Press Release-IV-08-002, NRC Conducting Special Inspection at San Onofre Nuclear Plant

Press Release-IV-08-002: NRC Conducting Special Inspection at San Onofre Nuclear Plant

ML080080522
Person / Time
Site:	San Onofre
Issue date:	01/08/2008
From:	Office of Public Affairs Region IV
To:
Category:Press Release
References
FOIA/PA-2011-0157 Press Release-IV-08-002
Download: ML080080522 (1)

Text

NRC NEWS U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs Region IV 611 Ryan Plaza Drive - Suite 400 Arlington, Texas 76011-4005 No. IV-08-002 January 8, 2008

Contact:

Victor Dricks E-Mail: opa4@nrc.gov Phone: (817) 860-8128 NRC CONDUCTING SPECIAL INSPECTION AT SAN ONOFRE NUCLEAR PLANT The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is conducting a special inspection at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in response to the failure of an emergency diesel generator during testing last month. The plant, operated by Southern California Edison Co., is located in San Clemente, Calif.

The licensee has corrected the problem, believed to have been caused by an improperly installed electrical connector on the diesel generator, said Region IV Administrator Elmo E.

Collins. But it appears they were slow to understand the implications of what happened and we want to know why.

Emergency diesel generators are used to supply electrical power to plant safety systems in the event of a loss of off-site power. The NRC requires they be tested monthly to ensure operability.

Operators encountered problems during testing of the emergency diesel generator on three occasions in late December. They corrected the problem, but may not have taken action promptly enough to satisfy regulatory requirements.

A two-person team of NRC specialists will review the circumstances related to the emergency diesel generator failures, the licensees root cause evaluation and determine whether similar conditions exist with other electrical equipment. The team consists of a reactor inspector from the NRCs Region IV office in Arlington, Texas, and the senior resident inspector permanently assigned to the site.

The inspection will begin today and is expected to take several days. The team will write a report about 30 - 45 days after completion of the inspection. The report will be available on the agencys online document library at: http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams/web-based.html .

NRC news releases are available through a free list serve subscription at the following Web address:

http://www.nrc.gov/public-involve/listserver.html . The NRC homepage at www.nrc.gov also offers a SUBSCRIBE link. E-mail notifications are sent to subscribers when news releases are posted to NRC's Web site.