CARLTON, Wis. â?? Kewaunee Power Station nuclear plant will close in six months because a buyer could not be found, a spokesman for the owner Dominion Resources said Monday.

The cost of electricity was a factor in the decision to close the plant here, which employs 650 people. The site eventually will be returned to its natural state although that is expected to take decades.

The one-reactor, 568-megawatt plant, on Lake Michigan nine miles 33 miles southeast of Green Bay, Wis., recently completed a refueling.

Thomas Farrell II, chairman, president and chief executive of Dominion, said in late April that the company planned to sell the plant. When Dominion bought it in 2005, Farrell said the purchase was intended to be one of several in the Midwest. However, the company based in Richmond, Va., was unsuccessful in acquiring other nuclear plants in the region.

The company also owns nuclear plants in Virginia and New England.

Dominion acquired Kewaunee for $220 million from Wisconsin Public Service Corp. of Green Bay and Alliant Energy of Madison, Wis.

Kewaunee recently received a 20-year renewal of its license from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The plant went online in 1974

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