Category Archives: Natural disasters

UK nuclear safety report clears way for new build

Posted on October 20, 2011 by dyurman| 3 Comments

Energy Secretary Chris Huhne delivers Mike Weightman’s report to Parliament

by Dan Yurman

Mike Weightman, chief nuclear inspector

There is no reason to stop or slow down the development of new nuclear power stations or change the selected sites for them, says a report issued on October 10 by the United Kingdom’s Office of Nuclear Regulation. A 300-page final report prepared by safety expert Mike Weightman reviewed the events that took place at Fukushima, Japan. It says that the U.K. is taking the right steps to address the design basis for new nuclear facilities, including issues such as earthquakes and floods. (video interview)

The report emphasized that there is no fundamental weakness in the U.K. nuclear reactor licensing program or in the safety assessment principles and processes that support it.

Weightman wrote that he found no reason to change the sites selected for new reactors.

“I remain confident that our UK nuclear facilities have no fundamental safety weaknesses. The Office for Nuclear Regulation already requires protection of nuclear sites against the worst-case scenarios that are predictable for the UK.

But we are not complacent. Our philosophy is one of continuous improvement. No matter how high our standards, the quest for improvement must never stop. We will ensure lessons are learned from Fukushima. Action has already been taken in many cases, with work under way to further enhance safety at UK sites.”

Energy Secretary Chris Huhne told Parliament that the report will help the nuclear industry remain committed to improving current and future nuclear power stations.

Critical Mass
New nuclear reactors in the U.K.
Site Consortium Year MW
Bradwell EDF, Centrica 2024 1,600
Heysham EDF, Centrica 2025 1,600
Hinkley Point EDF, Centrica 2018 1,600
Hinkley Point EDF, Centrica 2019 1,600
Oldbury RWE, Eon, & Npower 2023 1,600
Sellafield GDF Suez, Iberdola 2022 1,600
Sellafield GDF Suez, Iberdola 2025 1,600
Sizewell EDF, Centrica 2022 1,600
Sizewell EDF, Centrica 2022 1,600
Wylfa RWE, Eon, & Npower 2020 1,100
Wylfa RWE, Eon, & Npower 2022 1,100
Wylfa RWE, Eon, & Npower 2024 1,100
 Financial Times May 9, 2011    

The report identifies 38 additional areas for further review. The topics include emergency response mechanisms, dealing with prolonged loss of off-site power, and risks associated with various types of natural disasters.

The report also pointed out, however, that the combination of events composed of a record-high tsunami triggered by an unprecedented earthquake along the Pacific rim are unlikely to impact nuclear reactors in the U.K.

Weightman also said that human factors played a significant role in the Fukushima disaster. He wrote that as more information becomes available, “there is considerable scope for lessons learned about human behavior in severe accident conditions.”

Even as Weightman was issuing his report, Electricite de France was issuing a revised schedule that could push back start-up of the U.K. first new reactor at Hinkley Point from 2018 to 2020. One reason is that despite Weightman’s optimistic views, the U.K. joint regulatory agencies have delayed giving interim approval for the Westinghouse AP1000 and Areva EPR reactors designs.

The nuclear safety review, however, was received warmly by the U.K. nuclear industry. Volker Beckers, the head of RWE, told financial wire services that the report opens the door to nuclear energy being an important part of the U.K. energy mix. RWE has plans to build up to 6 Gwe of new nuclear power in the U.K. by 2025.

Royal Academy urges caution

Not everyone was optimistic about the report’s findings. The Royal Academy of Engineering issued a statement warning that the pursuit of nuclear energy must be balanced against risks.

“The seriousness and potential global nature of accidents in the nuclear industry bring particular challenges. Continued vigilance, transparency and cooperation by all countries and organisations must be maintained on issues of safety and security. The potential scale of a disaster means that, despite the fact that accidents are rare, traditional probabilistic methods of assessing the risk should be supplemented with contingency plans to deal with all conceivable eventualities.”

The Academy called for deep geologic disposal of spent fuel and remained silent on the issue of reprocessing.

Royal Society calls for MOX

Britain’s Royal Society, a scientific group, weighed in as well. It called for development of new mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel facilities to dispose of the U.K.’s huge inventory of surplus plutonium. The U.K. has a reported stockpile of 112 tonnes.

Roger Cashmore, chair of the Royal Society  working group, and head of the U.K. Atomic Energy Authority, said that converting the plutonium to MOX is the only reliable way to take it out of circulation. Failure to proceed in this direction, he said, undermines the credibility of the government’s position relative to nonproliferation efforts.

The Royal Society report said :

“There is no proliferation proof nuclear fuel cycle. The dual use risk of nuclear materials and technology and in civil and military applications cannot be eliminated.”

For these reasons, the Royal Society said that the government should reconsider its plan to close the Sellafield reprocessing plant once current orders are completed.

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Yurman

Dan Yurman publishes Idaho Samizdat, a blog about nuclear energy and is a frequent contributor to ANS Nuclear Cafe.

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Posted in accident, Earthquake, Natural disasters, News, Nuclear events, Spent nuclear fuel reprocessing

Samples from NRC Webcasts (First of a Series)

Posted on October 17, 2011 by rmichal| 2 Comments

by E. Michael Blake

For a while in the early 1990s, my work at Nuclear News magazine included coverage of Washington, D.C.  Eight or ten times a year, I’d spend two or three days in our nation’s capital, attending congressional hearings, interviewing bigwigs, pestering agencies to give me copies of arcane documents, and frantically taking notes in public meetings at the headquarters of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

Two decades later, much of that scurrying around is no longer necessary, in large part because many NRC meetings can be accessed by phone or internet.  This is fortunate, because in recent months the commissioners and staffers have held several public sessions of substantial importance, and this reporter has been able to watch them from his office as a normal workday activity (reducing both the cost to the American Nuclear Society and the travel-related aggravation of the reporter).

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in 2002

Many of the high-profile meetings this year have had to do with the NRC’s effort to learn from the Fukushima Daiichi accident in Japan, or with the first few new reactor projects to reach the brink of receiving combined construction and operating licenses (COL). Nuclear News does not have room, nor do its readers likely have time, for all of what goes on at all of these events.

Here at the ANS Nuclear Cafe, however, it may be possible from time to time to mention isolated moments that don’t make it through to detailed coverage in the magazine. Because Fukushima Daiichi and new reactors will remain important issues for quite a while, it seems safe to conclude that this sort of webcast sampling will become a series here on the blog. And so it begins:

Jaczko

• In an August 30 commission meeting on the development of inspections, tests, analyses, and acceptance criteria (ITAAC) for new power reactors, Chairman Gregory Jaczko stated early on that he had previously not looked closely at any ITAACs, and that he found the first one that he’d read carefully to be “surprisingly vague,” and that he didn’t think this “bodes well for our ability to work through these issues.”

Jaczko returned to the point often during the meeting. The ITAAC concerned the waterproof membranes and mudmats for the nuclear island foundations at Southern Nuclear Operating Company’s Vogtle-3 and -4; Jaczko asked whether the ITAAC’s statement—that the mudmat’s coefficient of friction will be tested—describes adequately what will be done by the applicant, how it would be examined by the NRC, and what would have to happen next if the goal is not met.

The chairman’s statements contrasted with the presentation of Laura Dudes, director of the division of construction inspection and operational programs in the agency’s Office of New Reactors, who said in her prepared remarks that ITAACs are a “good news story,” but later conceded (as did other speakers from the staff) that not all ITAACs thus far have been written as clearly and as objectively as perhaps they should have been; the staffers said that they’d work on this some more. Dudes did affirm, however, that every aspect of the work covered by an ITAAC would be inspected against the plant’s licensing basis, so there would not be an issue of the NRC not fulfilling its mission or allowing any unsafe practices to exist.

• Both the NRC and the Nuclear Energy Institute have recently referred to being guided, in their efforts to learn lessons from Fukushima Daiichi and to respond accordingly, by “living documents.” On the charter proposed for the NRC’s Long-Term Task Force on the accident in Japan, the staff told the commissioners in an August 26 paper that the charter would “live” in the sense that the staff would change it as needed, if information gleaned from the recovery of Fukushima Daiichi indicated that different lines of inquiry should be pursued. During a September 21 meeting with NRC staffers, industry representatives said that their own guidance document, titled The Way Forward, is intended to “live” as well, and for essentially the same reason: to keep open all options until after the damaged reactors have reached cold shutdown and more detailed examinations can be carried out by Japanese experts.

Apostolakis

• On September 14, the staff briefed the commissioners on the latter’s request for input on which of the recommendations from the Near-Term Task Force (NTTF) report on the Fukushima Daiichi accident should be acted upon without delay. One of the proposed actions is for information requests to be sent to current power reactor licensees to develop and carry out seismic and flooding walkdowns at their reactors. Commissioner George Apostolakis looked at the request for licensees to develop acceptance criteria for the process, and asked, “Don’t we know how to do walkdowns?” Martin Virgilio, NRC deputy executive director for reactor and preparedness programs, replied, “I would have thought so until I had a discussion with Jack Grobe,” a member of the NTTF. Because the walkdowns will be related to response to events beyond a reactor’s design basis, acceptance criteria must be developed and agreed upon by the licensee and the NRC, before these walkdowns can be carried out.

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Blake

E. Michael Blake is a senior editor of the American Nuclear Society’s Nuclear News magazine.

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Posted in accident, American Nuclear Society, Earthquake, Fukushima, knowledge transfer, lessons learned, Meetings, Natural disasters, News, Nuclear News, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, reactor designs, U.S. Congress

We Were Once Terrified of Fire, Too

Posted on October 5, 2011 by pbowersox| 22 Comments

By Steven B. Krivit

The discovery of fire a million years ago must have been terrifying to cave men and women. Since that time, many people have died and much damage to the earth has occurred as a result of chemical energy released through fire. Nevertheless, that chemical energy found its place in the world, providing great benefits, and most people take it for granted. 

In stark contrast, humankind began to develop and use nuclear energy less than a hundred years ago. In 2010, nuclear energy provided 13.5 percent of worldwide electricity. 

On March 11, 2011, several of the Fukushima-Daiichi, Japan, nuclear power plants were damaged from a 9.0 magnitude earthquake and a 14 meter tsunami. The event dominated headlines and, with help from the mass media, re-sparked the public’s fears of nuclear radiation. Fifteen thousand people died as a direct result of the earthquake and tsunami. Nobody died from radiation exposure. Yet no governments have called for a moratorium on coastal development. However, some have on nuclear energy.

Some people wrongly believe that radiation has no place in a safe and healthy world. Yet radiation has always been around us. It comes from a variety of natural sources, and it is widely used in medicine.

The difference between radiation levels that pose a significant health risk and radiation levels that pose negligible or no risks has everything to do with emission rate, concentration, dispersion, distance from, and duration of exposure. Other key factors include the unique properties of each isotope, such as how it affects the body and how long it remains radioactive.

In light of the public’s fear, examining how nuclear energy has fared in terms of safety and environment is useful. Chemical energy and hydroelectric energy have caused their share of environmental damage and deaths.  

The undercurrent of fear affects all matters related to this industry. It must be addressed. Doing so requires examining the risks and consequences of nuclear energy and comparing it to other energy technologies, for none is perfect.  

The 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident – by far the worst – is most instructive. In 2006, the Chernobyl Forum published an authoritative analysis of the health, environmental and socio-economic impacts of Chernobyl.

The report concluded that 31 emergency workers died as a direct consequence of their response to the Chernobyl accident. The Forum was unable to reliably assess the precise number of fatalities by radiation exposure. The best it was able to do was speculate based on the experience of other populations exposed to radiation. By 2002, 15 deaths were reported from among 4,000 people exposed to radiation and diagnosed with thyroid cancer. These data are in stark contrast to a number of other poorly referenced sources which have speculated on large numbers of radiation-related deaths from Chernobyl.

Clearly, the fears about nuclear energy are based on perceptions, imagined or engineered, and not on the consequences of actual events.

For example, in August 1975, the Banqiao hydroelectric dam in western Henan province, China, failed as a result of Typhoon Nina, 180,000 people died. Another example is that 1 billion gallons of oil from 21 disasters have been spilled in the oceans since 1967. A third example is that, in Nigeria, on Oct. 18, 1998, a natural gas pipeline explosion took the lives of 1,082 people.

Members of the public would benefit from scrutinizing the comparative safety and track record of clean, emission-free nuclear energy. The nuclear industry would benefit by helping the public learn the basic concepts and principles of nuclear technology. Nuclear energy can help achieve quality of life for those who don’t have it and help sustain it for those who do.

Steven B. Krivit is the senior editor of New Energy Times, an online magazine specializing in low-energy nuclear reaction research.  He also is the editor-in-chief of the 2011 Wiley and Sons Nuclear Energy Encyclopedia.

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Posted in Chernobyl, Earthquake, Economic benefits of nuclear, Education, Fukushima, Natural disasters, Radiation

September 2011 Nuclear News is online

Posted on September 19, 2011 by rmichal| Comments Off

The September issue of Nuclear News is available in hard copy and electronically for American Nuclear Society members (must enter ANS user name and password in Member Center). The issue contains a variety of features, including:

  • An interview with Cliff Hamal, of Navigant Economics, on the expected cost increase in the coming decades of storing spent nuclear fuel at retired reactor sites.
  • A look at the Blue Ribbon Commission’s draft recommendations for spent fuel management.
  • Insights from the Fukushima Daiichi accident: Comments on the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s near-term task force report.
  • An in-depth review of ANS’s 2011 annual meeting, which was held in Hollywood, Fla.

Hanford workers load a mixed LLW container onto a shipping platform.

Other news items in the September issue deal with: an NRC staff memo that addresses small modular reactor staffing issues; the summer heat that led to power level reductions at nuclear power plants; the commercial start of Watts Bar-2 being officially delayed until 2013; the NRC’s extending the time to apply for NFPA 805 amendments; the seismic studies scheduled for Diablo Canyon’s license renewal; the draft environmental impact statement issued for Seabrook’s renewal; U.S. Department of Homeland Security, European Commission teaming up to enhance security; first applications submitted for new reactor construction in United Kingdom; U.K. energy market reforms aim to attract nuclear investment; Sellafield MOX fuel plant closing as demand dips; Japan’s prime minister’s call for a nuclear phaseout; the arrival of the world’s first AP1000 reactor pressure vessel in China; the tsunami countermeasures planned for Japan’s Hamaoka nuclear station; India’s signing of a cooperation agreement with South Korea; the completion of a retubing project at South Korea’s Wolsong-1; the Department of Energy beating of deadlines for dealing with transuranic and mixed waste at the Hanford Site; investors extend deadline for USEC to obtain a DOE loan guarantee for the American Centrifuge Plant; the DOE awards $39 million for university-led nuclear R&D; and more.

Past issues of Nuclear News are available here.

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Posted in accident, American Nuclear Society, Department of Energy, Earthquake, Education, Fukushima, India, Meetings, Natural disasters, News, Nuclear News, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Publications, reactor designs, Small modular reactors, spent fuel

NRC terminates Yucca Mountain proceeding

Posted on September 15, 2011 by pbowersox| 4 Comments

Next stop, federal court!

By Cornelius Milmoe

In June 2010, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) determined that the Department of Energy’s attempted “withdrawal” of the Yucca Mountain license application could not relieve the NRC of its duty to make a decision approving or disapproving the application. A year after the ASLB decision, the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled in the Aiken County case that the Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA) requires the NRC to review and act on the Yucca application, and that the court would order the NRC to make a decision if it refused to do its duty.

Despite the ASLB and court rulings, the NRC has suspended all agency action on the application and refused to release the Safety Evaluation Report (SER) prepared by NRC staff. The decision to suspend work and close out the license process was made unilaterally by Chairman Gregory Jaczko, not by the full commission.

On Friday, September 9—the NWPA due date for the NRC final decision, and 14 months after the ASLB decision—the NRC issued a two-part order in the licensing proceeding. First the order stated “the Commission finds itself evenly divided on whether to take the affirmative action of overturning or upholding the Board’s decision.” It would seem that with the divided vote, the ASLB decision denying the motion to withdraw would stand. But, the second part of the order stated, “we hereby exercise our inherent supervisory authority to direct the Board to, by the close of the current fiscal year [September 30], complete all necessary and appropriate case management activities, including disposal of all matters currently pending before it and comprehensively documenting the full history of the adjudicatory proceeding.”

The order is difficult to parse. On one hand, it indicates that there were not enough votes to terminate the case as the DOE requested, but on the other hand, it appears to direct the ASLB to terminate the case by the end of this month because of “budgetary limitations”. What is clear is that the NRC has thrown down the gauntlet to the court of appeals.

In its Aiken County opinion last July, the court deferred review of the NRC’s action in the Yucca Mountain proceeding until there was a final NRC decision. The court flatly stated that “the NWPA requires the Commission to issue a final decision approving or disapproving the issuance” of a license within three years of the application. It warned the NRC that it would issue an order compelling action if the NRC decision was “unreasonably delayed” or if the court found a “transparent violation of a clear duty to act”.

Judge Janice Rogers Brown wrote a separate concurring opinion that referenced Jaczko’s plan to provide no money for licensing activities and closing out review of the license application so that “unresolved legal questions, … would stay unresolved legal questions.” Even last June, Brown wrote, “It is arguable the NRC has abdicated its statutory responsibility under the NWPA.” Judge Brett Kavanaugh’s opinion recognized that President Obama has decided not to use Yucca Mountain, but concluded that the president does not have the final word about whether to terminate the Yucca Mountain project. Kavanaugh said, “[T]he ball in this case rests … with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.”

The petitioners in the Aiken County case have filed a new motion for an order requiring the NRC to proceed with the licensing process as required by the NWPA. They argue that the NRC had the DOE appeal of the ASLB decision under consideration for 10 times longer than the 45 days it gave the ASLB to get briefs, hold hearings, and make the original decision. The petitioners also pointed to evidence in congressional testimony and a report by the NRC’s inspector general that Jaczko acted unilaterally, without a commission majority, to stop staff work on the license, withhold the staff SER, and delay the commission’s decision on the DOE motion. With that evidence, and the NRC’s failure to meet the NWPA deadline for its final decision, it seems likely that the court will conclude that the NRC is guilty of unreasonable delay and that it may be a transparent violation of a clear duty to act.

In any event, the court has given the NRC its chance to do its duty on the Yucca Mountain application, and the NRC has declined. The next episode will be in the court of appeals, as the NRC tries to defend its failure to act on the license application.

Note: A detailed analysis by C.J. Milmoe of the NRC actions is available via Nuclear Townhall.

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Milmoe

C.J. Milmoe has been involved in waste management and nuclear power development for more than 30 years, both in government and in the private sector. He is active in ANS and in nuclear industry advocacy groups.

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Posted in Department of Energy, Education, lawsuit, Natural disasters, nuclear opponents, Nuclear Regulatory Commission, spent fuel, U.S. Congress, Yucca Mountain

Japan’s search for nuclear export deals

Posted on September 1, 2011 by dyurman| 2 Comments

The hunt is on in Vietnam, Turkey, and elsewhere

By Dan Yurman

Yoshihiko Noda, new prime minister of Japan (Photo: Wikipedia)

The Japanese government, in close cooperation with some of the nation’s largest heavy industrial manufacturers, is seeking to export Japan’s nuclear technologies, products, and services despite the loss of six reactors on March 11 to a combination of a record earthquake and massive tsunami. The replacement of Prime Minister Naoto Kan with 54-year-old Yoshihiko Noda, a career politician and the current finance minister, may play a key role in achieving success.

Prime Minister Kan ended his term with a strong call for the nation to retreat from dependence on nuclear energy. At one point he also tried to shut down efforts to continue exports even though he had played a leading role inking a deal with Vietnam in October 2010 for two reactors.

When this policy tilt became apparent on August 5, Japanese Foreign Minister Takeaki Matsumoto and Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano prevailed on Kan to back off. The country’s industrial exports are needed to pay for its lack of agricultural self sufficiency, and it depends on high value deals like new reactors. According to the Wall Street Journal, Japan produces only 40 percent of the food it needs to feed its population. Basic economics demands that the country sell finished goods abroad to pay for food imports at home.

The problem of supplying the baseload power for manufacturing at home remains a major issue. Platts reported that as of September 1, 2011, only 11 (10 GWe) of Japan’s 54 (49 GWe) reactors were operating. The rest were closed for maintenance and safety checks. While some have completed those tasks, provincial officials are adamant about not letting them restart without assurances that they are safe. Politics, not technology, is pushing the country’s electric utilities into plans for rolling brownouts and possible blackouts.

Noda has said that the stable supply of electricity is the lifeblood of the economy.  A combination of arm twisting and economic incentives may convince provincial officials to relent.  Jobs associated with nuclear exports may be one of the tools in Noda’s hands.   As a result, it appears that in addition to getting the reactors back online, the government is also focused on the multi-billion yen needed to build new reactors overseas.

For now, a key factor in Japan’s favor is that Japan Steel Works (JSW) is one of the world’s few companies capable of producing large forgings for new nuclear reactor pressure vessels.  However, the multi-year backlog of orders has made the work an attractive target.

Mitsubishi plans to build its own large forgings plant so that it won’t have to wait in line at JSW. International competition comes from South Korea and Russia. The United Kingdom is said to be planning a large forgings plant, as is India.  Both countries should be able to produce them within the next five years if their respective governments provide the necessary financial support.

Vietnam deal back on the front burner

Prior to the March 11 events, Japan had inked a deal with Vietnam to build two of its planned eight 1000-MW reactors. Japan has been training Vietnamese nuclear engineers for years in preparation for the project. Japan, however, is in second place in Vietnam when it comes to nuclear deals. Russia is building the first two plants and will provide all of the fuel for them as well as taking back the spent fuel at the end of each cycle.

Talks with Vietnam to execute the provisions of the deal and begin construction will restart this month. Government officials from both countries are scheduled to meet September 8 and 9 in Tokyo to layout project plans.

For its part, Vietnam pronounced itself happy the deal is back on the table. Vietnam’s ambassador to Japan Nguyen Phu Binh told the Manichi News on August 31 that he wants to see construction get underway in his country’s southern province of Ninh Thuan. He told the Manichi News, “I believe Japan will use the [Fukushima] crisis to learn important lessons and develop great technology.”

Turkey swaps negotiating tables, but keeps talking

Japan has been involved in off-and-on negotiations with Turkey to build that nation’s second nuclear power station at Sinop, some 440 miles east of Istanbul on the Black Sea coast. Paradoxically, Turkey’s first nuclear power station, a 4.8 GWe monster, is being built by the Russians at Mersin, about 600 miles southeast of Istanbul on the country’s Mediterranean coast. The Sinop site will be a similar size in terms of power generation capacity.

One would have thought that in terms of delivery of large components by sea, Turkey would put the Russians on the Black Sea and the Japanese on the Mediterranean, but that’s not how it worked out. The Japanese were never in the running for the first tender, which went to the Russians as the sole bidder.

Toshiba was involved in the first round of negotiations for the second site with Turkey last December, with TEPCO as its partner. Since March 11, that bid team has had to withdraw. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is now taking a crack at closing a deal by teaming up with Kansai Electric. It turns out that Turkey wants pressurized water technology, which makes Kansai a competent competitor due to its operational experience with this type of reactor in Japan.

The Toshiba/TEPCO team also withdrew from the South Texas Project in the United States, forcing NRG to stop all work on the development of twin 1350-MW ABWR reactors at a site south of Houston, Tex.

Lithuania looms in the future

Meanwhile, Hitachi, another industrial giant, is negotiating to build new reactors in Lithuania. Last July, Hitachi President Hiroaki Nakanishi said while traveling to promote the sale that his view is that the demand for new reactors will remain steady in foreign markets over the long-term. He noted that winning deals requires help from the government. There are opportunities for new reactors, fuel, operations and maintenance, and reprocessing of spent fuel.

The Russians view Lithuania as their provincial backyard and may put up a stiff fight to win the project. A similar battle is expected over the Czech Republic’s five-reactor Temelin new build, where Toshiba is competing against the Russians and Areva.

Middle East opportunities?

An interesting development is that Hitachi told Kyodo News in July that the company will keep to its goals for developing new nuclear reactor business in Asia and the Middle East, despite fears that the Fukushima crisis might deter some nations from going in this direction.

The business plan was drawn up prior to the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. The company says it sees no reason to change it.

Tatsuro Ishizuka, Hitachi vice president for business development, told the news service on July 20 that the company hopes to get orders for 20 new reactors in Asia and the Middle East.

“We will give priorities to negotiations with India, Vietnam, the U.S., and other countries with growing energy demand,” he said.

In the Middle East, Saudi Arabia is reported to be planning to build 16 nuclear reactors by 2030, with the first two operational by 2021. According to wire service reports, it plans to have 20 percent of its electricity come from nuclear reactors.

Forgoing uranium enrichment to fuel them would help tamp down the Middle East’s volatile politics by preventing the massive nuclear new build from setting off an arms race with other countries.

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Yurman

Dan Yurman publishes Idaho Samizdat, a blog about nuclear energy, and is a frequent contributor to ANS Nuclear Cafe.

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Posted in Areva, Earthquake, Economic benefits of nuclear, Electricity generating capacity, Export Control, Fukushima, India, Japan Steel Works, Natural disasters, News, reactor designs, Russia, spent fuel, Spent nuclear fuel reprocessing, Vietnam

Fukushima on Young Members’ agenda

Posted on August 30, 2011 by rmichal| 2 Comments

By Elia Merzari

The American Nuclear Society’s Young Members Group, with the help of ANS’s Nuclear Installation Safety Division, is organizing a panel session at the Young Professionals Congress (an embedded topical at the 2011 ANS Winter Meeting) on the history of severe nuclear accidents.

A primary focus for the YMG is the transfer of knowledge, and this session will provide unique perspectives from individuals involved in the world’s most prominent nuclear events. The lessons learned from these front-line individuals will be invaluable for the new generation of workers in the nuclear power industry.

Before the events at Fukushima in Japan, the most recent severe accident took place more than 25 years ago at Chernobyl, making it reasonable for  younger people to have a slim perspective on the impacts of severe events. In addition, young members may have a limited knowledge of past accidents and certainly won’t have direct personal experience. The panel session at the winter meeting will focus on the lessons learned from Chernobyl and Three Mile Island, and how these events have profoundly shaped our understanding of severe accidents. In particular, this session will also address how these lessons have been applied to the response to Fukushima.

With the help of Alan Levin, of Areva, we are able to bring together notable panelists who will tackle the issues from different perspectives:

  • Michael Corradini (University of Wisconsin, ANS Special Committee on Fukushima and ANS vice president/president-elect) will give a brief summary on the conclusions drawn by the ANS special committee.
  • Masanori Naitoh (Institute of Applied Energy, Japan) will discuss in detail the event sequence at Fukushima, and address the very important question, “Why did such a catastrophe occur, even after the lessons learned from TMI and Chernobyl?”
  • Dana Powers (Sandia National Laboratory) and Joy Rempe (Idaho National Laboratory) will discuss what was learned from TMI and Chernobyl. Powers also will discuss the history of the source term in the TMI accident, while Rempe will address insights from TMI’s accident progression. Rempe’s presentation will include videos related to the events immediately following the accident and the relocated debris and damaged internal structures within the TMI-2 vessel.
  • Brian Sheron (Nuclear Regulatory Commission) will discuss the regulator perspective on severe accidents with a focus on recent events.

We hope that you will attend this session at the 2011 Young Professionals Congress, scheduled in the morning on Tuesday, November 1st, 2011, at the Omni Shoreham hotel in Washington DC.

Merzari

Elia Merzari is the current YMG secretary. He works as a nuclear engineer at Argonne National Laboratory, where his research interests include nuclear thermal-hydraulics, modeling and simulation of nuclear reactors, and accelerator driven systems.
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Posted in American Nuclear Society, Areva, Earthquake, Education, Fukushima, knowledge transfer, lessons learned, Meetings, National Laboratories, Natural disasters, News, Nuclear Energy Narrative, nuclear opponents, training, workforce, Young Members Group

Hurricane Irene Watch ~ Saturday Aug 27; 0800

Posted on August 27, 2011 by dyurman| 1 Comment

ANS Hurricane Nuclear Watch for
Saturday 08/27/11; 0800 eastern time; 1200 GMT

Follow the ANS Twitter feed for breaking news:  @ans_org

There are no media reports this morning of any reactor shutdowns, but that may be a function of the wire services. The NRC website does not provide real time information on reactor status.  The Washington Post published this table of the expected progress of the storm over the next several days.

Timing of Impacts from Hurricane - Table source: Washington Post 08/27/11

The Weather Channel is reporting that the hurricane made landfall near Cape Lookout, NC, this morning with 85 mph winds. The NRC requires reactors to shut down when wind speeds exceed 74 mph. Expect closures later today and Sunday assuming wind speeds do not decrease over time.  See AP list of reactors below.

A live stream of the Weather Channel’s coverage of the hurricane’s progress up the east coast is found here.

Weather Channel

http://www.weather.com/tv/tvshows/Livestream

The Weather Channel explains here why this is such a dangerous storm – slow progress means high rainfall totals, as much as 10 inches predicted for New York, and a huge area of high winds, will lead to substantial property damage and power outages.

http://www.weather.com/weather/hurricanecentral/article/hurricane-irene-major-northeast-threats_2011-08-23

AP released a list of reactors in the hurricane’s path. CNN reported that the NRC sent additional inspectors to these plants to verify that preparations had been made to ride out the storm. The CNN report is a recap of an NRC press release.

NRC

http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/news/2011/11-159.pdf

CNN

http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/08/26/hurricane.nuclear.plants/

Associated Press

http://tinyurl.com/4xty2kb

Nuclear reactors sit on eight coastal sites along the Eastern seaboard in the projected path of Hurricane Irene. They are built to withstand winds much stronger than those expected from Irene. They are also equipped with backup generators protected from flooding to provide power to keep the reactor cool if outside power is lost. Still, some will likely be shut down as a precaution in advance of Irene’s winds and heavy rains.

North Carolina

Brunswick Nuclear Power Plant

Location: Near Southport, N.C., 30 miles south of Wilmington.

Operator: Progress Energy

Virginia

Surry Power Station

Location: Surry County, Va., 35 miles northwest of Norfolk.

Operator: Dominion Resources

Maryland

Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant

Location: Lusby, Md., 60 miles southeast of Washington.

Operator: Constellation Energy

New Jersey

Salem and Hope Creek Nuclear Generating Stations

Location: Lower Alloways Creek, NJ, 20 miles south of Wilmington, Del.

Operator: PSEG

Oyster Creek Generating Station

Location: Lacey Township, NJ, 60 miles east of Philadelphia.

Operator: Exelon

Connecticut

Millstone Power Station

Location: Waterford, Conn., 60 miles southeast of Hartford.

Operator: Dominion Resources

Massachusetts

Pilgrim Nuclear Station

Location: Plymouth, Mass., 45 miles south of Boston.

Operator: Entergy

New Hampshire

Seabrook Station

Location: Seabrook, NH, 45 miles north of Boston.

Operator: NextEra Energy

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Posted in Natural disasters

Hurricane Irene Watch ~ Friday Aug 26; 1700

Posted on August 26, 2011 by dyurman| Comments Off

Projected path of Hurricane Irene 8/26-28/2011

1700 HRS Aug. 26, 2011—Nuclear energy facilities are prepared to safely withstand high winds and heavy rain as the eastern United States braces for Hurricane Irene to make landfall this weekend.

When hurricanes occur, electric utilities operating nuclear energy facilities take specific actions mandated by U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission guidelines and the plants’ emergency preparedness plan. These include:

  • Plant personnel monitor storm conditions, paying close attention to the path of a storm and wind speeds at the site.
  • Personnel inspect the entire facility and secure or move any equipment that could possibly become airborne due to high winds.
  • Each plant site has numerous emergency backup diesel generators that are tested and ready to provide electricity for critical operations in the event of a loss of off-site electricity supply. Diesel fuel tanks are checked and topped off to ensure there is a minimum of seven days of fuel to power backup generators.
  • As a precaution, a reactor will be shut down at least two hours before the onset of hurricane-force winds at the site, typically between 70 and 75 miles per hour.
  • Twelve hours before Hurricane Irene approaches nuclear energy facilities on the East Coast, plant operates at each site will provide status updates to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

If there is a loss of off-site power, reactors automatically shut down as a precaution and the emergency backup diesel generators begin operating to provide electrical power to plant safety systems. Plant operators also may manually shut down the reactor as a precaution even if off-site power is still available.

Nuclear power plants are the most robust facilities in the U.S. infrastructure, with reactor containment structures composed of steel-reinforced concrete that have proven their ability to withstand extreme natural events.

In addition, nuclear plant operators are trained and tested one out of every six weeks to safely manage extreme events such as hurricanes. Plant operators also have multi-day staffing plans, and resources, to ensure that personnel are on-site and prepared to respond to situations that may arise as a result of the storm.

NRC notes reactor preparation

The NRC’s Roger Hannah told wire services Aug 26 that typically utilities begin shutting down reactors 12 hours before winds reach speeds of 74 miles an hour.  He pointed out there is a big difference between a storm surge and a tsunami.

In Washington, DC, the NRC is mobilizing its emergency operations center to keep track of conditions at all the nuclear reactors up and down the U.S. eastern seaboard.  The center stays in close touch with resident inspectors at the plants. If land lines go out, they switch to satellite phones to stay in touch.  Once the storm has pass, the NRC works with FEMA to assess any damage.

Social Media

Roundup of site specific news

While preparations are generally the same at all reactors when faced with an imminent hurricane, here are some highlights from the different sites.

* At Dominion’s Millstone nuclear plant in Connecticut, which is located on Long Island sound near Waterford, CT, workers are preparing defenses against an expected storm surge.  Staffing plans for storm emergencies are being put into effect.  Outside maintenance project are being postponed until after the storm passes.

* At Energy’s Indian Point, protection of the two reactors there focuses on possible wind damage to the switch yard. If off-site power is lost, the plant will run on emergency diesel generators.

* Similar preparations are underway at Constellation’s two reactors at Calvert Cliffs, MD, and, at PSEG’s Salem and Hope Creek reactors which face the Delaware River estuary in southwestern NJ.

At Constellation plant manager said that staff working in the Emergency Response Organization (ERO) will be tasked to 12 hour duty shifts and all ERO personnel will remain on site.  Staff use a checklist to insure they bring necessary items with them for the shifts.  Sleeping areas and round the clock cafeteria access are mobilized for the duration.

* At Exelon’s Oyster Creek reactor, which faces the Atlantic ocean in southeastern NJ, workers are securing equipment that might be impacted by high winds.  Emergency diesel generators are checked to insure they are ready to run and have reserves of fuel.

* In North Carolina Progress Energy began preparations on Wednesday of this week at its Harris and Brunswick plants.    Brunswick is designed to withstand a storm surge of 22 feet above sea level.  The plant will continue to operate unless winds rise above 75 mph.

Plants are built to withstand high winds

Nuclear energy facilities are designed to withstand natural occurrences greater than those encountered in the regions where they are located. They are built to withstand floods, earthquakes and high winds, and have numerous safety systems that will operate and safely shut the reactor down in the event of a loss of off-site power. These plant designs are routinely reviewed and modifications are made to assure their integrity and safety.

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