Ukraine leaders meet to discuss power demand fall hurting nuclear plants

摘要

Ukraine’s top security body under President Volodymyr Zelenskiy held an emergency meeting June 2 to review the situation for power operators after the country’s largest nuclear power plant, Zaporozhe, was forced to reduce output nearly 45% in May compared to May 2019. The industry is facing a significant drop in demand for power since mid-March, following a nationwide lockdown due to the coronavirus pandemic. Ukraine’s overall power consumption dropped 5.6% to 50.9 billion kWh in January- April from 53.93 billion kWh in the same period a year ago, according to the energy ministry. The demand collapse is being felt strongly by nuclear generation, which supplies more than half the country’s electricity. “Our task is to find a balanced solution that would allow to overcome the crisis,” Herman Halushchenko, vice-president of Energoatom, said in a statement June 4, following the meeting of the National Security and Defense Council. Energoatom is the state-owned nuclear plant operator in Ukraine. The Zaporozhe plant, comprised of six 1,000-MW units, generated 1.6 billion kWh of power in May, down 44.8% from 2.9 billion kWh in May 2019, according to Energoatom, which operates the country’s four nuclear power plants.