US energy policy under new Administration
US president-elect Joe Biden has published an outline of policies on climate change, including investment in the power sector and innovation. His future administration would "move ambitiously to generate clean, American-made electricity to achieve a carbon pollution-free power sector by 2035" and "drive dramatic cost reductions in critical clean energy technologies, including battery storage, negative emissions technologies, the next generation of building materials, renewable hydrogen, and advanced nuclear - and rapidly commercialise them, ensuring that those new technologies are made in America".
 
The 2020 Democratic Party Platform included: “Recognizing the urgent need to decarbonize the power sector, our technology-neutral approach is inclusive of all zero-carbon technologies, including hydroelectric power, geothermal, existing and advanced nuclear, and carbon capture and storage.” Also that the U.S. should continue “to leverage the carbon-pollution free energy provided by existing sources like nuclear and hydropower.”  This marked the first time since 1972 that the Party had anything positive about nuclear power in its platform. The previous platform in 2016 was heavily influenced by anti-nuclear ‘environmental’ groups. The change followed two years of bipartisan support for legislation in Congress which aims to restore the USA to a high profile in world nuclear technology and nuclear exports which it had lost since the 1970s.
WNN 9/11/20.   US NP
 
Construction start for new Chinese reactor
China General Nuclear Power has started construction of Huizhou Taipingling unit 2 in Guangdong province, near Daya Bay.  It is a Hualong One reactor of 1116 MWe net. Unit 1 construction started late in December.
IAEA PRIS & DY.163.com      China NP
 
Second Leningrad reactor retired
Leningrad unit 2, a first-generation RBMK reactor at Sosnovy Bor in Russia, has been finally shut down after 45 years operation and following the start-up of its new successor, which is now in pilot operation for electricity supply and this week was connected also to the district heat system of Sosnovy Bor.  Nine RBMKs remain in operation at three plants.
WNN 10/11/20.   Russia NP
 
New IEA report on renewables
The OECD’s International Energy Agency has published a new report on renewable energy sources, with forecasts to 2025. In terms of installed capacity, it shows a steady rise for natural gas, predictably complementing that for wind and solar, though at lower rate. Hydro remains the largest source of renewables supply to 2025, though intermittent wind plus solar are closing the gap by then at just over 400 TWh/yr.  “In most advanced economies, renewables replace coal generation as aging fleets retire” over 2020 to 2025 according to IEA forecast, but without mention of the system costs involved.
World Energy Needs
 
Correction: In Digest of 6 November: Bohunice & Mochovce power plants are in Slovakia, not Czech Republic.