** Power prices on the biggest US power grid are about to hit a record-high amid a wave of plant retirements and surging demand, thanks in part to new data centers being built. Generators that provide electricity to the 13-state grid that stretches from New Jersey to Illinois will get a record $269.92 per megawatt-day from utilities to provide capacity over a 12-month period starting in June, according to results of an auction by grid operator PJM Interconnection LLC disclosed Tuesday. That’s more than a ninefold increase from $28.92 in last year’s auction.
** Jeep and Ram maker Stellantis says it will offer buyout packages to many of its U.S. white-collar workers just five days after the company’s CEO said the auto industry is in the middle of a significant storm.
** Construction of Hermes, Kairos Power’s 35-MWth iterative non-power demonstration molten salt nuclear reactor, has officially kicked off in Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The effort marks another major step for the burgeoning advanced nuclear industry, which celebrated the groundbreaking of TerraPower’s Kemmerer 1, a pioneering sodium-cooled fast reactor demonstration, in June.
** A data center building boom across the US will boost the amount of electricity American Electric Power Co. plans to supply by 15 gigawatts — the output of 15 nuclear reactors — by 2030, company executives said Tuesday.
** The U.S. Department of Energy announced plans to transform a contaminated former nuclear weapons production site into what could be the largest solar project in the country. The installation would stretch across up to 8,000 acres in south-central Washington state and boast up to 1 gigawatt of energy capacity — enough to power 750,000 homes.
** Eighty-two arrests have been made in a recent escalation to combat the “growing epidemic” of copper wire thefts, Los Angeles city officials announced Tuesday.
** Intel Corp. plans to eliminate thousands of jobs to reduce costs and fund an ambitious effort to rebound from an earnings slump and market share losses.
World
** BP Plc maintained the pace of share buybacks and increased its dividend as strong second-quarter earnings from pumping crude offset weakness in other parts of the business. The British oil major reiterated that it will purchase $3.5 billion of stock through to the end of this year, while boosting its dividend by 10% to 8 cents a share, as expected.
** Researchers in China have developed the world’s first meltdown-proof nuclear power plant, The Independent reported. The researchers from Tsinghua University used several new methods to create the plant, which relies on a “pebble-bed reactor” to virtually eliminate the possibility of a meltdown. The reactor is cooled by helium instead of water and uses highly heat-resistant billiard-ball-sized graphite spheres filled with tiny uranium fuel particles in place of large fuel rods.
** According to the 2023 Global Carbon Budget, shared by Our World in Data, China was responsible for annual carbon dioxide pollution of over nine billion tons from coal in 2022. However, government controls on dirty fuel industries have resulted in a 70% reduction in aerosol emissions over the last 10 years, as Yale Environment 360 detailed.
** Chinese EV maker BYD, is looking to enter the Canadian automotive market, according to a regulatory document filed earlier this month, even as Canadian officials consider imposing tariffs on vehicles imported from China.