The government recently announced its new post-Fukushima nuclear disaster energy policy. The section on nuclear power said that the safety of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant would have to be assured before it would be allowed to start operating. At virtually the same time, the Atomic Energy Council (AEC) announced that Taiwan Power Co (Taipower) had committed a third-degree violation of regulations with its design modifications of the very same plant. The fine for the violation was NT$15 million (US$496,000), unprecedented in the history of nuclear power in Taiwan.
In 2008, the AEC reportedly discovered that Taipower had commenced work on the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant with 395 changes to the original plans, all of which were unauthorized by General Electric Co (GE), the company that was contracted to design the plant. At the time, this was ruled to be a third-degree violation, for which Taipower was fined NT$4 million.
Still, an inspection of the plant last year revealed a further 700 or more changes. If the AEC itself, the government’s nuclear power watchdog charged with overseeing nuclear industry safety, was not sure what Taipower was up to, or if they knew, but did nothing about it, can the public really trust any of the safety assurances it gives us?
The biggest difference between the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant and the three that preceded it is that the contracts for the latter were won by US companies, with US consulting firms supervising the process. Prior to the construction of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant, -Taipower had absolutely no experience in building nuclear power plants, and yet it has had the audacity to alter more than 1,000 of GE’s design specifications.
The process for welding the structure of the water feeds for the reactor’s emergency cooling system, for example, did not follow the original design. If an incident happens and the reactor core leaks, it is quite possible that the emergency cooling water supply will fail to engage because of changes in the plans. When the government talks of ensuring safety, is it referring to the need to revise these designs so that they comply with the specifications in the original plans?
According to Taipower, in an article published in 2008 in the Chinese-language edition of Scientific American, the main reason for the delays in the completion of the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant was not the continuous stop-start nature of its construction, but rather GE’s excessively conservative designs that, it said, contributed to purchasing and construction difficulties. It also said that the robustness of GE’s designs were “10 times, 100 times” higher than that required by this plant, which again created headaches and led to increased costs. This is why Taipower had been changing the design specifications as it went along.
However, it is not just the designs that Taipower is altering: It has also permitted the use of inferior products in place of standard materials. The original designs specified that spacers and joins keeping pipelines and switches securely in place be made of carbon fiber material resistant to temperatures of 1,000°C. However, Taipower allowed neoprene to be used instead. You can burn neoprene with a lighter. If there is ever a fire in the plant, these spacers will melt in no time at all, the switches will malfunction and there is every likelihood that operators would lose control over the plant.
Given that the plant is to have a working life of 40 years, the original plans require the use of urban and coastal area application hot-dip galvanized pipes designed to last for 50 to 80 years. However, Taipower has opted for zinc-plated tubing known to rust within three years. According to the project oversight report for the plant, the hot-dip galvanized pipes cost NT$15 to NT$16 per kilogram, compared with just NT$4 to NT$5 per kilogram for the zinc-plated pipes, and under dry conditions there is no problem with the soundness of the pipes.
When the story about these design changes broke in 2008, the AEC said there were no safety issues surrounding the spacers or the piping. What exactly does that mean? In 1986, NASA’s space shuttle the Challenger exploded in mid-air not long after launch because, it was later discovered, of a damaged O-ring join. Surely any assurance of safety would involve the replacement of these inferior spacers and zinc-plated pipes that have already been fitted in the plant.
When the AEC was conducting an inspection of the plant last year, the team discovered damage to many of the -electricity cables, apparently caused by mice. Perhaps because of poor site management, the plant had become infested by mice. If you have a problem with mice in your home, you risk fires through short-circuits if the rodents manage to gnaw through the insulation around the cables and wires. In a nuclear power plant, this problem could well be manifest in damage to high--voltage cables and VGA cables in the control rooms. Any assurance of safety must also entail onsite rodent extermination.
All of the current nuclear power plants in Taiwan are vulnerable to earthquakes and tsunamis. The Fourth Nuclear Power Plant has additional weaknesses, deriving from these introduced construction flaws. The government has already announced that, once the construction of the plant is completed, it will invite the International Atomic Energy Agency to conduct an inspection of the facilities to ensure that it is safe. How, though, are these international experts supposed to check for problems that they would never have suspected to exist even within their wildest dreams?
Before it incurs the cost of bringing in experts, the government should inform the public whether these irregularities have actually been addressed and, if they have, what exactly has been done about them. If they have not, then perhaps it could explain by what measure the nuclear power plant can be said to be safe.
Gloria Hsu is a committee member of the Taiwan Environmental Protection Union.
Translated by Paul Cooper
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