100 year licences for nuclear reactors? – a hazardous plan

What a great idea!   This way, all the nuclear industry  heavies, all the regulatory officials involved, will be long gone when disaster strikes.  They get off scot free –   no costs, no blame, no shame.  Just leaves the taxpayers’ grandchildren, great grandchildren and so on, to deal with the massive problems caused bu these self=serving decision-makers.

NRC to discuss 100-year licenses for nuclear plants, Facilities could receive longer extensions, Gloucester Daily Times. By Heather Alterisio Staff Writer, 9 Jan 21,  SEABROOK, N.H. — A daylong Nuclear Regulatory Commission meeting Thursday will revolve around discussion of any technical issues that could arise if nuclear power plants were licensed to operate for 100 years.

When a nuclear power plant is first licensed by the NRC, that license permits a plant to operate for 40 years. After that, owners of nuclear plants can apply for a 20-year license extension. Nearly every power plant in the U.S. has gone through that renewal process at least once, according to NRC spokesman Scott Burnell.

Seabrook Station at 626 Lafayette Road received approval from the NRC in 2019 to extend its operating license from 2030 to 2050. The plant sits about 17 miles northwest — as the seagull flies — from parts of Cape Ann.

As of Oct. 31, the federal Energy Information Administration said there were 56 commercially operating nuclear power plants with 94 nuclear reactors in 28 states.

About 10 years ago, the NRC began discussions to address what protocols should be put in place if plant owners wanted to renew their license a second time, allowing operation for 80 years. Burnell said the law does not set a limit on how many times a plant can apply to renew its license.

The NRC has since awarded second renewals to a Florida plant and one in Pennsylvania, allowing operation for 80 years. The meeting Thursday — which will be online and open to the public — poses the question, what protocols should be in place if a plant owner pursued a third renewal, allowing it to operate for 100 years?………

Natalie Hildt Treat, executive director for C-10, an Amesbury-based nonprofit that monitors Seabrook Station and its impact on surrounding communities, said C-10 has already brought attention to issues related to aging concrete at Seabrook, the first nuclear power plant known to have this problem.

Prior to and while Seabrook Station was undergoing its recent license renewal process, C-10 pressed the NRC to address concrete degradation caused by alkali-silica reaction in which tiny cracks develop in concrete structures. C-10 worked closely with Victor Saouma, a professor of civil engineering at the University of Colorado Boulder and an expert in alkali-silica reaction.

Saouma is one of the experts who will speak Thursday on technical issues relating to concrete. C-10 believes there should be federal regulations that include taking concrete samples from all of the nation’s nuclear reactors, testing them “rigorously,” and creating protocols for how to manage issues as they arise, Treat said.

“We don’t think the NRC or the plant operators have a handle on whether these reactors are safe today, much less an unprecedented number of decades,” she said.

Treat added that Seabrook Station, like other plants around the country, was designed a few decades ago and they “are not getting any safer as they age.”

It is implausible to think that plants could safely operate for more than double of their anticipated life span,” she said.

Construction of the Seabrook reactor began in 1976 and the plant began operating at full power in 1990.

More information on the work of C-10 may be found at www.c-10.org.

The public meeting is Thursday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information or for the Microsoft Teams webinar details, visit www.nrc.gov/pmns/mtg?do=details& Code=20201407.

To access the meeting by telephone, call 301-576-2978 and then enter the passcode, 835226175#.

Heather Alterisio may be contacted at halterisio@gloucestertimes.com

https://www.gloucestertimes.com/news/local_news/nrc-to-discuss-100-year-licenses-for-nuclear-plants/article_c0762bc7-dfa9-5d14-a307-71015064ee88.html

January 21, 2021 - Posted by Christina MacPherson | politics, safety, USA