NRC Region I Administrator Samuel Collins said the annual meeting was not a formal inspection review but instead a more freewheeling conversation about how CENG was handling reactor safety across the three nuclear plants it operates with its new French partner, EDF. Unlike a customary inquiry into a plant issue, this meeting's focus extended to corporate accountability.
"It does not take the place of our regular oversight process," Collins explained to a reporter. "It does allow us to bring these insights back into our regulatory decisionmaking, so we can understand better why things may have happened, but more important, what's being done about it across the fleet, and whether Constellation is taking away lessons learned."
"What are their standards? How are they reinforcing those rules? Where are they focusing their time, people and money?" Collins said.
Mea culpa and red flags
The meeting was an opportunity for CENG executives to highlight the reduced radiation exposures at their plants, the company's above-average record in keeping its plants online, and its standing at the high end of the performance ratings by the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, an industry oversight organization.
But CENG's review began with a mea culpa. "We recognize our recent performance ... does not meet expectations and we are taking aggressive fleet-wide actions," the company said.
The several incidents covered during the daylong session at Nine Mile Point and the R.E. Ginna nuclear plant near Rochester, N.Y., accounted for a small fraction of the reactors' operations during 2008 and 2009, but they raised red flags nonetheless.
At Ginna, a turbine-driven auxiliary feed water pump failed in May 26, 2009, then failed again during a test run a little over a month later. While NRC concluded it did not pose a serious safety threat to the plant, it did disable one of the backup systems that would have to remove heat from the reactor in an emergency shutdown accompanied by a loss of outside power to the plant.
The pump failed because the stem of a control valve had become corroded, and the cause of the corrosion, in turn, was leakage of steam from a system involving a connected valve. The steam leak had been going on since 2005, and the NRC said the May 2009 failure should have triggered an exhaustive search for the "root cause." Ginna operators thought they had pinpointed the issue and a fix, but they did not probe deeply enough to identify the rust issue and the steam leak that was causing it, the NRC inspectors said.
"This is a critical system. This is a high safety important system," Ginna plant Vice President John Carlin told NRC officials at the January meeting. "Our performance didn't meet expectations."
"It's caused us to challenge how we were looking at the business," Carlin added. "Do you have the right mindset?"
A progression of errors
Given the stakes involved at nuclear plants, it's not enough for operators to "fix" equipment that fails, said Glenn Dentel, NRC branch chief for the three CENG plants. They have to be certain of the cause and have proved to themselves that the equipment will do its job.
The hose incident at Nine Mile Point was a progression of errors and inadequate responses, NRC inspectors concluded. Although the underwater cleaning operation had never been done before, it was not subject to a rigorous planning process, NRC inspectors said, nor was the change in the cleaning process on Nov. 4 adequately reviewed.
Contrary to expected practice, the divers did not immediately stop work when the incident occurred. Plant management was not immediately notified. An hour passed between when the first and second pumps were fouled, the NRC said.
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19 Comments
Add CommentThere is little point investing in nuclear energy, when there is only enough uranium to last for 30 years at present rates of consumption. If more reactors are built, the time scale will be significantly reduced, meaning the new plant will never be economical.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt would surely be better to invest in new technologies, such as decarbonising hydrocarbons to release hydrogen for pollution-free energy supplies. In that way the carbon can be safely discharged in land-fill, and complex refining would no longer be necessary. (This can also be done with methane gas)
the
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGoogle solar thermal. It does the same thing as nuclear - boils a pot of water, only with the sun.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGoogle solar thermal. It does the same thing as nuclear - boils a pot of water, only with the sun.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThermoelectric power accounts for 49% of total water withdrawals in the USA (USGS, 2009). Given imminent water wars, is this a wise choice of a basic, precious resource.
Read more at Suite101: Nuclear Power's Affect on Nation's Water Budget: Recirculation Saves More Water than 'Once-through Cooling' http://environmental-engineering.suite101.com/article.cfm/nuclear-powers-affect-on-nations-water-budget#ixzz0hhNMkvOG
The US nuclear power industry safety record is outstanding and it will stay this way because of tough self regulation, inspections and the NRC. Compare this to coal or worse natural gas and it is clear that Nuclear is the best option we have not just for reducing the US's Carbon footprint but for safe reliable power. I am curious why this type of investigative reporting wholly ignores other parts of the power industry. Only 1 month ago a billion dollar natural gas power plant exploded killing 5 people and injuring more than a dozen. (cnn article http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/02/07/connecticut.explosion/index.html) Yet, there has not been a single nuclear plant related death in 40 years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe notion by eco-steve that there is only enough uranium to last for the next 30 years is 100% false. Even if it were true, there are other sources of fissionable material such as Thorium which the earth has enough of to last at current power consumption levels for 1000's of years.
With modern efficient generation 3.5 reactors able to use reprocessed and thorium fuels, a huge eighty year current supply of natural uranium and orders of magnitude more efficient fast breeder reactors there is sufficient nuclear fission fuel to last hundreds of years. Thorium is five times as abundant as uranium.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisNuclear waste is valuable fuel for 4th gen reactors like the IFR. IFR's at $1B/Gw could supply all the world's power for hundreds of years on existing nuclear waste. The tiny amount of low level waste from IFR's is safe enough to put back in the mine. We need to build new types of nukes to clear the mess from the old types.
India's new nuke waste burning 500 Mw GenIV power plant coming into service next year at a cost of $1.5B/Gw. Six years construction time for first of a kind.
In general, complex large scale systems are built to meet expected or specified longevity requirements with specified maintenance and service requirements. Production costs are minimized within specifications. As a result, nothing lasts forever, and system failures occur more frequently as equipment ages. Meanwhile, there is an enormous financial incentive to continue operation of amortized equipment rather than investing capital in new equipment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisMy 1993 Ford is still fundamentally sound and meets all safety regulations in effect at the time of its production. With about $1,000 maintenance annually I expect to continue using it some time. However, the risk of catastrophic failure contaminating my neighborhood is negligible.
This is just a bunch of propaganda, B.S. and disinformation, pumped out by shills of the fossil fuel industry - to try to block clean, green Nuclear Energy from stealing market share from them. Case in point:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTake the effort to get Vermont Yankee closed - for some Mickey Mouse Tritium leak, that released a trillionth of a curie, vs a self-illuminating exit sign contains 15-30 curies of tritium.
Turns out, the major "environmental" group fighting to get the Nuclear Power Plant closed is The Conservation Law Foundation, which is directly affiliated with CLF Ventures, who’s major client at the moment is a AES Corporation which is building a 720 MW combined-cycle natural gas fired power plant, next door in New Hampshire.
CLF Ventures business also supplies nuclear decommissioning services, and just happens (according to their website) to have a comprehensive Site Closure Plan for Vermont Yankee.
http://yesvy.blogspot.com/2010/02/follow-money.html
At the same time, these same "environmental" organizations have been totally silent about the recent NG explosion that killed 6 workers. Amazing how easy one gasfitter with a valve can destroy a $1B NG power plant and kill all those people. Sounds like an excellent terrorist target to me. Especially since they like to build those things right close to population centers.
http://depletedcranium.com/information-comes-out-about-kleen-energy-explosion/
A tiny few of the many NG explosions, there's a lot more of those coming:
1944, Cleveland, 180 killed and one sq. mile of Cleveland destroyed
1937, New London Texas, 300 students & teachers killed
1968, Richmond, Indiana, 41 killed, 150 injured, 4 sq blocks of city heavily damaged
1988, North Sea, 167 dead
1992, Guadalajara, 206 killed, 500 injured, 15,000 homeless
2004, Arkhangelsk, Russia, 58 killed
1996, Puerto Rico, 33 killed.
Undoubtedly, NG causes 1000's of deaths in the USA due to the pollution it creates, NOx, CO & Particulates mainly.
Natural Gas radiation:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=marcellus-shale-natural-gas-drilling-radioactive-wastewater
dwbd - To get back to the question of risk assessment for older nuclear power plants, which catastrophic failure of non-nuclear processes or equipment produced consequences comparable to the Chernobyl failure? In terms of longevity of affects, I suggest that sum of all non-nuclear failures cannot match the potential impact of a single nuclear failure.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt's stupid to call Chernobyl case an accident. They were disabling safety systems in order to run tests in the middle of the night. Then the system run out of control and caused hydrogen blast that broke the building and ignited the graphite causing a fire. As far as I know there are no graphite reactors in USA, so such an idioticy is not possible to duplicate. I think the worst possibility is the meltdown of the reactor in case the cooling can not be maintained.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJokunen - Its ignorant to ignore the potential consequences of a catastrophic nuclear power plan failure, even if the probability of failure is acceptably low, as judged by interested parties, including regulatory groups.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe article referred to critical procedural errors that, fortunately, were judged to have no impact of safe operations.
I think it'd be most convenient for those interested in nuclear power generation to live in the immediate vicinity of a nuclear power plant.
Eco-Steve: According to this article of SA there is over 200 years of viably mined uranium for current reactor use.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=how-long-will-global-uranium-deposits-last
Others have already mentioned other materials which can be substituted.
Another important aspect of nuclear reactor development that I haven't seen mentioned in these comments is further scientific and technological advancement. Perhaps developing nuclear reactors will help the development of sustainable fusion power.
Emporer : According to the latest figures of the International Atomic Agency, there is enough uranium at present rates of consumption for 30 years, extensible to 50 years taking into account possible ores after extensive prospection. You are considering possible advances in nuclear technology which have not yet been proven. I don't count chickens before they have been hatched....
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEco-Steve: I believe that humans are very capable creatures with not only visions of "possible advances" but the tenacity, creativity and intelligence to bring those ideas to fruition.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI suspect you believe that too. "It would surely be better to invest in new technologies, such as decarbonising hydrocarbons to release hydrogen for pollution-free energy supplies." This is a direct quote from you comment. By using the word invest I can only assume that you're aware that your talking about technologies that are possibly decades away from maturity. Or in other words.... possible advances.
I don't necessarily need a chicken; sometimes and omelet is good enough.
The most pessimistic situations of a full meltdown in a U.S. LWR cannot reach the level disaster reached in the Chernobyl accident. As a real life example, the TMI accident was a full failure of so many safety systems that it is difficult to imagine much else going wrong. Yet there have been zero deaths and zero injuries directly attributed to the accident. There are a number of misconceptions about the dangers of radiation that are consistently perpetuated in news media and politicians that any mention of the word 'nuclear' or radiation incites fear in the average person. A great article that I encourage all to read concerning evaluating the risks associated with nuclear power written by Ted Rockwell can be found on his blog at:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishttp://www.learningaboutenergy.com/nuclear-energy-facts-report/
"I think it'd be most convenient for those interested in nuclear power generation to live in the immediate vicinity of a nuclear power plant."
I think you can reasonably assume that they do live in the immediate vicinity. How else would they commute to work?
The Flying Saucer Technology has another spin-off: A very low-cost ING.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisWe can have uranium being radiated by a small ING and immediatedly use the results for power generation.
1) It is inherently unethical to produce waste that maintains its toxic and mutagenic concentrations for 460,000 years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this2) Nukes are more complicated than jets to operate with a potential for 5 orders of magnitude more damage from a catastrophic failure. Care to count the failure rates of 40 year old jets? The nuke industry is damn lucky to have its favorable catastrophic failure rate and it can only deteriorate from here.
3) Even the best plant technicians have bad days and all of the training and efforts of the best technicians can be undermined by a disgruntled employee or the feeble efforts of minimum wage security fleeing from determined intruders.
4) The front end and back end of the fuel cycle occur in open country with total reliance upon Joe Six-pack and short range profit motivated corporations controlling the highly toxic and mutagenic constituents. Any nutcase with an RPG can make short work of a high level waste canister in the middle of an urban center and there will be many thousands of such waste transports.
Emporer : 12 years ago technology to pyrolyse biomass didn't exist. Today it is not only a proven, adaptable technology to remove CO2 from the atmosphere, but is earning money. But 5,000,000 units still need to be sold to inverse climate Change!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDecarbonising hydrocarbons use the same technology, but needs new money to get validated then getting rapidly to market.
As you say, this takes time, one thing we have little of if we are to meet international green deadlines.
See www.eprida.com for details of modern pyrolysis research.