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New York to build one of first U.S. nuclear-power plants in generation
- melling 1y agohttps://archive.ph/0UZ1W https://archive.ph/0UZ1W
- idiotsecant 1y agoWe will see. It's unfortunate but there is a long list of attempted nuke construction that ends up billions of dollars in the hole before the first mwh is made.
- cool_dude85 1y agoAnd, funny enough, often the utility company can raise rates to cover these losses! Easy money and you don't have to build a thing.
- Archelaos 1y agoAnd if companies were obliged to insure their power plants properly, it would cost many, many billions more. It is the same old story: socialise risks and privatise profits.
- nxm 1y ago“Bowing to anti-nuclear fears, New York chose to shut down a reliable and safe source of energy—and now burns more fossil fuels than before.”
- perihelions 1y agoThe same far-sighted leaders who permanently shuttered 2 GW of nuclear power, in a time of low electricity prices, would like credit, please, for their aspirational concept of a plan for building 1 GW of nuclear. To alleviate high electricity prices.
- phonon 1y agoTo be fair, that was mostly Cuomo. Who knows why he was so dead-set on its closure.
- nullc 1y ago> Who knows why he was so dead-set on its closure. https://dailycallernewsfoundation.org/2017/01/09/cuomos-deal-to-shut-down-a-nuclear-plant-soiled-by-bribery-charges/ https://dailycallernewsfoundation.org/2017/01/09/cuomos-deal... But no worries, looks like this time around the nuclear side has figured out that they need to pay their protection of money: https://nypost.com/2025/06/16/us-news/andrew-cuomo-hit-with-ethics-complaint-for-failing-to-disclose-2-6m-in-nuclear-stock-options/ https://nypost.com/2025/06/16/us-news/andrew-cuomo-hit-with-...
- phonon 1y agoUgh!
- cbm-vic-20 1y agoThe article is paywalled, presumably the reactor they're referring to is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Point_Energy_Center https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_Point_Energy_Center "New York City's greenhouse gas emissions from electricity have increased from approximately 500 to 900 tons of CO2 per MWh from 2019 to 2022 as a result of the closure."
- amanaplanacanal 1y agoWhy wouldn't the governor solicit bids for energy, and let the companies that actually build and run generation capacity decide the cheapest way to do that? Having the governor choose seems weird to me.
- coldpie 1y agoThe market is famously terrible at pricing in externalities and accounting for long-term needs. I think if you used the government to force bidders to account for those, you'd just end up in the same place.
- amanaplanacanal 1y agoYou might, or you might not. You might end up with tidal or wave, or wind+batteries, or something else. Tying yourself to something that's going to take decades and almost certainly include big cost overruns seems like a terrible idea.
- cool_dude85 1y agoNot an unreasonable choice if externalities such as carbon (and mining, etc. in the case of nuclear) are taken into account. And suppose you price carbon in, how do you actually produce a real carbon sink at the assumed cost and scale if nat gas wins the bid?
- LeafItAlone 1y agoAre you suggesting letting private companies whose entire purpose is to make the most amount of profit for their shareholders to be the ones that decide what is best for the people of the state?
- Workaccount2 1y agoBecause it would be natural gas.
- amanaplanacanal 1y agoI keep hearing that solar and wind are the cheapest sources of new energy. Why would it be natural gas? And for that matter, if you are worried about CO2 emissions, you could make that be part of the requirements.
- ImHereToVote 1y agoI love that nuclear is just far too dangerous when it comes to powering peoples homes. Obsoleting workers with AI however.....
- game_the0ry 1y agoCould you elaborate with sources? I suspect much of the perception of nuclear being too dangerous comes from the fossil fuel energy lobby.
- taskforcegemini 1y agoI think we have enough real examples of its dangers
- ImHereToVote 1y agoI was being sarcastic. I'm pro nuclear.
- coldpie 1y agoGreat news! Nuclear is a critical component for the non-carbon energy infrastructure we're building. Yes, it's expensive, but the only way to make it cheaper is to invest in rebuilding the expertise we stupidly threw away over the past 5 decades. Paying for past mistakes always sucks, but it's better than not doing it and digging the hole even deeper.
- croes 1y agoIt was never cheap even with the expertise and such a kind of centralized energy generation is a bad idea.
- thinkingtoilet 1y agoIs it critical these days? I am by no means against nuclear energy, and if we had been building reactors these last 50 years the world would be a better place. With things like solar, wind, geo-thermal, etc... is it still smart to invest this much money into nuclear power? Wouldn't it be better to invest in solar at this point?
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- coldpie 1y agoI have yet to see a convincing analysis that renewables+storage can cost-effectively power all the homes in Minnesota, where I live, through our 4+ month-long winters. The days get very short, the Earth tilts away from the sun, cloud-cover and snowfall is frequent, and going 24+ hours without power for heat can be fatal, not just inconvenient. I'd welcome someone to try to run the numbers on this. I tried myself, but I just don't have the expertise. Don't forget to account for almost all of our current heating coming from natural gas burned on-premise. Then, expand your analysis to include all buildings in all northern climes. Is there even enough materials on the planet to build all those batteries? Do batteries even work at -40 degrees? And that's just one set of challenges, every area has similar but different problems for renewables to tackle. The answer is both: put huge money into renewables and into nuclear. Nuclear is a proven tech. It works. We understand it. We stupidly threw away all of our skill to build it, and put up huge regulatory roadblocks. But those are solvable human problems, if we care to do it. Storage for renewables is still a huge question mark, which we should also dump a ton of money into, but we need a solution today. Nuclear is here.
- PaulHoule 1y agoIt's easy to say but not so easy to do. The two Western designs built in the last generation are the EPR and the AP1000. The EPR is so unconstructable that it could have been designed by Amory Lovins to put the nails in the coffin of nuclear power. The supply chain for the AP1000 is centered in China. If it wasn't for problems of war and peace the rational thing to do might be ask the Russians to come in and built a VVER. GE is pushing the BWRX300 which might get some cost reductions because it doesn't need a steam generator, but the small size doesn't help the economics and the cost numbers they are talking about are amazingly low.
- SoftTalker 1y agoSmaller scale can make construction more practical though, even if the economics are worse than the theoretical best. Billions have been lost on unfinished large-scale nuke plants more than once, because they take too long, are too complex, and get more and more mired in politics as the years drag out. A small plant that could be online in months or at most a year or two from start of construction is way more pragmatic.
- PaulHoule 1y agoThe concrete benefit I see for the small LWR is this: it is possible to build a pressure vessel by welding segments together but most economical to build one in a superheavy forge that can pound one out of a single piece of steel. There are no superheavy forges in North America (although there are many in various Asian and European countries) although the BWRX300 is small enough that it can be made in Canada. As for simpler construction it has to be proven. The AP1000 was a "modular reactor" in that they tried to make it out of large modules that could be built in a factory and stuck together on site. The factories struggled to make those modules and when they arrived they often needed major rework. The ACP100 was recently completed in China https://nucleus.iaea.org/sites/INPRO/df13/Presentations/011_CNNC%27s%20ACP100%20SMR-Technique%20Features%20and%20Progress%20in%20China.pdf https://nucleus.iaea.org/sites/INPRO/df13/Presentations/011_... and press releases boasted that it was one of the most complex construction projects of all time -- what I wanted to hear was "this is one of the most simple construction projects of all time!"
- ecshafer 1y agoI am hoping they build this in Oswego on top of the other reactors being built in 9 mile. Lake Ontario has an inexhaustible amount of cold water, and there's plenty of space up there.
- kevin_thibedeau 1y agoThis needs to be in Western New York. The existing plant for the region is operating on an an extension that expires the earliest of the bunch in 2029. When it goes, electricity rates are going to skyrocket without a replacement.
- ecshafer 1y agoIll admit I am saying this out of only regional loyalty and have no idea about the status of other plants in upstate NY. I am also not sure on how much the power generated in Upstate NY goes to say Toronto vs NYC, and how much that reactor being in Buffalo or Rochester would even matter for that vs Oswego being 100 miles closer to NYC.
- Workaccount2 1y agoThere is almost no way this doesn't end up wasting an enormous amount of money, while only having a slim chance of ever coming online, while only having a slim chance of actually lowering energy costs. If you are gonna blow $10 Billion on a 10 year nightmare project, just buy a ton of solar, wind, and batteries to get 2GW in 5 years.
- LightBug1 1y ago[flagged]
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- fsckboy 1y ago>actually lowering energy costs isn't green energy worth higher energy costs?
- evklein 1y agoAdditionally, renewables have their own drawbacks - their volatility makes reliability more challenging and thus brings energy prices higher. Nuclear has the benefit of providing consistent base load, something that's needed more now than ever. That kind of thing might be worth the investment, but until now no one has wanted to put up the kind of money needed for that level of reliability.
- Workaccount2 1y agoIn a state the size of New York, the sun is always shining or the wind always blowing somewhere in the state. You then use battery back-up to fill the gaps and gas to fill the gaps of the filled gaps. The latest nuclear plant in the US was the completion of the Vogtle plant in Georgia, which ran a staggering $22B over budget. Twenty Two Billion Dollars over budget! $22B, is enough to build the largest solar plant in the US 10 times over (total 5GW). Or about 7 of the largest wind farm (total 10.5GW). Or 33 of the largest battery storage plant. With $2B left over for logistics. And $14B left over for anything else because the total cost was $36B! The current state of nuclear doesn't make sense anyway you cut it.
- calvinmorrison 1y agomy grandma lived by the old plant, there were sort of endless signs around to get rid of it. now we get another one.
- 1970-01-01 1y ago... because AI. Love it or hate it, the AI hype has at least lit a fire on nuclear power. If AI winter comes, we at least get to keep the powerplants and receive clean power for decades.
- dragonwriter 1y ago> If AI winter comes, we at least get to keep the powerplants and receive clean power for decades. When the AI winter comes, it’s not going to mean the energy devoted to AI applications decreases, it’ll mean the perception of rapid future expansion in profits fueling VC interest in AI goes away. It’s not like we cut back the aggregate energy cohsumption of systems running, say, rule-based expert systems during the last AI winter.
- pjc50 1y ago> If AI winter comes But what happens to the AI in the nuclear winter?
- disambiguation 1y agoPrevious Attempt: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoreham_Nuclear_Power_Plant https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoreham_Nuclear_Power_Plant tl;dr it was commissioned, constructed, and closed due to local safety concerns in the wake of the Three Mile Island accident. Interesting excerpt from the wiki: In 2004, the Long Island Power Authority erected two 100-foot, 50 kW wind turbines at the Shoreham Energy Center site,[18] as part of a renewable-energy program.[19][20] At a ceremony, chairman Kessel stated, "We stand in the shadow of a modern-day Stonehenge, a multibillion-dollar monument to a failed energy policy, to formally commission the operation of a renewable energy technology that will harness the power of the wind for the benefit of Long Island's environment." The turbines generate 200 MWh per year, or 1/35,000th of the energy the nuclear plant would have produced.[21]
- crmd 1y ago> The New York Power Authority—created nearly a century ago by then-Gov. Franklin D. Roosevelt to manage hydropower production on behalf of the public This is rich considering that NYPA’s current customers are exclusively government entities. I found this out when researching why I pay among the highest cost per KWh in the country despite having the largest non profit publicly owned power utility in the country.
- southernplaces7 1y agoOne of the really tedious types of comment I keep seeing on HN whenever someone posts about some possible or new nuclear power project can be summed up as "But nuclear is no good/too expensive because it just can't do X and Y, so why bother?!". Sure, maybe, right now some of these kinds of criticisms apply, but we're talking about a technology that's barely been given much room to develop seriously in most cases. In others, where it has been allowed a bit more leeway for development, it's shown itself to be remarkably useful. For example, in the reactors aboard military vessels, or with RTGs. These sorts of of criticisms such as above seem absurd, especially when you imagine there were indeed people saying roughly similar things about technologies like solar power back in the 70s, or powered flight close to the turn of the 20th century. It's foolish to shun the entire scope of a technology if its present state of development is the only one you know anything about. This applies so especially to nuclear power, which so very obviously has considerably more potential, without even going into more exotic territories like sustainable fusion energy.