• Artificial Intelligence Could Secure the Power Supply

    The future European power system – based primarily on renewable energy sources – will be much more weather dependent than the power system today. The two researchers believe that consumption patterns will also change. All these factors contribute to creating uncertainty around the energy supply, causing decision-making to be far more complicated.

  • European Countries Would Be Wise to Assist Each Other with Regard to Energy

    If European countries collaborate, they can avoid severe energy scarcity due to a gas shortage. If the European countries act selfishly in times of gas shortage, Eastern Europe in particular will suffer. Eastern Europe is vulnerable because the entry points for natural gas are now in the west of the continent.

  • Americans’ Support for Nuclear Power Soars to Highest Level in a Decade

    A Gallup survey released in late April found that 55 percent of U.S. adults support the use of nuclear power. That’s up four percentage points from last year and reflects the highest level of public support for nuclear energy use in electricity since 2012. As the country looks to decarbonize, the popularity of nuclear continues to climb.

  • Sustaining U.S. Nuclear Power Plants Could be Key to Decarbonization

    Nuclear power is the single largest source of carbon-free energy in the United States and currently provides nearly 20 percent of the nation’s electrical demand. New research sought to answer the question: Just how much do our existing nuclear reactors contribute to the mission of meeting the country’s climate goals, both now and if their operating licenses were extended?

  • U.S. Should Begin Laying the Foundation for New and Advanced Nuclear Reactors: Report

    New and advanced types of nuclear reactors could play an important role in helping the U.S. meet its long-term climate goals, but a range of technical, regulatory, economic, and societal challenges must first be overcome.

  • Geothermal Energy: Limitless, Renewable, and Nonpolluting

    Geothermal resources offer a tantalizing opportunity to provide affordable, carbon-neutral electricity. It is virtually limitless, “always on,” and widely available across all fifty states.

  • The Critical Minerals End-Game?

    To reduce greenhouse gas emissions, there’s been a dramatic uptake of renewable energy, primarily solar and wind, with a transition to lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles and energy storage. The transition relies on increasing the extraction of critical minerals for their production.

  • Shutting Down Nuclear Power Could Increase Air Pollution

    Nearly 20 percent of today’s electricity in the United States comes from nuclear power. The U.S. has the largest nuclear fleet in the world, with 92 reactors scattered around the country. Many of these power plants have run for more than half a century and are approaching the end of their expected lifetimes. If reactors are retired, polluting energy sources that fill the gap could cause more than 5,000 premature deaths, researchers estimate.

  • Progress in Alternative Battery Technology

    It is not easy to make batteries cheap, efficient, durable, safe and environmentally friendly at the same time. Researchers have now succeeded in uniting all of these characteristics in zinc metal batteries. Zinc batteries are considered a possible future alternative to the lithium-ion batteries now widely in use. Currently, however, their use often requires toxic salts.

  • Testing Gaming Technology to Train Nuclear Workforce

    Video game software paired with high-tech hard hats can bridge theory and reality to engage a new generation of workers. Argonne engineers tested extended reality tools at the nation’s largest liquid metal test facility.

  • Germany to Turn Off Nuclear Power, but Other Countries Not Ready Yet

    Germany is shutting down its last three atomic power plants this weekend after previously delaying the nuclear phaseout due to the war in Ukraine.

  • Preparing Students for the New Nuclear

    Nuclear power has gained greater recognition as a zero-emission energy source, and an MIT program trains leaders for a rapidly evolving industry.

  • The Potential for Geologic Hydrogen for Next-Generation Energy

    Hydrogen, you may recall from your school days, is a gas. It is considered the cleanest fuel, because burning it only produces heat and pure water. A previously overlooked, potential geologic source of energy could increase the renewability and lower the carbon footprint of the U.S. energy portfolio: natural hydrogen.

  • Shutting Down Nuclear Power Could Increase Air Pollution

    Nearly 20 percent of today’s electricity in the United States comes from nuclear power. If reactors are retired, polluting energy sources that fill the gap could cause more than 5,000 premature deaths, researchers estimate.

  • From High to Low in 15 Years: Coal Continues Its Precipitous Decline

    The country’s power generators used more coal in 2007 than ever before — a little over one billion tons. This year, coal use by U.S. electric-power producers would likely not reach 400 million tons. Roughly 40 percent of the country’s current coal-fired capacity is set to close by 2030. “This is not an economic cycle that is simply going to go away,” says an expert. “It is a real phaseout across the industry of the use of coal.”