While Chernobyl officials reportedly hoped that the installation of the New Safe Confinement in November 2016 would help curb the problems related to the.
May 15, 2021 05:30 PM EDT
Tons of nuclear fuel in the wrecked basement of the plant has started their reaction again, and it s displaying no signs of stopping.
(Photo : Getty Images)
Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant
In Ukraine, nuclear reactions are smoldering again in a basement of the wrecked Chernobyl nuclear power plant that is unreachable, according to news reports. Researchers keeping an eye on the plant - which exploded infamously in a 1986 lethal meltdown - have identified a stable spike in the number of neutrons in an underground room known as 305/2.
The room is filled with heavy rubble, hiding a radioactive mush of graphite, zirconium, uranium, and sand that flows into the basement of the plant like lava, before solidifying into formations known as fuel-containing materials (FCMs). Rising neutron levels show that these FCMs are going through new fission reactions, as neutrons hit and split the nuclei of uranium atoms, producing energy.
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Danger zone? The ‘new safe confinement’ over the reactor at Chernobyl (Simon Calder)
Scientists in Ukraine were alarmed last week to encounter unexpected fission reactions erupting deep within the bowels of the abandoned Chernobyl power plant, scene of the world’s worst nuclear disaster when a spectacular meltdown occurred on 26 April 1986, leading to mass evacuations and a failed Soviet cover-up.
Experts from the Institute for Safety Problems of Nuclear Power Plants (ISPNPP) in Kiev reported a 40 per cent increase in neutron emissions from 2016 levels in a chamber rendered inaccessible by the catastrophe.
The activity is seemingly the fault of the New Confinement Shelter that was erected to cover the former reactor site five years ago, a giant steel arch structure that, unlike its shoddier predecessor, prevents rainwater entering, unwittingly eliminating a key element that turns out to have played a role in suppressing the neutrons.
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ExtremeTech
Chernobyl Is Heating Up Again, and Scientists Aren’t Sure Why By Ryan Whitwam on May 13, 2021 at 7:20 am
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The disaster at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant is now more than 35 years in the past, but the possibility of another disaster has yet to fade completely. Recently, engineers completed the construction of the New Safe Confinement (NSC). The NSC was supposed to stabilize the site, which is still highly radioactive and full of fissile material. However, some worrying signals have emerged from the sarcophagus covering the Unit Four reactor, suggesting the remains could still heat up and leak radiation into the environment all over again.