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Grand Gulf Nuclear Reactor with Lakes River
Grand Gulf Nuclear Monstrosity on the Mississippi: America’s Largest Single Nuclear Reactor, in poor rural Mississippi

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” (Santanaya, 1905)

The more recent nuclear reactor construction projects, which are late, much more costly than planned, and with documented shoddy construction, are mostly a repeat of a past, which the nuclear industry doesn’t want anyone to recall.

“Is there a thing where of it may be said, See, this is new? It hath been long ago, in the ages which were before us./ There is no remembrance of the former generations…” Ecclesiastes 1, ASV Bible

“And [Jesus] said, Woe unto you lawyers also! for ye load men with burdens grievous to be borne, and ye yourselves touch not the burdens with one of your fingers.” Luke 11:46 ASV Bible

The Wise-Carter, Child and Caraway (of Mississippi) Law Firm web site brags that in the 1980s they helped MP&L (now Entergy) get what was then the biggest rate increase given to a Mississippi utility. Why was it needed? To pay for a late, over-priced, and unneeded nuclear reactor. It is the largest single reactor in the US for one of the poorest and least populated states. For some strange reason Entergy Nuclear is located in Mississippi rather than New Orleans.

The case reached the US Supreme Court where Wise-Carter and their utility client won. If you look at their web site you see that they have represented utilities for over 100 years. Today their clients include such nasty entities as Entergy, BASF, TVA and Toshiba, majority owner of Westinghouse (nuclear). If you are a utility they are a great law firm and recognized as such. If you are the average person then they are bad guys. They are the filthy (radioactive) underbelly of Mississippi story-telling.

Excerpts from arguments before the Mississippi Supreme Court regarding rate increase due to Grand Gulf Nuclear:
“State Ex Rel. Pittman v. MISSISSIPPI PSC
506 So. 2d 978 (1987)

STATE of Mississippi, ex rel. Edwin Lloyd PITTMAN, Attorney General, et al. v. MISSISSIPPI PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION, et all No. 56762.
This is an appeal from an order issued by the Mississippi Public Service Commission (MPSC) on September 16, 1985, in which Mississippi Power & Light Company (MP & L) was granted the largest rate increase it has ever requested, based on the costs associated with the Grand Gulf I Nuclear Power Plant (Grand Gulf). In granting the increase, on September 16, 1985, the MPSC found that MP & L had a revenue deficiency of and granted an additional increase of $326,547,000.00, despite the fact that it had granted MP & L an increase of $44,671,544.00 in June, 1985. Collection of the $326,587,000.00 increase was ordered over a ten year period.
[…]
The primary objection to the allocation of Grand Gulf to MP & L is that Mississippi ratepayers simply do not need the energy generated by the plant. In fact, we cannot utilize this excess capacity until the mid-1990’s, if ever. Frank Gallagher, an MP & L witness, testified that with the addition of ISES2 but before the Grand Gulf allocation, MP & L had a reserve capacity of 85% over peak demand. Both Gallagher and Lewis Perl, another MP & L witness, testified that the appropriate reserve margin was 30-35%. MP & L represented to the MPSC that the reserve capacity figures are unimportant, because the ratepayers only support the capacity that MP & L cannot sell off the system. Nevertheless, should MP & L be unable to peddle its excess energy to other companies, (which is the case now) Mississippi ratepayers would have to support over 100% more capacity than they can use.
[….]
On July 1, 1985, Grand Gulf Unit 1 came on line, causing MP & L to begin incurring unrecovered costs of about $906,000.00 per day. On July 26, MP & L applied for temporary emergency rates, claiming that the Grand Gulf bill would cause its net income to become negative in September. The first bill for Grand Gulf, of approximately $27 million, was sent to MP & L on August 7.
[….]
What appears to have taken place here is the evasion by sister MSU companies of any review of the prudency of their operation or the fairness of their many “in house” dealings. The C.O.N. to construct Grand Gulf was granted under a specific set of circumstances: the first unit was to be operational in 1980, the two units were to cost $1.227 billion, and Mississippi ratepayers were not to pay for any more of its capacity than they needed. Unit 1 began operation in July, 1985; the cost of Unit 1, alone, was over $3.5 billion; and the MSU-controlled operating companies agreed, among themselves that Mississippians should pay for 1/3 of its cost much of Grand Gulf was even paid for in advance of receiving one kilowatt of power from the plant. Now MP & L presents us with this rate increase as a fait accompli, and demands that we affirm it, because the FERC has determined that a 33% allocation of Grand Gulf to MP & L does not discriminate among the various sister operating companies. We do not interpret the law to require that we approve the blind pass-through of a $326 million rate increase to Mississippians without a prudency review; to do so would be a gross abdication of the responsibility of state regulator
[….]
In this case, there is no doubt that Mississippians do not need the power provided by Grand Gulf, and that lower cost power is available elsewhere (in fact, by plants owned by MP & L). [….]” (Emphasis our own).
Read this case and more here: http://law.justia.com/cases/mississippi/supreme-court/1987/56762-0.html

The Grand Gulf Affair was a lengthy and complicated affair, and only the lawyers and construction contractors appear to have benefitted from this nuclear reactor.

According to their web site, in 2000, Entergy’s domestic utility business had a total of 2.7 million customers (in western Mississippi, southeastern Arkansas, most of Louisiana and possibly some in Texas, according to a map shown). A large number of these would be in Louisiana, meaning the burden on poor, rural western Mississippi would have been particularly severe. It must have had many singing the blues.

Ironically, TVA which was to be a public utility for the average American, has become an apparently nasty nuclear utility itself.

About Entergy: “Entergy traces its history to November 13, 1913, with the formation of Arkansas Power Company. Founder Harvey Couch used sawdust from a lumber company to bring electricity to rural Arkansas. In the 1920s, Couch set his sights on buying electric companies in other states. In 1923, he merged four independent companies in Mississippi into Mississippi Power and Light. Two years later, he formed Louisiana Power and Light to provide power to his Mississippi customers from northern Louisiana’s natural gas fields.[1]

Meanwhile, in 1922, Sidney Mitchel of Electric Bond and Share Company (EBASCO), a subsidiary of General Electric, had merged several competing electric utilities in New Orleans into New Orleans Public Service, an EBASCO subsidiary. Mitchel began turning his attention to other territories, and eventually began competing with Couch. The two men ultimately decided to merge their resources. In 1925, Electric Power and Light Corporation, an EBASCO subsidiary headquartered in New Orleans, was formed with Couch as its president. It was the parent company for Mississippi Power and Light, Louisiana Power and Light, New Orleans Public Service and Arkansas Power and Light.[1]

EBASCO was ordered dissolved in 1949 under the provisions of the Public Utility Holding Company Act. Mississippi Power and Light, Louisiana Power and Light, New Orleans Public Service and Arkansas Power and Light were deemed to be an integrated system, and were reorganized under the control of a new holding company, Middle South Utilities.[1] It changed its name to Entergy in 1989, and merged/bought Gulf States Utilities, based in Beaumont, Texas, as of 12:00 midnight, January 1, 1994.

Since its inception, Entergy has been headquartered in New Orleans. That city had also been home to Entergy’s various corporate predecessors since 1925. After Hurricane Katrina hit the city of New Orleans in August 2005, Entergy temporarily relocated the 1,500 employees and contractors who worked at the headquarters to other cities, including Clinton, Mississippi, Little Rock, Arkansas, and The Woodlands, Texas. In April 2006, the company began moving back into its New Orleans headquarters.[4]” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entergy
(Still, Entergy Nuclear appears to still be in Mississippi. It appears that they were in Mississippi even before Katrina. See: http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/enforcement/actions/reactors/ea99158.html )

“The Life of Reason“(1905-1906) https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Santayana