CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · Places & Architecture

Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant

unfinished nuclear power station in Poland

Architectural plans, a scale model, maps and brass measuring instruments
Places and architectureInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionFeb 5, 2026
Entity authorityQ1739505 ↗
Source-derived summary

The Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant (Polish: Elektrownia Jądrowa Żarnowiec) was to be the first nuclear power plant in Poland.

The construction was cancelled due to changes in the economic and political situation in Poland, in the Soviet Union and in the Eastern Bloc and due to the Chernobyl disaster in 1986 and the following years. It was to be located in the former village of Kartoszyno and had its seat in Nadole.

Planned design

The location of the plant was chosen after several years of hydrological, seismological and demographic research commissioned for the purpose of determining the most suitable location. A site was located in the north of the country near the Baltic Sea, about 50 km northwest of Gdańsk, just to the south of its namesake village Żarnowiec, adjacent to Lake Żarnowiec which was to be used for cooling. The research also identified the site for a second plant in Klempicz in west-central Poland.

The plant was planned to occupy 70 ha of land area, while the entire complex with dedicated construction facilities and supporting buildings would take 425 ha. The design incorporated four VVER-440 pressurized water reactors of Soviet design produced in Škoda factories in Czechoslovakia, rated at 440 MWe each, for a combined power rating of 1600 MWe. The turbines and power generators were to be produced in Poland. An adjacent pumped-storage plant was to act as a load balancer and energy reservoir to ensure continued power delivery during reactor maintenance.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant” as unfinished nuclear power station in Poland. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Żarnowiec, Nuclear and Power.

Editorial reviewMost useful as a place-based finding aid connecting the present description to earlier jurisdictions, maps and built evidence. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1986, 1600—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Żarnowiec, Nuclear and Power providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant”, the useful work is to connect “unfinished nuclear power station in Poland” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Place names and jurisdictional language are key evidence: both can reveal earlier catalogue descriptions and overlooked record series. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 5, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1739505. Authority coordinates are 54.743, 18.090. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1986 and 1600.

Critical limits

Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.

Best used for
  • Historic place names
  • Jurisdictional context
  • Routes into maps and plans
Verify next

Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant primary sources, Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant archive and Żarnowiec research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant”?
  2. What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
  3. Which earlier names or jurisdictions may reveal additional records?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Żarnowiec Nuclear Power Plant” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.