June, 2011

AREVA DZ, LLC, a joint venture of AREVA and Day & Zimmerman ECM, has signed agreements with Entergy Nuclear for future upgrades at all nine Entergy nuclear plant sites. The five-year agreements include full-scope Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) services for capital projects to upgrade the sites for future operations. Entergy’s nuclear fleet includes Pilgrim, Vermont Yankee...

A city-park-sized barge towed to the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan has been put into service for the first time to store water with low levels of radioactivity. Quoting Tokyo Electric Power Co. officials, Japan Today recently reported that crews have started to transfer 8,000 metric tons of water from turbine buildings at units 5 and 6. Their reactors were not damaged...

The U.S. Coast Guard pulled three Ohio men from Lake Erie Tuesday after their disabled boat was pushed into a breakwater near the Perry nuclear plant. A Coast Guard news release cited by the News Herald newspaper said a rescue boat found the men just after 3 p.m. By that point, waves were pounding their disabled 28-foot boat into the rocks near the plant, located 35 miles northeast...

The Department of Energy (DOE) today awarded a contract to CH2M Hill-B&W West Valley of Englewood, Colorado, for the Phase I Decommissioning and Facility Disposition activities at the West Valley Demonstration Project (WVDP). The contract is a performance-based, cost-plus-award-fee, completion type contract with cost and schedule incentives. The total contract value is $333.4 million.

The Quince robot was developed by Chiba Institute of Technology for nuclear and biological disaster relief activity. This robot was used in Unit 2 to set up a gauge to measure the contaminated water pooling in the basement.

Crews have restarted a system to decontaminate and reuse water for core cooling at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant after another set of leaks forced it to shut down. Fukushima's new treatment system started recirculating decontaminated water into reactor cores on Monday only to stop 90 minutes later because of a leaky joint. Agence France Press quoted TEPCO as saying...

A forest fire adjacent to the Los Alamos National Laboratory prompted an evacuation of the 11,000-employee lab Tuesday. LANL announced it has suspended research and closed the site to all nonessential employees through at least Thursday. CNN reported the Los Conchas fire has burned more than 61,000 acres since it started Sunday, and it has reached the southern border of the lab property...

Westinghouse today welcomed the announcement from the UK nuclear safety regulator that the “Regulatory Issue” connected with the design of the company’s AP1000 nuclear plant had been lifted. This move clears a significant obstacle on the pathway towards Design Acceptance Confirmation by the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) that is currently assessing the AP1000 reactor as part...

Xcel Energy officials today welcomed the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s renewal of operating licenses for Prairie Island Nuclear Generating Plant units 1 and 2 for 20 years. The NRC issued the renewed licenses Monday. The original licenses had been set to expire in 2013 and 2014.

Tokyo Electric Power Co. faces new accusations that it withheld critical information from regulators in the early hours of the Fukushima Daiichi crisis, including the likely presence of hydrogen that caused explosions in reactor buildings. A report from the country's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says TEPCO detected 290 millisieverts of radiation per hour in unit 1 - indicative...

While neighboring Germany backs off its use of nuclear power, French President Nicolas Sarkozy has announced that his country will invest 1 billion euros ($1.43 billion) in the technology in coming years. That funding includes a substantial portion for fourth-generation reactor development. He also promised further funding for nuclear safety research and 1.3 billion euros ($1.86 billion...

Constellation Energy Nuclear Group, LLCSM (CENG) announced leadership changes Friday at its R.E. Ginna Nuclear Power Plant, located in Ontario, N.Y., including Joe Pacher as Site Vice President and Sonny Dean as Plant General Manager (PGM). Pacher replaces John Carlin, who is leaving the company for another job.

Progress Energy Florida has provided an update to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the Florida Public Service Commission (FPSC) regarding the status of its Crystal River Nuclear Plant. Based on an initial review, the company believes that repairing the unit is the best option, and is taking steps to complete more detailed engineering and construction analyses. At this time, the company estimates...

In what could be a major step forward at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, Tokyo Electric Power Co. has started using treated water from plant basements for core cooling. For more than a week, engineers have struggled to overcome leaks and higher-than-expected radiation accumulation in a water filtration system installed at the plant. Designed by Areva, Veolia and Kurion...

A water-filled berm at the Fort Calhoun nuclear plant deflated Sunday, the Omaha Public Power District reported. Apparently punctured by heavy equipment operating nearby, the berm was among several barriers protecting plant buildings from extreme flood conditions on the adjacent Missouri River. The plant remained under an unusual event declaration, the lowest of the Nuclear Regulatory...

A remote-controlled aircraft monitoring the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan lost power today, making an emergency landing on top of a reactor building. Bloomberg quoted a Tokyo Electric Power Co. spokesman as saying the 18-pound drone engineered by Honeywell is on top of unit 2, but that it likely did not damage the building.

GE-Hitachi's reaffirmed its fall forecast for regulatory approval of its new boiling water reactor with the close of the public comment process earlier this month. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has determined that only three of the comments received must be addressed in its final rulemaking for the Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor . After the agency granted the ESBWR...

Westinghouse Electric Company has developed and implemented a passive thermal shutdown seal that protects a nuclear plant's reactor core by preventing loss of reactor coolant system water inventory should an event occur that causes a loss of all reactor coolant pump (RCP) seal cooling. The SHIELD® passive thermal shutdown seal is a fail-safe protection that requires no operator action, power...

The limited success of a new water treatments system and Tuesday's start to the rainy season have prompted Tokyo Electric Power Co. to reduce the amount of water it is injecting into damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. TEPCO said it has reduced the amount of water injected into units 1 and 2 at the plant by half a metric ton per day. As of Tuesday, 3.5 tons...

Following an outage brought on by April's tornado outbreak across the South, Virginia's Surry nuclear plant briefly restarted its unit 2 reactor but took the unit offline again Monday after detecting a problem in its cooling system. Dominion Virginia Power operators restarted unit 2 last Thursday, bringing the unit up to nearly full power by Monday afternoon. It had been offline...

Drawing further scorn from Japanese regulators, Tokyo Electric Power Co. has said it cannot find a number of subcontractor employees who worked at the Fukuhsima Daiichi nuclear plant in the early days of the crisis. The utility recently checked the radiation exposure of nearly all of the 3,639 people who worked at the site between the station blackout and March 31, but TEPCO said 69 could...

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission recently found that Ur Energy's Lost Creek uranium recovery project will have no environmental impacts that preclude its licensing. A final supplemental environmental impact statement indicated the plans would have only small or moderate environmental impacts -- a finding that paves the way for regulatory approval of uranium recovery and in-situ...

Radiation readings at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant grounds were unchanged Monday after workers opened the doors to reactor unit 2. The doors were opened gradually between Sunday night and Monday morning, Japan time, to minimize airborne dust. Readings on plant grounds afterward did not show a rise in radiation, the Asahi Shimbun reported. (Photo: Partially opened airlock...

Westinghouse announced Monday that it will soon begin shipping fuel to Tennessee's Watts Bar unit 2 – scheduled to be the first U.S. reactor to come online in 15 years. According to a Westinghouse release, fuel from the company's Columbia, S.C., fuel fabrication facility will ship between June and August, with fuel loading expected to begin next year.

Water filters expected to last a month accumulated excessive radiation levels after only five hours this weekend at Japan's severely damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. After recovering from delays last week, Tokyo Electric Power Co. again suspended operation of the new water filtration system Saturday. At issue are cartridges that use chemical processes to separate radioactive...