With Westinghouse settlement final, Santee Cooper to start VC Summer equipment sale
Now that a lawsuit has been settled over who owns equipment leftover from a now abandoned nuclear construction project, Santee Cooper is free to start selling equipment it has from the defunct $9 billion V.C. Summer nuclear plant expansion project.
The lawsuit settlement, between Santee Cooper and contractor Westinghouse, was finalized over the weekend, the state-owned utility said.
Money from the sale of the equipment will go toward Santee Cooper’s four-year rate freeze and paying off long-term debt, the state-owned utility said in a news release.
Santee Cooper, which serves 2 million people, is freezing rates for its electricity rates for four years under a $522 million settlement with ratepayers stemming from a lawsuit over the failed nuclear project.
Santee Cooper partnered with SCE&G, which was then owned by the Cayce-based SCANA, in the V.C. Summer project. The two utilities hired Westinghouse as the lead contractor to carry out the $9 billion project, which suffered from cost overruns and construction delays. In March 2017, Westinghouse declared bankruptcy and the project was scrapped in July 2017.
“Finalizing this agreement is a tremendous milestone, because it means Santee Cooper can move quickly to sell thousands of pieces of equipment ourselves, as well as support Westinghouse’s efforts to sell the nuclear equipment,” Mark Bonsall, Santee Cooper President and CEO, said in a statement released Monday.
Westinghouse and Santee Cooper agreed on how it would split the proceeds of the equipment sales in February; however, an estimate of how much money the equipment would bring in is not available.
- Santee Cooper and Westinghouse each own 50% of the non-installed nuclear equipment on the site.
- Santee Cooper owns 90% of the installed nuclear equipment, with 10% ownership going to Westinghouse.
- Two-thirds of the safety equipment is owned by Santee Cooper, and one-third is owned by Westinghouse.
- Santee Cooper owns 100% of the remaining equipment on site.
Westinghouse will market the equipment for sale for up to five years, under the agreement.
