NRC to increase inspections at Virginia nuke plant that shut down after earthquake

Federal regulators said Monday they will conduct additional inspections at a Virginia nuclear power plant that shut down after a 5.8-magnitude earthquake that shook the East Coast last summer.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Monday it found that a failure by workers at Dominion’s North Anna Power Station in Louisa County, Va., to adequately maintain backup diesel generators at the plant posed a “low to moderate” safety risk.

One of four backup generators failed when the plant lost offsite power, and two reactors shut down in the aftermath of the Aug. 23 earthquake.

A subsequent inspection conducted by NRC officials found that the earthquake did not cause the backup generator’s failure.

The backup generator problems were a result of the “failure of North Anna personnel to establish and maintain appropriate maintenance procedures for the plant’s emergency diesel generators,” NRC said in a statement Monday.

NRC labeled the violation “white,” the second-lowest category of safety risk. The agency, which is charged with overseeing the country’s 104 nuclear power reactors, said it will subject the North Anna plant to more inspections as a result of the violation.

Activists have pointed to the earthquake to bolster long-time claims for improved safety rules at U.S. nuclear power plants. NRC is in the process of implementing a series of beefed-up safety standards recommended by a federal task force in the aftermath of the disaster at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi power plant.