GEORGIA - Due to the recession, the nuclear industry has been able to sell themselves as a Godsend to the people living nearby. Locals are in favor of the construction of the nuclear power plant b/c it is creating jobs and profits for busin...See more YIKES! Southern, one of the biggest utilities in the United States, raced to grab incentives offered by Congress to restart the nuclear construction business and to try out a licensing system devised by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to avoid a repeat of the experience of the 1970s and ’80s. In those decades parts of plants were built, ripped out and rebuilt because of design and regulatory problems, leading to ruinous costs. Examples sit across the muddy construction site: Vogtle 1 and 2, which opened in 1987 and 1989, cost $8.87 billion. When they were proposed in 1971 the estimated cost was $660 million. UNBELIEVABLE!! --For Vogtle 3 and 4, the company submitted a license application with a design described as nearly complete and received an operating license when construction had barely started, contingent on building exactly what it said it would. But with construction now roughly one-third complete, it is clear that much is not going as planned, and that the schedule — which is closely linked to cost because of growing interest expense on the incomplete asset — has slipped by at least 14 months and possibly more. Mark Cooper, an economic analyst affiliated with the Vermont Law School Institute for Energy and the Environment, predicted in a study in March that over their lifetimes, Vogtle 3 and 4 in Georgia would cost $10 billion more than the alternatives. The reason that utilities choose nuclear plants, he argued, is that they can collect profits on their investments. In Georgia they can do so even before the plant is finished. EVEN MORE SAD THAN THE BILLIONS OF DOLLARS BEING DUMPED INTO THIS OLD OUTDATED DANGEROUS ENERGY SOURCE IS THIS.... Due to the recession, the nuclear industry has been able to sell themselves as a Godsend to the people living near the nuclear power plant. Locals are in favor of the construction of the nuclear power plants b/c it is creating jobs. Sad that they are not able to look beyond to what this could ultimately do to their families. youtube/watch?v=8ujAG_Ofj4M Local support is strong in a county previously dominated by farming cotton, peanuts, soy and corn. Roads are now dotted with signs offering housing to construction workers. Near the main entrance, Greg Hawkins opened Greg’s Convenience in 1984, to sell bacon, egg and cheese breakfast sandwiches to the workers who built Vogtle 1 and 2. When plans for units 3 and 4 were announced, his son Shane tore the place down and built a bigger store opening at 4 a.m. daily. Shane Hawkins has since branched out into real estate, offering parking spots for the RVs that some workers live in behind his shop. For the duration of construction, business is great. “There are so many people here, you could sell an Eskimo a refrigerator,” said the elder Mr. Hawkins. nytimes/2013/06/12/business/energy-environment/nuclear-powers-future-may-hinge-on-georgia-project.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
Posted on: Mon, 08 Jul 2013 12:34:01 +0000
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