NJ customers off the hook for cleanup at Three Mile Island reactor site
Credit: (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster, File)File photo: Three Mile Island nuclear power plant
By Tom Johnson, NJ Spotlight
Forty-one years after Three Mile Island’s Unit 2 partially melted down, customers of Jersey Central Power & light are almost off the hook for any liability stemming from the decommissioning of that nuclear reactor.
The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities on Wednesday approved the sale of JCP&L’s 25% interest in the plant to Energy Solutions, a Utah-based company, for $10,000. As part of the deal, customers of New Jersey’s second-largest utility will be absolved of any liability in cleaning up from the accident in 1979, the nation’s worst accident at a nuclear power plant.
The board approved the purchase with scant discussion. Ratepayers already have paid $900 million — $239 million by JCP&L customers — to decommission the plant, although the current owner projected earlier this year it could cost $1.3 billion to dismantle the plant.
“This will end all liability from JCP&L ratepayers to TMI-2,’’ said Stacy Peterson, director of BPU’s Division of Energy. “All liabilities are done.’’
In the petition, JCP&L asserted the transfer of the TMI assets for the $10,000 purchase price is appropriate consideration based upon an assessment of the assumed liabilities and estimated cost of decommissioning.
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