Members Login
Username 
 
Password 
    Remember Me  
Post Info TOPIC: U.S. nuclear industry on track for revival
10kBq jaro

Date:
U.S. nuclear industry on track for revival


NUCLEONICS WEEK NOVEMBER 18, 2004
U.S. nuclear industry on track for revival in next decade, officials say
There can be meaningful growth in U.S. nuclear power during the next 10
years, several speakers stressed this week at an American Nuclear Society (ANS)
meeting, saying that at least one advanced reactor was expected to be
operating or about to operate in 2014.
DOE is hopeful NRC will be ready to issue early site permits (ESP) in 2006,
according to William Magwood, who heads the DOE office of nuclear energy.
His office’s cost-share programs are helping shepherd utilities through
NRC’s new ESP and combined construction and operating license (COL)
processes. Dominion Nuclear, Entergy, and Exelon are seeking ESPs for possible
use at the utilities’ North Anna, Grand Gulf, and Clinton reactor sites, respectively.
"If there are new nuclear power plants in the U.S. in the next decade, it
will be because of the COL program," Magwood said. Last week DOE awarded
a total of $13-million in fiscal 2004 funds to two utility-led COL teams.
Dominion received $9-million and the multicompany consortium NuStart
Energy Development LLC, $4-million (NW, 11 Nov., 1). The awards were
made using the balance of the FY-04 funding for DOE’s Nuclear Power 2010
program, which involves the ESP and COL efforts.
The difference between the Dominion and NuStart
funding reflects the amount of work that needs to be done
now, Magwood told Nucleonics Week. The total cost of
each team’s project has been estimated at $500-million,
which involves both federal and private-sector money.
The Nuclear Power 2010 program earlier awarded $4.2-
million to a Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA)-led team for a
cost and schedule study on building an ABWR on TVA’s
Bellefonte site in Alabama. The federal utility is trying to
keep its options open and has not yet committed to pursuing
a COL, said Jack Bailey, TVA senior vice president of
power resources and operations planning.
In a telephone interview, Bailey said TVA hoped to complete
the study, as well as a business model for a new reactor,
in May 2005. Next fall, he said, TVA will decide whether
to pursue a COL. If TVA proceeds, it also must decide
whether it will move forward with General Electric’s ABWR,
or one of the designs being examined by NuStart—GE’s
ESBWR or Westinghouse’s AP1000.
A third option involves the existing partially built reactors
at TVA’s Bellefonte site, work on which has been
deferred since the 1980s. At a time when vendors are offering
turnkey plants, the completion of reactors using old
technology seems unlikely.
The move toward advanced reactors and other advanced
nuclear technologies is a turnaround from 1998, when
DOE’s nuclear energy research and development budget was
zero, according to Magwood. In 1998, "people were saying
deregulation would make it impossible for anyone to build a
new reactor," Magwood said.
DOE’s new Idaho National Laboratory (INL), which the
department wants to be its centerpiece for nuclear energy
R&D, will feature an updated advanced test reactor, said
John Grossenbacher, who will head INL contractor Battelle
Energy Alliance as the new lab’s director. Grossenbacher was
part of a panel at the ANS winter meeting in Washington,
D.C. that assessed the outlook for U.S. nuclear power during the next 10 years.
INL will combine the existing Idaho National
Engineering & Environmental Laboratory and Argonne
National Laboratory-West, which shares the site. Though
DOE’s goal is for INL to be the leading nuclear energy R&D
facility, nuclear research also will continue at other DOE
labs. The laboratory has memoranda of understanding with
four other national labs, Grossenbacher said.
Several speakers pointed to the advanced fuel cycle work
that will be continued under INL that is aimed, in part, at
the development of proliferation-resistant fuel, and strong
nonproliferation measures as important prerequisites for
growth in the nuclear power sector. The detonation of a
dirty bomb or other nuclear device anywhere in the world
would jeopardize that growth, they said.
If the DOE repository project at Yucca Mountain, Nev.
were to be "derailed," new nuclear power plants also might
be derailed, Magwood said.
Nuclear Energy Institute Senior Vice President Marvin
Fertel noted that additional environmental requirements
were likely to be imposed on fossil-fueled plants during the
next 10 years and that those requirements would increase
the asset value of power reactors.
The nuclear waste disposal facility planned for Yucca
Mountain would be licensed and operating 10 years from
now, Fertel said. DOE has targeted 2010 for the start of operations
at Yucca Mountain, though the program faces several
potential stumbling blocks that some sources believe could jeopardize that date.
In addition, Fertel said that Nevada, which has spent
decades fighting the disposal facility, probably would be
more constructively engaged in the repository program 10
years from now and would be receiving benefits from the
federal government as compensation for being the repository site.
Though Nevada state officials have continued to oppose
any state benefit negotiations with DOE, claiming that
would be seen as their acceptance of a facility they consider
unsafe, benefit negotiations have gained some support in
rural counties on the local level.—Elaine Hiruo, Washington

__________________
Page 1 of 1  sorted by
 
Quick Reply

Please log in to post quick replies.

Tweet this page Post to Digg Post to Del.icio.us


Create your own FREE Forum
Report Abuse
Powered by ActiveBoard