Sorry, not their problem.

I want you to remember that government does not have to be responsible. The way to avoid all responsibility is for the NRC to stop all activity. You can’t prove that THEY are responsible for your job dying or at least leaving the US, not in our sound-bite media. Please remember that the next time you worry about having a good job in the US.

I’m a very high tech geek and I no longer expect innovation from US companies. I think we are a failed state. California’s bankrupcy is an example.

I wonder what country will build its future and were my children will choose to live. I wonder if Argentina or Korea needs nuclear engineers?
Rob

        Safe T Rad said:

… but it’s a mess by design …

I like that one! The entire US federal system defined in the Constitution is a “mess” in the sense that the designed checks & balances make it very hard for the gov’t to *do* anything. It’s set up such that most votes will end up in a tie or deadlock. Ironically, the main thing they *have* been able to agree on over the last 200+ years is that they can stick their noses into what should be none of their business. I don’t think the founding father’s ever envisioned the system evolving to the current situation, where the federal gov’t is actually concerned with business activities. I think they’d be shocked to see Representatives & Senators debating whether you or I could run a power plant.

The system is a mess.

However, we can’t blame the NRC alone and just say that they are incompetent. They operate under a political system that can make it difficult for them to change things even if they want to. Any kind of reduction in regulation (even if it’s reducing an unnecessary or redundant step) or streamlining of the process will be grabbed by interest groups and held up as proof of laxing safety standards. Do we really need two years to study the safety concerns of evacuating a whole area within dozens of miles of the plant? No, not really. What if they did away with this requirement? The politicians would not be very happy and would start their talk of the safety of the children and so on.

If you want an example, not long ago, the NRC classified depleted uranium at the lowest level of nuclear waste. Aside from questioning whether it needs to be classified as nuclear waste at all, this would make sense. If it has to be classified as nuclear material, it should be at the lowest level, since it’s pretty innocuous material that is barely radioactive at all. The politicians called for a hearing to determine why they would do that and started with a lot of unsubstantiated allegations that they were bought off or not doing their jobs.

How can you expect an agency to do its job under those conditions? The NRC is a mess, but it’s a mess by design and if those who work at the NRC made a real effort to fix it, they’d be hauled before Congress.

        Gordon said:

One of the big issues with a nuclear power plant or any big project is delays. This applies in both the US and Canada and just about everywhere else. Any time construction is delayed it dramatically increases costs. It’s not just the added time paying construction expenses, but the interest.

You are so right, about 40% of the total cost of the last few CANDU builds in Ontario was due to interest charges alone. What really screws things up is that in many jurisdictions the utility cannot start paying down the debt with existing revenue until the plant is producing power. This was supposed to prevent utilities from cranking up rates to pay for new generation before the fact, but it’s crippling to projects like these.

Once the plant is opened, then there is a cash inflow, but before it is a burden and the interest can cause the cost to spiral like crazy. This is why it is so important to keep the build relatively speedy. It is also why there is apprehension about going into any project where the possibility of delays is a concern. You really want to get the plant operational so you can start paying down the cost and generating a net income off of it.

This goes for other things and big projects, of course, but the fact that nuclear power plants so often are hit by regulatory delays can be a big deal to the final cost.

New coal: Depends. Coal gasification is actually pretty easy to build but if it’s traditional burning raw coal then it is a bit harder. In that case pretty good scrubbers are usually required, but it’s not a very difficult thing to get federal approval for.

Gas fired plants are very easy to build. You don’t need much approval from any agency. A combined cycle gas plant does not have much regulatory hurdles.

We all know that dirt-burners have gotten a free pass on radioisotope releases, and waste management compared to nuclear, what I don’t want to see is the same thing happen with ‘Clean Coal’ where the builder can make all sorts of promises and then get wavers when things don’t pan out.

I don’t worry so much about wind and solar because in the end they will fail to deliver the power they promised and that reality will spell their end. Even now we can see that the shine is off the sector in Europe and while many are putting up a brave face, it’s clear that the writing is on the wall there. If we have to go through the same stupid process here in North America, then so be it.

‘Clean Coal’ on the other hand CAN produce power, no question, the issue is is it going to be all that clean and because they will be generating useful amounts of electricity, there is going to be a lot of pressure to keep them going, meeting their design promises or not.

The thing is coal isn’t out of play yet and we have to watch our backs, because they will make a move before this is over.

        DV82XL said:

I have to walk carefully here as I am not a American, and God knows I would cheerfully dissolve the The Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission in an eye-blink for the same list of sins if I had the chance.

I would like to know what the procedure is for getting a new gas or more importantly a new design of coal plant approved. That industry is claiming they can build clean plants with carbon sequestration, will they have to go through the same hoops as a nuclear plant? Will their license require them to meet or exceed every single parameter on the cert, or face closure? Will they be subject to the same inspection regimen that a nuclear plant is through its operating lifespan? Will they have to establish where the captured carbon is going before breaking ground on the project?

In other words will the playing field be level, or are the dirt-burners going to get a free pass paid for by empty promises.

As a comparison: there are currently several proposals in various forms in front of the NRC and the one that seems to be furthest along is the South Texas Project to add two new power reactors to a facility.

http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/new-reactors/col/south-texas-project.html

Beginning of preparations for submission: circa 2002-2005 (they actually had been working on plans for more reactors since the 1990’s)
Letter of intent submitted to NRC: June 2006
Tentative Schedule for Application Review Setup: February 2009
Initial Safety Review: Scheduled to begin in September of this year
Final Safety and Environmental Approval: Assuming the review stays on schedule, it should be 2011, at which point the enviornmental assessment is reviewed by the EPA.

If all goes according to plan and there are no holdups, the final drafts should be sometime around mid to late 2011. (if there are no holdups)

At that point a hearing before the NRC is scheduled which will likely take place within a year. The hearing, in theory, should last a few months.

Construction of the first unit was expected to start in 2010, but that obviously is not going to happen. Right now they’re realistically hoping to get authorization around 2014. In theory it could be as soon as 2012, but that’s being extremely optimistic. Unit three could product watts out by 2018 realistically or 2015, optimistically.

So about twelve years since the first formal step.

By the way: South Texas is fortunate in being on an existing plant which cuts the approval down by skipping some of the initial site permit steps which are a good three or four years more.

As far as coal goes: It’s a bit hit or miss. There is not the same level of federal oversight like with a nuclear plant. There are permits, of course, but it varies a lot depending on the state and such things. It is relatively easy to add capacity to existing plants if you’re not adding more boilers. Modifications to existing units to handle more coal or higher temperatures are easy to do, mostly under the table.

The most recent new coal burner I’ve been able to find information on in a good amount is Spurlock Station in Kentucky.

Spurlock-Gilbert is the newest phase of the station. A proposal for the first new unit came in 2002 and the unit first started operation in 2005. It is only 278 megawatts, relatively small, but it’s only part of the expansion. The second unit (which is Spurlock 3) is going to be fired up soon, if it hasn’t already. It is supposed to be at full power by summer 2009.
The initial review on air quality to the EPA was submitted in 2006. Approval for construction was granted in 2007. Although it was easier due to the fact that the earlier portion of the plant had been approved and operating.

Coal fired plants are hit or miss because although they are relatively easy to get approval for, there is enormous community and political pressure to stop them. Thus older plants are generally being pushed to their limits.

There are several coal power plants under construction in Texas, Lousiana and Indiana

Entergy managed to sneak one in by converting an old gas power plant to coal

Gas plants, on the other hand: those are easy.

There are a whole bunch of those under construction. I’ll go see if I can find some more info on that.

I would like to know what the procedure is for getting a new gas or more importantly a new design of coal plant approved. That industry is claiming they can build clean plants with carbon sequestration, will they have to go through the same hoops as a nuclear plant? Will their license require them to meet or exceed every single parameter on the cert, or face closure? Will they be subject to the same inspection regimen that a nuclear plant is through its operating lifespan? Will they have to establish where the captured carbon is going before breaking ground on the project?

In other words will the playing field be level, or are the dirt-burners going to get a free pass paid for by empty promises.