Circular Logic On Protecting the HB Robinson Plant.

Is this the first SG tube leak post San Onofre?

So Robinson was notified of elevated radioactivity going to the outside with ...

On January 31, 2012, Unit 3 control room operators received an alarm that indicated a primary-to-secondary reactor coolant leak from steam generator 3E0-88. The alarm received was from the main condenser air ejector radiation monitors, which continuously samples from a vent line for the purpose of rapidly identifying steam generator tube leaks.  

 

See how fast a leak could develop?

Jan 2012 San Onophe.

MANUAL TRIP DUE TO A PRIMARY TO SECONDARY LEAK GREATER THAN 30 GAL/HR

"At 1505 PST, Unit 3 entered Abnormal Operation Instruction S023-13-14 'Reactor Coolant Leak' for a steam generator leak exceeding 5 gallons per day.

"At 1549 PST, the leak rate was determined to be 82 gallons per day. At 1610 PST, a leak rate greater than 75 gallons per day with an increasing rate of leakage exceeding 30 gallons per hour was established and entry into S023-13-28 'Rapid Power Reduction' was performed.

"At 1630 PST, commenced rapid power reduction per S023-13-28 'Rapid Power Reduction'. At 1731 PST, with reactor power at 35% the Unit was manually tripped. At 1738 PST, Unit 3 entered Emergency Operation Instruction S023-12-4 'Steam Generator Tube Rupture'.

"At 1800 PST the affected steam generator was isolated."

All control rods fully inserted on the trip. Decay heat is being removed thru the main steam bypass valves into the main condenser. Main feedwater is maintaining steam generator level. No relief valves lifted during the manual trip. The plant is in normal shutdown electrical lineup.

Unit 2 is presently in a refueling outage and was not affected by this event.

The licensee has notified the NRC Resident Inspector. The licensee has issued a press release.

1975	Point Beach 1	Wisconsin	125 gal/min	Rupture
1976	Surry 2	Virginia	330 gal/min	Rupture
1979	Prairie Island 1	Minnesota	390 gal/min	Rupture
1982	Ginna	New York	630 gal/min	Rupture
1987	North Anna 1	Virginia	600 gal/min	Rupture
1989	McGuire 1	North Carolina	500 gal/min	Rupture
1993	Palo Verde 2	Arizona	240 gal/min	Rupture
2000	Indian Point 2	New York	90 gal/min ??	Rupture

Plus Fort Calhoun and San Onophe. It is a very rare event...

The Steam Generator Tube Rupture at Indian Point

So these guys were messing around with a potential of a 600 gal leak a minute tube leak. A lot smaller leak took out the two plant San Onofre. You know for a fact everyone is worrying more about the consequence of a tube leak post. A 600 gal leak and even a much smaller one would be a huge post Fukushima national event. A media circus.

So if you were a professional, you got a tube leak...it is increasing. Why would you be gambling so much money and credibility over risking a complete tube failure. Why would you even think of risking throwing away a nuclear plant over a tube leak and putting another black eye in the PWRs. 

Unless you are terribly addicted to gambling and you are desensitize to risk!

This is exactly what I am talking about. The deal should be with the NRC is to intervene early and heavy with a bad nuclear plant and utility. They dip into the negative column for a very limited amount of time...then the NRC drives them up to better than average grades.

The NRC consumes a tremendous amount resources over a  prolonged bad actor like HB Robinson. These guys were terrible actors before the fire in 2010. Right, it consumes NRC resources that should go to other weak actors...to prevent them from becoming another bad actor.

This should be a very cautionary tail...how hard it is to bring a plant back from a near death experience.  

So the chickens comes home to roost in 2010 according to the Union of Concern Scientist on the HB Robinson. Only the terrible shaking of the tree during a accident gets us to see the debis under the tree of the broken off leaves and branches...the horrendous component and organization degradation. The leaves didn't break off during the accident...they been there for many years and all the big players seen it  It wasn't the NRC exposing the horrendous condition before accident. You catch all the latent NRC violations that went around uncontested for many years in the UCS write up...the licence didn't disclosed them and the ROP wasn't engineer to pick up these violations and extreme safety issues before the accident. We see this a lot in the nuclear industry. An accident happens, then on the investigation a lot of NRC rules and codes were acceptably broken for many years which was a factor in the accident. 

I'd just like to see once a serous accident emerge...a real random accident out of nowhere with no current code or secret NRC violation..with no NRC and engineering code violations causing or making worst the event. Just why is there so many dangling violations without NRC attention? There just must be a enormous amount of unenforced regulations and engineering codes going on nationwide. One theory on this says this intentional. If they find a broke a rule, if they find and  fix the rule violation post accident, they can quickly start back up without fixing the wider organizational or fix the global quality of components and systems problem.   

I mean, if you were a objective observer in a bad actor plant seeing the god's eyes view with all the plant information...you could see the accident coming a million miles away.  A dummy could. Bottom line, pre accident, the organization becomes just plane crazy!  The UCS:

The most significant near-miss event took place at Progress Energy’s HB Robinson nuclear plant in Florence, South Carolina on March 28, 2010, the 31^st anniversary of the Three Mile Island accident. The NRC sent an SIT to the nuclear site to investigate electrical fires.

After uncovering multiple problems, including“design and procurement of safety equipment, maintenance, operations, and training—over many years,” the NRC upgraded the SIT to an augmented inspection team (AIT), used when the risk of reactor core damage rises to a factor of 100. 

What ensued at the plant that day was what could be described as a black comedy of errors, with one misstep exacerbating the next. The following is an abbreviated account of the March 28 events as described in the UCS report:

• An electrical cable shorted out and started a fire.

• A breaker designed to automatically open and de-energize power to the shorted cable failed to do so, allowing electricity to flow from a circuit through the shorted cable into the ground, reducing the circuit’s voltage.

• This circuit, which powered a pump circulating water through the reactor core, experienced a drop in power. The pump’s output dropped, triggering an automatic shutdown of the reactor.

• “The electrical problems damaged the main power transformer between the plant and its electrical grid.” About half of the plant’s equipment was then left without power.

• Without power, valves on drain lines remained open, allowing heat to escape from the reactor more rapidly that normal. “The operators did not notice the open drain valves or abnormally fast cool down.”

• When pumps transferring water from a tank to the reactor vessel failed to automatically realign, plant operators failed to notice this failure for nearly an hour.

• Four hours into the event, operators attempted to restore power to the de-energized circuit without checking first to ensure workers had fixed the original fault, which they had not.

• “When the operators closed the electrical breaker to repower the circuit, they reenergized the shorted cable, and it cause another fire. The electrical disturbance also triggered alarms on both sets of station batteries, prompting the operators to declare an emergency Alert.”

The AIT also documented other equipment failures. The cable that started the first fire, installed in 1986, did not meet specified facility parameters. A light bulb replacing a bad bulb in 2008 failed to illuminate, causing an electrical breaker not to open.

The report writes of the March 28 incident:“There is simply no excuse for the fact that the company and the NRC had not detected and corrected at least some of these problems before this event.”

UCS also notes that Progress Energy informed the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, in writing, that certain diagnostics and testing had been performed at the HB Robinson plant when, in fact, they had not been done.

See, fix a few NRC violations without understanding if the organization has compromised multiple systems...then another accident pops right back up. With a bad actor plant who never resets all the systems back into initial new plant condition...a plant for decades can hover around just barely safe.

...The NRC sent another SIT to the Florence, South Carolina plant on October 7, 2010, after an automatic shutdown of the reactor, followed by equipment failures and operator errors. The NRC team determined that the motor failure initiating the event was caused by degradation of insulation on the motor winding. While Progress Energy had been aware of the problem, and had a plan in place in 2003 to deal with it, the motor had never been fixed.

Nearly all of the 14 near-misses documented in the UCS report were the result of known safety problems that went uncorrected. Most of them followed similar scenarios to that at the HB Robinson plant documented above, described in the report as an “error-fest.”

So here we are  right up to today with the HB Robinson Plant. They been in a degraded condition for a very long very long period. These guys are very deep into Republican land and teabagger locals hate government. Some plants barely get their heads above water, then slide right back down to a unsafe condition ready to generate another terrible accident. They remain uncontested by the NRC.   

Nuclear Plans In US Are In Bad Shape As More Than 10 Percent Earn “Degraded Level Of Performance” Or Worse Score

Of highest concern are two facilities: the Browns Ferry 1 power plant in Alabama and the Fort Calhoun plant in Nebraska.

The NRC graded nine additional power plants with a “degraded level of performance.” Those include: Browns Ferry 2 in Alabama, Duane Arnold in Iowa, Monticello in Minnesota, Pilgrim in Massachusetts, Point Beach 1 in Wisconsin, Susquehanna 2 in Pennsylvania, Sequoyah 1 and 2 in Tennessee and Watts Bar 1 in Tennessee. 

Browns Ferry and the TVA are in the same boat. This three plant facility has been drowning with negligent unsafety for many years... they had a red finding in the beginning of 2011. It took a unimaginable broken broken valve to wake the NRC up. These guys has discovered tons of uncontested and secret hidden from public view...NRC rule violations through the red finding These guys just don't have enough power to quickly throttle out of the degraded condition...they remain on NRC intensive care for many years. Basically TVA tried to lie their way out of this. These utilities have absolutely no fear of the NRC and the public at large...they are unconstrained by a conscience or a organized government force 

Blame yourselves folks, for allowing your government and our political to run like this.

Basically, Obama has been a completely neutral force over our nuclear industry in the last 6 years ...he terribly mismanage the NRC commissioners office all through his presidential years. He controls the NRC through hiring the commissioners...he hired the do nothing majority of the commissioners. 

I think the independence agency is a fail form. I think the agency needs to be under the control of the politicians, thus being under control of the peoples. This form is a result of the teabaggers and anti government campaign contribution influence. It is the main reason this technology is unacceptable by the public and the nuclear technology is a failed endeavor.

The leaking steam generator tube is right out of the news today...this kind of behavior would comes out of a negligent operator whose bad acting and degraded behavior has been going on for years. This challenges if their tube inspections has been compromised.

...Check out their safety instincts, they knew they had a tube leak from Feb 27. How did they know what condition the tube was in...if it could immediately burst or especially under accident condition? Did they have the god’s eye view of the condition of that tube or related tubes? No! It is all guesswork and saving profits and bonuses.  

They said the delay in shutting down was because they were gathering the resources to do a SG inspection. They delayed taking the conservative safety action to immediately shut down to save a very pennies...just like their pattern of many years. Why didn’t the NRC order them to shut down?    

Remember these guys have absolutely no information with what is going on in there and even what tube is leaking. It is all guess work over incomplete information. These are all Confidence Men! 
 

SUBJECT: ROBINSON UNIT 2 SHUTDOWN DUE TO STEAM GENERATOR TUBE LEAK 

On March 7, 2014, at 7:00 p.m. (EST), the licensee commenced a shutdown from 100% power due to a Steam Generator tube leak on the ‘C’ Steam Generator. The NRC resident inspectors monitored and observed the shutdown.

The licensee had noted indications of a Steam Generator tube leak on the ‘C’Steam Generator of approximately 1 gallon per day (gpd) on February 27, 2014. The Technical Specification limit is 75 gpd. The licensee closely monitored the Steam Generator tube leakage, including enhanced sampling.

In parallel with the monitoring activities, the licensee planned a maintenance outage for steam generator inspection and repairs due to the gradual increasing leakage. On March 7, 2014, the Steam Generator ‘C’ tube leakage had reached appropriately 37.5 gpd.

Certainty/ Uncertainty Gaming At HB Robinson: Leaking SG.

HARTSVILLE S.C. -- The H.B. Robinson nuclear plant near Hartsville is one of 38 reactors across the U.S. identified in a recent review as being at risk of early retirement.A new analysis by Mark Cooper, senior fellow for economic analysis with the Institute for Energy and the Environment at Vermont Law School, concludes that the tough times facing the nuclear power industry in the U.S. are going to get tougher.

I mean if Nuke plant science and engineering is so good at predicting risk and the future…why wasn’t this repaired before it leaked.

　
PRELIMINARY NOTIFICATION - PNO-II-14-004

This preliminary notification constitutes EARLY notice of events of possible safety or public interest significance. Some of the information may not yet be fully verified or evaluated by the Region II staff (Atlanta, GA).

Facility: Licensee Emergency Classification:

Plant H.B. Robinson

□ Notification of Unusual Event

SUBJECT: ROBINSON UNIT 2 SHUTDOWN DUE TO STEAM GENERATOR TUBE LEAK

On March 7, 2014, at 7:00 p.m. (EST), the licensee commenced a shutdown from 100% power due to a Steam Generator tube leak on the ‘C’ Steam Generator. The NRC resident inspectors monitored and observed the shutdown.

The licensee had noted indications of a Steam Generator tube leak on the ‘C’ Steam Generator of approximately 1 gallon per day (gpd) on February 27, 2014. The Technical Specification limit is 75 gpd. The licensee closely monitored the Steam Generator tube leakage, including enhanced sampling.

In parallel with the monitoring activities, the licensee planned a maintenance outage for steam generator inspection and repairs due to the gradual increasing leakage. On March 7, 2014, the Steam Generator ‘C’ tube leakage had reached appropriately 37.5 gpd.

This preliminary notification is issued for information only. The resident inspectors will continue to monitor the licensee’s actions and inspectors from the NRC Region II Office will assist in onsite inspection activities.

Region II received initial notification of this occurrence through the resident inspectors who had been monitoring licensee actions. The information presented herein has
been discussed with the licensee and is current as of 1:00 p.m. March 10, 2014.



LICENSE AMENDMENT REQUEST FOR REVISION TO STEAM GENERATON
PROGRAM INSPECTION FREQUENCIES AND TUBE SAMPLE SELECTION AND

APPLICATION OF PERMANENT ALTERNATE REPAIR CRITERIA (H*)

This request proposes to combine two changes that affect the same Technical Specification (TS) sections into one License Amendment. Specifically, the first part proposes to implement revisions consistent with TSTF-5 10, Revision 2, "Revision to Steam Generator Program Inspection Frequencies and Tube Sample Selection." The second part proposes to permanently revise TS 5.5.9 to exclude portions of the Steam Generator (SG) tube below the top of the SG tubesheet from periodic inspections by implementing the permanent alternate repair criteria "H*." Both of these changes address SG inspections and reports and are combined to minimize redundant reviews.

　

SUMMARY OF CONFERENCE CALL WITH H. B. ROBINSON STEAM ELECTRIC PLANT, UNIT 2

REGARDING THE FALL 2013 STEAM GENERATOR

  TUBE INSPECTION RESULTS

DUKE ENERGY PROGRESS, INC.

DOCKET NO. 50-261

On October 22, 2013, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff participated in a conference call with Duke Energy Progress, Inc. (the licensee) representatives regarding the
fall2013 refueling outage steam generator (SG) tube inservice inspection activities at H. B. Robinson Steam Electric Plant, Unit 2 (Robinson 2).

Under enormous economic pressures:

Posted: Tuesday, July 23, 2013 11:35 am | Updated: 2:19 pm, Tue Jul 23, 2013.

Report: Hartsville's Robinson plant at risk of early retirementBy JIM FAILEMorning News

HARTSVILLE S.C. -- The H.B. Robinson nuclear plant near Hartsville is one of 38 reactors across the U.S. identified in a recent review as being at risk of early retirement.A new analysis by Mark Cooper, senior fellow for economic analysis with the Institute for Energy and the Environment at Vermont Law School, concludes that the tough times facing the nuclear power industry in the U.S. are going to get tougher.

Inconsistent Nuclear Plant Safety Enforcement

I just the NRC is in the game of releasing what information they think is important…afraid to trust the public with all of the information.

Again, we are talking about tremendous forces…our bought out political system and the enormous resources of the electric utility system.
 
Report: Inconsistent Nuclear Plant Safety Enforcement
Eric Connor, Greenville News 8:57 a.m. EDT March 10, 2014

After the Fukushima meltdown, the NRC required all nuclear utilities to study flood and seismic hazards

Inconsistent enforcement by federal regulators stands in the way of protecting the public from the dangers of nuclear energy, across the country and at the Upstate's Oconee Nuclear Station where concerns over fire and flood have hovered for decades, a nuclear watchdog group says in a new report.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission can be an effective regulator but hasn't followed through in holding utilities across the nation accountable, the Union of Concerned Scientists environmental group said in its annual report analyzing the state of industry safety.

The report — "The NRC and Nuclear Power Plant Safety in 2013: More Jekyll, Less Hyde" — lists 10 instances of what the group considers "near miss" events that required special inspections and posed higher-than-acceptable risks.

The Oconee station managed to stay off the "near miss" list this year — but the report nonetheless made special mention of dual, ongoing safety concerns at the plant: the threat of a break in the Lake Jocassee Dam upstream and repeated delays in meeting fire-protection standards set three decades ago.

Duke spokeswoman B.J. Gatten said that Oconee's three reactors are operating safely and that the company is taking action to meet the NRC's standards for fire and flooding protection.

NRC spokesman Joey Ledford said that the report "consistently mischaracterizes" the effectiveness of the agency's regulatory actions.

The report's author — Dave Lochbaum, a nuclear safety expert who once trained NRC inspectors — wrote that the NRC has been complicit in allowing utilities like Duke to ignore deadlines for years.

"What's protecting the people around Oconee from fire risk? Luck," Lochbaum wrote. "What's protecting Oconee's owner from the cost and bother of legally managing the fire risk? The NRC."

The report comes just before the three-year anniversary of the nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, when a massive earthquake and tsunami caused fire systems to fail and reactors to flood.

In the report, Lochbaum pointed to long-held concerns among NRC engineers that a break in the Jocassee Dam — while unlikely — would assuredly result in a meltdown of Oconee's three reactors.

Last year, The Greenville News reported on an NRC whistleblower's analysis detailing dam concerns that spanned decades.

The NRC had held the analysis from public view on grounds that it contained security-related information, but the document has since been released in largely unedited form.

The News also reported on hundreds of internal emails that show NRC staffers expressing frustration over superiors they said were cowing to the industry instead of holding it accountable for the threat of a dam failure.

Just one month after the Fukushima meltdown, Lochbaum wrote, the NRC met with the public but didn't mention the long-held concerns.

"The exact same flooding hazard that exists today at the Oconee nuclear plant was not mentioned by the NRC — so the public was actually misled into believing no such problems existed," Lochbaum wrote.

After Fukushima, the NRC required all nuclear utilities to study flood and seismic hazards.

Last summer, Duke presented the findings of its flood study and is awaiting the NRC's response.

Ledford said the NRC will provide a written response "in the near future."

Meanwhile, the company has interim measures in place that have been approved by the NRC and is performing permanent modifications that "will add additional safety margin against flooding damage to the nuclear facility," Gatten said.

The NRC's directive to Duke to address flood concerns comes at the same time as the agency has ordered the company to honor newly set deadlines to improve fire protection.

Nearly two decades after fire standards were put into place in 1980, the NRC discovered that almost half of the nation's reactors weren't in compliance.

The agency in 2004 gave utilities the choice to comply with the 1980 rules or be allowed to operate under temporary standards in pursuit of new standards.

In 2010, the NRC approved Duke's plan to implement new fire-protection measures and gave the company two years to complete them.

In summer 2012, Duke asked for an extension until the end of 2014, then four months later asked for another extension to the end of 2015.

The NRC declined to grant the extension and issued notice to the company of an "apparent violation," which carried the potential for civil fines.

Then, last July, the NRC ordered Duke to complete the fire-protection transition by the middle of November 2016.

The decision ultimately granted the company a four-year extension from its original request for two, Lochbaum wrote.

"If two years' delay is unsafe, four years' delay is insane — especially since fire regulations have been in place since 1980," Lochbaum wrote.

The Oconee station has operated safely under temporary measures allowed by the NRC as part of the upgrade, Gatten said.

"The completion of the fire protection modifications is receiving the full attention of Duke resources to ensure this project is completed to deliver the additional benefits as designed," Gatten said.

Two years ago, Oconee was named on the "near miss" list after emergency breakers in the station's backup reactor core cooling system were deemed inoperable.

Last year, another Duke station in South Carolina, Catawba, was listed as a near miss after a shutdown of its reactor opened electrical breakers that disconnected the reactor from the power grid.

This year, one Duke reactor was cited as a near miss — the Shearon Harris plant outside of Raleigh, N.C.

In 2001, workers at Oconee discovered that a crack in a metal tube passing through a reactor vessel had caused a leak of cooling water, Lochbaum wrote.

In response, the NRC required owners of similar reactors, including Shearon Harris, to examine larger portions of the tubes and increase the frequency of inspections, Lochbaum wrote.

However, last May a special inspection team of the NRC found that a reactor vessel flaw had not been properly diagnosed a year earlier, he wrote.

The incident shouldn't be classified as a near miss, Ledford said.

"The bottom line here is that the reactor vessel flaw was identified before it developed into a safety concern," Ledford said.

NRC: Soviet Style Confidence Men

That is why I think Jascko was a terrible regulator…at the heart of it he was dishonest. He was carrying the industry’s water.

I think the NRC employees are just trying to survive and feed their families. Just like the rest of us. A survival tactic is to minimize your profile….the electric utilities and the politicians hold tremendous powers over them. The Republicans will slit their throats if they get crossed...the Democrats will just turn their backs on them. 

They basically don’t want to risk losing their great jobs they love.

At the bottom of it, the pro safety folks just don't have the resources and the access to the foundational information as the economic interest of the nuclear industry. It is a terrible mismatch of power and access to information...

I also think the uneducated anti nuclear extremist disserved our nation...cut of the main proportion of our population into getting involved with maintaining standards.

U.S. Nuclear Agency Hid Concerns, Hailed Safety Record as Fukushima Melted

By Bill Dedman

In the tense days after a powerful earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Japan on March 11, 2011, staff at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission made a concerted effort to play down the risk of earthquakes and tsunamis to America’s aging nuclear plants, according to thousands of internal emails reviewed by NBC News.

The emails, obtained via the Freedom of Information Act, show that the campaign to reassure the public about America’s nuclear industry came as the agency’s own experts were questioning U.S. safety standards and scrambling to determine whether new rules were needed to ensure that the meltdown occurring at the Japanese plant could not occur here.

At the end of that long first weekend of the crisis three years ago, Scott Burnell, a manager in the agency’s media and public relations wing, thanked his colleagues for sticking to the talking points that his team had been distributing to senior officials and the public.

"While we know more than these say," Burnell wrote, "we're sticking to this story for now."

There are numerous examples in the emails of apparent misdirection or concealment in the initial weeks after the Japanese plant was devastated by a 9.0 earthquake and 50-foot tsunami that knocked out power and cooling systems at the six-reactor plant, eventually causing releases of radioactive material:

Trying to distance the U.S. agency from the Japanese crisis, an NRC manager told staff to hide from reporters the presence of Japanese engineers in the NRC's operations center in Maryland.

If asked whether the Diablo Canyon Power Plant on the California coast could withstand the same size tsunami that had hit Japan, spokespeople were told not to reveal that NRC scientists were still studying that question. As for whether Diablo could survive an earthquake of the same magnitude, "We're not so sure about, but again we are not talking about that," said one email.

When skeptical news articles appeared, the NRC dissuaded news organizations from using the NRC's own data on earthquake risks at U.S. nuclear plants, including the Indian Point Energy Center near New York City.

And when asked to help reporters explain what would happen during the worst-case scenario -- a nuclear meltdown -- the agency declined to address the questions.

As the third anniversary of Fukushima on Tuesday approaches, the emails pull back the curtain on the agency’s efforts to protect the industry it is supposed to regulate. The NRC officials didn't lie, but they didn't always tell the whole truth either. When someone asked about a topic that might reflect negatively on the industry, they changed the subject.

NBC News requested in late March 2011 all of the emails sent and received by certain NRC staffers during the first week of the crisis. Other news organizations and watchdogs filed similar requests. The NRC has now been posting thousands of emails in its public reading room over the past two years.

The NRC declined to discuss specific emails or communications. But NRC Public Affairs Director Eliot Brenner provided an emailed statement: "The NRC Office of Public Affairs strives to be as open and transparent as possible, providing the public accurate information in the proper context. We take our communication mission seriously. We did then and we do now. The frustration displayed in the chosen e-mails reflects more on the extreme stress our team was under at the time to assure accuracy in a context in which information from Japan was scarce to nonexistent. These e-mails fall well short of an accurate picture of our communications with the American public immediately after the event and during the past three years."

Dating back to the Three Mile Island nuclear crisis in 1979, many nuclear watchdogs and critics have said that the NRC acts first to protect the industry, and its own reputation. One critic said these emails solidify that perception.

"The NRC knew a lot more about what was going on than it wanted to tell the American people," said Edwin Lyman, senior scientist at the nuclear watchdog group Union of Concerned Scientists and co-author of the new book "Fukushima: The Story of a Nuclear Disaster," which relied on some of the same emails. "They immediately put out information that implied that U.S. reactors were in a better position to withstand Fukushima type events than Fukushima reactors were, but it was clear that the what the NRC knew internally was not nearly as positive."

'We all need to say a prayer'

From the earliest hours of the crisis, the emails among NRC staff show deep concern about the developing crisis in Japan, particularly among the technical experts.

The first word that the powerful earthquake and tsunami waves had devastated the Fukushima plant came early morning (Eastern time) on March 11, 2011. Throughout the day, staff at NRC headquarters in Rockland, Md., struggled to learn what was going on in Japan. The chief of the NRC Component Integrity Branch, senior engineer David Rudland, was asked by a colleague if he had any new information. [The emails excerpted in this article are shown in full in a PDF file.]

From: Rudland, David

Date: Friday, March 11, 2011, 10:54 AM

No, at this point all we know is that they are struggling to shut down the plant.

We all need to say a prayer.…

By that afternoon, the news was worse. An officer in NRC research passed on to his colleagues a status update from the Japanese electrical company.

From: Nosek, Andrew

Date: Friday, March 11, 2011, 4:46 PM

There was a triple SBO.

SBO is nuclear jargon for a station blackout. The earthquake had cut electrical power to the plant, and the tsunami had damaged the backup diesel generators.

NRC operations officer Daniel Mills had an emotional reaction:

From: Mills, Daniel (NRC operations officer)

Date: Friday, March 11, 2011, 4:49 PM

BBC is reporting radiation levels at reactor are 1000x normal. I feel like crying.

The NRC staff recognized immediately the public-relations nightmare that Fukushima presented for nuclear power in the United States. More than 30 of America's 100 nuclear power reactors have the same brand of General Electric reactors or containment system used in Fukushima.

American nuclear reactors are well into middle age. The median age of an operating reactor in the U.S. is 34 years, placing start-up in midst of the Carter administration. The oldest -- the Ginna plant near Rochester, N.Y. -- was licensed in 1969, the year Neil Armstrong walked on the moon. Only four of the 100 reactors have begun generating power since 1990. The newest, at Watts Bar in Tennessee, was licensed in 1996, when many of this year's high school seniors were born.

The unfolding disaster in Japan triggered immediate alarm inside the NRC about plans to announce regulatory actions. Seeing the video from Japan, NRC engineer Richard Barkley pointed out that the NRC staff that week to recommend extending for 20 years the license for reactors a nuclear power plant in New England called Vermont Yankee. He warned colleagues, "That was a very scary picture to myself, much less the public, especially since the machine is a GE designed BWR (boiled-water reactor) not radically different in size, age and design than some high visibility plants in my region. I can see the cards and letters coming to my in-box by Monday." (Ultimately, the NRC delayed the Vermont Yankee re-licensing only briefly, approving it on March 21. This year the plant's owner plans to close it, a victim of the competition from falling prices for natural gas.)

Three decades after the partial meltdown at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania, nuclear power companies saw hope for a renaissance, with the first new reactors in years being planned. But public opinion was fragile: If the Fukushima reactors, built by American companies, could be overwhelmed by natural disasters, could the public trust that American power plants were safe?

'We are not talking about that'

In the NRC's Office of Public Affairs, the first talking points had been written and distributed by 10:25 a.m. on Friday, less than 10 hours after the quake. NRC technical experts were cautioned repeatedly not to make any public statements. All information had to come from Public Affairs.

In an email sent at 2:56 p.m., the updated talking points were unequivocally reassuring: "The NRC has regulations in place that require licensees to design their plants to withstand environmental hazards, including earthquakes ... based on historical data from the area's maximum credible earthquake, with an additional margin added."

But privately, the NRC was aware of uncertainties.

An hour before that email was sent, Brenner, the public affairs director, sent a "great work so far" memo to his staff at HQ and around the U.S. His third bullet point highlighted he NRC's role in helping Japanese engineers deal with the problems at Fukushima -- a fact not mentioned in the NRC's press releases that day. The emails indicate that the Obama administration and the NRC were keen to keep up the appearance that they were merely observing the Japanese nuclear crisis and had no responsibility for helping resolve it.

From: Brenner, Eliot

Date: Friday, March 11, 2011, 1:54:57 PM

While one reporter knows or has guessed that there are Japanese here in our Ops center in communication with their home authorities, we will NOT make the[m] available and we will NOT volunteer their presence. If anyone knows they are here and wants to talk with them, they will have to make the request through the embassy to have it relayed to these folks.

The memo also instructed staff to evade any questions about efforts by the NRC's Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation (NRR) to model the effects of similar earthquakes and tsunamis on California plants:

“NRR is getting tasked with making an overlay of the Japanese conditions … to see how west coast plants stack up against it,” it said. “We think preliminarily Diablo would have had no trouble with a wave that size. [For an earthquake of about] 8.9 we're not so sure about, but again we are not talking about that.”

NBC News

 

Find the distance from any U.S. location to the nearest nuclear power plants with this map from Esri.

In congressional testimony and interviews in that first week, NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko was quick to say that the NRC could learn lessons from Fukushima.

"We're going to take a good solid look at everything that comes out of Japan, and if we need to make modifications to our facilities in this country, then we'll do that," he told NBC News on March 16. He did not disclose that the NRC technical staff had already been reassessing, before Fukushima, increased risks from earthquakes, tsunamis, dam failures and power blackouts.

Jaczko did push for release of a report on Fukushima and its lessons just 90 days after Fukushima. Some of those recommendations have been implemented. Jaczko, who resigned in 2012, declined a request last week to be interviewed.

'Non-public information'

The talking points written during the emergency for NRC commissioners and other officials were divided into two sections: "public answer" and "additional technical, non-public information." Often the two parts didn't quite match.

One topic the NRC avoided in the talking points, even when responding to a direct question: meltdown.

"Q. What happens when/if a plant 'melts down'?

"Public Answer: In short, nuclear power plants in the United States are designed to be safe. To prevent the release of radioactive material, there are multiple barriers between the radioactive material and the environment, including the fuel cladding, the heavy steel reactor vessel itself and the containment building, usually a heavily reinforced structure of concrete and steel several feet thick.

"Additional, non-technical, non-public information: The melted core may melt through the bottom of the vessel and flow onto the concrete containment floor. The core may melt through the containment liner and release radioactive material to the environment."

The Japanese public television network, NHK, asked if the NRC could provide a graphic depicting what happens during a meltdown of a nuclear reactor.

From: McIntyre, David

Date: Friday, March 18, 2011, 9:02 AM

NRC would not have such a graphic. I suspect any number of anti-nuclear power organizations might.

When reporters asked if the Japanese emergency could affect licensing of new reactors in the U.S., the public answer was "It is not appropriate to hypothesize on such a future scenario at this point."

The non-public information was more direct: This event could potentially call into question the NRC's seismic requirements, which could require the staff to re-evaluate the staff's approval of the AP1000 and ESBWR (the newest reactor designs from Westinghouse and General Electric) design and certifications.

On the subject of tsunamis, the public assurances omitted the "non-public " nuances that might have given the public reasons to doubt nuclear power safety:

Design standards varied significantly from plant to plant in the U.S.

The experience in Japan had taught the NRC that it needed to study the dangerous effects of “drawdown,” the powerful receding of ocean water near the shore that can precede a tsunami's arrival.

And although the U.S. was developing new tsunami standards, those wouldn't be in draft form for another year.

'It was a hydrogen explosion'

The NRC spokespeople sometimes had trouble following the public debate, because for days their computers were blocked by security rules from accessing Twitter and YouTube. And they often had incomplete information about events in Japan.

From: McIntyre, David

Date: Saturday, March 12, 2011, 10:02 PM

Just saw an incoherent discussion on cnn by Bill Nye the science guy who apparently knows zilcho about reactors and an idiot weatherman who said Hydrogen explosion? Pfft. I'm not buying it.

His boss sent back the following reply, correcting the staffer and explaining plans to ask the Obama administration to help blunt critical news coverage.

From: Brenner, Eliot

Date: Saturday, March 12, 2011, 10:07 PM

1: There is a good chance it was a hydrogen explosion that took the roof off that building, though we are not saying that publicly.

2: I have just reached out to CNN and asked them to call (former NRC Chairman Nils) Diaz, and reached out to push the white house yet again to start talking on background or getting out in front of some of this crap.

 

On March 20, when Energy Secretary Steven Chu hesitated on CNN when asked if U.S. plants could withstand a 9.0 earthquake?

McIntyre, one of the agency’s spokesmen, suggested to his bosses what Chu should have said:

From: McIntyre, David

Date: Sunday, March 20, 2011, 10:01:00 AM

He should just say "Yes, it can." Worry about being wrong when it doesn't.

Sorry if I sound cynical.

The public affairs staff showed disdain in the emails for nuclear watchdog groups, including the Union of Concerned Scientists and also the Nuclear Control Institute.

When the UCS raised concerns about diesel backup power and batteries being inadequate, as at Fukushima, spokesman McIntyre dismissed it as "bleating" from nuclear power foes.

When Steven Dolley, research director of the NCI, asked McIntyre for a nuclear containment expert to speak to a reporter, the NRC asked if he had contacted the industry's Nuclear Energy Institute.

Dolley asked, "So, should I say NRC is deferring inquiries to NEI?" suggesting that the NRC was deferring to the industry it is supposed to regulate.

McIntyre shared this exchange with his bosses, adding the comment, "F---ing a-hole."

There is NO SUCH NRC REPORT!

The NRC's Public Affairs staff attempted to discredit news reports that raised questions about nuclear plants, even when they were based on NRC data.

A story by this reporter for msnbc.com (now NBCNews.com) reported that the NRC had published a study six months earlier with new estimates of the risk that an earthquake could cause damage to the core of U.S. nuclear power plants. The plants were listed in alphabetical order, along with the NRC's risk estimates.

The msnbc.com story, published on March 16, ranked the U.S. nuclear plants by those NRC estimates. Surprisingly, the highest risk was not on the Pacific Coast, where plants are designed and built with severe earthquakes in mind, but in the Central and Eastern states, where scientists have raised their estimate of the earthquake risk since the plants were designed and built. The story said that the NRC still described the plants as safe, but also said the margin of error had shrunk.

We had checked our understanding of the report with NRC earthquake experts, but Burnell responded to the story by asking the same staff to find fault with it.

From: Burnell, Scott

Date: Wednesday, March 16, 2011, 6:22 AM

I know you're going to have a cow over this - somewhat inevitable when a reporter new to the subject tries to summarize things. Apart from "you're totally off-base," what specific technical corrections can we ask for??

OPA (Office of Public Affairs) - this is likely to spark a lot of follow-up. The immediate response would be "that's a very incomplete look at the overall research and we continue to believe U.S. reactors are capable of withstanding the strongest earthquake their sites could experience." I'll share whatever we get from the experts.

Senior officials at the industry's lobbying arm, the Nuclear Energy Institute, sent emails asking the NRC for help rebutting the story. Burnell urgently asked again for errors in the article.

From: Burnell, Scott

Date: Wednesday, March 16, 2011, 11:11 AM

Folks, the expected calls are coming in -- We need a better response ASAP!

But the NRC experts found nothing to correct.

From: Beasley, Benjamin

Date: Wednesday, March 16, 2011, 12:31 PM

I have received no concerns or corrections regarding the MSNBC article.

Nevertheless, the Public Affairs staff waved other news organizations off the story, particularly after New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo reacted to his state's Indian Point nuclear power plant having the worst risk in the NRC data.

From: McIntyre, David

Date: Thursday, March 17, 2011, 2:20 PM

I just filed this request for correction with The Huffington Post, which has a report of Cuomo wanting to shut IP based on the MSNBC report:

There is NO SUCH NRC REPORT! The NRC does not rank nuclear power plants according to their vulnerability to earthquakes. This "ranking" was developed by an MSNBC reporter using partial information and an even more partial understanding of how we evaluate plants for seismic risk. Each plant is evaluated individually according to the geology of its site, not by a "one-size-fits-all" model - therefore such rankings or comparisons are highly misleading. Please correct this report.

His colleague in Atlanta, spokesman Joey Ledford, replied, "Great talking point, Dave. I wish I had it during my 10 or so calls today trying to debunk this thing."

The New York Times, which was reporting a story about Indian Point, was dissuaded from using the NRC's risk estimates. We asked the New York Times reporter, Peter Applebome, why he ignored the NRC data. He replied in an email, "Burnell said it wasn't accurate and included rankings the NRC never made. I have no idea if that's correct, but I was writing a column on deadline and figured I did not have the ability to figure out who was right in the time I had."

In his piece, Applebome quoted the NRC downplaying the risk: "Officials with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission say the site is safe and that its earthquake threat is on the lower end nationally and in the Northeast." The NRC's recent study with a different picture was ignored.

The NRC followed up with a blog post from Brenner, the public affairs chief, cautioning the public, “Don't Believe Everything You Read.” Brenner called the msnbc.com report "highly misleading."

He didn't mention that its figures came from the NRC.

SHAHEEN: FIXING OUR NATION’S BRIDGES CRITICAL FOR PUBLIC SAFETY, ECONOMY

March 16 Reformer:

"Darcy and Ebbighausen have said they decided to run for re-election to see through some projects that have started in town, most notably the replacement of the Charles Dana and Anna Hunt Marsh bridges that link Hinsdale to Brattleboro, Vt., and the development of a new police station."

March 9 Saturday: I had a part in raising the consciousness within Hinsdale NH!

Just saying, according to the Reformer this weekend about the Hinsdale selectman's upcoming election...one spoke in the newspaper at length about how the Hinsdale bridge hobbles our town and the need for a replacement.  

It is still not enough money!

Hey, Reformer...when you going to run that story about my court pleading. Those initial charges including the felony you ran on the paper...that was a smear! It was a wild ass exaggeration of my illegality.

Scumbag! 

N.H.'s Shaheen introduces bridge funding bill to U.S. Senate

By DOMENIC POLI / Reformer Staff

Posted: 03/08/2014 03:00:00 AM EST

The Vilas Bridge stretches across the Connecticut River. (Reformer file photo)

BRATTLEBORO -- U.S. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) introduced a bill Thursday to increase funding for bridge repairs, though it is unclear if the Vilas, Charles Dana and Anna Hunt Marsh bridges would benefit if it becomes law.According to Shaheen's office, the legislation would maintain public safety and provide businesses and consumers with the infrastructure necessary in the 21st century."The Strengthen and Fortify Existing Bridges Act of 2014 (SAFE Bridges Act) would establish a program to provide funding specifically dedicated to repair and replace aging and deteriorating bridges," a statement reads.Built around 1930 as a "Symbol of Friendship" between New Hampshire and Vermont, the Vilas Bridge connects Walpole, N.H., to Bellows Falls and was closed in 2009 after a semi-annual inspection that found continued deterioration of the reinforced bridge deck. The closure has been a hot-button issue for Bellows Falls residents, who feel a broken promise is hurting their economy.A letter from Charles O'Leary, the then-commissioner of the N.H. Department of Transportation, to Nancy C. Muller, then the director and state preservation officer for the N.H. Division of Historical Resources, in 1993 stated the Vilas Bridge would be taken out of commission only under exceptional circumstances (such as natural disasters creating a serious safety hazard or another unforeseen situation). Muller also said there would be efforts would be made to maintain the 635-foot-long bridge.An estimated 4,600 vehicles crossed the structure on an average day at the time of its closure and village residents say businesses are suffering because the traffic from Walpole has been severed. New Hampshire owns 93 percent of the bridge.Pat Fowler, the president of the Bellows Falls Downtown Development Alliance (BFDDA), which has spearheaded efforts to reopen the Vilas, said she hopes the news of Shaheen's bill will bring more attention to the bridge.

She added, however, she has no idea where the Vilas falls on New Hampshire's priority list.Further down the state line, the Anna Hunt Marsh Bridge connects Brattleboro to Hinsdale Island, which is connected to Hinsdale by the Charles Dana Bridge. The two Pennsylvania truss bridges, built in 1920, are now considered "functionally obsolete." By federal highway standards, they are too narrow and have insufficient weight limits and vertical clearances. The structures are deemed by many to be essential for commuters and industry trucks, not to mention emergency vehicles.There is a plan to replace the two old bridges with a new one that begins near the stop light at the former Walmart location and spans over the railroad tracks, the Connecticut River and the southern portion of Hinsdale Island before touching down near Vernon Road south of the Marlboro College building.Hinsdale Selectman Jay Ebbinghausen, who have been involved in the project, said Shaheen's bill is "certainly excellent news." He told the Reformer the Southwest Region Planning Commission (SWRPC) had reached out to Shaheen's for help, as the bridges cross the stateline.A representative from Shaheen's office did not know if the Vilas would be affected if Shaheen's bill becomes law, but it would provide an extra $150 million a year for the New Hampshire Department of Transportation for two years, according to NHDOT's Public Information Officer Bill Boynton.Boynton said New Hampshire's funding shortfalls are well-documented and Shaheen is simply trying to get more money for the safety of her constituents.According to Shaheen's statement, nearly 15 percent of New Hampshire's 2,429 bridges are considered structurally deficient and more than 18 percent are considered functionally obsolete. That equals nearly a third of the state's bridges. On average, more than 2 million vehicles travel over bridges that are rated structurally deficient every day in New Hampshire."The condition of our bridges is unacceptable," Shaheen said in a statement. "Bridges in need of repair or unable to sustain the weight of heavy trucks and emergency vehicles impact jobs and the economy and put public safety at risk. My plan will help repair and replace New Hampshire bridges that are currently substandard and at the same time put Granite Staters to work."Nationally, one-quarter of all bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete as determined by Federal Highway Administration standards. The SAFE Bridges Act would increase the amount of funds the federal government dedicates to states for bridge repair by 50 percent, to $5.5 billion over two years.The SAFE Bridges Act, the companion to House legislation introduced by U.S. Congressman Nick Rahall (D-W.V.), has already been endorsed by the American Road & Transportation Builders Association, America's Infrastructure Alliance, Transportation for America, the AFL-CIO, the Building and Construction Trades, and the American Highway Users Alliance, according to Shaheen's statement.Domenic Poli can be reached at dpoli@reformer.com, or 802-254-2311, ext. 277. You can follow him on Twitter @dpoli_reformer.

American Society of Civil Engineers Report Card on Infrastructure

PoliticalNews.me - Mar 07,2014 - SHAHEEN: FIXING OUR NATION’S BRIDGES CRITICAL FOR PUBLIC SAFETY, ECONOMY

SAFE Bridges Act would rehabilitate and replace structurally deficient bridges

(Washington, DC) – Citing a need to upgrade and update our roads and bridges, U.S. Senator Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) has introduced legislation that will both maintain public safety and provide businesses and consumers with the infrastructure necessary for a 21st century economy. The Strengthen and Fortify Existing Bridges Act of 2014 (SAFE Bridges Act) would establish a program to provide funding specifically dedicated to repair and replace aging and deteriorating bridges.

“The condition of our bridges is unacceptable,” Shaheen said. “Bridges in need of repair or unable to sustain the weight of heavy trucks and emergency vehicles impact jobs and the economy and put public safety at risk. My plan will help repair and replace New Hampshire bridges that are currently substandard and at the same time put Granite Staters to work.”

In New Hampshire nearly 15 percent of the state’s 2,429 bridges are considered structurally deficient and more than 18 percent are considered functionally obsolete, totaling nearly one-third of New Hampshire’s bridges. Nationally, one-quarter of all bridges are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete as determined by Federal Highway Administration standards. The SAFE Bridges Act would increase the amount of funds the federal government dedicates to states for bridge repair by fifty percent to $5.5 billion over two years.

Last year, Shaheen visited Sewalls Falls Road Bridge in Concord to call for repairs to the nearly 100 year old structure. The condition of the bridge has limited access to emergency vehicles subjecting some Concord residents to extended emergency response times. On average more than 2 million vehicles travel over bridges that are rated structurally deficient every day in New Hampshire.

The SAFE Bridges Act, which is the companion to House legislation introduced by Congressman Nick Rahall (D-WV), has already been endorsed by the American Road & Transportation Builders Association, the National Infrastructure Alliance, Transportation for America, the AFL-CIO, the Building and Construction Trades, and the American Highway Users Alliance.

The Ukraine Crisis Is An American “False Flag Operation”?

 

Eia-Dec 13

Pipeline     4.70

Liquefied  8.75

Export

Pipeline    3.92

Liquefied 13.4

The Guardian today:

In Washington, there is a growing appetite to retaliate against Russia with a long-term, strategic acceleration in energy exports. Exporting US gas obtained through fracking would be controversial among environmentalists, Democrats, and US industries reliant on cheap energy, the price of which would be expected to rise if supplies were being piped abroad.

Republicans, backed by gas producers such as ExxonMobil, have for years been pushing to dramatically increase gas production to enable export trade, and are using the crisis in Crimea to argue for swift action by the Obama administration. 

US gas production is projected to rise 44% by 2040, according to the US Energy Information Administration, and producers have been pressing the Obama administration to expand exports of natural gas. 

The Republican leader of the House, John Boehner, used an an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal on Friday to call on Obama to “dramatically expand production of American-made energy” and make US supplies of natural gas available to global markets.

You get it; the US natural gas industry is withholding 15 billion cubic feet a day from the American market...to inflate the price of energy to us. Maybe more!

Remember the propane shortage and price crisis this winter was driven by the exporting propane overseas.

See how they abuse altruism today...”altruism” is such a dirty word. The NYTs and the Obama administration are using the fear of the Russians and the fall of the Ukraine to drive an internal domestic policy. They want to in an emergency fashion open up the exportation of  liquefied natural gas. They couldn’t get this policy passed on the merits domestic and external issues.

This is really not a complicated model or computer program today. Model the energy markets...and run what the result would occur if we supplied 15 billion cubic feet a day of natural gas to Europe. What would happen to the price. What fedural control we going to put on the domistic market. Oh, the private corporation would save us.  

Right, we want to send our natural gas bounty to the expensive markets of Europe and Asia...   

http://www.topix.com/forum/city/brattleboro-vt/THIV0NI8HLLV4IKOK

So let me get this straight, just like the propane shortage this winter....we are going to provide lignified natural gas to Europe and the Ukraine to make up for the Russian upcoming cutoff.

This is the congressional bailout to the nuclear and coal industry... 

Oh brother, this has got to spike natural gas prices... 

I bet you our intentions are we are subsidized the hell out of the lignified natural gas exports.  

We are letting them borrow a billion dollars. 

How about Europe develops ling their own energy supplies instead of being dependency on Russia or the USA. 

Who is now going bail out our poor and middle class in the USA

Right, here everyone wins...we bailout the coal and nuke folks...we make the natural gas folks richer than they could ever could imagine.

Then they buy our our democracy!

Everyone wins!

But do you hear a peep from the NYTs and the Obama administration on what this would do to the cost of our cost of natural gas and increasingly our electricity prices.

You just don’t get it. "All Of The Above Energy Policy" means all of the energy sources collude against us for exaggerated prices. It basically means the highest cost source sets the price of everyone else...the US administration bypasses the free market.

They then collect just a fraction of the profit...they turn our government against us with 100s of billions dollars of excess profit. They buy out our political system!

This issue with the Russia, the Ukraine and natural gas...this looks exactly like our energy sources ganging up on all us...look exactly like these trumped up events and their exaggerations.  

America's Natural Gas Lever

By MICHAEL WARAMARCH 7, 2014

STANFORD, Calif. — The news that the Obama administration wants to use America’s new natural gas abundance as a lever against Russia offers a chance to change a long-term dynamic in Europe, which allows an undemocratic petrostate to dictate terms to our closest allies.

This won’t happen overnight, and it won’t be of use in the current crisis. But by accelerating the process now, we can give our allies freedom to respond to future aggressions like the one in Crimea. And we will increase our capacity to shape coalitions that manage a resurgent and aggressive Russia.

Europe imports 15 billion cubic feet of gas per day from Russia. This dependency has emboldened and financed the Russian government while hampering Europe’s ability to respond. America faced this dilemma six years ago as it struggled to confront Russian aggression in Georgia. But that was before horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing unleashed America’s shale gas.

At present, the United States lacks the capacity to ship any of this natural gas overseas. But an export terminal capable of supplying three billion cubic feet of gas per day in liquefied form is under construction in Cameron Parish, La., and numerous others are in the planning and permitting stages. These vast projects hold the potential for a long-run solution to problems like the one in Ukraine.

The hitch is that these projects are bedeviled by a complex and uncertain permitting process, especially in order to sell their gas to countries, like those in the European Union, that haven’t signed a free-trade agreement with the United States. As a result, each project must petition the Department of Energy for a finding that exporting gas to our European allies is in the “public interest.” Events of the past week show that the energy security of our closest allies is decidedly within the public interest of the United States.

The president can help to accomplish this by issuing an executive order finding that liquefied natural gas exports to our allies meet the legal standard. The president should also direct the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Energy Department to expedite the complex permitting process for these terminals, consistent with state and federal safety and environmental laws.

In doing so, Mr. Obama should make clear that the intent of such action is to give Europe flexibility, not to cut Russia out of its European gas business.

The truth is that today, gas suppliers in both the United States and Europe would choose to ship their gas to Asian markets, where it is most valuable. But global markets evolve. As more natural gas export capacity comes online, this price differential should erode and European utilities could find American natural gas an attractive option.

Having that option in a crisis is valuable. Even if Europe is not the normal destination for American natural gas, it might welcome it under extraordinary conditions. Diverse energy supplies also prevent crises by removing the incentive to use energy as a tool of geopolitics.

Those who oppose gas exports are rightly worried about the economic and environmental consequences. Both are real concerns, but the former is an acceptable cost and the latter can be managed with tougher environmental rules.

Some fear that gas exports may cause gas prices to rise in the United States. The laws of supply and demand suggest that they are right to some degree. The Obama administration should acknowledge this policy cost and its impact. But the crisis in Ukraine illustrates why this is a price worth paying.

Others fear that gas exports will encourage further hydraulic fracturing for natural gas, which can cause local air and water pollution. Here, the administration can offer a deal to companies profiting from shale gas resources. In exchange for facilitating access to foreign markets, the federal government should set minimum national environmental standards. Production of additional gas, under stringent regulation, is in the national interest. But local communities should not have to pay the price of unacceptable air or water quality.

Some in the environmental community also worry about the impact of higher gas prices on greenhouse gas emissions: Gas exported may mean more coal burned at home. Here, the rules the administration is developing to regulate fossil-fuel-fired power plants should blunt any impact. Also, environmental advocates can take comfort from the fact that lower-cost gas in Europe would reduce the competitiveness of dirty power plants in Europe. Lastly, Mr. Obama should redouble efforts to regulate methane leaks from gas extraction and transport infrastructure.

There will be costs to breaking the codependent relationship between Russia and Western Europe. But these costs are a price worth paying to eliminate Russia’s ability to flout international norms with impunity.

Michael Wara is an associate professor at Stanford Law School.

NRC Says Palisade' SCWE/Safety Culture has Melted Down!

This is a special inspection...the plant SCWE/Safety Culture has melted down recently.

Honestly, doesn’t look like this isn’t a coincidence with my 2.206. There is no question the agency knew I smelled something was going on.

See how these things are sickeningly repeating themselves over and over again...there is a periodicity of these things.  

The NRC never holds a utility accountable to the public also. The agency doesn't assume their interaction with a license are going to enter into a enforcement activity and thus necessitating court level qquality evidence. These guys are still stuck in the 1970s regulatory regime where all of the advantages go to congressional ly protected licensee. It always becomes a “he said, she said”...the licensee and their employees know they can tell half-truths and outright lies without professional accountability.

 

At the end of the day, an inspector goes back into his office sometimes after many days and writes up his recollection of events and complicated discussions.   

 

Right, these inspectors should have to  go into this teleconference with full audio recording capability. Most of the NRC activities should be recorded...most of these activities should have them go into a recorded conference room and all this stuff should be available for public scrutiny.

 

So what about the court of the public? The public gets such a limited window on what goes on with a licensee and the NRC ...and this allows the licensee to portray horrible behaviors to the inspector. Basically the agency has to collect not obtainable quality of document evidence...the licensee knows how to not collect the bad information or write around not getting caught!

 

And if a inspector or NRC management is a friend to the industry, looking for a industry job...a lot of issues just get sterilized.

 

Right, we are talking about the security officer lying to the NRC here below. Actually we are talking Entergy lying to the NRC...probably to meet budgets and save a few pennies? These lies are always about pennies and promotions...

Telephone Conference (Director, Nuclear Security / NRC Inspector) (February 2008)

Recollection of the two participants differs.
 

( New today)

1)  SUBJECT: PALISADES NUCLEAR PLANT – PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION AND RESOLUTION FOCUSED INSPECTION (REPORT 05000255/2014009)
 

As documented in the inspection report, Safety Culture deficiencies, in part, contributed to these findings. In 2013, the NRC observed that although your efforts were generally on track with your Recovery Plan, the NRC received several concerns related to SCWE/Safety Culture. Collectively, these issues prompted questions into progress made in the plant’s Recovery Plan regarding Safety Culture. Therefore, the NRC performed this limited scope PI&R inspection to continue assessment of Safety Culture at Palisades, focusing on SCWE.

The NRC identified a chilled work environment in the Security Department. The NRC concluded that staff within the Security Department perceived that: (1) recent actions to terminate the employment of two supervisors was in retaliation for their raised concerns; (2) the Corrective action Program (CAP) was ineffective at addressing equipment and other concerns raised by Security staff; (3) the Security management was unresponsive to employees’ concerns; and (4) the Employee Concerns Program (ECP) could not be relied upon to maintain employee confidentiality.

The NRC inspectors concluded that the Palisades management team did not recognize the

extent of SCWE related concerns within the Security.

2)  NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION [NRC-2009-0505]

CONFIRMATORY ORDER

[NRC-2009-0505]

 (EFFECTIVE IMMEDIATELY)Office of Investigations (OI) initiated an investigation (OI Case No. 3-2008-020). Based on the evidence developed during the inspection and investigation, the NRC identified a violation of 10 CFR 50.9 for inaccurate and incomplete information. This violation is described in the separate Notice of Violation, included as Enclosure 3 to the transmittal letter.

3)  Enterqy Response for Action 6 ofConfirmatory Order EA-09-060