Fluor contracted to Diablo Canyon

Fluor is to provide operations and maintenance services to the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant in California under a five-year contract with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E). Meanwhile PG&E has taken steps to address a potential gap in emergency procedures at the plant.

The contract will see Fluor provide integrated services in facility maintenance, strategic and station projects, engineering and outage services for the two pressurized water reactor plant. The company has provided mechanical, electrical and civil engineering support for Diablo Canyon since 2010 under an existing operations and maintenance contract.

The value of the contract has not been disclosed, but Fluor power business president Matthew McSorley said the company was pleased.

White finding over ocean evacuation

Meanwhile, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued a "white" ruling for Diablo Canyon after inspectors determined that changes to plans for evacuations in the event of a plant emergency would have reduced the plan's effectiveness. A "white" finding denotes low-to-moderate safety significance.

Licensees must provide action plans for a 10-mile (16 kilometre) emergency planning zone in its entirety regardless of whether this includes areas of water, and changes introduced by PG&E had failed to comply with this requirement. However, as the ocean areas at issue were included in local authority evacuation procedure plans there would in practice have been no gaps in evacuation measures. "At no time was the public going to be allowed to stay in an area that had the potential for radioactivity if an event had occurred," the NRC said.

According to the NRC, operator PG&E had changed its procedure without prior regulatory approval but had already taken action to fully resolve the issue.

Researched and written
by World Nuclear News