Welcome to your Friday Rundown, for the week ending Feb. 1. I’m your driver, ClearPath Communications Director Darren Goode. Anything we missed? Let me know at goode@clearpathaction.org. Thanks for reading.
CONGRESS, DOE: MORE TO COME ON ADVANCED NUCLEAR
Expect more from the federal government and private industry this Congress on advanced nuclear.
That was the heart of a discussion on microreactors at the latest Atomic Wings nuclear power briefing co-hosted by the Department of Energy and ClearPath this week.
DOE Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy Ed McGinnis said we may see the first microreactor company this year submit a licensing application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. That company would follow in the footsteps of NuScale Power, which submitted the first small modular reactor design for review and is steadily progressing toward NRC certification.
Rep. Richard Hudson (R-N.C.) said lawmakers aren’t done yet either. “It’s paramount that we continue to build off of last year’s successes,” he said, referencing the suite of nuclear policies that were enacted in the 115th Congress. That means you can expect more from the House Energy and Commerce Committee, he added, including legislation to “help ensure regulatory and fuels infrastructure that’s needed for advanced reactors to thrive is there.” This is one area “I truly believe” can secure bipartisan support in divided government, Hudson said.
Hudson and Rep. Joe Wilson (R-S.C.) were among those leading a successful bipartisan effort last Congress to get into law language requiring DOE to study a pilot program to site microreactors on military and DOE national security sites.
That could also lead to these microreactors being used in remote places, from Alaska to Guam, Wilson said at the Atomic Wings briefing.
He added that it remains a bipartisan agenda, specifically calling out Rep. John Garamendi (D-Calif.) as a partner. “He and I both are just so enthusiastic about small modular reactors,” Wilson said.
Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.), a member of the House Energy and Water Appropriations Subcommittee, highlighted efforts at Oak Ridge National Lab and said microreactors “could be a new American industry.”
One of those companies striving for that breakthrough is Oklo, whose co-founder Caroline Cochran stressed that their passion is to serve remote communities first, with the promise that the electric grid is “going in the hands of communities” that may face a shorter and dirtier list of energy source options currently. But that is just one slice of a hugely promising U.S. and global microreactor market. “This is a market big enough for all of these developers,” Cochran said.
George Washington University’s Joseph Cascio detailed a study conducted by the university’s Environment & Energy Management Institute and incoming Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment Alex Beehler laying out a roadmap for microreactor deployment at military facilities.
DOE: MORE TO COME ON CARBON CAPTURE AS WELL
The U.S. is “more involved than ever” and will “remain a strong global voice” in carbon capture technologies, including funding in the coming months to support two commercial-scale systems that could be used on gas and coal plants, DOE Assistant Secretary of Fossil Energy Steven Winberg said this week.
That funding would support at least two front-end engineering design (FEED) studies for commercial-scale carbon capture, with additional funding also to support “transformational” technologies that can provide real-time sensing of carbon dioxide below the Earth’s surface, he said.
The FY19 spending bill provided at least $30 million for FEED assistance to two commercial-scale carbon capture power projects – one to retrofit an existing coal plant and one for a coal or natural gas plant that generates CO2 suitable for utilization or storage. Public-private FEED partnerships are a cost-effective way for DOE to advance carbon capture technologies within the R&D pipeline.
Winberg spoke at an event highlighting a Global CCS Institute report indicating growth last year in supportive policies and projects for carbon capture technologies.
Baker Hughes, an oil and gas subsidiary of GE, this week announced plans to reduce its carbon footprint in half by 2030 and to be net- zero carbon equivalent emissions by 2050. “Oil and gas will continue to be an important part of the global energy mix, and BHGE is committed to investing in smarter technologies to advance the energy industry for the long-term,” Chairman and CEO Lorenzo Simonelli said.
It’s the latest in a growing trend of decarbonization efforts by major energy producers. Xcel Energy recently announced it would reduce its carbon emissions 80 percent by 2030 and be carbon-free by 2050, the most ambitious plan yet from a major U.S. investor-owned utility.
Globally, 121 corporations in 21 countries last year purchased 13.4GW of clean power through long-term contracts, more than doubling the 6.1GW purchased in 2017, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. This includes more aggregation from smaller corporate energy buyers and new markets such as Poland.
THE PATH AHEAD
WEDNESDAY POLITICO and Breakthrough Energy host a discussion on clean energy innovation, including Assistant Secretary for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy Dan Simmons, House Energy Subcommittee Chairman Bobby Rush (D-Ill.), former Energy Sec. Ernest Moniz, IHS Markit’s Dan Yergin and Xcel Energy Chairman Ben Fowke.
WEDNESDAY The House Energy and Commerce Environment & Climate Change Subcommittee hearing, “Time For Action: Addressing the Environmental and Economic Effects of Climate Change.”
THURSDAY Senate Energy and Natural Resources hearing to “Examine the Status and Outlook of Energy Innovation in the United States.”
