Update from I-Nuclear:NRC issues first orders for post-Fukushima safety fixes addressing highest priorities

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NRC issues first orders for post-Fukushima safety fixes addressing highest priorities by I-Nuclear

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission on March 9 ordered all 104 operating nuclear power plants, plus those under construction, to implement safety improvements resulting from lessons learned from the Fukushima nuclear accident last year.

US  nuclear plant owners have until December 31, 2016 to better protect safety equipment installed after the 9/11 terrorist attacks and to obtain sufficient equipment to support all reactors at a given site simultaneously.

The commission also ordered all plants to install enhanced equipment for monitoring water levels in each plant’s spent fuel pool.

In addition, U.S. boiling-water reactors that have “Mark I” or “Mark II” containment structures, which are similar to the Fukushima plant designs, must improve venting systems (or for the Mark II plants, install new systems) that help prevent or mitigate reactor core damage in the event of a serious accident.

The NRC will also issue a detailed information request to every operating U.S. commercial nuclear power plant, and certain parts will apply to reactors currently under construction or recently licensed. The request covers several topics, including:

•            Re-analyzing earthquake and flooding risks using the latest available information;

•            Conducting earthquake and flooding hazard “walkdowns,” where skilled engineers closely examine a plant’s ability to meet current requirements;

•            Assessing the ability of a plant’s current communications systems and equipment to perform under conditions of onsite and offsite damage and prolonged loss of all alternating current (ac) electrical power; and

•            Assessing plant staffing levels needed to fill emergency positions in response to events simultaneously affecting all reactors at a given site.

Each section of the request includes schedules for plants to provide the relevant information to the NRC.

The orders and the information request will be available on the NRC’s website. These actions address what the NRC determined to be the highest-priority recommendations from the agency’s Japan Near-Term Task Force. The Task Force issued its report in July 2011. The NRC staff continues to examine how to best address the remaining Task Force recommendations, as well as additional topics raised during the early implementation effort.