Belarusian nuclear power plant is stress-resistant

10:50 / 15.08.2018

After the safety tests the foreign experts had concluded that the Belarusian nuclear power plant was stress-resistant.

The stress tests for the Belarusian nuclear power plant have been speculating by the Western and our opposition press for a long time. At first we were accused that the Belarusian side didn’t want to hold them. Then they claimed that we were not going to involve foreign experts to that issue. New suspicions arose when the tests were started (by the way, they were started of our own free will). Said Belarus didn’t plan to take into account the recommendations of the Western experts…

1521185681_5c0f2472183968c5f0383a9241cc6322.jpg

Now most problems are resolved. The European Nuclear Safety Regulators Group checked the Belarusian nuclear power plant. On 9 August the results of the checking were presented by Gosatomnadzor. They were announced by Mark Foy, Chief Nuclear Inspector at Office for Nuclear Regulation in Great Britain.

For the record: no one tried to break strategic assets of the nuclear power plant. There are other ways. At first, Gosatomnadzor prepared the National Report on the safety aspects of the nuclear plant. This information is accessible to the public on the Internet, by the way.

Аfter a detailed examination of the National Report 20 foreign experts headed by Mark Foy visited the construction site of Belarusian nuclear power plant. There they assessed the situation with the help of Belarusian side (the foreign experts conveyed their thanks to our side for the help). On the outcome of that visit the designers, the builders and the operators were asked 460(!) questions, about 120 of which were voiced by the representative of the Republic of Lithuania. The questions were different, some were requiring further development and challenging. All of them were answered in detail by Belarusian side.

IMG_20180809_101710.jpg

According to Mark Foy, the group of experts didn’t study all the aspects of safety of the Belarusian nuclear power plant, but three main ones that acquired special significance after the Fukushima accident: the station's work in conditions of de-energizating and loss of the final heat sink, management of heavy accidents and station management in case of extreme weather events, such as earthquakes, floods and others. Incidentally, after the accident in Japan, similar stress tests were conducted for all nuclear facilities operating in the EU countries. The Belarusians decided to check themselves during the construction phase. According to Mark Foy, this is a unique experience, which deserves a positive evaluation.

Mark Foy told journalists and representatives of the public that the expert group had not found any serious lacks in the safety system of the Belarusian nuclear power plant. However, they proposed some recommendations to increase the safety level of the nuclear power plant.

One of the main recommendations is the additional study of the seismic situation in the construction area of the nuclear power plant, in particular, the assessment of the 1908 earthquake that hit the catalogs, which took place on the territory of the present Ostrovets district according to a publication in one of the newspapers of that time. By the way, the fact of the so-called "Gudogai earthquake" was questioned by Arkady Aronov, director of the Geophysical Monitoring Center of the National Academy of Sciences, who was present in the hall.

IMG_20180809_101706.jpg

Mark Foy also noted the positive aspects of the safety of the Belarusian nuclear power plant, in particular, the existence of a passive protection system which was designed to prevent a nuclear accident even in the absence of electricity. The head of the expert group positively assessed the installation of the so-called melt trap under each of the reactors, as well as the creation of a training center with a full-scale simulator, where personnel work out their actions to the smallest detail in case of any emergency situation. Mark Foy commended the creation of an independent department of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, which was equipped with all necessary equipment. According to him, such specialized units began to be created at nuclear power plants in the United Kingdom only after the accident at Fukushima, and this required additional costs.

Head of the Gosatomnadzor Olga Lugovskaya informed that on the base of the results of the evaluation and recommendations of the expert group would be develop a plan for their implementation. In general, the safety of the Belarusian nuclear power plant is a continuous process. He didn’t start with stress tests and won’t end with the publication of the opinion of the expert group. And first of all there is huge our interest in it. After all, the president of the country set the task to build in Ostrovets the most reliable and safe nuclear power plant.


For the record: the stress tests carried out by the Belarusian nuclear power plant were developed in the European Union as a measure of reaction to events in Japanese Fukushima, where the earthquake and tsunami in 2011 caused a nuclear power plant accident. After that, additional safety measures were taken at all nuclear power plants in Europe. The Belarusian nuclear power plant was tested by the strictest newest criteria.

Текст: Главный администратор