The Ukrainian authorities are not in a hurry to solve the problems that have accumulated in the nuclear power industry, postponing the implementation of this task for subsequent years, experts say. But such a tactic can be costly for both Ukraine and its neighboring countries.

A symptom of serious problems in the nuclear power industry of Ukraine has become the increasing frequency of shutdowns of power units of Ukrainian NPPs, reports of which appear in the media with unenviable regularity. Thus, due to the damage to the transformer, in December 2018, the second power unit of the Khmelnitsky NPP was shut off, as reported by the press service of the National Atomic Energy Generating Company Energoatom. It was not the first accident at the second power unit of the NPP - its work was stopped due to malfunctions in the control system and protection of the nuclear reactor. And in 2016, a steam generator leaked at the first power unit of the station, which led to an emergency stop of its operation.

But the problems are not only at the Khmelnitsky NPP. In September last year, an emergency shutdown of one of the units occurred at the Zaporizhzhya NPP. It was necessary to disconnect the unit to eliminate the defect in the piping circuit of the main circulation pump. Subsequently, the NPP management attempted to dispel public fears about the incident, calling the media reports an “information war.” As the press secretary of the NPP, Sergei Shimchev, said then, “the Ukrainian publications distort the facts” in order to “increase the number of views.”

However, already in December, the sixth power unit of the Zaporizhzhya NPP was closed for scheduled maintenance. Completion of work was scheduled for January 2019, but the power unit has not yet been put into operation. Instead, on the night of March 7, another, fourth power unit was shut down. According to the management of ZNPP, the repair will last 100 days.

Now at the nuclear power plant located in Energodar, Zaporozhye region, there are 4 power units in operation. The total capacity of the generators is 3,862 MW. ZNPP also plans to carry out a major overhaul at unit 2 at the end of March. Also this year, the planned average repair of power unit No. 5, which will begin in June, and overhauls of power units No. 1 and No. 3 - in September and November, respectively. The average repair of power unit No. 6 is scheduled to begin at the end of December 2019.

In total, on March 7, only 11 out of 15 power units were operating at Ukrainian NPPs, Energoatom company reported on the previous day.

As a source at Energoatom told RT, Ukraine has long been sitting on a powder keg - most of the energy blocks are worn out and need to be replaced, but there is no money for that.

“The blocks are regularly stopped for actual redecoration, but you cannot hold it forever. In addition, there is a shortage of professionals who could monitor the operation of the reactors. Western partners have long expressed concern about this, ”said the source.

According to experts, the real scale of the problems may be even more than the official statistics reflect.

In 2016, the academic profile publication Energy Research & Social Science reported that “for many years, accidents at Ukrainian NPPs have not been recorded in the database, despite reports about them in the state media”. The authors of the study concluded that the probability of a major nuclear accident in Ukraine in the coming years reaches 80%.

“Solving problems is needed now”

Ukraine inherited a developed nuclear power industry from the USSR. In 2014, the Ukrainian authorities began to increase the load on nuclear power plants, and if in 2013 the nuclear industry accounted for about 43% of the total electricity generated in the country, in 2016 the share of nuclear power plants was already 52.4% of the energy produced.

Against the background of the reduction of atomic capacities in a number of European countries, by 2017 Ukraine took the 9th place in the world in the number of operating reactors, and Kiev is not going to reduce its figures.

As the president of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko declared in the beginning of March during a working trip to the Nikolaev area, atomic energy allows the country to survive without the Russian gas. The politician added that now for Ukraine the priority task is the construction of new power generating units.

"This will also increase the share of nuclear energy and make Ukraine's economy more competitive," said Poroshenko.

  • Petro Poroshenko
  • Reuters
  • © Vasily Fedosenko

However, the construction of new power units is a very expensive undertaking. For example, the Ukrainian leadership has long been carrying out plans to build two additional power units for the Khmelnytsky nuclear power plant. In July last year, the government even approved a technical and technical justification (TTO) for the construction of the third and fourth blocks. According to a preliminary estimate, the cost of building two units can cost the budget over UAH 72 billion (over $ 2.7 billion).

As the head of the Ukrainian Cabinet of Ministers, Vladimir Groisman, said, commenting on the decision of the government, the Ministry of Energy and Energy and Energoatom were given the task of finalizing the document on the use of reactor facilities at NPPs "except for the production facilities of the aggressor country."

Kiev planned to involve the Czech company Skoda JS as in the works, but in June last year its mention was excluded from the technical and technical justification, it was decided to look for a contractor by a competitive method.

However, this will not be easy, experts say. Recall that in 2010, Moscow and Kiev agreed that Rosatom will take part in the construction of new power units of the Khmelnitsky NPP. However, in 2015 this agreement was terminated by new Ukrainian authorities for political reasons.

It was then that the Ukrainian side decided to involve the Czech Skoda JS as in the project. As explained earlier by KNPP Deputy General Director for Capital Construction Oleg Rakhlinsky, the Czech project is cheaper than others.

“Two blocks cost a little more than $ 3 billion. And if you take, for example, Korean, or Chinese, or Areva, Westinghouse, then they have a minimum price of one block - $ 4 billion,” he said.

However, the division of the company engaged in the production of reactors is included in the Russian holding United Machine-Building Plants (OMZ). Therefore, the cooperation of Kiev with Skoda JS as was also in question.

As the leading expert of the National Energy Security Foundation and the Financial University Stanislav Mitrahovich noted in an interview with RT, since the collapse of the USSR, not a single new power unit has been built in Ukraine, only the completion of the construction of the two blocks that had been laid during the Soviet period was completed.

Earlier, Kiev tried to form a special fund for investment in the nuclear industry, but in the end, those who wanted to develop the Ukrainian nuclear power industry abandoned their plans.

Cooperation with Russia could save the situation - it would be cheaper, but the Ukrainian authorities excluded such an option.

“The construction of such facilities is very expensive, while Kiev has no money. Those blocks that were built in the USSR will have to be changed soon - their work limit will end in the 20s and 30s. Probably, the current Ukrainian authorities simply hope to shift the burden of solving these problems onto their successors. However, to begin to solve these problems need right now. If this is not done, after a few years, serious problems can be expected, ”the expert explained in an interview with RT.

  • The central control of the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power plant
  • RIA News
  • © Falin

Dmitry Marunich, Director of the Kiev Institute of Energy Problems, has a similar opinion.

“Perhaps we can talk about attracting a loan, but there is no information that Energoatom or the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine should consult on how to raise such money,” said the expert.

"Redecorating"

While the construction of new power units is under discussion, Kiev resorts to the practice of extending the service life of power units of Soviet construction. For example, in November last year, the board of the State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine (HIARU) decided to “consider it possible” to extend the operation of the first power unit of the Khmelnitsky NPP.

Although in the world extension of the service of nuclear power units is indeed practiced, the plans of Kiev cause concern in the expert community. The fact is that the technology of extending the service life of the VVER-1000 reactor casing is currently mastered only by Rosatom. Whether Ukrainian specialists will be able to carry out such operations correctly without the help of their Russian colleagues is unknown, experts say.

  • View of the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant
  • RIA News
  • © Falin

In addition, there are also objective limitations - it is impossible to extend the permanently the operation time of the power units, a source in the Popular Front party told RT.

“They will have to be closed in the years 2023-2025, otherwise massive disruptions and problems may begin. Nuclear power plants produce 50% of the country's electricity, and it amazes me that there is no further strategy in this direction. What shall we do in 5-6 years? Will half of the population sit without electricity? ”He noted, citing as an example the first power unit of the South Ukrainian NPP (operating since 1982. –RT ), whose life in 2013 was extended for 10 years.

The situation in the Ukrainian nuclear industry worries not only the Russian side, but also the European neighbors of Ukraine. In 2015, the European Parliament even sent a written appeal to the EBRD and the European Commission demanding not to allocate loans for the “reanimation” of Ukrainian NPPs.

The EP considered that Kiev was violating the terms of the convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context, according to which countries are obliged to notify other participants in the convention of their intention to extend the operation of old nuclear reactors.

According to Stanislav Mitrakhovich, the Ukrainian side should work on extending the service life of the units together with Russian specialists.

“But the problem is not even in this, but in the fact that Ukraine is likely to extend these terms more than once, which is very dangerous,” the expert believes.

“There is no money, experts and special desire”

The deterioration of nuclear reactors is not the only problem of the Ukrainian nuclear industry. Putting political motives to the fore, Kiev neglects security issues.

In 2008, Energoatom and the American company Westinghouse signed an agreement on providing with nuclear fuel from three to six power units of Ukrainian NPPs with WWER-1000 reactors in 2011-2015. In 2014, the parties agreed to extend and extend the contract until 2020, in January 2018 the contract was extended until 2025. The agreement provides for the supply of nuclear fuel to provide seven of the 15 Ukrainian nuclear units.

However, experts from the outset warned of the high risk of an accident in the event of the replacement of “native” fuel blocks with American-made blocks. Heat-removing elements assembled in the USA differ in configuration from the Soviet and Russian analogues. Hexagon elements are produced in Russia, and quadrilateral in the USA.

As Igor Ostretsov, Doctor of Technical Sciences, Nuclear Physics and Atomic Energy Specialist, told in an interview with RT, it would be very dangerous to use such elements at nuclear power plants of Soviet construction.

Westinghouse took these risks into account and refined the fuel assemblies, experts say. Dmitry Marunich reminded that the American company carried out work on the bugs after the incident at the South Ukrainian NPP in 2012.

However, if Kiev continues to increase the share of American nuclear fuel, other problems will be aggravated, in particular, the storage of spent nuclear fuel. Unlike Russia, Ukraine does not have the technological capabilities to process such waste.

  • PLNF site
  • globallookpress.com
  • © Danil Shamkin

According to the terms of the Russian-Ukrainian agreement, Kiev sends spent nuclear fuel to Russia, where it is stored and reprocessed - they get new fuel from it. The remaining waste, unsuitable for further processing, is vitrified and should be sent back to Ukraine in the future.

The problem is that there is almost no place to store this hazardous waste in Ukraine - the last warehouses in the country are already overfilled. In addition, only Russia takes waste for recycling, while the American side does not take back its spent fuel.

In 2017, the US company Holtec International announced plans to build a centralized repository for nuclear waste in the Chernobyl exclusion zone. The project involves the storage of spent fuel in containers on the surface of the earth, which, according to experts, is extremely unsafe.

According to Stanislav Mitrakhovich, Ukraine is trying to show that it can exist without cooperation with Russia, however there are situations in which it is simply impossible, despite political motives.

“For example, Ukraine cannot abandon Russian nuclear fuel, the share of which is still higher than the American one at Ukrainian NPPs. Nor can Kiev give up on Russia's services for the storage and processing of nuclear waste — Ukraine itself can only bury the waste for the time being, there is no question of recycling. The safety of this project is a debatable question, ”the expert explained.

As RT source explained in the Batkivshchyna party, the country itself is not able to solve the problem of Ukrainian NPPs.

“There is no money, experts and special desire. Tomorrow, the power may change, and it will be the problems of the new officials - why bother now? I do not exclude that all power units will be transferred to the management of Western companies, which will be engaged in their modernization or repair. But if an irreparable thing happens and at the NPP it “blows up”, then it will already be problems not only of Ukraine, but of the whole region, ”the interviewee concluded.