Westinghouse, Ukraine Near Deal on Nuclear Fuel for Reactors Contract Extension

[TomClash]

Source: Wall Street Journal

A U.S.-based energy company and Ukraine are on the verge of signing a deal that would lessen Russia's influence and give the West greater leverage on the former Soviet republic.

Westinghouse Electric Co. of Pennsylvania said on Thursday it is in negotiations to extend its contract with Ukraine energy operator Energoatom to supply nuclear fuel for reactors, a deal that would bolster the country's commitment to long-term cooperation with the West.

The talks come after the Obama administration has extended the welcome mat to the interim Ukraine government as Kiev looks to strike deals with Western partners. In March, Ukraine's Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk met with President Barack Obama before meeting with Westinghouse officials in Pennsylvania.

. . .

The interim government in Kiev, which came to power earlier this year after public protests and violence, has reached out to the West for alternatives and last week signed several parts of a long-sought association agreement with the EU.

Read more: http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702303847804579479543798143068?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB10001424052702303847804579479543798143068.html

[TomClash]

1. Compare the above with a year ago

While Westinghouse and EnergoAtom remain optimistic that the structural issues are behind them, Ukraine's nuclear regulators are more cautious. And Russia is ready to step in to reclaim its monopoly over the country's nuclear operations.

"You still have a split in the Ukraine," said Bob Percopo, a consultant to nuclear companies and the U.S. Department of Energy.

Some in the Ukraine government want to assert their independence from Russia, while others cling to old Soviet dynamics of Russia as protector.

"And typical of Russia, they don't want to lose any of their influence on anything that was part of former Soviet Union," Mr. Percopo said.

Westinghouse has been trying to gain a foothold in Ukraine for more than a decade by tailoring its fuel services to the country's Russian-made reactors. Its involvement there began after the U.S. government signed on to help Ukraine experiment with Western-made fuel in its reactors. The former Soviet republic has always relied on Russia to supply its fuel but wanted to hedge its bets with other suppliers. Ukraine is already dependent on Russia for its natural gas supplies.



Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/business/businessnews/2013/08/08/Westinghouse-still-facing-difficulties-in-Ukraine/stories/201308080382#ixzz2xuYfIs16

[Kolesar]

2. I would advocate an efficiency program

And a vast installation of wind and solar energy.

[reACTIONary]

11. What about conservation...

... the per capita consumption of natural gas is higher in Ukraine than anywhere else in Europe, basically because no one was paying for it. Now that Gazprom isn't subsidizing it anymore, consumption should decrease.

[okaawhatever]

13. Gazprom didn't subsidize it, the Ukraine government did. Gazprom offered a discount as part of the

Sevastopol lease deal. The terms still weren't very good. Ukraine bought a bunch of gas last year from Poland. Since Russia has mostly overcharged Ukraine for their gas, some of the other neighboring countries have reversed their pipes and buy gas on the open market, reverse the pipelines to send it to Ukraine. All of that was cheaper than the "discounted" price Gazprom gave them.

[reACTIONary]

14. Thanks for the details...

... my understanding was that although Gazprom charged for the gas, they didn't demand payment and so "in effect" were subsidizing it. I also read that the consumers were simply ignoring their gas bills and not paying them.

In any case, Ukraine seemed to have been consuming a lot more (per capita) than other countries in the region, so they should be able to "weather" a price increase by cutting back on consumption.

Once again, thanks for the details.

[dipsydoodle]

20. It was the Russian government who subsidised it , not Ukraine's , and not Gazprom.

It was done by removing the duty on the gas as part of the deal to extend the naval base.

[okaawhatever]

50. The individual poster was referring to the subsidies from the Ukraine government. nt

[nyabingi]

3. So now we see...

...what the Ukrainian coup was all about and we'll see more mega-corporations slithering from under the basements to get a piece of the Ukrainian pie. Our foreign policy is all about helping the super-wealthy exploit with their slash-and-burn profit chasing. SMH...

[TomClash]

4. Certainly a big factor

Not to excuse Russian belligerence, but capitalism always needs to expand markets.

[nyabingi]

5. I don't really see...

...Russian belligerence in this situation but a Russian reaction to something initiated by the US and EU, actions aimed squarely and aggressively at Russia. I don't think the US would allow Russia or China to behave in the same way if they helped install pro-Russian narco-traffickers in Mexico's government.

[MrNJ]

7. Sure, parrot Putler's line

"The Ukrainian protesters were not there because they were fed up with corrupt, thieving government.
They were merely sheep led to the slaughter by the all-powerful West"

Or not.
Not everything that happens is part of a vast conspiracy, you know...

[nyabingi]

8. Not everything is a vast conspiracy...

...but this one is pretty well-known outside of the mainstream western media sources (which have been laying on the propaganda thick and heavy - moreso than usual). If you're familiar at all with the way our NGO's (NED, IRI, NDI, etc) operate, then you'd sed this one fit the same pattern with the same results. I don't assume the US is automatically wrong in every situation, but I look at both sides (including actually checking the accounts of the other side) and try to decide which sounds the most plausible.

The anti-Russian rhetoric has completely hypnotized many Americans to the point at which they think anything to the contrary is "conspiracy" and nonsense. This is exactly what they want you to believe, MrNJ.

[reACTIONary]

9. Here is the way our NGO's operate....

... National Endowment for Democracy's recent projects in the Ukraine: http://www.ned.org/where-we-work/eurasia/ukraine

Be sure to check out the human rights film festive! Human rights... what could be a greater deception?

[nyabingi]

16. Lots of money flowing in...

...to a lot of groups which support goals defined by the US for the benefit of the US. Don't let all the rosy, feel-good names fool ya man. The right-wing discovered long ago that using benign, even outright deceptive names for their organizations are enough to hide the true intent of the group. For example, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracy sounds like a good thing until you see that it is made up of far-right neo-cons hellbent on regime change.

The NED does a lot of the work the CIA used to do back in the day (but the CIA is busy targeting weddings and funerals in Pakistan to be bothered with regime change now apparently).

[reACTIONary]

19. Yes, those...

... nefarious human rights film festivals. First they attend an innocent sounding film human rights film festival, and the next thing you know they end up thinking they are entitled to human rights!

[Demeter]

6. And if there's another Chernobyl in Ukraine, it will be the West's fault, this time

somehow, that's not making me feel better about it, at all.

WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH THESE PEOPLE?????

[reACTIONary]

10. What reactor in the west has had a Chernobyl melt down?

Westinghouse knows what they are doing.

[JVS]

17. Fukushima's reactor was a Western design. It seems to be fucking up quite well.

[reACTIONary]

18. Fukushima was, and is an ongoing, major disaster...

... however, there is no comparing it to Chernobyl. It is certainly not anywhere near or anything like THAT.

The Fukushima incident seems to have been precipitated by the tidal wave inundating the backup power generators - that shouldn't have been allowed to have happened, but it is a stretch to condemn a nuclear reactor design based on the inappropriate location of the backup generators.

You may be aware of the design characteristics of the Soviet RBMK reactors that contributed to the Chernobyl disaster, but in case you or others are not, here is a description: The RBMK "High Power Channel-type Reactor". The design issues impacting safety are described in this section: Design Flaws and Safety Issues

[kristopher]

21. World Needs to Get Ready for the Next Nuclear Plant Accident

... the causes of the three events followed no pattern, and the inability to immediately contain them escalated the episodes into global disasters with huge economic, environmental and political consequences. Even if no deaths have yet been officially linked to Fukushima radiation, for example, cleanup costs have soared to an estimated $196 billion and could take more than four decades to complete.

If nuclear is to remain a part of the world’s energy supply, the industry must come up with solutions to make sure contamination -- and all other consequences -- do not spread beyond station grounds, Gregory Jaczko, ex-chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, said in an interview in Tokyo.

“We have this accident and people will say, you know, it was caused by this and that,” Jaczko said. “But the next accident is going to be something different. Nobody can tell you where or when or what exactly it is going to be. You really need to do more on the consequence side.”

...

“Once you have an accident, a low-probability and high consequence event, you can no longer call it a low probability event,” Jaczko said. “It is an event that’s happened and you cannot ignore the consequences simply because it was never supposed to happen. The consequences are real. Probabilities are always hypothetical.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-04-03/world-needs-to-get-ready-for-next-nuclear-power-plant-accident.html

And if you want the academic view of how the nuclear industry is playing fast and loose with the risk probabilities you are relying on.

From the journal Ethics, Policy and Environment
Vol. 14, No. 3, published October 2011
Fukushima, Flawed Epistemology, and Black-Swan Events
Kristin Shrader-Frechette
Department of Biological Sciences and Department of Philosophy,
University of Notre, Dame, IN, USA

...A second illegitimate defense of BSC is through the frequency fallacy, confusing core-melt-relative-frequency data with subjective probabilities. Yet ‘probability’ can mean: (i) ‘classical probability;’ (ii) ‘relative frequency;’ or (iii) ‘subjective probability,’ not all of which are applicable to nuclear-core-melt assessment.

Classical probability (i) is illustrated by card games in which the deck contains a fixed number of cards, for example 52. The probability of an event (e) thus equals the number of possible favorable outcomes (f) divided by the total number of possible outcomes (n): P(e) = f/n. Provided the deck of cards is fair, each card has an equal chance of being picked, and the probability (i) of picking an ace = 4/52. Thus, (i) assumes that all possible outcomes are equally likely and that we know n—neither of which is the case regarding nuclear-accident outcomes.

Relative-frequency probability (ii) is often used for cases where the number of outcomes (n) is so great that all typically cannot be observed, as in the probability (ii) that current 5-year-olds will contract cancer. We cannot observe all 5-year-olds throughout their lifetimes, but can reliably predict cancer probability for random, typical 5-year-olds, if we observe a large-enough, long-enough sample. Thus, if we observed 1000 5-year-olds over their lifetimes, if samples were representative and large enough, and if we observed 350 cancer deaths, we could say this cancer probability was roughly P(e) = 35.0% (350/1000). We cannot predict with certainty, however, unless we know the frequency of all relevant events—whether lifetime cancers or total nuclear-core melts. Given that preceding core-melt lists include all occurrences (consistent with the three caveats), those lists suggest an almost-certain, core-melt probability (ii) = core melts/total reactors = 26/442 = roughly a 6% probability (ii)—roughly a 1 in 16 chance of core melt—which is hardly a low probability.

Subjective probability (iii) relies only on what people think particular probabilities are. The odds people get when they bet at racetracks are subjective probabilities because if the probabilities were objective, smart players would always win. Obviously (iii) does not provide reliable nuclear-core-melt probabilities because it is based not on facts, but on what people think about facts. Nuclear proponents think the facts are one way, and opponents think they are another. Both cannot always be correct. Since (iii) is subjective and could be inconsistent, and because (i) would require knowing n and knowing a falsehood (that all reactor outcomes were equally likely), (ii) appears most relevant to nuclear-core-melt assessment.

As preceding sections revealed, however, typical atomic-energy advocates use (iii) not (ii) to assess core-melt probabilities, such as when the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) said core-melt accidents, for all 104 US reactors, would only occur once every 1000 years. Instead, the NRC should have made predictions based on government inspections, independent analyses, and accident-frequency data, not ‘on data submitted by plant owners’ (Broder et al., 2011, p. D1). The NRC predecessor agency, the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) also has a long history of making BSC based on (iii). AEC said the probability of a US nuclear core meltdown is 1 in 17,000 per reactor year (AEC, 1957; Mulvihill et al., 1965).

Even universities erroneously use subjective probabilities (iii), not frequencies (ii), to assess nuclear-core-melt likelihood, particularly when pro-nuclear-government agencies fund their studies. For instance, although the classic, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)-authored, government-funded, reactor-safety study had frequency data for various nuclear accidents that already had occurred after decades of US-operating experience, it did not use them; instead the MIT authors used subjective, pro-nuclear assumptions and conjectures about these accident probabilities (Rasmussen, 1975). When independent, university mathematicians compared US nuclear-accident-frequency data, reported from operating experience, with MIT guesses (iii), they discovered that all ‘guesses’ were far too low, by several orders of magnitude. None of the nuclear-accident-frequency data, based on reactor-operating experience, was within the theoretical, 90% confidence interval of the MIT ‘guesses.’Yet there is only a subjective probability of 10% that any of these true (frequency-based) probability values (for different types of reactor accidents) should fall outside this 90% interval. The conclusion? University mathematicians said that MIT assessors were guilty of a massive ‘overconfidence’ bias toward nuclear safety, a typical flaw in most industry-government-funded, nuclear-risk analyses (Cooke, 1982).

...

Open access article available at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/21550085.2011.605851

[reACTIONary]

22. What's your point? That nuclear power generation...

... is dangerous? It is. That there will be another nuclear power accident in the future? There will be. That we should be prepared for it? We sure should.

None the less, Fukushima is just not comparable to Chernobyl and there are good reasons why Fukushima did not escalate to that level despite being hit by an earthquake and a tsunami.

All large scale industrial processes, especially those that involve energy conversion and distribution are inherently dangerous. One example that comes to mind is the Lac-Mégantic derailment and explosion. And, of course, the The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explosion.

There doesn't seem to be a completely risk free alternative, at least not without future technology developments that do not yet exist.

[kristopher]

23. Renewables are a superior alternative.

The idea that nuclear is necessary or desirable cannot be defended successfully.

And the point of the post was to refute your idea that the risk of a meltdown is related to a specific reactor design or set of circumstances. That is exactly what the article on risk assessment addresses.

[reACTIONary]

24. I'll take a closer look at the article ...

... and try to keep an open mind. However, off hand, I don't understand how the relative risk of a melt-down can't be related to reactor design or a specific set of circumstances. That's a bit like saying that the risk of injury in a car accident isn't related to a specific car design or the circumstances of the accident. Intuitively, it doesn't make any sense.

Renewables would be a superior alternative, if they WERE an alternative. Unfortunately, at this time they don't seem to be viable. Hopefully that will change with further development. But until then....

[kristopher]

25. Your assumption about renewables isn't valid.

I don't know what you mean by "they don't seem to be viable" but that isn't in accord with the facts in any sense. Economically, environmentally, technologically they are ready to completely replace the current energy systems in virtually every sector.

[reACTIONary]

26. I finished reading both...

... the Bloomberg and the Ethics, Policy & Environment article.

According to the Bloomberg article there are 176 new reactors being planned around the globe.

Now, if "renewables" were ready to completely replace any and all current energy systems, why would these reactors be in the pipe line? Who in the world would pass up the opportunity to go renewable rather than build dangerous, costly and outdated systems?

The people and nations that are building these reactors are not irrational. They are making choices based on the alternatives that actually exist and that will actually fill the demand for electricity. This is why I say renewables don't seem to be viable.

[kristopher]

27. So you read both of those articles and that is your take-away?

I'm happy to get into a discussion on the number of "proposed" reactors vs the number of reactors that will likely be built, why that disparity exists and the forces driving the schism between to two; but before moving on, why don't we address the issues already on the table?

The Bloomberg article quotes Jaczko, who just left his post as Chair of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, making statements that reflect an opinion that sees validity in the analysis by Shrader-Frechette.

What is your response to that in light of your earlier statements?

Even universities erroneously use subjective probabilities (iii), not frequencies (ii), to assess nuclear-core-melt likelihood, particularly when pro-nuclear-government agencies fund their studies. For instance, although the classic, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)-authored, government-funded, reactor-safety study had frequency data for various nuclear accidents that already had occurred after decades of US-operating experience, it did not use them; instead the MIT authors used subjective, pro-nuclear assumptions and conjectures about these accident probabilities (Rasmussen, 1975). When independent, university mathematicians compared US nuclear-accident-frequency data, reported from operating experience, with MIT guesses (iii), they discovered that all ‘guesses’ were far too low, by several orders of magnitude. None of the nuclear-accident-frequency data, based on reactor-operating experience, was within the theoretical, 90% confidence interval of the MIT ‘guesses.’Yet there is only a subjective probability of 10% that any of these true (frequency-based) probability values (for different types of reactor accidents) should fall outside this 90% interval. The conclusion? University mathematicians said that MIT assessors were guilty of a massive ‘overconfidence’ bias toward nuclear safety, a typical flaw in most industry-government-funded, nuclear-risk analyses (Cooke, 1982).

[reACTIONary]

28. No, that was not my "take away". That was my...

...response to my doubt about the claim that renewables are variable and your claim that renewables are ready to replace virtually all existing energy systems. I don't believe that is true, and if it was, one would not expect major development of non renewable resources to be going ahead apace world wide. It would be economically irrational, and I don't think the world is full of economically irrational people.

[kristopher]

29. Please address the point at hand instead of diverting the topic.

As I wrote, I'll be happy to have that discussion as soon as we've disposed of the matter that started the conversation - that being your statement regarding relevant considerations for establishing the safety of nuclear power.

[reACTIONary]

31. Relax, Kristopher...

... to paraphrase Obama, bloggers have to be able to deal with more than one issue at a time, and it is not necessary for us to have to discuss only one thing and suspend everything else.

[kristopher]

32. Now you are being patronizing...

You twice diverted from the main point under discussion and when you did address it you did so in a less than forthright manner. I really do understand since advocating for nuclear power is a nonstarter when honest, direct discussion is practiced all that really leaves those wishing to promote it is silly attempts at gamesmanship.

[reACTIONary]

33. OK, Kristopher...

... and thanks for the links.

[reACTIONary]

30. What is your response to that in light of your earlier statements?

I read both articles with the expectation that I would find something that would "refute (my) idea that the risk of a meltdown is related to a specific reactor design or set of circumstances."

I didn't find anything to refute that idea. For instance, the Bloomberg article states...

The problem with an engineering solution, an ever better reactor design or grander safety systems, is that based on the premise that all technology is fallible those defense systems can also fail... “This is an endless cycle... Whatever is your technology, however it is developed, we always have residual risk.”

This argues that risk can be reduced through better reactor design and engineering practices, but cannot be reduced to zero. Of course risk cannot be reduced to zero. But it can be reduced, and through ever better reactor design. Therefore the risk of a meltdown is, indeed, related to specific reactor designs.

This, of course, is elementary. The design of cars is related to the risk of automobile accidents and injuries, the design of planes is related to the risk of aviation accidents and injuries, the design of lawn mowers is related to the risk of injury... and on and on.

The second article claims that the risk of nuclear accidents is greater than is sometimes estimated and provides facts that the author claims are ignored in making wishful, subjective, self-serving evaluations. There is nothing in the article that claims that risk cannot be estimated (in fact, technique ii, "frequencies" is recommended) or that risk cannot be reduced through improved design.

I'm all for fact based, frequency risk assessment. So, instead of only "three high-profile disasters" we have had 26 incidents, including 3 high-profile disasters, over 14,500 plus cumulative reactor-years of nuclear power operation in 33 countries.

[kristopher]

34. Calling core meltdowns mere "incidents" is a pretty radical attempt at minimizing the issue...

...don't you think?

So, instead of only "three high-profile disasters" we have had 26 incidents, including 3 high-profile disasters, over 14,500 cumulative reactor-years of commercial nuclear power operation in 33 countries.

Considering the nuclear industry advertises that "a core-melt accident in the 104 US reactors will occur only once every 1000 years (NRC, 2003); suggesting a core-melt accident will occur only once every 250 years for 442 global reactors", and that we've had 26 in less than 50 years I'd say (to quote Ricky Ricardo) they've got some explaining to do that goes well beyond the same schtick of "but this design isn't like Chernobyl".

As to the other part of the discussion:
1) The number of reactors in the pipeline isn't even close to a reflection of the actual number of plants that can be expected to be built. Especially considering that money the money flow is steadily increasing in the direction of renewables in places like China and to a lesser extent India.

Given the known volume of reactors planned, the industry isn't even on track to keep pace with shut-downs.

- The nuclear industry is in decline: The 427 operating reactors are 17 lower than the peak in in 2002, while, the total installed capacity peaked in 2010 at 375 GWe before declining to the current level, which was last seen a decade ago. Annual nuclear electricity generation reached a maximum in 2006 at 2,660 TWh, then dropped to 2,346 TWh in 2012 (down 7 percent compared to 2011, down 12 percent from 2006). About three-quarters of this decline is due to the situation in Japan8, but 16 other countries, including the top five nuclear generators, decreased their nuclear generation too.

- The nuclear share in the world’s power generation declined steadily from a historic peak of 17 percent in 1993 to about 10 percent in 2012. Nuclear power’s share of global commercial primary energy production plunged to 4.5 percent, a level last seen in 1984.9 Only one country, the Czech Republic, reached its record nuclear contribution to the electricity mix in 2012.

From The World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2013
http://www.worldnuclearreport.org/World-Nuclear-Report-2013.html#executive_summary_and_conclusions

From that document:






See also the list of articles here for a popular press overview:
http://sync.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1127&pid=61129

[reACTIONary]

35. Mere incidents?

RE: Calling core meltdowns mere "incidents" is a pretty radical attempt at minimizing the issue...

No, I don't think so. Qualitatively, all of these incidents may be characterized as "core meltdowns", but quantitatively, the severity, consequences and circumstances very widely. I think any reasonable analysis of safety and risk has to take those factors into account and not treat all incidents that can be classified as "core meltdowns" as equally significant "disasters".

Given the recent focus on Malaysia Airlines flight MH370, I looked into aviation accidents as an analogy. Although we have had only one true aviation disaster so far this year we have had 852 aviation accidents, 15 total on the same day that MH370 disappeared. I don't think treating each and every one of these accidents as equal from a safety and risk perspective , let alone treating them as equal to the MH370 disaster, would be appropriate.

I've got to get to sleep now, so I'll look at the rest of your post tomorrow.

[kristopher]

36. Of course you don't think so, you are the one that did it.

Trying to characterize the 26 core meltdowns in the global nuclear reactor fleet as mere "incidents" is disingenuous wordplay intended to minimize the significance of what has been hyped by the industry in the US as a "once in a thousand year" event.

In the second sort of trimming, fission proponents report only meltdowns of which the public is likely to be aware. For instance, well-known nuclear engineers say only 2–3 reactor core melts have occurred and that atomic-energy disasters are rare (Bodansky, 1996, p. 391; but see Lochbaum, 2011). Or, they cite the US government’s prediction that: (i) a core-melt accident in the 104 US reactors will occur only once every 1000 years (NRC, 2003); suggesting (ii) a core-melt accident will occur only once every 250 years for 442 global reactors.

As the former head of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission stated:

“Once you have an accident, a low-probability and high consequence event, you can no longer call it a low probability event,” Jaczko said. “It is an event that’s happened and you cannot ignore the consequences simply because it was never supposed to happen. The consequences are real. Probabilities are always hypothetical.”

Aside from the fact that nuclear power is a disaster waiting to happen, the technology suffers from extremely high and rising costs, lack of a plan for disposal of nuclear waste, and very real concerns about the spread of key nuclear weapons technologies.

We don't need it. In fact its pursuit is counter-productive and impedes our effort to move away from the centralized system of thermal energy that is designed around fossil fuels.

[reACTIONary]

38. I don't agree with "data trimming" and...

... I agree with the author that estimates of safety and risk should be based on facts, not on subjective speculation.

However, there is a good reason why there are only a few meltdowns of which the public is likely to be aware. It's because only a few meltdowns seem to have had the serious consequences that warrant characterization as a disaster. The term "meltdown" is likely to be interpreted by some as a "disaster" and that doesn't seem to actually be the case. I'm quite willing to believe that there have been 26 "nuclear meltdowns" over the course of the last 60 years or so, however, I don't think there have been 26 "nuclear disasters". There seem to have been about three "meltdowns" that fall into the "disaster" category.

[reACTIONary]

37. I'm pretty impressed...

... with the chart showing wind and solar vs. nuclear grid connections. I was also pretty impressed with the two "decline of nuclear" charts until I noticed that they are speculative, forty seven-year projections and not historical data. If, in 2050, there are less than 100 nuclear power plants operating, I won't be crying any tears - if I happen to still be alive.

But over-all, these two charts do not support the contention that renewables are "Economically, environmentally, technologically ... ready to completely replace the current energy systems in virtually every sector." If they were, why would we be projecting nuclear power out to 2058?

Take one particular point made in the report: that Japan now generates more power from renewables than from nuclear power. Before the Fukushima disaster, Japan relied on nuclear for about 25% of its energy needs - as the chart below shows, when they took that capacity off-line they replaced it by ramping up fossil fuels, not renewables, which seem to have also declined a bit in the Fukushima aftermath.

If renewables are ready to "completely replace" other energy systems, why didn't they ramp up renewables instead of fossil fuels? Japan certainly has a greater interest in energy independence than other countries do, so that would have been the sensible thing to do. But they didn't.

In fact, "In a stunning reversal of previous government plans to mothball nuclear power plants" Japan approved a new energy policy reinstating nuclear power. So we can expect the trend will be for Japan's dependence on nuclear power to once again move towards 25%, displacing oil, gas and coal. And maybe, over time, renewables will start to trend upwards again.

Over all, nuclear energy has not turned out to be as good as we hopped, nor as bad as we feared. I think we will find that renewables will turn out to be better than the nay-sayers predict but not as great as the advocates hope. And I don't think renewables are now "ready to completely replace the current energy systems". Maybe in 2058. We'll see.

[kristopher]

39. What an odd interpretation of the data

Your chart shows 30 years of growth in energy consumption from both fossil fuels and nuclear. It is extremely clear that nuclear in no way changes the trajectory of growth for fossil fuel consumption.

The fact that they had to resort to fuller utilization of their existing fossil fuel infrastructure certainly does not speak to the viability of renewable energy. In fact, the primary lesson is that most of their low carbon technology was made unusable by a single accident. While the new, hard rightwing national government is dedicated to the attempt to restart the nuclear plants, local opposition and new safety regulations make it highly unlikely that more than a few will actually be brought back online. Not even counting the costs of clean up, the hundreds of billions of dollars Japan has spent on low carbon energy sources has been wasted.

None of those issues are problems for deploying renewable energy.

[reACTIONary]

40. Fossil fuel consumption...

RE: It is extremely clear that nuclear in no way changes the trajectory of growth for fossil fuel consumption.

You're right! Nor did I say it did.

What I did say (or attempt to say) is that it isn't possible, as of yet, to replace all existing systems with renewables. If it were possible, nuclear would be the first to be replaced by them. And it would be the first to go whether the government was right wing, left wing or aliens from mars.

When I say renewable sources are "not viable alternatives now" I don't mean that they are useless or that they won't become more useful in the future or that they shouldn't be pursued. I mean that, as your charts show, there is a very good chance that we will be stuck with nuclear power out to at least 2058.

That's what your charts show, isn't it?

[kristopher]

42. What you said was that the consequences of Fukushima made your point.

When in fact it shows nothing of the sort. We've known since 1992 that we can meet our needs with current renewable technology. You've offered no evidence at all to contradict the accepted knowledge about the state of renewable technology. None. Your arguments are like those of climate deniers who drift from one irrelevancy to the next, all the while working mightily to avoid the fact that you are disputing an indisputable body of evidence.

There are no authoritative sources that agree with your premise that renewables are not a viable way to meet our energy needs. We need to do the work of building out the infrastructure, but the obstacles are political and the negative influence of vested economic entities like the fossil fuel and nuclear industries.

[reACTIONary]

47. We've known since 1992...

RE: We've known since 1992 that we can meet our needs with current renewable technology.

Please provide me with some sort of reference or report that demonstrates that this is the case. I'll take a look at it.

[kristopher]

49. If you're interested you won't have trouble finding plenty of good sources.

That particular one was a definitive analysis on renewable energy prepared for the UN's 1992 Rio Earth Summit.

The knowledge about renewable potential exists as widely as the knowledge about climate change so I'm not playing your climate-denier style game of "fetch" any longer.

Just as in climate discussions, it is on you to show why your outlier opinion has more weight than the global consensus of the scientific community.

[reACTIONary]

51. I'll look into it...

... and I'll check with one of my contacts at the National Academy of Sciences and see what they have on the subject.

[kristopher]

41. Japan Replaced Half Its Nuclear Power With Energy Efficiency.

Japan Replaced Half Its Nuclear Power With Energy Efficiency. Could The U.S. Do Something Similar?
BY ARI PHILLIPS ON APRIL 10, 2014 AT 4:59 PM

The March 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan didn’t only shut down the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, it caused Japan to close all 50 of its nuclear plants over safety concerns and to reconsider its entire energy strategy for the rest of the century. Before the disaster Japan got about 30 percent of its electricity from nuclear power and had plans to raise that to about half by 2050. To replace that energy, Japan had to look elsewhere, both domestically and abroad. Japan doesn’t have its own significant fossil fuel reserves, and so it must import oil and gas — an expensive and environmentally unfriendly approach for a country that has prided itself on leading the fight against climate change. To help offset this, Japan also established a lucrative feed-in tariff for solar power that lead to a rapid growth in installations.

But replacing nearly one-third of their energy supply — especially going into peak summer demand — was not a realistic option, and the population braced for rolling blackouts to accompany the crippling impacts of the tsunami and earthquake. The government and the people also turned to another option, energy efficiency and conservation. A campaign called ‘setsuden’ (power saving) was established to generate support. It worked, and by allowing dressed-down outfits and rotating air-conditioning schedules, the country averted blackouts. But many worried that this short-term effort would prove to be just that, and that in the long-term an elevated demand for electricity would return, once again taxing the system.

“To push renewable and safe energy to the national forefront and reduce Japan’s reliance on nuclear energy, it is important to sustain the current public setsuden mood,” Kazuko Sato, of Soft Energy Project, an NGO that lobbies for renewable energy expansion, told the Guardian in 2011. “I am worried that the public support could be temporary.”

However, it turns out these worries were unwarranted — Japan has managed to replace half its missing nuclear power capacity through energy efficiency and conservation measures that endure three years later.

“These temporary measures have proven to have long-term impact,” reports Greentech Media. “They’ve dramatically increased the awareness of energy use and energy efficiency, and large companies are running high-profile efficiency programs:”

“The key lesson from the Japanese experience is that coal plant construction is simply too slow to be relevant in the modern world, where resiliency is highly valued. To cope with rapid loss of generation capacity, Japan needed fast, nimble and modular 21st-century solutions. That means efficiency and clean energy.”

The article states that even with these leaps in efficiency, there is still significant room for improvement in Japan...

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/04/10/3425406/japan-energy-efficiency-replacement/

[reACTIONary]

48. I'm all for ‘setsuden’ (nt)

[reACTIONary]

12. Slithering? "Westinghouse has been trying...

...to gain a foothold in Ukraine for more than a decade by tailoring its fuel services to the country's Russian-made reactors."

Doesn't sound like slithering to me. Sounds like a good opportunity for Westinghouse, America, and Ukraine. Win, win, win.

[nyabingi]

15. Big loss for

the people of Ukraine and the ideals of democracy. Lose through and through.

[Cheerful Charlie]

43. Win?

For US imperialism, yes.

[reACTIONary]

44. For the WIN...

... For western liberal democracy, and for the advancement of justice for all human kind.

[Cheerful Charlie]

45. Oh, ok, if that's what you want to call it.

When people stage a coup d'etat.

[reACTIONary]

46. That's my view! :) (nt)