Press Release, 14.07.2026

Photo: The slag heap near the Chelyabinsk Electrometallurgical Plant in Chelyabinsk

Yabloko Chairman Nikolai Rybakov has sent an appeal to Russian President Vladimir Putin calling for immediate reclamation of the slag heap belonging to the Chelyabinsk Electrometallurgical Plant. Its hazardous radioactive waste has been stockpiled in the centre of the city since 1931, poisoning the air, water and soil for decades.

In his appeal, Rybakov noted that the stockpile of 20 million tonnes of hazardous waste occupies an area of almost 500,000 m² in the centre of Chelyabinsk and poses a serious threat to residents’ life and health. In addition to the extremely hazardous chemical elements contained in the slag heap, the dump is also a source of radioactive contamination.

Scientists have recorded radiation anomalies at the slag heap site, with background readings of up to 330 μR/h. In the 1990s, the plant did not conceal the site’s radioactive contamination: the results of scientific studies were made public which, together with radiation monitoring carried out by public organisations, showed radioactive anomalies at levels tens of times above the permissible norm. As early as 2013, the media had reported on “clicking” radioactive dust being carried across the city by the wind, with radionuclides entering the Miass River, near which the slag heap is situated, via rainwater and meltwater.

Federal authorities had also acknowledged the danger posed by the stockpiled waste: in 2016, Rosprirodnadzor (the Federal Service for Supervision of Natural Resource Usage) had ordered the plant to begin reclaiming the slag heap, and in 2018, courts at three levels had upheld the validity of the agency’s demand. In 2024, the plant was nationalised, and that same year, during a working visit to Chelyabinsk, Vladimir Putin stated that the Chelyabinsk Electrometallurgical Plant’s hazardous production facilities should be relocated outside the city, and that investors needed to be brought in for this work:

“This hazardous production facility here, in the centre of the city, needs to be shut down and moved outside the city, and we need to work with the Government of the Russian Federation on how the work will continue and jobs will be preserved. For the part of the work that will be necessary and will involve relocation and rebuilding operations on a new technological level, investors should be brought in with the support of the Russian Government, and it would be preferable to bring in local investors.”

However, despite Rosprirodnadzor’s demands, the rulings of courts at three levels, and Vladimir Putin’s public statement, the slag heap has still not been reclaimed to this day.

Rybakov has proposed that Vladimir Putin instruct the relevant bodies to begin reclaiming the slag heap immediately, and to carry out a comprehensive environmental survey of the entire site and make the results public.