Sweden's Forsmark "Chernobyl" has no effect on dropping nuke "phase-out."

[NNadir]

I engage in private correspondence with Jan Willenius, who is a Professor of reactor physics at KTH, a technical university in Sweden. I first encountered him in connection with some searching I was doing related to advanced nuclear fuel cycles that consume the actinide portions of so called "nuclear waste," recovering energy, minimizing the quantity of spent fuel, reducing the need for mining, etc.

Intrigued that he was teaching advanced reactor physics relating to schemes that will not be in place for many decades in a country that had an official nuclear phase-out policy in place, I originally wrote him to discuss the situation with respect to nuclear power in Sweden. Sweden's "phase-out" is one of the world's oldest, dating from 1980. Like all such "phase-outs" the politicians who enacted it proposed it for some future date where they would have no responsibility for the consequences, but lo and behold, that time arrived. Swedish reactors continued to operate, but the date of the declared time to actually shut nuclear reactors approached in the mid 1990's. The "phase-out" driven shutdown of Barseback-2 in Sweden engendered a lot of controversy, since much of the power that replaced the reactor came from fossil fuel electricity generated in Germany (primarily coal) and/or the importation of nuclear electricity from Finland and even the less reliable reactors of the former Soviet Union. Many Swedes recognized that the Barseback shutdown was a setback for the environment as well as a really poor business decision.

The storm over the Barseback shutdown lead to a moratorium on shutting reactors and to the approval of the power uprates at Ringhals, which in effect, added Swedish nuclear power capacity. In this fact there was a de facto repeal of the phase-out, but Swedish public opinion in favor of nuclear energy continued to improve.

This summer there was an event at Forsmark in Sweden which rated on the international scale events as a "2" in the 7 point scale by which Chernobyl was rated as a "7".

However, it was reported internationally that a former construction chief at the plant, identified in the international media as "Plant Director" and "nuclear expert," had declared the event as a near "Chernobyl."

Here is a report on this terrible tragic vast incredible "almost Chernobyl" that is typical of the reporting at the time:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,1518,430458,00.html

Note the immediate appeal to the luddite scientific illiterates at Greenpeace, who just eat this shit up while the world continues to dump tens of billions of tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere - waiting for the promised solar nirvana that, like Jesus, never comes. Note the difference between this "could have happened accident" and coal operations is that coal operations do kill people continuously in normal operations, where as nuclear power seldom actually injures anyone.

As one might expect, news of this tragic event that "almost" depopulated Sweden was predictably broadcast immediately at Democratic Underground in the normal manner, surrounded with typically complete ignorance about the actual situation:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=115&topic_id=62585

I knew of course, since I actually know what I am talking about, that the reactor would come back on line, and that all of the hysterics in the media and Greenpeace types would pay no attention to the matter. I waited, and searched and searched and searched for information about the reactors status. None was available because the broad success of nuclear power around the world is not as sexy or fun in the minds of our media morons as a good ole' fashion scare story. Unable to learn about Forsmark's status, I finally I dropped Dr. Wallenius a line, writing him thusly:

11 okt 2006 kl. 20.19 skrev (NNadir):

> How has the Forsmark situation played out with the Swedish
> public? Has it
> lead to a hardening of attitudes about nuclear power, or lead to
> calls to
> keep the phase-out in place. I have read that the new government
> in Sweden
> was calling for a repeal of the phase-out. Is this possible?
> Finally will
> Forsmark reopen soon? I've been unable to learn too many details
> about the
> status and plans.

I received this response:

Hi *******,

The Forsmark incident did not affect the public opinion in Sweden,
and the new government has indeed halted the phase-out. Forsmark is
again on-line. The guy who cried Chernobyl in the media lost all
credibility when it came out he was in a huge legal conflict with the
utility. From the academic world, we were also able to give the
correct picture in media with a few days of delay, which probably
helped.

Best regards -- Janne

That's all there is to it.

Once again, we have an event that - while serious - was addressed without injury or loss of life (unlike normal operations at a coal plant), for which corrective action was taken and the safety level of the infrastructure was again improved, making a repeat less likely. Was is notable is that the Swedish scientific community immediately sprang into action to confront ignorance, and that the Swedish public believed their scientists.

The Swedish nuclear phase out, like the Dutch phase out, probably like all European phase outs ultimately will be, is dead. In the face of the immediate emergency of global climate change, a catastrophe, this is some good news.

[Stockholm]

1. Very interesting post Nnadir

Thanks for posting it.

[NNadir]

3. My pleasure. n/t.

[phantom power]

2. Imagine living in a country where it's *possible* to lose credibility.

Here in America, it seems that there is no limit to how badly you can fuck up, and still wield influence.

[Dead_Parrot]

4. Or get the correct picture in the media...

Weird place, Sweden. Must be something in the meatballs.

[phantom power]

5. fascinating... what if a cuisine based on bland meat-and-starch composites...

was responsible for elevated levels of good sense? The Woebegone Theory of culture.