The staff of the Tennessee Valley Authority is recommending that one of the original reactors at the Bellefonte Nuclear Plant be finished in the next decade at a projected cost of up to $4 billion.
In the final environmental assessment of the unfinished twin-reactor plant in Alabama, TVA concludes that completing the Unit 1 reactor at Bellefonte would be cheaper than pursuing the alternative of building a next generation reactor on the same site.
Bellefonte was once targeted as the pioneer site for the new Westinghouse AP1000 reactor, but Plant Vogtle in Georgia is now first in line for that new design and TVA wants to put off building such a new reactor.
In the environmental impact statement released this month, TVA estimates it will need another 7,500 megawatts of power by 2020 to make up for growth in the Tennessee Valley and also needs to shut down some of its aging coal fleet.
“Completing a nuclear unit is one option that would help us meet our customers’ growing needs and provide a reliable and safe power source at significantly less cost per installed kilowatt than other generation options,” TVA Senior Vice President Ashok Bhatnagar said today. “At the same time, additional nuclear generation leads to a reduction of our carbon footprint.”