Studies on 2nd-generation A-bomb victims to begin in May

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@EARTHLINK.NET>]

Index:



Studies on 2nd-generation A-bomb victims to begin in May

UK hires advisers on delayed nuclear fuel plant

Plebiscite on MOX fuel use at Niigata plant to be held May 27

Czech Temelin N-plant says to reconnect to grid

German nuclear waste on the move after protest

S African Opposition Mounts to Nuclear Smelter Plan: Paper

U.S. to give written notice of nuclear subs' port calls

Exelon Nuclear Generating Station Sets National Mark

========================================



Studies on 2nd-generation A-bomb victims to begin in May



HIROSHIMA, April 25 (Kyodo) - Full-scale studies on the hereditary 

effects on second-generation victims of the atomic bombings of 

Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II will begin next month, the 

organizing group said Tuesday. 



The Radiation Effects Research Foundation, which has been conducting 

research on the effects of radiation exposure on the children of 

atomic bomb victims, made the decision in a joint meeting of two 

committees it set up with outside experts. 



The studies aim to cover these indirect victims of the atomic 

bombings as they are reaching an age when they could be affected by 

lifestyle related diseases, the foundation said. 



It said that the studies will be completed by December 2005, with 

disclosure of the findings expected to follow a year or so later. 



The foundation said it will mail study sheets over four years to 

15,000 victims and their children in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and 

subsequently conduct medical checkups for those who respond to the 

studies and are interested. 



A liaison group for second-generation A-bomb victims across Japan has 

given its consent for the study. The group has been very keen on 

protecting the privacy of such victims. 



According to the foundation, it has consulted second-generation A-

bomb victims on the particulars of the health checkups, after a 

preliminary survey it had conducted ended last November. 

--------------



UK hires advisers on delayed nuclear fuel plant



In April 24 story "UK hires advisers on delayed nuclear fuel plant" 

second paragraph should read "...the Department of Environment, 

Transport and the Regions...instead of Department of Trade, 

Environment and the Regions...correcting department name. 



A corrected repetition follows. 



LONDON, April 24 (Reuters) - Britain has appointed independent 

consultants to assess whether there is an economic case for opening a 

controversial nuclear fuel plant built by state-owned British Nuclear 

Fuels. 



"Consultants Arthur D Little will report in around seven weeks," a 

spokesman for the Department of Environment, Transport and the 

Regions said on Tuesday. 



The 460-million-pound ($662.5-million) Sellafield Mox Plant (SMP) has 

lain idle since completion in 1997 because it has been unable to 

secure regulatory approval to start up. 



The government has consistently refused to grant a full operating 

licence because of fears the mixed oxide fuel, a combination of 

plutonium and uranium, will have trouble finding buyers following a 

scandal nearly two years ago. 



In late 1999 BNFL's Mox fuel created an international furore after 

revelations that quality control data on a batch of fuel sent to 

Japan had been falsified. 



The fuel at the centre of the storm was manufactured at BNFL's Mox 

demonstration facilty and not SMP. 



Despite attempts by the company and senior government officials to 

reassure customers the fuel was not dangerous, two key customers, 

Japan and Germany placed import bans on BNLF Mox fuel raising 

questions about the size of future export markets. 



Critics of Mox, including environmental group Greenpeace, say the 

fuel, which is more more expensive than uranium and requires 

modifications to most reactors before it can be burnt, has no real 

market. 



Greenpeace argues that Mox is merely a vehicle by which BNFL 

repatriates to its overseas customers the plutonium created when the 

company reprocesses foreign spent nuclear fuel. 



Before the SMP is allowed to start up it needs to pass a test of 

justification required by European law proving that the benefits of a 

practice involving ionising radiation outweigh any environmental 

impact. 

---------------



Plebiscite on MOX fuel use at Niigata plant to be held May 27



NIIGATA, Japan, April 24 (Kyodo) - The village of Kariwa in Niigata 

Prefecture on the Sea of Japan coast will hold a plebiscite May 27 on 

a plan to use plutonium-uranium mixed oxide (MOX) fuel at a local 

nuclear plant, village mayor Hiroo Shinada said Tuesday. 



The decision to hold the plebiscite next month follows the Kariwa 

village assembly's passage of an ordinance last Wednesday to hold a 

plebiscite on the plan to use MOX fuel at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa 

plant of Tokyo Electric Power Co. 



The plebiscite will be the first to be conducted in Japan in which 

the opinion of local residents over the use of MOX fuel at a local 

nuclear plant will be sought. 



In March 1999, the Kariwa village assembly rejected a petition 

calling for a plebiscite on the issue. In December last year, 

however, the assembly passed a similar bill submitted by assembly 

members, but Shinada vetoed it and ordered the assembly to vote 

again. The bill was rejected in January. 



The power company plans to introduce a so-called pluthermal process 

at the plant's No. 3 reactor. The process entails using MOX fuel -- 

made by mixing uranium with plutonium chemically extracted from spent 

nuclear fuel -- to power a thermal reactor. 

-------------



Czech Temelin N-plant says to reconnect to grid

  

PRAGUE, April 24 (Reuters) - The controversial Czech nuclear plant 

Temelin, run by CEZ, said on Monday it would reconnect to the power 

grid after it repairing cracks to steam pipes in its turbine. 



Temelin spokesman Milan Nebesar told Reuters the reactor is currently 

running at 40 percent but that its output will be gradually raised to 

55 percent as its testing operations, which began last autumn, 

continue. 



"We are currently at 40 percent of the (reactor's) output and are 

planning to connect to the grid within hours," he said. 



Technical problems with the piping on the plant's secondary, non-

nuclear circuit emerged in January. The main contractor, Skoda Praha, 

plans to replace the internal parts of vibrating regulation valves. 



Nebesar said a shutdown is planned for June and will take a month, 

delaying the planned launch of a full trial operation. He did not 

give any new deadline for the commercial launch, originally planned 

for May of this year. 



"The deadline depends on readiness of the Skoda Praha's equipment. 

Everything is getting longer, each stage is longer (than planned) but 

I hope that in summer months we will be able to reach 100 percent of 

the output." 



He added CEZ was in talks with Skoda Praha on compensation for the 

delays but decline to elaborate. 



The $2.6 billion plant was built just over 50 km (31 miles) from the 

borders of neighbouring Austria. Austrian protesters have staged 

border blockades demanding its closure, and a series of minor 

failures forced repeated shutdowns since it was first launched last 

October. 



Austria says the station, which combines a Russian VVER-1,000 reactor 

with a U.S.-made control system by Westinghouse, may be unsafe. 



But a recent Czech-led independent commission, which included 

observers from the EU, Austria and Germany, gave it high marks in an 

environmental impact study. 

-------------



German nuclear waste on the move after protest

  

NECKARWESTHEIM, Germany, April 24 (Reuters) - Germany began 

transporting nuclear waste to Britain for the first time in three 

years on Tuesday, after police cleared away 100 protesters attempting 

to block the road from a power plant. 



In what has become a recurring scene since Germany resumed nuclear 

waste transports in recent weeks, anti-nuclear activists tried to 

block the shipment by sitting in its path. 



Police detained about 50 of the protesters, a police spokesman said. 



The truck carrying the waste travelled 5 kilometres (3 miles) from 

the power plant in Neckarwestheim in southern Germany to the town of 

Walheim. It will await the arrival of another load of nuclear waste 

from the Biblis plant before continuing by rail to Sellafield in 

northwest England on Wednesday. 



Anti-nuclear activists clashed with police earlier this month as they 

tried to stop the first transport in three years of nuclear waste 

from Germany to France. 



Thousands of demonstrators also protested last month when Germany 

took back the first cargo of reprocessed waste from France since the 

German government banned the shipments in 1998 over concerns about 

radioactive leaks. 



Environmental activists also chained themselves to rail tracks for 

several hours on Monday to protest Tuesday's shipment. 



Protesters say their goal is to raise the cost of nuclear transports 

so that they become prohibitively expensive and then halted for good.



The nuclear waste transports are part of a deal struck with industry 

last year to phase out Germany's 19 reactors by about 2025, a 

deadline considered too far away by anti-nuclear activists. Germany 

has no reprocessing facilities of its own. 

--------------



S African Opposition Mounts to Nuclear Smelter Plan: Paper

  

Johannesburg, April 24 (Bloomberg) -- Local residents and anti-

nuclear activists are marshalling opposition to a planned radioactive 

waste smelter at Pelindaba, west of Pretoria, which they say poses an 

environmental danger to a popular recreation area, The Citizen 

reported. 



The smelter, situated close to the Hartbeespoort Dam nature reserve, 

will be used to dispose of 14,000 tons of radio active waste from a 

reactor at the Pelindaba nuclear research facility, the newspaper 

said, citing environmental group Earthlife Africa. 



``This problem will be compounded if plans also go ahead to make 

nuclear power fuel at Pelindaba'' for a Pebble Bed Modular Reactor 

the state-owned power company Eskom is planning to build in the 

Western Cape, said Earthlife Africa's anti-nuclear campaign co-

ordinator Muna Lakhani. 



Concerned local residents are meeting next week to discuss opposition 

to the planned smelter, The Citizen said. The nuclear Energy Corp. of 

South Africa said the smelter posed no danger to the environment. 

---------------



U.S. to give written notice of nuclear subs' port calls



SASEBO, Japan, April 24 (Kyodo) - A Japan-U.S. joint committee has 

drawn up a draft to require prior notification in writing as well as 

verbally for port calls in Japan by U.S. nuclear-powered submarines, 

Sasebo Mayor Akira Mitsutake said Tuesday. 



Mitsutake made the announcement at a press conference after the 

Foreign Ministry informed him of the decision of the joint committee 

on U.S. military forces in Japan. 



The draft was mapped out following the unannounced call of 6,080-ton 

U.S. nuclear submarine Chicago at Sasebo port in Nagasaki Prefecture, 

southwestern Japan, on April 2, although a bilateral agreement 

requires 24 hours notice. The U.S. Navy said the lack of notification 

was the result of an error. 



The draft will be signed by Japan and the United States shortly, and 

the written prior notification will be checked by the two countries, 

he said. 



The mayor said he takes back his remark that Sasebo would reject port 

calls by nuclear submarines, as the committee's draft is acceptable 

to some extent. 



The Sasebo municipal government has approved the draft. 

---------------



Exelon Nuclear Generating Station Sets National Mark, Another Places 

Second

  

DOWNERS GROVE, Ill., April 23 /PRNewswire Interactive Release/ -- 

Exelon Nuclear's Limerick Generating Station Unit 2 in Pennsylvania 

set a national refueling efficiency record over the weekend.  Almost 

simultaneously, the Byron Generating Station Unit 2 in Illinois 

completed the second shortest refueling ever recorded in the U.S. 



The two refueling outages reaffirm Exelon Nuclear's position as the 

U.S. nuclear industry leader in refueling performance.  Exelon 

Nuclear generating stations have conducted the four shortest 

refueling outages in U.S. history. 



Limerick Unit 2, about 21 miles northwest of Philadelphia set the 

national mark for the shortest refueling of a boiling water reactor 

at 16 days, 8 hours.  Limerick began refueling on April 4 and 

returned to service Friday evening, beating the existing BWR record 

set last year by a sister Exelon Nuclear plant, the Dresden 

Generating Station in Illinois. 



At Byron, workers completed the Unit 2 refueling in 15 days, 18 

hours, less than two hours off the overall U.S. record set by yet 

another Exelon Nuclear station, the Braidwood Generating Station.  

Operators shut down Unit 2, a pressurized water reactor, on April 7 

to perform maintenance and replace fuel.  The unit began producing 

electricity again Sunday.  The station is about 90 miles west of 

Chicago. 



By way of comparison, the national average for nuclear plant 

refueling duration in 2000 was 38 days.  Exelon Nuclear's fleet-wide 

average last year was 22 days.  The company operates 17 nuclear 

generating units at 10 locations in Illinois, Pennsylvania and New 

Jersey. 



Refueling efficiency is a key industry performance measure.  The 

shorter a refueling outage, the more power generated for businesses 

and consumers. Refueling outages also are important periods for 

performing required maintenance and improving the material condition 

of the plants. 



Both of the newly refueled units are expected to be at full power by 

mid-week.  Byron Unit 2 will run for 18 months before its next 

refueling, Limerick Unit 2 for 24 months. 



In addition to refueling the reactors, Exelon Nuclear workers 

performed extensive inspections, tests, maintenance and modifications 

on a variety of components and equipment.  The work will help ensure 

that the plants operate reliably during the summer months, when 

demand for power is at its highest. 



The Byron station also completed work to increase power output by 5 

percent in time for rising summer energy demands.  That and similar 

work performed last fall on Byron's other unit will enable the 

station to generate an additional 120 megawatts of power -- enough 

energy to meet the needs of about 120,000 residential customers, or 

the equivalent of a small combined-cycle gas turbine generating unit.



"Exelon Nuclear intends to do its part to keep the lights on this 

summer," said Oliver D. Kingsley, Jr., president and chief nuclear 

officer of Exelon Nuclear.  "These nuclear plants are particularly 

reliable in the kinds of weather extremes that we sometimes see in 

the Midwest and mid-Atlantic regions in the summer. 



"The people at these two stations have done a superb job of planning 

and completing these refueling outages and doing all the required 

work necessary to ensure that reliability," Kingsley said. 



Key contractors supporting the Limerick refueling General Electric, 

Bechtel Inc., Sargeant & Lundy Inc., Hake Inc., The Washington Group 

and Day and Zimmerman NPS Inc.  Contractors playing critical support 

roles at Byron were Westinghouse LLC, Siemens-Westinghouse Power 

Corporation and Newberg-Perini/Stone & Webster, The Venture. 



The Limerick Generating Station has two 1,200-megawatt boiling water 

reactors.  Unit 1 began commercial operation in February 1986.  Unit 

2, the last boiling water reactor to be built in the U.S. began 

producing electricity commercially in January 1990. 



The Byron Generating Station has two 1,200-megawatt pressurized water 

reactors.  Unit 1 began commercial operation in September 1985 and 

Unit 2 in August 1987. 



Each station generates enough electricity to meet the demands of 

about 2.4 million households.



------------------------------------------------------------------------

Sandy Perle					Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100   				    	

Director, Technical				Extension 2306 				     	

ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Service		Fax:(714) 668-3149 	                   		    

ICN Pharmaceuticals, Inc.			E-Mail: sandyfl@earthlink.net 				                           

ICN Plaza, 3300 Hyland Avenue  		E-Mail: sperle@icnpharm.com          	          

Costa Mesa, CA 92626



Personal Website: http://sandyfl.nukeworker.net

ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Website: http://www.dosimetry.com



************************************************************************

You are currently subscribed to the Radsafe mailing list. To unsubscribe,

send an e-mail to Majordomo@list.vanderbilt.edu  Put the text "unsubscribe

radsafe" (no quote marks) in the body of the e-mail, with no subject line.

You can view the Radsafe archives at http://www.vanderbilt.edu/radsafe/