What next for Ukraine’s nuclearsites and Wylfa and Trawsfynydd?
Dylan Morgan, on behalf of CADNO a PAWB. What next for Ukraine’s nuclear
sites and Wylfa and Trawsfynydd? The war in Ukraine has highlighted the
danger of the rush to build new nuclear power stations in Wales.
Russia’s miltiary attacks on Ukraine have been terrible. However, there is one
frightening fact about this conflict that isn’t mentioned in the press.
This is the first war to be fought on the land of a country that has
operational nuclear reactors.
In fact, Ukraine gets about 52% of its
electricity from 15 nuclear reactors. During the first days of the Russian
invasion, their chosen path into Ukraine to the south from Belarus was
through the exclusion zone around Chernobyl’s old nuclear reactors.
Higher levels of radioactivity have been reported in the area because
Russia’s heavy military vehicles have stirred up dust and mud releasing
radioactivity in to the environment.
Russian forces succeeded to gain
control of the site. Reports are reaching us suggesting that Ukrainian
workers trying to keep the site as safe as possible are under great strain.
It was reported that about 200 of them had to stay there without rest
facilities for the first fortnight after the arrival of the Russian forces.
Within days, we heard about Russian forces attacking the Zaporizhzhia
nuclear site in south east Ukraine. This is the largest nuclear site in
Europe and is the home to six Soviet 950MW reactors. That is, six Wylfa
size stations alongside each other. Luckily, neither the reactors nor the
waste stores there were hit. But great damage was caused to a training
building on the site. Russian soldiers have also captured this site. It is
logical to presume that work conditions there are very difficult for
Ukrainian workers in trying to run three of the six reactors with movement
to and from the site controlled by the Russians. It appears that the 3
other reactors there are not in operation at the moment.
We can only hope
that the names of the other nuclear sites, Rovno (4 reactors), South
Ukraine (3 reactors) and Khmeinitski (2 reactors) don’t become well known
as military targets hit by Russia over the next weeks. Dr Jim Green from
Friends of the Earth Australia warns us about dangers apart from the
reactors themselves in an article in the Ecologist two weeks ago:-
“radioactive reactor cores whether kept in situ or removed from the
reactors – would remain vulnerable, as would nuclear waste stores. Spent
fuel cooling ponds and dry stores often contain more radioactivity than the
reactors themselves, but without the multiple engineered layers of
containment thar reactors typically have.”
Nation Cymru 15th March 2022
Radiation Free Lakeland protests against plan for a Near Surface Nuclear Waste Dump
PROTESTORS voiced concerns about nuclear waste disposal facility plans at
a drop-in event this week. A new campaign has launched by the Radiation
Free Lakeland group titled Lakes Against Nuclear Dump and supporters held a
peaceful demonstration on Friday. Environmental activists picketed at a
Mid-Copeland Community Partnership drop-in which was designed to discuss
the potential to host a geological disposal facility with residents of the
area. But LAND raised concerns about a the potential for a new development,
a Near Surface Nuclear Waste Facility.
Whitehaven News 16th March 2022
Zelensky Says He’s ‘Cooled’ on Joining NATO, Ready for Talks With Russia on Crimea, Donbas
Russia wants Ukraine to declare neutrality, recognize Crimea as Russian, and recognize the independence of the breakaway Donbas republics. https://news.antiwar.com/2022/03/08/zelensky-says-hes-cooled-on-joining-nato-ready-for-talks-with-russia-on-crimea-donbas/ by Dave DeCamp
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told ABC News in an interview that aired Monday night that he had “cooled down” on the idea of Ukraine joining NATO and is open to talks with Russia about the future of the Donbas and Crimea.
“Regarding NATO, I have cooled down regarding this question long ago after we understood that NATO is not prepared to accept Ukraine,” Zelensky said. “The alliance is afraid of controversial things and confrontation with Russia. I never wanted to be a country which is begging something on its knees. We are not going to be that country, and I don’t want to be that president.”
Regarding Crimea and the Donbas, Zelensky said Ukraine is not prepared for Russian “ultimatums” but is ready to discuss the status of the territories. “The people who elected me are not ready to surrender. We are not ready for ultimatums,” he said. “But we can discuss with Russia the future of Crimea and Donbas.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told ABC News in an interview that aired Monday night that he had “cooled down” on the idea of Ukraine joining NATO and is open to talks with Russia about the future of the Donbas and Crimea.
“Regarding NATO, I have cooled down regarding this question long ago after we understood that NATO is not prepared to accept Ukraine,” Zelensky said. “The alliance is afraid of controversial things and confrontation with Russia. I never wanted to be a country which is begging something on its knees. We are not going to be that country, and I don’t want to be that president.”
Regarding Crimea and the Donbas, Zelensky said Ukraine is not prepared for Russian “ultimatums” but is ready to discuss the status of the territories. “The people who elected me are not ready to surrender. We are not ready for ultimatums,” he said. “But we can discuss with Russia the future of Crimea and Donbas.”
HELEN CALDICOTT: Russia’s war could spell worldwide nuclear disaster
The U.S., as always, standing on its self-righteous dignity, is retaliating with economic sanctions and arming NATO neighbours with murderous weapons. It has rejected outright Russian President Vladimir Putin’s plea to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO and to remove the missiles pointed at Russia in NATO countries that were liberated from the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War after Secretary of State James Baker promised that the U.S. would not enlarge NATO inch to the east.
HELEN CALDICOTT: Russia’s war could spell worldwide nuclear disaster https://independentaustralia.net/article-display/helen-caldicott-russias-war-could-spell-worldwide-nuclear-disaster,16149
By Helen Caldicott | 14 March 2022, Boasting the world’s biggest nuclear arsenal, Russia’s aggression towards Ukraine could spell catastrophe on a global scale, writes Dr Helen Caldicott.
The unleashed power of the atom has changed everything save our modes of thinking and we thus drift toward unparalleled catastrophe” ~ Albert Einstein
How right he was. Now laced with thousands of nuclear weapons, some on hair-trigger alert, with a
determined leader invading a neighbouring country and threatening to use his nuclear arsenal, planetary life is hovering on the edge of obliteration.
After Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the world witnessed the dreadful human tragedy of atomic bombs:
‘People exposed within half a mile of the Little Boy fireball, that is, were seared to bundles of smoking black char in a fraction of a second as their internal organs boiled away. The small black bundles now stuck to the streets and bridges and sidewalks of Hiroshima numbered in the thousands.’
Knowing man’s propensity to fight, why in God’s name did the U.S. Government and Soviet Union authorise the brilliant scientists and weapons makers to construct thousands of nuclear weapons during and after the Cold War, culminating in more than 70,000 nuclear weapons during the ’70s and ’80s?
About 40 per cent of all U.S. scientists, engineers and technical professionals are engaged in weapons construction and design. And currently, Russia has 6,255 nuclear weapons, the U.S. has 5,550 and China, 350.
I am a physician, so let me describe the medical effects of a single bomb dropping on a city, be it New York or Boston. A Russian 20-megaton bomb would enter at 20 times the speed of sound exploding with the heat of the sun, digging a hole three-quarters of a mile (1.27 kilometres) wide and 88 feet (26.8 metres) deep, converting all buildings, people and earth shot up into the air as a mushroom cloud.
Twenty miles (32.2 kilometres) from the epicentre, all humans would be killed or lethally injured, some converted to charcoal statues. Winds of 500 mph (804 km/h) turn people into missiles travelling at 100 mph (161 km/h). A massive conflagration would follow covering 300 square miles (776.9 km2) and the fires would coalesce across the nation
As cities burn across the world, a massive cloud of toxic black smoke will elevate into the stratosphere blocking out the sun for ten years inducing a short ice age nuclear winter when all humans and most plants and animals will perish.
But the war in Ukraine is more than dangerous, hosting Chernobyl which contaminated 40 per cent of the European land mass with radioactive isotopes, together with 15 nuclear reactors and which could suffer meltdowns during wartime activities, causing unbelievable injury and death to people across Europe.
And a plant with six reactors was recently under attack.
God help us all.
The U.S., as always, standing on its self-righteous dignity, is retaliating with economic sanctions and arming NATO neighbours with murderous weapons. It has rejected outright Russian President Vladimir Putin’s plea to prevent Ukraine from joining NATO and to remove the missiles pointed at Russia in NATO countries that were liberated from the Soviet Union at the end of the Cold War after Secretary of State James Baker promised that the U.S. would not enlarge NATO one inch to the east.
UK government now considering extending life of Sizewell nuclear power station by 20 years
UK looking to extend life of nuclear plant by 20 years amid energy crisis, Ft/com 14 Mar 22, Sizewell B in Suffolk was due to be decommissioned in 2035 and can meet about 3% of Britain’s electricity demand
The UK is looking at a 20-year extension of the Sizewell B nuclear power plant on England’s east coast to 2055 as Boris Johnson aims to bolster domestic energy supplies following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The extension is one of several options under consideration as the prime minister draws up a new “energy supply strategy”, which will be published next week against the backdrop of highly volatile international gas prices and an escalating cost-of-living crisis. ……………………….
Britain is set to experience a significant loss in nuclear capacity by the end of the decade as EDF of France and the UK’s Centrica, which own all of the current fleet of reactors, have been forced to close several earlier than planned.
EDF’s 1.2 gigawatt Sizewell B plant in Suffolk, which started operating in 1995 and can meet about 3 per cent of the UK’s electricity demand, is the only one of Britain’s six remaining atomic power plants that will continue generating beyond the end of the decade. Only one new station, the 3.2GW Hinkley Point C in Somerset, is currently under construction. It is due to come on stream in 2026.
Ministers are encouraging investors to build another new plant on a site adjacent to Sizewell B but are also keen for EDF to invest the estimated £500mn-£700mn that would be needed to extend the lifetime of the existing station to 2055.
Kwasi Kwarteng, business secretary, visited Sizewell in January, where he met EDF directors and some of the workforce. Government officials said Kwarteng was supportive towards EDF, which is “actively exploring” a 20-year extension for Sizewell B and is aiming to take a final decision on the project in 2024, for which UK government approval would be required. “It probably will be extended,” said one official. ……………. https://www.ft.com/content/51d4ff8c-f0c0-4082-8db6-11c031be1420
Rolls Royce wants to hurry up the introduction of small nuclear reactors, but UK govt is focussed on a big one for Wylfa
Rolls-Royce calls for accelerated SMR rollout as Boris considers bigger plans for Wylfa
14 MAR, 2022 BY CATHERINE KENNEDY ROLLS-ROYCE IS APPEALING TO THE UK GOVERNMENT TO SPEED UP THE ROLLOUT OF SMALL MODULAR REACTORS (SMRS), WHILE PRIME MINISTER BORIS JOHNSON IS REPORTEDLY KEEN TO REVIVE PLANS FOR THE WYLFA NEWYDD NUCLEAR POWER PLANT IN RESPONSE TO THE UK ENERGY CRISIS.
There is a pressing need to improve the UK’s energy security, with prices soaring due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and alternative solutions are being explored to plug the gap.
Rolls-Royce submitted SMR designs for Wylfa and Trawsfynydd for assessment last week. However extensive safety checks are needed and these are not expected to come online until the 2030s. As such, government sources told the Telegraph that Rolls-Royce is frustrated with the lack of progress.
Meanwhile according to The Times, government sources have also said Johnson is determined to press ahead with plans for a large scale nuclear plant at Wylfa, with the government in talks with US nuclear reactor manufacturer Westinghouse and the engineering firm Bechtel about a proposal to develop the site. The government has so far set aside £120M to support the project………..
Macron government considering nationalising France’s debt-laden nuclear company EDF
 | |||
France looking to nationalise debt-laden power company EDF https://www.power-technology.com/news/france-power-company-edf/ 13 Mar 22
The French Government, which holds an 84% stake in the $30bn energy giant, could retain domestic business but review overseas operations. The Government of France is reportedly weighing options to nationalise multinational electric utility company Electricite de France (EDF), reported Bloomberg.
Citing people familiar with this, the report said that the French Government is considering the option to reorganise the debt-laden business with a focus on nuclear energy production.
French officials have been carrying out talks with advisers on the option to acquire all the stake from EDF’s small stakeholders and delist the company from the stock exchange, people aware of the development said.
The French Government, which owns 84% of EDF, could retain the ownership of the company’s domestic business but review EDF’s overseas operations, the sources added.
If the idea to nationalise EDF is approved, then the move is expected to take place after the French Presidential election, which is slated to take place later this year.
The Government of France is reportedly weighing options to nationalise multinational electric utility company Electricite de France (EDF), reported Bloomberg.
Citing people familiar with this, the report said that the French Government is considering the option to reorganise the debt-laden business with a focus on nuclear energy production.
French officials have been carrying out talks with advisers on the option to acquire all the stake from EDF’s small stakeholders and delist the company from the stock exchange, people aware of the development said.
The French Government, which owns 84% of EDF, could retain the ownership of the company’s domestic business but review EDF’s overseas operations, the sources added.
If the idea to nationalise EDF is approved, then the move is expected to take place after the French Presidential election, which is slated to take place later this year.
However, a spokesperson for the French finance ministry said that the information is ‘false’ and the government isn’t working on such a project.
Last month, French Government announced it will offer $2.4bn to support EDF, as the group sees a hit to profits due to outages at several of its nuclear plants and the impacts of a government power-price cap.
Hopes for Bradwell nuclear power station now fading away like the ebbing tide
Calm After the Storm https://www.banng.info/news/regional-life/calm-after-the-storm/ 3 March 2022
As we emerge from Covid a rather eerie silence descends over Bradwell B. After a tumultuous period of fighting the grotesque prospect of a colossal nuclear power station of Chinese design we are left wondering if the threat is ebbing away or will flow back like the returning tide.
Just two years ago and just before the first frightening lockdown, The Chinese operator launched its pre-Application proposals and the gross scale of the Bradwell B juggernaut was as unexpected as it was threatening. Despite lockdown the local reaction was immediate, widespread and determined. The proposals were summarily repelled and CGN declared a pause and retreated homeward to think again.
At least the China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN) has got part of what it came for. The regulators, Environment Agency and Office for Nuclear Regulation, have gifted approval for the Chinese Hualong One UK HPR1000 reactor design as ‘suitable for deployment in the UK’.
But, not necessarily at the Bradwell site. Although the ultimate prize for CGN is to build its reactors at Bradwell gaining the Generic Design Assessment (GDA) approval is not really much help. It doesn’t tackle the issues of cooling water, long-term storage of radioactive waste or the impacts of climate change in anything like the detail needed to gain approval for the Bradwell site. There are many obstacles that must be surmounted before permission to build can be granted.
Perhaps, as BANNG and other commentators have observed, CGN will have to be content with the consolation prize and seek its fortune elsewhere. That may not be in the UK since it is widely felt that the UK will prevent the Chinese state in the guise of CGN having a strategic role in developing sensitive UK infrastructure like a nuclear power station.
And so there is impasse. Opposed by the local Blackwater communities and shunned by the UK Government Bradwell B seems frozen in aspic. The best that may be said is that CGN may not walk away or be pushed immediately but the project is likely to languish in a state of indefinite inanition and will fade away like the ebbing tide.
Investors keen on renewable energy, while UK govt is trapping consumers into paying upfront for nuclear power plants to be built in a decade or more
Gordon Murray: LESLEY Riddoch’s article (The National, March 10)
is eminently sensible. The UK Government wants to build more large nuclear
plants such as Hinkley Point C. The problem for Boris is that investors are
not interested.
Centrica abandoned its plans to build new nuclear, Toshiba
exited the giant 3.3GW plant at Moorside, Cumbria and Hitachi scrapped the
£16 billion Wylfa plant on Anglesey. The current Hinkley development costs
are a whopping £23bn, almost double that projected in 2008 and set to rise
further.
The smart money is now with renewables where the returns are
higher, more immediate and less risky. Notwithstanding these setbacks, the
Conservative government, backed by Labour, is determined to plough on with
Sizewell C.
Their problem is who is going to fund it. The Government is not
keen to involve the Chinese who already get a return of 15% on their
investment at Hinckley Point C.
The Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng’s
answer is the Regulated Asset Base (RAB) funding model whereby consumers,
that’s us, will pay the construction costs by increasing energy bills. It
is a fanciful type of nuclear subsidy where consumers pay for and
underwrite the construction costs for 10 years before a single watt of
power has been generated.
You have not misread this! The Government is set
to increase our energy bills even further at a time when gas/energy prices
are soaring, pushing even more people into fuel poverty. Perhaps their
spirits will be raised when they learn that RAB, according to Kwarteng,
will give private investors greater certainty through a lower and more
reliable rate of return.
An added bonus is that bill payers can expect
their bills to rise even further when the project is completed since we can
expect the energy strike price for nuclear to be twice that of renewable
– the cheapest form of electricity generation that is now subsidy
free-where consumers only start paying once they start to generate.
TheSmall Modular Reactor programme promises lower energy production costs but
there is no hard evidence to support this claim. What we will get for
certain is large numbers of these power plants spread all over the country
that will raise safety concerns over proliferation of nuclear materials and
terrorist attacks.
The National 12th March 2022
Chernobyl nuclear plant lacking external power supply
Ukraine’s state nuclear power regulator said on Friday the electricity
supply to the Chernobyl nuclear power station had not yet been restored,
despite Russia’s energy ministry saying it was restored by Belarusian
specialists on Thursday. Ukraine has warned of an increased risk of a
radiation leak if the high-voltage power line, damaged in fighting, is not
repaired to the plant, which is occupied by Russian forces.
Reuters 11th March 2022
UK’s Ministry of Defence called out for lobbying MPs on nuclear weapons
MoD under fire for lobbying MPs on nuclear weapons, The Ferret, Rob Edwards. March 13, 2022
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) is facing criticism for lobbying up to 27 Westminster politicians on the “benefits” of nuclear weapons for “UK industry, economy and the union”
Four lords and 23 MPs were invited to two briefings by senior MoD officials at the Faslane nuclear submarine base on the Clyde in 2021. According to the MoD, the aim was to “educate” them on the “continued relevance” of the Trident nuclear weapons system, and how replacing it was “value for money”.
According to experts, it is “highly unusual” for a government department to lobby politicians in this way. Campaigners questioned whether it was an “appropriate” use of public money and accused the MoD of acting as an “influencer” for nuclear vested interests………………………
One lobbying expert disputed the MoD’s suggestion it was not trying to influence politicians. “This is clearly a lobbying and influencing strategy, thinly disguised as a briefing to promote dialogue about defence policy,” said Dr Will Dinan, a senior lecturer in political communications at the University of Stirling.
“It is highly unusual for a government department to lobby UK politicians in this way. While the rationale offered is that these briefings are simply educational, it is clear that the overall strategic aim is to increase support among parliamentarians for maintaining nuclear capability.”
Dinan maintained that the nuclear briefings were “hardly neutral, informational or apolitical”. The need for nuclear weapons was “highly political” and MoD officials appeared to have “strayed some way from offering neutral and balanced advice to inform decision makers”, he said.
The Nuclear Information Service, which researches nuclear weapons, was also critical of the MoD. “These documents make it clear that the purpose of this exercise is to bolster support for the UK’s nuclear weapons programme,” said the group’s director, David Cullen.
“Lobbying in this fashion is not an appropriate use of public funds and diminishes the prospects for meaningful parliamentary oversight.”
The Scottish Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament pointed out that retired military commanders had spoken out against nuclear weapons. “The MoD is acting as an influencer for the nuclear-military-industrial complex with vested interests in them being constantly modernised and never given up,” said the campaign’s chair, Lynn Jamieson.
“If the MoD had a genuinely educational agenda it would include consideration of how to move towards signing the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. But then their job isn’t education, it’s defence and security — and Scottish CND’s view is that nuclear weapons put that at risk
The SNP MSP, Bill Kidd, is co-president of the international group of Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament. He pointed out that MSPs from the Scottish Parliament had not been invited to MoD nuclear briefings.
He said: “Will this be because we, at Holyrood, have voted time and again against the maintenance of these weapons of mass murder being stationed in our midst and looking for their removal? Or could it be that it’s Westminster that votes on the budget and long-term future of nuclear weapons and therefore it’s MPs who need to be influenced?”
Kidd also criticised the House of Commons and Lords for voting through upgrades and increases in nuclear warheads. This breached article six of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty committing countries to nuclear disarmament, he claimed…………….. https://theferret.scot/mod-lobbying-mps-nuclear-weapons/
Nuclear threat: Faslane, home to Trident, symbol of humanity’s power and folly
Nuclear weapons are often described as a deterrent. But do they really deter? That they have “kept the peace” is just a story, “a myth”, not backed by evidence of cause and effect, as New York Times writer Ward Wilson has put it. He observed, “We don’t accept proof by absence in any circumstance where there is real risk.”
Nuclear threat: Faslane, home to Trident, symbol of humanity’s power and folly, https://uk.sports.yahoo.com/news/nuclear-threat-faslane-home-trident-110835394.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly9uZXdzLmdvb2dsZS5jb20v&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAG3X514QPdgktFOrKbKPrnzoSz6joD3PVpI6uSj2DBv3oIZTOIzUDZWnifcsw_SXXPYtt3h1orA3QYlShoI_rlgBn5o675_PqDys5-xmgpGOEFmBJ1ooQWfTzK9RMofsPeZk-CfshnVXybppn5h7kGhpqKtNAaeAVwv0YCeavNKnVicky Allan
Sun, 13 March 2022, On the northern shore of Gare Loch, washed by salt waters that merge into the Firth of Clyde, is the naval base, Faslane, home to Vanguard-class submarines. The UK has four such Trident-carrying submarines, each armed with eight missiles, each of which carries three warheads. All together, currently, the UK holds a stockpile of 225 such warheads. This sea loch, and the wildlife it sustains, knows little of the destructive capacity contained within it.
Each warhead is said to be eight times as destructive as the bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945, which killed over 140,000 civilians. They are dark pearls of latent horror; symbols of humanity’s power and folly.
This stretch of shoreline has, for this reason, been one of the most controversial sites in Britain since the 1960s – first home to Polaris, more recently Trident. Concern over the threat of nuclear weaponry, has waxed and waned with the changes in global politics.
The SNP’s calls to scrap it were a key message of the Independence referendum, and one still repeated now. 2016 saw debate around whether the programme should be renewed at an enormous cost of £31 million for just the replacement submarines – CND estimated the overall cost would be more like £205 million. The House of Commons backed it, though only one Scottish MP voted in favour. Then, just last year, Boris Johnson announced a lift on the cap on the the number of Trident nuclear warheads it can stockpile by more than 40 percent by the middle of this decade. This ended thirty years of gradual disarmament.
UN Elder Mary Robinson’s view on this was clear, “While the UK cites increased security threats as justification for this move, the appropriate response to these challenges should be to work multilaterally to strengthen international arms control agreements and to reduce – not increase – the number of nuclear weapons in existence.”
We are now in another chilling moment. Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, his threats of “consequences you have never seen”, have meant that the word nuclear is on our lips again. The threat, which not long ago had seemed half-forgotten, a childhood nightmare demoted down the current list of existential threats, was there again: “the nuclear option”. Might the Russian leader be mad and power-hungry enough to use it?
Ian Blackford recently confirmed the continuing support of SNP for getting rid of Trident, saying, “The idea that having nuclear weapons provides a deterrence that removes that threat is far-fetched, to say the least.”
Nuclear weapons are often described as a deterrent. But do they really deter? That they have “kept the peace” is just a story, “a myth”, not backed by evidence of cause and effect, as New York Times writer Ward Wilson has put it. He observed, “We don’t accept proof by absence in any circumstance where there is real risk.”
Above all Faslane is a reminder of the ridiculous nuclear arsenal the world has built. We may have already clambered down from the global peak stockpile of nuclear weapons which existed in 1986, but there is a long way to go. Approximately 13,080 nuclear warheads exist worldwide and almost 90 percent of them belong to two countries: the United States and Russia. There are more than enough, if such maths made any sense, to kill every human on the planet, one hundred times over.
That fact, and Putin’s terrifying recent posturings, should be a reminder that global nuclear disarmament must remain a key goal of our times.
Video analysis reveals Russian attack on Ukrainian nuclear plant veered near disaster.
NPR, March 11, 2022: Last week’s assault by Russian forces on the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant was far more dangerous than initial assessments suggested, according to an analysis by NPR of video and photographs of the attack and its aftermath.
A thorough review of a four-hour, 21-minute security camera video of the attack reveals that Russian forces repeatedly fired heavy weapons in the direction of the plant’s massive reactor buildings, which housed dangerous nuclear fuel. Photos show that an administrative building directly in front of the reactor complex was shredded by Russian fire. And a video from inside the plant shows damage and a possible Russian shell that landed less than 250 feet from the Unit 2 reactor building.
The security camera footage also shows Russian troops haphazardly firing rocket-propelled grenades into the main administrative building at the plant and turning away Ukrainian firefighters even as a fire raged out of control in a nearby training building.
The evidence stands in stark contrast to early comments by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which while acknowledging the seriousness of the assault, emphasized that the action took place away from the reactors. In a news conference immediately after the attack, IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi made reference to only a single projectile hitting a training building adjacent to the reactor complex.
“All the safety systems of the six reactors at the plant were not affected at all,” Grossi told reporters at the March 4 briefing.
In fact, the training building took multiple strikes, and it was hardly the only part of the site to take fire from Russian forces. The security footage supports claims by Ukraine’s nuclear regulator of damage at three other locations: the Unit 1 reactor building, the transformer at the Unit 6 reactor and the spent fuel pad, which is used to store nuclear waste. It also shows ordnance striking a high-voltage line outside the plant. The IAEA says two such lines were damaged in the attack.
“This video is very disturbing,” says Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists. While the types of reactors used at the plant are far safer than the one that exploded
n Chernobyl in 1986, the Russian attack could have triggered a meltdown similar to the kind that struck Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in 2011, he warns.”It’s completely insane to subject a nuclear plant to this kind of an assault,” Lyman says.
In a news conference on Thursday, Grossi said that he had met with Ukrainian and Russian officials but failed to reach an agreement to avoid future attacks on Ukraine’s other nuclear plants. “I’m aiming at having something relatively soon,” he told reporters in Vienna.
The assault
On March 3, the nuclear plant was preparing for a fight. A news release posted to its website just hours before the assault described the facility as operating normally, with its assigned Ukrainian military unit ready for combat.
The Russian decision to move on the plant was clearly premeditated, according to Leone Hadavi, an open-source analyst with the Centre for Information Resilience, who helped NPR review the video.”It was planned,” Hadavi says, and it involved around 10 armored vehicles as well as two tanks. That is far more firepower than would have been carried by, say, a reconnaissance mission that might have stumbled across the plant by chance.
Just before 11:30 p.m. local time, someone began livestreaming the plant’s security footage on its YouTube channel. The livestream rolled on as Russian forces began a slow and methodical advance on the plant. The column of armored vehicles, led by the tanks, used spotlights to cautiously approach the plant from the southeast along the main service road to the facility.
Around an hour and 20 minutes later, one of the two tanks that led the column was struck by a missile from Ukrainian forces and was disabled.
That marked the beginning of a fierce firefight that lasted for roughly two hours at the plant. Immediately after the tank was disabled, Russian forces returning fire appeared to hit a transmission line connected to the plant’s main electrical substation. The IAEA says two of four high-voltage lines were damaged in the attack. Lyman says that these lines are essential to safe operations at the plant……..
Based on photos and damage assessments by Ukrainian officials and the IAEA, Lyman says that the damage appears to have been to some of the less hardened points within the nuclear plant. Unlike office buildings and elevated walkways, the reactors themselves and their spent fuel are sealed within a thick steel containment vessel that would withstand a great deal of damage.
But he also says that the host of systems required to keep the reactors safe are not hardened against attack. Cooling systems rely on exterior pipework; backup generators are kept in relatively ordinary buildings; vital electrical yards are out in the open; and the plant’s control rooms are not designed to operate in a war zone……………. https://www.npr.org/2022/03/11/1085427380/ukraine-nuclear-power-plant-zaporizhzhia
IAEA doubts that the attack on Kharkiv Institute was a serious radiation hazard.
Russia has reportedly bombed a site in Ukraine which houses an
“experimental nuclear reactor”. The attack on the National Science Centre
Kharkiv Institute of Physics and Technology was reported in the early hours
of this morning. “
The State Inspectorate for Nuclear Regulation of Ukraine
announced that the facility was struck, damaging the exterior and possibly
numerous labs throughout the building,” reported the Kyiv Independent via
Twitter. The Kyiv Independent is an English language media outlet created
by journalists who say they were “fired from the Kyiv Post for defending
editorial independence”.
However, doubts have been expressed about the
amount of nuclear materials at the site. The International Atomic Energy
Agency IAEE has previously said the site’s “inventory of radioactive
material is very low” and kept at a “subcritical” state.
Lincolnshire Live 11th March 2022
1 This Month
of the week– Nuclear Reactor Information Task Force
14 May – online event From Bombs to Data Centres: the Face of Nuclear Colonialism
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