NEI Nuclear Notes

In the news : Voters in the Vermont town of Vernon have once again approved getting rid of the local police force. Why? Budget cuts have been in the works since the August announcement that Entergy would shut down the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant by the end of this year. Yankee accounts for about half of the town's municipal tax base. Now, we should note that Vernon has about 2200 people in it, so turning police services over to the county will not cause pandemonium and murder sprees. It’s not Gotham City. Still, when we say that nuclear energy facilities have an economic impact on their communities, we’re not fooling. Closing Vermont Yankee is what the state wanted – is the state going to step up and replace the lost revenue? All eyes on Montpelier.

From Japan : A candidate backed by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe won Sunday's election for governor of Tokyo, frustrating a rival's efforts to make the vote a referendum on the Japan ese leader's pro-nuclear energy policy nearly three years after the Fukushima disaster The widely-expected victory by former health minister Yoichi Masuzoe comes as a relief for Abe, who had suffered a rare setback in another local election last month. So Abe lost one and won one – which proves only that Japanese voters are tough to move on a single issue – and that nuclear energy is not a potent enough issue, if it ever was, to sway elections. --- A striking example of how a nuclear energy facility can benefit neighboring communities: The University of Sharjah has announced that three nuclear energy laboratories worth Dh7 million will be set up in the university, with the aim of preparing highly qualified human cadres specialized in nuclear power. The first ever inte...

Let’s take a step back, shudder, and look at a dire report from Mark Cooper of the Institute for Energy and the Environment at the Vermont Law School. Cooper releases reports like this occasionally, although why he continues to be interested in nuclear energy is difficult to pin down. He’s not trying to dispute the “lies” propagated by the industry nor try to show that nuclear energy does something other than it claims to do. He just sees the business crumbling into dust every couple of years – I guess that can qualify as an academic pursuit, even if it’s not exactly productive. You can read the earlier articles linked above to see how Cooper’s ivory tower musings have not been as rigorous as they might be. In the current instance, he wants to grab the San Onofre/Kewaunee “nuclear is unviable” wave to assert that “more than three dozen U.S. reactors in 23 states are at greatest risk of early retirement, including nine reactors that exhibit the largest number of risk factors.” T...

It's been a full week since we first raised some questions about a claim made by Arnie Gundersen about soil samples he took in Japan recently. Gundersen claims the lab results he obtained indicated that the soil would be classified as radioactive waste here in the U.S. -- a statement that was reported by the Associated Press in a subsequent story . We had our doubts about the story, so NEI decided to do some investigating of its own. 24 hours later, we sent an email to the AP asking questions about how they went about reporting the story. We wanted to know how they were able to verify Gundersen's claims without working with a radiation protection professional who could properly interpret the data. We wanted to know why the story lacked any specifics about the lab results that Gundersen provided to the AP. We were also concerned that the AP identified Gundersen as a "nuclear consultant" when in fact he has long track record as an anti-nuclear activist and is current...

It's been about 24 hours since we sent our last note to the Associated Press concerning claims that Arnie Gundersen has made about some soil samples he took in Japan recently -- soil samples that he says would have been classified as radioactive waste here in the U.S. While we've yet to get a response from the AP, we're going to open an additional avenue in our inquiry to get to the bottom of this story. Here's a note I sent to Arnie Gundersen at Fairewinds Associates a few minutes ago. Dear Mr. Gundersen, For the past week or so, many of us here at NEI have had serious questions concerning claims you made to the Associated Press about the soil samples you took in Tokyo. In order for us to resolve these questions, we'd like to ask you to provide us with a complete copy of the results of the test results you've been referencing. We'd also like to obtain contact information for the laboratory that you used, in order that we may be able to ask some follow up ...

Our readers will recall that last week we forwarded a note to some editors at the Associated Press concerning some irregularities I identified in a story that ran earlier in the week that contained a claim from anti-nuclear activist Arnie Gundersen that soil samples he took in Tokyo would be classified as low level radioactive waste in the U.S. Late on Friday afternoon we received a one line answer from Cara Rubinsky, the AP's New England Editor: "We have reviewed your concerns and obtained a copy of the report from the lab that did the testing. We do not believe a correction is warranted." Considering the details we shared in our message to the AP, the response seemed less than adequate. Here's the latest note I shared this morning with Rubinsky, AP Editor Evan Berland and reporter Dave Gram. Hi Cara, Please forgive me if I find your response to be insufficient, and hardly in the spirit or the letter of your organization's own published standards. In fact, your...

By now I'm sure most of you have seen the AP story that ran earlier this week that quoted Arnie Gundersen saying that soil samples he took in Tokyo would be classified as low level radioactive waste in the U.S. Yesterday, I published a short blog post on the subject after speaking with NEI's Chief Health Physicist, Ralph Andersen. After discussing the situation further with our media relations staff, we decided to take our case directly to the AP. The following note was sent to AP Editors Karen Testa and Evan Berland in Philadelphia this afternoon. We'll provide updates once we hear back from them. Dear Ms. Testa: I am writing to you in reference to an unbylined Associated Press story that appeared in a number of newspapers earlier this week with the headline, " Vt. consultant Gundersen: Tokyo soil is N-waste ." The claim made in this article by Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds Associates that soil collected in Japan could be classified as radioactive w...

Vermont Yankee wins : Vermont’s only nuclear plant can remain open beyond its originally scheduled shutdown date this year, despite the state’s efforts to close the 40-year-old reactor, a federal judge ruled Thursday. In February 2010, Entergy, Vermont Yankee’s owner, discover a tritium leak at the plant. Tritium is a mildly radioactive form of hydrogen that is incorporated into water molecules. It is found in nature and as a byproduct of fission processes. Health effects are minimal and present only if ingested in large amounts. In any event, none leaked outside the plant nor was there any measureable amount in drinking water at the plant. Regardless, in March, the state legislature voted to close the plant due to the leak. Now, that was controversial. In all instances, only the NRC can close a plant due to a safety concern. But Vermont and Entergy had signed an agreement that said the plant could operate only if the state issued a certain document – the March vote essenti...

Today, we have the privilege of hosting the carnival for the seventh time in its young history. We have contributions from ten folks discussing a whole slew of things on nuclear. History In the latest APR Atomic Journal , Will Davis completes the story of the Elk River nuclear plant built back in the late ‘50 and ‘60s. Using original and never-before-seen material, he takes you back in time to describe one of the first reactors constructed in the world. … Brian Wang at Next Big Future noted that research on radiation from back in 1946 was uncovered that suppressed evidence related to benign low doses of radiation. … Speaking of history, Dan Yurman at Idaho Samizdat reported on Siemens’ exit from the nuclear energy industry. In doing so, the firm is leaving the potential for substantial revenue. Siemens will scrap its deal with Russia’s Rosatom to develop the state-owned firm's VVER pressurized water reactor (PWR) to compete with exports from Areva. Siemens said the f...

Vermont is bound and determined to close the Vermont Yankee nuclear energy facility over a leakage of tritium last year that harmed no one - at all. While the leak should not have occurred, the cause of it was located and sealed and no one inside or outside the plant was harmed by it. More about tritium here But the Vermont legislature saw it as an opportunity to close the plant, an action that Vermont  Yankee's owner, Entergy, has filed suit over. The NRC has issued a license allowing the facility to operate an additional 20 years and Entergy would like to do that. We'll see if Entergy's suit prevails - I'm not a lawyer and have no special intelligence on it. You can read more about the suit here . So let's leave that all on the side of the road and focus on the possibility of Vermont Yankee closing. Care to guess how much of Vermont's electricity is generated by nuclear energy? 72 percent . Let that sink in - clearly, the Vermont legislature hasn't ...

Over at the ANS Nuclear Cafe , Meredith Angwin who blogs at Yes Vermont Yankee , makes the case for why the NRC has jurisdiction over nuclear plants: Watching the POP [Vermont Public Oversight Panel] at work, it was clear to me why the NRC has jurisdiction, and why nuclear regulation cannot be a state privilege. Nuclear energy cannot be regulated by a group of people who may be eager to please their legislative employers. There needs to be objective criteria, assessed by full-time experts, in order to keep a plant working well. Having the internal workings of the plant doubly-assessed, by a group of people chosen politically, could get in the way of plant operations. It could even possibly degrade safety. Part-time inspectors with political agendas? This is not the same as having the Occupational Safety and Health Administration come to the plant. Trained OSHA inspectors go to many industrial facilities. The NRC catches a lot of guff in the nuclear industry: The NRC is slo...

Entergy filed a complaint today with the U.S. District Court to seek “a judgment to prevent the state of Vermont from forcing the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant to cease operation on March 21, 2012.” Looks like they have a solid case, though I’m not a lawyer so don’t quote me. Here’s one of the more notables lines from Entergy’s statement: “We have made every reasonable effort to accommodate the state of Vermont and its officials while allowing the continued operation of Vermont Yankee – an outcome that benefits all stakeholders, including Vermont consumers and the approximately 650 men and women who work at the plant,” said Richard Smith, president of Entergy Wholesale Commodities. “Despite the fact that Vermont Yankee is important to the reliability of the New England electric transmission grid, emits virtually no greenhouse gases, and provides more than $100 million in annual economic benefits to the state of Vermont, it has been made clear that state officials are singula...

They write letters : Shutting down Yankee would be disastrous. So true. This is written by PJ Beaumont, who wrote a letter to the Bennington Banner’s editors to say so. And more: We received a flier in our mail from "Green Mountain Future," recommending Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant be shut down. The flier distorts the facts about Yankee, implying that the water tower leak contained radioactive water (it didn't) and throwing out of context the past minor radioactive leak (the Vermont Department of Health determined it posed no significant adverse health threat). The flier was put out by a recently formed group with the "Democratic Governors Association" purportedly backing it. The purpose of the flier is to make an issue of Vermont Yankee to get Democrats elected, even when the Democrats know in the end Vermont Yankee has to stay open, regardless of who is governor. Beaumont is right on the facts – I might substitute “no significant adv...

Even though VPIRG is considered a research group, based on the coalition’s critique of their report , looks like much research wasn’t done at all on how to supposedly power VT without VY. Meredith Angwin from Yes Vermont Yankee sums it up : I belong to a group, Coalition for Energy Solutions . We are all local energy professionals : one physicist, one chemist (me), and four engineers. Some of us have active careers and companies, some are semi-retired. At any rate, we felt that this VPIRG report [pdf] overstated the ease of replacing Vermont Yankee with renewables, and understated the costs. (Actually, they didn't state the costs.) We began doing research for a report on the costs and engineering feasibility of their recommendations. It has been a long road, in which we evaluated the capacity factors of wind farms in Maine, called foresters to assess the sustainable yield of our northern forests, and tried to assess the costs and reliability of cow power . And of course, ...

It’s been awhile since we added anybody to our blogroll. Today we have the pleasure of adding Nuclear Fissionary who Idaho Samizdat introduced several weeks back. Jack Gamble, main contributor at Nuclear Fissionary, has done an informative job of refreshing our memories on costs, capacity factors, Chernobyl and so on. As well as Jack’s good work, this week has been a great week for pro-nuclear bloggers out there. As many who read here know, the debate about the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant is raging on. Atomic Insights knocked out some very useful information about how much total tritium leaked at VY as well as exposed the misinformation from Vermont Senate Pro Tem Peter Shumlin on Vermont Yankee . Apparently many people in the Vermont state legislature believe solar provides 30 percent of Germany’s electricity; an achievement that gives hope for renewable advocates. Well, Rod and Meredith from Yes Vermont Yankee squashed that false info (solar provides less than one percent) a...

John McClaughry, president of the Ethan Allen Institute , wrote a commentary piece to the Rutland Herald about Vermont's Fanatic Anti-Nuclear Movement : In the face of all science, reason, and experience, the anti-nuclear zealots fiercely maintain that the Vernon nuclear power plant [Vermont Yankee] is a standing death threat against the population for miles around, that its pall of radiation will produce deformed children, and that the plant's present owner, Entergy, is a reckless and sinister enterprise making enormous profits while scornfully dismissing the concerns of its likely Vermont victims. ... The attack on Vermont Yankee has escalated since 2003, and especially since 2007, when the champion of the anti-nuke/VPIRG forces, Windham County Sen. Peter Shumlin, returned to the Senate and again became its president pro tem. In return for the state's non-objection to an increase of Vermont Yankee's electricity output by 20 percent, the legislators in 2003 demanded t...

Back in May, we started to follow the story about how the Vermont State Senate was planning on starting a "clean energy" fund with $25 million in additional tax money from Vermont Yankee . After Governor Jim Douglas vetoed the legislation , proponents of the tax mounted an effort to override the veto -- an effort that I was unaware was supported by former Vice President Al Gore. He explained his support on June 14th in the following video address -- one which clearly experienced some technical difficulties: A "terrific" law, eh? Can someone please explain to me why placing additional taxes on one form of clean electrical generation in order to subsidize another can possibly be "terrific"? Lucky for the ratepayers of Vermont, the override attempt fell 12 votes short .

Details from the Bennington Banner .

From the Boston Globe : Activists released a new report Friday indicating Vermont has more radioactive nuclear waste per capita than any state in the nation, which they said underscores the need for approval of a climate change bill that would tax the Vermont Yankee plant. Which led Ruth Sponsler to respond: Vermont Yankee's spent nuclear fuel is contained and hidden away where it hurts no one. If there's more "nuclear waste" per capita in Vermont than in other states, that means that Vermont is releasing less fossil fuel waste to the open atmosphere. That means Vermont residents breathe less sulfur dioxide, particulate matter, and nitrous oxides per capita - - - because nuclear energy is substituting for fossil fuel generation. Here's hoping somebody's editor at the Boston Globe reads Ruth's response. For a previous post on anti-nuke efforts to increase taxes on Vermont Yankee, click here .

The new tax increase on Vermont Yankee that we wrote about earlier this week passed the state senate : Without a word of debate or even a roll call, the Senate voted Wednesday for a bill designed to encourage energy efficiency and renewable energy, along with an increase in the state's tax on Vermont Yankee to pay for it. The tax on Vermont Yankee's electric generation would claim $25 million from the nuclear power plant's owner, Entergy Corp., between 2009 and 2012. The House is expected to vote on the bill Friday, when it's likely to face debate. Though the tax is significantly less than a $37 million profits tax the Senate previously proposed, the company and the governor remain opposed to it. "This is still a case of a deal not being a deal," Entergy spokesman Brian Cosgrove said. "How do we know what's next?" David O'Brien, commissioner of the state Department of Public Service, called the tax "irresponsible," and said it woul...