TMI Update: Jan 14, 2024


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The MPSC will host the third of three stakeholder meetings of the Nuclear Feasibility Study Workgroup on January 9, 2024, from 9:00am – 12:00pm EST. This meeting will be held virtually via Microsoft Teams and meeting details can be found here or below.
 
 
Or join by phone: +1 248-509-0316; Conference ID: 978 154 615# 
 
The purpose of this meeting is to review the Nuclear Feasibility Study draft report. The meeting agenda and draft report have been posted to the Nuclear Feasibility Study Workgroup webpage. We are also sharing these documents here for reference.
                
             
 
Further information regarding the study can be found on the Nuclear Feasibility Study Workgroup webpage. Communications regarding the study can be sent to LARA-MPSC-NuclearStudy@michigan.gov.
 
OPINION
COP28's Nuclear Mirage
Copyright © 2023 Energy Intelligence Group
 
Nuclear,Concept,Atom

Production Perig/Shutterstock

Among the long list of pledges, declarations and other undertakings at COP28 is a commitment to triple nuclear energy’s output by mid-century, and to “mobilize investments in nuclear power.” The Declaration to Triple Nuclear Energy signed Dec. 1 concedes the goal is “aspirational”, but in truth it is profoundly misguided. Global investments in nuclear have long been only a fraction of those in renewables, and tripling the amount of existing nuclear capacity would cost trillions of dollars and require massive investments in infrastructure. The problem with throwing nuclear into the mix of potential climate change fixes is that it takes money and attention away from proven and more viable solutions that are urgently needed, such as transforming grids to ensure delivery of renewables, and energy efficiency and storage. 

Only 22 countries signed onto the US-lead initiative in contrast to the more than 120 countries that agreed to the more realistic goal of tripling renewables by 2030. Not surprisingly, the signatories included major Western countries such as France, the UK, Canada, Japan and South Korea, all struggling to keep their aging and diminishing nuclear fleets operational while promoting small modular reactors (SMRs) and “advanced” reactors that are even less likely to make an impact on reducing carbon emissions. China and Russia, the two countries with the most dynamic nuclear programs (domestically in the case of China and overseas in the case of Russia), did not sign on. Notably, China signed the renewables pledge.

The Western intergovernmental declaration was echoed in a similar industry pledge to “at least” triple nuclear energy globally by 2050, signed by 120 nuclear industry companies from around the world and pro-nuclear organizations in 25 countries. None of them want to miss out on the prospects of a bonanza in government and export credit agency financing. “By ensuring nuclear has access to climate finance equal to other clean energy sources, governments can enable nuclear capacity deployment at scale worldwide,” their declaration states.

Weak Vital Signs

But the smart money is not on nuclear. Globally, renewables (not including hydro) received a record $495 billion in investments in 2022, up 35% from the previous year and 74% of all power generation investments that year. By contrast, only $35 billion was committed to new nuclear power plant construction in that same period, according to the recently released World Nuclear Industry Status Report, or WNISR. (Full disclosure: I wrote the foreword.) Renewables (including hydro) added 348 gigawatts of new capacity in 2022 compared with a net addition of 4.3 GW in operating nuclear power capacity.

Nuclear “doesn’t have the conditions for success to be built and scaled economically in the 21st Century, and wind, water, solar, transmission and storage do,” writes Michael Barnard, chief strategist for TFIE Strategy and editor of The Future is Electric.

The sector’s other vital signs continue to founder — industry CEOs know this, as do leaders of the countries that signed the declaration in Dubai. Nuclear energy’s share of global commercial electricity generation in 2022 dropped to just 9.2% — roughly half its all-time high of 17.5% almost three decades ago in 1996. In France, output from the country’s beleaguered nuclear fleet dropped roughly 120 terawatt hours below the 2005-15 level of around 400 TWh, and for the first time since 1980 the country (whose fleet is the world’s second-largest) became a net electricity importer, according to the WNISR.

Solar and wind power together began outperforming nuclear in 2021, and that trend continued last year with the two generating 28% more electricity than nuclear and contributing 11.7% of global generation. Solar alone produced more power than nuclear in China for the first time in 2022, as it already had in India, and solar and wind combined produced more power than nuclear in the European Union, the report notes.

As renewables continued adding substantial amounts of new capacity to grids across the planet — 348 GW in 2022 — nuclear staggered along, adding only 4.3 GW last year. Even in China, with the world’s fastest-growing nuclear program, the rate of new reactor construction is slowing and renewables are growing much faster.

Money Better Spent

For world leaders in Dubai, 2050 is a long way out. By signing onto the US initiative, they could opportunistically curry favor with Washington while appearing to be doing something about climate change. However cynical their reasons, their support likely means that substantial sums of money — much of it from taxpayers or ratepayers — will flow toward an effort with little chance of success. Meanwhile, those pocketing the bounty will be lawyers, PR firms, politicians, corporations and utilities perpetuating the fantasy that nuclear energy will make a difference.

Government bureaucracies — especially in the major nuclear countries — will be the biggest beneficiaries. More than half of the US Department of Energy (DOE) annual budget of roughly $50 billion goes toward commercial nuclear energy programs, thus enabling a never-ending cycle of promotion and spending on technologies that were never able to fulfill their promise of revolutionizing energy. Initiatives like the one in Dubai sets up a new round among a club of like-minded nuclear bureaucracies around the world, all increasingly desperate to find new ways to push nuclear.

They are running out of ideas. Large reactors have proved way too expensive to continue building and the SMR and advanced reactor technologies more recently promoted are based on mid-20th century technologies that beyond being too costly, were also considered too dangerous or unworkable to commercialize. DOE has so far watched two showcase SMR projects collapse — one in 2017 and the second, led by Fluor subsidiary NuScale, just a month before COP28. These were based on conventional light-water nuclear technology. The advanced reactor projects are even less likely to succeed.

The idea of tripling nuclear energy surfaced in a DOE report earlier this year. The cost would exceed $5 trillion, assuming 300 new reactors (although the report suggests adding 200 new reactors to the existing fleet of 93, ignoring the fact that most of those reactors will be permanently shut by then).

Recently passed legislation (mainly the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act) contains as much as $150 billion in tax credits and loan guarantees, mainly for keeping aging reactors running twice as long as their original 40-year license periods, and the rest for new reactors, according to Tim Judson of the Nuclear Information and Resource Service. The actual amount could be far less if planned new nuclear projects or life extensions fail to materialize. Either way it falls far short of what’s needed for a major nuclear expansion in the US.

If governments are serious about addressing climate change, they need to stop perpetuating the fantasy of a nuclear future, and pursue viable alternatives. They know that.

Stephanie Cooke is the former editor of Nuclear Intelligence Weekly and author of In Mortal Hands: A Cautionary History of the Nuclear Age. The views expressed in this article are those of the author

 
 
 
 
 
 
Regulators approve deal to pay for Georgia Power’s new nuclear reactors
 
Updated 11:14 AM PST, December 19, 2023
 
ATLANTA (AP) — Almost 15 years of wrangling over who should pay for two new nuclear reactors in Georgia and who should be accountable for cost overruns came down to one vote Tuesday, with the Georgia Public Service Commission unanimously approving an additional 6% rate increase to pay for $7.56 billion in remaining costs at Georgia Power Co.'s Plant Vogtle.
The rate increase is projected to add $8.95 a month to a typical residential customer’s current monthly bill of $157. It would take effect in the first month after Vogtle’s Unit 4 begins commercial operation, projected to be sometime in March. A $5.42 rate increase already took effect when Unit 3 began operating over the summer. 
Tuesday’s vote was the final accounting for Georgia Power’s portion of the project to build a third and fourth reactor at the site southeast of Augusta. They’re currently projected to cost Georgia Power and three other owners $31 billion, according to Associated Press calculations. Add in $3.7 billion that original contractor Westinghouse paid the Vogtle owners to walk away from construction, and the total nears $35 billion.
The reactors were originally projected to cost 14 billion and be complete by 2017
Unit 3 and Unit 4 are the first new American reactors built from scratch in decades. Each can power 500,000 homes and businesses without releasing any carbon. But even as government officials and some utilities are again looking to nuclear power to alleviate climate change, the cost of Vogtle could discourage utilities from pursuing nuclear power.
Southern Co., the Atlanta-based parent of Georgia Power, said in a stock market filing Friday that it would record a $228 million gain on the deal, saying it will now be able to recover from ratepayers certain construction costs that it had been subtracting from income. That means the total loss to shareholders on the project will be about $3 billion, which the company has written off since 2018.
Overall, the company said Georgia Power would collect an additional $729 million a year from its 2.7 million customers.
“We believe this decision by the Georgia PSC acknowledges the perspectives of all parties involved and takes a balanced approach that recognizes the value of this long-term energy asset for the state of Georgia and affordability needs for customers,” Georgia Power spokesperson John Kraft said in a statement.
The five Republican commissioners, all elected statewide, voted on an agreement that Georgia Power reached with commission staff and some consumer groups. Called a stipulation, it averted what could have been lengthy and contentious hearings over how much blame the company should bear for overruns.
“This is very reasonable outcome to a very complicated process,” Commission Chairman Jason Shaw said in an interview after the vote. 
Calculations show Vogtle’s electricity will never be cheaper than other sources Georgia Power could have chosen, even after the federal government reduced borrowing costs by guaranteeing repayment of $12 billion in loans. Yet the company and regulators say Vogtle was the right choice. 
“You can’t go back to 2009 and make a decision based on everything that happened,” Shaw said.
But Bryan Jacob of the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy called the vote “disappointing.” He said residential and small business customers paid a disproportionate share of a financing charge that Georgia Power collected during construction, but Tuesday’s vote parceled out additional costs without giving customers credit for heavier shares of earlier contributions.
Other opponents held up crime scene tape after the vote to show their displeasure.
“The Georgia Public Service Commission just approved the largest rate increase in state history,” said Patty Durand, a Democrat and possible candidate for the commission. “The people of Georgia deserve a state agency that protects them from monopoly overreach, but that’s not what we have.”
Georgia Power owns 45.7% of the reactors. Smaller shares are owned by Oglethorpe Power Corp., which provides electricity to member-owned cooperatives, the Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia and the city of Dalton. Some Florida and Alabama utilities have also contracted to buy Vogtle’s power.
Subject: NRC LIC-109 Acceptance Review Results for Susquehanna License Amendment Request to Revise Technical Specifications to Adopt TSTF-563 (EPID L-2023-LLA-0153)
 
ADAMS Accession No.: ML23345A054
 
 
Using Web-based ADAMS, select “Advanced Search”
Under “Property,” select “Accession Number”
Under “Value,” enter the Accession Number
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Very succinctly, here’s why it’s still important to shut down Diablo Canyon on time, in 2024 and 2025 (or sooner):
  1. Economics: TURN (The Utility Reform Network) estimates a cost of at least $10 billion over market price to run Diablo through 2030.
  2. Power Needs: California has an excess of at LEAST 10,000 MW right now if you factor in battery storage, solar, and demand response, and more is coming online daily.
  3. Grid Reliability: Diablo Canyon PROHIBITS renewable energy from being added to the grid, especially during sunny weather, because it clogs the grid.
  4. Seismic Issues: Recent seismic information tells us that there are two VERTICAL THRUST FAULTS directly under the plant. A vertical thrust fault causes significantly more damage than a lateral fault from an earthquake of the same magnitude.
  5. Embrittlement: The Unit 1 reactor pressure vessel is EMBRITTLED, meaning that if it had to be shut down in an emergency, and cold water injected into the vessel, the vessel could shatter like glass, causing the worst-case catastrophe possible at a nuclear plant.

PDF icon2023.12.14 SLOMFP Briefing Paper.pdf

California regulators vote to extend Diablo Canyon nuclear plant operations through 2030
California energy regulators have voted to allow the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant to operate for an additional five years, despite calls from environmental groups to shut it down
 
ByThe Associated Press
December 15, 2023, 9:46 AM
 
FILE - This Nov. 3, 2008, file photo shows one of Pacific Gas and Electric's Diablo Canyon Power Plant's nuclear reactors in Avila Beach, Calif. California energy regulators voted Thursday, Dec. 14, 2023, to allow the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant to operate for an additional five years, despite calls from environmental groups to shut it down. (AP Photo/Michael A. Mariant, File)

FILE - This Nov. 3, 2008, file photo shows one of Pacific Gas and Electric's Diablo Canyon Power Plant's nuclear reactors in Avila Beach, Calif. California energy regulators voted Thursday, Dec. 14, 2023, to allow the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant to operate for an additional five years, despite calls from environmental groups to shut it down. (AP Photo/Michael A. Mariant, File)
The Associated Press

SAN LUIS OBISPO, Calif. -- California energy regulators voted Thursday to allow the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant to operate for an additional five years, despite calls from environmental groups to shut it down.

The California Public Utilities Commission agreed to extend the shutdown date for the state's last functioning nuclear power facility through 2030 instead of closing it in 2025 as previously agreed.

Separately, the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission will consider whether to extend the plant’s operating licenses.

The twin reactors, located midway between Los Angeles and San Francisco, began operating in the mid-1980s. They supply up to 9% of the state’s electricity on any given day.

The Public Utilities Commission's decision marks the latest development in a long fight over the operation and safety of the plant, which sits on a bluff above the Pacific Ocean.

In August, a state judge rejected a lawsuit filed by Friends of the Earth that sought to block Pacific Gas & Electric, which operates the plant, from seeking to extend its operating life.

And in October, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission rejected a request from environmental groups to immediately shut down one of two reactors.

PG&E agreed in 2016 to shutter the plant by 2025, but at the direction of the state changed course and now intends to seek a longer operating run for the plant, which doesn't produce greenhouse gases that can contribute to climate change.

Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom, who once was a leading voice to close the plant, said last year that Diablo Canyon’s power is needed beyond 2025 to ward off possible blackouts as California transitions to solar and other renewable energy sources.

Activists condemned the extension and noted that the projected costs of continuing to run the aging plant are expected to top $6 billion.

“This ill-conceived decision will further escalate financial strain on California ratepayers and extend the threat of a catastrophe at Diablo Canyon,” said Ken Cook, president of the nonprofit Environmental Working Group.

“With California’s annual renewable energy additions exceeding Diablo Canyon’s output, there is zero reason to keep it running,” he added in a statement.

COP28 and the nuclear energy numbers racket
By Sharon Squassoni | December 13, 2023

 


Participants arrive at the venue of the COP28 United Nations climate summit in Dubai on November 29. (Photo by GIUSEPPE CACACE/AFP via Getty Images) 
Nuclear energy made a big splash at the COP28 climate meeting in Dubai with a declaration by 22 countries calling for a tripling of nuclear energy by 2050. It seems like an impressive and urgent call to arms. On closer inspection, however, the numbers don’t work out. Even at best, a shift to invest more heavily in nuclear energy over the next two decades could actually worsen the climate crisis, as cheaper, quicker alternatives are ignored for more expensive, slow-to-deploy nuclear options.

Here’s what the numbers say:

22: That 22 countries signed the declaration may seem like a lot of support, but 31 countries (plus Taiwan) currently produce nuclear energy. Notably missing from the declaration are Russia and the People’s Republic of China. Russia is the world’s leading exporter of nuclear power plants and has the fourth largest nuclear energy capacity globally; China has built the most nuclear power plants of any country in the last two decades and ranks third globally in capacity. Thirteen other countries that have key nuclear programs are also missing from the declaration: five in Europe (Armenia, Belarus, Belgium, Switzerland and Spain), two in South Asia (India and Pakistan) three in the  Americas (Argentina, Brazil and Mexico), South Africa (the only nuclear energy producer in Africa), and Iran.

5: Five of the countries signing the declaration do not have nuclear power—Mongolia, Morocco, Ghana, Moldova, and Poland. Only Poland’s electricity grid can support three or four large nuclear reactors—the rest would have to invest billions of dollars first to expand their grids or rely on smaller reactors that would not overwhelm grid capacity. Poland wants to replace its smaller coal plants with almost 80 small modular reactors (SMRs), but these “paper reactors” are largely just plans and not yet proven technology. One American vendor, NuScale, recently scrapped a six-unit project when cost estimates rose exponentially. In any event, none of these five countries is likely to make a significant contribution toward tripling nuclear energy in the next 20 years.


17: The 17 remaining signatories to the nuclear energy declaration represent a little more than half of all countries with nuclear energy, raising the issue of how much support there really is for tripling nuclear energy by 2050.

RELATED:
A small modular reactor’s demise calls for big change in Energy Department policy

3x: The idea of tripling nuclear energy to meet climate change requirements is not new. In fact, it was one of eight climate stabilization “wedges” laid out in Science magazine in 2004 in a now-famous article by Robert Socolow and Stephen Pacala of Princeton University. A stabilization wedge would avoid one billion tons of carbon emissions per year by 2055. In the case of nuclear energy, this would require building 700 large nuclear reactors over the course of 50 years. (In 2022, there were 416 reactors operating around the world, with 374 gigawatts-electric of capacity). In 2005, to reach the one-billion-ton goal of emissions reduction would have meant building 14 reactors per year, assuming all existing reactors continued operating. (In fact, the build rate needed to be 23 per year to replace aging reactors that would need to be retired.)  Given the stagnation of the nuclear power industry since then, the build rate now to reach wedge level would need to be 40 per year.

10: Average annual number of connections of nuclear power plants to the electricity grid, per year, over the entire history of nuclear energy. Between 2011 and 2021, however, the average annual number of nuclear power reactors connected to the grid was 5.

42 GWe: New nuclear energy capacity added from 2000 to 2020.

605 GWe: New wind capacity added from 2000 to 2020.

578 GWe: New solar capacity added from 2000 to 2020.  Growth in renewables has vastly outpaced that of nuclear energy in recent years.

73 billion: In US dollars, the amount lent or granted by the World Bank in fiscal year 2023 through the International Bank of Reconstruction and Development and the International Development Association for projects. The December nuclear energy declaration called upon shareholders of the World Bank, international financial institutions, and regional development banks to encourage the inclusion of nuclear energy in their lending policies. This sounds like it would improve the chances for nuclear energy investment, but like many things associated with nuclear energy, any such move would be far too little and too late. The recently cancelled NuScale project estimated that it would cost $9.3 billion for six small modular reactors (77 megawatts-electric each); that is, the six reactors would have half the electricity capacity of a single large reactor. If the World Bank decided to spend all its funds on nuclear energy, it could afford to pay for the construction of seven NuScale projects, which would increase nuclear energy capacity by three gigawatts-electric—or one percent of total global capacity. The opportunity costs of using scarce development funds on nuclear energy is another issue.

RELATED:
A small modular reactor’s demise calls for big change in Energy Department policy
15 trillion: In US dollars, the cost to build enough NuScale reactors (9,738 77 megawatt-electric reactors) to triple nuclear energy capacity, assuming existing reactors continue to operate.  There are less expensive SMRs, perhaps, but none further along in the US licensing process.

13: An unlucky number in some cultures, but this was the time from design to projected operation of the NuScale VOYGR plant. Nuclear power plants have to be “done right,” and cutting corners to speed deployment is in no one’s interests. The design-and-build phase for a country’s first nuclear reactor, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency, is 15 years. If the great expansion of nuclear energy is supposed to occur in more than the 22 countries that signed the declaration, this lead-time cannot be ignored.

The climate crisis is real, but nuclear energy will continue to be the most expensive and slowest option to reach net zero emissions, no matter how you cook the numbers

US House passes bill banning uranium imports from Russia
By Timothy Gardner
December 11, 2023
 
 
"...The House bill contains waivers allowing the import of low-enriched uranium from Russia if the U.S. energy secretary determines there is no alternative source available for operation of a nuclear reactor or a U.S. nuclear energy company, or if the shipments are in the national interest...
 
U.S. nuclear power plants imported about 12% of their uranium from Russia in 2022, compared to 27% from Canada and 25% from Kazakhstan, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. The United States was the source of about 5% of uranium used domestically that year, the EIA said.
Allowed imports of Russian uranium under the waiver would be gradually reduced to 459 metric tons in 2027 from about 476.5 tons in 2024.” ​​​​​​​

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