Nuclear promises
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Nuclear promises
Sunday, June 26, 2005
When nuclear power came to the neighborhood a little more than three decades ago, folks were assured there’d be no problems.
For one thing, nuclear-generated electricity would be inexpensive — too cheap to meter, in the memorable phrase of Lewis Strauss, an early chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission).
Another early assurance was that the byproducts of nuclear power generation — the deadly spent fuel — would be taken away by the government and safely disposed of. That waste would be encapsulated in glass, or shot to the moon, or whatever. Anyway, the federal government had promised to take the spent fuel away. Eventually, a date was set for the handoff: January 31, 1998. That was the law, and that was a United States government guarantee, and no good American doubted the word of the United States government.
So the plant was built — in this case alongside the Connecticut River in the Vermont town of Vernon. A few scruffy people protested, hippies and the like. What did they know?
As it turned out, they knew a good deal more than the politicians and the experts.
It soon became clear that nuclear-generated electricity would not be cheaper than other varieties, not when you figure in the costs of keeping track of that nuclear waste. Some storage costs are paid by the federal government; most come out of a tax in the rate base. And those costs are open-ended, extending 200,000 or more years into the future, much longer than the entire period of recorded human history so far.
Consider what’s going on at the Yankee Rowe nuclear plant about 35 air miles from southwestern New Hampshire in Massachusetts. After 30 years of operations, Yankee Rowe was closed down in 1992. It was worn out and too expensive to fix. The plant has since been chopped up and carted away. But its owners are still looking after its 1,700 tons of spent nuclear fuel. That fuel sits in dry casks on a big concrete platform, surrounded by a wire fence and patrolled by armed guards.
It’s a costly obligation. Only one armed guard, paid the minimum wage 24 hours a day for 200,000 years would earn about $10.5 billion. There’s a cost of nuclear power no one reckoned with back in the ’50s and ’60s. And one armed guard won’t do the trick in the era of terrorism. Far from it. There are many guards at Yankee Rowe, and they are highly trained and well paid.
Meanwhile, over at Vermont Yankee, the spent-fuel pool is once again nearing its capacity.
We say “once again,” because the plant, which started operating in 1972, was designed to store 600 spent fuel-rod assemblies. Ten years later, the storage pool was almost full. So the Nuclear Regulatory Commission gave plant owners permission to move those assemblies closer together and add 800 more. In 1989, the pool was about full again. So the NRC allowed 870 more assembles to be squeezed in. And so it went. The current limit is 3,355 assemblies. The plant will reach that number by 2007 or 2008. And, apparently, this is really the limit, even for the indulgent NRC.
What about that U.S. government guarantee? Well, January 31, 1998, passed and nothing happened. Glassification and space rockets didn’t work out. And a proposed storage site in Nevada may not be all that safe either. And now, after September 11, how could we ship all that deadly stuff out there along our highways and byways?
Despite all these setbacks, Vermont Yankee’s owner — Entergy Nuclear Corp. — plans to forge ahead. It wants to boost the plant’s power output by 20 percent, creating even more spent-fuel assemblies. It wants to extend its operating license beyond the current 2012. And, rather urgently, it wants to shift some of that spent fuel out of the jam-packed cooling pool and into dry storage casks, similar to the ones over at Yankee Rowe.
And the Vermont Legislature has voted to let the company do it. Within a few weeks, Entergy will make an application to the Vermont Public Service Board, which has the final say.
All this, it seems, is of no concern to New Hampshire. Although Vermont Yankee hugs the Connecticut shoreline across from Hinsdale, this state’s two U.S. senators rarely mention its plans and problems. Second District Congressman Charles Bass issued a press release last year expressing confidence that Entergy’s requested power increase “will be resolved with the necessary due diligence.” Ah, confidence.
Questions do remain. After 33 years of operations, is Vermont Yankee in sound enough shape to handle a big power increase? And are dry casks safer than fuel pools? Some scientists say they are. But a press report in March indicated that a secret scientific warning to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had raised grave doubts about that. The NRC won’t let the public see the report. An NRC spokesman explained: “Our core concern is making sure that information that could reasonably be expected to be available to a terrorist is not publicly available.”
So who knows? And, as far as official New Hampshire is concerned, who cares?
"
Nuclear promises
Sunday, June 26, 2005
When nuclear power came to the neighborhood a little more than three decades ago, folks were assured there’d be no problems.
For one thing, nuclear-generated electricity would be inexpensive — too cheap to meter, in the memorable phrase of Lewis Strauss, an early chairman of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission).
Another early assurance was that the byproducts of nuclear power generation — the deadly spent fuel — would be taken away by the government and safely disposed of. That waste would be encapsulated in glass, or shot to the moon, or whatever. Anyway, the federal government had promised to take the spent fuel away. Eventually, a date was set for the handoff: January 31, 1998. That was the law, and that was a United States government guarantee, and no good American doubted the word of the United States government.
So the plant was built — in this case alongside the Connecticut River in the Vermont town of Vernon. A few scruffy people protested, hippies and the like. What did they know?
As it turned out, they knew a good deal more than the politicians and the experts.
It soon became clear that nuclear-generated electricity would not be cheaper than other varieties, not when you figure in the costs of keeping track of that nuclear waste. Some storage costs are paid by the federal government; most come out of a tax in the rate base. And those costs are open-ended, extending 200,000 or more years into the future, much longer than the entire period of recorded human history so far.
Consider what’s going on at the Yankee Rowe nuclear plant about 35 air miles from southwestern New Hampshire in Massachusetts. After 30 years of operations, Yankee Rowe was closed down in 1992. It was worn out and too expensive to fix. The plant has since been chopped up and carted away. But its owners are still looking after its 1,700 tons of spent nuclear fuel. That fuel sits in dry casks on a big concrete platform, surrounded by a wire fence and patrolled by armed guards.
It’s a costly obligation. Only one armed guard, paid the minimum wage 24 hours a day for 200,000 years would earn about $10.5 billion. There’s a cost of nuclear power no one reckoned with back in the ’50s and ’60s. And one armed guard won’t do the trick in the era of terrorism. Far from it. There are many guards at Yankee Rowe, and they are highly trained and well paid.
Meanwhile, over at Vermont Yankee, the spent-fuel pool is once again nearing its capacity.
We say “once again,” because the plant, which started operating in 1972, was designed to store 600 spent fuel-rod assemblies. Ten years later, the storage pool was almost full. So the Nuclear Regulatory Commission gave plant owners permission to move those assemblies closer together and add 800 more. In 1989, the pool was about full again. So the NRC allowed 870 more assembles to be squeezed in. And so it went. The current limit is 3,355 assemblies. The plant will reach that number by 2007 or 2008. And, apparently, this is really the limit, even for the indulgent NRC.
What about that U.S. government guarantee? Well, January 31, 1998, passed and nothing happened. Glassification and space rockets didn’t work out. And a proposed storage site in Nevada may not be all that safe either. And now, after September 11, how could we ship all that deadly stuff out there along our highways and byways?
Despite all these setbacks, Vermont Yankee’s owner — Entergy Nuclear Corp. — plans to forge ahead. It wants to boost the plant’s power output by 20 percent, creating even more spent-fuel assemblies. It wants to extend its operating license beyond the current 2012. And, rather urgently, it wants to shift some of that spent fuel out of the jam-packed cooling pool and into dry storage casks, similar to the ones over at Yankee Rowe.
And the Vermont Legislature has voted to let the company do it. Within a few weeks, Entergy will make an application to the Vermont Public Service Board, which has the final say.
All this, it seems, is of no concern to New Hampshire. Although Vermont Yankee hugs the Connecticut shoreline across from Hinsdale, this state’s two U.S. senators rarely mention its plans and problems. Second District Congressman Charles Bass issued a press release last year expressing confidence that Entergy’s requested power increase “will be resolved with the necessary due diligence.” Ah, confidence.
Questions do remain. After 33 years of operations, is Vermont Yankee in sound enough shape to handle a big power increase? And are dry casks safer than fuel pools? Some scientists say they are. But a press report in March indicated that a secret scientific warning to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission had raised grave doubts about that. The NRC won’t let the public see the report. An NRC spokesman explained: “Our core concern is making sure that information that could reasonably be expected to be available to a terrorist is not publicly available.”
So who knows? And, as far as official New Hampshire is concerned, who cares?
"
posted by Greta Jane at Wednesday, June 29, 2005
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