It's one thing to be a blogger, but speaking to your local Rotary Club is another great way to get the message out about our industry and how it can protect the environment while supporting energy security.
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...
Comments
This is simply not true.
Carbon emissions aside, which he did not qualify in his statement, from the fuel fabrication process, routine operations release a wide variety of radioisotopes to both the air and water and eventually the soil. Simply look at the annual radioactive discharge reports for each and every nuclear power station and you will see a wide variety of routine release rates.
Oyster Creek for example released more than 1 million curies out the elevated stack in 1979 alone and nobody at NRC as much as batted an eye.
Such claims are also in denial of the radioactive waste stream that comes from reactors and remains unresolved.
So alot more than water vapor is coming off every reactor. Clearly the hope here is that if you tell a lie enough times, people will start to believe it.
Well, Mr. Gunter, working for NIRS, you should be well equipped to educate us about that. Only, you call them "factoids."
Anyone in the nuclear power industry can tell you that routine discharges from commercial nuclear power are trivial by way of comparison with the fluctuation in natural background radiation. Note I said the "fluctuation" and not the actual level. Even releases from incidents such as TMI-2 were inconsequential.