Catawba 1 - Status & History

Comprehensive reactor performance metrics, cycle analysis, and historical outage data.

Reactor Status Timeline

Online NRC data, Mon to Fri ? Actual daily reactor status from NRC reports (Mon to Fri), the current state, and what is coming: the utility's published Scheduled outage plus, for subscribers, NukeWorker's model Projection. Colored by status. How far ahead you can see depends on your plan.
Aug2025SepOctNovDecJan2026FebMarAprMayJunJulAugOnline: Jul 11, 2025 to Apr 3, 2026Coastdown: Apr 4, 2026 to Apr 17, 2026Refueling Outage: Apr 18, 2026 to May 13, 2026Power Ascension: May 14, 2026 to May 16, 2026Online: May 17, 2026 to Jul 11, 2026Today
OnlineCoastdownPower AscensionRefueling Outage
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Composite Operational Excellence Score (0-100) — average percentile rank across 7 dimensions in three sub-scores: Reliability (capacity factor, forced outage days, B2B avg streak), Efficiency (fuel utilization, refuel duration), and Discipline (startup duration, scram count). 5-year window. Higher = more operationally excellent. Click to see the full breakdown.
72
Excellence
#21 of 93
Top Quartile
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Days of continuous operation since the last outage ended. Clean run (no forced outages since last refueling).
59
Current Run
days ✔
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Longest recorded period of continuous operation between outages (2017-05-22 to 2018-11-17).
544
Record Run
days
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Breaker-to-Breaker runs — continuous operation exceeding the cycle-adjusted threshold (457 days for this 18-month cycle unit) with no trips to 0% power.
10
B2B Runs
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Lifetime capacity factor: average power level across all recorded days (100% = always at full power).
92%
Capacity Factor
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Net electricity actually generated over the most recent 12 months reported by the U.S. EIA (Form EIA-923), summed across every unit at this plant. Authoritative actuals, not an estimate.
18.66 TWh
Net Generation
EIA-923 · 12 mo to 2026-04 · plant total
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Total number of scheduled refueling outages detected in the historical data.
19
Outages
since 1999
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Average time from first power generation (>0%) to sustained full power (≥95% for 2+ days) across the last 3 scheduled outages. Click to compare against the fleet on the Operator Efficiency Leaderboard.
2.7
Avg Startup
days (last 3)
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Average fuel utilization — percent of the designed fuel cycle that this unit consumes before refueling, derived from the historical burn-down trajectory. Higher = more efficient operator (refuels with less margin remaining; closer to coastdown). Computed as 100% minus the unit's average refuel-point fuel %, using the last 3 years where available, otherwise lifetime average. Click to compare against the fleet on the Operator Efficiency Leaderboard.
96.0%
Fuel Utilization
3yr avg
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NukeWorker's Operational Excellence Score is a composite 0–100 ranking of every active US nuclear unit across 7 publicly observable performance metrics, grouped into three sub-scores:
Reliability — capacity factor, forced outage days, B2B avg streak
Efficiency — fuel utilization, refuel duration
Discipline — startup duration, scram count
Each unit's metric is converted to a percentile across the active fleet. Sub-score = average of its components; composite = average of the three sub-scores. Use the time-window toggle below to switch between 3yr / 5yr / lifetime.
Time window — change how far back we look
NukeWorker's
Operational
Excellence Score
72/100
Top Quartile · #21/93
5-year window

Catawba 1 ranks #21 of 93 active US units on NukeWorker's Operational Excellence Score over the 5-year window. Strongest area: Scrams (5-year) (90th percentile). Weakest: B2B Avg Streak (24th percentile).

Reliability
55
Capacity factor + Forced outages + B2B streaks
Efficiency
70
Fuel utilization + Refuel duration
Discipline
90
Startup duration + Scram count
Cohort Rankings apples-to-apples comparison within each peer group
Reactor type: #11 of 61 PWR
Containment: #1 of 10 Ice Condenser
Cycle length: #8 of 53 18-month cycle
Fleet rank above (21 of 93) compares all active US units; cohort ranks compare only against units sharing this property.
Per-dimension breakdown (7 metrics)
Capacity Factor 61th
92.8% (higher better, Reliability)
Forced Outage Days/yr 80th
1.4d (lower better, Reliability)
B2B Avg Streak 24th
504d (higher better, Reliability)
Refuel Duration 70th
27d (lower better, Efficiency)
Scrams (5-year) 90th
0.0/yr (lower better, Discipline)

Each dimension's percentile is computed across the active US fleet (93 units with sufficient history). Sub-score = average of its component percentiles. Composite = average of the three sub-scores. 5-year window. View full leaderboard →

Methodology

NukeWorker's Operational Excellence Score is a composite ranking that combines 7 publicly observable performance metrics into a single 0-100 number per US nuclear unit.

How it's computed: Each unit's raw value is converted to a percentile (0-100) within the 93 active US units that have at least 2 completed refueling cycles. The 7 percentiles are averaged into 3 sub-scores (Reliability, Efficiency, Discipline), and those are averaged into the final composite.

Active window — 5-year:

  • Reliability — Capacity factor (5yr), forced outage days/yr (5yr), B2B avg streak (lifetime)
  • Efficiency — in-cycle fuel utilization (3yr), median refuel duration (5yr)
  • Discipline — robust mean startup duration, scrams/yr (5yr, annualised)

Cohort rankings: alongside the fleet rank, each unit gets ranked within its reactor type (PWR/BWR), containment design (Ice Condenser, Mark I, etc.), and cycle length (12/18/24-month). Useful for apples-to-apples comparisons.

What's excluded: subjective community ratings, confidential INPO ratings, financial metrics. We only use publicly available NRC + cycle data.

Why three windows? 5yr (default) is the industry standard. 3yr captures recent operational changes and post-pandemic recovery. Lifetime gives newer units a fair comparison and reveals long-term consistency.

Edge cases: units with fewer than 2 cycles (e.g., Vogtle 4) show "Provisional". Decommissioned units excluded.

Refresh cadence: recomputed daily. Each window cached separately.

A data-derived proxy for operational performance; not affiliated with INPO. INPO ratings are confidential and qualitative — ours is public and quantitative.

5-yr trend: 2021: 61/100 (#33/93)2022: 63/100 (#27/92)2023: 54/100 (#36/92)2024: 54/100 (#35/93)2025: 73/100 (#19/93)2026: 72/100 (#21/93) Stable vs 2025
Compare Catawba 1 head-to-head with up to 3 other units. Compare now
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Duration of each outage in days, shown chronologically. Green bars are scheduled refueling outages, red bars are forced/unscheduled. The orange dashed line marks the average duration. Extended outages (>180 days) and D&D periods are excluded.

Outage Duration Trend

Catawba 1 has 31 outages plotted here, averaging 23 days each. The most recent, in Apr 2026, was a scheduled refueling outage lasting 26 days.
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Days between consecutive scheduled refueling outage starts, showing operating cycle regularity. The purple dashed line marks the average cycle length. Most U.S. reactors operate on 18-month (547 day) or 24-month (730 day) cycles.

Cycle Length History

Between refueling outages, Catawba 1 runs about 548 days, or roughly 18 months, per cycle. That average comes from 18 completed cycles, the most recent lasting 564 days.
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Time in days from first power generation (>0%) to sustained full power (≥95% for 2+ consecutive days) after each scheduled refueling outage. The dashed line marks the average. Includes startup testing holds and power dips.

Startup Duration Trend

After a refueling outage, Catawba 1 takes about 3 days to climb from first power back to full power. That average is drawn from 19 startups on record, and the most recent took 3 days.
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Estimated fuel remaining in the current cycle, expressed as a percentage of the unit's typical cycle. Starts at 100% when the unit returns to power post-refuel and drops as full-power-days are burned. Days at reduced power burn fuel proportionally — so a unit with significant downtime (high burn deficit) drops slower and ends up with MORE fuel left than its calendar position would suggest. Coastdown threshold around 15%. Toggle to overlay past cycles on a normalized "days into cycle" axis to see how aggressively this unit historically burns down before refuel.

Fuel Burn Down Cycle since May 14, 2026

89.3% remaining 57 / 530 days 0.4 FPD margin
Catawba 1 is 57 days into its current fuel cycle with an estimated 89.3% of its fuel left. This cycle is set up to run about 530 days. Across its last 18 cycles, it has refueled with an average of 5.1% remaining.
Avg refuel: 5.1% Avg refuel (3yr): 4.0% Deepest burn: 0.0% (2017-05 → 2018-11) Most margin: 10.9% (2003-12 → 2005-05)
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Monthly capacity factor with outage events overlaid as red bands. Green bars show average power level per month. Toggle to Daily view for raw daily data.

Power History

Over its operating life, Catawba 1 has run at about 92% of its rated capacity. Across the last 12 reported months it averaged 92.4%. On the chart, flat stretches near the top are full-power running and drops to zero are outages.
This table logs every recorded outage for Catawba 1, 31 in all since 1999. Of those, 19 were scheduled refueling outages and 12 were unplanned or forced. The typical outage lasted about 23 days. Where the Scheduled column shows (Model), the date is a NukeWorker projection because the utility had not published one.
Scheduled
2026-04-18 2026-05-13 26 442d 2026-04-18 0d
Unscheduled
2025-01-29 2025-01-31 3 93d - -
Scheduled
2024-10-01 2024-10-28 28 493d 2024-09-27 +4d
Scheduled
2023-04-19 2023-05-27 39 532d 2023-04-22 -3d
Scheduled
2021-10-17 2021-11-03 18 504d 2021-11-20 -34d
Scheduled
2020-05-02 2020-05-31 30 77d 2020-05-02 0d
Scram # 54523
2020-02-13 2020-02-15 3 429d - -
Scheduled
2018-11-17 2018-12-11 25 544d 2018-11-17 0d
Scheduled
2017-04-29 2017-05-22 24 500d 2017-04-29 0d
Scheduled
2015-11-21 2015-12-16 26 515d 2015-11-21 0d
Scheduled
2014-05-06 2014-06-24 50 496d 2014-05-03 +3d
Scheduled
2012-11-25 2012-12-26 32 224d 2012-11-24 +1d
Scram # 47805
2012-04-05 2012-04-15 11 111d - -
Unscheduled
2011-12-16 2011-12-16 1 195d - -
Scheduled
2011-04-24 2011-06-04 42 425d 2011-05-07 -13d
Unscheduled
2010-02-18 2010-02-23 6 66d - -
Scheduled
2009-11-07 2009-12-14 38 506d 2009-11-21 -14d
Scheduled
2008-05-04 2008-06-19 47 492d 2008-05-03 +1d
Scheduled
2006-11-11 2006-12-29 49 154d 2006-11-10 +1d
Unscheduled
2006-05-21 2006-06-10 21 350d - -
Scheduled
2005-05-08 2005-06-05 29 153d 2005-05-07 +1d
Unscheduled
2004-12-06 2004-12-06 1 283d - -
Unscheduled
2004-02-22 2004-02-27 6 65d - -
Scheduled
2003-11-08 2003-12-19 42 61d 2003-11-08 0d
Unscheduled
2003-08-29 2003-09-08 11 205d - -
Unscheduled
2003-02-05 2003-02-05 1 264d - -
Scheduled
2002-04-27 2002-05-17 21 464d 2002-04-27 0d
Unscheduled
2001-01-18 2001-01-18 1 59d - -
Scheduled
2000-10-15 2000-11-20 37 244d 2000-10-15 0d
Unscheduled
2000-02-14 2000-02-14 1 267d - -
Scheduled
1999-04-22 1999-05-23 32 - 1999-04-22 0d
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