KBOO Interview: Columbia Generating Station
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The Columbia Generating Station, a nuclear power facility in Washington, was shutdown on May 9th for refueling that was scheduled to take forty two days. Fifty days later, Columbia is only partially online, functioning at 60% of full operating capacity. Nuclear outages like this are planned to the hour, it is unusual to take an additional ten days then operate on only 60%. Nuclear plants are designed to be either shutdown or working at 100% capacity, not partial operation. In an interview with KBOO radio, Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds Energy Education gives his expert analysis of what might be going on as the public is kept in the dark by both Columbia's owner Energy Northwest and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
