EDF Energy has confirmed that it shut down four of its nuclear power reactors in the UK for at least eight weeks after discovering a fault in a boiler unit. The down time resulted in a loss of nearly one quarter of the French company's total nuclear power capacity.
In total EDF owns and operates eight nuclear generators throughout the UK and provides 8.8m kilowatts, representing about ten percent of that nation's total electrical output. According to cnbc.com, the faulty boiler was discovered at the plant in Heysham during a scheduled outage for routine inspection.
At the time the faulty part was isolated and the boiler was returned to service at a lower capacity. It has since been shut down entirely and EDF says they plan "to carry out further inspections in order to satisfy itself and the regulator that the reactors can be safely returned to service."
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