Latest news with #AmericanGrid
Bloomberg
15-07-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
Constellation CEO on Regulations, New NY Nuclear Project
CC-Transcript 00:00So there's two big announcements recently with your company, including with Meta and Microsoft. Here today, we're talking a lot about the private sector and investments, but also how the administration is playing a role. How do you see and what are you asking administration officials when you sit down with them for what you want in terms of building up nuclear capabilities? You know, the thing we need is regulatory certainty so that we know that when we start on a pathway where we're investing billions of dollars to bring on new megawatts, that we're going to be able to complete that work and get the necessary approvals timely. That's the only thing. The rest of it we could do with the private sector. We could attract the capital. We have the customers who are interested in working with us and we're doing wonderful projects, but we need to be able to get from the starting line to the finish line with clarity. Can we drill down on that just a little bit more? What specifically are you looking for? Which action? Because the administration talks a lot about its deregulation agenda. What are you specifically lobbying for that could get done perhaps in the quickest amount of time? Well, let me give you a couple examples of things that have already been done, because I think that's the best illustration in PJM, this part of the American grid that we're in right now. We had a tremendous number of renewable projects that were in the queue to go in. But what we were missing is power plants that could operate when we need power during peak times. So the administration and Governor SHAPIRO was a big part of this. So this was bipartisan, created a pathway to more quickly bring on what we call dispatchable generation, simply power plants that operate when we tell them to operate like nuclear plants, like gas fired plants. As a result of that, the crane restart has been moved up a year. That means we're going to bring over $1,000,000,000 worth of new energy to the market for families and businesses a year or sooner. That's already happened. Are you concerned at all about a lower price environment when you do have an administration that is looking to lower energy prices? Well, you know, I, I think we're going to do okay in the end and in this environment because it's growing. Right. And so but we do have to keep a good eye on the affordability of energy and the reliability of energy for American families. Can you give us a little bit more insight into how these deals with Hyperscalers? Have they accelerated your your commercial activities? Well, what they've been able what we've been able to do with them is secure the future of plants. So we have a big pathway for investments in things like extending the operating life of a plant or increasing the output of the plant in order to make those billions of dollars investment. You want to have a customer on the other end that gives you certainty that you're going to be able to recover the costs of the investment. So that's where the Hyperscalers have come in. And I think the greatest example of that is Crane, which had been shut down restarting with the support of Microsoft. So we're bringing enough power for effectively a million families onto the grid because a hyperscale was supporting that project. We're doing that in Illinois as well with Meda at our Clinton facility a couple of years ago, that Clinton facility was scheduled for shutdown. Now it's available to the American grid precisely because we have a customer that's willing to do that. And we're also adding new megawatts to the grid through these same agreements. So it's a pretty exciting time. Is there any exclusivity when it comes to meddle in Microsoft that would prevent you from engaging with deals with other companies? No. Okay. So you've see a future expansion to other. I hope so, yes. I wanted to ask you, you name some of the states that you're working in, and I wanted to ask you specifically if you're interested in working in New York State, because we actually heard from the governor a few weeks ago who says she wants to see one gigawatt of new nuclear, but she didn't really give us any additional details beyond that. Is that something that that you're looking into? Yeah, we sure are. And we will participate in the process that's been created in New York. We think it makes the most sense to build new nuclear where there is existing nuclear, where communities have enjoyed the relationship with the plants for decades. So we have a number of sites in New York. We have three sites. We think that's the right home for new nuclear. And we're going to participate in the process and we hope to be successful. Just lastly, because I know you have to go, but I want to ask you about tariffs. Are you lobbying the administration at all for some sort of tariff carve out when it comes to the energy sector? No. Do you have any concerns about some of the incoming tariffs? We're talking about copper or steel that could impact some of the prices that you're paying in order to get the energy out? I think There. is going to be an impact. But I think here's the other reality that we're dealing with. There's a lot of critical infrastructure that we need in the supply chain that should be on shored here in America. We should have the ability to have big steel manufacturing transformers, materials like copper developed domestically. That's important for the industry in the long term. There might be a bump along the way in terms of the prices to accomplish that, but the tariffs are an important mechanism for us to control as a nation critical infrastructure that frankly adds to our geopolitical and economic security. Well, just lastly, because you did bring up geopolitical, I'm wondering what your take, as we heard yesterday from President Trump, a threat of 100% so-called secondary tariffs on Russia for countries that would import Russian energy supplies. How are you looking at that when it comes to what that could mean ultimately for the global energy market? You know, I don't know the answer to that. I don't I don't think we've studied the impact. We certainly hope for peace in the Ukraine. And again, I think I think we as a nation have to get beyond thinking about the immediate price impacts and look at the long term things we're trying to accomplish, whether it be through tariffs or through efforts to to secure a peace in the Ukraine by putting pressure on Russia as a business. That's what Constellation cares about.
Coin Geek
27-06-2025
- Coin Geek
Power, Protocol, Protection: Mitch Burcham on Weekly Livestream
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... On this week's episode of the CoinGeek Weekly Livestream, BINARY founder Mitch Burcham told Kurt Wuckert Jr. about the state of the U.S. grid, how solar power will revolutionize energy, and how a more robust, decentralized grid can be built on the Bitcoin protocol. title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen=""> Who is Mitch Burcham? And a bit about the US grid Burcham is an entrepreneur and Founder of BINARY. He's also the National Blockchain Director at the Homeland Security Taskforce, giving him unique insight into both the government and business worlds. Burcham describes the last few years of his life as a 'deep dive' into the American grid. He describes it as highly complex and originally built by central planning. At its inception, Alternating Current (AC) won out, and they got economies of scale via coal-fired plants and hydro dams. While it still works great, the way it was designed created monopolies. Everything relies on the wires that the companies that built the grid own, and to this day, it depends on the monolithic structures they control. Burcham describes this as 'infrastructure jenga,' warning that it will inevitably collapse. This inevitable collapse is a feature of the top-down model, Burcham tells us. Thankfully, we now have solar panels—a distributed technology that can power almost anything locally. What is Burcham's idea for a more robust grid? Burcham begins his answer by stating an obvious fact: the sun is the biggest energy producer we'll ever find. It emits limitless energy wirelessly, giving him nuclear fusion on his rooftop. The Earth always has been and always will be solar-powered, so this energy source is part of the solution for him. However, the power source is only one element of a more robust, decentralized grid. They produce direct current (DC) electricity, which has to be inverted, and inverters introduce vulnerabilities like cybersecurity threats. In his vision, power would be transmitted between AC islands, and energy from rooftop panels would stabilize the grid. Currently, Burcham and his team are trying to build a state machine to allow all stakeholders to see the state of the grid and any actions taken. The ultimate aim is seamless coordination and competition between nodes. Wuckert mentions the cost of solar setups and how they become less efficient over time as potential barriers to a system like this. Burcham counters that the cost of solar panels has dropped 90% in 20 years, but the batteries are still relatively expensive. Regardless, he sees a future in which every house has one. The key to solving most cost problems is the open market, he says. We need price signals to determine when to recharge, etc. Aggregators can also help automate much of this. Unpacking what Burhcam's ideal grid would look like Wuckert asks for more detail on what this would look like at scale. He notes there are four time zones in the USA, and he wonders if arbitrage is possible over the huge distances in the country. Burcham envisions something much more local, emphasizing that this can't be centrally planned. It requires local power generation, and peer-to-peer transactions are a necessary part of it. How is blockchain utilized? The Bitcoin protocol acts as the global communication standard, facilitates peer-to-peer transactions, and offers timestamped records and verifiable proofs. Furthermore, backing this with an asset like Bitcoin (or tokens on it) will only add resiliency. The main benefit of building the grid on Bitcoin is that to attack it, a malicious actor would have to attack the Bitcoin network itself. However, if they also ran on it, they'd ultimately be attacking themselves, rendering the attack pointless due to mutually assured destruction. 'Bitcoin doesn't exist if the grid goes down, but the grid doesn't go down if it's built on Bitcoin,' Burcham says, highlighting the genius of Satoshi Nakamoto's invention. How receptive are stakeholders to this idea? Wuckert wonders what the grey-haired government officials and stakeholders think about Burcham's ideas. How has his pitch gone over with them? 'They wonder if I'm selling it,' Burcham says, emphasizing that he doesn't know. Others have told him it's impossible. Nobody wants to do it because of the costs involved, but he reminds them of how it's a national security superpower, and the first mover will have the advantage. To hear more about how a decentralized grid can be built on Bitcoin, why tradable assets like tokens can make it even more secure, and the direction Burcham's company is taking now, check out the episode here . Watch: Here's how Triple Entry Accounting guarantees trust in accounting title="YouTube video player" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen="">
