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U.S. Nuclear Power Plants Weather the “Polar Vortex”

Christina Macpherson’s opinion of this post is that it is:  nuclear-marketing-crap

From U.S. NRC Blog
January 6, 2014 – 3:12pm
Extract
Neil Sheehan Public Affairs Officer Region I   When the temperatures plunge into Arctic territory, there are few parts of the infrastructure not impacted in one way or another. Pipes can freeze, roads and bridges can quickly ice over and car batteries can go dormant. Now, with what meteorologists are calling a “polar vortex” flooding much of the country with a blast of frigid air, precautions are being taken to guard against potential effects. Count U.S. nuclear power plants among those facilities gearing up for the 2014 version of the Big Chill. As of Monday afternoon, no plants were reporting any problems of note related to the frigid extremes, but ongoing checks will be in order to ensure that remains the case. The NRC’s regional offices in the Midwest and Northeast are keeping an eye on plant owners’ responses to the unusually low temperatures.
Plants in the affected areas have entered off-normal procedures that entail minimizing regular surveillance activities and increasing the frequency of checks and walkdowns (visual evaluations) of equipment that could be impacted by the temperatures. NRC Resident Inspectors, who are assigned to specific sites, will continue to monitor the situation. The inspectors use an “Adverse Weather Protection” inspection procedure to guide their assessments of whether plants are ready for extreme temperatures, including the bitter cold.
Those reviews are typically done at the start of the season. “As applicable, verify cold weather protection features, such as heat tracing, space heaters, and weatherized enclosures are monitored sufficiently to ensure they support operability of the system, structure or component (SSC) they protect,” the procedure states in part. It also instructs inspectors to perform walkdowns to verify the physical condition of weather-protection features. The NRC has long recognized the need for nuclear plant owners to be on guard for extreme cold-related issues. Along those lines, the agency in January 1998 issued an Information Notice on “Nuclear Power Plant Cold Weather Problems and Protective Measures.” Although such notices do not require a specific action or written response, they do serve to make plant owners aware of possible concerns. For example, the Information Notice discussed an ice plug that formed on Jan. 8, 1996, at the Millstone Unit 2 nuclear power plant in a service water strainer backwash drain line.
Service water refers to water taken from a nearby source of water — be it the ocean, a lake or river — used for cooling purposes in the plant and then returned. To prevent a recurrence of the problem, the plant owner changed an operating procedure to ensure closer monitoring when service water intake structure temperatures drop below 40 degrees Fahrenheit and to make use of portable heaters or go to manual operation of the strainers. Nuclear power plants are designed to withstand weather extremes. Nevertheless, NRC inspectors will be on hand to keep a close watch on plant conditions during the “vortex” and beyond.Filed under: Operating Reactors Tagged: NRC, nuclear power plant, polar vortex
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January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Whats the worry? – Dose or hot particle? Chris Busby

There is a lot of argument about the effects from Fukushima on the Pacific and the US west coast. I have just been reading one site “true facts about ocean radiation and. . .blah blah “.

I agree with the author about the total radiation concentration (activity) in sea water less than 30Bq/cubic metre. The calculation I made show that its unlikely that the total radioactivity levels in the will be higher than those which we had in the Irish Sea or the Baltic Sea, but the problem is the particles, and these are not described by “radioactivity levels”.

I attach a picture of an edible mussel (myrtilis edulis) from the Irish Sea. The tracks are from a hot particle, which would end up inside you if you ate it.

1526981_10152146727212451_892707712_n

January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | 8 Comments

Irish free to sue British nuclear operators over contamination

….A spokesman for Ireland’s energy department said that ministers and officials there were “aware” of the amendments and its implications. The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, which owns 19 sites in the UK, said that accident clean-up costs are covered by insurance….

Or they could trample them to death with these guys and gals:

Mark Leftly Author Biography

 

Sunday 05 January 2014

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/irish-free-to-sue-british-nuclear-operators-over-contamination-9039178.html

British nuclear operators face being sued for billions of pounds by the Irish government and Irish victims of any radioactive damage they cause under legal changes to be introduced this year.

Politicians and campaigners in Dublin have long complained about the impact, both historical and potential, of the UK’s civil nuclear programme close to its shores, with particular focus on the safety record of Sellafield. The Cumbria site is located less than 100 miles from Ireland’s east coast.

Greenpeace has warned that the dumping of the reprocessing plant’s liquid waste has made the Irish Sea among the most contaminated waters in the world, even though Ireland itself produces no nuclear energy. Irish fishermen have been angered by catches of unsaleable mutated fish and by findings that they have been exposed to low-level radiation.

However, Ireland’s government and environmental campaigners have struggled to make international legal headway to clampdown on Britain’s nuclear activity, soon to be expanded with a new fleet of power plants starting with Hinkley Point C in Somerset. In 2006, for example, the European Union blocked ministers from taking a case to a United Nations tribunal in an attempt to force the closure of Sellafield.

Legal experts say that Ireland’s case will be radically strengthened when amendments to the Paris Convention on Third Party Liability in the Field of Nuclear Energy finally come into force this year, having been originally proposed in 2004. The UK is a signatory to this treaty and the changes will allow anyone in Ireland affected by a nuclear accident that originates at a British site to seek up to £1bn in damages from the plant’s operator in the High Court.

Previously, only governments and victims from signatory nations to the treaty could sue each other, and even then claims were capped at £140m per incident. From this year, countries such as Ireland that are not part of the convention will be able to seek damages under its terms, while British victims will be able to claim nine times more than they were previously allowed.

Ian Salter, an international legal expert in nuclear issues at lawyers Burges Salmon, said: “If a country has no nuclear installations in it, then they will benefit from the changes. Someone in Ireland could bring a claim to a court in the UK in a way that they couldn’t before.

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January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

TEPCO demands families of employees return compensation for evacuation

….According to the sources, the families of at least four TEPCO employees have received demands that they return compensation to the firm, with two of them being required to repay over 10 million yen.

 

Another employee of the utility was quoted by the sources as saying, “I’m afraid because I could be urged to return the compensation at any time.”

 

 

Tsuyoshi Kamata, a lawyer consulted by the families of TEPCO employees, criticized the utility’s practice. “TEPCO’s attitude to require families of employees to tolerate hardship is impermissible. The company needs to improve itself.”…..

http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20140106p2a00m0na019000c.html 

 

  h/t http://fukushima-is-still-news.over-blog.com/article-tepco-wants-money-back-from-workers-2-121933738.html

 

Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), the operator of the tsunami-ravaged Fukushima nuclear plant, is demanding that the families of employees return compensation paid to them for being forced to evacuate from their neighborhoods due to the nuclear disaster, sources close to the case said.

 

 

 

In one case, a household is under pressure to return more than 30 million yen in damages from the company, raising concerns about future livelihoods.

 

Critics pointed out that TEPCO’s demands are unfair. “The families of employees aren’t responsible for the nuclear disaster. As such, the firm’s demands for the return of the compensation are inappropriate,” one of them says.

 

 

According to the sources, one TEPCO employee under pressure to return compensation was living with his wife and two children in a rented house in an area near the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant — where it has been deemed that evacuees are unable to return home in the foreseeable future with an annual radiation dosage of over 50 millisieverts. The family moved to another area several months after the March 2011 outbreak of the nuclear disaster.

 

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January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Good News from KC anti-nuke protesters, and help needed for the Oak Ridge Three

http://peaceblog.wordpress.com/2014/01/06/good-news-from-kc-anti-nuke-protesters-and-help-needed-for-the-oak-ridge-three/

Alert from our friends at Roots Action on the Oak Ridge 3:

On January 28, 2014, three nonviolent protesters against nuclear weapons, Sr. Megan Rice, Michael Walli and Gregory Boertje-Obed, are scheduled to be sentenced in U.S. District Court in Knoxville, Tennessee, for the supposed crime of sabotage.

They risked their lives, but threatened no one else, when they entered the free-fire zone of a supposedly top-security nuclear weapons facility called Y-2 in Tennessee. They spray painted messages of peace and exposed the lack of security.

Click here to tell the judge how such courageous activists should be sentenced.

In a separate case in Kansas City, nuclear weapons protesters were recently sentenced to write explanations of their concerns to be included in the court records. That seems far more appropriate than prison for people upholding the law and morality.

Since the 1963 limited test ban treaty, the United States has been committed to “the speediest possible achievement of an agreement on general and complete disarmament.”

The law and morality demand disarmament, but those calling attention to the ongoing evil of nuclear weapons production and maintenance stand convicted and face the risk of 30 years behind bars.

Please sign this petition, which we will deliver to the judge before the sentencing.

Please forward this email widely to like-minded friends.

– The RootsAction.org team

P.S. RootsAction is an independent online force endorsed by Jim Hightower, Barbara Ehrenreich, Cornel West, Daniel Ellsberg, Glenn Greenwald, Naomi Klein, Bill Fletcher Jr., Laura Flanders, former U.S. Senator James Abourezk, Coleen Rowley, Frances Fox Piven, and many others.

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

One of the things we like to highlight at Peace Action is we use all the tools in the activist toolbox, from congressional lobbying to public education to community organizing to supporting pro-peace candidates for election to nonviolent direct action from time to time.

Below are two items related to inspiring nonviolent civil resistance actions against nuclear weapons from Kansas City (which included many of the leaders of our affiliate, PeaceWorks KC) and Oak Ridge, Tennessee. The first is an article from Common Dreams and the National Catholic Reporter on a surprise “sentence” from the judge in the trial of peace activists protesting the new bomb factory in Kansas City. The second is an action alert to the judge in Tennessee urging leniency for the Oak Ridge 3, who trespassed onto the nuclear weapons manufacturing facility there but posed no harm to anyone (as a matter of fact they did us all a favor, even the government!).

Every Time I Learn Something: Judge Gives Anti-Nuclear Activists A Break and Platform

by Abby Zimet

Evolution Happens Dept: An uplifting scene recently in a Kansas City courtroom, where a group of Catholic priests – two over 75 – and activists were being sentenced for a July protestat a National Nuclear Security Administration plant that produces nuclear weapon components. After allowing much rowdy evidence and listening intently to defendants’ impassioned arguments – Question: “Don’t you teach your parishioners to obey the rules?” Answer: “God’s rules….We each have our own conscience to follow” – Judge Ardie Bland, who two years before had sentenced other nuclear activists to jail, announced, “If you’re not getting to anyone else, you’re getting to me,” according to the National Catholic Reporter.Noting the activists’ mention of Rosa Parks and others whose actions changed the world – Bland is black – he found them guilty of trespassing, and sentenced each not to prison, fines or community service but to the writing of a one-page essay in response to a series of ethical and political questions, to be made part of the public record in order to “give you a chance to say what you want to say.” With moving, joyful, Louis-Armstrong flavored video of the July action.
Bland’s questions, as reported by National Catholic Reporter:

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January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | 1 Comment

AREVA signs agreement with Saudi groups to develop country’s nuclear program

areva-medusa1Luc Oursel, President and CEO of AREVA, added: “These agreements demonstrate the common will of EDF and AREVA to establish a true long-term partnership with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. They will enable the country to build a strong industrial base and a robust skills management program.”

Michael Allan McCrae | January 6, 2014

EDF Energy Group and AREVA signed agreements with several Saudi industrial groups last week to advance the country’s nuclear program.

The memorandum of understanding, which was signed while French President Francois Hollande was in Riyadh, was developed with four Saudi universities and five Saudi manufacturers.

EDF CEO Henri Proglio said that the agreements will develop Saudi Arabia’s network of local manufacturers and qualified engineers.

Here’s the full press release from Areva

January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

UK nuclear weapons components and arms sales under question

Sky News reports that the UK actually sold materials to Syria that could have been used to make chemical weapons, with the Commons Committees on Arms Export Controls (CAEC) citing that as one example of questionable deals being carried out by UK contractors and countries on the (FCO) list.

Recent news that the United Kingdom may in fact be arming or assisting in weapons deliveries to Somali pirates should be of great concern not only to the companies and individuals who have paid millions upon millions of dollars to the pirates to secure the release of ships, cargoes and crews, but also to all of the governments, including that of the Russian Federation, that have also spent millions and risked lives while engaged in anti-piracy missions in the Gulf of Aden and other pirate-infested waters off the coast of Africa and Somalia.

John Robles
Read more: http://voiceofrussia.com/2014_01_06/UK-nuclear-weapons-components-and-arms-sales-under-question-0367/

6 January 2014

The UK’s Independent, a publication which has regularly published articles and information shedding a less than positive light on the dealings of the UK Government, recently reported that in a 15 month period, between April 2012 and June 2013, over 44,000 guns of various types were sent to “tackle piracy in East Africa”.

Although officially the weapons were supposed to be used by security firms the sheer number of fresh weapons exported by the UK during the period in question raised the alarm among members of the House of Commons Arms Export Controls Committee especially in light of the fact that the firms in question already have thousands of weapons in their armories. Surely it is suspicious and call for concern why these firms which have been operating at full force would all of a sudden need to escalate the level of their already adequate arsenals with the addition of 30,000 assault rifles, 11,000 rifles and 2,536 pistols.

Members of the committee are right to voice concern especially given the light that the scourge of piracy has all but been eliminated and that the weapons could be destined to the pirates themselves or to other regimes in Africa and perhaps even the Middle East where ongoing violence is taking place.

According to the Independent Ann McKechin, a committee member said: “The evidence provided to us by Mr. Bell seems to suggest that the department did not have a process of looking at the cumulative number of weapons and whether those exports fitted the scenario on the ground needed for protection.”

Unfortunately for those profiting from weapons deals the latest enquiry is only part of a wider inquiry into arms exports from the UK which the Independent continues has already attempted to force the UK’s recalcitrant Business Secretary Vince Cable into publicly revealing the names of British companies who were given licenses to export items to Syria that could be used to make chemical weapons, something he continues to refuse to do.

Given the record of US/UK/NATO in the Middle East and Africa and the propensity for continuing and escalating conflicts in order to further expand militarily and maintain the profit margins of their military industrial complexes and self-serving desire to stay relevant while justifying their over-bloated military budgets, it is very reasonable to question whether so many weapons are needed, not in fact to maintain “security”, but to continue to have a well armed “enemy” thus justifying their own expansion and existence, something particularly true of NATO which has arrogated unto itself authority to operate almost worldwide.

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January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Nuclear waste decisions loom on the Great Lakes! – Petition

……A small group of Bruce County residents has started an  

online petition

against burying waste near Lake Huron.

Co-organizer Beverly Fernandez calls the OPG site a “Trojan horse” for the used fuel site, arguing that once one is approved, it will open the gates for a second.

Dozens of Great Lakes towns and cities — including Toronto — have gone on record opposing any nuclear waste site in the Great Lakes basin.

An umbrella group, the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative, whose members include Toronto, Montreal and Chicago, issues a statement in May voicing concern over “the close proximity of the site” to Lake Huron…..

Business reporter,

Published on Mon Jan 06 2014

http://www.thestar.com/business/2014/01/06/nuclear_waste_decisions_loom.html

More than half a century after miners started gouging uranium out of the Canadian Shield at Elliot Lake, William Elliott wants it back.

He’s leading the campaign by the town and surrounding communities to become the place where the used fuel from Canada’s nuclear reactors is stored forever.

But the long-running saga of finding a spot for Canada’s nuclear waste still has years more to run as those who want the waste — and those who don’t — struggle over what to do with it.

And the question gets even more vexed as a decision nears on a second radioactive waste site for less potent — but still hazardous — nuclear waste that Ontario Power Generation wants to develop at its Bruce nuclear site near Kincardine, Ont.

Decisions about nuclear waste, which have simmered for decades, are starting to heat up, as two processes move forward.

  • The Nuclear Waste Management Organization, responsible for finding a home for used fuel from nuclear reactors, has started trimming the list of applicants from its roster, dropping four communities and leaving 17 in the running.
  • A federal panel is due to make a decision this year on whether to give the go-ahead to OPG’s proposed waste site at the Bruce.

The double process, for two different waste sites, has sown confusion in the Kincardine area, where the town solidly backs OPG’s proposal, but has made it clear it has no interest in the used fuel waste site.

But a number of Kincardine’s neighbours have said they do want the used fuel site, leading to speculation that the two projects could still somehow become one.

That simply isn’t going to happen, vows Mike Krizanc of the Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO).

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January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Hitachi-GE nuclear reactor design assessment begins and comment by John H. large UK

…Nuclear expert John Large commented: “The existence of such uncertainties together with the quite obvious incompleteness of the plant design and development, particularly in the generic safety critical areas of Fault Studies and Control & Instrumentation must have, surely, rendered the GDA process itself incomplete and inconclusive.”…

Image source ; http://www.power-technology.com/features/featurerise-of-a-giant-russias-nuclear-future/featurerise-of-a-giant-russias-nuclear-future-4.html

The Office for Nuclear Regulation and the Environment Agency have begun assessing Hitachi-GE’s boiling water nuclear reactor design.

The Ecologist
6th January 2014

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_round_up/2225593/hitachige_nuclear_reactor_design_assessment_begins.html
In January 2013, UK regulators received a Government request to undertake a Generic Design Assessment (GDA) of a new nuclear reactor design in the UK, Hitachi-GE’s Advanced Boiling Water Reactor – the UK ABWR.

A year on, the regulators “consider that they should now begin their assessments and that there are adequate project management, technical and legal provisions in place.”

Horizon Nuclear Power Ltd are planning to use the UK ABWR at Wylfa in Anglesey and Oldbury in Gloucestershire. If the reactor design passes the GDA it may also be used by any developer at any of the sites included in the Government’s Nuclear National Policy Statement.

These include Bradwell (Essex), Hartlepool (Durham), Heysham (Lancashire), Hinkley Point (Somerset), Oldbury (South Gloucestershire), Sellafield (Cumbria), Sizewell (Suffolk) and Wylfa (Anglesey).

In principle the design could also be used at the two EDF nuclear sites at Hinkley Point in Somerset and Sizewell in Suffolk. However EDF has announced its intention to build the troubled EDF / AREVA European Pressurised Reactor (EPR) reactor design – despite the prodigious problems being experienced with the EPR at Olkiluoto in Finland and Flamanville in France.

The purpose of the GDA system is to allow regulators to begin assessing the safety, security, environmental and waste implications of a new reactor design before site-specific proposals are brought forward. The GDA for the ABWR is expected to take four years to complete.

However critics say that the GDA system has already failed after it passed the EPR reactor design in spite of 724 unresolved concerns known as ‘Assessment Findings’. This is set out on The Ecologist in “Hinkley C: the Generic Design Assessment has failed“.

Nuclear expert John Large commented: “The existence of such uncertainties together with the quite obvious incompleteness of the plant design and development, particularly in the generic safety critical areas of Fault Studies and Control & Instrumentation must have, surely, rendered the GDA process itself incomplete and inconclusive.”

http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_round_up/2225593/hitachige_nuclear_reactor_design_assessment_begins.html

January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | 2 Comments

130 ‘radioactive’ Japanese cars banned from entering Russia

Breaking and unverified –  Arclight2011

Source ;

Published time: January 05, 2014 15:36

http://investordiscussionboard.com/boards/politpub/130-%E2%80%98radioactive%E2%80%99-japanese-cars-banned-entering-russia

A customs officer holds up a device used for measuring radiation levels, while standing in front of vehicles delivered from Japan, in Russia’s far eastern city of Vladivostok.(Reuters / Yuri Maltsev)

Screenshot from 2014-01-06 18:58:59

January 6, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment