The Omaha, Neb., Public Power District (OPPD) projects it will cost nearly $1.4 billion over five decades to maintain and then decommission the shuttered Fort Calhoun Station nuclear power plant, according to the utility’s newly released post-shutdown decommissioning activities report (PSDAR).
The 43-year-old single-reactor facility permanently shut down last October, due to what OPPD described as difficult market conditions and other challenges. The utility said at the time it would place Fort Calhoun in SAFSTOR (safe storage) mode under which nuclear plants can delay full decommissioning for up to 60 years while radioactivity levels drop and additional funds are set aside for cleanup.
The PSDAR, submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission on March 30 and made public last week, lays out a detailed schedule and spending forecast for decommissioning of the site 19 miles north of Omaha.
Preparations for SAFSTOR are underway and include a long checklist of items to be completed, including deactivation of systems that are no longer necessary, disposing of surplus tools and other incidental waste, and conducting interim radiation surveys. All nuclear fuel has already been removed from the reactor, with 944 assemblies now in the spent fuel pool and 320 in dry-cask storage; all material in the pool will in 2022 be transferred to Fort Calhoun’s independent spent fuel storage installation (ISFSI).
The preparatory phase is scheduled to end on July 1, 2018, after which the plant will remain dormant until 2058. Reduced operations in this 40-year period would include 24-hour security, various maintenance activities, and site environmental and radiation monitoring, according to the PSDAR.
OPPD anticipates that it will by the end of the SAFSTOR period have transferred its spent fuel to the Department of Energy, per the 1982 congressional order that the federal agency build a permanent repository for U.S. defense and commercial nuclear waste. Congress in 1987 designated Yucca Mountain, Nev., as the site; the Obama administration in 2009 canceled that project, but the Trump administration has indicated its intention to resume NRC licensing for the facility – to Nevada’s great dismay.
The Fort Calhoun spent fuel management plan anticipates DOE beginning to transfer commercial spent fuel to a federal facility in 2030, removal of spent fuel from the Nebraska facility’s ISFSI starting in 2032, and extracting all fuel from the site by 2058.
Preparations for dismantlement and decontamination would last from 2059 to 2060, with actual decommissioning and site restoration scheduled for 2060 to 2066. Significant work will begin with the extraction, packaging, and disposition of site parts connected to the reactor, so that the reactor vessel itself can then be dealt with. Other operations will include removal of gear from the plant’s support buildings and preparation of various radioactive wastes for final disposal, possibly at the Waste Control Specialists storage complex in Andrews County, Texas, or the EnergySolutions facility in Clive, Utah.
Total time from plant shutdown to license termination is forecast at 50.16 years. Site restoration would follow license termination, encompassing removing remaining structures “to a nominal depth of three feet below the surrounding grade level,” the PSDAR states. Afterward, the spaces would be backfilled.
License termination operations would cost just under $932 million, covering the preparation period, fuel storage, and elimination of the plant itself. Another $406 million would go toward spent fuel management, primarily storage operations. The remaining $46 million would be spent on site restoration.
The Omaha Public Power District has two accounts for decommissioning operations: The license termination expenditures account had a $288.1 million balance as of March 31, while the spent fuel management and site restoration expenditures trust held $111.6 million. “[W]e expect to be able to cover the expenses as planned,” via rate revenue and interest earnings for the accounts, OPPD spokeswoman Jodi Baker said by email.
There are no current plans for any deal similar to Entergy’s plan to sell its shuttered Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Station to New York-based NorthStar Group Services – which the companies say will cut decades off the timeline for decommissioning that plant. “OPPD periodically reviews its assets and agreements, following the guidance of its board of directors to act in the best interests of the district’s customer-owners,” another spokesman, Christopher Averett, said by email.
There are currently 442 employees at Fort Calhoun, down from 709 in January 2016 when the plant was operational. Once the facility enters SAFSTOR, employment is expected to drop to 72 workers providing security, systems monitoring, preventive maintenance, and other services.
The NRC is accepting comments on the PSDAR and decommissioning cost estimate through July 7 at www.regulations.gov, docket ID: NRC-2017-0099; by email or phone to Carol Gallagher, [email protected]. or 301-415-3463; or by mail to Cindy Bladey, Office of Administration, Mail Stop: OWFN-12- H08, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001.
The NRC has scheduled a public meeting on the new documents for 6 to 9 p.m. local time Wednesday, May 31, at the DoubleTree Hotel, 1616 Dodge St. in Omaha.
