AKRON, Ohio, June 7, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company (FENOC), a subsidiary of FirstEnergy Corp. (NYSE: FE), announced its Perry Nuclear Power Plant in Perry, Ohio, returned to service today following a scheduled shutdown for refueling and maintenance, beginning on April 18, 2011.
The 1,268-megawatt unit began producing electricity at 12:35 a.m. Power levels will vary over the next several days as part of routine testing. The plant is expected to reach full power in the next several days.
During the outage, 248 of the 748 fuel assemblies were replaced and safety inspections were successfully conducted. In addition, numerous preventive maintenance activities and improvement projects were completed to ensure continued safe and reliable operations, including replacement of several control rod blades, rewind of the generator, and routine work on more than 150 valves, pumps and motors.
Perry had operated safely and reliably since the completion of its last refueling in May 2009, generating more than 19.2 million megawatt hours of carbon-free electricity.
FirstEnergy is a diversified energy company headquartered in Akron, Ohio. Its FENOC subsidiary also operates the Beaver Valley Power Station in Shippingport, Pa., and the Davis-Besse Nuclear Power Station in Oak Harbor, Ohio.
Forward-Looking Statements: This news release includes forward-looking statements based on information currently available to management. Such statements are subject to certain risks and uncertainties. These statements include declarations regarding management's intents, beliefs and current expectations. These statements typically contain, but are not limited to, the terms "anticipate," "potential," "expect," "believe," "estimate" and similar words. Forward-looking statements involve estimates, assumptions, known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially due to: the speed and nature of increased competition in the electric utility industry, the impact of the regulatory process on the pending matters in the various states in which we do business including, but not limited to, matters related to rates, the status of the PATH project in light of PJM's direction to suspend work on the project pending review of its planning process, its re-evaluation of the need for the project and the uncertainty of the timing and amounts of any related capital expenditures, business and regulatory impacts from ATSI's realignment into PJM Interconnection, L.L.C, economic or weather conditions affecting future sales and margins, changes in markets for energy services, changing energy and commodity market prices and availability, financial derivative reforms that could increase our liquidity needs and collateral costs, replacement power costs being higher than anticipated or inadequately hedged, the continued ability of FirstEnergy's regulated utilities to collect transition and other costs, operation and maintenance costs being higher than anticipated, other legislative and regulatory changes, and revised environmental requirements, including possible GHG emission, water intake and coal combustion residual regulations, the potential impacts of any laws, rules or regulations that ultimately replace CAIR and the effects of the EPA's recently released MACT proposal to establish certain mercury and other emission standards for electric generating units, the uncertainty of the timing and amounts of the capital expenditures that may arise in connection with any NSR litigation or potential regulatory initiatives or rulemakings (including that such expenditures could result in our decision to shut down or idle certain generating units), adverse regulatory or legal decisions and outcomes (including, but not limited to, the revocation of necessary licenses or operating permits) and oversight by the NRC, including as a result of the incident at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant, adverse legal decisions and outcomes related to Met-Ed's and Penelec's transmission service charge appeal at the Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania, the continuing availability of generating units and changes in their ability to operate at or near full capacity, the ability to comply with applicable state and federal reliability standards and energy efficiency mandates, changes in customers' demand for power, including but not limited to, changes resulting from the implementation of state and federal energy efficiency mandates, the ability to accomplish or realize anticipated benefits from strategic goals, efforts, and our ability, to improve electric commodity margins and the impact of, among other factors, the increased cost of coal and coal transportation on such margins, the ability to experience growth in the distribution business, the changing market conditions that could affect the value of assets held in FirstEnergy's nuclear decommissioning trusts, pension trusts and other trust funds, and cause FirstEnergy to make additional contributions sooner, or in amounts that are larger than currently anticipated, the ability to access the public securities and other capital and credit markets in accordance with FirstEnergy's financing plan, the cost of such capital and overall condition of the capital and credit markets affecting FirstEnergy and its subsidiaries, changes in general economic conditions affecting FirstEnergy and its subsidiaries, interest rates and any actions taken by credit rating agencies that could negatively affect FirstEnergy's and its subsidiaries' access to financing or their costs and increase requirements to post additional collateral to support outstanding commodity positions, LOCs and other financial guarantees, the continuing uncertainty of the national and regional economy and its impact on the major industrial and commercial customers of FirstEnergy's subsidiaries, issues concerning the soundness of financial institutions and counterparties with which FirstEnergy and its subsidiaries do business, issues arising from the recently completed merger of FirstEnergy and Allegheny Energy, Inc. and the ongoing coordination of their combined operations including FirstEnergy's ability to maintain relationships with customers, employees or suppliers, as well as the ability to successfully integrate the businesses and realize cost savings and any other synergies and the risk that the credit ratings of the combined company or its subsidiaries may be different from what the companies expect, the risks and other factors discussed from time to time in FirstEnergy's and its applicable subsidiaries' SEC filings, and other similar factors. The foregoing review of factors should not be construed as exhaustive. New factors emerge from time to time, and it is not possible for management to predict all such factors, nor assess the impact of any such factor on FirstEnergy's business or the extent to which any factor, or combination of factors, may cause results to differ materially from those contained in any forward-looking statements. FirstEnergy expressly disclaims any current intention to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.
SOURCE FirstEnergy Corp.
Share this article