Thanks to the dedication, hard work and environmental stewardship of Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant Employee Brad Wright, as a winner of The Exelon Environmental Achievement Award Exelon Generation will donate $10,000 to the Maryland Artificial Reef Initiative. This award recognizes outstanding employee projects that help sustain the environment while creating value for the company. Examples include projects that reduce environmental risks, enhance environmental stewardship, increase operational efficiency, utilize innovation or enhance the company's environmental reputation.
"We are proud to work for a company that not only leads the industry in environmental stewardship, but encourages and rewards employees for their efforts," says Calvert Cliffs Site Vice President Mark Flaherty.
"I believe supporting habitat improvements and conservation of renewable natural resources is the best way to ensure our children have the opportunity to enjoy them in the future. Those who enjoy a resource tend to care about it the most. Take a Kid Fishing; they will not forget the experience, you will not forget their smiles. It is a win-win," said Wright, senior engineering analyst for Calvert Cliffs and winner of one of only three $10,000 awards given by Exelon as part of this program.
In 2017 Calvert Cliffs partnered with the Maryland Artificial Reef Initiative (MARI) to install an artificial reef 11.3 miles north of CCNPP in an area known as Plum Point. Plum Point Reef consists of 18 old panels from the baffle wall and 24 concrete berms all that were set for disposal to a landfill (250 tons of scrap material). With help from station and corporate funds the material was loaded onto a barge and placed at the location of the proposed Reef. 95% of the naturally occurring oyster bars in the Bay were flattened or buried in silt by 1984 leaving them unproductive, this reef will help enhance the local oyster populations by providing hard surface for them to attach. In addition to providing hard substrate the reef will provide habitat, cover and food for native species and act as a nursery, for rockfish, barnacles, mussels and the eastern oyster. The Reef will also add recreational value to the community by creating fishing habitat and ecosystem restoration, recreational diving, biodiversity, as well as increasing the carrying capacity of native aquatic organisms. CCNPP plans to donate additional baffle panels for future reef projects.
