Taiwan Power Co (Taipower), the operator of the nation’s nuclear power plants, said yesterday it has finished replacing and repairing six anchor bolts after local media reported that seven anchor bolts of the first reactor at the Guosheng Nuclear Power Plant in Wanli District (萬里), New Taipei City (新北市), were found to be fractured or cracked during annual maintenance last month.
Because the seventh anchor bolt interferes with other devices on site, it will be necessary to use alternative means to repair it, and its replacement has been scheduled for inclusion in the next major rehabilitation project, Taipower said.
The first reactor, which began commercial operation in 1981, was temporarily shut down on March 16 for routine maintenance. Earlier this month local media revealed that one of the anchor bolts was broken, two fractured, and four cracked. The report was later confirmed by Taipower
Taipower said there are 120 anchor bolts in the first reactor that secure the bottom part of the reactor to the steel-reinforced concrete substrate, and that the weight of all the components in the reactor is supported by the substrate.
It said that according to reactor designer General Electric Co’s (GE) ultrasonic examination, the other 113 anchor bolts were good enough to ensure the reactor’s safe operation. GE said the reactor would be able to resume operation once repairs had been completed, Taipower added.
The fracturing of the anchor bolts could have been caused by defective materials, the manufacturing process, environmental influences or metal fatigue, Taipower said, adding that it was difficult to determine what caused the cracks. However, initial evaluation of the fractured surface appeared to show they were caused by long-term stress instead of sudden shearing.
Taipower said it would consult other related agencies to analyze and fix the problem and add vibration sensors near the supporting base of the reactor for continuous monitoring.
However, at a coordination meeting at the Legislative Yuan on Friday, an official from the Atomic Energy Council said this was the only case of fractured anchor bolts in GE BWR-6 boiling water reactors that had ever been recorded anywhere in the world.
The Chinese-language Liberty Times (the Taipei Times’ sister paper) yesterday quoted a Taipower official named Lin Te-fu (林德福) as saying GE charged US$3 million for the six newly replaced anchor bolts. The rehabilitation price was questioned by civil engineer Wang Wei-min (王偉民), who said the bolts were massively over-priced, and that as the fractures resulted from metal fatigue, all 120 anchor bolts should have been replaced to ensure safe operation.
In response to the media report, Taipower said the rehabilitation work was contracted to GE and included emergency treatment by its specialists, the bolt material, monitoring personnel, structural safety analysis and engineering design, so the price could not be compared with ordinary mechanical components.
The Green Citizens’ Action Alliance, a civic group, said it was concerned that ultrasonic examinations might not detect possible metal fatigue in the remaining 113 original anchor bolts until they cracked.
TECH SECTOR: Nvidia Corp also announced its intent to build an overseas headquarters in Taiwan, with Taipei and New Taipei City each attempting to woo the US chipmaker The US-based Super Micro Computer Inc and Taiwan’s Guo Rui on Wednesday announced a joint venture to build a computation center powered only by renewable energy. After meeting with Supermicro founder Charles Liang (梁見後) and Guo Rui chairman Lin Po-wen (林博文), Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) instructed a cross-ministry panel to be established to help promote the government’s green energy policies and facilitate efforts to obtain land for the generation of green power, Executive Yuan spokesperson Michelle Lee (李慧芝) said. Cho thanked Liang for his company’s support of the government’s 2019 Action Plan for Welcoming Overseas Taiwanese Businesses to Return to Invest in
The Taipei City Government yesterday said contractors organizing its New Year’s Eve celebrations would be held responsible after a jumbo screen played a Beijing-ran television channel near the event’s end. An image showing China Central Television (CCTV) Channel 3 being displayed was posted on the social media platform Threads, sparking an outcry on the Internet over Beijing’s alleged political infiltration of the municipal government. A Taipei Department of Information and Tourism spokesman said event workers had made a “grave mistake” and that the Television Broadcasts Satellite (TVBS) group had the contract to operate the screens. The city would apply contractual penalties on TVBS
The lowest temperature in a low-lying area recorded early yesterday morning was in Miaoli County’s Gongguan Township (公館), at 6.8°C, due to a strong cold air mass and the effect of radiative cooling, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. In other areas, Chiayi’s East District (東區) recorded a low of 8.2°C and Yunlin County’s Huwei Township (虎尾) recorded 8.5°C, CWA data showed. The cold air mass was at its strongest from Saturday night to the early hours of yesterday. It brought temperatures down to 9°C to 11°C in areas across the nation and the outlying Kinmen and Lienchiang (Matsu) counties,
A new board game set against the backdrop of armed conflict around Taiwan is to be released next month, amid renewed threats from Beijing, inviting players to participate in an imaginary Chinese invasion 20 years from now. China has ramped up military activity close to Taiwan in the past few years, including massing naval forces around the nation. The game, titled 2045, tasks players with navigating the troubles of war using colorful action cards and role-playing as characters involved in operations 10 days before a fictional Chinese invasion of Taiwan. That includes members of the armed forces, Chinese sleeper agents and pro-China politicians
RSS