Chernobyl anniversary offers a bleak look at what may await other Ukrainian nuclear plants
A huge steel and concrete sarcophagus covers the site of the meltdown. Under its dome, called the New Safe Confinement, lie 200 tons of lava-like nuclear fuel, 30 tons of highly contaminated dust and 16 tons of uranium and plutonium that continue to release high levels of radiation.
April 26, 2023 by Charles Digges https://bellona.org/news/nuclear-issues/2023-04-chernobyl-anniversar
A little over a year ago, Russian troops abandoned Chernobyl after briefly occupying it during the grim opening days of Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine. The takeover of the site where the world’s worst nuclear disaster happened thirty-seven years ago this week offered a preview of the reckless disregard for nuclear safety that has characterized so much of this war.
While the site has been left to Ukraine to painstakingly restore since the Russian withdrawal on March 31, 2022, the new anniversary of the Chernobyl plant’s original disaster on April 26, 1986, leaves lingering questions about what, exactly, the world can do when Ukraine’s nuclear infrastructure — or indeed any nuclear infrastructure — is attacked by a hostile neighbor.
The answer, at this point? Not much — aside from trying to pick up the pieces after the damage is already done.
As it stands, the Chernobyl exclusion zone is still dotted with mines planted by Russian troops when they rolled into the territory, churning up clouds of radioactive dust with hundreds of heavily armored vehicles. The mines have made treacherous any efforts to restore the territory.
Russian troops also dug trenches and set fires in an area known as the Red Forest — a gnarled expanse of irradiated trees — and scorched, according to NASA, some 14,000 hectares of land, filling the air with so much radioactive smoke that it was unsafe for firefighters to quell the blazes.
All the while, hundreds of Chernobyl employees — who oversee the site’s sprawling network of spent fuel storage facilities as well as the enormous efforts to dismantle the radioactive remnants of the exploded No. 4 reactor — were held hostage onsite, prevented from rotating out at the end of their shifts. Five workers were kidnapped and nine were killed, according to The Washington Post.
Those who remained said later that they had tried to keep the Russians from the most dangerous areas within the plant’s territory. But in what many called the worst situation they have seen in the decades since the initial disaster, Chernobyl’s power was cut by fighting, leaving them to rely on diesel generators for nearly a week to support the critical work of circulating water to cool spent nuclear fuel.
The damage the Russian soldiers did wasn’t purely technical. Doors to offices were ripped off hinges, windows smashed, walls spray-painted with graffiti.
“The poop was the icing on the cake,” Aleksander Barsukov, deputy director of the Chernobyl Ecocenter, which keeps samples of radioactive material collected from all over the world, told The Wall Street Journal after the Russian retreat.
By the time Russian troops pulled back from the plant on March 31, 2022 — amid reports of possible radiation poisoning among their ranks — Chernobyl’s technicians had been held at literal gunpoint at their workstations for more than a month.
During the retreat, according to Ukrainian accounts, Russian soldiers ransacked the site and took anything that looked valuable, looting more than 1,000 computers, and spiriting away dosimeters, software, lab tools, firefighting equipment — and in some cases even household appliances — piling them in stolen Ukrainian trucks.
“Whatever they didn’t steal, they broke,” Chernobyl Information Director Vitaly Medved told the BBC at the time.
Russian soldiers then brazenly mailed much of the booty home from across the Belarusian border. They also made off with radioactive instruments used to calibrate personal dosimeters for Chernobyl staff — substances that can cause radiation burns if handled improperly.
According to the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development, which has financed much of Chernobyl’s cleanup work since the original 1986 disaster, the Russian Army’s destructive adventure in the world’s most famous radioactive wasteland will cost some €100 million to repair.
The four RBMK reactors at the enormous nuclear station in Chernobyl no longer produce power, but before the invasion nearly 6,000 workers monitored the lasting effects of the disastrous meltdown that took place in 1986, as well oversaw as processing spent nuclear fuel from other plants in Ukraine. In the days before the invasion, all but a few hundred employees were evacuated.
Located just a few miles from the Belarusian border, Chernobyl was one of the first places occupied by Russian troops. Yevhen Kramarenko, the director of the exclusion zone — the 2,6000-square-kilometer area where radiation levels remain high and public access is limited — told The Washington Post that on the first day of the invasion, a Russian general presented himself as the new leader of the station, and introduced employees from Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation.
“I believe that at the time when they came,” Kramarenko told the paper, “they planned to be there permanently, they planned to take control for a long time.”
A sign of things to come?
Even before the occupation, the Chernobyl station had a post-apocalyptic air. It is situated in a dense forest, swarming with mosquitoes and gnats. Pripyat, the city where employees lived before the disaster, now stands empty and is being reconquered by nature.
A huge steel and concrete sarcophagus covers the site of the meltdown. Under its dome, called the New Safe Confinement, lie 200 tons of lava-like nuclear fuel, 30 tons of highly contaminated dust and 16 tons of uranium and plutonium that continue to release high levels of radiation.
Yet while Rosatom may have failed to keep hold of Chernobyl, the same cannot be said about Ukraine’s embattled Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant — Europe’s largest such facility — which once supplied a fifth of Ukraine’s electricity.
Since October of 2022, Moscow claims that it now controls the plant — a claim not honored by the UN’s International Atomic Energy Association, to say nothing of Kyiv.
From then on, Rosatom has begun flooding the Zaporizhzhia plant with Russian staff that it has transferred from its own Kalinin nuclear plant, 545 kilometers across the front to the northeast.
But while Russia asserts the six-reactor facility has been taken over as a protective measure, there is little to suggest that the joining of Russian and Ukrainian workforces is going smoothly. Only about 2,000 Ukrainian staff members still work at the plant, out of 11,000 before the war.
Indeed, much of Rosatom’s effort to assert itself at the plant has involved arresting and torturing Ukrainian workers opposed to the occupation as it toils to link Zaporizhzhia with the Russian electricity grid.
The plant, which lies on the south side of the Dnipro River next to the nuclear plant’s home city of Enerhodar, is on the front line of the war. Ukrainian troops are just a few of kilometers to the north, on the far bank of the Dnipro, while Russians are holed up in the power plant.Anxieties are high that the area could see renewed fighting in any Ukrainian counteroffensive.
Ukraine accuses the Russians of using the plant as a shield, hoping that the danger of causing a nuclear accident will keep Ukrainian soldiers from firing on them — the first time an atomic reactor has been put in such a position.
“They know Ukrainian troops would not dare to fire back. The nuclear power plant is a perfect hiding place from Ukrainian artillery,” Oleksiy Melnychuk, a former worker at the plant who fled from Enerhodar last July to Ukrainian-held territory, told Politico.eu. The Russians in turn accuse the Ukrainians of ignoring safety protocols and firing on areas near the plant.
The IAEA has inspectors on site and has been trying to walk a diplomatic tightrope to establish a non-military safety zone around the plant. While Moscow says it is keen to do so, Kyiv is leery of any step that could lend legitimacy to the Russian occupation.
Late last month, IAEA chief Rafael Mariano Grossi dropped the idea, and instead is now pushing for both sides to take steps to ensure that the plant isn’t attacked.
Over the last year, four of the station’s six VVER reactors have been put into a cold shutdown to minimize the risk of an accident, while two have been restarted to produce low levels of power to keep the plant operational. The facility needs access to electricity to ensure reactor cooling and other safety functions. However, its links to the Ukrainian grid have been cut six times since last March, forcing the ZNPP to rely on diesel-powered generators for emergency backup power — a situation that IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi has referred to as “rolling the dice.”
“And if we allow this to continue time after time then one day our luck will run out,” he added.
Still, even as events deteriorate, there is little the world can do but watch.
Even Grossi — who heads the world’s most respected nuclear power diplomacy body — has admitted as much. During a meeting of the IAEA’s 35-member board of governors last month, Grossi castigated his colleagues for “complacency” after the latest spate of airstrikes had again cut off Zaporizhzhia’s access to grid electricity.
“What are we doing to prevent this [from] happening?“ a flabbergasted Grossi asked the board. ”We are the IAEA, we are meant to care about nuclear safety.”
Even so, aspirations of pushing out the Russians among plant workers remain high.
“We still hope de-occupation is possible,” Melnychuk told Politico.eu. “You can’t even imagine how ready we all are to return and let our colleagues, working under tremendous pressure and fear, to finally have some rest.”
Unfortunately, the state of Chernobyl offers the clearest glimpse of what they may find if — or when — that time comes.
Remembering Chernobyl as nuclear danger grows with attacks in the Zaporizhzhia region
The explosion of a nuclear reactor put Chernobyl on the map in 1986 for the
worst reasons. It is still considered the most serious nuclear accident in
history.
The memories are vivid 37 years later and fears of a new nuclear
accident are more pressing since Russia attacked Ukraine. Ukraine has 15
nuclear power plants, but it is Zaporizhzhia that is focusing attention.
Despite appeals from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), there
are daily reports of attacks in the region. Interviewed by Euronews, a
former head of the IAEA believes that we are more exposed to danger today
than in 1986.
Euro News 26th April 2023
Ukraine’s nuclear power plants are still a source of nightmares years after the Chornobyl disaster
CNBC, APR 26 2023
- It’s been 37 years since the disastrous and deadly explosion at the Chornobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, then a part of the Soviet Union.
- The disaster in 1986 is still considered the world’s worst ever nuclear disaster.
- Ukraine’s nuclear power plants are still a source of concern as the war continues.
…………………………………………………………………………..The disaster is still seen as the most serious accident in the history of nuclear power operation although Ukraine has remained heavily dependent on nuclear energy.
Today, its nuclear power plants have once again become a source of nightmares as fears abound for their safety and security amid the relentless fighting between Ukrainian and Russian forces.
Ukraine has 15 operable nuclear reactors at four plants that generate about half of its electricity, according to the World Nuclear Association, although since the war started last February, the number of units in operation has changed over time, “with reactors put online and taken offline depending on the situation around the plants and the stability of external power supplies,” the association notes.
Most concerns around the safe functioning of the country’s power plants amid war have centered on the the nuclear power plant located in Zaporizhzhia in southern Ukraine, which also happens to be Europe’s largest nuclear power plant.
The Zaporizhzhia plant was occupied early on in the war by Russian forces (when it was attacked in the early hours of March 2 last year, it became the first operating civil nuclear power plant to come under armed attack) and it has repeatedly found itself at the epicenter of fighting since then, with both sides accusing each other of shelling near the facility and risking another potentially catastrophic nuclear accident.
There have been a number of occasions now when shelling near the plant has damaged external power lines to the facility, meaning that Ukrainian workers still running the plant have had to rely on emergency generators for the power needed for reactor cooling and other essential nuclear safety and security functions.
The IAEA’s Director-General Rafael Grossi described the unstable conditions that the plant is forced to operate in as “extremely concerning,” noting that “this is clearly not a sustainable way to operate a major nuclear facility.”
He has often repeated calls for the establishment of a demilitarized zone around the plant but, for now, that remains a distant prospect, although the IAEA was able to convince Russia to allow its inspectors to remain permanently on site to monitor safety at the plant. The IAEA has also sent inspectors to other nuclear facilities in Ukraine………………………………………….. https://www.cnbc.com/2023/04/26/37-years-after-chornobyl-ukraines-nuclear-plants-are-again-in-danger.html?fbclid=IwAR1LBPuusObwSd5ZQibJVClqi5jlDayFFhvoJjFjyWny6WWP6VXCG-Nlh2k—
No change to nuclear transport rules following accident down under, says regulator
in Western Australia.
The Office of Nuclear Regulation is responsible for oversight of operators transporting nuclear materials in the UK, and the Chief Nuclear Inspector’s report from October 2022 recorded 69 incidents related to nuclear transport in the reporting period. Two of these involved lost radioactive packages.
In response to the Western Australian accident, Richard Bramhall, of the Low-Level Radiation Campaign, told the NFLA: ‘The company is to be criticised for appalling practice since the gauge itself came apart and the packaging came apart and the vehicle was inadequate to contain the outcome of those failures.’
The NFLA and Dr Jill Sutcliffe, joint Chair of the NGA Forum of the Office of Nuclear Regulation, sent an FOI request to the ONR with their concerns. The ONR’s response is shown below as, whilst it contains no commitment to procedural changes, it has useful detailed guidance on the regulatory regime that applies to the transport of nuclear materials and links to reports.
The NFLA also wrote to senior executives at Rio Tinto PLC, the mining conglomerate that lost the caesium capsule, asking the company to issue a statement outlining how procedures would be tightened up to avoid another accident and whether Rio Tinto would fully reimburse the local authorities for the cost of recovering the capsule. Despite a reminder being sent urging the executives to respond, no reply has so far been received. 25 Apr 23
Maintenance impacted at Zaporizhzhia, says IAEA
24 April 2023 https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/Maintenance-impacted-at-Zaporizhzhia,-says-IAEA
The current situation at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant is having a significant impact on the plant’s maintenance capability, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said.
Plant management informed the IAEA experts present at plant that the scope of maintenance performed during outages on all units in 2022 was reduced compared with the planned scope, due to reduced maintenance staff, absence of external contractors who perform a significant part of the work, and a lack of spare parts needed for the maintenance, including critical components.
The Zaporizhzhia plant currently has only about one-quarter of its regular maintenance staff available, the IAEA said. It noted new staff are being hired but it will take some time until they are fully trained. The plant said a substantial list of required spare parts has recently been submitted to Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom.
“As a result of the significant reduction of staff, the ZNPP currently does not have a systematic maintenance and in-service inspection schedule,” the IAEA said. “Before restarting any of the reactor units, the site is considering obtaining advice from an engineering organisation within Rosatom that will assess the status of the plant and provide recommendations for all structures, systems and components important to safety regarding their maintenance or any necessary replacement before operation. The site considers that this maintenance/replacement work may be undertaken using the services of a centralised Rosenergoatom company that is capable of performing these types of maintenance tasks.”
“This shows again the continuing detrimental impact that the current situation on the site is having on the seven indispensable pillars for ensuring nuclear safety and security, in this case pillars two and five on safety and security systems and equipment and logistical supply chain,” IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said.
The IAEA noted that the Zaporizhzhia plant continues to rely on the only remaining functioning 750kV power line for the external electricity it needs for reactors cooling and other essential nuclear safety and security functions. Meanwhile, a back-up 330kV power line that was damaged on 1 March on the other side of the Dnipro River from the Russian-controlled plant remains unrepaired, with Ukraine having said military action is preventing its experts from safely accessing the location situated in territory it controls to repair the line.
Russia reported last month that Rosatom was working to remove damaged equipment from the open switchyard, with the aim of restoring three 330kV lines to the grid system in currently Russian-controlled territory. The IAEA team will access the site to assess the situation.
Four of the six reactors have been in cold shutdown, with two (units 5 and 6) in hot shutdown – which allows them to provide heat to the plant and the nearby town of Energodar where many of the workers live. However, the IAEA said that, with the weather warming, unit 6 has now been transferred to cold shutdown.
Campaigners’ concerns about safety of Sizewell as Russian ‘spy’ ship seen nearby
Campaigners have expressed concerns about the risks posed to Suffolk’s
Sizewell nuclear plants after a Russian ‘spy’ ship stopped at sites off the
coast. The Admiral Vladimirsky ship is believed to have stopped at wind
farms off the East Anglian coast to map undersea power cables as part of
plans to sabotage the UK’s key energy infrastructure.
Alison Downes, from campaign group Stop Sizewell C, said she wanted to know what measures UK regulators were proposing to protect UK power plants, including Sizewell B,
from attack.
East Anglian Daily Times 22nd April 2023
https://www.eadt.co.uk/news/23473262.concerns-sizewell-safety-russian-spy-ship-seen/
Nuclear life extension plans tested by obsolete components
Reuters, By Paul Day, April 5 – Nuclear operators must be able to swap out old parts for new to keep a reactor running, but when like-for-like is unavailable, original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) are faced with the challenge of finding an alternative while avoiding making any major changes.
There’s a rule of thumb that if a plant has to do a design change, it’ll cost anywhere from $300,000-$500,000 just in engineering, licensing changes, drawing changes, and that doesn’t include the cost of the required equipment … so we try, wherever possible, to keep our clients from doing a design change,” says Vice President of Westinghouse Parts Business in its Operating Plant Services unit Craig Irish………………………….
Life extensions
Many of the world’s nuclear power plants were built several decades ago and applications for long-term operations (LTOs) beyond initial lifespans are becoming increasingly common.
…………………………………………………………..In the United States………….the average age of the fleet is 41 years including three reactors that started operation 52 years ago, according to the Department of Energy (DOE)
Nine U.S. reactors have active applications with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to extend their lives and 10 reactors have publicly announced plans to extend their licenses to 80 years.
“Under current license basis 92% of operating reactors would shut down by 2050 and 74 percent would shut down by 2050 with anticipated license renewals. However, if 54 reactors extended operation to 80 years, only 20% of operating reactors would shut down by 2050,” the DOE said in its 2022 report on nuclear energy supply chains.
Obsolescence challenge
The challenge, say OEMs, is keeping a supply chain running and up to date for complex, always-on machines that were built with Reagan-era (or earlier) technology.
………………with construction times for some plants approaching ten years, many of the parts can be obsolete before the plant has even started generating power, according to Westinghouse’s Irish.
……………………………………………Internationally, part of the challenge is many of the parts produced for the nuclear industry face varying specifications depending on the regulator they are working under, restricting an already tight market to national boundaries.
Such differences will become even more pronounced with the introduction of a new generation of reactors expected to begin commercial operations within the next decade, with more than 70 SMR designs under development in 18 countries.
…………………………………………………………………………… “The biggest problem is a lot of these discrete components, resistors, diodes, transistors, capacitors, etc are either substantially changed from the 70s and 80s when we built these instruments or they’re not available or they got bought and sold by another company,” he says. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/nuclear-life-extension-plans-tested-by-obsolete-components-2023-04-05/
Hungary to Prolong Nuclear Plant’s Lifetime as Expansion Stalls
By Marton Kasnyik, April 21, 2023 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2023-04-21/hungary-to-prolong-nuclear-plant-s-lifetime-as-expansion-stalls?leadSource=uverify%20wall
Hungary aims to extend the lifetime of its sole nuclear power plant by 20 years to bridge major delays to its Russian-managed expansion, according to a senior official.
Extending the operation of the Paks plant in southern Hungary will maintain the source of about 40% of the country’s electricity consumption. The government is currently assessing safety issues after previous 20-year extensions to the four existing reactors in the last decade.
“Our plan is to get a further 20 years of life-extension,” Energy Minister Csaba Lantos said at a conference on Friday.
Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s administration handed a €10 billion ($11 billion) contract to Russia’s Rosatom Corp. in 2014 to expand the Paks plant. The project has been marred by delays, including due to initial European Union opposition to the investment and the quality of Rosatom’s plans, which Hungary’s own regulator has said fell short of stringent requirements.
Last week, Hungary and Russia said they agreed to an amendment of their original contract following media reports of a potentially reduced role for Rosatom amid EU sanctions against Russia for its invasion of Ukraine.
The changes are “technical” in nature and don’t affect the project’s cost, Cabinet Minister Gergely Gulyas told reporters on Thursday, without elaborating.
Shining a light on St Louis’ radioactive waste landfill scandal
ST. LOUIS PREPS FOR “CATASTROPHIC” NUCLEAR EVENT http://armydotmil.com/st-louis-preps-for-catastrophic-nuclear-event/
To offer your help, email: westllakemoms@gmail.com http://armydotmil.com/epa-does-nothing-as-nuclear-waste-calamity-inches-closer/
UN’s nuclear chief warns ‘we are living on borrowed time’ after two landmine explosions near Europe’s largest atomic power station in Ukraine
- UN has often expressed fears over the safety of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia plant
- Two landmine explosions took place outside plant’s perimeter this month
- Russian forces took control of the six-reactor plant in Ukraine in March last year
Daily Mail, By ARTHUR PARASHAR, 14 April 2023
A UN nuclear chief has warned ‘we are living on borrowed time’ after two landmine explosions near Europe’s largest atomic power station in Ukraine.
Rafael Grossi, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), has repeatedly expressed fears over the safety of Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia plant.
……….. We are living on borrowed time when it comes to nuclear safety and security at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant,’ Mr Grossi said yesterday.
‘Unless we take action to protect the plant, our luck will sooner or later run out, with potentially severe consequences for human health and the environment,’ he added.
Two landmines exploded outside the plant’s perimeter fence – the first on April 8, and another four days later on Wednesday, according to the statement.
It was not immediately clear what caused the blasts, it said.
Grossi met senior Russian officials in Kaliningrad last week and prior to this with Zelensky in Zaporizhzhia to discuss a safety plan.
He also warned yesterday that the plant continued to depend on a single still-functioning power line, posing ‘a major risk to nuclear safety and security’.
A back-up power line damaged on March 1 has still not been repaired, the IAEA said.
It added that the staffing situation at the plant remained ‘complex and challenging’, in part because of staff shortages.
Last month, Grossi warned that a nuclear disaster was very possible due to the ‘perilous’ situation at the plant.
‘The plant’s lack of access to the grid and necessary repair work on its last emergency power line could cause a complete loss of power, making it reliant on diesel generators for the seventh time since Russia captured it,’ Grossi said at the time.
I once again call for a commitment from all sides to secure nuclear safety and security protection at the plant,’ he added.
Emergency diesel generators had been activated to power the plant’s safety systems, according to Ukrainian nuclear energy agency Energoatom, which has warned of the risk of an accident.
Without the electricity produced by these generators, the overheating of the reactor fuel could cause a nuclear accident, as in Japan’s Fukushima in 2011……………………………………..more https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11972139/UNs-nuclear-chief-warns-living-borrowed-time-two-explosions-near-Zaporizhzhia.html
Disturbing Clues at Fukushima Nuclear Plant May Be an Omen for Another Disaster
880 tons of melted nuclear fuel remains inside the three failed reactors—that’s about 10 times the fuel removed during the Three Mile Island clean up after the 1979 meltdown
It’s been 12 years since the catastrophe at Fukushima Daiichi, and decommissioning the site continues to be a major headache. Popular Mechans BY DARREN ORF, APR 10, 2023
- On March 11, 2011, Japan’s Fukushima prefecture experienced a devastating earthquake and tsunami, which killed upwards of 20,000 people.
- One of the lasting legacies of the earthquake is the extensive damage to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant that experienced meltdowns in three of its six nuclear reactors.
- Twelve years later, the clean up and decommission of the plant continues, and new evidence suggests that at least one reactor could be vulnerable to future earthquakes
…………………………………………………………………………………………….. Because of the immense radiation inside these reactors, engineers still don’t know the exact extent of the meltdowns. But for years, robotic rovers have investigated these highly irradiated zones to get a better understanding of each reactor’s status and—crucially—ability to withstand another earthquake.
Earlier this week, the Associated Press reported that one of these robotic sojourns, conducted by an underwater remotely operated vehicle named ROV-A2, uncovered something troubling: exposed steel bars in the main support structure of Unit 1, along with missing pieces of its external concrete wall.
Located right under the nuclear core of Unit 1, this support structure wasn’t in jeopardy of failing on its own, but experts worried about its ability to withstand another earthquake if one were to strike. Because decommissioning and cleaning up Fukushima Daiichi will likely take decades to fully complete, the plant experiencing more earthquakes is likely. Just last year, the region was hit by another earthquake—thankfully the tremor was some 63 times less powerful than the devastating disaster in 2011.
Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (TEPCO), which operates Fukushima Daiichi, says that it will analyze the video taken by the underwater drone, along with other data, in the coming months to figure out ways to improve the unit’s earthquake resistance. This a priority, as 880 tons of melted nuclear fuel remains inside the three failed reactors—that’s about 10 times the fuel removed during the Three Mile Island clean up after the 1979 meltdown, according to the Associated Press……………………
[this article then goes on to say how safe nuclear power now is! ] https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a43525886/fukushima-nuclear-plant-images-raise-safety-concerns/
The Other Atomic Concern in Taiwan—Nuclear Reactors
NEWSWEEK, GARRETT EHINGER , CHINA ANALYST, DEFENSE PRIORITIES, 4/7/23
The Ukrainian nuclear reactor at Zaporizhzhia came dangerously close to a meltdown when Russian forces damaged power circuits, affecting cooling systems. This has sparked concern over Taiwan’s nuclear plants amid heightening tensions between China and the U.S. Considering China’s preparations to invade Taiwan, the United States should seek to establish a convention with China that explicitly forbids the intentional assault of nuclear establishments to both protect Taiwan against nuclear devastation, and also to open up much needed dialogue with China that may help relax tensions.
In a wartime scenario, nuclear reactors are something of a house of cards. It’s rather easy for stray ordinance to hit an unintended target, as demonstrated by stray missiles from the Ukraine conflict that landed in Poland, killing two civilians. Taiwanese reactors are not only near major population centers, but they also overlap with many optimal landing sites for Chinese invasion forces, heightening the risks of being damaged by close proximity to battlefronts.
Nick Roth, senior director of the Nuclear Threat Initiative’s Nuclear Materials Security Program, said that the risks of things going wrong either from direct or indirect attacks is “quite high.”
To manage rates of fission reactors rely on control rods to absorb radiation. If the control rods are damaged, there is nothing to limit reaction rates, and a small nuclear explosion can erupt. Cooling systems maintain temperature and pressure in nuclear reactors, and are extremely vulnerable in a warzone. If the power circuits to Taiwan’s Kuosheng reactor cooling systems get damaged, a meltdown could occur where temperatures and pressures reach explosive levels.
Even if these explosions themselves don’t have immediate anti-personnel effects, seasonal winds can still blow their radiation clouds onto large cities, sickening or killing thousands, and costing billions in damages.
Wenchung Liu, deputy minister of the Atomic Energy Committee in Taiwan, said in a September news conference last year that because of these risks of serious collateral damage, a deliberate attack by China on Taiwan’s nuclear power plants was “unlikely.” He claimed that military operations leading to damage and disruption of critical infrastructure were more realistic concerns
But Ian Easton, senior director at the 2049 Research Institute, disagreed. He pointed out that in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) course manuals the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) stated, “Taiwan’s nuclear power plants represent high-value military targets…[and advise] PLA combat commanders to … [use] helicopter gunships armed with anti-tank missiles” to attack facilities. The manuals also instruct soldiers to “wash off” nuclear radiation and not let it “slow you down as you finish conquering the island,” clearly indicating the CCPs lack of care about radiation damage to their troops.
……………………………………………………………… Ultimately, China and America desperately need détente. On top of absolving risks to Taiwanese nuclear reactors, a collaborative treaty between America and China prohibiting attacks on nuclear facilities could be the olive branch both countries seek. Thankfully, as former U.S. State Department foreign policy expert Bennett Ramberg pointed out, “a perfectly serviceable template already exists” for such a treaty. “In 1988, India and Pakistan, two of the world’s most ferocious adversaries, cobbled together [an adequately detailed] accord” prohibiting attacks on nuclear establishments. He said “this model should be adopted as a universal norm.”
Regardless of the fate of Taiwan’s nuclear energy programs, the risks posed to existing facilities amid heightening cross-strait tensions demands international coordination—coordination that might make room for talks between America and China and a cooling of relations. https://www.newsweek.com/other-atomic-concern-taiwannuclear-reactors-opinion-1792583
Fukushima Now Part 1: Railroading the Contaminated Water Release is Unacceptable!
BY CITIZENS’ NUCLEAR INFORMATION CENTER · APRIL 5, 2023, By Ban Hideyuki (CNIC Co-Director)
The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) and Tokyo Electric Power Holdings (TEPH) had decided on a policy of oceanic release of the contaminated water, which continues to build up at Fukushima Daiichi NPS, from an early stage and have been steadily proceeding with preparatory construction work for the release. This work has been proceeding despite written commitments to the National Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations and Fukushima Prefecture Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations in August 2015 that “(contaminated water) would not be released into the ocean without their agreement.”
This is the plan for how the release work will proceed. …………………………………………………………………..
This resulted in construction costs of 43 billion yen for the first four years and a release period of 30 years or more, a significant increase from the initial estimate of 3.4 billion yen and 88 months. However, the cost is based on an assessment of 800,000 tons, which differs from the current volume, but nevertheless the assessment that the oceanic release method is “cheap and fast” has been destroyed. Fishermen’s groups passed a special resolution at their general meeting in FY2022 to oppose oceanic releases, and their opposition remains unchanged.
………………………………………………………………….. Securing storage space for high integrity containers is a challenge
Wastewater collected during the ALPS treatment and its pre-treatment stage is stored in polyethylene high integrity containers (HICs). As of December 2022, there were 4,192 containers in storage. To prepare for an increase in wastewater, TEPH plans to expand the storage space by 192 units by June 2025 and a further 192 units by about the middle of 2026………………………………………………
As of June 2021, the Nuclear Regulation Authority had pointed out that there were 31 HICs with absorbed doses that had reached the limit of five mega-grays. That means the limit has been reached sooner than TEPCO had predicted, because, unlike TEPH, TEPCO evaluated absorbed doses from the sludge accumulated at the bottom of the waste effluent HIC. ………………………. Given that contaminated water will continue to be generated in the future, it is likely that securing storage space will become even more difficult. https://cnic.jp/english/?p=6562
Foundation in Fukushima nuclear plant reactor likely badly damaged
The internal wall of a cylindrical foundation supporting the reactor
pressure vessel of the No. 1 unit of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear
power plant may be badly damaged across its entire circumference, its
operator said Tuesday. Some of the damage was revealed in videos taken
during a survey of the No. 1 unit’s containment vessel by operator Tokyo
Electric Power Company Holdings Inc., which said it would further analyze
the footage and assess the seismic resistance of the pedestal. The survey,
conducted from March 28 through March 31 using an underwater robot, found
the concrete wall missing in over half of the pedestal measuring 5 meters
in internal diameter, leaving the reinforcing bar exposed.
Mainichi 4th April 2023
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20230404/p2g/00m/0bu/040000c
Americans now fear cyberattack more than nuclear attack
The Hill, BY DANIEL DE VISÉ – 04/07/23
Americans now see cyberattack as the greatest threat facing the country, two recent polls show, suggesting that cyber fears have outflanked concern over climate change, immigration, terrorism or nuclear weapons.
The national obsession with computer-on-computer attack, documented in a 2023 Gallup poll and a 2022 Pew Research survey, comes at a time when cyberattack seems to be everywhere and nowhere.
………………………………………………. In the Gallup poll, published last month, 84 percent of respondents rated cyberterrorism as a critical threat, ranking it above 10 other fears, including international terrorism, global warming, the conflict between Russia and Ukraine and Iran’s nuclear program. ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
And, of course, the world faces many perils beyond cyberattack. One is nuclear war. Nuclear fears surged in the weeks after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
More than a year later, the nuclear threat seems greater than ever. The Doomsday Clock, a symbol of humanity’s proximity to extinction, stands at 90 seconds to midnight, signifying a moment of unprecedented danger.
Peter Kuznick, a history professor and director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University, believes “the danger of nuclear war is probably greater” now than at the invasion’s start.
But the nuclear threat, Kuznick said, is “something that people don’t want to think about.”
1 This Month
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com/
Now until to February 10, 2026 Radioactive waste storage in France: the debate is finally open! How to participate?
12 February – Webinar The Big Push: New Nuclear Projects in Canada
Thursday, February 12, 7 pm Eastern | 2nd of 4 sessions in the 2026 Nuclear Waste Online webinar series.
Join a webinar on the push for new nuclear generation in Canada. Go to Northwatch.org to register or use the registration link https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ZfWOf1GITqSRIZX8CB-A9w
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