Paper: Russian NPP Y2K safe

["Tsurikov, Nick" <nick.tsurikov@iluka.com>]

Happy New Year from Western Australia!!!

Saint Petersburg Times, Tuesday, 28 December 1999,
http://www.sptimes.ru/current/y2k.htm
<http://www.sptimes.ru/current/y2k.htm> 
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Our Nuke Plants Are Y2K Safe: Experts
By Melissa Akin
STAFF WRITER
For those who fear that a Y2K computer failure could lead to a catastrophic
Chernobyl-style meltdown at one of Russia's nuclear reactors at midnight
Jan. 1, Nikolai Ponomaryov-Stepnoi has some advice.
"Have a bottle of champagne on hand, and second, some vodka, but not too
much, or you might fall down or pass out and hit your head on a shelf,"
suggested physicist Ponomaryov-Stepnoi, vice president of the Kurchatov
nuclear research institute, which operates four reactors in northwestern
Moscow.
Ponomaryov-Stepnoi, who spoke by telephone last Thursday, is one of Russia's
army of nuclear officials anxious to reassure citizens that they should not
worry about the Soviet-built nuclear reactors at power stations and research
institutes scattered around the country and across Russia's borders in
former Soviet republics.
They all insist they're ready for the Y2K problem, in which computers using
old two-digit code to specify the year might misread "2000" as "1900,"
causing unforeseen disruptions.
All Russia's nuclear installations have tested their systems for potential
Y2K failures, Nuclear Power Minister Yevgeny Adamov said at a press
conference last week.
"We don't expect any radiation-related consequences, or consequences related
to anomalous ... behavior of our systems," Adamov said.
Around 24,000 date-dependent devices were changed throughout the nuclear
industry, including the facilities that produce materials for Russia's
nuclear bombs.
All in all, with $2 billion of foreign aid, the ministry fulfilled 70
percent of its $10 billion Y2K solution program, nuclear officials said.
"Naturally, there wasn't enough funding," Adamov said. Alternative technical
solutions were found where funding failed to cover planned expenses, Adamov
said, without elaborating on those solutions.
"People at the Russian reactors - and the other reactor systems as well -
they've been doing triage," said Morgan Libby, manager of the Y2K program
for nuclear power plants at the International Atomic Energy Agency in
Vienna. "Obviously [they've] fixed the most important things first."
But the primary safety systems at Russian plants have passed muster for Y2K
with the American nuclear agency, the Energy Department. Russia's State
Nuclear Inspectorate is also unconcerned by Y2K, a spokesman said Thursday.
The Moscow city environment committee normally keeps sensors pointed at
Russia's major nuclear power plants so that in case of an accident, a
radioactive cloud will not pass over the city unnoticed, Gennady Akulkin,
the committee's head of radiation safety, said.
But he isn't expecting them to go off because of Y2K - nor is he expecting
trouble from the reactors at Kurchatov and the Moscow Institute of Physics
and Engineering. Ponomaryov-Stepnoi said all Kurchatov's reactors will be
shut down for the holiday.
Still, some international bodies appear concerned.
The European Commission is considering a payout of around 2 million euros
for last-minute fixes and other remediation projects that will likely extend
into 2000, Libby said.
He said he discussed the payout with EC officials last week. Neither Minatom
nor European Union officials in Moscow could confirm the commission was
considering additional funding.
A Central Intelligence Agency official testified before the U.S. House of
Representatives International Relations Committee in October that the chance
of a nuclear accident at a Russian reactor at the turn of the year is small,
but present.
Even if the operators do their jobs perfectly, the official said, faulty
information systems could lead to poor decision-making, for example, or a
loss of outside power could lead to fluctuations and even shutdowns.
If operators don't do their jobs perfectly, it could lead to the kind of
catastrophic accident that happened at Chernobyl, he said. But nuclear
officials rule out that possibility.
While Ponomaryov-Stepnoi is drinking to the new millennium in Moscow,
Vladimir Vysotsky will be manning his post in the automated heating and
measurement department of the Kalinin Nuclear Power Plant. That plant, just
a few hours drive from Moscow, is part of the north-west and central Russian
section of the national power grid and supplies the capital with some of its
electricity.
"I have no fear," Vysotsky said by telephone from Udomlya, the town in Tver
region where the plant is located.
The reason for Vysotsky's confidence: The main safety systems that prevent
accidents in the reactor's core, shutting down the reactor if an accident is
imminent, can't be hit by the Y2K glitch.
Those mechanisms run on analog systems, which run continuously like a windup
clock and will glide through the date change without noticing it. Only
two-digit, date-dependent systems, which click from day to day, month to
month, and year to year, can be tripped up when the year suddenly turns from
99 to 00.
In any case, Adamov said glitches were not exclusive to Y2K.
"Every day we have some routine failure," he said at Thursday's press
conference.
But just in case, he and top ministry personnel will be on watch at
Minatom's shiny new situation and crisis center in Moscow, which will keep
tabs on nuclear installations year round.
There, at 3 p.m. Moscow time Dec. 31, officials will watch as Bilibino power
station on the Chukotka Peninsula faces the millennium.
"We are probably the first nuclear country ‡qdl%H ~dĠd to meet the new
year," Adamov said.
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Kind regards
Nick Tsurikov
Eneabba, Western Australia
nick.tsurikov@iluka.com <mailto:Nick.tsurikov@iluka.com> 
World Collection of Radiation Links:
http://eneabba.net/ <http://eneabba.net/> 



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