A ‘new clear’ path for nuclear energy? ⚛️⚡🪫
Decades after reactor disasters at Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and Fukushima, Americans' appetite for nuclear power is now on the upswing, according to recent polling from the Pew Center and Gallup.
The interest is being fueled in part by tech companies that are hungry for electricity to fuel data centers. Small, modular reactors are also seen as an attractive option because they can be deployed faster than traditional power plants.
And both the Trump and Biden presidential administrations have pushed policies aimed at encouraging new nuclear generation.
"Whether you're looking from the federal level or the state level … I think there are a lot of people that see the potential that new nuclear can provide, that other generation sources can't," said Kristy Hartman, a spokesperson for the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry trade group.
About a quarter of New England's electricity comes from nuclear reactors in New Hampshire and Connecticut.
But Jamie Dickerson, senior director of climate and clean energy programs at the Acadia Center, doubts nuclear power will make further significant inroads in the region.
"Most of the modeling that we have reviewed largely suggests a future where solar, wind and batteries are really dominating the generating resource mix well into the future," Dickerson said.
Nuclear plants are incredibly costly and take years to get approved and constructed. And Jack Shapiro from the Natural Resources Council of Maine said new reactors have a track record of construction delays and massive cost overruns.
"Building new nuclear will not occur in time to meaningfully contribute to emissions reductions, while renewables are being rapidly deployed today," Shapiro said in testimony to the Maine Legislature this winter.
According to Hartman, the payoff is worth it — enormous amounts of electric power made without climate-warming pollution and available at any time of day, unlike solar, for instance.
That prospect could be attractive to states like Maine, with goals to use 100% clean energy in the near future. Janet Mills recently signed a bill into law that moves up the timeline for Maine to reach its renewable energy goals — to 2040.
“They are not going to reach the finish line with just the renewables that they originally set," Hartman said.
Maine lawmakers recently rejected two bills aimed at smoothing the way for nuclear generation. A third bill, to request informational bids for small modular reactors, was carried over for more debate next year.
Maine doesn’t have any active nuclear power plants. But at one point, Maine Yankee, a former nuclear power plant in Wiscasset, generated roughly 30% of the state’s power — the largest source of electricity in the state.
Surrounded by trees and fields, the remains of the plant are protected by a tall chain link fence topped with razor wire and a checkpoint manned by armed guards.
Don Hudson remembers when it opened in 1972. Twenty-four years later, safety concerns and expensive repairs shuttered Maine Yankee. Hudson now chairs the community advisory panel group, established first to help decommission the plant, and now to advocate for the removal of 540 tons of spent nuclear fuel still stored at the site.
"If we're going to use nuclear power from here into the future, we need to resolve this issue with high level radioactive waste," Hudson said.
It costs about $10 million a year to store the waste at Maine Yankee. And under current rules the material will have to remain secure for the next 10,000 years — possibly longer.
And without a national strategy to manage spent fuel, Hudson’s not convinced new reactors are a solution for future electric demand.
"This is a serious issue and, frankly, if it doesn't get resolved soon people should stop talking about nuclear power 2.0," Hudson said. "It just doesn't make any sense.”
Food and Water Watch goes one step further, calling nuclear power “a hazardous distraction from renewables like solar and wind,” in a recent article.
“A nuclear build-out will distract from the development of real renewables, like solar and wind, which have already proven cheaper, safer, and much less hazardous than nuclear,” writes the environmental advocacy group.
Project Drawdown, an international organization of scientists and researchers that evaluates and ranks the most effective climate solutions, puts it even more simply in their evaluation of whether small nuclear reactors are a viable climate change solution: “Is it plausible? Yes. Is it ready? No.”
~ Reporting by Peter McGuire. Listen to the full story here.
New data show Caribou, Bangor among fastest-warming locations in nation
A climatologist with NOAA's regional climate center says cooler places are warming faster than areas that are already warm, largely due to the lack of snowpack that insulates the ground from the sun's rays.
Record year for Maine's piping plovers
Maine’s piping plovers are having their best year on record, according to the latest census of the endangered shore birds. But despite a rebounding population, the tiny birds aren't out of the woods.
Maine Big Night director gives amphibians a B+ for their spring migration
How many, and what kinds of amphibians crossed the road? And how well did they survive the annual spring migration?
Shark notification flags are out after two recent sightings near Harpswell
Beachgoers reported two great white shark sightings east of Bailey Island earlier last week. Anyone who sees a shark is being encouraged to call the Cumberland County Regional Communications Center.
Hydropower storage project proposed in Western Maine
Hydropower storage works by shifting water through turbines between two large reservoirs. It's a technology with a long track record in the U.S. and across the world.
Golden, lobstermen call on Congress to extend right whale regulatory moratorium until 2035
Last summer, the state of Maine started conducting its own research to study the presence of right whales in the Gulf of Maine. State officials have said they want their data, which takes some time to put together, to inform the federal government's new regulations.
Maine joins lawsuit to restore FEMA funding
The state lost money for 18 projects when the Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities program was canceled this year, according to the Maine Emergency Management Agency.
$6,000 reward offered over introduction of largemouth bass to West Musquash Lake
Last week, Maine Inland Fisheries and Wildlife biologists confirmed the presence of the invasive species Washington County. The fish species is not native to the state.
Central Maine Power plans multi-year investment to improve storm preparedness
Electric customers will shoulder the costs, but CMP spokesperson Jon Breed said they're already paying for extreme weather through tens of millions of dollars in storm recovery charges.
Violent storms damage homes, business, power lines in southern Maine
Violent thunderstorms tore roofs off of buildings and brought trees down on power lines, homes, and even a motorist.
Speaking of energy, we’re reaching the part of summer when energy demand will start to peak: long, hot days when more households are running their AC or heat pump cooling features than at other times throughout the year.
Peak reduction, or demand response, is the practice of reducing energy consumption during times when use is highest. Some energy companies will ask users to do this in various ways, like turning up the thermostat during key hours.
And some ratepayers, like the activists with the New England group No Coal, No Gas, are organizing “peakbusting” get-togethers, with the goal of reducing energy usage and, in turn, reliance on “peaker plants.”
ISO New England relies on peaker plants to produce additional energy during times when electricity demand is highest. These plants, which run on fossil fuels like natural gas and oil, are used to stabilize the grid — although in recent years, solar is really helping at peak times, too. They’re only turned on during peak times, standing by the rest of the year.
Whether or not you’re embracing your inner activist, there are lessons to be learned from the peakbusters, and from demand response measures in hotter states:
Keep it running
It may seem counterintuitive, but if you’re going to use it, it’s best to keep the air conditioning on, rather than turning it on and off to save power. That’s because cooling down a hot room is much more work for the machine, requiring more power, than simply maintaining a temperature. Setting the temp higher (the Department of Energy says between 75 to 78) and keeping it continually going is going to be your best bet.
Choose a few rooms
Rather than keeping the whole house cool all day, choose a couple of rooms (the kitchen, the home office) you’ll be spending time in, and keep those cool with fans, the AC, curtains — whatever the strategy may be. Stick to that part of the house, then cool the rest after the sun goes down.
Run appliances at night
On hot days when you can reasonably guess the grid is straining to keep everyone’s AC running, try to use other household appliances (especially those that are heat-generating) at off-peak times, like later at night or early morning. This could mean dishwashers, laundry machines and dryers, ovens and the like.
Does pre-cooling work?
The idea is to get your house so cool in the morning that it’ll stay that way all day, usually by blasting AC earlier in the day (though in Maine, the same could probably be achieved by filling the house with cool night air overnight and then closing all the shades and windows in the morning). Some people swear by pre-cooling, but it’s definitely not a simple solution — and whether it’s officially recommended varies by state (Arizona is pro, Georgia is against). Experts say it will only work in extremely well-sealed homes. In Arizona, the utility companies recommend turning the thermostat down to 60 in the morning, then dialing the AC way back to 78 during peak demand 2-8 p.m. For Mainers, this likely isn’t necessary — but the point is to start thinking about those peak hours and factoring them in.
Embrace the communal
When the heat is on, so are the air conditioners. But, we can crowd-source cool! Host a pot luck with friends on a hot summer day so you can all gather in one person’s air conditioning. Or, hit up a local movie theater, library or mall to cash in on someone else’s AC.
See you next time,
Molly
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