nuclear-news

The News That Matters about the Nuclear Industry Fukushima Chernobyl Mayak Three Mile Island Atomic Testing Radiation Isotope

Judicial review will hear appeal against UK govt’s consent for Sizewell C nuclear

Together Against Sizewell C is delighted to announce that we now have the
date for our judicial review in the Court of Appeal, a two-day hearing has
been set for Wednesday 1st and Thursday 2nd November 2023.

This will give our legal team the opportunity to present TASC’s appeal against Justice
Holgate’s refusal in the High Court of our judicial review of then
Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng’s decision to give development consent
to Sizewell C.

The unusually early date for the hearing is a result of
pressure from the government requesting the case be treated as a priority.
TASC continues to have the support of Suffolk Coastal Friends of the Earth
and Stop Sizewell C in this vitally important battle for the soul of the
Heritage Coast, however because of the short timeframe that has been forced
on us we have little time to raise the £25,000 needed to cover the costs
of our legal team for this appeal stage of the proceedings.

 Crowd Justice 8th Oct 2023 #nuclear #antinuclear #Nuclearfree #NoNukes

https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/save-suffolks-heritage-coast-w/

October 11, 2023 Posted by | legal, UK | Leave a comment

Motor fault, legal problems, future delays …. giant costly Vogtle nuclear project struggles on

Vogtle 4 start-up moved to 2024

World Nuclear News, 09 October 2023 #nuclear #anti-nuclear #nucler-free #NoNukes

The in-service date for the second AP1000 plant at the site near Waynesboro, Georgia, has been revised after a motor fault was discovered in a reactor coolant pump. Meanwhile, Georgia Power has agreed to pay the plant’s co-owner Oglethorpe Power Corporation USD308 million in settlement of an ongoing dispute.

The motor fault in one of the unit’s four reactor coolant pumps – or RCPs – was discovered during start-up and pre-operational testing, Georgia Power said in a filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)……………………………

Southern Nuclear believes that the motor fault on the RCP at Vogtle 4 is an isolated event, the companies said. The projected schedule for Vogtle 4 “primarily depends on the continued progression of pre-operational testing and start-up”, it added: “As testing continues, new challenges also may continue to be identified, which may result in required engineering changes or remediation related to plant systems, structures, or components (some of which are based on new technology that only within the last few years began initial operation in the global nuclear industry at this scale). These challenges may result in further schedule delays and/or cost increases.”

Dispute settled


In the same SEC filing, Georgia Power and its parent, Southern Company, announced the agreement with Oglethorpe Power to resolve a dispute regarding cost-sharing and tender provisions of the joint ownership agreements relating to Vogtle units 3 and 4. Georgia Power has agreed to make a payment of USD308 million to Oglethorpe for a portion of Oglethorpe’s previously incurred construction costs, as well as paying a portion of Oglethorpe’s further construction costs for the units – around USD105 million – based on the current capital cost forecast. It will also pay 66% of Oglethorpe’s costs of construction with respect to any amounts above the current project capital cost forecast. The parties have agreed to dismiss pending litigation on this issue, including counterclaims by Georgia Power.

Georgia Power resolved a similar dispute with another of the plant’s co-owners, the Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia (MEAG Power) in September 2022. Similar litigation with the other co-owner, Dalton Utilities, is still pending.

Construction of the two Westinghouse AP1000s began in 2013. Unit 3 ………………… Plant Vogtle is jointly owned by Georgia Power (45.7%), Oglethorpe (30%), MEAG Power (22.7%) and Dalton Utilities (1.6%).

October 10, 2023 Posted by | business and costs, politics, USA | Leave a comment

Endless electricity and water use: the Artificial-Intelligence-Blockchain-Data Centre -Nuclear-NuScale nightmare to come

Blockchain biz goes nuclear: Standard Power wants to use NuScale reactors for DCs

Please, no crypto boom, thank you

The Register, Tobias Mann, Sun 8 Oct 2023 #nuclear #anti-nuclear #nucler-free #NoNukes

Colocation outfit Standard Power hopes to power two new datacenters in Ohio and Pennsylvania entirely by miniaturized nuclear reactors from NuScale.

Standard Power makes no secret it focuses on providing datacenter services to not just those into AI workloads and other kinds of high-performance computing but also those performing proof-of-work blockchain mining, the kind needed to craft digital tokens like Bitcoin. The significant energy requirements of this type of blockchain work spurred an investigation by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy last year, and calls by lawmakers to implement reporting and/or sustainability requirements for such operations.

Generally speaking, a datacenter packed with proof-of-work miners is going to demand a chunky amount of power. Concerned it may not get adequate electricity supplies for its new facilities, which by the sounds of it will support blockchain mining as well as other workloads, Standard Power said it hopes to take the nuclear option.

“We see a lot of legacy baseload grid capacity going offline with a lack of new sustainable baseload generation options on the market especially as power demand for artificial intelligence-computing and datacenters is growing,” Standard Power CEO Maxim Serezhin said in a statement.

And the colo outfit’s Ohio and Pennsylvania datacenters may need or get a lot of power. The company expects to deploy 24 of NuScale’s small modular reactors between the two sites. These reactors are reportedly capable of generating 77 megawatts apiece — putting the total deployed capacity at 1,848 megawatts.

Despite the announcement, it may be a few years before Standard Power can realize its nuclear dreams. As we learned in January, Idaho National Labs will be among the first to demonstrate NuScale’s reactors, and the first of these modules isn’t expected to come online until 2029. We asked Standard Power when it expects its facilities will be operational; we’ll let you know if we hear anything back…………………………………..

Standard Power is hardly the first datacenter operator to get excited about nuclear power, either. Cumulus Data opened a datacenter next to a nuclear plant — the full-size kind — in January and last month we learned that Microsoft is now hiring someone to potentially deploy SMR systems to power its growing cloud enterprise.  https://www.theregister.com/2023/10/08/standard_power_nuclear_datacenter/

October 10, 2023 Posted by | ENERGY, technology, USA | 1 Comment

14 October 12-2pm ET Join Us WARHEADS TO WINDMILLS – ONLINE FORUM

 https://www.nuclearban.us/join-us-warheads-to-windmills-online-forum-october-14th-12-2pm-et/

Abolishing Nuclear Weapons and Fossil Fuels: What will it take? #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclear-free #NoNukes

Following a webinar on May 7th which brought together leading organizations and activists working on the two crucially important issues of climate change and nuclear war, this forum will allow for more in depth discussion on how the climate and nuclear weapons movements can work together to save the planet from these existential threats before it is too late. Merging these into an inclusive mass movement in the transition to a greener economy is essential!

An online forum with speakers on climate solutions, nuclear solutions, and a panel on how we can help each other build a strong and inclusive movement. Followed by breakout rooms to share ideas on action.

Speakers and Schedule: all times listed in ET…………………………………………………………………

October 10, 2023 Posted by | opposition to nuclear | 1 Comment

All This Death Is The Fault Of The Western Press

The western press are largely to blame for all this. If they’d just told the truth instead of running “Palestinian child walks into bullet” headlines this whole time and telling everyone that boycotting Israel is genocide, political pressure could’ve long ago been brought about to force a peaceful and just resolution to this mess.

Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix

CAITLIN JOHNSTONE, OCT 9, 2023

Israel is reportedly preparing a ground invasion of Gaza very soon in response to Saturday’s Hamas attack. We can expect things to get much, much bloodier from there.

Meanwhile the US has deployed an aircraft carrier strike group to the eastern Mediterranean in support of the coming Israeli military operations, on top of the additional military aid Biden has already pledged to Netanyahu. At the same time, The Wall Street Journal claims that the Hamas operation was coordinated with both Iran and Hezbollah. 

This war has the potential to expand in some very ugly directions in the coming weeks.

Whenever something like this happens warmongers always seize on the emotional frenzy of the moment to shove through insane acts of warmongering and scream vitriol at anyone who questions them. Then later when all the facts are in people slowly start to realize that something went very wrong, and that they were deceived.

After 9/11 anyone who didn’t support multiple full-scale ground invasions of sovereign nations was a terrorist sympathizer and a Saddam apologist. We were told Al Qaeda were evil, irrational actors who attacked because “they hate us for our freedom”, and we need to support a war on terror against any nation deemed threatening because all such monsters understand is violence. Now both the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are regarded as colossal mistakes by anyone who’s honest.

When Russia invaded Ukraine anyone who wanted peace talks instead of a rapidly escalating proxy war between nuclear-armed nations was a Putin lover and a Kremlin shill. We were told Putin invaded solely because he is evil and hates freedom, and we need to support a war against him because all such monsters understand is violence. Now the counteroffensive failed, the US is having trouble getting proxy war funding through congress, and even the head of NATO acknowledges that this war was provoked by NATO expansion.

And now we’re facing another instance of intense emotional frenzy, and we’re being told that Hamas attacked Israel completely unprovoked for no other reason than because they are evil monsters who love killing Jews. We will be told to support any act of war deemed necessary, because all such monsters understand is violence.

Someday we’re going to have to stop falling for this tired old song and dance.

The western press are largely to blame for all this. If they’d just told the truth instead of running “Palestinian child walks into bullet” headlines this whole time and telling everyone that boycotting Israel is genocide, political pressure could’ve long ago been brought about to force a peaceful and just resolution to this mess.

If they’d just done their jobs and reported the facts to the public, there never would’ve been enough public consent for the US empire to back a brutal apartheid regime which cannot exist without nonstop violence, and peaceful resolutions would’ve become unavoidable.

Instead they hid all those abuses from the public for generations, creating an environment where peaceful resolutions are impossible and giving rise to Palestinian factions which understandably see violent force as the only viable answer.

This is their fault. They created this mess with a mountain of lies and obfuscation, and now those lies are being paid for with rivers of blood. The western press are war criminals. They’ve committed crimes against humanity…………………………………………………

It’s getting harder and harder to argue that the US-led world order brings more peace and stability to the world than the war and instability it causes. As more and more force is brought to bear against nations and groups who refuse to submit to Washington’s dictates, we’re seeing more and more conflict and chaos. Russia’s refusal to lie down before Washington resulted in the Ukraine war and all the nuclear brinkmanship that comes with it. Hamas, Hezbollah, Ansarallah, Syria and Iran refusing to prostrate themselves to the US power alliance results in constant violence in the middle east. As the imperial crosshairs move to Beijing we’re now faced with the terrifying prospect of a hot war with China.

At a certain point you have to ask, if the US-led world order requires more and more violence and nuclear brinkmanship to maintain, what specifically is the argument for maintaining it in the first place? Does it not at some point begin to cease looking like “order” at all, and instead like a tyrannical empire trying to rule the world no matter how much death and destruction is necessary to subjugate it?  https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/all-this-death-is-the-fault-of-the?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=137788966&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&utm_medium=email

October 10, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Loud Explosion Heard In Pakistan’s Dera Ghazi Khan City With Nuclear Facility; Officials Say ‘Sonic Boom’

The loud thud in the vicinity of Dera Ghazi Khan town in southern Punjab caused panic and soon it started trending on social media.

BQ Prime 6 Oct 23

Pakistan authorities on Friday said that the sound of a loud explosion in Punjab province could be due to a sonic boom as there was no information of a bombing incident or an act of sabotage. The loud thud in the vicinity of Dera Ghazi Khan town in southern Punjab caused panic and soon it started trending on social media. Videos circulating on X showed people vacating the area even as rescue teams and police personnel were moving around.

Pakistan’s nuclear research site is in the neighbourhood…………………….

Read more at: https://www.bqprime.com/politics/loud-explosion-heard-in-pakistans-dera-ghazi-khan-city-with-nuclear-facility-officials-say-sonic-boom

October 10, 2023 Posted by | incidents, Pakistan | Leave a comment

Residents closest to Dounreay and Vulcan to be excluded from the nuclear emergency planning zone.

By Iain Grant, 06 October 2023    https://www.johnogroat-journal.co.uk/news/nearby-homes-to-be-outside-of-dounreay-emergency-zone-for-fi-328741/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclear-free #NoNukes

Residents closest to Dounreay and Vulcan are for the first time to be excluded from the emergency planning zone around the redundant nuclear sites.

It is being shrunk to reflect the perceived reduction in risk to the public presented by the adjoining plants.

The zone would be the focus of the response to what is considered a worst-case scenario involving a radiation release.

Up until the plug was pulled on Dounreay’s fast reactor programme in the mid-1990s, its zone extended to five kilometres. The equivalent at Vulcan was two kilometres.

Dounreay’s limit was subsequently cut to 1.5km and reduced further in 2020 when a new linked zone taking in both sites was set at 700 metres.

October 10, 2023 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

US public support declines for arming Ukraine, Reuters/Ipsos poll shows

By Jason Lange and Patricia Zengerle. October 6, 2023 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclear-free #NoNukes

WASHINGTON, Oct 5 (Reuters) – Support is falling among Americans of both major political parties for supplying Ukraine with weapons, a warning sign for Kyiv, which relies heavily on U.S. arms to fight against a Russian invasion, according to a new Reuters/Ipsos poll.

The two-day poll, which closed on Wednesday, showed only 41% of respondents agreed with a statement that Washington “should provide weapons to Ukraine,” compared to 35% who disagreed and the rest unsure.

Support for U.S. weapon shipments is down from May, when a Reuters/Ipsos poll showed 46% of Americans backed sending arms, while 29% were opposed and the rest unsure.

The poll was taken as U.S. congressional leaders debate Democratic President Joe Biden’s request for $24 billion in additional funding for Ukraine, of which about $17 billion would be defense aid……………………………………………………….  https://www.reuters.com/world/us/us-public-support-declines-arming-ukraine-reutersipsos-2023-10-05/

October 10, 2023 Posted by | politics, USA | Leave a comment

NRC Issues Event Notification for Peach Bottom Nuclear Plant, Pa.

Energy Central, WASHINGTON, Sept. 25 — The Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued the following event notification (No. 56753) involving Peach Bottom Nuclear Plant, Pennsylvania:

…………………………………………………….. FITNESS-FOR-DUTY REPORT

The following information was provided by the licensee via phone and email:

“A licensed operator had a confirmed positive test for alcohol during another entity’s pre-access fitness-for-duty screening for unescorted access authorization. The individual’s unescorted access at Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station has been denied.

“The NRC Resident Inspector has been notified.”

Original text here: https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/event-status/event/2023/2…  https://energycentral.com/news/nrc-issues-event-notification-peach-bottom-nuclear-plant-pa-1

October 10, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

France seeks European subsidies for its nuclear industry – fears “discrimination against nuclear”

France urges swift deal on EU power reform to counter US subsidies Energy minister says bloc will lose out to Biden’s IRA if Paris and Berlin fail to resolve differences over nuclear power.

The US will be the main winner if a Franco-German divide over nuclear power prevents a long-awaited reform of Europe’s electricity market being finalised, France’s energy minister has warned.  Agnès Pannier-Runacher said in an interview with the Financial Times that the sweeping overhaul of EU rules was needed as soon as possible to give businesses visibility on power prices, at a time when the US was luring industry with President Joe Biden’s clean energy subsidy programme under the Inflation Reduction Act……………….

The call comes ahead of a bilateral conference in Hamburg, starting on Monday, between French president Emmanuel Macron and German chancellor Olaf Scholz, accompanied by their cabinet ministers. Energy issues will be high on the agenda because Paris and Berlin have been arguing for months over the EU electricity market reform, specifically over how nuclear energy will be priced and the extent to which it can be subsidised……………

Behind the scenes in recent days, Paris and Berlin have been exchanging duelling policy papers and rewritten clauses for the draft law, while marshalling support from other EU member states.

On this reform and others, France has mounted a pro-nuclear campaign now joined by other countries that use the technology, including Poland and Hungary, in an effort to ensure the sector will be treated favourably.

But its drive has hit roadblocks, particularly in Germany, over concerns France will end up riding roughshod over state aid rules and benefit from lower prices for consumers and industry that other countries cannot match………………………………………………………..

Whether France and Germany will be able to square their differences in time for the next meeting of EU energy ministers on October 17 is unclear. The risk is that the reform will not be done by the end of the year and only become harder as EU parliament elections approach……………………..

The main thing still to be ironed out in the reform is the use of a mechanism known as “contracts for difference” (CFDs) which guarantee a minimum price for energy produced, and whether they should be applied to existing nuclear plants or just new ones. The CFDs have typically been used to incentivise renewable energy projects by guaranteeing revenues for producers, and Berlin has argued they should only apply to new investments.

France’s Energy Minister Pannier-Runacher said French reactors built decades ago required billions of euros in new investments for maintenance and to extend their lifespan and therefore should not be penalised with heavy restrictions around the application of CFDs.

As well as a minimum price, the CFD mechanism allows governments to recover excess revenues if prices jump past a set threshold, raising more questions about how governments then use those funds, especially if they were to be directed at providing further energy subsidies.

France had been happy with an original proposal on market reform put forward by the European Commission in March. But subsequent amendments with more restrictions on the uses of CFDs in a version presented by the European parliament have sparked the pushback. “At a certain stage it amounts to a discrimination against nuclear. We would not be allowed to do in the French system what other countries can [with their energy assets],” Pannier-Runacher said.

October 9, 2023 Posted by | EUROPE, politics international | Leave a comment

How safe is the release of treated radioactive water from Fukushima plant

#nuclear #antinuclear #nuclear-free #NoNukes

5 Oct 2023Japan begins second discharge of treated nuclear water from Fukushima Japan has begun discharging a second batch of treated radioactive water from the crippled Fukushima plant into the ocean. It’s happening amid protest from countries like China, Russia and South Korea who are all concerned about the risks. Robert Jacobs from the Hiroshima Peace Institute explains with these worries are founded.

October 9, 2023 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, oceans | Leave a comment

Wind and solar are only forms of power generation rising globally, study finds.

Independent, Stuti Mishra 8 Oct 23,

 China leads the charge by contributing to 43 per cent of the global
growth in solar energy generation.

. Electricity data from 78 countries that
represented 92 per cent of global electricity demand for the first half of
2023 was analysed in the study released by environmental think-tank Ember
on Thursday. It found that while overall emissions remained stable, with a
slight 0.2 per cent increase, wind and solar power generation surged ahead.

 Independent 6th Oct 2023

more https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/solar-wind-energy-growth-rising-globally-b2425311.html

October 9, 2023 Posted by | renewable | Leave a comment

Class action launched against British Government over nuclear bomb tests in Australia

By A Current Affair Staff 7 Oct 23 https://9now.nine.com.au/a-current-affair/nuclear-bomb-testing-australia-class-action-british-government/199eafe9-c774-432e-99b2-f71a96ffb696—

It’s a scandal that has spanned decades as Australian and British servicemen sent to nuclear testing sites fight to be officially recognised for their service and suffering.

Between 1952 and 1963, Great Britain carried out nuclear bomb tests in Australia and the Pacific.

Doug Brooks was at the first one.

“The only thing we were told to do was turn our backs to the blast ground zero, cover our eyes with our hands and the blast x-rayed our hands we could see the bones,” he told A Current Affair.

Tony Spruzen was at the Maralinga test range in the remote outback of South Australia.

“The brightness was so much, it’s something like I never experienced before, I could see through my eyelids, I could see the bones of my fingers,” he said.

Doug and Tony are two of the rapidly diminishing number of veterans sent to the nuclear test sites.

In total 45 tests were conducted by Britain’s Ministry of Defence – 12 of those were in Australia at the blessing of the Menzies government.

There were 22,000 servicemen in the Pacific tests. 1500 are still alive.

Now there is a new class action against the British Government.

“Well, what’s prompted it is that we’ve discovered medical records do in fact exist for these servicemen,” lawyer Matthew Jury said.

“We have a copy of these records and what that tells us is the other medical records exist which the government has been concealing for 70 years so those surviving servicemen who want answers now know that those records exist so where and the government has been concealing them.”

Jury’s firm has launched the action class and he claims records reveal the radiation levels in the blood and urine of the servicemen.

“As they have grown older they have developed extreme and aggressive forms of cancer,” Jury said.

“There have been miscarriages and other birth defects which can’t be treated by their doctors because their doctors don’t have their full medical records.”

The British Ministry of Defence hasn’t responded to requests for an interview or statement.

Watch the full story in the video player above. [on original]

October 9, 2023 Posted by | Legal, UK | Leave a comment

Portland filmmaker on ‘Downwind,’ a powerful documentary about nuclear tests on U.S. soil

Oregon Live  Kristi Turnquist  6 Oct 23 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclear-free #NoNukes

Millions of people bought tickets this summer to see “Oppenheimer,” Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster movie about J. Robert Oppenheimer and the development of the atomic bomb during World War II. The first nuclear weapon was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945, and a second bomb was dropped a few days later, on Nagasaki, Japan.

While the bombs are credited by some with ending World War II, as Japan surrendered shortly after the atomic weapons were dropped, the long-term effects of the radioactive fallout unleashed by detonating nuclear weapons is a subject the movie didn’t delve into, which has drawn some criticism.

However, a new documentary, “Downwind,” takes an in-depth look into the devastating impact the American government’s testing of nuclear weapons on U.S. soil has had, particularly on those unfortunate enough to live near testing sites, and potentially in people far beyond those borders.

………………………………….. In a phone interview, Shapiro and Miller talked about how they became interested in the subject of nuclear tests in America, and how for years the government downplayed the effects of radioactive fallout.

Shapiro recalls how he and Miller, who have collaborated on various projects over the years, became intrigued by a magazine report about “The Conqueror,” a 1956 movie produced by Howard Hughes that starred John Wayne in the unlikely role of Genghis Khan.

The movie was filmed in Utah in 1954, in locations a little over 100 miles from the Nevada Test Site, which was about 65 miles north of Las Vegas, and was the place where hundreds of above and below-ground nuclear tests were conducted, from 1951 through 1992.

As Patrick Wayne, son of the iconic star, says in an interview for “Downwind,” at the time “The Conqueror” was filmed, the nuclear tests were kept quiet, and those involved in the film didn’t know they were working in an area that had been dusted with, as the film says, some of the highest levels of radioactive fallout ever recorded in United State history.

A large number of people who worked on “The Conqueror,” including Wayne, ultimately died of complications related to cancer. In “Downwind,” Patrick Wayne acknowledges that some of the people involved in the making of “The Conqueror” smoked, but he suggests that the number of cancer-related fatalities suffered by members of “The Conqueror” cast and crew was still remarkable.

From this early interest, “We dove deeper into the research,” Shapiro says. They found that, from 1951 through 1992, the U.S. detonated 928 nuclear weapons at the Nevada Test Site.

“Downwind” looks at how miscalculated wind forecasts, government proclamations that radiation exposure wasn’t a serious health threat, and revelations from now-declassified documents referring to those who lived near the test site as a “low use segment of the population” potentially contributed to illnesses suffered by Americans who were never warned about the dangers of living near the test sites.

……………………….. Most affecting, however, are interviews filmed with some of the people who have been directly impacted by being “Downwinders,” and have become activists trying to draw attention to the dangers of exposure to radioactive fallout.

Ian Zabarte, Principal Man of the Western Bands of the Shoshone Nation of Indians, for example, speaks with emotion about how the Nevada Test Site was located on Shoshone land, and how the soil, the water, and the people have all been affected, a process Zabarte calls “disgustingly shameful.”…………………………..

Another striking element of “Downwind” are clips from films produced by Lookout Mountain Laboratory, which operated generally in secret as a Hollywood film studio that was a unit of the U.S. Air Force and churned out films that, among other things, tended to downplay the impact of exposure to radioactive fallout…………………………….

Since “Downwind” has been shown at film festivals and became available to rent on streaming services, Shapiro says the filmmakers have been hearing from lots of people either interested in or close to the topic, including, as Shapiro says, “folks from Hanford,” the Washington state site that was established in 1943 “as part of the Manhattan Project to produce plutonium for national defense,” as the U.S. Department of Energy describes it………………………………………………………………………………. more https://www.oregonlive.com/entertainment/2023/10/portland-filmmaker-on-downwind-a-powerful-documentary-about-nuclear-tests-on-us-soil.html

October 9, 2023 Posted by | media, Resources -audiovicual | Leave a comment

‘Substantial’ safety violation alleged at South Carolina nuclear plant after 20 years of problems

The State, Sammy Fretwell, Sun, October 8, 2023 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclear-free #NoNukes

Federal regulators have cited Dominion Energy for what they say is a substantial safety violation after finding that utility workers failed for 20 years to resolve cracking problems at the company’s V.C. Summer nuclear power plant northwest of Columbia.

This past week, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued what’s known as a preliminary “yellow’’ safety assessment, a measure of how serious an atomic safety problem is considered at a power plant. Yellow assessments are the second most serious on an NRC scale of severity.

The NRC, which rarely issues yellow findings, said nuclear plant operators did not resolve cracking problems from 2003 to 2022 in V.C. Summer’s diesel generator system, one of the most important backup safety systems at an atomic power plant.

NRC officials were not available Friday to explain their concerns with the backup diesel generator system, but an Oct. 4 enforcement letter to Dominion nuclear operations president Eric Carr said the utility violated an atomic safety standard that could result in more scrutiny of the power plant……………………………………….

the NRC says the utility never adequately assessed what could be done to make sure the diesel piping system did not experience more cracking. The most recent cracks were identified in November 2022 during a 24-hour test of the system. Workers found a small leak on one of two diesel generator systems. The leak increased over time and workers discovered a 140-degree crack around a pipe, records show………………..

Tom Clements, a long-time nuclear safety advocate, said the NRC’s recent yellow safety assessment reveals a violation “too egregious to ignore.’’ He called for a “severe monetary fine’’ against Dominion, which he said ignored preventative maintenance through the years.

Dominion’s problems are noteworthy in light of the company’s recent request to renew its V.C. Summer operating license another 40 years, Clements said. The power plant, which cranked up operations in the early 1980s, is about 25 miles northwest of Columbia in rural Fairfield County…………  https://news.yahoo.com/substantial-safety-violation-alleged-sc-141716023.html

October 9, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

« Previous Entries     Next Entries »