Power provider Entergy estimates it will need to withdraw about $5 million from the shuttered Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant’s $581 million decommissioning trust fund to cover September expenses, Nuclear Regulatory Commission documents show.
Entergy spokesman Marty Cohn said Wednesday by telephone the estimate is part of an ongoing dialogue with the regulator. Each month Entergy is required to provide an estimate to NRC for decommissioning trust fund withdrawals. He said the company typically withdraws between $6 million and $7 million, though the amount fluctuates.
September expenses include: site-specific decommissioning expenses related to licensing and emergency planning contractor costs; insurance; and property taxes, according to a Sept. 7 letter to NRC. Entergy will withdraw up to $5 million in early October, so long as NRC Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation Director Bill Dean has no objections. NRC spokesman David McIntyre said as of Wednesday that Dean has not registered any objections.
Cohn said the decommissioning trust fund was recorded at $581 million at the end of August, down from the $595.4 million recorded as of December 2015. The end-of-year amount was about $70 million less than it held in 2014. The bulk of the decline came from Entergy’s $58 million withdrawal for decommissioning expenses, including employee salaries, plant modification, and construction costs.
Vermont Yankee, after shutting down in 2014, was placed into SAFSTOR decommissioning, which is expected to be completed by 2068, when active decommissioning would begin. The total cost of decommissioning is projected at $1.2 billion. Entergy plans to move Vermont Yankee’s spent fuel into dry storage by the end of 2020, but Cohn said company aims to finish the job by June 2020 of that year.
A total of 3,880 spent fuel assemblies are stored at Vermont Yankee, including 2,996 spent fuel assemblies stored in spent fuel pools. The existing 13 dry casks contain 884 spent fuel assemblies. When all fuel is on the pad, there will be a total of 58 dry cask storage casks.
Cohn said Entergy anticipates 6.5 percent growth for 2016 in the value of the trust fund, which compares to NRC’s estimate of 3 percent growth.
