ANALYSIS-German ministers at loggerheads over energy needs

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

Index:



ANALYSIS-German ministers at loggerheads over energy needs

Power Glitches Not New to FirstEnergy

Kucinich: FirstEnergy Should Lose License

Los Alamos Whistleblower Paid Settlement

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



ANALYSIS-German ministers at loggerheads over energy needs



BERLIN, Aug 21 (Reuters) - Germany's environment and economy 

ministers are spoiling for a fight over how to ensure future energy 

supply while fighting global warming as the world's third largest 

economy phases out nuclear power in the next 20 years.



Environment Minister Juergen Trittin is proposing increasing 

subsidies for wind, solar and other renewable energy sources to 

double their current contribution to total electricity generated to 

12.5 percent by 2010, and to 20 percent by 2020.



But Economy Minister Wolfgang Clement says industry cannot afford to 

pay more for renewable energy and wants to continue to support coal, 

which provides 50 percent of electricity supply.



"Electricity must not be allowed to become more expensive," said 

Carsten Kreklau of the BDI German Industry Federation.



"Protection of the environment and climate are important... but it 

must also be recognised that fossil fuels will remain dominant for 

energy supply in the long term," he said.



The blackout in North America last week as well as a heatwave in 

Europe that forced German power plants to cut output due to cooling 

problems and fuelled concerns about global warming have given new 

impetus to the debate about energy needs.



Trittin, a leading Green, was not invited last week when Chancellor 

Gerhard Schroeder and Clement, both Social Democrats, met the heads 

of Germany's four biggest energy firms.



HEATED DEBATE



Schroeder says Trittin will be present at another set of talks next 

month, but a row looks inevitable between the ruling SPD and their 

Greens junior partners.



"The environment ministry proposal is diammetrically opposed to that 

of the economy ministry," energy industry sources said.



Michael Glos, a leading member of the conservative opposition, said 

the centre-left government had dodged sensitive issues for too long. 

"It wants to avoid laying bare the unfinanciable costs and horrendous 

economic effects of its one-sided ecologically-skewed energy 

policies," he said.



The government's current energy strategy states that a balance must 

be struck between security of supply, economic efficiency, 

environmental goals and limiting global warming.



Nuclear power makes up about 30 percent of Germany's electricity 

supply. But after years of anti-nuclear protests, a deal was struck 

in 2001 to close nuclear plants by 2020.



At the same time, Germany is committed by the international Kyoto 

Protocol to slash the carbon dioxide emissions that are produced by 

buring fossil fuels and blamed for global warming.



With that in mind, Trittin wants renewable energy and natural gas -- 

that produces less carbon dioxide than burning coal -- to make up the 

nuclear power shortfall.



Clement prefers new investment in modern coal power stations to 

replace ageing plants due to come off the grid in the next 20 years 

and rejects higher subsidies for renewable energy.



"There cannot be higher burdens for industry at the moment," he said. 

"That would also be counterproductive for employment."



Trittin wants to hike the surcharge on electricity for renewable 

energy from 0.35 cents per kilowatt hour to 0.45 cents by 2010 and 

target the extra funds on wind farms at sea rather than on land, 

solar energy and hydroelectric power.



Meanwhile, the government is phasing out subsidies for its domestic 

coal industry. RAG, Germany's sole remaining hard coal producer, 

hinted last week it might exit coal mining in Germany.



SECURITY RISKS



All these developments mean Europe's biggest economy will become even 

more dependent on energy imports than it already is. Germany 

currently imports 60 percent of its energy needs, compared with a 

European Union average of 50 percent.



Frank Umbach, an analyst at the German Council on Foreign Relations 

who has written a new book on energy and foreign policy, says 

Germany's focus on environmental concerns has blinded it to the need 

to diversify its energy sources.



"I am in favour of promoting renewable energy because that reduces 

dependence on potentially unstable regions but I also criticise 

phasing out nuclear power because it is completely uncertain how the 

shortfall will be overcome," he said.



Umbach said while Trittin focused on the environment and Clement on 

the demands of German industry, nobody in government was really 

addressing security of supply. Germany imports 35 percent of its gas 

and 30 percent of its oil from Russia.



"The question is how can we reduce dependence on the unstable regions 

-- in particular for oil and natural gas -- and should we become 

dependent for 50 percent or more of our needs on Russia. These 

questions are hardly ever discussed, he said.

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



Power Glitches Not New to FirstEnergy



CLEVELAND (AP) - Before it came under international scrutiny for its 

role in last week's blackout, beleaguered utility FirstEnergy had 

staggered through a storm of recent technical glitches.



In one, a computer worm hobbled the network monitoring its nuclear 

plant. Another doused lights on the 4th of July weekend on the Jersey 

Shore.



In June, FirstEnergy was the subject of a Cleveland suburb's 

complaints for power outages blamed on outdated equipment and trees 

too close to power lines - some of the same problems cited in last 

week's massive outages.



Now, some experts say the trigger for last Thursday's blackout may 

stem from FirstEnergy's borrowing a large amount of power from other 

Midwest utilities. The system may have collapsed when a FirstEnergy 

generating plant and several power transmission lines failed, 

snuffing lights from Detroit to Toronto to New York City, the experts 

said.



Tom Kraynak, manager of operations and resources for the Canton, Ohio-

based East Central Area Reliability Council, said that scenario is 

one among many that investigators are considering.



The practice of one utility siphoning away electricity from another 

to meet demands ``could crash the system,'' Kraynak said. ``It's 

possible if it's done with a big enough amount.''



In any case, Midwest utilities had been given notice that their 

portion of the grid was particularly prone to the kind of fast-

spreading outages that unfolded last Thursday.



Three months before the blackout, the country's grid watchdog, the 

North American Electric Reliability Council (NERC), issued a report 

singling out the Midwest as the only part of the country that risked 

such a devastating event. NERC said the region could face ``large, 

unanticipated power flows'' this summer.



Concerns about oversight of service in the Midwest were raised as 

well more than a year ago by the Federal Energy Regulatory 

Commission, which worried that the region's fractured market 

threatened reliability.



In Detroit, U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham met with his 

Canadian counterpart for the first time Wednesday to discuss their 

joint investigation of the blackout.



Herb Dhaliwal, the minister of natural resources, said: ``We are 

committed to working to make sure we have some of those answers as 

quickly as possible.''



Not everyone was pleased with the Bush administration's decision to 

halt NERC's independent blackout investigation.



Rep. John Dingell of Michigan, the ranking Democrat on the House 

Energy and Commerce Committee, complained that the Energy Department-

led probe might be compromised by the Bush administration's support 

for electricity deregulation. Dingell said the investigation should 

consider whether deregulation in the industry created conditions for 

a blackout.



``The public deserves nothing less than complete, parallel and 

independent investigations by both DOE and NERC,'' Dingell wrote to 

Abraham. There was no immediate reply from Abraham, who also declined 

to discuss causes when briefing Ohio officials Wednesday.



``To speculate on issues or rumors or whatever they might be before 

we have the facts, before we've fully analyzed the data, would be 

unfair,'' Abraham said when asked whether FirstEnergy's power 

borrowing may have contributed to the crash.



FirstEnergy spokesman Todd Schneider said his Akron-based company was 

gathering records for the investigating task force.



According to a complaint lodged in June with the Ohio Public 

Utilities Commission, a FirstEnergy subsidiary in the Cleveland 

suburb of Solon is being blamed for power outages in May and June 

that lasted for as long as seven hours.



Solon filed the complaint against Cleveland Electric Illuminating Co. 

after FirstEnergy failed to halt the outages, which left hundreds of 

homes and businesses without power, said David Kovass, an attorney 

for Solon. Inspections pointed to the need to trim trees around 

transmission lines, Kovass said.



``We heard reports of tree branches falling on the lines,'' Kovass 

said. ``There were glitches in the system. They had surges and 

dimming. On Memorial Day weekend they had power outages that would 

last four to five hours at a time.''



FirstEnergy's tree-trimming in the area - every four years or so - 

always stirs ire of residents, company spokesman Schneider said. 

Inspections in the area also have pointed to the need to replace some 

of the utility's electrical equipment in Solon.



``Nobody wants us to trim their trees but everyone wants reliable 

electric service. You have to balance those issues,'' Schneider said.



In New Jersey, FirstEnergy is being sued by Dover Township, N.J., 

where 40,000 electric Jersey Central Power & Light customers lost 

power on the July 4th weekend.



One blackout scenario investigators are pursuing is whether 

FirstEnergy may have been pulling power from stations south of 

Cleveland to meet its own needs. When that supply abruptly closed, 

the shock could have upset the equilibrium on FirstEnergy's grid, 

leading to voltage swings and failures of four of its power 

transmission lines - the opening events of the massive blackout.



Schneider said he wasn't aware of the scenario, but a trio of energy 

analysts said it was plausible.



Around 4 p.m., analysts said FirstEnergy's ``borrowing'' of power may 

have been halted. It's unclear whether the power would have been cut 

purposefully by a utility that couldn't meet its own needs, by an 

automatic switch, or by the failure of FirstEnergy's transmission 

lines.



Either way, the shut-off appears to have destabilized the Akron 

utility.



A huge power vacuum pulled in electricity from other utilities, 

overloading lines and tripping four of FirstEnergy's transmission 

lines, said Joseph Welch of International Transmission Co., owner of 

eastern Michigan's power grid. He said FirstEnergy had been getting 

imports from American Electric Power Co.'s power stations to the 

south.



Investigators looking into the blackout also are checking into 

FirstEnergy's alarm system, which the company said was broken when 

transmission lines were tripping.



In January, the ``slammer'' computer worm disabled a monitoring 

system at the utility's Davis-Besse nuclear plant for a few hours, 

despite a belief by plant personnel that the network was protected, 

plant spokesman Wilkins said.



Davis-Besse, one of three FirstEnergy nuclear generators, sits on the 

shore of Lake Erie east of Toledo. The plant has been shuttered since 

February 2002 after workers found a hole in a cap covering the 

plant's reactor vessel.

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



Kucinich: FirstEnergy Should Lose License



WASHINGTON (AP) - An Ohio congressman and longtime critic of 

FirstEnergy Corp., the Ohio-based utility at the center of the 

investigation into last week's blackout, wants the company's 

operating license revoked.



Rep. Dennis Kucinich, a Democratic presidential contender, will 

petition the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio to revoke 

FirstEnergy's right to operate in Ohio, spokesman Doug Gordon said.



Kucinich would release the petition at a news conference in Cleveland 

on Wednesday afternoon, Gordon said. A copy of the complaint was not 

immediately available, but it was related to ``mismanagement and a 

climate of putting profit above the public interest,'' a release on 

the news event said.



Last week's blackout left 50 million people from the Midwest to the 

Northeast in the dark. Experts have said the outage appears to have 

started on the northeast Ohio power grid owned by FirstEnergy, which 

has 4.3 million customers in Ohio, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.



FirstEnergy spokesman Ralph DiNicola said the company is assisting 

Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham and his Canadian counterpart, who 

are heading a U.S.-Canadian task force investigating the blackout.



``As far as presupposing the outcome of that study, we think that 

would be speculative and irresponsible,'' DiNicola said of Kucinich's 

petition.



Shana Gerber, a spokeswoman for the Public Utilities Commission of 

Ohio, declined to comment on the petition until after it's filed.



Kucinich, who represents Cleveland, has clashed with FirstEnergy 

before.



He filed a petition in February with the Nuclear Regulatory 

Commission to revoke FirstEnergy's authority to operate an Ohio 

nuclear plant damaged by an acid leak.



The Davis-Besse nuclear plant near Toledo has been shut down since 

February 2002, when it was closed for maintenance. In March 2002, 

leaks were discovered that had allowed boric acid to eat nearly 

through the 6-inch-thick steel cap that covers the reactor vessel.



He also fought with power companies when he was mayor of Cleveland in 

the 1970s. Kucinich refused to sell the city's municipal electrical 

system to a utility now owned by FirstEnergy, and the city was 

plunged into deficit.



Kucinich barely survived a recall, and he lost re-election the 

following year to Republican George Voinovich, now a U.S. senator.



Cleveland officials now say Kucinich's decision saves consumers money 

in electricity rates.

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



Los Alamos Whistleblower Paid Settlement



WASHINGTON (AP) - A Los Alamos National Laboratory investigator who 

was fired after he blew the whistle on mismanagement and alleged 

fraud has been paid nearly $1 million to settle claims that lab 

managers retaliated against him.



Glenn Walp said Wednesday that the agreement adds to the vindication 

he felt when investigations by the Energy Department verified many of 

the allegations he raised.



Walp and fellow investigator Steve Doran were fired late last 

November after a memo Walp had written was the basis of a published 

report saying millions of dollars worth of computers and other 

equipment were missing. They subsequently voiced objections to lab 

employees buying thousands of dollars worth of personal items with 

lab funds.



Their firing prompted a series of congressional inquiries and 

hearings, and Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham ordered a review of 

management at the lab.



The University of California, which has operated the nuclear weapons 

lab since it was founded six decades ago, conceded the firings were 

wrong and offered in January to give both men jobs advising the 

university president on reform efforts.



Doran has since taken a job as the top law enforcement officer for 

the university. Walp is in the process of looking for another 

criminal justice job, finishing his doctoral thesis in the field and 

working on a book on his experience at Los Alamos.



The university also instituted sweeping changes to lab management. 

Eighteen top managers, including the lab director, were fired, 

reassigned or left the lab.



The Energy Department review found severe management failures and 

recommended that the lab's management contract be opened to 

competitive bidding when University of California's contract expires 

in 2005.



The settlement agreement includes a $900,000 payment and 3 1/2 months 

of salary worth $30,000.



``The university is glad to put this settlement matter that occurred 

under former labor management behind us, and we continue to ensure 

that strong business practices are in place at the laboratory,'' said 

Chris Harrington, a spokesman for the university. ``We continue to 

focus on the mission of the lab and the work the laboratory is 

doing.''



A series of recent internal audits indicated the problems at the lab 

were narrower in scope than initially alleged. Officials exonerated 

an employee that had been accused of trying to charge a $30,000 Ford 

Mustang to her lab credit card - a case repeatedly cited by media 

reports and members of Congress as representative of lab troubles.



Walp said the university is trying to save face and it will take more 

changes to fix a culture that pervades Los Alamos.



``They're trying to make it look now like it's not a big thing, it's 

just a few people, we've got it all under control. It's fluff. It's 

just fluff,'' he said.



On the Net:



Los Alamos National Laboratory: http://www.lanl.gov/worldview/



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

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/



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