The Case for Retiring Columbia Generating Station
No Nukes Northwest
Columbia Generating Station The Only Nuclear Power Plant in the Northwest Boiling water reactor used to produce heat to run turbines to create electricity (same as Fukushima) Uranium fueled Located on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in eastern Washington just north of Richland, Kennewick and Pasco Cooled by the Columbia River
CGS
CGS
CGS
CGS has generated electricity with nuclear power for 30 years… but supplies only 3.9% of the Northwest region’s needs .
Nuclear Power Dirty Dangerous Expensive
It is Dirty Utah Uranium Mine
Carbon Emitted per Kilowatt * 12.01 25.09 9.2 11.58 8.2 Total: 66.08 g/kWh *Uranium mining
Not the Carbon Free Energy as Advertised Life Cycle GHG Emissions (bas ed on Sovacool, Energy Policy 36 (2008) 2940– 2953) Construction Wind (ons hore) Milling, Mining and Enrichment Hydroelectric Heavy Water Production Solar (parabolic trough) Energy NW Paducah Fuel Contract Solar (PV) Nuclear Nuclear Natural gas (CCCT) Coal (with s crubbing) 0 200 400 600 800 1000 g CO2eq/kWh
It is Dangerous Design Location Radioactive Legacy
Fukushima vs. CGS “Atomic energy is a stupid way to boil water.” ~ Buckminster Fuller
Boiling Water Reactor Design at Fukushima Daiichi Spent Fuel Pool
Spent Fuel Pool Design Fukushima Dai-ichi Reactor Unit 4
Increased Failure Rate Aging Reactors
CGS Problems to Date Safety issues Electrical fires Aging parts
Location June 14, 2011 Fort Calhoun, NB and Missouri River
Wildfires on the Hanford Reservation
Known Earthquakes Affecting Hanford Region Year: 1872 Magnitude 7.4 Hanford
Hanford
Newly-Discovered Earthquake Potential Hanford lies on 12 known earthquake fault lines Tied to Puget Sound subduction zone
Hanford Reservation
Grand Coulee Dams on the Columbia River Hanford Portland
Grand Coulee Earthquake • 1872 earthquake epicenter was less than 100 miles from Grand Coulee site
Teton Dam Collapse 1976
CGS Nov 17, 2013 3.2 Earthquake epicenter
CGS Website on Seismic Bracing
Human Acts of Destruction A terrorist attack on CGS may have been planned by Al Qaeda in 2002
Guarding Spent Fuel Rods at CGS
Squirrels to Solar Flares The electrical grid can be knocked out for hours with common incidents.
It is Dangerous Radioactive Waste: High and Low Level HOSS: hardened on-site storage for spent fuel rods
Hanford Nuclear Reservation “The most polluted place in the Western Hemisphere”
Radioactive Waste High Level
HARDENED ON-SITE STORAGE for High Level Waste H.O.S.S.
Radioactive Waste Low Level
It is Expensive
Market Price (Mid-C) Bathtub Curve
What are the real costs? Columbia Generating Station Operating Expenses
Future Capital Expenditures Needed to Maintain CGS: Fukushima-type upgrades including filters and vents ($24- 30 million) Seismic upgrades (unknown $$) Normal end-of-life part replacements including the steam generator and turbines ($122 m)
“ No days lost in 10 years” The truth is that the maintenance time for 2011 which was scheduled to be 80 days stretched to 175 days because of the replacement of the brass condenser
Potential Economic Consequences of Meltdown Intense contamination of the Columbia River Displacement of large groups of residents (Richland, Kennewick, Pasco and possibly beyond to Portland/Vancouver) Creation of hundreds of square miles of uninhabitable land Major economic impact on industries
50 mile radius = 300,000 people Yakima Pendleton
Industries within 50 Miles of Hanford Salmon Fruit, vegetables and hops Wine Research & Fabrication Companies ◦ Battelle NW Labs ($1 billion annual revenue) ◦ Areva nuclear fuel fabrication (French company) ◦ Silicon manufacturers
Double Jeopardy: Hanford Waste and CGS K Priest Rapids Columbia River B-C Dam 15 miles Tank Farms CGS
Hanford Nuclear Waste K Basin: spent fuel from nuclear production reactors (1968) considered one of most vulnerable sites at Hanford because of corroded pools WESF: largest concentration of strontium and cesium in the world; no containment or back-up systems; located near the tank farms Tank Farms: enough plutonium to make 70 nuclear bombs CGS: above-ground holding pool (similar to Fukushima) is already 2/3rds full of spent fuel
B Reactor
Path to a Nuclear-Free Energy Plan
What is Needed to Replace the 3.9% Electricity Produced by CGS? Conservation through efficient technology and PUD incentives ( Potential energy savings: 3 to 5%) Safer, cleaner energy production through alternatives like wind and solar
Energy Efficiencies Residential: LED, heat pump and power strip technologies as well as monitoring equipment Commercial and Industrial: new building systems as well as retrofits, greater use of combined heat and power (CHP) systems, new agricultural energy technologies
Renewable Energy Sources Reported by Washington Utilities 2012 Wind 75% Solar .02% Biomass 2% Landfill Gas .6% Hydro Upgrades 22%
Alternative Energy Has Relative Short Start-Up Time Exelon’s first commercial wind farm only started operating in January 2012. The company now has 44 wind projects operating in 10 different states. Nuclear plant takes 10-15 years to build.
Other Regions Are Well On Their Way to Alternatives to Nuclear According to Christopher Crane, the CEO of energy giant Exelon, “as wind power increases, nuclear power will decrease”
Driving Factors to Abandon Nuclear: Costs and Safety Concerns Are Global Concern U.K.’s plan to build 10 new nuclear power plants just lost the backing of British utility Centrica In Japan, only two of 54 have been allowed to continue operation Germany plans to shut down all of its nuclear plants by 2022
Citizens Don’t Want It 50,000 Germans block railway deliveries of uranium (Nov 2010) “Nuclear power is everywhere – no thank you!” Germany 2012
What about the Costs of Decommissioning? Much of it could be covered by foregone capital expenditures needed for new Fukushima- driven regulatory requirements
Nuclear power is dirty, dangerous and expensive. There are alternatives!
What You Can Do Support the closing of CGS for safety and economic reasons Support energy conservation Contact Kitzhaber, DeFazio, Merkley and Wyden
ShutDownCGS.wordpress.com
http://www.energy- northwest.com/news/2011/documents/NR %2011- 11%20Nuclear%20Energy%20Facility%20 Connects%20to%20Power%20Grid%20FI NAL.pdf
Tokyo
Information on Fukushima Radiation http://news.nationalgeographic.com/new s/energy/2013/08/130807-fukushima- radioactive-water-leak/ http://ww.activistpost.com/2013/10/some thing-is-killing-life-all-over.html
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