Nine Mile Point Nuclear Station is a
nuclear power plant
A nuclear power plant (NPP) is a thermal power station in which the heat source is a nuclear reactor. As is typical of thermal power stations, heat is used to generate steam that drives a steam turbine connected to a electric generator, generato ...
with two
nuclear reactor
A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat from nu ...
s located in the town of
Scriba, approximately five miles northeast of
Oswego, New York
Oswego () is a city in Oswego County, New York, United States. The population was 16,921 at the 2020 census. Oswego is located on Lake Ontario in Upstate New York, about 35 miles (55km) northwest of Syracuse. It promotes itself as "The Port C ...
, on the shore of
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...
. The site is also occupied by the
James A. FitzPatrick Nuclear Power Plant
The James A. FitzPatrick (JAF) Nuclear Power Plant is located in the Town of Scriba, near Oswego, New York, on the southeast shore of Lake Ontario. The nuclear power plant has one General Electric boiling water reactor. The site is also the lo ...
.
In April 2011,
Exelon
Exelon Corporation is an American Fortune 100 energy company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois and incorporated in Pennsylvania. It generates revenues of approximately $33.5 billion and employs approximately 33,400 people. Exelon is the larges ...
of Chicago announced its intention to purchase Constellation Energy, the owner and operator of Nine Mile Point Nuclear Station. The acquisition was approved by FERC and the companies officially combined on March 12, 2012 with Constellation Energy taking the
Exelon
Exelon Corporation is an American Fortune 100 energy company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois and incorporated in Pennsylvania. It generates revenues of approximately $33.5 billion and employs approximately 33,400 people. Exelon is the larges ...
name.
Exelon
Exelon Corporation is an American Fortune 100 energy company headquartered in Chicago, Illinois and incorporated in Pennsylvania. It generates revenues of approximately $33.5 billion and employs approximately 33,400 people. Exelon is the larges ...
separated its generating assets back into Constellation Energy in 2022. Constellation owns Unit 1 and holds (82%) of Unit 2 while
Long Island Power Authority
Long Island Power Authority (LIPA, "lie-pah") is a municipal subdivision of the State of New York that owns the electric transmission and electric distribution system serving all of Long Island and a portion of New York City known as the Rocka ...
holds (18%).
Constellation Energy
Constellation Energy Corporation () is an energy company headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. The company provides electric power, natural gas, and energy management services. It has approximately two million customers across th ...
is the sole operator of both Units 1 & 2. Both units are
boiling water reactor
A boiling water reactor (BWR) is a type of light water nuclear reactor used for the generation of electrical power. It is a design different from a Soviet graphite-moderated RBMK. It is the second most common type of electricity-generating nu ...
s (BWRs).
Units 1 and 2
![HD](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e7/HD.6D.338_%2810824947354%29.jpg)
Both units are
General Electric
General Electric Company (GE) is an American multinational conglomerate founded in 1892, and incorporated in New York state and headquartered in Boston. The company operated in sectors including healthcare, aviation, power, renewable energ ...
boiling water reactor
A boiling water reactor (BWR) is a type of light water nuclear reactor used for the generation of electrical power. It is a design different from a Soviet graphite-moderated RBMK. It is the second most common type of electricity-generating nu ...
s (BWR). Unit 1, a BWR-2 (Generation 2), went online in 1969 and has a rated capacity of . It is the oldest operating commercial nuclear reactor still in service in the United States. Unit 2, a BWR-5, has been in operation since 1988 and has a rated capacity of 1,375 MW. Construction of both units, along with neighboring Fitzpatrick, was commissioned by
Niagara Mohawk Power Corporation
Niagara Mohawk Power Corporation was a New York State utility company, which was acquired in 2000 by National Grid plc. The Niagara Mohawk Power Corporation designation was retired, using variations of NationalGridUS (such as National Grid Buffa ...
. Fitzpatrick was sold immediately upon completion, while Niagara Mohawk retained its share of the Nine Mile Point units until 2001, when it sold them to Constellation.
On October 31, 2006, Constellation announced that the NRC had granted 20-year license extensions to both units. Unit 1 is now licensed to operate until 2029 and Unit 2 is licensed until 2046.
The Nine Mile Point 2
cooling tower
A cooling tower is a device that rejects waste heat to the atmosphere through the cooling of a coolant stream, usually a water stream to a lower temperature. Cooling towers may either use the evaporation of water to remove process heat and ...
is 543 feet tall and is visible from Chimney Bluffs in Sodus, New York nearly 30 miles away. Nine Mile Point 1 draws cooling water from
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...
, and does not have a cooling tower.
In early May 2011, the plant operator reported that the plant fuel supplier, General Electric, notified the operator that mathematical errors could've resulted in the reactor's fuel getting hotter than expected.
In 2016,
Governor of New York
The governor of New York is the head of government of the U.S. state of New York. The governor is the head of the executive branch of New York's state government and the commander-in-chief of the state's military forces. The governor has ...
Andrew Cuomo
Andrew Mark Cuomo ( ; ; born December 6, 1957) is an American lawyer and politician who served as the 56th governor of New York from 2011 to 2021. A member of the Democratic Party, he was elected to the same position that his father, Mario Cuo ...
directed the Public Service Commission to consider ratepayer-financed subsidies similar to those for renewable sources to keep nuclear power stations profitable in the competition against natural gas.
Indian Point would not be included in the scheme.
Withdrawn unit 3 proposal
Unistar Nuclear, a joint venture between
Constellation Energy
Constellation Energy Corporation () is an energy company headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. The company provides electric power, natural gas, and energy management services. It has approximately two million customers across th ...
and
Électricité de France
Électricité de France S.A. (literally ''Electricity of France''), commonly known as EDF, is a French multinational electric utility company, largely owned by the French state. Headquartered in Paris, with €71.2 billion in revenues in 2 ...
(EDF), announced in late 2008 that it had notified the U.S.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with protecting public health and safety related to nuclear energy. Established by the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, the NRC began operat ...
(NRC) of its plan to submit a
combined construction and operating license
The Combined Construction and Operating License (Regulatory Guide 1.206, COL) replaced the previous Draft Regulatory Guide 1145 as the licensing process for new nuclear power plants in the United States. It is a part of a newer "streamlined" proce ...
(COL) application for a
European Pressurized Reactor
The EPR is a Generation III reactor, third generation pressurised water reactor design. It has been designed and developed mainly by Framatome (part of Areva between 2001 and 2017) and Électricité de France (EDF) in France, and Siemens in Germ ...
(EPR) at Constellation Energy's Nine Mile Point site. Less than a year later however, Unistar requested a temporary suspension of the application review, and in 2013, citing a lack of
federal loan guarantees, withdrew the application completely.
Electricity Production
Surrounding population
The
Nuclear Regulatory Commission
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with protecting public health and safety related to nuclear energy. Established by the Energy Reorganization Act of 1974, the NRC began operat ...
defines two emergency planning zones around nuclear power plants: a plume exposure pathway zone with a radius of , concerned primarily with exposure to, and inhalation of, airborne
radioactive contamination
Radioactive contamination, also called radiological pollution, is the deposition of, or presence of radioactive substances on surfaces or within solids, liquids, or gases (including the human body), where their presence is unintended or undesirab ...
, and an ingestion pathway zone of about , concerned primarily with ingestion of food and liquid contaminated by radioactivity.
The 2010 U.S. population within of Nine Mile Point was 35,632, an increase of 17.0 percent in a decade, according to an analysis of U.S. Census data for msnbc.com. The 2010 U.S. population within was 909,523, an increase of 3.2 percent since 2000. Cities within 50 miles include Syracuse (36 miles to city center).
1991 site area emergency
On August 13, 1991 a "site area emergency" was declared at the plant. According to
''Time'' magazine, this was the third occasion an SAE had been declared at a US nuclear plant.
The emergency was due to an electrical fault which caused a momentary loss of electrical power to the reactor and control room. The operators shut down the reactor in accordance with the emergency plan requirements. There were no injuries or release of radiation as a result of the incident. The reactor left emergency procedures about 13 hours after initiation.
''Fro
NRC Information Notice 91-64, Supplement 1''
:The facility was operating at full power when a phase-to-ground electrical fault occurred on phase B of the Unit 2 main power transformer. This resulted in a trip of the main generator, main turbine, and reactor. The fault also caused the voltage on electrical distribution phase B buses to drop to about half of its nominal value for approximately 200 milliseconds, after which it returned to normal.
:This momentary voltage drop resulted in the simultaneous loss of power output from each of the five Non-Class 1E uninterruptible power supplies. Exide's UPS units have internal continuously charged back-up batteries to prevent a loss of control logic power. Exide's UPS control logic circuitry receives, processes, generates, and sends electrical signals essential for proper UPS operation. However, in this incident the back-up power battery packs were apparently past their useful life and were completely discharged.
:The loss of power from the UPS units caused a loss of all the following: the control room annunciators, the safety parameter display system computer, control rod position indication, the plant process computer, the core thermal limits computer, the feedwater control system, some of the lighting for the plant, the plant radio and paging systems, some instrumentation for
balance-of-plant systems, and some instrument recorders.
:The loss of control room annunciators concurrent with the plant transient resulting from automatic tripping of the main generator, main turbine, and reactor caused the licensee (Niagara Mohawk) to declare a site area emergency in accordance with the site emergency plan. The loss of control rod position indicators and other equipment losses burdened the operators in implementing the emergency procedures. However, the operators shut down the plant in accordance with emergency procedures. About 13 hours after the plant trip, the reactor was placed in a cold shutdown condition; and approximately 1 hour later, the licensee ended the site area emergency.
Seismic risk
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's estimate of the risk each year of an earthquake intense enough to cause core damage to the reactor at Nine Mile Point was Reactor 1: 1 in 238,095; Reactor 2: 1 in 178,571, according to an NRC study published in August 2010.
See also
*
Darlington Nuclear Generating Station
Darlington Nuclear Generating Station is a Canadian nuclear power station located on the north shore of Lake Ontario in Clarington, Ontario. It is a large nuclear facility comprising four CANDU nuclear reactors with a total output of 3,512&nbs ...
— located on the opposite side of Lake Ontario
*
New York energy law
*
Nuclear Power 2010 Program
*
Pickering Nuclear Generating Station
Pickering Nuclear Generating Station is a Canadian nuclear power station located on the north shore of Lake Ontario in Pickering, Ontario. It is one of the oldest nuclear power stations in the world and Canada's third-largest, consisting of eight ...
— located on the opposite side of
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...
*
R. E. Ginna Nuclear Power Plant
The Robert Emmett Ginna Nuclear Power Plant, commonly known as Ginna ( ), is a nuclear power plant located on the southern shore of Lake Ontario, in the town of Ontario, New York, Ontario, Wayne County, New York, United States, approximately ea ...
— located 50 miles west on
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...
near Rochester
Notes
External links
Exelon Nine Mile Point Page*
{{Electricity delivery, collapsed
Energy infrastructure completed in 1969
Energy infrastructure completed in 1988
Nuclear power plants in New York (state)
Towers in New York (state)
Buildings and structures in Oswego County, New York
Exelon
Électricité de France