Legislation lifting state’s nuclear moratorium clears House energy committee

Sometimes bills are designed to add new statutory language. Sometimes, they’re all about subtraction.

You could put HF2002 in the latter camp.

State law currently prohibits the Public Utilities Commission from issuing a certificate of need for a new nuclear power plant. The bill would remove that language from state law.

Sponsored by Rep. Spencer Igo (R-Wabana Township), the bill, after being replaced by a delete-all amendment, was approved via voice vote by the House Energy Finance and Policy Committee on Thursday, and sent to the House floor, where a debate awaits that’s likely to be at least as lively as the one at the committee meeting.

While the bill continues to remove the prohibition on issuing a certificate of need for construction of a new nuclear power plant, it would prohibit building any new nuclear facility on Prairie Island in southeastern Minnesota, which currently houses such a plant and several casks of spent nuclear fuel. It also would prohibit bringing waste from another nuclear facility to Prairie Island.

“One of the best forms of baseload power that we have available to us is nuclear power,” Igo said. “We’ve had a moratorium that’s prohibited even looking into and doing studies about ‘What if our [investor-owned utilities] and our [municipal utilities] want to host these types of facilities?’ A moratorium around ideas, I think, is a very archaic way of legislating and policy making.”

Despite the assurances that no new nuclear facilities or outside waste would be coming to Prairie Island, Blake Johnson, government relations specialist for the Prairie Island Indian Community, said that his community remains opposed to lifting the moratorium.

“We understand why the vast majority of the state has enjoyed an incredible amount of carbon-free baseload energy for the last 50 years and the vast majority of the state has not noticed the cost,” Johnson said. “But we do. We’ve noticed the cost because it’s awfully hard to ignore it.”

Both Rep. Athena Hollins (DFL-St. Paul) and Rep. Larry Kraft (DFL-St. Louis Park) described themselves as “nuclear curious,” but both also said that the reason for the moratorium still exists: That there’s no long-term plan for what to do with nuclear waste.

Rep. Dave Baker (R-Willmar) believes that nuclear power will have to be part of the equation if the state is to reach its goal of using completely carbon-free electricity sources by 2040. Rep. Mike Wiener (R-Long Prairie) added that 31 countries have come out in support of tripling global nuclear energy capacity by 2050, including the United States.

But Rep. Patty Acomb (DFL-Minnetonka) still opposes the bill.

“For us to be doing this without having a solution for the waste is putting the cart before the horse,” she said. “2040 will be here by the time we get a plant built. And we have Xcel Energy saying that they’re going to meet their 2040 goals early, and that doesn’t include building a new nuclear plant to achieve that.”