NEI Nuclear Notes

The following is a guest post from NEI Senior Vice President of Communications  Scott Peterson, reporting from the  59th General Conference of the IAEA  .  Scott Peterson With the 21st session of Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) just 10 weeks away, one hopes that this week’s United Nations conference in Vienna is setting the stage for negotiations around meeting the 2-degree reduction by 2050. Leaders at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), meeting today in the opening session of its general conference, echoed a resounding statement of support for nuclear energy to increase its share of electricity production globally as one way to meet the carbon reduction challenge. Nearly 440 reactors in 30 countries generate 11 percent of the world’s electricity. “Nuclear power is one of the lowest emitters of carbon dioxide among energy sources when emissions through entire life cycles ...

When developing countries consider nuclear energy, it can give one pause. Not because such countries are inherently incapable of grasping and implementing the technology but because the technology could be beyond their current developmental level. If a country has barely met its electricity needs up to now, it would not seem to have the infrastructure necessary to introduce thousands of megawatts onto its grid. That’s an uncomfortable statement, but also an uncomfortable feeling, and it’s worth testing – and it is getting tested . This year, the IAEA will, for the first time, conduct Integrated Nuclear Infrastructure Review missions to Nigeria, Kenya and Morocco - three countries which are considering introducing nuclear power. These are review missions by international experts who help countries assess the status of their national nuclear infrastructure. They are part of the comprehensive package of assistance which the IAEA provides to help ensure that even the most chal...

Ted Jones The following is a guest post by Ted Jones, Director of International Supplier Relations for NEI. In a post published this week on the New York Times’ India Ink blog , M.V. Ramana and Suvrat Raju discussed U.S.-Indian commercial nuclear cooperation in the context of nuclear liability law. They argue that the divergence of the Indian liability law from international practices is minimal and justified by the Indian public interest.  But the authors are deeply misinformed about the attributes, purposes and effects of nuclear liability law. As a result, they misunderstand features of the Indian liability law that could undermine India’s public safety interest. A basic principle of nuclear liability law – embodied in the international conventions as well as the national laws of nuclear energy countries – is channeling of absolute and exclusive legal liability to the operator of the plant. A second basic principle is limitation of the amount of liability borne ...

IAEA Director Yukiya Amano The International Atomic Energy Agency is important, in part, because it encourages, supports and helps organize the regulatory and safety regimes necessary to have a viable domestic nuclear energy industry. Countries with mature industries – the United States, France, Russia, etc. – may not need that kind of assistance, but they all participate in the IAEA’s activities to support it. The IAEA is like the engine that allows the nuclear energy industry to motor ahead globally. (Terrible analogy – I don’t think countries want to be seen as cogs.) So, I’m always keenly interested in the IAEA’s annual report to its home base, the United Nations. A lot of the report is routine speech filler, but it’s always intriguing to see how the organization characterizes the world of nuclear energy and nuclear energy in the world. To an extent, it informs how nuclear energy will be discussed over the next year and the issues that may gain prominence. You can read IAEA...

Nuclear energy, you may have heard, is not universally beloved and some countries would like to banish it from their shores. ( Switzerland is an outlier , of course, having no shore.) It has always been disfavored in a few countries (Australia, for example, though not as strongly these days ), some of which used it anyway and some of which never did. So be it – try as you might, that’s how it goes. After the accident at Fukushima Daiichi, there were plenty of stories anticipating a wide-scale abandonment of nuclear energy or at least a dramatic slow down. From April of last year : The future of nuclear power was bleak, even before the Fukushima disaster, said energy expert Mycle Schneider Wednesday at a press conference in Berlin, where he previewed an upcoming Worldwatch report on the outlook of nuclear power. "The industry was arguably on life support before Fukushima. When the history of this industry is written, Fukushima is likely to introduce its final chapter," s...

I’d give you a link to the final report of the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future at its site at brc.gov, but that has been flooded and is not responsive. But NEI has you covered. Go here to get a copy of the report. The BRC says the report hews pretty closely to the draft report released last summer – our coverage of that is here with some useful links. We’ll have lots more to say about the final report, I’m sure, but for now, reading glasses on. --- The Japanese government has asked the International Atomic Energy Agency to stop by and double check the stress tests it has been conduction on its fleet. Specifically, the Japanese want the IAEA to visit Oi, its third largest nuclear facility. Why have the IAEA do this ? Seeking to assuage public misgivings about nuclear-plant safety, government and nuclear industry officials have sought to use "stress tests" that gauge resilience to natural disasters such as earthquakes and tsunamis. The invitation...

Some words from Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the United Nations: The Obama Administration is committed to nuclear power as a component of our secure energy future, and we recognize that nuclear power is a vital contributor to the world’s growing energy needs. It is, therefore, not an option that we simply can take off the table. But: But it is an option that carries special risks and dangers. Therefore, we must do everything possible to ensure its safe and responsible use. We must remain vigilant against outside threats and internal weaknesses to prevent accidents from occurring. We must make continuous improvements to regulations and strengthen implementation of existing conventions so we hold ourselves, and others, to the highest standards. One might call all this self-evident, but she was speaking at a high-level meeting on nuclear safety of the United Nations General Assembly yesterday, so perhaps we can allow for the self-evident. Here is Japanese Prim...

Platts has the story : The share of nuclear power in world electricity supply could shrink over the next 40 years to 6.2%, half what it was in 2010, according to a recent analysis by the International Atomic Energy Agency's Department of Nuclear Energy. This would be bad: Although overall installed capacity will grow, nuclear power will lose ground to other energy sources like renewables and fossil fuels, Hans Holger Rogner, head of the Vienna agency's Planning and Economic Studies Section, told journalists in Vienna today. That would mean increased carbon emissions and higher fossil fuel prices, he said. I don’t really doubt Herr Rogner nor the prognosticators at DOE’s Energy Information Administration when they put out the agency’s annual energy forecast. But forecasting is forecasting. It sets out some scenarios that may or may not happen and looks at the outcome of the scenarios – if time were to unfold as predicted. And Rogner has that right – if you ramp ...

You may have heard the International Atomic Energy Agency is having a ministerial conference in Vienna – ironic, of course, as Austria has no nuclear facilities. But the pastries are nice and the tourist council always appreciates the visitors. I think the most interesting part of the conference, which was called to discuss post-Fukushima Daiichi safety issues - will happen later this week, as Japan will present its initial findings on the accident. But the early part of the week brought a rather surprising proposal from the IAEA itself: In Vienna this week, opening the International Atomic Energy Agency's first major global meeting since the Japanese Fukushima reactor disaster, agency head Yukiya Amano proposed that his organisation conduct random checks on reactors. Warning that "business as usual" was not an option for the nuclear industry, he called for drafting of stronger IAEA global standards within a year and for improvements to the independence and...

IAEA’s team of nuclear experts has a preliminary assessment available on Fukushima-Daiichi and Japan’s overall response to the accident. There are some good nuggets and takeaways from their experience. Below are a few of the team’s preliminary findings and lessons learned: - Japan's response to the nuclear accident has been exemplary, particularly illustrated by the dedicated, determined and expert staff working under exceptional circumstances; - Japan's long-term response, including the evacuation of the area around stricken reactors, has been impressive and well organized. A suitable and timely follow-up programme on public and worker exposures and health monitoring would be beneficial; - The tsunami hazard for several sites was underestimated. Nuclear plant designers and operators should appropriately evaluate and protect against the risks of all natural hazards, and should periodically update those assessments and assessment methodologies; - Nuclear regul...

From NEI’s Japan earthquake launch page : Plant Status • Tokyo Electric Power Co. continues to deal with water management issues at the Fukushima Daiichi site. The company is plugging concrete enclosures at the plant to retain contaminated water and is studying the feasibility of building a system to purify seawater. The Japan Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency has ordered TEPCO to complete a plan for storing and treating contaminated water at the Fukushima Daiichi site by June 1. • TEPCO has begun to build a concrete structure to provide additional support to the used fuel storage pool for reactor 4 at the Fukushima Daiichi facility. Work is planned for completion by the end of July. Industry/Regulatory/Political Issues • The Japanese government announced plans to appoint a panel to investigate the accident at Fukushima Daiichi. The head of the committee will be Yotaro Hatamura, a professor emeritus at the University of Tokyo. • A delegation from the International Atomic...

How’s the world coping? Turkey : Speaking about a trip to Ukraine last week to mark the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster and discuss nuclear security, Minister Taner Yıldız said: “Greenpeace members had a placard there, reading, ‘No to Chernobyl.’ I agree with that placard. Still, the correct one sign should have been, ‘No to Chernobyl, yes to Akkuyu.’” Akkuyu is the town where Turkey will build its first nuclear energy plant. Austria : Austria's environment minister [Nikolaus Berlakovich] says safety tests for European nuclear power plants must be mandatory and take into account the possibility of plane crashes or terror attacks. Austria has no plants of its own. I’d be surprised if European utilities haven’t taken these elements into account – American plants certainly have (see this page for answers on these and other myths about nuclear energy plants). Pakistan : International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Monday declared the nuclear program...

About a week ago, the Japanese government rated the event at Fukushima Daiichi at level 7, the highest such level on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale. This put it on par with the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in 1986 (then in the Soviet Union, now Ukraine.) For some commentators, that meant that Fukushima Daiichi is as serious as Chernobyl . For others, it qualified as a head scratcher , as the two events seem to have many points of departure. One quick way to find out which view is closer to the truth is to consult the scale itself. It was created and is maintained by the International Atomic Energy Agency. A brochure explaining it can be found here . From the introduction: The INES Scale is a worldwide tool for communicating to the public in a consistent way the safety significance of nuclear and radiological events. Just like information on earthquakes or temperature would be difficult to understand without the Richter or Celsius scales,...

UPDATE AS OF 8:30 A.M. EDT, TUESDAY, APRIL 12 : Japan’s nuclear safety agency has raised the crisis level of the Fukushima Daiichi accident from 5 to 7 on the seven-level International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale . The new rating puts the Japanese incident on the same level as the 1986 Chernobyl accident—even though Japanese authorities estimate that radiation released at Fukushima is only 10 percent of the amount released from the Ukrainian plant. The new level designates Fukushima as a “major accident,” up from an “accident with wider consequences.” Level 7, the highest on the scale, describes an event with “a major release of radioactive material with widespread health and environmental effects requiring implementation of planned and extended countermeasures," according to the International Atomic Energy Agency , which sponsors the ratings. For the new rating, the Japan Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency combined the accidents at reactors 1, 2 and 3 as a sing...

The International Atomic Energy Agency starts a mission : Starting Monday, they will hold meetings with the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. and others, Denis Flory, IAEA deputy director general and head of the department of nuclear safety and security, said at a separate news conference. "The objective of this mission is to exchange views with Japanese technical experts and to get firsthand information what the current status of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant is, measures to be taken and also future plans to mitigate the accident," he said. "It is not an assessment team," he said, adding that this will also "pave the way for future missions which will be expert peer review missions." It will also be interesting to see if the IAEA will feel it needs to rethink its own role in an incident like this. I'm not implying it has or hasn't done what it should - I really don't know - but insofar as...

This speaks for itself : The International Atomic Energy Agency will host a high-level conference on nuclear safety from June 20 to 24 in Vienna to discuss lessons learned from Japan's nuclear crisis, Kyodo News reported Wednesday, citing the agency's director general. Yukiya Amano said he expects conference participants to make an initial assessment of the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in northeastern Japan, which was hard hit by an earthquake and tsunami on March 11. Participants will likely include representatives of various countries' foreign affairs, energy and other ministries, IAEA sources told Kyodo. --- The CEO of French nuclear reactor maker Areva says she will meet with Japanese officials to improve the situation at the quake-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Speaking to an NHK reporter on her arrival at Narita Airport, near Tokyo, on Wednesday afternoon, Anne Lauvergeon pledged full cooperation. She brough...