Nuclear plants likely to slow development

By CHRIS KAHN

NEW YORK

The head of an energy trade group said Thursday he expects the development of nuclear power plants to be pushed back by two or three years as the industry waits for energy demand to return.

"The recession has decreased demand of electricity everywhere," Nuclear Energy Institute chief Marvin Fertel said in an interview with The Associated Press. "You're seeing a natural movement" away from early completion dates.

Fertel didn't identify any specific plant that would be delayed. But nuclear power plants with projected completion dates of 2017 or 2018 probably "are 2020 projects now," he said.

According to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, there are 13 applications for nuclear reactors currently under review by the federal government. Of that number, eight are on track to come online between 2017 to 2018, NRC spokesman Scott Burnell said.

However, once a company gets federal approval for a nuclear power plant, it can hold onto its license for several years, Burnell said.

Electricity demand has slumped in 2009 and 2008, with big drops in industrial electricity consumption. As demand picks up, Fertel said the nuclear industry will become a bigger resource for the U.S. Nuclear power plants can pump huge amounts of energy onto the grid at a stable price without producing carbon dioxide.

"You can't achieve what we want in (limiting) climate change without nuclear part of the portfolio," he said.