EDF will have to face a new problem: a new crack has just been detected on a nuclear reactor.
According to the group, it is a ” significant stress corrosion defect present on one of the reactors of the Penly power plant, in Seine-Maritime. This discovery could have important consequences for EDF, which has already suffered record losses in 2022.
A crack of unprecedented depth
At a time when there is talk of possibly extending the life of French nuclear reactors, the discovery that EDF has just made on the Penly site should not go down well. Especially since since 2021 and the discovery of a phenomenon of ” stress corrosion on its power plants, the electricity giant is carrying out a control program which has led to the closure of a number of sites and the record losses that we know of.
But today, an even more critical problem is observed on the Penly 1 shutdown reactor. While the previous cracks detected did not exceed a few millimeters in depth, this one “ extends 155mm, approximately one quarter of the circumference of the pipe, and its maximum depth is 23mm, for a pipe thickness of 27mm “, according to the Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN).
A level 2 risk
This crack, present at the level of an emergency circuit of the reactor, within the radioactive zone, would present a risk of leakage. The problem was thus classified at level 2 on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES), which corresponds to the stage of the incident. ASN is now asking the energy supplier to ” take into account this new information in the checks it operates.
For its part, EDF explains that the fault would have originated from “ targeted “double repair” operations during the first assembly of the pipes “, at the time of the construction of the plant, commissioned between 1990 and 1992. For the moment, the group is not able to know if this new hitch is serious enough to lead to the extension of the commissioning. upon reactor shutdown.
Sources: Release, The echoes
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