Slovak prime minister Robert Fico will meet U.S. president Donald Trump on Saturday at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida to sign an agreement advancing the construction of a new nuclear reactor in Slovakia. The meeting will mark the first time the two leaders have met since Trump returned to office last year.
The planned reactor, to be built at the Jaslovske Bohunice plant about 70 kilometres northeast of Bratislava, will be Slovakia’s first U.S.-designed nuclear unit.
On Friday, Fico will meet U.S. energy secretary Chris Wright in Washington and participate in a ceremony to formalise an agreement “on cooperation in the field of civil nuclear energy.” The Slovak government said the deal “is of fundamental importance for the construction of a new nuclear source in Jaslovske Bohunice”.
The government has previously said the new unit should be operational by 2040 with an expected capacity of up to 1,200 megawatts.
The project, estimated to cost around €15 billion, would be the largest infrastructure investment in Slovakia’s history. A construction contract with U.S. company Westinghouse could be signed in 2027.
Slovakia’s existing reactors are all of Russian design, but Fico has said that his cabinet decided to “diversify and work with a different partner.”
