Russia is building the first of a proposed eight sea-going nuclear reactors, to be used to power fossil fuel exploration in the Arctic, in the hopes of claiming more Arctic territory and resources, potential or realized, than competing nations in the race to establish strategic control of the worlds dwindling oil and gas supplies.
The Russians also propose to sell these reactors internationally, and several countries have already expressed interest in the $336 million dollar ship-borne power plants.
Russian officials are optimistic about the project, and cite their record of no accidents with nuclear powered icebreakers, despite having two serious incidents, one of which left a melted down reactor core on the bottom of Tsivolki Bay, and neither of which were made known until long after they occurred. Read the story here, here and here. Picture here. Thanks, rja.