The Wolf Creek Generating Station remains off-line after being shut down Friday because of a loss of off-site power and workers are investigating the cause of the power loss.
“The plant is still down and we are in the process of evaluating and understanding what happened,” said Jenny Hageman, communication specialist for the plant. “We know that we had a breaker fail, but we need to understand why that caused the loss of off-site power.”
As a result of the power loss and shutdown, officials at the nuclear power plant declared a Notification of Unusual Event, the least serious of four emergency classifications defined by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, according to a press release.
While the occurrence is rare, the plant’s safety-related equipment reacted in the way it was designed, with both diesel generators automatically powering up.
“The plant responded as designed and the emergency generators started and supplied power to the safety systems that are necessary to keep the core cool,” Hageman said. “We are in the process of restoring power to non-safety-related systems and we are still investigating and understanding what happened, so the plant is still down.”
Hageman would not speculate on when the plant will be up and running again.
“We are working diligently and around the clock to do what we need to do to get the plant back online,” she said.
Wolf Creek’s owners, Kansas City Power & Light Company, Westar Energy and Kansas Electric Power Cooperative, Inc. will use other generating facilities they own or will purchase power from other utilities while Wolf Creek is shut down, the release stated.
goodoleboy (anonymous) says...
The frequency of these happenings against a historical track record leads one to wonder what is going on.
January 16, 2012 at 8:12 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
owenrhys (anonymous) says...
A breaker tripped on the lines coming 'IN' to the plant ... If this was a coal plant, would it even be in the paper? No.
January 17, 2012 at 11:08 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )
goodoleboy (anonymous) says...
Coal plants don't have the potential "fallout" if lose power. Wolf Creek used to be a shining example of how to function in the Nuclear industry, but in recent years they have stumbled badly. Only the ignorant would not question why.
January 17, 2012 at 3:02 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )