James_Jan-Feb_2026_web - Flipbook - Page 60
installed. The electricity systems
operators in California and Texas—
California ISO and ERCOT— have
both said that in critical times, their
systems have been saved by utility
batteries. They are the silent heroes
of the moment.
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JAMES JANUA RY /F E B RUA RY 2 02 6
Likewise, another critical
change has been the development of better transmission
wires, known in the industry
as connectors. Traditionally,
they have been made with
a steel core and the electricity moving in aluminum
around the core, which
provides strength and stability. The new connectors
have light carbon fiber cores,
which don’t sag when hot and
carry nearly twice as much electricity as the steel-cored variety.
The so-called Big Beautiful
Bill savages the renewable power
sector by phasing out tax credits,
which had become the building
blocks of the sector. Now many
solar and wind projects will evaporate, and some companies will fail.
Part of the genesis of today’s
problem is that another kind of
polarization hampered the ordered
growth of nuclear power— the log-
ical new frontier of electric generation— in the latter three decades of
the 20th century. Fears over nuclear safety were fanned by politicians
and the environmental movement.
The environmentalists favored
coal over nuclear before wind and
solar were perfected. That legacy
means nuclear power is now in
need of a whole new workforce
and supply chain.
President Donald Trump wants
to build 10 big nuclear plants of
the kind that make up the present
nuclear fleet of 95 reactors. He will
find that the workers and expertise
for that kind of effort are in perilously short supply and will take
years to rebuild.
To take any power source off
the table today for political reasons
is to endanger the nation.
Veteran journalist Llewellyn King is the
executive producer/host of “White House
Chronicle,” a public affairs program airing
on PBS and PEG stations.
