NEI Nuclear Notes

Ceres has produced a new report called Benchmarking Air Emissions, which shows that the electric generating business has done a significant job in reducing a variety of greenhouse gases, notably nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide. Nuclear energy does not weigh heavily into the report because new nuclear power is still a few years away, so only uprates can have contributed to the report’s profile. Still: Among the top 100 power producers, Exelon had the eighth lowest CO 2 emissions rate in 2011, largely due to its large nuclear and renewable energy fleet, as well as its investments in nuclear uprates.  Even with a low level of emissions, Exelon reduced its total CO 2 emissions by 32 percent and its CO 2 emission rate by 40 percent between 2000 and 2011. It’s the “even with a low level of emissions” bit I want to focus on here, because it recognizes that nuclear energy has made a significant contribution. Southern Company reduced total SO 2 emis...

Tufts University Prof. Ujjayant Chakravorty From the earliest days of the blog, we've tried to introduce our readers to personalities who support the expanded use of nuclear energy. That was the whole idea of a series of posts called, " Another Blogger for Nuclear Energy ." In the same vein, I'd like to present Ujjayant Chakravorty , an economic professor at Tufts University who specializes in resource and environmental economics. A graduate of the prestigious IIT in Delhi, Prof. Chakravorty came to Tufts from the University of Alberta. For him, supporting the expansion of nuclear energy is all about helping the world transition to clean energy. Here's what he had to day in an interview with Phys.org: What are the advantages of nuclear power? If you look at where base load power comes from—the least amount of energy we need to provide power—you need a major source, something that is non-stop. Nuclear provides non-stop generation. It's not like dep...

We return, once more, to Germany where details are starting to emerge on the real costs of their nuclear phase out. Let’s start with emissions. According to an estimate by Laszlo Varro, the head of the gas, coal, and power markets division at the International Energy Agency emissions will rise significantly . Varro estimates that the nuclear phase out in Germany has caused a 25-million-ton annual increase in carbon dioxide emissions. The culprit, in large part, is the new coal power that has come online to meet the shortfall. 25 million tons is sort of abstract, but EPA has a pretty cool tool: the Greenhouse Gas Equivalencies Calculator . It finds more concrete alternatives to “tons of carbon dioxide” like “emissions from passenger vehicles.” Turns out 25 million tons of CO 2 emissions per year is equal to (pick your favorite one of the following): Annual greenhouse gas emissions from 4,446,984 passenger vehicles or CO 2 emissions from 52,743,297 barrels of oil. ...

Back in 2003, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology released a study on nuclear power because they believed "this technology, despite the challenges it faces, is an important option for the United States and the world to meet future energy needs without emitting carbon dioxide (CO2) and other atmospheric pollutants." The 2003 study identified "the issues facing nuclear power and what might be done to overcome them." Today, MIT released its Update to the 2003 study (pdf), and while some great progress has been made over the past six years, more needs to be done: After five years, no new plants are under construction in the United States and insufficient progress has been made on waste management. The current assistance program put into place by the 2005 EPACT has not yet been effective and needs to be improved. The sober warning is that if more is not done, nuclear power will diminish as a practical and timely option for deployment at a scale that would constit...

We wonder if industries will have to affix Surgeon General labels on their plants : Having received White House backing, the Environmental Protection Agency declared Friday that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are a significant threat to human health and thus will be listed as pollutants under the Clean Air Act — a policy the Bush administration rejected. You’ll remember that this became a point in the last election, with fears of backyard barbecues being shut down. But the intent is more likely this: The move could allow the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases, but it's more likely that the Obama administration will use the action to prod Congress to pass regulations around a system to cap and then trade emissions so that they are gradually lowered. As you might expect, the usual suspects have lined up. One one side: The EPA should be required "to follow up with standards under the Clean Air Act, the nation's most effective environmental law, ...

Chris Gent over at the Conway blog shared his thoughts on his tour of the Crystal River 3 nuclear plant in Florida: The energy complex is the second largest power-producing facility in the nation and the largest east of the Mississippi. The sprawling facility covers 4,700 acres and generates nearly 3,200 megawatts of electricity. One megawatt serves approximately 800 homes so we’re talking about a plant output that serves nearly 2.6 million homes! The complex is comprised of four coal-fired units and one nuclear. These units came online in 1966 (Unit 1), 1969 (Unit 2), 1977 (Unit 3), 1982 (Unit 4) and 1984 (Unit 5). Before I begin my overview of the tour, let me tell you that security at the facility is beyond intense. I’ve visited the U.S. Capitol and the White House and the security there is elementary compared to what it takes to enter this complex. ... Because the U.S. doesn’t permit the reprocessing of used nuclear fuel, nuclear plants are required to store their entire supply of ...

The American takes a closer look.

It looks like Adam Blinick's post at TNR has kicked off a little debate. Over at The Atlantic , Matt Yglesias had this to say: We'll be weaned off the dastardly power, perhaps, with nuclear powered cars? What about plug-in hybrids ? The idea here is simple: If you generate electricity with a non-emitting source like nuclear, you can power plug-in hybrids while cutting the emission of carbon and other particulate matter like sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide, which would deliver the added benefit of helping to avoid acid rain. Yglesias continues: I have no problem with the idea that putting a proper price on carbon might lead to good things for the nuclear power industry, but the issue in practice is that nuclear advocates are busy demanding large subsidies. It makes sense to some extent to subsidize clean sources of electricity, but we should target subsidies on really, truly clean sources of power -- and nuclear's not that. The idea that dastardly anti-nuclear activist...

Once again, the global anti-nuclear lobby has found a reporter willing to parrot its lies and distortions regarding nuclear energy and CO2 emissions. Stepping to the plate this time is Reuters reporter Nick Trevethan : Nuclear power's claim to be the answer to global warming is being questioned by reports suggesting mining and processing of uranium is carbon intensive. While nuclear power produces only one 50th of the carbon produced by many fossil fuels, its carbon footprint is rising, making wind power and other renewable energies increasingly attractive, according to environmental groups and some official reports. [...] "Nuclear is a climate change red herring," said Ben Ayliffe, Senior Climate and Energy Campaigner at Greenpeace. "There are safer, more reliable alternatives, like energy efficiency and renewables as part of a super-efficient decentralised energy system." What an utter hunk of baloney. Rather than explain things in detail again, here are the...

Some thoughts from Steven Aplin .

Senator John McCain is on the campaign trail in New Hampshire talking about energy and the environment : A key way to reduce harmful greenhouse gas emissions, he said, would be to increase the use of nuclear power. When asked after the forum how he proposed to dispose of high level nuclear waste, McCain said, "My preference is that we store it. I always thought that Yucca Mountain was the right place to do it." "It's not a problem of technology. It's a problem of political will. We have now the worst of all worlds, because we have nuclear waste sites around every nuclear power plant in America, which provides us with the greatest challenge to our security," he said. "So I would try and resolve it and I would try to go back and revisit the Yucca Mountain issue, but I would do everything in my power to resolve it." The Senator has been pretty consistent on this issue for some time now:

Last week, the Council on Foreign Relations sponsored an online discussion on nuclear energy and climate change between NEI's Steve Kerekes and Michael Mariotte of NIRS. To say the least, I think Steve got the better of the exchange, but I'll let our readers decide for themselves. Click here to read it right now.

From the AP : SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - California sued the federal government on Thursday to force a decision about whether the state can impose the nation's first greenhouse gas emission standards for cars and light trucks. More than a dozen other states are poised to follow California's lead if it is granted the waiver from federal law, presenting a challenge to automakers who would have to adapt to a patchwork of regulations. The state's lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency, filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., was expected after Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger vowed last spring to take legal action. "Our future depends on us taking action on global warming right now," Schwarzenegger said during a news conference. "There's no legal basis for Washington to stand in our way." At issue is California's nearly two-year-old request for a waiver under the federal Clean Air Act allowing it to implement a 2002 state anti-polluti...

From the AP : BEIJING,: China will reject any agreement that calls for binding limits on carbon dioxide emissions that will replace the Kyoto Protocol, an EU official said Wednesday. Guido Sacconi, chairman of a visiting European Parliament delegation, said that was the impression he got after three days of talks in Beijing with government and environmental officials. "In the private meetings we have had, particularly with Chinese politicians, there were of course some differences of opinion," Sacconi, who heads the European Parliament's Temporary Committee on Climate Change, told a news conference. "The main difference is, unlike the European Parliament or the European Union, the Chinese believe that it will not be possible, in the agreement which follows the Kyoto Protocol, for China to accept any binding obligations — this was one difference between us."

From Life Cycle Analysis : Bringing to a dramatic close the successful POWERSHIFT 2007 conference in Washington, D.C., hundreds of youth and community members converged on a downtown branch of the financial giant Citibank yesterday. In a unique "direct action," they dumped a half-ton of coal on the doorsteps of Citibank. A delegation of coal-field residents and students went inside to denounce Citibank’s investments to their customers and employees. Out in the street, hundreds of youth began coughing violently, with a massive “die-in” surrounding the bank that shut down them down for the rest of the day. Looks like it won't be the last .

Couldn't help but shake my head when I read this paragraph from Spiegel Online : As energy companies plan several new coal-burning power plants to replace nuclear reactors, experts warn against the environmental impact. Cleaner technologies are not yet production-ready. No kidding. The equation is simple: Eliminate nuclear energy, get used to spewing more carbon. For more from our archives on Germany, where we've been writing about this very problem for a couple of years now, click here . Thanks to Brian Davey at FEASTA for the link.

Hitting the wires earlier today was an AP story out of Vermont that took a look at the debate about renewing the operating license of Vermont Yankee . It was hard not to get a little angry while reading it as the reporter, David Gram, allowed the opponents of the plant to repeat a an old saw about nuclear energy that keeps getting repeated over and over again ... [James] Moore [Vermont Public Interest Research Group] said that comparison doesn't account for something often left out of the conversation when nuclear power is described as not generating greenhouse gases: Mining and processing the uranium fuel for nuclear plants is energy-intensive, and it depends on carbon-generating fossil fuels. And even when you include those factors into the equation, the total lifecycle emissions of nuclear energy are still roughly comparable to renewables . And here's another beauty: "For the average Vermonter, little to nothing would change," said James Moore, energy advocate wi...

The October issue of Nuclear Energy Insight is now available online. In it, you'll find an article about the first full license application for a new nuclear plant filed in nearly 30 years. There also are reports on how reactors helped defang the dog days of summer and nuclear plant neighbors' welcoming reception of new-plant plans. Another article remembers NRC Commissioner Edward McGaffigan, while other articles discuss the energy sector's work force options, multiple studies' conclusions that nuclear is needed to reduce carbon dioxide emissions and the nuclear sector's completion of a key security review. You also can read about how nuclear technology is improving Zambia's prognosis for cancer treatment.

From Daniel Gross at Slate .

The Wall Street Journal takes a look at the debate over how to constrain carbon emissions .