NEI’s Wall Street Briefing

Every February, NEI briefs Wall Street analysts and media on the nuclear energy industry – both where it’s been in the previous year and where it’s going the current year.

The briefing will address 2013 power plant performance, 2014 priorities, the impact of changes in electricity markets, the status of new nuclear plant construction, small modular reactor development and a lot more. It’s really worth watching if you follow nuclear energy. It starts tomorrow, February 13, at 8:30 am EST. A webcast is available and it will be live tweeted (twittered, tweetered) at @N_E_I and @NEI_media (#NEIWSB).
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I was curious after reading through Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s report on grid stability yesterday (see post below) as to where plants fired by other than nuclear energy are located in the United States. It’s certainly possible to just assume that where there is a nuclear facility, it basically makes all the electricity for that part of the state, but that’s just naïve. You mean there still are other plants? Madness.

Happily, the Energy Information Agency has a very well-done map of the country that allows you to pinpoint every natural gas works, every wind farm, every oil well – well, everything energy. Sounds like it could be a mess, but it provides all the controls you need to figure out what’s where. Well worth a look if, like me, you make your local coal plant fade into the background with nuclear sharp in the foreground.

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Fluor Invests in NuScale

You know, it’s kind of sad that no one is willing to invest in nuclear energy anymore. Wait, what? NuScale Power celebrated the news of its company-saving $30 million investment from Fluor Corp. Thursday morning with a press conference in Washington, D.C. Fluor is a design, engineering and construction company involved with some 20 plants in the 70s and 80s, but it has not held interest in a nuclear energy company until now. Fluor, which has deep roots in the nuclear industry, is betting big on small-scale nuclear energy with its NuScale investment. "It's become a serious contender in the last decade or so," John Hopkins, [Fluor’s group president in charge of new ventures], said. And that brings us to NuScale, which had run into some dark days – maybe not as dark as, say, Solyndra, but dire enough : Earlier this year, the Securities Exchange Commission filed an action against NuScale's lead investor, The Michael Kenwood Group. The firm "misap...

Wednesday Update

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Nuclear Utility Moves Up in Credit Ratings, Bank is "Comfortable with Nuclear Strategy"

Some positive signs that nuclear utilities can continue to receive positive ratings even while they finance new nuclear plants for the first time in decades: Wells Fargo upgrades SCANA to Outperform from Market Perform Wells analyst says, "YTD, SCG shares have underperformed the Regulated Electrics (total return +2% vs. +9%). Shares trade at 11.3X our 10E EPS, a modest discount to the peer group median of 11.8X. We view the valuation as attractive given a comparatively constructive regulatory environment and potential for above-average long-term EPS growth prospects ... Comfortable with Nuclear Strategy. SCG plans to participate in the development of two regulated nuclear units at a cost of $6.3B, raising legitimate concerns regarding financing and construction. We have carefully considered the risks and are comfortable with SCG’s strategy based on a highly constructive political & regulatory environment, manageable financing needs stretched out over 10 years, strong partners...

NEI Nuclear Notes

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