The White House and US Biden administration is working on plans to bring back decommissioned nuclear power reactors and plants online to meet energy demands and emissions-free electricity

The Biden administration is developing plans to bring more decommissioned nuclear power plants back online to meet the rising demand for emissions-free electricity, according to White House climate adviser Ali Zaidi. On Monday, Zaidi confirmed that two such projects are already underway, including the planned recommissioning of Holtec’s Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan and the potential restart of a unit at Constellation Energy’s Three Mile Island plant in Pennsylvania, near the site of the most severe nuclear accident in U.S. history.

When asked about the possibility of reviving additional shuttered plants, Zaidi said, "We're working on it in a very concrete way. There are two that come to mind." However, he declined to provide further details or identify the specific power plants involved.

Speaking at the Reuters Sustainability conference in New York, Zaidi explained that reopening dormant nuclear plants is part of a broader three-pronged strategy by President Joe Biden’s administration to increase nuclear power generation, which is crucial to combating climate change and meeting growing energy demands. The other two key areas of focus include developing small modular reactors (SMRs) for specific applications and advancing next-generation nuclear reactors.

Biden has called for tripling U.S. nuclear power capacity to address increasing energy needs, driven partly by the expansion of power-hungry technologies such as artificial intelligence and cloud computing.

Just last week, the Biden administration approved a $1.52 billion loan to revive the Palisades plant in Michigan, which is expected to take two years to bring back online. Additionally, Constellation Energy and Microsoft recently signed a power agreement to help restart a unit at the Pennsylvania plant, with hopes of securing government support for the project.

Zaidi also mentioned that the U.S. Navy had requested information about building SMRs at six bases, signaling that this technology could be deployed within the decade. "SMR is a technology that isn't decades away. Companies in the United States are looking to deploy it within this decade," he said.

Zaidi further discussed the challenges facing another Biden clean energy goal: bringing 30 gigawatts (GW) of offshore wind capacity online by the end of the decade. The administration recently postponed offshore wind lease sales in Oregon and the Gulf of Mexico due to low demand from companies facing high costs, equipment issues, and supply chain problems. Despite these setbacks, Zaidi assured that at least half of the 30 GW target is already under construction, and that early difficulties offer valuable lessons for future projects.