Prairie Island 1 - Status & History

Comprehensive reactor performance metrics, cycle analysis, and historical outage data.

Reactor Status Timeline

Online NRC data, Mon to Fri ? Actual daily reactor status from NRC reports (Mon to Fri) and the current state. What is coming -- the utility's published Scheduled outage and NukeWorker's model Projection -- is part of a subscription. Colored by status. How far ahead you can see depends on your plan.
Sep2025OctNovDecJan2026FebMarAprMayJunJulAugOnline: Aug 10, 2025 to May 2, 2026Reduced Power: May 3, 2026Online: May 4, 2026 to May 17, 2026Reduced Power: May 18, 2026 to May 21, 2026Online: May 22, 2026 to Jul 17, 2026Reduced Power: Jul 18, 2026 to Jul 19, 2026Online: Jul 20, 2026 to Aug 10, 2026Today
OnlineReduced Power
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Composite Operational Excellence Score (0-100) — average percentile rank across 7 dimensions in three sub-scores: Reliability (capacity factor, forced outage days, B2B avg streak), Efficiency (fuel utilization, refuel duration), and Discipline (startup duration, scram count). 5-year window. Higher = more operationally excellent. Click to see the full breakdown.
52
Excellence
#38 of 93
Mid Quartile
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Days of continuous operation since the last outage ended. Clean run (no forced outages since last refueling).
384
Current Run
days ✔
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Longest recorded period of continuous operation between outages (2020-10-13 to 2022-10-15).
732
Record Run
days
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Breaker-to-Breaker runs — continuous operation exceeding the cycle-adjusted threshold (611 days for this 24-month cycle unit) with no trips to 0% power.
3
B2B Runs
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Lifetime capacity factor: average power level across all recorded days (100% = always at full power).
88.7%
Capacity Factor
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Net electricity actually generated over the most recent 12 months reported by the U.S. EIA (Form EIA-923), summed across every unit at this plant. Authoritative actuals, not an estimate.
8.8 TWh
Net Generation
EIA-923 · 12 mo to 2026-05 · plant total
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Total number of scheduled refueling outages detected in the historical data.
15
Outages
since 1999
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Average time from first power generation (>0%) to sustained full power (≥95% for 2+ days) across the last 3 scheduled outages. Click to compare against the fleet on the Operator Efficiency Leaderboard.
3.3
Avg Startup
days (last 3)
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Average fuel utilization — percent of the designed fuel cycle that this unit consumes before refueling, derived from the historical burn-down trajectory. Higher = more efficient operator (refuels with less margin remaining; closer to coastdown). Computed as 100% minus the unit's average refuel-point fuel %, using the last 3 years where available, otherwise lifetime average. Click to compare against the fleet on the Operator Efficiency Leaderboard.
85.1%
Fuel Utilization
lifetime avg
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NukeWorker's Operational Excellence Score is a composite 0–100 ranking of every active US nuclear unit across 7 publicly observable performance metrics, grouped into three sub-scores:
Reliability — capacity factor, forced outage days, B2B avg streak
Efficiency — fuel utilization, refuel duration
Discipline — startup duration, scram count
Each unit's metric is converted to a percentile across the active fleet. Sub-score = average of its components; composite = average of the three sub-scores. Use the time-window toggle below to switch between 3yr / 5yr / lifetime.
Time window — change how far back we look
NukeWorker's
Operational
Excellence Score
52/100
Mid Quartile · #38/93
5-year window

Prairie Island 1 ranks #38 of 93 active US units on NukeWorker's Operational Excellence Score over the 5-year window. Strongest area: Refuel Duration (76th percentile). Weakest: Forced Outage Days/yr (5th percentile).

Reliability
31
Capacity factor + Forced outages + B2B streaks
Efficiency
76
Fuel utilization + Refuel duration
Discipline
48
Startup duration + Scram count
Cohort Rankings apples-to-apples comparison within each peer group
Reactor type: #23 of 61 PWR
Containment: #20 of 47 Dry Ambient (PWR)
Cycle length: #21 of 40 24-month cycle
Fleet rank above (38 of 93) compares all active US units; cohort ranks compare only against units sharing this property.
Per-dimension breakdown (7 metrics)
Capacity Factor 17th
87.2% (higher better, Reliability)
Forced Outage Days/yr 5th
21.6d (lower better, Reliability)
B2B Avg Streak 72th
682d (higher better, Reliability)
Refuel Duration 76th
25d (lower better, Efficiency)
Scrams (5-year) 48th
0.4/yr (lower better, Discipline)

Each dimension's percentile is computed across the active US fleet (93 units with sufficient history). Sub-score = average of its component percentiles. Composite = average of the three sub-scores. 5-year window. View full leaderboard →

Methodology

NukeWorker's Operational Excellence Score is a composite ranking that combines 7 publicly observable performance metrics into a single 0-100 number per US nuclear unit.

How it's computed: Each unit's raw value is converted to a percentile (0-100) within the 93 active US units that have at least 2 completed refueling cycles. The 7 percentiles are averaged into 3 sub-scores (Reliability, Efficiency, Discipline), and those are averaged into the final composite.

Active window — 5-year:

  • Reliability — Capacity factor (5yr), forced outage days/yr (5yr), B2B avg streak (lifetime)
  • Efficiency — in-cycle fuel utilization (3yr), median refuel duration (5yr)
  • Discipline — robust mean startup duration, scrams/yr (5yr, annualised)

Cohort rankings: alongside the fleet rank, each unit gets ranked within its reactor type (PWR/BWR), containment design (Ice Condenser, Mark I, etc.), and cycle length (12/18/24-month). Useful for apples-to-apples comparisons.

What's excluded: subjective community ratings, confidential INPO ratings, financial metrics. We only use publicly available NRC + cycle data.

Why three windows? 5yr (default) is the industry standard. 3yr captures recent operational changes and post-pandemic recovery. Lifetime gives newer units a fair comparison and reveals long-term consistency.

Edge cases: units with fewer than 2 cycles (e.g., Vogtle 4) show "Provisional". Decommissioned units excluded.

Refresh cadence: recomputed daily. Each window cached separately.

A data-derived proxy for operational performance; not affiliated with INPO. INPO ratings are confidential and qualitative — ours is public and quantitative.

5-yr trend: 2021: 60/100 (#35/93)2022: 75/100 (#14/92)2023: 55/100 (#33/92)2024: 51/100 (#43/93)2025: 52/100 (#39/93)2026: 51/100 (#36/93) Stable vs 2025
Compare Prairie Island 1 head-to-head with up to 3 other units. Compare now
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Duration of each outage in days, shown chronologically. Green bars are scheduled refueling outages, red bars are forced/unscheduled. The orange dashed line marks the average duration. Extended outages (>180 days) and D&D periods are excluded.

Outage Duration Trend

Prairie Island 1 has 37 outages plotted here, averaging 26 days each. The most recent, in Jul 2025, was a unplanned outage lasting 6 days.
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Days between consecutive scheduled refueling outage starts, showing operating cycle regularity. The purple dashed line marks the average cycle length. Most U.S. reactors operate on 18-month (547 day) or 24-month (730 day) cycles.

Cycle Length History

Between refueling outages, Prairie Island 1 runs about 664 days, or roughly 22 months, per cycle. That average comes from 14 completed cycles, the most recent lasting 707 days.
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Time in days from first power generation (>0%) to sustained full power (≥95% for 2+ consecutive days) after each scheduled refueling outage. The dashed line marks the average. Includes startup testing holds and power dips.

Startup Duration Trend

After a refueling outage, Prairie Island 1 takes about 4 days to climb from first power back to full power. That average is drawn from 15 startups on record, and the most recent took 4 days.
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Estimated fuel remaining in the current cycle, expressed as a percentage of the unit's typical cycle. Starts at 100% when the unit returns to power post-refuel and drops as full-power-days are burned. Days at reduced power burn fuel proportionally — so a unit with significant downtime (high burn deficit) drops slower and ends up with MORE fuel left than its calendar position would suggest. Coastdown threshold around 15%. Toggle to overlay past cycles on a normalized "days into cycle" axis to see how aggressively this unit historically burns down before refuel.

Fuel Burn Down Cycle since Jan 18, 2025

20.0% remaining 568 / 691 days 15.1 FPD margin
Prairie Island 1 is 568 days into its current fuel cycle with an estimated 20.0% of its fuel left. This cycle is set up to run about 691 days. Across its last 14 cycles, it has refueled with an average of 14.9% remaining.
Avg refuel: 14.9% Deepest burn: 0.0% (2020-10 → 2022-10) Most margin: 29.7% (2011-06 → 2012-10)
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Monthly capacity factor with outage events overlaid as red bands. Green bars show average power level per month. Toggle to Daily view for raw daily data.

Power History

Over its operating life, Prairie Island 1 has run at about 88.7% of its rated capacity. Across the last 12 reported months it averaged 98.9%. On the chart, flat stretches near the top are full-power running and drops to zero are outages.
This table logs every recorded outage for Prairie Island 1, 37 in all since 1999. Of those, 15 were scheduled refueling outages and 22 were unplanned or forced. The typical outage lasted about 26 days. Where the Scheduled column shows (Model), the date is a NukeWorker projection because the utility had not published one.
Scram # 57813
2025-07-17 2025-07-22 6 182d - -
Scheduled 1R34SGR/Major
2024-09-21 2025-01-16 118 223d 2024-09-15 +6d
Unscheduled
2024-02-09 2024-02-11 3 16d - -
Scram # 56803
2023-10-20 2024-01-24 97 345d - -
Scheduled 1R33
2022-10-15 2022-11-09 26 732d 2022-10-14 +1d
Scheduled 1R32
2020-09-19 2020-10-13 25 20d 2020-09-18 +1d
Scram # 54859
2020-08-27 2020-08-30 4 672d - -
Scheduled 1R31
2018-09-22 2018-10-25 34 671d 2018-09-21 +1d
Scheduled 1R30
2016-10-16 2016-11-20 36 502d 2016-10-14 +2d
Scram # 51107
2015-06-01 2015-06-02 2 24d - -
Unscheduled
2015-04-08 2015-05-08 31 56d - -
Unscheduled
2015-01-27 2015-02-11 16 32d - -
Unscheduled
2014-12-11 2014-12-26 16 20d - -
Scheduled 1R29
2014-10-08 2014-11-21 45 645d 2014-10-08 0d
Scheduled 1R28
2012-10-23 2013-01-01 71 66d 2012-10-27 -4d
Unscheduled
2012-08-15 2012-08-18 4 410d - -
Scram # 47017
2011-07-02 2011-07-02 1 22d - -
Scheduled 1R27
2011-04-30 2011-06-10 42 525d 2011-04-30 0d
Scheduled 1R26
2009-09-12 2009-11-21 71 114d 2009-09-11 +1d
Unscheduled
2009-05-19 2009-05-21 3 290d - -
Unscheduled
2008-08-01 2008-08-02 2 133d - -
Scheduled 1R25
2008-02-13 2008-03-21 38 51d 2008-02-28 -15d
Unscheduled
2007-12-22 2007-12-24 3 218d - -
Unscheduled
2007-05-18 2007-05-18 1 3d - -
Unscheduled
2007-05-12 2007-05-15 4 341d - -
Scheduled 1R24
2006-04-29 2006-06-05 38 14d 2006-04-28 +1d
Unscheduled
2006-04-15 2006-04-15 1 408d - -
Unscheduled
2005-03-03 2005-03-03 1 5d - -
Unscheduled
2005-02-19 2005-02-26 8 89d - -
Scheduled 1R23
2004-09-11 2004-11-22 73 515d 2004-09-10 +1d
Unscheduled
2003-04-15 2003-04-15 1 131d - -
Scheduled 1R22
2002-11-16 2002-12-05 20 432d 2002-11-16 0d
Unscheduled
2001-08-02 2001-09-10 40 158d - -
Scheduled 1R21
2001-01-20 2001-02-25 37 38d 2001-01-20 0d
Unscheduled
2000-12-02 2000-12-13 12 556d - -
Scheduled 1R20
1999-04-17 1999-05-26 40 96d 1999-04-17 0d
Unscheduled
1999-01-06 1999-01-11 6 - - -
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