Russian President demanded from the governor of Primorye an immediate transfer of "Thermal Power Plant -2" (TPP-2) to natural gas

Vladivostok. November 23. VOSTOK-MEDIA. – Russian President Dmitri Medvedev charged the Minister of Energy Sergei Shmatko and the governor of the Primorskii Krai Sergei Darkin to accelerate the process of changing boiler equipment to natural gas power in Vladivostok.

AS PRIME-TASS reports, the head of the Russian government talked about this during his video conference with the citizens. Medvedev also demanded primary reports about the modernization of the boiler equipment to be submitted before July 1, 2011. The resident of Vladivostok, Natalia Tsvetayeva, was able to contact the president in his receiving room in Moscow, and tell the President that the obsolete equipment of TPP-2 causes great amount of air pollution in the city. She asked the President to accelerate the process of changing technology at TPP-2, which at present is coal powered. She mentioned that at present TPP-2 produces heating for nearly a third of the city. She cited data, that showed that in the last years, pollution from TPP-2 has increased by as much as 3 times and now spread all over the city.

The head of the Ministry of Energy, who was called into the conversation, and who is currently in Brussels, confirmed that lately the pollution from TPP-2 is 7 times the acceptable norm. He promised, that 10 out of 14 boilers of TPP-2 will be changed to natural gas power by 2012, explaining the long wait as inescapable, because the gas will reach Vladivostok via the gas pipe line Habarovsk-Vladivostok only in the second quarter of 2011.