At midnight on October 25, USA fleet member Cook Nuclear Plant Unit 1’s original 40-year operating license ended and the plant began operation under the renewed license granted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in 2005. The unit is now licensed to operate until 2034.
“Welcome to the next generation of safe, reliable and low-cost electricity produced by Cook Nuclear Plant Unit 1,” said Larry Weber, chief nuclear officer and senior vice president. “Thank you to the countless men and women who have operated and maintained our plant for the past 40 years. We are also very proud to be a part of this community and we thank our neighbors for their outstanding support.”
As part of the renewed license, AEP began the Life Cycle Management (LCM) project for Cook. LCM replaces and upgrades various systems and components with equipment designed to support the additional life of the plant.
In many cases, new technologies improve reliability and operating safety margins. Many of the replacements are extremely large components weighing tens of tons and require multi-year planning horizons and equipment fabrication lead times as long as five years. AEP has added staff and has project teams working out of its Buchanan office. Installation activities are scheduled during operation and regular refueling outages through 2018.
The Michigan Public Service Commission and Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission have both approved these projects as reasonable and necessary.
Indiana Michigan Power announced plans to build a power plant on a 480-acre site in southwest Michigan in 1959, although it had not yet determined what fuel source would be chosen. A construction permit request for a nuclear power plant was filed in 1967 with the Atomic Energy Commission. The AEC was the predecessor to today’s Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The construction permit was granted in 1969.
The plant was named for the late Donald C. Cook, a Michigan native, and former chairman of the board of American Electric Power, parent company of I&M. AEP served as the architect, engineer and managed construction for the plant. Construction cost for both Cook units was $1.3 billion.
A low-power operating license was granted in October, 1973. The first nuclear fuel was loaded in January, 1974. The initial criticality occurred on January 18, 1975.
Since beginning commercial operation on August 28, 1975, the Unit 1 reactor has been critical for 250,691 hours and generated 238,453,056 megawatt-hours of electricity. That is enough electricity for 550,090 average homes every day for the 40 years of operation.
Cook Unit 2’s original license ends in 2017, and it is now licensed to operate until 2037.
