Vietnam Likely To Sign Nuclear Cooperation Pact With US This Year -Official

News - Vietnam will likely sign a civil nuclear cooperation agreement with the U.S. this year, paving the way for General Electric (GE) and Westinghouse to export nuclear technology to the Southeast Asian nation, a senior official with the Vietnam Atomic Energy Institute said Tuesday.

"The two countries are speeding up talks so that the agreement can be signed soon," the official, who didn't want to be named, said.

Vietnam has so far signed the so-called 123 agreements with Russia, China, France, South Korea, India and Argentina.

The country has decided to use Russian technology for its first nuclear power plant and Japanese technology for the second. The plants, each with a capacity of 2,000 megawatts, are expected to go online in 2020 and 2021, respectively.

"South Korea wants to develop Vietnam's third nuclear power plant," the official said. "It has pledged to arrange finance and provide technology and equipment for the project."

Deputy Minister of Science and Technology Le Dinh Tien said earlier Tuesday that the country was targeting a total installed nuclear power capacity of 10, 700 MW by 2030, accounting for 10.1% of its total installed capacity.