Nuclear Energy:

Nuclear power is an attractive power source due to a lack of emissions, low fuel costs and uncertainty over potential carbon legislation at the federal level. Significant federal incentives also are in place for new nuclear power generation.

Nuclear power’s downside includes lengthy and costly permitting process, capital costs that exceed coal-fueled plants and waste disposal.

Texas has two nuclear power facilities, Comanche Peak in Glen Rose in north Texas and the South Texas Project on the Texas coast in Bay City.

With a combined generating capacity of 5,000 megawatts, the two reactors at each site produce 10 percent of the state’s electricity, enough to power almost 3 million homes.

These facilities employ more than 2,000 people and have combined annual payroll of nearly $200 million.

Two of the first new commercial nuclear applications in decades anywhere in the nation are for projects to be built in Texas at the South Texas Project. As many as six more applications for new reactions could be submitted to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), including two more at Comanche Peak and four at two new sites.

The eight proposed reactors would supply 17,000 megawatts of power, 15 percent of Texas’ total capacity.

The Texas Comptroller sees a variety of factors creating a renaissance for nuclear energy, including the aging of existing nuclear reactors, a new generation of advanced reactors, rising global energy demands, the cost of natural gas and pressure to reduce air emissions.

Standing in the way, according to the Comptroller, are regulatory and economic hurdles.