It’s no surprise to anyone covering the story for a while, but the price tag for Georgia Power’s Vogtle two-unit, 2,000-MW new nuclear plant has now surpassed $30 billion. That’s more than double the original cost estimate for a plant planned to be in operation in 2016. It now looks very likely that neither unit will be operating until at least 2023.
Given Georgia Power’s putrid record to date on cost and schedule, which has been repeatedly reported in this publication, there is good reason for skepticism that the project will meet the latest milestones. Vogtle’s latest walk-back prompted E&E’s Energy Wire to comment, “Plant Vogtle’s latest move highlights the nuclear industry’s chief troubles with building large, baseload reactors: safety and cost.”
Even many staunch supporters of nuclear have soured on the Vogtle project, the only new nuclear baseload construction in the U.S. It was originally billed by Georgia Power’s parent, Atlanta-based Southern Co. utility holding company, as the harbinger of a return of atomic energy in the nation, after decades of stagnation. Critics have focused blame on both the utility managing the project, and sycophantic regulation by the Georgia Public Service Commission.
Some of the cost increases are a result of staffing shortages resulting from the pandemic. But others appear to be classic mismanagement, including, as reported here and elsewhere, thousands of missing and incomplete inspection records covering materials and equipment.
Vogtle now becomes the most expensive nuclear plant in history, by at least one calculation:
Vogtle is 15,000 $/kW
For comparison:
-Flammanville 3, France 11,800 €/kW
-Hinkley Point C, UK 9,000 £/kW
-Olkilouto3, Finland 5,800 €/kW
-Mochovce 3&4, Slovakia 5,200 €/kW
-Karachi 2, Pakistan 5,000 €/kW
The revelation about the records screwup in March brought the cost estimate to close to $30 billion, adding another over $900 million to the bottom line (if there is a bottom line). The project passed the $30 billion marker earlier this month, as POWER magazine reported, when Municipal Energy Agency of Georgia (MEAG), a public power system that owns 22.7% of the project, unveiled the latest cost projection.
Investor-owned Georgia Power owns 45.7% of the project, while Oglethorp Power Corp., a public power generation and transmission cooperative, owns 30%, while the city of Dalton, Ga., owns 1.6%.
POWER noted, “The owners’ updated cost estimate does not include the $3.68 billion that original contractor Westinghouse paid to the project’s owners after Westinghouse declared bankruptcy, putting total spending for the expansion in the range of $34 billion.”
–Kennedy Maize
Twitter: @kennedymaize