Today marks 50 years since Fermi 1 accident
This is a copy of a photo of the the Fermi 1 that is a part of the Fermi 1 exhibit that is installed in the halls of the Career Technology Center on the campus of Monroe County Community College in Monroe.
Photographed Monday, Sept. 26, 2016.
FERMI HISTORICAL EXHIBIT
JC REINDL | Detroit Free Press - October 5, 2016
It was 50 years ago today that Monroe County was the site of the worst nuclear accident at a U.S. commercial power plant, years before Three Mile Island captivated the nation.
The incident occurred around 3 p.m. at the now-defunct Fermi 1 plant in Frenchtown Township near Monroe and involved the partial meltdown of nuclear fuel in the reactor's core. No one was hurt and no dangerous radiation released in the Oct. 5, 1966, mishap. However, the plant remained shut down for nearly four years. It reopened in July 1970 but then was permanently shut for economic reasons in 1972 after producing just a trickle of electricity.
Controversy over just how close southeast Michigan actually came to a serious nuclear accident hasn't fully died down.
Fermi 1 was the subject of a 1975 anti-nuclear book, "We Almost Lost Detroit," and the inspiration for a song of the same name by the late Gil Scott Heron, more recently covered by the Detroit indie band JR JR.
But nuclear industry experts and officials at Detroit Edison (now DTE Energy), which operated Fermi I and led the consortium of power and industrial firms that developed it, say the book grossly exaggerated the dangers and emphasized that its safety systems worked. The utility company published a detailed rebuttal in 1976 titled "We Did Not Almost Lose Detroit."
"We did not lose Detroit and we did not almost lose it, either," DTE spokesman Guy Cerullo said last month.
Fermi I was much different from nuclear plants today and featured an experimental "breeder reactor" that could theoretically generate more nuclear fuel than it consumed. This reactor was cooled by the nonstop circulation of liquid sodium, a highly volatile substance that can explode if exposed to water or outside air. Most current U.S. nuclear plants, such as Fermi 2, are cooled by ordinary water.
The Fermi 1 incident occurred after a metal object broke loose inside the reactor vessel and blocked the sodium coolant from reaching a portion of the fuel — causing a small portion of the fuel to melt. The object at one point was thought to be a beer can, but later discovered as a zirconium plate.
Today many of Fermi 1's original buildings are still standing, although the reactor vessel was cut up and shipped out. It remains the first of just two breeder reactors built for potential commercial use to operate in the U.S.
The 1979 nuclear incident at Three Mile Island (Pa.) was more serious and involved the melting of about half of the reactor core. Thousands were evacuated for that mishap, but there was no dangerous release of radioactive material because the plant's containment building remained intact — unlike the subsequent Chernobyl (Soviet Union), and Fukushima (Japan) accidents.
Contact JC Reindl: 313-222-6631 or jcreindl@freepress.com.
Follow him on Twitter @JCReindl.
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