Constellation Energy Corporation and the Department of Energy’s (DOE’s) Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) have announced a long-term agreement to evaluate trends in the US energy system and develop technologies for more efficient, carbon-free power generation.
One such project will focus on the use of hydrogen from nuclear power to store and transmit energy in back-up power, transportation and a variety of other applications.
ANL researchers are already working with Constellation to assess market demand for hydrogen as well as the environmental and economic impacts of hydrogen production, storage and delivery.
“Clean hydrogen produced from carbon-free nuclear has the power to transform difficult-to-decarbonise industries,” said Colleen Wright, Vice President of Corporate Strategy for Constellation. By combining Constellation’s nation-leading carbon-free energy resources with electrolysis technologies and Argonne National Laboratory’s technical expertise, we have an opportunity to deliver real world solutions to combat the increasing threats of climate change.”
Constellation noted that, by providing a legal framework and laying out intellectual property agreements, the agreement allows ANL and Constellation to quickly launch projects and pivot to address emerging challenges and opportunities the rapidly changing US energy system. “In addition, the six-year timespan enables the parties to grow and expand their work to build on successes from previous projects, paving the way for Constellation to become a leader in emerging power technologies.”
Mark Petri, Grid Security and Resilience Lead at ANL, said: “The Agreement can help align our research and development at the laboratory, because it gives us much better insight into what industry actually needs. The industry benefits because they get the power of Argonne National Laboratory’s capabilities and expertise to address specific technical issues that they may have.”
He added that perhaps the biggest impact of the agreement is the pipeline it establishes for developing and applying innovative technologies to help decarbonise the US energy system. “We can immediately move our projects into field studies, pilots, and adoption. We want to make a difference and help the nation solve problems associated with climate change, but we can’t do that without industry. Constellation is an ideal industry partner, given their commitment to clean, reliable power generation and their willingness to be pioneers for new energy technologies.”
Image: Scientists at Argonne launched a long-term partnership with Constellation to combat climate change by analyzing the economic and environmental impacts of nuclear-hydrogen production (courtesy of Shutterstock/ Stefan_Sutka)
