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NEWS RELEASE June 18, 2003 Reactor Emergencies Continue at Shearon HarrisWatchdog Group Declares Plant Among Most Troubled in U.S.
DURHAM, NC – The string of failures at the Shearon Harris nuclear power plant continued last Saturday when a pump malfunction in the main feedwater system led to an emergency shutdown of the reactor. The incident was followed the next day by a human error leading to failure in the same cooling system as the plant was preparing to be brought back on line.
The problems come on the heels of five emergencies in a three-week period ending last month, one of which led to a special investigation by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The plant also had four emergency shutdowns in 2002, along with other problems. The industry average is one emergency shutdown each 18 months. Watchdog organization NC WARN said today that Harris has become one of the most troubled plants in the U.S.
Plant owner Progress Energy did not respond to NC WARN’s question about a possible connection between the continuing problems in the main feedwater system, one of several cooling loops critical for safety of the reactor core. A company spokesman did tell the group, “All plant safety equipment responded well and there were no injuries or personal or nuclear safety issues … The Harris Team quickly analyzed and fixed the problem.” He said Harris resumed full power by Tuesday morning.
In a nuclear reactor, water is heated to produce steam and electricity, but water is also vital for keeping the superheated reactor core cool. Loss of system cooling could lead to melting of the uranium fuel rods, explosions, and large amounts of radioactivity released into the atmosphere.
David Lochbaum, Nuclear Safety Engineer for the Union of Concerned Scientists, said today, “Harris seems to be having plenty of problems in its feedwater system. Whether it’s the same problem happening lots of times – or a lot of problems each happening once – starts to lose importance. Other plants are able to avoid this history.” He added that the goal is to minimize cooling system failures because each time these occur, the potential exists for compounding errors caused by workers or equipment failures, which would heighten the risk of a radiation release.
Regarding the April 28th loss of cooling that led to the special NRC investigation, a new NRC report indicates that almost the exact same problem happened at Harris 10 years ago. As indicated by the inspection report, Harris did not learn from its mistake and repeated it unnecessarily. Both emergencies occurred during refueling outages, during which nuclear plants have a far smaller safety margin due to an industry trend to take cost-saving measures to shorten the time for refueling.
The report says that had cooling water not been restored, water inside the reactor would have heated up to boiling in 29 minutes. The NRC said workers could have closed the containment building in 25 minutes to prevent radioactive steam being released into the atmosphere. They then would have started a pump to replace the water being boiled off, thus maintaining the water level surrounding the reactor core.
Lochbaum was skeptical about the time estimate for closing containment, noting that other plants have required longer to do so during emergency conditions, and that vapors preceding boiling could hamper the work environment. He stated his belief, however, that Harris operators should have been able to restore cooling prior to core damage.
NC WARN Executive Director Jim Warren remarked, “I’m sure the Harris workers are doing all they can to keep the plant safe. But this host of emergencies is bound to be troubling to them, as it is to those of us following this progression.”
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