Walmart Goes Nuclear

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THE TOP FIVE

1. Walmart inks a major deal for nuclear energy

Wally World is soon to be powered by the atom. On Tuesday, Walmart announced a 15-year deal with Constellation, the nation’s largest operator of nuclear plants, for a chunk of the electricity coming from the Dresden Clean Energy Center in Illinois. The agreement included about 176 megawatts of wholesale supply from the two-reactor station southwest of Chicago, including 30 megawatts of expanded generating capacity through “uprates” — upgrades that allow operators to get more power out of an existing unit. Over the past two years, tech giants such as Google, Microsoft, and Meta, have bought shares of the power coming from nuclear power stations as the companies sought steady supplies of clean electricity for their burgeoning data centers. But the Walmart deal stands out as one of the first to involve a major brick-and-mortar retailer. “We’re constantly evaluating new capabilities and energy solutions that help ensure the electricity we rely on is dependable, responsibly produced, and built to support long-term growth,” Shayne Wahlmeier, Walmart’s senior vice president of energy, said in a statement.

2. Trump makes a $20 billion bet on big Westinghouse reactors

The Trump administration just unveiled one of its biggest bets on nuclear power yet. The Department of Energy announced $17.5 billion in low-interest loans for utilities to pay for the equipment needed to order new Westinghouse AP1000 reactors. The program marks arguably the most significant effort yet to reclaim U.S. control over its flagship reactor design. While the two 1,100-megawatt units completed at Southern Company’s Alvin W. Vogtle Generating Station in 2023 and 2024 were the first installed in the U.S., China has been building its own version of the reactors at an industrial scale for years. The program will support up to 10 reactors, including two per venture with as many as five utilities. The power companies, currently in talks with the administration, have not yet been named. But Dan Sumner, the chief executive of Westinghouse Electric, told The Wall Street Journal the deal “really kick-starts fleet-scale nuclear development in the United States.” As my colleague Robinson Meyer wrote last night: “I hesitate to praise the project's climate bonafides at the risk of discouraging the Trump administration, but it is worth noting that if this project were to succeed, it would be one of the largest state-assisted build-outs of zero-carbon electricity in recent American history. But it would still take some time to arrive: These reactors aren’t forecast to come online til 2035.”

3. Giant solar and battery plant opens in Utah

Yet another behemoth solar farm has come online. On Tuesday, the developer rPlus Energies said its Green River Energy Center had started operations. The facility in central Utah with 400-megawatts of solar panels and 1,600 megawatt-hours of batteries is now the largest solar-and-storage plant within PacifiCorp’s six-state territory out west, including Oregon, Washington, California, Utah, Wyoming, and Idaho. “Operation Gigawatt is about ensuring Utah has the reliable, homegrown energy needed to power opportunity for generations,” Utah Governor Spencer Cox, a Republican, said in a statement. “Green River Energy Center represents the kind of large-scale energy investment we need to deliver reliable energy, support rural Utah, and help power the next generation of prosperity across our state.”

The opening comes as solar is now generating more U.S. power than coal, as I told you recently.

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4. Supreme Court greenlights Exxon’s bid to sue Cuba

Lights out in Cuba. Magdalena Chodownik/Anadolu via Getty Images

The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that Exxon Mobil has the right to sue a Cuban-owned company to recoup more than $70 million in 1960 dollars from an oil complex seized by the Cuban government after Fidel Castro’s revolution. Havana later transferred the ownership of the refinery, terminals, plants, and service stations to Corporación Cimex, the state-owned conglomerate. The lawsuit could now see the oil major try to recover more than $1 billion in losses. “Today’s decision is a critical moment in a 60 year effort to be compensated for what the Cuban government illegally seized,” Exxon spokesperson Todd Spitler told E&E News in an emailed statement. “It reflects two things: the merits of our argument and the fact that our company will fight a good fight for as long as it takes.”

5. U.S. sanctions shutter Canada’s only cobalt refinery

The Trump administration understands the importance of refining cobalt — that’s why, as I reported last year, the Pentagon’s Defense Logistics Agency is pumping money into a startup that promises a new and cheap way to process the mineral. Canada’s Sherritt International started shutting down its Fort Saskatchewan refinery after the U.S. expanded sanctions on Cuba, halting exports of a feedstock supply needed for the plant in Alberta, Canada. The move, in addition to the Supreme Court ruling, come amid intensifying pressure by Washington on the Cuban regime.

THE KICKER

California is once again following a New York trend. Just weeks after Albany sued to stop the Trump administration’s bid to pay TotalEnergies to give up its offshore wind projects, Sacramento is joining the litigation. “At a time when the country needs more reliable and sustainable power supply, the Trump Administration is busy using taxpayer money to strike backroom buyouts that make clean-energy projects disappear,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement. “California won’t stand idly by as the Trump Administration illegally strikes deals to kill offshore wind projects and replace them with more windfalls for his fossil fuel friends; we’re putting the Administration on notice that we intend to sue.”