This brief report, based on work done by the Terra Praxis team since 2018, summarizes analysis of the risks to the clean energy transition in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and Japan, and outlines the immediate risks that must be anticipated and mitigated to ensure progress toward a Net Zero future. It also sets out how, by diversifying the portfolio of emissions-free technologies, aligning targets with feasibility analysis, and implementing risk-informed strategies, we can mitigate the key risks and help drive a successful transition.
The Terra Praxis ‘Repowering Coal’ system is a fast, low-cost repeatable strategy to repower hundreds of existing coal plants that would otherwise continue to burn coal, and whose closure is likely to encounter fierce political resistance and cause economic harm to communities. This initiative is designed for radical cost reduction to enable production of reliable, competitive, clean energy, rapidly repowering the 2TW global coal fleet and cutting carbon emissions by 40%. The repowering system transforms coal plants into flexible clean generators, making them better partners for renewables on the grid. This paper describes a fast, low-cost, and repeatable strategy to repower hundreds of existing coal plants that would otherwise continue to burn coal, or whose closure would cause economic harm to communities.
Widespread impacts from climate change are already here. Our actions in this critical decade will determine the full extent of future impacts on our children and grandchildren. In our 2022 Annual Review, you will see how, with our world-class sustainability partners, Terra Praxis is the only entity designing a scalable, rapid repowering system to decarbonize the entire global coal fleet by 2050. This is how we plan to eliminate one-third of global carbon emissions and provide a method for supplying affordable, reliable, and emissions-free energy to billions of people.
In September 2020, Terra Praxis and LucidCatalyst published the Missing Link to a Livable Climate report. This brief contains its main findings, key messages, and interesting facts on how we can still meet the Paris Goals with proven, ready technology and with no major investments.
Climate change is an energy problem. We only have 28 years to replace fossil fuels and double our overall energy supply. Our programs could accelerate the reduction of global carbon emissions by repurposing trillions of dollars of existing infrastructure to supply clean, affordable, and reliable energy to billions of people. As you reflect on our 2021 Annual Review, we hope you will be as energized as we are by our success in mobilizing a broad coalition of public and private sector leaders and building momentum for innovative climate solutions.
Our report shows that it’s not too late to still meet the Paris goals — but only if we are prepared to make major investments in clean hydrogen production. There is simply no other way to make the numbers add up — this truly is the missing link we need to maintain a livable climate on this planet.
This excellent report skilfully shows how nuclear energy helps meet all 17 of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. No other electricity generation technology can match this diversity of beneficial impacts... The NNWI strongly endorses “Beautiful Nuclear: Driving Deep Decarbonisation”. - Tim Yeo, Chair, The New Nuclear Watch Institute and former Chair of the UK Environment Select Committee
Terra Praxis staff have worked on the following publications through their affiliations with other organisations.
In this article, Belá gives an insightful brief on the important issue of land constraints for clean technology rollout. He makes an emphasis on the fact that If not addressed, this constraint -among others- will put the clean energy transition at risk.
This new National Academies’ report discusses how the US could support the successful commercialization of advanced nuclear reactors with near-term actions to establish policies and practices. Kirsty Gogan is a member of the Committee responsible for this report.
2023In what is probably the most comprehensive recent multinational survey of public attitudes to nuclear energy, the authors find strong public support for advanced nuclear technologies and what they can bring. This report describes a rigorous and objective study, the perceptions and misperceptions people share, and the top ten findings, which collectively lead to the conclusion that “the world wants new nuclear.” Terra Praxis was on the study Advisory Committee.
With nearly a quarter of the U.S. coal-fired fleet scheduled to retire by 2029, replacing retiring coal power plants with advanced nuclear, specifically small modular reactors (SMR), has been put forth as a strategy to maintain local employment and economic opportunities for existing energy workers and communities, while simultaneously pursuing national climate goals.
US climate change not-for-profit TerraPraxis has proposed repowering 5,000 to 7,000 coal plants globally with SMRs between 2030 and 2050. Whether replacing coal in power plants or supplying industrial processes, SMR reactors have the potential to be installed in a packaged fashion based on standardized designs and processes. This should mean they can be deployed more quickly and with greater certainty over the likes of outcomes, costs and regulatory approvals than nuclear power has to date.
Repowering coal plant infrastructure with clean heat sources such as nuclear and geothermal energy is crucial if we want to reach the Paris Goals of Net Zero by 2050. Luckily, several colleagues and organzations are now doing very through analysis to turn this into a reality. This article, written by our colleagues from QuantifiedCarbon (QCL) proposes and analyzes a solution that will enable the flexibility of electricity production of new nuclear energy while avoiding the stranding of existing fossil fuel assets and local job losses.
This white paper by EPRI sheds light on the benefits to repowering coal plants into clean energy generators. Repowering offers many advantages, including the potential to reuse existing site infrastructure, operating and environmental permits, equipment, facilities, and water usage for future clean power generation and energy storage facilities. It can also provide social and economic benefits to the surrounding community through retention of jobs and tax base.
The NICE Future initiative published a digest which showcases examples of leading nuclear produced hydrogen initiatives which can be used to power hard-to-electrify sectors such as transport and heavy industry. Eric Ingersoll and Kirsty Gogan were honoured to contribute both a Foreword and a chapter.
Read this if you want to get a quick and realistic understanding of how SMRs could be a game-changer. This new report from the IAEA, available as a pre-print, is the secretariats' view on SMRs. It talks about three major areas (1) Understanding SMRs (2) What will it take to make SMRs a success and (3) What's next for SMRs. The last chapter provides a comprehensive list of IAEA activities to support the SMR deployment.
This DOE study estimates potential savings for coal plant owners, and benefits for regions: “To replace a large coal plant, nuclear overnight costs of capital could decrease by 15%-35% when compared to greenfield construction, through the reuse of infrastructure. This aligns with TerraPraxis estimates: “Converting plants to run on AMRs will deliver capital cost saving of 28%-35% (compared with new nuclear plant) and 9%-28% reduction in levelized cost of energy.” (WNN, 2022a). This is also consistent with analysis based on Kairos Power SMR design (Bartela et al., 2021), and C2N#3 approach.
IEA's report examines how nuclear energy can help address the crises of energy and climate. The study team acknowledges benefitting from TerraPraxis' work: “the replacement of coal-fired plants with SMRs, such as that of TerraPraxis which aims to prepare standardised and pre-licensed designs supported by automated project development and design tools.” “In today’s context of global energy crisis, skyrocketing fossil fuel prices, energy security challenges, and ambitious climate commitments, I believe nuclear power has a unique opportunity to stage a comeback,” said IEA's head Fatih Birol.
IAEA Director General and leading experts discuss current issues in nuclear energy in this new book by the IAEA. Our Missing Link report (Missing Link to a Livable Climate: How Hydrogen-Enabled Synthetic Fuels Can Help Deliver Paris Goals) is referenced and discussed in Chapter 6 "The Challenge of Climate Change—Complete Energy Transformation: No Nuclear, No Net Zero," by Tim Stone, and also in Chapter 13 "The Humanitarian Atom: The Role of Nuclear Power in Addressing the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals," by Sam Bilbao Y Leon and John Lindberg.
TerraPraxis informs a report published by Clean Air Task Force & Environmental Defense Fund.
TerraPraxis informs a report published by LucidCatalyst & ClearPath. TerraPraxis colleagues John Herter and Ian Woodhouse conducted transmission and interconnection queue analysis for this report.
Policymakers of many countries, even those that have taken a more passive approach toward decarbonization, have started to define the dates by which their countries will completely abandon coal as an energy source. On 25 September 2020 Poland decided that it will close its coal plants by 2049, exploring viable techno-economic solutions that meet this policy objective is key to achieving its goals and mission. This paper by our colleagues from QuantifiedCarbon (QCL) studied the retrofit decarbonization of coal units using a low-carbon heat source to an existing brownfield coal site.