IRAN STARTS BUILDING A NEW NUCLEAR POWER FACILITY

In its Khuzestan region in the southwest, Iran started building a new nuclear power facility on Saturday.

The construction of the 300 megawatt Karoon nuclear power plant, which will install a pressurised light water reactor and use 4-percent enriched uranium oxide as the fuel, was witnessed by Mohammad Eslami, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, and a few local officials, according to a report from Xinhua news agency, citing Nour news agency.

Eslami claimed that Iran has accelerated the construction of nuclear power plants and that the Karoon facility will enable Iran to achieve its target of boosting the percentage of nuclear energy to roughly 20% of the total electricity basket.

According to Nour news agency, Iran intends to develop the Karoon facility over the course of eight years and between $1.5 and $2 billion.

With Russia's assistance, Iran's 1,000 megawatt Bushehr nuclear power station, the country's first nuclear-powered civilian facility, started generating energy in September 2011.