Nuclear corruption 2012 to date

[kristopher]

Nuclear corruption 2012 to date

Nautilus Peace and Security Weekly Report—Contributor’s blog entry for Climate Change and Security.

Go to the Weekly Report for 5 July 2012.

Fukushima will teach many lessons, but one that does not seem to have sunk in yet is the global link between nuclear power and corruption. There is plenty of evidence that the corruption, collusion and nepotism that characterized the Japanese “nuclear village” contributed to what former Japanese PM Kan Naoto called the “myth of nuclear safety” in his country. Yet, this is far from being something peculiar to Japan with its squirrelly politics and industry-regulator-politics with feet happily inter-twined under the kotatsu.

It’s already been a busy year for nuclear corruption. Last month a US company, Data Systems & Solutions (DS&S), agreed to pay $8.8 million in fines to resolve charges of bribing officials at a Lithuanian nuclear power plant to obtain orders. DS&S executives paid substantial bribes in return for influence in awarding contracts to a range of officials at the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant (INPP) which included the plant Director-General, the heads of the International Projects Department and the Instrumentation & Controls Department, and “the lead software engineer at INPP with influence over the award of contracts”. Court records show that DS&S executives involved knew exactly what they were doing, with one asking colleagues “How do I put my nerves on an expense report?”

DS&S, a subsidiary of global power company Rolls Royce, has a very large number of contracts for “reactor integrity solutions” and reactor support services in nuclear power plants in both North America and Europe. In the case of the Lithuanian Ignalina NPP, the Department of Justice objected to DS&S’s activities over a number of years to “obtain and retain contracts for DS&S from INPP to design, install, and maintain INPP’s instrumentation and controls systems through the promise and payment of bribes to foreign officials employed by INPP.”

In Taiwan in June this year the Control Yuan impeached four senior officials of the state-owned Taiwan Power Company (Taipower) and the former Bureau of Energy director-general over procurement corruption that lead to orders exceeding requirements by NT$5.9 billion (US$196 million). Charges against other Taipower personnel are expected in the face of a $4 bn. loss in 2011.

In April this year South Korean prosecutors ...

Lots more here: http://nautilus.org/napsnet/napsnet-weekly/nuclear-corruption-2012-to-date/

[bananas]

1. "Lots more here" - and those are only the ones which have been exposed.

Probably just the tip of the iceberg.

[NNadir]

2. Fukushima taught many lessons? Not really.

It kept up the noise machine of people who hate, out of fear, ignorance and superstition, the world's largest, by far source of climate change.

Nothing learned.

It kept up the hope on the part of the same set that someone, anyone, would die from radiation from the effects of the destruction of three nuclear reactors, so that the same set could continue, like some kind of Pavlovian nightmare, while 3.3 million people killed each year by air pollution, not causing even one shed tear from the anti-nuke cults.

And it kept the same noodnicks from trying to suck hundreds of billions upon and hundreds billions upon billions of yen, euros, dollars and yen from the world's economies to finance their so called "renewable" religious fantasy.

It was 118F in Kansas last week.

It is reported in Comptes Rendus Biologies that 70,000 people died from the European heatwave of 2003; again producing not a peep from the anti-science cults who hate, with endless dollops of fear, ignorance, and superstition the world's largest, by far, source of climate change gas free energy.

Death toll exceeded 70,000 in Europe during the summer of 2003

Heckuva job anti-nuke. Heckuva job. You must be very, very, very, very proud. Congratulations.

Why don't you tell us again all about how renewable energy can provide all of the earth's energy needs by 2050? You may prove to be right, in the sense that most of the population will be dead by then, and people will be living short, savage lives just as they did the last time renewable energy supplied the world.

[kristopher]

3. 80% Clean, Renewable Energy by 2050: More Than Possible

80% Clean, Renewable Energy by 2050: More Than Possible, But Need More Political Will (& Public Demand)

Each bar represents a different level of renewable generation as part of the mix





Prelude to article's discussion of National Renewable Energy Lab's findings released last month that using currently available commercial technologies we could we could power 80% the US by 2050.

Even more ambitious than the above, Mark Jacobson and Mark Delucchi wrote in 2009 about how the whole world could be 100% powered by renewable energy by 2030. These guys aren’t wackos, either. Mark Z. Jacobson is a professor of civil and environmental engineering at Stanford University and director of Stanford’s Atmosphere/Energy Program, and Mark A. Delucchi is a research scientist at the Institute of Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis. I have seen no indication that they were technically wrong.

Another very reputable body, the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), noted this year that research it has conducted has found that clean, renewable energy could cheaply supply 48 states of the continental U.S. with 70% of its electricity demand by 2030 (and that’s without including hydroelectric).

So, we’re not exactly lacking in top researchers telling us that we can implement a ton more renewable energy than we have today. But one more study from a top research institute doesn’t hurt, and NREL is certainly a top renewable energy institute, one of the top institutes in the world for the subject. And this wasn’t just the product of a few researchers. It is actually the result of “110 contributors from 35 organizations including national laboratories, industry, universities, and non-governmental organizations.” It’s the most thorough report I’ve seen on the topic.


Basically, with these 110 researchers chiming in, there’s no reason anyone should say we can’t get a huge majority of our power from clean, renewable energy sources via currently available technology.

With that preface, let’s get to NREL’s key findings...

More at http://cleantechnica.com/2012/07/02/80-clean-renewable-energy-potential-2050-us/

[XemaSab]

4. Pretty big fans of the nukes there

[kristopher]

5. It's pretty difficult to see any support for that conclusion. nt

[kristopher]

6. The OP can't count things like this

Utility regulators asleep at the switch
07/13/2012

There is a reason for all of the bluster in North Carolina over the ouster of Bill Johnson as CEO of newly combined Duke Energy and Progress Energy. The regulators are embarrassed for failing to do their job and properly examine the deal. In North Carolina, utility regulators did not even ask about the shuttered Crystal River nuclear power plant. In Florida, they asked but failed to move aggressively and had even less authority to review the merger. If regulators didn't see this coming, they have only themselves to blame.

Former Duke CEO James Rogers replaced Johnson, the former Progress Energy CEO, as head of the combined company. Rogers told the North Carolina Utilities Commission on Tuesday that the board of directors forced Johnson's resignation hours after the merger closed due to "an accumulation of concerns and observations" that began surfacing earlier this year. Among the major issues: the extent of problems at the troubled Crystal River nuclear plant. The facility was shut down in 2009 for repairs, but it remains shuttered after Progress Energy's failed attempt to repair it without hiring an outside firm.

Yet in the days leading up to the merger's completion July 2, the North Carolina commission refused to examine the Crystal River issue despite requests from watchdog groups. North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper, who launched his own investigation last week, claimed, "We need to get the bottom of this to make sure we protect consumers." It seems a little late for the cavalry .

For months, Progress Energy customers have been begging the Florida Public Service Commission to take a harder look at the botched repair job in Crystal River and whether it should just be shut down. (The PSC will hear a status report next month.) The PSC also has been unwilling to re-examine its approval of an advanced nuclear fee paid by 1.6 million Florida customers for a proposed Levy County nuclear plant that has more than quadrupled in cost since it was first announced six years ago.

Also absent: the Republican-led Florida Legislature...

http://www.power-eng.com/news/2012/07/13/utility-regulators-asleep-at-the-switch.html