Fro "Blaami Aaron" Subiec pdate from NREL Date: August 22 2018 al 6.29 36 AM PDT All, we are in a pretty tough spot with the seams study There was some signiticant political blow back at the most senior levels ot DOE as a result OfJosh Navacheck's presentation at a Transmission Policy Summit in Kansas. Josh presented a subset otthe deck trom Ames which at the lime' had lull DOE approval. For those that don't know Josh, he is an exceptional presenter that knows the story and sensitivities well As I understand it the presentation was very well received by everyone except DOE We hit a political trigger point. As a result of katie Jerezza's (deputy assistant secretary tor DOE omce otelectricity) dlssallsfacllon with the mere mention of the word "Carbon: the NREL website has been modified to remove the presentation trom Transerid x. This study has consumed significant time trom the head ot the lab and the very top stall at DOE. it may have even gotten on Petry's radar it certainty went to his number 2 Ugh We were also directed to pull our visualizations trom the NREL YouTube account lt had 1500 views as a result ot the Vox anlcle' making it one otthe most popular videos we've ever had at NREL Please continue to direct people that want intormation to go to the website to obtain meeting intormation ln NREL is prohibited trom talking about the study until we get a paper accepted in peer review ln DOEs eyes the paper is incomplete and any presentation is premature Whether we will be allowed to submit a paper that includes all scenarios remains an open question The prohibition of engagement on the study means I'm not returning phone calls trom any media or anyone else. lam also unable to suppon others that want to submit their own publications on our loint proiect Furthermore Josh's speaking spot at Parls was cancelled by DOE despite being peer reviewed. I've cancelled three speaking engagements this tall as well and withdrawn NREL trom an abstract was aiming to submit to conterence don't exactly know what the next steps need to be Josh and I worked very hard on updating our paper and sent out a new dratt internally last night Thal new dratt changes the scenario names to Base Case (tormerly current pulley) and High vet tormerly carbon pollcy) Avanely ot additional edits were also made We expect to process comments to that drafl today and submit to the rest ot our coauthors and NREL management as soon as possible From there it will go to DOE Since many of you are coauthors will be sure to tollow up with the updated dratl. l'll update the rest ot you as I learn more Aaron