August, 2009

A few news items filter through the hazy days Entergy revives plans for River Bend and Grand Gulf plants Reuters reports that Entergy, the second largest U.S. nuclear utility, is reviving its option to build the River Bend nuclear power plant near St. Fancisville, LA. At the same time the utility said...

You know it don’t come easy The NRC said Aug 12 Entergy’s Indian Point nuclear power station has no safety issues that would stop the agency from issuing a license for it to operate for another 20 years.  The agency issued a Safety Evaluation Report (SER) that contains its formal finding. A review...

Anti-nuclear groups are vulnerable on the cost of replacing nuclear energy with fossil sources A trade association in Vermont is throwing a blazing fast ball at Vermont anti-nuclear groups with a hard edged appeal to businesses and consumers on the issue of the cost of getting electricity to replace...

South Texas Project get challenges about rates and costs The headlong Texas land rush into a future robust with new nuclear reactors, at one time rivaling China in the number of planned new construction projects, could be slowing down.  Elected officials and citizens groups in Texas are asking tough...

Small reactors making news in the Pacific Northwest Greentech Media has coverage of discussions taking place in the Puget Sound region by electric utilities there about the market prospects of small reactors.  A small reactor is defined as one that generates less than 500 MW of electricity. ...

The blog will continue. There will be more content. Readers of this blog, which is now well into its third year of  operation, may have wondered whether the slow down of content this month was just the case of being a summer slacker ?  This blog will continue be be published, and there will...

Transition Power launches an effort to secure an Early Site Permit Transition Power LLC, the illogically secretive and sometimes publically conflicted nuclear energy firm developing the Blue Castle nuclear reactor project, unveiled this week an effort to secure an Early Site Permit for its proposed location...

Cold war policy gives way to commercial contracts Since 1993, half of the commercial nuclear fuel we burned to keep  the lights on in U.S. cities and to run our factories has been blended down from Russian highly enriched uranium ( HEU ) that once lived inside nuclear bombs installed on ICBMs. In...

Early Site Permits point to new hiring The nuclear energy industry has two major growth sectors which should be commanding the attention of job seekers with backgrounds in mechanical, electrical, chemical, and nuclear engineering. The sectors the ramping up of design and construction of new plants and...

Wall Street rating service takes a slap shot at utilities which want to build new reactors Some parts of this blog post were also published in Fuel Cycle Week V8:N339 August 12, 2009, by International Nuclear Associates, Washington, DC Publically traded firms love rating services when they get high ...

New Mexico asks Appeals Court for review of "Indian Country" decision The State of New Mexico has weighed in on the "Indian Country" issue and on the side of the uranium industry.  NM Special Assistant Attorney General Christopher D. Coppin and governor's chief counsel Justin...

American Nuclear Society public affairs specialist says the White House understands it is necessary While some advocates for nuclear energy in the U.S. have tied its future to the development of climate change legislation, an astute participant in the process and observer of all things nuclear thinks...

Safety issues, rates, and even profit sharing are in the mix The toughest jobs in the nuclear industry right now have to be those of the managers of the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant.  Green groups want to shut the plant down, state agencies want to have their say about everything from safety to...

CEO says he’s look at Idaho State Lands Over at the Idaho Statesman reporter Rocky Barker has a piece that indicates there is more confusion about plans by Alternative Energy Holdings Inc. (AEHI) ( OTC:AEHI ) for a new nuclear reactor at a site near Mountain Home, ID , in Elmore County.  Barker...

Three assaults recorded in past two years The Times of India report s that an open source journal published in July 2009 at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point revealed that Pakistan's nuclear weapons facilities have been attacked three times over the past two years.  The incidents, tracked...

Nuclear energy deal still too expensive for Ankara Russia turned up the heat on Turkey this week over a long  running and complex negotiations to build four nuclear reactors for a total of 4,800 MW of electricity generation.  None other than Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin showed up in...

BLM State Office to review environmental assessment Some of this content was also published in Fuel Cycle Week V8:N327 on 07/29/09 by International Nuclear Associates, Washington, DC Two Utah environmental groups have temporarily gained the upper  hand in a dispute over the quality of an environmental...

Despite a gloomy economic outlook in its service area, the utility’s CEO is bullish on the future of nuclear energy Utility CEO’s are not known for exuberance, irrational or not, in talking about the future of an energy technology.  In fact, with the “ prudent investor ” paradigm motivating publically...

Some reactor projects at the front of the line might be better off moving to the back If you add up the number of new reactors with license applications  submitted to the NRC, what you get are way too many projects chasing not nearly enough capital much less sufficient  manufacturing capability...

An new nuclear jobs portal is now publishing exclusive content I’m pleased to announce that I am now posting twice a month at  CoolHandNuke , a new nuclear jobs portal run by Jeff Madison.  Jeff’s background includes work in human resources and recruiting at a major nuclear utility. These blog...