BUCHANAN – A reactor vessel head at the Indian Point 2 power plant, which is shut down for refueling, was found to be leaking last week and if left alone, the chemical seeping out could result in “serious corrosion” in the vessel head, according to Riverkeeper organization Legal Program Director Richard Webster.
Indian Point spokesman Jerry Nappi said there is “no challenge to safety while the plant was in operation, nor would one have been expected from this issue.”
Nappi said the issue “is not unusual in the industry and our repair
plan has been successfully performed at other plants. Entergy will expend
all appropriate time and resources needed to complete the work according
to expectations.” He said during the current outage, engineers inspected
all 97 tubes that penetrate the head of the reactor with one requiring
repair before the plant is started up again.
“Pleading poverty, Entergy has asked the federal safety regulator (the NRC) [to] approve its proposed fix and allow restart by April 10-14,” said Webster. “The NRC has said that it needs Entergy to document the proposed fix and will review Entergy’s proposal before it will allow the reactor to restart.”
Webster said there are unanswered questions about the issue and the proposed fix:
Is the proposed fix for the identified cracking adequate?
Have the other 96 similar sleeves been inspected to determine if they could develop similar cracking?
Will periodic inspections for similar issues be required during operation?
Was the boron on the head a result of leakage caused by the cracking?
Nappi said all inspections “are rigorously performed and thorough, using industry best practices to ensure even the slightest variation in equipment is identified, analyzed, and if necessary, repaired.” He said inspections of the reactor head during the refuel have been completed with no other issues identified.
