Moscow provides Turkey with $9 billion in new financing for its first nuclear power plant

Russia has provided Turkey with $9 billion in new financing for the construction of the Akkuyu nuclear power plant, according to a Reuters report citing Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar. Ankara expects the plant to begin generating electricity in 2026.

The Akkuyu nuclear power plant is being built in Turkey’s southern Mersin province on the Mediterranean coast by Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom under an intergovernmental agreement signed in 2010. The total cost of the project is estimated at $20 billion. The plant was originally scheduled to come online in 2025, but the timeline has since been pushed back.

Bayraktar said most of the new financing would likely be used in 2026-2027. In 2026 alone, foreign funding is expected to account for at least $4 billion to $5 billion of the project’s financing structure.

As previously reported by The Insider, Russia’s nuclear industry remains one of Moscow’s foreign policy tools. Rosatom builds nuclear plants abroad through financing arrangements and long-term contracts for fuel supply, maintenance and staff training, tying client countries to Russian technology and supplies for decades. Turkey’s Akkuyu nuclear plant is the most prominent example of this approach. Built under a build-own-operate model, it allows Russia to retain a central role throughout the project, albeit while shouldering much of the financial burden.