OAK HARBOR, Ohio — The Davis-Besse nuclear plant has become the subject of a special inspection again, this time because the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said it found evidence of excessive ground-settling.
Ground settling has been blamed for an October, 2022, event which broke a pipeline used as a main source of firewater. The pipeline was out of service for one hour, NRC spokesman Victoria Mitlyng said on Tuesday.
Upon further investigation, the NRC found an undetermined number of other parts of the plant revealing evidence of excessive settling this past February. But she said no other ruptured pipes or other safety-related plant equipment broke because of it.
The NRC has assembled a five-member special inspection team to look deeper into the issue. It met at the site on Monday, and will stay as long as the agency has questions it wants answered, Ms. Mitlyng said.
“A certain extent of ground settling is normal,” she said. “Some ground settling happens everywhere. Here, what triggered this was in October 2022, a firewater underground pipeline broke. It was not available for about an hour.”
The NRC is “just getting our arms around the issue because we have questions,” Ms. Mitlyng said.
“There’s no deadline or anything like that,” she added. “It depends what the team is finding.”
The NRC said the special inspection team has expertise in operations, fire protection, aging of components, license renewal, geotechnical science, geology, and geophysics/seismology.
It will issue a report for the public 45 days after the inspection is complete, Ms. Mitlyng said.
Energy Harbor spokesman Todd Morgano could not be reached for comment.
Arnie Gundersen, chief engineer and board member of the Charleston, S.C.-based nonprofit, Fairewinds Energy Education, contends there has been excessive settling at the Vogtle nuclear plant complex in Georgia and at the Waterford nuclear plant complex in Louisiana.
“The weight of the foundation of a nuclear plant is huge, which compacts the ground under it,” he said. “Over time, the nuclear plant begins to sink.”
Michigan-based Consumers Power ran into major settling problems when trying to build its Midland nuclear plant decades ago. The project was canceled on July 16, 1984, when it was 85 percent complete.
The University of Michigan has said it was the nation’s largest and most expensive cancellation, some 13 years behind schedule and more than 20 times over its original budget.
David Lochbaum, a nuclear safety engineer who has been critical of the industry and the NRC in the past, said the settling of that plant’s emergency diesel generator building was that project’s “Achilles' heel.”
An 11-page NRC report filed Jan. 12, 1979, said that Consumers Power thought it had a remedy for that building’s settling. But the NRC staff was quoted in its closing remarks that the company was proceeding “at the risk of the applicant.”
Mr. Lochbaum agreed some settling is normal, but too much is problematic.
“Settling can be tolerated as long as it does not compromise safety margins,” Mr. Lochbaum said. “If the only safety consequence from settling were potential rupture of piping, the solution could be to shore up the foundation or relocate the piping.”
Toledo-based activist Terry Lodge said he hopes the NRC “will note the history of cracking of the shield building at Davis-Besse, which contains the nuclear reactor.”
That cracking was attributed to the Blizzard of 1978 several years ago. But Mr. Lodge said effects of settling “might directly affect its remaining, and suspect, stability.”
Paul Gunter, of Maryland-based Beyond Nuclear, said the nuclear industry shouldn’t be allowed to wait and see what underground pipelines break.
“That’s not going to be the safest or most reasonable assurance for the reliability of an aging nuclear power station's fire protection systems,” he said.
Frank Calzonetti, University of Toledo vice president for research, said it’s difficult to say what, if any, impact this latest discovery will have on a massive proposal that UT, Cleveland-Cliffs and others have submitted in hopes of having this region land one of eight “hydrogen hubs” the U.S. Department of Energy wants built to help the Biden administration achieve its goal of lowering climate-altering greenhouse gases.
The regional effort calls for hydrogen to be produced at Davis-Besse and used by industries such as Cleveland-Cliffs and TARTA.
Davis-Besse is along western Lake Erie, 30 miles from downtown Toledo.
First Published April 25, 2023, 5:25 p.m.
