NEI Nuclear Notes

Maybe it was the collapse (this year) of an attempt to lift a ban on uranium mining in Virginia that got the Washington Post thinking about the other end of the fuel cycle, but here’s what they think regardless: Since the president helped to kill the Yucca project, his administration has borne a particular responsibility to devise a workable way to clean up this mess. Last month the Energy Department finally released its proposal. It is a reasonable plan for post-Yucca policymaking that nevertheless relies on a big assumption — that someplace in the country will volunteer to host some waste. Oh, somehow I don’t think that will be so difficult. Even the people around Yucca Mountain wanted Yucca Mountain. And the President’s Blue Ribbon Commission proposed the idea of consent-based repository siting after seeing it work at New Mexico’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant and in Sweden, where towns competed for a repository. But disbelief that anyone would take used nuclear fuel is reall...

Miniature not because Georgia Power is a small provider of electricity, but because the company’s view of its own future may provide some insight into larger energy trends. We should not assume this to be true, an easy trap to fall into; instead, let’s look at it as one data point in a thesis that could be proven or disproven by more data points. The reason we can glimpse into the future is because the Georgia Public Service Commission requires Georgia Power to submit what it calls an integrated resource plan. This IRP provides a look at the electricity landscape over the next 20 years. Georgia Power prepares a new IRP every three years, so its outlook can change based on changes in the marketplace. Although we often refer to the two new reactors at Georgia’s Plant Vogtle as a Southern Co. project, the facility is jointly owned by Georgia Power (45.7%), Oglethorpe Power Corporation (30%), Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia (22.7%) and Dalton Utilities (1.6%). Georgia Powe...

The following statement can be attributed to NEI President and CEO Marv Fertel: “The nuclear energy industry extends our thanks to Secretary Chu for his service to the nation and our best wishes to him and his family in his future endeavors. “The industry greatly appreciates Secretary Chu’s strong belief in the expansion of nuclear energy as a vital clean-energy technology for our nation. His leadership with regard to the construction of new nuclear energy facilities was important symbolically and substantively. This applies to the larger reactors that already are part of the backbone of our nation’s electricity grid, as well as innovative small reactor designs that offer great promise as a complementary technology. “The energy, environmental and economic challenges confronting our nation make it imperative that Secretary Chu’s successor continue to recognize nuclear energy as a vital part of our energy and environmental policy. As a reliable provider of affordable, low-carbon el...

Politico has the story : Energy Secretary Steven Chu is stepping down, ending a four-year tenure marked by milestones in green-energy spending along with withering attacks from Republicans and the collapse of the solar company Solyndra. Chu announced Friday that he intends to resign once a successor is confirmed, according to a memo sent to Energy Department staff and obtained by POLITICO. He was the last of President Barack Obama’s long-serving Cabinet members to announce plans to leave or stay for the second term. Read the rest at the link. We’ll certainly have more about this later. For the moment, a tidbit: Chu will be the longest serving energy secretary since the founding of the department.

Switzerland's Beznau NPP Switzerland’s energy profile is one of the cleanest in the world, with virtually no fossil fuel output in the production of electricity. About 55 percent is hydroelectric, 39 percent nuclear (from five reactors) and most of the remainder renewable energy. That profile also highlights problems going forward, as the Swiss would like to end their involvement with nuclear energy by 2034. There’s some more potential in their hydro resources, but shuttering the reactors will hurt. The decision to close the reactors is part of an energy policy and, as we’ve seen in Japan, those can change . So whither the Swiss ? Nuclear or no nuclear? “It doesn’t make sense to burn one bridge when the other one does not yet exist or is not yet in the process of being built,” said Michael Schorer, spokesman for the Nuclear Forum Switzerland. “We reject the ban on building new nuclear power plants and urge the federal council to devise an additional scenario that includes ...

So how did that vote in Bulgaria go? We mentioned a couple of weeks ago that Bulgaria had a referendum coming up on whether to continue to build more nuclear facilities. So how did the vote go? Well, you can’t win ‘em all even when you, um, win ‘em all . 60.5 percent of Bulgarians who took part in yesterday’s national referendum voted in support of the development of nuclear energy. Some 6.9 million people had had the right to vote, out of which a mere 1.5 million voters went to the booths. According to the estimates of the Central Election Commission the activity was almost 22%. Which to my mind means, nuclear energy won – by a lot. Even if 1.5 million qualifies as paltry, it’s still 1.5 million who cared enough about the issue to cast a vote. Everyone else could have voted and abdicated sharing their view by not doing so – insofar as the non-voters had any view at all. That’s how it should work, right? Well, no. The rules of the election foiled it. Constitutional rules mean...

NEI VP Richard J. Myers The following statement concerning today's story on nuclear energy and natural gas ("Can gas undo nuclear power?") that appeared in the Wall Street Journal can be attributed to Richard J. Myers, NEI's Vice President, Policy Development, Planning and Supplier Programs: Electricity production issues are not quite as cut-and-dried as portrayed in the article, certainly not from the vantage point of energy companies who must evaluate an array of factors to determine what their future generating mix will and will not be. A nuclear energy facility produces benefits well beyond the electricity it generates. They include economic benefits like jobs, taxes and procurement; grid reliability benefits in the form of voltage support and ancillary services; the environmental benefit of avoided emissions; and the energy security benefits of an electricity source that adds diversity and forward price stability to the electricity supply portfolio. It a...