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A KEY DEVELOPMENT FOR NUSCALE?: NuScale announced this morning that its small nuclear reactors are capable of producing 25% more power than previously expected, a development that could help address cost concerns raised by potential customers.
The Oregon-based nuclear technology company is claiming its reactors can generate 77 megawatts of electricity per module, compared to the current expectation of 60 megawatts.
NuScale says the higher output would enable a power plant of 12 individual 77-megawatt reactors to lower its overnight capital cost — basically the expense of running a plant — on a per kilowatt basis from an expected $3,600 to roughly $2,850.
“The NuScale design is evolving in a way that better supports potential customer needs and concerns,” Brett Rampal, nuclear manager for Clean Air Task Force, told Josh.
He said NuScale would still need to get regulatory approval before customers could use the reactors with higher electricity output, even though the company is not changing the fuel used to power it or its underlying technology.
This can only help Nuscale’s case: Despite being no sure thing, it’s a positive development for a company racing to be the first in the U.S. to operate a small nuclear reactor, which supporters are counting on as a key potential carbon-free tool to address climate change.
It comes as NuScale has faced questions from customers about the high cost of the project.
At least eight members of the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS), a group of small, community-owned utilities in six Western states that is planning to be NuScale’s first customer, have opted out of the project in recent weeks.
In August, UAMPS notified NuScale that it was pushing back the timeline for when it plans to operate the first reactor from 2026 to 2029, citing an unexpected rise in costs.
The Energy Department last month approved a $1.4 billion grant to help defray costs for the utility group and its members, but that did not stop some cities from leaving the project.
NuScale is also hoping to entice other customers outside UAMPS and says its reactors will be on the market for sale by 2027.
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FED ACKNOWLEDGES CLIMATE RISK FOR THE FIRST TIME: The Federal Reserve is sounding the alarm on the risks climate change poses to financial markets.
Climate change “is likely to increase financial shocks and financial system vulnerabilities that could further amplify these shocks,” the U.S. central bank said in its financial stability report released yesterday. It’s the first time the Fed has included discussion of climate risks in the report, which comes out twice a year.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell has talked increasingly about climate risks in recent months. Just last week, he told reporters the Fed is “very actively in the early stages” of determining how to account for and address climate-related risks to the financial system. The Fed has been engaging with central banks around the world on the issue, he added.
Pressure is mounting: President-elect Joe Biden is expected to tackle climate risks to financial markets with new climate disclosure rules and other requirements for banks and companies to take into account how climate change would affect their bottom line.
Though an independent agency, the Fed will likely be called on to take much stronger action on climate risks. Currently, the Fed is deepening its understanding of the full scope of climate risks to markets, the stability report says.
The Fed doesn’t, however, call on banks to take any additional measures to disclose or address climate-related risks. The report only says the Fed expects “banks to have systems in place that appropriately identify, measure, control, and monitor all of their material risks, which for many banks are likely to extend to climate risks.”
Flag this for future reference: Federal Reserve member Lael Brainard, reportedly on the shortlist to be Biden’s Treasury secretary, said it’s not enough for the Fed to simply acknowledge climate risks. The central bank must move “to the stage where quantitative implications of those risks are appropriately assessed and addressed,” she said in a statement on the report.
Brainard added, “Increased transparency through improved measurement and more standardized disclosures will be crucial.”
Her comments come as some activists have criticized Brainard for being too quiet on climate change during her time on the Fed, which they say signals she wouldn’t be as aggressive on the issue as other more left-wing picks for Treasury secretary, such as Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
OIL AND GAS GROUP EMBRACES ESG INVESTING: A major oil and gas trade group is embracing sustainable and socially conscious investing metrics to woo investors increasingly focused on issues like climate change.
The Independent Petroleum Association of America, which represents thousands of small- and medium-sized oil and gas producers, recently launched an ESG Center focused on environmental, social, and governance metrics that investors are increasingly applying when deciding where to put their money.
The ESG Center is meant to be a resource hub for IPAA’s member companies, so they can start to set up their own ESG programs and boost their standing with investors using those metrics.
Climate activists, however, are skeptical of IPAA’s push on ESG. The oil and gas group’s fight against climate regulations, such as methane limits, undermines its credibility, they say.
More details in Abby’s story for this week’s Washington Examiner magazine.
TRUMP OUSTS TOP CLIMATE SCIENTIST: The Trump administration has removed the scientist overseeing the National Climate Assessment, a federal government report produced every four years, and is planning to replace him with an official who disputes mainstream climate science.
The White House ousted Michael Kuperberg as executive director of the U.S. Global Change Research Program and returned him to his previous position as a scientist at the Energy Department, according to reports.
Per the New York Times, he’s expected to be replaced by David Legates, a recent appointee to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration who has argued that carbon dioxide “is plant food and not a pollutant” and rejects the Endangerment Finding giving the EPA authority to regulate carbon emissions.
What it means: The move is another example of the Trump administration trying to undermine efforts to curb climate change on its way out the door, and sideline officials who don’t follow its agenda, coming after it demoted Neil Chatterjee as chairman of FERC last week.
But it will likely have little practical impact on production of the National Climate Assessment since Biden can quickly appoint his own personnel to oversee it. Trump administration officials have sought to downplay the findings of the latest version of the report released in 2018, which included scenarios showing that global warming will impose hundreds of billions of dollars of damages on the U.S. economy. The updated edition of the report isn’t expected to come out until 2023.
BIDEN AND TRUDEAU TALK CLIMATE: The U.S. and Canada will work together to combat climate change, Biden and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said in a post-election phone call yesterday.
Biden, according to a readout of the call, said the U.S. would “deepen collaboration with Canada to address a range of regional and global challenges”, including climate change.
It was Biden’s first conversation with a foreign leader as president-elect.
An immediate challenge for their relationship will be whether Trudeau can persuade Biden to back-off his campaign pledge to kill the Keystone XL pipeline that President Trump has tried to revive.
DOMINION ENERGY BACKS GLOBAL CLIMATE DISCLOSURE FRAMEWORK: The Virginia-based utility announced yesterday it would support disclosing climate risks consistent with recommendations from the Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Risks.
“Greater transparency regarding climate-related risks and opportunities is a competitive advantage,” said Robert Blue, Dominion’s president and CEO.
The task force, chaired by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and including 31 members across the G20, set a global benchmark for climate risk disclosures back in 2017. Globally, nearly 1,500 companies and organizations have said they back the TCFD framework. Even so, the TCFD’s latest status report released earlier this year shows companies are still falling short in meeting the recommendations, despite increased support.
Dominion joins five other major U.S. utilities that back the TCFD framework, according to a list of supporters from the task force.
RENEWABLES HAVE MORE THAN RECOVERED FROM THE PANDEMIC: In fact, renewable power will grow nearly 7% this year, and renewable energy demand will grow, even as global energy demand is slated to drop 5% due to the pandemic, the International Energy Agency said in a new report today.
Global capacity additions of renewable energy will hit a new record this year, the IEA says, driven by wind and hydropower additions. Solar power additions will stay stable, with growth in utility-scale solar additions offsetting a dip in rooftop solar additions this year. Both the U.S. and China will see a 30% jump in wind and solar capacity additions amid a rush to build projects before incentives expire, the IEA adds.
The good news for renewables shows how quickly the sector has dealt with challenges brought on by the pandemic. While the sector experienced supply chain disruptions and construction delays in the first half of the year, the IEA says those issues have largely been resolved.
Renewables growth in the next few years will continue at a steady pace: Next year, the IEA expects a record 10% expansion of renewable energy capacity additions. By 2023, there will be more installed wind and solar capacity than natural gas capacity. Wind and solar capacity will surpass coal capacity in 2024.
Policy matters: The IEA doesn’t expect renewables to be as resilient to policy changes, however. It expects a dip in renewable capacity additions in 2022 as incentives dry up in China and the U.S. and there’s uncertainty about whether those incentives will be extended.
If countries address that uncertainty, however, the IEA says global solar and wind additions could each grow 25% in 2022.
GENERAL MOTORS IS HIRING: The automaker announced yesterday it would add 3,000 software jobs through the first quarter of next year focused on development of autonomous and electric vehicles.
“This will clearly show that we’re committed to further developing the software we need to lead in EVs, enhance the customer experience and become a software expertise-driven workforce,” said Mark Reuss, General Motors’ president. The company said recent engineering developments have allowed it to accelerate the timelines of upcoming electric cars without increasing costs.
TEXAS REGULATORS TAKE STEPS TO REDUCE FLARING: The Texas Railroad Commission, which regulates the state’s oil and gas industry, announced yesterday new steps to reduce flaring.
The action falls short of a total ban on flaring, and instead changed the application form that producers fill out to get permission to burn off excess gas. Flaring is the deliberate burning of unwanted gas as a byproduct to oil, which usually happens when there is insufficient demand for the gas or a lack of pipelines preventing it from being delivered to market. The practice releases millions of tons of carbon emissions.
The commission’s changes reduce the amount of time a producer can obtain an exception to flare gas, provide incentives for operators to use technologies to reduce flaring, and require companies to offer more specific information on why they want to flare.
The Rundown
Politico Wall Street braces for climate change scrutiny under Biden
Wall Street Journal In Biden, Detroit gets a ‘car guy’ with electric vehicles on his mind
Reuters NextEra Energy in $15 billion bid for Evergy
Financial Times World’s largest coal producer warns of bankruptcy risk
Calendar
THURSDAY | NOV. 12
2 p.m. The Business Council for Sustainable Energy, Clean Energy Business Network, and CRES Forum host a post-election webinar on the impacts for clean energy.
