United States of America: Case Study. Annex IV (Asset management for sustainable nuclear power plant operation)

Optimizing the financial value of nuclear power plant is one of the key drivers in a plant's asset management programme. With growing market competition and stringent budgets, the asset management programme has to maximize the financial value of the asset. In recent years, plant owners in the United States of America have closed or announced closure of 14 reactor units at 11 plant sites; 6 nuclear reactors (Crystal River 3 in Florida, San Onofre 2 and 3 in California, Kewaunee in Wisconsin, Vermont Yankee in Vermont, Fort Calhoun in Nebraska) have shut down permanently. The San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station is another example, wherein the operator and the vendor complied with existing regulatory requirements, and engineering risk assessments, and yet were blindsided by the technical challenge, resulting in the plant shutdown. This annex shows what has been done in the United States of America to face this risk.