NRC: Nuke plant reactor still down, another problem being addressed

Jun 5 - Rachel Morgan Beaver County Times, Pa.

 

One week after a rare forced outage at the Beaver Valley Nuclear Power Station, Unit 2 is still offline -- and the company is using the time to address another, unrelated, issue, officials said Tuesday.

"The company is continuing to work on the generator vibration issue," said Neil Sheehan of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. "It is also addressing leakage from a seal on a reactor coolant pump. The seal was installed during the last refueling and maintenance outage for the unit about 18 months ago. FirstEnergy is conferring with Westinghouse on the seal leakage."

The leak was found on the large industrial pump used to inject water into the reactor as part of the reactor coolant system, he said. The pump is located inside the plant's containment building, and any leaks from the pump are captured via sumps inside the building.

FirstEnergy declined to comment on whether they knew about the leak beforehand or if they became aware of it during the forced outage.

"Also, there are other systems that can be used to cool down the reactor during a shutdown," Sheehan said. "Of course, the reactor is also out of service at the moment. As such, there is no risk posed to plant workers or the public by this issue."

He also said the leak on the reactor coolant pump and the generator vibrations were unrelated issues and located in separate buildings.

The newest reactor at the Shippingport plant was shut down May 28 because of a malfunctioning generator. NRC officials said last week the vibrations resulted from parts in the main generator stator, a stationary part of the rotary system used in an electric generator, that had either broken or become loose.

FirstEnergy officials confirmed Tuesday that the reactor was still offline, but declined to say when it might come back online due to competitive reasons.

They said last week that while both the main generator and the reactor are located inside the plant's protected area, the main generator is part of the non-radioactive electrical generation equipment in the plant, and that the unplanned outage posted no risk to public safety.

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