NEI Nuclear Notes

Both the Department of Homeland Security and the Federal Bureau of Investigation have concluded that  U.S. nuclear plants are among the most secure of all industrial facilities . But for some reason, that fact wasn't reported on Fox and Friends this morning when  Tucker Carlson interviewed Alan Kuperman of the Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Project  on nuclear power plant security. When it comes to the threat of terrorism, American nuclear plants responded quickly in the wake of the 9-11 attacks, spending more than $2 billion to upgrade security. The independent U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission  (NRC) has said that nuclear power plants are "among the best-protected private sector facilities in the nation." The NRC holds nuclear power plants to the highest security standards of any American industry. These security measures get more robust the closer you get to the plant, using defenses such as vehicles, barriers/concrete walls, sophisticated intrusion dete...

A Greenpeace initiative that’s actually kind of interesting is its drive to get large scale data centers – such as those run by Google, Facebook and Apple – to use more renewable energy to run them. They call it Clicking Clean . Greenpeace operates in an area where the practical -  which, after all, is what electricity is – intersects with the idealistic, if one defines idealism fairly narrowly, i.e., as what Greenpeace favors. That’s where data centers come in. There’s a cluster of them in North Carolina, which, in part, has to do with the state’s efforts to foster high-tech development. I’ve had a couple of friends migrate to the Research Triangle (Raleigh-Durham) to pursue their careers, so it’s having an impact on the east coast at least. But it likely also has something to do with plentiful electricity But here’s the problem for Greenpeace. Greenpeace says Duke’s Green Source Rider, proposed in 2013 at the urging of Google and Facebook as a way to sell green...

Writer Mark Gunther over at the Energy Collective talks about his hesitation to renew his Greenpeace membership: If Greenpeace manages to persuade the US or other governments to "eliminate nuclear power"- that's what the headline [of the renewal letter] says - the risk of catastrophic climate change will grow much worse. Climate activists [and]environmentalists who  support nuclear power include Stewart Brand (in his excellent book Whole Earth Discipline ), ex-DOE chief Steven Chu, contrarians Michael Shellenberger and Ted Norhaus (see Going Green? Then Go Nuclear ), the former British prime minister Tony Blair, economist Jeffrey Sachs and ex-NASA scientist James Hansen. You could throw in current DOE Secretary Ernest Moniz (“Moniz is an advocate for a low-carbon future and has, in a variety of forums, promoted the use of nuclear energy to get there.” – from the National Journal ) and President Barack Obama if you want. Gunther also brings up our old bête n...

Patrick Moore, ex-Greenpeace, sees in nuclear energy an interesting argument for what he terms “environmental justice,” which is true enough, and economic justice, used in the headline, works as well : African-American and Hispanic advocacy groups have historically been focused on civil rights, but they're "morphing into economic development," Moore said, and looking at energy policy for the first time. Unlike many other big industrial facilities, he noted, polls show nuclear power plants have increasing popular support the closer people live to them. Nuclear plants are "wealth creating machines," Moore said, with no pollution, better roads and schools financed by the plants' property taxes, and large payrolls. Moore is right about this. Nuclear energy facilities are also often union shops, which offers a good path to the middle class and out of economic uncertainty. A city of industry can be a world of opportunity and nuclear energy plants have the adde...

The French arm of Greenpeace is probably searching for a few new recruits after two of its activists were arrested today by French authorities for paragliding onto the grounds of the Bugey nuclear energy facility and dropping a smoke bomb. The stunt is nothing more than a political ploy by the organization to expose what it calls, “gaps,” in nuclear plant security ahead of the French presidential election. However, plant owner EDF assures the public that no such security gaps exist and that the plant remained safe and secure despite today’s criminal activity: Safety at the installation was never called into question. Safety measures put in place at the end of 2011 allowed the detection and immediate arrest of the intruder. But, some people still wrongly believe that the criminal activity proves just how easily someone could intrude a nuclear plant and wreak havoc. To their false notions, I’d like to point out a few facts about nuclear plant security. First, simply landing a...

Sort of a silly article from the New York Times: Internet companies often cloak themselves in an image of environmental awareness. But some companies that essentially live on the Internet are moving facilities to North Carolina, Virginia, northeastern Illinois and other regions whose main sources of energy are coal and nuclear power, the report said. Virginia generates 36 percent of its electricity from nuclear, 35 percent from coal; North Carolina, 56 percent coal, 31 percent nuclear; and Illinois, 47 percent nuclear, 46 percent coal. So, where clean energy is concerned, internet companies are doing reasonably well given the world we live in. And some want to improve their profile further: Apple immediately disputed the report’s findings, saying that the company planned to build two huge renewable energy projects at its recently opened data center in North Carolina that would eventually offset much of the coal-fired and nuclear energy use. To me, this sounds like th...

Suzy Hobbes over at Pop Atomic Studios makes the case .

A mini-debate over at Business Week’s appropriately named Debate Room blog highlights something we often see when pro-nuclear energy meets anti-nuclear energy. See if you can spot it. First, NEI’s Vice President of Communications Scott Peterson: Nuclear plants alone won’t improve our air quality but coupled with renewable energy sources, they are a sustainable energy resource that will produce electricity for 60 years or more. As the auto industry develops electric vehicles, using carbon-free nuclear energy to charge them is a win-win for our environment and national security. One nuclear energy facility could charge more than 1.8 million electric cars each night and power mass transit, homes, and businesses during the day. And Greenpeace’s Nuclear Policy Analyst Jim Riccio: Our best bet for reducing pollution from coal plants is energy efficiency and renewable energy. These solutions can be deployed more quickly and affordably than wasting billions on a new nuclear rea...

After a series of posts about Germany and its decision to keep its nuclear plants open while transitioning to renewable energy sources– and good luck on that! – it was time to move on to other subjects, however much the Germans had turned that overly tortured episode into an amusing soap opera. However, a soap opera needs a villain to keep the pot boiling and one has to admit that the German effort didn’t have a very clearly defined antagonist. Until now : Chernobyl-like disasters at Germany's most vulnerable reactors could render parts of the country uninhabitable for decades, Greenpeace has warned. For a Chernobyl-like disaster, you’d need, at a minimum, an RBMK reactor, which Germany does not have. (The design is banned in the U.S.) But let’s allow that Greenpeace means this metaphorically – since it’s not going to make distinctions, any energy plant with nuclear on its mailbox is a potential Chernobyl. In the case of a Chernobyl-like disaster at Kruemmel, a reac...

Southern Co. is busily working on the site for their two new reactors at its Plant Vogtle site in Georgia, so the Associated Press decided to ask the state’s Republican gubernatorial candidates what they think about nuclear energy in the state. Answer: they’re for it. Here’s former Congressman Nathan Deal: "I believe it is an answer to part of our energy issues," Deal said in a recent interview. "It is a renewable resource." Well, sustainable, anyway, but we’ll take it. And here’s former Georgia Secretary of State Karen Handel: "I support a diversification of our sources for electrical generation and believe that nuclear power represents a safe and clean option and should continue to play significant role in Georgia's overall power generation supply," she said in a statement. Here’s Handel’s Web site – she won an endorsement from former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, which is right up front. On the issues page, she doesn’t have a...

We’re sure all of us would like to live in a world where nuclear energy and renewable energy sources – and some natural gas and maybe even some coal with carbon sequestration – powered our lives. But that’s not the world we live in – yet – and most of us have rather limited choices about living our lives in a carbon-free environment. This would be true even if you could hear windmills in the morning or see the nuclear plant’s cooling towers off in the misty distance. Electricity providers can help with carbon offsets, but for the most part, how electricity whips through the grid and gets to your house is difficult to quantify by source except in general terms. So this gave us pause: As the internet grows as a platform — a place where more things are done, not only stored away — the IT industry's hunger for energy will increase. Efficiency is a hot topic in IT, but improving energy efficiency is only part of the solution, the industry also needs to take responsibility for...

Nuclear Fissionary noted that no-one can submit comments anymore at the Nuclear Reaction blog : I have left numerous comments on their pseudo-scientific website. I’ve also used the Nuclear Fissionary Page on Facebook to direct our readers to the Greenpeace site to make sure their antinuclear rants don’t go unanswered. Well, it would appear that Greenpeace no longer has the stomach for debate. While visiting the site the other day I noticed that my comments were gone. Every blogger knows that deleting comments is unethical, so I thought that GP had just decided to silence me. But then I noticed that there were no other comments either. What’s more, there was no box where readers could add to the ‘dialogue’ of the nuclear debate. The comments were just gone. … Unless there’s a technical issue with the blog, I would say this action pretty much speaks for itself. Update 3/31/10 - Apparently they suffered a spam attack and the comments are now back on. Hmm...

Probably not in the U.S., but in the UK they may be lessening their anti-nuclear stance. World Nuclear News has the story : The latest manifesto from Greenpeace UK is the first ever with no explicit anti-nuclear policies. It was launched with the tagline "Change the politics. Save the climate." ... Most of the 12 goals were expressed in terms of 'low-carbon' energy, which should supply all the UK's power by 2030, according to the group. Development of low-carbon power should be supported in less developed countries, while the UK should invest in a supply chain for low-carbon technology as well as low-carbon research. Nothing was ruled in or out of the low-carb on group. ... The manifesto referred to yesterday's report from the Committee on Climate Change and analyses by the International Energy Agency, which both recommend increases in nuclear power as part of dramatic action to lower carbon dioxide emissions. Greenpeace will surely continue to speak up for re...

We tip our hats to the savvy marketing peeps at Greenpeace for generating lots of internet buzz this morning about their spoofed edition of the International Herald Tribune . From the AFP , Greenpeace supporters handed out mock copies of the International Herald Tribune in several countries Thursday to press world leaders to agree on ambitious efforts to tackle climate change. The eight-page mock-up included everything from an environmentally friendly Garfield comic strip to a horoscope (Sagittarius: 'There is a limit to what you can do with the resources available to you'). This below-the-fold (beyond the pale?) article caught our eye, " Sarkozy: Nuclear is dead. " While it might be fun to reciprocate in kind, and create a spoofed news article with a headline that read, "Greenpeace Embraces Nuclear Energy," we remember that the founder of Greenpeace, Patrick Moore , and the former head of Greenpeace UK, Stephen Tindale , already have.

Well, we just don’t know. (click on pictures or here to see full size versions): These are ads created in Romania for Greenpeace and, although these are in English, they may be intended for Eastern Europe. Mutations? Really? This went out of style after Universal Pictures grew tired of growing tarantulas and praying mantises to the size of houses in the 1950s. Greenpeace can make all the arguments against nuclear energy they want, but dishonestly leads to a loss of credibility. We can’t imagine Greenpeace USA using these ads, but if this is their response to the vastly increased interest in nuclear energy in Europe, this is a battle they’re fated to lose. Sheesh!

Nuclear Green and Pro-Nuclear Democrats took a critical eye to Greenpeace's latest study called Energy [R]evolution and weren't impressed. Greenpeace's study leaves nuclear plants off the table as a solution in reducing CO2 emissions (surprise, surprise) while renewables and efficiency are claimed to be able to handle it all. Here's Nuclear Green's part one on Greenpeace's study: The cutesy feature of the report title, the rather uncreative play on the words revolution and evolution suggests the report's fundamental dilemma: the difficulty of charting a path to a renewables energy future given the serious limitations of renewable energy sources. ... Clean thus appears to be disassociated from "science based emissions reductions", because the shutdown of nuclear is viewed as being in the interest of being "clean." Furthermore, the notion that over 50% of American nuclear plants would be shut down for the sake of "the clean",...

First it was Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore seeing the light about the benefits of nuclear power , now another former director of the international environmental organization has become a convert. In an exclusive interview with The Independent , Stephen Tindale , Executive Director of Greeenpeace UK from 2001-2007 , describes his road to Calvary Damascus. “My change of mind wasn’t sudden, but gradual over the past four years. But the key moment when I thought that we needed to be extremely serious was when it was reported that the permafrost in Siberia was melting massively, giving up methane, which is a very serious problem for the world,” he [Tindale] said. “It was kind of like a religious conversion. Being anti-nuclear was an essential part of being an environmentalist for a long time but now that I’m talking to a number of environmentalists about this, it’s actually quite widespread this view that nuclear power is not ideal but it’s better than climate change,” he added. Fo...

Despite our pre-Thanksgiving prep-for-bloat kind of lethargic mood, we thought we point you to a couple of interesting videos. Here's one from the BBC about the disassembly of the Sellafield Cumbrian plant. This isn't a nuclear power plant, but a plant at which plutonium was produced for bombs. We can't think of a nicer plant to go to pieces. Note: If you're not British, you'll have to listen quite closely to decommissioning manager Euan Hutton, who narrates, because he frequently disappears into a thicket of accent. Worth watching more than once to catch all he has to say. --- Well, all right, we can rouse ourselves from thoughts of gobblers and bog fruit to express dismay about Jim Riccio's sourpuss ding on NEI central. Of all people, he knows that advocacy organizations make the most positive case possible for the object of their advocacy and he also knows that credibility craters if NEI or Greenpeace or any other such entity spins facts into lies or hi...

We occasionally take a look at Greenpeace's Nuclear Reaction blog (subtitle: "Blogging the Meltdown of the Nuclear Industry") so we can see if some interesting new meme is springing up we may want to note. A couple of stories caught our eyes: Business Wire: Areva: Revenue and Data for the First Nine Months of 2008 The group cleared revenue of 9.1 billion euros over the first nine months of 2008, up 12.9% compared with the same period in 2007. and The Deal: Northrop Grumman in $360M nuclear deal with French MNC Defense and technology company Northrop Grumman Corp. said its shipbuilding division is creating a joint venture with France's Areva SA to build a manufacturing and engineering facility in Newport News, Va., to supply the American nuclear energy sector. Nothing says meltdown of the nuclear industry more than profitability and an expanding infrastructure. We cannot say the blog is being unfair with its readership, though, so points for honest...

Yesterday on WNYC-FM's Brian Lehrer Show, Gwyneth Cravens, author of Power to Save the World: The Truth about Nuclear Energy , made a joint appearance with Jim Riccio, Nuclear Policy Analyst for Greenpeace . Normally, I'd suggest that you take a listen, but given the fact that Riccio spent most of the interview talking over Cravens and not letting her get a word in edgewise, I'm afraid there's not much to recommend it. However, there was one point of contention between the two guests that I think bears closer examination. At one point during the interview, Cravens made the point that there hasn't been any other core meltdowns of a commercial nuclear reactor in the U.S., at which point Riccio started berating Cravens about Fermi 2, and how she should have read a book by John G. Fuller called We Almost Lost Detroit concerning the accident. Fermi 2 is a 1,098 MWe General Electric boiling water reactor owned by DTE Energy and currently still in operation. There has ...