IAEA Chief to Pay His Fifth Visit to Zaporozhye NPP

Rafael Grossi’s first visit to ZNPP took place on September 1, 2022

© Alexey Konovalov/TASS

MELITOPOL, September 4. /TASS/. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi is expected to pay his fifth visit to the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant (ZNPP) on Wednesday.

The international agency’s chief earlier described the situation around the nuclear facility as serious, saying that his goal was to assist in preventing a nuclear disaster.

Grossi’s first visit to ZNPP took place on September 1, 2022 and resulted in establishing a permanent IAEA mission there. The team of experts is rotated on a regular basis.

Grossi departed on his fifth visit to Energodar, the satellite city of the ZNPP, on the evening of September 2. The plant’s chief spokeswoman told TASS that the ZNPP staff was looking forward to Grossi’s visit and was ready to take him anywhere he would like to go "under the current security conditions."

Prior to his departure, the IAEA chief met with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, Energy Minister German Galushchenko and the country's nuclear regulator Oleg Korikov. Commenting on the situation at the ZNPP, Grossi described it as very fragile.

Situation at ZNPP

The ZNPP, located in Energodar, has six power units with a total capacity of 6 GW. It is Europe‘s largest nuclear power generating facility. At the end of February 2022, the facility was taken over by Russian forces. Since then, Ukrainian army units have periodically shelled both residential areas in Energodar and the plant itself using drones, heavy artillery and multiple rocket launchers.

On August 11, Ukrainian drones delivered two direct strikes on one of the two cooling towers at the Zaporozhye NPP, which resulted in a fire. The main fire was extinguished by emergencies ministry units at around 11:30 p.m. that same day. The IAEA chief stressed that the fire, combined with frequent drone attacks and the loss of power lines, made it clear that the nuclear safety and security situation at the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant "remains extremely challenging."

Since September 2022, all the six ZNPP reactors have been in cold shutdown mode. There is enough qualified personnel at the plant to ensure its safe operation.