Epress.am News from Armenia
The nuclear power plant in Armenia is designed for this seismically active zone; meaning, it was designed just for that earthquake which happened, Communications Director of the Russian state atomic energy corporation Rosatom Sergey Novikov, who is also a member of the team monitoring the situation in Japan, told radio station Ekho Moskvy (Echo of Moscow).
The ANPP, he said, stands at 120 or 130 hydraulic shock absorbers, which ensure the stability of the concrete foundation pad.
“When the Spitak earthquake happened, the epicenter had a magnitude of 9, while at the plant site, it was about 7; that is, as much as it was in Japan. First the nuclear power plant ceased operations itself, then it started to work mechanically, becoming almost the only source of electricity in devastated Soviet Armenia and then worked for several years.
“And when the Soviet Union collapsed, the new leadership of independent Armenia for unknown political reasons decided to terminate the plant’s activities. Then, when furnaces appeared in homes, they began to restart operations again; four years passed, they checked all systems and got it working again. Metsamor NPP still works till today and the Armenian authorities are preparing to decommission it in 2016, when a new replacement unit will be built,” said Novikov.
The Metsamor NPP is the only one in the South Caucasus and is located just a half-hour’s drive (30 km) from the Armenian capital, Yerevan.