Sinking South Korea nuclear plant is safe - officials
Date: 09-Sep-02
Country: SOUTH KOREA
The Dong-a Ilbo daily had said last week part of the Ulsong nuclear power plant had sunk 7.54 mm (0.2968 inch) since 1978. The report was said to have been based on information from the Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co, which operates the power plant.
Quoting some geological experts, the newspaper also said the situation could get worse, particularly if there was a geological fault in the ground below the plant's number one nuclear reactor.
But Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co, a wholly-owned unit of state-run Korea Electric Power Corp (KEPCO) , said in a statement the subsidence was "within permissible limits of 12.95 mm" and rejected the suggestion of a (geological) fault near the plant.
"It does not threaten the safety at all and it is not sinking any more," Ham Young-seung, a senior engineering official at Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power told Reuters.
The company said they had expected the subsidence before they started building the plant completed in 1983, but went ahead with their plan as geological experts said it was not a problem.
A geology professor at a local university also said the newspaper report appeared alarmist.
"It is more like an assumption that a fault is near the plant. And I don't see the ground would sink further," said the professor, who asked not to be identified.
The power plant has four nuclear power reactors with combined power generation capacity of 2,770 megawatts (MW).
Nuclear power supplies about 40 percent of South Korea's total electricity demand.
