The 2005 Nuclear Energy Assembly

Sorry for the light posting over the past few days, but everyone here at NEI has been very busy preparing for our annual Nuclear Energy Assembly.

It's our biggest event of the year, and all hands are on deck these days, so to speak. This year's meeting will take place from May 16-18 at the Fairmont Hotel here in Washington.

The speakers lined up for this year's event, billed as "Nuclear Energy 2005: A Time of Opportunity", include NEI President and CEO Skip Bowman, Senators James Inhofe and Pete Domenici, Energy Secretary Sam Bodman, Congressman Joe Barton, NRC Chairman Nils Diaz and Robert McGhee, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Progress Energy and NEI's Vice Chairman.

Also speaking on Tuesday, May 17 will be one of our contributors here at NEI Nuclear Notes, Lisa Shell of Dominion Generation. Lisa is also incoming president of North American Young Generation in Nuclear (NA-YGN), a professional association for young nuclear professionals.

I'll be on site at the conference both Tuesday and Wednesday, and I'll try to post links to some of the major policy speeches once they're delivered. I've also been detailed to write a story for our member newsletter about our last speaker, Duke University Men's Basketball Coach Mike Krzyzewski.

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Fluor Invests in NuScale

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An Ohio School Board Is Working to Save Nuclear Plants

Ohio faces a decision soon about its two nuclear reactors, Davis-Besse and Perry, and on Wednesday, neighbors of one of those plants issued a cry for help. The reactors’ problem is that the price of electricity they sell on the high-voltage grid is depressed, mostly because of a surplus of natural gas. And the reactors do not get any revenue for the other benefits they provide. Some of those benefits are regional – emissions-free electricity, reliability with months of fuel on-site, and diversity in case of problems or price spikes with gas or coal, state and federal payroll taxes, and national economic stimulus as the plants buy fuel, supplies and services. Some of the benefits are highly localized, including employment and property taxes. One locality is already feeling the pinch: Oak Harbor on Lake Erie, home to Davis-Besse. The town has a middle school in a building that is 106 years old, and an elementary school from the 1950s, and on May 2 was scheduled to have a referendu

Wednesday Update

From NEI’s Japan micro-site: NRC, Industry Concur on Many Post-Fukushima Actions Industry/Regulatory/Political Issues • There is a “great deal of alignment” between the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the industry on initial steps to take at America’s nuclear energy facilities in response to the nuclear accident in Japan, Charles Pardee, the chief operating officer of Exelon Generation Co., said at an agency briefing today. The briefing gave stakeholders an opportunity to discuss staff recommendations for near-term actions the agency may take at U.S. facilities. PowerPoint slides from the meeting are on the NRC website. • The International Atomic Energy Agency board has approved a plan that calls for inspectors to evaluate reactor safety at nuclear energy facilities every three years. Governments may opt out of having their country’s facilities inspected. Also approved were plans to maintain a rapid response team of experts ready to assist facility operators recoverin

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