4. NUCLEAR PLANT

KCP&L owns 47% of Wolf Creek Generating Station (Wolf Creek), its only nuclear generating unit. Wolf Creek is located in Coffey County, Kansas, just northeast of Burlington, Kansas. Wolf Creek's operating license expires in 2045. Wolf Creek is regulated by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), with respect to licensing, operations and safety-related requirements.

Spent Nuclear Fuel and High-Level Radioactive Waste

Under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, the Department of Energy (DOE) is responsible for the permanent disposal of spent nuclear fuel. KCP&L pays the DOE a quarterly fee of one-tenth of a cent for each kWh of net nuclear generation delivered and sold for the future disposal of spent nuclear fuel. These disposal costs are charged to fuel expense. In 2010, the DOE filed a motion with the NRC to withdraw its then pending application to the NRC to construct a national repository for the disposal of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. An NRC board denied the DOE's motion to withdraw its application, and the DOE appealed that decision to the full NRC. In 2011, the NRC issued an evenly split decision on the appeal and also ordered the licensing board to close out its work on the DOE's application by the end of September 2011 due to a lack of funding. These agency actions prompted the states of Washington and South Carolina, and a county in South Carolina, to file a lawsuit in a federal Court of Appeals asking the court to compel the NRC to resume its license review and to issue a decision on the license application. The court has not yet issued a final decision in the case, but in August 2012, the court ordered the parties to report to it, no later than December 14, 2012, on whether Congress by then had provided funding for the NRC to proceed on the license application. Wolf Creek has an on-site storage facility designed to hold all spent fuel generated at the plant through 2025, and believes it will be able to expand on-site storage as needed past 2025. Management cannot predict when, or if, an alternative disposal site will be available to receive Wolf Creek's spent nuclear fuel and will continue to monitor this activity. See Note 11 for a related legal proceeding.

Low-Level Radioactive Waste

Wolf Creek disposes of most of its low-level radioactive waste (Class A waste) at an existing third-party repository in Utah. Management expects that the site located in Utah will remain available to Wolf Creek for disposal of its Class A waste. Wolf Creek has contracted with a waste processor that will process, take title and store in another state most of the remainder of Wolf Creek's low-level radioactive waste (Classes B and C waste, which is higher in radioactivity but much lower in volume). Should on-site waste storage be needed in the future, Wolf Creek has current storage capacity on site for about four years' generation of Classes B and C waste and believes it will be able to expand that storage capacity as needed if it becomes necessary to do so.

Nuclear Decommissioning Trust Fund

The following table summarizes the change in Great Plains Energy's and KCP&L's nuclear decommissioning trust fund.



	September 30 2012			December 31 2011
Decommissioning Trust		(millions)
Beginning balance January 1		$	135.3		$	129.2
Contributions		2.5			3.4
Earned income, net of fees		2.0			4.8
Net realized gains		0.9			0.3
Net unrealized gains (losses)		11.4			(2.4		)
Ending balance		$	152.1		$	135.3

The nuclear decommissioning trust is reported at fair value on the balance sheets and is invested in assets as detailed in the following table.



	September 30 2012													December 31 2011
	Cost Basis		Unrealized Gains			Unrealized Losses				Fair Value			Cost Basis			Unrealized Gains			Unrealized Losses				Fair Value
	(millions)
Equity securities	$	79.5		$	20.9		$	(2.5	)		$	97.9		$	76.5		$	12.3		$	(4.5	)		$	84.3
Debt securities	45.9			5.2			—				51.1			44.2			4.5			(0.1		)		48.6
Other	3.1			—			—				3.1			2.4			—			—				2.4
Total	$	128.5		$	26.1		$	(2.5	)		$	152.1		$	123.1		$	16.8		$	(4.6	)		$	135.3

The weighted average maturity of debt securities held by the trust at September 30, 2012, was approximately 7 years. The costs of securities sold are determined on the basis of specific identification. The following table summarizes the realized gains and losses from the sale of securities in the nuclear decommissioning trust fund.



	Three Months Ended September 30						Year to Date September 30
		2012			2011			2012			2011
		(millions)
Realized gains		$	0.5		$	0.2		$	1.2		$	1.0
Realized losses		(0.1		)	—			(0.3		)	(0.7		)