I'm wondering how this "jives" with the Fort Belvoir SM-1 Nuclear Reactor being the first nuclear power reactor in the U.S. to provide electricity to a commercial power grid? Seems to me both can't be true.
This link shows that the Fort Belvoir SM-1 was the first hooked up to a commercial "grid" in 1957. Maybe the town of Arco wasn't part of a commercial grid.
Arco was the first town powered with nuclear energy. The, then existing, Atomic Energy Commission had a government reservation in Eastern Idaho only a few miles from Arco. This reservation is now called the Idaho National Laboratory. (But the locals still call it "the site" from the AEC Site days.)
The Experimental Breeder Reactor 1 (EBR1) at the AEC Site was exactly that, experimental. The powering of Arco was also only a test. The Arco test was short before the town went back on the main grid. I cannot see that the EBR1 would have been allowed on the grid or that its operators would have wanted that. It might help you to know that Arco has always been a very small town.
http://virtualglobetrotting.com/map/13574/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SM-1
The Experimental Breeder Reactor 1 (EBR1) at the AEC Site was exactly that, experimental. The powering of Arco was also only a test. The Arco test was short before the town went back on the main grid. I cannot see that the EBR1 would have been allowed on the grid or that its operators would have wanted that. It might help you to know that Arco has always been a very small town.