The connections of Russian cities hosting nuclear power stations

Abstract

Research on the horizontal inter-city mobility of nuclear specialists within Russia is scarce, owing to the inherited Soviet Union secrecy in the industry and a lack of available data. The paper uses unpublished geo-analytical data from mobile operators on population size and migration to shed light on regional and local migration statistics between ten Russian cities with nuclear power stations. The hypothesis assumes that cities with nuclear power stations obtain a higher share of SIM card holders from regions with nuclear power stations than regions without them. A chi-square test, a two-sample z-test for mean shares, box plot visualization, and social network analysis were performed to support the idea. The methodological contribution includes the way we define a hometown among a limited number of cities, regardless of their SIM contract-signed region. Our research empirically confirms the economic interconnectedness of the nuclear cities, which comprise an industrial settlement network of urban people from various regions separated by thousands of kilometers.