After three decades, Plant Vogtle considering adding two new nuclear reactors

As the population in Georgia grows, Southern Nuclear (a division of Southern Company) and Georgia Power are looking ahead and anticipating the power generation capacity needed for the future. Part of their proposal for an anticipated 7,000 Megawatt increase in capacity includes two new nuclear reactors to be installed at their Plant Vogtle site.

Plant Vogtle currently operates two 1215 Megawatt (Mw) Westinghouse Pressurized Water Reactors that were completed in 1987 and 1989.

Kristi E. Swartz stated, "Raleigh-based Progress Energy and Charlotte-based Duke Energy Corp. have estimated that two of the new Westinghouse reactors would cost between $4 billion and $6 billion combined" in her April 9, 2008 story titled "2 more nuclear reactors in works" in the Atlanta Journal Constitution.

Due partly to the public’s aversion to nuclear power after incidents like Three Mile Island in 1979 and Chernobyl in 1986, the nuclear industry came to a virtual standstill. However, after nearly 30 years of virtually no action, wildly fluctuating fuel prices, along with environmental concerns, are causing people to reconsider nuclear power as an option. Nuclear power is actually considered "green" by some proponents as it would lessen our dependence on foreign energy and also cut back on carbon emissions and other pollutants.

On August 15, 2006, Southern Nuclear Operating Company (a subsidiary of Southern Company) applied for an Early Site Permit (ESP) for two new units at the Alvin W. Vogtle Electric Generating Plant, a two-unit nuclear power plant located near Waynesboro, GA.
Recently, on March 31, 2008, Southern Nuclear filed an application with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for a Combined Construction and Operating License (COL) on behalf of the owners of Plant Vogtle.
The COL is another step in the NRC’s new, streamlined licensing process designed to reduce regulatory uncertainty by completing the process in stages. It is a one-step licensing process by which the NRC approves and issues a license to build and operate a new nuclear power plant. Beth Thomas, the Nuclear Development Communications Coordinator with Southern Nuclear, said that submitting the application did not commit the owners to build new units, but it is part of the licensing process should they decide nuclear power is the best option for providing additional generation.
A few days later, on April 8, Georgia Power, in conjunction with Plant Vogtle's co-owners (Oglethorpe Power, Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia [MEAG Power], and Dalton Utilities), entered into an Engineering, Procurement and Construction contract (EPC) with a consortium consisting of Westinghouse Electric Company LLC and The Shaw Group Inc.'s Power Group for the engineering, procurement and construction of two AP1000 nuclear units with electric generating capacity of approximately 1,154 megawatts each and related facilities.
Beth Thomas added, "The technology we have selected is Westinghouse AP1000 technology. In our initial steps, we evaluated various plant designs. In evaluating these designs, we looked at many criteria, among them design certification. Based on the AP1000 technology receiving design certification from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the existing Westinghouse technology of our units at Vogtle, we selected AP1000 as the appropriate technology for the Vogtle site."
"Through its Independent Evaluator, the Georgia PSC will review the EPC and competing base load generation bids," explained Oscar Harper, vice president of resource planning for Georgia Power. Georgia Power will select a preferred resource, which will be submitted to the Georgia PSC in August 2008 for approval, with a final certification decision expected in March 2009. If selected by Georgia Power and certified by the Georgia PSC, Vogtle Units three and four are expected to be placed into service in 2016 and 2017, respectively. If completed, the two new units would make Plant Vogtle one of the nation’s largest generators of nuclear power, at approximately 4738Mw. One megawatt is approximately enough power for 250 homes in Georgia.
John Sell, Media Relations Manager at Georgia Power further clarified this by stating, "The Georgia Public Service Commission (PSC) has a structure in place where Georgia Power files a 20-year outlook Integrated Resource Plan (IRP) every three years. Based on an approved IRP, the PSC then issues request for proposals (RFP) for generation sources to cover the needs for certain years. The RFP process, including receiving the bids and evaluating those bids, is overseen by an Independent Evaluator that works for the PSC. The bids into the RFP for 2016-2017 are due May 1, 2008 and that is the RFP that we will bid in the proposed two new units at Plant Vogtle. We anticipate that most of the new generation sources before the 2016 timeframe will be natural gas plants. Any power producer can submit a bid to participate in meeting the request for proposal and can do so using a variety of fuel sources including coal, natural gas, solar, wind and biomass. Winning bids are typically decided based on the best interest of Georgia Power's customers with price being a key consideration. Once bids are evaluated and the winning bids determined, Georgia Power will enter into a contract (pending certification) with the winning bidders and then those contracts are submitted to the PSC for certification."
We expect demand for electricity in the Southeast - specifically in Georgia - to increase significantly by 2015 and beyond," said Mike Garrett, Georgia Power president and CEO. "Nuclear power is a safe, reliable, cost- effective power source that has a low impact on the environment. We are experiencing tremendous price volatility with natural gas and coal and believe we should further balance our portfolio with other fuel sources. It is a prudent business decision to preserve nuclear energy as an option to meet that need. We believe nuclear power is competitive with other generation resources.
"Our focus remains on a balanced portfolio of supply-side options, including renewable energy sources," added Garrett. "We will continue to increase our emphasis on energy efficiency and conservation initiatives to reduce energy consumption and demand."
Although there are negatives, such as how to handle spent nuclear fuel, there are many positives to using nuclear power.
In the May 2008 issue of Discover magazine Jesse Ausubel, head of the Program for the Human Environment at Rockefeller University stated, "As a green, I care intensely about land-sparing, about leaving land for nature. To reach the scale at which they would contribute importantly to meeting global energy demand, renewable sources of energy such as wind, water, and biomass cause serious environmental harm. Measuring renewables in watts per square meter, nuclear has astronomical advantages over its competitors."
According to the Westinghouse AP1000 Web site, "operating nuclear plants in the United States are already competitive producers of electricity compared to coal-fired plants. This is enhanced by the fact that fuel cost accounts for about 25 percent of production costs for nuclear power, while the remaining 75 percent of the production cost is in the fixed cost of operation and maintenance. That means that nuclear power production is much less sensitive to changes in fuel costs than fossil-fuel-powered plants, where fuel costs can account for 75 percent or more of the production cost."
In the meantime, increased safety regulations have decreased the likelihood of another disaster.
The AP1000 pressurized water reactor works on the simple concept that, in the event of a design-basis accident (such as a coolant pipe break), the plant is designed to achieve and maintain safe shutdown condition without any operator action and without the need for ac power or pumps. Instead of relying on active components such as diesel generators and pumps, the AP1000 relies on the natural forces of gravity, natural circulation and compressed gases to keep the core and containment from overheating. However, many active components are included in the AP1000, but are designated as non safety-related.
Multiple levels of defense for accident mitigation are provided, resulting in extremely low core-damage probabilities while minimizing occurrences of containment flooding, pressurization and heat-up.
The AP1000 meets the U.S. NRC deterministic-safety and probabilistic-risk criteria with large margins. Results of the Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) show a very low core damage frequency (CDF) that is 1/100 of the CDF of currently operating plants and 1/20 of the maximum CDF deemed acceptable for new, advanced reactor designs.
One downside of nuclear power is the nuclear waste generated by reactors. Its impact is still being debated. One school of thought is the amount generated is far less than pollution created by coal fired power generation plants. Reprocessing has been done in other countries, like the United Kingdom and France, but it is many times more expensive than creating new fuel, and still leaves nearly as much waste. In addition, the plutonium 239 recovered from re-processing is very dangerous, as it could possibly be diverted for use in nuclear weapons. Beth Thomas, who works in the Southern Nuclear Public Affairs office stated, "There is no reprocessing at nuclear energy plants in the US."
The majority of this article is derived from the March 31 Southern Nuclear press release and the April 8 Georgia Power press release. Excerpts from the Atlanta Journal Constitution and Discover magazine were also used, along with information from the Westinghouse (http://www.ap1000.westinghousenuclear.com).