Inflation, carbon prices, and wholesale power prices have all surged, the authors note, saying also, “The crunch has not only exposed Europe’s supply vulnerabilities, but also the entrenched cultural and political divisions over the nuclear industry and a failure to forge a collective vision.”

Judging by public comments of officials in NATO, the EU, and the United States among others, recent escalations in the Russia-Ukraine conflict and related contingency planning for energy in the event of an invasion has only strengthened whatever the existing consensus was that Europe needs to wean off Russian gas imports.

But neither Germany nor Austria, nor a handful of other EU members, are prepared to do that by adding new nuclear capacity nor, in Germany’s case, by extending the life of existing nuclear assets.

Importantly, there is plenty of movement in the other direction within the bloc. France, which leads the world in nuclear power as a share of total electricity generation at more than 70%, is preparing to spend big on new reactors.

Lawmakers in Belgium are also debating whether to keep some reactors online, over and against a scheduled retirement of all seven of the country’s reactors by 2025.

Meanwhile, in the U.S.: Of course, the Biden administration sees nuclear as integral to its green energy ambitions. President Joe Biden signed off on some $8.5 billion in funding for new and existing nuclear plants provided by the new infrastructure law. And although some states are wary about nuclear, about two-thirds are planning to lean on nuclear in decarbonizing.

Still, where the Biden administration and the U.S.’s European allies are similarly motivated to mitigate carbon emissions from electricity generation, they diverge widely as to the course.

Europe’s response: In a worst-case scenario, European countries could face blackouts if Russian gas were to be completely cut off, some have warned.

Some countries had already returned to the coal font last year as natural gas prices reached record highs, and the International Energy Agency predicts it will continue to do so this year — something which the threat of blackouts could make more likely.

“Gas-fired power generation is expected to decline amid the strong expansion of renewables, while high gas prices continue to weigh on its competitiveness vis-à-vis coal-fired generation,” IEA said in a report released yesterday.

Reminder – prices in Europe are brutal: Gas on the benchmark Dutch TTF hub for March is hovering around $30 per metric million British thermal units. By contrast, gas in the U.S. is trading around $4.67 per MMBtu.

Welcome to Daily on Energy, written by Washington Examiner Energy and Environment Writer Jeremy Beaman (@jeremywbeaman). Email [email protected] for tips, suggestions, calendar items, and anything else. If a friend sent this to you and you’d like to sign up, click here. If signing up doesn’t work, shoot us an email, and we’ll add you to our list.

RELATED – US MAINTAINS SPOT AS TOP EXPORTER THANKS TO EUROPE: The U.S. was the world’s top exporter of LNG for the second month in a row in January, thanks to soaring demand from Europe.

U.S. LNG exports hit a record 7.3 million tons in January, beating out Qatar again, Bloomberg reported. More than a third of the 101 LNG export cargoes in January arrived in European ports.

US BECOMING MORE RELIANT ON MINERAL IMPORTS: Total value of domestic nonfuel mineral production increased 12% in 2021 year-over-year, but the U.S. was still heavily reliant on imports from both allies and from China and Russia last year, according to a new mineral commodities report by the U.S. Geological Survey.

Imports made up more than one-half of the U.S.’s apparent consumption for 47 nonfuel mineral commodities. The U.S. was 100% net import reliant for 17 of those minerals, including arsenic, graphite, and manganese.

Rich Nolan, president and CEO of the National Mining Association, said the report indicates that “U.S. mineral import reliance is only deepening, with ever-greater reliance on our geopolitical rivals.”

“Meeting the material needs of tomorrow and building the supply chains our economy demands requires a whole-of-government approach to ensure made-in-America also means mined-in-America,” he said in a statement provided to Jeremy.

The deficits were smaller for other critical minerals, like cobalt and zinc, but the U.S. still relied heavily on imports.

Mining interests and many Republicans have seized on the fact of U.S. import reliance for many of these minerals, some of which are key inputs in batteries and other renewable energy technologies, criticizing the Biden administration and environmental groups for opposing certain mining projects like the Twin Metals mine in Minnesota.

But the administration has recognized it has to help incorporate more domestic mining to support its green energy policies. Jigar Shah, director of the Energy Department’s Loan Programs Office, said in a recent tweet, “We have plenty of Lithium here in the USA, we know where it is and have been given a mandate to bring it online either through mining, geothermal brine, or recycling.”

INTERIOR REVEALS PLAN FOR PLUGGING ORPHANED WELLS: The Interior Department announced yesterday it will soon begin to make available $1.15 billion in funding to states, provided by the new infrastructure law, to plug orphaned oil and gas wells.

The department said it would issue guidance to states in the coming weeks on how to apply for grants under the program. Texas and Pennsylvania, two heavyweight oil and gas states, will be eligible for the most funding under the program.

The Department of Energy separately launched a “Methane Reduction Infrastructure Initiative” to provide technical assistance to the orphaned well clean-up efforts of federal agencies, states and tribes, while the White House announced a Greenhouse Gas Monitoring & Measurement Interagency Working Group within the White House to “help identify and deploy the best available tools and data systems to measure, monitor, report, and verify (MMRV) carbon dioxide, methane, and other GHG emissions and removals.”

The Biden administration aims to put the U.S. on track to reduce emissions of methane at least 30% by 2030 as part of a “Global Methane Pledge” agreed to with other nations.

EPA MOVES ON MERCURY POLLUTION: EPA is proposing to restore the legal basis for the Obama-era Mercury and Air Toxics Standards to limit airborne pollution of mercury and acid gases emitted by power plants, reversing a rule the Trump administration put in place to peel back those standards.

EPA said its proposal would leave the existing emissions standards in place but would seek public comment as to how to achieve additional reductions in pollution under the standards. It also said power plants were the largest domestic source of mercury, hydrogen chloride, and selenium pollution before MATS was put in place.

The Trump administration rolled back the determination that the standards were “appropriate and necessary” in part on the basis that the Obama EPA failed to properly account for compliance costs to plants of the MATS standards.

BUSINESSES AND UNIONS ASK FOR CARBON CAPTURE MEASURES: More than 110 businesses and labor and conservation groups want to see incentives supporting carbon management technologies included in whatever iteration of Democrats’ spending bill comes next.

The group, which hosts among its signatories AFL-CIO, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries America, and Equinor, asked congressional Democratic leadership to prioritize provisions enhancing the 45Q tax credit, including with a direct pay option at full value of the credit and lowered annual CO2 capture thresholds to expand eligibility for the credit.

Interest groups have been lobbying Democrats to keep up the work on the Build Back Better agenda since Sen. Joe Manchin put a stop to negotiations ahead of Christmas, as have Democratic lawmakers themselves, who are starting to be more candid about their election-year motivations.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal of Washington, who has served as Manchin’s counterweight in the House throughout this whole saga, identified the bill as something that can help voters turn out and boost Democrats’ numbers in November so they can come back for more.

“We need bigger majorities in the House and the Senate,” she said during a forum on the Democrats’ climate agenda last week.

EXXON MOVING HQ TO HOUSTON: ExxonMobil will move its company headquarters from Irving to Houston by mid-2023 as part of an effort to “streamline its business structure” and cut costs, the oil giant announced yesterday.

Exxon said it will combine chemical and downstream oil and gas businesses to be organized along three business lines: ExxonMobil Upstream Company, ExxonMobil Product Solutions, and ExxonMobil Low Carbon Solutions. It will also combine its technology and engineering operations into a single technology organization, ExxonMobil Technology and Engineering.

Chairman and CEO Darren Woods said the change “enables us to more fully leverage the corporation’s scale, integration, technology advantages, and the skills and capabilities of our talented workforce, to better serve our customers.”

The company said it is on track to exceed $6 billion in structural cost savings by 2023, compared to 2019, helped by sales of oil and gas assets across its global portfolio.

Earnings update: Exxon also announced this morning $8.9 billion in earnings for the final quarter of last year, closing 2021 with $23 billion in total earnings. It has also initiated a $10 billion share repurchase program.

GEORGIA POWER PLANS COAL CLOSURES: The utility announced yesterday it filed a plan with the Georgia Public Service Commission detailing its intentions to shutter 12 coal-fired electricity generating units by 2028 with a combined capacity of 3,500 megawatts.

The company proposed to replace the retiring coal capacity mostly with natural gas but also said it intends to scale up generation from renewables, planning to add 6,000 megawatts of renewable capacity by 2035, reaching a total 11,500 megawatts by the same year.

Remember: After repeated delays, one of the utility’s two new nuclear reactors at its Plant Vogtle is supposed to come on line during the third quarter of this year, with the second expected to start generating electricity next year. The units, which according to the Energy Department are the first new reactors to be built in three decades, together have 2,200 megawatts of capacity.

The Rundown

Financial Times EU wind and solar push not enough to limit global warming as coal use remains stubborn

Associated Press EU auditor: Fossil fuels get more tax breaks than renewables

Calendar

TUESDAY | FEB. 1

3:00 p.m. 366 Dirksen The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee will host a hearing on the state of the U.S. territories.

WEDNESDAY | FEB. 2

10:30 a.m. Dingell 2123 The Energy and Commerce Committee’s Consumer Protection and Commerce Subcommittee will hold a hearing entitled, “Pandemic Profiteers: Legislation to Stop Corporate Price Gouging.”

THURSDAY | FEB. 3

10:00 a.m. 366 Dirksen Energy and Natural Resources will consider the nominations of Maria Robinson to be an assistant secretary of energy (Office of Electricity); Joseph DeCarolis to be administrator of the Energy Information Administration; and Laura Daniel-Davis to be an assistant secretary of the interior (Land and Minerals Management).