Employee Sabotage at Millstone Plant and the Happy Talk of Everyone

June 28: Honestly, if a investigation of this nature was ongoing, would they admit it to me?

June 27: An aid to the region 1 administrator called me this morning. They threw my complaint into allegation, I didn't request that. Now it may interfere with my worthless 2.206. He said I didn't have enough evidence to throw it into a deeper or more immediate investigation. He asked me if I had more information and I told him that is a area I can't get into. I heard his little fingers tapping on his computer keyboard all though this conversation...so this is in official documents. All I was trying to do is raise NRC awareness through multiply channels and get it documented. I consider this a success. I warned this aid that the public might see this through a different lens than the agency’s policies and procedures.

I am in a process of continually updating this blog and polishing it. This is definitely going into a 2.206 process with my intent to get this onto the official record. 

 June 24@1130am   Ok, so I want to talk multiple pathways into the NRC. I called the region 1 top administrator Bill Dean’s office. At best, I wanted to get a short recording on his phone. I got to the secretary, couldn’t leave a message, then wanted me to talk to one of his aid, wasn’t available. Finally she connected me to enforcement. I asked her to sum up our discussion, then give it to Bill. I told her I neither trust enforcement or the allegation department…the excuse to stick it in a secretive investigation and then make it disappeared.  

June 24@9:30am Talked to the senior resident. It is basically a simple shrink tube like rubber material they slide over a cable connection for environmental conditions. Just like the pictures below. Those ty wraps and the plastic bag were slipped inside the Raychem boot around the cable and intentionally they shrunk the boot around the foreign material. Well, the resident didn’t say it was malicious, as they haven’t have looked over it yet. She said she would be making a note about I think it is malicious.

She said this won’t be inspected until the third quarter of this year and I (me) am guessing we won’t see the results until Feb 2015…

I told her you are our heroes and thanked her for the hard work. Told her, “you are dealing with an encyclopedia worth of weak and useless rules that make you powerless to control the behavior of a plant like this.” Your nation doesn’t give you enough power, where a giant corporation like this has any fear of you at all. Dominion can falsify nuclear safety documents at will and they have absolutely no fear they will be held accountable in any meaningful way. Our nation as yet, doesn’t give them any meaningful incentive to want to change their bad and corrupt behavior.  

I am astonished this inspector's alarm bells aren’t going off big time…they are falsifying federal documents. What if all their documents submitted to the NRC are falsified or maliciously incomplete???

"foreign material (ty-wraps and a plastic bag) were found inside the cable environmental seal (Raychem boot) of the 'A' phase"

June 22@3:30pm: I put a call into the Millstone residents and left a message for them to call me on this LER.

Are they talking about the inside metal electrical box with the foreign material? 

 

This guy is a mess:

1) Feb 3:repeated issues with unit 3's  turbine- driven auxiliary feedwater pump and special inspection
 

2) May 25: trip of both units due with some kind of relay problem in the switch yard and failure of unit 3's non safety instrument air and another special inspection...

Unit 3 issues with turbine- driven auxiliary feedwater pump during the LOOP event.
 

3) inoperability of Unit 2's turbine- driven auxiliary feedwater pump for fourteen years due ty-wraps and a plastic bag foreign materials. Was that materials part of the work done on 2000. Say, was the plastic bag holding parts that went into the job...was the ty wraps actually going to the 2000 job?

Event date: April 10, 2014      

Report date: June 9, 2014

This employee gets a thrill out of secretly damaging nuclear safety equipment and taking a chance…a thrill game…with breaking a host of company rules. 

We don't know what kind of plastic bag it was and was their illegal drug residue inside the bag??? I can't believe the ty wraps would have anything to do with this Job.

LER 2014-004-00 (Unit 2)

DOMINION NUCLEAR CONNECTICUT, INC. MILLSTONE POWER STATION UNIT 2 LICENSEE EVENT REPORT 2014-004-00 FOREIGN MATERIAL FOUND IN A MOTOR LEAD RENDERED A MOTOR DRIVEN AUXILIARY FEEDWATER PUMP INOPERABLE
 On April 10, 2014, with Millstone Power Station Unit 2 in MODE 6 at 0% reactor power, while de-terminating the motor leads for the 'B' Motor Driven Auxiliary Feedwater (MDAFW) Pump motor, foreign material (ty-wraps and a plastic bag) were found inside the cable environmental seal (Raychem boot) of the 'A' phase. An inspection of the electrical motor leads revealed no damage occurred. This motor was last re-terminated In May 2000. The motor leads to the other phases did not have any foreign material inside the Raychem boot. Since the Raychem boot was not in the as tested environmentally qualified (EQ) configuration the 'B' MDAFW pump was considered inoperable. The direct cause was an historical inappropriate maintenance practice which rendered the MDAFW pump inoperable. Plant Technical Specifications (TS) 3.7.2.1 Action d, states in part, that in operating MODES 1, 2, or 3, with two AFW pumps inoperable, the plant must be in at least HOT STANDBY within six hours and in HOT SHUTDOWN within the following 12 hours. A review of the control room logs for the past three years determined there were 4 occasions where there were two AFW pumps inoperable for longer than allowed by TS.

The 'A' phase motor lead was properly re-terminated. During the most recent MPS2 refueling outage (spring 2014) in april or after.

 

In the above, we don’t know how bad the situation is because the rules say you need only report events (4) back three years, while the employee sabotage and the beginning of the safety component inoperability occurred fourteen years ago. You know, the rule say, if you kill a guy and don't get caught for 3 years, the courts can't prosecute you? The rules are set up where where if you got ten drunken driving convictions in 15 years and killed three people, but now the courts and newspapers can only look back 4 years where you only have one DUI conviction. Who creates such unfair rules for the public...why and who do these rules serve? Do you for one second believe the public would vote for this of game...they would find it acceptable? I got a solution for this, be diligent and don't break the rules creating such a horrible record.  

Basically this is a Raychem electrical cable boot or rubber covering. They heat it up and it shrinks to a leak proof shape around the electric cable. It sounds like the employee stuck the ty wraps and plastic bag inside the rubber seal. It can't be a simple oversight, somebody kicked the wrench in the hole unseen and by mistake...

This had to be malicious and with intent!!!

What is a ty wrap?

I believe it is these guys?

Ty wraps;




I am saying, you can create a set of so called legal rules and laws where your behavior is portrayed to outsiders much better than what has actual happened. The record is inaccurate and it is portrayed to outsiders much better than what you really earned. Nothing more damages a safety culture than this. It is like a child with his report card changing his "D" grades into a "A"s before the parent sees the report cards.  

In a six months period, the NRC reported a host of so called low level events where the plant staff looked at problems shallowly. Dominion always gain a benefit from this cheating, where they repeatedly use their errant bad judgement in a way that favors not spending money and drives the plant to be less conservative than the public would expect out of Dominion. Do you ever see them make a bad or inaccurate judgement where it drives them to be more conservative or cause them to wast money?   

Inspection Report 2014002

Unit 3

Description. On February 23, Dominion performed post-maintenance testing on the ‘A’ SW pump and the pump did not meet its acceptance criteria. The acceptance criteria included the requirement for running amps to be less than or equal to 84.1 amps and the results at the three testing positions were 85, 82, and 85 amps. The 84.1 amp value is the nameplate current value listed on the motor. Operations consulted the engineering department for assistance in disposition of the results and engineering concurred that the acceptance criteria could be changed to 85 amps and the ‘A’ SW pump returned to an operable state. Engineering concluded that exceeding the motor nameplate current by 0.9 amps would not result in any significant short term motor degradation. Based on engineering’s assessment, operations changed the acceptance criteria to 85 amps and declared the ‘A’ SW pump functional.

The inspectors questioned the basis of this assertion, because the service factor of the ‘A’ SW pump is 1.0, which would imply that even a small increase in amperage could have adverse consequences to the motor. Dominion generated a CR with the inspector’s concerns (CR541081) and upon further investigation found that they had not considered whether the motor will start/accelerate as designed during a degraded bus voltage consideration or what impact there would be on the bus if the motor is running and the station encounters a degraded bus voltage condition. Dominion operators placed the pump in a pull to lock condition and entered Technical Requirements Manual 3.7.4 for having one SW pump non-functional.

The inspectors questioned the basis of this assertion, because the service factor of the ‘A’ SW pump is 1.0, which would imply that even a small increase in amperage could have adverse consequences to the motor. Dominion generated a CR with the inspector’s concerns (CR541081) and upon further investigation found that they had not considered whether the motor will start/accelerate as designed during a degraded bus voltage consideration or what impact there would be on the bus if the motor is running and the station encounters a degraded bus voltage condition. Dominion operators placed the pump in a pull to lock condition and entered Technical Requirements Manual 3.7.4 for having one SW pump non-functional.

Specifically, Dominion had not tracked, trended, or reviewed the performance of the installed cards that had been repaired with NSR parts. Based on interviews, the inspectors determined that Dominion assumed none of the repaired cards had failed, because the overall failure rate of all 7300 cards was believed to be very, very low. Contrary to Dominion's assumed failure rate for cards with NSR parts, the inspectors identified two instances of repaired cards which had been returned to NAPS for additional repairs after an in-service period of a few years. Therefore, the inspectors concluded that Dominion's assessments were based, in part, on an unverified assumption regarding the failure rate of cards repaired at NAPS because the performance history (e.g., failure rate) of the installed affected cards was not fully understood.

 

If they never pay a price for bad behavior, how do you ever expect them to change and evolve in a positive way? The moral hazard. The two special inspections and the erratic operation of the TDAFW leading to the potential of confusing the control room operators in a serous accident. How pathetic and powerless is the NRC, where they can't make them fix this core cooling safety pump at the first opportunity. How pathetic weak and powerless is the agency in doing our greater good. 

The is the Veteran Administration in the nuclear industry!!!    

On January 23, 2014, the Unit 3 TDAFW pump failed a required surveillance test. During the starting sequence, the pump tripped on overspeed due to mechanical binding in the turbine governor linkage. Dominion entered TS LCO 3.7.1.2(a) action (C) which provided up to 72 hours to repair the failed pump before requiring Unit 3 to be shutdown to Mode 3. Troubleshooting efforts revealed that the mechanical linkage between the governor and the turbine control valve (3MSS*MCV5) was binding due to a degraded cam follower bearing and a mechanical link that had been installed incorrectly. Although repairs had been completed, it became apparent thatthe required post-maintenance tests, including a full flow test at full power, could not be completed prior to the expiration of the LCO on January 26, 2014. Dominion requested enforcement discretion from compliance with TS 3.7.1.2 for a period of 72 hours. The NRC reviewed the request in accordance with IMC 0410, NOED, and granted a one-time 48 hour extension to required action (C) of TS LCO 3.7.1.2(a).Dominion completed the post-maintenance testing and restored the TDAFW pump to an operable status within the additional time granted.

Obviously, the NRC's ROP is not reporting to the community in a way portraying the full and accurate dangerous condition this site is in. We aren't fairly giving the public the opportunity and incentive to change Millstone and Dominion. The NRC just doesn't have enough horsepower to make these guys change and become better corporate citizens. The dangerous conditions I am talking about is, a nuclear accident or the plant being operated in such unreliable manner as a third world country's puppet regime would be ashamed to have them operating in their country. 

Need I remind everyone the NE grid is in a terrible crisis without sufficient power capacity this summer and into the foreseeable future. You say boo in this condition, the cost of grid electricity doubles or triples.

05000423/2013005: Introduction. The inspectors identified a Green Finding (FIN) for the failure to follow Dominion Procedure OP-AA-102, “Operability Determinations,” and establish adequate compensatory measures to restore reliability to the Unit 3 TDAFW following an overspeed trip on November 4, 2013. Subsequently, the TDAFW pump tripped again on overspeed during surveillance testing on December 18, 2013.

Discussion. The TDAFW pump tripped on overspeed on November 4, 2013 and December 18, 2013, during scheduled surveillance testing. Dominion attributed the initial test failure to condensate in the steam lines without fully evaluating other potential causes that could contribute to the failure to start. As a result, the reliability of theTDAFW to respond to a start signal was reduced. Compensatory measures established following the November 4 test failure and subsequent revisions to the prompt operability determination were inadequate and did not prevent the December 18 failure. Additional compensatory measures were subsequently added.

In August 2013, Dominion adjusted the governor compensator on the TDAFW pump such that the speed sensitivity of governor was reduced in order to prevent spontaneous oscillations from occurring at low flow rates. Subsequently, on November 4, 2013, the TDAFW pump tripped on overspeed during the start sequence during a quarterly surveillance test. A prompt operability determination (OD000561, Revision 0) assessed the cause of the trip as being due to a buildup of condensate in the steam supply lines to the TDAFW pump. Compensatory measures were established to eliminate the source of the condensate by ensuring the steam traps were adequately draining the steam supply lines. The operability determination attributed the probable cause of the overspeed trip as being caused by the failure to properly operate and maintain the steam traps in the steam lines such that condensate accumulated in the steam lines and caused the throttle valve to fail to close due to hydraulic drag. On November 5, the ‘D’ steam line isolation valve to the TDAFW pump was closed. The ‘D’ steam supply line remained isolated until December 18, 2013.

Dominion Engineering considered several other potential causes in the analysis in OD000561, Revision 0, but determined that they were likely not involved in the overspeed trip that occurred on November 4. Subsequent revisions to the initial operability determination (Revisions 1 and 2) provided further rationale to justify why governor and throttle valve potential failure modes did not require compensatory measures to restore reliability. As a result, Dominion did not conduct any further testing of the governor, the governor linkage and the throttle valve, 3MSS*HCV5, nor did they establish compensatory measures that would have addressed these other potential causes. On December 5, CR534403 identified that “there was a discreet (vs. smooth) change in the acceleration rate” of the TDAFW pump during pump startup that had not been observed prior to the maintenance on the governor in August. A timely recommendation by the root cause team to test the throttle valve and governor for binding prior to the next scheduled surveillance test was not implemented prior to the second overspeed test failure on December 18.

OD000561 (Revisions 0, 1, and 2) was narrowly focused on the malfunctioning of the steam traps as the source of the condensate building up in the steam lines. On December 18, Dominion unisolated the ‘D’ steam supply line and another overspeed trip subsequently occurred during the surveillance test. The root cause evaluation was still in progress and the causal assessment had not been fully completed when operations restored the ‘D’ steam line to service in preparation for the surveillance test.  

Dominion focused on the malfunctioning steam traps upstream of the steam admission valves as the primary cause of the test failures requiring compensatory measures. The other potential causes of the problem were not fully investigated. They did not use conservative assumptions in the decision making process and did not demonstrate that the other potential causes were not valid when formulating compensatory measures to restore reliability. Dominion did not fully investigate nor recognize that condensate was trapped in the steam line between 3MSS*AOV31D and 3MSS*MOV17D (downstream of the steam admission valve) which may have caused or contributed to the turbine overspeed condition. They also did not further investigate possible degradation of the governor, linkage, nor throttle valve binding as potential causes.

The Palisades PCP Impeller Continues!

June 26:

According the NRC tonight Entergy replaced the C PCP pump with a new one this outage and a malfunctioning PCP seal on the new C pump caused the most recent shutdown.

It was a new seal!! 

June 22: 

Hmm, the Cooper plant secretly just came down for a recirc pump seal job a week or so ago. Had to pry it out of them.  One is PWR and the other is a BWR. It is suspicious though as hell…are they related?

Is there some deep management philosophy thing going on...like just let it run till it fails. Did they take a shutdown with anomalies readings on the seal…just start up without replacing the seal because they didn’t have enough time?  

See bottom update...








+++The Below is the first entry setting this up and then Reposted from 6/20...everything else was added after one day later.

Junk and obsolete "primary coolant pumps" and Entergy has a habit of intentionally running safety equipment until failure. We have no idea if the proper maintenance was taken on these seals...

Maybe they will break another impeller blade on the way down and up...they will be running these pumps outside their design margins during the shutdown and start-up. Everyone cross their fingers!

June 26: The severely out of balanced  impeller since 2011 damaged the C pump...this cause them to replace the whole unit this spring. The brand new pump and its brand new seals failed upon start-up...this is what caused their new shutdown.  

Was it the pump they dissembled looking for blade damage this outage?

"2014: The licensee removed the impeller from PCP-C and replaced it with a newly manufactured impeller. The removed impeller had missing portions in two impeller vanes." 

Obviously the massive vibrations with the severely out of balance impeller shortened the life of the seals? You think Entergy would be smart enough to replace the seals at the same time...I doubt it.

Now when did they come out of their recent outage...March 16.

Congratulation Entergy on that record run of 97 days!  

(June 22: Pretty cool ha, sending signals...)

COVERT TOWNSHIP, MI – Palisades Nuclear Power Plant was removed from service at 11:30 p.m. Friday, (June 20).

 You catch that...I put this up on the internet at 4 pm yesterday:)

That is being done to conduct a "planned maintenance outage" to replace a primary coolant pump seal, says Lindsay Rose, spokeswoman for Entergy Corp., which owns Palisades.
She said the outage will be brief but she would not provide an estimate of how long, saying that is not information the company makes available to the public.
"This is not an emergency situation at all," Rose said. "We are just shutting down to replace this now so we can have more reliable operations in July and August, through the summer, when energy demand is higher."
She said the seal helps maintain pressure inside one of four primary coolant pumps at the plant.
"There are primary pumps that push water from steam generators to our reactor vessel," Rose said. "We have four of them. We are replacing the seal in one of the pumps."
She said the seal is being replaced "because we've been monitoring the seals and we noticed one of the seal's layers – each has four layers – and we've noticed one of the layers of the one seal wasn't performing the way it should."
The pumps work together to circulate water and keep the vessel cool.
Early this month, Allison M. Macfarlane, chairwoman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and U.S. Rep. Fred Upton, R-St. Joseph, toured the plant to see safety upgrades. They said the plant was safe but Macfarlane acknowledged that there were concerns about a "chilled work environment" in Palisades' security department.
In a poll, workers said they believed they could not raise safety issues without facing retaliation.
Macfarlane said there was no final word on what the NRC would do to address those concerns, "but it's something we look at very seriously."

These reports are so selective and incomplete…no mention in the 2012 inspection report and I believe the newest IR don't mention "out of licensing" issue began in 2002. I don’t trust these guys to give us the unvarnished truth on these events.

I can’t find the non sighted violation so far... 

 05000255/2012003

In further consultation with industry specialists over the next several months, the licensee reviewed previous site and industry operating experience regarding PCP impeller issues and assessed the manner in which the Palisades pumps were operated. The research concluded that the cause of the failures is fatigue-related effects from the operation of the pumps in conditions beyond the maximum flow rates and below the minimum net positive suction head recommendations as described in the UFSAR and other design documentation.

In response to the October 2011 event and subsequent research conducted to better understand the phenomena affecting the PCPs, the licensee has instituted a monitoring plan, changed the preferred sequence for starting/stopping PCPs during startups and shutdowns, and has corrective actions to explore further procedure changes regarding operation of the PCPs and the resultant impact on other aspects of plant operation. 

 

This is a brand new inspection report.

I just can't understand this, yet this continuation of allowing the operating the PCP outside the design operating critera in 2002 lead to the distruction of many PCP impellers.

I can't find any non sited violation of the PCP pumps in 2002...somebody is smoking dope in the NRC. The idiot must be must be talking about 2012.  

June 20:

PALISADES NUCLEAR PLANT – NRC PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION AND RESOLUTION INSPECTION REPORT 05000255/2014007

For example, the licensee received a non-cited violation in 2002 for the failure to operate the primary coolant pumps in accordance with their design operating criteria. The inspectors verified that the licensee’s evaluations for the issue were comprehensive and the corrective actions completed and planned were appropriate and timely, commensurate with their safety significance.

 

This is the first time I’d seen this…

Was this in the recent inspection (foreign material) about this?

June 21@ 6:30pm

>>>>Can you even imagine how many well educated NRC officials looked over IR 2014007 for errors? So I looked in the back section of the "listed of documents" they inspected. They had no 2002 documents listed in this inspection report. This below is what they looked at.

We are lucky these guys aren't reactor operators.The NRC looked over IR 2012003 and recertified there was no any operational safety issues with repeatedly spewing RCP impeller blades all in the coolant over the decades. But we could never see the secret internal document...how do we know the operational determination was thorough?<<<<    

CR-PLP-2012-02044 Operation of Primary Coolant Pumps with Inadequate Net Positive Suction Head April 2, 2012

Firing NRC Commissioner George Apostolakis by June 30?

Originally posted on 6/20

Just think about this with those weak kneed and cowardly democrats...it was only the rabid dog right wing extremist in the senate who stood up for the democrat's choice Apostolakis.  

Me June 11: Apostolakis must have asked the republicans for a favor, to bring it up during the meeting. The Republicans in the senate subcommittee meeting were apoplectic he wasn’t yet renominated to the NRC by Obama…they thought it disrespectful he hasn’t been notified he was going to continue to be a NRC commissioner.

A excellent choice would be William Corcoran...

My plain vanilla political choice would be Dave Lochbaum. He has been kind of kindly to the industry of late and I think he has been angling for the commissioner’s job. My best choice though would be Arnie Guntersen because he’s got such a big chip on his shoulder…he would represent the anti-nuclear establishment the best. He would take the contrary position more than Dave and he would be in all out fight against the industry until death!  He would shake them up the most, even if the commissioner was always voting 4 to 1 against him. Though Lockbaum has invaluable insider NRC experiences as he was once an employee. Bob Meyer would also be a great choice as in PROS…

Heaven would be having both commissioner Lochbaum and Guntersen!!!

My secondary choices would be having politician, a union official or a neutral nuclear industry CEO or VP. To die for, would be getting somebody in there who actually once had or has a reactor license.

The best “wild man” choice of all time would be me!!!! of course!!!! Note: I was recently criminally convicted for repairing a dilapidated and loose boards on a 1920's bridge walkway, i narrowly escaped a felony!!!

"According to people in the nuclear-energy industry"...basically this is acknowledgement nobody has has any sway in the nomination process except the nuclear industry insiders.

We don't even get a token they are so insecure...

If I am nominated :) my highest priority would be that I am a tool for and of transparency!!!

Originally posted 6/11...

Basically none of these guys has any direct nuclear plant insider experience and certainly no licence operator experience....it will take them three years to come up to speed.

Do they need 60 votes or just a majority which are democrats. I be researching these guys.

Jeff Baron, an aide to retiring Rep. Henry Waxman

Can't find much on Jeff yet...

Stephen Burns, a former general counsel to the NRC:

Is this a insider nuclear industry joke, Magwood is heading to the OECD Nuclear Energy (NEA) Agency and Stephen Burns is coming out of th the same agency. Oh, Burns is the chief legal counsel and Magwood is going to be the general.

Stephen G. Burns appointed Head of Legal Affairs at the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency

The OECD Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA) is pleased to announce that Mr. Stephen G. Burns has been appointed Head of Legal Affairs. Mr. Burns will provide legal opinions and secretariat services to the Nuclear Law Committee, advise NEA management on all legal aspects of the Agency’s operations, assist member countries in the establishment of international joint projects and contribute to the Agency's nuclear law information and education programmes. He will also provide legal assistance to the Contracting Parties to the Paris Convention on Third Party Liability in the field of nuclear energy and the Brussels Convention Supplementary to the Paris Convention.

Mr. Burns was appointed General Counsel of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) in May 2009 after serving as the NRC’s Deputy General Counsel since 1998. As General Counsel, he was responsible for legal advice and representation for the NRC. Mr. Burns joined the NRC as an attorney in 1978 and has worked on a number of significant issues involving nuclear safety and regulation. He received the NRC Distinguished Service Award in 2001 and the Presidential Meritorious Executive Rank Award in 1998 and 2008. Mr. Burns served as a member of the US delegation to the NEA Nuclear Law Committee. He has also been a lecturer

Global Studies Law Review 

GLOBAL NUCLEAR ENERGY LAW AND
REGULATION SYMPOSIUM 

THE FUKUSHIMA DAIICHI ACCIDENT:
THE INTERNATIONAL COMMUNITY RESPONDS
　
STEPHEN G. BURNS 

I read this report...I know he is just representing his agency...but I don't trust him. I wouldn't vote for him with what I'd seen.

(Updated June 21) My assessment of these two...it is a typical weak kneed democrat and Obama ploy. They try to neutralized their opportunity by choosing one to please the democrats and the other to please the republicans. The NRC lawyer got to be a Republican.

If it was a republican president extremist with two republican slots open, he wouldn't blink putting in their two right wing nuclear industry extremist.

The rather moderate right wing nuclear industry extremist of the chairman and these next two democrats nominees would have the majority voting block for the next 4 of 5 years.  

Remember Obama set up Jaczko to fail in his "cap and trade" deal in the beginning of his presidency. He picked pro nuclear commissioners to appease the nuclear utilities...that is where "rat bastard Magwood" came from.

Just saying, if this was the rabid mad dog treabagger Republicans, they would take no prisoner. They would hire without a conscience two nuclear industry extremist. But you get it, when the Republican extremist take the presidency, generally their political choices are highly partisan. While when the weak kneed democrats take power, there political choices become most neutral or slightly right wing. You go though a few political cycles and this game mostly screws the democrats who voted for their democrat party...they are always selling out the democratic party.

You can see this coming from a million miles away, Obama and the Democrats will throw the House a rabid mad dog Republicans extremist a commissioner gift. We will nominate a rabid Republican extremist commissioner in the hopes of moderating the house mad dog republicans. The House will assume it is a sign of weakness, just like Putin...then the nuclear industry will hold the commissioner voting majority for the foreseeable future and they will vote like Obama never gave them the majority, you fool. Thank you Mr Obama...  

Got this right since March 2013

Epic Reform of the NRC this Year: Magwood Out

Nuclear Regulator to Leave Federal Agency

Typically political Friday night and weekend dump?

WSJ: White House Decides Not to Renominate Apostolakis as an NRC Commissioner

WASHINGTON—One of the five members of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission will leave the agency after the White House decided not to renominate him for a second term.

George Apostolakis, first nominated to the commission by President Barack Obama in 2010, will leave the NRC on June 30 when his term ends, according to agency spokesman Eliot Brenner.

A White House spokesman declined to comment on why the administration opted not to renominate Mr. Apostolakis, who has publicly stated he would like to continue as a commissioner. He was given notice this week from the White House, according to a person familiar with the matter.

In a statement issued Friday, Mr. Apostolakis thanked Mr. Obama for giving him the opportunity to serve and noted the work he had done while on the commission, including work related to the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear-power plant meltdown caused by a tsunami following a major earthquake in Japan.

"During this demanding period, the NRC staff continued to carry out our mission with expertise and professionalism," Mr. Apostolakis said.

Another NRC commissioner nominated by Mr. Obama in 2010, William Magwood IV, said earlier this year that he had accepted the position of director general of the Paris-based Nuclear Energy Agency. Mr. Brenner said Mr. Magwood would leave the NRC by late summer, and the NEA said he would begin Sept. 1.

Messrs. Apostolakis and Magwood are both Democrats, and the White House hasn't announced who Mr. Obama intends to nominate to fill their seats. The nominees will require Senate confirmation.

According to people in the nuclear-energy industry, the White House is considering nominating Jeff Baron, an aide to retiring Rep. Henry Waxman (D., Calif.), who is the top Democrat on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, and Stephen Burns, a former general counsel to the NRC.

Platts:

 A nuclear industry source said Thursday that Jeff Baron, a Democratic congressional staffer, and Stephen Burns, former NRC general counsel, are being "vetted" as possible nominees for Apostolakis' seat.

Baron is staff director for energy and the environment with the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee. Burns retired from NRC in March 2012 and is currently head of the legal affairs section in the secretariat at OECD's Nuclear Energy Agency.

Senator David Vitter of Louisiana, the senior Republican member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, which oversees NRC, said during a committee hearing June 4 that he was "concerned with the lack of communication" with the Senate from the White House and NRC on potential nominees to the agency.

Vitter said keeping those positions filled "must remain a priority," and he urged the administration "to act quickly so the commission can continue its important work without interruption or distraction."

Both Apostolakis and Magwood are Democrats, as is NRC Chairwoman Allison Macfarlane. Commissioners William Ostendorff and Kristine Svinicki are Republicans. The Atomic Energy Act specifies that no more than three commissioners can be from the same political party, so the new appointees are likely to be Democrats.

The commission has previously conducted business with two commissioner slots vacant.

June 11:

What are the Cantor ramifications for the NRC commissioner nominations and President Obama?

WSJ: Eric Cantor Loses to Tea Party's David Brat in Virginia Primary

Will the Republicans be willing to make a deal or will they be more ideologically strident on the NRC. Will the ideologues be controversial adverse...just want to make a deal to shut everyone one up.  

I think this will drive the House and Senate Republican nuclear ideologues more to the right...hate Obama even more. Will the Senate Committee on the Environment and Public works have more open warfare or less?

Will the House yank funding from the NRC as a show of force? 

Originally posted on 6/6

What is his role in nominating the NRC commission?

 

 

Harry Reid Shapes Energy Regulator With an Eye to Nevada Industry

Senate Leader Uses Influence to Try to Develop His State's Renewables Firms

As majority leader of the Senate, the Nevada Democrat is one of the most powerful people in Washington. Over the past year, he has on two occasions scotched the White House's pick of leader for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, a low-profile agency that oversees the nation's electric grid, and he has successfully pushed for other preferred candidates.

His efforts will be tested as soon as this week when the Senate's energy committee votes on whether to confirm Norman Bay as FERC chairman and Cheryl LaFleur as a commissioner. Mr. Bay is a Reid-backed candidate. The senator blocked Ms. LaFleur from getting the top job, and he is blunt about his interest in shaping FERC.

"Oh really? No kidding," Mr. Reid said. "Wow, that is amazing—that a majority leader who has a responsibility of selecting people would have some opinion as to who he suggests to the White House."

Mr. Reid's interest stems from his expressed intent to develop his state's renewable-energy industry. In 2013, Nevada ranked second in the nation for geothermal energy production and third for solar production, and 18% of its total electricity generation came from renewable, above the national average of 13%.

Nevada and the West in general, however, need more power lines to deliver renewable energy to customers. While FERC, which can have as many as five members, doesn't generally approve construction of interstate power lines, it does approve wholesale electric transmission sales and tariffs, which influence where power companies decide to build transmission lines.

Mr. Reid's attentions have roiled an agency that, like other federal regulatory bodies, is supposed to be independent from Congress and the executive branch.

"The uncertainty over the makeup of the commission has created a level of dysfunction I have not seen in my five years on the commission," said John Norris, an Obama commission appointee who also was boxed out of the chairmanship by Mr. Reid, according to people involved in the process. "The dysfunction of the Senate seems to be spilling over to those agencies Sen. Reid wants to have a controlling hand on."

A spokeswoman for Ms. LaFleur declined to comment. A White House spokesman declined to address specific interactions with Mr. Reid.

"We, of course, work closely with Sen. Reid and other members of the Senate to nominate and confirm the best, most qualified candidate for open positions across the government," said White House spokesman Matt Lehrich. "When it comes to FERC, the president chose Norman Bay because he is a proven leader and dedicated public servant with expertise in the energy markets, a tough, evenhanded approach to enforcing the law, and a history of bipartisan support."

Mr. Norris was the first potential nominee for chairman to run into Mr. Reid. According to the people involved in the nominations process, the lawmaker insisted the White House not nominate Mr. Norris as chairman, in part because he had taken a position in a previous job that Mr. Reid considered too favorable to coal.

"It is a rare instance," said one former Obama administration official. "Usually the White House and Sen. Reid work together pretty well. This was a bit of hard ball."

Mr. Reid wanted instead someone from a Western state similar to Nevada, according to people familiar the matter. (Mr. Norris is an Iowan).

Last July, the White House nominated former Colorado Public Utilities Commission Chairman Ron Binz as chairman. A few months later, Mr. Binz withdrew his nomination because of opposition from Republicans and some Democrats for comments he made about supporting renewable energy over fossil fuels.

Mr. Reid also didn't take to Ms. LaFleur as chairman, contending she wouldn't adequately protect consumers from electricity-market manipulation or support building transmission lines for renewable energy. "I don't want her as chair," Mr. Reid said during a recent interview in his Washington office.

Ms. LaFleur has been acting chairman since Jon Wellinghoff, a Nevadan close to Mr. Reid, retired in late 2013. "She has done some stuff to do away with some of Wellinghoff's stuff," Mr. Reid said.

Mr. Bay is up for a vote as FERC chairman by the Senate committee as soon as Thursday, after which the full Senate would vote. Mr. Reid supports him in large part because he hails from a Western state, New Mexico. He also draws bipartisan support.

It isn't rare for lawmakers to work to shape regulatory agencies, but observers said Mr. Reid's direct line to the White House allows him to fight for who he wants on FERC behind the scenes. The senator's allies also say Washington lawmakers routinely seek to benefit the states they represent.

"You're crazy not to use it to help your constituents back home," said Eric Washburn, a principal at lobbying firm Bracewell & Giuliani who worked on energy and environment issues for Democratic senators, including Mr. Reid, for 10 years. "People may argue that is unfair, but it is the seniority system and it is what it is."

Mr. Reid's vision for FERC is broadly aimed at securing investment in renewable energy and transmission lines in the West.

He helped secure federal approval for a major renewable-energy power line in Nevada, according to former Reid aides, and supported the sale of Las Vegas-based utility NV Energy to a unit of

FERC under Mr. Wellinghoff advanced policies that in the long run help boost Nevada's renewable energy, according to Mr. Reid and his aides. One regulation that FERC approved in 2011 under Mr. Wellinghoff requires states to coordinate on transmission planning, such as new power lines, which utility experts say would help move renewable energy more easily, especially throughout the West.

 

Wellinghoff said. "And he supports Nevada becoming an exporter of these resources."

Is the NRC's great revolution beginning???

The Honorable George Apostolakis was sworn in as a Commissioner of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) on April 23, 2010, for a term ending on June 30, 2014.

U.S. Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) on June 4 urged the Obama administration to act soon to avoid a vacancy on the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC). 

Barrasso, a member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, said during a committee hearing on NRC that Commissioner George Apostolakis is currently scheduled to see his term expire June 30.

So far the Obama administration has neither re-nominated Apostolakis for a new term nor nominated someone else to replace Apostolakis on the five-member panel. 

While Barrasso did not mention it, NRC will already be facing at least one vacancy in the near future. Commissioner William Magwood IV announced earlier this year that he will resign from the commission to become director general of the Paris-based Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) Nuclear Energy Agency. 

Magwood's current term was not scheduled to expire until June 30, 2015.

Then Magwood is quiting by summer's end...fired upwards into the better position.

Usually what is going on, it is just horse trading between the politicians. He will eventually get renominated after the deal is set.

America’s faith in media at all-time low

Because they starve their news room staffs and predominantly only serve the business and corporate class…as our political class who is also increasingly who is increasingly serving the elites, business and corporate class….

America’s faith in media at all-time low

Americans now trust television and print media about as much as they do the Internet, which is to say, not very much.

The latest edition of a Gallup poll that tracks confidence in media follows a decades-long trend that shows a declining faith in television and print news. The percentage of Americans that have "a great deal" or "quite a lot" of confidence in the three media formats now hover around one-fifth.

Twenty-two percent of respondents trust newspapers, 19 percent trust web-based news sites, and 18 percent say they trust TV. All three of those numbers are within the polls 4-point margin of error.

Faith in print media is down 29 points since its 1979 peak. TV peaked in 1993 with a 46 percent confidence rating. Oddly, Gallup hadn’t asked the question about the Internet since 1999, but the difference (from 21 percent then to 19 percent now) is statistically negligible.

While the numbers across all three venues are dreary, the trend lines are important. With the decline in faith comes a decline in traditional media’s ability to influence public opinion and political debate. If the trends continue (and it is hard to find a reason why they won’t), the Web would soon be the most influential media component in the national conversation.

Another interesting takeaway from this survey: Self-identified political conservatives trust in newspapers has tied its all-time low — 15 percent — while confidence among self-identified liberals, though still down over the last 10 years, is more than double that of conservatives: 34 percent.

Gallup does not say whether those that distrust newspapers actually read them.

There is, however, almost no split between liberals and conservatives when it comes to television — disdain for TV news spans the ideological divide.

You can trust us on that one

The London Array Wind Farm @ $221 MWh

London Array Wind Farm

But you get it, at $221MWh, it has a capacity factor of 40% and it has a astonishing short operating life time of  24 years for "Phase 1 of London Array cost £1.9bn to build, has a 630MW capacity and is expected to produce around 2,200,000MWh of electricity a year".

This is call insanity!!!

The UCS talks about the new" Vogtle expansion, with mid-range levelized costs (per MWh) of $82, $83, and $90, respectively".

It is $35MWh in New England on June 22  and on a Saturday, and it is cool outside. It been $40 to $60 most of this month…but our high market price is leverage by the threat of a natural gas shortage and not enough installed capacity. We are in severe electricity crisis…well, a severe profit crisis because the utilities can’t find a bank big enough to hold all their money.   

Remember energy diversity and the all-of-the-above philosophy means the politicians are out to screw you and sabotage our jobs and income…this basically means the ginned up highest priced source of electricity sets the price of all the lower priced electricity. This allows all the sources of energy to collude against us all and wreck our political system with all their dirty money…gang up on us together.     

I am certain they could build a safe nuclear plant at $221MWh but it would drive our economy back to the stone age.

The London Array is the world’s largest offshore wind farm and began operation earlier this year. Located in the outer Thames Estuary, the 100km2 installation of 175 3.6MW turbines has a combined generating capacity of 630MW – and that’s just phase 1.

We asked the team behind the Array to answer your questions on the engineering challenges involved in such an ambitious project, and how much it all costs.

How long are the turbines designed to last and could their lifetime be extended or could they be replaced with like-for-like units? Could the Array exist indefinitely?

The lifetime of the turbines is approximately 24 years. It is possible that the turbine’s lifetime could be extended with refurbishments at appropriate intervals, and it is also possible to replace the turbines with new ones. This would need to be done within the consenting conditions that apply to London Array Phase 1. London Array has been developed under a 50-year lease for the site from the Crown Estate – which gives it a finite lifetime – and is not designed to be there indefinitely.

How much energy (in MWh) do you expect to generate annually? What is your expected load factor?

We expect a load factor of c.40%, giving output of c.2,200,000MWh – enough to meet the electricity needs of around 500,000 households.

How does the capital cost per MWh of predicted annual energy output compare to new nuclear and gas plants of the equivalent size?

Phase 1 of London Array cost £1.9bn to build, has a 630MW capacity and is expected to produce around 2,200,000MWh of electricity a year. Wind is currently a more expensive form of energy generation than traditional sources largely because it is a newer form of power plant, but the government has set a target of reducing the cost of offshore wind to £100/MWh.

One of the partners, DONG Energy, has also set a target of reducing the cost of its offshore wind projects to €100/MWh for projects sanctioned in 2020 and has put a number of plans into action in order to achieve that aim. Once constructed, offshore wind farms have relatively low operating costs and produce no waste products.

The analysts’ view

We asked two energy analysts for their views on the costs of offshore wind relative to other electricity sources, trends in wind turbine prices and to what degree offshore wind is artificially supported by subsidies.

Angus Crone, Bloomberg New Energy Finance

Our levelised cost of electricity model currently has offshore wind at $221 per MWh, onshore wind at $83, PV solar at $128, nuclear on $101 and combined cycle gas turbines (CCGT) at $70. Note that these are global averages and are levelised costs, not simply capital costs. They also exclude the costs of CO2 emissions in the case of CCGT gas.

Only about 45-50% of offshore wind capital costs are the turbine. The rest consists of foundations, cabling, installation etc, and there is probably even more scope for cost reductions there. Our estimate is that levelised costs of electricity for offshore wind will come down by 22% between 2012 and 2020. There will be further significant cost reductions beyond that.

We think costs will peak in the next couple of years and then fall

Offshore wind costs have already gone up in the last few years because of the move to deep water. We think costs will peak in the next couple of years and then fall, as improvements in installation knowhow, foundations and turbine technology outweigh the extra costs of going to deeper and deeper water.

Offshore wind projects would simply not be built at the moment without support provided by the roc scheme, or after 2017 the contracts for difference feed-in tariff scheme. However the government hopes that by supporting offshore wind now, it will make possible a big reduction in costs over the next 15 years and also help create a world-leading industry in the UK.