Fermi 2 nuclear plant shut down for maintenance

Frenchtown Township – A nuclear power plant in southeastern Michigan is shut down for refueling and maintenance.

The Monroe News reports DTE Energy’s Fermi 2 plant in Monroe County was shut down Saturday and workers will replace about a third of the fuel in the reactor. They’ll also complete thousands of other maintenance and testing activities. The company hasn’t said how long the outage will last.

Keith Polson, Fermi 2’s senior vice president and chief nuclear officer, says the work is “is essential to maintaining the safety and reliability of plant systems.”

The newspaper says more than 1,200 supplemental workers are at Fermi for the outage.

It’s the 19th such outage for the plant. The Detroit-based utility’s plant is located along Lake Erie in Frenchtown Township, near Michigan’s border with Ohio.