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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 magnitud

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.

ksm1717 6y ago
Why would you hold erring on the side of caution against them?
- cbmuser 6y ago
  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-fears-just-because-its-russian-doesnt-mean-its-bad/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2020/04/28/eu-nuclear...
wolfram74 6y ago
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 6y ago
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.
- NeutronStar 6y ago
  > 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?
- cbmuser 6y ago
  > - 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-mission-reports-to-belarus-and-egypt 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 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-fears-just-because-its-russian-doesnt-mean-its-bad/ 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 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_FSRU
rmind 6y ago
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.
- Maakuth 6y ago
  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-design-moves-next-stage https://www.fennovoima.fi/en/news/quarterly-update-basic-des...
  - cbmuser 6y ago
    > 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 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 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loviisa_Nuclear_Power_Plant
    - Maakuth 6y ago
      Yes, they are constructing infrastructure like office buildings and roads to the power plant area. But none of that is under nuclear safety regulations. They will only start the plant construction once the plans have approval from the regulatory body. Loviisa plants are VVER, but they too underwent a lot of redesign compared to the Soviet reference to meet safety criteria. That's why they called it "Eastinghouse".
rob74 6y ago
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 6y ago
  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 6y ago
    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.
    - natmaka 6y ago
      At best this is another manifestation of the "is–ought problem" and AFAIK there is no way to decide, at worst it is an appeal to tradition ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_tradition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_tradition ).
ceilingcorner 6y ago
The EU and NATO have a vested interest in making Belarus seem like a scary, dangerous place that needs regime change.
- cheph 6y ago
  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 6y ago
  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
  - ceilingcorner 6y ago
    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.
  - axnk 6y ago
    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.
daliusd 6y ago
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 6y ago
  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 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?
  - rob74 6y ago
    > 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: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greifswald_Nuclear_Power_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greifswald_Nuclear_Power_Plant
bluecalm 6y ago
Older, less advanced reactor run by a democratic country is safer than modern more advanced reactor run by what is basically a dictatorship.
- xyzzyz 6y ago
  RBMK is not simply “less advanced” design, it is dangerously unsafe.
  - cbmuser 6y ago
    Exactly.
- paganel 6y ago
  We'd need to have prove for that, afaik the reactor at Fukushima was not old and Japan is a strong democracy.
  - Hamuko 6y ago
    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 6y ago
      > 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 6y ago
        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.
duxup 6y ago
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.
ashtonkem 6y ago
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 6y ago
  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-mission-reports-to-belarus-and-egypt https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/iaea-delivers-inir-miss... > https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975 https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975
  - fomine3 6y ago
    Is inspection enough to operate reliable services?
ohnoesjmr 6y ago
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 6y ago
  Source for these claims? There are EU nuclear inspectors on the site: > https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975 https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975
sparkling 6y ago
Pretty much this. Its politics, especially after the recent post-election events in Belarus.
trhway 6y ago
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 6y ago
  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 6y ago
    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 6y ago
      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-Estonian-SMR-deployment-confer https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/No-time-to-waste-in-...
osacial 6y ago
Well, people in Latvia were very upset about plant in Ignalina - not because of the distance from Riga, but because of a very close distance from border of Latvia(because not all of them are living in Riga). I guess, this is a very political topic and that has nothing to do with technical parameters of plants, because Belarus is constantly polluting rivers and that pollution is coming through into neighbouring countries. And there is nothing that these countries can do about and power plant belongs to the same issue. Yeah, your commenting activity doesn't seem to be Russian troll at all to readers of NH, but for someone who has to encounter similar active trolls in Baltic sources, this doesn't seem like credible non-troll activity(paid or unpaid - doesn't matter). So, under a threat of being blocked here, I think, that it should be noted that some of the behaviour of cbmuser(and accompanying friends and "opponents") ticks most of the flags of what in Baltics is known under a name of "Russian troll factory", where they are actively swarming on specific topics.
natmaka 6y ago
One decade later Lithuanians can change their minds about all this (their plant is now closed). Or they may be less confident when they don't manage a plant. In any case they may be right even if they didn't apply their own precepts ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque ) > Lithuania is just upset because they invested a lot into natural gas plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_motive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_motive

ksm1717 6y ago

Why would you hold erring on the side of caution against them?

cbmuser 6y ago
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-fears-just-because-its-russian-doesnt-mean-its-bad/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/kenrapoza/2020/04/28/eu-nuclear...

wolfram74 6y ago

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 6y ago

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.

NeutronStar 6y ago
> 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?
cbmuser 6y ago
> - 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-mission-reports-to-belarus-and-egypt 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 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-fears-just-because-its-russian-doesnt-mean-its-bad/ 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 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_FSRU

rmind 6y ago

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.

Maakuth 6y ago
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-design-moves-next-stage https://www.fennovoima.fi/en/news/quarterly-update-basic-des...
- cbmuser 6y ago
  > 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 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 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loviisa_Nuclear_Power_Plant
  - Maakuth 6y ago
    Yes, they are constructing infrastructure like office buildings and roads to the power plant area. But none of that is under nuclear safety regulations. They will only start the plant construction once the plans have approval from the regulatory body. Loviisa plants are VVER, but they too underwent a lot of redesign compared to the Soviet reference to meet safety criteria. That's why they called it "Eastinghouse".

rob74 6y ago

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 6y ago
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 6y ago
  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.
  - natmaka 6y ago
    At best this is another manifestation of the "is–ought problem" and AFAIK there is no way to decide, at worst it is an appeal to tradition ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_tradition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_tradition ).

ceilingcorner 6y ago

The EU and NATO have a vested interest in making Belarus seem like a scary, dangerous place that needs regime change.

cheph 6y ago
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 6y ago
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
- ceilingcorner 6y ago
  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.
- axnk 6y ago
  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.

daliusd 6y ago

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 6y ago
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 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?
- rob74 6y ago
  > 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: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greifswald_Nuclear_Power_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greifswald_Nuclear_Power_Plant

bluecalm 6y ago

Older, less advanced reactor run by a democratic country is safer than modern more advanced reactor run by what is basically a dictatorship.

xyzzyz 6y ago
RBMK is not simply “less advanced” design, it is dangerously unsafe.
- cbmuser 6y ago
  Exactly.
paganel 6y ago
We'd need to have prove for that, afaik the reactor at Fukushima was not old and Japan is a strong democracy.
- Hamuko 6y ago
  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 6y ago
    > 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 6y ago
      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.

duxup 6y ago

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.

ashtonkem 6y ago

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 6y ago
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-mission-reports-to-belarus-and-egypt https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/iaea-delivers-inir-miss... > https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975 https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975
- fomine3 6y ago
  Is inspection enough to operate reliable services?

ohnoesjmr 6y ago

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 6y ago
Source for these claims? There are EU nuclear inspectors on the site: > https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975 https://twitter.com/RosatomGlobal/status/1360129094906707975

sparkling 6y ago

Pretty much this. Its politics, especially after the recent post-election events in Belarus.

trhway 6y ago

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 6y ago
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 6y ago
  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 6y ago
    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-Estonian-SMR-deployment-confer https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/No-time-to-waste-in-...

osacial 6y ago

Well, people in Latvia were very upset about plant in Ignalina - not because of the distance from Riga, but because of a very close distance from border of Latvia(because not all of them are living in Riga). I guess, this is a very political topic and that has nothing to do with technical parameters of plants, because Belarus is constantly polluting rivers and that pollution is coming through into neighbouring countries. And there is nothing that these countries can do about and power plant belongs to the same issue. Yeah, your commenting activity doesn't seem to be Russian troll at all to readers of NH, but for someone who has to encounter similar active trolls in Baltic sources, this doesn't seem like credible non-troll activity(paid or unpaid - doesn't matter). So, under a threat of being blocked here, I think, that it should be noted that some of the behaviour of cbmuser(and accompanying friends and "opponents") ticks most of the flags of what in Baltics is known under a name of "Russian troll factory", where they are actively swarming on specific topics.

natmaka 6y ago

One decade later Lithuanians can change their minds about all this (their plant is now closed). Or they may be less confident when they don't manage a plant. In any case they may be right even if they didn't apply their own precepts ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tu_quoque ) > Lithuania is just upset because they invested a lot into natural gas plants https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_motive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Appeal_to_motive