[ RadSafe ] Nuclear Energy Advocates See Bright Future

[Sandy Perle]

Index:

Nuclear Energy Advocates See Bright Future
FEATURE - Nuclear power quietly confident in energy debate
DOE likely to miss deadline for nuclear treatment plant at Hanford
US, Kazakhstan To Downgrade Weapons-Grade Nuclear Fuel
Japan ships uranium-contaminated soil to U.S. for disposal
Entergy finds tritium in well at NY Indian Pt 2 nuke
==================================

Nuclear Energy Advocates See Bright Future

SELLAFIELD (Oct. 7) - The nuclear power industry is quietly confident 
that the world is about to beat a path to its door in an increasingly 
desperate search for "clean" energy that doesn't heat up the planet.

Soaring oil prices and new data on global warming -- brought into 
sharp focus by devastating hurricanes in the United States -- have 
heated up the nuclear debate and outraged the environmental lobby, 
which says nuclear power is not the answer.

China plans to invest some $50 billion to build around 30 new nuclear 
reactors by 2020, there are investment incentives in the United 
States and nuclear power was back on the agenda at a summit of the 
Group of Eight industrialised nations in July.

The nuclear industry now feels it is on a roll -- 20 years after an 
explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear reactor spread a cloud of 
radioactivity over Europe and dealt a severe blow to the reputation 
of a sector long denounced by environmentalists.

"Nuclear power is in the ascendant world-wide -- less so in the 
(United Kingdom) than elsewhere, but that will change," said Ian Hore-
Lacy of the World Nuclear Association (WNA), which aims to promote 
nuclear power as a sustainable energy resource.

Last week, British Prime Minister Tony Blair pledged a review of the 
country's climate change commitments which he said must include 
looking at the nuclear option.

A few days later, a government minister said Britain must decide 
within a year whether to invest in a new wave of nuclear power 
generation but added no decision had yet been made.

Scientists' warnings about global warming have increased the pressure 
on rich nations to cut carbon dioxide emissions.

Experts have said that the earth's temperature will rise by at least 
two degrees centigrade by the end of this century due to greenhouse 
gases from burning fossil fuels, putting millions of people at risk 
from floods and droughts.

It is difficult to tell if global warming caused hurricanes Katrina 
and Rita, scientists say but they forecast more unpredictable weather 
as the world gets hotter.

CLEANING UP ITS IMAGE

The nuclear debate has long stirred passions in Britain, home of one 
of the most intensively used nuclear sites in the world at 
Sellafield, northwestern England.

In the late 1990s, Sellafield found itself in the firing line after a 
report criticised safety standards at the nuclear reprocessing plant 
which has been operating for some 50 years.

Now, workers understand the public relations challenge.

"We have got to demonstrate that we can clean up the legacy of the 
past. That way we can show we can deal with the waste of the future," 
said Tony Price, head of the clean-up programme.

Waste has long been an industry black spot. The enriched uranium used 
in atomic reactors in nuclear plants is highly radioactive and spent 
fuel remains hazardous for 100,000 years.

"As we show we are dealing with the legacy waste, people are starting 
to get more confident," Price said.

The nuclear industry's most optimistic projection, from the WNA, sees 
global nuclear power capacity doubling to around 750 gigawatts over 
the next 25 years but its share of world electricity supply only 
edging up to 18 percent from 16 due to booming demand, expected to 
double between 1990 and 2020.

To put that in context, 750 gigawatts of capacity could produce up to 
5.2 trillion kilowatt hours of electricity which would be enough to 
supply every person in the United States, Britain, Russia, France and 
Germany for a year.

"Between 2030 and 2050 you could see nuclear as a percentage of world 
electricity supply rising sharply," Hore-Lacy said. "It is not hard 
to envisage a scenario where nuclear could provide 50 percent of 
world electricity."

"THE WRONG ANSWER"

Environmentalists say the true costs of nuclear power are three times 
those stated, there is a risk terrorists could get hold of deadly 
plutonium, and waste is a problem for the future.

"We are not taking an ideological view ... We have analysed the pros 
and cons ... and we have concluded that (nuclear power) is the wrong 
answer," said Tony Juniper of Friends of the Earth.

"A much more positive set of options are there," he said, citing a 
combination of energy efficiency, microgeneration, renewables, carbon 
capture, and more sustainable transport.

Greenpeace told the European Parliament last week that far from being 
the answer, nuclear power should be phased out.

"To replace one environmental catastrophe -- polluting fossil fuel 
power -- with another environmental disaster -- nuclear energy -- is 
clearly not the answer," it said.

Environmentalists want more use to be made of renewable energy like 
solar, wind and waves. The wind power industry says that by 2020 wind 
could provide 12 percent of the world's electricity, but it complains 
of administrative barriers.

It says wind power has no carbon emissions, employs many and is good 
for local economies -- although most complaints come from people who 
don't want wind farms in their back yards.

In Europe, Germany takes the lead with renewable energy sources 
supplying 10 percent of electricity while in neighbour France, 
nuclear power provides nearly 80 percent of electricity.

In Britain, where Blair advocates tackling global warming, renewables 
provide only 3 percent of electricity with 19 percent coming from 
nuclear power but plants are getting old, hence the need for a prompt 
decision on whether to build new ones.

WNA's Hore-Lacy argues that the nuclear industry has high start-up 
costs but low running costs and dismisses the notion that waste 
causes any problems.

"We have to dispel the myths, the suspicion and the fear."
--------------------

FEATURE - Nuclear power quietly confident in energy debate

SELLAFIELD, England (Reuters) - The nuclear power industry is quietly 
confident that the world is about to beat a path to its door in an 
increasingly desperate search for "clean" energy that doesn't heat up 
the planet.

Soaring oil prices and new data on global warming -- brought into 
sharp focus by devastating hurricanes in the United States -- have 
heated up the nuclear debate and outraged the environmental lobby, 
which says nuclear power is not the answer.

China plans to invest some $50 billion to build around 30 new nuclear 
reactors by 2020, there are investment incentives in the United 
States and nuclear power was back on the agenda at a summit of the 
Group of Eight industrialized nations in July.

The nuclear industry now feels it is on a roll -- 20 years after an 
explosion at the Chernobyl nuclear reactor spread a cloud of 
radioactivity over Europe and dealt a severe blow to the reputation 
of a sector long denounced by environmentalists.

"Nuclear power is in the ascendant world-wide -- less so in the 
(United Kingdom) than elsewhere, but that will change," said Ian Hore-
Lacy of the World Nuclear Association (WNA), which aims to promote 
nuclear power as a sustainable energy rs, putting millions of people 
at risk from floods and droughts.

It is difficult to tell if global warming caused hurricanes Katrina 
and Rita, scientists say but they forecast more unpredictable weather 
as the world gets hotter.

CLEANING UP ITS IMAGE

The nuclear debate has long stirred passions in Britain, home of one 
of the most intensively used nuclear sites in the world at 
Sellafield, northwestern England.

In the late 1990s, Sellafield found itself in the firing line after a 
report criticized safety standards at the nuclear reprocessing plant 
which has been operating for some 50 years.

Now, workers understand the public relations challenge.

"We have got to demonstrate that we can clean up the legacy of the 
past. That way we can show we can deal with the waste of the future," 
said Tony Price, head of the clean-up program.

Waste has long been an industry black spot. The enriched uranium used 
in atomic reactors in nuclear plants is highly radioactive and spent 
fuel remains hazardous for 100,000 years.

"As we show we are dealing with the legacy waste, people are starting 
to get more confident," Price said.

The nuclear industry's most optimistic projection, from the WNA, sees 
global nuclear power capacity doubling to around 750 gigawatts over 
the next 25 years but its share of world electricity supply only 
edging up to 18 percent from 16 due to bould provide 50 percent of 
world electricity."

"THE WRONG ANSWER"

Environmentalists say the true costs of nuclear power are three times 
those stated, there is a risk terrorists could get hold of deadly 
plutonium and waste is a problem for the future.

"We are not taking an ideological view ... We have analyzed the pros 
and cons ... and we have concluded that (nuclear power) is the wrong 
answer," said Tony Juniper of Friends of the Earth.

"A much more positive set of options are there," he said, citing a 
combination of energy efficiency, microgeneration, renewables, carbon 
capture, and more sustainable transport.

Greenpeace told the European Parliament last week that far from being 
the answer, nuclear power should be phased out.

"To replace one environmental catastrophe -- polluting fossil fuel 
power -- with another environmental disaster -- nuclear energy -- is 
clearly not the answer," it said.

Environmentalists want more use to be made of renewable energy like 
solar, wind and waves. The wind power industry says that by 2020 wind 
could provide 12 percent of the world's electricity, but it complains 
of administrative barriers.

It says wind power has no carbon emissions, employs many and is good 
for local economies -- although most complaints come from people who 
don't want wind farms in their back yards.
----------------------

Energy Department likely to miss deadline for nuclear treatment plant 
at Hanford site

YAKIMA, Washington (AP) - The federal government says it likely will 
miss the deadline to open a multi-billion-dollar nuclear waste 
treatment plant, delaying cleanup of highly radioactive materials 
leftover from a site that made Cold War weapons.

The Energy Department, which already has delayed the project three 
times at the Hanford nuclear reservation, halted construction on 
major portions of the plant last month amid skyrocketing costs 
stemming from a seismic study.

The study found the government had underestimated the impact a severe 
earthquake could have on the treatment plant, which is the federal 
government's largest construction project.

A department spokesman said the study's findings mean the project 
will probably miss a deadline in 2011, when the plant was to be fully 
operational.

"Based on our review to date, there are a number of technical issues 
that have made it clear we likely will not be able to meet the 2011 
milestone," Energy Department spokesman Mike Waldron said.

On Thursday, the agency notified state officials that a new cost 
estimate and schedule for completing construction on the plant will 
not be ready before June.

The treatment plant has long been considered the cornerstone of 
cleanup at Hanford, which was created in the 1940s as part of the top-
secret Manhattan Project. Today, it is the nation's most contaminated 
nuclear site.

The greatest risk is posed by 53 million gallons (201 million liters) 
of decades-old radioactive waste in 177 underground tanks. Retrieval 
of the waste is a priority because some of the tanks are known to 
have leaked, threatening the aquifer and the Columbia River less than 
10 miles (16 kilometers) away.

Federal officials refused to release a new cost estimate for the 
plant - currently tagged at more than $5.8 billion (4.78 billion). 
Congress has estimated the latest problems could push the cost as 
high as $10 billion (8.23 billion) and delay the start by four years.

"We continue to be frustrated by this update, but at the same time 
agree that USDOE and the contractors should do the job right and not 
make promises they cannot keep," Sandy Howard, a spokeswoman for the 
state Department of Ecology, said Friday.

Cleanup of the entire 586-square-mile (1,500-square-kilometer) 
Hanford site is expected to total $50 billion (41.17 billion) to $60 
billion (49.41 billion), with completion by 2035.
------------------

US, Kazakhstan To Downgrade Weapons-Grade Nuclear Fuel

UST-KAMENOGORSK, Kazakhstan (AP)--A U.S. nonproliferation group and 
Kazakh officials announced Saturday a project to eliminate nearly 3 
metric tons of weapons-grade nuclear fuel that could be used to make 
two dozen atomic bombs.

The project is part of nonproliferation efforts that have taken on 
added urgency in Central Asia, which has seen the spread of Islamic 
radicalism since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

Kazakhstan had been a major production and test site for the Soviet 
military's nuclear program. Nuclear and other activity related to 
weapons of mass destruction was stopped after 1991, but the nation of 
15 million was left with tons of weapons-grade nuclear material, 
millions of tons of radioactive waste and large contaminated areas - 
all guarded poorly or not at all.

That and the weapons expertise existing in the region, given its lax 
border controls and economic decline, have raised fears that some of 
the nuclear material could end up in terrorists' hands. Among the 
former Soviet region's neighbors are Afghanistan, Iran and China.

Under the project, about 2,900 kilograms of nuclear fuel containing 
highly enriched uranium from a mothballed Soviet-built nuclear 
reactor in western Kazakhstan will be blended down so that it cannot 
be used to make bombs, officials said.

The project was initiated and funded by the Nuclear Threat 
Initiative, a U.S.- based nonprofit organization dedicated to 
reducing the threat of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons.

The fuel was transported from the Mangyshlak nuclear power plant to 
the Ulba Metal Plant in the eastern Kazakh city of Ust-Kamenogorsk 
last year, and is expected to be blended down by the end of the year, 
according to NTI.

The project, launched in 2002, has been monitored by the 
International Atomic Energy Agency.

IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei, who Friday won the Nobel Peace Prize, 
congratulated NTI and the Kazakh government on the project, saying in 
a message that it could serve as a model in other countries.

"This project demonstrates the feasibility of developing valuable 
material that is not directly usable in nuclear weapons," he said.
------------------

Japan ships uranium-contaminated soil to U.S. for disposal

TOKYO (AP) - Japan's nuclear research and development agency on 
Monday shipped uranium-contaminated soil to an undisclosed location 
in the United States for disposal, officials said.

The Japan Atomic Energy Agency sent 290 cubic meters (10,150 cubic 
feet) of radioactive soil from the port of Kobe, part of 3,000 cubic 
meters (105,000 cubic feet) of contaminated soil from a uranium ore 
plant in western Japan, said Atsushi Oku, an official of the Ministry 
of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology which oversees 
the agency.

He declined to disclose the destination of the ship, but Kyodo News 
agency said it was headed for Everett, Washington.

The soil will be sent to a company which will extract the uranium, 
Oku said, declining to give the name of the company.

However, the watchdog group Citizen's Nuclear Information Center said 
the soil would be sent to a company in Utah.

In 1988, abnormally high levels of radioactivity were found in soil 
in Yurihama in Tottori prefecture (state), where the agency's 
predecessor had a plant which extracted uranium from uranium ore for 
enrichment, according to the CNIC. In 2004, Japan's Supreme Court 
ruled that the contaminated soil must be removed.

Officials had been looking for a place inside Japan for disposal of 
the soil, but could not find a suitable location, Oku said.

Japan currently does not have facilities to dispose of radioactive 
byproducts from uranium enrichment.

CNIC criticized the move, saying that "countries which are unable to 
handle their own radioactive waste are not qualified to produce such 
waste."
--------------------

Entergy finds tritium in well at NY Indian Pt 2 nuke

NEW YORK, Oct 6 (Reuters) - Entergy Corp. detected tritium in a 
monitoring well in the transformer yard at the Indian Point 2 nuclear 
power unit in New York, the company told the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission in an event report.

Tritium is a rare radioactive isotope of hydrogen with three times 
the mass of ordinary hydrogen atoms and a half-life of 12.5 years.

On Oct. 5, the New Orleans-based company said the sample indicated a 
very small amount of tritium, 2.11E-4 micro curies per cubic 
centimeter, was in the water in the well. Other samples from nearby 
wells were negative.

The well, which is close to the unit 2 spent fuel pool, is likely a 
couple of hundred feet deep, a spokesman for the plant said.

The spokesman, Jim Steets, said the company was looking for the 
source of the leak, which he said was probably coming from the unit 2 
spent fuel pool.

The company conducted the sampling as part of an ongoing 
investigation to verify and quantify previously identified leakage, 
potentially from the spent fuel pool at unit 2 at the Buchanan, New 
York facility.

Steets said the only radioactive isotope the company found in the 
well was tritium. He noted if the tritium originated in the unit 2 
spent fuel pool, it has not traveled very far. The company does not 
expect it to have any impact offsite and very little on site, he 
said.

In late September, the NRC started a special inspection into leakage, 
noting it was minimal and does not pose any immediate health or 
safety concern for members of the public or plant workers.

Spent fuel pools are deep, water-filled storage structures designed 
to hold the used fuel assemblies. The pools, which contain hundreds 
of thousands of gallons of cooling water, have stainless-steel liners 
surrounded by steel-reinforced concrete walls measuring several feet 
in thickness.

During recent excavation work done in conjunction with the dry cask 
spent fuel storage project, which will move some of the fuel 
assemblies out of the pool and into dry casks, workers identified 
several hairline cracks on concrete walls of the pool.

The company expects to start moving the spent fuel into the dry casks 
by the end of next year.

The 1,978 MW Indian Point station is located in Westchester County 
about 45 miles north of New York City. There are two units at Indian 
Point, the 965 MW unit 2 and 985 MW unit 3.

One MW powers about 800 homes, according to North American averages.

Entergy's subsidiaries own and operate about 30,000 MW of generating 
capacity, market energy commodities, and transmit and distribute 
power to 2.6 million customers in Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi 
and Texas.

-------------------------------------
Sandy Perle
Senior Vice President, Technical Operations
Global Dosimetry Solutions, Inc.
2652 McGaw Avenue
Irvine, CA 92614 

Tel: (949) 296-2306 / (888) 437-1714  Extension 2306
Fax:(949) 296-1144

E-Mail: sperle at dosimetry.com
E-Mail: sandyfl at earthlink.net 

Global Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com/ 
Personal Website: http://sandy-travels.com/