Russia's first sea-borne nuclear power plant arrives in Arctic

[Devil Child]

Source: Reuters

Russia’s first-floating nuclear power plant arrived in the Arctic port of Murmansk over the weekend in preparation for its maiden mission, providing electricity to an isolated Russian town across the Bering Strait from Alaska.

The state company behind the plant, called the “Akademik Lomonosov”, says it could pioneer a new power source for remote regions of the planet, but green campaigners have expressed concern about the risk of nuclear accidents. Greenpeace has called it the “nuclear Titanic”.

Russian state nuclear company Rosatom, which developed the floating power plant, said that it docked the unit in Murmansk on Saturday where it was towed from St Petersburg, the city where it was built.

In Murmansk it will take on board a supply of nuclear fuel. It will then will be towed to the town of Pevek in the Far Eastern region of Chukotka, separated from the U.S. state of Alaska by the 86-km (53 miles) wide Bering Strait. It will start operations there next year.

Read more: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-nuclear-greens/russias-first-sea-borne-nuclear-power-plant-arrives-in-arctic-idUSKCN1IM1A9

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Floating nuclear power-plants. Complete with brutal looking Soviet-style design scheme. Ugly, but gets the job done I guess.

[7962]

1. Hey, what could go wrong? nt

[lagomorph777]

2. No problem - if it starts to melt down they tow it to the East.

Where Sarah Palin can see it.

[7962]

3. I guess in a way, its SURROUNDED by 'coolant"!

[lagomorph777]

4. Or "diluent"

Which is probably not a great thing.

As a coolant, it's tremendously corrosive; not the kind of thing you want to swirl around inside a reactor's intricate plumbing. But yeah, they are probably planning to do exactly that.

[Devil Child]

5. "I can see and feel Russian fallout from my house!"

Can be her new quote.

[FBaggins]

6. "The plant will replace a coal-fired power plant and an aging nuclear power plant"

Surely a brand new reactor is preferable to four 45-year old reactors plus a coal plant?

[7962]

7. You've got a point......but Russian "quality" is still a rarity!

[FBaggins]

8. Lol... which brings us back to the four old units

Some of the only reactors left in the world that use graphite moderation (can anyone say Chernobyl?)

[MGKrebs]

9. I think this is very suspicious.

That Chukotka region is bigger than Texas, and has 50,000 people total. This just seems like an odd way to get power to them.
I suspect this has more to do with the Arctic ice melting and some plans they have for exploiting that.