In a world in which nuclear energy is experiencing a resurgence of interest and action, the determined efforts of groups opposed to the relicensing of the twin 1,100 MW PWRs at the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant flies in the face of global wisdom. According to the World Nuclear Association, as of 12/04/25, 33 nations have signed a pledge to triple the amount of nuclear power on the planet by 2050. That’s a lot of good company for any utility wanting to start, restart, and/or relicense a nuclear power plant of any size or design.
Sama Bilbao y León, Director General of World Nuclear Association said: “The path to tripling nuclear capacity is open, but it demands bold, pragmatic, and visionary leadership. Governments must act now, but the industry needs to deliver and work together with civil society. A cleaner more resilient future is within reach with nuclear energy. We need to move with purpose, investing in solutions that work to shape a tomorrow that is defined by reliability, innovation, and climate responsibility.”
“Tripling global nuclear capacity by 2050, can be achieved, provided governments take immediate and sustained action to deliver on their own national targets for nuclear capacity.”
According to the report, global nuclear capacity could reach 1,428 GWe by 2050, exceeding the 1200 GWe target set in the Declaration to Triple Nuclear Energy set in 2023 at in September 2023 COP28 in Dubai.
Nuclear Opposition Groups Face the Realities of the 21st Century
Closer to home, here in the US sustained commitments to nuclear energy are visible with projects under way to bring five nuclear reactors slated for decommissioning back from the dead. While the economic drivers of these projects vary, all of them have targeted being in revenue service as quickly as possible, several will hit that milestone in the next 2-3 years, in order to meet rapidly growing demand from data centers and other sources of electricity demand including the closure of coal fired power plants. These efforts put the relicensing of Diablo Canyon in good company.
Opposition groups and some elected officials in California don’t like what they see. The implications of the restarts of five reactors, and relicensing of two at Diablo Canyon, set the examples for future financial investment decisions in small modular reactors as well as potential new full size reactors.
Wikipedia lists 80 anti-nuclear groups in the U.S. These are direct action, environmental, health, and public interest organizations who oppose nuclear weapons and/or nuclear power. It is a real head scratcher why in the middle of the second decade of the 21st century, opposition groups are working in California, Michigan, and other places to spike reactor restarts and prevent the development of SMRs are stuck in the middle of the last decades of the last century.
The 1980s and 1990s were dark decades for nuclear energy in terms of spanners tossed into the gears of nuclear R&D with the cancellation of the Integral Fast Reactor. Public fears driven by the Three Mile Island accident in March 1979 were energized by an anti-nuclear movie “The China Syndrome,” which was released just 12 days before the accident.
A lot of lessons have been learned since which is why flogging current reactor restarts with the sins of the past make little sense. Even Japan, with the effects of the Fukushima accident still in the news, is restarting closed reactors and plans to complete reactors that were under construction in March 2011. Here in the US the resurgence of nuclear power called for by the World Nuclear Association’s global pledge by 33 nations is well underway.
Five Reactor Restarts Lead the Way
There are the five reactors being restarted in the U.S. Every nuclear utility in the country is watching their progress towards revenue service especially to see what lessons can be learned about the market for large 1,000 MW+ reactors related to the demand for electricity based on the rapid growth of data centers and the closing of coal fired power plants.
Holtec -Work is progressing for the restart of the Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan. According to recent press statements by Holtec, Palisades expect to restart in 2026. When it does, it will be the first nuclear plant in the United States to generate electricity again after being decommissioned.
A long-term power purchase agreement signed between Holtec Palisades Energy and the non-profit Wolverine Power Cooperative is a key economic driver of the restart effort. Under the multi-decade agreement, Wolverine committed to purchasing two-thirds of the power generated from a reopened Palisades, with Wolverine’s partner Hoosier Energy purchasing the balance. It also includes a “contract expansion provision” to include one or two small modular reactors that Holtec plans for the site.
At the time it was taken out of service, the 805 MW Palisades reactor was licensed to operate until 2031. Holtec notified the NRC last year that it intends to apply for a second, or subsequent, license renewal for the plant during the first quarter of 2026. This would extend the plant’s operating period by a further 20 years, to 2051.
In October, the plant received new nuclear fuel – 68 assemblies in total – as part of the restart plans. The plant returned to operational status in August following three years in decommissioning.
As the first mover for reactor restarts in the nation, Holtec has also attracted the most vigorous opposition to its plans. Beyond Nuclear, an anti-nuclear group in Maryland, is opposed to the restart and 20-year license extension of the plant. It alleges that the Palisades plant was poorly maintained and has suffered age related degradation, which it says could impact health, safety, security, property and the environment.
It attacked Holtec’s plans to build two 300 MW PWR type SMRs at the site. A coalition of opposition groups, as described in a 12/06/25 article in the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, label Holtec as being untrustworthy. Beyond Nuclear’s opposition to the restart of Palisades is long standing. In 2022 it called the project a “zombie reactor restart scheme.”
So far Beyond Nuclear’s rhetorical broadsides and lawsuit have not affected Holtec’s progress. The NRC rejecrted the group’s efforts in September 2024 to derail the re-licensing of the reactor.
V.C. Summer – The most dramatic restart announcement of the year is the planned restart of construction of the twin Westinghouse 1,150 MW AP1000s at the V.C. Summer plant in South Carolina. Brookfield, the Canadian private equity firm that holds a majority share of the ownership of Westinghouse, has been selected by South Carolina utility Santee Cooper to finish building and commission the two partially built Westinghouse 1,150 MW AP1000 PWR type nuclear reactors.
Brookfield won the V.C. Summer development contract with the main factor being a commitment to paying down $2.7 billion of an existing $3.6 billion obligation Santee Cooper has on the site and sharing ownership and power. Ratepayers have been stuck with the debt since the project collapsed in 2017. Until now there were no prospects to complete the twin reactors or relieve ratepayers of the debt payments on their utility bills.
Neither reactor is even 50% complete. As a result of the uncertainty associated with the cost to complete the two reactors, Westinghouse and its EPC will be expected to make project management and controls for costs and schedules job number one.
In terms of regulatory status, the NRC terminated the combined licenses for the two reactors in March 2019. Santee Cooper and Brookfield will have to submit new applications for construction and operating licenses under the NRC’s Part 50 process. The documentation from the previous COLs for both reactors should, to some extent, make life easier in terms of relicensing the the two units.
For now Brookfield and Santee Cooper are working out the feasibility issues that are a precursor to a final investment decision and bringing an EPC on board to complete the reactors.
Constellation Energy – The effort to restart TMI-1 in Pennsylvania, now renamed as the Crane Clean Energy Center, is targeting 2027 for revenue service for the 819 MW reactor. A 20-year power purchase agreement (PPAs) with Microsoft is the incentive for the restart. Other IT platforms are following this example of using PPAs to access power from existing nuclear power plants.
Duane Arnold – In March 2025 NextEra Energy filed paperwork with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) indicating its intent to restart the 600 MW Duane Arnold nuclear power plant which is located in Iowa. The reactor was shut down in 2020 after 45 years of operation. The utility has also reportedly communicated with regional grid operators about its plans to be a source of power for new data centers being built in Iowa.
In October 2025 the utility said the plant is targeted to be fully operational by the first quarter of 2029. A key economic driver of the restart is that Google and NextEra Energy sign a 25-year power purcjhase agreement for Duane Arnold’s energy, as well as an agreement to explore deployment of nuclear generation nationwide.
Public Opinion Remains High for Nuclear Energy
According to Bisconti Research, Inc. the American public overall has a favorable view of nuclear energy. Here are some highlights from the 2025 report.
- 72% favor nuclear energy vs. 28% who oppose. The 2025 National Nuclear Energy Public Opinion Survey finds continued highly favorable public opinion of nuclear energy, despite a slight drop since 2024. Four decades ago, the numbers for favor and oppose were about even.
- 29% strongly favor nuclear energy vs. 6% who strongly oppose. Those who strongly favor nuclear energy outnumber those who strongly oppose by 5 to 1.
- Overall, support for nuclear power dropped by 7 points due in part to global geopolitics related to the wars in Ukraine and Gaza. Threats by Russia to use tactical nukes has energized perceptions that conflate civilian nuclear power with nuclear weapons.
- Russia’s military occupation of Ukraine’s six-reactor Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant (ZNPP)—the largest in Europe—has raised widespread alarm about potential damage to the plant that could cause large radioactive releases to the environment.
Chart: Bisconti Research, Inc.
Opinions are not polarized. The myth of polarized public opinion about nuclear energy is a thing of the past. A majority of Americans are fence-sitters on nuclear energy. They somewhat favor or somewhat oppose nuclear energy, with more tending to favor. Among persons with a strong opinion, those in favor outnumber those opposed by 5 to 1.
87% support license renewal, and 64% would build more plants. Opinions about license renewal for “nuclear power plants that continue to meet federal safety standards” and for “definitely building more nuclear power plants” also are favorable in 2025.
Since these questions were first asked in 1998, most of the public has agreed with license renewal of nuclear power plants that meet federal safety standards. In contrast, barely half the public (47% in 1998) supported definitely building more nuclear power plants. Those agreeing that we should definitely build more plants rose in recent years to a high of 72%. While that number fell 7 points between 2024 and 2025, it remains high.
A Call to Action for the US Nuclear Industry
The Bisconti report contains data that should be taken as a call to action by the U.S. nuclear industry.
According to the Bisconti report,one of the reasons why so many Americans take middle positions on nuclear energy is that they don’t feel very well informed about this energy source.
In 2025, only 15% feel very well informed on the topic, 47% somewhat well informed, 31% not too well informed, and 7% not at all well informed. The correlation between the level of feeling informed and attitudes is striking. Among those who feel very well informed about nuclear energy, 66% are strongly favorable and only 6% are strongly opposed.
Chart: Bisconti Research, Inc.
It is time for the nuclear industry’s trade organizations as well as scientific and educational organizations to ramp up their efforts to inform the public about the current progress being made with reactor restarts and the potential for entirely new builds of small modular reactors, advanced reactors of all sizes, and new 1,000 MW+ units. It is a new year’s resolution waiting for the industry to act.
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