British Energy Considers Divesture of North American Generation Assets

---

Researched by Industrialinfo.com (Industrial Information Resources, Incorporated; Houston, Texas). British Energy plc (NYSE: BGY) (Edinburgh, United Kingdom) is contemplating the divesture of up to 40% of its total generation assets or 44% of its nuclear generation assets. Due to economic hardships caused by the fall of wholesale power prices, British Energy is evaluating cost cutting measures to maintain their core business in the United Kingdom and has come up with a few solutions. Plans to construct new nuclear generating units have been suspended and they are conducting studies to determine if divestiture of all or part of their North American assets will prove economically feasible.

British Energy owns 78% of Bruce Energy, which controls 7,740 megawatts (MW) at the Bruce Nuclear Station in Ontario. Bruce A is mothballed with four (4) units totaling 3,304MW and Bruce Energy is presently preparing to restart commercial operation of two existing units by the spring of 2003. British Energy also formed a joint venture with Exelon Corporation (Chicago, Illinois) called AmerGen. This venture owns 86% of the 985MW Clinton Nuclear Station in Illinois, 100% of the 879MW Three Mile Island Nuclear Station in Pennsylvania and the 641MW Oyster Creek Nuclear Station in New Jersey.

British Energy, with over 8,000 employees, is the largest generator in the United Kingdom producing approximately 20% of the country's electricity. It was privatized in 1996 and has about 11,600MW of generation in the United Kingdom with interests in 5,260MW in Canada and 2,369MW in the United States.