updateThe restart of the Doel 2 nuclear reactor, which stopped unexpectedly on Thursday morning, will take place on Saturday morning and not on Friday as previously mentioned, confirmed Engie Electrabel.
Doel 2 stopped automatically this Thursday around 09:45. The stoppage turned out to be due to a short circuit in the control system of a control rod, it is explained. “This is a purely operational problem. There is no danger to safety,” said a spokeswoman for Engie Electrabel.
This shutdown comes as Tihange 3 (1,038 MW) has also been shut down since Monday, probably until October 15. This was also a stop that had not been scheduled. It was attributed to a drop in pressure in one of the generators.
The other four nuclear reactors are producing normally. The seventh of the Belgian nuclear fleet, Doel 3, was permanently shut down at the end of September as part of the nuclear phase-out law. The Doel 2 outage apparently caused little disruption to the electricity market on Thursday.
Extension of the Doel 1 and Doel 2 reactors
In addition, the Chamber adopted Thursday in plenary session a bill aimed at postponing the gradual exit from nuclear energy from 2015 to 2025. More specifically, the text endorses the decision to extend the operation of the Doel 1 and Doel reactors 2.
This decision was taken in 2014 under the previous legislature by the Michel government. But the Constitutional Court had canceled it because certain requirements were not met, such as the preparation of an environmental impact study. Now the various requirements are met. The Council of Ministers had therefore approved on June 10 the “remedial” draft law extending Doel 1 and 2 by 10 years.
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