Michigan's Rep. Bill Huizenga, and U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright celebrate historic Palisades Nuclear Plant

COLVERT TOWNSHIP, Mich. — The Palisades nuclear plant in Van Buren County is on the road to being fully operational after a slight delay in August. U.S. Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright, expects the plant to be up and running by the end of November.

Crews began putting new radioactive fuel into the reactor vessel itself, during which a piece of machinery called a fuel assembly handler caused one of the assemblies to be tilted.

Thursday was called a historic day as federal, state and local leaders came together to announce the palisades nuclear power plant will soon be operational after being shut down for four years.

It's being called a win for Michigan.

The Palisades nuclear power plant shut down in May 2022, but after a $1.5 billion loan by the U.S. Department of Energy, Holtec International has helped to give the site a new life.

"That’s about four million homes it would power but of course, it’s also dozens of new sizable businesses that’ll create new jobs and new opportunities for American workers,' said U.S. Secretary of Energy, Chris Wright.

Michigan's 4th district representative, Bill Huizenga, took the stage alongside other federal, state and local leaders and credits the Trump administration and Republicans for this historic restart. He says Michigan needs a commonsense energy policy.

“Dependence on solar fields and wind farms, battery storage, that’s not going to cut it. We need to have energy production here in Michigan if we are going to grow this state," said Huizenga.

Secretary Wright says there are just a few more steps before the full start up.

"To have everything in place. You have to have every system checked; every system automated. It’ll be ready to start at least two weeks before we actually start. There’s just a huge amount of redundancy in nuclear operations to make sure things are impeccably safe.”