CHERNOBYL

1
CHERNOBYL
Allyson White, Maria Hendricks, and Larry
Baxter Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah
Exclusion Zone
26 April 1986
Solutions
(Shown in dotted line)
Build a multiuse sustainable forest with high
biodiversity and productivity -Reduces fire
threat -Displays to world effective method
of managing forests -Wood from forest could
be used in one of three options

• Coal Co-fired with Biomass Plant
• -Produce 1GW of power
• -Cost estimated 800 million USD
• -Produce power at 0.025/kWh
• -Most efficient use of renewable energy
• -Creates high number of local jobs
• -Build on existing power grid lines from
  Chernobyl to Kiev

Chernobyl Plant Unit 4 after Explosion

• 30 km radius
• Still heavily contaminated with137Cs, 90Sr, and
  239,240Pu
• Unhealthy, overgrown, monoculture forests

• Effects
• 31 immediate deaths with 10-100s of thousands of
  deaths in the long term
• Incidences of children with thyroid cancer in
  Ukraine grew two orders of magnitude
• Environmental contamination of Cs, Sr, and Pu
• Destruction of the entire regional economy
• Loss of 20 of countrys power, in addition to
  blackening the eye on the entire nuclear industry

 2. High-Grade Pulping/Power Plant -Provides
300-400 MWe of power (could run entirely off its
own power) -Forest supply large enough for
largest paper mill in Europe -Additional energy
sold for 0.05/kWh -Decreases CO2
emissions -Provides highest number of jobs -Build
on to existing plant in Svetlogorsk
3. Separate Nuclear and Biomass Power
Plants -Biomass plant cost of 50 million
USD -Energy sold for 0.06-0.07/kWh -Employ
50-100 people -CO2 neutral -EU already promised
to assist in building nuclear plant  
Contaminated Forests Pose High Fire Threat,
Carrying Radioactive Smoke Across Europe