• Tepco restarts Kashiwazaki-Kariwa unit 6 Tokyo Electric Power Company has restarted unit 6 of its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant in Japan’s Niigata Prefecture. • The company aims to return the reactor to commercial operation on 18 March. • The 1356 MWe Advanced Boiling Water Reactor (ABWR), which has been offline for almost 14 years, was restarted at 14:00 (local time) on Monday, Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) said. • Criticality - a state in which nuclear fission reactions occur continuously - was confirmed at 15:20. • Tepco said it plans to raise the pressure inside the reactor gradually after restarting it, and resume power generation and transmission on 16 February. • It will then halt the reactor temporarily on 20 February or later to check for abnormalities, before conducting a final inspection and confirmation from the Nuclear Regulation Authority.
Article Summaries:
- Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) restarted its 1,356‑MW Advanced Boiling Water Reactor (ABWR) at Kashiwazaki‑Kariwa Unit 6 on 14 February after almost 14 years offline. Criticality was confirmed at 15:20, and Tepco plans to gradually increase pressure before resuming power generation on 16 February. The unit will be temporarily shut down on 20 February or later for abnormality checks, followed by a final inspection by the Nuclear Regulation Authority. Commercial operation is scheduled for 18 March. The restart follows an earlier alarm in January that halted the unit, and marks the first Tepco reactor to resume after the Fukushima Daiichi accident.
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