Susquehanna Steam Electric Station
Map
CountryUnited States
LocationSalem Township, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania
Coordinates41°5′20″N 76°8′56″W / 41.08889°N 76.14889°W / 41.08889; -76.14889
StatusOperational
Construction beganNovember 2, 1973 (1973-11-02)
Commission dateUnit 1: June 8, 1983
Unit 2: February 12, 1985
Construction cost$7.983 billion (2007 USD)[1]
Owner(s)Talen Energy (90%)
Allegheny Electric Cooperative (10%)
Operator(s)Talen Energy
Nuclear power station
Reactor typeBWR
Reactor supplierGeneral Electric
Cooling towers2 × Natural Draft
Cooling sourceSusquehanna River
Thermal capacity2 × 3952 MWth
Power generation
Units operational2 × 1350 MW
Make and modelBWR-4 (Mark 2)
Nameplate capacity2514 MW
Capacity factor94.50% (2017)
85.05% (lifetime)
Annual net output19,943 GWh (2021)
External links
WebsiteSusquehanna Nuclear Power Plant
CommonsRelated media on Commons
[edit on Wikidata]

The Susquehanna Steam Electric Station is a nuclear power station on the Susquehanna River in Salem Township, Luzerne County, Pennsylvania.

Operations

PPL operated the plant until June 2015 when Talen Energy was formed from PPL's competitive supply business. The plant has two General Electric boiling water reactors within a Mark II containment building[2] on a site of 1,075 acres (435 ha), with 1,130 employees working on site and another 180 employees in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Harrisburg-based Allegheny Electric Cooperative purchased 10% of the plant in 1977.[3][4]

Susquehanna produces 63 million kilowatt hours per day. It has been in operation since 1983. The prime builder was Bechtel Power Corporation of Reston, Virginia. In November 2009, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) extended the operation licenses of the reactors for an additional 20 years.[5]

Data Center

Cumulus Data, a subsidiary of Talen Energy, is developing a data center directly connected to the power stations. On January 17, 2023, it completed the phase 1 construction.[1] On March 4, 2024, it was sold to Amazon Web Services for 650 million dollars.[2][3]

Electricity Production

Generation (MWh) of Susquehanna Steam Electric Station[6]
Year Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Annual (Total)
2001 1,641,381 1,482,806 1,050,655 909,095 1,533,526 1,568,380 1,626,269 1,618,389 1,586,322 1,639,836 1,593,926 1,614,081 17,864,666
2002 1,627,242 1,368,563 813,610 959,909 1,648,911 1,586,051 1,634,103 1,631,149 1,583,552 1,274,053 1,607,308 1,663,585 17,398,036
2003 1,640,809 1,422,792 976,200 1,022,446 1,649,299 1,575,937 1,652,085 1,643,323 1,387,214 1,667,531 1,625,346 1,696,767 17,959,749
2004 1,650,478 1,403,764 864,302 988,853 1,668,931 1,617,379 1,680,026 1,666,301 1,618,848 1,695,244 1,449,297 1,719,678 18,023,101
2005 1,723,149 1,381,611 1,038,859 1,483,961 1,685,803 1,468,806 1,640,526 1,657,191 1,616,810 1,603,341 1,239,475 1,724,827 18,264,359
2006 1,723,425 1,532,732 928,498 1,236,026 1,552,576 1,503,961 1,639,653 1,661,875 1,581,886 1,175,403 1,541,913 1,727,484 17,805,432
2007 1,724,278 1,557,034 909,886 1,163,118 1,703,662 1,623,539 1,676,569 1,669,359 1,629,479 1,181,577 1,667,967 1,731,434 18,237,902
2008 1,731,666 1,610,267 942,630 1,135,197 1,734,942 1,635,252 1,703,041 1,672,452 1,662,760 1,751,662 1,693,887 1,766,058 19,039,814
2009 1,771,827 1,602,695 1,726,689 1,004,345 1,188,205 1,689,774 1,756,807 1,745,430 1,694,390 1,783,800 1,739,475 1,783,220 19,486,657
2010 1,807,052 1,565,156 919,205 690,462 1,565,552 1,729,962 1,316,879 1,677,543 1,761,339 1,824,897 1,796,169 1,861,363 18,515,579
2011 1,728,725 1,682,644 1,590,450 1,028,381 445,235 86,601 1,610,334 1,700,558 1,816,715 1,904,803 1,844,903 1,924,377 17,363,726
2012 1,915,903 1,795,186 1,841,550 921,187 864,309 704,284 1,728,928 1,826,063 1,826,134 1,162,708 878,645 1,449,460 16,914,357
2013 1,913,584 1,726,984 1,912,078 1,276,158 225,721 1,141,016 1,741,591 1,869,464 1,455,597 1,894,580 1,819,764 1,922,526 18,899,063
2014 1,913,406 1,703,367 1,116,604 1,258,937 936,728 1,388,426 1,705,009 1,814,722 1,490,264 1,891,172 1,860,863 1,701,797 18,781,295
2015 1,928,439 1,735,532 1,954,556 1,215,948 1,063,232 1,807,193 1,870,327 1,868,367 1,797,288 1,884,454 1,564,364 1,901,560 20,591,260
2016 1,915,434 1,735,811 1,234,864 885,516 1,601,861 1,123,585 1,846,755 1,844,095 1,804,267 1,643,232 1,807,301 1,908,254 19,350,975
2017 1,910,531 1,665,417 1,032,548 1,494,551 1,878,682 1,724,092 1,844,050 1,858,879 1,732,211 1,872,981 1,844,843 1,893,780 20,752,565
2018 1,903,980 1,644,670 1,694,732 907,337 1,730,401 1,804,216 1,837,720 1,566,621 1,778,638 1,877,072 1,836,176 1,887,159 20,468,722
2019 1,879,592 1,625,064 1,493,473 1,156,300 1,863,184 1,803,796 1,852,517 1,867,551 1,796,823 1,884,813 1,831,458 1,864,436 20,919,007
2020 1,832,553 1,482,539 1,536,238 895,446 1,475,102 1,711,863 1,848,934 1,849,871 1,798,231 1,858,398 1,828,551 1,873,177 19,990,903
2021 1,826,498 1,553,674 1,403,996 1,062,730 1,864,787 1,794,454 1,638,047 1,854,408 1,808,079 1,644,610 1,819,233 1,673,030 19,943,546
2022 1,841,431 1,591,781 1,566,471 866,125 1,644,935 1,746,251 1,818,542 1,821,939 1,728,111 1,759,022 1,814,194 1,866,229 20,065,031
2023 1,713,699 1,629,401 1,337,612 997,065 1,724,610 1,683,485 1,702,201 1,734,624 1,627,409 1,740,751 1,364,045 1,746,058 19,000,960

Abandoned plans for an adjacent power plant

In 2008, PPL filed an application with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a license to build and operate a new nuclear plant under consideration near Berwick, Pennsylvania. The Bell Bend Nuclear Power Plant would be built near the company’s existing two-unit Susquehanna nuclear power plant. On August 30, 2016, Talen Energy formally requested the license application be withdrawn,[7] and the NRC officially accepted the application withdrawal on September 22, 2016,[8] officially cancelling the project. Unlike the existing two units, which are American-designed boiling water reactors, the plan called for the French-German EPR which is a pressurized water reactor. At 1.6 Gigawatt net electric nameplate capacity (1.66 GW in the case of Taishan nuclear power plant), the EPR is the nuclear power plant design with the highest per-reactor electric power output ever built.

Incidents

In the plant's first emergency, an electrical fire erupted at a switch box that controls the supply of cooling water to emergency systems. No injuries were reported following the 1982 incident.[9]

Roughly 10,000 gallons of mildly radioactive water spilled at the Station's Unit 1 turbine building after a gasket failed in the filtering system in 1985. Installed drains collect water, and is released into the air. No radiation was released from the building to the public, and no personnel were contaminated as a result of this incident.[10]

Surrounding population

One of the power plant's cooling towers from the north

The NRC defines two emergency planning zones around nuclear power plants: a plume exposure pathway zone with a radius of 10 miles (16 km), concerned primarily with exposure to, and inhalation of, airborne radioactive contamination, and an ingestion pathway zone of about 50 miles (80 km), concerned primarily with ingestion of food and liquid contaminated by radioactivity.[11]

The 2010 U.S. population within 10 miles (16 km) of Susquehanna was 54,686, an increase of 3.3 percent in a decade, according to an analysis of U.S. Census data for msnbc.com. The 2010 U.S. population within 50 miles (80 km) was 1,765,761, an increase of 5.5 percent since 2000. Cities within 50 miles include Wilkes-Barre (18 miles to city center) and the larger city, Scranton (33 miles to center city).[12]

Seismic risk

The NRC's estimate of the risk each year of an earthquake intense enough to cause core damage to the reactor at Susquehanna was 1 in 76,923, according to an NRC study published in August 2010.[13][14]

See also

References

  1. ^ "EIA - State Nuclear Profiles". www.eia.gov. Retrieved 3 October 2017.
  2. ^ "U.S. boiling-water reactors with "Mark 1" and "Mark 2" containments". NRC. November 2, 2015. Retrieved January 6, 2016.
  3. ^ "At a Glance". Pplweb.com. Retrieved 2011-03-24.
  4. ^ "PPL Susquehanna Fact Sheet". Pplweb.com. Retrieved 2011-03-24.
  5. ^ "Susquehanna gets 20 more years". World Nuclear News. World Nuclear Association (WNA). 25 November 2009. Retrieved 2009-11-25.
  6. ^ "Electricity Data Browser". www.eia.gov. Retrieved 2023-01-07.
  7. ^ "Bell Bend Combined Operating License application withdrawal" (PDF). Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). 30 August 2016. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  8. ^ "Bell Bend Combined Operating License application withdrawal acceptance" (PDF). Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). 22 September 2016. Retrieved 2017-12-19.
  9. ^ "Nuke plant has emergency". Reading Eagle. September 22, 1982. Retrieved March 24, 2011.
  10. ^ "Radioactive water spills at nuke plant". Gainesville Sun. October 28, 1985. Retrieved March 24, 2011.
  11. ^ "NRC: Emergency Planning Zones". United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Retrieved 2019-12-22.
  12. ^ Bill Dedman, Nuclear neighbors: Population rises near US reactors, NBC News, April 14, 2011 http://www.nbcnews.com/id/42555888 Accessed May 1, 2011.
  13. ^ Bill Dedman, "What are the odds? US nuke plants ranked by quake risk," NBC News, March 17, 2011 http://www.nbcnews.com/id/42103936 Accessed April 19, 2011.
  14. ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2017-05-25. Retrieved 2017-05-05.((cite web)): CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)

External links

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