US Army engineers to focus on ‘energy density’ for future energy project permits

A digital render of a planned X-Energy advanced modular reactor, announced under the Atlantic Partnership for Advanced Nuclear Energy (Image courtesy of Centrica)

USACE said the move is a “key step” towards implementing the National Energy Emergency declared in President Trump’s Executive Order 14156, dated 20 January 2025.

It is part of a move by the Trump administration away from projects involving wind and solar in favour of nuclear projects.

USACE said it would “weigh whether energy projects that might impact America’s navigable waters would actually deliver significant energy, relative to impacts, for the American people before it allows such activity”.

Assistant secretary of the Army for Civil Works Adam Telle said, “The guidance that I provided to the Corps today is in direct response to President Trump’s leadership and vision to make America energy dominant.

“Our nation has a finite amount of land that we must use efficiently to compete globally during the 21st Century, and the Corps will now consider an energy generation project’s energy density or energy-generation-per-acre as it makes permitting decisions.”

New guidance directs USACE to prioritise processing Clean Water Act and Rivers and Harbors Act permit applications related to projects that would generate the most annual energy generation per acre over projects with low generation per acre.

“Considerations will include a project’s annual potential energy generation per acre, whether it would displace more reliable energy sources, and whether it would denigrate the aesthetics of America’s natural landscape,” USACE said in a statement.

It pointed to findings by the US Department of Energy, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), and the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) that to generate 2,000 megawatts, an onshore wind farm requires 170,000 acres, while a solar farm requires 12,000 acres. Advanced nuclear reactors can develop the same 2,000 megawatts using only 60 acres, according to the same data.

A series of offshore wind farm projects in the US have seen their permits revoked as the Trump administration gives nuclear projects a major push.

Last week, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) filed a motion in federal court to take back its approval of SouthCoast Wind’s plan to build an offshore wind farm south of Nantucket.

Earlier this year, it stopped construction on the Empire Wind project off New York, although it has subsequently been allowed to resume. The Revolution Wind project for Rhode Island and Connecticut has also been paused, while $679 million in federal funding for offshore projects has been stopped.

When it comes to nuclear, the White House has set a target to have three small-scale nuclear reactors running by next year and is also endorsing the expansion of existing plants.

And ahead of US President Donald Trump’s state visit to the UK earlier this month, the two countries signed an agreement to accelerate the development of nuclear power, called the Atlantic Partnership for Advanced Nuclear Energy.