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Constellation Energy Corp. says it has signed a 20-year agreement with Microsoft under which the technology company will purchase power from Three Mile Island Unit 1.

Reactor operators Brian Bowers (left) and Bryan Bricking in the control room of Three Mile Island in 2017. Constellation Energy Corp. signed a 20-year agreement with Microsoft to provide power from TMI Unit 1. That reactor is located at an independent facility from Unit 2, which closed in 1979 after a partial meltdown.
Reactor operators Brian Bowers (left) and Bryan Bricking in the control room of Three Mile Island in 2017. Constellation Energy Corp. signed a 20-year agreement with Microsoft to provide power from TMI Unit 1. That reactor is located at an independent facility from Unit 2, which closed in 1979 after a partial meltdown. Clem Murray / Staff Photographer

By Andrew Seidman, Philadelphia Inquirer

Five years after a nuclear reactor at the Three Mile Island plant in central Pennsylvania closed amid financial troubles, its owner wants to bring it back online.

Baltimore-based Constellation Energy Corp. said Friday that it has signed a 20-year agreement with Microsoft under which the technology company will purchase power from Three Mile Island Unit 1. That reactor is located at an independent facility from Unit 2, which closed in 1979 after experiencing a partial meltdown.

Constellation said it would spend $1.6 billion to restart Unit 1 — and won’t seek “a penny in grant money” from the state or federal governments — which the company said “operated at industry-leading levels of safety and reliability for decades.” Federal regulators would need to approve a restart, though it already has support from Gov. Josh Shapiro. The company said it expects the reactor to come online by 2028.

“I think policymakers have recognized that a strategy that is dependent just on wind, solar, batteries isn’t going to fully get us there and meet the needs of the system from a reliability standpoint,” Joe Dominguez, Constellation’s president and CEO, said in an interview.

The Three Mile Island power plant complex in Londonderry Township, Pa. Unit 2, on the left, infamously shut down in 1979 after an accident. Unit 1, on the right, was shut down in 2019 for financial reasons.
The Three Mile Island power plant complex in Londonderry Township, Pa. Unit 2, on the left, infamously shut down in 1979 after an accident. Unit 1, on the right, was shut down in 2019 for financial reasons.Read moreClem Murray / Staff Photographer

For Microsoft, buying energy from the renewed plant, dubbed the Crane Clean Energy Center, will “help match the power its data centers in PJM use with carbon-free energy,” according to a news release. Valley Forge-based PJM Interconnection, a regional transmission organization, operates the electric grid in 13 states, including Pennsylvania and New Jersey.

Read the full story here

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