Fuel unloaded from Bushehr NPP after metal particles got into reactor, contractor says
MOSCOW. Dec 3 (Interfax) - Fuel was unloaded from the Bushehr nuclear power plant in Iran in October because metal particles from pump cooling units found their way into the reactor, Russia's Atromstroyexport, the NPP's general contractor, told Interfax.
"This is repercussion of last year's problems with the pumping unit - metal particles were discovered which weren't found a year ago," the company said.
OJSC NIAEP, the managing company of Atomstroyexport, had said motivated the decision to unload fuel in October, NIAEP said unscheduled additional testing and inspections, as well as equipment maintenance was behind the decision to unload fuel.
Bushehr is situated on the Persian Gulf coast and has one power unit with 1,000 MW capacity. Its construction began in the 1970s by a consortium led by German company Siemens. However, Siemens subsequently pulled out of the contract with Iran for political reasons. In 1992, Russia and Iran agreed to complete the plant's first unit. Russian general contractor CJSC Atomstroyexport, which is managed by NIAEP, left off where the Germans started.
Bushehr was connected to the power grid and formally inaugurated in September 2011.
The NPP was brought up to full capacity at the end of August 2012 but stopped as early as October, Fuel was re-loaded in October and full capacity is expected to be reached again by the end of December.
Iran hoped to launch the Bushehr plant in early April 2011, but the reactor operation was suspended for technical reasons in late February 2011 due to problems with the internal elements of one of the pump cooling mechanisms, which could have led to metal getting into the reactor. To rule out any possibility of metal parts getting on the fuel rods, the fuel rods were removed from the reactor and washed and fuel was reloaded into the reactor in early April. Unit 1 was taken to the minimally controlled capacity level in early May.