Novovoronezh NPP

"Novovoronezh nuclear plant was established in 1964, it's one of the oldest nuclear plants in Russia. Two nuclear reactors are shut down but not decommissioned and remains dangerous because the spent nuclear fuel is not removed from reactors. Presently, 3 units are in operation at the NV NPP - unit 3 and 4 of VVER-440 design and unit 5 of VVER-1000 design. In 2001-2002 two more units of VVER-440 design at the NV NPP will reach their 30th anniversary and have to be shut down. Several IAEA expert groups concluded that it's impossible to upgrade the Soviet-designed VVER-440s up to western safety standards. Russian Minatom (Ministry of Atomic Power) announced plan to build 2 more units at this nuclear plant.

Russian nuclear industry presently faces the great lack of cash and can not fund even its own program of the safety upgrade and reactors' repairing. Russian government is not able to extract large subsidies for nuclear industry and the consumers aren't able to pay for reactors as well. In this situation nuclear reactors must be shut down/replaced by the renewable energy and implementation of the energy-efficiency technologies. In Russia, where nuclear reactors generate about 12% of energy and potentials for efficiency are great, such replacement will help to establish a new system based on the sustainable and safe energy."

"A public hearing gathered last Tuesday in Novovoronezh, Central European Russia, to discuss the construction of a temporary radioactive waste storage facility for 10,000 barrels of new waste anticipated from Novovoronezh Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) highlights a deeper problem: Russia may soon face an ever-mounting pile of radioactive waste from its old but still operating commercial reactors – a pile that will demand accommodating, managing, and safeguarding for decades to come. [...] The facility is to house 10,000 containers of newly anticipated waste generated by Novovoronezh NPP.

The facility proposed for construction at Novovoronezh NPP is a warehouse where 200-litre barrels holding radioactive waste are to be stacked in tiers, ten tiers in all. The apocalyptic picture painted by ecologists – dozens of thousands of barrels with deadly wastes inside, an unwieldy menace left for future generations to inherit – now seems more real than some would like to believe (EIA Report, Page 14):

''“The design of the facility allows for organised storage of special 200-litre-capacity metal containers (special-purpose barrels) with the evaporator concentrate that provides for the technological possibility of [subsequent] removal of [solid radioactive waste] for reprocessing and/or disposal. Containers with the evaporator concentrate are accommodated in stacks of up to 10 tiers in height in the storage facility’s compartments.

''Storage of containers with [radioactive waste] in the cells of [the solid radioactive waste storage facility] provides for their “compact” arrangement next to each other.

''Based on the conditions of the arrangement, the storage facility’s capacity is stipulated at no fewer than 10,000 containers with [radioactive waste].”"