Special Report
Everywhere Except Here
A nuclear power renaissance is going on outside our borders, pioneered by companies that never were or are no longer American.
The PowerGen Conference is a gathering of power generators from around the world sponsored by PennWell, the Oklahoma publishing empire. Its gathering in Orlando in early December was the largest ever, attended by 18,000 people. Energy is a hot topic these days.
Windmill companies abounded. Vesta, the Danish supplier, had several scale models on the exhibition floor and did a wraparound cover over free copies of the Wall Street Journal. “Denmark’s pretty filled up with windmills but we’re moving offshore,” explained a Vesta salesman, standing beneath a 25-foot replica of the 450-foot structures. “The wind over the ocean is stronger with less variation.”
But for all the contemporary appeal of wind, however, the underlying theme of the conference was how fast the revival of nuclear power is taking shape. “The nuclear renaissance isn’t something in the far-off future,” said J.M. Bernhard, Jr., CEO of the Shaw Group, in giving the keynote address. “It’s already happening today. With greenhouse gases in the mix, we believe nuclear is where we need to go.”
Nuclear is coming along so fast that PennWell split out a separate “Nuclear Power International” section with an eye to creating a stand-alone conference in the future. (Oil and renewables already have their own events.) The American nuclear industry — such as it is — was well represented in the exhibition booths. GE, the last man standing from the earlier nuclear era, now does most of its business in partnership with Hitachi. Newcomers such as Hyperion are blazing a trail by building miniature reactors (60 megawatt as opposed to the standard 1,000). But the horrible truth remains that, if there is a nuclear renaissance going on in the world, it is happening mostly outside our borders, pioneered by companies that never were or are no longer American.
The most entertaining keynote speaker, for example, was Jacques Besnainou, the puckish American director of Areva, the French nuclear giant. (“When I first came to this country, I spent two years living in New Jersey,” began Besnainou in his heavy French accent. “Therefore as you see I have a very strong New Jersey accent.”) Besnainou and Areva are on a roll of late, having announced the construction of a uranium enrichment plant in Idaho last May — the first built here in twenty years — and then announcing in October that it will build a manufacturing plant for nuclear components in partnership with Northrop Grumman Shipbuilding in Newport News.
The French embrace of nuclear has left the Gauls paying the cheapest electrical rates in Europe, importing only half as much natural gas from Russia and Britain and Germany, and making money hand-over-fist by exporting kilowatts to Germany and Italy. When asked how Areva planned to finance the Newport News facility in the face of a worldwide credit crunch, Besnainou answered with one word: “Cash.”
The lag in America’s nuclear effort was reflected by a comment heard over and over from vendors of nuclear accessories. “We’re doing a great business,” said one after another. “But most of it is abroad.”
HERE’S THE SCORECARD on what’s going on the in the rest of the world:
Europe. Finland is building the first new reactor in Europe in twenty years, a 1,200-MW unit at Olkiluoto. The project has fallen two years behind schedule — largely because Finnish environmental officials are taking three times as long as planned to approve blueprints — but it undoubtedly opens the door for other projects. The French are now building an identical plant at Flammanville. Sweden, which is 50 percent nuclear and 40 percent hydro, has even lower carbon emissions than France and has all but abandoned a 1980 vow to shut down its reactors by 2010.
Germany agreed to shutter its nuclear component when Social Democrats were admitted to the ruling coalition in 2001. Two small reactors have been mothballed, but four more generating 4000 MW are scheduled for shutdown in 2009 and Germans are now awakening to the possibility of losing 30 percent of their generating capacity by 2020. Chancellor Angela Merkel has asked for reconsideration. Italy shut its four reactors after a referendum held shortly after Chernobyl but recently started suffering blackouts because of electrical shortages. In May Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi announced plans to revive reactor construction by 2013.
After the breakup of the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe was discovered to be surprisingly reliant on nuclear power. Safety upgrades — little things like the containment structures Soviets scientists thought they didn’t need — sought to counteract the legacy of Chernobyl but Brussels bureaucrats weren’t buying. They have demanded the former satellite nations abandon their nuclear reactors before entering the European Union. This has caused considerable hard feelings.
“Bulgaria used to export electricity to the rest of Eastern Europe,” says Ognyan Minchev, Bulgarian director of the European Council on Foreign Relations. “Now we can’t even provide ourselves.” The Bulgarians closed four reactors in 2002 but are now building two new units at Belene. Atomstroyexport, the Russian nuclear conglomerate, did the design work while Areva and Siemens, the German giant, are providing the equipment.
Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are in a similar dilemma, facing a 2009 EU deadline to close the Ignalia reactor, which provides more than half their electricity. The Baltic republics have appealed the decision but to no avail. (These are the same EU bureaucrats who decided countries couldn’t win Kyoto Protocol carbon credits by building nuclear reactors in other countries.) A larger Areva reactor is scheduled to replace Ignalia 2 by 2015.
Asia and the Middle East. Just as the world’s tallest skyscrapers are now being built east of Suez, so the most intense nuclear activity is occurring there as well. The United Arab Emirates has hired the French to build two new reactors and Saudi Arabia wants to employ them both for electricity and desalinization. Iran’s efforts to develop its own nuclear technology, of course, need no repeating.
Japan gets 30 percent of its electricity from 55 reactors and is now planning a 1300-MW mixed-oxide (MOX) facility at Ohma, which will burn uranium and plutonium from conventional reactors, drastically reducing the so-called problem of “nuclear waste.” South Korea has 20 reactors providing 40 percent of its electricity and is now aiming at the level of France, with 11 new plants under construction. Taiwan has four reactors providing 20 percent of its electricity.
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Marc Jeric| 12.16.08 @ 12:02PM
When Carter nominated a Sierra Club lawyer and a Massachussetts consumer advocate to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and when he killed the Clinch River breeder reactor, he in effect killed nuclear power generation in this country. We now, after 30 years of that sabotage, do not have the engineers nor the equipment nor the welders capable of restarting nuclear power industry; we would have to order our reactors and designs from the French or Japanese.
George Bruce| 12.16.08 @ 12:07PM
"If the United States had gone forward with nuclear power twenty years ago, you would be in much better shape economically than you are today."
No kidding! I wish the lefties and the wackos solely had to pay the price of their stupidity. Unfortunately, they will be secure with their government jobs and pensions. Ordinary working Americans will pay the price, as usual.
Stan Redmond| 12.16.08 @ 12:56PM
The enviromentalists creed. Can't build windmills 'cuz it kills the birds. Can't build solar plants 'cuz the minerals required damage the rainforest (Coltan). Can't build hydroelectric 'cuz it interupts salmo runs and drowns trees. Can't build nuclear 'cuz of a stupid Jane Fonda movie. Can't burn coal 'cuz it releases evyil carbon dioxide. Can't use tidal generators 'cuz it interfers with whale migration... Is there ANYTHING acceptable to a tree hugging democrat for producing energy? Nope... How embarassing that the backward Saudi Arabia, with the largest known reserves of petroleum, is decades ahead of the USofA (where this technology was invented by the way) in nuclear power generation and desalinization.
Dustoff| 12.16.08 @ 1:25PM
The envoir fools want us in log cabins.
Opps that's wrong, we must kill trees to make cabins. Hmmm time for caves.
Ron| 12.16.08 @ 2:36PM
I'd be all for nuclear if someone could just show me what to do with the nuclear waste that must be safely stored for longer than the pyramids have been in existence. I'm not a tree hugger, this is a serious question that has not been answered in this country since the Manhattan Project.
Steve| 12.16.08 @ 3:18PM
Ron,
"is a serious question that has not been answered in this country since the Manhattan Project. "
What has the answer been in the rest of the world? Obviously, they have one.
Luonne Dumak| 12.16.08 @ 3:32PM
We can reprocess the waste just like Germany, Great Britian and other Countries do. Unfortunately Jimmy (peanut farmer) Carter stopped us from doing that. Every time I see his face, I gringe at all the damage he has done to this country and wait his peaceful demise. a bad president and an even worse Expresident .
Ken| 12.16.08 @ 4:29PM
The answer is a 4th generation nuclear reactor called an Integral Fast Reactor (IFR). This reactor is cooled by liquid sodium and fueled by a metallic alloy of uranium and plutonium. In traditional water-cooled reactors (1st & 2nd generation) the core must be maintained at a high pressure to keep the water liquid at high temperatures. In contrast, since the IFR used a liquid metal as a coolant, the core could operate at close to ambient pressure, dramatically reducing the danger of a loss of coolant accident. The entire reactor core, heat exchangers and primary cooling pumps were immersed in a pool of liquid sodium, making a loss of primary coolant extremely unlikely. The coolant loops were also designed to allow for cooling through natural convection, meaning that in the case of a power loss or unexpected reactor shutdown, the heat from the reactor core would be sufficient to keep the coolant circulating even if the primary cooling pumps were to fail. Compared to current light-water reactors with a once-through fuel cycle that induces fission (and derives energy) from less than 1% of the uranium found in nature, the IFR has a very efficient (99.5% of Uranium undergoes fission) fuel cycle. The IFR's primary fuel is depleted uranium (U-238) mixed with highly enriched uranium and plutonium (perhaps from decommissioned weapons). Because of the IFR's reprocessing capability, the depleted uranium could be replaced by spent fuel (nuclear waste) from traditional water reactors. The two forms of waste produced, a noble metal form and a ceramic form, contain no plutonium or other actinides. The radioactivity of the waste decays to levels similar to the original ore in about 200 years. The on-site reprocessing of fuel means that the quantity of nuclear waste leaving the plant is tiny relative to other nuclear facilities. This makes storage simpler and reduces the security risk associated with nuclear waste transportation. Too bad the entire technology was killed by democrats in 1994.
Ivan Ivanovich| 12.17.08 @ 4:54AM
Marc writes: "We now, after 30 years of that sabotage, do not have the engineers nor the equipment nor the welders capable of restarting nuclear power industry"
Is this what we will say about the auto business in 2038? We better turn it around before those I trained are retired and can't train the next generation. It's easy too! Just stop buying rice burners. Buy a Chevy or a Ford.
Rob| 12.17.08 @ 8:37AM
It appears (I have been reading Scientific American) that new fuel cycles and even new fuels (thorium) will allow for 'burning' the long lived nuclear waste and much more efficient use of familiar nuclear fuels.
We have had our future crippled by strange leftist green politics.
Is there no end to the damage that exPrez Carter can accomplish?
Can you say 'economic suicide'?
Can you say 'global warmist'?
Through our lack of maturity we have brought much of the energy crisis on ourselves as the leftists/greens systematically deny us alternatives to Saudi oil.
Merlin8047| 12.18.08 @ 12:40AM
Ivan wrote: "Is this what we will say about the auto business in 2038? We better turn it around before those I trained are retired and can't train the next generation. It's easy too! Just stop buying rice burners. Buy a Chevy or a Ford."
As an engineering participant in said auto industry, I can only add, AMEN.
As a refugee from the domestic machine tool industry, I've already experienced this - and I can't find but one engineer in a thousand whom I can teach anything of what I know. They don't care, because there's no future for them in that industry. Breaks my heart, sometimes.
I've read, however, that Los Alamos has some sort of reactor (maybe that sodium cooled thingy), that can be reduced to the size of a BUS, and is virtually a sealed capsule, therefor making possible to distribute them widely, rather than building large plants and more long transmission lines. So there must be a FEW American engineers still on the ball. Thanks be to God !
Paxus Calta | 12.29.08 @ 10:37PM
There is some stunning misinformation here, especially in the comments. I will take on just one. Reprocessing does not deal with rad waste, it significantly increases it volumetrically without reducing the radioactivity. Reprocessing also creates various liquid wastes that are harder to handle than the original solid forms.
We reprocess to create fresh fuel for reactors from irradiated fuel. It turns out that reprocessing is significantly more expensive than mining uranium.