Japan will restart fifth nuclear reactor in July

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Workers have begun loading nuclear fuel into a reactor at the Ikata power plant in western Japan. The operator plans to restart the reactor in late July.

Shikoku Electric Power Co. started loading nuclear fuel Friday into a reactor at its Ikata power plant, paving the way for a scheduled restart next month.

The utility plans to reactivate the No. 3 unit at the plant in Ehime Prefecture on July 26. The company envisions beginning electricity generation three days later and resuming commercial operation in mid-August.

The pressurized-water reactor using uranium-plutonium mixed oxide, or MOX, fuel, will be the fifth unit to be reactivated under tougher regulations introduced in the wake of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster.

In February, 2016, Kansai Electric Power Co.’s Takahama No. 4 reactor in Fukui Prefecture was Japan’s fourth nuclear reactor to be restarted since 2012 and the first to burn MOX, a mixed-oxide fuel that contains plutonium.

SOURCES – NHK, Japan Times