The Tenth Anniversary and Conspiracy Theories

The tenth year anniversary of that grim day. This week's New Yorker cover says so much: Reflection.

September is the month of reflection. It contains September 11. It holds the beginning of the High Holy Days. On a personal note, September is our anniversary month, and our son's birthday month. September gives me many opportunities to reflect.

Like the reflections of the New Yorker cover, the Towers are in my heart.

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,

Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit

Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,

Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it.

What did I learn from 9/11? Things I learned, and that I manage to forget all the time.

• To be grateful for life.
• That some people are brave and disciplined, and willing to give up their lives for others (firemen and other first responders are people like this, and there are others).
• That hating whole groups of people is a worthless attitude.
• That being open to people is a worthwhile attitude.
• That not everyone loves us. Defense against enemies is a real-world requirement.
• That helping others is a real-world requirement.

The Enemies We Are Comfortable With

I see bumper stickers frequently: "9/11 was an inside job!" I think this is a very comforting belief for some people. With this belief, they don't have to learn how to live in a complex world where people have enemies as well as the requirement to be helpful to people. Once the conspiracy theorists have eliminated the idea that real enemies from another country did this, they can go right back to business-as-usual. They need only acknowledge the enemies they are comfortable with: business owners, the CIA, right-wing politicians, whatever. It's a little cocoon of beliefs, and the difficulties of the real world don't penetrate.

In a similar manner, we have some women around here who like to get arrested at Vermont Yankee. A letter in True North Reports describes these women's activities during the flooding. I recommend reading the letter.

On Tuesday August 30, first responders were busy with scenes like this in nearby Brattleboro, or scenes like this fly-over, further north in Rutland. On August 30, these women marched into Vermont Yankee, chained a gate, and refused to unlock it or go away peacefully. Several policemen had to take time from rescuing people to cut the chain and arrest the women. These women had their comfortable enemies and their comfortable activities, and the suffering of other people during the storm didn't appear to matter to them.

I think they have a mindset similar to that of conspiracy theory people. Conspiracy theorists tend to look down on the rest of us as as "not understanding" reality, "being fooled" by conspiracies. I think they cannot bend their minds and emotions to living in a complex world that contains enemies and floods and heroism and the requirement to be kind. By indulging in conspiracy theories, they feel they can choose their enemies, and they stay in their comfort zone.

Today is a Day to Acknowledge Reality

I think that today is a day to acknowledge reality, not conspiracies. To understand that reality includes enemies, enemies not picked-and-chosen. Reality includes huge, deep sadness. Huge. As big as the hole at Ground Zero, and bigger. For me, reality includes the memory of the pervasive smell of decay and smouldering fires that lingered in New York for weeks.

Huge, deep sadness.

First responders saved many lives in Vermont. First responders died trying to save lives in New York.

In a small return for the suffering, reality also gives us heroes.

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Verse from the Rubaiyiat of Omar Khayyam

Handcuff image from Wikipedia

New Yorker cover from New Yorker website. This is a web story about ten years of New Yorker covers on September 11, and well worth reviewing.

69th Carnival of Nuclear Energy Bloggers at Atomic Power Review

The 69th Carnival of Nuclear Bloggers is up at Atomic Power Review (APR). Once again, Will Davis starts with a graphic from nuclear energy history: "guess what this is." I have to admit..I pretty much knew this one. Except that I didn't. I didn't understand why it was special. Oh well, read the Carnival yourself to find out

The Blog posts in the Carnival are terrific. Brain Wang, at Next Big Future, reviews a Japanese report on post-Fukushima nuclear economics. Even assuming a clean-up cost of over a hundred billion dollars, the cost of nuclear electricity in Japan is completely competitive with other sources of power. Meanwhile, something completely different: Gail Marcus at Nuke Power Talk describes one of the oldest uses for uranium: orange and yellow ceramic glazes. It's fun to read her post, and brought back my days studying geochemistry in grad school. The people in my lab studied minerals and geochemistry, and often published in the Journal of the American Ceramic Society. Ceramics and rocks are pretty much the same thing, not even two sides of the same coin.

In other blog posts, Rod Adams of Atomic Insights points out that instead of calling wind and solar energy intermittent (which sounds like a windshield wiper) they might be better called uncontrollable or unreliable. Dan Yurman of Idaho Samizdat describes China's post-Fukushima nuclear program, which is slower than its pre-Fukushima program, but still a very impressive set of builds. Margaret Harding of 4 Factor Consulting talks about the demographics of the workforce in nuclear energy (too many oldsters, not enough 40-year-olds), and Stephen Aplin of Canadian Energy Issues discusses how the Darlington Reactor has become a political campaign issue. ANS Nuclear Cafe featured Rod Adams again, this time describing the new Center for Advanced Engineering Research in Virginia. The center is part of a community that welcomes science and nuclear energy. Gosh, that sounds nice. No, it sounds wonderful. Actually, it sounds like a dream come true. Of course, I live in Vermont...

The Carnival also includes my post on cancelled festivals and broken windows, and Will Davis post at APR on the story of the Elk River Power Reactor. The Elk River post is part of a new series: APR Atomic Journal, including technical and historical pieces about nuclear energy.

Come to the Carnival! Fun! Upbeat blog posts! Solid technical nourishment! Everyone is welcome!

Carousel image from Wikipedia

Broken Windows, Ruined Roads, the Glory Days of the Railroad, and Nuclear Decommissioning

The Seen and the Unseen

The Broken Window Fallacy says that destroying something (breaking a window), and then fixing it (hiring a glazier), stimulates the economy. The broken window fallacy was first described by the French economist Bastiat in 1850.

In the broken window story, a hooligan breaks the baker's window. The baker then pays a glazier to fix his window. However, this does not stimulate the economy. If the baker didn't have to pay for fixing his window, he might have bought something else (a new suit from the tailor) with the money.

The point of the broken window fallacy is that we can see what we get after the window is broken. We see the glazier getting paid.

However, we can't see what we don't get. We can't see the the tailor not being paid.

Irene's Broken Window in Hartford Township

There has been a lot of destruction of roads and property in my township. Irene broke the windows, for sure. However, it is a small town, the money has to come from somewhere, and this article in the Valley News describes the "unseen." The article describes some of the things my town had hoped to do, but will not be doing in the near future, because we have to fix the roads.

The town has decided to:

• cancel the Glory Days of the Railroad Festival this Saturday, because there is too much clean-up to be done
• cancel or postpone a bond to fix up the ice rink
• cancel or postpone a bond to fix up the town hall, a drafty and energy-inefficient Victorian edifice

After Irene, the town will see people employed on the roads, but people will not be employed to improve the municipal building or ice rink. What we don't get is visible in this case. We won't have a festival, we won't have a good ice rink, we won't have insulation in the municipal building. We will get the roads fixed, but we will be poorer (less fun, no improved town infrastructure) due to Irene's broken windows.

The "unseen" is visible in my township, and it isn't pretty.

Nuclear Decommissioning

In recent weeks, I wrote two articles on the jobs effect of nuclear decommissioning. Governor Shumlin repeatedly states that decommissioning Vermont Yankee will be a great jobs bonus and economic stimulus for the southern part of Vermont. He claimed that "several hundred" plant workers would continue to be employed for "five to six years." The Governor also said that decommissioning would "fuel the economy" of southern Vermont by a billion dollars over ten years.

Who is the Glazier in Decommissioning?

Decommissioning a working power plant is like throwing a brick through a window. It doesn't take many highly skilled people (compared to running the plant). It doesn't take much money (compared to running the plant).

The "glazier repair bill" isn't the actual decommissioning costs, though they may be part of the bill. (It depends on how you look at it.) The true repair bill is

• the cost of either new power plants (which will be needed eventually, but this is twenty years too early)
• and/or the higher cost of power bought from out of state.

Out of state power is far more likely: we are already buying nuclear power from Seabrook. New power plants and transmission lines in Vermont usually attract fierce opposition. I think we will buy from out of state. Governor Shumlin practically commutes to Canada, setting up new power deals.

Vermont will spend our money on out-of-state glaziers. We will see the money be spent, money that could have "fueled" the Windham County economy for twenty more years. What we would have spent the money for, here in Vermont...that will be unseen.

Related Information

In a recent post, I described the broken window fallacy in terms of the possible job stimulus of Hurricane Irene's destruction, or of decommissioning a nuclear plant. In both cases, destruction is not a job stimulus.

I also have two articles on decommissioning. My first article, Decommissioning Vermont Yankee: the Governor vs. The Facts, appeared in True North Reports on August 14. This showed that 80% of the plant employees would be laid off within six months to two years.

My second article was posted yesterday: Will Decommissioning Vermont Yankee Funnel a Billion Dollars into the Vermont Economy? The answer is "no." In a ten-year period, about $200 million can be expected in salaries for contract workers decommissioning the plant. If the plant is running, in ten years, $650 million in salaries are earned by plant employees. In other words, plant-related employment would drop by about two-thirds. Scarcely an economic boom!

Zion plant from Wikipedia

Rally in Support of Nuclear Power and Vermont Yankee

Rally in Support of Nuclear Power

For Immediate Release:

Contact Meredith Angwin

Meredith@ethanallen.org

802-291-9172

Early in the morning of September 12, local supporters of nuclear energy will rally near the Brattleboro Courthouse to show support for continued operation of Vermont Yankee power plant. At 9 a.m. that morning, hearings will begin in Federal Court on the lawsuit between the State of Vermont and Entergy. Among other things, Entergy contends that Vermont has attempted to regulate the radiological safety of Vermont Yankee, in direct defiance of federal law.

A group of people supporting nuclear power will be near the Courthouse that morning. The group includes members of the Ethan Allen Institute Energy Education Project, the American Nuclear Society Vermont Pilot Project, and the Coalition for Energy Solutions. We will be there to support continued operation of Vermont Yankee power plant, a plant that produces one-third of Vermont’s electricity with virtually no emissions. Many of the members of our group have advanced degrees in engineering, chemistry and physics. We will be happy to answer questions about nuclear energy. However, we are not there to argue with dedicated nuclear opponents. We will avoid confrontations and name-calling, which are both unfortunate tactics of some plant opponents.

This rally is not planned by Entergy or sponsored by Entergy. However, any Entergy employees who decide to join us are very welcome.

Participants will include:

• Meredith Angwin, director of the Energy Education Project of the Ethan Allen Institute
• Dr. Robert Hargraves, energy educator at Dartmouth ILEAD and advanced reactor specialist
• Willem Post, well-known energy commentator on The Energy Collective: conservation advocate and wind critic
• Richard Schmidt, nuclear engineer and advocate for small-scale solar

All these people will be available for on-site interviews.

http://www.energyeai.org/

http://www.coalitionforenergysolutions.org/

http://ansnuclearcafe.org/2011/08/08/old-tactics-new-approaches/

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This is a press release I sent to friends and to Vermont media yesterday. I look forward to seeing people at the rally!

I am trying to get a headcount. If you are coming to the rally, I would appreciate an email. Also, I can tell you a little more about our plans in a return email. Meredith@ethanallen.org

Nuclear opponents have all sorts of rallies: it is about time that pro-nuclear people had some!

Also, a big thanks to Rick Maltese at Deregulate the Atom, for posting the press release at his website.

Map from United States District Court website As usual, click to see a larger image.

The Broken Window Fallacy, the Hurricane, and Decomissioning Nuclear Plants

Vermont and the Hurricane

Many towns in Vermont will take a long time to recover from Hurricane Irene. My family and my home are fine, but I live in Windsor County. Here's Vermont Digger's article about Windsor County: Stately Windsor Country Towns Wracked by Irene. That news is several days old, and several of the towns now have power back, but it gives you an idea of what has happened.

Decommissioning

If the hurricane wasn't enough to depress me, I was also working on my second article about decommissioning.

My first article on the subject has been published at True North Reports: Decommissioning Vermont Yankee, the Governor vs. the Facts. Governor Shumlin had said that decommissioning Vermont Yankee would be a huge jobs bonanza for southern Vermont. In my article, I showed that the workers at Vermont Yankee would mostly laid off within six months to two years of plant shutdown. Shumlin had said hundreds of plant workers would still have jobs for many years.

This week, I worked on a second article to answer the following question: Though the plant people will be laid off, will contract hiring be a real job burst?

I finished the article, and it will be posted at True North Reports next week.

I won't keep you in suspense. The answer is "no." There won't be tons of new hires, and decommissioning will not be a jobs bonanza.

Trying to Find the Correct Question

As I was writing the article, I felt that something was missing. The amount of money that would be spent on decommissioning wasn't the biggest issue. Decommissioning the plant is destroying something. Even if if the process provides jobs (and it provides very few), I felt there was something wrong.

Then, in my local paper, I saw a Tony Auth cartoon about the hurricane. The cartoon shows a flooded house, with a tree down on top of it, and several workers near it. The workers are wading through water toward the house, and one says to another: "Finally, a second stimulus."

I realized what the problem had been about my decommissioning research. "Jobs from decommissioning" is just the Broken Window Fallacy in a new guise.

Destruction is not a stimulus.

The Broken Window Fallacy

The Broken Window Fallacy is the idea that if something is destroyed, rebuilding it stimulates the economy. This is not true, which is why it's a fallacy. As the video below illustrates, after the money has been spent for rebuilding, you are merely back to square one. No real value has been added.

Similarly, decommissioning a power plant takes away the plant's ability to create something valuable (electricity) and returns the land to being a pasture. We have plenty of pastures in Vermont. A new pasture won't add much, but taking away our one major power plant will subtract a lot.

Looking at the "jobs created" during decommissioning is like being happy that the stone hit the window in the video. As the video says: "If throwing the stone through the window is a stimulus, why not go further? Why not burn down the town?"

Hurricane Irene has done huge amounts of damage to Vermont. The state will test the Broken Window Fallacy with the destruction caused by the storm. Will this destruction be a jobs stimulus? (My own answer is "no.") Vermont doesn't have to do even more damage to itself by shutting down our major power plant.

photo of Irene in North Carolina from Wikipedia

End Note: This video ends with the idea that any money that the government spends hurts the economy. This is an oversimplification at best. I wish the video had not ventured into tax policy, but just made the one point that is the heart of the Broken Window Fallacy: Destruction does not stimulate the economy.

68th Carnival of Nuclear Energy Bloggers at Deregulate the Atom

The 68th Carnival of Nuclear Energy Bloggers is up at Deregulate the Atom, Rick Maltese's blog. Maltese is hosting the Carnival for the first time, and he has ranged far and wide to get the best blogs into this Carnival.

Maltese starts the Carnival off with Richard Schmidt's guest post on Yes Vermont Yankee. Great way to start, Rick!

The Carnival includes posts by Margaret Harding on industry economics, a movie about Shoreham at Rod Adams blog, Dan Yurman debunking Markey about Hurricane Irene (go Dan!), John Bickel pointing out that, no, we didn't "almost lose" North Anna. Steve Aplin looks at Obama, jobs and smog: Obama says yes to jobs-and-smog, while there is a way to have jobs without smog. Gail Marcus discusses Japan and transparency, comparing the way the U.S. NRC responded to TMI with the way the Japanese handled Fukushima. Charles Barton sails into nuclear proliferation, and makes a strong case that today's concerns will change drastically by mid-century. He also follows the Chinese and Indian situation, particularly with an intriguing post on Indian Deproliferation and Thorium Fuel.

And there's more! There's more! Actually, there's too much to list. Leaving out some excellent posts, I need to recommend Maltese's own post: F.E.A.R. (Fukushima Emits Acceptable Radiation) which he modestly puts at the end of the list. Maltese's post is a thoughtful comment on Mark Lynas's recent essay: How Dangerous is the Fukushima Exclusion Zone.

Visit the Carnival! Bigger and better than ever!

What is the Real Impact? Richard Schmidt on Strontium, Mercury and Potassium in Fish

This opinion piece by Richard Schmidt ran as an editorial in the Brattleboro Reformer on August 26, 2011. Mr. Schmidt was kind enough to allow me to post it on my blog.

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Recently, the Vermont Department of Health (DOH) received a routine test report on one fish that was caught in the Connecticut River nine miles upstream from Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant in Vernon. The edible portion of this fish contained a very low but surprising level of radioactive strontium-90.

The DOH regularly monitors the environment for many such "radionuclides" to detect possible leakage from Yankee. This analysis of fish is part of that program.

Strontium-90 is a fission product that has spread throughout our environment predominately from pre-1964 nuclear bomb atmospheric testing, and is dissipating slowly with a 29 year half-life. Because strontium-90 is "hard to detect" and was detected in only one sample of fish flesh, a scientist will term such a result to be an "outlier." It lies outside of the norm. This subjects the sample and test process to scrutiny, and the result is held until further review. This is exactly what DOH has done by calling for more fish samples.

DOH said that they cannot associate low levels of strontium-90 with Yankee without supporting evidence. The DOH website also states that the result is "within the range of background strontium-90 in edible portions of fish reported in a 1971 study," prior to Yankee's startup.

Also, according to U.S. Department of Health "strontium-90 is a fairly constant part of the U.S. diet," and New York State has found similar strontium-90 levels in fish.

By taking more samples, DOH is doing a professional job and maintaining a scientific perspective on the matter.

But in a press conference found on YouTube, Governor Peter Shumlin blew this matter out of perspective when he called the strontium-90 level "high," attributed it to Yankee, and said that he would not eat fish from the river, although he did so as a boy.

He said this despite contrary information from his health department, and despite unwarranted damage to tourism. It appeared that his only purpose was to discredit Yankee.

Strontium and Mercury

This brings up two questions. The first is about strontium-90 levels over time. According to the DOH and other sources, the strontium-90 levels in fish that Gov. Shumlin ate as a boy were up to 20 times greater than the levels in this fish because radioactive decay and dispersion have since reduced the radioactivity.

The more significant question is about highly toxic mercury in our fish. Mercury in our environment is primarily due to coal-burning power plants, as coal contains mercury that is released from coal plant stacks.

Vermont and New Hampshire and most states issue advisories to limit the eating of locally caught fish due to mercury. For example, the N.H. Fish and Game Department warns against eating more than four wild-fish meals per month, restricted further to one meal per month for children and pregnant women. Children and the unborn are particularly sensitive to this neurotoxin. There is no direct connection between mercury and Yankee because the plant releases none. But if Yankee is shut down, its power will be largely replaced by low-cost coal power.

Unfortunately for us, most coal plants are to the west of us; New York has 48. The prevailing winds will carry more mercury, cadmium, arsenic, particulates and other pollutants to our environment, to the detriment of our health.

The Environmental Protection Agency wants stronger pollution controls on coal plants. It estimates such controls would reduce deaths in the U.S. by 17,000 per year and reduce related illnesses.

Radioactivity in Fish

Before making public statements about the fish, the governor should have asked "Is this strontium-90 significant?"

Let's compare the fish's strontium-90 radioactivity to the natural radioactivity that we ingest with fish and other foods, which contain the essential nutrient potassium and its inseparable radioactive isotope potassium-40.

A person eating the DOH fish sample would ingest about 2 percent of the radioactivity (6 percent of the radiation risk) from the strontium-90 relative to the natural potassium-40 in the same fish. Interestingly, natural potassium-40 makes our bodies about as radioactive as that fish in the news.

What is the Real Impact?

In truth, neither the strontium nor the potassium are significant hazards at all.

The question "Is this material significant to my health?" was completely lacking in this case. The real health impact of Gov. Shumlin's statements is to encourage the burning of more coal and the continued mercury pollution of our fish, our bodies, and our biosphere.

Richard Schmidt is a chemical and nuclear engineer and energy consultant who is not associated with Vermont Yankee. He lives in Westmoreland, N.H.

Fish shield image is the coat of arms of Narva, Estonia.

Mercury image from Wikipedia.

The Shumlin press conference video is also on one of my earlier blog posts.