California’s last nuclear power plant must start its federal relicensing process anew, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Tuesday, derailing its operator’s plan to put huge chunks of bailout money to quick work via a regulatory shortcut.
In 2022, Diablo Canyon Power Plant operator Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) secured more than $2 billion in financial aid from Sacramento and the Department of Energy, giving the company the financial resources it said it needed to keep the Avila Beach, Calif., plant online until at least 2030, five years past its planned shutdown date.
But even with the bailout money lined up, PG&E needed a way to prevent the plant’s operating license with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission from lapsing before 2025. The company had been working on a license renewal application with the feds but walked away from it in 2018 when it announced it would shut down the plant.
Suddenly flush with cash four years later, PG&E asked the NRC to resurrect the abandoned license application, reasoning that the shortcut would prevent Diablo Canyon from losing its license before the NRC could get all the way through a fresh renewal application.
On Tuesday, the NRC said no.
Such an action “would not be consistent” with NRC regulations and that “there is no compelling precedent to support your request to resume the review of your withdrawn application,” the letter reads.
Without quick action by the NRC, Diablo Canyon’s license will run out in December 2025. A company spokesperson on Tuesday said it will take until the end of 2023 just to get a new license renewal application to the commission.
However, there is still hope for the plant.
NRC on Tuesday said it was still “evaluating” a separate request from PG&E for a regulatory exemption that would allow Diablo Canyon’s license to remain in effect — even after it expires — while the agency weighs a renewal. The commission plans to respond to that request in a separate letter, NRC said.
A spokesperson for PG&E told the Exchange Monitor via email Tuesday that the utility had taken into account that NRC might reject its request to resume license renewal activities.
“We have been developing application materials and supporting documents to support a filing with the NRC later this year,” the spokesperson said.
If a new license is approved, PG&E plans to keep Diablo Canyon afloat until 2030 or so using roughly $1.1 billion in federal cash awarded by DOE in November as part of the agency’s civil nuclear credits program. The utility also has access to up to $1.4 billion in state-stewarded loans authorized in a package of climate legislation signed into law in August by Gov. Gavin Newsom (D).
