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 = 100 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 100 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 103 nanosieverts per hour
Pumpkin from Central Market = 93 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 91 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 80 nanosieverts per hour
Part 1 of 2 Parts
Global nuclear generating capacity is expected to increase from four hundred and sixteen gigawatts in 2023 to six hundred and forty-seven gigawatts in 2050 in a scenario based on existing energy policies, according to the latest World Energy Outlook from the International Energy Agency (IEA).
Fatih Birol is the IEA Executive Director. She announced the release of its latest World Energy Outlook together with lead authors Tim Gould and Laura Cozzi. “Today’s geopolitical tensions and fragmentation are creating major risks both for energy security and for global action on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The world is set to enter a new energy market context in the coming years, marked by continued geopolitical hazards but also by relatively abundant supply of multiple fuels and technologies.”
Birol added, “In the second half of this decade, the prospect of more ample – or even surplus – supplies of oil and natural gas, depending on how geopolitical tensions evolve, would move us into a very different energy world from the one we have experienced in recent years during the global energy crisis.”
Based on current policies, the latest IAE report finds that low-carbon sources are set to generate more than half of the world’s electricity before 2030. Demand for all three fossil fuels, coal, oil and gas, is still projected to peak by the end of the decade. However, the report warns that despite growing momentum behind clean energy transitions, the world is still a long way from meeting its net-zero goals.
The World Energy Outlook 2024 report considers three scenarios. The Stated Policies Scenario (STEPS) supplies a prediction based on the latest policy settings, including energy, climate and related industrial policies. The Announced Pledges Scenario (APS) makes the assumption that all national energy and climate targets made by governments are met in full and on time. The Net Zero Emissions by 2050 Scenario (NZE) reports on what must be done to limit global warming to one and a half °C.
In the STEPS scenario, clean energy deployment accelerates as the pace of overall energy demand growth slows, which is leading to a peak in all three fossil fuels before 2030. Increasing reductions in coal demand indicates that it is overtaken by natural gas in the global energy mix by 2030. Clean energy sources grow more than total energy demand between 2023 and 2035. Clean energy becomes the largest source of energy in the mid-2030s led by surging solar photovoltaic (PV) and wind power.
The STEPS scenario suggests a triple increase in renewable sources that reduces fossil fuel use from eighty percent of total energy demand in 2023 to fifty eight percent in 2050. This falls far short of the step change that occurs in the APS scenario and the NZE scenario. In both of these scenarios, renewable sources begin to rapidly grow at the expense of the fossil fuel market share. By 2035, clean energy meets forty percent of global energy demand in the APS. This rises to nearly three-quarters by 2050. In the NZE scenario, clean energy meets ninety percent of global energy demand in 2050. Around one-third of the remaining fossil fuel demand in the NZE scenario is fully replaced, around half is used as a feedstock or in other non-energy use. The remainder is offset by direct air capture, negative emissions from bioenergy or other forms of carbon removal.
Please read Part 2 next
Ambient office = 110 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 89 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 91 nanosieverts per hour
Roma tomato from Central Market = 100 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 103 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 89 nanosieverts per hour
Virginia considers small nuclear reactor at Lake Anna to meet growing power demand wusa9.com
Mattis feared Trump would order a surprise nuclear strike militarytimes.com
Tc-99m shortage expected into November auntminnie.com
An Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities could backfire aljezeera.com
Part 2 of 2 Parts (Please read Part 1 first)
It’s not clear how long the shelf life is for recommissioning a limited number of shuttered nuclear sites. That’s leaving the door open for still-unproven small modular reactors. Critics note that we still haven’t solved the radioactive waste problem that raised concerns during nuclear’s first golden era.
Rich Powell is the CEO of the Clean Energy Buyers Association. The association represents some of the country’s biggest commercial power customers including Amazon, Google, Meta and Microsoft. Powell said, “But I think it’s fair to say that folks are taking a hard look at every one of them that would be technically possible to restart.”
Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh defended the court’s decision to scrap the Chevron deference as a move to restore balance between the executive and legislative branches. Speaking recently at Catholic University’s Columbus School of Law in Washington, Kavanaugh said that the longstanding deference to federal agencies’ interpretations of ambiguous laws had “put a thumb on the scale” in many legal battles over issues from the environment to health care to immigration.
Kavanaugh continued, “What we did in Loper Bright, the chief justice’s opinion was, I think, a course correction consistent with the separation of powers to make sure that the executive branch is acting within the authorization granted to it by Congress.” Kavanaugh was appointed to the Supreme Court by former President Donald Trump in 2018. He warned against over-reading the Chevron ruling, which critics have said could shift power from agencies to judges.
Kavanaugh added that “It’s really important, as a neutral umpire, to respect the line that Congress has drawn, and when it’s granted broad authorization, not to unduly hinder the executive branch from performing its congressionally authorized functions — but at the same time, not allowing the executive branch, as it could with Chevron in its toolkit, to go beyond the congressional authorization.”
California Governor Gavin Newsom has entered the debate on an issue that had its moment in the culture war spotlight. He vetoed what would have been the nation’s first law mandating health risk labels on gas stoves. The legislation would have required warnings on gas stoves sold online to Californians starting next year and in stores starting in 2026.
Newsom said in a veto message, “This static approach falls short in enabling timely updates to the labeling content that should align with the latest scientific knowledge so that consumers are accurately informed about their purchases.” The proposed warnings about the possible health impacts of “toxic” pollutants drew opposition from home appliance manufacturers, builders and business groups. Similar appliance warning bills were defeated in New York and Illinois. Newsom signed legislation delaying by six months the timeline for implementing California’s nation-leading corporate climate disclosure laws.
The legal revision endorsed by the governor over the weekend gives state regulators until July 2025 to write the rules and make decisions on things like how much the filing fee should be for corporations disclosing their greenhouse gas emissions and climate-related financial risks. The new law also allows subsidiaries to compile their disclosures at the level of their parent company. The implementation delay is shorter than the two years that Newsom had been seeking and it doesn’t go as far as the California Chamber of Commerce wanted to go in weakening the disclosure regime. With the so-called cleanup legislation in place, all eyes will turn to the next biggest threat to the laws which is a federal lawsuit led by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that is set for a hearing Oct. 15.
Missiles roll across northwest Russia in test of nuclear unit English.arabiya.net
Putin says Ukrainian hints about nuclear bombs are pure provocation yahoo.com
Ukraine not considering nuclear weapons, says top official news.az
Iran’s Regime Pushes For Nuclear Weapons As It Faces Existential Crisis eurasianview.com
Ambient office = 102 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 98 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 100 nanosieverts per hour
Red bell pepper from Central Market = 158 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 97 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 81 nanosieverts per hour
Part 1 of 2 Parts
Nuclear power enjoyed popularity in the 1970s and many of the currently operating U.S. reactors date from that period. However, cost overruns, schedule delays and several serious nuclear accidents cooled that popularity in the following decades. In one of the more surprising comebacks in recent memory, nuclear power is back in the headlines. Its new popularity is being fueled by rising demand for clean energy.
Microsoft recently made headlines by announcing a deal with the operators of Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island to provide carbon-free fuel to help power its data centers. Three Mile Island was the site of the nation’s worst nuclear accident.
The Biden administration followed the Microsoft announcement on Monday by announcing that it has finalized a loan to reactivate the shuttered Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan over local objections. Representative Buddy Carter (R-Ga.) said “An American nuclear energy resurgence is beginning,” in a statement after the Microsoft deal was announced.
If that is true, the resurgence is being driven by the technology industry’s demand for clean energy to fuel artificial intelligence and data centers. These facilities are on track to take an increasing share of the nation’s overall power demand in coming years at a time when there is pressure to reduce reliance on fossil fuels.
Recent Gallup polls found that public support for nuclear energy is the highest it’s been in a decade. But public support by itself isn’t going to be enough to overcome the complications of reopening nuclear facilities that fell out of vogue decades ago or getting new plants built. This is especially true in light of the delays and cost overruns that plagued construction of the recently completed Vogtle project in Georgia.
But Big Tech money just might fuel the nuclear resurgence as cutting-edge companies push their AI dreams as climate positive. Meta has indicated support for nuclear power, and Amazon signed an agreement last March to buy a nuclear-powered data center.
The fact that nuclear’s comeback is being fueled by some of the world’s wealthiest corporations is raising concerns among some experts. David Hess is a former Pennsylvania secretary of environmental protection who lived a dozen miles away from Three Mile Island during its 1979 meltdown. He is particularly critical of the Microsoft deal. He commented that “Fundamentally, it’s 1960s technology. It’s the only U.S. design of a nuclear power plant that failed catastrophically. So people better go into this with their eyes open, especially because it’s being restarted not for public benefit, but for the private benefit of one company.”
Facing diminishing low-carbon options as solar and wind power continue to be brought online, states across the country are taking nuclear power seriously as a part of their energy plans. Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro wants a rapid permitting process to reopen Three Mile Island. Governor Kathy Hochul is talking up nuclear power in New York State. Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin is recommending nuclear power as a cornerstone of his energy agenda. And California Governor Gavin Newsom worked hard to save California’s last remaining nuclear plant.
Please read Part 2 next
Ambient office = 134 nanosieverts per hour
Ambient outside = 115 nanosieverts per hour
Soil exposed to rain water = 111 nanosieverts per hour
Potato from Central Market = 80 nanosieverts per hour
Tap water = 103 nanosieverts per hour
Filter water = 90 nanosieverts per hour
New debate ignited over Seoul’s right to nuclear reprocessing voanews.com
Ukraine ‘will seek nuclear weapons’ if it cannot join NATO telegraph.co.uk
DOE signs off on Oklo fuel fabrication facility design world-nuclear-news.org
Russia tells Israel to not even consider attacking Iranian nuclear facilities, TASS says reuters.com
