Wylfa cleared for continued operation

Wednesday, 1 October 2014

Wylfa unit 1 - the world's last operating Magnox reactor - will be able to continue generating electricity until the end of 2015 after the UK nuclear regulator approved the plant's latest periodic safety review.

Wylfa unit 1 (Image: Magnox Ltd)

A periodic safety review for Wylfa was submitted to the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) in September 2013. It is required to be submitted every ten years and includes a review of the safe operation of the site for the next ten years. The review covers 2014 to 2024 and includes power generation to no later than December 2015, defuelling and initial decommissioning.

On 30 September, the ONR announced that Magnox Ltd "has demonstrated that the station can continue to operate safely until 2024."

The ONR's deputy chief nuclear inspector Mark Foy said, "Although the periodic review will not be considered complete until the licensee has delivered an agreed program of work to address certain areas identified for improvement, our assessment has identified no issues of nuclear safety significance that could impact power generation at Wylfa to the planned end date of December 2015, and the subsequent defuelling and early decommissioning operations until 2024."

Magnox Ltd said it is currently addressing the areas for further work identified by the ONR and that all this work will be completed "in a prioritized and timely manner, to a program agreed with ONR." The regulator said it will monitor Magnox Ltd's progress in completing this work.

The two units at Wylfa were both scheduled to shut down at the end of 2012, but Magnox Ltd - which manages and operates the plant on behalf of its owner the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) - decided to shut down unit 2 in April 2012 so that unit 1 could continue operating in order to fully utilize existing stocks of fuel, which is no longer being manufactured.

Magnox Ltd said it will now continue with its program of transferring partially used fuel from Wylfa unit 2 - which stopped operating in 2013 - to unit 1, "to bring the Magnox reactor program to a successful conclusion." According to the company, electricity generation from Wylfa 1 between 2010 - when the plant was originally scheduled to shut - until the end of 2015 could be worth around an additional £785 million ($1.3 billion) to the UK taxpayer.

Wylfa site director Stuart Law said, "We are pleased that Wylfa's extended generation will allow us to maximise income from generation for the NDA and the UK taxpayer, and also provide another 15 months of opportunities and continued development for staff."

He added, "This will be Wylfa's final period of generation. After December 2015, we will follow in the footsteps of other Magnox sites and begin to defuel the reactor which will take up to three years."

Researched and written
by World Nuclear News