Experts warn of risks of nuclear catastrophe as electricity supply disrupted by fighting at power plant
Volodymyr Zelenskiy has said the world narrowly avoided a “radiation disaster” on Thursday when electricity to Europe’s largest nuclear power plant was cut for hours after fires broke out around the plant.
Ukrainian authorities and international experts have warned of the potential for nuclear catastrophe because of fighting around the facility. Energoatom, Ukraine’s state nuclear agency, said one of the two working reactors had been reconnected to the grid.The nuclear plant, Europe’s largest, relies on electricity to keep its reactors cool. Disconnecting it from the grid is dangerous because it raises the risk of catastrophic failure of the electricity-run cooling systems for its reactors and spent fuel rods.
If all the external connections go down, the plant must rely on diesel-fuelled generators for power. If these break down, engineers only have 90 minutes to stave off dangerous overheating.Agency was scheduled to visit next week, Lana Zerkal, an adviser to Ukraine’s energy minister, said on Thursday night on Ukraine’s Radio NV.
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