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.
The U.S. Export-Import Bank was created in 1934 by an executive order of the President. Its purpose is “financing and insuring foreign purchases of United States goods for customers unable or unwilling to accept credit risk. The mission of the Bank is to create and sustain U.S. jobs by financing sales of U.S. exports to international buyers.” Its charter was last extended to June 30th, 2015. If Congress does not act quickly, the charter will expire.
Supporters of the U.S. nuclear industry claim that the Ex-Im Bank must be rechartered in order for the U.S. to be able to compete in the international nuclear marketplace. They say that without the support of the Ex-Im Bank, U.S. nuclear companies cannot compete with the aggressive Russian marketing of nuclear technology because the Russian nuclear industry is heavily supported by the Russian government. Critics of these claims say that extending the Ex-Im Bank charter will just encourage corruption and make the U.S. taxpayers liable for corporate losses. They recommend that the U.S. government streamline export regulations for countries that want to purchase U.S. nuclear technology. They also say that U.S. companies must offer superior products and services at competitive prices.
Another claim made by the supporters of rechartering the Ex-Im Bank is that an export credit agency like the Ex-Im Bank is often made a requirement for bidding on international nuclear contracts. The say that if the U.S. does not have such an agency, then U.S. companies cannot bid for these contract. Opponents of the rechartering say that foreign buyers ask for such credit support just because it is available. U.S. companies, backed by private financing, already compete successfully for foreign nuclear business against government-supported companies of other nations.
Ex-Im Bank supporters say that uncertainty over the future of the Bank will make potentials buyers less confident about the purchase of U.S. nuclear technology. Critics point out that U.S. nuclear products and services are the world’s “gold standard” for the global nuclear market and they are not worried about the disappearance of the Bank hurting U.S. competitiveness. The critics say that it would be better for the U.S. nuclear industry to proceed on its own merits without be tied to the turbulence and uncertainty of political disputes over funding and chartering of government agencies.
Critics of the renewal of the Ex-Im Bank charter say that far from being critical to the flourishing of the U.S. nuclear export business, the U.S. government may, in fact, be an obstacle to the industry. They say that the current “commercial nuclear export regime is convoluted and burdensome and spread between three different federal agencies—all of which increases costs, imposes delays, and limits innovation.” They say that government subsidies create dependency in subsidized industries that actually undermines competitiveness.
Ultimately, the U.S. nuclear industry should be able to stand on its own without the need for taxpayer support which may disappear as political currents shift. The fears about other governments subsidizing their nuclear industries may be overblown. The Russian government is poised to substantially reduce its support for nuclear exporting companies in the near future. France’s nuclear export company, Areva, is in serious financial trouble. And Japan’s nuclear industry is still reeling from the aftermath of the Fukushima nuclear disaster.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Monday that it had approved the first step of “Project Aim,” a plan to downsize the agency to “meet the demands of an evolving work load, while maintaining its ability to project public health and safety.” nuclearstreet.com
In Iran nuclear negotiations, diplomats at odds over how to keep tabs on so-called undeclared facilities. latimes.com
John Quiggin is an Australian economics professor at the University of Queensland. He recently posted an article on his blog that he intends to ultimately submit to the Southern Royal Commission considering the nuclear fuel cycle. The proposed submission contains his analysis of the best choices for nuclear reactor technology if Australia wants to add nuclear reactors to the national grid. The main question his article asks is whether there are commercial nuclear reactors currently on the market or projected to be available in the next twenty years that can be constructed and integrated into the Australian national electrical market as a good source of electric power generation.
Quiggin states that for a developed country like Australia, obsolete Generation II and early Generation III reactor designs are not appropriate. He also rules out reactors from ” middle-income and less developed countries with inadequate safety standards.” He explicitly mentions Russia and China by name as examples.
Quiggin focuses on Generation III + or the most recent Generation III nuclear reactor designs from the United States, European or Japanese companies. He says that any reactor design being considered should have “a substantial record of safe and economical operation.” He warns against Australia considering the purchase of any “leading edge” or “first of a kind” designs because it is impossible to estimate the risks and Australia has no experience at all in operating and regulating a nuclear power plant.
Quiggin thinks that any reactor design under consideration should be able to document at least one hundred “reactor years of operation”. This means adding up the years of operation of all reactors with the same design to arrive at a crude estimation of the risks associated with that design. He points out that one hundred reactor years of operation is actually quite modest. If Australia builds ten reactors with licensed life spans of forty years, then the reactor years for all ten over forty years would be four hundred reactor years. If there was one accident for the one hundred reactors years that he is calling for, then Australia could expect four accidents in forty years with ten reactors.
Quiggin states that there are no Generation III+ reactor designs commercially available that can satisfy even these modest requirements. He does go on to say that the Westinghouse AP-1000 reactor design might be able to qualify within a few decades. It is projected that under current plans there should be eight AP-1000 reactors operating by 2020. If these plans are carried out successfully in spite of the usual cost overruns and scheduling delays common for nuclear reactor construction, then more AP-1000s will be built and brought online. Hopefully, the one hundred reactor hours required by Quiggin could be achieved for the AP-1000 design “sometime after 2030.”
The only possible competitors with the AP-1000 design are the EPR design from France’s Areva and the Candu Canadian design. However, with only a few EPRs under currently construction and no Candus, they would take so long to reach the one hundred reactor hours benchmark that they cannot be seriously considered by Australia. Any totally new reactor design would take decades to be developed, tested, licensed, sold and operated for the required one hundred reactor years and is not even worth considering.
Quiggin points out that the development of regulatory agencies and rules as well as process of site selection will impose serious delays in licensing and construction of Australian power reactors. Even a very aggressive construction program by Australia could not bring nuclear power online before 2040 and that is an optimistic estimate.
I think that Australian time and money could be much better spent on developing alternative energy sources. Wind power currently provides over a quarter of the electricity for the state of South Australia and use of wind power is rapidly expanding. Solar power utilization has only recently taken off in Australia but its potential is huge. Australia has been exploiting hydro power for decades with much room for expansion. Geothermal power could provide as much as 9% of Australia’s electricity by 2030. All things considered, it would be a waste of money and time to develop nuclear power in Australia.
