As Bruce Power continues its upgrade of its Unit 3 Major Component Replacement, the company says that the project is on track.
The energy company says that it’s running on time and on budget as it marks the one-year milestone of the three-year replacement project.
Executive Vice-President and Chief Development Officer for Bruce Power James Scongack says that the crew completing the upgrade was able to improve using their experience from the replacement of Unit 6.
“We’re really seeing the project progress safely and on track,” he says. “What’s really important for us is that as we learn in one Major Component Replacement, we continue to improve as we go along and certainly we’re advancing along that trajectory.”
Unit 6 was returned to service ahead of schedule and under budget in September of 2023 and the company says that the three-year Unit 3 MCR outage is on track to improve upon that performance.
Scongack says that a lot of that success was based on input from employees who were completing the work.
“Working closely with our vendor partners on improving tooling for various evolutions, [and] taking worker input and empowering them with our vendor partners on investing in new and advanced tooling with different types of technology, so you really see more automation and a tremendous amount of worker engagement driving that.”
The Major Component Replacement will see Units 3-8 refurbished, allowing the site to continue its goal of providing clean energy and producing medical isotopes.
During the Canadian Nuclear Association’s annual conference in Ottawa, the company announced that they’ll be increasing the production of Cobalt-60 when they complete the Unit 7 MCR project, which is slated to begin in April.
Cobalt-60 is used to sterilize medical equipment, as well as treat brain tumours and breast cancer.
“We’re really pleased to announce the expansion of that, and it will continue to position our company, Ontario, and Canada as a very critical but reliable provider of life-saving medical isotopes.”
Bruce Power’s Life Extension Program and Major Component Replacement project is one of Canada’s largest infrastructure projects.
