Thorium nuclear reactors for military use, too, funded by USA and Chinese tax-payers
SPECIAL REPORT-The U.S. government lab behind China’s nuclear power push Dec 20, 2013 Dec 20 (Reuters) – Scientists in Shanghai are attempting a breakthrough in nuclear energy: reactors powered by thorium, an alternative to uranium.
The project is run by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, a government body with close military ties that coordinates the country’s science-and-technology strategy. The academy has designated thorium as a priority for China’s top laboratories. The program has a budget of $350 million. And it’s being spearheaded by the influential son of a former Chinese president.
But even as China bulks up its military muscle through means ranging from espionage to heavy spending, it is pursuing this aspect of its technology game plan with the blessing – and the help – of the United States. Read more »
Small Modular Nuclear Reactors (SMRs) raise saafety and security concerns
Potential fire and explosion hazards……
Potential flooding hazards:……
Limited access for conducting inspections of pressure vessels…
Safety and Security Concerns about Small Modular Reactors: NuScale’s Design http://allthingsnuclear.org/safety-and-security-concerns-about-small-modular-reactors-nuscales-design/ Ed Lyman, senior scientist December 17, 2013 Late last week the Department of Energy finally announced its decision to provide the small modular reactor (SMR) design NuScale with a matching grant of up to $226 million under its Licensing Technical Support program intended to speed the development of SMRs.
But the real news is not that DOE awarded a second grant under the program, but that it took so long to do so. NuScale, along with three other reactor vendors, originally applied for the funds in early 2012 with the expectation that two designs would receive grants. However, later that year DOE surprised many observers by only awarding a grant to one design, the Generation mPower.
Safety and Security Concerns
As discussed in detail in my September 2013 report “Small Isn’t Always Beautiful,” UCS has safety and security concerns about small modular reactors in general and about the NuScale design in particular
SMR vendors are pushing the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to weaken its regulations regarding operator staffing, security staffing, and emergency planning, based on highly optimistic assertions that their reactors will be significantly safer than larger reactors. Continue reading
Big push for Small Modular Nuclear Reactors grinds to a halt
Ameren/Westinghouse passed over again for small modular reactor funding By JACOB BARKER December 13, 2013 Ameren Missouri and Westinghouse Electric again were passed over by the U.S. Department of Energy, which announced Thursday that its final funding award under a small modular nuclear reactor program would go to NuScale Power of Portland, Ore.
The announcement was the second disappointment for a coalition built around Westinghouse’s nuclear reactor design and St. Louis-based Ameren, which had indicated it would build a new reactor near its existing nuclear power plant in Callaway County if it could secure a federal investment….. the department said it would enter into a five-year cost-share agreement with NuScale and invest as much as half of the total project cost. The department did not release the final amount it would put up for the project, saying that sum would be negotiated with NuScale and come from a $452 million fund established for the SMR program.
…….[In 2012] DOE said then it would open future funding opportunities, but this time, it isn’t planning any more…..
“As a result of the DOE’s decision, we are stepping back and considering our alternatives as we continue to focus on maintaining all generation options for a cleaner energy portfolio to meet Missouri’s energy needs in the future,” Ameren said in its statement. ……
The Missouri Coalition for the Environment responded to the decision with a news release saying Missouri should focus on “clean renewable energy,” excluding nuclear power, in line with a 2008 statewide vote requiring utilities to generate more power from renewable sources. http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/local/ameren-westinghouse-passed-over-again-for-small-modular-reactor-funding/article_8141670c-637c-11e3-8c67-001a4bcf6878.html?comments=focus
USA government has lost enthusiasm for Small Modular Nuclear Reactors
DOE Drops the Ball on Nuclear Design Funding The Motley Fool, By John Licata December 13, 2013 …The Department of Energy (DOE) was expected to announce two winners of the first round of small modular nuclear reactor (SMR) design funding which was delayed several times in 2012. However, only one award was announced last November and that award went to Babcox & Wllcox (NYSE: BWC ) . Now over one year later and past the most recent deadline of September 2013 for two more design award announcements, the DOE continues to delay further commitment to SMR designs….
Approval for Tokai nuclear reprocessing plant BEFORE safety screening!
NRA to approve restart of reprocessing facility http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/english/news/20131211_29.html Japan’s nuclear regulator plans to approve a partial restart of a facility for reprocessing spent nuclear fuel before it clears safety screening under new regulations.
The Nuclear Regulation Authority says it’s allowing the restart to make plutonium and other highly radioactive waste in the facility solid and more stable.
The authority said on Wednesday that it plans to allow the government-backed Japan Atomic Energy Agency to operate part of the plant in Tokai Village, about 100 kilometers north of Tokyo.
The decision comes after the agency sought permission to restart the facility soon, saying that keeping the waste in liquid form involves high risks.
NRA commissioners said the facility’s stockpiles of plutonium solutions and other liquid waste will be made safer when reprocessed into solids.
They came up with a plan to allow part of the facility to run for 5 years before checking is done under the enhanced regulations.
The facility stores 3.5 cubic meters of solutions containing plutonium and more than 400 cubic meters of highly radioactive liquid waste. NRA secretariat officials say reprocessing the plutonium solutions into powder will take about 2 years, and turning other liquid waste into glass 21 years.
The new regulations are to take effect on December 18th. The NRA is to give formal approval after confirming that the agency can ensure stable reprocessing at the plant.
US govt chooses small Oregan company for grant for small nuclear reactors
Small Oregon Nuclear Power Plant Company Gets Massive Federal Backing OPB | Dec. 12, 2013 Portland, Oregon NuScale Power, a spin-off business out of Oregon State University, will receive up to $226 million from the U.S. Department of Energy.
NuScale Power is designing a small nuclear reactor — about the size of a semi-trailer standing on its head.
Chief commercial officer Mike McGough says the money will be spent getting the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to certify the design — a task that’s expected to cost about $1 billion……
If NuScale secures certification, a reactor isn’t expected to be up and running until at least 2023.It would be built in Idaho.
Oregon has tight restrictions on the construction of nuclear power facilities. For example, it would have to be approved by voters and builders would need to be able to demonstrate the safe disposal of high level waste….http://www.opb.org/news/article/small-oregon-nuclear-power-plant-company-gets-massive-federal-backing/
PRISM – Power Reactor Innovative Small Module new nuclear magic gimmick
The plutonium stockpile poses enormous problems for the government. Not only is it highly radioactive and an immense potential danger to health, it is also a target for terrorist attacks and for anyone interested in stealing nuclear weapons-grade material.
The NDA’s report to DECC is understood to conclude that the Prism fast reactor is as credible as the two other options based on Mox fuel, even though GE-Hitachi has not yet built a commercial-scale plant for burning plutonium waste. DECC, however, has refused to release the report under a Freedom of Information request
It is understood that the NDA has been impressed by proposals from GE-Hitachi to build a pair of its Prism fast reactors on the Sellafield site,
Revealed: UK Government’s radical plan to ‘burn up’ UK’s mountain of plutonium http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/revealed-uk-governments-radical-plan-to-burn-up-uks-mountain-of-plutonium-8967535.html 28 Nove 13 A radical plan to dispose of Britain’s huge store of civil plutonium – the biggest in the world – by “burning” it in a new type of fast reactor is now officially one of three “credible options” being considered by the Government, The Independent understands. However, further delays have hit attempts to make a final decision on what to do with the growing plutonium stockpile which has been a recurring headache for successive governments over the past three decades.
The stock of plutonium, one of the most dangerous radioactive substances and the element of nuclear bombs, has already exceeded 100 tonnes and is likely to grow to as much as 140 tonnes by 2020, bolstered by a recent decision to include foreign plutonium from imported nuclear waste.
Ministers had pledged to resolve the plutonium problem in a public consultation but are sitting on a secret report by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) which is believed to confirm that there are now three “credible options” for dealing with the plutonium stored at the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant in Cumbria. Continue reading
What is really going on in the high risk operation at Fukushima Nuclear reactor No 4?
Why TEPCO is Risking the Removal of Fukushima Fuel Rods. The Dangers of Uncontrolled Global Nuclear Radiation, Global Research, 24 Nov 13 By Yoichi Shimatsu After repeated delays since the summer of 2011, the Tokyo Electric Power Company has launched a high-risk operation to empty the spent-fuel pool atop Reactor 4 at the Dai-ichi (No.1) Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant.
The urgency attached to this particular site, as compared with reactors damaged in meltdowns, arises from several factors:
– over 400 tons of nuclear material in the pool could reignite
– the fire-damaged tank is tilting badly and may topple over sooner than later
– collapse of the structure could trigger a chain reaction and nuclear blast, and
– consequent radioactive releases would heavily contaminate much of the world.
The potential for disaster at the Unit 4 SFP is probably of a higher magnitude than suspected due to the presence of fresh fuel rods, which were delivered during the technical upgrade of Reactor 4 under completion at the time of the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami. The details of that reactor overhaul by GE and Hitachi have yet to be disclosed by TEPCO and the Economy Ministry and continue to be treated as a national-security matter. Here, the few clues from whistleblowers will be pieced together to decipher the nature of the clandestine activity at Fukushima No.1. Continue reading
MOX nuclear fuel – the secret and so dangerous ingredient in the Fukushima No 4 nuclear cooling pond
The un-irradiated rods inside the Unit 4 spent-fuel pool are, in all probability, made of a new type of MOX fuel containing highly enriched plutonium.
Why TEPCO is Risking the Removal of Fukushima Fuel Rods. The Dangers of Uncontrolled Global Nuclear Radiation, Global Research, 24 Nov 13 By Yoichi Shimatsu
“…….Mystery of MOX super-fuel A Mainichi Shimbun editorial mentions in passing that the Reactor 4 pool contains 202 fresh fuel assemblies.(3) The presence of new fuel rods was confirmed in the TEPCO press release, which described the first assembly lifted into the transfer cask as an “un-irradiated fuel rod.” Why were new 
rods being stored inside a spent-fuel pool, which is designed to hold expended rods? What threat of criticality do these fresh rods pose if the steel frame collapses or if crane operators drop one by accident onto other assemblies, as opposed to a spent rod?
Against the official silence and disinformation, a few whistleblowers have come forward with clues to answer these questions. Former GE nuclear worker Kei Sugaoka disclosed in a video interview that a joint team from Hitachi and General Electric was inside Reactor 4 at the time of the March 11, 2011 earthquake. By that fateful afternoon, the GE contractors were finishing the job of installing a new shroud, the heat-resistant metal shield lining the reactor interior.(4)
TEPCO inadvertently admitted to the presence of foreign contractors at Fukushima No.1 up until March 12, 2012, when the management ordered their evacuation in event of a massive explosion during the rapid meltdown of Reactor 2. So far, leaks indicate the presence of the GE team and of a Israeli nuclear security team with Magna BSP, a company based in Dimona.(5)
Another break came in April 2012, when a Japanese humor magazine published a brief interview of a Fukushima worker who disclosed that radioactive pieces of a broken shroud were left inside a device-storage pool at rooftop level behind the Reactor 4 spent-fuel pool.(6) This undoubtedly is the used shroud removed by the GE-H workers in February-March 2011.
A curious point here is that the previous shroud had been in use for only 15 months. Why would TEPCO and the Japanese government expend an enormous sum on a new lining when the existing one was still good for many years of service?
Obviously, the installation of a new shroud was not a mere replacement of a worn predecessor. It was an upgrade. The refit of Reactor 4 was, therefore, similar to the 2010 conversion of Reactor 3 to pluthermal or MOX fuel. The same model of GE Mark 1 reactor was being revamped to burn MOX fuel (mixed oxide of uranium and plutonium).
The un-irradiated rods inside the Unit 4 spent-fuel pool are, in all probability, made of a new type of MOX fuel containing highly enriched plutonium. If the frame collapses, triggering fire or explosion inside the spent-fuel pool, the plutonium would pulse powerful neutron bursts that may well possibly ignite distant nuclear power plants, starting with the Fukushima No.2 plant, 10 kilometers to the south…..
The upgrade of the Reactor 4 shroud may well have involved the test-fitting of some MOX rods, which abandoned on the floor next to the reactor when the tsunami reached shore. In other words, in early March 2011 crane operators completely filled space inside the spent-fuel pool with new MOX rods and then simply left casks of assemblies on the roof and lowered more into the basement. That is the simplest explanation for the damage to the structural integrity of the reactor building. GE is not about to disclose its role in this disaster………. http://www.globalresearch.ca/why-tepco-is-risking-the-removal-of-fukushima-fuel-rods-the-dangers-of-uncontrolled-global-nuclear-radiation/5359188…..http://www.globalresearch.ca/why-tepco-is-risking-the-removal-of-fukushima-fuel-rods-the-dangers-of-uncontrolled-global-nuclear-radiation/535918
So far so good – first batch of nuclear fuel rods moved from Fukushima reactor 4
First batch of fuel from Fukushima reactor 4 pool now in different storage site, Japan Times, KYODO NOV 22, 2013 Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Friday that it has finished transferring the first batch of fuel rod assemblies from the Fukushima No. 1 plants reactor 4 spent fuel pool to another building with more stable storage conditions.
“All of the fuel assemblies have been placed in the storage rack (inside the common pool), meaning the first fuel transfer work effectively ended,” Tepco official Noriyuki Imaizumi told a press conference.
Common Pool Fukushima Daiichi Unloading Unit 4 Fuel Unloading
After reviewing the work flow that started Monday, the utility will move on to retrieve the next batch of fuel assemblies from the spent fuel pool of the damaged reactor 4 building.
The pool contains over 1,000 fuel assemblies and the process is expected to continue through the end of next year. To get used to the operation, workers commenced with the removal of unused fuel assemblies, but they will also have to take out spent fuel, which is more difficult to handle because it is highly radioactive and emits heat as radioactive elements in the fuel decay.
The process starts with the transfer of fuel assemblies inside the water-filled spent fuel pool one by one into a transport container also placed inside the pool.
Once the container is filled with 22 fuel assemblies, workers lower it by crane from the fifth floor of the building where the pool is located so that it can be taken to the common pool about 100 meters away…… http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/11/22/national/first-batch-of-fuel-from-fukushima-reactor-4-pool-now-in-different-storage-site/#.UpJtYdJwo7o
NASA abandoning New Nuclear Generator plan for Deep Space Exploration
NASA Halts Work on its New Nuclear Generator for Deep Space Exploration
Universe Today by DAVID DICKINSON on NOVEMBER 21, 2013 “……. The announcement comes from Jim Green, NASA’s Planetary Science Division Director. The statement outlines some key changes in NASA’s radioisotope program, and will have implications for the future exploration of the outer solar system……
Pandora’s misleading spin about Integral Fast Nuclear Reactors (IFRs)
Other Department of Energy studies showed that pyroprocessing, by generating large quantities of low-level nuclear waste and contaminated uranium, greatly increases the volume of nuclear waste requiring disposal, contradicting “Pandora’s Promise’s” claim it would reduce the amount of waste.
Scientist: Film hypes the promise of advanced nuclear technology By Edwin Lyman, CNN November 7, 2013 In his zeal to promote nuclear power, filmmaker Robert Stone inserted numerous half-truths and less-than-half-truths in his new documentary “Pandora’s Promise,” One of Stone’s more misleading allegations was that scientists at a U.S. research facility, the Argonne National Laboratory, were on the verge of developing a breakthrough technology that could solve nuclear power’s numerous problems when the Clinton administration and its allies in Congress shut the program in 1994 for purely political reasons.
Like the story of Pandora itself, the tale of the integral fast reactor (IFR) — or at least the version presented in the movie — is more myth than reality. In the final assessment, the concept’s drawbacks greatly outweighed its advantages. The government had sound reasons to stanch the flow of taxpayer dollars to a costly, flawed project that also was undermining U.S. efforts to reduce the risks of nuclear terrorism and proliferation around the world…….
What did “Pandora’s Promise” leave out? First, it does not clearly explain what a “fast reactor” is and how it differs from the water-cooled reactors in use today. Most operating reactors use a type of fuel called “low-enriched” uranium, which cannot be used directly to make a nuclear weapon and poses a low security risk. The spent fuel from these water-cooled reactors contains weapon-usable plutonium as a byproduct, but it is very hard to make into a bomb because it is mixed with uranium and highly radioactive fission products.
Fast reactors, on the other hand, are far more dangerous because they typically require fuels made from plutonium or “highly enriched” uranium that can be used to make nuclear weapons.
In fact, fast reactors can be operated as “breeders” that produce more plutonium than they consume. To produce the large quantities of plutonium needed to fuel fast reactors, spent fuel from conventional reactors has to be reprocessed — chemically processed to separate plutonium from the other constituents. Facilities that produce plutonium fuel must have strong protections against diversion and theft. All too often, however, security at such facilities is inadequate.
In the IFR concept, which was never actually realized in practice, reactor-spent fuel would be reprocessed using a technology called pyroprocessing, and the extracted plutonium would be fabricated into new fuel. IFR advocates have long asserted that pyroprocessing is not a proliferation risk because the plutonium it separates is not completely purified.
But a 2008 U.S. Department of Energy review — which confirmed many previous studies — concluded that pyroprocessing and similar technologies would “greatly reduce barriers to theft, misuse or further processing, even without separation of pure plutonium.” Continue reading
Computer worm Stuxnet ‘badly infected’ Russian nuclear power plant
Stuxnet infected Russian nuclear plant By Darren Pauli on Nov 8, 2013 Jumped airgap, Kaspersky boss says. http://www.scmagazine.com.au/News/363578,stuxnet-infected-russian-nuclear-plant.aspx Stuxnet had ‘badly infected’ the internal network of a Russian nuclear plant after the sophisticated malware caused chaos in Iran’s nuclear facilities in 
Natanz.
The malware, widely considered to have been developed by the US Government as a means to disrupt Iran’s nuclear enrichment plans, had crossed a physically separated ‘air-gapped’ network in the Russian plant after it was carried across on a USB device.
Eugene Kaspersky, the charismatic boss of the Russian antivirus company bearing his name, said a staffer at the unnamed nuclear plant informed him of the infection. “[The staffer said] their nuclear plant network which was disconnected from the internet … was badly infected by Stuxnet,” Kaspersky said.
“So unfortunately these people who were responsible for offensive technologies, they recognise cyber weapons as an opportunity.” But USB devices were used to ferry malware cross a far greater air-gap: Russian astronauts had carried a virus on removable media to the International Space Station infecting machines there, Kaspersky said.
In a presentation given at the Canberra Press Club designed to give mainstream journalists a broad overview of the state of information security, the chief executive offered his view of the state of online crime and state-sponsored espionage. “All the data is stolen,” Kaspersky said. “At least twice.”
He said sophisticated malware like Gauss, Flame and Red October were rare and would require around $10 million to build.
Such malware had infected Saudi Aramco knocking it offline for two weeks, Kaspersky noted. Half of all malware was written in Chinese, according to Kaspersky. About a third was written in Spanish or Portuguese, followed by Russian-coded malware that was less prevalent but the most sophisticated in the world, he said.
He said Chinese malware appeared to ‘not care’ about operational security because researchers regularly found personal photos and social networking accounts on servers used in attack campaigns.
On Integral Fast Reactor and France “Pandora’s Promise” gets it wrong
Nuclear energy film overstates positives, underplays negatives By Ralph Cavanagh and Tom Cochran, CNN November 6, 2013 – “………The still-unrealized Integral Fast Reactor is the real star of the film, along with the nation of France, whose nuclear generation program is extolled as “one of the most inspiring stories ever” (“the trains are electric powered, they have clean air, and they have the cheapest electricity in Europe”). Nuclear power debates are the only places where you will ever see those at the conservative edge of the political spectrum argue that the United States should reorganize its economy to be more like France.
The Clinton administration killed the Integral Fast Reactor in 1994 because of concern over the potential diversion of the plutonium fuel by terrorists and non-nuclear weapon states of concern. Yet the film’s closing argument is that a “fourth-generation” reactor modeled on the Integral Fast Reactor will sweep the globe, burning waste created by the first three generations and “solving” the nagging problem of long-term disposal of nuclear waste. The film fails to mention that this would take hundreds to thousands of plutonium-fueled reactors operating over hundreds of years, resulting most likely in an increase in the releases of radioactivity to the environment as a consequence of operations by the Integral Fast Reactor’s fuel processing and fabricating facilities.
The film invokes Bill Gates as one of many forward-thinking new investors in nuclear innovation, but surely even Gates would recoil from the Integral Fast Reactor’s poor economic outlook compared to conventional reactors and the financial risks associated with building just one Integral Fast Reactor, let alone a global fleet of them. The film fails to acknowledge that the flagship fast reactor development efforts in the United States, France, Germany, Japan and Italy all failed, and that fast reactors were abandoned by both the U.S. and Soviet navies, hardly a strong selling point for resurrecting the Integral Fast Reactor program………..http://edition.cnn.com/2013/11/06/opinion/pandora-nuclear-energy-opinion-cavanagh-cochran/
Nuclear fusion a far away dream, but will it be safe, anyway?
“the first wall”: any nuclear fusion facilities must be fitted with an internal container made up by a “first wall” that faces the space where the reaction takes place.
This wall will be exposed to neutronic radiation. It won’t take long for it to become radioactive and begin to erode. In time, it will have to be replaced by another wall if the fusion reactor is to remain in operation.
Where will the discarded containers end up? These “first walls” will be loaded with radioactivity. As fusion technology develops, this can become a problem.
Nuclear Fusion: Is it as Safe as We Think? Dmitri Prieto http://www.havanatimes.org/?p=99809 4 Nov 13
HAVANA TIMES — It seems to me that we are not sufficiently aware of the risks surrounding a new, emerging technology. Producing energy through the fusion of light nuclei (such as deuterium and tritium, which are heavy, radioactive isotopes of hydrogen) is the dream of many physicists and technologists.
This is the process which takes place inside the sun, the stars and hydrogen bombs. The aim is to “domesticate” the thermonuclear reaction so that, on the one hand, it does not produce an explosion (like the 50-megaton hydrogen bomb detonated by the Soviets in the Arctic in 1961), and, on the other, the process stabilizes at a temperature in which the atomic nuclei can fuse and generate energy.
No fusion thermonuclear plant yet exists. Existing complexes are fission plants. I am referring to those that work on uranium and plutonium (like the Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear power plants). Continue reading
1 This Month
19 November – Webinar – The Reality of Reprocessing
Time: 11:00 AM Pacific Time (US & Canada) / 2:00 PM Eastern / 7:00 PM UK / 8:00 PM CET
Register for the Zoom Event Here
Shut down the radiation-damaged Heysham nuclear reactors now
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
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