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Nuclear Renaissance Blossoms—Without the USA

By from the October 2010 issue

The world is going nuclear while we’re going nowhere. 

This summer China surpassed the United States as the world’s largest producer of energy. What was noteworthy, however, is not what China has accomplished over the past 10 years — doubling its energy capacity — but what it is planning for its future.

Under construction now in China are 23 nuclear reactors, many originally of American design. The Chinese are building four Westinghouse AP1000s — a model our Nuclear Regulatory Commission has not even approved yet. On the drawing boards are at least 30 more projects. By 2020, China’s nuclear complex will be more than half the size of the U.S.’s aging fleet of 104.

But that’s just the beginning. In July the Chinese announced plans for a 50-square-mile “Nuclear City” in Haiyan, 70 miles south of Shanghai. The city, which now houses much of China’s nuclear industry, will now add an educational center for training nuclear engineers and scientists, a center for the study of radiation safety, a research lab for radiation-based industry and agriculture, a manufacturing center for nuclear parts, and a marketing center to sell nuclear power to the rest of the world.

At this point, the world probably doesn’t need much persuading. Outside America’s borders, the long-awaited Nuclear Renaissance is now fully under way. There are currently 60 reactors under construction around the globe, with countries as diverse as Vietnam, Brazil, Turkey, and Jordan planning nuclear programs.

What is America’s role in this? Not much, except perhaps for running after everyone shouting, “Hey, wait a minute, we invented this technology.” On the basis of outdated treaties and outmoded concerns about nuclear proliferation, we are currently: a) telling South Korea it cannot reprocess its own spent fuel rods, and b) telling Jordan it cannot process its own uranium. Both countries are furious at America’s buttinski ways and are politely telling us to get lost. After all, both countries have many other options to which to turn.

THEY CAN HARDLY be blamed. Of the half-dozen major players in nuclear construction now, General Electric is the only American company still on the field and it is running in last place. With hardly any customers, GE has tried to revive its fortunes by partnering with Hitachi. Rumors persist that it will eventually sell its nuclear division to the Japanese and quit the field altogether. “No GE CEO has ever made money at nuclear and I don’t expect to, either,” says CEO Jeff Immelt.

Remember Westinghouse, the other major player on the American stage in the 1970s and 1980s? It is now a Japanese company, bought by Toshiba from British Nuclear Fuels in 2007, mainly for the name and a few reactor designs. Toshiba has succeeded in marketing the Westinghouse AP1000 (“Advanced Passive 1000 Megawatts”) to China, but the Chinese demanded the design specs and are probably going to be developing their own version in the near future.

France decided to go nuclear in the 1960s under Charles de Gaulle. (“We don’t have oil but we have ideas!” was the rallying cry.) The country now gets 80 percent of its electricity from nuclear and has the cleanest air and the cheapest electricity in Europe. In addition, the French make $4 billion a year selling surplus power to Italy and Germany, both of which have closed reactors and now need electricity. Areva, the French nuclear giant, 80 percent owned by the French government, has won contracts in Finland, China, and India but now finds itself locked in brutal competition with newcomer South Korea.

Until the late 1990s, the Koreans bought reactors from Japan, building their fleet to 40 percent of its electricity. (Japan gets 33 percent and we get 20.) But Korea is a nation whose students score at the top in international math comparisons and have developed a passion for engineering and invention. So 10 years ago the Koreans took a design from Combustion Engineering, another American company, and fashioned it into the Korean Standardized Nuclear Plant, a 1,400-megawatt giant. Two years ago they entered the bidding to build 5,000 MW of nuclear power in the United Arab Emirates. Although original estimates put the project at $40 billion, the Koreans bid $20 billion and won the contract, astonishing the competition, Areva and Westinghouse. The Japanese have now assembled all their nuclear companies into a consortium for future bidding while France is undergoing a soul-searching as to whether Areva can continue to compete. Meanwhile, the Koreans are seeking new business in Jordan, India, Indonesia, and Vietnam.

Where does America fit into this? “We didn’t invent this technology, you did,” says Jacques Besnainou, the genial CEO of Areva North America. “We’re just continuing what you started.” Besnainou’s modesty may be becoming, but it barely describes the technological gap that has opened between the two countries. While America arm-wrestles with Harry Reid over the disposal of thousands of tons of spent nuclear fuel rods at Yucca Mountain, the French have perfected reprocessing — a technology banned by Jimmy Carter in the 1970s.

In America, disposing of “nuclear waste” is regarded as a showstopper — even though all our spent fuel from the last half-century would fit on a football field to a depth of ten feet. But separating the highly radioactive isotopes from the mildly radioactive non-fissionable uranium reduces the volume of dangerous material by 95 percent. And even the remaining residue contains many valuable fuel, industrial, and medical products. With complete reprocessing, the French are now able to store all their unrecyclable radioactive wastes from 50 years of producing 75 percent of their electricity beneath the floor of one room at La Hague.

WHILE THERE HAS BEEN much talk of a nuclear revival in this country, so far everything has happened only on paper. Twenty-six companies have submitted applications to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a total of 34 reactors, but the glacial pace of review means little will get done in the next decade. On taking his seat as chairman of the commission in 2009, Gregory Jaczko, a former adviser to Harry Reid, said he hoped to get at least one license application out the door by the time his term ended in 2013. That may have been optimistic.

If a license is ever issued, construction under NRC oversight could easily take another five to eight years. Even David Lochbaum, director of nuclear safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists and perhaps the foremost anti-nuclear voice in the country, says he is frustrated by the Commission’s inertia. “The NRC can take up to five years to make up its mind whether or not to do something,” says Lochbaum. “Companies and vendors can’t operate with that kind of regulatory uncertainty. The result is that costs go up and safety goes down.”

Yet the blame does not lie solely with the NRC. To a loud and vocal portion of the population, nuclear technology is still the devil’s work, while only a few mandates and government subsidies stand between us and a world powered by wind and sunshine. In mid-July Jaczko braved a trip to Brattleboro, Vermont, where he broke bread with nearly 100 anti-nuclear crusaders trying to shut down Vermont Yankee, the 660-megawatt reactor that supplies one-third of the Green Mountain State’s electricity. The crowd was the usual collection of pony-tailed men in business suits, eager young lawyers from the Naderite Public Interest Research Group, and well-heeled, gray-haired women who can’t imagine why anyone would ever fool with nuclear power. Their verdict was unanimous: “Shut it down this afternoon!” Jaczko, of course, was accused of giving the nuclear industry a free pass and “not listening to the people.”

Faced with these pressures, the NRC responds by regulating the industry into the ground. Only one new reactor — the Vogtle Plant in Georgia — has received permission to begin site preparation for construction. Last July the NRC informed the utility, Southern Electric, that the dirt it was using to grade the site was inadequate. Southern was forced to go further abroad and spend more money on better dirt. Two weeks later the NRC shut down the project entirely when it discovered that a subcontractor had only asked prospective employees about drug and alcohol in interviews but failed to secure statements in writing. Work halted for three weeks.

Page: 1 2  

About the Author

William Tucker is news editor for RealClearEnergy.org.

Letter to the Editor View all comments (19) |

Eric Cartman| 10.31.10 @ 12:05PM

I wonder if Thomas Friedman would like us to be this China for a day. Someone should ask him.

Thomas Friedman| 10.31.10 @ 3:32PM

You have offended the proletariat with your anti-state rambling. You will be executed and your family billed for the cartridge. You may escape this fate by immediately buying subscriptions to the New York Times for yourself and sixty-eight friends.

David W| 10.31.10 @ 3:03PM

We can thank the NRC for continuing the stonewalling. We can thank the environmentalists who, instead of working to ensure nuclear power is safe, work hard to keep filing injunction after court order after complaint after whatever to slow advancement to a crawl. As they screw the nuclear energy companies they will start screwing the coal and natural gas companies with the help of Obama, the EPA, and the democrats. Energy costs will skyrocket, and we will be forced to burn wood to heat. This will of course require us to cut down all of the trees in the country. The environmentalists will try to stop that, but preventing us from cutting down trees is a lot harder than using the courts to stop the construction of more energy plants. Soon, we will be begging the Chinese to send us "energy" instead of just buying our treasury bonds.

Bruce | 10.31.10 @ 3:16PM

Exactly right, David. We had this happen right here on Long Island after the now defunct Long Island Lighting Company (morphed into the Long Island Power Authority) spent millions to build a supremely safe nuclear plant that could have powered the island for years, and was forced by enviro-Nazi lawsuits to tear the damned thing down before it ever went on line - with more millions spent to do so. Thank you NYPIRG for effectively doubling my electric rates, tripling my natural gas rates, and leaving me with a $300 per month gas &electric; payment ... on the "budget" plan! BTW, my home is only 1600 sq ft, fully insulated, all new energy star rated appliances, new 90% efficient gas furnace/water heater.

Oh the joy of living in the Peoples Republik of NY.

chuck| 10.31.10 @ 5:02PM

For God's sake,MOVE! I can't believe that people put up with the crap tha's being dished out daily in places like New York and California. At least California has nice weather, but what the hell does NY have besides being full of liberal bastards?

Bruce | 10.31.10 @ 9:04PM

Chuck, my home has been on the market for 2 years. I have reduced the price as far as I can while having enough left to pay cash for construction of a new place on property I already own in Tennessee. I am lucky in that my mortgage is long paid off - I have only credit card debt to pay off. Since I am on SS Disability, I cannot get a new construction mortgage, which leaves me in a bind.

The problem many like me in NY have is the damned Democrats have bumped every conceivable tax and fee so astronomically high that nobody can sell! There were at last count over 100 listings just in my town.

I would dearly like to have the means to just pick up and tell these clowns to shove it, but at my age I can't - simple as that. I am by no means alone in this quandary. The rich are leaving in droves, leaving middle class folks like me and the welfare leeches.

chuck| 10.31.10 @ 10:12PM

Bruce,
Sorry for your horrible situation. I truly hope you are able to sell your home, and move to Tennessee. I live in Ga, grew up in PA, then off to TX, and now GA. Love the south, people here are friendly, and much more conservative than in the north.

Good luck to you.

Chuck

Dixie Pixie| 10.31.10 @ 3:34PM

Like China under the Mandarins, the USA is being crushed under deliberately nonsensical rules and regulations.

Liberalism simply wants to repeal the Industrial Revolution so we can all live as Hunter-Gatherers as Gala intended.

To the Environmental Liberals all Technology is Evil especially Energy producing Nuclear Technology.

Anthony| 10.31.10 @ 5:20PM

Great point Eric. Somehow Thomas al Friedman remains strangely quiet on the subject of freeing the hands of our nuclear industry.
As is the case with this fraud and his fellow leftists, bureaucracy is just fine as long as it's Americans that are being hindered. China and the rest of the totalitarians are given a "green" pass.
It goes to further show the point that it's not about the enviornment, it's about punishing America.
Tuesday can't come fast enough!! Time to find new places to bury our nuclear waste, along with the America hating left.

Intelligent Design| 10.31.10 @ 5:44PM

We should be building nuclear power plants with the same sense of urgency that we manufactured weapons during WW II. Instead, nuclear construction has been on hold for 30 years (or more?). The radiation released at Three Mile Island was equivalent to a chest X-ray, but that incident along with the movie China Syndrome have shaped public policy. Ignorance of facts has caused the U.S. to remain dependent on foreign oil. This ignorance continues to jeopardize our economy, national security, and freedom.

no1patriot| 10.31.10 @ 5:51PM

The facts are there for all to see-in North Carolina where I live, we have had approval to build a nuclear reactor for 5 years..Everytime it's getting started, some environmentalist or official stop it again and again. The Japanese are building this one when our first one was built by America in the 60's, I think. It's unbeleivable how much pressure is being put on our economy by progressives and Obama to stiffle it while they give money to other countries for oil drilling, etc. Stimilus money was mostly a give away to foreign countries and to pay reparation for the "poor" whose new poverty level is now around $90,000 for a family of 4?? I love the idea that France is recycling their waste-I've always wondered why America wasn't doing this already since we have outstanding scientists and businesses who could do this if the government would leave them alone. We've lost 43,000 factories in 10 years-God help us-the government is killing us along with environmentalsists..I know Soros is funding monies all over to help kill our dollar since he made so much money off the collapse of Britain's pound. Sometimes it's hard to beleive that Americans don't see what's happening in greater numbers or just how many support our growing liberal society. Thanks for your remarks. I agree.

Osamas Pajamas| 10.31.10 @ 10:42PM

Very simple. When we run out of energy due to the moronic energy policies of green meanies, ecofreaks, and enviromaniacs, let's burn all the green meanies, ecofreaks, and enviromaniacs --- they're getting FAT on our tax oney, their fat will pop and sputter and burn real nice, in the fire.

Osamas Pajamas| 10.31.10 @ 10:42PM

Very simple. When we run out of energy due to the moronic energy policies of green meanies, ecofreaks, and enviromaniacs, let's burn all the green meanies, ecofreaks, and enviromaniacs --- they're getting FAT on our tax money, their fat will pop and sputter and burn real nice, in the fire.

Osamas Pajamas| 10.31.10 @ 10:46PM

We could pursue wind energy by chaining all the Democrats and the entire Democrat-captured media behind some huge windmills. These blowhard blowers could blow and blow and blow for wind-generated energy. It doesn't actually matter if this scheme works --- just as long as it gets all these stupid bastards the hell out of the way.

Nicolas Day| 11.1.10 @ 12:30AM

China's nuclear industry In 2001, the nuclear capacity for the most heavily populated country on Earth was slightly less than that of Finland. Nevertheless, the international nuclear industry is 'beating a path' to China's open door. Asia is a growth market for nuclear power. The question is no longer: can China’s nuclear industry maintain its current growth rate? The question now being asked is, can China accelerate that growth rate to meet the even more ambitious pace of its new energy plan?
http://dermaliftreview.com

Rod Clemetson| 11.25.10 @ 8:09AM

==> It's really tempting to lose patience with all the environmentalist/NRC negative attitudes. Paralysis by analysis. Look around. There's a quiet revolution under way in nuclear reactor design. Have you ever heard of a nuclear fuel called thorium? Well, innovation is alive and well in America, in the person of Kirk Sorensen, one of the leaders of the Thorium Energy Alliance (TEA). Kirk has a truly "green" solution to U.S. energy independence, plus an alternative to Iranian and North Korean nuclear weapons development.

Please take a look at the TEA web site. I promise you'll be amazed -- http://thoriumenergyalliance.com

-- check out Kirk's blog at -- http://energyfromthorium.com

Since 1965 there has existed a *CLEAN*, SAFE*, *NON-PROLIFERATING* nuclear reactor design called Molten Salt Reactor (MSR). The original 8 megawatt MSR was created by Alvin Weinberg's research team at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). After considering several dozen alternative designs, Alvin's MSR was up and running for 5 years in the late 1960's.

Then the AEC trashed the MSR program and fired Dr. Weinberg, ORNL director, for insisting on better nuclear safety -- a career-ending, politically incorrect attitude. The AEC was convinced it already had all the best answers to construction safety and operating procedure safety -- so who needs another option? Now the NRC has driven Westinghouse and GE out of the nuclear energy business, and established China, South Korea, and Japan as the new owners of the nuclear reactor designs.

Google the "Thorium for Singapore" web site for a terrific set of essays detailing the obsessive path from Nautilus to Enterprise to Shippingport power plants, to another 100+ similar reactors (LWR's) that supply ~20% of our electricity. Then there's all the billions and billions spent on failed breeder reactors that could have been better spent on developing the proven MSR design.

So here we are, still stampeding down the path to uranium-fueled, water-cooled reactors. Kirk Sorensen is Chief Nuclear Technologist for Teledyne Brown Engineering, and is earning his doctorate in nuclear engineering. His work with thorium has led to the re-discovery of MSR's -- one of the best-kept (or MOST IGNORED) secrets of the last 50 years. Now the TEA has created a prototype design for a 4th-generation, thorium-fueled, version of the MSR called Liquid Flouride Thorium Reactor (LFTR).

Kirk has posted PDF files of all the original Oak Ridge MSR research papers at the "Energy from Thorium" web site. *SO* MSR's are no secret -- just *THOROUGHLY IGNORED*. Any nation with reasonably intelligent nuclear engineers can do the R&D to build LFTR's. Alvin's simple old MSR design (nicknamed the "3-P" -- a pot, a pipe, and a pump) could be engineered into commercial reality as LFTR within two or three years. Coal-fired generators could be completely phased out in 15 to 20 years. (Watch the coal lobby try to kill this notion.)

Power plant efficiency will be nearly 50% (vs. 35% for coal). Power at the meter will be around $.03/kwh (vs. $.04 for coal). Thorium can be totally, 100%, consumed (vs.

Rod Clemetson| 11.25.10 @ 8:22AM

==> (continuing original posting)

Power plant efficiency will be nearly 50% (vs. 35% for coal). Power at the meter will be around $.03/kwh (vs. $.04 for coal). Thorium can be totally, 100%, consumed (vs.

Rod Clemetson| 11.25.10 @ 8:12AM

==> (continuing previous post)
Power plant efficiency will be nearly 50% (vs. 35% for coal). Power at the meter will be around $.03/kwh (vs. $.04 for coal). Thorium can be totally, 100%, consumed (vs.

Rod Clemetson| 11.25.10 @ 8:20AM

==> (still continuing previous post)

Power plant efficiency will be nearly 50% (vs. 35% for coal). Power at the meter will be around $.03/kwh (vs. $.04 for coal). Thorium can be totally, 100%, consumed (vs.

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