THE CHERNOBYL LEGACY "Chornobyl Is a Word We Would All Like to Erase from Our Memory
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JUNE 9, 2006 | No. 645-646 THE CHERNOBYL LEGACY "Chornobyl is a word we would all like to erase from our memory. It opened a Pandora's box of invisible enemies and nameless anxieties in people's minds, but which most of us probably now think of as safely relegated to the past. Yet THE CHERNOBYL LEGACY 1 there are two compelling reasons why this tragedy must not be forgotten. First, if we forget Chornobyl, we increase the CHERNOBYL - 20 YEARS, 20 LIVES 3 risk of more such technological and environmental disasters in the future. Second, more than seven million of our fellow CONSEQUENCES OF THE human beings do not have the luxury of forgetting. They are CHERNOBYL CATASTROPHE 13 still suffering, every day, as a result of what happened 14 CHERNOBYL, IN BRIEF 15 years ago. Indeed, the legacy of Chernobyl will be with us, IN BRIEF 16 and with our descendants, for generations to come." Kofi Annan, April 2000 (645-646.5752) Rebecca Harms, MEP vegetable farmers in 1989 alone. The - According to the UK's Food Standard treatment of contaminated whey cost Agency, in 2005 there were still 379 another 35.8 million Euros (US$43.7 British farms - covering over 74,000 million) and even now, two decades hectares - and a total of 200,000 sheep after the accident, Germany is still that remain under post-Chernobyl paying compensation to hunters for restriction orders. Last year I asked the contaminated game animals. Overall the European Commission to confirm those economic costs to Germany have numbers and the Commission not only reached approximately 250 million confirmed the impact on British farmers, Euros (US$305 million). but also provided other alarming information. It stated that over the next This example pales into insignificance decade, there would be no significant when compared with the ongoing change in the degree of contamination tragedy in the Ukraine, Russia and being experienced. The farmers will Belarus - the countries mostly affected have no choice but to live with the by the Chernobyl fallout. It is difficult to restrictions for many years to come. grasp the full impact of the Chernobyl disaster - especially for those of us In other European countries like living thousands of kilometres away Germany, Austria, Italy, Sweden, from the exclusion zone. Finland, Lithuania and Poland, the levels of contamination found in certain At the IAEA conference in Vienna last mushrooms and berries in some areas autumn, World Health Organisation still exceed the permitted maximum. (WHO) expert Dr. Bernett told a story about the life in the villages of one of Many Western European countries still the most affected areas. He recalled suffer notable economic costs from the seeing children on their way to school accident. In Germany for example, 159 crossing the street at the exact same million Euros (almost US$194 million) spot every morning. When asked why, was paid in compensation to milk and the children stated that this was quite obvious - they had to cross the street million people. These people have not Chernobyl's consequences can be because of a contamination hot spot. only left all their possessions behind but removed within 30 years but it is highly Dr. Bernett used this example to show also their former lives, familiar unlikely that this will prove to be the that people are able to cope with the surroundings and history. case by 2015 so this projected cost can consequences of the disaster; that the be expected to rise. consequences have become part of Economic costs people's every day life and that the Belarus' economic situation continues to necessary changes in behaviour have With regard to the economic costs suffer and with almost one quarter of been integrated into their daily routine. associated with the Chernobyl nuclear the population living beneath the Had Dr. Bernett been describing accident, even the IAEA, whose poverty level, according to the World children in his own hometown crossing function it is to promote nuclear power, Bank, life expectance is approximately the street to avoid a contamination hot states that the impact of the catastrophe 10 years less than the Western spot, it is unlikely that he would have was strong enough to accelerate the European average. painted quite the same picture. break up of the Soviet Union. Huge costs were imposed on the Soviet In Ukraine the situation is just as bad. The message being sent by the IAEA Union and three successor countries, 30,000 km2 was contaminated and and WHO experts like Dr. Bernett since Belarus, Russia and the Ukraine. These 160,000 people were relocated. the Vienna conference has been quite costs are impossible to calculate Ukrainian experts estimate the clear. They acknowledge that the precisely owing to the non-market economic damage to be in the region of Chernobyl disaster was the worst conditions prevailing at the time of the 164 billion Euros (US$201 billion). In nuclear accident in the industrialized disaster and the high inflation and 1992 15% of the state budget was used world, and accept that the number of volatile exchange rates of the transition to cope with the catastrophe, and in deaths is higher than first assumed - period that followed the break-up of the 2003 the sum had been reduced to 6% probably 4,000 deaths worldwide - or Soviet Union in 1991. However the of the budget. Due to the long economic compared with the assumptions of other magnitude is quite clear - hundreds of crisis in the country, the Ukrainian experts, "only" 4,000 deaths as IAEA billions of dollars of costs were incurred government still owed almost 115 puts it. However, their argument is that as a result of: million Euros (US$140 million) to the although this is bad, the time has now victims of the disaster in April 1999. come to move on and to "Look into the · Direct damage caused by the future!" - as demanded in the title of the accident; "Shelter Implementation Plan" IAEA conference to be held in Kiev on · The actions taken to seal off the the 20th anniversary of the disaster. We reactor and mitigate the consequences The sarcophagus built - under a lot of cannot and shall not accept that! The in the exclusion zone; time pressure and in the most difficult legacy of Chernobyl does not lie in the · The resettlement of people and the circumstances - to enclose the reactor past - it is not over yet. construction of new housing and debris is now dilapidated and fragile. infrastructure to accommodate them; Ukraine and the then G7 countries People are still suffering from the · Social protection and health care signed the "Shelter Implementation consequences of the disaster every day provided to the affected population; Plan" in 1997 with the aim of stabilising and the lives of many will continue to be · Research on the environment, health and improving the sarcophagus. The affected for decades and generations to and the production of clean food; European Bank for Reconstruction and come. Many of the consequences are · The radiation monitoring of the Development (EBRD) estimated the only now starting to emerge as some environment; overall costs for this project to be types of cancer and genetic · The disposal of radioactive waste US$768 million (630 million Euros) and malformations take years to develop. · The losses relating to the incidental this amount was subsequently paid into The large and increasing number of cost of withdrawing agricultural land the "Chernobyl Shelter Fund" by 37 thyroid cancers, even if many of the and forests from use and the closure countries. In 2003 the Ukrainian energy victims survive, shows the severe of agricultural and industrial facilities. minister stated that, due to employment consequences of exposure to the protection measures, the costs would radiation released by Chernobyl. In Belarus, for example, 7,000 km2 was be higher than expected. Today the declared blocked or a strict control zone costs are estimated to be close to US$1 Stress, being uprooted, fatalism and and 23% of the country's land is still billion (820 million Euros) - a 30% cost self-abandonment are also among the highly contaminated - including 40% of increase. An expert at the Russian consequences of the catastrophe. In the land used for agricultural purposes. Nuclear Institute has since suggested Belarus 135,000 people had to leave that the costs will instead be closer to their villages, their homes, right after The economic damage to the country is US$2.5 billion (over 2 billion Euros). the accident and even recently, estimated to be around 192 billion evacuation measures still had to be Euros (US$235 billion) - ten times Another Chernobyl? taken. 2.2 million people were living in Belarus' gross national budget in 1997 the contaminated area before 1989 but and approximately six times the yearly IAEA experts want us to believe that a today the number has gone down to 1.5 state budget. This figure assumes that disaster like Chernobyl was only 2 NUCLEAR MONITOR 645-646 possible under the circumstances · Fuel assembly damage of a type disaster could happen again - anywhere existing in the Soviet Union in 1986 and never seen before, in block 3 of the and at any time. We must not rely on a would never happen again. French Cattenom power plant; technology that poses these threats to Unfortunately several nuclear incidents society. We have to stop nuclear energy in recent years have shown that these · A serious hydrogen explosion in a pipe production - now! assertions cannot be relied upon. A at the Brunsbüttel boiling water World Association of Nuclear Operators reactor, in the immediate vicinity of a Rebecca Harms is a German Green (WANO) list includes the following reactor pressure vessel; MEP and a member of the Parliament's incidents with potentially disastrous Committee on Industry, Research and consequences: · Massive corrosion on a reactor Energy, and the Delegation to the EU- pressure vessel at the Davis-Besse Ukraine Parliamentary Cooperation · Overheating of radioactive material plant in the USA, long overlooked, Committee.