Chernobyl Unit 4 in 1986 explosion damage contaminated the region

From an Article by Grant Smith, Environmental Working Group, May 22, 2019

From 2009 to 2012, Gregory Jaczko was chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which approves nuclear power plant designs and sets safety standards for plants. But he now says that nuclear power is too dangerous and expensive – and not part of the answer to the climate crisis.

“Nuclear power was supposed to save the planet,” Jaczko wrote in a recent op-ed for The Washington Post. As an atomic physicist, he once endorsed that view. But his years on the NRC ­changed his mind:

This tech is no longer a viable strategy for dealing with climate change, nor is it a competitive source of power. It is hazardous, expensive and unreliable, and abandoning it wouldn’t bring on climate doom. The real choice now is between saving the planet and saving the dying nuclear industry. I vote for the planet.

Jaczko describes how his experience revealed the pervasive political influence of the nuclear power industry in Congress and among his fellow commissioners. Their opposition derailed much of the safety measures he proposed in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan. In 2011 an investigative series by The Associated Press detailed the collusion between regulators and the industry to weaken safety standards to keep existing plants economically viable.

Jaczko’s efforts to protect the American public likely cost him his career at the NRC. He now leads an offshore wind power startup and is speaking out at an important juncture for the nation’s energy future.

Electric utilities that operate nuclear plants are boasting of being “carbon free” by mid-century. They insist that their aging nuclear plants must be part of the equation to keep costs down. But even though Japan closed most of its reactors after Fukushima, carbon emissions went down, because the Japanese ramped up energy efficiency and solar investments.

“It turns out that relying on nuclear energy is actually a bad strategy for combating climate change,” Jaczko wrote. “One accident wiped out Japan’s carbon gains. Only a turn to renewables and conservation brought the country back on target.”

Jaczko’s heightened concern for a nuclear accident in the U.S. is also well founded. The former director of the nuclear safety project at Union of Concern Scientists, David Lochbaum, determined that the industry’s efforts to continue to run aging nuclear plants 20 to 30 years or even longer than their initial licenses allowed for is akin to playing Russian roulette.

Since Fukushima, Germany has ordered the shutdown of all nuclear plants by 2022. Japan has reopened only a few reactors. Even France, long a champion of nuclear power, is ramping down its nuclear fleet because of safety concerns. But in the U.S., the Trump administration and lawmakers in some states continue to support taxpayer-financed subsidies to bail out money-losing nuclear plants. On grounds of both economics and safety, that’s a fool’s bet.

Three-Mile Island in Susquehanna River south of Harrisburg, PA

From an Article AD CRABLE, Lancaster OnLine, March 11, 2019

Legislation calling for electric ratepayers to prop up nuclear power in Pennsylvania — and save Three Mile Island from closing — was introduced Monday in the state House.

State Sen. Ryan Aument of Landisville said he would introduce similar but not identical legislation in the Senate later this week.

“My focus remains on finalizing a proposal that I intend to introduce along with Senators Yudichak, Gordner, Boscola, Folmer, and Vogel that is consistent with our report and comments I have made over the last two years with regards to the Commonwealth’s ability to make strategic public policy decisions to ensure that Pennsylvania consumers are able to benefit from the environmental and economic attributes of nuclear energy.”

Lawmakers in both chambers will have to act quickly if they want to prevent TMI from closing — a process that is scheduled to begin in September.

TMI owner Exelon has said that it needs assurances of support by June, which is when it would have to order another round of uranium fuel to run the plant for another two years.

Meanwhile, FirstEnergy says it will close its Beaver Valley reactors in western Pennsylvania by 2021.

State Rep. Thomas Mehaffie of Dauphin County, who introduced the bill on Monday, said nuclear power deserves preferential treatment as a “clean” energy source. His plan would cost ratepayers $500 million in subsidies, adding about $1.77 a month to the average household bill, he said.

That’s a small amount to pay, Mehaffie added, compared to the environmental costs of losing a reliable carbon-free energy source that does not contribute to global warming, and to losing the economic benefits the state’s five nuclear plants offer.

Looking to ratepayers

The legislation would designate nuclear power as a non-polluting renewable energy, similar to wind and solar.

It would require a percentage of energy purchased by electric-distribution companies to come from nuclear power. The added cost of buying the more expensive power — power produced by natural gas and coal-fired plants, for example, is cheaper — would be passed on to ratepayers.

But the natural gas industry, consumer groups, including the AARP, and large industrial users of electricity quickly panned the legislation, calling it a bailout that would saddle all Pennsylvania residents with added costs while hurting free-market competition.

Also quickly coming out against the plan were environmental groups that had considered endorsing the legislation if it was tied to a comprehensive plan to cut back on all sources of carbon emissions from energy production and further stimulate renewable energy sources in the state.

‘Expensive Band-Aid’

“This is an expensive Band-Aid that saddles consumers with the majority of risk,” said Elaine Labalme, Pennsylvania advocacy director of the Environmental Defense Fund.

“Pennsylvania must take concrete action to reduce its carbon emissions. It’s the only state from Maine to Georgia without a limit on carbon pollution from the power sector and today’s proposed legislation will leave Pennsylvania even further behind.”

Other environmental groups opposing the bill were PennFuture, PennEnvironment, Keystone Progress, Clean Water Action, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Conservation Voters of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia Solar Energy Association, The Sierra Club, Natural Resources Defense Council and Clean Air Council.

Other groups questioned whether nuclear power in Pennsylvania — beyond Three Mile Island — need a financial rescue. They cited a PJM Interconnection study that found four of the five plants are currently profitable.

Nearly 40 percent of the electricity produced in Pennsylvania comes from nuclear power. More than 27 percent of that is exported to other states.