Partnering With Utilities on Decommissioned Coal Sites

Nearly a decade ago, nuclear generation in the United States began to plateau. Since then, uneconomic commercial plants have continued to close even as power demand has increased, leaving the country with the puzzle of how to sate both its growing appetite for electricity and the net-zero emissions demands of a warming climate. 

The need for new and emissions-free production, however, butts up against the reality that siting a new power project -- especially in nuclear, with its fraught reputation among the public -- and its accompanying transmission is infamously difficult. 

But one project announced this summer aims to skirt some of these issues by using existing coal infrastructure -- a concept that stakeholders hope will serve as a silver bullet that relies on the old energy system to speed adoption of the new. 

The benefits of brownfields

In 2020, the Department of Energy launched its Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program, which is providing initial funding for two reactors that are on track to be operational by 2027. One of the selected projects comes from TerraPower, a nuclear energy company founded by Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates, with the utility PacifiCorp intending to host the demonstration reactor and purchase it once it is operational and shown to be “in the interest of its customers.”

In a first for the industry, the Natrium reactor project will be developed at a retiring coal plant in Wyoming. Though the specific site chosen will not be announced until later this year, Jeff Navin, TerraPower’s director of external affairs, said the company has “seen nothing but enthusiasm from the four communities under consideration,” including “active campaigns” in favor of Natrium’s construction in each, a fact that PacifiCorp confirmed.

The use of retired coal plant “brownfield” sites comes with a number of perks for nuclear stakeholders, according to Dr. Jessica Lovering, founder of the progressive nuclear policy group Good Energy Collective. The sites are already zoned for industrial applications, have rail connections, are often near a water source and, crucially, come with transmission lines, which are virtually “impossible to site now,” she said.

Navin added that “many of the functions needed to run a new nuclear plant have direct analogs in coal plants.”

And making do with the alternative -- building at a site without any history of power sector infrastructure -- is increasingly difficult, Lovering said, which has also complicated matters recently for the renewables sector.

“So anytime you can take advantage of existing infrastructure or adaptive reuse of these brownfield sites could really help,” she said. 

Tiffany Erickson, a spokesperson for PacifiCorp, said that the company’s brownfield sites not adapted to nuclear would otherwise be used for unit replacements, fuel conversions, renewable development or land reclamation. 

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