Finishing the refurbishment of Darlington nuclear power plant’s Unit 2 will take longer than expected.

Ontario Power Generation (OPG) announced the delay in the 2019 second quarter financial results this month.

“We expect that Unit 2 will return to service in the second quarter of 2020, rather than the first quarter as previously anticipated, as a result of slower than expected installation of lower feeders,” OPG president and CEO Ken Hartwick said in a news release.

A feeder is a type of pipe that carries the coolant required to cool nuclear fuel.

“This revised schedule also reflects our unwavering commitment to safety as the No. 1 priority in everything we do. We continue to expect the project overall to be executed on time and on budget,” Hartwick said.

OPG began the first steps in the refurbishment of its four reactors at Darlington in October 2016, beginning with Unit 2. In the original schedule, work to install new tubes into the reactor was to be completed and loading fuel back into the reactor was to begin this summer.

The installation of fuel channel assemblies and upper and middle feeders on Unit 2 has been completed. The installation of the lower feeders is taking longer than expected. The lower feeder installation series is in progress and is now expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of 2019.

“It’s piping work and it just took longer than anticipated to complete these steps,” said OPG spokesperson Neal Kelly. “There was a fabrication delay, which had a cascading impact.”

Refurbishment work on the next reactor (Unit 3) is still expected to begin in early 2020. The schedule always included an overlap period when work would be finishing on the first unit and beginning on the next. The work of beginning and finishing a refurbishment involved different teams of workers with different specialties, explained Kelly.

As of June 30, 2019, $369 million has been invested in planning and prerequisite activities related to the refurbishment of Unit 3.

The overall refurbishment project is still on track to finish on schedule (expected completion is mid-2020s) and under the $12.8 billion budget, according to the financial results.

OPG’s Darlington station has been in operation since the early 1990s. Refurbishment (replacing critical components of the CANDU reactors) is expected to extend Darlington’s operating life by 30 years or more, and generate a total of $89.9 billion in economic benefits for Ontario and create 14,200 jobs per year.

Correction - August 20, 2019: This article was edited from a previous version that said the overall refurbishment project is expected to be complete in mid-2020. In fact, the expected completeion is mid-2020s.

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