ZAPORIJIA. Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency are visiting the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant on Thursday 1 September. Despite the visit, the site continues to be bombarded and a Russian strike caused the shutdown of a reactor according to Energoatom.
[Mis à jour le 1er septembre 2022 à 12h11] All eyes are on the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. It is this Thursday, September 1, 2022 that the visit of experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to the site occupied by the Russians since March takes place. The visit is eagerly awaited but involves risks which are reinforced by the bombardments which targeted the plant this morning. The Ukrainian nuclear operator Energoatom has also announced the shutdown of one of the Zaporijia reactors on September 1 because of a mortar fire which activated the emergency system and led to the shutdown of reactor number 5. According to the Ukrainians and the mayor of Enerhodar, Dmytro Orlov, these were Russian fires, but Moscow is also accusing Ukraine and denouncing the dispatch of “saboteurs”: “Around 6 a.m., two groups of saboteurs from the Ukrainian army, up to sixty people, landed on board seven boats (…) 3 kilometers northeast of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant”, announced the Russian Ministry of Defense in a statement. communicatedstating that he had taken measures “to annihilate the enemy”.
Strikes are still raining down on the Zaporijia nuclear power plant and the town of Enerhodar despite the security guarantees promised by the Ukrainian and Russian authorities to the IAEA. Despite the risks, the director general of the agency, Rafael Grossi, intends to carry out the mission and affirmed “to begin immediately the evaluation of the security situation at the plant”. The mission of the IAEA convoy is to “preserve” the nuclear site and to carry out all the technical checks in terms of safety and working conditions. The arrival of experts should make it possible to “assess the real situation” and “help stabilize the situation as much as possible”. Since the start of the war, the bombardments targeting the nuclear power station in Zaporijia have raised fears of the worst and Rafael Grossi has himself warned against “the real risks of nuclear catastrophe”.
Zaporizhia nuclear power plant targeted by bombardments
Several bombings have targeted the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant or neighboring towns since the beginning of the war in ukraine. Moscow and kyiv blame each other for each new strike, but both sides are called upon by the international community and the IAEA to put an end to attacks near the site given the danger that this represents. Calls renewed in August when several bombings followed one another. The latest strikes date back no further than the morning of September 1, the day of the visit by IAEA experts. Assaults of Russian origin and which targeted the city of Enerhodar according to Ukraine.
In addition to the bombardments which have already hit a radioactive material storage building and a reactor of the plant, the Zaporijia nuclear power plant was also temporarily disconnected from the electricity grid by Russian troops between August 25 and 26. The procedure, even temporary, almost jeopardized the plant since it prevented the cooling of the reactors and posed the risk of overheating and therefore of a nuclear accident. Fortunately, the situation returned to normal thanks to a back-up system that took over until the site was connected to the electricity grid. In the following days, the Ukrainian nuclear operator Energoatom warned of the risk of radioactive leaks and fires after new strikes. The national company indicated that “the infrastructure of the plant has been damaged and there are risks of hydrogen leakage and spraying of radioactive substances”. According to her, there is also a high risk of fire.
What are the risks for the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant?
The International Atomic Energy Agency confirms that it is worried about the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant and the risks smoldering on the site due to the bombardments. “The installation is working, but with difficulties, so that in the current circumstances the scenario of an accident cannot be excluded. There are continuous interruptions in the electricity supply, problems with spent fuels… An accident makes you go from green to red without transition. So, I am indeed worried”, detailed Rafael Mariano Grossi, the director general of the IAEA, in an interview granted to the World August 26.
The risk of a meltdown accident at the plant’s core has become a possibility since the disconnection of the nuclear plant from the electricity grid at the end of August. Electricity is essential to ensure the cooling of the reactors and to avoid a nuclear accident and according to the boss of the Ukrainian nuclear industry, Petro Kotin, 90 minutes without electricity would be sufficient for the temperature of the reactors to become worrying and for a start of fusion to be considered. . Still, the risk is “very unlikely” according to Emmanuelle Galichet, teacher-researcher in nuclear physics at the National Conservatory of Arts and Crafts contacted by the world, August 31. The important security measures that take into account the presence of twenty emergency generators offer “about a week to ten days of fuel autonomy”, enough to allow time to intervene and avoid disaster. The expert also excludes the risk of an explosion or the formation of a radioactive cloud, as was the case during the Fukushima explosion.
According to Emmanuelle Galichet, the risks and accidents most likely to occur mainly concern the storage of radioactive waste. “If the very robust containers in which they are stored were to give way, there will be a dissemination of radioactivity around the storage area”, she explains, once again ruling out the hypothesis of a radioactive cloud in the upper atmosphere. For the time being “no abnormal release of radioactivity” has been noted by the research institutes, which are very attentive to the situation.
Map of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant
The Zaporizhia nuclear power plant is located on the banks of the Dnieper River, in the southern part of Ukraine. The site is not in the direct vicinity of the city, but about fifty kilometers as the crow flies to the south-west of the town. It is precisely installed on the territory of the city of Enerhodar.
While Ukraine currently has five nuclear power plants on its territory, that of Zaporijia is the most powerful in Europe.