Holtec cancels plans for New Mexico interim storage facility

"After discussions with our longtime partner in the HI-STORE project, the Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance, and due to the untenable path forward for used fuel storage in New Mexico, we mutually agreed upon cancelling the agreement. This allows for ELEA to work to redevelop the property in a manner that fits their needs and allows Holtec to work with other states who are amenable to used fuel storage based on the recent DOE work on public education and outreach," Holtec said in a statement.

Holtec and the Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance (ELEA) - which includes the cities of Hobbs and Carlsbad as well as Eddy County and Lea County - signed a memorandum of agreement in 2015 covering the design, licensing, construction and operation of a facility modelled on Holtec's HI-STORM UMAX dry storage system. Known as the HI-STORE CISF (for Consolidated Interim Storage Facility), the proposed facility was to have been built at a site located between Carlsbad and Hobbs in Lea County on land owned by ELEA and would provide an option for storing used nuclear fuel from US power reactors until a permanent repository should become available. Used fuel was to be transported by rail to the CSIF.

The initial application for the HI-STORE facility included storage of up to 8,680 tonnes tons of uranium in commercial used fuel with future amendments for up to 10,000 storage canisters, according to Holtec information.

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) issued a final licence to Holtec to build and operate HI-STORE in 2023. But in March 2024, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals published a decision to "vacate" the licence following a similar ruling against another Interim Storage Partners' licence to provide interim storage in Texas. In June this year, the Supreme Court ruled that the plaintiffs in the Texas case did not have standing to challenge the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s decision to provide a permit to Interim Storage Partners.

Holtec, together with the NRC and the federal government, had filed Supreme Court petitions asking for the licence to be reinstated.