New South Korean reactor shuts down

An automatic shutdown was triggered at a nuclear power plant in South Korea Sunday, the facility's operators said. Korea Hydro and Nuclear Power Co. said the new Shin Woldong 1 reactor went offline Sunday morning when a malfunction was detected in a system that control's the power output of the plant. A company official told the Yonhap news agency the cause of the malfunction was being determined and there was no danger of a radiation leak. The Shin Woldong 1 reactor located southeast of Seoul went into operation at the end of July and has a capacity of 1 million kilowatts, Yonhap said. The shutdown comes at a time when South Korea's electricity supply has been strained by hot weather. The nation came close to a blackout last September when high temperatures continued into early fall. About 30 percent of South Korea's electricity comes from 23 nuclear plants.