Not for the first year in fish tanks - coolers of Russian nuclear power plants fish are grown. Kalinin NPP boast their fatty trout, carp grown on Smolenskaia NPP NPP Kola specializes in salmon and in reservoirs - coolers Rostov NPP float carp and carp. In this case, many fish are indecently huge. What is it - good care and breeding? Or should I say thank you to the atom?

Today, right away, you can not tell who first came up with the idea of ​​growing fish in warm water reservoirs at nuclear power plants.

- In 1990, near the Leningrad nuclear power plant, a fish farm was created specifically to feed the nuclear scientists with fresh fish, "says Lev Maksimov, former director of the Institute of Physical and Technical Problems of Metallurgy and Machine Building. - There was a special channel that went from the side of the nuclear power plant. That's it and adapted for your daily needs. Sturgeon, grown in atomic water, reached a weight of 15-20 kilograms. To taste, they looked like a sterlet. But soon the nuclear workers could not keep this economy, and the local businessmen bought the farm.

Probably, it was the example of the St. Petersburg nuclear scientists that inspired their colleagues, since the re-stocked reservoirs began to appear everywhere. But why did not the size of the fish living in the water from the nuclear power plant become alarmed?

At Kalinin NPP in 2017, both reservoirs - the station cooler - the natural lakes of Pesvo and Udomlya were reared.

- This time more than 1 ton of a two-year carp was produced in the lake, - says Dmitriy Pidushkov, deputy of the city council, editor-in-chief of the newspaper "Golos Udomli". - The average weight of each fish is 600 grams. Who else lives in our lakes? White and black Cupid, carp and carp.

The advertising leaflet of the state corporation Rosatom reads: "Fish in cooling ponds of nuclear power plants are excellent helpers in clearing water from bio-interference, which hinders the operation of the technical water supply systems of the nuclear power plant. The stocking promotes not only the safety of the power units, but also the preservation of the ichthyofauna balance, the replenishment of fish stocks. "

However, this leaflet for some reason is silent about the presence of tritium in lakes-coolers, for example, the mentioned Kalinin NPP. Radionuclides from nuclear power plants can enter the environment, falling into the biological cycle, fish, soil water. In addition, tritium is probably present in discharges. But this is not said.

As explained by an expert on nuclear energy Alexey Shchukin, the most dangerous to date radionuclide to humans is just tritium - a radioactive isotope of hydrogen with a half-life of 12.3 years, which is produced in large quantities by irradiation of normal water in the reactors. Tritium practically does not lend itself to purification. The danger is, first of all, that it migrates easily, including into biological chains. It does not get rid of it even when processing radioactive waste - when evaporating water it flies with the steam.

Experts note that the final absorber of radionuclides released into the environment is fish. And the fish in the reservoirs-coolers get it all with interest.

"The IAEA director, the Japanese Yukiya Amano, came to Udomlya with us to inspect us," says Dmitry Pidushkov. - So he still promised on the way to the nuclear power plant an ear from trout caught in the Pesvo lake ... But we'll give out a secret: the trout was bought the day before in one of Tver's restaurants. Apparently, they decided not to risk it.

So, at the Rostov nuclear power plant the implementation of the complex program of stocking the reservoir - the cooler of nuclear power plants with herbivorous fish species is in full swing. The reservoir of the cooling reservoir of the Rostov NPP was built in the late 1980s, and during this time its ichthyofauna set was formed, the feature of which was the predominance of predatory fish over the herbivore. This imbalance led to the fact that the reservoir was overgrown with reeds and algae. These plants entered the water intake of the nuclear power plant, disrupting the normal organization of the circulating water supply of the station. To solve this problem, a program for stocking the reservoir-cooler was developed.

Since 2015, the Rostov Nuclear Power Plant has been actively involved in the Don's stocking program. Twice a year representatives of Rostov NPP purchase young fish. In 2017, the station workers released 42 million fish fry. Today the atomic scientists intend to embrace the Tsymlyansk Sea with their stocking. Beloyarsk NPP is also actively engaged in stocking. In 2017, the Beloyarsk Reservoir was populated with 270 thousand fish. Silver carvers destroy the main enemy of the pond - the cooler of the nuclear power plant - blue-green algae. In this case, adult individuals reach a weight of 40 kilograms.

Wow! Perhaps, it's not for nothing that atomic scientists do not mention tritium, which, apparently, still exists in the water of cooling reservoirs? Studies on the behavior of tritium in biological objects indicate its thousand-fold accumulation in living organisms.

"As for the production of tritium at nuclear power plants, it is formed in proportion to the generation of electricity itself," says nuclear physicist Lev Maksimov. - Tritium is a radioactive isotope of hydrogen (hydrogen-3, 3H) with an atomic mass of 3 (one proton, two neutrons). Disintegrating, tritium turns into helium, thus allocating a rather intense beta-radiation. Tritium can pose a serious threat to health. After all, tritium, being an isotope of hydrogen, chemically behaves like hydrogen, and therefore able to replace it in all compounds with oxygen, sulfur, nitrogen, easily penetrating the protoplasm of any cell. In this case, the beta radiation emitted by tritium can damage the genetic apparatus of cells.

So what kind of fish are grown in reservoirs - coolers of nuclear power plants?

Dead fish

The deputy of the local city council Artsvik Avetisyan informed that the fish can be found in the reservoir of the Smolensk nuclear power plant in Desnogorsk.

- In the reservoir of the nuclear power plant, fish are killed for the first time. Dead carbage trucks are transported by tractors to the city dump, - the deputy said.

Why fish dies, it is not known - officially this is not reported. However, the city is crawling with bad rumors. And although the authorities continue to assert that all established environmental compliance standards are adhered to at the nuclear power plant, which is a city-forming enterprise, people are worried. And not without reason - in Desnogorsk there was a difficult situation on oncological diseases. Even the head of the Department of Health of the Smolensk region Vladimir Stepchenkov, after learning about the number of cancer patients in Desnogorsk, reproached the doctors that they did not go to the department for help.

- And why should the authorities take out the dirty linen from the hut? - explains Artsvik Avetisyan. - Suddenly again, the next wave of ecologists will stir up. And they will force to recognize the work of the nuclear power plant as dangerous. It's easier to pretend that everything is in order.