The NEI Afternoon Clip File

Here are some of the news clips we're reading at NEI this afternoon. The Mercury News (registration required) ran an editorial by NEI President and Chief Executive Officer Skip Bowman in its Sunday edition. Bowman wrote that the energy bill puts the United States "on a path toward a safer, cleaner and more prosperous future:

In these uncertain times, energy security and national security are inextricably linked. By developing a diverse energy supply within our borders, we are better able to protect ourselves from becoming dependent on unstable regions of the world that do not have our best interests in mind.

... The overwhelmingly bipartisan support for a new wave of nuclear plant construction may have taken some observers by surprise. But the industry's excellent record in safety, efficiency and reliability in the past decade has captured the attention of policy-makers, both Democrat and Republican.

... Elected officials, environmental advocates like the Pew Center and World Resources Institute, business leaders and opinion-makers in this country and abroad increasingly support the expansion of nuclear power. The Group of 8 meeting in Scotland noted the importance of nuclear power to a cleaner future and a diverse global energy portfolio. This was echoed by the strong bipartisan support for the energy bill in Congress. And in a nationwide poll conducted in May, 83 percent of Americans said nuclear energy will be important in meeting America's electricity needs in the years ahead.

Congress has taken an important first step toward long-term energy policy for America, but it is now up to the industry, state and local government leaders and consumers to carry the torch of enhancing our energy independence.

A renewed commitment to nuclear should be part of a brighter, safer, more prosperous future.

Australia's Yamarna Goldfields Ltd. is refuting the idea that uranium resources will be severely depleted in the next 50 years -- a scenario being sketched by organizations such as the European Commission and the Organization for Economic Cooperation:

Ian Hore-Lacy, manager of the Melbourne-based Uranium Information Centre, said this line was disinformation pushed by the Greens and other anti-nuclear organisations.

... "The world faces many challenges in achieving a global expansion of nuclear energy to fully realise the technology's clean-energy potential. A limited supply of uranium resources is not among them," the [World Nuclear Association] report stated.

The association said current estimates put uranium resources, including those not yet economic or properly explored, at volumes to fulfil about 200 years' use at today's consumption rates.

Moreover, technology had improved since the first uranium boom of the 1970s.

In June, NEI Nuclear Notes contributor, Dr. Clifton W. Farrell, made a similar argument.

South Korea is looking forward to becoming a hydrogen-based economy by 2040, with a sizeable part of its transportation, power generation and household appliances operating on eco-friendly fuel cells, the government said Friday.

"South Korea relies heavily on fossil fuel, making it imperative to take serious action to develop energy resources that will not dry up," a government expert said.

... If all goes according to plan, hydrogen-based fuel cells will account for 8 per cent of the gross domestic product by 2040, the official said, adding that up to a million new jobs and a 20 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide can be expected.

Oil update: Price per barrel is continuing to fall, as OPEC increases production to meet demand. As of 12:15 p.m., $66.40 was the going rate for a barrel of crude oil.

Crude oil fell for the first time in four sessions on speculation that increased production will help refineries meet demand for gasoline and other fuels.

The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries raised output this year to trim prices that reached an all-time high last week. U.S. crude-oil stockpiles probably rose 1.5 million barrels last week, according to a Bloomberg survey. Supplies jumped 3 million barrels in the two weeks ended Aug. 5 after falling the previous four weeks, Energy Department data shows.

"Prices are pulling back a bit after last week's gain,'' said Kyle Cooper, an analyst with Citigroup Inc. in Houston. ``The pullback is slight and market sentiment remains bullish."

Come back tomorrow morning for more news from the NEI Clip File.

Technorati tags: Nuclear Energy Environment Energy Politics Technology Economics

Activists' Claims Distort Facts about Advanced Reactor Design

Below is from our rapid response team . Yesterday, regional anti-nuclear organizations asked federal nuclear energy regulators to launch an investigation into what it claims are “newly identified flaws” in Westinghouse’s advanced reactor design, the AP1000. During a teleconference releasing a report on the subject, participants urged the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to suspend license reviews of proposed AP1000 reactors. In its news release, even the groups making these allegations provide conflicting information on its findings. In one instance, the groups cite “dozens of corrosion holes” at reactor vessels and in another says that eight holes have been documented. In all cases, there is another containment mechanism that would provide a barrier to radiation release. Below, we examine why these claims are unwarranted and why the AP1000 design certification process should continue as designated by the NRC. Myth: In the AP1000 reactor design, the gap between the shield bu...

How many nuclear plants does it take to meet the world's energy needs?

Several weeks ago Joshua Pearce at Clarion University in Pennsylvania released a study titled “ Thermodynamic limitations to nuclear energy deployment as a greenhouse gas mitigation technology .” In the study he stated... nuclear energy production would have to increase by 10.5% per year from 2010 to 2050 to both replace fossil-fuel-energy use and meet the future energy demands. This line, of course, made the headlines and has been picked up by several outlets and blogs . When looking into his calculations for this statement, he made one assumption error that overstated the above sentence by nearly a factor of three. Page 121, Section 4.1 of the study states: Richard Smalley pointed out that in 2004, the global economy consumed the equivalent of 220 million barrels of oil per day, which converted into electricity terms is the equivalent of 14.5 TeraWatts (TW), or 14,500,000 MegaWatts (MW) (2005). … With a nuclear plant having about 1000 MW (1 GW) of capacity, we would need 14,500...

What Happens During a Refueling Outage?

You may have noticed over the past few weeks that a number of nuclear plants are shut down for refueling outages or are resuming operations after just returning from one. This type of routine outage usually occurs in the spring or fall when electricity demand is low so that nuclear reactors can replace about one-third of the spent fuel rods with new fuel and conduct other routine maintenance and repairs at the plant. To get a better sense of how refueling works at a nuclear energy facility, I spoke with Marcus Nichol, NEI’s senior project manager for used fuel storage and transportation, and asked him to explain the basics. Why does a nuclear plant need to replace one-third of its fuel? Nichol: The main purpose of a refueling outage is to replace older fuel that is depleted—meaning it can no longer efficiently produce energy from nuclear fission reactions—with new fuel. This “used fuel” has typically been used in the reactor for four-and-a-half to six years before it is pe...

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