Transformer replacement keeps Pilgrim offline
By Christine Legere
Shutdown continues with nuclear plant’s annual performance assessment days away.
PLYMOUTH — As the historically contentious annual assessment meeting to discuss Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station’s performance nears, the 45-year-old reactor remains in cold shutdown, marking 17 days since it has churned out power for the grid.
And it will remain offline for as long as it takes to replace a crucial start-up transformer.
No one is providing a time frame for the work, although a spokesman for Entergy Corp., the plant’s owner-operator, said a replacement was on-site.
Operators shut down the reactor March 6 because of a suspected leak in a system needed to heat water before it is pumped into the reactor vessel.
While workers addressed this problem, the reactor lost off-site power a week later, at the height of the March 13 blizzard.
The two 345-kilovolt lines and the 23-kilovolt line that connect the plant to the electric grid became unavailable.
Power to safety systems was then provided via emergency diesel generators.
Eversource restored off-site power March 15, and Pilgrim came off the backup generators. Workers performed extensive equipment tests and analysis in anticipation of firing up the reactor.
“During that testing, we identified an issue on the non-nuclear side of the plant,” Entergy spokesman Patrick O’Brien said via email. “It was determined that we would need to replace our start-up transformer before we could return the station to service.”
O’Brien said the transformer allows power from the 345-kilovolt transmission lines to enter the station.
“This replacement is underway,” he wrote. “The time for when the plant returns to service is currently undetermined.”
Getting information about the reactor’s long shutdown has been difficult. Neil Sheehan, spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, wrote in an email that plant personnel were still working through the reactor’s “pre-startup checks and preparations,” including work on the start-up transformer.
“Our resident inspectors assigned to Pilgrim continue to track those activities,” Sheehan wrote. “We can’t address specific restart dates, as that is market-sensitive. However, we can say the plant is currently in cold shutdown, which means the reactor coolant system has been cooled down and depressurized.”
That status puts the reactor farther away from connecting to the grid than if it were in a so-called hot shutdown.
“Entergy might prefer to have Pilgrim up and running before the assessment meeting, but I suspect they’d prefer even more not to have Pilgrim experience a failed restart attempt (or two, or three) before that meeting,” David Lochbaum, director of the Nuclear Safety Program for the Union of Concerned Scientists, wrote in an email. “In fact, they might portray the extended outage as proof that they are more focused on safety than on just making electricity.”
There has been no shortage of available electricity even with the extended shutdown of the Plymouth reactor, according to Marcia Blomberg, spokeswoman for ISO-New England, who wrote “the region has had sufficient capacity to meet demand.”
Mary Lampert, president of Pilgrim Watch, called the extended shutdown “divine intervention.”
“Neither the Nuclear Regulatory Commission nor Entergy have a safety culture,” Lampert said. “They will not shut down even knowing in a storm that a timely evacuation is impossible.”
Critics have argued for the plant to be closed completely because of safety concerns, but especially in the face of bad weather, including the March 2 nor’easter, which downed trees and power lines, blocking roads within the 10-mile emergency planning zone around the plant.
Pilgrim was shut down during the Jan. 4 storm, but only after one of the 345-kilovolt lines became unavailable.
“It was a relief to know that (Pilgrim) was offline during the last massive nor’easter knowing that Entergy ignored the warning that the state could not guarantee safe evacuation if there were an accident in the prior storm,” Janet Azarovitz, a Falmouth resident and member of Pilgrim Legislative Action Coalition, wrote in an email.
“Wear and tear has taken its toll on this old, outdated accident waiting to happen. I would guess they’re pasting it together before the NRC annual meeting on March 27,” she wrote.
The 45-year-old plant has a history of emergency shutdowns related to loss of off-site power when major storms blow through. The emergency shutdown of the reactor in a January 2015 nor’easter was a major contributor to Pilgrim’s descent to the lowest category on the NRC’s performance matrix — one step from a forced shutdown.
A large contingent from the Cape is expected to attend the annual meeting Tuesday.
Azarovitz called the Cape an area of collateral damage, were an accident to occur at Pilgrim.
“What happens in Plymouth affects us all,” she wrote.
Annual meeting
What: annual assessment of Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station
When: 6 to 8:45 p.m. Tuesday; doors open at 5 p.m.
Where: Hotel 1620 ballroom, 180 Water St., Plymouth
To be heard: Speakers must sign up, but order will be chosen by lottery.
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