November 23, 2011
12:48 pm EDT
Industry/Regulatory/Political
- Japan’s Diet passed legislation to provide $156 billion in disaster reconstruction aid, the third time since the March earthquake that legislators have approved supplemental funding. Of the total, $3 billion is earmarked to fund radiation decontamination efforts, with the majority of the money to be used to rebuild areas devastated by the earthquake and tsunami and to help companies build new manufacturing plants.
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November 22, 2011
11:10 am EDT
Fort Calhoun During Spring Floods
For much of the summer, the Fort Calhoun nuclear energy facility in Nebraska was an island in the middle of a vastly swollen Missouri River. An unexpectedly large spring runoff from the mountains to its north and higher-than-average rainfall during the spring caused extreme flooding in portions of Nebraska and Missouri.
Fort Calhoun remained dry. The highest water in the unprecedented flood was below the level that the Fort Calhoun reactor is designed to withstand.
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November 21, 2011
4:31 pm EDT
Industry/Regulatory/Political
- The Japanese cabinet has approved “basic policies” to clean up radioactive contamination resulting from the Fukushima Daiichi accident. Based on recommendations made in 2007 by the International Commission on Radiological Protection, areas contaminated to dose levels within two rem per year above background will be cleaned up to reduce adult doses by 50 percent within two years and 60 percent for children, and to a long-term level of 0.1 rem/year above background radiation levels. Two rem is about the same amount of radiation exposure a patient would receive from a full body CT scan. Areas where the annual dose levels are above two rem/year will be given priority in scheduling decontamination activities.
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November 18, 2011
2:48 pm EDT
Plant Status
- Water temperatures inside the Fukushima Daiichi reactor pressure vessels remain below boiling as operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. reports on progress toward stabilizing the damaged reactors. The company expects to reach what it calls a “cold shutdown condition” in the three reactors by the end of the year, with temperatures below 212 F and radiation contained. The exact status of the fuel in the reactors is not known. But if damaged fuel has leaked from the reactors into the primary containments, however, TEPCO said “it is sufficiently cooled to suppress steam from being generated and [the] accompanying release of radioactive materials.” Radiation measured at the site boundary is 10 millirem per year, one-tenth of the government safety limit. The circulating reactor cooling systems continue to function, as pumps maintain the total volume of accumulated water on the site at a level that can withstand heavy rain or an extended outage of processing facilities.
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November 16, 2011
5:16 pm EDT
Industry/Regulatory/Political
- Shikoku Electric Power Co. has submitted the results of first-phase stress tests for its Ikata Unit 3 reactor to the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency. The results show Ikata 3 could withstand an earthquake with ground acceleration 1.9 times as strong as the reactor’s design basis and a 47-foot tsunami, four times its design basis. Shikoku Electric is the second utility to submit a stress test result after Kansai Electric did so for its Ohi Unit 3 reactor Oct. 28. Read More »
Through its relentless commitment to the pursuit of excellence in operations, the U.S. nuclear industry is taking significant action to ensure that each of the nation’s 104 nuclear plants operate safely and securely.
NEI’s
interactive graphic explains the U.S. nuclear fuel process from mining to storage.
In 2011, U.S. nuclear plants responded to a series of natural events, including record-breaking storms and an historic East Coast earthquake.
Safe, clean, reliable electricity to power America.