Palisades investigation indefinitely halts refueling (Is Holtec competent?)

October 1, 2026, https://beyondnuclear.org/palisades-refueling-indefinitely-halted-by-investigation/

On September 26, 2026, the Detroit Free Press(opens in new tab) headlined its news story “Nuclear regulators probe fuel assembly installation mishap at Palisades”. The news article regards the occurrence of a nuclear fuel handling mishap at the very end of August 2026 involving Holtec International’s mishandling of a used radioactive nuclear fuel assembly that was one of 136 scavenged used radioactive fuel assemblies being reloaded into the Palisades reactor core as part of the company’s “recommissioning” following certified permanent cessation of power operations by its former owner/operator, Entergy Corp, and last legitimate holder of the Palisades operating license in Covert, Michigan on the shore of Lake Michigan. Palisades was permanently ceased operations on May 20, 2022.

As some background, Holtec acquired ownership of Palisades as a “possession only” license transfer from Entergy Corp as approved by US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). The Palisades license transfer included a Decommissioning Trust Fund approximately $552 million was finalized making Holtec the new owner on June 22, 2022 solely for the purpose of decommissioning the reactor, decontamination and clean up of the reactor site. However, in an unprecedented move not recognized by NRC regulatory guidance, Holtec announced that was no longer pursuing the decommissioning of the reactor as previously certified to the federal agency but instead on September 23, 2023 formally filed on September 23, 2023 with the NRC to to refurbish and “recommission” Palisades back into commercial power operations to the end the original initial license renewal period, and even provided an exemption if NRC granted Holtec with an reactor operating license, out to March 24, 2031. Furthermore, on June 23, 2025, Holtec filed a formal Letter Of Intent (LOI) to the NRC announcing that it would be seek a second 20-year renewal of the operating license extending it out to 2051.

When Entergy Corp certified the permanent cessation of operations, the nuclear operator was required to completely defuel the reactor core from the reactor pressure vessel transferring all of the used fuel to the spent fuel storage pool, including the most recent refueling.

The fuel mishandling event involved just one of 136 highly radioactive fuel assemblies from the reactor’s most recent refueling cycle where restart commenced on October 10, 2020 before the Palisades previous owner/operator, Entergy Corp, permanently ceased power operations on May 20, 2022. The used fuel being loaded into Palisades by Holtec was operational for 578 days and therefore is extremely radioactive. When the mishandling accident happened, Holtec was salvaging used nuclear fuel assemblies that was stored in the spent fuel pool. Each one of these used fuel assemblies contains 214 highly radioactive fuel rods. The full reactor core complement for the Palisades reactor constitutes 204 fuel assemblies. Only 68 fuel assemblies are will unused new fuel in the reloading.

When Holtec started reloading the Palisades reactor core using the highly radioactive nuclear fuel assembly was being moved in the reverse direction from the nuclear power plant’s spent fuel storage pool shielded under 40 feet of water through a water filled fuel transfer channel back into the reactor containment building to be reloaded into the water filled reactor core in an opened reactor pressure vessel. There it was apparently misplaced by Holtec International operators such that radioactive fuel assembly tilted over, out of alignment in the reactor core and detached from the reactor’s fuel handling machinery. Holtec must now get a license amendment approved procedurally explaining how it will retrieve the misplaced and highly radioactive fuel assembly and evaluate if it can be still be used in the reactor core.

The irradiated nuclear fuel handling accident went unreported to the public for weeks by both Holtec International, now turned unlicensed and inexperienced reactor operator, and the NRC. When confronted, both the company and the regulator claimed that the mishap had not risen to the level of a publicly reportable safety event. However, the mishandling of highly radioactive nuclear fuel is not a minor event without accountability. Palisades already represents a highly controversial and genuinely contested unprecedented effort to refuel and restart the world’s first “permanently closed” nuclear power plan.

The fuel mishap accident represents a warning , a red flag, question the competence of Holtec safety culture and competence. Palisades should not be allowed to balk on fulfilling a 2020 joint decommissioning agreement(opens in new tab) made between Entergy Nuclear and Holtec International, and certified to the NRC on conditions of the reactor license transfer. The joint agreement recognized Palisades to permanently cease operations, permanently defuel, decontaminate, decommission and site mitigation. Holtec International has radically reversed its intention to decommission the reactor and instead proceeded to restore the previous power operating license to be followed by the submission of an application to the NRC for a twenty-year operating license extension out to 2051(opens in new tab).