nuclear-news

Another one bites the dust: New York’s Fukushima-clone Fitzpatrick reactor will close permanently next year.

In mid-September, I wrote a piece delving into prognostication–always a dangerous endeavor–identifying (with tongue slightly in cheek) the nation’s most troubled nuclear reactors and dividing them into two piles: pawn or toast. Toast was those reactors most likely to shut down; pawn indicated that while on the precipice, the utilities would go to great lengths to avoid shutting them down.

Only six weeks or so later, enough has happened to revisit that list and see how we’ve done.

I wrote then that Entergy’s Fitzpatrick reactor was toast. Yesterday, Entergy announced that Fitzpatrick will close permanently at the end of its current fuel cycle–sometime toward the end of next year. Pretty good prediction, though I wrote that Entergy wouldn’t make the announcement until December. As it turns out, the reactor is losing so much money…