Welcome to Grid Brief! Here’s what we’re looking at today: Boston’s mayor has banned fossil fuel use in new municipal buildings and renovations, Norway gives the go ahead to Western Europe’s largest LNG plant’s grid connection, the American power industry is (mostly) pushing back on the EPA’s new emissions rules, and more.

Boston Mayor Bans Fossil Fuels in New Buildings

Boston Mayor Michelle Wu has issued a ban on fossil fuels in new building construction and renovation.

Wu’s executive order prohibits natural gas and heating oil in new municipal constructions. It also disallows the use of fossil fuels in substantial renovations of city-owned buildings, mandating renewable energy in projects that involve replacing a building's HVAC system.

“Boston owns more than 16 million square feet of property, according to Wu’s office,” reports Utility Dive. “Wu said the move will accelerate Boston’s goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, with buildings accounting for more than 70% of the city’s total carbon emissions, and municipal emissions constituting 2.3% of all those emissions. As part of its existing capital plan, the city has already allocated more than $130 million to advance decarbonized buildings and revitalize older structures.”

Boston has a city-wide plan to reach net-zero emissions by 2050—it’s unclear if this means decoupling from the New England grid as the city pursues greater electrification. ISO-NE is heavily reliant on natural gas for reliability and will likely remain so for the foreseeable future.

Norway Okays Big LNG Plant Connection

Norway has granted approval for Equinor's Hammerfest liquefied natural gas (LNG) facility to be linked to its power grid. This initiative involves the closure of a gas power plant – Norway's largest single carbon dioxide emitter – by 2030, and its replacement with renewable energy.

"This is an important day for building industry and creating jobs in northern Norway, and for the climate," Norway's Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere told a news conference held in front of the LNG plant in Arctic Norway.

Equinor anticipates that the transformation of Western Europe's largest LNG plant could potentially curtail approximately 850,000 tons of annual CO2 emissions, constituting roughly 2% of Norway's overall yearly emissions.

“The plan, however, has been contentious with locals due to its perceived clash with green industry development, rising power prices as well as the rights of Indigenous Sami reindeer herders,” reports Reuters. “To ease voters' concerns ahead of local elections in September, the centre-left government has pledged to support the development of new renewable power sources in its northernmost region and the building of new power lines to offer more grid connections.”

Equinor and its partners plan to invest 13.2 billion crowns ($1.30 billion) in the plant's electrification and upgrades to lengthen its operational lifespan by roughly a decade.

Known as Melkoeya, the Hammerfest LNG facility can supply 6.5 billion cubic meters of gas annually, enough to supply about 6.5 million homes in Europe with energy.

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Power Industry Pushes Back on EPA Rules

Power plant owners have warned the Biden administration that the Environmental Protection Agency’s new emissions standards isn’t feasible.

The Edison Electric Institute, a legacy utility trade association, has formally requested the EPA to ditch the suggested power plant regulations. These regulations are contingent upon the broad availability of technologies like carbon capture and storage (CCS) and low-emission green hydrogen. EEI has expressed the view that the EPA's proposed approach is "legally or technically unsound" as these technologies aren’t ready for game time.

"Electric companies are not confident that the new technologies EPA has designated to serve as the basis for proposed standards for new and existing fossil-based generation will satisfy performance and cost requirements on the timelines that EPA projects," EEI said in a public comment released on Tuesday.

“Proposed in May, the EPA plan would for the first time limit how much carbon dioxide power plants can emit, after previous efforts were struck down in court,” reports Reuters. “The proposed limits for both new and existing power plants assume availability of CCS technology that can siphon the CO2 from a plant’s smokestack before it reaches the atmosphere, or the use of hydrogen as a fuel. The agency said that last year's passage of the Inflation Reduction Act, which subsidizes those technologies, makes them cost effective and viable.”

Last week, Grid Brief covered the Florida Municipal Power Agency’s comment on the new rules, which shared the EEI’s concerns. Environmental policy think tank, the Breakthrough Institute, has also raised doubts about the efficacy of the new rules. In a recent analysis, BTI argued that deregulating clean energy would be a more effective than regulating emissions.

But not everyone in the power industry is unhappy about the rules. The CEO of the utility Constellation, Joseph Dominguez, voiced his support for the EPA’s new rules. “I am disappointed to see many of my peers represented by the Edison Electric Institute and others working to block these very practical measures,” Dominguez said in a statement.

Conversation Starters

• South Korea and the United Arab Emirates are thinking about more nuclear collaboration. “South Korea and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) have launched talks on the construction of additional reactors in Barakah, 14 years after Korea won the order to build four Advanced Power Reactor 1400 MW electricity (APR 1400) reactors in 2009,” reports Pulse. “Multiple sources familiar with the project said soil preparation work has been partially completed at the construction site. Both sides are expected to settle the details following further negotiations. The project of building two additional units is estimated at 20 trillion won ($15.3 billion). Both Korea and UAE have demonstrated a strong desire for the project, sources said.”

• Japan bought a huge stake in an Australian natural gas project. “LNG Japan is set to buy a 10% interest in the Scarborough natural gas project operated by Australia’s Woodside Energy,” reports Oilprice.com. “The Japanese company will pay some $880 million for the stake in total, including reimbursement for expenses Woodside has already made in relation to the Scarborough project, the Australian company said. In addition to the minority stake, LNG Japan will also buy 12 LNG cargoes annually from the Scarborough project, each of 900,000 tons, beginning in 2026.”

• Poland patched up a big pipeline. “The Druzhba oil pipeline from Russia to Europe has returned to full functionality after a leak was detected during the weekend that needed repairs, Poland’s pipeline operator PERN said on Tuesday,” reports Oilprice.com. “‘PERN’s technical services restored full functionality of the damaged pipeline on Monday evening,’ the pipeline operator said in a statement carried by Reuters. The company said on Sunday that it had halted a section of the Druzhba pipeline carrying oil from Russia to Europe after detecting a small leak that was being fixed. Back then, oil flows were expected to be restored by Tuesday.”

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