Commercial Decommissioning

Thomas Gardiner The owner of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station (PNPS) in Massachusetts and nuclear watchdogs are questioning the effectiveness of state legislation that would force the company to pay the state $25 million annually for each year decommissioning of the facility remains unfinished after a half-decade. The bill was filed in January in the […]

A watchdog group in California on Thursday filed a federal lawsuit aimed at preventing storage of spent nuclear fuel at the closed San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). The lawsuit, from La Mesa-based Public Watchdogs, comes just months after a settlement to resolve a prior legal challenge against expansion of the plant’s dry storage pad […]

The owner of the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station (PNPS) in Massachusetts and nuclear watchdogs are questioning the effectiveness of state legislation that would force the company to pay the state $25 million annually for each year decommissioning of the facility remains unfinished after a half-decade. The bill was filed in January in the Massachusetts General […]

An administrative law judge for the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) on Wednesday recommended approval of Pacific Gas & Electric’s application to close the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant by 2025. The utility last year announced a joint proposal reached with labor and environmental organizations to shut down Diablo Canyon reactor Unit 1 in 2024 […]

Entergy has slightly narrowed its new timeline for closure of the Palisades Power Plant in Michigan, according to a recent letter to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The power provider had planned to close the nuclear facility next October, but in September pushed that back to spring 2022 following the dissolution of a deal for […]

Thomas Gardiner The transfer of spent fuel at the shuttered Vermont Yankee nuclear plant is proceeding as planned, a manager for owner Entergy said last week during a meeting of the state’s Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel. “We are transferring an average of one canister per week,” according to Joseph Lynch, the power company’s senior […]

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission expects more work on the back end of the nuclear fuel cycle as additional power plants shut down and spent fuel remains stored on-site at those facilities, a senior official said Tuesday. Twenty atomic energy facilities are already in decommissioning status, and a number of others are scheduled for closure […]

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is scheduled in November to release the final regulatory basis for its decommissioning rulemaking. The agency expects in 2019 to complete the rulemaking, which is intended to clarify and enhance the process of decommissioning nuclear power plants through amendments to current regulations. The focus is on reducing the need for […]

Entergy has slightly narrowed its new timeline for closure of the Palisades Power Plant in Michigan, according to a recent letter to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The power provider had planned to close the nuclear facility next October, but last month pushed that back to spring 2022 following the dissolution of a deal for […]

The transfer of spent fuel at the shuttered Vermont Yankee nuclear plant is proceeding as planned, a manager for owner Entergy said Thursday during a meeting of the state’s Nuclear Decommissioning Citizens Advisory Panel. “We are transferring an average of one canister per week,” Joseph Lynch, Entergy senior manager for government affairs, said during an […]

Power company Entergy on Tuesday reported higher earnings on both an as-reported and operational basis for the third quarter of the year. After-tax as-reported earnings rose from $388.2 million ($2.16 per share) in third-quarter 2016 to $398.2 million ($2.21 per share) in the latest earnings period. Operational earnings, on a non-generally accepted accounting principles basis, […]

Thomas Gardiner The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has unanimously voted to cut off a potential rule that would have required commercial nuclear facilities to promptly remediate radioactive contamination of surrounding ground, subsurface, and groundwater while still in operation. The three sitting commissioners voted in November and December 2016 to end the rulemaking. The notice was posted […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has received formal notice of Entergy’s intent to close its Palisades Power Plant in Michigan more than three years later than it had recently planned. Power operations will end in spring 2022, Charles Arnone, site vice president for Entergy Nuclear Operations, said in a Sept. 28 letter to the NRC. The […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved a request to effectively suspend the requirement that the Indian Point Energy Center in New York state complete fresh assessments of earthquake and flooding risks. The regulator in 2012 required that all holders of nuclear power reactor licenses and construction permits conduct the evaluations in the wake of the […]

Thomas Gardiner The California Public Utilities Commission this week laid out an open-ended schedule for finally resolving the settlement over the premature retirement of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) after parties failed to reach an agreement by the August deadline. The ruling sets forth an expedited schedule for hearings and filings to speed what […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved a request to effectively suspend the requirement that the Indian Point Energy Center in New York state complete fresh assessments of earthquake and flooding risks. The regulator in 2012 required that all holders of nuclear power reactor licenses and construction permits conduct the evaluations in the wake of the […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has received a formal notice of Entergy’s plans to close its Palisades Power Plant in Michigan more than three years later than earlier scheduled. Power operations will end in spring 2022, Charles Arnone, site vice president for Entergy Nuclear Operations, said in a Sept. 28 letter to the NRC. The letter, […]

An AREVA Nuclear Materials-NorthStar Group Services joint venture no longer expects to seal the deal in 2017 on its first acquisitions of nuclear plants for decommissioning, an executive said this week. The two companies in February announced the formation of Accelerated Decommissioning Partners, which would buy closed nuclear plants and take charge of decommissioning, site […]

Thomas Gardiner Degrading safety equipment in the spent nuclear fuel pool at the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts forced plant owner and operator Entergy to devise a plan to more than double its current number of used fuel assemblies in dry cask storage. The current storage situation, in which close to 3,000 spent fuel […]

Power company Entergy has notified the Nuclear Regulatory Commission of its plan to withdraw up to $4.5 million from the trust fund for decommissioning of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant. The disbursement from Bank of New York Mellon would occur 30 days after the date of the Aug. 15 letter from Entergy, which was posted […]

By Thomas Gardiner A settlement announced Monday could provide a path for more than 3.5 million pounds of nuclear waste from storage at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) along a California fault line to a more stable facility inland. The settlement agreement filed with the state Superior Court in San Diego brought potential […]

Entergy has notified the Nuclear Regulatory Commission of its plan to withdraw up to $4.5 million from the trust fund for decommissioning of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant. The disbursement from Bank of New York Mellon would occur 30 days after the date of the Aug. 15 letter from Entergy, which was posted Tuesday […]

Monday’s settlement to move nuclear waste away from the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) in California put potential punctuation on a nearly two-year lawsuit, but one potential recipient is already refusing to accept the material. The agreement between SONGS owner Southern California Edison and Citizens Oversight cites the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station near […]

A settlement announced Monday could provide a path for spent nuclear fuel from storage at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) along a California fault line to a more stable facility inland. The settlement agreement filed with the State Superior Court in San Diego on Monday morning brings potential resolution to a lawsuit originally […]

The parties to the 2014 ratepayer settlement for the premature retirement of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) told the California Public Utilities Commission on Tuesday that they have failed to negotiate a compromise on potential revisions to the deal. The commission had given the parties until Aug. 15 to hammer out any revisions […]

The contractor in charge of cleanup of the retired fast-reactor research and development facility at Dounreay, Scotland, said Friday it expects next year to select a subcontractor to demolish the country’s oldest nuclear reactor. A formal notice for bids to manage teardown of the Dounreay Materials Test Reactor (DMTR) will be posted in the Official Journal […]

Power provider Exelon’s clean energy branch, which includes its nuclear power plants, lost $250 million in the second quarter. That was a drastic drop from the $8 million non-adjusted loss Exelon Generation reported for the same three-month period of 2016, according to the company’s earnings update Wednesday. Still, executives had cause for optimism about their […]

By Wayne Barber Entergy CEO Leo Denault said this week the company is determined to “finish strong” as it winds down operations at its non-utility nuclear power plants including the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts. “With critical decisions behind us, our strategy to execute a planned orderly exit of our Merchant business remains on […]

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Wednesday issued a confirmatory action letter laying out the operational corrections power provider Entergy has pledged to make at its Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Massachusetts. The nuclear industry regulator in 2015 placed Pilgrim in Column 4 of its Action Matrix, the lowest safety rating for an operating nuclear reactor, following […]

Power provider Exelon’s clean energy branch, which includes its nuclear power plants, lost $250 million in the second quarter. That was a drastic drop from the $8 million loss Exelon Generation reported for the same three-month period of 2016, according to the company’s earnings update Wednesday. On the upside, courts in Illinois and New York […]