Few New Nukes
Atomic Energy Forecast Still Cloudy
By Richard Martin, 9-21-07
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Uranium producers in the West are not the only ones foreseeing a nuclear-energy renaissance in the United States; big energy companies, the U.S. Department of Energy, and manufacturers like Westinghouse and GE also look forward to new reactors sprouting across the landscape.
With abundant fuel and almost zero greenhouse-gas emissions, atomic energy is considered by many experts the only viable solution to global warming. Nuclear plants currently supply some 20 percent of U.S. electricity.
While no nuclear power plants currently exist in the mountain West, the Utah legislature is looking at “how to make it easier to build Utah’s first nuclear power plant,” reports the Salt Lake Tribune. Rocky Mountain Power president Richard Walje told participants in Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal’s annual Natural Resource Tour last week that his company is “seriously considering” building a nuclear plant in the West. Nationwide, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission expects up to 28 new-plant applications by 2009, with the first new nuclear power stations in three decades coming online by 2015.
Having seen its prospects destroyed in 1979 by a lousy Jane Fonda movie and an accident that harmed no one and caused no damage outside the plant itself, the nuclear industry itself is at once newly confident and pessimistic, reports Teresa Hansen in Power Engineering magazine. No ground has been broken so far for any new plants. Attendees at the American Nuclear Society’s 2007 annual meeting expressed fears about three obstacles that could derail the nuclear renaissance: public opposition, issues with radioactive waste disposal, and supplies of components for building nuke plants. Many of the materials needed for new plants are expected to be in short supply in coming years, including heavy metal forgings, reinforced steel, and even concrete.
In other energy news:
-- Tired of the fat cats getting rich off high petroleum prices? Better look in the mirror. A new study commissioned by the American Petroleum Institute and conducted by former Undersecretary of Commerce for Economic Affairs Robert Shapiro shows that the owners of [Big Oil] companies look a lot like those in other industries”: in other words, a broad cross-section of the public via mutual funds, pension funds, and direct equity investments.
-- The town of Aspen is not just offering carbon offsets to owners of climate-changing vacation homes; it’s also doing some more concrete in the form of stiffer environmental requirements for new commercial buildings, including “a carbon footprint statement showing that the project does not add greenhouse gas emissions,” reports the Aspen Times.
-- While new nukes may be making a comeback, old nukes were under scrutiny last week, as well, as the Department of Energy released a study considering whether it’s safe to drill for natural gas near the site of a 1969 sub-surface atomic blast in western Colorado. To no one’s surprise, the DOE found that the chances of radioactivity being released into the environment by the new well are minimal. A previous proposal to drill near Project Rulison, as the blast site is called, was vaporized by community opposition.
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Comments
I've tried to provide some sense of nuclear perspective in my novel "Rad Decision", which is available free at my website http://RadDecision.blogspot.com and is also in paperback (from which I get no royalties). I'd invite those interested in energy issues to take a look.
"I'd like to see Rad Decision widely read." - Stewart Brand, National Book Award winner, founder of The Whole Earth Catalog and noted environmentalist
1. Where will the waste go?
2 How will nuclear material be transported across the country? (especially concern given terrorism potential, and just plain accidents)
3. If there is more investment in nuclear, will it mean we lose momentum in developing long-term renewable energies?
One potential carrot to communities near nukes who worry about health concerns may be for the government to offer free health care to those folks within the "danger zone." Provide an incentive to avoid NIMBY.
The insurance industry is many things (venal, grasping, greedy, etc.), but they aren't stupid. An industry that will happily insure areas prone to earthquake, hurricain, volcano, tidal wave and wildfire, has good reason NOT to insure the nuclear industry.
And yes, there is a nuclear technology that continuously recycles and uses nuclear fuel, so that nuclear waste is a minor problem. There's just one glitch--the process produces weapons grade plutonium.
Also, the nuclear industry is much better at greasing the palms of politicians than it is at providing meaningful security at its plants.
As for the American Petroleum Institute study about who owns Big Oil, the study glosses over the essential powerlessness of minor owners like pension funds to actually call the shots.
What's going on is an industry-wide looting of money by grossly overpaid executives. Company boards are worse than useless.
http://djysrv.blogspot.com/2007/09/utahs-legislature-divided-over-nuclear.html
Anyone who thinks a nuclear renaissance is not taking place in the U.S. needs to take a closer look at its uranium enrichment market.
According to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), there are more than two dozen new nuclear power plants coming off the drawing boards in the U.S. The rapidly expanding demand for enriched uranium has triggered the starting gun in a race to capture U.S. market share for uranium enrichment sales. So far there are three horses on the track with multi-billion dollar bets being placed by global corporations.
Within six years, three new plants are planned to be operational in the U.S. They are the National Enrichment Facility (NEF) being built by Urenco in New Mexico, the American Centrifuge Plant (ACP) being built by U.S. Enrichment Corporation (USEC) in Ohio, and a new U.S. project to be built by AREVA at a location that has yet to be selected.
The National Enrichment Facility, a $1.5B facility, is under construction in New Mexico. The plant received its license from the NRC in June 2006. The plant is expected to supply 25% of U.S. demand for enriched uranium and have a 30-year operational life.
U.S. Enrichment Corp is building the American Centrifuge Demonstration Plant (ACP) in Ohio with plans for commercial operations of a full-scale plant by 2012 which was licensed by the NRC in April 2007. USEC is building a bigger plant than NEF’s with a target price tag of $2.3B.
The new horse in the race is a uranium enrichment plant expected to be built by AREVA on a scale similar to the first two. In a briefing on licensing issues given to the NRC in May, AREVA executives said they want to put their plant on the fast track to be operational by 2013. The firm still has to select a location and obtain an NRC license before it can break ground.
It would make sense for AREVA to put it in a western state close the nation's uranium mining industry which is concentrated in Wyoming, Colorado, and Utah. Location of the plant in one of these western states would reduce transportion costs.
Think Wall Street is investing in a nuclear energy future? You'd be right. No one makes these kind of "bet the company" investments without a very strong basis, and in this case, the $6 billion in combined bets for the three uranium enrichment plants is that is there will be new nuclear reactors to generate electricity in the U.S.
Idaho Samizdat Nuke Notes
http://djysrv.blogspot.com
However, my interpretation is that it primarily indicates that the current administration is continuing enormous subsidies to nuclear power.
To find out more about these subsidies, visit:
http://www.earthtrack.net/earthtrack/index.asp
Scroll down and click on:
Nuclear Power in the US: Still Not Viable Without Subsidy
and there are other reports there as well.
Also, are the investments that Ohadi cites really Wall Street investments? Maybe they are to some extent, but these "bet the company" investments are backed up by subsidies from you and me via your government, which currently is pro-nuclear:
To find out about subsidies to U.S. Enrichment Corp., use Google
to search for "U.S. Enrichment Corp. subsidies" for many links.
To find out about subsidies to the National Enrichment Facility,
use Google to search for "National Enrichment Facility subsidies"
To find out about subsidies to Areva, do the same.
To find out why 300 environmental groups have rejected the idea that nuclear power is a good solution to global warming:
http://www.citizen.org/documents/GroupNuclearStmt.pdf
I would suggest the immediate alternatives to subsidizing nuclear energy are less attractive: coal to liquid, continued drilling across the West, wars, etc.
IN THE SHORT TERM nuclear seems to be the least offensive option out of a host of offensive choices. It isn't about loving nukes, but hating the immediate alternatives more.
Sustainables are 20-30 years away from providing a majority of US power. We certainly should subsidize their development, but besides conservation, what do we do in the meantime?
If there was ever something worth public subsidies, it is energy production. In fact, a free-market option for energy production is not a good idea. Anybody remember deregulation of energy in MT and Northwest energy?
Furthermore, from a safety perspective, I don't trust the private nuclear industry to do it right, because they have incentives to cut corners, and enforcement is always going to be lax.
And, sorry again, but the idea of free health care for folks near nuclear facilities also did not sound very environmental to me. People do not want to get cancer or die from radiation poisoning, regardless of free health care. Just my opinions...but then I'm a fiscal conservative.
Good grief, I wasn't suggesting we stop regulating the nuclear industry. That's quite different from whether we subsidize them. Privatize the funding, but regulate them. They are dangerous.
Yes, a free market in energy has serious limits, but the nuclear industry has enjoyed remarkable subsidies relative to sustainables. That is good part of the reason why sustainables are lagging.
The issue of loan guarantees for nuclear power plants is currently being debated in Congress. The House bill offers new nuclear plants coverage of 100% of the debt and 80% of the cost of the plant. Similar provisions are in a Senate committee bill which has not yet seen floor action.
For analysis of these subsidies and government collusion, have a look at this book:
Helen Caldicott--Nuclear Power is not the Answer.
and here's a website (one of many) with more on how those subsidies are not transparent, but quite real:
http://www.nirs.org/factsheets/productiontaxcredits.htm
I'm afraid we've been bumped from the front page, and probably not many listening to this any more. New West could do an in-depth look at this! Help readers sort through a complex subject.
The federal government is expected to support loan guarantees for up to four new reactors, one of each advanced reactor design type, but it is unlikely to provide support beyond that point. A loan guarantee is not a handout since the entity receiving it pays the government the administrative costs associated with it.
Since there are four plausible commercial candidate reactors in the US market at this point – [GE-Hitachi ESBWR, Toshiba-Westinghouse AP 1000, Mitsubishi APWR, and the Areva-Unistar EPR - any utility that gets a license application in first with one of these designs is likely to apply for the federal loan coverage. Note that only the first two designs are actually "pre-approved" by the NRC. Even with a combined construction and operating permit from the NRC, the cost of approval is from $24-48M none of which is "subsidized" by the federal government. For the other two designs, the costs will tend towards the higher range.
There is enormous activity brewing within the nuclear industry that goes well beyond the first four new reactors.
On Monday 9/24 the Wall Street Journal reported, "The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has geared up for an expected flood of applications over the next 15 months, which could cover as many as 29 new reactors at 20 sites and represent a possible investment by the U.S. power industry of $60 billion to $90 billion."
That's real money as Everett Dirkson would say and the numbers pretty much speak for themselves.
The greatest activity will be in Texas. It plans to keep the lights on with nuclear power plants. According to a comprehensive article in the Dallas Morning News by reporter Elizabeth Souder, the future of the nuclear industry may get a jump start in Texas. The state has four nuclear reactors in operation today and six more are planned to be operational by 2015.
http://djysrv.blogspot.com/2007/07/texas-plans-to-keep-lights-on-with-new.html
College students in engineering programs take note. If you want a job in the nuclear industry, head for Texas because that's where the industry is lighting up.
Idaho Samizdat Nuke Notes
http://djysrv.blogspot.com