Yesterday the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced it will approve a construction and operating license for two Westinghouse AP1000 reactors at The Southern Company’s Vogtle generating plant. This will be the first new U.S. nuclear project in more than three decades. It will create around 25,000 direct and indirect jobs. A couple years ago,...
Westinghouse nuclear
CANDU back in the game: what now?
After months of excruciating uncertainty, the CANDU situation has been resolved somewhat. As everyone predicted, SNC-Lavalin has agreed to purchase the CANDU reactor part of Atomic Energy Canada Ltd. I won’t go into the ins and outs of the deal. I’ll just focus on what needs to happen now. Assuming the deal is indeed...
Ontario’s electrical future: another go at Darlington?
“Live better electrically.” Remember that slogan? It used to be how Ontario Hydro, formerly the world’s biggest electric utility, promoted its product, electricity. With that slogan, Hydro promised customers a better life if they used more of its product. Though the slogan, together with the underlying concept, fell (and has till now stayed) out of fashion,...
A cold-blooded look at the CANDU: problems and opportunities
“Look what happened to the CANDU,” a senior official at Rosatom, the Russian nuclear conglomerate, recently told Platts. “It’s a good reactor, but nobody is building it.” Why the post mortem, for a reactor that at six a.m. today was cranking out 62.6 percent of Ontario’s electricity? Because, said the official, a Rosatom analysis indicates that if...
Fragile pro-nuclear consensus emerges in U.S., but wait for the green/gas counterattack
Jacques Besnainou, CEO of Areva North America, on Monday applauded the Obama administration’s decision in February to award federal nuclear loan guarantees to The Southern Company. Southern will use the guarantees to borrow US$3.4 billion to build two Westinghouse AP 1000 reactors in Georgia. Yes, the head of a French company is happy to see...
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