The Tennessee Valley Authority’s Sequoyah Nuclear Plant Unit 1 started a scheduled refueling and maintenance outage early Saturday morning after generating nearly 1.4 billion kilowatt hours of carbon-free energy, following more than 500 days of power operation.
“Outages like this demonstrate TVA’s investment to deliver reliable, low-cost, carbon-free electricity for the people and businesses of the Valley,” said Matt Rasmussen, TVA Sequoyah site vice president. “The team will load new nuclear fuel and perform key maintenance activities that can only be safely completed with the unit offline.”
According to Mr. Rasmussen, preparations begin years in advance. Planning for this outage began in May 2016, as part of the site’s standard work management practices to ensure all work can be completed safely and as scheduled.
“Sequoyah’s highly skilled workforce is making the most of this opportunity to ensure Unit 1 continues to operate safely and reliably until its next refueling outage about 18 months from now,” Mr. Rasmussen said.
An additional 872 contract employees are supplementing the site’s regular staff during the scheduled outage. Over 11,443 work activities are planned, including loading new fuel assemblies, performing inspections of reactor components, maintenance of plant equipment and installing unit enhancements.
"Sequoyah Unit 1 is one of seven TVA nuclear reactors across the Valley. Collectively, TVA’s nuclear fleet safely and reliably provides more than 40 percent of all electricity used by nearly 10 million people in the Tennessee Valley," officials said.