Weakened Hurricane Florence Spared Most Southeast U.S. Nuclear Plants

(Bloomberg) -- Out of the nine nuclear reactors that were potentially in the path of Florence before the storm landed Friday, just one was forced to close.

Duke Energy Corp.’s two Brunswick reactors on the southern coast of North Carolina were shut down Thursday in advance of the storm and are still down, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Florence made landfall as a Category 1 hurricane, and has since weakened to a tropical depression.

Southern Co.’s Vogtle 1 reactor in Georgia is also down, for planned maintenance and refueling, according to Michelle Johnson Tims, a spokeswoman. That’s not related to the storm and a second reactor at the site is operating at full power, she said.

The nuclear outages in the U.S. Southeast have increased demand in the region for natural gas, boosting imports of the competing fuel from the Northeast.

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