nuclear-news

France’s Nuclear Safety Authority, or ASN, requested a probe of Le Creusot in early May after a flaw was discovered in the vessel of a reactor under construction in Flamanville in France.

Areva checked the records of Le Creusot and found anomalies associated with about 400 parts manufactured there since the plant opened in 1965. Areva purchased the forge in 2006.

One U.S. plant with parts from Le Creusot is Dominion Resource Inc’s Millstone station in Connecticut, which has had a pressurizer from the French forge in service in Unit 2 since 2006.

Dominion spokesman Ken Holt said that when Areva manufactured the pressurizer for Millstone they performed some additional heat treatment, but did not tell Dominion……

Another plant that may be affected is FirstEnergy Corp’s Beaver Valley station in Pennsylvania. Beaver Valley has steam generators and reactor vessel heads manufactured by Spain’s Equipos Nucleares SA, or ENSA, which FirstEnergy said may contain some subcomponents from Le Creusot.

“The audit is still underway but at this point in time there have not been any identified issues with quality or safety of any components at our plants,” FirstEnergy spokeswoman Jennifer Young said.

(Reporting by Scott DiSavino; Editing by Tom Brown) http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-france-nuclear-idUSKBN1432XY