Canadian isotope production restarts

Canada's National Research Universal reactor (NRU)returned to service in the early hours of 16 December, Atomic Energy ofCanada Ltd (AECL) has confirmed. The removal of medical isotopes forprocessing and distribution was expected to begin within four days ofthe restart. The reactor, at the Chalk River site, was shut down forscheduled maintenance on 6 December but AECL opted to extend the outageafter the country's nuclear regulator, the Canadian Nuclear SafetyCommission (CNSC), found out that safety upgrades mandated over a yearpreviously had not been implemented. The extended shutdown triggered acrisis in the supply of medical isotopes both in Canada and around theworld, and resulted in the Canadian government overruling the CNSC andordering an early restart. AECL partially completed the required workbefore Sunday's restart, and assured the government that the reactorcould operate safely in an interim configuration while the rest of theupgrade work is carried out.