Jacopo Buongiorno teaches at MIT, is a strong advocate for the role of nuclear energy in our transition away from fossil fuels, and thinks our fears around Chernobyl are “absurdly exaggerated.” We talked to him after Russia invaded Ukraine and commandeered the country’s nuclear reactors at Chernobyl.
Bluedot: You were a source for our story, What’s So Bad About…Nuclear Energy? last fall. You said then that you are strongly in favor of nuclear energy being part of a portfolio of clean energy solutions for the U.S. and the world. Given what we’re seeing in Ukraine — news that Russia had control of Chernobyl, that they’re targeting nuclear reactors in the country — do you remain convinced of nuclear’s promise? How worried should we be?
Jacopo Buongiorno: Both risks as they've been portrayed in the media are absurdly exaggerated. The situation is serious, but if you look at the worst-case scenarios, even for those operating nuclear power plants, it is nothing compared to what [Ukraine] is going through in terms of devastation and destruction. It would be like focusing completely on the wrong risk in the nuclear facilities versus the real, not just risk, but the damage that has been done already to the country.
Bluedot: In our story, we talked about the potential of small modular reactors (SMRs) and the growing public acceptance of them. If we do start seeing this sort of nuclear infrastructure being rolled out in communities around the U.S. or the world, will their people view them as something that more likely can easily be weaponized? I guess I’m asking you to predict the future.
JB: It's not going to be easy to weaponize them and the fact that they're smaller with lower inventory radioactivity, I think, plays in their favor. On the other end, the fact that they're going to be more distributed, you have more opportunities to mess with them. So it could go either way. But we don't envision that these very small microreactors — we were talking about transportable nuclear batteries — we don't envision that, in the beginning, they will be in high rises, shopping malls, etc. In the beginning, they will be in industrial facilities or in military bases or remote communities. And security has to be a concern, for sure. The question is, how are these nuclear reactors, whether they're microreactors or even larger, compare in terms of robustness and resilience with respect to other civilian infrastructure? And my point is, they compare very favorably. If you look at long-span bridges versus high-speed rail or other power plants, [micro reactors are] much much softer targets. You can do so much more damage, attacking or targeting those infrastructures than nuclear power plants. People [should] think about it in those terms.[From a letter released by Buongiorno and other nuclear scientists in response to reporting on Russia’s commandeering of Chernobyl: “…loss of cooling systems would not lead to an urgent risk of significant radioactivity release. This is because the temperature of the spent fuel can be managed by ensuring that adequate water remains in the pool. We estimate that enough water to cool down the spent fuel can be maintained manually for a duration of 7-8 months with water supplies on site.”]
I wouldn't lose sleep over a small release of radioactivity from a reactor when you could have massive damage from, for example, knocking out the power grid in a country. I'm trying to put the risks in relative perspective here. You know, there's not a nuclear accident, there is a war that is going on there, and the question is, which of your infrastructures are most vulnerable? The answer is certainly not the nuclear reactors.
Bluedot: Where do you place the risk?
JB: I'm not saying that the risk is zero. Because if someone deliberately is targeting nuclear reactors, there would be some kind of radioactivity release. The question is, is that a big deal? Is that the end of the world? No, absolutely not. But if you destroy the power grid, transmission lines, and people no longer get electricity in their homes or their hospitals or factories, that's a much bigger deal.
The other thing is that, while no nuclear power plants or any other civilian infrastructure was ever designed for a war zone, nuclear power plants do have a very, very rugged design and robust barriers. It will not withstand heavy artillery or cruise missiles. No ceiling infrastructure can do that. But light weapons and grenades, RPG, and gun stuff like that — absolutely. They're designed to be able to take those kinds of loads. So that's not a concern; it's not going to be a fatal issue.
The other thing I should say on Chernobyl, is that it’s been blown out of proportion. Of course, the word Chernobyl evokes the big disaster back in 1986. But all these shenanigans about the power being cut at Chernobyl and, oh my god, there is going to be a release … people don't realize that even if you completely cut the power, you get something like six or seven months before you have to start cooling those rods. These are spent fuel rods in the pool. And in order to make up the water that will eventually evaporate from those pools, it’s about six or eight gallons per minute, which is basically a garden hose. So you have a lot of fuel there but it's so old and cold that it doesn't produce a lot of residual heat and so it's very easy to cool. So all this absurd information that you hear all the time that it's a sleeping giant, where there's going to be a release that covers Europe in a cloud … completely ridiculous. I'm part of a task force trying to inject some accurate information here, but it's hard because Chernobyl certainly excites people's imagination in a big way.
Bluedot: It sounds like there’s a fundamental misunderstanding of nuclear energy, generally.
JB: For sure, the word nuclear elicits an emotional response from people because a lot of people still mainly associate the word nuclear with nuclear explosions, nuclear weapons, massive obliteration of cities and so on. So here, we're not talking about that. It would be a completely different conversation if Putin decided to use nuclear weapons. That's nothing to do with reactors. I think indeed, there is a lot of misunderstanding, a lot of exaggeration, bad information, really bad information, particularly about Chernobyl. I'm concerned like everybody else about what's happening. It's terrible. It's tragic to watch [Ukraine] being destroyed for no reason. The concern is that the workers at these facilities are under extraordinary stress and overloaded, which can lead to mistakes in routine operation at the plant like opening and closing valves, connecting wires, taking a measurement, operating a forklift, etc. Such mistakes could lead to injury of the workers, and under extreme circumstances damage to the plant. These plants are designed to withstand a broad range of accidents and thus the risk to the public would be minimal, but any accident at a nuclear facility in Ukraine at the moment would create additional anxiety that the country certainly does not need. So there should be a much greater consideration of those facilities to make sure that workers are able to rotate and do their shifts and then continue to work in relatively stable and safe environments. So it’s sad to watch that they're working at gunpoint and stuff like that, it's just not right.
Bluedot: The entire situation, of course, is heartbreaking. We appreciate your thoughts on this.
JB: My pleasure.
This interview was conducted on March 28, 2022. It has been condensed and edited for clarity. For more information, visit the American Nuclear Society (ANS), which provides information about nuclear safety and security around the world.
