(Concord Monitor) NH DOT Chief: We Need Help

And I am locally the bad guy trying to bring attention to the dilapidated 1921 Charles Dana and Anna Hunt Marsh bridges....10,000 cars per days...warning everyone about the consequences when they shut down this bridge.

One thing I am certain with is our roads, bridges and highways…it looks likes the politicians are trying to save you money with this strategy. If you elect me I am going to save you a few pennies off your taxes. But they are recklessly doing the exact opposite. Or elect me if you hate government. Neglecting our highway system only means you are damaging it…it is going to be a much more expensive fix in the end. Further, it is a generational cost shifting…our children and grand children are going to pay for our reckless penny pinching.

You get to see the nasty politics in this. The NHDOT commission isn’t a independent operator just telling us what is collectively in our best interest. He is captured by the insecure and nasty local and Concord politics. The governor and the fearful legislators always controls the mouth of the NHDOT commissioner, if he wants a job. He can’t go to the cities and towns of NH trumpeting the damagers we face with under funding our transportation system…notifying the citizens of their needs. Right, NH politics is truly a soviet style gulag where head rolls if you tell the people the truth! NH politics is always about playing the concord insider game, and most of it is done in secret.

 

At the bottom of all this is in all the citizens of NH...the overall insecurity theology or philosophy that has been educated in all of us. Is I always automatically do what I think is in my own self interest. That is how they control us..they give us no choice!

Largely a resourced and politically dysfunctional organization...everyone knows I picked up the magnitude of NHDOT downsizing during my interviews with DOT officials...

∎ Since 1991, the DOT has reduced staff by 22 percent, or 430 positions. In that time, the amount of traffic on the roads has increased 30 percent.

Front page Concord Monitor DOT Chief: We Need Help

DOT commissioner: We need more resources

4268 miles of roads

ANNMARIE TIMMINS

Monitor staff

Tuesday, January 7, 2014
(Published in print: Wednesday, January 8, 2014)

Chris Clement, the commissioner of the state Department of Transportation, is a man who likes numbers. Just not his numbers.

He’s paving 200 fewer miles of roads a year than he’d like to. The number of “red-listed” state bridges is 145 and climbing. He’ll begin 2016 with a $48 million deficit in the highway fund. Thirty-seven percent of the state’s roads are in poor condition.

And while plenty of lawmakers say they want to finish improvements to Interstate 93, they’ve put $0 toward the $250 million bill.

Lawmakers reconvene today and will consider a few bills this session that would send more money Clement’s way, either from casino proceeds or a bump in the gas tax. The same lawmakers vetoed both ideas last year.

Since then, Clement has taken his case to the public, talking with locals in small meetings across the state and handing out 5,000 copies of his PowerPoint presentation along the way.

“I’m revenue agnostic,” Clement said in an interview with Monitor editors yesterday. “I’m not going to say (I want a) gas tax or casino. We are just presenting the needs. We are saying we have the need here and wherever the funding comes from . . . is just fine with us.”

In his Monitor interview yesterday, Clement went through his 53-page presentation, counting the ways he believes the state’s roads and bridges are dangerously deteriorating.

Clement discussed the promise he saw in last year’s gas tax bill from Rep. David Campbell, which would have increased the gas tax by 12 cents over three years, giving the DOT an additional $93 million a year – enough, Clement said, to cover the department’s immediate needs and work on I-93.

This year’s gas tax bill from Sen. Jim Rausch, a Derry Republican, would add 4 or 5 cents to the gas tax, generating $28 million a year for the DOT. If the bill passes, it would be the first increase in the gas tax – and thereby the state’s highway budget – since 1992.

But it would still fall short of what Clement argues his department needs.

“If the Legislature lets me use those funds, do I use all those funds and plug the operational hole in DOT and not fix roads and bridges and not continue (improvements on) I-93? Or do you use it toward I-93?”

Here’s what Clement wants lawmakers and the public to know about the upkeep – or lack thereof – of roads and bridges they use daily:

∎ Since 1991, the DOT has reduced staff by 22 percent, or 430 positions. In that time, the amount of traffic on the roads has increased 30 percent.

∎ The number of miles plowed in an average snowstorm would equal nine trips to Alaska and back.

∎ If the Legislature does not increase the DOT’s budget and Clement is left with a $48 million deficit, he will have to eliminate up to 700 positions or a combination of positions and programs.

∎ The number of “structurally deficient” state bridges will reach 175 by 2016. Clement said he doesn’t have the money to repair bridges and reduce that number.

∎ There is $500 million worth of turnpike projects that won’t be completed without more money. That includes a $195 million plan to widen I-93 in Bow and Concord.

∎ Thirty-seven percent of the state’s roads considered to be in “poor”condition equal the number of miles between Concord and Fargo, N.D. And the DOT is investing its limited dollars in the state’s other roads instead because it costs $50,000 a year to improve a mile of a “good” or “fair” road and $1.1 million a mile to do the same for a poor road.

∎ A federal program that brings the state $140 million to $150 million for road work expires in September. “If Congress doesn’t come together with another . . . program, that’s going to cause us problems,” Clement said.

∎ The $30 surcharge on car registrations the 2010 Legislature repealed raised $45 million for the DOT in one year.

Clement came to the DOT in 2008, initially as deputy commissioner, from private business. In his former life, numbers like these drove budget decisions. The transition to a government job has been a difficult one.

“I come into state government and I’m trying to sell the need for investment, and that’s how I look at all of this stuff, is investment . . . and it’s much more difficult because of politics. And because of the need to educate both the public, the businesses and the policymakers.”

Clement’s persistence in making his case has put him at odds with some lawmakers. That’s a risk he feels he needs to take.

“I’m not going to give up,” he said. “I’m going to keep communicating the need. I’m going to keep going out there and presenting just the facts.”

(Annmarie Timmins can be reached at 369-3323 or atimmins@cmonitor.com or on Twitter @annmarietimmins.)

Editorial: A 21st-Century Way To Pay For Roads

Editorial: A 21st-century way to pay for roads

Tuesday, January 7, 2014

New Hampshire’s highway trust fund is going broke. So are the highway funds of most states, as well as the federal Highway Trust Fund, which pays for about half the road and bridge work done in the United States. The common denominator is the historic, but failing, reliance on gasoline taxes to maintain the nation’s transportation infrastructure.

The gas tax, as we’ve argued often in the past, should be increased, if only to reflect the vastly improved vehicle fuel efficiency. But it’s time to recognize another reality. More vehicles are powered by means other than gasoline: natural gas, electricity, biofuels and the latest entry in the vehicle fuel mix, hydrogen. Fuel efficiency will continue to increase. So will the shortfall between what a fuel tax can raise and the revenue needed to maintain, let alone improve, the roads and bridges used by all.

New Hampshire raised its gasoline tax to 18 cents per gallon in 1991 and hasn’t touched it since. The federal gasoline tax of 18.4 cents per gallon hasn’t been increased since 1993. Every effort to do so succumbs to a massive lobbying effort by those who benefit from keeping the tax low and the mindless anti-tax mentality that’s infected politics. As a consequence, a national infrastructure that was once the envy of the world is crumbling.

New Hampshire has 145 red-listed state bridges and an additional 353 local bridges that are structurally deficient or functionally obsolete. The Department of Transportation, which has shed hundreds of employees in recent years, faces a $48 million deficit in fiscal year 2016 and a $105 million deficit the following year. The roads are getting worse, and the damage toll to humans, roads, vehicles and the state economy is mounting.

Several states, most notably Oregon, are experimenting with a different way to pay for roads: a user tax based on the number of miles driven. In its pilot program, one that continues in modest form, vehicle owners pay 1.5 cents per mile driven on that state’s roads. No fuel escapes taxation. Everyone in the program pays to maintain the transportation infrastructure.

A switch to such a system would have to be phased in, but it’s eminently doable. The simplest, though not the fairest system, would be based on the difference in mileage recorded when a vehicle is inspected or registered. Since the tax would be small, say $150 or $200 per year for most drivers, it generally wouldn’t exceed what the owner would have paid with a per-gallon gasoline tax. Since heavy trucks cause far more road wear than passenger vehicles, the tax could be adjusted to account for vehicle weight.

The technology exists, say using a GPS device, to ensure that the mileage tax is levied for the driving done within a given state. As in the Oregon experiment, drivers could pay the mileage tax in a variety of ways, with a surcharge at the pump, or, using a version of E-ZPass transponders, periodically via credit card. To protect privacy, the mileage information collected would not be preserved.

Congress is expected to take up two bills to address the Highway Trust Fund shortfall: one to raise the federal gas tax by 15 cents over the next three years to pay for catchup maintenance and another that would create a federal pilot program to tax motorists based on the number of miles they drive. Given the woeful state of Congress, it’s difficult to imagine that much progress will be made. But that shouldn’t stop New Hampshire from moving ahead with a plan to rebuild its infrastructure while transitioning to a funding mechanism that taxes all road users equitably.

Seabrook Nuclear Station's "Crap" Service Water Piping System

Jan 7, 2013 10:02 am

Sarah, 

Any news about my Seabrook Nuclear Plant's "crap" carbon steel service water piping letter? It is going on all over the place...one plant (Salem) has over 200 Walmart temporary rubber patch jobs in the vital nuclear plant cooling water piping systems contrary to ASME codes. 

Of course, what worries me most is the local NRC inspectors don't feel their Washington NRC management fully supports them. Or at least that is a perception these guys expressed to me. 

Thanks,

Mike Mulligan

Hinsdale, NH

16033368320

 Jan 7, 2013 10:10 am

Mike – we had some downtime during the holiday so your inquiry just went into NRC. I will let you know as soon as we’ve received a reply.

Kind Regards,

Sarah

First Published on 12/18/13

The problem is national in scope...cheap cooling water carbon steel pipes at old obsolete nuclear power plants. Calvert Cliffs got a leak in a service water piping and they are asking the NRC for special permission to put a patch over it for two years.

Obscene falsification with Calvert Cliffs documents...crap service water system!   

Excepts and links from the NRC web site.

Pressure building. Why did the NRC act now? Did they get this letter?

December 20, 2013

NRC: No relicense until ASR addressed

BY ANGELJEAN CHIARAMIDASTAFF WRITERThe Daily News of NewburyportFri Dec 20, 2013, 03:00 AM EST

SEABROOK — Political pressure to close Seabrook’s nuclear power plant continues to mount, but the Nuclear Regulatory Commission says it will not make a decision until issues with degrading concrete are fully understood

Dear Senator Shaheen,

These comments below are from the NH Union Leader newspaper by Seabrook Station’s Local 555 Union President Ted Janis on Nov 26, 2013. They were negotiating a union contract.

“Their battle cry is ‘natural gas’ is killing us. We are not making the money we were making five years ago,’ ” said Jenis. “But it’s hard for us to sit here and see these raises go out to management.”

"This is a workplace that has been beaten down over the last few years," he said.

“There seems to be a total attitude change toward the workers from the corporate level.”

Seabrook nuclear plant was brought on line in 1990 with cheap and non-corrosion resistant carbon steel service water piping. Within two years, piping integrity problems began showing up with pitting and local corrosion. And this problem has only gotten worst and it’s running out of control as I write. It is corrupting the staff of this organizations.

 

In 2011 they replaced a 30 year old 8 foot section of 24 inch (huge) width pipe on the service water strainer by pass line. I think because of corrosion issues. It seemingly had a secret failure of some sort in 2011, as the NRC didn't disclose it in their most recent inspection report (2013001). They replaced it with new carbon steel piping that was lined with so called super epoxy material Belzona. It failed within three years during August of this year. This is called progress. How do we know if the Belzona isn't’ going to clog again the emergency diesel generator cooling water orifices?
 

As it stands right now, the pipe only has a Band-Aid over the wound till the next outage (late spring 2014). Seabrook and the NRC will tell you they ultrasonically tested the hell out of this section of pipe once they detected it leaking. This device shows you the thickness of the metal piping. This is a nuclear plant and a crucial nuclear safety component...one which just failed mysteriously after 2 years...why weren't they UTing the hell out the pipe before it leaked, as they knew the carbon steel service water piping was seriously corrosion prone? Why wasn't there an intense program to uncover any corrosion throughout the system and especially on the strainer bypass line that already failed? Why didn't they catch the defect before it first leaked...then catch it before the tinfoil thickness of pipe wall burst and the leak got even bigger threatening the design of the plant? This is a matter of trusting them and their integrity. This is a matter of the NRC prodding them over and over again about following their procedures and using conservative engineering ethics.

 

Seabrook through August this year didn't want to shut down over a pipe leak fearing a summer grid emergency with limited electricity and in a heat wave with expensive replacement electricity. Was this all about money and very little about public safety?
 

Next Era obtained regulatory good will and forbearance to not shutdown to fix this dangerous leak even after botching the UT reading. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers sets the engineering standards that the NRC requires Seabrook to abide by. The ASME nuclear piping codes requires Seabrook to repair the pipe...not a temporary repair like the NRC gave them permission to do. I bet you they want Seabrook to actually see the damage inside by eye to make certain they know what is going on...not guessing. They could have kept this plant up at power if they first designed this plant prior to construction with sufficient extra service water capacity and flexibility in this area.

• "ASME Standards used in over 100 countries 
• ASME members provide engineering and technical expertise to policy makers in Congress, the White House Office of Science and Technology policy, and key federal agencies"

You get it, the poor initial plant design of the service water system sets Seabrook up to cry like a baby to the NRC with the burdens of code and agency compliance. Your brother Pilgrim (Entergy) plant up north and the NRC doesn’t have a care in the world with any "shutting the plant down in mid-cycle creates undue and unnecessary stress on plant systems, structures, and components” during the last year with all the multitudes of shutdowns and scrams Entergy had caused by their poor plant upkeep and maintenance. These are nothing but excuses of convenience, and it boarders on another falsification in federal documents.   
 

"6. Burden Caused by Compliance

It is impractical to complete a Code-acceptable repair to the identified SW leak at Seabrook Station without shutting the plant down. Shutting the plant down in mid-cycle creates undue and unnecessary stress on plant systems, structures, and components." (Sept 4, 2013)
 

I don’t think these guys deserved any regulatory forbearance. They should have prepared their service water system years before for the rigors of summertime operations. This is how you protect the consumers from the potential of electricity shortages and maintain nuclear safety. Nuclear safety never comes from undeserving regulatory good will. Honestly, they need to spend big bucks to fix their service water. Course, the grid might be more vulnerable in winter time operations and with our limited natural gas piping capacity. They should have spent our good money towards the aims of making this plant reliable without regulatory nuclear safety forbearance during these critical summer months. Do you think the NRC's regulatory good will and forbearance will get us a reliable service water system for the rest of the life of this plant?   
 

The service water cooling system supports all the reactor core cooling and the emergency diesel generator. This is certainly their Fukushima nuclear safety system. I spent considerable time talking to the NRC senior resident inspector and his boss the branch chief. The senior NRC resident frames the quality of the carbon steel service water piping system as “crap”. Every professional in the field knows this is grossly inappropriate material for a salt water system.
 

Because of the poor quality of the carbon steel and its reckless susceptibility to early failure and all sorts of corrosions, they have lined (inside) portions of the piping with concrete, plastisol and Belzona. Seabrook began using plastisol in 1992 two years after first operation of the plant.

The station was oblivious to the fact that the plastisol only has a service life of fifteen years. The NRC had to remind them of this. The brittle and pitted plastisol then sheeted off the piping and clogged a cooling orifice into a Fukushima emergency diesel generator. The machine didn’t have enough cooling water and the station botched the "operability determination" over this twice. The big event you should be worrying about is any of the cement, plastisol or Belzona detaching from the inside of the piping and clogging up the water flow or damaging any of the valves.
 

I believe Seabrook knowingly falsified internal paperwork (prompt operability determination (POD)) the NRC depends on to make a regulatory judgment. Is it safe to stay up at power or should they shut down? Seabrook has made a string of bad "operability determinations" over the recent years and nothing the NRC does seem to turn these guys around into making accurate operability determinations. Seabrook had a leak in their service water system and they used a ultrasonic detector to measure the nature of hole in the pipe. They had information the hole was a very dangerous type which could leak big amounts of water...but they put on the POD document it was a safe and stable hole. Within weeks the hole widened and leaked significant amount of water inside the plant threatening other safety equipment.
 

Then I questioned the Branch Chief and senior NRC inspector. They tell me Seabrook didn’t adequately support their prompt operability determination (POD). This is a basic operation’s safety function at a nuclear plant and they are all trained much on it. What are they even up at power for if they can’t perform this simple determination? These guys are all extremely educated and there are many employees with advanced engineering degrees who ultimately make these determinations. It doesn’t wash with these really smart and educated people making these kinds of simple mistakes. What they are really good at is covert-ups and playing stupid. Like I said, this plant has had lots of bum service water safety operability determinations lately...why isn’t the punishment cumulative? They had at least two stupid and inaccurate operability determinations with erratic cooling water flow indication to an emergency diesel generator. The dangerous brittle and over aged so called protective plastisol that sheeted off the sw pipes. What does it take to turn their hearts? What does it take to make accurate and safe operability determination? How will this faux stupidity end? This revolved around an accurate UT scan of the pipe hole on day one and the staff blowing it with getting the information into the “Prompted Operability Determination”. (wink wink)

 

I questioned the NRC inspector Mr. Cataldo about if it was a falsification of documents or if the NRC interpretation was Seabrook didn’t adequately support the POD. How could these really smart and highly trained employees ever make that kind of simple mistake? He said, "Mike, it was just gross staff incompetence" surrounding the reading of the UT and getting the correct information into the POD.” I still believe it was an intentional willfull falsification of documentation and the NRC is sweet talking this event into a poor support of the POD. But the great problem now is; why didn’t the NRC accurately characterize this event as “gross Seabrook staff incompetence” surrounding the UT and the characterization of the hole in the NRC’s inspection report? Does the NRC have two tiers of reporting, the prettified talk in the inspection reports for the community and the actual events at the plant?

 

I have real issues with the early failure of the new carbon steel piping and its super epoxy material Belzona. The nuclear industry is riddled with issues of improper heat treatment of metals and using the wrong type of metal. Remember, the old section of pipe failed mysteriously after 30 years. The new section of pipe failed failed within three years and the inside of the pipe was covered with the supper epoxy Belzona.  You get it, they never depressurized this section of piping. They never eyeballed the flaw inside the pipe and taken samples for sophisticated metallurgical analysis at an approved engineering laboratory. And these guys are terrible at guesswork. It could be related to microbial corrosion, electrochemical reactions with dissimilar metals and cement is a great worry.

"As previously stated in Section 7.2, the cause of the degradation is from localized corrosion. The typical corrosion rate used in Seabrook Station Service Water piping evaluations is 30 mils per year (mpy). However, the current identified wall defect resides in piping which was recently replaced during Refueling Outage 14 during April 2011, concluding that an accelerated (presently unknown) mechanism exists within the bounding area." (Sept 4, 2013)

The new carbon steel and the super coating failed after two years. The NRC’s branch chief says the seawater in the bypass line is stagnant, but is open at the downstream connection. Nowhere in their documentation does it explain why the new section of piping failed so quickly other than to imply it is the same corrosion mechanism that destroyed the 30 year old first pipe. I think it is a new failure mechanism and other areas of the pipe could also fail quickly.
 

And believe me, there is no way to get an objective and independent interpretation of what went on here. The NRC and Seabrook have a dog in this race with protecting their credibility...you would need a recording (voice, visual) of the initial control room discussion about this hole with the NRC and then a recording of any subsequent discussion on this. Can you even imagine in a nuclear plant’s safety cooling water piping, the NRC would allow the metal destruction mechanism to remain unknown?

 

Senior inspector Paul Cataldo told me he fought like hell with his bosses trying to get a bigger violation over this. He talked to me about the burdens the agency who only gives him with a very limited weekly or monthly time budget with events at the plant. He put in a lot of time with this non violation. No overtime and certainly no paid overtime. I got the impression he thinks his bosses don’t fully support him as they should and he is worried Seabrook’s management doesn't respect him for his federal oversight role at the plant.

 

I have called Seabrook’s security gate and left a message asking to speak to an engineer about the sw strainer piping leaks. Better, somebody in the know within the operations department. I am still waiting for that call back?

Sincerely,

Mike Mulligan

Hinsdale, NH

(Cell)16032094206

‘The Popperville Town Hall’
 

http://steamshovel2002.blogspot.com/

Blizzard Hercules catastrophe at Pilgrim Nuclear Plant tonight?

Jan 3: Holy crap, they survived the night. Now I am boring with nothing to write about!

Oh, yes...with the NE ISO market prices now around $200, they can smell how vulnerable we are! 12:45pm

I give them a 30% chance of staying up at power tonight...when we most need them. Almost a certainty they will lose all off site power to the facility again. There is no way they got the problems fixed about the high voltage transmission system and with icing up and causing shorts on their own transformers and switchyard! Pilgrim has a long history with not tolerating blazzards well!  

It is extremely dangerous and rickless operating the Pilgrim nuclear plant in NE Nor'easters.

Remember blizzard Nemo On February 8, 2013 that tripped off Pilgrim, whose switchyard isn’t designed for the harsh winter climate....who scared the pants off us with regional electricity shortages last Blizzard Nemo.

What is the chance of another secret met tower failure like Nemo?  

The National Weather Service just gave a blizzard warning around the Pilgrim....

It will go much like this:

Notification Date: 02/08/2013
Notification Time: 22:50 [ET]
Event Date: 02/08/2013
Event Time: 22:00 [EST]
Last Update Date: 02/10/2013

UNUSUAL EVENT DECLARED DUE TO LOSS OF OFFSITE POWER

"Pilgrim Station scrammed on a loss of offsite power. All systems performed as designed. Groups I, II, VI went to completion. Reactor Core Isolation Cooling (RCIC) is injecting to the vessel controlling level. High Pressure Coolant Injection is in pressure control and slowly cooling down. Offsite power was lost multiple times. The Startup Transformer has been declared inoperable. The Unusual Event was declared under EAL SU 1.1 based on loss of offsite power greater than 15 minutes [at 2200 EST]."

The licensee originally experienced an automatic reactor scram at 2117 EST due to a load reject with a turbine trip/reactor scram due to loss of power. Offsite power availability has been fluctuating in and out to the site. The licensee states that all systems are functioning as required. All rods fully inserted and the reactor is stable in Mode 3. Both Emergency Diesel Generators are providing power to the safety related buses. The loss of offsite power is believed to be weather related.

The licensee has notified the State and local authorities and the NRC Resident Inspector.

Notified DHS SWO, FEMA, USDA, HHS, DOE, DHS NICC, EPA, and NuclearSSA via email.

* * * UPDATE FROM PAUL GALLANT TO VINCE KLCO AT 2/10/13 AT 1108 EST* * *

Pilgrim terminated the Unusual Event and has transitioned to recovery effective at 10:55 AM on 02/10/2013. Offsite power has been restored to safety-related and non-safety-related electrical buses through the station Startup Transformer via a single 345 KV line. The other two offsite power sources remain out of service. The emergency diesel generators have been secured and are in standby. Residual heat removal is in shutdown cooling mode maintaining the reactor in cold shutdown. Fuel Pool Cooling is in service with fuel pool coolant temperatures trending down.

 A late Thusday night blizzard like last year?

 ...LOSS OF OFFSITE POWER AND SUBSEQUENT PRESS RELEASE

"On Sunday, February 10, 2013 at 1405 [EST], with the reactor at 0% core thermal power, all control rods fully inserted, and in cold shutdown conditions, the plant experienced a loss of off-site power. With Pilgrim Station aligned to off-site power via the start-up transformer (SUT), a fault on the 'B' phase of the SUT was experienced due to suspected falling ice striking the phase's insulator. This resulted in the tripping of the feeder breaker, ACB-102, and the loss of power to 4160 KV buses A1 through A4. Emergency Diesel Generators (EDGs) 'A' and 'B' auto-started as designed and are powering emergency buses.

"The loss of off-site power resulted in de-energization of both Reactor Protection System (RPS) channels resulting in a reactor scram signal and isolation of shutdown cooling. At 1418, shutdown cooling was returned to service. All other plant systems responded as designed. Station personnel are in the process of establishing back-up power in accordance with plant procedures.

"The following press release was made at 1715 hours: 'Offsite power to Pilgrim station was interrupted this afternoon. The plant is in a cold shutdown condition and Pilgrim's diesel generators are providing power to the site. There is no worker or public safety concern. Plant personnel are troubleshooting the cause of the interruption.'

"This event had no impact on the health and/or safety of the public.

"The NRC Senior Resident Inspector has been notified."

 

US power firms slam ISO NewEngland over market ‘flaws’

So a pack of power firms are circle the defenceless public doe.

US power firms slam ISO NewEngland over market ‘flaws’

Author: Alexander Osipovich

Source: Energy Risk| 18 Dec 2013

Market woes may threaten winter reliability, firms argue

Winter reliability at risk due to problems with real-time pricing, market participants warn

As the northeast US prepares for winter, electricity firms are warning that flaws in the design of the New England power market will threaten the reliability of the region’s power supply in the event of an extended cold snap.

No Accident Cameras in Nuclear Power Plants?

Asiana, MTA Metro North Crash and our nukes

Asiana captain 'very concerned' about making visual landing

By Martha Mendoza and Stephen Braun, The Associated Press

The pilot whose Boeing 777 crashed last summer at the San Francisco airport told investigators he was "very concerned" about attempting a visual approach without the runway's instrument landing aids, which were out of service because of construction, according to an investigative report released Wednesday...

So why aren’t our nuclear plants camera’d up and voice recorded? They might  be able to transfer the crash data over to the simulators so all the switch movements and dials and monitors redo the accident....but that is it.

But what if we had a new TMI…the public wouldn't have the camera images and voice to see.

Why is the nukes any different than out the airline industry?

I think the Nuke industry would behave better off if outsiders could see the control room.

Remember routine plant business and nodding off on shift would be invaluable information if recorded...

Pilgrim Plant: What Was Behind the Disclosure of the "Bridge Failure" and Shutdown?

Basically, they get away with violating the rules until the plant runs away from the staff and NRC!

We really got the national philosophy of ghost regulations and rules...  "translucent or barely visible wispy shapes rules" that come in and our of reality depending on if they are convenient to profits and plant viability.

1EP5 Maintaining Emergency Preparedness (71114.05 – 1 sample)

a. Inspection Scope

The inspectors reviewed a number of activities to evaluate the efficacy of Entergy’s efforts to maintain the PNPS emergency preparedness program. The inspectors reviewed letters of agreement with offsite agencies; the 10 CFR 50.54(q) Emergency Plan change process and practice; Entergy’s maintenance of equipment important to emergency preparedness; records of evacuation time estimate population evaluation; and provisions for, and implementation of, primary, backup, and alternate ERF maintenance. The inspectors also verified Entergy’s compliance at Pilgrim with new NRC emergency preparedness regulations regarding: emergency action levels for hostile action events; protective actions for on-site personnel during events; emergency declaration timeliness; ERO augmentation and alternate facility capability; evacuation time estimate updates; on-shift ERO staffing analysis; and ANS back-up.

And blizzzard Nemo occured in Feb 2013 knocking out the Met Tower
 

During the 2009 NRC emergency preparedness program inspection, the inspectors determined that the 2008 quality assurance (QA) surveillance performed to justify exceeding the 12-month review frequency did not include an assessment against adequate performance indicators.

 The above on Feb 11, 2013

Swinging in the background before my Dec 3, 2013 contact beginning  at 10 am with Branch Chief Ray Mckinley was a important emergency preparedness "conference bridge failure" and leaking big turbine steam valve. They decided to shutdown to fix it later in the day. 

I leaving it to you to figure out if someone prompted me to make this call. I am uncertain the bridge failure would have been reported if it wasn't for my interest in this. I had talked to the Pilgrim NRC senior resident about this four or five days ago and I suspect senior inspector Max Schneider told his boss. They had failed to report on the Met Tower just recently and I am not sure how deep this goes. 

...I spent about an hour talking to this Ray M. Summed up the conditions in Region 1 and complained the agency has gone weak kneed on us with non cited violation at Indian Point, Seabrook and Pilgrim. I told Ray with the meteorological tower inop, the commissioner chairman came to Pilgrim saying they were one step from Fort Calhoun and we got enormous budgets problem-Natural Gas...now you are throwing out non cited violations like candy. We jostled about the tower being so out many times and the meaning of the national weather service. Told him he he’s got at least three senators gunning for the agency and they don’t need 60 votes anymore. I said you are using unjustly the NWS as a tool so you don’t have to site the plant. Your guys are going weak on us at a critical time.

He listened to me attentively and engage me...actually another guy I like. I am not saying he is on my side by a far shot.

Told him the big problem is you don’t have enough horsepower such that these plants don’t fear you enough and fear the day when they don’t tell you everything about their problems.

Power Reactor Event Number: 49605
Facility: PILGRIMRegion: 1 State: MAUnit:[1][][]RX Type:[1] GE-3NRC Notified By: PAUL GALLANTHQ OPS Officer: VINCE KLCO Notification Date: 12/03/2013Notification Time: 20:04 [ET]Event Date: 12/03/2013Event Time: 13:30 [EST]Last Update Date: 12/03/2013
Emergency Class: NON EMERGENCY10 CFR Section:
50.72(b)(3)(xiii)- LOSS COMM/ASMT/RESPONSEPerson (Organization):
WILLIAM COOK (R1DO)
Unit SCRAM Code RX CRIT Initial PWR Initial RX Mode Current PWR Current RX Mode1 N Y 100 Power Operation 82 Power Operation

Event Text

LOSS OF EMERGENCY COMMUNICATIONS CAPABILITY- EP CONFERENCING LINES UNAVAILABLE

"At approximately 1330 [EST] on Tuesday, December 03, 2013, while performing a table top drill, Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station (PNPS) discovered that EP [Emergency Preparedness] bridge conferencing lines were unavailable. The conference lines affected included the mitigation line, plant data phone, radiation data phone, emergency conferencing line, and the back up conference bridge line. Reviews to determine the cause of the event and efforts to restore the system are ongoing.

"The licensee has determined the Emergency Plan to be functional based on other communication methods that are available between onsite and offsite facilities. These include direct telephone lines, portable handheld radios, satellite phones and cell phones. Immediate actions to establish compensatory conferencing lines have been completed. On-going actions are in-progress to ensure procedure instruction is provided at each facility to enable use of the compensatory conference lines.

"At the time of this report, the plant is currently operating at 82% power due to a planned power maneuver unrelated to the reported communication event.

"The licensee has notified the NRC Senior Resident Inspector [and will notify the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

During a table-top emergency preparedness drill earlier that day, staff discovered that the “bridge-conferencing” system that allows operators to remain in constant communication during an emergency wasn't working.

... So now we are talking about the pathetic widespread condition of the infrastructure necessary to reliable evacuate the public and notify the state in a meltdown or potential meltdown.

I am telling you the truth, I am certain today he is thinking WTF am I dealing with that Mr Mulligan?
Leaky valve causes Pilgrim plant shutdown

Dec 4

Representatives from Entergy Corp., Pilgrim's owner-operator, were offering a scheduled presentation to officials and residents at Plymouth Town Hall on Tuesday night, touting the nuclear plant's safety features and outlining post-Fukushima federal requirements for future improvement. 

During a table-top emergency preparedness drill earlier that day, staff discovered that the “bridge-conferencing” system that allows operators to remain in constant communication during an emergency wasn't working.

... I kept hitting him over and over ...why wasn’t the Met Tower reported to the NRC and the public. Why wasn’t it in an event report or as UE? Why didn’t the agency enforce this?

He never gave me a direct answer...so I would wait a few minutes and ask him the same question in different way. I did this at least three times.

So today we get this daily event report you see and shutdown on a steam leak...

No question about it, this guy was really intelligent. He had a lot of miles under his belt! He got what I was doing.

... This is for Entergy’s benefit.

So I called region 1 yesterday morning...their phone answering system is terrible. I get the regional administrator’s number and give the secretary a call. She gives me the number to the inspector’s boss. I leave a message on his telephone number. Right, I outline my past interest on this on the message recording, my complaint in their system...the issues I want to talk about with this. Maybe 10 am.

Then he called me back at around 2 pm...

I tell him right off the bat, I initiated your Met tower NRC inspection and the findings. He scoffs at this...no I said, I got it on your document system. You were responding to me complaint. Get a blah, blah, blah, my inspectors were working on that long before that, he said. I said, I doubt it, I waited for the LER and the inspection report, you guys were in la la land. You guys didn’t have a clue the met tower was out in blizzard Nemo and many times before that.

He was feeling me out if I had Pilgrim staff cooperation on it?

Just like his quick phone call back to me....he was wondering if I had cooperation on the phone bridge thingy being out yesterday and the upcoming daily event report. They probable had the drill in the morning table top. I wonder if he was wondering how much I knew about the steam leak.

... "conferencing lines” : is this entergy's property or the NRC's...or is it a private conferencing sevice?

Is this another thing we don't understand how it will perform in an emergency.

.. I talked about the new complexity we have with the national weather services with my boss buddy yesterday. We don’t understand how the communication lines are set up; we don’t have any understanding of the communications and computer junk in the National Weather Service, the organizational rules, their QA...

Right, we got a highly trained staff at the plant and we got a QA system over the whole deal. We got and dependent regulator who oversees everything. We don’t have that with the NWS. This is what supposed to make the met tower highly reliable.

Then he talks about there is very good procedures that allows using the NWS. I remind him, say you own a jet airplane and have the best and most expensive procedures in the world. Those procedures mean nothing unless the pilot is trained over and over again with how to operate the ship...and he says highly proficient at operating that craft.

Good procedures don't mean shit if they aren't tested over and over again in real world situations

.... A real accident might not use a conferencing line? Right, but then they wouldn’t have made it a NRC mandated daily event report.

Was the states involved with this boondoggle?

... His name was Ray Mckinley...he is the branch chief.

... Infrastructure issues continue to plague Plymouth's Pilgrim Nuclear

While officials briefed selectmen why Fukushima can't happen here, reactor had to be shutdown because of steam leak 

Read more: http://www.wickedlocal.com/plymouth/news/x182...

... Talked yesterday about the Palisades debacle. I would have thought Entergy would have learned from that painful episode. They were up and down a lot...very costly shutdowns...lost reputational points.

I thought they would never want to go that way again as a corporation...then we have the Palisades adventure all over again with Pilgrim.

I told Ray, this isn’t just about the Met tower...it was about a pattern of poor behavior at Pilgrim, back to Palisades...within Entergy for a very long time.

And they don’t seem to learn by their mistake...

.Feynman's Appendix to the Rogers Commission Report on the Space Shuttle Challenger Accident 

Conclusions 

If a reasonable launch schedule is to be maintained, engineering often cannot be done fast enough to keep up with the expectations of originally conservative certification criteria designed to guarantee a very safe vehicle. In these situations, subtly, and often with apparently logical arguments, the criteria are altered so that flights may still be certified in time. They therefore fly in a relatively unsafe condition, with a chance of failure of the order of a percent (it is difficult to be more accurate). 

Official management, on the other hand, claims to believe the probability of failure is a thousand times less. One reason for this may be an attempt to assure the government of NASA perfection and success in order to ensure the supply of funds. The other may be that they sincerely believed it to be true, demonstrating an almost incredible lack of communication between themselves and their working engineers. 

In any event this has had very unfortunate consequences, the most serious of which is to encourage ordinary citizens to fly in such a dangerous machine, as if it had attained the safety of an ordinary airliner. The astronauts, like test pilots, should know their risks, and we honor them for their courage. Who can doubt that McAuliffe was equally a person of great courage, who was closer to an awareness of the true risk than NASA management would have us believe?Let us make recommendations to ensure that NASA officials deal in a world of reality in understanding technological weaknesses and imperfections well enough to be actively trying to eliminate them. They must live in reality in comparing the costs and utility of the Shuttle to other methods of entering space. And they must be realistic in making contracts, in estimating costs, and the difficulty of the projects. Only realistic flight schedules should be proposed, schedules that have a reasonable chance of being met. If in this way the government would not support them, then so be it. NASA owes it to the citizens from whom it asks support to be frank, honest, and informative, so that these citizens can make the wisest decisions for the use of their limited resources. 

For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled. 

Dr. Feynman discusses his experience on the Rogers Commission as part of his second autobiographical volume.

...For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.

You get it, the implication was the NRC was sitting on the steam leak to dress up the pathetic shutdown history of Pilgrim. But it's occording to the rules.
 

2013 Pilgrim shutdowns and glitches

Jan. 10-17: Both recirculation pumps tripped, followed by a head drain valve leak.

Jan. 20-24: Leaking safety valve.

Feb. 8-16: Winter storm, 169 hours down.

Aug. 22-26: All three main water pumps shut down.

Sept. 8-17: Steam pipe leak.

Oct. 14-21: Off-site power to plant unavailable because of NStar problem, which caused initial shutdown. Plant remained closed for two days after power restored because of faulty mechanical pressure regulator, which caused water levels in the nuclear reactor to become too high.

Dec. 4: Leaky steam valve. Reactor still down.

OTHER INCIDENTS

July 15: Loss of control room alarms. Plant stayed online. Alarms came back on with no explanation. Reason for malfunction never found.

July 16: Heat wave warmed seawater temperatures, forcing the plant to power down to about 85 percent intermittently. Federal regulation requires seawater, used for cooling the reactor, to be no warmer than 75 degrees.

Sources: NRC website and Entergy press releases