[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
Nuclear Waste Could Be Moved Across Bay (South Florida)
Index:
Nuclear Waste Could Be Moved Across Bay
Framatome ANP Awarded Project at Palo Verde Station
Wen Ho Lee Still Hasn't Found Job
====================================
Nuclear Waste Could Be Moved Across Bay
Miami Aug 7 (WPLG TV) Channel 10 News has learned that tons of
radioactive nuclear waste could be sailing across one of South
Florida's greatest natural resources.
Turkey Point Nuclear Power Plant has been accumulating waste for some
time now. Government officials say that they want to move the waste
by barge to a nuclear facility in Nevada.
Moving the waste would mean a trip across Biscayne National Park, a
one-of-a-kind underwater wildlife sanctuary. Environmentalists say
that they fear a nuclear accident, or even worse, that an act of
terrorism could destroy the park's beauty.
John Coequyt of the Environmental Working Group said, "We know for
sure if a Stinger missile, for example is shot at them, it's likely
to go through it, although we are not entirely sure how that will be
with the final cask."
The final decision on how the spent fuel will be moved is still a
ways off. But the first shipments to Yucca Mountain are expected to
begin in five years.
-------------------
Framatome ANP Awarded Project at Palo Verde Station
LYNCHBURG, Va., Aug. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- Framatome ANP Inc. has been
awarded a contract by the owners of Palo Verde Nuclear Generating
Station to chemically clean the station's Unit 1 and Unit 3 steam
generators. Preparatory work is underway for the Unit 1 cleaning
process, which will be performed in September. Site set-up for the
spring 2003 cleaning project will begin in November 2002.
Framatome ANP will utilize its High Temperature Chemical Cleaning
(HTCC) process for both units, a process not previously performed by
any other nuclear power service provider. As the reactors are shut
down, plant heat will be utilized to heat the solvents as high as 290
degrees Fahrenheit to conduct the cleaning process. According to
Framatome ANP engineers, the HTCC process, while not new, has become
more attractive to nuclear plant operators because of the critical
need to minimize outage times.
"The higher temperature allows for quicker setup and potentially
considerably less critical path time. We utilized this procedure on
two units in 1995 and it was very successful," said Dr. John F.
Remark, Framatome ANP manager of chemical application engineering and
task leader for the Palo Verde project. "Our HTCC team will be the
first team in and the cleaning of the steam generators will be the
first major task accomplished during the outage." Dr. Remark said he
anticipates the HTCC team will remove approximately 3,700 pounds of
deposits from each of the generators.
More than 25 truckloads of equipment are being sent to the Palo Verde
site during July and August, and much of that equipment is being
assembled on-site prior to the outage. Dr. Remark said more than 60
Framatome ANP engineers and scientists are involved in the project,
performing on site work, coordinating efforts and conducting backup
support at Framatome ANP Inc.'s headquarters in Lynchburg, VA.
Palo Verde has three identical nuclear units that generated a
combined 28.8 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity in 2001, more
than any other power producer in the United States.
Palo Verde is jointly owned by the Arizona Public Service Company
(APS), as well as Salt River Project, Southern California Edison Co.,
El Paso Electric, Public Service Co. of New Mexico, Southern
California Public Power Authority and the Los Angeles Department of
Power & Water.
APS, which operates Palo Verde on behalf of the station's six other
owners, is Arizona's largest and longest-serving electric utility and
serves more than 857,000 customers. APS is headquartered in Phoenix
and is the largest subsidiary of Pinnacle West Capital Corporation
(NYSE:PNW).
--------------------
Wen Ho Lee Still Hasn't Found Job
LOS ALAMOS, N.M. Aug 9 (AP) - Former government researcher Wen Ho Lee
says he hasn't found a job since he was fired and prosecuted for
making copies of sensitive nuclear weapons data.
``I have tried to get a job in both the university and industry
setting, but so far I have not been able to locate a job,'' Lee said
in an interview in the July issue of the American Physical Society
News.
``I am currently doing my own research on semiconductor design. I
hope that someday I can make a contribution to the electronics
industry.''
Lee, responding to written questions submitted by the online
publication through an intermediary, said foreign-born scientists
face
difficulties getting jobs requiring security clearance.
``I feel that racial profiling may be a very complicated and long-
standing problem,'' he said. ``It will take a long time even to make
tiny
progress.''
The Lee investigation caused nearly two years of controversy over the
alleged loss of nuclear secrets to China and lax security at the
Energy Department's nuclear weapons laboratories.
Lee, who has been a U.S. citizen since 1974 and spent 20 years doing
top-secret work at Los Alamos National Laboratory, was
held in solitary confinement for nine months, though never charged
with spying. He pleaded guilty in September 2000 to a single
count of downloading sensitive data to unsecured computer tape and
was sentenced to time served.
Lee has said he made tape copies of codes to protect his access to
his work after a computer malfunction destroyed or damaged
several files.
``I used the best technique that I knew to protect my files,'' Lee
told the science publication. He said the worst punishment he had
ever heard of for such violations was barring an employee from work
requiring a security clearance.
Lee has an unlisted number and could not be reached for further
comment. Phyllis Hedges, a Los Alamos attorney and Lee family friend,
said Friday that he still has had no luck in finding a job in the
weeks since he made his comments to the publication.
On the Net:
Lee interview: http://www.aps.org/apsnews/0702/070204.html
-------------------------------------------------
Sandy Perle
Director, Technical
ICN Worldwide Dosimetry Service
ICN Plaza, 3300 Hyland Avenue
Costa Mesa, CA 92626
Tel:(714) 545-0100 / (800) 548-5100 Extension 2306
Fax:(714) 668-3149
E-Mail: sandyfl@earthlink.net
E-Mail: sperle@icnpharm.com
Personal Website: http://sandy-travels.com/
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/