Renewed shelling has caused a blackout in the city nearest Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant and could force the plant to shut down, the U.N.’s nuclear watchdog said Friday.
The city of Enerhodar, where most of the facility’s staff and families live, is experiencing a complete power blackout, with “no running water, no power, no sewage,” Rafael Mariano Grossi, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said.
The situation could have a serious impact “on the availability of essential staff on site to continue to safely and securely operate the nuclear power plant,” he warned.
The operator of the Zaporizhzhia plant “is considering shutting down the only remaining operating reactor,” as it no longer has “confidence in the restoration of offsite power,” the agency said in a written statement.
That means “the entire power plant would then be fully reliant on emergency diesel generators for ensuring vital nuclear safety and security functions.”
The reactors could only be re-started if a reliable power line is restored — but that is unlikely, according to the IAEA.
“There is little likelihood of re-establishing reliable offsite power to the ZNPP, especially as the shelling continually and repeatedly damages the power infrastructure,” Grossi said.
The nuclear plant, the largest in Europe, has been under Russian military occupation since March but is still operated by Ukrainian staff.
Grossi said the situation showed the “absolute imperative” of establishing “a nuclear safety and security protection zone” around the site. A nuclear power plant “can never be a pawn of war,” he tweeted.
In a report on the security situation at the facility released last week, the agency recommended creating a security zone to “prevent a nuclear accident arising from physical damage caused by military means.”