CHORNOBYL 40 YEARS ON | SAFETY & SECURITY
from decommissioning activities. Even being an enterprise not producing any products, the plant has significant infrastructure that requires support, maintenance, and repair. This includes, in particular, major repairs to high-voltage circuit breakers and substation renovations, construction of a radiation monitoring system and replacement of SNFS-1 power equipment, lighting and communications systems, instrumentation and automation systems, construction of a physical security system for the transport of spent nuclear fuel, and so on. Furthermore, the plant holds 17 state licenses for certain types of nuclear power activities. The plant also actively collaborates with international institutions and partners – the IAEA, the US Department of Energy, and others – to implement projects to maintain safety and infrastructure.
The next chapter In February 2022, a new chapter in the plant’s history began: the Russian invasion and capture of the plant. The personnel were held hostage and were only able to leave the plant after 25 days. In late March of that year, Russian troops withdrew from the plant. Before the war, personnel travelled approximately 45 minutes from Slavutych to the station by commuter train through Belarus. After the destruction of the railway tracks and the bridge over the Pripyat River in 2022 and the impossibility of crossing the border with Belarus, travelling along the old route was impossible. Personnel are now transported by buses via Kyiv, which takes about 6 hours. A rotational method, with personnel staying at the station for 10 days, has become the new norm. The war is a constant presence and in February 2025 a
drone crashed into the NSC and exploded. This damaged the NSC, as well as the main crane system. Fire fighting and damping down efforts continued for nearly three weeks, periodically being suspended due to air raid alerts. Experts from French companies – participants in the Novarka consortium, which designed and built the NSC – were brought in to inspect the damage and the scope of necessary restoration work. Despite this damage to the NSC, there were no radiation effects although the integrity of the structure was compromised. The plant director stated that, as a result of the risks of the conflict, dismantling of the unstable structures within the NSC had been postponed indefinitely.
The end of the Chornobyl era? There’s a popular belief that the USSR collapsed because of the Chornobyl disaster. However, until 1991, nothing but the slowly deteriorating economic situation foreshadowed the radical changes in the country’s life that would emerge. It is true that only two months passed between the second Chornobyl accident and the signing of the Belovezh agreements on 8 December 1991 which signalled the end of the USSR. Proponents of simple causes for complex processes can confidently claim this was the trigger for the collapse of the empire, but that is an argument that is not really supported by the facts. Nonetheless, the scale of the Chornobyl accident is so vast
and paradoxical that the part proved greater than the whole. Until 1986, nuclear power plants in the USSR were a reliable source of energy, and failures and accidents were considered unlikely. Every citizen knew this. Extensive plans existed for the construction of such reactors. After the accident, this optimistic concept had to be revised and plans to build RBMK power units at new sites were abandoned. Construction of
units at various stages of completion was halted – Chornobyl 5 & 6, Kursk 5 & 6, and Smolensk 4 were all abandoned. After 1986, only two RBMK reactors were commissioned: Ignalina 2 in 1987 and Smolensk 2 in 1990. At the plant life continued, but it was a different plant and a different life. After the collapse of the USSR European pressure for a complete shutdown of the plant began. Unit 1 operated until 1996. In December 2000, the last operating unit, number 3, was shut down. The country entered a new century and a new millennium without any operating RBMK reactors. The active phase of the Chornobyl NPP’s life was over. Europe breathed a sigh of relief. This was an economically difficult decision for the country but economic assistance was conditional on the plant’s shutdown. Except in Russia, this marked the end of the RBMK era in the post-Soviet space but not the end of the Chornobyl legacy. In the absence of humans, today Chornobyl is a haven for wildlife. According to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) the exclusion zone now represents the third-largest nature reserve in mainland Europe and is a case study in the resilience of nature and its ability to bounce back under the most extreme circumstances. The Chornobyl legacy is also one of improved safety standards worldwide that benefitted the industry as a whole. With the perspective of decades of hindsight, the RBMK
reactor might be compared to the Soviet Union itself – both were huge, poorly managed, closely associated with the military, and, most importantly, both collapsed with serious consequences. Russia, as the heir and legal successor to the USSR, continues to operate its RBMK reactors. Three nuclear power plants – Leningrad, Kursk, and Smolensk – operate seven RBMK reactors today. Their service life has been extended to 50 years, and each one has several more years of operation remaining. Of course, all of them have been modernised and positive reactivity coefficients are considered a thing of the past. In the intervening years several Russian RBMK reactors were shut down after 45 years of operation and replacement nuclear units of a different design have been commissioned or are under construction at the same sites. It seems that in time, when all these units are shut down – well over 60 years after Leningrad 1 was commissioned – the era of the RBMK will be over. But such reactors cannot be completely decommissioned – the RBMKs are huge and radioactive, full of elements with half-lives of thousands of years. There is nowhere to move them. For generations they will tower over the world as grim colossi where they were built. The age of the RBMK will finally end in the far distant future. ■
www.neimagazine.com | April 2026 | 37
In February 2025 a drone crashed into the NSC and exploded, damaging the outer and inner shells. Source: Chornobyl International
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