Calvert Cliffs-3 Reactor License Denied; NRC Licensing Board Rules In Favor Of Intervenors, Says Atomic Energy Act

Licensing Board. The first was the license application for the Byron reactor in Illinois in 1984, which was briefly denied because of quality assurance problems at the site. But that decision was quickly overturned on appeal as the utility already had initiated a program to correct the problems.

…”This is a great day for Maryland,” said Michael Mariotte, executive director of Nuclear Information and Resource Service, which first filed the contention on foreign ownership in November 2008 and has been the pro se intervenor on the issue ever since. “Marylanders need not fear another dangerous nuclear reactor in our state, nor the accumulation of still more lethal radioactive waste on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay.”

Mariotte added, “But this is also a blow to the so-called ‘nuclear renaissance.’ In the summer of 2007, Calvert Cliffs-3 became the first new reactor project to submit even a partial application in about 30 years. It was the flagship of the nuclear renaissance and now it is a symbol of the deservedly failed revival of nuclear power in the U.S. That UniStar has been unable to find a single U.S. utility to partner with it in this extraordinarily expensive project speaks volumes about the lack of genuine interest in new nuclear reactors in the U.S.”