Tokyo Soil Samples Would Be Considered Nuclear Waste In The US

While traveling in Japan several weeks ago, Fairewinds’ Arnie Gundersen took soil samples in Tokyo public parks, playgrounds, and rooftop gardens. All the samples would be considered nuclear waste if found here in the US. This level of contamination is currently being discovered throughout Japan. At the US NRC Regulatory Information Conference in Washington, DC March 13 to March 15, the NRC's Chairman, Dr. Gregory Jaczko emphasized his concern that the NRC and the nuclear industry presently do not consider the costs of mass evacuations and radioactive contamination in their cost benefit analysis used to license nuclear power plants. Furthermore, Fairewinds believes that evacuation costs near a US nuclear plant could easily exceed one trillion dollars and contaminated land would be uninhabitable for generations.

4 generator failures hit US nuclear plants

Guardian
Ray Henry

Associated Press= ATLANTA (AP) — Four generators that power emergency systems at U.S. nuclear plants have failed when needed since April, an unusual cluster that has attracted the attention of federal inspectors and could prompt the industry to re-examine its maintenance plans.

None of these failures has threatened the public. But the diesel generators serve the crucial function of supplying electricity to cooling systems that prevent a nuclear plant's hot, radioactive fuel from overheating, melting and potentially releasing radiation into the environment. That worst-case scenario happened this year when the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Japan lost all backup power for its cooling systems after an earthquake and tsunami.

Three diesel generators failed after tornadoes ripped across Alabama and knocked out electric lines serving the Tennessee Valley Authority's Browns Ferry nuclear plant in April. Two failed because of mechanical problems and one was unavailable because of planned maintenance.

Another generator failed at the North Anna plant in Virginia following an August earthquake. Generators have not worked when needed in at least a dozen other instances since 1997 because of mechanical failures or because they were offline for maintenance, according to an Associated Press review of reports compiled by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

"To me it's not an alarming thing," said Michael Golay, a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who studies risk at nuclear plants. "But if this trend were to continue, you'd certainly want to look into it."

At a minimum, the failures have prompted NRC inspectors to increase their scrutiny at plants where the problems happened. Beyond that, industry officials and academics say the incidents could lead the NRC to formally warn nuclear plant operators about the recent failures and prompt utilities to reevaluate what can disable a generator. Some think these experiences may factor into upcoming rules the NRC will issue in response to the crisis in Japan.

A single generator failure is not a calamity. All reactors have at least one backup generator and sometimes more. If the diesel generators fail, nuclear plants can run safety gear off batteries for hours or use steam-driven pumps to keep cooling water flowing.


But the loss of all emergency power — including the diesels — is a crisis. That happened on March 11 when an earthquake and tsunami disabled all the diesel generators at the Japanese plant. Three of its six reactors suffered meltdowns. The facility was rocked by explosions and released radiation requiring the evacuation of roughly 100,000 people.

In the U.S., an average of roughly one diesel generator has failed when needed each year since 1997. Government researchers who examined diesel generator failures in the U.S. from 1997 to 2003 calculated the average odds that a diesel generator would fail to work at some point during an eight-hour run were slightly greater than 2 or 3 percent, depending on which database was analyzed.
Even at low odds, a generator failure can turn serious when combined with other problems, notably human error.

Nuclear Plant Loses Electricity in Virginia after Quake

Wall Street Journal
Rebecca Smith, Tennile Tracy, Gary Fields

Tuesday's 5.8-magnitude earthquake created a state of emergency at the North Anna nuclear-power station in central Virginia, causing it to lose electricity and automatically shut down, although generators restored power.

The North Anna Power Station declared an "alert" status, which is the second lowest of four emergency situations.

Jim Norvelle, director of media relations for Dominion Resources Inc., operator of the North Anna plant, said its workers inspected the switch yard, through which electricity enters and leaves the installation, and believe problems there caused the nuclear plant to lose access to grid power. When the plant lost access to grid power, it automatically shut down.

Mr. Norvelle said the four diesel generators at the plant, 40 miles northwest of Richmond, can furnish enough electricity to run vital safety systems indefinitely at the two-reactor site. Electricity is needed to keep the reactor cores covered with coolant and to keep safe temperatures in spent fuel pools. Problems in both those areas led to the near-meltdown of reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan, following a 9.0 earthquake and tsunami on March 11.

It will be at least several days before the North Anna plant is returned to service, the company said. First, workers must make sure there was no earthquake damage. That requires a thorough inspection of many systems. Then a slow and orderly process is followed to return reactors to service.
"As far as we know, everything is safe," said Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman David McIntyre.

Twelve additional nuclear plants in Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, North Carolina and Michigan declared "unusual events," the lowest of four emergency situations. They included Calvert Cliffs, the closest nuclear plant to Washington, D.C. The plant remained stable at 100% of capacity, said Mark Sullivan, a spokesman with Constellation Energy Nuclear Group LLC, which owns the plant.

The Calvert Cliffs plant is in Lusby, Md., about 50 miles from the city limits of the nation's capital.
Mr. Sullivan said that as part of normal procedure, employees were performing increased observations and instrumentation monitoring.

Meanwhile, at the Indian Point nuclear-power plant north of New York City, officials said some minor shaking was felt, but the facility was still online and operating at full power.

June 30: Japan Impact in U.S.

Fort Calhoun in Nebraska. Photo by Nati Harnik/AP

Footprints

The ongoing disaster in Japan at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant has launched the nuclear debate to the forefront of energy discussions even here in the United States.  The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) recently launched a  90-day task force to assess the safety of the U.S. nuclear reactor fleet and to determine what measures the agency may need to implement in order to ensure that regulations reflect lessons from the Fukushima crisis. Initial findings indicate that there are regulatory gaps in inspections and re-licensing procedures at older reactors, which may not be equipped to handle extreme events. Several troubling findings are specifically related to training and emergency preparedness. More than 40 percent of all U.S. nuclear plants lack proper integration of safety guidelines into periodic reviews and revisions of operating procedures; only 61 percent periodically include these guidelines in their emergency drills.

Despite the initial findings of obvious regulatory gaps, Martin Vigilio, the deputy executive director of operations for the NRC, asserted his faith in the current system last week during his presentation to the Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards (ACRS). “We continue to have confidence in the safety of the U.S. fleet without question,” he said. In apparent contrast to this statement, however, he identified several regulatory and safety gaps, including ill-maintained or missing equipment meant to control large fires or terrorist attacks and lack of consistency for ‘voluntary industry initiatives’ meant to increase safety measures. Pressed by ACRS Chairman Abdel-Khalik, Mr. Virgilio acknowledged that the U.S. is in a similar position to the one in Japan; the International Atomic Energy Agency issued a report earlier this month raising concerns about complacency by Japanese regulators which we believe mirrors the situation here. He agreed that voluntary initiatives are unevenly applied, lack strictness and have not been reviewed or updated since 1992.


Mr. Virgilio also mentioned that emergency preparedness planning is currently the responsibility of each state. He expressed concern about the availability of training and resources to ensure that state-level decision makers are properly prepared, and also about the apparent lack of understanding about potassium iodide pills‘ potential to prevent the uptake of radioactive iodine into the thyroid gland. You can access the complete transcript of the June 23, 2011 ACRS meeting on Fukushima and the presentation slides here.

Populations Around Aging US Nuke Plants Soar

Common Dreams
Jeff Donn

BUCHANAN, N.Y. – As America's nuclear power plants have aged, the once-rural areas around them have become far more crowded and much more difficult to evacuate. Yet government and industry have paid little heed, even as plants are running at higher power and posing more danger in the event of an accident, an Associated Press investigation has found.

Populations around the facilities have swelled as much as 4 1/2 times since 1980, a computer-assisted population analysis shows.

But some estimates of evacuation times have not been updated in decades, even as the population has increased more than ever imagined. Emergency plans would direct residents to flee on antiquated, two-lane roads that clog hopelessly at rush hour.

And evacuation zones have remained frozen at a 10-mile radius from each plant since they were set in 1978 — despite all that has happened since, including the accidents at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukushima Dai-ichi in Japan.

Meanwhile, the dangers have increased.

More than 90 of the nation's 104 operating reactors have been allowed to run at higher power levels for many years, raising the radiation risk in a major accident. In an ongoing investigative series, the AP has reported that aging plants, their lives extended by industry and regulators, are prone to breakdowns that could lead to accidents.

And because the federal government has failed to find a location for permanent storage of spent fuel, thousands of tons of highly radioactive used reactor rods are kept in pools onsite — and more is stored there all the time.

These mounting risks, though, have not resulted in more vigilant preparations for possible accidents.
The AP found serious weaknesses in plans for evacuations around the plants, including emergency drills that do not move people and fail to test different scenarios involving the weather or the time of day.

Some plans are merely on checklists, and never have been tested. In drills, responders typically go to command centers and not to their emergency posts. There is no federal requirement for how fast an evacuation must be carried out.

And disaster planners from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Federal Emergency Management Agency have made dubious assumptions about the public response to a major accident. They insist, for example, that people who are not called upon to evacuate will stay put; they're now saying that they might under some circumstances tell people to hunker down at home even in the 10-mile evacuation zone, and they believe people will do it.

That advice flies in the face of decades of science and policy, millions of dollars in planning and preparations — and common sense.

New Study: Fluoride Can Damage the Brain - Avoid Use in Children

Sweet Remedy


PRNewswire, June 21, 2011

"The prolonged ingestion of fluoride may cause significant damage to health and particularly to the nervous system," concludes a review of studies by researchers Valdez-Jimenez, et al. published in Neurologia (June 2011), reports New York State Coalition Opposed to Fluoridation, Inc.

Valdez-Jimenez, et al. describe studies that show fluoride induces changes in the brain's physical structure and biochemistry which affects the neurological and mental development of individuals including cognitive processes, such as learning and memory.

The research team reports, "It is important to be aware of this serious problem and avoid the use of toothpaste and items that contain fluoride, particularly in children as they are more susceptible to the toxic effects of fluoride."

A different research team (Tang et al.) reported in 2008 that "A qualitative review of the studies found a consistent and strong association between the exposure to fluoride and low IQ."

Project Flood: Fort Calhoun nuclear power plant under serious flood threat

Examiner
Deborah Dupre

This picture indicates Fort Calhoun Nuclear power
plant cask building partially underwater

After the Army released near record water from six major reservoirs, levees have failed to hold the Missouri River so flooding now poses a "serious threat" to Fort Calhoun Nuclear Power Plant according to today's International Business Times article.

IBTimes Staff Reporter reported at 4:17 AM EDT that "Fort Calhoun nuclear power plant was reportedly very close to getting engulfed by the floodwaters, raising fears of a crisis similar to Japan’s Fukushima disaster."

The nuclear plant declared the event as “unusual.”

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has maintained that there was no risk of disaster. MIT graduate software engineer expert and nuclear researcher Arthur Hu has noted, however, that Fort Calhoun nuclear plant's "dry-storage bunker is half-submerged outside the condom," writes seasoned nuclear researcher/journalist Tom Burnett. (Listen to Burnett on http://rense.gsradio.net:8080/rense/special/rense_Burnett_061311.mp3 that also highlights nuclear industry veteran of over 30 years, Arnie Gundersen speaking about hot particles.)

IBTimes refers today to the Reuters report that federal officials widened flood gates last week to allow record, or near-record water releases to ease pressure on six major reservoirs swollen by heavy rains and melting snow.

"But later in the week, Missouri River floodwaters reached a levee built up to protect Hamburg, Iowa, after the main protection along the river failed, a county emergency official said."

Despite lowering nuclear power plant regulations and dismissing some safety threats, "industry and government officials defend their actions, and insist that no chances are being taken," reported Daily Mail at MailOnline today, referring to the extensive Associated Press nuclear industry investigation report recently released.

Negligence was the bottom line of the AP report. "Examples abound," Daily Mail says.

"[N]egligence is destined to to bring the plants closer to a catastrophic accident that could harm millions and jeopardize the future of nuclear power in the U.S."

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Radioactive tritium leaks found at 48 US nuke sites

'You got pipes that have been buried underground for 30 or 40 years, and they've never been inspected,' whistleblower says

A decoy sits on Bob Scamen's pond in Braidwood, Ill.,
within view of the Braidwood Nuclear Power Station in
Braceville, Ill. Braidwood has leaked more than
six million gallons of tritium-laden water in
repeated leaks dating back to the 1990s — but not publicly
reported until 2005.

BRACEVILLE, Ill. — Radioactive tritium has leaked from three-quarters of U.S. commercial nuclear power sites, often into groundwater from corroded, buried piping, an Associated Press investigation shows.

The number and severity of the leaks has been escalating, even as federal regulators extend the licenses of more and more reactors across the nation.

Tritium, which is a radioactive form of hydrogen, has leaked from at least 48 of 65 sites, according to U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission records reviewed as part of the AP's yearlong examination of safety issues at aging nuclear power plants.

Leaks from at least 37 of those facilities contained concentrations exceeding the federal drinking water standard — sometimes at hundreds of times the limit.

While most leaks have been found within plant boundaries, some have migrated offsite. But none is known to have reached public water supplies.

At three sites — two in Illinois and one in Minnesota — leaks have contaminated drinking wells of nearby homes, the records show, but not at levels violating the drinking water standard.

At a fourth site, in New Jersey, tritium has leaked into an aquifer and a discharge canal feeding picturesque Barnegat Bay off the Atlantic Ocean.

Previously, the AP reported that regulators and industry have weakened safety standards for decades to keep the nation's commercial nuclear reactors operating within the rules.

While NRC officials and plant operators argue that safety margins can be eased without peril, critics say these accommodations are inching the reactors closer to an accident.

Any exposure to radioactivity, no matter how slight, boosts cancer risk, according to the National Academy of Sciences. Federal regulators set a limit for how much tritium is allowed in drinking water. So far, federal and industry officials say, the tritium leaks pose no health threat.

But it's hard to know how far some leaks have traveled into groundwater. Tritium moves through soil quickly, and when it is detected it often indicates the presence of more powerful radioactive isotopes that are often spilled at the same time.

For example, cesium-137 turned up with tritium at the Fort Calhoun nuclear unit near Omaha, Neb., in 2007. Strontium-90 was discovered with tritium two years earlier at the Indian Point nuclear power complex, where two reactors operate 25 miles north of New York City.

 Interactive: Population within 10 and 50 miles of nuclear power (on this page)

The tritium leaks also have spurred doubts among independent engineers about the reliability of emergency safety systems at the 104 nuclear reactors situated on the 65 sites.

That's partly because some of the leaky underground pipes carry water meant to cool a reactor in an emergency shutdown and to prevent a meltdown. More than a mile of piping, much of it encased in concrete, can lie beneath a reactor.

Tritium is relatively short-lived and penetrates the body weakly through the air compared to other radioactive contaminants. Each of the known releases has been less radioactive than a single X-ray.

The main health risk from tritium, though, would be in drinking water. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says tritium should measure no more than 20,000 picocuries per liter in drinking water. The agency estimates seven of 200,000 people who drink such water for decades would develop cancer.

Still, the NRC and industry consider the leaks a public relations problem, not a public health or accident threat, records and interviews show.

"The public health and safety impact of this is next to zero," said Tony Pietrangelo, chief nuclear officer of the industry's Nuclear Energy Institute. "This is a public confidence issue."

Closing Ranks: The NRC, the Nuclear Industry, and TEPCO are Limiting the Flow of Information