ANS Nuclear Cafe

I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to go to the American Nuclear Society meeting in Las Vegas in November 2016, although it was by happenstance. I had contributed to a paper that was to be presented at the meeting but the author was unable to attend, so I was sent instead. To be honest, at the time I was more excited, as a naïve college student, to get a university-sponsored trip to Las Vegas than by participating in the conference itself. What college student wouldn't jump at the opportunity to lose every cent of his single-digit bank account to a slot machine? I couldn't have been more wrong.

In my last article, I discussed the importance of the economics of nuclear power. I'm personally of the belief that if we cannot find ways to make nuclear energy the most cost competitive form of electricity universally, then the industry will eventually fizzle out. Since writing that last article, Toshiba, who owns Westinghouse and is responsible for AP1000 construction, declared billions of dollars in losses, and is looking to sell their nuclear assets. This to me represents the need to look more closely at the reasons behind nuclear energy's economic barriers, and the best ways to address them, especially here in the U.S. If the U.S. wants to be a global leader for nuclear energy, we have to take an honest look at what's holding us back. Before getting too much into that though, I think it is important to understand the electricity market here in the U.S., since it sets the stage on how to approach future decision making. I think that given the current market, and capacity demand, SMRs (small modular reactors) fill a unique niche. While the reduced initial capital is certainly attractive, for this article, I would like to focus on the electric market forces that could factor into utility decision making.

The sealing membrane for the new Chernobyl enclosure has been delivered to the site. Photo courtesy SSE ChNPP.

1. The Chernobyl Accident Wasn't a Nuclear Explosion. The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant reactor no. 4 in April 1986 did destroy the reactor itself as well as the roof of the reactor building, but the explosive forces involved were, first, a steam explosion inside the complex reactor, followed almost immediately by a hydrogen gas explosion similar to those that occurred at Fukushima. No "nuclear yield" was involved-the forces were, instead, explosive expansion of steam and chemical.

Several years ago I attended a nuclear chemistry conference. The conference, overall, was intriguing but I particularly remember a speaker from a world-renowned laboratory that gave a talk on the future of nuclear medicine. His lecture covered a wide range of new and exciting isotopes - isotopes that have the power to safely destroy tumors into nothingness - isotopes that could potentially extend the life of terminally ill patients.  These were medicines on the verge of federal approval, capable of eradicating cancerous tissue in pre-clinical trials. Producing these amazing cancer-fighters would normally suffice for a good, professional story on its own. But there was one isotope that wasn't in his domain, and he knew everyone was thinking about it. Towards the end of his presentation:

A lot of people can remember the first time they celebrated Halloween or Christmas, but I distinctly recall the first time I learned about Earth Day.

On April 12, executives of SCANA Corporation and South Carolina Electric & Gas (SCE&G)-two of the owners of the V.C. Summer nuclear plant expansion, which is presently in progress adding two Westinghouse AP1000 units to the older, existing unit on site-delivered an ex parte briefing to the Public Service Commission (PSC) of South Carolina. The information given was quite detailed, but we present the major points here to expand on our coverage of the Westinghouse reorganization.

Compared to our ancestors, we live relatively luxurious lives thanks to the tremendous advancements of science and technology. Every generation seeks to carve out a better life for the next, and an embrace of science is key to allow this to happen. Yet as we make more advances as a society, there seems to be more resistance to scientific fact.

In the April 2017 issue of Nuclear News:

By Paul Menser

This week's matinee is a documentary of sorts, set to music, showing the decommissioning process undertaken at the former Yankee Atomic Electric plant at Rowe, Massachusetts.  The heavy work to remove the power plant from the site stretched from 2003 to 2007, and much of it is shown in this several section video set to music.  The video is entertaining, but also quite instructive.

Nukie Nuclear Power Plant has issued a SCRAM alert and an emergency shutdown has been declared due to a mandatory employee science march.

Editor's note: The ANS Nuclear Cafe is proud to feature 

The dawn of the atomic energy age had only just broken in 1954 when representatives of the major electric utility companies of New England met to form a new venture.  On the very next day after President Dwight Eisenhower signed the (amended) Atomic Energy Act of 1954, these representatives launched, in their first meeting, the consortium that would build one of the most successful early nuclear plants of them all.  This plant was to be owned by a generating company, not a utility, and would sell atomic generated electricity to the component owner-members.  The company would soon be named the Yankee Atomic Electric Company and would set a precedent for several following "Yankee" plants.

Steven (L) and Anthony (R) Udotong. Steven is well on the way to constructing a nuclear fusor, some of whose components are seen here. Photo courtesy Steven Udotong.

Steven Udotong, a 16 year old high school junior from Cinnaminson, N.J., recently made headlines as he prepares to become one of only a handful of young men or women to privately construct a nuclear fusor (a device using the inertial electrostatic confinement concept to fuse deuterium gas molecules) on his own time.  ANS contacted Steven via email for information about the project, and his opinions about nuclear energy, nuclear technologies and the place of nuclear technologies in education.

Westinghouse Electric announced very early this morning that it had filed for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11 of the U.S. Bankruptcy code, according to an official press release.  This event quickly follows the wide reporting yesterday evening that Toshiba's board of directors had voted to approve the declaration of bankruptcy by Westinghouse, which is Toshiba's subsidiary.  News releases from the various concerned parties are out this morning in response, and we have our first glimpse of how this process might affect the Westinghouse AP1000 plants under construction at V. C. Summer (owned by SCANA, SCE&G and Santee Cooper) and at Plant Vogtle (whose majority owner is Georgia Power, a subsidiary of Southern Company).

The impact of intermittent electricity on the power grid is sometimes difficult to understand or explain. Electricity is not a product you can see or touch and is often treated like any other consumer product. Electricity is different from other usual products, however, and I thought that a good way to explain it is to compare it to a game of musical chairs with slightly modified rules.

Chien-Shiung Wu is the last of my three-part series for Women's History Month. Born in China in the early 1900s, Chien-Shiung was blessed with a family that always encouraged her to pursue her educational aspirations. After immigrating to the United States during the Great Depression she successfully received a Ph.D. in physics from the University of California, Berkeley. Like Maria, Chien-Shiung was then recruited to join efforts in the Manhattan Project, even though she had no idea what the project is about.

Today's short video shows the emission of radiation in a cloud chamber. Enjoy!

SMR on trailer courtesy NuScale Power

On March 15, 2017, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) announced that it had accepted NuScale Power's application for Design Certification of its innovative Small Modular Reactor (SMR) design. This begins what will be, according to NuScale, an approximately 40-month process until the design is certified by the NRC.

There was a time when the mPower SMR (Small Modular Reactor) was the perceived industry leader.  The consortium behind it won the first Department of Energy (DOE) funding award to move such a design through to licensing at the end of 2012, and it was planned that a two-reactor Generation mPower nuclear plant would be licensed and constructed at the TVA Clinch River site. Now, just over four years later, the effort - which has been through a fairly recent restructuring - has been ended by its participants.