On its website, Exelon (EXC) describes its Clinton Power Station in Illinois as one of the company’s “newest nuclear power plants” — remarkable, considering the plant became operational back in 1987.

Exelon says the facility, which serves Chicago, is capable of generating over 1,000 megawatts (MW), or enough electricity for one million average U.S. homes. But a depressed market for nuclear energy, along with costly post-Fukushima safety upgrades for the entire nuclear sector, have reportedly caused this plant (and others) to bleed funds.

Back in May, according to Bloomberg, Exelon CEO Chris Crane said some of the company’s nuclear generators in Illinois “have to pay customers to take its power about 8% of the time due to a glut of electricity provided by new wind turbine farms.”

Bloomberg also quotes a research note released in July by the energy investment and merchant bank Tudor Pickering Holt and Co., calling Clinton one of the plants most at risk of being shut down. UBS (UBS), meanwhile, projected the facility will lose money through 2016.

Read entire story: http://money.msn.com/now/12-nuclear-plants-on-the-chopping-block

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