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27–301PDF 2017

S. HRG. 115–111 

DEVELOPING AND DEPLOYING ADVANCED 

CLEAN ENERGY TECHNOLOGIES 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CLEAN AIR 

AND NUCLEAR SAFETY 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON 

ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

UNITED STATES SENATE 

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

JULY 25, 2017 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov 

(II) 

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS 

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming, Chairman 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia 

JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas 

ROGER WICKER, Mississippi 

DEB FISCHER, Nebraska 

JERRY MORAN, Kansas 

MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota 

JONI ERNST, Iowa 

DAN SULLIVAN, Alaska 

RICHARD SHELBY, Alabama 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island 

JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon 

KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND, New York 

CORY A. BOOKER, New Jersey 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois 

KAMALA HARRIS, California 

RICHARD M. RUSSELL, Majority Staff Director 

GABRIELLE BATKIN, Minority Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CLEAN AIR AND NUCLEAR SAFETY

SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, West Virginia, Chairman 

JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma 

JOHN BOOZMAN, Arkansas 

ROGER WICKER, Mississippi 

DEB FISCHER, Nebraska 

JERRY MORAN, Kansas 

JONI ERNST, Iowa 

RICHARD SHELBY, Alabama 

JOHN BARRASSO, Wyoming (ex officio) 

SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, Rhode Island 

BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland 

BERNARD SANDERS, Vermont 

JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon 

KIRSTEN GILLIBRAND, New York 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois 

THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware (ex officio) 

(III) 

C O N T E N T S 

Page 

JULY 25, 2017 

OPENING STATEMENTS 

Capito, Hon. Shelley Moore, U.S. Senator from the State of West Virginia ...... 1 

Whitehouse, Hon. Sheldon, U.S. Senator from the State of Rhode Island ......... 2 

Alexander, Hon. Lamar, U.S. Senator from the State of Tennessee ................... 4 

WITNESSES 

Anderson, Brian, Director, WVU Energy Institute, West Virginia University .. 16 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 18 

Begger, Jason, Executive Director, Wyoming Infrastructure Authority ............. 24 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 26 

Responses to additional questions from: 

Senator Barrasso ....................................................................................... 30 

Senator Whitehouse .................................................................................. 30 

Bohlen, Steve, Global Security E-Program Manager, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory .................................................................................................. 33 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 35 

Response to an additional question from Senator Whitehouse .................... 43 

Khaleel, Moe, Associate Lab Director for Energy And Environmental Sciences, 

Oak Ridge National Lab ...................................................................................... 49 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 51 

Responses to additional questions from: 

Senator Barrasso ....................................................................................... 62 

Senator Whitehouse .................................................................................. 64 

Pasamehmetoglu, Kemal, Associate Laboratory Director, Nuclear Science & 

Technology Directorate, Idaho National Laboratory ......................................... 68 

Prepared statement .......................................................................................... 70 

Responses to additional questions from: 

Senator Barrasso ....................................................................................... 81 

Senator Whitehouse .................................................................................. 82 

(1) 

HEARING ON DEVELOPING AND DEPLOYING 

ADVANCED CLEAN ENERGY TECHNOLOGIES 

TUESDAY, JULY 25, 2017 

U.S. SENATE, 

COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON CLEAN AIR

AND NUCLEAR SAFETY, 

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:07 a.m. in room 

406, Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Shelley Moore Capito 

(chairwoman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Present: Senators Capito, Whitehouse Inhofe, Boozman, Fischer, 

Ernst, Merkley, Gillibrand, and Markey. 

Also present: Senators Barrasso and Carper. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SHELLEY MOORE CAPITO, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA 

Senator CAPITO. The Committee will come to order. The Ranking 

Member is en route, I believe, and so, in the interest of everybody’s 

time, I am going to go ahead and begin my statement. 

Thank you all for being here today. Thank the Subcommittee. 

I will begin by obviously recognizing myself for an opening statement and then Ranking Member Whitehouse when he appears. 

Senator Alexander and Chairman Barrasso will then introduce 

witnesses from their home States. 

Our hearing today will provide an opportunity for the members 

of this Subcommittee to learn more about advanced power generation technologies that will improve air quality and reduce carbon 

emissions. 

The development and commercial deployment of these technologies will inform this Committee’s consideration on clean air 

and nuclear safety regulatory and legislative proposals, and oversight of regulated agencies. 

Our panel of expert witnesses has a diverse and deep wealth of 

experience dealing with research and development of advanced coal 

and nuclear technologies across the private and public sectors and 

academia. 

I am particularly happy that Brian Anderson, who is the Director 

of the Energy Institute at West Virginia University, has joined us 

today. Dr. Anderson is extremely knowledgeable on fossil technology, research, development, and commercialization across academia and the national lab system and the private sector, so I look 

forward to hearing his insights. 

2 

The Federal Government has played a role in incubating important energy technologies for decades with the goal of commercial viability. These days, this development in coal and nuclear technologies is as important as ever. 

The coal-fired and nuclear power generation sectors provide the 

core of this Country’s baseload electricity, and both are under serious pressure as the result of a confluence of regulations, electric 

market inefficiencies, and competition from cheap natural gas. 

Plants powered by both fuels are currently either being shuttered 

or pushed beyond their original planned ends of life at the cost of 

foregone investment, lost jobs, higher electric rates, and economic 

harm to upstream and downstream industries. 

However, there is no clear reliable baseload alternative to these 

technologies. New high-efficiency coal plants with cleaner emissions streams to facilitate carbon capture and utilization, the development of advanced carbon-based materials and manufacturing 

processes, and the employment of advanced nuclear reactor designs 

that are safer and more efficient than the cold war era designs that 

will be replaced are all essential developments to ensuring the reliability of the grid. 

The U.S. has a vast and diverse energy resource and a deep well 

of scientific and engineering talent. But instead of using these assets to great effect, over the last several years we have let those 

skills atrophy, leaving the major advances in these markets to foreign competitors due to a lack of policy vision. 

As we consider agency regulations and congressional legislation 

dealing with emission standards and energy permitting, we must 

consider whether we are protecting ourselves into harm’s way. If 

the Federal Government is funding advanced fossil and nuclear 

technologies with an eye to getting these designs into the marketplace, but is simultaneously creating regulatory structures that are 

not flexible or expeditious enough, we may actually smother those 

taxpayer investments in the crib. This will be a negative feedback 

loop, as unrealized reductions in emissions drive demands for tighter regulations. 

West Virginia has both a great story to tell when it comes to the 

research and development of this technology, and a great deal at 

stake when it comes to the future of energy markets and regulation. We are a major exporter of energy, including electricity, to our 

neighboring States, and that sector is under significant pressure. 

The State is home to West Virginia University, which Dr. Anderson is representing, and the National Energy Technology Lab in 

Morgantown. Their presence has also attracted innovative and 

manufacturing companies researching more efficient power plant 

designs, fuel cells, carbon capture technologies and other technologies that will contribute to a manufacturing renaissance 

achieved with lower emissions of carbon dioxide and air pollutants. 

Given the stakes of this policy debate for my State of West Virginia and the entire Country, Congress must be well informed 

about the development of new technologies in these fields, what 

they can and cannot deliver in terms of efficiencies, and how realistic their commercial viability is. That is the only way we can craft 

legislation and create meaningful oversight of Federal agencies to 

3 

achieve the best outcomes for American workers, families, and environmental quality. 

Today’s hearing will support that mission by giving voice to a 

panel of this Nation’s foremost experts in the field. I look forward 

to hearing from our witnesses and the dialog from our members. 

I will now yield and welcome our Ranking Member, Senator 

Whitehouse, for his 5-minute opening statement. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. SHELDON WHITEHOUSE, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF RHODE ISLAND 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Thank you, Chairman Capito. I am delighted that we are having this hearing and want to welcome my 

Chairman in the HELP Committee, Chairman Alexander, here. 

Chairman Alexander invited me to testify in his Energy Appropriations Subcommittee last year, and he and I have worked together on promoting clean energy solutions, so I am looking forward to his testimony. His State is the home of Oak Ridge Lab, one 

of 17 exceptional national laboratories that we have spread across 

14 States, employing thousands of scientists, and very strongly 

supporting the scientific consensus that climate change is real and 

that something needs to be done about it. 

Along with our terrific State universities, these laboratories are 

centers of innovation. They have helped us explain photosynthesis, 

discovered 16 periodic elements, created the modern seatbelt, developed flu vaccines, redefined cancer treatment, and helped develop the Internet. We can be extremely proud of our national labs 

and of the relationships they have with our greatest universities. 

Today we are here to learn about developments in homegrown 

clean energy technologies like carbon capture utilization and storage, and advanced nuclear, technologies that hold promise to transition the U.S. to a carbon-free future. 

Of course, funding these labs is important. I won’t dwell on this, 

but the President’s budget is very inconsistent with the bipartisan 

support for our national laboratories, and I hope that our appropriators will see the wisdom of continuing to support the national 

labs. 

Carbon capture research and nuclear programs have bipartisan 

support here in Congress as well. I recently joined Senators 

Heitkamp, Barrasso, and Capito on a bipartisan carbon capture 

utilization and storage bill to provide tax incentives to avoid carbon 

emissions. Senators Booker and Duckworth on this Committee are 

also cosponsors. Chairman Capito, Senator Inhofe, and other EPW 

colleagues also have a bipartisan advanced nuclear bill to reform 

the Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing process for advanced 

reactors whose technology is being developed in our national labs. 

And last year Senator Alexander and I wrote an op-ed in The New 

York Times on the importance of our existing nuclear fleet to carbon-free energy and our effort to address climate change. 

New energy technologies can move us closer to energy security, 

increase our global competitiveness, and improve the reliability of 

our energy grid. But what matters most to me is protecting my 

home State of Rhode Island, which is on the front lines of climate 

change. In our ocean State, we have almost 400 miles of beautiful 

4 

coastline. West Virginia has beautiful things, but not much coastline. 

Senator CAPITO. Not much. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Everyone in Rhode Island lives less than 

a half hour from the shore. Warming, acidifying, and rising oceans 

endanger our Rhode Island coasts. Rhode Island’s Coastal Resources Management Council projects sea levels to rise by between 

9 and 12 feet along our shores by 2100 if we continue to do nothing 

about carbon emissions. That submerges downtown Providence, our 

capital city, and it reshapes our coastline into a new Rhode Island 

archipelago. 

Innovative clean energy solutions to reduce emissions and stave 

off those disastrous effects are vital to me. I remain committed to 

reaching across the aisle and finding common ground in these pursuits. I look forward to hearing from our witnesses today. 

And as we recognize Chairman Alexander, let me just say my 

trip to Oak Ridge was really remarkable. The people you have 

working there are extraordinary and the presentation that they 

give on climate change is extraordinarily compelling, well researched, and founded in the real science. 

Thank you. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you, Senator. 

We will begin the first panel. Our colleague, very well known to 

all of us, from Tennessee, Senator Alexander will be here to introduce the witness from Oak Ridge National Laboratory and to make 

some comments. 

Welcome, Senator Alexander. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. LAMAR ALEXANDER, 

U.S. SENATOR FROM THE STATE OF TENNESSEE 

Senator ALEXANDER. Thank you, Madam Chairman and Senator 

Whitehouse. Thank you for allowing me to introduce the witness 

and to make a few remarks beforehand. 

As Senator Whitehouse said, he testified before our Energy and 

Water Appropriations Committee recently and, in a way, I am returning the favor, so thank you for that. 

I am glad to be back before the Committee. Senator Carper and 

I were co-chairmen of the Clean Air Subcommittee, worked on it 

together for a number of years. 

And so far as funding for the labs go, I think you will be pleased 

to know that the Energy and Water Appropriations bill approved 

last week, for the second consecutive year, had a record level of appropriated funding for the Office of Science, which funds the 17 national labs that we have. 

Our Country has 99 nuclear reactors. They are capable of producing 100,000 megawatts of clean, reliable electricity with zero 

carbon emissions. If we were to close those 99 reactors, which provide more than 60 percent of our Country’s carbon-free electricity, 

and replace them with natural gas plants, which history has shown 

is what usually happens when nuclear power is replaced, the emissions produced by these new natural gas plants would be the equivalent of placing nearly 118 million new cars on the road. That is 

more than all U.S. passenger cars on the road today. 

5 

If you are concerned about climate change, as I am, that possibility is alarming. 

While we normally think of clean nuclear power when we talk 

about climate change, it is more fundamental than that; it is also 

about jobs. The nuclear industry employs 100,000 people. They are 

high-quality, good-paying, career-long jobs. In South Carolina and 

Georgia, the four reactors currently under construction employ 

about 10,000 Americans. 

If you are concerned about unemployment in the communities 

that support our existing nuclear reactor sites, the thought of losing these jobs is alarming. 

Nuclear power is also about reliable electricity. Reactors operate 

over 90 percent of the time and provide reliable baseload power. 

We expect our lights to turn on in the morning and our air conditioners to work in the evening. Our manufacturers, which consume 

more than 30 percent of the Nation’s energy, rely on electricity to 

produce goods 24 hours a day. Without reliable electricity, none of 

this would be possible. 

So if you are concerned about manufacturing and supporting the 

12 million manufacturing workers, losing nuclear power is alarming. 

It is also about affordable electricity. Natural gas prices are low 

today. Less than 10 years ago, though, natural gas prices in the 

U.S. were at their highest ever. If we continue to replace closing 

nuclear plants with natural gas plants, it could lead to an increase 

in natural gas prices. 

In 2014, an IHS energy report found that the diversified electricity supply in the U.S. lowers the cost of generating electricity 

by more than $93 billion a year. This means having nuclear, coal, 

hydro, natural gas all available. That lowers the cost of electricity. 

Losing this diversity could be very costly. 

So if you are concerned about low-cost power, losing nuclear 

plants, which supplies 20 percent of our electricity, is alarming. 

So I think we need to do something about nuclear power. 

Over the last 5 years, six reactors have shut down prematurely. 

Analysts have warned dozens of additional reactors could shut 

down over the next 10 years, and in roughly two decades the U.S. 

could lose about half its reactors. That is because by 2038, 50 reactors will be at least 60 years old. 

We could replace that lost generation with natural gas, but that 

could lead to an increase in prices and increased carbon emissions. 

Or we could replace it with renewables, but that would lead to considerable loss in reliability and could lead to a large increase in 

electricity prices. 

It would take a wind farm the size of Indiana to build enough 

wind turbines capable of producing the same amount of electricity 

as our current nuclear fleet. 

The way I see it, we must replace the lost generation of nuclear 

reactors with new ones. If we continue to develop and be ready to 

efficiently license small modular reactors and advanced reactors, 

they could represent the future of nuclear power. They will be 

safer, produce less waste, and operate with higher efficiency. 

Our next generation of reactors will not likely be possible without government funding, research, and support at the outset, which 

6 

means we must double funding for basic energy research, which is 

about $5 billion a year today. We could pay for it by reducing subsidies for mature technologies, both for renewables and for fossil 

fuels. 

I think the best way to lower the cost of energy, clean the air, 

improve health, increase family incomes, and produce jobs is double 

the funding for basic energy research. That means we must continue to support the good work of our national labs doing work on 

advanced reactors. I just mentioned the Appropriations Committee 

has recommended that to the Senate. 

Dr. Moe Khaleel is here today to talk about the great work they 

are doing at the Oak Ridge National Lab in Tennessee. Dr. Khaleel 

is Associate Lab Director for Energy and Environmental Sciences 

at Oak Ridge. In his role, he oversees the lab’s activities that bring 

basic science to applied research and develop to support energy 

production, transmission, and conservation. 

I thank the Chair and the Ranking Member not only for inviting 

me to introduce Dr. Khaleel, but allowing me to say those few 

words about what we can do to advance the next generation of nuclear reactors. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Senator Alexander follows:] 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. LAMAR ALEXANDER, U.S. SENATOR

FROM THE STATE OF TENNESSEE

Thank you Chairman Capito and Ranking Member Whitehouse for inviting me 

today and for holding this hearing. And, thank you to the witnesses for being here 

today. Today, our country has 99 nuclear reactors. These 99 reactors are capable 

of producing 100,000 megawatts of clean, reliable electricity—with zero carbon emissions. If we were to close those 99 nuclear reactors, which provide more than 60 

percent of our carbon-free electricity, and replace them with natural gas plants— 

which history has shown is what usually happens when nuclear power is replaced— 

the emissions produced by these new natural gas plants would be the equivalent 

of placing nearly 118 million new cars on our roads. 

That’s more than all U.S. passenger cars on the road today. If you are concerned 

about climate change, that possibility is alarming. And while we normally think of 

clean nuclear power when we are talking about climate change, it’s much more fundamental than that. First, it’s about jobs. The nuclear industry employs 100,000 

people throughout the country. These are high-quality, good-paying, career-long 

jobs. In South Carolina and Georgia, the four nuclear reactors currently under construction created about 10,000 jobs. If you’re concerned about unemployment and 

the communities that support our existing nuclear reactor sites, the thought of losing these jobs is alarming. 

Second, it’s about reliable electricity. Nuclear reactors operate over 90 percent of 

the time and provide reliable, baseload power. We all rely on electricity every day. 

We expect our lights to turn on in the morning and our air conditioners to work 

in the evenings. Our manufacturers, which consume more than 30 percent of the 

nation’s energy, rely on electricity to produce goods 24 hours a day. Without reliable 

power, none of this would be possible. If you’re concerned about domestic manufacturing and supporting the 12.3 million manufacturing workers in the United States, 

losing 100,000 megawatts of baseload power is alarming. 

Third, it’s about affordable electricity. While natural gas prices are low today, less 

than 10 years ago, natural gas prices in the United States were at their highest 

ever. If we continue to replace closing nuclear plants with natural gas plants, it 

could lead to an increase in natural gas prices. In 2014, an IHS Energy report found 

that the diversified electricity supply in the United States we have today lowers the 

cost of generating electricity by more than $93 billion per year. This means having 

nuclear, coal, hydropower, and natural gas all available lowers the cost of electricity. 

Losing this diversity could be very costly. So if you’re concerned about providing 

low-cost power in the United States, losing nuclear power—which supplies 20 percent of our nation’s electricity—is alarming. 

I think it’s clear that we must do something to support nuclear power. But, over 

the last 5 years, six nuclear reactors have shut down prematurely and analysists 

7 

have warned dozens of additional nuclear reactors could potentially shut down over 

the next 10 years. And in roughly two decades, the United States could lose about 

half of its reactors. That’s because, by 2038, 50 reactors will be at least 60 years 

old, which is when their licenses run out, representing nearly half of the nuclear 

generating capacity in the United States. We could replace that lost generation with 

natural gas. But that could lead to an increase in electricity prices and increased 

carbon emissions. Or we could replace that lost generation with renewables. But 

that would lead to a considerable loss in reliability and could lead to a large increase in electricity prices. And it would take a wind farm the size of Indiana to 

build enough wind turbines capable of producing the same amount of electricity as 

our current nuclear reactor fleet. 

The way I see it, we must replace that lost generation with new nuclear reactors. 

And to do that we must develop the next generation of nuclear reactors. We must 

continue to develop and be ready to efficiently license small modular reactors and 

advanced reactors. These new technologies could represent the future of nuclear 

power. These new reactors will be safer, produce less waste and operate with higher 

efficiencies and at a lower cost than the existing reactor fleet while still providing 

carbon-free electricity. But, our next generation of nuclear reactors will likely not 

be possible without government funded research and support. Which means we 

must double funding for basic energy research. 

I think the best way to lower the cost of energy, clean the air, improve health, 

increase family incomes, and produce good-paying jobs is to double funding for basic 

energy research and drive American innovation. We must continue to support the 

good work our national laboratories are doing on advanced reactors. Dr. Moe 

Khaleel is here today to talk about the great work they’re doing at the Oak Ridge 

National Laboratory in Tennessee. Dr. Khaleel is the Associate Lab Director for Energy and Environmental Sciences at Oak Ridge. In his role, Dr. Khaleel oversees 

the lab’s activities that bring basic science to applied research and development to 

support energy production, transmission, and conservation. I thank the Chair and 

Ranking Member for inviting me to this hearing and look forward to the testimony 

from the witnesses and hearing about what we can do to advance the next generation of nuclear reactors. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you, Senator Alexander. 

Now we will turn to Senator Barrasso, Chair of the full Committee. 

Welcome. 

Senator BARRASSO. Thank you very much, Madam Chairman. I 

would like to take a moment to introduce Jason Begger, who has 

served as Executive Director of the Wyoming Infrastructure Authority since July 2015. His past experience includes positions in 

the private sector and time as a staffer for the U.S. House of Representatives, where he handled energy issues. 

In his current role, Jason oversees the development of the Wyoming Integrated Test Center. This center is now under construction 

on the site of a state-of-the-art coal-fired power plant outside of Gillette, Wyoming. When the Center comes online later this year, researchers will use the facility to test carbon capture, utilization, 

and sequestration technologies. 

Those researchers will include finalists of the Carbon XPRIZE 

competition. The XPRIZE competition attracted 47 teams from 

seven countries to compete for funding to research innovative ways 

to convert carbon captured from coal plants into marketable products. 

In my home State of Wyoming, we know coal provides affordable, 

reliable energy, and good jobs. Coal communities in the Powder 

River Basin and the Green River Basin, and all across Wyoming, 

have been smothered by Federal overreach and regulation. 

The State-led Wyoming initiative provides a path forward for 

coal, while spurring new technologies to transform carbon emissions into usable products. 

8 

Mr. Begger, I want to thank you for coming to Washington today. 

We look forward to hearing your testimony about this successful 

venture in Wyoming. 

And I would also like to applaud the Chairman of this Subcommittee, Chairman Capito, and Ranking Member Whitehouse for 

holding this hearing so that the Subcommittee can explore policies 

that will help the Nation develop energy and make sure that it is 

as clean as we can as fast as we can. 

Thank you very much, Senator Capito. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you. And I would like to welcome the witnesses. 

Senator CARPER. Madam Chair, could I just make a unanimous 

consent request? I would ask that my statement be included in the 

record. 

And we have a special guest here from West Virginia, and I just 

want to say, as a native of West Virginia, we are happy that you 

are here. Give Gordon Gee my best. He has been President of West 

Virginia twice, Ohio State when I was an undergraduate, Vanderbilt, Colorado. He has had a lot of—— 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Are you missing somebody? 

Senator CARPER. Brown. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. He has had a lot of jobs, but he has always had 

a good one. Give him my best, please. Thank you. 

Senator CAPITO. Yes, without objection on your unanimous consent. 

[The referenced information follows:] 

9 


27301.066
10 


27301.067
11 

Senator CAPITO. And we will have the witnesses take their place 

at the table. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. And, Madam Chair, while the witnesses 

are getting seated, I would like to ask unanimous consent that the 

op-ed piece that I referenced in my opening remarks that Senator 

Alexander and I wrote, as well as an op-ed piece that I wrote with 

Senator Inhofe, Senator Booker, and Senator Crapo be added to the 

record of this proceeding. 

Senator CAPITO. Without objection. 

[The referenced information follows:] 

12 


27301.128
13 


27301.129
14 


27301.130
15 


27301.131
16 

Senator CAPITO. So now I will introduce or I will recognize the 

rest of our panel. And I think your written statements are in our 

materials, and you will be recognized for 5 minutes. 

Our next witness is Dr. Brian Anderson, who I referred to in my 

opening remarks, and I am very pleased that he is here representing the Energy Institute at West Virginia University. 

Welcome, Dr. Anderson. 

STATEMENT OF BRIAN ANDERSON, DIRECTOR, WVU ENERGY 

INSTITUTE, WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY 

Mr. ANDERSON. So, first I would like to thank Senator Capito 

and Ranking Member Whitehouse, as well as Chairman Barrasso 

for having us here in this hearing. 

And, Senator Carper, I will pass on my regards to President Gee. 

What I would like to talk about today is a little of the research 

that we do at WVU and also some of the findings about the broader 

impacts of advanced fossil energy technologies on the potential for 

reducing climate-forcing gases into the atmosphere. 

So, at West Virginia University we have 167 faculty members 

who are affiliates of the University WVU Energy Institute, and this 

is across many different areas of research in the University, 14 different colleges, in fossil energy, renewable energy, policy and the 

environment. If you may recall, it was our environmental team, the 

Center for Alternative Fuels, Engines and Emissions, that found 

that Volkswagen was cheating on their emissions regulations for 

the NOx emissions. We also have the Water Research Institute 

that is leading in the development of technology from taking acid 

mine drainage in our waters and extracting rare earth elements 

that support many renewable energy technologies. 

In the renewable space, we are a leader in biomass, as well as 

geothermal, and in energy storage to enable renewable energy technologies into the grid. 

But the focus of my 5-minute testimony, the remaining three and 

a half minutes, is on fossil energy technologies, and really three 

major projects that we have going on at the University. 

The first is the U.S.-China Clean Energy Research Center Advanced Coal Technology Consortium, which is a result of the U.S.- 

China Protocol signed in 2009 to reduce carbon emissions from all 

aspects of energy technologies. We lead the Advanced Coal Technology Consortium, along with Livermore National Lab and another couple national labs and universities, in developing clean energy technologies hand-in-hand with counterparts in China, and to 

this project we really focus on two different areas: efficiency of the 

current fleet, as well as new technologies to reduce the carbon footprint of coal power generation. 

So increasing efficiency, there is one particular barrier I would 

like to draw attention to this Subcommittee and the Committee as 

a whole, is the New Source Review for coal burning power plants. 

With substantial improvements in efficiency, plants have to go 

through the New Source Review, and this is a significant barrier 

to the deployment of new, higher efficiency technologies in the coal 

fleet. 

In the areas of new technologies under the CERC program at 

WVU and across the world, our developments of technologies of 

17 

chemical looping combustion, as well as oxy-pressure combustion, 

gasification, integrated gasification, combined cycle, carbon capture, and sequestration technologies, and we are able to witness 

the advances in these technologies that are occurring in China and, 

quite frankly, we are falling behind in the development of new materials for higher temperature power cycles that lead to higher efficiency coal burning generation. Any carbon CO2 molecule that is 

not emitted through efficiency is one that is equivalent to one that 

is captured and sequestered. 

The second project I do want to draw attention to is called the 

Marcellus Shale Energy and Environment Laboratory. As we know, 

much of our power sector is shifting to natural gas, and there is 

a lot of natural gas and natural gas liquids being produced from 

the region in Appalachia. Our Marcellus Shale Energy and Environment Laboratory, called MSEEL, is the world’s first transparent 

well in the sense that all the data collected in terms of its water 

footprint, its air footprint, noise, light, and the full cycle of the production of natural gas from this Marcellus Shale site in Morgantown is open to the public. This is one of the most instrumented 

wells in the world, and we have a full record of all of its emissions 

through the cycle, with a design on reducing emissions during production, as well as emissions during transportation and distribution of natural gas. 

And then the third project I do want to draw attention to is one 

called the Appalachian Natural Gas Liquid Storage and Training 

Hub that we have been working on for a couple of years now. This 

is trying to catalyze both the industry and lower carbon clean manufacturing, as well as the efficient use of our natural gas and natural gas liquids resources to reduce transportation costs, as well as 

the cost of the end manufactured product to consumers. 

This particular project is one that we envisioned to catalyze the 

industry and the petrochemical industry in the Appalachian Basin 

in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Kentucky, but do it in 

a fashion where the next generation of the petrochemical industry 

can implement new technologies that we are working on both at 

the University and our national lab partners. 

So again I would like to thank you for inviting me here today, 

and I look forward to the questions the Committee would have. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Anderson follows:] 

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Senator CAPITO. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Anderson. 

Our next witness is Mr. Jason Begger, introduced by his Senator 

from Wyoming. He is at the Wyoming Integrated Test Center. He 

is also Executive Director of the Wyoming Infrastructure Authority. 

Welcome. 

STATEMENT OF JASON BEGGER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, 

WYOMING INFRASTRUCTURE AUTHORITY 

Mr. BEGGER. Thank you. Madam Chairman, Ranking Member 

Whitehouse, Chairman Barrasso, members of the Subcommittee, I 

appreciate the opportunity to speak to you today about our carbon 

technology efforts in Wyoming. 

Senator Barrasso gave a little bit of my background, but the Infrastructure Authority is a State instrumentality tasked with promoting and assisting in the development of energy infrastructure. 

Currently, our largest project is the Wyoming Integrated Test Center, which is a private-public partnership between the State of Wyoming, Basin Electric Power Cooperative, Tri-State Generation and 

Transmission Association, the National Rural Electric Cooperatives 

Association, and we have also received various sorts of in-kind contributions from Black Hills Energy and Rocky Mountain Power. 

While we believe there is an important role for Federal Government to play in advancing technology, and we would welcome a 

partnership, not one cent of Federal funding has been utilized at 

the ITC. 

The ITC is a post-combustion, flue gas research facility located 

at Basin Electric’s Dry Fork Power Station near Gillette, Wyoming. 

It will be the largest facility of its kind in the United States, delivering up to 18 megawatts worth of scrubbed flue gas to researches 

testing CCUS technologies. The power plant will provide flue gas 

to five small research bays each capable of hosting tests up to 0.4 

megawatts, and a large test bay that can host two demonstration 

projects with a cumulative total of 18 megawatts. 

The distinction from the National Carbon Capture Center in Alabama is that their largest testing capabilities is only 1.5 

megawatts. 

Today, most post-combustion CO2 capture plants employ amine 

solutions. Boundary Dam and Petra Nova utilize amines; Technology Centre Mongstad in Norway, and the National Carbon Capture Center are leading research on solution-based CO2 capture. In 

Wyoming, we didn’t want to duplicate work that was already being 

done; we wanted to compliment the other test centers by providing 

a place to scale up current research or look at other novel technologies. 

One such technology that has received support from Wyoming is 

cryogenic carbon capture. The various components of flue gas freeze 

and vaporize at different temperatures. This technology involves 

freezing the flue gas and capturing CO2 as a frozen solid. Early 

tests have shown a 99 percent CO2 capture rate, costing less than 

$30 per ton, with a 15 percent parasitic load. The method has also 

proven to be very successful in removing sulfur dioxide, nitrous 

oxide, and mercury. 

25 

While we have seen promising results at small scale, further 

funding and testing is necessary to see this as a larger pilot 

project. 

One of the most exciting partnerships that we have developed is 

with the XPRIZE Foundation. One of the best known XPRIZE competitions is the Ansari XPRIZE, which awarded the first team to 

fly three people to space and back twice within 14 days. One $10 

million prize spurred 27 teams to invest over $100 million in technology development. 

Eventually, Richard Branson licensed this technology to create 

Virgin Galactic, and today the private space travel industry is 

worth $2 billion, only 22 years after the idea for the competition 

was created. 

The NRG COSIA Carbon XPRIZE will award $20 million in 

teams that are best able to convert CO2 into other valuable products. Currently, we have 23 teams from six countries that are in 

the second semifinal round, and they are working on ways to convert CO2 into things like carbon nanotubes, methanol, building materials, fish food, and plastics. The five finalists will test at the ITC 

with the goal of turning CO2 into an asset. 

Technology should be apolitical, and the U.S. can make its greatest impact by investing in technology development that can be utilized around the world. There is considerable debate over the future of coal in the United States. However, every credible energy 

analysis from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate 

Change to the Department of Energy acknowledges that large 

amounts of coal will continued to be used globally for the foreseeable future. Technology is the best way to ensure these countries 

have access to power but, yet, can meet environmental goals. 

I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today and will 

gladly answer any questions. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Begger follows:] 

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RESPONSES OF JASON BEGGER TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR BARRASSO

Question 1. The Wyoming Integrated Test Center (ITC) is a great example of what 

can be achieved when government, researchers, and industry work together to innovate. Can you discuss other initiatives related to Carbon Capture, Utilization, and 

Storage (CCUS) that the State of Wyoming is pursuing to support the transformation of carbon into a commercial asset? 

Response. The State of Wyoming has been very proactive in developing all of the 

pieces necessary to commercialize carbon management technology by creating a 

number of entities focused on particular portions of the development chain. The University of Wyoming School of Energy Resources (SER) was created to host and develop the academic and bench-scale processes, with a goal of identifying which technology concepts are worthy of scale-up. The SER has state-of-the-art laboratory facilities, which includes a 3-D visualization center where researchers can literally 

walk into 3-D models of geologic reservoirs to study suitability for things such as 

enhanced oil recovery (EOR) and permanent geologic sequestration. The University 

has also created many Centers of Excellence, such as the Enhanced Oil Recovery 

Institute, which characterizes and identifies areas well-suited for CO2 EOR; and the 

Carbon Management Institute, which is currently characterizing two geologic formations for potential permanent CO2 storage. 

The State has also created several independent entities to push carbon management. The Wyoming Business Council assists entrepreneurs looking to commercialize and establish a business, or businesses that are looking to relocate to Wyoming. The Wyoming Pipeline Authority works to develop pipeline infrastructure 

within the state, including CO2 pipelines that would be necessary. Last, the Wyoming Infrastructure Authority is tasked with developing large-scale, new generation 

technology projects. The Wyoming ITC is one such project. 

The State of Wyoming’s efforts have led to an entire network of entities from the 

SER looking at the basic research; to the ITC, where projects can scale-up; to the 

end users of CO2 . 

Question 2. What are the most important actions that the Federal Government 

should take to facilitate the development and scaling up of CCUS technologies for 

power plants across the nation? 

Response. From a purely R&D perspective, you cannot force innovation through 

regulation or a politically mandated deadline. Innovation comes from incentives, 

adequate resources and reasonable timeframes. Many of the timelines with the 

Clean Power Plan were simply unworkable since even if the technology was commercial, it did not consider the time necessary to manufacture and install. A consistent R&D funding stream would provide the reliability necessary for researchers 

to undertake multiyear projects. One such avenue would be to divert the Federal 

Government’s share of the Federal coal mineral royalty to technology development 

for a period of 10 years. 

Utilities also need regulatory certainty. Certainly, economic forces such as low 

natural gas prices have hindered coal usage, however, natural gas prices have a relatively short commodity cycle of a few years, whereas a coal plant has a 50–60-year 

operating life. With such a long lifespan, utilities are hesitant to make multibilliondollar investments without knowing the rules beyond the current Presidential administration. Through regulation, legislation, technology or a combination, utilities 

must have long-term certainty about how carbon will be managed. 

It would also be helpful to recognize and incentive companies that are willing to 

host research projects or take undertake major pilot demonstration projects. While 

some may view the Kemper Project as a failure, Southern Company should be commended for attempting to push a major technological leap. R&D is risky and we 

need more utilities who are willing to scale-up technologies. 

RESPONSES OF JASON BEGGER TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR WHITEHOUSE

CCUS Technologies General 

Question 1. During the hearing, I mentioned several CCUS projects that have 

come online in recent years. This includes, the Iceland Carbfix Program, the 

Climeworks Direct Air Capture facility in Switzerland, the BioProcess H2O ethanol 

facility, and the Boundary Dam III carbon capture facility in the Canadian Province 

of Saskatchewan. These facilities cover a broad variety of CCUS technologies that 

includes coal, ethanol, permanent sequestration, and direct air capture. 

31 

a. Can you discuss the other promising CCUS technologies that have come online 

in recent years either at the pilot scale or larger? What are the economics of these 

projects that allow them to operate? 

Response. A very important consideration of the economics of any project are the 

particulars of the country in which a project is commissioned. According to the Energy Information Administration, the average cost of electricity in the United States 

was 10.5 cents/kWh in 2016 (U.S. Energy Information Administration, 2017). That 

compares to 12 cents/kWh in Saskatchewan (city of Saskatoon, 2017), Switzerland 

is 20.6 cents/kWh (ALPIQ Group, 2017) and 16 cents/kWh in Iceland (Statista, 

2017). All prices converted to US dollars. Another consideration is how or if electricity is subsidized. For example, electricity used for home heating in Iceland is 

subsidized by the government (Bar tir, 2004). A carbon price would also impact the 

economics. It is difficult to conduct a true ‘‘apples to apples’’ comparison across 

international boundaries without a full accounting of the various factors impacting 

what the end-users actually pay. Understanding these differences in prices helps 

understand something that may be economical in one country, may not be in another. 

Two major projects in the United States are the Petra Nova and NET Power 

projects located in Texas. The Petra Nova is a commercial-scale, post combustion 

CCUS facility that utilizes solvent capture process to capture CO2 for use in enhanced oil recovery (EOR). The project is unique in many ways that assist with its 

economics. First, it received $190 million from the Dept. of Energy, a $250 million 

loan from the Japanese government and the owners, NRG and JX Nippon contributed $300 million. NRG is an independent power producer, meaning they simply sell 

power onto the open market, they do not serve specific customers. JX Nippon is a 

Japanese oil and gas company. Adding the uniquness is that Texas is an unregulated utility market, so NRG did not need to obtain permission from a Public Service Commission or other rate making body to undertake the project. 

The NET Power project employs the Allam Cycle, which is a completely new process for utilizing fossil fuels to produce electricity while eliminating all air emissions, 

including carbon dioxide. A 50 MW pilot plant is scheduled to commence operations 

in November 2017 at a site in LaPorte, Texas. 

Other researchers such as SES in Utah are working on cyrogenic carbon capture; 

TerraCOH from Canada, which is working on using pressured CO2 stored geologically as a battery; and membrane separation technologies from MTR in California. 

It is important to remember that first of a kind technologies are oftentimes not 

profitable without some sort of grant or financial assistance. Only after perfecting 

the technolgies in subsequent plants will the cost of manufacturing, construction 

and operations decrease to the point where it is truly economic. The key is to understand the price curve and path to commercialization with confidence at plant number x, it will become fully economicaly viable. 

b. Can you also discuss what CCUS technologies you believe could be coming online over the next several years as it relates to both CCUS and direct air capture? 

Response. The Allam Cycle is a very exciting new technology and could very well 

be the next generation power plant. However, as Wyoming has invested heavily in 

post-combustion research, we are very closely following those types of technologies, 

especially cyrogenic and mebrane separation. 

Currently, we do not see a near-term promise for direct air capture. According to 

Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers, the capture costs for the 

Climeworks project in Switzerland are nearly $1000/ton (Marshall, 2017). Other 

capture technolgies cost nearly 10 times less (Service, 2016). Simply put, we can 

capture ten times the CO2 for the same cost by using other methods. 

c. What types of CCUS technologies hold the most promise as it relates to reducing our emissions to address climate change? 

Response. In Wyoming, we are most interested in large-scale, commercial technologies that would produce large quantities of CO2 that could be used for EOR or 

conversion technologies. We believe industrial settings, at or near large, stationary 

sources, provide the best economics. 

While there are many oportunities to refine and improve amines, largely, CO2

capture via amines is considered close to commercial today since it is being utilzied 

at full-scale at sites such as Petra Nova and Boundary Dam. For post-combustion 

retrofits, membranes that would filter away the CO2 hold great promise. 

With regards to new combustion technologies, oxy-fired and the Allam cycle are 

technologies that would utilize fuel in an entirely different way, 

Carbon Utilization 

Question 2. To address climate change we must reduce our emissions from multiple sectors including the power, industrial sector, and transportation sector. As 

32 

discussed during the hearing, BioProcess H2O is a unique as it reduces emissions 

from an ethanol plant. 

a. What are the different forms of carbon utilization that have proven to work at 

the pilot scale? In your opinion what are the promising carbon utilization technologies that have not yet been tested at the commercial scale? 

Response. CO2 is a chemical compound and if it is simply considered a feedstock 

consisting of carbon and oxygen, the wide array of products that can be produced 

is limitless. However, the CO2 has very strong, double covalent bonds. This renders 

CO2 an incredibly molecule necessitating large amounts of energy to break the carbon and oxygen apart. Plant photosynthesis is a natural molecule splitting process, 

which is why many CO2 management projects utilize some sort of plant production 

component. Companies such as LanzaTech are using CO2 to feed microorganisms 

which will be converted into biofuels. 

Other projects seek to use the CO2 as a feedstock in their process. A British company, Carbon 8, is using CO2 as a catalyst to create artificial limestone, which is 

turned to aggregate and cinder blocks for construction. Covestro is a company producing plastics and materials from CO2 . 

Wyoming’s largest relationship in carbon utilization is with the NRG COSIA Carbon XPRIZE, which will conduct the final round of their competition at the Wyoming ITC. Currently, 23 teams from six countries are working on processes to capture CO2 from an operating coal-fueled powerplant and convert them into some marketable product. These teams are currently focused on products such as fish food, 

fertilizer, carbon nanotubes and building materials. Full team profiles and summaries of their technologies can be accessed at: https://carbon.xprize.org/teams. 

b. What does carbon utilization mean for the overall economics of making CCUS 

projects more cost competitive? 

Without government assistance, carbon utilization is necessary to improve the economics until the capital and operating costs are hopefully reduced in subsequent 

plants. The first of a kind plants are the most expensive and the lessons learned 

building and operating them lead to future cost decreases. NRG acknowledges that 

they could build a second Petra Nova unit at a cost 15 percent less than the original. 

Also, the utilization of the CO2 provides an additional revenue stream. EOR is the 

simplest and most widely utilized use of CO2 today. Selling theCO2 to an EOR operator could provide $25–30/ton to help offset the cost of the capture. Converting the 

CO2 into an even higher value product, such as carbon fiber, could lead to revenues 

that exceed the cost of capture and make CCUS economically profitable. 

In Wyoming, we believe market based solutions toward CCUS will ultimately be 

more successful than government mandates. If CCUS is a revenue generator rather 

than an expense through regulation, technology will develop even faster. A win-win 

is removing CO2 and creating a new industry. 

c. Can carbon utilization play a major role in reducing the cost of capture for 

CCUS projects? 

Absolutely. If the products or end use of the CO2 sells for more than the cost of 

the capture, the business opportunity will push technology. Free markets drive innovation and cost declines much more quickly than government mandates. 

EMISSIONS FREE GRID BY 2050

Question 3. Each witness from the hearing discussed different clean air technologies that if developed and commercialized can reduce our emissions footprint. 

There is international agreement that CCUS and other renewable technologies can 

play a role in helping us cut emissions consistent with meeting our 2C targets, in 

a way that is sustainable and economically sound. 

a. Why are your labs prioritizing research in clean energy technologies like this? 

Response. The State of Wyoming currently receives approximately 70 percent of 

it’s entire tax revenues from mineral extraction. Acknowledging societal concerns regarding carbon emissions, the State recognized nearly 15 years ago that advances 

in technology was a proven way to mitigate environmental concerns. Since the early 

2000’s, Wyoming has invested millions in funding new research and facilities with 

the goal of sustaining its tax base, while advancing clean energy tech. 

b. What role will advanced nuclear and carbon capture and utilization play in 

helping us meet our climate targets and having an emissions free grid by 2050? 

Technology is apolitical and the U.S. can make its greatest impact by investing 

in technology development that can be utilized around the world. There is considerable debate over the future of coal within the United States. However, wind farms 

and renewable alternatives still face long permitting timelines and intermittency 

33 

challenges. For example, the Sierra Madre/Chokecherry Wind Farm and the associated TransWest Express transmission line planned for Wyoming would be the largest on-shore wind farm in the United States, delivering 3000 MW of electricity to 

the Southwest U.S. This project filed its first permits in 2007 to the Bureau of Land 

Management, U.S. Fish Wildlife Service and associated Federal agencies during the 

last year of the Bush administration. They did not receive their final permits until 

2017 under the Trump Administration. The permitting timeline was 10 years and 

cost over $125 million. The lengthy, expensive and complicated permitting requirements for new wind farms an incredible barrier to entry for large amounts of renewables in the Western U.S. to be added to the grid. 

Every credible energy analysis from the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate 

Change to DOE acknowledges large amounts of coal will be used globally for the 

foreseeable future. The world will not see an emissions free grid without CCUS. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you very much. 

I now recognize Dr. Steve Bohlen, who is the Global Security EProgram Manager at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory 

of California. 

Welcome, Mr. Bohlen. 

STATEMENT OF STEVE BOHLEN, GLOBAL SECURITY E-PROGRAM MANAGER, LAWRENCE LIVERMORE NATIONAL LABORATORY 

Mr. BOHLEN. Thank you, Senator. 

Senator CAPITO. Dr. Bohlen. Sorry. It took you a lot of years to 

get to that. 

Mr. BOHLEN. Thank you. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to share our insights into the current status and future of 

carbon capture, utilization, and storage. My name is Steve Bohlen, 

and I lead the advanced energy technologies and energy security 

portfolios at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. 

Management of carbon dioxide emissions is not just viable; the 

technology exists today, is deployed and operating, and functions as 

designed. In addition, and perhaps most important, technologies for 

converting CO2 into useful materials and chemical feedstocks is developing rapidly. These provide new possibilities for a commercial 

enterprise in the United States, not to mention technical leadership. 

Carbon capture, utilization, and storage is a growing, but underutilized element in the clean energy industry. CCUS, as it is 

known, includes carbon capture and storage, CO2 for enhanced oil 

recovery, CO2 for conversion and use as various products, and even 

carbon removal technologies which pull CO2 from the air and 

oceans. These different pathways provide many commercial and environmental opportunities for companies, communities, and governments. 

Technical progress in CCUS is significant with unrealized potential to manage carbon emissions. Today, 16 commercial plants operate worldwide, and 6 more will be operating in 2020. A third of 

these are in North America. Costs have come down, performance 

has improved, high-capacity sequestration has been demonstrated 

and proven to be safe, and new technologies have been borne. 

Independent analysis shows that CCUS can be cost-competitive 

in certain markets with clean energy technologies. Together, these 

projects will inject 40 million tons of CO2 underground, equivalent 

to pulling 8 million vehicles off the road. I describe a number of 

these projects in some detail in my written testimony. 

34 

For nearly two decades, Lawrence Livermore National Lab has 

been funded to work on CCUS and has been a partner in most of 

the carbon capture sequestration projects nationally and globally. 

In addition, the lab has developed early stage technologies for CO2

conversion to useful products such as methane, methanol, and 

ethylene. 

Livermore and other laboratories provide technical expertise, 

modeling and simulation, and actionable solutions for the challenges of enhanced oil recovery and carbon capture, utilization, and 

storage. For example, today Livermore provides advanced 3-D fracture mechanics modeling for industrial partners for managing the 

risk of induced seismicity, for enhanced oil recovery, and underground carbon sequestration projects, as well as hydraulic fracturing, with the added benefit of using the same advanced tools for 

the monitoring of nuclear testing programs by our adversaries. 

Lawrence Livermore National Lab scientists have provided technical and modeling expertise for large-scale geologic carbon sequestration projects globally, and the safe, long-term storage of several 

tens of millions of tons of CO2 underground. 

In looking to the future, Livermore is engaged in the development of revolutionary new technologies with industrial partners to 

manage CO2 emissions by turning CO2 into valuable feedstocks for 

fuels and chemicals. In fact, we see a society that is poised at the 

edge of a new carbon economy, one in which CO2 is the driving 

force for new products and new enterprises in which innovation 

and entrepreneurships creates new companies and wealth by capturing and converting CO2 into value-added products. 

Employing out-of-the-box thinking, the Lab is embarking on a 

bold new approach to manage CO2 at large scale, and simultaneously providing carbonate sands for cement manufacture and 

beach replenishment and elevation gain by extracting CO2 from 

seawater. 

CCUS has many applications, including power, heavy industry, 

and as a pathway for achieving negative emissions. Though commonly considered a coal power sector technology, for which the 

technology would be most valuable in reducing emissions, the same 

or similar technology can be applied to biomass, natural gas, 

biogas, and even fuel cell power systems. 

Many heavy industries, representing 20 percent of global emissions, lack other options to decarbonize. For cement, steel, petrochemical refining, and glass making, most of these emissions are 

a direct consequence of fabrication chemistry. To manage these 

emissions, carbon capture is currently the only viable option. 

This concludes my testimony, and I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Bohlen follows:] 

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RESPONSES OF JASON BEGGER TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR WHITEHOUSE

1. CCUS TECHNOLOGIES GENERAL: 

During the hearing, I mentioned several CCUS projects that have come online in 

recent years. This includes, the Iceland Carbfix Program, the Climeworks Direct Air 

Capture facility in Switzerland, the BioProcess H2O ethanol facility, and the Boundary Dam III carbon capture facility in the Canadian Province of Saskatchewan. 

These facilities cover a broad variety of CCUS technologies that includes coal, ethanol, permanent sequestration, and direct air capture. 

Question 1. Can you discuss the other promising CCUS technologies that have 

come online in recent years either at the pilot scale or larger? What are the economics of these projects that allow them to operate? 

Response. There are many projects and approaches that highlight the state-of-theart today and what is possible soon. Direct air capture projects (e.g., the Climeworks 

project in Zurich) are discussed in section 3 below. 

• PetraNova, Texas: Using Japanese technology (Mitsubishi Heavy Industries), 

NRG retrofit a Houston supercritical coal unit for 90 percent CO2 capture. Roughly 

1.4 million tons CO2/y are used for enhanced oil recovery. Unit costs are roughly 

$100/ton CO2 , which is comparable to reduction costs achieved by many other clean 

power technologies, with substantial room to reduce costs in the 2nd–4th plants. Economics are possible due to revenues from enhanced oil recovery sales, a novel business structure where NRG owns part of the oil field receiving CO2, and a $227 million grant from the US Dept. of Energy. 

• Al Reyadah, Abu Dhabi: This project takes 800,000 tons/y of by-product CO2

from a steel mill and uses it for enhanced oil recovery. Conventional pre-combusion 

separation technology (Selexol) separates CO2 from syngas. Unit costs are estimated 

to be between $15–25/ton CO2 . The economics are possible due to revenues from 

enhanced oil recovery sales, low power costs for compression, and the low cost of 

compressing and transporting pre-concentrated by-product CO2 from the steel plant. 

• NetPower, Houston: This new, advanced power cycle uses supercritical CO2 as 

working fluid in the turbine, and combusts natural gas or coal syngas in an oxygen 

and CO2 rich synthetic air. The pilot plant is fully constructed and is under testing 

now (more details in section 1.b on economics and opportunities for deployment). Economics are possible based on lack for CO2 storage integration and private investment of private capital from industrial partners. 

• Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), Illinois: High-concentration, by-product CO2

from an ethanol fermenter in Decatur is compressed and injected into a deep saline 

formation. Economics are made possible by a $180M grant from the US Dept. of Energy, which covers capital and operating costs, as well as low-cost power for compression. 

NOTE: This project would be commercial today if ethanol from this plant sold into 

California under the Low-Carbon Fuel Standard ($80–120/ton CO2 ). It is anticipated that ADM will take advantage of this revenue source once the State of California completes its accounting standard for CCS, scheduled for 2 years from now. 

Many ethanol producers are looking forward to this CCS economic boost, which we 

estimate will provide about $0.20/gallon in additional profit for ethanol with CCS 

(including the cost of the CCS system). 

The Department of Energy estimated in the recent Billion Ton Report that the 

U.S. could reliably produce 1.5 billion tons of biomass for biofuel production. Typically half of the carbon in biomass is emitted as CO2 during processing. If all of this 

biomass were treated in facilities with CCS like ADM, as much as 750 million tons 

of CO2 could be sequestered. This CO2 has been captured from the atmosphere by 

the agricultural plant growth, and the sequestered amount would be ‘negative’ emissions. The capture technology is well-demonstrated to achieve this goal, but storage 

options need to be developed. 

Most of these projects are in the US with American companies. The economics of 

every project required some additional revenues, grants, or funds to close a financial 

gap for these first of a kind sequestration operations. 

Question 2. Can you also discuss what CCUS technologies you believe could be 

coming online over the next several years as it relates to both CCUS and direct air 

capture? 

Response. Yes. 

• NetPower: NetPower is using the Allam cycle—a new, high-pressure/high-temperature gas oxycombustion approach that remains above the supercritical point for 

CO2 through the whole cycle. If it works as predicted, it will combine high efficiency 

44 

of gas turbines with 100 percent CO2 capture at near-zero additional costs. The unit 

is being tested at the Houston pilot plant now. NetPower would be the first in line 

to provide a zero-Carbon natural gas project in the U.S. (and in the world). 

This technology could be a game-changer in the U.S. with our large natural gas 

reserves and geologic storage capacity. It requires all new-plant construction (cannot 

be retrofit to existing plants) but offers an intriguing option for renewable integration; for the last 3 years new power plant construction in the U.S. has been a mix 

of gas, wind, and solar, roughly 1/3 each. Constructing new gas plants that meet 

the NetPower expectations would make that mix a zero-carbon solution. 

• Reykjavik Energy, CarbFix, and Climeworks: Today, Climeworks captures CO2

from the air and sells it to a greenhouse. They are working with an Icelandic geothermal power company, Reykjavik Energy, to create the world’s first negative emissions power plant. The preferred site is at the CarbFix project, which reinjects CO2

into the basalt formations of geothermal production zones, where it mineralizes as 

new carbonate minerals. They plan to integrate the Climeworks technology at the 

CarbFix site, and hope to sell the service of negative emissions to potential buyers. 

• Carbon Recycling International in CA: A number of technologies and companies 

convert CO2 into chemicals and products, including methanol (which can be used as 

a transportation fuel, cooking fuel, or feedstock chemical). Carbon Recycling International is an Icelandic company that combines renewable hydrogen with CO2 and 

heat to make methanol, which they sell to the European market. They have a subsidiary office in Los Angeles, which is exploring the possibility of integrating directair capture technology with CO2 -to-methanol conversion in California. These fuels 

would benefit from the low-carbon fuel standards and air-quality control regulations 

in CA, and may be commercial there. 

• Biomass Conversion with CCS: Converting the wood and fiber left over from agriculture and forestry is being pursued by a number of small ventures including a 

partnership of Easy Energy and Iowa State University who are working with LLNL 

and the State of California to demonstrate conversion of forest waste into bio-oil by 

pyrolysis, a fast heating process. About 20 percent of the waste is turned to charcoal, or biochar, that can be used to improve farm soils while permanently storing 

carbon, making this a negative emissions process. The pyrolysis approach only requires small equipment that can be moved near the biomass source, rather than facing the transportation problems of large biomass energy plants. 

• Other Industrial CCUS—Like the ethanol and fertilizer plants of the US breadbasket, many industrial belts in the US have large-volumes of near-pure CO2 that 

could be stored, used for EOR, or serve as feedstocks for CO2 conversion. One important example is along the Gulf Coast, including Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas. 

In particular, CO2 from these sources could be applied in offshore carbon storage 

and EOR sites. These would take advantage of existing infrastructure, namely nearshore platforms that are close to decommissioning. Storing CO2 would help delay 

decommissioning costs, saving money and creating more resource. 

Question 3. What types of CCUS technologies hold the most promise as it relates 

to reducing our emissions to address climate change? 

Response. The efficient conversion of biomass to products like fuels is the lowhanging fruit of CCUS today. Ethanol plants emit pure CO2 for storage or reuse, 

thermal processes make biochar for soil improvement, and good crop management 

improves soil carbon. The products benefit from Federal RINS and State LCFS economics. These efforts need to demonstrate that they are effective, and quantify their 

final carbon footprint. ‘Air capture’ through biomass is already a pillar of the U.S. 

economy in our agricultural and forestry management systems. All of the direct air 

capture systems have these economic benefits and demonstration challenges—it is 

convenient to consider them in the same light. 

Liquid fuel production, and CCS associated with it, address the largest source of 

U.S. CO2 emissions: transportation. Great progress has been made in electric power 

generation, but transportation gains have been limited to efficiency. Biofuels are an 

important part of this, as is creation of hydrogen from natural gas with CCS. This 

is a low-cost option today, and hydrogen can be used as a fuel itself, or to upgrade 

other fuels, even to make fuels directly from CO2 . Hydrogen is an important industrial product, and three projects (including the Shell Quest project in Alberta and 

the Air Products project in Texas) demonstrate that zero-carbon hydrogen production from natural gas plus CCS is a commercially viable approach that is technically 

mature. 

We have been very focused on CCS in coal fired power, and those technologies 

are maturing. Options like NetPower (see above, sections 1.2 and 1.1) could completely reshape our carbon emissions. With the impressive gains in renewables, a 

carbon-free U.S. grid is in sight. Electrification and reduction of the carbon footprint 

45 

of liquid fuels can make major progress in transportation. But key industrial emissions like steel, concrete, glass, and chemical production need new options. 

A thorny problem is that captured CO2 needs to be transported to its storage or 

use point. Creation of pipeline systems to provide this service would greatly reduce 

the cost. Some future options for utilization of CO2 , such as creating ethylene from 

CO2 via electrocatalysis, could facilitate local usage of CO2 at the source. Inexpensive hydrogen from natural gas with CCS would enable the decarbonization of many 

industrial processes including steel production. 

Norway has just undertaken an effort to completely decarbonize its industrial sector via CCS. The industrial sources include cement, fertilizer, and waste-to-energy 

(trash burning).They will use ship transport of CO2 to a single storage site in the 

North Sea. The industries are responsible for capture at their site, but the government is taking responsibility for the transport and storage, including liability issues. 

The ship transport demonstration is unique in the world, and could be applicable 

in the U.S. Gulf Coast where most emitters are along shipping lines, and there is 

huge capacity offshore. 

Finally, there are many other promising CCUS technologies nearing technical 

readiness. Chemical looping is one example—it draws the energy from fuels very efficiently without burning them through direct chemical reactions. New solid 

sorbents present potential breakthroughs in both capital and operating costs, and 

may prove sufficiently robust for direct air capture. Advances in advanced manufacturing, like the microbead capture technology developed at LLNL, hold promise for 

dramatic cost reduction and the ability to deploy CCS at distributed sources. Many 

of these technologies require more time and funding before they could enter the 

market competitively. 

2. CARBON UTILIZATION: 

To address climate change we must reduce our emissions from multiple sectors 

including the power, industrial sector, and transportation sector. As discussed during the hearing, BioProcess H2O is a unique technology as it reduces emissions from 

an ethanol plant. 

Question 4. What are the different forms of carbon utilization that have proven 

to work at the pilot scale? In your opinion what are the promising carbon utilization 

technologies that have not yet been tested at the commercial scale? 

Response. 

• Enhanced oil recovery is the major success in carbon utilization. Programs that 

incentivize storage could increase use of CO2 in EOR to the point that the oil produced is carbon negative (more CO2 stored than emitted in burning the fuel). This 

may prove particularly important in developing CO2 -based EOR in residual oil 

zones (ROZ), which account for over 200 billion barrels of estimated resource in 

Texas alone. • Feeding CO2 to algae is a surprising success. Algae uses CO2 to make biomass 

and are limited in their growth if they only get it from the air. Programs to add 

CO2 to the ponds show significant increases in productivity, while also demonstrating reduction in the cost to capture the CO2 because there is a much simpler 

separation system (for instance, high compression is not needed). Algae is converted 

into valuable chemicals, animal feed, and in the future, fuels. 

• An early target of CO2 utilization efforts was in cement and concrete production. 

Those efforts have created businesses like CarbonCure, who add CO2 to concrete, 

resulting in a new reduction in the carbon footprint because the concrete is stronger, 

and less is needed, in addition to the CO2 incorporated. A number of companies are 

pursuing similar goals. Transportation of the CO2 to the concrete plants is a barrier, 

as is the technical understanding of all the mechanisms which incorporate CO2 into 

cement. 

• LLNL is working with Stanford University to produce methane from CO2 with 

renewable energy. Both physical catalysts and biologic pathways are being evaluated. The low cost of renewable energy makes this potentially viable even in the 

U.S. if there are carbon emissions goals, such as those in California. Both major gas 

utilities in California are interested in this as a way to utilize their existing natural 

gas infrastructure in a zero-carbon economy. 

• Laboratory studies have shown that CO2 can be converted in to chemicals and 

fuels. The ARPA-E supported process from Oxide Materials and 3M produces gasoline from CO2 and water using renewable electricity. A number of studies, notably 

those of Jarmillo at Stanford University, show that many if not all industrial chemicals can be made in this way. Ethylene, with 200 million tons of annual worldwide 

production resulting in 300 million tons of CO2 emissions is a target for 

electrocatalytic production. Total, the French oil company, is working with LLNL to 

46 

achieve this goal in hopes of decarbonizing their chemical products sector. Shell Oil 

has created an entire division to look at producing chemicals by this means, and 

also how to provide the large amounts of CO2 that will be required. 

With renewable energy prices dropping steadily, we are optimistic that these approaches can become competitive with existing fossil-fuel approaches. In the event 

that long-lived products like polyethylene are produced, these processes become carbon negative. Future production of carbon fiber and carbon nanotubes is being investigated. These utilization approaches would both reduce our fossil fuel emissions, 

and create real negative emissions needed to hit our 2 degree C targets. 

Question 5. What does carbon utilization mean for the overall economics of making CCUS projects more cost competitive? 

Response. 

• Utilization for EOR is generally considered to provide $30/ton of CO2 in economic support. CO2 use in concrete by CarbonCure reduces the overall cost of the 

product by making it slightly stronger. Use of CO2 for algae may reduce the cost 

of carbon capture by 50 percent (these are very preliminary studies, but the reduction in expensive equipment is the main benefit). 

• Future payments through the California LCFS (Oregon and British Columbia 

are starting similar systems) could reduce the cost of ethanol with CCS by $0.20/ 

gallon including the costs of the CCS system. This is the only case that we know 

of where an actual profit, rather than a reduction in costs, accrues to CCS, and we 

expect it to revolutionize the Midwest U.S. ethanol industry. Unlike the EOR reduction however, this is a result of a policy action. 

• The cost benefit of chemical and fuel production from CO2 is not yet clear, but 

is not expected to be better than current embedded systems using fossil fuels until 

three events occur: 

1. Renewable energy is widely available. 

2. Effective systems to utilize these catalytic approaches are demonstrated, and, 

3. CO2 supply is easy and inexpensive (a carbon economy exists). 

• We expect CO2 utilization to grow just as wind power did in the United States: 

early success at demonstration scale, a long period of industrial and business development, followed by unsubsidized commercial success in the not too distant future. 

c. Can carbon utilization play a major role in reducing the cost of capture for CCUS 

projects? 

• CO2 utilization doesn’t actually reduce capital or operating costs—what it does 

is create new revenues. The additional revenues can be large enough to substantially reduce the integrated project costs and close the gap in financing projects. 

• It already plays a major role in the large number of projects where EOR is utilized, and policy support for those efforts is likely to cause an increase in CCS 

projects. Algae efforts could play a major role to the extent that algae producers are 

successful in creating markets for their products (fuels are not considered a nearterm economic target). They are gradually doing so. Turning CO2 into new products, 

such as fuels and chemicals, is still in the research stage and is not likely to provide 

short-term cost reductions in CCS, although in the long run these may provide the 

carbon economy required to completely decarbonize our industrial and fuel sectors 

that currently lack options to meet 2050 targets. 

3. DIRECT AIR CAPTURE: 

The Climeworks direct air capture project in Zrich is a capture facility connected 

to an existing garbage incinerator that generates waste heat. This waste heat is 

used to power fans in the direct air facility, which suck outside air into a compressed air chamber. The plan is for the facility to take in 900 tons/year of CO2 , 

but the cost of capture for these types of plants is roughly $600/dollars a ton. 

Question 6. Dr. Bohlen why is the cost of capture for direct air capture so high? 

What can bring down the costs to make this technology more feasible? 

Response. The costs for CO2 capture from air will always be more expensive than 

capture from power plant or industrial sites. This is because CO2 concentrations are 

much lower in air (0.04 percent CO2 ) than from flue gas streams (4–7 percent from 

natural gas power, 12–20 percent from coal power, nearly 100 percent from ethanol 

fermenters, and 1–35 percent from most heavy industry smokestacks). The low partial pressure of CO2 from air requires large surface area contactors, or much large 

systems, or much more strongly binding capture agents. All of these add substantial 

capital and/or operating costs. 

Despite these challenges, two companies are operating commercial units that capture CO2 from the air. Both companies require relatively low-cost zero-carbon power 

($0.03–0.04/kW-hr) to achieve their current operating prices and performance. 

47 

• Climeworks, Zurich: A small Swiss company, Climeworks, has created the first 

commercial, for-profit direct air capture project. They have developed a robust, modular technology that capture 50 tons CO2 /year, and have assembled 18 modules 

that sell 900 tons/year of CO2 to an organic greenhouse. Climeworks technology delivers food-grade CO2 in one step, as well as two tons of water for every ton of CO2

capture. This technology is born mass-producible, scalable, and robust. • Carbon Engineering, Vancouver: A small, Canadian company, Carbon Engineering has assembled and innovated around existing commercial components to make 

a new system (like the Wright brothers building a plane out of bicylcle parts). They 

deliver lower purity CO2 than Climeworks, but appear to have susbtantially lower 

capital and operating costs. 

Direct air capture can be deployed anywhere there is cheap, zero-carbon power. 

This creates a market value of avoided costs (e.g., no trucking or shipping). Early 

applications are likely to be in the food and carbonated beverage industry. It is also 

possible that they could sell CO2 for EOR in locations where CO2 supply is a challenge. 

Question 7. Do you think there is scaling feasibility for ocean direct air capture 

technologies to pull CO2 from the ocean to precipitate carbonate building materials 

like limestone bricks or sand? Could the act of pulling CO2 from seawater indirectly 

aid in our solutions for ocean acidification? 

Response. The cost of LLNL’s ocean CO2 capture system has not been established, 

and will require full scale demonstration of the sort being done in the air capture 

systems today. The advantage of our concept is that the ocean concentrates CO2 due 

to biological activity, so we anticipate that we can improve on the cost of air capture 

systems. However, this is a fairly small difference, and capture from the ocean will 

still be more expensive than capture from any of the industrial sources we discussed 

above. It will, however, remediate some ocean acidification and of course the new 

advantage of the approach is that it will create new construction material in remote 

places. To be clear, we see direct ocean capture as providing both a new option and 

new benefit, and do not wish to criticize other air capture methods . 

It is difficult to speak authoritatively to scaling of a system like this, but our 

thought process is to design a system that runs entirely on wind (preferred for cost 

and availability), wave, or solar power. Those costs we know well today. Our system 

will most likely require a location where tidal currents bring fresh seawater to the 

extraction process. This is a cost advantage because those flows are predictable. The 

value of the created building material must be high, favoring distant islands or 

places like Japan—industrialized countries that lack those specific resources. Onshore use is likely to be less economic than simple truck-transport of building materials. 

The seawater exiting the process will be less acidic than the inlet. We anticipate 

that about 17,000 cubic meters will need to be processed to obtain one ton of CO2

and two tons of calcium carbonate building material. That seawater will have a pH 

0.1 pH units higher than the inlet, which would be a major factor for shellfish larvae which require high pH to make their first shells. Problems that may occur include clogging of the system by sea life (a constant problem for ocean water systems). We do not yet have an understanding of that difficulty. 

Regarding the feasibility of scaling, we think the chances are good. The ancillary 

benefits of more building material and less acidification will only increase as the 

system is deployed at larger scale. As with any new idea, there may be problems 

that only are exposed by demonstration and testing. We look forward to an opportunity to do that. c. In addition to paying direct air capture a carbon payment for 

their avoided emissions, like we do in our recently introduced bipartisan CCUS bill. 

What else can legislators to drive these technologies closer to commercialization? 

Systems such as the California Low Carbon Fuel System (LCFS) encourage rapid 

technology development. R&D on capture not from coal fired power is critical. Gas, 

industry, biofuel all need the kind of R&D that to date has been limited exclusively 

to coal by legislative language constraints. For the US Dept. of Energy to pilot and 

demonstrate those systems, amendment to appropriations language from the 2014, 

2015, and 2016 budgets would be required. 

Many potential policies could be considered. The most important and valuable 

policies would be ones which accomplish two goals. First, they should stimulate innovation for researchers and companies so as to improve performance and cost. Second, they should seek to create market pull for initial products and projects. Such 

policies could include tax incentives, grants, procurement requirements, product 

standards, feed-in-tarriffs, portfolio standards, and other policies to stimulate innovation and markets. 

The U.S. carbon management science effort has been incredibly effective and leads 

the world, but is almost entirely focused on coal. We believe that natural gas for 

48 

power and industry, biofuel production, and chemical reactions intrinsic to many industrial processes like steel making, now deserve the attention of the Nation’s outstanding scientific resources. R&D in these areas will yield benefits immediately. 

Fuels remain a major difficulty in U.S. carbon emissions. Two policies could help. 

1) Encouragement of biofuel development and carbon management to reduce the 

carbon footprint of carbon fuels. 2) Encouragement of ‘overshoot’ CO2 EOR where 

more CO2 is used than is needed, effectively reducing the carbon footprint of the 

oil, would have a very similar effect for fossil fuel production (for example, with residual oil zone (ROZ) production). 

These two approaches could be encouraged simultaneously by a single approach 

to low carbon fuels such as enhancing the Federal renewable fuel standard to encourage these approaches. That enhancement would improve the value of a RIN 

based on a better carbon footprint, encouraging both new processes as we have discussed, and overall efficiency in the production system. The California LCFS, with 

limited goals, has demonstrated how rapidly a process like this drives innovation. 

A similar change to RINs could have a nationwide effect, strongly improving the 

value of fuels made in America with forward-looking environmentally friendly processing. 

In the longer term, the management of CO2 in our economy requires a new paradigm which we think of as the carbon economy. CO2 can be a feedstock, along with 

natural gas, for most of our industrial chemicals and fuels. The US has rich carbon 

resources and nearly unlimited renewable power which can create the new carbon 

economy and all the jobs and industries it entails. Investment at all levels of science 

and engineering will encourage this result—one we need to have in place by roughly 

2050 to have any hope of meeting 2〉C. Our renewable revolution took that much 

time and a major investment of government and academic science, as well as many 

thoughtful policies to support the creation of new businesses to implement that 

science. 

4. Emissions Free Grid by 2050: 

Each witness from the hearing discussed different clean air technologies that if 

developed and commercialized can reduce our emissions footprint. There is international agreement that CCUS and other renewable technologies can play a role in 

helping us cut emissions consistent with meeting our 2C targets, in a way that is 

sustainable and economically sound. 

a. Why are your labs prioritizing research in clean energy technologies like this? 

As part of our missions for science in public service and to prevent and mitigate 

national security threats, we believe an emissions-free grid is both necessary and 

feasible. Investments over the last 20 years have made remarkable progress possible—wind and solar are now are the cheapest sources of power. Carbon capture 

and storage is demonstrated and safe. The investments in research have demonstrated their value. b. What role will advanced nuclear and carbon capture and 

utilization play in helping us meet our climate targets and having an emissions free 

grid by 2050? 

Costs are now driving utility’s choices in power production technology. The biggest 

gap in the present low-cost technologies is that renewables need something like storage or another zero-carbon source to make up their shortfalls when the wind and 

sun are not available. Today gas fills that role, but a zero-carbon electric system 

requires either massive storage with no gas, or CCS on gas. CCS on gas is possible 

today, and deserves the attention of policymakers. The U.S. vast reserves of natural 

gas can play a key role in electric power and hydrogen for industry, with thoughtful 

application of CCS. 

The existing fleet of nuclear plants are an irreplaceable resource for carbon-free 

electricity. Along with hydro they simply make it easier to meet our other goals, 

which ultimately are driven by capital costs. Where will the Nation get the capital 

to build the power fleet we want? Many of our choices will take advantage of existing power infrastructure. While we are hopeful for advanced nuclear technology, it 

does not yet appear to have a cost structure that will enable it to penetrate the U.S. 

market. In particular, the two challenges of high capital costs of contruction and robust and swift licensing require more focused work to overcome these challenges. 

Utilization will play the same role in the future that recycling does today in reducing waste. Once the technologies are available, industries will choose to treat 

CO2 as a feedstock. Cheap renewable power will make this possible, and the ability 

to make products onsite in small inexpensive reactors instead of at massive refineries half the world away will open new possibilities for business to be efficient and 

flexible. 

An immediate benefit of utilization technologies is as an energy storage mechanism. Both methane and transportation fuels can be made at any time and stored 

for almost nothing. With appropriate S&T to make those transformations affordable, 

49 

this can be an excellent way to store our bounty of renewable energy, without the 

large capital investment required for battery storage. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you very much. 

Our next witness, as introduced by Senator Alexander, is Dr. 

Moe Khaleel, of Oak Ridge National Laboratory. He is Associate 

Lab Director for Energy and Environmental Sciences. 

Welcome, Doctor. 

STATEMENT OF MOE KHALEEL, ASSOCIATE LAB DIRECTOR 

FOR ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES, OAK RIDGE 

NATIONAL LAB 

Mr. KHALEEL. Chairman Capito, Ranking Member Whitehouse, 

and members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to 

appear before you today with this distinguished panel. 

Reliable energy is the foundation of our competitive national 

economy and our way of life. Reliable and sustainable energy requires a diverse mix of resources, including nuclear energy and fossil fuels. 

To support a healthy energy portfolio that includes abundant domestic resources such as coal, oil, and natural gas, ORNL performs 

transformative science-driven solutions to better capture, utilize, 

and store carbon dioxide emitted from power plants. 

Just in the past 8 months ORNL announced two remarkable 

breakthroughs in carbon capture and conversion. We discovered a 

simple, reliable process to capture CO2 directly from ambient air, 

offering a new and potentially cheaper option for carbon storage. 

The method uses a simple compound that binds strongly with atmospheric CO2 and forms a crystal. The CO2 gas can later be easily 

separated from the crystal structure at mild temperatures. The 

new ORNL method offers a less energy-intensive alternative. 

In another breakthrough, ORNL scientists created a new catalyst 

that converts carbon dioxide directly into ethanol. It is very difficult to go straight from carbon dioxide to ethanol with a single 

catalyst. The process did so at high volumes, turning CO2 into ethanol with a yield of 63 percent in the lab. 

These are just two examples of how ORNL’s deep expertise in 

material science can be used to accelerate clean energy innovation. 

We are also pursuing in our research a deeper understanding of 

the subsurface environment so we can better store CO2 and energy. 

Our scientists have used isotopes and tracers to decipher how CO2

moves into storage caverns. We have devised sensors for harsh environments and novel computational imaging to explore oil and gas 

reservoirs and to ensure well-borne integrity in drilling operations. 

Our high-performance computing resources at Oak Ridge, like 

Titan, the Nation’s most powerful supercomputer, have been essential to model and simulate the subsurface, and to test the clean 

coal technologies and compression systems used to store CO2 . 

For nearly 75 years ORNL has discovered the best ways to harness nuclear energy to provide electricity. The first nuclear power 

produced as electricity in the world came from the experiments 

with the Lab’s graphite reactor in the 1940’s. 

The challenge is an urgent one. It is estimated that some 100 

gigawatt of electricity could be retired in a relatively short period 

of time beginning in the early 2030’s. ORNL is answering the chalVerDate Aug 31 2005 12:26 May 04, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00053 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\27301.TXT VERN
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lenge with leading research in the entire nuclear fuel cycle. From 

the development of new materials to new reactor technologies, our 

expertise and capabilities reduce the time from scientific discovery 

to usage. 

ORNL’s supercomputers support modeling and simulation of new 

materials and reactor designs. For example, the Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors program at Oak Ridge 

was used to aid the startup of a new unit at the Tennessee Valley 

Authority’s Watts Bar Nuclear Power Plant in October 2016. ORNL 

is pursuing scientific research of small modular reactors. These reactors can be tailor-made for specific local needs, requiring a smaller geographic footprint and fewer operating personnel. 

We are also researching molten salt reactor technology. These reactors use liquid salt as a coolant and offer better safety margins 

than conventional light water reactors. 

The national labs, including Oak Ridge, are uniquely positioned 

to address clean energy challenges with transformative scientific 

breakthroughs and to sustain American leadership. 

Thank you for the opportunity to be here today and to share with 

you what we see as some of the solutions for a reliable clean energy 

portfolio for the Nation. I welcome any questions you may have. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Khaleel follows:] 

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RESPONSES OF MOE KHALEEL TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR BARRASSO

Question 1. For each of the following countries, would you please provide a list 

of the advanced, non-light water reactor designs either under construction or operating: United States, China, and Russia. 

Response. The following information is from the World Nuclear Association with 

regards to non-light water reactors currently operating or under construction. 

United States: 

None. 

China: 

A high temperature reactor (HTR) was built in China and wpent operational in 

2003 after achieving its first criticality in 2000. China is also developing a high temperature gas reactor (HTGR) that began construction in 2012 and is expected to be 

connected to the grid by the end of 2017. China is currently marketing its HTGR 

technology and has recently signed a cooperative agreement with Saudi Arabia. 

China also has a sodium-cooled fast neutron reactor, the Chinese Experimental Fast 

Reactor that started operation in July 2010 and was built in cooperation with various Russian institutes. Although this reactor was connected to the grid in 2011, it 

has been operated sporadically since that time. China has signed additional agreements with Russia to further develop larger-scale fast reactors. 

Russia: 

The BN series of reactors at the Beloyarsk Nuclear Power Station in Russia are 

fast breeder reactors that support the use of a closed nuclear fuel cycle with mixed 

oxide fuels. Over recent decades, Russia has consistently invested in the development of breeder reactor technologies. Two are currently operating at the Beloyarsk 

site. Russia is also pursuing a number of fast reactor demonstration projects. These 

include the SVBR (Svintsovo-VIsmutovyi Bystryi Reaktor) 100 MWe, Pb-Bi cooled 

fast reactor, the BREST (Bystryi Reactor so Svintsovym Teplonositelem) 300 MWe, 

Pb-cooled fast reactor, and the multipurpose fast research reactor, MBIR, rated at 

150 MWt. 

Question 2. S. 512 contains robust provisions directing the Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission to develop a regulatory framework for licensing advanced reactors. 

What more can be done to improve the regulatory environment for advanced reactors in addition to enacting these provisions into law? 

Response. In addition to examining licensing process options such as the staged 

licensing discussed in the bill, it is imperative that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) undertake efforts to modify its licensing infrastructure to accommodate 

the licensing of advanced reactors. The first step in this process at the top level is 

underway with the NRC’s issuance of a draft regulatory guide (RG) on the development of design criteria for advanced reactors. These criteria are derived from 10 

CFR 50 Appendix A, and they are essentially light water reactor (LWR)-centric. 

This work resulted from a collaboration between the NRC and the Department of 

Energy (DOE) in which DOE laboratories drafted a proposed set of design criteria 

and provided them to the NRC for their consideration. 

Equivalent versions of the NRC’s Standard Review Plan (NUREG–0800) for LWRs 

are needed for liquid-metal, gas-cooled, and molten salt reactors to provide guidance 

to NRC staff on how to review license applications and potential licensees. The next 

level of documents that underpin the NRC Standard Review Plan are regulatory 

guides (RGs). These RGs must be reviewed to identify guidance that must be adapted for the various advanced reactor types to determine what, if any, new RGs might 

be needed. The RGs in many instances endorse national consensus standards as a 

means of meeting NRC requirements. DOE could take the lead responsibility to 

work with standards organizations to identify and support the development of needed standards for advanced reactors. 

In summary, it is important to understand: (1) the relationships and dependencies 

of the several document types noted above that form the licensing infrastructure, 

and (2) that efforts need to start now for the NRC to be prepared to license advanced reactors. The NRC can license by exception, but that approach will likely 

be quite costly and would lack certainty for potential licensees. 

Question 3. What more could DOE be doing to accelerate the development of 

Small Modular Reactors and demonstrate their ability to provide secure and highly 

reliable power for DOE and DOD national security and mission critical activities? 

Response. DOE could accelerate development of small modular reactors (SMRs) by 

fulfilling the role as a ‘‘first mover’’ by deploying SMRs selectively across the US. 

In this role, DOE would assist in development of the supply chain that is critical 

to the success of any new reactor type. The supply chain provides jobs and re-establishes the needed commercial nuclear infrastructure. This effort would also support 

63 

future deployment of advanced reactor technologies. Oak Ridge National Laboratory 

(ORNL) has conducted studies identifying small regional areas or clusters where the 

combined power needs of governmental agencies—largely driven by Department of 

Defense (DoD) military sites—match very well with electrical generation power capacities of SMRs. Early deployments would provide the SMR community with the 

needed opportunity to demonstrate their reliable, safe operations, which in turn 

could result in follow-on deployments in the US and internationally. 

An additional area that could be addressed relates to the implications of having 

a limited number of personnel operating two or more reactor units. One of the prime 

cost savings areas associated with SMRs is based on the ability to limit the number 

of control centers for a suite of reactor units. However, the operational processes 

and challenges have yet to be fully examined and could be an area of contention 

in the licensing process. In addition, DOE could support efforts to develop the scientific basis for evaluating the passive safety systems and the main criteria that the 

NRC would need to consider for evaluating these systems. Appendix K of 10 CFR 

50 is currently being used to establish the regulatory requirements for the emergency core coolant systems based on active cooling, whereas some SMR designs rely 

on passive cooling systems. 

In addition to LWR SMR designs, several non-LWR SMR designs are being considered under advanced reactor concepts. Several companies are designing advanced 

SMRs around molten salt, sodium cooled, and HTGR technologies. DOE’s research 

and development efforts in areas such as new materials for extreme environments, 

predictive modeling and simulation, and regulatory approaches are important for 

enabling the deployment of such technologies. 

Question 4. What can the labs do to help make sure that Small Modular Reactors 

can be manufactured and constructed with the most advanced methods? 

Response. National laboratories provide the fundamental scientific knowledge for 

the application, development, and demonstration of nuclear science and technology. 

Modular construction techniques have been perfected for the design of nuclear powered submarines and ships. Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory and Bettis Atomic 

Power Laboratory have been instrumental in the design process for the US Nuclear 

Navy. 

An appropriate role for national labs, like ORNL for example, may be to establish 

component prototyping centers using capabilities in materials, neutrons, and modeling and simulations at exascale to develop and deploy innovative manufacturing 

technologies, where advanced manufacturing and 3D printing at DOE’s Manufacturing Demonstration Facility can be used to design, print, and test reasonably 

sized components in representative experimental facilities. These efforts would be 

followed by design modifications as needed. Related activities are being performed 

at DOE facilities today under programs through the Advanced Manufacturing Office 

within DOE’s Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. New materials and 

processes have been demonstrated for first-of-a-kind products at ORNL, such as 

wind turbine forms, pressure hulls for small submersibles, and large-scale excavating equipment. Such an approach for nuclear manufacturing could help shorten 

the time to develop and qualify components, thus reducing costs and time to commercialization. 

Question 5. Industry, the national labs, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission 

need employees with specialized skill sets in nuclear-related disciplines to accomplish their missions. Is enough being done to ensure universities produce adequate 

numbers of graduates in these fields? 

Response. Currently, Federal agencies provide direct support to nuclear engineering programs through NRC, DOE and the National Nuclear Security Administration 

(NNSA). Congress has generously appropriated funding to each of these organizations to support US university programs. In addition, the DOE Office of Nuclear Energy (DOE-NE) also allocates a portion of its research and development budget to 

the university program through competitive grants that support the DOE-NE mission. These efforts have helped sustain and maintain interest in nuclear science and 

technology. 

As an example, this program could be modeled after the DOE’s NNSA Nuclear 

Security Education Program to establish a graduate-level program to develop and 

educate the next generation of engineers with careers in the nuclear fields. 

In addition, consideration should be given to funding focused internships at DOE 

labs, the NRC, utilities operating commercial nuclear plants, and reactor design developers. Industry-national lab-university focused advisory councils provide unique 

opportunities to inform stakeholders of the barriers and challenges facing the nuclear energy sector. The goal is to create visibility and enthusiasm among students 

while better preparing them for the nuclear energy job market. 

64 

RESPONSES OF MOE KHALEEL TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR SHELDON WHITEHOUSE

1. CCUS TECHNOLOGIES GENERAL: 

During the hearing, I mentioned several CCUS projects that have come online in 

recent years. This includes the Iceland Carbfix Program, the Climeworks Direct Air 

Capture facility in Switzerland, the BioProcess H2O ethanol facility, and the Boundary Dam III carbon capture facility in the Canadian Province of Saskatchewan. 

These facilities cover a broad variety of CCUS technologies that includes coal, ethanol, permanent sequestration, and direct air capture. 

Question 1. Can you discuss the other promising CCUS technologies that have 

come online in recent years either at the pilot scale or larger? What are the economics of these projects that allow them to operate? 

Response. Our understanding is that many carbon capture technologies have been 

demonstrated at pre-production scales, but additional research and testing is required to validate long term and commercial scale viability of the various approaches. Many recent pilot scale efforts have involved solvent, sorbent, and membrane separation technologies, but key limitations have yet to be resolved. 

For example, the energy costs for process steps such as regeneration or desorption 

of solvent and sorption must be addressed through additional research and development (R&D). Membrane technologies must address significant technical challenges 

such as throughput enhancement and fouling mitigation. ORNL is developing highthroughput, polymer-based membranes that may overcome existing barriers. Finally, there are earlier stage separation approaches, such as chemical looping combustion, that hold promise but require experimentation before they can be implemented at the scales needed for carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS). 

There is a strong need for a large-scale (ideally gigatons of CO2) geologic sequestration demonstration in the United States. One project not mentioned above that 

we are familiar with is the Nagaoka CO2 storage project, in Nagaoka, Japan. From 

2003 to 2005, 10,499 tonnes of CO2 was injected into an onshore deep oil and gas 

reservoir and CO2 plume migration and its reaction with the surrounding rock are 

currently being monitored. 

The CO2 was from ammonia production, and was transported to the site by truck. 

The cost was approximately $67 per tonne of CO2 sequestered, including separation/ 

capture pressurization (57 percent of cost), transport (11 percent of cost), and injection (32 percent of cost). Economic analysis found that cost reductions need to occur 

in the separations and capture processes, that utilization of reservoirs near emissions sources reduced costs significantly, and that injection capacity should be increased. 

The DOE Energy Frontier Research Center for Nanoscale Controls of Geologic 

CO2 made the study site a focus of its research to examine the capacity to precipitate CO2 in the form of carbonate minerals, helping to determine the long term storage security of the CO2 . Researchers found evidence for substantial reaction with 

volcanogenic minerals in the rock, suggesting that storage security would be high 

because CO2 would be immobilized in mineral phases. 

An example of a recent carbon utilization project is in the city of Saga, Japan. 

There, Toshiba Corporation completed a system in August 2016 to capture up to 10 

tons of CO2 per day from flue gas at a municipal waste incineration plant. The technology was originally developed for cabon capture at power generation plants. 

Saga has constructed a pipeline to deliver the captured CO2 to an adjacent facility 

where it is used in algae cultivation. The algae is then used to produce raw materials for cosmetics and nutritional supplements. Utilizing the CO2 supply in a process to make aviation biofuels from algae is also being studied. The Saga carbon capture and utilization project was estimated to cost approximately US$15 million. 

Question 2. Can you also discuss what CCUS technologies you believe could be 

coming online over the next several years as it relates to both CCUS and direct air 

capture? 

What types of CCUS technologies hold the most promise as it relates to reducing 

our emissions to address climate change? 

Response. These two questions have some similarities, so I will address them together. 

Use of captured CO2 for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) holds promise because there 

is an economic incentive to utilize the CO2 . However, beyond developing efficient 

carbon capture technologies, establishing the long-term fate and transport of the 

CO2 and its storage security is necessary if EOR is to be used for sequestration, as 

opposed to production. 

65 

About 80 percent, or 9 million metric tons of captured CO2 used by industry is 

in enhanced oil and coal-bed methane recovery operations. Estimated net marginal 

value for CO2 in EOR varies widely with oil price and field conditions. According 

to one 2014 estimate, the value one would be willing to pay to have CO2 delivered 

at a field varies between approximately 5/tCO2 to $66/tCO2 , with the highest values applying in times of high oil price. Another estimate ranges US $4/tCO2 to $8/tCO2

. Direct air capture (DAC) of CO2 is an attractive CCUS technology as it could be 

employed anywhere and would not be subject to fouling by contaminants such as 

sulfur oxide and nitrogen oxide often present in smokestacks. The process could provide a ready feedstock of CO2 for utilization technologies such as fuel production. 

Researchers are currently focused on chemical sorbents that can effectively remove CO2 at low concentrations in the atmosphere—including calcium hydroxide, 

which binds with CO2 to form calcium carbonate. However, the process to separate 

out the captured CO2 from the calcium carbonate for utilization or storage is currently considered too energy-intensive and inefficient. Other proposed approaches 

include mineral carbonation and electrochemical processes, the use of membranes, 

and photocatalytic CO2 conversion. All require further exploration. 

As an example, our ORNL scientists discovered a low-cost method of DAC that 

requires minimal energy and chemical input. The method uses a simple compound 

known as guanidine that captures CO2 from the air and binds it as a crystalline 

carbonate salt. Releasing the carbon from the crystal is accomplished through mild 

heating. While the findings are promising, more R&D is needed to explore and potentially scale up the process. Our scientists are using the Spallation Neutron 

Source at ORNL to analyze the carbonate binding in the crystals with the aim of 

designing a next generation of sorbents. 

2. CARBON UTILIZATION: 

To address climate change, we must reduce our emissions from multiple sectors, 

including the power, industrial sector, and transportation sector. As discussed during the hearing, BioProcess H2O is unique as it reduces emissions from an ethanol 

plant. 

Question 3. What are the different forms of carbon utilization that have proven 

to work at the pilot scale? In your opinion what are the promising carbon utilization 

technologies that have not yet been tested at the commercial scale? 

Response. Carbon utilization can be divided into four broad categories: direct utilization, biological utilization, geologic utilization, and chemical utilization. CO2 utilization remains a challenge due to both the life-cycle energy considerations and the 

potential requirements for the CO2 stream (such as purity). 

Current commercial direct uses of CO2 include processes for carbonation for beverages, and as a supercritical solvent. The magnitude of these uses is stable and 

small relative to carbon emissions. 

Biological utilization of enriched CO2 stream has been demonstrated with algae 

at pilot scale and beyond. Several companies are pursuing and selling products in 

high-value arenas such as for feed. However, challenges remain to lower costs and 

improve yields for fuels and commodity chemicals. 

While geological utilization for enhanced oil recovery is demonstrated, more longterm research on the fate of CO2 pumped belowground is needed. Chemical utilization is mostly at the pre-pilot scale to convert CO2 into chemicals such as carbon 

monoxide or hydrocarbons using renewable heat, light, and electricity. 

The biological, electrochemical, photochemical and various hybrid combinations 

are promising approaches that would require more R&D, including demonstrations. 

For example, at ORNL we have developed a simple, efficient process to convert CO2

directly into ethanol. The method uses a nanotechnology-based catalyst made from 

copper, carbon, and nitrogen, and applied voltage that triggers a chemical reaction. 

With the aid of the catalyst, we demonstrated a conversion to ethanol with a yield 

of 63 percent in the laboratory. The process operates at room temperature in water. 

In addition to removing carbon from the atmosphere, the process could be used to 

store excess electricity as ethanol. Doing so would help to balance a power grid supplied by intermittent renewable energy sources. This laboratory-scale process also 

needs further R&D to be proven effective at a larger scale, however. 

The Carbon X-Prize provides an excellent cross-section of CO2 utilization technologies in early commercial development by 23 teams from six countries. These 

teams are pushing the boundaries of CO2 utilization to create breakthrough solutions to turn waste (CO2 emissions) into valuable products such as fish food, fertilizer, carbon nanotubes, and building material. The teams are listed at http://carbon.xprize.org/teams. 

66 

Question 4. What does carbon utilization mean for the overall economics of making CCUS projects more cost competitive? 

Can carbon utilization play a major role in reducing the cost of capture for CCUS 

projects? 

Response. These two questions have some similarities, so I will address them together. 

According to both the International Energy Agency and the Intergovernmental 

Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), CCUS can play a critical role in emissions reduction. It is unlikely that key industrial sources, which generate approximately 20 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, can be decarbonized without CCUS. However, 

CCUS is a capital-intensive enterprise that has not fully advanced to the point of 

broad commercialization. 

Carbon utilization (CU) can help with the economics of CCUS in any case where 

the utilization value of CO2 minus the transportation cost to the point of use is positive. In that case it can defray the cost of capture and avoid the cost of sequestration or emission. A range of advanced CU concepts are being evaluated, including 

conversion of CO2 to fuels, chemicals, and building materials. 

It is important to recognize that in terms of CO2 emissions, CCU is not a onefor-one substitute for CCS because the utilized CO2 might eventually be re-emitted 

to the atmosphere. However, a carbon atom that is captured and reused can replace 

a carbon atom from fossil sources, thereby limiting total emissions. Life-cycle analysis of energy use and emissions is important to the comparative economics of carbon utilization. 

3. EMISSIONS FREE GRID BY 2050: 

Each witness from the hearing discussed different clean air technologies that if 

developed and commercialized can reduce our emissions footprint. There is international agreement that CCUS and other renewable technologies can play a role in 

helping us cut emissions, in a way that is sustainable and economically sound. 

Question 5. Why are your labs prioritizing research in clean energy technologies 

like this? 

Response. DOE’s scientific and technical capabilities are rooted in its system of 

national laboratories—17 world-class institutions that constitute the most comprehensive research and development network of its kind. The laboratories work as 

a network with academia, industry, and other Federal agencies to ensure America’s 

security and prosperity by addressing its energy, environmental, and nuclear challenges through transformative science and technology solutions. 

The advancement of clean energy ensures that the United States will have abundant, reliable resources for a robust economy while protecting the environment and 

health of its citizens. Reliable energy requires a diverse portfolio ranging from safe, 

clean, nuclear and fossil fuel plants backed by carbon capture, utilization, and sequestration, to renewable resources essential to our domestic economic engine and 

our competitiveness abroad. 

The challenge of ensuring our energy resources are clean and reliable requires 

sustained research and development. These transformative scientific discovery programs address technical and regulatory risk, improve economic competitiveness, develop the next generation of scientists and engineers, establish advanced facility capabilities, and address the entire fuel cycle. Rapid innovation will also be essential 

to achieve success on the time scale needed to replace retiring generation capacity 

and to enable deployment of new technologies. 

Through these activities—conducted at large scales and with significant, longterm investments of resources, including world-class scientific and technical expertise—DOE’s national laboratory enterprise serves as an enduring science and technology powerhouse for the Nation. 

Question 6. What role will advanced nuclear and carbon capture and utilization 

play in helping us meet our climate targets and having an emissions free grid by 

2050? 

Response. The United States cannot have an emissions-free grid by 2050 without 

increased use of nuclear energy and commercialization of effective carbon capture 

technologies. Carbon emissions cannot be eliminated through use of wind, solar, and 

other renewable sources alone. 

Advanced nuclear reactor concepts offer significant potential advantages relative 

to current light water reactor technology in terms of improved safety, cost, performance, sustainability, and reduced proliferation risks. DOE has recently stated that 

by 2050, advanced reactors will provide a significant and growing component of the 

nuclear energy mix both domestically and globally, due to advantages in terms of 

improved safety, cost, performance, sustainability, and reduced risk of proliferation. 

67 

Nuclear energy, which currently accounts for more than 60 percent of carbon-free 

electricity production in the United States, can be expected to grow even more with 

the introduction of advanced reactor technology. 

Carbon capture and utilization (CCU) is also expected to contribute to reducing 

emissions of greenhouse gases from various industrial and manufacturing sectors, 

although the main benefits likely to be derived from CCU lie in offsetting the use 

of petroleum products in the production of transportation fuels, chemicals, and highvalue products that would otherwise be derived from petrochemical feedstocks. The 

current global demand for chemicals does not have the capacity to sequester enough 

CO2 emissions to contribute significantly to meeting carbon reduction targets. 

4. ADVANCED REACTORS AND MODEL SIMULATIONS: 

Dr. Khaleel, you discussed several modeling tools used in nuclear research in your 

testimony, this includes CASL and the Virtual Environment for Reactor Development (VERA). You stated that CASL was used to simulate 14 cycles (20 years) of 

the TVA Watts Bar Unit 1 and operations and simulation of Watts Bar Unit 2 startup. Other uses included modeling and simulation for accident tolerant fuels and use 

in advanced reactor research. 

Question 7. Can you discuss whether these modeling tools should be used in the 

development and potential licensing of non-light water reactors? 

Response. Modeling and simulation tools that are applicable to advanced nonLWRs are essential for supporting concept development, reactor design, reactor safety analysis, regulation, and licensing. The primary driver for this need is the limited 

operational and experimental data available for advanced concepts—particularly in 

comparison to the mature LWR industry. Most available advanced reactor data resulted from the US reactor development programs in the 1950’s through the 1980’s. 

Development of additional required data is difficult due to the lack of test reactor 

facilities and the significant time and expense required. Therefore, modeling and 

simulation is crucial to supplement the historical data, to make the best use of current experimental programs, and to optimize future experimental programs. 

Many modeling tools for advanced reactors are relatively old and do not conform 

to modern software practices. Furthermore, these tools do not take advantage of the 

significant advances in computing. The capabilities being developed in VERA under 

the Consortium for Advanced Simulation of Light Water Reactors (CASL) are for 

LWRs, but their basis allows them to be extended to non-LWRs. In addition, DOENE also established the Nuclear Energy Advanced Modeling and Simulation 

(NEAMS) program to develop modeling capabilities for non-LWRs. NEAMS has 

mostly focused its multiyear development efforts on high-fidelity simulations for sodium fast reactors, but a planned consolidation of CASL and NEAMS offers an opportunity for DOE to leverage tools from both programs and expand these capabilities to support numerous reactor types. Engagement with companies developing advanced reactor concepts through the Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear 

has also established the need to develop new modeling capabilities to support their 

activities. 

Question 8. Is there a role for modeling simulations for licensing of advanced reactors, for testing different materials that may be more resistant to radiation? 

Response. The licensing of advanced reactors relies on modeling to perform the 

required safety analysis to understand the performance of the reactors in normal 

and postulated off normal conditions. Typically, this analysis is performed by the 

reactor designer, and the regulator may perform a confirmatory analysis as part of 

its review processes. In ‘‘NRC Vision and Strategy: Safely Achieving Effective and 

Efficient Non-Light Water Reactor Mission Readiness,’’ the NRC has stipulated that 

‘‘staff must have adequate computer models and other analytics resources to conduct 

its review of non-LWR designs in an independent manner.’’ 

Modeling supports development of new materials in several ways, including fundamental atomistic simulations of materials in the appropriate environments (radiation, temperature, etc.) to investigate performance and to identify promising materials. Modeling also supports experimental irradiations used to test the materials 

by simulating test reactor conditions to ensure that the experiments will meet the 

test objectives. Modeling is also used to extrapolate and compare performance of materials under test conditions to performance in an actual reactor, which may scale 

to longer periods of time, such as throughout the entire 40-to 60-year expected reactor lifetimes. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you so much. 

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And finally we have Dr. Kemal Pasamehmetoglu. He is Associate 

Laboratory Director for the Nuclear Science and Technology Directorate at Idaho National Laboratory. 

Welcome, Doctor. Thank you. 

STATEMENT OF KEMAL PASAMEHMETOGLU, ASSOCIATE LABORATORY DIRECTOR, NUCLEAR SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY 

DIRECTORATE, IDAHO NATIONAL LABORATORY 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. Thank you, Chairwoman Capito and 

Ranking Member Whitehouse. I truly appreciate the opportunity to 

testify in this subcommittee today. 

I was going to say a few words about the existing fleet and the 

value of nuclear energy, but I believe Senator Alexander did a 

great job in summarizing that, so I am quickly going to jump into 

looking into the future and what might be coming to meet the 

needs of twenty-first century energy. 

As you know, there are a number of advanced reactor concepts 

that are being developed out there. They do have certain advantages compared to the existing fleet. I believe the existing fleet will 

continue to serve us well for a few more decades, but at some point 

we have to transition into those advanced concepts. 

When we talk about advanced reactors, it is not just one type of 

reactor that we are talking about; there are multiple companies, 

private sector developing different types of reactors. The ones that 

are closer to deployment, I believe, are what we refer to as the 

small modular reactors that are cooled by light water. They do offer 

some advantages in terms of the manufacturability, as well as the 

inherent safety features of those, but there are also reactors that 

are not cooled by water. Water has been the traditional coolant 

ever since we started nuclear energy production in our Nation, but 

there are some advantages to go to other types of coolants. 

Those sorts of reactors are cooled by molten metals, sodium or 

lead. They operate at higher temperatures. They also offer certain 

safety advantages in terms of inherent safety. Then there are reactors that operate at even higher temperatures. They are typically 

cooled by either molten salt or helium gas; and those reactors not 

only have higher efficiency in terms of electricity production, but 

they can also be useful for process heat applications, so using nuclear energy above and beyond what we can do in the electricity 

sector. 

And, finally, there is a set of reactors that combines the coolant 

and the fuel together. We refer to those as the molten salt fueled 

reactors. Basically, the fuel is dissolved in the molten salt and travels through the reactor core. They operate at high temperatures, as 

well, and they do offer some safety benefits just because the coolant 

and the fuels are combined together. 

Overall, when we look at those advanced reactors, the advantages are economics, higher efficiency due to the higher temperatures, the inherent safety features, and fuel forms that they use 

that can benefit in terms of resource utilization, wider range of applications in case of incidental conditions, and associated power 

conversion systems. 

Now, I am sure you are all aware that there are multiple companies developing these technologies, but development of these techVerDate Aug 31 2005 12:26 May 04, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00072 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\27301.TXT VERN
69 

nologies are expensive and require really expensive facilities for research and development. In November 2015, Department of Energy 

announced an initiative. Shortly, we refer to it as the GAIN Initiative, which is Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear, and 

its premise is trying to provide easy access for those startup companies to the capabilities that exist primarily at the government 

sites at the national laboratories. 

In less than 2 years, I believe that GAIN has already made an 

impact in advancing some of those concepts considerably, or at 

least identifying the key issues. 

In the last part of my talk, I just want to—did I run out of time? 

Senator CAPITO. You are getting close. 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. I want to say a few words about Idaho 

National Laboratory. Very quickly, it is the lead nuclear energy 

laboratory; however, not all the capabilities require to advance 

these advanced concepts are located at Idaho. We create partnerships with other sister laboratories, universities, and industry to 

advance these concepts, and the larger experimental facilities, such 

as the test reactor and the large hot cells and facilities where we 

need to deal with nuclear materials are located in Idaho, and they 

are being used today to advance these technologies. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Pasamehmetoglu follows:] 

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RESPONSES OF KEMAL PASAMEHMETOGLU TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR BARRASSO

Question 1. For each of the following countries, would you please provide a list 

of the advanced, nonlight water reactor designs either under construction or operating: United States, China, and Russia. 

Response. 

United States: Under Construction: 

None Operating: None 

China: Under Construction: Shidaowan 1—High Temperature Gas Reactor 

(HTGR) 

Operating: China Experimental Fast Reactor (CEFR)—Sodium-cooled Fast Breeder Reactor (FBR) 

Russia: Under Construction: None 

Operating: Beloyarsky–3 (BN–600)—Sodium-cooled FBR Beloyarsky–4 (BN– 

800)—Sodium-cooled FBR 

Question 2. S. 512 contains robust provisions directing the Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission to develop a regulatory framework for licensing advanced reactors. 

What more can be done to improve the regulatory environment for advanced reactors in addition to enacting these provisions into law? 

Response. S. 512’s robust provisions are an excellent start toward the regulatory 

changes that need to be implemented in order to protect U.S. leadership in nuclear 

energy innovation. To further protect U.S. leadership, additional measures should 

be designed to accelerate the timeframe and mitigate the cost of bringing innovative 

advanced nuclear technologies through the technology and demonstration stages to 

prepare them for market. The time required for the licensing stages and the difficulty in navigating the multiple regulatory regimes for siting a new plant has already pushed some advanced reactor developers to consider building their demonstration/pilot plants in competing nations. A risk-based and staged licensing 

framework would be useful for facilitating investment decisions at different phases 

of advanced reactor development projects. 

Question 3. What more could DOE be doing to accelerate the development of 

Small Modular Reactors and demonstrate their ability to provide secure and highly 

reliable power for DOE and DOD national security and mission critical activities? 

Response. DOE can help accelerate the development of Small Modular Reactors 

(SMR) through policies and programs that will ensure the ability to resolve the 

First-Of-A-Kind (FOAK) engineering challenges that inevitably arise during the design and construction of these units. 

New methods of implementing public/private partnerships, including assistance 

with siting, are a good first step. One such example exists with the UAMPS/NuScale 

project under way at the INL site. DOE’s objectives to support innovative nuclear 

technologies require that these long-term projects are carried through to completion. 

Aggressive support of joint-use research and demonstration projects such as the 

Joint Use Module Project (JUMP) hybrid systems proposed for the NuScale reactor 

also helps overcome the financial hurdle for the construction and operations of 

FOAK units. In general, a combination of loan guarantees, tax credits, power-purchase agreements, government site use permits, and joint research arrangements for 

enhancing U.S. technology leadership are all tools that can be used to enable SMR 

(and advanced reactor) commercialization. 

Question 4. What can the labs do to help make sure that Small Modular Reactors 

can be manufactured and constructed with the most advanced methods? 

Response. Expanded use of the Gateway for Accelerated Innovation in Nuclear 

(GAIN) initiative to support advanced manufacturing technologies aimed at construction of nuclear plant components and systems will help ensure plant construction can take advantage of the safety, cost, and quality control benefits of modular 

and modern manufacturing techniques. 

Question 5. Industry, the national labs, and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission 

need employees with specialized skill sets in nuclear-related disciplines to accomplish their missions. Is enough being done to ensure universities produce adequate 

numbers of graduates in these fields? 

Response. DOE and its national laboratories provide support for nuclear-related 

disciplines through various university partnership programs and direct support to 

universities with the Nuclear Energy University Program. In the last decade, these 

programs have been very useful in strengthening education in related areas, and 

both the laboratories and industries are benefiting from the human resources created under these programs. These programs must continue to ensure the transfer 

of critical knowledge and experience from the existing workforce, much of whom are 

nearing retirement, to new employees. 

82 

RESPONSES OF KEMAL PASAMEHMETOGLU TO ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS

FROM SENATOR WHITEHOUSE

1. EMISSIONS FREE GRID BY 2050: 

Question 1. Each witness from the hearing discussed different clean air technologies that if developed and commercialized can reduce our emissions footprint. 

There is international agreement that CCUS and other renewable technologies can 

play a role in helping us cut emissions consistent with meeting our 2C targets, in 

a way that is sustainable and economically sound. 

Why are your labs prioritizing research in clean energy technologies like this? 

Response. The scenarios analyzed under the 2C targets show that a single technology will not be sufficient to achieve the goals. An optimized combination of all 

the technologies, including CCUS and nuclear energy, will be needed. The economics 

and timing associated with the technology maturity will determine the relative contributions of these technologies to greenhouse gas reduction as we move forward. As 

such, the laboratories are working across the spectrum of these technologies, and 

not necessarily picking winners at this stage of the research. 

Question 2. What role will advanced nuclear and carbon capture and utilization 

play in helping us meet our climate targets and having an emissions free grid by 

2050? 

Response. Both advanced nuclear and to a lesser extent, CCUS technologies will 

have a major role in achieving an emissions-free grid by 2050. Past and ongoing investments into the development of advanced nuclear technologies have laid the 

groundwork for the final stages of technology development and demonstration in the 

near term. These investments will help ensure that commercial-scale deployment is 

feasible as the bulk of the current light water reactor fleet begins to shut down as 

we approach 2050. The economics and timing associated with the technology maturity will determine the relative contributions of these technologies to greenhouse gas 

reduction as we move forward. 

Question 3. Dr. Pasamehmetoglu in your testimony you said the stalemate on 

dealing with our nation’s nuclear waste is more political than technical. 

Can you elaborate on what is holding us back from dealing with our nation’s 

waste stockpile? 

Response. Extensive national and international studies indicate that we can engineer storage and disposal facilities to isolate used nuclear fuel and nuclear waste 

from the environment for many thousands of years. Engineering features depend on 

the choice of the repository location, but feasible solutions have been developed for 

a Yucca Mountain-like repository, salt formation repositories such as the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in New Mexico, clay or granite repositories that have been 

studied abroad. My statement was predicated on our experience to date, where multiple Federal, State and local jurisdictions are involved in every aspect of evaluating, 

identifying, constructing and operating the sites. Such multi-layered, overlapping jurisdictions mean that any project, regardless of technical merit, can be effectively 

blocked or delayed at any stage through combinations of emotionbased ‘not-in-mybackyard’ activism and focused legal actions. Additionally, the long-term sustained 

effort needed to advance these projects is often derailed as a result of changes in 

political climate. 

Question 4. Do you think there is value to working to develop advanced reactor 

concepts that can reuse our spent nuclear fuel? What are the biggest barriers for 

advancing these types of advanced reactor concepts? What role can these advanced 

concepts play in addressing our waste stockpile? 

Response. Advanced reactor concepts that can reuse spent nuclear fuel have value 

in two key areas: (1) the ability to extract more useful energy from existing inventories of spent fuel with minimal processing (e.g., molten salt reactors) and (2) the 

ability of some advanced fast reactor technologies to eliminate the longest-lived 

transuranic elements from the waste stream can greatly reduce the complexity, size, 

and cost of the needed final disposal sites. The biggest barriers for advancing these 

reactor concepts are similar to those for advanced technologies in general, as mentioned above. As mentioned here, these concepts can play a significant role in reducing the volume and long-term radiotoxicity of waste for final disposition. At present, 

recycling technologies are not being pursued in the U.S. at commercial scale because 

of the economics of the associated reactors and recycling facilities. Recycling concepts exist with both improved economics and reduced environmental impact. Continued development and demonstration in this area will be beneficial for 

transitioning into a cost-effective recycling economy with the right kinds of reactors 

and with reduced environmental impact. 

83 

Question 5. Dr. Pasamehmetoglu, during the hearing several modeling tools used 

in nuclear testing and development were discussed, including CASL and the Virtual 

Environment for Reactor Development. It was also noted that next-generation materials that can withstand higher temperature and radiation environments are being 

developed and tested through computer modeling. 

How accurate are these modeling tools? 

Response. The capabilities of newer modeling platforms is expanding at a pace 

that closely follows the continuing advancements in high-performance computing 

technology, and it will continue to grow. Advances in computation, numerical analysis, and fundamental material science allow us to model phenomena with accuracy 

that was not possible even a decade ago. However, these multi-scale and multi-physics modeling tools need to be validated against experimental data. To make the tools 

truly predictive, novel multi-scale phenomenological experimental techniques are 

being used, and the data support the validation efforts. In some areas, these tools 

are already making a difference in the way we design fuels and additional, focused 

experiments to accelerate the development process (e.g., BISON/MARMOT fuel modeling code). Other areas of physics codes are catching up very rapidly as well. I believe that within a decade, a paradigm shift will occur in the way we use these predictive codes in accelerating the advancement of nuclear energy technologies. 

Question 6. Is there a role for computer model simulations in the regulatory approval and licensing of advanced reactors? 

Response. Computer model simulations have and will continue to have a role in 

the licensing of advanced reactors as modeling systems are developed and validated 

to simulate the many advanced concepts. As each new modeling system is tested 

with the appropriate level of experimental validation, regulatory and licensing authorities can begin to take advantage of these models to accelerate deployment of 

the technologies. Multi-scale, multi-physics codes designed to reduce uncertainty 

propagation will be very beneficial for developing risk-informed regulatory and licensing frameworks that will define adequate safety margins without excessive cumulative conservatism. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you. Thank you. 

Thank you all very much. 

Normally, I would begin the questioning, but I am going to yield 

to Senator Ernst. She has other obligations. 

So, Senator Ernst, if you want to start us off. 

Senator ERNST. Thank you, Chairman Capito. I appreciate that. 

And thanks to our panelists as well. 

As some of you know on this panel, Ames Laboratory at Iowa 

State University is home to the Critical Materials Institute, where 

the mission is to come up with materials that solve energy challenges related to clean energy. CMI focuses on five critical rare 

earths and two near-critical materials. Rare earths materials and 

other critical materials play a vital role in many modern, clean energy technologies, such as our wind turbines, solar panels, electric 

vehicles, and energy efficient lighting. Ames Lab has also done 

work in nuclear materials. 

The Critical Materials Institute partners with four national laboratories, two of which are represented here today, so thank you 

very much. 

And I would like to ask both gentlemen from the labs today, in 

your opinion, what sort of material development is needed to advance the next generation of nuclear reactors? 

Mr. Khaleel, if we can start with you, please. 

Mr. KHALEEL. Sure, Senator. I think, you know, for the next generation of reactors, one needs materials, as Dr. Kemal mentioned, 

that can actually survive harsh environments at high temperatures. So the national labs, broadly speaking, really have these capabilities in terms of advancing new materials, and also new manufacturing technologies where some of the parts can actually be 

84 

born both certified and qualified. So we can reduce the costs and 

reduce prototyping in these kind of technologies. 

Senator ERNST. So, very important work for the labs, correct? 

Mr. KHALEEL. Absolutely. Absolutely. 

Senator ERNST. Yes. Thank you. 

Yes, please. 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. As I have indicated, most of these advanced reactors would like to operate at higher temperatures for efficiency purposes, and, also, trying to make the reactors more and 

more compact requires that it has to be resistant to higher radiation damage. So the type of materials that we need to design for 

the future need to be able to operate in those harsh environments. 

Typically, we have the technologies to be able to design materials 

like that. The issue is always it takes a long time to qualify those 

materials and get them for commercial use, so a big part of the research that the national laboratories are conducting, including 

modeling and simulation, is to see how we can accelerate that qualification process and bring them from concept to commercialization 

faster. 

Senator ERNST. Very good. And it is truly a cooperative effort between all of those labs, then, as well. 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. That is correct. 

Senator ERNST. Thank you very much. 

Mr. Bohlen, I understand that Lawrence Livermore National 

Laboratory is working with Iowa State University on an effort to 

convert forestry waste to biofuels. Can you tell me just a little more 

about this and how that partnership with Iowa State is going? 

Mr. BOHLEN. Yes, ma’am. Thank you, Senator. It is a great partnership and it is funded by the California Energy Commission. And 

it is not an insignificant investment by the State; it is almost $7 

million. 

It is a partnership that grew out of the State’s need to deal with 

the hundreds of thousands of trees that died during the 7-year 

drought. And there is a delicate balance between ecosystem health 

and fire health, and a not insignificant amount of the carbon emissions from the State come from forest fires. So there is a fast paralysis, so it is a process that involves heat, and can be conducted 

very rapidly, to convert forest waste, and that is everything from 

sawdust to trees that are pulled from the forests, into a biofuel. 

And Iowa State has a process that can be delivered on two skids, 

essentially tractor trailer containers, that are delivered. The entire 

process is there. We are partnering with Sierra Pacific, as a forest 

manager, and we provide the lifecycle analysis to actually demonstrate that there is true carbon savings and the carbon pathways 

is a negative carbon pathway. 

So it is a really great example of the labs working with universities, working with private industry to solve a very significant 

problem, and it is funded by the California Energy Commission. 

Senator ERNST. That is fantastic. And I love to see that there is 

so much collaboration amongst so many groups out there, so thank 

you for your contributions. 

To all of you, thank you very much. 

Thank you, Ms. Chair. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you. 

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Senator WHITEHOUSE. Thank you, Chairman. 

Since Iowa State has been mentioned, let me reference an Iowa 

State University professor who recently told a United Nations conference that climate change was already affecting Iowa farmers. 

‘‘This isn’t just about the distant future,’’ he said. Iowa State has 

published extensive research, one report titled ‘‘Global Warming: 

The Impact of Climate Change on Global Agriculture.’’ 

And Iowa State has a prestigious Leopold Center that, to quote 

them, views climate change not merely as ‘‘warming, but as a worsening, destabilization of the planet’s environmental systems.’’ 

Sounds pretty serious. And it warns that it will create aggravated 

and unpredictable risk that will challenge the security of our agricultural and biological systems. 

Iowa State’s Leopold Center concludes, ‘‘The scientific evidence is 

clear that the magnitude of the changes ahead are greater, the rate 

much faster, and the duration of climatic destabilization will last 

much longer than once thought.’’ 

And Iowa State University is not unique. If we go to our Chairman’s University of Wyoming, you would find the University of Wyoming Center for Environmental Hydrology and Geophysics reporting that many of the most pressing issues facing the western 

United States hinge on the fate and transport of water and its response to diverse disturbances, including climate change. 

University of Wyoming scientists are publishing articles on the 

effects of projected climate change on forest fires’ sustainability. 

The University of Wyoming is awarding university grants to study 

the effects of climate change on pollinators, on water flow, on beaver habitat, and on white bark pine growth. And, indeed, the University of Wyoming even has its own University of Wyoming Climate Action Plan committing the University to reduce its carbon 

footprint, to expand climate research, and to demonstrate leadership as a charter member of the American College and University 

President’s Climate Commitment. 

If you go to West Virginia, which has, as I said, not much coast, 

but serious concerns about rains and flooding, the West Virginia 

University Mountaineers have a Mountain Hydrology Laboratory 

which tells us climate change has important implications for management of freshwater resources, which include that the highlands 

region in the central Appalachian Mountains is expected to, to use 

their phrase, ‘‘wet up.’’ Warmer air carries more moisture, leading 

to what West Virginia University is calling this intensification of 

the water cycle. The laboratory warns that the implications of this 

intensification are immense. And, of course, West Virginia has seen 

rain-driven flooding. 

West Virginia University’s Wildlife Conservation Lab publishes 

regularly on climate change effects, and one of West Virginia University’s climate scientists, Professor Hessl, has been recognized by 

West Virginia University as West Virginia University’s Benedum 

Distinguished Scholar. 

Hard to believe this isn’t serious when these recognitions are 

going out. 

West Virginia University even sends people all the way to China 

to study climate change. 

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And, of course, our distinguished national laboratories appear to 

be unanimous in the view that climate science is serious. 

I would ask, for the record, to put in a presentation that Oak 

Ridge National Laboratory put together through its Climate 

Change Science Institution. 

Senator CAPITO. Without objection. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. And it is called Climate Change Science 

Institution Overview. 

[The referenced information follows:] 

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Senator WHITEHOUSE. So it is nice to have scientists back here 

in the panel again, and I think every single one of the institutions 

here has a demonstrated record of understanding that climate 

change is serious and that it is significantly manmade, and that its 

consequences are going to be very impactful if we don’t get ahead 

of it by dealing with the carbon dioxide that is at the heart of the 

problem. 

So I will close with a question for the record to all of you. I have 

been up to Saskatchewan and I have seen the amino rain technology, basically pumping exhaust through an amino fog to extract 

carbon dioxide. It is working and it is being compensated with oil 

extraction. 

I have been out to Shenandoah, Iowa to see the ethanol plant 

where they are extracting algae from the waste stream using both 

waste heat, wastewater, and exhaust to feed algae, which then 

have marketable uses. 

I have not been to Iceland, but I am familiar that they have a 

geologic sequestration facility there where they are pumping carbon dioxide into the ground, which has a geological formation in 

which the carbon dioxide actually turns to rock down there, so it 

is fully and thoroughly sequestered. 

And, finally, that in Switzerland there is a direct air capture facility. It is not taken out of the waste stream, it is taken out of the 

air, but it is powered by waste heat. And, in return, what they get 

is carbon dioxide that then can be compressed, put into tanks and 

sold into the commercial gas stream. 

If there are other technologies, I would love to get your answers 

in writing as to what the other technologies are, with an evaluation 

of how promising they are. 

And, Mr. Bohlen, if you could focus particularly on the ocean 

technologies, that would be of great interest to me. 

But my 5 minutes has expired, so let me leave it at that. I will 

have other questions for the record, as well. 

This is a very impressive and distinguished panel, and I thank 

the Chairman for bringing them in. 

Chairman CAPITO. Thank you. Thank you. 

Senator INHOFE. 

Senator WHITEHOUSE. I even have a few bits on the University 

of Oklahoma, but I ran out of time. 

Senator INHOFE. No, I have some good ones from the University 

of Oklahoma, but since you brought it up, let me just make one 

comment about it. Nobody questions that climate has always 

changed; all evidence, all scriptural evidence, all archaeological evidence. We all understand that. 

But I also would quote another great scientist, Richard Lindzen, 

with MIT, who said regulating CO2 is a bureaucrat’s dream. If you 

control climate, you control life. 

So, back in 1995 was my first year here in the U.S. Senate, and 

I was on this Committee, and at that time I actually chaired it. It 

was called then, I guess it still is, Clean Air and Nuclear Subcommittee. And at that time we had gone, I think, 12 years, 12 

years without having any kind of a hearing on the NRC. Of course, 

we immediately got involved in that and kind of revived them, beVerDate Aug 31 2005 12:26 May 04, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00109 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\27301.TXT VERN
106 

cause you can’t do that with any bureaucracy; you have to stay on 

top of it. So we did, and we have been very much interested. 

It is interesting, because that is the only area where I think that 

Senator Whitehouse and I agree, that nuclear is so incredibly important for us to have in the mix. 

Now, last month there is a magazine, an article in the Business 

Insider, published, article detailing seven different ways the United 

States is falling behind when it comes to nuclear power technology. 

Some of you may be familiar with this, and I would ask that this 

be part of the record at this time. 

And while we are correcting the dependency problem that we had 

actually with the shale revolution in oil and gas, we are still increasing our dependency in other areas. Of course, one is importing 

uranium from Russia and purchasing heavy water from Iran. The 

United States can’t afford to lose ground to countries like Russia, 

Iran, China, and other countries. 

I would like just to ask you guys, particularly from the labs, 

what you think about this and why it is that we cannot get back 

in a position where we—I understand that we have actually not 

had heavy water here since 1996 and have been importing uranium 

from Russia, about 20 percent, I think, of our mix right now is imported from Russia. 

Does that sound right to you, either one of you? 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. Yes, sir. 

Senator INHOFE. OK. Now, what can we do to—I am concerned 

about that as a national security issue. I am concerned about that 

for other reasons other than just advancing without creating a 

problem in trying to get back in a leadership position in nuclear 

energy. What can we do about those two importations apparently 

that are still prevalent today? 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. Senator, part of the uranium importation 

was to reduce the stockpile of weapon-usable uranium and down 

blending it. So it was, in terms of national security, I believe it was 

beneficial. However, as we look to the future, those advanced reactor concepts that I have mentioned, quite a few of them require enrichment higher than what we are capable of doing today. The 

standard light water reactors use 5 percent enrichment, and all our 

enrichment capabilities, commercial enrichment capabilities are 

limited by 5 percent. But the liquid metal coal reactors, as well as 

those high temperature reactors, will require enrichment up to 20 

percent. 

So, at some point, if we are serious about advancing those technologies and taking the leadership in those technologies globally 

again, we have to look at the enrichment issue and the uranium 

issue very seriously. 

Senator INHOFE. Are we doing that now? Are we looking at it? 

Are we trying to make it advancements? Because when I see that 

other countries now are passing us up, as pointed out in this article, in technology, and you say that we need to be looking at that, 

are we in the process now of trying—— 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. Department of Energy is looking at the 

options on how we can start supplying uranium enriched higher 

than 5 percent. 

107 

Senator INHOFE. Well, you know, for some of them we talk about, 

yes, we need to get back to where we have everything renewable 

and all that. I go back to my State of Oklahoma and they ask questions there they don’t ask in Washington, like, you know, if we are 

dependent upon fossil fuel and nuclear for 89 percent of the power 

it takes to run this machine called America and you do away with 

both of those, how do you run the machine? And the answer is you 

can’t. 

What do you think, Mr. Khaleel? Are you optimistic that we are 

going to be able to do something in the future to put us back getting into technologies at least on an even keel with some of our 

competitors out there? 

Mr. KHALEEL. I think so, Senator. You know, currently, the Department of Energy is pursuing these advanced reactors, non-light 

water reactors. And as Dr. Kemal mentioned earlier, there is a variety of concepts, and I think that really is an important thing, you 

know, in terms of our security, but also our competitiveness. 

Senator INHOFE. Yes. 

Mr. KHALEEL. Likewise, modular reactors, they are really a good 

and a cheap way to trying to get to deliver nuclear power, sustained power in really a modular way, but also situated to the local 

conditions. So these two kind of approaches and activities are fairly 

important. 

We also have enrichment, uranium enrichment activities at Oak 

Ridge National Lab. So I think we are pursuing multiple tracks. 

I think an important thing is really to deal with the whole balance between finances and licensing, and also to bring modeling 

and simulation capabilities to accelerate the cycle for licensing in 

the U.S. I think that really is an important aspect that needs to 

come through, and I think most of our national labs have tremendous capabilities in modeling and simulation. These are high-fidelity predictive tools that can actually enable us to do things in a 

rapid way, and I think that is critical. 

Senator INHOFE. Well, I appreciate that. We had a Commerce 

Committee meeting at the same time that this is going on, so I 

missed the opening statements, and some of these things, I am 

sure, were covered. But that has been my interest for a long time, 

to make sure that we get back. I look at countries like France, and 

the percentage of their total energy provided from nuclear, and I 

can’t see, looking into the future, how we are going to be able to 

do it without becoming more aggressive than we have been, more 

competitive in technology, too. Very good. 

Thank you, Madam Chairman. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you, Senator. 

Senator CARPER. 

Senator CARPER. Thanks, Madam Chair. 

When I read through your testimony in preparation for today’s 

hearing, I thought to myself, boy, what an all-star lineup. And you 

have not disappointed. This is an exceptional panel and we welcome each of you. 

Dr. Bohlen, you mentioned in your testimony something that always commands the attention for a lot of us on the East Coast who 

have coastal beaches, and that was the possibility of somehow addressing beach replenishment and using CO2 to bind up part of 

108 

that process. You mentioned that was embryonic at this point in 

time. I will ask you a question for the record. I will ask you to go 

into that in a little more detail. But my ears perked up when you 

said those words, so thanks for that. 

I hosted a visit yesterday, along with Senator Coons and our 

Congresswoman Lisa Rochester, in Delaware, a visit from our Secretary of Agriculture, who is a recovering Governor like I am, and 

he spent a big part of the day with us at the Delaware State Fair. 

We pulled together in the morning a roundtable that included 30, 

40 people from the agricultural sector in our State. And we raise 

more soybeans, I think, in Sussex County, Delaware than any 

county in America. I think we raise more lima beans than any 

county in America. We raise more chickens there than any county 

in America. So Delaware, which most people don’t think of as a big 

ag State, really is, and we punch above our weight, if you will. 

One of our farmers who was there raises a lot of peaches and 

other fruits, but also raises corn. But he spoke passionately, and 

surprisingly to me, about the threat that climate change poses to 

his business, his farm business. Among the crops that he raises, he 

raises peaches, and he said when the blossoms on his peach tree 

bloom in the middle of February, that is not good. And he said for 

years he could almost set the clock by when they are going to start 

harvesting particular commodities in the middle part of August, 

and that date continues to move up, up, up, up, up. 

A lot of times, in my State, the real threat from climate change 

is sea level rise. But I just would share with you his words, and 

it makes all the more important some of what you are sharing with 

us today. 

The Administration, current Administration, often uses what I 

believe is questionable information to defend the President’s decision to walk away from the Paris Climate Agreement. For example, 

the Administration claims that the U.S. has made great strides in 

reducing greenhouse gas emissions over the past 14 years without 

government intervention. I think a closer look at that suggests that 

his comment ignores the facts on the ground. 

I want to make three points, then ask a question. 

First of all, the Federal Government has been regulating greenhouse gas emissions for our largest source, that is, mobile sources, 

for some 8 years. Other clean air regulations targeting sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, and air toxic emissions from our Nation’s power 

plants have also had a co-benefit, as you know, of reducing greenhouse gas emissions. 

Second point, the Federal Government has incentivized investment in clean energy through the tax code for decades. I submitted 

a statement for the record. In that statement I mention that the 

Federal Government has had a long-term production tax credit for 

alternative means of natural gas, which helps lead to the natural 

gas boom that we enjoy today. And then, of course, there are the 

tax credits that the Congress has provided for a whole host of clean 

energy technologies in the Recovery Act of 2009, and tax-extended 

packages in 2012, 2014, and 2015. 

Third point, then I will ask my question. The Federal Government has funded research on a host of clean energy technologies 

109 

that have made these technologies cheaper and easier to develop 

and deploy. 

Here is my question. How important have Federal Government 

actions been over the last decade in providing what I describe as 

a nurturing environment for clean energy investments and job creation, and what more can our Federal Government do and should 

we be doing? 

Our West Virginia compadre, I will ask you to lead off. Dr. Anderson. 

Mr. ANDERSON. Senator, thank you for the question. Investments 

in technology development through the Department of Energy, both 

in individual clean energy technologies like wind, solar, biomass, 

geothermal, etcetera, have certainly played an important role in deployment, as have the ITC and PTCs. In the fossil energy space, 

I would say that investments in carbon capture and sequestration 

technologies, as well as advanced power generation cycles have certainly created an environment in which technologies are being developed. However, we are at the stage now where, if you consider 

technology readiness level and system readiness level, the next 

generation of deployment investments come at integrating the systems together. We have seen some challenges in terms of certain 

components of systems, but we are at the stage where large-scale 

carbon capture and sequestration technologies are ready to be developed and deployed, but there are some challenges at the system 

level, and that takes considerably large investments in dollars to 

deploy large-scale demonstration projects, and that is the hurdle 

we see next. 

Senator CARPER. Thanks very much. 

Again, the question, what more can the Federal Government be 

doing, should be doing? 

Please. 

Mr. BEGGER. I guess, Madam Chairman, Senator Carper, you 

know, I think the Federal Government can do a couple things. One 

is we need to impose sort of realistic timelines. From utility industry perspective, when you looked at the deadlines of the Clean 

Power Plan, 5 to 10 years was just literally an impossibility to develop technologies, commercialize it, and employ that. So we need 

to understand what is a realistic timeline to deploy these technologies. 

We also need adequate resources. You know, if you look at I 

guess the mark for the energy and water appropriations fossil energy account, it is roughly about $500 million a year, all to do some 

of these larger scale technologies, Petra Nova, boundary dams and 

these things. Those are billion dollar plusses. So the real challenge 

is starting to integrate these different systems. 

We understand that they work really well in small capabilities 

on their own, but when you start plugging them together, that is 

what the great unknown is. So we do need to provide those resources to scale things up. 

And then also certainty. A power plant, utility that goes and 

builds a new coal-fired power plant today has a 60-year depreciation schedule, so I have been asked questions like why are we not 

seeing a new rush of coal-fired power plants with this Administration. It is like, well, a four-or 8-year Presidential administration 

110 

doesn’t provide the regulatory certainty moving forward. So the 

sooner that the Federal Government can sort of provide that clarity 

and understanding of what they are going to do, I think that is 

going to give utilities comfort in adopting new technologies and 

moving forward. 

Senator CARPER. All right, thanks. 

My time has expired, Madam Chair, but if we have a second 

round, could I finish my question? 

Senator CAPITO. OK. That would be fine. Thank you. 

You kind of hit on the question that I wanted to go to initially. 

Senator Whitehouse mentioned that we just introduced, with 23 

colleagues, a bill to reauthorize and expand the 45Q tax credit for 

carbon capture utilization and storage. We had strange bed fellows 

on that. Not only are Senator Whitehouse and I on this Committee 

and some of our fundamentals at odds with one another who we 

are representing, Senator Barrasso at the same time, and we were 

all on this bill to try to figure out the best way to move forward 

with this broader commercialization of the CCUS, and you sort of 

alluded to this, Mr. Begger did. 

So I would like to ask Dr. Anderson, and you alluded to this as 

well in your opening statement. You mentioned that New Source 

Review was a regulatory burden to commercialization. My question 

is how much of the challenge is financial; how much is regulatory. 

I don’t know if you want to expand on that a little bit, between the 

financial and regulatory. That is what I am trying to get to, as Mr. 

Begger said, to get the challenge at the system level. 

Mr. ANDERSON. Right. And I agree with what Mr. Begger mentioned in terms of system integration, as well as one of the major 

challenges, as I mentioned in my statement, in terms of New 

Source Review. In terms of the financial challenges, it is that certainty in the regulatory environment to be able to create a consistent demand side pool for the development of technologies. So I 

think that the 45Q is a great step in that direction, as long as we 

can create a playing field in terms of putting, whether it is a price 

on carbon, in terms of evening up the playing field between investment tax credits, production tax credits, and things like 45Q. If we 

can have a system in which it is much more predictable for the investment community, it would provide that opportunity to develop 

and deploy technologies. 

Senator CAPITO. Does anybody else have a comment on that, the 

regulatory versus financial? Yes, Dr. Khaleel. 

Mr. KHALEEL. There was a study in 2013 that surveyed over 260 

experts in the carbon capture and sequestration area to learn about 

obstacles and challenges. The No. 1 obstacle was cost; No. 2, legislation; and I believe No. 4, regulation. So I think, you know, to decouple, really, the issue of finance and regulation is a little difficult, but as technologies move forward, then there is a need, a 

certainty to license these technologies, and that becomes very important. The uncertainty in the licensing process drives some of the 

finances and makes it really difficult. So I think it is really important to deal with the risk associated with licensing. 

And, at the same time, when you look at costs, to drive costs 

down, really, one needs to do a more R&D in that space and at the 

same time maybe, you know, a role that the Government may play 

111 

in accelerating some of the deployment. That will be actually the 

case when one looks at the nuclear area, the modular reactors. But 

I would argue it may be also applicable in the carbon capture situation. 

Senator CAPITO. OK, let me ask a question on the utilization 

issue. No, let me backtrack here. I want to ask about utilization, 

but I want to ask about this ambient air. 

Many of you mentioned the research going on removing carbon 

from ambient air. So, to me, that means not something at the 

power plant’s source, but actually out, I don’t know, on the highway or wherever that would happen to be. Am I correct in assuming that is what ambient air, that is what mean, just in general? 

So I guess what I am asking is do we see this as the new frontier, this ambient air carbon removal? And again it comes back to, 

then, the utilization portion of it. 

Dr. Bohlen, did you mention that in your comments? 

Mr. BOHLEN. I did mention that, Senator, and there are already 

commercial entities that are extracting CO2 from the air. 

Climeworks is a company in Switzerland. They are extracting CO2

from the air. 

Senator CAPITO. What are they doing with it when they capture 

it? 

Mr. BOHLEN. They are compressing it and selling it, actually, to 

greenhouses to encourage plant growth in very, very large, many, 

many acre-sized greenhouses. 

Senator CAPITO. OK. 

Mr. BOHLEN. So it is a very leading edge technology. The Climeworks executives feel that they can make money at $200 a 

ton CO2 , I believe is the number. So it is not yet going to spread 

commercially worldwide, but it is a leading technology. People are 

working very hard to reduce the risk and uncertainty of how this 

is done, because it turns out that it is the CO2 itself that may actually become a more valuable product as we learn about catalysts 

and so forth to convert it into feedstocks that we currently now 

make out of petroleum. 

Senator CAPITO. Well, thank you. I have always sort of had this 

vision. Being a coal State, obviously it is a big concern of mine that 

CO2 is going to have that value, that there is something either on 

the cutting edge of being researched and developed at the end of 

the supply chain that all of a sudden it becomes that looping back 

in. 

So is WVU doing research on the ambient air? 

Then I will turn to the next Senator. 

Mr. ANDERSON. Not directly on the ambient air. As Dr. Bohlen 

mentioned, in terms of the cost, it is higher particularly because it 

is much more dilute than ambient, so it suffers from thermodynamics in terms of trying to concentrate it. It is like we have a 

lot of gold in the ocean and we could concentrate it, but it is probably better to find a gold mine. 

So when you have a point source that is a coal burning power 

plant with a much, much more concentrated stream of CO2 , it is 

more efficient and lower cost to do it that way. 

Senator CAPITO. And probably the best place to start, in any 

event. 

112 

Mr. ANDERSON. It would be the lowest hanging fruit, for sure. 

Senator CAPITO. Senator Markey? 

Senator MARKEY. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Today’s hearing is about the development of advanced clean energy technologies, and we should be talking about the next frontiers in the clean energy revolution, but we also have to continue 

to support the revolution that is underway right now. The testimony submitted by our witnesses focuses on carbon capture and 

nuclear technology, and I am very open-minded when it comes to 

climate change solutions. 

When Henry Waxman and I constructed the Waxman-Markey 

bill that passed the House of Representatives in 2009, we actually 

included $200 billion for carbon capture and sequestration in that 

piece of legislation. Now, it was part of a comprehensive bill that 

dealt with all aspects of climate change, but it was clearly an ingredient. And the bill, as well, was endorsed by the Nuclear Energy 

Institute. So clearly a low carbon goal would establish incentives 

for development of advanced technologies. And we actually included 

$75 billion for advanced energy technologies in that bill as well. 

But the fact is that we are already in the middle of the clean energy revolution. In 2005, the United States installed just 79 

megawatts of solar across the entire Country. Last year we installed nearly 200 times that amount, 14,000 megawatts. We now 

have more than 40,000 megawatts of solar in the United States. 

We have more than 80,000 megawatts of wind capacity installed in 

the United States, including 8,200 new megawatts installed last 

year. On reliability, in Iowa, they are now producing, many days, 

40 percent of all of their electricity from wind; it was very good reliability. So obviously tremendous breakthroughs have been made 

on that front. And a little more than a decade ago wind and solar 

generated less than 1 percent of all of our electricity. It is now 7 

to 8 percent of all of our electricity. And if it continues at the existing pace, no further breakthroughs, it would be 30 percent of all 

of our electricity by the year 2030. 

So that is the good news. There is a tremendous revolution that 

is taking place, and that is without any breakthroughs in advanced 

wind or solar technology. 

Today there are 360,000 Americans employed in the wind and 

solar industries. By 2020 there will be 500,000. And here is a number that is absolutely astounding: last year, the solar industry created as many jobs in 1 year as exists in the entire coal mining industry, 50,000 new jobs. So that is a huge, huge development. And 

they are good paying jobs. We have blue collar workers, 137,000 

electricians and roofers were working last year in the solar industry in our Country. Just absolutely an incredible revolution, a blue 

collar energy job creation revolution that has taken place. 

The same thing is true over on the wind side of these issues. We 

have 102,000 people working in wind; 25,000 of them are in manufacturing, 35,000 of them are in construction, transportation, and 

sales. There are 10,000 wind engineers just maintaining those devices across the Country, with a starting salary of $50,000 in our 

Country. 

So there is a tremendous revolution that has absolutely been unleashed. 

113 

Dr. Bohlen, you included a chart in your written testimony showing how carbon capture and sequestration compares to other technologies in terms of unsubsidized costs. The chart shows onshore 

wind electricity has an all-in cost of as little as $32 per megawatt 

hour and solar has an all-in cost of as little as $46 per megawatt 

hour. Electricity generated from natural gas with carbon capture, 

the cheapest CCS option costs more than $69 per megawatt hour, 

while electricity generated from coal with CCS costs more than $80 

per megawatt hour. 

That is why, in my opinion, utility executives are looking more 

toward alternatives. Could you talk about that in terms of how the 

free market is actually moving utility executive decisions toward 

cleaner energy sources and the lower costs, which increasingly are 

in the renewable sector? 

Mr. BOHLEN. Yes, Senator. First of all, I want to emphasize I am 

a scientist, not an economist, and the figures that I quoted were 

from an analysis by those who are expert in that, Lazard. But others do it, too. 

What is clear is that costs are rapidly declining. And an important role that the national labs play in that is that they help derisk the very, very early stage technologies and then bring the 

risks down through a variety of approaches; new materials, new 

manufacturing approaches, and modeling and simulation that 

greatly reduce the risk and make these new technologies viable in 

the commercial sector. 

For example, the natural gas revolution in this Country was 

founded on $200 million of Federal investment, and that led to industry being able to take that over. I know George Mitchell, from 

Mitchell Energy, likes to talk about the role of industry. But it was 

preceded by some significant Federal investment in hydraulic fracturing and wells, long horizontals. 

So costs are coming down. Natural gas is less expensive per kilowatt hour, in general, than are other technologies; wind is less expensive, and so forth. So the economics are driving this and decisions by power companies. 

Senator MARKEY. May I continue for just one more question, 

please, Madam Chair? 

Senator CAPITO. One more. 

Senator MARKEY. OK, thank you, Madam Chair. 

Senator Whitehouse and I have introduced legislation to extend 

the tax credits for offshore wind through 2025. The entire tax 

break expires for wind at the end of 2019. And offshore wind is 

clearly a huge potential job creation opportunity with very low 

greenhouse gas, non-existing greenhouse gas production. Could you 

talk a little bit about that, the offshore wind revolution, and what 

you think that might portend for the future, as well, and the kind 

of focus that we should have upon that as well, Mr. Bohlen, if you 

could? 

Mr. BOHLEN. Without moving into the policy issues, Senator, 

what I can say is we have examples around the world where offshore wind has been incredibly impactful. Denmark, for example, 

has very, very significant offshore wind, and they are moving toward powering their entire country in that way. So the answer is 

114 

there is enormous potential, and how that develops will be a matter of State policies and so forth. 

Senator MARKEY. From my perspective, the same winds that 

brought the pilgrims to Massachusetts can also power our industry 

and our homes. The winds, as they have been mapped by the Department of Interior, indicate that off of our coastline is the Saudi 

Arabia of wind. So to the extent to which there is a movement toward new generations of electrical generation capacity, I think that 

wind has to be solidly in that category, and any tax breaks, any 

incentives that are created should include them as well, because 

the potential is vast. 

Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you. Thank you very much. 

I can’t help it, I have to say in terms of wind and Massachusetts, 

remember, we have to site the windmills, and, as I recall, over the 

last several years that has been quite a controversial thing off the 

coast. 

I would like to—— 

Senator MARKEY. If I may. 

Senator CAPITO. No, I am going to go on. I gave you some extra 

time. I am allowed to make a comment here. 

On solar, let’s talk about solar, because my understanding is that 

to manufacture solar efficiently, you need to have rare earth metals. I think was it Dr. Khaleel, did you mention, or maybe Dr. Anderson, the rare earth? Are we are doing some of this at WVU? 

Could you talk about that a lot? Because I think that would help 

solar, that would help coal, and that would help the areas of coal 

ash and other residuals where these rare earth minerals can be 

found. 

Mr. ANDERSON. Excuse me, Senator. Currently in the U.S., we 

import the vast majority, almost 100 percent, of our rare earth elements, and we do have some closed amount at the Mountain Pass 

Mine at the border of California and Nevada has a significant 

amount of light rare earth. However, what we found in the acid 

mine drainage sludge in the central and northern Appalachian coal 

fields is that we have a concentration of heavy rare earth elements, 

and we have been working on and developed a technology at WVU 

to be able to extract those heavy rare earths from the acid mine 

drainage sludge, so going out to remediated coal sites and extracting the rare earths that go into heavy permanent magnets that 

support the wind industry, as well as the materials for the construction of solar panels. 

Senator CAPITO. And for those things we call cell phones, as well. 

Mr. ANDERSON. Absolutely. 

Senator CAPITO. Right. 

Yes, Dr. Khaleel, did you want to add to that? 

Mr. KHALEEL. Yes, Senator. So, you know, as the Senator earlier 

mentioned, there is an institute called the Critical Materials Institute, jointly done by multiple national labs, including Oak Ridge, 

and the objective is really to look at how we separate these elements from, say, you know, coal or other materials. 

Rare earth elements are very critical for various applications, 

and the underpinning technologies are really separation techVerDate Aug 31 2005 12:26 May 04, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00118 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\27301.TXT VERN
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nologies, so you need it for solar, you need it for magnets, for lighting, for multiple applications. 

And the national labs, broadly speaking, have capabilities in separation that can be applied to these problems and also, you know, 

really help us in not relying on foreign sources for these elements. 

Senator CAPITO. I think that is a great distinction on the security 

issue. If, all of a sudden, the supply dried up, that would cause 

great difficulties, I think, across many industries in this Country. 

Let me ask you just a more global question because I have you 

all here. We have the Lawrence Livermore National Lab, we have 

the Oak Ridge National Lab, and Idaho National Laboratory. I 

hope I know the answer to this question because we are talking 

about some of the same technologies, whether it is nuclear or clean 

coal or carbon capture. Do you all have a regular coordination 

where you are coordinating your research working together? I am 

assuming this is not the first time you have met. What kinds of efficiencies of scales? We are doing a lot at the National Energy 

Technology Lab in Morgantown as well. 

Who wants to step up to that question? 

Mr. BOHLEN. It is interesting that question comes, Senator, as 

our chief research officers of all of the laboratories meet here today 

for a 2-day meeting. They meet regularly. We work across the laboratory system very, very effectively. Yes, we compete. Yes, we 

think we have great technologies. But we also partner much more 

vigorously than people know because we just work together and get 

stuff done. 

Senator CAPITO. Dr. Khaleel? 

Mr. KHALEEL. Senator, the DOE Office of Science has looked at 

all of the national labs and looked at their core capabilities, and 

based on critical mass in terms of the staff, critical mass in terms 

of facilities and equipment, the labs are assigned core capabilities. 

So in multiple areas you see some labs have the same core capability and they coordinate. 

I think like Steve mentioned, we have also the national lab directors, you know, tomorrow meeting together. We also have bilateral 

work between the national labs. For example, we coordinate with 

the National Renewable Energy Lab. They are the renewable energy lab and we do a lot of work in energy efficiency. So we have 

a lot of complimentary capabilities. 

For example, the Senator talked about offshore wind. One of the 

basic and fundamental capabilities, really advanced manufacturing, 

especially of composite materials. We use, at Oak Ridge, 3-D printing to enable that to happen, and we work with IRNL. Likewise, 

we coordinate with Idaho National Lab in the area of nuclear. 

So you see a lot of these partnerships to leverage facilities and 

staff and capabilities. 

Senator CAPITO. Dr. K, did you have a comment on that? 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. Yes. I will comment on the nuclear piece. 

As I indicated before, the nuclear research capabilities are expensive and they are not all located in one place, so they are spread 

across the DOE complex and multiple national laboratories. So just 

by virtue of that we have to collaborate and we have to complement 

each other, and the recent vehicle—yes, in the past there was competition, but the recent vehicle for that collaboration has been that 

116 

initiative that I mentioned, the GAIN Initiative, that basically ties 

the laboratories together. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you. 

Senator CARPER. Senator CARPER. Thank you. 

Folks, just to refresh your memories, I had asked a question 

about the role of the Federal Government with respect to clean energy technologies, and I had asked how important has the Federal 

Government’s role been in the last decade or so in providing a nurturing environment for clean energy investments and job creation 

related to those. And then I asked what more can the Federal Government be doing or should be doing in this regard, and we got as 

far as you, Mr. Bohlen. 

If you could just take a shot at that. Not too long, but just take 

a shot at that for me. What more could we be doing, should we be 

doing in this vein? 

Mr. BOHLEN. Yes, Senator. What we know from looking at experience is that investment in these technologies at the national laboratories, with their university partners and industry partners, 

lowers the risk and lowers the costs so that they become commercially competitive. So in the wisdom of the Congress and the Federal investment apparatus, whatever they want to invest in, they 

know they will get lower risks and more rapid commercialization 

by investing. This has been demonstrated over and over and over 

again. 

Senator CARPER. Thank you very much. 

Dr. Khaleel, also known as Moe? 

Mr. KHALEEL. The first thing is for the Government to have 

stronger support for the national user facilities, the science user facilities and the applied program user facilities, as these facilities 

attract elite scientists from universities and industry to work on 

challenging problems with the talent at the national labs. I think 

that is fairly important. 

The other thing is really to have more focus on early stage R&D, 

but also mid-stage and later stage, and to open the national lab as 

we are doing it today, but more deliberate to work with the industry, the U.S. industry, to help them in buying down some of the 

risk, especially as we have the best capabilities to deal with early 

stage and mid-stage R&D. 

Senator CARPER. All right, thank you. 

I also want to ask Mr. Pasamehmetoglu. I know that wasn’t very 

well done, but I just wanted to stay here to try to pronounce your 

name. Do you have any nicknames? What do your friends call you? 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. Well, my friends call me Kemal. 

Senator CARPER. All right. All right, Kemal it is. Take it away. 

Same question. What more could we be doing, should we be doing? 

Mr. PASAMEHMETOGLU. Well, I think the issue we need to look 

at, if you are really serious to take over, to at least maintain the 

technology leadership and regain the industrial leadership in nuclear energy, and especially in the advanced nuclear systems, I 

think it is important as a Nation for us to look at a different way 

of public-private partnership because a lot of these technologies 

have large promises to cut cost and to be a lot more efficient; however, jumping over the hump of a first-of-a-kind unit is not someVerDate Aug 31 2005 12:26 May 04, 2018 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00120 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 S:\_EPW\DOCS\27301.TXT VERN
117 

thing that the private sector alone can do. So, in my opinion, a new 

model of public-private partnership to get us through that initial 

hump and get those things to end of a kind where they are economically competitive, and then the private sector can take over 

and run with it. 

Senator CARPER. I want to go back, before I conclude, to where 

I started, and that was to talk about the visit of Secretary of Agriculture, Sonny Perdue, former Governor of Georgia, to Delaware 

yesterday, and it was a wonderful, wonderful visit that focused on 

what we are doing in our ag economy and how we can strengthen 

it further. And I mentioned the one farmer who talked about what 

the effect of climate change is having on his livelihood, and he was 

very concerned about it. 

Delaware is the lowest lying State in America, and we see the 

vestiges of sea level rise every day. We had huge storms in the last 

couple days, but even throughout the year we see vestiges of what 

is happening to our coastline and to our State, and we are not the 

only State. 

The work that you all are doing, and your colleagues are doing, 

is just enormously important as we deal with what is a reality for 

us. I have always looked at adversity and tried to find opportunity 

in that adversity. That is Einstein. And I think there is a chance 

for us to draw on that again in this vein as well, to look at adversity, too much CO2 in our air, find opportunity. 

Thank you for helping us find it. 

Senator CAPITO. Senator Markey, second round, 5 minutes. 

Senator MARKEY. OK. Thank you, Madam Chair. 

Boston is the fourth most vulnerable city in the United States to 

climate change, and it is the eighth most vulnerable city in the 

world in terms of economic impact, so we are very conscious about 

this issue; it has tremendous implications for our well-being. 

Just coming back to the colloquy that I was having with the 

Chairwoman earlier, there was a problem with the siting process 

for wind off of the coast of Massachusetts, but what has happened 

now is that pursuant to the 2005 Energy Act, although the Bush 

administration did not act on it, they should have, the Department 

of Interior has now mapped off of the coast of Massachusetts, in 

our Federal waters, where it is acceptable to deploy wind. And the 

State of Massachusetts has now established its goal of deploying 

1,600 megawatts of offshore wind over the next 10 years. And now 

New York is following and the Department of Interior is continuing 

its mapping off of the coast in Federal waters that gives more certainty, economically, to the development of wind technology. 

So the objective should be, from my perspective, to ensure that 

there is a level playing field as we are going forward. Yes, we need 

to help with carbon capture and sequestration. Yes, we need to look 

at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and its regulations. But we 

also have to make sure that the barriers to entry for offshore wind 

or for the continuing development of solar are also taken into account so that it is a race. And as we know right now, this race does 

have wind and solar now sprinting out toward a minimum of 30 

percent of all electrical generation. 

And, by the way, if you add in the 6 percent of all electrical generation, which is hydro, by the year 2030, because that will not 

118 

change, and potentially keeping nuclear at around 19 percent, we 

are looking at 55 percent, 56 percent of all electricity being nongreenhouse gas emitting within 13 years in our Country, and that 

is if wind and solar and other renewable technologies don’t make 

any additional breakthroughs, if we don’t have breakthroughs in 

battery technologies that can contribute to the reliability of using 

renewables in our national grid. And I would bet on a breakthrough in battery technology because of the vast fortune to whichever individual or company makes that breakthrough. They could 

ultimately become the wealthiest company on the planet. So there 

is a huge economic incentive to make that breakthrough as well. 

So I am just basically somebody that wants an all-of-the-above 

strategy, truly an all-of-the-above, and it includes carbon capture 

and sequestration for our fossil fuel industry, but also extending 

the tax breaks for wind and solar, ensuring that the continued 

mapping of the coastline continues, because that could come into 

jeopardy in a Trump era Department of Interior. But as long as 

that is in place, then I think we are going to be on a pathway to 

solve the problem. 

So I thank you, Madam Chair, and I thank you for holding this 

very important hearing. 

Senator CAPITO. Thank you. 

I want to thank the witnesses, and I would like to note that the 

record for the Committee will stay open for 2 weeks, and I would 

ask the witnesses that any written questions that were submitted 

to you, if you could respond in a timely fashion, it would be much 

appreciated. 

Thank you all for coming. 

[Whereupon, at 11:50 a.m. the committee was adjourned.] 

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