31 May (NucNet): US-based utility Exelon Corporation has decided to prematurely shut down the single-unit Three Mile Island nuclear power station in Pennsylvania in September 2019 unless state authorities introduce a set of “needed” policy reforms, a statement by the company said.
Exelon said it will be taking the first steps to shut down the power station, including informing key stakeholders and notifying within 30 days the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, terminating capital investment needed for long term operation of the plant, as well as cancelling 2019 fuel purchases and outage planning activities.
The company said it will also take immediate one-time charges of $65-110m (€58-98m) for 2017 for the early retirement of the plant and accelerate about $1bn of asset depreciation between now and the announced shutdown date.
Exelon said it will focus on plant employees and the impact on the local community to prepare them for the potential shutdown of Three Mile Island.
The plant employs about 675 people, produces electricity to power 800,000 homes and pays more than $1m in state property taxes every year, Exelon said.
According to Exelon, nuclear power generation is not included in Pennsylvania’s Alternative Energy Portfolio Standard (AEPS) policy package, which supports 16 clean power sources including solar, wind and hydro.
Exelon said making amendments to the AEPS is needed to keep Pennsylvania’s nuclear stations in operation. Exelon said another solution may be the establishment of a zero emissions credit program, similar to the approach being implemented in Illinois and New York.
In December 2016, Exelon reached an agreement with Illinois governor Bruce Rauner on a proposed state energy bill, which was to recognise nuclear energy’s clean air value. The deal came a few months after Exelon had announced a decision to prematurely close the Clinton and Quad Cities nuclear power stations in Illinois if the state legislature would not pass the proposed Future Energy Jobs Bill by the end of 2016.
There is a single 819-MW pressurised water reactor in commercial operation since 1974 at the Three Mile Island site in southern Pennsylvania.
In 1979 the plant’s second unit, also a PWR, suffered a partial meltdown, which caused no deaths or injuries to workers or the nearby community, but ever since counted among the best-known civil nuclear accidents, along with those at Chernobyl in 1986 and Fukushima-Daiichi in 2011.
