Magnox News

Oldbury Power Station has been given consent by its regulator, the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate, to re-start Reactor 1.

Joe Lamonby, Site Director, said: “Having previously secured the future operation of Reactor 2 in 2008, we are very pleased that our regulators, the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate, (NII) have granted us permission to re-start reactor 1.

“Working with our customer the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), a considerable amount of work has already been completed on site to ensure the reactor is ready to re-start.

“This includes a successful readiness review and work on the reactor and supporting equipment, as well as extensive sampling, testing and channel viewing of the graphite core.”

Detailed camera inspections of more than 1000 of Reactor 1’s 3,308 fuel channels, (covering 15,000 graphite bricks) have been completed during the reactor’s extended outage. The inspections confirmed that the reactor is in good condition.

The reactor is now likely to run through 2009 and 2010, taking account of fuel availability and reprocessing schedules at Sellafield.  

“Safety is always our number one priority and the NII would not have allowed us to re-start unless they were totally satisfied with our safety case,” said Joe.

“The time we have taken over this investigation is testament to the thorough case that we have prepared, and extensive analysis of the integrity of the core has demonstrated the reactor is safe.”

Richard Waite, NDA Acting Chief Executive said: “This is good news for UK plc, generating much needed electricity from a low carbon source while at the same time generating income to support our decommissioning mission.”

And Mark Morant, President of EnergySolutions International Group, added: “This is a tremendous achievement and gives us the opportunity to generate further income for our customer, the NDA. I would like to congratulate Joe and the team for their dedication and commitment.”