The Navy announced, Tuesday, plans to study the effects of radioactive water on its operations in an apparent countermeasure against Japan’s alleged plan to dump the contaminated water from its Fukushima nuclear plant into the ocean.
While many domestic and international environment groups have studied the possible water release by Japan, this is the first time that the Korean military has decided to investigate the issue, although it remains cautious about specifying Japan is the target country for the study.
According to a notice posted on the government’s procurement system site, the Navy plans to commission research into the potential impact of radioactive water within its operational areas on its maritime operations and ways to stably carry out missions.
The Navy said the 30 million-won ($24,000) research project is scheduled to run until Nov. 30.
“We recognize the growing possibility of radiation-contaminated water being released into our operational areas, and international environmental organizations have warned that if a neighboring country dumps radioactive water into the ocean, it would reach the East Sea within a year,” a Navy officer said.
OAK RIDGE, Tenn., May 11, 2020 — Researchers at the Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory are refining their design of a 3D-printed nuclear reactor core, scaling up the additive manufacturing process necessary to build it, and developing methods to confirm the consistency and reliability of its printed components.
The Transformational Challenge ReactorDemonstration Program’sunprecedented approach to nuclear energy leverages advances from ORNL in manufacturing, materials, nuclear science, nuclear engineering, high-performance computing, data analytics and related fields.
The lab aims to turn on the first-of-its-kind reactor by 2023. The program has maintained its aggressive timeline during the COVID-19 pandemic, using remote work to continue design and analysis efforts. [TCR video]
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As part of deploying a 3D-printed nuclear reactor, the program will also create a digital platform that will help in handing off the technology to industry for rapid adoption of additively manufactured nuclear energy technology.
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Through the TCR program, ORNL is seeking a solution to a troubling trend. Although nuclear power plants provide nearly 20 percent of U.S. electricity, more than half of U.S. reactors will be retired within 20 years, based on current license expiration dates.
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The Transformational Challenge Reactorbuilds on ORNL’s 77-year history of international leadership in nuclear science and technology development. The lab began as home to the world’s first continuously operating reactor, and its scientists and engineers pioneered technology and expertise in the first decades of the Atomic Age.
Today, the lab operates the High Flux Isotope Reactor, a DOE Office of Science user facility that provides a world-leading source of neutrons for a variety of research and produces isotopes for medicine, industry, and space exploration. TCR will be the 14th reactor built and operated by ORNL.
Despite strong public opposition to the proposal, the Environment Ministry will soon start a trial demonstration to confirm the safety of growing food crops in soil decontaminated following the 2011 nuclear accident.
The ministry received nearly 3,000 public comments about its proposal to revise an ordinance to enable the soil to be reused across Japan, most of which opposed the proposal.
Many people are opposed to reusing the soil, saying, “It will spread contamination.”
At a news conference on May 1, Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi acknowledged, “I strongly recognize the fact that there are people who are opposing (the reuse of decontaminated soil). We will provide detailed explanations to seek understanding for our willingness to take a step forward even if it’s just a small one.”
The project, to start by the end of May at the earliest, will be conducted in the Nagadoro district in Iitate, Fukushima Prefecture. The district is designated as a “difficult-to-return” zone, where radiation levels remain high since the triple meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant following the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.
The ministry is seeking to reuse decontaminated soil for public construction work and farmland development if the radiation level of the soil is below certain standards. In the last fiscal year, which ended in March, flowers and crops used to make solid fuel for biomass power generation were grown on land using the decontaminated soil.
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In the Nagadoro district, there is a demonstration plot of farmland that spans about 600 square meters in total. The land comprises an 800-cubic-meter embankment of soil whose radiation level is 5,000 becquerels or lower per kilogram, and the embankment is covered with uncontaminated soil that is 50 centimeters thick.
Decontaminated soil is currently stored at interim storage facilities in Okuma and Futaba in Fukushima Prefecture. The law stipulates that the final disposal of the soil should be conducted outside the prefecture within 30 years from 2015, when the facilities began storing the soil.
The total amount of soil stored at such facilities is expected to reach about 14 million cubic meters, equivalent to 11 Tokyo Domes, located in Tokyo’s Bunkyo Ward.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission keen to allow material to be disposed of by ‘land burial’ – with potentially damaging effects
he federal agency providing oversight of the commercial nuclear sector is attempting to push through a rule change critics say could allow dangerous amounts of radioactive material to be disposed of in places like municipal landfills, with potentially serious consequences to human health and the environment.
“This would be the most massive deregulation of radioactive waste in American history,” said Dan Hirsch, president of the Committee to Bridge the Gap, a nuclear industry watchdog non-profit, about a proposal that would permit “very low-level” radioactive waste to be disposed of by “land burial”.
Currently, low-level radioactive waste is primarily disposed of in highly regulated sites in Texas, Washington, South Carolina and Utah. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) also provides exemptions allowing “low-level waste” to be dumped in unlicensed disposal sites, but these exemptions are given only rarely, and are conducted with strict case-by-case protocols in place.
The proposed “interpretive” rule change relaxes the rules surrounding how radioactive materials would be disposed of in unlicensed disposal sites “significantly”, said Hirsch.
“If you dump radioactive waste in places that aren’t designed to deal with it, it comes back to haunt you. It’s in the air you breathe, the food that you eat, the water you drink,” he added.
In an email, David McIntyre, an NRC spokesperson, explained that the rule would apply only to a “small subset” of very low-level waste, and that the agency would not allow such disposals “if we felt public health and safety and the environment would not be protected”.
But major sticking point, say experts, concerns how the term “very low-level waste” is not defined by statute or in the NRC’s own regulations.
The NRC describes low-level wastes as contaminated materials like clothing, tools, and medical equipment. According to McIntyre, the radioactivity of “very low-level waste” is just above background. “The radioactivity level of very low-level waste is so low that it may be safely disposed of in hazardous or municipal solid waste landfills,” he wrote.
Nevertheless, “background doesn’t mean it’s safe,” said Diane D’Arrigo, radioactive waste project director for the Nuclear Information and Resource Service, who added that the interpretive rule’s loose language “opens the floodgates” for nuclear waste to be disposed of “as if not radioactive”.
The proposal caps the maximum annual “cumulative dose” to a person from the radioactive wastes dumped into unlicensed sites to 25 millirems – the same limit the NRC uses for highly regulated waste disposal sites. That measurement, said D’Arrigo, is a “projected” amount that can be manipulated through modeling.
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Some environmentalists fear the rule change will also disproportionately impact low-income, marginalized communities who are more likely than their wealthier neighbors to be situated near solid waste landfills.
According to Caroline Reiser, nuclear energy legal fellow with the Natural Resources Defense Council, if the proposal is successfully passed, then the issue could end up in court.
“Once it starts getting implemented, that’s when the real fights end up happening,” she said.
Many people are opposed to reusing the soil, saying, “It will spread contamination.”
At a news conference on May 1, Environment Minister Shinjiro Koizumi acknowledged, “I strongly recognize the fact that there are people who are opposing (the reuse of decontaminated soil). We will provide detailed explanations to seek understanding for our willingness to take a step forward even if it’s just a small one.”
The project, to start by the end of May at the earliest, will be conducted in the Nagadoro district in Iitate, Fukushima Prefecture. The district is designated as a “difficult-to-return” zone, where radiation levels remain high since the triple meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant following the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.
The ministry is seeking to reuse decontaminated soil for public construction work and farmland development if the radiation level of the soil is below certain standards. In the last fiscal year, which ended in March, flowers and crops used to make solid fuel for biomass power generation were grown on land using the decontaminated soil.
The ministry initially planned to revise a related ordinance in April to enable the soil to be reused, saying it obtained “results that showed the soil was safe enough (to be used for growing crops).”
However, the ministry decided to postpone the revision after hearing requests from local residents who want to grow food crops as well. The ministry must check the safety of the soil once again since such crops will be intended for human consumption. The ministry will grow vegetables including tomatoes and cucumbers during the test project.
In the Nagadoro district, there is a demonstration plot of farmland that spans about 600 square meters in total. The land comprises an 800-cubic-meter embankment of soil whose radiation level is 5,000 becquerels or lower per kilogram, and the embankment is covered with uncontaminated soil that is 50 centimeters thick.
Decontaminated soil is currently stored at interim storage facilities in Okuma and Futaba in Fukushima Prefecture. The law stipulates that the final disposal of the soil should be conducted outside the prefecture within 30 years from 2015, when the facilities began storing the soil.
The total amount of soil stored at such facilities is expected to reach about 14 million cubic meters, equivalent to 11 Tokyo Domes, located in Tokyo’s Bunkyo Ward. The ministry is considering reusing the soil to reduce the amount of soil that needs to be disposed of.
However, perhaps the most worrying parallel between these crises is the way political leaders have stumbled into the same communication and policy missteps as their predecessors. Understanding the connection between the mistakes made a decade ago and the errors being made now might help Japan avoid repeating the missed opportunities of 2011.
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Part of the reason for this delay may have been the administration’s belief that cancelling the Games unilaterally could result in financial liabilities, due to the IOC contract. However, the government’s first concern should clearly be the health and welfare of citizens, and this prioritization was not reflected in official statements, such as when Abe’s told President Trump that even delaying the Games was “not a subject at all.” Even after this, it took weeks of pressure from prefectural-level leaders and public health officials before the government announced preparations to declare a state of emergency. Given this sluggish response, it is not surprising that crowds continued to flock to urban districts in the Kanto region even as Tokyo recorded nearly 150 new cases of COVID-19 in a single day.
While we still do not know how far the pandemic will spread in Japan, one would have thought that the experience of the meltdowns at Fukushima would have taught the country’s leadership to avoid these kinds of overly optimistic statements, which might save face in the short run but risk breaking trust with the public in the long run.
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In 2011, one of the decisions that prevented the situation at Fukushima from spiraling even further out of control was plant chief Yoshida Masao’s refusal of a direct order from a TEPCO official working inside the prime minister’s office in Tokyo to stop pumping seawater into one of the damaged reactors. Although Yoshida’s actions were lauded, such an intervention should not rely on such an act of heroic defiance. Instead, experts, especially those with local knowledge of the situation, should be empowered.
Emily Gosden, Energy Editor, 5 May 2020, The Times
More than £50 million could be paid to EDF to reduce power output from Britain’s largest nuclear reactor and avert the risk of blackouts this summer.
National Grid is negotiating with the French energy group to halve generation from Sizewell B in Suffolk as part of a series of measures to help it to keep the lights on.
The lockdown has caused a drop in electricity demand that is making it much harder for National Grid to manage the system and threatens to overwhelm the network with surplus power. The company has warned of a “significant risk of disruption to security of supply” over the Bank Holiday weekend unless it is granted emergency powers to disconnect excess solar and wind farms.
Last night National Grid was understood to be finalising the contract with EDF as a further measure to shore up the system before Friday, in case sunny weather brings record low demand. The costs will ultimately feed through to consumer energy bills.
National Grid has to keep supply and demand balanced in real time to prevent blackouts, such as that of August 9 last year, when a million homes were cut off. It needs to have certain types of flexible power plants running, such as gas plants and some wind farms, that can adjust their output at short notice in a way that Sizewell can not. When demand is very low, it may be impossible to have these plants running as well as Sizewell without ending up with too much power. Second, Sizewell’s reactor is the largest single generation unit in Britain, producing enough power for more than two million homes. If it failed it could cause a huge imbalance in supply and demand and a dangerous drop in frequency that could trigger other plants to fail. This happened after the failures of two other power stations last August.
