Financial status of nuke plants

[Hitec757]

Are most of these financially secured by bonds or government guarantee's that would keep them from ever having such a cash shortfall that they would have to cut back to the point of being unsafe?  Too much capital investment for one to ever go bankrupt except in very rare situations I would think.

[jams723]

With the exception of TVA, which is a unique animal in nuclear and I do not know how they originally funded. All current operating reactor are funded by utilities with investors. No government bonds or guarantees. I am not sure if SCANA or Souther is taking advantage of the gov. guarentees but would imagine they are.

Any business can mismanage itself into trouble and some pay the price of deferring maintenance activities resulting in failed components resulting in challenges to generation. This results in hit to performance indexes, INPO rating and added NRC attention. The plant performance hits impact investor returns and results in a change of philosophy and items get fixed.

Assets also get sold when utilities feel it is in the best interest of the utility and investor.

All that to say you will not see safety compromised or a utility strong enough to build a nuke go bankrupt.