The current industry “solution” is to store it unsafely where it was generated (near major metropolitan areas like Los Angeles and San Diego) or to get political revenge and force it on Nevada (a state that produces no nuclear waste and continues to suffer from 928 atom bomb tests).
Did anyone notice that two of Florida’s nuclear power plants quickly shut down before the hurricane? Or that South Carolina has abandoned construction of two new plants after wasting $8 billion on them? How about the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Stationbeing closed following a generator failure and radiation accident?
Japan commission supports nuclear power despite Fukushima, Kedger Enquirer
BY MARI YAMAGUCHI, Associated Press, SEPTEMBER 14, 2017 TOKYO
Japan’s nuclear policy-setting Atomic Energy Commission called Thursday for nuclear power to remain a key component of the country’s energy supply despite broad public support for a less nuclear-reliant society.
The commission recommended in a report that nuclear power account for at least 20 percent of Japan’s energy supply in 2030, citing a previous government energy plan. It said rising utility costs caused by expensive fossil fuel imports and slow reactor restarts have affected Japan’s economy……..
Thursday’s report comes as regulators are making final preparations to certify the safety of two reactors at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant in northern Japan, also operated by TEPCO. The utility says restarting the Kashiwazaki plant, one of its three nuclear plants, is vital to finance the massive cost of the Fukushima cleanup and compensation for disaster-hit residents.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority on Wednesday deemed TEPCO “competent” to run the plant safely and its final greenlight is expected within weeks, though its actual restart could be months away, after an on-site inspection and local consent. Many Japanese oppose the Kashiwazaki plant’s restart, saying TEPCO should not be allowed to operate a nuclear plant until it fully investigates the cause of the Fukushima accident and completes the cleanup.
The report also endorsed Japan’s ambitious pursuit of a nuclear fuel cycle program using plutonium, despite a decision last year to scrap the Monju reactor, a centerpiece of the plutonium fuel program, following decades of poor safety records and technical problems. Japan faces growing international scrutiny over its plutonium stockpile because the element can be used to make atomic weapons.
Japan currently has a stockpile of 47 tons of plutonium — 10 tons at home and the rest in Britain and France, which reprocess and store spent fuel for Japan. Japan plans to start up its controversial Rokkasho reprocessing plant next year, but critics say that would only add to the problem.
Without the prospect of achieving a plutonium-burning fast reactor, Japan has resorted to burning a mixture of plutonium and uranium fuel called MOX in conventional reactors as a last ditch measure to consume plutonium. The report calls it “the only realistic method of making use of plutonium.”
The need to reduce its plutonium stockpile adds to Japan’s push for reactor restarts. It would require 16 to 18 reactors to burn enough MOX to keep its plutonium stockpile from growing, according to a pre-Fukushima accident target set by the Federation of Electric Power Companies of Japan, an umbrella group for Japanese utilities. The target is unchanged, though widely seen as too optimistic.
Geological processes send more meltwater from glaciers and ice sheets to Earth’s mid-latitudes. Rachael Lallensack, As an ice sheet melts, it leaves a unique signature behind. Complex geological processes distribute the meltwater in a distinct pattern, or ‘fingerprint’, that causes seas to rise unevenly around the world. Now, for the first time, researchers have observed what these sea-level fingerprints look like on a global scale.
“No one has put it together for a complete global picture like this before,” says James Davis, a geophysicist at Columbia University in Palisades, New York. The work was published in Geophysical Research Letters on 9 September1.
The concept of sea-level fingerprints has been been factored into models used to predict sea-level rise for several years, says lead researcher Isabella Velicogna, a geophysicist at the University of California, Irvine. And researchers have used tide gauges for just as long to observe the fingerprints in coastal regions. But the global view provided by the latest study adds confidence to projections of future sea-level rise.
As an ice sheet melts, it leaves a unique signature behind. Complex geological processes distribute the meltwater in a distinct pattern, or ‘fingerprint’, that causes seas to rise unevenly around the world. Now, for the first time, researchers have observed what these sea-level fingerprints look like on a global scale.
“No one has put it together for a complete global picture like this before,” says James Davis, a geophysicist at Columbia University in Palisades, New York. The work was published in Geophysical Research Letters on 9 September1.
The concept of sea-level fingerprints has been been factored into models used to predict sea-level rise for several years, says lead researcher Isabella Velicogna, a geophysicist at the University of California, Irvine. And researchers have used tide gauges for just as long to observe the fingerprints in coastal regions. But the global view provided by the latest study adds confidence to projections of future sea-level rise.
Velicogna and co-author Chia-Wei Hsu, also at the University of California, Irvine, used gravity data from NASA’s two Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) satellites, which measure changes in mass on Earth’s surface. The scientists looked at satellite data from April 2002 to October 2014, and matched it with measurements from pressure stations on the ocean floor. These instruments measure the total mass above them.
Velicogna says that the findings should be used to create a roadmap for better placement of ocean-bottom pressure stations, which in turn can be used to improve calculations of sea-level fingerprints in the future.
“We know sea-level change throughout the world won’t be uniform, and it’s useful for people to know how those changes might show up,” says Mark Tamisiea, a geophysicist at the University of Texas at Austin.
Solar grid keeps harvests high, hospitals lit in parched rural Zimbabwe, by Tonderayi Mukeredzi | Thomson Reuters Foundation, 11 September 2017, With worsening droughts drying fields and hydropower, solar energy is providing a way forward in rural areas MASHABA, – Until recently, farmers in this town in southern Zimbabwe struggled to water their crops, frustrated by poor rainfall and the regular breakdown of the diesel engines that powered their irrigation systems.
As in most areas of rural Zimbabwe, rain-fed agriculture provides most of the jobs in this part of Gwanda district, some 130km (80 miles) southeast of Bulawayo.
But sparse rains over the last decade, a worsening problem associated with climate change, have caused many harvests to fail, and cut into the country’s generation of hydropower, which provides much of its electricity.
In Mashaba, however, the community’s luck is turning. In 2015, the town installed a solar mini-grid power station that has helped green the hot, arid area transform into a hive of entrepreneurial activity. The off-grid power system, with 400 solar panels that provide nearly 100 kilowatts of reliable power, has made it possible to effectively irrigate crops, boosting farming yields and fuelling economic growth. Local leaders say schools have become more productive and medical facilities safer.
The $3.2 million mini-grid was funded by the European Union, the OPEC Fund for International Development and the Global Environment Facility as part of a drive to promote universal access to modern energy in rural areas. Its construction was overseen by Practical Action Southern Africa, a development charity.
The plant powers the Mankonkoni and Rustlers Gorge irrigation schemes, which cover 32 hectares (79 acres) and 42 hectares (104 acres) respectively; the Mashaba Primary School; a business centre with three shops; the Mashaba Clinic; and the Masendani Business Centre, which has four shops and an energy kiosk.
A board of trustees selected by the community is responsible for the day-to-day operation of the mini-grid, and community members have been trained to maintain and operate it.
¶ “Harrowing Storms May Move Climate Debate, if Not GOP Leaders” • For years, climate change activists have faced a dilemma: how to persuade people to care about a grave but seemingly far-off problem and win their support for policies that might cost them in utility bills and at the pump. Now, people can see the problem for themselves. [New York Times]
Sailboat in Georgia (Credit: Luke Sharrett | The New York Times)
¶ “Nuclear industry jeopardized” • Nuclear power financing is embroiled in a global bankruptcy with two top reactor makers in financial debacles. After Toshiba-Westinghouse went bankrupt, its French equivalent, the state-owned AREVA went technically bankrupt after losing $12.3 billion over six years. The whole industry is facing repercussions. [Millennium Post]
¶ “Will Hurricane Harvey Launch a New Kind of Climate Lawsuit?” • Scientists can now link “acts of God” to climate change…
Russia and China have started doing joint military exercises. North Korea is and has been a client state of them both.
Rosoboronexport is part of Rostec – directly owned by the Russian State. It “is a legal successor of the state arms exporters existed in the ex-USSR and present-day Russia…. On August 4, 2006, the Bush administration imposed sanctions on Rosoboronexport accusing it of supplying Iran in violation of the United States Iran Nonproliferation Act of 2000…” [1]
US Nuclear Power Stations reactor status for Tuesday Sept. 12, 2017, showing Turkey Pt. Reactors and St. Lucie 1 at 0% output to grid.
In the blog they state that the second Turkey Pt. Nuclear reactor shut down automatically, whereas in the reactor events notice they state that it was manually shutdown: “MANUAL REACTOR TRIP ON LOWERING STEAM GENERATOR WATER LEVEL: On 09/10/17 at 1855 [EDT], [Turkey Point] Unit 4 reactor was manually tripped from 88% RTP [Rated Thermal Power] due to a failure of 4C Steam Generator main feed regulating valve causing lowering S/G [Steam Generator] level…. The licensee is investigating the failure of the feed regulating valve. Offsite power is available. Decay heat is being removed via main feedwater with steam discharged to atmosphere using the ADVs [Atmospheric Dump Valves]. There is no known primary-secondary steam generator tube leakage“. https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/event-status/event/2017/20170911en.html
¶ A paper published in the journal Climatic Change builds on earlier research finding that nearly two-thirds of historical greenhouse gas emissions can be traced to just 90 companies. Researchers from the Union of Concerned Scientists and two universities calculated how much of the actual change in the climate can be tied to those emissions. [InsideClimate News]
Source of climate change (Credit: Christopher Furlong)
World:
¶ The Climate Group announced that Kellogg Company, DBS Bank Ltd, and Clif Bar & Company joined its RE100 campaign and committed to sourcing 100% renewable electricity across their global operations. The total demand of the 105 campaign members is now around 150 TWh annually, more than enough to power New York State. [The Climate Group]
¶ BYD announced that the first commercial application of its SkyRail monorail mass transit solution opened for operation in Yinchuan, China, on September…
McCain’s comments were made Sunday on CNN as he called for the United States to increase its presence in the region and warned North Korean leader Kim Jong Un that his country could face “extinction” if it “acts in an aggressive fashion.”
North Korea, in turn, vowed the U.S. will pay a harsh price if harsher sanctions are approved by the U.N. Security Council on Monday as Washington and its allies pressed for an oil embargo following the communist state’s sixth nuclear test.
McCain said the U.S. needs to increase its missile defense and other capabilities in South Korea and do more to pressure China to help. He also raised the once-unthinkable idea of redeploying U.S. nuclear weapons in South Korea.
“The Korean defense minister just a few days ago called for nuclear weapons to be redeployed,” the Arizona Republican said on the “State of the Union” program. “It ought to be seriously considered.”
He was referring to remarks by Defense Minister Song Young-moo during an appearance at the National Assembly last week.
The U.S. brought the weapons to the South in the years following the 1950-53 Korean War but withdrew them in 1991 after the two Koreas agreed to denuclearize the peninsula.
President Moon Jae-in’s office has consistently rejected the idea of redeploying the warheads in response to mounting opposition calls to do so.
Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha reiterated that the issue was not on the table at the moment, although she acknowledged “that the public opinion is swinging in that direction.”
“We are currently not reviewing the issue of tactical nuclear weapons,” she said Monday during a press conference at the Seoul Foreign Correspondents’ Club. “Our policy remains a complete commitment to denuclearization.”
Kang, who was addressing reporters before traveling with Moon to New York for the U.N. General Assembly later this month, said any U.S. decision on the issue must be made in close coordination with Seoul.
She also insisted that North Korea’s “provocations” must be met with increased pressure to force them to engage in talks.
Worldwide deployments of nuclear weapons, 2017, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Hans M. Kristensen &Robert S. Norris, Pages 289-297, 31 Aug 2017
Abstract
The authors estimate that as of mid-2017, there are nearly 15,000 nuclear weapons in the world, located at some 107 sites in 14 countries. Roughly, 9400 of these weapons are in military arsenals; the remaining weapons are retired and awaiting dismantlement. Nearly 4000 are operationally available, and some 1800 are on high alert and ready for use on short notice. This article reviews the locations of nuclear weapons in all nine nuclear-armed states, as well as those of US weapons deployed outside the United States.
Russia
We estimate that Russia stores nuclear weapons at 48 locations, by far the largest number of any nuclear-armed state. This is a significant reduction from the 100 sites it was using in the late 1990s, 250 in the mid-1990s, and 500 in 1991………
United States
The United States today stores nuclear weapons at 18 sites, including 12 sites in 11 US states and another six sites in five European countries……
Britain and France
London and Paris have reduced the size of their arsenals and limited where their weapons are deployed. Britain only has one type of nuclear weapon, the Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM). The missiles and associated warheads are located at two facilities in Scotland, although warheads are also serviced at two factories southwest of London.1010. For an overview of British nuclear forces, see Kristensen and Norris (2011Kristensen, H. M., and R. S.Norris. 2011. “British Nuclear Forces, 2011.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, September.http://bos.sagepub.com/content/67/5/89.full.pdf+html[Google Scholar]).View all notes
France has retained two types of nuclear weapons: SLBMs at a submarine base in Bretagne and air-to-surface missiles for land- and carrier-based aircraft. France also has a warhead production and maintenance complex at Valduc. We estimate that the French warheads are spread over seven locations.
China
Researching Chinese nuclear weapons storage is difficult given the almost complete official secrecy that surrounds China’s nuclear forces.1212. For an overview of Chinese nuclear forces, see Kristensen and Norris (2016bKristensen, H. M., and R. S.Norris. 2016b. “Chinese Nuclear Forces, 2016.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. July. doi:10.1080/00963402.2016.1194054?needAccess=true.[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®], [Google Scholar]).View all notesMoreover, as is the case with other nuclear-armed states, Western governments say very little about what they know……..
We cautiously estimate that China may have nuclear warheads at 12 facilities. Nearly all of China’s 270 nuclear warheads are concentrated in the central nuclear weapons storage site, known as 22 Base and located in the western part of Shaanxi province in central China.
Pakistan
Islamabad is quantitatively and qualitatively increasing its arsenal and deploying weapons at more sites, yet the locations are difficult to pinpoint. …..Pakistan has a rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal of 130–140 warheads and an increasing portfolio of delivery systems……..
India
As with Pakistan, we have found little reliable information that indicates where India’s 120–130 nuclear warheads are stored.1515. For an overview of India’s nuclear arsenal, see Kristensen and Norris (2017bKristensen, H. M., and R. S.Norris. 2017b. “Indian Nuclear Forces, 2017.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, July. doi:10.1080/00963402.2017.1337998?needAccess=true.[Crossref], [Web of Science ®], [Google Scholar]).View all notes Based on available unclassified sources and satellite imagery, we cautiously estimate that India stores nuclear weapons at at least five locations…….
Israel
Israel is a wild card because of the opacity of its nuclear weapons program. Like other nuclear-armed states, however, Israel has been modernizing its arsenal and probably also its storage facilities. …….http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00963402.2017.1363995
Hinkley Point C nuclear power station was conceived in the days when offshore wind cost £150 per megawatt hour and a few misguided souls, some of them government ministers, thought a barrel of oil was heading towards $200.
Successive governments swallowed the line that Hinkley represented a plausible answer to the UK’s threefold energy conundrum – keeping the lights on, reducing carbon emissions and producing the juice at affordable prices for consumers and business.
Hinkley still scores on reliability and low carbon (if one ignores the effect of spoiling the Somerset countryside with so much concrete), but the extent to which its costs are obscene is now plainer than ever. In Monday’s capacity auction, two big offshore wind farms came in at £57.50 per megawatt hour and a third at £74.75. These “strike prices” – a guaranteed price for the electricity generated – are expressed in 2012 figures, as is Hinkley’s £92.50 so the comparison is fair.
The dramatic improvement in offshore wind’s competitiveness is easy to explain because it was predicted. The turbines have become bigger and more efficient, installation costs have fallen and operators are able to use existing infrastructure. Even the post-Brexit fall in sterling has not altered the script because more of the equipment is produced in the UK these days.
By contrast, nuclear – a technology that has been around for half a century – seems to only become more expensive in a world of tighter safety regulation. Hinkley Point’s construction tripled between conception and contract, remember.
As for the argument that we must pay up for reliable baseload supplies, there ought to be limits to how far it can be pushed. A nuclear premium of some level might be justified, but Hinkley lives in a financial world of its own, even before battery technology (possibly) shifts the economics further in favour of renewables. A credible energy strategy would concentrate on wind- and gas-fired stations, and invite nuclear to the game only if it can vaguely compete on price.
The government should draw the obvious conclusion from Monday’s successful auction. One Hinkley is bad enough; a series of follow-on white elephants would be a disgrace.
This illogical notion is enshrined in Article IV of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) which rewards signatories who do not yet have nuclear weapons with the “inalienable right” to “develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.”
Now comes the international low-enriched uranium bank, which opened on August 29 in Kazakhstan, to expedite this right. It further reinforces the Article IV doctrine— that the spread of nuclear power will diminish the capability and the desire to manufacture nuclear weapons.
The uranium bank will purchase and store low-enriched uranium, fuel for civilian reactors, ostensibly guaranteeing a ready supply in case of market disruptions. But it is also positioned as a response to the Iran conundrum, a country whose uranium enrichment program cast suspicion over whether its real agenda was to continue enriching its uranium supply to weapons-grade level.
The bank will be run by the International Atomic Energy Agency, whose remit is “to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic energy.” Evidently the IAEA has been quite successful in this promotional endeavor since the agency boasts that “dozens of countries today are interested in pursuing nuclear energy.”
A caveat here, borne out by the evidence of nuclear energy’s declining global share of the electricity market, is that far more countries are “interested” than are actually pursuing nuclear energy. The IAEA numbers are more aspiration than reality.
Superficially at least, the bank idea sounds sensible enough. There will be no need to worry that countries considering a nuclear power program might secretly shift to nuclear weapons production. In addition to a proliferation barrier, the bank will serve as a huge cost savings, sparing countries the expense of investing in their own uranium enrichment facilities.
The problem with this premise is that, rather than make the planet safer, it actually adds to the risks we already face. News reports pointed to the bank’s advantages for developing countries. But developing nations would be much better off implementing cheaper, safer renewable energy, far more suited to countries that lack major infrastructure and widespread electrical grid penetration.
Instead, the IAEA will use its uranium bank to provide a financial incentive to poorer countries in good standing with the agency to choose nuclear energy over renewables. For developing countries already struggling with poverty and the effects of climate change, this creates the added risk of a catastrophic nuclear accident, the financial burden of building nuclear power plants in the first place, and of course an unsolved radioactive waste problem.
No country needs nuclear energy. Renewable energy is soaring worldwide, is far cheaper than nuclear, and obviously a whole lot safer. No country has to worry about another’s potential misuse of the sun or wind as a deadly weapon. There is no solar non-proliferation treaty. We should be talking countries out of developing dangerous and expensive nuclear energy, not paving the way for them.
There is zero logic for a country like Saudi Arabia, also mentioned during the uranium bank’s unveiling, to choose nuclear over solar or wind energy. As Senator Markey (D-MA) once unforgettably pointed out: “Saudi Arabia is the Saudi Arabia of solar.” But the uranium bank could be just the carrot that sunny country needs to abandon renewables in favor of uranium.
This is precisely the problem with the NPT Article IV. Why “reward” non-nuclear weapons countries with dangerous nuclear energy? If they really need electricity, and the UN wants to be helpful, why not support a major investment in renewables? It all goes back to the Bomb, of course, and the Gordian knot of nuclear power and nuclear weapons that the uranium bank just pulled even tighter.
Will the uranium bank be too big to fail? Or will it even be big at all? With nuclear energy in steep decline worldwide, unable to compete with renewables and natural gas; and with major nuclear corporations, including Areva and Westinghouse, going bankrupt, will there even be enough customers?
Clothed in wooly non-proliferation rhetoric, the uranium bank is nothing more than a lupine marketing enterprise to support a struggling nuclear industry desperate to remain relevant as more and more plants close and new construction plans are canceled. The IAEA and its uranium bank just made its prospects a whole lot brighter and a safer future for our planet a whole lot dimmer.
Radar showing Hurricane Irma with its eye north of Cuba and south of the Florida Keys. Turkey Point Nuclear Power Station sits just north of Key Largo on Biscayne Bay. Turkey Point Nuclear (and non-nuclear) Generating Station on Biscayne Bay.
While Turkey Point Unit 3 started shutdown on Saturday morning ahead of tropical storm winds from Hurricane Irma, Turkey Point Unit 4 reportedly shut itself down “just before Sunday evening due to a valve issue“, according to Roger Hannah (US NRC) on the NRC blog [1]. Rather frighteningly, at “St. Lucie, also in Florida, operators are reducing power on Unit 1 due to salt buildup on insulators in the switchyard that supplies offsite power and plant employees are working to resolve this situation. St. Lucie Unit 2 remains at full power“, writes Hannah (NRC).
St. Lucie Nuclear Power Station sits on a barrier island.
¶ “The constant risk from the Bruce Mansfield plant” • On Aug. 29, an accident at the Bruce Mansfield Power Plant that claimed the lives of two workers who were exposed to hydrogen sulfide gas. A spokesperson for FirstEnergy, the owner, stated that the plant posed no threat to the public. That statement is not completely true. [Pittsburgh Post-Gazette]
Bruce Mansfield Power Plant (Post-Gazette image)
¶ “Good news! Energy demand will peak for the first time in human history” • Global energy demand will plateau from 2030, oil demand will flatten from 2020 and then decline significantly, the shift to renewable energy will be quicker and more massive than most people realize, according to findings of DNV GL’s Energy Transition Outlook. [HuffPost]
¶ “Nationals demand “coal target” as energy politics spirals into loony fog” • It seems unbelievable, but the politics of energy just got…
“To date, we have had wars which have been initiated after a well thought-out decision,” Guterres said in an interview published by the French Sunday newspaper Le Journal du Dimanche.
“But we also know that other conflicts have started through an escalation caused by sleepwalking.
“We have to hope that the seriousness of this threat puts us on the path of reason before it is too late,” said Guterres, according to the French language account of the interview.
“It’s the most serious (crisis) that we have had to face in years,” he said, admitting he was “very worried”.
Guterres said the key question was to get North Korea to stop its nuclear and ballistic missile programme and respect UN Security Council resolutions.
“But we must also maintain the unity of the Security Council at all costs, because it is the only tool which can carry out a diplomatic initiative with a chance of success,” he said.
The United States wants the Security Council to vote on Monday to impose tougher sanctions against Pyongyang, despite resistance from China and Russia.
A US-presented draft resolution calls for an oil embargo on North Korea, an assets freeze on Kim, a ban on textiles and an end to payments of North Korean guest workers.
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