Ihor Syrota, head of Ukraine’s hydropower plant operator Ukrhydroenerho, has told Forbes that the restoration of the Kakhovka Hydro Power Plant (HPP) will cost an estimated $1 billion and is expected to take five years, if working 24/7. Syrota noted that the reservoir will be depleted to a “dead point” in approximately four days.
The situation at Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, situated on the reservoir that is is reportedly under control and catastrophic outcomes are not anticipated. “Our main problem is that a large part of three oblasts, Kherson, Mykolaiv, and Zaporizhzhia, will be left without water. According to rough estimates, 35—37 villages will be flooded,” Syrota noted. He added that within 7—10 days, all of this will have been managed and all the water will have flowed out to sea.
Earlier, Ukrhydroenerho announced that the Kakhovka HPP is fully destroyed and unrepairable.
Ukrhydroenerho has already begun professional discussions on how to quickly block the dam after de-occupation. Syrota noted that builders from Türkiye and Italy had offered their services for reconstruction, and a project institute had gotten in touch. In addition, experts are discussing measures to supply water from the upper reservoirs of the Dnipro cascade to provide for oblasts that will suffer from water shortages.
When asked about what caused the destruction and the volume of explosives used by the Russians, Syrota answered:
“Since the station and the engine room broke in half, we understand that the explosion was in the lower levels of the engine room. We knew that they were planting explosives last year.
We did not expect such barbarism. If they wanted to flood it, they could have blown up the spillway dam further away and flooded it in the same way. But what else did they do? They blew up both the plant and the spillway dam.
We don’t see any logical explanation for this. They are just barbarians, they are destroying everything because they realize that there is a [Ukrainian] counteroffensive. This is terrorism and nothing else.”
On 6 June, the dam of the Kakhovka hydropower plant was destroyed, unleashing 18 cubic kilometers of water and putting 16,000 people at risk of flooding. Ukraine accused Russia of destroying the dam and launched an investigation into ecocide. Meanwhile, Russia alleged that the incident was caused by Ukrainian shelling, but the inconsistent messaging of Russian sources challenges those claims.
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant could be affected by the incident, but the head of Ukraine’s nuclear agency Enerhoatom stated that the situation is currently not critical.
Russian troops blow up dam of Kakhovka HPP, unleashing environmental disaster (UPDATING)
