Palisades nuclear plant fuel loading marks
The Palisades plant in Michigan began loading fuel assemblies in August 2024, becoming the first U.S. Commercial reactor to restart after entering decommissioning. This milestone establishes a federal template for environmental reviews and financing now being applied to two other shuttered plants.
Workers began loading 204 fuel assemblies into the Palisades reactor vessel on Aug. 30, 2024. The plant in Covert Township, Michigan, had been shut down since 2022, making this the first time a commercially decommissioned U.S. Reactor has resumed fueling.
This event is not an isolated case. It is the leading edge of a template now being applied at two other shuttered plants: Constellation’s Crane Clean Energy Center in Pennsylvania and NextEra Energy’s Duane Arnold Energy Center in Iowa.
Federal environmental review template enables restarts across three plants
Each restart is running through the same two pieces of federal machinery. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) built a two-stage environmental review process for Palisades. That template is now being reused.
Leah Hare, a PNNL Earth scientist, explained they had to look at it as two different stages. The review examined impacts from preparations for resuming power and impacts from operations for the remainder of the license term. Her review examined Lake Michigan water withdrawals, decades of groundwater data, and cultural and public-health concerns, completing the assessment in under a year.
Daniel Barnhurst, an NRC senior environmental scientist, said their work with PNNL on Palisades established a baseline for environmental reviews on other proposed restart projects. PNNL is now running comparable reviews for Crane and Duane Arnold. Formal National Environmental Policy Act timelines were opened by separate Federal Register notices in early 2026.
| Plant | Draft Assessment Issued | Finding |
|---|---|---|
| Crane Clean Energy Center | June 9, 2026 | No significant environmental impacts |
| Duane Arnold Energy Center | Aug. 3, 2026 | No significant environmental impacts |
Cyler Conrad, a PNNL Earth scientist and environmental assessment team lead, noted that working with the NRC allowed them to leverage experience from previous reviews to improve efficiency.
DOE loan program evolution underpins financing for all three restarts
Financing for all three plants traces to a single DOE lending office. It was rebranded in October 2025 as the Energy Dominance Financing (EDF) Program. This office expanded its authority and narrowed its portfolio to favor nuclear and natural gas projects.
Palisades’ loan guarantee, worth up to $1.52 billion, closed in September 2024 under the Biden administration. By September 2025, the DOE had disbursed six tranches totaling $491 million. Energy Secretary Chris Wright announced the sixth tranche of $155.9 million as evidence of what he called the next American nuclear renaissance.
In October 2025, Wright rebranded the office as the EDF Program. He used new authority to raise its lending cap to $250 billion through 2028. Wright reportedly signaled the office would keep funding legacy applications that fit current priorities, stating "not all of them were nonsense."
A January 2026 DOE release showed the EDF Program restructured or eliminated more than $83 billion of the roughly $104 billion in loan obligations it inherited. It cut nearly $9.5 billion in wind and solar loans while redirecting funds toward natural gas and nuclear projects. Palisades’ loan survived that review.
Crane’s $1 billion loan closed in November 2025. Duane Arnold’s loan of up to $1.9 billion closed on Sept. 8, 2026. Both were written after the rebrand under the EDF name. All three projects trace back to the same lending desk.
Palisades leads restarts; Crane and Duane Arnold lag behind
While Palisades is actively loading fuel, the other two plants are on slower paths. Palisades is furthest along. Restart work there included steam generator tube reinforcement, control rod drive mechanism nozzle replacement, primary system passivation, and installation of a new fuel handling machine.
Crane trails by roughly a year. Constellation pointed to 2027 as its restart target. This followed NRC approval of Crane’s fuel license amendment and a FERC clearance for transferring capacity interconnection rights.
Duane Arnold is furthest out. It is targeted for restart no later than the first quarter of 2029. The Iowa Utilities Commission issued a construction and operation certificate in June 2026, but substantial inspection and engineering work remains.
Holtec International Chairman and CEO Dr. Kris Singh called the Palisades restart a reflection of "what can be accomplished when government and private industry work together." Palisades is the only one of the three actually loading fuel. The harder test-sustained commercial operation after a permanent shutdown-hasn’t been done anywhere in the country.
