KKP 1 to be shut down again as a precautionary measure due to a drop in pressure in the containment dome

Karlsruhe. After the completion of the annual inspection of Unit 1 of the Philippsburg nuclear power plant (KKP 1), the process of restarting the installation began at the start of the week. At the end of the restart process, the containment dome was filled with nitrogen, in accordance with the usual routine. After this, a slight drop in pressure was observed, indicating that nitrogen was escaping from the containment dome. In order to discover the source of this leak, and then to resolve the problem, EnBW shut down KKP1 once again as a precautionary measure.

The containment dome is one of the numerous different safety measures which work together to prevent the escape of any radioactive materials. It contains, among other things, the reactor pressure container, the forced circulating pumps and the pipework systems. The containment dome is also completely enclosed in an additional metal shell. As a fire protection measure, the containment dome is filled with nitrogen during productive operation.

None of these measures have any impact on people, the plant itself or the environment. Nevertheless, the operating company, EnBW Kernkraft GmbH, considered this incident worth reporting and has preliminarily recorded it as a category E (urgent) and INES 1 (disruption) incident. The supervisory authorities were immediately informed about the incident, verbally, and a written report was given to them the same day.

Unit 1 of the Philippsburg nuclear power plant is a boiling water reactor that produces 926 megawatts of electricity. Since 1979, when the plant came into operation, it has generated more than seven billion kilowatt hours of power.