News

Susquehanna Steam Electric Station has 2 units. Both of these units represent the nation’s largest Boiler Water Reactors (BWRs). The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) issued the Amendments #246 and #224 in January 2008, to allow these units Extended Power Uprates (EPU). These amendments...(read more)

A massive, groundbreaking agreement between Chinese nuclear power companies, French energy giant EDF and the British government is moving closer to a signing ceremony, which could held next week during a visit to Britain by Chinese President Xi Jinping, according to news reports. The deal is reportedly...(read more)

Three steps backward, three steps forward. That is, essentially, the score for the nuclear power industry on a global scale this week as two companies, Entergy in the United States and OKG in Europe, announced they would close three reactors before their operating licenses had run out. To balance...(read more)

Owners of the three-unit Oskarshamn nuclear power plant on the east coast of Sweden said Wednesday that it would permanently shutter the oldest two units at the plant due to economic factors that put profits from nuclear power out of reach in both the short term and the long term. The plant, as of...(read more)

A survey released Wednesday by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers said that a majority in the United Kingdom supported nuclear power, although close to half of the country was strongly opposed to a nuclear waste facility if it were to be built close to their homes. The survey of 2,000 respondents...(read more)

British engineering, consultancy and construction giant Amec Foster Wheeler said that it had been appointed by Japan's decommissioning organization to conduct a study of radioactive waste management options at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi power station. The company categorized the work as a...(read more)

Entergy Corporation, one of the largest energy companies in the United States, said Tuesday it would close down the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Plant in Plymouth, Mass., by June 1, 2019, citing economic factors. The decision to close Pilgrim 1, a General Electric Type 3 boiling water reactor with a viable...(read more)

German utility companies can afford the cost of decommissioning their nuclear power plants, the Ministry of the Economy said on Saturday The ministry is backing legislation, which has not yet been approved, that seeks to seal the fate of utilities regarding decommissioning costs. It would also set...(read more)

Solving the problem of spent fuel storage and management for the United States as a whole requires a market-based approach that provides incentive to drive a solution forward, a highly respected, conservative think tank in Washington has said. The new study produced at The Heritage Foundation is called...(read more)

At least one key U.S. senator says he is not satisfied with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's streamlining efforts. The NRC announced recently that it was re-shuffling some top management positions to reflect the post Fukushima Daiichi slowdown in licensing applications and a predicted drop...(read more)

Westinghouse Electric Company on Thursday announced that it is seeking to collaborate with the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) on the a lead-cooled fast reactor (LFR) that the company says will be designed to achieve new levels of energy affordability, safety and flexibility. Westinghouse submitted...(read more)

by Nick Negoescu Many naysayers here in the US, are saying, “Nuclear power is finished. Renewables are here and they can do the job. Shut the old nuke plants down!” This is an amazingly blind statement, when we look first at the world, and then at nuclear power here in the US. Currently...(read more)

Westinghouse Electric on Thursday said it had signed memorandums of understanding (MOUs) with UGL Limited, Saab Australia Pty Ltd. and Teralba Industries as a first step in welcoming the Australian suppliers to become part of the Westinghouse global supply chain. This development helps set the stage...(read more)

AZZ Inc., a global provider of galvanizing services, welding solutions, specialty electrical equipment and highly engineered services to the power generation industry, said it had been awarded a $15 million contract to refurbish main steam isolation valves and reactor recirculation cooling systems valves...(read more)

As every Project Manager understands, there are 3 primary aspects of his job he must continually monitor. These are Cost, Scope and Schedule. It doesn’t matter whether you’re adding a porch to your home, or adding 2 nuclear plants to your Baseload. Cost, Scope, and Schedule will be...(read more)

Construction progress on Units 3 and 4 at the Vogtle Electric Generating Plant in Waynesboro, Ga, is highlighted in Georgia Power's third quarter timeline video. Despite the "intense Georgia heat," says narrator Joe Washington, the company reached significant milestones in the third...(read more)

U.S.-based NuScale Power, majority owned by Fluor Corporation, said that it had set it sights on the British energy market for its Small Modular Reactor (SMR) and that it was seeking a partner to help develop and deploy their technology in the U.K. NuScale Power reiterated its intentions with the...(read more)

Yesterday, “D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser threw her support Tuesday behind a new agreement with Exelon Corp., a move expected to pave the way for regulatory approval of Exelon's proposed $6.8 billion merger with Pepco Holdings Inc.," the Washington Business Journal reported. What did it...(read more)

Assembly members of a small town 466 miles southwest of Tokyo have unanimously agreed to allow the restart of a nuclear power reactor operated by Shikoku Electric Power Company. In the post-Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disaster era, gaining political support for a restart has become a critical hurdle...(read more)

The general press is having a field day, pun intended, with a study that says the Exclusion Zone near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant disaster is now thriving with wildlife. The study, which was published in the science journal Current Biology, says that elk, wild boar and lynx have thrived, pointing...(read more)

AREVA TN said Monday that it had signed a contract with Xcel Energy to provide wide-ranging dry fuel storage management services for Xcel's Prairie Island and Monticello nuclear generating plants. Both plants are in Minnesota. Prairrie Island is in Red Wing. Monticello is in a city of the same...(read more)

GE Hitachi and DTE Energy on Monday said they would explore advancing the detailed design of the Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor, known as the ESBWR. DTE has not made a commitment to build a new reactor, but in May the company received the first-ever ESBWR-based licensing from the U.S. Nuclear...(read more)

A report from the think tank Chatham House, which involved 18 months of research, concludes that nuclear power plants around the globe are vulnerable to cyber-attacks and that the risk of cyber-oriented plant disasters is increasing. The study says that cyber-security at some nuclear power facilities...(read more)

Westinghouse Electric said Thursday its purchase of the Multibus I production line from U.S. Technologies Inc. was done to ensure continuity of service to 41 operating nuclear power reactors at 25 sites around the globe. Those sites rely on EAGLE, Eagle 21 and other Multibus I safety systems that...(read more)

The European Union's Court of Justice on Thursday said that a tax in Sweden on nuclear power plants that is based on production capacity rather than the amount of electricity sold could stand, because it did not violate the international mandates that the court is expected to uphold. The court...(read more)

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Thursday that it had completed its Final Safety Report for the combined licenses for the South Texas Projects Units 3 and 4 and that there were no safety impediments that would preclude issuing licenses for construction and operation of the two proposed reactors...(read more)

A new nationwide survey found that a strong majority of Americans agreed that nuclear power should be part of the U.S. energy mix in the future when the power source was linked to low-carbon electricity generation. The survey arranged by Bisconti Research with Quest Global Research on behalf of the...(read more)

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said that it had made several senior level management changes to help streamline the agency's management “and broaden the scope and diversity of its leadership.” The moves were made in anticipation of a reduction in the size of the agency as a...(read more)

A couple of glitches aside, the U.S. nuclear power plant fleet has been posting very high plant capacity factors for the year to date, according to the federal Energy Information Administration. From January through June of 2015, the average capacity factor – the ratio of generation produced...(read more)

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Monday that it had renewed the operating licenses of Units 1 and 2 at the Sequoyah nuclear power plant in Soddy-Daisy, Tenn., for an additional 20 years, which allows them to operate until Sept. 17, 2040 and Sept. 15, 2041, respectively. The Tennessee Valley...(read more)

The U.S. Naval Reactors Program has awarded BWXT Nuclear Operations Group contracts valued at $34.5 million for work involving support and manufacture of naval nuclear reactor components for nuclear-powered submarines and aircraft carriers, BWX Technologies Inc. said Tuesday. In effect, the work for...(read more)

AREVA’s next-generation boiling water reactor fuel design, ATRIUM™ 11, is now in operation for the first time in the United States, the company announced. The lead fuel assemblies have been producing electricity successfully at two reactors since April. The ATRIUM™ 11 assembly is...(read more)

A study conducted by researchers from Nagoya University in Japan confirmed that 70 percent to 100 percent of the nuclear fuel in the No. 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant had melted following the earthquake-triggered tsunami event in March 2011. The finding, reported by Kyodo...(read more)

Georgia Power said Thursday the Vogtle nuclear power plant expansion project near Waynesboro, Ga., received two packages from Italy this week – two core make-up tanks for Unit 4, each weighing 149 tons. The tanks were fabricated in Itay and arrived through the Port of Savannah, where they were...(read more)

AREVA Inc. said Thursday that it had been named as a Talen Energy's Engineer of Choice (EOC) provider to support nuclear reactor operations at the company's Susquehanna Nuclear Plant in Salem Township, Pennsylvania. The selection amounts to a three-year contract under which AREVA has the first...(read more)

Local dignitaries with Cameco and AREVA Resources Canada Inc. officials in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, celebrated the opening of the Cigar Lake uranium mine and McCLean Lake processing facility Wednesday in a belated ceremony that included tours and speeches. In addition, the mining group said that Cigar...(read more)

TerraPower, a Bellevue, Washington-based startup that is associated with investor Bill Gates and is working on development of a next-generation nuclear reactor, has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with China National Nuclear Corporation to cooperate on new technologies. The company's Chief...(read more)

The Chairman of General Electric Jeff Immelt has ruled out India as a place to do business in nuclear power, saying that the liability laws of the country are not in line with the rest of the world. “I am not going to put my company at risk for anything – there is no project that is worth...(read more)

Chinese officials, including President Xi Jinping, met with the governors of five states on Tuesday in Seattle to discuss deals that included support of clean energy businesses, including nuclear power, according to reports on the head of state visit. President Xi gave a speech in front of 650 business...(read more)

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said it had begun a special inspection of the Callaway nuclear power plant in Fulton, Mo., following a reactor shut down in August that involved the failure of three of four control valves that regulate water flow to the plant's steam generators. The plant...(read more)

French nuclear power giant AREVA said it had been awarded a contract to provide German utility company E.ON with maintenance and refueling services for three nuclear power plants – Isar 2, Brokdorf and Grohnde. All of the power plants are in Germany. The contract, AREVA said, included maintenance...(read more)

Entergy Corp. said that it was reviewing options for the 43-year-old Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station that included the possibility it would shutter the plant due to economic reasons. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said on Sept. 2 that it had increased oversight of the power plant in Plymouth, Mass...(read more)

The financial picture for the Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant build in Somerset, England, became a bit clearer Monday, after British Finance Minister George Osborne said the government would provide a financial guarantee of $3.1 billion for construction of the power plant that is expected to generate...(read more)

The Emirates Nuclear Energy Corporation said that two huge steam generators shipped from South Korea to the nuclear power plant under construction in Barakah – the first nuclear power plant for the country – were in place, completing a four-year process. The steam generators were put in...(read more)

The highlights of the International Atomic Energy Agency's General Conference, which took place in Vienna this week, include various cooperation agreements on nuclear power involving Canada, Japan, Switzerland, India, Korea, the United Arab Emirates, France and Vietnam. The Canadian Nuclear Safety...(read more)

Westinghouse Electric Company said Wednesday it had signed a 10-year agreement to team up with Holtec International to provide “pool-to-pad services” to U.S. nuclear sites using Holtec's dry cask spent fuel storage technology. Westinghouse said customers benefit from the team arrangement...(read more)

--Press Release-- L-3 MAPPS announced today that it has won an order from Westinghouse Electric Company to deliver a full-scale 1,000 MWe class pressurized water reactor (PWR) simulator equipped with severe accident simulation capability as part of a larger project that Westinghouse is fulfilling...(read more)

Ukraine's Parliament on Wednesday voted to cancel an agreement with Russia for construction of a third and fourth reactor at the Khmelnitsky Nuclear Power Plant that had been set in motion with an agreement struck in 2010. Russia and Ukraine have a spotty history together regarding energy matters...(read more)

The Bruce Reactor Inspection and Maintenance System (BRIMS) tool was unveiled this summer after 5 years in development. BRIMS is a specialized tool system that will be deployed during outages to inspect and maintain fuel channels in their Candu reactors. Bruce Power’s older UDM refueling...(read more)

Southern Company subsidiary Southern Nuclear on Tuesday unveiled a dual charging station for 10 electric and/or plug-in hybrid vehicles that can help “energy-conscious employees,” charge up their cars while they work. It costs about $1 for 35 miles worth of energy at the charge-up station...(read more)