The nuclear safety regulator has warned that two new reactor designs earmarked for use in Britain remain incomplete and could be rejected unless improvements are made.
The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII) said that it was concerned about several features of both the US-Japanese and French reactor technologies that had been proposed for use in a new generation of British nuclear power stations.
The NII, which is part of the Health and Safety Executive, is conducting a safety review of the so-called AP-1000 reactor from Toshiba-Westinghouse and the European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) from Areva of France.
Final approval of the designs is not due to be granted until 2011, but an update on progress said that significant questions remained unanswered.
Kevin Allars, the director of new nuclear build design assessment at the NII, said that he was confident that both designs “could be suitable” for use in Britain. However, he added: “If they aren’t acceptable, or there are sufficient doubts in our mind whether they should be built in this country, then we will not issue a design acceptance confirmation. So far we don’t have a complete design yet from either . . . So we cannot rule it out.”
In particular, he said that progress on the AP-1000 design was behind schedule because its parent company had been too slow in providing information about a range of issues.
He said that the NII was concerned about the functioning of specialist valves controlling pressure at the heart of the reactor, while there were also worries about a proposal to use a “modular” method of construction designed to cut costs.
“There is still a lot of work to do,” Mr Allars said, although he added that Toshiba-Westinghouse had recently increased the manpower that it was devoting to the British safety review, which is known as the generic design assessment. The review is a key part of the Government’s drive to build a fleet of new nuclear plants in Britain.
Mr Allars said that the NII was also concerned about some aspects of the design of the French reactor, although he added that Areva and EDF, the French state-controlled energy company, had been co-operating more closely with the agency in recent months.
In July, The Times disclosed that the NII was concerned about the “control and instrumentation” systems, the so-called brain of the reactor. Mr Allars said that, since then, Areva and EDF had submitted a proposal to resolve these concerns, which the NII said it had accepted “in principle”.
However, he added that it was “too early to say” whether they would be sufficient to resolve the matter and that further details would be published next year.
Mr Allars said that the NII was also concerned about the strength of safety doors used in the design of the French reactor and that these needed to be fortified.
The EPR is the world’s most powerful nuclear reactor, with a capacity of 1,600 megawatts — or enough to power a city the size of Manchester.
EDF wants to build at least four EPRs — two each at Hinkley Point, in Somerset, and Sizewell, in Suffolk.
Mr Allars said that the NII had enough staff to complete the job after completing an intensive recruitment programme. There had been concerns, at the beginning of the review, that the nuclear safety regulator lacked the resources required to complete it while continuing with its normal workload of monitoring safety at Britain’s existing nuclear stations.
The Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII) said that it was concerned about several features of both the US-Japanese and French reactor technologies that had been proposed for use in a new generation of British nuclear power stations.
The NII, which is part of the Health and Safety Executive, is conducting a safety review of the so-called AP-1000 reactor from Toshiba-Westinghouse and the European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) from Areva of France.
Final approval of the designs is not due to be granted until 2011, but an update on progress said that significant questions remained unanswered.
Kevin Allars, the director of new nuclear build design assessment at the NII, said that he was confident that both designs “could be suitable” for use in Britain. However, he added: “If they aren’t acceptable, or there are sufficient doubts in our mind whether they should be built in this country, then we will not issue a design acceptance confirmation. So far we don’t have a complete design yet from either . . . So we cannot rule it out.”
In particular, he said that progress on the AP-1000 design was behind schedule because its parent company had been too slow in providing information about a range of issues.
He said that the NII was concerned about the functioning of specialist valves controlling pressure at the heart of the reactor, while there were also worries about a proposal to use a “modular” method of construction designed to cut costs.
“There is still a lot of work to do,” Mr Allars said, although he added that Toshiba-Westinghouse had recently increased the manpower that it was devoting to the British safety review, which is known as the generic design assessment. The review is a key part of the Government’s drive to build a fleet of new nuclear plants in Britain.
Mr Allars said that the NII was also concerned about some aspects of the design of the French reactor, although he added that Areva and EDF, the French state-controlled energy company, had been co-operating more closely with the agency in recent months.
In July, The Times disclosed that the NII was concerned about the “control and instrumentation” systems, the so-called brain of the reactor. Mr Allars said that, since then, Areva and EDF had submitted a proposal to resolve these concerns, which the NII said it had accepted “in principle”.
However, he added that it was “too early to say” whether they would be sufficient to resolve the matter and that further details would be published next year.
Mr Allars said that the NII was also concerned about the strength of safety doors used in the design of the French reactor and that these needed to be fortified.
The EPR is the world’s most powerful nuclear reactor, with a capacity of 1,600 megawatts — or enough to power a city the size of Manchester.
EDF wants to build at least four EPRs — two each at Hinkley Point, in Somerset, and Sizewell, in Suffolk.
Mr Allars said that the NII had enough staff to complete the job after completing an intensive recruitment programme. There had been concerns, at the beginning of the review, that the nuclear safety regulator lacked the resources required to complete it while continuing with its normal workload of monitoring safety at Britain’s existing nuclear stations.
Source: The Times
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