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Sites considered for nuclear plant

Officials narrow potential locations in Alabama and Mississippi for the first new reactor since 1973.

WASHINGTON - Utility companies on Thursday narrowed the possible locations for what could be the first new nuclear power plant in the United States in more than three decades, focusing on reactor sites in Mississippi and Alabama.

The group of companies has not decided whether to build a reactor, but plans to apply for the required permits by late 2007 or early 2008. If that happens, the project could be finished by 2015, the group said.

One of the sites selected is adjacent to the existing Grand Gulf nuclear power plant, operated by Entergy near Port Gibson, Miss. The second is at the site of an essentially mothballed pair of reactors owned by the Tennessee Valley Authority near Scottsboro, Ala.

The announcement by Nustart Energy Development, a consortium of eight utilities and two reactor manufacturers, is the latest development reflecting the intense interest to build a reactor to meet growing electricity needs.

"Our country needs these advanced nuclear plants. We must reduce our dependence on imported foreign energy," said Marilyn Kray, president of Nustart and an executive of Exelon, the country's largest operator of nuclear power plants.

No nuclear power plant has been ordered in the United States since 1973. Interest waned after the Three Mile Island nuclear accident in Pennsylvania in 1979.

Ironically, the Alabama location is where the TVA once wanted to build a complex of nuclear reactors. One of two reactors at the Bellefonte facility was 80 percent completed when the project was abandoned in 1988.

Jack Bailey, the TVA's vice president for nuclear projects, said there is no plan to finish the two 1970-era reactors, but some parts of the complex would be used if a reactor is built there. The Bellefonte project cost $4-billion before it was scrapped, he said.

In recent years, nuclear plants have become more efficient and more profitable. To promote construction, Congress recently gave the industry new subsidies, including "insurance" against financial losses caused by regulatory delays for the first six new-design reactors.

At least eight utilities, including all the major operators of nuclear power plants, have been testing the regulatory environment to determine how fast a new reactor might win approval.

Reactor manufacturers Westinghouse, General Electric and the French company AREVA are competing with different reactor designs. Under the Nustart plan, the reactor at Grand Gulf would be a GE designed reactor. The one in Alabama would use a Westinghouse design.

The Nustart consortium was created to develop an application for a construction and test the NRC's licensing process.

Were the group to receive a federal license, any of the group's members or a combination of them could use it.

Dan Keuter, vice president at Entergy Nuclear, said his company will be the licensee if a new reactor is built at the Grand Gulf site, but may have partners in ownership.

Entergy, which owns 10 reactors, said Thursday it plans seek a license for a new reactor at its River Bend nuclear plant site near Baton Rouge, La. The company has not decided whether to build it.

Other utility companies are moving toward a decision on whether to build a reactor, apart from the Nustart initiative.

Last week, Constellation Energy, a Baltimore utility company and a Nustart member, said it plans to work with AREVA, the French reactor manufacturer, on a possible reactor.

Two North Carolina companies, Progress Energy and Duke Power, have said they are preparing a site application for a new reactor - separate from the Nustart program - in the event they decide to proceed with a project.

[Last modified September 23, 2005, 02:45:59]