China reconnects nuclear reactor after shutdown due to damage

Part of Taishan nuclear power plant was taken offline last July after Chinese authorities reported minor fuel rod damage and a build-up of radioactive gases.

A nuclear reactor in southern China has been reconnected to the electricity grid more than a year after it was shut down to repair damage, its operator said.

Part of Taishan nuclear power plant in Guangdong province was taken offline last July after Chinese authorities reported minor fuel rod damage and a build-up of radioactive gases at the plant.

Operators reconnected the damaged reactor after months of “inspection and maintenance”, China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN) said in a stock exchange filing late on Tuesday.

“The monitoring results of Taishan Nuclear Power Plant and its surrounding environment are normal,” CGN said in the filing, without giving further details.

The plant is operated in a partnership with French energy giant EDF and uses the European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) design, which was developed to relaunch nuclear power in Europe after the Chernobyl catastrophe of 1986.

The design is touted as offering higher power and better safety, but EPR projects in Finland, France and Britain have been plagued by delays and cost overruns.

There are more than 60,000 fuel rods in the reactor and the proportion of damaged rods was “less than 0.01 percent”, China’s environment ministry and nuclear regulator said before the reactor’s closure.

They called the damage “inevitable” due to factors including fuel manufacturing and transportation.

EDF also previously blamed the build-up of radioactive gases at the Taishan plant on deteriorating coating on some uranium fuel rods.

EDF on Wednesday confirmed that the reactor resumed production on Monday.

“After an in-depth investigation, the Chinese safety authority gave its agreement for the restart of EPR reactor 1 at Taishan,” EDF’s spokeswoman said.

Official environmental monitoring data last year showed a slight increase in radiation near Taishan compared with other nuclear plants in China, but within the normal range of environmental radiation levels in Guangdong.


China nuclear reactor shut down for maintenance after damage


© 2022 AFP

Citation:
China reconnects nuclear reactor after shutdown due to damage (2022, August 17)
retrieved 17 August 2022
from https://techxplore.com/news/2022-08-china-reconnects-nuclear-reactor-shutdown.html

This document is subject to copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study or research, no
part may be reproduced without the written permission. The content is provided for information purposes only.

For all the latest Technology News Click Here 

 For the latest news and updates, follow us on Google News

Read original article here

Denial of responsibility! TechNewsBoy.com is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.