Economics of nuclear power plants nuclear plants going online in 2019, capital costs will make up 74% of the levelized cost of electricity; higher than the capital percentages for fossil-fuel power plants (63% for coal, 22% for natural gas), and lower than the capital percentages for some other nonfossil-fuel sources (80% for wind, 88% for solar PV). Areva, the French nuclear plant operator, offers that 70% of the cost of a kWh of nuclear electricity is accounted for by the fixed costs from the construction process. Some analysts argue (for example Steve Thomas, Professor of Energy Studies at the University of Greenwich in the UK,
Spent fuel pool American nuclear plants "to protect with high assurance" against specific threats involving certain numbers and capabilities of assailants. Plants were also required to "enhance the number of security officers" and to improve "access controls to the facilities". Spent fuel pool Spent fuel pools (SFP) are storage pools for spent fuel from nuclear reactors. They are typically 40 or more feet (12 m) deep, with the bottom 14 feet (4.3 m) equipped with storage racks designed to hold fuel assemblies removed from the reactor. A reactor's pool is specially designed for the reactor in which the fuel was used and situated