Sizewell C nuclear plan – a disastrous and expensive mistake
heritage coast, but quite possibly the entire county, could be changed for
ever by the arrival of two new European pressurised reactors (EPRs).
‘Sizewell C, a proposed new nuclear power station in Suffolk, has the
potential to generate the reliable low carbon electricity the country needs
for decades to come’ is the claim made by EDF Energy, the French-owned
company behind the project. It also has the potential to be a disastrous
and expensive mistake. Many believe it already is.
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/building-sizewell-c-would-be-a-nuclear-sized-disaster#
Ipswich Council raises fresh worries about Sizewell nuclear power plan
nuclear power station project on the Suffolk coast, citing train concerns
and impacts on housing as key worries.
consultation last month after tweaking plans for the £20billion scheme,
with Ipswich Borough Council’s planning committee on Wednesday agreeing its
response.
movements by rail on the East Suffolk Line should have regard to noise and
air quality disturbance; questions over the impact freight transport would
have on the Ipswich Garden Suburb development being built at the north of
the town; and fears that the extra freight by rail could reduce the number
of passenger trains on the East Suffolk Line – a key commuter route and
sustainable mode of transport. EDF agreed to transport more construction
materials by rail and sea in a bid to take hundreds of lorries off the road
during the construction, a move that would cut road haulage by 20%,
according to the developers.
https://www.eadt.co.uk/news/local-council/ipswich-borough-council-sizewell-c-consultation-response-6855812
34 years later, food crops near Chernobyl still contain ionising radiation
Unsafe levels of radiation found in Chernobyl crops, By Harry Baker – Staff Writer https://www.livescience.com/chernobyl-radioactive-isotopes-crops.html– 19 December 20, The effects of the explosive 1986 disaster can still be seen in nearby crops.
Crops grown near the Chernobyl nuclear site in Ukraine are still contaminated with radiation from the explosive 1986 disaster.
In a new study, researchers found that wheat, rye, oats and barley grown in this area contained two radioactive isotopes — strontium 90 and cesium 137 — that were above safe consumption limits. Radioactive isotopes are elements that have increased masses and release excess energy as a result.
“Our findings point to ongoing contamination and human exposure, compounded by lack of official routine monitoring,” study author David Santillo, an environmental forensic scientist at Greenpeace Research Laboratories at the University of Exeter, said in a statement, referring to the fact that the government suspended its radioactive goods monitoring program in 2013.
Santillo and his colleagues, in collaboration with researchers from the Ukrainian Institute of Agricultural Radiology, analyzed 116 grain samples, collected between 2011 and 2019, from the Ivankiv district of Ukraine — about 31 miles (50 kilometers) south of the nuclear plant.
This area is outside of Chernobyl’s “exclusion zone,” which is a 30 mile (48 km) radius around the plant that was evacuated in 1986 and has remained unoccupied. They found radioactive isotopes, predominantly strontium 90, were above safe consumption level in 48% of samples. They also found that wood samples collected from the same region between 2015 and 2019, had strontium 90 levels above the safe limit for firewood.
The researchers believe that the lingering radiation in the wood, in particular, may be the reason for the continued contamination of crops, almost 35 years after the disaster. When analyzing the wood ash from domestic wood-burning ovens, they found strontium 90 levels that were 25 times higher than the safe limit. Locals use this ash, as well as ash from the local thermal power plant (TPP), to fertilize their crops, which continues to cycle the radiation through their soil.
However, computer simulations suggest that it could be possible to grow crops in the region at “safe” levels if this process of repeated contamination ceased. The researchers are now calling for the Ukrainian government to reinstate its monitoring program and create a system for properly disposing of radioactive ash.
“Contamination of grain and wood grown in the Ivankiv district remains of major concern and deserves further urgent investigation,” study author Valery Kashparov, director of the Ukrainian Institute of Agricultural Radiology, said in the statement. “Similarly, further research is urgently needed to assess the effects of the Ivankiv TPP on the environment and local residents, which still remain mostly unknown.”
The findings were published on Dec. 17 in the journal Environment International.
Originally published on Live Science.
Big boasts for small nuclear reactors on ships – but a recipe for disaster?
Floating ‘mini-nukes’ could power countries by 2025, says startup, Danish company plans to fit ships with small nuclear reactors to send energy to developing countries, Guardian, Jillian Ambrose, 18 Dec 2020 Floating barges fitted with advanced nuclear reactors could begin powering developing nations by the mid-2020s, according to a Danish startup company.Seaborg Technologies believes it can make cheap nuclear electricity a viable alternative to fossil fuels across the developing world as soon as 2025……..
Seaborg has raised about €20m (£18.3m) from private investors, including the Danish retail billionaire Anders Holch Povlsen, and received the first of the necessary regulatory approvals within a four-phase process from the American Bureau of Shipping this week. ….
Seaborg hopes to begin taking orders by the end of 2022 for the nuclear barges, which would be built in South Korean shipyards and towed to coastlines where they could be anchored for up to 24 years, he said. ……….
Seaborg’s design would be one of the first examples of a commercially available nuclear barge used to provide electricity to the mainland.
Chris Gadomski, a nuclear analyst at Bloomberg New Energy Finance, said: “The concept of a floating nuclear power plant has been around for a long time, and makes a lot of sense. But there are concerns.” There was inherent risk involved with nuclear reactor technologies and floating power plants, so combining to two could raise serious questions for investors and governments, he said.
“In places like the Philippines and Indonesia it makes a lot of sense. But it wasn’t so long ago that the Philippines was the site of a major tsunami, and I don’t know how you would hedge against a risk like that,” he added.
Jan Haverkamp, from Greenpeace, said floating reactors were “a recipe for disaster” including “all of the flaws and risks of larger land-based nuclear power stations”. “On top of that, they face extra risks from the unpredictability of operation in coastal areas and transport – particularly in a loaded state – over the high seas. Think storms, think tsunamis,” he said. ……..https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/dec/17/floating-mini-nukes-could-power-countries-by-2025-says-startup
Doubts about planned Berkshire ”garden town”, because it’s too close to AWE nuclear weapons factory
BBC 15th Dec 2020, Plans to build a new “garden town” could be scrapped over concerns about a
potential nuclear emergency. The proposed 15,000-home development in
Grazeley is within a couple of miles of nuclear weapons factory AWE
Burghfield. The Office for Nuclear Regulation has extended a “detailed
emergency planning zone” (DEPZ) for the plant, taking in most of the site
earmarked for homes.
That means anyone living in the zone could be affected
by a “reasonably foreseeable” radiation emergency. Three Berkshire councils
that have worked jointly on the plans are now considering shelving the
project, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).
Russian hackers evaded layers of U.S. security to attack America’s military and intelligence agencies
New York Times 14th Dec 2020, The scope of a hack engineered by one of Russia’s premier intelligence agencies became clearer on Monday, when some Trump administration officials acknowledged that other federal agencies — the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security and parts of the Pentagon — had been compromised. Investigators were struggling to determine the extent to which the military, intelligence community and nuclear laboratories were affected by the highly sophisticated attack.https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/14/us/politics/russia-hack-nsa-homeland-security-pentagon.html
Why is UK govt taking the financial and flooding risk of Sizewell nuclear, when renewables are clearly safer and cheaper?
Tax Research UK 16th Dec 2020, There is an article in the FT this morning that suggests something thatshould be obvious, but needs saying. And that is that renewable energy is
now bringing deflation into the energy market.
Management. As he puts it: With the US poised to rejoin the Paris Agreement
under the incoming Biden administration and the proliferation of net-zero
commitments from various governments, the romance between equity markets
and renewable-energy goes from strength to strength.
overlooked: the underlying reason for the astonishing transformation of
renewables over the past decade from niche to mainstream competing
head-to-head with fossil fuels is economic rather than environmental.
fuels are intrinsically inflationary. This has huge implications for the
distribution of value across the global energy system over the next three
decades.
on the Suffolk coast where the chance that it will be flooded within the
foreseeable future is high? I wish I knew. We now have the option of viable
energy to sustain the transition we need. More investment in it only
increases its appeal. And yet still we stick with the harmful solutions. I
have never got this. I never will.
Law and Disorder: The case of Julian Assange
In the case of Julian Assange, what is on trial is nothing less than our right to know what is done by governments in our name, and our capacity to hold power to account.
Law and Disorder: The case of Julian Assange, DiEM25, By Pam Stavropoulos | 10/12/2020,
What kind of law allows pursuit of charges under the 1917 United States Espionage Act — for which there is no public interest defence — against a journalist who is a foreign national?
The closing argument of the defence in the extradition hearing of WikiLeaks founder and publisher Julian Assange has been filed. For this and other reasons it is apposite to consider the authority invested in the law before which, in democratic societies, we are ostensibly all equal.
In fact, notwithstanding the familiar claims of objectivity (and as `everybody knows’ in Leonard Cohen’s famous lyric) the reality is somewhat different. Jokes about the law attest to this:
‘One law for the rich…’
‘Everyone has the right to their day in court — if they can pay for it’
‘What’s the difference between a good lawyer and a great one? A good lawyer knows the law. A great lawyer knows the judge’
The term ‘legal fiction’ calls into question the relationship between law, objectivity, and truth. On the one hand, law is the essential pillar of a functioning society. On the other, it is replete with anomalies both in conception and execution. To what extent can these perspectives be reconciled? High stakes are attached to this question.
Questioning claims of objectivity in the context of law.
Britain: Controversial funding arrangements for unnecessary Sizewell C nuclear project ?
 Sizewell C: government reignites £20bn nuclear power station row, Talks with EDF could lead to energy customers being charged for construction costs, Guardian, Jillian Ambrose Energy Energy correspondent, Tue 15 Dec 2020 The government has reignited a row over Britain’s nuclear energy ambitions by agreeing to restart talks with EDF over plans to build a reactor at Sizewell C in Suffolk.The talks could lead to the government taking a direct financial stake in the project before the end of the current parliamentary term in 2024, and using a new financial model that would make the public liable for cost overruns.
The formal negotiations over the £20bn nuclear plant will hinge on whether the French state-owned EDF can prove it has learned lessons from its Hinkley Point nuclear project in Somerset, and that a successor plant would offer the public value for money. If it succeeds it may be offered a multi-billion-pound deal that allows it to charge energy customers for the cost of construction while it builds the reactor, effectively putting bill payers on the hook for delays or cost overruns. Ed Miliband, Labour’s shadow business secretary, accused the government of “kicking big decisions into touch” and failing to offer a “definitive statement today one way or the other on financing, costs or an overall plan. The decision to restart talks is also expected to reopen a debate over whether nuclear energy can offer good value for money, and whether the UK needs new nuclear reactors to help meet a steep rise in demand for low-carbon electricity to power a boom in electric vehicles, induction hobs and heat pumps. …….. The decision to restart formal negotiations follows a hiatus in talks that have been dogged by concerns over cost, and the involvement of China General Nuclear Power (CGN), which owns 20% of the project. But environmental campaigners, including Greenpeace, have warned that nuclear reactors are “unnecessary” and expensive compared with renewable energy combined with battery storage technology. The community group Stop Sizewell added that the reactor posed a risk to the natural habitats along the Suffolk coast and the nearby Minsmere nature reserve. ……. The government said it would only consider playing a greater role in the Sizewell project if there was “clear value for money for consumers and taxpayers”. It is also planning to back a new generation of small modular nuclear reactors, or “mini nukes”, which can be built at a lower cost…… https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/dec/14/sizewell-c-government-talks-nuclear-power-station-edf-suffolk |
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European Leadership Network appeals to nuclear weapons States to reduce nuclear risks
Group statement | 14 December 2020
European Leadership Network ELN Group Statement: Appeal for P5 states to reduce nuclear weapons risks.
Over the past decade, geopolitical relations among the major powers have deteriorated and the threshold of nuclear use has lowered due to the near-total erosion of arms control, the modernisation of nuclear arsenals in all P5 states as well as a move, by some P5 states, to include “limited nuclear use” in their national security strategies. These developments, and the fiftieth anniversary of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty’s entry-into-force, are stark reminders of the risks stemming from nuclear weapons.
Against this strained security environment, the ELN has issued a group statement, signed by 140 security experts from 30 countries, calling upon the five recognised nuclear-weapon states by the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) – China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom, the United States (the P5) – to launch a sustained, open-ended and regular panel on strategic risk reduction.
Full statement reproduced below……….. (Many signatories from many States ) https://www.europeanleadershipnetwork.org/group-statement/eln-group-statement-appeal-for-p5-states-to-reduce-nuclear-weapons-risks/
UK’s Sizewell nuclear project could be a costly fiasco like Hinkley Point C
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Britain must tread with caution on new nuclear
The country’s first power plant in over 20 years is costly and late,THE EDITORIAL BOARD, Ft.com, 14 Dec 20, The government cannot afford a repeat of what happened with Hinkley Point. Thanks to spiralling construction costs and a controversial support system that guaranteed EDF and its junior partner, China’s CGN, a steep price for the electricity, it has become one of the most expensive nuclear reactor projects in the world. Under the 2013 deal, the coalition government agreed a price of £92.50 per megawatt hour for the electricity — at the time, close to double the wholesale price. The price is also indexed to inflation. Since then, the cost of renewables has plummeted, making Hinkley Point look even more expensive. ….. https://www.ft.com/content/b528ba1c-3e29-4472-89ef-6627b60b6b0c
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UK Sizewell nuclear project could be a costly fiasco like Hikley Point C
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Britain must tread with caution on new nuclear
The country’s first power plant in over 20 years is costly and late,THE EDITORIAL BOARD, Ft.com, 14 Dec 20 The government cannot afford a repeat of what happened with Hinkley Point. Thanks to spiralling construction costs and a controversial support system that guaranteed EDF and its junior partner, China’s CGN, a steep price for the electricity, it has become one of the most expensive nuclear reactor projects in the world. Under the 2013 deal, the coalition government agreed a price of £92.50 per megawatt hour for the electricity — at the time, close to double the wholesale price. The price is also indexed to inflation. Since then, the cost of renewables has plummeted, making Hinkley Point look even more expensive. ….. https://www.ft.com/content/b528ba1c-3e29-4472-89ef-6627b60b6b0c
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No “green light” for £20bn Sizewell nuclear project, but the UK govt “in talks” with EDF
Sizewell C: Government in talks to fund £20bn nuclear plant, BBC , By Roger Harrabin & Simon Read, 14 Dec 20, The government has begun talks with EDF about the construction of a new £20bn nuclear power plant in Suffolk…….. it has proved controversial with campaigners saying it is “ridiculously expensive” and that taxpayers will have to foot the bill for extra costs.
The government said any deal would be subject to approval on areas such as value for money and affordability.,,,,,,
The government said talks with EDF about Sizewell C would depend on the progress of the Hinkley Point C. However, that project is set to cost up to £2.9bn more than originally thought and will be up to 15 months late.
China General Nuclear Power has a 20% stake in Sizewell C but is thought to be planning to pull out after security concerns were raised about a Chinese state-owned company designing and running its own design nuclear reactor on UK soil…….
If it does pull out, it would increase the need for new investors. One option could be for the government to take a stake in the plant……
“We are starting negotiations with EDF, it is not a green light on the construction,” Business and Energy Secretary Alok Sharma told the BBC’s Today programme. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-55299511
Beware the nuclear road to nowhere
Nuclear power is the slowest and most expensive way to reduce carbon emissions, per kilowatt hour. Choosing new nuclear therefore impedes and supplants renewable energy development, which would save more carbon far sooner and faster and at a lower cost.
Beware the nuclear road to nowhere
Dear people of Anglesey:
The announcement that a US consortium, consisting of American companies Bechtel, Southern Company and Westinghouse, could take over the Wylfa B nuclear power project in North Wales, may sound like a much-needed jobs panacea, but it is another cruel joke on the people of Anglesey.
Horizon/Hitachi’s legacy of broken promises, destroyed homes and landscapes, and a 100% failure to deliver the promised two-reactor Wylfa B project, is already a bitter pill. Inking a new nuclear deal with the American consortium would turn it into a poison one. Trust me, we know. We’ve already swallowed it.
Here in the US, the track record of Bechtel, Southern Company, Westinghouse and the AP1000 reactor design, now being proposed for Wylfa B, should send a dire warning to Wales.
Westinghouse’s AP1000 two-reactor project at the V.C. Summer site in South Carolina ballooned to $9 billion in costs and bilked ratepayers of $2 billion before it was abandoned in 2017 after a 9-year debacle. The project’s director, Stephen Byrne, pled guilty to a massive nuclear conspiracy that defrauded ratepayers, deceived regulators and misled shareholders, but not before pocketing a tidy $6 million for himself.
The company’s former CEO, Kevin Marsh, has agreed to plead guilty to federal conspiracy fraud charges, will go to prison for at least 18 months, and will forfeit $5 million in connection with the $10 billion nuclear fiasco.
Southern Company’s “flagship” nuclear project at Plant Vogtle in Georgia, where two AP1000 reactors are still under construction, is now five years behind schedule with costs soaring to at least $28 billion, more than double the original projection. The site has recently suffered an epidemic of Covid-19, as the company rushes to meet completion deadlines and save additional costs.
Even $12 billion in federal loan guarantees wasn’t enough to keep the Georgia project afloat, so ratepayers are helping to foot the bill in advance under a law similar to the UK’s regulated asset base scheme, with no guarantee that the reactors will ever be finished.
Bechtel is no more reliable and was caught up in a 2016 lawsuit that led to a $126 million settlement for subpar work while building a nuclear waste treatment facility at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation.
Of course, that’s just the tip of Bechtel’s ugly iceberg. It, too, has seen company executives convicted of crimes, and was a key player in Iraq, before, during and after the US war there, helping to bring about the war in the first place, then scoring more than $680 million in contracts to help rebuild what it was complicit in destroying.
Efforts to find a new buyer for Wylfa B now that Hitachi, which owns the land, has decided to withdraw, are also rife with hollow promises. One such claim, that a revived Wylfa B would deliver electricity at a “market competitive price”, really means that Welsh electricity customers and British taxpayers will pay, because nuclear by itself isn’t competitive. That’s already borne out by the financial collapse of the AP1000 Moorside project in Cumbria, where weeds now obscure the NuScale sign at the abandoned site.
The false narrative put forward to justify resumption of nuclear construction at Wylfa B — that it is essential in order to reach a 2050 net zero emissions target — is disproven by reality: new nuclear power plants are by far the most expensive option, especially compared to the rapidly falling cost of renewables, and take far too long to tackle climate change, which is here, now.
Nuclear power is the slowest and most expensive way to reduce carbon emissions, per kilowatt hour. Choosing new nuclear therefore impedes and supplants renewable energy development, which would save more carbon far sooner and faster and at a lower cost.
Fortunately there are alternatives for the region, whose young people should not feel forced to leave to find work; whose farmers should be able to maintain their way of life; whose families should not have to watch their ancestral homes torn down; and whose local businesses could once again thrive.
Sustainable, Wales-based projects that employ local people in the long-term, while preserving language, culture and landscape, are abundantly possible. Many of these can be found in a new report from SAIL, which outlines a foundational economy for Ynes Môn — as Anglesey is more properly known in Welsh — and Gwynedd.
Reclaiming the Wylfa site to re-wild it would do more for climate change than a nuclear power plant and would attract visitors to its natural wonders, Heritage Coastline and extraordinary wildlife. More visitors in turn helps stimulate local businesses.
The island is even primed for new renewable energy projects, especially offshore wind, which again would provide much-needed, longterm employment.
There is no need for the people of Anglesey to be deceived once again by foreign corporations bearing false nuclear gifts that fail to materialize. Opening the door to Bechtel and co. will only lead to yet more environmental damage, and to more despair and disillusionment as, once again, promised nuclear jobs fail to materialize.
Anglesey can avoid being led down another garden path, soon to be overgrown with weeds, on the nuclear road to nowhere. It’s time for Anglesey Council to step up and say no to nuclear and commit to projects that will deliver safe, long-term jobs to the region without stealing money from the pockets of ratepayers and without wrecking the precious landscape they call home.
Linda Pentz Gunter is the international specialist at Beyond Nuclear and writes for and edits Beyond Nuclear International.
British government’s “perpetual” lack of knowledge about £130bn clean-up of 17 old nuclear sites.
Public accounts committee calls for ‘clearer discipline’ in managing sites, Nathalie Thomas in Edinburgh Ft.com NOVEMBER 27 2020 MPs have warned there is a “perpetual” lack of knowledge in government about the state of Britain’s 17 earliest nuclear power sites, which are expected to cost taxpayers about £130bn to clean up over the next 120 years.
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