NEI Nuclear Notes

Here at NEI, it seems as if the first five months of the year has gone by in a blur. January featured Third Way's Advanced Nuclear Summit and Showcase . February was our annual Wall Street Briefing . March saw us participating in the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory's Commission's Regulatory Information Conference . The Nuclear Industry Summit straddled March and April. And then the last two weeks of May rocketed past as we participated in a Department of Energy summit on preserving at-risk nuclear reactors , and then, just two days later, headed south to Miami for the 2016 Nuclear Energy Assembly . PREACH IT DON! #NEA16 #actfornuclear #climate pic.twitter.com/kbBWVSzTLZ — Nuclear Energy Inst. (@NEI) May 24, 2016 Not that we're complaining. Our industry is facing some strong headwinds , and while the future is bright with prospects for a number of advanced reactor designs , we need to #ActForNuclear now in order to preserve the current fleet and the benefits it contribu...

Major news, nukes! In less than 15 years of existence, NAYGN has registered 10,000 members. That means thousands of young, energized and influential nuclear professionals dedicated to shaping our industry's future. Exciting stuff, I know. Take a look at the press release below: The North American Young Generation in Nuclear (NAYGN) is celebrating a milestone achievement –the organization has registered over 10,000 unique members since its inception. “We have now become the premier leadership development activity for the nuclear energy industry. With so many opportunities at the local, regional and continental level, we provide some of the first opportunities for young professionals to practice their leadership skills,” says Past President Elizabeth McAndrew-Benavides . NAYGN started with seven members who were passionate about nuclear science and technology, and it continues now with 10,000 members who share their same passion. The organization remains a strong pro-nuclea...

Ginger Jones The following guest post was submitted by Elizabeth McAndrew-Benavides, NEI's Senior Manager, Workforce Policy and Programs. Educating the next generation of nuclear professionals begins early. How early? According to North American Young Generation in Nuclear (NA-YGN) member and fellow Mother in Nuclear Ginger Jones it begins in kindergarten. Jones, a chemist by training, full time nuclear utility employee and mother of three, is volunteering her time to serve on her local school board. "I had always been a really active volunteer especially at my oldest son’s school," Jones said. "I had been the president of the Parent Teacher Organization at Saratoga School [Morris, IL.] for nearly three years when four school board seats came up for election." The Saratoga school board has a strong track record for attracting Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) professionals, but this is not a normal occurrence across the United ...

Or maybe pusillanimous. --- Gizmodo takes a quick look at 1979: the Year We Wussed Out of Nuclear: The timing of the movie coming out tying in with Three Mile Island may have been lucky for the producers, who suddenly had a huge blockbuster hit on their hands, but it was less lucky for boosters of safe nuclear energy. Since that meltdown, the production of nuclear power plants has gone down significantly despite the fact that there were no deaths or even recorded cases of cancer caused by Three Mile Island—the amount of radiation that the people near the plant were exposed to is said to be similar to that of getting an X-ray. Too short to really make an argument, the post seems to want to blame The China Syndrome and Three Mile Island equally for the hibernation in building new nuclear plants. We’d likely stress the movie less – movie alarmism usually has a brief half-life – and Chernobyl and the No Nukes movement (that also spawned a movie, in 1980) that arose from TMI. ...