Blog
-
Geiger Readings for Jun 22, 2017
Ambient office = 75 nanosieverts per hourAmbient outside = 76 nanosieverts per hourSoil exposed to rain water = 79 nanosieverts per hourAvocado from Central Market = 70 nanosieverts per hourTap water = 93 nanosieverts per hourFilter water = 76 nanosieverts per hour -
Nuclear Reactors 293 – Russia Holds Nineth Annual AtomExpo International Forum in Moscow
Russia held its Ninth AtomExpo International Forum in Moscow this week. The annual nuclear trade show is billed as the “largest exhibition venue for meetings and negotiations between world leaders of the nuclear power sector. The Forum has traditionally included an exhibition of leading Russian and international companies of the nuclear power sector and an extensive business program with participation of corporation executives, top managers of international companies and international-level experts. The goal of the Forum is to promote international cooperation between the Russian Federation and the countries of Latin America, Pacific Asia, Africa, Central and Eastern Europe in the field of nuclear power, and to discuss Russia’s proposal on developing national energy programs.” (Event website)
Rosatom, the Russian owned nuclear company always announces the signing of a lot of agreements at these events. Often, large sums of money are mentioned in conjunctions with the signings but the actual documents are usually Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which express the intent to work together on nuclear energy projects and are not real contracts. This year such MoUs were announced with Ethiopia, Sudan and Uganda.
TVEL, Rosatom’s nuclear fuel subsidiary, signed a contract for thirty million dollars with the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran to supply a batch of nuclear fuel for the new Bushehr nuclear power plant.
Rosatom and the Nuclear Energy Agency of the European Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development signed an agreement for the translation of NEA documents into Russian. This will allow Russian nuclear agencies and companies to access reference and analytical documents from the NEA.
Rosatom signed a MoU with the Areva, the French owned utility company, to cooperate in fuel fabrication, automated process control systems, as well as maintenance of equipment and machinery for nuclear power plants.
Rosatom signed a MoU with Hungary’s MVM Ltd to improve cooperation in the maintenance, service and fuel supply of the Paks nuclear power plant in Hungary. The MoU also said that the two companies wanted to cooperate in developing nuclear power plants in Russia and other countries.
Rusatom Service signed a two year contract with MVM Paks nuclear power plant for technical support and scheduled maintenance on the main circulating pumps at the plant.
Rusatom International Network and Kazakhstan’s Antares Group signed a MoU for the companies to cooperate on the use of nuclear power in the medical and agricultural sectors, as well as cooperation in the supply of isotope products to Kazakhstan.
Rusatom International Network signed a MoU with the International Investment Bank to implement Rosatom’s projects in nuclear medicine, radiation technology applications, and the construction and maintenance of nuclear power plants. The two entities are interested in creating bilateral cooperation in Bulgaria, Hungary, Vietnam, Cuba, Mongolia, Russia, Romania, the Slovak Republic and the Czech Republic.
ASE group signed a MoU with SAP, the software developer, to cooperating in the creation of software for the management of the life-cycle of nuclear power plants. The intent is to create a “Competence Centre for Automation of Engineering Activities.” The project will bring data technologies such as Big Data analytics to the construction of nuclear power plants.
-
Geiger Readings for Jun 21, 2017
Ambient office = 94 nanosieverts per hourAmbient outside = 143 nanosieverts per hourSoil exposed to rain water = 135 nanosieverts per hourCelery from Central Market = 74 nanosieverts per hourTap water = 124 nanosieverts per hourFilter water = 109 nanosieverts per hour -
Nuclear News Roundup Jun 21 2017
The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued a notice of non-conformance to Westinghouse over concerns about quality assurance (QA) at its Mangiarotti subsidiary. World-nuclear-news.org
The Western Australian government has imposed a ban on future uranium mining leases, but says it will not stand in the way of four uranium projects approved by the state’s previous government. World-nuclear-news.org
-
Nuclear Weapons 285 – Los Alamos National Laboratory Problems May Halt Work On Plutonium Cores For Nuclear Weapons
The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DMFSB) is an independent agency of the U.S. federal government. The Board was created in 1988 to oversee the nuclear weapons complex administered by the U.S. Department of Energy. The most important duty of the Board is the “responsibility of providing recommendations and advice to the President and the Secretary of Energy regarding public health and safety issues at Department of Energy (DoE) defense nuclear facilities. The Board reviews and evaluates the content and implementation of health and safety standards, as well as other requirements, relating to the design, construction, operation, and decommissioning of the Department’s defense nuclear facilities. The Board consists of five members appointed by the President for staggered five-year terms.” (Board website)
The Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) is a U.S. DoE national laboratory that was created during World War II to develop nuclear weapons as part of the Manhattan Project. It is located near Sante Fe, New Mexico. “Today, Los Alamos is one of the largest science and technology institutions in the world. It conducts multidisciplinary research in fields such as national security, space exploration, nuclear fusion, renewable energy, medicine, nanotechnology, and supercomputing.” (Wikipedia)
In mid-April of this year, a fire broke out in the PF-4 plutonium building of the Lab. Lab officials said that the fire was put out quickly with a fire extinguisher. A lab spokesman said that the fire was likely caused by “pyrophoric materials and compounds [that] can spontaneously overheat in the presence of oxygen.” There were only minor injuries reports. Several fingers of an employee were burned and the burns were treated at the Los Alamos Medical Center.
The PF-4 building is located in Technical Area 55. This is where the main processing of radioactive plutonium takes place. Small cores of plutonium also referred to as plutonium pits are constructed there. These cores are used to initiate nuclear bomb explosions.
The PF-4 building was shut down for a day. The New Mexico Environmental Department issued emergency authorization for the Lab to destroy unstable hazardous waste which was discovered in one of the labs of PF-4. The waste consisted of about a pound of lanthanum nickel powder which is used to make fuel cells. The waste was said to “pose an imminent and substantial health and safety risk.” The Lab is still assessing whether there was any connection between the waste and the fire.
Over the past few years last year, there have been DNFSB reports of multiple problems at the Lab. These problems include substandard fire protection, concerns about seismic stability and failures in its nuclear criticality program. If there was an earthquake, the aging sprinkler system of PF-4 might not be able to function properly in the event of a fire. In March, the DNFSB sent a letter to the Secretary of Energy expressing its concerns with problems at LANL. Following the fire, the DNFSB said that it would hold a hearing in June to “discuss the future of the Lab.”
The Trump administration wants to increase production of plutonium pits as part of the modernization program for the U.S. nuclear arsenal. Given the recent problems at the LANL, the question has been raised of whether or not the LANL can be relied upon to produce the pits safely.
-
Geiger Readings for Jun 20, 2017
Ambient office = 129 nanosieverts per hourAmbient outside = 117 nanosieverts per hourSoil exposed to rain water = 119 nanosieverts per hourRedleaf lettuce from Central Market = 103 nanosieverts per hourTap water = 89 nanosieverts per hourFilter water = 80 nanosieverts per hour -
Nuclear Reactors 293 – Nuclear Power Facing Serious Problems In the United States
Nuclear power in the United States is in trouble. The U.S. currently has ninety nine operational nuclear power plants that supply about twenty percent of the electricity in the U.S. Many of the plants are approaching or have passed their original licensed life-span of forty years. Five plants have closed in the last four years. Six more plants are scheduled to close in the next five years. Some of these plants were or are closing prematurely before their licenses expire because they cannot compete.
Part of the reason for premature closures is the availability of cheap natural gas made possible by fracking which releases natural gas from shale formations. New efficient natural gas plants are cheaper than new nuclear reactors. The federal wholesale energy market promotes the cheapest sources of electricity such as natural gas plants and demotes more expensive sources such as nuclear plants.
Exelon is the biggest electrical utility company in the U.S. Text on the Exelon website says “The future of America’s 99 nuclear reactors is uncertain. In the next two decades, key economic and policy challenges threaten to close about half of America’s reactors. As America’s largest nuclear fleet operator, we’re working hard to reverse this trend. In total, Exelon currently employs more than 12,000 workers across its nuclear fleet, and the fate of its 14 nuclear reactors is uncertain.”
The Nuclear Energy Institute is the lead trade association for the nuclear power industry. They argue that supporting nuclear power production is a matter of national security and not just economics. The NEI is frustrated by what it perceives as a lack of timely response to the problems of the industry on the part of the federal government.
An NEI spokesman said “The market-driven challenges confronting the U.S. nuclear industry do imperil numerous plants with premature retirement, and losing more plants means that our long-standing global leadership with the technology we founded is at risk. This has fundamental national security implications. We cannot credibly claim global leadership while our domestic fleet shrinks.”
The NEI did not have much success arousing the concern of the federal government under President Obama. They are now working on getting the new Trump administration to support nuclear power more aggressively. While Commerce Secretary Wilber Ross and Energy Secretary Rick Perry have both said that nuclear power is critical to national security, the NEI does not expect much because the national government has always been slow to change energy policy. The NEI hopes that individual states will provide short-term solution to nuclear energy issues.
Both Illinois and New York have recently decided to provide subsidies for their nuclear power plants to prevent their closure. However, natural gas plant owners have filed lawsuits against such subsidies as being unfair to other sources of energy. Exelon and other nuclear power plant operators are appealing to the Federal Energy Regulatory Agency on the grounds that reduced carbon emissions from nuclear power plants aid in the fight against climate change.
There are also issues with the cost of prematurely decommissioning nuclear power plant that might cause problems for state budgets. The U.S. has no permanent repository for spent nuclear fuel and decommissioning a nuclear power plant would mean emptying the spent fuel pool and finding someplace to put the spent fuel. If the spent fuel is allowed to remain at the shutter plant, it could pose a serious security threat to the surrounding region.
Whether nuclear power plants continue to operate or are prematurely closed, the cost of building, operating or decommissioning a nuclear power will keep rising. It would be best for the U.S. and the rest of the world to stop building nuclear power plants and to close the operating nuclear power plants.
