REstart palisades

the Palisades nuclear plant restart - 1st in U.S. history!

In May 2022, Michigan’s Palisades nuclear plant was shut down after 51 years of operation. The 800 MW facility generated 5% of the state’s electricity and 8% of its clean electricity, employing 600 workers. However, after the 15-year power purchase agreement with Consumers Energy ended, the plant’s owner, Entergy, decided to shut down the plant prematurely. The license of the plant was transferred to Holtec International company for decommissioning in June of 2022.

But when the Civil Nuclear Credit Program in the Inflation Reduction Act passed in August 2022, along with strong support from federal, state, and community partners, Holtec applied to the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Loan Programs Office (LPO) for federal loan funding to repower Palisades in early 2023.

The DOE denied Holtec’s first application but Holtec reapplied, after DOE’s second cycle of funds expanded to include plants, like Palisades, that had recently ceased operations.

In September 2023, Holtec secured a long-term power purchase agreement (PPA) with Wolverine Power Cooperative, an NGO rural power provider. In October 2023, Holtec firmly initiated the process with the NRC in seeking federal reauthorization of power operations at Palisades.

Holtec’s second attempt was supported by the bipartisan group of Michigan’s Congressional delegation, who signed a letter supporting the government loans. “The repowering of Palisades represents a critical step in addressing energy shortages, supporting the fight to lower carbon emissions, and promoting economic growth,” they wrote in December of 2023.

In March of 2024, Holtec received a conditional commitment of a loan guarantee of up to $1.52 billion from the Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office (LPO) to finance the restoration and return of service of the 800-MWe plant.

In recognition of this decision, Secretary of Energy, Granholm announced the Biden Administration’s support for the restart on Twitter.

On April 17th, 2024, the NRC held its first meeting to discuss the plans for the possible Palisades restart.

On July 11th, 2024, the NRC held an open comment-gathering session for the draft environmental assessment evaluating the possible environmental impacts of restarting the plant.

To follow the process and see past work, click here.

WHAT WERE THE EFFECTS OF THE CLOSURE?

The CO2 intensity of Michigan’s electricity generation rose to 502 kgCO2/kWh in May 2022, the month of the Palisades nuclear plant’s closure. Coal generation in-state rose to 3500 GWh, 30% higher than the previous year, and the highest total for May since 2017.

This led to an increased CO2 intensity of 8% over the 2015-2019 average for the month of May, reversing a trend of declining emissions which continued across the remainder of the upper midwest (Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and Wisconsin) and the U.S., where CO2 intensity was down 20% and 18%, respectively. The average YoY decline in the rate of emissions from the last decade average has since slowed to 15% in Michigan, compared to 20% in the U.S. and 25% in the upper midwest.

Other factors which contributed to the spike in emissions in Michigan include a scheduled outage at Donald Cook nuclear plant and an increased demand for electricity exports to neighboring states.