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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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Calpine and ExxonMobil Sign CO2 Transportation and Storage Agreement for CCS Project in Texas

LCG, April 24, 2025--Exxon Mobil Corporation (ExxonMobil) announced yesterday an agreement with Calpine Corporation (Calpine) to transport and permanently store up to 2 million metric tons per annum (MTA) of CO2 from Calpine’s Baytown Energy Center, a natural gas-fired facility located near Houston, Texas. This is part of Calpine’s Baytown Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) Project that is designed to add CCS for the facility’s CO2 emissions. The Calpine facility could then provide a 24/7 supply of low-carbon electricity to the Texas grid plus steam to nearby industrial facilities.

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Industry News

New Generation Records for Cook Nuclear Plant

LCG, March 27, 2013--Indiana Michigan Power, a wholly owned subsidiary of American Electric Power (AEP), announced earlier this week that its Cook Nuclear Plant Unit 1 will break its previous records for total generation, capacity factor and consecutive days online when it starts its 24th refueling outage Wednesday.

The 518 consecutive day run since the prior refueling outage beats the 1994 record of 471 days. Running continuously between refueling outages is known in the industry as "a breaker-to-breaker run" as the unit's output circuit breakers remained connected to the transmission grid for the entire 18-month fuel cycle. The projected total fuel cycle generation of 12,970,576 MWH and capacity factor of 101.3 percent are also records for Unit 1. The capacity factor exceeded 100 percent through gains in efficiencies given lower than normal lake water temperatures.

Cook Nuclear Plant is located in southwest Michigan. The net generating capacity of Unit 1 and Unit 2 is 1,030 MW and 1,077 MW respectively. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) renewed the operating licenses of both reactors. With the renewal, the operating license for Unit 1 will expire in 2034, and the license for Unit 2 will expire in 2037.

"Unit 2 also just completed a breaker-to-breaker run. So both Cook units are running very well, in fact, better than ever," stated AEP's Chief Nuclear Officer and Senior Vice President. "It's a tribute to the safety and operational focus of the entire organization, and also the fact that we are doing the right work with quality during our outages."

The current outage work will include: refueling the reactor, performing regular maintenance and testing work, plus the installation of a new control room annunciator system and two Unit Auxiliary Transformers. In each control room, there are almost 1,600 annunciators used as an indicator of the status of equipment or systems. The new digital computer-screen system will replace existing push-button analog controls. The new Unit Auxiliary Transformers reduce voltage on a small portion of the output of the main generator to power plant equipment during normal operation.

According to AEP, those two projects are part of the $1 billion Life Cycle Management project that replaces and upgrades various systems and equipment on both Cook units with the latest technologies. "This investment in Cook not only increases safety margins, but will provide our customers predictably low-cost and reliable generation for an additional 20-years past the original licensed life of the plant," stated AEP's Chief Nuclear Officer and Senior Vice President.
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