Get It Right This Time
One theme at the Platts meeting, reiterating the previous four years of nuclear renaissance hype, was, "We’ve got to get it right this time." That’s a reference to the failures of the nuclear industry in the 1970s and 1980s that led to the industry’s legendary flameout.
But that "get it right" mantra may not match reality, according to NRC Commissioner Gregory Jaczko, who led off the Platts conference. Many insiders believe Jaczko, a PhD physicist with anti-nuclear ties, will be the new NRC chairman in the Obama administration. Jaczko was the scientific advisor to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and a staff advisor to Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), one of the nuclear industry’s most dogged critics.
Addressing the Platts meeting, Jaczko said we may be seeing a reprise of the bad old days. He noted that the 2005 law precipitated an avalanche of applications for the new NRC combined construction and operating licenses for new nuclear plants. The law required that the applications be filed by the end of 2008 in order to be eligible for the goodies (including loan guarantees) in the new law. That, he told the meeting, "led utilities that are probably not as close to a decision about whether to build to at least apply."
As a result, said Jaczko, "we now find ourselves again making some of the same mistakes of the past. One of the challenges of the 1960s, 70s, 80s was that applicants, vendors, and the regulator were attempting to do everything — designs, site/environmental issues, and applications — all at once."
Jaczko noted that the NRC has received 17 combined license applications before reactor designs are complete and certified (Figure 2). "We have approved three early site permits," he said, "but for sites where utilities have not yet decided to move forward aggressively. All of this is certainly allowed under our regulation, but I do not believe it is the most efficient or predictable path forward."
2. Location of projected new nuclear plants. Source: NRC
Furthering Jaczko’s observations, UniStar Nuclear Energy (born of Constellation Energy and EDF Group) CEO George Vanderheyden told the meeting that he expects that the NRC will grant a combined construction and operating license for his company’s plans for a new two-unit AREVA plant at the existing Calvert Cliffs, Md., site before the commission approves the AREVA reactor design. The reactor design certification, he said, "is the critical path" for the new plant. AREVA’s evolutionary design, a French pressurized water reactor, is pending at the NRC.
That troubles Jaczko. The NRC staff, said Jaczko, recently proposed to the commission a path to "further streamline the design certification rulemaking process. The intentions here are good — developing templates, optimizing processes, providing better information earlier — but the goal of this effort is grounded simply in achieving a shorter schedule. While efficiency is good, the magnitude of the time savings staff is looking at is dwarfed by the delays being caused incomplete applications and technical issues."
Jaczko, to the considerable dismay of his industry audience, praised the delay that today’s marketplace is placing on generating projects. "I firmly believe," he said, "the benefit of the more reserved atmosphere we find ourselves in today is that everyone involved in this journey has an opportunity to look at their core mission, refocus on what matters, and plan for a safe and efficient long-term future."
The delays ahead, said Jaczko, are largely caused by extrinsic forces, such as the current financial crisis and the difficulties in lining up debt financing. Nonetheless, he said, the "NRC should take advantage of the opportunity those delays give us to reinvest in safety."
—Kennedy Maize is a POWER contributing editor and executive editor of its online sister publication MANAGING POWER
(www.managingpowermag.com).
Email
Comments
Print
Reuse
