Michele Kearney's Nuclear Wire - Major Energy and Environmental News and Commentary affecting the Nuclear Industry. Nuclear Activities
Thursday, December 29, 2016
EM Update | Vol. 8, Issue 24 | Dec. 29, 2016
Fukushima Update 12/29/16
Government data indicates that F. Daiichi ocean contamination has stopped… Tokyo allows Tepco to freeze the remaining “ice wall” sections… Ten more thyroid anomalies are diagnosed in Fukushima Prefecture… Tokyo District Court says “no” to Tepco’s antinuclear shareholder’s suit to publish nuke accident transcripts.
http://www.hiroshimasyndrome.
10 Energy Surprises In 2017
By Peter Tertzakian, for Oilprice.com. – December 26
There’s less than two weeks left before the 2016 calendar gets tossed.
So for the pundit community it’s time to publish the obligatory list of,
“What to Watch For in in the New Year”. It’s pointless to list the
obvious. For oil and gas, pundits know that things like OPEC compliance,
U.S. rig counts, pipeline angst, and Chinese consumption are on a long
list of standard items that are obligatory to parse from our cluttered
news feeds. But what are the nascent items that could lead to
unforgiving surprises? “When everyone looks to the right, it’s time to
look left,” is an adage I always go by. So for 2017 here is a 10-item
listicle that won’t be in the mainstream, but may be worthy of the left
shoulder.
Read on...http://www.theenergycollective.com/staffjam/2395422/10-energy-surprises-in-2017
Siemens Supplies Battery Storage System to Energy Provider in Wunsiedel
Siemens has received an order from the energy provider SWW Wunsiedel
GmbH to supply and install a battery storage system. The Siestorage
system is based on lithium-ion batteries and has a capacity of more than
6 megawatts. The storage system, which will be connected to the
distribution grid, will enable the company to participate in the primary
control reserve market. "Energy stores, such as our Siestorage model,
are an important building block of the energy transition," says Dr.
Frank Büchner, who heads the Energy Management Division in Germany.
"Together with SWW Wunsiedel GmbH, we are helping to further stabilize
the grids in Germany." The energy provider and Siemens have agreed on a
ten-year financing model. Commissioning is scheduled for 2018.
The large storage system from Siemens consists of three containers with
lithium-ion cells, one container with the inverters, a concrete station
with the transformers and the control system. The power supplied by the
storage system will provide the higher-level transmission grid with
short-term support. Distributed power supply is increasing as part of
Germany’s transition to a new energy mix. Integrating more and more
renewable energy sources into the grids causes the volatility to
increase, the base load to decrease, the medium- and top-capacity demand
to grow and power surpluses to occur with increasing frequently. The
grid operators need reserve power to establish a balance between
generation and consumption at all times. The function of the primary
control reserve is to immediately balance out unforeseen fluctuations
and short-term load changes in the transmission grid. Energy
stores are generally better suited to this task since they can respond
in seconds, unlike the sluggish conventional power plants. All of the
offered power must be available within 30 seconds in order to maintain
the normal frequency of 50 Hertz and prevent a blackout. Transmission
grid operators purchase the primary control reserve they need on a
market basis with weekly invitations to bid.
"Installing the battery storage system is an important part of the
'WUNsiedler Weg – Energie' road map of SWW Wunsiedel GmbH", says Marco
Krasser, Managing Director of SWW Wunsiedel GmbH. With this road map,
the company has already built a number of innovative power generation
plants, thus proving that it is financially possible to cover energy
demand with purely renewable and locally available energy sources. In
the next step. the region is to be developed as part of Vision 2030 into
a service area that can operate in isolation and thus autonomously in
an emergency.
For further information on Division Energy Management, please see www.siemens.com/energy-
For further information on Siestorage, please see www.siemens.com/siestorage
Exxon, Qatar Petroleum Get OK to Export U.S. Fracked Gas Amidst Tangled Ties to Russia, ISIS
By Steve Horn
for DeSmog Blog. – December 27
Just days before Christmas, the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission (FERC) gave ExxonMobil a gift: a permit to export natural gas
from its Golden Pass LNG (liquefied natural gas) facility located in
Sabine Pass, Texas. Dubbed Golden Pass Products, the expansion of this
LNG facility to export gas is a joint venture between Exxon (30 percent
stake) and Qatar Petroleum (70 percent stake), the state-owned oil
company. Golden Pass LNG is now the fourth LNG export facility, and
third situated along the Gulf of Mexico, approved under the Obama
administration. This facility will continue to open up the global market
to U.S. natural gas obtained via hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”). The
permit for Golden Pass comes shortly after Exxon’s CEO, Rex Tillerson,
was named Trump’s nominee for U.S. Secretary of State and will likely
face a tough Senate confirmation hearing in January, mainly due
to his close ties to Russia. Read on...http://www.theenergycollective.com/desmog/2395438/exxon-qatar-petroleum-get-ok-to-export-u-s-fracked-gas-amidst-tangled-ties-to-russia-isis
Russia Sees South Africa as a Potentially Lucrative Market for Nuclear Power Plants
By Rod Adams, publisher of the Atomic Insights blog and produce of The Atomic Show Podcast. – December 26
Rosatom, the Russian state-owned conglomerate that is building nuclear
power plants in Russia and around the world, has confirmed that it is
closely monitoring the public discussion that is taking place in South
Africa over the newly released integrated energy plan. South Africa’s
draft energy plan isn’t being presented to the public as a fait
accompli. Instead, the draft provides information about several likely
scenarios, all of which would include the 9.6 GWe of new nuclear plant
capacity described in the 2010 version of the plan. There is some
variation in the timing for the completion of the first new units
depending on selected strategies for optimizing costs and balancing
completion delays against the increased quantities of pollutants that
would be emitted by delaying the introduction of new nuclear. In the
base case, the first new nuclear plant would be starting by 2026 with
the first tranche of a continuing construction program being completed
by the early to mid 2030s. In that base case, nuclear energy would
provide 29.5 GWe by 2050. All of the capacity would have to come from
plants that are not yet built. South Africa’s only operating nuclear
units were completed in the second half of the 1980s and are not
expected to still be operating in 2050. Read on...http://www.theenergycollective.com/rodadams/2395423/russia-sees-south-africa-as-a-potentially-lucrative-market-for-nuclear-power-plants
Fast Reactors are Alive and Kicking
By Ian Hore-Lacy, for Energy Post. – December 23
Anti-nuclear campaigner Jim Green declared in Energy Post recently that
fast reactors are dying a slow death. He used a lot of information from
the World Nuclear Association to support his argument. It is good to
see that he does not take issue with anything we have published in our
information papers. However, he is selective. For example, he makes too
much of countries backpedalling on the technology due to the effect of
abundant low-cost uranium likely to last to mid century, even with
substantially increased demand from conventional reactors. He also
points to the sort of technical and other failures that can be expected
with any innovative technology. So, let me set out the main elements of
the fast neutron reactor (FNR) picture as I see it, which is much more
positive than Green’s vision. When the first fast reactors were built
and operated in the 1960s-70s, a shortage of uranium
was feared, and this drove policy to utilize that uranium much more
fully. We now know that uranium is abundant, and can be recovered
economically from low-grade ores. Today the development of FNRs is
justified rather by the desire to burn long-lived actinides from used
light water (conventional) reactor fuel. Read on...http://www.theenergycollective.com/energy-post/2395377/fast-reactors-are-alive-and-kicking
NRC’s Work in Progress on Public Meetings
NRC’s Work in Progress on Public Meetings
http://ansnuclearcafe.org/2016/12/28/nrcs-work-in-progress-on-public-meetings/#sthash.TH5iFtPX.LulgHY4y.dpbs
Toshiba's Radioactive M&A Blunder
Toshiba's Radioactive M&A Blunder
http://www.topix.com/energy/nuclear-energy/2016/12/toshibas-radioactive-m-a-blunder?fromrss=1
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