Google is investing $900M to boost Georgia Power’s nuclear capacity.

• The goal: To fund upgrades that will raise the max power output of plants Vogtle and Hatch, adding 96 MW to Georgia's grid. The enhancements will also extend the life of the units and “help Georgia Power customers receive even more value from the existing nuclear fleet,” Joshua Peacock, communications lead at Georgia Power, told us. 

• A new structure: Google would make monthly payments under a proposed Georgia Power tariff and receive zero-emission credits in return. The value of those credits would be defined in a contract between the utility and data center customers. 

• The impact on bills: Georgia Power froze its base rates through 2028, and intends to ask the PSC to lower the base rates again in the future, according to Peacock. The utility has been able to keep its rates steady “because of all of the growth and revenue coming in from large energy users like Google,” he said. 

Dear Decommissioning Working Group,
 

“Massachusetts blocks Holtec from discharging Pilgrim water”

https://www.ans.org/news/2026-09-17/article-8397/massachusetts-blocks-holtec-from-discharging-pilgrim-water/
 

Massachusetts blocks Holtec from discharging Pilgrim water

Thu, Sep 17, 2026, 10:28PM

Pilgrim, shown here in 2021. (Photo: Holtec)

In 2024, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection (MassDEP) denied Holtec International’s application to release treated water into Cape Cod Bay from the Pilgrim nuclear power plant site as decommissioning work continues.

Holtec appealed that decision, and on Tuesday, MassDEP announced that it has dismissed the appeal, leaving Holtec—for now—with fewer options for how to deal with the up to 1.1 million gallons of water it seeks to discharge.

The context: Pilgrim sits on Cape Cod Bay in Plymouth, Mass. It was shut down in May 2019, and ownership transferred from Entergy to Holtec for decontamination and decommissioning a few months later. At the time, Holtec planned to complete its work at the site within eight years.

In 2021, the company announced that it had placed the last of the plant’s fuel in dry storage. By 2022, all high-level waste was in storage. The ongoing decommissioning progress hit a significant roadblock in February 2024, however, when MassDEP denied Holtec’s request to discharge the plant’s treated wastewater into Cape Code Bay. MassDEP’s decision was made against the backdrop of significant public outcry regarding Holtec’s proposal.

The appeal: Holtec appealed MassDEP’s decision on the grounds of jurisdictional authority and technical veracity. To the former point, the company argued that the Atomic Energy Act bars MassDEP from entirely blocking the discharge of treated water from a nuclear power plant.

To the latter point, Holtec essentially rejected MassDEP’s presupposition that the water at issue is “waste,” as defined by the relevant law—in this case, the state’s Ocean Sanctuaries Act, which defines Cape Cod Bay as an ocean sanctuary subject to special environmental protections. One of those protections is a prohibition on “dumping or discharge of commercial, municipal, domestic or industrial wastes.”

The act defines wastes as “any unwanted, discarded, or environmentally harmful solid, liquid, or gaseous materials resulting from commercial, municipal, domestic, or industrial activities.”

Holtec argued that Pilgrim’s water does not fit into this definition, in that “the treated water to be discharged is not environmentally harmful,” the company said. The appeal further emphasized that the concentrations of the detectable pollutants in the released water would be both well within federal standards and actually “well below the concentrations detectable in the receiving waters.”

Nonetheless, on Tuesday, MassDEP announced that it has dismissed Holtec’s appeal and upheld its 2024 determination denying the company’s request to discharge the water at Pilgrim.

Next steps: The future of Pilgrim’s decommissioning is now somewhat uncertain. As Patrick O’Brien, director of government affairs and communications for Holtec, told Boston NPR station WBUR, the yearslong permitting process has already delayed the cleanup schedule, and the new decision may impose a further delay.

O’Brien added that the company is “reviewing the finalized denial and looking at what options may remain available.” MassDEP said its final decision can be appealed to the state’s Superior Court. Another solution advocated for by some in the state is shipping the water to an out-of-state facility.

Depending on the next steps Holtec takes, this regulatory back-and-forth ultimately may become moot. As deliberations continue, the water at the site is slowly evaporating. However, the rate of evaporation at the site has been variable and difficult to calculate thus far, and it is currently unclear how many years it would take for the remaining water at the site to evaporate.

https://www.ianfairlie.org/news/us-million-person-study-on-low-dose-rate-exposures-to-radiation-preliminary-findings/

Dr Ian Fairlie
An independent consultant on radioactivity in the environment.
 

This article requires an extensive introduction, so bear with me.
 

Current risk estimates for radiation are based by the ICRP principally on the Japanese survivors of the US bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945.  This is the Life Span Study (LSS). However it has several shortcomings including that it is based on instantaneous exposures (lasting less than a second) to high blasts of gamma radiation and neutrons.  Other shortcomings were that the studies did not commence until 5 years after the explosions and many unrecorded deaths occurred during the interval. Also the translation of the estimated risks in the acutely-exposed Japanese population to people in different countries exposed to lower doses over lengthier time periods introduces large uncertainties in the LSS risk estimates.

Finally the LSS only covered ~80,000 people. A better, larger study covering ~300,000 workers – was the INWORKS study of nuclear industry workers in the US, UK and France which found radiation risks higher than the risks observed by the Life Span Study but broadly similar to it. (It is explained that the phrase “broadly similar to” means that the uncertainty ranges of the two studies overlapped.) The INWORKS study has been examined and discussed by me previously  -see https://www.ianfairlie.org/news/important-new-bmj-article-increases-our-perception-of-radiation-risks/

A third, even larger, study – the US Million Person Study- has been underway in the US for several years. For its history, see – Boice Jr JD., André Bouville, Lawrence T. Dauer, Ashley P. Golden, Richard Wakeford (2022) Introduction to the special issue on the US Million Person Study of health effects from low-level exposure to radiation. International Journal of Radiation Biology, Volume 98, 2022 – Issue 4.

The quantitative results of this US study have not yet been published formally, it seems, in any academic scientific article. However, rather strangely,  an article containing its preliminary findings has been  just published in the UK magazine of the UK Society for Radiological Protection.  See https://srp-uk.org/professional-resources/radiation-protection-today

I say “rather strangely”,  but perhaps it’s unsurprising for a US study to first release in the UK controversial findings on radiation risks, given the US President’s recent attacks on internationally-accepted cornerstones of radiation protection, such as the linear no threshold model of radiation risks and ALARA.

The US Million Person Study of Low-Dose-Rate Health Effects (https://www.millionpersonstudy.org/) is the largest radiation occupational epidemiologic study that I’m aware of. It eventually will cover about a million US nuclear workers and military veterans etc. It is examining cancer and non-cancer morbidity (cases) and mortality (deaths) after exposures to low rates of radiation. It includes nuclear industry workers who predominately received about 300 mGy over their working lives. In other words, it is not a low level study but a low rate study. It includes workers from Los Alamos National Laboratory, Oak Ridge Mound Nuclear Facility, Rocky Flats plant, civilian nuclear utilities, industrial radiographers, medical radiation radiographers, and workers at military nuclear weapons test sites.

Early findings based on ~ 600,000 US workers and US military veterans include the following

• an association between occupational radiation exposures and Parkinson’s disease
• a low risk of lung cancer
• a risk of leukemia (excluding chronic lymphocytic leukemia)
• some evidence of increases in all solid cancers and
• evidence that chromosomal damage could be detected 65 years after veteran exposure to fallout from nuclear weapons testing.

These findings are unsurprising and fit in with evidence elsewhere , especially the INWORKS studies.  What is significant is that the study runs directly contrary to the views of the US President and can be viewed as a direct riposte to them. So far, no collective quantitative risk estimates from this study have been published in the US.

The Million Person Study continues at large US DoE facilities including Hanford and Oak Ridge, and US Navy personnel, including nuclear submarine sailors and naval shipyard workers. interestingly, is also re-examining the US radium dial workers from the 1920s and 1930s. The ongoing Million Person Study also covers

• safe and secure cleanup of historically contaminated US nuclear sites
• protection from radiation exposures during space travel
• the development of new forms of nuclear power designs and
• resilience preparation for response to emergency radiological incidents.

The SRPS article was written by two US academics, Dr Nicole Martinez and Dr Laurence Dauer. They conclude– somewhat courageously given the US President’s outspoken views –

“A better understanding of potential impacts of radiological exposure enables more informed decisions which in turn can support a more sustainable and prosperous future. See www.millionpersonstudy.org”

https://apnews.com/article/uranium-mining-mount-taylor-traditional-cultural-property-8bf3cc46117a507cd0a966a3041e0e39

Uranium mines pose first test for state-recognized Mount Taylor cultural landscape in New Mexico

The western slope of Mount Taylor is capped with snow on Nov. 25, 2025, in Cibola County, N.M. (Bella Davis/New Mexico In Depth via AP) License this photo

By  BELLA DAVIS/New Mexico In Depth
Updated 2:31 AM GMT+8, September 16, 2026
 

For Native communities in northwest New Mexico’s Grants mineral belt, one of the central concerns with the idea of resumed uranium mining is the potential harm to Mount Taylor. That concern led the state to designate Mount Taylor as a traditional cultural property nearly two decades ago. But as uranium mining companies hoping to operate within the area move through the state permitting process, state regulators still can’t say what role the designation will play in their decisions.

Mount Taylor is sacred to the Navajo Nation, the Hopi Tribe, and the pueblos of Laguna, Acoma and Zuni.

“We have, and other peoples have, a really millennia-long relationship with the mountain,” June Lorenzo (Laguna/Diné) told the Radioactive and Hazardous Materials Committee during a meeting in the Laguna Pueblo village of Paguate on Friday. “It’s part of our vocabulary. It features largely in our creation stories.”

It’s not only the mountain that’s important, but also the surrounding landscape, said Lorenzo, a former tribal court judge who’s done academic research and advocacy work on legacy uranium issues.

The five tribes undertook a legal fight in the late 2000s in an effort to protect Mount Taylor from extraction, resulting in the state designation of 400,000 acres as a traditional cultural property. At the time, Lorenzo said, the tribes were accused of using the process to try to acquire the land, but that’s a misunderstanding of their relationships with Mount Taylor. Besides, the designation didn’t actually transfer ownership to them.

“None of us want to own—we will never own the mountain,” she said. “It’s like a relative.”

The designation is meant to give tribes a stronger voice in decisions about mining and other development, but because New Mexico hasn’t permitted a uranium mine since the designation took effect, it’s never been tested.

Two proposed underground uranium mines — Roca Honda and La Jara Mesa — would fall within the state-designated acreage.

Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces, asked state regulators whether they can deny a permit based on concerns about cultural sites.

“I don’t have an answer to that question. We have yet to get to that stage of how impacts to the (traditional cultural property) will be mitigated,” said David “D.J.” Ennis, program manager of the Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department’s Mining Act Reclamation Program.

Ennis said the department is partnering with the U.S. Forest Service to evaluate the issue.

Energy Fuels, the top producer of uranium in the U.S., proposes having dewatering well pads used to remove groundwater from the mine and ventilation shafts on about 30 acres of the designated land.

In response to tribal input, the company revised previous iterations of its plan to remove “significant disturbance” from the area, including a mine shaft, said Nick Martin, environmental manager at Energy Fuels.

Steinborn seemed to be unconvinced.

“We have tremendous concern for cultural sites, not to mention the environmental issues and the worker safety issues,” he told Martin and two other Energy Fuels representatives.

How do they plan to mitigate impacts to the area, the state senator asked.

Martin mentioned independent engagement with tribes and a review under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act, which requires federal agencies to consider how projects they carry out or permit will affect historic properties.

Sen. Angel Charley (Laguna/Zuni/Diné), a Democrat who grew up in Laguna Pueblo and lives in nearby Acoma Pueblo, pushed back on that, noting the Trump administration is trying to weaken Section 106.

That includes a proposal to make tribal consultation no longer required.

As Friday’s meeting wrapped up, New Mexico In Depth asked Misael Cabrera, senior vice president of regulatory affairs at Energy Fuels, to respond to the concern Charley — who has called for a moratorium on uranium mining — raised about Section 106.

“Sometimes politicians deregulate, other times politicians re-regulate,” Cabrera said. “Irrespective of what those folks do, we want to make sure that we’re being good neighbors for the communities that we’re in. Why? Because it makes business sense. If the people around you are always fighting you, it makes things harder.”

He pointed to an agreement Energy Fuels and the Navajo Nation signed in January 2025 that allows the company to transport uranium ore through Navajo lands. In exchange, the company agreed to more protections than what’s legally required and to haul away up to 10,000 tons of waste from abandoned uranium mines spread across the Navajo Nation, according to a press release.

The agreement came after the Navajo Nation and the Havasupai Tribe condemned Energy Fuels in 2024 for moving ore across their lands without their permission.

“One of the things that folks don’t understand when I say middle ground, some might ask, ‘Well, why can’t you just leave? Why can’t you just leave that place alone?’ It’s because these projects, they actually don’t start making money until like year five, after you’ve started producing,” Cabrera said. “And until then, we actually work on borrowed money. We borrow money from shareholders. … So we’ve got to analyze all of that in our decisions.”

___

This story was originally published by New Mexico In Depth and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.