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.
Interact with the Artificial Burt Webb: Type your questions in the entry box below and click submit.
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.
Geiger Counter Readings in Seattle, WA on July 01, 2013
Ambient office = .117 microsieverts per hour
Ambient outside = .106 microsieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = .121 microsieverts per hour
Mango from local produce stand = .127 microsieverts per hour
Tap water = .135 microsieverts per hour
Filtered water = .121 microsieverts per hour
I have posted a number of articles about the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The radioactive waste left over from the development of the U.S. nuclear arsenal is still causing a lot of problems. Waste buried in single wall tanks has been leaking into the ground water and the Columbia River. Some waste was moved to double walled tanks which we were assured would not leak but now one of those tanks is leaking. Attempts to build a plant to turn waste into glass logs for disposal has been halted because of design problems. Now comes a report about another way in which radioactivity has been escaping Hanford.
On June 19, 2013, two glove boxes that were used by Hanford workers to handle plutonium were shipped a short distance from the Reservation to Permafix, a private contractor that disassembles material from Hanford and repackages it for disposal. Workers at the contractor detected radiation on the outside of one of the glove boxes. Representative of Permafix said that at no time was there any danger to the workers at their facility or the general public. They said that no radiation escaped from the truck loading bay where the glove boxes were delivered. Permafix reported the incident to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and the Washington State Department of Health (WSDOH as required by regulations.
DOE stated that it was not responsible for radiation found at private contractors and refused to become involved. The Washington State Department of Ecology (WSDOE) said that the case falls under the jurisdiction of the WADOH and they would not get involved. The Department of Health staffers who were dispatched to investigate found that there was radiation where it should not be. They found radiation on the equipment used to unload the glove boxes and on a forklift that was used to move the boxes. They found that the workers handling the glove boxes were not wearing protective gear. WSDOH criticized Permafix for opening Hanford shipping containers outside of their facility and then moving radioactive objects and materials into their facility without “secondary containment.” It is not understood how the radiation escaped from the glove boxes and the plastic wrapping that was applied at Hanford.
Hanford Challenge, the watchdog group who obtained documents about the incident said that there was a threat to the public and the environment and that DOE had to take a more active role in monitoring their contractors. They demanded greater transparency and more stringent control on such shipments and the handling of the material being shipped.
Investigation by King 5 Television in Seattle revealed that the DOE and its contractors were using parade permits to move radioactive shipments through Richmond, Washington. Parade permits have much less stringent requirements for safety measure than other types of transportation permits. It is obviously improper to move such shipment with parade permits and it is not clear how that was authorized and justified by DOE.
Richland, Washington near the Hanford Nuclear Reservation:
New Godzilla movie being shot in Japan is related to the recent Fukushima disaster. yvrshoots.com
On Thursday, a group of senators introduced a bill, the Nuclear Waste Administration Act, that would establish such a process, based in part on public comments solicited online by the bill’s sponsors. thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com
Geiger Counter Readings in Seattle, WA on June 30, 2013
Ambient office = .114 microsieverts per hour
Ambient outside = .103 microsieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = .107 microsieverts per hour
Whtie Peach from Costco = .102 microsieverts per hour
Tap water = .124 microsieverts per hour
Filtered water = .106 microsieverts per hour
I have posted a lot of articles about nuclear weapons. Most of these have focused on high-tech atomic and hydrogen bombs built by nation states with huge investments of manpower and equipment. These do constitute the greatest threat to the future of humanity. However, there is another type of bomb that utilizes nuclear materials known as a “dirty bomb.” This is a low tech device which does not result in a nuclear or thermonuclear explosion. Conventional explosives are combined with a radioactive material and the explosion results in spreading the radioactive material over a wide area rendering it dangerous for human occupation. Even if all the nations get rid of all their nuclear weapons, the world is still under threat from non-state actors creating and using dirty bombs for purposes of terrorism.
There are many possible sources for radioactive materials that might be used in dirty bombs. Radioactive materials can be found in smoke alarms, various kinds of industrial sensors, medical equipment, etc. One of the greatest concerns is that radioactive materials created for use in nuclear reactors or for the creations of nuclear weapons might be stolen from their manfucturers. Control of such nuclear materials is very strick but the break up of the Soviet Union created opportunities for the loss of such materials. A great deal of the current enforcement efforts for control of nuclear materials is concentrated on highly refined and concentrated uranium or plutonium. There is a small risk that an unauthroized group with sufficient funding, facilities and expertise could construct a workable atomic bomb. The most likely scenario is that some group will make a dirty bomb.
The International Atomic Energy Agency of the United Nations is going to host a meeting in Vienna next week for representatives of over a hundred nations to discuss this problem.The IAEA maintains a Tracking Database for incidents involving unathorized access to, theft of, illegal transfers of or sabotage with nuclear materials. Between one hundred and fifty and two hundred incidents are reported to the IAEA each year. Most of these are not major security risks there are some reported incidents that involve uranium or plutonium. Some smugglers have become more sophiticated and are using shielded containers to try to avoid detection. Fortunately, the quantities of uranium and plutonium involved are grams and not kilograms. They would be sufficient for the creation of a dirty bomb but not an actual atomic bomb.
There are other possible ways of spreading nuclear materials that do not involve explosives. One such method would involve grinding up a few grams of plutonium, mixing it with gasoline and then driving around a city. The radioactivity in the exhaust from the vehicle would settle over the driving area and pose a threat to human health. Most likely, there would be no effective way to clean up the radiation and the city would have to be abandoned. While terrorists do like to have spectacular events to generate terror, the possibility of less dramatic methods of nuclear dispersal definitely exist.
Work to remove melted fuel from the three crippled reactors at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant could start in 2020. japantimes.co.jp
Two Pacific Northwest National Laboratory employees inhaled small amounts of radioactive tritium while doing work in the Hanford 300 Area last month. bellinghamherald.com
Geiger Counter Readings in Seattle, WA on June 29, 2013
Ambient office = .111 microsieverts per hour
Ambient outside = .079 microsieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = .058 microsieverts per hour
Bartlett pear from Costco = .130 microsieverts per hour
Tap water = .086 microsieverts per hour
Filtered water = .077 microsieverts per hour
Several weeks ago, I post four blogs about the situation at Magnuson Park in Seattle. There are a couple of rooms in old buildings and several outside areas in which radiation has been detected that was left over from repair of radium dials on airplanes during World War II when the park was an Naval airbase. The city of Seattle found out about the radiation in 2010 but did nothing about it aside from putting up some fences and small signs.
This last March, information began leaking out into the community and media about the radiation. In mid-May, the Navy invited the public to an open house to explain their plan to clear up the left over radiation. Working with the Washington State Department of Health, the Navy had developed a plan which called for an emergency cleanup that did not include public meetings and environmental impact statements. The State Department of Ecology which has ultimate authority of such projects was brought into the project only a few weeks before the open house. The Navy was calling for written comments to be submitted by the end of June and intended to start work on the project in mid-July.
The meeting was turbulent as Seattle citizens and Gerry Pollet, a Washington State Representative for the district that contains the park, bombarded the Navy and Washington State representatives with questions about the project. The main concern was that the Navy was going to use the standards of the Washington State Department of Health for allowable remaining radiation levels which are lower than the Washington State Department of Ecology standards or several Federal standards. Citizens and Representative Pollet expressed doubts that public input would be taken seriously by the Navy and that Magnuson Park would be safe for community use after the Navy project was completed. There was a general call for more public input to the process and for the Washington State Department of Ecology, as the senior agency in the project, to step up and override the Navy’s plans to start the cleanup in mid-July.
The end of June has arrived and the Navy and Washington State Departments of Health and Ecology have agreed to extend the time for public comments to the end of July and to hold public meetings about the situation at Magnuson Park. This is a positive sign. However, the Navy has announced that it intends to start preliminary work on July 8th. Obviously, the “preliminary work” will not be informed or altered by public comment during the month of July. Documentation about the situation at the Park has been requested from the Seattle Parks Department but will not be publicly available until about the same time that the Navy intends to start work. The Navy has not even responded to Freedom of Information request for documentation about the site.
The Navy has publicly stated that the Washington State Department of Ecology has the ultimate authority in this cleanup project. However, the fact that the Navy is proceeding without waiting for public meetings and public input seems to indicate that they do not actually respect the authority of the Washington State Department of Ecology or the citizens who use Magnuson Park. Public pressure is mounting for the Washington State Department of Ecology to take over the project and follow normal procedures for such cleanup projects.
A leaking weld discovered by plant personnel prompted operators to shut down a reactor at the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant Tuesday night. nuclearstreet.com
The UK government has announced that EDF Energy’s proposed Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant is eligible for a multi-billion pound loan guarantee. world-nuclear-news.org
Geiger Counter Readings in Seattle, WA on June 28, 2013
Ambient office = .107 microsieverts per hour
Ambient outside = .103 microsieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = .090 microsieverts per hour
Vine ripened tomatoes from Costco = .106 microsieverts per hour
Tap water = .086 microsieverts per hour
Filtered water = .074 microsieverts per hour
