(to the 25th anniversary of the closure of the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant)
I remember well one long-ago business trip to the Nikolaev region. Beautiful Bug rapids, happy and carefree faces of local residents. For a minute it suddenly seemed as if time had stopped here. It’s as if the calendar shows not Ukraine in the mid-2000s, but the early 80s. Clean streets, well-kept houses, a park and a city beach on the river. Friendly and smiling people, young mothers walking with strollers and flower beds everywhere. This is how I saw Yuzhno-Ukrainsk. 80% of the local population work at one state enterprise– Nuclear power plant, which generates 17-18 billion kWh of electrical energy throughout the year and covers 96% of the electricity needs of the three southern regions of the country (Nikolaev, Kherson, Odessa)
Large industrial enterprise provides work that is stable and relatively high wages with a full social package not only for residents of the satellite city, but also nearby settlements. Two months later, fate brought me to Shchelkino, a satellite town of the former Crimean Nuclear Power Plant. However, there the picture was completely opposite. Dead streets, shabby facades of houses, lack of evening lighting and a completely broken local House of Culture "Arabat". I never encountered flower beds and working fountains during my two days in this slowly dying city. But there were often drunk men and grumpy women. In their eyes there is complete hopelessness, despondency and anxiety for tomorrow. Shchelkino lives only two months a year - during summer season. Almost every second or third resident of the city considers it a blessing to buy a garage. It doesn't matter that he doesn't have a car. After all, in the summer you can live in the garage and let vacationers into your apartment. Local kulaks are considered not only those who have successfully rented out housing during the season, but also those who have...a boat. After all, she is a real nurse, and in Azov in winter there is so much bearing... It was thanks to the sea that hundreds of families survived here in the hungry 90s.. The two cities, as it turned out, had different fates. But the history of their foundation began simultaneously with the construction of local nuclear power plants and almost at the same time.
Construction of the Crimean nuclear power plant itself began in 1981. However, three years earlier, at the foot of Cape Kazantip, a working settlement for the builders of the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant was founded, which, by the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Ukrainian SSR of May 11, 1982, was named Shchelkino, thereby perpetuating the name of the outstanding Soviet scientist, three times Hero of Socialist Labor Kirill Ivanovich Shchelkin. In 1979, the first three residential buildings were put into operation. And herself Crimean NPP a year later it received the status of a republican (Ukrainian) Komsomol construction site, and on the threshold of perestroika - in 1984 it was already an All-Union shock construction site.
By that time, the city already had 25 thousand inhabitants. However, in 1987, at the stage of 80% completion of the first power unit and 18% of the second, construction of the station was suspended. The main reason is that the site on which they built was considered geologically unstable. In addition, there was a fear of a repeat of last year’s Chernobyl tragedy. . The design capacity of the Shchelkino NPP was 2,000 MW, with a subsequent increase to 4,000 MW (construction of two additional power units) using VVER-1000/320 type reactors.
The planned launch date was 1989. But ironically, it was the summer of this year that went down in history as the time of the final mothballing of the construction site.
If you look in more detail, there were several reasons. Firstly - sad experience Chernobyl. Secondly, there was a powerful earthquake in Armenia in December 1988. 
Then, Crimean seismologists received an urgent task: to identify what the maximum earthquake on the peninsula could be. Scientists wrote a “ten” in the report, and the station construction project was designed only for 8 points on the Richter scale. And finally, the third reason for closing the station is money. The difficulty of financing was already seriously felt in 1987, when large construction projects began to wind down throughout the Union, both in the energy sector and in industry, transport, and urban planning...
In addition, the public actively got involved. During the elections of delegates to the Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR in the spring of 1989, real battles broke out in the Crimean districts. As a result, doctors and an environmentalist, who actively used anti-nuclear power plant speeches in their election campaigns, won in three districts.
When it became clear that there was no and never would be money to complete construction, there were ideas to create a nuclear power plant on the basis of the Crimean nuclear power plant training center on training dispatchers of nuclear power plants of the USSR Ministry of AtomEnergo. But these ideas were not destined to come true. The union collapsed...
500 million Soviet rubles were spent on the construction of the nuclear power plant in 1984 prices. Approximately another 250 million worth of materials remained in warehouses. The station began to be slowly torn apart for ferrous and non-ferrous scrap metal. Although in the mid-90s the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant even became a brand for four years. From 1995 to 1999, discos of the “Republic of KaZantip” festival were held in the turbine section of the station under the slogan “Atomic party in the reactor.”
And yet, they tried to return part of the money spent on the main republican construction project. In September 2003, the Property Fund sold a unique Danish crane “Kroll” K-10000, installed for installation nuclear reactor, for 310 thousand hryvnia with an original price of 440 thousand hryvnia. Before its dismantling, the high-altitude crane was used for base jumping. Extreme jumps were carried out from the lower (80 m) and upper (120 m) booms of the crane.
After this, the remaining parts of the Crimean NPP were to be sold: the reactor compartment, the block pumping station, workshop building, cooler at the Aktash reservoir, dam of the Aktash reservoir, supply canal with a water intake tank, oil and diesel station facilities, diesel generator station. It is known that at the beginning of 2005, the Representative Office of the Crimean Property Fund sold the reactor compartment of the Crimean NPP for UAH 1.1 million ($207,000) legal entity, whose name has not been disclosed.
There is evidence that the VVER-1000 reactor, which was never installed in the room prepared for it, was cut into scrap in 2005.
Crimean nuclear power plant today (photo by patteran) 
A little-known fact: the station has an almost complete twin - the abandoned, unfinished Stendal nuclear power plant, 100 km west of Berlin in Germany, built according to the same Soviet project from 1982 to 1990. By the time construction stopped, the readiness of the first power unit was 85%. Its only significant difference from the Crimean NPP is the use of cooling towers for cooling, rather than a reservoir. Currently, the Stendal nuclear power plant is almost completely dismantled. A pulp and paper mill now operates on the territory of the former station; the cooling towers were dismantled in 1994 and 1999. Using excavators and heavy construction equipment The dismantling of the reactor shops is being completed. This is exactly how practical and careful Germans approached the problem of unnecessary long-term construction.
What's in Shchelkino? Empty boxes of abandoned houses, dilapidated production premises, rusty skeletons of metal structures. The nuclear power plant itself was sold for scrap several years ago, and is now one of the Ukrainian construction companies removes the remaining glands from it. From the outside, the station looks even more deteriorating. Hunters come to her, replacing each other, for equipment, for non-ferrous metals, for various building material… Photographers, both local and visiting, both professionals and amateurs, visit regularly. On weekends, whole groups of paint and strike ball fans come. The collapsing building of the power unit is an excellent platform for games according to the Stalker scenario. And a few years ago, the filming of the film “Inhabited Island” even worked here. Surprisingly, it was here, in the ruins of the station, that Fyodor Bondarchuk saw a picture of the planet Saraksh.
There are also frequent guests here - lovers of extreme tourism, who also dreamed of wandering around the zone. And a tour of the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant, unlike Chernobyl, is practically safe. After all, they never managed to deliver nuclear fuel to the peninsula...
Meanwhile, the local station managed to get into the Guinness Book of Records as the most expensive power unit in the world. Billions of rubles were thrown down the drain: neither money nor much-needed due to the worsening crisis lately in Crimea there is an energy crisis. The frozen, half-looted station, as a symbol of mismanagement and short-sightedness, will stand on the soil of Kazantip for decades to come.
The first design surveys were carried out in 1968. Construction began in 1975. The station was supposed to provide electricity to the entire Crimean peninsula, as well as create a foundation for the subsequent development of industry in the region - metallurgical, mechanical engineering, chemical. Design capacity is 2000 MW (2 power units) with the possibility of subsequent increase to 4000 MW: the standard design provides for the placement of 4 power units with VVER-1000/320 reactors on the station site.
After the construction of a satellite city, a reservoir embankment and auxiliary farms, construction of the station itself began in 1982. From the Kerch branch railway a temporary line was laid, and at the height of construction, two trains of building materials arrived along it per day. In general, construction proceeded without significant deviations from the schedule with the planned launch of the first reactor in 1989.
The unfavorable economic situation in the country and the disaster at the fourth power unit of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant on April 26, 1986 led to the fact that by 1987 construction was first suspended, and in 1989 the final decision was made to abandon the launch of the station. By this time, 500 million Soviet rubles in 1984 prices had been spent on the construction of the nuclear power plant. Approximately another 250 million rubles worth of materials remained in the warehouses. The station began to be slowly torn apart for ferrous and non-ferrous scrap metal.
No fuel was imported and does not pose a radiation hazard.
Prospects for using the nuclear power plant site and developing a satellite city
In 2006 territory former nuclear power plant selected as one of the possible locations for the creation of a pilot industrial park project. In 2008, preparatory work began on the implementation of the Shchelkinsky Industrial Park industrial park project; the city council transferred ownership of some of the objects located on this land plot to the Shchelkinsky Industrial Park.
- The Crimean nuclear power plant was included in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's most expensive nuclear reactor. This is due to the fact that, unlike the Tatar NPP and the Bashkir NPP of the same type, which were stopped at the same time, it had a higher degree of readiness at the time construction was stopped.
- A solar power plant was built nearby. Near it, on the eastern part of the shore of the Aktash reservoir, there is also an experimental wind power plant YuzhEnergo, consisting of 15 wind turbines with a capacity of 100 kW each. Not far from it there are 8 old non-working experimental wind turbines of the East Crimean Wind Power Plant, installed back in Soviet times.
- A little-known fact: the station has an almost complete twin - the abandoned, unfinished Stendal nuclear power plant (German) 100 km west of the city, which was built according to the same Soviet project from 1982 to 1990. By the time construction stopped, the readiness of the first power unit was 85%. Its only significant difference from the Crimean NPP is the use of cooling towers for cooling, rather than a reservoir. Currently, the Stendal nuclear power plant (2009) is almost completely dismantled. A pulp and paper mill now operates on the territory of the former station; the cooling towers were dismantled in 1994 and 1999. With the help of excavators and heavy construction equipment, the dismantling of the reactor shops is being completed.
- The Crimean Nuclear Power Plant is mentioned in the song of the punk rock group “Cockroaches!” “Who will sleep with me now?”:
The north of the Kerch Peninsula is not the Taurida we are used to imagining - with palaces, ancient ruins, boarding houses and comfortable beaches. The Leninsky district is better known for the Kazantip that raged here. By the way, with the passing of this festival, youth life does not fade away: it is provided by other shocking parties that are held “for old times’ sake.” And fashionable youngsters are also drawn here by the urban landscape - something that earned them the name “city of the future” in the USSR. Our topic is the Crimean nuclear power plant, which remains unfinished.
Where is the station located in Crimea?
On the map of the Crimean east, a huge protrusion between the bays is clearly visible. Its top is , an oval can be seen a little to the south. All that is between them is the village of Shchelkino and its agricultural district. However, part of the suburb has nevertheless become industrial, because there is a partially dismantled nuclear power plant.
Nuclear power plant on the map of Crimea
Open map
History of the object's appearance
Construction of the most expensive (at that time) project in the region nuclear energy began in 1975, and its development dates back to 1968. According to the design capacity, the future enterprise was supposed to take place between the Balakovo and Khmelnytsky stations - it was designed for 2 GW. Since 1984, the installation of a nuclear power plant has been declared a nationwide shock construction project, thanks to which the “satellite city” of Shchelkino appeared. Nowadays it has faded and looks more like a village.
Here, for the first time, such world know-how as a polar crane (a circular cargo bridge unit) and the first solar station in the USSR SES-5 were used. The Crimean nuclear power plant in the Leninsky district was 80% ready when news of the accident at the Chernobyl power plant came and all work was first suspended and then frozen (three years later).
Why didn’t you want to use the object later?! After the organizers of Kazantip, the unfinished building was exploited by extreme clubs offering base jumping (parachute jumping from low altitudes) to everyone. At the end of the 1990s. They decided to sell the industrial site to one of the Swedish energy companies.
On at the moment– in the “new Russian era” - on the territory of the “failed” Crimean nuclear power plant, the disposal of its constituent structures is taking place. Future plans Russian ministry energy - the creation of an industrial park here that is in no way connected with the use of hazardous nuclear fuel. Perhaps this place will become a truly famous landmark of Shchelkino and the entire Crimea.
If you are a connoisseur of the terrible rather than the beautiful, for example, a fan of post-apocalyptic quests or a digger, then you have come to the right place. On the territory of the Shchelkino NPP, visitors will be presented with gloomy urban landscapes, the viewing of which in Ukrainian times cost tourists 50 hryvnia - the guards of the abandoned enterprise acted as guides and cashiers. 
Licensed guards were needed to ensure that the dismantling of the plant took place in an organized manner, and not with the help of an army of “metal hunters.”
So why was the local nuclear power plant never completed? After all, the residents of Crimea desperately needed their own electricity even during the Soviet era, and even more so now. Is it really only because of the fear of a repeat of the Chernobyl tragedy? Discussions in the Russian media are still ongoing. In fact, there were other reasons, for example, problems with object input.
However, those who come here do not bother their heads with boring thoughts related to the economy. For them, the reinforced concrete structures lying side by side and the remaining walls of the main power unit are a location for amazing adventures and a backdrop for “fantastic” photos. Everyone rushes to the turbine department, where from 1996 to 1999. “Republic of Kazantip” held parties under the slogan “Nuclear Party in the Reactor,” and the now fashionable Fyodor Bondarchuk filmed the film “Inhabited Island.” The silhouette of the power unit “lit up” in the frames of other films. It remains to add that travelers should not be afraid of radiation - in the Soviet years they never managed to place raw materials here, although they brought them all the way to Shchelkino.
How to get (get there) to the nuclear power plant?
You can get to the dismantled object without reaching Shchelkino a few kilometers. The final point of the route is the shore of the Aktash reservoir (lake), the road to which starts from garden society"Cherry-96" ().
If a map is your best assistant, then here is the route to the attraction laid out on it:
Open map
Note to tourists
- Address: Shchelkino village, Leninsky district, Crimea, Russia.
- Coordinates: 45.391925, 35.803441.
An abandoned nuclear power plant in Crimea is a bright end to a vacation spent in Shchelkino. Look at the photo of the grandiose landscape, reminiscent of the scenery of a large-scale alien invasion. Overturned modules, the remains of giant units scattered everywhere, gray concrete boxes, a power unit bristling with empty openings - isn’t this the place for an “acid” selfie that you will be proud of?! In conclusion, we also offer a video about it, enjoy watching!
The Crimean nuclear power plant was never completed. It began to be built in 1975. However, in the late 80s, construction was abandoned. Whether this was influenced by the events in Chernobyl, public protests, or simply problems with financing, now perhaps does not matter. Be that as it may, the almost finished station was abandoned and will never be completed. By the way, not only her was abandoned, there were several more. And everyone's fate is different. Some have been completed, some will be completed, and some have only the foundation left.
But we have a rather rare opportunity to see how it all could have looked, since a number of stations of this type were nevertheless completed.
In the photo - a power unit of the Rivne NPP, and a power unit of the Crimean NPP.
And this is what it looks like main hall management. If you look closely, you can see that the instrument panels are almost identical. Of course, there were no LCD monitors in the 80s. Probably in their place there was more bulky equipment.
A little theory - how a nuclear power plant works. If you don’t go into details, then everything is banal. In the reactor, uranium atoms constantly fission, resulting in the release of heat that heats the water. This water circulates in a circle (the first circuit) and heats other water outside the reactor (in the second circuit), and this happens inside the steam generators. That, in turn, turns into steam and spins turbines, which spin generators, and they then generate electricity. After passing through the turbines, the steam is further cooled to turn it back into water. For cooling, another circuit with cold water taken from the reservoir is used. This is why most nuclear power plants are built near large bodies of water. General principle similar to a conventional thermal power plant, the main difference is that instead of “firewood” a nuclear reaction is used.
Of course, as with everything, it’s simple on the fingers, but in practice everything is incredibly complicated, but I think whoever wants to will get into these jungles himself :)
And here is the diagram, already in relation to the type of reactor in question (VVER-1000). In the center is the reactor itself. Four large cylinders are the steam generators. Conical devices (I circled one of them in red) are pumps that drive water through the primary circuit.
And now, to imagine the scale of the entire structure, here is a photograph of one of these pumps in comparison with a person.
This photo shows the layout of a station of this type:
The cylindrical containment zone, the yellow polar valve, the primary circuit pumps and steam generators are clearly visible. A little man can be seen on the floor above the reactor. To the right of the reactor block is the machine room with turbines.
And this is a real steam generator:
They did not have time to install them at the Crimean nuclear power plant, as well as the reactor. They were brought and laid on the grass. So they lay there until 2005, when two people came with an autogen and turned the reactor into scrap metal in a few days.
However, during construction they managed to install a polar crane. Here it is - a huge colossus under the ceiling of the containment zone, from which the cables hang. This crane could rotate, moving along guides along the station's containment zone. I'm afraid to imagine what a roar there was. With the help of this crane it was planned to install equipment, and in the future, carry out maintenance of the reactor.
Also, during construction, a unique tower crane was used, one of the largest in the world, with a lifting capacity of 240 tons. It stood until the mid-2000s, after which it was sold for scrap. This is the tallest crane in the photo. By the way, please note that the engine block attached to the reactor block was built in the structures, but it is currently completely destroyed.
It should be noted that this is not the only nuclear power plant abandoned during the construction phase.
This is, for example, what the power unit (5 and 6 if I’m not mistaken) of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, unfinished for obvious reasons, looks like.
In addition, it should be noted that cases of construction stoppages occurred not only in the USSR. For example, on March 28, 1979, an accident occurred at the Three Mile Island nuclear power plant, as a result of which the construction of the Forked River station was first suspended, and subsequently finally terminated.
The unfinished reactor block of the Stendal NPP, East Germany, of the same type as the Crimean NPP, has now been completely dismantled.
Personally, I would not like to give loud assessments to such situations. I think this can already be considered history. That's how it was and nothing could be done. Who knows, maybe it’s for the better, maybe for the worse. If we talk about the current state of affairs, then of course it’s incredibly sad to see how the Crimean nuclear power plant is being destroyed. But, apparently, selling metal is more profitable than, for example, organizing a museum.
Lastly, I’ll give you a photo of the Zaporozhye Nuclear Power Plant. At this nuclear power plant, as many as 6 power units were built, identical to the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant. It is difficult to imagine the scale of this entire enterprise, while the scale of even one block is amazing.
It was not my goal to tell everything - you will find this information yourself if you are interested. I have provided only a small part of the information. Photos of the Crimean (except historical) and Chernobyl nuclear power plants are mine, the rest are taken from various sources. Below I will provide links to them and related information, as well as food for thought. Most of the links are from Wikipedia.
UPD: decided to collect information about the real state unfinished nuclear power plants.
A similar question interested me immediately after visiting the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant several years ago. But then it was difficult to find information on the real state of some nuclear power plants. Now it turned out to be much easier.
Bashkir NPP
Some infrastructure has been built, but construction of the reactor unit (except for the foundation) has not begun. Photo from the mothballed boiler room. On the right you can see the square foundation of the reactor block.
Kostroma NPP/Central NPP
The situation is similar to the previous one, or even worse. Essentially these are just concrete ruins in the forest.
Crimean NPP
See above.
Odessa ATPP
Some infrastructure has been built, but construction of the reactor unit apparently has not begun.
Tatar NPP
Part of the infrastructure has been erected, construction of the reactor unit has begun, but not much has been built; apparently, they have not even gotten to the point of starting construction of the containment zone.
Voronezh AST
Probably the most completed project after the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant. There are plans to complete the facility. Currently, it is heavily guarded and funds are allocated for conservation.
Gorky AST
Also, a largely built block. It is located in a protected area, but the internal condition and the severity of the protection are unknown. There are vague plans to convert it into a thermal power plant
Belene Nuclear Power Plant (Bulgaria)
Construction was frozen, then resumed. On current moment status unknown, probably frozen again. However, in any case, the readiness of the structures is low.
Zarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant (Poland)
Construction has been frozen and the readiness of the structures is low.
Juragua Nuclear Power Plant (Cuba)
One of the blocks is almost completely built, the second has just begun. These are units of a slightly different type than the Crimean NPP (and most other unfinished nuclear power plants). VVER-440 reactor of lower power. Judging by the photographs from space, the station is of very great interest, and besides, it is most likely not particularly guarded (although God knows what they have there and how). However, unfortunately, due to its remoteness, all this is more theoretical in nature. I'll probably look for more detailed information about this station.
Stendal Nuclear Power Plant (East Germany)
The reactor block was largely built, but was completely dismantled at the end of the 2000s.
In the 1970s, the Soviet Union developed a large-scale nuclear power plant construction program. various types. By the end of the next decade, the European part of the country was supposed to be covered with a new dense nuclear network. The tragedy that happened on April 26, 1986 near the regional center of Chernobyl, Kyiv region, put an end to these plans. Only about half of the grandiose energy projects launched then were completed in one form or another (these include, for example, the Minsk Thermal Power Plant-5, which we talked about a month ago). The remaining “shock communist construction projects” were abandoned forever, becoming an atmospheric monument to the collapse of the USSR and its ambitions. “Ghost nuclear power plants” of the Soviet Union (and not only) - in the review of Onliner.by.
The 1970s were a successful decade for the main country of the socialist camp. High prices for oil and gas, a period of relative warming in relations with the United States and Western Europe, called “détente” and which made it possible to reduce spending on defense industry, helped the Soviet Union implement many ambitious industrial projects. The opposite effect of the rapid development of heavy and energy-intensive industry was the prospect of a shortage of electricity in the country. Power plants operating on traditional fuels, the most powerful hydroelectric power plants of the 1950s-1970s, and the first generation of nuclear power plants could no longer satisfy the increasingly ambitious plans of the Soviet leadership. This problem should have been largely solved by new network nuclear power plants, the construction of which began at the turn of the 1970s-1980s with the prospect of putting the first stages into operation a decade later.
Almost all nuclear power plants were to be implemented according to a standard scheme, which provided for the construction of stations with two, four or six power units with VVER-1000 reactors, the latest development of Soviet nuclear scientists at that time (by the way, a different type of reactor, the RBMK, exploded at the notorious Chernobyl nuclear power plant). The first VVER-1000 was launched in 1980 at the Novovoronezh NPP, then over the next five years about a dozen more similar reactors were put into operation, mainly on the territory of the Ukrainian SSR: the Kalinin, Balakovo, Zaporozhye, Rivne, and South Ukrainian NPPs came into operation.
But the main thing was ahead. The plans included the construction of nuclear power plants in Bashkiria and Tatarstan, in the Crimea and near Kostroma, on Southern Urals and in the Cherkasy region of Ukraine. Nuclear combined heat and power plants (ATES) and nuclear heat supply stations (AST) were supposed to begin heating Minsk and Odessa, Kharkov and Gorky. To one degree or another, work began on each of these facilities, and all of them (with the exception of the Minsk ATPP) became victims of the Chernobyl disaster and the subsequent systemic crisis of the Soviet economy and the collapse of the USSR. The energy complexes remained unfinished, and the satellite cities, which were always built first, found themselves without their city-forming enterprise.
Crimean NPP (Shchelkino, Crimea)
The failed power plant in Crimea is probably the most famous nuclear "abandonment" former USSR. Firstly, the degree of readiness of its first power unit at the time of the suspension of construction was 80%, which means that the main work was nearing completion, the complex was acquiring a finished appearance. Secondly, the very location of the station in a resort area, next to the Sea of Azov, contributed to the popularity of the facility among visitors.
The construction of the Crimean Nuclear Power Plant began at the very end of the 1970s. As usual, the creation of the necessary infrastructure was accompanied by the construction of an atomic city, which initially housed the complex’s builders, who were later replaced by power engineers. This is how the city of Shchelkino appeared on the map of the peninsula, named after the Soviet nuclear physicist Kirill Shchelkin. In 1981, work began on two power units, the first stage of the station. In 1987, after the Chernobyl accident, they were suspended, and two years later they were completely abandoned. At the same time, the readiness of the first power unit was about 80%, the second - 18%. Even in the conditions of a difficult economic situation in the country, at least the first unit of a nuclear power plant could be completed quite easily, as happened, for example, at the South Ukrainian or Zaporozhye nuclear power plant, where the construction of the next VVER-1000 was completed at the very end of the 1980s.
Instead, the fantastic money already spent was literally buried in the ground. The progressive public, focusing on the resort nature of the region and the periodic earthquakes observed there, stopped construction. Crimea never gained energy independence, and the almost completely finished first power unit began to be stolen. The equipment and structures of the complex were sold for next to nothing or cut into scrap metal.
For example, in 2003, a unique double-tower self-propelled crane K-10000 set off in an unknown direction. The Danish company Kroll Kranes built only 15 of these engineering masterpieces with a lifting capacity of 240 tons, and 13 of them were purchased Soviet Union just for a new atomic project. Of all of them, only two K-10000 are now preserved on the territory of the former USSR: one in Russia and one in Ukraine. The rest either work for new owners, mainly in eastern countries, or have disappeared without a trace.
But the Crimean nuclear power plant has become an object of worship for lovers of abandoned architecture and electronic music. In the 1990s, discos of the “Republic of KaZantip” festival were held right in the turbine hall of the unfinished first power unit. Now this building continues to slowly collapse - independently and with human help. Of course, there can be no talk of any completion of the station.
Tatar NPP (Kamskie Polyany, Tatarstan)
The remaining abandoned nuclear construction sites of the former Soviet Union are in a much less complete state of completion. In the early 1980s, construction of a nuclear power plant began in Tatarstan, which was supposed to become an energy donor for large republican industrial giants, commissioned in the previous decade. By April 1990, when work on the site stopped, a settlement of future power engineers grew up 50 kilometers from the city of Nizhnekamsk, which received the romantic name Kamskie Polyany. The first two (out of four planned) units with VVER-1000 reactors were at the stage of constructing machine rooms and reactor rooms.
A number of auxiliary facilities of the station infrastructure and a start-up boiler room, intended to launch the first reactor, were ready. Similar facilities were built first and are present at many “ghost nuclear power plants”.
Unlike the nuclear power plant in Kazantip, local authorities continue to harbor hopes of completing the station. At the same time, it is obvious that almost everything that was already built in the 1980s (except perhaps the boiler room) is useless when resuscitating the project. The inevitable degradation of the “unfinished building” in the absence of proper conservation, its barbaric exploitation with partial dismantling will allow, if desired, only the use of the prepared site and the residents of Kamskie Polyany, who are languishing from the complex vicissitudes of fate.
Bashkir NPP (Agidel, Bashkortostan)
Just 400 kilometers from the Tat Nuclear Power Plant, around the same years, construction of a nuclear power plant was underway in neighboring Bashkiria. Over the course of a decade, about $800 million in modern equivalent was spent on a project similar to the Crimean and Tatar nuclear power plants (2+2 power units with VVER-1000 reactors). But here they managed to do even less than in Kamskie Polyany.
Only the first power unit was at the stage of constructing the reactor hall and engine room. Only pits were ready for the rest of the “nuclear” part of the complex. The funds were mainly spent on the infrastructure part (construction base, auxiliary workshops, administrative premises, start-up boiler room) and the satellite village of Agidel.
Kostroma NPP (Chistye Bory, Kostroma region)
Approximately the same degree of readiness (a town for power engineers, here called Chistye Bory, a boiler house, a number of auxiliary infrastructure facilities and power units in the initial stage of construction) is now at the Kostroma NPP, whose task was to provide electricity to the Moscow region and the Kostroma region.
The main feature of this plant was that, unlike all other new nuclear power plants of the 1980s, it was planned to use not the VVER-1000, but the RBMK-1500, the next generation of the series, installed, in particular, at Chernobyl. At the end of the 2000s, plans were voiced to continue construction (with a return to more reliable VVER), but the economic situation in Russia and a number of new projects already started by Rosenergoatom again made the future of the station near Kostroma and its satellite village illusory.
Chigirinskaya NPP (Orbita, Ukraine)
The construction of a nuclear power plant in the Cherkasy region of Ukraine initially began as a large, but quite traditional state district power plant in the early 1970s. The project, however, was difficult to implement, with a number of changes, the last of which was the most dramatic. In 1982, instead of a state district power plant, it was decided to build a nuclear power plant on the same site according to a standard design with four power units. In this case, work stopped at the very first stage - during the construction of a satellite town and a start-up boiler house.
Before the Chernobyl disaster, builders managed to finish the boxes of the first dormitories, a nine-story residential building and a number of public buildings, such as a department store. As such energy complex didn't have time to start. As a result, in the Cherkassy steppes on the banks of the Dnieper, to the delight of the homeless, young people from the neighboring city and visiting “stalkers,” a ghost village with the proud name Orbita appeared, in which only two five-story buildings are inhabited. About 60 families live there.
Kharkov ATPP (Borki, Ukraine)
In addition to traditional nuclear power plants, primarily intended for generating electricity, the same USSR energy program of the 1970s provided for the construction of nuclear power plants of a different type in the European part of the country. In particular, the construction of ATPPs began - nuclear thermal power plants capable of generating, in addition to electrical energy, thermal energy, which could be directed to heating the neighboring large city. In the village of Borki near Kharkov, only a few residential buildings were built.
Odessa ATPP (Teplodar, Ukraine)
The Odessa counterpart was lucky (or maybe not) a little more. The satellite city of Teplodar was built in full, having managed to complete the same ubiquitous start-up boiler room. It never got to the point of constructing the power units, and as a result, the boiler room needed to launch the first reactor is not doing what was intended by the design engineers, Teplodar heats.
Compared to its Ukrainian sisters, the fate of the Minsk ATPP, repurposed as a conventional combined heat and power plant and completed in this form already during the years of independence, looks even more or less enviable.
Voronezh and Gorky AST (Voronezh and Nizhny Novgorod, Russia)
The third type in this program, along with nuclear power plants and nuclear power plants, were nuclear heat supply stations, actually “nuclear boiler houses” that generated only thermal energy for the same supply of large cities. In the 1980s, two such stations were almost completely built: near Voronezh and the modern Nizhny Novgorod, - but even here the work was not completed due to the economic crisis and protests of the local population.
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