Nuclear Energy Industry Transitions

President Bush has sent five nominations to the Senate for new positions on the Tennessee Valley Authority board of directors. The nominees include:

• Dennis Bottorff, chairman of Council Ventures and Council Capital Management
• Robert Mike Duncan, chairman and CEO of Community Holding Co. and Community Thrift Holding Co.
• William Sansom, chairman and CEO of H.T. Hackney Co.
• Hward Thrailkill, former president of Adtran
• Susan Richardson Williams, owner of Susan Williams Public Affairs

Peter Oleksiak will replace Daniel Brudzynski as controller at DTE Energy. Brudzynski will in turn become vice president of Regulatory Affairs. Oleksiak has been with DTE Energy since 1998, most recently as assistant controller. Brudzynski joined the company in 1997. He has been controller since 1999 and vice president since 2001.

ComEd has announced that, effective immediately, a new five-member board of directors has been elected for the company. The five directors are:

• Frank Clark, chairman and chief executive officer of ComEd
• Sue Ling Gin, founder, owner, chairman and CEO of Flying Food Group LLC• Edgar Jannotta, chairman of William Blair & Co. LLC • John Rogers Jr., chairman and CEO of Ariel Capital Management
• Richard Thomas, retired chairman of First Chicago NBD

ComEd’s previous board members were Barry Mitchell, Gary Snodgrass, John Rowe and John (Jack) Skolds.

In addition, the company announced the appointment of a new slate of ComEd officers:

• Darryl Bradford, vice president and general counsel
• Frank Clark, chairman and CEO
• John Costello, executive vice president and chief operating officer
• John Hooker, senior vice president of government affairs
• Bob McDonald, senior vide president and chief financial officer
• Barry Mitchell, president
• Anne Pramaggiore, senior vice president of regulatory affair

Duke Energy and Cinergy Corp. have proposed a top executive team for the new company that will result from their merger. The following appointments will be subject to the approval of the new company’s board of directors:

• Paul Anderson, Duke Energy’s chairman of the board and CEO, will be the new company’s chairman of the board.
• Paul Barry, currently vice president of mergers and acquisitions for Duke Energy, will lead Duke Energy Americas.
• Julie Dill, vice president of shareholder and investor relations for Duke Energy, will lead investor relations and corporate communications.
• Fred Fowler, now president of Duke Energy, will be CEO of the new company’s gas businesses, Duke Energy Gas Transmission and Duke Energy Field Services.
• Lynn Good, Cinergy’s executive vice president and chief financial officer, will be the new company’s treasurer.
• David Hauser, current group vice president and chief financial officer for Duke Energy, will continue in that role for the new company.
• Marc Manly, Cinergy’s executive vice president and chief legal officer, will continue to lead the new company’s legal group.
• Jim Mogg, current group vice president and chief development officer, will become adviser to the chairman.
• Thomas O’Connor, Duke Energy’s group vice president for corporate strategy, will head U.S. franchised electric and gas operations for the new company.
• James Rogers, Cinergy chairman and CEO, will be president and CEO.
• Christopher Rolfe, current vice president of human resources for Duke Energy, will continue in that capacity.
• Ruth Shaw, Duke Power’s current president and CEO, will provide executive leadership for nuclear strategy and operations, environmental policy and other public policy issues.
• B. Keith Trent, current group vice president, general counsel and secretary for Duke Energy, will lead corporate development.
• James Turner, Cinergy president, will lead U.S. franchised electric and gas commercial functions.
• Steven Young, current vice president and controller at Duke Energy, will be the new company’s controller.

Technorati tags: Nuclear Energy, Environment, Energy, Politics, Technology, Economics

Activists' Claims Distort Facts about Advanced Reactor Design

Below is from our rapid response team . Yesterday, regional anti-nuclear organizations asked federal nuclear energy regulators to launch an investigation into what it claims are “newly identified flaws” in Westinghouse’s advanced reactor design, the AP1000. During a teleconference releasing a report on the subject, participants urged the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to suspend license reviews of proposed AP1000 reactors. In its news release, even the groups making these allegations provide conflicting information on its findings. In one instance, the groups cite “dozens of corrosion holes” at reactor vessels and in another says that eight holes have been documented. In all cases, there is another containment mechanism that would provide a barrier to radiation release. Below, we examine why these claims are unwarranted and why the AP1000 design certification process should continue as designated by the NRC. Myth: In the AP1000 reactor design, the gap between the shield bu...

How many nuclear plants does it take to meet the world's energy needs?

Several weeks ago Joshua Pearce at Clarion University in Pennsylvania released a study titled “ Thermodynamic limitations to nuclear energy deployment as a greenhouse gas mitigation technology .” In the study he stated... nuclear energy production would have to increase by 10.5% per year from 2010 to 2050 to both replace fossil-fuel-energy use and meet the future energy demands. This line, of course, made the headlines and has been picked up by several outlets and blogs . When looking into his calculations for this statement, he made one assumption error that overstated the above sentence by nearly a factor of three. Page 121, Section 4.1 of the study states: Richard Smalley pointed out that in 2004, the global economy consumed the equivalent of 220 million barrels of oil per day, which converted into electricity terms is the equivalent of 14.5 TeraWatts (TW), or 14,500,000 MegaWatts (MW) (2005). … With a nuclear plant having about 1000 MW (1 GW) of capacity, we would need 14,500...

What Happens During a Refueling Outage?

You may have noticed over the past few weeks that a number of nuclear plants are shut down for refueling outages or are resuming operations after just returning from one. This type of routine outage usually occurs in the spring or fall when electricity demand is low so that nuclear reactors can replace about one-third of the spent fuel rods with new fuel and conduct other routine maintenance and repairs at the plant. To get a better sense of how refueling works at a nuclear energy facility, I spoke with Marcus Nichol, NEI’s senior project manager for used fuel storage and transportation, and asked him to explain the basics. Why does a nuclear plant need to replace one-third of its fuel? Nichol: The main purpose of a refueling outage is to replace older fuel that is depleted—meaning it can no longer efficiently produce energy from nuclear fission reactions—with new fuel. This “used fuel” has typically been used in the reactor for four-and-a-half to six years before it is pe...

NEI Nuclear Notes

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