Oyster Creek Reactor to Close by 2019 (Ten years before permit expires)

[kristopher]

Oyster Creek Reactor to Close by 2019
By MATTHEW L. WALD
Published: December 8, 2010

The Oyster Creek nuclear reactor in New Jersey will be shut down by 2019, at least 10 years before its license expires, in a deal with state environmental regulators that will allow it to operate until then without building costly cooling towers, its owner said on Wednesday.
Related

Exelon Nuclear, which owns the reactor, in Lacey Township in Ocean County, has been negotiating with Gov. Chris Christie on the issue since he took office this year, said Exelon’s chief nuclear officer, Christopher M. Crane.

Installing cooling towers “would cost us significantly more than the current value of the plant,” Mr. Crane said in a telephone interview. Under Gov. Jon S. Corzine, the previous state administration had approved a draft environmental permit for the plant that would have required cooling towers so the plant would stop pumping hot water into Barnegat Bay.

The plant, the oldest operating power reactor in the United States, was built in 1969 by Jersey Central Power and Light Company. Exelon and a partner each bought a 50 percent share in 2000, and Exelon bought the partner out in 2002.

Exelon ended...

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/09/nyregion/09nuke.html?partner=rss&emc=rss

[NNadir]

1. The fucking idiots in the gas industry must be thrilled with this willful destruction of the

cleanest energy source in New Jersey.

Thanks, fucking idiotic anti-nukes for working to kill my family.

[David__77]

2. Another sign of a country in decline.

Others build, the US destroys abroad, and shuts down at home.

[bananas]

3. These crappy old reactors have to be shut down.

It's time to shut down these old dirty dangerous nuke and coal plants,
and start building new clean safe renewables which never run out.

[kristopher]

4. Coal and nuclear, nuclear and coal - two sides of the same coin

The statement in the header is based on this 1970s article by Amory Lovins' in "Foreign Affairs" where he describes the concepts of a "hard path" and "soft path" related to energy use.

You can download it here: http://www.rmi.org/rmi/Library/E77-01_EnergyStrategyRoadNotTaken