Briefing on the environmental damage caused by the russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine (October 21 - November 3, 2023)

Nature has no borders, so if we don't stop the Russian ecocide in Ukraine now, the consequences may be inevitable. So the world can no longer stand by. And nature is a silent hostage of Russia's armed aggression.

Russian armed aggression has moved the world away from climate neutrality by more than 150 million tons of CO2 emissions.According to Ruslan Strilets, in monetary terms, this is a significant amount of 11.7 billion euros (taking into account the market value of one ton under the EU ETS). Therefore, it is most important to unite with the whole world today to make the climate aggressor pay.

Minister Ruslan Strilets discussed mechanisms for holding Russia accountable and Ukraine's preparations for the COP28 climate conference with 18 representatives of foreign diplomatic missions.Among the participants were ambassadors and representatives of the diplomatic missions of Italy, Germany, Sweden, Finland, Bulgaria, Brazil, Austria, France, Canada, Moldova, Japan, the United Kingdom, the EU, Romania, Spain, as well as the UN Resident Coordinator in Ukraine Denise Brown, the Ambassador of the European Union to Ukraine Katarina Mathernova, representatives of UNICEF and UNDP.

Nuclear and radiation safety threats

"On October 25, Khmelnytsky Nuclear Power Plant was the most likely target of enemy drones at night," Volodymyr Zelensky said.

"On the night of October 25, powerful explosions shook the area near the Khmelnytsky Nuclear Power Plant, resulting in a large number of broken windows on the plant site and temporary power outages at some off-site radiation monitoring stations, which once again emphasizes the danger to nuclear safety and security during the current military conflict," International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi said today.

"At Zaporizhzhya NPP, according to the terms of the licenses, all six power units without exception should be in a cold state. Instead, in violation of the licenses issued by the State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate of Ukraine, the occupiers put power units 4 and 5 into a hot state, i.e. heated them up to their nominal parameters. In addition, the occupiers intend to disassemble the reactor of power unit No.3, which was under scheduled maintenance as of early March 2022", said Oleh Korikov, SNRIU Acting Chairman, Chief State Inspector for Nuclear and Radiation Safety of Ukraine, on the air of the national telethon "United News" on 28 October 2023.

Recent attacks on infrastructure and industrial sites

On October 22, russia dropped a record number of bombs on the Kherson region in one day. The Ukrainian Armed Forces recorded that the russians dropped 36 bombs.

The occupier also struck the Nova Poshta terminal in the Kharkiv region. The investigation found that the russians had used an S-300 missile.

On October 24, at about 11:27 a.m., the enemy attacked the city of Zaporizhzhia with two missiles (previously ballistic missiles) from the south. One of the missiles hit the territory of the enterprise. The strikes damaged buildings on the territory of the enterprise.On October 25, the russian army attacked Khmelnytsky region at night. In the Shepetivka district, debris fell on the territory of a critical infrastructure facility. The blast wave damaged non-residential premises, houses and cars.November 1 in Kremenchuk, a "shahed" hit an oil refinery. A fire broke out and was extinguished by rescuers. There were no casualties, according to the head of the Poltava Regional Military Administration, Filip Pronin.

On November 3, the russians attacked the Kharkiv region. Around 00:45, the enemy struck Kharkiv with 4 "shaheds" beforehand. Two garages, 4 cars, an outbuilding, a service station building, an inoperable sewing shop and a residential building were damaged. An educational institution was partially destroyed.Also, during the attackon November 3, the enemy hit a critical infrastructure facility in the Lviv region. In total, 16 enemy attack drones were heading to western Ukraine. Five hits on critical infrastructure were recorded.

Pollution caused directly by hostilities

According to the State Emergency Service of Ukraine (SESU), from February 24, 2022, to November 3 , 2023, a total of 450,998 explosive objects have been neutralized on the territory of Ukraine. An area of 1079 square kilometers has been surveyed.

The operator of the boiler house of the Slavutske Forestry branch of the State Enterprise "Forests of Ukraine" suffered as a result of a night attack in Khmelnytskyi region. The blast wave damaged the forestry's wood processing complex.

As a result, workshop buildings, the boiler room of the lower warehouse, the former administrative building and canteen, 5 drying chambers, a repair shop, garages, etc. were destroyed. The total area of the damaged facilities is 8,800 square meters.

Olena Kravchenko, Executive Director of the International Charitable Organization "Ecology-Law-Human Rights", said at a briefing at the Media Center Ukraine-Ukrinform:"Since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, more than 30% of the territory has been mined, more than 180 thousand square kilometers of land, incredibly fertile land, because Ukraine owns one quarter of all the fertile land on our planet. And now this one-fourth of the most fertile land on the planet is being mercilessly destroyed, turning not even into a desert, because a desert is an ecosystem, but simply into scorched earth. This includes Kherson, Odesa, Mykolaiv, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv, and Donetsk regions," Olena Kravchenko said.

On October 18, a Shahed attack in Sumy damaged a sports complex and several nearby high-rise buildings. According to the State Ecological Inspectorate, almost 1,500 square meters were contaminated by the destruction waste.Environmental inspectors estimated the environmental damage at over UAH 35 million. All the materials were handed over to be included in the criminal case opened on the fact of violation of the laws and customs of war.

Damage to natural reserves and protected ecosystems

Scientists continued monitoring the bottom of the Kakhovka Reservoir, which began immediately after the dam was blown up.

Native vegetation is forming on the territory of the essentially drained reservoir. More than 65 plant species have been recorded in the habitats. The whole area is overgrown. But, of course, the density of overgrowth is different: on the mudflats it is high, and where there are shell forests, the overgrowth is slower.

Scientists are still studying how the vegetation in this area is and will be restored. But we can already state that there will be no desertification or a large-scale invasion of aggressive invasive plants.

The occupiers want to eliminate almost all mines in Donbas.Serhii Haidai, former head of the Luhansk Regional Military Administration, saidthat local gauleiters had approached the Kremlin with the idea of closing most mines in the region. Only about 10 units should be left.According to Mr. Haidai, if only about 10 mines are really left in the region, two bad things can happen."There are bad signals. The first consequence is that there will be an environmental disaster in the region. No one will pump out toxic water from abandoned mines. It will go into the groundwater. And a large number of miners will lose their jobs," said Haidai.

The first hectare of forest was planted in Kherson district after de-occupation.It is impossible to determine the number of forests destroyed in Kherson region due to the full-scale war and temporary occupation of the left bank. On the liberated right bank, the exact number of territories that need reforestation is hampered by mines, saidSerhii Vlasenko, Deputy Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine."For humans and the environment in general, these are consequences for the whole of nature: water, trees, and the consequences are great, but we are fighting them, we are eliminating all the consequences that are possible," saidthe deputy minister.According to him, the full-scale war has also affected the ecosystem of the Kherson region."Huge territories have changed, endemic species of animals have disappeared, the Lower Dnipro National Nature Park was completely flooded, a huge number of forests were flooded and destroyed," Vlasenko said.

Damage to freshwater resources

The United Nations has given its own assessment of the consequences of the Kakhovka dam explosion.

In a published "rapid environmental assessment" of the russian explosion of the Kakhovka hydroelectric dam, the United Nations Environment Program has pointed to the "unclear" scale of the disaster and the consequences that will be felt for decades.

"This is a far-reaching environmental disaster that goes beyond Ukraine, the extent of which may not be clear for years or even decades," said UN Secretary-General's spokesman Stephane Dujarric.

The report states that the explosion resulted in the release of chemical pollutants (e.g., machine oil and liquid fertilizers). A significant number of chemical storage facilities were located in the flooded area.

Experts from 13 institutions in Kyiv and abroad worked on the rapid environmental assessment. They used official data, satellite images and remote sensing.

Black and Azov Seas

Five months after the explosion of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant, toxic substances continue to be detected in the Black Sea, and seafood and fish caught near the Odesa coast are still unfit for consumption.

Viktor Komorin, director of the Ukrainian National Center for Marine Ecology, told this during a briefing at Ukraine Media Center Odesa on November 1.

According to his findings, after the hydroelectric power plant explosion, large quantities of toxic substances, including toxic metals and organochlorine compounds, entered the sea water. In some places, the concentration of these substances in the water exceeded the maximum permissible levels by hundreds of times.

"After that, we analyzed animals inhabiting the Black Sea: mussels, mullet fish, dolphin remains that were found off the Odesa coast, and saw that in some cases the concentration of these substances was hundreds and thousands of times higher than the permissible level," said Viktor Komorin.

He added that it is currently difficult to make predictions about when seafood from the Odesa coast will be safe to eat. However, environmentalists are now preparing to send microbial analyzes to European laboratories, where it is possible to do a broader analysis of toxic substances, and then make appropriate predictions. According to him, due to the tragedy at the Kakhovka HPP, about half of the mussels that were over three years old died off the Odesa coast.

Ukraine continues to insist on the creation of an international working group to study the impact of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant explosion on the Black Sea.The conviction that russia must be held accountable for its illegal actions was expressed by First Deputy Minister of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources Oleksandr Krasnolutskyi at the 43rd meeting of the Commission for the Protection of the Black Sea from Pollution."We have repeatedly asked for the formation of an international working group that could investigate the impact of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant explosion on the Black Sea and condemn the actions of the russian federation in this regard. The ecocide of the russian federation at the Kakhovka HPP is a clear violation of the principles of the Black Sea Commission, and it is extremely important to bring the aggressor country to justice," he emphasized.According to Oleksandr Krasnolutskyi, russia's terrorist actions have caused a large-scale environmental disaster in the Ukrainian South. In response, the representative of the aggressor country noted that Ukraine is politicizing the issue of blowing up the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant.

Unfortunately, this proposal of Ukraine was not supported at the meeting.

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https://ecozagroza.gov.ua/en/news/134