I wrote about the history of the Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant in Seabrook, NH, in the August 21, 2025 edition of the Seacoast Scene.
This August is the 35th anniversary of the Seabrook power plant beginning commercial operations, and I was excited to be able to write about it.
The plant was built between 1976 and 1986 but didn’t receive a license to begin commercial operations until 1990. Scott Burnell, Public Affairs Officer at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, told me this was due to a long, two-step process necessary to obtain the license.
Yet, many of the old news articles I read said the delay in licensing was the result of the multiple lawsuits filed against the plant by various environmental groups as well as due to concerns among the community about evacuation plans for the area.
The plant was originally designed to be powered by two reactors, but the delays in licensing and construction eventually bankrupted the owners, Public Service Company of New Hampshire, and they were unable to build the second reactor.
The project simply proved to be too ambitious for the Public Service Company of New Hampshire, which was a small utility company with only seven coal-and-oil burning plants in 1968 when the board decided to add nuclear energy to its business plan.
Atomic power plant construction was all the rage at the time, but the company’s executive vice president, David N. Merrill, was later quoted in the press in 1980 saying that the NRC misled him on the licensing process, stating, “Those silver-tongued people in the Nuclear Regulatory Commission told me the licensing procedure would take 14 months. That was 1972.”
In 1989, the plant’s top executive at the time, Edward Brown, was quoted in the press stating, “Seabrook Station has faced one of the longest, most convoluted licensing processes that any commercial nuclear power plant has ever encountered in this world.”
What the NRC probably didn’t see coming when they promised a quick and easy licensing process was the growing public opposition to atomic energy, which prompted a slew of lawsuits and mass protests.
Construction on the plant started in 1976, and the protests began shortly after. The first protest had only 18 demonstrators, but a year later, around 2,000 protestors showed up, and police made widespread arrests, detaining demonstrators in National Guard armories, where some of them waited weeks for release.
The next year 18,000 protestors showed up, and the demonstrations made national headlines, but even they couldn’t stop the project from going forward. The lawsuits did, though. In 1977 and 1978, the Audubon Society sued, and their lawsuit brought construction to a halt for eight months.
As the delays dragged on, the cost of the project ballooned from $900 million to $3.1 billion, and, at the same time, the state legislature voted against allowing the company the right to charge its customers for some of the construction costs.
The company sought buyers to purchase nearly one-third of its 50 percent interest in the plant, but the new buyers, a conglomerate of Massachusetts utilities, only brought more red tape and public opposition in yet another state.
The lawsuits, bad press, and mass protests continued until finally, in 1990, the NRC approved the plant’s commercial license and allowed it to become fully operational. By the time the plant came online, it had cost a total of $6.5 billion to construct.
Some environmental advocates argue that the national backlash against nuclear power at the time only paved the way for more fossil fuel-powered plants, and, as a result, the Seabrook plant was one of the last nuclear power plants ever built in the United States for decades.
Since then, public opinion on nuclear power seems to have shifted, and 61% of Americans are now in favor of nuclear power, according to a recent Gallup poll.
The reason I decided to write this article is because, although I’m a history writer, I also have an interest in science, particularly atomic science, space travel, quantum mechanics, and such.
I also grew up in Salisbury, so, as a kid, the Seabrook Power Plant was something I was always terrified by but also strangely fascinated with at the same time.
I actually used to be against nuclear power, mostly because I didn’t understand it and because I remember vividly the news reports about the accidents at Chernobyl and Three Mile Island.
I was under the impression that accidents like that were common and could happen at any time, but I have since learned that this is not true and that these types of accidents are actually quite rare.
I was always looking up information about the Seabrook plant, particularly about its history, but all I could ever really find on it was information about the many protests and lawsuits against the plant during its construction.
So when I got this job with the Seacoast Scene, I figured if I can’t find the types of articles I’m looking for about the plant, why don’t I write one?
As much as I desperately wanted to write this article, I never thought it would happen. I first pitched the idea for the article directly to Lindsay Robertson, Senior Communication Strategist at NextEra, last month, before I even mentioned it to my editor, because I was sure the plant was going to shoot it down.
My original idea was to write a history article about the plant and take a media tour of it, which I never thought they would go for, but it was worth a try.
So I wasn’t that surprised when Lindsay emailed me back and said that they didn’t really offer tours for security reasons. Yet, what did surprise me was that she suggested I write an article about the plant anyway, by conducting some one-on-one interviews with the employees, in order to commemorate the 35th anniversary of the plant.
I was shocked because the timing was perfect, but I also never expected that they would let me actually talk to and interview their employees. Most companies keep the press far away from their workers and only communicate with the press through their public relations office.
I actually mentioned this to Lindsay during the interviews, and it turns out I am one of the first journalists they have actually let interview their employees, and it was solely because my interest in the plant seemed genuine and they felt assured that I wasn’t going to try and write a negative article criticizing the plant.
I’m thrilled and honored that the plant let me interview their employees, who are such smart, hard-working people, and I’m also thrilled that my editor let me even do the story.
I worried he might deem it too controversial or even too nerdy or scientific for the newspaper, and it took him a while to get back to me about it, so I was excited when he gave me the go-ahead. It’s so great working for a publication that gives you that kind of support and encouragement.
Below is a list of articles I used to research the history of the plant. If you have any thoughts, questions, or concerns about the story, leave a comment below.
I will also be publishing a transcript of my interview with Emilee Lewis, the chemist at the Seabrook Power Plant, in which she gives a detailed description of how a nuclear power plant actually works.
Sources:
“Chronology of Seabrook: Plans, Protests, Building.” New York Times, 2 Mar. 1990, nytimes.com/1990/03/02/us/chronology-of-seabrook-plans-protests-building.html
“Special NRC Oversight at Seabrook Nuclear Power Plant: Concrete Degradation.” NRC.gov, nrc.gov/reactors/operating/ops-experience/concrete-degradation.html
“Seabrook Starts its first atomic fission reaction.” The Nevada Daily Mail, 14 June. 1989, pg. 7.
Struck, Doug. “Heavy Costs May Crush Troubled Seabrook A-Plant.” The Pittsburgh Press, 30 July. 1980, p. 20.
“Analysts Say Stockholders Should have Seen it Coming.” The Telegraph, 29 Jan. 1988, p.1.
“About 650 Arrested at Nuclear Protest.” Daily Union (Kansas), 6 June. 1989, p.2.
“Seabrook Foes Applaud NRC Probe.” The Telegraph (Nashua), 17 Aug. 1990, p. 3.
“Seabrook License Finally Arrives.” The Telegraph (Nashua), 16 Mar. 1990, p.1.
“Seabrook reactor coming down.” Associated Press, 17 Dec. 2010, seacoastonline.com/story/news/2003/06/19/seabrook-reactor-coming-down/51275438007/