The cause of an automatic shutdown at the PPL Susquehanna nuclear power plant in Berwick is still under investigation. Just before 2:00 a.m. Sunday morning one of the plant’s two reactors shut down unexpectedly. PPL says the reactor is safe, and the other one is functioning normally at full power. PPL co-owns the plant with Allegheny [...]
All four Pennsylvania nuclear power plants in Hurricane Sandy’s path expect to remain operational through the storm. Exelon Energy owns Dauphin County’s Three Mile Island, York County’s Peach Bottom Atomic Power station, and Limerick Generating Station in Chester County. Spokespeople from all three facilities say the plants will keep producing, despite winds exceeding 50 miles-per-hour. [...]
Three Mile Island shut down for about a day-and-a-half last week, due to “problems with a relay switch on a reactor coolant pump,” as the Patriot-News reports. The Exelon power plant also shut down in late August, but the paper reports nuclear reglulators don’t think the two incidents are related. More from the Patriot-News: Three [...]
Mars is about as far away as you can get from Pennsylvania. But energy is energy, and it’s worth highlighting the fact that NASA’s Curiosity rover runs on nuclear power. The radioactive device’s title is a mouthful: it’s a “multi-mission radioisotope thermoelectric generator.” The New York Times has more:
Nuclear reactions and flint-and-steel fires occupy opposite ends of the energy spectrum, but 100 Boy Scouts are getting a feel for both this summer, as they work on a nuclear science merit badge by visiting a New Jersey nuclear power plant. As Lacey Patch reports, the experience involves a shift in Oyster Creek Generating Station’s mock-up control [...]
The Three Mile Island nuclear crisis began 33 years ago today. Since that’s not a round number, the anniversary hasn’t gotten much attention. But if you’re looking for more information on Pennsylvania – and America’s – worst nuclear crisis, look no further. Here are five comprehensive reports about what happened at the Dauphin County nuclear [...]
The Natural Resources Defense Council has a new mapping tool that charts potential deadly nuclear fallout at U.S. plants in the wake of an accident. The NRDC released the map a week before the first anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, which was touched off by an earthquake and tsunami that damaged the Japanese plant. [...]
The New York Times’ Green blog takes a look at a new report examining nuclear power plant safety in 2011: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission spotted a few problems at American reactors last year and directed plant owners to fix them before they could cause accidents, but it also let a lot of problems slide and [...]
Don’t worry – this story isn’t as scary as the headline makes it out to be. State officials are distributing potassium iodide pills to people who live within ten miles of Pennsylvania’s five nuclear power plants tomorrow. The Harrisburg Patriot-News and York Daily Record have more on where you can pick the free tablets up. [...]
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