Linas Baužys on a 100-Year Project | Blind Spot #14

SUMMARY

The Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant, though shut down for 15 years, has become one of Europe’s most complex and forward-looking infrastructure projects. IAE director Linas Baužys explains that Ignalina is no longer just a decommissioning site — it is a 100-year technological, legal, engineering and safety project, creating expertise that countries around the world come to learn from. Lithuania is dismantling a reactor type no one has ever taken apart before, meaning all methods must be invented locally and much of the work will be done by robots.

Ignalina mirrors Lithuania’s previous LNG terminal experience: by solving its own challenges, the country builds know-how it can later export globally. As nuclear energy experiences a worldwide renaissance, Lithuania already has what many others don’t — regulatory capacity, infrastructure, and unique decommissioning expertise.

About 45% of the work is complete, but the hardest phase — removing reactor cores — is still ahead. Despite its name, the project is less about demolition and more about constructing entirely new long-term storage and safety systems that will operate for centuries.

If Europe is serious about nuclear energy, Ignalina can become a key hub in the continent’s nuclear transformation — a platform for future technologies, engineering solutions, and internationally usable practices.