Cuomo and Utility Sign Agreement to Dismantle Long Island Reactor

Gov. Mario M. Cuomo and the president of Long Island Lighting Co. signed a tentative agreement Tuesday to close the $5.4-billion Shoreham nuclear power plant. It will be the first completed nuclear plant in the nation to be shut down without ever generating electricity for its customers.

The deal, in which the facility will be sold to the state for $1 and dismantled, still must be approved by the state Public Service Commission, the New York Power Authority, the Long Island Power Authority and the utility’s stockholders.

The reactor was done in by contentions from Cuomo, legislators and vocal activists that a safe evacuation of the 1.3 million Long Island residents who could be endangered by a nuclear accident would be impossible.

The state and the utility reached a similar agreement on closing the plant last year, but Long Island lawmakers complained that it would mean higher power rates, and the state Legislature rejected the deal.

The new agreement does not include a rate hike for Long Island customers, but instead calls for the Public Service Commission to set new rates after public hearings, as it does in other rate proposals.