Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said today that he is working closely with Ukraine to finalize the dates and other arrangements for the upcoming International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) mission to help ensure safety and security at the country’s Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant (NPP).
The Director General will head the team of IAEA safety, security and safeguards experts that is expected to travel to the site in northern Ukraine later this month, a few weeks after he went to the South Ukraine NPP to meet with senior Ukrainian government officials and plant staff.
The IAEA is planning a series of technical assistance missions in the coming weeks to reduce the risk of a nuclear accident during the conflict in Ukraine. The country has 15 nuclear power reactors at four plants in addition to various radioactive waste management facilities at Chornobyl, which was held by Russian forces for five weeks before their withdrawal on 31 March.
As part of the preparations for the missions, the IAEA and its Ukrainian counterparts are discussing what kind of safety-related equipment – including spare parts and components – is needed at the different nuclear sites. At Chornobyl, the site of the 1986 accident, the IAEA experts will also conduct radiological assessments and repair remote safeguards monitoring equipment.
Ukraine separately informed the IAEA today that there had been no significant new developments related to nuclear safety and security over the past 24 hours, Director General Grossi said.
Regarding Ukraine’s nuclear energy reactors, seven are currently connected to the grid, including two at the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhya NPP, two at the Rivne NPP, two at the South Ukraine NPP, and one at the Khmelnytskyy NPP. The eight other reactors are shut down for regular maintenance or held in reserve. Safety systems remain operational at the four NPPs and they also continue to have off-site power available.
In relation to safeguards, the IAEA said that the situation remained unchanged from that reported previously. The Agency was still not receiving remote data transmission from its monitoring systems installed at the Chornobyl NPP, but such data was being transferred to IAEA headquarters from the other NPPs in Ukraine.