Thursday, June 26, 2014

US Westinghouse Is Asking NRC for Approval for 'Specialized Seismic Option' for Its AP1000 Nuclear Reactors, Eyeing Earthquake-Prone Markets


The news is from Reuters (6/26/2014; emphasis is mine):

Westinghouse eyes nuclear reactor technology for higher seismic locations

Westinghouse Electric Co on Thursday announced it has begun the process of attaining regulatory approval for developing technology that would enable its AP1000 nuclear reactors to be used in locations with higher seismic activity.

The company said it started the process of obtaining approval from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for its 'Specialized Seismic Option' at a meeting on Wednesday.

The 'Specialized Seismic Option' being worked on by the company and its majority owner, Toshiba Corp will allow new units to be built in areas with a higher seismic spectrum seen in some portions of the western United States and other countries.

Eight units of its AP1000 reactors are being constructed worldwide, including in China and the U.S., the company said.


I guess Toshiba wants to be the one-stop total nuclear solution company - from building reactors (AP1000) to soaking up radioactive materials (SARRY, ALPS) after reactors get damaged.

Westinghouse's press release (6/26/2014) doesn't discuss the detail of this "Option", other than saying:

"...In addition, customers in more active seismic environments have expressed a strong interest in incorporating this Westinghouse technology into their energy portfolios,” said Jeff Benjamin, Westinghouse senior vice president, Nuclear Power Plants.


The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission has the non-proprietary information package submitted by Westinghouse/Toshiba on May 29, 2014, but the critical part of it (what the "Specialized Seismic Option" is) is blank (whiteout). The slide presentation says:

Target sites are select hard-rock sites west of the Mississippi River. Range also envelopes certain sites in other countries

6 comments:

VyseLegendaire said...

It's almost like Toshiba/Westinghouse are trying to pull a reverse-Icarus here.

Anonymous said...

We can only attribute this sort of development to the "unusual" relationship between Japanese and American industry.
Each of course performs its worship of the power of money, and in this case each relies upon the assistance of the other in denying the "dislocation from sense" in designing such timebombs.

In the end, both are celebrating their "victory" over the peoples' weal, and identifying themselves as terato-children of decades of corruption, industrial.

How more cynical could each be in relating to the lessons of their former world war relationships?
THAT is their celebration. [perverse]

Anonymous said...

One would think the obvious solution is to concrete with a boron mix to a depth of 20 metres beneath the reactor and provide all plumbing and electricals to and within the plant above ground.

The entire reactor is cocooned on stilts and there are multiple reinforced tunnels to the area beneath the concrete as well as within for boronated fluid injection into the dropped core.

Stilts are supported by independent concrete pads.

On the other hand you utilise geothermal as it's always on and always will be.

If you gotta have Diesels you run them atop ziggurats of concrete and you provide above ground pipes capable of taking water from upriver.

You don't build on sediment or various volcanic tuff you build on Granite or Gneiss.

An igneous intrusion sill is good enough.

Anonymous said...

Really though it shows stupidity on behalf of governments to enable foreigners to place submarine designs on land.

Those imbeciles are dead but not before they trained all new imbeciles.

Anonymous said...

Of course in the early days of steam power there were incidents whilst mining the coal and engine explosions and derailments or like the Titanic one could suffer a hull breach through misadventure but these disaters are quite minor when one considers the spectre of severe radiological imparement of all life within thousands of square kilometres for hundreds of thousands of years,longer in fact than the human species will be here to witness...

Anonymous said...

2:35,
Why would they do things like that when they'd lose the sense of violating obvious sensibilities. That's what they really thrive on, violation.

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