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Press Release-I-05-021: NRC Monitoring Event at Millstone 3
	ML051080010
Person / Time
Site:	Millstone
Issue date:	04/17/2005
From:	; Office of Public Affairs Region I
To:	;
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	Press Release-I-05-021
	Download: ML051080010 (2)
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NRC NEWS

U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION

Office of Public Affairs, Region I

475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa.

No. I-05-021 April 17, 2005

Contact: Diane Screnci, 610/337-5330 Email: opa1@nrc.gov

Neil Sheehan, 610/337-5331

NRC MONITORING EVENT AT MILLSTONE 3

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is monitoring activities at Millstone Unit 3 nuclear power

plant in Waterford, Conn., following the declaration of an "Alert" at the plant at 8:42 a.m. today

(4/17/05). The plant is operated by Dominion Nuclear.

Just before 8:30 this morning, the plant automatically shut down and a steam generator safety

relief valve lifted and failed to close, causing the company to declare an Alert. The safety relief

valves are located on each steam line and are used to control pressure on the lines. The main steam

lines carry steam from the steam generators to the turbine to produce electricity. The main steam line

safety valves are designed to release steam to the environment. The plant is stable. Radiological

monitoring by the company to this point indicates there have been no detectable releases of

radioactivity from the plant.

An "Alert" is the second lowest emergency action level in the NRC required emergency

response plan for nuclear power plants.

In response to the "Alert," the NRC has staffed its incident response center in the Region I

office in King of Prussia, Pa., and is following developments from its operations center in Rockville,

Md. The NRC Resident Inspectors responded rapidly to the plant, where they are monitoring

Dominions response to this event.

Wayne Lanning, who is coordinating the NRCs response from the Region I Incident Response

Center is King of Prussia, PA., said, The NRC is following this event closely. There has been no

impact on public health and safety.

Neither Millstone Unit 1 nor Unit 2 were affected by this event. Unit 2 is in a refueling outage

and Unit 1 is permanently shut down.

The States of Connecticut and New York have been notified.

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