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Rise Up - Restarts, Uprating, Microreactors to Play Important Roles in Building U.S. Nuclear Capacity

The U.S. intends to triple its nuclear generating capacity by 2050 to meet the expected growth in electricity demand and expand carbon-free power production. In a recently related roadmap to achieving that goal, the outgoing Biden administration said the U.S. aimed to have 35 gigawatts (GW) of new nuclear capacity either in operation or under construction by 2035. It also outlined the key roles that restarting previously shut reactors, uprating some facilities to produce more power and the development of microreactors could play in the years ahead. In today’s RBN blog, we’ll discuss the report’s key findings and recommendations and what they tell us about the future of U.S. nuclear power. 

We’ll start with a quick summary of the country’s complicated history with nuclear power. The U.S. has the world’s largest operating nuclear fleet, with 94 reactors at 54 sites across 28 states, but it’s also among the world’s oldest, as most reactors began operations in the 1970s and ’80s. As our older readers will recall, the country began to shy away from nuclear power after the Three Mile Island accident near Middletown, PA, in March 1979, when the plant’s Unit 2 reactor partially melted down. It was the most serious accident in the U.S. involving a commercial nuclear power plant.

In recent years, however, there’s been renewed interest in nuclear power, largely due to the massive growth of data centers — which we detailed in Storm Front and Just Can’t Get Enough — along with efforts to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. While there is still a lot of hesitancy, the topic of nuclear power is a rare one on which many Republicans and Democrats generally agree. (While the Biden administration unveiled the U.S. initiatives, the incoming Trump administration has also indicated support for expanded nuclear power, although Trump has expressed concerns about cost overruns and the challenges associated with building new plants.) The new report, Safety and Responsibility Expanding U.S. Nuclear Energy: Deployment Targets and a Framework for Action, addressed a number of key topics, including how state, local and federal leaders are embarking on restarting shut nuclear reactors. Thirteen reactors at 11 sites totaling 11 GW of generating capacity have been shut down since 2013 for economic reasons, and the report said a number of these reactors could be restarted, a much simpler process than building a new power plant.

As we discussed in Coming Back to Life, the 800-MW reactor in Palisades, MI, is going through a review before its planned restart, which could provide electricity for 800,000 homes. While other nuclear reactors have fired back up after shutting down, Palisades would be the first to restart after the decommissioning process had begun. The effort was boosted by a $1.52 billion loan guarantee from the Department of Energy (DOE) to the plant’s owner, Holtec. The plan is still to restart Palisades in 2025, and the NRC held a public hearing in Benton Harbor, MI, in November to discuss work at the site. 

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