A reactor at the Susquehanna nuclear plant entered another outage over the weekend to address potential cracking in the blades of its steam turbine.
PPL has repaired the turbines of both boiling water reactors multiple times at the Pennsylvania plant since discovering blade cracking in unit 2 in 2011. Vibration monitoring equipment indicated two turbine blades might have developed small cracks, prompting operators to shut down unit 2 early Saturday. In a release, PPL reported it did not expect the financial impact of the repairs to be material, and workers will conduct other maintenance while the reactor is offline. Unit 1 continued to operate normally.
The unit 2 turbine was replaced 10 years ago, and PPL last repaired it during a refueling outage that began in April. Both units at the plant near Harrisburg, Pa., use General Electric Type 4 BWRs first licensed in the 1980s, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.