Once a raving anti-nuclear proponent, environmental activist Michael Shellenberger, in his written testimony to the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources on March 11, urged the lawmakers to maintain the current U.S. fleet of nuclear power plants, American Nuclear Society news reported. Testifying right after the cold snap that brought the natural gas and wind-power-dependent Texas to its knees, he wrote: “The premature closure of nuclear plants threatens reliability, resiliency, affordability, as well as America’s reductions in greenhouse gases. Without state or federal action, the US will close twelve nuclear reactors by 2025, which constitute 10.5 gigawatts of highly-reliable, low-cost, and low-carbon power. Despite ratcheting regulations, the cost of operating America’s nuclear plants fell from $44.57 per megawatt-hour on average in 2012 to $30.42 in 2019.”
Pointing to the fact that nuclear plants are among the most reliable components of America’s power grids, Shellenberger wrote: “restructured wholesale electricity markets, low-priced natural gas, and subsidized variable renewable energy have undermined the economics of nuclear power plants, including those that prevented wider power outages during the recent cold snap. Those plants are Byron and Dresden in Illinois, Palisades in Michigan, Davis-Besse and Perry in Ohio, and Beaver Valley in Pennsylvania. If those nuclear plants are lost, grids may suffer from energy shortages during future heat waves or cold snaps.”
