According to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, there are "significant performance issues" at OPPD's Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant. Although everyone maintains the plant is safe, new issues are surfacing, as OPPD works to bring the plant back online.

One of the most obvious obstacles that faced the Fort Calhoun Plant last year was the flood. The plant was already shut down for refueling at the time.

Although no water ever penetrated the crucial buildings housing the nuclear reactors, it did take over the campus. OPPD is still working to make sure the receding water left no other damage.

However, in the early days of the flooding, there was a fire in a breaker room. It brought the NRC in for an inspection and they discovered many performance issues, dating back long before the fire or the flood. In fact, inspectors say if Fort Calhoun hadn't already been offline, it would have been shut down based on what they found. The NRC won't go into detail about what was found.

"We're clearly not satisfied with our performance," said OPPD President, Gary Gates to the Commission. He went before the five-member commission to answer questions Wednesday in Washington D.C.

"I think the number of events and the significance of the events that we've seen at Fort Calhoun station indicate that there are significant performance issues that need to be addressed by the licensee," said Elmo Collins, of the NRC.

One of the commissioners says it appears there is a problem with "safety culture" within OPPD. "One would think that's the hardest to fix, and really the hardest to assess as you look long term," said Commissioner William Magwood.

Gates says the district's performance going downhill was so slow and subtle, it's hard to pin-point what happened. "They have operated at a high level of performance, we lost our edge."

Gates spoke to Channel Six News over the phone, after the meeting. "There's not a regret in the sense that, we always wish we could handle things better, when you don't perform at an excellent level, so from that position you do wish you'd have done it better, I think the focus for us right now is the future."

The regional public affairs spokesman for the NRC says OPPD is still evaluating the breadth of the performance problems, and could be subject to more oversight from the NRC. He also says Fort Calhoun will not be able to restart until that's complete, and at this time, there's no time table for when that will happen.