NEI Nuclear Notes

The following post was submitted by William Skaff, NEI's Director of Policy Development. The MIT study, “ Water-CO2 Trade-Offs in Electricity Generation Planning ,” that was recently published in Nature Climate Change Letters indicates that power sector water use increases as carbon emissions are reduced. The measure employed for water use is withdrawal. A closer look at the study indicates that this approach is seriously flawed and could lead to erroneous conclusions about nuclear power plants and cooling water. Climate change eliminates water from watersheds. It does not take water out and then put it back again. Therefore, the appropriate measurement of power plant water use in this context is consumption. This study is seriously flawed because its modeling employs withdrawal, when once-through cooling systems return 99 percent of the water withdrawn, 1  and the power sector as a whole returns 98 percent of water withdrawn, to the source water body. 2 For example, accor...

What would happen to electricity prices in the event of a significant nuclear power plant shutdown? If recent events in Southern California are any measure, electricity prices would go up. In January of 2012, both reactors at San Onofre in Southern California were taken out of service. The result? Electricity prices in the north and south of the state are no longer comparable. Prices were up 12% in 2012 in “the Southland” compared to Northern California where PG&E ’s Diablo Canyon keeps humming along, according to new data from the US Energy Information Administration. Electric Light & Power magazine says that the difference is one of simple substitution. Switching off nuclear power has led to more expensive alternatives. But don’t look to natural gas prices as the culprit. Relative differences in natural gas prices do not seem to be driving the gap between Northern and Southern California power prices… Electricity imports (from other states) aren’t t...

Cheap gas? Not last week in the Northeast. Yesterday evening, the Wall Street Journal published a story by Rebecca Smith that asked the question, " Can Gas Undo Nuclear Power? " It's a question that's been asked often, especially in the wake of the announced closing of the Kewaunee Power Station in Wisconsin by Dominion last October. Here's what NEI's Richard Myers had to say about it at the time : In 2005, when Dominion bought the plant: (1) power prices in the Midwest were in the $40-50/MWhr range; wellhead gas prices were in the $6-10 per million Btu range; and U.S. electricity demand was growing. Today: (1) power prices in the Midwest are in the $30/MWhr range: gas prices are in the $2-3 per million Btu range; and (3) the U.S. has had 5 years of no growth in electricity demand, thanks to the worst recession in 80 years. Near the close of 2012, NEI's President and CEO, Marv Fertel addressed the natural gas issue head on when it came to buildin...

Here's a snippet of what went on in the energy markets last week: Electricity peak prices rose slightly last week at ERCOT and Palo Verde, averaging $32-34/MWh at those hubs. Meanwhile at the Northeast, PJM, and Southwest hubs, prices fell $2, $6, and $11, respectively, to average $38-39/MWh. Gas at the Henry Hub rose 12 cents during the week, averaging $3.38/MMBtu. “Faced with softening fall demand fundamentals, power prices for next day delivery worked mostly lower across the U.S. on Thursday, Oct. 11, even as traders looked to rising natural gas prices and climbing outages. ... Cash gas markets also worked higher, adding as much as 15 cents in parts of the West and as much as 25 cents in the East, which offered direct support to power markets. Also lending support, various generating units continue to drop offline, and the outages will accelerate in the coming weeks as units shutter operations for fall maintenance and refueling. ... Several more outages lie around the corne...

Here's a snippet of what went on in the energy markets last week: Electricity peak prices fell slightly last week at ERCOT and Palo Verde, averaging $32/MWh at those hubs. Meanwhile at the Northeast and PJM hubs, prices rose $7 to average $40 and $45/MWh, respectively. “Next-day power markets were mixed to conclude the first week of the new month Friday, Oct. 5, as traders looked to cover short positions ahead of the impending weekend but also with choppy demand outlooks and recent ho-hum moves for natural gas also coming into play.” (SNL Energy’s Power Daily – 10/8/12) … West Texas Intermediate crude oil fell 54 cents to average $90.81/bbl last week. “EIA projects average household expenditures for heating oil and natural gas will increase by 19 percent and 15 percent, respectively, this winter (October 1 through March 31) compared with last winter. Projected household expenditures are 5 percent higher for electricity and 13 percent higher for propane this winter. Ave...

Here's a snippet of what went on in the energy markets last week: Electricity peak prices rose across the country last week, except at the Northeast hub, where they fell $8/MWh. “As traders closed their books on September and dealt the first daily product for October, power prices drifted in mixed directions in the eastern two-thirds of the U.S. on Friday, Sept. 28. ... Across the U.S., demand remains a muted driver as the mild fall air keeps weather-related demand balanced between cooling and heating needs. However, a growing number of outages continued to lend power prices a push higher, especially with natural gas prices once again on the rise, meaning replacement generation is likely to cost more, too.” (SNL Energy’s Power Daily, 10/1/12) … Average nuclear plant availability fell one percent last week, to 83 percent nationwide. Beaver Valley 2 began a planned refueling and maintenance outage September 24. Brunswick 1, Nine Mile Point 1, and Monticello returned to s...

Here's a snippet of what went on in the energy markets last week: Electricity peak prices were mostly down last week. Prices at ERCOT-Houston, PJM West, and the Northeast hubs fell substantially, dropping $27, $20, and $11/MWh, respectively. Prices at Palo Verde and the Southwest hubs rose marginally, in the face of a heat wave. “Largely defying a typical pre-weekend tick higher, power prices for Sept. 17 delivery moved in both directions across the U.S. on Friday, Sept. 14, but with the bias mostly lower as traders focused on softer gas prices and mild fall weather rather than mounting outages or the return of business-related demand early in the next week. … The cost of gas could have heightened influence at the power markets in the coming weeks as large baseload reactors drop offline for routine seasonal maintenance. In total, almost 39,000 MW of supply is already offline nationwide, up about 4,000 MW on the day, according to data from IIR Energy. By fuel, there are more th...

What would a world without electricity look like? That's a question that Hollywood's J.J. Abrams is attempting to answer this Fall on NBC in a new hour-long Science Fiction drama called Revolution . Set 15 years after the world's electricity mysteriously blinks out, the show premieres tonight at 10:00 p.m. U.S. EDT/9:00 p.m. U.S. CDT on the peacock network. The full premiere episode is available as a free preview on iTunes, so I was able to catch it over the weekend. While I wouldn't want to reveal any spoilers, I'll just say that a lot of the program looks awfully familiar . If you've ever watched Life After People on cable's History Channel , you'll know exactly what I mean. But while the world the characters inhabit looks a lot like post-apocalyptic worlds we've seen on television and in the movies before, it sure seems like more than a few folks managed to stash a working blow dryer and a washing machine somewhere. Then again, this is...

Here's a snippet of what went on in the energy markets last week: Electricity peak prices were mixed last week across the country. ERCOT-Houston and PJM West hubs saw the most action, rising $20 and $12 to average around $55/MWh, respectively. Prices at the Western, Northeastern and Southeastern hubs remained soft, moving less than $5/MWh in either direction. “Power prices across the United States moved mostly higher Tuesday, Sept. 4, with the largest gains recorded in parts of the East and Midwest after markets were closed Monday for Labor Day. … PJM West jumped more than $10 on the day with trades in the mid- to upper $50s, driven in part by a higher demand forecast as the PJM grid operator expects demand in the Western region reaching 69,700 MW on Wednesday. … As the Gulf Coast recovers from Hurricane Isaac's landfall last week, hotter weather and higher demand helped push ERCOT power prices higher Tuesday” (SNL Energy’s Power Daily – 9/5/12). Average nuclear plant ...

Here's a summary of what went on in the energy markets last week: Electricity peak prices made marginal gains last week across the country. The largest movers were the Western hubs which increased $4-$6 to average $40/MWh in the region. The Eastern hubs barely budged and the Texas hub rose $4 to average $36/MWh. “Power prices across the U.S. moved in mixed directions Tuesday, Aug. 28, finding support from hot weather in California, across the Southwest and Texas but taking on a more bearish bias elsewhere across the country in line with weak spot gas prices. … In addition, generation remains healthy. While several units are slated to shut through September and October, a fairly minimal 22,790 MW is offline nationwide in the meantime, according to IIR Energy. The nuclear generation sector, which could see as many as 30 reactors shut for refueling by the end of the year, represents the largest market share of outages, with 8,337 MW offline. In addition, about 5,568 MW of the tot...

Here's a summary of what went on in the energy markets last week: Electricity peak prices fell $1-$16 last week across the country to all settle below $40/MWh. “Next-day power markets were mixed but generally lower across the U.S. to open the workweek Monday, Aug. 20, as traders eyeballed higher load forecasts in most areas but also weak natural gas prices and an overall healthier generation picture. … Other sources of generation were improving Monday. According to data from IIR Energy, just more than 19,300 MW of various generation was offline across the U.S. early Monday. By fuel type, 3,866 MW was coal-based, while about 8,150 MW was nuclear-based and 1,969 MW was natural gas-driven” (SNL Energy’s Power Daily – 8/21/12). Electricity production was down 8.3 percent last week compared to the same week in 2011. For the first 34 weeks of 2012, electricity production is down 2.3 percent compared to the same period in 2011. … For more of the report click here .

It's almost impossible to get your arms around the sheer size and scope of the blackout that's struck India over the past two days. Estimates say that about 670 million people are without electricity. As the New York Times noted , that's roughly equivalent to the entire population of Europe or more than the population of North and Central America combined. By way of comparison, the largest blackout that ever struck North America, the 2003 outage that hit the Northeastern U.S. and parts of Canada, deprived about 50 million people of electricity for about two days. As we've seen in the past, power outages in advanced economies can lead to economic disruption and loss of life -- something that should give all of us pause when considering the magnitude of this event. I'll close with some words from NEI's Senior Vice President of Government Affairs, Alex Flint: The earth has 7 billion people on it. Today, 2 billion of those people’s principal source of e...

We cannot fully endorse everything that puts nuclear energy in a favorable light: It isn't hard to see the one energy source that's grown lockstep with South Korea's economic ascension... The country built its first nuclear power plant in 1977. Its rise to economic powerhouse began in 1980. Today nuclear accounts for 30% of generation, but because of its high reliability, it accounts for 45% of the country's total electric consumption. Since that first reactor in the late seventies, South Korea has built 22 more. The United States hasn't built any. (The U.S. ranks 26th in Internet connectivity and has no high-speed rail. You decide if there's correlation.) Korea plans to bring 11 more reactors online between now and 2021, bringing nuclear's share of electric generation up to 60%. It's not true that no U.S. plants went online after 1977, but the point here is that the author overloads nuclear energy with responsibility for South Korea’s phenomen...

Earlier this week, the journal Nature Climate Change published a study concerning how warmer weather and reduced river flows might impact electricity generation at nuclear and coal-fired power plants. Here's how Reuters reported the findings: In a study published on Monday, a team of European and U.S. scientists focused on projections of rising temperatures and lower river levels in summer and how these impacts would affect power plants dependent on river water for cooling. The authors predict that coal and nuclear power generating capacity between 2031 and 2060 will decrease by between 4 and 16 percent in the United States and a 6 to 19 percent decline in Europe due to lack of cooling water. The nuclear energy industry isn't unfamiliar with the topic. Here at NEI Nuclear Notes, we first dealt with the issue during the Summer of 2006 when a heat wave struck Europe and forced a number of nuclear plants to reduce power. Back then, our points were pretty clear: the indu...

Earlier this week, Jamie Reno , a reporter for Tina Brown's Daily Beast wrote a story about San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station, and the situation there concerning excessive wear in the steam generators . For an update on that situation, click here . In any case, Reno's story attempted to tie the operating difficulties at San Onofre to Fukushima, and efforts by anti-nuclear activists in California to shut it and the state's other nuclear power plant at Diablo Canyon . The anti-nuclear power movement in the United States peaked in 1979, with widespread protests, the “No Nukes” concert in New York City, and the release of The China Syndrome, the gripping film about a near-meltdown at a fictional California facility that foreshadowed a real-life accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania just weeks after the movie’s premiere. Since then, no new nuclear plants have been built in the U.S. That's incorrect. 50 more reactors were built after Three Mile I...

Over the past few days we've seen a raft of coverage about the incident at San Onofre last week, but little of it has put the events there in the proper context. The one exception to the rule is this report by Vikki Vargas of the NBC affiliate in Los Angeles : View more videos at: http://nbclosangeles.com . More later.

Earlier this week, we reported on our blog about a steam generator tube leak in unit 3 at the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) in California (see here and here ). The key facts are that: 1) the public and plant workers were never in danger; 2) the plant responded exactly how it was supposed to—sensitive monitoring instruments alerted workers to the problem & they were able to quickly shut down the plant and isolate the component within four hours of detection. Southern California Edison , the plant’s owner, also immediately notified the Nuclear Regulatory Commission , the nation’s nuclear energy regulator, of the issue; and 3) pinhole-sized leaks in steam generator tubes are not an uncommon occurrence while a new steam generator is still being broken in. (SONGS just last year finished installing new steam generators at the site.) As soon as the event occurred, some groups immediately called for the plant to close. For instance, in the San Clemente Times...

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology released a report on Monday that discusses the future challenges facing the U.S. electricity grid and several recommendations for how to best manage them. The researchers found that one of the most notable challenges facing the electricity grid is the threat of cyber attack. MIT writes in the report: Perfect protection from cyberattacks is not possible. There will be a successful attack at some point. This is a huge threat to the grid because a cyber attack in one area has the ability to affect other areas very rapidly, which could greatly disrupt power supply all over the country. Cyber attacks are also considered by the Pentagon to be an “ act of war ,” said the MIT researchers at a National Press Club event this week. To best manage this issue, MIT recommends that: The federal government should designate a single agency to have responsibility for working with industry and to have the appropriate regulatory authority to enhance c...

Yesterday afternoon, the Union of Concerned Scientists released a study that suggested that thermoelectric power plants were contributing to stress on the nation's supply of fresh water . For readers of NEI Nuclear Notes, this issue isn't exactly new. Back in 2006, we needed to push out some clarifying information (click here and here ) in the wake of the drought that struck Europe. Back then, the angle reporters would take targeted nuclear energy in isolation (speaking of reporters, see this from NEI's Steve Kerekes ), despite the fact that any steam cycle power plant has to deal with the same issues. At the time we pointed out that data from the U.S. Geological Service showed that the largest use of freshwater in the country was not electric power generation, but rather crop irrigation. NEI's Bill Skaff wrote the following response to the UCS study. Responsible environmental management must begin with a recognition of the water-energy nexus—large-scale electricity ...

One of the big arguments against nuclear is that it simply costs too much. Well, if the latest reports from Germany are anything to go by, consumers are going to have to pay more without it. As reported here earlier, Germany has decided to phase out nuclear power and is hoping to shut down all of its plants by 2022. What has been the result ? Rising electricity prices. Since the first nuclear power plant was shut down, the price of electricity on the European Energy Exchange in Leipzig has increased by about 12 percent. Not only that, Germany has lost  some energy independence too: Germany has gone from being a net exporter to a net importer of electricity. According to the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity (ENTSOE) in Brussels, Germany now imports several million kilowatt hours of electricity from abroad every day. This wasn’t the way things were supposed to go. "According to our calculations, the cost of a kilowatt ho...