Anxiety mushrooms over Japanese nuclear exports

Japan is tempted to cash in on its relatively safe history of nuclear power generation by exporting its expertise to India and elsewhere. Source: AP

IT’S hard not to draw cynical conclusions about Japan’s decision to pursue sales of nuclear technology overseas.

One of the country’s most treasured principles appears to have a price as it hawks nuclear systems to India, the Middle East and perhaps other countries.

For years the world’s leading advocate of nuclear disarmament, Japan has recently opened talks with India about supplying reactor technology.

It has also set up a powerful nuclear export organisation comprised of leading nuclear energy companies and government agencies.

Against a backdrop of a sagging economy and growing public debt, Japan is desperate to find a new technological edge that can provide a meaningful boost to gross domestic product.

With Japan’s long and relatively incident-free history of nuclear power generation, exporting its skills in this area obviously appeals to the Kan government.

In announcing its nuclear technology exports group, the government said it would target developing nations and aim to supply construction and operation services. “This is the first, important step towards promoting Japan’s nuclear power technologies in emerging countries by public and private sector co-operation,” Trade Minister Naoshima said.

He suggested that “policy challenges” stemming from the deal could be dealt with via concluding nuclear co-operation agreements and education and legislation.

The week before the group’s formation was announced, Japan had its first meeting with energy-hungry India (which plans to build 20 reactors by 2020) on a proposed civilian nuclear co-operation pact.

This rush to secure a nuclear future for the developing world comes as Japan continues to bang the non-proliferation drum. Continued…

Source: Rick Wallace, The Australian

SEW-Eurodrive speaks out against counterfeit parts

SEW-Eurodrive says Australian drive solutions providers are intensifying the fight against counterfeit gear-unit and motor pirates.

According to SEW-Eurodrive, it has seen recent increases in the off-shore manufacture and importation of counterfeit gear-units and motors. Overseas manufacturers are pairing with unscrupulous local importers to introduce these inferior units to the Australian market.

It attributes this increase to advance in reverse-engineering techniques which have made the unlawful replication of branded products more achievable.

SEW-Eurodrive says the industry is still identifying quite a number of suspect units in Australian factories. It warns installing such gear-units and motors can damage equipment, and inferior products will inevitably need to be replaced at cost.

Gear units and motors are said to be particularly susceptible to replication, as both utilise relatively easily copied housing. However, the internal components, including bearings, gears, rotors and stators, are the key to performance levels.

As such, SEW-Eurodrive claims a similar-looking counterfeit unit will not perform to the same level, and have the potentially to dramatically impact the bottom-line of end-users, by causing downtime. Additionally, the counterfeits may not be compliant with Australia’s Minimum Energy Performance Standards.

SEW-Eurodrive says end-users can avoid all the pitfalls associated with counterfeit drive technologies by buying direct from the manufacturer, authorised re-seller, or OEM. However, if the drive technology is being provided as part of a larger machine package, purchasers are urged to request serial numbers of the gear-units and motors prior to the sale.

In the case of SEW-Eurodrive technologies, end-users should phone-in serial numbers to confirm that they are genuine SEW-Eurodrive products.

Source: Motors & Drives

Switkowski: We need nuclear power for climate

NUCLEAR campaigner Ziggy Switkowski has called for an assessment of nuclear power plants to be included in the energy white paper and studied by the Productivity Commission, saying Australia would have to adopt the atomic option to meet its emissions targets.

In a debate with Greens leader Bob Brown at the National Press Club yesterday, Dr Switkowski said nuclear power plants were a viable, safe and proven low-cost option. The former Telstra chief is now chairman of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation.

Senator Brown said nuclear power would be too slow, too expensive and too dangerous. .

He warned that nuclear power plants would be vulnerable to terrorist attacks, and said they risked creating an atomic energy race in a region that was one of the most peaceful in the world and free of nuclear threats.

“A huge threat of terrorism hangs over the industry in an age of handbag-sized weapons,” Senator Brown said.

Speaking in favour of nuclear power, Dr Switkowski said Australia could have 50 nuclear reactors in action by 2050, doubling the number he suggested to the Howard government in a report 3 1/2 years ago. The first reactor should be commissioned for generation in 2020.

Dr Switkowski said he believed public opinion on nuclear energy would turn around in two or three years when the magnitude of the task of cutting greenhouse gas emissions became apparent.

But the nuclear industry would need a carbon price of $15-$40 a tonne to be economically viable, he said.

Kevin Rudd in February ruled out nuclear power for Australia. And the Prime Minister has decided against attending the nuclear disarmament summit in Washington this month, a decision he took after there was a change of agenda for the COAG meeting due on April 19.

Mr Rudd first revealed he would not be attending the nuclear summit in an interview with The Australian, because of a clash with the scheduled COAG meeting on health and the proposed visit of US President Barack Obama, since cancelled.

Along with a possible trip to Turkey for Anzac Day, the Washington trip was dropped because of fears Mr Rudd was seen by some as spending too much time overseas.

Source: The Australian

Lasers could spark clean nuclear energy

Researchers hope to one day recreate the nuclear process that drives the Sun, using lasers instead of heat and pressure to fuse atoms together (SOHO/ESA/NASA)

An Australian-led team of scientists may have found a way of creating a cheap and abundant source of clean energy through nuclear fusion.

The process could generate no radioactivity and produce little pollution.

The scientists have used computer models to simulate nuclear fusion without the extreme temperatures currently needed for other fusion methods.

Emeritus Professor Heinrich Hora, of the Department of Theoretical Physics at the University of New South Wales, is leading the research effort, and says the process relies on a new generation of extremely powerful and very fast lasers being developed.

“The key is a very carefully controlled extremely short laser pulse essential for ignition. The pulse would ignite a fuel made of ordinary hydrogen and boron-11,” Professor Hora said.

“The idea of a hydrogen and boron fusion reaction is interesting because it wouldn’t cause neutron production. Neutrons are a problem because they generate radioactivity.”

The team’s findings appear in the journal Energy and Environmental Science.

Professor Hora says his team was originally developing computer models using next generation lasers to duplicate the work being done at the new $4.34 billion National Ignition Facility at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in the United States.

The US scientists are developing what is currently the world’s largest laser to ignite highly compressed spheres of deuterium-tritium fuel in a nuclear fusion reaction.

Fast and furious

The laser can produce a pulse of a few billionths of a second duration which produces 500 times more power than all US power stations combined.

Professor Hora’s team originally rejected the idea of a hydrogen-boron fuel for their simulations “because the higher temperatures and compression needed made it 100,000 times more difficult than the Lawrence Livermore approach, making it just about impossible”.

“But when we ran computer simulations using these next generation petawatt [quadrillion watt] strength lasers with a hydrogen-boron fuel, we were shocked to find that it’s only 10 times more difficult than deuterium-tritium,” he said.

“It makes this all within the reach of current technology in a relatively short time. In fact these types of lasers are already in early testing at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.”

Professor Hora says the key is to ensure the laser pulse is “extremely clean”, lasting no more than a millionth of a millionth of a second.

“This allows conversion of optical energy to mechanical energy without heating,” he says.

Professor Hora says the hydrogen-boron fuel has a numberof advantages over deuterium-tritium.

“It would be largely free of radioactive emissions producing less radiation than that emitted by current power stations that burn coal, which contains trace amounts of uranium,” he says.

According to Professor Hora, hydrogen and boron are plentiful and readily accessible, and the waste product of ignition would be clean helium gas.

“The hydrogen-boron fuel would not have to be compressed. This means it needs far less energy to start the ignition,” he said.

But Professor Hora warns the study only demonstrates the potential of the new process and much work needs to be done to demonstrate it in practice.

Source: ABC Science Online

Japan’s Itochu buys Kalahari stake

Japanese trading house Itochu has agreed to acquire a 15% share of Kalahari Minerals plc, giving it an interest in the Rössing South uranium deposit in Namibia.

Its 15% share of Kalahari will make Itochu the UK-based company’s largest shareholder, and the Japanese company has already been invited to nominate a director to Kalahari’s board.

Kalahari is the biggest shareholder - 40% - in Australia-based Extract Resources, which owns 100% of Rössing South. The Namibian uranium deposit has 9,250 tU in measured and indicated resources plus a further 93,660 tU of inferred resources, and is currently undergoing feasibility studies with a view to starting production in 2013. The project, also known as the Husab Uranium Project, is located due south of Rio Tinto’s operating Rössing uranium mine, and comprises three main prospects: Rössing South, Ida Dome and Hildenhof. It has the potential to become one of the world’s leading uranium mines, according to Itochu.

Kalahari executive chairman Mark Hohnen welcomed Itochu’s participation in the company, which he described as “yet another transformational step for Kalahari.” He noted the strong relationship which the 150-year old Japanese company has with the Japanese government. “We look forward to receiving support from the Japanese government through Itochu,” he said.

Such support is already forthcoming. In parallel with Itochu’s announcement of its purchase, state-owned Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corporation (JOGMEC) announced it would be extending exploration financing reported to be worth 4 billion yen ($43 million) to the project, which it says has development costs of $704 million.

Japan relies on nuclear power for 30% of its electricity, a figure set to rise to 40% by 2017, and although it has a full nuclear fuel cycle industry it has no indigenous uranium. Itochu, which lays claim to delivering some 4000 tU per year, says it is committed to an “aggressive approach” in its uranium business and securing a “stable supply” of uranium for Japan.

Source: World Nuclear News

E.T. hovering over Australian waste repository

It appears that it is not only Australia’s federal government that is interested in a site in Northern Territory, proposed for a national radioactive waste repository. According to Ray Aylett, manager of Muckaty Station, UFOs have been hovering over Tennant Creek, where two sites are under consideration for the repository, the Northern Territory News reported. He said, “At one of the sites, two UFOs followed me – I was going to Helen Springs and two followed me along the road.” Aylett, who is a councillor in the Barkly Shire, added, “I thought ‘bugger you, if you wanna go past, I’ll pull over.’ I pulled over and they went. Later, when I got to the Helen Springs turnoff, two came in front of me – in the same night!” He noted, “They’ve been coming ever since I’ve been at Muckaty, for 13 years. They’re funny things, I reckon there are people on Earth, so there have got to be people out there.” Aylett said, “I keep getting out the torch, I wanna get them down to have a beer or a steak but they won’t come down.” He commented, “Everybody reckons I’m mad, but you’ve gotta be hunting them.”

Source: World Nuclear News

Study shows nuclear power is not the best option for Australia

NUCLEAR power will be the Western world’s cheapest option for electricity in an age of significant carbon charges, but Australia will be one of the few exceptions, a global study has found.

In a stunning conclusion, the study by the OECD and the International Energy Agency found that even with a carbon charge of $US30 ($A33) a tonne, it ill be cheaper for Australian generators to burn black coal and send the emissions into the atmosphere than to turn to gas or other low-emission alternatives.

And even on the optimistic assumption that carbon can be captured and stored for $US17.50 to $US25 a tonne, it will be cheaper, it found, for generators in most of Australia to keep sending carbon up the chimney than to adopt carbon capture and storage.

The study, Projected Costs of Generating Electricity: 2010, compares the long-term cost of new state-of-the-art generators using different power sources in different countries – assuming a price of $US30 a tonne for carbon emissions.

In general, the plants are expected to be commissioned by 2015, although carbon capture and storage technologies are assumed to come later.

The study was carried out by the Paris-based IEA and its cousin, the OECD’s Nuclear Energy Agency, using data supplied by governments – or, in Australia’s case, the Energy Supply Association of Australia.

It essentially asks the question: which technology will be best for a carbon-constrained age? Not surprisingly, it concludes that there is no one-size-fits-all answer, with the best choice varying from one region to another. But three strong conclusions stand out:

■For the Western world in general, including the success stories of Asia, nuclear power will be the cheapest source of electricity in a world of carbon pricing. This is particularly true for Japan and Korea – Australia’s two biggest customers for coal in 2008-09.

■ For Australia and the United States, geothermal energy offers the cheapest source of future electricity, at least at the power station gate, but that could be a long way from the transmission lines and the consumers.

■In most countries, including Australia, gas is generally not competitive as a source of base-load power – assuming interest rates remain low. But if financing costs were to double from the assumed discount rate of 5 per cent, the flexibility and low capital cost of gas-fired power would see it replace nuclear as the best choice.

■ Renewable energy is generally not competitive, other than large hydro projects in the few countries where they are still possible, and biogas and wind in the US. While solar energy costs are expected to fall sharply over the next decade, the study warns that it could be 20 years before solar is a financially attractive option.

For Australian investors, the real head-turning stuff could be the projections of energy costs in Japan and Korea – on 2008-09 data, our two biggest customers for coal. If these figures are right, it’s not new coal loaders we’ll be needing, but new conveyor belts for the drums of uranium oxide.

In Japan, the study estimates, assuming a 5 per cent discount rate, a new nuclear plant would produce electricity at a cost of $US49.71 a megawatt hour. Power from a new coal plant would cost $US88.08, with gas more expensive still.

In Korea, the gap would be even wider, with nuclear costing $US29.05 a megawatt hour and coal $US65.80. The study attributes this to Korea’s low construction costs and its experience in building nuclear stations.

It would be a different story in China, which is assumed not to have carbon pricing. Its massive hydro schemes supply the world’s cheapest power, with coal and nuclear more or less equal in cost.

No nuclear power options were costed in Australia, since none have been proposed. Without them, Australia stands to lose its cheap energy advantage, as even Japanese nuclear energy would be cheaper than any of our coal options.

There were also surprising conclusions for Victoria, with the study estimating that brown coal with carbon capture and storage would be a cheaper source of power than gas. But if the discount rate for projects is raised towards 10 per cent, gas or dirty brown coal would be the best options in Victoria, and dirty black coal or geothermal in the rest of Australia.

Source: The Age

Australians eager to adopt nuclear energy

A new poll says there has been a significant shift in support for nuclear power in Australia. It has found that almost half of all Aussies believe the technology should be considered as an alternative source of energy to help combat the effects of climate change.

The survey, conducted by the Melbourne Age newspaper and the Nielson polling company, shows a marked change in Australian attitudes to nuclear power, in the last three years. In 2006, only a third of respondents thought the atomic option was a good one. Today almost 50 percent believe it would be a sensible alternative source of energy in a country that is heavily dependent on fossil fuels.

An exhaust stack rises through the steam of the Loy Yang B power station in the Latrobe Valley, east of Melbourne , Australia, 13 Aug 2009

On a per capita basis, Australia is one of the world’s worst emitters of greenhouse gases and scientists have warned it is particularly vulnerable to the effects of a shifting climate.

Supporters of nuclear power have insisted it is the only practical low-emissions substitute for coal.

Barry Green – one of Australia’s leading nuclear physicists – says the technology is improving all the time.

“The fission community – R&D community – is working very hard to produce advanced reactors that will reduce the radioactive waste problem, which will be safer and so on. And it strikes me that certainly you cannot shut nuclear fission out of the debate at all,” said Green.

Green believes that, in decades to come, nuclear fusion – a process where two atomic nuclei fuse together to release large amounts of energy – could play a major role in eventually solving the world’s power crisis.

Proponents have insisted that fusion is attractive because tests indicate it will be affordable, safe and environmentally friendly. The fuel the process relies upon deuterium, which is a sustainable resource. However, commercial fusion reactors, could be 50 years away.

At present, nuclear technology revolves around a process called fission, where atoms are split to generate power.

However, critics are worried about the risk of accidents and the awkward issue of safely storing radioactive waste. Opponents also assert that it would take too long for Australia to develop a nuclear power industry.

At the moment, the federal government has no plans to go down the nuclear path, preferring instead to investigate clean-coal technology and a raft of renewable energy sources.

Australia has just one atomic facility, on the outskirts of Sydney, which is used mainly to produce radiopharmaceuticals.

Source: VOA News

Australian nuclear organization chairman ‘nuclear energy is too important and effective a source of clean energy to be ignored’

A DECISION to build a nuclear reactor in Australia will be made within five years according to nuclear advocate Dr Ziggy Switkowski.

Dr Switkowski, chairman of the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation and a former chief executive of Telstra, said yesterday the Australian community was not yet ready for nuclear power, but the tide was turning.

Speaking at the Paydirt 2009 Uranium Conference in Adelaide, Dr Switkowski said polls showed more than half of the community now supported nuclear power, but not in their area.

He conceded the nuclear industry would not yet attract political backing.

“My own view is that over time the government will find, as other governments have, that nuclear energy is too important and effective a source of clean energy to be ignored,” Dr Switkowski said.

“I think we’re two to five years away from that point as a country.”

Dr Switkowski said nuclear had to be part of the solution if the Federal Government was serious about tackling climate change.

“Targeted deep greenhouse gas emission reductions will almost certainly prove beyond the capability of existing technologies and renewable energy platforms to deliver in the available time,” he said.

“Our lights will start to go out as investment in clean base load energy generation stalls in an uncertain regulatory environment and the nuclear alternative is not validated.”

Under the Kyoto Protocol, Australia has committed to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions by 60 per cent from 1990 levels by 2050.

This goal would not be achieved without nuclear power, Dr Switkowski said. He said 31 countries, representing two-thirds of humanity, already used nuclear power to produce some of their electricity. This equated to 15 per cent of the world’s total electricity consumption.

“The current nuclear community is expected to grow to 50 countries by 2020,” Dr Switkowski said.

Once the decision had been made to build a nuclear reactor, it would take about 15 years for the first reactor to be up and running, he said.

Dr Switkowski said if the cost of carbon was factored in, as would be the case in the Federal Government’s carbon pollution reduction scheme, the cost of nuclear power would be comparable to other base load power sources such as coal and gas.

“If the cost of carbon was high, nuclear would be the least expensive base load option. It’s also the cleanest and it’s also the safest,” he said.

Source: HeraldSun