German power utility RWE put its reputation at stake by pursuing an interest to buy 49 per cent in the company that would build and operate Bulgaria's second nuclear power plant at Belene on the Danube River, Greenpeace has said in a media statement.

RWE was picked by Bulgaria's Cabinet as the preferred buyer of the stake on October 3 2008, with the remaining 51 per cent to be kept by state-owned power grid operator National Electricity Company (NEK).

RWE won the race against Belgian peer Electrabel, offering a loan of 550 million leva to NEK to finance the project until a financing scheme is agreed. It would pay 1.275 billion euro for the stake, which could rise to two billion euro by the time the power station is finished in 2014. The deal was expected to be signed by end-November, by which point the terms of the contract would be finalised, Economy and Energy Minister Petar Dimitrov said on October 3.

"Up to now RWE has only operated nuclear power plants in its home market," Greenpeace EU policy and energy campaigner Jan Haverkamp said in the statement.

"In Bulgaria, however, there is a poor safety culture and Bulgaria has repeatedly been warned by the EU because of corruption cases. Only a few weeks ago, NEK, the majority shareholder in Belene, announced that Bulgarian companies would be awarded contracts without a public tender. Such an environment opens the door to corruption and makes it difficult to guarantee high-quality safety standards."

According to Heffa Schücking, from German environmental organisation Urgewald, there were many risks for RWE related to the Belene investment and one of them is the impact it would have on the company’s reputation in Germany.

“The use of Russian reactor technology at the new Belene nuclear power plant and the sitting of the plant in an earthquake zone have already provoked strong misgivings among municipal and union representatives on RWE's supervisory board,” Schücking said. “According to German standards, this project would never receive an operating license. We therefore call on RWE’s supervisory board to say ‘No’ to this controversial investment," he said.

Environmental organisations across Europe believed Belene to be one of the most dangerous nuclear projects on the current EU agenda. In 1977, a large-scale earthquake shook the region, only 14km away from the planned Belene nuclear power station site, killing 120 people, the environmentalists said.

Albena Simeonova from the Bulgarian coalition BelenNE (No to Belene) said: "The plan to build a nuclear power plant in Belene goes back to the early 1980s. In 1983, however, even Soviet scientists warned that this location is not suitable for a nuclear power station. RWE and the Bulgarian Government are playing Russian roulette with the health and safety of millions of citizens."