[ RadSafe ] FPL wants another Fla. nuclear plant by 2018

Sat Feb 10 11:10:34 CST 2007

Index:

FPL wants another Fla. nuclear plant by 2018
Nuclear Regulators allow one technician at Pilgrim plant 
Swedish power concern reveals new flaws at Forsmark nuclear plant
Defunct Japan nuclear reactor building found substandard
Swiss still braced for nuclear war  
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FPL wants another Fla. nuclear plant by 2018

TALLAHASSEE (Palm Beach Post) Feb 10- Florida Power & Light Co. 
President Armando Olivera said Friday that within the next two years 
the utility will inform federal regulators that it wants to build 
another nuclear plant in Florida and hopes to have it constructed in 
about a decade.

He also said FPL was looking at building a "gasified" coal-fired 
power plant on the same site as one of its other power plants, but 
only after it builds a "clean-coal" plant in Glades County.

"Nuclear power, from a public policy point of view, we think it's the 
best long-term strategy for this country," said Olivera, adding that 
it is the cheapest fuel for the utility. "We are optimistic that we 
can get a nuclear plant built in the 2016-2018 time frame."

Olivera spoke to the new Florida Energy Commission at its first 
meeting.

FPL has two nuclear reactors in St. Lucie County and two reactors at 
its Turkey Point plant in Miami-Dade County, where it has thousands 
of additional acres available for growth.

FPL said last year that it was considering building an additional 
nuclear plant. Olivera said the utility hopes to file a combined 
construction-and-operating license with the Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission either next year or in 2009.

Olivera said it will cost FPL $100 million just to complete all of 
the work necessary to file the licensing application with the NRC, 
prompting at least one panel member to say that regulatory costs are 
too high and should be changed.

"I think we have to have a candid, open discussion of what is the 
cost of regulation and what does that do, because in the end ... it's 
the user in the home or the business that has to pay for it," Michael 
Hightower said.

Florida Department of Environmental Protection Secretary Mike Sole 
said most of that money goes to federal regulators and that the state 
has tried to streamline the process to save time and costs.

Meanwhile, FPL is in the process of obtaining regulatory permits to 
build an ultra-supercritical pulverized coal plant in Glades County. 
The plant would have twin 980-megawatt units, the first of which 
would start up in 2012.

Consumer advocates have been pressing the utility to build a gasified 
coal plant, saying it's cleaner. But Olivera listed several reasons 
why FPL decided not to do that at this point, including cost and 
reliability.

"We really needed to be able to move the needle on diversity, so we 
settled on this technology," he said.
---------------

Nuclear Regulators allow one technician at Pilgrim plant 

PLYMOUTH, Mass. WPRI News Feb 10 - Nuclear regulators have given the 
go ahead for the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth to cut 
back the number of shifts for safety specialists.

The U-S Nuclear Regulatory Commission says only one radiation 
protection technician is needed on call.

There are currently two technicians working each shift.

The radiation technicians monitor contamination levels and make sure 
no hazardous materials leave the plant.

N-R-C regulators say most power plants have only one technician on 
duty.

The Utility Workers Union of America represents about 400 of the 550 
unionized workers at the plant.

They filed a petition with the N-R-C last month to stop the 
commission from allowing the change.
----------------

Swedish power concern reveals new flaws at Forsmark nuclear plant  

Stockholm (dpa) Feb 10 - State-owned Swedish energy concern 
Vattenfall on Saturday admitted further serious security deficiencies 
at its controversial Forsmark nuclear power plant.

A company statement said one of the plant's boiling-water reactors 
had been operating for seven months with deficient rubber seals to 
its outer walls.

The statement said a test rubber sample had been taken last June. 
"When the test result had been analysed, it was clear that the 
elasticity of the rubber packing was insufficient," the company said.

The reactor was closed down on February 2.

Vattenfall spokesman Hans von Uthmann, newly nominated as chairman of 
the Forsmark Kraftgrupp AB board, described the security failure as 
"not acceptable."

The reactor will again be operational following the replacement of 
the rubber packing.

Three nuclear reactors are operated at Forsmark, some 140 kilometres 
north of Stockholm. The plant has since last year been under review 
by the Swedish Nuclear Power Inspectorate (SKI) after a
shut-down of one of the reactors late July 2006 after a short-circuit 
in a switchyard outside the plant.

The reactor shut down, but two of four emergency generators failed to 
start. Several other systems partly malfunctioned, sparking a debate 
over nuclear safety.

Safety procedures at the plant were additionally questioned after the 
recent publication of an internal report that cited "a deterioration 
in security thinking," citing some two dozen accidents
at the plant.

The controversy led to the resignation of the plant's chief executive 
officer Lars Lagerberg on Thursday and the approval of a new 
programme aimed at improving security issues. 
-----------------

Concrete walls at defunct Japan nuclear reactor building found 
substandard

(Kyodo) _ The Japan Atomic Energy Agency announced Saturday it has 
found that concrete walls at a key building in the defunct Fugen 
nuclear reactor plant in Fukui Prefecture do not meet building design 
standards at 25 of the 34 locations examined. 

"We strictly oversaw the execution of construction and it is 
difficult to believe such a result came out," an agency official 
said, adding that the agency will have the wall strength checked once 
again. "The accuracy of the measurements is questioned," the official 
said. 

The agency subcontracted a company to conduct the examination of the 
auxiliary building that houses the reactor's central control room and 
emergency reactor core cooling facilities constructed adjacent to the 
unit containing the reactor, according to the official. 

The company does not specialize in inspections, the agency said. A 
company specializing in inspections is expected to conduct the next 
round of inspections, it said. 

Located in Tsuruga city, Fugen was a new type of reactor developed 
independently by Japan. Unlike a regular reactor that uses enriched 
uranium for fuel, Fugen was designed to be capable of running on 
various kinds of fuel such as natural uranium and plutonium-uranium 
mixed oxide fuel. 

It reached criticality in 1978. In 1995, the government dropped a 
plan to build a successor reactor because of high operation costs. 
Fugen's operations ceased in 2003 and work is under way to dismantle 
and decommission it.  

According to the agency, in order to examine the impact of wearing 
after nearly 25 years of operations, an inspection was conducted on 
walls constituting the building by removing a cylindrical column with 
a 10-centimeter diameter at 34 locations. 

The strength of the concrete was lower than the 22.06 newtons 
required by the building's design at 25 spots. At least at one 
location, strength measured 10.6 newtons. 
------------

Swiss still braced for nuclear war  

BBC News, Switzerland  Feb 10 - Many historians will agree the fall 
of the Berlin Wall marked the end of the Cold War, but in Switzerland 
the threat of nuclear war has left an unexpected legacy.  

The Sonnenberg tunnel contains the world's largest nuclear shelter 
If you are driving through Switzerland, south to Italy, you are 
likely to take the route via the charming town of Lucerne and that 
means driving through the Sonnenberg tunnel. 

Those tunnels around Lucerne can be quite irritating, especially in 
fine weather. Just as you are enjoying a spectacular view of the lake 
and the mountains, you are plunged into darkness. 

But when you get to the Sonnenberg, make sure your eyes adjust, and 
take a closer look, for this is much more than a tunnel. In here is 
the world's largest nuclear shelter. 

Under Swiss law, local governments are required to provide shelter 
spaces for everyone, and in the early 1970s Lucerne was short by 
several thousand. The new Sonnenberg motorway tunnel, just being 
built, seemed a neat solution: kit it out as a nuclear shelter as 
well and it could hold 20,000 people. 

The Sonnenberg, in theory, is able to withstand a one megaton nuclear 
bomb, as close as half a mile away "Actually we got the idea from you 
British," explains Werner Fischer, the local civil protection chief, 
as he shows me around. "Londoners used the underground as shelter 
during the blitz."  

Well maybe, but believe me, there are things in the Sonnenberg that 
you will never find down the Finchley Road tube station.  

It starts with the doors, which are a metre and a half thick (5ft), 
and weigh 350 tonnes each. The Sonnenberg, in theory, is able to 
withstand a one megaton nuclear bomb, as close as half a mile away. 

The shelter was designed to be self-sufficient  
One megaton is 70 Hiroshimas. That means the Sonnenberg residents 
would have emerged to a world reduced not to smoking rubble, but to 
ash. 

Inside, the tunnel is a surreal monument to neutral Switzerland's 
desire to survive a total war which would, naturally, have been 
started and waged by someone else. 

Every eventuality has been thought of. 

There are vast sleeping quarters, with bunk beds four layers deep. 
There is an operating theatre, a command post, and as Mr Fischer 
points out, a prison. "Just because there's a nuclear war outside 
doesn't mean we won't have any social problems in here," he says. 

Some of my friends have private ones in their own houses, used, these 
days, mostly to store wine or skis.  

There were even, it is rumoured, plans for a post office, until 
someone asked the obvious question "when the world outside is 
burning, who would you write to? What would the address be, not to 
mention who would deliver your letter?" 

Then there are the coloured lights, indicating whether it is night or 
day outside. Obviously the country which produces the world's top 
watches would not like to lose track of time. 

There are some truly impressive feats of engineering: the air 
filters, designed to supply those 20,000 souls with 192 cubic metres 
each of non-radioactive air every day, are indeed breathtaking. So 
large, the hall they are housed in has the dimensions of a medieval 
cathedral. 

But while the Sonnenberg may be the biggest shelter, it is by no 
means the only one. 

Many shelters are now being used a storage spaces 
In fact, there are over a quarter of a million of them in 
Switzerland, because, 17 years after the end of the Cold War, the 
policy of providing shelters for the entire population still stands. 

Some of my friends have private ones in their own houses, used, these 
days, mostly to store wine or skis. My house, though does not have 
one. 

An anxious telephone call to my local civil protection office brings 
a reassuring answer. "Actually your community has 40% overcapacity in 
shelters," I'm told. 

It turns out that, should the unthinkable happen, I have got a luxury 
of choice. I can settle into a cosy neighbourhood shelter designed 
for 10. Sounds good, as long as my family and the neighbours we get 
on with get there first. 

Or, there is a larger shelter, beneath the local fire station, which 
those without private shelters would share with the firemen. I can 
see it is not going to be the easiest of decisions. 

And down on the main street of my village, new houses are going up, 
the bulldozers are digging remarkably deep and blast resistant 
concrete is arriving by the tonne. 

But why add an estimated 4% to the house price, just to carry on 
preparing for a threat that has gone away? 

Until the law changes, bunkers will continue to be dug 

Karl Widmer, deputy director of Switzerland's civil defence 
department, looks a little sheepish when I put this to him. 

"We asked ourselves this question," he admits. "But then we thought, 
we've built all these things, so let's just carry on. And there could 
be new threats around the corner." 

"What threats exactly?" snorts a Social Democrat member of 
parliament. "Bird flu? Terrorism? An underground bunker won't protect 
against that. It's time we stopped this nonsense, all we're doing is 
building very expensive wine cellars." 

Later this year, the Swiss government will decide whether to continue 
the shelters-for-all policy, but this week, sirens right across 
Switzerland were tested, and the population had to check their 
bunkers were up to scratch. 

The monstrous Sonnenberg shelter though, is being gradually 
dismantled. But not because it has finally been deemed unnecessary: 
no, no, the real problem is those 350 tonne blast doors. When they 
were tested, they would not shut.

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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

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