MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 29th October, 2019) Turkey's Akkuyu nuclear power plant, which is being built with Russia's participation, held at its construction site the first planned emergency response drills designed for a scenario in which a hurricane had caused various consequences, the NPP's press service said in a press release on Tuesday.
"Emergency drills are an integral HSE [Health, Safety and Environment] element at large industrial facilities, including nuclear power plants, starting from the stage of their construction. Such exercises are held annually at all operating Rosatom nuclear power plants. Over here, at the construction site of Akkuyu NPP, already at the initial construction phase, we are honing the preparedness of the relevant services for any situations and are actively cooperating in this field with the local authorities and relevant departments of Turkey," Anastasia Zoteeva, CEO of Akkuyu Nuclear, said, as quoted by the company's press service.
As part of the drill's scenario, a hurricane provoked an emergency at the NPP site, triggering numerous implications that included a forest fire, road traffic accident, power transmission line breakdown and disruption of communication systems. Emergency rescue teams had to develop coordination skills by completing various tasks including administering first aid; rescuing workers who were injured on site as a result of the emergency; rescuing people on the water; evacuating personnel to assembly points and extinguishing a fire.
The exercise was aimed at "enhancing the coordination, cohesion and responsiveness of various services in emergency situations," the press release read.
The Akkuyu NPP was inaugurated in April 2018 to become the first-ever nuclear power plant built in Turkey. The plant will have four nuclear power units equipped with Russian-designed generation 3+ VVER reactors. The capacity of each NPP power unit will amount to 1200 MW. The first unit is expected to go into service in 2023, while the remaining three will be connected to the grid by 2026.
