At Three Mile Island, Pennsylvania May Consider Reviving Nuclear Power

Pennsylvania officials and Constellation Energy Corporation are reportedly considering restarting one of the two reactors at Three Mile Island, the notorious site of a 1979 nuclear crisis.

Last week, unnamed sources told Reuters that the governor’s office and state lawmakers were “beyond preliminary” in their discussions with the Baltimore-based energy provider, which was spun off from Exelon two years ago.

The company may seek a public-private partnership for the plant on the island outside Harrisburg. The unit in question operated from 1974 to 2019. The other unit suffered a partial meltdown in March 1979, sending panic through the region and leaving a legacy of skepticism about the risks of the nuclear industry and regulatory transparency.

Gov. Josh Shapiro’s administration declined to confirm the conversations Monday, but said the governor was committed to updating the state’s energy portfolio standards.

“Pennsylvania is an ‘all-in-one’ energy state, and the Shapiro administration recognizes the role Pennsylvania’s nuclear power fleet plays in providing safe, reliable, carbon-free electricity that helps reduce emissions and makes Pennsylvania’s energy economy more competitive,” spokesman Manuel Bonder said in a statement.

Constellation Energy could not immediately be reached for comment on its interest in Three Mile Island. The company operates more than a dozen nuclear power plants in the United States, including the Limerick plant in Montgomery County and the Peach Bottom plant in York County. Pennsylvania has five nuclear power plants, including Three Mile Island.

“While we have determined that it would be technically feasible to restart the unit, we have not made any decisions on a restart as many economic, commercial, operational and regulatory considerations remain,” Constellation spokesman Dave Snyder told Reuters.

Support for nuclear power has grown in recent years. The technology is touted as a key part of a strategy to reduce carbon emissions by reducing reliance on fossil fuels. It is also seen as a way for the United States to solidify its energy independence.

“We’re in a climate emergency, and any zero-carbon energy source that can come online will help solve that problem,” John Quigley, a senior fellow at the University of Pennsylvania’s Kleinman Center for Energy Policy, said in an interview Monday. “Clearly there are legitimate public concerns and issues about safety. There’s the ongoing issue of nuclear waste disposal that the country hasn’t solved yet. But it’s good to look at every zero-carbon asset.”

High costs and long timelines for developing nuclear power make it difficult to combat carbon emissions. Nuclear power accounts for about 18 percent of U.S. electricity, but only three new reactors have been built since 1996. There had been some optimism about the development of new nuclear technologies, such as small modular reactors and microreactors, but Utah’s plan to become a pioneer in this field was abandoned in January due to financial difficulties.

“The new series of reactors is just too expensive,” Eric Epstein, president of the Three Mile Island Alert watchdog, said Monday afternoon. “What’s happening is the easiest path seems to be restarting nuclear plants — small plants.”

Three Mile Island Alert, founded in 1977, was among the environmental watchdogs that opposed the adoption of nuclear power. At the time the plant opened in Pennsylvania, nuclear power was seen as an antidote to dependence on foreign energy sources, which was having a wide-ranging impact on the American economy. Decades later, Epstein remains wary of overinvestment in nuclear power because of the long-term dangers of radioactive waste and doubts about the industry’s commitments to public safety and sustainability.

“People who opposed nuclear power were marginalized at the time,” Epstein said. “It’s interesting that history seems to be repeating itself. We’re fighting a rearguard action today like we did in the 1970s. (…) People have a hard time understanding the nuclear age. Nuclear is forever.”

Three Mile Island remains a national flashpoint for debates over the risks of radiation exposure, the challenges of managing nuclear waste and the reliance on water supplies to safely operate plants. The unit Constellation plans to restart has not received a water permit from the Susquehanna River Basin Commission since 2021 and is expected to reapply for one, among other regulatory approvals.

When the 819-megawatt Three Mile Island unit shut down in 2019, Exelon said it had reliably powered 830,000 homes and businesses during the reactor’s years of operation. The rapid growth of Pennsylvania’s natural gas industry simply made it too difficult for the plant to compete on price. A lack of private investment and limited government incentives made it difficult for utilities and policymakers to accelerate nuclear power’s growth.

“The problem with Three Mile Island before it closed was that it simply couldn’t sell its energy to the market,” Epstein said.

A possible restart of Three Mile Island could follow the model established in Michigan. In March, the Department of Energy provided a $1.5 billion conditional loan to reopen the Palisades plant. The United States has yet to reopen a nuclear power plant that had been shut down.

“There may be a federal window where resources would be available to help restart Three Mile Island if that’s the direction Constellation goes,” Quigley said.

Last week, Pennsylvania lawmakers revived the bipartisan nuclear energy group to review the state’s goals for its reactors after setbacks the industry has faced over the past decade.

“It’s early days, but there’s a lot of talk about nuclear power in Harrisburg,” Quigley said. “It seems like some of the stars are aligning.”

Restarting the Three Mile Island unit faces significant hurdles. Cleanup of the unit that melted decades ago is expected to continue until 2078. The unit is owned by Constellation and relies on a trust fund to clean up the facility.

“The plant is highly radioactive. The radiation is embedded in the buildings themselves,” Epstein said. “It has to be destructively dismantled. Most of the fuel is now in Idaho, but the remaining fuel is a really dangerous particulate form. … This plant is right next to the one they want to reopen. It’s never been done. You have one plant being aggressively dismantled and another in secure storage.”

Quigley agreed that any effort to revive Three Mile Island faces major dilemmas.

“It’s going to be a complicated project if it goes forward because of the existing materials that have to be disposed of,” he said. “It’s going to impact feasibility in every sense of the word: political, economic, technological. It’s a problem, and it’s a much harder problem to solve, as I understand it, than the Palisades plant in Michigan.”

The Three Mile Island meltdown leaves a lasting impression, which means any future projects will have to take its history into account. For decades, federal regulators and the nuclear industry have maintained that the reactor’s partial meltdown didn’t release enough radiation to cause a spike in cancer rates among workers and community members, though some long-term studies in Dauphin County have suggested otherwise over the years.

The Biden administration’s willingness to fund the Michigan project could be a signal to nuclear supporters in Pennsylvania that national politics could determine the future of Three Mile Island, depending on the outcome of the November presidential election.

“There are certainly concerns that the incentives and supports available today may not survive past January,” Quigley said. “There’s some urgency to that. Obviously, restarting a shutdown plant is going to be an expensive proposition, and I’m sure Constellation has its eye on what types of incentives might be available.”

Epstein said nuclear power will undoubtedly be part of Pennsylvania’s economic mix in the future, but cautioned that lawmakers should take a broader view of the future.

“We have to recognize that nuclear will be part of the portfolio,” he said. “There are five plants. An energy portfolio, to be sustainable, cannot be exclusive. The key word here is diversity. You don’t want to choose one energy source and then be hostage to the whims of the market.”