President Biden’s “American Jobs Plan” on Infrastructure Raises Important Questions on Energy Security

On March 31^st President Biden delivered remarks from a union training center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania where he unveiled his $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan.  His speech underscored the importance of securing our current electric grid infrastructure, even though the contents of his plan do not seem to make that a top priority, raising important questions about the future of America’s energy security.

The President was introduced by a Pittsburgh-based senior line worker and member of the international brotherhood of electrical workers who stated, “Every day I deal with our electrical grid, so I know how critical infrastructure is to our communities.” Having one of these unsung heroes make the introduction was a fitting way to signal the importance of electricity. However, his comments focused almost exclusively on the one “threat” that seems to be the most prominent concern for the Administration: climate change. The line worker added,

I don’t want my kids growing up in the world where the threat of climate change hangs over their heads…that means in investing in electrical vehicle charging infrastructure and all forms of clean power technology so we can slash carbon emissions and create tens of thousands of green energy jobs…union jobs..

The President considers his plan “a once in a generation investment in America, unlike anything we have seen or done since we’ve built the interstate highway system and the space race decades ago. In fact, it’s the largest American jobs investment since WWII.”  A key theme throughout the speech was the importance of tackling “climate change” to “protect our communities from billions of dollars of damage from historic superstorms, floods, wildfires, droughts, year after year by making our infrastructure more secure and resilient and seizing incredible opportunities for American workers and American farmers in a clean energy future.”

The President at least acknowledged the vulnerabilities of our current electric infrastructure, stating “as we saw in Texas and elsewhere, our electrical power and power grids are vulnerable to super storms, catastrophic failures and security lapses, with tragic results.” He said, “my American job plan will put hundreds of thousands of people to work, line workers, electricians, laborers, laying thousands of miles of transmission lines, building a modern, resilient, fully clean grid…and capping hundreds of thousands of orphan oil and gas wells that need to be cleaned up because they have been abandoned.”

“Resilient” is a key word here, but what exactly does that mean to the Biden Administration?

Because the electric grid is vulnerable to broad spectrum of hazards, a “resilient” grid would have protection from all potential threats. The best and most comprehensive definition of this all-hazards protection can be found in a pending bill in the Texas legislature. This type of resilience includes defense from everything from terrestrial weather and earthquakes to supply chain vulnerabilities, cyberattacks and physical sabotage, to the threat of naturally occurring geomagnetic disturbances or even a deliberate attack by a Radio Frequency (RF) or Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) weapon. Any and all of these threats have the potential to permanently cripple the nation’s power grid.

But there’s reason to be concerned that many of these hazards could be overlooked, merely because of a lack of focus and funding with respect to research and development (R&D).

Biden said his “American Jobs Plan is the largest increase in our Federal non-defense research and development spending on record.” Yet traditionally, the best R&D with respect to threats and hazards to the grid has been done as part of national defense.  Some of this research has been conducted by government agencies and national laboratories, but America’s defense establishment (including contractors) have decades of experience in protecting critical infrastructures from major hazards including cyber and electromagnetic threats.

The President also indicated that this R&D spending would “boost America’s innovative edge in markets where global leadership is up for grabs.  Markets like battery technology, biotechnology, computer chips, clean energy for competition with China in particular.”

Here again, words matter.  Does the term “clean energy” include nuclear power generation?  Private companies are developing promising technologies such as fast reactors capable of converting spent nuclear fuel into electricity – a concept that many believe would make nuclear truly a “new renewable” and clean energy source – one that could power America for hundreds, if not 1000 years.

The use of such fast reactors and their fuel – spent nuclear waste and depleted uranium stockpiles – would reduce nuclear proliferation concerns as well, since it could reduce the long term need for uranium enrichment, eliminate conventional nuclear reprocessing (which requires plutonium separation) and last up to 30 years versus the roughly 18-month fuel cycle for conventional light water reactors.

Since some of the companies developing these promising technologies are also involved in extremely important work supporting our national defense, would the Biden Administration be willing to support their research with “non-defense” R&D money?

Additionally, is the Biden Administration willing to consider coal in any form or fashion when it considers America’s energy future?  For example, would “clean energy” include the production and use of clean carbon fuel (CCF)?  A first-of-its-kind solid energy refinery is developing alternative uses for CCF and coal byproducts by removing impurities from coal before burning it. This not only produces a much cleaner burning coal, but also the extracted fossilized plant mineral matter that has great promise as a plant fertilizer for mineral-depleted farmland. That CCF refinery is located in the very city where President Biden delivered his speech – Pittsburgh. Would he be willing to make a visit?

Would “clean energy” include waste-to-energy tech, including electromagnetic induction technology that can transform landfill trash, tires, wastewater, and coal fines into electricity, pure water, liquid biofuels and plant fertilizer?  The application of such technologies – especially if protected against all-hazards from design through installation – would be to enable communities to transform their own waste into valuable forms of energy and fuel, reducing dependability on outside sources of these critical commodities and, thereby, enhancing both their resilience and environmental stewardship.

Nuclear waste-burning fast reactors, clean carbon fuel refineries, and electromagnetic induction waste-to-energy systems are just three examples of promising technologies that exist now and provide great promise with respect to promoting domestic energy production and environmental protection. Since these are all in the beginning stages of development, they could be engineered with “all-hazards” protection “baked in” to their designs to provide truly resilient electric power generation at either a localized or industrial scale.

Will the Biden Administration consider investing in these technologies with R&D funding or providing economic incentives for communities and industries to embrace them, or will it just be more incentives for solar and wind industries which have benefited from these perks for many years?

While at least one solar company has used their own funding to invest in all-hazards resilience, including protecting against EMP, many of these renewables were never built with these types of protections “baked in” to their designs. Nor has the government provided incentives for them to do so.

Ultimately, the President seems convinced about his plan and the urgency. He said, “We have to move now.  Cause I’m convinced, if we act now, in 50 years, people are going to look back and say, this was the moment that America won the future.”

Winning the future requires the Biden Administration get serious about defining “resilience” for current and future electric infrastructure as being secure against all-hazards. If the administration wants to “build back better” they will need to support R&D funding for all-hazards protection and innovative clean energy solutions that include nuclear, coal, waste-to-energy, and others – even when that technology is being developed within the defense industry. They will need to incentivize true resilience, not the same old tired approach.

If we do not, then we will -as Biden says- have failed at one of the largest national-level challenges since WWII, and perhaps suffer comparable future economic, environmental, and societal losses.