Eight nuclear power plants have been retired since 2013 in the face of continued energy market pressure, with five more scheduled for shutdown over the next six years, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said Monday.
The latest early retirement was Exelon’s reactor Unit 1 at the Three Mile Island plant near Harrisburg, Pa., on Sept. 20. Before that, Entergy closed its single-reactor Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station on Cape Cod, Mass., on May 31.
“Declining prices for electric power in wholesale markets have placed economic pressures on many nuclear power plants in the United States and led to several plant closures,” the EIA noted on its “Today in Energy” article.
Low natural gas prices have been identified as a particular challenge to the viability of nuclear power.
To offset these challenges, five states have enacted financial-assistance programs for atomic energy operations within their borders, according to the EIA. Ohio put its program into place in July, following similar efforts dating to 2017 in Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey, and New York.
“Collectively, the 14 reactors at the 10 plants receiving state support account for 9% of the utility-scale generating capacity in those five states and 13% of the nation’s nuclear generating capacity,” EIA said. “Because nuclear power plants tend to operate at higher capacity factors than other generator types, these plants’ shares of their states’ or the national electricity generation is larger than their shares of capacity.”
The programs have been controversial, drawing lawsuits and, in Ohio, a November 2020 ballot referendum to undo the new law under which electricity ratepayers subsidize continued operation of FirstEnergy Solutions’ Davis-Besse and Perry plants. FirstEnergy Solutions had planned to close the sites before the legislation passed this summer.
Unlike their peers in the five states, legislators in Pennsylvania have to date refused to pass legislation to provide financial support for nuclear power.
