US-based company Amentum has been awarded a contract worth an estimated EUR5.5 million (about USD6 million) to consult for the first-of-a-kind dismantling of steam drum separators at units 1 and 2 of the Ignalina nuclear power plant in Lithuania The seven-year contract with Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (INPP) will be implemented under International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC) Yellow Book Conditions administered by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and funded by European Commission grants Lithuania assumed ownership of the two RBMK-1500 units - light-water It agreed to shut down the Ignalina plant as a condition of its accession to the European Union with unit 1 shutting down in December 2004 and unit 2 in December 2009 The reactors are expected to be fully decommissioned by 2038 with most of the cost of the decommissioning being funded by the European Union via the EBRD and other funds Amentum said it will provide consultancy services to support INPP's Project Management Unit and carry out the duties of FIDIC Engineer for the dismantling contract It will help INPP to manage the removal of the steam drum separators which are large drums installed over the graphite core to divert steam to the turbines The Project Management Unit will oversee the design and safety justification for dismantling and fragmentation of the drums and associated equipment These are located in the plant’s radiologically contaminated primary circuit "We will deploy our extensive nuclear decommissioning and waste management experience from the UK Czechia and Slovakia to this ground-breaking project,” said Andy White who leads Amentum Energy & Environment International Amentum was created in early 2020 from the spin-off of US-based global infrastructure firm AECOM's Management Services business Amentum has been working at Ignalina for more than 20 years on projects including the delivery of the New Interim Spent Fuel Storage Facility and other facilities required for decommissioning Amentum completed a merger with Jacobs Solutions Inc's Critical Mission Solutions and Cyber and Intelligence government services businesses to form an independent publicly traded company called Amentum Holdings The combination was described by Amentum CEO John Heller as transformational for the company forming a "global leader in advanced engineering and innovative technology solutions" Ignalina NPP has signed a procurement contract for the environmental impact risk assessment of the deep geological repository (DGR) for radioactive waste The procurement contract is with UAB “Sweco Lietuva” the Swedish capital engineering and architecture company will carry out a comprehensive environmental risk assessment of the installation and operation of the DGR over the coming years This will include investigating the direct and indirect impacts of the DGR on the environment such as soil and ground depth landscape and biodiversity in areas potentially suitable for DGR installation Sweco Lietuva will also develop recommendations for the significant environmental impact mitigation measures 77 potential sites in 29 Lithuanian municipalities have been identified which will be comprehensively investigated and evaluated until 2047 After a complex and detailed investigation it is planned to select the final site for the DGR The selection of a specific area for the DGR project requires the evaluation of not only geological aspects as well as knowledge of the local communities The public consultation on the DGR installation site selection process was held in March this year and the issues raised mostly related to the possible environmental impact “This new stage marks an important step towards sustainable decision-making by involving the wider public in the decision-making process. Once the supplier’s assessment is complete a comprehensive methodology will be developed and made available to the public. By encouraging active participation we will invite the public to submit comments and suggestions to ensure that the project solutions are not only technically justified but also sustainable – in line with the needs and environmental principles of both present and future generations,” says Andrius Vyšniauskas Manager of the Deep Geological Repository Project at the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant “We are aware of the importance of this project not only for today’s residents of Lithuania but also for our future generations and of our responsibility for the proper selection of a site for the long-term storage of radioactive waste,” said Liudas Zalunskis Give your business an edge with our leading industry insights View all newsletters from across the Progressive Media network © Business Trade Media International Limited Generation mix: wind 1.5 TWh (31%); hydro 1.0 TWh (20%); biofuels & waste 1.0 TWh (20%); natural gas 0.5 TWh (10%); oil 0.4 TWh; solar 0.3 TWh Import/export balance: 8.6 TWh net import (11.2 TWh imports; 2.7 TWh exports) Source: International Energy Agency and The World Bank Since the closure of the two reactors at Ignalina in 2004 and 2009 Lithuania switched from being an electricity exporter to importer and significantly increased its consumption of natural gas and biomass (see below) In 2020 some 70% of the country’s electricity requirements were met through imports.  Integration into the European Union (EU) energy market is a strategic priority for all three Baltic countries (Lithuania Latvia and Estonia). This was formalized by the Baltic Energy Market Interconnection Plan (BEMIP) signed by eight states of the Baltic region and the European Commission The main goal of the BEMIP is to create a unified market of the Baltic Sea region Full synchronization with the European continental grid is aimed for by 2025 The planned Visaginas nuclear power plant constitutes an integral part of the BEMIP. Apart from about 60 km of Lithuania’s border with Poland the three Baltic states are bordered by Russia and Belarus Interconnections have been established with: Poland – 'LitPol Link' (500 MWe commissioned 2015); Sweden – 'NordBalt' (700 MWe commissioned 2016); and Estonia and Finland – 'Estlink 2' (650 MWe Energy security has been a key priority for Lithuania (and other Baltic states) since 1990 The 2012 National Energy Independence Strategy was cast around the Visaginas nuclear plant (details below) a new liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal The plan aimed to reduce energy reliance on Russia. The Visaginas power plant has not moved forward following a referendum in October 2012 in which two-thirds voted against the project proceeding the country’s gas transmission operator confirmed all gas imports were taking place through the Klaipėda LNG terminal About 75% of heat (district and residential) is produced from burning woody biomass after a major shift away from the use of natural gas Biomass is harvested in Lithuania and imported from Belarus Construction on a third reactor at Ignalina commenced in 1985 but was suspended after the 1986 Chernobyl accident Originally the Ignalina plant was designed to provide power not only for Lithuania but also for neighbouring Latvia Belarus and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad In 1994, Lithuania agreed to accept funds – eventually 34.8 million ECU ($36.8 million) from the Nuclear Safety Account administered by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD)e – to support a safety improvement program at Ignalina which evolved to include closing both units at least by the time their pressure tubes needed replacing after some 15-20 years with considerable help from other countries The Ignalina plant was operated by Ignalinos Atominé Elektriné (IAE) and supplied power to national utility Lietuvos Energija at very low cost. Electricity prices increased dramatically following the closure of the plant at the end of 2009.f In February 2007, the three Baltic states (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) and Poland agreed to build a new nuclear plant at Ignalina, initially with 3200 MWe capacity (2 x 1600 MWe)g Though located next to the Soviet-era Ignalina plant near the Belarus border the new one was to be called Visaginas after the nearby town of that name The Visaginas Nuclear Energy (Visagino Atominė Elektrinė VAE) company was established in August 2008 for the new units with Lithuania wanting 34% of the project and Poland then wanting 30% of it Latvia and Estonia were unhappy with the prospect of minor stakes and the split was far from clear In April 2010, formal proposals from five selected strategic investors were submitted to the government, and bids from these were then sought. Early in December 2010, it was announced that the tender had failed after two bids were received. One undisclosed bid did not comply with tender requirements and the other, from Korea Electric Power Corporation (Kepco), was withdrawn two weeks after submittal8 The Lithuanian government said it would instead conduct direct negotiations with potential investors and that it expected to begin operation of the new plant in 2020 At an early December 2010 meeting in Warsaw Estonia and Poland confirmed their support for the Visaginas project In May 2011 "competitive proposals from potential strategic investors" were received In July the government selected Hitachi as strategic investor though it would be GE Hitachi which does the engineering Latvia and Poland participated in the evaluation to determine which of the two proposals was "most economically advantageous." Their energy companies would be investors with Hitachi in the project company GE Hitachi planned to build a single 1350 MWe ABWR The first was expected to operate from 2020. A combined construction and operating licence was to be issued by July 2015 The cost of the project was estimated at €4.92 billion In October 2011 the government formally notified the European Commission of plans for the new nuclear power plant at Visaginas to be built in collaboration with Estonia in December Poland withdrew from the project saying that VAE's conditions were unacceptable to PGE In March 2012 the prime ministers of Estonia and Latvia reiterated their support for the project, a concession agreement with Hitachi was initialled and then in May signed providing the contractual framework for the project and giving Hitachi a 20% stake in it In May 2012 the Lithuanian parliament approved the project and the concession agreement Initially Latvia was to take 20% of the project company and Estonia 22% for about €1 billion each a non-binding referendum held in conjunction with a national election in October 2012 clouded the prospects for the Visaginas project The referendum question asked if voters wanted new nuclear power capacity built The Social Democrats had forced the referendum in order to make Visaginas an election issue and they formed a government with Labor and two smaller parties (they had led a minority government 2004-08) following Russia’s annexation of Crimea seven parliamentary parties* signed a broad agreement expressing consensus on the country’s security policy to 2020 The agreement reaffirmed Lithuania's desire to reinforce cooperation with strategic partners – the Baltic and Nordic countries the EU and the USA – as a principal foreign policy goal It identified energy dependence as one of the greatest challenges to national security Hence a priority “is to integrate as quickly as possible into the EU's internal energy market and to implement major energy projects the Visaginas Nuclear Power Plant and power interconnections with Sweden and Poland.” The nuclear plant project has to be implemented “in accordance to the terms and conditions of financing and participation improved in cooperation with partners in order to expand the autonomous and competitive basic capacities of generating electricity.” * The agreement was signed by Chairman of the Lithuanian Social Democratic Party Chairman of the Homeland Union – Christian Democrats (former PM to 2012) Vice Chairman of the Order and Justice Party Chairman of the Lithuanian Liberal Movement Chairman of the Electoral Action of Poles in Lithuania and representative of the Way of Courage Party In July 2014 an agreement with Hitachi regarding the project company was signed In June 2015 Hitachi said that it expected the project company to be set up "in about a year" and the energy minister said that discussions were proceeding with Latvia and Estonia Hitachi estimated the cost at about $4 billion at the end of 2015 the project company was wound down and in November 2016 the government released a National Energy Strategy and said it was delaying the 3400 MWe project until it either becomes cost effective under market conditions or is needed for energy security While discussions proceeded regarding Visaginas Russia started to build the 2400 MWe Baltic nuclear power plant in Kaliningrad Russia's RAO UES (57% owned by Rosatom) signed an agreement with its Lithuanian subsidiary RAO Lietuva to export 1000 MWe of power from this to Lithuania from 2017 Lithuania contested the location of the Baltic plant since it is only 10 km from the border and 200 km from Vilnius and it said that the environmental assessment did not meet the requirements of the Espoo Convention* governing such The former government was therefore not keen to buy electricity from it Poland also discontinued talks with InterRao regarding buying power from the Baltic plant. Rosatom said that it had responded to all Lithuania’s questions and sent more than 1000 pages of information to it. Rosatom subsequently suspended construction of the Baltic plant due to lack of interest by the Baltic states Poland and Germany in buying power from the project * Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context. Belarus has ratified the convention Lithuania also objected on the same basis to Belarus' new nuclear power plant at Ostrovets 23 km from the border and 55 km from Vilnius. Belarus claims to have answered all the questions put to it regarding siting the plant. Lithuania filed a complaint with the Implementation Committee of the Espoo Convention and in 2013 the committee ruled that Belarus had violated the convention. In 2014 a meeting of the parties to the convention "encouraged” Belarus to take measures to build confidence with neighboring countries concerning the project They also suggested that Belarus invite the IAEA to carry out a site and external events design (SEED) mission at Ostravets and in January 2017 the IAEA team reported favourably for Belarus (The Baltic states and Belarus have good interconnection of grids from the Soviet era Kaliningrad gets much of its electricity from Russia The revised energy policy in 2012 involved rebuilding the grid to be independent of the Russian/Belarus system and to work in with the European Network of Transmission System Operators (ENTSO) synchronous system as well as strengthening interconnection among the three Baltic states in March 2013 Rosatom said that Russia had officially notified the European Commission (EC) that it wanted its Baltic exclave of Kaliningrad to join the ENTSO system The EU authorized the EC to hold talks with Russia and Belarus on disconnection of the transmission systems of Lithuania Latvia and Estonia from the IPS/UPS system controlled by Russia Rosatom renewed the proposal for a transmission link between Kaliningrad and Poland and asked the EC to build this into the Baltic Energy Market Interconnection Plan (BEMIT) to obtain EU financial support It appears that there was no positive response and Lithuania continues to take measures to isolate Kaliningrad The Radioactive Waste Management Agency (RATA) was established in 2001 by the Ministry of Economy for management and final disposal of all radioactive waste from the Ignalina plant. In 2018 the Law on the Management of Radioactive Waste was amended merging RATA with Ignalina NPP and assigning sole responsibility for the management of all of the country’s nuclear waste and spent nuclear fuel to the state enterprise RATA identified a site close to Ignalina for a near-surface final repository for low- and intermediate-level waste and the government approved this VATESI issued a licence to build the Solid Waste Management and Storage Facilities (SWMSF) at the Ignalina site for all solid operational and decommissioning waste In November 2009 a consortium led by Areva was contracted to design the €10 million repository which consists of reinforced concrete cells holding about 120,000 cubic metres of waste immobilized in a cement matrix covered with multi-layer protective barriers In June 2015 the Ignalina plant applied for a licence to operate the SWMSF The solid waste retrieval facility has been built next to the existing temporary waste storage buildings inside the perimeter of the Ignalina plant The solid waste treatment and storage facilities have been constructed close to the plant adjacent to the interim used fuel storage facility Due to the fuel pools at both reactors being essentially full some used fuel is stored in dry casks onsite A new interim spent fuel storage facility (ISFSF) was built by a consortium led by GNS-Nukem about one kilometre from the power plant It will store most of the used fuel that has accumulated over the course of the plant's operation Some 18,000 RBMK-1500 fuel assemblies from Ignalina 1&2 will be stored in a total of 202 metal and concrete Constor M2 containers at the facility for 50 years. Phase 1 contract was for €93 million and in 2009 an amendment for phase 2 took the project to €193.5 million financed by the EBRD’s International Decommissioning Support Fund In 2010 VATESI licenced construction of a very low-level waste (VLLW) facility to store 60,000 cubic metres of VLLW from both operation and decommissioning of the plant It is close to the new used fuel storage facility and the solid radioactive waste treatment and storage facility Both Ignalina RBMK reactors are now being decommissioned Used nuclear fuel from both units has been moved from the used fuel storage pools into casks and transported to the ISFSF facility Dismantling of unit 2 commenced in mid-2014 Funding for this was suspended by EBRD in December 2012 due to lack of progress The total estimated cost of the Ignalina decommissioning project is over €2.5 billion EU funding for this work is largely through the Ignalina International Decommissioning Support Fund (IIDSF) administered by the European Bank for Reconstruction & Development (EBRD) and two other funds administered by EBRD About 95% of the required decommissioning funds are being provided by the EU member states and the spending is being administered by a Central Project Management Agency (CPMA) and the EBRD The other 5% comes from Lithuanian state funds through the state's own energy agency In 1991, Lithuania's State Nuclear Power Safety Inspectorate (Valstybinė atominės energetikos saugos inspekcija, VATESI) was set up to oversee Ignalina VATESI is the state regulatory and supervisory authority for nuclear energy and the safety of activities involving sources of ionising radiation It is now an independent institution which reports directly to government the Independent Safety Analysis Group (ISAG) was also set up by the government at the Lithuanian Energy Institute in Kaunas to give technical assistance to both VATESI and the plant The Radiation Protection Centre oversees radiation protection It drafts laws and regulations on radiation protection Lithuania has been party to the Vienna Convention on civil liability for nuclear damage since 1994 It became a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency in 1993 Lithuania came under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1992 and the Additional Protocol in came into force in 2000 a. The Ignalina site is located near the town of Visaginas, 130 km from Vilnius, near the point where Lithuania's borders with Latvia and Belarus meet. The plant is beside a large lake, Lake Drukshyai, which was used for cooling. [Back] b. The design capacity of the two Ignalina RBMK-1500 reactors was 4800 MWt (1500 MWe) each. Following safety concerns arising from the April 1986 accident at Chernobyl, it was decided to limit operation of the units to 4200 MWt, effectively derating them. [Back] c. Construction of unit 2 commenced in 1980 and was completed in 1986. However, its startup was delayed until August 1987 due to the April 1986 accident at Chernobyl. [Back] e. The Nuclear Safety Account was the first multilateral fund set up at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) in 1993 to finance nuclear safety projects in central and eastern Europe. See the page on nuclear safety on the EBRD website (www.ebrd.com). [Back] f. In January 2010 – the month following the shutdown of Ignalina 2 – electricity prices increased by 33.3%. [Back] A feasibility study launched by the MoU showed that a new nuclear plant costing €2.5-4.0 billion would be economically attractive and could be on line in 2015 Lithuanian Prime Minister Gediminas Kirkilas invited Poland to join in the project despite Lithuania's Baltic partners being against Poland's involvement the Baltic states agreed to discuss cooperation with Poland and it was announced that Poland was to participate The envisaged capacity of the proposed plant was increased to up to 3200 MWe up from the 800-1600 MWe capacity originally planned with each of the other three parties taking 22% but a formal agreement could not be reached the Lithuanian Electricity Organization (LEO LT) was established by the Lithuanian government to raise funds for the new nuclear plant The Lithuanian government held 61.7% of LEO LT and NDX Energija 38.3% The government's 96.4% holding in Lietuvos Energija along with its 71.34% stake in RST (Rytų skirstomieji tinklai Eastern Power Grid Company) were transferred to LEO LT; and NDX Energija transferred its 97.1% stake in VST (Vakarų skirstomieji tinklai Much controversy surrounded the formation of LEO LT and the general election at the end of 2008 brought in a new government (under Prime Minister Andrius Kubilius) that was against the company LEO LT decided to name the new plant after the nearby town of Visaginas although it would be built adjacent to the Ignalina RBMKs VAE) joint venture company was established in August 2008 for the new units LEO LT initially owned all the shares in the new company and intended to retain 51% the Lithuanian government officially began searching for strategic investors in the project (see Note i below) Belarus is also building a VVER-1200 nuclear plant, initially with two units6 located in the Ostovets/Astravets district of the Hrodna region, near the Lithuanian border. Construction started in November 2013 and the first unit was connected to the grid in March 2020.  [Back] j. The planned 154 km double-circuit HVDC 400 kV overhead line, connecting Alytus in Lithuania and Elk in Poland, is coordinated by LitPol Link. Established in May 2008, LitPol Link is a 50:50 joint venture between transmission system operators Lietuvos energija AB and PSE (Polskie Sieci Elektroenergetyczne) Operator SA. [Back] If you would like to learn more about the IAEA’s work sign up for our weekly updates containing our most important news Lithuania’s Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant is being decommissioned the world’s first such project involving RBMK reactors As part of the country’s accession talks with the European Union Lithuania agreed to the early shutdown of the two reactors The European Commission has provided significant financial assistance to Ignalina NPP decommissioning complemented by Lithuanian national co-financing How you can use IAEA Videos → The room will look familiar to anyone who’s watched the HBO Chernobyl series, which was filmed at the Ignalina power plant in August 2018. The hugely popular series, watched by over 8 million people shows the catastrophic nuclear explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant near the town of Pripyat in Ukraine in 1986 Current estimates place the number of deaths between 4,000 (according a 2005 United Nations analysis) and 90,000 (as suggested by Greenpeace International) tourism to Ignalina has “massively increased,” says Natalija Survila-Glebova Chernobyl’s radiation levels remain too high for tourists to walk around the plant and Australia have poured into the Ignalina plant in Visaginas for the unique experience of being able to walk on nuclear reactors something that’s too dangerous to do in Chernobyl The rise in tourism has breathed new life into a town that has faced an identity crisis since the Ignalina plant was decommissioned in 2009 The closure led to the loss of thousands of jobs and a surge in young people leaving Visaginas; Survila-Glebova says that the plant will be fully closed off in eight years The mayor and residents are instead finding ways to move the town away from its nuclear identity and develop other industries to keep people from leaving “Our city will always be a nuclear age monument but it will not support the life of our residents,” says Pavel Kostenko a 36-year-old Visaginas resident who runs a small steel production company Visaginas’ design resembles a butterfly cut in half with each wing representing the INPP reactors.) Launching and expanding new industries is now seen as a way of connecting more closely with other parts of Lithuania. In this mostly Russian-speaking town, where more than half of the population are Russian many residents have felt disconnected from the rest of the country now we need to think about the future,” Kostenko says “No one could believe they would do that and cut thousands of jobs,” says Kostenko Some 5,000 people were employed at the plant; today have migrated to Russia and other cities in Europe; the town is now home to about 18,700 people according to Visaginas mayor Erlandas Galaguz who worked as a reactor engineer for over a decade “Residents thought that there won’t be life here.” The crisis was compounded by the language barrier “To be Lithuanian you need to speak the language,” says documentary producer Cullinane Many people from Visaginas’ older generation can’t speak Lithuanian and that “doesn’t go over so well” in modern Lithuania Even residents who are fluent in Lithuanian have struggled to integrate Speaking through her respirator in a muffled voice as we walk through a long brightly lit corridor Jevsejeva says: “I understand talk and work in Lithuanian and with Lithuanians but unfortunately I don’t feel fully Lithuanian and other Lithuanians don’t recognize me as one of them.” The 31 year old worked in London at two major banks for four years before deciding to move back “I thought I would die of loneliness in London,” she says, adding that she’s one of a handful of her classmates who decided to settle in Visaginas, where the average salary is 700 euros a month.(The national average is 1,300 euros.) “We need to go back to a state where people believe in the town’s perspective and potential,” says Visaginas mayor, Erlandas Galaguz. And to do that, he says, Visaginas needs jobs. “But things are getting better,” he adds. A new factory that will produce medical equipment is currently being built by the U.K It’s expected to give an economic boost to the town with the factory planning to employ about 200 people initially and to eventually increase the workforce to 1,500 given to Lithuanians who return home after living abroad to start their own civic initiative Lake Visaginas in Lithuania on Nov. 29, 2019.Madeline Roache for TIMELitWild has been able to bring in visitors, Anastasija says, because of improvements in infrastructure in Visaginas. These new pavements, street lights and regular trains connecting the town to the capital are largely the result of E.U. funds from 2007-2013 But she says the company needs more support needs more support from local authorities,” says Anastasija LitWild wants to set up a local camping site and an information center which require a greenlight from local politicians But Anastasija says they’ve been waiting for concrete action for over a year Residents are also keen to develop the creative industries Alex Urazov greets me with a smile outside his art residency “Tochka” (“Point”) in central Visaginas barefoot and in cut-off cargo pants even though it’s snowing The 35 year old was born in Russia and moved to Visaginas in 1988 at the age of 4 he says he felt he had “hit a ceiling” and needed to get out he moved back to his hometown to set up an art residency which occupies a 5 story building in the center of town welcomes young Visaginas residents and visiting artists Urazov’s only rule is that alcohol and drugs are banned “I won’t turn them away if they come here drunk but they can’t take anything in here,” he says sci-fi figurines and other crafts — some made by the visitors — crowd the dimly lit rooms One of the rooms is decked out in dream catchers and hand-made key-chains which they sell online and at local markets engage in heated debates or read Urazov’s collection of books on philosophy It’s also a rare safe space in Visaginas for LGBT people “A lot of people who don’t feel like they fit in come here,” he says Urazov says he wants Visaginas to move away from its “Soviet” past and become more “European.” “I want to bring Lithuania and the world closer to Visaginas attract diverse people and make it contemporary,” he says Various artists and photographers have begun migrating from the capital to Visaginas it’s peaceful with the surrounding nature and has all the necessities of a city.” Other residents see a huge potential in the plant’s leftover infrastructure drive to a large 3-story administrative building in the Ignalina power plant that’s been abandoned and closed off to the public since 2009 Kostenko proudly shows me a frame from the Chernobyl trailer featuring this exact gate and tells me how camera crews took over the site for four days But attracting more production companies is not what they have in mind for the future a member of the “Visaginas is Us” a public election committee led by seven other young professionals from the town envisions Visaginas as an IT hub that hosts data centers—and hopes to transform the Ignalina power plant facilities into a data center “Visaginas is Us” says politicians in Vilnius could help the town attract investors and encourage companies to expand by introducing a free economic zone in Visaginas (an area where companies are taxed very lightly or not at all) or by offering corporate tax concessions they secured the lifting of the sanitary protection zone which bans certain businesses operating within a 2 mile radius of the plant expected to be implemented from January 2020 will allow businesses to set up shop in this building and six others around the plant In one of the building’s rooms at Ignalina old fire extinguishers and barrels of oil are scattered on the ground and a large industrial hook hangs from the ceiling runs through the room and around the Ignalina plant; “the plant’s artery” is what Kostenko calls it Keep out” hang below red rubber gloves coated in white dust In a room that occupies the entire third floor and black and white photos of former plant employees “Think how many offices and people could be here,” says Kostenko we get a view of hundreds of yards of the Ignalina plant and even more foundations of those that were dismounted “If we could only get the young generation to build something as big and impressive in such a short amount of time as the older generation did,” says Kostenko The original version of this story misstated the number of deaths caused by the Chernobyl explosion The original version of this story misstated the name of INPP’s head of communications Contact us at letters@time.com A third reactor was planned and construction started in 1985 but it was suspended and demolished in 1989 The IEA said safe decommissioning by 2038 is a priority for the government The EU has financed decommissioning with €820 Lithuania discussed options for building a new nuclear power plant close to Visaginas the project was cancelled following the 2012 referendum showing the electorate’s opposition at 62.7% The development of nuclear power in Belarus close to Lithuania’s capital Vilnius, without consultation with the Baltic countries, has raised concerns Baltic states collectively opposed the construction and commissioning of the two-unit Belarus nuclear station Lithuania and neighbouring couuntries stopped imports from Belarus in November 2020 The start of the first Belarusian unit was postponed from March 2021 in the light of the safety concerns raised by the European Nuclear Safety Regulators Group (Ensreg) Lithuania has strengthened its energy policies over recent years Electricity market reforms are underway and Lithuania – along with its Baltic neighbours Latvia and Estonia – is integrating its power system into Continental Europe’s about 40 percent of the dismantling work at the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant in eastern Lithuania has been completed The nuclear fuel removed from the reactors has been safely transferred to a storage facility in four-metre-high casks According to the plant’s director general Linas Baužys one hundred and ninety casks contain 90 percent of the most dangerous radioactive material from the plant we should have built a deep repository where we can store the spent nuclear fuel in a safer because it is not going to disappear by itself,” he tells LRT TV Where such a repository will be located will presumably become apparent in 20 years’ time Seventy-seven potential sites across Lithuania have now been identified “The deep repository will be about 700 metres deep which is equivalent to two TV towers at that depth,” says Baužys not only have we deepened them and everything Now that the decommissioning of the nuclear power plant is nearing the second reactor hall no outside visitor will be able to enter once the dismantling begins “The radiation background increases and it becomes dangerous for outside visitors to go there we will certainly look for alternatives to show the nuclear power plant in other ways,” says the facility’s head of communications Jolita Mažeikienė The decommissioning process since 2010 has involved dismantling over 90,000 tonnes of equipment Just as much work remains until the task is complete Lithuania’s strategy is to dismantle the plant immediately conserve it and leave it for future generations to deal with in a hundred years or so which is to start the dismantling work immediately after the shutdown,” explains Inglaina NPP planning manager Valdas Ledzinskas The decommissioning works at the plant are expected to last until 2038 US-based nuclear engineering company Amentum has been selected as consultant for the first-of-a-kind dismantling of steam drum separators at units 1&2 of Lithuania’s Ignalina NPP (INPP), now undergoing decommissioning Ignalina comprised two water-cooled graphite-moderated channel-type RBMK-1500 reactors. Unit 1 came online in 1983 and unit 2 in 1987. Following the Chornobyl accident, both units were de-rated to 1360 MWe. Lithuania agreed to close the plant as part of its accession agreement to the European Union (EU). Ignalina 1 closed in 2004 and Ignalina 2 in 2009 Lithuania subsequently became an energy importer The past few years has seen INPP focusing on defuelling the reactors which are expected to be fully decommissioned by 2038 The work is mostly funded by the EU through the European Bank for Reconstruction & Development (EBRD) and other funds Amentum’s seven-year contract is estimated by INPP to be worth €5.5m ($6m) in revenue and will be implemented under International Federation of Consulting Engineers (FIDIC) Yellow Book Conditions It will be administered by the EBRD and funded by European Commission grants Amentum will provide consultancy services to support INPP’s Project Management Unit (PMU) and carry out the duties of FIDIC Engineer for the dismantling contract “We will deploy our extensive nuclear decommissioning and waste management experience from the UK Czechia and Slovakia to this ground-breaking project,” said Andy White head of Amentum Energy & Environment International Amentum will help INPP to manage the removal of the Steam Drum Separators – large drums installed over the graphite core to divert steam to the turbines The PMU will oversee the design and safety justification for dismantling and fragmentation of the drums and associated equipment which are located in the plant’s radiologically contaminated primary circuit The Amentum team will also be available to support further stages of decommissioning at INPP is a significant contributor to the dismantling of the steam drum separators,” said Linas Baužys “Their large international experience both as a FIDIC engineer and while working in various similar nuclear power projects will be a contributory factor to the success of the project’s joint implementation.” IAE has signed separate contracts with a consortium comprising Westinghouse Electric Spain Jacobs Slovakia sro and the Lithuanian Energy Institute as well as a consortium comprising EDF and Graphitec with the maximum price of each preliminary contract being EUR5.5 million (USD5.8 million) excluding VAT The design services for reactor dismantling technologies will be provided in two stages after concluding two preliminary contracts with contractors the reactor dismantling concept will be developed Each contractor will design and propose two engineering solutions in consultation with stakeholders - including the European Commission the Central Project Management Agency and the State Nuclear Power Safety Inspectorate - will evaluate the proposed options and choose the best concept on the basis of which the technical design and licensing services for reactor dismantling will be purchased later Phase 2 works (including the technological design safety analysis report and other documents) which focus on further development of the selected reactor dismantling concept will be acquired through a separate purchase after the completion of the preliminary contracts "Today we reached an important stage in the decommissioning project of the Ignalina nuclear power plant," said IAE CEO Audrius Kamiens "Decommissioning the reactor core is the most complex part of decommissioning most advanced and safest reactor decommissioning technologies together with skilled and reliable world-class partners "It is very important for us that these world-renowned companies which have accumulated significant professional experience and develop cutting-edge innovations will be part of the nuclear power plant decommissioning project I am firmly convinced that the knowledge and experience they will bring to the project will be invaluable and will lay a solid foundation for the further dismantling of the reactors of the Ignalina nuclear power plant." Lithuania agreed to shut down Ignalina units 1 and 2 as a condition of its accession to the European Union Unit 1 was shut down in December 2004 and unit 2 in December 2009 The final cask of used fuel was transferred from the reactor buildings at Ignalina to an on-site interim storage facility in April 2022 The physical dismantling of the reactors is scheduled to begin in 2028 with the site expected to achieve the "brown field" end-stage by 2038 IAE said the dismantling of Ignalina reactors "is an unprecedented work The decommissioning of two of the world's most powerful RBMK-type reactors is the first decommissioning project of such a nuclear power plant in global practice" The project is being financed through the funds of the EU Ignalina programme Lithuaniaís Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant is being decommissioned the world's first such project involving RBMK reactors As part of the countryís accession talks with the European Union the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant is undergoing decommissioning the world's first such project involving RBMK nuclear power reactors Before it joined the European Union in 2004 The European Commission has provided significant financial assistance for the project Narrated by an IAEA decommissioning specialist, this video highlights the ongoing work at Ignalina the spent fuel pool and the turbine building decontaminated before being stored or released Also featured is work being carried out in the new free release measurement facility the interim fuel storage facility and the solid waste management and storage facility - all of which were purpose-built for the project is expected to offer valuable lessons as the international community prepares to decommission scores of nuclear power plant reactors that have reached the end of their operating lifetime or will do so in the coming years IAEA Advises Lithuania on Project Risks of Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant Decommissioning Laboratory Built for Radiological Emergencies now Supports Cancer Research Project supported by EU and 14 European governments the project Improving the Safety of Radioactive Waste Management at INPP largely funded by the Norwegian Financial Mechanism controls and preventive measures during decommissioning which would minimise the negative impact on the environment Ignalina NPP is currently decommissioning two 1500MWe RBMK reactors that provided 70% of Lithuania’s electricity before they were closed as a condition for Lithuania’s accession to the European Union Ignalina NPP has removed fuel from the reactors and placed it into dry casks for interim storage at the site pending construction of a geological disposal facility (GDF) including the development of concepts for a bituminous waste storage facility and a GDF The project involved the State Atomic Energy Safety Inspectorate of Lithuania (VATESI) the Norwegian Radiation & Nuclear Safety Authority (DSA) the Central Project Management Agency (CPVA) the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and other organisations The total value of the implemented activities amounted to more than €3m ($3.2m) 85% of which came from the Norwegian Financial Mechanism “One of the strategic goals of the enterprise is the safe management of radioactive waste ensuring that future generations do not inherit the unjustified burden of radioactive waste management,” said INPP project manager Andrius Višniauskas “This project made it possible to solve problems related to radioactive waste management it was an exceptional opportunity to improve knowledge and competence in the field of decommissioning of nuclear power facilities.” One of the tasks that the project solved was the transformation of a storage facility for bituminised radioactive waste This storage facility was put into operation at the Ignalina NPP in 1987 The 5,600-square-metre building stores 14,400 cubic metres of bitumen compound the possibility of modernising the complex for storing bituminous waste into a repository was analysed The project also included the preparation of a methodology for removing radiation monitoring of an industrial waste landfill and a research programme for the landfill as well as geotechnical and radiological studies The industrial waste landfill from 1985 to 2015 contained mixed construction and demolition waste more than 30,000 cubic metres of waste have accumulated The results of the research will make it possible to convert the landfill into a regular waste dump A particularly important part of the project was the development of the concept of a GDF for radioactive waste it will be an engineering structure located at a depth of several hundred metres underground and designed for the safe storage of long-lived radioactive waste generated during the work of the IAEA (1983-2009) and during decommissioning (until 2038) The GDF is planned to be built and commissioned in 2068 the concept will be adjusted depending on the progress of the project Damaged fuel management work at the unit began in September 2020 and last month the last 16 damaged fuel assemblies were processed and placed in a special container for their shipment the damaged fuel will fill 22 containers out of 190 stored at the temporary storage facility "Damaged fuel management is a first-time technologically complex and time-consuming process so it is particularly gratifying that the professional and coordinated work of our staff allowed us to successfully complete the transportation of fuel from unit 1 and start handling damaged fuel at unit 2 two weeks earlier," said INPP Director General Audrius Kamienas "This is an invaluable experience and an important stage in the entire INPP radioactive waste management process," he added After transporting damaged fuel management system equipment from unit 1 to unit 2 on 5 May the first two of 189 damaged fuel assemblies had been treated All damaged fuel management work is planned to be completed in October 2022 The safety of the damaged fuel management process in terms of nuclear and radiation safety Workers dismantling the turbine hall at Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant measure scrap metal for traces of radiation The ongoing initiative to decommission Lithuania’s Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (INPP) should include plans for potential project risks to ensure that future costs and scheduling remain realistic according to an IAEA-led expert mission that concluded today carried out at the invitation of the Government of Lithuania reviewed project risks and uncertainties related to the decommissioning of Ignalina’s two RBMK-1500 light water cooled graphite moderated reactors The European Commission is providing substantial funding for the project “Any undertaking of this kind involves a series of risks and uncertainties so it’s important to mitigate them wherever possible,” said Patrick O’Sullivan the IAEA decommissioning specialist who led the four-person mission team that also included experts from Slovakia “Factoring these risks into the planning effort will help ensure realistic future cost estimates.” The operator has identified risks at both the corporate and individual project level and has taken into consideration the experience of other countries in decommissioning which the team considered to be good practices which in the coming weeks will deliver its full report to the plant’s operators also made a series of recommendations and suggestions aimed at strengthening the operator’s ability to identify project risks INPP Director General Darius Janulevičius welcomed the team’s findings saying they would be analyzed and applied to the extent possible “INPP has achieved significant progress over the past few years ensuring effective implementation of key decommissioning activities,” Janulevičius said “The broad competence and extensive experience of the experts involved in the IAEA mission will support INPP’s efforts towards building up an integrated risk management system that works effectively.” located in the southeastern corner of the Baltic country near the border with Belarus including partial dismantlement of the turbine hall and construction of a solid waste management facility and an interim spent fuel storage facility The experience at Ignalina could offer valuable lessons as the international community prepares to decommision scores of nuclear power plant reactors that have reached the end of their operating lifetime or will do so in the coming years “The decommissioning of power units with RBMK-type reactors has allowed INPP to gain unique experience that can be systematized and applied in other nuclear energy projects,” Janulevičius said “INPP has a vision to become an expert on safe and efficient nuclear facility decommissioning and radioactive waste management.” “The thinking used to be that we could close down these plants and wait a few decades before dismantling them,” O’Sullivan said “But the arguments for waiting are becoming less compelling in many places funds have been built up to carry out the work and at the end of the day it’s a question of fairness: our generations benefited from these plants so the job of decommissioning them shouldn’t be left to future generations.” New Video: Decommissioning of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant New IAEA Project Focusses on Decommissioning and Remediation of Damaged Nuclear Facilities The last container of fuel was transported to the INPP New Interim Spent Fuel Storage Facility (ISFSF) on 21 April bringing the total number of casks stored there to 190 loaded with 15,555 used fuel assemblies from Ignalina's two RBMK reactors and storage ponds The fuel in this facility is stored in CONSTOR RBMK-1500/М2 containers 2.6 metres in diameter and weighing about 118 tonnes After interim storage - up to 50 years - in the dry-type ISFSF all used fuel will be disposed of in a deep geological repository The ISFSF was opened in October 2016 and is administered through the Ignalina International Decommissioning Support Fund (IIDSF) which is managed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) the IIDSF has provided more than EUR830 million (USD896 million) to date for the implementation of key decommissioning projects and the development of Lithuania's energy sector The IIDSF is funded by the European Community as well as by Austria "Completion of this stage is a key development in the overall decommissioning programme for Ignalina reactors 1 and 2," The EBRD said "This milestone is a testament to the longstanding collaboration between the EBRD Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant and the government of Lithuania," said EBRD Director of Nuclear Safety Balthasar Lindauer delivered in close collaboration with the European Union as a major donor to the IIDSF has supported the construction and implementation of a range of complex decommissioning facilities We look forward to maintaining this unique partnership to ensure the long-term aims of final decommissioning can be achieved safely and on time." INPP noted that now all the fuel has been removed from the units it will be able to obtain a decommissioning license from Lithuania's State Nuclear Power Safety Inspectorate (Vatesi) and perform complex decommissioning works related to the dismantling of reactor systems "It is hoped that the terms of such a license will reduce post-commissioning costs and make demolition and demolition work more efficient," the plant said "The completion of such a significant and technically complex project is an important event in the history of the Ignalina nuclear power plant and an expression of our core mission," said INPP General Manager Audrius Kamienas "We aim to become experts in the safe and efficient decommissioning of nuclear facilities and in the management of radioactive waste We are committed to the safe decommissioning of a world-class nuclear power plant with two RBMK reactors added: "The equipment that will no longer be considered as safety-relevant after appropriate safety justifications and with appropriate permits During the entire operation period of the Ignalina plant 21,571 heat-generating nuclear fuel assemblies were used: 6016 are stored in the old storage facility and 15,555 in the new ISFSF Lithuania’s Ignalina NPP (INPP) has signed two contracts for the provision of services for the design of reactor dismantling technologies with two major international consortia The first is a consortium led by Westinghouse Electric Spain (a subsidiary of US-based Westinghouse) and including Jacobs Slovakia The second is a consortium led by the Lithuanian Energy Institute and the French company Electricite de France (EDF) Preliminary contracts were concluded for four years the maximum price of each being €5.5 million ($5.86m) excluding VAT Lithuania’s Ignalina NPP (INPP) has signed two contracts for the provision of services for the design of reactor dismantling technologies with two major international consortia The first is a consortium led by Westinghouse Electric Spain (a subsidiary of US-based Westinghouse) and including Jacobs Slovakia the maximum price of each being €5.5 million ($5.86m) excluding VAT Services for the design of reactor dismantling technologies will be provided in two stages At the 1st stage, a concept for dismantling the reactor will be developed Each contractor will develop and offer two engineering solutions in consultation with stakeholders (Lithuania’s Energy Ministry; Central Project Management Agency; nuclear regulator Vatesi; and the European Commission) will evaluate the proposed options and select the best concept on the basis of which the procurement of engineering design services and licensing services for reactor dismantling will follow The second stage (technological design safety analysis report and other documents) is aimed at further development of the selected reactor dismantling concept which will be acquired through separate procurement after completion of the preliminary contracts “Today we have reached an important milestone in the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant decommissioning project Reactor core decommissioning is the most complex part of decommissioning.” said INPP Director General Audrius Kamenas “It is very important for us that these world-famous companies become participants in the INPP decommissioning project I firmly believe that the knowledge and experience they will bring to the project will be invaluable and will lay a solid foundation for further dismantling of the Ignalina NPP reactors.”  The project is funded by the EU Ignalina Programme INPP comprised two Soviet-built water-cooled graphite-moderated channel-type RBMK-1500 reactors Lithuania agreed to close the plant as part of its accession agreement to the European Union (EU) which argued that lack of containment made the units unsafe Ignalina 1 closed in 2004 and Ignalina 2 – which accounted for 25% of Lithuania’s electricity generating capacity and supplied about 70% of Lithuania’s electrical demand – closed in 2009 The past few years has seen INPP focusing on defueling the reactors Technologies for dismantling of graphite channel reactors are currently being developed in Russia Neither Westinghouse nor EDF have any experience in dismantling such reactors Russian nuclear utility Rosenergoatom set up an engineering centre for the decommissioning of RBMK units (ODIC RBMK) at the Leningrad NPP where two RBMK units have been closed pending commission with two more to close in the near future. ODIC RBMK is developing methods for the safe serial decommissioning of shutdown power units of NPPs with channel-type reactors a structural unit has been created at the site of the Beloyarsk NPP which has two closed AMB graphite channel reactors As well as the Leningrad and Beloyarsk units these will include four RBMKs at Kursk NPP and three at Smolensk NPP all of which will be replaced by VVER-1200 or VVER-TOI pressurised water reactors Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (INPP) in Lithuania has announced the removal of the last used fuel assembly from the reactor of unit 2 Some of the used fuel was removed from the reactor after its final closure in 2009 but the remainder was left pending the launch of an Interim Spent Fuel Storage Facility (ISFSF) INPP restarted unloading of used fuel from the unit 2 in June last year after receiving a licence for the industrial operation of the ISFSF The state-run company said it has unloaded 1134 fuel assemblies from the reactor “in a very short time” It is now focused on accelerating the transfer of used fuel to the ISFSF with full adherence to international safety standards and on ensuring the most efficient of state targets for decommissioning The B1 project is financially supported by the Ignalina International Decommissioning Support Fund (IIDSF) which is managed by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development The European Union is by far the biggest contributor to the IIDSF Lithuanian State Nuclear Power Safety Inspectorate said in May last year that it had issued a permit for the start of commercial operation of the ISFSF The announcement followed INPP's successful completion of hot tests with ten new design casks The facility is at the plant site in Visaginas municipality Used fuel will be stored in specially designed Constor RBMK1500/M2 casks that will each weigh 118 tonnes when fully loaded It is expected that about 190 containers with 17,000 used fuel rods will be stored in the facility for up to 50 years Researched and writtenby World Nuclear News Jacobs formed part of a project management unit for a set of purpose-built facilities needed to decommission the station as part of a programme led by the European Union and 14 European governments through the Ignalina International Decommissioning Support Fund In April 2022, international efforts to assist Lithuania with the decommissioning of its only nuclear power station reached an important milestone, with the last of the spent fuel removed from the reactors at Ignalina The EBRD said the final cask – the special container used to store spent nuclear fuel safely and securely – was transferred to the interim spent fuel storage facility loaded with 15,555 spent fuel assemblies from the Ignalina reactors and storage ponds “Completion of this stage is a key development in the overall decommissioning programme for Ignalina reactors 1 and 2,” the EBRD said Inside a reactor hall at the Ignalina nuclear power station in Lithuania the Ignalina nuclear power plant originally featured two 4,800MW units The first power plant unit was commissioned in 1983 and the second unit in 1987 The capacity of each unit was reduced to 4,200MW after the nuclear accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine in April 1986 The plant is currently undergoing decommissioning that is controlled by the Lithuanian Ministry of Economy The units were shut down in 2004 and 2009 respectively citing the potential risk of nuclear hazard due to the similar RBMK 1500 reactors as used in the infamous Chernobyl plant Ignalina plant was designed to remain operational until 2015 the decommissioning project is estimated to cost €3.4bn ($3.8bn) The Ignalina nuclear power station used two light-water high-power channel type RBMK 1500 reactors that were designed by the Soviet Union An accident localisation system (ALS) was also in place to contain the radioactive materials in the plant Several non-upgradable faults of the reactor design were discovered during the Anticipated Transients Without Scram (ATWS) study The study was performed to identify the power plant reactors’ potential improvement scope and threats as well as the requirements for the reactors’ shutdown system future modifications The effective shutdown system acted as a substitute for the insufficient intrinsic safety features in the RBMK reactors while the lack of proper containment building increased the potential risks Lithuania agreed for the early closure of the nuclear reactors as part of its accession process to the European Union in May 2004 The dismantling of the first unit began in 2010 while that of the unit’s turbine hall equipment was completed in June 2016 The dismantled contaminated equipment was treated and transported to the new solid radioactive waste management facility that was opened in 2017 while the decontaminated equipment was released from the plant emergency core cooling system (ECCS) tanks gas circuit and venting was also completed A total of 17,000 RBMK spent nuclear fuel rods were dismantled from the reactors in the units and safely stored in 190 specially designed CONSTOR® RBMK 1500 / M2 casks The casks were transported to the nearby 2,370m² interim spent-fuel storage facility that was opened in October 2016 The complete defuelling of the units and its transportation to the new facility will be completed by 2022 The 17,100t reactor core will also be dismantled A landfill facility is being developed for disposing 60,000m³ of operational waste and dismantled Class A waste that will accumulate during the demolition and site remediation process multi-barrier near-surface repository is being constructed to dispose of 100,000m³ of low and intermediate level short-lived radioactive waste Ignalina International Decommissioning Support Fund was set up by the European Commission and 14 European governments to provide funding for the Ignalina nuclear power plant decommissioning European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) manages the fund The allocated budget for the decommissioning project for the period between 2021 and 2027 is €780m ($905.2m) The project is also supported by the Lithuanian state funds NUKEM Technologies performs the development installation and pre-commissioning works of the solid waste treatment and storage facility (SWTSF) and solid waste retrieval facility at the nuclear power plant site NUKEM subcontracted a Lithuanian construction company Vetruna for the construction of the nuclear waste containment unit A consortium of NUKEM and GNS Gesellschaft für Nuklear-Service designed and built the spent nuclear fuel container for interim storage The near-surface repository is being constructed by Areva TA consortium and France-based radioactive waste management company Andra The Ignalina nuclear power plant was developed under the former Soviet Union’s North-West Unified Power System Following the independence of Lithuania in March 1990 under the Lithuanian Republic jurisdiction the Lithuanian Ministry of Economy became the owner of the nuclear plant The Lithuanian Nuclear Power Safety Inspectorate (VATESI) has subsequently regulated the plant since 1994 the Ignalina nuclear power plant and the EBRD signed an agreement to provide a $36.9m grant for the plant safety improvement programme (SIP) The improvements included 20 projects across operational Another safety improvement programme SIP-2 was implemented to perform design modifications View all newsletters from across the GlobalData Media network Cold testing - one of the first stages of the commissioning process - has started at the new Solid Waste Management and Storage Facilities (SWMSF) at the shut down Ignalina nuclear power plant in Lithuania A ceremony was held at the plant yesterday to mark the start of the cold tests the CEO of Lithuanian state enterprise Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant Darius Janulvičius Nukem Technologies executive director Jean Maurer and European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) nuclear safety director Vince Novak The cold tests aim to test the equipment and operational systems to demonstrate their safety and that they meet the design and operation requirements The tests are scheduled to be completed next year after which hot tests using radioactive waste will continue until 2017 Full operation of the facilities will then commence The solid waste facilities will handle all solid radioactive waste from the operation and decommissioning of the Ignalina plant that has provided almost 70% of the country's power Some 120,000 cubic meters of short- and long-lived radioactive waste currently stored at Ignalina will be processed by them The facilities will be used for characterization and storage of solid radioactive waste accumulating in the course of operation and decommissioning of the plant The solid waste will be stored at the facility for 50 years The new SWMSF is located at two separate sites The solid waste treatment and storage facilities have been constructed on a new site close to the plant Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant signed a contract with Nukem in November 2005 for the design construction and commissioning of the SWMSF The project is financed by the Ignalina International Decommissioning Support Fund "With the launching of the Solid Waste Management and Storage Facilities safe and well-considered radioactive waste management infrastructure." Lithuania agreed to shut down Ignalina I and 2 – both Soviet-design RBMK reactors - as a condition of its accession to the European Union Unit 1 was shut down in 2004 and unit 2 in 2009 graphite-moderated reactors came on line in 1983 and 1987 where the radioactive materials placed can stay for ages and not turn into a problem for future generations,” Linas Baužys told LRT RADIO on Friday a deputy director at the Lithuanian Geological Survey says the site for the repository will be chosen on the basis of geological and tectonic parameters as well as the stability of the future structures in deep layers and the isolation of waste from the geological environment “We must choose the safest and most suitable site first The storage of radioactive waste [in storage facilities] is only a temporary solution and a deep repository is the safest way in the world,” she told LRT RADIO Lithuania needs to pick a site for the deep repository by 2047 following research and an assessment of the geological suitability of the sites in terms of safety The repository is scheduled to be completed by 2068 long-lived radioactive waste from the Ignalina NPP which was shut down in 2009 and is scheduled to be completely decommissioned by 2038 It will later be transferred to the deep repository Work that began in October 2011 to dismantle the turbine halls of unit 1 of the Ignalina nuclear power plant - or the B9/1 project - has been completed The dismantled equipment weighs more than 18,000 tonnes and consists mostly of turbines Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant said work is continuing on the initial treatment of dismantled waste and which is scheduled for completion in 2019 Lithuania agreed to shut down Ignalina 1 and 2 as a condition of its accession to the European Union The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said in April that Lithuania should plan for potential project risks in the decommissioning of the Ignalina plant IAEA-led expert mission to the plant reviewed project risks and uncertainties related to the decommissioning of the two RBMK-1500 light-water which were permanently shut down in 2004 and 2009 The mission - carried out at the invitation of the Lithuanian government - said the operator has "identified risks at both the corporate and individual project level and has taken into consideration the experience of other countries in decommissioning" Lithuania should plan for potential project risks in the decommissioning of the Ignalina nuclear power plant the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has said Such planning should ensure that future costs and scheduling "remain realistic" IAEA-led expert mission to the plant reviewed project risks and uncertainties related to the decommissioning of Ignalina's two RBMK-1500 light-water the four-person team made a number of recommendations and suggestions aimed at strengthening the operator's ability to identify project risks These include putting in place a baseline cost and schedule for the remainder of the project that provides "sufficient detail and is realistic" It also said the operator should integrate risks into the baseline project and cost schedules It also said the plant should introduce a formal process of regular reporting against the identified risks The team will present its full report to the plant's operator "in the coming weeks" The IAEA team leader Patrick O'Sullivan noted "Any undertaking of this kind involves a series of risks and uncertainties so it's important to mitigate them wherever possible Factoring these risks into the planning effort will help ensure realistic future cost estimates." Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (INPP) director general Darius Janulevičius said "The broad competence and extensive experience of the experts involved in the IAEA mission will support INPP's efforts towards building up an integrated risk management system that works effectively." "The decommissioning of power units with RBMK-type reactors has allowed INPP to gain unique experience that can be systematized and applied in other nuclear energy projects," Janulevičius added "INPP has a vision to become an expert on safe and efficient nuclear facility decommissioning and radioactive waste management." The IAEA said some key decommissioning milestones had recently been reached at Ignalina including partial dismantlement of the turbine hall and construction of a solid radioactive waste management facility and an interim used fuel storage facility Under a year-long contract that enters into force Posiva Solutions will "discuss the principles that will ensure the safety of used nuclear fuel and long-lived radioactive waste storage in a geological repository the methodology for long-term safety assessment the methods to be used for safety assessment software and data," Ignalina NPP said The support also includes discussion of "the principles that will ensure the safety of used nuclear fuel and long-lived radioactive waste storage .. Posiva will also perform a general safety assessment of geological formations potentially suitable for a used fuel repository in Lithuania and will prepare general criteria for the construction of it Ignalina NPP noted that the design of the eventual repository system would need to comply with Lithuania's general nuclear safety requirements for nuclear facilities which themselves are in line with the recommendations of the International Atomic Energy Agency Posiva is jointly owned by Finnish nuclear power companies and has developed that country's geological disposal facility at Olkiluoto The main tunnels are excavated and at the end of last year Posiva submitted an application to operate it and begin disposing of fuel from 2024 Two large RBMK reactors at the Ignalina nuclear power plant provided 70% of Lithuania's electricity until their closure as a condition of joining the European Union The power plant is being decommissioned by the company Ignalina NPP which has removed fuel from the reactors and placed it into dry casks for interim storage at the site Damaged fuel handling is a technically complex and more time-consuming technological process The station said a total of 182 damaged fuel assemblies are being stored at Ignalina-1 and 185 at Ignalina-2 All damaged fuel will be ultimately transferred to 22 spent fuel casks out of 190 planned for the interim spent fuel repository Handling of damaged fuel at Unit 1 should be completed in late August 2021 all damaged fuel is scheduled to be removed from the two units Ignalina reported that all undamaged spent fuel had been successfully removed from Unit 1 with only damaged assemblies left to handle Ignalina-1 was shut down in December 2004 and Ignalina-2 in December 2009 which were retired permanently in line with requirements for Lithuania’s membership of the EU the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development which manages overseas funding for the decommissioning of Ignalina The interim storage facility for spent fuel opened in October 2016 and has since received a total of 142 casks with spent fuel assemblies from the Ignalina reactors and storage pools Learn about the EBRD's journey to investing more than €210 billion in over 7,400 projects business services and involvement in high-level policy reform We draw on three decades of regional knowledge and financial expertise to tailor our products and approaches to each client's needs Engage with us Contact us Cookies are pieces of code used to track website usage and give audiences the best possible experience Use the buttons to confirm whether you agree with default cookie settings when using ebrd.com We use Adobe Analytics cookies to measure usage of the website in order to improve it and respond to end user actions. We review anonymised data on how people reach the site, where they click and so forth. Learn more here about specifics of our cookie use We use Adobe marketing cookies to enable us to customise ebrd.com to tailor the website and email marketing services based on the interests of each end user It will be carried out in phases starting with a geophysical research programme followed by socio-economic assessment and geophysical surveys of areas that could potentially host a final disposal facility The aim is to produce a concept for a deep geological repository which Ignalina said “is the only sustainable and safe way” for the final disposal of radioactive waste Ignalina’s two Soviet-era RBMK units were shut down permanently in 2004 and 2009 in line with requirements for Lithuania’s membership of the EU With the permanent closure of Unit 2 of the Ignalina nuclear power plant on 31 December Lithuania is no longer a generator of nuclear electricity and will have to rely on imports to meet its electricity demand With the permanent closure of unit 2 of the Ignalina nuclear power plant on 31 December the country hopes to have replacement nuclear generating capacity in place by 2018 The shutdown of the two Soviet-designed RBMK reactors at Ignalina was a condition of the accession to the European Union The EU has agreed to pay decommissioning costs for the two RBMK reactors and some compensation through to 2013 Unit 1 of the Ignalina plant was shut at the end of 2004 The closure of the second Ignalina unit leaves Russia as the only country operating RBMK reactors The Ignalina reactors were originally 1500 MWe units (1380 MWe net) but were later de-rated to 1360 MWe (1185 MWe net) Construction started in 1978 and they came on line in 1983 and 1987 Lithuania assumed ownership of them in 1991 A third unit was planned at Ignalina but not completed the Ignalina plants were designed to provide power not only for Lithuania but also for neighbouring Latvia Belarus and the Kaliningrad area of Russia the second unit at Ignalina was supplying over 70% of Lithuania's electricity State-owned utility Lietuvos Energija said that the country was prepared for the plant's closure The company noted that Lithuania had managed to maintain electricity supplies during Ignalina's annual scheduled shutdowns as well as during unplanned outages at the plant Lietuvos Energija said that Lithuania's electricity demand in 2010 is expected to be some 9.1 terawatt-hours (TWh) of which more than half would be generated by domestic power plants and the remainder would be imported Electricity supply contracts have been signed with Estonia There are also possibilities to import electricity from Scandinavia Lithuania officially began its search for strategic investors to construct and operate a new nuclear power plant in the country to replace Ignalina The government published a notice of public work concession in the Official Journal of the European Union seeking "an experienced investor or investors which have a long experience in developing new electricity generation capacities and operating nuclear power plants." The deadline for submissions of proposals is 29 January Lithuania has proposed building a new nuclear power plant to replace the Soviet-era Ignalina plant with the participation of neighbouring Poland The two-unit plant would be built at Visaginas at a cost of around €6.7 billion ($10 billion) The investor would get a majority stake in the proposed new plant alongside Lithuanian state-owned utility Lietuvos Energija together with project partners Latvenergo of Latvia Eesti Energia of Estonia and Poland's Polska Grupa Energetyczna The notice said that "the new nuclear power plant project has become a very important goal of the Lithuania government's policy." Researched and writtenby World Nuclear News  23 Aug (NucNet): The dismantling of the turbine hall equipment at Lithuania’s Ignalina nuclear power station has been completed The total mass of the dismantled equipment during the project amounted to 18,159 tonnes and included turbines work on the initial treatment of the dismantled waste radiological measurements and packaging" is now under way and will continue until 2019 The two Soviet RBMK units at Ignalina were shut down in line with requirements for Lithuania’s membership of the EU the Ignalina station said in a statement that 23.4 percent of the total amount of equipment at the plant had been dismantled Decommissioning works at Ignalina are scheduled for completion in 2038 whose two RBMK-1500 graphite moderated reactors are the same fatally-flawed design of those at Chernobyl the site in 1986 of the world’s worst nuclear power accident The process started with the shutdown of reactor number one on Friday "This stoppage is no different from previous ones when the plant was closed for maintenance the only difference is that we won’t be restarting it," said spokeswoman Rasa Sevaldina Plant technicians began to slowly reduce the plant’s output at 9:00 a.m The operation was brought to a halt at 9:00 p.m Economic troubles lay ahead As a condition for its entrances into the EU Brussels demanded that Lithuania shut down the Ignalina plant because of long-held fears over the plants safety and potential for catastrophic disasters But the decision was a tough one for Vilnius to make as Ignalina supplies 80 percent of the country’s electricity the closure of the first reactor will slash another source of revenue for Lithuania in the form of energy exports to the nearby countries of Estonia The shut down will also bring with it a rise in unemployment in the nearby town of Visaginas an oasis in of mainly Russian plant workers worsening an already spiraling crisis of unemployment in eastern Lithuania 200 will be laid off by the end of the year The EU has made funds available to attract investment to the area and try to make use of the highly-skilled workers said recently that the country would build a modern nuclear power plant that would come on-line before the closure of Ignalina’s second unit but experts have said such a timeline for building a new reactor is not realistic Ignalina’s two reactors started operating ass a Soviet nuclear power plant in the mid-1980s after a decade of construction The building of a third unit at the plant was stopped after the Chernobyl disaster Thirteen of the EU’s 25 member states operate nuclear power plants Germany and Sweden have decided to gradually phase out atomic energy while Finland has opted to build up more nuclear power capacity Oslo office: info@bellona.no Brussels Office: europa@bellona.org Berlin Office: deutschland@bellona.org Vilnius Office: ru@bellona.org The International Biathlon Union (IBU) Regional Events continue to captivate audiences and athletes alike showcased the resilience and talent of biathletes from across the globe The event faced two contrasting days of weather - a warm and rainy Saturday followed by a sunny Sunday thanks to the extensive preparation of the tracks which were covered with approximately 60 cm of artificial snow The next stop in the IBU Regional Events series was Fossum This event saw participation from over 400 athletes representing Norway Fossum IF had the privilege of hosting the event which was a combined event for the IBU Regional Event and the Norwegian cup The schedule included a short individual race on Saturday and a sprint on Sunday Results for the races are forthcoming from the organizing committee the organizers at Fossum IF implemented a unique accommodation program where athletes could live with hosting families from Fossum This initiative was well-received by athletes and families with Lydia Hiernickel from Switzerland praising the arrangement as an excellent experience that she would recommend to other event organizers The IBU Regional Events series continues to bring together athletes from various nations highlighting the global appeal and spirit of biathlon The demolition of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) is scheduled to be completely finished only in 2038 although it has not been generating electricity for a long time the plant had not been always operating smoothly: in 1994 another over a mysterious spike in radioactivity part of the plant was shut cordoned off due to rusting Media reports about problems at the Ignalina NPP in the 1990s contrasted sharply with the Soviet-era glorifications a decade before The 1984 film Time Does Not Split Into Atoms noted that the plant under construction in eastern Lithuania would be the most powerful in the world With Gioachino Rossini’s score in the background the cameraman shows a construction crew and the driver Henrikas A voiceover proclaims that the “atom” will now ensure peace The film also attempts to assuage any worries of accidents and radiation “A person gets some radioactivity from drinking mineral water,” says an expert The plant was planned as an all-Soviet project and was bound to be a burden once Lithuania inherited it after the union’s collapse Lithuania was producing three times more electricity than it needed and supplying plutonium to the Soviet military industry This was one of the arguments that EU institutions used when negotiating with Vilnius on the plant’s decommissioning Lithuania entered into an agreement with the G7 to close down the plant when Vilnius was negotiating for EU membership the closure of the Ignalina NPP was believed to be a key issue against which Lithuania’s credibility would be assessed Lithuania was urged to prepare an energy restructuring plan as soon as possible “The EU is monitoring Lithuania’s compliance with its commitments to close the Ignalina NPP,” said Ritt Bjerregaard EU countries at the time had around 50 operating nuclear reactors producing just under half of the EU’s electricity The biggest point of concern about the Ignalina NPP was that it was fitted with Russian RBMK reactors and that it was impossible to put a containment vessel on the plant in case of an accident The latter was a requirement for nuclear power plants after the Chornobyl accident Foreign officials have also referred to the low level of safety culture among staff in Lithuania Lithuania was already receiving direct support from the West for decommissioning preparations and putting in place safety measures The Lithuanian government accepted that the plant would have to be shut down arguing that perhaps the EC was afraid the report would conclude the plant could still be run for a few more years “The Commission is avoiding involving real nuclear safety experts in this debate This position complicates our further decisions We ask only one thing: that the agreement be reconfirmed by Western experts [...] We want to play with an open hand,” he argued MP Julius Veselka and a group of politicians from the People’s Union ‘For a Just Lithuania’ suggested that Western Europeans should instead close down their own nuclear power plants Posters at a protest rally in 2000 proclaimed: we don’t want to pay more than 1 litas (at the time USD 0.25) per kilowatt-hour of electricity Veselka’s poster was also accusing the EU of trying to destroy Lithuania’s agriculture and industry “We don’t need credits for closing down [the plant] Let them give us credits to build electricity bridges to the West and we will make money by selling our surplus power,” the politician insisted a sociologist at Vytautas Magnus University (VDU) in Kaunas the Ignalina NPP served as a weathervane pointing towards the social change the country was experiencing at the time In the Soviet times and even in the first years of independence the plant offered some advantages to Lithuania caused a “huge rage” among some people fearing economic consequences “The shutdown of the Ignalina plant pushed the country into an energy crisis – with no alternatives for energy production and dependent on Russian infrastructure Lithuania was for a long time paying probably the highest price for imported gas Lithuania’s geopolitical shift towards the West opened up the gaps of Soviet modernisation which resulted not only in dependence on Soviet infrastructure and supply but also non-compliance with Western security standards,” says Genys the Ignalina NPP went from being a symbol of security and pride to a very expensive focus of public anxiety the consequences of which are still being felt even after the closure of the facility,” he adds Energy security has since then been high on the agenda of all political parties despite such a huge amount of attention both from the public and from politicians the transformation of our energy system took more than two decades,” says Genys This had as much to do with domestic politics as with objective circumstances he explains: each successive government would scrap whatever plans their predecessors had conceived in order to implement their own ideas – and fail due to opposition from them According to contemporaries interviewed by LRT.lt “The closure of the Ignalina NPP was included in Lithuania’s EU Accession Treaty so the government and the president’s office did not negotiate it was a commitment that Lithuania had made,” says former energy minister Arvydas Sekmokas Although the then Prime Minister Aleksandras Abišala was tasked with going around European capitals and trying to reopen the issue Germany even promised to provide electricity to Lithuania although it was not clear how this would be implemented would have been all the decommissioning funding Lithuania had received by that point: had it decided not to close the plant who took part in the shutdown negotiations says he considers the deal Lithuania negotiated a success was also closing a similar plant and received less money from the EU Lithuanian negotiators put together a negotiating package with an estimate of 3 billion euros “Lithuania agreed to close the plant earlier especially for social issues,” Auštrevičius says “Lithuania had not built up any decommissioning funds We only had money to repaint the doors,” he notes The process received attention in foreign media too what stirred passions was less the money given to would-be EU members than nuclear safety concerns “[The media] kept saying it was Chornobyl [...] The Chornobyl accident did not help Lithuania We were unlucky that our reactor was [...] of the same type as in Chornobyl,” says the MEP recalls the night in 2009 when “we went from being an electricity-exporting country to a deficit country overnight” The price of electricity immediately went up by 30 percent which caused dissatisfaction among the population he says the process went remarkably smoothly Amid the concerns Lithuanian leaders had at the time was that Russia could somehow interfere “We were afraid of some Kremlin influences and the management was strengthened to ensure that the plant would be shut down and that there be no incidents,” Sekmokas recalls “we did not see any direct actions or measures of influence from Russia” he adds Russia’s calculation was simple: Lithuania was losing a large source of electricity.” Russia was very different at that time and so was Lithuania’s attitude towards its big neighbour they were preoccupied with their own problems Vladimir Putin was consolidating power and EU enlargement was a secondary issue,” he believes If Moscow had wanted to sabotage the decommissioning process it could have used the staff at the Ignalina NPP many of whom were Russians with “multiple” contacts with Russian special services Lithuania was not in control of the Ignalina NPP even after it regained independence,” he says visit and even test the operation of a nuclear power plant the exact simulation system of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant will be opened Nuclear cultural heritage is a rapidly growing cultural field throughout Europe director of the Museum of Energy and Technology it is becoming more and more important for historians and energy workers to preserve information about the architecture operating principles and effects of buildings belonging to the nuclear cultural heritage the construction of the nuclear power plant is not only a symbol of energy independence but also a factor of changes in the social structure of society the beginning of the history of the city of Visaginas "Museum of Energy and Technology has valuable experience in the preservation and revival of industrial cultural heritage objects during the implementation of the "NuSPACES" project it was determined that stopping the operation of nuclear facilities creates a risk of losing valuable tangible and intangible elements of the industrial heritage," he said The Ignalina nuclear power plant is the only nuclear power plant in the Baltic States created to supply energy to all three Baltic countries IAE was one of the most innovative solutions of that time the operation of the nuclear power plant will be terminated and all buildings on the territory of the power plant will be demolished a generation will have grown up who will never have seen such objects so it is vitally important to restore and preserve these historical industrial objects partners from the highest-level international heritage organization TICCIH but also designers and artists will join forces the curator of the museum workshop and the author and manager of the idea of ​​this project says that the simulator will be controlled by a remote control "By pressing different buttons on the control panel it will be possible to observe how the IAE starts different stages of operation Animated light will show the directions of steam and water flow A dynamic experience will allow the visitor to immerse himself in the principles of the power plant's operation by testing a real scenario of the Ignalina nuclear power plant's operation simulator" The opening of the simulator of the Ignalina nuclear power plant in the Museum of Energy and Technology will take place in 2025 reproduction and distribution are permitted only with the written consent of UAB "Naujosios medijos grupė" Instructions for resetting the password will be emailed to you now Already have an Elektor ID account? Click here to log in Leave further comments in the fields below If you wish to leave a comment with your rating Lithuania-based Ignalina nuclear power plant (INPP) has begun the hot trial phase of solid radioactive waste management and storage facility (SWMSF) built by Nukem Technologies The Lithuania-based Ignalina nuclear power plant (INPP) has begun the hot trial phase of a solid radioactive waste management and storage facility (SWMSF) built by Nukem Technologies Radioactive materials have been used in the trial which seeks to verify that the SWMSF performance complies with the technical specification The trial represents an important step forward in the decommissioning process The test began after the company received an operating license from the state regulator VATESI for the facility INPP's director general Darius Janulevicius said: “As a result of the huge dedication and competence of all parties involved we can mark today the achievement of an important milestone in the construction of this modern radioactive waste management and storage facility.” INPP’s facility has been designed to meet new regulatory requirements of Lithuania and International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) recommendations Don’t let policy changes catch you off guard Stay proactive with real-time data and expert analysis The SWMSF has seen an investment of around €200m and construction has been financed through the EBRD-managed Ignalina International Decommissioning Support Fund (IIDSF) The facility will provide INPP with the means to retrieve and store the short and long-lived radioactive solid waste accumulated both during plant operation and decommissioning Image: Ignalina nuclear power plant in Lithuania bustling with young professionals from all over A towering ghastly concrete structure on the outskirts of the town is a far cry from what the site known as the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (INPP) and the town hosting it looked like in their best days – from the 1980s when already independent Lithuania took it offline Hopes were high that Visaginas (the names of Visaginas and Ignalina are used interchangeably – L J.) would see a recovery with the arrival of the Japanese whom Lithuania has entrusted with construction of a new 5 billion euro 1358-megawatt nuclear plant to replace the old one But a national non-binding referendum on the need for the plant held in 2012 together with a parliamentary election saw 63 percent of voters reject the plan and elect a Social Democrat-led government that It not only phased out atomic energy in the country but also created a bunch of socio-economic issues of enormous scope that are still haunting Lithuania the unemployment level in the Ignalina and Visaginas municipalities was at a staggering 14 percent at the inception of the year a former energy minister in the Conservative government during 2008-2012 and once a staunch supporter of the Japanese-led nuclear venture still believes that the positive impact on Visaginas’ infrastructure from a new nuclear power plant would have been wide encompassing many fields of life – Hitachi was aiming to turn Visaginas into a high-tech «smart» town with a «smart» power grid new communications infrastructure and even a Japanese bank There would have been a high added value from other investments into the region,» Sekmokas told BNN the Visaginas project would have not only ensured Lithuania’s energy security but would have significantly enhanced Lithuania’s geopolitical «weight» in the region and has prevented Belarus from building the nuclear power plant in Astravyets former chief of the National Commission for Energy Control and Prices of the Republic of Lithuania (formerly VKEKK) «If Lithuania had embraced the new Visaginas nuclear power plant project being pursued by the Japanese Lithuania would not have not necessarily gone from an electricity exporter to an importer due to the enormous costs of a nuclear power project That we keep importing electricity is not because of our incapacity to generate enough of it here but because the electricity from other countries with which we are on the Nord Pool Spot electricity exchange and through which we are buying the bulk of electric power they had mulled building a nuclear power plant well before the Japanese got interested in our new Visaginas NPP project Just perhaps they did not pinpoint it being in Astravyets,» Jankauskas told BNN Former President calls it a «very grave mistake» But the similarity of two Soviet Ignalina NPP RBMK reactors which meltdown in 1986 triggered an environmental and public health catastrophe for years to come – the nuclear particle-filled clouds have made way as far as thousands of kilometres away stoked fear not only for the Soviet-era atomic station but doomed nuclear energy in the country on the whole Few top Lithuanian politicians have ever come as much fiercely in defence of the old plant as Rolandas Paksas a former euro-parliamentarian and an impeached President «I’ve been always saying and I keep telling everybody that the decision to close the plant has been one of the very worst decisions that Lithuania We lost the plant and our energy independence because of our servile obedience to Brussels and the politics which can still be characterised as politics of an ostrich,» Rolandas Paksas told BNN «The regulations of 2006 European Council did allow us to extend operations of the plant’s second reactor until 2012 with two conditions in effect – that Lithuania was in acute shortage of domestically produced electricity and that our nuclear safety was compromised We matched both,» Paksas is still convinced the former director of the Ignalina power plant who are known for their affinity with nuclear power have helped Lithuania much with the Ignalina facility «Even they told us that it was pretty safe» he said admitting that the whole decommissioning has been tinged with politics the town without a nuclear power plant will never be the same thousands of people from all over the Soviet Union came for the construction and work at the new nuclear plant The European Union has destroyed the town with the closure of the plant Many have pinned their hopes on the Japanese young people do not stay here long,» Viktor Afanasjev a once respected engineer at the Visaginas plant In its 16th year since the closure of the Visaginas NPP’s first reactors Lithuania is still grappling with difficult issues stemming from the management of nuclear waste but the remainder had to wait for the opening of an Interim Spent Fuel Storage Facility (ISFSF) in late 2019 According to the Energy minister Žygimantas Vaičiūnas about a third of nuclear waste held at the facility has been processed and taken away over the last decade and 70 percent of spent nuclear fuel has been loaded into special storage But the decommissioning will be fully completed only in 2038 «when a green meadow will be all that remains in the 80-hectare territory» the chairman of the Seimas Commission for Energy and Sustainable Development has called this week the Ignalina decommissioning «too heavy a burden» on the national budget although the EU has approved 490 million euros earlier this week for the decommissioning of the Ignalina NPP through 2021-2027 The good news is that the country’s co-financing share has been lowered Lithuania was allocated 837.4 million euros from the EU budget for the Ignalina decommissioning in the 2007-2013 period and another 450.8 million euros in 2014-2020 VILNIUS - Lithuania is seeking to secure all necessary funding for the dismantling of the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant's reactors and the government is now asking the European Commission for more funds to ensure that works are not interrupted during the switchover from one EU budget period to another, Energy Minister Zygimantas Vaiciunas said on Tuesday.  tables its proposal only for the next financial perspective what's important is that we have a good starting position Our main position is that we need to secure the necessary funding before the start of the dismantling of the reactors," Vaiciunas said at a news conference.  "The designing and dismantling will take place between 2023 and 2033 and the peak of the work will coincide with the turn of two EU financial perspectives," he said.  "That's why we say that we need to secure all the necessary funding because once the dismantling of the reactors starts we are seeking higher funding."     The EU's executive body has proposed to allocate 552 million euros for the Ignalina decommissioning in 2021 through 2027 well below the 780 million euros sought by the Lithuanian government.  the Commission's proposal sets a ceiling of 80 percent for EU co-financing in the 2021-2027 budget with the rest to be contributed by Lithuania and international donors.  Lithuania's co-financing share in the current budget is 14 percent the European Parliament's rapporteur on the Ignalina NNP decommissioning said that other EU member states should contribute more to the plant's closure.   "We should not forget that the EU decided that Lithuania should close this plant The burden should also be taken by those countries who are big players in nuclear energy and who are profiting from closing the plant in Ignalina I doubt about 20 percent of the EC proposal," she said at the news conference.  Vaiciunas said that Lithuania has sufficient arguments in favor of keeping its commitment at 14 percent The EU has already allocated around 1.3 billion euros for the Ignalina plant decommissioning since 2007.  Lithuania shut down the first unit of the Soviet-era facility in late 2004 and closed the second unit at the end of 2009 It may take until 2038 to fully decommission the facility A subscription to The Baltic Times is a cost-effective way of staying in touch with the latest Baltic news and views enabling you full access from anywhere with an Internet connection. Subscribe Now! 2025 © The Baltic Times /Cookies Policy Privacy Policy Lithuania — An HBO miniseries featuring Soviet-era nuclear nightmares has sparked global interest in the 1986 Chernobyl disaster and boosted tourism in Lithuania which served as the filming location for "Chernobyl," has become a destination of so-called atomic tourism since the program aired earlier this year Mikhail Nefedyev was staring grimly at the row of blinking green lights on a control panel when another group of curious visitors poured into his realm The 64 year-old engineer explained to them what exactly happened when a similar reactor exploded in Chernobyl The Ignalina plant is of the same prototype as the one in Chernobyl It has similar blueprints and the same water-cooled graphite-moderated reactors with a capacity of 1,500 megawatts of power Closing and decommissioning it were key conditions of Lithuania's entry to the European Union in 2004 was one of the republics affected by the nuclear disaster Thousands were sent to clean up the mess in Chernobyl the nuclear disaster is helping Lithuania grow as a tourist destination continues to send curious watchers to the filming locations in the capital Vilnius and at Ignalina where glowing uranium rods cool in concrete pools But what happened long ago does not bother us now I think looking backward is not good," Nefedyev said after explaining how the RBMK-type reactor blew up Tourists who come to this Baltic coastal country of 3 million to see the HBO filming locations first visit the KGB museum in downtown Vilnius where interrogation scenes were shot They are taken to a Soviet-era district of gray condos built in the mid-1980s that look somewhat like Pripyat a nuclear city that served the Chernobyl plant "People come to see these places that we never used to promote This is very new and unusual to see them not in the Old Town taking photos of Baroque churches but sporting selfies here," said Inga Romanovskiene Already a popular movie-making destination Lithuania has benefited economically from the HBO miniseries The amount of foreign capital spent on filming reached 45.5 million euros ($50.6 million) last year atomic tourists may opt to travel 160 kilometers (100 miles) north and join a three-hour tour of the nuclear plant white clothes and shoes before venturing through a maze of long turbine hangars and the control center with the red button which was pushed just before the explosion drinking and smoking are strictly off limits The plant tour costs 67 euros (75 dollars) per person and tickets are sold until Christmas came from the United Kingdom to see the whole thing with her own eyes "It feels like you are stepping back into one of the scenes actually And I remember seeing about Chernobyl on the news but I'm so much more interested in what happened and the events having seen the drama series So I think it has kind of ignited an interest that I wasn't aware of at the time," Adams said after the visit to a Soviet-era district used by HBO as a filming location for Pripyat Antanas Turcinas was among those sent to Chernobyl weeks after the disaster He hopes the buzz from the miniseries leads to better care for survivors because in 1986 we did not understand what we faced