Bolt-bedeviled Salem reactor begins restart

July 15: Why are they only at 45 % power last night...problems? RCP testing or problems?

The company also said Monday that several bolt heads had previously been recovered during the prior two refueling outages. During this most recent outage, eight turning vane bolt heads were recovered from the reactor cooling system.

A safe company would have discovered these issues when cracks first emerged and certainly when bolt heads were recovered from the cooling system.

Remember, these events usually emerge from a broad change in strategies of the company. Usually it is buget cutting. These companies have millions of components and tens of thousands of systems…if you reduce care to millions of components, then a site could become very troublesome with a lot of breakdowns. If the degradation goes on long enough, the components are stressed in an emergency or transients, or when electricity is really needed in a summer heat wave.  This is when you see many components mis-operated in a stressful emergency and many components failing at the same time and could confuse the hell out of the control room staff.   

Also nationwide, because these cooling pumps troubles don’t have to be reported to the NRC and inspected by the NRC, we really don’t know the extent of these problems broadly.  This is probably the reason why this happpened in the first place...excess secrecy.  

If these negative strategies go on for a long period of time, it usually takes them many years of really intense recovery before they will even see any measurable result. And usually, there is a few slide back times in the recovery where they revert to the bad habits.  

And as another example with conditions in the industry…generally until it gets to a atrocious unprofessional condition…things going wrong with primarily coolant pumps and recirc pumps need not be inspected and reported on to the public by the NRC. Terrible events going on with these crucial safety components need not be reported by the licensee to the NRC. The public is totally left out of the loop. There was prior events with falling out bolts and nut that wasn’t reported to the NRC.

Bolt-bedeviled Salem reactor begins restart

Jeff Montgomery, The News Journal 10:30 a.m. EDT July 14, 2014

Aerial photo of the nuclear power plant in Salem, New Jersey. Nov. 18, 2009. (Photo: GARY EMEIGH/THE NEWS JOURNAL )    

PSEG’s troubled Salem Unit 2 nuclear plant began a restart over the weekend after a three-month idling triggered by the discovery of dozens of broken bolts in four pumps. 

A Nuclear Regulatory Commission status report on Monday morning showed the 33-year-old plant, along the Delaware River southeast of Augustine Beach, had reached 18 percent of its full power by Monday morning. 

Obviously this site has a lot more troubles than what can be seen.

New: A failed wiring termination on the Unit 1, A Phase Neutral Generator CT{EL/XCT} caused the Generator Differential Trip to occur. A root cause investigation was performed to address this and the previous generator CT connection failure event on April 13, 2014. The root cause was determined to be an improper termination of the CT lead wire to field wire connection. A contributing cause was that the extent of condition visual examination and testing to identify potential common mode failures was not adequately challenged by the station. Failure analysis determined that the CT connection insulating tape failed due to chronic thermal fatigue permitting moisture intrusion due to inadequate environmental controls.

Neil Sheehan, spokesman for the Nuclear Regulator Commission’s regional office in King of Prussia, Pa., said that nuclear plants usually begin to feed electricity to regional power systems when output hits 30 percent of capacity. 

PSEG Nuclear spokesman Joe Delmar said that the company would release a statement after the reactor had completed its synchronization with the regional PJM grid. 

During a refueling outage originally scheduled to end in mid-May, workers found that all of the dozens of bolts used to secure water moving impellers had broken or sheared off in all four of Salem’s 30-foot reactor coolant pumps. 

Some bolt-heads and pieces had not yet been found by late last month, and some were found in the bottom of the reactor core itself, or in cooling water piping. 

“We are satisfied with the repairs done on the reactor coolant pumps, as well as with the supporting evaluations,” Sheehan said Monday morning. “We will be documenting our reviews in an upcoming inspection report.” 

The NRC allowed the company to investigate and complete the work without putting a formal hold on operations. NRC spokeswoman Diane Screnci said the commission’s on-site, resident inspectors have been following the repairs and assessments throughout the shutdown.

 

The below is based on a special technical ideology of selfishness...not on the engineering and what is best for our nation. They are talking about a leak in the primary coolant system...it is prohibited...it is basically a Loss of Coolant Accident (LOCA). It is a continuation of the Palisades impeller problem with flinging off blades caused by not following the rules. Cavitations and and not enough NPSH. They are basing the safety in risk perspectives...a process outsiders can't understand...undecipherable and scrutinizable.  Basically a behavior that is acceptable as long as it is perceived as not leading to a severe core meltdown. Smaller core melts are acceptable....which would severely damage our nation.

The NRC definition of safe is starkly different than what a reasonable person would use. They are using language as a weapon of misunderstanding…

Regulators said that bolt failures in the coolant pumps were never classified as a direct safety issue, although the problem could have caused fast-spinning blades to dislodge and possible break open the coolant pump casing, spilling cooling water into the containment building. 

Salem Unit 2 is one of three reactors on PSEG’s Artificial Island complex in Lower Alloways Creek, N.J. Exelon owns 43 percent of the the two Salem reactors at the site. PSEG owns 57 percent of Salem and 100 percent of the newer Hope Creek nuclear plant.

Contact Jeff Montgomery at 463-3344 or jmontgomery@delawareonline.com