A Carnival and a Welcome to New Blogger Guy Page

The 34th Carnival of Nuclear Energy is up at Next Big Future. I welcome vermontpressconnections, a new blog published by Guy Page.

34th Carnival of Nuclear Energy

In the 34th Carnival of Nuclear Energy, Brian Wang has assembled a deep and world-wide view of nuclear.

The first two linked posts are Charles Barton's post at Nuclear Green. Barton demolishes Mark Z. Jacobson's views that nuclear war can be prevented by not building nuclear power plants. (I call these Mark Jacobson's views because Jacobson has such a proliferation of factual errors that I can't call his work a research paper.) Read Charles Barton's posts. Follow Barton with gun and camera, as he tracks Jacobson's errors to their source.

In more international news, Dan Yurman of Idaho Samizdat explains why the recent fuel recycling breakthrough in China is only a partial breakthrough. Writing as a guest blogger at ANS Nuclear Cafe, Yurman describes why India is looking to Russia and France for its nuclear technology, and how America has fallen behind. At Yes Vermont Yankee, I go international a bit, widening my view from Vermont to Iowa and all the way to England.

Brian Wang, once again, puts it all into perspective at Next Big Future, with posts on the Asian builds and China's grid upgrades. Wang also follows the fusion story. Many of us (myself included) have mostly given up on fusion, but new and hopeful processes are being developed. It is great that Wang keeps us abreast of the real progress.

Come to the Carnival! Enjoy yummy food-for-the-intellect, gathered for your mental pleasure. Watch nuclear grow world-wide. Be happy!

Welcome New Blogger! Guy Page and vermontpressconnections

Guy Page has started a new blog, vermontpressconnections. This blog covers the ever-changing Vermont media scene.

Page is a skilled newspaperman whose credentials include Burlington Free Press, Caledonian-Record, St. Albans Messenger, News & Citizen, and Chittenden Observer. He has also worked with many not-for-profits in Vermont, including the Vermont Lung Association, Vermont Alliance for Ethical Healthcare, and Coalition for a Tobacco Free Vermont. At Vermont Energy Partnership, Guy supports Vermont Yankee with skill and clarity. He also regularly gets attacked for his support...see the comment stream on the article linked above.

When the Coalition for Energy Solutions (I am a member) published Vermont Electric Power in Transition, we wanted to do a press release and hold a press conference. Everybody we asked about press conferences told us that we should get in touch with Guy Page. They said that he had the best media contact list, and he would be able to give us the best advice. We were very grateful to Guy, and I am delighted to see him starting this blog. I expect this blog will be useful for everyone who does business in Vermont.

Welcome, 34th Carnival of Nuclear Energy. And Welcome, vermontpressconnections!

The Inauguration: Finally, I Understand the Honeymoon Concept

Peter Shumlin was inaugurated as Governor of Vermont today. During his campaign, he described himself as "Vermont Yankee's worst enemy." In his inaugural speech, he laid out an ambitious agenda, including health care, broadband, and education. He didn't mention Vermont Yankee. You can read his inaugural speech or you can listen to it.

• Perhaps Shumlin didn't mention Vermont Yankee because he is sure it will be shut down, and it is time to move on to new plans.
• Perhaps he didn't mention Vermont Yankee because now he is governor, and having unemployment rise on his watch isn't going to be good for his chances for re-election.
• Perhaps he read one of my blog posts which noted that he was losing the election when he was running against Vermont Yankee. He only pulled ahead when he chose a more positive, standard-Democratic-policy approach.
• Perhaps he has decided to hold a positive mood and not saying anything negative in his first speech as governor.
• Perhaps he realizes that Vermont Yankee needs to stay open, and he doesn't want to back himself into a corner.
• Perhaps...

Enough speculation. As many have noted, running for office is quite different from holding office. Someone asked me what I thought Shumlin would do as governor, and I answered: "Disappoint a lot of people." He made many campaign promises, and they will not all be fulfilled.

I Finally "Get it" about Elections and Honeymoon Periods

I finally understand the "honeymoon" period that newly-elected officials usually receive from the press. I never understood it before. I thought it was just an odd courtesy that the press traditionally extended. Actually, it is very necessary.

The new office-holder needs time to define what he or she is going to do, in office. You can't judge them by what they said on the campaign trail. What they said during the campaign may or may not be relevant.

Shumlin will hold his inaugural ball tomorrow night. It is time for his honeymoon to begin. I honor it with the classic Vermont song.

Widening the View: From Vermont to Iowa and England

Starting in Vermont

This morning, the Brattleboro Reformer had an interesting and controversial op-ed about Vermont Yankee. Since Howard Shaffer and I had visited the Reformer offices recently to have a background-style talk, I was interested in the editorial.

The op-ed claimed that Vermont Yankee is unlikely to close "on schedule." It pointed out that Entergy could bring several types of lawsuits against the state-ordered closing. Any of these lawsuits could extend the plant license for twenty years (if Entergy wins) or for a couple of years (while the lawsuits wend their way through the courts) even if Entergy doesn't win. The potential suits fall into three categories:

1. Federal pre-emption. What were all those Vermont Senators doing when they inveighed against the dangers of tritium and insisted the plant must close down? Weren't they aware that radiation safety is an NRC issue, and cannot be decided by a state? The Senators were giving grounds for a lawsuit on pre-emption of the NRC.
2. Contract violation. Entergy signed a Memorandum of Understanding that said it agreed that it would abide by a Public Service Board issuing (or not issuing) a Certificate of Public Good. After the contract was signed, the Legislature voted itself the privilege of telling the Public Service Board whether or not it could issue that Certificate. This legislative veto power was not in the original contract.
3. What is an MOU? A Memorandum of Understanding is a contract. On the other hand, with some lawyers getting into the act, an MOU could also be considered non-binding, or it could be considered more binding than the usual contract. Fun for all, I suppose.

I covered many of these topics in two February 2010 blog posts called The Day After the Vote and The Morning After. I discussed pre-emption, contract law, and the possibility of lawsuits. I would call myself a real fortune-teller, except that I expected the lawsuits to begin more-or-less immediately at that time. No lawsuits began. Entergy quite reasonably decided to find and remediate the tritium leak before getting lawyers involved.

There's still time in the future for a lawsuit. At this point, these lawsuit ideas are simply speculation.

Expanding to Iowa

A local blog, Vermont Tiger, discussed the Reformer op-ed in a post Drop Dead Date for Yankee? Vermont Tiger compared the fierce opposition to Vermont Yankee with the general acceptance of the license extension recently granted to Vermont Yankee's sister plant, Duane Arnold in Iowa. Duane Arnold is a 615 megawatt BWR: it even has a low bank of cooling towers, just like Vermont Yankee. (picture above). The Iowa paper describes Duane Arnold as an employer, a provider of taxes, a provider of energy, and a "valuable corporate neighbor."

I appreciate Vermont Tiger for widening my view of how people look at nuclear plants. Too many people in Vermont declare: "We are Vermont and we are very very special. Nothing is quite good enough for us." These people give Vermont a smug problem. Without Vermont Yankee, Vermont will have gas-fired generation, and we will also have a smog problem. Nice to know that Iowa has a different view of nuclear!

Britain

And now, looking across the seas, Centrica, a UK gas company, moved into the nuclear market in 2009. They made this video to educate their employees about their investment in the UK nuclear program. This video shows why Britain needs nuclear energy. It also shows why Iowa and Vermont need nuclear energy. Or basically, why the whole world needs nuclear energy.

Images from Wikipedia and NRC.

Variable Pricing and Vermont Yankee: Another Reason the Hydro-Québec Deal Shows Legislative Desperation

Variable Pricing and Vermont Yankee

Recently, I published a post called A Bad Deal with Hydro-Québec. This post was later featured on the Energy Collective, where it had many readers and some interesting comments.

DaveL made several comments, and I would like to answer one of them in this blog. He asked (paraphrase): "Why are you attacking the HQ deal because it is a variable price contract? After all, variable price contracts save the ratepayers money when the price of electricity goes down, which is more than a fixed rate contract will do."

Here's an expanded and edited version of my response.

The Legislators of Vermont Hated Variable Pricing

DaveL: I need to put my remarks about variable pricing for HQ power in context. The Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for Vermont power purchases after 2012 with Entergy was signed in 2002. It says that for ten years after 2012:

• Entergy will sell at the market AND
• If the market goes above 6.1 cents, Entergy will split the extra money with the utilities.

The MOU agreement with Entergy was a variable price contract with revenue sharing. If the market was below 6.1 cents, Entergy would just sell at the low market price. If electricity prices went up, there were estimates from the DPS (Department of Public Service) and others of Entergy returning tens to hundreds of millions of dollars to the utilities over the length of the contract. This money could have improved transmission lines, implemented the smart grid, or been returned to ratepayers in the form of lower prices.

The Senators and Representatives in Montpelier said this agreement, though signed, was totally unacceptable. That lousy Entergy wasn't giving Vermont a fixed price! Those Entergy scumbuckets were trying to get away with just stonewalling them! The newspapers were full of statements such as: "Negotiations stall as Entergy refuses to name price."

The Legislature was trying to pressure Entergy into changing the MOU. However, a contract is a contract, and it takes agreement from both sides to change it. Entergy preferred the MOU, and the MOU was a good deal for Vermont. If the price was electricity was low, that is the price Vermont utilities would pay Entergy. If the price went up, Vermont utilities got partially re-imbursed.

However, the legislators wanted a fixed price. Entergy has now given them a fixed price, and they don't like that, either.

Comic Relief

In one of the legislative committee meetings I attended in Montpelier, one of the legislators asked a utility consultant: "Why can't Entergy give us a fixed price AND keep the revenue sharing agreement?" The consultant had to explain that: "You can sell a kWh at market price and share the revenue, or you can sell it at a fixed price. You can't do both. A revenue-share on a fixed price is just a lower fixed price."

This question was a wake-up call for me about the level of knowledge of some of our legislators. In fairness to this legislator, VY currently has a fixed price agreement for most of its power, and a sort-of revenue sharing agreement for the power involved in a recent plant uprate. However, the legislator's follow-up questions did not show any knowledge of the uprate power contract. It was clear she thought 1) a low price fixed-cost power agreement is good, and 2) revenue sharing is good, so why can't we have both?

Capitulation to Hydro-Québec

Despite this hatred of variable-priced contracts, the legislators of Vermont were willing to buy market-price power from HQ. By doing this, they support HQ profits and HQ jobs while letting Vermont people hit the unemployment lines. These are Vermont people whose company offered a better deal for Vermont than HQ did.

The Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) is a much better deal for Vermont than the HQ contract. The MOU is public, it includes revenue sharing if the price rises, it's transparent, it's cheaper power, if only because of transmission costs at the same ISO price. End of story.

Instead, the Legislature chose to roll over and play dead for Hydro-Québec. Let's face it. The Legislature was desperate, as I noted in my blog post about the HQ contract.

As my Canadian friend said: Don't you guys realize that we only want your money?

Addendum: Some interesting links

I recommend Guy Page's op-ed in the Burlington Free Press about the future of Vermont Yankee and the consequences if it closes.

I was a participant in the latest Atomic Show podcast, led by Rod Adams of Atomic Insights blog.

Happy Birthday, Yes Vermont Yankee!

This blog is one year old as of January 1. I feel happy that the blog has affected the dialog in Vermont. There is now a place for pro-Vermont Yankee information, opinions, and support.

I'm not doing a blog-retrospective here because I wrote one at Looking Backward, Looking Forward. This was a guest post on the American Nuclear Society blog, Nuclear Cafe. The post was also featured on the Energy Collective.

Thank you to all my readers, and all the other supportive nuclear bloggers, and all Vermont Yankee supporters. This will be a crucial year for Vermont Yankee, and we will be very active in this year. Once again, we will make a difference.

A special huge thanks to the Ethan Allen Institute for helping me start the Energy Education Project this fall. The Energy Education Project sponsors local talks and talks by outside experts. Howard Shaffer and I are also appearing on TV and radio. We will continue to help the people of Vermont understand their real energy options.

The Energy Education Project is especially proud of bringing Gwyneth Cravens to Vermont later this month. She will speak at a Legislative Round Table in Montpelier and a presentation in Burlington. Here's the announcement about the Round Table. As usual, you can doubleclick the image to see a bigger version.

I encourage people to click the PayPal button on this blog to join the Energy Education Project. A year's membership is $30, but we accept any level of donation. Right now, we have raised the money for the Cravens visit, and are raising money for pro-Vermont Yankee flyers and FAQ publications. Your $30 will go a long way!

A Happy and Healthy New Year to all who read this blog!

33rd Carnival of Nuclear Energy Blogs:Year-End Edition

Retrospectives and Prospects for the Future

Most of the blog posts for this Carnival put the Big Issues of the previous year in useful perspective.

The SMRs, the Hatchets, the Laurels, the HardLy-s

Dan Yurman of Idaho Samizdat looked at the blog posts that drew the most readers to his blog this year in Top Blog Posts for 2010. He notes that his top three stories were about commercializing and licensing small modular reactors. These results reflect rising interest in SMRs.

Yurman was also pleased to see that to see his response to Bob Herbert’s hatchet job on nuclear energy made it as a top 10 reader choice. Herbert's piece in the New York Times was emotional, irrational, and factually wrong.

In the category of you can’t make this stuff up, Yurman distributed his annual Laurel & HardLy awards. (Something appealing, something appalling.) The Laurel and HardLy post was among the posts with the highest readership.

Gail Marcus and Brian Wang Sum It Up

Gail Marcus sums up the achievements of the year in her blog post Year End Reflections at Nuke Power Talk. She points out that more and more of the "nuclear" blog posts seem to be about alternative energy, as wind becomes the darling of people opposed to nuclear power. On another topic, Marcus was pleased to see the NRC "Principles of Good Regulation" being adopted world-wide. She was a member of the group that developed those principals.

Also, Marcus is pleased with the reception of her book Nuclear First, Milestones on the Road to Nuclear Power Development. The book is an important achievement, since so many "nuclear history" books focus on weapons.

Meanwhile, Brian Wang at Next Big Future has two posts about the nuclear renaissance in Asia, where it is moving along at a great clip. In India, Russia is planning to build 18 reactors, and will work on Fast Reactors with Indian scientists. Further east, China's AP 1000 is still on track to operate in 2013, and Japan has a fourth MOX fueled reactor. Areva, building China's reactor, discusses what they need to do in order to compete with Asian reactor builders.

Externalities Explained at ANS Nuclear Cafe

At ANS Nuclear Cafe, Art Wharton wrote an authoritative, three-part post on the external costs of energy technologies.

In the first post, Wharton notes that policymakers should take all factors into account when making important decisions. In other words, they should think about external costs. External costs are the source of one of the most popular questions from people outside of the nuclear energy industry: “So, what about the waste?”

Unlike many other forms of energy production, the nuclear industry does have an answer to deal with the waste it generates. One thing is for sure: The nuclear industry’s answer is assuredly NOT “the waste goes out of the smoke stack.”

In the second post, Wharton describes the external costs of combustion technologies. Clusters of death, respiratory problems, cancer, and other sicknesses are related to combustion's ability to release massive amounts of waste into the atmosphere. These costs don’t enter into

the equation on the cost of energy in conventional models.

In his third post, Wharton describes the external costs of solar photovoltaic (PV). This is often considered the most benign of technologies. Wharton describes the impact of the materials used to produce solar panels, and the impact of the methane-burning power plants and other systems required to back up this intermittent source of power.

At the end of the day, there is no denying it: We need nuclear energy.

Northeast Retrospective

I posted my own retrospective on the ANS Nuclear Cafe blog, as Looking Backward, Looking Forward. In this post, I review the tumultuous year in Vermont: tritium, accusations of lying, election of Peter Shumlin as governor. All this excitement happened since I started blogging on January 1, 2010. (Sigh.)Looking forward, I describe the start of the Energy Education Project, and some of our plans for the future. Among other things, we are sponsoring a visit by Gwyneth Cravens to the Vermont state legislature. We aren't just watching the tumult, we're trying to bring some reason to the state's decisions.

I also recommend my recent post on why the Hydro-Québec deal was a bad deal for Vermont.

Meanwhile, in Canada, Steve Aplin of Canadian Energy Issues tackles the big question of proliferation in his post Filthy lucre and nuclear non-proliferation: what keeps them apart. As Aplin points out: Shutting down the nuclear industry will spur proliferation. It is the nuclear industry that ultimately pays for international safeguards, which are the best bulwark against the spread of nuclear weapons. The information in this post is a short, clear answer to accusations that power reactors enable bomb-making.

Come to the Carnival!

It's entertaining, and there is a lot of wisdom in the summing-up posts! Lots of fun with no admission fee and no calories!

Everyone involved in the Carnival wishes all our readers very happy, healthy, successful and bright New Year!

All images from Wikimedia.

Donation For The Energy Education Project

There's a new ornament on Yes Vermont Yankee. We now have a PayPal button in the upper right hand corner. Click on this button to donate to the Energy Education Project. The Energy Education Project is part of the Ethan Allen Institute, a tax-deductible educational organization. Year end is a traditional time to donate to charities. Your donation to the Energy Education Project is tax-deductible.

The Energy Education Project

The Energy Education Project of the Ethan Allen Institute is changing the dialog about energy in Vermont. We are making support for nuclear energy acceptable! Please join us and support us!

In the near future, I will be making many appearances around the state, as will Howard Shaffer. The Energy Education Project has also expanded our reach by bringing noteworthy speakers to Vermont. One of the Project members has donated travel expenses for Gwyneth Cravens to come to the Vermont Statehouse. On January 20, Cravens will speak to a Legislative Round Table at noon, and she will speak at the Sheraton in Burlington in the evening (see graphic below). At the Round Table, her books will be available to legislators free of charge. Ethan Allen Institute has arranged significant media coverage for her visit.

In February, we will bring Dr. Kathryn McCarthy of Idaho National Laboratory to Montpelier and Burlington. She will speak about Gen IV reactors.

These visitors are in addition to our own constant efforts to speak to groups, be on radio talk shows, and take part in debates. We need to change the dialog from sheer reaction-to-accusations to actual education about energy. Through the Energy Education Project, we are changing the dialog.

Please Join....even on a Shoe-String.

We are doing this all on a shoe-string, and we need your help.

Soon, I will approach some major donors for the Energy Education Project. I am sure these donors will ask me: How big is your Energy Education Project? What is the project membership? Which means.... the project needs members! It's $30 a year for membership, completely tax-deductible. Please support our efforts with your membership.

Of course, if you want to give more, we will be very happy! But right now, we are asking for memberships, which are as important as large donations. Smaller donations are also welcome.

You can join by clicking the PayPal button on this blog. (Upper right hand corner. Very easy to click.)

Alternatively, write a check to

Ethan Allen Institute

P.O. Box 543

Montpelier, VT 05601

Please make your check out to "Ethan Allen Institute EEP," or add "EEP" to the memo field.

You can also join through the Membership Page on the Energy Education Projecct website.

I wish you all a very happy Holiday Season and Bright New Year.

Ethan Allen logo courtesy of the Ethan Allen Institute.