During Wednesday’s Senate Appropriations Committee hearing, Sen. Katie Britt (R-AL) questioned Energy Secretary Chris Wright about nuclear energy competition with China.
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00:00Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.
00:02Senator Britt, we were talking earlier, and I made the comment, I want to state it on the record,
00:06that you've got an automatic place in heaven for having to carry Senator Tubervich, okay?
00:13It was legendary right here.
00:15I hope you're listening, Senator Tubervich.
00:17Legendary.
00:19Well, as the chair mentioned earlier, and I wasn't expecting that one, so that's some good stuff.
00:25Your department covers everything from basic research to advanced nuclear reactors to grid security.
00:33The work that you do affects Americans every single day.
00:36When we're looking at that, and this kind of piggybacks off of both of the questions or questions that have been asked previously,
00:41but I want to talk about China and where they are specifically with their embrace of nuclear generation.
00:47When you look at the facts as they are, China is, I think, has at least 28 nuclear reactors that are in construction,
00:55which is about half of the construction of all nuclear reactors across the entire globe.
01:02We look at what they're doing.
01:03We know they're working to undermine us.
01:05To me, this is very similar to what we saw in the manufacturing space.
01:08They're using political and economic leverage to ultimately manipulate and get ahead.
01:14I think that that is a mistake on a number of ways.
01:19I mean, if we turn a blind eye to that, I think it's critical that we look at this,
01:23particularly within the AI space, knowing that AI is not just an AI race.
01:27It is also an energy race, and we must win both.
01:31So my question to you is, what are your plans?
01:34What is the Trump administration's plans to win that race?
01:37And how do we make sure that you have the funds in the proper place to do that?
01:40Fantastic, Senator Britt.
01:43And I agree very much with the assumptions.
01:45China is moving full speed ahead with nuclear.
01:48In fact, most of the reactors they're building is essentially a knockoff, a stealing of an American reactor technology.
01:54But they build them much cheaper and much faster.
01:57And they don't have the giant bureaucratic regulatory overhang we have in the United States.
02:02We need to get the NRC, you know, in touch with physical reality.
02:07Grand Central Station in New York, our train station, could not be licensed as a nuclear reactor because radiation is too high.
02:15We have standards that are just so expensive to meet.
02:18It makes everything slow.
02:19It makes everything expensive.
02:21We bring all sorts of regulatory uncertainty into that environment.
02:26So we are talking with commercial providers.
02:28We've offered up DOE lands.
02:30We've had tons of solicitations.
02:32Come build on our land.
02:34We'll be fast.
02:35We'll be efficient.
02:36We'll help you get going.
02:37We'll arrange creative incentives for you to build nuclear reactors in our space.
02:43I think we'll do it.
02:44The loan program office is a key tool.
02:47We do need to make sure we have funding available in the loan program office.
02:52Because used judiciously, it's a way to leverage private capital to make things happen fast.
02:57If your equity investors behind that debt are the six hyperscalers in the United States, they're great credit.
03:06The American taxpayers are going to be paid back.
03:09Alternatively, in the last administration, the loan program office in its 15-year history lent $43 billion.
03:15In the 76 days since Election Day to Inauguration Day of the new president, the previous administration lent or committed $93 billion.
03:28Two and a half times the 15-year total.
03:29You're kidding me.
03:29Tell me that time frame again.
03:3176 days from Election Day when Biden lost the presidential election to President Trump's inauguration.
03:38In 76 days.
03:38That is absolute insanity.
03:40They lent or committed $93 billion.
03:43So is there a reason I'm moving slow and I'm doing evaluations of projects?
03:47Yes, there's a very big reason.
03:49Well, let me turn quickly in my remaining time.
03:52And thank you so much for doing that.
03:54We cannot cede this ground to China.
03:56And so thank you for making sure that we don't do that at all.
04:00In December of 2020, DOE selected a team led by Southern Company in Birmingham, Alabama,
04:05to lead the Molten Chloride Reactor Experiment, MCRE, in partnership with DOE.
04:11Developing this new type of nuclear reactor is transformational to that next generation nuclear energy
04:18and that type of leadership that we need to see across our nation.
04:21The MCRE program is going to deliver the world's first fast-spectrum salt reactor
04:27to support the administration's goal of unleashing American energy dominance
04:31and to achieve world leadership in nuclear energy.
04:35Further, MCRE is the first demonstration of a reactor technology
04:40that can revolutionize the commercial shipping industry
04:43and serving as a catalyst for restoring American maritime dominance
04:47throughout floating nuclear power plants and U.S.-flagged large commercial ships.
04:52So this project supports scalable, deployable, and transformational American nuclear energy.
04:59Given that strategic value associated with this critical advanced reactor demonstration project,
05:04will you commit to support this project and to continuing to work
05:07that it has successful reactor operation and will be executed during this administration?
05:13A super exciting project.
05:15I can't commit today to any specific project
05:17because I very carefully assembled a team of people, of leaders,
05:21that are evaluating honestly and objectively all of these projects
05:26and going full steam ahead on ones that deliver affordable, reliable energy
05:30and have a reasonable chance of success.
05:31Well, good. I hope you will take a look at this.
05:33We're really proud of the work that's being done,
05:34and I think that you are going to be very pleased with what you see.
05:37And in my last few remaining seconds, I just wanted to ask about grid security.
05:43So when you're looking at the chair and I, we live in Gulf Coast states,
05:48and so hurricane season is upon us when we're looking at what's happening with the grid,
05:52obviously, making sure it's protected not only for natural disasters but natural national security disasters.
05:58What are you all doing to ensure that reliability and protection?
06:03It's a key issue.
06:05It is a vulnerability of our country.
06:06Our grid is very distributed.
06:08A lot of it's very antiquated.
06:10It's very easy to attack our grid, and we are being attacked all the time.
06:15And I think there's more sophisticated attacks possible that have not been launched against us yet,
06:21but it could be an adversary waiting for the right time.
06:24In fact, one of the meetings I had right before coming here was with him.
06:26Land the plane for me, Mr. Secretary.
06:28We've got to move on here.
06:30Yeah.
06:31I agree with the problem.
06:32We are working on it, including today.
06:34Excellent.