Oyster Creek nuclear plant to be sold to Holtec


Amanda Oglesby reports for the Asbury Park Press:

LACEY — A Camden-based company specializing in nuclear and solar energy intends to purchase Oyster Creek Generating Station and decommission the plant in eight years, more than half a century earlier than previously planned.

The deal will transfer ownership of Oyster Creek to Camden-based Holtec International. The company will also take over the plant’s spent nuclear waste and its decommissioning trust fund, worth more than $890 million.

The deal is expected to be finalized sometime in 2019, but needs approval from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and other regulators. The plant’s current parent company, Exelon, said the purchase will not impact current decommissioning activities. The plant is scheduled to stop generating electricity mid-September.

“This landmark agreement is good news for Oyster Creek employees, the Lacey community and the state of New Jersey,” Exelon chief’s nuclear officer Bryan Hanson said in a news release. “Holtec’s commitment to the nuclear industry and its presence in New Jersey will allow many of our employees previously facing relocation to continue living and working in the

Exelon’s original plan including storing the plant for more than a half-century to allow radiation levels to drop and its trust fund to accrue more money before taking down the plant.

Holtec’s ownership will speed up the process. The company intends to hire Comprehensive Decommissioning International (CDI), a joint venture company of Holtec and engineering and nuclear waste management firm SNC-Lavalin, to help decontaminate and decommission the plant. Terms of the sale agreement require CDI to offer jobs to current Oyster Creek decommissioning employee.

Holtec’s President and CEO Kris Singh said in a news release that the company will use the latest technologies to preserve the shore near the plant and minimize radiation exposure to workers.



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Elcon clears DEP hurdle to build waste treatment facility

A graphic rendering of the proposed chemical treatment plant

The controversial proposal in Lower Bucks County, Pa
will now undergo a
10-month technical review by Pa. Department of Environmental Protection.
                             Kyle Bagenstose reports for the Bucks County Courier Times:

Circle May 2019 on the calendar. By then, residents of Lower Bucks and Northern Burlington counties should know whether the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has given the green light for a hazardous waste treatment facility to be built near the Delaware River in Falls.

Proposed by Elcon Recycling Services, the plant would process between 150,000 to 210,000 tons of chemicals and pharmaceutical waste each year, according to the company’s past filings. The company aims to build the facility on a 23-acre site in the Keystone Industrial Port Complex, an approximately 3,000-acre industrial park encompassing the former footprint of U.S. Steel’s Fairless Works operation.

The DEP announced Thursday afternoon that Elcon cleared a key part of the application process, in which the department reviewed its application materials to ensure all necessary materials were included. Elcon previously failed to clear that hurdle twice, when the DEP announced the materials were “incomplete” in May and October 2017.

The third time proved to be the charm for Elcon, as it resubmitted the materials again in late May. Now that the DEP has all necessary materials, Elcon’s application will “undergo a 10-month technical review which will include opportunities for public participation,” according to the DEP.

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Military: No chemical tests for fish near PA, NJ bases

Mirror Lake in the Browns Mills section of Pemberton, NJ Burlco Times photo

Kyle Bagenstose reports for the Burlington County Times:

Last week, the NJDEP released a study finding fish near the bases could be contaminated with enough chemicals to harm residents who catch and eat them. However, military officials say there are no immediate plans to test fish near Pennsylvania and New Jersey bases.
But Navy officials in Pennsylvania said they’ll continue to work with regulators to “evaluate” potential ways which humans could be exposed to the chemicals.
In mid-July, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection released fish consumption advisories based on a study of the state’s fish for perfluorinated compounds or PFAS. The toxic chemicals are being found in water systems across the country after being used for decades in a variety of consumer and industrial products. They were also used in military-grade firefighting foams, and have been found in large amounts at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New Jersey, as well as a trio of former and current bases in Bucks and Montgomery counties in Pennsylvania.
The chemicals are not regulated at the federal level. That leaves states such as New Jersey to conduct much of their own research into potential health risks. As a part of that effort, New Jersey studied fish in about a dozen lakes and creeks near sites of suspected PFAS contamination to assess how much of the chemicals had been built up in their bodies. Lakes near the joint base showed the highest levels of the chemicals of anywhere in the state, leading the NJDEP to recommend limiting fish consumption to just one meal a season or year, depending on the species.

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PADEP reaches settlement over Mariner East 2 pipeline

Mariner_East_2_pipeline_activity

    • Marie Cusick reports for
      StateImpact:
  • The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental protection has reached a settlement with three environmental groups that were challenging its issuance of permits for the embattled Mariner East 2 pipeline.
The pipeline is planned to carry natural gas liquids from western Pennsylvania to an export terminal near Philadelphia; it has faced numerous problems throughout its construction — including spills, sinkholes, and legal disputes, like this one.
In 2017,  the Clean Air Council, Delaware Riverkeeper Network, and Mountain Watershed Association challenged the construction permits DEP issued to Sunoco for the project.
“While this doesn’t cure the violations that have already taken place, it puts in place critical protections for future projects,” said Maya van Rossum, of the Delaware Riverkeeper Network. “Holding this company accountable and holding the DEP accountable at every turn is vitally important.”
Lisa Dillinger, a spokeswoman for Sunoco’s parent company, Energy Transfer Partners, said the settlement agreement will have no impact on the project.
“From the outset, Sunoco has maintained that the permits were properly and lawfully issued by PADEP and fully protective of the environment,” she wrote in an email.
The state Public Utility Commission has temporarily halted construction on the project in West Whiteland, Chester County due to safety concerns.
On Thursday DEP agreed to pay $27,500 to the environmental groups, money that will help them recoup costs. The agency also agreed to implement new policies aimed at enhancing public participation around pipeline projects.
Among other things, DEP has pledged to post more information online, including non-privileged, non-confidential materials it receives from companies seeking pipeline permits, as well as technical deficiency letters it issues to pipeline companies, and final decision documents.

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NJ proposes critical offshore-wind funding rule

Board of Public Utilities explains key funding mechanism for offshore-wind projects. Developers are keen, but some clean-energy advocates chide agency for lack of specifics

Tom Johnson reports for NJ Spotlight:

The state yesterday proposed a funding mechanism to develop offshore wind, one of the first concrete steps and perhaps most critical of the regulatory components needed to build wind farms off the Jersey coast.

The new rule, proposed by the Board of Public Utilities (BPU), sets forth the framework for how ratepayer subsidies will flow to the offshore-wind developers and how revenues earned by projects from the wind-generated electricity will be returned to utility customers.
More significantly, the mechanism, dubbed Offshore Renewable Energy Certificates (ORECs), ensures that project developers obtain a steady and long-term stream of funding that will allow them to gain financing for the wind farms from Wall Street.
The BPU did not release any version of the proposed rule, which is expected to be published in the New Jersey Register within the next few weeks, so details about exactly how the system would function remain unclear.
The proposal, however, was welcomed by offshore-wind developers and clean-energy advocates, who have been waiting eight years for the BPU to propose such a rule. During the prior administration of Gov. Chris Christie, the agency had developed a rule, but it never won approval from the governor, who had cooled on the prospect of developing offshore-wind energy.

It’s a significant piece of the puzzle

“It’s significant because it is the final piece of the regulatory program that will enable the development of offshore wind,’’ said Scott Weiner, a former BPU president who now represents Deepwater Wind, one of four offshore developers expected to submit applications to the agency to build wind farms.
The step also won praise from Gov. Phil Murphy, who wants the state to build 3,500 megawatts of offshore wind by 2030, the most aggressive target in the nation. Initially, the BPU’s target is to approve 1,100 megawatts.
“There has been more activity in the first six months of this administration when it comes to achieving our offshore wind goals than there was in the eight years since the signing of the Offshore Wind Economic Development Act,’’ Murphy said in a press release. “The action by this board shows we are truly all-in on offshore wind.’’
But they still have a long way to go. Offshore-wind developers are pressing the BPU to begin accepting applications before the end of the year, fearing that if the state does not move swiftly, they will not be able to qualify for lucrative federal tax credits. The credits expire at the end of 2019 and developers need to start spending big dollars on their projects before then or they will not qualify for the incentives.

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Solar’s hitting a cap in SC, with thousands of jobs at stake

Solar energy’s popularity jumped with net metering. Now, utilities plan to cap the program 3 years earlier than expected, and it’s an issue in the governor’s race.

James Bruggers reports for Inside Climate News:

Solar installation. Credit: Alexandra Beier/Getty Images

On July 31, Duke Energy plans to cap its net-metering program in South Carolina. After that, customers adding new solar systems will get less favorable rates. Credit: Alexandra Beier/Getty Images
South Carolina shot from almost no solar energy to having enough to power nearly 100,000 homes in less than four years, but it’s about to slam on the brakes.
When the state legislature passed its landmark energy bill in 2014, it ushered in a net-metering system that allows residential and smaller-scale commercial power customers with solar panels to get credit at retail rates for the power they produce and send back to the grid.
But the legislation had a catch: Once solar output reached 2 percent of utilities’ peak power production, the utilities could cap the program.
On July 31, Duke Energy plans to do just that for a large swath of the state. Two other utilities are also expected to hit 2 percent in the coming months, solar installers say. Customers who already have net metering won’t see any change until the whole program is due to expire in 2025, but Duke Energy customers who add solar after this month will get much less favorable rates.
This is all coming three years earlier than expected, and it could put as many as 3,000 solar jobs at risk.

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