Heysham nuclear power station is operated by
EDF Energy
EDF Energy is a British integrated energy company, wholly owned by the French state-owned EDF (Électricité de France), with operations spanning electricity generation and the sale of natural gas and electricity to homes and businesses through ...
in
Heysham
Heysham ( ) is a coastal town in Lancashire, England, overlooking Morecambe Bay. It is a Heysham Port, ferry port, with services to the Isle of Man and Ireland, and the site of two Heysham nuclear power station, nuclear power stations.
Demogra ...
, Lancashire, England. The site is divided into two separately-managed
nuclear power
Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced b ...
stations, Heysham 1 and Heysham 2, both with two reactors of the
advanced gas-cooled reactor (AGR) type.
In 2010, the British government announced that Heysham was one of the eight sites it considered suitable for future nuclear power stations.
On 1 August 2016, Heysham 2's Unit 8 broke the world record for longest continuous operation of a nuclear generator without a shutdown. This record-breaking run exceeds the previous record of 894days set by
Pickering Nuclear Generating Station's Unit 7 (
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...
, Canada) in 1994. The reactor has generated 13.5TWh of electricity so far during this continuous operation, taking its lifetime generation to 115.46TWh.
Heysham 1
Construction of Heysham 1, which was undertaken by British Nuclear Design & Construction (BNDC), a consortium backed of
English Electric
N.º UIC: 9094 110 1449-3 (Takargo Rail)
The English Electric Company Limited (EE) was a British industrial manufacturer formed after the Armistice of 11 November 1918, armistice of World War I by amalgamating five businesses which, during th ...
,
Babcock & Wilcox
Babcock & Wilcox is an American renewable, environmental and thermal energy technologies and service provider that is active and has operations in many international markets across the globe with its headquarters in Akron, Ohio, USA. Historicall ...
and
Taylor Woodrow Construction
Taylor Woodrow Construction, branded as Taylor Woodrow, is a UK-based civil engineering contractor and one of four operating divisions of Vinci Construction UK. The business was launched in 2011, combining civil engineering operations from the ...
,
[The UK Magnox and AGR Power Station Projects]
/ref> began in 1970, with the first reactor commencing operations in 1983 and the second reactor following in 1984. However, initial production levels were low, and full commercial operation was only declared in 1989. It is likely to remain in operation until 2024. Its generating capacity is 1,150MWe. The reactors were supplied by National Nuclear Corporation and the turbines by GEC. There were four 17.5MW auxiliary gas turbines on the site, these had been first commissioned in January 1977.
Heysham 1 shares its reactor design with Hartlepool nuclear power station
Hartlepool nuclear power station is a nuclear power station situated on the northern bank of the mouth of the River Tees, south of Hartlepool in County Durham, North East England.
The station has a net electrical output of 1,185megawatts, ...
, which introduced the replaceable pod boiler design. The CEGB
The Central Electricity Generating Board (CEGB) was responsible for electricity generation, transmission and bulk sales in England and Wales from 1958 until privatisation of the electricity industry in the 1990s.
It was established on 1 Januar ...
specified a compact design for the Heysham 1 and Hartlepool power station reactor islands in comparison to the design of the two preceding stations at Hinkley Point B and Hunterston B
Hunterston B nuclear power station is a shut down AGR nuclear power station in North Ayrshire, Scotland. Located about south of Largs and about north-west of West Kilbride on the Firth of Clyde coast. It is currently operated by EDF Energy, and ...
in order to reduce the capital cost, but this caused expensive construction delays because of restricted access. The Heysham 2 reactor island occupies a much larger footprint than Heysham 1 for a similar design output of power.
In 2013 a defect was found by a regular inspection in one of the eight pod boilers of unit 1. The reactor resumed operation at a lower output level with the defective pod boiler disabled, until June 2014 when more detailed inspections confirmed a crack in the boiler spine. As a precaution, unit 2 and the sister Hartlepool nuclear power station
Hartlepool nuclear power station is a nuclear power station situated on the northern bank of the mouth of the River Tees, south of Hartlepool in County Durham, North East England.
The station has a net electrical output of 1,185megawatts, ...
were also shut down for inspection.
All units have since returned to full power after successful inspections on the three other reactors revealed no other defects. Heysham 1 unit 1 will operate on seven out of the eight boiler pods until a detailed repair strategy has been developed.
Heysham 1 is scheduled to be shut down for defueling and then decommissioning in March 2024.
Heysham 2
The construction, which was undertaken by a consortium known as National Nuclear Corporation (NNC),[ began in 1979 and the station opened in 1988. Its generating capacity is 1,250MWe, and it is estimated to keep running until at least 2030. Heysham 2 shares its reactor design with ]Torness nuclear power station
Torness nuclear power station is a nuclear power station located approximately east of Edinburgh at Torness Point near Dunbar in East Lothian, Scotland. It was the last of the United Kingdom's second generation nuclear power plants to be commi ...
near Dunbar
Dunbar () is a town on the North Sea coast in East Lothian in the south-east of Scotland, approximately east of Edinburgh and from the English border north of Berwick-upon-Tweed.
Dunbar is a former royal burgh, and gave its name to an ecc ...
in East Lothian
East Lothian (; sco, East Lowden; gd, Lodainn an Ear) is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland, as well as a historic county, registration county and lieutenancy area. The county was called Haddingtonshire until 1921.
In 1975, the histo ...
, and is a development of the reactor design used at Hinkley Point B in Somerset
( en, All The People of Somerset)
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. The reactors were supplied by NNC, the turbines and boilers by NEI
Nei or NEI may refer to:
*Nei, Iran, a village in Ardabil Province, Iran
*Nei, a character in the ''Phantasy Star II'' roleplaying game
*Nutrition and Education International
*Nuclear Energy Institute, American nuclear industry lobbying group
*N ...
.
On 15 August 2019, Reactor 8 inside Heysham 2 let off a large amount of steam, with banging noises at approximately 11pm that could be heard away in Lancaster. This caused alarm among local residents, and numerous calls to the police reporting “gunshots”. EDF later reported that a reactor had earlier experienced a "non-planned shutdown after an electrical fault", and the noise was from the re-start process when unsilenced relief valves lifted on the Startup Vessels during boiler feeding.
Heysham 2 is expected to be shutdown in 2028, prior to a three-year defueling period and then decommissioning.
See also
*Nuclear power in the United Kingdom
Nuclear power in the United Kingdom generated 16.1% of the country's electricity in 2020. , the UK has 9 operational nuclear reactors at five locations (8 advanced gas-cooled reactors (AGR) and one pressurised water reactor (PWR)), producing 5. ...
*Energy policy of the United Kingdom
The energy policy of the United Kingdom refers to the United Kingdom's efforts towards reducing energy intensity, reducing energy poverty, and maintaining energy supply reliability. The United Kingdom has had success in this, though energy int ...
*Energy use and conservation in the United Kingdom
Energy in the United Kingdom came mostly from fossil fuels in 2021. Total World energy supply and consumption, energy consumption in the United Kingdom was 142.0millionTonne of oil equivalent, tonnes of oil equivalent (1,651TWh) in 2019. In 20 ...
References
External links
Heysham 1 official website
Heysham 2 official website
Heysham 1
Nuclear Engineering International wall chart, 1971
Heysham 2/Torness
Nuclear Engineering International wall chart, 1981
{{City of Lancaster buildings
Nuclear power stations in England
Buildings and structures in the City of Lancaster
Power stations in North West England
Nuclear power stations using Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors