The owners of operational and shuttered nuclear power plants in 2017 all demonstrated “assurance” that they are prepared to manage the costs of decommissioning their facilities, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Agency staff offered its assessment in a summary of its evaluation of the decommissioning funding status reports filed last year by licensees for both power-generating facilities and those in decommissioning.
Federal law demands that nuclear licensees be able to show “reasonable assurance” that they are prepared to pay the costs of decommissioning their plants. That doesn’t necessarily mean they have all the financing on hand, but that funding amounts “provide assurance that licensees have available the bulk of the funds to safely decommission the facility,” according to the policy report, made public on Aug. 21, from Brian Holian, acting director of the NRC Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, to the five commissioners.
Licensees for all 100 operational nuclear power reactors demonstrated decommissioning funding assurance, as did the licensees for the 20 reactors now being decommissioned, the report says.
Three reactors that had funding shortfalls in the 2015 review – the two units at the Braidwood Generating Station and Unit 2 at the Byron Generating Station, both sites operated by Exelon in Illinois – had by last year met NRC minimum funding requirements.
While Indiana Michigan Power Co. demonstrated funding assurance for its Donald C. Cook Nuclear Plant in Michigan, the utility noted that its decommissioning trust for two reactor units dropped by about $150 million from 2015 to 2017. The company attributed the reduction to shifting funds to finance upcoming spent fuel management operations. The NRC has asked for more information on the situation, Holian wrote.
In addition, one of the decommissioning reactors – Unit 1 at EGC’s Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania – reported a $35 million shortfall. The company, though, “provided additional financial assurance to cover the estimated cost to complete decommissioning” for the reactor, the report says.
