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Holtec Signs Strategic Cooperation Agreement with Utah and Hi Tech Solutions to Deploy Nuclear SMRs

LCG, May 1, 2025--Holtec International (Holtec) announced the signing on April 29 of a strategic cooperation agreement with the State of Utah and Hi Tech Solutions, a leading nuclear services provider based in Kennewick, Washington, to collaborate in the deployment of Holtec's SMR-300s (small modular reactor) in Utah and the broader Mountain West region. Hi Tech will play a leading role in the project development and workforce training to support the rise of new nuclear power generation in the region.

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EPA and Texas Railroad Commission Sign Memorandum of Agreement for Permitting Geologic Storage of Carbon Dioxide

LCG, April 29, 2025--Officials from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Texas Railroad Commission (RRC) signed a memorandum of agreement (MOA) today outlining the state’s plans to administer programs related to carbon storage wells, known as Class VI wells. The MOA signing is a required step in the RRC’s application to be granted authority to permit Class VI wells in the state of Texas. EPA is currently preparing a proposed approval of RRC’s primacy application.

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Industry News

Dynegy Threatens to Push Cal Utilities into Bankruptcy

LCG, Jan. 16, 2001Dynegy Inc. said it would force Pacific Gas & Electric Co. and Southern California Edison Co. into bankruptcy court if past due bills for wholesale electric power were not paid this week.

Dynegy, which purchased three power plants divested by SoCal Edison as part of the state's electric restructuring scheme, has been selling wholesale power from those plant to their former owners at market prices, which have soared far above the rates PG&E and SoCal Edison are allowed to charge their customers.

Dynegy is one of the "out-of-state" power producers which California Gov. Gray Davis says have plundered the state economy.

Dynegy's threat came as state lawmakers wrestled through yesterday's holiday (for government workers, at least) in an effort to create legislation that would allow the state of California to act as a broker, buying power from the plant owners at attractive prices and selling it without markup to the beleaguered utilities, and Dynegy sounded serious.

"If we can't get this bill through in the next two days, this will start to unravel," Dynegy president Stephen W. Bergstrom told the Los Angeles Times. "When and if they default on Thursday, it puts us in a position where we have to take them into bankruptcy, and I'm sure others will be right beside us."

On Sunday, Davis announced his plan for California to act as broker and yesterday legislators grappled with the sticky issues. Stickiest of all was a desire to purchase power at rates the power producers consider unreasonably low in the face of rising natural gas prices. Gas is the fuel for their power plants and is the most significant element in the cost of producing electricity.

State Senate President Pro Tem John Burton, a San Francisco Democrat, said on Sunday that the state was seeking to purchase power for 5 to 5 cents per kilowatt-hour, but power producers "didn't come in with that kind of offer." Instead, the power producers are seeking 7 to 8 cents per kilowatt-hour to cover the soaring price of natural gas.

In an 8-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission yesterday, SoCal Edison said it has "temporarily suspended payment of certain of its debt obligations and purchased-power obligations." The company is believed to be referring to a bill owed to the California power Exchange, which could amount to hundreds of millions of dollars. That bill comes due today.

As to the immediate threat of bankruptcy posed by Dynegy's demand, Burton said that power generators should be willing to cut the utilities a little slack while the legislature was working on the problem.

"We're just not going to do that," Bergstrom said, "because the stakes are too high."

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