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New nuclear reactors shielded from liability if federal law passes Congress. Price-Anderson Act renewal hidden from public

February 28, 2024, https://beyondnuclear.org/price-anderson-act-renewal-still-hiding-from-public/

The ADVANCE Act of 2023 (HR6544) with Price-Anderson renewal for 40 years passes US House floor vote 

Bipartisan support to extend  severe accident liability protection to “inherently safe” new reactors?

The “Price-Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act”, also known as the “Price-Anderson Act” (PAA), is moving for renewal by Congress. The federal law to shield the nuclear industry from full liability of a nuclear accident is presently scheduled to sunset on December 31, 2025.

However, there is remains little to no transparency of the Act’s extension and expansion process to the public’s scrutiny of its incongruities.

Since 1957, Congress has periodically extended an adjusted upper limit for the nuclear industry’s financial liability protection from the otherwise unpredictably high projected cost in damages from the next severe radiological accident at a commercial nuclear power plant.

Originally, the industry’s limited liability for damages caused by a single nuclear accident was artificially set at $500 million per incident including personal injuries caused by radioactive fallout, population and economic dislocation by prolonged evacuations without re-entry, potentially permanent loss of property (residential, commercial and industrial), agricultural production and the contamination of natural resources with widespread and long-lived radioactivity.

The “Price-Anderson Nuclear Industries Indemnity Act”, also known as the “Price-Anderson Act” (PAA), is moving for renewal by Congress. The federal law to shield the nuclear industry from full liability of a nuclear accident is presently scheduled to sunset on December 31, 2025.

However, there is remains little to no transparency of the Act’s extension and expansion process to the public’s scrutiny of its incongruities.

Since 1957, Congress has periodically extended an adjusted upper limit for the nuclear industry’s financial liability protection from the otherwise unpredictably high projected cost in damages from the next severe radiological accident at a commercial nuclear power plant.

Originally, the industry’s limited liability for damages caused by a single nuclear accident was artificially set at $500 million per incident including personal injuries caused by radioactive fallout, population and economic dislocation by prolonged evacuations without re-entry, potentially permanent loss of property (residential, commercial and industrial), agricultural production and the contamination of natural resources with widespread and long-lived radioactivity.

According to the latest figures provided by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) Report published January 25, 2024, the industry’s financial liability ceiling for a single, severe nuclear accident is now capped at $16.6 billion by federal law. Beyond that ceiling, damages would supposedly be covered by US taxpayers. But the still unrealized total damage costs of a severe nuclear accident as evidenced by ongoing nuclear catastrophes at Fukushima (13 year ago) and Chernobyl (38 years ago) are already running into the hundreds of billions of dollars. The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear catastrophe’s damage is recently updated to surpass ¥15.4 trillion ($102.7 billion).

The PAA renewal is part of the controversial “Accelerating Deployment of Versatile, Advanced Nuclear for Clean Energy (ADVANCE) Act of 2023” that is now approved by both the Senate and the House with  significant differences including the PAA liability protection extension period.

The US Senate version (SB 1000) extends the PAA by 20 years to December 31, 2045, was passed on July 31, 2023 as a “must pass” inclusion in the National Defense Authorization Act of 2023 without a single public hearing.  With Senate passage, the National Defense Authorization Act went to the US House of Representatives for approval where the ADVANCE Act of 2023 along with the PAA renewal on its coattail were instead culled from the military spending bill.

The ADVANCE Act with its the Price-Anderson renewal rider were introduced to the House as  stand alone legislation (HR 6544) with the House version extending the industry’s limited accident liability protection to 40 years (December 31, 2065).  According to E&ENews,  “The House will vote on bipartisan nuclear energy legislation this week (02.26.2024) in hopes of reaching an agreement with the Senate in the coming weeks”—still without a single public hearing. The House floor vote to pass the HR 6544 with broad bipartisan support was confirmed by E&ENews February 29, 2024. The ADVANCE Act with the Price-Anderson extension for 40 years now goes back to the Senate to consider reconciliation.

Both the Senate and House versions intend to expand the government’s limited accident liability coverage beyond the aging, economically distressed and grandfathered commercial nuclear power fleet to now include new and supposedly “inherently safe” Small Modular Reactors and Advanced Non-Light Water reactor designs that incongruently could be licensed without any offsite radiological emergency planning zones.

All of this, thus far, has been accomplished without the transparency of a single congressional hearing in either the US Senate or House to explain the extension and expansion of Price-Anderson Act liability protection to increasingly economically distressed old reactors and new reactors where safety claims have yet to be technically certified.

March 2, 2024 Posted by | politics, safety, USA | Leave a comment

Texas nuclear weapons facility pauses as fires spread

The Standard, By John Crouch, February 28, 2024

A series of wildfires has swept across the Texas Panhandle, prompting evacuations, cutting off power to thousands, and forcing the shutdown of a nuclear weapons facility as strong winds, dry grass and unseasonably warm temperatures fed the blazes.

An unknown number of homes and other structures in Hutchinson County were damaged or destroyed, local emergency officials said.

The main facility that assembles and disassembles America’s nuclear arsenal shut down its operations Tuesday night.

“We have evacuated our personnel, non-essential personnel from the site, just in an abundance of caution,” Laef Pendergraft, a spokesman for National Nuclear Security Administration’s Production Office at Pantex, said during a news conference………………………………………………….

Republican Governor Greg Abbott issued a disaster declaration for 60 counties as the largest blaze, the Smokehouse Creek Fire, burned more than 1000 square kilometres, according to the Texas A&M Forest Service.

That is more than twice its size since the fire sparked on Monday……………………………………more https://www.standard.net.au/story/8539003/texas-nuclear-weapons-facility-pauses-as-fires-spread/

March 1, 2024 Posted by | climate change, safety, USA | Leave a comment

Nuclear security is under attack in Ukraine, say experts at Bellona forum.

 https://bellona.org/news/nuclear-issues/2024-02-nuclear-security-is-under-attack-in-ukraine-say-experts-at-bellona-forum—

These and other questions were raised during today’s Bellona forum, “War and the Russian Nuclear Industry,” which brough together experts from Norway and Bellona’s new offices in Vilnius — the new locale for the organization’s Russian staff, who can no longer safely conduct their work on Russian soil.

“We have full-scale war in a country with full-scale nuclear installations, and a situation where international cooperation on nuclear security no longer exists,” said Bellona founder Frederic Hauge in the forum’s opening remarks.

Bellona has worked on nuclear cleanup in Russia since the early 1990s, and this month mark 30 years since Bellona released its first report on the nuclear threat caused by the legacy of the Soviet nuclear navy. It has also been almost exactly two years since Russia invaded Ukraine. That was the backdrop for today’s Bellona Forum, where about 100 people participated physically or digitally.

Tons of Nuclear Waste

Aleksandr Nikitin, a former Russian nuclear submarine officer and Bellona employee of 30 years standing, opened the forum by discussing Bellona’s strategic goals for its nuclear project in Russia.

“First and foremost, together with international actors, we have worked to prevent radiation and nuclear accidents at Russian facilities,” he said. “We have also been concerned with ensuring the elimination or safe conversion of the Soviet nuclear and radiation legacy.”

He noted that the Russian nuclear and radiation legacy consists of nearly 20,000 tons of used nuclear fuel, approximately 800,000 cubic meters of radioactive waste, over 4,700 nuclear and radiation hazardous facilities — as well as more than 30,000 cubic meters of radioactive waste dumped on the seabed.

Since Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, 2022, international efforts to grapple with those issues have stalled.

“But at Bellona, we still have full focus on the Russian nuclear industry, even though now, since we were banned by Russian authorities, we must operate from outside Russia’s borders,” Nikitin said. “We are still working to gather and disseminate information; we share knowledge about the use of nuclear technologies and how the Russian nuclear industry contributes to the continuation of the war in Ukraine.”

‘Rosatom Significantly Involved in the War’

One of the employees at Bellona’s Environmental Transparency Center in Vilnius is nuclear expert Dmitry Gorchakov, who spoke at the Bellona Forum about the role of the Russian atomic agency Rosatom in Russia’s war against Ukraine.

“We closely monitor nuclear risks in Ukraine. And we monitor Rosatom’s global nuclear activities and the agency’s role in the international nuclear market closely,” said Gorchakov.

Rosatom is the world’s largest builder of nuclear power plants. One-third of all nuclear power plants under construction in the world are either built by Rosatom or according to Rosatom’s technology and design.

“Rosatom is significantly involved in the ongoing war. One of the most critical situations is the occupation of Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, Zaporizhzhia (in southeastern Ukraine), which the Russians have occupied since the first weeks of the war. Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have been denied access to several areas of the facility,” said Gorchakov.

He highlighted three main risks at the nuclear power plant as it continues to be controlled by Russia on the front lines of the conflict.

“First, there is a risk of equipment damage due to abnormal operation and lack of maintenance. The second risk is the lack of qualified personnel. But the biggest risk, of course, is the war itself; it is unpredictable and creates chaos. Dramatic changes can occur at any time. For example, if Russia decides to switch reactors to power mode or if military activity escalates near the plant,” said Gorchakov.

Secret Nuclear Weapons Program

Thomas Nilsen from The Independent Barents Observer also participated in the Bellona forum. He talked about Russia’s secret reactor-driven nuclear weapons program and its development and testing in the Arctic.

We are in a new arms race involving new nuclear weapons and new reactor systems. And we are back to the flow of information that existed during the Soviet era, meaning almost no information. We at The Barents Observer have not reported a single incident from Russian nuclear submarines in the past four years, and that’s not because accidents haven’t happened. It’s becoming harder and harder to obtain information from Russia,” Nilsen explained.

The Barents Observer is the only Norwegian media outlet with four exiled Russian journalists on its editorial staff.

You can watch the entire Bellona forum by clicking on this link.

February 29, 2024 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Minister urges TEPCO to ensure nuclear safety measures

By Jiang Xueqing in Tokyo 2024-02-22 ,  https://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202402/22/WS65d6a0fca31082fc043b86ea.html

Japan’s industry minister said on Wednesday a recent radioactive water leak at the wrecked Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant earlier this month has caused anxiety in Japan and abroad and will hinder the completion of the decommissioning of the plant.

Ken Saito, minister of economy, trade and industry, summoned Tomoaki Kobayakawa, president of the Tokyo Electric Power Company, operator of the Fukushima plant, to his office on Wednesday, urging TEPCO to take the incident as a serious management issue and ensure thorough safety measures.

Furthermore, Saito requested an analysis to identify any common factors contributing to a series of troubles for the purpose of preventing recurrence. He also urged the utilization of digital technology to prevent human errors, Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported.

On Feb 7, TEPCO informed the International Atomic Energy Agency that water containing radioactive materials was found to have leaked from a caesium absorption tower at the plant.

TEPCO calculated that the leakage totaled around 5.5 cubic meters of water containing an estimated 0.022 terabecquerel of radioactive substances, according to the IAEA.

The water was assessed to have leaked from a valve left open during cleaning work at the absorption tower.

On Oct 26 last year, TEPCO announced that two male workers in their 20s and 40s, who were exposed to nuclear-contaminated water while cleaning pipes at the Advanced Liquid Processing System at the Fukushima nuclear power plant, have been hospitalized for decontamination and observation.

The two workers, employees of a partner firm of TEPCO, were engaged in the cleaning process along with three other male workers. During the operation, a hose used to transfer nuclear-contaminated water to a tank went loose, leading to the splashing of approximately 100 milliliters of radioactive water, as reported by The Asahi Shimbun, one of the major daily newspapers in Japan.

In the process of handling the Fukushima nuclear-contaminated water, accidents have occurred repeatedly, fully exposing the chaotic and disorderly internal management of TEPCO, a spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in Japan said on Feb 8.

The accidents also demonstrate the inadequate and ineffective supervision measures by the Japanese government and once again prove the lack of long-term reliability of the nuclear-contaminated water treatment equipment, highlighting the necessity for international supervision, he said.

Japan has so far dumped approximately 23,400 cubic meters of nuclear-contaminated water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant into the sea since August 2023 in three rounds. The fourth round is scheduled to commence in late February.

The spokesperson of the Chinese Embassy in Japan said the discharge of nuclear-contaminated water from Fukushima into the sea concerns the health of all mankind, the global marine environment and international public interests.

“We once again earnestly urge Japan to take seriously the concerns of neighboring countries and the international community; engage in sincere consultations with relevant stakeholders; fully cooperate in establishing effective international monitoring arrangements with substantive participation from stakeholders; and handle nuclear-contaminated water in a scientific, safe and transparent manner,” he said.

February 23, 2024 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, safety | Leave a comment

UK lawmakers seek reassurances after nuclear missile test fails for second time

By CNN, Associated Press9News Staff, Feb 22, 2024

British lawmakers are seeking reassurances about the nation’s nuclear deterrent after a test of the system failed dramatically last month when an unarmed missile crashed into the sea near the submarine from which it was launched.

It marks the second time in eight years that the country’s Trident II ballistic missiles have malfunctioned during trials.

An “anomaly occurred” during the test on board the nuclear-powered submarine HMS Vanguard, a UK Ministry of Defence spokesperson said on Wednesday in a statement……………

Britain’s Trident nuclear deterrent system suffered an earlier failure off the coast of Florida in June 2016, a US defence official with direct knowledge of the incident previously told CNN.

The latest incident, first reported by The Sun newspaper, occurred during an exercise on January 30 near Florida.  https://www.9news.com.au/world/uk-trident-nuclear-missile-test-fails-sparking-concerns-about-program/0fe0541b-67e9-4690-b31a-291e81d8bc5b

February 22, 2024 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

The Complexity of Nuclear Submarine Safeguards Impacts the Current Landscape

InDepthNews

By Leonam dos Santos Guimarâes*

RIO DE JANEIRO | 14 February 2024 (IDN) — The topic of applying safeguards to nuclear submarine fuel, with a focus on ensuring security and proliferation resistance, involves a complex interplay of international regulations, agreements, and technical considerations.

A pivotal aspect of this discussion centers on the application of International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards, particularly in the context of military-to-military transfer of nuclear material for submarine programs. It has been argued that there should be no automatic exclusion from safeguards for nuclear material simply because it is used in military activities.

The emphasis is on ensuring that the non-application of safeguards is as limited as possible, encompassing all processes outside the actual use of relevant nuclear material in the submarine, such as enrichment, fuel fabrication, storage, transportation, reprocessing, and disposal.

AUKUS

The application of safeguards to the AUKUS (Australia, United Kingdom, and United States) Nuclear Submarine program is a complex and highly technical subject, requiring a nuanced understanding of international nuclear non-proliferation norms, the specific details of the AUKUS agreement, and the technical aspects of nuclear submarine technology. The AUKUS pact, a security agreement between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, announced in September 2021, involves the provision of nuclear-powered submarines to Australia. This arrangement has significant implications for nuclear non-proliferation and safeguards. The following points are pertinent AUKUS agreement:

Nature of Nuclear Technology in Submarines: The nuclear reactors used in submarines are designed for propulsion and not for the production of nuclear weapons. However, they do use weapon degree HEU, which can be weaponized. This necessitates strict safeguards to ensure that the HEU is not diverted for non-peaceful purposes.

Australia’s Nuclear Non-Proliferation Commitments: Australia is a non-nuclear weapon state (NNWS) party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). As such, Australia is obliged to maintain a civilian nuclear program exclusively for peaceful purposes and under international safeguards. The acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines places Australia in a unique position, as it will have to demonstrate that its new capabilities are not being used for prohibited military purposes, like nuclear weapons development.

International Safeguards and Oversight: The IAEA plays a crucial role in the implementation of safeguards. Australia, along with the UK and the US, must work closely with the IAEA to develop a framework that ensures the submarine program adheres to Australia’s non-proliferation commitments. This could involve regular inspections, monitoring, and verification mechanisms.

Regional and Global Implications: The deployment of nuclear-powered submarines by Australia could have significant implications for regional security dynamics, particularly in the Indo-Pacific region. There is a need for transparency and dialogue to address any concerns raised by neighboring countries and to prevent any escalation of regional arms races.

Technological and Operational Safeguards: Apart from international oversight, there are also technical and operational safeguards that are integral to the program. These include secure handling and accounting of nuclear materials, physical protection measures, and safety protocols to prevent accidents or unauthorized use.

Legal and Policy Frameworks: The AUKUS partners will need to develop robust legal and policy frameworks that align with international norms and bilateral agreements. This includes legislative and regulatory measures that govern the use, transfer, and disposal of nuclear materials and technology.

The application of safeguards

The application of safeguards to the AUKUS Nuclear Submarine program is a critical aspect of its implementation. It requires a balanced approach that addresses the non-proliferation concerns while allowing Australia to enhance its defense capabilities. Ensuring the program’s compliance with international nuclear non-proliferation norms and maintaining transparency will be essential in mitigating any regional tensions and in bolstering global nuclear security………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. more https://indepthnews.net/the-complexity-of-nuclear-submarine-safeguards-impacts-the-current-landscape/

February 16, 2024 Posted by | politics international, safety, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Safety panel urges Fukushima nuclear plant operator to better communicate with public

Feb. 14, 202, By MARI YAMAGUCHI, TOKYO, https://japantoday.com/category/national/safety-panel-urges-fukushima-nuclear-plant-operator-to-better-communicate-with-the-public-after-leak

A panel of safety experts has urged the operator of the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan to communicate more quickly with the public over incidents such as last week’s leak of contaminated water.

Thirteen years after the Fukushima disaster in which the plant suffered triple meltdowns following the 2011 earthquake, safety culture at the Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings company has improved but there is still work to do, said Dale Klein, a former U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission chairperson who now serves as an advisor to TEPCO’s reform committee.

The panel’s news briefing Tuesday on its periodic assessment came a week after highly radioactive water leaked from a treatment machine during maintenance work at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. TEPCO said no one was injured, and radiation monitoring shows no leakage escaped the compound.

But the leak triggered criticism in and outside Japan. Any leak of radioactive water is a sensitive topic.

In another accidental leak in October, four workers were sprayed with radioactive liquid waste while cleaning a treatment facility. Two were briefly hospitalized for skin contamination, though none showed symptoms of poisoning.

Klein said both incidents could have been prevented, and TEPCO needs to quickly analyze what happened in such mishaps and “very quickly communicate to the public what happened and why.”

For risk control, many companies, including TEPCO, often try to know everything before they say anything publicly, Klein said. But in the age of social media, speculation spreads quickly, he said.

The filtering machine involved in last week’s incident is part of TEPCO’s controversial wastewater discharge project, which began in August.

The discharges, expected to continue for decades, have been strongly opposed by fishing groups and neighboring countries including China, which banned imports of all Japanese seafood. The Japanese government hopes the International Atomic Energy Agency’s assistance and reviews affirming the discharges have met international safety standards would further help address concerns in and outside the country.

The TEPCO safety experts acknowledged improved safety culture at TEPCO. It noted the Nuclear Regulation Authority’s lifting of a suspension on the utility to resume preparations to restart another nuclear power plant, Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, after addressing lax safeguarding measures.

The next big hurdle is consent from the local community.

“TEPCO must build trust every day, all the time,” Klein said. “(Trust) is hard to gain but easy to lose.”

February 16, 2024 Posted by | safety | Leave a comment

Congress takes aim at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

By Victor Gilinsky | February 12, 2024, Victor Gilinsky is a physicist and was a commissioner of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission during the Ford, Carter, and Reagan administrations.  https://thebulletin.org/2024/02/congress-takes-aim-at-the-nuclear-regulatory-commission-its-a-deja-vu-all-over-again/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=MondayNewsletter02122024&utm_content=NuclearRisk_NuclearRegulartoryCommission_02122024

Politico reports that congressional promoters of “advanced” nuclear plants are blaming the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) as the main obstacle to their deployment. The report singles out Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee Chairman Joe Manchin (D-WV) and cites his and his colleagues blocking the reappointment to the commission of Jeff Baran, who tended to lean toward safety more than his fellow commissioners, as the start of a campaign to bring the agency to heel. Such crude bullying of a safety agency, especially by people who don’t understand what it involves, is so obviously improper as not to need further comment. But there is more to the story.

The triggering event for Sen. Manchin’s ire appears to be the faltering of NuScale, the leading firm touting the development of small modular reactors (SMRs), and the most likely to succeed commercially. The NuScale reactor design had some hiccups in satisfying the NRC’s requirements for a license, but its fundamental problem was its inability to attract customers. That commercial failure darkens the prospects of the rest of the nuclear industry’s stable of “advanced” designs, whose variety makes licensing more difficult. Safety is a subtle business (think of the Boeing door problem) and depends on design details.

More fundamentally, at risk is the dream of the nuclear industry and the US Energy Department—spun out in hearings before the Senate Energy Committee—of building large numbers of such reactors and exporting them around the world, with the United States regaining undisputed global leadership in nuclear technology.

If this beautiful dream isn’t working out, somebody must be at fault, and who better to blame than the nuclear licensing authorities for paying too much attention to safety. If you think this way, the obvious fix is to reorient the NRC. Legislation to do that (ADVANCE Act, S-1111) has passed the Senate with strong bipartisan support. As Sen. Shelley Capito (R-WV), the act’s chief sponsor, put it: “we must establish regulatory pathways for next-generation nuclear designs to be approved quickly and without burdensome unnecessary costs.”

There is a sense here of “deja vu all over again.” The most prominent in the pipeline of “advanced” reactor designs are fast reactors. (Sidebar: They rely on fast neutrons and are cooled by liquid sodium, whereas all currently operating US power reactors rely on slow neutrons and are cooled by water.)

The most prominent design of this type is TerraPower’s (Bill Gates’s) Natrium reactor. Despite its “advanced” label, this type of power reactor was developed by the US Atomic Energy Commission in the 1960s and 1970s. The prototype Clinch River plant, about the same size as Natrium, was then the country’s largest energy project. The AEC’s central goal, backed at the time by the powerful Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, was to shift US electricity generation to such reactors, starting around 1980. The advantage of these reactors is that, fueled with plutonium, there are enough excess neutrons to convert uranium in the reactor into more plutonium than is being consumed; thus it is possible to “breed” plutonium, hence the name “breeder reactor.” Natrium can be fueled in this way and likely would be if it gained wide acceptability.

Just as supporters of new “advanced” reactors see NRC safety licensing as a threat, so the AEC’s fast reactor developers saw that agency’s semi-independent reactor licensing division as standing in the way and sought to undermine it. (“Regulatory,” as it was called then, was split off from the AEC in 1975 and became the NRC. In time, the rest of the AEC became the Energy Department.) The licensing division was treated by the AEC commissioners as a stepchild and kept weak so as not to threaten the big-budget reactor project.

In the end, this strategy didn’t help the fast breeder reactor project. It got canceled because it didn’t make sense economically. But the weakness of the AEC regulatory organization had important consequences affecting the safety of the power reactors utilities bought in large numbers starting in the mid-1960s. Under pressure from the industry and commissioners, plants got licensed after rather skimpy safety reviews. So as not to constrain the licensing process, the AEC commissioners did not approve any safety regulations for power reactors until 1971. All but two of today’s 94 US operating power reactors were ordered before 1974. When it later became evident the early power reactors needed important safety upgrades, especially after the 1979 Three Mile Island accident, the nuclear industry resisted them.

In the late 1990s, it became evident that some of the plants’ safety documents—necessary for operation—were a mess. Then-NRC Chair Shirley Jackson tried to apply the NRC regulations strictly. The plant owners didn’t like this kind of oversight and got to New Mexico Sen. Pete Domenici, their senatorial godfather, who, in a private meeting, threatened Jackson with a huge budget cut. She got the point quickly, fired offending staff, hired Arthur Anderson management consultants to “improve” the licensing process, and ended the detailed public rating of nuclear power plants that the companies hated because Wall Street used the ratings for bond issues. After those changes, Domenici said he was happy. He boasted about coercing her in his book, A Brighter Tomorrow: “Since that meeting with Chairman Jackson, I have been very impressed with the NRC. They are now a solid, predictable regulatory agency.” There haven’t been many industry complaints since NRC fell into line—that is, until recently.

While the historical industry attacks on the NRC put self-interest above public safety, the agency, after its accommodating responses, didn’t come out looking good, either. A more recent change in the way the commission describes its responsibilities raises further questions about its priorities. It concerns the safety standard in the Atomic Energy Act (Sec. 182): “adequate protection of the public health and safety.” That phrase was cited by the agency for decades as the source of its authority and was the safety standard applied in commission actions.

Perhaps a dozen years ago, for reasons unknown but guessable, the commissioners began to use a modified version of the statutory standard, which now reads (for example, Strategic Plan 2022-2026) “reasonable assurance of adequate protection of public health and safety.” There is no denying that the added phrase waters down the Sec. 182 standard, which itself has not changed.

Do Nuclear Regulatory Commission actions under that modified standard even conform with the Atomic Energy Act? The Senate energy committee might usefully address itself to that question before it undertakes any more brow-beating of the already-timid NRC.

February 14, 2024 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Latest Fukushima leak exposes failures in nuclear crisis management

Xinhua 2024-02-12,  https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202402/12/WS65c9eda7a3104efcbdaeab75.html

In a chilling revelation that sent shockwaves through the world, a new nuclear waste leak has unearthed the gaping crack in Japan’s professed claim of responsible handling the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The leakage of about 5.5 tons of water containing radioactive materials from the plant also highlights the need for international supervision of Japan’s controversial discharge of the Fukushima nuclear-contaminated water into the ocean.

It is estimated that 22 billion becquerels of radioactive materials such as cesium and strontium are contained in the leaked water, and the plant’s operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), claimed on Wednesday that monitoring of a nearby drainage channel did not show any significant radiation level changes.

This begs the question: What constitutes a “significant” level?

Nearly 13 years after the catastrophic earthquake and tsunami, recurring leaking incidents still hint at the utility’s mismanagement and the Japanese government’s inadequacy in overseeing it.

On Oct. 26, 2023, just one week before Japan started the third round of release, two men were hospitalized after being accidentally splashed with radioactive liquid at the plant. On Aug. 11, 2023, days before the first round of discharge started, TEPCO found leaks in a hose used to transfer nuclear-contaminated water, which, as it said, would not affect the discharge plan.

Even more concerning, the causes of these incidents have fully exposed the chaos and disorder of TEPCO’s internal management. The leak on Wednesday stemmed from a valve left open during cleaning operations, while the October incident resulted from a loose hose channeling contaminated solutions. In August, TEPCO attributed a leak to cracks approximately four centimeters in length found in a hose.

The deficiencies in the fundamental equipment raise questions about the potential for similar occurrences and whether TEPCO conducts regular inspections of its equipment.

While TEPCO this time claimed that there is no risk to the public and that the surrounding environment remains unaffected by the leak, its history of cover-ups and opacity has eroded public trust.

For instance, it took TEPCO over two years after the 2011 tsunami to acknowledge that radioactive tritium had leaked into the Pacific Ocean, contradicting its initial assertions that the toxic water had been contained within the plant’s premises.

Also, in February 2015, TEPCO admitted that since April 2014, it had been aware of radioactive substances from a rainwater drainage ditch linked to one of its buildings being leaked into the sea when it rained.

Until meaningful reforms are enacted, the specter of Fukushima will continue to haunt Japan, serving as a sober reminder of the country’s failure to protect its citizens and the broader environment.

February 14, 2024 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, safety | Leave a comment

Nuclear regulator raps EDF over safety flaws

The nuclear industry regulator has demanded improvements are made in at Dungeness B power station after a maintenance worker suffered an electric shock.

The Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) has served an improvement notice on Energy Nuclear Generation Ltd (EDF Energy) following an incident at Dungeness B power station in Kent.

An employee suffered an electric shock from a portable heater while undertaking maintenance work at the site. The worker suffered injuries on 5th November 2023, which required medical treatment.

The ONR stressed that there was no risk to nuclear safety, the public or the environment as a result of the incident.

Mike Webb, ONR’s superintending inspector for operating reactors, said: “Our investigation found that EDF had failed to ensure the electrical systems involved in the incident were constructed and maintained in a way that prevented danger to their workers, so far as is reasonably practicable. We will engage with EDF during the period of the improvement notice to ensure positive progress is made to address the shortfall.”……………………………….

 Construction Index 12th Feb 2024

https://www.theconstructionindex.co.uk/news/view/nuclear-regulator-raps-edf-over-safety-flaws

February 13, 2024 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

France’s Flamanville EPR has numerous technical problems which mean that its safety issues are not “now closed”

Response from GLOBAL CHANCE to the ASN consultation on the request for
authorization to commission the Flamanville EPR reactor.

Contrary to what the President of the ASN stated on January 30, 2024 in his conference press
and the presentation of one’s wishes, numerous technical subjects which are
as much potential problems for the proper functioning of the EPR and which
call into question the reactor safety, cannot be considered “now closed”.


The problems that hamper the operation and safety of the EPR are numerous.
Most serious are presented in the following chapters in two parts: severe
and persistent then severe and whose solutions are risky. They lead to
asking questions including the answers do not appear in any of the
documents which constitute the file released made available to the public
by the ASN

 Global Chance 9th Feb 2024

February 12, 2024 Posted by | France, safety | Leave a comment

France’s EDF shuts down two nuclear reactors after fire at Chinon plant

Reuters, February 11, 2024,  https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/frances-edf-shuts-down-two-nuclear-reactors-after-fire-chinon-plant-2024-02-10/
—

Nuclear energy operator EDF has shut down two reactors at Chinon in western France after a fire in a non-nuclear sector of the plant in the early hours of Saturday, the company said.

The fire has been extinguished, it said.

“Production unit number 3 at the Chinon nuclear power plant has shut down automatically, in accordance with the reactor’s safety and protection systems,” EDF said in a statement, adding it also shut down reactor number 4, which is coupled to number 3.

France’s nuclear safety watchdog said in a separate statement the fire had led to an electricity cut at the plant that triggered the automatic shutdown.

Chinon is one of France’s oldest nuclear plants.

Reporting by Tassilo Hummel; editing by Barbara L

February 12, 2024 Posted by | France, incidents | Leave a comment

5.5 tons of radioactive water leaked from Fukushima nuclear plant: media

China Daily, Xinhua 2024-02-07

TOKYO — Approximately 5.5 tons of water containing radioactive materials have leaked from an equipment at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, local media reported Wednesday.

At about 8:53 am local time on Wednesday, workers discovered water leaking from the outlet of a device used to purify nuclear-contaminated water during the inspection of the equipment, Fukushima Central Television reported, citing the plant’s operator Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO).

TEPCO estimates that the amount of water that leaked was approximately 5.5 tons, which may contain 22 billion becquerels of radioactive materials such as cesium and strontium, the report said.

Most of the leaked water appeared to have seeped into the soil, but monitoring of a nearby drainage channel did not show any significant radiation level changes, it added.

TEPCO has made the area where the water was leaked a no-go area……………………………. more https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202402/07/WS65c35af9a3104efcbdaea423.html

February 9, 2024 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, incidents | Leave a comment

The dangerous craze for SMRs

This is going too far in trivializing risk. And this is not limited to “acceptability” which seems to be ASN’s major concern, but to the risks of such “mixed” installations.

a serious accident situation (AZF, Lubrizol) could damage the SMR unit and transform the accident into a disaster.

Bernard Laponche,  Doctor of Science in Nuclear Reactor Physics, President of the Global Chance association, Le Club Mediapart, 5th Feb 2024 https://blogs.mediapart.fr/bernard-laponche/blog/050224/le-dangereux-engouement-pour-les-smr

The development of small modular nuclear reactors (SMR) is the subject of spectacular announcements.Based on the declarations of the Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN) on this
subject, we launch an appeal for reason on the realities and difficulties of such projects, on the technical, safety and security levels .

During his press conference on January 31, 2024, the president of the Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN) addressed the issue of small modular nuclear reactors, known as SMRs, and answered some questions on this subject.
In his presentation, the president highlights the technical and societal questions posed by these new reactors, as well as the safety, security and non-proliferation issues “to be integrated upstream of the projects”.

These are the usual concerns when we are interested in nuclear reactors, which produce heat and possibly electricity from fission and chain reactions of fissile elements (uranium, plutonium), but also products fission and transuranium elements found in irradiated fuels currently intended for reprocessing, leading to the accumulation of radioactive waste in addition to that from the dismantling of reactors. These are the problems that will have to be analyzed for candidate SMR reactors, as for any nuclear reactor and with the same rigor as for conventional reactors.

In the same way that a conventional industrial installation cannot claim to be free from all risk of accident, no nuclear installation can claim to be free of any risk of accident. The declaration “a nuclear accident is possible in France” by successive ASN officials is valid for SMRs, even if, as its current president says, certain innovative SMRs “present potentially promising intrinsic safety characteristics” .

The first “prototype” examples of candidate reactors under the title of SMR, that is to say intended to be mass-produced in a factory before installation on site, will therefore have to be built on nuclear sites, probably those housing research reactors.

As ASN points out, the use of SMR in France would not be of great interest for the production of electricity given the importance of the current fleet of EDF power plants and the announced projects. But, on the other hand, SMRs could be very useful for the production of heat or steam for the process industries (paper, food, chemical industries, etc.) of which there are very many.

It would then be necessary to install the SMR reactor very close to the industrial installation or even, according to ASN, inside this installation.

This is going too far in trivializing risk. And this is not limited to “acceptability” which seems to be ASN’s major concern, but to the risks of such “mixed” installations.

Indeed, we cannot admit the presence of a basic nuclear installation, containing highly radioactive materials within a classic industrial installation, of the ICPE type in which a serious accident situation (AZF, Lubrizol) could damage the SMR unit and transform the accident into a disaster.

Furthermore, it is clear that each promoter of an SMR candidate aims for a large order in the number of copies (of the order of a hundred say some) which will allow the “modular” manufacturing of reactors in a dedicated factory, this allowing the supposed reduction in unit cost.

In this case, by eliminating the solution of an SMR in the plant itself, we would have the creation of a large number of INB-ICPE couples. Even if we admit that the probability of an accident on the SMR is lower than for a conventional reactor (which remains to be demonstrated for each case), this probability is multiplied by the number of reactors, all identical.

In examining the safety files for EDF’s large power reactors and nuclear fuel plants, ASN and IRSN pay very close attention to “external attacks” of natural or malicious origin. What happens to these concerns for SMS located almost everywhere on the territory, on locations which are those of the industrial installation which they must supply with heat and whose location was chosen without any concern for nuclear safety and security? ? How would specific protection be organized which, to be effective, would certainly be expensive, especially since the SMRs concerned would be of low power?

The profusion of candidate projects for SMR, some of which are financially supported by the Government, leads to each being examined by the IRSN and the ASN, as announced by the latter. This examination can be postponed over time depending on the maturity of the projects, all of which currently only exist on file, more or less elaborate.

If this examination is done correctly, that is to say with as much care as for a power reactor, the examination of the technical and safety files of each SMR prototype is a considerable task. We can fear that the “craze” for SMRs that ASN speaks of will exert dangerous pressure on the quality of studies and safety and security injunctions.

Finally, but this is not the problem of the IRSN and the ASN, we would still need to have serious information on the costs. Not only that of the construction of a prototype (the example of NuScale in the United States is edifying) but also that of its exploitation and especially that of the fuel, from its manufacture to its treatment after use, dismantling and management garbage.

When we examine in the light of what we know of the climatic upheavals which are already affecting our territory and will intensify considerably, we can really ask ourselves the question of the fragility and the risk of installing a little small nuclear reactors everywhere which will obviously be subject, depending on the period and their site, to floods, droughts, storms, tornadoes, earthquakes, etc.

All those who today say they want to welcome an SMR on their territory should really think about it seriously.


February 8, 2024 Posted by | France, safety | Leave a comment

IAEA watchdog to visit nuclear plant in occupied Ukraine to assess safety of ageing fuel and low staffing.

UN nuclear watchdog chief Rafael Grossi said
he would visit the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Russian-occupied
Ukraine today to see if it can be run with a reduced number of staff and
whether its years-old uranium fuel is safe. Russia gained control of
Europe’s largest nuclear power plant after launching a full-scale
invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, and its six nuclear reactors are now
idled.

 Irish Independent 7th Feb 2024

https://www.independent.ie/world-news/europe/watchdog-to-visit-nuclear-plant-in-occupied-ukraine-to-assess-safety-of-ageing-fuel-and-low-staffing/a89069391.html

February 8, 2024 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | 2 Comments

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