Nuclear reactor meltdown fallout radius3/18/2023 ![]() Neal Kelly, the director of media, issues and information management for OPG corporate affairs, said in a statement to National Observer: “Pickering Nuclear has an exemplary safety record and is considered among the world's top performing stations, as recently recognized by the World Association of Nuclear Operators. This is a way to keep the nuclear industry gainfully employed, and stretching the lifetime of these reactors as far as they can. Pickering reached that benchmark around 2015, but since then the OPG has “kept pushing the envelope, and the limiting factor is the pressure tubes’ fitness for service.”Īccording to Greening, “every time you turn around, they try and squeeze a little bit more juice out of the lemon. Greening says the benchmark for operating performance for CANDU reactors is roughly 30 years at 80 per cent capacity. During that period, he estimates he spent half the time researching pressure tubes. According to Edwards, that makes the sampling less than reassuring.įrank Greening is a research scientist who worked for OPG for 23 years. One might have signs of degradation while the one next to it might be fine. While the Pickering plant must inspect the tubes as a condition of its operating licence, Edwards notes it only tests a fraction of the tubes, fewer than 10 per cent. So therefore the integrity of the piping is a prime concern,” Edwards said. I’m not saying every loss of coolant will lead to a meltdown, but that’s the precipitating cause that could lead to a meltdown. If you don’t cool the fuel even after shutdown, you can have a meltdown. ![]() “Cooling the fuel is essential in nuclear power. Over time, the stress to the tubes can cause them to become brittle and develop blisters that potentially become the site for an elongated crack or a serious rupture. Over their lifespan, the tubes are subjected to great heat, pressure and radiation from the fissioning uranium atoms. He explains that every other CANDU reactor that reaches a certain age is scheduled for refurbishment or re-tubing, which is a replacement of the pressure tubes and feeder pipes that go into the reactor’s core and cool the fuel. Gordon Edwards, president of the non-profit Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, says OPG is “running these plants like no other CANDU reactor in the world.”
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