Holtec International is still waiting on more information regarding a federal bailout crucial to efforts to restart a recently-shuttered nuclear power plant in Michigan, a spokesperson said this week.
Holtec, which in September applied for financial assistance from the Department of Energy as part of its civil nuclear credits program, expects to hear from DOE “by the end of the year” about whether the agency would grant the company a bailout for Palisades Nuclear Generating Station, a company spokesperson told RadWaste Monitor via email Thursday.
The Camden, N.J.-based nuclear services company has said that it would use a DOE bailout to solicit potential buyers to restart Palisades, which went offline May 20. Holtec initially acquired the Covert, Mich., plant from Entergy Corp. in June with the intention to decommission the site.
Despite Holtec’s prediction, the company does not have any specific information on when DOE might make a decision on whether to offer Palisades a bailout, the spokesperson said.
A DOE representative declined to comment Thursday on when such an award could be made public. The deadline for submissions for the agency’s first round of bailouts under the roughly $6 billion credits program was Sep. 6.
Even if DOE decides to grant Holtec a bailout for Palisades, that may not mean the plant could switch back on right away. The company said in September that there would still be a number of challenges to bringing Palisades back online, such as staffing, maintenance and financial obligations.
“There are still many hurdles to a restart,” the Holtec spokesperson said Thursday, “but we continue to be ready to work through those should the DOE come back favorable to the credit.”
