TVA Maps New Plan to Meet Energy Demand

By Dave Flessner, Chattanooga Times/Free Press, Tenn.

Jan. 28–SPRING CITY, Tenn. — To meet the growing energy needs of the Tennessee Valley, TVA estimates it will need the equivalent of a new nuclear power plant every two years.

TVA directors are preparing a new strategic plan this year to guide how the utility will supply that need.

The utility already is committed to reactivating its oldest nuclear reactor this spring at its Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant near Athens, Ala. The Unit 1 reactor there has been shut down since 1985.

TVA next is looking at finishing Watts Bar Unit 2. Construction here began in 1974, but only one of the two reactors was completed.

Jack Bailey, vice president for nuclear generation development at TVA, estimates the Unit 2 reactor is about half completed. TVA is in the midst of a $20 million engineering study to help scope out the work and costs involved in restarting the second reactor. A supplemental environmental impact statement on the new reactor should be released to the public in March or April, Mr. Bailey said.

TVA estimates it will take about five years to finish the Watts Bar Unit 2 reactor once construction starts. By 2009, TVA could employ more than 2,500 contract workers during the peak of the $2 billion construction and recovery program.

By October, TVA and its NuStart partners are due to submit their application to the NRC for a new type of pressurized water reactor — a Westinghouse AP-1000 design — at the Bellefonte nuclear plant site. Regulators will have three years to review and sign off on the plans before construction begins.

The two new reactors proposed at Bellefonte are among 31 new units being considered nationwide by utility groups under the a streamlined licensing process, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute.

“In the old days, you spent a billion dollars on construction and you still had to wait to see if you got an operating license,” Mr. Bailey said. “Now you will know whether you can operate the plant or not before you start spending large amounts of money.”

The U.S. Department of Energy picked TVA’s Bellefonte site in Hollywood, Ala., for the new AP-1000. A consortium of utilities and contractors known as NuStart Energy LLC is splitting the projected $50 million costs with DOE for initial design of the two reactors for Bellefonte.

If the license application for the AP-1000 is submitted this year and construction is under way by 2012, any private owners of Bellefonte or similar next-generation plants could qualify for up to $125 million a year in federal subsidies, officials said.

TVA officials say they will benefit from new government rules that provide a more streamlined licensing process and government incentives for new nuclear plants. Other government nudges offered by the 2005 Energy Policy Act encourage new reactors with production tax credits, risk insurance and matching funds for the design of the first half dozen new reactors.

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