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Indybay Feature

Utilities’ nuclear power plants threaten millions

by Ed Oberweiser
It’s painfully obvious that nuclear power is harmful and dangerous. France has had 12 nuclear accidents between 1969 and 2012. Japan has had 12 since 1978. There were 46 nuclear accidents in the United States between 1955 and 2011.

Photo: The Diablo Nuclear Power Plant, just 600 yards east of the Shoreline Fault, and less than two and a half miles from the Hosgri Fault.
aerial-diablo-canyon.jpg
Utilities’ nuclear power plants threaten millions

http://noyonews.net

By Ed Oberweiser

Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison (SCE) have placed millions of California citizens in danger of a nuclear catastrophe on a par with Fukushima.

They’ve built nuclear power plants near earthquake faults capable of generating earthquakes that could damage the plants and irradiate millions of people.

PG&E constructed the Diablo Canyon Power Plant on the Central California coast near San Luis Obispo and Morro Bay. The plant is 2.5 miles from the Hosgri Fault. The Hosgri Fault is a component of the San Andreas Fault system. It’s considered capable of generating a 7.5 magnitude earthquake.

AB1632 Assessment of California’s Operating Nuclear Plants is a 2008 California Energy Commission (CEC) study. According to the study (http://www.energy.ca.gov/2008publications/CEC-100-2008-005/CEC-100-2008-005-F.PDF), “The deep geometry of faults that bound the San Luis-Pismo block, where Diablo Canyon sits, is not understood sufficiently to rule out a San Simeon-type earthquake directly beneath the plant.”

That same year, the Shoreline Fault was discovered. It’s a 25 kilometer-long fault that lies less than a mile from Diablo Canyon. Some government scientists believe there’s a possibility that faults acting with others in the region could produce a stronger earthquake than Diablo Canyon was constructed to withstand.

During a Spring, 2012 US Geological Survey (USGS) presentation in Menlo Park, one scientist laid out a scenario showing the Hosgri Fault reaching 250 miles from Point Conception to Bolinas. He said if it was that long, it could generate nearly an 8.0 magnitude earthquake. The USGS scientists won’t directly say if the Hosgri fault is that long because it’s officially listed as being only 105 miles long. The USGS is still collecting data through the California Sea Floor Mapping Program.

The San Onofre nuclear power plant is located near Riverside, Orange and San Diego Counties. It’s closest to the city of San Clemente (population 64,491) in Orange County. Orange County’s population as of 2011 is more than three million. The plant is in the northwestern corner of San Diego County, 68 miles from downtown Los Angeles. San Diego County’s population is more than three million. Riverside County’s population is approximately 2.4 million. The population of Los Angeles County is nearly ten million. San Onofre’s radiation could reach any or all of the three counties in the event of a nuclear disaster.

The San Onofre nuclear power plant has had problems from its beginning. Its first reactor, Unit One, began operating in 1968 but developed problems and was shut down in 1992. Units 2 and 3 began operations in 1983 and 1984. Both the Unit 2 and Unit 3 reactors have been shut down since January 2012 due to premature wear found on tubes in their steam generators. The steam generators were installed two years ago in Unit 2 and one year ago in Unit 3. Plant officials pledged not to restart San Onofre until the cause of the tube leaks and degradation is understood. The units are expected to be offline during the summer.

There are major uncertainties regarding the seismology of the San Onofre site. They relate to the continuity, structure and earthquake potential of the South Coast Offshore Fault Zone. The uncertainties concern the faulting that connects the Newport-Inglewood Fault in the Los Angeles region with the Rose Canyon Fault in the San Diego region.

Instead of working toward converting to renewable energy production and energy conservation technology, PG&E is stubbornly holding on to nuclear power until the bitter end. It will spend millions on a seismic survey of the faults around Diablo Canyon using acoustic pulse-generating active air guns. These 40 to 360 cubic inch air guns would fire every fifteen seconds, twenty-four hours a day.

The Environmental Impact Report indicates the tests would kill and injure marine mammals, including seals, whales, dolphins and otters. In Peru a mass die off of marine mammals occurred during the same time frame that seismic testing was being done off Peru’s coast. Nearly 900 porpoises and dolphins died there.

The Diablo Canyon Power Plant should never have been built in the first place. Nuclear power plants should never have been built anywhere in the world. There has never been any secure way to store spent nuclear fuel rods for a period longer than all of recorded human history, which is what is necessary.

According to The Associated Press, the nuclear industry had created 71,862 tons of highly radioactive nuclear waste in the United States by 2011. The US still hasn’t created a safe place to permanently store the material for the necessary tens of thousands of years.

If all this wasn’t bad enough, numerous nuclear accidents have already happened. The Enrico Fermi reactor on the shore of Lake Erie had a partial fuel meltdown in 1966. At the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania, the number two reactor had a partial core meltdown in 1979. The plant released 40,000 gallons of radioactive wastewater directly into the Susquehanna River.

At the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant in Russia, a reactor exploded. A fire burned for nine days. It released 100 times more radiation into the atmosphere than the atom bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The radiation spread not only to western Russia but also into Europe. Russian scientists said 28,000 square kilometers were contaminated. Approximately 116,000 citizens were evacuated and 830,000 people were contaminated with Cesium 137. The incidence of thyroid cancer among children in Belarus, Ukraine and Russia has risen sharply since the Chernobyl disaster.

Finally, the world has been subjected to the nuclear disaster at Fukushima, Japan where three reactors have melted down. Japanese officials initially assessed the accident as Level 4 on the International Nuclear Event Scale (INES) despite the views of other international agencies that it should be higher. The level was successively raised to 5 and eventually to 7, the maximum scale value.

It’s painfully obvious that nuclear power is harmful and dangerous. France has had 12 nuclear accidents between 1969 and 2012. Japan has had 12 since 1978. There were 46 nuclear accidents in the United States between 1955 and 2011.

Greedy, uncaring corporations like Pacific Gas and Electric Company and Southern California Edison have put profit above the safety of the biosphere and humanity.
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Comments (Hide Comments)
by Bob in Philly
Far from being able to produce electricity "too cheap meter" the nuclear industry and its supporters continue to create problems which cannot be solved while dumping the cost of billions on local rate payers and U.S. taxpayers at large while those within the industry treat with disdain and arrogance anyone who questions what they are doing. Crystal River, San Onofre, Fort Calhoun, Vermont Yankee, Bessie Davis and any one of more than two dozen other plants with serious and ongoing risks remaining in operation. All of while the major U.S. media outlets will ot to run a single story on the ongoing deadly crisis in Fukushima Japan. The only discernable reaction within the U.S. to this crisis was for the industry to race ahead and get as many extended operating licenses as they could even as the realities of Fukushima slowly unfolded.

As foretold by their very own engineers back in the 1950s, these nuclear plant cores are too big to be physically contained, warnings which were ignored in a time period of great arrogance wherein technology became the be all means to the end. When finally realizing the very trap they had created for themselves in the size of these cores, the industry compounded the problem with a series of Rube Goldberg piping, plumbing, pumps and valves, the vast majority of which not even the plant operators fully understand.

The biggest shame of it all is its a house of cards industry all designed to heat water to make steam to spin a turbine in which the very same thing can be done using the sun despite all the claims to the contrary.
A solar storm, of the type that will peak next year, can bring down power grids worldwide for months.

Nuclear plants without grid power for two weeks are meltdown candidates.

See the Aesop Institute website for an overview of the problem.

As well as what might be done to minimize the impact, if we are wise enough to launch a massive program that may save many millions of lives.
by Frank Eggers
Compare the number of deaths resulting from nuclear power with the number of deaths caused by oil refinery accidents, coal mining, and the air pollution resulting from burning fossil fuels. Actually, there is no comparison; nuclear power has been demonstrated to be far safer than its fossil fuel alternatives and even safer than hydro power which has killed thousands of people via dam failures.

Renewable energy sources are intermittent; we need reliable power. Moreover, the amount of concrete and steel required to build solar systems and wind systems is at least 10 times greater than the amount of steel required to build nuclear plants. Those who condemn nuclear power are condemning us to use more fossil fuel power which is far more dangerous and likely to cause destruction of our civilization via global warming which would lead to widespread warfare.

At one time, cars were considered dangerous because many people broke their arms cranking them to start them. That problem was solved with electric starting. Similarly, the problems of nuclear power can be solved. There are many ways to build nuclear reactors and the nuclear technology we have chosen is, unfortunately, far from the best available. Better nuclear technologies are available.

The liquid fluoride thorium reactor (LFTR) is very promising. A prototype was successfully demonstrated decades ago but was abandoned partly because it uses thorium instead of uranium and was unable to contribute to making nuclear warheads. There are also other nuclear technologies that would be better than what we are currently using.

People who are unaware of LFTR technology and other nuclear technologies are not qualified to condemn nuclear power. So, instead of remaining ignorant and condemning nuclear power, they should educate themselves on other nuclear technologies that would solve the problems associated with our current bad nuclear technology.

I urge everyone not familiar with LFTR technology to read the book Super Fuel: Thorium, the Green Energy Source for the Future, by Richard Margin.

by Angel
Radiation from Japan's nuclear crisis was found in the air, milk, water, vegetables, nuts, etc. in the U.S. !!

That's just one of a thousand reasons why nuclear energy is a massive failure.

Nuclear energy only provides 8% of the energy in the U.S. Couldn't we easily conserve that amount of energy and thereby negate the need for nuclear energy.

For your readers, here is a list of some of the best websites keeping on top of Japan's nuclear crisis and how it's affecting the U.S.:

www dot enenews dot com
www dot enformable dot com
www dot enviroreporter dot com
www dot nuclearcrimes dot org
www dot nuclearhotseat dot com
RadChick on Facebook

Every one of those sites is worth a visit and is packed with relevant information.






Ailing Calif. reactor prepares to remove fuel
By MICHAEL R. BLOOD, Associated Press – 24 minutes ago
http://is.gd/Py0vRG
snip
SAN CLEMENTE, Calif. (AP) — The operator of the San Onofre nuclear power plant is preparing to empty the radioactive fuel from one of its twin reactors, a federal official said Monday, another sign the plant won't be operating at full capacity anytime soon, if ever.
Tons of fuel inside the disabled Unit 3 reactor will be moved into storage in mid-September, Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspector Gregory Warnick told The Associated Press on Monday.
by CaptD
Thorium is Borium...

http://gu.com/p/3v4p3
Yet another nuclear "pipe dream" to keep America from going GREEN ASAP, before China buys up all the resources needed to do it!

Solar (of all flavors):
... Is faster to install,
... Costs less to install
... Is ready for 24/7 power
... Requires no decommissioning costs
... And has no Nuclear RISK...
by Keyto Clearskies
Aesop Institute is a wonderfully elaborate fraud, operated by Mark Goldes.

Mark Goldes, starting in the mid-seventies, engaged for several years in the pretense that his company SunWind Ltd was developing a nearly production-ready, road-worthy, wind-powered "windmobile," based on the windmobile invented by James Amick; and that therefore SunWind would be a wonderful investment opportunity.

After SunWind "dried up" in 1983, Goldes embarked on the long-running pretense that his company Room Temperature Superconductors Inc was developing room-temperature superconductors; and that therefore Room Temperature Superconductors Inc would be a wonderful investment opportunity. He continues the pretense that the company developed something useful, even to this day.

And then Goldes embarked on the pretense that his company Magnetic Power Inc was developing "NO FUEL ENGINES" based on "Virtual Photon Flux;" and then, on the pretense that MPI was developing horn-powered "NO FUEL ENGINES" based on the resonance of magnetized tuning-rods; and then, on the pretense that his company Chava Energy was developing water-fueled engines based on "collapsing hydrogen orbitals" (which are ruled out by quantum physics); and then, on the pretense that he was developing ambient-heat-powered "NO FUEL ENGINES" (which are ruled out by the Second Law of Thermodynamics).

Goldes' forty-year career of "revolutionary invention" pretense has nothing to do with science, but only with pseudoscience and pseudophysics - his lifelong stock-in-trade.

I have spent months investigating the career of Mark Goldes, Aesop Institute's Perpetual Scam Machine.

1976: Goldes seeks investors with fraudulent claims to have developed a nearly production-ready, road-worthy, wind-propelled, wind-rechargeable "windmobile" that could reach 60 mph. Goldes has never developed any roadworthy windmobile.

1998: Goldes fools the gullible US Air Force with his "room temperature superconductor" scam, receiving over four hundred thousand dollars in "Innovative Research" grants. Goldes has never produced any superconductor.

2005: Goldes seeks investors with fraudulent claims that his company, MPI, is developing "Magnetic Power Modules" based on "Virtual Photon Flux."

2008: Goldes seeks investors with fraudulent claims that "MPI is also developing breakthrough magnetic energy technologies including POWERGENIE (Power Generation of Electricity by Nondestructive Interference of Energy)." The basic idea of POWERGENIE is to generate electricity from sound energy, by blowing a horn at a magnetized tuning rod. Goldes claims to have "run an electric car for more than 4,800 miles with no need to plug-in." According to Goldes, "[MPI] Revenues from licenses and Joint Ventures are conservatively projected to exceed $1 billion annually by 2012."

2009: Goldes seeks investors with fraudulent claims that his latest scamporation, Chava Energy, "has been developing enhanced theoretical and practical paths that lead towards commercialization of energy conversion systems that utilize hydrinos." He now claims to be "developing a Self Powered Internal Combustion Engine – SPICE(tm) powered by hydrinos." ("Hydrinos" are pure fiction and do not exist.)

"For over 20 years Mark Goldes has claimed his company MPI has been developing machines that generate energy for free. In over 20 years his company has not presented one shred of evidence that they can build such machines...

"For the past five years Mark Goldes has been promising generators 'next year.' He has never delivered. Like 'Alice in Wonderland' there will always be jam tomorrow, but never jam today."

- Penny Gruber, December 2008

- Gruber's comment was written almost five years ago - but it's just as true today - except that MPI, Goldes' corporation that he claimed would bring in one billion dollars in revenue from his horn-powered generator in 2012, is now defunct, having never produced any "Magnetic Power Modules" - just as his company called "Room Temperature Superconductors Inc" is also now defunct, having never produced any "room temperature superconductors." Evidently there's a limit to how many years in a row the same company can claim it will finally have something to demonstrate "next year." Now Goldes has a new scamporation, Chava Energy.

Goldes' current favorite scam is an engine that would run on ambient heat - which is clearly ruled out by the Second Law of Thermodynamics. But of course, the laws of physics always make an exception for the scams of Mark Goldes.

Mark Goldes is a textbook-ready example of a highly talented con artist who clearly takes pleasure in fooling people with his ludicrous claims, artfully peppered with pseudoscientific rubbish.

Make no mistake: Mark Goldes' scamtastic Aesop Institute is a ZERO-STAR nonprofit.

Let's look at just one example of Goldes' offerings in "revolutionary new technology:"

Most Ludicrous Scamvention: Mark Goldes' "POWERGENIE"

One of the most laughable of Mark Goldes' many invention scams is his "POWERGENIE" horn-powered generator. The brilliant idea of this revolutionary breakthrough is to blow a horn at a magnetized tuning rod, designed to resonate at the frequency of the horn, and then collect the electromotive energy produced by the vibrations of the rod.

I'm not making this up.

POWERGENIE tuning rod engine explained - from the patent:

[The device incorporates] "an energy transfer and multiplier element being constructed of a ferromagnetic substance... having a natural resonance, due to a physical structure whose dimensions are directly proportional to the wavelength of the resonance frequency..."

"In this resonant condition, the rod material functions as a tuned waveguide, or longitudinal resonator, for acoustic energy."

"Ferrite rod 800 is driven to acoustic resonance at the second harmonic of its fundamental resonant frequency by acoustic horn 811, resulting in acoustic wave 816 within the rod having two nodal points... Bias magnet 801 produces magnetic flux 802 extending axially through both nodal points developed within rod 800... The sum electromotive force of coils 820 and 821 develops electrical current and power in resistive load 830."

- But the patent doesn't tell us who is going to volunteer to blow the horn at the rod all day. Perhaps it will come with an elephant.

Goldes claimed in 2008 that this wonderful triumph of human genius would bring his company, Magnetic Power Inc, one billion dollars in annual revenue by 2012. Magnetic Power Inc is now defunct, having never produced any "Magnetic Power Modules" - just as his company called "Room Temperature Superconductors Inc" is also now defunct, having never produced any "room temperature superconductors."

http://greatnonprofits.org/reviews/aesop-institute/166232/
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