Southern California Edison (SCE) on Monday resumed transferring used reactor fuel at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) into dry storage.
The restart follows a nearly yearlong recovery from a high-profile mishap in moving one spent-fuel canister. On Aug. 3, 2018, the container of fuel assemblies became lodged on the shield ring of its underground storage slot at the retired San Diego County nuclear power plant. It took workers nearly an hour to identify and fix the problem, during which the canister was at risk of an uncontrolled 18-foot drop.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission investigated the event, and in March fined SCE $116,000 for two violations of federal nuclear safety rules: failure to have backup equipment in place to prevent the canister drop and failure to notify with the agency within 24 hours. The regulator in May OK’d Southern California Edison to resume the fuel offload.
In a press release, SCE said it and fuel-transfer contractor Holtec International have improved procedures, oversight, and training for the operation. Cameras and load-monitoring gauges have also been deployed.
“We’ve done a lot of work to ensure that going forward we will be successful in safely loading and storing each and every spent fuel canister,” Doug Bauder, SCE vice president and chief nuclear officer, said in the release. “We’re confident the improvements we’ve made are effective and sustainable. Our job now is to demonstrate that to our stakeholders.”
In total, Holtec is to move 73 canisters filled with fuel assemblies from SONGS reactor Units 2 and 3, which were permanently retired in 2013 after being equipped with faulty steam generators. Twenty-nine canisters had been moved at the time of the 2018 event. It should take 36 to 48 hours to put the 30th canister into place, an SCE spokesman said Monday. The entire project is expected to be completed by next April.
