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Britain's
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| Home | Opinion | The
Voice of Experience (this page) |
Editorial |
Up-date: 9/3/2010 Amazingly (leastways, to us) is the oft-repeated statement that no-one has ever died as a result of working in the nuclear industry. We know from past records of the 1950s and early 60s that death certificates did actually link some deaths with working with radioactive materials and consequence exposure to that. When things got a little uncomfortable for the industry the root cause was usually ignored, and the specfic cause entered on the record. Having come across a reiteration of the statement recently in correspondence in a local paper, we asked Lord Hunt, Deputy Leader of the House of Lords, just how many people had died or been made ill as a result of working in the industry. He has (after only two month's delay) now told us that since 1982 [when the compensation scheme started] there have been 124 successful claims. He adds that it is not possible to ascertain, either medically or technically why a cancer is caused. We have to note that these 124 people must have been employed by the industry in order to benefit from the scheme. The question remains, therefore, how many other unfortunates have suffered as a result of the pollution but are nonetheless excluded from the scheme! Watching the Inquiry into the future of the nuclear industry in the north west, we have to wonder how Phil Woolas, M.P. , can justify his repeated assertion that the Cumbrian public are overwhelmingly in favour of future developments. Not judging from the meetings we've been to, they aren't. A FOI request for the evidence has been submitted. Mr. Woolas also has problems with the number of people who will find employment as a a result of any proposed expansion. Shady deals have already been done between the government and EdF, with much bargaining and jockeying for position. We are sure that there is no connection between the perceived favourable treatment of EdF and the fact that it employs ministers and their relatives. However, apparently the government has achieved success in that EdF has now agreed that 50% of the permanent workforce will be from this country. (A bit of a hazy concept?) Of that 50% a further 50% (i.e. 25% of the whole) will be Cumbrians. Figures given by Woolas were 5,000 construction workers and 600 - 1,000 operators. Somewhat of a discrepancy between that and the 100,000 talked about by a local MP. Mind you, that one had a financial interest, having just allocated many millions of pounds of taxpayers money in a contract just before joining the company he was responsible for handing the contract to. Apparently the government have been debating how much the can chip in to assist these foreign companies to develop their unwanted nuclear power stations in remote areas. Strange when the planning guidance has always made the developer liable for any infrastructure improvements required as a result of their proposals. Healthcare in west Cumbria might be a little behind the requirements in the event of nuclear development. Being linked to the population levels, there will need to be an influx of people before the funding reaches a sufficiently high level for an increase in healthcare funding. This may be as much as three or four years at best. On the positive side, once the construction work has been done (don't be ill during this phase!) and the builders have moved on, waiting lists should come tumbling down. Residents can be reassured that Mr. Woolas has a firm grip on what infra-structure changes will be required to enable the proposed nuclear new-build in the north-west: better broadband connections and improvements to the A599, according to his evidence to the inquiry. They are going to need very broad broadband to get cement mixers on-site down these country lanes! - Oh and the high-speed railway line will help things along. Except that it won't serve Cumbria at all, other than as a blur on the landscape. High-speed trains don't stop any more than is absolutely necessary for revenue purposes. So it will be Glasgow to Manchester or Crewe, and then on to London. However, that is all academic now, as Lord Adonis announced the high speed railway line will be built between London and Birmingham. This will save a whopping 15 minutes on the journey and destroy a fair bit of the Chilterns, but what the heck. It is a start. Or rather, it will be, once the crossrail link had been completed. We note below some recent French mishaps and, elsewhere, the long catalogue of "incidents" at Sellafield. Just to prove that these are not isolated events, we would point to the fire at Hinkley B Power Station, near Bridgewater, Somerset on 25th November, 2009: Nuclear reactor fire probed Engineers are investigating a fire which shut down a nuclear power station. The active reactor at Dungeness B in Kent, was taken offline after the blaze broke out in a boiler annexe on Monday night. Operator British Energy said there was no risk to the public and there was no release of radioactive material as a result of the fire. Experts were on site trying to find out what happened. A British Energy spokeswoman said: "They are looking at the cause of the fire and will be bringing the reactor back online as soon as possible." All 52 staff on site were accounted for after the fire and there were no casualties. Other Notes: The Times 22 Dec 08 - Npower fined £1.8M for mis-selling gas and electricity to domestic customers. Npower agents lied to customers by telling them that they worked for 'the electricity board', and by inducing customers to sign legally binding contracts by claiming that they were non-binding. The Times 14 Dec 08 - RWE Npower seeks to pull out of investments in windfarms, including the one at Gwint y Mor in Wales, and the 'London array' in the Thames estuary. Nov 08 - RWE Npower and EDF are setting up a joint company called Horizon Nuclear Power, for the joint exploitation by the two companies of the sites at Oldbury in Gloucestershire and Wylfa in Wales for new nuclear power stations. Westinghouse reactors are only 33% efficient, which means that nearly 60% of the heat generated gets dumped in the sea. Multiply that by the number of reactors feeding into the area and wonder what effect it will have on the various currents which affect our shores! Nuclear Energy Design Faults Private Eye, 1248, 30th October to 12th November, 2009 |
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| One of the two nuclear reactor
designs being proposed for Britain's atomic renaissance is already in
trouble with safety inspectors in the United States. The UK's Nuclear Installations Inspectorate is working on generic approvals for two reactor designs in an effort to speed up the country's nuclear "new build". Once the generic approvals are made, compaines are free to build either design without further safety checks. But last month the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission cast a shadow over one of the designs by questionning the safety of the Westinghouse AP1000. US regulators rejected Westinghouse's design of the AP 1000's shield, which protects the nuclear reactor from severe weather and provides a radiation barrier during normal operations. Plans for new nuclear plants are more advanced in the US than in the UK, and power firms there have already asked for licences to build 12 AP 1000s across the southern states. |
Meanwhile the other reactor
under consideration for the UK, Areva's
"European Pressurised Reactor", or EPR, is currently being built in
Finland and France. In both countries the EPR is already running
over
budget and late because of quality issues concerning the reactor
structure. Thus it is that both reactors lined up for Britain
have
problems. Any difficulty can be overcome by extra spending, but
this
makes promises that Britain will build a new generation of nuclear
power stations without public subsidy look less convincing. Government can of course introduce disguised subsidies by manipulating the "carbon tax" or by taking on more public liability for cleaning up after the power stations close. Helpfully, the nuclear industry has direct routes into Number 10 to press its case. The generic safety case for Areva's EPR was jointly published with its partner, French power firm EDF, with one Andrew Brown acting as chief contact. Andrew is, of course, Gordon's brother, who when not promoting nuclear reactors arranges the cleaning of the prime minister's flat. |
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Nuclear Expansion HSE Spells Trouble Private
Eye, 1249, 13th November to 26th November, 2009
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| Energy secretary Ed Miliband
seems more determined than ever to push through a raft of new nuclear
power stations - even though the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has,
like its US equivalent, now raised serious concerns about the
Westinghouse AP1000 nuclear reactor (See
last Eye.) The AP1000 is supposedly one of the two destined to fuel Britain's nuclear renaissance. The HSE's questions about the reactor, which come after the American Nuclear Regulatory Commission said the design was not secure enough, are raised in the HSE's latest "Generic Design Assessment(GDA)" progress report. In order to speed things up, the HSE and Environment Agency are trying to approve "generic" designs for two reactors in advance so power companies can start building them without having to get each power station approved individually. But parts of the report, spotted by Building magazine, show that Westinghouse is not helping. The HSE flashed up various "red indicators", including inspector's worries about Westinghouse's approach to civil engineering, saying: "Progress remains slow in providing adequate responses to our questions on design codes and standards. We have not seen evidence that the civil structure design conforms to the kind of design standards we would expect to be applied to new nuclear construction." The inspectors wanted details of new pressure valves but "to date, Westinghouse have shown little |
progress in addressing our
concerns, and we consider that there is a significant risk that
Westinghouse have underestimated the depth of the issue and the
resources and effort that are needed." The inpectors also wanted details of how the AP1000 would stand up to "external hazards", such as floods,, extreme weather or plane crashes, as well as infomration on "human factors" that might cause safety problems. The promised detail is yet to materialise. A company spokesman told Private Eye: "Westinghouse recognises each of these areas as important to the successful GDA licensing action and has committed resources to the timely resolution of these issues." The AP1000 is likely to be the choice reactor for RWE / Eon for their proposed UK nuclear stations. EDF has chosen Areva's EPR reactor, which has its own contruction problems in France and Finland. The HSE also has worries about the EPR. The fact that both reactors planned for Britain are in technical difficulty means costs are likely to rise, making the need for a government subsidy even stronger. |
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Citigroup Global Markets
New Nuclear - The Economics Say No Source: https://www.citigroupgeo.com/pdf/SEU27102.pdf |
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| In a
report published on the 9th November, 2009, in response to E.
Miliband's statement in parliament in respect of future generating
needs, Citi came to the conclusion that as things stand at present, new
nuclear is not commercially viable. (Something we have been
saying all along.) According to the report, there are five main risks to be borne by the developers: planning, construction, power price, operational and decommissioning. The report goes on to point out that never before have developers had to face such odds, and suggests that without government aid in at least three of the fields, new nuclear is unlikely to happen. The initial effort of speeding up the planning process, the report says, is unlikely to be enough incentive for the generating companies and their backers to become involved. It suggests that help will be needed in guaranteeing finances, minimum power prices and / or government-backed power take-off agreements. The in-depth analysis of the situation is very helpful and aids a better understanding of the commercial position. However, the up-shot is exactly what we have said from the beginning - that the UK taxpayer is going to have to pay considerably more for the electricity they use and there will, despite |
policician's
promises to the contrary,
have to be government constributions. As we have said, that
means the
foreign companies will benefit from £billions of assistance, and
to
compound this, any running profits will also go abroad. The report looks at the techincial problems of connecting such high-powered generators to the national grid, and suggests prices per unit. Sadly, these are based on figures supplied by one generator, EDF, who proposes load factors of 85%. In actual fact, the reports says, EDF has, in the past 5 years consistently reported load factors below 80%. (The lower the load factor the higher the effective price per unit generated and the dearer electrity becomes to the consumer.) The report notes, too, the building delays and cost-overruns inherent in the construction process. The consequences would be greater difficulties in raising the necessary finances. It concludes: "We believe that if governments want new nuclear to be part of their energy policy, they will need to provide some support as either these plants will not be built or, once they are, won't be economically viable." |
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It Cannot Happen (Just a spot of déjà vu) PARIS, Sept 25 (Reuters) - EDF
(EDF.PA) has turned off the 1,300-megawatt Paluel power reactor 3 after
fire broke out in the machine room in the non-nuclear part of the
plant, it said on Friday.
The fire was put out and there were no casualties, it said. "This had no impact on the plant's safety," an EDF spokeswoman said, but could not say when the reactor would restart. (Sounds like Windscale in the 50s!) PARIS, Nov 2 (Reuters) - EDF (EDF.PA) cut the production capacity of its reactor 2 at the Belleville plant in Central France to 60 percent after a fire broke out on Sunday in a non-nuclear part of the installation, the firm said on Monday. "Smoke erruped at 1215 (1015 GMT) from the non-nuclear part of the plant," EDF said on the plant's information line. "The fire was extinguished immediately," EDF said. Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSL260481220091102 PARIS, Nov 3 (Reuters) - A new generation of French nuclear power reactors came under attack on Tuesday as opposition parties called for an inquiry into their security systems, after three nuclear safety bodies asked for changes to their design. In a rare joint
statement, nuclear safety bodies in France, Britain and Finland on
Monday ordered France's Areva (CEPFi.PA) and EDF (EDF.PA) to modify the
safety features on its European Pressurised Reactors (EPR) due to
insufficient independence between the
day-to-day systems and the emergency systems.
The pressing need for
more
nuclear waste storageOpponents to nuclear power latched on to the news, with France's opposition socialist party calling for a parliamentary inquiry. CAP21, a political party founded by Corrine Lepage, a former environment minister, also said more investment should be made in renewable energy rather than nuclear. French President Nicolas Sarkozy has championed nuclear power, both at home and abroad, where he hopes French companies will benefit from a global drive to find ways of generating electricity that produce less CO2 emissions and are independent of oil price fluctuations. The design problems come as a blow to Areva, which has staked its export growth on the EPR and is hoping that it will beat out American rival Westinghouse, owned by Japan's Toshiba (6502.T), to become the standard-bearer for a new generation of nuclear plants. Pierre Boucheny head of French research at financial service company Kepler capital markets told Reuters Areva's financial visibility was obscured by unexpected hitches and delays in the construction of the firm's first EPR in Finland. "This problem (over safety) might cause a delay of a few months, maybe more, but it's hard to say what it will cost," he said. Non-voting shares in Areva closed 3.9 percent lower at 8.75 euros. Areva said on Monday it was in talks to modify the design of the EPR plants before the end of the year and insisted the safety of the EPR plants was not in question. EDF, which operates all of France's 19 nuclear power plants, said on Tuesday it had been asked to conduct a closer study of secondary systems at its Flamanville EPR reactor and would respond by year-end. Areva has started building two EPRs in China's Guangdong province and in January Sarkozy gave approval for the construction of a second EPR plant in France. Areva has also joined forces with Total (TOTF.PA) and GDF Suez (GSZ.PA) in a consortium to bid build at least four nuclear power reactors in the United Arab Emirates Britain also is mulling whether to relaunch its nuclear energy programme with modern plants and the Italian government has signalled that it intends to build four new nuclear plants. Source: http://www.reuters.com/article/companyNews/idUSL358767420091103?pageNumber=1&virtualBrandChannel=11604 The low-level nuclear waste depository at Drigg in Cumbria could be full in 20 years, one reason the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority is looking to 'refine' its strategy Terry Macalister guardian.co.uk, Monday 19 October 2009 |
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A tiny sign outside
the picturesque Cumbrian village of Drigg points the way to "LLWR".
There is nothing to indicate this is the road to Britain's main nuclear
waste dump.
Barely a mile away lie 10,000 large, red steel containers – many in an open trench – that contain the low-level waste legacy of an industry that was established during the Cold War but is now set for expansion in the fight against climate change. The sense of unreality is compounded by the cigar-toting figure of Dick Raaz. The 63-year-old American is the boss at the Low-Level Waste Repository (LLWR) and a man on a mission. He aims to ensure only the most toxic of Britain's low-level waste is housed at Drigg, so that it does not fill up by 2030 – as it is threatening to do. [So the government will have to persuade the relevant "experts" to say the site is suitable, regardless of the true situation.] "This is a robust disposal design. It's clearly overkill when you are dealing with waste which is at the bottom end of the spectrum (of toxicity)," he says during a whirlwind minibus tour of the 98-hectare (245 acre) site, which he describes as "a ride around the ranch". Raaz is supported by the government and the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), which is trying to open up a network of landfill or other sites for the disposal of rubble, earth or other very low-level radioactive materials. He recognises that the orderly management of this waste facility – he hates the word "dump" [a rose by any other name . . . no matter what it is called, it is still a DUMP!] – is vital if the public is to have faith in the wider nuclear industry and allow it to build a new generation of plants. He acknowledges that the sector has been bedevilled in the past by accusations of secrecy and inefficiency. [He could have added, "dishonesty" and "total lack of respect for the environment and innocent lives".] Raaz estimates it would cost up to £2bn to build another Drigg and accepts that getting planning permission for such a facility could be very hard. In the meantime, the former nuclear submarine commander wants to find ways of cutting costs at his facility, which is just a few miles away from the massive Sellafield complex from where much of the waste originates. One proposal he has made to the regulators is to do away with the traditional procedure of placing the waste in various protective membranes, putting it in one of the 10,000 containers, which cost £10,000 each, then covering it in earth and concrete. "We think it's wasteful," says Raaz. The managing director of LLWR, itself a consortium of American, Swedish and French companies, accepts that whether he is successful partly depends on dispelling some of the myths that have grown up around what exactly is contained at Drigg. He describes suggestions that the site is home to Chernobyl waste, for instance, as an "extreme falsehood" that never made any sense, pointing out that much of the waste is contaminated clothing [pity the poor wearer!], wood and paper. [Where, then, did the material alleged to have been contaminated by the Chernobyl fallout end up?] He admits not all of the records on the containers' contents are as detailed as he would wish. [How convenient! How can anyone prove that only low-level material is here - or even the contrary!] Advertisements placed in the local paper for former staff to come forward with information alarmed environmentalists. Raaz says the exercise brought some helpful responses. |
The site head says much of his job has been about building closer links with the community around the site – he lives nearby – and being open and transparent in its operations. This warmth does not extend to the media, however, with requests to check all quotes and an official from the NDA sitting in on interviews. The NDA last month completed a 14-week consultation [with whom?] on how to deal with low-level waste and is now working to "refine" its strategy. Insiders confirm that the policy is almost certain to switch to putting more waste in landfill and other sites not used in the past. The Department of Energy and Climate Change says the use of landfill does not represent a major shift as it has been available for use for less toxic waste since 2007, although this is usually radioactive materials from the oil and gas industry or hospitals [not to mention the odd JCB or so and similar plant].The corporate sector is already convinced that an official policy for the wider use of landfill is on its way. Leading waste management firms such as the French-owned Sita group and the American company, EnergySolutions, are trying to press ahead with plans to use Cumbrian facilities at Keekle Head and Lillyhall for dealing with nuclear waste from Sellafield and elsewhere. A British firm, Augean, is trying to do the same near Peterborough [see below]. Around 90% of the UK's nuclear waste by volume is low-level, but the government also needs to deal with the much more dangerous high-level waste. This is being held at Sellafield itself or at the different nuclear power plants around the country, pending a final decision about what to do with it. In 2007, the government committee on radioactive waste management recommended the use of a deep geological repository. Finland and Sweden have built vaults deep below the ground where the high-level waste can be stored for the thousands of years it needs to become harmless. In the UK, the government has so far called for expressions of interest from areas willing to consider housing such an underground repository, subject to geological surveys proving it viable. Two local councils in west Cumbria – site of the vast Sellafield complex – have stepped forward. [Just how many ex-Sellafield employees were involved in the councils and various quangos to ensure a satisfactory result for the nuclear industry?] But Fergus McMorrow, the chief executive of Copeland borough, said the whole process was at a "very early stage" and there could be no certainty about what people in the area would decide. The energy department is known to be increasingly concerned at the slow progress with its need to find a long-term solution to high-level waste. The next generation of nuclear reactors it hopes to see built will generate more highly radioactive waste. The department wrote on 1 October to all local authorities in England "offering to give presentations to interested parties". There was relatively little interest even on the Cumbrian coast – despite high unemployment and considerable social deprivation, and despite the awareness that public money at Sellafield and the nuclear submarine plant at Barrow-in-Furness keep the regional economy afloat. In Whitehaven, outside the struggling Pizza Piazza and next to the peeling paint of the closed-down Adrenaline tattoo parlour, Mrs Burns says no one wants atomic waste dumps in the area but you have to be realistic: "Do-gooders want to shut down nuclear, but without Sellafield we would all be crippled." |
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Comment: That final statement in the article above is, sadly, typical of what people in the area have been deceived into thinking is the truth. It is so entrenched it is difficult to persuade anyone that the finances are nothing but a big conjuring trick. If even a small percentage of the money invested in polluting Cumbria had been invested in more sustainable and less injurious industries, Sellafield and all its consequences would never have been needed in the area. Anyone who doubts it might consider how Windermere, Ambleside and the other major tourist centres became and remain so successful. These places are permanently packed with tourists. A few new roads and suitable investments, better rail links (perhaps even including trains on Sundays?) and the whole of the Cumbrian coast could have become self-sufficient. Instead, the head of tourism has written off the area, (thereby keeping his nose clean with the Great and Good,) preferring instead to concentrate on the already over-populated hotspots. So now the coastal area is almost entirely dependent on Sellafield. The answer may not be to further develop Sellafield but to close it down altogether. Further development of the nuclear facilities will merely result in even greater dependency; this, together with the permanent pollution which will then ensue, will kill off any possible green solution to the economic future. |
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| King's Cliffe Resource Management Facility | |||||
| Because the Low Level Waste
Repository at Drigg is now getting rather full, the authorities are
threshing about trying to find somewhere else to off-load their toxic
waste. Although they might have thought they had found a
suitable site at King's Cliffe, a former landfill site near
Peterborough, it seems that the path may not be too easy. There
is a strong consensus that the site should not be used for nuclear
dumping. Its owners, Augean plc, have not been supported by the
local district council, and public protest is growing encouraged by a
local group, Waste Watchers. We note from the Environment Agency's site that in 2007, the Corby magistrates fined eight different operators for attempting to illegally dump inappropriate waste at the site. The site is lined to prevent materials leaching into the soil, but some of the chemicals being brought to the site by operators such as Biffa and Veolia could well have eaten the lining and caused considerable environmental damage to ensue. In the hopefully unlikely event that permission is ever given to dump nuclear waste at this site, one might care to bear in mind that the material has to be delivered from its source. One has to wonder at the security and safety of such transports. |
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| We note with some disillusion and
sadness that the environmental group, Greenpeace,
has, for the first time ever, omitted nuclear opposition from its
current manifesto. Given the emerging developments being
proposed
around the country, we find this very disturbing, especially given
their extreme anti-nuclear views of the past, as noted on our home page. We look forward to some clarification of the matter in due course, but on face value would suggest that this is a disappointing volte face. |
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| More
Pro-Nuclear Outbursts
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| According to the
Sunday Times, 4/10/09, Professor David MacKay is a newly-appointed
chief scientific advisor to the government. The report goes on to say that Professor MacKay believes nuclear power could be the only way Britain can meet its soaring demand for electricity while keeping emissions under control Source: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6860181.ece Later in the week, speaking on Newsnight on BBC 2 television on Friday, 9th October, the minister for the Department of Energy and Climate Change (mercifully shortened to DECC), Mr. Ed. Miliband, stated that there was no alternative to nuclear development. He repeatedly said that "nuclear has to be part of the energy mix". Presumably government -speak for future power supply. Strangely, this is the man who has to keep an open mind before announcing a Considered Opinion several months in the future. No element of bias or pre-judgement then? Happily, several academics are reported to be seeking a judicial review, in order to prevent him from making the decision because of his ill-considered remarks prejudicing the outcome. |
It is worth watching
again as Kirsty Wark treats Miliband like the immature juvenile fibber
his statements reveal him to be but, sadly, the clip has now been
removed from the BBC i-Player, In a few seconds Kirsty Wark demonstrated that for over 12 years there had been nothing substantive in the way of energy policy - let alone decisions made to resolve the problem of energy security and reduction of pollution. Quoting the various papers (such as the two most recent ones: the 2006 Energy White Paper, and the 2008 Nuclear White Paper) and the fact that at the inauguration of the 1997 Labour government there had been an anti-nuclear policy. She showed that various attempts had been made to persuade the government to formulate a policy, but nothing had actually been decided in that whole 12 year period, despite the problems having been known from the outset. The listing of facts stunned Mr. Miliband, and Ms. Wark then turned her back on him, in what seemed to be a demonstration of her disdain, leaving Mr. Miliband with his mouth open. Sadly, Mr. Greg Clark, the shadow energy minister didn't come across all that well, either. The best he could do was promise that the £200 billion needed to sort out the problem would be forthcoming - without actually stipulating how or what that investment might achieve. |
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Except:
Professor MacKay is whistling in the wind if he thinks it is possible to build the number of reactors he suggests in time to do anything to save the climate. The government of Ontario was recently quoted almost £14 billion for two reactors. Ben Ayliffe
Greenpeace UK |
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| The UK Atomic Energy Authority Sells-off its Commercial Arm | |||||
| Business Secretary Peter Mandelson, said: “Today’s announcement is good news for UKAEA Limited and its employees. The sale will allow the company, as part of Babcock International, to continue its development and take advantage of new opportunities in the nuclear industry. It also generates good value for the tax payer.” Actually, taken at face value, a sale price of £50 million for the assets of this company seems to somewhat of a bargain for Babcock Engineering. According to some sources, there is £12 million in the company already, and it made £32 million profit in the year ending April, 2009. On that basis, it might seem simple to work out that the net cost to Babcock in a year's time (assuming that the profit margin does not increase, and at least remains level) will have been just £6 million. Is that really such a good deal for the taxpayer? Why is it that we find it difficult to believe anything Mr. Mandleson tells us? The chief executive of the UKAEA is Lady Barbara Judge - a favourite in the august journal "Private Eye", which makes frequent reference to the number of directorships the good lady has. It is listed as being "not less than 30". This might seem a touch excessive, and certainly does not comply with recommendations. Disregarding the wisdom of such intense work - some of which requires considerable travel - how much time can she actually spend doing the work to the level required to maximise the benefit to the various companies? Or is that not what she is paid for? As well as the directorships, the good lady is also available for hire as an after-dinner speaker. Contact /www.gordonpoole.com for details of availability and cost. The following article is from: http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/news/Stock%20News/2483494/ As the Spectator reports, "when she (Lady Judge) came over here in 1993, more than 20 per cent of our energy was delivered by nuclear power. But if we keep decommissioning, then by 2020 just 2 per cent of our power will be delivered by nuclear. And no one's told me that we will need 18 per cent less power by then." The report goes on to cite Britain's recent history in the Nuclear industry, "in 2006, British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) sold its two most valuable divisions, BNFL USA and Westinghouse Electric UK, for $5.4 billion. At the time, BNFL was widely considered to have pulled off a coup by ridding itself of twin burdens. Toshiba, the buyer, was accused of overpaying for outdated technology. New reactors are being built in 11 countries, including Russia, China and Abu Dhabi, with up to 70 more to come by 2025 in the likes of Italy and Jordan. Some of these projects would undoubtedly have involved BNFL, notably those in Jordan and Abu Dhabi, where Britain has strong links. Instead they will be built by one or more of Canada's |
CANDU, Toshiba's Westinghouse, a Russo-German alliance involving Rosatom and Siemens, and state-controlled Areva of France - for which President Sarkozy acts as de facto head of sales." In her position as head of the UK's Atomic Energy Authority, Lady Judge states plainly, "we in Britain should be leading the nuclear power industry, because we have such a glorious past. When I was young, the smartest graduates would want to become nuclear engineers or physicists. Now, the dream is to do an engineering undergrad, then an MBA, then to get shipped off to a bank to become an energy analyst." When asked about her role and the role of the UK Atomic Energy Authority, Judge is quick to point out that "we can help with safety, site selection, construction services, maintenance - and prove that we are the most competent people to plan and build a project anywhere." Obviously fast learners from the NDA buy-them-off approach, we offer the following quote from a flyer for the Nuclear Institute's formal dinner: "The NI Cumbria Branch would like to extend our particular thanks to NSG Ltd. and Doosan Babcock Energy Ltd. who have secured the 2 main sponsor packages. " Source: Nuclear Institute flyer Lady Barbara Judge became a director of the UK Atomic Energy Authority in 2002 and has been its Chairman since 2004, having been reappointed in 2007. She is also Chairman of the School of Oriental and African Studies and Deputy Chairman of Friends Provident plc as well as Co-Chairman of the UK Task Force on Corporate Governance and is a Public Member of the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants. Until recently, she was Chairman of LIFE IC, an incubator for renewable energy technologies. From 2003-2007 she was Deputy Chairman of the UK Financial Reporting Council which regulates UK corporate governance and accountants. She is a Member of the Governing Body of the Ditchley Foundation and a Member of the Trilateral Commission, among others. Her international experience includes being an Independent Director of NV Bekaert SA (Belgium) and Magna International Inc (Canada) among others. She was the first woman member of the Board of Overseers of the Wharton School and is a founding director of the Lauder Institute of Management at the Wharton School. Source: http://www.gordonpoole.com/?artistID=1924 |
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Part of the presentation
which was allegedly material in convincing Copeland and Allerdale
councillors of the practicality of burying the evidence came from
something called the "Yucca Mountain Project". The report has
now been shown to be flawed and thus irrelevant, albeit too late - as
the decision had been made by then. However, it may
be of interest to know that Yucca Mountain is about 100 miles north
west of
Las Vegas, in a very arid area - quite unlike the parts of Cumbria
being investigated. An interesting video can viewed at the US
government's site below. However, one of the salient points has
to be this quotation:
'Knowing where the cracks [in the rocks] are is vital, as it allows scientists to design a repository that keeps water away from the waste. That's important because the enemy of any metal waste container is water.' Source: http://www.ymp.gov/home/Video_The_Making_of_an_Underground_Laboratory.shtml The median annual
rainfall for Yucca Mountain, for the period 1999 - 2007 was <9½"
Source: http://hrc.nevada.edu/data/unqualified/ORD-FY04-007/FinalReport.pdf
The median rainfall for Cumbria for the period 2000 - 2007 was 35.84" (Directly comparable figures not available.) Source: http://www.bramptonweather.co.uk Also of relevance is that the premise for global climate change predicts winter rain will increase by 30%, and there will be more storms. |
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| "The outlook for summer is
fairly weak at the moment because the supply/demand situation is pretty
comfortable," said Niall Trimble, director of the Energy Contract
Company, a consulting firm. "It probably would tend to increase pressure on the big six (utilities companies) to reduce their domestic gas prices. Only two of them have actually reduced their prices at all." Despite pressure from the government to cut bills to household consumers, only Scottish and Southern Energy and British Gas have so far done so this year. They cut prices by 4 percent and 10 percent, respectively. The six utilities, including RWE npower, EDF Energy, E.ON UK and Iberdrola's Scottish Power, raised bills twice for both gas and electricity last year, blaming soaring wholesale energy prices since 2007. (Source http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE51O24H20090225) |
"Good customer
service is vital to our success. So wherever
possible, we want to resolve our customers’ enquiries on first
contact". Guess which energy company has the lowest star rating when it comes to customer satisfaction . . . Yep, RWE npower. (http://www.moneysupermarket.com/utilities/results.aspx?Id=9336243) Our own experiences have demonstrated what happens in practise. From the outset no-one outside the cliques were informed of what was to happen to their homes. Even at the Beckermet meeting the RWE representative had no idea - seeming not to know that the bungalows even existed. An e-mail sent to the company's contact address on the 2nd August, asking specifically what the company's plans are in respect of Braystones Beach has been ignored for over six weeks. We also asked why only a select few residents received letters informing them of the next development in the proposals. Not that failures to communicate are their exclusive province. We have been waiting for a response to a letter to the Prime Minister since 28th April. We reminded them in June, but still no answers to our questions. A letter to E. Miliband, MP, minister for DECC asking a simple question about the relative cost of electricity generated in the various ways has remained unanswered and unacknowledged for over six weeks. One might have expected that question to be so simple. |
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|
As part of our continuing investigation of things nuclear, we have been sent the following articles which, we believe, realistically illustrate the current position within the industry. Although, obviously, our interest centred around Sellafield - that being the nearest, best-known and most experienced example - it is apparent that Sellafield is not unique in the troubles it brings to a nation. |
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 Washington Monthly, January/February 2009 |
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|
In Finland, Nuclear
Renaissance Runs Into
Trouble
By
JAMES KANTER
|
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OLKILUOTO, Finland — As the Obama administration tries to steer America toward cleaner sources of energy, it would do well to consider the cautionary tale of this new-generation nuclear reactor site. The massive power plant under construction on muddy terrain on this Finnish island was supposed to be the showpiece of a nuclear renaissance. The most powerful reactor ever built, its modular design was supposed to make it faster and cheaper to build. And it was supposed to be safer, too. But things have not gone as planned. After four years of construction and thousands of defects and deficiencies, the reactor’s 3 billion euro price tag, about $4.2 billion, has climbed at least 50 percent. And while the reactor was originally meant to be completed this summer, Areva, the French company building it, and the utility that ordered it, are no longer willing to make certain predictions on when it will go online. While the American nuclear industry has predicted clear sailing after its first plants are built, the problems in Europe suggest these obstacles may be hard to avoid. A new fleet of reactors would be standardized down to “the carpeting and wallpaper,” as Michael J. Wallace, the chairman of UniStar Nuclear Energy — a joint venture between EDF Group and Constellation Energy, the Maryland-based utility — has said repeatedly. In the end, he says, that standardization will lead to significant savings. But early experience suggests these new reactors will be no easier or cheaper to build than the ones of a generation ago, when cost overruns — and then accidents at Three Mile Island and Chernobyl — ended the last nuclear construction boom. In Flamanville, France, a clone of the Finnish reactor now under construction is also behind schedule and overbudget. In the United States, Florida and Georgia have changed state laws to raise electricity rates so that consumers will foot some of the bill for new nuclear plants in advance, before construction even begins. “A number of U.S. companies have looked with trepidation on the situation in Finland and at the magnitude of the investment there,” said Paul L. Joskow, a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, a co-author of an influential report on the future of nuclear power in 2003. “The rollout of new nuclear reactors will be a good deal slower than a lot of people were assuming.” For nuclear power to have a high impact on reducing greenhouse gases, an average of 12 reactors would have to be built worldwide each year until 2030, according to the Nuclear Energy Agency at the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Right now, there are not even enough reactors under construction to replace those that are reaching the end of their lives. And of the 45 reactors being built around the world, 22 have encountered construction delays, according to an analysis prepared this year for the German government by Mycle Schneider, an energy analyst and a critic of the nuclear industry. He added that nine do not have official start-up dates. Most of the new construction is underway in countries like China and Russia, where strong central governments have made nuclear energy a national priority. India also has long seen nuclear as part of a national drive for self-sufficiency and now is seeking new nuclear technologies to reduce its reliance on imported uranium. By comparison, “the state has been all over the place in the United States and Europe on nuclear power,” Mr. Joskow said. The United States generates about one-fifth of its electricity from a fleet of 104 reactors, most built in the 1960s and 1970s. Coal still provides about half the country’s power. To streamline construction, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Washington has worked with the industry to approve a handful of designs. Even so, the schedule to certify the most advanced model from Westinghouse, a unit of Toshiba, has slipped during an ongoing review of its ability to withstand the impact of an airliner. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has also not yet approved the so-called EPR design under construction in Finland for the American market. This month, the United States Energy Department produced a short list of four reactor projects eligible for some loan guarantees. In the 2005 energy bill, Congress provided $18.5 billion, but the industry’s hope of winning an additional $50 billion worth of loan guarantees evaporated when that money was stripped from President Obama’s economic stimulus bill. |
The industry has had more success in getting states to help raise money. This year, authorities permitted Florida Power & Light to start charging millions of customers several dollars a month to finance four new reactors.[*1] Customers of Georgia Power, a subsidiary of the Southern Co., will pay on average $1.30 a month more in 2011, rising to $9.10 by 2017, to help pay for two reactors expected to go online in 2016 or later. But resistance is mounting. In April, Missouri legislators balked at a preconstruction rate increase, prompting the state’s largest electric utility, Ameren UE, to suspend plans for a $6 billion copy of Areva’s Finnish reactor. Areva, a conglomerate largely owned by the French state, is heir to that nation’s experience in building nuclear plants. France gets about 80 percent of its power from 58 reactors. But even France has not completed a new reactor since 1999. After designing an updated plant originally called the European Pressurized Reactor with German participation during the 1990s, the French had trouble selling it at home because of a saturated energy market as well as opposition from Green Party members in the then-coalition government. So Areva turned to Finland, where utilities and energy-hungry industries like pulp and paper had been lobbying for 15 years for more nuclear power. The project was initially budgeted at $4 billion and Teollisuuden Voima, the Finnish utility, pledged it would be ready in time to help the Finnish government meet its greenhouse gas targets under the Kyoto climate treaty, which runs through 2012. Areva promised electricity from the reactor could be generated more cheaply than from natural gas plants. Areva also said its model would deliver 1,600 megawatts, or about 10 percent of Finnish power needs. In 2001, the Finnish parliament narrowly approved construction of a reactor at Olkiluoto, an island on the Baltic Sea. Construction began four years later. Serious problems first arose over the vast concrete base slab for the foundation of the reactor building, which the country’s Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority found too porous and prone to corrosion. Since then, the authority has blamed Areva for allowing inexperienced subcontractors to drill holes in the wrong places on a vast steel container that seals the reactor. In December, the authority warned Anne Lauvergeon, the chief executive of Areva, that “the attitude or lack of professional knowledge of some persons” at Areva was holding up work on safety systems. Today, the site still teems with 4,000 workmen on round-the-clock shifts. Banners from dozens of subcontractors around Europe flutter in the breeze above temporary offices and makeshift canteens. Some 10,000 people speaking at least eight different languages have worked at the site. About 30 percent of the workforce is Polish, and communication has posed significant challenges. Areva has acknowledged that the cost of a new reactor today would be as much as 6 billion euros, or $8 billion, double the price offered to the Finns. But Areva said it was not cutting any corners in Finland. The two sides have agreed to arbitration, where they are both claiming more than 1 billion euros in compensation. (Areva blames the Finnish authorities for impeding construction and increasing costs for work it agreed to complete at a fixed price.) Areva announced a steep drop in earnings last year, which it blamed mostly on mounting losses from the project. In addition, nuclear safety inspectors in France have found cracks in the concrete base and steel reinforcements in the wrong places at the site in Flamanville. They also have warned Électricité de France, the utility building the reactor, that welders working on the steel container were not properly qualified. On top of such problems come the recession, weaker energy demand, tight credit and uncertainty over future policies, said Caren Byrd, an executive director of the global utility and power group at Morgan Stanley in New York. “The warning lights now are flashing more brightly than just a year ago about the cost of new nuclear,” she said. And Jouni Silvennoinen, the project manager at Olkiluoto, said, “We have had it easy here.” Olkiluoto is at least a geologically stable site. Earthquake risks in places like China and the United States or even the threat of storm surges mean building these reactors will be even trickier elsewhere. Matthew L. Wald contributed reporting from Washington. (Ref.: http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/business/energy-environment/29nuke.html) |
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| *1
In the UK the
corporations set up to build the new reactors are private companies.
Experience with, for example, GNER, has shown that in
general,
profits go to the company and losses revert to the taxpayer. The risk must be greater if the corporation is outside UK control. Furthermore, the initial proposal was for the private contractors to fund their own reactors - something which now seems to be unlikely, with rumours and reports suggesting that the government is seeking ways to give a secret subsidy. |
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 International Herald Tribune, May 29., 2009 |
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| We also offer the following precis from the original article. You might be able to recognise the symptoms and cynical method of influencing the public's decisions. The manipulative process certainly seems to have crossed the Atlantic. Even some of the players are the same. |
| Bad Reactors Rethinking your opposition to nuclear power? Rethink again. By Mariah Blake Washington Monthly January/February, 2009. Ref.: http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/features/2009/0901.blake.html |
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|
Nuclear
power may have some unsavory side effects, like radioactive waste and
the risk of meltdowns. But no other energy source can deliver vast
quantities of low- or zero-carbon energy at a price that rivals natural
gas and coal, as the industry has promised the new breed of reactors
will do. With this in mind, many people who once dismissed atomic power out of hand have come to view it as a vital, if imperfect, tool in the struggle to salvage our warming planet. But as Finland’s experience shows, the reality may be far messier than the industry lets on: a growing body of evidence suggests that new nuclear construction projects are prone to the same setbacks as those undertaken a generation ago, when lengthy delays and multibillion-dollar cost overruns were commonplace. This raises serious questions about the potential of nuclear power as a front-line solution in the battle against climate change. In the early days of the Atomic Era, nuclear power was heralded as a panacea—a cheap, abundant energy source that would spur economic growth, cut dependence on foreign oil, and enable every imaginable human endeavor. Lewis Strauss, chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, declared that future generations would enjoy electricity "too cheap to meter." By December 1957, residents of western Pennsylvania were brewing coffee and vacuuming carpets with power from the Shippingport plant. The project’s success set off a chain reaction. Beginning in the early 1960s, utilities—lured by promises of cheap electricity and growing concerns about air pollution—were lining up to purchase new reactors, a phenomenon historians have dubbed the "great bandwagon market" for nuclear power. Between 1965 and 1967, sixty plants with 40,000 megawatts of generating capacity were ordered. By the mid-1970s, more than 100 nuclear power stations were being planned or built. But the manic enthusiasm was fading as reactor projects ran aground amid soaring inflation, shrinking energy demand, bungled construction, and regulatory delays. As problems piled up, the market for new reactors collapsed. Between 1973 and 1978 the number of annual orders dwindled from thirty-eight to two. Some utilities began canceling reactor plans or abandoning half-built projects. In the mid-1980s, the Washington Public Power Supply System walked away from two unfinished reactors and $2.25 billion in bonds, the largest municipal bond default on the books. Another major utility was forced into bankruptcy. Although public opposition and safety concerns played a role in the industry’s undoing—especially after the partial meltdown at Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island plant in 1979—the primary stumbling blocks were economics and an unworkable business model. Most first-generation plants were custom designed and built, and in many cases design plans weren’t finished before construction began. This opened the door to construction errors and endless regulatory delays. In 1985 the Electric Power Research Institute, an industry-funded think tank, aided by executives from nuclear utilities and Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials, came up with a set of principles for next-generation reactors with simpler, standardized designs, fewer moving parts, and more modular components. The goal was to make them not only safer than their predecessors, but also faster and less expensive to build than coal-fired power plants. Four years later, the NRC overhauled its regulatory process to help this effort along. Reactor vendors were invited to submit a limited number of designs for precertification, so utilities could simply pick one and apply for a permit to build it as a specific site. "The idea was to commit to just a few designs, and set those designs in stone to create a more efficient process," explains NRC spokesman Scott Burnell. The first two standardized designs were rolled out in 1997, but they were never built in the United States. In 2001, the Bush administration took office and began working to overhaul government agencies to make them friendlier to the industry. Layers of NRC regulation were stripped away. At the DOE, the top position in the Office of Nuclear Energy was promoted to an assistant-secretary-level appointment, and a host of new programs were added to promote the resurgence of atomic energy—among them Nuclear Power 2010, under which the government pays half the cost of site selection, planning, and licensing for new nuclear reactors. The industry, meanwhile, worked to shift public perception, through an aggressive PR campaign that involved, among other things, planting ghostwritten op-eds advocating nuclear energy in local newspapers under the names of prominent local personalities, and setting up front groups that appeared to be independent environmental organizations, such as the New Jersey Affordable, Clean, Reliable Energy Coalition. It also began pressing Congress for subsidies and, starting in 2001, federal loan guarantees. Nuclear advocates made little headway on this front until 2003, when Republicans regained control of the Senate and Domenici was appointed chairman of the Energy Committee. He rehired Alex Flint, who had gone on to work as a nuclear power lobbyist, to direct the committee’s work. Flint spent the next two years wrangling with politicians, often in secret, over a new energy bill. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 fulfilled many of the industry’s key legislative ambitions. Most importantly, it provided unlimited federal loan guarantees to cover up to 80 percent of project costs for next-generation nuclear plants and other "innovative technologies" to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It also included a twenty-year extension of the Price-Anderson Act, which limits the liability of nuclear power plant operators in case of accidents, and $13 billion in direct subsidies for nuclear power, including $2 billion in "risk insurance" to pay extra costs caused by delays in construction and licensing for the first six new reactors. Bush touted these measures as a boon for the environment. "Of all our nation’s energy sources, only nuclear power plants can generate massive amounts of electricity without emitting an ounce of air pollution or greenhouse gases," he said, to a burst of applause. The Energy Policy Act’s passage signaled a seismic shift: in less than a decade, the nuclear power industry had gone from energy pariah to political heavyweight. Its lobbying operation was now among the most formidable on Capitol Hill, thanks to a generous infusion of cash. (Since the mid-1990s, the energy and nuclear power sector has spent at least $953 million lobbying Congress and the executive branch, according to the Center for Responsive Politics—more than any group except the pharmaceutical and insurance industries.) That money helped the industry to meet most of the goals laid out at the 1998 forum and win tens of billions of dollars in new subsidies. All told, the nuclear power sector has secured more than $100 billion in federal support, at least $25 billion of it in the last four years alone, according to the nonpartisan group Taxpayers for Common Sense. That’s far more than renewable energy sources. While Republicans—especially those with links to energy interests and the national labs—played a key role in the industry’s resurgence, this stunning second act would not have been possible without the growing support of Democratic lawmakers. By 2005, it was becoming clear that the dangers of climate change were real, and politicians saw few solutions. Renewable energy was still viewed as an expensive niche market that was decades away from providing power on a large scale (though, in reality, some renewables—wind, most notably—were becoming financially competitive with coal). As a result, many Democrats were rethinking |
their
reservations
about atomic energy, including longtime foes like Senate Majority
Leader Harry Reid, who was once "totally opposed to nuclear power." One
sign of this newfound support was the broad backing for the Energy
Policy Act, which passed the House by a margin of 275 to 156 and the
Senate by 74 to 26. Four out of ten Democrats voted for it, including
then Senator Barack Obama, who declared that the bill took "significant
steps in the right direction on energy policy." This emerging bipartisan consensus did not extend to Wall Street, where the new package of giveaways did little to ease doubts about the viability of new nuclear power. Months after the 2005 bill passed, the rating agency Standard & Poor’s issued a report saying that the generous new subsidies "may not be enough to mitigate the risks associated with operating issues and high capital costs" of new nuclear plants, and that companies that built or financed them would see their credit ratings slide. This was a blow to the industry; at the time, the Nuclear Energy Institute was claiming that the overnight building costs (meaning inflation isn’t factored in) for next-generation reactors would be between $1,100 and $1,500 per kilowatt capacity—roughly on par with natural gas plants and cheaper than coal. In June 2007, the Keystone Center, a Colorado-based energy think tank, published another report, funded in part by the industry, which cast fresh doubt on NEI estimates. The study (which, unlike the NEI figures, used actual hard data from reactors built in Asia in the 1980s and ’90s) projected that the overnight costs for new nuclear plants would be about $3,000 per kilowatt, or up to $4,000 per kilowatt including inflation—at least double the NEI’s estimate. The only way to unlock capital was for taxpayers to take on all of the risk. In October 2007, Moody’s Investor Services piled on with a report projecting that new reactors would cost $5,000 to $6,000 per kilowatt to build, or up to $12 billion per unit. This figure, which was based on actual bids for new reactors in the United States, caused considerable sticker shock. The trade magazine Nuclear Engineering International ran an article questioning whether utilities would shelve their plans for new reactors amid revelations about "prohibitively high" costs. In January 2008, Warren Buffett’s MidAmerican Energy Holdings Co. scrapped plans to build a new reactor because it found the "economics of building the next generation of nuclear power plants" were "not in our customers’ best interests." But as staggering as their estimates were at the time, those who did the calculations for Keystone and Moody’s have concluded, based on newer data, that they were not high enough. "The numbers have simply gone flying past our highest 2007 estimates," says Jim Hempstead, a senior vice president at Moody’s, which now predicts new nuclear power plants will cost $7,500 per kilowatt to build. That’s more than double the capital costs for solar power and three and a half times the cost for wind. Nuclear’s high building costs are offset somewhat by low operating expenses and high operating efficiency, which in recent years has climbed from about 60 percent to more than 90 percent on average in the United States. But even taking into account these factors, according to Moody’s forecasts, the production costs for nuclear power are higher than for most large-scale renewable energy sources (though not for solar power). And Moody’s analysis was based on preliminary industry estimates—on average, first-generation nuclear plants in the United States cost three times initial projections. How is it that new reactors make so little economic sense, even with massive government support? Part of the answer is that the industry still hasn’t solved the problems that led to its initial collapse. A decade on, the standardized plant designs, on which nuclear advocates pinned their hopes of lower costs and greater reliability, have yet to materialize. This is not to say that no one has built a uniform fleet: some countries—most notably France, where the government holds a controlling stake in the main electricity-generating company—have managed to created a degree of standardization among their own reactors. But spreading the idea to countries with different regulatory agencies and requirements, to say nothing of the patchwork American utility market, is easier said than done. Nowhere are the hurdles more evident than in the new NRC licensing process and its supposedly set-in-stone designs. Initially, the industry had hoped to limit the number of reactor models to two or three. Instead, there are eight on offer, half of them certified, the rest awaiting approval (a process that takes years). What’s more, all but one of the seventeen companies that are planning to build new reactors have chosen designs that are either not yet certified or that will need to be recertified because they have been substantially redesigned. Even the one company that has picked a fully certified model, NRG of New Jersey, isn’t sticking to the original blueprints. Rather than working with ready-made plans and a series of simple, modular components, engineers and designers working on Finland’s new reactor are scrambling to finish plans even as construction is under way. During my visit to Olkiluoto, I met Jouni Silvennoinen, the construction manager on the plant for the Finnish utility TVO. He told me that, in his view, projects as large and complex as reactors simply don’t lend themselves to cookie-cutter solutions. "The basic design can be planned in advance," he explained. "But you still have to do the detailed design. Where exactly is the rebar? How thick are the walls? Where is the pinning for pipes? Those details have to be tailored to the individual project, and it takes a tremendous amount of work." Another reason estimates for new reactors have been both high and unpredictable is the atrophy of nuclear expertise and the dwindling number of suppliers, which has led to labor shortages and supply bottlenecks. Today, there is only one company in the world that can produce the heavy steel forgings for a reactor core—Japan Steel Works Ltd., in Osaka—and it has a two- to three-year backlog. In the United States, once the primary source of reactor components, the number of suppliers has dropped from 400 to eighty, while the number of accredited nuclear engineers has dwindled from 900 to 200. And the worst is yet to come. Half of all employees in the nuclear energy sector are older than forty-seven, and more than a quarter will be eligible for retirement in the next four years, according to NEI research. NRC Chairman Dale E. Klein summed up the gravity of the situation in remarks before the American Nuclear Society last year, saying, "The global supply chain is stretched, if not to the breaking point, at least to the tipping point." In August 2008, a bipartisan group of senators introduced a bill to open coastal areas to offshore drilling. Buried in it were billions of dollars in subsidies for nuclear power and language exempting DOE loan guarantees from congressional oversight. Though this bill was tabled after the financial crisis struck, it had broad bipartisan backing: half of the twenty sponsors were Democrats. There is a reason for the nuclear industry’s dogged pursuit of generous guaranteed loans: without them, or a similar public financing scheme, it doesn’t have much of a future. Even before the financial meltdown, Wall Street wasn’t willing to sink money into new reactors. Squeezing private capital from today’s ravaged markets will be nothing short of impossible, which means the only way most utilities will be able to build new nuclear plants is if taxpayers shoulder the risk. On this front, the industry has proven remarkably resourceful. UniStar, a consortium of French and American utilities, was formed for the purpose of building four new reactors in the United States, a venture it expects to cost up to $38 billion. But it doesn’t intend to sink any of its own money into construction. Instead, its plan for financing the project hinges entirely on guaranteed loans from the DOE and the French export bank, which |
is
offering financial support to spur investment
in
French nuclear technology (see "Sub-prime Nuclear Loans"). Though the financial plans for most reactor projects have yet to become public, it appears that all but a few contenders are banking on similar schemes. Right now the DOE is weighing the first batch of loan guarantee applications, submitted in October. It includes twenty-one reactors, with an estimated total cost of $188 billion. The requested loan guarantee total is $122 billion, a hefty sum considering that the Congressional Budget Office has found the chance of default on guaranteed loans for new reactors is "well above 50 percent." And it will take roughly three times as much new nuclear capacity as those twenty-one reactors will provide just to keep a stable supply of nuclear power over the next few decades, as the aging plants that provide a fifth of our electricity are decommissioned. For nuclear power to make a meaningful contribution to the fight against climate change in the United States, the Keystone report concluded we will need to add 238 gigawatts of new capacity, or at least 140 of the most powerful reactors on the market. The cost, according to Harold A. Feiveson, a senior research policy scientist at Princeton University and a member of the Keystone panel: between $1 trillion and $1.8 trillion (an estimate that assumes capital costs of $4,000 to $7,500 per kilowatt). The question is whether the new Democratic majority in Congress and the Obama administration will agree to anything approaching such a sweeping expansion of support for nuclear power. On the campaign trail, John McCain tried to gain advantage by painting Obama as a nuclear naysayer. In one particularly memorable instance, the Republican candidate visited the Enrico Fermi nuclear plant near Detroit, where he donned a gleaming white hard hat and toured the reactor building, then held a press conference in front of its cooling towers. "Senator Obama has said that expanding our nuclear power plants doesn’t make sense," he argued. "I could not disagree more." Obama was forced to repeatedly reaffirm his support for nuclear power as part of the energy mix. In fact, rhetoric aside, Obama was actually the candidate with the closest ties to the industry; his chief political adviser, David Axelrod, runs a political consulting firm that has lobbied on behalf of Exelon, the nation’s largest operator of nuclear plants. Exelon and its employees contributed around $250,000 to Obama’s Senate and presidential races, more than to any other candidate. In 2006, it came to light that Exelon had failed to disclose low-level nuclear leaks at an Illinois plant. Initially, Obama introduced a Senate bill that would have required nuclear utilities to notify state authorities as soon as leaks were detected. But according to the New York Times, he later stripped out the reporting requirements, as requested by Senate Republicans and Exelon lobbyists. In his climate plan, Obama makes the case for expanding nuclear energy, saying, "It is unlikely that we can meet our aggressive climate goals if we eliminate nuclear power as an option," though he also calls for nailing down secure storage for radioactive materials before new reactors are built. Steven Chu, Obama’s secretary of energy, also advocates boosting America’s atomic energy supply. Last August, he signed onto "A Sustainable Energy Future: The Essential Role of Nuclear Energy," a DOE manifesto, which argues that "nuclear energy must play a significant and growing role in our nation’s—and the world’s—energy portfolio" if we are to stave off catastrophic climate change. When asked by the San Jose Mercury News in June 2007 whether it was possible to tackle global warming without pursuing the nuclear option, Chu said, "If you start thinking like that, then you doom yourself." This was not a slap at other carbon-free technologies. Unlike most Bush appointees, Chu is a champion of renewable energy. He simply believes we will have to deploy every weapon in our arsenal, including nuclear fission, in our urgent struggle against climate change—a position embraced by a growing majority of politicians and pundits. This all-of-the-above approach is smart in theory, but in practice it has two glaring flaws. One is the long, uncertain construction schedule for building new reactors. To avoid the worst effects of global warming—rapidly rising sea levels, rampant famine, severe storms, and widespread drought—we will need to reverse the growth of greenhouse gas emissions by 2015, according to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The designs for most of the reactors on the drawing board in the United States won’t be certified until 2011 or 2012. Only then can the NRC approve individual licenses—after which the plants still need to be built. Last time around, construction took an average of twelve years. The other key problem is that, given the enormous expense and the industry’s hunger for subsidies, pursuing the nuclear path can crowd out investment in green energy. Over the last decade, federal funding for renewable energy and efficiency research has essentially remained flat, even as concerns about global warming have mushroomed. Support for nuclear power, on the other hand, has soared from zero in the late 1990s to $438 million a year in 2008. The DOE’s fiscal year 2009 budget request (which has yet to be approved) includes $630 million for nuclear energy research, a 44 percent increase from the previous year, while the request for renewable energy and efficiency R&D programs has dipped slightly to around $535 million. Bills to foster renewable energy or rein in carbon emissions also tend to get bogged down in debate over attaching perks for nuclear power. In some cases, this struggle has derailed meaningful climate-change legislation. The bipartisan coalition backing the Lieberman-McCain Climate Stewardship Act—Congress’s first serious attempt to cap greenhouses gases—fell apart in 2005 after McCain added $3.7 billion in subsidies for nuclear power. The push for nuclear subsidies was also a key sticking point during last year’s floor debate over the Warner-Lieberman carbon cap-and-trade bill. Elsewhere in the world, there are also signs that nuclear power and renewables aren’t as compatible as policymakers tend to believe. In 2000, Germany became the first major industrialized nation to commit to phasing out atomic power. To fill the gap, it has introduced incentives to foster investment in renewables, ushering in a green-energy boom. Despite its damp, cloudy weather, the nation now has more than half the world’s solar power generating capacity and is the leading producer of wind energy. All told, roughly 15 percent of German electricity comes from renewable sources, more than any other nation except China, which relies on hydroelectric dams for much of its power. By 2020, Germany aims to increase the share of renewables to 30 percent, roughly the same percentage nuclear supplied at its peak. On the other end of the spectrum is Finland. Because residents believed the new reactor in Olkiluoto would drastically cut emissions, there was little effort to promote renewable energy or boost efficiency, with the result that the country is now lagging behind its neighbors. Despite its long, windswept coast, Finland has less wind power capacity than any central European state except the tiny, landlocked countries of Luxembourg and Switzerland. It also ranks near the bottom on energy efficiency, and its record on greenhouse gas emissions is dismal: between 1990 and 2006 (the most recent year for which data is available) the nation’s carbon output leapt by ten million tons a year, or 13 percent, one of the largest spikes in any developed nation. This means that to meet the European Union goals of cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 20 percent from 1990 levels by 2020, Finland will have to either resort to austerity measures or shell out hundreds of millions more dollars for emissions credits. |
| Happy
Returns So, for an investment approaching $1 billion the nuclear industry has won more than $100 billion in federal support. A good investment. In the UK, where politicians are so pecunious some even claim for a bath plug on their expenses, it is not difficult to imagine the kind of support and influence that these sums of money might buy. The recent events of the East Coast Main Line railway service are interesting and relevant, in that (we understand) all the risks were farmed out to small subsidiary companies, leaving the parent company with little liablility and the government shocked and surprised that they had no leverage at all. The Value of a Contract and Insurance Policy Returning to the nuclear industry, let us suggest that the usual poor quality contracts are drawn up by over-worked civil servants with little experience in the nuclear industry.. How can such a contract be enforced if all the parties involved are beyond control of the UK government? The suppliers of the reactors, Areva (France), or Westinghouse - once owned by BNFL but now a division of Toshiba (Japan), are obviously going to be difficult to bring sanctions against. When it comes to the actual corporations involved in the bidding, RWE n-Power is German, and EDF (despite its misleading television advertisement), is French. The insurance risks for the industry are so high as to preclude any possibility of commercial insurance, so the UK government will have to foot the bill. (i.e. take even more of the risk.) We have already asked how much it costs to decommission a nuclear plant and been told that nobody knows. So, how will the government assess the cost of the energy produced? Will they just consign the cost of commissioning to the future, as they will consign the highly toxic waste produced by the new plants? There are no plans even to attempt to process the waste - not even the hole in the ground burial. All waste will have to be stored on the site where it was produced. So, the risks get even higher for accidents (incidents) or hostile actions. What is the True Cost of Nuclear Energy? Even assuming that no money changes hands before the proposed sites are completed, how can an honest assessment be made of the unit cost of the energy without knowing all the costs? How will the government manage to enforce the commissioning companies to properly decommission their obsolete plants in 50 years time? It seems to us that the profits will all go to the parent companies and the risks will be borne by the UK taxpayer, potentially along with the decommissioning costs should the corporations decide to ignore their obligations. Meeting the Timescale From the above article, it seems that there is not only a difficulty in successfully designing a generic reactor, but also the materials as strictly limited by the production capabilities of other countries. Retiring from the Arena From the Weightman paper, we learn that there are insufficient inspectors at the moment. It would be impossible to train sufficient numbers in the short timescale envisaged by the Department for Energy (DECC) and already the scrutiny of plans for proposed new build sites is outside the capacity of the inspectorate to cope with. In the event of an "incident", apparently, the whole process of screening new developments will grind to a halt. At 450, the inspection effort by the department is the lowest of any country with nuclear facilities, being only 1/3rd of the average, and less than a fifth of the effort made in Mexico (2567). We also learn that most of the current inspection team are due to retire soon - before these new plants could possibly be built. The rules for civil servants will prevent them from being re-employed in the same or a similar field, at least for a period. This means that their skills will be lost and the responsibility will fall on the relatively inexperienced newcomers. Quite how many of these newcomers will be seconded from the companies submitting proposals for new build is not yet decided, but it is likely to be quite a high percentage. Can this possibly be sensible? Please remember the amount of money being invested in buying good will and changing attitudes - of both the public and the government. There is a lot at stake for these investors and the government. |