 Hello and welcome to the special plenary session for the NRC's 34th Regulatory Information Conference. Once again, I'm Andrea Vale, Director of the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation. And today I have the distinct privilege of opening this session and introducing a special guest speaker for this year's grant. The Honorable Jennifer Granholm, Secretary of Energy. Jennifer N. Granholm was sworn in as the 16th Secretary of Energy on February 25, 2021, becoming just the second woman to lead the U.S. Department of Energy. Secretary Granholm will lead the department in helping America achieve President Biden's goal of net zero carbon emissions by 2050 by advancing cutting edge clean energy technologies and building an equitable clean energy future. Secretary Granholm will also oversee DOE's core missions of promoting American leadership and scientific discovery, maintaining the nuclear deterrent and reducing nuclear danger, and remediating the environmental harms caused by legacy defense programs. Unfortunately, due to her schedule, Secretary Granholm won't be able to join us live. However, she provided her remarks in a pre-recorded video that we would like to share with you now. Hello everyone, I am delighted to join all of you there and to take part in the 34th annual Regulatory Information Conference. Let me thank the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for the opportunity to speak to you. The Department of Energy and the NRC are really kind of sister agencies of sorts. Actually, we both share a parent in the Atomic Energy Commission and your work is essential to our work. You obviously ensure the safety and the security and the efficiency of a nuclear fleet that supplies roughly 20% of our country's total electricity production and more than half, of course, of our emissions-free electricity generation. You have earned and kept the public's trust in this vital energy source. You know, and you've given us at the Department of Energy the license to think big when it comes to the future of nuclear power. Today, I'd like to tell you about our vision for nuclear power in the 21st century. It's a vision that is really underscored in its urgency and necessity by the present moment. The images that we've all seen out of Ukraine over the past two weeks have brought a few things to mind. First and foremost, of course, the extraordinary courage and the unbreakable will of the Ukrainian people. And at the same time, as Vladimir Putin's unacceptable, unjustifiable, unprovoked invasion, that has made the need to diversify the world's energy sources as clear as day. For the sake of our energy security and affordability and reliability, we can't remain over-reliant on volatile fossil fuel markets that an autocrat can wield as a geopolitical weapon. Let me note that we condemn, in the strongest terms, the Russian military's reckless engagement around the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant. A firefight near a peaceful nuclear facility should be unthinkable, and it's outrageous that that's exactly what unfolded last week. And Russian forces must not interfere with a safe plant, operations, or regular shift rotations. So that being said, it really is a credit to the strong global regulatory standards in nuclear energy, construction, and operations that these reactors knock on wood, have not suffered serious damage, and are still supplying power to the Ukrainian grid. And among all of this chaos and tragedy unfolding because of Putin's aggression, the IPCC just reminded us once again that the threat of climate change looms larger with each day. The math on the carbon budget is really simple. We've got to get emissions under control by the end of this decade, and that imperative doesn't pause in the face of global conflict. The clock just keeps on ticking. But there is still hope. There's hope in clean energy. There's hope in nuclear power. Since President Biden's inauguration, this administration has made clean energy innovation and deployment a top priority. We're pursuing the most ambitious agenda for climate action in history. We're setting goals to cut emissions in half by 2030 and to reach 100% clean electricity by 2035, and of course to achieve net zero by 2050. And we're not alone. Over 70 countries, accounting for nearly 70% actually of the world's population, have all announced net zero plans. So to make it happen, the world needs to deploy as much clean energy capacity as we can, and as quickly as we can. I call it the silver buckshot strategy. We need to use a broad range of technologies to hit these targets, not just one silver bullet, but a whole range. And nuclear has got to be a big piece within that silver buckshot because in no small part it's currently our best source of clean, baseload, dispatchable power. Already the Biden administration has secured $6 billion within the bipartisan infrastructure law to keep our existing fleet online. We've requested more funding for the Lightwater Reactor Sustainability Program, which we're going to use to increase cost effectiveness of operations and maintenance. Our Office of Nuclear Energy is supporting research, development and deployment of new and improved accident tolerant fuels to further enhance performance and to reduce costs. And we're working with four facilities, the Palo Verde Nuclear Generating Station, Davis Bessie, Nine Mile Point and Prairie Island. All of them to demonstrate how we can use nuclear energy to produce clean hydrogen. There's funding for that in the bipartisan infrastructure law too. And that's just what we're doing with the fleet we have today. We're also looking ahead to the fleet we want to build tomorrow. Once upon a time, I served as governor of Michigan, which is the heart, of course, of America's auto industry. And I actually see some similarity between the trajectory of our autos and of nuclear energy. They were both born out of American ingenuity. With a little more than more of that ingenuity, they can both be a key part of our solution to climate change. Today's cars have come a long way since the model team, much like our reactors have evolved since the atomic age of the mid 20th century. And in that era, the United States built a vast fleet of reactors at home and around the world, which have ably served us for decades and continue to serve us well today. And just as the auto industry is entering into this new electric era, we can usher in a new era for the nuclear industry as well with new next generation reactors to power the 21st century. These reactors can help strengthen America's economic influence on the world stage. They can help us build alliances with other nations, much in the same way that the last generation of reactors did. So partnering with developers and universities and our invaluable national laboratories, our aim is to deploy advanced nuclear technologies within this decade. We have two and a half billion dollars to support advanced nuclear demonstration projects. Thanks once again to President Biden's bipartisan infrastructure law. And these concepts are real. They're ready to support a variety of energy demands and applications. And we believe that a lot of them offer new pathways to economic revitalization for coal and power plant communities. We'll see the first deployments of these small modular reactors in the coming years. And we believe, for example, the new scale regulatory process can serve as a model for how DOE and industry and the regulatory community can work together to commercialize new technologies. We will also have two deployments of Generation 4 technology operational by 2028. Terra Power's Natrium Sodium Cooled Fast Reactor and X Energy's Small Modular High Temperature Pebble Bed Gas Reactor. So one of the most exciting discussions in nuclear energy is its potential for aiding the transition to clean energy because of the possibility of placing small reactors at these retired or retiring coal thermal power plants. In fact, Terra Power's demonstration is going to be cited as you probably know at a retiring coal plant. That project is going to take advantage of, of course, the coal plant's existing infrastructure and the skilled workforce. And that means jobs, jobs, jobs for coal plant employees. It means that a community's shift from fossil to nuclear can lift fossil energy workers up. And since nuclear energy doesn't produce carbon pollution, it obviously means cleaner air for that community as well. As more coal plants retire, we're very eager to pursue more of those kind of projects so that we can ensure that we're bringing every community along in this clean energy transition. I can tell you Congress is particularly interested in this, as many of you doubtlessly know, so are governments all around the world. And of course, we at DOE are ready to partner on it. We are just ready to partner on nuclear energy. We're ready to help countries develop or expand nuclear programs with the use of American advanced nuclear technologies. In the last year, for example, we took new steps with Poland and Romania, the former Poland to replace its coal power plant fleet, and the latter of which selected new scale powers, SMR, designed for deployment at a retired coal site by the end of the current decade. So there's more to come. We're going to continue to engage the international community and to showcase the future of America's nuclear industry when we host the 2022 International Atomic Energy Agency Nuclear Power Ministerial this October in Washington, D.C. And as we look to export next generation technologies all over the world, we want to shore up the supply chains that we need to build it here at home, particularly in light of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We know we can't depend on our adversaries for our reactors fuel supply. We know that we need to double down on on shoring the front end of the fuel cycle, mining, milling, conversion, enrichment. We need to do that to meet our needs for nuclear power and defense as well as research and medical uses. So just two weeks ago, DOE released a deep dive into our nuclear energy supply chain. And it lays out the challenges that we face in the U.S. from fuel requirements to security risks around imported components, and of course the policies that could solve those deficits. So we're going to be working with the rest of the administration and with Congress to put these policies in place. And of course, we also know that we can grow and improve our own industry with lessons from abroad. And that's particularly true of our effort to restart consent based siting for an interim spent nuclear storage facility. Sweden, Finland, others, they've got impressive records of success on this front. We're going to be looking to their approaches, their lessons as we frame our own consent based project process. So our vision for nuclear power covers a lot of ground from that consent based siting to maintaining and upgrading the current nuclear fleet to rebuilding our own nuclear supply chain and on to expanding nuclear capacity around the world. We have got big plans, bold goals, and of course that's all possible because of our regulators. And I don't just mean the NRC, the entire regulator community is critical to the success of this industry. You're why modern nuclear power has a pristine record of safety. You've built confidence in this technology. And that means that you have laid the foundation for a future powered with far more nuclear energy. But I do have more to ask of you. First, as we push to innovate and to modernize the nuclear industry, we're really depending on experts like yourselves to innovate and modernize nuclear regulations. I know the NRC is on the ball here. They've shown that they've got their eye toward the future with the actions that they've taken on design certification. That's impressed us at DOE. We hope that their international counterparts follow their lead. This is critical to ensuring that we're going to be able to build new advanced reactors and get them operating efficiently and ensure that they're as secure as possible anywhere in the world. So second, we need everyone here to speak up about the benefits of nuclear, both in your countries and on the international stage. Nuclear energy is sustainable. It is safe. It's a proven solution to climate change. Whether they're in the EU or the US or anywhere else, lawmakers have to hear that. And this group can offer a unified voice. And then one more, finally, we need your help to invest in and to mold this next generation of nuclear energy leaders so that they can develop innovative solutions to today's challenges. I know we've got some students that are attending this meeting. I've no doubt that it's a brilliant bunch, and we all need to do our part in supporting them because they may well hold the keys to this industry's challenges. We need to support diversity in this field, too. A few weeks ago, I had the privilege of touring South Carolina State University's nuclear engineering facility with WIP Clyburn. It is the only one of our historically black colleges and universities to have an undergraduate nuclear engineering program. But we could change that by forging new partnerships between industry and regulators and DOE and HBCUs. And if that interests you, let's talk. In the meantime, let's work together to ensure that when these students are ready to start their careers, this industry is well on its way to reaching its full potential. There is just a massive opportunity here. There's an opportunity to add more clean, safe, secure nuclear power. There's an opportunity to finally get our arms around the climate crisis. And there's an opportunity to deliver a safer and healthier future for our children and our grandchildren. So let's get out there and take it. Thank you all once again for having me, and I hope you enjoy the rest of the conference. On behalf of the U.S. nuclear regulatory commission, we would like to thank Secretary Granholm for taking the time out of her very busy schedule to share her thoughts with us. There were several great messages, but I just want to touch on some of the messages that particularly resonated with me. First was our status as sister agencies and the great cooperation that we have with DOE on several projects. Also, driving next generation technology forward and leveraging international partnerships to power more of the world with safe, secure nuclear energy. We look forward to doing our part at the NRC to support the Department of Energy's plans and our regulatory role. Thanks once again to Secretary Granholm and to everyone at the Department of Energy for their service. Also, I'd like to thank each of you for your time and attention. We look forward to meeting all of you in our next special plenary after the break at 1045. It's titled, women belong in all places where nuclear safety decisions are being made. That's chaired by Chairman Hansen with President Romina Velsche and Brooke Clark. Thank you for your longer break and this concludes this plenary session. Thank you.