The Indian Point Energy Center is located in Buchanan, New York. It draws cooling water from the Hudson River. There are three Westinghouse pressurized water reactors at the Center. Unit 1 was put into operation in 1962 and permanently shut down in 1974 because it did not have an emergency core cooling system. Unit 2 was built by Consolidated Edison and began commercial operation in 1973 with a license to operation until 2014.
I have already written a post about decommissioning nuclear reactors. In that previous post, I ending it by writing about concerns I had with the funding of the decommissioning. In this post, I want to drill down into that subject a bit more. The NRC requires nuclear power companies to maintain sufficient funds to dismantle nuclear power reactors and decontaminate the land where the reactor was located.
The Clinton Nuclear Generating Station is located near Clinton, Illinois. It is a General Electric Generation II boiling water reactor with a one thousand megawatt generation capacity. It was built by Illinois Power and put into operation in 1987 with a forty year operating license until 2026.The plant owners also own a five thousand acre cooling reservoir, most of which is open for recreational use.
The Pilgrim Nuclear Generating Station is located in Plymouth, Massachusetts and draws its cooling water from Cape Cod Bay. It is a General Electric boiling water reactor built in 1972 by Boston Edison with a six hundred and ninety megawatt generation capacity. It was sold to Entergy Corporation in 1999. The original license expired in 2012. In 2006, Entergy applied for a twenty year extension which was granted.
The Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station is fifty miles southeast of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and draws cooling water from the Susquehanna River. Unit One was an experimental reactor that only operated for eight years and was shut down in 1974. Unit Two and Unit Three are General Electric boiling water reactors rated at one thousand two hundred megawatts each.
The Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station is fifty miles southeast of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and draws cooling water from the Susquehanna River. Unit One was an experimental reactor that only operated for eight years and was shut down in 1974. Unit Two and Unit Three are General Electric boiling water reactors rated at one thousand two hundred megawatts each.
The Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant is located in Vernon, Vermont. It has a six hundred and twenty megawatt General Electric boiling water reactor that draws cooling water from the reservoir pool of the Vernon Hydroelectric Dam on the Connecticut River. It was put into operation in 1972 and was licensed for forty years until 2012. Entergy Nuclear currently owns and operates the power plant.
The Braidwood Nuclear Generating Station (BNGS) is located in northeastern Illinois near Joliet and draws it water from the Kankakee River. It was originally built by Commonwealth Edison and ultimately transferred to Exelon Corporation, the parent company of Commonwealth Edison. The Station contains two Westinghouse pressurized water reactors. The Unit 1 reactor was put into operation in 1987 and is licensed by the NRC to operate until 2026.
The nuclear industry is in serious trouble these days. It if was not so huge and tightly involved with national governments, it would have collapsed long ago. I got this list of problems for the nuclear industry off the Nuclear-News website and have added a few comments of my own.
The Palisades Nuclear Plant is located on Lake Michigan near South Haven, Michigan. The reactor is a Combustion Engineering pressurized water reactor that was put into operation at the end of 1971. It can generate up to seven hundred and fifty megawatts of electricity. It was owned by CMS Energy Corporation and operated by the Nuclear Management Company prior to April of 2007 at which time it was purchased by Entergy. The reactor was originally licensed to 2011.
