Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant leaked 300 tonnes of radioactive sludge, coverups galore..

Snippet from here

MOSCOW – Witnesses say the leak of three hundred tonnes of radioactive sludge at Lithuania’s closed-down Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) last October 5 – the accident occurred during decommissioning works at this site, which used to operate Chernobyl-type RBMK reactors – led to radiation exposure suffered by cleanup personnel and severe contamination of the premises. Did management try to downplay the accident? And are accidents like this possible at RBMK-running NPPs in Russia?

Mm, I smell a rat...
The NPP claims it was a non event, no exposure outside the controlled areas..

Rimasauskaite further confirmed the official version that the leak does not pose any threat to the plant’s employees or the environment in a telephone conversation with Bellona. She also said all the 300 tonnes of the leaked radioactive decontamination solution was absorbed by the drainage system. She denied, however, that the event could be considered an accident and said it was a non-significant, below-the-scale event.

However..

A Russian-language publication in Lithuania called Litovsky Kurier (The Lithuanian Courier) initiated an investigation into the incident (in Russian), concluding that the event had to be regarded as an accident and suggesting that assurances coming from Ignalina’s press service “may not fully correspond to reality:”

Around three hundred cubic metres of thick flushing material – a highly radioactively contaminated suspension containing nitric acid and potassium permanganate – leaked through the rupture into the technological area of Reactor Unit 1,” the story said.

“But this thick radioactive mass did not escape into the technological drain holes, as affirmed in the statement prepared by Ms. Rimasauskaite ,” the article continued. “According to unconfirmed information, this was the reason why a large number of plant employees were engaged in cleanup works after the accident. People were manually collecting the leaked radioactive suspension, which they were then removing from the technological area and ‘burying’ on site.” “There is no doubt,” the story said, “that working with contaminated material led to these people’s exposure to radiation. But they are forced to take such risks out of fear of losing their jobs.” That conclusion was supported in statements posted on a website hosting a forum for Visaginas-based nuclear workers, as well as on the website of the publication Delfi.Lt, which also provides a public discussion forum. These are just a few samples: “Talk to the people who were cleaning up this solution. These were people working the first shift; covering that shift [for a colleague] was shift manager Lutkov, who I respect a lot; he, being a true hero, was the first one to enter the area with dispersed acidic [decontamination] solution. And I can’t but feel sorry for the millions of public money [lost], for the guys who were cleaning up this crap…because that dirt from the circuit, just beta radiation alone in it makes for up to two million [particles per square centimetre per second]. If my memory serves me right, a towel that we use to dry our hands with can have no more than 10 particles – just compare the scale of contamination.” “Three hundred cubic metres (SIX railway tank cars!) of radioactively contaminated nitric acid with potassium permanganate getting smeared all over – other than that, it’s all great. Everything’s just dandy!”

There had been talk of restarting this plant..

As you probably know, this model of reactor is still in use elsewhere, even the Kursk (submarine) uses one.

It is certainly disconcerting to read in a 2009 report issued by the Russian industrial oversight agency, the Federal Service for Ecological, Technological, and Atomic Supervision (Rostekhnadzor), that there are problems with assessing the integrity and durability of pipelines at Russian NPPs, or that not all of them are in fact under due control:
“As regards the weld seams in the […] austenitic pipelines of RMBK-1000 reactors, the issue of reliability of maintenance control must be differentiated depending on the method of maintenance control and location of the weld seams (some of them are not subject to control). On the whole, the reliability of defect monitoring, as dependent on the method of maintenance control, can be assessed to range between 64% and 90%, which also attests to the urgency of the problem of substantiating assessments of integrity and strength of […] welded austenitic pipelines.”
In plainer language, the danger is there that the pipelines in use at the RBMK-running NPPs in Russia may burst at any given moment. Whether this is as big a threat as another Chernobyl depends on many factors, but one should certainly not dismiss the risks.

No wonder we have increasing cancers worldwide.. Chernobyl, Three mile island, Mayak... the list goes on. Stolen/Orphaned sources, nuclear plant failure, sabotage, bombings.. Seems we are destined to suffer ever increasing levels of radiation. Scientists now think that any exposure has detrimental effects, may not be statistically significant at the lowest levels, however there are risks.

Iran.

reply to post by LilFox


LilFox, thanks for the very informative thread and yes I do think these types of incidents are downplayed all the time and covered up by many nations. Flag and welcome to ATS.

reply to post by Ophiuchus 13


Thank you

Given how much radioactive waste is just, laying around.. I carry a terra-p geiger counter on me at all times. Anything over .20 μSv/h and alarms go off... quite daunting when it happens in the middle of the night. @_@

Majak/Mayak.. I will make a post on that when I have full posting rights. The plant pumps cooling fluid in/out of the local RIVER.. disaster after disaster, dumping nuclear waste in the river (Pronounced river "Tetch").. then, they end up confessing that it is an experiment on the long term effects of radiation poisoning.. Some areas there are 6 sieverts! (600 roentgen) That is highly lethal, 10 is classified as instant death for most people. Guess what, they used to have prisoners working there in exchange for a lower sentence, 5y instead of much more.. most didn't live that long. It employs 15000 odd people and covers 90 square km. Ill be posting quite an "article" on it.

Just found this: (From 2008)

The condition of Mayak’s equipment Research conducted by Bellona Web reveals, the last incident at the RT-1 reprocessing facility at Mayak occurred in June 2007. A pipeline carrying pulps of radioactive mixtures in the facility’s No. 5 workshop sprung a leak between June 24th and 26th. The severe leak, according to many interviewed by Bellona Web, cost Mayak’s former director, Vitaly Sadovnikov, his post. In October of 2007, a leak occurred in the industrial complex of Mayak during a routine transport of liquid radioactive waste over one of the plant’s internal roadways while being transferred from Mayak’s chemical-metallurgical facility to its radio-chemical plant. But Rosatom’s Konyshev said that the recent string of incidents “does not have anything to do with equipment deterioration at Mayak.” “Routine equipment substitutions occur at Mayak. One can’t speak of any equipment (there) being worn out beyond the norm,” he said. Mayak was the Soviet Union’s most important production point for weapons grade plutonium. Since 1977, Mayak has been used for reprocessing spent nuclear fuel at its RT-1 facility. RT-1 is built to handle spent nuclear fuel from VVER-450, BN-450 and BN-600 reactors, as well as fuel from submarine and nuclear icebreaker reactors. In recent years, RT-1 has been undergoing upgrades in order to reprocess fuel form VVER-1000 reactors – per Rosatom’s plans - which are the workhorse of Russia’s nuclear industry. Mayak reprocesses some 120 tons of spent nuclear fuel a year, though its annual throughput is designed to be 400 tons. In February 2006, the State Duma’s Committee on Ecology demanded that reprocessing at Mayak be brought down to the minimum that was “sufficient to fulfill international agreements, as well as programmes of geared toward ecological and defence purposes” – meaning the continued reprocessing of fuel from nuclear submarines.

Speaking of non-events. Here in upstate NY a companys sump pump failed and spilled "hundreds of gallons" of nuclear waste into the Mohawk river. This event occured on October 25th, it was on the news (local) the day before yesterday, bear in mind it had a two minute plug with zero information, and stated that it was not a threat to the public. I was fumed man, I'll tell ya'! People fish and boat on this river.
"The lab, operated for the Department of Energy by San Francisco-based Bechtel Corporation, says the water likely contained low levels of Cesium-137, Strontium-90, uranium and plutonium." Really????
Here is a link to the story...
wnyt.com...
I did a google search and nothing came up for it, havent heard anything anywhere else either.

Sorry about the loosely related post. I had to get it off my chest!!!

reply to post by mutantgenius


I found it here

No immediate threat, pfft.. Yeah.. just cancer down the track, nothing to worry about

DAYM!

1990 June Kapl, New York, USA - A parking lot at Knolls Atomic Power Lab (KAPL) in New York is contaminated with radioactive waste, yet workers have been permitted to work there, even though AEC and the US Dept of Energy knew the radioactivity was far above Federal and State limits and may pose a health hazard. ("Schenectady Gazette" (US) 22/1/88, WISE p.4 NC 303, 9/12/88)

Wouldn't expect any honesty out of knobs, sorry, knolls

No wonder these are non-events...appparently noone gives a snip eh? Just like DU...too scary to contemplate.

BAAAAA..

It's okay, radiation doesn't cause cancer, sit back down, watch the tv, be a good little consumer.. it'll all be okay, don't you feel like McDonands? Would you like fries with your cancerrrr, ah burger?

BAAAAA

June 29, 2005 WASHINGTON (AP) The Associated Press reports -- The preponderance of scientific evidence shows that even very low doses of radiation pose a risk of cancer or other health problems and there is no threshold below which exposure can be viewed as harmless, a panel of prominent scientists concluded Wednesday.