Wisconsin Energy CEO Urges Consideration of New Nuclear Capacity
Wisconsin Energy Corp. Chairman, President and CEO Gale E. Klappa told the Greater Milwaukee Committee that the state needed to consider building more nuclear capacity, the Milwaukee Business Journal reported. Klappa was quoted as saying: “We need to have in the state of Wisconsin nuclear as an option put back on the table. We don’t need a major increment of new power capacity probably till past 2020 in our region, but before then we have to make that decision.” Wisconsin passed a law in the 1970s prohibiting new construction of nuclear power plants until the federal government figured out what to do with nuclear waste.
Klappa urged debate in the Wisconsin State Legislature about replacing the nuclear power plants at Point Beach and Kewanee, which are 40 years old and supply 20 percent of the state’s power. Klappa said that for now the state had ample power supplies because the company has invested $7.8 billion in its “Power the Future” projects. He said Wisconsin Energy would meet the state’s 10 percent renewable standard by late 2013.
-Rich Kirchen
