Duke's nuclear plans advance

Duke's nuclear plans

advance

Utility ready to apply for construction license; no site confirmed yet
STAN CHOE AND BRUCE HENDERSON
Staff Writers

Duke Power stepped closer to building the Carolinas' first nuclear power plant in decades on Wednesday, saying it's preparing to apply for a construction and operating license.

Duke emphasized it hasn't yet decided to build a nuclear plant. It wants to keep its options open among building nuclear, coal- or natural gas-fired plants.

But the $30 million license application process represents a significant step, industry analysts say. Duke says it could file an application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission within 30 months. If the NRC approves, the two-reactor plant could go online by 2015.

Duke said it won't decide until year's end where a nuclear plant would go. The utility has targeted 14 undisclosed sites, said Brew Barron, the utility's chief nuclear officer. He would name only three where Duke already has nuclear plants: Lake Norman, Lake Wylie, S.C., and upstate South Carolina, although those aren't top candidates, a spokeswoman said.

If Duke follows through, it would be in the forefront of a nuclear resurgence.

Trying to break from past memories of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, the industry touts safer, emission-free plant designs. Trade groups boast surveys that show improving public support. And the recently passed Energy Policy Act is packed with loan guarantees and insurance programs to spur more nuclear investment.

Some areas are dangling incentives to attract the plant, which would cost $4 billion to $6 billion and employ 800 to 1,000 people. Environmental groups still question plants' safety and how to dispose of nuclear wastes.

Duke says a new plant would need access to water, roads, transmission lines and railroads. Its territory stretches from Durham to the S.C.-Georgia border.

Two sites where Duke had previously considered building plants could be candidates again.

One is 2,000 acres of Duke-owned land on the Yadkin River, mostly in Davie County near Mocksville, about 45 miles northeast of Charlotte. Duke did geological work there but scrapped plans for a plant in the early 1980s. Duke won't say whether the site is on its list, but the county economic development chief believes it is.

"They've certainly kept it for some reason," said Terry Bralley, chairman of Davie's Economic Development Council. "Where we stand on that list, I don't know."

The other site is in Cherokee County, S.C., where county council members this month agreed to offer Duke tax breaks if it built the plant. Duke started but never finished a nuclear plant there in the early 1980s, later selling the site.

With the textile industry dying, "we've got a lot of people out of a job and some working out of the community," said county council Chairman Hoke Parris. "We hope they look at us very seriously."

The last U.S. reactor to be granted a construction license was Progress Energy.'s Harris plant near Raleigh, in 1978. The accident at Pennsylvania's Three Mile Island, the most serious in U.S. history, occurred the following year and galvanized public opposition to more plants.

Memories have faded, but anti-nuclear groups say time hasn't softened their opposition. "We're already working on it," said Lou Zeller of the Blue Ridge Environmental Defense League.

Environmentalists argue the new proposals wouldn't be economically viable if not for incentives included in this year's energy bill.

Most advocates favor development of alternative energies such as solar and wind power.

"We have a lot more options out there than pulverized coal and nuclear plants," said Sara Barczak of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy.

A Lengthy Process

• Preparing the application for a construction and operating license: 24-30 months.

• Picking a site: Expected this year.

• Application review by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission: Could take another 33 months.

• Construction: About 5 years.