The surging floodwaters of Hurricane Helene slightly damaged one of the two Nuclear Regulatory Commission uranium fuel fabrication plants licensed to process highly enriched uranium, Nuclear Fuel Services, Inc., in Erwin, Tenn. The plant is in eastern Tennessee, just across the North Carolina line, 0.2 mile from the flooded Nolichucky River. The Johnson City Press… More Hurricane Helene’s atomic energy impacts
In a recent article in The Nation, arguing [unpersuasively—Ed.] that the Tennessee Valley Authority should repeat its 1970s fervid enthusiasm for nuclear power to combat global warming, writer Fred Stafford begins with a rhapsodic description of driving by TVA’s Watts Bar nuke. In that description, he writes, “As I drove across State Highway 68, a… More H2O: The most abundant and most consequential greenhouse gas
NuScale Power, long touted as the most mature of the various small reactor proposals on the market, has failed to make the cut in the U.K.’s SMR design competition, undertaken by the government’s Great British Nuclear (GBN). Four competitors – GE Hitachi, Westinghouse, Holtec International, and Rolls Royce – made the finals and will submit… More Big news for small reactors: UK competition, South Korean license action
The Tennessee Valley Authority has released a new, unconventional 25-year draft integrated resource plan (IRP), including a draft environmental impact statement, replacing the 2019 plan. The draft plan has generated both heat, yawns, and head-scratching. Typically, electric utility integrated resource plans have a five-year timeframe. That was the case for TVA’s prior plan. The new… More TVA 2050 integrated resource plan: Through a glass darkly?
Facing a series of costly physical problems and a becalmed market, GE Vernova, the largest offshore wind turbine developer in the U.S., has informed European authorities that it plans to lay off up to 900 workers around the world as it scales back its offshore business. The Maritime Executive reported that the General Electric wind… More GE Vernova’s U.S. offshore wind business faces rough seas
Just as Holtec International has hit a potentially significant pothole in its road to restart the moribund Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan, Constellation Energy says it has a deal to restart its shuttered Three Mile Island Unit 1 in Pennsylvania. Is this a trend, or just a limited instance of life after nuclear death? There’s… More Nuclear Recommissioning: Palisades problem, TMI 1 to restart
The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is pushing back against a recent gas pipeline ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals from the D.C. Circuit. The court in July vacated FERC’s approval of a Transco project to move gas from the Marcellus shale region of Pennsylvania to New Jersey, ruling that the agency’s 2023 approval was… More FERC’s Phillips pushes back on pipeline decisions
Welcome to Baku, population 2 million. Capital of Azerbaijan, population 10 million. Remember COP28? Forget about it. Most everybody else has. This is COP29, Nov. 11-24, 2024. It will be the 29th annual international greenwashing gabfest about the world’s promised actions to deal with a climate being changed by man-made global warming. Most of those… More Commentary: The curtain rises on COP29
Ohio-based investor-owned utility holding company FirstEnergy Sept. 12 agreed to pay the Securities and Exchange Commission a $100 million settlement in the long-running nuclear bribery scandal that has seen prominent Ohio politicians and political players jailed. At the same time, Ohio’s attorney general indicted two former top company executives on further bribery charges in the… More FirstEnergy pays another $100M fine in bribe case, two former execs indicted
The D.C. Circuit appeals court has upheld the authority of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission to license private, away-from-reactor storage of spent nuclear fuel, adding to confusion to the gnarly issue of what to do with high-level nuclear waste. With federal circuit courts in collision, it may take the U.S. Supreme Court to sort it… More Nuke waste confusion continues with D.C. Circuit ruling