A Preview of Graham-Kerry-Lieberman

Some news about the climate change legislation being developed by Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) emerged from meetings they had with industry representatives.

According to several sources in the meeting room, the bill will call for greenhouse gas curbs across multiple economic sectors, with a target of reducing emissions 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020 and 80 percent by 2050. Power plant emissions would be regulated in 2012, with other major industrial sources phased in starting in 2016.

That’s fairly ambitious and exactly the same amounts as the Waxman-Markey bill that passed the house last summer. The particulars of the bill get a bit of a rehearsal in the story. Not much on nuclear energy, except this:

Overall, the bill will include eight titles: Refining, America's Farmers, Consumer Refunds, Clean Energy Innovation, Coal, Natural Gas, Nuclear and Energy Independence, according to sources.

Normally, we’d wait until the official unveiling of the bill to tell you something about it, but since this has hit the New York Times and mostly been affirmed by Sen. Kerry, it’s worth noting if not yet quite worth discussing. Consider this an early warning – we’ll go over the nuclear title when the legislation is officially unveiled.

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Poland has chosen a site for a new nuclear plant.

The survey identified Zarnowiec, located on the Baltic Sea 40km from Gdansk, as the best location for the first NPP to be built in the country by 2020. This site is near the site of Baltic NPP, which is currently under construction in the Neman district of Kaliningrad.

Poland tried to build a plant here in 1972, but did not finish it. Maybe that’s the site that will house the new reactor.

And why the interest in a new plant?

Nuclear new build will contribute to reducing the country’s reliance on coal, which currently accounts for 90% of Poland’s electricity production. In addition, over the last few years Poland has experienced significant economic growth and electricity consumption is expected to rise by 80%-93% by 2025.

We don’t know where Poland is with carbon capture and sequestration, but the country has determined that a nuclear plant can take over some of the load. And it can.

Quite the toasty buffet offered by this Zarnowiec hotel. For the record, that’s not a nuclear energy plant behind it.