Jellyfish force French nuclear plant shutdown
A “massive” swarm of jellyfish has triggered the shutdown of a nuclear power plant in northern France, the operator of the facility said on Monday.
The bloom of marine creatures clogged cooling systems filters at the plant at Gravelines, according to energy group EDF. The “massive and unpredictable presence of jellyfish” prompted four of the facility’s power units to automatically shut off. The entire plant was put offline, as two other units were already inoperable due to maintenance.
The incident, which occurred late on Sunday, had “no impact on the safety of the facilities, the safety of personnel, or the environment,” EDF said, adding that the gelatinous creatures made it only to “the non-nuclear part of the facilities.”
“The plant teams are mobilized and are currently carrying out the necessary diagnostics and interventions to be able to restart the production units safely,” the energy group added.
The nuclear site draws cooling water from a channel linking it to the North Sea, which is home to several jellyfish species. The plant operator did not elaborate on the type of jellyfish involved in the incident.
There are multiple cases of jellyfish getting sucked into cooling systems or clogging up intake pipes of nuclear and conventional energy facilities worldwide.
The Gravelines power plant is one of the largest nuclear sites in France, a country which gets 70% of its electricity from nuclear installations. Six of the facility's units have a peak production of 900 megawatts each, making the station alone capable of powering an estimated 5 million homes.
