[Sandy G]

Back in the early Seventies, TVA jumped in w/BOTH feet on the Nukie "Breeder" reactor business. They decided that they were gonna build one across the river from my family's farm. It was initially a $3 BILLION project. Well, they excavated, they built this, that, & the other over there, it was a truly BIG-TIME project. Then came the late Seventies/early Eighties, the economy slowed down, & they took a long, hard look at the Phipps Bend reactor. Lotsa DARK stories-Some said it was a fundamentally FLAWED design, others said they did some more site preparation, & found that it was gonna sit atop/adjacent to a HUGE natural gas dome.. Others pointed out that they were barely a third of the way done, yet had spent way more than HALF of their budget. Anyhow, the project was cancelled. The workers literally put down their tools & went home. But not everything was so neat & tidy-Both reactor cores were still being built. One, I think, was delivered at great fanfare-And expense. Actually, I think BOTH were eventually delivered-to a dead project.