CONSULTING

Conservation (DEC) to deny the plant a clean water permit” and a decision is expected in the fall
of 2016. 459 These environmental problems add to the outages of the plant, likely due to aging,
making Indian Point less profitable to Entergy. Indeed, Moody’s vice president and senior analyst,
Ryan Wobbrock argued that “Indian Point is becoming increasingly expensive to operate; not only
are there declining prices for power but the costs of the actual facility are increasing because of
the extended outages and various problems the plant had over the past years,” leading to the
possibility that the reactor might ultimately be shut down for economic rather than
environmental or legal reasons.
In neighboring New Jersey, the state Department of Environmental Protection has allowed PSE&G
Power, the operator and, along with Exelon, owner of the two units at Salem, to continue operating
the reactors without building cooling towers, a step environmentalists had long advocated as a
way to avoid decimating the estuary’s fish population, by issuing permits allowing the units to
withdraw billions of gallons of water from the Delaware Bay. 460
Another nuclear plant that just became the latest victim of eroded competitiveness is Fort Calhoun
Station. Fort Calhoun had struggled since the 2014 debut of the day-ahead market in the
Southwest Power Pool (SPP) and in May 2016 the President of Omaha Public Power District
(OPPD)—the plant’s owner—told its Board that its continued operation was not financially
sustainable. 461 The reason offered for its shutdown reveal the problems confronting nuclear
power plants in the United States. In April 2016, the Chairman of Board of OPPD called for
potential scenarios regarding future power resources; it turned out that in all scenarios, Fort
Calhoun did not meet the requirements of the lowest cost portfolio and that “other carbon-free
options are more economic”. 462 Separately, Moody's Investors Service’s evaluation suggested that
the price for electricity in the SPP has been “well below the operating cost of Fort Calhoun”
because of low natural gas prices and expanding wind generation in SPP; Moody's calculated Fort
Calhoun's 2015 operating and maintenance expenses at US$32.39/MWh, 65 percent above SPP
South's average price of US$19.59/MWh. 463 On 17 June 2016, the OPPD Board voted unanimously
to shut down the reactor by the end of the year; the decision was, in the words on one board
member, “simply an economic decision”. 464
459 Frank Koster, “Could Indian Point Fall Victim to Economics?”, NIW, 10 June 2016.
460 Tom Johnson, “DEP Says Salem Nuclear Good to Go Without Cooling Towers”, NJ Spotlight, 13 June
2016, see http://www.njspotlight.com/stories/16/06/12/dep-says-salem-nuclear-good-to-go-without-coolingtowers/,
accessed 13 June 2016.
461 Argus, “Fort Calhoun reactor may shut by year-end”, 31 May 2016, see
http://www.argusmedia.com/pages/NewsBody.aspx?id=1249396&menu=yes, accessed 16 June 2016.
462 Aaron Larson, “Fort Calhoun May Close by Year End, Joining List of Premature Nuclear Power Plant
Retirements”, POWER Magazine, 12 May 2016, see http://www.powermag.com/fort-calhoun-may-close-byyear-end-joining-list-of-premature-nuclear-power-plant-retirements/,
accessed 16 June 2016.
463 Argus, “Fort Calhoun reactor may shut by year-end”, 31 May 2016, see
http://www.argusmedia.com/pages/NewsBody.aspx?id=1249396&menu=yes, accessed 16 June 2016.
464 Cole Epley, “‘Simply an Economic Decision’: OPPD to Close Fort Calhoun Nuclear Plant by End of 2016,”
Omaha.com, 17 June 2016, see http://www.omaha.com/money/simply-an-economic-decision-oppd-to-closefort-calhoun-nuclear/article_3fe6ce02-3352-11e6-a426-a7596287dd59.html,
accessed 1 July 2016.
Mycle Schneider, Antony Froggatt et al. 134 World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2016