The Quad Report

By Henry Sokolski For decades, the Defense Department made little or no connection between China’s civilian nuclear power program and its military nuclear weapons buildup. No longer. With its latest annual assessment of China’s military power, the Pentagon identifies Beijing’s civilian fast reactor and plutonium reprocessing efforts as being ideal for producing significant quantities of… More Guest Commentary: Chinese Nuclear Weapons and Canada: An Uncivil-Military Connection

As winter approaches, vulnerable Texas dithers and grumbles. Weather resilience is important in the Lone Star State, where intense summer heat and deep winter freezes have often crippled the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), the state-wide, autarkic electric grid. Winter Storm Uri in February 2021 caused many of dollars in economic damage and over… More Is Texas Ready for Winter?

Richmond, Virginia-based Dominion Energy, seeking to improve its winter reliability, is planning to go into the liquified natural gas business in the Old Dominion. Dominion Energy Virginia (still technically operating under its original moniker, Virginia Electric and Power Co.) is planning an LNG production, storage, and regasification facility serving two of its large gas-fired power… More Onsite LNG at Gas Power Plants?

A major coal strip mine in Montana has suffered two recent legal blows. The Montana Supreme Court Monday (Nov. 27) halted expansion of Denver-based Westmoreland Mining’s Rosebud mine, which supplies the two-unit, 1,480-MW Colstrip coal-fired power plant. Three days earlier, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco rejected a Westmoreland appeal of… More Montana Coal Mine Suffers Two Big Legal Defeats

Small modular nuclear reactor developer NuScale Power, rocked by collapse of its only project and hammered by a freefall in its share prices, is facing another major threat. Boston-based law firm Block & Leviton announced Monday (Nov. 27) that it has filed a “class-action shareholder lawsuit in federal court, alleging the company ‘made materially false… More NuScale Investor Lawsuit: Small Reactors, Big Problems

The annual international greenwashing lollapalooza, COP28, kicks off in Dubai tomorrow. That’s Dubai, one of the United Arab Emirates, a leading oil and gas producer. Indeed, the UAE holds the world’s sixth largest natural gas reserves and the seventh largest oil reserves. So a major fossil energy power will be hosting COP28, the 28th meeting… More Commentary: Defund the COPs

The California Public Utilities Commission has approved a plan for Pacific Gas & Electric to bury some 1,230 miles of high-voltage electric transmission lines and use covered conductors on another 778 miles over the next four years at a cost of $4.78 billion. The San Francisco-based utility had proposed to bury 2,000 miles of transmission… More Electric Utility Merry-Go-Round: PG&E, Consumers, NYISO, AEP

Another small advanced reactor has seen a major contract in jeopardy, casting more doubt on the prospects for the highly-touted future of small modular nuclear reactors. The online news service Alaska Beacon reports that the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) has revoked an August Air Force preliminary decision to install an experimental Oklo micro reactor at… More Oklo-Air Force SMR Preliminary Contract Revoked

Hoping to give a kick to greater solar generation, electric storage, and electric transmission, the Biden administration’s Department of Energy last Thursday (Nov. 16) proposed new and streamlined “categorical exclusions” to required environmental reviews mandated by the National Environmental Policy Act. On Friday (Nov. 17) the Treasury Department and its Internal Revenue Service announced liberalized… More Two Biden Moves to Aid Renewables

Loading up consumers’ electricity bills with socially desirable but costly items, as California and other states are wont to do, has unanticipated and undesirable consequences, says prominent energy economist Severin Borenstein of Berkeley’s Energy Institute at Haas. In a recent blog, he says that “the problem is that the electricity price you face – if… More Hass’s Borenstein Pans California Electric Rate Plan