– By Tom Lamar –
After reviewing Exelon’s Fourth Quarter and 2010 Results statement, we have summarized some points concerning their nuclear power fleet.
- Exelon Generation Company, LLC (Generation) had its eighth consecutive year of nuclear fleet capacity factors that exceeded 93 percent.
- Increased nuclear output at Generation primarily reflecting the effect of fewer nuclear outage days in 2010
- Higher nuclear fuel costs at Generation
- Notes on Oyster Creek Nuclear Station Retirement
Fourth Quarter Notes:
Oyster Creek Nuclear Station Retirement: On December 8, 2010, Exelon announced that the company will operate the Oyster Creek Generating Station in New Jersey until 2019, after which the plant will retire. The 625-megawatt (MW) nuclear plant is federally licensed to operate until 2029. Oyster Creek faces a unique set of adverse economic factors and changing environmental regulations that make ending operations in 2019 the best option. Potential additional environmental compliance costs based on evolving water cooling regulatory requirements at both the federal and state government levels created significant regulatory and economic uncertainty. Due to Exelon's decision to retire the plant early, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection will not require the company to install cooling towers at Oyster Creek.
Nuclear Operations: Generation’s nuclear fleet, including its owned output from the Salem Generating Station, produced 35,115 gigawatt-hours (GWh) in the fourth quarter of 2010, compared with 33,609 GWh in the fourth quarter of 2009. The Exelon-operated nuclear plants achieved a 93.1 percent capacity factor for the fourth quarter of 2010 compared with 89.8 percent for the fourth quarter of 2009. The Exelon-operated nuclear plants completed four scheduled refueling outages in the fourth quarter of 2010, compared with completing four and beginning a fifth scheduled refueling outage in the fourth quarter of 2009. Three Mile Island (TMI) Unit 1 was shut down from late October 2009 for an extended refueling outage which included the replacement of steam generators. The steam generator replacement increased the number of refueling outage days in the fourth quarter of 2009. As a result, the number of refueling outage days totaled 97 in the fourth quarter of 2010 versus 136 days in the fourth quarter of 2009. The number of non-refueling outage days at the Exelon-operated plants totaled 18 days in the fourth quarter of 2010 compared with 23 days in the fourth quarter of 2009.
For the full year 2010, the Exelon-operated nuclear plants achieved an average capacity factor of 93.9 percent, as compared with 93.6 percent for 2009. The average annual capacity factor for the Exelon-operated plants during the five years ended 2010 was 94.0 percent.
The full earnings release can be found here.