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Ten years ago after the world’s worst nuclear accident at the Chernobyl power plant in Ukraine, the arguments are still continuing over the effects of the disaster on human health and ways to make the plant safe Jonas Hughes reports.
For many people, the most alarming thing about the nuclear power plant at Chernobyl is that it is still operating. A decade after reactor number four exploded, and four years after a fire shut down reactor number two, the remaining reactors one and three are still supplying Ukraine with five percent of its electricity.
The plant was supposed to close permanently at the end of 1993 – a date agreed between the Group of Seven (G7) leading industrialized countries and the Ukrainian government. But in October of that year closure plans were called off after officials in Kiev decided the country could not function without a supply of electricity from Chernobyl. Many believe that this was inevitable since G7 offered no financial help towards the closure.
The next date for closure – agreed with European Union and the US last December – is year 2000. Critics say this is another date that will be missed, but this time, significantly, financial help has been promised. The acting head of Ukraine’s nuclear power complex, Nurnigmatullin, calls it “bribery”. He says the Ukraine has accepted the bribe because it does not have the money to close the plant itself.
As yet, a decision has not been taken on the biggest problem of all – what to do about the crumbling sarcophagus that surrounds the destroyed reactor. The European Union and the US have agreed to devise an ecologically sound replacement, but it is not clear what this will be. The most likely solution seems to be a “super sarcophagus” which will be built over the existing one. It is estimated that this will cost more than $300 million and will take over five years to be build.
But time is running out. The sarcophagus that covers reactor number four – built to last 30 years – is in danger of collapsing. It was built in a hurry and the quality of work is poor. The metal has rusted and much of the concrete is badly cracked, allowing rain and snow to get inside. If it were to collapse – an earthquake would almost certainly destroy it – large amounts of radioactive dust would be released into the atmosphere, creating another ecological disaster.
Securing the closure of Chernobyl, if it happens on schedule, will have taken over 14 years. The problems are, in part, a result of scarce resources and the political changes that followed the fall of the Soviet Union. The blame lies with many people, among them the plant’s designers, and the leaders of the former Soviet Union. Critics also blame Western government for failing to provide proper financial and scientific support.
In the first place the Chernobyl reactors were not designed for civilian use. The design of RBMK –1000, is based on a military reactor, build to produce materials for nuclear weapons. Moreover, the RBMK-1000 has a design flaw which makes it unstable unless it is operating in full power.
The Chernobyl reactors also did not conform to international safety standards: all safety mechanisms could be switched off manually (they had been switched of just before the explosion); and there was no protective structure around the reactors to limit the effects of an accident.
These design and operation failures caused the accident. But, many horrors of the aftermath could have been avoided, or at least reduced, if the situation had been dealt with openly and properly.
The two explosions took place at 1.23 a.m. on 26 April 1986. Moscow issued a statement that evening, well over 12 hours later, saying that measures were being taken to deal with the accident. In reality, little was being done. The explosion had instantly killed two people, and all the firemen who fought the blaze were to die within the next few weeks, having been exposed to enormous doses of radiation.
The evacuation of villages near the reactor began over 40 hours after the explosion. It was only by 2 May, nearly a week later, that the evacuation zone was extended to 30 kilometers around the plant.
The operation to seal off the reactor started three days after the explosions, and took ten days to complete. A concrete slab had to be laid beneath the reactor core to prevent contamination of the ground below and the sarcophagus had to be build to surround the reactor.
The countries worst affected by the radiation included Ukraine, Belarus, Russia, Georgia, Poland, Sweden, Germany and Turkey. but radioactive particles were carried much further away. Even Japan and the USA, on the other side of the globe, received measurable amounts of radiation after the accident. The total amount of radiation released will never be known, but it is hundreds of times greater than that released by the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The extent of the impact on the inhabitants of the region surrounding Chernobyl will never be known. Of the 400,000 workers who cleaned up after the blast, an estimated 30,000 have fallen ill, many with sexual and reproductive disorders. And, in Ukraine alone, about 13,00 children are thought to have inhaled enough of the radioactive substance called iodine (atomic number) 131, to risk contracting thyroid cancer. Today, rates of thyroid cancer in children have increased ten-fold since the accident. (if people have been evacuated earlier, far fewer would have been exposed to iodine 131, which disappears after about eight days.)
Another disease, which has become known as “Chernobyl AIDs” because it somehow depletes the killer cells of the immune system, is also of great concern. People suffering from this condition are much more susceptible to leukemia and malignant tumours, as well as heart problems and a variety of more common infections.
Stress-related illness is also a problem. Ironically, this was largely a result of Soviet propaganda, which tried to allay public fears about the effects of radiation. The lies and lack of information have caused such confusion and rumour that many people are now suffering from psychological disorders similar to those which affect war veterans.
Many people view Chernobyl as proof that technology has run amok. They say nuclear technology is not worth the risks. They might be right: research conducted after the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings suggests that many people will become ill as a result of the Chernobyl explosions. Let us hope, though, that it does not take another nuclear accident before we learn the lessons of Chernobyl.
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