On 2-3 July 2019 a workshop reviewing results of ChNPP Cooling Pond decommissioning was held under IAEA support at the Institute of Hydrobiology of NAS of Ukraine and at the ChNPP industrial site, with experts from Ukraine, Japan and Great Britain participating in the discussion.
The workshop has reviewed the results of surveys performed by Institute of Hydrobiology and Agricultural Radiology of NAS of Ukraine, Ukrainian Hydrometeorological institute and other scientific and research organizations of Ukraine. Experts once and again focused attention on the importance of accuracy of the monitoring performed by ChNPP specialists under the Cooling Pond Decommissioning Project.
According to Fedir Lanskykh, the Leading Engineer of ChNPP Strategic Planning Department, most of the workshop participants have agreed about the necessity to carry on surveying the processes taking place in the Cooling Pond now when it's reached the design level of water and is in the decommissioned status, and in the future. This activity is of great scientific importance, since until these days there is no experience and scientifically confirmed data in the world practice on the decommissioning of engineering ponds of such dimensions, particularly in a situation when its water area and surrounding territories are contaminated with radionuclides.
Within the technical tour to ChNPP, experts have inspected the Cooling Pond and its dam, visited the former on-shore pump station which was used to maintain the water level in the pond during the operation period, and also visited the New Safe Confinement Observation Pavilion and the town of Prypiat.
Participants of the workshop also met with ChNPP First Deputy Director General,Valeriy Seyda, to discuss the workshop results and ChNPP's follow-up actions on the final decommissioning of the Cooling Pond, as well as the vision regarding future monitoring and maintenance of the cooling pond.
FYI
The ChNPP Cooling Pond was constructed by installing a man-made dam at the Prypiat River floodplain site with the area about 22.9 km². According to the design, the amount of cooling pond water was to cool down four ChNPP Power Units during production of electricity. The loss of water from filtration and evaporation was compensated by intake from the Prypiat River with make-up pumps up to the design water level of 111.00 mBES, which was 7 m higher than the surface of the Prypiat River.
The shut down of ChNPP in electricity production mode allowed to decommission most of the systems which required feed of process water for operation.
ChNPP Cooling Pond decommissioning activities commenced in 2014, for maintaining the water level in the cooling pond required substantial operational costs, and due to the presence of substantial risks connected with high level of underground water at the ChNPP industrial site.
