![]() New York’s electricity supply will continue to be reliable after the closure of the plant. Because of these risks to public health and safety, NRDC has long opposed relicensing Indian Point.Įlectric System Reliability Will Be Maintained My colleague Matthew McKinzie, a nuclear physicist and director of NRDC’s Nuclear team, laid out potential severe nuclear accident consequences here. Indian Point’s proximity to New York City and the rest of the densely populated tri-state area made the potential impacts of an accident severe. One of the 9/11 terrorists cited the plant as a potential target. The power plant’s two operating units lie within a mile of a significant seismic zone discovered after the plant was built in the 1960s, prompting the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to deem Indian Point one of the top ten facilities most in need of reevaluation for earthquake vulnerability. ![]() For decades, the plant had one alarming incident after another, including missing and damaged bolts on the structures in both reactors that surround and are critical to cooling the nuclear fuel, a May 2015 transformer fire which sent thousands of gallons of oil into the Hudson River, radioactive spills and releases into the Hudson River and groundwater, failed accident drills, and inadequate disaster planning. The Indian Point nuclear plant, located in the most densely populated part of our country, presented a unique set of risks. Indian Point Presents Unique Siting, Public Health, and Safety Risks Entergy has noted that its decision to enter into the agreement to close the reactors reflected a number of factors, including reduced revenues from the plant due to New York’s competitive wholesale electricity markets. Through the 2017 agreement, Entergy agreed to close Unit 2 on April 30, 2020, and to close Unit 3 on April 30, 2021. In 2017, Indian Point’s owner, Entergy, voluntarily entered into a negotiated agreement with New York State and the environmental group Riverkeeper, which ended a ten-year legal proceeding about whether the expired operating licenses for Indian Point’s two reactors should be renewed.
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