Thursday
Oct282010
Workers at the Turkey Point nuclear power plant in South Florida have discovered a rusty quarter-sized hole in the steel liner of the containment of one of the two reactors there along with a 30-inch section of corrosion. The hole and corrosion were found during a refueling shutdown. Turkey Point is now the fourth reactor to have discovered a containment liner hole in the last two years but the problem is feared to be widespread within the aging U.S. reactor fleet. According to Arnie Gundersen, a Vermont-based nuclear engineer and consultant who produced a report detailing holes and cracks at half a dozen U.S. reactors, a hole such as that found at Turkey Point could allow enough radiation to escape to threaten public safety.