TEPCO makes progress toward restarting idled reactors in Niigata
NIIGATA, Japan (Kyodo) — Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Thursday it will apply the following day for a state safety assessment of its two idled reactors in Niigata Prefecture, as it received local approval to move ahead with the procedure essential to reboot the reactors.
“Today we received an approval from Niigata Prefecture to apply for screening...We will file an application tomorrow to the Nuclear Regulation Authority,” TEPCO President Naomi Hirose said in a press release regarding the Nos. 6 and 7 units at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant.
TEPCO and Niigata Gov. Hirohiko Izumida have been at loggerheads over the restart of the reactors since the utility announced in July its plan to apply for the state safety checks.
But the governor gave the green light to TEPCO applying for the safety assessment after Hirose visited him Wednesday and promised to install at the reactors additional safety equipment to deal with severe nuclear accidents.
The equipment is a backup venting system with filters that can reduce the amount of radioactive substances emitted when pressure needs to be released from reactor containers during emergencies.
Under the new safety requirements introduced in July, boiling water reactors like the Nos. 6 and 7 reactors at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant are required to be equipped with such filtered vents.
A backup system, however, is not a requirement that needs to be immediately satisfied, according to an official of the NRA secretariat.
Izumida said he decided to endorse TEPCO’s plan because not allowing a third party to check the safety of the reactors may not be desired by the local people.
But he set some conditions, such as making sure that the use of vents is consistent with the evacuation plan for local people were there an emergency.
TEPCO, which is struggling to turn its business around after the 2011 accident at its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex, wants to reactivate its idled reactors to cut its soaring fuel costs for increased thermal power generation to compensate.
Speaking to reporters later in the day at TEPCO’s head office in Tokyo, Hirose hailed the latest development as “a step forward,” but noted that he cannot foresee when the reactors will actually restart.
“We are not in the position to tell (how long the assessment will take),” Hirose said.
The need to restart the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant was stipulated in a 10-year special business plan for TEPCO, which is under effective state control after its receipt of 1 trillion yen in public funds last year.
TEPCO owns the Fukushima Daiichi and Daini plants as well as the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa complex — the world’s largest nuclear power plant with an output capacity of 8.2 million kilowatts.
Currently, none of the 50 commercial reactors in Japan are online. A dozen reactors owned by utilities other than TEPCO are now subject to the NRA’s safety assessments.
After the NRA confirms that a reactor satisfies the new regulations, its operator will seek the consent of the local people to restart it.
Kyodo News, September 26, 2013
http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20130926p2g00m0dm103000c.html
TEPCO files for safety assessments of 2 idled reactors in Niigata
TOKYO (Kyodo) — Tokyo Electric Power Co. on Friday filed for state safety assessments of two nuclear reactors in Niigata Prefecture, joining moves by four other utilities in Japan toward reactivating idled atomic power plants to improve their tough business conditions.
TEPCO spent over two months seeking local approval to apply for the safety checks of the Nos. 6 and 7 units at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, reflecting the sensitivity of reactor restarts by the utility that is struggling in the cleanup efforts at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi complex.
Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Toshimitsu Motegi told TEPCO President Naomi Hirose that local consent is an important factor in the process, while warning that the handling of the Fukushima crisis should not take a backseat.
The move brings the number of reactors for which power companies have applied for safety assessments to 14. All of the country’s 50 commercial reactors are currently offline and have to be checked by the Nuclear Regulation Authority to determine whether they satisfy a set of new safety requirements before they can be restarted.
TEPCO and many other utilities are desperate to reactivate their idled reactors so they can reduce spending on costly fossil fuel imports for boosting non-nuclear thermal power generation.
Furthermore, TEPCO needs massive funds to pay compensation related to the Fukushima Daiichi disaster, triggered by a huge earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011, and to scrap reactors at the plant that suffered meltdowns.
While it is not clear how long the safety evaluation process will take, it is important for TEPCO to show that it is at least making progress toward improving its business conditions to continue receiving loans from banks.
Under a 10-year restructuring plan authorized by the government last year, the utility is projected to move into the black in fiscal 2013 through streamlining efforts, raising electricity rates and by bringing back online reactors at its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant.
Although TEPCO has fallen behind schedule to restart the plant, originally set for April this year, Hirose told reporters that he has no intention of withdrawing the goal to become profitable in the current fiscal year through March.
“I know that we are facing an extremely tough situation...but there is no change at all (to the goal),” he said.
TEPCO has said it will face additional fuel costs of 8 billion to 11 billion yen for every month of delay in resuming a 1.1 million kilowatt-output reactor.
The president also said the company is making preparations so that other reactors can undergo NRA safety assessments.
The Nos. 6 and 7 reactors are advanced boiling water reactors and the newest among the seven units at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant, the world’s largest nuclear power plant with a combined output capacity of 8.2 million kilowatts.
Under the new regulations, reactors are required to be equipped with filtered venting systems to reduce radioactive substances if gas and steam need to be released from containment vessels in an emergency.
Another senior TEPCO official said that the venting system will be set up by the end of the current fiscal year. The company also plans to install secondary vent systems about two years later.
TEPCO said in early July that it will swiftly apply for the safety assessments, but opposition from Niigata Gov. Hirohiko Izumida made it difficult for the company to do so.
Izumida gave the green light to TEPCO on Thursday after the utility promised to install secondary vents to enhance safety, but he set conditions such as not allowing TEPCO to use vent equipment without securing local approval.
Of the 14 reactors the NRA is checking or plans to check, the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa plant units are the only boiling water reactors, the same type as the reactors that suffered meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in northeastern Japan.
More applications toward restarting BWRs are expected to follow, including Chugoku Electric Power Co.’s No. 2 reactor at the Shimane plant in western Japan. Sources close to the matter said Friday that the application will be submitted in October at the earliest.
Kyodo News, September 27, 2013
http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20130927p2g00m0dm042000c.html
Regulators say 2 reactors at Tomari nuclear plant ’ill-prepared’ for restart
The Nuclear Regulation Authority said on July 23 that two reactors at Hokkaido Electric Power Co.’s Tomari Nuclear Power Plant were “clearly ill-prepared” to be brought back online for the first time since the outbreak of the crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant.
The NRA held its second meeting on July 23 to check whether the applications filed by electric companies for the restart of their nuclear reactors would meet the new safety regulations introduced earlier this month. At the meeting, the NRA said that the No. 1 and No. 2 reactors at Hokkaido Electric’s Tomari Nuclear Power Plant in Hokkaido were “clearly ill-prepared” and decided to put its screening process for the two reactors on the back burner.
Hokkaido Electric had originally asked the NRA to place priority on processing its application for the restart of the No. 3 reactor at its power complex, instead of the No. 1 and No. 2 reactors. The NRA, meanwhile, effectively started to process the applications belatedly filed by Kyushu Electric Power Co. for the restart of the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at its Genkai Nuclear Power Station in Saga Prefecture.
The NRA saw a problem in the fact that Hokkaido Electric used data on structurally different reactors in analyzing what would happen to the reactors in the event of severe accidents. The NRA then said that it would keep the safety review process for the two reactors on hold until the company submits proper materials. NRA Commissioner Toyoshi Fuketa said, “We are not in a situation where we can go ahead and process the applications.” On the No. 3 reactor at the Tomari plant, he said, “It is partially ill-prepared.” But the NRA decided to continue to process the application for the restart of the No. 3 reactor.
A senior official of Hokkaido Electric Power Co. told reporters after the meeting, “It’s a shame that we were told that the applications for the No. 1 and 2 reactors were ill-prepared. But we are not considering withdrawing the applications. We want to deal with it by amending the applications.”
Kyushu Electric explained for the first time to the NRA the content of its applications for the restart of the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at the Genkai nuclear complex. At the next round of meetings on July 25, the NRA is set to sort out key points in the applications.
The NRA is poised to forgo the immediate safety review of the equipment at the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at the Takahama Nuclear Power Plant in Fukui Prefecture as part of its comprehensive review of the applications filed by Kansai Electric Power Co. for the restart of the two reactors. That’s because the NRA plans to examine other key issues with the reactors first by checking whether the facilities can meet anti-tsunami regulations and by carrying out a three-dimensional structural survey to accurately ascertain the possible shock of earthquakes, among other key elements of safety.
The NRA has decided not to go ahead with the review process for the applications for the restart of the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at Kansai Electric’s Oi Nuclear Power Plant — the only reactors currently online in Japan — until a final conclusion is drawn on whether an active fault actually lies beneath the power complex.
The two reactors are due to be suspended in September for mandatory routine checkups. Such being the case, the NRA will go ahead with its initial safety review of the applications for the restart of six reactors at four nuclear power stations — the No. 3 reactor at the Tomari plant, the No. 3 reactor at Shikoku Electric Power Co.’s Ikata plant in Ehime Prefecture, the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at Kyushu Electric’s Genkai nuclear power complex, and the No. 1 and No. 2 reactors at Kyushu Electric’s Sendai Nuclear Power Station in Kagoshima Prefecture.
Mainichi Shimbun, July 24, 2013
http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20130724p2a00m0na011000c.html
Nuclear regulator hints at possible active fault off Aomori peninsula
Kunihiko Shimazaki, acting chairman of the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA), has hinted that a seabed fault off the Shimokita Peninsula in Aomori Prefecture, which is dotted with nuclear fuel cycle facilities, may be active.
In an interview with the Mainichi Shimbun on July 25, Shimazaki, an NRA commissioner who heads the authority’s geological fault investigation team, said there is a possibility that the 84-kilometer fault on the edge of the continental shelf is active.
The NRA will make a final judgment on the fault’s status after checking the results of an ongoing joint probe by Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd. (JNFL), operator of the Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant, and other operators.
If the fault is determined to be active, the operations of nuclear fuel cycle facilities on the peninsula are expected to be affected. The fault lying east of the peninsula runs from north to south and could trigger a magnitude-8 level earthquake if it moves.
JNFL and other operators have ruled out the active-fault theory in past safety screenings. But multiple experts have pointed out that the fault may be active, leading JNFL and other operators including Tohoku Electric Power Co., operator of the Higashidori Nuclear Power Plant in Aomori, to jointly reinvestigate faults since last November.
“There is a special structure unseen in other faults,” Shimazaki said in the interview, adding the JNFL’s past data cannot rule out the possibility that the fault is active. He said officials would reach a decision after examining the results of the joint research by the operators, to be compiled as early as September.
“We need more accurate data to draw a conclusion,” he said.
If the fault is deemed active, the operating schedule of the reprocessing plant and the Higashidori power station may be delayed.
Commenting on applications by four electric power companies to restart 12 reactors at six nuclear power plants, Shimazaki, a leading seismologist, said the utilities should be sincere in their efforts to protect nuclear safety.
“We want them to be dead serious about making preparations for a tsunami,” he said. He pointed out that nuclear power plant operators varied in their levels of preparedness for future natural disasters.
Mainichi Shimbun, July 26, 2013
http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20130726p2a00m0na016000c.html