KIEV, March 15 (Xinhuanet) -- The Ukrainian government approved a long-term national energy diversification strategy in a bid to both reduce overall energy consumption, and further develop nuclear energy.

    Ukrainian Energy Minister Ivan Plachkov told reporters on Wednesday that the strategy required Ukrainian industrial enterprises to take measures to reduce energy consumption. Meanwhile, Ukraine would improve the capacity of its nuclear and thermal power plants.

    He said the current nuclear power plants in Ukraine would continue to run for 12 to 15 years.

    Plachkov said that while Ukraine would also cut its overall coal imports drastically, it would focus on the import of high quality coking coal.

    Further, Ukraine planned to reduce its consumption of natural gas from 76 billion cubic metres per year, to 50 billion cubic metres per year, and to increase its own natural gas yield from 20 billion cubic metres per year, to 30 billion cubic metres per year before 2030, he added.

    Ukraine began to seriously plan towards energy diversification after it went through a major confrontation with Russia over natural gas prices at the beginning of this year. Enditem