[HN Gopher] Lithuania plans to hold drills in case of accident a...
___________________________________________________________________
Lithuania plans to hold drills in case of accident at the Belarus
nuclear plant
Author : maury91
Score : 148 points
Date : 2021-02-18 10:34 UTC (12 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.lrt.lt)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.lrt.lt)
| cbmuser wrote:
| Lithunia was operating a twin RBMK-1500 (Chernobyl-type) plant
| just 140 km from the site of the new Generation III+ VVER-1200
| plant in Belarus which is magnitudes safer.
|
| The majority of Lithuanians opposed shutting down their own plant
| in Ignalina which was done on request of the European Union. I
| think it was even a requirement for their EU membership.
|
| And now just a decade later, the same people are worried about
| the safety of a far more modern and safer plant as the one that
| they refused to shut down just 140 km away?
|
| Not very credible at all.
|
| Lithuania is just upset because they invested a lot into natural
| gas plants and now Belarus is competing with zero-emission
| electricity from a Generation III+ plant they would love to have
| themselves.
| daliusd wrote:
| Your comment is not very credible at all. In Lithuania we have
| democracy and we have people having different opinions. We had
| actually idea here in Lithuania to build Japanese Atomic Power
| Plant but because of politics this has not happened. In result
| we have Russian one 50km from our Capital. If there is one
| thing Lithuania is upset about it is Belarusian dictatorship
| not following safety regulations while building atomic power
| plant.
| StreamBright wrote:
| It doesn't matter much if the country that builds the power
| plant has a dictatorship or a democracy. Both political
| systems produced nuclear disasters.
|
| The currently built VVER1200 NPP has pretty good safety:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VVER#Safety_features
|
| There are a lot of these (especially the older version of
| VVER1200) reactors operating in the European Union. Some of
| them are not too far from international borders. I think a
| casual Russophobia is the main driving force of the opposing
| voices instead of actual criticism of the VVER1200. I am not
| sure if Russia would want to have another nuclear disaster by
| not taking nuclear safety seriously. It would be really bad
| for business.
|
| Some places where these VVER blocks are operating or going to
| operate:
|
| VVER power stations have been mostly installed in Russia and
| the former Soviet Union, but also in China, Czech Republic,
| Finland, Germany, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, India, and
| Iran. Countries that are planning to introduce VVER reactors
| include Bangladesh, Egypt, Jordan, and Turkey.
|
| What is the scenario that could cause a catastrophic failure
| in the VVER design or implementation that would result in a
| disaster that would create a situation to evacuate cities
| 50kms away?
|
| I am truly interested in this, because I though that VVERs
| where designed to avoid any sort of disaster. This is why
| these have a pretty reliable control rod system with safety
| factor of 5+ and the containment block can survive a Boeing
| 747 flying into it. Do you think there is a real change that
| the reactor going super critical and exploding?
| lukeschlather wrote:
| Chernobyl is the only nuclear disaster that makes me thing
| "hm, maybe really nobody should ever build nuclear power
| plants" and it occurred under a dictatorship. There have
| been significant disasters (Fukushima and Three Mile
| Island) under democracies but both of those are pretty tame
| compared to the ongoing harm wrought by coal and natural
| gas. Even if you just restrict it to direct health effects
| of their pollution vs. all negative health effects from
| Fukushima, at worst Fukushima over its lifetime likely cost
| fewer lives per megawatt-hour than an average coal plant.
|
| (Of course, things like solar and wind are still generally
| preferable, if you can store the power effectively.)
| orbital-decay wrote:
| Chernobyl had RBMK, not VVER, that's the entire point GP
| is making. Reducing Chernobyl/Fukushima/TMI to the
| difference in political systems is derailing the
| conversation and ignores the actual causal chain of each
| event.
| FDSGSG wrote:
| Essentially all Fukushima related deaths were caused by
| the evacuation, which many now consider to have been a
| mistake https://www.ft.com/content/000f864e-22ba-11e8-add
| 1-0e8958b18...
| sandworm101 wrote:
| While we can argue about the extent of the evacuation and
| the extended timeline for return to evacuated areas, the
| fact that there was an evacuation shouldn't be up for
| debate. When uncontrolled explosions happen to buildings
| holding nuclear reactors, regardless of the nature of
| those explosions, the immediate area should be evacuated.
| roenxi wrote:
| On what basis are you claiming that?
|
| In fully half of the INES level 7 the leading cause of
| death was the evacuation. Designed safety systems are
| really good. Evacuating should not be an unthinking
| decision.
| joshuamorton wrote:
| > In fully half of the INES level 7
|
| For anyone reading along here, this is drawn from a
| sample size of 2. (Fukushima and Chernobyl)
| corty wrote:
| Fukushima ended with very little contamination over land
| due to the prevailing weather at the time. But if winds
| and rain hadn't cooperated as nicely, things would have
| been more serious. So I wouldn't say evacuations were
| pointless. However, keeping the area off limits for as
| long as they did was.
| sandworm101 wrote:
| Because evacuations are not done on perfect hindsight.
| They are done with limited and often incorrect live
| information. When building are collapsing atop a reactor,
| when nobody knows for sure what is happening inside, it
| is only reasonable to start moving people away.
| rmind wrote:
| I agree that INES Level 7 accident (well, a disaster at
| this level) is very unlikely and VVER-1200 generally ought
| to be matching the quality of the Western designs at this
| point. Even if the level 7 disaster would happen, the 50 km
| distance is not great and it's "living on the edge", but it
| ought to be just about enough for the population to be
| okay.
|
| However, there are some points you miss:
|
| - There is a lot of space for smaller accidents which can
| happen, including nuclear fuel leaks. Belarusian Power
| Plant is very close to River Neris and, as far as I know,
| uses its water for cooling. River Neris goes through
| Lithuanian capital Vilnius and there is a great concern
| that accidents can contaminate the water.
|
| - See my point in a post bellow about the nuclear power
| plants not being built equal, even if they use the same
| reactor technology.
|
| - Both political systems produced nuclear disasters, but
| accidents above INES Level 5 only occurred in the Soviet
| Union; I am not including Fukushima, because its cause was
| a natural disaster: earthquake followed by tsunami (and
| their 1960s tech was still holding in the immediate
| aftermath). Poor quality standards, general attitude to
| safety, disregard to procedures, etc -- these are the
| common problems in such political systems like the Soviet
| one. Also, many of the accidents in the West occurred in
| 1950s when the nuclear technology was still in its early
| days. So, no, I don't draw the equality between different
| political systems in the context of nuclear safety,
| although perhaps it shouldn't be overestimated either.
| maratc wrote:
| > River Neris goes through Lithuanian capital Vilnius and
| there is a great concern that accidents can contaminate
| the water.
|
| A power plant needs access to water for cooling. Belarus
| is a land-locked country without access to sea, so all of
| its rivers also flow through other countries. Its
| watershed is divided between Nemunas, Daugava, and
| Dnieper, which have Vilnius, Riga, and Kiev situated on
| them. It seems like there's no place you can build a
| power plant there without risking a potential
| contamination of water which would then run through a
| capital of another state.
|
| Also, Lithuanian Ignalina power plant was using the water
| eventually getting into Daugava river, running through
| Riga, a capital of the neighboring Latvia. I can't see
| why Lithuania itself thinks it's ok to risk potential
| contamination of water of a neighboring country capital,
| but not ok when someone else is doing the same to them.
| rmind wrote:
| You have a point here, but I think the proximity is still
| concerning: compare the distance between Ignalina and
| Riga with the distance between Belarus' Power Plant and
| Vilnius.
|
| It is worth mentioning that the UN commission has decided
| that the location of the Belarusian power plant was
| chosen in violation of the Espoo Convention. That's why
| it's not OK.
| maratc wrote:
| Leningrad NPP is at about the same distance from Saint
| Petersburg, Kursk NPP from Kursk, etc. There's a power
| plant in the suburbs of Antwerp, another one in Lyon,
| another two near Toronto, etc. There's a French NPP 20 km
| from Luxembourg and a Swiss NPP on German border. What is
| your point here?
| rmind wrote:
| In the Soviet and other totalitarian systems the
| government could build wherever the hell they wanted, so
| their decision making is really far from exemplary. I
| have no idea why would you build an NPP so close to
| densely populated areas these days, if you have other
| options. I can see the issue in a smaller and densely
| populated country like Netherlands, but not in France
| which is quite more spacious.
|
| A hundred years ago you could happily buy all sorts of
| drugs in your local pharmacy, but it doesn't mean it was
| healthy for people. We came a long way with the safety
| standards and general attitude towards safety. So, the
| point here is: embrace it instead of looking for excuses.
| There really were better sites to build the Belarusian
| NPP, but they built it in violation of the Espoo
| convention instead of embracing safety and cooperation
| with your neighbours.
|
| P.S. It is an official recommendation by the Association
| of Regulators of Western Europe (WENRA) to avoid building
| NPPs closer than 100 km to the big cities. WENRA was
| established in 1999, though, so it's relatively recent.
| maratc wrote:
| I don't know whether Belarus signed the Espoo convention,
| or is a member of Association of Regulators of Western
| Europe, etc.. If your point is, "why don't my neighbours
| play according to my rules", I can see where you're
| coming from, but not necessarily agree.
|
| Belarus suffered the most from Chernobyl accident, with
| 70% of fallout in its territory. And Chernobyl NPP wasn't
| even in their country. I might think that they are well
| positioned to do everything they can to prevent any
| nuclear accident happening in their NPP.
| qilo wrote:
| > Also, Lithuanian Ignalina power plant was using the
| water eventually getting into Daugava river, running
| through Riga, a capital of the neighboring Latvia. I
| can't see why Lithuania itself thinks it's ok to risk
| potential contamination of water of a neighboring country
| capital, but not ok when someone else is doing the same
| to them.
|
| I guess under Soviet regime Lithuanians and Latvians
| didn't have any say in the matter where the nuclear power
| plant must be built (or be built at all).
| maratc wrote:
| I guess after that regime fell, Lithuanians had much say
| in whether to _continue_ operating that plant, and
| between 1990 and 2009 their say was "aye".
| edgi wrote:
| I guess you must have a secret plan none of us are aware
| of on how to transition the entire country off nuclear
| power and diversify its energy sources overnight.
| maratc wrote:
| "Overnight" is a straw man. If Lithuania was extremely
| worried about not polluting Latvia capital's river, it
| wouldn't take them 19 years.
| edgi wrote:
| Oh and polluting rivers being the only factor in this
| matter is not strawman? Changing entire country's energy
| infrastructure takes decades, let alone absorbing that
| economically. Especially when you're a newly formed
| country that at the same time needs to change every other
| aspect of itself to move from socialist to capitalist
| economy, society and infrastructure serving them.
|
| Given the circumstances, I'd call 19 years a great
| success in this case.
| cbmuser wrote:
| > Lithuania imports 70% of its power from Belarus, and
| the average price of electricity is among the highest in
| EU.
|
| From: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignalina_Nuclear_Powe
| r_Plant#S...
| cbmuser wrote:
| > I guess under Soviet regime Lithuanians and Latvians
| didn't have any say in the matter where the nuclear power
| plant must be built (or be built at all).
|
| Why didn't they shut off the plant then right after the
| Iron Curtain fell? In fact, they actually opposed the
| closure of that very plant.
| daliusd wrote:
| > What is the scenario that could cause a catastrophic
| failure in the VVER design or implementation that would
| result in a disaster that would create a situation to
| evacuate cities 50kms away?
|
| There is Neris river that is both near Astravets NPP and
| running through Vilnius - so it is not only 50 kms away and
| adds other risks.
|
| I hope for the best but stuff like this does not give much
| confidence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astravets_Nuclear_
| Power_Plant#...
| rob74 wrote:
| > _VVER power stations have been mostly installed in Russia
| and the former Soviet Union, but also in China, Czech
| Republic, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria,
| India, and Iran._
|
| Not sure about the other ones, but the ones in (East)
| Germany were decomissioned presto after reunification: http
| s://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greifswald_Nuclear_Power_Plant
| cbmuser wrote:
| > Not sure about the other ones, but the ones in (East)
| Germany were decomissioned presto after reunification
|
| Which was completely unjustified. I visited that plant
| and the engineers there confirmed me that the
| VVER-440/213 is safer than all the BWR designs in West-
| Germany.
| petre wrote:
| Germany decomissioned almost everything nuclear. Also a
| politically motivated move. Now they have the highest
| electricity prices in the EU.
|
| VVER reactors have an overall good safety record so far,
| the trouble is this one seems botched.
| rob74 wrote:
| Yeah, they are currently decommissioning all West German
| nuclear plants (initially announced by the Social-
| Democrat/Green government before 2005, then delayed by
| the Christian-Democrat/Social-Democrat government, then
| finally set to 2022 after Fukushima), but this is much
| later than 1990, when the Greifswald plant was
| decommissioned. Of course, that was only 4 years after
| Chernobyl, that may help explain the decision...
| cbmuser wrote:
| Both Greifswald and Rheinsberg were built according to
| German standards. East Germany even produced the reactor
| pressure vessels themselves.
|
| Also, the blocks 5-8 in Greifswald were modern
| VVER-440/213 which are far more reliable and safe than
| for example the SWR-69 reactor types used in
| Neckerwestheim I, Kruemmel and Isar 1 which were all in
| operation until 2011.
| cbmuser wrote:
| > In result we have Russian one 50km from our Capital.
|
| And? You've been running one of the unsafest reactor designs
| in history and you were actually opposed to shutting it off.
|
| You just built a brand new LNG terminal in Klaipeda [1] and,
| of course, having such a big plant in Belarus generating 2400
| MW of carbon-free energy will mean that electricity
| production from LNG is getting a fierce competition.
|
| > [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_FSRU
| bluelu wrote:
| Many years ago, there were discussions here in Luxembourg to
| build a nuclear power plant together with the French in the
| east of Luxembourg. The "greens" at that time were against
| it, so it was not being build.
|
| But the french build it then in France just 10km from the
| border (the biggest at that time with 4 reactors), and it's
| closer to our capital then your nuclear power plant to yours.
| brnt wrote:
| If you like questionable nucleair power plant placement,
| look up Chooz.
| dainiusse wrote:
| The problem is - I'd trust french people, but not
| belarus/russia. As their quality sign - check out the cars
| they produce...
| cbmuser wrote:
| Well, look at the Russian space program. There haven't
| been any fatal accidents in the Russian/Soviet space
| program since 1971 as opposed to the US where the last
| fatal accident happened 20 years ago (Columbia accident).
|
| See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-
| related_ac...
| redis_mlc wrote:
| > Well, look at the Russian space program.
|
| Excuse me, but the Russians tried to compete with the US
| moon program. Their rockets were so unsafe they killed
| one of their most famous cosmonauts (friend of Gagarin,
| who told him not to go) and finally gave up. He knew it
| was a one-way trip, but boarded because patriotism.
|
| The problem with communist countries is that the Party
| and its narrative always comes first, and the "little
| people" are last.
| stemc43 wrote:
| As a Belarussian - go to hell. Belarus simply dint sell out
| like Lithuania did and all the dictatorship rhetoric - are
| cheap propaganda shots.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| I think the issue is that they don't trust Belarus to properly
| manage their nuclear plants, not that they don't trust nuclear
| plants in general.
|
| Given that Belarus is a corrupt authoritarian regime that's
| teetering on the edge, I'd say that's a fair concern.
| cbmuser wrote:
| The plant has been inspected by IAEA personnel and is
| currently being inspected by EU nuclear experts.
|
| > https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/iaea-delivers-inir-
| miss...
|
| >
| https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975
| trhway wrote:
| your comment sounds like you aren't familiar with those places.
| Anyway, one thing is to bear risk and harvest associated
| benefits, and another is just to bear the even higher risks
| without any benefits. Also the way the prevalent wind goes
| there the old Lithuanian plant was threatening mostly Latvia,
| while the current Belarusian plant mostly threatens Lithuania
| and the most populous region of it at that. I don't see how
| Lithuanians couldn't be upset by that development. Though i
| don't think drills or anything would help them much if
| something happens at the plant - any release would hit Vilnus
| in a matter of a couple of hours.
| maratc wrote:
| Lithuania closed their own plant with pressure from EU, and
| later voted down a proposal to build a new NPP instead. I
| guess that gave them a feeling of "nuclear safety". Now they
| lost that safety through no fault of their own, and they
| can't have it back, so they are upset.
|
| I only hope Lithuania will take it to a good direction: if
| there is and would never be any nuclear safety anyway, maybe
| they can at least enjoy the benefits of NPP by building their
| own.
| trhway wrote:
| Lithuania is too small to have any nuclear industry of
| their own. They would have to depend on some big nuclear
| power in supply chain and spent fuel processing. And Big
| Nuclear is like Big Oil - very corrupting to your society.
| What is going to work for them is combination of solar&wind
| - that combination works great on Baltic - plus natural gas
| with diversifying supply from Russia with LNG from US,
| Saudis, etc. plus high power integration into EU power grid
| which they have already done.
| cbmuser wrote:
| Natural gas isn't helping to reduce greenhouse gas
| emissions.
|
| Lithuania can opt for small nuclear reactors like Estonia
| did:
|
| > https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/No-time-to-
| waste-in-...
| trhway wrote:
| Honestly, whatever Estonia or Lithuania do would hardly
| directly affect total greenhouse gas emissions of our
| civilization. Given local geopolitics their first
| priority is survival and prosperity as independent
| states. If they can do it while getting and staying
| "clean" - and i think they can do it by using more
| solar&wind (and that will even enhance their
| independence) - great, and if they have to burn some
| natural gas - nobody will really notice given their size
| especially considering that natural gas is the cleanest
| energy source among the "dirty". While getting nuclear in
| any way for them would mean losing a bit of independence
| (that closing of their own NPP at the will of EU is a
| clear example that your nuclear industry decisions aren't
| really yours and are actually subject to the will of the
| bigger powers).
| wolfram74 wrote:
| The data supports the idea that nuclear power is safe, making
| them /feel/ safe is the next step in widespread adoption, so we
| have a lot of FUD to undo from the coal lobby. Drills and
| explicit plans might help from the "there's nothing you can do"
| angle. I'm not sure, though.
| rmind wrote:
| A few points:
|
| - The RBMK-1500 in the now decommissioned Ignalina Power Plant
| wasn't built near a big city, unlike the Belarusian power
| plant.
|
| - Lithuania invested a lot into the safety of the Ignalina
| Power Plant, installing the latest European safety systems.
| Partly thanks to EU, yes, but the point is that there was
| cooperation and safety improvements. Belarus largely ignored
| the safaty concerns and recommendations by the International
| Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
|
| - Lithuania didn't invest into natural gas -- this is just
| factually not true. Elektrenai Power Plant was modernized
| (well, in fact, they just built a modern one in the same site
| and closed down the old units) as a strategic "backup" power
| plant, but the overall capacity was not expanded. If anything,
| Lithuania has been investing significantly into renewable
| energy, although perhaps not as much as we would wish.
| cbmuser wrote:
| > - The RBMK-1500 in the now decommissioned Ignalina Power
| Plant wasn't built near a big city, unlike the Belarusian
| power plant.
|
| Well, it was around 120 km from Vilnius, the new NPP is 60 km
| from Vilnius which is still sufficient. Leningrad NPP is
| around 70 km from St. Petersburg.
|
| > Lithuania invested a lot into the safety of the Ignalina
| Power Plant, installing the latest European safety systems.
| Partly thanks to EU, yes, but the point is that there was
| cooperation and safety improvements.
|
| It's still an RBMK and therefore far less safe than any VVER-
| type reactor.
|
| > Belarus largely ignored the safaty concerns and
| recommendations by the International Atomic Energy Agency
| (IAEA).
|
| The IAEA was on site and inspected the plant:
|
| > https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/iaea-delivers-inir-
| miss...
|
| There is currently also a EU nuclear expert group at the
| site:
|
| >
| https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1361996208928153604
|
| - Lithuania didn't invest into natural gas -- this is just
| factually not true.
|
| Quoting:
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2020/04/28/eu-
| nuclear...
|
| "For Lithuania, which invested a lot of money in a liquefied
| natural gas floating storage and regasification unit in
| Klaipeda a few years ago, the Belarussian nuke plant means it
| is a potentially cheaper, and definitely cleaner, readily
| available source of power generation for neighboring nations.
| In theory, that takes Lithuania out of the market. It's the
| reason they are working overtime to get countries not to buy
| energy generated from it."
|
| Wikipedia source on the LNG terminal:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_FSRU
| NeutronStar wrote:
| > The RBMK-1500 in the now decommissioned Ignalina Power
| Plant wasn't built near a big city, unlike the Belarusian
| power plant.
|
| So they need to hold in case of accident at the Belarus
| nuclear plant but it was fine for their own plant in their
| own country?
|
| > didn't invest into natural gas -- this is just factually
| not true. Elektrenai Power Plant was modernized as a
| strategic "backup" power plant, but the overall capacity was
| not expanded.
|
| So no money was invested into the power plant but somehow it
| got upgraded for free?
| ohnoesjmr wrote:
| They are mostly concerned with the incidents that Belarus tried
| to hide during construction, showing that corners have been cut
| and the safety of the plant is in questionable state. A fair
| thing to be concerned about.
| cbmuser wrote:
| Source for these claims?
|
| There are EU nuclear inspectors on the site:
|
| >
| https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975
| sparkling wrote:
| Pretty much this. Its politics, especially after the recent
| post-election events in Belarus.
| rmind wrote:
| By the way, just one more point: Generation III+ VVER-1200
| reactors and all the systems around them are not the same in
| different power plants.
|
| VVER-1200 is used in Hanhikivi Nuclear Power Plant built in
| Finland by Russian Rosatom. This particular power plant uses
| comprehensive "package" with extra safety features and also a
| lot of European equipment. Yet, the regulators still identified
| a considerable list of issues to be addressed.
|
| Belarus, on the other hand, opted for the cheapest "basic"
| package with the bare minimum and pretty much "winged" the
| whole construction, ignoring all foreign concerns.
| cbmuser wrote:
| > Belarus, on the other hand, opted for the cheapest "basic"
| package with the bare minimum and pretty much "winged" the
| whole construction, ignoring all foreign concerns.
|
| Do you have a source for that claim?
| fuoqi wrote:
| Any reliable sources which would confirm that Belarus indeed
| uses "the cheapest" package without "extra safety features"?
| exabrial wrote:
| Yep, I'm looking for this too. The VVER-1200 design
| definitely seems like it has a myriad of safety features,
| so I'm curious what is being left out.
| cbmuser wrote:
| I would carefully argue that there is a lot of fear-
| mongering from the Lithuanian side because the new NPP
| poses a great financial risk to Lithuania's investments
| into liquefied natural gas.
|
| Good article on the issue:
| https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2020/04/28/eu-
| nuclear...
| Maakuth wrote:
| It is perhaps also worth mentioning that the construction of
| the Hanhikivi plant has not started yet. Indeed according to
| their latest press release[1] about the situation, they say
| that 5/15 document batches of the preliminary safety review
| have been submitted so far. So while this plant is going to
| be based on the same design, there's going to be an extensive
| review of all the details and quite possibly a lot of changes
| to match the regulatory requirements.
|
| 1: https://www.fennovoima.fi/en/news/quarterly-update-basic-
| des...
| cbmuser wrote:
| > It is perhaps also worth mentioning that the construction
| of the Hanhikivi plant has not started yet.
|
| Looks like it has: https://twitter.com/PekkaTMakinen/status
| /1354383491937538051
|
| Also, Finland already has a plant with two VVER reactors
| built in cooperation with the Soviet Union:
|
| > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loviisa_Nuclear_Power_Plant
| u320 wrote:
| > Yet, the regulators still identified a considerable list of
| issues to be addressed.
|
| This is normal for any plant. Doesn't mean that VVER is less
| safe.
| rob74 wrote:
| The distance between the plants is not the point - the point is
| that the Ignalina plant was in a sparsely populated area ~150
| km from Vilnius (and subject to EU regulations), while the new
| plant is only ~60 km from Vilnius (and subject to Belarusian
| regulations).
| maratc wrote:
| There's a French NPP 20 km from Luxembourg and Swiss NPP on a
| river dividing them from Germany.
|
| Chernobyl was 100km from Kiev (with a population of 2.5m),
| but Kiev almost did not suffer, as the winds took the fallout
| in the direction of ... Belarus, where 70% of it landed.
|
| Given that Belarus can reliably claim the title of a country
| worst affected by nuclear accidents even before they had a
| NPP of their own, I think they are well positioned to do
| everything to prevent any such accidents in the future.
| Holding nation-wide "drills" just for the case looks a bit
| like demonizing.
| cbmuser wrote:
| Germany has lots of plants near larger cities.
| Neckarwestheim NPP, for example, is just about 25 km from
| the city of Stuttgart and it operated a rather old boiling
| water reactor at the site until 2011.
|
| At this point, only the far more modern Neckarwestheim II
| is operational at the site.
| bluecalm wrote:
| Older, less advanced reactor run by a democratic country is
| safer than modern more advanced reactor run by what is
| basically a dictatorship.
| paganel wrote:
| We'd need to have prove for that, afaik the reactor at
| Fukushima was not old and Japan is a strong democracy.
| eldaisfish wrote:
| >afaik the reactor at Fukushima was not old
|
| That's not true. All of Fukushima reactors were constructed
| before Chernobyl's reactors. Fukushima's reactors are based
| on a 50's design by GE/Westinghouse.
|
| They are very old to the point where they could be labelled
| ancient.
| Hamuko wrote:
| I'd argue that Chernobyl, which was basically a man-made
| disaster that stemmed from a drill, is quite fundamentally
| different from getting hit by the fourth highest magnitude
| earthquake known to man.
| paganel wrote:
| > which was basically a man-made disaster
|
| So the man-made disaster consisted in allowing to build
| something like this in an area where there are
| earthquakes so big.
| watt wrote:
| For me, the man-made disaster is the amount of dirty coal
| the Germany burns, after shutting down their nuclear
| power plants. And from pressure by the Greens, no less!
|
| Man made disaster is the prices for electricity we pay in
| Germany, while France is happy generating nuclear power
| and pays 30% less.
| rmind wrote:
| Even for a strong democracy it is tough to sustain the blow
| of a magnitude 9.0 earthquake followed by tsunami. And no,
| reactors/technology in Fukushima were not new, they were
| from 1960s.
| xyzzyz wrote:
| RBMK is not simply "less advanced" design, it is dangerously
| unsafe.
| cbmuser wrote:
| Exactly.
| duxup wrote:
| It seems like the could be plenty of reasons to want to
| maintain a nuclear power plant, and be concerned with safety
| about others, or even all of them.
| ceilingcorner wrote:
| The EU and NATO have a vested interest in making Belarus seem
| like a scary, dangerous place that needs regime change.
| proxysna wrote:
| Lived there up until August. It's not nato, it's an insane
| old man that is turning my country into a concentration camp
| makes Belarus look like a scary place that needs change.
| brnt wrote:
| What nonsense is this? I've never heard anyone say that about
| Belarus (I hold a EU passport and have lived in a few
| countries). Sure, there is a problem with their dictator, and
| many, probably most Belarussians agree. Don't confuse that
| for 'hating Belarus' or whatever you are trying to imply.
| cheph wrote:
| Lukashenko must be on their payroll because he is by far the
| most effective at making it seems like a place that needs
| regime change.
| maury91 wrote:
| If I was Belarus and I didn't want to look scary, I would
| have avoided building a Nuclear Power Plant near the capital
| of my neighbouring EU country.
|
| A safest place could have been in the direction of Ignalina,
| the area has low density population both in Belarus,
| Lithuania and Latvia.
|
| And because the Lithuanians did build a NPP in that position
| in precedence, they would have lost one of the main point
| they are complaining about: proximity to the capital
| axnk wrote:
| Belarusian here, actually we don't need this NPP too!
|
| In our non-democratic country all decisions are made by
| single person and you know his name. The idea of selling
| electricity to Baltics was imposed by Russia to him. Russia
| gives loan and builds NPP, and Belarus makes money. Who'd
| say no to this, right?
|
| Now, when Lithuania makes everything it can to ban
| transferring electricity from Belarusian NPP into EU, our
| government has a painful headache. They really don't know
| how to use this electricity inside Belarus. They also need
| to build new reserve capacity for NPP.
|
| P.S. 1-st NPP in Belarus/BSSSR were being constructed ~ in
| 35km (22 miles) from Minsk (capital). But it was cancelled
| after Chernobyl explosion and converted into gas-fired
| power plant.
|
| P.P.S Less than mont ago our minister of energy were
| talking about 2nd and 3rd NPP.
| cbmuser wrote:
| > Belarusian here, actually we don't need this NPP too!
|
| Belarus previously had 99% of its electricity produced by
| thermal plants. The new NPP will produce 30% of the power
| in Belarus and seriously reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
|
| See: https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/13235808273
| 77258507
| ceilingcorner wrote:
| Probably, I'm just saying that there is likely more to this
| story. I've personally seen the misleading narratives about
| Belarus and Russia that are all-too-common in Western
| media.
| ksm1717 wrote:
| Why would you hold erring on the side of caution against them?
| cbmuser wrote:
| Because Lithuania has very good economical reasons to be
| upset about this plant:
|
| Quote:
|
| "Lithuania invested almost 500 million euros in their
| aspiration of being an LNG supplier for an EU supposedly
| weening neighbors from Russia. Since then, their EU partners,
| led by Germany, collaborated with Gazprom to build a second
| natural gas pipeline to Germany, undercutting Lithuania."
|
| > https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2020/04/28/eu-
| nuclear...
| lnsru wrote:
| Let's think from other side. It's a great geopolitical move.
| Russia build a power plant almost on the EU border. It will be
| paid by Belarus. That's even cooler. Now imagine some bad event
| going in Vilnius. Like some NATO conference. 30 minutes before it
| radioactive water comes through the river Neris and the city must
| be evacuated. Conference didn't happen. I even don't see a good
| way for city evacuation. There is not enough road capacity to the
| west. Like 2 roads with 2 lanes each. During serious nuclear
| disaster the whole city is sitting ducks, there is not place to
| hide and no road to run.
| hangonhn wrote:
| > Let's think from other side.
|
| You're not thinking. You're fantasizing and projecting. In your
| fantasy you basically stripped the Russians of all humanity to
| the point where they would intentionally poison a river with
| highly dangerous nuclear waste to stop a NATO conference and
| basically kill off an entire city.
|
| Rather than these complicated conspiracy theories, a far
| simpler explanation is that Belarus needs energy and Russia has
| a nuclear power industry. Russia have sold these power plants
| all over the world, not just next to the EU border. If Russia
| really wanted to do something so horrific they don't need to go
| through all the steps of building a complicated nuclear power
| plant to do it. They have plenty of weapons in their arsenal to
| do it already.
| lnsru wrote:
| Well, these guys like poisoning bad people in foreign
| countries with weird substances. So dropping couple
| radioactive barrels into a river does not sound that
| unrealistic to me. And it then makes a thing called
| "accident". Using weapon is an "attack", what is totally
| uncool nowadays.
| 35fbe7d3d5b9 wrote:
| Targeted actions against individuals is bread and butter
| covert operations for states. Just ask the CIA or the
| Mossad. I don't think you can use the evidence of targeted
| attacks to suggest that a state will engage in crimes
| against humanity.
| wassenaar10 wrote:
| > In your fantasy you basically stripped the Russians of all
| humanity to the point where they would intentionally poison a
| river with highly dangerous nuclear waste to stop a NATO
| conference and basically kill off an entire city.
|
| That's true, Russians only intentionally poison individuals
| and not entire cities.
| pvaldes wrote:
| > In your fantasy you basically stripped the Russians of
| all humanity to the point where they would intentionally
| poison a river with highly dangerous nuclear waste... and
| kill off an entire city.
|
| Meanwhile in Nagasaki...
| pvaldes wrote:
| > In your fantasy you basically stripped the Russians of
| all humanity to the point where they would intentionally
| poison a river with highly dangerous nuclear waste... and
| kill off an entire city.
|
| Yep, good people wouldn't never, ever, think about doing
| something like that. We are 100% safe.
|
| Meanwhile in Nagasaki...
| selivanovp wrote:
| You should eat your pills again asap.
| rmind wrote:
| It's a bit of a stretch, isn't it? :) In addition to the safety
| concerns, you are absolutely right that it was also a Russian
| geopolitical project, though, just with more realistic and with
| more practical objectives.
|
| One of the objectives was an attempt to make the Baltic States
| dependant on the Russian (well, Belarusian, but due to
| political realities it doesn't quite matter) energy supplies by
| flooding them with cheap electricity and discouraging them from
| diversification. Such dependency would give some means to make
| political influence to the Baltics. This was in addition to
| another objective of making Belarus even more economically
| reliant on Russia (in this case, very cheap but large loans
| given to build the power plant).
|
| However, I don't think they managed to gain anything in the
| Baltics, because of a robust strategic response from the Baltic
| States: 1) they diversified their electricity supply with more
| links to Scandinavia and Poland (see NordBalt, EstLink and
| LitPol projects) 2) created an open and well functioning
| electricity market (see Nord Pool) 3) eventually decided to
| boycott the electricity from the Belarus Power Plant,
| undermining its economic basis.
|
| Russia succeeded in tightening the economic grip on Belarus,
| but in terms of economic dependency, things are already pretty
| grim there..
| billfruit wrote:
| Isn't geopolitical paranoia running too high these days even
| compared to the Cold War in certain aspects.
|
| I remember Canada building Nuclear Reactors in Romania during
| the Cold War years.
|
| Even during the 90s USA I think even started work on nuclear
| reactors in North Korea.
|
| Even recently Russia is building a nuclear power plant in
| Turkey.
| petre wrote:
| Some nuclear tech choices are geopolitically motivated.
| Romania licensed CANDU specifically because its then
| communist leader did not trust the Soviets after the invasion
| if Hungary and Czechoslovakia. They also have or had domestic
| heavy water production and domestic nuclear fuel production.
| [deleted]
| Scoundreller wrote:
| I would do this in SimCity: always build my coal and nuke
| plants at the corner of town :)
| brutusborn wrote:
| I wonder why they practice distributing iodine pills rather than
| just distribute them ahead of time?
|
| The article reminds me of fraudulent material certificates at
| South Korean nuclear plants. As much as I advocate for nuclear
| power, I am fearful that more disasters will occur due to human
| error.
| maury91 wrote:
| That power plant has a LOT of human error, from the news, it
| appears they made many mistake while building the power plant (
| breaking stuff, pouring concrete in the wrong way, ... ) and
| they did try to hide it. And many incidents after turning the
| power plant on.
|
| I also think that Nuclear plants are safe, but only when
| constructed and operated properly, and this doesn't seems the
| case.
|
| - tanks imploding: https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-
| english/19/1288877/belarusian-... - transformers exploding:
| https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-english/19/1272842/incident-re...
| - broke a reactor vessel: https://bellona.org/news/nuclear-
| issues/2017-05-rosatom-repl...
| cbmuser wrote:
| Lithuania was operating an RBMK (Chernobyl-type) reactor just
| 140 km away from that new Generation III+ design and the
| majority of Lithuanians opposed the closure of the plant in
| Ignalina.
|
| And that reactor vessel was never used, it's actually still
| lying on the compound of Atommash in Volgodonsk.
|
| Furthermore, transformers have been failing at NPPs in the
| West as well.
| maury91 wrote:
| The point is not that they are using a broken reactor
| vessel, but that they tried to hide it.
|
| The construction of the plant was problematic, and it had
| several incidents while running.
|
| You can't trust a government that tries to cover up every
| incidents that happens and could have international
| repercussions.
| nikaspran wrote:
| Iodine pills have been distributed already. This is most likely
| for subsequent doses.
| rmind wrote:
| Yup: https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-
| english/19/1256930/vilnius-han...
| [deleted]
| johanneskanybal wrote:
| Everyone hates nuclear and has been told to hate nuclear for
| decades. Irrational and hope it changes fast enough.
| selivanovp wrote:
| It's fun to see how Lithuanians fucked up their own nuclear power
| plant, basically murdered their own cheap energy production, then
| had to buy electricity from other countries and stage drills to
| pretend they closed their own station "for good".
| slicktux wrote:
| Aren't drills more for safety preparedness for worst case
| scenario rather than fear driven; I see no problem here if it's
| the former...
| OnAironaut wrote:
| Looks like cbmuser will be working overtime today.
| dang wrote:
| You can't attack another user like that on HN. We ban accounts
| that do this, so please don't do it again. Instead, if you're
| worried about abuse, please follow the site guidelines and
| email us so we can look into it.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| dmos62 wrote:
| What you probably mean is that this user is often active in
| similar topics. What your comment might be interpreted to say
| is that cbmuser is paid to participate, as in troll farming.
| Whatever you meant, let's try and steer away from what might be
| seen as inflamatory remarks.
| Udo wrote:
| Not sure if that's typical, but my perspective is this: I
| know almost nothing about energy infrastructure, and even
| less about local conditions and history in that field. I do
| tend to lend credibility to HN users who seem to have
| detailed knowledge, like _cbmuser_. However, I also see that
| they are often engaged in heated discussions where basic
| statements of facts are disputed on both sides.
|
| With that in mind, I don't see why it would have to be
| inflammatory to ask cbmuser if a) they work in that field b)
| there are potential conflicts of interest and c) what their
| general outlook is. Even if there is a conflict of interest,
| that wouldn't invalidate their positions, of course, it's
| just something to keep in mind when reading.
|
| _Edit:_ you 're right dmos62, this comment was a bit trite.
| I can't delete it anymore now. Thank you for clarifying
| anyway!
| dmos62 wrote:
| I don't think it's inflamatory to investigate some user. We
| all tend to lend credibility to those we perceive as having
| detailed knowledge.
|
| What I was talking about is that the topic of this thread
| is unfortunately inflammatory due to regional politics, so
| we should be careful to maintain a standard of discussion.
| bob29 wrote:
| I'll say it, that user reguritates rhetoric and talking
| points that happen to be aligned with a multi-billion
| lobbying industry, but they're always packaged in social
| media comment sized appealing package.
|
| Very few on HN actually work in the energy industry and so
| anything that "sounds about right" gets accepted if the
| person says it confidently. Unlike anything related to
| computer languages, where there are people who also know
| the topic techncially to debate.
|
| It's a case of "those who speak do not know, those who know
| do not speak _" _ because to do the topic justice would be
| a longer comment than anyone wants to read, and it
| cbmuser's ignorant comment is sure to be at the top.
| dang wrote:
| Insinuations of astroturfing and shillage are not allowed
| on HN without evidence. If you want to know more about
| why, it has been explained countless times over many
| years--see the links below. The short version is that
| internet users have an overwhelming tendency to imagine
| this into other people's comments, so there needs to be
| something objective to go on, and someone else having a
| different opinion is not objective evidence.
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=co
| mme...
|
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&
| que...
| lorenzhs wrote:
| Nah, I disagree with him a lot, too, but I recognise the
| nickname from other communities. He's just a dude who's
| very passionate about nuclear power and, iirc, holds some
| other views I strongly disagree with. But he's entitled
| to his views and opinions. I'm much more annoyed by the
| people who vote his comments to the top :)
| londons_explore wrote:
| This seems at least 60% political to try to get the population
| worried about foreign 'scary' nuclear, and the fact they have no
| control over it...
| duxup wrote:
| How do you calculate 60%?
| varjag wrote:
| Belarusian here.
|
| Lithuanians hardly have a perception of Belarusians as "scary
| foreigners" due to enormous amount of shared history, culture
| and even cuisine. It's foreign in the sense an Irish is foreign
| to an English, or a Norwegian to a Swede.
|
| Lithuanians did live under the not dissimilar regime for half a
| century though and they understand how safety is done in such
| circumstances. The power station had numerous incidents during
| construction and commissioning, including human fatalities.
| Can't blame them for taking precautions.
| KDJohnBrown wrote:
| Perhaos Lithuania has valid fears about the stability of the
| country given the unrest over dictator Lukashenko's sham
| elections.
|
| The region doesn't exactly a stellar reputation in honesty after
| nuclear incidents. Japan was instantly honeat about Fukushima.
| Russia still lies about Chernobyl.
| AnotherGoodName wrote:
| >Japan was instantly honest about Fukushima
|
| They acknowledge it now but when it hit there were non-stop
| blog posts going viral about how it's impossible for Fukushima
| to suffer a meltdown due to the design. The Japanese government
| was restricting information so tightly that there was no
| refutation of this misinformation.
|
| Josef Oehmen's "Why I am not worried about Japan's nuclear
| reactors" went viral for example:
| https://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20266-how-josef-oehme...
|
| It was all very reminiscent of the Soviet "It's impossible for
| Chernobyl to meltdown".
|
| So no Japan was not instantly honest. They were not informing
| people of the real situation even after they knew.
| jacquesm wrote:
| Chernobyl came pretty close, if you read whatever factual
| information is available about the progression of the
| accident there were at least two moments where very small
| changes made all the difference.
| LockAndLol wrote:
| Is this being done in other places close to nuclear plants? The
| article just mentions that there are allegations of security
| standards not being followed but who was making the accusations
| and why?
|
| And why are the Baltic states pulling out of the Belorussian
| energy network?
|
| I find the article pretty sparse on details.
| petre wrote:
| > And why are the Baltic states pulling out of the Belorussian
| energy network?
|
| To protest the operation of the new power plant. Belarus has no
| reason to operate it in the first place if they don't have
| buyers for the electricity. They'll probably exchange with
| Kalinigrad and mainland Russia anyway and electricity from the
| Astravets NPP could end up in the Baltics via the Russian grid.
| It's just that they make it more expensive this way. Latvia
| wants to ask for origin certificates for Russian electricity,
| which is kind of silly. How does one discern between a Russian
| or a Belorussian megawatt?
|
| https://www.reuters.com/article/litgrid-belarus-idUSKBN27J2C...
|
| Also, this is a politically motivated move that actually
| reduces safety because if the NPP's somehow gets disconnected
| from the grid and the exchange with the Baltics is shut down as
| well, they have a loss of coolant accident on their hands. I
| really hope they have working diesel generators in good
| condition and good interconnects with Russia and Poland.
| Deukhoofd wrote:
| Several Dutch, German and Luxembourg cities and states have
| been trying to shut down a Belgian nuclear reactor (Tihange)
| due to safety concerns, but I don't think it has come to drills
| yet.
| Pawka wrote:
| Probably because all countries you've mentioned are members
| of EU and transparency level is high. Meanwhile Belarus
| already tried to hide accidents in the power plant while
| building it and haven't allowed inspection from foreign
| countries. I assume (and hope) such cases won't happen in
| Belgium PP.
| rmind wrote:
| Some context: -
| https://www.ft.com/content/a98322de-96f7-11e7-b83c-9588e51488a0
| - https://www.rferl.org/a/belarus-launched-nuclear-power-plant-
| despite-safety-issues-/30928660.html -
| https://www.euronews.com/2020/05/21/belarus-nuclear-plant-
| minsk-set-to-fire-up-reactor-just-45km-from-vilnius
|
| Basically, Belarus mostly ignored numerous safety
| recommendations by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
| and other parties. There were several accidents during the
| construction of the power plant, including the one where
| workers dropped the 330 ton reactor vessel. All that raised
| many questions about the general quality standards in the
| Belarusian project.
|
| Lithuania issued several diplomatic notes and protests,
| requesting to address the safety issues, but there was little
| cooperation from the other side.
| Tade0 wrote:
| So that's how you build a nuclear power plant in 6 years.
|
| I wonder if the Chinese are just more efficient at this or do
| they cut corners as well?
| rmind wrote:
| I don't know about China, but I would guess that the
| economies of scale might have an impact. If you are
| planning to building 100 power plants, you can probably
| design your processes such that after the initial
| production, the further ones could be built much quicker..
| as you already have your assembly lines ready and busy.
| samizdis wrote:
| That reminded me of a Wired article I read many years ago
| (turns out that it was in 2009) that got me optimistic
| about China and the development of safe nuclear power:
|
| _Let a Thousand Reactors Bloom_
|
| https://www.wired.com/2004/09/china-5/
| vincnetas wrote:
| Recent EU resolution (with more details) regarding safety
| situation in this nuclear power plant :
| https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/document/B-9-2021-0109_...
| cbmuser wrote:
| The EU inspectors haven't even finished their work yet, but
| the European parliament is already sure the plant is unsafe:
|
| >
| https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1361996208928153604
| vincnetas wrote:
| If you read the resolution it says that inspectors have not
| finished everything. But what worries EU is what they
| already found, and what recommendations they made, which
| are still not implemented by Belarus. Have you read the
| resolution? It's only 3 pages long.
| dmos62 wrote:
| Such an inspection is incremental. What will be found later
| won't undo what was found previously.
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