The Power Plant That Never Opened

Search “Satsop” and open the page called “The power plant that never opened.” Read the whole page, then answer each question.

1. 1.From which highway can you see the two cooling towers?

   🔎 The opening paragraph.

2. 2.How much electricity did this nuclear plant ever actually make?

   🔎 The opening paragraph / “A second life.”

3. 3.What was the name of the group of public utilities that set out to build the plants?

   🔎 “A bet on the future.”

4. 4.How many nuclear plants did they try to build at once, and what were the two at Satsop called?

   🔎 “A bet on the future.”

5. 5.Planners thought the Northwest would need more power. What did people actually do instead?

   🔎 The “The demand never came” card.

6. 6.When construction stopped in the early 1980s, about how finished was WNP-3?

   🔎 The “The money ran out” card.

7. 7.What is the site used for today?

   🔎 “A second life.”

Challenge · Grades 7–12

1. 8.Two things went wrong at once — a cost problem and a need problem. Explain how they together doomed the plants.

   🔎 The cards under “Then the math fell apart.”

2. 9.What happened in 1983, and why does the page call it historically important?

   🔎 The “The money ran out” card.

3. 10.The page ends with a question worth “chewing on.” What planning question does the Satsop story leave us with?

   🔎 The last paragraph of “A second life.”