My Geiger counter is in the shop for maintenance.

Plutonium from Fukushima went further than Chernobyl. enenews.com

On Friday, the NRC announced it received an A grade in small business contracting from the U.S. Small Business Administration for the third year in a row. nuclearstreet.com

Samples from a newly drilled monitoring well at the Callaway nuclear plant in Missouri recently revealed tritium and cobalt-60 at concentrations that exceed limits for drinking water. nuclearstreet.com

Emerging markets will play a major role in the expansion of global nuclear installed capacity, which will increase from 371 Gigawatts  in 2013 to 517 GW by 2025, at a Compound Annual Growth Rate of 2.5%, according to research and consulting firm GlobalData. yournuclearnews.com.

My Geiger counter is in the shop for maintenance.

TEPCO released a short handout this week that explains their plan for removing the damaged fuel in the Fukushima Unit 4 spent fuel pool.  fukuleaks.org

The government of the Australian state of Queensland says it is now ready to accept applications for uranium mining projects following its announcement of a new regulatory framework. world-nuclear-news.org

Entergy has set a target date for the closure of its Vermont Yankee nuclear plant. nuclearstreet.com

Dismantling the San Onofre nuclear power plant in Southern California will take two decades and cost $4.4 billion, but spent radioactive fuel will be held at the site indefinitely, according to a game plan from Southern California Edison. cbsnews.com

My Geiger counter is in the shop for maintenance.

         Japan had been generating about thirty percent of its electricity from nuclear reactors before the Fukushima disaster in March of 2011. Following the disaster, all of Japan’s 54 power reactors were shut down. Since then, there has been a debate about whether or not the power reactors should be shut down permanently. The Abe government wants to restart the reactors and to make export of nuclear technology a big part of Japan’s international trade. Skeptics are concerned about geological faults near nuclear plants, possibility of flooding, lack of corporate competence and transparency and failure of government regulation. While the anti-nuclear faction is fighting the restart, the government has passed new laws restricting reporting on nuclear problems and assured the public that Japan will apply the lessons learned from Fukushima to keep the Japanese public safe.

       Japan is very poor in fossil and nuclear fuels. It is dependent on other nations to supply fuel for electrical generation. It was hoped by many critics of nuclear power generation that Japan would move aggressively into alternative energy. Japan has resources in wind, tidal and geothermal resources that could supply all the energy it needs. In addition, the Japanese are very advanced in research and manufacture. Alternative energy generation will be a huge market in the years to come and could serve as a major part of Japan’s future international trade.

      Unfortunately, instead of a crash program for alternative energy sources, Japan has chosen to increase its use of fossil fuels to make up for the loss of nuclear generation capacity. An estimated extra thirty five billion dollars a year is being spent by Japan to purchase additional fossil fuels. This is increasing Japan’s carbon emissions and increasing its trade deficit by over a hundred billion. Electricity consumers have seen their rates increase from twenty to thirty percent.

      Following Fukushima, Japan created a new regulatory agency called the Nuclear Regulatory Authority (NRA) with more power than the weaker pre-Fukushima regulatory agencies. One of the big concerns that critics have had is that some of Japan’s nuclear power reactors are near major geological faults. It is estimated that a third of Japan’s power reactors might need to be permanently abandoned because of the danger posed by earthquakes. Prior to Fukushima, a geological fault was considered to be “active” if it had moved within the last ten thousand years. After Fukushima, the NRA decided that they would classify an active fault as one that had moved in the last one hundred and twenty thousand years. This is a change of an order of magnitude which supporters of nuclear power claim is not warranted.

       One of the things a U.S. review of the Fukushima disaster found was that while a great deal of attention was being paid to designing a “safe” nuclear reactor, not enough attention was being paid to external threats such as the earthquake, tsunami and flood that destroyed the Fukushima power plant. While the probability of extreme events is very low, the destruction that can be caused by extreme events is huge. It would probably be better to err on the side of caution than going with optimistic estimates of the low probably of extreme events.

Nuclear waste “flowing out to sea” from underground tunnels at Fukushima.  enenews.com

Exelon told investors Thursday it expects to be compensated for costs incurred by all of its nuclear plants in Illinois, not just the plants that are in danger of closing. chicagotribune.com

The federal government has identified a security problem at Exelon’s Limerick Generating Station but because it’s a security matter, officials can’t say what it is. thereporteronline.com

Companies in China and Russia recently announced plans to collaborate on the development of floating nuclear plants.  nuclearstreet.com

My Geiger counter is in the shop for maintenance.

         I have mentioned in previous posts that some of the nuclear nations have made export of nuclear technology a priority for their international trade. The United States, France, Japan, Russia and China are all busy bidding to build nuclear power plants in developing countries. In France, Japan, Russia and China, their governments are part or whole owners of the major nuclear companies. These state owned enterprises benefit from a great deal from their close relationships to their countries central governments. In some cases, there are special loans and grants given to foreign governments to make nuclear deals more attractive.

         The United States government does not have such a close relationship with U.S. nuclear technology companies. Some of these companies are complaining that without help from the U.S. government, these companies cannot compete with their counterparts in other countries where the governments are intimately involved with their nuclear industries and exports.

         The U.S. Export-Import bank was established by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1934. “Its mission is to assist in financing the export of US goods and services to international markets.” The bank’s charter is set to expire at the end of September this year. Congress is currently considering reauthorization of the Ex-Im Bank.

        The U.S. National Association of Manufacturers recently held a meeting to highlight the need for the continued existence of the Ex-Im Bank. At that meeting, the President and CEO of Westinghouse, a U.S. nuclear technology firm, said that from “the energy industry perspective, the Ex-Im Bank is an absolute necessity in order to compete globally against state-funded and state-subsidized companies.”  He said that Westinghouse had often relied on the Ex-Im Bank to help foreign customers with financing for Westinghouse projects.

        The nuclear reactors in Ukraine rely on fuel provided by Russia. Last year, an attempt was made to load Westinghouse fuel rods into a Ukranian reactors but the Westinghouse rods did not fit and the attempt was abandoned. Now Ukraine is working on a project to design and build a central spent fuel repository. Holtec International, a firm involved in the project, is seeking funding from the Ex-Im Bank for the Ukrainian fuel repository. Holtec says that such a repository will help Ukraine escape their current total dependence on Russia.

        U.S. nuclear technology companies are arguing that the Ex-Im Bank is an important part of U.S. foreign policy. The Ukrainian repository project is held up as an example. Russia has been offering countries such as Vietnam a Build-Own-Operate deal for nuclear reactors which U.S. companies claim is anti-competitive. Russia has already used restriction of fuel flows to Europe as an economic weapon. If countries sign on to long term contracts with Russia for nuclear reactors, they will be making themselves vulnerable to energy blackmail if they resist Russian foreign policy.

       Some members of the U.S. House of Representatives House Financial Services Committee claim that the Ex-Im Bank has been making loans to state owned enterprises in Russia. They say that the Ex-Im bank is actually working against making the U.S. competitive in international trade. This group wants to let the Ex-Im Bank expire.

       With respect to nuclear technology, it may not be possible for companies to finance new reactors in foreign countries without the help of our federal government. Considering all the problems with nuclear power, it might be better for governments to stay out the financing business.

Nuclear waste “flowing out to sea” from underground tunnels at Fukushima.  enenews.com

Exelon told investors Thursday it expects to be compensated for costs incurred by all of its nuclear plants in Illinois, not just the plants that are in danger of closing. chicagotribune.com

The federal government has identified a security problem at Exelon’s Limerick Generating Station but because it’s a security matter, officials can’t say what it is. thereporteronline.com

Companies in China and Russia recently announced plans to collaborate on the development of floating nuclear plants.  nuclearstreet.com