The Nuclear Landscape as a Garden 39
processing infrastructure, Kazakhstan rose to the status of the world’s number one uranium exporter in the 2000s and concluded a series of strategic
partnerships with nuclear companies all around the globe in which it bartered nuclear commodities (uranium) for nuclear technologies. However, in
the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster in 2011, nuclear energy phaseouts
in a number of countries curtailed Kazakhstan’s choice of foreign technology partners and plummeting uranium prices undercut its ability to fund
its ambitious nuclear modernization drive. Furthermore, unexpectedly tenacious resistance against nuclear power among the Kazakhstani population
stalled projects for the construction of new NPPs, let alone the creation of a
domestic nuclear manufacturing industry. 162
Once more, Aktau condenses these ambiguities in a local microcosm, highlighting how the ambitious plans for Kazakhstan’s atomic-powered future are
mapped onto the unresolved legacies of its nuclear past – and what problems
result from this. While open-pit uranium mining in Mangyshlak was abandoned in the mid-1990s, 163 Aktau’s MAEK remained the country’s preferred
location for the construction of a new NPP in view of existing infrastructure and expertise on-site. As early as 1994, Kazakhstan’s National Nuclear
Center in Kurchatov commissioned a feasibility study for a new NPP based
on a yet-to-be-developed next-generation FBR of Russian manufacture. 164
In the new millennium, the overambitious project has been superseded
by a more realistic one, based on a proposed Russian compact pressurized
water reactor (the VBER-300), whose development was promised to involve
Kazakhstani specialists. 165 Aktau was chosen as the preferred site because it
offered relevant infrastructure and experienced personnel remaining from
the BN-350 reactor, and also because the government expected opposition to nuclear power to be low as the city population “was already used to
NPPs.” In 2012, a government strategy paper for the future development of
the Mangistau region envisioned the commissioning of two reactor blocks by
2018 and 2020, respectively. 166
Importantly, the new atomic pile was no longer designed as a standalone
project, but this time, was embedded in a more comprehensive sociotechnical imaginary that easily matched earlier comprehensive visions of
“atomic-powered communism” 167 : Aktau City, a hypermodern city expansion project for up to 1 million inhabitants with an investment volume of up to
30 billion USD, for which the former president Nursultan Nazarbayev turned
the first sod in 2008. Earmarked as a hub for the development of the Kashagan
oil field off the Caspian coast and a transshipment point for China’s New Silk
Road project, the venture was to include a free trade zone and business park,
and was said to be cofinanced by investors from the Far and Middle East. 168
However, public protest against the NPP project, expressed in the media
and during citizen assemblies, proved unexpectedly vigorous. As a result,
the Mangistau provincial government officially declared its opposition to the
construction of the NPP in early 2014. 169 The prospects of Aktau city, too,
started to look increasingly bleak at that time. Official explanations blamed
processing infrastructure, Kazakhstan rose to the status of the world’s number one uranium exporter in the 2000s and concluded a series of strategic
partnerships with nuclear companies all around the globe in which it bartered nuclear commodities (uranium) for nuclear technologies. However, in
the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster in 2011, nuclear energy phaseouts
in a number of countries curtailed Kazakhstan’s choice of foreign technology partners and plummeting uranium prices undercut its ability to fund
its ambitious nuclear modernization drive. Furthermore, unexpectedly tenacious resistance against nuclear power among the Kazakhstani population
stalled projects for the construction of new NPPs, let alone the creation of a
domestic nuclear manufacturing industry. 162
Once more, Aktau condenses these ambiguities in a local microcosm, highlighting how the ambitious plans for Kazakhstan’s atomic-powered future are
mapped onto the unresolved legacies of its nuclear past – and what problems
result from this. While open-pit uranium mining in Mangyshlak was abandoned in the mid-1990s, 163 Aktau’s MAEK remained the country’s preferred
location for the construction of a new NPP in view of existing infrastructure and expertise on-site. As early as 1994, Kazakhstan’s National Nuclear
Center in Kurchatov commissioned a feasibility study for a new NPP based
on a yet-to-be-developed next-generation FBR of Russian manufacture. 164
In the new millennium, the overambitious project has been superseded
by a more realistic one, based on a proposed Russian compact pressurized
water reactor (the VBER-300), whose development was promised to involve
Kazakhstani specialists. 165 Aktau was chosen as the preferred site because it
offered relevant infrastructure and experienced personnel remaining from
the BN-350 reactor, and also because the government expected opposition to nuclear power to be low as the city population “was already used to
NPPs.” In 2012, a government strategy paper for the future development of
the Mangistau region envisioned the commissioning of two reactor blocks by
2018 and 2020, respectively. 166
Importantly, the new atomic pile was no longer designed as a standalone
project, but this time, was embedded in a more comprehensive sociotechnical imaginary that easily matched earlier comprehensive visions of
“atomic-powered communism” 167 : Aktau City, a hypermodern city expansion project for up to 1 million inhabitants with an investment volume of up to
30 billion USD, for which the former president Nursultan Nazarbayev turned
the first sod in 2008. Earmarked as a hub for the development of the Kashagan
oil field off the Caspian coast and a transshipment point for China’s New Silk
Road project, the venture was to include a free trade zone and business park,
and was said to be cofinanced by investors from the Far and Middle East. 168
However, public protest against the NPP project, expressed in the media
and during citizen assemblies, proved unexpectedly vigorous. As a result,
the Mangistau provincial government officially declared its opposition to the
construction of the NPP in early 2014. 169 The prospects of Aktau city, too,
started to look increasingly bleak at that time. Official explanations blamed