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Comment by bradfa | Hacker News Reader

The article says that 4 operating nuclear plants supply 1/3 of the electricity for NY state. That's impressive!

Sadly, 4 of the NY nuclear plants were commissioned in the 1970s. A 5th plant, in Shoreham, is the newest but is also no longer operating. Nine Mile Point has one newer unit from the 1980s, but all told, most of the nuclear power generation capacity in NY is 40+ years old.

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Shoreham is actually way more interesting and complicated than that. The plant was never really in operation, but a deal was struck for it to briefly "turn on" so that cost recovery could be triggered and passed on to the rate base. It never entered real operation despite being completely finished.

Shoreham was completed but effectively never generated power. The evacuation method for an accident was "everyone drives away from Long Island" and Long Island refused to allow the plant to be turned on. The community paid back the entire cost of the plant through taxes because they had agreed to the planet before construction and effectively reneged on the deal.

Was partly a victim of external circumstances as well. It got federal approval in 1985, and might have eventually had an evacuation plan approved (over opposition) if Chernobyl hadn't happened in 1986, at which point nobody was willing to take on the political cost of pushing it through.

It is, but the state is accelerating the shutdown of the major plant feeding NYC.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/06/nyregion/indian-point-nuc...

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