Heorhii KOPCHYNSKY: There are no trifles in nuclear safety
The well-known Ukrainian independent nuclear energy experts Heorhii Kopchynsky and Mykola Steinberg are going to publish a book, Lessons of Chornobyl. Kopchynsky is especially interested in this because the ashes of Chornobyl are still beating painfully in his heart. A year ago some “well-wishers” publicly (in a well-known newspaper) accused this expert, a Communist Party Central Committee instructor in 1986, of telephoning the Chornobyl nuclear power plant control room on the night of April 26 and giving instructions that resulted in the accident and the tragedy. And he still refuses to repent, they claim.
Kopchynsky, of course, wrote a well-grounded denial (suffice it to say that power plant operators would not have listened even to the CPSU CC secretary general, let alone an instructor), but the dirty gossip had already spread through the Internet, casting a shadow on a good name. One may wonder how he managed to muster enough strength to overcome the stress this libel caused. What must have helped him was his work on the book, some pages of which this writer saw next to the laptop on a desk. The voice recorder is on, and, without waiting for questions, Kopchynsky speaks about what worries him most of all today:
“Donors promised to fully fund Shelter 2, now referred to as the safe confinement, and the new facilities that were supposed to make up for the decommissioned Chornobyl nuclear power plant. (They had insisted on decommissioning.) There were some minor projects, but this problem has not been solved radically. I do not know where the former and current leaderships of this country have been drawing optimism from. In any case, our ancient thermal power plants are in dire straits indeed. When and how this will come out is anybody’s guess. We must have already lost five years or so. Both the West and Ukraine are to blame.”
“The bidding-based system of purchases is undoubtedly progressive, but in some unique cases it does not work. For example, it is clear as day now that Shelter 2 should be designed and built by an organization that has profound knowledge of this problem at all stages – exploratory design, preliminary design, and provision of shop-floor documentation. But each of these stages requires a lot of bidding. Then Western experts come over. As a rule, this means new people every time. As soon as they have learned something, they immediately go back home. The principle that every donor company should cut a slice from the pie, i.e., have an opportunity to secure a contract and cash in a little is also problematic. This means we are wasting both time and money.”
At present nuclear energy is drawing “double attention.” First, because of the Japanese nuclear reactor accidents and, second, in connection with the upcoming 25th anniversary of the Chornobyl tragedy. These events have the same root – miscalculations in nuclear safety. The consequences for nuclear energy were and are the same: demands to freeze its development or even abandon this source of energy altogether. What do you think of this?
“I must say that the world nuclear community has drawn no exhaustive conclusions from the Chornobyl accident. At the same time, it was done very much after Chornobyl to increase the safety of currently operating nuclear power plants. International nuclear energy safety regulations were set up. But Fukushima became another stern reminder that there are no trifles when it comes to nuclear safety. Official reports may create an impression that the Fukushima-1 Japanese nuclear power plant came under the pressure of such grandiose, fatal, and super-disastrous natural phenomena as earthquakes and tsunamis. But it is gradually becoming clear that, although this viewpoint is, of course, correct, it is not exhaustive. As it turned out, a few years ago a Japanese seismologist warned the government and the authorities in charge of nuclear safety about the likelihood of such a tsunami. His warnings, based on serious scientific research, were not taken into account. At any rate, no drastic action was taken. As a result, not so much an earthquake as a tsunami hit the nuclear plant right in the heart, so to speak. It destroyed the stand-by sources of energy supply, while the earthquake had ruined the outer electric grid some time earlier. This left the plant without a cooling system, whereas one of the main problems of nuclear power plant safety is uninterrupted removal of the thermal energy that emanates in the reactor’s active zone and in the spent nuclear fuel cooling pond as a result of radioactive decay. Stripped of energy supply, Fukushima found itself in an extremely difficult situation.
“Speaking of how this will affect the prospects of nuclear energy, we must admit this is a new blow to it. This blow will, beyond any doubt, be felt for a very long time. But it seems to me that the existing energy and ecology situation on Earth is such that any possible energy source should be regarded as vital today. We can sometimes hear very encouraging comments about alternative sources. I think that all, traditional and alternative, sources need to be taken care of and developed because hydrocarbons will sooner or later be exhausted and civilization will have to face a very severe shortage of energy. Then any source will be indispensable and valuable. But one should not forget that modern civilization shows an extreme concentration of consumers and, hence, enormous consumption of energy. Kyiv alone uses about six or seven billion kilowatts a year. Neither wind turbines nor solar panels can ensure this much. This may be enough to heat some water or energize a certain structure, but these scattered sources will hardly be able to keep businesses, transport, water supply, and sewerage working. Besides, they are unstable. Solar batteries will not work at night, and when the wind subsides, wind turbines will, naturally, grind to a halt. But energy is always needed. So in the conditions, when energy becomes an important factor for the existence of civilization, such concentrated sources as nuclear energy, the potential of which can serve humankind for millennia, are bound to be used. And, in general, a ban is the easiest, but not the wisest, way in this kind of situations. Yes, we must install safe devices, and there is no utopia. Projects like this already exist, namely fourth-generation nuclear power plants.
“Scientists are convinced that this is a solvable problem for nuclear energy. The only question is to what extent a certain community or country is prepared to fully meet nuclear energy safety requirements, including those linked to a culture of safety. I must say that this country has been showing, especially of late, that the statement ‘safety culture is at a proper level here’ is not fully true.”
Olena Mykolaichuk, chair of the State Inspection of Nuclear Regulation in Ukraine, believes there is no sense wasting funds to modernize obsolete nuclear facilities and extend their service life. I think that in practice this attitude may eventually force Ukraine to shut down some power units which we have failed to bring into line with modern safety requirements due to a lack of funding. What do you think of this option? Decommissioning may require as much spending as additional safety measures do. But in the former case the unit no longer works and generates no electricity – it only consumes too much.”
“I’ve heard this from Ms. Mykolaichuk. What is the danger of the current situation? Fears after the Fukushima-1 events are sure to trigger antinuclear tendencies. And one can resort to a lot of mindless actions. For example, there must be serious grounds to deny the possibility of extending the service life of our power units. If the user organization has made available materials that raise no doubts and justify the extension of service life, there will be no legal grounds to impose a ban. And the inspection is authorized to issue a license to continue operation. But I repeat – only in case there are no doubts. But, in all seriousness, I must say that the second-generation reactors, now used in Ukraine and at most nuclear power plants worldwide, generally meet present safety requirements. We very often recall not only Chornobyl but also the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in the US. In the latter case, there was almost a complete core meltdown and everything turned into pellets. The cause was the same as at Fukushima-1: heat removal disruption. But in that case practically nothing went outside the protective cover because the station’s safety systems functioned very well in a rather difficult situation. From this angle, I do not think there are any serious grounds to make a categorical conclusion that the units now operating in Ukraine may not have their service life extended. Let me say it again: one must make an in-depth analysis in accordance with standard-setting documents, and if nothing dangerous is found, why not continue using the units?
“Now about the ratio between decommissioning and building new units. Nuclear power generation demands very heavy investments. Today, the cost of a one-million-kilowatt nuclear power unit is more than two billion dollars. So the development of nuclear power facilities requires proper funds, which is a major problem for this country. This is a serious barrier to the development of nuclear power generation not only in Ukraine but also worldwide, because nobody will invest enormous funds in what may be a safety risk. So it is very difficult to make any unambiguous conclusions against this background. What is more cost-effective: to decommission old units and build new ones or to invest in service life extension? This is a difficult question, even taking into account that mothballing the shut-down units will undoubtedly require major expenditures. Yet this is far cheaper than constructing new units.
“But it is not worthwhile to ban without valid reason the extension of the service life of the power units now functioning in Ukraine. Nuclear power engineering is not so much a national as an international phenomenon today. If something happens at the atomic energy facilities of one country, this will affect the entire world. This was the case with Chornobyl and now with Fukushima. For this reason, all those who make decisions in nuclear power engineering must be well aware that whenever they decide on something, they assume responsibility not only before their own country and its people but also before the world community. It is a copybook maxim which everybody should understand.”
The New York Times reported the other day that Russian nuclear reactors might become as vulnerable as the Fukushima ones if their cooling system were to go out of order. One may say the same about the reactors at Ukrainian power plants. Do you think there is a chance of a breakdown of our cooling systems?
“I will comment on this as follows: they can also say the same about their nuclear power plants. The equipment may fail at any station, no matter what country it belongs to. There are practically no essential differences in the design of second-generation plants in Russia and in the West. There only are some not essential details. On the other hand, there is a series of RBMK-type (“high power channel-type reactor”) reactors at the Russian stations in Kursk, Smolensk, and Petersburg, which are noticeably inferior, in terms of safety, not only to their Western analogues but also to the later-designed pressurized-water reactors. The Chornobyl RBMK units have already been decommissioned. So, from this angle, the situation in Ukraine is far better. But what happened at Fukushima can happen neither in Russia nor in Ukraine. In the former case, the emergency diesel generators of all the six units went out of order within a few seconds. A wave covered and destroyed them. It is an extremely rare occurrence. Nothing of the sort is possible in Russia or here – there are just no objective grounds for this. Incidentally, other Japanese stations endured the earthquake quite well. Maybe, some faults will be found later, but, as of today, all the equipment has survived. It is the tsunami that caused irreparable damage.”
What are the main differences between the Chornobyl and Fukushima accidents? Was the human factor irrelevant in Japan? Is nobody facing prosecution there?
“From the technological angle, the differences are clear and obvious. In Chornobyl, there was a nuclear-type accident, when a huge quantity of energy was released and triggered a blast. What happened at Fukushima-1 was heat removal disruption. It is not so fast a process, and the explosions that occurred when pressure was being reduced in the reactor’s pressure suppression chambers or when hydrogen caught fire, are still incomparable to what happened at Chornobyl.
“Frankly speaking, Chornobyl was a manmade disaster from beginning to end. And it began way before the accident in the design bureaus and research laboratories which failed to fully test the performance range of this power unit and made glaring mistakes in designing the reactor’s safety control system. All this was then exacerbated with the personnel’s misdeeds. I can say that in our case the human factor ruled supreme. Besides, there were neither earthquakes, as some people suggest, nor extraterrestrials – all this is nonsense pure and simple.
“Conversely, Fukushima was hit by a natural disaster. Yet some data suggest the human factor also played a role. I have already cited an example, when nobody heeded the seismologist who had warned about the danger of such a high wave. There is other indirect evidence that power generation and regulation authorities, and even the Japanese government in general, failed to react in a way that would prevent such accidents. Is anybody going to stand trial? I think it is the Americans who made the wisest decision in a similar situation. They took nobody to court – even the operator who made a blunder. Why? The point is the operator must decide on something within a second or so. But the human brain is not perfect enough to ideally work at such a high speed. The operator needs a detailed instruction which is the result of intensive work, longtime research and tests – otherwise, he will fall hostage to the situation. Therefore, I also come out against prosecuting anybody. But we still do not know all the details of what happened at Fukushima I, so it is difficult to predict the further course of events. The authorities will see to it.”
I was astonished by the statement of Mykhailo Umanets, ex-manager of the Chornobyl power plant, about the condition of fuel-containing masses inside the Chornobyl sarcophagus and the course of the construction of the facilities that are indispensable for overcoming the disaster’s consequences. Do you agree with him?
“I was also surprised. Mr. Umanets must have totally forgotten that measures were recently taken to stabilize the sarcophagus’s structural units. And this facility will be standing for much more than the originally planned 30 years. There is no danger in this aspect today. Moreover, things are under strict control there.
“As for the destruction of fuel-containing masses, it is really the case. There was an international inspection four or five years ago, in which I took part as an expert. Some Ukrainian experts warned at the time that the fuel-containing masses would fully disintegrate and go into a finely-dispersed state. But, like many foreign experts, I was of the opinion that a catastrophic disintegration was still at least 50 years away. For the spent uranium dioxide is not in itself something unusual. If this danger really existed, we would have come across this phenomenon long ago. Why do some Ukrainian experts insist on this version? It seems to me the reason is that the Chornobyl clean-up is markedly underfunded, so they have to press some arguments to improve funding. I have no doubts that the condition of these masses needs to be properly monitored and studied. But I do not think it is necessary to scare people. Statements of this kind are absolutely groundless from a scientific angle. Yet their message is clear: get down immediately to removing the fuel-containing masses from the shelter. But there is no technology for doing this. Still they are highly active long-lived elements. How can they be disposed of? There are no special waste burials, and, as US experience shows, it would take billions of dollars to build them. So let us first resolve all the problems of preparing such operations and only then talk about this. But, instead, we are scaring people, although it is not at all obvious today that these fuel-containing masses must be relocated – doing so might present a still greater danger. But we must, of course, make sure that the conditions inside the sarcophagus (humidity, temperature) prevent further destruction.”
How come the Zaporizhia NPP functions without having been checked for earthquake risks? Is it the designers’ mistake or that of the monitoring and regulating bodies? What can this situation lead to?
“Frankly speaking, I do not know this situation in detail. It is strange for me that seismicity was not assessed in this area. Preliminary project documents always take into account seismic conditions when a NNP site is being chosen. I could perhaps hurl a reproach that this survey was not carried out to a proper extent and with proper credibility and accuracy. I will not dare comment on this. But I can still say that the equipment at the Zaporizhzia, Khmelnytsky, Rivne, and Southern Ukrainian power plants is in fact the same and, as far as I remember, is designed to withstand a 6 to 7 magnitude earthquake. If there are any special circumstances, such as fault lines, etc., at the Zaporizhzia site, the latter would have been or will be pronounced quake-prone. In this case special measures must be taken. But, in my view, the situation is not so dangerous. I say it again that I may be wrong in this matter, but those statements were so unexpected for me. All this should be, of course, checked again.”
There was once so much talk about which of the existing reactor types should be chosen for the Khmelnytsky NPP’s new units. We chose the Russian project, but as soon as an accident occurred in Japan, some began to claim we are applying yesterday’s technologies. However, Enerhoatom President Yurii Nedashkovsky does not think so. Do you agree with him?
“Yes, I do. Power units 3 and 4 will be built according to an absolutely new design which essentially differs from Project 320, which includes all the now functioning VVR-1000 units. For example, they employ a new emergency cooling system and a passive heat removal system, which Fukushima-1 did not have. Even if all the power sources have been lost, the so-called emergency air heat-exchangers will come into play – they will be removing the generated heat into the atmosphere by means of natural heat convection process. So it is absolutely groundless to call this ‘yesterday’s design.’
“Why the Russian project was chosen is a good question. I will just remind you that the bidding was international. Anybody could take part in the competition. Some other countries also put in bids, only to withdraw them later. Korea wanted to take part. I know that France stepped in with a new European project. There were also discussions with US firms which could offer new projects. All decisions were made on a competitive basis. On the other hand, the problem of building the two units has not yet been finally solved for lack of proper legislation. We can begin the construction only when the law has been passed. And there is still a long way to go. Only preliminary project work is being done. There are still many questions. For example, if Russia takes part in this, will it be able to grant us a loan? On what conditions? What will be the share of Ukrainian equipment? The two sides should solve all this before drawing up contracts. There should be materials for public hearings and referendums. All this is still to be done.”
You forecast in 2000 that, if we did not change the situation in nuclear power engineering, with many plants reaching the end of their service lives, we would be in for terrible times. But nothing of the sort has happened in the past 11 years. Moreover, Ukraine, where NPPs account for almost a half of power-generating facilities, has a surplus of electric energy. Were you wrong at the time or were your words heeded?
“I was not wrong. I will remind you that I – and not only I – had to make such comments because the powers that be did not address the problems of safety at all. Those were hard times, especially in terms of funding. Nobody would give money to increase nuclear power plant safety. On the contrary, NPPs were robbed of a considerable part of the money they had earned. It is a proven fact. So I said: if the safety improvement program, which was drawn up in the previous years, is not to be carried out, we may be in for hard times. Now this program is about to be fully, if belatedly, carried out. And it does not matter whether they heeded me or somebody else…”
