NRC file photo of AEP's twin reactor Cook nuclear power plant on the Lake Michigan shoreline in Bridgman, Michigan
The Michigan Public Service Commission (MPSC) has blessed a new form of Construction Work in Progress (CWIP), to the benefit of the nuclear utility, American Electric Power (AEP), at the expense of Michigan ratepayers. The MPSC has approved $850 million, for repairing and refurbishing the nearly four decade old Cook nuclear power plant (see photo, left), which has received a rubber-stamp from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for a 20-year license extension. Cook Units 1 & 2 represent but two of 73 such reactor license extension rubber-stamps handed out by NRC since the year 2000.
Additional Background on AEP's Cook nuclear power plant.
"A Bathtub Curve for Nuclear Accidents" (so-named because of the graph's shape, showing that as atomic reactors, as at Cook, age, the risk of catastrophic accidents increases, due to break-downs), compliments of David Lochbaum, Director, Nuclear Safety Project, Union of Concerned Scientists. The meltdown at Three Mile Island (1979) and the explosion and fire at Chernobyl (1986) are referred to as "break-in phase," the disasters occurring due to bugs in the systems being worked out the hard way, operator inexperience, etc. Indian Point, NY's steam generator tube rupture (Feb. 2000) and Davis-Besse, OH's reactor lid corrosion hole near-miss (Feb.-March 2002) are "break-down phase" accidents, due to age-related equipment failure.