Nuclear Power Plants

[Townsend]

What a relevant retort...

So we now have a new King?

[Teatownclown]

We're all screwed...


The day the tsunami hit Fuckishima, I quit eating fish....good instincts.

Guest Commentary
HARVEY WASSERMAN FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT
Hold That "Hot" Fukushima Sushi
We all knew it was coming.

Radioactive tuna has been caught off the coast of California. The fingerprint of cesium 137 is unmistakably from the exploded reactors at Fukushima.

But Fukushima's hot hands are also on a very welcome debate still stalemating China's plans to build more than 30 new reactors. Fierce No Nukes opposition continues to escalate in India. Reactor cancellations have spread throughout Europe.

And the $8.33 billion loan guarantee for Georgia's Vogtle double-reactor project has still not been finalized. After just five months construction is $1 billion over budget and falling ever further behind schedule. There is no firm price tag. Substandard concrete and rebar steel that doesn't meet official specifications are just the beginning of the nightmare.

You can help Georgia ratepayers and American taxpayers out of this misery by signing our petition at http://nukefree.org/please-do-sign-petition-stop-new-nuke-loan-guarantees.

You can also prepare for life without sushi. National Public Radio has assured us all that the radioactive tuna are perfectly safe to eat. This is the same network whose Scott Simon glibly told us that there were no injuries at Three Mile Island, "not even a sprained ankle."

But as long-time radiation expert Robert Alavarez warns, "It's not harmless." Fukushima released far more cesium-137 than the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Many decades ago lesser fallout from nuclear testing forced the confiscation of more than 4 million pounds of fish.

But as the really bad news from Fukushima continues to escalate, we must begin to adjust to far worse than giving up raw fish.

Massive quantities of Japanese trash have begun to wash up on the west coast of North America, from Alaska to California and beyond. The tragic residue of the earthquake and tsunami that killed thousands and cost trillions has crossed the Pacific. The waves of debris include at least one "ghost ship," many motor vehicles, thousands of barrels full of unknown substances and much more.

Much of it is radioactive. Government officials, the nuclear industry and corporate media will lowball the readings and scoff at the health implications. But American beaches are now contaminated, the fish you once ate is unsafe and the situation could get much worse.

Still hovering 100 feet in the air is the spent fuel pool at Fukushima #4. Stacked with thousands of tons of the most lethal substances ever created, the fuel rods could come crashing to the ground with the next big earthquake. Strewn at random, with no cooling water, exposed to the air, the radiation releases would far exceed Chernobyl, the nuclear bomb tests and any other polluting fallout humankind has yet created. That it would go global is a given.

Repeated calls for help from international teams of experts underline the core reality that nobody really knows what to do, except to pray for seismic stability...an impossible dream in Japan, but at this point the only port of last resort.

Thankfully, the doubts instilled by Fukushima and the growing power of the global No Nukes movement have had their impact. Reports from China indicate deep divisions about further reactor construction.

Massive demonstrations and hunger strikes continue in opposition to India's Koodankulam project. Cancellations have spread throughout Europe.

In the meantime we Americans can finally kill the prospect of federal loan guarantees for building new reactors here.

As Mary Olson of the Nuclear Information & Resource Service has pointed out, money for new nukes---which can't get private financing---was set aside early in the George W. Bush Administration. But in large part as a result of the power of the grassroots No Nukes movement, not a single guarantee has yet been finalized.

Vogtle is the first project officially designated. But problems with design, planning and execution continue to escalate. So have the rate hikes imposed on Georgia consumers. With no firm price tag or completion date, and with the entire industry in chaos, the Office of Management and Budget has been unable to set reasonable terms that the reactor builders can meet.

It all adds up to an industry in accelerating collapse. Reactor construction at South Carolina's V.C. Summer is also over budget, behind schedule and at the core of massive rate hike fights in both Carolinas.

Reactors proposed for Florida's Levy County have soared over a minimum of $9.5 billion to as high as $12 billion each, and still climbing---far in excess of original estimates. Shutdowns continue at nearby Crystal River, California's San Onofre, the flooded Calhoun in Nebraska and many others. Public pressure to forever close Vermont Yankee, New York's Indian Point, Ohio's Davis-Besse, South Texas and more continues to escalate.

Whether these shut-down movements succeed before a Fukushima happens here, or that spent fuel pool collapses, or Vogtle again escalates in price, remains to be seen.

What's certain is that you can help stop the Vogtle loan guarantee and kill the chance of any new reactors being built here---paving the path at last for a totally green-powered Solartopian Earth.

So next time you start to reach for some sushi, grab a pen or keyboard instead. Sign the petitions, call your Representative, run a bake sale---do whatever is needed to kill this loan guarantee and lessen the odds on being harmed by a Fukushima here at home.

---

Harvey Wasserman's SOLARTOPIA! is at harveywaseerman.com along with HARVEY WASSERMAN'S HISTORY OF THE US. His Green Power & Wellness Show airs at prn.fm. He is Senior Editor of freepress.org, where this was first published.

I post this stuff to help all of us....I really do.

[DTowner]

According to Rueters, the radioactive tuna were discovered in Aug. 2011 and the levels are well below acceptable standards.  I guess that explains why my spicy tuna rolls still don't glow in the dark.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/28/us-japan-nuclear-tuna-idUSBRE84R0MF20120528

[Conan71]

According to Rueters, the radioactive tuna were discovered in Aug. 2011 and the levels are well below acceptable standards.  I guess that explains why my spicy tuna rolls still don't glow in the dark.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/28/us-japan-nuclear-tuna-idUSBRE84R0MF20120528

Take a look at the scholarly material he reads:

"HARVEY WASSERMAN FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT"

I mean really?

[Townsend]

Japan just started two reactors up.

[Teatownclown]

Japan just started two reactors up.

Temporary. Here's a tip: LNG

[DTowner]

Temporary. Here's a tip: LNG

Not so easy for a country like Japan without any domestic LNG production.

[Gaspar]

Truthout!

[patric]

Dominion closing nuclear plant due to low natgas prices

(Reuters) - Dominion Resources Inc plans to shut its Kewaunee plant in Wisconsin next year, the first U.S. nuclear plant to fall victim to the steep drop in power prices as rising natural gas production makes some plants uncompetitive.

After claiming hundreds of coal-fired plants, the boom in U.S. shale gas output is now starting to grind down the nuclear industry, with smaller older plants like the 566-megawatt (MW) Kewaunee plant first to be affected.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/22/us-dominionresources-idUSBRE89L1EY20121022

[nathanm]

That's both great and not so great. Great that it gets an older reactor offline. Not so great in that it replaces it with a GHG-emitting fuel that is far more vulnerable to supply disruptions.

[patric]

That's both great and not so great. Great that it gets an older reactor offline. Not so great in that it replaces it with a GHG-emitting fuel that is far more vulnerable to supply disruptions.

It's the same type reactor (albeit different maker) that partially melted at Three Mile Island.
Sadly, they were the county's biggest employer, and victim of investment bankers who wanted to quickly unload a failed investment strategy.

[heironymouspasparagus]

That's both great and not so great. Great that it gets an older reactor offline. Not so great in that it replaces it with a GHG-emitting fuel that is far more vulnerable to supply disruptions.

The recent past history of uranium supplies are showing that the supply of nuke fuel is becoming the poster child of "vulnerable to supply disruptions".

[nathanm]

The recent past history of uranium supplies are showing that the supply of nuke fuel is becoming the poster child of "vulnerable to supply disruptions".

Sure, but the supply disruption isn't going to shut the plant down right this second. It'll be a problem next year when it's time to shut down and refuel. In a gas fired plant, if the poorly maintained pipeline starts leaking or something, it's out of service right this second, with all the attendant grid difficulties that brings with it.

At least coal fired plants usually have at least a couple of days worth of fuel on hand at any given time.

[heironymouspasparagus]

Sure, but the supply disruption isn't going to shut the plant down right this second. It'll be a problem next year when it's time to shut down and refuel. In a gas fired plant, if the poorly maintained pipeline starts leaking or something, it's out of service right this second, with all the attendant grid difficulties that brings with it.

At least coal fired plants usually have at least a couple of days worth of fuel on hand at any given time.

And that gets right to one of the biggest problems we have in this country right now - rotting infrastructure.  Both private and public.  

And the poorly maintained pipeline is due to a liability concern and structure of regulations that lets them get by with an attitude of "don't inspect; don't tell".  If they don't maintain, then they are literally allowed to use that as a defense when something goes wrong - "we didn't know...."   Because they didn't inspect/maintain.  And are not forced to because it would be an "unwarranted government intrusion".

Catch 22.  How sad is that...??

[nathanm]

And the poorly maintained pipeline is due to a liability concern and structure of regulations that lets them get by with an attitude of "don't inspect; don't tell".

The most galling part? Their rates, which have to be approved by FERC since pipelines are (usually, there are some parallel pipelines with different operators) monopolies include a charge for maintenance which is never done. Kind of like they include a charge for taxes that are (usually) never paid. MLPs pay no corporate-level income tax, but still get to charge as if they did. It's a freakin' racket.