Energy Secretary Perry’s Electric Resiliency Rule Could Be a Big Win for Nuclear and the Climate

Recently, Energy Secretary Rick Perry proposed that the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) issue a rule requiring payments to nuclear and coal power plants to maintain a resilient electrical grid.

The Trump administration can’t say it, but Environmental Progress can:  the rule could be a huge win for the climate.

The reason is because while the rule would keep nuclear plants producing power, it wouldn’t necessarily do the same for coal plants.  If implemented properly, the rule could result in a system of “cold standby” for coal plants — ready to run in case of an emergency, but otherwise not producing power (or pollution).

Nuclear plants are cheaper to operate than coal plants.  As such, under this rule, nuclear plants would likely be favored ahead of both coal and natural gas plants.

Another reason the rule would likely benefit nuclear over coal is because it would require nuclear and coal plants to keep three months or more of fuel on-site.

Nuclear fuel is over one million times more “energy dense” than coal, and so it’s easy for nuclear plants to keep several years worth of fuel on-site.  By contrast, most coal plants keep just one month’s worth of coal on site, because of the high cost of storing so much energy-dilute fuel.

Of course, there are still big questions about how all of this will work in practice.

Read more at Energy Secretary Perry’s Electric Resiliency Rule Could Be a Big Win for Nuclear and the Climate