nuclear-news

Operators took the southwest Mississippi plant offline last week, citing problems with a turbine bypass valve. Last Wednesday’s outage came to light Tuesday when the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced a special inspection.

“The reactor was safely shut down but some equipment issues occurred that the agency wants to better understand,” the agency said in a statement.

It’s at least the sixth unplanned decrease in output at the plant in the last 15 months, according to NRC documents. The plant has been running at reduced or zero power output for much of the time since 2016, according to an analysis published earlier this month by E&E News …….

The plant’s troubles come as President Donald Trump continues to support plans to subsidize nuclear power generation for reliability purposes. …….

Beyond questions of safety, the absence of Grand Gulf’s 1,443-megawatt capacity can stress power supplies and may cause higher prices across Mississippi, Arkansas, Louisiana and southeastern Texas, a region that includes not only New Orleans-based Entergy’s utilities, but cooperatives and private utility Cleco of Pineville, Louisiana…….

Entergy spent hundreds of millions to increase the plant’s generating capacity in 2012, setting it up to be a cornerstone of low-cost generation in the region for decades, especially after winning a 20-year extension of the plant’s license from the NRC through 2044. But when it’s down, utilities have to buy power from other plants in the MISO region……..https://www.clarionledger.com/story/news/2018/12/19/grand-gulf-nuclear-power-plant-outage-safety-reliability-ms-entergy/2361876002/