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The Right Voices on Climate

Conservatives have been vocal about our climate for years. Those voices won’t be ignored any longer.

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Repowering closing coal plants with advanced nuclear represents both an opportunity and a challenge. In the previous blog post of this series, Momentum Grows to Repower Retiring Coal Plants with Nuclear, we detailed the tangible economic and energy reliability benefits of coal-to-nuclear projects. Delivered effectively, they can ensure the preservation of jobs, revitalize communities, and provide clean power available 24/7 to the grid. However, despite these potential advantages, the shift to nuclear energy is not a guaranteed success. To the contrary, numerous hurdles need to be overcome if coal-to-nuclear projects are to become a reality. Significant changes to the current nuclear deployment model are required to make this transformation both technically feasible and effective in terms of cost and schedule.

Current Challenges in Nuclear Deployment

While a nuclear reactor could theoretically replace coal to create steam for many power plants, today’s nuclear energy deployment model cannot meet the speed or scale required to repower hundreds of coal plants or maintain American nuclear leadership, a goal set forth in the bipartisan Advance Act of 2024. Coal-to-nuclear projects must be constructed quickly enough to prevent the loss of transmission rights and retain the existing power plant workforce, all while maintaining commercial viability. To repower the coal plants currently operating in the United States by 2040, more than one coal-to-nuclear project would need to be completed every month, starting now. Given current U.S. nuclear deployment timelines of 6-10 years per project, achieving this goal requires a total paradigm shift in nuclear construction. Unfortunately, both traditional nuclear reactors and many advanced designs face challenges with complexity, high costs, and slow construction, making it difficult to fully capitalize on this opportunity.

Read more from the Bipartisan Policy Center here.

Ferries are a key method of transportation in many places around the country. From the ferries that cross the Puget Sound in the Pacific Northwest to the commuter ferries that let people travel to and from their Manhattan workplaces in New York City, these small ships use coastal waters to get Americans where they need to go. Now, a city in Georgia is launching America’s first ferries powered by waterjet propulsion

Chatham Area Transit in Savannah, Georgia, worked with Marine Jet Power and Derecktor Shipyards New York to commission and launch the United States’ first ferries powered by waterjet propulsion. Waterjet propulsion is relatively straightforward; a pump unit on the bottom of the vessel pulls water in, and the force from pushing the water back out is enough to propel the ship forward. 

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While other ships have used this technology in American waters, the Juliette Gordon Low II and Susie King Taylor II mark the first use of propulsion on commuter ferries. Each 65-foot ship is equipped with waterjets and a serial hybrid propulsion system. The ferries were christened in New York, and Chatham Area Transit expects them to operate in Savannah early this year.

The ridership numbers for Chatham Area Transit are not publicly broken down by mode of transportation (ferry versus bus, for example). However, the transit authority has stated that it sees roughly 4 million passenger trips annually. Ferry routes in Savannah connect City Hall Landing, the Savannah Convention Center, and the Waving Girl Landing. Each ferry has a capacity of 149 passengers.  

“Chatham Area Transit faced specific operational challenges, including frequent docking and varying currents. Waterjets, with their inherent maneuverability and seamless integration with hybrid-electric systems, provided the perfect answer,” remarked Kevin Kirby, president and regional director of Marine Jet Power Americas.

>>>READ: How Technology Can Make Hydropower More Efficient 

These ferries are unlikely to be entirely powered by waterjet propulsion technology. The ships also have diesel engines they can use for power. However, they also have a lithium-ion battery to capture the power generated by the waterjets, making them a more environmentally friendly option than a traditional ferry. By relying on power generated by propulsion, the boat will reduce its carbon emissions while reducing the marine sound pollution typical of a diesel engine

These hybrid ferries will also likely reduce operational costs by making the ferry routes more energy-efficient. According to marine energy company Wärtsilä, hybrid ships can lower fuel consumption by 15 to 25 percent compared to equivalent diesel-powered vessels. Chatham Area Transit’s Fiscal Year 2024 budget for marine expenditures was more than $1.36 million. Considering the transit authority receives funding from state and federal agencies, reducing operating costs could save taxpayers money even if fares do not increase. 

“Investing in hybrid ferry technology is not just about improving our transit services—it’s about setting a precedent for sustainable innovation,” said Deidrick Cody, Chatham Area Transit Board of Directors chairman. “The Susie King Taylor II and Juliette Gordon Low II ferries are a testament to our commitment to a greener, more connected future for all.”

If these ferries successfully lower the environmental impacts of moving Savannah’s commuters and tourists at cost-competitive prices, we should expect to see hybrid ferries deployed across other ferry routes in the coming years. 

President Donald Trump ordered the creation of a White House council focused on steering the US toward “energy dominance,” with the promise of action as soon as next week. 

“We have more energy than any other country, and now we are unleashing it,” Trump said Friday in the Oval Office as he signed an executive order commissioning the panel. “I call it liquid gold under our feet — and we’re going to utilize it.”

The new National Energy Dominance Council will be led by Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, with Energy Secretary Chris Wright as its vice-chair. The panel is meant to shape energy policy across the federal government and help mobilize the permitting, production and distribution of oil, gas, electricity and other resources.

Read more in Bloomberg here.

The U.S. paper and pulp industry is lobbying President Donald Trump’s administration to ask the EU to declare the United States deforestation-free, a step that could make it easier for exporters to meet the bloc’s new environmental rules.

From December, the European Union’s anti-deforestation policy will ban imports of commodities linked to forest destruction. Brussels already delayed the policy’s launch by a year following complaints from trade partners including Brazil, Indonesia and the Biden administration in the United States.

“A delay does not solve our concerns with the regulation’s complex requirements and significant technical barriers,” Heidi Brock, CEO of the American Forest and Paper Association (AF&PA), told Reuters, saying the EU law would impose “costly and unnecessary obligations” on U.S. companies.

“We are urging President Trump and his trade advisors to include this on the list of items to negotiate with the European Union to ensure the U.S. is recognised as a country that wisely manages its forest resources and must be recognised as not contributing to deforestation,” Brock said in emailed comments.

Read more in Reuters here.

The electric grid has been described as the world’s largest machine. I’d like for you to take a moment to consider the generation and delivery of an electron to your home or business and how incredible today’s electric grid truly is.

An electron is created by heat, inversion or friction at a power plant. That electron takes what looks like an impossible journey, sometimes across hundreds of miles of transmission lines, to a substation, then to a distribution line, then to your home or business. Finally, that electron helps power a smart device, a heater, a hair dryer or a child’s nightlight.

Ultimately, that’s the business of electricity. And while electrons haven’t changed, everything else in the electric industry is evolving. Twenty-five years ago, we generated power almost exclusively with coal, natural gas or nuclear fission; now we use wind turbines, solar panels and release stored electricity from batteries.

Read more in RealClearEnergy here.

Renewable energy generation is surging across many of the country’s red-leaning states, positioning some to outpace their bluer peers in a national drive toward grid decarbonization.

Their emerging leadership in the area in some ways defies the political battle lines that have been drawn on energy in recent years. On the federal level, Democrats have been the primary champions of renewable energy development, while Republicans have been more skeptical of efforts to bolster the sector — if not outright opposed to it. President Trump, for his part, has made moves to claw back clean-energy investments implemented under the Biden administration and suggested he will pursue “a policy where no windmills are being built.”

But even as Republican-led states have demonstrated a similar antipathy toward the kind of climate-driven policies embraced by many of their more Democratic counterparts, a number of them have fast grown into hubs of wind and solar power production.

Renewable markets have emerged “even in places where talking about climate change may be untenable,” Sarah Mills, director of the University of Michigan’s Center for EmPowering Communities, told The Hill.

Read more in The Hill here.

U.S. senators reintroduced a bipartisan bill on Thursday that would allow nationwide sales of gasoline with a higher blend of ethanol year-round, a plan that has the support of a leading oil trade group.

Senator Deb Fischer, a Republican from Nebraska, introduced the bill with senators including Tammy Duckworth, a Democrat from Illinois, and said it would do away with patchwork regulations that would have the blend containing 15% ethanol, known as E15, only available in certain areas of the U.S.

Read more in Reuters here.

A coalition of Texas energy and industrial organizations urged the new head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to swiftly grant the state primacy over carbon capture and storage (CCS) permitting.  

The groups argue that this shift would stimulate private investment and accelerate the deployment of carbon capture technology.

In a letter to EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, six organizations, including the Texas Oil and Gas Association and the Texas Association of Manufacturers, requested expedited approval of Texas’s application for primacy.  

Read more in Carbon Herald here.

President Donald J. Trump recently announced tariffs on imports, which will cover energy commodities like oil and gas to a certain extent. At a glance, this policy may appear to advance “energy independence,” an agenda Trump favored on the campaign trail—but it’s not quite so simple. Defenders of tariffs on energy would point out that they will reduce energy imports and that retaliatory tariffs will reduce demand for U.S. energy exports, thereby making the United States more “energy independent.” But the problem is that policies that seem to advance energy independence objectives can, ironically, make our energy access less secure.

A more careful analysis of the issue reveals an inherent tension between “energy independence” and “energy security,” terms that politicians often use interchangeably although they are not the same.

Read more from R Street here.

Today, U.S. Senator Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), Chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee, led a hearing on advancing carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration (CCUS) technologies, and examining the implementation of the Utilizing Significant Emissions with Innovative Technologies Act or USE IT Act.

During the hearing, Chairman Capito questioned Kevin Connors, Assistant Director for Regulatory Compliance and Energy Policy at the Energy and Environmental Research Center; Dan Yates, Executive Director of the Ground Water Protection Council; and Jack Andreasen Cavanaugh, Manager of Carbon Management, U.S. Policy and Advocacy at Breakthrough Energy. In her questions, Chairman Capito asked about the pace of USE IT Act implementation, how to improve the permitting process for CCUS projects, and the importance of bipartisanship in these efforts. 

Read more from the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works here.

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