The talks come less than a year before the expiration of New START, the last remaining nuclear arms control deal. The United States and Russia have entered a new phase of talks on nuclear arms control in Vienna, with working groups comprising government experts from both sides starting to meet for the first time.Over the course of three days, starting Tuesday, the groups of experts will deal with military doctrines and potentials, transparency and verification, as well as with security in space, according to the Russian foreign ministry.
The new format was set up in June in negotiations between US arms-control envoy Marshall Billingslea and Russia Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov in the Austrian capital.
The talks are taking place less than a year before the expiration of the New START agreement, the last remaining nuclear arms-control deal between the countries, which together possess about 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons.
The US-Russia Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, which had banned nuclear-capable, land-launched missiles with a range between 500km (310 miles) and 5,500km (3,417 miles), ended last year, after the US initiated a pull-out, accusing Moscow of cheating.
Washington also wants China to take part in the arms control negotiations, but Beijing has made it clear that it is not interested.
readers may wonder how UAMPS convinced some members to sign an “option” contract, which eventually converts to a “hell-or-high-water” contract, meaning that the buyer has no right, under any circumstances, to abandon the contract once construction, the Achilles heel of nuclear projects, is authorized.
Over 20 municipalities, primarily located in Utah, have signed a contract with Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems (UAMPS) to purchase entitlement shares for a first-of-a-kind nuclear power plant based on NuScale’s unproven small modular reactor (SMR) design. [and they’re not really small at all]
Ignoring the history of commercial nuclear plant construction, advocates have promoted the SMR project as a cost-effective energy resource without fully addressing the economic, contractual and litigation risks with stakeholders.
Between 1953 and 2008, approximately 250 commercial nuclear reactors were ordered in the United States. During this period, ratepayers (and investors) bore the burden for well over $200 billion (in 2009 dollars) in costs for completed and abandoned nuclear plants.
For example, one of the largest municipal bond defaults occurred in 1982 when the Washington Public Power Supply System defaulted on $2.25 billion in bonds for two nuclear power plant construction projects. In an effort to reduce their losses, bondholders sued a group of utilities (including several Idaho cities) that entered into contracts to pay for the plants.
However, the Vogtle project, supported with $12 billion in taxpayer-backed loan guarantees and plagued with cost overruns and delays, remains under construction.
Well, what about the UAMPS SMR project, including the $65 dollars per megawatt-hour (price cost of electricity) sales pitch?
During a 2018 Los Alamos County Council meeting, held to consider approval of the UAMPS power sales contract, a council member asked a UAMPS lawyer, “There’s been mention of a target of $65 a megawatt-hour. How did we come up with that number?” Another council member, probing into the terms of the contract, expressed additional concern. The councilor stated, “I feel like we’re being sold a bill of goods with $65 a megawatt-hour.”
With that said, readers may wonder how UAMPS convinced some members to sign an “option” contract, which eventually converts to a “hell-or-high-water” contract, meaning that the buyer has no right, under any circumstances, to abandon the contract once construction, the Achilles heel of nuclear projects, is authorized.
Having a similar concern, especially given the history of nuclear plant construction, a sincere effort was made to address project risks with the UAMPS SMR project chair, including sharing concerns about transparency and proposing possible ways to minimize risks to ratepayers, including contract modifications such as price guarantees and redefining the construction period. Unfortunately, my questions and concerns fell on deaf ears.
San Onofre Decommissioning Update https://www.kpbs.org/news/2020/jul/27/san-onofre-decommissioning-update/ Monday, July 27, 2020, ByAlison St John Work continues to dismantle the San Onofre nuclear power plant, which provided San Diego with 20% of its electricity until 2012 when it shut down prematurely, due to a radiation leak. The process of decommissioning the plant is more controversial than its 44 years in operation. The question is whether the high-level nuclear waste, which remains radioactive for tens of thousands of years, can be safely disposed of?
Rob Nikolewski, energy reporter for The San Diego Union-Tribune, has been following the progress of decommissioning and storing the radioactive waste.
Nikolewski said one very large chunk classified as low-level nuclear waste has already been transported to a storage site near Clive, Utah. The 770-ton reactor vessel was shipped by rail and a convoy of eight trucks across over 400 miles to its destination. Millions more pounds of low-level waste will be broken down into smaller pieces and transported to Clive, where the private company Energy Solutions has a licensed repository.
However the high-level waste — hundreds of spent fuel rods — remains on-site, since the federal government has failed to approve a long- term storage site for the nation’s high-level nuclear waste. Southern California Edison, which owns the plant, has nearly finished transferring canisters of highly radioactive spent fuel rods into over 70 concrete bunkers next to the beach.
Earlier this month the California Coastal Commission approved Edison’s permit for the decommissioning, including removing the cooling pools which originally held the stored spent fuel rods. The Commissioners reserved the right to review the permit in 15 years and if there is evidence of cracking or other problems such as sea-level rise that threaten the integrity of the canisters, the permit holder could be required to move them.
San Diego Congressman Mike Levin is concerned about the safety of the site, which is in his district and has millions of people living within 50 miles. Levin convened a task force that met for a year and recently came out with a report. One recommendation is that since the federal government has not approved a long-term storage site for high-level nuclear waste, the state of California should take more responsibility for how the nuclear waste is disposed of.
Nikolewski said he has not seen any evidence of state officials stepping forward to hold the companies accountable. He said federal law may need to be changed to allow for that.
The distinctive twin domes that are visible from the Interstate 5 will be removed sometime between 2025 and 2027, and decommissioning the plant, including removal of the low-level nuclear waste, should be complete within 6 to 8 years. The high-level waste will remain indefinitely, in bunkers near the beach.
On July 23, 2020, the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DCF) announced its intention to open the door to funding opportunities for nuclear projects abroad.
In a summary of its decision following a voluntary 30-day comment period, DCF announced that it has enabled “its full suite of finance products to support all civil nuclear projects that meet the United States’ highest safety security, and nonproliferation standards and laws.” In doing so, it modified the definition of “renewable energy” in its Environmental and Social Policy and Procedures (ESPP) to allow for consideration of nuclear projects.
The former ESPP specifically excluded nuclear power from the definition of renewable energy. Removing this prohibition aligns the definition with the United States Energy Information Administration’s definition, as discussed in our previous blog, “US Government Proposes to Lift Ban on Financing Nuclear Energy Projects Overseas.” DCF CEO Adam Boehler boasted that this decision will “accelerate growth in developing economies with limited energy resources,” after the proposal received over 800 comments with overwhelming support and bi-partisan participation.
……… Some comments did pose concerns that nuclear energy would not help those communities that lacked access to energy and argued the benefits of renewables over nuclear energy. However, DCF responded that it will continue to prioritize developing countries, pursuant to the BUILD Act.
Advancing U.S. Foreign Policy: Commenters largely viewed the proposed change as a way to increase U.S. competitiveness in the nuclear industry. … Additionally, comments discussed that DCF funding will carry great weight not only as a monetary mechanism, but also as a demonstration of government support.
Generating Returns for American Taxpayers: Comments that fell into this category were also largely supportive and posited that the proposed changes would lead to an increase in jobs as well as a return on investment to fund future nuclear research and development. While a few comments demonstrated concern that DCF might fund “unproven technologies”… https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/dcf-opens-door-to-fund-nuclear-power-61753/
Federal investigators seek records for nuclear bills introduced before Larry Householder became Ohio House speaker, By Andrew J. Tobias, cleveland.com, 27 Jul 20, COLUMBUS, Ohio — Federal investigators are eyeing several nuclear bailout bills, including House Bill 6 but also three previous iterations introduced before Larry Householder became Ohio House speaker.
A federal subpoena, obtained via a public-records request, seeks records related to four nuclear bailout bills. One is 2019′s HB6, which ultimately passed that year through what federal prosecutors have described as an elaborate corruption scheme funded by $60 million in FirstEnergy bribes. Three bills introduced in 2017 failed to progress significantly in the legislative process.
Two of the 2017 bills, House Bills 178 and 381, were sponsored by state Rep. Anthony DeVitis, a Republican from suburban Akron, near FirstEnergy’s corporate headquarters.
One, Senate Bill 128, was co-sponsored by Sen. John Eklund, a Geauga County Republican and then-Sen. Frank LaRose, a Hudson Republican who is now Ohio Secretary of State.
None of the bills’ sponsors have been accused of wrongdoing…….
All four bills sought to subsidize two Ohio nuclear plants owned by a former FirstEnergy subsidiary by tacking fees onto electricity customers’ bills. Previous versions of the bill failed to advance until Householder was elected speaker, with heavy financial backing by FirstEnergy, in January 2019. The final version of HB6 raised more than $1 billion, which company officials argued was needed to rescue the financially troubled plants.
Federal investigators also are seeking “all documents and items, including communications” related to public records issued to the House referencing or related to Householder.
The subpoena is dated July 20, the day before federal agents arrested Householder, his top political aide and three prominent lobbyists who all worked for a political enterprise federal investigators say was led by Householder. Federal agents say FirstEnergy provided $60 million for the enterprise, which first fielded legislative candidates who backed Householder for speaker, then passed HB6 and finally defended it against a repeal effort, in a “corrupt bargain” in return for Householder’s promise to secure the bailout….. www.cleveland.com/open/2020/07/federal-investigators-seek-records-for-nuclear-bills-introduced-before-larry-householder-became-ohio-house-speaker.html
A former executive of South Carolina utility Scana Corp has pleaded guilty to his role in what investigators called a “breathtaking” conspiracy to hide unresolvable problems in a project to build a $10bn nuclear power plant.
Stephen Byrne, 60, an executive vice president of Scana, repeatedly assured investors, taxpayers and state officials that two new units at the VC Summer nuclear power station would be finished in time to qualify for a federal nuclear production tax credit, worth up to $1.4bn, that is set to expire on 31 December this year.
Prosecutors said Byrne knew the scheme was hopelessly behind and over budget, but that his and co-conspirators’ deceptions allowed Scana to obtain rate increases from Scana’s customers to continue financing it.
“This conspiracy to defraud Scana customers is breathtaking in scope and audacity,” said FBI Special Agent in Charge Jody Norris. “The FBI remains committed to ensure all those responsible for this crime, which only served to enrich a few by robbing families and communities within South Carolina, are held accountable.”
Byrne, who was in charge of Scana’s nuclear work, agreed a plea deal with prosecutors and has been cooperating with investigators. He faces up to five years in prison.
Peter McCoy, US attorney for the district of South Carolina, told reporters outside the courtroom after the plea: “Today is a good start to years upon years of investigation, so we’re mighty proud about what happened here today.”
The project to add two reactors to the station was abandoned by Scana subsidiary SCE&G three years ago after it became mired in cost overruns and then fell foul of the collapse of Westinghouse, a subsidiary of Japanese engineer Toshiba, which was carrying out the work.
The first concrete pour for unit two was made in March 2013, making it the first reactor to start construction in the US in 30 years. The first concrete for unit three was completed in November of the same year. However, the original $9.8bn cost of the scheme had increased to roughly $25bn by 2017.
As an example of Byrne’s deception, prosecutors gave evidence that in July 2016, Byrne submitted written testimony to the South Carolina Public Service Commission, the Office of Regulatory Staff and the public stating that the construction schedule was “logical and appropriate” when Byrne knew it was unreliable and unlikely to be achieved.
As part of the plea deal, the Virginia-based utility Dominion Energy, which acquired Scana in 2018, will provide $4bn to state rate-payers as damages for criminal activity that took place in 2015 and 2016.
The US Securities and Exchange Commission filed a second lawsuit against Byrne and former Scana chief executive Kevin Marsh in February, also connected with misleading statements about progress at VC Summer.
Byrne joined Scana in 1995 and has more than 30 years’ experience in the utility industry. He has been released pending sentencing.
Image: The second containment vessel ring being placed on unit two in February 2017 (Santee Cooper)
Faults Cited After A 2008 Nuclear Carrier Fire Exacerbated The Bonhomme Richard Conflagration, Forbes, Craig Hooper, Senior Contributor, 27 Jul 20,In the aftermath of the disastrous fire aboard the USS Bonhomme Richard (LHD-6) the U.S. Navy is cracking down on lax waterfront safety practices. This is not enough. Unless the U.S. Navy wants to risk a repeat of the Bonhomme Richard fire at sea, the Navy’s safety standup must extend beyond the pier, encompassing fire safety across the entire Navy enterprise.
As the USS Bonhomme Richard fire—and as at least 4 other major pier-side fires have demonstrated since a shipyard arsonist torched the attack submarine USS Miami (SSN-755) in 2012—the pier is a dangerous place for any naval vessel. Earlier in the month, as the wrecked amphibious assault ship still smoldered, the Navy’s waterfront chronic safety culture shortcomings were re-emphasized and emphasized again after workers inexplicably sparked two minor fires aboard the amphibious assault ship USS Kearsarge(LHD-3)and America’s undelivered super carrier, the John F. Kennedy (CVN-79).
The Navy’s pier-side safety standup is as welcome as it is overdue. . But the Navy also needs to take a closer look at fire safety at sea and throughout the enterprise. In the past month, far too many have sought to minimize safety culture,……………
Conclusion:
The fact that the Navy is moving so quickly to address almost exactly the same deficiencies as those identified after the 2008 fire aboard the USS George Washington is concerning. At a minimum, it suggests that most of the firefighting deficiencies and lax pier-side safety culture that contributed to the demise of the USS Bonhomme Richard are well-known and widely disseminated across the Navy enterprise.
The fact that exactly the same firefighting and safety deficiencies still exist little more than decade after a fire sidelined an underway and strategically critical U.S. Navy platform is inexplicable. The lack of urgency in driving and sustaining a solution to the Navy’s lax fire safety culture is mind-boggling. This is a massive vulnerability. And with Navy’s fire safety proven to be a large—and systemic—national security risk, America must assume sophisticated rivals have noted the Navy’s lax safety culture and are currently targeting these vulnerabilities at individual, command and enterprise levels.
If a rival knows that the persistent encouragement of bad safety practices and the deliberate minimization of real safety risks can effectively sink a carrier for less than the cost of a single carrier-killing missile, there is no reason not to try it.
Ohio’s nuclear plants face new uncertainty as HB 6 comes under attack, Crains Cleveland Business,DAN SHINGLER 26 Jul 20, So what happens to Ohio and its nuclear plants now?
It’s becoming apparent that 2019’s House Bill 6, the now-tainted law that provides about $150 million a year in subsidies primarily to Ohio’s two nuclear plants, likely will be repealed.
But will it be replaced? And if so, will the plants, which Ohioans were told would close without the subsidies, be saved?
Those are questions now causing angst from Columbus, where state lawmakers are grappling with the issue, to the Toledo area and Lake County, where the affected Davis-Besse and Perry nuclear plants are respectively located. The companies involved, FirstEnergy Corp. of Akron and its former subsidiary, Energy Harbor, which owns the plants, have yet to say how they might address the matter and have declined interview requests.
Legislators, economic developers and others across the state expressed their disgust with the situation — which already has become one of the largest scandals in Ohio’s history and resulted in the July 21 arrest of House Speaker Larry Householder and four others for what federal officials say was a $60 million bribery scheme to pass the law…….
Cirino said he would like to see HB 6’s subsidies remain in place, but he’s resigned to the bill likely being repealed. A number of lawmakers have already announced legislation to undo HB 6, and Gov. Mike DeWine, who said he supported keeping the law in place when the scandal broke, had reversed course by July 23 and joined calls for it to be repealed. ………
some GOP lawmakers working to repeal HB 6 are expressing support for renewables.
“Renewable energy in the long run will save the consumer a lot of money, in addition to the job development,” said Rep. Laura Lanese, R-Grove City, who is working on legislation to repeal HB 6. She and other lawmakers, from both parties, are calling for Ohio to start over on a new energy policy.
Alaska is getting wetter. That’s bad news for permafrost and the climate. UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO AT BOULDER EurekAlert 26 Jul 20,Alaska is getting wetter. A new study spells out what that means for the permafrost that underlies about 85% of the state, and the consequences for Earth’s global climate.
The study, published today in Nature Publishing Group journal Climate and Atmospheric Science, is the first to compare how rainfall is affecting permafrost thaw across time, space, and a variety of ecosystems. It shows that increased summer rainfall is degrading permafrost across the state.
As Siberia remains in the headlines for record-setting heat waves and wildfires, Alaska is experiencing the rainiest five years in its century-long meteorological record. Extreme weather on both ends of the spectrum–hot and dry versus cool and wet–are driven by an aspect of climate change called Arctic amplification. As the earth warms, temperatures in the Arctic rise faster than the global average.
While the physical basis of Arctic amplification is well understood, it is less known how it will affect the permafrost that underlies about a quarter of the Northern Hemisphere, including most of Alaska. Permafrost locks about twice the carbon that is currently in the atmosphere into long-term storage and supports Northern infrastructure like roads and buildings; so understanding how a changing climate will affect it is crucial for both people living in the Arctic and those in lower latitudes. ……… https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-07/uoca-aig072420.php
The U.S. Department of Energy put out the formal request to build what it calls a fission surface power system that could allow humans to live for long periods in harsh space environments.
The Idaho National Laboratory, a nuclear research facility in eastern Idaho, the Energy Department and NASA will evaluate the ideas for developing the reactor.
The lab has been leading the way in the U.S. on advanced reactors, some of them micro reactors and others that can operate without water for cooling. Water-cooled nuclear reactors are the vast majority of reactors on Earth.
“Small nuclear reactors can provide the power capability necessary for space exploration missions of interest to the Federal government,” the Energy Department wrote in the notice published Friday.
The Energy Department, NASA and Battelle Energy Alliance, the U.S. contractor that manages the Idaho National Laboratory, plan to hold a government-industry webcast technical meeting in August concerning expectations for the program.
The plan has two phases. The first is developing a reactor design. The second is building a test reactor, a second reactor be sent to the moon, and developing a flight system and lander that can transport the reactor to the moon. The goal is to have a reactor, flight system and lander ready to go by the end of 2026.
The reactor must be able to generate an uninterrupted electricity output of at least 10 kilowatts. The average U.S. residential home, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, uses about 11,000 kilowatt-hours per year. The Energy Department said it would likely take multiple linked reactors to meet power needs on the moon or Mars.
In addition, the reactor cannot weigh more than 7,700 pounds (3,500 kilograms), be able to operate in space, operate mostly autonomously, and run for at least 10 years.
“This may drive or start an international space race to build and deploy new types of reactors requiring highly enriched uranium.”
– Edwin Lyman, director of Nuclear Power Safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists
The Energy Department said the reactor is intended to support exploration in the south polar region of the moon. The agency said a specific region on the Martian surface for exploration has not yet been identified.
Edwin Lyman, director of Nuclear Power Safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit, said his organization is concerned the parameters of the design and timeline make the most likely reactors those that use highly enriched uranium, which can be made into weapons. Nations have generally been attempting to reduce the amount of enriched uranium being produced for that reason.
“This may drive or start an international space race to build and deploy new types of reactors requiring highly enriched uranium,” he said.
Earlier this week, the United Arab Emirates launched an orbiter to Mars and China launched an orbiter, lander and rover. The U.S. has already landed rovers on the red planet and is planning to send another next week.
Officials say operating a nuclear reactor on the moon would be a first step to building a modified version to operate in the different conditions found on Mars.
“Idaho National Laboratory has a central role in emphasizing the United States’ global leadership in nuclear innovation, with the anticipated demonstration of advanced reactors on the INL site,” John Wagner, associate laboratory director of INL’s Nuclear Science & Technology Directorate, said in a statement. “The prospect of deploying an advanced reactor to the lunar surface is as exciting as it is challenging.”
But communities downwind from the first atomic test in the New Mexico desert on July 16, 1945, are still holding out for compensation for health effects that they say have been ongoing for generations due to fallout from the historic blast.
So far, their pleas for Congress to extend and expand a federal radiation compensation program have gone unanswered. The program currently covers workers who became sick as a result of the radiation hazards of their jobs and those who lived downwind of the Nevada Test Site.
Those excluded from the program include residents downwind of the Trinity Site in New Mexico, additional downwinders in Nevada, veterans who cleaned up radioactive waste in the Marshall Islands and others.
Tina Cordova, a cancer survivor and co-founder of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium, said the excuse always has been that the federal government doesn’t have enough money to take care of those affected.
She said the need is even greater now since the coronavirus is disproportionately affecting those with underlying health conditions and downwinders fall into the category because of their compromised health
“When you talk about enhancing plutonium pit production and defense spending in the trillions, you can’t tell us there’s not enough money to do this,” she told The Associated Press. “You can’t expect us to accept that any longer and that adds insult to injury. It’s as if we count for nothing.”
U.S. Rep. Ben Ray Lujan, the New Mexico Democrat who advocated for the apology, continues to push for amendments to the radiation compensation program. His office recently convened a meeting among downwinders, uranium miners, tribal members, other advocates and staff in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office.
“The congressman believes that the need for medical and monetary compensation has never been more urgent,” said Monica Garcia, a spokeswoman for the congressman.
The discussions come as the New START treaty between the U.S. and Russia nears expiration in 2021. Russia has offered to extend the nuclear arms control agreement while the Trump administration has pushed for a new pact that would also include China.
While the U.S. House has adopted language that would prohibit spending to conduct or make preparations for any live nuclear weapons tests, a group of senators has included $10 million for such an effort in that chamber’s version of the bill.
The Union of Concerned Scientists, nuclear watchdogs and environmentalists all are pushing for the funding to be eliminated. They sent letters this week in opposition and plan to lobby lawmakers.
“A U.S. resumption of nuclear testing would set off an unpredictable and destabilizing international chain reaction that would undermine U.S. security,” reads one letter.
Kevin Davis with the Union of Concerned Scientists’ global security program said resuming live testing would be unnecessary because the U.S. has been able to do sub-critical experiments and use its super computers along with data from past testing to run simulations on the nation’s nuclear stockpile.
The last full-scale underground test was done Sept. 23, 1992, by scientists with Los Alamos National Laboratory at the Nevada Test Site northwest of Las Vegas. Less than two weeks later, then President George H.W. Bush signed legislation mandating a moratorium on U.S. underground nuclear testing.
Democrat Rep. Ben McAdams of Utah is among those leading the effort to ban spending for testing. He said thousands of residents in his state are still dealing with trauma and illness as a result of previous testing.
Dozens of groups also signed on to a letter sent to congressional leaders in May advocating for the expansion of the radiation compensation program.
“We can’t continue to allow the government to walk away from their responsibility,” Cordova said.
It’s been a bit of a Watergate week for nuclear power, with individuals in two states arrested for criminally defrauding the public to keep nuclear power alive. In Ohio, it was public officials, backed by nuclear company money, who illegally orchestrated a massive subsidy. In South Carolina, it was the arrest of an energy company official who has pled guilty to a $9 billion nuclear fraud. This week, we feature the Ohio story. Next week, it will be South Carolina’s turn.
If you were going to pull someone out of central casting to play a thuggish villain, you would choose Larry Householder. But he wouldn’t need any acting skills.
On July 21, Householder, along with four others, was arrested for his alleged involvement in what amounts to the biggest criminal racketeering conspiracy in Ohio history. Somehow it’s not a surprise that it revolved around pots of money to keep two aging and unaffordable nuclear power plants open.
While Householder may physically embody everyone’s idea of a gangster, it’s not his official profession. He is — and presumably that will soon be a “was” — the Speaker of the Ohio House of Representatives.
The scheme is laid bare in an 81-page criminal complaint. It was busted open by a year-long, detailed and covert investigation by the US Attorney’s office and the FBI, and involves the flow of $61 million of dark money directed toward activities that would ensure the passage of legislation in Ohio guaranteeing the bailout of the Davis-Besse and Perry nuclear reactors to the tune of $1.5 billion. The subsidy is being funded via a surcharge on electricity customers.
The bill, known as HB6, also slashed mandates for wind and solar energy and eliminated energy efficiency requirements. It was, as David Roberts described it on Vox just after the bill passed in July 2019, “the worst piece of legislation in the 21st century” and “the most counterproductive and corrupt piece of state energy legislation I can recall in all my time covering this stuff.”
FirstEnergy Solutions, the then owner of the plants, had threatened their closure if the subsidy was not forthcoming.
That ultimatum set in motion a breathtaking sequence of criminal activities beginning in 2018, with the $61 million slush fund first used to bankroll political elections, then to ensure sufficient votes for the July 2019 passage of HB 6, and finally the sometimes violent suppression of citizen efforts to overturn it.
Millions of dollars went into the campaign war chests of 21 political candidates, in order to stack the House with friendly votes for the subsequent nuclear bailout bill. (Only one ended up voting against it.) The money also shored up Householder’s successful bid to regain the House Speakership.
The money also went into the personal pockets of the co-conspirators, although the exact amounts and their purposes are still being investigated. As events unfold we may also learn whether votes in favor of HB6 were “bought” by Householder.
As the story is far from over, more arrests will almost certainly follow. And more news on this will continue to break. By necessity, this can only be a glimpse of the story so far.
The crimes with which Householder and four political advisors and lobbyists have been charged constitute “a shameful betrayal of public trust,” said FBI special agent, Chris Hoffman during a July 21 press conference announcing the arrests and indictment.
It was also, “likely the largest bribery money-laundering scheme ever perpetrated against the people of the state of Ohio,” said US Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio, David DeVillers at the same press conference, whose department led the investigation alongside the FBI.
But whose money was it?
The racketeering scheme that the justice department uncovered found a money trail of $61 million flowing from what they are required to call “Company A” in the indictment, into a 501(c)(4) fund named Generation Now. Generation Now has also been charged with racketeering conspiracy.
“Company A” is FirstEnergy, whose subsidiary, FirstEnergy Solutions (FES) was the then owner of the crumbling and uneconomical Davis-Besse and Perry reactors. (They are now owned by yet another spin-off, Energy Harbor).
Although FirstEnergy has been served with subpoenas, so far no one there has been named in the indictment. And while the company clearly handed out the $61 million, DeVillers said of the web of conspirators that “this enterprise went looking for someone to bribe them”.
Meanwhile, the money trail that led from FirstEnergy to Larry Householder’s pocket and others’ was deftly concealed. As DeVillers described it, the entire scheme was “created completely and utterly to hide where there donor came from and [who it] was.”
Generation Now, as a 501(c)(4), was not obliged to declare the source of its funding. If it had been, said DeVillers at the press conference, the criminal enterprise it operated could never have happened. Despite its name, DeVillers said, “make no mistake, this is Larry Householder’s 501(c)(4).”
And a Republican-led operation. Generation Now’s treasurer is D. Eric Lycan, a Lexington, KY attorney with ties to the Kentucky House Republican Leadership Caucus. In addition to the ad buys Generation Now made for FirstEnergy, it also made them for an entity called Strategic Media Placement, run by GOP operative, Rex Elass. As DeVillers told the media as he pointed to a rather simple flow chart displayed at the press conference, “the real one would have covered this whole wall.”
FBI special agent Hoffman lumped Householder and his cronies in with FBI usual suspects like “gangs, child sex trafficking and Chinese spies,” but said that “public corruption is actually the top criminal priority for the FBI.”
But it should not be the priority for the US Attorney’s office. DeVillers, a Republican and Trump appointee, could not suppress his anger as he told reporters that his district is already struggling with limited resources and “a massive overdose epidemic where you’ve got people dying of overdoses of fentanyl, people stacked up like cord wood at a coroner’s office, we’ve got violent crime sky-rocketing, we’ve got two Franklin County sheriff’s deputies shot this morning.”
And yet, he continued, “we have to take our resources away from those real victim cases and investigate and prosecute some politicians who just won’t do their damn job.”
Chinese spies were in fact part of the Generation Now misinformation campaign, a scare tactic used to derail efforts by a coalition called Ohioans Against Corporate Bailouts (OACB), which launched a petition drive to repeal HB6.
A FirstEnergy/Householder front group ran scaremongering “yellow peril” ads to deter people from signing a petition that would have reversed the nuclear bailout bill, HB6
As petitioners took to the streets, attempting to gather enough signatures to get a repeal of HB6 onto a November ballot, a smear campaign suggested that, among other things, the petition gatherers were in the payroll of Chinese government operatives who were “quietly invading our American electric grid” and that if you signed the HB6 repeal petition, the Chinese government would be capturing “your name, your address, your signature”. National security would be at risk.
Most ludicrously, the Chinese scare ad, put together by Ohioans for Energy Security (in reality a front group funded by Generation Now) suggested China, and by definition the ballot petitioners, were “taking Ohio money,” which is precisely what the Householder racket was doing.
It worked. OACB eventually ran out of time and petition gatherers, with some having been bought off with a portion of the $61 million. In October 2019, OACB withdrew the initiative, which is when HB6 effectively became law. And it still is.
That’s the worst part of the news. Householder and others may pay a fine, or even see jail time, but the people of Ohio remain in danger. Davis-Besse and Perry are two of the most seriously degraded reactors in the country and should have been shut down long ago.
If Davis-Besse suffered a serious meltdown, there could be “1,400 peak early fatalities, 73,000 peak early injuries, 10,000 peak cancer deaths, and $84 billion in property damage,” according to Beyond Nuclear’s Kevin Kamps, citing a 1982 study by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. With populations having soared since then, today’s figures would be far higher, he pointed out.
Likewise, the Perry plant’s numbers would be well above the 5,500 acute radiation deaths, 180,000 radiation injuries, 14,000 latent cancer fatalities, and $102 billion in property damage, cited in the 1982 study, should that reactor suffer a major accident.
The $1.5 billion subsidy, says Toledo public interest attorney, Terry Lodge, “didn’t go to ensure safe nuclear plant operations for the next five years, but instead was paid to investors as dividends once the FirstEnergy bailout was over.”
However, it looks unlikely that HB6 will be undone, despite the criminal machinations behind its passage. While Howard Learner, executive director of the Chicago-based Environmental Law & Policy Center, told the Toledo Blade that the Ohio bailout “should not remain in effect if obtained through bribery or other means”, it would have to be nullified by the legislature itself, an action for which there seems little political inclination.
One reason for that reluctance could be yet one more sinister discovery. Prior to the vote on HB6, a Trump operative, Bob Paduchik had pressured “at least five members of the Ohio House of Representatives,” to vote ‘yes’ on HR6, according to Politico. “The message is that if we have these plants shut down we can’t get Trump reelected,” one senior legislative source told Politico.
As DeVillers said: “We’re not done with this case.”
How bankrupt US nuclear financing schemes are going to be used to fund nuclear power in the UK to fund nuclear power. https://100percentrenewableuk.org/blogby David Toke 24 July, 20 As different types of corrupt pro-nuclear handouts in the USA unravel the British Government is expected to support bringing in a legalised version of bankrupt US nuclear financing practices to fund Sizewell C nuclear power plant.
The US nuclear power industry is in danger of implosion as corrupt practices used to maintain its old power plant and pay for new plant are the subject of prosecutions. In Ohio the Speaker of the House of Representatives has been arrested on account of charges that he was bribed to ensure that nuclear power and coal plant in Ohio were given bailouts whilst policies supporting renewable energy and energy efficiency were cut back.
Meanwhile in South Carolina the Securities and Exchange Committee has charged executives of the State’s monopoly utility with fraud after the abandonment of two of the only four nuclear reactors whose construction has been started in the USA this century. According to the Wall Street Journal: ‘The defendants claimed the project was on track even though they knew it was significantly delayed and wouldn’t be completed on time by Jan. 1, 2021, to qualify for $1.4 billion of federal tax credits, the securities regulator alleged’. In the process the electricity consumers were charges billions of dollars for the power plant which were not built through a similar cost recovery process that is proposed for the UK.
Over to Florida, and while nobody has been charged with any offences there is great controversy over the way the dominant state utility has charged the electricity consumer for a nuclear power plant that was never built. In this case they never even got as far as breaking ground, but the consumers had to pay out $871 million as well as lots more money for other bungled projects relating to nuclear energy. Florida, like other US states has simultaneously erected huge barriers stopping homeowners (in the so-called ‘Sunshine State’) from putting solar panels on their roofs.
According to the New York Times: ‘Florida is one of eight states that prohibit the sale of solar electricity directly to consumers unless the provider is a utility. There is also a state rule, enforced by the utilities, requiring expensive insurance policies for big solar arrays on houses’.
Meanwhile in Georgia, the third state to use the cost recovery method for financing nuclear plant, the only two nuclear power plant being built in the USA (Vogtle III and IV) are hopelessly delayed with massive cost overruns, again, yes you’ve guessed it, with costs paid by electricity consumers.
Of course all of these real or abandoned nuclear plant were financed under the so-called Regulated Asset Base (RAB) model that is being slated to pay for Sizewell C in the UK. This is hailed as a much cheaper way to pay for nuclear power compared with the way that Hinkley C is financed. Cheaper, for the developer (in this case EDF), certainly, but for the electricity consumer it’s a disaster! The consumer, as the US experience clearly illustrates, starts paying and continues paying for a nuclear power plant long before it is generating any energy, and there is no guarantee even that it will ever generate anything! But the consumer still pays, no matter what the constructions cost overruns turn out to be! And invariably, with nuclear power plant, there are very large cost overruns.
Added to this of course the bias in favour of new nuclear as opposed to new renewable energy schemes is also assured. The contracts nuclear power are being given assure them that they will get paid the premium price for energy generated even if wholesale electricity prices are negative whereas windfarms and solar farms will get nothing in such circumstances. See our report on this. Of course there’s nothing illegal in this because mountains of impenetrable contractual and accountancy paperwork make it so. It is just written by the the people who have the energy establishment’s interests at heart.
Ohio House Republicans introduce legislation to repeal controversial bailout of nuclear power plants, Cleveland 19 News, Jim Nelson | July 23, 2020 COLUMBUS, Ohio (WOIO) – A pair of republican members of the Ohio House of Representatives are introducing a bill to repeal House Bill 6, the controversial bailout of the state’s nuclear power plants now at the center of a bombshell corruption scandal.
“Not only because it was bad policy from the start, but because we need to reassure Ohioans that their representatives, be they democrat or republican, are truly working in their interest,” said Rep. Laura Lanese (R-Grove City).
She, along with Rep. Mark Romanchuk (R-Ontario), will co-sponsor the bill.
Federal investigators say the passage of the controversial legislation was helped by a phony social welfare organization, orchestrated by House Speaker Larry Householder.
They say $61 million was funneled through the organization to Householder and his associates, who in turn helped elect 21 members of the Ohio House of Representatives.
Nearly all of them voted in favor of the bailout.
“House Bill 6 was bad policy from the start,” Lanese said. “From the beginning to the middle through the end, this legislation has been tainted.”
Neither Lanese nor Romanchuk supported the bill.
Romanchuk was not at the Thursday news conference held in Columbus, where Lanese stressed the importance of coming up with a new energy solution.
“Many of my house colleagues are not against nuclear energy. We are part of the ‘all of the above’ policy. This is not about kicking out nuclear energy or destroying jobs,” she said. “I would like to see [that] we include a lot of the clean energy portfolio pieces that were part of the last general assembly’s legislation. Those were taken out in this piece.”
“We did have a lot of support for energy efficiency and renewable energy,” she pointed out……..
While Householder is the only elected official implicated in the criminal complaint, released on Tuesday by the U.S. Attorneys Office, there is speculation that others could be more deeply involved. …….
Former SCANA executive pleads guilty to fraud charges tied to failed SC nuclear project, Post and Courier By Andrew Brown and Avery G. Wilks abrown@postandcourier.com; awilks@postandcourier.com, Jul 23, 2020COLUMBIA — Federal prosecutors locked in a valuable witness Thursday who will give them insights and advantages as they continue to bring charges against the leaders of a failed $9 billion nuclear expansion project in South Carolina.
Steve Byrne, the former vice president of Cayce-based SCANA Corp., pleaded guilty in federal court to defrauding electric customers and lying about construction progress as the company tried to build two nuclear reactors at the V.C. Summer Nuclear Station in Fairfield County.
The guilty plea requires Byrne, 60, to cooperate with federal prosecutors who have spent three years investigating the project’s sudden abandonment in July 2017. The construction failure cost South Carolina electric ratepayers billions of dollars in higher power bills. SCANA’s shareholders also suffered huge losses when the company’s stock value tanked. The company was ultimately sold at a bargain price to Virginia-based Dominion Energy.
On Thursday, Byrne admitted to falsely telling regulators, investors and the public the project was on track in order to win rate hikes on customers and keep the venture going while failing to raise alarms about critical flaws that were dooming the expansion effort.
By pleading guilty, Byrne is hoping to avoid a stiffer sentence. The fraud charges he pleaded to can still carry up to five years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release afterward.
He could also be required to forfeit up to $1 million in pay and bonuses tied to his performance when he oversaw the V.C. Summer venture.
For now, Byrne will remain out of jail. A federal magistrate released him on $25,000 bail and required Byrne, who owns a home on the Isle of Palms, to surrender his passport. He will need permission from federal parole officials to leave the state for consulting work or special occasions.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Shiva Hodges said she was providing leniency because it could take years for a judge to issue Byrne’s sentence, which will come at the end of a federal investigation targeting other SCANA officials…….
Byrne will have more to say as the V.C. Summer investigation progresses. SCANA’s former No. 2 official is expected to be a star witness in future trials or grand jury proceedings involving other officials who oversaw the project.
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