Feds send team to assess Va. uranium incident

LYNCHBURG, Va.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has sent a special inspection team to assess an incident involving uranium at Babcock & Wilcox's operation in Lynchburg.

The commission said Monday that the four-member team will spend about a week reviewing factors that led to the buildup of enriched uranium last week.

The commission says a saw used to cut fuel components discharged oil containing a small amount of highly enriched uranium into a container.

The commission says the incident prompted the company to go into alert status for five hours. An alert is the lowest emergency classification for operations such as the one in Lynchburg.

The commission says its inspection team will review the company's investigation of the cause.

The operation handles highly enriched uranium used in nuclear fuel.

http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D99IE9A80.htm

Piketon Plant: Uranium Project May Go on Hold

Oh, great! This leaves USEC's gaseous diffusion plant in Paducah, KY still the only operational nuclear enrichment plant in the US.

Thursday, July 9, 2009 3:06 AM

By Jonathan Riskind

THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH

WASHINGTON -- The planned uranium-enrichment plant project in Piketon, Ohio, faces "demobilization" beginning in August unless the federal government grants a $2 billion loan guarantee, says USEC Inc.

USEC, the suburban Washington company trying to build the $3.5 billion advanced-technology plant on the same site where it ran the enrichment facility closed in 2001, has indicated for months that without the loan guarantee from the Department of Energy, the Piketon project would fail to get needed financing.

USEC has spent about $1.4 billion to build a test plant and begin work on the full-scale commercial facility, which would make fuel for nuclear power plants. The company says the enrichment plant could be operating by early 2011.

An Energy Department spokesman declined on Tuesday to discuss the status of the USEC request. However, Energy Secretary Steven Chu has made it a priority to speed up the loan guarantee process.

USEC made its application more than 10 months ago. Announcements are expected "fairly soon" for several projects, said Ebony Meeks, an Energy Department spokeswoman. But she could not say whether USEC would be the subject of one of those announcements.

Overall, the project employs 5,700 directly or indirectly; jobs range from construction of the plant in Piketon to work on the enrichment-facility components and supplies in eight states, the company says. In Piketon, more than 600 are working, and a fully operating plant would employ about 400 for years to come.

The enrichment facility is separate from the planned nuclear-power plant that a consortium of companies recently announced. The nuclear power plant could take a decade to go online even if it gains all the necessary approvals.

USEC said this week that it expects the Energy Department to make a decision by early August on whether to grant a "conditional commitment" for the loan guarantee. But if the decision is no, or there is no decision, a demobilization plan for significantly slowing down the project will be put into effect that would "involve the partial or full halt of certain American Centrifuge project activities and plant construction," the company said.

"Even if a conditional commitment is provided by early August, demobilization may be initiated if the terms of such conditional commitment are not acceptable or if subsequent progress toward achieving actual funding later this year under the loan guarantee is not maintained," the company said.

http://www.dispatchpolitics.com/live/content/local_news/stories/2009/07/09/copy/usec08.ART_ART_07-09-09_A9_3QEE0AO.html?adsec=politics&sid=101

Global Laser Enrichment Submits License Application to Build First Commercial Uranium Enrichment Plant Using Laser Technology

Third-Generation Technology Would Increase Production of Enriched Fuel for U.S. Nuclear Power Plants

WILMINGTON, N.C.--30 June 2009--

Global Laser Enrichment (GLE), a business venture of GE, Hitachi Ltd. and Cameco, today announced a landmark in the deployment of its proposed, next-generation enrichment facility designed to increase the United States’ supply of enriched uranium to fuel its nuclear power plants.

GLE has completed its license application to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to build the world’s first commercial uranium enrichment facility to use laser technology. The proposed facility would be built in Wilmington, N.C.

The new facility would produce a new domestic supply of low-enriched uranium used to power nuclear plants to meet an anticipated increase in global demand. The facility also would help support the country’s goal to reduce carbon emissions through the expanded use of nuclear energy, which creates virtually no greenhouse gases during the electricity generation process.

If approved, GLE’s facility could help drive U.S. job creation, including up to 300 permanent engineering and support staff positions and more than 500 construction jobs.

“Our goal is to enable an efficient and effective review of our innovative technology by providing a quality, complete application to the NRC,” said Tammy Orr, President and CEO of GLE. “Submitting the highest-quality product has been our priority for this significant licensing process milestone.”

The NRC’s estimated 30-month application review will officially begin once the agency formally dockets, or accepts, the GLE application. On January 30, GLE submitted its environmental report for the proposed facility, representing a significant portion of the overall license application. The NRC had approved the early, partial submittal to add efficiency to its review process.

Global demand for low-enriched uranium is expected to increase significantly in the coming years.

First, a major supply of low-enriched uranium for U.S. nuclear power plants will cease in 2013, with the expiration of a program to convert Russian weapons-grade material into nuclear plant fuel (commonly known as “Megatons to Megawatts”).

Also, the anticipated construction of a new generation of nuclear power plants is expected to further intensify the demand for fuel.

”This is an exciting time in our industry,” Orr said. “As world leaders in innovation and technology, we have a unique opportunity to offer needed enrichment supply to nuclear operators meeting the challenges of energy security, climate change and increased demands for power.”

GLE currently is in the pre-deployment stage of its enrichment test loop, which is designed to confirm the commercial feasibility of the technology and advance the design of the equipment, facility and processes for the planned production facility.

GLE will use the information from the test loop in its evaluations of whether or not to proceed with the full-scale commercial facility. The plant would be co-located with the existing nuclear fuel manufacturing facilities of Global Nuclear Fuel and the new plants and services business of GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy, headquartered in Wilmington, N.C.

If the decision is made to proceed with construction, the GLE commercial production facility would have a target capacity of three-to-six million separative work units (SWUs). A SWU is a unit measuring the energy used to enrich uranium, which is then fabricated into fuel assemblies for nuclear power plants.

In 2006, GLE acquired the exclusive rights to develop and commercialize the third-generation uranium enrichment technology globally through a license from Silex Systems Ltd. of Australia. In 2008, Cameco, one of the world’s largest uranium producers, acquired a 24% ownership stake in GLE.

About GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy

Based in Wilmington, N.C., GEH is a world-leading provider of advanced reactors and nuclear services. Established in June 2007, GEH is a global nuclear alliance created by GE and Hitachi to serve the global nuclear industry. The nuclear alliance executes a single, strategic vision to create a broader portfolio of solutions, expanding its capabilities for new reactor and service opportunities. The alliance offers customers around the world the technological leadership required to effectively enhance reactor performance, power output and safety.

About Cameco Corporation

Cameco, with its head office in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, is one of the world's largest uranium producers. The company's uranium products are used to generate electricity in nuclear power plants around the world, providing one of the cleanest sources of energy available today. Cameco's shares trade on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges.

Ohio Uranium Plant at Risk Without Federal Loan

Your tax dollars at work! Again!


Updated 12:26 PM Sunday, June 21, 2009

COLUMBUS, Ohio — A company's plans to build a uranium enrichment plant in southern Ohio are in jeopardy without a $2 billion federal loan guarantee, The Columbus Dispatch reported Sunday.

USEC Inc., based in Bethesda, Md., is developing the American Centrifuge project on the site of a former gaseous diffusion plant in Piketon, about 65 miles south of Columbus.

The company applied for the loan guarantee 10 months ago under a U.S. Department of Energy program launched by former President George W. Bush.

Without the loan guarantee, USEC won't be able to obtain private financing, company officials said.

The delay is adding to the project's overall cost, which is about $3.5 billion, USEC spokeswoman Elizabeth Stuckle told The Dispatch. The company has spent about $1.4 billion so far, including the construction of a new facility.

Secretary of Energy Steven Chu has said he intends to speed up the process of approving loan guarantees, but only one has been issued. In late March, Chu's department signed off on a $535 million loan guarantee for a solar-panel manufacturing plant to be built by California-based Solyndra.

USEC's project, announced five years ago, is supposed to open in 2011 and employ about 400. Enriched uranium from the plant would be used in generating electricity at nuclear power plants.

Work on the plant has slowed, and the prospect of mothballing it isn't far off, said Stuckle told the newspaper. She declined to specify when the project could be shut down.

"This is a serious time issue. We cannot get enough funding absent the loan guarantee," Stuckle said.

Rob Portman, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate and a former congressman from Cincinnati whose district included Piketon, recently wrote to President Barack Obama urging that the loan guarantee be granted quickly.

Democratic Gov. Ted Strickland also wrote to Obama in March, saying that "without timely approval of the loan guarantee, the many thousands of new jobs currently being created will be delayed or perhaps lost."

Obama was supportive when he campaigned in southern Ohio last year.

The Piketon site is where the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant enriched uranium during the Cold War.

Cleanup of the site is still going on, and just last week Gov. Ted Strickland and other politicians announced plans by Duke Energy and the French nuclear energy company Areva to build a $10 billion nuclear power plant there over the next 10 years.

http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/ohio-news/ohio-uranium-plant-at-risk-without-federal-loan-171934.html

Chatham Star-Tribune Provides Uranium Co. With Free Advertising

USEC Inc. (NYSE:USU), a leading supplier of enriched uranium fuel for commercial nuclear power plants, is being given free advertising by the Chatham Star-Tribune under the guise of a Letter to the Editor. USEC operates the only uranium enrichment facility in the United States [Paducah, KY] and supplies more than half of the U.S. market and more than a quarter of the world market. 2008 revenues were more than $1.6 billion. But they don't have to pay to advocate for mining Coles Hill and advertise in Chatham!

Here's the specious letter from their Vice-President of Marketing and Sales, John M. A. Donelson:

http://www.wpcva.com/articles/2009/05/28/chatham/opinion/opinion02.txt

Uranium offers new economic engine, like lake 45 years ago

Wednesday, May 27, 2009 9:57 AM EDT

About 45 years ago Smith Mountain Dam was completed.

It would take several more years for Smith Mountain Lake to fill and become the wonderful resource many of us enjoy today.

It is certain that if the Smith Mountain Dam project was proposed today, anti-development organizations would scream about the pending danger, doom, and devastation.

They would warn that building a power plant at Smith Mountain gap could ruin the countryside.

Today with decades of safe operation and clean energy created from that hydroelectric power plant, all but the most wild-eyed radicals share the opinion that Smith Mountain Dam and the lake it created have been a blessing for the area.

Smith Mountain Lake was created because people with vision used science and engineering to harness a natural resource and create positive change.

Today Southside suffers from chronic high unemployment and the loss of traditional economic engines.

As the farming and manufacturing sectors struggle, many blue chip employers are gone.

Today we need to again use technology to utilize our natural and human resources and create core jobs.

Just as hydroelectric power from Smith Mountain Lake has benefited this area for the past 45 years, in the future the same will be said of the clean and safe energy that will come from safe uranium mining at Coles Hill.

Let's hope that anti-development organizations don't drown out the voices of reason.

We should strengthen Southside Virginia by developing new economic engines that are under our feet instead of looking for greener pastures.

John M. A. Donelson

McLean

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Meet Mr. Donelson!

From USEC's website http://www.usec.com/donelson.htm :

John M.A. Donelson

Vice President, Marketing and Sales

John M.A. Donelson is vice president, marketing and sales, for USEC Inc. He is responsible for the Company’s revenue generation from the sale of enriched and natural uranium and for managing relationships with customers. He reports to Robert Van Namen, senior vice president, uranium enrichment.

Mr. Donelson joined USEC in 1995 in the advanced technology department. He later became a senior sales executive and most recently served as director, North American and European sales. Prior to joining USEC, he held positions of increasing responsibility at Newport News Shipbuilding and Duke Energy.

Mr. Donelson holds a bachelor of science degree in physics from Hampden-Sydney College, a master’s degree in nuclear engineering from the University of Virginia, and a master of business administration degree from Queens University. He is a registered professional engineer in the state of North Carolina. In 2003, Donelson received USEC’s highest honor, the Chairman’s Award, for outstanding performance.

USEC Inc. (NYSE: USU), a global energy company, is a leading supplier of enriched uranium fuel for commercial nuclear power plants.

Kaine predicts wave of environmental action on horizon

It's so apparent to me that this man has no interest in Virginia. His heart is elsewhere...maybe from whence he came...but it's certainly not in Virginia.

By Scott Harper
The Virginian-Pilot
© May 7, 2009

NORFOLK

About 10 minutes into his speech Wednesday night, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine stripped off his suit jacket, rolled up his white sleeves and jumped squarely from his prepared remarks.

"I'm getting warmed up," he told a crowd of about 300 people inside Old Dominion University's Webb Center. "I always do when I talk about this subject."

That subject is the environment, an issue he has put a focus on this year, his final year in office.

The environmental and energy initiative has its own name - Renew Virginia - and despite a cash crunc h in Richmond and an economic crisis nationwide, the governor said he still has big plans for going green in 2009.

Kaine hinted at some major changes coming to the Chesapeake Bay cleanup, steps that he and other mid-Atlantic governors will announce next week at a summit at Mount Vernon.

That suggestion brought a smile to the face of Will Baker, president of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. Baker has been pressing Kaine and the Obama administration to make the Bay a national priority and speed up its restoration, which began in 1983 and still is struggling.

The Bay Foundation co-sponsored Wednesday night's lecture as part of its Blue Planet Forum on environmental issues facing Virginia.

Kaine ticked off a list of state programs that soon will receive federal stimulus money - $75 million for energy efficiencies and green buildings; $39 million in incentives for solar, thermal and small wind projects; $5 million for alternative energy research - all dedicated to environmental progress.

He predicted that, as money trickles out of Washington over the next two years, Virginia and other states will experience "one of the greatest unleashings of American ingenuity" on new energy technology since the dawn of the combustion engine.

The governor said he intends to push ahead against two big pollutants affecting the Bay and impairing hundreds of Virginia streams - farm runoff and urb an stormwater.

The state is rewriting its stormwater regulations and hopes to complete this year these "extremely innovative" rules against tainted rainwaters that wash off parking lots, roofs, lawns, streets and gardens and pass oil, fertilizers and chemicals into the Bay.

In response to questions, Kaine said developing an offshore wind farm off Virginia Beach "is a spectacular idea."

Oil and gas drilling in those same waters should be confined to exploration only, "to see what resources are really out there," he said.

He urged expansion of nuclear energy in Virginia and defended his position to support a new, major coal-fired power plant in southwestern Virginia over objections from environmentalists.

The governor also said that if a study shows that uranium mining cannot be done safely in Virginia's wet climate, "maybe we ought to keep the ban in place and move on."

Scott Harper, (757) 446-2340, scott.harper@pilotonline.com

http://hamptonroads.com/2009/05/kaine-predicts-wave-environmental-action-horizon

Activist: Claim of 'Green' Nuclear Power is False

By DAVE GRAM , 04.10.09

AP

An internationally known writer and anti-nuclear activist got a warm reception from Vermont lawmakers as she heaped criticism on the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant and the atomic power industry.

But one thing Dr. Helen Caldicott didn't get during a visit to the Statehouse was the meeting she was hoping for with Gov. Jim Douglas. "He needs to be educated," she said.

In Thursday's morning talk to the House and Senate Natural Resources and Energy Committee, Caldicott, an Australian-born pediatrician, took aim at several aspects of nuclear power, including claims that it helps to minimize greenhouse gas emissions.

She spoke of the ill health effects of radiation and long-lasting nature of radioactive materials that are byproducts of nuclear power. And she sharply criticized Vermont Yankee and the nuclear industry for promoting themselves as "green" alternatives to energy sources that use fossil fuels and are heavy emitters of carbon dioxide, a gas blamed for global climate change.

"A nuclear power plant doesn't stand alone. It has to be fueled," Caldicott said in an interview after her legislative testimony. "And there's a huge industrial infrastructure behind a nuclear power plant."

She pointed to a section of her 2006 book, "Nuclear Power Is Not The Answer," which takes aim at a nuclear fuel processing plant in Paducah, Ky., that processes uranium fuel for the U.S. nuclear industry.

She said the Paducah plant, owned by United States Enrichment Corp., uses power equivalent to that produced by two 1,000-megawatt, coal-fired power plants. She said it also uses CFC 114 - a gas used widely in refrigeration until it was banned under an international treaty in 1989 over concerns it was damaging the earth's ozone layer.

Caldicott said the nuclear processing industry was "grandfathered" under that treaty, meaning not subject to the ban, and wrote that the gas "leaks unabated from the hundreds of miles of cooling pipes used in the uranium enrichment operation at Paducah, Kentucky, and its sister facility in Ohio."

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2009/04/10/ap6279079.html

Editorial: Three Mile Island - - Nuclear Challenges

Readers of this blog know the serious issues France's nuclear power industry has presented (and continues to present). We also know of the massive extent of Babcock & Wilcox's continued presence in the nuclear industry in this country and that one of their their huge nuclear facilities is in Lynchburg. We're acutely aware that watch-dog agencies are far more 'dog' than 'watch' and that quite often, their 'watching' is just that...passive observation, not pro-active vision or timely intervention to protect those they are charged with protecting.

We need to remember Three Mile Island and be aware that something similar, or worse, could easily happen here again...we could have our own Chernobyl. It is indeed time for a "brighter idea"...and that idea is alternative, renewable energy. Now. ...SB

Posted on Sun, Mar. 29, 2009

Three Mile Island. The China Syndrome. Thirty years later, it's still hard for some people to separate the reality of the worst nuclear accident in U.S. history from a fictional depiction of an eerily similar event in a popular movie.

In a way, the movie made the after-effects of Three Mile Island worse.

The China Syndrome, starring Jane Fonda, Michael Douglas, and Jack Lemmon, warned what could happen if the core of a power-plant nuclear reactor overheated and melted clear through the earth to Asia. Twelve days after its release, the film almost proved prescient.

On March 28, 1979, Unit 2 at the Three Mile Island plant near Middletown, Pa., overheated. The core began to melt. Toxic gases escaped into the air before the situation was controlled. More than 200,000 nearby residents were evacuated. There were no injuries. No loss of life.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said two million people were likely exposed to low levels of radiation, but that the effects on them and the environment were negligible.

The same could not be said for the nuclear power industry in America. It was crippled by Three Mile Island, which became the rallying cry for activists who had long pointed out the danger in using radioactive material to generate electricity.

But the industry didn't die. In fact, although Unit 2 has remained out of service, Unit 1 at Three Mile Island provides power to Pennsylvania homes and businesses to this day.

The expansion of nuclear power, however, has been stalled nationally, largely on the basis of the justified fear spawned by Three Mile Island and linking it to the possibility of a real "China Syndrome" occurring. Subsequent lesser incidents at other plants have perpetuated that fear.

The utilities that operate nuclear power plants have greatly improved safety procedures since Three Mile Island. Nine months after that event, they banded together to form the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations to share best practices.

But troubling incidents continue to occur; like the security guards caught sleeping at Peach Bottom, or the sabotage discovered at Turkey Point in Florida. These events don't exactly boost confidence in the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the industry's watchdog.

Then there's the overarching concern of the public, that in the 30 years since Three Mile Island, this nation has yet to develop a viable alternative to storing nuclear waste on-site at the power plants.

The Obama administration has indicated that it doesn't support locating a national repository at Yucca Flats, Nevada. But with nuclear energy being touted as a better option to our expensive foreign-oil habit, the waste question must be answered.

Utilities have submitted applications to the NRC to build up to 26 new nuclear reactors, including one at the Bell Bend plant in Luzerne County.

Worldwide, more than 400 reactors are being planned, as other nations also attempt to become less oil-dependent. Even Sweden, which banned any new nuclear power plants after Three Mile Island, has new plants on the drawing board.

Thirty years ago, the rest of the world might have looked to this country at this point. General Electric, Westinghouse, and Babcock & Wilcox were the leaders in building nuclear reactors. But today, it's Electricite de France. Indeed, 75 percent of France's electricity is derived from nuclear power compared with 20 percent in the United States.

France handles its nuclear waste by reprocessing most of it to be used again. That has been resisted here, because it requires separating uranium from plutonium, which could be used to make nuclear weapons.

But if reprocessing isn't the answer, and Yucca Flats is out of the question, so should be new nuclear plants - until someone has a brighter idea.

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/currents/20090329_Editorial__Three_Mile_Island.html

NRC reviews GE Nuclear's NC Uranium Enrichment Plant Proposal

By Jim Brumm,
Wilmington Star-News Correspondent

Published: Tuesday, March 24, 2009 at 6:45 p.m.
Last Modified: Tuesday, March 24, 2009 at 6:45 p.m.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission has begun its review of the laser uranium enrichment plant proposed for GE Nuclear's facilities in Castle Hayne [North Carolina] .

The NRC said Monday its staff has accepted for formal review an environmental report submitted Jan. 30 by General Electric Hitachi Global Laser Enrichment LLC (GLE).

The report is one part of an application for a 40-year license to build and operate a laser-based uranium enrichment facility at the existing General Electric/Global Nuclear Fuels-Americas site near Wilmington, the NRC'S statement explained.

The NRC staff has determined that the report is sufficiently complete to begin a formal technical review, the commission statement continued, noting Global Laser Enrichment has indicated it intends to file the rest of its application by the end of June.

Global Laser Enrichment, a venture owned 51 percent by General Electric, 25 percent by Hitachi and 24 percent by uranium producer Cameco Corp., has not disclosed an expected price for the enrichment plant, one of four proposed to open in the U.S. over the next several years to provide fuel for nuclear power plants.

The plant proposed for Castle Hayne is the only one that would enrich uranium by using lasers, a process the venture has successfully tested and is now seeking to ramp up for commercial production.

The NRC pointed out that the proposed facility would enrich uranium up to an assay level of 8 percent U-235, the isotope crucial for nuclear fission. The enriched uranium would be used in the production of fuel for commercial nuclear power reactors.

http://www.starnewsonline.com/article/20090324/ARTICLES/903244008/1002/NEWS06?Title=NRC-reviews-GE-Nuclear-s-uranium-enrichment-plant-proposal