Two earthquakes that jolted South Korea on Monday night, including the largest ever recorded in the country, prompted concerns about the safety of nuclear plants clustered in the quake-prone southeast.
The South Korean Meteorological Agency said the two earthquakes, of magnitude of 5.1 and 5.8, occurred near the city of Gyeongju. They could be felt in the capital, Seoul, more than 300km to the northwest.
Fourteen people were injured, but there were no reports of serious damage, a South Korean Ministry of Public Safety and Security official said.
Nonetheless, Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power Co shut down four nuclear reactors at the Wolsong complex in Gyeongju as a precaution.
South Korea’s reactors are designed to withstand a magnitude 6.5 to magnitude 7 earthquake, according to the South Korean Nuclear Safety and Security Commission.
Orders were given to nuclear operators to upgrade old reactors to that standard after the disaster at Japan’s Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in 2011 brought about by tsunami.
“That will be completed by next year,” said Shim Eun-jung, a spokeswoman at the nuclear watchdog.
South Korea’s 25 reactors supply about one-third of the nation’s electricity and make it the world’s fifth-largest user of nuclear power.
It plans to add nine more nuclear plants by 2027, according to the nuclear watchdog.
Park Jong-kwon, head of an anti-nuclear civic group in South Gyeongsang Province, said that no more nuclear reactors should be built in southeastern cities like Ulsan and Gyeongju, as they are close to an active faultline.
“Even though nuclear reactors are designed to withstand an earthquake of a magnitude 7, if they are hit by 4.5 and 5.8 magnitude earthquakes several times, they can be knocked down by a real 7 magnitude earthquake at a single blow,” Park said.
About 70 percent of South Korea’s nuclear reactors are in the southeast, partly to locate them further away from North Korea.
The two sides are still technically at war after the Korean War ended with an armistice, not a peace treaty.
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