A bill that would allow Ameren to charge ratepayers for licensing a proposed second reactor at its Callaway nuclear plant is again before state legislators in Missouri.
HB 1316 received a hearing before the House Committee on Utilities Tuesday after a similar measure languished last year. The bill would grant Ameren the authority to raise up to $45 million from ratepayers over 20 years for the costs of a combined license for the new reactor, Missouri News Horizon reported. The bill would also allow state regulators to refund the money if the plant is sold.
Ameren submitted a COL application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2008 but then suspended the project the following year, according to NRC documents. At the hearing, an Ameren executive said the company has spent about $25 million on permitting so far and would not move forward without approval to recover the project’s licensing costs from ratepayers. The legislation Ameren seeks is similar to bills in Iowa and other states that roll back prohibitions on charging ratepayers for reactors’ construction before their completion – laws implemented in the late 1970s and 1980s after a number of nuclear plant projects were abandoned.
Ameren currently operates a single 1,236 megawatt Westinghouse pressurized water reactor first licensed in 1984 at the Callaway plant near Fulton, Mo. The COL seeks approval to build an Areva EPR at the site.