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The Olkiluoto Nuclear Power Plant ( fi, Olkiluodon ydinvoimalaitos, sv, Olkiluoto kärnkraftverk) is one of Finland's two
nuclear power plant
A nuclear power plant (NPP) is a thermal power station in which the heat source is a nuclear reactor. As is typical of thermal power stations, heat is used to generate steam that drives a steam turbine connected to a electric generator, generato ...
s, the other being the two-unit
VVER
The water-water energetic reactor (WWER), or VVER (from russian: водо-водяной энергетический реактор; transliterates as ; ''water-water power reactor'') is a series of pressurized water reactor designs originally de ...
Loviisa Nuclear Power Plant
The Loviisa Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) ( fi, Loviisan ydinvoimalaitos, sv, Lovisa kärnkraftverk) is located close to the Finnish town of Loviisa. It houses two Soviet-designed VVER-440 PWR reactors, with capacities of 507 MW each. I ...
. The plant is owned and operated by
Teollisuuden Voima Oyj (TVO), a subsidiary of
Pohjolan Voima
Pohjolan Voima Oy (PVO; English: Northern Power Company Ltd.) is the second biggest Finnish energy company, which owns hydropower and thermal power plants (including biofuel-fired power plants).
Shareholders
Pohjolan Voima is a founder and main sh ...
, and is located on Olkiluoto Island, on the shore of the
Gulf of Bothnia
The Gulf of Bothnia (; fi, Pohjanlahti; sv, Bottniska viken) is divided into the Bothnian Bay and Bothnian Sea, and it is the northernmost arm of the Baltic Sea, between Finland's west coast ( East Bothnia) and the Sweden's east coast (West ...
, in the municipality of
Eurajoki
Eurajoki ( sv, Euraåminne) is a municipality of Finland located in the region of Satakunta in the province of Western Finland. The municipality has a population of () and covers an area of of which is water. The population density is .
The mu ...
in western
Finland
Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...
, about 20 kilometres from the town of
Rauma and about 50 kilometres from the city of
Pori
)
, website www.pori.fi
Pori (; sv, Björneborg ) is a city and municipality on the west coast of Finland. The city is located some from the Gulf of Bothnia, on the estuary of the Kokemäki River, west of Tampere, north of Turku and north-w ...
.
The Olkiluoto plant consists of two
boiling water reactor
A boiling water reactor (BWR) is a type of light water nuclear reactor used for the generation of electrical power. It is a design different from a Soviet graphite-moderated RBMK. It is the second most common type of electricity-generating nuc ...
s (BWRs), each producing 890
MW of electricity, together comprising 22% of the country's electricity generation for 2020. A third reactor, Unit 3, reached first criticality in late 2021, and at a
nameplate capacity
Nameplate capacity, also known as the rated capacity, nominal capacity, installed capacity, or maximum effect, is the intended full-load sustained output of a facility such as a power station, of 1,600 MW net electric output, will by itself satisfy 14% of the country's electricity demand.
Unit 3 is an
EPR reactor and has been under construction since 2005. The start of commercial operation was originally planned for May 2009 but was postponed repeatedly. The reactor eventually started up on 21 December 2021, and electricity production started on 12 March 2022. In May 2022, foreign material was found in the turbine steam reheater, and the plant was shut down for about three months of repair work.
[ On 30 September 2022, the reactor reached its maximum output power for the first time.][ In October damage was detected in all of the feed water pumps and unit 3 was shut down for an investigation. Regular production is expected to begin at the end of January 2023 at the earliest.
]
Units 1 and 2
Units 1 and 2 consists of two BWRs
NSW SES Bush Search and Rescue (SES BSAR) (previously known as Bush Search and Rescue NSW, Bushwalkers Wilderness Rescue Squad (BWRS) and Bushwalkers Search and Rescue (B S&R) is a remote and rugged area land search and rescue service in New South ...
, each producing 890 MW of electricity. The main contractor was ASEA-Atom
''Allmänna Svenska Elektriska Aktiebolaget'' (English translation: General Swedish Electrical Limited Company; Swedish abbreviation: ASEA) was a Swedish industrial company.
History
ASEA was founded in 1883 by Ludvig Fredholm in Västerås a ...
, now a part of Westinghouse Electric Sweden AB. Turbine generators were supplied by Stal-Laval
ABB Ltd. is a Swedish- Swiss multinational corporation headquartered in Zürich, Switzerland. The company was formed in 1988 when Sweden's Allmänna Svenska Elektriska Aktiebolaget (ASEA) and Switzerland's Brown, Boveri & Cie merged to create ...
. The units' architecture was designed by ASEA-Atom. The reactor pressure vessels were constructed by Uddcomb Sweden AB, and reactor internal parts, mechanical components by Finnatom. The electrical equipment was supplied by Strömberg. Unit 1 was constructed by Atomirakennus and unit 2 by Jukola and Työyhtymä. Unit 1 achieved its initial criticality in July 1978 and it started commercial operations in October 1979. Unit 2 achieved its initial criticality in October 1979 and it started commercial operations in July 1982.
The original power of the reactors was 660 MW. They were uprated to 710 MW in 1983–1984, to 840 MW in 1995–1998, and further to 860 MW in 2005–2006. Major upgrades were carried out to the units in 2010 and 2011, including replacement of turbines and generators, isolation valves, electrical switchgear and seawater pumps. The upgrades increased the net electrical output by 20 MW to 880 MW each.
In 2017, unit 2 was upgraded and modernized, increasing the output further to 890 MW from the beginning of 2018. A similar upgrade to unit 1 was performed in 2018. The extended maintenance was also made to prepare for a license renewal application. The license extension was granted in September 2018 and allows the reactors to operate until 2038.
A decision-in-principle for a fourth reactor to be built at the site was granted by the Finnish parliament in July 2010, but, in June 2015, TVO decided that it would not apply for a construction license for Olkiluoto 4.
Unit 3
In February 2005, the Finnish government
sv, Finlands statsråd
, border =
, image = File:Finnish Government logo.png
, image_size = 250
, caption =
, date =
, state = Republic of Finland
, polity =
, coun ...
gave its permission to TVO
TVO (stylized as tvo), formerly known as TVOntario, is a publicly funded English-language educational television network and media organization serving the Canadian province of Ontario. It operates flagship station CICA-DT (channel 19) in To ...
to construct a new nuclear reactor, making Finland the first Western European country in 15 years to order one. The construction of the unit began in 2005. The start of commercial operation was planned for 2010, but has been pushed back several times.[
Olkiluoto 3 is the first EPR, which is a type of ]third generation Third generation may refer to:
* ''Third Generation'' (album), a 1982 album by Hiroshima
* ''The Third Generation'' (1920 film), an American drama film directed by Henry Kolker
* ''The Third Generation'' (1979 film), a West German black comedy b ...
PWR, to have gone into construction. It will have a nameplate capacity of 1600 MW. Japan Steel Works
is a steel manufacturer founded in Muroran, Hokkaidō, Japan in 1907.
History
Japan Steel Works was set up with investment from British firms Vickers, Armstrong Whitworth and Mitsui. During World War II, they manufactured what was then the wor ...
and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries
is a Japanese multinational engineering, electrical equipment and electronics corporation headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. MHI is one of the core companies of the Mitsubishi Group and its automobile division is the predecessor of Mitsubishi Mo ...
manufactured the unit's 526-ton reactor pressure vessel
A reactor pressure vessel (RPV) in a nuclear power plant is the pressure vessel containing the nuclear reactor coolant, core shroud, and the reactor core.
Classification of nuclear power reactors
Russian Soviet era RBMK reactors have each fuel a ...
.
At the start of construction, the main contractor was Areva NP (now Framatome
Framatome () is a French nuclear reactor business. It is owned by Électricité de France (EDF) (75.5%), Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (19.5%), and Assystem (5%).
The company first formed in 1958 to license Westinghouse's pressurized water reacto ...
, after the sell-off mentioned below), a joint venture of Areva
Areva S.A. is a French multinational group specializing in nuclear power headquartered in Courbevoie, France. Before its 2016 corporate restructuring, Areva was majority-owned by the French state through the French Alternative Energies and Atom ...
and Siemens
Siemens AG ( ) is a German multinational conglomerate corporation and the largest industrial manufacturing company in Europe headquartered in Munich with branch offices abroad.
The principal divisions of the corporation are ''Industry'', '' ...
. However, in 2009, Siemens sold its one-third share of Areva NP to Areva, which is now the main contractor. Siemens remained on the project as the subcontractor with the main responsibility for constructing the turbine hall. Areva sold its majority stake in Framatome (previously Areva NP), its nuclear reactor and fuel business, to Électricité de France
Électricité de France S.A. (literally ''Electricity of France''), commonly known as EDF, is a French multinational electric utility company, largely owned by the French state. Headquartered in Paris, with €71.2 billion in revenues in 2 ...
.
According to TVO, the construction phase of the project would create a total of about 30,000 person-years of employment directly and indirectly; that the highest number of on-site employees has been almost 4,400; and that the operation phase would create 150 to 200 permanent jobs. A 90 MW battery storage
A battery storage power station is a type of energy storage power station that uses a group of batteries to store electrical energy. Battery storage is the fastest responding dispatchable source of power on electric grids, and it is used to s ...
is scheduled for 2022.
On 8 December 2021 the company submitted its application to Finland's Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority
The Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority ( fi, Säteilyturvakeskus, sv, Strålsäkerhetscentralen), often abbreviated as STUK, is a government agency tasked with nuclear safety and radiation monitoring in Finland. The agency is a division of ...
asking permission to start up Unit 3 and to move forward with initial testing of the unit. This was granted on 16 December 2021. First criticality of the OL3 EPR plant unit was reached on 21 December 2021. An unplanned automatic trip occurred on 14 January 2022, delaying connection to the national grid to February 2022. The electricity production of Olkiluoto’s third nuclear power plant unit started on Saturday, 12 March 2022, at 12.01 p.m. In May 2022, foreign material detached from the steam guide plates was found in the turbine steam reheater, and the plant was shut down for about three months of repair work. The test production phase should complete in December 2022, when regular electricity production should start.
In September 2022, the Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority
The Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority ( fi, Säteilyturvakeskus, sv, Strålsäkerhetscentralen), often abbreviated as STUK, is a government agency tasked with nuclear safety and radiation monitoring in Finland. The agency is a division of ...
(STUK) granted a licence for the Olkiluoto 3 reactor to increase its power output to more than 60 percent to a full 4,300 MW of thermal capacity. On 30 September 2022, the reactor achieved its design output power.[ In October 2022, damage was discovered in the feedwater pumps, likely delaying the end of commissioning testing.] On 28 October, it was announced cracks a few centimetres long had been found in all four of the feedwater pump impellers. The cause of the cracks was yet to be determined, and it was unclear how the schedule would be affected. The feedwater pumps are larger than in other nuclear reactors.
Construction delays
The first license application for the third unit was made in December 2000 and the date of the unit's entry into service was estimated to be 2010. However, since the start of construction, several delays to the schedule have been announced. In July 2012 TVO announced that the unit would not go into service before 2015, five years after the original estimate. In a statement, the operator said it was "not pleased with the situation" although solutions to various problems were being found and work was "progressing", and that it was waiting for a new launch date from Areva and Siemens. At the end of 2013, TVO said that the Areva-Siemens consortium plans to reduce workers and subcontractors on the construction site and says that it expects the contractor to provide details about the expected impact on the project's schedule. In February 2014, TVO said that it could not give an estimate of the plant's startup date because it was still waiting for the Areva-Siemens consortium to provide it with an updated overall schedule for the project." Later the same month it was reported that Areva was shutting down construction due to the dispute over compensations and unfinished automation planning. According to Kauppalehti
''Kauppalehti'' (Finnish: "Trade Newspaper") is a commerce-oriented newspaper published in Helsinki, Finland. The paper has been in circulation since 1898.
History and profile
''Kauppalehti'' was established by the Finnish Businessmen's Associat ...
, the estimated opening was delayed until 2018–2020. In July 2019 TVO announced that regular electricity generation is expected to start in July 2020. The delay was caused by slower than expected modification works. In August 2020 TVO announced that regular electricity generation is delayed to February 2022 due to slow progress in system testing, technical problems found in the testing, and delivery time of spare parts to replace faulty components.
The delays have been due to various problems with planning, supervision, and workmanship, and have been the subject of an inquiry by STUK, the Finnish nuclear safety regulator. The first problems that surfaced were irregularities in the foundation concrete, and caused a delay of months. Later, it was found that subcontractors had provided heavy forgings that were not up to project standards and which had to be re-cast. An apparent problem constructing the reactor's unique double-containment structure also caused delays, as the welders had not been given proper instructions.
In 2009, Petteri Tiippana, the director of STUK's nuclear power plant division, told the BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
that it was difficult to deliver nuclear power plant projects on schedule because builders were not used to working to the exacting standards required on nuclear construction sites, since so few new reactors had been built in recent years.
In 2010, Jukka Laaksonen, Director General of STUK at that time, analyzed reasons for the delay:
* Many nuclear power plants were constructed in Europe in the 1970s and 1980s. After that there was a long break in the construction, and experienced experts retired.
* Areva did not have experience in construction of nuclear power plants. In all the earlier projects in which Areva supplied the reactor,
Électricité de France
Électricité de France S.A. (literally ''Electricity of France''), commonly known as EDF, is a French multinational electric utility company, largely owned by the French state. Headquartered in Paris, with €71.2 billion in revenues in 2 ...
was responsible for the construction management. Many experienced subcontractors had left the business, and Areva had to find new subcontractors and to coach them in nuclear manufacturing.
* The original schedule, four years from construction start to grid connection, was too ambitious for a first-of-a-kind plant that is larger than any earlier reactor.
* The project started very slowly because Areva was not adequately prepared. When the construction permit was given in 2005, parts of the detailed design were not yet available. Areva did not recognize how much additional work was needed to complete it. The construction started to proceed in a controlled manner two years later.
* Areva was not used to STUK’s regulatory approach with an early focus on the quality of structures and components. Manufacturing information and a quality control plan must be approved by both the licensee and STUK before manufacturing of the most important components is allowed to start. Inspections with hold points are made during the manufacturing.
* The large size of the reactor and the application of new technologies brought major challenges. Some manufacturing technologies had not been used before. For instance, new
welding
Welding is a fabrication (metal), fabrication process that joins materials, usually metals or thermoplastics, by using high heat to melt the parts together and allowing them to cool, causing Fusion welding, fusion. Welding is distinct from lower ...
techniques were used in the reactor pressure vessel. Many large components, such as
pressurizer forging
Forging is a manufacturing process involving the shaping of metal using localized compressive forces. The blows are delivered with a hammer (often a power hammer) or a die. Forging is often classified according to the temperature at which i ...
s and some reactor internal parts, had to be re-manufactured once or twice to achieve the specified quality.
* TVO’s key persons did not have experience from management of a large construction project.
Construction of the turbine succeeded better under the responsibility of Siemens. Installations of the main turbine equipment were completed about one year behind the original schedule.
After the construction of the unit started in 2005, Areva began constructing EPRs in
Flamanville,
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, and in
Taishan __NOTOC__
Taishan may refer to:
*Mount Tai or Taishan (), Shandong, China
*Taishan District, Tai'an (), named after the Mount Tai, a district in Tai'an, Shandong, China
*Taishan, Guangdong (), a county-level city of Jiangmen, Guangdong, China
**Gre ...
,
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
. However, as of 2019, the construction of the EPR in France is ten years behind schedule. Taishan 1 in China became the first EPR to start power generation on 29 June 2018,
and the second one (Taishan 2) came online in 2019.
Cost
The main contractor, Areva, is building the unit for a fixed price of €3 billion, so in principle, any construction costs above that price fall on Areva. In July 2012, those overruns were estimated at more than €2 billion,
and in December 2012, Areva estimated that the full cost of building the reactor would be about €8.5 billion, well over the previous estimate of €6.4 billion.
Because of the delays, TVO and Areva both sought compensation from each other through the
International Court of Arbitration
ICC International Court of Arbitration is an institution for the resolution of international commercial disputes. It operates under the auspices of the International Chamber of Commerce and consists of more than 100 arbitrators from roughly 90 cou ...
.
In October 2013, TVO's demand for compensation from Areva had risen to €1.8 billion, and Areva's from TVO to €2.6 billion.
In December 2013, Areva increased its demand to €2.7 billion.
On 10 March 2018 French newspaper
Le Monde
''Le Monde'' (; ) is a French daily afternoon newspaper. It is the main publication of Le Monde Group and reported an average circulation of 323,039 copies per issue in 2009, about 40,000 of which were sold abroad. It has had its own website si ...
announced that Areva and TVO had reached an agreement.
A day later, TVO confirmed that Areva would pay it €450 million in compensation over the delays and lost income.
The agreement would settle all legal actions between the two companies. With the settlement, TVO disclosed its total investment to be around €5.5 billion. Areva had accumulated losses of €5.5 billion. The total cost of the project, therefore, is estimated to be €11 billion.
Between 2013 and 2017 OL1 and OL2 produced between 13,385 GWh and 14,740 GWh per year at
capacity factors between 87.2% and 96%. OL3 is expected to produce an additional 12,000-13,000 GWh annually. Even taking into account all OL3 construction delays the long term
LCOE
The levelized cost of electricity (LCOE), or levelized cost of energy, is a measure of the average net present cost of electricity generation for a generator over its lifetime. It is used for investment planning and to compare different methods ...
target for all three plants is 30 EUR/MWh. LCOE for the OL3 reactor alone is estimated at 42 EUR/MWh.
Criticism
In 2009,
Stephen Thomas wrote, "Olkiluoto has become an example of all that can go wrong in economic terms with new reactors," and that Areva and the TVO "are in bitter dispute over who will bear the cost overruns and there is a real risk now that the utility will default."
The project has also been criticized by
STUK because "instructions have not been observed in the welding of pipes and the supervision of welding."
STUK has also noted that there have been delays in submitting proper paperwork.
Olkiluoto 3 was supposed to be the first reactor of
3+ generation which would pave the way for a new wave of identical reactors across Europe, safe, affordable, and delivered on time. The delays and cost overruns have had knock-on effects in other countries.
The construction workforce includes about 3,800 employees from 500 companies. 80% of the workers are foreigners, mostly from eastern European countries. In 2012 it was reported that one Bulgarian contracting firm is owned by the mafia, and that Bulgarian workers have been required to pay weekly protection fees to the
mafia
"Mafia" is an informal term that is used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the original “Mafia”, the Sicilian Mafia and Italian Mafia. The central activity of such an organization would be the arbitration of d ...
, wages have been unpaid, employees have been told not to join a union and that employers also reneged on social security payments.
Unit 4
On 14 February 2008, TVO submitted an environmental impact assessment of unit four to the Ministry of Employment and Economy.
On 21 April 2010, the government of Finland decided to grant a decision-in-principle to Teollisuuden Voima for the fourth reactor in Olkiluoto. The decision was approved by the parliament on 1 July 2010.
If constructed, the fourth unit would be a
PWR or a
BWR with a power output of 1,000 to 1,800 MW.
In September 2014, with unit 3 still unfinished, the Finnish government rejected TVO's request for time extension of the unit 4 decision-in-principle. Economic Affairs Minister
Jan Vapaavuori
Jan Pellervo Vapaavuori (born 3 April 1965) is a Finnish politician, the former Minister of Economic Affairs, and the former mayor of Helsinki. Vapaavuori was Minister of Housing and Minister of Nordic Cooperation in Matti Vanhanen's second cabi ...
referred to the long delay of the 3rd reactor and to unsatisfactory assurances by TVO that the 4th unit would ever be built. Nevertheless PM
Stubb stated that the rejection didn't spell the end for the OL4 project, and that TVO would have the opportunity to apply for a construction license before the decision-in-principle expires in June 2015.
In June 2015 TVO decided not to apply for a construction permit for the Olkiluoto 4 unit because of delays with the unit 3, however saying they are prepared to file for a new decision-in-principle later.
Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository
![Onkalo 2](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/30/Onkalo_2.jpg)
The ''Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository'' is a
deep geological repository
A deep geological repository is a way of storing hazardous or radioactive waste within a stable geologic environment (typically 200–1000 m deep). It entails a combination of waste form, waste package, engineered seals and geology that is suited ...
for the final disposal of spent nuclear fuel, the first such repository in the world. It is currently under construction at the Olkiluoto plant by the company
Posiva
Posiva Oy is a Finnish company with headquarters in the municipality of Eurajoki, Finland. It was founded in 1995 by Teollisuuden Voima (60% of stock) and Fortum (40% of stock), two Finnish nuclear plant operators, for researching and creating a m ...
, owned by the nuclear power plant operators
Fortum
Fortum Oyj is a Finnish state-owned energy company located in Espoo, Finland. In addition to Finland, it focuses on Germany and other countries in Central Europe, Great Britain, Russia and the Nordic region. Fortum operates power plants, inc ...
and
TVO
TVO (stylized as tvo), formerly known as TVOntario, is a publicly funded English-language educational television network and media organization serving the Canadian province of Ontario. It operates flagship station CICA-DT (channel 19) in To ...
.
Agriculture
The
waste heat
Waste heat is heat that is produced by a machine, or other process that uses energy, as a byproduct of doing work. All such processes give off some waste heat as a fundamental result of the laws of thermodynamics. Waste heat has lower utility ...
, an output common to all
thermal power plants
A thermal power station is a type of power station in which heat energy is converted to electrical energy. In a steam-generating cycle heat is used to boil water in a large pressure vessel to produce high-pressure steam, which drives a steam ...
, which heats the cooling water (at 13 °C) is utilized for small-scale agriculture before being pumped back to the sea. The power plant hosts the northernmost
vineyard
A vineyard (; also ) is a plantation of grape-bearing vines, grown mainly for winemaking, but also raisins, table grapes and non-alcoholic grape juice. The science, practice and study of vineyard production is known as viticulture. Vineyards ...
in the world, a 0.1 ha experimental plot that yields 850 kg Zilga
grapes
A grape is a fruit, botanically a berry, of the deciduous woody vines of the flowering plant genus ''Vitis''. Grapes are a non- climacteric type of fruit, generally occurring in clusters.
The cultivation of grapes began perhaps 8,000 years ago ...
annually.
Another use is a pond for growing crabs,
whitefish and
sturgeon
Sturgeon is the common name for the 27 species of fish belonging to the family Acipenseridae. The earliest sturgeon fossils date to the Late Cretaceous
The Late Cretaceous (100.5–66 Ma) is the younger of two epochs into which the Cretace ...
for
caviar
Caviar (also known as caviare; from fa, خاویار, khâvyâr, egg-bearing) is a food consisting of salt-cured roe of the family Acipenseridae. Caviar is considered a delicacy and is eaten as a garnish or a spread. Traditionally, the ter ...
.
Incidents
An incident occurred at unit 2 on 10 December 2020 at 12:22. Because of a valve repair work, excessively hot water flowed to the reactor water clean-up system filters. The hot water dissolved materials from the filters. When the clean-up system was restarted, the dissolved materials flowed to the reactor core, where they
became radioactive. This caused the radiation levels in the steam line to rise momentary 3–4 times higher than the normal level. The increase of the radiation level activated safety systems, which operated as planned and triggered reactor
scram
A scram or SCRAM is an emergency shutdown of a nuclear reactor effected by immediately terminating the fission reaction. It is also the name that is given to the manually operated kill switch that initiates the shutdown. In commercial reactor ...
, closed containment isolation valves, and started the containment spray system. The operators followed procedures and declared a site area emergency at 12:32.
The event caused a full-scale emergency response at the power plant and at the
Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority
The Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority ( fi, Säteilyturvakeskus, sv, Strålsäkerhetscentralen), often abbreviated as STUK, is a government agency tasked with nuclear safety and radiation monitoring in Finland. The agency is a division of ...
. There was no radioactive release to the environment, and the workers were not exposed to radiation. The event was categorized as 0 on the
INES scale, which means that it was an exceptional event with no safety significance.
The reactor was restarted on 19 December, nine days after the incident.
In April 2014 a turbine steam condenser of unit 1 had a small seawater leak, at a rate of two litres per hour. According to the operator, the leak forced to limit the plant output down to 300 MW, but was not serious and was to be repaired in a day.
Timeline of the Olkiluoto 3 project
See also
*
List of nuclear reactors#Finland
**
Hanhikivi Nuclear Power Plant
The Hanhikivi Nuclear Power Plant ( fi, Hanhikiven ydinvoimalaitos, sv, Hanhikivi kärnkraftverk) was a project to build a nuclear power plant on the Finnish Hanhikivi peninsula, in the municipality of Pyhäjoki. It was planned to house one Ru ...
*
Nuclear engineering
Nuclear engineering is the branch of engineering concerned with the application of breaking down atomic nuclei ( fission) or of combining atomic nuclei (fusion), or with the application of other sub-atomic processes based on the principles of n ...
*
Nuclear power in Finland
As of 2023, Finland has five operating nuclear reactors in two power plants, all located on the shores of the Baltic Sea. Nuclear power provided about 34% of the country's electricity generation in 2020. The first research nuclear reactor in Finla ...
*
Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository
The Onkalo spent nuclear fuel repository is a deep geological repository for the final disposal of spent nuclear fuel. It is near the Olkiluoto Nuclear Power Plant in the municipality of Eurajoki, on the west coast of Finland. It is being const ...
* ''
Into Eternity'', a 2010 documentary about the construction of a Finnish waste depository
* ''
Journey to the Safest Place on Earth
''Journey to the Safest Place on Earth'' is a 2013 documentary film written and directed by Edgar Hagen. It discusses the huge quantity of radioactive waste and spent fuel rods being stored at various locations on the planet.
Charles McCombie is ...
'', a 2013 documentary about the urgent need for safe depositories
Notes and references
External links
Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority in Finland''European Pressurised Reactor at Olkiluoto 3, Finland – Brief Interim Review of the Porosity and Durability Properties of the In Situ Cast Concrete at the Olkiluoto EPR Construction ''Reactor at Olkiluoto 3, Finland – Review of the Finnish Radiation Nuclear Safety Authority (STUK) Assessment'', R3123-A2, July 2005''Reactor at Olkiluoto 3, Finland – Review of the Finnish Radiation Nuclear Safety Authority (STUK) Assessment'', R3123-A2, July 2005
{{Authority control
Nuclear power stations in Finland
Radioactive waste repositories
Nuclear power stations using boiling water reactors
Nuclear power stations using pressurized water reactors
Nuclear power stations with reactors under construction
Nuclear power stations with proposed reactors
Nuclear power stations using EPR reactors
Eurajoki
Buildings and structures in Satakunta