New NRC Report Highlights Dangerous Components at Palisades Nuclear Plant

{The Register has reported on this story.}

NEWS FROM BEYOND NUCLEAR

For immediate release

Contact: Kevin Kamps, radioactive waste specialist, Beyond Nuclear, Kalamazoo, MI, (240) 462-3216, [email protected]

Michael Keegan, co-chair, board of directors, Don’t Waste Michigan, Monroe, MI, (734) 770-1441, [email protected]

(Media reporters wishing to speak with Arnie Gundersen, chief engineer of Fairewinds, can do so by contacting Kevin Kamps, above.)

Arnie Gundersen, chief engineer at Fairewinds, has prepared the following analysis of the new NRC report. Gundersen has been retained by an environmental coalition — Beyond Nuclear, Don’t Waste Michigan, and Michigan Safe Energy Future — in their bid to block Palisades’ unprecedented restart from closed for good status, because it is unneeded, insanely expensive for the public, and extremely high-risk for safety, health, and the environment, including these just revealed risks involving the steam generators.

Gundersen analysis:

Permanently shut down by Entergy Corp. in May 2022, the outdated Palisades reactor was sold to Holtec International as scrap to be entirely dismantled.  Holtec instead abruptly decided to attempt its reactivation and, in August 2024, began an inspection of the Palisades steam generators to achieve its restart goal.  Federal regulators from the NRC identified four key problem areas.  [NRC quotes in bold]:

1. When Entergy sold Palisades for scrap, it did not place plant systems in “wet layup” — stabilized storage, with appropriate chemicals to prevent corrosion.  “The site [Holtec] placed the SGs in wet layup once it was determined they would be attempting to recommence normal operation,” according to the NRC. It is still unclear whether wet layup was delayed by weeks, months, or longer, very likely resulting in accelerated corrosion of SG tubes.
   
2. The inspection uncovered “at least 700 additional tubes that must be plugged” due to metal corrosion.   These were as many tubes as had been plugged during the previous 20 years of operating the aged Palisades reactor, designed in 1965.
3. Even worse, the NRC said, was that Stress Corrosion Cracking (SCC) under Holtec “far exceeded” what occurred under previous Palisades owner, Entergy.  250 times more tubes were found to be damaged.  Stress Corrosion Cracks (SCCs) in an atomic reactor are severe and cause significant damage to sensitive, vital safety equipment.  Because the system was not placed in a proper wet layup, extensive corrosion was discovered on the outside diameter of steam generator tubes.
4. Avoiding Stress Corrosion Cracking is critical to prevent a reactor core meltdown at Palisades.  “The NRC staff notes that stress corrosion crack indications must be appropriately addressed to maintain the generator’s pressure boundary.”  What happens when a steam generator pressure boundary is not maintained?  If a “cascading failure” impacts enough SG tubes, it could result in a catastrophic nuclear reactor core meltdown.

Gundersen published an essay in the aftermath of the March 2011 Fukushima Daiichi triple-meltdown in Japan, explaining why such a nuclear disaster on the shoreline of Lake Michigan would be even more catastrophic for those downstream.

-30-