BENEFIT OR SAFETY?

Regions have different attitudes towards the use of potentially dangerous Ukrainian metal

In March, Ukrainian businessman Viktor Pinchuk announced that the Prostal project to build a scrap metal processing plant in the Shatursky district with a capacity of 2.5 million tons of rolled steel per year was frozen. Investors were allegedly not satisfied with the final payback period for the project, the financing of which required at least $800 million. But market participants do not exclude another version: construction was suspended due to the fact that Rospotrebnadzor refused to give permission to import large quantities of Ukrainian scrap into Russia, which it was supposed to be processed at Prostal.

Apparently, this is due to the high risks of radioactivity from Ukrainian scrap - there are serious reasons to believe that it may be of Chernobyl origin. At the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, irradiated metal structures are still being actively dismantled, including the equipment of the 4th power unit and the plant’s turbine room. The reserves of metal concentrated at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant reach 1 million tons, the total activity exceeds 1 million curies.

According to Ukrainian law enforcement agencies, large amounts of metal from radioactive burial grounds, including from the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant exclusion zone, reach metallurgical plants through illegal scrap collection points. Cars with radioactive scrap were found at Ukrainian metallurgical plants more than once, after which the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine tightened the punishment for the unauthorized removal of metal from the exclusion zone. However, this did not stop illegal harvesters: radioactive scrap continues to be discovered - recently a carload of “fouling” metal arrived at the Yenakievo Metallurgical Plant.

Products made using radioactively contaminated scrap, including Chernobyl scrap, also become radioactive. During remelting, only cesium can be removed from the “phoning” metal, while transuranium elements (americium, uranium-235, uranium-238) remain in the metal matrix. Therefore, pipes, fittings, building structures and other metal products that contain Chernobyl metal pose a serious danger to humans. Even a small level of radiation from a particular metal product can cause a whole range of serious diseases, including cancer. Moreover, the negative impact of transuranium elements on humans can be completely unpredictable, since it has not been fully studied.

Having assessed the danger that could come from radioactive recyclables, the Moscow region authorities abandoned the construction of a plant for processing Ukrainian scrap metal. Things are different in the Kurgan region, on whose territory, according to the plans of the Ukrainian company Lehman Pipe, a pipe plant will be built by 2009. The construction of the enterprise is called in Kurgan a project of special significance for the region.

The raw material problem of the Kurgan Pipe Plant was solved through the conclusion of long-term contracts for the supply of rolled metal with a number of Ukrainian metallurgical enterprises, including Zaporizhstal, Metal Steel Krivoy Rog, Dneprovsky Metallurgical Plant named after. Dzerzhinsky. The design capacity of the enterprise is 615 thousand tons of pipes of various assortments annually. The Kurgan plant will produce pipes that are most in demand by operators of large pipeline projects, and primarily by Gazprom and Transneft. A significant part of pipe products is aimed at the needs of construction organizations and public utilities. It is also known that the Kurgan Pipe Plant has already received registration in the form of a limited liability company. Investments in the project are estimated at $300 million.

However, for federal authorities, the answer to the question of building a plant, even taking into account its great economic and social significance for the region, is apparently not so clear-cut. Not long ago, the chairman of the State Duma Committee on Ecology, Vladimir Grachev, sent a letter to the prosecutor of the Kurgan region, Valery Machinsky, in which he insists on the need to “understand in detail the situation with the construction of a pipe plant in the region.” Grachev pointed out that the rolled metal supplied to Kurgan may be unsafe in terms of radiation. The basis for this is the repeated discovery of large volumes of radioactive scrap at the same Zaporizhstal, Dneprovsky Metallurgical Plant, and Mital Steel Krivoy Rog. The deputy emphasizes that the problem of possible processing of radioactive raw materials in Kurgan is of particular importance due to the significant deterioration of water supply and sewerage systems, as well as the rapidly growing pace of housing construction in the country. The use of pipes made with radioactive scrap in construction and housing and communal services can cause exposure of thousands of people.

The State Duma has not yet received an official response from the prosecutor of the Kurgan region.

published in the "Position" section

Anton ILYIN