Full steam ahead at Byron Nuclear Generating Station

BYRON – A reactor at the Byron Nuclear Generating Station began producing electricity Tuesday for the first time since a loss of offsite power last week led to an emergency shutdown.

Unit 2 was reconnected to the electrical grid and back online at 12:02 p.m. Tuesday, Exelon Nuclear said in a news release.

Station Vice President Tim Tulon said the plant’s safety systems “passed with flying colors.”

An electrical insulator failed and fell off the metal structure it was attached to, interrupting power and causing an automatic shutdown of the reactor as a precaution on Jan. 30, a Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokeswoman said Tuesday.

“The broken insulator was replaced and the NRC inspection team verified the repair,” Viktoria Mitlyng said.

The shutdown caused the NRC to declare an “unusual event, the least serious of four levels in the agency’s emergency classification system.

On Jan. 31, the NRC began a special inspection of the plant, which remained offline.

Exelon says technical experts did hundreds of maintenance and inspection tasks while the unit, one of two at the plant, was offline.

When the plant was shut down last week, steam was vented from a relief valve to cool the reactor.

Lab results of tests conducted Jan. 31 showed “no health hazard” from the steam to people who live and work near the plant, Jonathon Monken, director of the Illinois Emergency Management Agency, said Tuesday.

Results from the Jan. 31 sampling near the plant are available on the IEMA website at www.iema.illinois.gov.