The issue:  Concerns over safety and risk at Kozloduy nuclear power plant

There has been  political to-ing and fro-ing between Bulgaria and the EU concerning the closure of units at Bulgaria's Kozloduy nuclear power plant (KNPP) for over a decade, ever since a  1992 meeting of the then-G-7 countries deemed  the Soviet-designed 440 MW reactors in units one, two, three and four to be dangerous. 

The issue of the closure of units three and four and of the development of the nuclear sector in Europe dominated talks at the international forum, Nuclear Power and Environment, held at the Black Sea city of  Varna on June 2-4 at which Ivanov was speaking.
At present, Kozloduy is Bulgaria's only functioning nuclear power plant, though plans are currently underway for the construction of a second nuclear power plant at Belene. The agreement to build KNPP was signed in 1966 as a joint venture between the Soviet and Bulgarian governments. Construction began in 1970. The first two units went into operation in 1974 and 1975 respectively; units three and four, in 1980 and 1982, and units five and six in 1998 and 1993.

Following the 1992 meeting, at which the older units - one to four - were deemed to have a high level of risk, the EU set up a fund to help meet the costs of the early closure of the units. Various deadlines for closure of the units have since been negotiated, with pressure coming from the EU for earlier closure and resistance coming from Bulgaria, which claimed that after safety upgrades, the reactors in units three and four met safety standards and were licensed for operation by the Nuclear Regulation Agency until 2011 and 2013 respectively.

In 1999, the Ivan Kostov-lead government signed a memorandum of understanding as a prelude to EU accession, agreeing to the closure of the oldest units, one and two, by  December 2002. According to the EU, units three and four should be closed by 2006, but the government wanted this extended to 2008 and 2010 respectively.  In 2002,  the Saxe-Coburg government ratified the EU accession treaty in line with a credit agreement for modernisation of units five and six without leading negotiations over the date of closure of units three and four.

Units one and two ceased operation on December 31 2002, but Bulgaria has received criticism from the European Commission (EC) for its delay in decommissioning of the equipment in the closed units. The EC's most recent report in May of this year stated that: "regarding Bulgaria's commitments to early closure of units one to four of the Kozloduy nuclear power plant, as enshrined in the Act of Accession, Bulgaria has not yet taken the necessary steps to ensure irreversible dismantling of units one and two, which were shut down in 2002. It has also not yet taken tangible operational and administrative action to secure the definitive closure of units three and four in 2006 and to guarantee their subsequent decommissioning, thereby allowing appropriate use of the available EU funds. There is no full compliance yet with the Euratom Treaty requirements and procedures. Preparations in this area need to be significantly improved."

The report concluded that in the area of nuclear energy and nuclear safety, the situation had "deteriorated with regard to the decommissioning process", stating that increased efforts and swift action were now needed to guarantee the "irreversible closure" of units one to four of the Kozloduy nuclear power plant.

The views in the report were compounded by a letter to Bulgaria's European Integration Minister Meglena Kouneva from European Enlargement Commissioner Olli Rehn calling for the ministry to "further demonstrate its commitment to the closure of the two reactors, and the forthcoming shutdown of two more by end-2006".

Speaking at the Varna Nuclear Power and Environment forum, the European Parliament's Rapporteur for Bulgaria Geoffrey van Orden  expressed his worries over these developments, which he said demonstrated a feeling of distrust toward Bulgaria by the EU.  Van Orden, a supporter of the nuclear sector, said that he had argued for a more flexible approach toward the closure of units three and four, but that  now, "it would not be helpful to give the impression that Bulgaria is not willing to fulfill its obligations".

Energy and Economy Minister Roumen Ovcharov also took the line that talks about reopening the Energy chapter of the aquis communautaire were useless and could even be harmful for the country in portraying a negative image to the EU.However, it was at the opening of the forum on Friday June 2, that Ivan Ivanov, then-director of Kozloduy NPP, voiced the fears over the impact the closures would have on in the social sphere and the energy sector in the Balkans. On Tuesday June 6, Ivanov was dismissed from his post by Ovcharov in the latter's capacity as representative of the state as majority owner of the plant. Ivanov, who said he was not surprised by the decision, was replaced by his former deputy Ivan Genkov, presumably considered by the ruling coalition to be more likely to cultivate the "friendly relations" with the EU that Ivanov had not.

Given these political manoeuvrings, it is possible to lose sight of the key issues underlying the debate. These can be seen as being played out in terms of safety and risk. At a fundamental level, when confronted by the issue of nuclear power, the first issue that is on most people's lips is that of personal safety. Incidents such as the Chernobyl disaster have illustrated all too vividly the risks to people and to the environment that nuclear power poses. These concerns over personal and environmental safety are weighed up against financial concerns in the context of  electricity prices and supply. Ivanov also said that Bulgaria was the only country that had to "pay" for its EU accession, referring to the expected increase in electricity prices and losses from the export of electricity that would be incurred as a result of the closures. In the wider context, this translates into concerns over Bulgaria's position as a major exporter of electricity in the region. Earlier this year, Ovcharov said that Bulgaria's electricity exports could reach a record level of nine million MW/h by the end of 2006. Last year, Bulgaria was the fourth largest energy exporter in Europe behind France, the Czech Republic and Poland. However, it is predicted that closure of units three and four would radically cut exports to two to three million MW/h in 2007, compromising Bulgaria's position as the largest exporter in the region. Related to this is the deregulation of the energy market in Bulgaria. Currently, Kozloduy does operate on the deregulated market, but production quotas are set by the state and in 2005 only 5.8 per cent of sales were made on the liberalised market at freely negotiated prices. According to its 2005 annual report, last year KNPP calculated a loss of 27 million leva before taxes, which it blames on the record-low regulated prices sales prices fixed for one year from October 2005.

These issues also need to be addressed in terms of the future of the energy sector in Bulgaria, and indeed, of the energy question that is being faced internationally in the need for clean energy solutions in the face of climate change and depleting resources. British ambassador to Bulgaria Jeremy Hill addressed this issue at the Varna conference, stating that a variety of energy sources was best for Europe's energy policy.  He cited UK prime minister Tony Blair, according to whom the country would not be able to fulfill its engagements on reducing harmful emissions unless it changed its energy policy. Hill advocated the use of alternate energy sources in order to achieve this. The call for Bulgaria to exploit its potential for renewable energy sources has also been voiced by environmental non-government organisations, such as Greenpeace and CEE Bankwatch. They argue that the active nuclear lobby in Bulgaria is responsible for deceiving Bulgarian society with misleading information about the purposes and process of decommissioning into seeing the issue in terms of bullyboy tactics by the EU, when in fact the reasons for closure are due to a real risk that the reactors pose.

Jan Haverkamp of Greenpeace argues that the Ministry of Energy has never made a serious attempt to see whether it was possible to move away from nuclear energy and fossil fuels, instead continuing to focus on creating projects for a centralised energy industry, pointing out that this is the very industry from where its ministers directly come. He accuses the government of " ignoring completely" the negative consequences of nuclear power for the Bulgarian economy and population, which he lists as "radioactive waste, nuclear risks, bad air quality, shifting measures to abate climate change to future generations, choosing expensive solutions over cheap ones and making the Bulgarian population pay for that". At present, says Haverkamp, Bulgaria is poor, being largely dependant on foreign resources for its energy, including the import of uranium from Russia. However, he says, "in reality Bulgaria is rich: it has the potential to build a strong economy while at the same time reducing primary energy demand; it has plentiful renewable resources in the form of wind, biomass and solar energy which are largely untapped".

But, supporters of the nuclear sector counter that renewable sources simply do not have the capacity to provide the amount of power needed, or  in time.

And so, when considering Kozloduy and Ivanov's assertion about the social and energy instabilities that will ensue from the closure of two more of its units, one must attempt to weigh up not only these, not only the political, but also the personal,  financial, and environmental implications that are involved in this, the energy equation, that the great Kozloduy debate is a part of.