Oakland Harbor, Ohio — According to online US Nuclear Regulatory Commission records, Vistra Corp.’s Davis-Besse nuclear plant is back up and running at full capacity.
The plant was shut down for several days, first to repair a steam generator leak. The company then had to convince the NRC that a restart could be done safely, despite the fact that it couldn’t figure out why a neutron flux monitor in the reactor wasn’t working.
Finally, the NRC agreed that other instruments could provide adequate safeguards. It authorized the restart process to begin on Wednesday but informed the company that the broken monitor would need to be repaired when the plant was taken out of service for about a month in March for routine refueling and maintenance.
Davis-Besse is located in Ottawa County, on the Lake Erie shoreline, approximately 30 miles from downtown Toledo. Its reactor was reported to be at 30% power Tuesday and full power Wednesday. Restarting nuclear plants usually takes a few days.
