A steam leak was detected near a high-pressure turbine at a nuclear power plant in Japan’s Fukui Prefecture. Kansai Electric Power Company announced that reactor operations had been suspended. The leak was detected at around 4:10 a.m. local time today, and workers manually shut down the reactor approximately 15 minutes later.
Kansai Electric Power, the operator of the nuclear plant located in central Japan’s Fukui Prefecture, stated that it halted the reactor after detecting a steam leak near a high-pressure turbine.
Operations at Reactor No. 3 of the Mihama Nuclear Power Plant were suspended shortly after the leak was discovered. The company said the leak had not come into contact with radioactive materials and had no external impact so far.
According to the company’s statement, the leak was detected at approximately 4:10 a.m. local time today. Workers manually shut down the reactor about 15 minutes later.
Unit 3, which began operations in 1976, became the first Japanese nuclear reactor to operate beyond 40 years under new regulations introduced after the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster. The regulations limit a reactor’s service life to 40 years, but allow extensions of up to 20 additional years with approval from regulators.
Decommissioning work is also ongoing for two other aging reactors at the Mihama plant.