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Solar and Wind Now Half the Cost of Nuclear

Nukewatch Quarterly Winter 2015-2016

Columnist Emily Schwartz Greco, the Managing Editor of OtherWords, a non-profit national editorial service run by the Institute for Policy Studies, has penned a scathing critique of nuclear power and its future prospects, particularly in view of the plumetting costs of solar and wind power. Titled, “A Big Fat Radioactive Lie: Billionaires are Hyping Nuclear Power as a Magic Cure for Climate Change,” Greco notes some encouraging news.

Lazard, a giant investment banking firm with offices in 43 cities in 27 countries—and $180 billion under management—says in a lengthy new report about today’s principle energy options: Utility-scale “wind and solar are much cheaper than gas and coal, and less than half the cost of nuclear.”

Source: OtherWords, Institute for Policy Studies, Dec. 2, 2015

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Sierra Club Not Fooled by Pro-Nuclear Lobby

Nukewatch Quarterly Winter 2015-2016

Known more for its steadfast work against Big Coal and Big Oil, the Sierra Club has long been critical of nuclear power and is not hoodwinked by industry propaganda about climate-safe “clean” reactors. The Club had this to say in a recent position paper: 

“Nuclear power produces less CO2 than fossil alternatives, but more [CO2] than energy efficiency and most forms of renewable energy on a life cycle basis. Nuclear power is not safe, affordable, or clean with currently available technology and practice. Mining uranium risks workers’ health and creates toxic residues. All current [reactor] designs are complex, prone to accidents and have severe security vulnerabilities. Nuclear waste transportation, storage and disposal problems remain unsolved. The industry is heavily subsidized by public subsidies, incentives and liability shielding everywhere it operates, dependencies that dramatically increased in recent federal legislation. The nuclear fuel cycle increases weapons proliferation and risk among nations and non-state entities.

“The Sierra Club will continue to oppose nuclear power unless these deficiencies are eliminated. While it is possible that a different approach to nuclear power might substantially address these issues, the likelihood is remote given the decades of research and investment already made. Clean energy resources are sufficient to address climate change and are cheaper than nuclear power. In addition, the huge investment to bring additional nuclear facilities online would siphon capital from much more cost-effective uses of financial resources, especially investments in efficiency.

“Existing nuclear plants should be frequently inspected and thoroughly monitored. They should be retired upon the expiration of their licensed operating period, and should be shut down immediately if significant safety, security or environmental threats are found. It is imperative for spent fuel from operating nuclear plants to be moved into safer temporary storage and for an effective long-term storage strategy to be developed as quickly as possible.”

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US Radiation Monitoring System Fails, is Turned Off

Nukewatch Quarterly Winter 2015-2016

That radical anti-nuclear rag the Wall Street Journal has revealed that nearly three-quarters of the United States’ radiation-monitoring stations have been turned off “because they don’t work.”

Operated by the US Environmental Protection Agency, 99 out of 135 monitors built to measure beta particles have failed and have been turned off, including those in New York City, Chicago, and Los Angeles. The EPA has blamed interference from cellphone towers and other stray electromagnetism for the failure of the monitors. The EPA said it did not know why some of the beta radiation monitors were still working, including those near Phoenix, Dallas, Pittsburgh, and Washington, DC.

The same stations have RadNet gamma-radiation monitors, that the EPA said are not hindered by the interference. Since “almost all” radioactive substances that give off beta radiation also emit gamma radiation, the EPA said it could just rely on the gamma detectors.

Quoting unnamed nuclear experts, the Journal warned that, “In instances where only a beta [radiation] emitter is present, the lack of a working monitor could leave officials unaware of potentially dangerous levels of contamination.”

Strontium-90, one of the principle and most dangerous radionuclides spewed from reactor melt-down disasters, is one of the substances that emits only beta radiation. Nevertheless, John Griggs, Director of the EPA’s National Analytical Radiation Environmental Lab, told the Journal, “Not having the beta monitor is absolutely not a concern of ours.” However a 2012 EPA report concluded that gamma monitoring could not account for strontium-90 contamination, which could “cause large-scale public health impacts.”

Critics of federal radiation-protection programs warned that being able to specifically and quickly record the dispersal of strontium-90 would influence the nature and extent of evacuation and emergency response plans.

Radioactive substances that emit gamma and beta radiation are carried long distances by the wind in cases of major nuclear disasters, as occurred at Kyshtym, Russia in 1957, Windscale, England in 1957, Three Mile Island, Penn. in 1979, Chernobyl, Ukraine in 1986, and Fukushima, Japan in 2011.

Gamma ray-emitting materials are dangerous from hundreds of feet away, and gamma radiation penetrates concrete, steel, and bone. Beta particles normally move only several feet from their source but can penetrate the skin. As with alpha particles, the most dangerous exposure to beta radiation is internal, after it is inhaled or ingested in contaminated food or water.

Even in the face of the Journal’s revelation of broad failure of the monitoring system, the EPA’s director of radiation protection division said, “We can confidently say that this system is…fully operational now with the current monitors it has to detect fairly minute levels of radiation.”

A separate 2012 report by the EPA noted that 25 of its RadNet monitors were out of operation at the time of the Fukushima disaster, and were not providing any information on either gamma or beta radiation.

This 2012 admission by the EPA calls into question the oft-repeated assertion by it and other federal, state and logal officials that radiation reaching the United States from Fukushima was not a public health threat.

—JL

Source: Wall Street Journal, Oct. 19, 2015

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Energy Transition Law Ends France’s Nuclear Renaissance 

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2015
By Kelly Lundeen

Nuclear power is on the decline—evidence is everywhere. A contributing analyst for Energy Investor, Jeff Siegel, wrote in a July article, “I changed my mind…. nuclear can’t cut it.” Sweden, which derives 42 percent of its electricity from nuclear, is closing four out of ten reactors due to the burdensome cost of nuclear energy. Now the financial crisis of France’s nuclear power industry has forced the country to announce an unprecedented Energy Transition Law that will reduce the share of nuclear energy from 75 percent to 50 percent of its total portfolio in less than ten years. This follows on the heels of a report released in June by the French Agency for Environment and Energy Management demonstrating how France could reach 100 percent renewable energy by 2050.

While France has aspired to fuel the nuclear renaissance, economic woes have plagued the industry. The large French nuclear power company Areva recently entered bankruptcy after a loss of $7.37 billion over four years and had to be taken over by the government-run EDF. Yet EDF is having financial troubles of its own, with a $38 billion debt and a negative cash flow. Amidst a throng of reactor construction contracts going over budget and running years behind schedule, along with the discovery of a major design flaw, the company had to abandon several projects. Since our last Quarterly, Areva’s reactor licenses for Calvert Cliffs 3 in Maryland and Callaway 2 in Missouri have been officially canceled. The French government needed a new plan to prevent an economic disaster for the country.

While a financial predicament has led France to see the non-radioactive beam of light in renewable energy, anti-nuclear organizations have always opposed nuclear power on ethical grounds. Pressure from these groups even resulted in EDF spying on Greenpeace, for which they were found guilty in 2011. This movement continues. As we go to press, there is an international action against radioactive uranium transport from Hamburg, Germany to Narbonne, France. A large anti-nuclear contingent is being planned at the United Nations Climate Change Convention beginning December 12, 2015, in Paris. (See http://www.wiseinternational.org/campaign/march-paris.) There is no doubt that the anti-nuclear movement has had an impact on the Energy Transition Law.

The new policy was passed in July by the French Parliament. While it could have gone further, the plan is very ambitious and will need support in order to be fully implemented. After replacing 25 percent of the nation’s electricity with renewable energy by 2025, it will continue to increase to 40 percent renewables by 2040. The Energy Transition Law will remove obstacles that have hindered renewable energy development, and it includes a carbon tax. More importantly, it gives France a place at the head of the table as it hosts the UN climate talks in December.

—Nuclear Heritage Network, Aug. 19; ClimateWire, Jul. 29; Energy & Capital, Jul. 22; Greenpeace France, Jun. 23, 2015

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Japanese Baby Milk Formula Again Declared Unfit by China

Nukewatch Quarterly Fall 2015
By John LaForge

Chinese import authorities seized more than 881 pounds of baby milk formula that had been imported from Japan because it had been produced in areas known to be heavily contaminated with radioactive material emitted by three damaged nuclear reactors at the Fukushima-Daiichi complex. 

China’s Xinhua news agency reported that quarantine officials said no excessive radioactive material was found in the formula, but that the baby food was sent back to Japan because China retains its ban on all imports from the areas around Fukushima. 

The seizures of the baby formula, betwen July 1 and 20, came just after a Japanese delegation implored the Chinese to ease its restrictions on Japanese food imports. On June 19, Japan’s Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries used a meeting in Beijing to request that the import bans—which still apply to 10 Japanese prefectures—be lifted. According to the South China Morning Post, the Japanese Agricultural Ministry had stressed “the safety of Japanese food.” 

The Chinese may have scoffed at the lobbying effort since July’s seizure was the second time Japanese infant milk formula has been declared dangerous by Chinese authorities. In December 2011, traces of cesium-137 were detected in imported baby formula from the same area from the same company. Shortly thereafter, Tokyo-based Meiji Holding Company announced the recall of 400,000 cans of their baby formula as a precaution but said the levels of cesium detected were well below allowable limits. At the time, Meiji PR officials claimed, “Babies could still drink the formula every day without any effect on their health.” 

Contrary to the clearly uninformed Meiji corporate opinion, many doctors and scientists warn that even the slightest internal radioactive contamination can cause cancer. Dr. John Goffman, Dr. Rosalie Bertell, Dr. Alice Stewart, Dr. Ernest Sternglass, Dr. Jay Gould, Dr. Helen Caldicott, and others, have all promoted the precautionary principle regarding any inhalation or ingestion of radioactive materials. 

Scientific evidence indicates that the exposure to radiation suffered by fetuses, infants and children is far more serious than if the same exposure is suffered by adults. Also, the damage done to girls and women by radiation—compared to boys and men—is known to be more severe. The World Health Organization’s 2011 assessment of Fukushima notes that when children are exposed to radiation below the age of five, there is a 70 percent higher risk of cancer for girls than there is for boys.

Feeding radiation-tainted food to the most vulnerable is at best ill-advised and at worst criminal. 

Mary Olson, a senior staff researcher with the Nuclear Information and Resource Service explains, “If the alpha-emitting particles are hitting tissue from inside the body, estimates indicate that internal alpha particle damage is anywhere from seven to 1000 times more damaging to cell structures than is X-ray [external] exposure. Another way of saying this is that when there is no distance from the source of the alpha or beta particle to its target, the doses to the target are very much higher.” When it comes to babies ingesting contaminated baby formula, no level is actually safe and this is known throughout scientific circles. 

The principle radioactive poison that is being tested for in Japanese foods is cesium-137. Unfortunately, there are also other deadly poisons that have been spewed in lesser amounts by the Fukushima disaster. These include americium-241, plutonium-236, uranium-238, thorium-232 and the extremely dangerous isotope, strontium-90. All of these contaminants may also be found in food from Japan, including in baby formula. 

In July 2011, Tokyo officials discovered cesium-137 at levels 6.4 times the national limit in beef sold to restaurants and stores in at least five prefectures; in April 2011, radioactive iodine-131 was found in breast milk of mothers east of Tokyo; radioactive tea from Japan was seized in France in July 2011 when it was found with twice the permitted amount of cesium—not that even a trace can be called harmless. The tea had come from Shizuoka Prefecture, 300 miles south of Fukushima.

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