Historical background

 The history of OJSC SPII VNIPIET, its development and gaining the status of the independent design institute is tightly linked to the construction and operation of the Leningrad NPP (LNPP).
 VNIPIET  as General Designer was instructed by the Government to perform nuclear plant engineering on a tight schedule. The design and building works were carried out along with the research of certain scientific problems and elaboration of the requirements to the equipment, which was developed for NPPs with pressurized tube reactors (RBMK) for the first time in Russia. Two years ahead of the launch of power unit I the directorate of the “VNIPIET” head office came to a decision to establish an integrated department in Sosnovy Bor for the immediate solution of current problems and on-site NPP designer supervision. Department No. 443 was established as a part of BKP-4 in accordance with Order No. 523-k dated November 29, 1971. Hereafter department No. 443 was reorganized into two departments. These were VNIPIET's permanent design departments No. 446 and No. 447 in SosnovyBor and Gatchina respectively. So the birth of department No. 446 was a starting point for the history of Sosnovoborsk Design and Survey Institute "VNIPIET".
The personnel of department No. 446 was renewed by experienced designers from the head office, Uralskiy andВ  Krasnoyarskiy (later Tomsk-7 and Novosibirsk) divisions.
 With personnel growth and their professional development the Sosnovoborskaya design company was charged with such new challenges as design of separate systems, facilities and buildings of the Leningrad NPP, designer supervision and project progress tracking for the other facilities in Sosnovy BorВ  (Alexandrov Research Institute of Technology, Leningrad Specialized Combinat RADON, Central design bureau of machine building, Radium Institute of the Academy of Sciences etc.), and then design works for these facilities.
The experience acquired during the construction of the Leningrad NPP made it possible for VNIPIET to carry out the design works and designer supervision at the Ignalina, Kursk, Smolensk, Chernibyl NPPs and the Gorkovskaya nuclear heat plant.
Department No. 446 was reorganized in an integrated design bureau BKP-7 in 1977 and achieved the status of a division in 1992 (SO VO VNIPIET), which was modified  into Sosnovoborsk State Design and Survey Institute SGPII “VNIPIET” three years later in 1995. Today Sosnovoborsk Design and Survey Institute “VNIPIET” is an open joint stock company. The Institute is open for new ideas and has all possibilities for its implementation.