Kursk NPP: One of Four Reactors Will Be Decommissioned

Tensions are rising around Russia’s Kursk nuclear power plant after an air attack blamed on Ukraine’s armed forces. According to the TASS news agency, the Ukrainian military, which invaded Russia’s Kursk region on August 6, “attempted to attack the Russian nuclear power plant with a kamikaze drone and commit an act of nuclear terrorism.” The drone was shot down by a Russian air defense system near a nuclear power plant. “On the night of August 22 to 23, the Kiev regime attempted an act of nuclear terrorism with a kamikaze drone launched against the nuclear power plant located in Kurchatov, Kursk region. The Ukrainian drone was shot down in the immediate vicinity of the Kurchatov nuclear power plant by Russian electronic warfare systems,” a Russian intelligence official said, according to whom “the remains of the drone were found near a storage facility for spent nuclear fuel from the plant.”

Next week, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), Rafael Grossi, will travel to Russia for a personal visit to the Kursk NPP. Grossi, among other things, will be shown the maintenance work on reactor number four, which will go offline on August 25. Russia’s state-owned Rosenergoatom, the operator that runs the country’s nuclear power plants, said “that reactor unit No. 4 will undergo preventive maintenance, which is planned according to the annual schedule and which is unrelated to the Ukrainian attacks. The maintenance work is expected to last 59 days,” the company said in a statement. The technical works will involve 2000 specialists who will be engaged in technical and technological modernization of the equipment. As a representative of Rosenergoatom emphasized, “scheduled preventive maintenance is a standard procedure performed on the power units of any nuclear power plant to ensure their reliable and safe operation.”