There is no other region in the world in which such a number of operating and disabled nuclear reactors would be located. Disposal of nuclear waste is the most complex environmental problem, and local authorities are trying to solve it with the involvement of EU countries.
Over the 40 years of operation of reactors in the region, radioactive waste (RAW) with a total activity of more than 10 million Curies has accumulated, and most of it is stored in an environmentally unfavorable state. Now there are about 8 thousand cubic meters of liquid radioactive waste (LRW) in the region. It will be possible to get rid of them only after the commissioning of a liquid radioactive waste disposal facility (cost $4.5 million), built jointly by Russia, the United States and Norway. If the installation, as planned, is launched this year, then, according to specialists' forecasts, the Kola Peninsula will be cleared of liquid radioactive waste by 2006-2007. In 2001, it is planned to launch a plant for compacting and recycling solid radioactive waste in the city of Polyarny (there are about 14 thousand cubic meters of it on the Kola Peninsula). However, financing for the construction of the installation, the cost of which is estimated at $91 million, is being delayed.
According to official data, more than 200 reactors are currently operating in the Murmansk region, installed on nuclear submarines of the Northern Fleet, nuclear icebreakers of the Murmansk Shipping Company and the Kola Nuclear Power Plant. But the main problem is the reactors of 100 submarines that have been withdrawn from the fleet and are subject to disposal. The ship repair yards "Nerpa" in Snezhnogorsk and "Shkval" in Polyarny are engaged in cutting up nuclear submarines, but due to a lack of funds this is being done slowly. Five nuclear submarines were dismantled in 1999, seven in 2000, and eight submarines are planned to be dismantled in 2001.
The situation is also difficult with spent nuclear fuel (SNF), which is unloaded from submarine reactors. So far, the cores have been unloaded from only 20% of the nuclear submarines, the rest are waiting their turn. It is planned that the state unitary enterprise SevRAO, created in the region to maintain submarines to be dismantled, sites with radioactive waste and management of spent nuclear fuel, will help solve the problem.
The security of North-West Russia is currently estimated at $1.5 billion (this amount also includes the construction of a radioactive waste repository on Novaya Zemlya). This figure was announced at the meeting of the regional council of the Euro-Arctic Barents region at the end of March by Governor Yuri Evdokimov. Russia is ready to allocate no more than 30% of the amount, foreign partners - so far no more than 15%. The region can only get the remaining 55% from abroad, but EU countries are not yet ready to invest that much money. At the same meeting, Mr. Evdokimov showed a diagram from which it followed that funding for environmental programs in the Murmansk region from the federal budget was growing, while Western investments in this area were gradually decreasing. In general, the governor successfully uses the method of blackmailing neighbors: “If we go crazy, you won’t care.”
Norway takes his words most seriously. The Murmansk region and the Northern Kingdom are cooperating on 22 joint environmental projects. Norway allocated money for the construction of a liquid radioactive waste processing plant in Murmansk, the installation of additional alarm systems at the Kola NPP, and much more. The Norwegian government allocated 6.2 million kroner (more than $800 thousand) for the diversion of a radioactive stream in Andreeva Bay (the base of the Northern Fleet Zaozersk), which polluted the Motovsky Bay of the Barents Sea. The Norwegians agreed to allocate money even though they were not given the opportunity to control the process of disbursing the money, since the military does not allow foreigners into Andreeva Bay. They were satisfied with the photo and video materials provided by Murmansk ecologists.
VYACHESLAV GUDKOV, Murmansk

Newspaper "Kommersant St. Petersburg" No. 53 dated March 27, 2001, p. 3

“If we gasp, you won’t think it’s enough.”