The dam of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station, a key structure for supplying Crimea
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday evening accused the Russians of having ” mine “ the dam of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power station. Located in the occupied region of Kherson (South), it allows, among other things, to supply water to the Crimean peninsula, annexed by Moscow in 2014. The dam and the power station were taken by Russian troops from the start of the invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
Built on the Dnieper River, and built in 1956, the structure is 16 meters high and 3,850 meters long. It is one of the largest infrastructures of this type in Ukraine. According to the website of the Ukrainian operating company Ukrhydroenergo, the power of the hydroelectric plant is 334.8 megawatts. Upstream of the work is the Kakhovka reservoir, an artificial water reservoir formed on the course of the Dnieper, 240 kilometers long and up to 23 kilometers wide.
Kakhovka is about 60 kilometers east as the crow flies of Kherson, the first major city to fall into Russian hands in March. The front is about forty kilometers to the north.
If the dam explodes, “more than eighty localities, including Kherson, will find themselves in the zone of rapid flooding”was alarmed Mr. Zelensky before the Council of the European Union (EU). “It could destroy the water supply of a large part of southern Ukraine” and affect the cooling of the reactors of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, which draws its water from this artificial lake of 18 million cubic meters, he added.
The Russian occupation authorities in Kherson deny, for their part, any mining of the dam, denouncing the ” lies “ of President Zelensky.