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‘Factually Incorrect’ The energy department’s statement said it “noted” an article published by the Mail & Guardian on Oct. 6. The newspaper listed potential bidders for a 1 trillion rand ($126 billion) tender to build six nuclear plants by 2030 as Areva SA, EDF SA (EDF), Toshiba Corp. (6502)’s Westinghouse Electric Corp. unit, China Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Corp., Korea Electric Power Corp. (KEP) and Rosatom Corp. The report, which cited unidentified people in government and industry, is “full of statements that are not true and factually incorrect,” the Department of Energy said in its statement.

Areva is hoping to be part of the nuclear bid program in South Africa,” an external company spokesman said yesterday in an e-mailed response to questions.

Czech Industry & Trade Minister Martin Kocourek (right) told the Bloomberg wire service  September 8 the country will not give in to anti-nuclear influences from Austria or Germany. “Czech doesn’t need ideology.  What it needs is a rational update of its energy strategy.  The current ideology-driven policies of some countries is one thing; our reality is another.” If state-owned Czech utility CEZ builds all five reactors, worth about $28 billion, it will export electricity to Germany and Poland.  CEZ is expected to release documents related to the bid process next month.  The bidders are Areva, Westinghouse, and Rosatom.  An award for the first two new reactors to be built at Temelin is expected in 2013.

Czech utility CEZ plans Europe’s largest reactor complexes The Czech government is planning a significant expansion of nuclear energy now that Germany has moved to shutter its 17 reactors by 2020.  A national energy strategy would call for building two or more new reactors at Temelin and three more at Dukovany. The two sites house a total of six existing reactors and grid infrastructure. 

On September 15 CEZ named Daniel Benes, 41, as its new CEO with a mandate to execute a national energy strategy that includes building new nuclear reactors.  On September 20 Benes told financial wire services it will be his top priority linked to the goal of energy security for the Czech Republic.

On September 23 Czech President Vaclav Klaus (left) spoke at the United Nations in support of nuclear energy.  According to English language Czech news media, Klaus said: . . . “We consider what happened in Fukushima did not by any means question the arguments for nuclear energy.  These arguments are strong, economically rational and convincing.” He called Germany’s decision to close its reactors an “irrational populist event.”  In a parallel statement trade minister Kocourek said that CEZ would not expand renewable energy sources beyond 13% because it is unrealistic to expect to run a modern country on them.  He added CEZ “has big doubts” about biomass.

South Korea to invest in Romanian nuclear plant A South Korean nuclear energy consortium may invest in a project to build a third and a fourth reactor at Cernovoda in southeast Romania. The consortium replaces an investor group which pulled out of the project earlier this year.  The project manager for the new reactors is EnergoNuclear.  Right now Romania’s state owned electric utility holds an 85% share in the project and Italy’s ENEL holds another 9%. If the deal goes through, the South Korean group could take up to a 45 % stake in the project which is estimated to cost $5.7 billion.  Romania has two CANDU reactors at the site near the country’s Black Sea coast.  South Korea has experience with the CANDU design so it is plausible it may reference it in a proposal to build the next two units. This would be a huge win for AECL which recently was split up with its reactor division sold off for peanuts to SNC Lavalin.  AECL has marketed itself in eastern Europe hoping for this kind of development.

Asia's fourth-largest economy imports 97% of its energy needs from overseas and has moved to cut dependence on fossil fuels and to diversify energy sources.

In October Seoul unveiled a five-year plan to spend 36 billion dollars developing renewable energy as its next economic growth engine, with a goal to become one of the world's five top players in the sector.

Firth, management of radioactive waste and spent fuel are solvable problems. Dry cask storage works and deep geologic repositories are feasible once you get the politics right.Sixth, windmills will not replace reactors nor will solar nor anytime soon. These are intermittent and niche technologies which require massive government subsidies to get their electricity to market. Smart grids will improve the use of these technologies, but claimed improvements in energy storage technologies contain some starry eyed projections.The FAS describes itself as being focused on national and international security issues connected to applied science and technology. 

South Africa new buildThe South African government, which tried to offer a tender for 12 new nuclear reactors in 2008, but failed to arrange the financing for them, is making a second attempt. Energy Minister Dipuo Peters told financial wire services Oct 19 a tender for 9.6 GWe is under review by the government.The reactors would be built over a period of two decades. The bid process could begin as early as winter 2012.

The first U.S. utility to break ground for twin AP1000s is Southern at its Vogtle site in Georgia. Southern says it expects a combined construction and operating license sometime in the first months of 2012. At that time it will also ink the final term sheet of its $8.3 billion loan guarantee with the Department of Energy.Other utilities which plan to build twin AP1000s include Scana (2 at V.C. Summer site in South Carolina, Florida Power & Light at Turkey Point and Progress at Levy County. Both sites are in Florida.

NRC progress with AP1000The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's technical staff has recommended to the full commission that it approve final design certification of the Westinghouse AP1000. According to agency officials, the commission will vote on the matter by the end of the year. Eight new reactors in the southeast have referenced the AP1000 design. Construction of four units is already underway in China.The NRC rejected a petition by anti-nuclear groups to stop all new licensing until safety improvements related to the Fukushima crisis are issued as regulatory requirements. The commission said that the Part 52 licensing process allows for new safety measures to be added to licenses as the commission approves them.

The value at $4,000/kw could be in the range of $38 billion for the reactors, but as much as three times that amount in total for turbines, upgrades to the grid, including lines and substations, first fuel loads, and spent fuel management.A critical issue remains which is how the government will finance the new build. The country has suffered through a series of power crisis because in prior years the government failed to raise rates or diverted money from Eskom, the state owned utility, to social welfare purposes. As a result, the country's overall GDP suffered as manufacturing plants and mines had to close periodically or reduce operations due to problems with electricity supply.Since then the government has imposed rate increases, but faces some political opposition because of chronically high unemployment officially measured at 25% of the workforce. New coal plants are being built along with wind and solar plants.An interesting note is that China's Guangdong Nuclear Power Group has indicated interest in providing the financing in return for the right to build and operating the plants. Other bidders include the major developed country vendors.

Niobium-95Tellurium-129Tellurium-129mTellurium-132Silver-110mCesium-136Lantanium-140Barium-140They look to be the nuclides coming out of melted fuel rods. No plutonium, strontium or uranium are mentioned.

The level of radioactive iodine (131) and cesium (134, 137) is also markedly high in Kanto. It is particularly high in Tochigi and Ibaraki Prefectures, and it is higher in Tokyo than in Saitama or Chiba. The area with the elevated level of radioactive fallout includes Shizuoka and Nagano Prefectures. For details for other prefectures, please go to the Ministry of Education website.

The MIT article on nuclear : The biggest factors limiting the growth of nuclear power in the near term are financial and regulatory uncertainties, which result in high interest rates for the upfront capital needed for construction. Nuclear power is half the cost in China and South Korea and almost as cheap in Russia and India. The countries with more favorable regulations is where nuclear power is being built. The IAEA list of nuclear reactors under construction. Country Number of reactors Nameplate watts Expected TWh generation China 27 27230 200 TWh Russia 11 9153 70 TWh S Korea 5 5560 44 TWh India 6 4194 32 TWh Taiwan 2 2600 20 TWh Bulgaria 2 1906 15 TWh Ukraine 2 1900 15 TWh Others 10 10000 80 TWh China and India are expecting to scale nuclear construction to several hundred gigawatts by 2030-2035.

China will start exporting reactors in 2013. Those reactors will be very affordable and middle eastern countries will be eager buyers and China will have no qualms about selling them nuclear power. The MIT article talking about lack of scaling of nuclear power before 2050 is talking about the USA and Europe building almost zero new power generation and having regulations and business which makes it expensive. I am surprised that MIT made such clear mistakes in their energy articles.

Now six months after the disaster, the smoking gun has finally surfaced, not on a Japanese paddy field but inside a pile of steer manure from a pasture near Sacramento, California

The sample of cattle dung and underlying soil was sent to the nuclear engineering lab of the University of California, Berkeley, which reported on September 6:

We tested a topsoil sample and a dried manure sample from the Sacramento area. The manure was produced by a cow long before Fukushima and left outside to dry; it was rained on back in March and April. Both samples showed detectable levels of Cs-134 and Cs-137, with the manure showing higher levels than the soil probably because of its different chemical properties and/or lower density. One interesting feature of t the Sacramento and Sonoma soil samples is that the ratio of Cesium-137 to Cesium-134 is very large - approximately 17.6 and 5.5, respectively. All of our other soil samples until now had shown ratios of between 1 and 2. We know from our air and rainwater measurements that material from Fukushima has a cesium ratio in the range of approximately 1.0 to 1.5, meaning that there is extra Cs-137 in these two soil samples. The best explanation is that in addition to Fukushima fallout, we have also detected atmospheric nuclear weapons testing fallout in these soils. Weapons fallout contains only Cs-137 (no Cs-134) and is known to be present in older soils ..Both of these samples come from older soils, while our samples until this point had come from newer soils.

The last atmospheric nuclear blast at the Nevada Test Site occurred in 1962, whereas the manure was presumably dropped less than 49 years ago. Over the past year, the approximate life-span of a cow patty, the rain that fell on the plain came not from a former province of Spain. Within that short time-frame, the only possible origin of radioactive fallout was Fukushima.To think otherwise would be lame.

Sun-dried manure is more absorbent than the rocky ground of Northern California, which explains the higher level in Sacramento dung than in the Sonoma soil. As a rule of thumb, the accuracy of radiation readings tends to improve with higher concentration of the test material.The manure acted like a sponge for the collection of radioactive rainfall. Its ratio of Cs-137 (resulting from enriched uranium) to Cs-134 (from a civilian fuel rod) is more than 17-to-1. Larger by 1,700 percent, this figure indicates fission of large amounts of weapons-grade material at Fukushima.

The recent higher readings were probably based on either late releases from a fire-destroyed extraction facility or the venting of reactor No.3, a Toshiba-designed unit that used plutonium and uranium mixed oxide or MOX fuel. Unannounced nighttime airborne releases in early May caused radiation burns in many people, as happened to my forearms. Those plumes then drifted toward North America.

Enrichment of uranium for nuclear warheads is prohibited under constitutional law in Japan and by terms of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. Since no suspects have been charged by prosecutors, this cannot be a plot by a few individuals but stands as the crime of a national entity.

Yellow-Cake Factory 608   Fukushima Province has a history of involvement in atomic weapons development, according to a New York Times article by Martin Fackler titled "Fukushima's Long Link to a Dark Nuclear Past" (Sept. 6). Following the lead of Japanese news reports, the correspondent visited the town of Ishikawa, less than an hour's drive south of the Fukushima No.1 nuclear plant. There he interviewed Kiwamu Ariga who as a student during the war was forced to mine uranium ore from a local foothill to supply the military-run Factory 608, which refined the ore into yellow-cake.

Several research groups worked on building a super-weapon for militarist Japan. The Naval Technology Research Institute was best-positioned due to its secret cooperation with the German Navy. Submarine U-234 was captured in the Atlantic after Germany's surrender with a cargo of uranium along with two dead passengers - Japanese military officers .Soon after departing Norway, U-864 was bombed and sunk, carrying a load of two tons of processed uranium..

In the article for the Atlanta Constitution, dated, Oct. 2, 1946, David Snell reported that the Japanese military had successfully tested a nuclear weapon off Konan on Aug. 12, 1945. There are detractors who dispute the account by a decommissioned Japanese intelligence officer to the American journalist, stationed in occupied Korea with the 24th Criminal Investigation Detachment of the U.S. Army. A cursory check on his background shows Snell to have been a credible reporter for Life magazine, who also contributed to the Smithsonian and The New Yorker magazines. A new book is being written by American and Russian co-authors on the Soviet shoot-down of the Hog Wild, a B-29 that flew over Konan island soon after the war's end..

Due to its endemic paranoia about all things nuclear, the U.S. government had a strong interest in suppressing the story of Japan's atomic bomb program during the war, just as Washington now maintains the tightest secrecy over the actual situation at Fukushima.

The emerging picture shows that nuclear-weapons development, initiated in 1954 by Prime Minister Nobusuke Kishi and supervised by Yasuhiro Nakasone, was centered inside civilian nuclear plants, since the Self-Defense Forces were bound by strict Constitutional rules against war-making and the Defense Agency is practically under the direct supervision of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff. Funding came from the near-limitless budget of the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), which today claims financial insolvency without explanation of how its vast cash holdings disappeared. A clandestine nuclear program must be expensive, since it would include the cost of buying the silence of parliament, the bureaucracy and foreign dignitaries.

Following the March 11 disaster, TEPCO sent a team of 250 emergency personnel into the plant, yet only 50 men were assigned to cooling the reactors. The other 200 personnel stayed out of sight, possibly to dismantle an underground plutonium-extraction facility. No foreign nuclear engineers or Japanese journalists were ever permitted entry into the reactor structures.   Radiation leakage from Fukushima No.1 prevented local police from rescuing hundreds of tsunami survivors in South Soma, many of whom consequently went unaided and died of wounds or exposure. Tens of thousands of farmers have lost their ancestral lands, while much of Japan's agriculture and natural areas are contaminated for several generations and possibly longer, for the remaining duration of the human species wherever uranium and plutonium particles have seeped into the aquifers.

TEPCO executives, state bureaucrats and physicists in charge of the secret nuclear program are evading justice in contempt of the Constitution. As in World War II, the Japanese conservatives in their maniacal campaign to eliminate their imagined enemies succeeded only in perpetrating crimes against humanity and annihilating their own nation. If history does repeat itself, Tokyo once again needs a tribunal to send another generation of Class-A criminals to the gallows.

The government banned the shipment of cows from Fukushima Prefecture on Tuesday and will not allow a resumption until safety can be ensured. The agriculture ministry has urged prefectures to check "more thoroughly" whether farmers fed cows hay that had been left outside after the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear accident started.

Some very low level nuclear waste can go into landfill-type settings. But low level waste consists of low concentrations of long-lived radionuclides and higher concentrations of these short-lived must remain sequestered for a few hundred years in subsurface engineering facilities. Medium-and high-level wastes require placing hundreds of meters below the ground for hundreds of thousands of years in order to ensure public safety. Intermediate waste containing high concentrations of long-lived radionuclides, as high-level waste, including spent fuel reprocessing and fuel waste. Because they are extremely radioactive high level waste that emits heat. There is no repository for high level nuclear waste disposal wherever in the world.

All types of energy production, money is on the front end of the process and of waste management in the back end. Macfarlane argues, however, that a failure to plan for the disposal of waste can cause the most profitable front end of a company to collapse.

Nuclear fuel discharged from a light water reactor after about four to six years in the kernel. This should be cool, because the fuel is radioactively and thermally very hot to discharge, in a pool. Actively cooled with borated water circulated, spent fuel pools are approximately 40 feet (12 meters) deep. Water not only removes heat, but also helps to absorb neutrons and stop a chain reaction. In some countries, including the United States, metal shelves in spent fuel pools hold four times the originally planned amount of fuel. The plans to reprocess fuel have failed for both economic and political reasons. This means that today is more fuel pools from reactor cores, and the fuel endangers big radiation in the event of an accident-loss of coolant, as happened in Fukushima.

Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi plant spent fuel has seven pools, one at each reactor and large shared swimming pool, dry storage of spent fuel on site. Initially, Japan had planned a brief period of storage of spent fuel in the reactor before reprocessing, but Japan’s reprocessing facility has suffered long delays (scheduled to open in 2007, the installation is not yet ready). This caused the spent fuel to build the reactor factory sites.

Countries should include additional spent fuel storage nuclear projects from the beginning, and not the creation of ad hoc solutions, after spent nuclear fuel has already begun to build. Storage location is a technical issue, but also a social and political.

The aftermath of a Fukushima-type incident might look very different in many developing countries. With volatile populations and little disaster management capability, the social response would probably be quite different. In Japan, tsunami survivors helped each other, relief teams operated unobstructed, and rescuers had full radiation protection gear. No panic, and no anti-government demonstrations followed the reactor explosions. Questions about cost

Is nuclear energy cost efficient? A 2009 Massachusetts Institute of Technology study, which strongly recommended enhancing the role of nuclear power to offset climate change [2], found that nuclear electricity costs more per kilowatt-hour (kWh): 8.4 cents versus 6.2/6.5 cents for coal/gas. It suggested that as fossil fuel depletes, the nuclear-fossil price ratio will turn around. But it hasn't yet. The World Bank has labelled nuclear plants "large white elephants". [3] Its Environmental Assessment Source Book says: "Nuclear plants are thus uneconomic because at present and projected costs they are unlikely to be the least-cost alternative.

There is also evidence that the cost figures usually cited by suppliers are substantially underestimated and often fail to take adequately into account waste disposal, decommissioning, and other environmental costs." [4] According to the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the cost of permanently shutting down a reactor ranges from US$300 million to US$400 million. [5] This is a hefty fraction of the reactor's original cost (20–30 per cent). While countries like France or South Korea do find nuclear energy profitable, they may be exceptions to a general rule. Countries that lack engineering capacity to make their own reactors will pay more to import and operate the technology.

Poor track record, military ambitions The track record of nuclear power in developing countries scarcely inspires confidence. Take the case of Pakistan, which still experiences long, daily electricity blackouts. Forty years ago, the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission had promised that the country's entire electricity demand would be met from nuclear reactors. Although the commission helped produce 100 nuclear bombs, and employs over 30,000 people, it has come nowhere close to meeting the electricity target. Two reactors combine to produce about 0.7 GW, which meets around 2 per cent of Pakistan's electricity consumption.

India's record is also less than stellar. In 1962, it announced that installed nuclear capacity would be 18–20 GW by 1987; but it could reach only 1.48 GW by that year. Today, only 2.7 per cent of India's electricity comes from nuclear fuels. In 1994, an accident during the construction of two reactors at the Kaiga Generating Station pushed up their cost to four times the initial estimate. Cost overruns and delays are frequent, not just in India. And some developing countries' interest in nuclear technology for energy could mask another purpose. India and Pakistan built their weapon-making capacity around their civilian nuclear infrastructure. They were not the first, and will not be the last.

Warning bells ring loud and clear when big oil-producing countries start looking to build nuclear plants. Iran, with the second largest petroleum reserves in the world, now stands at the threshold of making a bomb using low enriched uranium fuel prepared for its reactors. Saudi Arabia, a rival which will seek its bomb if Iran makes one, has plans to spend over US$300 billion to build 16 nuclear reactors over the next 20 years. Climate change gives urgency to finding non-fossil fuel energy alternatives. But making a convincing case for nuclear power is getting harder. Neither cheap nor safe, it faces an uphill battle. Unless there is a radical technical breakthrough — such as a workable reactor fuelled by nuclear fusion rather than nuclear fission — its prospects for growth look bleak. Pervez Hoodbhoy received his PhD in nuclear physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA. He teaches at the School of Science and Engineering at LUMS (Lahore) and at Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad, Pakistan.