Clear air rules to create jobs: report

Just Transition for Coal and Nuclear Workers explains policy frameworks, compensation packages, retraining, and community support during decarbonization, plant closures, and energy shifts across Europe and the U.S., including Diablo Canyon and Uniper strategies.

Key Points

A policy approach to protect and retrain legacy power workers as coal and nuclear plants retire during decarbonization.

✅ Germany and Spain fund closures with compensation and retraining.

✅ U.S. lacks federal support; Diablo Canyon is a notable exception.

✅ Firms like Uniper convert coal sites to gas and clean energy roles.

The coronavirus pandemic has not changed the grim reality facing workers at coal and nuclear power plants in the U.S. and Europe. How those workers will fare in the years ahead will vary greatly based on where they live and the prevailing political winds.

In Europe, the retirement of aging plants is increasingly seen as a matter of national concern. Germany this year agreed to a €40 billion ($45 billion) compensation package for workers affected by the country's planned phaseout of coal generation by 2038, amid its broader exit from nuclear power as part of its energy transition. Last month the Spanish authorities agreed on a just transition plan affecting 2,300 workers across 12 thermal power plants that are due to close this year.

In contrast, there is no federal support plan for such workers in the U.S., said Tim Judson, executive director at the Maryland-based Nuclear Information and Resource Service, which lobbies for an end to nuclear and fossil-fuel power.

For all of President Donald Trump’s professed love of blue-collar workers in sectors such as coal, “where there are economic transitions going on, we’re terrible at supporting workers and communities,” Judson said of the U.S. Even at the state level, support for such workers is "almost nonexistent,” he said, “although there are a lot of efforts going on right now to start putting in place just transition programs, especially for the energy sector.”

One example that stands out in the U.S. is the support package secured for workers at utility PG&E's Diablo Canyon Power Plant, California's last operating nuclear power plant that is scheduled for permanent closure in 2025. “There was a settlement between the utility, environmental groups and labor unions to phase out that plant that included a very robust just transition package for the workers and the local community,” Judson said.

Are there enough clean energy jobs to replace those being lost?
Governments are more likely to step in with "just transition" plans where they have been responsible for plant closures in the first place. This is the case for California, Germany and Spain, all moving aggressively to decarbonize their energy sectors and pursue net-zero emissions policy goals.

Some companies are beginning to take a more proactive approach to helping their workers with the transition. German energy giant Uniper, for example, is working with authorities to save jobs by seeking to turn coal plants into lower-emissions gas-fired units.

Germany’s coal phaseout will force Uniper to shut down 1.5 gigawatts of hard-coal capacity by 2022, but the company has said it is looking at "forward-looking" options for its plants that "will be geared toward tomorrow's energy world and offer long-term employment prospects."

Christine Bossak, Uniper’s manager of external communications, told GTM this approach would be adopted in all the countries where Uniper operates coal plants.

Job losses are usually inevitable when a plant is closed, Bossak acknowledged. “But the extent of the reduction depends on the alternative possibilities that can be created at the site or other locations. We will take care of every single employee, should he or she be affected by a closure. We work with the works council and our local partners to find sustainable solutions.”

Diana Junquera Curiel, energy industry director for the global union federation IndustriALL, said such corporate commitments looked good on paper — but the level of practical support depends on the prevailing political sentiment in a country, as seen in Germany's nuclear debate over climate strategy.

Even in Spain, where the closure of coal plants was being discussed 15 years ago, a final agreement had to be rushed through at the last minute upon the arrival of a socialist government, Junquera Curiel said. An earlier right-wing administration had sat on the plan for eight years, she added.

The hope is that heel-dragging over just transition programs will diminish as the scale of legacy plant closures grows.

Nuclear industry facing a similar challenge as coal
One reason why government support is so important is there's no guarantee a burgeoning clean energy economy will be able to absorb all the workers losing legacy generation jobs. Although the construction of renewable energy projects requires large crews, it often takes no more than a handful of people to operate and maintain a wind or solar plant once it's up and running, Junquera Curiel observed.

Meanwhile, the job losses are unlikely to slow. In Europe, Austria and Sweden both closed their last coal-fired units recently, even as Europe loses nuclear capacity in key markets.

In the U.S., the Energy Information Administration's base-case prediction is that coal's share of power generation will fall from 24 percent in 2019 to 13 percent in 2050, while nuclear's will fall from 20 percent to 12 percent over that time horizon. The EIA has long underestimated the growth trajectory of renewables in the mix; only in 2020 did it concede that renewables will eventually overtake natural gas as the country's largest source of power.

The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis has predicted that even a coronavirus-inspired halt to renewables is unlikely to stop a calamitous drop in coal’s contribution to U.S. generation.

The nuclear sector faces a similar challenge as coal, albeit over a longer timeline. Last year saw the nuclear industry starting to lose capacity worldwide in what could be the beginning of a terminal decline, highlighted by Germany's shutdown of its last three reactors in 2023. Last week, the Indian Point Energy Center closed permanently after nearly half a century of cranking out power for New York City.*

“Amid ongoing debates over whether to keep struggling reactors online in certain markets, the industry position would be that governments should support continued operation of existing reactors and new build as part of an overall policy to transition to a sustainable clean energy system,” said Jonathan Cobb, senior communication manager at the World Nuclear Association.

If this doesn’t happen, plant workers will be hoping they can at least get a Diablo Canyon treatment. Based on the progress of just transition plans so far, that may depend on how they vote just as much as who they work for.

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2040 Energy Outlook projects a shifting energy mix as renewables scale, EV adoption accelerates, and IEA forecasts plateauing oil demand alongside rising natural gas, highlighting policy, efficiency, and decarbonization trends that shape global consumption.

Key Points

A data-driven view of future energy mix, covering renewables, fossil fuels, EVs, oil demand, and policy impacts.

✅ Renewables reach 16-30% by 2040, higher with strong policy support.

✅ Fossil fuels remain dominant, with oil flat and natural gas rising.

✅ EV share surges, cutting oil use; efficiency curbs demand growth.

Which is more plausible: flying taxis, wind turbine arrays stretching miles into the ocean, and a solar roof on every house--or a scorched-earth, flooded post-Apocalyptic world? 

We have no way of peeking into the future, but we can certainly imagine it. There is plenty of information about where the world is headed and regardless of how reliable this information is—or isn’t—we never stop wondering. Will the energy world of 20 years from now be better or worse than the world we live in now? 

The answer may very well lie in the observable trends.

A Growing Population

The global population is growing, and it will continue to grow in the next two decades. This will drive a steady growth in energy demand, at about 1 percent per year, according to the International Energy Agency.

This modest rate of growth is good news for all who are concerned about the future of the planet. Parts of the world are trying to reduce their energy consumption, and this should have a positive effect on the carbon footprint of humanity. The energy thirst of most parts of the world will continue growing, however, hence the overall growth.

The world’s population is currently growing at a rate of a little over 1 percent annually. This rate of growth has been slowing since its peak in the 1960s and forecasts suggest that it will continue to slow. Growth in energy demand, on the other hand, may at some point stop moving in tune with population growth trends as affluence in some parts of the world grows. The richer people get, the more energy they need. So, to the big question: where will this energy come from?

The Rise of Renewables

For all the headline space they have been claiming, it may come as a disappointing surprise to many that renewable energy, excluding hydropower, to date accounts for just 14 percent of the global primary energy mix. 

Certainly, adoption of solar and wind energy has been growing in leaps and bounds, with their global share doubling in five years in many markets, but unless governments around the world commit a lot more money and effort to renewable energy, by 2040, solar and wind’s share in the energy mix will still only rise to about 16 to 17 percent. That’s according to the only comprehensive report on the future of energy that collates data from all the leading energy authorities in the world, by non-profit Resources for the Future.

The growth in renewables adoption, however, would be a lot more impressive if governments do make serious commitments. Under that scenario, the share of renewables will double to over 30 percent by 2040, echoing milestones like over 30% of global electricity reached recently: that’s the median rate of all authoritative forecasts. Amongst them, the adoption rates of renewables vary between 15 percent and 61 percent by 2040.

Even the most bullish of the forecasts on renewables is still far below the 100-percent renewable future many would like to fantasize about, although BNEF’s 50% by 2050 outlook points to what could be possible in the power sector. 

But in 2040, most of the world’s energy will still come from fossil fuels.

EV Energy

Here, forecasters are more optimistic. Again, there is a wide variation between forecasts, but in each and every one of them the share of electric vehicles on the world’s roads in 2040 is a lot higher than the meagre 1 percent of the global car fleet EVs constitute today.
Related: Gas Prices Languish As Storage Falls To Near-Record Lows

Government policy will be the key, as U.S. progress toward 30% wind and solar shows how policy steers the power mix that EVs ultimately depend on. Bans of internal combustion engines will go a long way toward boosting EV adoption, which is why some forecasters expect electric cars to come to account for more than 50 percent of cars on the road in 2040. Others, however, are more guarded in their forecasts, seeing their share of the global fleet at between 16 percent and a little over 40 percent.

Many pin their hopes for a less emission-intensive future on electric cars. Indeed, as the number of EVs rises, they displace ICE vehicles and, respectively, the emission-causing oil that fuels for ICE cars are made from.  It should be a no brainer that the more EVs we drive, the less emissions we produce. Unfortunately, this is not necessarily the case: China is the world’s biggest EV market, and its solar PV expansion has been rapid, it has the most EVs—including passenger cars and buses—but it is also one of the biggest emitters.

Still, by 2040, if the more optimistic forecasts come true, the world will be consuming less oil than it is consuming now: anywhere from 1.2 million bpd to 20 million bpd less, the latter case envisaging an all-electric global fleet in 2040. 

This Ain’t Your Daddy’s Oil

No, it ain’t. It’s your grandchildren’s oil, for good or for bad. The vision of an oil-free world where renewable power is both abundant and cheap enough to replace all the ways in which crude oil and natural gas are used will in 2040 still be just that--a vision, with practical U.S. grid constraints underscoring the challenges. Even the most optimistic energy scenarios for two decades from now see them as the dominant source of energy, with forecasts ranging between 60 percent and 79 percent. While these extremes are both below the over-80 percent share fossil fuels have in the world’s energy mix, they are well above 50 percent, and in the U.S. renewables are projected to reach about one-fourth of electricity soon, even as fossil fuels remain foundational.

Still, there is good news. Fuel efficiency alone will reduce oil demand significantly by 2040. In fact, according to the IEA, demand will plateau at a little over 100 million bpd by the mid-2030s. Combined with the influx of EVs many expect, the world of 20 years from now may indeed be consuming a lot less oil than the world of today. It will, however, likely consume a lot more natural gas. There is simply no way around fossil fuels, not yet. Unless a miracle of politics happens (complete with a ripple effect that will cost millions of people their jobs) in 2040 we will be as dependent on oil and gas as we are but we will hopefully breathe cleaner air.

By Irina Slav for Oilprice.com

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Germany January Power Mix shows gas-fired generation rising, coal steady, and nuclear phaseout impacts, amid cold weather, energy prices, industrial demand, and emissions targets shaping renewables, grid stability, and security of supply.

Key Points

The January electricity mix, highlighting gas, coal, renewables, and nuclear exit effects on emissions, prices, and demand.

✅ Gas output up 13% to 8.74 TWh, share at 18.6%.

✅ Coal share 23%, down year on year, steady vs late 2023.

✅ Nuclear gap filled by gas and coal; emissions below Jan 2023.

Germany's electricity generation in January presented a fascinating snapshot of its energy transition journey. As the country strives to move away from fossil fuels, with renewables overtaking coal and nuclear in its power mix, it grapples with the realities of replacing nuclear power and meeting fluctuating energy demands.

Gas Takes the Lead:

Gas-fired power plants saw their highest output in two years, generating 8.74 terawatt hours (TWh). This 13% increase compared to January 2023 compensated for the closure of nuclear reactors, which were extended during the energy crisis to shore up supply, and colder weather driving up heating needs. This reliance on gas, however, pushed its share in the electricity mix to 18.6%, highlighting Germany's continued dependence on fossil fuels.

Coal Fades, but Not Forgotten:

While gas surged, coal-fired generation remained below previous levels, dropping 29% from January 2023. However, it stayed relatively flat compared to late 2023, suggesting utilities haven't entirely eliminated it. Coal still held a 23% share, and periodic coal reliance remains evident, exceeding gas' contribution, reflecting its role as a reliable backup for intermittent renewable sources like wind.

Nuclear Void and its Fallout:

The shutdown of nuclear plants in April 2023 created a significant gap, previously accounting for an average of 12% of annual electricity output. This loss is being compensated through gas and coal, with gas currently the preferred choice, even as a nuclear option debate persists among policymakers. This strategy kept January's power sector emissions lower than the previous year, but rising demand could shift the balance.

Industry's Uncertain Impact:

Germany's industrial sector, a major energy consumer, is facing challenges like high energy prices and weak consumer demand. While the government aims to foster industrial recovery, uncertainties linger due to a shaky coalition and limited budget, and debate about a possible nuclear resurgence continues in parallel, which could reshape policy. Any future industrial revival would likely increase energy demand and potentially necessitate more gas or coal.

Cost-Driven Choices and Emission Concerns:

The choice between gas and coal depends on their relative costs, in a system pursuing a coal and nuclear phase-out under long-term policy. Currently, gas seems more favorable emission-wise, but if its price rises, coal might become more attractive, impacting overall emissions.

Looking Ahead:

Germany's energy transition faces a complex balancing act, with persistent grid expansion woes and exposure to cheap gas complicating progress. While the reliance on gas and coal highlights the difficulties in replacing nuclear, the focus on emissions reduction is encouraging. Navigating the challenges of affordability, industrial needs, and climate goals will be crucial for a successful transition to a clean and secure energy future.

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Air Humidity Energy Harvesting converts thin air into clean electricity using air-gen devices with nanopores, delivering continuous renewable energy from ambient moisture, as demonstrated by UMass Amherst researchers in Advanced Materials.

Key Points

A method using nanoporous air-gen devices to harvest continuous clean electricity from ambient atmospheric moisture.

✅ Nanopores drive charge separation from ambient water molecules

✅ Works across materials: silicon, wood, bacterial films

✅ Predictable, continuous power unlike intermittent solar or wind

Sure, we all complain about the humidity on a sweltering summer day. But it turns out that same humidity could be a source of clean, pollution-free energy, aligning with efforts toward cheap, abundant electricity worldwide, a new study shows.

"Air humidity is a vast, sustainable reservoir of energy that, unlike wind and solar power resources, is continuously available," said the study, which was published recently in the journal Advanced Materials.

While humidity harvesting promises constant output, advances like a new fuel cell could help fix renewable energy storage challenges, researchers suggest.

“This is very exciting,” said Xiaomeng Liu, a graduate student at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and the paper’s lead author. “We are opening up a wide door for harvesting clean electricity from thin air.”

In fact, researchers say, nearly any material can be turned into a device that continuously harvests electricity from humidity in the air, a concept echoed by raindrop electricity demonstrations in other contexts.

“The air contains an enormous amount of electricity,” said Jun Yao, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst and the paper’s senior author. “Think of a cloud, which is nothing more than a mass of water droplets. Each of those droplets contains a charge, and when conditions are right, the cloud can produce a lightning bolt – but we don’t know how to reliably capture electricity from lightning.

"What we’ve done is to create a human-built, small-scale cloud that produces electricity for us predictably and continuously so that we can harvest it.”

The heart of the human-made cloud depends on what Yao and his colleagues refer to as an air-powered generator, or the "air-gen" effect, which relates to other atmospheric power concepts like night-sky electricity studies in the field.

In broader renewable systems, flexible resources such as West African hydropower can support variable wind and solar output, complementing atmospheric harvesting concepts as they mature.

The study builds on research from a study published in 2020. That year, scientists said this new technology "could have significant implications for the future of renewable energy, climate change and in the future of medicine." That study indicated that energy was able to be pulled from humidity by material that came from bacteria; related bio-inspired fuel cell design research explores better electricity generation, the new study finds that almost any material, such as silicon or wood, also could be used.

The device mentioned in the study is the size of a fingernail and thinner than a single hair. It is dotted with tiny holes known as nanopores, it was reported. "The holes have a diameter smaller than 100 nanometers, or less than a thousandth of the width of a strand of human hair."

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COVID-19 Impact on U.S. Electricity Consumption shows commercial and industrial demand dropped as residential use rose, with flattened peak loads, weekday-weekend convergence, Texas hourly data, and energy demand as a real-time economic indicator.

Key Points

It reduced commercial and industrial demand while raising residential use, shifting peaks and weekday patterns.

✅ Commercial electricity down 12%; industrial down 14% in Q2 2020

✅ Residential use up 10% amid work-from-home and lockdowns

✅ Peaks flattened; weekday-weekend loads converged in Texas

This is an important turning point for the United States. We have a long road ahead. But one of the reasons I’m optimistic about Biden-Harris is that we will once again have an administration that believes in science.

To embrace this return to science, I want to write today about a fascinating new working paper by Tufts economist Steve Cicala.

Professor Cicala has been studying the effect of Covid on electricity consumption since back in March, when the Wall Street Journal picked up his work documenting an 18% decrease in electricity consumption in Italy.

The new work, focused on the United States, is particularly compelling because it uses data that allows him to distinguish between residential, commercial, and industrial sectors, against a backdrop of declining U.S. electricity sales over recent years.

Without further ado, here are four facts he uncovers about Covid and U.S. electricity demand during COVID-19 and consumption.

Fact #1: Firms Are Using Less
U.S. commercial electricity consumption fell 12% during the second quarter of 2020. U.S. industrial electricity consumption fell 14% over the same period.

This makes sense. The second quarter was by some measures, the worst quarter for the U.S. economy in over 145 years!

Economic activity shrank. Schools closed. Offices closed. Factories closed. Restaurants closed. Malls closed. Even health care offices closed as patients delayed going to the dentist and other routine care. All this means less heating and cooling, less lighting, less refrigeration, less power for computers and other office equipment, less everything.

The decrease in the industrial sector is a little more surprising. My impression had been that the industrial sector had not fallen as far as commercial, but amid broader disruptions in coal and nuclear power that strained parts of the energy economy, the patterns for both sectors are quite similar with the decline peaking in May and then partially rebounding by July. The paper also shows that areas with higher unemployment rates experienced larger declines in both sectors.

Fact #2: Households Are Using More
While firms are using less, households are using more. U.S. residential electricity consumption increased 10% during the second quarter of 2020. Consumption surged during March, April, and May, a reflection of the lockdown lifestyle many adopted, and then leveled off in June and July – with much less of the rebound observed on the commercial/industrial side.

This pattern makes sense, too. In Professor Cicala’s words, “people are spending an inordinate amount of time at home”. Many of us switched over to working from home almost immediately, and haven’t looked back. This means more air conditioning, more running the dishwasher, more CNN (especially last week), more Zoom, and so on.

The paper also examines the correlates of the decline. Areas in the U.S. where more people can work from home experienced larger increases. Unemployment rates, however, are almost completely uncorrelated with the increase.

Fact #3: Firms are Less Peaky
The paper next turns to a novel dataset from Texas, where Texas grid reliability is under active discussion, that makes it possible to measure hourly electricity consumption by sector.

As the figure above illustrates, the biggest declines in commercial/industrial electricity consumption have occurred Monday through Friday between 9AM and 5PM.

The dashed line shows the pattern during 2019. Notice the large spikes in electricity consumption during business hours. The solid line shows the pattern during 2020. Much smaller spikes during business hours.

Fact #4: Everyday is Like Sunday
Finally, we have what I would like to nominate as the “Energy Figure of the Year”.

Again, start with the pattern for 2019, reflected by the dashed line. Prior to Covid, Texas households used a lot more electricity on Saturdays and Sundays.

Then along comes Covid, and turned every day into the weekend. Residential electricity consumption in Texas during business hours Monday-Friday is up 16%(!).

In the pattern for 2020, it isn’t easy to distinguish weekends from weekdays. If you feel like weekdays and weekends are becoming a big blur – you are not alone.

Conclusion
Researchers are increasingly thinking about electricity consumption as a real-time indicator of economic activity, even as flat electricity demand complicates utility planning and investment. This is an intriguing idea, but Professor Cicala’s new paper shows that it is important to look sector-by-sector.

While commercial and industrial consumption indeed seem to measure the strength of an economy, residential consumption has been sharply countercylical – increasing exactly when people are not at work and not at school.

These large changes in behavior are specific to the pandemic. Still, with the increased blurring of home and non-home activities we may look back on 2020 as a key turning point in how we think about these three sectors of the economy.

More broadly, Professor Cicala’s paper highlights the value of social science research. We need facts, data, and yes, science, if we are to understand the economy and craft effective policies on energy insecurity and shut-offs as well.

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Brazil ICMS Tax Cap limits state VAT on fuels, natural gas, electricity, communications, and transit, promising short-term price relief amid inflation, with federal compensation to states and potential legal challenges affecting investments and ANP auctions.

Key Points

A policy capping state VAT at 17-18 percent on fuels, electricity, and services to temper prices and inflation.

✅ Caps VAT to 17-18% on fuels, power, telecom, transit

✅ Short-term relief; medium-long term impact uncertain

✅ Federal compensation; potential court challenges, investment risk

Brazil’s congress approved a bill that limits the ICMS tax rate that state governments can charge on fuels, natural gas, electricity, communications, and public transportation. 

Local lawyers told BNamericas that the measure may reduce fuel and power prices in the short term, similar to Brazil power sector relief loans seen during the pandemic, but it is unlikely to produce any major effects in the medium and long term. 

In most states the ceiling was set at 17% or 18% and the federal government will pay compensation to the states for lost tax revenue until December 31, via reduced payments on debts that states owe the federal government.

The bill will become law once signed by President Jair Bolsonaro, who pushed strongly for the proposal with an eye on his struggling reelection campaign for the October presidential election. Double-digit inflation has turned into a major election issue and fuel and electricity prices have been among the main inflation drivers, as seen in EU energy-driven inflation across the bloc this year. Congress’ approval of the bill is seen by analysts as political victory for the Brazilian leader.

How much difference will it make?

Marcus Francisco, tax specialist and partner at Villemor Amaral Advogados, said that in the formation of fuel and electricity prices there are other factors, including high natural gas prices, that drive increases.

“In the case of fuels, if the barrel of oil [price] increases, automatically the final price for the consumer will go up. For electricity, on the other hand, there are several subsidies and policy choices such as Florida rejecting federal solar incentives that are part of the price and that can increase the rate [paid],” he said. 

There is also a possibility that some states will take the issue to the supreme court since ICMS is a key source of revenue for them, Francisco added.

Tiago Severini, a partner at law firm Vieira Rezende, said the comparison between the revenue impact and the effective price reduction, based on the estimates made by the states and the federal government, seems disproportionate, and, as seen in Europe, rolling back European electricity prices is often tougher than it appears. 

“In other words, a large tax collection impact is generated, which is quite unequal among the different states, for a not so strong price reduction,” he said.

“Due to the lack of clarity regarding the precision of the calculations involved, it’s difficult even to assess the adequacy of the offsets the federal government has been considering, and international cases such as France's new electricity pricing scheme illustrate how complex it can be to align fiscal offsets with regulatory constraints, to cover the cost it would have with the compensation for the states” Severini added.

The compensation ideas that are known so far include hiking other taxes, such as the social contribution on net profits (CSLL) that is paid by oil and gas firms focused on exploration and production.

“This can generate severe adverse effects, such as legal disputes, reduced investments in the country, and reduced attractiveness of the new auctions by [sector regulator] ANP, and costly interventions like the Texas electricity market bailout after extreme weather events,” Severini said. 

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