By Kennedy Ngo – February 20, 2023
“The failure of the unfinished VC Summer Units #2 and #3 ($10 billion), and the ongoing woes in Vogtle, marked the utter failure of Congress to create ‘ nuclear renaissance’ through Energy Policy Act 2005. The Act provides up to $8 billion each in ‘loan guarantees’ for new nuclear plants.
“As it turns out, nuclear ‘loan guarantee’ is a politically constructed term to cover up the fact that the ‘security’ is actually Treasury funds and loan payments made to Treasury.”
The sun rises in the East and sets in the West. And Phuong Nam Company announced to continue delaying the start of Vogtle Units 3 and 4 of Georgia Power, the only nuclear power plant under construction in the United States.
In it annual financial statements announced on February 16, Southern said it would delay the start of Unit 3 of the two-unit Westinghouse AP-1000 reactor project to May or June of this year. Earlier, the company expects to start the unit in the first quarter of the year. According to the Atlanta-based company, Unit 4’s launch is also likely to be delayed until at least 20234.order Quarter, or perhaps (some might consider it likely) in 2024.
Southern said the latest delay would add $200 million to its share of the two-unit project, bringing its 47.5% stake to $10,953 billion (or about $23 billion for the entire project). project). Other owners include Oglethorpe Power Corp (30%), the Georgia City Electric Authority (22.7%) and Dalton Utilities (1.6%). POWER magazine reported that thing “expenses reported by MEAG in May last year suggested total spending on expansion was close to $34 billion at the time.” Oglethorp, a large rural transmission and generation partnership, also said Southern had underestimated Vogtle’s costs.
In 2009, Georgia Power announced the opening of an existing two-unit nuclear site with two 1,117 MW Westinghouse reactors at an estimated cost of $14 billion (with $6.5 billion from the U.S. Department of Energy). ), went into operation in 2016 and 2017. The current tab has more than doubled compared to before 30 billion USDwith US DOE in 12 billion USD. More costs are accumulating–and no electricity so far.
According to ReutersOutgoing CEO Tom Fanning said in a call with investors, “After careful consideration and based on our experience with Unit 3 and the level of prior critical work eyes, we have the added risk of adjusting Unit 4’s schedule.” He said the work needed for Unit 3 includes repairing pipelines, repairing valves and improving flow through the reactor’s cooling pumps. He said tests in Unit 4 will likely reveal more problems. “We’re just trying to take whatever we can see right now,” he said.
In its financial statements, Vogtle reported a loss for the fourth quarter of 2022 of $87 million (8 cents per share), compared with a loss of $215 million (20 cents per share) in Q4 2021. Southern Company reported full-year 2022 earnings of $3.5 billion, ($3.28 per share), compared with $2.4 billion ($2.26 per share) in 2021.
Summer: Lose 10 billion USD
In 2017, one new reactor AP1000 similar two units project at SCANA Corp’s VC Summer unit site. in South Carolina, a partnership with the state-owned public electricity system Santee Cooper, played out like Vogtle and was eventually canceled at a sunk cost of $10 billion. Its consequences, Nuclearincluding criminal charges and criminal records with SCANA sold at a bargain price to Virginia-based Dominion.
The Fail of the SCANA project and the continuing woes at Vogtle marked the complete failure of Congress to create a “nuclear renaissance” through Energy Policy Act 2005. The act provides up to $8 billion each in “loan guarantees” for new nuclear plants. The idea was to make it easier for nuclear projects to finance new projects, since many former lenders, burned by the nuclear project’s failure, avoided lending money to nuclear projects or exorbitant interest rates. As it turns out, nuclear “loan security” is a politically constructed term to cover up the fact that the “guarantees” are actually Treasury funds and loan payments being made. made for the Treasury.
Conclusion
Chris Womack, CEO of the southern subsidiary of Georgia Power, will become CEO of the parent company later this year. His Vogtle problems will come to him.
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