Inside NIRMA Fall 2020

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What Refueling a Nuclear Reactor During COVID-19 Taught the Industry As the coronavirus pandemic continues, we’ve all had to adapt. Increasingly, the health crisis highlights how essential electricity is to our daily lives—from remote work to family Zoom calls. America’s 94 nuclear plants have also adjusted to these new circumstances and have continued to provide reliable, carbon-free energy to keep the electricity flowing. This was especially evident during the spring when COVID -19 brought new challenges to the seasonal effort to refuel 30 nuclear reactors across the country. This fall, the nuclear industry will take valuable lessons learned from that success as it prepares to refuel another two dozen reactors. What the Industry Learned Safety is the highest priority of every U.S. nuclear plant and there were no exceptions last spring as the nuclear energy industry worked to minimize the spread of coronavirus during refueling outages. Nuclear plants employ hundreds of workers and during a refueling outage, they bring in hundreds more people for maintenance and inspections. A nuclear plant is mostly a hands-on workplace, but innovative nuclear service companies were able to use new tools so some activities could be done remotely. For workers who still need to go on-site, the industry has changed its approach to scheduling duty shifts for certain plant personnel, keeping some of them together consistently in teams to reduce the opportunities for virus transmission. Many nuclear plants also worked with regulators to find changes in procedure to reduce the opportunities for infection, like postponing some annual medical exams or security guard weapons range activities as well as other lower priority maintenance activities. In addition to those broad efforts, plants were able to take on smaller— though no less effective—changes. These included decontaminating the buttons and switches in control rooms, extensive sanitizing of other workplaces, being ahead of the curve in marking the floors at six-foot intervals for social distancing, and requiring social distancing, mask-wearing and handwashing on-site, as well as encouraging the same practices outside of the workplace. Some plants even supplied employees with meals and groceries for their homes to help minimize the time that they needed to be in public areas. What the Industry Is Still Doing As we’ve seen, the days of COVID- 19 have required extra equipment, extra precautions and an added sense of responsibility beyond just yourself. This is true when wearing a mask in public or assuring a reliable electricity supply. Nuclear operators have always been adept at working together across the industry; during the pandemic, this was even more valuable. Plants knew how to screen people at the plant gate for warning signs, like a fever or cough, or report if someone was sick at home. But they improved on that and learned to share this information across the industry. The industry has also continued to think ahead; it’s part of why nuclear energy is prepared for any emergency. Plants have had pandemic response plans since 2006 and updated them early this year before the virus first surged in the U.S. These plans included measures we consider standard today such as using protective equipment like masks, and exercising social distancing. Because of the possibility of hurricanes or other extreme weather, nuclear plants are also prepared to keep crews in the plants if necessary, with housing, food and other necessities, so that their vital work can continue, a precaution that could be used in a pandemic. Additionally, plants have also continued to identify people who could fill critical roles if others fall ill, and to exchange information and pool insights with reactor operators around the world. What’s Next The novel coronavirus has defied almost everyone’s ability to predict, but there’s one thing we can be assured of: Electricity will be essential to the recovery we all seek. As certain plants look to refuel their reactors this season, the industry is looking ahead as always to keep the lights on with reliable, carbon-free energy. With the lessons learned from operating during a pandemic and with the industry’s culture of preparedness, nuclear energy is ready for the next set of refueling outages. Article reprinted with permission of NEI. Read full article here. 24 Fall 2020 NIRMA.org Inside NIRMA
Exelon to retire four Illinois reactors early; generation nears record high in 2019 Dresden and Byron have registered revenue shortfalls for hundreds of millions of dollars due to declining energy prices and market rules that allow fossil fuel plants to underbid Continued on next page. The front entrance of the Three Mile Island Nuclear Power Plant (Source: REUTERS/Carlo Allegri) Exelon Generation will retire two of its twin-unit power stations, Dresden Generating Station and Byron Generating Station, in the autumn of 2021, between 10 and 20 years ahead of schedule, the company said in a statement at the end of August. Byron, located just outside of Byron, Illinois, will close September 2021, 20 years before its license expires, while Dresden, found in Morris, Illinois, will close November 2021, a decade before its license is up, the company said. The plants employ over 1,500 fulltime employees and 2,000 supplemental workers during refueling outages, and supply 30% of Illinois’ carbon-free energy, it said. “We recognize this comes as many of our communities are still recovering from the economic and public health impacts of the pandemic, and we will continue our dialogue with policymakers on ways to prevent these closures,” said President and CEO if Exelon Christopher Crane. “To that end, we have opened our books to policymakers and will continue to do so for any lawmaker who wishes to judge the plants’ profitability.” Washington, D.C.— Today the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission completed Phase 6 of its review, the last and final phase, of the Design Certification Application (DCA) for NuScale’s groundbreaking small modular reactor (SMR) with the issuance of the Final Safety Evaluation Report (FSER). The FSER represents the completion of the technical review and approval of the NuScale SMR design. The following statement can be attributed to Marc Nichol, senior director of new reactors at the Nuclear Energy Institute: “The approval of NuScale’s small modular reactor design is not only a monumental milestone for NuScale but is a crucial step for the future of the industry. As the first U.S. small modular reactor design to be issued a FSER, NuScale is pioneering the way for additional innovative advanced nuclear technologies under development. “NuScale’s design approval, the first of its kind, brings the country closer to meeting its clean energy goals and making electricity more accessible for all. This milestone demonstrates the nuclear industry can meet the demands for reliable, safe and affordable carbonfree energy here in the U.S., but also meet the demands of customers across the world. “With growing customer interest and agreements with entities in the U.S., Canada, Romania, the Czech Republic and Jordan, NuScale has sparked a turning point for the entire industry in the advancement of U.S. technological innovation and our goal of providing carbon-free energy across the globe.” Article reprinted with permission of NEI. Read full article here. Back to Content | Inside NIRMA NIRMA.org Fall 2020 25
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