New Nukes
Insurers won’t cover energy companies against the risk of a Chernobyl-style nuclear accident, forcing the government to self insure planned new nuclear power stations, the Times reports. The Department of Energy and Climate Change has appointed PricewaterhouseCoopers to set out how the government could insure the proposed new nuclear power stations.
Insurance Times 9th Sept 2009 more >>
Springfields
More than 500 jobs are set to be created after a long term lease was clinched at a Preston nuclear fuels site. Operator Westinghouse has signed a new deal with the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) which will also assure around 1,500 current jobs at the Springfields site in Salwick over the next five years. Bill Hamilton, of the NDA, said: “It will play a role in providing nuclear fuel as part of the nuclear fuel renaissance around the globe.
Lancashire Evening Post 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Southport Visiter 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Huddersfield Examiner 10th Sept 2009 more >>
A plant producing nuclear fuel for the new generation of reactors is set to be developed at Springfields in Lancashire, safeguarding 1,400 jobs at the site and securing for British industry some of the benefits of the revival of nuclear power. Westinghouse, the privatised nuclear engineering company now owned by Toshiba of Japan, will say on Thursday that it is in advanced talks with the government’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority to take a long-term lease on the Springfields nuclear fuel assembly plant.
FT 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Uranium
Uranium and nuclear projects in Africa, Australia and Russia are set to be the recipients of funds raised by two separate financing moves announced by Russian state nuclear company Rosatom and Australia-based uranium company Paladin. Rosatom announced its plans for a major bond offering worth up to 195 billion roubles (US$6.3 billion) through its subsidiary AtomEnergoProm. The five-year 1000-rouble bonds will be sold through the MICEX stock exchange, with Rosatom acting as guarantor. Paladin Energy has also announced its plans to raise its own funding through an institutional private placement of shares. The placement is expected to be for up to 15% of the company’s issued capital.
World Nuclear News 9th Sept 2009 more >>
Energy Security
It looks like Russia is once again gently reminding Europe that its hand hovers over the gas tap supplying 25pc of the continent’s needs this winter. It’s still only early September and sparks are already flying with Ukraine, which transports the gas from east to west in pipelines. It’s almost irrelevant what they are squabbling about. The UK doesn’t get its gas through pipes from Russia, as most comes from Norway and the North Sea, topped up with liquefied natural gas (LNG), which can be easily stored. But when other European countries run short, they are willing to pay whatever it takes to get their hands on LNG from storage facilities, diverting reserves from the UK to continental Europe. Often the supertankers simply turn around in the middle of the ocean and head in the other direction when one country outbids another.
Telegraph 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Radiation and Health
At the start of the Cold War, Stalin chose one of the furthest outposts of his empire to test the Soviet Union’s first nuclear bombs. Sixty years on, their cancerous legacy is still being felt. It is the names of Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Chernobyl that stand for the horrors of the new technology. The name of Semipalatinsk has no such resonance, and is all but forgotten. Yet nowhere else in the world was there such a large concentration of nuclear explosions in one place over such a long period. When Beria earmarked this far eastern corner of Kazakhstan to be the Soviet Union’s top secret nuclear test facility, he described the place as “uninhabited” – conveniently forgetting the 700,000 people who lived in the surrounding villages, towns and cities. Overnight the region was deleted from the map and for the next 40 years Soviet scientists detonated 615 nuclear devices at their secret Semipalatinsk Polygon.
Independent 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Australia
The nuclear debate in Australia has been stepped up by a declaration from Ziggy Switkowski, chairman of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (Ansto), that there is no impediment to the country using 50 reactors for power by mid-century. The level of the political nuclear debate in Australia has lagged behind that in media and business circles, with many commentators wondering about the contradiction of the country’s position: Nuclear power is forbidden even though the country is the world’s leading exporter of uranium and officially recognises the mineral’s benefits in climate protection. Meanwhile, the vast bulk of power is generated from coal and the country is among the highest per capita carbon emitters.
World Nuclear News 9th Sept 2009 more >>
US
On Wednesday, General Electric claimed a significant step toward getting one of its advanced reactor designs, the Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor, approved by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission although the model has recently lost most of its customers. Westinghouse, in contrast, has customers lined up for its new reactor model, the AP1000, but it was recently told by the N.R.C. that certification would be delayed because the company had been slow in answering the regulators’ questions.
New York Times 9th Sept 2009 more >>
GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy said on Wednesday it has submitted the revised design documents for its Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor (ESBWR) to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. GE Hitachi said the submission marks a milestone in the company’s effort to move forward with the 1,520-megawatt design which two U.S. utilities have selected to use for two new nuclear plants, some of the first reactors proposed after a three-decade lapse in U.S. nuclear expansion.
Yahoo 9th Sept 2009 more >>
Iran
European Union diplomats said last night that Iran had failed to meet demands for an immediate discussion on its nuclear programme after Tehran sent a fresh proposal on the issue to the world’s big powers. As expectations grow that negotiations on United Nations sanctions will now begin in New York, EU diplomats said Iran’s response to a long-standing incentives package had failed to contain any substance.
FT 10th Sept 2009 more >>
THE United States has voiced concerns Iran may already have stockpiled enough enriched uranium to build a nuclear bomb. US envoy Glyn Davies told a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) 35-nation board in Vienna yesterday: “We have serious concerns that Iran is deliberately attempting, at a minimum, to preserve a nuclear weapons option.
Scotsman 10th Sept 2009 more >>
FT 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Telegraph 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Times 10th Sept 2009 more >>
The proposals that Iran’s Foreign Minister handed to other governments yesterday appear to be an exercise in buying more time, a skill that Tehran has honed with great success to protect its nuclear programme.
Times 10th Sept 2009 more >>
Iran handed a package of proposals to world powers on Wednesday, as it came under renewed Western pressure to swiftly engage in “meaningful” talks to resolve the dispute over its nuclear programme.
Herald 9th Sept 2009 more >>
France
Workers at EDF’s 3,600-megawatt Bugey plant voted on Tuesday to end a strike that started on Aug. 28 over salaries, a CGT union official said on Wednesday. Workers at the 900-MW nuclear reactor 4 went on strike that day when EDF stopped the reactor for refuelling and maintenance, slowing works at the plant.
Interactive Investor 9th Sept 2009 more >>
