FirstEnergy looking into buying small nuclear reactor from Babcock & Wilcox

FirstEnergy Corp. is interested in buying a new, small nuclear reactor somewhere in its multi-state service area.

Generating just a fraction of the power of FirstEnergy's huge older nuclear power plants, the new reactor would be buried in a containment building 140 feet underground -- with its electrical generator at the surface.

It would cost a fraction of what a new large reactor would cost -- under $2 billion compared to $15 billion, the estimated cost of proposed new plants in the South.

And it is said to be much safer, with many features that would make a catastrophe far less of an issue.
Though FirstEnergy has not committed to buying such a power plant, the Akron-based company said on Wednesday that it had signed an agreement with a subsidiary of global manufacturer Babcock & Wilcox Co. of Charlotte, N.C., to study deploying B&W's small reactor.

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