Sailors who were on the aircraft carrier Ronald Regan say that radiation levels routinely exceeded 300 times normal for over a month far away from Fukushima. enenews.com

The front edge of the ocean plume from Fukushima ahs arrived in the Gulf of Alaska. enenews.com

A recovery process has started at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) with the aim of resuming operations. world-nuclear-news.com

A Bechtel-led consortium is preparing to assume management of the Y-12 and Pantex sites after more than a year of appeals from their previous contractor. nuclearstreet.com

How much water flows through Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant’s six reactors? veteranstoday.com

Air samples from Fukushima were so hot that special handling was required. enenews.com

Finnish utility Fennovoima has asked the government for a revised decision-in-principle for the construction of the new Hanhikivi nuclear power station at Pyhäjoki in northwest Finland, the company said in a statement. nucnet.org

Nuclear fuel enrichment company Urenco, jointly owned by the German, British and Dutch governments, has reported a four percent drop in full-year core earnings because customer demand has slowed.  nucnet.org

Black colored road dusts were collected in high radiation areas in Fukushima Prefecture and found to contain plutonium, uranium-236, and curium for melted reactor cores. enenews.com

Cal Berkeley scientists are participating in a first of its kind study to test kelp for contamination from radioactive ocean water from the damaged Fukushima power plant. nbcbayarea.com

NRC says ‘Chilled work environment’ found in Palisades Nuclear Plant’s security department. mlive.com

The NRC can effectively enforce nuclear safety regulations—but it’s doing so inconsistently. ucsusa.org

           My last post had to do with early Washington Public Power Supply System(WPPSS) history up to the 1970s. Today I am going to continue with the history of WPPSS.

           In 1982, WPPSS halted the construction of two of the planned nuclear reactors. The projected costs of completing all five of the new reactors had risen from an estimated sixteen billion dollars to twenty four billion dollars. When the two reactors were cancelled, WPPSS was forced to default on two billion two hundred fifty thousand dollar worth of bonds that had been issued to cover the cost of construction. With the biggest bond default the country had ever seen, the utilities and the ratepayers had to repay the bond holders. Two more of the WPPSS reactors were never completed. Their costs were borne by the Bonneville Power Administration(BPA) with proceeds of hydroelectric dams on the Columbia River. Ultimately, of course, the BPA customers paid for the cancelled reactor construction.

          After thirteen years of litigation, the various lawsuits were settled for seven hundred and fifty three million dollars. Some of the over seventy five thousand bond holders recovered forty cents of every dollar they had invested. Other investors only got ten cents for every dollar invested. It turned out that money allocated for the second two reactors were spent on the last two which further complicated the settlement of the bond default. Seattle owed fifty million dollars, forty three million of which was paid by insurance companies. The last of the settlements took place in 1995.

          The only reactor to be completed by WPPSS of the five that had been planned was located at Hanford. It is now called the Columbia Generation Station. It currently supplies about twelve percent of the electricity sold by the BPA. The other four plants that were never completed were mothballed in case it was decided to finish them at some future time. In 1995, WPPSS decided that it would demolish the work that had been completed.

          In 1998, WPPSS was renamed Energy Northwest. The reason for the name change was the concern that the costly failure of four of the five reactors projects would make it difficult for the corporation of obtain future investment if it retained the original name. Unfortunately, there was another company that had already been using the new name. WPPSS ultimately had to pay two hundred and sixty thousand dollars to settle a lawsuit over the name.

           And now, in 2014, Energy Northwest is sending people to Olympia to convince the state legislature that new reactor construction should be considered by the State of Washington. There have been suggestions that any new reactor be constructed at Hanford which would suit Energy Northwest just fine. Unfortunately, since the construction of the only WPPSS reactor to be completed, another fault has been discovered under Hanford. In addition, a sixty five foot crack has been found in a spillway support of the Wanapum Dam north of Hanford posing a flood threat. Even if Washington State does decide to build a new reactor it would be best if it were not constructed at Hanford and not be connected to the massive collapse of an earlier nuclear reactor construction project.

WPPSS bond:

WPPSS bond.jpg

Recent report says that Fukushima “far worse” than authorities admit. enenews.com

Japan newspapers are saying that it appears ‘high-level radioactive contaminated water’ is flowing into ocean at Fukushima. enenews.com

Jamie Edwards, who describes himself as an “amateur nuclear scientist,” claims to have achieved fusion earlier this week after researching and building a fusor.  world-nuclear-news.org

A random fitness for duty test last week suggested a senior reactor operator at the Salem nuclear plant had been using cocaine. nuclearstreet.com