In the period from November 25 to December 12 of this year, an event significant for the European nuclear energy cluster, the international partner verification of the functionality of the Kozloduy NPP, is taking place on the territory of the Republic of Bulgaria under the patronage of the World Association of Organizations Operating Nuclear Power Plants (WANO).
The personnel of the WANO partner team is represented by more than 28 nuclear industry specialists from the USA, Great Britain, France, Ukraine, Hungary, Russia, Finland, Slovakia and Spain, who arrived at the industrial site of the Bulgarian NPP not only for inspection purposes, but also to exchange accumulated experience and work together on existing problems during the operation of nuclear power facilities.
It is worth noting that according to the primary evaluation indicators of the current state of the Bulgarian nuclear industry, high-ranking WANO advisors voiced positive feedback on the high standards and full compliance of the national nuclear energy complex with the most stringent international safety requirements.
Along with this, in the format of the seminar, representatives of scientific and public circles of the WANO and the IAEA participating countries also identified current challenges and certain problematic issues in the implementation of additional measures to protect the environment from radiation and uncontrolled release of ionizing radiation beyond the limits of existing storage facilities with spent nuclear fuel (SNF).
As an example, experts have analyzed in detail an emergency situation related to the depressurization of about 70 fuel elements in the reactor plant of the Taishan -1 NPP (it is an EPR-type reactor plant operating in China, the manufacturing country of France) and an increase in the level of radioactivity in the coolant.
In turn, the French side expressed concern about the implementation of a project on the territory of Ukraine for the construction of a Centralized Spent Nuclear Fuel Storage Facility, with the direct participation of the American company Holtec International.
In particular, according to experts, the facility under construction has a number of design flaws and serious deviations from the design solutions previously adopted and agreed with the Ukrainian regulator in the field of logistics procedures with nuclear fuel using multi-purpose containers and platforms "HI-TRAC" and "HI-STAR", also produced by Holtec International, which unfortunately has no positive experience in radioactive waste management.
In addition, nuclear specialists highlighted the fact that the management of the national Ukrainian operator of the State Enterprise NAEK Energoatom refused to use the technology of SNF transportation in water-cooled transport containers, which has already proven itself in the global energy cluster, due to the rise in the cost of this project, which in turn contributes to the formation of security threats in nuclear energy and requires additional competent assessment by the IAEA.
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