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Conference Spotlight
2026 ANS Annual Conference
May 31–June 3, 2026
Denver, CO|Sheraton Denver
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Getting back to yes: A local perspective on decommissioning, restart, and responsibility
For 45 years, Duane Arnold Energy Center operated in Linn County, Ia., near the town of Palo and just northwest of Cedar Rapids. The facility, owned by NextEra Energy, was the only nuclear power plant in the state.
In August 2020, a historic derecho swept across eastern Iowa with winds approaching 140 miles per hour. Damage to the plant’s cooling towers accelerated a shutdown that had already been planned, and the facility entered decommissioning soon after, with its fuel removed in October of that year. Iowa’s only nuclear plant had gone off line.
Today the national energy landscape looks very different than it did just six short years ago. Electricity demand is rising rapidly as data centers, artificial intelligence infrastructure, advanced manufacturing, and electrification expand across the country. Reliable, carbon-free baseload power has become increasingly valuable. In that context, Linn County has approved the rezoning necessary to support the recommissioning and restart of Duane Arnold and is actively supporting NextEra’s efforts to secure the remaining state and federal approvals.
Technical Session|Sponsored by OPD
Tuesday, November 17, 2020|12:00–2:10PM EST
Session Chair:
Hitesh Bindra (Kansas State Univ.)
Alternate Chair:
W. Neal Mann (The University of Texas at Austin)
Session Organizer:
Staff Producer:
Paul LaTour (American Nuclear Society)
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Micro-Reactor and Energy Storage Coupled Truck Charging Terminal
Derek W. Kultgen (Argonne National Laboratory), Darius D. Lisowski (Argonne National Laboratory), Nicolas E. Stauff (Argonne National Laboratory), Matthew D. Bucknor (Argonne National Laboratory)
Paper
Multi-Gigawatt-Day Low-Cost Crushed-Rock Heat Storage Coupled to Light-Water Reactors with a Stand-Alone Steam Cycle
Ali Aljefri (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Charles W. Forsberg (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Base-Load Reactors for Variable Electricity with Crushed-Rock Heat Storage and Nitrate-Salt Heat Transfer
Mriganka Mandal (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), Charles W. Forsberg (Massachusetts Institute of Technology)
Performance Comparison of Solid Reactant Based on Pellets and Powder for Ca(OH)2/CaO Chemical Heat Pump
Aman Gupta (University of Idaho), Paul D. Armatis (Oregon State University), Piyush Sabharwall (Idaho National Laboratory), Brian M. Fronk (Oregon State University), Vivek P. Utgikar (University of Idaho)
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