Vance and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian signed following their talks on Monday a joint statement on the “completion of negotiations” on the agreement. Although the statement says nothing about the new plant, it represents the clearest indication yet that the Armenian government wants to rely on the United States in the possible implementation of its extremely ambitious project.
Pashinian’s government says it wants to replace Armenia’s Metsamor nuclear plant with a modern facility equipped with small modular reactors (SMRs), a new and relatively untested technology explored worldwide. Metsamor, which produces around one-third of the country’s electricity, is due to be decommissioned in 2036.
“Regarding U.S.-Armenian cooperation on nuclear energy, there are old Soviet facilities [in Armenia,] which, of course, are of Soviet and Russian design,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told Russian media. “Russia undoubtedly has greater expertise and greater competitiveness here. And, as the most advanced country in the world in this field, Russia is capable of withstanding the highest level of international competition if such competition is demanded by its partners.”
“In other words, Russia is capable of providing better quality at a lower cost for many years to come,” said Peskov.
Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin likewise told the Izvetsia daily that Yerevam has no “real alternatives” to a key Russian role in the project. He said Russia’s Rosatom nuclear corporation is ready to “begin implementing the project as soon as possible.”
U.S. Vice President JD Vance and Armenia's Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian hold signed copies of a joint statement on the completion of negotiations on a U.S.-Armenian nuclear agreement, Yerevan, February 9, 2026.
Speaking at a joint news conference with Pashinian, Vance said the U.S.-Armenian agreement “will pave the way for American and Armenian companies to strike deals on civil nuclear projects.”
“That means up to $5 billion in initial U.S. exports, plus an additional $4 billion in long-term support through fuel and maintenance contracts,” he said, clearly alluding to the construction of the new Armenian nuclear plant.
The $9 billion in total funding cited by him nearly matches Armenia’s entire state budget for this year. Pashinian’s domestic critics believe that a U.S.-led nuclear project is therefore too expensive to be ever implemented in Armenia.
Some of them claim that Pashinian is using the issue for not only geopolitical purposes but also as a smokescreen for actually ending Armenia’s reliance on atomic energy. They also argue that the U.S. itself does not yet have a functioning SMR plant.
“We are going to make a deal on a technology that doesn’t yet exist and, according to American experts, has murky prospects, rejecting tested and workable options,” said Levon Zurabian, an opposition leader. “This is simply a plan for the smooth closure of our nuclear energy, another ‘gift’ to our people from Nikol Pashinian’s government.”
The U.S. company NuScale Power Corp had planned to build America’s first SMR facility in Idaho by 2030. It was due to consist of six reactors with a combined capacity of 462 megawatts slightly exceeding that of Metsamor’s sole reactor. However, NuScale cancelled the $9.3 billion project for economic reasons in November 2023.