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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

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
  - petre 6y ago
    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 6y ago
      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 6y ago
        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 6y ago
    > 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.
    - corty 6y ago
      It is a law of engineering that every engineer will claim his code is the most efficient, his car the best and hist nuclear power plant the safest. WWER-440 has no closed safety vessel, poor emergency cooling and no redundancy to speak of. It is a PWR design that is maybe on par with a poor western BWR. Also, all the reactors in West Germany were continually retrofitted, especially after the lessons learned due to Czernobyl. That wasn't feasible for a Sowjet design during the breakup of the Sowjet Union (while a lot was built in the GDR, there was also a lot that would have been imported).
- lukeschlather 6y ago
  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.)
  - FDSGSG 6y ago
    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-add1-0e8958b189ea https://www.ft.com/content/000f864e-22ba-11e8-add1-0e8958b18...
    - sandworm101 6y ago
      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 6y ago
        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.
        corty 6y ago
        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.
- rmind 6y ago
  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 6y ago
    > 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.
- daliusd 6y ago
  > 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#Incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astravets_Nuclear_Power_Plant#...
stemc43 6y ago
As a Belarussian - go to hell. Belarus simply dint sell out like Lithuania did and all the dictatorship rhetoric - are cheap propaganda shots.
bluelu 6y ago
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 6y ago
  If you like questionable nucleair power plant placement, look up Chooz.
- dainiusse 6y ago
  The problem is - I'd trust french people, but not belarus/russia. As their quality sign - check out the cars they produce...
  - cbmuser 6y ago
    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_accidents_and_incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-related_ac...
    - redis_mlc 6y ago
      > 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.
    - osacial 6y ago
      Columbia had 28 missions - 28 launches and 27 successful landings. There has been no Russian space vessel, that has been launched more than 1 time into space. Even Buran space shuttle had only 1 mission, before it was abandoned. I wouldn't comment on quality of cars, as I do not own any Russian car - and I also do not own any nuclear submarine(yet), but what we know is that Russians can't properly build bunker for their own fuhrer and Nuclear plant is less significant project.
cbmuser 6y ago
> 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 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_FSRU
- bromuro 6y ago
  Maybe people in Lituania changed their mind? i don’t understand your point based on what “they” choose a decade ago.
- akoncius 6y ago
  LNG does not produce any electricity, it's just a platform for gas storage and stuff. so not sure why you mix those two different things.

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
- petre 6y ago
  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 6y ago
    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 6y ago
      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 6y ago
  > 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.
  - corty 6y ago
    It is a law of engineering that every engineer will claim his code is the most efficient, his car the best and hist nuclear power plant the safest. WWER-440 has no closed safety vessel, poor emergency cooling and no redundancy to speak of. It is a PWR design that is maybe on par with a poor western BWR. Also, all the reactors in West Germany were continually retrofitted, especially after the lessons learned due to Czernobyl. That wasn't feasible for a Sowjet design during the breakup of the Sowjet Union (while a lot was built in the GDR, there was also a lot that would have been imported).
lukeschlather 6y ago
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.)
- FDSGSG 6y ago
  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-add1-0e8958b189ea https://www.ft.com/content/000f864e-22ba-11e8-add1-0e8958b18...
  - sandworm101 6y ago
    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 6y ago
      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.
      - corty 6y ago
        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.
rmind 6y ago
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 6y ago
  > 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.
daliusd 6y ago
> 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#Incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astravets_Nuclear_Power_Plant#...

stemc43 6y ago

As a Belarussian - go to hell. Belarus simply dint sell out like Lithuania did and all the dictatorship rhetoric - are cheap propaganda shots.

bluelu 6y ago

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 6y ago
If you like questionable nucleair power plant placement, look up Chooz.
dainiusse 6y ago
The problem is - I'd trust french people, but not belarus/russia. As their quality sign - check out the cars they produce...
- cbmuser 6y ago
  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_accidents_and_incidents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spaceflight-related_ac...
  - redis_mlc 6y ago
    > 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.
  - osacial 6y ago
    Columbia had 28 missions - 28 launches and 27 successful landings. There has been no Russian space vessel, that has been launched more than 1 time into space. Even Buran space shuttle had only 1 mission, before it was abandoned. I wouldn't comment on quality of cars, as I do not own any Russian car - and I also do not own any nuclear submarine(yet), but what we know is that Russians can't properly build bunker for their own fuhrer and Nuclear plant is less significant project.

cbmuser 6y ago

> 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 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klaip%C4%97da_LNG_FSRU

bromuro 6y ago
Maybe people in Lituania changed their mind? i don’t understand your point based on what “they” choose a decade ago.
akoncius 6y ago
LNG does not produce any electricity, it's just a platform for gas storage and stuff. so not sure why you mix those two different things.