New Nukes
The Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLA) submitted a detailed list of questions and issues it wishes to see the Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (of the new Office for Nuclear Regulation) take up in its review of UK nuclear safety following the Fukushima incident. As Japanese Police start today to search in radiation suits for over 1000 bodies following the earthquake and tsunami believed to be in the Fukushima evacuation zone, the UK nuclear safety review takes place amidst the multifarious issues in dealing with these heavily damaged reactors. Discharged low-level radioactive waste water is still going into the Pacific Ocean and concerns now remain with water levels in the basement of Reactor Number 2, which are unexpectedly rising (1). It seems clear that this incident is likely to go on for many more months at least.
NFLA Press Release 14th April 2011 more >>
Letter: Since the nuclear incidents in Japan, our ruling elite has employed anyone who seems knowledgeable about nuclear power stations and the like to try to talk down the panic the general public feels about nuclear energy. There are claims that nuclear power can be better supervised and more efficient. But the thing is that where nuclear power is concerned the public is quite correct to feel panic – we have no way of cleaning it up safely. Proof of this is the fact that waste from the beginning of nuclear power generation up till now is being stored, not dealt with. That tells us the industry does not know how to deal with waste. From an early age we are told not to take chances in life if no proper exit strategy is available.
Southern Reporter 15th April 2011 more >>
Letter: An estimate of the cost of compensation to Fukushima victims of $133bn has been reported by Reuters. The UK has nuclear sites closer to major cities than Fukushima is to Tokyo, so costs could be even greater here. So it’s scandalous that nuclear operators are being allowed to cap their liability at €0.7bn or at most €1.3bn – barely 1% of the possible Fukushima compensation. No other industry is allowed to do this: BP has a $20bn fund for compensation to victims of last year’s oil spill. Why should nuclear be let off? The industry says the public have a poor perception of risk. That although a nuclear accident could be catastrophic and cause us to lose our homes and towns, the chances of it happening are so small that we should not worry about it. How strange then that their shareholders are not willing to accept the same small risk that they might lose their money. A more suitable measure would be to remove the protection of limited liability from the owners and directors of these companies in the event of a major accident. If we are to lose our homes, they should too, not walk away with bonuses and pensions intact as the bankers did. Readers may like to make their own views known to the Department of Energy and Climate Change nuclear third party liability consultation, which ends on 28 April.
Guardian 15th April 2011 more >>
The bigger question for the global construction industry centres around nuclear power. As iC went to press, the Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima was still in a precarious state, and it remains to be seen how bad the radiation leaks from the plant will be. Like the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl disasters before it, the Fukushima accident is bound to reopen the debate about the safety of nuclear energy. It is a debate that can be driven more by emotion and ideology then cool analysis of the facts, and this is understandable given the horrifying consequences of nuclear accidents. But it would be a blow if the world’s governments suddenly went cold on nuclear power for the wrong reasons, especially given that the industry has been gradually returning to favour due to its low carbon emissions. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency there are currently 65 nuclear power plants under construction around the world, including 27 in China and 11 in Russia. Even the most modern nuclear power plants cost at least US$ 1 billion per GW to build, and each of these 65 projects is a multi-GW scheme. That gives some indication of the size and value of the market.
International Construction 15th April 2011 more >>
Sellafield MoX Plant
A former minister has demanded an official investigation into Downing Street’s approval of a controversial nuclear fuel plant at Sellafield in Cumbria that has already cost the taxpayer 1.34bn with little return. Michael Meacher MP, who was environment minister under Tony Blair, said that he would be asking the National Audit Office and the House of Commons’ Public Accounts Committee to investigate the economic evidence used to justify the licensing of the Sellafield Mox Plant. Despite the cost, since the plant opened it has failed to fabricate more than a tiny fraction of the uranium- plutonium mixed oxide fuel it was designed to produce for foreign customers just 13.8 tons over 8 years compared to a projected output of 120 tonnes a year. Mr Meacher was the minister responsible for giving the plant an operating licence in 2001 but signed the licence only after he was pressurto do so by Tony Blair’s chief of staff, Jonathan Powell, who had told Mr Meacher that the former Prime Minister was adamant the “Mox fuel” plant must open. “The effort to get the Mox plant agreed was held up by me for at least two years because I was never persuaded that Mox fuel had a commercial market. I thought the cost was exorbitant,” Mr Meacher told The Independent. “I repeatedly expressed my doubts and concerns, and asked [officials] to go away and do further work. In September 2001, Mr Meacher was attending a European conference when he received a mid-morning phone call from Mr Powell. “It was fairly terse and straight to the point; that this had been held up for far too long, that the Prime Minister is concerned about this and that he is expecting an answer to this and wants the matter settled by 3pm that day,” Mr Meacher said. “I was being told that you pretty well have to sign up. I said tha t I’m not satisfied and he said that this is the Prime Minister’s view and he wants the matter settled. He couldn’t actually say, ‘You sign this’, but I knew perfectly well what he was saying.”
Independent 15th April 2011 more >>
In part, it was Blair’s realisation that there were a lot of jobs in deprived west Cumbria that depended on the nuclear plant at Sellafield. But his support for nuclear energy was even more fundamental – it was part of his unbridled enthusiasm for projects that were large-scale and shiny and new and high-tech (genetically modified crops were another such keen interest). In November 2006 I flew with Mr Blair on a visit to Sellafield. When he arrived at the plant the genuine warmth was quite astonishing: he was greeted by executives and workers alike as a saviour, which, given his low-key but crucial backing for their industry behind the scenes, is what he was.
Independent 15th April 2011 more >>
THE nuclear industry has been asked to look at radioactive contamination of the seabed along parts of West Cumbria’s coast. The Environment Agency wants more resources put into a seabed survey and less on monitoring local beaches for traces of radioactivity. Sellafield Ltd has agreed to the survey. The switch in emphasis was announced at last week’s meeting of the West Cumbria Stakeholders Group, the community’s health and safety watchdog for Sellafield. Cumbrians Opposed to a Radioactive Environment (Core) campaigner Martin Forwood was at the public meeting. He said later: “The risk of plutonium contamination to local beach users highlighted by Core over the last 30 years became a reality with the confirmation in an Environment Agency report that biological samples taken from those involved in beach monitoring around Sellafield showed elevated levels of plutonium.” However, in the meeting, the Environment Agency made it clear that further samples showed that the levels had dropped to normal. The Agency told The Whitehaven News it would continue to monitor the workers concerned as well as trying to discover the apparent discrepancy in the radiation readings.
Whitehaven News 14th April 2011 more >>
MAGNOX reprocessing is set to resume at Sellafield after being forced to shutdown for several months. And there is also good news for Thorp. Referring to a new contract with Japanese power utilities to manufacture Mox fuel, the stakeholder relations director said: “Initial trials to demonstrate that SMP can make fuel to the required standards have begun (again on schedule) and are progressing well.
Whitehaven News 14th April 2011 more >>
SELLAFIELD has a new police centre for its armed officers whose job is to safeguard nuclear materials and guard the site against potential terrorist threat. The centre has cost £3 million.
Whitehaven News 14th April 2011 more >>
AN anti-nuclear protest led to a car being put on a main railway line crossing near Sellafield station.
Whitehaven News 14th April 2011 more >>
AN emergency exercise at Sellafield had to be called off due to a real incident affecting the site on the same day, it has been revealed five months after the event. There was a loss of some of the site’s primary water supply piped from Wastwater. Some of the pipework is thought to be 50 years old. One pipe sprang a leak in freezing conditions but Sellafield bosses stress that, as back-up systems were in place, there was no loss of cooling water to operating plants or any threat to site safety. Sellafield’s own firefighters were assisted by the Seascale brigade to top up alternative supplies and make sure enough water was available to cool vital plants.
Whitehaven News 14th April 2011 more >>
Radwaste
Allerdale Democratic Services have quashed Councillor Joe Sandwith’s motion to withdraw the borough council’s “expression of interest” in geological disposal of high level nuclear wastes.
Northern Indymedia 14th April 2011 more >>
A LEGAL challenge may be brought against the Environment Agency’s decision to allow low levels of radioactive waste to be buried in Lillyhall’s conventional landfill site. Cumbria County Council, supported by Allerdale Council, is considering making the challenge. They don’t believe it is the best way of disposing of high volumes of the slightly radioactive material. Tim Knowles, county council cabinet member responsible for the environment, has asked legal and environmental officers to explore whether a challenge “is possible and feasible”.
Whitehaven News 14th April 2011 more >>
Nuclear Accidents
Everyone knows about Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and, now, Fukushima. But what about Semipalatinsk, Palomares and Kyshtym? The world is full of nuclear disaster zones — showing just how dangerous the technology really is.
Der Spiegel 12th April 2011 more >>
Companies
Toshiba, the Japanese company that is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of nuclear reactors, expects the accident at Fukushima Daiichi atomic power station to slow growth in its nuclear business for several years, its president has said. However, Norio Sasaki said the long-term impact of the Japanese nuclear crisis on global demand for atomic energy and on Toshibas business was likely to be small. I havent heard any of our customers say they have changed their minds, Mr Sasaki said in a meeting with journalists on Thursday. Rather than demand falling, the timing of construction is likely to shift a little.
FT 15th April 2011 more >>
Chernobyl
THIS year marks the 25th anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster when radiation spread across Europe and Asia after a fire and explosion destroyed one of Ukraine’s major nuclear power stations.This year also marks the 10th anniversary of the Mid Sussex Friends of Chernobyl’s Children, the charity that was born as a result of the on-going suffering caused to the people living closest to the nuclear reactor site, particularly in Belarus. The Mid Sussex FOCC organises a month-long holiday for more than a dozen children from Belarus every year, raising £10,000 every year to pay for the trip.
Mid Sussex Times 14th April 2011 more >>
Sizewell
The UK’s largest nuclear operator EDF Energy gave the BBC special access to Sizewell B to reassure people that a disaster similar to that which affected Japan’s Fukushima plant could not happen in Suffolk. The firm said the Suffolk nuclear plant could survive the sort of catastrophic failure which left the Japanese plant without power and without a cooling system.
BBC 14th April 2011 more >>
Japan
Japan’s fragile post-disaster political truce unravelled yesterday as the head of the main opposition called on prime minister Naoto Kan to quit over his handling of the crises. At the stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in the north-east of the country, engineers were struggling to find a new way to cool one of six crippled reactors and Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said it was now “highly likely” there was a hole in the suppression unit of the reactor.
Scotsman 15th April 2011 more >>
Metro 14th April 2011 more >>
Japan’s government said today it had ordered the operator of the tsunami-damaged nuclear power plant embroiled in the country’s worst-ever atomic crisis to pay about £7,300 to each household forced to evacuate because of radiation leaks. Trade Ministry spokesman Hiroaki Wada said Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) had been told to pay the compensation as soon as possible. Individuals forced to evacuate would get about £5,500.
Wales Online 15th April 2011 more >>
Guardian 15th April 2011 more >>
BBC 15th April 2011 more >>
The Japanese government is setting up a state-run insurer to take on the task of compensating radiation victims from the Fukushima nuclear power station’s crisis and radiation leakage.
Reactions 15th April 2011 more >>
As people in Japan struggle to control the damaged nuclear reactors and various agencies are involved in mitigating the risk involved. The people are living under a constant threat of nuclear radiation. To put all the doubts to rest Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency has released a question and answer session that expalins nuclear radiation threats.
IB Times 15th April 2011 more >>
The operator of a stricken nuclear power station in north-eastern Japan reported levels of radioactive iodine and caesium in groundwater has soared at the plant, a sign of seepage from nearby reactor turbine buildings, a news report said Friday.
Monsters & Critics 15th April 2011 more >>
A decline in leaks at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant yesterday allowed police to search for missing tsunami victims closer to the complex than before. Officers in protective gear scoured a six-mile radius around the plant for the first time as part of their search for up to 15,000 people who are still missing after the 11 March earthquake and tsunami.
Independent 15th April 2011 more >>
The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan emitted a new burst of radioactive material this week after a bungled cooling effort apparently affected spent atomic fuel in the site’s No. 4 reactor cooling pond, the Associated Press reported.
Global Security Newswire 14th April 2011 more >>
400,000 to develop cancer in 200km radius of Fukushima – Busby.
Russia Today 13th April 2011 more >>
Workers at Japan’s troubled nuclear plant should store blood cells now in case they need them later as treatment for radiation overdose, some Japanese experts suggest.
Telegraph 14th April 2011 more >>
A 102-year-old Japanese man killed himself because he did not want to leave his home in the extended radiation zone. The centenarian lived in the village of Iitate, which until earlier this week was declared safe from radiation leaking from the crippled nuclear plant at Fukushima.
Government officials earlier insisted that anyone living within a 19-mile radius of the plant must move and either stay with relatives or take shelter in an evacuation centre outside the zone.
Daily Mail 14th April 2011 more >>
Nuclear powers ended a closed-door meeting by delaying for 16 months consideration of the failures that triggered the meltdown at Japan’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant. The 72-nation Convention on Nuclear Safety pledged to hold an extraordinary meeting in August 2012 to review the breakdown of safety systems at Fukushima, according to a seven-paragraph statement released today in Vienna.
Bloomberg 14th April 2011 more >>
Nuclear regulators from 72 nations have held a conference in Vienna to review the 1996 Convention on Nuclear Safety which has been dominated by the need to strengthen safety after the Fukushima Daiichi disaster. The forum said it would hold a special meeting on Japan next year to improve safety, and support plans for a nuclear safety conference in June focusing on Fukushima, to be hosted by UN atomic agency the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).The meeting will aim to improve nuclear safety and draw lessons from Fukushima, the most serious nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986, said IAEA chief Yukiya Amano.
Engineering & Technology 14th April 2011 more >>
Tokyo Electric Power Co. confirmed that some spent fuel rods in one of the reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant are damaged.Kyodo News reports that the company analyzed the water in the spent fuel pool of reactor No. 4. The water had iodine-131 and cesium-137 at much higher than expected levels. TEPCO said it measured 220 becquerels per cubic centimeter of iodine-131, 88 becquerels per cubic centimeter of cesium-134 and 93 becquerels of cesium-137. Such levels are up to 100,000 times normal, according to the Japanese Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.
IB Times 14th April 2011 more >>
Japan’s nuclear clean-up continued to unravel as officials admitted there may be too much radioactive water to pump out of the damaged power plant.
Telegraph 14th April 2011 more >>
Tokyo Electric Power is Lehman Brothers times 10. It really is too big to fail. The company supplies 29 per cent of Japans electricity to more than 2m businesses and 26m households in the Tokyo metropolitan area. Not only is Fukushima Daiichi now out of permanent action, 13 of the companys 17 nuclear reactors are offline, as are half of its 20 oil-fired thermal plants and both of its coal-fired thermal plants. Tepcos loss of power generation about one-quarter of its normal output is already having a profound effect, even before the intensely hot summer months when demand surges. The government is expected to exercise a legal provision, not invoked since the 1974 oil shock, to restrict electricity use this summer to just three-quarters of last years level. Keidanren, the big business lobby, worries that enforced cuts will damage swaths of industry railways, pulp and paper, steel, chemical s, breweries, computer chip makers, auto and auto-parts makers all rely heavily on power. It is desperately trying to persuade the government to accept voluntary cuts. In short, all talk about the earthquake and tsunami affecting only a small part of Japans gross domestic product looks optimistic. If power cuts carry on for the rest of the year, or longer, the very heart of Japans economy will be on life support.
FT 14th April 2011 more >>
Germany
Chancellor Angela Merkel faces a bid by members of the upper house of parliament to force her to abandon nuclear power as she tries to rally German state leaders behind an overhaul of energy policy by the middle of May. The main opposition Social Democratic Party will put a bill to the upper house in Berlin today calling for the immediate closure of eight reactors and all 17 nuclear plants to be shut within about a decade. The opposition holds a majority in the upper house, the Bundesrat, where states are represented.
Bloomberg 14th April 2011 more >>
The German government plans to replace nuclear reactors with thousands of wind turbines and thousands of kilometers of high-voltage “monster masts” in a move that will deface vast swathes of territory. Germans, though desperate to phase out atomic energy, are gearing up to protest against the green revolution.
Der Spiegel 13th April 2011 more >>
Chile
A total of 84.1 percent of Chileans reject the construction and operation of nuclear energy facilities in the country, according to an opinion poll published on Wednesday. The poll was taken by local consultancy group Ipsos after the March 11 great earthquake in Japan, which has caused a nuclear disaster in the Asian country.
Xinhuanet 14th April 2011 more >>
Uranium
Since Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant began leaking radiation after last month’s earthquake and tsunami, those watching with consternation have included the Mirarr Aboriginal people of Australia’s Northern Territory, who are determined to limit uranium mining on their land despite the promise of vast riches. The Mirarr are the traditional owners of land where uranium has been mined for more than 30 years and exported all over the world. Tepco, which operates the Fukushima plant, is a long-standing customer of Ranger, the principal mine. The senior traditional elder in the area, Yvonne Margarula, has written to the UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-moon, expressing her people’s sorrow about Japan’s suffering, and their concern about the nuclear emergency.
Independent 14th April 2011 more >>
We have nearly all heard about Peak Oil despite doubts on very basic elements like how we define “oil” compared with oil condensed from natural gas, but the possibility of there simply not being enough uranium to keep present and planned reactor fleets going is new.
Market Oracle 14th April 2011 more >>
Renewables/Scotland
SNP leader Alex Salmonds pledge to produce 100% of Scotlands electricity needs through renewable energy by 2020 has been branded pure fantasy by Labour. The proposal says the 100% target can be reached because of the scale of Scotlands offshore renewable potential. It predicts Scotland will be a major exporter of electr icity with no upper limit to our ambition. However, Lewis Macdonald, the Labour Party energy spokesman, said: Labour is behind the drive to produce more electricity from renewable sources but Alex Salmonds manifesto pledge is pure fantasy.
Herald 15th April 2011 more >>
But business organisations and industry experts criticised Mr Salmond, with Iain McMillan, the director of the CBI in Scotland, accusing the First Minister of being unrealistic and putting too many eggs in one basket. Paul Brewer, a partner and energy specialist at Pw C, said: The difference between achieving the existing 80 per cent target and a 100 per cent target would have to come from a substantial acceleration in offshore wind development. But there are still a number of constraints on that happening, not the least of which is finance for that investment. The First Ministers ambition for the renewables industry in Scotland was the most dramatic element in a document that forms the centrepiece of the SNPs attempt to win another four years in power at Holyrood.
Times 15th April 2011 more >>
CBI Scotland director Ian MacMillan said: “We do need more power generation from renewables, but to have 100 per cent of Scotland’s electricity generated by renewables by 2020 is not only unrealistic, it is also undesirable. “What is needed is Scottish electricity to be generated from a range of different sources in order to ensure security, consistency of supply and delivering to customers at a price that is affordable. Wave and tidal energy hold a g reat deal of promise, but they have not been proven on scale commercially or financially. And wind power is being provided at a substantial subsidy paid for by the taxpayer.” Peter Hughes, chief executive of trade body Scottish Engineering, said the failure to commission new nuclear stations would leave Scotland’s exposed to an unreliable power source.
Scotsman 15th April 2011 more >>