AmerenUE’s Callaway Nuclear Plant, located near Fulton, Mo., is scheduled to go offline early Saturday, April 17, to begin a routine refueling and maintenance outage. The plant is expected to be out of service for about 35 days.
Refueling outages at the 1,190-megawatt plant occur every 18 months, and this will be the plant’s 17th refueling since it began operating in 1984. Callaway’s most recent refueling occurred in the fall of 2008.
During refueling, operators will replace 88 of the 193 fuel assemblies in the reactor core. A fuel assembly is an 8 ½-inch-square bundle of 12-foot-long metal tubes containing ceramic pellets of uranium dioxide fuel.
As in past refueling outages, thousands of maintenance activities, modifications, inspections and tests will also be performed, to ensure maximum safety and reliability when the plant returns to service. About 1,000 supplemental workers will join the plant’s regular staff of about 900 employees to help handle the volume of outage activities.
While the Callaway Plant is out of service, its generation will be replaced by other plants.
In 2009, the Callaway Plant generated more electricity than in any other calendar year in its 25 years of operation. The plant’s net generation of 10.2 million megawatt-hours was enough to supply the electricity needs of 780,000 average households. Callaway was the second largest power producer on the UE system—accounting for 21 percent of UE’s total generation. 2009 was also one of the plant’s best years for worker safety, with no lost workday accidents.
AmerenUE, founded in 1902, provides electric and gas service to approximately 1.2 million customers across central and eastern Missouri, including the greater St. Louis area. UE serves 57 Missouri counties and 500 towns. The company's electric rates are among the lowest in the nation. For more information, visit www.amerenue.com.
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Contact: Mike Cleary, 573.681.1737