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A Maryland agency has given a key approval to a deal between two companies that hope to build an Areva-designed nuclear reactor. The approval lets Electricite de France buy about half of Constellation Energy Group's nuclear business, seen as an important step in the two companies' plans to build new nuclear reactors. The two companies partnered two years ago to form UniStar Nuclear Energy, a joint venture. UniStar has been working to promote the construction of Evolutionary Power Reactors in the U.S.

A Maryland agency has given a key approval to a deal between two companies that hope to build an Areva-designed nuclear reactor. The approval lets Electricite de France buy about half of Constellation Energy Group's nuclear business, seen as an important step in the two companies' plans to build new nuclear reactors. The two companies partnered two years ago to form UniStar Nuclear Energy, a joint venture. UniStar has been working to promote the construction of Evolutionary Power Reactors in the U.S.

"The Oswego County Legislature has approved a one-year tax agreement with Constellation Energy Nuclear Group for the Nine Mile Point Unit I plant. The tax agreement nearly triples the amount of taxes the company would pay Oswego County, the town of Scriba and the Oswego school district. The company this year paid $4 million through its payment in lieu of taxes, or PILOT, and would pay $11 million in 2011 with the tax agreement. The county receives $1,489,000 this year and would receive $4,096,400 under the tax agreement."

"A proposed nuclear reactor in Maryland that is close to winning a billion-dollar federal loan guarantee would produce twice the energy of the state's two existing reactors combined. But the project at Calvert Cliffs faces many hurdles. Nuclear energy opponents are challenging the reactor's licensing qualifications with charges that the amount of foreign ownership violates the Atomic Energy Act -- which bars nuclear projects with "foreign ownership, control or domination." The Calvert Cliffs reactor would be built by UniStar Nuclear Energy -- a joint venture between Maryland's Constellation Energy Group and French company Electricite de France. Paris-based Areva would provide the reactor technology. Electricite de France and Areva are 85 percent owned by the French government."

Electricite de France SA and Constellation Energy Group say they want Exelon to join their UniStar Nuclear Energy development venture. After being ranked in the lower tier for federal loan guarantees, Exelon said it is seeking a reactor design more proven than the GE Hitachi Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor it initially planned to use in Texas. UniStar plans to use Areva SA's Evolutionary Power Reactors in Maryland and New York." The Energy Policy Act of 2005 establishes loan guarantees for handful of reactors built in the United States. Now, some companies are making their case for unlimited loan guarantees and more subsidies to keep things moving forward.

It's the eve of 2009, but a year from now, he'll be immersed in a campaign for re-election. He'd like to be running on a record of rate relief for consumers of electricity - and possibly re-regulation of the energy industry. Thus, at the governor's urging, Attorney General Douglas F. Gansler recently held that the Public Service Commission has the authority to review a blockbuster deal struck between Constellation Energy Group and one of its shareholders, Electricite de France.

Sunday's Sun editorial claims the Constellation Energy Group-Electricite de France deal will help ratepayers, in part because EDF might construct a new nuclear reactor that will increase Maryland's supply of electricity ("PSC's power play," Sept. 20). The cost of a new nuclear reactor is in the billions, and the electricity generated by the reactor may not be available for a decade. The problem is that ratepayers are suffering high energy costs now. The best and most immediate solution to our high energy costs is investment in energy efficiency. Instead of investing billions into nuclear, we should invest heavily in weatherizing and retrofitting our homes and businesses. By doing so, we will decrease the amount of electricity needed to turn on our lights and keep us warm in the winter. In fact, studies demonstrate that we can reduce Maryland's electricity use by 15 percent by the year 2015 through basic energy efficiency projects. We owe it to ratepayers to start lowering utility rates today, not in a decade. Fielding Huseth, Baltimore

As Constellation Energy seeks to expand its nuclear energy output by partnering with a French power company and building a new reactor just south of Anne Arundel County, statewide consumer groups are trying to draw a line in the sand. Members of Chesapeake Safe Energy Coalition, which includes Maryland PIRG, Chesapeake Climate Action Network, Nuclear Information and Resource Service and others, released a new report yesterday outside of the Public Service Commission headquarters, advocating for clean-energy alternatives.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has decided to open its hearing process in a dispute over a proposal to build a third nuclear reactor at Calvert Cliffs in Lusby. The NRC made the decision Tuesday in the application process for UniStar Nuclear, which is a joint venture of Baltimore-based Constellation Energy and the EDF Group, a French company. Several groups argue the third reactor would be owned and controlled by foreign interests, contrary to the Atomic Energy Act and NRC regulations. But UniStar counters that the proposal would not put a third reactor into control by foreign interests. The NRC hasn't taken a position, and the hearing process can take more than a year.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has decided to open its hearing process in a dispute over a proposal to build a third nuclear reactor at Calvert Cliffs in Lusby. The NRC made the decision Tuesday in the application process for UniStar Nuclear, which is a joint venture of Baltimore-based Constellation Energy and the EDF Group, a French company. Several groups argue the third reactor would be owned and controlled by foreign interests, contrary to the Atomic Energy Act and NRC regulations. But UniStar counters that the proposal would not put a third reactor into control by foreign interests. The NRC hasn't taken a position, and the hearing process can take more than a year.

A common perception of nuclear power is that it's an affordable, carbon-free energy source that could meet a lot of America's demand for electricity, if only those darn environmentalists would get out of the way. Unfortunately for nuclear power advocates and Maryland ratepayers, this statement crumbles upon contact with reality. The average cost of electricity for all of Maryland's sectors is 13.45 cents per kilowatt-hour. There's a growing possibility some of us will have the pleasure of paying double that thanks to the pending merger between Constellation Energy and French electric giant EDF Energy, which is supposed to pave the way for construction of a new nuclear power plant at Calvert Cliffs. Doubling rates is fairly easy to predict with a trip down memory lane.

A common perception of nuclear power is that it's an affordable, carbon-free energy source that could meet a lot of America's demand for electricity, if only those darn environmentalists would get out of the way. Unfortunately for nuclear power advocates and Maryland ratepayers, this statement crumbles upon contact with reality. The average cost of electricity for all of Maryland's sectors is 13.45 cents per kilowatt-hour. There's a growing possibility some of us will have the pleasure of paying double that thanks to the pending merger between Constellation Energy and French electric giant EDF Energy, which is supposed to pave the way for construction of a new nuclear power plant at Calvert Cliffs. Doubling rates is fairly easy to predict with a trip down memory lane.

"Constellation Energy Group's joint venture with a French company to build a nuclear reactor at Calvert Cliffs is now "first in line" for a federal loan guarantee, according to an influential lawmaker from Maryland. Democratic Rep. Steny H. Hoyer, the House majority leader, said in an interview Thursday that he has been informed by senior administration officials that the Calvert Cliffs project is further along in the loan-guarantee process than competing projects in Texas and South Carolina. That's potentially significant because, at the moment, the Department of Energy has only enough loan authority to offer one project a federal guarantee. Advertisement Hoyer, whose Southern Maryland district includes Calvert Cliffs, site of two existing reactors on the western shore of the Chesapeake Bay, said company officials were informed about two weeks ago that their application is nearly ready to be reviewed by the credit board that makes loan guarantee recommendations to the energy secretary."

UniStar Nuclear Energy, a joint venture between Electricite de France (EDF) and Constellation Energy Group Inc. (NYSE:CEG), and PPL Corporation (NYSE:PPL), a UniStar partner, have passed the first regulatory review on the road to building four new nuclear power plants. The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission just added the fourth, a plant near Berwick, Pennsylvania, to its docket of combined license applications for new nukes. The NRC now has docketed 26 new nuclear units at 17 different sites for review and approval. It can take up to four years for a project to receive NRC approval, and that's without any public clamor against nukes. The timeline can go way out if lawsuits start getting filed.

Barely a few days before the collapse of Lehman Brothers, EDF finally clinched its multi-billion pound acquisition of British Energy. At about the same time, the French state-controlled electricity group also tried - and failed - to counter veteran investor Warren Buffett's bid for control of a US electricity utility, Constellation Energy. The moves seemed logical for a French champion of nuclear energy. With oil prices hitting record highs of nearly $150 a barrel and climate change pushing governments to promote investments in clean and renewable energy, the nuclear lobby felt confident the industry was about to enjoy a renaissance. The US and the UK, countries that have committed themselves to expand significantly their nuclear power generating capacities, seemed the new promised lands of the nuclear revival.

MarylandDoesn't Need a $10 Billion Radioactive Boondoggle, Groups Say WASHINGTON, D.C. - Four environmental organizations filed a legal challenge late Wednesday against the proposed Calvert Cliffs-3 atomic reactor before the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). The filing, which is a formal petition to intervene in the NRC's licensing process, marks the latest action in an ongoing fight to stop the proposed reactor before construction starts. The challenge asserts that the Calvert Cliffs project runs afoul of laws and regulations that prohibit foreign ownership or domination of a U.S. reactor; that the company - UniStar Nuclear, a subsidiary of Constellation Energy and Electricite de France - does not have adequate assurance that it will have the funds necessary to decontaminate and decommission the facility; that the license application does not consider the cumulative effects of adding yet another nuclear reactor's radioactive and chemical discharges to a Chesapeake Bay already groaning under the effects of discharges from 11 atomic reactors; and that the proposed reactor does not have any place to put either its high-level or "low-level" radioactive waste.

The spot uranium price fell to $46 a pound U3O8, Ux Consulting said late Monday. The latest estimate is $3 below the company's October 6 price estimate and marks the lowest spot price since June 2006. Another price-reporting firm TradeTech on Friday dropped its price $4 to $47/lb U3O8. One US utility, Baltimore-based Constellation Energy, is said to have let it be known that it would purchase about 50,000 pounds U3O8 at a price of $42/lb. But so far, no sellers have shown any interest in pursuing a deal at that price.

It's been more than 20 years since a new nuclear reactor came online in New York. That could soon change. Unistar, a partnership between Constellation Energy and the French company AREVA, is proposing a new reactor at Nine Mile Point just outside of Oswego. The plant would produce 1,600 megawatts, reports the Syracuse Post-Standard - a single megawatt can power up to 1,000 homes. Unistar told the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that it plans to apply for the expansion this year, says the Post-Standard. The licensing process is expected to take up to four years.

Nuclear regulators will talk today about the licensing of a fourth nuclear plant in Oswego County at a public meeting on the State University College at Oswego campus. The session begins at 7 p.m. in Sheldon Hall. Officials will be on hand at 6 p.m. to informally discuss the project with the public. UniStar, a partnership including Nine Mile Point Nuclear Station owner Constellation, has told the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission it intends to apply for a license later this year to build and operate a so-called evolutionary power reactor at the site.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission will delay license review for a new nuclear reactor at the existing Nine Mile Point nuclear power station in New York at the request of UniStar Nuclear Energy LLC, the NRC said on Friday. UniStar is a joint venture of Maryland-based Constellation Energy Group (CEG.N) and EDF Group (EDF.PA) of France formed to pursue building new U.S. reactors. UniStar said it wants the NRC to hold off on the Nine Mile license to focus attention on UniStar's planned reactor at the Calvert Cliffs plant in Maryland. Earlier, UniStar dropped Nine Mile out of the competition for federal loan guarantees for nuclear power, also to concentrate on the Calvert Cliffs proposal.