Scientists Make Vodka with Grain from Chernobyl

Scientists Make Vodka with Grain from Chernobyl

Scientists from the UK and Ukraine have made vodka using water and grains from the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone, an area of more than 4,000 square kilometers around the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, where one of the world's worst nuclear disasters occurred in 1986.

The vodka is the result of a project that began in 2015 as a way of testing whether land in the exclusion zone can be used to grow food that is safe to eat. It was produced by the Chernobyl Spirit Company and named "Atomik Grain Spirit."

Only one bottle of Atomik has been made, and the product is not yet for sale, but the BBC says it's the first consumer product to come from the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone.

While a few people have continued to live in the exclusion zone, and about 60,000 tourists visited Chernobyl in 2018, experts say the area won't be safe to live in for at least another 3,000 to 20,000 years.

The grains that were used to make Atomik are still too radioactive to eat, but tests at four different labs have shown that the process of making the vodka has removed any extra radioactivity, so Atomik is as safe to drink as any other vodka.

"We hope people will be happy to drink Atomik," says Dr. James Smith, a professor at the University of Portsmouth and an expert on Chernobyl, who led the vodka project.

Smith and his team hope to make 500 bottles of Atomik later in 2019 and sell them to tourists. At least 75% of profits will be used to support wildlife and communities in and around the exclusion zone.

"The problem for most people who live there is they don't have the proper diet, good health services [or] jobs," says Smith. Since Atomik could help their economic recovery, he says, "I think this is the most important bottle of spirits in the world.