The director of the Fordow nuclear power plant made the remarks during a recent media visit to the plant.

“All activities at Fordow are carried out by Iranian experts. The only exception is our cooperation with the Russian side on stable isotopes,” the director added.

“The field of stable isotopes requires far more complicated knowledge and we did not have any prior experience in the field. We are cooperating with the Russians on the design of a chain to begin the industrial enrichment.”

Noting that with Fordow coming on stream, the country’s enrichment capacity would increase by 15% to 20%, the director added “previously, we had about 6,000 SWU enrichment capacity, which was once raised by 2,662 SWU and now by about 1,000 SWU within the framework of Iran’s reduction of JCPOA commitments.”

“These increases have brought the country’s enrichment capacity to over 6,500 SWU, nearly the capacity we had before the JCPOA was put into effect,” the director added.

On Nov. 7, Iran officially started injecting gas into hundreds of centrifuges at Fordow nuclear plant in the fourth step of the country’s reductions to its commitments to the 2015 nuclear deal.

AEOI spokesman Behrouz Kamalvandi said the plant would resume uranium enrichment, and that the level of purity of enrichment would reach 4.5 percent.

Iran began reducing commitments step by step a year after the US’ unilateral withdrawal and in the face of any practical measures by the European signatories to the nuclear agreement.

Tehran says the suspension of its commitments is not a violation of the JCPOA but is based on Articles 26 and 36 of the agreement itself, and all the measures will be reversed once the other parties start living up to their own commitments.

Making the remarks during the ceremony to start laying the concrete foundations of the second unit of Bushehr nuclear power plant, the AEOI chief added that Bushehr plant will help the country save $660 million per year.

Describing that each nuclear power plant can stay online for about 60 years and more, Salehi added that each plant costs $5 billion and can return its initial construction costs in six years after becoming operational.

The Iranian official also informed that Bushehr plant, which is safe and secure, can provide local residents with 200,000 to 400,000 cubic meters of potable water in the future.

Concrete placement in foundations of the second unit of Bushehr nuclear power plant kicked off on Sunday in the presence of Salhi, some Iranian officials and the President of ASE Group of Companies of the Russian Federation’s power equipment and service exporter, Atomstroyexport, Alexander Lokshin.

On November 2, the IAEO chief underscored that Iran will continue its discovery and extraction plans powerfully and that under JCPOA, the country had not abdicated its rights but had only accepted time and numerical restrictions.

As previously reported, the second unit of the Bushehr nuclear power plant is scheduled to come on stream in 6 years, while the third unit will be finished in 8 years.

The 2nd and 3rd units of the Bushehr plant will increase the share of nuclear power in Iran’s electricity supply to amounts well beyond the current 2.7 percent.

In November 2014, the Nuclear Power Production and Development Company of Iran (NPPD) and Russia’s Atomstroiexport signed two contracts to work on parts of the 2nd and 3rd units.

A total of $10 billion has been allocated for the construction of the two units.

The capacity of the second phase of Iran nuclear electricity generation is expected to stand above 1,000 megawatts (MW). The total capacity of the two units of WWER-1,000 (Water-Water Energetic Reactor) will be 2,100 megawatts.