New Nuclear Responsibility

A recent flurry of activity around nuclear energy—driven by an upsurge of interest and incipient investment from technology companies anxious to find enough power for AI—points toward a potential renaissance, both in the United States and around the world. We’ve been here before, of course: nuclear power has experienced similar periods of optimism since its inception in the 1950s. However, especially in the United States, such hopes have been repeatedly crushed under the weight of construction delays and cost overruns, as well as persistent, inherent problems such as safety concerns, long-lived toxic waste, and environmental damages. Evaluating the potential of …

US Power Sector Outlook 2025

Understand opportunities, costs and risks in the energy transition with first-class U.S. power and utility sector data, electricity price forecasts, proprietary power market and regulatory research, and climate analytics.

Identify clean energy opportunities by analyzing thousands of continuously updated active power projects and review past renewable projects in development. Conduct due diligence on PPA procurement using FERC Electric Quarterly Reports (EQR) and data, and our proprietary PPA tracking,

Quantify stranded asset transition risk using our forecast on fossil fuel-fired plant retirements, track and map retrofitting activity of coal and gas plants and evaluate asset operating margins.

Understand power price forecasts, …

Boston Medical Center: New England’s Largest Safety-Net Hospital Installs Energy Storage

A battery storage installation at Boston Medical Center demonstrates how hospitals can integrate energy storage into an efficiency or sustainability program to better manage peak demand and lower costly demand charges. The project is profiled in this case study by Clean Energy Group.

Boston Medical Center (BMC) is the largest and busiest trauma and emergency services center in New England. Over 50% of its patients come from underserved populations. As a safety net hospital, BMC serves all patients who come through its doors, including those without insurance and those who are publicly insured.

In 2022, BMC installed a 572 kW …

Offshore Wind Energy: Actions Needed to Address Gaps in Interior’s Oversight of Development

Offshore wind energy development in the U.S. is expanding. There are active wind farms and construction in the Atlantic and planned development off the Pacific coast and in the Gulf of Mexico. BOEM and BSEE are responsible for permitting and oversight of offshore wind projects. Numerous other federal agencies provide input throughout the process. As of January 2025, BOEM had granted 39 offshore wind leases to commercial developers, but on January 20, 2025, the President issued a memorandum that, among other things, prohibits agencies from new leasing, permits, or approvals for offshore wind projects pending a review of federal wind …

Strengthening Utility Balance Sheets in West Africa

This paper is one of a series of three that aim to help West African utilities and governments and the development financiers that support them – better understand and respond to these issues. The focus in the papers is primarily on utilities with a distribution function (that is, distribution-only utilities, transmission & distribution utilities, or vertically integrated utilities), but examples from other types of utilities (transmission only, generation & transmission) are drawn on when instructive. Though each paper’s approach is tailored to its topic, they share common features. Each paper contains: i) a stocktaking of the scope of the challenge …

Towards Net-Zero Electronics: Unlocking the Power of Energy Efficiency in Manufacturing Facilities

The electronics manufacturing sector is undergoing rapid expansion fueled by global trends such as digitization and automation. As the demand for electronic products soars, the industry’s environmental impact also rises, particularly in terms of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. The electronics industry is responsible for over 4 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Energy efficiency is a vital lever in reducing the sector’s carbon footprint. Leading electronics companies have demonstrated that energy-efficiency measures can result in up to 30 percent energy savings in existing facilities at minimal costs. This presents a significant opportunity for manufacturers to meet their climate …

Techno-Economic Feasibility Analysis of Hydrogen Refueling Stations for Fuel Cell Vehicles

This study presents a comprehensive economic and technological evaluation of renewable hybrid power systems for hydrogen refueling stations (HRS) in Nizwa, Oman, leveraging cutting-edge optimization algorithms to determine the most cost-effective and efficient hybrid energy system configurations. Three hybrid energy systems of photovoltaic-wind turbine-battery (PV-WT-B), photovoltaic-wind-fuel cell-battery (PV-WT-FC-B), and wind turbine-battery (WT-B) were evaluated based on net present cost (NPC), levelized cost of energy (LCOE), and levelized cost of hydrogen (LCOH). The study employs advanced optimization techniques, including the Mayfly Algorithm, Genetic Algorithm, CUKO Search, Gray Wolf Optimizer (GWO), Constrained Particle Swarm Optimization (CPSO), Harmony Search (HS), and Flower Pollination …

Rising Power System Strains Despite Decreasing Heating Demand in a Warming Climate

Electrifying systems like heating is essential for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. France provides a compelling case study due to the high share of electricity used in its buildings sector. Using a heating degree-days methodology alongside a power demand model applied to ten climate model simulations, the authors examine four emission scenarios, assuming the actual electricity mix and use. The results indicate a significant decrease in average power demand, with a slight reduction in peak demand during cold waves, driven by rising winter temperatures. This trend may give the misleading perception of a reduction in grid constraints. However, counterintuitively, the demand …

Summary Report of the 16th Information Exchange Meeting on Actinide and Fission Product Partitioning and Transmutation

Efforts to enhance the safety, sustainability and economic efficiency of nuclear energy are driving international research into advanced nuclear fuel cycles. A key component of these efforts is partitioning and transmutation (P&T), a technology that seeks to reduce the volume, heat generation and long-term radiotoxicity of nuclear waste. By incorporating P&T strategies into advanced fuel cycles, the management of nuclear waste can be optimised, addressing technical, economic and societal challenges.

The 16th Information Exchange Meeting on Actinide and Fission Product Partitioning and Transmutation (16 IEMPT) was held at the NEA headquarters in Boulogne-Billancourt, France, from 24 to 27 October 2023, …

Improving Utility Governance and Management in West Africa