Moscow, 2 August 2005. Sergey Dubinin, member of the Management Board and Financial Director of RAO "UES of Russia", and Vyacheslav Sinyugin, member of the Management Board of RAO "UES of Russia" and Chairman of the Management Board of OAO "HydroWGC"*, will hold a regular meeting of the Operations Headquarters for the construction of the Bureyskaya HPP, which will be held on 3 August 2005 in the settlement of Talakan, Amurskaya Region.

The HQ will determine the exact date for the launch of the fourth hydraulic power unit at the Bureyskaya HPP, which was provisionally scheduled for Q4 2005. As the construction and installation works at the hydraulic power unit of the Bureyskaya HPP are nearing completion, RAO "UES of Russia" formed a Central Acceptance Commission headed by Vyacheslav Sinyugin. The Commission is responsible for organizing the unit acceptance and commissioning of the equipment and facilities of the start-up complex of hydropower unit No. 4 at the Bureyskaya HPP. After the launch of the unit, the plant's capacity will rise from 670 MW to 1,003 MW and will reach half of its design capacity.

A ceremony will be held at the construction site of the Bureyskaya HPP to celebrate the three-millionth cubic meter of concrete laid into the plant's dam (the two-millionth cubic meter was laid in 2003). When the dam is raised to the design level, the amount of concrete laid in the dam will total 3.5 million cubic meters.

The dam of the Bureyskaya HPP is the first hydraulic facility of such scale in Russia to use the rolled concrete method. This method helps reduce concrete use by one third per 1 cubic meter of concrete, and accordingly, the cost of construction.

The construction and installation works at the Bureyskaya HPP were started back in 1985. However, soon they were virtually suspended due to insufficient funding. The situation changed in 1999, when the project was included in the Investment Programme of RAO "UES of Russia" and declared one of the Company's top priority projects. In 2000-2004, the investments made by RAO "UES of Russia" in the construction of the Bureyskaya HPP made RUB23.45 billion; the plant's first two hydropower units of 370 MW were put into operation in 2003; hydropower unit No. 3 of 300 MW was commissioned in November 2004. Since then, the power plant has generated about 4 billion kWh of electricity, which enabled the Far Eastern energy system to save over 2 million tonnes of coal.

In 2005, RAO "UES of Russia" allocated RUB 5.85 billion in earmarked funds to finance the project to complete the Bureyskaya HPP. It is also planned to raise an extra RUB200 million in loans. Effective 2006, the project will be funded with own and borrowed funds of OAO "HydroWGC".

When the Bureyskaya HPP is completed and all six hydropower units are put into operation, its capacity will reach 2,000 MW, and the average annual output will be in excess of 7.1 billion kWh, which represents approximately one fifth of the total output of the Far Eastern energy system. When the plant reaches full capacity, it will help ensure long-term power supply to the Primorsky Kray and Khabarovsky Kray, Amurskaya Region, and export any electricity unused on the domestic market.

The construction of the Bureyskaya HPP is scheduled for completion in 2008.