cnn

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Nuclear waste and the people who pay for it

Ahlers, Mike M. “Hot Nuclear Waste, Cold Hard Cash, and You.” CNN. Cable News Network, 16 May 2014. Web. 01 Mar. 2015. <http://www.cnn.com/2014/05/16/us/nuclear-waste-money/index.html>.

In this CNN article we learn that for over 30 years, the US government had been collecting a fee from the power companies in order to be able to dispose of the nuclear waste that we have lying all over the country. After a battle between the department of energy and many power companies and state regulators they managed to win and end the collection of the fee. The fee was being charged a tenth of a cent for every kilowatt hour of power produced by nuclear power this all adds up to about 15 to 20 cents on the monthly electric bill. these numbers might seem miniscule but all of these fees amounted to about $750 million in fees per year. These fees were all placed into a fund which has about $31 billion dollars and is growing yearly through interest by $1.3 billion. Many of these companies have found that a lot of the nuclear debris still hasn’t been disposed of and there is now an estimated amount of about 2,000 tons of waste added yearly to the rowing number of 70,000 million tons of nuclear waste.

When we see how much money has been collected and how much the government has actually done with that money its disappointing and it shows our governments lack of interest in the safety of its people and its land. Also I feel that the government should have let the plants know about the fee instead of taking a percentage of the income and using it to invest into failed nuclear waste plants such as the nuclear repository plant in nevada on the Yucca Mountain. One other big issue is that a lot of this waste has to be left alone for a number of years before it can be disposed of, if we dont wait then there could be many consequences.

 

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How Fukushima changed world’s attitude to nuclear power

Kottasova, Ivana. “How Fukushima Changed World’s Attitudes to Nuclear Power.” CNN. Cable News Network, 12 Mar. 2014. Web. 01 Mar. 2015. <http://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/12/business/nuclear-power-after-fukushima/index.html#top_of_page>.

This article talks about how the worlds view on nuclear power has changed due to the recent nuclear disaster that occurred in japan. after the japanese nuclear meltdown many of the nuclear power runned nations were stunned due to the high regulations that japan has on its plants also the effects made many countries think twice about their nuclear plants safety. Some statistics were taken to see the effects of the Fukushima incident and they found that before the accident 442 plants in 30 countries were operating and in 2012 15 reactors had closed. Although 12 reactors had closed recent studies show that there are now 435 active reactors in 31 countries and about 68 new plants are being constructed. Japan stopped it nuclear power program and are thinking of restarting, while in germany they closed 8 reactors and they are now considering changing from nuclear to renewable energy. Switzerland is following in germany’s footsteps and hopes to get rid of nuclear power by 2036. The US and France, two of the worlds biggest users of nuclear power are thinking of securing their reactors more but are not considering a change to other power sources.

I feel that this article was helpful in showing us how the worlds nuclear power was disoriented after the fukushima incident. This article also provides key statistics which help us learn more on certain countries nuclear programs. One of the most surprising things that I noticed from this article were that a few years after the incident the world was back on nuclear power with 435 reactors in 31 countries and with the undergoing construction of about 68 more reactors. This showed me how the world moved on from the nuclear incident and instead of keeping the number of reactors leveled decided to add more reactors which only means more potential problems for these countries and their counterparts.

 

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CNN Nuclear Power plants

CNN Library. (2014, August 6). U.S. Nuclear Power Plants. Retrieved November 23, 2014, from http://www.cnn.com/2013/09/30/us/u-s-nuclear-power-plants/

 In this article the CNN library gives some facts about the nuclear reactors and how they are managed. They stated the the US has 100 licensed commercial nuclear reactors that operate in 31 of the 48 contiguous (touching) states. The US government compiled a commision named The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) whose job is to inspect and help assess all of the threats to the nuclear plants in the country. Out of those 100 reactors 65 of them are pressurized water reactors water the other 35 are boiling water reactors. Since the events in 2001 the US has increased its security at nuclear plants and has limited the entrance of any kind. The NRC had divided the country into 4 regions on which each region contains certain states and each state contains its nuclear plants. For example Region 1, contains 26 reactors in 8 states, region 2, contains 32 reactors in 7 states, and region 3, contains 23 reactors in 6 states, and region 4 contains 19 reactors in 10 states.

I believe that the US has done a good job of maintaining and securing their nuclear power plants, but we could probably do more for this type of energy source. It has been said that the US is trying to distance itself from nuclear power and as of right now the number of nuclear plants will decrease rapidly and the price for electricity will increase because the nuclear plants create about 20 percent of the US’s energy. I also feel that the US has done good by creating the NRC and allowing it to do its job unlike the FDA and other government inspection agencies.