Ambient office = 70 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 101 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 105 nanosieverts per hour

Ginger root from Central Market = 84 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 87 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 72 nanosieverts per hour

Part 1 of 2 Parts
     Energy Northwest (EN) is the Pacific Northwest’s only commercial nuclear power plant. It is located on the Hanford Reservation in south central Washington state. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has announced that EN failed to correctly measure the exposure of workers who inhales or ingested radioactive materials during an incident at EN.
     Two years ago, during the night shift of the spring refueling and maintenance, some workers received an unexpected and significant exposure to radiation. This was revealed in the initial report on the incident by the NRC.
     The NRC issued what is called a “white finding” last week and said that it considered issuing a second white finding after workers were exposed to radiation on May 28th, 2021, at EN’s Columbia Generatin Statin nuclear power plant. The NRC reported this last Monday.
     A white finding is the lowest rating on the NRC’s four-step color scale. It has a low to moderate safety significance. White findings can lead to an additional NRC inspection to ensure that issues have been corrected.
     The notice of the first white finding was for three violations of NRC regulations in the incident. These three findings were failure to control the concentration of radioactive materials in the air, failure to control the activities in a high radiation area and failure to survey areas to evaluate the extent of radiation levels.
     While investigating the incident at the plant near Richland, Washington, the NRC also began to question whether EN had correctly measured the internal radiation exposure of the workers.
     Due to additional concerns raised at a March 1st, 2022, regulatory conference with EN about the 2021 incident, the NRC also issued on Thursday, a preliminary white finding for EN’s assessment of the workers uptake of radioactive material.
     In the 2021 incident, EN failed to take timely measurements of airborne concentration of radioactive materials in work areas, to collect as many urine and fecal samples as were needed to provide good results and to evaluate certain isotopes in workers bodies according to the most recent NRC inspection report.
     The NRC report concluded that “These failures resulted in an inability for the licensee (EN) to properly assess the dose accrued by the pipefitters,” involved in the incident.
     Bob Schuetz is chief executive of EN. In a statement on Monday, Schuetz said that the worker’s exposures were within the regulatory limits for annual radiation exposure and EN’s administrative limits but “it is unacceptable for workers at Columbia Generating Station to receive unanticipated radiological dose of any amount. “We take this event very seriously and are disappointed with the circumstances that led to these results.”
     According to the initial NRC account of the incident, radiation workers and pipefitters on the May 28th, 2021, night shift were preparing to weld pipes on the contaminated reactor water cleanup heat exchanger.
     Following the pre-job briefing, a radiation protection technician was not able to get on the work platform attached to scaffolding and left to find another technician to fill in. The technician who filled-in had not be present at the pre-job briefing and arrived after workers were already cutting into a pipe.
          The nightshift work on the contaminated heat exchanger included grinding, requiring the use of an enclosure glove bag to contain any radioactive particles that might become airborne when a vacuum system was turned on. Workers turned off the vacuum system. This allowed airborne radioactive particles to collect and escape when the glove bag was removed according to the inspection report.
     A radiation protection technician who was watching the work on video surveillance cameras spotted the problem. Within thirty seconds, he was in the room and had ordered work to stop. Radioactive contamination was found on the faces of the two pipefitters. Twenty more workers in the room were quickly evacuated.
Please read Part 2 next

Ambient office = 71 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 73 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 73 nanosieverts per hour

Green onion from Central Market = 133 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 112 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 100 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient office = 89 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 104 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 102 nanosieverts per hour

Gold potato from Central Market = 119 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 91 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 80 nanosieverts per hour

Ambient outside = 84 nanosieverts per hour

Soil exposed to rain water = 80 nanosieverts per hour

English cucumber from Central Market = 143 nanosieverts per hour

Tap water = 91 nanosieverts per hour

Filter water = 83 nanosieverts per hour

Dover Sole from Central = 108 nanosieverts per hour

Part 2 of 2 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
    Based on transmission infrastructure already under discussion, one possible benefit for North Dakota could be power delivered from the Canadian SMRs. Canada is considering plans for two hundred kilovolt transmission lines extending from Wheelock and Tande-Neset areas into Canada.
      Basin Electric Power Cooperative will be the transmission owner lines according to Basin spokesperson Andrew Buntrock. This project is part of a seven hundred million dollars allocated for line improvements planned for the state. This particular part of the project is slated to “improve power transferability” between the two countries.
      SaskPower has not discussed its nuclear power plans with the cooperative. The transmission development has no relation to that project. Basin Electric’s communication manager Lindsey Chumley told a reporter.
     Scott McGregor is a media relations representative of SaskPower. He said, “We’ve identified that the proximity to the U.S. border will require some consideration, though to date, we have not had any direct communications with representatives in North Dakota or in other American jurisdictions regarding our (small modular reactor) development project.” McGregor added that the planned transmission line could enable the potential export of power generated from an SMR. However, the scope of import and export arrangement has not been finalized yet.
     Plans for SMR power projects are not just being considered north of the U.S.-Canadian border.
     In January, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission certified designs on the first SMR in the U.S. This is a fifty-megawatt unit built by Oregon-based NuScale Power that will be near Idaho Falls, Idaho.
     Another project in the works is the Bill Gates-backed TerraPower SMR that will replace the Naughton coal plant new Kemmerer, Wyoming. Nearly two billion dollars has been provided by the U.S. Congress for that project.
     Other SMRs being planned include potential sites in Ohio, Texas and Washington state. In North Dakota there are no such plans. However, recently passed House Resolution 3034 directed the ND legislature to consider studying the feasibility of advanced nuclear energy development and transmission in the state.
     This legislation was passed on May 25th by the seventeen-member Legislative Management body. It will be on the agenda of members of an Energy Development and Transmission Committee in the next two years. Cory Mock, D-Grand Forks, sponsored the study bill. He said, “This study is a vital first step to future-proof our energy industry.”
     Mock said it is important to consider nuclear power as coal-fired power plants age and reach the end of their life cycle. This is especially true considering the average age of coal power plants in the state is over forty-five years.
     Shock said that SMRs discussion have come up over the years at PSC. However, concerns have been raised. ND would like to have a cost-effective, developed technology ready to deploy instead of creating something new. Another aspect is long term storage of spent nuclear fuel. This has been a costly regulatory problem for other nuclear power providers. That being said, nuclear power will likely need to be on the table in the coming years.
     Shock mentioned that renewable energy resources, natural gas and battery storage can’t fully ensure grid reliability. He added “There’s really no future reliable energy that can happen without that piece of the puzzle.”