How to Help Nuclear Plants in Ohio

Davis-Besse
NRC photo

Two plants and three ways to help them

Ohio has two nuclear plants,  Davis-Besse and Perry.  They add up to around 2000 MW electric. Ohio as a whole is a coal and natural gas state.  I did a quick addition, based on this table of power plants in Ohio. By my calculations,  Ohio has about 14,000 MW of coal. That is a lot of coal.

 I grant you that some of those coal units are scheduled to close, and will probably be replaced by natural gas.  Nevertheless, it is clear that these two nuclear plants are essential for Ohio to avoid being completely fossil power.

As a Vermonter, I do not want Ohio to have nothing but fossil-powered electricity.  The prevailing winds are from the West, and Vermont has a long history of resenting the acid rain visited on our forests by the coal-burning states of the Midwest.  The rain is less acid nowadays, but our soils have not fully recovered.  And "less acid" does not mean: Good for the forests.  It does mean: Better than it used to be.

Three ways to help nuclear in Ohio

How can you help nuclear in Ohio? Three ways, and you can do it now.

1) If you live in Ohio: Write your legislator in support of two bills that value nuclear for its zero-emissions electricity.   NEI has a post  with links. Exelon Rep Urges  Ohio Lawmakers to Support Zero-Emission Program. 

2) If you don't live in Ohio (or even if you do) donate to Generation Atomic. Generation Atomic has been going door to door in Ohio, building support for the nuclear plants.  They have a plan, they have volunteers, they have an App for your phone, and they are having success, including more than a thousand people who are now actively in favor of nuclear, and excellent press coverage.  Here's their latest field report (Notes from the Field, Week 5, Sandusky Ohio)  And here's a very important link for people: the Donate screen for Generation Atomic.

3) If you live in or near Ohio, go to the rally-symposium June 13!  Well, okay, the event is called an educational symposium on nuclear technology. (I added the "rally" part because I think of it as a rally.) The symposium will include panels, speakers and questions. This event at the Ohio Statehouse atrium includes American Nuclear Society Michigan-Ohio Section, the AFL-CIO, and North American Young Generation in Nuclear.  Maria Korsnick, president of NEI, will speak. Be there!  I think this symposium  (rally?) will be heavily covered in the press, and quite important.

Help the Ohio nuclear plants keep generating clean low-carbon power.  The environment needs you!

Generation Atomic open meeting in Ohio

Vermont Yankee was replaced by natural gas: Doing the numbers

Vermont Yankee energy was replaced by natural gas.  That's the bottom line.

Three Quarters Compared

During the first three quarters of 2014, (January through September) Vermont Yankee was running.  During the first three quarters of of 2015, it had shut down.

Scott Luft writes the ColdAir blog, which is mostly concerned with Canadian energy issues. http://coldair.luftonline.net. However, in early December, Luft tweeted some comparisons of energy sources in the Northeastern U.S.,  before and after Vermont Yankee shut down.  Similar charts are below.

Changes in Fuel Usage: New England Grid
Comparison of first nine months 2015 to similar 2014
Comparison of first quarter 2015 to last quarter 2014

The rise of natural gas with the fall of nuclear

First look at the top chart--the nine-month comparisons.  About 1500 GWh more electricity was produced in the first nine months of 2015 than in the first nine months of 2014 (see the "all fuels" line).  Almost all of the change in electricity (top chart) was produced by an expansion of the use of natural gas, making up for the drop in nuclear and coal. There was also an expansion of utility-scale photovoltaic energy, but the vast majority of the change in power supply was expanded use of natural gas.

One anti-nuclear commentator challenged these results, saying that looking at the first three quarters was a clever way to cherry pick data and avoid the true story of what really happened. Nuclear and natural gas use both fell between the last quarter of 2014 and the first quarter of 2015.

And indeed, they both did (second chart).

This wasn't anything to be proud of, however.  The first quarter of the year is quite cold in the Northeast, and people use natural gas to heat their homes.  Therefore, many natural gas-fired power plants cannot obtain fuel.  Oil and coal take up the slack.  Nowadays, natural gas plants are equipping themselves to be dual-fired, so they can burn oil.

Nuclear went down, natural gas wasn't available, and oil and coal use went up.  Nothing to celebrate. We're not looking at "green" energy expanding.

You can double-click to expand the charts.
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History of the charts

After I saw Luft's tweet, I contacted Scott Luft and asked him about his sources. Luft very kindly re-produced his sources and spreadsheets.  Luft's information came from several queries to the EIA data browser.

Luft had pulled the information into spreadsheets. Later, my husband George pulled the same data into the Macintosh spreadsheet that he likes better. Then he made the charts from the data.  The data from his spreadsheets is shown below.  It is all based on queries to this EIA database.

Deepest appreciation to Scott Luft and George Angwin.

History of the anti-nuclear comments

Also, Scott Luft compiled a "storify" of his twitter interchange with Mark Z. Jacobson on this subject.    In my opinion, Jacobson comes off badly in the exchange. It doesn't take complex work to show the flaws in Jacobson's arguments.  You simply start with quoting him directly, and the facts take it from there.

The Local Grid: Pictures at the Edge

It's minus 24 at my house this morning, and here are some pix I snapped of the ISO-NE Real-Time system page.

To me, the first one is the most telling: 20,000 MW demand, 243 MW in reserve.  That's too little reserve!

The rest are more typical winter ISO.

Grid running at over $200/MWh.

Actually, it has been bouncing up to over $300/MWh, in the five-minute market.  I just didn't get a screen shot at the higher levels.

And here's the fuel mix: Lots of coal and oil, of course: total of 27%.  Renewables hanging in at 6%.

And the renewables chart. Wind is actually a reasonable part of it, since this has been windy weather.  Wood and refuse dominate, of course.  Of course, what is "reasonable"?  Wind is 17% of 6% on a day the grid  is struggling.

Our summer peak is above 20,000 MW, and today is only 19,000.  However, in the summer, you can get natural gas to the gas-fired plants.

Electricity Prices Soar in New England. And Soon in Vermont.

 Neighboring States

Yesterday and today, two New England electricity distribution companies announced the rate increases that they require for winter.  Vermont can expect similar price rises.  Let's start with the neighboring states.

Massachusetts 37%: National Grid says that its customers in western Massachusetts can expect a 37% rate hike on November first, due to the retirement of Vermont Yankee nuclear plant and Salem coal plants. Other factors were also cited, including the fact that there are no new gas pipelines, expensive replacement fuels are used in winter, and natural gas prices are rising.  The higher electricity prices in Massachusetts will be in effect until April.  The video clip about the price rise finishes with a recommendation: people should think about replacing their older energy-hog refrigerators with a newer model.

New Hampshire 50%: Meanwhile, in New Hampshire, a small utility expects to double the "energy charge" portion of customer's bills in November.  The company, Liberty Utilities, explains that this will lead to an increase of about 50% in the customer's bills. A spokesman for Liberty Utilities explains that when demand for natural gas exceeds the supply, electric generators must use more expensive fuels to generate electricity, therefore driving up prices for the whole electricity market. This utility is located very close to my home in Vermont.

Is Vermont Different?  Well, no.

The latest we heard, the major Vermont utility, Gaz Metro (aka Green Mountain Power) was lowering rates by 2.5%, largely due to revenue sharing from Vermont Yankee.   Maybe we're good, here in Vermont? Too bad about the other states, but we're good?

Vermont: Yeah, we have grid power.  Nope.  Not really.  We're not good. None of our major utilities agreed to buy power from Vermont Yankee after the 2012 end of the plant's NRC license. Instead of buying Vermont Yankee power, they basically bought grid power. They bought one million megawatt-hours more grid power per year than they had purchased when they had contracts with Vermont Yankee.  Guy Page of Vermont Energy Partnership wrote Vermont Electricity At A Glance in March 2013, showing how much grid power Vermont utilities now purchase.

The Vermont Yankee license was renewed for another 20 years, but still, our utilities shunned  the plant.  They buy a lot of grid power, and  they are partially vulnerable to the same wholesale electricity market prices that affect the utilities in New Hampshire and Massachusetts.

Vermont: Yeah, we have Hydro Quebec Power. Partially vulnerable?  Did I say partially vulnerable? I meant mostly vulnerable!

Spillway in Hydro Quebec system

The jewel-in-the-crown of Vermont power purchases are the utility contracts with Hydro-Quebec.  See, it's not all grid power in this state.

But...those contracts don't matter.  As I wrote in two posts in 2010 (March 2010 and   December 2010) Vermont contracts with Hydro Quebec are market-follow contracts.  If the grid price goes up, the rate that Hydro Quebec charges Vermont also goes up. As I wrote in the December post, A Bad Deal with Hydro-Quebec,  these contracts will NOT protect us against major rises in grid prices.  The contracts have a little price-smoothing. Prices will not bounce around with the daily market changes. But those 35-50% price rises in other states aren't because of the volatility of the grid prices.  The price rises in other states are because of the total electricity cost raises on the grid.

I expect a similar price rise for Vermont.

Watch for it.

I suspect, however, that Green Mountain Power will probably not announce the price rise until after the election in November.

Vermont and the EPA Carbon Abatement. Be Careful What You Ask For.

The Carbon Abatement Plan

A few days ago, the EPA issued a proposed plan for greenhouse gas mitigation.  The plan is intended to cut greenhouse gas emissions in the electricity sector by 30% by 2030.  The required mitigations are determined by state.  For example, since Vermont has no fossil fuel electricity plants, Vermont has no required mitigation.

According to USA Today, the EPA document about the plan is 645 pages long. According to many reports, President Obama was frustrated with Congress’s inability to pass greenhouse gas legislation. Therefore, he  asked the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases directly, without requiring a law passed by Congress.

State by State and Here Come the Lawsuits

In the 645 page plan, different states have different proposed carbon mitigations. As reported in the Washington Post  and also published in my local Valley News)

Kentucky and West Virginia get more than 90 percent of their power from coal. The EPA made concessions to those states in setting its climate target. Coal-heavy Indiana, for example, would need to make smaller percentage cuts than New York or Washington states.

• West Virginia is a heavily coal state, and the EPA says it must cut its carbon dioxide emissions by 19%. 
• New York State gets less than 10% of its electricity from coal, and 80% of its electricity is generated by nuclear, hydro and natural gas. The EPA says that New York State must cut its carbon emissions by 44%.

To me, these rules seem arbitrary. It is no wonder that many commentators expect a raft of lawsuits. The satirical website, The Onion,  sums up the situation beautifully: New EPA Regulations Would Force Power Plants to Find 30% More Loopholes by 2030.

What about Vermont?

In this potential mess, Vermont is doing well. As Vermont Digger wrote: Obama Points to Vermont as a Model for Carbon Reduction. As noted in that article: Vermont does not generate electricity from coal and is the only state not required to come up with a plan (the district of Columbia is also exempt.)  Indeed, Vermont does not generate much electricity from fossil fuels, though we do generate 14% of our electricity from oil (ISO-NE state profile).  We have hydro, biomass, and of course, Vermont

From ISO-NE state profile

Yankee nuclear power.

Oops.  Vermont Yankee?  Vermont Yankee will go off-line at the end of the year. What will this mean for Vermont’s carbon-reduction plan?


Well, nothing immediately.  Though the current Vermont administration encourages more natural gas pipelines and the state Comprehensive Energy Plan includes a  great deal about natural gas, we don’t have any natural gas power plants in-state at this time.

When our nuclear plant shuts down,  this will not mean that Vermont will immediately generate fossil-fuel-based electricity in-state.  Oh yes, we will be buying more fossil-fuel based electricity from the grid.  Yes, the grid will be burning more fossil fuels to make up for Vermont Yankee being off line.  Those are facts.

However, since Vermont won’t be generating fossil-fuel-based electricity in-state, we won’t have to design a fossil-fuel mitigation plan for Vermont.  To me, this is just another way that the rules are more about politics than about pollutant mitigation.

NOx and carbon and me

Back in the early days of the Clean Air Act, I worked on methods for preventing NOx pollution. At the time, our work was funded by the EPA and the California Air Resources Board (CARB).  NOx (nitrogen oxides) are precursors of acid rain, photochemical smog, and ozone.  Comparing the NOx abatement work with the current set of carbon rules, I notice that this recent pollution control plan is political right from the  beginning.

Usually,  emission rules are based on an assessment of health issues or other concerns of importance to society.  Once the rules are in place, however, groups seek (and often get) variances based on their particular situations. The variances often include political considerations.

Still, the rules themselves, as promulgated,  are supposed to be based on science, not politics. Not in this case, as far as I can tell.  These rules incorporate the politics of each state.

Perhaps this 645 page document means that President Obama’s administration is cutting to the chase: they are going directly to the political realities.  However, one cannot help but notice that drastic cuts in greenhouse gases are set for states with only few coal plants. This isn’t terribly effective as a mitigation measure.  “If you mine and use a lot of coal, that’s okay!  Just small cutbacks!  But if you use nuclear and natural gas...we’re on your case!”

This policy does not have a lot to do with effectively limiting greenhouse gases.

Vermont as the model?

Vermont does not have to come up with a greenhouse mitigation plan because we do not burn coal for electricity generation in Vermont.  After Vermont Yankee shuts down, we will be generating far less of our electricity in Vermont.  The rest of our electricity will be imported from elsewhere, and those other states will have to bear the burden of complying with the new rules. We still won't have to come up with a greenhouse gas mitigation plan for Vermont.  It will be somebody else's problem.

Electric  car in China

Is this truly the model that the president wants? Export your problems?

Be careful what you wish for...
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Snide end note:  Does anybody except myself see the irony in the graphic at the top the Vermont Digger article Obama points to Vermont as a model for carbon reduction?  The graphic is a picture of a charging station “for the state’s fleet of solar vehicles.”

The Cold Truth on the New England Grid This Week: A High-Carbon Fuel Mix

The Grid In Winter

I have been following the New England Grid through the extremely cold weather of  the past few days.  As you would expect, electricity prices have been high, demand is high, and so forth.  Here's a typical screen-shot of the Vermont situation this morning.  Electricity prices above 25c per kWh.  (Price of $274 per MWh is 27 cents per kWh.) This screen shot comes from the ISO-NE main website, where the price ticker keeps changing in real time.

That is hardly the highest it has been. Here's some more information from the ISO-NE express page.  You can see that the variation, with moments of 40 cents/kWh today, and they had around 50 cents yesterday. Alas, I didn't take a screen shot yesterday.  (As usual, you can click on the graphics to enlarge them.)

The demand is soaring, also.

Here's a screen shot of the various areas in ISO-NE, including the lines feeding in from Canada, out to New York, and the cross-sound link to Long Island.

Note, you can see all these charts for yourself, real time, by clicking this link. With sub-zero weather, demand and price are soaring.  Of course.

The interesting thing was the fuel mix.

The Fuel Mix in Winter: Nuclear and Natural Gas are Equal

At the bottom of that same page, there's a little pie-chart of the current fuel mix.  This is an astounding pie chart: nuclear and natural gas are neck-and-neck in supplying power right now.   This is despite the fact that ISO-NE often says that New England is overly dependent on natural gas. The ISO-NE statement about closing Vermont Yankee noted that 52% of New England's electricity is generated with natural gas.  

Well, right now, New England's electricity isn't being generated by natural gas.  With a high demand on the grid, nuclear is 27% and natural gas is 28%.  Since nuclear power is reliable, but the amount is rather fixed, the nuclear component didn't go up.  Instead,  the percentage of natural gas has gone down.  In other words, when we need natural gas in New England, it isn't available.

But take a look at that oil percentage: 18%!  And coal at 13%.  

The lack of availability of natural gas is old news.  Indeed, the high percentage for oil shows that the ISO-NE winter reliability program is working.  In that program this fall,  ISO-NE (well, the rate-payers of New England) payed $75 million in capacity payments for oil-burners to have oil on site.   Now that those plants are actually making power, the oil-burners are also getting high prices as they sell their power. The $75 million this fall was a "capacity"payment--a payment to have oil on-site so the oil-fired capacity is available for dispatch.

ISO-NE has made some comments yesterday about the situation in New England. This grid isn't looking particularly good. This article Energy demand, prices soar as temperatures drop in New England quotes ISO-NE as follows:  

ISO-New England, the region's power grid operator, told transmission and generating companies on Tuesday to halt routine maintenance to free up resources for power exports to other regions if necessary, spokeswoman Marcia Blomberg said.

Some electric power plants have switched to burning oil and coal in New England in response to rising natural gas prices, she said.

(Note: This Energy Demand article by Stephen Singer of AP also appears in the Brattleboro Reformer, but I think it may be behind a paywall there.)

The whole situation on the grid is going to get worse next year when Vermont Yankee goes off-line.  That 27% nuclear will shrink and it is very unlikely that new gas lines will have been installed.  I think that coal and oil will be the new normal for the New England grid in winter. 

What about the renewables?

This post isn't particularly about renewables, but it has been windy, and we have had wind power. "Renewables" are 8% of the fuel mix chart above, and clicking on the "renewables" tag on that chart shows the percentage of the various renewables, as below.  Wood and refuse are 66% of the renewables and wind is 32%.  In other words, wind is about a third of 8% of the demand on the grid, or less than 3%.  And it has been windy!  We are not experiencing a mass of still cold air which is typical of winter. This weather system is described as a "vortex."  For what it's worth, production of power from refuse and wood is relatively fixed-capacity, but the amount of wind varies.  This chart covers a time when the wind power was comparatively high. 

I guess it is time to repeat myself a little. Here's the conclusion:

When Vermont Yankee goes off-line, coal and oil will be an even bigger part of the New Normal on the winter grid in New England. 

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Update: I recommend this NEI blog post about the grid and nuclear energy: Nuclear Fleet Shrugs Off Polar Vortex, and this article in the Hartford Courant about nuclear supplying more power to the grid than any other fuel on Tuesday afternoon when power demand was high.

As Germany goes, so goes Vermont? Guest post by Guy Page

Guy Page

As Germany goes, so goes Vermont?

Parallels in renewable energy policy and outcomes

By Guy Page

“As Maine goes, so goes the nation,” went the political truism between 1834 and 1932, when the Pine Tree State picked the winner in almost every presidential election. When only staunch Republican (!) Vermont joined Maine in selecting Republican Alf Landon in 1936, winner Franklin D. Roosevelt’s campaign manager James Farley famously if somewhat predictably quipped: “As Maine goes, so goes Vermont.”

Eighty years later Vermont is following another trendsetter:  Germany, the Western world’s undisputed leader of government-subsidized renewable power. Visitors to Germany note that solar panels cover the south face of seemingly every village church, school and home. Germany is home to a well-funded, highly popular “feed-in tariff” (FIT) that has encouraged almost broadbased power production. Of the 40 GW of installed solar power worldwide at the end 2010, almost half – 17.4 GW – was located in Germany. In just two years Germany’s share jumped to about 30 GW, according to the Feb. 2013 Washington Post.

German Inspiration

The German program was an inspiration to the crafters of Vermont’s May, 2009 feed-in tariff law, the energy-generation lynchpin of the state’s plan to use 90% renewables by 2050. Then Senate Pro-Tem (and now Governor) Peter Shumlin was particularly enthusiastic. In March, 2010 he told Fox News that if overcast Germany can get 30% of its electricity from solar power, so can America. He said this just days after leading the Vermont Senate in its “no” vote on Vermont Yankee. (When Fox reporter Stuart Varney pointed out that Germany gets just one percent of its power from solar, Shumlin conceded the error but has never retreated from his central point: Vermont, like Germany, can become a leader in the new renewable power energy economy, resulting in new jobs, clean air, and energy independence.)

Like its European forebearer, Vermont’s FIT solar power program also contributes about one percent to the state’s total power portfolio – actually, about one-third of one percent. The state’s SPEED website lists 13 projects (see “project summary” page) as “online and generating,” producing about 18,000 MWh of Vermont’s total load of about 6,000,000 MWh. (The FIT program for ALL forms of generation comes in at 53,000 MWh, or just under the one percent mark.)

German FIT solar power costs about 32 cents American per kilowatt-hour. Likewise in Vermont: FIT solar power is down from 30 cents to 25.7, about five times the average market rate. And while market power rates fluctuate – for better or worse - the Vermont FIT solar power rate, once set, is fixed in contractual stone over the course of the 10 year contract.

Nuclear and Fossil

As in Germany, Vermont opponents of nuclear power were empowered by a nuclear “incident” that helped them reverse government support for nuclear power. The Vermont Senate’s 2010 vote was held amid a powerful public response to reports of a tritium leak at Vermont Yankee. In May 2011, in the wake of Fukushima, the German government announced plans to close many nuclear plants. Although Germany followed Vermont chronologically, the decisions-making process was similar: the politically astute realized that a sense of crisis had moved matters to a tipping point.

The pro-renewables, anti-nuclear policy has had an unexpected effect in both locales: they are more reliant on fossil fuels. Germany has been an acknowledged leader among the “green” nations of Europe. In 2011, Vermont had the nation’s smallest carbon footprint for power generation, thanks largely to its reliance on hydro and Vermont Yankee.

A Step Backwards for the Carbon Footprint

Lignite or "Brown Coal"

In carbon terms, both have taken a step backwards. According to a February 27 2013 Bloomberg News report, Germany plans to build 6000 new megawatts of coal-fired power generation, a move which will significantly increase their overall carbon footprint. The pragmatic Germans realize they need plentiful, domestic, baseload power capacity to support Europe’s strongest manufacturing economy. Deprived of nuclear power, the German government is turning – back – to coal.

In Vermont, something similar has happened. Vermont Yankee’s contract providing about a third of the state’s electricity expired in March, 2012. Vermont’s reliance on New England grid power jumped about one million megawatt-hours in 2012 over 2011, according to “Vermont Electricity At A Glance,” study I conducted for the Vermont Energy Partnership. That figure equals one-sixth of Vermont’s total electrical load. About three-quarters of the grid’s power is derived from fossil fuels, mostly natural gas.

Concerns about the technical Achilles Heel of intermittent power - grid instability - are present in both Vermont and Germany. The August, 2012 Spiegel Online reported that large German manufacturers have experienced expensive power interruptions related to the transition to renewable power. In Vermont, the New England transmission grid operators have “curtailed” its purchases of power from the Lowell Mountain wind turbine development due to intermittency, resulting in a million dollars of lost income this winter, according to the general manager of one Vermont utility quoted in the April 5, 2013 Vermont Digger. The project’s owner is installing a synchronous condenser - $10 million pricetag – that it hopes will solve the problem.

Looking Forward

It is only fair to point out that in neither Vermont nor Germany has the final chapter been written. Perhaps solar power will prove to be greener, in both cash and carbon, in the long run.  Someday, a bright engineer may solve the problem of “translating” intermittent power into a traditional power grid. No doubt renewable power is delivering many positive benefits right now, including energy diversity, property tax income, and strong growth in solar-related employment. Solar power’s cost of production has decreased somewhat in recent years, in part due to fierce competition from China’s solar panel producers. Nevertheless, it’s a safe bet that when the avid backers of solar power in Vermont and Germany celebrated the passage of their FIT laws, few of them were anticipating that the immediate future would have more carbon and serious concerns about power cost and reliability.

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Guy Page is a frequent guest blogger at Yes Vermont Yankee. His most recent blog post described his report on Vermont's transition to renewable energy. 

A Safe Plant and the Same Few Protestors: Guest Post by Steve Moriarty

Hello.  My name is Steve Moriarty; I live in Greenfield, MA and have worked at VY for 34+ years.


Prior to that, I worked all around NE for New England Power Service Co., a construction company that services all NE plants.

My background is electrical construction/maintenance, Materials Management, Quality Assurance and Quality Control.

In that first job, I traveled from fossil plant to fossil plant in NE.  Some were oil and some were coal.  I also work at a few Hydro stations.

In 1977 I was assigned to VY. When I first visited the site I was pleasantly surprised.  It was clean, organized and run proficiency.

It was nothing like the dirty fossil plants that I was working in previously.

I soon saw that extraordinary attention was and continues to be paid to safety of the public, workers, and environment.

Procedure adherence was not an option it was and continues to be the standard operating procedure.

I was so impressed by the workplace and the personnel at VY; that I took a permanent position at VY and have been here since (now 39+ years combined service).

I met and married my wife, raised two children in Franklin County.

The bulk of my state taxes are paid to VT.

My daughter worked here as a summer employee while attending college.  She is a Microbiologist and is now married with two healthy and happy children.

My son is a Mechanical Engineer.  He worked here for two summers as an intern, and that experience set him up for success.  He too, is now married and healthy.

I would not have allowed either to work here, if I didn't truly believe it was a good and safe place to work.

Both of my children and my wife cannot believe the day to day difficulty that I must go through as a nuclear worker just to be able to do my job.

This defensive posture, that all nuclear workers are forced to assume, is not a daily task of workers in most professions.

My son noted that "there really aren't many young people speaking out  against your plant".   This was based on discussions over the nuclear  option at UMASS Amherst, while at college.

I got to thinking, and I too realized that I have been looking at the same faces for 10-20-30 years. (i.e. really not a lot of people speaking out against Nuclear, "just the same few").

I also asked my son him what he has heard at college and in the workplace, relative to nuclear power and its future, and his response was that many students in the Engineering program and engineering professionals are in favor of nuclear as a viable green source of energy.

Some, of course, like the idea of wind, solar, or hydro; but they also realize the nuclear power is needed, as well.

One thing that was agreed on was that this country's reliance on coal and oil was something they don't want.

They all seem to be very concerned about the environmental damage being done by fossil fuel, let alone the problems associated with obtaining those fuels.

So, what's the point?  The point is that if "these same few" spent as much energy on working with us to make the next generation of nuclear power plants even better, we all could gain.

It may be time to stop the 10-20-30++++ years of protesting and redirect that energy toward valuable and welcomed input to the future, all of our futures.

Nuclear power is here, it has proven its value, and it can be even more valuable to the environment and our energy demands into the future.

Thank you for your consideration, and I hope you see the real value of allowing Entergy-Vermont Yankee to operate into the future.

________

Steve Moriarty wrote this statement by email and submitted it to the Public Service Board on Docket 7862.  He was kind enough to send me a copy to be used as a guest post.  Moriarty's post and Stuart Endsley's recent guest post are boots-on-the-ground comparisons of nuclear and fossil plants.  Their words may be well known to utility workers, but they cover a subject that you rarely see in print.  Endsley's post: Acid and Air, the Environmental Effects of Non-Nuclear Electricity. 

Acid and Air, the Environmental Effects of Non-Nuclear Electricity: Guest Post by Stuart Endsley

Stuart Endsley

My name is Stuart Endsley and I am in favor of granting a permit to Vermont Yankee. Over the past 32 years, I have worked in many types of power generation facilities -- both nuclear and non-nuclear.

I don’t need to speak of the economic benefit of Vermont Yankee since many business leaders have already done so. Nor do I need to speak about the great benefit local charities receive, you’ve heard from them as well. You, as board members, are smart individuals, and I’m certain you recognize the public good Vermont Yankee provides in regard to those issues.

Instead, I would like to speak of my personal experiences working at different types of power generation facilities -- the facilities that would most likely replace much of the energy generated by Vermont Yankee should it close.

I would like to tell you about a fossil plant I worked in last February where after just six weeks the paint on my car was damaged by the acid rain coming from the stack. The pollution that damaged my car does not know state borders and simply goes wherever the wind blows, including Vermont.  This is certainly NOT in the public’s good.

I would also like to mention a Biomass plant, a so-called “Green Plant,” that I worked in a few years back.  After just two shifts, the caustic chemicals used in the scrubbers ate up the threads in the soles of my shoes causing the soles to fall off. These chemicals were found on the walkways and catwalks and when it rained they simply went down the street and ultimately into the ground water which also doesn’t recognize state borders.  This is certainly NOT in the public’s good.

I’ve worked at wind turbine projects in Iowa, Minnesota, Oklahoma, California, and Texas. At each of these sites I found dead birds that had been killed by the turbines. These birds did not know state borders either and some of them may have come from Vermont. Again, this hidden side effect of wind energy is certainly NOT in the public’s good.

And what about the coal plant in southern Nevada with tens of acres of fly ash containing arsenic and God knows what other carcinogens?  All in public view where the winds were free to carry it where they pleased. Most certainly NOT in the public’s good.

So I close my testimony by asking each of you to consider the true environmental impact of these alternative sources of energy.  I encourage you to personally visit some of these plants to see first-hand, as I have, the impact of these plants in regards to the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the wildlife we enjoy.

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Stuart Endsley works at Vermont Yankee.  He gave this statement at the Public Service Board's November 19 interactive TV hearing on Vermont Yankee's Certificate of Public Good.  He was kind enough to send me a copy of his testimony.

Carnival 134 plus Great Video from Bruce Power

Carnival #134 is up, and it is the first time that the blog Things Worse than Nuclear Power has hosted the Carnival. The Things Worse blog is written by two MIT engineers: grad student and recent graduate.  They write clearly and are not afraid to tackle the big subjects: the Fukushima butterfly scare, things worse than Chernobyl.

Read the latest Carnival and check out the great blog!

Speaking of "Things Worse Than Nuclear Power" -- there's coal.

Bruce Power's thirty-second commercial makes a clear case for nuclear power compared to fossil fuels and air pollution.  A tip of the hat to Rod Adams, who featured this video on his blog a few days ago.



 

Engineering Adventures with Nevil Shute

Poster for No Highway in the Sky
from Wikipedia

Once again, I will be leading a course at ILEAD at Dartmouth.  This time I will lead a 4-session course in January called Engineering Adventures with Nevil Shute.  Below is a reprint of  the ILEAD catalog description of the class.

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 Engineering Adventures with Nevil Shute

In this course we will read two of Nevil Shute’s  lesser-known books: Slide Rule (his autobiography) and No Highway, (which presaged the failure of the early De Havilland Comet airplane).

Based on these books, we will discuss the troubles that can befall engineering projects.  The books include issues of changing specifications, the difference between private enterprise and "government work," and how quirky individuals affect the outcome of projects.

The course will be participatory. We will discuss issues from the books, then we will trade "war stories": similar problems and solutions with our own projects.

The material will be of interest to engineers and non-engineers. If you have been involved in a big project, such as building a house, you have the background to enjoy this course.

Discussion group members should plan to read both books.

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MEREDITH ANGWIN has a MS in Physical Chemistry. Though most of her life was spent in nuclear energy research and problem-solving, she also worked extensively with fossil fuels.  She likes to talk about technical subjects in a relatively non-technical fashion. For many years, her job title was "project manager." Consequently, she often wonders how projects get managed.

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In this class, we are also going to watch the movie, No Highway in the Sky, in an optional extra class session.

I have led courses at ILEAD before, specifically:

• All Around the Coal Boiler
• Energy Safari with Robert Hargraves. 

Robert Hargraves did most of the work with Energy Safari.  I was co-leader of the course, and I have several posts about it on this blog.

Leading a course like this, as opposed to a leading a course in energy technology, will be a new adventure for me. Wish me luck!  I will post about the course occasionally.

Guest Post by Kit P: EPA, NRC and Coal Environmental Studies

In my blog post Vermont Yankee is Not Fukushima, I compared the health effects of Vermont Yankee with the more serious health effects from coal, quoting an EPA paper. Kit P made incisive comments  on that post, stating that the EPA link did not show the cause-and-effect relationships that I thought it showed.

 I felt his comments were too important to be hidden in a long (17 comment) stream of responses to a blog post. I invited Kit to write a guest post. He was good enough to write one, and here it is.



--------------------

The Purpose of Environmental Studies

One reason to read environmental studies is to learn information to make informed decisions about solving environment problems. One reason to cite environmental studies is to promote an agenda.

I worked at a nuke plant in California called Rancho Seco when it closed. Studies have cited how infant mortality improved after the plant closed. I have not read the study. One way to improve infant mortality is to provide free prenatal care for the poor which is just what happened about the same time as the closing of the plant.

My point here is to recognize the difference between improving the quality of life and fear mongering.

So on one hand I am an advocate of VY and on the other hand fear mongering about other sources of power is unnecessary. If VY closes it will be an economic loss for those who work at VY and the state that has to import power most likely by burning fossil fuel someplace else.

Is the EPA fear-mongering?

The question that this essay attempts to raise is the Obama EPA fear mongering? If so Meredith has jointed the ranks of an Obama sock puppet. She should not feel too bad being in the company of a Nobel Prize winner in Physics. (Meredith comments: "Sock puppet", "shill", whatever. No problem!)

Meredith writes:

“On the other hand, some of the worst air quality in their models is Ohio and Pennsylvania. ”

From the map, “Cross-State Air Pollution Rule (CSAPR) RIA, Table 1-1 and -2; mortality impacts estimated using Laden et al. (2006), Levy et al. (2006), Pope et al. (2002) and Bell et al. (2004); monetized benefits discounted at 3%.” http://www.epa.gov/airtransport/benefitsmap.html

The following are listed references and quotes:

• Laden et al. (2006): “Reduction in Fine Particulate Air Pollution and Mortality Extended Follow-up of the Harvard Six Cities Study” http://ajrccm.atsjournals.org/content/173/6/667.full.pdf+html  
• “Annual city-specific PM2.5 concentrations were measured between 1979 and 1988, and estimated for later years from publicly available data.”
• Levy et al. (2006), “Ozone exposure and mortality: an empiric bayes metaregression analysis."zxs http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15951663 
• "We gathered 71 time-series studies relating ozone to all-cause mortality, ”
• Pope et al. (2002). “Lung cancer, cardiopulmonary mortality, and long-term exposure to fine particulate air pollution.” http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11879110
• “The risk factor data for approximately 500 000 adults were linked with air pollution data for metropolitan areas throughout the United States and combined with vital status and cause of death data through December 31, 1998.”
• Bell et al. (2004). “Ozone and Short-term Mortality in 95 US Urban Communities, 1987-2000” http://jama.ama-assn.org/content/292/19/2372.full 
• "we estimated a national average relative rate of mortality associated with short-term exposure to ambient ozone for 95 large US urban communities from 1987-2000.” “Deaths for people aged 75 years and older comprised approximately half of total deaths in these 95 communities. ” “Ozone pollution is now widespread in urban areas in the United States and many other countries. Its rise reflects primarily increased numbers of motor vehicles and miles traveled; vehicle emissions are a major source of precursor hydrocarbons and nitrogen oxides. ”

Nice Try, EPA, But Those References Are Not About Coal

Nice try EPA but if you want to make claims about 'mortality impacts' of coal don't you think that coal should be the source of the pollution? The second problem with these studies is 'cause and effect' is not studied. The third problem is that 'mortality impacts' are not defined.

So what do all the studies say for those who are worried about air pollution cutting short their life?

• Do not smoke. 
• Do not heat your house with coal, wood, or dried manure. 
• If you do not want your children to breathe mercury, do not break things with mercury in your house bigger than a thermometer.

For the US there are just no studies that provide a 'smoking' gun for 'mortality impacts' related to coal plants, Yes there are chronically ill people and yes they die. We all die but I am skeptical that our good air quality is the cause.

NRC and EPA Regulatory Approaches

Let me approach the question from a different angle. The NRC and the EPA regulate differently.

The NRC is very site specific. Each nuke plant must show that annual offsite exposure is less than 5 mrem/year compared to 300 mrem/year average background. Each plant provides an annual report. For example, I used to live 12 miles from a nuke plant. One year I checked the annual report and the offsite exposure was below detectable. A calculation estimated the annual offsite exposure is less than 0.004 mrem/year.

Downwind of the nuke plant about 90 miles, background is 1800 mrem/year because of elevation and radon. If Downwinders are concerned about radiation, they should more closer to the nuke. This downwind location sometimes has air quality issues. The same conditions that trap radon also trap pollution from cars/trucks. However, there are not coal-based generation impacting air quality.

The US EPA looks at air quality based on regional measuring stations and can be found at http://airnow.gov/ and the Weather Channel will also provide a local report. I frequently monitor this site looking for places where the air quality is above a threshold of harm.

At the moment, Cleveland/Akron has just reached that threshold.

The EPA provides this warning, “Health Message: Unusually sensitive people should consider reducing prolonged or heavy exertion.”

The Third Approach

The '"Ain't It Awful" group hates good news. Zero is the number of people who check http://airnow.gov/ and tell me I am wrong. Air quality is very good in the US. Air pollution has no 'mortality impacts' any more.

A third approach is the correct approach. The benefits of power generation far out weighs the risks.

 Closing Vermont Yankee requires that the power be replaced as discussed in the Vermont Yankee renewal EIS: http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/licensing/renewal/applications/vermont-yankee.html#impactstatements

Already know what it will say:

Table 8-2

Air Emissions from Coal-Fired Alternative

As such, Entergy concludes that the coal-fired alternative would have MODERATE impacts on air quality; the impacts would be clearly noticeable, but would not destabilize air quality in the area. (Page 8-8)

However, in the absence of more quantitative data, human health impacts from radiological doses and inhaling toxins and particulates generated by a coal-fired plant at an alternate site are considered to be SMALL. (Page 8-9)

Therefore, it is official the environmental impact of nukes is less than a coal-based power plant, but this does not justify saying that coal is causing 'mortality impacts'.

Evidence for Impacts?

Is there any evidence?

“The NRC stated in the GEIS that there could be human health impacts (cancer and emphysema)

from inhalation of toxins and particulates from a coal-fired plant, but the GEIS does not identify the significance of these impacts [Reference 8-11].”

As far as I know, lung cancer and emphysema are strongly associated with smoking and nothing else. So I went to NUREG-1437 looking for the reference. No reference was listed.

While I think WIKI is a place to start, it is a source to be skeptical about. What could be some of the other causes of emphysema?

“This could include exposure to air pollution, second-hand smoke, and/or other chemicals and toxins.[citation needed]”

Here is the deal with a smoking gun, the absence of evidence is not actually evidence. However, if coal-based power is causing 'mortality impacts' or mercury poisoning there should be lots of smoking guns.

We Can and Have Solved Environmental and Safety Issues

There is lots of evidence that systematic approaches to solving environmental and safety issues work. Measured levels of air quality have shown huge improvements over the last 50 years in the US so that it no longer has 'mortality impacts'.

Air quality is poor for billions of poor because of cooking and heating using coal and biomass. Industrial societies show that air quality improves by electrification with affordable power if coal is the source.

Energy Safari: The Class, the Field Trip, the Blog

Energy Education at ILEAD

Dr. Robert Hargraves and I have both taught energy classes at Dartmouth ILEAD. He gave an amazing course in Rethinking Nuclear Power, and I gave a course on pollution control for coal, All Around the Coal Boiler. In both our courses, actually visiting a power plant was a very important part of the course. Seeing is believing. Seeing is understanding. There's only so much a teaching that can be done with PowerPoint.

This fall we are teaming up for a super-duper-once-in-a-lifetime (probably) course on all sorts of energy, including energy efficiency.

It is ......Energy Safari!

During this course, the group will visit most major types of power plants. We will visit a solar installation, the Lempster wind farm, a wood-fired plant, an LEED (efficient) building, a hydro plant, a nuclear plant, a coal plant and a combined-cycle gas turbine. Whew! That is a LOT of information about energy. Most people (including people in the power industry) never get to see so many types of power plants.

We are very lucky, and very grateful to our hosts:

• AllEarth Renewables (solar)
• Iberdola Renewables (wind)
• Springfield Power LLC (wood)
• Dartmouth College (efficiency)
• TransCanada (hydro)
• NextEnergy (nuclear, Seabrook Station)
• Public Service of New Hampshire (coal and wood)
• Granite Ridge Energy (combined cycle gas)

We will use David MacKay's book, Sustainable Energy Without the Hot Air, as our text. This book is available to read on-line or as a free download. You can also buy a more standard copy on Amazon.

The Blog

Hargraves has started a blog for Energy Safari, and we are also trying to get some media coverage. Getting media coverage may be hard, since most power plants will not allow photography on-site. This is such an unusual group of visits that we think they should be documented.

Visit the blog at Energy Safari. I will also post in this blog about our adventures.

Images from various sources on Wikipedia. Anthracite coal from the Wikipedia article on coal.The hydroelectric dam diagram originates from TVA. The gas turbine diagram is a GE gas turbine.

55th Carnival of Nuclear Energy Blogs

Today I am hosting the 55th Carnival of Nuclear Energy, bloggers look at the world, including Saudi Arabia, Germany, and what kind of Lessons Learned are possible at this point from Fukushima. It's truly a feast of information!

Germany and the Czech Republic

At Idaho Samzdat, Dan Yurman describes Germany's Nuclear Energy Panic Attack.

Shortly after the extent of the damage to reactors at Fukushima became apparent, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced she was reversing her policy of keeping the nation’s oldest reactors open beyond 2022. A deal put in place by her predecessor called for the eventual closure of all 17 reactors by that date.

There is no middle ground in the nuclear debate in Germany. Anti-nuclear sentiment in Germany runs high with polls showing as much as 70% of the population says "no thank you" to nuclear power.

Some sentiment among Green Party members calls for a reduction in Germany's industrial economy and a return to a life style of "off the grid" villages in natural ecosystems. Meanwhile, in the Czech Republic, the utility is moving ahead with its reactor projects, planning three to five new reactors. Perhaps Germans won't have to live "off the grid" after all. There's always "nuclear colonialism." If a neighbor country like the Czech Republic builds nuclear plants, there's nothing wrong with Germany buying the power, right? The map to the right shows a potential nuclear colony of Germany. Much more complete analysis in Yurman's post.

Fukushima Fuel Pools (Red Herrings)

In her blog post, Nuclear Power and the Witch Hunt, Margaret Harding shows that the spent fuel pools at Fukushima are a witch story. They didn’t burn, they did run out of water and caused problems for TEPCO, but we should not over-react in the need to “fix” a problem that isn’t there. There is risk that a fix could create other issues.

Harding's post includes a video of Unit 4 fuel pool, showing the pool intact, the fuel rods intact, the fuel racks intact, and debris in the water from the explosion at Unit 4. Harding is in touch with people in Japan who are figuring out what caused the explosion at that unit: clearly not the fuel pool. Harding notes that we may well have to rethink our fuel storage, but we should do it on the basis of facts, not witch hunts.

The NRC and Nuclear Power

In Nuclear Sanity and Nuclear Insanity, Will Davis of Atomic Power Review describes the evolution of nuclear thinking world-wide (Germany wants to shut down its nuclear plants, Saudi Arabia plans to build 16 nuclear plants) and in the United States. As he points out, we can expect 40 million tonnes more CO2 in the air each year if Germany closes down its nuclear plants. Davis describes the role that nuclear bloggers and others might take to change the NRC's position from insanity (we must PROVE we are doing EVERYTHING possible) to some level of sanity. His post is a call to action.

The Future of Energy in Europe and Arabia

In a series of posts at Next Big Future, Brian Wang describes Saudi Arabia building 16 nuclear reactors by 2030 and Lithuania building two. As usual, his well-referenced post is a pleasure to read.

Wang also notes that Desertec plans to build terrawatts of wind and solar power in North Africa. Desertec is a proposal to build terawatts of wind and solar power in North Africa, which is Libya, Algeria, Saudi Arabia and other countries. This proposal would be to spend $600 billion or more to build wind farms and solar farms in the same politically unstable area where OPEC is now to provide about 17% of europe power needs by 2050. About 110% of the current world nuclear power generation. (2,940 TWh per year). The detailed financial and technical proposal is due in 2012. So currently it is a back of napkin proposal and they hope to progress to vaporware in 2012, all for a bad idea for Europe to fund a solar and wind OPEC by 2050.

Wang describes the consequences to Switzerland and Germany if they phase out nuclear power. Electricity costs will go up and Germany will depend more on coal and fossil fuel.

In another post, Wang points out that instant-phase-out of nuclear power in Germany is running into some snags. German Utility Eon is taking action to recover tens of billions of dollars in lost revenue that will result from the German decision to shut down nuclear prematurely.

That's the trouble when governments take unilateral action without due process. They get sued. Happens in Vermont and it happens in Germany.

• Due Process: it's what makes governments into governments, not tyrants.
• Lawsuits: they are what keep governments from becoming tyrants.

All in all, this Carnival is perfect for a summer evening's reading!

Retrospective

The 54th Blog Carnival was hosted at Idaho Samizdat last week. It includes good news about thorium reactors, discussions about the NRC, and an analysis of passive cooling for small modular reactors. Worth reading! (I had serious internet connection problems last week and was not able to blog or even email, most of the week.)

Map of Czech Republic from Wikimedia.

Anthracite Coal Image from Wikipedia.

42nd Carnival of Nuclear Energy

The 42nd Carnival of Nuclear Energy is up at Next Big Future. Come and visit and have some fun!

This compendium of the best nuclear blogs shows that nuclear does not exist in a vacuum. There are other energy sources, too. (Of course, most of them aren't as good.)

In this Carnival:

• Gail Marcus of Nuclear Power Talk discusses the (supposed) subsidies for nuclear energy and the actual $4 a month charge proposed for Maryland ratepayers. This fee will support offshore wind farms.
• At ANS Nuclear Cafe, Ajax Eastman, a long-time environmentalist, sees her beloved Maryland ridges chopped and cut for wind turbines. She re-examines nuclear, and she decides she likes it.
• Charles Barton of Nuclear Green discusses the lack of due diligence in fossil fuel energy analysis.
• In a more hopeful look at fossil fuels, Brian Wang of Next Big Future describes improved particulate control for coal plants. This form of pollution control could save millions of lives each year.
• Dan Yurman of Idaho Samizdat shows that progress is being made on new plants in Texas and Virginia. It is clear that 2011 is shaping up to be a better year for American nuclear than 2010 was.
• At Yes Vermont Yankee, I count fish in the Connecticut River. There are more of them than you might think, if your source of information is Arnie Gundersen. (Arnie says the river has a total of 16 shad.)
• Rod Adams of Atomic Insights has some important ideas for improving the licensing process for the new generation of nuclear plants. Wind and solar have intrinsic limitations, but nuclear has man-made obstacles.

Overall, this 42nd Carnival provides great perspective on the world's energy options. All that, and cotton candy too! Come visit!