March 3, 2016 – Ontario Power Generation (OPG) has begun a $75-million planned maintenance and inspection outage on the 500MW Pickering Nuclear Unit 8, which was removed from service March 1.

“The strong performance of Unit 8 helped Pickering Nuclear achieve its best-ever reliability performance in 2015,” said Brian McGee, senior vice-president.

OPG says it has invested more than $200 million in the Pickering nuclear generating station since 2010. During the Unit 8 planned outage, the generator says more than 20,000 tasks will be performed.

In January, OPG announced a plan to pursue continued operation of the Pickering Station to 2024 to provide reliable baseload power during the Darlington and initial Bruce refurbishments.