Antinuclear

Stanford-led research finds small modular reactors will exacerbate challenges of highly radioactive nuclear waste

Small modular reactors, long touted as the future of nuclear energy, will actually generate more radioactive waste than conventional nuclear power plants, according to research from Stanford and the University of British Columbia.

BY MARK SHWARTZ, 30 May, News Stanford

Nuclear reactors generate reliable supplies of electricity with limited greenhouse gas emissions. But a nuclear power plant that generates 1,000 megawatts of electric power also produces radioactive waste that must be isolated from the environment for hundreds of thousands of years. Furthermore, the cost of building a large nuclear power plant can be tens of billions of dollars.

To address these challenges, the nuclear industry is developing small modular reactors that generate less than 300 megawatts of electric power and can be assembled in factories. Industry analysts say these advanced modular designs will be cheaper and produce fewer radioactive byproducts than conventional large-scale reactors.

But a study published May 31 in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences has reached the opposite conclusion.

“Our results show that most small modular reactor designs will actually increase the volume of nuclear waste in need of management and disposal, by factors of 2 to 30 for the reactors in our case study,” said study lead author Lindsay Krall, a former MacArthur Postdoctoral Fellow at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation (CISAC). “These findings stand in sharp contrast to the cost and waste reduction benefits that advocates have claimed for advanced nuclear technologies.”

…………………………………. In the U.S. alone, commercial nuclear power plants have produced more than 88,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel, as well as substantial volumes of intermediate and low-level radioactive waste. The most highly radioactive waste, mainly spent fuel, will have to be isolated in deep-mined geologic repositories for hundreds of thousands of years. At present, the U.S. has no program to develop a geologic repository  after spending decades and billions of dollars on the Yucca Mountain site in Nevada. As a result, spent nuclear fuel is currently stored in pools or in dry casks at reactor sites, accumulating at a rate of about 2,000 metric tonnes per year.

Simple metrics

Some analysts maintain that small modular reactors will significantly reduce the mass of spent nuclear fuel generated compared to much larger, conventional nuclear reactors. But that conclusion is overly optimistic, according to Krall and her colleagues.

“Simple metrics, such as estimates of the mass of spent fuel, offer little insight into the resources that will be required to store, package, and dispose of the spent fuel and other radioactive waste,” said Krall, who is now a scientist at the Swedish Nuclear Fuel and Waste Management Company. “In fact, remarkably few studies have analyzed the management and disposal of nuclear waste streams from small modular reactors.”

Dozens of small modular reactor designs have been proposed. For this study, Krall analyzed the nuclear waste streams from three types of small modular reactors being developed by Toshiba, NuScale, and Terrestrial Energy. Each company uses a different design. Results from case studies were corroborated by theoretical calculations and a broader design survey. This three-pronged approach enabled the authors to draw powerful conclusions.

“The analysis was difficult, because none of these reactors are in operation yet,” said study co-author Rodney Ewing, the Frank Stanton Professor in Nuclear Security at Stanford and co-director of CISAC. “Also, the designs of some of the reactors are proprietary, adding additional hurdles to the research.”

Neutron leakage

Energy is produced in a nuclear reactor when a neutron splits a uranium atom in the reactor core, generating additional neutrons that go on to split other uranium atoms, creating a chain reaction. But some neutrons escape from the core – a problem called neutron leakage – and strike surrounding structural materials, such as steel and concrete. These materials become radioactive when “activated” by neutrons lost from the core.

The new study found that, because of their smaller size, small modular reactors will experience more neutron leakage than conventional reactors. This increased leakage affects the amount and composition of their waste streams.

“The more neutrons that are leaked, the greater the amount of radioactivity created by the activation process of neutrons,” Ewing said. “We found that small modular reactors will generate at least nine times more neutron-activated steel than conventional power plants. These radioactive materials have to be carefully managed prior to disposal, which will be expensive.”

The study also found that the spent nuclear fuel from small modular reactors will be discharged in greater volumes per unit energy extracted and can be far more complex than the spent fuel discharged from existing power plants.

“Some small modular reactor designs call for chemically exotic fuels and coolants that can produce difficult-to-manage wastes for disposal,” said co-author Allison Macfarlane, professor and director of the School of Public Policy and Global Affairs at the University of British Columbia. “Those exotic fuels and coolants may require costly chemical treatment prior to disposal.”

“The takeaway message for the industry and investors is that the back end of the fuel cycle may include hidden costs that must be addressed,” Macfarlane said. “It’s in the best interest of the reactor designer and the regulator to understand the waste implications of these reactors.”

Radiotoxicity

The study concludes that, overall, small modular designs are inferior to conventional reactors with respect to radioactive waste generation, management requirements, and disposal options.

One problem is long-term radiation from spent nuclear fuel. The research team estimated that after 10,000 years, the radiotoxicity of plutonium in spent fuels discharged from the three study modules would be at least 50 percent higher than the plutonium in conventional spent fuel per unit energy extracted. ……..more https://news.stanford.edu/2022/05/30/small-modular-reactors-produce-high-levels-nuclear-waste/?fbclid=IwAR3hUe5R3zYb25eJ-8dJzM_vXATq4Du7Hk_XEhdeED_BTvwCqm0XLo3mE8o

May 17, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Zelensky plotted attacks deep inside Russia – Washington Post

 https://www.rt.com/russia/576237-zelensky-hungary-russia/ 15 May 23

The Ukrainian leader reportedly wanted to “occupy” Russian cities to gain leverage over Moscow

Despite public assurance that he would limit military action to his own country’s 1991 borders, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky formed plans to conduct attacks deep inside Russia and suggested that Kiev “destroy” the industry of Hungary, the Washington Post reported on Saturday, citing leaked Pentagon documents.

Citing US intelligence reports recently published on a gaming server, the Post described how Zelensky suggested at a meeting in January that his troops “conduct strikes in Russia,” while moving across the border to “occupy unspecified Russian border cities” in order to “give Kiev leverage in talks with Moscow.”

Less than two months later, the Ukraine-based Russian Volunteer Corps launched a cross-border raid that left two civilians dead in Russia’s Bryansk Region. A member of the group told Western media that Kiev had approved the attack, and further assaults have taken place since.

With Ukraine’s Western backers reluctant until recently to provide him with long-range missiles for fear he would use them against targets within Russia, Zelensky suggested to his top military commander, General Valery Zaluzhny, that he use drones to “attack unspecified deployment locations in Rostov” in February, the Post reported.

Prior to and after the alleged meeting, Ukrainian forces used drones to attack infrastructure in Rostov Region, which borders the formerly Ukrainian territory of Lugansk.

In a meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svridenko in February, Zelensky reportedly suggested that Ukraine “blow up” the Druzhba oil pipeline, which transports Russian oil to Hungary. According to the US report cited by the Post, Zelensky suggested that “Ukraine should just blow up the pipeline and destroy…Hungarian [Prime Minister] Viktor Orban’s industry, which is based heavily on Russian oil.”

American spies listening to his meeting with Svridenko concluded that Zelensky was issuing “hyperbolic, meaningless threats.” Nevertheless, the Druzhba pipeline has come under attack on several occasions since the meeting, most recently when it was hit by drone-dropped explosives on Wednesday.

The Post’s article corroborates a CNN report last month claiming that US spies have been intercepting Zelensky’s communications.

Contacted by the newspaper, Zelensky dismissed the incidents described in the report as “fantasies,” and claimed that “no one in our country has given orders for offensives or strikes on Russian territory.”

Contacted by the newspaper, Zelensky dismissed the incidents described in the report as “fantasies,” and claimed that “no one in our country has given orders for offensives or strikes on Russian territory.”

May 17, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Washington Post censors its own report of interview that showed President Vladimir Zelensky in a poor light

 https://www.rt.com/russia/576284-zelensky-wapo-transcript-deleted/ 15 May 23 Washington Post deletes ‘treason’ quotes from Zelensky interview

The Ukrainian president reacted angrily when confronted about his own intelligence agents’ supposed “dealings” with Russia’s Wagner Group

The Washington Post has cut a large segment from an interview with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, in which he pushed the newspaper to reveal alleged traitors in his ranks and angrily accused its reporters of aiding Russia by publishing information from leaked documents.

The Post published a transcript of a lengthy interview with Zelensky on Saturday. After a discussion of a Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russian forces, the newspaper asked whether his military intelligence agency – the GUR – had “back-channel contact” with Yevgeny Prigozhin, head of the Russian private military company Wagner Group.

Citing recently leaked Pentagon documents, the Post explained to Zelensky that American spies noted a meeting between the president and GUR chief Kirill Budanov in February in which Budanov told him that he had learned of a Wagner plan to “destabilize Moldova,” but could counter this alleged plan by exposing his own “dealings” with Prigozhin, thus portraying the Wagner boss as “a traitor who has been working with Ukraine.”

Zelensky responded angrily, first asking who within his government had handed this document to the Post. Whoever it was, he said, was committing “treason,” which “is the most severe felony in our country.”

Despite being told that the document did not come from Kiev, but from Washington, Zelensky asked his interviewer to reveal “with which Ukrainian official did you talk?”

The Post has not yet published a story based on the document, and when informed that he was the first Ukrainian official the newspaper had spoken to, Zelensky urged his interviewer not to run the story, arguing that doing so would “demotivate Ukraine,” and accusing them of “playing games with me.”

“You are right now playing with, I think, things that aren’t good for our people,” he warned, asking the Post’s reporter “is your goal to help Russia?” When the reporter said that it was not, Zelensky countered “well, it looks different.”

By Sunday, however, the explosive exchange – during which Zelensky did not dispute that the meeting with Budanov had happened – was missing from the Post’s transcript. The entire 1,400-word back-and-forth about the document was removed, with no explanation given.

The Post’s edit is not the first incident in which Western governments or media outlets have scrubbed information potentially embarrassing or damaging to Kiev. Back in December, the European Commission deleted a video and its associated transcript in which Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said that the Ukrainian military had suffered 100,000 fatalities since Russia’s military operation began ten months earlier. 

Kiev keeps its losses a closely guarded secret, and when asked by the Washington Post to comment on this policy, Zelensky sniped “if you have the relevant documents, maybe you can tell us how many people have died…and what their names were.”

May 17, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized | Leave a comment