The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has completed the first of five planned on-site inspections to evaluate Entergy’s progress in carrying out its operations improvement plan at the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts.
Four NRC officials were on-site from Dec. 4 to Dec. 8, according to a letter from the agency to Entergy, dated Feb. 1 and posted Friday on the NRC website. The remaining four visits will be spread throughout 2018, according to Entergy spokesman Patrick O’Brien.
The nuclear industry regulator in early 2017 wrapped up a special inspection of Pilgrim, two years after giving the Cape Cod power plant the lowest safety rating allowed for a live nuclear reactor following a number of operational failures and unplanned shutdowns. Entergy developed a 156-item comprehensive recovery plan, which was cemented in an August 2017 confirmatory action letter from the NRC.
In the December inspection, the regulator reviewed 20 of the items cited in the recovery plan. The team found that Pilgrim had completed 17 corrective actions and closed those items. Three remain open, and will likely be revisited at the NRC’s next visit, O’Brien said by telephone.
Inspectors will examine all 156 corrective items over the five inspections, the spokesman added. The next is scheduled for March 19-23, followed by site visits in June, August, and December. The final inspection report would be expected in January 2019.
“We will look to close as many as we can each inspection,” O’Brien said.
Entergy plans to close the Pilgrim plant permanently on May 31, 2019. The company has pledged before then to address the operational problems identified in the confirmatory action letter.
