Project: Chernobyl reactor confinement

Budget: Confidential

Services: Lead independent monitor, cost and risk management

Project Summary: Thomas & Adamson were appointed to lead an international team monitoring the construction of the new safe confinement, the largest steel structure ever built to seal the destroyed Reactor No. 4 from the environment. This along with the interim storage facility 2 (ISF-2), which will safely store the spent nuclear fuel from reactors no. 1, 2 and 3, has seen T&A provide a principal site – based monitoring role as well as cost and risk management service between 2013 and 2019.

On 25th April 2019 the NSC final commissioning test was successfully completed. In September 2020 the ISF-2 project commenced Hot Testing with spent nuclear fuel.

The 1986 meltdown, has already estimated to have caused hundreds of billions of euros worth of damage, led to the resettlement of hundreds of thousands of people and many premature deaths.

The latest efforts to confine the unstable concrete and steel sarcophagus, constructed quickly after the accident, have a lifespan of 100 years and will protect the surrounding area from high levels of potentially deadly radiation. During the 100 year period it is intended to dismantle the unstable structure(s) and find suitable permanent storage for the radioactive waste, although at this time, technology does not exist to safely store the radioactive waste.

T&A’s role is part of a wider international effort, in which the UK is a leading international financial contributor, providing expert support and oversight on programming completion of the works, financial management, risk management and quality assurance processes.