News from the Nuke

The South Texas Project, known as "the Nuke" in Austin, has been providing cheap electricity for several years. Austin owns a 16 percent share of it.

A company from Princeton, N.J., company spent $5.8 billion on an energy portfolio that includes another 44 percent of the plant. Although the sale should not affect Austin, some people are worried about this move.

From the Statesman.com:

"There are always catastrophic possibilities that nuclear plants can inherently be responsible for," Jackie Goodman, who spent 12 years on the City Council and more time as an activist, wrote in an e-mailed warning to City Council members in November.

The thing that worries some in Austin is that the buyer, NRG Energy Inc., just got out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy about two years ago.

If the plant breaks down some fear that NRG may not have sufficient financial resources to take care of the problem.

Reports indicate that the Nuke still takes about a third of every Austin Energy bill and provides about as much of the city's power. The power from the plant is cheaper than other sources of energy, and the sale should have no effect on Austin's rates.