<
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/sep/27/safety-fears-as-external-power-to-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-plant-still-out-after-three-days>
"External power to the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant has been cut
for more than three days, a record outage that has prompted safety concerns
over the six-reactor site on the frontline of the Ukraine war.
Emergency generators are being used to power cooling and safety systems after
the final power line into the plant was cut on the Russian side at 4.56pm on
Tuesday and there is no immediate sign that the line will be reconnected.
Rafael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency
(IAEA), described the situation as “deeply concerning” on Wednesday and met
Vladimir Putin on Thursday but the situation has continued.
Western experts and Ukrainian officials fear the Kremlin is manufacturing a
crisis to consolidate its grip over the plant, which is Europe’s largest, and
that Russia is taking high-risk steps to turn on at least one reactor despite
the wartime conditions.
“Russia is using the nuclear power station as a bargaining chip,” said one
Ukrainian government official, while a specialist at Greenpeace said the
Russian occupation had entered “a new critical and potentially catastrophic
phase”.
Stress tests by European regulators after the 2011 Japanese reactor disaster at
Fukushima indicated that a nuclear plant should be able to operate without
external power for 72 hours. Going beyond that time limit is untried, Ukrainian
sources said.
Russia seized the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant in March 2022 and its reactors,
once capable of powering 4m homes, were put into cold shutdown for safety.
Ukraine regards the nuclear plant as its own but the plant has cropped up in
negotiations between Donald Trump and Putin. Trump has tried to suggest the US
should to take control, while the Kremlin has said it wants to restart all the
reactors and connect them to the Russian grid – a task considered feasible only
during peacetime.
External power has been lost at Zaporizhzhia nine times before. On each
occasion the damage was done in Ukrainian-held territory by Russian forces
striking energy infrastructure across the Dnipro. The final 750-kilovolt
electricity line had run across the river, with Ukraine willing to supply
energy to maintain safety."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
