Impossible Conundrum: Nuclear Waste Storage

There are a multitude of reasons why nuclear fission reactors make no sense as a part of our energy future (without even thinking about it too much, you've got dwindling supplies of uranium ore; the impossibility of building enough reactors fast enough to cope with climate change challenges; the difficulty finding suitable sources of cooling water for new reactors; the demonstrated problems during heat waves, such as in 2003 when France was forced to shut down reactors when cooling water temperatures became too high; the element of human error that frequently complicates safety issues, as demonstrated mightily during the ongoing Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster; and on and on).

Significantly, however, nuclear proponents have consistently dodged the issue that presents a glaring indictment of the entire technology: devising a long-term solution for the end of the fuel cycle, finding a way to contain and store the byproducts of 70 years of nuclear fission, much of it still residing in spent fuel pools—a storage solution that has always been deemed temporary, but with the lack of industry initiatives to move cooler fuel to dry casks and the absence of any progress toward a permanent repository, some 72,000 tons of nuclear waste exist with no plan for long-term storage.

Writing for Truth-Out.org, Gregg Levine analyzes the situation, tracing the initial enthusiasm of the nuclear industry to the present-day confusion.

As he points out in the article:

The crisis at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi facility was so dangerous, and remains dangerous to this day, in part because of the large amounts of spent fuel stored in pools next to the reactors but outside of containment - a design identical to 35 US nuclear reactors. A number of these GE Mark 1 Boiling Water Reactors - such as Oyster Creek and Vermont Yankee - have more spent fuel packed into their individual pools than all the waste in Fukushima Daiichi Units 1, 2, 3, and 4 combined.

In retrospect, it's completely insane that we've proceeded with nuclear power generation and proponents continue to present the technology as the solution to global warming when the most fundamental concerns—long-term isolation of the radioactive byproducts—have never been suitably addressed.

Solar Flares and Nuclear Safety

Photo by Fernando Reyes Palencia

Power grid failure presents a serious risk to the operation of nuclear reactors, which require electricity to maintain cooling water circulation even when shut down. As demonstrated by the reactor meltdowns at the Fukushima reactor complex, if you lose power lines and suffer backup generators failures at he same time, the loss of cooling capabilities rapidly causes the situation to spiral out of control.

Besides the natural disaster impacts of earthquake and tsunamis, another natural phenomenon—solar flares—poses dangers unlikely to be factored into the accident trees that assess plant operational risks. Coronal Mass Ejections (CMEs), which peak during regular cycles of the sun, can potentially disrupt the energy grid and render nuclear plants unable to maintain coolant circulation far beyond the week that diesel backup generators are required to function. In Flare-up: How the Sun Could Put an End to Nuclear Power, Gar Smith writes:

A 2011 Oak Ridge National Laboratory report warned of a 33 percent likelihood that a solar flare could lead to “long-term power loss” over a nuclear reactor’s life. With 440 nuclear power plants in 30 countries, and 250 research reactors, there are nearly 700 potential Fukushimas waiting to be unleashed.

Faced with a grid collapse, nuclear plants must rely on backup power to cool reactor cores and spent-fuel ponds. But the Nuclear Regulatory Commission requires only eight hours of battery power and enough fuel to run emergency generators for a week. Restoring outside power to Fukushima’s damaged reactors was a daunting task even when Japan had a functioning grid to fall back on. If the Sun sends a geomagnetic tsunami sweeping across Earth, it could become impossible to provide any form of traditional power.

The failure of the Solar Shield Bill (H.R.668), which included provisions that could protect the grid against the threat of geomagnetic storms, illustrates how woefully unprepared we are to deal with the very likely possibilities of large-scale power blackouts. As Gar points out in his article:

The US could protect its grid by spending around $1 billion to “harden” 350 key EHV transformers and stock blast-proof warehouses with replacement parts. Transformers could be protected with ground resistors. Costing about $40,000 each, they could be installed on 5,000 critical transformers for less than $200 million – about one-tenth the cost of a B-2 bomber.

 

Inside the Evacuation Zone at Fukushima

Former Shooto heavyweight champion Enson Inoue took a bold journey into the evacuation zone at Fukushima and offered some candid revelations on the state of affairs in and around the disabled nuclear plant. Anyone who thinks the situation is firmly under control should look and listen and perhaps reconsider the situation. MMA Fighting also interviewed Inoue, who offered additional details about his journey into the region.

Reflections of a Nuclear Power Engineer

In this article, reposted on CommonDreams.org, a nuclear engineer talks about his disenchantment with nuclear power because of safety issues and offers an insider view of inherent problems. He offers an interesting assessment of the probability and risk associated with nuclear plant operation:

He illustrates this by comparing driving on the Italian highway, the Autostrada, with running a nuclear power station. Driving on the Autostrada has a low risk to the general population. A possibility does exist that you will crash, and perhaps die as a result, but the consequences of the accident to the general society will be next to nil. That’s why countries let almost anyone drive. So a moderately high P times a very low C equals a small risk to society as a whole.

On the other hand, the chance of an earthquake and tsunami of the magnitude that hit Japan are quite remote, especially occurring in tandem, which makes for a tiny P. But the consequences — the C — of them imperiling a nuclear power plant are huge, leading to a much higher risk to society.

Voters in Italy are convinced. They just voted down plans to restart nuclear power in their country.

Vermont Yankee Voted Down by Senate

Unreliability, radioactive spills, aging reactor components, and lying statements from Entergy, the firm that had operated the Vermont Yankee plant for the past 37 years, were among the reasons that the Vermont Senate voted to deny a request for a 20-year extension of its operating license. Here is a photo essay on the historic vote from the Burlington Free Press.

Health Physicist Talks of Three Mile Island Coverup

As reported in a detailed investigative piece by Sue Sturgis in Facing South, Randall Thompson, the health physicist hired to monitor radiation emissions in the aftermath of the near meltdown of the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in March of 1979, spoke of radiation releases hundreds to thousands of times higher than official reports.

The number of discrepancies between the government and Kemeny Commission findings are numerous and extremely disturbing, based on the first-person experiences of Randall Thompson and his wife, Joy, who was hired to monitor the radiation doses received by TMI workers.

They [the Thompsons] also offer evidence of atmospheric releases of dangerously long-lived radioactive particles such as cesium and strontium -- releases denied by the Kemeny Commission but indicated in the Thompsons' own post-disaster monitoring and detailed in the report -- and show that there were pathways for the radiation to escape into the environment. They demonstrate that the plant's radiation filtration system was totally inadequate to handle the large amounts of radiation released from the melted fuel and suggest that the commission may have arbitrarily set release estimates at levels low enough to make the filtration appear adequate.

Shockingly, they also report that when readings from the dosimeters used to monitor radiation doses to workers and the public were logged, doses of beta radiation -- one of three basic types along with alpha and gamma -- were simply not recorded, which Joy Thompson knew since she did the recording. But Thompson's monitoring equipment also indicated that beta radiation represented about 90 percent of the radiation to which TMI's neighbors were exposed in April 1979, which means an enormous part of the disaster's public health risk may have been wiped from the record.

Finally, in a separate analysis the Thompsons point to discrepancies in government and industry accounts of the disaster that suggest the TMI Unit 2 suffered a scram failure -- that is, a breakdown of the emergency shutoff system. That would mean the nuclear reaction spiraled out of control and therefore posed a much greater danger than the official story allows.

The Thompsons aren't the only ones who have produced evidence that the radiation releases from TMI were much higher than the official estimates. Arnie Gundersen -- a nuclear engineer and former nuclear industry executive turned whistle-blower -- has done his own analysis, which he shared for the first time at a symposium in Harrisburg last week.

"I think the numbers on the NRC's website are off by a factor of 100 to 1,000," he said.

The story also describes the threats received by the Thompsons as they attempted to make this information public, which eventually caused them to move to New Mexico in fear for their lives. The truth of the Three Mile Island incident threatens a multi-billion dollar industry trying to revive itself and those indifferent to public safety seem willing to go to any lengths to hide the truth.

Uranium Mining: The Dirty Side of "Clean" Nuclear Power

Those who tout the benefits of "clean" nuclear energy don't usually talk much at all about the dirty sides to this industry: uranium mining. As many of the most abundant sources of ore are on Native American lands, the pressure is on once again to open these lands to mining.

As reported by the Washington Post, Navajos in particular have borne the consequences of mining operations.

Like many Navajos who worked in the mines, Larry J. King didn't know then that there was anything dangerous about it. "We had no respirators; you'd have sweat running down your face with the uranium dust getting in your ears, nose and mouth," said King, who surveyed mine tunnels from 1975 to 1982. "You couldn't help but swallow it."

During mining's peak, from the early 1950s to the early 1980s, about 400 million pounds of uranium were extracted from the region. At the end of the boom, around 1984, the price of uranium languished below $10 a pound. Mines shut down, and the United States began importing nearly all of its uranium, with the bulk coming now from Canada, Russia and Australia. But by last summer, the price had rebounded to a record high of $136 a pound.

Though the mines created numerous jobs and substantial royalties for the Navajo and Laguna tribes, the decades of extraction took a heavy toll: lung cancer, kidney disease, birth defects and other ailments at notably high levels among miners and families who lived among piles of uranium tailings -- the ground-up waste from milling -- and even used the material to build their homes.

All but one of the major companies now seeking to mine in New Mexico are newcomers to the state and have promised to do a better job than their predecessors. In addition, pending state legislation would require them to deposit a small percentage of their profits in a "legacy fund" to clean up existing uranium contamination.

But King said, "I don't believe them one bit."

He blames his recent health problems on uranium. He remembers July 16, 1979, when more than 90 million gallons of uranium-contaminated water burst through the dam of a tailings holding pond and into the Puerco River running by his land. And he remembers seeing his cattle drop dead from, he thinks, drinking polluted mine runoff.

There is other dirt deeply embedded under this industry's fingernails as well, of course. Periodic tritium discharges from the stacks. Fish kills from overheated cooling water effluent. The carbon costs of the coal-fired plants that power the uranium processing facilities.

But, that's another story for another day.

Nuclear Power, By the Numbers

Nuclear power, the most expensive technique for boiling water ever invented, is perhaps best described by the numbers.

Amount that a dollar spent on energy efficiency and renewable energy goes toward reducing CO2 emissions compared to a dollar spent on nuclear power: 7 to 10 times

Number of dirty, coal-fired plants required in Kentucky to operate two uranium enrichment plants: 4

Percentage increase in ovarian and testicular cancer among children in Navajo lands adjacent to uranium mining operations performed in the 1950's: 1,500

Year that India's first commercial nuclear power reactor went on line: 1969

Year that India performed its first test of a nuclear bomb: 1974

Number of days the $10-billion French faster breeder reactor, Superphenix, operated during an 11-year span before being permanently shut down following a massive leak of sodium coolant: 287

Number of French reactors that shut down during the heat wave of 2003 because of a rise in the temperature of cooling water from rivers: 17

Number of tons of plutonium oxide powder transported annually to French MOX fuel reprocessing facilities in Belgium and southern France: 10

Number of metric tons of plutonium stored worldwide as of 2003: 240

Number of pounds of plutonium required to make a nuclear weapon: <20

Percentage of CFC-114 gas released into the air as a result of uranium enrichment in the U.S.: 90

Number of times that CFC is more potent as a heat trapper and global warmer than CO2: 10,000 - 20,000

Percentage of citizens in France polled in 2006 who favor a phase-out of nuclear energy: 61

Number of peak early fatalities predicted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in their Calculation of Reactor Accident Consequences study if the Salem 2 nuclear plant in New Jersey suffered a meltdown: 100,000

Property damage estimated in the CRAC 2 study from a Salem 2 meltdown (in 1980 dollars): $155,000,000,000

Number of energy companies that Don Hintz, President of Entergy, says can afford the $1.5 - 2 billion cost of building a nuclear reactor right now: 0

Draw your own conclusions...

Nuclear Energy Hoax and Its Hucksters

FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting) just posted an outstanding article, repurposed from their print publication Extra, that chronicles the media's inattention to the glaring problems of nuclear power. The purported revival of nuclear energy is being heralded as a dramatic and important advance in the fight against global warming, but, as this article points out, the problems of nuclear power run the gamut from excessive costs to unacceptable risks. Karl Grossman, a professor of journalism at the State University of New York College, in this article, Money is the Real Green Power, points out:

“With a very few notable exceptions, such as the Los Angeles Times, the U.S. media have turned the same sort of blind, uncritical eye on the nuclear industry’s claims that led an earlier generation of Americans to believe atomic energy would be too cheap to meter,” comments Michael Mariotte, executive director of the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. “The nuclear industry’s public relations effort has improved over the past 50 years, while the natural skepticism of reporters toward corporate claims seems to have disappeared.”

The risk scenarios are also regularly downplayed, though the potential disasterous effects of a meltdown are mind-numbing.

As to the risks, the mainstream media’s handling—or non-handling—of the U.S. government’s most comprehensive study on the consequences of a nuclear plant accident is instructive. Calculation of Reactor Accident Consequences 2 (known as CRAC-2) was done by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in the 1980s. Bill Smirnow, an anti-nuclear activist, has tried for years to interest media in reporting on it—sending out information about it continually.

The study estimates the impacts from a meltdown at each nuclear plant in the U.S. in categories of “peak early fatalities,” “peak early injuries,” “peak cancer deaths” and “costs [in] billions.” (“Peak” refers to the highest calculated value—not a “worst case scenario,” as worse assumptions could have been chosen.) For the Indian Point 3 plant north of New York City, for example, the projection is that a meltdown would cause 50,000 “peak early fatalities,” 141,000 “peak early injuries,” 13,000 “peak cancer deaths,” and $314 billion in property damage—and that’s based on the dollar’s value in 1980, so the cost today would be nearly $1 trillion. For the Salem 2 nuclear plant in New Jersey, the study projects 100,000 “peak early fatalities,” 70,000 “peak early injuries,” 40,000 “peak cancer deaths,” and $155 billion in property damage. The study provides similarly staggering numbers across the country.

And it's pretty clear that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission plays number games with accident probabilities, as discussed in this well-documented, heavily footnoted article from Greenpeace USA, The Probablility of a Nuclear Accident.

Why are the major media so enthusiastically supportive of nuclear power? Just follow the money trail:

What are the causes of the media nuclear dysfunction? The obvious problem is media ownership. General Electric, for one, is both a leading nuclear plant manufacturer and a media mogul, owning NBC and other outlets. (For years, CBS was owned by Westinghouse; Westinghouse and GE are the Coke and Pepsi of nuclear power.) There have been board and financial interlocks between the media and nuclear industries. There is the long-held pro-nuclear faith at media such as the New York Times.

There are abundant alternatives to nuclear energy that are genuinely clean, safe, and sustainable. But, don't expect to hear this from the mainstream media.

Drought and Nuclear Power

The prospect of water wars and extended drought as a side effect of global warming places the nuclear power industry in an increasingly untenable position. As nuclear power proponents try to cast the moribund technology as a carbon-free power source to lead us out of the global warming crisis, real-world concerns cast a different light on nuclear futures.

As reported by The Associated Press and reposted on CommonDreams.org, droughts across the Southeast United States could force serious power reductions or plant shutdowns this coming year. The rivers and lakes that supply the cooling water essential to plant operation are at extremely low levels.

Already, there has been one brief, drought-related shutdown, at a reactor in Alabama over the summer.

“Water is the nuclear industry’s Achilles’ heel,” said Jim Warren, executive director of N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, an environmental group critical of nuclear power. “You need a lot of water to operate nuclear plants.” He added: “This is becoming a crisis.”

The current situation mirrors the crisis that occurred in Europe during the heat wave in 2006. Countries dependent on nuclear power often had to reduce power or shut down as the temperatures soared. Buying electricity from other sources in this type of situation is very expensive.

During Europe’s brutal 2006 heat wave, French, Spanish and German utilities were forced to shut down some of their nuclear plants and reduce power at others because of low water levels - some for as much as a week.

If a prolonged shutdown like that were to happen in the Southeast, utilities in the region might have to buy electricity on the wholesale market, and the high costs could be passed on to customers.

“Currently, nuclear power costs between $5 to $7 to produce a megawatt hour,” said Daniele Seitz, an energy analyst with New York-based Dahlman Rose & Co. “It would cost 10 times that amount that if you had to buy replacement power - especially during the summer.”

There are many other reasons why nuclear power doesn't make sense (safety concerns, waste disposal, scarcity of uranium ore, cost overruns, terrorist threats), but sometimes the issue is basic and inescapable: without abundant water, nuclear power plants can't operate.

Faux Nuclear Renaissance

In sharp contrast to the numerous mainstream media reports (which have been widely circulated and strongly encouraged by numerous pro-nuclear factions), the nuclear power industry is in decline around the world. The "World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2007", presented to the European Parliament in late November 2007 by the Greens European Free Alliance group, documents that the proportion of nuclear energy in power production has decreased in 21 out of 31 countries. Compared to five years ago, there are five fewer functioning nuclear reactors. At the moment, 32 nuclear power plants are under construction or in the late planning stage, which is 20 fewer than at the turn of the millennium.

In a summary of the report posted on the Greens/EFA site, German Green MEP and energy spokesperson said,

"The shrinking of nuclear in Europe is particularly notable, with ten power plants being permanently withdrawn from the network since the last report in 2004.With fewer plants being built and existing plants becoming more decrepit, it seems clear that the grandiose ambitions of the nuclear industry will remain in the realm of fantasy."

False promises for a nuclear revival could lead to misplaced public expenditure, delaying a more intelligent and sustainable approach to energy supply. In addition, plans for building new reactors would be in direct competition for the limited manufacturing capacity that is already stretched by the maintenance costs for existing (aging) reactors.

"The gap between the expectations being promoted by the nuclear industry and reality are perfectly highlighted by the bungled attempt to build a new reactor at the Olkiluoto plant in Finland. This first new nuclear project in 15 years has been blighted by problems.After only two years of construction the project is already two years delayed and the budget is set to be overrun by at least 50%, with 1.5 billion euro in losses and shocking errors in key technical specifications. Clearly, talk of a nuclear revival is divorced from reality and political leaders must call the nuclear industry's bluff," continued Rebecca Harms.

Recognition of the fallacies perpetuated by nuclear power boosters could help steer more resources toward wind, solar, geothermal, and tidal power development.

Nuclear Power Information Tracker

The Union of Concerned Scientists, one of the best watchdog and energy advisory group around, offers a comprehensive online guide to the existing reactors in the U.S. The interactive map also provides some startling surprises, such as when you click on the button labeled "Show Inherently Safe Reactors" and get this popup:

An inherently safe reactor, in theory, would be designed, operated, and monitored in such a way that the reactor would never be damaged and, as a result, no radioactivity would ever be released to the environment. No such reactor currently exists. The risk from existing reactors is so real and so large that liability insurance from private companies is financially impossible, thereby requiring federal liability protection

The catalog of reactor problems, near misses, forced shutdowns, and spotty safety records is eye opening and a clear indication of the nature of the beast.

Our Noocular Future

The AustralianGreens have their say in this nifty sequence that spells out the benefits of Noocular Power in no uncertain terms.

From Oil Kings to Uranium Kings

Whether you have an energy economy geared to oil or hooked on uranium, as in France, as the commodity becomes scarce, the prices rise and fights often break out among those who want the remaining stores. This Le Monde editorial talks about the dynamics involved as France negotiates with Niger to ensure an ongoing supply of "yellow cake" to fuel its reactors.

Mr. Tandja has observed the price takeoff. A pound has gone from ten dollars three years ago to close to one hundred and fifty dollars on the international market (not counting long-term revisable contracts). And the increase should continue as needs grow and tensions over supplies appear. A windfall for Niger, which sees Chinese, Canadians, and Australians flooding in. World reserves are abundant, but exploration only resumed recently after twenty years of under-investment linked to attractive oil prices up to 2003 and to the rejection of nuclear power after the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe. Demand from big American, German, French, Japanese, Chinese, and Russian electricity companies will grow as they build new reactors. With the exhaustion of military (especially Russian) stocks, recycled as fuel since the end of the Cold War to compensate for mining under-production, rationing looms.

Wind, solar, and geothermal are looking better all the time.