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Holtec Adds Indian Point Nuclear Plant to Decommissioning Portfolio

April 17, 2019

Entergy on April 16 said it will sell its Indian Point Energy Center to Comprehensive Decommissioning International, a Camden, N.J.-based jointly owned subsidiary of Holtec International, a company buying nuclear plants that are closed or scheduled for retirement.

Holtec in the deal will receive funds that Entergy has invested in a decommissioning trust, currently worth about $ 2 billion. Entergy has now agreed to sell all its remaining fleet of merchant nuclear reactors to decommissioning firms; the company last year said it would sell its Vermont Yankee plant, which closed in 2014, to New York-based NorthStar.

NorthStar said it would complete decommissioning and restoration of the Vermont Yankee site by 2030. Entergy in its decommissioning report filed with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) had said its work would not be completed until 2075.

Entergy has said it will shut down the last two of Indian Point’s three reactors in 2021. Unit 1, a 257-MW reactor that came online in 1962, was retired in 1974.…

Ohio Lawmakers Announce Plan to Subsidize Nuclear Plants

April 15, 2019

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Ohio lawmakers on April 12 announced a plan to provide financial support to the state’s two nuclear power plants by adding a surcharge to customers’ electric bills. The bill’s supporters said it also would generate as much as $ 300 million annually for clean power generation in Ohio, though the measure calls for abolishing mandates for renewable energy.

House Speaker Larry Householder (R), leader of the state’s Republican-controlled House that is backing the bill, said the proposal—called the Ohio Clean Air Program (OCAP) —would do more than save the nuclear plants. About half the money raised by the surcharge would go to Davis-Besse nuclear plant near Toledo and the Perry plant near Cleveland.

The nuclear plants are scheduled to close by 2021 unless operator FirstEnergy Solutions (FES) can find a buyer for the plants or financial relief to keep them open. FES sought bankruptcy protection in March 2018, just after the company notified regional transmission organization (RTO) PJM Interconnection that it would close four uneconomic nuclear units—a total of 4 GW, including the two Ohio plants—in the RTO’s footprint.…

CEOs Say Preserving the Nuclear Power Fleet Is Imperative

March 28, 2019

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Several power-sector CEOs—appearing at the Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) Summit in New York this week—suggested that existing nuclear power plants should not be allowed to slowly vanish from the U.S. electricity grid under market pressure caused by cheap natural gas and the growth of renewable energy. The leaders submitted that nuclear power provides important carbon-free energy needed to meet greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction goals.

“We have this issue in the U.S. around nuclear. It doesn’t compete against gas, but is a critical component of a decarbonized future,” said Audrey Zibelman, CEO and managing director of the Australian Energy Market Operator. Although Zibelman no longer resides in the U.S., she appeared to still have a vested interest in the country’s energy sector, having previously chaired the New York State Public Service Commission, and having been executive vice president and chief operating officer of the PJM Interconnection, among other things.

Ralph Izzo, chairman, president, and CEO of Public Service Enterprise Group Inc.…

Gas Now Tops Coal in PJM, but Nuclear Still No. 1

March 20, 2019

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A report from an independent market monitor for PJM Interconnection shows that natural gas-fired power generation topped coal-fired output in PJM in 2018, the first time that gas has topped coal in the history of the largest U.S. grid operator.

The “2018 State of the Market” report from Monitoring Analytics LLC, which includes Volume 1 and Volume 2, was released March 14. It showed that while nuclear power continues to lead PJM electricity production, at 34.2%, natural gas-fired generation accounted for 30.6% of PJM’s power mix last year, while coal-fired units provided 28.6% of the region’s power.

The report showed that gas-fired generation in PJM rose by more than 18% in 2018. Coal generation dropped by 6.6%, and nuclear generation fell by 0.5%.

PJM serves 65 million people in all or parts of 13 states and the District of Columbia.

“This winter confirms what we have been seeing in PJM recently,” said PJM President and CEO Andrew L. Ott in a March 18 news release.…

Dominion Reaches Deal to Keep Millstone Nuclear Plant Open

March 18, 2019

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Dominion Energy has reached an agreement with utilities in Connecticut to keep the Millstone Power Station, the state’s only nuclear power plant, in service for at least another decade.

Dominion announced the deal March 15, the deadline the company had to tell ISO New England, the regional grid operator, whether it would retire the two reactors at the 2,088-MW plant.

The Millstone station produces about half the electricity in Connecticut. Analysts have said it also accounts for 98% of the state’s carbon-free power, and its operation is seen as key for the state to meet its carbon reduction goals.

“This is a huge win for Connecticut, the region, and our colleagues at Millstone,” Paul Koonce, president and chief executive of Dominion’s Power Generation Group, said in a statement. “Not only does this preserve the vast majority of Connecticut’s carbon-free electricity, it preserves good jobs for the 1,500 women and men who work at Millstone and keeps 4,000 other residents employed.”

Dominion, headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, has for years said that the Millstone station is no longer economic to operate.…

THE BIG PICTURE: Japan’s Nuclear Comeback

March 1, 2019

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After the Great Tohoku Earthquake and tsunami, and ensuing crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in March 2011, Japan issued stringent safety regulations and reviews that affected its entire 50-reactor fleet. It meant that as each Japanese nuclear reactor entered its scheduled maintenance and refueling outage, it could not returned to operation until restart was approved by both Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) and the central government. Nuclear operators also need consent from governments of local prefectures.

Between September 2013—when Ohi 3 and 4 were shut down—and August 2015, when Sendai 1 and 2 restarted, Japan’s entire reactor fleet went black. In 2013, though there was no consensus on how long the approval process could take, some industry observers forecast reactors under NRA review could be back online within a year. As of December 2018, only nine reactors had restarted. Sixteen others were under review by the NRA, where average review duration stretched beyond 1,000 days, owing to staffing issues.…