Holtec International was launched in 1986 with the ambitious goal of strengthening, in the company's areas of expertise, the commercial nuclear power industry. Reeling from the setbacks of Three Mile Island in 1979 and the disaster of Chernobyl earlier in the year, the company's leadership believed that safe storage of used nuclear fuel was shaping up as a potentially fatal body blow to the industry already under siege from vocal intervenors across the country. Shaping up on-site storage technologies for spent nuclear fuel thus became the company's first calling.

Another area of early concentration was the supply of heat transfer equipment for nuclear, cogeneration and resource recovery plants in which some of the company's pioneering engineers had in-depth expertise. The narrative below chronicles Holtec's emergence from a nascent energy company in the 80s to an industry leader today.

The 1980s

Holtec's initial focus was to develop the technology to substantially increase the in-pool storage capacity at light water reactor plants in the wake of the U.S. government’s decision in 1977 to ban reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel.

In the 1980s, U.S. nuclear plants faced the looming specter of the reactors shutting down for lack of a means of storing the irradiated spent fuel. Dry storage technology for storing spent fuel was still in its embryonic stages, and public opposition to fuel transport had foreclosed the option to ship the fuel off-site for most nuclear plants.

The solution came in the form of Holtec’s ultra-high density storage rack technology that, in one stroke, doubled, tripled, even quintupled (in some cases) the in-pool (wet) storage capacity in America’s fuel pools. Through the 1980s and 1990s, Holtec “reracked” over 80 fuel pools in America and overseas, averting the loss-of-full-core reserve in reactors from Taiwan to Tennessee and giving the nuclear plant operators a safe and economical means to manage their growing spent fuel inventory for many, many years, some to the end-of-their-reactors-licensed operating life.

Over 80% of all spent fuel produced in the U.S., Mexico, Korea, Taiwan, and the U.K. is stored in Holtec-supplied ultra-high density wet storage equipment. Wet expansion projects continue to play a role in the spent fuel management of many plants even to this day, although dry storage now clearly dominates the world scene and also accounts for an increasing portion of Holtec’s corporate income.

The 1990s

Holtec’s dry spent fuel storage program, begun in 1991, soon became the industry’s epicenter for developing the technology to package used nuclear fuel in canisters equally competent for on-site storage or offsite transport. In 1999, Holtec became the first company to license a dual-purpose overpack (on-site storage and transport) – HI-STAR 100, along with an array of multi-purpose canisters to store and/or transport PWR and BWR spent nuclear fuel.

A year later, the industry’s first MPC technology based vertical ventilated module – HI-STORM 100 – was licensed for deployment under general certification (i.e., pre-approved for use in all of the territorial United States). The company continues to strive to develop the technologies to improve the human factors (health and safety features) of its dry storage and transport technology, staying a generation (always, at least one generation) ahead of its worldwide competitors. In 2004 the company unveiled its underground vertical ventilated module (VVM) technology for storage of loaded MPCs in watertight cavities that provides for safe storage of fuel even under the most challenging vagaries of nature, such as flood, tsunamis, hurricanes, or earthquakes, and is seen by the industry observers as the ultimate foil to the kind of terror that struck on 9/11.

The 2000s

A great bulk of the company’s business backlog consists of turnkey undertakings wherein Holtec develops the design of a device or a system, secures its certification by appropriate government authorities, effectuates all required manufacturing, and finally, executes on-site installation, testing, and commissioning into service. Among projects of the turnkey genré completed by the company are both dry storage and wet storage projects in nuclear plants around the world. Since the mid 1980s, the company has delivered over $1.5 billion of goods and services to the power industry and has over $6 billion in assured long-term backlog from ongoing projects.

Another principal product line of the company is the supply of heat exchange equipment to all segments of the power industry, including the nuclear, cogeneration, and resource recovery sectors. Over 100 power plants in four continents employ Holtec-supplied main steam surface condensers and feedwater heaters. A great many auxiliary heat exchangers used in the NSSS Systems supplied by U.S. firms are of Holtec’s design.

Enabling the energy industry to produce power safely and in harmony with the environment underlies Holtec’s decades old commitment to serve the nuclear power industry. A similar sense of commitment to the environment has been behind the company’s program, launched in 2003, to develop the air-cooled condenser technology that relies on air rather than water as the heat sink to run power plants. Reduced reliance on water, an increasingly precious resource in many parts of the world, is clearly an emerging energy technology need, and therefore, a suitable corporate calling for Holtec International.

The 2010s

Heat exchangers and systems for emerging solar energy technology is the area of most recent corporate R&D focus of Holtec International. The company expects to build on its present backlog of solar plant equipment in the coming year. The company also plans to play a major role in Generation-3 and Generation-4 nuclear power reactors.

Recognizing that solid achievements in technology take time and cost money, Holtec International has focused on long-term goals, eschewing the business pressures to emphasize short-term earnings. The company is thankful to its banking and insurance service providers who have stood ready to extend loans and insurance protection on large capital projects at favorable rates. The company’s management prizes the company's unblemished record of performance (no client litigation, no long-term debt, no unprofitable fiscal year, and no client call on any posted bond, etc.) that has enabled the banks and insurance companies to view Holtec as a splendid credit risk.