SEQUOYAH 1 0% 09/25/00 Hot Shutdown
RX TRIP ON LOW STEAM GENERATOR
WATER LEVEL - SEE EVENT #37375;
UE BASED ON RCS LEAKAGE OF 45 GPM
WHILE PLACING RHR IN SERVICE -
SEE EVENT #37378 - '1B' RHR
RELIEF VALVE WILL BE ISOLATED AND
"A" TRAIN RHR PLACED IN SERVICE
IN APPROXIMATELY 1 HOUR

-- spider (spider0@usa.net), September 26, 2000

Answers

Story last updated at 12:33 p.m. on Wednesday, September 27, 2000

TN - TVA reactor shuts down at Sequoyah plant

by Duncan Mansfield Associated Press

KNOXVILLE -- A Tennessee Valley Authority reactor was shut down for repairs after a pump problem led to a brief reactor coolant leak, officials said Tuesday.

"This is really an operating problem. It is not a safety event," said Ken Clark, spokesman for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Atlanta.

A main pump supplying water to steam generators at Seqouyah Nuclear Plant's Unit 1 reactor malfunctioned at about 10:30 a.m. EDT Monday. The plant is in Soddy-Daisy, about 20 miles north of Chattanooga.

The 1,100-megawatt reactor had been operating at full power for 187 days. It shut down as designed and "posed no danger to employees or the public," TVA spokesman John Moulton said.

Sequoyah officials decided to take the reactor down to a cold shutdown so another problem could be fixed -- a reactor coolant pump that had been vibrating excessively.

While cooling off the reactor, Sequoyah workers discovered a 45- gallons-per-minute coolant leak. It took 10 minutes to stop. The coolant was contained in a pressurized relief tank and never left the containment building.

"The NRC staff will look into it to see what conditions existed and if TVA should have declared an 'unusual event,"' Clark said, referring to what the NRC considers its lowest-level of emergency.

This sort of event "usually involves something that does not pose any immediate threat to plant safety or personnel," Clark said.

Moulton said the TVA nevertheless notified the NRC.

The reactor will remain off line indefinitely to make repairs. "We don't normally predict a (restart) date," Moulton said.

Meantime, Sequoyah's identical Unit 2 reactor continues in operation. It has been running at full power for 249 days.

The Sequoyah station went into service in 1981. It is one of three nuclear stations owned and operated by TVA, the nation's largest public power producer.

TVA provides electricity to nearly 8 million people in Tennessee and parts of Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama and Missisippi.

http://www.oakridger.com/stories/092700/stt_0927000001.html

-- Doris (groomlk@bellsouth.net), September 28, 2000.