The U.S. nuclear industry is feeling its age. Once touted as a source of electricity that would be “too cheap to meter,” plants face an unprecedented wave of closures. Yet 82 of the 117 U.S. nuclear power plants, including seven in the process of shutting down, don’t have enough cash on hand to close safely.
Humboldt Bay Power Plant (HBPP) is located just South of Eureka near the mouth of Humboldt Bay, in Humboldt County, California.
At the edge of Humboldt Bay in northern California lies a relic from the heyday of U.S. nuclear power.
The reactor was shut down in 1976. The remaining cost to decommission the plant once and for all -– cleaning up lingering radiological dangers, dismantling the remains — will be about $441 million, according to its owner, PG&E Corp.
The question is who will pay — for Humboldt Bay, and for dozens of other reactors that are in the process of closing or might soon. Nuclear operators like PG&E are supposed to lay up enough money to cover the costs, similar to how corporations fund pensions. Turns out, most haven’t.
PG&E’s Humboldt Bay trust fund, for instance, is currently $308 million short, according to a company filing to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. PG&E customers will shoulder the cost in the form of higher electricity bills.
“Somebody’s got to pay for it — the money doesn’t come from magic,” said Allison M. Macfarlane, a former NRC chairman. Brittany McKannay, a PG&E spokeswoman, said the company is committed to operating and decommissioning its nuclear plants safely.
The U.S. nuclear industry is feeling its age. Once touted as a source of electricity that would be “too cheap to meter,” plants need expensive upgrades to protect them from terrorism and natural disasters. At the same time, they face growing competition from renewables and natural gas. While five new reactors are under construction, current economics give little incentive to build more. Looming is an unprecedented wave of closures.
Yet 82 of the 117 U.S. nuclear power plants, including seven in the process of shutting down, don’t have enough cash on hand to close safely, according to NRC records. And closing tends to cost more than operators expect. Based on NRC filings, the actual combined cost may be somewhere in the neighborhood of $100 billion — $43 billion more than the current balance of the trust funds.
So the coming closures could drag on for decades and place unexpected burdens on investors, consumers or taxpayers.