NEI Nuclear Notes

Michael Purdie The following is a guest post by NEI's Michael Purdie. Major cities in Texas were subject to numerous 100 degree-plus days this month . Houston, Dallas, San Antonio and Austin all had record setting electricity demand. If you have ever been to these cities during one of these days, it’s hot and there is very little breeze to cool you down. The most extreme day for the grid was August 13, when power prices peaked above $1,000/MWh. When this occurs, the grid operator (in this case, ERCOT ) takes action. ERCOT called for conservation measures because electricity reserves were below 2,500 MWs during the peak. Why did this occur? Simple. The wind generating units in Texas produced less than 20% of what they’re capable of providing. By operating at less than a 20% capacity factor, wind units provided 633 MWs of power less than what ERCOT predicted during the daily peak demand. The chart below depicts the planned and actual wind generation during hours of...

Editorial boards around the country continue to ruminate about nuclear energy in this country in the wake of event in Japan. From the Amarillo Globe-News : But is this tragic event reason to throw the nuclear power strategy onto the trash heap? No. Well, that’s direct. Part of the response is informed by industry around Amarillo: The Panhandle of Texas has its share of natural gas and oil production and, thus, residents here are exposed to potential danger all the time. Do we toss aside those energy sources because of accidents? Again, no. So: But it must be noted that the Fukushima plant that's been all but destroyed by Mother Nature is an old plant. Newer installations would have far superior technology to guard against the kind of disaster that's occurring in Japan. I’m not sure that argument holds true. Fukushima and all older plants are held to the standards of the present day, but it’s all right. Newer plants have redundant safeguards that do...

Here’s the news : A Texas commission Tuesday set in motion the importation of low-level radioactive-waste from 36 other states, a move long sought by the nuclear-energy industry and long opposed by environmentalists. The disposal site near Andrews, Texas, is managed by Waste Control Specialists (WCS) and is licensed to process, store and dispose of low-level and mixed low-level radioactive waste (LLRW). Waste Control Specialists became the first American company in 30 years permitted to dispose of Class A, B and C LLRW when the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality granted it a license in 2009. (Others are Barnwell in South Carolina and Energy Solutions in Utah, which each provide similar services for groups, or compacts, of states). See here for the NRC’s definition of what is represented by the different classes of waste. Since its inception, the site has been used to dispose of waste from Texas and Vermont (and Maine, too, for awhile), and Vermont still retains ex...

  A group called Nuclear Energy for Texans (NET) is protesting the actions of another group, Texans for a Sound Energy Policy Alliance (TSEPA), who, according to NET, are up to mischief : "It is outrageous that this small anti-nuclear activist group would travel across the country to try and derail a project that the vast majority of Victoria, Texas residents whole-heartedly support." And though the story doesn't say what that mischief might be, Marketwatch has another press release to explain : TSEPA spokesperson John Figer states: "Exelon's record in Illinois is clear. We don't want to be a Braidwood, Texas. Beyond safety, this project critically impacts our state's water future. The Guadalupe River has been listed as one of the 10 most threatened rivers in the U.S. and we don't have enough water to support a thirsty nuclear power plant. A lack of freshwater inflow will critically impact the San Antonio bay, wetlands, estuaries, fish ...

Recommendation 1: Recognizing that the combination of incentives and competitive market forces in place in Texas resulted in more rapid investment in wind energy than in any other state, Texas should promote the competitive marketplace by neither increasing nor removing the mandates for renewable energy. That comes from 2008 Texas State Energy Plan (warning: big pdf). The report has 37 recommendations and seems to leave nothing out of its energy mix. Nuclear energy appears at number 4: Recommendation 4: To encourage the development of nuclear power in Texas, the [Texas Commission on Environmental Quality] should expedite necessary water and wastewater permits associated with new nuclear power plants. While all design and site permits reside with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, ensuring that these state permits do not delay development is critical. And there are entries for clean coal, carbon sequestration, solar, and others. (Hydro not so much, but it does earn a tou...

Be sure to look at Texas' new coalition which was created to promote nuclear energy in the state: United under the name Nuclear Energy for Texans, a statewide coalition has formed in support of nuclear energy as a safe, reliable and clean alternative to meeting the increasing energy needs of the state. The coalition includes elected officials at the state and local level, representatives from business and industry, environmental groups, health organizations and the scientific and engineering community. The coalition was formed solely to educate Texans and promote the benefits of nuclear energy as a safe, reliable and clean alternative form of electricity for the state.

Two days ago on DallasNews , Arjun Makhijani from the anti-nuclear group Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (IEER) gave his usual commentary that nuclear can't cut it but renewables can . Having failed miserably to deliver on the 1950s promise that nuclear electricity would be "too cheap to meter," the industry now says it will save us from climate change. Can't the antis come up with something better than to hold the industry to a claim made 50 years ago? Since the 1980s, it's been clear nuclear plants were not cheap. I'm sure if we dig hard enough we can find old claims made from all industries that never came to fruition. On to Comanche Peak: And then there is the problem of cooling water. The two proposed reactors would consume about 40 million gallons of water per day. Even assuming that the water is available, Texas is risking a less reliable power system, given that droughts are estimated to become more extreme in a warming world. I guess ...

Idaho Samizdat is looking hard at build plans in Texas.

That's the message the folks in Matagorda County, Texas are trying to send to Exelon : Matagorda County officials are stepping up their efforts to inform Exelon Nuclear of the county’s positive attributes and why it is a better fit for the new nuclear power plant than the company’s alternative site near Victoria. Recent news that Victoria County has formed “Team Exelon,” a group of representatives from the Guadalupe-Blanco River Authority, Victoria County, City of Victoria and the Victoria Economic Development Corporation, to tout Victoria County has prompted local officials to reconsider their actions, said County Judge Nate McDonald. Victoria County is “treating this project just like we would treat any industrial project, to make sure our community attributes are highlighted,” said Dale Fowler, president of the Victoria Economic Development Corporation in a telephone interview. “We’re pretty aggressive about getting in front of industry and talking about what this county has to ...

In New York, they want to shut down a nuclear power plant . In Texas, they want to stop a wind farm dead in its tracks : The famed King Ranch and a coalition of environmental groups sued Texas Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson in federal court Tuesday, seeking to require extensive environmental review and public comment on two planned wind power projects along the Gulf Coast in Kenedy County. The coalition, the Coastal Habitat Alliance, also sued over the wind project in state District Court in Travis County. That suit claims that the state's Public Utility Commission illegally denied the alliance's request to participate in permit hearings for the wind project's transmission line. The lawsuits threaten to delay or stop the two massive wind projects, which could place more than 600 turbines on 60,000 acres near Laguna Madre, south of Corpus Christi. Part of the wind projects would place about 250 turbines just east of a portion of the sprawling King Ranch.

Details from World Nuclear News . For more from GE Nuclear, click here .

I was kicking around YouTube again today, and came across a video that had been posted some time ago by Michael Williams, Chairman of the Texas Railroad Commission. Be sure to let him know what you think.

Another diarist at DailyKos (not our friend N Nadir) drove 80 miles to attend a public hearing on NRG's potential plans for new nuclear build in Texas . He sounds bullish on nuclear energy: Expanding electricity capacity in Texas from nuclear, wind, and potentially in the future, solar, while pushing hard for conservation is our only hope for a fossil fuel phase-out. Not only are these measures necessary on their own, they provide the necessary foundation for transitioning our transportation network to fully-electric or transitional-synthetic fuels (e.g. DME using CO2 from atmospheric/process sequestration). Unlike other long-term movements towards a sustainable, fossil-fuel free, more socioeconomically just Texas, changing electricity production sources is relatively "behind-the-scenes," and is a path that can be pursued vigorously and immediately because it requires no large, structural rearrangements in society or our built environment. As such, it has a high probabil...

From the Houston Chronicle : Exelon Nuclear has picked two possible sites for for a proposed nuclear plant both located southwest of the Houston area. Illinois-based Exelon, which operates the largest number of nuclear plants in the country, is considering building a plant in Matagorda County or Victoria County. If it goes forward the primary site is a 1,250-acre tract about 10 miles south of Collegeport in Matagorda County. The secondary site covers 11,500 acres about 20 miles south of Victoria in Victoria County. Matagorda County is already home to the The South Texas Project, near Bay City. The owners of that plant is seeking to build two new reactors. The proposed sites are needed to seek a permit allowing the company to build and operate a plant, should it go decide to build one. Exelon said it expects to submit the application to the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission in November of 2008. UPDATE : Our friends at Exelon have shared a map of the designated sites with us. Click ...

"We very much feel that nuclear has to be a significant part of the energy mix. If one is truly serious about global warming, it is the only carbon-free alternative we have right now,". That's Container Store founder Garrett Boone , one of the founders of Texas Business for Clean Air . Thanks to We Support Lee for the pointer.

From the Dallas Business Journal (subscribers only): "More recently he (Rudy Guiliani) was speaking on the West Coast, and he said basically what (I) said in the Los Angeles Times: That the fuel of the future of course is going to be nuclear power. Got to have it; got to use it. It's clean. There have been no accidents with it, and you can get rid of the waste. That will be the first question about it. But Giuliani said we're not going to be energy independent; we're going to have to figure a way out of this. I think that's the way the question should be answered. Interesting.

I was kicking around the Web this morning when I came across the Web site for Texas Business for Clean Air . When you take a look inside their Executive Summary , you see a lot of support for clean air energy : Any future power plants beyond this should use newer and cleaner technologies such as IGCC (gasified coal), nuclear power and renewable sources, such as wind and solar power. [...] We support nuclear power as a clean, safe alternative for generating base loadpower. While we take no position on the Texas Pacific/KKR/TXU deal, we commend TXU for ordering nuclear power plant equipment and starting to prepare for the next generation of nuclear power . Looks like it's worth a bookmark.

On Sunday night, 60 Minutes correspondent Steve Kroft mentioned that France had managed to build 58 nuclear reactors in a country the size of Texas. Coincidentally, less than 24 hours later, the Wall Street Journal fronted a story about how TXU, a company that recently abandoned plans to build 8 coal-fired power plants, was now planning on building some of the largest commercial nuclear reactors in the world . Now that story about Texas and nuclear energy is creating some other conversations. Click here for a post from Slouching Toward Serfdom , and then here to listen to a discussion of TXU's plans on the latest episode of the Atomic Show . UPDATE: More from Marketplace .

Just off the wire from STP : Completing a second consecutive breaker-to-breaker run, the South Texas Project nuclear power plant successfully took its Unit 2 reactor offline on Sunday for a scheduled refueling and maintenance outage. “We are pleased with the reliable and successful performance of our reactors. STP’s consecutive breaker-to-breaker runs could not have been accomplished without the continued commitment and skill of our entire team," said Ed Halpin, STP's site vice president. A breaker-to-breaker run refers to the time between refueling outages when a nuclear plant safely produces electricity. An outage begins with the opening of an electrical breaker to discontinue power to the grid so that maintenance can be performed and refueling can occur. The outage ends when the breaker is closed and electricity can again be produced. Refueling outages occur every 18 months. Congrats to the team at STP for a job well done. Bravo Zulu!

That's a story that's running in today's Houston Chronicle : The number of nuclear-powered generators in Texas could triple in the next decade with several new projects in the works. Expansions at the state's two existing plants — Comanche Peak [pictured to left] south of Dallas and the South Texas Project near Bay City — took steps this past week when TXU Energy said it will likely buy two reactors from Mitsubishi for the Dallas-area expansion, and NRG Energy said it will work with a Tokyo utility as an adviser for two reactors at Bay City. Illinois-based Exelon Energy has also said it is considering sites in South and East Texas for a new two-unit plant, while a private firm in Amarillo hopes to build two new nuclear units. [...] The four announced projects in Texas may only be the tip of the iceberg. TXU has indicated it may build more than just two new reactors and may place them at sites previously planned for the coal plants. And according to the state's main ...