MOSCOW, March 19 - RAPSI. The Moscow District Federal Commercial Court has postponed until April the hearing of RusHydro's appeal against the decision to recover $871.055 in losses from the company under a Rusal Sayanogorsk Aluminum Smelter lawsuit.

An accident at the Sayano-Shushenskaya HPP occurred on August 17, 2009 when Turbine 2 broke apart. The turbine hall and engine room were flooded. Three turbines were destroyed and the other turbines were damaged. The plant consequently ceased operating.

The accident caused a power outage at the Sayanogorsk and Khakassky aluminium smelters, which resulted in the multi-million ruble losses sustained by the plants. The Rusal Sayanogorsk Aluminium Smelter sustained a 25 million ruble ($806,700) loss. The smelters filed a lawsuit against RusHydro to compensate for the losses.

The Ninth Commercial Court of Appeals satisfied Rusal's lawsuit in December, stating that the plaintiff proved the cause-effect relationship between the losses and the defendant's preceding illegal actions and the amount of the losses. RusHydro will appeal the decision.

RusHydro is Russia's largest power generating company comprising 60 renewable energy plants, including the Sayano-Shushenskaya Hydropower Plant, which is presently under repair.

Rusal is the world's leading aluminum manufacturer. It occupies 10 percent of the global aluminum and alumina markets. About 76,000 people work for the company. Rusal operates in 19 countries on five continents. The company mostly sells its products in Europe, North America, Southeast Asia, Japan and Korea.