In the hills of southern Illinois, a facility that was once on pause now has new life. The Metropolis Works plant, the only site of its kind in the United States, is ramping up production to meet a massive spike in demand for nuclear fuel. Solstice, the company that took over the site after spinning off from Honeywell last year, is heavily investing in the facility to keep up.

The plant specializes in a specific part of the nuclear process called conversion. Basically, it takes “yellowcake” from mines and turns it into a gas called uranium hexafluoride (UF6). This is a necessary middle step before the material can be used to power reactors.

Growing the Uranium Conversion Sector

Back in 2017, the plant stopped production because there was too much fuel on the global market and not enough buyers. However, things are shifting in the other direction. With a new goal to quadruple American nuclear energy by 2050, the demand is back.

Solstice already has a backlog of $2 billion in orders, mostly from domestic utility companies. To handle that load, they are “de-bottlenecking” the current setup, essentially finding and fixing the slow spots in the assembly line. Additionally, the company has hired an engineering firm to figure out how to expand the facility’s capacity even further.

“Solstice has stepped up production of UF6, a critical component in the nuclear fuel supply chain, with the support of disciplined capital investments and improved operational excellence at our Metropolis Works facility,” said Solstice President and CEO David Sewell. “Leveraging our 60-plus years of operational excellence, industry leadership and proprietary expertise, we are exceedingly well-positioned to ensure our capacity to produce converted uranium is aligned with the industry and its rapid expansion.”

With a license that runs all the way to 2060, the Metropolis plant is settling in for a long run.