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

Bill Gates and ORANO (formerly the bankrupt AREVA) aim to start nuclear shipping, despite its history of failures.

UK-Based Startup Proposes a Renaissance for Nuclear-Powered Shipping,  The Maritime Executive 11-02-2020, A UK-based startup with backing from some of the biggest names in nuclear energy has applied to the U.S. Department of Energy for cost-sharing support for the development of a new generation of nuclear power for commercial ship propulsion.Nuclear-powered civilian shipping had a small heyday during the Cold War, when the United States, the Soviet Union and Japan invested in demonstration vessels that could operate for years without refueling. In the U.S., the Eisenhower administration conceived of a nuclear-powered “peace ship” that would carry passengers and cargo in small quantities to serve as a demonstration of the potential for civilian nuclear energy projects. The result, the NS Savannah, entered service in 1962 and operated until 1972, when the Maritime Administration decommissioned her over cost concerns.

Japan’s entrant, the freighter Mutsu, entered service in 1974. She suffered a minor reactor shield fault on her maiden voyage, which led to a wave of negative publicity, and her operators had to negotiate with port communities in order to find her a new berth. She was not fully repaired until 1982 and did not set sail again until 1991. She was decomissioned one year later, and her reactor core was removed so that she could be converted into a conventionally-powered oceanographic research vessel.

The Soviet-built icebreaking LASH vessel Sevmorput is the only remaining nuclear-powered merchant cargo ship in civilian use. Operated by Atomflot, the agency charged with running Russia’s nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet, Sevmorput carries containerized cargo and project cargo along Russia’s Northern Sea Route (NSR). Shortly after she entered service in 1988, four Russian ports in the Siberian Far East refused to allow her to enter over fears that her nuclear reactor posed a public safety hazard. Similar concerns have been raised by foreign port operators, and she has generally been deployed on domestic intra-Russian routes only; however, this year she was dispatched to resupply Russia’s Antarctic research station. (As of Monday, she was broadcasting restricted maneuverability and moving north at a slow bell off the port of Luanda, Angola.)

Despite the past difficulties encountered by nuclear vessel operators, nuclear innovation company TerraPower – chaired by Microsoft founder and serial entrepreneur Bill Gates – has decided to partner with utility firm Southern Company and nuclear tech company Orano USA to back a new reactor designed to power commercial ships. The reactor’s developer, UK-based Core Power, sees molten salt reactor (MSR) nuclear “batteries” as a sustainable alternative for decarbonizing the world’s merchant fleet in the decades ahead.   ….. https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/uk-based-startup-proposes-a-renaissance-for-nuclear-powered-shipping

November 3, 2020 Posted by | technology, USA | Leave a comment

Nukes in space

New Los Alamos spin-off aims to put nuclear reactors in space,   LOS ALAMOS, N.M., Nov. 2, 2020—A new agreement hopes to speed along a nuclear reactor technology that could be used to fuel deep-space exploration and possibly power human habitats on the Moon or Mars. Los Alamos National Laboratory has signed an agreement to license the “Kilopower” space reactor technology to Space Nuclear Power Corporation (SpaceNukes), also based in Los Alamos, NM…… https://www.miragenews.com/new-los-alamos-spin-off-aims-to-put-nuclear-reactors-in-space/

November 3, 2020 Posted by | space travel, USA | Leave a comment

Bill Gates has another go at getting taxpayer funding, for another nuclear venture (ships this time)

Bill Gates joins nuclear-powered shipping push, Splash Sam ChambersNovember 2, 2020  Bill Gates, one of the richest men in the world, has turned his attention to getting ships powered by nuclear energy.

The Microsoft co-founder, who turned 65 last week, is also chairman of TerraPower, a nuclear tech company that today announced a new venture with Mikal Bøe’s CORE POWER, French nuclear materials handling specialist Orano and American utilities firm Southern Company. The four companies plan to develop molten salt reactor (MSR) atomic technology in the United States………

The four companies have submitted an application to the US Department of Energy to take part in cost-share risk reduction awards under the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Programme to build a prototype MSR, as a proof-of-concept for a medium-scale commercial-grade reactor.

…….  we seek to build scale-appropriate technology and broad acceptance of modern and durable liquid-fuelled atomic power to shape the future of how we deal with climate change,” Bøe commented today…….

Thorium is a weakly radioactive metallic chemical element found most commonly in India and is a substance that Gates’ TerraPower has been studying closely of late.

Admitting the technology would not be cheap to install on ships, Bøe has proposed a leasing model for his batteries, similar to those deployed for aircraft engines………. https://splash247.com/bill-gates-joins-nuclear-powered-shipping-push/

November 3, 2020 Posted by | politics, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, thorium | Leave a comment

While Canadian authorities fall for “New Small Nuclear” spin, U.S. consortium rips off Canada’s nuclear waste disaster

U.S. corporations profiting from major Canadian nuclear liability,  https://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/views-expressed/2020/10/us-corporations-profiting-major-canadian-nuclear-liability Ole Hendrickson, October 30, 2020

The nearly 70-year history of the federal crown corporation Atomic Energy of Canada Limited (AECL) has left a $16 billion toxic legacy of shuttered reactors, polluted lakes and groundwater, contaminated soils, and hundreds of thousands of cubic metres of radioactive waste.

AECL’s 2018 annual report estimates its undiscounted waste and decommissioning liability at $15.9 billion as of March 31, 2018. Table 5.7 in Canada’s 2019 public accounts estimates AECL’s environmental liabilities at $1.05 billion and “asset retirement obligations” at $6.6 billion.

This $7.7 billion estimate of AECL’s total nuclear liability is heavily discounted. The accounting firm Deloitte does not recommend discounting for environmental liabilities and asset retirement obligations unless the amount of the liability and the amount and timing of cash payments are “reliably determinable.” As explained in a detailed report, neither is true for AECL’s liability.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper thought that the private sector might do a better job of addressing this massive liability than AECL itself. Just before losing power to the Liberals in the 2015 election, his government contracted an American-controlled consortium (creatively called the “Canadian National Energy Alliance”) to manage federal nuclear facilities and reduce the waste liability quickly and cheaply.

According to the main estimates, AECL’s expenditures grew from $326 million in 2014-15 (before the consortium assumed control) to $491 million in 2015-16, $784 million in 2016-17, $827 million in 2017-18 and $829 million in 2018-19. The 2020-21 main estimates for AECL are $1.2 billion.

AECL hands most of this money over to the consortium, whose current members are Texas-based Fluor and Jacobs, and SNC-Lavalin. AECL retains ownership of the waste. A 2017 special examination report of the Auditor General of Canada to AECL’s board of directors says that “approximately $866 million for contractual expenses was paid or payable by the Corporation in the 2016-17 fiscal year.”

Is this “Government-owned, contractor-operated” (GoCo) arrangement providing value for money?

The GoCo contract was supposed to have been reviewed after an initial six-year period. However, AECL — whose president is an American with past ties to consortium members — extended it to a full 10-year period in April 2020, 18 months before its September 2021 renewal date.

The centrepiece of the consortium’s approach — a million-cubic–metre radioactive waste mound on a hillside draining into the Ottawa River – was revealed in May 2016, shortly after the ink dried on the contract. Neither the public, nor Algonquin peoples on whose unceded territory this facility would be built, were consulted.

Technical problems and public opposition have put the “near surface disposal facility” — to be built at AECL’s Chalk River laboratories — years behind schedule. AECL waste management experts who left when the consortium took over have been highly critical, pointing out that an above-ground mound would not contain and isolate the types of radioactive waste that the consortium planned to put in it.

Chalk River, the focal point of Canadian nuclear research since the late 1940s, is where most of AECL’s radioactive waste legacy is found. But AECL also built reactors at four other sites in Manitoba, Ontario and Quebec. All have been shut down for decades — radioactive hulks, yet to be fully decommissioned.

AECL and its American-led consortium have announced quick and cheap plans for Manitoba and Ontario reactors: fill them up with blast furnace slag and concrete, and abandon them in place. Critics say these proposals are seriously flawed, noting that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) says that “entombment” should only be considered in the event of a serious reactor accident.

Critics say that these sub-standard schemes would pollute major Canadian waterways and could expose workers and future generations to dangerous radiation levels.

The consortium is trying to salvage its Chalk River mound proposal with a promise to reduce the amount of radiation in the wastes it would house. Less radiation would leak into the Ottawa River.

However, management practices during Chalk River’s early years were poor, accidents were frequent and records were lost in a fire. Trying to separate out lower-activity from higher-activity wastes would involve considerable expense and high worker radiation exposures. And if strict limits on the mound’s radioactivity were adhered to, much of the federal waste liability would likely remain unaddressed.

Management of Canada’s radioactive waste by for-profit corporations, combined with a lack of government oversight, creates risks of delays, excessive radiation exposures to workers and the public, and squandering of tax dollars. Critics of AECL’s GoCo contract are asking the federal government to establish a publicly acceptable strategy for addressing its nuclear liability.

In a mission to Canada in late 2019, IAEA reviewers found virtually “no evidence … of a governmental policy or strategy related to radioactive waste management.” The government agreed to their recommendation that this gap be filled, assigning the task to Natural Resources Canada.

But Natural Resources Minister Seamus O’Regan seems preoccupied with promotion of a new generation of mass-produced, “modular” nuclear reactors. Two consortium members — Fluor and SNC-Lavalin — are heavily invested in their own reactor designs. There are plans to build three new demonstration reactors at Chalk River, and talk of building as many as eight. One proposal has already reached the environmental assessment stage.

If the Liberal government caves into industry pressure to fund the building of these new reactors — instead of dealing responsibly with its existing waste liability — AECL’s $16 billion radioactive burden on Canadian taxpayers — and risks to workers and the public — will just keep growing.

Ole Hendrickson is a retired forest ecologist and a founding member of the Ottawa River Institute, a non-profit charitable organization based in the Ottawa Valley.

November 2, 2020 Posted by | business and costs, Canada, investigative journalism, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, wastes | 1 Comment

Financial red flags warn against Utah’s NuScale small nuclear reactor project

October 31, 2020 Posted by | business and costs, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, USA | Leave a comment

Another city bites the dust in regard to Utah’s NuScam small nuclear reactors plan

Seven Utah cities have now bailed out of an Idaho nuclear power project, Salt Lake Tribune,  By Taylor Stevens-30 Oct 20,

Three more Utah cities voted this week not to move forward with a first-of-its kind nuclear power project that proponents have pitched as the future of clean energy but that opponents have lined up against over concerns about financial risk.

Beaver, Bountiful and Heber are the latest municipalities to exit the small modular nuclear reactor pursuit, following in the footsteps of Murray, Kaysville, Lehi and Logan, which also backed out in recent weeks. ………

The Heber Light and Power Board, which voted 5-1 to get out of the project, and the Bountiful City Council, which unanimously made the decision to back out, both did so this week largely over concerns about the subscription rate of the nuclear energy pursuit.

“There’s enough things wrong with this project that it made it really scary,” said Bart Miller, Heber Light and Power’s chief financial officer. “We’re just a bunch of little utilities in the state of Utah trying to do a $6 billion nuclear power plant.”………

Bountiful City Councilman Richard Higginson said the leaders there had similar concerns, and felt too many of the development and construction costs were falling to a small number of municipalities…….

Costs have been one of the main concerns for several of the cities that have backed out over the last few weeks, as the project’s projected price tag has ballooned significantly, from $4.5 billion a few years ago to around $6 billion now. Opponents have also raised concerns about time and cost overruns, safety considerations and an uncertain regulatory environment.

The Utah Taxpayers Association has been among the critics of the project, arguing that municipal power companies should not act as a “seed investor” for the new technology, a responsibility it’s argued should lie with the private sector.

Environmental groups, such as the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah, have also raised concerns about the radioactive waste that would be generated by the project.

Cities participating in the Carbon Free Power Project through the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems — a consortium of municipally owned power systems in Utah and several other Western states that has partnered with NuScale Power to study and create the nuclear technology — have until Saturday to decide whether to stay in the project or back out.  https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2020/10/29/seven-utah-cities-have/

October 31, 2020 Posted by | business and costs, politics, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, USA | Leave a comment

Big questions on the costs and safety of NuScale’s little nuclear reactors

NuScale Faces Questions on Nuclear Reactor Safety and Financing Its First Project

The first small modular reactor to receive federal approval must still grapple with design changes and safety concerns if it’s to be built by 2030. GreentechMedia

JEFF ST. JOHN OCTOBER 27, 2020   NuScale Power wants to build the first small modular nuclear reactor complex in the U.S. by decade’s end and has pointed to recent federal safety approvals and a cost-sharing arrangement with its first prospective public utility customers as advancing that goal.

But its reactor design faces significant safety questions that were not resolved by a Nuclear Energy Commission (NRC) review completed in August. Those include potential problems with the system that automatically shuts down its reactors in case of emergency, casting doubt on key safety claims from the Portland, Oregon-based company, critics say.

The nature of NRC’s review will leave the resolution of these key safety issues to be completed later this decade.

This could prove problematic for NuScale’s first project, the 12-reactor Carbon Free Power Project (CFPP) in Idaho Falls, Idaho. Over the past two years, the project has seen expected costs double from $3 billion to $6.1 billion and its completion date moved from 2026 to 2030, putting pressure on parent company Fluor Corp. to keep further cost increases in check and secure financial backers for the project.

NuScale won’t complete key safety reviews for its reactor design until later this decade. These design changes and safety reviews will be the responsibility of the Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS), the first customer for 213 megawatts of the 720 MW the CFPP will produce, under a combined construction and operating license process. This could open up the CFPP to technical and legal challenges after significant investments in the project have already been made, critics warn.

UAMPS, a division of the Utah state government serving wholesale electric services to communities across the Intermountain West, has seen three cities vote to depart the 33-city consortium planning to agree to buy power from the CFPP in the past few months and is facing an October 31 deadline to commit to its role in the project.

And while the Department of Energy has issued a $1.36 billion, 10-year cost-share pledge to UAMPS, that funding will require future congressional appropriations in order to become reality. …..

Other U.S.-based SMR developers include Bill Gates-backed TerraPower and X-Energy, which have recently received financial support from DOE with the goal of building their first working units in the next seven years. Others include Hyperion Power Generation and Terrestrial Energy. ……

Safety questions on emergency shutdown

One of the most pressing unresolved safety issues deals with NuScale’s system to prevent overheating or meltdown during emergencies, according to the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS), which reviews reactor designs for the NRC.

NuScale’s reactor must submerge its fuel in water carrying boron, an element that absorbs neutrons and slows the fission chain reactions that generate heat and radioactivity. That water can be boiled away during emergencies, meaning that redundant safety systems are required that are capable of replacing it.

NuScale has said its system can reintroduce boronated water into the reactor without pumps that might lose power during an emergency, by venting steam into a surrounding containment vessel and condensing it back into water to inject into the core. But a March ACRS review noted that boron could be left behind as water turns into steam, yielding condensed water without enough boron to slow the chain reactions that could lead to overheating or core meltdown.

NuScale submitted design modifications to add boron to that reintroduced water supply. But in an April meeting, ACRS member Jose March-Leuba noted that the new design requires a series of 10 valves to operate without fail to solve the problem it’s geared to address, which he characterized as “10 single failure points.”

The ACRS told the NRC in a June letter that it “cannot reach a final conclusion on the safety of the NuScale design until the issue of the potential for a reactivity insertion accident” — a sudden increase in fission that cannot be halted — “is resolved to our satisfaction.” ………

Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that the ACRS finding casts doubt on “one of the major selling points for this reactor, which is that it can passively shut down without any operator actions.”

NuScale has relied on its passive safety claims to argue that it should be exempt from other nuclear reactor safety requirements, such as maintaining emergency evacuation and planning zones within a 10-mile radius of the site and employing a security force to prevent sabotage attempts. Integrating these safety requirements into its projects may push NuScale’s power costs beyond the $55 per megawatt-hour it has targeted, he said.

“Nuclear safety is not just design. It’s the whole set of measures,” Lyman said.

Uncertain path to approval, unclear financing future

NuScale’s recent safety approval from the NRC is not as comprehensive a stamp of federal approval as the company had planned to obtain by now.

In March testimony before the U.S. House of Representatives, NuScale CEO John Hopkins said that parent company Fluor Corp. and investors have spent about $500 million to prepare a “design certification application,” which was submitted in 2016 and expected to be complete by September.

But NuScale’s recent approval from the NRC is not for a design certification application, Lyman said. Rather, it’s a “standard design approval,” which comes with less stringent rules for NRC review and allows future design changes. But it opens up NuScale’s design to future legal challenges that a design certification approval would not, he said.

NuScale also plans to increase the size of its reactor units from 50 MW to 60 MW units, which will require a separate design approval review, Lyman said. Meanwhile, NuScale’s original design certification, “when it’s approved, may never actually be used.” ……

these uncertainties have complicated the picture for UAMPS, which has pushed back its deadline for finalizing its licensing agreement with NuScale from September until October 31. UAMPS could be facing more than $100 million in commitments under its yet-to-be-finalized agreement. ….

Broader challenges for small modular reactors

In a September report, M.V. Ramana, a professor of disarmament and human security at the University of British Columbia, highlighted other risks facing NuScale. Those include further delays in licensing and certification, as well as the potential that design changes and increased safety requirements will raise the cost of power from NuScale’s reactors, which is already higher than the prices being set by new wind and solar energy today. Adding batteries or other forms of energy storage to renewables may prove a less costly solution to providing reliable zero-carbon electricity than NuScale can, he wrote.

Ramana also questioned the financial stability of NuScale’s parent company, engineering and construction giant Fluor, which has seen its share price drop about 80 percent over the past two years amid mounting financial losses and federal investigations into its accounting practices.

Fluor has invested $643 million into NuScale alongside $314 million in DOE funding, Hopkins told Congress in March. But it will need to bring more financial backers on board in the decade to come.

As for the DOE cost-share agreement, Lyman said it’s dependent on future congressional budget approvals that may not emerge. “The bottom line is, without a large subsidy, it would not be economical for them to buy this power.” ……… https://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/nuscale-faces-questions-over-nuclear-reactor-safety-path-to-financing-first-project

October 29, 2020 Posted by | Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, USA | Leave a comment

Space exploration – to lead to dangerous nuclear-armed totalitarian societies

Professor warns space exploration will give rise to totalitarian societies equipped with nuclear weapons – but some say his forecast is too pessimistic   

  • Daniel Deudney is a political science professor at Johns Hopkins University
  • He recently published a book titled ‘Dark Skies’ that talks about space expansion
  • The text warns that space settlements could become totalitarian societies
  • Populations and resources will need to be controlled for survival
  •  Deudney notes that nuclear weapons will become the gold standard in space
  • He fears that the cosmic battles will eventually make their way to Earth 

By STACY LIBERATORE FOR DAILYMAIL.COM, 28 October 2020    Space agencies across the world are working tirelessly to design the best ships and technologies for the chance to claim a stake of the final frontier for their country.

Although it may seem like an act of national pride, a professor from Johns Hopkins University warns that space expansion may lead to the extinction of humanity, suggesting it should not be attempted at all.

Daniel Deudney recently published a book titled ‘Dark Skies’ that examines space expansionism through geopolitics revealing cosmic habitats could spark totalitarian empires.

The political science professor also notes that if these settlements stretch across the solar system, nuclear weapons will become the gold standard in war, along with using asteroids to destroy enemy planets – but other experts feel these arguments are ‘too pessimistic.’

‘I argue that the consequences of what has actually happened in space are much less positive than space enthusiasts and many others believe,’ reads ‘Dark Skies.’

‘My case for this darker net assessment of actual space activities centers on the role of space activities in making nuclear war more likely.’

‘In sum, this book argues that the large-scale expansion of human activities into space, past and future, should join the lengthening list of catastrophic and existential threats to humanity, and that the ambitious core of space expansionism should be explicitly relinquished.’

The book’s release comes at a time when many countries are muscling up to head into space.

The US announced a new branch of its armed forces called the US Space Force in 2019, which ‘is designed to protect the interests of the United States in space, deter aggression in the final frontier and conduct prompt and sustained space operations.’

Many other countries including France, Canada and Japan have since followed in suit for their chance to take a piece of space.

However, Deudney’s concludes that these countries’ efforts will come with serious consequences.

The professor used geopolitics for this work, which studies ‘the practice of states controlling and competing for territory’ – and in this case, space.

Deudeny also explains that he is not opposed to using space in ways that will benefit Earth and is not on a mission to ‘defund space’ by eliminating the many robots and satellites that currently patrol the area.

He is looked at ‘the political and military potential of a system-spanning human civilization only increases the chances of totalitarianism and the deliberate or accidental extinction of human society,’……..

Along with using objects in space, governments have revealed details over the past years for launching nuclear weapons into the final frontier.

NASA is working on a method that would send a nuclear bomb into space aboard a rocket to destroy an asteroid heading towards Earth.

Earlier this year, the US raised concerns that China or Russia may soon detonate a nuclear weapon in space ‘to fry the electronics’ of spacecraft and ‘indiscriminately’ take out satellite.

Although neither of these are a reality, the technology may be in the works and could be used to wage space war…… https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-8885599/Professor-warns-space-exploration-spark-totalitarian-societies-equipped-nuclear-weapons.html

October 29, 2020 Posted by | politics international, space travel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Two more cities opt out of Utah’s dubious small nuclear reactor project

October 29, 2020 Posted by | Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, USA | Leave a comment

The very real risks of radiation accidents on Earth, from nuclear reactors in space

October 29, 2020 Posted by | 2 WORLD, safety, space travel | Leave a comment

Finland, stuck with increasingly costly Olkiluouti nuclear nightmare, plans and even worse expense, with small nucler reactors!

Taz 26th Oct 2020, The European pressurized water reactor Olkiluoto 3 has long since developed into a Finnish BER – at least twelve years too late, three times as expensive as planned. And it’s far from being online. The same goes for the
new Hanhikivi project: years behind before construction began .

But the Finnish nuclear lobby is already planning another nuclear energy adventure: the construction of so-called Small Modular Reactors (SMR). Paul Dorfman of the UK UCL Energy Institute and co-author of an SMR study by the Nuclear
Consulting Group estimates that small reactors would provide increasingly expensive energy due to the cost of materials and personnel : the massive investments that would be required to create a supply chain so that replacing the economies of scale of large reactors with the advantage of series production would make the investment risk for SMR even higher than for standard reactors.

https://taz.de/AKWs-vom-Fliessband/!5720692/

October 29, 2020 Posted by | Finland, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors | Leave a comment

Trump’s USA is pushing NuScale’s small nuclear reactors for South Africa.

The US nuclear company with an eye on South Africa  just got a R23 billion boost, courtesy of Donald Trump, https://www.businessinsider.co.za/nuscale-nuclear-which-has-plans-for-sa-gets-a-big-us-subsidy-to-test-its-design-2020-10    Phillip de Wet , Business Insider SA Oct 22, 2020, 

  • American nuclear energy company NuScale has been citing Cape Town as an example of an ideal customer for its still-theoretical generators.
  • It has now received in-principle financial support from the American government to build a nuclear power station in South Africa.
  • NuScale’s pathfinder project for its new technology, in Idaho, just got a promise of an infusion of US government cash worth some R23 billion.
  • While South Africa abandoned plans to create next-generation PBMR systems, the administration of Donald Trump has pushed small-scale nuclear development.

NuScale, a company with roots in US-funded research, this week received assurances that the American government will provide up to $1.4 billion (around R23 billion) in subsidies for a 12-module reactor it hopes to start building in Idaho by 2025.

The project is a commercial one, with municipal buyers lined up for the electricity, but the cash from the US department of energy is intended to bring the cost of that electricity down to $55 per MWh on a levelised cost of energy (LCOE) basis, making the project at least vaguely competitive with other forms of power generation.

Without the subsidies, the supposedly once-off cost of building a first-of-its kind power station would make the NuScale project commercially unviable, its planned customers say.

Just how once-off such costs are, and how much money the US government ends up actually spending on the project, will be closely watched in South Africa

Last week the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) announced it had signed a letter of intent to support NuScale “to develop 2,500 MW of nuclear energy in South Africa”.

NuScale has cited Cape Town as a purely theoretical customer for a 12-module version of its nuclear energy system, saying that such an installation could desalinate enough water to keep the entire city going.

But the 2,500MW number cited by the DFC suggests its South African ambitions are substantial. That is the full generating capability the South African government now envisages adding to the national grid from nuclear stations – but the government plan calls for a mixture of the conventional pressurised water reactors (PWRs) such as Russia’s Rosatom sells, and the type of small modular reactors (SMRs) NuScale is developing.

By seeking development finance for the full 2,500MW, NuScale appears to be signalling a plan to bid for the whole thing, rather than seeking to build only part of a new set of nuclear generators in SA alongside companies from China or elsewhere.

That matches the aggressive posture of the US government under the administration of Donald Trump. The DFC letter of intent is the first time the organisation has supported any nuclear project; a ban on its involvement in nuclear energy was lifted on the recommendation of a working group formed by the White House.

The state funding for the NuScale project in the US, meanwhile, comes after consistent and determined efforts under Trump’s presidency to “revitalise” nuclear energy in America, both in production and through research and development on next-generation systems.

South Africa, though determined to buy new nuclear power stations, has not had a similar political appetite to invest in research. In 2010 it mothballed work on the pebble bed modular reactor, a project launched in the late 1990s to create a safe, small, modular reactor system for both domestic use and sale abroad.

Russia once thought it had a done deal to build new nuclear reactors in South Africa. Half a decade later, thanks to its sheer political weight, China seems to be a serious contender for the job. Both France and South Korea have, at various points, been in the running too.

But as of this week, an American company with no track record of actually building commerical nuclear reactors yet is lining up the kind of money from the US government that could make its plans for South Africa viable – replacing a dream of home-grown next-generation nuclear with an imported version.

As of this year there are still vague plans to revive the project, in one form or another, but even if those were to succeed, the pace of development would have to be improbably fast for it to have any place in South Africa’s current round of explorations.

October 24, 2020 Posted by | marketing, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, South Africa | Leave a comment

Another city leaves small nuclear reactor project – unanimous vote by Murray City Council, Utah

Murray City votes to withdraw from nuclear power project,  Salt Lake Tribune, By Taylor Stevens– 23 Oct 20,  The Murray City Council voted unanimously this week to back out of a first-of-its-kind nuclear power project that has the support of a number of Utah municipalities.

It’s the fourth Utah city to exit the small modular nuclear reactor pursuit over the last few months amid pressure from opponents who have raised concerns about environmental and financial risks of the proposed 12-module plant, which would be located at Idaho National Laboratory in Idaho Falls and produce a total 720 megawatts of electricity.

During the city’s Tuesday council meeting, Murray Power Manager Blaine Haacke outlined several advantages of the project, including the potential that it could fill the energy gap that will be left when the Hunter Power Plant in Castle Dale goes offline in the coming years.

But he ultimately recommended that the council vote to back out of the project, saying there were too many risks involved in committing another $1.1 million to $1.4 million in taxpayer dollars, with an ultimate anticipated price tag to city residents of around $2.1 million.
“I think there’s just enough stumbling blocks out there that I’m really concerned about,” Haacke told the council.
The project’s projected costs have ballooned significantly, from $4.5 billion a few years ago to around $6 billion now. And he said there’s a chance that leadership or priority changes on the national level could affect federal appropriations toward the nuclear reactor plant.
But Haacke told the council Tuesday that his biggest concern is that the plant is only 25% subscribed — and it’s not a sure thing that new customers will suddenly come on board once it’s built.,,,,,,,,,
Ahead of the vote, city staff also read several public comments from residents, all of which urged their elected officials to back out of the project over concerns about both cost and potential environmental impacts.
Rusty Cannon, vice president of the Utah Taxpayers Association, was among those who sent in a written comment, arguing that the municipal power company should not act as a “seed investor” for the new technology.
That responsibility, he said, should lie with the private sector, and “municipal power companies could instead look to purchase power from such a project upon its completion” around 2029.
Environmental groups, such as the Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah, have also raised concerns about the radioactive waste that would be generated by the project.
Despite the federal government’s support, the future of the project seems murkier now that Murray has joined Lehi, Logan and Kaysville in backing out of the project. And Haacke said he’s heard rumors that other cities are considering an exit as well ahead of a recently-extended deadline to “off-ramp” from the project.

He told the council that he expects UAMPS will carry the project forward without Murray. But he said the association’s members will meet during the first week of November to make a final decision, after they find out how many cities have exited.

“If there are enough [municipalities] that have dropped out, as a UAMPS committee we will say, ‘let’s just drop it and move on,’” he said. …………
The Utah cities that remain in the Carbon Free Power Project have until Oct. 31 to drop out or to appropriate additional funds to the small modular reactor project.  ….  https://www.sltrib.com/news/politics/2020/10/23/murray-city-votes/

October 24, 2020 Posted by | politics, Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, USA | Leave a comment

Very dubious claims made by proponents of NuScam’s small nuclear reactor plans

Small Nuclear Reactors Would Provide [a dubious claim] Carbon-Free Energy, but Would They Be Safe? Inside Climate News, Jonathan Moens, -21 Oct 20 Regulators have approved designs for 12 small reactors to be built in Idaho, but opponents say the project is dangerous and too late to fight climate change.   “……… Last month, U.S. officials approved NuScale Power’s designs for 12 small nuclear reactors to be built in Boise, Idaho. The reactors could make use of the water, transmission lines and general infrastructure of former coal-powered plants in the West to produce clean energy, said Jose Reyes, co-founder of the company.

NuScale said the energy produced by its reactors would generate enough electricity to power about 50,000 homes across six Western states. The Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems, an energy cooperative, would be the first to build the reactors on a federal site at the Idaho National Laboratory.  

The NuScale Power initiative has met with opposition from local environmental groups, who say that nuclear power is a dangerous and unsustainable energy source.

In addition, the highly radioactive waste from nuclear reactors must be securely stored indefinitely to prevent accidents, and contains plutonium and uranium that can be reprocessed into nuclear weapons. “We see this project as a way to create a whole new generation of high level radioactive waste,” said Scott Williams, executive director of Healthy Environment Alliance of Utah, a nuclear watchdog. ……

The designs underwent a public health and safety review by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. But some scientists think they still aren’t safe enough. In a public statement, Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety with the Union of Concerned Scientists, cited a report by a senior engineer at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission expressing concern that the cooling process might inadvertently cause “catastrophic” core damage to the reactors.

Other scientists worry that NuScale may be getting ahead of itself by not having a planning protocol for a radioactive emergency that affects areas around the site.

“In the event of an accident, the people around there will not have rehearsed how to do an evacuation,” said M.V. Ramana, a professor in the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia.  …….

Too Late in a Climate Crisis?

The municipal power systems cooperative still needs to obtain a license to build and begin operating the reactors. To do so, the project will undergo an additional site-specific review to consider the potential ecological, geographic and residential impact the technology may have on the area, said George Griffith, lead technician at the Idaho National Laboratory.

The delay means that while NuScale will be ready to manufacture modular reactors by around 2024, it will take an additional five to six years for them to be operational at the Idaho site, said Reyes. 

Some experts, however, question whether 2029 is too late for the technology to be relevant in a time of climate crisis…….

Ramana, of the University of British Columbia, said, “While the overall capital cost [for small modular reactors] might be smaller, they also generate smaller amounts of electricity.” He outlined his concerns in a report released in September urging the Utah energy cooperative to “end their pursuit of small modular reactors.”

Ramana made clear that while devastating incidents associated with nuclear power plants might seem unlikely, we need to remain cautious. 

“The lesson we should learn from all the many nuclear and other accidents that have happened with hazardous technologies, is a little bit of humility,” he said. https://insideclimatenews.org/news/20102020/small-nuclear-reactors-carbon-free-energy

October 22, 2020 Posted by | Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, spinbuster, USA | Leave a comment

Japan now has enough plutonium to make about 6,000 atomic bombs

Japan Sticks to Nuclear Fuel Recycling Plan Despite Plutonium Stockpile

Japan now has 45.5 tons of separated plutonium, enough to make about 6,000 atomic bombs.  https://thediplomat.com/2020/10/japan-sticks-to-nuclear-fuel-recycling-plan-despite-plutonium-stockpile/

By Mari Yamaguchi, October 21, 2020   Japan’s government said Wednesday it will pursue a nuclear fuel recycling program that would involve extracting plutonium from spent fuel, despite international concerns about the country’s already huge plutonium stockpile and lack of prospects for effectively consuming it as nuclear fuel.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Kato Katsunobu, at a meeting with the governor of Aomori prefecture, home to Japan’s pending nuclear fuel reprocessing plant, reaffirmed that new Prime Minister Suga Yoshihide’s government will pursue the country’s nuclear energy policy.

“The government will firmly promote our nuclear energy policy and fuel cycle programs,” Kato said. He said Japan will make effort to reduce volume and toxicity of high-level nuclear waste, and extract plutonium from spent fuel from a resource conservation point of view.

critics say continuation of spent fuel reprocessing only adds to Japan’s already large plutonium stockpile. Japan also lacks a final repository for high-level nuclear waste.

Wednesday’s meeting came after the Nuclear Regulation Authority granted a safety approval this past summer for the Rokkasho fuel reprocessing plant, operated by Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd., located in northern Japan, for a planned launch in 2022. The authority also gave a preliminary permit for the Rokkasho MOX fuel production plant, also planned for completion in 2022.

Japan now has 45.5 tons of separated plutonium — 8.9 tons at home, and 36.6 tons in Britain and France, where spent fuel from Japanese nuclear plants has been reprocessed and stored because Japan lacks a plant to produce MOX fuel containing plutonium at home. The amount is enough to make about 6,000 atomic bombs.

Despite security concerns raised by Washington and others, the stockpile is hardly decreasing due to difficulties in achieving a full nuclear fuel recycling program and slow restarts of reactors amid setbacks from the 2011 Fukushima disaster.

Japan reprocesses spent fuel, instead of disposing it as waste, to extract plutonium and uranium to make MOX fuel for reuse, while the U.S. discontinued the costly and challenging program. Allowed under international safeguard rules, Japan is the only non-nuclear weapons state that separates plutonium for peaceful purposes, though the same technology can make atomic bombs.

October 22, 2020 Posted by | - plutonium, Japan, reprocessing | Leave a comment

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