30 Jun 2022 10:02

IAEA again loses remote connection to Zaporizhzhya NPP, Grossi insists on urgent visit

MOSCOW. June 30 (Interfax) - The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has again lost remote connection to its safeguards surveillance systems installed at Ukraine's Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP), IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said.

"The fact that our remote safeguards data transmission is down again - for the second time in the past month - only adds to the urgency to dispatch this mission," Grossi said in an update on Ukraine published on the IAEA website on Wednesday.

The connection was lost again on June 25, due to a disruption of the facility's communication systems, Ukrainian media outlets quoted Grossi as saying.

While insisting on a visit to the ZNPP, Grossi said that "inspectors can only carry out essential nuclear material verification work when they are at the site."

The interval of physical inventory verifications at nuclear power plants (NPPs) cannot exceed a specified duration, and it is running out at the ZNPP, Grossi said.

"This is particularly important at two of the units at ZNPP. These units have also been refuelled in recent months and a physical verification of the nuclear material therein is a safeguards pre-requisite before re-starting them," he said.

The IAEA is also facing a partial loss of remote safeguards data transmission from the Chernobyl NPP, Grossi continued.

"Safeguards data from IAEA systems installed at two of the NPP's facilities are no longer being transmitted. The problem seems linked to safeguards equipment at the site, in which case IAEA technicians need to go there to restore communication," he said

Grossi has repeatedly insisted on sending an IAEA inspection team to the ZNPP but Ukraine objects to the visit, as it is not in control of the plant.

Only two out of six units are functioning at the ZNPP. Some units are in reserve.