Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant 1995 informational booklet

The Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (Lithuanian: Ignalinos atominė elektrinė, IAE) is a decommissioned two-unit RBMK-1500 nuclear power station in Visaginas Municipality, Lithuania, named after the nearby city of Ignalina.

As you know, I like collecting historical documents about Chornobyl, so this information booklet about the Ignalina NPP released nearly 30 years ago is a great addition.

The Ignalina’s design shares many similarities with the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant – the Soviet RBMK-1500 water-cooled and graphite-moderated reactors are more powerful variants of the the infamous RBMK-1000, producing 4800MW thermal and 1500 electrical power through two turbines with 800MW generators for each of the two blocks. The RBMK-1500 reactors also lacks a confinement building seen in the western power plants of that generation.

The popular “Chernobyl” HBO series was filmed mainly in Lithuania, and Ignalina NPP was used to film the scenes depicting Chernobyl NPP.

Ignalina NPP played an important role in the Chornobyl Disaster – the effect of the graphite tips of the control rods on power output was recorded by Ingalina operators several years before the worst nuclear accident in history. The plant operators sent an official note to the Soviet party authorities, Kurchatov institute and other nuclear power plants, which was largely ignored and classified, to not undermine the Soviet supremacy in nuclear power industry.

Click on the cover to start reading!