A new study by a Pakistan think-tank claims India has the capacity to produce between 356 and 492 nuclear bombs. The study, titled “Indian Unsafeguarded Nuclear Program,” comes amid growing hostilities between India and Pakistan, which continues to result in the loss of lives along the boundary dividing the disputed region of Kashmir. ibtimes.com

South African Finance Deputy Minister Mcebisi Jonas told the media on Wednesday that the Treasury department will continue to play a role in the planning of the nuclear procurement program. Treasury will ensure it protects South Africa’s fiscal integrity with regard to South Africa’s nuclear procurement plan. businesstech.co.za

Unit 1 of the Novovoronezh II nuclear power plant is now operating at full power. Russia’s first VVER-1200 reactor was connected to the grid on 4 August and Rosatom announced the latest milestone today, following its new director general’s working visit to the plant yesterday. world-nuclear-news.org

Exelon expects to achieve “clarity” before the end of the year over the future of its nuclear plants in the states of New York and Illinois, president and CEO Chris Crane said yesterday. world-nuclear-news.org

 

 

Part One of Two Parts

      I have blogged before about China’s nuclear ambitions. They have expressed the intent to build dozens of new reactors in the coming decades. I was at a pro-nuclear presentation last night and one of the presenters said that he heard a rumor that the Chinese wanted to build a thousand new reactors. There is horrible air pollution in China from coal fired power plants and the Chinese are desperate to stop burning coal. They are looking to nuclear technology not only for internal energy needs but also as a major export product for their country. While the government is very supportive of nuclear technology, the Chinese public is not so enthusiastic.

       Now it is being reported that China has only started one new nuclear power plant this year. This suggests that their goal of building fifty eight gigawatts of new nuclear power capacity by 2020 might be too ambitious. China currently has about thirty gigawatts of nuclear capacity and another twenty under construction. Considering that it takes up to five years to build a nuclear power plant, at the moment it looks like they will fall at least seven gigawatts short of their 2020 goal.

        All of the power plants which started construction between 2008 and 2010 are now online except for six reactors that are being imported from foreign sources. Westinghouse, a subsidiary of Japan’s Toshiba, is providing four AP1000 reactors. France’s Areva is supplying two European Pressurized Reactors. These six plants are expected to be completed in 2017 which is at least three years behind schedule.

       The two Areva EPRs have been delayed by a series of issues involving quality control and project planning. EPR plants which are being built in Finland and France are nine and six years behind schedule. It appears the complexity of the EPR design is making it difficult to construct these new reactors in the time being allocated for that task.

       The four AP1000 reactors are being constructed by the China State Nuclear Power Technology Company (SNPTC). This company has never constructed a nuclear reactor before. The projects are running behind schedule partly due to continuing design changes being issued by Westinghouse. They have had serious problems with reactor coolant pumps and the squib valves.

       Currently, it appears that China will be the first country to actually complete the construction of the new AP1000 and EPR reactor designs. China will have to create and test new procedures for bringing the plants online and monitoring their operation. The vendors will be involved in the creation of procedures but Chinese regulators will have to approve them. As of 2014 there had been little progress in developing such procedures for the AP1000s and the EPRs.

      China will be reluctant to purchase more AP1000s until at least one of the AP1000s under construction is finished and successfully put into service. China has no plans to buy any more EPR reactors. Chinese nuclear technology companies are working on their own gigawatt reactor designs called the ACP1000 and the ACPR1000 which are based on an older reactor design from Areva.

Please read Part Two.

Saudi Arabia and Kazakhstan have signed an agreement to cooperate in the peaceful use of nuclear energy. The agreement was signed in Riyadh yesterday during a visit by Kazakhstan President Nursultan Nazarbayev. world-nuclear-news.org

The growth of China’s nuclear power industry will make it the world’s biggest in 15 years, the World Nuclear Association (WNA) said on Tuesday. re.com

Nuclear power will come to an end in the U.S. if the industry doesn’t get more government support, according to Carlyle Group LP, one of the world’s largest investment firms. bloomberg.com

Exelon Corp. said its third-quarter earnings fell 22%, as the energy company saw decreased capacity prices and more write-downs related to the decommissioning of nuclear plants. wsj.com

 

 

       The threat of North Korean nuclear weapons has been in the news a lot. I have blogged about North Korea before. They have a few nuclear warheads and are working on building more. They are busy working on missiles to carry their nuclear warheads. There have been numerous threats by the N.K. regime to use nuclear weapons against South Korea, the U.S. and other neighboring countries. The international community has attempted different measure to deal with N.K. including trade sanctions and multinational negotiations none of which have stopped the N.K. nuclear program. There are contingency plans for U.S. marines to carry out a surgical strike on the N.K. nuclear facilities if the current situations deteriorates. However, an analyst believes that such an action could start a war with China.

       China is N.K.’s only ally. China have been N.K.’s principle trading partner since the Korean War and has repeatedly come to the aid of N.K. in difficult times. They have had a military defense treaty since 1961 which would obligate China to respond if N.K. was attacked. China is playing a dangerous game of tightrope in its continued support of N.K. and its desire to have beneficial relations with other countries in the area. Other nations have tried to pressure China to force N.K. to moderate its rhetoric and actions with limited success.

       ” 38 North is a Web site, blog, and think tank about North Korea; it is a program of the U.S.-Korea Institute at Johns Hopkins University’s Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies and is authored by certain faculty members and by guest commentators.” (Wikipedia)

       John Drury, a China expert, recently wrote a report on the N.K. situation for the 38 North. He said “If the United States launches a pre-emptive strike not to prevent a specific, imminent missile attack, but rather to prevent North Korea from perfecting an intercontinental nuclear strike capability, it is unlikely to meet Beijing’s standard for jus ad bellum (right to war). On the contrary, a strike of this nature could likely drive Beijing to side with the North in accordance with their 1961 treaty. ‘Surgery’ would rapidly descend into a bloodbath. ‘Pre-emption’ would start a war.”

      He went on to say that N.K. recently touted the 1961 defense treaty with China and claimed that it was on “firm legal ground.” China apparently believes that sanctions and threats of military action will not affect the N.K. regime and that diplomatic measures are the best (and perhaps the only) way to get N.K. to abandon the development of its nuclear arsenal and warhead delivery systems. China is betting that helping N.K. economic development and working to integrate N.K. into the association of neighboring countries will moderate N.K.s militaristic impulses and actions.

      Drury believes that “If the next US president adopts an engagement strategy, Xi Jinping’s government would likely step up its own work to achieve short-term breakthroughs and long-term solutions. Paradoxically, Washington’s best chance of getting China to apply constructive pressure on its errant neighbor is through a major U.S. initiative to negotiate with Kim Jong-un.”

North Korea:

Divers are carrying out underwater work in the former cooling ponds at the Dungeness A nuclear power plant in a first for UK nuclear decommissioning. Magnox intends to roll out the technique, which brings safety and environmental benefits, to other decommissioning sites. world-nuclear-news.org

A small amount of radioactive iodine was released into the environment yesterday during an incident involving the handling of test fuel in the reactor hall of the Halden research reactor in Norway. world-nuclear-news.org

Efforts to convince North Korea to give up its nuclear program and “denuclearize” the Korean Peninsula are bound to fail, US Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said Tuesday. scmp.com

The cost of cleaning up Tokyo Electric Power’s wrecked Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant may rise to several billion dollars a year, the Japanese government said on Tuesday, adding that it would look into a possible separation of the nuclear business from the utility. reuters.com

Plans to allow China to build another new nuclear power station in the UK will “evaporate” in the wake of the predicted failure to bring online its next one – built by France and financed by China – because of financial and technology issues. sputniknews.com

In a rare move for power-hungry Asia, the Taiwanese government has decided to abolish nuclear power generation by 2025 to meet the public’s demand for a nuclear-free society following the Fukushima nuclear disaster. asahi.com

Ukraine is going to start active phase of construction works at its Centralized Spent Fuel Storage Facility (CSFSF) in the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant Zone of Alienation in March 2017, the press service of Ukraine’s Energoatom nuclear corporation said on Monday. sputniknews.com

Problems with adopting nuclear power in Singapore. straitstimes.com