The Wire

Energy news from Omaha Public Power District

75th Anniversary

First fuel load at Fort Calhoun

August 8, 2016 | Jason Kuiper | flashback, Fort Calhoun Station, history
first fuel FCS

Over a 16-day period in 1973, personnel loaded the first “core” into the reactor at Fort Calhoun Station (FCS). The core consisted of 61.3 tons of uranium dioxide.

The initial fuel load cost about $13 million. A Flash article from that time called the five-plus years of construction and training surrounding FCS “without question the greatest achievement in OPPD history.”

first fuel FCS

first fuel FCS

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About Jason Kuiper

Jason Kuiper joined OPPD as a communications specialist in 2015. He is a former staff writer and reporter at the Omaha World-Herald, where he covered a wide range of topics but spent the majority of his career covering crime. He is a graduate of the University of Nebraska at Omaha and has also appeared in several true crime documentary shows. In his free time he enjoys cooking, spending time with his wife and three children, and reading crime novels.

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