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Getting back to yes: A local perspective on decommissioning, restart, and responsibility
For 45 years, Duane Arnold Energy Center operated in Linn County, Ia., near the town of Palo and just northwest of Cedar Rapids. The facility, owned by NextEra Energy, was the only nuclear power plant in the state.
In August 2020, a historic derecho swept across eastern Iowa with winds approaching 140 miles per hour. Damage to the plant’s cooling towers accelerated a shutdown that had already been planned, and the facility entered decommissioning soon after, with its fuel removed in October of that year. Iowa’s only nuclear plant had gone off line.
Today the national energy landscape looks very different than it did just six short years ago. Electricity demand is rising rapidly as data centers, artificial intelligence infrastructure, advanced manufacturing, and electrification expand across the country. Reliable, carbon-free baseload power has become increasingly valuable. In that context, Linn County has approved the rezoning necessary to support the recommissioning and restart of Duane Arnold and is actively supporting NextEra’s efforts to secure the remaining state and federal approvals.
Richard D. Reid (EPRI)
Proceedings | 16th International High-Level Radioactive Waste Management Conference (IHLRWM 2017) | Charlotte, NC, April 9-13, 2017 | Pages 952-962
Decommissioning of a nuclear power plant involves the safe disposition of a large quantity of radioactive, hazardous and conventional waste. A number of nuclear power plant decommissioning projects have been completed or are nearing completion in the US, Germany and Spain. These projects have used various waste disposal and interim storage options, and have developed successful methods for handling the large quantities of waste created by the decommissioning. Additionally, decommissioning projects in several Asian and European countries are in progress or are in the planning stages such that strategies for the handling of decommissioning waste are being developed and/or implemented to address the regulatory requirements and disposal options available in these countries. These experiences provide important lessons learned and successful strategies for the handling of waste from power plant decommissioning projects. As the handling and disposition of decommissioning waste have a substantial effect on power plant decommissioning cost, schedule and complexity, these lessons learned are valuable for planning future decommissioning projects.