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Federal regulators have granted permission for reactors at the Peach Bottom nuclear plant in Pennsylvania to each generate an additional 140 megawatts of electricity.

Exelon applied for a 12.4 percent extended power uprate for units 2 and 3 in the fall of 2012. (Peach Bottom unit 1 was a smaller gas-cooled reactor shut down in 1974). Plans call for improvements to increase each unit's power by 437 megawatts-thermal. A release from the NRC reported that Exelon plans to increase the power at unit 4 during a refueling outage this fall and at unit 3 during its refueling outage a year later.

The reactors near Lancaster, Penn., entered service in 1973 and 1974. Both are General Electric type 4 boiling water reactors with Mark I containment. NRC records indicate they were approved for a 5 percent uprate in the mid-1990s and a 1.62 percent uprate in 2002.