Possible US Nuclear Power Revival

[NeoGoomba]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20841590/

NEW YORK - The current turmoil in credit markets is unlikely to derail plans by power companies to begin ordering the first new nuclear plants since cost overruns and public opposition virtually killed the industry three decades ago.

Nearly 30 years after the disastrous partial meltdown at Three Mile Island, Pa., several companies are planning to seek regulatory approval to build new plants, including Entergy Corp., Dominion Resources Inc., Exelon Corp. and the Tennessee Valley Authority. Constellation Energy Group has already filed a partial application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which expects up to seven requests this year and 28 by 2009. The first plants could be online by 2014 or 2015.

TVA’s plans to expand its nuclear capacity have already begun, with the recent restart of a reactor at Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant in Athens, Ala.


The nation’s largest public utility is also a partner in a consortium to resume construction at the unfinished Bellefonte plant site in Hollywood, Ala. It is also looking to finish a second reactor at the Watts Bar nuclear plant in Spring City, Tenn.

“I think investors are relatively positive on companies that are ... planning the next round of nuclear plants,” said Barry Abramson, analyst and portfolio manager at GAMCO Investors Inc., in Rye, N.Y. “The numbers seem to work.”

Utilities see in nuclear plants an opportunity to affordably meet demand for electricity, which the Energy Information Administration is forecasting will grow by 42 percent by 2030. High natural gas prices and the prospect of taxes or constraints on greenhouse gases are making gas- or coal-fired plants less attractive. New modular designs and a streamlined regulatory process further strengthen the argument for nuclear power.

“At the end of the day, we believe ... nuclear will be cost-competitive,” said Randy Hutchinson, senior vice president of nuclear business development at New Orleans-based Entergy.

But this nuclear renaissance faces challenges. No company has lined up financing, and their ability to borrow affordably will depend on federal loan guarantees and state rules about when utilities can hike rates to pay for construction. Construction costs are rising due to growing global demand for raw materials. And activism, an accident or terrorist attack could stoke public opposition.

Still, reactor vendors, such as General Electric Co., Toshiba Corp.-owned Westinghouse Electric Co. and France’s Areva Group, in a new joint venture with Constellation, are positioning themselves to profit. GE, in joint venture with Japan’s Hitachi Ltd., sees its annual reactor business growing from $1.1 billion to $8 billion over the next decade.

To strengthen its hand, the industry is pushing legislation to expand federal loan guarantees, available for 80 percent of plant costs. Utilities are also lobbying state lawmakers to let them raise rates to recover construction costs. Florida and Louisiana, for example, have passed such measures.


State officials are reluctant. “I just don’t want to ... give them a blank check and say, build a plant and we can talk about the cost later,” said Nielsen Cochran, chairman of the Mississippi Public Service Commission.

Some states are allowing such rules subject to “prudence reviews,” said Diane Munns, executive director of the Edison Electric Institute’s retail energy services group.

The Energy Department is also helping, paying half the cost of three early applications, including $5.5 million of the $11 million Entergy has spent so far preparing an application for a new reactor in Port Gibson, Miss., site of its existing Grand Gulf plant. GE has received $46 million in incentives since 2004, and expects a total of $250 million by 2010.

Experts doubt the current credit market dislocations will affect nuclear plant financing. Lenders will view reactors as safe and desirable investments because of the federal guarantees and state cost recovery rules, and because they’ll be built by established utilities with long track records of operating power plants.

Most utilities will invest some of their own equity in the projects, and many will finance the plants on their balance sheets — paying for them out of cash flows and borrowings not tied directly to any one project.

“I would argue that you’re investing in an entire company,” said Standard & Poor’s analyst Dimitri Nikas. “The issue will not be tied to a specific asset.”

Nuclear plants still use low-grade nuclear reactions to generate heat and create steam or pressurized water to spin turbines. But instead of the one-of-a-kind designs the new plants will use interchangeable modular designs. Gravity, instead of pumps, will move water in an emergency and new alloys and digital controls will also improve operations and safety. The 1979 accident at Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island plant began when cooling system pumps and valves failed.

The NRC has already approved two Westinghouse designs. One GE-Hitachi design has been approved, another is pending. Areva plans to submit a design for approval soon.

Nuclear plants cost more than conventional plants, but are cheaper to operate. A new 1,000-megawatt reactor would cost $2.1 billion in 2006 dollars, compared to $1.3 billion and $600 million, respectively, for comparable coal and natural-gas plants, according to EIA estimates.

But the average cost of nuclear-produced electricity was 1.72 cents per kilowatt hour in 2005, versus 2.21 cents for coal-fired plants and 7.51 cents for natural gas plants, says the Nuclear Energy Institute, a trade group.

Weighing in nuclear power’s favor is utilities’ belief that the government will constrain or tax greenhouse gases, which would significantly increase operating costs at conventional plants. Nuclear plants emit greenhouse gasses, but far less than conventional plants.

Also pushing utilities toward nuclear power are new regulations that let companies apply for a single construction and operating license. In the past, the licenses were separate.

“You might spend a few billion dollars, and then you’re at risk of not getting an operating license,” said NRC Chairman Dale Klein.

Long Island’s Shoreham Nuclear Power Station, for instance, was completed in 1984 for $6 billion but never opened due to community opposition.

Licensing isn’t cheap, either. Hutchinson estimated the process can cost $50 million to $100 million.

“Bottom line, in developing a nuclear project, you could be spending several hundred million dollars just to keep the option open,” Hutchinson said.

Critics say the industry is overstating the new plants’ advantages, and ignoring the unresolved issue of spent nuclear fuel.

“There clearly are some benefits to relying on gravity over electric motors and pumps,” said Paul Gunter, director of the reactor watchdog project at the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, which opposes nuclear power plants. “But there are no guarantees that terrorism or an accident won’t penetrate one of these new designs.”

Indeed, radioactive water leaked into the Sea of Japan from buildings housing reactors built to one of GE’s newer designs after July’s magnitude 6.8 earthquake struck Japan’s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant.

Seems to me almost like its too little too late, but at least some people with influence are heading in the right direction.

[Guardsman Bass]

Do none of these activists know about breeder reactors? It's a solution to much of the waste problem that's been around for decades.

[Starglider]

Do none of these activists know about breeder reactors? It's a solution to much of the waste problem that's been around for decades.

An expensive and difficult one though. Plus Jimmy Carter, all-around nitwit, issued a presidental directive banning commercial reprocessing in the US back in 1977. It would have to be rescinded first, then the facilities built, and the only existing expertise to do that in the US is from the classified weapons programs (which I imagine is somewhat but by no means completely transferrable to commercial reprocessing).

[Adrian Laguna]

Jimmy Carter, all-around nitwit, issued a presidental directive banning commercial reprocessing in the US back in 1977.

What the fuck was his logic? "Oh noes, breeder reactors reduce nuclear waste, we can't have that!"

[Guardsman Bass]

Jimmy Carter, all-around nitwit, issued a presidental directive banning commercial reprocessing in the US back in 1977.

What the fuck was his logic? "Oh noes, breeder reactors reduce nuclear waste, we can't have that!"

It probably had to do with the fact that breeder reactors can be used to produce plutonium, which, in the rather ugly anti-nuclear climate of the time, would be a serious public relations issue.

[Chris OFarrell]

Why do they keep calling 3rd Mile Island a *disaster* FFS?

[CaptainChewbacca]

Why do they keep calling 3rd Mile Island a *disaster* FFS?

Because it shot radioactive material across a good chunk of Pennsylvania? I'd call it an accident, personally, but I can see where they're coming from.

[Uraniun235]

Why do they keep calling 3rd Mile Island a *disaster* FFS?

Because it shot radioactive material across a good chunk of Pennsylvania? I'd call it an accident, personally, but I can see where they're coming from.

A pretty low amount - much less harm in that singular incident than in the thousands of tons of smoke belched from a coal-fired plant every day.

[Ritterin Sophia]

Do none of these activists know about breeder reactors? It's a solution to much of the waste problem that's been around for decades.

Most of the activists STILL bring up Chernobyl, being too ignorant to know that they could have stopped it with a simple containment shell; so I seriously doubt they know.

[Patrick Degan]

Do none of these activists know about breeder reactors? It's a solution to much of the waste problem that's been around for decades.

Most of the activists STILL bring up Chernobyl, being too ignorant to know that they could have stopped it with a simple containment shell; so I seriously doubt they know.

Shit, Chernobyl is stopped from happening if its techs don't disable over 100 separate safety systems to carry out some half-assed experiment.

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

Do none of these activists know about breeder reactors? It's a solution to much of the waste problem that's been around for decades.

Most of the activists STILL bring up Chernobyl, being too ignorant to know that they could have stopped it with a simple containment shell; so I seriously doubt they know.

Shit, Chernobyl is stopped from happening if its techs don't disable over 100 separate safety systems to carry out some half-assed experiment.

What were they trying to do with that anyway?

[Ritterin Sophia]

Most of the activists STILL bring up Chernobyl, being too ignorant to know that they could have stopped it with a simple containment shell; so I seriously doubt they know.

Shit, Chernobyl is stopped from happening if its techs don't disable over 100 separate safety systems to carry out some half-assed experiment.

What were they trying to do with that anyway?

Experiment: What Happens During a Meltdown of a Reactor With No Containment Shell?

[tim31]

I think it was something like when, as a teenager, you were drunk off your arse and decided to ride a shopping trolley down a hill with your friends. In other words, the same sort of behavior that spawns infamous MTV shows.

[Adrian Laguna]

Do none of these activists know about breeder reactors? It's a solution to much of the waste problem that's been around for decades.

Most of the activists STILL bring up Chernobyl, being too ignorant to know that they could have stopped it with a simple containment shell; so I seriously doubt they know.

As someone else in this forum said, it's like bringing-up Titanic as an argument for modern passenger liners being unsafe.

[Ma Deuce]

It would have to be rescinded first.

It was rescinded by Reagan, but by then Congress wasn't interested in allocating funds to rebuild the infrastructure and restart reprocessing, for a variety of political reasons (not the least of which was continued public suspicion of nuclear power), and despite rescinding Carter's executive order, Reagan made little effort to do anything further.

Restarting reprocessing would be absolutely essential to any future expansion of the US nuclear power industry, since in the 30 years since reprocessing was halted, a massive pile of spent fuel has accumulated, which has nowhere to be buried and thus just sits around in above-ground storage yards.

It probably had to do with the fact that breeder reactors can be used to produce plutonium, which, in the rather ugly anti-nuclear climate of the time, would be a serious public relations issue.

Yes, and Carter felt that breeder reactors represented an increased risk of nuclear proliferation, and that if the United States stopped reprocessing spent fuel, other nations would follow that example and stop as well. Obviously that didn't happen.

[Sea Skimmer]

What were they trying to do with that anyway?

The rector was newly installed and had an emergency cooling system powered by diesel engines. However those engines took about 40 seconds to start up and reach full power, and so they needed to validate the ability of the reactor to continue powering its primary coolant pumps via steam turbine for 40 seconds after the reactor was shut down. Under normal operations an external electrical feed could keep the pumps going anyway, but the idea was to test a scenario in which that external power feed failed AND the reactor had to be quickly shut down.

An earlier test before the plant commissioned had failed, but with no disaster as the test could be done sort of safely, and upgrades had been performed since, while the plant was being used operationally.

What happened was that the test was delayed the night of the disaster by unexpected high demands for electrical power, and had to be left in the hands of the night shift which was inexperienced. After that, a combination of inherent flaws in the reactor design, poor safety equipment (the control rods jammed when the last second attempt was made to shut down the reactor) and the inexperienced crew all combined to cause the steam explosion.

The night shift dropped the power level of the reactor was too quickly and the nuclear reacting literally slowed down because of a build up of impurities, reducing power to an insufficient level. This was an inherint flaw of the reactor at work, it was always very unsafe at low power levels.

The crew then began removing control rods to increase the power back to what was needed for the test, unaware of the true cause of the power reduction. Despite continuing problems, the crew kept pushing on with the test, and increased water flow through the reactor. This slowed the reaction down even more, since water absorbs neutrons. As a result the crew kept pulling out control rods, until finally the crew actually removed some special manual rods that should have never been touched! At this point the reactor was only stable because of the water and the impurities acting as substitute control rods, and disaster was very close at hand.

Now the moment came to do the test. The water pumps where switched off to simulate the external power failure…. And this meant that now the neutron absorption rate was too low. The reactors thermal output surged. The water remaining in the reactor turned to steam, reducing neutron absorption even further, while the impurities began to burn up, making things even worse. The test however was quickly over, and at this point a SCRAM shutdown was ordered, but not as an emergency measure, still no one knew what was happening, but rather just to turn the reactor off so some maintenance work could be done as planned.

The control rods insertion was too slow (big design flaw) and disrupted what little remaining cooling water was left in liquid form. The reactors thermal output actually spiked as a result, fracturing the control rod tubes, making complete insertion impossible. In the space of less then ten seconds after the SCRAM, the thermal output went to ten times its designed level, the fuel rods melted, and the reactor suffered its steam explosion.


The reason for using the inherently insafe (in mulitpul ways) graphite moderate design BTW, was because it could be refueled while operating. This was useful as it let the reactor continuously produce nuclear weapons material without time consuming shutdowns. The massive size of the design made a containment dome impractical, and indeed even most Soviet era pressurized water reactors didn’t have containment domes either, something which is true to this day.

[Einhander Sn0m4n]

Thank you, Skimmer. They should have called off the test completely instead of handing it off to the nub crew. It appears it was a massive confluence of factors combining into a worst case scenario unexpectly, then.

[Sea Skimmer]

Because it shot radioactive material across a good chunk of Pennsylvania? I'd call it an accident, personally, but I can see where they're coming from.

30 curies of mostly short lived isotopes; and that release was the result of deliberate venting of radioactive gas to remove the risk of a hydrogen explosion, not accident caused leakage. In comparison to other accidents, this is nothing.

The explosion of the tiny SL-1 reactor released about 80 curies, the 1999 reprocessing accident in Tokaimura about 150, and the Windscale fire about 20,000. Chernobyl meanwhile unleashed not less then 7 million (some estimates are as high as 25 million but that is unlikely). It’s not the worst contaminated area in earth either, that honor belongs to the Soviet plutonium production complex at Mayak. This complex had several accidents, one of which released some 20 million curies, the result of a waste storage tank overheating and exploding. Another involved the lake the Soviet used for cooling water (open cycle reactors) and for dumping waste. The lake accumulated more then 100 million curies over several decades, and then during a drought much of it became dry, unleashing an enormous cloud of radioactive dust, the radioactive power of which can’t even be calculated. In addition some radioactive waste was also continuously dumped into a local river, contaminating it so badly that the Soviets eventually fenced off its entire length right up to the artic sea.


But anyway, even if no one died, I think it is perfectly reasonable to call 3 Mile Island a disaster. I mean what else can you really call the loss of a billion dollar piece of equipment in a manner that required hundreds of millions more in cleanup? Not to mention it certainly had a disastrous effect on the environment… as a result of the cancellation of nuclear plants forcing the construction a countless new gas turbine and coal plants.