It is still possible to reach a nuclear deal with Iran, but new U.S. congressional sanctions could seriously undermine prospects for an agreement and end up isolating Washington instead of Tehran, the U.S. envoy to the United Nations said on Monday. news.yahoo.com

A leak of radioactive water from a tank at the Browns Ferry Nuclear Power Plant released tritium into the environment this week, but a TVA spokesman said Saturday the leak was quickly contained and presented no public risk. timesfreepress.com

US and UK Leaders to Meet Over Russia’s Role in Ukraine Conflict; Gorbachev Fears ‘Nuclear Catastrophe.’ au.ibitmes.com

While Indonesia’s first nuclear power plant, a prototype reactor, is under construction near Jakarta, the country’s Minister of Research, Technology and Higher Education Muhammad Nasir said that nuclear power represented clean energy at a cost more affordable than coal. nuclearstreet.com

 

The earthquake that set off the tsunami which caused the Fukushima nuclear plant disaster was unleashed by a stealthy nine-year buildup of pressure on a plate boundary, scientists said Tuesday. phys.org

On the verge of the new year, scientists from the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans issued the first systematic report of measurements on the spread of radioactive seawater from Japan’s damaged Fukushima nuclear reactor to the coast of British Columbia. macleans.ca

In another indication that cutting edge nuclear research is focusing on the race for affordable nuclear power plants, Martingale disclosed a liquid-fuel reactor design that it touts as able to solve global issues of poverty, pollution, energy security and climate destabilization. nuclearstreet.com

A Fitch Ratings report this week said that the electric generation capacity of the nuclear industry in the United States was slipping due to plants closing before their regulatory licensing.  time was up. nuclearstreet.com

         If nuclear power were just a matter of designing a safe, efficient nuclear reactor, then it might be a good choice for a source of power. Unfortunately, there are many other factors that play a role in the implementation of nuclear power. Economic, environmental, health, political, social and other factors relating to nuclear power must be assessed. The Westinghouse Electric Company’s AP-1000 is advertised as being one of the safest nuclear power reactors ever developed. While this is a great selling point for the AP-1000, there are other issues in the real world that it has to confront.

         Bulgaria is a small country in Eastern Europe on sits on the Black Sea. It was a part of the old Soviet Union. The Kozlodui nuclear power plant was opened in 1974 and was the first nuclear power plant in the Soviet Union outside of Russia. The Bulgarians are proud of Kozlodui and many in Bulgaria would like to find a way to keep it open. Critics say that the additional electricity is not needed and that Bulgaria would be wiser to improve their existing electricity infrastructure and efficiency of their industries.       

          When Bulgaria petitioned to join the European Union in 2007, one of the conditions was that it shut down four aging Russian reactors at the Kozlodui nuclear power plant. The  two remaining old reactors at the plant will reach the end of their licensed lifespan in the next decade. The supply of electricity in Bulgaria is politically sensitive and the price of electricity was one of the reasons that a previous government was overthrown there in 2013.

          Recently, Russia has been belligerent and aggressive in Eastern Europe. It annexed the Crimea from nearby Ukraine and is involved in supporting rebels in Eastern Ukraine. Other Eastern European countries such as neighboring Romania, Belarus, Lithuania and Estonia are very concerned about the Russians. They have substantial Russian minorities which might form spearheads for Russian aggression against them. All these countries have to deal with the reality of being in the middle of rising tensions between NATO and Russia.

        Russia is dedicating a lot of resources to the development of nuclear power reactors and nuclear fuel for export. There is already a war of words between Russia and the U.S./Japanese Westinghouse over the supply of nuclear fuel to Ukrainian reactors. Russia built the current Ukrainian reactors and supplied fuel for them. When Ukraine tried to use Westinghouse fuel rods in one of the Russian reactors, there were serious technical problems. Westinghouse claims that they have solved the problems and Russia expresses skepticism and says that using Westinghouse fuel rods in the Ukrainian reactors will be dangerous. Russia is competing with other nuclear technology exporting countries for the reactor business in countries without their own nuclear technology.

       Russia was going to build the South Stream natural gas pipeline to supply Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary, Austria and Italy. Work was underway  when the U.S. and the E.U. managed to force Bulgaria to stop construction on the pipeline in June of 2014 because it was claimed that the pipeline was monopolistic. Russia was so angered by that development, that it officially cancelled the project in December of 2014, blaming Bulgaria. This was a serious blow to the current pro-Western regime in Bulgaria.

         Bulgaria is walking a tightrope between two antagonistic major world powers. They hope to balance Russian energy projects with Western energy projects to keep everyone happy. Westinghouse and Bulgaria have been discussing the construction of an AP-1000 nuclear power reactor lately. Bulgaria says that major western investors such as Citibank are eager to finance the deal but they have not given any details. The Bulgaria government is short of funds and has just had its credit rating changed to “junk.” Will Bulgaria get a Westinghouse reactor or will it be a casualty of international economic conflict like the abandoned South Stream natural gas pipeline?

Bulgarian Kozlodui nuclear power plant:

Iranian and American negotiators preparing to square off in Geneva next week over Iran’s nuclear ambitions will also be eying another showdown brewing in Washington. cnn.com

Point Beach nuclear plant is an important asset for Wisconsin. htrnews.com

As nuclear plants retire, reduced U.S. nuclear capacity is eroding a major source of carbon-free electricity and increasing reliance of natural gas. marketwatch.com

Intelligence suggests that Syrian President Bashar Assad is building a secret underground plant with the aim of developing nuclear weapons, Germany’s Spiegel news magazine said Friday. naharnet.com

 

 

 

 

         India is having problems with foreign nuclear technology providers because a controversial 2010 nuclear liability law. The law states that nuclear equipment suppliers are liable for damages caused by nuclear accidents. Since the 1950s when the United States was the only exporter of nuclear technology, the international standard with respect to liability has targeted the operators of nuclear power plants and not companies that provided the technology for nuclear power plants.

        India’s 2010 law was ultimately based on the Indian response to the Bhopal poison gas disaster in 1984. Bhopal is considered to be the world’s deadliest industrial accident. Union Carbide owned the plant where the accident took place and families of victims are still after Union Carbide for compensation. Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the accident vary from two to four thousand with forty thousand people seriously injured.

       In 2008, the U.S. and India signed an agreement on nuclear cooperation. The 2010 Indian liability law has basically been blocking major nuclear technology suppliers, including the U.S., from shipping nuclear technology to India which has serious power supply problems and wants to increase their nuclear power by thirteen times its current level.

       GE-Hitachi,  Westinghouse Electric Company and France’s Areva have received authorization to build two reactors each in India. Although the deals were signed years ago, no construction has yet taken place partly because of the Indian liability law. Even Indian manufactures of nuclear technology are afraid to sell equipment to the Indian government because they are concerned about being held liable in case of a nuclear accident.

       Now a reinsurer called GIC Re that is run by the Indian government is developing a proposal for a “nuclear insurance pool.” This proposal would indemnify nuclear technology suppliers against any liability in case of an accident. Companies supplying equipment to construct Indian reactors would buy insurance from the pool and then pass the charges along to the purchasers of the equipment. An alternative proposal suggests that the Indian Nuclear Power Corporation of India could buy insurance for nuclear technology suppliers. These proposal could be implemented more quickly and easily than trying to change the 2010 law. Major suppliers of nuclear technology are cautiously optimistic but say that they need to see more of the specifics of the proposals which are still in development.

       In December of 2014, Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, visited India. One of the major topics for discussion was a proposal for Russia to supply India with a dozen nuclear reactors in the next two decades. There are already two Russian built nuclear reactors in India.  An Indian nuclear affairs expert said that Russia seems to believe that it can construct the promised reactors under the existing liability laws without any problems. Russia intends to make export of nuclear technology and fuel a major part of its plans for international trade.

      India would be better served by investing in renewable energy sources, conservation and efficiency instead of building more nuclear reactors.

General Insurance Corporation of India:

The IAEA can’t guarantee any nuclear program is peaceful. blogs.reuters.com

Iranian investors’ concerns over the future of nuclear negotiations with the world powers, added to falling oil prices, have caused further falls in shares prices on the Tehran Stock Exchange. blogs.ft.com

Argonne partners with industry on nuclear reactor work. rdmag.com

TVO may cut jobs due to delayed nuclear reactor, low power prices. power-eng.com

         I have blogged in the past about cheap natural gas and declining electricity demand making nuclear power reactors less economical. Past recipient of many tax breaks, loan guarantees, guaranteed electricity prices and subsidies, now nuclear power is facing the prospect of having to compete with other sources of energy on a more level playing field. One of the unique aspects of nuclear energy is the fact that if the owners of a nuclear power plant in the United States cannot show that it is making a profit and cannot find someone who wants to buy the power plant, it can have the operating license pulled by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. This would mean that the nuclear power plant in question would have to be shut down and decommissioned. About half of the one hundred nuclear power plants in the U.S. are directly competing with cheaper fossil fuels. As might be expected, owners of nuclear power plants are hard at work trying to find a way to stay in business.

        Exelon Corporation has already had to close a nuclear power plant in New Jersey because it was not able to compete in the open energy market. Exelon has been a harsh critic of government support for other energy sources such as renewables. They apparently had no problem with government support when it helped the nuclear industry. Exelon is also complaining about the “regulatory burden” that it says is adding up to five percent to its operating costs per year. If all nuclear power plants were adhering scrupulously to all NRC regulations, the U.S. citizens and environment would be much safer. Hard to be sympathetic when failure to follow correct procedures could threaten the lives of millions of people near a nuclear power plant.

       Exelon and other nuclear power plant owners are trying to get states to give them assistance in the form of price guarantees that may be higher than the market price for power or special consideration as a low carbon power source. While they complain about subsidies and quotas for renewable energy because of its low carbon footprint, they are actively seeking the same sort of government assistance for nuclear power. Without government help, the nuclear industry says that it will have to close more nuclear power plants because they can’t compete in the energy market place.

         Many environmentalists who once opposed nuclear power are now supporting it as a low carbon energy source. Unfortunately, they are not considering all the different carbon sources in the entire nuclear fuel cycle as well as the carbon dioxide emitted in the construction of nuclear power plants and the transportation of equipment, materials and fuel. Even if you ignore the carbon issues and the lack of permanent nuclear waste depositories, the time needed to license and construct nuclear reactors is too long for nuclear power to help much with the climate crisis. We have to act in the next ten years to avoid disaster and the world simply cannot build and operate enough nuclear reactors to make much impact on the global supply of energy in that time. Renewables are getting cheaper every day and they do not have all of the baggage of nuclear power.