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Toshiba Shares Plummet After Warning of 'Billions' in Losses (cnn.com)
Toshiba's troubles keep piling up. From a report on CNN Money: The Japanese firm's shares plunged 20% on Wednesday, after the company warned it is expecting billions of dollars in losses from its takeover of a U.S. nuclear construction business last year. "We're still figuring out the exact numbers, but it could reach up to several hundred billion yen," CEO Satoshi Tsunakawa told reporters Tuesday. Toshiba's U.S. nuclear-power subsidiary Westinghouse acquired CB&I Stone & Webster late last year, when Toshiba was still struggling to recover from a $1.2 billion accounting scandal. Toshiba's shares dived in the months following that scandal, which led to a major management reshuffle after the Japanese conglomerate admitted it had doctored financial results for years. The company reported a loss of 460 billion yen ($3.9 billion) for 2015.
nuclear plants spend months offline for maintenance and reconditioning, and take months more to fully go online. .
Wow, how clearly wrong. Nuclear plants have the highest capacity factor of any other source, around 90% availability. They only shut down for short periods for refueling and maintenance, and this is scheduled for low electricity demand windows in the spring and fall.
Yes, shale gas has made other sources less profitable and challenging, and renewable market subsidies have exacerbated pricing challenges. But some states are started to realize that nuclear's societal cost is much lower when you consider the high number of well paying jobs and tax revenue it generates.