Kewaunee nuclear power plant shutdown to cost $1bn

Dominion Resources, the owner of the Kewaunee Power Station, said the shutdown of the plant in Wisconsin, US, has been estimated to cost nearly $1bn.

The plant operators will commence the process of decommissioning the nuclear power plant to restore the site along Lake Michigan to what it looked like in the 1960s, reported JSOnline.

Dominion Resources has announced that it will shut the plant on 7 May. The reactor will be closed because the Wisconsin utilities that had purchased its electricity declined to continue buying it, due to low price of natural gas.

The company had put the power plant up for sale in 2011, but no buyer were ready for the acquisition.

Dominion spokesman Mark Kanz said, “We’ve got 60 years to turn it back to a ‘greenfield’ site.”

“At some point it basically has to look like the farm fields in the 1960s, before any construction started here,” Kanz added.

During the decommissioning, all buildings on the 900-acre site east of Green Bay will be torn down and low-level radioactive waste will be shipped out of state.