Our latest ANS Nuclear Cafe Matinee film is the latest video update by Southern Company on the progress of the Vogtle nuclear plant expansion.  This video runs just over seven minutes and brings you the details of the construction as of the last quarter of 2018.  Enjoy!

Welcome to 2019!  I hope everyone who took a break enjoyed it. For those who didn't, why didn't you?  Initially, I had thoughts of trying to separate from social media and news to a significant extent during the holidays but, after conversations with Linda Zec (our wonderful ANS staff liaison for the Social Media Team, among many other things) decided that it was impractical to do so for a variety of reasons.  So, as the holiday furor ebbed and flowed and I continued, still connected, to read news and year-end summations, I found myself wishing that there wouldn't be so much frustrating news in 2019.  That's why I decided to open my eighth calendar year writing for the ANS Nuclear Cafe with a wish list, or "listicle" in the inside jargon, if you prefer.  Here, in ascending order of importance (or, I suppose, increasing order of unlikelihood) are my five wishes for this new year in nuclear energy.  (All on one screen; no annoying "next" buttons.  You're welcome.)

Near Augusta, Georgia, the first new commercial nuclear power reactors under construction in the United States in 30 years continue to "go vertical."  Take an inside look at the latest from the Vogtle-3 and -4 construction site, including placement of the 1.8 million pound containment vessel bottom head for Unit 4, the cooling tower for Unit 3 surpassing 300 feet, and a very interesting visit to the Port of Savannah where many of the most massive Vogtle components arrive via ship.

Near Augusta, Georgia, the first new commercial nuclear power reactors built in the United States in 30 years continue to take shape. This latest video update features the recent heavy lift of the massive 5-story CA20 module, which will house the spent fuel pool, fuel transfer canal, and other essential components for Unit 3. The video also features a visit by US Secretary of Energy Dr. Ernest Moniz, day-to-day problem-solving operations at the site's operations control center (especially during recent unusually cold weather), and the immeasurable beneficial economic and other impacts on the region's economy and school systems. Fuel loading and connection to the grid is scheduled for Unit 3 in 2017, and Unit 4 in 2018.

It's been more than two years since Vogtle Units 3 and 4 began to rise from the landscape near Waynesboro, Georgia-though construction officially began just last March with pouring of the Unit 3 basemat concrete, and a few months ago in November with the Unit 4 basemat. Turbine buildings, cooling towers, AP1000 reactor operator training... 2013 saw great strides toward the first new commercial nuclear power reactors in the United States in 30 years. Join host Joe Washington for a tour of the most recent milestones achieved in this amazing construction project.

The ANS Nuclear Cafe Matinee is usually celebrated on Fridays-but this time, we just couldn't wait.

A new time-lapse video shows early site preparation and containment vessel bottom head placement at the Plant Vogtle Electric Generating Plant near Waynesboro, Georgia. Two new nuclear power reactors are scheduled to begin operations at Plant Vogtle in 2017 and 2018. Along with two units under construction at the V.C. Summer Nuclear Generating Station in South Carolina, these will be the first new nuclear units built in the United States in the last three decades. Enjoy the show!

Last week at the ANS Nuclear Cafe Matinee we caught up with the latest milestones in nuclear construction going on at the V.C. Summer site in South Carolina.  Now, let's take a look at history in the making at Plant Vogtle in Burke County, Georgia, where construction of two new AP1000 reactors is quickly moving onward and upward.  How in the world do you make a nuclear power plant?  Watch, and find out.

Today the ANS Nuclear Cafe Matinee features the impressive transformation going on at the Plant Vogtle -3 and -4 construction site near Waynesboro, Georgia.