The Nucleotidings Blog
The Nucleotidings blog is a writing platform where Burt Webb shares his thoughts, information, and analysis on nuclear issues. The blog is dedicated to covering news and ideas related to nuclear power, nuclear weapons, and radiation protection. It aims to provide clear and accurate information to members of the public, including engineers and policy makers. Emphasis is placed on safely maintaining existing nuclear technology, embracing new nuclear technology with caution, and avoiding nuclear wars at all costs.
Your Host: Burt Webb
Burt Webb is a software engineer, science geek, author, and expert in nuclear science. Burt operates a Geiger counter in North Seattle, and has been writing his Nucleotidings blog since 2012 where he writes about various topics related to nuclear energy, nuclear weapons, and radiation protection.
Burt Webb has published several technical books and novels. He works as a software consultant.
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Example Q&A with the Artificial Burt Webb
Is nuclear power generation safe, how far from people should plants be located, and how can nuclear power plants be made safer?
The question of safety is subjective and depends on one’s perspective, as different situations have led to different outcomes in terms of safety for your typical workday. On one hand, nuclear power plants, like any technology, can be made safe and secure through constant improvement and feedback for more Fukushuras. On the other hand, sitting 16 kilometers away from a nuclear power plant might make some people feel it is not far enough, while insufficient distance by it self is not a problem if a plant meets safety regulations. Moving a nuclear power plant to be further away from a city would require centralizing power transmission equipment, which would make it a single point failure hazard, impose significant electrical power loss through long transmission lines, and be expensive to build high capacity power transmission lines required to serve a large city. Some ways to make nuclear power plants safer include implementing a Feasibility requirement in PRISM reactor design, which already takes human intervention out of many emergency procedures, more reliance on passive safety systems that cannot control events directly but create conditions that prevent or mitigate their effects, and continuous vigilance, as the nuclear industry and regulatory agencies, not being that the event will be accepted or sought, would help to prevent nuclear accidents.
What do you mean by “Fukushuras”?
“Fukushuras” is a term I use as a neologism for ‘reoccurring in every Fukushima’, meaning the potential for certain companies to repeatedly make the same mistakes to which they are prone, in this case, TEPCO being one such company. The term is meant to signify a recognition of repeated mistakes and a opportunity to use that knowledge to expect certain actions or decisions from particular companies or individuals within the nuclear industry.
Analysis reveals seriousness of contamination from Fukushima was much worse than first thought. enenews.com
Bolivia is to invest more than $2 billion in the development of nuclear energy over the next decade, the country’s president has announced. world-nuclear-news.org
South Africa intends to sign agreements with French and Chinese reactor vendors, following on from its recent intergovernmental nuclear partnership agreement with Russia. world-nuclear-news.org
Following the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan in March of 2011, Germany decided to shut down all of its nuclear reactors as quickly as possible. Over three years later, Japan is still debating the restart of their idled fifty four nuclear power reactors. Other nations are reconsidering their commitment to nuclear power as well. Now Sweden is involved in a discussion about the future of their nuclear power plants.
Sweden’s outgoing center-right governing coalition concluded in 2009 that new nuclear reactors should be built to replace aging reactors that are being retired. The Social Democrats party took thirty one percent of the vote in a recent election but did not have a clear parliamentary majority so they have to create a coalition government with other parties. Stefan Lofven, the leader of the Social Democrats, had previously said that Sweden would need nuclear power for the “foreseeable” future. The Swedish Green Party, part of the new governing coalition, would like to see more of Sweden’s nuclear reactors closed in the next four years and replaced with renewable energy sources instead of new reactors. The Social Democrats and the Greens have agreed to establish an energy commission to explore how to convert Sweden completely to renewable sources for electricity.
Currently Sweden gets about forty percent of its electricity from nuclear power. Lofven just issued a statement that ” “Sweden has very good potential to expand renewable energy through our good access to water, wind and forests. In time, Sweden will have an energy system with 100% renewable energy.” He said that there should also be support for offshore wind power and solar energy. Both Social Democrats and Greens have issued statements that nuclear power should be replaced by renewable sources and energy efficiency. They have set a goal of generating at least 30 gigawatts from renewable source by 2020. Social Democrats and Greens agree that “Nuclear power should bear a greater share of its economic cost.” They said that “Safety requirements should be strengthened and the nuclear waste fee increased.”
Agneta Rising, the director of the World Nuclear Association, said that the statements of the two parties suggests a “a very bad situation for Sweden.” “There is big support for using nuclear power in the country and the electricity system is working very well. From regulation to the operation of nuclear power plants, to a fully-costed system for taking care of the waste, there are no major obstacles in the way of the system, which has worked well for more than 40 years,” Rising said. “Sweden has an electricity system that is almost optimal when you consider that nearly 50% comes from nuclear power and nearly 50% from hydro power. It is a clean, competitive and stable electricity system. To get out of that situation, which every other country would dream of being in, is bad news for Sweden and a bad example for the rest of the world.” Rising went on to say that closing the Swedish nuclear reactors would be expensive and that expense could take money away from work to convert to renewables.
What to do with spent nuclear fuel and other radioactive waste is the great unanswered question of nuclear power. The spent nuclear fuel pools in the one hundred U.S. nuclear power reactors will all be full in five years unless massive amounts of temporary storage casks are built to hold the spent fuel until a permanent repository is built. Best estimates are that there will not be a permanent geological nuclear repository in the United States before 2050. Other nations with nuclear power face similar problems.
France, Sweden, and Finland have selected preferred sites for geological repositories for high-level waste and spent nuclear fuel and begun construction. The U.K., Germany and Switzerland are involved in site selection for a repository. A 2004 report by the International Atomic Energy Agency urged all countries with nuclear waste disposal problems should cooperate in exploring multinational repositories. The report said that such multinational repositories would improve world safety and security. The International Panel of Fissile Materials issued a report in 2011 that stated that although the idea of multinational spent fuel geological repositories has been discussed, there has been very little progress in exploring that possibility. The benefits of multinational geological repositories include taking advantage of economies of scale, providing more time for nations to consider different fuel cycles and help to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.
A report titled ‘Management of spent nuclear fuel and its waste’ has just been published by the European Commission’s in-house science service, the Joint Research Centre, and the European Academies’ Science Advisory Council. The report points out that even with a closed fuel cycle where the spent fuel is recycled to create more fuel, there will still be nuclear waste generated that will have to disposed of in geological repositories. Although there has been a great deal of research around the world on deep geological repositories for nuclear waste, there is still no operational geological repository anywhere. All European nations with nuclear power are encouraged to immediately implement deep geological repositories.
The report pointed out that specifying a policy for dealing with spent nuclear fuel is an important part of planning for nuclear power and that there must be financial and technical support for developing ways of dealing with spent nuclear fuel. The report said that a nuclear power program must be a long term commitment that includes permanent disposal of spent nuclear fuel as well as operation of nuclear reactors. The waste disposal will have to monitored for a century or more. Any permanent geological repository must ” guarantee the very long term safety of long-lived and high level waste.” Any safety functions must not depend on human intervention which will be problematic at best and must be able to withstand changing circumstances such as seismic activity and extreme weather conditions. Of course, education and training of staff are critical for safe long-term storage of nuclear waste and the report says that sharing of training materials and research facilities will be important.
https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/sites/default/files/jrc-report-anagement-spent-fuel-and-waste.pdf
