Hill

The recent shutdown of Germany’s three remaining nuclear reactors is “a senseless act of folly, against all the science and available evidence.” So writes Lincoln Hill, director of policy and external affairs at the Nuclear Industry Association, in a strong opinion piece on CapX, a publication of the London-based Centre for Policy Studies.

Illogical: Hill is emphatic is criticizing Germany’s move as an antiscience action that is ideologically driven and harmful to the cause of battling climate change. He calls it “the single worst decision Europe has taken in the fight against climate change, and one for which we all are paying the price.”

He points out that Germany’s former chancellor, Angela Merkel, “ostensibly” made the decision to phase out nuclear energy as a reaction to the Fukushima accident in Japan. However, Japan itself is seeking to “restart its 30-GW nuclear fleet, even as Germany finishes shuttering a fleet of 20 GW.”

Although the first quarter of the year saw some of the French nuclear fleet return to service, it was not at the rate originally anticipated, according to data analysis company EnAppSys. France’s nuclear availability, the company noted, was expected to reach a maximum of 50 GW by the middle of the first quarter, but that goal was not reached due to several reasons, including the need for additional repairs and maintenance when stress corrosion cracking first appeared in several reactors last year. Workforce strikes at nuclear operator Électricité de France also led to widespread employee walkouts from nuclear power plants.

Nuclear energy was the focus of a recent NPR 1A podcast episode, hosted by journalist Jenn White, who welcomed guests to discuss the role of nuclear energy in the future of the United States. The guests—Joe Dominguez, chief executive officer of Constellation Energy; Samantha Gross, director of the Energy Security and Climate Initiative at the Brookings Institution; and Edwin Lyman, director of Nuclear Power Safety for the Union of Concerned Scientists—participated in the episode, titled “Where Does Nuclear Energy Fit in a Carbon-Free Future?”

The latest advances in nuclear fusion, the remaining challenges, and proposals to overcome those challenges are the focus of a new report, Fusion Energy: Potentially Transformative Technology Still Faces Fundamental Challenges, published by the Government Accountability Office.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has announced its Minority-Serving Institutions Grants Program (MSIG) awards for fiscal year 2023. Four institutions were granted a total of $997,943: University of North Texas ($400,000 for fellowships), University of Central Florida ($397,943 for fellowships), University of Nevada–Las Vegas ($100,000 for scholarships), and Virginia Commonwealth University ($100,000 for scholarships).

More details about the grants for this year will be posted on the NRC’s grant awards website, where recipients of awards from previous years can also be seen.

After more than a decade of global efforts led by the Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration, all four major medical producers of the radioisotope molybdenum-99 for the U.S. market are now using low-enriched uranium (LEU) in their production processes instead of high-enriched uranium (HEU), the latter of which presents risks of nuclear weapons proliferation.

More than 300 employees from the Department of Energy's Office of Environmental Management (EM) have recently retired, resulting in a large amount of job vacancies across the cleanup program, according to the DOE.

EM’s Workforce Management Office is implementing recruitment efforts to fill the vacancies with college graduates, early career professionals, mid-career candidates, and seasoned veterans.

According to the DOE, "The open positions offer opportunities across many different disciplines, including engineering, science, business, management, safety and information technology."

According to a new study conducted by the economics consulting firm Analysis Group, “Massachusetts utilities could save their customers $880 million to more than $2 billion by 2032 by entering into a long-term power purchase contract with the Seabrook Station nuclear plant.” The study, Economic and Environmental Benefits to Massachusetts from the Operation of the Seabrook Nuclear Plant, also found that operation of the plant through 2032 is expected to contribute as much as $2.9 billion to the state’s economy and reduce regional greenhouse gas emissions by 5 million tons per year.

The International Atomic Energy Agency is inviting teens aged 14 to 18 to submit original comic book pages depicting a space-based nuclear science experiment on agricultural seeds that the agency is conducting with the United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO). The contest is offering prizes, including publication of the winning designs on the IAEA website, for the champion and finalists. The deadline for submissions is April 16.

Director General Daniel Alvarez, left, and John Kutsch. (Photo: TEA)

Representatives of El Salvador’s government and the Thorium Energy Alliance have signed a memorandum of understanding to promote El Salvador’s plan for renewable energy through thorium.

The document was signed on March 14 by Daniel Alvarez, director general of energy, hydrocarbons, and mines, and John Kutsch, executive director of the Thorium Energy Alliance, at the El Salvador embassy in Washington, D.C. The signing was witnessed by Milena Mayorga, El Salvador’s ambassador to the United States.

The Women in Nuclear chapter at Entergy Nuclear has been recognized by the U.S. WIN organization as the “most reactive” for its educational outreach efforts conducted during last year’s Nuclear Science Week.

The annual award recognizes significant achievements in promoting nuclear science in the community. U.S. WIN chapters are judged on the number of activities held during Nuclear Science Week, the number of participating WIN members, the number of individuals and public sectors reached, and the variety of topics covered.

NIST's Center for Neutron Research in Gaithersburg, Md. (Photo: NRC)

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has authorized the restart of a test reactor at the National Institute of Standards and Technology, in Gaithersburg, Md. The reactor was shut down in February 2021 when a fuel element became damaged during startup and approach to full power. The incident violated the NRC’s fuel cladding temperature safety limit, although public health and safety were not affected, according to the agency.

The reactor is located at NIST’s Center for Neutron Research.

The Texas Department of State Health Services issued a public notification of a missing radiographic camera in Houston, Texas, on March 11. According to the department, the last known location of the device was 4040 Little York Road, on the northern edge of the city.

Sherwood-Randall

The Biden administration on March 2 announced a new strategy to remove and secure certain highly radioactive materials that are used in hospitals and other civilian commercial facilities as a measure to prevent such materials from being acquired by terrorists for making “dirty bombs” or other weapons. Elizabeth Sherwood-Randall, White House assistant to the president for Homeland Security, shared the details of the National Security Memorandum to Counter Weapons of Mass Destruction Terrorism and Advance Nuclear and Radioactive Material Security (NSM19) later that same day in a discussion at the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) global security organization in Washington, D.C., according to a report in the New York Times.

National strategy: Biden’s newly signed NSM 19 “integrates, in a systematic way, U.S. policies to counter the use of chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear weapons by non-state actors; sets out unified priorities for Departments and Agencies across the Federal government; and affirms the Biden-Harris Administration’s commitment to work with state, local, tribal, international, and private sector partners on preventing, mitigating, and responding to WMD terrorism threats.”

The Department of Energy has announced the release of application guidance for the second award cycle of its $6 billion Civil Nuclear Credit (CNC) Program.

Part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act—the $1.2 trillion bipartisan measure signed by President Biden in November 2021—the CNC Program was established to prevent the premature retirement of economically challenged nuclear power plants in recognition of the crucial role the Biden administration sees nuclear playing in achieving its ambitious decarbonization goals, including 100 percent clean electricity by 2035.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has published its 2022–2023 Information Digest, NUREG-1350, Vol. 34, which describes the agency's responsibilities and activities and provides general information regarding nuclear-related topics.

One doesn’t typically come across nuclear fusion in a fashion magazine, but a recent issue of Vanity Fair profiled the creative director of a famous luxury fashion house who has made nuclear fusion a conceptual focus of her clothing creations. According to the article, Gabriela Hearst, the creative director at the New York City office of Paris-based Chloé, has designed a spring-summer 2023 collection “inspired by site visits to labs in the Pacific Northwest, New England, and southern France, where hundreds of scientists and engineers are working to develop technology that will produce a net energy gain through fusion.”

Georgia Institute of Technology has announced the Consortium for Emerging Technologies and Innovation’s third ETI Annual Summer School, which will focus on advanced manufacturing within the context of nuclear nonproliferation.

Registration is now open. Register online by May 15, 2023.

The Oregon Encyclopedia website has posted an article about the state’s Oregon Centennial Exposition and International Trade Fair, held in Portland in 1959 in celebration of Oregon’s becoming the 35th U.S state 100 years prior. The Oregon Encyclopedia is a project of the Oregon Historical Society.

The OECD Nuclear Energy Agency is offering the first International School on Simulation of Nuclear Reactor Systems (SINUS) workshop in May this year, with the topic “Reactor Single- and Multi-Physics Simulations Based on Light Water Reactor (LWR) Uncertainty Analysis in Modeling (UAM) Benchmark.”

Registration for the workshop is available online.