Generating controversy: The Shoreham nuclear power plant, http://www.newsday.com/long-island/history/generating-controversy-the-shoreham-nuclear-power-plant-1.13702920 [large set of excellent photos] June 2, 2017 The nuclear power plant built in Shoreham was initially sold as a solution for a power-hungry Island, a safe and economical source of electricity that would light 500,000 homes and last for several decades. The LILCO project instead generated intense controversy.
An estimated 15,000 people rallied in a driving rainstorm outside Shoreham’s gates on June 3, 1979, in what was then believed to be the biggest demonstration of any kind in Long Island history. Before the protest was over, 571 people were peacefully arrested. In the years after the protest, questions about the plant’s safety and its ballooning costs led to a state takeover of the Long Island Lighting Co. and the decommissioning of the plant. LIPA, which owns the property and operates a substation and other power facilities there, continues to express interest in redeveloping the site. But despite occasional calls to convert it for other uses, the property’s future remains uncertain.
The plant’s legacy included $6 billion in debt related to its closure and LIPA taking over LILCO, with $1 billion left to be paid, and vivid memories of a demonstration that captivated the Island on June 3, 1979.
After years of controversy, the Shoreham nuclear power plant was ordered closed on May 25, 1988. It was fully decommissioned in 1994.
June 5, 2017
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history, USA |
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Units 5, 6 at Kudankulam Nuclear power plant to cost Rs 50,000 crore: The New Indian Express, NPCIL 2 June 17 ST. PETERSBURG: The construction of the fifth and sixth units of India’s largest nuclear power plant in Tamil Nadu will cost about Rs 50,000 crore with half of the amount being funded by Russia as loan.
The project will take seven years to start generating electricity, Nuclear Power Corporation of India (NPCIL) Chairman and Managing Director S K Sharma told PTI here.
India and Russia yesterday signed an agreement for the two new reactors for the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant (KNPP) on the sidelines of the annual summit between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
“The entire project will cost about Rs 50,000 crore. The first unit will be commissioned in 66 months and the second six months thereafter,” Sharma said.
Atomstroyexport, a unit of Russian state nuclear corporation Rosatom, will build the reactors.
“The project will be funded in 70:30 debt-equity ratio (70 per cent debt, 30 per cent equity),” he said.
The Russian government will lend India USD 4.2 billion to help cover the construction cost……http://www.newindianexpress.com/states/tamil-nadu/2017/jun/02/units-5-6-at-kudankulam-nuclear-power-plant-to-cost-rs-50000-crore-npcil-1612150.html
June 5, 2017
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business and costs, India, politics international |
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Times 3rd June 2017 A coalition of American cities and states, led by the economic powerhouse of California, have vowed to resist President Trump’s decision to withdraw the US from the Paris climate accord. The United States Climate Alliance also includes dozens of US businesses and banks, including Goldman Sachs, which fear being excluded from a green energy revolution that willyield contracts worth billions.
As many as 30 states have already pledged to wean themselves off fossil fuels. The Democratic governors of Washington, New York and California plan to negotiate with the United Nations to be recognised as parties to the 195-nation pact — a highly unusual effort that underscored how Mr Trump’s decision has split the US.
The three states, which together account for about a fifth of US economic output, said they would stick by the commitment Barack Obama made under the Paris deal in 2015 to reduce emissions by at least 26 per cent from 2005 levels.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/world/thirty-states-defy-trump-and-refuse-to-abandon-paris-accord-mkpvgrrfz
June 5, 2017
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climate change, USA |
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Independent 2nd June 2017, Former New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg has said he will personally make up the $15m in funding that the United Nations will lose after Donald Trump pulled the US out of the Paris climate accord.
The US would have been required to contribute that amount towards efforts to prevent catastrophic
climate change under the historic agreement between 195 countries to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.“Americans are not walking away from the Paris climate agreement,” Mr Bloomberg said on Thursday, according to the Washington Examiner. “Just the opposite – we are forging ahead.
Mayors, governors, and business leaders from both political parties are signing on to a statement of support that we will submit to the UN and together, we will reach the emission reduction goals the United States made in Paris in 2015. The billionaire philanthropist added: “Americans will honour and
fulfil the Paris agreement by leading from the bottom up — and there isn’t anything Washington can do to stop us.” http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/former-new-york-city-mayor-michael-bloomberg-has-said-he-will-personally-make-up-the-15m-in-funding-a7769416.html
June 5, 2017
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Lawfare 2nd June 2017 The two-dozen experts in attendance at the inaugural meeting of the Working Group on Climate, Nuclear and Security Affairs, hosted by the Center for Climate and Security, sought to examine the intersection of three threats that have long been viewed as separate—climate change, nuclear proliferation, and international conflict. In doing so, they confronted the unpleasant prospect that those threats not only had intensified over time, but also had become increasingly entwined and difficult to keep in check.
Collectively these experts had garnered at least two centuries’ worth of national security experience. They came from defense, homeland security, journalism, think tank, academic, and NGO backgrounds, and all of them had spent years working on nuclear or climate issues, or both. Over the course of two days, it became clear that examining nuclear and climate issues together through the lens of new security issues—such as technological advances, unprecedented migration, continually evolving terrorist threats and an emboldened Russia—reveals the world order faces a deeply
destabilizing toxic brew of risk.
The nuclear threat is not new. What has changed is the nature of the nuclear threat in the face of monumental security stressors and a rapidly increasing global average temperature that threatens to reach 3.5 degrees Centigrade (6.3 degrees Fahrenheit)or more if we continue on our current trajectory in spewing carbon. As the world heats up, emerging security trends—including unprecedented migration, cyber threats, proliferation of non-state actors, and global pandemics—compound the stresses on systems of governance. When countries turn to nuclear energy in an effort to reduce consumption of fossil fuels, concerns about nuclear weapons proliferation and nuclear disasters such as Chernobyl increase. https://www.lawfareblog.com/nuclear-energy-climate-change-and-security-threats
June 5, 2017
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2 WORLD, climate change, safety |
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Scientists warn US coral reefs are on course to disappear within decades
New Noaa research shows that strict conservation measures in Hawaii have not spared corals from a warming ocean in one of its most prized bays, Guardian, Oliver Milman, 30 May 17, Some of America’s most protected corals have been blighted by bleaching, with scientists warning that US reefs are on course to largely disappear within just a few decades because of global warming.
New research has shown that strict conservation measures in Hawaii have not spared corals from a warming ocean in one of its most prized bays, with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
predicting yet more bleaching is likely off Hawaii and Florida this summer.
“I’m concerned because we could very well see bleaching return to Florida, parts of the Caribbean and Hawaii,” said Mark Eakin, a coral reef specialist at Noaa.
“It won’t be as severe as 2015, but we’ve now moved into a general pattern where warmer than normal temperatures are the new normal. US reefs have taken a severe beating. We are looking at the loss or at least severe degradation of most reefs in the the coming decades.”
A global coral bleaching event has shifted between the northern and southern hemispheres since 2014, affecting around 70% of the world’s reefs. The “terminal” condition of Australia’s sprawling Great Barrier Reef, which suffered bleaching along two-thirds of its 1,400-mile length in 2016 and 2017, has provoked the greatest alarm.
But scientists have pointed out that America’s main reefs, found off Hawaii, Florida, Guam and Puerto Rico, are facing a largely unheralded disaster.
“The idea we will sustain reefs in the US 100 years from now is pure imagination. At the current rate it will be just 20 or 30 years, it’s just a question of time,” said Kim Cobb, an oceanographer at Georgia Tech. “The overall health of reefs will be severely compromised by the mid-point of the century and we are already seeing the first steps in that process.”
Bleaching occurs when prolonged high temperatures in the ocean cause coral to expel the symbiotic algae that provides it with food and colour. The coral turns a ghostly white, and can die if tolerable conditions don’t return. The world’s oceans have absorbed more than 90% of the extra heat generated by the release of greenhouse gases from human activity.
Cobb said regular annual bleaching events, which recent research has forecast happening by the 2040s, will “undercut the resilience of these ecosystems”. Corals not killed off by bleaching are left weakened by the process and are less likely to survive if repeatedly subjected to above-average temperatures.
“As scientists we are breathlessly trying to catch up,” said Cobb. “Things started to run away from us around 10 years ago but we were perhaps a little naive in not realizing that.”
In 2014 and 2015, Hawaii’s coral reefs suffered up to 90% bleaching, with some areas losing half of their coral cover. New research now shows that even one of the most protected parts of the Hawaiian coast was ravaged by coral bleaching………
Severe bleaching has swept across the Pacific Ocean, Indian Ocean and the Caribbean, with some areas altered beyond recognition. More than 80% of shallow water reefs off Christmas Island, an Australian territory in the Indian Ocean, have died, while images released from a survey last year showed 90% bleaching of reefs around Okinawa, Japan……..
Coral reefs are found in less than 1% of the world’s oceans but support a riot of colour and life, with around a quarter of all marine species relying upon the nooks and crannies of reefs for food or shelter. Reefs also act as a crucial coastal buffer from storms and provide food and livelihoods for millions of people. A study published this month foundthe global reef tourism industry is worth around $36bn.
“In the US our reefs are worth a huge amount but I don’t know if people realize that, more attention would not hurt,” said Dona, co-author of the Hawaii reef study.
“There are places in the world that have lost a tremendous amount of coral and we have the same prognosis if we continue to burn fossil fuels in the way we are doing. We need to cut our carbon emissions because the corals just can’t handle it.”https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/may/30/us-coral-reefs-global-warming-climate-change
June 5, 2017
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Leading the way is Lightsource, Europe’s largest privately-held solar developer, which plans to expand into the US. Last year the company unveiled a world first: a floating solar installation to help power a Thames Water reservoir just outside London.
The 6-megawatt structure lies flat against the water and is made up of 24,000 solar panels that sit on a platform buoyed by 61,000 individual floats and held in place by 177 anchors.
Once eclipsed, the solar industry will rise and shine again over Britain http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/06/03/eclipsed-solar-industry-will-rise-shine-britain/ Jillian Ambrose 3 JUNE 2017 •
From above, the summer sun catches the glimmer and sheen of a new facet of the energy evolution.
A solar panel does not command attention quite like the stoic thermal power plants that rise up from British landscapes. But on a balmy summer’s day last month, the collective glare of millions of panels proved solar power’s mettle.
The spring bank holiday heatwave began with a new record for solar power generation, which created a quarter of the nation’s electricity mix on Friday afternoon. Britain’s solar panels produced more electricity than nuclear and coal power combined. They are likely to do this again and again as summer rolls on. Five years ago this was a feat few would have dared predict. The solar boom was fuelled by generous subsidies and spurred by rapidly falling costs, at a rate far exceeding expectations.
Paul Barwell, head of the Solar Trade Association, says there are now 12.1 gigawatts of solar in the UK, the same production capacity as eight new-generation nuclear reactors and enough to power 3.8m homes.
He says the “colossal achievement” achieved in just five years sends a positive message that solar has a strong place in the UK energy sector. This is a point Barwell is keen to make because the rise of solar power has been far from assured – the industry has been shattered by knee-jerk political interventions.
In China, policymakers put the country’s manufacturing heft firmly behind developing cheaper solar panels, accelerating the technology’s journey down the cost curve.
Once considered the preserve of the very well-off, in the UK rooftop solar panels were suddenly within the reach of homeowners. Farmers with depleted land found economically it made more sense to farm renewable electricity than sheep. Energy-intensive factories were easily persuaded to generate their own power to cut costs.
Now solar panels encrust the surfaces of reservoirs and are expected to plate the roof of Buckingham Palace. Continue reading →
June 5, 2017
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Trump Paris About-Face Likely To Hurt, Not Help Nuclear, Coal Sectors, Wamstead on Energy,
June 1, 2017 President Trump, with his fossil fuel fantasists in tow, made it official Thursday, announcing that he would pull the United States from the Paris climate change accord in order to “make America great again.” ….The issue at hand is the decision’s likely negative impact on the U.S.’ already-battered nuclear and coal industries.
For years the nuclear industry has been making the case that it was vital to the country’s climate change mitigation efforts because of its emissions-free generation profile. While accounting for just 20 percent of the nation’s annual electric generation, the industry noted ad infinitum, it was responsible for 60 percent of the carbon dioxide-free emissions . In a carbon-constrained world, that would be a valuable attribute. But the Trump administration has now made it clear that it places no value on CO2-free generation sources.
That, in turn, could be a major problem for the industry, as the effort to secure nuclear subsidies—successful so far in Illinois and New York (although now tied up in court), still pending in Ohio, Connecticut and now Pennsylvania—has relied in large part on the sector’s glowing greenhouse gas attributes. In an interesting twist, just before the administration’s head-in-the-sand announcement, Chicago-based Exelon said it would close the 837-megawatt Three Mile Island nuclear reactor in late 2019 because the facility couldn’t compete in the PJM electricity market, which sprawls across 13 states and the District of Columbia. The company largely blamed the market’s structure, including its failure to reward the plant for its emissions-free generation, for its decision to shutter the plant…..
the argument falls apart when the federal government, from the very top on down, essentially says such generation has no special value, and that is exactly what the administration has just done. If nuclear can’t clear the market economically—and TMI has not for the past three years—and policymakers don’t value its one unique attribute—emissions-free power—how then can you make a persuasive argument to keep the facility open……
What Pennsylvania’s Republican-controlled legislature and Democratic governor will do remains to be seen, and there are good arguments to be made on both sides. But unless the state’s Republicans have the fortitude to stand up to President Trump and his toadies, nuclear’s environmental attributes no longer have any value.
The same is true for the surprisingly bipartisan efforts on Capitol Hill to expand tax credits and approve other measures designed to spur the development of carbon capture and storage technologies. One such measure, the Carbon Capture Improvement Act introduced this spring in both the Senate and House, would allow companies to use private activity bonds issued by states or localities to finance carbon capture projects. These bonds, commonly used for infrastructure such as water and sewer projects, are tax exempt and have a longer repayment period, lowering a project’s development cost……
Today, we have an administration that doesn’t even believe in climate change, let alone carbon capture, so what value is there in offering federal support for such projects……..
The administration’s action undercuts those arguing to keep open the nation’s existing fleet of economically challenged but emissions-free nuclear plants; challenges the need for future nuclear construction (Why, for example, should the four over-budget, long-delayed reactors under construction in Georgia and South Carolina receive any preferential federal aid if climate change concerns are off the table?); and puts yet another nail in coal’s coffin by obliterating any justification to fund CO2 capture technologies.
http://www.wamstedonenergy.com/2017/trump-paris-about-face-likely-to-hurt-not-help-nuclear-coal-sectors
June 5, 2017
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business and costs, politics, USA |
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it is highly unlikely that its financial performance will improve drastically, making it an unappealing investment.
Don’t Try to Catch This Falling Knife https://www.fool.ca/2017/06/01/dont-try-to-catch-this-falling-knife/ Matt Smith | June 1, 2017 The world?s second-largest uranium producer Cameco Corp. (TSX:CCO)(NYSE:CCJ) continues to suffer, posting a first-quarter 2017 net loss which dragged its stock lower; it’s almost 13% down for the year to date. This has attracted the usual bargain hunters who believe that Cameco is now an appealing, undervalued investment but this couldn?t be further from the truth.
Now what?
Cameco?s woes can be directly attributed to the prolonged slump in uranium which has lasted for longer than a decade; prices fell to a 13-year low late last year. The embattled uranium miner posted a first-quarter adjusted net loss of $29 million. According to some analysts, wind power is now cheaper than nuclear power, while solar and geothermal electricity generation can have lower costs. These forms of power generation don’t produce highly toxic waste or the potential to create catastrophic environmental damage in the event of failure.
For these reasons, it is difficult to see a huge upswing in demand for uranium over coming years, especially with renewables technology advancing at a rapid rate. This means that Cameco may find itself in the position where it is producing a product that is suffering from a terminal decline in demand. Worse yet, uranium prices remain under pressure because of high global inventories and a growing supply which is expected to expand by over 40% to reach 80,383 tonnes by 2020.
Now what?
Cameco’s woes can be directly attributed to the prolonged slump in uranium which has lasted for longer than a decade; prices fell to a 13-year low late last year. The embattled uranium miner posted a first-quarter adjusted net loss of $29 million, which was 3.5 times greater than the net loss reported for the same quarter in 2016 and that predicted by analysts.
A key reason for the massive net loss was the decision by Tokyo Electric Power Company, the operator of Japan’s disabled Fukushima nuclear plant, to terminate its contract with Cameco for the supply of 9.3 million pounds of uranium through to 2028. The contract was worth $1.3 billion in revenue.
Nonetheless, Cameco has pitched its hopes on a surge in demand for uranium as the 57 reactors currently under construction across the globe come online. While there won’t be an immediate ramp-up in demand, according to industry consultants, it will lead to cumulative uncovered requirements for uranium to total around 800 million pounds of the fissile material over the next nine years.
This may be a positive for company that has been battling significant headwinds for some time, but it does not necessarily guarantee a return to profitability.
You see, nuclear power has been falling into disfavour for some time, and this only gained momentum in the wake of the Fukushima disaster in 2011. While nuclear plants do not emit pollutants, there are the serious issues associated with the leakage of radiation and the disposal of fissile waste.
Radiation can have a catastrophic impact on the environment, animals, and humans. High-level nuclear waste such as a spent fuel assembly, according to the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, produces 20 times the fatal dose of radiation for humans for 10 years after being removed from a reactor.
This makes the correct handling and storage of this waste essential, costly, and highly onerous.
The Fukushima disaster highlighted just how vulnerable nuclear plants can be to environmental catastrophes, although, fortunately, there was no leakage of fissile material or polluted water in that case.
However, these aren’t the only reasons for the growing unpopularity of nuclear power.
The cost of safer forms of renewable energy continues to fall.
According to some analysts, wind power is now cheaper than nuclear power, while solar and geothermal electricity generation can have lower costs. These forms of power generation don’t produce highly toxic waste or the potential to create catastrophic environmental damage in the event of failure.
For these reasons, it is difficult to see a huge upswing in demand for uranium over coming years, especially with renewables technology advancing at a rapid rate. This means that Cameco may find itself in the position where it is producing a product that is suffering from a terminal decline in demand. Worse yet, uranium prices remain under pressure because of high global inventories and a growing supply which is expected to expand by over 40% to reach 80,383 tonnes by 2020.
So what?
The loss of the Tokyo Electric Power Company contract is a major blow for Cameco, costing it around $1.3 billion in revenue in what is already a difficult operating environment. When considered with the growing unpopularity of nuclear power, the inexorable advance of renewable energy, and growing uranium supplies, it is difficult to see any significant bounce in the price of uranium occurring.
This makes difficult to see Cameco ever returning the halcyon days when uranium traded at US$67 per pound, meaning that it is highly unlikely that its financial performance will improve drastically, making it an unappealing investment.
June 5, 2017
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
business and costs, Canada, Reference |
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