A pending pact between South Carolina’s state-owned utility and a Canadian-American corporation to complete nuclear reactors mothballed since 2017 could relieve Palmetto State taxpayers of billions in debt and be a precursor for similar public-private partnerships that won’t leave utility customers on the hook for project cost-overruns and failures.
Santee Cooper’s 14-member board agreed on Oct. 24 to negotiate with Brookfield Asset Management to resume development of two partially built Westinghouse AP1000 nuclear reactors at the V.C. Summer Nuclear Station it shares with Dominion Energy near Jenkinsville, South Carolina.
Santee Cooper President and CEO Jimmy Staton said two factors are rekindling interest in nuclear power after decades of inertia: rapidly increasing electricity demand, and President Donald Trump’s four May executive orders aimed at quadrupling the nation’s nuclear energy by 2050….