The Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced today it has upgraded the construction permit at TVA’s Bellefonte Nuclear Plant, moving the idled Alabama plant closer to possibly being finished in the next decade.
The NRC staff approved the Tennessee Valley Authority’s request to change the unfinished Bellefonte Unit 1 and 2 reactors from “terminated” to “deferred” status.
“This is just one step in a long list of actions TVA must complete before they can ask the NRC for permission to resume construction at Bellefonte,” said Eric Leeds, director of the NRC’s Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation. “We’ll continue inspecting TVA’s efforts to ensure they’re maintaining the site and all the information necessary to support the plant in deferred status.”
NRC officials said the change will let TVA further evaluate the plant and the cost of completing the two reactors. Construction work was suspended at the plant in 1988.
The TVA board is expected to decide next April whether to finish the twin-reactor facility as originally designed or scrap that design in favor on a pair of next-generation Westinghouse AP-1000 reactors,
For complete details, see tomorrow’s Times Free Press