Moscow, 18 March. CEO of RAO "UES of Russia" Anatoly Chubais is flying Wednesday to the settlement of Talakan in Amurskaya Oblast, where he will chair a regular meeting of RAO UES operations committee for construction of Bureyskaya HPP scheduled for 20 March.

The Committee meeting will review progress in the construction of Bureyskaya HPP, the main project of RAO "UES of Russia" to become operational in 2003. Besides, the meeting will address the preparation of the reservoir floor of Bureyskaya HPP for flooding, which is to be completed by mid-April 2003.

The meeting will be attended by Presidential Plenipotentiary to the Far Eastern federal district Konstantin Pulikovsky, Deputy Minister of Economic Development and Trade Andrey Sharonov, Deputy Chairman of Gosstroy of Russia Nikolay Zatsarinsky, Head of Amurskaya Region Administration Leonid Korotkov, First Deputy Chairman of Khabarovsk Kray Government Vladimir Popov, members of the Federation Council of the Russian Federal Assembly Valentin Mezhevich, Vyacheslav Vinogradov, Mikhail Odintsov, and State Duma deputies Vladimir Pekhtin and Igor Dines.

During its one-day visit, the delegation of RAO "UES of Russia" will also hold a joint conference with the Amurskaya Oblast administration.

The first hydroelectric unit at Bureyskaya HPP is scheduled to become operational on 30 June 2003, with the entire project to be completed in 2007. The plant's installed capacity will amount to 2,000 MW, with the average annual output of 7.1 billion kWh. At present, all power plants located in the Far East of Russia generate 38 billion kWh of electricity annually.

The launch of Bureyskaya HPP will help eliminate the electricity shortage in the Far East of Russia, mainly in Primorsky Kray, increase reliability of power supply, and reduce the quantity of coal and black oil transported to the area every year by several million tons.