Straight Talk
About The Brunswick Nuclear Plant
It's time for some straight talk about the Brunswick
Nuclear Plant:
The Brunswick Plant has two General Electric boiling water
reactors. Each of the two units operates independent of the
other. Unit 2 is currently operating. Unit 1 is in a refueling
CP &L outage.
News about a crack in a component of Unit 1 got national
attention last week. Some of the stories led to public con
cerns that are not justified by the facts. Here are the facts:
? First, neither of our reactor vessels is cracked. The
crack that caused all the headlines is in a piece
of equipment that is completely enclosed inside
the thick steel walls of the reactor vessel.
? The crack does not cause a leak of radioactive
material. The piece of equipment that has the
crack directs the flow of water inside the reactor.
? Past operation of the plant was unaffected by this
problem. We are modifying the equipment so the
crack will not be a problem in the future.
? We identified this crack through an inspection
program designed to identify and deal with
potential problems before they become problems.
How The Brunswick Plant works
The Brunswick Plant makes electricity. We use nuclear fuel
to boil water and make steam, and then we use that steam to
turn the big turbines that power the generators that make
electricity to supply power to CP&L customers across our
state.
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to make electricity, we pump water into the reactor vessel.
When this water absorbs heat it becomes steam, and this
steam is piped out of the reactor to drive a turbine. It is then
recycled back through the reactor. The reactor vessel and
the pumps and piping used to circulate water through the
reactor core sit inside a steel and concrete containment with
walls from four to eight feet thick.
The Shroud
The shroud is a piece of equipment that sits inside the six
inch thick reactor pressure vessel. It is a large stainless
steel cylinder that encircles the nuclear core. The walls
of the shroud direct water to flow down between the
shroud and the reactor vessel wall, and up through the
nuclear fuel core, where the water is heated to form steam.
Jn July of this year, we were inspecting the shroud of
Ur.it 1. The fuel is out of the Unit 1 reactor, so right now,
the inside of the reactor is just a big tank filled with water.
During this inspection, we found evidence of what is called
"intergranular stress corrosion cracking" on the inner wall of
the shroud, near the top. This is a type of hairline cracking
that attacks stainless steel.
We have examined this cracking using specially designed
equipment. The shroud crack is not a problem today.
However, if the crack on the inner wall of the shroud grew
over the next several years of operation, the shroud might
not withstand an extremely severe earthquake.
Based on this information, we are planning to modify
the shrovd by replacing a welded connection to the top with
a bolted connection. This modification is designed to last
the life of the plant.
Fuel
bundle
Water inii
r \
\U o
Steam out
[7 T Shroud
l ! 1 -J - Steam
dryer
Shroud inside vessel,
including core, and
flow diagrams
Fuel bundle
The process is really pretty
simple, but the equipment
we use is a little more
complex.
All of the heat to boil the
water comes from uranium
fuel that is contained in
bundles of half-inch wide
tubes full of uranium
pellets, which are
assembled here in
Wilmington. The bundles of
tubes are about eight inches
wide on each side, and
about 12 feet long.
There are 540 of these
bundles of fuel in the plant.
Reactor pressure
vessel, walls six to
12 inches thick
Shroud (dotted line)
Nuclear fuel (core)
Steel-reinforced
concrete containment
building, walls four
to eight feet thick
Brunswick Nuclear Plant
We have also looked at the shroud
in Unit 2, which is now operating.
When we identified this cracking
in Unit 1, we went back to video
tapes of a 1991 inspection of Unit
2. We found some very small
cracks in that shroud. Analysis of
these cracks showed that they do
not affect the safety margins of
the shroud, so we are continuing
to operate the unit. We will
inspect Unit 2 again next spring
when we come down for a
refueling outage. We will do this to
measure any changes that may
have occurred during this fuel
cycle.
They are what we call the "core"
of the reactor.
This core sits on supports inside the reactor vessel. The
reactor vessel is a very large steel pressure vessel that is 69
feet tall, with walls that are 12 inches thick at the ends, and
almost six inches thick along the sides.
This nuclear core generates heat. In order to use this heat
Unit 2 is currently operating, and over
the hottest part of the summer, the unit produced about 13
percent of the total electricity generated by CP&L power
plants.
During the Unit 1 outage, we have completed about 50 m^jor
modifications. This work is nearing completion, and the unit
will be ready to return to service once the shroud is modified
and fuel is reloaded into the reactor.
Dear Neighbors,
The Brunswick Nuclear Plant has made a lot of headlines during the past ueek. And some of the news
has sounded downright scary.
This may have caused some of our neighbors in Brunswick and New Hanover Counties to be a little
confused... maybe even frightened.
The fact is that we have an engineering issue that has received a lot of publicity. This is not an issue of
current safety of the plant. Instead, it deals with future plant operations and the longevity of plant
equipment. That is why we are making modifications now.
This issue did not pose a threat to your safety. You are not in danger from the plant. We have a
technical problem at Brunswick, and we are working to fix it. Our 1100 employees live here too, and we
all want our plant to operate safely.
Our mission is the safe, reliable, economic and environmentally compatible generation of electricity
from nuclear fuel If we aren't living up to this goal, then tell me. If your time permits, come and visit
us. We have an information center located on Highway 87, just in front of the plant.
I hope you will take the time to read the information we have prepared here, and that you will come
visit us. Thank you for your time and interest in Brunswick Plant.
Sincerely,
Roy A. Anderson
Vice President,
Brunswick Nuclear Plant
M p* { ? Wi ;
This advertisement paid for by the shareholders of Carolina Power & Light Company