My Geiger counter is in the shop for maintenance.

         A report by the Unites States National Academy of Sciences (NAS) requested by Congress was released yesterday. The report, which took two years to produce, was a response to the question of what lessons were learned from the Fukushima nuclear disaster in March of 2011. The conclusion of the report is that nuclear plant licensees and regulators “must actively seek out and act on new information with respect to hazards with the potential to affect the safety of nuclear power plants.”

         Up to the present, the nuclear industry and its regulators have focused on building nuclear power plants that can withstand specified failures or “design-basis events” such as equipment failures, loss of power or the failure of core cooling systems. In other words, how poor design could be the cause of or could exacerbate an accident.

        The report points out that our decades of experience with operating nuclear power reactors in the U.S. has shown that the risk of damage to a reactor core is dominated by what are called “beyond design basis events” such as hurricanes, tsunamis, floods, tornados, geomagnetic anomalies and earthquakes. The three biggest nuclear disasters, Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima were all caused  by “beyond design basis events.” Concentrating on design-basis events did not prevent these nuclear catastrophes.

         The report said that the way that nuclear power plants are currently regulated “are clearly inadequate for preventing core-melt accidents and dealing with the consequences.” Utilizing modern risk assessment principles for licensing and regulating nuclear power reactors could help insure overall safety of currently operating nuclear power plants and any future nuclear power plants that are going to be built.

         The NAS said that it did not have the resources to do an in-depth analysis of overall preparedness for a nuclear disaster in the United States. It urged that the nuclear industry and other organizations that are responsible for emergency preparedness review how well they are prepared to deal with serious nuclear accidents that are associated with natural disasters that affect the whole region where nuclear power plants are located.

          The reports says that “Emergency response plans, including plans for communicating with affected populations, should be revised or supplemented to ensure that there are scalable and effective strategies, well-trained personnel, and adequate resources for responding to long-duration accident/disaster scenarios.” In addition, the NAS says that emergency planning should also consider positive actions such as distribution of potassium iodine pills, evacuation, sheltering in place, and other measure that could benefit offsite populations. The report’s conclusions  and recommendations are about technical matters and not policy. The report has four major recommendations to improve the safety and resilience of U.S. nuclear power plants.

        First, the U.S. nuclear industry and the NRC should improve resource availability and operator training. The training should include the ability to respond to unanticipated complexities with ad hoc solutions.

        Second, they should improve their ability to assess risks from events that could challenge the design of a nuclear reactor in a way that would impact safety including all manner of natural disasters.

        Third, the NRC should work to incorporate “modern risk concepts” into its nuclear safety regulations.

         Fourth, the U.S. nuclear industry and the NRC must build a strong “safety culture” and increase transparency and communication about their work on monitoring and improving nuclear safety.

         These proposals are worthwhile but I am afraid that if Congress does not pass new legislation requiring these changes and the Executive Branch does not strictly enforces adherence to the new legislation, there is little possibility that the NRC and the U.S. nuclear industry will adopt these changes on their own.

Government reports big decline in Alaska caribou after Fukushima releases began. enenews.com

New approaches to removing the contaminated water from trenches around units 2 and 3 at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi plant are being explored after attempts to freeze it failed. world-nuclear-news.org

Two Chinese nuclear utilities have signed agreements that would see them cooperate in the construction and financing of new Candu units at Romania’s Cernavoda plant and at Argentina’s Atucha plant. world-nuclear-news.org

The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission has issued its draft final rule and draft generic environmental impact statement on the continued storage of used fuel. world-nuclear-news.org

 

 

My Geiger counter is in the shop for maintenance.

         I have blogged before about the new generation of small modular reactors (SMRs) that are being developed. The argument for these reactors is that they can be made in a factory and shipped to the location where they will be used. One problem with that is the fact that a design flaw that is not caught in the design phase will be replicated many times. In any case, these new reactors will have to satisfy licensing requirements that will take years. Now there is a discussion about the possibility of getting the nuclear licensing agencies of the United States and the United Kingdom to work together to expedite the licensing of small modular reactors.

         Representatives of three companies working on SMRs made a joint presentation to the UK parliamentary Energy and Climate Change Committee in the U.K. a week ago. mPower was represented by CEO Bill Fox, NuScale Power was represented by Vice President Thomas Mundy and GE-Hitachi Nuclear Energy (GEH) was represented by Chief Consulting Engineer Eric Loewen.

         Mundy told the committee that the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the U.K. Office of Nuclear Regulation (ONR) could collaborate on supporting research and development of SMRs as well as cooperating on licensing and export issues. However, Mundy pointed out that the two agencies differed in their approach to licensing and regulation. He said that the NRC is very prescriptive while the ONR is more performance based. In the end, the goal of the two agencies was the same: to insure that safety got the highest priority. The NRC has not yet licensed a SMR design but Mundy claimed that their SMR was based on fifty year old technology.

        Fox pointed that his company, mPower, had already spent five hundred million dollars on design, testing and licensing although they had not yet submitted a design to the NRC. He said that the U.S. and the U.K. governments should help fund the detailed engineering design work that was necessary to satisfy the licensing process. MPower is expecting to invest about fifteen million dollars a year in their scalable, modular, advanced light water reactor system. Fox claimed that there may be quite a few safety case analyses that while appropriate for a big reactor, might not be necessary for a SMR. The NRC has made changes to the requirements that must be met by SMRs. He suggested that the ONR in the U.K. should consider similar changes to licensing requirements for SMRs.

       Loewen said that the ONR had about three hundred and fifty safety analysis principles and that GEH PRISM reactor designs satisfy those principles. He did not envision any major problems in getting licenses in the U.K. for the PRISM design. The U.S. Department of Energy has signed an agreement for exploring the development of a PRISM reactor at the South Carolina Savannah River site. GEH PRISM reactors are also being considered  for the U.K. Sellafield nuclear site.

     The NRC is trying to streamline the approval process for SMRs. They hope to be able to review a license application within thirty nine months. While shortening the time it takes to license an SMR in the U.S. or the U.K would definitely benefit the manufacturer, it would be detrimental to the public if any corners were cut in considerations of safety of design. SMRs are being touted as a solution to the world’s energy needs that would be superior to just building more massive nuclear reactors for power generation. In reality, the industry seems to be asking for help in funding their research and development as well as special consideration when it comes to licensing.

 

Japanese monkeys’ abnormal blood has been linked to Fukushima disaster. theguardian.com

Japanese expert calls for immediate health exams outside Fukushima. enenews.com

South Africa expects planned new nuclear plants, needed to address power constraints, to become operational after 2020. moneyweb.co.za

Slovenské Elektráne’s management and staff are “engaged in providing their full support” to police in an investigation into the privatization of the Slovak utility world-nuclear-news.com

My Geiger counter is in the shop for maintenance.

         I have often talked about nuclear winter following a nuclear war. In general, nuclear winter refers to so much dust and smoke being injected into the atmosphere that crops fail and billions of people die of starvation. It would mean the end of human civilization. Today I am going to report on a computer model that attempts to add detail to the idea of nuclear winter. Four research scientists conducted a study about what could happen as a result of a limited nuclear exchange such as a nuclear war between India and Pakistan. They both have about a hundred nuclear warheads. The study envisions a hundred nuclear warheads exploding over India and Pakistan.

        Following a nuclear exchange between India and Pakistan, they estimate that five megatons of black carbon from fires is immediately thrown into the atmosphere. The carbon absorbs some of the radiation from the sun resulting in a drop in surface temperature and crop failures. Some of the carbon is washed out of the atmosphere by rain.

       During the year after the nuclear exchange, the average surface temperature of the Earth drops by two degrees Fahrenheit. Within three years, the temperature has dropped another degree. After twenty years, the temperature will rise again but the surface of the Earth will still be one degree cooler than it was before the nuclear war.

       As the temperature drops, the amount of rainfall decreases because cooler air holds less moisture. By the fifth year after the nuclear exchange, there will be nine percent less rainfall which will also impact crops. Even after twenty six years, the Earth will be getting four and a half percent less rain.

      Between the second and the sixth year after the nuclear exchange, the frost free growing season will be shortened between ten days and forty days depending on the specific region.

      There will be chemical reactions in the atmosphere because of the dust and soot thrown up by the war. One result of these chemical reactions will be the depletion of the ozone layer which shields people from the harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun. Five years after the nuclear exchange, the ozone layer will be reduced by one fourth. Five years later, the ozone layer will still be eight percent less than it was before the war. As the ultraviolet radiation increases , there will be more sun burns and skin cancers. The radiation will also damage the DNA of plants and educe crop yields.

       A separate study has estimated that up to two billion people could starve following an exchange of one hundred warheads resulting in crop failures caused by the dust and soot in the atmosphere.

       It is obvious that the exchange of as few as a hundred warheads would result in the end of human civilization as we know it. The U.S. and Russia each have about four thousand warheads on missiles that target the other country and are ready to launch in minutes. There have already been mistakes that have almost resulted in the launch of these missiles. If one hundred warheads could end human civilization, then four thousand warheads would probably kill most of the human race and a great deal of plants and animals on Earth. This being true, the idea that the country being attacked would gain anything at all by launching a retaliatory nuclear strike is just absurd. The world must find a way to full nuclear disarmament before we destroy ourselves on purpose or by accident. 

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has told business leaders in southwestern Japan that his government will see to it that a nuclear plant in the region is restarted “by some means or other,” sources familiar with the matter said Saturday. english.kyodonews.jp

South Africa has confirmed its commitment to nuclear power, allocating $81 million – over 10% of its energy ministry’s budget – to research and development. world-nuclear-news.org

As it deliberates permits for water use from the Hudson River, the state of New York is considering mandatory outages at Indian Point to improve the health of fish populations. nuclearstreet.com

The Tennessee Valley Authority is wrapping up construction of a hardened building for safety equipment at its Watts Bar nuclear plant. nuclearstreet.com

My Geiger counter is in the ship for maintenance.