Nuclear Eupemism

In doing some research yesterday I did a double-take at a name change for my favorite local nuclear energy facility. A facility run by Ameren Missouri, formerly Ameren UE. This facility, Callaway Nuclear Power Plant #1 was licensed in October 1984 and is a Pressurized Water Reactor (PWR).

All of a sudden I notice that Ameren Missouri is no longer referring to this facility as a nuclear power plant, it is now called Callaway Energy Center. It has such a pleasant ring to it.

And why the change in name? Well, Ameren gives this explanation [emphasis mine]:

Generation of electricity by solar cells and possibly by wind turbines is under consideration for land surrounding the Ameren Missouri nuclear plant south of Fulton. 

Trina Muniz, an Ameren Missouri spokesperson, said Monday the new name is part of a general corporate policy of continuous reassessment of its overall operations and to more accurately reflect the possible expansion of types of energy generated at its various power plants. For this reason, the Callaway Energy Center is the new name for the nuclear plant operated by Ameren Missouri south of Fulton. The plant had been known as the Callaway Nuclear Power Plant. 

“In October of 2010,” Muniz said, “we changed our name from AmerenUE to Ameren Missouri. Since then we have looked at our overall structure. We are committed to expanding our renewable energy power generation. For this reason we are examining now the possibility of adding more solar and wind generation.”

And you wonder why I have such an innate distrust of this company. I suppose those rods in the spent fuel pools are now called "caca".