Florida Power & Light's St. Lucie Nuclear Licenses Renewed Another 20 Years

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Written by Eric Funderburk for IIR News Intelligence (Sugar Land, Texas)

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Summary

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved Florida Power & Light's application for subsequent license renewals for the two reactors at its St. Lucie nuclear power plant in southern Florida, giving both reactors another 20 years to operate.

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Another Successful Renewal

Florida Power & Light (FPL) and its parent company NextEra Energy have now extended the operating licenses of all of their operational nuclear reactors to 2050 or beyond. NextEra has four operating nuclear power facilities, including two in Florida owned by its subsidiary FPL. The latest license renewal for the company comes for FPL's 2,000-megawatt (MW) St. Lucie nuclear power station, located on Hutchison Island on the state's Atlantic coast, about 125 miles north of Miami.

Nuclear reactors in the U.S. initially are licensed to operate for 40 years. This can be extended by 20 years in an initial license renewal, and for another 20 years (80 total years of operating) through subsequent license renewals.

To date, NextEra has achieved subsequent license renewals for three of its nuclear facilities, pushing the plants' reactors operating life to 80 years, as well as one initial license renewal for a newer reactor in New Hampshire whose life is now licensed for 60 years total. The St. Lucie application was a subsequent license renewal, allowing both reactors to operate for up to 80 years: to 2056 for Unit 1 and 2063 for Unit 2. Unit 1 began operating in 1976, followed by Unit 2 in 1983. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) granted initial license renewals for the reactors in 2003, allowing them to operate until 2036 and 2043. Now, those dates have been extended for another 20 years.

Industrial Info Resources is tracking on ongoing refueling outage at St. Lucie's Unit 2 currently. The refueling started last month and is expected to be completed by the end of May. Unit 1's next refueling outage is expected to occur about a year from now, over April and May 2027.

Other NextEra Nuclear License Renewals

FPL's other nuclear plant, the Turkey Point nuclear facility, has two reactors in addition to a gas-fired unit, pushing the facility's total generating capacity to more than 2,700 MW, including about 1,600 from nuclear. The NRC has issued subsequent license renewals for the two nuclear units, allowing them to operate until 2052 and 2053 (80 years each.) Industrial Info is tracking refueling outages for both units set to occur this year and a major 42-day planned maintenance outage on a portion of the gas-fired unit in 2027.

Outside of NextEra's subsidiary FPL, the parent company's most recent subsequent renewal application was for two units at the 1,200-MW Point Beach nuclear power plant in Wisconsin, now allowed to operate until 2050 and 2053. Refueling outages at the plant are expected for Unit 1 later this year and Unit 2 in late 2027.

The newest of NextEra's nuclear plants, the Seabrook Station in New Hampshire, about 40 miles north of Boston, began operating in 1990. An initial license renewal for the sole 1,244-MW reactor was issued in 2019, allowing the reactor to operate until 2050. Industrial Info Resources data finds the plant is in the midst of a 35-day refueling outage accompanied by a turbine rotor replacement.

Duane Arnold

While all of NextEra's operating nuclear plants are now licensed until at least 2050, the company is making moves to restart its Duane Arnold nuclear power station in Iowa. The facility was scheduled to close in October 2020 for economic reasons, but ended up being closed a couple of months earlier following severe storm damage. With the national rollout of power-hungry artificial intelligence-focused data centers, power demand is growing and expected to continue growing at a very rapid rate, prompting calls for increased nuclear power. NextEra's plans to restart the single 615-MW unit at the Duane Arnold plant come in addition to other planned restarts at U.S. nuclear plants.

Plans for the Duane Arnold were strengthened last year when Google struck an agreement to buy the plant's power. Plans are now in motion to restart the facility by 2029, nine years after it closed. Before it was shuttered in 2020, the Duane Arnold plant had received a subsequent license renewal allowing its reactor to operate until 2034. The NRC will conduct inspections of the plant this year and next to determine its ability to restarted safely.

The Duane Arnold plant joins two other U.S. nuclear plants in the restart process: Holtec's 812-MW Palisades plant in Michigan and Constellation Energy's 835-MW Crane Clean Energy Center Unit 1 (formerly Three Mile Island) in Pennsylvania, both of which were decommissioned for economic reasons but are now seeing demand for their low-emissions baseload power in great demand.

Key Takeaways

• The NRC has granted subsequent license renewals for both reactors at Florida Power & Light's St. Lucie nuclear power plant in Florida, allowing the reactors to run until 2056 and 2063.
• All of parent company's NextEra's seven operational nuclear reactors now are licensed to operate until 2050 or beyond.
• NextEra is making moves to restart the Duane Arnold nuclear power plant in Iowa by 2029.

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