Today more and more attention is paid to training of young specialists. Atomic industry now is on the rise, the State Corporation is full of plans. However bringing all these plans to life will be possible only if new atomic specialists, young graduates, keep joining the industry. Rosatom only wants the most talented and ambitious. The career day on November 20 showed future specialists what exactly Rosatom may offer them.
Nice to Meet You!
The career day is an annual event. It usually takes place at the National Research Nuclear University MEPHI, a major Russian higher education institution preparing specialists for the nuclear field. As well as in the previous year, the event gave an opportunity to students and graduates to find an interesting and well paid job in civil power industry, engineering, and science. More than 50 atomic enterprises and more than 5,000 MEPHI students and graduates took part in the event.
The lecture given by Sergey Kiriyenko, head of Rosatom, attracted general interest. These days sectoral science is well funded, which means that the need in good specialists will grow. Thus only one Rosatom block for innovation management has calculated an order for 2,500 people from MEPHI for the coming five years, which is 500 people annually. “That is the amount of graduates we will be ready to receive starting from 2017 approximately”- said Kiriyenko.
These days Rosatom employs young specialists enthusiastically. Last year the total amount of MIPHI graduates, employed by the corporation was 1350. “The characteristics we are looking for are the following: ability to work in conditions of uncertainty, aiming for result, being ready for changes, having some strategic vision. What is the easiest way to get a job with us? Well, the most effective one is to do on-the-job training, practicing, write a senior thesis on enterprises” – advised Kiriyenko.
Spectacular Career
Today there are three main streams of career development in the nuclear field. Those are scientist, executive and project management expert. Meanwhile some really outstanding opportunities are offered by the State Corporation these days. “A spectacular career in Rosatom can be made now within the period of 10-15 years, the highest points are quite attainable. The reason is fast changes and a constant need for enthusiastic well-educated specialists” – says Kiriyenko. In his opinion, the opportunities to have a good career now are very high, since there is a demand and state support.
The head of Rosatom believes the “back end” topic to be quite promising to students who right now are in search of future specialization. Back end is life circle completion in atomic power engineering. “The Fukushima catastrophe may make the idea of construction of new NPP look somewhat dubious. While the backend now is seen in a different light. Germany, for instance, has come to a conclusion to shut its stations. That’s why the backend specialists will be in need and the market will be huge” – says Kiriyenko.
Growing Points
The head of Rosatom also touched upon worldwide trends. Among other things he reminded that today the atomic power market is moving towards developing countries. “70 % of the world population constantly suffers from energy emergency, while about 2 billion of people have no access to electricity at all. That’s where the need will be. Less developed infrastructures need new approach. It is necessary to speed up the work on small and medium power reactors by 100 and 300 MW” – said Kiriyenko.
A real challenge for atomic specialists these days are shale gas and slate oil. The deposits of the latter are huge. “Before there were no technologies for its recovering. Now there are. The scope of recovering has grown dramatically, which lead to gas price decrease in the whole world. This can’t help influencing atomic technologies since gas power stations are our rivals. That’s why more efficiency now is needed from us. Our NPPs should be cheaper, should be built faster” – assumes the head of Rosatom. It means that the Corporation should increase the efficiency of working projects.
Modular Reactors
Sergey Kiriyenko believes modular reactors to be an interesting and fruitful field of work. “Constructing them doesn’t suggest any engineering problems. There was only one obstacle: this type of units was less effective economically than big reactors in big systems. However, geographic changes of atomic engineering demands in the world suggest that these projects should develop fast. For instance, Bill Gates has become interested in small modular reactors. I met him personally. He asked Rosatom for assistance in developing fuel for the project. On the whole there are about 20 small modular reactor projects in the world today. We are taking part in about a quarter of them and watch the progress of about 15% more”, said Kiriyenko.
A curious detail: one of the Rosatom project groups today develops technology for catching poachers who kill elephants in Africa. “The reason is simple – we bought a very special deposit in Africa. Uranium there appears at the depth of 60 cm and runs out at about 80 meters. We laid a road to the deposit, but poachers started using it for shooting elephants. If we don’t handle this problem, they won’t let us develop the deposit and our image will suffer”. Rosatom doesn’t want to be accused in making money destroying the environment.
“Today our special group is analyzing the situation, figuring out what kind of helicopters we should buy. I guess there would be unmanned aircrafts, tracking fires made by poachers. This program will show UNESCO and the government of Tanzania that the Corporation is responsible for environmental protection” – summed up the head of Rosatom.
