Akkuyu NPP in Türkiye Holds Full-Scale Joint Emergency Exercise: Cross-Departmental Live Drill Tested Ahead of First Unit Commissioning

The Akkuyu NPP, Türkiye's first nuclear power project, constructed by Rosatom, held a large-scale comprehensive emergency and firefighting tactical live exercise on October 12 at the Büyükeceli site in Mersin Province. The exercise aimed to comprehensively test the multi-agency coordinated response capabilities of nuclear power plant operating shift personnel, external technical support organizations, and Turkish local emergency rescue teams under extreme conditions, providing critical pre-commissioning safety justification for Unit 1 of the project as it formally enters the fuel-loading and commercial power generation phase.

Rosatom Director General Alexey Likhachev stated that emergency preparedness is the core cornerstone of ensuring inherent safety throughout the entire lifecycle of a nuclear power plant, and that building a safety system is particularly critical in countries developing civilian nuclear energy from scratch. Currently, the first unit of the Akkuyu NPP is infinitely close to the fuel-loading and commissioning start-up phase. The prerequisite for the project to reach its final milestone is obtaining a formal operating license from the Turkish Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NDK), and the completeness of rescue forces and emergency plans is a rigid precondition for licensing.

Senior officials and supervisory bodies from multiple departments of both countries observed the entire exercise process on site, including Anatoly Suprunovsky, Deputy Minister of EMERCOM of Russia and Chief State Inspector of the Russian Federation for Fire Supervision; Zafer Demircan, Deputy Minister of the Ministry of Energy and Natural Resources of Türkiye; as well as technical representatives from Akkuyu Nuclear JSC, the Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) of Türkiye, and the WANO Moscow Center.

The exercise was conducted using the full-scope simulator at the Akkuyu NPP Training Center, which served the core function of the Unit 1 main control room during the drill. The simulator precisely input extremely rare multiple technical disturbances and cascading failure scenarios of critical equipment. The main control room operating crew strictly followed accident management procedures, conducted rigorous diagnosis of unit conditions, and took emergency control measures to stabilize reactor core process parameters. Meanwhile, the on-site mobile crisis management center and the emergency committee were activated simultaneously, completing emergency situation assessment, command and coordination, and safe evacuation of non-essential personnel.

In the firefighting and engineering rescue phase, the exercise simulated a sudden fire in the Unit 1 station auxiliary transformer. The Akkuyu NPP dedicated firefighting and rescue team and the Mersin Provincial municipal fire brigade conducted joint water suppression and established a protective isolation zone for adjacent electrical systems. In response to a simulated forest fire hazard occasionally occurring beneath the plant's external transmission lines, the Gülnar Forestry Directorate, together with Akkuyu volunteer firefighting forces, launched a joint firefighting operation. By laying continuous water supply mains, clearing firebreak isolation belts, and dispatching helicopters for precise aerial bucket water drops, the risk of external forest fire spreading to the nuclear island area was rapidly contained.

At the Büyükeceli residential settlement outside the plant isolation boundary, the Turkish Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) rapidly established a personnel reception and resettlement station, radiation dose monitoring points, and a decontamination and washing center. Professional medical and epidemic prevention personnel conducted systematic radiation contamination screening and on-site emergency triage for hypothetically affected individuals and evacuated employees. Mersin Provincial Governor Atilla Toros personally visited the site to supervise the operation of the peripheral support system.

As the first nuclear power plant under construction in Türkiye, the Akkuyu project plans to build 4 Russian Generation III+ VVER-1200 pressurized water reactor units with a single-unit capacity of 1200 MW, totaling 4800 MW, and pioneered the first Build-Own-Operate (BOO) business model in the global nuclear energy sector for concession-based operation. Deputy Minister of EMERCOM of Russia Suprunovsky emphasized in his summary assessment that all participating forces coordinated closely, and all live exercise subjects met the expected assessment indicators, laying a solid management foundation for the plant to subsequently obtain its operating license and achieve long-term safe and controlled operation.