Officials: Slovenian nuke plant shuts down
Slovenian nuclear plant shuts down after steam pressure drop, no radiation leak reported
KRSKO, Slovenia (AP) -- Slovenia's only nuclear power plant shut down automatically on Monday after a drop in pressure in a steam generator and there was no danger of a leak, officials said.
Slovenia's Nuclear Safety Administration said the shutdown happened shortly before noon and that "all safety systems functioned properly." An investigation was being conducted and "the situation is under control," Andrej Stritar, the head of the agency, told the state STA news agency
The plant in Krsko, some 60 kilometers (37 miles) east of Ljubljana, the capital, was built by Westinghouse and is owned jointly by Slovenia and Croatia. It went into operation in 1983 and has one 2,000 MW reactor.
In June 2008, a faulty valve caused a water leak in the plant, raising alarms across Europe. Another incident briefly closed down the plant in March 2011.
Environmentalists had urged the Slovenian government to shut the plant down before its scheduled closure in 2023 because of safety concerns.
