Donald C. Cook Nuclear Generating Station

Plant as seen from the road to the visitors center. Unit 1 is on the right.

Donald C. Cook Nuclear Generating Station is a nuclear power plant located in the town of Bridgman, Michigan which is part of Berrien County, on a 650 acre (2.6 km²) site 11 miles south of St. Joseph, Michigan, USA. The plant is owned by American Electric Power (AEP) and operated by Indiana Michigan Power, an AEP subsidiary. This is currently the company's only nuclear power plant, which has two nuclear reactors.

Built at a cost of $1.3 billion, the plant produces enough electricity to meet the needs of a city 1.25 million people.

The plant is connected to the power grid via one 765KV line that goes from the plant to AEP's DuMont substation near Lakeville, Indiana and by numerous 345KV lines, two of which interconnect with Consumers Energy/METC, connecting with the Palisades Nuclear Generating Station, owned by Entergy.

License expiration and renewal

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission renewed the operating licenses of both reactors on August 30, 2005. With the renewal, Unit One's operating license will expire in 2034 while Unit Two's will expire in 2037. [1] The units were initially licensed for forty years from their operational date.

Visitors center

The plant has a visitors center that was open to the public six days a week on a drop in basis. Since the attacks of September 11, however, the plant is open only to school groups by reservation. The visitors center features a 26 foot animated model demonstrating how the plant operates.

Ownership

The plant is operated by the Indiana Michigan Power Company and owned by American Electric Power.

Incidents

• A transformer caused an automatic shutdown of Unit 1 offline in 2003. ^[1]

• A fire broke out in the generator of Unit 1 on September 20 2008. causing the reactor to shut down. No radiation was released and Unit 2 continued to operate at full power ^[2][3]

Additional Information

Photographs

Unit 1 is on the left as viewed from the Lake Michigan shoreline.

Exterior of the Donald C. Cook Nuclear Generating Station.

Interior of the turbine building at the Donald C. Cook Nuclear Generating Station.

Arial view. Visitors center is in the foreground. Unit 2 is behind Unit 1.

References

External links

• Media related to Donald C. Cook Nuclear Generating Station at Wikimedia Commons
• Cook Nuclear Power Plant Page
• DoE Page
• Arial photo of Cook plant

Coordinates: 41°58′31″N 86°33′57″W / 41.975391°N 86.565914°W / 41.975391; -86.565914