The Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs warned of “another ecological catastrophe” after the Russians captured the Chernobyl nuclear facility in Ukraine.
Normal radiation levels in Chernobyl Exclusion zone, which includes four reactors that were closed in 1986 and which spread radioactive waste throughout Europe, were not exceeded According toAccording to reports, the state regulator of nuclear power in Ukraine was established as a result of military activity in that area.
But beyond the Chernobyl plant, there are concerns that some of Ukraine’s 15 active nuclear reactors could be caught in the crossfire.
“It’s a unique situation in nuclear power history in fact that we have a country operating 15 nuclear reactors, and is in full-scale war,” Shaun Burnie from Greenpeace East Asia, a nuclear specialist, told DW. Burnie said that while the plants account for half of Ukraine’s electricity, only nine reactors are currently operational.
He said that “the idea of building protection in the case of a full scale war was never part a nation’s planning, at most in terms commercial nuclear power.”
Burnie said that while some Cold War-era reactors in America and the Soviet Union were constructed underground to protect military threats, “enormous facilities” in Ukraine were all built above the ground.
“A nuclear power plant is one the most delicate and sensitive industrial installations. They require a very complex set resources in ready status at all times to keep them secure. This cannot be guaranteed in war,” Burnie writes and Jan Vande Putte, a Greenpeace East Asia co-worker, in a briefing that will be released publicly tomorrow on the vulnerability of nuclear power plants during military conflict.
Radiation leaks could be caused by cooling systems that aren’t working properly
Partially, a military attack could cause a power cut, which could make operating reactors more vulnerable. If a plant’s power supply is disrupted by heavy bombardment, it could result in the loss of reactor cooling or the cooling down of spent fuel storage.
In a worse-case scenario, this could lead to a Fukushima-like meltdown and “massive releases of radioactivity,” Burnie explained.
These anxieties are being fueled by increased military activity to the south of the Zaporizhzhia plant which has six reactors and a storage facility for high level nuclear spent fuel. Armed conflict in the region of Zaporizhzhia “raises the specter of major risks,” states the briefing.
According to the authors, the site is already at risk because some of the older reactors were constructed and designed in the 1970s. Roger Spautz, a nuclear campaigner at Greenpeace France & Luxembourg, says that the original 40-year life expectancy of these reactors has been extended as is the case in France.
Spautz stated that the greatest risk to spent fuels is that they are hit by a ballistic missile or can’t cool down due to the disabled energy systems. Spautz said that electricity is needed 24 hours a days. He also noted that diesel backup generators may not work for several weeks. This may be necessary during wartime.
Burnie said that there is a very unlikely chance of a direct attack. However, spent fuel pool containment structures could be “destroyed accidentally” during the crossfire.
“Installations containing dangerous force”
Doug Weir (Research and Policy Director, Conflict and Environment Observatory, UK) said that “Nuclear power stations are defined as ‘installations with dangerous forces’ under international human rights and should never be attacked.” He was referring specifically to the Geneva Convention.
Burnie believes Russia, which has More than twice as many reactors as Ukraine, understands the consequences of a direct attack on these facilities including nuclear contamination of Russia itself if winds blow in a westerly direction.
Weir said that although we do not expect to see deliberate targeting sites like Zaporizhzhia, the heavy weapons Russia is deploying is not particularly precise. “Fighting around such places must be avoided at any cost.”
On Monday, Petro Kotin, head of Ukraine’s state-run nuclear power plant operator Energoatom, Expressions of concern to the the International Atomic Energy Agency about Russian columns of military equipment and artillery “moving in the immediate vicinity” of its nuclear facilities.
Kotin informed IAEA that shelling was occurring near Energoatom plants.
He demanded that the IAEA intervene and support a zone of non-conflict for 30 km around the nuclear power plant.
For Roger Spautz, another concern is that the Russian military capture a power plant and don’t have the staff required to properly manage it. “You need several hundred technical personnel who know the plant,” Spautz said.
The Greenpeace briefing on Ukraine nuclear plant vulnerability, notes that these staff will be needed in the event of flooding from the Dnieper river, which flows through the vicinity of the Zaporizhzhia plant.
Nuclear fuel could overheat and release radiation if, for instance, the Dnieper reservoir dams that cool the Zaporizhzhia nuclear reactors are damaged.
Shaun Burnie stated, “All these facilities require constant monitoring, they’re not passively safe.”
