Naysayers call for shunning nuke energy

SHASH2K2

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Nice article SHASH2K2, I think its teh spent fuel that is the biggest problem too. The Quake issue is only secondary. What do we do with the spent fuel? Do we just dig and leave it in the ground. Or create a dumping ground or pay some other poor country to store it? Or maybe just put it on a rocket and shoot it out into space towards the sun?

ITs an important question that has to be resolved in the long term
I think storing them undersea in well tight container is a good option . Or may be in some strongs concrete structure underground .
No Room in the Pool: Dry Storage Options for Spent Nuclear Fuel

Utilities are facing a thorny problem in managing the highly radioactive fuel that is discharged from reactors used to generate electricity. The utilities, design firms, industry groups, legislators, community leaders, and manufacturers of specialized fuel storage containers are working together to ensure that the country's nuclear power plants stay on line producing electricity and preventing any further deterioration of the country's electric power supply.
Nuclear power plants in the U.S. produced 20 percent of the nation's electrical power in 1999. Fission of uranium atoms produces heat which, in turn, is used to make steam that drives turbines connected to generators. Since the uranium, which is contained in fuel assemblies in the reactor pressure vessel, is consumed by the fission process, the fuel assemblies must be periodically replaced. Typically, about a third of the fuel assemblies are replaced every 18 to 24 months depending on the individual plant's operating cycle and fuel design. When fuel is removed from the reactor pressure vessel, it is termed "spent fuel," is highly radioactive, and requires cooling to remove heat from decaying radioactive isotopes.
The spent fuel is stored temporarily in spent fuel pools at nuclear power plants. When nuclear power plants were built in the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, it was expected that the spent fuel would be sent to reprocessing plants where remaining fissionable materials in the fuels would be recovered and re-used in new fuel. Most utilities designed their spent fuel pools to hold about 10 years' worth of spent nuclear fuel.
In the late 1970s, President Carter established a new national policy dictating that spent fuel not be recycled because of concerns over possible diversion of fissionable material for nuclear weapons production. In 1982, Congress passed the Nuclear Waste Policy Act which mandated that the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) assume responsibility for disposing of the spent nuclear fuel by 1998. DOE has been studying a site in Nevada at Yucca Mountain for nearly 20 years as a possible location for a deep geologic repository where the spent nuclear fuel could be stored for thousands of years without adversely affecting the environment. However, studies at the site have taken far longer than expected and political problems associated with siting a permanent repository have substantially delayed the program. DOE currently does not expect to be able to begin receiving spent nuclear fuel from utilities until at least 2010.
For almost 20 years now, utilities have been working to address the issue of storing spent nuclear fuel at their nuclear power plant sites for longer periods of time. Most plants have redesigned the racks in their spent fuel pools to increase the number of assemblies that can be stored there. Still, many plants are faced with the prospect that their spent fuel pools will not be able to accommodate all the spent fuel that will be discharged from the reactor until DOE can begin accepting spent fuel shipments. It is estimated that 78 of the country's 103 reactors will have no room left in their spent fuel pools by 2010.
Dry Storage

After the spent fuel is removed from the reactor, heat and radioactivity in the fuel drop significantly. Many utilities are taking advantage of the decrease in heat load to remove "cooled-down" assemblies from the spent fuel pool and transfer them into dry storage casks that can be maintained at the reactor site with minimal risk to the plant and the public. A group of these dry storage casks is called an Independent Spent Fuel Storage Installation (ISFSI). It is expected that most nuclear power plant sites will have to construct an ISFSI in order to safely store the volume of spent fuel that will be produced by their reactors before DOE can begin accepting shipments of their spent fuel for permanent disposal.
According to Alan Nelson, a Project Manager at the Nuclear Energy Institute, 16 reactor sites in the U.S. had constructed ISFSIs as of August 2000. From 2001 to 2006, there are firm plans to construct an additional 18 ISFSIs that will handle spent fuel from 26 nuclear reactors. A total of 198 casks had been loaded with spent nuclear fuel as of August 2000. This number is projected to increase to 380 casks by 2005 and to 950 casks by 2010.
As part of the Nuclear Waste Policy Act in 1982, Congress directed the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to develop a streamlined process for utilities to use in moving spent fuel into dry casks. NRC amended its regulations to allow nuclear power plant owners to store spent nuclear fuel in pre-approved containers (casks) without having to go through a potentially lengthy and contentious licensing process. Under this streamlined process, storage cask vendors submit their cask designs to the NRC for detailed technical reviews. Once a vendor's design is approved, utilities can order and install casks that meet their individual needs. To date, the NRC has approved 12 spent fuel cask designs. Cask designs include those that rest horizontally in racks and vertically. The various cask designs can accommodate different sizes and types of fuel, heat loads and weight restrictions on plant equipment used for handling casks.
Click here to enlarge image
The spent fuel storage casks are made from steel or steel-reinforced concrete as much as 18 inches thick. Lead is generally incorporated into the design to provide additional shielding from the radiation still produced by the spent nuclear fuel. Figure 1 shows one type of spent fuel storage cask. The spent fuel assemblies are placed into stainless steel canisters. The canisters are sealed and the air is purged from the canister with helium. The helium provides an optimum mechanism for transferring heat from the assemblies to the canister interior surface by natural convection. The inert helium atmosphere in the casks also prevents corrosion of fuel assemblies. The canister is placed into the storage cask where vents provide natural convection cooling for the canister. - Figure 1. Spent fuel storage cask
The casks, which are designed to sit on concrete pads outside the nuclear power plant's structures but inside a secured area at the site, are designed to withstand a broad range of extreme natural phenomena including earthquakes, floods, fires, explosions, tornadoes, and temperature extremes. The entire ISFSI includes the casks, pads where the casks sit, instrumentation for monitoring the casks, security systems and equipment, and any other supporting structures. Parameters typically monitored for an ISFSI include cask exit air temperatures and area radiation levels. High exit temperatures may indicate blockage of airflow that requires cleaning.
System Design

The typical life cycle for an ISFSI starts with a process to select a cask vendor. Bid specifications are developed that define site specific parameters relating to fuel design and heat load, site design considerations for natural phenomena, and site specific requirements regarding quality assurance.

Figure 2. Three-dimensional architectural rendering of a typical ISFSI design.Click here to enlarge image
Once a cask vendor is selected, detailed design of the ISFSI can proceed. This includes the design of the storage pad, haul path evaluations and upgrades (cranes and roads for bringing casks to the ISFSI from the plant), equipment for lifting and handling, security systems, electrical power supplies, and any operational support facilities, such as monitoring buildings and stations. Figure 2 shows a three-dimensional architectural rendering of a typical ISFSI design.
When the NRC approves a spent fuel cask design, they issue a Certificate of Compliance (CoC) for the Vendor's system. This CoC is issued for reactor owner use under the General License provisions of the Code of Federal Regulations. The ISFSI designer and the reactor owners must verify that site specific conditions fall within the design limits established in the CoC before use. This may require analysis based on specific characteristics of the spent fuel, analysis of the cask response to natural phenomena such as an earthquake, or comparison of bounding site parameters with cask design parameters. If the site specific conditions are within the "envelope" of the Certificate of Compliance, then the reactor owner and designer only need to perform a safety evaluation that verifies that the ISFSI does not create the potential for a new or different kind of accident at the site.

Figure 3. Planned ISFSI at Diablo Canyon Nuclear PlantClick here to enlarge image
If, however, the design conditions for the site fall outside the design envelope established for the cask, the utility must obtain a site specific license before using the cask. At the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant, Enercon Services is providing support to Pacific Gas and Electric Company in designing an ISFSI. The installation will eventually accommodate 140 casks. Because of the high seismicity of the Diablo Canyon Site, Enercon, the cask vendor, and Pacific Gas and Electric are working together to demonstrate that the combination of the pad supporting the casks, seismic restraint systems, and the casks will withstand the site's Design Basis Earthquake. Documentation substantiating this conclusion will have to be submitted to the NRC, and the NRC will have to issue a separate plant specific license for the ISFSI at Diablo Canyon. Figure 3 shows the planned site for the ISFSI at the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Plant.
At the Oyster Creek Generating Station in New Jersey, where the site seismic demand is not as severe, Enercon is providing services to AmerGen Energy to support the selection of a storage system under a General License. The ISFISI at Oyster Creek is expected to consist of 20 casks.
In addition to design issues, considerable technical support is also required for operational activities to load the spent fuel from the spent fuel pool into the canisters that will in turn be placed in the casks. This may include special analyses of equipment to be used for lifting the spent fuel and the loaded canisters, nuclear criticality and shielding analysis, and thermal evaluations. Support may also be required in completing environmental assessments of proposed changes in the plant's technical specifications and in addressing issues identified by local stakeholders.

 
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ajtr

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Japan has called its the worst crisis ever and as the nation inches towards nuclear disaster countries across the world shaken by the Japan episode are reviewing their own nuclear technolgy. America is doing it too but at the same time continues to push its nuclear technolgy into India exposing its double standards.
 
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nitesh

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good read:

http://www.indianexpress.com/news/y...g-on-the-streets-or-driving-in-delhi/765570/0
'You should worry less about N-energy than about walking on the streets or driving in Delhi'


With Japan facing a nuclear crisis at its Fukushima Daiichi plant, Srikumar Banerjee, Chairman of India's Atomic Energy Commission, tells The Indian Express Editor-in-Chief Shekhar Gupta on NDTV's Walk the Talk that India's reactors are safe and that "even a very high tsunami can't strike Jaitapur"


SG: At a time when the world watches terrible, terrible news from Japan and worries about it, we have as our guest Dr Srikumar Banerjee, chairman, Atomic Energy Commission, who must be the one man watching the development in Japan most closely of all. And in India, most intelligently of all. What's happening now requires some explanation from a man of science, and who better than you?

I wouldn't take all the credit for myself. What I would say is that we are backed by scientists and engineers. There are a large number of people who are constantly following up on what's happening in Japan. And we have close contacts with WANO, that's the World Association of Nuclear Operators. WANO is one thing which is constantly giving us information. We have contacts with the Japan Atomic Industrial Forum and TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company). We have been getting genuine information about what's happening there. This information is not only being collected but collated and we're trying to build a scenario because it's very important for us to know how things are happening and evolving. We've built a scenario and it's a very important lesson for us to work out each of these scenarios in our safety analysis.

SG: First of all, how alarmed are you by what's happening in Fukushima?

We are definitely alarmed. You see the issue is that a reactor which was successfully shut down as per the drill, as per the design, in three seconds after the earthquake, heated up. But immediately following that is a question of the diesel generator set, which was to pump the water for cooling down in the decay heat removal process—it worked for one hour. Then the tsunami struck and when that happened, this cooling water was not available and that was the root cause.

SG: Do I take it to mean that by the time the cooling system fails, the nuclear reaction or fission has stopped inside the core?

Fission has stopped just when the shutdown has happened. So there is no more fission energy coming out of the system.

SG: Whereas in Chernobyl...

There was still fission on. Here there is no more nuclear energy, only the radioactive decay of the radioactive substances inside it before.

SG: What is the difference between the two levels of energy: nuclear fission energy and radioactive decay energy on a scale of thousand?

For fission energy, if you're running a reactor at 100 MW, after the reactor is shut down, immediately within an hour, it'll come down to typically 5 MW, that is 5 per cent, and after 24 hours, close to 1 MW. So we are talking about 1/100th of that energy which you have to handle and manage but even this one per cent energy, if it comes out, and if you don't have any coolant present, the temperature will go up. And that was the real problem in all the four instances of explosions. But let me explain that none of these explosions are nuclear events but chemical explosions.

SG: You see these scary pictures of the top of the buildings blowing up.

It is only the top of the building which is blowing up and not the containment which is blowing up. Containment has not blown up in any of the cases. What has happened is hydrogen generation because of metal water reaction. Even if a part of the fuel is open and not immersed in water, then the temperature there rises up. And with that rising temperature, it will interact with the coolant present that is steam and zirconium and steam results in hydrogen. This hydrogen seeps through and that gets collected at the top of the building where it explodes.

SG: All these are non-nuclear explosions. So why does radioactivity leak?

When you're actually bleeding this steam out, because the pressure gradually starts to develop. To reduce that pressure, you need to take this steam out. There are methods to take the steam out into a very large water chamber called the wet pool, inside the reactor building. So it goes there and there you're actually cooling down the steam. But the problem is that if it continuously heats up, that water also goes down and it becomes more of steam, so steam pressure builds up. And this is guesswork from me—they have to release certain amount of steam to reduce the pressure. So that makes some radioactivity present inside the system.

SG: But this is then relatively minor levels?

Very minor levels. It's nothing. And the moment it gets dispersed into the environment, it becomes absolutely insignificant.

SG: Would there be other events in our life where we might take that much radiation?

Oh yes, as we are standing in the sunlight, we are getting a lot of radiation. And I'm not talking about the ultraviolet radiation. But there are large variations—if you fly from one place to another, you get a lot of radiation. If you fly to Hyderabad, to the Kerala coast, it's unbelievably high. If you go to Lonavala and come back, you get a lot of radiation than if you go to the Tarapur site and come back. Tarapur site actually does not have any significant radiation.


SG: Dr Banerjee, you are a man of science, nuclear science, you can talk of radiation with a certain cool that the rest of us cannot.

No, the concern is very important. I'm not saying that we should not have any concern. The important point is that monitoring radiation, seeing that we're working in the safe limits, is very important. The safety culture is very important.

SG: Are you satisfied with the safety culture in our own nuclear establishments?

We are, but at the same time, we have to constantly update. There should be no complacency.

SG: Before I come back to India, let's go back to Fukushima. As the reactors stand now, you said some were already shut for maintenance earlier and the rest shut within a few seconds as this event happened, as prescribed in the book. What is the possibility of the worst case scenario that a container vessel bursts or breaks?

I think that isn't the biggest danger they're facing now. Even spent fuel is stored in many places. And one fire that happened was in reactor four, in the spent fuel storage—spent fuel storage also requires constant cooling. Because these are radioactive substances constantly heating up and again the same process that is happening inside the reactor is taking place here where the spent fuel reacts with steam and produces hydrogen. So this decay heat management is a burning issue.

SG: If one of these container vessels were to still break, what will come out?

The container vessel is not a single vessel. One is the pressure vessel that contains all the radioactive stuff inside. Around that is the concrete containment which is steel lined. Now if all these barriers break, only then will you get a significant amount of radioactivity. So, I would still consider that it is not going to be a catastrophic failure, it may leak out...it may fracture. But if the concrete is fractured, the steel will not fracture the same way.

SG: But hypothetically, if it opens up?

Then you have a very high level of radiation. And particulate matter will come out and that is also dangerous because it will go and deposit elsewhere so the issue becomes very complex.

SG: But the intensity of that on a scale of 100, how would it compare with that of Chernobyl?

I can't answer this directly because you are asking a quantified number. It is not just the radioactivity getting released, there is also a fire. If there's a fire, along with the plume, you carry the radioactive particles into the environment. So it is a combination of these two which happened in the case of Chernobyl. So I can't compare it with Chernobyl at all.

SG: But the amount of radioactivity contained in these chambers now is high. Would you compare it to that of Chernobyl?

Yes, because it is a power reactor, it'll be high.

SG: But you don't see that much of a chance of a catastrophic blowout?

No, the chance is not there. The chance of that much distribution into the environment is also not there.

SG: And Chernobyl was a different kind of a reactor?

It was a different kind of a reactor. It was a graphite moderated reactor. The graphite and steam reaction were actually sustaining the fire. And that was one of the reasons for its distribution. Another advantage is that being on the sea coast, and favourably the direction of the wind was towards the sea, so the dispersion will not cause damage to the nearby environment.

SG: But there is talk that this cloud could have blown all the way to the west coast of America and Canada?

But the distance it travels and the amount it disperses into the atmosphere on the way, by the time it reaches the west coast of America, the amount will be very little.

SG: So what has this changed for us in India?

It gives us a big lesson because in this scenario, we have all learnt this while doing the safety analysis. In a safety analysis, one has to work out that these are the possibilities. And all these things that have happened are conceptualised and a sort of safety feature is put in place so that it doesn't happen.

SG: Because this is an old generation of reactors? Boiling water reactor.

Boiling water reactors are there even today. But this is very old.

SG: Is our Tarapur reactor comparable to this?

Same. Tarapur is actually a few years older to this. In Tarapur, we have introduced some systems and updates. One of them is this condenser loop which actually takes out the heat of the reactor in a passive manner. This is located at a height and the thermosiphon keeps cooling it down. So it is the multiplicity of the barriers because of which we can say with confidence that we are much safer. In addition, we are not in a seismic zone.

SG: Right. Because this was very close to a fault.

Yes, it was about 140 km from a fault. And when we talk of Tarapur, it is 900 km away from the Makran fault.

SG: Which is the other extreme of Pakistan.

Yes, and 1945 was the last time a tsunami was recorded on the western coast. The eastern coast experienced one quite recently. But India is so located that the major fault on the seabed which can cause this kind of a combination of an earthquake and a tsunami—on one side we have the Makran fault which is 900 km away and the other side is Sumatra which is also about 1,000 km away—so the strength of the tsunami or earthquake will not be of the same magnitude.


SG: So, talk about the bulk of our reactors, the pressurised heavy water reactors, which are totally indigenous. Because some sceptics, particularly the foreign sceptics, would say that nobody knows what's going on there, there has been no peer review or that these are all Chernobyls.

You know, one of the biggest advantage of our pressurised water reactors is that these are low energy density reactors. And we are keeping this reactor into separate tubes in a large tank called the calandria vessel. And in each of these pressure tubes we have the fuel assembly and coolant. In addition, our steam generators are located at a point that if you want to take out the heat by natural circulation, you will be able to even when nothing is working. So we are much more comfortable with PHWs (Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors). Eighteen of our reactors are PHWs.

SG: But you've been talking about a new safety audit. What are you going to be looking at?

We are going to see that all these facilities are also subject to different levels of seismic loading. We've designed it for certain seismic loading, we know what's the nearest fault and site selection has been done on that basis. So we know that and that has been factored into the design. But we need to know how it functions in an off-normal situation. Not that this hasn't already been done.


SG: So now, the inevitable question, Jaitapur. The CPM politburo has now said, scrap it. Someone is saying scrap it because it's on the coast. And somebody is saying it has French Areva reactors which haven't been tested and we'll be like guinea pigs.

The first question is about the location—why on the coast? One advantage is that you can bring very heavy equipment which cannot be transported though roads. Second is that you need a huge quantity of water for running this reactor. And third important thing, you need an exclusion zone, and since it's on the coast and on one side is the sea, you only need a semi-circle and half that space is saved. In Jaitapur particularly, it's well suited because it's on a height, despite being on the coast—it's about 20 metres above sea level. So even a very high tsunami can't strike Jaitapur.

And as for your second question about it being untested, any reactor design is an evolutionary process. In India, we first designed the 220 MW reactor and then we went to 540 MW reactor and now we are embarking upon 700 MW reactor. We started it this year. So these reactors are not untested. It is only an incremental increase over the previous tested reactor from 540 to 700.

SG: So tell me sir, the last 96 hours, have they been a shock and disappointment to you? Have they been a learning experience? Have they also brought some kind of vindication that we managed things quite safely?

I would say this is a shock. Whenever I see human calamity, it's shocking. On top of it, you have another burning issue. Japan is producing around 30 per cent of its power by nuclear energy. In fact, even right now, what provides energy to Japan is nuclear energy. And what is a little disturbing is that we were talking about the resurgence of nuclear energy because it was getting established that the integrated number of events that have happened over the years is very insignificant. The confidence building among the people in US and Europe who were swinging towards nuclear energy—this will be a setback to that. But again, for India, since we have to provide energy and we have no alternatives, we have to exploit all forms of energy. Only then will we be able to sustain our growth. So we have no other alternative but to advance this nuclear energy to its fullest extent in a safe manner.


SG: Dr Banerjee, before I let you go, as one of the highly reputed, finest nuclear scientists in the whole world, will you look at an ordinary citizen like me in the eye and say don't worry about nuclear energy any more than you need to worry about anything else?

I can only say that you should worry less for nuclear energy than walking on the streets or driving in Delhi. Let's take this example: in Japan, four trains have been washed away. What happened to the passengers? No one is talking about that. Or this plume that they keep showing on TV...most of it is petrochemicals. And you say that there is a nuclear cloud over Japan in this blast, which is essentially a hydrogen blast, that has some fragments of concrete going up for a few seconds and that is being repeatedly shown. And it has been compared with the devastation in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. This, I think, is a little unscientific.

SG: Trust a nuclear scientist to keep a smile on his face in the face of...

There may be a smile on my face but we are worried. We know there is no escaping assessing, auditing our nuclear systems as much as possible. We won't leave any stone unturned in analysing the situation fully.

SG: Dr Banerjee, that's a very reassuring note to conclude this on.

Transcribed by Ayushi Saxena
 

nitesh

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I guess this is the best place to post this news:

http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/stories/20110408280702300.htm
In expansion mode

A confident NPCIL wants to build 36 imported reactors as India plans to generate 63,000 MWe by 2032.

India has 20 nuclear power reactors, including two Boiling Water Reactors (BWRs) imported from the United States and 18 indigenously built Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors (PHWRs). Of these, the first unit (100 MWe) at Rajasthan, commissioned in 1973, has been shut down permanently and a decision is to be taken whether to rehabilitate it or decommission it. The 19 operating reactors have a total generating capacity of 4,680 MWe. The BWRs use enriched uranium as fuel and light water as both coolant and moderator, while the PHWRs use natural uranium as fuel and heavy water as both coolant and moderator.

The NPCIL has an ambitious programme to build at six locations 36 imported reactors that will have a total generating capacity of about 40,000 MWe. India plans to generate 63,000 MWe of nuclear power by 2032. The NPCIL has already built two Russian reactors (1,000 MWe each) at Kudankulam in Tirunelveli district, Tamil Nadu. The first unit is expected to go critical in April this year and the second six months later. Jaitapur in Maharashtra and Sonepur in Orissa will have French reactors, Kovvada in Andhra Pradesh and Chhayamithi Verdi in Gujarat will have American reactors and Haripur in West Bengal will get Russian reactors.

India is also building two indigenous PHWRs of 700 MWe each at Kakrapara in Gujarat and two of the same capacity have been launched at Rawatbhatta in Rajasthan. Four more PHWRs of the same capacity are planned, two each at Bargi in Madhya Pradesh and Kumharia in Haryana.

India is poised to construct a series of Fast Breeder Reactors (FBRs) that will use plutonium-uranium oxide as fuel and liquid sodium as coolant. The FBRs that will come up subsequently will use metallic fuel. The Bharatiya Nabhikiya Vidyut Nigam Limited (BHAVINI) will build all the FBRs in India. The 500 MWe Prototype FBR (PFBR) under construction at Kalpakkam near Chennai is expected to go critical in 2012. Two more FBRs will come up at Kalpakkam. A Light Water Reactor of 700 MWe is also under development and it will use enriched uranium as fuel.
S.K. Jain is confident that "we will be in a position to convince the people about the safety of Indian nuclear power plants". "There is no cause for worry, be it about the indigenous nuclear power programme or the reactors to be imported," he said. He said a Japan-type situation would not arise in India. He pointed out that the east coast was 1,300 km away from the Sunda Arc (tectonic plate boundary) and the west coast was 900 km away from the Makaran fault. When a powerful earthquake struck Bhuj in Gujarat on January 26, 2001, the reactors at Kakrapara in Surat district continued to operate safely. During the 2004 tsunami, the two reactors at Kalpakkam shut down safely and were brought back on line in four days. The mean sea level (MSL) at Kalpakkam is 6.096 metres and the high tide level is 6.705 m. The tsunami water level in 2004 was 10.496 m. "The finished floor level of the nuclear island buildings of the PFBR site is 15.700 m, that is, they were 5.024 m clear of the tsunami water level in 2004. This means we have a high safety margin," said Prabhat Kumar, Project Director, PFBR.

At Kudankulam, too, tsunami protection has been factored in. "We have a shore protection bund at an elevation of 7.5 metres above the MSL," said M. Kasinath Balaji, Site Director, Kudankulam Nuclear Power Project. "The zero level (that is, the grade level) of all our buildings starts from 7.5 m above the MSL. We have a separate building called the safety building, which is flood-proof and has four diesel generator sets to provide alternative power supply [in case of a station blackout]," he said.
He said the strength of the Indian reactors lay in their passive heat removal system. The PFBR and the Generation 3I + VVER-1000 imported reactors at Kudankulam and the other reactors to be imported will have a passive heat removal system. In the case of Kudankulam, it is located at 43 m above the elevation level. It works on the principle of natural convection, without needing any electricity. There is an additional storage tank of water inside the containment building in case a LOCA [Loss of Coolant Accident] occurs. In the most unlikely event of a core-melt, the Kudankulam reactors have a feature called the core-melt catcher, which is a huge tank of water into which the fuel will fall in case of a severe accident.

Hydrogen accumulation will not take place in the reactor building at Kudankulam. Hydrogen recombiners are provided so that hydrogen and oxygen will combine to form water. This precludes the possibility of accumulation of an explosive quantity of hydrogen in the containment.
 

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http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/breaking/9077424/nuclear-reactor-core-may-be-damaged/
/quote

Two Japanese travellers have been hospitalised in China with "severe" radiation levels after they arrived on a commercial airliner from Tokyo, China's safety watchdog today.

The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said radiation levels that "seriously exceeded limits" were detected on the two when they arrived in the eastern city of Wuxi on Wednesday.

Meanwhile China said an abnormal level of radiation was detected on a Japanese merchant vessel when it arrived at a port in eastern China.

The General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine said on its website today the radiation was found on the Mol Presence when it arrived at Xiamen port on Monday.

The ship belongs to Japanese transport company Mitsui O.S.K. Lines and left Tokyo on March 17.
/Unquote
 

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http://business.in.com/article/on-assignment/a-perspective-on-the-nuclear-uproar-in-india/23582/0
A Perspective on the Nuclear Uproar in India

As India prepares to build the world's largest nuclear power plant, the plan has come under scrutiny in the wake of the disaster in Japan


Local fishermen like Kotawadekar, who owns two trawlers and whose family has been in the trade for generations, fear that the project could cause irreparable damage to the region's environment and marine ecology. The plant is expected to guzzle 52 billion litres of sea water every day — 15 times Mumbai's daily water supply — and disgorge the same volume five degrees warmer back into the sea. Environmentalists say that would push away marine life along the coast into deeper waters, depleting the catch and forcing local fishermen to go further out into the sea.
EPR is one of the world's "safest reactors", he claims, designed to even withstand the high-speed impact of a commercial or military aircraft. "The EPR design is a direct descendent of the tested and proven N4 and KONVOI reactors from Framatome and Siemens/KWU, the most modern and most powerful reactors in France and Germany," Jain says.

But despite such assurances, safety remains the paramount concern given that EPR is an untested reactor the world over. "Why should the people of Jaitapur be subjected to the high risk of proving out an unknown reactor in their backyard?" asks Dr A. Gopalakrishnan, former chairman of the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board.
In a statement to Forbes India, C.B. Jain clarified that NPCIL plans to initially store the spent fuel in an underwater storage facility adjoining the reactor building inside the plant premises. "The storage facility for spent fuel is adequate to store the spent fuel during 10 to 12 years of operation of the units," he says. "Whenever government of India decides to establish a reprocessing facility in any location in India, the above spent fuel will be transported to such a facility in a safe manner."
 

nitesh

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-13204923
India to tighten nuclear safeguards at Jaitapur plant

India has pledged to put in extra safeguards at a proposed nuclear power plant in western India after recent violent protests against the plan.

Activists say the $10bn (£6bn) plant in Maharashtra is located in a region prone to earthquakes and fear a repeat of Japan's Fukushima disaster.

Local villagers also fear the plant will ruin their traditional fisheries.

India has also decided to set up an independent nuclear watchdog to oversee its existing nuclear reactors.
 

nitesh

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http://www.deccanherald.com/content/157896/indias-first-fast-breeder-reactor.html?
India's first fast-breeder reactor to cost Rs.5,677 crore
Kalpakkam (Tamil Nadu), April 30 (IANS)

The upcoming 500 MW prototype fast breeder reactor (PFBR) being built by Bharatiya Nabhikiya Vidyut Nigam Ltd (Bhavini) in this Tamil Nadu town is expected to finally cost Rs.5,677 crore (Rs.56.7 billion), an official said on Saturday.

"The nuclear power plant will go on stream next year. The total cost of the project by then will be Rs.5,677 crore. The per MW cost will be around Rs.11 crore which compares well with that of PHWRs (pressurised heavy water reactors) costing around Rs.10.66 crore. The cost per unit of power generated by PFBR will be Rs.4.44," project director Prabhat Kumar told reporters in Kalpakkam, around 50 km from Chennai.
 

nitesh

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http://www.samachar.com/Prototype-F...ndependent-safety-mechanisms-le4xLhbfcjc.html
Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor 'has independent safety mechanisms'

The Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor (PFBR), under construction at Kalpakkam, near Chennai, is "a unique reactor" which does not require water for emergency cooling of its nuclear fuel core in the case of an accident, said Baldev Raj, who laid down office on Saturday as Director, Indira Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR) at Kalpakkam. The 500 MWe PFBR will be commissioned in 2012.

(The PFBR will use plutonium-uranium oxide as fuel, and liquid sodium as coolant. If sodium comes into contact with water, it will catch fire. At Fukushima in Japan in March, four reactors' nuclear fuel core could not be cooled because the station suffered a black-out after the tsunami, which also knocked out the pumps and the diesel generator sets. So water could not be pumped for cooling the fuel core.)

As the PFBR boasted a number of redundancy systems and independent mechanisms, the reactor would be shut down with minimum problems in the case of any event, Dr. Baldev Raj told a news conference at Kalpakkam. It had nine control and safety rods, and three diverse safety rods which would help in shutting it down quickly.

S.C. Chetal, who took over as IGCAR Director, explained that in the case of sodium fire in an open place, sodium bicarbonate — a dry chemical powder — would be used to douse the fire. If sodium caught fire in an enclosed place, nitrogen would be injected to extinguish it. Sodium fire was milder than oil catching fire, Mr. Chetal said.

The floor level of all equipment related to the PFBR's emergency core cooling had been raised after the tsunami of December 2004 struck the PFBR's foundation pit, Dr. Baldev Raj said. Seismic activity all over the country was monitored from Kalpakkam round the clock. "We don't wait for the national alert," he said. A tsunami protection wall had been built on the shore at the site and the township. Besides the PFBR, two Commercial Fast Breeder Reactors (CFBRs) of 500 MWe each would be built at Kalpakkam and their construction would begin in 2017. The layout of the two CFBRs was finalised and their site was getting readied.

Mr. Chetal said that while the 2004 tsunami wave had a height of 4.7 metres above the mean sea level (MSL) at Kalpakkam, the PFBR's floor level was 9.5 metres above the MSL. "There is no chance of sea water entering the PFBR buildings," he added. The PFBR personnel had been trained in handling the combustible liquid sodium. There was no leakage of sodium for the past 14 years in the Fast Breeder Test Reactor (FBTR) at Kalpakkam, which was a forerunner to the PFBR. Although 75 kg of sodium was spilled in the FBTR prior to that, there was no fire, Mr. Chetal said.

Prabhat Kumar, Project Director, PFBR, said the total investment in the PFBR would be around Rs.560 crore. The cost of construction for a MWe was around Rs.11 crore. The cost was "naturally higher" compared to other electricity generating plants because all the PFBR equipment were manufactured for the first time in India. Electricity from the PFBR would be sold to State Electricity Boards at Rs.4.44 a unit. Mr. Kumar called the PFBR "a robust reactor" and various lessons learnt from the 2004 tsunami had been factored into its construction. The PFBR had a passive heat decay removal system.

Review of safety

After the Fukushima accident, two committees reviewed the safety at the Madras Atomic Power Station (MAPS) at Kalpakkam. Mobile power generation sets had been procured. According to K. Ramamurthy, MAPS Station Director, MAPS' emergency core cooling equipment was relocated to a higher level after the 2004 tsunami.

If power generating plants were set up on inland sites, thermal pollution would be more because the decay heat would have to be conducted into nearby water bodies, said P. Chellapandi, Director, Nuclear and Safety Group, IGCAR.
 

nitesh

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so, in our case, NPCIL will be liable to un limited liability

http://www.businessspectator.com.au...pan-says-no-limits-to-Tepco-liability-f-GGEFH

TOKYO - Tokyo Electric Power should face unlimited liability for damages stemming from its crippled nuclear power plant, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said, indicating Japan's government will take a hard line against the utility in its rescue plan.
JP Morgan had estimated Tepco could face 2 trillion yen ($US25 billion) in compensation losses in the financial year that started last month, while Bank of America-Merrill Lynch had said the bill could reach $US130 billion if the crisis drags on.
 

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http://www.frontlineonnet.com/stories/20110520281009800.htm
Can n-power be safe?

As the government weighs the options of imposing the project or putting it on hold, the public must reflect on the record of nuclear power generation in the quarter-century since the Chernobyl disaster in Ukraine. Chernobyl, coming seven years after another core meltdown, at Three Mile Island in the United States, is the world's worst-ever industrial accident, whose effects have unfolded gradually through radiation-induced cancers and leukaemias. Estimates of additional cancers, based on the conservative methods adopted by the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation, vary from 34,000 to 140,000, leading to 16,000 to 73,000 fatalities.

This puts Chernobyl in a unique class. The global nuclear industry never fully recovered from its political, psychological and economic effects. In the U.S., which has the world's highest number of reactors (104, followed by France's 58 and Japan's 55), the industry was already down in the dumps, having received no new reactor orders since 1973. Wall Street never embraced nuclear power despite low liability under the Price-Anderson Act. Nuclear power failed the market test. In Western Europe, not a single reactor has been built since Chernobyl.

Meanwhile, Fukushima has dealt a huge blow to the global nuclear industry. As the Swiss investment bank UBS puts it: "At [Fukushima], four reactors have been out of control for weeks – casting doubt on whether even an advanced economy can master nuclear safety."¦ We believe the Fukushima accident was the most serious ever for the credibility of nuclear power."

Fukushima will almost certainly exacerbate the global nuclear industry's crisis and accelerate its decline. To imagine that nuclear power is the energy source of the future is to indulge in daydreaming. But India's nuclear czars are doing just that while denying the gravity of the Fukushima crisis. Their rosy assumptions about Jaitapur ignore a cardinal fact: namely, the EPR has become the world's most controversial reactor. Its capital costs have surged to $5,000 a kilowatt – compared with just over $1,000/kW for coal-based power and under $1,500 for wind in India.
Most industry claims about the low likelihood of nuclear accidents are based on probabilistic risk analysis (PRA), a flawed method, as the physicist M.V. Ramana argues in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (April 19). In 1975, a U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission study predicted that a meltdown would only occur once in 20,000 reactor-years (number of reactors multiplied by years of operation).

Globally, there have been close to 15,000 reactor-years of operation. But meltdowns have already occurred in five reactors. As Thomas Cochran of the Natural Resources Defence Council said, depending on how core damage is defined, other accidents should also be included. Says Ramana, "The actuarial frequency of severe accidents may be as high as 1 in 1,400 reactor-years." For the world's 437 reactors, an accident may occur every 3.2 years.
The passionately these guys are crying for alternative sources, why don't they provide the complete study about how they will be able to generate the electricity with those sources
 

S.A.T.A

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In the wake of the unfolding tragedy in japan,whose repercussions in terms of future social costs are still to ascertained,Indian must observe restraints in its rush to approve nuclear power reactors.Like we witnessed in japan,no govt can give assurance of safety beyond a certian degree of probability,are we prepared for such an eventuality,i wouldn't bet on that.The need to fuel rapid development exists,but it cannot come at unacceptable human and social cost.
 

LurkerBaba

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The human toll of coal vs. nuclear





Sources: "Electricity Generation and Health," by Anil Markandya and Paul Wilkinson in the Lancet; CO2 emissions data from the International Atomic Energy Agency; Britannica; Department of Energy. Bonnie Berkowitz and Patterson Clark - The Washington Post.
 

Tshering22

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This is madness! What are we going to use then to generate electricity? As if there aren't enough power cuts already in the country and people's relentless pursuit to make India the most populous country and adding to electricity and energy demand. The target for any GOI should be that at least 60% of India's electric generation should come from nuclear plants by another 2 decades.
 

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