Forty-three years after construction began, top officials of the Tennessee Valley Authority are gathering at the plant today to mark the final completion and testing for the second reactor at the Watts Bar Nuclear Power Plant.
TVA started the Unit 2 reactor at the Watts Bar plant near Spring City, Tenn., in May and has spent the past five months testing equipment and conducting power ascension tests before the unit could be regarded as a commercial unit and its capital costs brought into TVA’s rate base as an operating expense. Watts Bar Unit 2 is the first U.S. reactor to start operation TVA started the first reactor at Watts Bar in 1996 and is the first American commercial nuclear reactor to be added to the U.S. electric grid in the 21st century.
TVA has operated the unit at full power for more than two weeks.
At full power, the unit is capable of generating 1,150 megawatts of electricity, or enough power for about two cities the size of Chattanooga.