New Brookfield Venture May Restart Abandoned US Nuclear Project

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(Bloomberg) — Brookfield Asset Management has agreed to form an atomic power-plant development company with startup The Nuclear Company, which will initially focus on potentially restarting an abandoned project in South Carolina.

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The new company, which hasn’t been named yet, aims to build a fleet of reactors in the US, and will use designs from Westinghouse Electric Co., which is majority-owned by Brookfield Renewable Partners, Brookfield Asset said in a statement on Monday.

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The initiative is expected to capitalize on the resurgence of the US nuclear industry, especially a $80 billion plan by the White House to buy reactors from Westinghouse. The new development company has been selected as project manager for Brookfield’s potential effort to revive the VC Summer project in South Carolina, a two-reactor plan that was abandoned in 2017. 

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“We believe this platform has the potential to accelerate the American nuclear resurgence,” Wyatt Hartley, a Brookfield managing partner, said in the statement. 

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VC Summer is considered a low point for the US nuclear industry. South Carolina utility Santee Cooper and the plant’s former co-owner, Scana Corp., halted construction on two AP1000 reactors in 2017 after costs climbed above $20 billion and Westinghouse, a contractor on the project, filed for bankruptcy. It was one of two US efforts to build the Westinghouse AP1000 reactors; the other, at the Vogtle plant in Georgia, was completed in 2024, seven years behind schedule and more than $20 billion over budget. 

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But demand is now surging for electricity, especially to power artificial intelligence systems, and that’s prompted renewed interest in nuclear energy. Plant owners are working to restart three mothballed reactors, in Michigan, Iowa and Pennsylvania, and the partially built VC Summer plant is seen as a relatively fast way to connect more fission power to the grid. The Nuclear Company team includes veterans of both Vogtle and VC Summer, who would contribute valuable experience in building AP1000 systems. 

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Brookfield has been evaluating whether to complete the South Carolina project since last year. It said in December it expects to make a final investment decision by late 2027, under a deal that would call for the company to pay Santee Cooper $2.7 billion to acquire the assets, and the utility also receiving a targeted 25% ownership share. 

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