DOE Offers $263 Million Loan for SHINE’s Janesville Isotope Plant

The Department of Energy offered SHINE Chrysalis, LLC a conditional loan commitment of up to $263 million to finish the Chrysalis medical isotope plant in Janesville, Wisconsin, a move aimed squarely at tightening the U.S. supply of isotopes used in cancer diagnostics and treatment. Greg Piefer’s company says the facility is designed to establish the first domestic commercial supply of molybdenum-99, the workhorse isotope that helps produce technetium-99m for millions of diagnostic procedures in the United States.

The fine print matters. DOE’s Office of Energy Dominance Financing did not hand SHINE a blank check; it offered a conditional commitment, which means SHINE still has to satisfy technical, legal, environmental, and financial requirements before definitive financing documents are signed and money is advanced. DOE said the project is intended to create a reliable and secure supply of medical isotopes made with fusion and fission technology, and it expects the plant to support hundreds of construction and operation jobs.

For hospitals and radiopharmacies, the value of a plant like Chrysalis is not abstract. Mo-99 is short-lived, and supply disruptions ripple quickly through imaging schedules and treatment planning. SHINE says Chrysalis will also produce iodine-131 and xenon-133, expanding the commercial output beyond Mo-99 and into other medical and industrial isotope streams. If the plant reaches steady operation, it would give the U.S. a domestic source of materials that have long leaned on foreign reactors and older production lines with limited throughput.

The Janesville site has been moving through the nuclear licensing grind for years. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued SHINE’s construction permit in February 2016, SHINE broke ground in May 2019, and the company filed its operating license application on July 17, 2019. NRC staff completed the final safety evaluation report in February 2023, and DOE and NNSA said in 2025 that the facility was about 75% complete. The site covers about 91 acres on the south side of Janesville, roughly 40 miles southeast of Madison, with the dense core of the city more than a mile north of the property.

That is why this loan commitment feels less like a finish line than a financing bridge. It does not instantly erase U.S. dependence on imported isotopes, but it does add federal weight to a project that has already cleared major regulatory milestones and moved deep into construction. If SHINE can close the remaining conditions and keep the build on track, Janesville becomes a serious candidate for a domestic Mo-99 supply line that hospitals will actually feel.