EDF has awarded a contract to Alstom to retrofit the control systems of all of its 1300 MWe units in France. The contract is part of EDF's program to extend the operating lives of those units.

After four years out of service, New Brunswick Power's Point Lepreau nuclear power plant is entering the final phases of its restart program with regulatory approval to increase power up to 35%.

Work to bolster tsunami and flood protection at the Hamaoka nuclear power plant in Japan will not be completed until the end of 2013, Chubu Electric Power Company has announced. The plant will remain offline until it has strengthened its sea defences.

Canadian regulators have authorised the restart of the Point Lepreau nuclear power station at low power. The announcement comes days after Bruce A1, also undergoing major refurbishment, received permission to restart.

Bruce A's unit 1 can restart following refurbishment, Canadian nuclear regulators have ruled. The reactor has been out of service since 1997.

A regulatory investigation team has pointed at "faulty computer modelling" and "manufacturing issues" as contributing factors to the rapid deterioration of steam generator tubing at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). 

 

Data has been released on tube wear in the steam generators at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). Plant owner Southern California Edison has still to determine when the two reactors there will be restarted.

Honeywell is evaluating a series of upgrades for the Metropolis Works uranium conversion plant following the results of inspections on its preparedness for extreme natural disasters.

The long-awaited return to service of the refurbished unit 2 of the Bruce A nuclear power plant in Ontario, Canada, has been delayed due to damage in an electrical generator on the non-nuclear side of the plant.

More than 1300 steam generator tubes have now been plugged at Southern California Edison's San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) in California as the utility continues to investigate the cause of excessive wear in some of the tubes. It is not yet known when the two-unit plant will resume operation.

Projected costs for ongoing uprates at four Florida Power and Light nuclear units have increased by over half a billion dollars - but will still save customers around $3.8 billion in fossil fuel costs over the long term, the utility claims.

US utility Xcel Energy has reduced the size and delayed the schedule of a planned uprate at its Prairie Island nuclear power plant in Minnesota following a reassessment of the project's value to customers.