Bills Planned for Vote in Congress to Expand Use of Nuclear Energy

WASHINGTON – The U.S. House and Senate considered proposals Tuesday that would expand production of nuclear energy at a time global warming is leaving few alternatives.
Lawmakers, scheduled to vote as soon as this week on one of the bills, made clear they don’t want to deal with the health and safety risks of nuclear energy.
However, as the world emerges from one of the warmest winters on record and more expected in coming years, they say they can no longer delay weaning the U.S. off fossil fuels.
New technologies have made nuclear energy safer and more efficient, according to congressmen and witnesses at a hearing of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.
“Global energy demand is predicted to grow by at least 30 percent by 2035,” U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., the committee chairman, wrote in a memo accompanying the hearing. “Currently, 81 percent of the world’s energy and two-thirds of the world’s electricity comes from fossil fuels.”
Nuclear energy produces no greenhouse gases, which creates “the potential to decarbonize the power sector more affordably,” wrote Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat.
Expert witnesses at the hearing said the latest technology for nuclear reactors has significantly reduced hazards that created disastrous meltdowns at Chernobyl in Russia in 1986 and Fukushima in Japan in 2011.
“The question of nuclear safety and the risk of potential radiation releases will likely remain highly controversial,” Armond Cohen, executive director of the Clean Air Task Force, said in his testimony.
Renewable energies like solar, wind and geothermal are making steady progress to replace polluting fossil fuels, he said.
“And finally, we have America’s largest zero carbon source of electricity, nuclear energy, providing 20 percent of total power consumption,” he said. “The question for this hearing is whether nuclear energy can play a significant role in a future zero carbon economy. The evidence suggests it can, but there are many challenges to address, just as there are with all other zero carbon energy sources.”
Existing U.S. nuclear power plants use reactors cooled by ordinary water, similar to the kind linked to previous disasters, according to background information from the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Nuclear power reactor designers are developing reactors cooled by other chemicals, such as liquid metal and molten salt, that reduce meltdown risks and leave less radioactive waste.
They also are developing small modular reactors cooled by water that present a minimal risk of meltdown. They could be built quickly at relatively low cost in factories, then moved underground or to sites that now lack access to nuclear energy.
Proposals to expand development of the latest nuclear energy reactors are contained in pending House and Senate bills.
A leading bill is the American Energy Innovation Act, S. 2657, which is being debated in the Senate this week. Proposals in the House are similar.
Both the House and Senate bills seek to boost energy efficiency through energy storage, advanced nuclear systems and carbon capture. They also promote emission reductions for transportation vehicles and industrial sites.
The Trump administration has indicated the president would sign the legislation if it passes while still embodying his goals of using more nuclear energy for the nation’s electrical grid.
The move this week in Congress to expand nuclear energy production follows a new scientific study published in the journal Nature that shows oil and gas production is contributing more to global warming than previously believed.
The study showed that methane is produced at a rate 25 percent to 40 percent higher during oil and gas production than demonstrated by previous research. Methane is the second in amount to carbon dioxide emissions as a greenhouse gas but retains more heat from the sun.
In The News
Health
Voting
Energy

Although 2020 was an economically woeful year due to the coronavirus pandemic, a joint report by BloombergNEF and the Business Council for Sustainable Energy indicates renewable energy sources made record contributions to the country’s power grid. The annual report, called the Sustainable Energy in America Factbook,... Read More

A ruling by Britain's top court last week that said Royal Dutch Shell oil company could be liable in English courts for pollution by its subsidiary in Nigeria, is likely to expand the company’s potential liability abroad. The court’s decision also creates a likelihood of liability... Read More

AUSTIN, Texas — Rolling blackouts caused by an unprecedented winter storm have delayed the delivery of hundreds of thousands of doses of COVID-19 vaccinations across Texas, state health officials said Tuesday. Texas was set to receive 407,650 first doses and 333,650 second doses of COVID-19 vaccines... Read More

The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management on Friday cancelled an oil and gas exploration lease sale for a sizable swath of the Gulf of Mexico. Lease Sale 257, which was scheduled to be live-streamed from New Orleans on March 17, would have been the eighth offshore... Read More

WASHINGTON – Joe Biden is adding two new members to his energy and jobs team: David Turk, deputy secretary of Energy and Julie Su, deputy secretary of Labor. They will support the work of Secretary of Energy nominee Jennifer Granholm and Secretary of Labor nominee Marty... Read More

WASHINGTON — Each year the Energy Information Administration, a statistical and analytical agency within the Department of Energy, releases its annual Energy Outlook which provides updated projections of U.S. energy markets. Releasing its 2021 report with a virtual discussion at the non-profit Bipartisan Policy Center last... Read More