On Thursday, Russian forces began shelling the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Station in northern Ukraine — the largest nuclear power plant in Europe, triggering fires.
This led some to speculate that the fire could lead to a meltdown ten times more powerful than the 1986 incident at Chernobyl, itself the worst nuclear disaster in history.
But don't panic, say several nuclear experts: it is too early to know exactly what damage has been done, and — more important — this plant is designed with a series of safeguards that make an explosion of the sort that scattered radioactive debris at Chernobyl extremely unlikely.
Jon B. Wolfsthal, a former adviser on the National Security Council, explained some of the differences with the reactors currently under threat.
We don't know what we don't know. There is a major difference between a support facility or storage building being on fire, and the plant itself being heavily damaged. But the design of the VVER is inherently more safe and protected than the Chernobyl RBMK systems. 2/— Jon B. Wolfsthal (@Jon B. Wolfsthal) 1646355513
As my respected colleague @james_acton32 has pointed out, there will be a need for the plants to have external power to be fully safe, and to have active cooling. We don't know the status of the system or the power and until we do, we won't know the full extent of the risk. 4/— Jon B. Wolfsthal (@Jon B. Wolfsthal) 1646355514
Nuclear energy expert Mark Nelson said the idea the plant could trigger an explosion ten times worse than Chernobyl "absolute nonsense" — and that while there was a risk of disrupting the cooling process, the reactor itself hasn't been hit.
Just so everybody knows: the statement that "if it blows up, it will be 10 times larger than Chornobyl", is absolute nonsense.\n\nThis is a bad situation because it is an attack on a nuclear plant with people in it, not because it can "blow up" and be "larger than Chornobyl".https://twitter.com/DmytroKuleba/status/1499543775240196099\u00a0\u2026— Mark Nelson (@Mark Nelson) 1646354724
The containment domes around the reactors are extremely strong.\n\nThey will not be affected by light arms or moderate fire from heavier arms.\n\nThe worry is in interruption of plant cooling procedures after the reactors shut down.— Mark Nelson (@Mark Nelson) 1646356069
https://twitter.com/energybants/status/1499557421324415014\u00a0\u2026— Mark Nelson (@Mark Nelson) 1646357534
Nuclear expert James Acton noted, though, that none of this means everything is safe — and a different type of meltdown is still possible.
I assume that the three operational reactors have now been scrammed (switched off). In this case, all six reactors will be reliant on external power for cooling. (2/n)— (((James Acton))) (@(((James Acton)))) 1646353582
Without cooling, there will be a meltdown--precisely what happened at Fukushima in 2011. The meltdown there was accompanied by explosions in three units (IIRC) caused by hydrogen (produced by water being split as the fuel cladding burnt). \n(5/n)— (((James Acton))) (@(((James Acton)))) 1646353898
For the time being, however, a spokesman for the plant said that there is not currently a risk of radiation release into the surrounding environment.
According to Andrey Tuz, spokesman of the press service of the nuclear power plant, there is no threat of radiation spread.— NEXTA (@NEXTA) 1646356769
