Monthly Highlights from the Russian Arctic, September 2024
In this news digest, we monitor events that impact the environment in the Russian Arctic. Our focus lies in identifying the factors that contribute to pollution and climate change.
News
Publish date: September 11, 1997
Written by: Igor Kudrik
News
At the end of last week an automatic emergency shut-down of the second reactor occurred at Kursk nuclear power plant (KNPP). The reason to the incident was made public after an expert group finished its preliminary on-site investigation on September 8. The group claimed that a short circuit in one of the turbines led to the development of smoke. As a consequence, the automatic emergency systems initiated the second reactor’s shut-down procedure. The reactor will not be put back in operation until all the details are cleared up.
Kursk NPP operates on four RBMK-type reactors. This reactor design was made infamous by the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. The construction of a fifth reactor unit started in the second part of the eighties, but it is still only 65% complete. Recent statements from Minatom indicates that the new unit will be completed within a few years.
In this news digest, we monitor events that impact the environment in the Russian Arctic. Our focus lies in identifying the factors that contribute to pollution and climate change.
Following Kazakhstan’s country-wide vote in favor of building a nuclear power plant earlier this month, Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom has begun a courtship of officialdom in Astana, the country’s capital, in apparent hopes of landing a contract to construct it.
A survey of events in the field of nuclear and radiation safety relating to Russia and Ukraine.
Kazakhstan voted in a referendum last weekend on whether to build its first nuclear power plant, and an exit poll showed voters backed the idea promoted by President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev's cabinet in an effort to phase out coal plants.