Difference between revisions of "Springfield Nuclear Power Plant"

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The Springfield Nuclear Power Plant is a nuclear power plant owned by Mr. Burns and the main source of power in Springfield.

Profile

The plant, the core of which is a Fissionator 1952 Slow-Fission Reactor, is poor and badly maintained, largely due to owner Montgomery Burns' miserliness, especially considering having over 342 violations and bringing the plant up to code would cost $56 million. The plant itself has come close to a meltdown several times. Its safety record is appalling, with various episodes showing luminous rats in the bowels of the building, pipes and drums leaking radioactive waste, the disposal of waste in a children's playground, plutonium used as a paperweight, cracked cooling towers (fixed in one episode using a piece of chewing gum), skeletons in the basement, dangerously high Geiger counte readings around the perimeter of the plant, flashing red Alert signs being ignored by employees, the creation of a mutant subspecies of three-eyed fish and even a giant spider. In one episode it was revealed that the Emergency Exits are simply painted on. In the opening credits a bar of some radioactive substance is trapped in Homer's overalls and later disposed of in the street.

Homer has showed some prowess, averting nuclear disasters three times in the episodes Homer Defined and King-Size Homer.

Real Life

The design and folly of Springfield Nuclear Power Plant is often rumoured to be based on the real life Trojan Nuclear Power Plant near Matt Groening's home town of Portland, Oregon, or the Hanford Site in southeastern Washington. However, Antonia Coffman, Groening's publicist, has said that the Springfield plant's design is generic and that "the Springfield Nuclear Power plant was not based on the Trojan Plant or any other power plant in the country."^[1] Trojan Nuclear Power Plant opened in 1976 and was infamous for its poor construction and maintenance, resulting in steam generator leaks which ultimately caused the plant to close in 1993 (although other plants replaced theirs). The cooling tower of the Trojan nuclear power plant was finally demolished on May 21, 2006.

Production details

• A cawing crow is heard in nearly every establishing shot of the power plant; this is parodied in "Kiss Kiss, Bang Bangalore", in which a cow can be heard mooing during an outside shot of the India based power plant.

• The SNPP maintains a map of the United States indicating the status of all of the various nuclear facilities. Homer's job includes replacing most of the burnt out lightbulbs on the map.

• The wall that Homer faces in his work station changes between episodes. In some episodes the wall is a window showing reactor piping; in others it is a map of nuclear sites around the country, a solid wall, or a wall with a plaque saying "Don't forget: you're here forever" that has been rearranged by Homer to say "Do it for her" with pictures of Maggie.

• The plant's condition has actually deteriorated over the last few years. In one early episode, Smithers estimates that it would cost $56 million to bring the plant up to code, while in a later episode the new German owners of the plant discover that the cost has soared to $100 million.

• According to commentary on a Simpsons' DVD, it's stated that there is an actual Homer Simpson working in a nuclear power plant. It is not sure if this is true since there have been no other sources stating this.

• There is a real nuclear facility near Preston, United Kingdom called Springfields nuclear fuel production facility.

• An all-ages music venue in Augusta, Georgia bears the name "Sector 7G."

• In The Simpsons Hit & Run video game, you can press the 'Vent' button on a reactor, causing radioactive emissions, even though the button says 'Do Not Press!'.

• The unofficial Simpsons Archive website http://www.snpp.com is named after the power plant.

The Future

The episodes "Future-Drama" and "Lisa's Wedding" reveal that the plant is going to eventually upgrade the number of cooling towers (and possibly reactors) from two to at least five, perhaps as a response to the future growth of Springfield or its energy demand.

In Lisa's Wedding, set a decade in the future, we also discover that Lenny and Carl have been promoted to the executive board while Milhouse Van Houten has become a supervisor. The plant is operated mainly by robots but Homer still retains his familiar position at Sector 7G.