The Dnieper reservoir cascade or Dnieper cascade of hydroelectric power stations ( uk, Дніпровський каскад ГЕС) is a series of
dam
A dam is a barrier that stops or restricts the flow of surface water or underground streams. Reservoirs created by dams not only suppress floods but also provide water for activities such as irrigation, human consumption, industrial use, a ...
s,
reservoir
A reservoir (; from French ''réservoir'' ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam. Such a dam may be either artificial, built to store fresh water or it may be a natural formation.
Reservoirs can be created in a number of ways, including contro ...
s and
hydroelectric power station
Hydroelectricity, or hydroelectric power, is electricity generated from hydropower (water power). Hydropower supplies one sixth of the world's electricity, almost 4500 TWh in 2020, which is more than all other renewable sources combined and ...
s on the
Dnieper
}
The Dnieper () or Dnipro (); , ; . is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. It is the longest river of Ukraine and B ...
river in
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
. It was created to prevent uncontrolled flooding and improve
water transportation
Water transportation is the international movement of water over large distances. Methods of transportation fall into three categories:
* Aqueducts, which include pipelines, canals, tunnels and bridges
* Container shipment, which includes trans ...
infrastructure. Coordination and operation of all dams on the Dnieper is conducted by government company
Ukrhydroenergo
PJSC «Ukrhydroenergo» ( uk, Укргідроенерго) is a State-owned enterprise, state company of Ukraine that administers a cascade of major hydro power plants along Dnieper and Dniester riversPrivate Joint Stock Company «Ukrhydroenergo ...
. In 1970, the Kyiv dam partially prevented flooding in comparison with the 1931 Kyiv flooding.
As with any dam, the water reservoirs of the Dnieper in Ukraine pose a significant threat of a large-scale,
human-made
Artificiality (the state of being artificial or manmade) is the state of being the product of intentional human manufacture, rather than occurring naturally through processes not involving or requiring human activity.
Connotations
Artificiality ...
disaster
A disaster is a serious problem occurring over a short or long period of time that causes widespread human, material, economic or environmental loss which exceeds the ability of the affected community or society to cope using its own resources ...
if their dams fail. Those concerns were raised in particular in connection with the 2009 Sayano–Shushenskaya Dam disaster.
To combat uncontrolled flooding, the
National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine
The National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine (NASU; uk, Національна академія наук України, ''Natsional’na akademiya nauk Ukrayiny'', abbr: NAN Ukraine) is a self-governing state-funded organization in Ukraine th ...
had developed a program of flooding forecasting; however, as of 2012, the
Government of Ukraine
The Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine ( uk, Кабінет Міністрів України, translit=Kabinet Ministriv Ukrainy; shortened to CabMin), commonly referred to as the Government of Ukraine ( uk, Уряд України, ''Uriad Ukrai ...
Kaniv Hydroelectric Station
Kaniv Hydroelectric Power Plant is a hydroelectricity generating complex on the Dnieper River in Kaniv, Ukraine. It is operated by the Ukrhydroenego that is part of the state company Energy Company of Ukraine.
The power plant was projected by the ...
Middle Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Plant
The Middle Dnieper Hydroelectric Station is a run-of-river power plant on the Dnieper River in Kamianske, Ukraine, operated by Ukrhydroenergo.
The primary purpose of the dam is hydroelectric power generation and navigation. It is the fourth dam i ...
*
Dnieper Hydroelectric Station
The Dnieper Hydroelectric Station ( uk, ДніпроГЕС, DniproHES; russian: ДнепроГЭС, DneproGES), also known as Dneprostroi Dam, in the city of Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, is the largest hydroelectric power station on the Dnieper river. ...
Kyiv
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...
*
Kaniv
Kaniv ( uk, Канів, ) city located in Cherkasy Raion, Cherkasy Oblast (province) in central Ukraine. The city rests on the Dnieper River, and is also one of the main inland river ports on the Dnieper. It hosts the administration of Kaniv urb ...
*
Kremenchuk
Kremenchuk (; uk, Кременчу́к, Kremenchuk ) is an industrial city in central Ukraine which stands on the banks of the Dnipro River. The city serves as the administrative center of the Kremenchuk Raion (district) in Poltava Oblast (pr ...
*
Kamianske
Kamianske ( uk, Кам'янське, ), formerly Dniprodzerzhynsk, is an industrial city in Dnipropetrovsk Oblast of Ukraine and a port on the Dnieper. Administratively, it serves as the administrative center of Kamianske Raion. Kamianske hosts ...
*
Dnieper
}
The Dnieper () or Dnipro (); , ; . is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. It is the longest river of Ukraine and B ...
*
Kakhovka
Kakhovka ( uk, Кахо́вка, ) is a port city on the Dnieper River in Kakhovka Raion, Kherson Oblast, of southern Ukraine. It hosts the administration of the Kakhovka urban hromada, one of the hromadas of Ukraine. It had a population of
It ...
Concerns
Like other
reservoir
A reservoir (; from French ''réservoir'' ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam. Such a dam may be either artificial, built to store fresh water or it may be a natural formation.
Reservoirs can be created in a number of ways, including contro ...
s, Dnieper reservoirs pose a potential threat of causing major
flooding
A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are an area of study of the discipline hydrolog ...
if their dams fail. Such damage may be inflicted by a powerful
natural disaster
A natural disaster is "the negative impact following an actual occurrence of natural hazard in the event that it significantly harms a community". A natural disaster can cause loss of life or damage property, and typically leaves some econ ...
(e.g., an
earthquake
An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...
terrorists
Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...
or enemy (or even own military) forces at war.
The Dnieper reservoirs contain an additional major threat—after the
Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster
The Chernobyl disaster was a nuclear accident that occurred on 26 April 1986 at the No. 4 reactor in the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant, near the city of Pripyat in the north of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, Ukrainian SSR in the Sov ...
in 1986,
radionuclides
A radionuclide (radioactive nuclide, radioisotope or radioactive isotope) is a nuclide that has excess nuclear energy, making it unstable. This excess energy can be used in one of three ways: emitted from the nucleus as gamma radiation; transfer ...
washed away by rains badly contaminated the bottom
silt
Silt is granular material of a size between sand and clay and composed mostly of broken grains of quartz. Silt may occur as a soil (often mixed with sand or clay) or as sediment mixed in suspension with water. Silt usually has a floury feel when ...
of the Kyiv Reservoir and presumably the others. During the years following the disaster, there were suggestions to drain the Kyiv Reservoir because it was too shallow.
The dams are supposed to be strong enough to survive natural and terrorist threats. Both their construction schemes and government efforts work towards this goal. For instance, some engineers guarantee that every Dnieper dam will survive an earthquake (to its typical regional extent),
meteorite
A meteorite is a solid piece of debris from an object, such as a comet, asteroid, or meteoroid, that originates in outer space and survives its passage through the atmosphere to reach the surface of a planet or Natural satellite, moon. When the ...
or
aircraft
An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to fly by gaining support from the air. It counters the force of gravity by using either static lift or by using the dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in a few cases the downward thrust from jet engines ...
falling."The dam of the Kyiv's power plant will be around for a thousand of years", - the chief engineer of the "Skhema Dnepra" he "Pattern of the Dnieper river"institution Yefim Bakshayev seems to be tired of repeating those words. "The catastrophe is possible if it is directly hit by the nuclear bomb. I think that no one would then be around to be saved from flooding. Yes, the accidents are possible at peace time if the metallic structures of the dam are not replaced on time. But this is taken care of for the Kyiv dam. Besides, in the Netherlands, one third of the country spans across the territories gained from the sea. People build the reservoirs there for 400 years and no one is afraid of this proximity. Most important is to build the dam competently, provide it with modern equipment and follow on its operation ..The capital is fully protected from flooding" Lyudmila Kovalchuk, ' Kiev Reservoir: where the radioactive silt is now there were 52 villages "'', ''
Segodnya
''Segodnya'' ( rus, Сегодня, p=sʲɪˈvodʲnʲə, t=Today, a=Ru-сегодня.ogg) was a Russian-language Ukrainian tabloid newspaper founded in 1997. While run from Kyiv, it was linked to Donbass political and business groups; its hold ...
'', March 23, 2005. There are also countermeasures against overflooding and malfunction of dams. Authorities pay significant attention to safeguarding the dams and bridges by special units of the
Ministry of Internal Affairs
An interior ministry (sometimes called a ministry of internal affairs or ministry of home affairs) is a government department that is responsible for internal affairs.
Lists of current ministries of internal affairs
Named "ministry"
* Ministry ...
Kyiv Reservoir
The Kyiv Cistern ( uk, Київське водосховище, translit=Kyyivs’ke vodoskhovyshche), locally the Kyiv Sea, is a large Reservoir (water), water reservoir located on the Dnieper River in Ukraine. Named after the city of Kyiv, whi ...
would cause a flooding of the low-lying areas of
Kyiv
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...
Zerkalo Nedeli
''Dzerkalo Tyzhnia'' ( ua, Дзеркало тижня), usually referred to in English as the ''Mirror Weekly'', was one of Ukraine's most influential analytical weekly-publisher newspapers, founded in 1994.in Russian
in Ukrainian /ref> The aftermath of a possible complex flooding also include the spread of radioactive material from the Chernobyl disaster contained in the reservoirs, the widespread contamination by industrial and urban wastes and creation of swamps on bottoms of emptied reservoirs.
In 2001–03 the
Security Service of Ukraine
The Security Service of Ukraine ( uk, Служба безпеки України, translit=Sluzhba bezpeky Ukrainy}) or SBU ( uk, СБУ, link=no) is the law enforcement authority and main intelligence and security agency of the Ukrainian ...
organized exercises on the Kyiv Hydroelectric station, simulating a possible terrorist attack. The results of the exercises were considered satisfactory.
Government position
New concerns arose in 2005 after a fake terrorist threat case. A
police officer
A police officer (also called a policeman and, less commonly, a policewoman) is a warranted law employee of a police force. In most countries, "police officer" is a generic term not specifying a particular rank. In some, the use of the ...
, dissatisfied with his commanders, anonymously called an emergency line stating that he had planted a bomb in a cargo train crossing the Kyiv Reservoir's dam. An immediate check proved the threat to be fake and the officer was arrested. Regardless, the incident caused another wave of public concern. "The caller is out of the calling area", ''
Zerkalo Nedeli
''Dzerkalo Tyzhnia'' ( ua, Дзеркало тижня), usually referred to in English as the ''Mirror Weekly'', was one of Ukraine's most influential analytical weekly-publisher newspapers, founded in 1994.in Russian
in Ukrainian /ref>
In 2012, the former Kyiv Hydroelectric Power Plant manager and veteran stated that the dam is guaranteed to be capable of withstanding any physical threat except for a large space object impact or a deliberate military attack of significant scale. However, an emergency plan exists to safely minimize consequences of a space impact depending on if there would be
early warning
An early warning system is a warning system that can be implemented as a Poset, chain of information communication systems and comprises sensors, Detection theory, event detection and decision support system, decision subsystems for early identi ...
of the impact event.
See also
*
Dam failure
A dam failure or dam burst is a catastrophic type of structural failure characterized by the sudden, rapid, and uncontrolled release of impounded water or the likelihood of such an uncontrolled release. Between the years 2000 and 2009 more than ...
*
Dam safety system
Dam safety systems are used to monitor the state of dams, including external physical threats to the dams, and issuing emergency warnings at various degrees of automation. This includes the use of differential GPS and SAR remote sensing to monito ...
*
Dnieper
}
The Dnieper () or Dnipro (); , ; . is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. It is the longest river of Ukraine and B ...
*
Dnieper Hydroelectric Station
The Dnieper Hydroelectric Station ( uk, ДніпроГЕС, DniproHES; russian: ДнепроГЭС, DneproGES), also known as Dneprostroi Dam, in the city of Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine, is the largest hydroelectric power station on the Dnieper river. ...
Kievskiye Vedomosti
The ''Kievskiye Vedomosti'' (russian: Киевские ведомости) was a local daily Russian-language newspaper, based in Kyiv. It was published between 1992 and 2010 in a tabloid format. Its chief editor, Viktor Chayka, had been affili ...
Korrespondent
''Korrespondent'' (russian: links=no, Корреспондент; uk, links=no, Кореспондент; literally: ''Correspondent'') is a weekly printed magazine published in Ukraine in the Russian and Ukrainian languages. It is part of Unite ...
''.net, July 19, 2006
* “Комсомольская правда” об угрозах плотины Киевской ГЭС и водохранилищ
* “Аргументы и факты” о реальных угрозах дамбы Киевского водохранилища и ГЭ
* “Известия” о проблематике плотины Киевского водохранилища и ГЭ * Эксперт УНИАН об угрозах дамбы Киевского водохранилищ
radioactive contamination
Radioactive contamination, also called radiological pollution, is the deposition of, or presence of radioactive substances on surfaces or within solids, liquids, or gases (including the human body), where their presence is unintended or undesirab ...
Ukrainian Soviet Encyclopedia
The ''Ukrainian Soviet Encyclopedia'' ( uk, Українська радянська енциклопедія, ''Ukrayinska radyanska entsyklopediya'') was a multi-purpose encyclopedia of Ukraine, issued in the USSR.
First attempt
Following th ...
Encyclopedia of Ukraine
The ''Encyclopedia of Ukraine'' ( uk, Енциклопедія українознавства, translit=Entsyklopediia ukrainoznavstva), published from 1984 to 2001, is a fundamental work of Ukrainian Studies.
Development
The work was creat ...
Ukrayinska Pravda
''Ukrainska Pravda'' ( uk, Українська правда, lit=Ukrainian Truth) is a Ukrainian online newspaper founded by Georgiy Gongadze on 16 April 2000 (the day of the Ukrainian constitutional referendum). Published mainly in Ukraini ...