You may be seeing more out-of-state license plates than usual around the Tri-Cities for a couple of months.
RV parks and short term rentals are booked up and restaurants may be busier than usual, well ahead of vacation season.
This is one of those springs — the every-other-year spring when the Northwest’s only commercial nuclear power reactor, Columbia Generating Station near Richland, is shut down to have fresh reactor fuel added to its core.
This spring the outage started earlier as Energy Northwest plans a longer than usual outage and more workers are on the payroll.
Energy Northwest has hired on 2,000 additional skilled workers, including both Tri-Cities area residents and specialists who travel from across the nation, to help with the outage. They join about 1,000 permanent workers for the outage.
That compares to 1,200 workers hired for the 2023 spring outage.
The weeks when the reactor is not operating are used to complete maintenance tasks that are difficult or impossible while the plant is operating.
This year a major project is planned, in addition to the more typical maintenance and repair work.
The Columbia Generating Station, 10 miles northwest of Richland, is a 1,207 megawatt reactor. It is the third largest electricity generator in Washington state and can power 1 million homes.
56-day outage planned
The adjustable speed drive is being replaced, after having a few issues that required powering down to fix components, said Energy Northwest spokesperson Kelly Rae.
The speed drive controls the pumps that control the water inside the core, which in turn controls the amount of power the reactor produces, according to Energy Northwest.
The heat produced by a chain reaction boils the water within the core, creating steam that turns turbines attached to an electricity generator.
Typically the outage starts about a week into May.
But Friday evening, Energy Northwest disconnected the nuclear power plant from the grid, starting the 27th refueling outage for the plant.
The early start was to accommodate work expected to take 56 days, compared to two years ago when a 35-day outage was planned, but stretched to 44 days when workers encountered some maintenance challenges.
“For the next several weeks, our priority is to safely complete the schedule work, ensuring Columbia continues to deliver reliable, around-the-clock, carbon-free power to the region, said Grover Hettel, Energy Northwest’s executive vice president and chief nuclear officer, in a Saturday announcement of the start of the outage.
Outages are scheduled to coincide with peak spring runoff from snowmelt when hydroelectric dams in Washington and Oregon are at peak electricity production, minimizing the impact of taking the nuclear reactor offline.
2nd longest reactor run
Crews will replace 256 of the 764 nuclear fuel assemblies in the reactor core with new fuel. The biennual fuel outages allow all fuel to be replaced on a rotating schedule every six years.
Fuel assemblies that have been in the core for six years are placed in the reactor’s used fuel pool and then after at least five years are moved to dry storage on a pad outside the reactor.
They will remain there until the nation has a repository, once planned at Yucca Mountain, Nev., for used commercial nuclear fuel or until the nation implements another plan for temporary storage.
The secure outdoor used fuel storage area at Columbia Generating Station has 54 concrete and steel casks, each about 185 tons.
Planned maintenance work extends beyond the adjustable speed drive replacement to include replacing a reactor recirculating pump and motor, repair of a residual heat removing valve, repair of a circulating water pumphouse basin and transmission line upgrades.
In total, more than 10,000 tasks have been scheduled for key projects and preventative maintenance.
Prior to this outage, the reactor achieved its second-longest operating run in its 40-year history with 662 days of continuous operations. It was the third time that the reactor operated continuously between planned outages.
It is licensed to operate through 2043. The electricity it produces is provided at cost to the Bonneville Power Administration, which delivers it to communities across the Northwest.
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