Chernobyl power supply cut

March 09, 2022

Ukraine’s nuclear regulator said the power supply to the Chernobyl plant failed on Wednesday morning, and the national power company Ukrenergo said it was impossible to restore the power lines because of fighting in the surrounding areas.

The nuclear energy company Energoatom said in a post on the Telegram messaging app: “Emergency diesel generators are switched on at the site to supply power to safety-critical systems. In case of trouble-free operation, the stock of diesel fuel on diesel generators will be enough for 48 hours.”

Ukraine’s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said that after the 48 hours were up, “cooling systems of the storage facility for spent nuclear fuel will stop, making radiation leaks imminent.”

However, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said there was enough water in the spent fuel pools for the fuel rods to cool sufficiently to avoid an accident. It referred back to a statement the agency made on 3 March which said that due to the amount of time since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, the spent fuel had cooled down enough that “the pool is sufficient to maintain effective heat removal without the need for electrical supply”.