Reclaiming the land around Chernobyl
In the Ukraine, there is the site of the worst nuclear energy accident ever recorded. At 1am on the 26th April 1986 the number 4 Reactor in Chernobyl Power station exploded. It was a series of mistakes and safety corner cuts to meet deadlines that created the situation. The roof of the building was blown clean off revealing the reactor core that poured out radiation to the surrounding towns and countryside. The cloud that was released spread throughout Northern Europe and Scandinavia, reaching as far west as Wales and Ireland.
The radioactive debris were cleared off the roof by humans working shifts of up to 40 to 90 seconds before a lethal dose was administered. The structure was then covered in a huge concrete sarcophagus. This solved the immediate problem.
The land around the site also needs to be cleaned. It’s where the services of a Land Remediation Company like soilfix.co.uk/services/groundwater-soil-remediation-services would be needed. The Soviet solution was to create an exclusion zone that still exists today. At the time little of the land was used for agriculture being mainly wild forest and grassland.
People were, eventually, evacuated with little warning or reasoning. The authorities wanted to start up the other 3 reactors at Chernobyl as soon as possible as the state needed the power, which they duly did. People are only now just returning to the land to live, albeit with financial incentives by the current Ukrainian Government.