LACEY - The end of Lacey's nuclear era dawns on Monday.

The last megawatt of electricity will be produced at the aging nuclear reactor at Oyster Creek Generating Station, closing after a half-century run. The plant then shuts down for the final time.

The station has been an icon in Lacey since its construction in the 1960s. On Monday, employees will gather and mark the end with a ceremony.

Oyster Creek has "been certainly an icon here in the community, and throughout the whole county," said Lacey Committeeman and county Freeholder candidate Gary Quinn. “It’s going to be a sad day.”

The plant has also been the source of consternation for local environmentalists. Many voice safety concerns about the impending decommissioning, much as they have about plant operations over the many decades.

Here are five things to know about the plant's shutdown.

1. Why is Oyster Creek Generating Station shutting down?

High costs from aging infrastructure, coupled with lower production rates at more modern plans, have placed financial pressure on Exelon, Oyster Creek's parent company, to close the plant, said Dave Lochbaum, director of the Nuclear Safety Project for the Union of Concerned Scientists.

“Many (nuclear plants) have closed in recent years because of economics," Lochbaum said.

The low price of natural gas, the growing renewable energy sector, and slowing demand for electricity have also placed competitive pressure on nuclear plants, according to a May report from the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Nine nuclear plants of the 60 in operation, or 15 percent of the U.S. nuclear fleet, plan to close by 2025, according to the report. The administration expects more plants to announce closures in the years ahead.

2. Why is Oyster Creek important to Lacey?

The plant is a major financial contributor to the township. Exelon pays more than $2.3 million in property taxes each year on its more than 750 acres of property. Of that, $1.44 million supported the Lacey Township School District last year; $410,300 went to the municipal government for police and other local services; and $445,500 went to the county government, said Veronica Laureigh, Lacey Township's business administrator.

Related:How will Oyster Creek closing affect you?

Hosting Oyster Creek also earns Lacey's municipal government $11.1 million annually in Energy Tax Receipts, income earned by the municipality from hosting the plant and its transmission lines. The receipts support about a third of the municipal government's nearly $31 million annual budget.

The plant helped keep Lacey taxes low for decades and attract residents and businesses, said Kirk Moore, associate editor of WorkBoat Magazine and a former Asbury Park Press reporter who covered the plant for years.

“You always think that communities are looking to score some big industry, some big ratable that’s going to take care of them for all time," said Moore. "It didn’t even last as long as everybody thought it was going to."

In addition to keeping the town's taxes low, the power plant also employs hundreds of people and pays about $68 million per year in salaries, according to Exelon.

Quinn, the committeeman from Lacey, said town and state officials are working to preserve some of the income generated by the plant for as long as Lacey hosts its radioactive waste. Ensuring the safety of residents while the plant is decommissioned is also a priority, he said.

3. Will Lacey taxes rise when the plant closes?

Oyster Creek "is the single most important component of Lacey's tax base," U.S. Rep. Tom MacArthur said in an phone interview in late July.

MacArthur, R-N.J., has pushed Congress to approve bills that would ensure towns like Lacey — ones that, for now, are left storing the waste of their nuclear plants — are compensated for as long as they host the potentially dangerous material. If the income from the Energy Tax Receipts were to suddenly disappear, Lacey would be financially devastated.

Lacey's financial meltdown? What Oyster Creek's closure means to NJ

But the bills that would secure compensation in the future have, so far, stalled before congressional committees.

“This is a concern to that community, and I’m concerned for this whole part of southern Ocean County," MacArthur said.

Lacey is also likely to lose tax revenue as the plant's buildings are taken down and the assessed value of the properly drops as a result.

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To offset future losses, Lacey officials are waiting on state approval for a plan to increase the density of the town's commercial corridors along Route 9 and Lacey Road. That increased building density would enable the town to revitalize portions of its commercial corridors and attract a greater array of businesses to the township, officials here said.

4. Who would buy a shutdown power plant?

Camden-based Holtec International has proposed purchasing Oyster Creek, the property and its nearly $1 billion decommissioning trust fund.

Exelon's original decommissioning plan included letting the plant sit dormant for half a century, letting the radiation at the facility decay to safer levels, and decommissioning the plant in the later half of the 21st century.

But Holtec has proposed decommissioning the plant in just eight years using its own special storage casks to hold the nuclear waste. Holtec is also waiting on federal government approval to build a temporary nuclear waste repository in New Mexico, which would collect waste from plants across the nation.

The company intends to hire Comprehensive Decommissioning International (CDI), a joint venture company of Holtec and engineering and nuclear waste management firm SNC-Lavalin, to help decontaminate and decommission Oyster Creek. Terms of the sale agreement require CDI to offer jobs to current Oyster Creek decommissioning employees.

Oyster Creek to be sold:Holtec to take down plant in 8 years

Janet Tauro, New Jersey board chairwoman of the environmental advocacy group Clean Water Action, worries that Holtec may fall short of promises about the abilities of its casks.

Holtec drew negative press earlier this year when a contractor told the public that a cask of radioactive waste was nearly dropped, and potentially compromised, during loading at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station in California, according to The San Diego Union-Tribute.

“What safeguards are (going to be) put in place to make sure they aren’t cutting corners?" Tauro said.

Lochbaum, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said Holtec appears to have handled the near-mistake properly.

“What they’re doing now is the right thing," he said. “Hopefully the experience at San Onofre will result in better performance at Oyster Creek.”

5. What is the future of Oyster Creek's nuclear waste?

With Holtec's application for its proposed New Mexico storage facility still pending, Oyster Creek's casks of nuclear waste will remain in Lacey for the foreseeable future.

This worries Paul Berkowicz, 67, a retired Lacey science teacher and principal who lives about a mile from the plant.

“They (the casks containing waste) are going to stay dangerously radioactive for 1,000 years," he said. ”There needs to be something done with this radiation because it’s not going away.”

Tauro, of Clean Water Action, also worries that transporting the waste to another facility could subject people to additional hazards. Transporting the casks would turn them into what Tauro calls "mobile Chernobyls," referring to the 1986 nuclear disaster in the former Soviet Union.

“There’s no technology on earth available to handle long-term nuclear waste storage," she said.

The proposed sale between Holtec and Exelon, if approved, will likely not be finalized until late 2019. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission as well as the state Board of Public Utilities would have to approve the sale.

Amanda Oglesby: @OglesbyAPP; 732-557-5701; aoglesby@gannettnj.com