However, only a handful of rods were used during the test compared to the minimum 30 rods required for safe operations. Control rods are used to help keep the reactor controlled. Plant operators attempted to increase the power level to a stabilized condition. Side of the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant that received the least amount of damage from the Unit 4 reactor explosion, via International Atomic Energy Agency
As a result, it creates unstable conditions for the reactor and makes it vulnerable to sporadic power surges. When power levels are very low, it causes the positive void coefficient to become dominant. This process causes fuel temperatures also to increase.
The RBMK reactor has a positive void coefficient, which means that steam production increases when power is increased, or water flow is decreased. The power was reduced significantly below the level it should have been to stabilize the reactor’s condition prior to shutdown. However, the test was performed when the reactor was in an unstable condition. On April 25, 1986, a test was conducted during a routine maintenance shutdown to see if the reactor could produce electrical power for emergency equipment in the event that the station lost power. Plans for additional reactors were in place when the disaster occurred. RBMK reactor Units 1 and 2 were constructed in the 1970s, and Units 3 and 4 were completed by 1983.
The plant was stationed in present-day northern Ukraine, about 130 kilometers north of Kyiv and about 20 kilometers south of the Belarus border. RBMK is a Soviet-designed boiling light water reactor that uses uranium dioxide fuel. It consisted of four RBMK reactors, which could generate up to 1,000 megawatts of electric power per reactor. The Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant was constructed in the late 1970s and early ‘80s. What Caused the Chernobyl Disaster? Aerial view of the destruction of the Chernobyl Unit 4 reactor courtesy of IAEA, 1986, via Britannica
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