December 30, 2014
Denis Pushilin, a pro-separatist leader in
southeast Ukraine, has said the Ukraine faces a ‘second Chornobyl’ due
to Ukraine’s decision to use nuclear fuel supplied by Westinghouse for
its Soviet-built nuclear power plants.
He said radiation has increased to 14 times the
acceptable norm at the Zaporizhia nuclear plant. This is the largest
nuclear power plant in Europe, and the fifth largest in the world.
The Russian news agency Interfax reported that
in a statement on December 28, Pushilin said Ukraine faces “a second
Chornobyl” due to Kyiv’s decision to use nuclear fuel supplied by
Westinghouse — a reference to the deadly 1986 nuclear power plant
accident that spead radioactivity over parts of Europe.
Pushilin said that “currently the level of
radiation is 14 times higher than the acceptable norm” in the area
around the Zaporizhzhya plant and that the problem started November 28
“after an unsuccessful attempt to replace rods in the Russian-made third
block (reactor) with the product of the American company Western
house.”
According to authorities, Unit 3 of the
Zaporizhia plant suffered a short circuit on Nov. 28, and theis reactor
was shut down for a week. Pushilin alleges that the reason for the
shutdown was the unsuccessful replacement of Russian-made fuel rods with
Westinghouse fuel rods.
Today a story came out on a Russian website,
documenting a report by Ukrainian emergency services that radiation had
increased to 16.8 times the acceptable norm. This story was picked up at
RT.com.
Radiation levels were at 5.05 mSv/yr. The criterion for evacuation in Ukraine from Chernobyl was 5 mSv/yr.
This comes out to 0.58 μSv/hr. Presumably this
does not include background radiation. According to the plant operator’s
website, background radiation at the plant is 0.10 μSv/hr, which gives a
0.68 μSv/hr dose.
This is equivalent to the less contaminated
parts of Fukushima prefecture. It might be around half the amount of
Fukushima City. But it seems to be increasing.
But this is from one reactor out of the 6 at the
plant. Today, it was announced that Ukraine had reached a deal for
Westinghouse to supply nuclear fuel to all Ukrainian nuclear power
plants.
Ukraine’s switch to the use of upgraded nuclear
fuel from the United States at its nuclear power plants (NPP), built in
the Soviet times, could threaten safety both at the domestic level and
in Europe as well, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on
Tuesday.
“Moscow was somehow alarmed as Ukrainian Prime
Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk announced on December 30 the signing of an
agreement with US company Westinghouse concerning nuclear fuel supplies
for Ukrainian nuclear power plants,” the ministry said in its statement…
“It seems that the Chernobyl tragedy did not
teach Kiev authorities any lessons concerning a scientifically feasible
approach to the [peaceful] use of nuclear energy,” the Russian ministry
said in its statement. “In might be in fact, that the nuclear safety is
sacrificed for the sake of political ambitions or, even more, other
tangible interests.”…
“Consequences of possible accidents and
meltdowns [at nuclear power plants] will be in the full responsibility
of the Ukrainian authorities and US suppliers of [nuclear] fuel,” the
statement added.
Safety concerns regarding Ukraine’s switch to
the US supplied nuclear fuel were repeatedly voiced by Russian experts
and some officials, including by Sergey Kiriyenko, the head of Russian
state-run nuclear corporation Rosatom.
SNIP
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