NUCLEAR POWER STATION  TRIAL  

TRIAL RESULTS

The trial at this nuclear  power station differs from other stations where trials have been held by virtue of its geographic location in relation to our base in South Yorkshire and also by the fact that it is Nuclear powered and therefore subject to a more rigorous security policy. This has meant that we are limited to results from samples taken by the station staff and the sampling regime is not quite as comprehensive as we would normally do when we are totally dedicated to this task. However the simple truth of the matter is the trial unit was installed on 9^th July 2009 and a sample taken from inlet side of unit, this sample although of good colour was certainly cloudy. A sample was then taken on the 10^th July and by this time the oil was clear and bright. A sample was taken PM on the 11^th as turbine was being run up to load and the subsequent analysis of this was 647ppm. On Monday the 13^th a sample was taken and analysed the resultant contamination level was some 39ppm. Although some 40 hours had elapsed between samples the results are still superb and show levels of oil purity that Heysham 2 has never experienced before.

The trial continued and the results continued to show that the water level was maintained under the bacterial formation level. After a period of weeks it became apparent that although the Seal Oil was fed from the same source i.e  the main lubrication oil tank because it was separated by a baffle plate it was in fact creating its own micro tank system within the main tank and the level of water within this micro system was at some 700ppm. A decision was taken to combine both main lub oil tank and seal oil offline filtration points and effectively clean both systems simultaneously. The trial has now been running for 14 weeks and as is shown by graph both systems are being maintained at below bacterial formation levels.

The other positives to come out of this extended trial are the facts that the System Health monitoring devices fitted are showing no deteoriation in any of the three operating phases thereby indicating a zero consumable spend.