WORLD’S FIRST STEADY-STATE NUCLEAR FUSION REACTOR? A Japanese startup has announced plans to build the world’s first nuclear fusion reactor that can produce power for an unlimited amount of time, Nancy reports .
The firm, Helical Fusion, said it aims to launch in 2034 and begin commercial operations in the decade after.
CEO Takaya Taguchi told Reuters that the startup intends to build a “pilot reactor” that will have a generation capacity of 50-100 megawatts.
The startup is meant to capitalize on the Japanese government’s investment of 400 billion yen, or $2.8 billion, into research at the National Institute for Fusion Science.
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ICYMI – HARRIS COMMENTS ON FRACKING: Vice President Kamala Harris was pressed on her stance on fracking in the CNN interview aired yesterday.
Interviewer Dana Bash asked if Harris stood by her 2019 statement in favor of banning fracking. Harris said that she does not want to impose a fracking ban.
Pressed to explain the change in position, Harris said that the implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act shows that the “clear crisis” of climate change can be addressed without banning fracking.
Asked once more if she had seen specific policy ideas or data that changed her mind about fracking, Harris said, “We can grow and we can increase a thriving clean energy economy without banning fracking.”
48E GETS AN EXPANSION: The Treasury Department released guidance to expand a tax credit meant to incentivize investment in clean energy projects placed in low-income communities.
The deets: The department’s proposed rules for the Clean Electricity Low-Income Communities Bonus Credit Program – known as 48E(h) within the tax code – would expand the already existing tax credit to technologies such as hydropower and geothermal energy.
The preceding tax credit, 48(e), is an incentive established under the Inflation Reduction Act meant to drive investment in facilities generating clean electricity. Under this incentive, companies can claim the credit for wind and solar.
The expanded tax credit would allow companies to claim additional funds on top of the original 48e credit. The credit would be allocated at the beginning of 2025, and will provide a 10-20 percentage point boost on top of the 30% boost provided by the original tax credit.
Why it’s important: This is one of the many environmental justice efforts within the IRA to allocate subsidies to lower-income and marginalized communities.
THE FASTEST GROWING ENERGY JOB: Wind turbine service technician is the fastest growing career in the country, with a concentration of the jobs in the Dakotas and Colorado, Axios reports.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics projects 60% job growth in the field between 2023 to 2033. North Dakota, South Dakota, and Colorado have the most wind energy jobs per 10,000 residents as of last year. Texas, however, still reigns supreme when it comes to the total of wind jobs overall, coming in with nearly 27,400.
Why this is notable: While the job sector for wind is still relatively small (11,400 jobs nationwide in 2023), the renewables industry is growing amid swaths of federal investment being poured in – seemingly creating stability in an otherwise turbulent economy.
Zoom in: While it’s no surprise that the largest energy state of the U.S. has the highest number of wind energy jobs, Illinois came in at second highest with approximately 9,400 jobs. More on that here.
META LEAVING FRONTIER CARBON REMOVAL PURCHASE GROUP: Meta is leaving the carbon removal advance purchase group Frontier and will instead focus on its own direct financing of efforts to pull emissions out of the air, Axios reports .
The social media giant said that as “our program has evolved and, after discussing with other founding members, we have decided we would like to source our own carbon removal deals.”
Frontier told Axios that it is already on pace for $1 billion in purchases for carbon removal by 2030, and Meta’s departure won’t affect that. Its coalition includes a number of big companies, including Stripe, Alphabet, and Salesforce. Another member, JPMorgan Chase, has also pursued major advance purchase commitments for carbon removal on its own .
BIDEN ADMINISTRATION AWARDS $62 MILLION FOR HYDROGEN TECH PROJECTS: The Department of Energy announced today that it is awarding $62 million for 20 projects across 15 states to boost the research, development, and deployment of clean hydrogen technologies.
Most of the funding, $40 million, will go to four projects geared toward developing a “hydrogen fueling station of the future” that can service commercial trucks.
Another award will go to efforts to develop components for hydrogen fueling for trucks. A third will help the Port of Oakland develop a hydrogen fuel cell “top loader” for containers and a mobile refueler.
ADMINISTRATION CONSIDERS PRICE FLOOR FOR CRITICAL MINERALS: Biden administration officials are considering setting a price floor for critical minerals in order to counter Chinese oversupply, Politico reports .
An official in the Department of Energy’s Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains Office told the publication that the policy would protect efforts by the administration to develop domestic supplies of lithium, nickel and other minerals in the face of falling prices driven by cheap imports from China.
Such a measure would dovetail with other administration efforts to counter what they describe as intentional efforts by the Chinese government to try to dominate key industries with subsidies and other aid for exporters.
ONE TO WATCH – REGULATOR FINDS BANKS HAVE WORK TO DO ON CLIMATE RISKS: The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, which regulates nationally chartered banks, has found that some major banks have significant work to do in identifying and managing financial risks posed by climate change, Reuters reports , citing people familiar with the agency’s actions.
The findings stem from a review conducted last year, and were shared in letters sent to the banks in recent days.
Why this matters: President Joe Biden signed an executive order on climate financial risk early in his tenure, and the top banking agencies have moved toward implementing various rules and actions meant to calculate and address such risks. Republicans, though, have argued that the efforts amount to backdoor climate policy-making via the financial system.
RUNDOWN
E&E News Oil, gas allies welcome Harris fracking stance — with an asterisk
Bloomberg How Japan Ignored Climate Critics and Built a Global Natural Gas Empire
The Wall Street Journal An Oil Giant Is Spending $100 Million to Preserve U.S. Forests
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