Firstborn nuclear power beyond the Arctic Circle,Bilibino NPP is a unique facility that ensures the functioning of the gold mining and mining enterprises of Chukotka. The main part of the population of the Chukchi region is concentrated in cities and towns, only a very small number of people live in the tundra and forest tundra, and the mountainous areas are completely deserted. The nuclear power plant with a total capacity of 48 MW is located near the town of Bilibino. The nuclear power plant supplies residents of the district center and other populated areas of Chukotka and Yakutia with electrical and thermal energy.
Construction of the only nuclear power plant inpermafrost conditions began at the end of 1967. The first power unit with a reactor installation was brought to a projected power level in January 1974. In the next two years, three more units were commissioned. The Bilibino NPP is connected to the isolated system of the Chaun-Bilibinsky energy hub with a 1,000-kilometer power line.
Like other nuclear power plants in Russia, a nuclear power plant atChukotka - a branch of the Concern Rosenergoatom. In 2011, the concern’s management decided to close the station, since it’s irrational to use this facility for more than 45 years. This decision is due to several reasons. First of all, the economic inexpediency of the operation of a nuclear power facility in a sparsely populated region. For 12 years (1989–2011), the population of the city of Bilibino has decreased by almost 3 times - from 15,600 to 5 500 thousand inhabitants. In addition, there are a number of problems related to the safety of equipment operation, which has worked for more than 30 years and, to a certain extent, has exhausted its resources.
Энергетики Чукотки рапортуют о том, что The environmental policy of the nuclear power plant is formed and implemented in full compliance with the provisions of the Environmental Policy of Rosatom State Corporation, and the Bilibino NPP has its own environmental service, represented by the environmental protection laboratory. Indeed, the activity of the nuclear power plant is backed up by the relevant decisions, licenses, conclusions of the sanitary-epidemiological service, limits and standards. However, the presence of a set of necessary permits in the field of environmental management does not guarantee a real reduction in emissions of radioactive gases, whose consumers are residents of Bilibino, located just 3.5 kilometers from the station’s industrial site, and the nature of Chukotka.
In April 2013 during the meeting R.Kopin, Governor of the Chukotka Autonomous Region, and F. Tukhvetov, Director of the Bilibino Nuclear Power Plant, discussed the activities to be undertaken in order to prepare for the decommissioning of power units, the replacement of outgoing power and the removal of spent nuclear fuel. Of course, decommissioning of the Bilibino NPP units will require additional resources.
