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Geiger Readings for Aug 25, 2017
Ambient office = 151 nanosieverts per hourAmbient outside = 123 nanosieverts per hourSoil exposed to rain water = 119 nanosieverts per hourCarrot from Central Market = 118 nanosieverts per hourTap water = 89 nanosieverts per hourFilter water = 82 nanosieverts per hour -
Nuclear Weapons 301 – Chi Yupeng, Chinese Businessman Changed With Evading Trade Sanctions With North Korea
I have blogged previously that some Chinese companies are clandestinely supplying critical technology to the North Koreans for their nuclear weapons program. The U.S. is working to identify those companies and impose sanctions on them to discourage their support of N.K. Now the U.S. has brought a lawsuit against a Chinese businessman who has major ties to North Korean trade.
Chi Yupeng has a network of companies that has imported over seven hundred million tons of N.K. coal into China. In return for the N.K. coal, Chi’s companies exported a variety of product to N.K. including cell phones, sugar and luxury items. But that is not all that N.K. received from Chi. According to the U.S. lawsuit, Chi also exported components for missiles and nuclear devices.
Chi’s companies have been involved with almost ten percent of the trade between China and N.K. One of his companies, named Dandong Zhicheng Metallic Material (DZMM) imported more N.K. coal than any other Chinese company. In 2016 alone, this trade was worth two hundred and thirty four million dollars.
The N.K. government has a special department known as “Office 39” that is responsible for a reserve of money under the control of Kim. Coal exports to China have played a major role in the expansion of the N.K. nuclear weapons program. A defector from N.K. says that the N.K. military has control of the quantity of coal that is produced and exported by N.K. He also said that Kim dedicates over ninety five percent of the revenues from coal exports in to the N.K. military nuclear weapons program. The defector went on to say that Chi was one of a small circle of foreigners that N.K. relies upon for access to global financial services.
Trade sanctions against N.K. imposed by the U.S. and the U.N. Security Council have been increasing since 2006. The international media would have you believe that N.K. has been effectively isolated from world trade. China announced the official end of their coal trade with N.K. last February but it turns out that DZMM coal trade with N.K. continued up until June of this year.
With the help of informants and defectors, the U.S. has documented the abuse of the sanctions by Chi and has filed suit seeking the direct forfeiture of four million dollars held in U.S. bank accounts and a hundred million dollars in penalties.
Chi used a variety of methods to evade sanctions. Some of the transactions involved moving money around but those were vulnerable to scrutiny by investigators. So in other cases, Chi used barter, sending consumer goods and weapon and missile components back to N.K. in direct exchange for shipments of coal with no money involved. Chi also used front companies to evade sanctions. In this way, Chi could carry out sanctioned transactions through the international financial system because the companies doing the business had different names.
This new U.S. lawsuit against a major supporter to the N.K. weapons program may finally have a major impact on the expansion of that program.
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Nuclear News Roundup Aug 24, 2017
RUSSIAN bombers have been flown on a huge drill through East Asia, sparking panic in a region already on edge due to North Korean chaos. Espress.co.uk
Exelon Corp. has laid off 296 contract workers at its three nuclear power plants in Pennsylvania, though it says those workers will be hired back under a new contractor. Stateimpact.npr.org
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Geiger Readings for Aug 24, 2017
Ambient office = 117 nanosieverts per hourAmbient outside = 167 nanosieverts per hourSoil exposed to rain water = 159 nanosieverts per hourCelery from Central Market = 86 nanosieverts per hourTap water = 86 nanosieverts per hourFilter water = 77 nanosieverts per hour -
Nuclear Reactors 296 – Nuclear Power In The U.S. Is Just Not Competitive.docx
I have often remarked that of all the arguments against nuclear power, in the end it will be its failure to be a competitive source of energy that will kill it. Not one single nuclear power project in the history of the U.S. nuclear industry was constructed on time and in budget. A new recent report by Bloomberg New Energy Finance (BNEF) provides more detail about the failure of nuclear energy to compete with other sources.
The BEFG states that over half of all the existing U.S. power plants are “bleeding cash.” Old plants are too expensive to operate and maintain and new plants are simply too expensive to construct without heavy subsidies from the federal and/or state governments.
This month, the construction of two nuclear power reactors in South Carolina at the V.C. Summer nuclear power plant was cancelled after eating up nine billion dollars. The original cost estimate was eleven and a half billion dollars. The intended start date for operations was 2018. When the project was cancelled, the estimated cost had more than doubled to twenty five million dollars and the earliest estimated operational date was in 2021. As is often the case with such cancelled projects, the rate payers will have to absorb some of the cost.
In George at the Vogtle nuclear power plant, the last two nuclear power reactors under construction in the U.S. are having serious problems. The original cost estimate for the project was fourteen billion dollars but now that estimate has swelled to twenty five billion dollars and the completion date has been push back by four years. The developers on the project are “are seeking more federal support for the project, potentially increasing a record $8.3 billion loan guarantee it has already been promised.” The Department of Energy has already denied a request from the South Carolina project for a three billion dollar subsidy so the prospects for federal support for the Vogtle project are dim.
Given the massive cost overruns of the V.C. Summer and the Vogtle projects, it is unlikely that any new nuclear power reactors will be built in the U.S. in the near future.
The owners of existing nuclear power reactors are struggling to pay for their continued operation and maintenance. They are trying to get states to subsidize their reactors on the basis of their low-carbon footprint which will help mitigate climate change. While New York and Illinois have chosen to provide requested support and some other states are considering it, there are states such as Ohio which have rejected such subsidies.
With the abundant cheap oil and natural gas as well as the falling cost of renewables such as wind and solar, the rising costs of maintenance and construction for nuclear power reactors would seem to spell doom for the U.S. nuclear industry.
The U.S. is not the only country struggling to keep its nuclear industry afloat. France gets about seventy five percent of its electricity from nuclear reactors although there are recommendations from the new president that that share be reduced to fifty percent. France has a major nuclear reactor construction firm that is partly government owed. Even with government support, a new reactor build project is behind schedule and over budget.
Russia and China have plans for the massive build up of domestic nuclear power reactors and plans to sell many nuclear power reactors abroad. However, recently both countries have begun to express doubts that they will be able to sell as many nuclear power reactors as had been planned. It appears that the global nuclear power industry is in decline.
V.C. Summers Nuclear Generating Station in South Carolina:
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Geiger Readings for Aug 23, 2017
Ambient office = 107 nanosieverts per hourAmbient outside = 95 nanosieverts per hourSoil exposed to rain water = 81 nanosieverts per hourYellow bell pepper from Central Market = 119 nanosieverts per hourTap water = 79 nanosieverts per hourFilter water = 73 nanosieverts per hour -
Nuclear Weapons 300 – Concerns Over Plutonium Production in Japan, China and South Korea
Plutonium-239 and Uranium-235 are used to create nuclear warheads. Nuclear reactors generate plutonium as the nuclear fuel is burned. Plutonium can be extracted from the spent nuclear fuel. Expanding capacity to purify plutonium in Japan, China and South Korea is of great concern with respect to the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Japan has been working on a plutonium production plant at Rokkasho for twenty five years. They have had many problems there and have only refined small amounts of plutonium. Now they have announced that they are going to greatly expand production beginning in 2018. They intend to produce about eighteen thousand pounds of plutonium a year. The intended purpose of this ramp up in production is to create fuel for their nuclear reactors and one fast breeder reactor. However, they have only restarted five of their power reactors since all were shut down following the disaster at Fukushima in 2011 and they have shut down their only fast breeder reactor. This means that if they carry out their plan, thousands of pounds of plutonium generated by the Rokkasho plant will accumulate before it is needed. Each year’s production of plutonium at Rokkasho could be used to make one thousand nuclear warheads should Japan decide to invest in a nuclear arsenal.
China has ordered a plutonium production plant from France with the same capacity as the Japanese plant at Rokkasho. A massive public protest caused China to abandon the first site selected for construction of the plant but China is going to proceed with construction when a new site is found. They want to have the plant in operation by 2030. China plans to use the plutonium produced by the plant to fuel a fast breeder reactor that it intends have operational between 2040 and 2050. This means that China will be producing about eighteen thousand pounds of plutonium a year for ten years before it will be needed to fuel the reactor. Ten thousand nuclear warheads could be produced with that plutonium. China has chosen to maintain only a few hundred nuclear warheads in its arsenal but should its nuclear policies change, it could greatly expand its stock of nuclear warheads with the plutonium from the plant.
South Korea has an arrangement with the U.S. that prohibits it from refining spent nuclear fuel from the U.S. to produce plutonium. They are not happy about that and point out Japan is allowed to reprocess spent nuclear fuel. The new S.K. President is against nuclear power and plutonium production but he won the presidency with only forty percent of the vote over a candidate who said that he wanted to secure permission to refine spent nuclear fuel. There are opposition parties in S.K. who have openly said that they would like S.K. to have their own nuclear weapons as a counter balance to the nuclear weapons possessed by North Korea.
These three countries in Southeast Asia are suspicious of their neighbors. Japan is worried about China’s nuclear arsenal. China is concerned that either Japan or South Korea might gain nuclear weapons. South Korea is worried about N.K. and China. It would be best for the U.S. to do everything it can to convince all three of these countries to give up reprocessing spent nuclear fuel for plutonium. Many citizens of each country are against such reprocessing. Reprocessing does not really make much economic sense for and of the three countries. If one starts piling up excess plutonium, it might lead the other two to do the same, increasing the possibility that such plutonium might find its way into nuclear weapons.
Rokkasho reprocessing plant in Japan:
