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.
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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.
Ambient office = 114 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 103 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 102 nanosieverts per hour
Jalapeno pepper from Central Market = 176 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 103 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 95 nanosieverts per hour
Part 1 of 2 Parts
One of the leading developers of small nuclear reactors in the U.S. is facing rising costs for a key project. This situation is potentially jeopardizing its future in a low-carbon power grid.
NuScale Power Corporation and Utah Associated Municipal Power System (UAMPS) are planning to start operation of the first of six small modular reactors (SMRs) in 2029. NuScale is the leader in a global competition to construct a new generation of SMRs that could provide a base of steady power to complement wind and solar energy on a zero-carbon grid. This project hopes to show that SMRs with factory-built components can avoid the huge cost overruns that have doomed the prospects of conventional reactors in the U.S.
Unfortunately, NuScale’s first SMR now faces much higher construction cost estimates. This has been caused by inflation and higher interest rates. If projected costs rise above fifty-eight dollars per megawatt-hour, it would trigger a make or break vote on the project as early as next month from the project’s anchor customers.
LaVarr Webb is a UAMPS spokesperson. He said that analysts are getting bids from vendors for construction and “counting every nut and bolt.” Webb would not speculate about the size of the increase. However, he said, “we do know it will go up substantially.”
This development comes as another advanced nuclear reactor proposal from TerraPower for a demonstration prototype in Wyoming will likely be delayed for at least two years because of lack of access to highly enriched fuel in Russia. The delay prompted a letter from Senator John Barrasso (R-Wyo) to Senate Energy and Natural Resources Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) requesting that an oversight hearing on this issue be held in the Senate.
UAMPS is a Salt Lake City-based group of fifty municipal utilities in six Western States. Along with NuScale, they are developing the reactor project. The U.S. Department of Energy has established a cost sharing grant of up to one billion four hundred million dollars. The organization members can leave the project if costs go above fifty-eight dollars per megawatt.
At this time, UAMPS does not intend to exit, according to Webb. Unless and until its members say otherwise. Each of its utilities will make separate decisions on buying the project’s electricity. If many of the utilities ultimately opt out, the project could fail. In order to go forward, there must be buyers for all of the SMR’s electricity.
About seventy developers in the U.S. and six other countries are also working on SMRs. However, NuScale is the only developer whose design has been approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. NuScale plans to build six reactors in Idaho. The entire project could deliver four hundred and sixty-two megawatts in 2030 if all regulatory approvals come through and construction schedules are met.
However, NuScale has seen costs of construction materials skyrocket since the project was first greenlighted in 2020. The cost of fabricated steel plate has increased by fifty six percent. Carbon steel piping is a primary component of nuclear plants. The cost of piping is ninety percent higher. The reactor components constitute about one-third of the plant’s expected total costs.
Interest rates have risen sharply to their highest level in fourteen years. Chris Colbert is the CFO of NuScale. He said, “All that has impacted the cost of the plant. We’re all trying to figure out what to do with it.”
Those rising costs are also impacting NuScale’s competitors in the wind and solar industry. Webb said, “We’re seeing cost increases for all forms of generation. Our member participants feel like they need baseload, dispatchable, always-available energy to back up renewable power.”
Please read Part 2 next
Ambient office = 105 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 107 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 112 nanosieverts per hour
Grape from Central Market = 106 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 119 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 111 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient office = 87 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 100 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 93 nanosieverts per hour
English cucumbers from Central Market = 73 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 99 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 89 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient office = 121 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 103 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 108 nanosieverts per hour
Blueberry from Central Market = 76 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 91 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 79 nanosieverts per hour
Dover Sole from Central = 93 nanosieverts per hour
The U.K. Space Agency and the National Nuclear Laboratory are collaborating to create the world’s first space battery powered by americium-241. The isotope will be extracted from spent nuclear fuel stored at the Sellafield site in Cumbria.
Radioisotope power systems are sometimes referred to as nuclear batteries. The current technology uses plutonium-238 as a fuel. Radioisotope thermoelectric generators and radioisotope heater units can supply power and heat continuously over long missions into deep space. Pu-238 is made by irradiating neptunium-237. The Np-237 is recovered from research reactor fuel or special targets in research reactors. Pu-238 is only produced in small amounts in the U.S. and Russia. An alternative is urgently needed.
This NNL work is commissioned and funded by the U.K. Space Agency. It will be delivered in a new twenty-three million dollar laboratory at NNL’s flagship Central Laboratory on the Sellafield site in Cumbria. The new laboratory will be filled with next generation equipment and technology.
NNL said that it will deliver a sovereign supply of fuel for space batteries in the context of a global shortage. This will enable the U.K and its partners to pursue new space science and exploration mission.
The support from the U.K. Space Agency follows the U.K. record investment in the European Space Agency for a variety of new programs. One of the investments of this program is twenty-two million dollars for the European Devices Using Radioisotope Energy (ENDURE) which will use radioisotopes to develop systems for warming and powering spacecraft.
NNL said that it had been working on this project since 2009 when its researchers first discovered that americium-241 is produced during the radioactive decay of spent nuclear fuel from commercial nuclear power reactors. The isotope emits power for four hundred years. In 2019, NNL and the University of Leicester announced that they had generated usable electricity from americium. This achievement was a major step towards potential use of americium in space batteries.
With the plentiful supply of Am-241 at Sellafield, the new collaboration “will turn a proven scientific concept into a fully-realized technology”, the collaborators said. The Am-241-powered space battery is expected to be operational within the next four years. It is likely to be used first on the European Space Agency’s Argonaut mission to the Moon and for future missions into deep spaced.
George Freeman is the U.K. Science Minister. He said, “Being able to offer a globally unique supply of americium-241 will encourage investment and unlock growth opportunities for all sorts of UK industries looking to explore nuclear energy.”
Tim Tinsley is the account director for this project at NNL. He said, “For the past 50 years, space missions have used plutonium-238 to stop spacecrafts from freezing but it is in very limited supply. At NNL we have identified significant reserves of americium-241, a radioisotope with similar properties to plutonium-238 but game-changing potential for the UK’s space ambitions. This work, which is being made possible through the support of UK Space Agency, will see us applying decades of experience in separating and purifying used nuclear material in order to unlock great public benefits, and it goes to the heart of our purpose of nuclear science to benefit society.”
Paul Bate is the CEO of U.K. Space Agency. He said, “This innovative method to create americium to power space missions will allow us not only to sustain exploration of the Moon and Mars for longer periods of time, but to venture further into space than ever before. Supporting the National Nuclear Laboratory’s expansion will make the UK the only country in the world capable of producing this viable alternative to plutonium, reducing the global space community’s reliance on limited supplies, which are increasingly difficult and costly to obtain. The UK Space Agency is committed to keeping space activities sustainable, and this resourceful technology exploits otherwise unused waste plutonium biproducts without generating additional waste.”
Nuclear history in New Mexico celebrated in national stamp collection, despite impacts currentargus.com
