Abandoned nuclear power plant: Zwentendorf, Austria

you have a very good look to the machine cause we enter the conversation channel in this room it was very hot and the radiation was really high although Austria claims to be a nuclear-free state for years Austria has its own nuclear power plant this is the main entrance in this cabin the security staff was sitting checking who is entering and leaving the nuclear power plant here the whole staff entered the building they changed the closest here after doing that UT they had to take a shower on this side because they washed up the radiation from the escapes and from here they went through to doing the chop inside the nuclear power plant this power plant is situated on the bank of the Danube River near Trenton North it was built from 1972 to 78 when it was done fuel rods were put into the reactor but then something went wrong here everything was ready for operation the only thing is everything was here including the fuel rods the only thing which was missing here was the official permission to to put the power plant into operation in 1978 there was a referendum the result was close 50 and a half percent voted against commissioning paradoxically the unpopular Prime Minister Bruno Kreisky supporting the startup changed the result against him he promised if the referendum would be against the start he would leave politics later he didn't keep his promise we are not going by elevator - sir - 9 meters to have a short look into the reactor okay it's directly under the roof of the building the nuclear power plant has two big buildings one is the machine hub hole wood for the turbines and the generator and the second the bigger one is the reactor building it's more than 45 meters high taking a look into the reactor Austria planned to build a total of three nuclear power plants seventeen Dorf is a boiling type reactor it is slightly more simple in construction that pressurized water reactors but turbines are contaminated with radioactive steam during operation Swanton Dorf was supposed to have 700 megawatts output let's have a look into the reactor from the Train there is an interesting difference compared to Czech power plants the protective containment doesn't include the reactor Hall but only the reactor itself and small space around it the scheme of the power plant the machine house yeah and the reactor building and we are now now here on thirty nine point four meters directly under the roof and we look down into the reactor there is a pool for cooling spent fuel next to the reactor shaft when fuel needs to be replaced the space above the reactor is filled with water up to the level of the cooling pool and the spent fuel rods move completely submerged I wasn't checked powerplant on time fuel rods being replaced let's compare how it looks like and how it would look like in 20 Dorf you have a very good look to the Machine of the engine-room originally had three turbines one of them was sold as well as the generator the engine room now serves as a space for events this is the containment upper this is the upper part of the containment it's a possibility to go inside but only two weeks a year because after one and half a year a reactor like this is refurbished and they are changing parts then they open this door to go inside the containment that Swanton Dorf power station became the Potemkin village for seven years after the decision not to start it it would be logical to have here only the staff guarding the building instead until 1985 all employees came here as if the power plant was working throughout the period of so-called conservation they had to be bored here very much here you see where we are at first we have been at 39 meter now we are 27 meters taking a look inside the containment our third stage will be a 10 meter we will enter the containment through a door we made some years ago normally there is no door because the whole containment is filled with water but here we have no water inside and we made it all for the trainings the unused power plant has one more purpose training of personnel especially from German nuclear power plants is held here there are several very similar power plants in Germany there is still one running until now we entered the condensation chapter a room filled with water in a nuclear power plant here we have no water inside working nuclear power plant of this type you have up to 2800 cubic meters of power plant water it's like this tiled water but here there's no water inside so we can enter this room and this room has a very special acoustic next place we visit is the room with the control rods we are just entering below the reactor this reactor was controlled from below from here they put into the reactor the driving rods it's a room full of Technology and over there you see the the rest what is resting of the period of conservation if the power plant was actually put into operation it would be impossible to see this place as a visit everything operational yes it's a telephone used in coal mines very because in this room it was very hot and the radiation was really high and this is a very stable telephone from a coal mine the mine phone is here because of its resistance in contaminated area during operation staff would enter here for a very short time because of security reasons there have been controls two times a day in this area but the engineers doing the controls were forced to keep it very short and there was the application to leave the nuclear power plant for some days afterwards this power plant costed about one and a half billion euros in today's currency by the way it is an operating power plant ten years ago a thousand solar panels was installed here they generate as much electricity per year as a reactor would produce in nineteen minutes so this is the control room yeah there is five to twelve obviously this time was set up by someone who is glad the chain reaction never started here 484 fuel rods reactor 121 driving rods the control room of unconditioned power plant is one of the places that comes to life most often during staff exercises as well as during filming after the plant was not started there was a plan to adapt it to a steam gas but adapting a power plant would be more expensive than building a new one so this plant now has one permanent employee he controls a total of 1,000 rooms but power plants were constructed here and it's a very bizarre paradox that anti-nuclear activists do not like to hear the Austrian distribution network was already adapted to the new source after its failure it was necessary to replace it so six kilometers away to thermal power plants were built a call from Poland and from Bohemia is transported here and the paradox nobody has told Austrian voters before the referendum that coal contains some uranium when it's burnt uranium gets into the air an operating thermal power plant emits more radiation than operating nuclear power plant so near Vienna there's a larger nuclear fallout finally Austria is not quite a country without a reactor there was built a total of three small research reactors one of them is at the University of Vienna still operating the good question is why studying an atomic power in Austria is like studying to be an astronaut in Czech Republic

Channel: Researchers

Views: 126,034

Rating: 4.8894577 out of 5

Keywords: mystery, mysteries, seeking, treasuries, secret, files, forbidden, places, npp, chernobyl, zwentendorf, austria, nuclear energy

Id: cQvdtHXR-7Y

Length: 12min 27sec (747 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 23 2020