NuScale:
smaller nuclear reactor company in Corvallis
Governor Kitzhaber, Senators Wyden and Merkley, Representatives Blumenauer, DeFazio, Walden, Schrader and Bonamici supported subsidies for NuScale nuclear power
NuScale reactors would be "mini" nukes, 45 megawatts instead of close to a thousand. However, NuScale is designing them to be clustered in 12 packs, which would be about 540 megawatts, approaching "full size" nuke generation. These mini nukes are marketed as meltdown proof, but even if that is true (and it's not) there are still the unsolvable problems of uranium mine tailings (lethal for eons) and nuclear waste on the back side of the reactor fuel cycle.
In 2019, Eugene Weakly finally ran a full story about NuScale but did not interview opponents, an odd omission for a paper whose image is ultra "woke" about ecological and "social justice" concerns. The article mentioned there was a Republican State Senator (singular) who championed NuScale.
In reality, the State Senate voted almost unanimously in 2017 to gut a 1980 ballot measure that outlaws new nukes in Oregon so long as nuclear waste remains unsolvable. But if the Weakly had mentioned this it would have been harder to blame pro-NuScale efforts as solely sponsored by Republicans.
In 2013, the entire Oregon Congressional delegation praised the Obama subsidy for NuScale: 2 Democratic US Senators, 4 Democratic Representatives and 1 Republican Representative. It is likely if Oregon's federal representation was Republican the Democratic funded environmental groups might be more free to suggest starting a new nuclear industry is a dumb idea.
"The most intolerable reactor of all may be one which comes successfully to the end of its planned life having produced mountains of radioactive waste for which there is no disposal safe from earthquake damage or sabotage." We are constantly being told about "a permissible amount of radiation." Who permitted it? Who has any right to permit it? Dr. John Gofman, M.D., Ph.D., Manhattan Project veteran, first biomedical director of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory: "My particular combination of scientific credentials is very handy in the nuclear controversies, but advanced degrees confer no special expertise in either common sense or morality. That's why many laymen are better qualitfied to judge nuclear power that are the so-called experts." "People like myself and a lot of the atomic energy scientists in the late fifties deserve Nuremberg trials. At Nuremberg we said those who participate in human experimentation are committing a crime. Scientists like myself who said in 1957, "Maybe Linus Pauling is right about radiation causing cancer, but we don't really know, and therefore we shouldn't stop progress," were saying in essence that it's all right to experiment. Since we don't know, let's go ahead. So we were experimenting on humans, weren't we? But once you know that your nuclear power plants are going to release radioactivity and kill a certain number of people, you are no longer committing the crime of experimentation--you are committing a higher crime. Scientists who support these nuclear plants--knowing the effects of radiation--don't deserve trials for experimentation; they deserve trials for murder. . . ." "Licensing a nuclear power plant is in my view, licensing random premeditated murder. First of all, when you license a plant, you know what you're doing--so it's premeditated. You can't say, "I didn't know." Second, the evidence on radiation-producing cancer is beyond doubt. I've worked fifteen years on it [as of 1982], and so have many others. It is not a question any more: radiation produces cancer, and the evidence is good all the way down to the lowest doses." www.ratical.org/radiation/inetSeries/nwJWG.html |
Obama Administration awards $226 million federal subsidy for NuScale
http://energy.gov/articles/energy-department-announces-new-investment-innovative-small-modular-reactor
Energy Department Announces New Investment in Innovative Small Modular Reactor
December 12, 2013 - 4:04pm
NEWS MEDIA CONTACT
(202) 586-4940
WASHINGTON – Building on President Obama’s Climate Action Plan to continue America’s leadership in clean energy innovation, the Energy Department today announced an award to NuScale Power LLC to support a new project to design, certify and help commercialize innovative small modular reactors (SMRs) in the United States. This award follows a funding opportunity announcement in March 2013. View a new Energy Department infographic on small modular reactors and their potential to provide clean, safe and cost-effective nuclear energy.
"Small modular reactors represent a new generation of safe, reliable, low-carbon nuclear energy technology and provide a strong opportunity for America to lead this emerging global industry," said Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz. "The Energy Department is committed to strengthening nuclear energy’s continuing important role in America's low carbon future, and new technologies like small modular reactors will help ensure our continued leadership in the safe, secure and efficient use of nuclear power worldwide."
This project represents a significant investment in first-of-a-kind engineering and design certification for small modular reactors in the United States. Through a five-year cost-share agreement, the Energy Department will invest up to half of the total project cost, with the project’s industry partners matching this investment by at least one-to-one. The specific total will be negotiated between the Energy Department and NuScale and will be derived from the total $452 million identified for the Department’s Small Modular Reactor Licensing Technical Support program.
The Energy Department investment will help NuScale obtain Nuclear Regulatory Commission design certification and achieve commercial operation around 2025, while providing innovative and effective solutions for enhanced reactor safety, operations and performance. The Energy Department’s cooperative agreements require that the reactors be built domestically – strengthening American manufacturing capabilities and creating important export opportunities for the United States. The project will be based in Oregon and will support additional suppliers and operations in California, Idaho, Washington, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Virginia, Kansas, Texas and Maryland.
Small modular reactors – which are approximately one-third the size of current nuclear power plants – have compact, scalable designs that are expected to offer a host of safety, construction and economic benefits. The Energy Department is seeking small modular reactor designs that can be made in factories and transported to sites where they would be ready for installation upon arrival. The smaller size could reduce both capital costs and construction times – helping to provide U.S. utilities with more nuclear energy options and support new low-carbon capacity for small electric grids and locations that cannot support the traditional large reactor designs.
Find more information on the important steps the Energy Department is taking to jumpstart America’s nuclear industry and support clean energy innovation at www.energy.gov/ne.
Energy Department to Give $226 Million to Support Nuclear Reactor Design
By MATTHEW L. WALD
Published: December 12, 2013WASHINGTON — The Energy Department will give a small company in Corvallis, Ore., up to $226 million to advance the design of tiny nuclear reactors that would be installed under water, making meltdown far less likely and opening the door to markets around the world where the reactors now on the market are too big for local power grids.
The company, NuScale Power, has made substantial progress in developing “an invented-in-America, made-in-America product that will export U.S. safety standards around the world,” Peter B. Lyons, the assistant secretary for nuclear energy, said in an interview. For supplying electricity without global warming gases and for providing the United States with a new export product, the reactor had “immense global and national importance,” he said.
The award is the second of two under a $452 million, multiyear program to assist in the development of “small modular reactors,” which would be built in American factories, potentially improving quality and cutting costs, and delivered by truck. The first award, in November 2012, went to Babcock & Wilcox, which formerly sold full-scale reactors. Its small model, called mPower, is a step ahead of NuScale’s because it has a preliminary agreement with a customer, the Tennessee Valley Authority. ....
[note: Babcock & Wilcox built Three Mile Island.]
Both Oregon Senators and all five Representatives shill for NuScale
Wyden, Ore. delegation back company's pitch for DOE's small modular reactor grants
Hannah Northey, E&E reporter
Published: Friday, August 2, 2013
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chairman Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and the rest of the Oregon congressional delegation this week threw their support behind NuScale Power LLC's pitch to build small modular reactors.
NuScale is pushing a 45-megawatt reactor design and competing with manufacturing behemoth Westinghouse Electric Co. and Holtec International Inc., which provides parts for more than 80 U.S.
commercial reactors, for a portion of the Energy Department's $452 million grant program.The agency last year awarded veteran reactor designer Babcock & Wilcox an undisclosed amount -- that the company will match -- to develop and license scalable, underground nuclear modules at the Clinch River site in Oak Ridge, Tenn. (Greenwire, Nov. 21, 2012).
Wyden and other lawmakers in a letter to Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz touted NuScale's design and said the company has already contracted with domestic suppliers in 37 states.
NuScale this week also teamed up with Rolls Royce. Fluor Corp., a global construction firm with experience building nuclear plants, also holds a stake in NuScale.
"Rolls-Royce has more than 50 years of nuclear heritage and this provides deep technical experience, state-of-the-art manufacturing support and access to world-class engineering for NuScale to advance its design through licensing to commercialization," John Hopkins, NuScale's CEO, said in a statement.
Western Governors, including Kitzhaber, promote nuclear power and NuScale after Fukushima multiple meltdowns
"I applaud today’s announcement of the coalition to help develop and deploy NuScale Powe’s small modular nuclear reactors," said Governor John Kitzhaber of Oregon. "This carbon-free generation technology originated in the labs of Oregon State University and NuScale currently employs 250 people in Portland and Corvallis, showing how Oregon-based ingenuity is once again at the forefront of energy innovation."
[note: nuclear power requires tremendous fossil fuel inputs for the nuclear fuel cycle, nuclear radiation causes cancers and genetic damage, and there is no way to detoxify nuclear wastes except the passage of time, lots of it. Nuclear power makes climate change worse through heat generation and requirements to use fossil fuels to make and operate reactors.]
www.nuscalepower.com/westerninitiative.aspx
NuScale Power Begins Nuclear Initiative with Governors and Utilities in Western U.S. States
In June 2013, NuScale Power, LLC, announced the launch of the Western Initiative for Nuclear (Project WIN) —a broad, multi-western state collaboration — to study the demonstration and deployment of a multi-module NuScale Small Modular Reactor (SMR) plant in the Western United States. A NuScale SMR built as part of Project WIN is projected to be operational by 2024.
Project WIN is viewed as the initial demonstration project for a potential series of projects that may be developed in other states. The first NuScale plant will most likely be developed, built and owned by a consortium of regional utilities like Project WIN, and operated by one of these utilities with a preferred location within the Idaho National Laboratory Site.
The Project WIN initiative was unveiled by NuScale’s Chairman and CEO John Hopkins and Chief Commercial Officer Mike McGough along with number of key stakeholders at the Western Governors’ Association annual meeting held in Park City, Utah. Also, at the WGA meeting, the governors announced a 10-year energy vision which included as one of its goals, finding ways to accelerate the introduction of small modular reactors into the commercial marketplace. In announcing the goals and objectives of the plan, WGA Chairman and Governor of Utah, Gary Herbert heralded SMR’s as an important hope for the future energy needs of the west.
A number of Western governors commented on NuScale’s Project WIN announcement:
“The technology of small modular reactors holds real promise for cleanly and safely addressing long-term energy needs in the West,” Idaho Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter said. “I’m pleased that western governors are engaging with industry to realize that promise.”
"I applaud today’s announcement of the coalition to help develop and deploy NuScale Power’s small modular nuclear reactors,” said Governor John Kitzhaber of Oregon. “This carbon-free generation technology originated in the labs of Oregon State University and NuScale currently employs 250 people in Portland and Corvallis, showing how Oregon-based ingenuity is once again at the forefront of energy innovation."
“As the home of our country’s largest nuclear power plant, Arizona and my administration have long benefited from safe, clean, reliable and economically-beneficial nuclear energy,” said Governor Jan Brewer of Arizona. “My state’s utilities continue to search for solutions to long-term, baseload energy needs, but we believe the Western Initiative for Nuclear and the NuScale small modular reactor hold great promise. I fully support this innovative effort to explore the potential of this cutting-edge technology.”
Additionally, as part of Project WIN, NuScale has signed teaming agreements with key utilities in the Western region, which include Energy Northwest in Washington State and the Utah Association of Municipal Power Systems.
“The participating utilities, Energy Northwest and Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems, have assessed regional strategies for reducing long-term carbon emissions including replacing aging coal-fired units, as well as meeting forecasted energy demand growth, and concluded that SMR technology is a vitally important option,” said John Hopkins, chairman and chief executive officer of NuScale Power. “Based on the teaming agreement, Project WIN establishes the initial participants and the foundational elements for deployment of the first NuScale SMR project.”
“As part of our SmartEnergy Initiative, Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems continually and carefully monitors and explores all resource options with an emphasis on conservation and efficiency to address the long-term energy needs of members. Project WIN is an example of our efforts to evaluate all options, particularly as we are faced with carbon-constrained baseload generation,” said Doug Hunter, general manager of Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems. “In accordance with state and national efforts to clean up our air and reduce carbon emissions, it is important that we investigate clean, safe, carbon-free SMR technology as a potential baseload resource.”
“Energy Northwest carefully investigated options for small modular reactors to fill future energy needs, including helping to integrate renewable sources” said Dale Atkinson, Energy Northwest Vice President. “We selected NuScale as our technology of choice. The NuScale design offers clear benefits in safety, cost-effectiveness and ease of operation.”
The NuScale SMR represents the next generation of commercial nuclear power. As the only U.S.-based company established solely for the commercialization of its SMR, NuScale and its 250 employees are working daily on the development of its unique and proprietary break-through technology to bring to market its innovative, simple, safe, economic and scalable small modular reactor.
NuScale bailed out by Fluor Corporation, Representatives DeFazio and Schrader cheer
'The investment announced today will help rebuild the US manufacturing base,' said Congressman Peter DeFazio, (D-OR). 'Most importantly, this investment will create high paying, high tech Oregon jobs that can't be exported and help keep the US competitive in international markets. This is good news for Corvallis, Oregon State University, and the state of Oregon.'
www.nuscalepower.com/nr-News-Press_20111013.php
NuScale Power, LLC and Fluor Corporation Team Up
CORVALLIS, Ore. - The investment by Fluor Corporation in NuScale Power, announced today in Washington, D.C., is a major leap forward in NuScale's effort to bring its scalable, small modular reactor to market by the end of the decade, asserted Paul Lorenzini, NuScale's chief executive officer.
'Fluor's financial and technical involvement at this point in the development of our technology will ensure that we maintain a leadership position in the nation's effort to provide the next generation of nuclear power plants; plants that are elegantly simple, avoid large capital outlays, and offer significantly enhanced safety,' Lorenzini said.
Fluor Group President John Hopkins said that in addition to agreeing to invest in excess of $ 30 million in NuScale, his company's depth of experience in the nuclear industry will provide a solid platform for NuScale to advance its design through licensing to commercialization.
'Fluor's world class engineering, procurement and construction capabilities in the nuclear industry coupled with NuScale's technology and innovation will provide the assurances and expertise that utilities and other customers will demand as they look to diversify into safer, more reliable nuclear generation,' Hopkins said.
Lorenzini said NuScale's scalable, naturally cooled nuclear power plant design addresses most of the concerns, past and present, about the safety and reliability of nuclear plants. Because the plant comprises 45 megawatt modules that can be clustered in a facility as large as 540 megawatts, utilities can custom fit their plants to expected load. And because each module is cooled by natural circulation of water, the design is far safer than competing nuclear technologies in that it eliminates the accident scenarios involving pumps and pipes.
'We have designed a plant that targets current domestic and international need for base load generation and responds to renewed concerns about safety following the events in Japan,' said Lorenzini. 'After extensive due diligence, Fluor agreed and took a majority stake in the company. We couldn't be more pleased that Fluor recognized the advantages of our design and chose NuScale as a partner in this emerging market.'
'This collaboration is vital to utilities that are exploring nuclear energy as an option to diversify their future generation portfolio,' said Bill Fehrman, president and CEO, MidAmerican Energy Company, based in Des Moines, Iowa. 'The collaborative effort between Fluor and NuScale is another strong signal that small modular reactor technology will be a viable alternative for the next generation of nuclear energy deployment.'
MidAmerican Energy is one of 11 major utilities in the U.S. and Canada serving on NuScale Power's customer advisory board. The board is conferring with NuScale on ways the company's technology can best meet the needs of electric utilities in an increasingly dynamic energy environment.
'The investment announced today will help rebuild the US manufacturing base,' said Congressman Peter DeFazio, (D-OR). 'Most importantly, this investment will create high paying, high tech Oregon jobs that can't be exported and help keep the US competitive in international markets. This is good news for Corvallis, Oregon State University, and the state of Oregon.'
'I'm very pleased to hear about this new investment from Fluor. NuScale Power is one of the most innovative energy companies in Oregon who, in a short time, has generated world-wide attention,' said Congressman Kurt Schrader, (D-OR). 'Their presence and growth is a win for our state, Benton County and the greater Oregon State community.'
Fluor obtained a majority position in NuScale when it bought outstanding shares held in receivership after the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission took actions that led to the indictment of an earlier investor.
About NuScale Power NuScale Power has designed a nuclear steam supply system and nuclear power plant that offers the benefits of nuclear power but takes away the issues presented by installing large capacity. The NuScale design is for a modular, scalable Light Water Reactor (LWR) nuclear power plant system. A nuclear power plant using NuScale's technology is comprised of individual NSSS modules. Each produces 45 megawatts with its own combined containment vessel and reactor system, and its own designated turbine-generator set.
A power plant can include as many as 12 NuScale integral PWR modules to produce as much as 540 megawatts. NuScale power plants are scalable - additional modules are added as customer demand for electricity increases. These multi-module plants are highly reliable - one unit can be taken out of service for refueling or maintenance, or a new unit added, without affecting the operation of the others.
For more information visit www.nuscalepower.com