The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP), which remains under Russian occupation, has been reliant on a single off-site power line for the past seven weeks, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
As reported by Ukrinform, this information was published on the IAEA’s official website.
“Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP) remains reliant on one single off-site power line to receive the external electricity it needs to cool its six reactors and their spent fuel, some seven weeks after it lost the connection to its last back-up power line,” the IAEA stated.
The IAEA recalled that a 330-kilovolt backup power line was disconnected on May 7 due to military activity near the plant, leaving Europe’s largest nuclear facility reliant on a single 750 kV line. Before the war, the plant had access to ten external power lines.
All six reactors at ZNPP have been in cold shutdown since 2024, but still require cooling water for the reactor cores.
“The extremely fragile external power situation as well as challenges related to the availability of cooling water after the Kakhovka dam was destroyed two years ago underline the fact that nuclear safety remains highly precarious at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant. There are many important issues that must be addressed before it will be feasible to restart the plant,” IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said.
The agency noted that its experts stationed at the plant reported hearing explosions nearly every day over the past week at varying distances from the facility.
Meanwhile, IAEA teams at Ukraine’s three operational nuclear power plants — Khmelnytskyi, Rivne, and South Ukraine NPPs, as well as the Chernobyl site, also reported air raid alerts in recent days.
As previously reported by Ukrinform, on May 27, Greenpeace announced that the Russian occupation authorities had begun construction of a new high-voltage power line on temporarily occupied territories in Zaporizhzhia and Donetsk regions. This line, running along the northern coast of the Sea of Azov, is expected to directly connect the occupied ZNPP to Russia’s power grid and could be used for a potential restart of the plant under Russian control.
At the IAEA Board of Governors meeting on June 12, a joint statement was adopted by 48 member states, affirming that any restart of the Zaporizhzhia NPP can only take place after it is returned to Ukrainian control.
Photo: Fredrik Dahl / IAEA
Source: Zaporizhzhia NPP reliant on single power line for seven weeks – IAEA
