The Unofficial Guide to Pandora's Promise, a Documentary Film About Nuclear Energy by Robert Stone Premiering in New York City on June 12 and Nationwide on June 14

Editor's Note: Here at NEI, we're keeping a close eye on Pandora's Promise, a documentary film about how many prominent environmentalists have changed their minds about nuclear energy because of concerns about climate change. To see the least, I'm looking forward to seeing the film, but haven't had the opportunity to do so as of yet. 

As we near the official premiere in New York on June 12, I'll be collecting all of the online coverage about the film in this space. Every time I make a major update to the content below, I'll bump this post back to the top of the blog. When I finally see the film myself, I'll write a review of my own that I'll link to below. As always, our readers are an important part of this conversation, so please don't hesitate to send us links and suggestions as to how we might improve our coverage of the film.

In this guide you will find:

• Synopsis
• Official Trailer
• Where to See Pandora's Promise
• Bios of Film's Principals
• Reviews and Other Coverage
• Videos
• Social Media

Synopsis (from the official web site):

Impact Partners and CNN Films present PANDORA’S PROMISE, the groundbreaking new film by Academy-Award®-nominated director Robert Stone. The atomic bomb and meltdowns like Fukushima have made nuclear power synonymous with global disaster. But what if we’ve got nuclear power wrong? An audience favorite at the Sundance Film Festival, PANDORA’S PROMISE asks whether the one technology we fear most could save our planet from a climate catastrophe, while providing the energy needed to lift billions of people in the developing world out of poverty. 

Official Trailer:



Where to See Pandora's Promise:

The film opens in New York City on June 12 at Sunshine Cinema on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Two days later, on June 14, the film will open in an additional 16 cities nationwide (Atlanta, Berkeley, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Irvine, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, St. Louis, Washington, DC) with another five cities being added on June 21 (Austin, Charlotte, Dallas, Portland, Scottsdale). Tickets should also be available online through Fandango and MovieTickets.com. Consult the film's web site for a complete list of theaters. On April 30, 2013, CNN Films announced that it had acquired cable television broadcast rights to the film and intended to air it sometime in November 2013.

Principals:

Robert Stone, Director:

Robert Stone is a multi-award-winning, Oscar-nominated and Emmy-nominated documentary filmmaker. Born in England in 1958, he grew up in both Europe and America. After graduating with a degree in history from the University of Wisconsin/Madison, he moved to New York City in 1983 determined to pursue a career in filmmaking. He gained considerable recognition for his first film, “RADIO BIKINI” (1987) which premiered at Sundance and was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Feature Documentary. Multi-tasking as a producer, director, writer, editor and cameraman, he has over the last 25 years developed a steady international reputation with a range of unique and critically acclaimed feature-documentaries about American history, pop-culture, the mass media and the environment.

Michael Shellenberger, The Breakthrough Institute:

Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger are leading global thinkers on energy, climate, security, human development, and politics. Their 2007 book Break Through was called "prescient" by Time and "the best thing to happen to environmentalism since Rachel Carson's Silent Spring" by Wired. (An excerpt in The New Republic can be read here.) Their 2004 essay, "The Death of Environmentalism," was featured on the front page of the Sunday New York Times, sparked a national debate, and inspired a generation of young environmentalists ...

Stewart Brand, Editor, The Whole Earth Catalog and Co-Chair and President of The Long Now Foundation:

Stewart Brand is co-founder and president of The Long Now Foundation and co-founder of Global Business Network. He created and edited the Whole Earth Catalog (National Book Award), and co-founded the Hackers Conference and The WELL. His books include The Clock of the Long Now; How Buildings Learn; and The Media Lab. His most recent book, titled Whole Earth Discipline, is published by Viking in the US and Atlantic in the UK. He graduated in Biology from Stanford and served as an Infantry officer.

Richard Rhodes, Author, The Making of the Atomic Bomb:

RICHARD RHODES is the author or editor of twenty-four books including The Making of the Atomic Bomb, which won a Pulitzer Prize in Nonfiction, a National Book Award and a National Book Critics Circle Award ...

Gwyneth Cravens, Author, The Power to Save the World: The Truth About Nuclear Energy:

[H]as contributed articles and op-eds on science and other topics to Harper’s Magazine, The New York Times, and The Washington Post. She has published five novels. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in The New Yorker, where she also worked as a fiction editor, and in Harper’s Magazine, where she was an associate editor. She grew up in New Mexico and now lives on eastern Long Island.

Mark Lynas, Environmentalist and Climate Change Activist (also writing a companion book to the film):

[A] frequent speaker around the world on climate change science and policy, focusing in particular on how carbon neutral targets can break the international logjam on climate mitigation, and how emissions reduction should be seen as an opportunity not a sacrifice. He is also a Visiting Research Associate at Oxford University’s School of Geography and the Environment.

Reviews and Other Coverage:

Tim Wu, Slate:

A good, politically charged documentary often seizes on what the audience already believes and throws fuel on the fire (see, e.g., the work of Michael Moore). A better such documentary tries to convince its audience that what it takes for granted is flat-out wrong. Pandora’s Promise, which premiered at Sundance, does just that. It makes the utterly convincing case that anyone who considers themselves an environmentalist or takes climate change seriously should favor more nuclear power.

Kate Briemann, Rolling Stone:

After sifting through the anti-nuclear choruses and the considerably smaller pro-nuclear groups in an attempt to find the truth about the advantages and disadvantages of nuclear energy, Stone found his answer with Michael Shellberger, the president and co-founder of the Breakthrough Institute: "We can have a world living modern lives without killing the climate."

John Anderson, Variety:

Can one be committed to the environment, and still be against nuclear power? Most issue docs are propaganda, and Robert Stone’s latest is a formidable sales pitch for nukes, yet the film’s points are well reasoned and urgent, and should attract viewers who have been drawn to the director’s earlier work(such as “Earth Days,” a history of the environmentalist movement).

Maxine Segarnick, Poughkeepsie Journal:

The film strives to debunk several nuclear myths, such as the reportedly high radiation level and death toll caused by the explosion at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. Environmental activists continue to use Chernobyl as an example of the potential danger of nuclear development. However, the film shows a radioactivity monitor at Chernobyl, as well as at other sites in America and Europe, and demonstrates that the level of radioactivity in Chernobyl in 2012 is nearly identical to that of Central Park in New York City.

Natalie Rooney, VoxTalk:

In a world where most people think nuclear plants are dangerous, Pandora’s Promise challenges viewers to see the benefits of nuclear energy. Despite this daunting challenge, the most admirable aspect of Pandora’s Promise is director Robert Stone’s commitment to presenting both sides of the nuclear energy argument.

Joe Bendel, Libertas:

Stone made his name with the anti-nuclear doc Radio Bikini and would further burnish his green credentials with Earth Days. Very concerned about global warming, Stone could no longer accept the environmental movement’s unrealistic claims about solar and wind power. As his primary POV experts argue, any power plan with a significant wind or solar component will by necessity be heavily dependent on big, dirty fossil fuel plants as a back-up. The simple truth is that the sun does not always shine and the wind does not always blow, but coal burns 24-7.

Stephanie Novak:

Pandora’s Promise has the immensely difficult task of changing people’s mindsets about nuclear energy—a task that became extraordinarily more difficult after the nuclear explosions at the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan. Knowing that the film was in favor of nuclear energy, I was surprised that during the beginning of the documentary, arguments against nuclear energy were explained—I almost thought that I was wrong and that the film might be anti-nuclear energy. But in my opinion, this was one of the strongest points of the film. I thought that by clearly laying out reasons why people would be against nuclear energy ultimately made the film’s pro-nuclear stance stronger, as I understood arguments on both sides of the debate by the time the film finished.

Videos:

Q&A at the IFC Center's Stranger Than Fiction Series (click here for additional interview):


Interview With Ondi Timoner of Bring Your Own Doc:



Robert Stone Interview with GenConnect:


BMI Sundance Composer/Director Roundtable:


Robert Stone and Mark Lynas Interviewed by Tara Hunnewell:


Mark Lynas Interview with Hedgerly Wood Trust:


Social Media:

Follow Pandora's Promise on Twitter and Facebook. Folks on Twitter seem to be using #PandorasPromise to organize conversations around the film. You can also subscribe to the film's YouTube Channel. If you've seen the film already, consider posting your review at the Internet Movie Database. In response to critiques of the film by anti-nuclear activists, Nick Touran, a recent Ph.D. graduate of the nuclear engineering program at the University of Michigan published a defense of the film.

Why Building Too Much Natural Gas Capacity to Generate Electricity Could Come Back to Haunt Florida

NEI VP Richard Myers

About a week ago, the Tampa Bay Times published an analysis by Ivan Penn claiming that ratepayers in Florida would be better served if Duke Energy built a natural gas plant in place of a proposed nuclear energy facility in Levy County. Over the weekend, that same paper published a letter to the editor by NEI's Richard Myers taking issue with that conclusion:

Nuclear plants offer benefits

The May 12 article "Levy nuclear plant more costly than a natural gas facility" fails to account for the economic and environmental benefits the two nuclear plants would bring to Florida. Progress Energy Florida, now Duke Energy Florida, determined in 2008 that the Levy nuclear plants would benefit the state by providing fuel diversity and price stability for consumers while avoiding air emissions.

In 2012, Florida generated 68 percent of its electricity from natural gas, a significant increase from 47 percent in 2008. Floridians may recall that in 2008 and 2009, the state endured its highest-ever electricity costs when natural gas prices were hitting all-time highs. Five years later, Florida relies even more on natural gas.

Just like a diversified financial portfolio is important for investors, so is a diversified energy portfolio for consumers. By relying ever more heavily on natural gas, Florida is putting itself in an increasingly vulnerable position if and when natural gas prices change.

Further, if natural gas plants are built instead of the two Levy nuclear plants, the gas plants will consume nearly 8 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and emit more than 500 million metric tons of carbon dioxide over 60 years.

The Levy nuclear plants will help Florida manage and balance any future that includes changes in carbon regulations and natural gas fuel costs, and an overreliance on any one form of electricity generation.

Richard Myers, vice president, Nuclear Energy Institute

This isn't the first time Richard has addressed this issue. Back in January, he took issue with a piece in the Wall Street Journal that concluded that the natural gas boomlet we're currently experiencing might undo nuclear energy. The key takeaway here: nothing is forever, and that goes double for natural gas prices.

A Boy and His Nuclear Reactor

Taylor Wilson built a fusion reactor at age 14 and remains interested in nuclear technology. So, at 19, he has presented his idea for a small reactor concept that uses molten salt to make the smaller reactor both more powerful and more efficient than their cousins.

Wilson's fission reactor operates at 600 to 700 degrees Celsius. And because the laws of thermodynamics say that high temperatures lead to high efficiencies, this reactor is 45 to 50 percent efficient.

Traditional steam turbine systems are only 30 to 35 percent efficient because their reactors run at low temperatures of about 200 to 300 degrees Celsius.

And Wilson's reactor isn't just hot, it's also powerful. Despite its small size, the reactor generates between 50 and 100 megawatts of electricity, which is enough to power anywhere from 25,000 to 100,000 homes, according to Wilson.

Okay, that’s the hot and powerful part.

And unlike traditional nuclear power plants, Wilson's miniature power plants would be buried below ground, making them a boon for security advocates.

According to Wilson, his reactor only needs to be refueled every 30 years, compared to the 18-month fuel cycle of most power plants. This means they can be sealed up underground for a long time, decreasing the risk of proliferation.

And that’s the small reactor part. Listening to Wilson at the TED conference and reading the details of his idea, I expected to find – more – that is, where this idea departs from earlier ideations of small, molten salt reactors.

For example, here is more-or-less (more, I’d say) the same thing from Transatomic Power.

Enter Transatomic’s molten salt reactor (MSR). …

The safety advantages of this project are mostly features of molten salt reactors in general. Using high boiling-point coolants like fluoride or chloride salts in place of light or heavy water negates the need to pressurize the system and instantly reduces the dangers associated with super-heated, pressurized liquids.

And the article from ExtremeTech points out that molten salt reactors have been contemplated since the 60s.

Researchers have actually had working models of the MSRs since the ’60s [even the 1950s – see here], but they’ve never been used for commercial purposes. One reason is that much of nuclear’s research capital comes from the military, and bulky MSR technology has traditionally been less desirable for submarines and aircraft carriers than their relatively slim light-water cousins. Another is that the plants require a separate facility to filter their core mixture.

So we can allow that Wilson may have some new ideas about the molten salt reactor – how to make it workable at a smaller size, maybe - but it’s hard at present to pin down what they are. Or what would cause the technology to gain traction at this particular time – which I imagine Transatomic would like to do, too.

But none of this is to say that the idea shouldn’t gain traction, or that Taylor has simply reinvented the molten wheel, or that Transtomic and Taylor shouldn’t pursue their ideas – well, to the extent that patents don’t play a role. Right now, it’s all just a curiosity. And that is the point of TED, right?

Guest Post: College Champions Debate Nuclear Energy

Bob Bishop

The following guest post comes from Bob Bishop, nuclear guru and former general counsel at NEI:

Each year, hundreds of university students from around the country participate in local, regional and national debate tournaments. In addition to their regular studies, they spend countless hours researching the topic and how best they can argue their position. The topic for this past year concerned U.S. energy policy with regard to domestic energy production. The precise wording was as follows: “Resolved: The United States Federal Government should substantially reduce restrictions on and/or substantially increase financial incentives for energy production in the United States of one or more of the following: coal, crude oil, natural gas, nuclear power, solar power, wind power.”

At each debate, the two-person team arguing in the affirmative chooses where to focus the argument based on the year’s topic. Under debate rules, the team arguing in the affirmative makes its case, the team arguing the negative makes its case, each team questions the other, and then each team makes its closing statements. It is an hour of focused intellects trying to win the judges’ votes based on their research, presentation skills, and mastery of the topic. Debates at the collegiate level, at least now, are not among nerds mumbling into their notes, but rather bright, intelligent, articulate young men and women happily and forcefully engaging in a battle of wits.

Andrew Arsht and Andrew Markoff

Last week, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) hosted a debate on one narrow aspect of the broader issue of the use of nuclear energy: whether the U.S. Departments of Defense and Energy should fund the development and use of new small modular reactors (SMRs) to power their facilities. Under the rules, that was the sole topic under discussion. It was fascinating to watch two teams ranked among the very best in the nation, a team from Georgetown University opposed a team from Northwestern University, go at it. Teammates Andrew Arsht and Andrew Markoff represented Georgetown arguing in the affirmative, and Northwestern’s team consisted of Peyton Lee and Arjun Vellayappan arguing in the negative. During the course of the give and take in the closely timed segments, each team had to address issues such as the design features of SMRs, the impact of the current sequestration of funds affecting government agencies, the NRC licensingprocess, high-level radioactive waste issues, security at government facilities, terrorist threats, micro-electric grids, and disaster planning. All as they might relate to the government’s potential use of SMRs.

Arjun Vellayappan and Peyton Lee

These are college students. Two juniors, a sophomore, and a senior, and not one of them even an engineering student. Yet their knowledge of the physical, engineering and political environments in which decisions will be made, and facets of the issue far beyond the assigned topic, was remarkable. I’ve had the benefit of almost fifty years of being involved in nuclear energy, first in submarines, then state energy policy, then a major utility, and then the broader nuclear energy industry. I was impressed. 

And don’t even ask about what they know compared to what I knew as a college senior.

I echo Mr. Bishop’s praise for the students. I was impressed by how knowledgeable both teams were. It was heartening that the arguments went beyond the why question, as it signals that these bright minds and future leaders recognize that nuclear has a place in America’s energy mix.

You can watch the full debate on the CSIS YouTube channel.

Can You Make an Ethical Case for Nuclear Energy?

Over the course of the history of NEI Nuclear Notes, I've assiduously avoided sharing coverage from the financial press for a variety of reasons, foremost of which is the fact that we shouldn't be in the business of providing investment advice.

But this morning I'm compelled to share a clip from a U.K. publication called Financial Reporter after I read the following passage in a story by James Howard titled, "Ten reasons to go with ethical investments."

1. They can avoid the negatives. Ethical investment ensures their money isn’t supporting companies which engage in activities they might disapprove of, such as animal testing, deforestation, arms manufacture, or nuclear energy.

Now, I don't want to tell folks who have a beef with nuclear energy how to invest their own money, but I do have a real problem with anyone who tries to make the case that investing -- and by extension working in the nuclear energy industry -- isn't an ethical endeavor. In fact, it's impossible not to feel downright insulted at the suggestion.

Better still. thanks to climate scientist James Hansen, I've got the numbers to back up the emotion (thanks to our friends at Energy Northwest for the cool graphic):

And that's just the start. According to Hansen's projections, the widespread adoption of nuclear energy to replace fossil fuels could save up to 7 million more lives in the next four decades. If that's not an ethical energy choice, I don't know what possibly could be.

Low Carbon Emissions? Look to Nuclear, Hydro

Ceres has produced a new report called Benchmarking Air Emissions, which shows that the electric generating business has done a significant job in reducing a variety of greenhouse gases, notably nitrogen oxide, sulfur dioxide and carbon dioxide. Nuclear energy does not weigh heavily into the report because new nuclear power is still a few years away, so only uprates can have contributed to the report’s profile. Still:

Among the top 100 power producers, Exelon had the eighth lowest CO₂ emissions rate in 2011, largely due to its large nuclear and renewable energy fleet, as well as its investments in nuclear uprates.  Even with a low level of emissions, Exelon reduced its total CO₂ emissions by 32 percent and its CO₂ emission rate by 40 percent between 2000 and 2011.

It’s the “even with a low level of emissions” bit I want to focus on here, because it recognizes that nuclear energy has made a significant contribution.

Southern Company reduced total SO₂ emissions by 63 percent while increasing overall generation by 8 percent between 2000 and 2011 by bringing online approximately 14,000 megawatts of natural gas-fired capacity during the same period.

Those numbers will become even more impressive when the two reactors at Southern Co.’s Plant Vogtle in Georgia go online.

This struck me as interesting, although not in the least counterintuitive:

Based on the latest available data, the report also reveals that Wyoming, Kentucky, West Virginia, Indiana, and North Dakota had the highest CO₂ emissions per megawatt-hour of power produced, while Idaho, Vermont, Washington, Oregon, and Maine had the lowest CO₂ emissions rates.

Of the five with the lowest emissions, Vermont and Washington have nuclear energy facilities, the others do not. Maine, Idaho and Oregon are three of the highest users of renewable energy at about 52 percent, 80 percent and 80.6 percent respectively. (Think hydro here, with wind and/or solar helping out.)

I may have expected nuclear to be a bit more determinative in these rankings, but it’s silly not to realize the prevalence of hydro in some states and regions, notably the Pacific Northwest. Call it an unattractive blind spot. Still, the results are what you want and the great thing about nuclear and hydro both is that they are “elder” technologies, doing the good they do for many years (many, many years in the case of hydro.)

The highest emitters – well, they do not need too much explication. Let give the devil his due, though, and allow that Kentucky, at least, is willing to consider nuclear energy more seriously.

The report itself (you have to provide your email to get it, so caveat emptor) is written in layman’s language and it’s fairly brief at 50 pages.

Here’s how Ceres describes itself:

Ceres is an advocate for sustainability leadership. Ceres mobilizes a powerful network of investors, companies and public interest groups to accelerate and expand the adoption of sustainable business practices and solutions to build a healthy global economy.

Not the most provocative report, but fair and free of cant – even the light nuclear pickup seems right in this context. Ceres performed a good service for its constituency.

Leveling the Board for Nuclear Trade

A letter in the Baltimore Sun suggests the paper  had featured an interesting op-ed recently. First, the letter:

Dan Ervin's commentary on lifting restrictions on U.S. companies supplying nuclear power equipment abroad is completely misleading ("A nuclear opportunity," May 6).

Nuclear energy is not, as Mr. Ervin says, pollutant free or carbon free. Government regulations allow nuclear power plants to deliberately' and routinely emit hundreds of thousands of curies of radioactive gases and other radioactive elements into the environment every day. Radiation cannot be seen, felt or tasted, so I'm wondering if this is why Mr. Ervin feels he can credibly say that nuclear power is pollution free.

Hundreds of thousands – every day? Radiation as pollution? Well, they write letters, don’t they?

But what about Ervin’s editorial?

Companies supplying components for the nuclear power industry are located throughout the United States, including a number in Maryland. These manufacturing firms have developed businesses providing components and equipment required for the maintenance and upkeep of the 104 operating reactors in the U.S. Unfortunately for them, the domestic market is expanding at a very low rate. Currently in the U.S., ground has been broken for five new reactors.

These supplying firms would benefit if allowed to participate in the growing international market. However, presently they have difficulty engaging in the growing international market for nuclear power — and part of the problem lies within our own government.

This really is a topic that has engaged the industry, particularly the segment of it that manufactures parts. Nationalized or semi-nationalized nuclear energy industries – France and Russia are examples - can move quickly to secure contracts to build reactors and supply parts and services. The United States, meanwhile, is hamstrung by the welter of agencies that have to sign off on any attempt by private industry to do so.

It’s not just nationalized industries that get this leg up. For example, South Korea has had considerable success exporting its technology, building the Barakah facility in UAE.

U.S. nuclear export licensing procedures can be needlessly difficult. They are increasingly complex, restrictive and time-consuming for companies to navigate. The U.S. process for getting the appropriate export licenses is divided among three departments (State, Commerce and Energy). Furthermore, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission administers four different sets of associated regulations. By contrast, comparable export licensing in most other countries is handled by one agency.

One runs the risk of sounding like a poor loser, because it sounds as though the nuclear industry is trying to tilt the board to its advantage. But you have to get the board level before you can tilt it – there’s little question that America can be competitive in terms of technology. In terms of all the other elements that make up trade, well, who knows? It would be nice to find out.

Ervin’s conclusion is pretty close to NEI’s.

A faster, straightforward licensing process would give American nuclear companies a chance to compete for this rapidly growing international business. It is not too late to make a change, but something needs to be done now. The potential reward (in economic value, job creation and protection, and tax revenue) makes the international nuclear power business too important to U.S. vital interests to neglect.

Terrific op-ed on a somewhat inside nuclear baseball topic. It inspired a reader to complain, after all.

NEI has some pages that go into more detail on nuclear trade. Go here to get started.

Experts Weigh In: Joseph Mangano Study Hopelessly Flawed

For the nuclear industry, safety is the top priority, and it goes to great lengths to minimize radiation exposure to the public and employees. So exhaustive are these measures that nuclear power plants only account for .1% of the annual radiation that a typical American is exposed to. Nearly half come from medical exposures.

Yet Joseph Mangano seems intent on repeatedly and falsely stating otherwise. Most recently, Mangano published a study that suggests a correlation exists between the closing of Rancho Seco and the decline in cancer rates in the surrounding area. We responded by reminding the media to consider Mangano's lack of credibility when it comes to "scientific findings" before distributing the study to their readers. This week, local Pennsylvania experts came to the same conclusion about his bogus work. An especially compelling statement comes from the state's director of the Bureau of Radiation Protection:

David J. Allard, director of the Pennsylvania Dept. of Environmental Protection’s Bureau of Radiation Protection, oversees nine active nuclear power plants on five sites throughout the state. DEP also oversees licensing for medical, academic, industrial type of sources of radiation including nearly 30,000 pieces of x-ray equipment in facilities, half of which are used by dentists.

“The technical reality with these nuclear power plants is that under the federal regulations, Title 10, Part 50, in the code of federal regulations, these power plants can’t emit liquid and airborne radiation that cause greater than three millirem of radiation,” says Allard.

“We see lots of background (radiation) and it’s only when you have Chernobyl or Fukushima where you actually see material on our samples other than the natural background and some residual fallout from the 50s and 60s. We monitor this and quite honestly at those kinds of levels, it’s really, really difficult to measure.”

According to Allard, radon, chemical exposures, genetics and lifestyles may have more impact on the prevalence of cancer rates.

“The problem is that correlation does not mean causation just because people live next to a power plant,” he says. “People are moving in and out. There are other major sources of radiation exposure that the public gets that really swamp whatever little radiation does come from the nuclear plant. The big one is the medical screenings…In these studies, whether by the NRC or Mr. Mangano, you have to control for those other sources of exposure.”

If his word isn't good enough, check out our past coverage of Mangano's sloppy research (a generous phrase for his work). The fact remains that America's nuclear plants are proven to be safe and continue to operate according to rigorous and comprehensive safety standards.

The State-of-Play of Nuclear Safety After Fukushima

If anything set the table for the American nuclear industry’s response to the accident at Fukushima Daiichi, it was the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. After that event, the security of all essential infrastructure was rethought. For all kinds of power plants, an important issue was keeping them functional after a devastating attack.

What happened at Fukushima was a devastating attack, albeit one without human agency. Because of the 2001 terrorist attack, the American industry was in many ways much better prepared for such an episode than the Japanese industry; still, Fukushima presented new lessons to be learned and new ways to enhance safety. The first lesson: never let a disaster go to waste. It has a lot to teach you.

The industry and the NRC are in broad agreement on the high-priority actions that should be taken at America's reactors. The industry's Fukushima response priority has been to identify those activities that provide maximum tangible safety benefits in the shortest time and implement them first.

That’s Anthony Pietrangelo, NEI’s senior vice president and chief nuclear officer, and he gets right to plant and public safety – “provide maximum tangible safety benefits in the shortest time.” The earthquake in Japan was unpredicted, but the workers at Fukushima Daiichi were already working to bring the reactors offline when the tsunami hit. That swept away the emergency generators and other emergency equipment.

The greatest safety improvement to protect against extreme events, regardless of their cause, comes from the FLEX response strategy that the industry began implementing last year. The heart of this effort is adding more portable, backup safety equipment at each reactor. More than 1,500 pieces of equipment have been acquired or ordered, including portable generators, diesel-driven pumps and satellite phones. The additional portable equipment will provide power and water to maintain key safety functions in the absence of AC power and heat transfer capability from permanently installed safety systems. These functions are reactor core cooling, used fuel pool cooling and containment integrity.

We may say, though, that the Fukushima workers didn’t expect emergency gear to wash away. Though the FLEX equipment is stowed at the facilities in order to prevent being destroyed, what if it were anyway? How do the plant workers deal with that?

In addition to new equipment being placed at all U.S. reactors, the industry is developing regional response centers in Memphis and Phoenix that will serve as dispatch points for additional equipment and resources. The regional response centers will be capable of delivering another full set of portable safety equipment, radiation protection equipment, electrical generators, pumps and other emergency response equipment to an affected site within 24 hours after an extreme event.

Of course, the world came together to offer help to the Japanese as needed and requested. Why not formalize that effort to respond to emergencies here and internationally?

In addition, the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations has upgraded its emergency response center, and the facility is operational. This center will facilitate the sharing of equipment and technical expertise whenever and wherever it is needed. Thus, between the equipment available via the regional response centers and the equipment purchased by each site, the industry will have significantly enhanced its capability to assist any site in an emergency.

INPO is the right venue for this because it already maintains a database of parts available at the various facilities.

Pietrangelo also addresses what the industry and NRC have done to deal with the most frightening aspect of a nuclear energy accident, the potential release of radiation. It is potential rather than inevitable; the goal is to keep it in the former category. The best answer is to install a filtering option well suited to the nature of each facility and the potential threats it faces, but the NRC and regulators in general tend to prefer singular solutions.

One prominent area of industry/NRC interactions of late is the NRC staff recommendation for external, filtered containment vents for boiling water reactors with Mark I and II containments. The Electric Power Research Institute concluded after intensive analysis that filtered vents aren't necessarily the most effective way to filter potential radioactive releases from fuel damage. The industry believes the optimal filtration method should be determined on a plant-specific basis. The NRC's Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards shares that view. The five-member Commission ultimately will decide the future course of action in this area.

If it were just the industry wanting this flexibility, one might conclude that it smells cynically of an industry wanting to go cheap, safety be damned. But no: the approach is probably not, in aggregate, the least expensive way to address filtering, but it acknowledges that a large country provides a range of potential disaster scenarios that are not the same from one to another region. That’s one thing – well, two things. More importantly, other regulatory bodies and watchdogs believe it is the correct approach, too. I’m not sure this quite rises to the level of a contention. We’ll see how it goes.

Pietrangelo makes a simple, strong case for nuclear energy.

Because the long-term fundamentals show a continued, if not growing, need for nuclear energy around the globe, it is paramount that existing facilities are operated safely even as advanced-design reactors are brought to market in the years ahead. Innovation, knowledge transfer, training, and strong safety cultures are among the elements that will define the future ability of nuclear energy technologies to help meet societal needs.

There are a lot of moving parts to this piece, written for Power Engineering. I’ve focused on some key safety points here, but there’s more, including a section on industrial preparedness and another on regulation. The whole thing is worth a careful read if you’re interested in the state of play of post-Fukushima safety planning.

For a little more background, here is NEI’s video on FLEX:

A detailed overview of the nuclear industry's FLEX approach to enhancing safety post Fukushima.