SODDY-DAISY, TN – After generating more than 12.5 billion kilowatt hours of carbon-free electricity over the past 18 months, the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Sequoyah Nuclear Plant Unit 1 began a scheduled refueling and maintenance outage on Saturday, April 7.

Sequoyah Nuclear Plant Unit 1. Image courtesy of TVA

“Outages like this are vital to continuing nuclear power’s role as a key supplier of reliable, low-cost, carbon-free electricity to those we serve in the Tennessee Valley,” said Tony Williams, Sequoyah’s site vice president. “In addition to loading new fuel, some key maintenance activities can only be safely completed when we are offline, so we will make the most of this opportunity to ensure Unit 1 operates safely and reliably for another 18 months.”

An additional 1,046 TVA and contract employees are supplementing the site’s regular staff during the scheduled outage. Approximately 14,100 work activities are planned, including loading new fuel assemblies, performing inspections of reactor components, maintenance of plant equipment and installing unit enhancements.

Sequoyah Unit 1 is one of seven operational TVA nuclear reactors across the Valley. Collectively, TVA’s nuclear fleet reliably provides more than one-third of the electricity used across the Valley.

In Tennessee, TVA operates 19 hydroelectric dams, six coal-fired power plants, two nuclear power plants, seven combustion turbine sites and a pumped-storage plant, with a combined generating capacity of more than 19,655 megawatts.

TVA covers 42,028 square miles of Tennessee.

» Hydroelectric plants: Boone, Cherokee, Chickamauga, Douglas, Fort Loudoun, Fort Patrick Henry, Great Falls, Melton Hill, Nickajack, Norris, Ocoee 1, Ocoee 2, Ocoee 3, Pickwick Landing, South Holston, Tims Ford, Watauga, Watts Bar and Wilbur.

» Coal-fired plants: Allen, Bull Run, Cumberland, Gallatin, Johnsonville and Kingston. Johnsonville Fossil Plant ceased operation on Dec. 31, 2017. Allen Fossil Plant will cease operation in 2018.

» Nuclear plants: Sequoyah and Watts Bar.

» Natural gas-fueled facilities: the Allen, Brownsville, Gallatin, Gleason, and Johnsonville sites host combustion turbine plants. John Sevier has a combined cycle plant, and Lagoon Creek hosts both a combustion turbine and a combined cycle plant.

» Pumped-storage hydroelectric plant: Raccoon Mountain.

For more information about TVA and its 84-year mission of service to the Tennessee Valley, click here.