Dr Arjun Makhijani, President of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, gives a lecture on the impact of the accident at Fukushima on nuclear safety and security at a luncheon seminar at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS – http://cns.miis.edu). He raises questions about the long-held belief that nuclear power is safe and reliable. For more nonproliferation seminars, visit the CNS NukeTube site at http:/nuketube.tv
Duration : 1:12:33
http://thefilmarchive.org/
The Vallecitos Nuclear Center is a nuclear research facility, and the site of a former electricity-generating nuclear power plant in unincorporated Alameda County, California, about 30 miles east of San Francisco, in NRC Region Four.
It is owned by GE Hitachi Nuclear Energy and is located on State Highway 84 between Livermore, California and Interstate 680, south of Pleasanton, California.
The Vallecitos boiling water reactor (VBWR) was the first privately owned and operated nuclear power plant to deliver significant quantities of electricity to a public utility grid. During the period October 1957 to December 1963, it delivered approximately 40,000 megawatt-hours of electricity. This reactor – a light-water moderated and cooled, enriched uranium reactor using stainless steel-clad, plate-type fuel – was a pilot plant and test bed for fuel, core components, controls, and personnel training for the Dresden Nuclear Power Plant, a Commonwealth Edison station built in Illinois five years later.
The plant was originally a collaborative effort of General Electric and Pacific Gas and Electric Company, with Bechtel Corporation serving as engineering contractor. Samuel Untermyer II, the GE engineer responsible for the initial design of the VBWR, had performed much of the conceptual research at Argonne National Laboratory, while conducting heat transfer and nuclear physics experiments, including the BORAX experiments (boiling reactor experiment). The main power generating facilities closed in 1963.
The Vallecitos site includes the Radioactive Materials Laboratory where post-irradiation examinations are done. A small 100 kilowatt research reactor is still in operation at the site. Vallecitos also fabricates radioactive source materials used in medicine and industry, under a license issued by the State of California.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vallecitos_Nuclear_Center
Duration : 0:0:55
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Japanese media have reported a nuclear reactor located on
the outskirts of Beijing had stopped running last October.
This was due to an accident in the generator building, but
was never announced by the CCP, who concealed the truth.
Civilians were panicked by the news, with many of them
calling for truth and refusing to be deceived any more.
Experts have commented that nuclear safety cannot be
guaranteed under the CCP’s dictatorship.
On Jan 25, Japanese media revealed that an experimental
nuclear reactor in Beijing stopped operation due to accident.
Japan News Network (JPN) cited Japan Atomic Energy
Agency (JAEA).
An experimental nuclear reactor, in a Beijing suburb, had
once stopped running due to an accident last October.
The CCP regime, however, had tried to hide the truth. JAEA
confirmed this news to be true after investigation.
The report said that, the malfunctioned nuclear power plant
first began generating power last July.
The nuclear reactor is a fast-breeder type that uses
enriched uranium as fuel.
The plant is the same as Japan’s Fukui nuclear plant, but
there’s no covering shield to stop leakage in Beijing’s reactor.
There are even beds in the central control room for people
to rest, evidence of a very bad level of safety management.
Such news has panicked Chinese netizens.
Some said that, on one hand authorities built nuclear plants
on a massive scale plants.
On the other hand, they were not capable of managing the
safety of those facilities.
Considering that these nuclear accidents had been
concealed, they could not help worrying.
Many Chinese also sharply criticized the CCP’s propaganda
strategy of “reporting only the positive, never the negative”.
Criticism is directed towards official media, which discards
professional integrity and public welfare to conceal the truth.
Some remarked that these media are extremely detestable,
since they helped the bad people.
The netizens also called for an immediate reply from the
government to relieve their panic.
In the evening of January 25th, some Chinese media cited
Wan Gang, Head of China’s Institute of Atomic Energy.
The nuclear plant in Beijing was not running at that time.
According to Oriental Daily News on Jan 26, the
malfunctioned plant was developed under the China
Experimental Fast Reactor (CEFR) project, which is subject
to the State High-Tech Development Plan (863 Program).
Chinese media reported that, the design, development,
building and operation of CEFT was carried out by China.
There was some technical cooperation with Russia.
Last July, the project managed to generate power for the first
time, which was also reported by some Russian media.
bbc.co.uk/Chinese reports that China Institute of Atomic
Energy is located in Fangshan district, southwest of Beijing.
This is 40 kilometers from downtown Beijing. The “Fast
Reactor” was built there, producing up to 20 MW of power.
Li Xutong, ex-professor of China’s Department of Nuclear
Safety, State Environmental Protection Administration, said
that 80% of nuclear accidents are man-induced; so human
factors are the most crucial in nuclear safety management.
Li Xutong:”What worries Chinese people, as well as the
global society is whether the CCP has enough qualified experts [to manage nuclear safety].
The national regime has been corrupted by the CCP to such
an extent that, you can hardly find any serious or scientific attitude towards real problems.
Any scientific standard can hardly survive under
the CCP’s dictatorship.”
Li Xutong believes that the CCP never reports any nuclear
Accidents.
This is not because they don’t happen, but because they
forbid such news to be reported to the public.
Li mentioned the Soviet Union as an example. All nuclear
accidents were never reported under its governing.
Nevertheless, they were all revealed after its dissolution.
Li Xuntong:”In USSR, there was once a most severe nuclear
accident near the Ural Mountains.
However, nobody knew about it for many years. Many
countries had suspicion about what happened.
However, they could not confirm it until dissolution of the
USSR.
It is after the dictatorship regime broke down that some
insiders told the whole world about truth of the accident.”
On Jan27, it is reported that Japan’s Atomic Energy Agency
(JAEA) issued an official statement on its website.
It states Sankei Shimbun ’s news on China’s Fast Neutron
Reactor accident was based on “unconfirmed and
inadequate” information. It said it “is extremely regrettable
that such unconfirmed information went out to news media.”
NTD reporters Zhao Xinzhi, Wu Wei and Ge Lei
《神韵》2011世界巡演新亮点
http://www.ShenYunPerformingArts.org/
Duration : 0:3:57
Excerpt from recently updated Operation Upshot-Knothole
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M65_Atomic_Cannon
Picatinny Arsenal was tasked to create a nuclear capable artillery piece in 1949. Robert Schwartz, the engineer who created the preliminary designs, essentially scaled up the 240mm shell (then the maximum in the arsenal) and used the German K5 railroad gun as a point of departure for the carriage. (The name “Atomic Annie” likely derives from the nickname “Anzio Annie” given to a German K5 gun which was employed against the American landings in Italy.) The design was approved by the Pentagon, largely through the intervention of chief of the Ballistics Section of the Ordnance Department’s Research and Development Division, Samuel Feltman, and a three-year developmental effort was begun. The project proceeded quickly enough to produce a demonstration model to participate in Dwight Eisenhower’s inaugural parade in January of 1953.
The cannon was transported by two specially designed tractors, both capable of independent steering in the manner of some extra-long fire engines. Each of the tractors was rated at 375 hp, and the somewhat awkward combination could achieve speeds of 35 miles an hour and negotiate right turns on 28 ft wide, paved or packed roads. The artillery piece could be unlimbered in 15 minutes and then returned to traveling configuration in 15 minutes more.
On May 25, 1953 at 8:30am local time, the Atomic Cannon was tested at Nevada Test Site (specifically Frenchman Flat) as part of the Upshot-Knothole series of nuclear tests. The test–codenamed Grable–was attended by then Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Arthur W. Radford and Secretary of Defense Charles E. Wilson; it resulted in the successful detonation of a 15 kt shell (warhead W9) at a range of 7 miles. This was the first and only nuclear shell to be fired from a cannon.
Subsequent to the successful test, there were at least 20 of the cannons manufactured at Watervliet and Watertown Arsenals, at a cost of $800,000. They were deployed overseas to Europe and Korea, often continuously shifted around to avoid being detected and targeted by opposing forces. Due to the size of the apparatus, their limited range, the development of nuclear shells compatible with existing artillery pieces (the W48 for the 155mm and the W33 for the 203mm), and the development of rocket and missile based nuclear artillery, the M65 was effectively obsolete soon after it was deployed. However, it remained a prestige weapon and was not retired until 1963.
Duration : 0:1:6
Heather MacLean talks about her job as a Nuclear Engineer for Idaho National Laboratory.
For more information about INL careers, visit http://www.facebook.com/idahonationallaboratory.
Duration : 0:1:34
May 1982 http://www.amazon.com/gp/redirect.html?ie=UTF8&location=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fs%3Furl%3Dsearch-alias%253Dstripbooks%26field-keywords%3Dthree%2Bmile%2Bisland%26x%3D0%26y%3D0&tag=doc06-20&linkCode=ur2&camp=1789&creative=9325 Watch the full program: http://thefilmarchived.blogspot.com/2010/09/three-mile-island-accident-interview.html
The anti-nuclear movement in the United States consists of more than seventy anti-nuclear groups which have acted to oppose nuclear power and/or nuclear weapons in the USA. The movement has delayed construction or halted commitments to build some new nuclear plants.
Anti-nuclear campaigns that captured national public attention in the 1970s involved the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant, Seabrook Station Nuclear Power Plant, Diablo Canyon Power Plant, Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant, and Three Mile Island. More recent campaigning has related to several nuclear power plants, the proposed Yucca Mountain waste repository, the Hanford Site, the Nevada Test Site, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and transportation of nuclear waste from the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
Some scientists and engineers have expressed reservations about nuclear power, including: Barry Commoner, S. David Freeman, John Gofman, Amory Lovins, Arjun Makhijani, Gregory Minor and Joseph Romm.
Unit 1 had its license temporarily suspended following the incident at Unit 2. Although the citizens of the three counties surrounding the site voted by a margin of 3:1 to permanently retire Unit 1, it was permitted to resume operations in 1985. General Public Utilities Corporation, the plant’s owner, formed General Public Utilities Nuclear Corporation (GPUN) as a new subsidiary to own and operate the company’s fleet of nuclear facilities, including Three Mile Island. The plant had previously been operated by Metropolitan Edison Company (Met-Ed), one of GPU’s regional utility operating companies. In 1996, General Public Utilities shortened its name to GPU Inc. Three Mile Island Unit 1 was sold to AmerGen Energy Corporation, a joint venture between Philadelphia Electric Company (PECO), and British Energy, in 1998. In 2000, PECO merged with Unicom Corporation to form Exelon Corporation, which acquired British Energy’s share of AmerGen in 2003. Today, AmerGen LLC is a fully owned subsidiary of Exelon Generation and owns TMI Unit 1, Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station, and Clinton Power Station. These three units, in addition to Exelon’s other nuclear units, are operated by Exelon Nuclear Inc., an Exelon subsidiary.
General Public Utilities was legally obliged to continue to maintain and monitor the site, and therefore retained ownership of Unit 2 when Unit 1 was sold to AmerGen in 1998. GPU Inc. was acquired by First Energy Corporation in 2001, and subsequently dissolved. First Energy then contracted out the maintenance and administration of Unit 2 to AmerGen. Unit 2 has been administered by Exelon Nuclear since 2003, when Exelon Nuclear’s parent company, Exelon, bought out the remaining shares of AmerGen, inheriting First Energy’s maintenance contract. Unit 2 continues to be licensed and regulated by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in a condition known as Post Defueling Monitored Storage (PDMS).
Today, the TMI-2 reactor is permanently shut down and defueled, with the reactor coolant system drained, the radioactive water decontaminated and evaporated, radioactive waste shipped off-site to a disposal site, reactor fuel and core debris shipped off-site to a Department of Energy facility, and the remainder of the site being monitored. The owner says it will keep the facility in long-term, monitored storage until the operating license for the TMI-1 plant expires at which time both plants will be decommissioned. TMI-1’s current license expires in 2014. On January 8, 2008, AmerGen Energy Corporation, the operator of TMI-1, submitted a license renewal application to the NRC. If the license is renewed, TMI-1’s license will be extended to 2034.
The China Syndrome is a 1979 thriller film which tells the story of a reporter and cameraman who discover safety coverups at a nuclear power plant. It stars Jane Fonda, Jack Lemmon, Michael Douglas, Scott Brady, James Hampton, Peter Donat, Richard Herd, and Wilford Brimley.
The movie was written by Mike Gray, T.S. Cook and James Bridges. It was directed by Bridges.
It was nominated for Academy Awards for Best Actor in a Leading Role (Lemmon), Best Actress in a Leading Role (Fonda), Best Art Direction-Set Decoration (George Jenkins, Arthur Jeph Parker) and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen. The film was also nominated for the Palme d’Or (Golden Palm) at the 1979 Cannes Film Festival and Lemmon won Best Actor for his performance. The movie’s script won the 1980 Writers Guild of America award.
Duration : 0:9:23
U.S. Atomic Energy Commission
Idaho Operations Office
SL-1 The Accident: Phases I and II
A13886VNB1
Describes this nuclear accident from the point of view of the Atomic Energy Commission.
Considering the time, this film report is exceptionally candid about the vulnerabilities of nuclear reactors. This first civilian reactor accident was especially gruesome in that one of the reactor operators was shot into the ceiling by an expelled reactor vessel plug and control rod. Views of the internal wreckage are fascinating. The cause of this accident has never been determined, although operator error has been alleged.
Documentaries of this quality are rare in the U.S. nuclear community, at least for the general public.
Producer: U.S. Atomic Energy Commission; Creative Commons license: Public Domain
The SL-1, or Stationary Low-Power Reactor Number One, was a United States Army experimental nuclear power reactor which underwent a steam explosion and meltdown in January 1961, killing its three operators. The direct cause was the improper withdrawal of the only movable control rod. The event is the only fatal reactor accident in the United States.
The facility, located at the National Reactor Testing Station approximately forty miles (60 km) west of Idaho Falls, Idaho, was part of the Army Nuclear Power Program and was known as the Argonne Low Power Reactor (ALPR) during its design and build phase. It was intended to provide electrical power and heat for small, remote military facilities, such as radar sites near the Arctic Circle, and those in the DEW Line. The design power was 3 MW (thermal). Operating power was 200 kW electrical and 400 kW thermal for space heating. NASA system failure studies have cited that the core power level reached nearly 20 GW in just four milliseconds, precipitating the reactor accident and steam explosion.
On December 21, 1960, the reactor was shut down for maintenance, calibration of the instruments, installation of auxiliary instruments, and installation of 44 flux wires to monitor the neutron flux levels in the reactor core. The wires were made of aluminum, and contained slugs of aluminum-cobalt alloy.
On January 3, 1961 the reactor was restarted after a shutdown of eleven days. Maintenance procedures commenced, which required the main central control rod to be withdrawn a few inches; at 9:01 p.m. this rod was withdrawn almost to the top of the core, causing SL-1 to go prompt critical. In four milliseconds, the heat generated by the resulting enormous power surge caused water surrounding the core to begin to explosively vaporize. The water vapor caused a pressure wave to strike the top of the reactor vessel. This propelled the control rod and the entire reactor vessel upwards, which killed the operator who had been standing on top of the vessel, leaving him pinned to the ceiling by a control rod. The other two military personnel, a supervisor and a trainee, were also killed. The victims were Army Specialists John A. Byrnes and Richard L. McKinley and Navy Electrician’s Mate Richard C. Legg.
Reactor principles and events
Fission produces neutrons with a wide range of energies. In all light-water-moderated reactors (LWR), to sustain fission of the U-235 the reactor core needs to have water present to moderate (slow down) the neutrons produced by the nuclear reaction. This process is called “thermalizing” and increases the probability of the neutrons causing fission. When reactivity is inserted in the reactor core, more neutrons are available and power rises. Several factors limit the increase in power.
The first limiting factor is that, given a proper initial spectrum of neutron energies, water has a negative reactivity coefficient. Having a negative reactivity coefficient means that, as the water heats up, the molecules are farther apart (water expands and eventually changes phase) and neutrons are less likely to hit hydrogen atoms, so fewer neutrons are thermalized by collisions with the hydrogen in the water and the probability of fission decreases. This removes reactivity from the core. The lower the temperature, the closer the molecules, the greater the number of neutrons thermalized and the greater the core reactivity. It is also possible to design a reactor core that has an entirely different neutron energy spectrum such that it has conditions for which water has a positive reactivity coefficient. A graphite-moderated, water-cooled reactor like the RBMK reactors at Chernobyl may have a positive reactivity coefficient for coolant (water) temperature.
Duration : 0:40:23
The elimination of the B53 by Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) is consistent with the goal President Obama announced in his April 2009 Prague speech to reduce the number of nuclear weapons. The President said, “We will reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy, and urge others to do the same.” The dismantlement of the last remaining B53 ensures that the system will never again be part of the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile.
As a key part of its national security mission, NNSA is actively responsible for safely dismantling weapons that are no longer needed, and disposing of the excess material and components.
Duration : 0:5:52
Date: 12/08/1953 | Type: Tower 30m | Yield: 400kt
Joe-4 was the fifth Soviet nuclear test and demonstrated the use of fusion in a weaponizable design known as the Sloika or “Layer Cake” design. The device obtained nearly all of its yield from fission and was limited for practical purposes to yields of less than 1Mt. The RDS-6s warhead used a U-235 fissile core surrounded by alternating layers of lithium-6 deuteride spiked with tritium, and a uranium fusion tamper inside a high explosive implosion system. Though not a true thermonuclear weapon the USSR claimed it was, and in conjunction with the fact that it was air-deliverable caused considerable embarasment to the US. The US did not successfuly test a deliverable thermonuclear bomb untill 1954.
Duration : 0:1:57
The worldwide nuclear power industry says it operates today in a “culture of nuclear safety.” Protecting the population and the environment, it says, are its top priorities. Achieving and maintaining that safety involves constantly improving reactor designs, along with rigorous training for those who operate power plants. But, as this first segment in a multi-part series explains, there have been tragic accidents that have driven this focus on safety. VOA’s Jeffrey Young has details.
Duration : 0:3:38