Two nuclear-power plants majority-owned by Vattenfall AB, a state-owned Swedish power company, were targeted by Greenpeace activists, about 70 of whom broke into restricted areas.
The activists targeted the Ringhals plant on Sweden's west coast and the Forsmark facility on the east coast. Combined they produce about 36% of energy consumed in Sweden.
The Swedish Radiation Safety Authority (SSM) has recommended a tripling of the fee paid by the country's nuclear power industry towards paying for management of the country's nuclear waste.
SSM has been tasked with assessing what level of fee Sweden's nuclear generators should be required to pay into the country's Nuclear Waste Fund for the next three years. Basing its assessment on information gathered from the relevant organisations - including cost estimates from the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Co (SKB) - SSM has recommended to the government that the fee should be set at 3 öre per kWh of nuclear electricity produced. The current level is 1 öre per kWh. (1 öre is worth approximately $0.001.)
Stockholm (Platts) - 13 Nov 2008 Forsmark management said it will try to use control rods from the closed Barsebaeck nuclear power plant to replace rods with broken and cracked shafts in Forsmark-3.
About 25% of the Swedish unit's 197 rods are cracked and at least one is broken. In a November 13 statement, Forsmark management said it wants to use the Barsebaeck rods because it would be difficult to quickly order and install so many new rods.
STOCKHOLM, Nov 4 (Reuters) - Swedish power group Vattenfall said on Tuesday an inspection had revealed one broken control rod and cracks in about 30 percent of others at its Forsmark 3 reactor.
Forsmark communications director Claes-Inge Andersson told Reuters that about 100 out of 169 rods had been inspected and cracks had been found in some 25-30 percent of them.
Stockholm - Two of Sweden's 10 nuclear reactors were to be offline for at least a month as checks continued on the control rods used to control the nuclear fission process, officials said Monday. The Swedish Radiation Safety Authority last week ordered operators to check the control rods after cracks were detected in the control rods at one of the three reactors at the Oskarhamn nuclear plant, south-eastern Sweden.
STOCKHOLM, Sweden - A Swedish nuclear reactor was shut down Tuesday for safety checks after an annual review of a similar reactor found cracks in several control rods.
Workers found cracks in at least five of 90 rods of a reactor at the Oskarshamn nuclear plant during annual maintenance work earlier this month. That reactor was closed for maintenance and has yet to reopen.
Forsmark nuclear power plant has been criticized by the Swedish Radiation Safety Authority (SSM) for slack security after it found that an emergency cooling system vent had been shut for a year.
During a routine inspection on August 18th this year, SSM inspectors discovered that an emergency cooling vent in reactor 2 at the Forsmark nuclear plant on Sweden's east coast had been closed since their inspection there a year earlier.
Forsmark nuclear power plant has been criticized by the Swedish Radiation Safety Authority (SSM) for slack security after it found that an emergency cooling system vent had been shut for a year.
During a routine inspection on August 18th this year, SSM inspectors discovered that an emergency cooling vent in reactor 2 at the Forsmark nuclear plant on Sweden's east coast had been closed since their inspection there a year earlier.
Stockholm - Confidence in the Swedish nuclear power industry has dropped to its lowest level in 20 years in the wake of a reactor shutdown in 2006, a report said Wednesday. The autumn 2007 survey by Gothenburg University researchers suggested 39 per cent had "very great or rather great" confidence in information about energy and nuclear power issues issued by the nuclear power industry, down 10 percentage points on 2006.
STOCKHOLM (Thomson Financial) - The UN's nuclear watchdog today noted improved security measures at a problem-prone nuclear plant in Sweden, but recommended a number of other steps to increase safety further.
The Forsmark nuclear plant on Sweden's east coast 'has introduced or extended several programmes contributing to improved operational safety,' Miroslav Lipar, head of International Atomic Energy Agency mission in Sweden, said in a statement.
