Podcast Episode 115 - 

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My first reaction was “Wow! Did I just read that correctly?!”

It was one of those “ah-ha moments” when a seemingly mundane statement leapt out of the page and whacked me on the forehead.  This time the catalyst was a twitter reply from Chris Pragman (@ChrisPragman) who describes himself as an “Avid Podcast listener, Engineer, Nuclear Power, Fire Protection, and beer geek with a long commute!”

You see, I had posted a tweet earlier in the day about the cost to taxpayers of some “green energy” jobs.  There’s a new wind farm in Oregon called Shepherds Flat that received federal cash grants totaling $490 million under the guise of job creation.  For that grand sum the Shepherds Flat project will create 35 new jobs.  The math is easy; $14 million per “green energy” job. Our tax dollars at work!

This tidbit about Shepherds Flat was part of a larger report by the Energy Tribune that among other things compared the relative size of US government subsidies to various energy industries.  The report by Robert Bryce calculated subsidy dollars per unit energy produced and concluded the renewable energy industry receives 6.5 times more federal government subsidies than the nuclear industry, and 12 times more than the oil and gas industry.  That fact really didn’t surprise me considering the billions of dollars in grants, production tax credits, and favorable depreciation rules the government lavishes upon anything branded with the “renewable” label.  Then Chris asked a great question, “What do they consider nuclear subsidies?”

When I dug into that question I learned the Congressional Budget Office is tasked with tracking the amount the government spends subsidizing various industries, and they publish their findings periodically.  There it was on page 3: $900 million in “subsidies” for the “favorable tax treatment of nuclear decommissioning funds.”  Hmmm. What could that be?

You see, every nuclear plant owner is required by federal law to set aside funds to ensure there’ll be enough money to pay for decommissioning the plant when the time comes.  Typically plant operators add to the fund each year and over time the fund grows until it’s used. The NRC monitors each fund and will require plant owners to make additional payments if they think they’re behind.  These funds are essentially forced savings accounts that add to each nuclear plants annual operating expenses.

So what’s the “favorable tax treatment?”  It turns out Title 26 of the United States Internal Revenue Code requires interest or other investment earnings of nuclear plant decommissioning funds to be taxed at “only” 20%.  Maybe I’m alone in this, but being required by law to set up a fund, then being taxed on that fund’s growth hardly fits the definition of a “subsidy!”  Other sources of energy are not required to set up such funds – they carry the potential future costs of dismantling equipment as liabilities on their balance sheets.  In the case of nuclear plants they’re forced to set aside capitol in government mandated and monitored funds, then the government takes 20% of the fund’s earnings.

Anyway, in 2009 the CBO calculated this “favorable tax treatment” to be worth $900 million, and they called that a “subsidy.”  That’s quite a different kind of subsidy from the cash grants, tax credits, and accelerated depreciation enjoyed by the renewable energy industry.  Personally, I have a tough time viewing this as a subsidy at all.

Chris, thanks for asking the question! I learned something new today, and maybe some of you out there did too.

Happy Birthday to This Week in Nuclear!

On Dec 27 This Week in Nuclear will turn seven years old.  I would like to express my heartfelt “thanks” to all of you who have supported and continue to support the blog and podcast!

Happy Holidays!

John Wheeler

This Week in Nuclear

Activists, medical practitioners and politicians who have demanded moratoriums [on uranium mining] may have various reasons for doing so, but their claims that the public and environment are at risk are fundamentally wrong.

That about sums up the facts on the safety of uranium mining and the validity of motives of those who oppose it.  What’s particularly noteworthy about this statement is its source: Michael Binder, the President of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.  It’s impressive to see this level of leadership from the Canadian equivalent of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

It’s also in stark contrast with the actions of former NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko who remained silent last year when the US Department of Interior banned uranium mining for 20 years across 4000 square km of Arizona.  Their excuse was “protecting the Grand Canyon,” but the area in question is outside both the Grand Canyon and the buffer zone that protects the park.

It would be great to see new NRC Chairman Allison Macfarlane following Mr. Binder’s lead to dispel the myths around uranium mining and take a first step in overturning the arbitrary ban.

What better way to celebrate National Nuclear Science Week than to acknowledge amazing career opportunities that exist for people interested in joiningthe nuclear renaissance. If you are a middle or high school student (or are the parent of one) considering college alternatives, you would be hard pressed to find a better investment than earning an associates or bachelors degree in nuclear-related science, engineering, or technology.

Opportunities for entry level positions have not been this rich at any time during the past three decades, and the nuclear industry is partnering with many schools to ensure graduates have the knowledge and skill for success as power plant engineers, operators, and technicians. Because of a combination of national and international trends, there have never been more opportunities for young people to begin careers in the nuclear industry.

About 120,000 people are currently employed in the U.S. nuclear industry. Over the next several years, many of these workers will retire. As a result, the industry will need to hire more than 25,000 new employees just to maintain the existing workforce. The economic slowdown  over the past few years has caused many workers to delay their retirement.

Today retirements are once again on the rise because 401K balances have recovered and workers have earned additional credits in pension plans. For example, in 2011 about 2,000 workers retired from the 104 operating nuclear plants in the United States, prompting many utilities to increase hiring. Four new nuclear plants being built in Georgia and South Carolina will each add up to 2,400 workers during construction, plus 400 to 700 permanent jobs when each is operating. In addition, the nuclear industry is booming overseas with more than 60 plants under construction around the world and many more planned. All of this means ample opportunities for rewarding careers in many nuclear related fields.

The industry hires almost every type of engineer, not just nuclear engineers. The most common are mechanical, electrical, civil, and power systems engineers. Since there are engineering colleges and universities in every state that offer one or more of these degree programs, opportunities are plentiful. Earning a bachelors degree in these engineering majors opens the door to an entry-level engineer position with a starting salary of approximately $60,000 to $65,000.

Some of the positions in greatest demand at nuclear plants are power plant operators and technicians. These opportunities generally require an associate’s degree or equivalent training. Starting salaries range from around $45,000 per year to about $50,000. As workers gain experience, salaries can rise $20,000 or higher to an average of $65,000 to $70,000, and overtime pay often adds thousands more to annual income.

In the past, finding a college that offered education courses for future operators and technicians could be difficult, but this is no longer the case. Several years ago the industry began working with colleges across the United States to create new degree programs. Today there are more than 40 community colleges around the U.S. offering what is known as the Nuclear Uniform Curriculum (NUCP). The NUCP is a standardized associates degree program that prepares students for careers as nuclear operators and technicians. Students who earn a B grade or better in their core courses are awarded a transferable certificate that is recognized at all 104 nuclear plants.

For workers interested in advancing into leadership roles, these positions in engineering, operations, and other technical fields are excellent starting points for future management positions.

According to the College Board, the national average for community college tuition and fees is about $3,000 per year. Thus, for about $6,000 a student with a solid math and science background can attend an NUCP school for two years and earn an associates degree and a transferable credential. This would qualify them for an entry-level position as an operator or technician earning a starting salary of $45,000 to $50,000. This is certainly one of the greatest deals in education today!

More information on careers in the nuclear industry is available from theAmerican Nuclear Society, theNuclear Energy Institute, and atGet Into Energy.

John Wheeler

It must be great to be a climate change believer.You get to boldly declare your alignment with the “A” team, the smartest minds and greatest strategic thinkers of our time, or so we’ve been told.You get praise from big government (at least under the current US administration) and get to hang out with old hippies who sail up and down the Hudson River playing folk music and singing songs about Mother Earth and fighting the good fight.

Unfortunately, I can’t count myself in, but I’m not exactly out either.I’m on the fence and that’s a problem for me.My science and engineering education taught me enough about pv=nrt and the partial pressure law of gasses to know you can’t just keep dumping airborne crud and gasses into a fixed volume of anything without changing it’s composition.I’ve also been around long enough to see changes in the planet, but are those being caused by progressive man-made climate change or a normal natural cycle?

I know a lot of very smart people I admire greatly who are staunch climate change believers, and almost an equal number of equally smart engineers and scientists who swear it’s the greatest hoax ever perpetuated on modern humanity.I’ve been reading a great deal on the topic lately because I really DO want to understand both sides of the argument with the hope that it will become clear and I’ll be able to join one crowd or another.

I’ve come to realize a big reason I continue to be a climate change skeptic is I question the integrity and the motives of the most vocal climate change advocates.I simply do not trust they are telling the truth.This is why:

1. If the real goal were to reduce greenhouse gasses, then it would be logical that environmental leaders would advocate policies to reward low carbon behavior and penalize high carbon endeavors, regardless of the technology involved.Instead, environmental and political leaders have already chosen “winning technologies” of conservation, wind and solar energy. Insistence on these creates the impression that social redesign are the real goal, not saving the environment.If leaders were really serious about reducing carbon emissions they would create a technology neutral playing field that punishes carbon emissions and rewards low-carbon and carbon-free energy sources.

2. Many of the most vocal proponents of man-caused climate change insist on solutions that won’t work.Despite massive investment in solar, wind, and conservation, there remains not a glimmer of hope that these can provide sufficient energy to replace fossil fuels, much less accommodate the energy requirements of the world’s growing population.The math just does not work.This virtually assures growing emissions from oil, gas, and coal.These facts cause me to wonder if the environmental movement created climate change as a means to promote their social and political agendas.

3. The anti-nuclear movement creates a huge credibility problem for global warming advocates.Many of the same people who accuse “climate skeptics” of ignoring science are themselves ignoring facts that show nuclear fission is the safest form of large-scale energy production.They also continue to over state the dangers associated with radiation exposure even though growing evidence suggests old theories about the risks of low-level radiation exposure are flat out wrong.

4. Governments are using the climate change mantra as an excuse to increase taxes and regulation, while spending tax revenues in ways that have nothing to do with reducing greenhouse gas emissions.In other cases they turn a blind eye to or even subsidize the worst CO2 emitters.

5. I know I’m getting away from science in my last reason, but emotions can be just as great a factor in our beliefs as facts.I confess: I have such huge distrust in Al Gore that I have a difficult time believing in anything he says.Gore preaches conservation yet lives a lifestyle that is hundreds of times more carbon intensive than the average American.He tells people to buy carbon credits without disclosing his financial relationship with a company that sells them.He flies around the globe on CO2 spewing private jets when commercial air travel could do just fine.Finally, he promotes the carbon reduction “wedge” strategy yet intentionally omits one of the most important wedges of all: expanding nuclear energy.

On a side note, fortunately whether or not I believe in man-made climate change has little bearing on my support for nuclear energy. Even without the risk of global environmental collapse from the buildup of CO2 in our atmosphere and oceans, there are plenty of reasons we should be building more nuclear power plants, including

• Reducing air pollution that causes mercury poisoning, acid rain, and airborne particulates blamed for hundreds of thousands of deaths worldwide each year.

• Reducing reliance on expensive imported petroleum products, and the negative impact that has on our nation’s economy.

• Reducing reliance on a fuel supply that will become increasingly scarce and in demand as world population explodes.

• Good jobs for more people. Nuclear energy facilities employ far more people than power plants that burn coal, oil or gas. The expense of operating a nuclear plant is chiefly in the salaries of the people who work there.  By contrast, most of the cost of operating a gas or coal plant is the cost of the fuel.

With this in mind, you can help me get off the fence on man-made climate change.Whether you are a climate change believer or a climate change denier, I’m interested in hearing from you.Please take a few minutes to post a comment here or on the Facebook fan page to share your thoughts – do you believe in man-caused climate change and why? If there was a turning point in your belief, what was it and how did it come about? When possible provide links to references that make the case supporting your position.

Thank you for your help!

John Wheeler

This Week in Nuclear

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As it was designed to do, the San Onofre nuclear plant automatically disconnected itself from the grid and shut down then the blackout occurred.  This was done as part of the plant’s protective scheme to shield the plant from unintended consequences from the falling grid voltage and frequency.  A similar thing happened to nine nuclear plants in the eastern USA during the blackout of 2003.

Why do nuclear plants trip off line when a blackout happens?

While this is a somewhat simplified answer, it covers the fundamentals.  Please be aware my experience is with pressurized water reactors, but the same basic principles should apply to boiling water reactors.

The nuclear plant’s generator, like that of any electrical generator supplying the grid, is electrically locked to the voltage and frequency of the grid. As grid voltage drops, so does the voltage sensed inside the plant. Most large electric loads inside nuclear plants are electric motors on pumps, valves, fans, and other such equipment.  To drive a fixed mechanical load connected to the shaft, a motor must draw a fixed amount of power from the power line. The amount of power the motor draws is roughly related to the voltage times current (amps). Thus, when voltage gets low, the current must get higher to provide the same amount of power.  Thus, as voltage drops, current inside the motors rises. This increase in current can cause overheating and short circuits. 

Note: the paragraph above was revised to correct an oversimplification & error in my original post. The results are the same, my explanation was lacking.

Also, normally the alternating current on the grid operates at 60 cycles per second (60 hertz).  As the grid collapses, the frequency begins to drop. If allowed to continue this would cause the nuclear plant’s reactor coolant pumps to run slower, thus moving less water through the reactor.  Less cooling water could potentially lead to higher than normal fuel temperatures.  To protect against the reactor operating with degraded cooling water flow, nuclear plants have various means of sensing low grid frequency or coolant flow.  When electrical frequency or reactor cooling flow drops below a defined threshold it triggers an automatic shut down.  Some of these protection schemes are anticipatory in nature – they happen predicatively before the grid situation has a chance to deteriorate to the point of causing a challenge to the reactor or plant equipment.

Why can’t nuclear plants stay on line when a black out happens?

While it’s possible to design a nuclear plant to be able to stay online during a loss of off-site power, it would require some large and expensive equipment, and a redesign of the reactor protection system.

The loss of electrical power to equipment inside the plant is not the only aspect of a loss of off-site power (LOOP) that designers have to consider. Another significant challenge is designing mechanical and control systems to withstand an instantaneous loss of load from 100% power to around 10% power.  The reactor is putting out 100% power one instant, and the next instant the “grid” is gone and the only load on the rector is in-house loads.  Since reactors can not change load that quickly, the reactor will be generating excess heat until reactor power can drop to balance with the new load.  While reactor power is greater than the load there is excess heat being generated.  That heat has to go somewhere; it causes the water in the reactor coolant system to heat up and to expand.  Thus, to accommodate a 100% loss of load a nuclear plant needs a reactor coolant system with a large surge volume to accept that expanding water, and a large heat dump system to reject the extra heat. Both of these attributes can be designed into a reactor system – I personally operated a prototype naval reactor that was designed to accommodate a near instantaneous 100% load rejection.  However, in a land based power plant the extra system hardware would be costly.  Since base load power plants are not expected to withstand a loss of grid transient often, it is tough to justify the extra expense.

It’s possible that some of the new small modular reactors could be designed to stay on line during a LOOP.  Perhaps some of my SMR friends will add some comments to this post below?

John Wheeler

This Week in Nuclear

The pipeline runs through Sinai, a Nairobi ghetto of corrugated tin and cardboard huts.  When the pipe began leaking hundreds of people gathered around to scoop up the spilled gasoline.  As the crowd grew a spark from a cigarette butt or some other heat source ignited the fuel.  The blast incinerated scores of people nearby.  Flames cascaded down on nearby huts then raced through the crowded slum.

Trying to image the chaotic and horrific scene, I realized there was something so far outside my own paradigm that I had to stop for moment to collect my thoughts…who runs TOWARDS a leaking gasoline pipeline?  Maybe that’s a silly question; but if anyone reading this came upon a leaking gasoline pipeline they would stop, back away, and call for help.  You would keep your distance while warning others not to go near for fear of igniting the leak and causing a fire or explosion.  If you were forced to approach the leak you would fear for your life and rightfully so!

So what is different between you and the hundreds of people in Kenya that did the exact opposite?  As word spread through Sinai about the leaking pipeline hundreds of people grabbed every container they could find and rushed towards the explosive spill! You might settle on a simple socioeconomic answer: because they are poor they’ll risk their lives for a few dollars worth of anything of value.  The real answer is a lot more complicated.  These people are not only poor, they are super poor, and one of the factors that separates the poor from truly impoverished is the lack of access to even basic energy sources that human beings need to survive.  They are energy destitute.

Another way of saying this is availability of plentiful, accessible energy is the greatest single factor that allows people to rise out of poverty.  All of the world’s developed economies got that way because they had access to plentiful supplies of energy.  For the energy destitute, a few kilowatts will replace dung or scraps of wood for cooking and warmth.  A few more kW and a village will have running water and refrigeration, and fewer people die of water or food born disease.  A bit more and machines can aid in harvesting or processing food in larger quantities.   Even more and suddenly the schools have electric lights and access to information that accelerates learning and further socioeconomic growth.

The people who ran towards that leaking gasoline pipeline did so knowing there was a risk of fire and death, but they accepted the risk and went anyway.  They placed such a high value in a few gallons of gasoline that they consciously or subconsciously decided it was worth risking their lives.  If they lived with even small amounts of reliable energy in their daily lives they would not have placed such great value on a few thousand BTUs of energy from a can of gasoline.  They would have reacted like you and me.

The investigation will unfold, and the cause of the fire will be known; a broken valve and a cigarette butt, or a rusty pipe and a static spark.  But it won’t really matter because they’ll ignore the real culprit.  The real blame rests on short sighted and corrupt political leaders around the world who have perpetuated energy policies that keep the world addicted to dangerous and limited fossil fuel supplies.  As a result, human beings compete for this limited energy with rationing accomplished by the economic divide.  The billions of impoverished people at the bottom have not a chance of getting the energy they need.  To make matters worse, as fossil fuel supplies dwindle and the earth’s population grows the problems will become acutely worse.

The only real solution to this worsening problem is to adopt global energy policies that improve access to low cost, abundant energy.   That energy will have to be low carbon because to continue dumping fossil fuel waste into the environment in such increasing amounts would result in an environmental disaster! Solar and wind energy can help, but in most applications they are too expensive or too intermittent to be useful for the growing billions of energy destitute and impoverished people.

The only realistic alternative is nuclear energy.  While nuclear power plants are relatively expensive to build, the per unit price drops with each successive plant of similar type built.  Once built, nuclear plants are cheap to operate because the fuel costs are so low.  New technologies like molten salt breeder reactors, fast breeder reactors, and “traveling wave” reactors offer additional fuel economy and safety advantages.  Thorium and used fuel from existing reactors will provide an almost limitless supply of fuel as these new reactors spread across the world.

Pundits will argue the risk of meltdown is too great, but the truth is in the numbers.  More than 100 people died in Kenya this week, and these types of accidents are becoming increasingly common.  About 5,000 people die around the world each year in coal mining accidents. Tens of thousands more die prematurely from fossil fuel waste products dumped in the air.   Yet the world takes these deaths in stride because we’ve been brainwashed to view these casualties as “worth the risk” and not reason enough to stop using fossil fuels.

By comparison, reactor accidents at Fukushima Dai-ichi, one of the “worst nuclear accidents” in history resulted in exactly zero deaths, and none are likely to occur in the future because radiation exposures to workers and the public have been low. While there is much media hype around “contaminated” soil and food, experience from places in the world with naturally high radiation levels, and from Chernobyl, where radioactive contamination of the soil was far worse than in Japan, has taught us that people have little to fear from the small increase above natural radiation they are likely to receive living near Fukushima.

The wealthy, elite anti-nuclear activists who jet around the globe to preach conservation and renewables own their share of the Sinai casualties.  Their successful efforts to demonize nuclear energy and slow its expansion around the world serve to perpetuate the world’s reliance on fossil fuels.  This in turn feeds the chronic energy shortage that exists for impoverished people everywhere.   They promote so-called “green” renewable energy sources that, because of their intermittent nature, require almost continuous fossil fueled backup.

While renewable energy can help, realistically only nuclear energy can supply clean, carbon-free energy in sufficient quantities to feed an energy starved world.

John Wheeler

This Week in Nuclear

Mixed Oxide (MOX) fuel has been used safely in nuclear power reactors for decades.  The presence of a limited number of MOX fuel assemblies at Fukushima Daiichi Unit 3 has not had a significant impact on the ability to cool the reactor or on any radioactive releases from the site due to damage from the earthquake and tsunami.

Here’s a link to their full report.  It’s a short read and provides an excellent explanation of the current situation and risks associated with MOX fuel.

Back in TWiN Episode #77 I covered the topic of MOX fuel, where it comes from, and where it is used.  Here are some important facts about MOX nuclear fuel:

• MOX present in nuclear plant fuel changes some aspects of the fuel’s performance in accident conditions, but these changes are relatively minor (see the ANS letter for details on this).
• MOX fuel comes from two main sources; recycling former weapons material into nuclear fuel, and recycling used nuclear power plant fuel for reuse.
• Creating MOX for power reactors is a safe way to dispose of weapons grade plutonium.
• MOX fuel can not be used to make nuclear weapons.  The NRC states “Using the plutonium in the reactor as MOX fuel makes using it for any other purposes difficult.”
• Plutonium in nuclear fuel is not unique to MOX fueled reactors.  All nuclear reactors contain plutonium after the reactor has been in operation for any period of time.  In fact, at the end of life of a typical low enriched uranium core up to about 20% of the heat being generated is from the fission of plutonium atoms.
• Plutonium in MOX fueled reactors can not cause the reactor to explode.

John Wheeler

This Week in Nuclear

$102 Million for 50.6 MW that will operate (best case) at 30% capacity = $6.72 million per megawatt (MW) of delivered electricity

Well now, that’s an interesting number, but what does it mean in the real world?  Let’s see how it compares to building other forms of large scale carbon-free energy like a nuclear power plant.

A Westinghouse AP-1000 reactor produces 1,154 MW at about a 90% capacity factor, thus delivering  a virtually consistant 1,040 MW.  The reported “all in” cost for two such rectors like the ones currently under construction at the Vogtle station in Georgia is about $8 Billion (or $4 Billion for 1040 MW).

How much would it cost to build the same energy delivery capacity with wind power (as shown above)?  Let’s find out:

Wind costs $6.72 million per MW * 1040 MW = $7.75 Billion

So this simple example of two current real world projects demonstrates wind generated electricity costs twice as much to build as the same quantity of nuclear generated electricity.  By the way, I’ve been very kind to wind in my analysis because the worldwide average capacity factor is more like 19.6%, not the 30% I’ve used in my comparison.  That difference would increase the cost of wind by another 50% to more than $10 Billion (2.5 times the cost of nuclear).

So would someone please tell me why the United States is squandering precious limited financial resources on intermittent wind energy projects that cost twice as much as an equivalent amount of reliable nuclear energy?

Dr. Chu, you should be ashamed!

Edit on March 8, 2011: I failed to consider generous state and federal subsidies that typically cover 30% to 50% of the cost of new wind energy installations, and the accelerated depreciation that assures investors get a rapid return on their investment even if the project produces little electricity.  These add further to the true cost of wind energy.

Podcast – download the MP3 File Here

During a recent conversation over the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, a friend asked if anyone in the group was boycotting BP.  This led to a lively discussion about the effectiveness of boycotts and the inevitable question,

“Who do you boycott?”

Before I answer that question, I want to make it clear that I don’t want to get overly negative.  I am sometimes critical of so called “environmental” groups like Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace who seem to be against everything yet provide no realistic alternatives.  In my view, to boycott one person, place or thing means I will support an alternative.

You don’t have to look very hard to find celebrities or companies who are actively working against the peaceful uses of nuclear energy.  There was a time in my life that going to the Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream shop was a ritual.  The company opened one of their first retail stores in a renovated gas station about a block from my apartment in Saratoga Springs, NY where I lived when I worked at Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory.   As the company grew and the profits rolled in their founders began to become politically active in Vermont.  Unfortunately they jumped on the anti-nuclear bandwagon and began to support groups like Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility who advocate shutting down the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant.  I made the decision not to buy Ben & Jerry’s ice cream because every scoop I ate was helping to fund activist efforts to shut down Vermont’s only nuclear plant.  It’s too bad Ben & Jerry’s fails to understand that without Vermont Yankee the electricity used to manufacture their ice cream would necessarily come from fossil fuels, and would contribute to air pollution and climate change.  They are probably unaware that Vermont is one of the only states to continue burning oil to generate electricity.  Their anti-nuclear campaign is in effect supporting the continued use of oil and other fossil fuels.  Fortunately for me there are plenty of ice cream alternatives!

I’m a big fan of Tom Clancy novels, and one of my favorites is “Hunt for Red October.”  I’ve read the book and enjoyed the movie when it premiered, but unfortunately I’ll never watch it again.  That’s because one of the stars of that movie is Alec Baldwin, an actor who has personally contributed millions of dollars to efforts to shut down the Indian Point nuclear plant in New York and the Oyster Creek nuclear plant in New Jersey.

Baldwin and his actress wife Kim Basinger support the anti-nuclear Radiation and Public Health Project, and have lobbied the NY State Government to acquire funding for the group.  The Radiation & Public Health Project is responsible for several junk science reports that claim commercial reactors are responsible for thousands of cancer deaths to plant workers and the general population around the plants.  Baldwin is also a frequent contributor to the Huffington Post which gives him a soap box on which to promote his radical anti-nuclear ideas (I am not against the Huffington Post.  In fact I follow a few of their other contributors regularly).  Some recent anti-nuclear articles by Alec Baldwin include The Hidden Costs of Nuclear Power and The Truth About Nuclear Power in Utility Reactors.

I will not watch any movie or television show in which Alec Baldwin or Kim Basinger appear.  To do so would support their ability to provide financial aid to anti-nuclear groups.  If you think about it, their ability to influence public opinion is based on their celebrity, and that is directly tied to the size of their audience.  If everyone quit watching Alec Baldwin and Kim Basinger then their value as lobbyists and spokespersons would diminish and their ability to financially support such efforts would decline.

So tell me . . . do you boycott any companies or entertainers?  If so, who?

Post a comment and share your thoughts.

John Wheeler

Fast Fission Podcast #23 – Download mp3 Here

Ever thought about how many zeros there are there in a “pico” something?

Remember back in grade school when we learned the metric system of measures?  We started out with units that are easy to visualize: meters get 1000 times bigger and become kilometers; meters get 1000 times smaller and become millimeters.  We understand these intuitively because we have a frame of reference and can visualize each of those unites of length and distance.  Units of mass are the same way; we know a gram is a small unit of mass – we can hold a gram of almost any material in the palm of our hand.  For example, a penny weighs 2.5 grams. Stack up 400 pennies and you have a kilogram, or 1000 grams.  Cut a thin copper shaving off a penny and you have a milligram, or one 1,000th of a gram.  Again, these are things we can see, and that makes it easier to understand.

As our schooling progressed we learned about very large and very small numbers, exponents, and scientific notation.  We put these principles to use in science and learned there are other units of measure larger than a “kilo” and smaller than a “milli”.  These are harder to visualize because we have to think in terms we can’t see.  For example, the mass of Mount Everest,  is 3E18 grams, or 3 “exa-grams” and the mass of the planet earth is 6×10^24 kg, or 6E27 grams (6,000 “yotta-grams”) (see note below).

On the opposite end of the scale is the prefix “nano” or 1E-9 of a unit. A nanometer is 1E-9 meters, and a nanosecond is 0.000000001 seconds.  I had a hard time visualizing a nano second of time until I learned that it takes about 1 nanosecond for a beam of light to travel one foot.  That kind of puts a nano into perspective, doesn’t it?  The newest computer chips, for example have transistors with a thickness of 45 nanometers!  We can only see things that small with powerful electron microscopes.

A “pico” is even smaller than a “nano” , 1000 times smaller!  “Pico” means there are 12 places behind the decimal point.  Even for a person like me who deals with engineering and science all the time, it can be difficult to visualize a “pico” of something.  A pico is so small that even a million picos is still very small amount. It takes a million, million pico grams to make one gram.  If you have a million pico-curies in a liter of water, it would take one million liters to provide a total of one curie.  To give you a sense of scale, an Olympic sized swimming pool (about 2.5 million liters) filled with water containing one million pico-curies of tritium per liter would hold a total of about 0.3 milligrams of tritium.  Said another way; if I had an olympic swimming pool full of pure water and I sprinkled in 0.0003 grams of tritium (less than the mass of one drop of water), then mixed it up, I would have a mixture containing 1,000,000 picocuries of tritium per liter.

It is very hard to measure anything as small as a nano or pico of anything.  There’s one area where we can: with advances in science, we’ve gained the ability to measure radioactivity in very, very small amounts down to the energy released by single energy particles or beams.  This gives us the ability to quantify radioactive material in extremely small quantities.

Anti-nuclear activists around the country aided by an uninformed media have grabbed on to the issue of tritium leaks at some nuclear plants around the USA, and are using the issue very effectively to create fear and distrust.  Nervous politicians are retreating from positions of outward support for nuclear plants even though the federal government, state agencies, and independent scientists all agree that the leaks pose no threat to public health and safety. The leaks have produced concentrations in special monitoring wells (not drinking water wells) in the range from few hundred to a million or so pico-curies per liter.  As I’ve shown, a million pico-curies per liter may sound like a lot, but in reality it is a tiny, tiny amount.

Every form of energy production has some impact on the environment.  Even wind and solar energy which are viewed by many as environmentally benign, have measurable effects.  The production of solar panels results in highly toxic chemicals, and worn out panels could leach chemicals into water supplies. Wind turbines cause noise pollution, kill bats and migratory birds, and catastrophic blade failures can throw lethal fragments hundreds or even thousands of feet.  Coal plants dump toxins into the land, water, and air, and the radioactive releases from coal plants are hundreds of times higher than allowed by nuclear plants.  Gas power plants emit greenhouse gases and, as we’ve seen in the last week, can and do explode and kill people.  Gas pipeline accidents kill people in the USA every year.

When nuclear plants shut down all the other plants in that market make money – lots of money.  Don’t think for a moment that fact is lost on people who are in the business of selling electricity from natural gas.  The increase in gas demand causes gas prices to rise and that hurts everyone else, except but gas distributors, of course.  I’m also sure this cash bonanza is not lost on politicians who are recipients of donations from coal, oil and gas companies.

It’s time for lawmakers, public service boards, and elected officials to do a reality check.  In the case of tritium in groundwater we’re talking about microscopic amounts of material with ZERO safety impact, and ZERO environmental risk.  Any time a nuclear plant is shut down, forced to reduce power, or delayed in starting up the replacement power has to come from another form of energy, usually natural gas.  When gas demand rises the price goes up and we get higher electricity bills, huge increases air pollution, and further reliance on a volatile, dangerous energy source.

John Wheeler

This Week in Nuclear

2/16/2010 Note: Thank you to a listener who recognized errors in my discussion of the mass of  Mt Everest and planet Earth – my numbers were way too low! After double checking my math, and performing the Earth mass calculation from scratch  (there were errors in my source data) I revised these show notes with the correct values.  I’ll update the audio podcast as soon as I am able.

John