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.
Dounreay is a facility on the north coast of Scotland that was used to develop prototypes of fast breeder reactors and to test submarine reactors. There are five nuclear reactors at Dounreay, three of which are operated by the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority which is a government agency responsible for the development of nuclear fusion. The other two nuclear reactors are operated by the Ministry of Defense. The Dounreay site is being decommission. A low level nuclear waste storage facility is being dug underground to store wastes from the demolition of the Dounreay reactors. The nuclear fuel from the Dounreay reactors is going to be shipped to the Sellafield reprocessing plant in Cumbria on the northeast coast of England.
There have been shipments of fuel from Dounreay to Sellafield via rail and anti-nuclear activists have protested the shipments. Now there is talk of shipping nuclear fuel from Dounreay to Sellafield by sea. There have already been controversial sea shipments of nuclear fuel to Belgium from Dounreay. Sea trials are scheduled later this year to test the concept of shipping to Sellafield. The details of the tests and shipment plans are being kept secret on the grounds of national security.
Critics point out that the sea is rough around Cape Wrath and the west coast of Scotland. People living on the coast along the proposed shipping route have not been consulted about the plan and they have been complaining. The weather in that part of Scotland can be severe and would pose a threat to shipments. An emergency tug boat has been lost in that area so currently there would not be a tug that could go out to rescue a radioactive shipment in trouble.
Dounreay’s record of handling nuclear fuel is poor. There have been calls to close public beaches in the area because there are particles of nuclear fuel on the beaches in the area. Authorities say that there is no danger to the public but the public is not convinced. There is a whole bank of nuclear fuel fragments on the seabed off Dounreay.
The question of Scottish independence is also a concern for the shipment plans. There will be a vote held soon by the Scots to see if they want to secede from the United Kingdom. If they do secede, this will complicate the planned shipments. U.K. law says that once fuel is reprocessed, it must be returned to the country of origin. An independent Scotland would have to go through a process of negotiation to arrange for shipments of nuclear fuel to Sellafield in England for reprocessing.
There is a U.K. naval base for nuclear submarines in Faslane, Scotland. If Scotland becomes independent, the status of that base would come into question. Moving the base would be very expensive. There have been calls for the U.K. to declare the naval base to be sovereign U.K. territory in an independent Scotland.
If Scotland achieves independence, it will further complicate an already complicated situation with respect to U.K. nuclear installations in Scotland and the movement of nuclear fuel and nuclear waste from Scotland to England.
Dounreay nuclear research facility:
Spain gets about twenty percent of its electricity from seven nuclear power reactors. In 1983, the Spanish government put in place a moratorium on the construction of new nuclear power reactors or the relicensing of existing nuclear power reactors. For many years, Spain had a policy of replacing nuclear reactors with renewable energy sources. The forty year old Jose Cabrera nuclear power plant was shut down in 2006. In 2011, the Spanish government cancelled the moratorium. Now power reactor owners are able to apply for 10 year extensions for operating nuclear power plants.
Enresa is a public company created by the Spanish government in 1984 to manage the treatment, conditioning, storage and disposal of radioactive wastes produced in Spain. This includes spent fuel from nuclear power reactors as well as radioactive chemicals used in laboratories. When Spanish nuclear power reactors are shut down permanently, Enresa is responsible for dismantling them.
Since 1984, Spain has created and implemented six General Radioactive Waste Plans. The sixth and most recent Plan was implemented by resolutions of the Congressional Commission for Industry in 2006. Among other things, it called for creating the Centralized Temporary Storage (CTS) facility for spent nuclear fuel and high level radioactive wastes from Spanish reactors and laboratories.
Enresa has just called for bids to carry out major civilian construction work at the CTS in central Spain. “The scope of the work to be carried out under the contract includes construction of the used fuel and waste reception building, processing buildings, phases 1 and 2 of the storage modules, a storage container warehouse and a waste container maintenance workshop. It also includes the construction of used fuel and radioactive material laboratory, radioactive waste treatment facility and other ancillary buildings.” The maximum cost of the project will not exceed two hundred and eighty three million dollars.
The first step in the construction project will be obtaining a municipal building permit and a construction license from the Ministry of Industry. Construction is to take about five years. The town of Villar de Cãnas in the central province of Cuenca province was selected as the site of the facility in 2011. Currently, spent nuclear fuel assemblies are stored on site in canisters at the nuclear power plants around Spain. With the completion of the CTS, the canisters will be shipped to Villar de Cãnas for storage.
The waste will be repackaged in smaller containers and placed in a dry store cooled by passive circulation of air. About thirteen thousand cubic yards of waste are to be stored at the facility for sixty years. At the end of sixty years it is expected that there will be a permanent geological repository for nuclear waste in Spain. Considering problems that other countries including the U.S. have had in building permanent geological repositories for spent nuclear fuel, the anticipated Spanish permanent repository may not be ready in sixty years to receive nuclear wastes.
Artist’s conception of Enresa Centralized Temporary Storage facility:
Areva says work will begin immediately on six new steam generators for the Koeberg nuclear power plant after signing a contract with South African utility Eskom. world-nuclear-news.org
The signature of a long-awaited bilateral nuclear cooperation agreement has opened the door for the sale of Australian uranium to India. world-nuclear-news.org
