Durham, NC – A second U.S. nuclear power construction project is expected to receive a license within weeks, but a new document shows that the majority owner and contractors are arguing over who should pay the extra costs of at least 11 changes totaling over $380 million for two Westinghouse AP1000 reactors.  Extra charges at the V.C. Summer project in South Carolina include “unanticipated rock conditions” for the nuclear island’s foundation, design modifications for the shield building and structural modules, and persistent problems at a Louisiana facility where plant components are being fabricated.

The delays and cost problems led primary contractor Westinghouse/Shaw to perform a “Delay Impact Study” to “assess strategies for mitigating the delay,” while a timetable for resolving the scheduling problems, along with an updated cost estimate, might not be completed for months, according to a report by South Carolina Electric & Gas to state regulators last week.  SCE&G owns 55 percent of the project, and its share of the cost overruns could reach $188 million in 2007 dollars.  The position of minority owner SCANA, an electric cooperative, regarding the overruns is not clear.

Out of 146 construction milestones, 42 have been delayed for up to 13 months so far, according to the report.  At the Louisiana fabrication plant, Shaw “has been working since 2010 to correct and recover from [Quality Assurance & Control] issues and other issues related to module fabrication at its facility in Lake Charles.”  … “One of the largest modules to be fabricated and [installed] early in the construction process” has been delayed by 11 months.

“South Carolina electric customers have joined those in Georgia and Tennessee in holding the bag for escalating costs of nuclear construction projects gone awry in their infancy,” said NC WARN’s Jim Warren today.  “Summer and Vogtle each hit major overruns even before gaining a construction license, and are sure to suffer more escalations for two reasons: dead-certain changes required by the Fukushima tragedy, and the combination of inherent complexities and experimental nature of the AP1000.”

The Tennessee mention refers to a construction project mothballed for decades and now suffering severe construction delays and millions in cost overruns during its attempted resuscitation by TVA, a federally owned electric utility.

Today’s news adds fuel to a lawsuit filed last week by public interest groups challenging the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s approval of the AP1000 plant design because the agency has not required owners to incorporate widely-expected changes, based on last year’s crippling disaster in Japan, as strictly required by federal law prior to licensing.  Such design changes will boost the price tags of AP1000 projects, and could include major alterations such as upgraded protections against earthquakes based on new information about seismic activity in the eastern U.S., and consideration of accidents on sites with multiple reactors.

In its quarterly report to state regulators, SCE&G wrote of the Fukushima changes, “New plants will fall under these same requirements once a license is issued.”  But the utility has not estimated the cost of the changes in official filings.

The lawsuit against the NRC also seeks to stop construction of two AP1000 units at Southern Company’s Vogtle site.  The groups point out that an independent nuclear industry engineer serving as construction monitor has warned that the problems at Vogtle go much deeper than Southern has admitted, that many have persisted despite repeated attempts at resolution, and that various parties are already arguing about responsibility for the many changes.

The monitor, Dr. William Jacobs, reported in December that Southern Company “continues to face significant challenges in maintaining the Project forecast at or below the certified amount.” 

One particular warning by the construction monitor – that efforts at Vogtle to recoup lost time could compound existing problems – rings ominously for the Summer project too:  Catch-up efforts “could result in, among other risks, significant additional cost to staff extra shifts of construction, support and oversight personnel, inefficiencies due to working additional shifts with lower productivity, congestion and unplanned overlap of construction activities, additional rework, and additional regulatory oversight due to increased Quality Assurance issues.”  

The extent of overlap between the Summer and Vogtle lists of cost overruns is not clear because information is being cloaked as business secrets.

“The sky’s the limit with these projects,” Warren added.  “State ratepayers and federal taxpayers are already suffering rate increases, while scores of contractors and suppliers gobble up the gravy train from myriad construction changes – just like in the 1980s.  The only reason these projects haven’t been abandoned – yet – is because the public has been forced to absorb uncontrolled rate hikes to pay for them.”

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V. C. Summer Nuclear Station Units 2 & 3: Quarterly Report to the South Carolina Office of Regulatory Staff Submitted by South Carolina Electric & Gas Company:

http://dms.psc.sc.gov/pdf/matters/E92F7F52-155D-2817-107F96CAE604402B.pdf

No More Solyndras: Groups Call On DOE to Force Public Release on Delays and 12 Secret Cost Overruns at Vogtle Reactors

With More than 15 Times the Solyndra Loan Guarantee on the Line, U.S. Taxpayers Being Kept in the Dark About Huge Vogtle Risks; Nine Groups Cite NRC Law Violation in Going to Court to Block Vogtle Licensing.

WASHINGTON, D.C. – February 16, 2012 – If you are a taxpayer who liked the less than half a billion dollar Solyndra federal loan guarantee debacle, you will love  the $8.33 billion loan guarantee to the even riskier Vogtle nuclear reactor project licensed last week by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).

Concerned organizations are warning that Southern Company is deliberately keeping U.S. taxpayers in the dark by covering up the details of 12 sizeable construction “change order” requests that are expected to add major delays and cost overruns to the controversial reactor project.     The secret cost overruns are discussed in a censored report from late 2011 by the independent Vogtle construction monitor, Dr. William Jacobs, who is a veteran nuclear industry engineer.  (See details below.)  Much of Jacob’s testimony was redacted by the utility in the attempt to keep the troubling information from the public, including the U.S. taxpayers who will be left holding the bag if Southern Company defaults on the federal loan guarantee.

The groups are calling on the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) to insist on full disclosure of the Vogtle delays and cost overruns before the federal agency moves ahead with a massive $8.33 billion taxpayer-backed federal loan guarantee that will be 15 times what was lost in the Solyndra debacle.  And Vogtle does have a history that should trouble taxpayers worried about assuming responsibility for the massive loan guarantee:  The original two reactors at the Georgia site took almost 15 years to build, came in 1,200 percent over budget and resulted in the largest rate hike at the time in Georgia.

Also today, nine groups went to U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to block the NRC license issued last week for the Vogtle reactors. The groups maintain that the NRC is violating federal law by issuing the Vogtle license without considering important public safety and environmental implications in the wake of the catastrophic Fukushima accident in Japan. They will ask federal judges to order the NRC to prepare a new environmental impact statement (EIS) for the proposed Vogtle reactors that explains how cooling systems for the reactors and spent fuel storage pools will be upgraded to protect against earthquakes, flooding and prolonged loss of electric power to the site.

NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko dissented against the Vogtle license, expressing concerns about significant changes that will be required based on the crippling Fukushima accident.  The lawsuit also challenges the overall Westinghouse reactor design.

The organizations filing the lawsuit today are: Friends of the Earth, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, Center for a Sustainable Coast, Citizens Allied for Safe Energy, Georgia Women’s Action for New Directions, North Carolina Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, and Nuclear Watch South.   The lawsuit text is available online at http://www.cleanenergy.org.

Jim Warren, executive director, NC WARN said:  “U.S. taxpayers need to brace themselves for some bad news if they are put on the hook for any ill-considered ‘investment’ in the Vogtle reactors. Taxpayers and Southern Company’s customers are sitting ducks for serial cost overruns and soaring power bills unless industry-captive federal and state regulators borrow some independence and make these giant corporations bear the costs of their mistakes with Westinghouse’s unproven, untested and unready AP1000 reactor design.   DOE owes it to Americans to get all the cost overrun and delay secrets out in the open about Vogtle so that taxpayer and ratepayers know what they are in for.”

Commenting on today’s court filing, Mindy Goldstein, acting director, Turner Environmental Law Clinic at Emory Law School said:  “The NRC decided to issue a license for Vogtle Units 3 and 4 before it could consider the lessons learned from the Fukushima accident.  This is the exact approach the National Environmental Policy Act was designed to prevent.  Allowing construction of the new units to continue, without first assessing the implications of the Fukushima accident, could have significant and irreparable environmental and economic consequences.”

Dr. Arjun Makhijani, president, Institute for Energy and Environmental Research said:  “Not only are the costs of retrofits likely to be lower if they are imposed at the start of construction rather than later in the process, but an up-front accounting of the costs allows a comparison with other alternative energy sources.  Electricity from natural gas combined cycle power plant is much cheaper than nuclear, for instance.  This is a very important consideration in the case of Vogtle.”

Lou Zeller, administrator, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League said:   “The nuclear disaster in Japan should have put the brakes on new plants in the United States.  But an aggressive industry and a compliant NRC seem to have a lead foot, ignoring the danger signs.”

WHAT IS SOUTHERN COMPANY HIDING FROM TAXPAYERS?

In November 2011, Southern Company admitted that the Vogtle the project is facing a five-month delay because of problems with design approval and licensing by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

But Southern Company has gone to great lengths to censor and keep from public view the report of the construction monitor, Dr. William Jacobs.    Far from just a five-month delay, Jacobs has warned that the problems at Vogtle go much deeper, that many of the difficulties have persisted despite repeated attempts at resolution, and that various parties are already squabbling over who pays for the many changes.

The censored Jacobs report is available online at http://www.ncwarn.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/JacobsTestimony_5VCM_12-02-11.doc.

Highlights of the report include the following passages:

… construction activities at the site are generally progressing well.  However, as described in more detail later in this testimony, the Project faces significant challenges in achieving commercial operation of Unit 3 in April 2016 and of completing the project within the certified cost.

While it is possible that some of the current delay can be recovered through schedule compression, I pointed out in my prior testimony that the Consortium has failed to meet many of the schedule milestones to date and this trend has continued. 

 … Given the first time nature of the Vogtle 3 and 4 Project, a significantly compressed schedule could result in, among other risks, significant additional cost to staff extra shifts of construction, support and oversight personnel, inefficiencies due to working additional shifts with lower productivity, congestion and unplanned overlap of construction activities, additional rework, and additional regulatory oversight due to increased QA [Quality Assurance] issues.

… the Company continues to face significant challenges in maintaining the Project forecast at or below the certified amount.  A possible schedule delay as discussed above would impact the financing cost of the Project.  In addition, the Company’s forecast does not include many potential change orders that could significantly impact the direct construction cost of the Project.

The Company has made little progress in resolving the potential changes in the six months since my last testimony.

Some of these potential change orders could have a significant impact on the Project cost.  The forecast cost provided in the Company’s testimony does not include the possible cost impact of these potential change notices.  Until the magnitude of the costs associated with these potential change orders and the responsibility for these costs is known, the forecast cost for the Project is uncertain.

 … The cause for Project delays, the responsibility for the delays and the cost of the delays need to be resolved before all parties can agree on a schedule.

Southern Co. has already commenced construction activities at the Vogtle reactor site, with cost overruns already documented in a manner that should give pause to U.S. taxpayers on the hook for Solyndra-style federal loan guarantees. The Vogtle license would allow Southern to commence construction of the containment, reactor cooling systems, spent fuel storage pools, and other major nuclear plant components. The organizations charge that these major structures could change substantially if they are redesigned to take the lessons of the Fukushima accident into account, and therefore continued construction of the new Vogtle reactors could be wasting money and resources.

MEDIA CONTACT:   Leslie Anderson Maloy, (703) 276-3256 or landerson@hastingsgroup.com.

Calling on the NRC to incorporate the real-world lessons of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the proposed rules would expand existing emergency evacuation zones from 10 to 25 miles around nuclear reactors and establish a new zone from 25-50 miles around reactors for which utilities would have to identify and publicize potential evacuation routes.

Another improvement would require utilities and state and local governments to practice emergency drills that includes a natural disaster that either initiates or occurs concurrently to a nuclear meltdown. Currently, utilities do not have to show the capability to conduct an evacuation during a natural disaster—even though, as seen at Fukushima, natural disasters can cause nuclear meltdowns. The petition would also expand the “ingestion pathway zone,” which monitors food, milk and water, from 50 miles to 100 miles around reactors.

“80% of the airborne radiation released from Fukushima went directly over the Pacific Ocean,” explained Michael Mariotte, executive director of Nuclear Information and Resource Service, which initiated the petition. “Even so, the Fukushima evacuation zone extended more than 25 miles to the northwest of the site, and the NRC and U.S. State Department both recommended that U.S. citizens within 50 miles of Fukushima evacuate. Such evacuations could not be effectively conducted in the U.S. under current emergency planning regulations. We need to be better prepared and we can’t rely on favorable wind patterns to protect the American people.”

Dominique French, who is leading NIRS’ campaign to improve emergency response planning, added, “The NRC has relied primarily on the 1979 Three Mile Island accident and subsequent computerized accident simulations to support its emergency planning rules. But first at Chernobyl in 1986, and now at Fukushima, the real world has trumped any possible simulation. Far too many Americans live near nuclear reactors, but outside existing emergency planning zones. Based on real-life experience, these people need better protection.”

NC WARN’s Jim Warren said today, “The NRC belied its bogus U.S. policy by calling for a 50-mile evacuation zone at Fukushima. With the Japanese people suffering through a long-running nightmare, the U.S. can’t keep pretending we’re prepared for a nuclear disaster. Millions of Carolinians are unprepared – and that needs to change right away.”

A third of the population in the U.S., or roughly 120 million people, lives within a 50 mile radius of a nuclear reactor. Current emergency planning rules require utilities to develop and exercise emergency evacuation plans within a 10 mile radius around reactors. The “ingestion pathway” currently consists of an area about 50 miles in radius and focuses on actions appropriate to protect the food ingestion pathway.

At Fukushima, and earlier at Chernobyl, interdiction of contaminated food and liquids has occurred further than 100 miles from the accident sites.

“Japan is still experiencing unfolding occurrences that are taking place outside of their projected protected zone. The United States must move to protect her citizens who are in these dangerous pathways,” said Charles N. Utley, community organizer for the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League.

Japan is already acting to improve its emergency response capability, in the event nuclear reactors ever are allowed to operate there again. Prior to the disaster at Fukushima, the emergency planning zones for nuclear emergencies in Japan was between 8-10 kilometers (5-6 miles). The zone is now being expanded to 30 kilometers (18 miles). The actual Fukushima evacuation zone was a 20 kilometer (12 mile) radius around the site, although areas to the northwest, where the heaviest radiation on land was measured, were evacuated more than 25 miles away.

“It will be interesting to see if the U.S. nuclear industry’s cost-cutting priority will continue preventing the NRC from protecting the public,” added NC WARN’s Jim Warren.

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The initial co-petitioners are: Nuclear Information and Resource Service (national and lead author), Bellefonte Efficiency and Sustainability Team (TN), Beyond Nuclear (national), Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League (Southeast), Citizens Action Coalition (IN), Citizen Power (PA), Citizens Awareness Network (Northeast), Citizens Within a 10-Mile Radius (MA), Citizens Environmental Coalition (NY), Coalition for a Nuclear Free Great Lakes (Great Lakes), Concerned Citizens of Shell Bluff (GA), Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone, Council on Intelligent Energy and Conservation Policy (NY), Don’t Waste Arizona, Don’t Waste Michigan, The Ecology Party of Florida, Empire State Consumer Project Inc. (NY), Grandmothers, Mothers, and More for Energy Safety (GRAMMES) (NJ), Greenpeace (national), Indian Point Safe Energy Coalition (NY), Jersey Shore Nuclear Watch (NJ), Missourians for Safe Energy, New England Coalition, Nuclear Energy Information Service (IL), NC WARN, (NC), Northwest Environmental Advocates (OR), Not On Our Fault Line (VA), People’s Alliance for Clean Energy (VA), Promoting Health and Sustainable Energy (PHASE) (NY), Public Citizen Energy Program (national), San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace (CA), SEED Coalition (TX), Sierra Club of South Carolina, Three Mile Island Alert (PA), Tri-Valley CARE (CA), Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah (HEAL Utah), Vermont Public Interest Research Group, We The People Inc. (TN).

The full text of the petition is available here.

NC WARN will host a pre-show discussion about the politics of coal and its impact on our society and environment.

Call 919-264-7089 or email marketing@thejusticetheaterproject.org to reserve a ticket. Mention NC WARN when you make your reservation and pay only $10 at the door for your ticket (normal ticket prices are $20 for adults and $15 for students and seniors).

Visit www.TheJusticeTheaterProject.org for more information.

The event’s speakers include:

Simon Parter, the Director of Duke’s Asian/Pacific Studies Institute (APSI); History Deptartment

William Pizer, of Duke’s Nicholas School for the Environment and the Sanford School of Public Policy

Jim Warren, the Executive Director of NC WARN, a local non-profit devoted to environmental awareness

To find the event, go to Von Cannons A on the bottom floor of the Bryan Center, the apex of Duke’s West Campus. There will be signs and people to greet you.

Let us know if you plan to attend so we can help the event organizers plan to have enough food and drinks. Please still come if you can’t RSVP ahead of time.

ATLANTA – The Nuclear Regulatory Commission approved the nation’s first nuclear power plant in a generation on Thursday, clearing the way for Atlanta-based Southern Co. to build two reactors at its Plant Vogtle site near Augusta.

The commission approved a license on a 4-1 vote over the objections of environmentalists and the NRC’s own chairman, Gregory Jaczko. It’s the first approval since 1978, the year before the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania.

Jaczko said he couldn’t vote for the licensing without a commitment from Southern that it would make safety changes prompted by the March 2011 nuclear disaster in Japan.

Southern President and CEO Thomas Fanning said the approval was “a monumental accomplishment” for the company, its partners and the nuclear industry.

“We are committed to bringing these units online to deliver clean, safe and reliable energy to our customers,” he said.

The company expects to begin operating the new units in 2016 and 2017. They will cost more than $14 billion. It says the project will generate 4,000 to 5,000 construction jobs.

Some residents of the communities near Plant Vogtle, who maintain that some cancers have increased since 1987, when Southern opened the first of two existing reactors, were dismayed.

“I think it’s a sad day for the people who live in this area,” said Willie Tomlin, pastor of Thomas Grove Baptist Church in Waynesboro.

“The people who live here have not been looked after for the first two reactors. If that was not the case, we would not have had this serious increase in cancer that we’ve had since they came online.”

Other residents have been staunch supporters of Vogtle, which is Burke County‘s largest employer, generating about 70% of the local tax base. City officials have said the tax revenue is expected to double when the new reactors come online.

Nine environmental groups plan a challenge in federal court in Washington, said Stephen Smith, executive director of one group, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, an energy policy and environmental organization in Georgia, Tennessee, the Carolinas and Florida.

The groups say that the approval process was rushed and that regulators failed to incorporate lessons from Japan’s accident.

“In a very literal sense, the rubble has not cooled in Japan, and the NRC has granted a license for a new, unproven reactor design here in the United States,” Smith said.

The other organizations are: Friends of the Earth, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, Center for a Sustainable Coast, Citizens Allied for Safe Energy, Georgia Women’s Action for New Directions, North Carolina Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, and Nuclear Watch South.

The groups want federal judges to require the NRC to prepare a new environmental impact statement for the new reactors. They want the new statement to explain how cooling systems for the reactors and spent fuel storage pools will be upgraded to protect against earthquakes, flooding and prolonged loss of electrical power.

Earlier Thursday, Fanning told reporters here that the company had “taken into account” the Japan disaster and will make necessary safety changes to the current and new reactors once an analysis of lessons learned from Japan is completed.

See the full article

WASHINGTON, D.C.//NEWS ADVISORY/// With the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) expected to consider as early as Thursday whether to issue the final license for two new reactors at the site of the currently operating Vogtle nuclear power plant in Georgia, nine national, state and regional groups will ask the NRC to delay its decision until the groups can file a challenge in federal court.

In the major legal challenge that will be filed within a matter of days, the organizations will maintain that the NRC is violating federal law by issuing the license without considering the important lessons of the catastrophic Fukushima accident in Japan regarding ways the Vogtle operation should be modified to protect public safety and the environment. They will ask federal judges to order the NRC to prepare a new environmental impact statement (EIS) for the proposed Vogtle reactors that explains how cooling systems for the reactors and spent fuel storage pools will be upgraded to protect against earthquakes, flooding and prolonged loss of electric power to the site. According to the groups, the EIS should also detail how emergency equipment and plans for the nuclear plant will be revised to account for accidents affecting multiple reactors on the Vogtle site, as happened at Fukushima.

As part of the action, the organizations will also challenge the validity of the Westinghouse-Toshiba AP1000 design, on which the new Vogtle reactors are based.

The organizations are preparing to file their lawsuit next week in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. Meanwhile, they will ask the NRC on Thursday (February 9, 2012) to give the nine organizations time to review the licensing decision. After such review, the groups will submit a formal motion to the NRC, asking the commissioners to suspend construction activities at Vogtle while the U.S. Court of Appeals is reviewing the license.

The nine organizations taking the legal action are: Friends of the Earth, the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League, Center for a Sustainable Coast, Citizens Allied for Safe Energy, Georgia Women’s Action for New Directions, North Carolina Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, Nuclear Information and Resource Service and Nuclear Watch South.

Although Southern Co. has already commenced construction activities at the Vogtle site, the license would allow Southern to complete construction of the containment, reactor cooling systems, spent fuel storage pools, and other major reactor components.

The organizations charge that these major structures could change substantially if they are redesigned to take the lessons of the Fukushima accident into account, and therefore continued construction of the new Vogtle reactors could be wasting money and resources. And if the license is disapproved in the lawsuit or Fukushima-related retrofits make the project too expensive to finish, utility ratepayers in Georgia are likely to be stuck with the expense of a large and useless concrete mausoleum, similar to many other abandoned reactor projects across the U.S.

Separately, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy has sued the Department of Energy for failing to disclose key information about the terms of DOE’s $8.3 billion loan guarantee for the new Vogtle reactors, especially the risk posed to U.S. taxpayers should the estimated $14 billion project default. The organizations remain very concerned that utility customers and taxpayers have been forced to put more “skin in the game” than Southern Co. and its utility partners and shareholders. With prices of natural gas very low, even the CEO of Exelon has said publicly that he wouldn’t build a nuclear plant today. For more details, see http://www.cleanenergy.org/index.php?/Press-Update.html?form_id=8&item_id=267.

MEDIA CONTACT: Leslie Anderson Maloy, (703) 276-3256 or landerson@hastingsgroup.com.

RALEIGH — A new study released Wednesday by Gov. Bev Perdue said North Carolina had the largest offshore wind resource on the East Coast and that the state should work with industry to develop the wind energy industry.

The 15-member panel said wind energy along North Carolina’s coast and sounds offered significant opportunities for renewable energy and for job creation.

“North Carolina’s extensive coastline and large offshore wind resources appear to make it a prime area for offshore-wind development,” the panel said.

The panel said there are areas off the North Carolina coast suited for wind farms that could generate a yearly average of 20,000 megawatts of power. The report said producing wind energy is expensive and would increase the cost to ratepayers in the short term but would provide long-term benefits in producing pollution-free energy.

The report comes as three wind farms have been proposed along the North Carolina coast.

Iberdrola proposes a 300 megawatt “Desert Wind” project near Elizabeth City, but no utility has been willing to commit to buy the power. Invenergy proposes an 80-megawatt project in Beaufort County near the Pocosin Lakes Wildlife Refuge. The project is delayed over concerns about migrating snow birds being killed. Apex Wind proposes an offshore project that is awaiting word on which federal water parcels can be used for wind farms.

The report recommended several laws and rules to encourage offshore wind development, efforts by the state to work with developers to provide energy transmission infrastructure, and state tax credits and incentives to locate a cluster of manufacturing to provide wind energy hardware and expertise.

The report won praise from the N.C. Sierra Club.

“We look forward to working with the legislature to make the possibility of thousands of jobs and the clean renewable energy the offshore wind industry would bring to our state a reality,” said Will Morgan, a Sierra Club spokesman. “It’s becoming clear that offshore wind is a better option than drilling off our coast.”

The report is the part of the recommendations of what came to be known the Governor’s Scientific Advisory Panel on Offshore Energy that was formed by Perdue in September 2009.

The panel grew out of the 2008 governor’s race, in which offshore oil and gas exploration became an issue, with Republican candidate Pat McCrory voicing strong support and Perdue saying she would study it.

Link to the news article.

Link to the full report.

A few key points that warrant attention:

• Georgia Power (part of Southern Company), plans to burn almost as much coal in 2020 as it does now.  As with the few other US utilities still hoping to build nukes, GP has no intention of using them to replace the coal-fired power plants it actually uses.
• Georgia Power plans virtually zero use of energy efficiency, solar or wind power.  As with other Southeast utilities, GP works to impede growth in those clean technologies.
• Energy-saving, solar, wind and cogeneration (also called combined heat and power) are abundant resources across the Southeast, and all are now cheaper than new nuclear power could ever be.  Ramping them up is the exact path needed to phase out coal, but because they compete with new nuclear, the utilities have stymied their development.
• These numbers are from utility long-range planning documents.  More can be found in NC WARN’s October report, New Nuclear Power is Ruining Climate Protection Efforts and Harming Customers.

As ecological and economic collapses continue accelerating due to climate disruption, the theory that new nuclear plants can help is fully refuted by the actual practices of the US utilities hoping to build them.

Thanks to you journalists who are scrutinizing the industry’s prodigious PR efforts.

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Note that Florida customers are on the hook for $1 billion already for this nuclear non-project.

This is enormously good news for climate protection; it provides further incentive for Duke and Progress to move to capture the clean energy market — or lose it to the growing distributed power suppliers — which is the needed step to phase out the big coal plants (the ones they actually use).

Jim Warren

The Tampa Bay Times

Progress Energy looking to cancel main construction contract for building Levy County nuclear plant

By Ivan Penn
January 26, 2012

Progress Energy plans to cancel the main development and construction contract for its proposed nuclear plant in Levy County, but its customers will have to keep paying in advance anyway.

The move could add hundreds of millions of dollars to what customers are already paying, if Progress decides to restart the project. It also raises questions about the “pay as you go” advance fee set up by the state Legislature explicitly to speed up nuclear plant construction and save money.

“It’s a dramatic strategy change (by Progress),” said Arnie Gundersen, a nuclear engineer who testifies before public utility commissions throughout the country. “Now, it looks like they’re retreating.”

Progress spokeswoman Suzanne Grant said the utility will continue to seek federal approval for the $20 billion project, and “we’ll reassess the project once we receive the (operating) license.”

Grant acknowledged that cancelling the construction contract will keep the Levy nuclear plant from opening by its current projected start date of 2021.

Progress is seeking to terminate the Levy construction contract as part of a settlement agreement announced last week over its crippled Crystal River nuclear plant.*

Grant would not discuss the reason Progress wants to cancel the contract or details about what items the utility purchased under the contract, citing confidentiality.

The contract enabled Progress to purchase in advance such items as nuclear parts produced by only two companies in the world. It can take years to acquire the parts because of demand from various utilities.

So far, Progress Energy has spent $1.1 billion on the development and planning of the Levy County nuclear project — $545 million coming from its customers through the end of 2011. Progress’ 1.6 million customers in Florida will eventually pay the remaining $555 million, too.

The advance fee resulted from legislation passed by state lawmakers in 2006 to allow utilities to collect money from customers for future construction of nuclear power plants. It was considered a major shift in policy for building new power plants. Proponents said paying for the projects “as you go” would speed up construction and save money on the financing of the plants.

But the Levy plant has not met either of those goals.

In 2006, Progress said the project would cost $4 billion to $6 billion and open in 2016. The price jumped to $10 billion in 2007. In 2008, the utility said the project would include two reactors, instead of one, and cost $17 billion.

A year later, the price remained the same, but the start date moved to 2018. In 2010, the date moved to 2021, and last year price projections reached as high as $22 billion.

“They’ve made a mess of this whole process,” said state Sen. Mike Fasano, R-New Port Richey, who wants to repeal the law that requires the advance nuclear construction fee. “I believe they knew a long time ago that they would never build these plants.

“It’s time for Progress Energy to refund the money the ratepayers have paid for power plants that will never be built,” Fasano said.

Whether Progress will ever build the Levy plant remains unclear, but if the state continues to allow the utility to collect money for the project, the so-called advance fee could go on for years.

The state Office of Public Counsel, which represents consumers before the Public Service Commission, has argued that Progress’ own documents suggest the utility won’t bring the plant online until at least 2027 — if at all.

Because of delays and the possibility the plant will never be built, the public counsel has argued — to no avail — that the advance fee should be suspended. To avoid extra costs to customers, the public counsel also had urged the PSC not to approve the construction contract until after Progress received its federal operating license, an argument the PSC also rejected.

Progress entered an agreement with a consortium of Westinghouse Shaw and Stone & Webster for the construction contract. Westinghouse is the maker of the reactor that Progress intends to use for the Levy County plant, called the AP1000.

Stopping the contract does have benefits, said J. R. Kelly, the state public counsel. It means Progress will not incur any more immediate costs related to purchasing and construction that could be passed on to customers.

And the settlement agreement, which Kelly helped negotiate, caps the amount Progress can collect from customers for Levy at $3.45 a month on the average utility bill from 2013 through 2017. Without the agreement, that fee could have reached $26.05 a month for the average customer by 2017.

Under nuclear fee law, none of the money Progress has spent on Levy has to be refunded, even if the utility doesn’t build the plant.

Because of the way the law is crafted and with all of the money customers have spent to date, Kelly said he decided to support the settlement agreement as a way to save customers some money.

“If they end up not building the facility, ratepayers are still going to have to pay,” Kelly said. “We want to stop any unnecessary spending as quickly as possible.”

See the full article