Hinkley
IRELAND’S National Trust is challenging permission for Somerset’s new nuclear power plant in the European courts. An Taisce is contesting the legality of granting consent for Hinkley Point C, which would be 150 miles from the Irish coast. Irish people should have been consulted about the environmental risks it is claiming under EU directives. Planning consent to build Hinkley Point C was granted to EDF Energy back in March 2013 by Energy secretary Ed Davey. An Taisce claim the government failed to undertake a ‘transboundary consultation’ with the Irish People as required by the European Commission’s Environmental Impact Assessment Directive.
This is the West Country 21st July 2014 read more »
EDF Energy and trade unions (GMB, Prospect, UCATT and Unite) have concluded negotiations on a comprehensive package of collective agreements for workers involved in building the proposed new Hinkley Point C nuclear power station in Somerset.
EDF Energy 21st July 2014 read more »
Wylfa
A protest was held outside Anglesey Council’s headquarters this morning in opposition to proposals which could see more pylons built across the island and the Menai Strait. The event, which attracted around 20 protesters including a number of Plaid Cymru councillors and the island’s Assembly Member, was held before a planned meeting at 10am between county councillors and the National Grid. The meeting was closed to both the press and public.The issue of more pylons has been a contentious issue on both sides of the Menai Strait, with a National Grid consultation finding that the vast majority of residents preferred undersea cables as a means of connecting a planned new nuclear station at Wylfa with the main grid. However, last week saw Rhun ap Iorwerth AM accuse the National Grid of ‘ignoring the democratic will of the people’ after the National Grid concluded that their intention remains for a new overhead line between Wylfa and Pentir, near Bangor.
Daily Post 22nd July 2014 read more »
Sellafield
New research released today by scientists at Newcastle and Oxford universities says children living near the Sellafield nuclear site are NOT at an increased risk of developing cancer – compared to children in other parts of Britain. For years, people living near the nuclear plant have claimed there have been clusters of child leukaemia, caused by the nuclear emissions.
ITV 23rd July 2014 read more »
STV 23rd July 2014 read more »
A Fenland manufacturer has been recognised for its high standards by the UK leader in nuclear decommissioning, Sellafield Ltd, at a prestigious industry event in West Cumbria. Stainless Metalcraft, of Chatteris, which builds stainless steel pressure vessels and fully insulated inconel melter crucibles for Sellafield Ltd, was awarded the Supplier Certification.
Wisbech Standard 22nd July 2014 read more »
A 61-metre high chimney at old nuclear power plant Sellafield will be demolished – but not with explosives. Standing in the heart of the busy nuclear waste processing site, it will be brought down bit by bit using a self-climbing platform, a technique recently used to take down Battersea Power Station’s famous chimneys. The 1950s stack has to come down because recent check-ups found it doesn’t meet modern design standards. Project Manager Matthew Hodgson said: “The job of bringing down the stack is going to be a delicate operation to ensure 100% safety of all personnel and surrounding nuclear plants.” Demolition will take several years to complete.
Energy Live News 23rd July 2014 read more »
Small Reactors
The UK’s nuclear regulator has refuted claims that small scale nuclear development is hampered by its licensing regime, MPs have heard today. Andy Hall, chief nuclear inspector at the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) told the Energy and Climate Change select committee (ECCC) the process for approving reactor designs does not discriminate against smaller projects and is the same regardless of size. Other factors, including commercial considerations and EU law, are slowing down the development of small modular reactors (SMRs), Hall claims. This was in contrast to what the ECCC heard in a previous session, when SMR developers from the US told MPs the deployment of the technology was being held up by a lengthy licensing process. Hall said there “would not be a significant difference” between a generic design assessment (GDA) process for a SMR and the larger reactors.
Utility Week 22nd July 2014 read more »
Working with nuclear regulators in different countries risks slowing the development of small nuclear power stations in the UK. That’s the view of the Chief Nuclear Inspector at the Office of Nuclear Regulation (ONR), who was providing evidence at the House of Commons on small modular reactors (SMRs) in Britain.
Energy Live News 22nd July 2014 read more »
Radwaste
Planning chiefs have refused a planning application for 113 homes next to a former nuclear tip. The proposal for a housing development on a site off Roes Lane, Crich, was put forward by Gladman Developments in May this year. However residents raised concerns that the houses would be located within very close proximity to Hilts Quarry, which was used for a number of years by Rolls Royce for dumping low–level nuclear waste.
Bakewell Today 22nd July 2014 read more »
Radwaste – Scotland
The Scottish Government has been warned that independence could see the country overrun with nuclear waste. The MP for Sellafield, Jamie Reed, has written to the First Minister Alex Salmond to tell him that international rules mean there would be restrictions on how much radioactivity Scotland could export to England. This means waste from Hunterston and Torness reactors could be prevented from being stored at Sellafield and would have to be dealt with in Scotland instead. A statement is expected from the Scottish Government.
ITV 22nd July 2014 read more »
The Scottish Government said “Following a vote for independence the way in which the UK’s nuclear legacy is managed will be the subject of detailed negotiations.”
ITV 22nd July 2014 read more »
Supply Chain – Scotland
FIVE years ago the First Minister branded nuclear power “a busted flush”.However, Scottish Enterprise, the quango that received £233million in Scottish Government funding in 2012-13, apparently holds a different view to that of its paymasters. The body is to invest hundreds of thousands of pounds of public cash in a project aimed at helping Scottish firms move into the nuclear power industry.
Herald 23rd July 2014 read more »
There is no sign of that happening but news that hundreds of thousands of pounds of public money are to be spent helping Scottish companies become involved in the nuclear industry is somewhat inconsistent with that nuclear-sceptic message.
Herald 23rd July 2014 read more »
UKAEA
The Triennial Review of the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) is one of the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS) reviews of non-departmental public bodies (NDPBs) scheduled to commence during the first year of the second programme (2014-15). This is not a review of the policy relating to Fusion research to which the Government remains committed.
Parliament 22nd July 2014 read more »
Carbon Budget
An unchanged fourth carbon budget has been confirmed by the Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc) today. The budget, which covers the period 2023 to 2027, will remain at its existing level of 50 per cent of emissions relative to 1990, as per the advice given to the government by the Committee on Climate Change (CCC). Carbon budgets set five-year legally-binding caps on UK greenhouse gas emissions, designed to prepare for the statutory target to reduce emissions by at least 80 per cent from 1990 levels by 2050.
Utility Week 22nd July 2014 read more »
The Chancellor has been forced to abandon his calls for the fourth carbon budget to be diluted after the Government announced today that, having listened to the business sector, the UK will retain the fourth carbon budget in its current form. This morning’s confirmation ends months of political uncertainty over the level of targets for the period 2023-2027. Opposition to the current targets has been led by the Chancellor, who has argued that adhering to the budget, set in 2011, could destabilise the UK’s economic growth.
Edie 22nd July 2014 read more »
The government today announced it will leave the UK’s emission reduction targets as they are. The UK has a legally binding obligation to reduce emissions by 80 per cent by 2050 on 1990 levels. To ensure progress is made at a steady pace, four interim targets were included in the law – known as carbon budgets. It has been reported for some time that chancellor George Osborne wanted to weaken these targets, opening the door for increased use of gas power. The government’s advisory body, the Committee on Climate Change (CCC), has always maintained there were no grounds for such a move.
Carbon Brief 22nd July 2014 read more »
Today I can announce that, having concluded a detailed review, the Government will not be amending the Fourth Carbon Budget. The budget, which covers the period 2023 to 2027, will therefore stay at its existing level of 1950 MtCO2 equivalent. The decision I have taken is consistent with the advice of the Committee on Climate Change. It also reflects the views of the vast majority of businesses, investors and environmental groups.
Parliament 22nd July 2014 read more »
The chancellor, George Osborne’s hopes of weakening the UK’s carbon budget for the next decade were quashed on Tuesday when Lib Dem energy secretary, Ed Davey, said the target would not be changed.
Guardian 22nd July 2014 read more »
Energy Costs
A new analysis from the government of Denmark found that wind power is by far the cheapest new form of electricity in the country. New onshore wind plants coming online in 2016 will provide energy for about half the price of coal and natural gas plants, according to the Danish Energy Agency (DEA), and will cost around five cents per kilowatt hour.
Climate Progress 22nd July 2014 read more »
The Government walked into a row yesterday after it “invited” Britain’s Big Six energy companies to hand customers a windfall they’ve pocketed through a deal made last December over official green levies. That was not good enough for the Labour MP John Robertson, who sits on the Energy Select Committee, who demanded that energy firms repay the cash. “I believe the energy companies have been conning us for years: raising prices while their profits soar,” said Mr Robertson. “They insist this isn’t true, so I challenge them to prove it. Their costs have gone down, so now their prices should as well.”
Independent 23rd July 2014 read more »
Energy companies should cut their prices after saving more money than expected from a deal to cut “green levies” on household bills, ministers have admitted. Consumers could be owed reductions of up to £23 a year from their energy bills, in addition to £50 cut agreed in December, analysis suggests. Under a December deal, the Big Six energy suppliers agreed to cut prices by £50 in return for a series of policy changes which cut the companies’ costs. The biggest element of the deal came from watering down a scheme, the Energy Company Obligation (ECO), which required suppliers to insulate homes. Suppliers collect levies from all households to fund the ECO programme. The changes reduced the number of homes that companies had to insulate, and were estimated to reduce companies’ costs by £30-£35 per household per year.
Telegraph 22nd July 2014 read more »
Energy Supplies
Europe has enough spare capacity in liquefied natural gas (LNG) to meet a large part of the region’s needs if Russia retaliates against the latest EU sanctions by restricting gas supplies. The showdown with Russian president Vladimir Putin comes at moment of surging global supplies of LNG, which can be diverted to European markets and reduce the Kremlin’s political leverage. The price of LNG in Asia has crashed from $20 to $11 per British thermal unit since February.
Telegraph 22nd July 2014 read more »
Nuclear Terror
The British government is to hold a public inquiry to establish whether Moscow was responsible for the death of Alexander Litvinenko, the former Russian agent who was poisoned in London.
FT 22nd July 2014 read more »
Japan – Fukushima
Engineers at Fukushima nuclear power plant have been trying to create a £185m ice wall to isolate contaminated water from mixing with groundwater. However, there has been a steady stream of news articles reporting on problems associated with the work so far. They are simply adding to the sense of despair and distrust that has hung over the clean-up operation since the disaster occurred at the site more than three years ago. However, a closer look at the technology inspires hope.
Phys.org 22nd July 2014 read more »
India
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday said the department of atomic energy (DAE) should strive to meet the target of increasing nuclear capacity threefold from the present level of 5,780 Mw by 2023-24, within the projected cost. “India’s self-reliance in the nuclear fuel cycle and the commercial success of the indigenous reactors demonstrated that with vision, resolve and hard work and India could be a front-ranking country in the most challenging fields,” Modi said.
Business Standard 22nd July 2014 read more »
Switzerland
What were contractors at Switzerland’s Leibstadt Nuclear Power Plant were thinking when they drilled holes in the reactor’s primary containment in order to mount fire extinguishers. Who was the expert who gave the go-ahead for this piece of potentially catastrophic stupidity? Who had this bright idea? On June 24 this year six 6mm holes were discovered by chance in the primary containment of the nuclear plant that, by the way, is on the border with Germany. They had been drilled right through the 3.8cm-thick steel of the concrete and steel shell surrounding the reactor’s core and is meant to keep all the horrible radioactivity inside from escaping. If that wasn’t bad enough, the plant’s operator admitted that they were drilled in 2008. That’s right. Six holes in the Leibstadt nuclear reactor containment went unnoticed for six years
Greenpeace 22nd July 2014 read more »
Spain
Nuclenor, operator of the Santa Maria de Garoña nuclear power station in Spain, has been fined 18.4 million euros (EUR) (25 million US dollars) by the Spanish National Commission on Financial Markets and Competition (CNMC) in relation to its decision to shut down the station before its operating licence expired, the commission has said in a statement. Nuclenor, which is jointly owned by Spanish utilities Endesa and Iberdrola, shut down the single unit station in December 2012, six months before its operational licence was due to expire.
Nucnet 17th July 2014 read more »
Russia – Fast Reactors
Russia’s Beloyarsk Nuclear Power Plant is set to be home to three fast-breeder nuclear reactors by 2030. An official with Rosenergoatom, Russia’s nuclear plant operator, was quoted as saying that the fifth unit at the plant will be one of the first to use a 1,200-MW BN-1200 reactor, according to RIA Novosti. The BN-1200 uses a liquid metal heat-transfer agent as a coolant. The plant already houses a 600-MW BN-600 reactor that has been in operations since 1980, and an 880-MW BN-800, which is considered a prototype of the BN-1200. That unit is expected to reach full capacity by October, the article said.
Power Engineering 22nd July 2014 read more »
Energy Storage
At the heart of the current debate around energy is the question of storage. In cars, how to build batteries that run for hundreds of kilometres; in electricity, storing energy from solar panels for when the sun doesn’t shine. Our analysis shows that the past very high storage costs are now rapidly falling. This suggests that the financial appeal of electric cars and stationary storage is set to keep increasing considerably in years ahead. First introduced by Sony in 1990, lithium-ion batteries are already the dominant type of battery for technologies such as mobile phones, laptops and electric cars, and are expected to remain so for some time. Their strength lies in being able to store a high amount of energy in a relatively small and lightweight package, as well as being capable of charging and discharging thousands of times while retaining most of their storage capacity.
Renew Economy 23rd July 2014 read more »
Decentralised Energy
The traditional model of energy distribution via large, centralised grids is changing as smaller private networks powered primarily by renewables come online
Guardian 23rd July 2014 read more »
Energy Efficiency/ Fuel Poverty
The government has published proposals to lift fuel poor homes to a Band C energy efficiency rating by 2030. The new proposals will mean that future governments will be legally required to lift as many fuel poor homes as is reasonably practical to EPC Band C. The department of energy and climate change (DECC) plans on introducing a staggered system that would see as many homes as possible raised to Band E by 2020, and Band D by 2025. Energy and climate change secretary Ed Davey said: “These proposals mark a radical shift away from old policies of tinkering at the edges without tackling the root causes of fuel poverty – homes that need too much energy and leak too much heat to be able to keep warm. Ed Matthew director of the Energy Bill Revolution fuel poverty alliance heavily criticised the new proposals. He said: “…this strategy is so full of holes they will never plug the UK’s fuel poor homes. The target to bring all fuel poor homes up to EPC Band C by 2030 is too far away and they have not committed to bringing homes up to this standard in one go, killing off the prospect of whole house retrofits and condemning millions of people to suffer the scourge of fuel poverty for yet another generation. Also by saying the government only has to do what is ‘reasonably practicable’ they don’t have to spend a penny on the programme. This makes the targets they are setting meaningless.”
Solar Portal 22nd July 2014 read more »
Government plans to tackle fuel poverty are “inadequate” and “meaningless”, campaigners have warned, after ministers unveiled new targets for insulating homes.
Telegraph 22nd July 2014 read more »
The amount of money households can claim back for installing energy efficiency improvements will be reduced this week, just six weeks after a new phase of the Green Deal was launched to encourage take-up. The Department of Energy & Climate Change (DECC) said more than 12,000 households in England and Wales have applied for vouchers to carry out home improvements under the second phase of the Green Deal. It said people had applied for more than £50m worth of cashback in total under the Green Deal Home Improvement fund, which initially allowed households to claim up to £7,600 each to install energy saving measures.
Telegraph 22nd July 2014 read more »
Fossil Fuels
The UK and Germany are ranked joint first – or last, depending on your perspective – in a new league table of Europe’s 30 most polluting coal-fired power stations. The ranking comes from several NGOs including WWF and the European Environmental Bureau. They’re using it to argue for specific anti-coal policies, saying Europe won’t meet its climate targets without them.
Carbon Brief 22nd July 2014 read more »
Guardian 22nd July 2014 read more »
German Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks, in conjunction with Sigmar Gabriel, Vice Chancellor and Minister for Economic Affairs, plan to propose a partial moratorium on hydraulic fracturing for the next seven years.
Environmental Working Group 16th July 2014 read more »
An application by a shale company to explore for oil and gas in a picturesque part of West Sussex has been turned down. West Sussex County Council’s planning committee refused the application by Celtique Energy for oil and gas exploration near Wisborough Green, a conservation area just outside the South Downs National Park. The refusal, thought to be the first time a council has rejected a planning application by a shale company, was welcomed by local campaigners and environmentalists who feared that the exploration would lead to controversial fracking for oil or gas.
Guardian 22nd July 2014 read more »
Independent 22nd July 2014 read more »
Scotland’s biggest coal-fired power station has been named as one of the top polluting energy plants in the European Union. Europe’s Dirty 30 report, compiled by environmental groups including the World Wildlife Fund, and Climate Action Network Europe, records CO2 emissions from coal-fired power plants across the EU. Longannet was ranked 21st on the list, with Poland’s Belchatow plant coming top and the UK’s largest coal plant, Drax in Yorkshire, listed 6th.
Times 23rd July 2014 read more »
