August 27, 2015

Sendai nuclear plant resumes output increase

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/nuclear.html

Aug. 27, 2015 - Updated 13:53 UTC+2

The operator of Japan's only restarted nuclear power plant has resumed increasing power output one week after equipment trouble forced it to suspend the ramp-up.

Kyushu Electric Power Company suspended the output increase last Thursday after a problem was found with one of the No. 1 reactor's condensers at the Sendai plant in Kagoshima Prefecture in southwestern Japan.

The utility said seawater leaked from damaged intake pipes into the condenser. The company stopped increasing the output while it inspected the equipment and fixed the problem.

The utility had restarted the reactor just 9 days earlier, on August 11th. It was generating power at 75 percent of capacity at the time of the suspension.

The condenser turns steam that drives the turbine back into water. Neither the steam nor the water is radioactive.

The utility said on Thursday that it had completed its inspections and fixed the problem by the previous day, and that nothing else amiss had been found. The company started increasing energy output again in the morning, and it had reached 95 percent by the evening.

However, the utility might miss its target to go back into commercial operation by early September.

The reactor was the first to go back online under the new regulations introduced after the Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011.