Welcome to Grid Brief! Here’s what we’re looking at today: the House of Representatives passes a series of bills to reduce wildfire risk and accelerate geothermal, Project Pele breaks ground in Idaho, and Ohio appeals to the Supreme Court concerning a FERC decision.

House Passes Bills to Address Wildfires, Promote Geothermal

On Tuesday night, the House of Representatives passed the Fix Our Forests Act, H.R.6474, and the Geothermal Energy Opportunity (GEO) Act on a bipartisan basis.

A comprehensive bill, The Fix Our Forests Act—sponsored by Rep. Bruce Westerman (R-AR) and Scott Peters (D-CA)—looks to reduce wildfire risk by expediting active forest management activities like prescribed burns and mechanical thinning on federal lands. The bill would set firm timelines and statutes of limitations for National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) litigation against these activities.

Fix Our Forests also expands the list of categorical exclusions (actions that don’t require an environmental review) under NEPA to include vegetation management and maintenance on transmission lines. These provisions will reduce wildfire risk which will save lives and lower the chance of grid outages from wildfires.

H.R.6474 expands the list of categorical exclusions (CEs) to include geothermal technologies and activities, putting the energy source on equal footing with oil and gas (which employs much of the same technology and drilling methods). Despite its track record as a clean, safe, and abundant source of energy, geothermal has not enjoyed the same preferential treatment as other renewable energy sources. Expanding the list of CEs to be more friendly to geothermal will lower costs and speed up timelines for an energy source that tech companies are increasingly looking at to power their data centers.

Finally, the GEO Act will require the Department of Interior (DOI) to authorize or deny a geothermal lease 60 days after the agency has reached a Record of Decision unless a federal court vacates the lease. In recent years the DOI has intentionally held geothermal projects up in bureaucratic limbo for fear of litigation. The GEO Act will provide regulatory certainty to developers, stretch taxpayer dollars further, and reduce costs for geothermal development and innovation.

Project Pele Breaks Ground

Groundbreaking for Project Pele is underway at Idaho National Laboratory (INL) and is expected to begin testing in 2026. Project Pele was launched in 2016 after the Department of Defense (DOD) recognized the need for a mobile, reliable, and resilient power source to meet battlefield needs.

Through the initiative, Virginia-based BWXT Technologies will create a high-temperature gas-cooled mobile microreactor. “Fueled with TRI-structural ISOtropic particle fuel, Project Pele will produce 1 MWe to 5 MWe for INL’s Critical Infrastructure Test Range Complex (CITRC) electrical test grid for about three years,” reports Sonal Patel of Power Magazine.

This is not DOD’s only venture into nuclear power. Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska is exploring options for a microreactor. Meanwhile, Joint Base San Antonio is collaborating with local utilities to explore the use of carbon-free energy sources such as geothermal and nuclear.

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Conversation Starters

• Oklo starts site work for microreactor (CNBC)

  Backed by Sam Altman, Oklo has received the green light to start site investigation work for its planned microreactor at Idaho National Laboratory. Oklo is planning to bring the reactor online by 2027.

• Ohio utility regulators urge Supreme Court to rein in FERC (E&E News)

  The Ohio Public Utilities Commission filed a petition earlier this year challenging a lower court ruling that upheld a 2021 FERC rule aimed at boosting renewables in the nation’s largest power market. The rule was made when FERC only had four commissioners and came to a split 2-2 decision, which meant it went into effect by operation of law. The Supreme Court may soon decide if judges should act as tiebreakers in deadlocked cases like these.

• Powering AI trumps climate concerns (Bloomberg)

  Despite the goals of tech giants to cut emissions, climate hawks are growing concerned there’s not enough low-emission energy — nuclear or otherwise — to satisfy AI, and natural gas will be key.

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