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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.
Colin Baus, Hugh Boniface, Ian Castillo, Amir Dashliborun, Christian Day, Takashi Ino, Minoru Jimma, Daiki Kikuchi, Mitch King, Satoshi Konishi, Yoshifumi Kume, Suneui Lee, Nobuo Maki, Yoshinao Matsunaga, John McGrady, Kyosuke Namba, Louis Neumann, Yuhei Nozoe, Richard Pearson, Donald Ryland, Jonas Schwenzer, Stephen Strickwerda, Sam Suppiah, Tim Teichmann, Bibake Uppal, Todd Whitehorne, Tomoya Yokoi
Fusion Science and Technology | Volume 82 | Number 1 | January-February 2026 | Pages 357-372
Research Article | doi.org/10.1080/15361055.2025.2481362
Articles are hosted by Taylor and Francis Online.
UNITY-2 (UNique Integrated Testing facilitY) is a facility designed to replicate the architecture of the deuterium-tritium fuel cycle of a fusion pilot plant (FFP) on a smaller scale. The facility will operate continuously at a steady-state flow rate of 2.3 Pa m3 s−1 using gas puffing, and will allow for the injection of fuel pellets for shorter periods with up to 27.5 Pa m3 s−1. UNITY-2 will demonstrate a fully integrated deuterium-tritium fuel cycle using a license for up to 30 g of tritium at Chalk River Laboratories, therefore reducing the risk of producing a FFP on a decadal timeframe. Its novelty, relative to past and planned fuel cycle experimental demonstrations, lies in the continuous and fully integrated operation, an inner fuel cycle that includes a direct internal recycling loop, an inner and outer loop, and a breeder cycle based on lithium lead coolant. UNITY-2 has a full suite of detritiation systems to demonstrate as low as reasonably achievable releases. Following the successful integrated operation, the technology readiness will reach a maturity to be applied to FFPs.
