Nuclear Plant Fire Caused a Huge Oil Spill on to Hudson River

After the transformer failure that took place at Indian Point nuclear plant earlier today. The oil from the transformer overflowed from its holding tank and on to the river.

The oil has now polluted the Hudson River and the crew from the plant is clueless about how much oil has leaked there. The crew tried to clean up as much as they could but the governor of New York, Andrew Cuomo, says it might be thousands of gallons.

A reactor was forced shutdown due to a transformer failure at the Indian Point nuclear power plant in suburban New York, causing a fire. According to a spokesman of the Entergy Corp, the reactor was considered secure since the fire was quickly taken care of and almost immediately put out.

Energy generated by the plant is essentially taken by the transformer at Indian Point and the voltage for the grid supplying power to the state is changed. Jerry Nappi, an energy spokesman commented that the combustion which occurred on Saturday was extinguished by members of the staff and a sprinkler system. Westchester fire department and the County police were on site as an additional safety measure.

Whether the transformer would be repaired or replaced and the cause and extent of the transformer failure was not apparent instantly. However, there were no health or safety risks according to Mr. Nappi. The question regarding how long the 1,000-megawatt reactor will be down is a blur and is currently under investigation.

Millions of homes, businesses and public facilities in New York City and Westchester County acquire electricity from the Indian Point Energy Center in Buchanan, located thirty five miles up the Hudson River from midtown Manhattan.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, state, county and local officials were notified of the occurrence in accordance with federal regulations, and it is deemed as the lowest of four emergency classifications for U.S. nuclear plants.

After Gov. Andrew Cuomo was notified on the failure at the site, he informed that the officials would evaluate how the emergency was dealt with to determine if the situation could have been taken care of in a better way. Cuomo informed that the fire caused oil to leak and there was a high possibility that it could cause oil to spill into the Hudson River, but crews were working containing it.

According to Mr. Cuomo lately there had been too many emergencies. Since Thursday morning Unit 3 has been shut down for a water leak on the non-nuclear side of the plant. Nappi informed there was no radioactive release and it was repaired. There was a month long shut down of Unit 3 for a planned refueling in March.

Moreover, spokeswoman Diane Screnci mentioned that there was no impact on the public. She also added it was not unusual for a transformer to have complications, and assured that it was on the non-nuclear sector of the plant.