Category Archives: Nuclear Energy

Do We Need Nuclear Power? Part 3

Aerial photo of Indian Point, courtesy Columbia University Earth Institute

Indian Point, Aerial view, courtesy Earth Institute

Indian Point’s two reactors, operating since 1974 and 1976, generate up to 30 percent of New York City and Westchester’s power. Yet the plant remains controversial.

March 1, 2012, Michael Gerrard, director of the Center for Climate Change Law, moderated the Forum on the Future of Indian Point held at Columbia Law School. The forum asked whether Indian Point was “Safe, Secure and Vital or an Unacceptable Risk?” Renee Cho covered it on the Columbia Earth Institute blog, here.

I was not there. However, have some thoughts …

Continue reading →

Do We Need Nuclear Power? Part 2

Turbines at Windeby

Rather than “Can we get away from Nuclear Power?” The real questions we need to ask ourselves are:

How quickly can we phase out nuclear power?
What will it cost?
Given that a definition of insanity is doing the same behavior but expecting different results, Continue reading →

Do We Need Nuclear Power? Part 1

Did the Japanese (and the rest of the world) NEED Fukushima?

Happy Earth Day. Think for the Future.

Do We Need Nuclear Power, Part 1, L. Furman, 4/20/12, here.
Do We Need Nuclear Power, Part 2, L. Furman, 4/20/12, here.
Do We Need Nuclear Power, Part 3, L. Furman, 4/21/12, here.

: US Recommended evacuation zone of 80 km radius around Fukushima

Nuclear Divers – Swimming in Hot Water

Diver using an AMP 100 to measure radiation

Another day at the office, from "The Life of a Nuclear Diver," William Sheaffer, here.

Nuclear power plant maintenance requires SCUBA divers in the rivers and oceans near the intake pipes and, as the image shows, in the reactor itself. And the men and women who work as employees and contractors for the plants and for Underwater Construction Corp, UCC do the job (more images).

According to Katheryn Kranhold, here, of the Wall Street Journal and Pittsburgh Post Gazette, “Divers are in great demand these days. Power companies need them to maintain many of the world’s 442 nuclear reactors. They’re also called on to repair aging bridges and water tanks…. That has done little to increase pay for nuclear divers, who start at salaries of about $30,000 a year.”

What are the risks of this work over and beyond the risks of SCUBA diving? What are the protections afforded the workers? What insurers underwrite the risks? And who purchases the insurance? The divers? Their employers? The nuclear plant operators? Or the sub-contractors who hire contract divers (at $20 per hour)? How many hours per year do the divers work, and can they afford the insurance? And if they can afford the insurance, do they actually buy it?

David Goodwillie, writing in Popular Science, reports on the chilling occupation of nuclear divers in Swimming On The Hot Side excerpted below. Continue reading →

Notre Dame researchers: new way of cleaning up and recycling nuclear waste

Physorg reports a new way to clean up the waste from nuclear operations:

A new paper by researchers at the University of Notre Dame, led by Thomas E. Albrecht-Schmitt, professor of civil engineering and geological sciences and concurrent professor of chemistry and biochemistry, showcases Notre Dame Thorium Borate-1 (NDTB-1) as a crystalline compound which can be tailored to safely absorb radioactive ions from nuclear waste streams. Once captured the radioactive ions can then be exchanged for higher charged species of a similar size, recycling the material for re-use.

If one considers that the radionuclide technetium (99Tc) is present in the nuclear waste at most storage sites around the world, the math becomes simple. There are more than 436 nuclear power plants operating in 30 countries; that is a lot of nuclear waste. In fact, approximately 305 metric tons of 99Tc was generated from nuclear reactors and weapons testing from 1943 through 2010. Its safe storage has been an issue for decades.

“The framework of the NDTB-1 is key,” says Albrecht-Schmitt. “Each crystal contains a framework of channels and cages featuring billions of tiny pores, which allow for the interchange of anions with a variety of environmental contaminants, especially those used in the nuclear industry, such as chromate and pertechnetate.”

Nuclear Power: Earthquakes and Risk Assessment

Matthew L. Wald, writing in the New York TImes, covers a new modeling technique to assess seismic risk to nuclear power plants. Quakes and U.S. Reactors: An Analytic Tool

With the release of a computer model of all known geologic faults east of Denver, nearly all of the nuclear power plants in the United States are about to embark on a broad re-evaluation of their vulnerability to earthquakes. The new mapping is the first major update of the fault situation for plants since 1989.

The map has been in preparation since 2008, well before the earthquake and tsunami that caused three meltdowns at Fukushima Daiichi in Japan last March or the quake near Mineral, Va., last summer that shook a twin-reactor plant beyond the degree expected. Still, those events have lent urgency to the effort to assess the American plants’ ability to withstand quakes.

The new study does not calculate the risk of damage from an earthquake or even specify how much ground motion is likely at the reactor sites. That work is left to the plants’ owners, supervised by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

The industry began to realize after the Fukushima disaster that engineers did not have a strong understanding of which structures and systems at the plants were most vulnerable.

As one of us, Lawrence J. Furman pointed out in Nuclear Power, Natural Disasters, and Security on Popular Logistics, on August 28, 2011,

“Nuclear power diminishes National Security and the stability of the electric grid.”

Mr. Furman also blogged on the nuclear plants at the North Anna Power Station, in Louisa County, Virginia, that were shut down because of the earthquake last summer, here, the eight plants that were shut down by Hurricane Irene, in the 8/28/11 post referenced above, and the Cooper and Fort Calhoun, Nebraska nuclear power plants. Cooper was shut down due to flooding on the Missouri River. Fort Calhoun was shut down for refueling in May, 2011. It was held offline in June, 2011, due to flooding of the Missouri River. Our coverage began here, on June 25, 2011, continued here, June 29, 2011. According to the NRC, here, the plant remains offline 285 days after the flood, at a cost, to the ratepayers, of $1 million per day, or $285 Million, and counting.

The nature of nuclear power is such that the plants can be shut down, as were Cooper, Fort Calhoun, and eight other plants from North Carolina to Connecticut, by the rain. Unlike solar energy systems, nuclear plants don’t come back on automatically.

As Mr. Furman wrote in “21 for 2011: The most significant events of the year,” here,

In the words of Mycle Schneider, “The industry was arguably on life support before Fukushima. When the history of this industry is written, Fukushima is likely to introduce its final chapter,” (click here). However, the three melt-downs at Fukushima, coupled with the melt-down at Chernobyl in 1986 and the partial melt-down at Three Mile Island in 1979, suggest a probability of one melt-down every 14 years and a major incident somewhere – and everywhere – every 11 years.

Nuclear Power, One Year After Fukushima

In the 54 years between 1957, when the Price Anderson Act was passed, and 2011 we have:

Experienced four melt-downs and one partial melt-down at nuclear power plants,
An increasing amount of radioactive waste that we really don’t know how to deal with, but must manage for hundreds of years – or thousands.
Security Concerns. Sharif Mobley, an American, arrested in Yemen in March, 2010, suspected of being a covert agent of Al Queda connected to Anwar Al Awlaki (CS Monitor), and who, before going to Yemen, worked at nuclear power plants in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Maryland (NJ News Room).

The World Nuclear Association has a detailed summary of the state of the industry (here), at Popular Logistics, We have concluded that a thorough understanding of the dynamics of the system and the risks from existing or future nuclear plants demands a paradigm shift to efficient use of sustainable energy.

The people of Fukushima – and Japan – are concerned that their food is “salted” with radioactive isotopes from the three reactors that melted downs. And they don’t trust their government. They feel it is too trusting of the people in the nuclear power industry (NPR). And we see the same cozy relationship between the regulatory agencies and the regulated industry in the United States. (PopularLogistics).

The “No More Fukushimas” walk from Oyster Creek to Vermont Yankee continues – and it will pass Indian Point today, March 11, 2012 (here).

The Japanese have closed 52 of their 54 nuclear power plants.

In the US, eight plants, from North Carolina to Connecticut were closed in August, 2011 because of Hurricane Irene. Two plants in Virginia were closed because of an earthquake. Fort Calhoun, the plant that was built on the bank of the Missouri River, near Omaha, Nebraska, that was shut down in May, 2011 for refueling and kept off-line due to heavy rains in June 2011 and 9 months later remains shut down. While the distribution of radioactive isotopes is minimal, and mostly tritium, the financial cost (not counting waste cleanup) is $1.0 million per day. These costs will be carried on the shoulders of the ratepayers, not the owners of the plant (here).

When Excelon whined that “upgrading Oyster Creek would cost too much; they would have to close it down,” Gov. Chris Christie said “Ok, then close it down.” The folks in Georgia are not as bold as the Honorable Governor of New Jersey. When Georgia Power said “In order to build two new 1.17 GW reactors at the Vogtle complex, we need to charge ratepayers for construction before we break ground, the NRC said “OK, and here are loan guarantees” (here).

But Georgia is the exception to the rule. Mycle Schneider, describing the Worldwatch Report he wrote on nuclear power last year, said (Press Release / Report):

“The industry was arguably on life support before Fukushima. When the history of this industry is written, Fukushima is likely to introduce its final chapter.”

Amory Lovins, of the Rocky Mountain Institute, in the foreword to the report, wrote,

“The Fukushima accident has just vaporized the balance sheet of the world’s #4 power company, TEPCO… this … could cost $100-plus billion… with such an unforgiving technology, accidents anywhere are accidents everywhere.”

Popular Logistics is a blog. We have the resources to write one or two articles per week, and cover a variety of issues. The professional news media, i.e., The New York Times, National Public Radio are able to commit substantial resources to these issues.

Nuclear Crisis in Japan will lead you to a collection of articles about Japan, Fukushima and the future of nuclear power from the Federation of American Scientists (FAS)

Matthew L. Wald (preceding link to Mr. Wald’s posts on the Green Blog, Transcripts Show U.S. Confusion Early in Japan Nuclear Crisis ; (on NYTimes.com)

Andrew C. Revkin, Nuclear Risk and Fear, from Hiroshima to Fukushima from the Dot Earth Blog, also of The Times,

Mr. Wald, again, Sizing Up Health Impacts a Year After Fukushima.

We now are experiencing the effects of four melt-downs and one partial melt-down in the 54 years since the Price Anderson Act was signed. This is four melt-downs too many. This is one meltdown every 13.5 years, one melt-down or partial melt-down every 11 years. While this is too small for statistical analysis, there have been melt-downs at four of the world’s 440 nuclear power plants. That’s a small number – about 0.9%. But the accidents were and remain catastrophic.

And in addition, nuclear power is expensive in terms of time and money for new plants (NPR). It’s too expensive for investors given the choice; that’s why Georgia Power asked for – and got – loan guarantees and permission to charge ratepayers in advance for the money to build the Vogtle 3 and 4 plants (here).

As noted above:

We must understand the dynamics of the system and risks from existing or future nuclear plants and shift the paradigm to efficient use of sustainable energy.

Fukushima. Accidents Anywhere Are Accidents EVERYWHERE

View of plume from the meltdowns at Fukushima

Plume from the meltdowns at Fukushima. Image courtesy Reuters.

Mycle Schneider, describing the Worldwatch Report he wrote on nuclear power last year (Press Release / Report) said:

“The industry was arguably on life support before Fukushima. When the history of this industry is written, Fukushima is likely to introduce its final chapter.”

Amory Lovins, of the Rocky Mountain Institute, in the foreword to the report, wrote,

“An accident can swiftly transform a mult-billion dollar generating asset into a larger cleanup liability. The Fukushima accident has just vaporized the balance sheet of the world’s #4 power company, TEPCO. A 2007 earthquake had cost the company perhaps $20 billion; this one could cost $100-plus billion. TEPCO is now broke and is becoming, in whaterver form, a ward of the state. And with such an unforgiving technology, accidents anywhere are accidents everywhere.”

Schneider’s report looks at the big picture. It is not directly focused on the impact that Fukushima has had, is having and will continue to have on the people of Japan.

As I wrote (here),

The nuclear industry in the USA is just like the nuclear industry in Japan – and that’s bad, really bad.
In a market economy there can be to too much pressure to increase shareholder value to invest enough on safety. In a command economy, such as existed in the Soviet Union and exists in China, North Korea, and perhaps, Iran, it is illegal to criticize the government and therefore likely that necessary investments in safety will not be made.

I spoke with people from Fukushima Prefecture at the “No More Fukushimas” event in Lincroft, NJ, on March 5, 2011, and expect to be at the event in Zuccotti Park at 9:00 AM on Thursday, March 8, 2012. Because radioactive particles are not easily identified – you need a Geiger Counter – the people I spoke with and many in Japan are worried that the vegetables they eat come from the Fukushima area. Even if the vegetables are labled from prefectures in the north, south and west, they are worried that the vegetables are actually from Fukushima but packaged in northern, southern or western prefectures. They have lost confidence in their government. (My question, as an American, is “How different is our government from the Japanese government, when it comes to managing the safety of nuclear power plants?”)

The Japanese also acknowledge that it could have been worse, much worse. In the days after the Earthquake / Tsunami / Triple Meltdown the winds blew from west to east – and blew much of the air borne radioactive particles into the skies above the Pacific, toward Hawaii, the United States, Canada, Chile. Japan was saved from what could have been a worse fate. The good news, I suppose, is that some of those particles will fall into the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch” and trigger mutations which will sooner or later develop into metabolic pathways by which bacteria, algae, or plankton will be able to eat the currently non-biodegradable plastics.

While some will say: there were meltdowns in Three out of the Six power plants at Fukushima Dai’ichi, and those melt-downs were caused by the failure of the cooling system, all we need to do is engineer better cooling systems. However, they are missing the point. We can build pretty good ones, but we can’t build a perfect nuclear power plant.

And building them well means they are very expensive. As David Lochbaum, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, told me last year,

“The NRC permits ALL nuclear plants to emit tritium. It is simply too expensive to capture ALL the tritium.”

Here’s the paradox: My light bulbs, computers, television and other appliances can’t distinguish between electricity from a coal plant, a nuclear plant, a wind turbine, or a solar module. In a competitive environment the owners of nuclear power plants need to manage costs. In a non-competitive environment, such as Iran, China, North Korea, or the Soviet Union, they don’t worry about costs, but they also don’t worry about what others (dissidents) say. So while we can build them safer, and we can maintain them at a higher level of safety, we don’t because it’s too expensive. People in command economies, who don’t concern themselves with money, don’t build them safely because they don’t worry about safety.

No More Fukushimas: From Coal, Oil, and Nuclear to Sustainable Energy

Smoke from three meltdowns and other fires

Fukushima reactors, after tsunami

On March 11, 2011, the Fukushima nuclear disaster shocked the world. Sadly, the thinkers in the anti-nuclear world were not complete surprised. We were startled, but we know that disasters, while unpredictable, are inevitable. Disasters are built into the nuclear power system. The best engineers are fallible. (Anyone who drives a car or uses a personal computer knows this.) We can engineer nuclear reactors to be “reasonably” safe – but that costs a lot of money. That’s why ALL nuclear reactors leak “acceptable” levels of tritium – it is too expensive to capture all the tritium.

We also know

While the probability of an accident may be low, the probability is very high that an accident, if it occurs, will be
In Three Mile Island, in 1979, Chernobyl, in 1968, and Fukushima, in 2011, we have four melt-downs and one partial melt-down since the Price Anderson Act was first signed into law in 1956. That’s four melt-downs in 56 years. While it’s a too small to give a precise statistical measure, it offers empirical data to suggest a high probability of a catastrophic accident every 14 years.

In command economies, such as existed in the Soviet Union, or exists in Iran and North Korea, it is illegal – and dangerous – to question the government. In market economies, such as exist in the United States, Europe, and Japan, there are strong incentives to cut corners.

But back to Fukushima – following the disaster, nearly all of Japan’s 54 Nuclear Plants have been shut down due to pressure by the Japanese people.

The disaster deposited radioactive fallout on a semicircular area of Japan with a radius of 50 miles. It caused the permanent displacement of 160,000 people. An unknown amount of radioactive materials have been flushed into the Pacific Ocean. TEPCO, the owners of the reactors, have a $100 Billion liability (that will probably be absorbed by Japanese citizens over the next 20 or 50 years).

So after Fukushima, the question that we ought to be asking is not: “Can solar, wind, geothermal, marine current and other sustainable technologies meet our energy needs?”

The question is: “HOW can solar, wind, geothermal, marine current and other sustainable technologies meet our energy needs?”

I will be speaking on Monday, March 5th, at 6:00pm, at the Unitarian Universalist Meeting House on West Front Street in Lincroft, NJ. This will be part of a series of discussions along a 250 mile walk from Oyster Creek, in Ocean County, NJ to Vermont, Yankee, in Vernon, Vermont. I will make a statement similar to the talk at the Space Coast Green Living Festival, reported here.

A group of Japanese Buddhists, Fukushima eye-witnesses and US citizens will be walking over 250 miles from Oyster Creek to Indian Point to the Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plants to bring awareness of the terrible risks of nuclear power. The “No More Fukushimas Peace Walk” is being led by Jun Yasuda.

Scheduled events open to the public:

Friday March 2nd, 7pm, “Implications of the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster for the U.S and continuing Japanese crisis”
Little Theatre, Georgian Court University, 900 Lakewood Ave, Lakewood N.J.

Speakers:

Sachiko Komagata, P.T., Ph.D, and Associate Professor & Chair, Department of Holistic Health & Exercise Science
Rachel Dawn Fudim-Davis, New Jersey Organizer, Food & Water Watch
Jeff Tittel, Director of Sierra Club, NJ Chapter
Sister Mary-Paula Cancienne, RSM, PhD.

Hosts: Sister Mary Bilderback, Mary Paula Cancienne
For information Kasturi DasGupta, PhD 732-987-2336

Saturday, March 3, 6:00 pm,
Sky Walk Cafeteria, 2nd Floor, 129 Hooper Ave, Toms River, NJ (Connected to parking garage)
Speakers:

Sky Sims, Sustainable energy specialist;
Joseph Mangano, Executive Director of Radiation and Public Health Project;
Ed M. Koziarski and Junko Kajino, Filmakers

For information Burt Gbur, 732-240-5107

Sunday, March 4th, 6:00 pm,
Murray Grove Retreat Conference Center, Lanoka-Harbor, NJ Church Lane and US Highway 9
Speakers:

Willie DeCamp, Save Barnegat Bay,
Greg Auriemma, Esq., Chair, Ocean County Sierra Club,
Peter Weeks.

For information Matt Reid, 609-312-6798

Monday, March 5th, 6:00pm,
Unitarian Universalist Meeting House, West Front Street, Lincroft, NJ

Speakers:

Larry Furman, “Beyond Fuel: The Transition from Fossil Fuel and Nuclear Power to Sustainable Energy.”
Japanese walkers share their post-Fukushima experiences in Japan

For Information:. Elaine Held (732-774-3492).

Thursday, March 8, 6:00 pm
Puffin Foundation, 20 Puffin Way, Teaneck, N.J.

Speaker:

Sidney Goodman, Author ‘Asleep At the Geiger Counter: Nuclear Destruction of the Planet and How to Stop It’, ISBN: 978-1-57733-107-0, available from Blue Dolphin Publishing, and elsewhere.

For information Jules Orkin, 201-566-8403

The walk will start at 10am on Saturday, March 3rd near the Oyster Creek area, and end at 129 Hooper Ave, Toms River. Starting times and places for March 4th and 5thwill also be announced on February 27th.
————————————————–
The mission of the Walk:

A plea for the people of New Jersey, New York and New England to recognize the grave dangers that nuclear energy poses to our lives, property, and all life on the planet.

We walk together in love and solidarity for a nuclear free future, and a more just, sustainable, and compassionate world built on respect for all living beings.

JOIN THE WALK FOR AN HOUR OR A DAY.

Edith Gbur 732-240-5107
Christian Collins 413-320- 2856
Cathy Sims 732-280-2244

Frontline: “Inside Japan’s Nuclear Meltdown”

PBS Frontline broadcast, earlier this week, Inside Japan’s Nuclear Meltdown: “An unprecedented account of the crisis inside the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex after the devastating earthquake and tsunami.” That’s their own description, but it’s fair, as we expect from this outstanding program. And – if you’ve got a decent connection – you don’t even need a conventional television to watch it.

Which is yet another illustration of the point that access to broadband, reasonably priced, should be thought of as access to telephone or mail service. A point that, I am embarassed to say, has been dawning on me only gradually. On that subject we refer you, generally, to Stimulating Broadband.

Nuclear Industry in Japan – Not Unlike the Nuclear Industry in the USA

Map of Japan showing US and Japanese evacuation zones

Fukushima Nuclear sites and Evacuation Zones. Courtesy, National Post.

Map of Japan showing Fukushima Prefecture

Fukushima Prefecture. Courtesy NY Times.

I drew four conclusions after reading Hiroko Tabuchi’s article, A Confused Nuclear Cleanup, in the NY Times, and looking at the US Government’s evacuation map, pictured above (obtained at the National Post, here.

The Fukushima disaster is bad, really bad.
The Japanese want to clean it up; but don’t know how.
The nuclear industry in the USA is just like the nuclear industry in Japan – and that’s also really bad.
In a market economy there may to too much pressure to increase shareholder value to spend enough on safety. (In a command economy, such as existed in the Soviet Union and exists in China, North Korea, and perhaps, Iran, it is illegal to criticize the government and therefore likely that necessary investments in safety will not be made.)

Here are the essential facts, as reported:

The Japanese government wants to clean an 8,000 sq mi area near Fukushima [about the size of New Jersey] to allow residents to return to their homes.

A day laborer wiping down windows at an abandoned school nearby shrugged at the work crew’s haphazard approach. “We are all amateurs,” he said. “Nobody really knows how to clean up radiation.”

The Japanese government awarded the first contracts to three giant construction companies — corporations that have no more expertise in radiation cleanup than anyone else does, but that profited hugely from Japan’s previous embrace of nuclear power.

“We are building expertise as we work,” said Fumiyasu Hirai, a Taisei spokesman. [Taisei is one of the three companies.] “It is a process of trial and error, but we are well-equipped for the job.”

“It’s a scam,” said Kiyoshi Sakurai, a critic of the nuclear industry and a former researcher at a forerunner to the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, which is overseeing this phase of decontamination. “Decontamination is becoming big business.”

The cleanup contracts, Mr. Sakurai and other critics contend, are emblematic of the too-cozy ties they say have long existed between the nuclear industry and government.

“The Japanese nuclear industry is run so that the more you fail, the more money you receive,” Mr. Sakurai said.

Though big companies have won the main contracts so far, the actual cleanup — essentially a simple but tedious task of scrubbing and digging — is being carried out by numerous subcontractors and sub-subcontractors, who in turn rely on untrained casual laborers to do the dirtiest decontamination work.

This tiered structure, in which fees are siphoned off and wages dwindle each step down the ladder, follows the familiar pattern of Japan’s nuclear and construction industries.

Fukushima coverage on Popular Logistics:

Earthquake, Tsunami, and Energy Policy, March 11, 2011
Nuclear Power: What Future?, March 27, 2011,
Nuclear Power and Russian Roulette, June 20, 2011
“Three Meltdowns at Fukushima” – Washington Post, July 11, 2011,

Nuclear Power – or Un Clear Power

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission, NRC, has voted to allow Georgia Power to spend $14 Billion of ratepayer monies to build two reactors, Vogtle 3 and 4 near Waynesboro, Georgia. These would be the first new nuclear plants in the US in 35 years. Opponents say “we don’t need the power, but the utility wants the revenue stream.” Supporting this allegation Georgia Power plans to charge ratepayers – customers – for the costs of construction WHILE BUILDING THE PLANTS – BEFORE THE ARE ONLINE. see Georgia Power – Nuclear – Recovering Financing Costs.

Scott Peterson, of the Nuclear Energy Institute, was quoted on Morning Edition on Friday, 2/10/12, here, ” saying,

Nuclear plants, because they are very large, 24/7 power producers, really anchor the entire U.S. grid for electricity,”

He also said,

“Gas prices are unpredictable, and so is energy from wind and solar.”

He’s wrong on all three counts.

Gas prices are rising. They may be difficult to predict on a day to day basis, but the trend is upward.
Similarly, solar and wind are also predictable. The Department of Energy, DoE, knows precisely how much wind and sun passes over every square inch of the United States, and how much sunlight hits every square inch of the United States over the course of a year. And how much electricty a wind turbine or a photovoltaic solar energy system will produce anywhere in the US. The PVWatts solar calculator, for example,here, http://www.nrel.gov/rredc/pvwatts/, tells you how much power a solar array will produce over the course of a year.
And nuclear is not 24 x 7. While the waste is 24 hours by 7 days per week by 365 days per year by ten thousand years, nuclear plants are not 24 by 7 days by 365. They are more like 24 by 7 by 350; they are shut down for about a month for refueling every 18 months. Nuclear plants are also shut down unexpectedly due to events like hurricanes, earthquakes, floods.

The Fort Calhoun reactor, on the Missouri River in Nebraska was shut down for refueling in May, 2011 . It stayed shut down due to flooding. It was offline throughout the summer and fall, (my coverage here and here) and as far as I know it is still offline. According to David Lochbaum, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, the shutdown cost the plant’s owners $1 million per day – $100 million if it was brought back online in September, $250 million if it is still offline. And I would hazard a guess that the owners asked for and received permission to charge the ratepayers those $1.0 million per day. (As far as I know the plant is still offline. I will update this post when I have more information.)

Regarding the Vogtle plants … the plan is to build two Westinghouse AP 1000 pressurized water reactors, here. Theses are 1154 MWe plant, that, according to Westinghouse,

“use the forces of nature and simplicity of design to enhance plant safety and operations and reduce construction costs.”

They are forecast to cost $14 Billion. $14 Billion divided by 2,308 MWe is $6.065 per MWe. That does not include the costs of security, fuel or waste management

Solar and wind costs less, takes a lot less time to deploy, do not require fuel, do not produce dangerous toxic wastes, do not present a target to terrorists and do not require special security infrastructures.

21 of 2011 – Most Significant Events of the Year

Tweet While it ain’t over till it’s over, 2011 is over. A lot that could have happened, didn’t. Obama didn’t resign, Donald Trump didn’t throw his hat into the ring or divorce his current wife and marry one or more Kardashians. Newt Gingrich threw his hat into the ring, but also didn’t divorce his current wife and marry one or more Kardashians. These are the most significant events of 2011.

Japan, March, 2011 . Nebraska, June, 2011. An earthquake triggered a tsunami which slammed Japan with a 30 foot wave, which shut down twelve nuclear reactors at three sites, triggering melt-downs in three reactors at the Fukushima Dai-ichi site. We now see radioactive particles in food and soil in Fukushima Prefecture. The United States government recommended an evacuation of a 50 mile radius from the plant – this is a semi-circular no-man’s land of 3,927 square miles. It would be 7,854 square miles but the plant was on the coast and therefore half of this radioactive no-man’s land is in the Pacific Ocean. The environmental ramifications of radioactive materials spreading over Japan and flowing into the Pacific Ocean are not known (Popular Logistics click here, here, here), however, liabilities to TEPCO and Japan are estimated to $100 Billion (click here). In the United States, two nuclear power plants on the Missouri River, the Fort Calhoun and Cooper plants, were shut-down when the Missouri River flooded (Popular Logistics, here). Eight nuclear power plants from South Carolina to Connecticut were shut down in the aftermath of the earthquake that struck with an epicenter in Virginia August 23, 2011, and Hurricane Irene a few days later (Popular Logistics, here). In the words of Mycle Schneider, describing the World Watch Institute report he authored, “The industry was arguably on life support before Fukushima. When the history of this industry is written, Fukushima is likely to introduce its final chapter,” (click here). However, the three melt-downs at Fukushima, coupled with the melt-down at Chernobyl in 1986 and the partial melt-down at Three Mile Island in 1979, suggest a probability of one melt-down every 14 years.
South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Vermont, August, 2011. Hurricane Irene covered an area of approximately 170,000 square miles, or about the size of California.”
Washington, DC, December. 2011. After 4,000 Americans were killed, about 50,000 were wounded, and $1 trillion was spent over 8 years, President Obama ended the American mission in Iraq that Congress authorized in October, 2002, President Bush started in March, 2003 and declared “Accomplished” in May, 2003 (for a timeline, click here).
Washington DC, Abbottabod, Pakistan, May, 2011, American soldiers, on orders from the White House, found and killed Osama bin Laden in a compound in Pakistan (NY Times, click here).
Yemen, In summer, 2011, American military forces, using a drone aircraft piloted from the ground via remote control, from the ground, targeted and killed Anwar al Awlaki, an American born Al Queda operative in Yemen (NY Times, click here).
The hacking group “Anonymous” broke into the computers of the security consulting group “Stratfor” and found 44,188 Encrypted Passwords, of which roughly 50% could be easily cracked. 73.7% of decrypted passwords were weak” (NPR, click here).
The “Stuxnet” computer worm virus, harmelss on PC’s runing MS Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux, and other computers, appears to have targeted centrifuges used in the Iranian uranium enrichment facilities. While the viruses were discovered in 2010, they became understood in 2011. The virus caused the centrifuges to spin out of control, wrecking themselves (NY Times, here, NPR here, CNET here, Wikipedia here). Continue reading →

The World Will Not End & Other Predictions for 2012

Here are my top 10 predictions for 2012. These are less readings of the tea leaves or the entrails of goats and chickens and more simple extrapolations of patterns in progress. Altho that may be the way effective oracles. They just masked their observations with hocus pocus, mumbo-jumbo, and guts.

This list runs a gamut from business and technology to energy, instability in the Middle East, micro-economics in the United States, politics, and not-yet-pop culture.

Apple and IBM will continue to thrive. Microsoft will grow, slightly. Dell and HP will thrash. A share of Apple, which sold for $11 in December, 2001, and $380 in Dec. 2011, will sell for $480 in Dec. 2012.
The Price of oil will be at $150 to $170 per barrel in Dec., 2012. The price of gasoline will hit $6.00 per gallon in NYC and California.
There will be another two or three tragic accidents in China. 20,000 people will die.
There will be a disaster at a nuclear power plant in India, Pakistan, Russia, China, or North Korea.
Wal-Mart will stop growing. Credit Unions, insurance co-ops and Food co-ops, however, will grow 10% to 25%.
The amount of wind and solar energy deployed in the United States will continue to dramatically increase.
The government of Bashar Al Assad will fall.
Foreclosures will continue in the United States.
Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio will resign. Calls for Clarence Thomas to recuse himself from matters involving his wife’s clients will become louder, but Justice Thomas will ignore them. A prominent politician who says “Marriage is between a man and a woman,” or her husband, will be “outed” as gay. President Obama will be re-elected.
The authors of Vapor Trails will not win a Nobel Prize for literature. They will not win a “MacArthur Genius Award.” Nor will I despite my work on this blog or “Sunbathing in Siberia” and the XBColdFingers project.

Here are the details … Continue reading →

Nuclear Power: Present Tense

— Tweet — Nuclear Power: Accident in France Kills 1, Injures 4 — NPR, and the Associated Press report “An explosion at a nuclear waste facility in southern France killed one person and injured four on Monday… The Nuclear Safety Authority declared the accident “terminated” soon after the blast at a furnace in the Centraco site, in the southern Languedoc-Roussillon region, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) from the city of Avignon. One of the injured suffered severe burns.”

The DC Bureau reported “The workers were operating a high temperature industrial oven that burns low-level nuclear waste in a sealed building when the unit blew up. The worker who was killed was burned so badly his body was carbonized, according to officials.”

The French Nuclear Safety Authority, analogous to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, or maybe Vichy, designated the accident as a 1 on a scale from 0 to 9.

While a death in an industrial accident is tragic, and while a worker could die as a result of injuries sustained falling off the nacelle of a wind turbine or a roof while installing or working on a solar array, it is probably impossible for a worker to get ‘Carbonized’ working on a wind turbine or solar farm. Continue reading →