The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued a draft environmental assessment (EA) finding of no significant impact (FONSI) for NextEra Energy’s Duane Arnold Energy Center in Iowa Monday.
With the issuance of the draft environmental documents, NRC is also seeking public input on the regulatory matters, according to the Federal Register notice. The comment period closes on Sept. 2.
According to the notice, NRC staff conducted the draft environmental assessment and FONSI for the environmental review of Duane Arnold, a shuttered plant that is planned to restart its operations.
NRC staff said it assessed potential environmental effects from the proposed restart of operations, such as land use, surface water and air quality. The staff additionally considered effects from decommissioning impacts, but ultimately found nothing it felt would be of significant harm to the environment.
“The NRC staff determined that the environmental impacts of the proposed actions would be NOT SIGNIFICANT for each potentially affected environmental resource area,” according to the notice. “In addition, the NRC staff determined that the projected effects of climate change would not alter any of the impact determinations described in the EA.”
In finding no significant environmental impacts from coming back online, NRC staff determined an environmental impact statement was not necessary and a FONSI would suffice. The agency’s staff also determined that no alternative environmental option was needed for these proposed actions of restarting Duane Arnold.
Duane Arnold, based in Linn County, Iowa, is a single boiling water unit that has a generating capacity of 615 megawatts. The plant ceased operations in 2020. However, last year NextEra partnered up with Google via a 25-year power-purchase agreement to help restart the Duane Arnold plant.
In April, NRC asked for public input on NextEra’s three license amendment requests that would support the restart of the Iowa plant.
NextEra recently said that it expects Duane Arnold to back up and generate electricity no later than the first quarter of 2029. Duane Arnold’s operating license is scheduled to expire in February 2034.