House Republicans Climate Plan Has Clean Energy
Innovation at the Core
House Republicans are working on their agenda to tackle climate change. Leader McCarthy held an all-conference meeting recently to start outlining the plan. As part of the plan, Energy & Commerce Committee Ranking Member Greg Walden has been highlighting 12 bipartisan clean energy innovation bills that could likely pass the House and Senate. Find the list here. Find the list here
RICH’S TAKE
“Too often, climate policy is oversimplified to false choices: renewables versus fossils, economy versus environment, immediate reductions at home versus inaction. Leader McCarthy and the conference are focusing on solutions that can make clean energy more affordable while preserving economic growth and reflecting the global nature of the challenge.
“Any debate on climate change must be rooted in political and technical realism, as well as economic competitiveness. We appreciate their moonshot approach to innovation that will make clean energy affordable. It’s good strategy to focus on policies that facilitate breakthroughs relevant for the developing world, instead of divisive policies that would make traditional energy more expensive and only aid deployment of existing technologies.”
GE Hitachi & TerraPower to Work With DOE on
Versatile Test Reactor (VTR)
GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy (GEH) and TerraPower are pursuing a Public Private Partnership to design and construct the Versatile Test Reactor (VTR) for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
The Nuclear Energy Innovation Capabilities Act that passed last Congress included authorization for development of the VTR, and the FY20 funding bill included $65 million for the VTR. The Nuclear Energy Leadership Act (NELA) also includes language supporting the VTR.
VTR would be a new reactor at a national lab that is used to test materials with very high energy neutrons (imagine neutrons moving at 9000 miles per second – that’s fast!). The VTR will be able to operate with much higher energy neutrons than even the DOE’s existing Advanced Test Reactor (ATR) housed at Idaho National Laboratory.
ITIF:
Accelerating Energy Innovation in the 116th Congress:
10 Priorities for 2020
The Information Technology & Innovation Foundation published their list of 10 priorities for Congress this year. We think this is a great list that includes:
National Lab Breakthrough Innovation, Recovering
Lithium from Geothermal
While the majority of energy storage exists in the form of pumped-storage hydro, the second most popular technology are lithium based batteries.
However, the lithium supply chain is controlled mostly by Asian companies. The most successful lithium ion battery technologies are composed of cobalt, a mineral increasingly referred to as the blood diamond of batteries due to lax child labor and safety laws in copper and nickel mining dominated in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
In the past, collecting lithium from geothermal brine has been uneconomical due to the inability to collect a concentration worth purchasing. But, leave it to our world class National labs to breakthrough the barrier. Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are working on how to recover lithium from brine wastes at geothermal power plants. Read more
Carbon Capture Takes Stage at Davos
Some may say there is no bigger stage than the World Economic Forum held in Davos, Switzerland each year. This year, Occidental Petroleum Corp CEO Vicki Hollub used the platform to talk about carbon capture. Fatih Birol, executive director of the International Energy Agency also shared potential of carbon capture to help lower emissions.
“Carbon capture is very important because we have still a huge amount of fossil fuels in the market,” Birol said. “It is the only technology which can marry the fossil fuels we have — oil, gas, others — and our climate goals.” Read more
Additionally, Prince Charles talked about clean energy innovation in his remarks specifically mentioning carbon capture, fusion, energy storage and more. Watch his remarks here
IN CASE YOU MISSED IT
Arizona’s Largest Utility Commits to 100% Clean
Arizona’s largest utility, Arizona Public Service (APS) announce a commitment to be 100 percent carbon-free power by 2050. Read more
Bipartisan Tech-Neutral Energy Innovation Tax Credit
The new bipartisan bill called the Energy Sector Innovation Credit (ESIC) led by Rep. Tom Reed Comment start (R-N.Y.) and Rep. Jimmy Panetta (D-CA.) Reps. Darrin LaHood (R-IL), Tom Suozzi (D-NY), David Schweikert (R-AZ) and Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) will incentivize new clean energy sources to enter the market. When added with the recent suite of bipartisan proposals to advance clean energy, ESIC could be a major missing financing piece of the clean energy innovation puzzle.
There is a growing list of groups who support ESIC including Bipartisan Policy Center, Southern Company, American Public Power Association, National Rural Electric Cooperative Association, United States Energy Association, Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions, Clean Air Task Force, Energy Storage Association, Nuclear Energy InstituteIndustry, The United States Nuclear Industry Council (USNIC), National Electrical Contractors Association, Information Technology and Innovation Foundation.
Carbon capture is real, working, and now expanding
To date, only two commercial carbon capture projects in the world have been installed at a power plant. One of the two – NRG’s Petra Nova project outside of Houston, TX – can capture up to 5,000 tons of carbon dioxide each day from the Texas coal plant.
In the two years Petra Nova has captured over 3 million tons of carbon dioxide and shows that with smart public private partnerships, the U.S. is able to innovate and deploy commercial scale projects to make clean energy more affordable. In Texas, carbon-free resources make up more than 30 percent of its energy generation. Even in the state of Texas, home to the largest U.S. wind power plants, Petra Nova is in the top ten percentile of largest clean energy sources.
Green Tech Media:
What Would It Take for the US to Become an Energy Storage Manufacturing Powerhouse?
Energy storage will play a critical important role in reducing carbon emissions. GTM published a piece this week tackling how the industry may be able to break through. In the FY20 spending bill Congress increased funding for basic research, technology transfer and workforce training. DOE’s budget also included a Grid Storage Launchpad which will be a facility at the Pacific Northwest National Lab (PNNL) focused on developing, testing and evaluating chemical storage (and potentially thermal energy storage) materials and systems for grid applications. Read more
NREL:
Declining Renewable Costs Drive Focus on Energy Storage
A blog post by the National Renewable Energy Lab highlights some intermitancy challenges with renewable energy and how declining costs are driving innovators to find solutions on storing the energy until it’s needed. Read more
THE PATH AHEAD
January 28, 2020: The CCUS Roadshow, D.C. workshop will feature leading experts on CCUS. This is the first event of seven sessions across the country. The event will take place from 8 am – 4:15 pm at the Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center. Learn more and register here
January 29, 2020: The Global America Business Institute (GABI) will host a briefing on Capitol Hill on Imperatives and Pathways for Advanced Nuclear Test Capabilities, The Case of the Versatile Test Reactor. The briefing is scheduled from 11:30 am – 1 pm in Rayburn 2325, the Science, Space and Technology Committee Room. Register here
House Republicans Climate Plan Has Clean Energy
Carbon Capture Takes Stage at Davos
Bipartisan Tech-Neutral Energy Innovation Tax Credit
