VERNON, Vt. – Entergy Nuclear bought the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant Wednesday, closing a deal that regulators endorsed but critics said is bad for ratepayers throughout New England.

The $180 million deal was sealed with the electronic transfer of funds and the filing of a deed at the opening of business Wednesday.

“I am very pleased to put our facilities in the capable hands of Entergy,” said Robert Young, chairman of Vermont Yankee.

Activists opposed to the sale protested up to the last minute but gave up their quest to block the sale late Tuesday as regulators throughout New England declined to intervene.

Opponents said out-of-state owners were giving up too much by agreeing to let Entergy keep any money left over in a fund that’s to pay for dismantling the plant once it goes out of service.

The Vermont Public Service Board ordered that any money left over in that fund that had been paid by Vermont utilities must be returned to the state’s ratepayers. The board refused to halt the sale of Yankee to the Mississippi-based Entergy Nuclear, saying it already had decided the issues and determined the sale to be in the state’s best interest. Utility regulators in Maine and Massachusetts also turned aside last-minute appeals.

Vermont Yankee is located in southern Vermont along the Connecticut River just west of New Hampshire and north of Massachusetts.

The plant’s New England utility owners, led by Central Vermont Public Service and Green Mountain Power, had been seeking since the late 1990s to sell the now-30-year-old Vernon reactor.