ANS looks at Illinois’s nuclear future

The latest installment in the ANS webinar series "Nuclear in the States" focused on the Society's home state of Illinois.

Illinois has 11 operating commercial reactors and the largest operating nuclear capacity in the country. Recently, it lifted the last restrictions it had on building new reactors. Furthermore, Gov. J. B. Pritzker has set a goal to add 2 GW of new nuclear capacity from either new sites or uprates, and for that construction to begin by 2033.

ANS CEO Craig Piercy once again led the discussion. He was joined by Caleb Brooks, professor and Donald Biggar Willett Faculty Scholar at the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign; Lisa Clemmons Stott, chief business attraction and development officer at the Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity; Kirsten Laurin-Kovitz, associate laboratory director for nuclear technologies and national security at Argonne National Laboratory; Nancy Norton, president and CEO of Grundy County Economic Development; and Colleen Wright, vice president of corporate strategy at Constellation.

"It seems the question is no longer whether Illinois needs new nuclear. It's about what to build where, and how to pay for it," said Piercy during Wednesday's webinar.

A different landscape: About five years ago, the talks surrounding nuclear energy in Illinois were more about nuclear power plants shutting down. How times have changed, the panelists said multiple times.

Norton said nuclear in the state has weathered its ups and downs in her 27 years in economic development. Once again, nuclear power plants are "darlings," she joked. This is good news for Grundy County, which houses the Dresden power plant. In fact, when the state requested information from communities interested in having a new nuclear facility, Grundy "raised their hands," she said. They have workforce and emergency infrastructures in place, as well as multiple generations of people familiar with and supportive of the plant.

Clemmons Stott said some of the renewed interest is coming from policy efforts that boosted energy sources like nuclear. Studies also show that with large load users coming on, the state needs more power. Between incentives, workforce investments, and innovations, Illinois is ready to "move forward to the next level," she said.

"We have become very good at establishing cutting-edge technologies in Illinois, from electric vehicles to quantum," she said. "We feel like this is our moment to refresh the industry and build on our legacy, and we're excited about it."

Wright said Constellation is looking into the expansion of its nuclear assets through four segments: relicensing, uprates, restarts, and building new nuclear.

"We're in the market now, whereas five years ago we were talking about shuttering these plants," Wright said. "Now we're talking about how across all four of those tranches we see demand sufficient enough to support and enable that expansion."

Research and academic enthusiasm: Many operating nuclear reactors feature technology that originated decades ago at Illinois-based Argonne and the other national laboratories, Laurin-Kovitz said. That continues to be the case today, even if it looks different. A lab like Argonne may provide support for both first-of-a-kind and nth-of-a-kind reactor technologies. They may be collaborating with other national laboratories in using artificial intelligence to accelerate the design and deployment of reactors. Laurin-Kovitz also said Argonne is in a position to provide objective technical advice to the state to help Illinois and its partners determine best steps forward.

Much like Argonne, the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign has played a role in advancing nuclear both locally and beyond. Currently, its most notable project is its partnership with Nano Nuclear Energy to construct a high-temperature gas-cooled research reactor. After submitting the construction application to the NRC this spring, the commission began its formal review in June. Nano hopes to be able to begin construction in the second half of 2027.

Brooks said the project's ultimate objective is about derisking microreactor deployment.

"What we want to focus on is a deployment that enables us to get to some of those real challenges and opportunities of the advanced reactor space," he said.

The workforce challenge: While most of the discussions on Wednesday were optimistic, the panelists were more mixed on the future of the nuclear workforce.

When discussing the skilled tradespeople needed to make new nuclear projects a reality, Norton said everyone is competing for electricians, welders, and others in a pool that is shrinking.

"The shortages we're seeing are in the skilled trades that can come in and maintain and work these outages is because there's a lot of competition for that talent right now," she said.

"I completely agree with [Norton]," added Wright. "I think that's going to be the biggest shortage that we see. We start getting these projects going and it's going to be the biggest bottleneck during the construction years."

Clemmons Stott said the state has been proactive, tracking over the last few years the worker shortages plaguing multiple industries. The Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity is hitting it from all different angles, she said, putting in place measures like pre-apprenticeship programs and manufacturing training academies to get people interested in the trades and providing grants to career centers to help them recruit more people into programs like welding. It also has conducted campaigns raising awareness on these jobs.

Brooks said it remains a great time for nuclear engineering students, as his department's graduates are "flying off the shelves" when looking for jobs. Universities, however, can partner with trade schools to boost the workforce across the entire spectrum, such as through efforts like "training the trainers," he added.