Krasnogorsk HPP on Irtysh river: a new wave of discussions, standing water of doubt
The Ministry of Natural Resources and Ecology of the Omsk region, as part of the consideration of the appeal of the chairman of the Omsk regional public organization “People’s Control” Olga Baranova, held a meeting on the situation related to the construction of the Krasnogorsk hydroelectric complex on the Irtysh River.
As stated in the appeal available to Commercial News, “the public and environmental experts have questions about the consequences of commissioning such a large facility as the Krasnogorsk hydroelectric power plant, maintaining the quality of drinking water in the reservoir, which will be located below the industrial facilities of the city, as well as the absence of treatment facilities higher up the Irtysh.” Activists are wondering why the construction of a complex facility is carried out without expertise, and if it is carried out, then why its results are hidden from the public. They refer to the words of the former head of the Irtysh Shipping Company, Ivan Yanovsky, that nowhere in the world are hydroelectric power plants, dams and reservoirs being built below large cities – the only exception is Omsk.
According to expert estimates cited by Baranova, the commissioning of the hydroelectric dam can lead to an environmental disaster. Firstly, there may be several environmentally hazardous objects in the zone of the greatest flooding: the sludge ponds of the Omsk oil refinery, the sour tar lake, the city landfill, closed, but continuing to replenish. Secondly, the density of the soil in the place chosen for the construction of the dam is low: the falling flow of water in a few years deforms the bottom and bank of the river, so that the operating oil depot located on the very edge of the right bank will be in the Irtysh.
Thirdly, if the shore is deformed, the water will carry the ash dumps of CHP-4, located a little further downstream, into the riverbed – in the future this will damage other enterprises and settlements. To prevent this from happening, social activists reasoned, additional costs are required to strengthen the right bank of the Irtysh below the dam. Fourthly, after the construction of the waterworks, thousands of suburban areas may be flooded. Fifthly, the rise of water in the Irtysh by 1.5–2 meters will create a backstop at the mouth of the Omi. This can lead to a stop in the flow of a small river, as it was in 1967, when it turned into a stinking swamp in a few hours and there was a threat of an ecological disaster.
Sixth, with such a rise in water, cattle burial grounds in the lower floodplain of the Irtysh will be flooded. The waterworks can slow down the already slow flow of the Irtysh (from 0.5–0.7 m / s to 0.12–0.15 m / s), as a result of which it will bloom. Seventh, mercury is coming from Kazakhstan: according to the results of laboratory tests performed in the Irtysh River within the boundaries of the village of Olkhovka in the Cherlak district of the Omsk region, approximately 15-17 km from the border of the Russian Federation with the Republic of Kazakhstan, the maximum permissible concentration of mercury was exceeded by 19 times. Public activists claim that despite the construction of an additional anti-filtration wall at the end of 2024, mercury continues to flow into the Irtysh:
– For 18 years from 1975 to 1993, mercury was used as a catalyst at the Himprom enterprise in Pavlodar, Republic of Kazakhstan, for production purposes. At the same time, due to the imperfection of the technological process, liquid metal leaked. Information on the extent of pollution and measures to protect the population taken by the Kazakh authorities is extremely contradictory. Data on the amount of mercury trapped in the soil range from 930 to 3000 tons. Forecasts regarding the timing of mercury reaching the Irtysh River are also different: according to some data – several decades, according to others – mercury is already currently entering the river. According to environmentalists, such mercury pollution of soil and groundwater has no analogues in the world. According to a number of experts, the demercurization program was not fully implemented: the mercury-contaminated soils on the plant’s territory remained intact, the base of the disassembled workshop itself was covered with clay, which was washed away by meltwater in the first year, etc. On February 15, 2021, the Ob-Irtysh Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring Department recorded an excess of the maximum permissible concentration of mercury in the Irtysh River 4 times.
Activists kindly reminded of criminal liability for pollution, clogging, depletion of surface or groundwater, drinking water sources or other changes in their natural properties, suggested that the Omsk Region government discuss the purpose of the construction of the Krasnogorsk hydroelectric power plant, the environmental consequences of its commissioning, consider the possibility of stopping the five-billion-dollar construction with the construction of only an additional bridge to unload urban roads.
Officials responded to the call to communicate and brought to the meeting a positive conclusion of the state expertise on the construction of a water-lifting hydroelectric complex. However, activists paid attention – it concerns only the first stage, but not the second. Alexander Taran, director of the Omsk Region KU “Customer Management for the construction of transport facilities and hydraulic structures”, retorted: the construction of the second stage is not underway yet. He stressed that the construction of the Krasnogorsk hydroelectric complex cannot be prohibited, because a permit has been issued for it, and funding is provided by the Federal Water Resources Agency. Also, since this is an object of the third hazard class, its construction does not require the conclusion of an environmental assessment:
– You can see for yourself that we have islands in the riverbed. It is predicted that by 2030 it is possible to expose water intakes – this is the primary reason why the hydroelectric power plant is being created. The second point: we are creating a reservoir within the existing channel, without increasing or lowering the water level, maintaining the natural level to ensure constant water intake.
Taran added that numerical and physical modeling was carried out by the St. Petersburg VNIIG named after B.E. Vedeneev, subordinate to PJSC RusHydro, and promised that he would provide all the data to activists. He assured that the piers and ponds of the refinery, the ash dumps of CHP-4, cattle burial grounds and suburban areas are not subject to flooding, and concrete pons 60 m long will prevent soil erosion. As for the water quality, TARAN explained that the Krasnogorsk hydroelectric power plant is a transit one:
– We do not accumulate water to create a flow, as they do at dams when turbines turn under pressure. We have a channel-type reservoir: we pass the same water that came to us. We just adjust the level so that our water intakes are not exposed. That’s all, the hydroelectric power plant is designed only for this, not to hold back water, to accumulate some volume of water and use this energy, no.
Nadezhda Ivanova, a representative of the Ob-Irtysh Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring Department, noted that the flow of water is growing and the concentration of mercury in it is falling:
– Every day at the border with Kazakhstan we take samples for the content of 44 pollutants, including mercury. The increased concentration of mercury is twice as often observed in the city of Omsk than on the border with Kazakhstan. Over the past 20 years, the average annual mercury concentration above the MPC has not been recorded.
The issue of holding a round table on the state of the mercury landfill of the former Pavlodar chemical plant and measurements of mercury concentration in the waters of the Irtysh River exceeding the maximum permissible concentration was also considered. Activists stressed that the waters of the Irtysh River are used by Omsk, Tobolsk, Tyumen region, and the risk of mercury contamination of drinking water extends to three major cities and their regions. The participants of such a meeting may be representatives of Kazakhstan – regions that use the water of the Irtysh below Pavlodar, representatives of the government of the Russian Federation, as well as representatives of the PRC, on the territory of which the Irtysh riverbed is located.
Anastasia Pavlova (Commercial News)
Original (in Russian): Красногорский гидроузел: новая волна дискуссий, стоячая вода сомнений
