$175M project in Norwalk to transform Route 7-Merritt Parkway interchange may start in 2027
NORWALK — Motorists looking to more easily make connections
between Route
7 and the Merritt
Parkway in Norwalk will
have to wait a bit longer for upgrades in the Connecticut Department of
Transportation's interchange
improvement program to come to fruition.
Neil Patel, principal engineer in the DOT's Major Highways
Unit, anticipated last summer that construction on the $175
million project could begin in 2026. Now, a 2027 start for
construction is more likely as Patel said he expects the project to move from
its current preliminary design phase to the final design phase this summer.
Motorists for years have called for improvements to the interchange involving
the Route 7 connector, Main Avenue and the Merritt Parkway, also known as Route
15.
“We have completed and received federal approval on
the preferred
alternative and that was received in August of last year, 2024,” Patel
said, although DOT is “not starting the construction project for the
interchange job for another few years.”
The plan, Alternative 26, calls for five traffic signals to
regulate the flow of vehicles entering and exiting the highways; four new
bridges; a replacement bridge; and new roadways on Norwalk's Main Avenue and
Creeping Hemlock Drive; and new ramps that make Route 7, the Merritt Parkway
and Main Avenue more accessible to each other, according to DOT's documentation
from 2023.
The final design phase will ideally be completed in 2026,
but could stretch into 2027 given the complexity of the project, Patel said.
“Construction would follow upon design completion and
approval of all permits and funding being in place,” he said. “Tentatively,
that's scheduled to start in 2027.”
The project aims to directly connect Route 7 and the Merritt
Parkway, Patel said. Right now, motorists driving south on the Merritt cannot
exit directly to either the southbound or northbound lanes of Route 7 and
drivers on both sides of Route 7 cannot exit to the northbound lanes of the
Merritt.
The project will also create a space more integrated for
pedestrians, bicyclists and motorists to share the road, Patel said.
“We're going to have pedestrian and bicycle accommodations
on Main (Avenue),” Patel said.
City of Norwalk spokesperson Skylar Eagle said the city is
excited about the DOT interchange project.
"We believe the overall design goals will simplify
traffic movements, allowing a more seamless connection between the Merritt
Parkway and Route 7," Eagle said in an email. "City staff continues
to work with the CTDOT team on improvements to local roads while ensuring a
connection for the Norwalk River Valley Trail."
Advocates were
concerned in 2023 that access to the trail, which will eventually
connect to Danbury, would be cut short.
All of the project's parts and the need to replace bridges
makes it even more complex, Patel said.
“How do we construct it while maintaining the traffic that's
there today?” he said.
The answer is not yet entirely clear — staged construction
will play a role, though it gives “construction crews a much smaller work
area,” Patel said.
But finer details of the construction rollout, such as lane
closures, will develop during the final design phase slated to begin this
summer, Patel said. In that phase, Patel said DOT will also determine how the
landscape and aesthetics will be incorporated into the interchange project.
Patel, who said he grew up in Norwalk, said access between
the two major regional routes is critical.
“I know the importance of mobility in that region,” Patel
said. “Completing the interchange at Route 7 and Route 15 has always been a
focus of many folks. It improves mobility.”
Part of the interchange project will also update “hazardous”
ramps along the routes that will also offer connection to Main Avenue, he said.
DOT will hold a public meeting in the spring to inform the
public more about the interchange project, Patel said.
Could widening I-84 reduce traffic between Waterbury and Danbury?
State Rep. Mitch Bolinsky, a Newtown Republican, is no stranger to traffic on Interstate-84.
He knows the bottlenecks along his route from his
home to the State
Capitol in Hartford, including places where traffic merges in what he deems
a chaotic or unsafe way, leading to frequent accidents. And he knows he's not
alone in the frustration.
"I experience it every day," Bolinsky said.
"But the most important thing is, I hear from the constituents every
day."
And so Bolinsky has proposed a possible solution, submitting
a proposed bill calling for Connecticut's Department of
Transportation to study adding an additional traffic lane along more
than 30 miles of I-84, from Exit 7 in Danbury through Exit 20 in Waterbury,
both eastbound and westbound.
"The economic future of Connecticut is tied to our
transportation system," Bolinsky said. "If we don't have the capacity
to handle the traffic that's flowing through here, it's going to find another
way."
Though the bill, which has been referred to the
legislature's Transportation Committee, isn't likely to pass, Bolinsky said his
primary goal is to "start some conversation" around the issue.
The primary question: Would adding a lane to the highway
actually reduce traffic?
Research has shown that adding lanes does, as one would
expect, relieve
congestion in the short-term. Within a few years, though, studies show
wider highways typically
attract more cars, which lead to increased traffic once again.
This principle, known
as "induced demand," has led some advocates and policymakers to
oppose adding lanes to roads as a way of mitigating traffic. As they see it,
making highways wider costs enormous sums of money without meaningfully
reducing congestion.
"It doesn't work," said Jay Stange, Transport
Hartford coordinator for the Center for Latino Progress. "Inevitably, that
extra capacity draws additional interest in using (the highway) until
eventually that's full and you end up with a 20-lane interstate with 10 lanes
going in either direction."
Stange lamented that I-84 cuts
through Connecticut's cities, and expressed hope the state would move away
from its reliance on highways as part of its near- and long-term development
plans.
Still, fears over induced demand haven't stopped highway
expansion projects nationwide, from Texas to Massachusetts to,
yes, Connecticut.
Bolinsky said in this instance, I-84 in western Connecticut
has been barely upgraded in decades, and it's not sustainable to have just two
lanes in each direction, in contrast with segments east of Waterbury that have
three lanes or more.
"The backups are pretty monumental," he said of
the location.
A spokesperson for the Department of Transportation noted
the state recently completed a $223 million project to upgrade
the interchange between I-84 and Route 8 in Waterbury — an area of
exits and ramps known locally as the mixmaster — and is currently exploring options to reduce congestion
in the Danbury area.
Bolinksy has also proposed other pieces of transit-related
legislation this session, including a bill that would increase
the use of automated traffic enforcement on highways and another that
would bar
GPS devices from detouring drivers toward local roads.
Stange argues the best way to alleviate traffic on highways
is to build a society less reliant on cars, by such measures as improving public
transit options and building more housing near train stations. This would
additionally provide environmental benefits, reducing pollution and greenhouse
gas emissions.
"Everybody is now stuck driving in a car, often by
themselves, everywhere they go," he said. "And if you try and change
the system by adding extra pavement, it's really a zero sum game. It's
impossible."
The Transportation Committee will consider a number of bills
during the current legislative session, including proposals to fully
restore service on the Shore Line East rail line, reform
laws around towing practices and allow high school students to more
easily access public transportation.
High-profile apartment buildings are going up from Fairfield to Shelton in 2025
Brian
Lockhart, Brian
Gioiele, Richard
Chumney, Jarrod Wardwell, Shaniece Holmes-Brown
Apartment buildings are popping up from Fairfield to
Shelton.
Some are mixed-use and feature commercial aspects like
Trumbull Center with its planned retail on the ground floor. Others are purely
residential, such as a new 100-unit building on Lordship Boulevard in
Stratford. Some had smooth sailing through Planning and Zoning boards, while
others faced headwinds including lawsuits before getting stamps of
approval.
Residential projects in Bridgeport-area to watch
Here are some big projects in the Bridgeport area where
construction of apartments is expected to start or continue in 2025. Hover over
each dot to see details.
Here are some big projects in the Bridgeport area where
construction is expected to start or continue in 2025.
Trumbull Center, Trumbull
The Planning
and Zoning Commission unanimously approved plans to build a
50-unit, five-story
mixed-use building in April.
The project was proposed by Peter Dinardo Enterprises, the
owner of Trumbull Center. Two of
the center's current buildings at 900 White Plains Road — one that
housed a former Starbucks and another that was a professional building – were
demolished in December.
The top four floors be residential and the bottom floor of the building feature retail, along with amenities to be used by residents such as a meeting room, gym and lobby.
The Crossings at Fairfield Metro, Fairfield
The first of five apartment buildings planned across from
the Fairfield-Black Rock train station, formerly named Fairfield Metro, is set
to open on Ash Creek Boulevard later this year.
The building, whose construction had stalled through much of
2024, will contain 70 units as part of what will eventually be a much larger
mixed-use development along Ash Creek. Developers plan to build 287 more
apartments and a 118-room hotel while reserving tens of thousands of square
feet for office and retail space.
The project has been decades in the making and broke
ground in 2022.
Langanke’s Landing, Shelton
Construction
is underway on the property that formerly housed Langanke’s
Florist and Greenhouses at 1055 Bridgeport Ave.
Langanke’s Landing, LLC, received approval to remove the
former florist structure and construct a four-story, 48,648-square-foot
structure with 55 apartments and 93 parking spaces.
Development of the property was delayed due a suit filed by
the owners against the city in May. The landowner
won its suit in August allowing construction to commence.
Lordship Boulevard, Stratford
Construction on a new 100-unit
apartment building at 225 Lordship Blvd. is expected to start early
this year after Stratford zoning officials approved plans to increase the
number of units designated as affordable housing.
The four-story building will be constructed next to the old
Stratford Hotel and Conference Center, which was recently converted by
Stamford-based Empire Residential into a 69-unit apartment building.
Empire, which owns the once-dilapidated 4.7-acre site, is
also developing the new building. According to site plans, the building will
include a mix of studios, one-bedroom units and two-bedroom apartments.
Representatives for the developer have said the market-rate
studios would likely be rented at $1,200 to $1,400 a month, while the 36
deed-restricted units would go for around $800 to $900 a month.
The structure will also feature a gym, a parking garage on
the first level and more than 1,000 square feet of commercial space, the plans
show. Construction is expected to take 18 to 24 months to complete.
Cedar Village at the Locks, Shelton
Shelton developer Don Stanziale, known for building
Cedar Village at Carrolls and Riverwalk Place, both along Howe Avenue, said he
expects his project at the end of Shelton’s Canal Street will begin this
year.
Stanziele, owner of Midland Development and Contracting,
said work
on Cedar Village at the Locks at 287 Canal St. is expected to be
completed in in 2026.
The four-story structure – on property known as
the Ascom Hasler site – will have 129 apartments and 1,745 square feet of
retail space.
Stanziale said his plans for the end of Canal Street also
call for him to complete
the Riverwalk and create a seating area so people can look over the
Shelton canal locks and the Housatonic River. The new building would have views
of the river.
River Road, Shelton
The developer B-WIZZ will be constructing a
four-building, 152-unit
complex at 453 River Road.
The project calls for the construction of four separate
four-story buildings — each with 38 “luxury” apartments — and a
5,500-square-foot clubhouse. Each of the apartment buildings are planned to be
11,800 square feet, according to architectural plans.
The commission agreed that the developer should designate 20
of the units, or about 13 percent of the apartments, as affordable. That figure
is less than the recommendations in the city's affordable housing plan for a
development this size, which was approved after the project was proposed.
The vacant property, which was previously partially zoned
commercial but changed to residential as a part of the approval, sits across
the street from Cumberland Farms, Hook Line and Sinker and the entrance to
Jordan Avenue.
Cherry Street Lofts, Bridgeport
A high-profile effort to reclaim historic buildings in a
run-down section of the city, Cherry Street Lofts opened in 2018 and consists
of 158 affordably-priced housing units and a charter school.
A subsequent phase consisting of 133 units was
delayed for several years by legal and financial issues that developer
Gary Flocco last summer said
are finally straightened out. He is now aiming to break ground in the
coming weeks or months.
New Milford approves $449,550 for architect to begin designs for riverfront revitalization project
NEW MILFORD – The town has taken another step toward
creating a blueprint for the revitalization
of New Milford’s riverfront area by voting to hire an architectural
firm for $449,550 to begin designing the project.
The Town Council approved a motion at its Jan. 27 meeting to
authorize Mayor Pete Bass to enter into a contract with WXY Architecture +
Urban Design, a New York-based firm, for design, engineering and planning
services.
The cost has already been set aside by the town of New Milford, said Liba
Fuhrman, chair of the Riverfront Revitalization Committee.
The area covers nearly 60 acres along the Housatonic
River, starting at Young’s
Field and Bridge Street and going up Housatonic Avenue.
Planning began in the fall of 2016 with the goal
of creating
“a dynamic 21st-century riverfront integrated with New Milford’s Town
Center to catalyze community development, economic resiliency, sustainability
and revenue generation while protecting the Housatonic River and its
ecosystem,” according to Furhman.
New Milford received a state Brownfield
Area-Wide Revitalization Grant totaling $170,000 in 2018 to help
pay for the creation of a master plan.
The master plan will refine the project’s conceptual design
and “strengthen the function, sense of place, economic vitality and
transportation infrastructure of the study area, creating a blueprint for
revitalization with a focus on high-quality reuse of town-owned property and
private properties,” Fuhrman said. The plan will also provide specific
recommendations to guide public and private investments and identify economic
opportunities, she said.
The plan will identify key design elements; the design of
the park and other publicly owned space along the riverfront corridor; roadway
designs; cost estimates; and a list of relevant permitting needed, Fuhrman
said.
The town received three proposals, and the
Riverfront Revitalization Committee met Dec. 19 and unanimously voted to
recommend awarding the contract to WXY Architecture + Design, Fuhrman
said.
WXY’s proposal contains “a robust and inclusive community
engagement component based on collaboration,” she said.
Some Town Council members expressed concerns about moving
forward with the contract without public input.
Councilwoman Alexandra Thomas said she has been approached
by a number of people who are concerned that they “haven’t had an opportunity
to say yes or no in referendum with regard to the entire project.”
“Money is being spent each year toward getting all the
information together to create a plan to vote on, but in the meantime, they
haven’t had a chance on whether to move the project forward,” Thomas said.
“There are people who don’t want to do that because we have other things to
take care of first.”
But Fuhrman said the money has been appropriated for the
Riverfront Revitalization Master Plan and must be used for this purpose. She
added the public will have an opportunity to weigh in on the project in the
future.
Millstone explores possibility of smaller-scale nuclear reactors
Thresa Sullivan Barger
At Holtec International’s manufacturing facility in Camden,
N.J., welders work to seal stainless steel canisters that will be used by an
overseas customer to ship spent nuclear fuel.
To ensure the canisters don’t leak, they undergo a series of
three tests, including digital radiology to essentially X-ray the welding job,
a dye check to discover leaks and a helium leak test because helium will pick
up minuscule holes that water or air wouldn’t.
The seven-year-old manufacturing facility produces
components for existing nuclear energy facilities and is the future site for
manufacturing small modular nuclear reactors (SMRs).
SMRs are advanced nuclear reactors that have a power
capacity of up to 300 megawatts per unit, which is about one-third of the
power-generating capacity of traditional nuclear power reactors like the
Millstone III unit in Waterford. Because they are modular, theoretically,
systems and components can be built in a factory, transported and assembled
relatively quickly on location.
Once the kinks are worked out, proponents say, they will be
quicker and cheaper to get up and running than traditional nuclear reactors.
But the first few SMRs in the United States have faced cost overruns and
construction delays.
Last November, NuScale, the first nuclear company to receive
approval for its SMR design from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, terminated
its project with the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems after rising costs
caused local utilities to back out of commitments to buy the energy.
This was after it received millions of dollars from the U.S.
Department of Energy. So while industry leaders predict SMRs will provide a
reliable, clean, financially efficient source of energy once they’ve reached
scale, the costs will be higher in the beginning during the early,
developmental stage.
SMRs at Millstone
Holtec has been working on its SMR design for a decade and
plans to respond to a request for proposals from Dominion Energy, owner of
Millstone Power Station in Waterford, Kelly Trice, president of Holtec
International, said in an interview Sept. 23.
“The goal of our reactor is to be able to fit the entire
plant on 25 acres,” he said.
Holtec built its SMR design and manufacturing facility along
the Delaware River, so the company can ship its SMRs via the river when the
time comes.
Dominion may launch an SMR at its North Anna, Va., facility
in the early to mid-2030s, if it makes business sense, said Tim Eberly,
Dominion spokesman.
“We haven’t committed to building an SMR down here. We’re
exploring it,” he said. “We don’t know if we’re going to build. We need to
learn a lot more.”
Dominion expects to learn about SMRs through its review of
the plans submitted in response to its request for proposals, he said.
If Millstone were to add an SMR to its 526-acre site, said
Susan Adams, Dominion’s state policy director for New England, it wouldn’t be
built for at least 15 years.
“We are hoping that information gathered through this
process will remove some of the risks associated with this new technology and
eventually lead to additional SMRs at other Dominion locations,” Adams wrote in
an email to The Day.
Millstone provides 47% of Connecticut’s electricity and 90%
of its carbon-free electricity.
Changing attitudes on nuclear power
Since 1979, Connecticut had banned adding new sources of
nuclear energy until the U.S. government approved a means for the disposal of
“high-level nuclear waste.” But in 2022, a bill to allow new nuclear power
construction at existing nuclear power generating facilities in the state ―
which is just Millstone ― received bipartisan support to meet the state’s plan
to reach zero carbon emissions from power plants by 2040.
Gov. Ned Lamont signed House Bill 5202 in May 2022. While
other countries move their spent nuclear energy to a storage location, all
nuclear facilities in the United States store nuclear waste on-site.
Connecticut’s legislators reflect the changing attitude
toward nuclear energy among Americans and climate activists. Consider: The Pew
Research Center reports 56% of U.S. adults support expanding nuclear power to
generate electricity, according to a May survey. The previous year’s survey was
statistically similar.
Author, environmentalist and activist Bill McKibben,
co-founder of the climate change movement 350.org, has said nuclear power is
essential if the world is going to lessen its dependence on fossil fuels like
coal, oil and natural gas.
Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg argued Germany’s
decision to shut down its nuclear plants was a mistake because nuclear was
preferable to coal. And James Hansen, a former NASA climate scientist and one
of the first to warn about climate change, has been advocating for nuclear
energy as an alternative to fossil fuels for years.
Several national and international environmental groups
still object to nuclear energy. “The Sierra Club is opposed to new nuclear,
including SMR,” said Samantha Dynowski, state director of the Sierra Club’s
Connecticut chapter.
“In order to adjust to climate change, we need to lean 100%
into renewables, like wind and solar with battery storage. … Nuclear is so
costly. It’s multiple times the cost of wind and solar to build,” she said. “In
the amount of time it would take to have new nuclear, we could cover the state
with solar at a time when we’re trying to eliminate emissions quickly.”
No SMRs yet in U.S.
The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has been funding
research into SMRs since 2000. There are no SMRs in operation in the United
States. The first SMR began commercial operation in late 2019 at Russia’s
Akademik Lomonosov, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. SMRs
also operate in China and India.
While the largest SMR could produce 300 MW of energy, the
two in Russia produce 35 MWs. There are SMRs in the licensing stage or under
construction in Argentina, Canada, China, Russia, South Korea and the United
States.
“More than 80 commercial SMR designs being developed around
the world target varied outputs and different applications, such as
electricity, hybrid energy systems, heating, water desalinization and steam for
industrial applications. Though SMRs have lower upfront capital cost per unit,
their economic competitiveness is still to be proven in practice once they are
deployed,” according to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
Some SMRs, especially those using coolants other than water,
may generate new forms of radioactive waste, the IAEA reported. Therefore,
countries planning to deploy SMRs must plan to manage these new types of waste.
Holtec, a privately held company with more than 200 patents,
has been designing its SMR for the past decade with input from the NRC along
the way.
“Our goal is to have a plant be able to start construction
and be on the grid in 36 months,” Trice said. “Our first one will probably be
slower. We design them all the same and manufacture them in a factory in a
novel concept called an assembly line.”
Traditional, large nuclear plants take more than a decade to
get up and running before they start generating income. The company plans to
have its first SMR approved, assembled and operational by 2030 at the site of a
nuclear power plant in Palisades, Mich.
The customers who buy the SMRs will prepare the site and lay
the concrete and the SMR will be shipped in pieces “to the field with as little
work on-site as possible. Even the walls of the structure would come from the
factory,” Thrice said.
The modular method of construction will keep building costs
down in order to keep the cost for power output lower than with traditional,
full-size reactors, said proponents such as Katie Austgen, project manager for
new nuclear with the Nuclear Energy Institute.
“Advanced nuclear reactors are small enough that they can be
part of integrated energy systems, for example, where their waste heat can be
used to meet local heating requirements,” she said.
SMRs have had a rocky start in the U.S. In NuScale’s case,
the company initially estimated that it would charge $58 per megawatt, but when
it raised its target price to $89 per megawatt, the community-owned utility
companies in the western U.S. decided against subscribing to purchase energy.
And yet, a Bank of America Global Research report from May
2023 concluded that when analyzing the life of nuclear power stations and their
outputs, “industry research suggests that, after accounting for efficiency,
storage needs, the cost of transmission, and other costs, nuclear power plants
are one of the least expensive sources of energy.”
Safety measures
SMRs are intended to be simpler so that fewer people are
needed to operate them, Trice said. SMR manufacturers have studied what went
wrong with the world’s three major nuclear accidents to learn from them,
Austgen said.
“The goal is a 100% passive safety system. No human operator
has to do anything in the event of an accident for the plant to be able to make
itself safe. If that’s the case, you would be able to operate with far fewer
people,” Thrice said.
The system would rely on natural properties such as gravity
so there would be no need for human intervention, he said.
“For instance, the main plant loop is a closed water cycle,
and it’s designed for natural circulation, which means when the reactor shuts
down, it can shut itself down. It still gives off heat, and that heat needs to
be discharged, and so essentially what would happen is the water would
circulate between the steam generator and the reactor in perpetuity until the
plant no longer gave off sufficient heat to matter,” he said.
One of the selling features of SMRs is that they do not need
to be located next to a body of water to supply water for cooling the reactor.
They could be placed in the middle of the desert, Trice said. Holtec is
designing its SMR to be either air-cooled, water-cooled or a combination of
both.
“In our case, what we’re proposing, the cooling tower sucks
water in and discharges water out. Our thesis is you can use air cooling. Water
inside the plant gets hot when it’s in the reactor; it turns the turbine and
makes steam. After the steam is done, it’s still got some hot residue that has
to be dealt with. You can ‘reject’ that heat to the air,” he said. ‘Rejecting’
is the term used for getting rid of heat.
It works like a convection oven, with fans pushing air
through the pipes to cool them, he said. It’s like what happens to the water
when someone takes a shower. The water comes out of the faucet warm and cools
as it hits the body, and as the water cools, it gives off steam, he said.
Nuclear industry leaders are well aware of public concern
about safety, given the accidents at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania in 1979,
at Chernobyl in Ukraine in 1986 and at Fukushima in Japan in 2011.
Despite public perception, nuclear energy is safer than
coal, oil, natural gas, wind and solar when comparing deaths from
energy-related accidents per unit of electricity, according to the World
Nuclear Association. Our World in Data, a project of the nonprofit Global
Change Data Lab, reports that when factoring deaths from accidents and air
pollution, solar is the only form of energy safer than nuclear, per terawatt
hour of electricity production.
Holtec, like others designing SMRs, is “designing a plant
that doesn’t need an offsite response beyond the plant boundary. So essentially
the plant is on about 25 acres or so,” he said. “Today if you were to look at
nuclear plants, they have emergency exclusion zones, which means if there’s
some sort of safety incident in the plant, the towns have to shelter and have
drills and things like that. In our case, we’re designing a plant where that
won’t be necessary. So, in theory, you could put it into the center of a
population and be just fine because the accident scenarios postulated would not
create a safety problem” for the nearby community.
The bottom line
The state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection
(DEEP) studied SMRs and advanced nuclear reactors and, in a report released in
April, it concluded that cost remains the single largest barrier to deployment
of SMRs in New England.
“Cost risk poses a particularly high barrier to deployment
for first-of-a-kind and subsequent early projects in a deregulated regional
electric market like Connecticut and New England. State policy tools to
mitigate and equitably distribute this risk are more limited in such markets.
Studies from the federal DOE and others suggest that advanced nuclear
technologies may become cost-competitive in the future. However, this cost
competitiveness has not yet been demonstrated and is unlikely to be realized until
these technologies move beyond initial projects and are deployed at scale,” the
report said.
The authors wrote, “Advanced reactors and their associated
fuel cycles can reduce carbon emissions, improve economic competitiveness,
reduce environmental impacts, and enhance nuclear safety and proliferation
resistance.” They have the potential to help meet decarbonization mandates and,
because they operate 24/7/365, they can help meet winter reliability needs, the
report continued.
DEEP officials are staying abreast of SMRs’ progress.
"Connecticut is always looking at diverse energy
options to meet our climate and energy goals,” said DEEP Commissioner Katie
Dykes. “Small modular reactor technology continues to make progress. DEEP is
monitoring deployments in other regions, and exploring local feasibility
studies and investment strategies that can help make SMRs an option for New
England in the future.”