Japan starts discharging treated water into the sea : Regulation & Safety

The process for releasing the ALPS-treated water (Image: Tepco)
Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) announced it has begun releasing treated water currently stored at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant into the ocean. The operation - expected to take up to 30 years to complete - is being closely monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

At the Fukushima Daiichi site, contaminated water - in part used to cool melted nuclear fuel - is treated by the Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS), which removes most of the radioactive contamination, with the exception of tritium. This treated water is currently stored in more than 1000 tanks on site. The total tank storage capacity amounts to about 1.37 million cubic metres and all the tanks are expected to reach full capacity in late 2023 or early 2024.

Japan announced in April 2021 it planned to discharge treated water stored at the site into the sea over a period of about 30 years.

On 22 August, the government announced that it had decided to request Tepco begin preparations for the release of ALPS-treated water into the sea.

On the same day, the company transferred a very small amount of ALPS-treated water - about 1 cubic metre - to the dilution facility using the transfer facilities. This water was then diluted with about 1200 cubic metres of seawater and allowed to flow into the discharge vertical shaft (upstream water tank). The water stored in the discharge vertical shaft was then sampled.

"The results showed that the analysis value is approximately equal to the calculated concentration and below 1500 becquerels per litre," Tepco said today. "The sample of the water was also analysed by the Japan Atomic Energy Agency, who confirmed that the analysis value is below 1500 Bq/litre." In comparison, the World Health Organization guideline for drinking water is 10,000 Bq/litre.

Tepco therefore announced it has now moved to the second stage of the water release, the continuous discharge into the sea. At the same time, the company began transmitting data from various points in the process to the IAEA.

"Today at 1.00pm, the seawater transfer pumps will be started up and we will commence the discharge," Tepco said ahead of the process beginning. "During the discharge, one tank group-worth of ALPS-treated water from the measurement/confirmation facility, and the water already stored in the discharge vertical shaft (upper-stream storage) during Stage 1, will be continuously transferred/diluted and discharged into the sea.

"Furthermore, today, the intake/vertical shaft monitors will be put into operation in preparation for the discharge into the sea. We also started uploading real-time data pertaining to the discharge of ALPS-treated water into the sea to our website."
IAEA monitoring

When Japan announced the discharge plan in 2021, it asked the IAEA to review its plans against IAEA safety standards and monitor the release. Neighbouring countries have raised concerns and opposed the planned discharge. An IAEA Task Force was established to implement the assistance to Japan, which included advice from a group of internationally recognised experts from Member States, including members from the region, under the authority of the IAEA Secretariat. The IAEA opened an office at the Fukushima Daiichi plant last month.

"IAEA experts are there on the ground to serve as the eyes of the international community and ensure that the discharge is being carried out as planned consistent with IAEA safety standards," said IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi. "Through our presence, we contribute to generating the necessary confidence that the process is carried out in a safe and transparent way."

The agency, which confirmed that the discharge had begun, noted: "The IAEA's independent on-site analysis confirmed that the tritium concentration in the diluted water that is being discharged is far below the operational limit of 1500 becquerels per litre."

The IAEA said it will have a presence on site for as long as the treated water is released. It also announced the launch of a webpage to provide live data from Japan on the water discharge, including water flow rates, radiation monitoring data and the concentration of tritium after dilution.

The IAEA experts will observe onsite activities related to the ALPS-treated water discharge, including samples and measurements, and will interface with Tepco and officials from Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority. The IAEA will also organise review missions periodically to observe activities on site and to request updates and additional data from Japanese authorities. The IAEA said its independent corroboration activities will also continue during the entirety of the discharge and will involve IAEA laboratories and third-party laboratories.

"All of these activities will work together to provide a comprehensive picture of the activities taking place at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant related to the ALPS-treated water discharge and whether these activities are consistent with relevant international safety standards," said Gustavo Caruso, Director and Coordinator for the ALPS Safety Review at the IAEA and Chair of the Task Force. "The data provided by Tepco, and displayed both by Tepco and IAEA, is just a single piece of the overall monitoring approach and the IAEA's ongoing safety review."Researched and written by World Nuclear News  Source: World Nuclear News
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Nuclear energy too expensive, too slow to battle climate change: report

Nuclear power as a renewable power option is more expensive and slower to implement than alternatives and therefore is not effective in the effort to battle the climate emergency, rather it is counterproductive, as the funds are then not available for more effective options, says a report on the status and trends of the international nuclear industry.
While the number of operating nuclear reactors has increased globally over the past year by four to 417 as of mid-2019, it remains significantly below historic peak of 438 in 2002, according to the World Nuclear Industry Status Report 2019 (WNISR2019), which is being released at the Central European University (CEU) in Budapest. Nuclear construction has been shrinking over the past five years with 46 units underway as of mid-2019, compared to 68 reactors in 2013 and 234 in 1979. The number of annual construction starts has fallen from 15 in the pre-Fukushima year (2010) to five in 2018 and, so far, one in 2019. The historic peak was in 1976 with 44 construction starts, more than the total in the past seven years. WNISR project coordinator and publisher Mycle Schneider stated: “There can be no doubt: the renewal rate of nuclear power plants is too slow to guarantee the survival of the technology. The world is experiencing an undeclared ‘organic’ nuclear phaseout.” Consequently, as of mid-2019, for the first time the average age of the world nuclear reactor fleet exceeds 30 years. However, renewables continue to outpace nuclear power in virtually all categories. A record 165 gigawatts (GW) of renewables were added to the world’s power grids in 2018; the nuclear operating capacity increased by 9 GW. Globally, wind power output grew by 29 per cent in 2018, solar by 13 per cent, nuclear by 2.4 per cent. Compared to a decade ago, nonhydro renewables generated over 1,900 TWh more power, exceeding coal and natural gas, while nuclear produced less. What does all this mean for the potential role of nuclear power to combat climate change? WNISR2019 provides a new focus chapter on the question. Diana Ürge-Vorsatz, Professor at the Central European University and Vice-Chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Working Group III, notes in her Foreword to WNISR2019 that several IPCC scenarios that reach the 1.5°C temperature target rely heavily on nuclear power and that “these scenarios raise the question whether the nuclear industry will actually be able to deliver the magnitude of new power that is required in these scenarios in a cost-effective and timely manner. This report is perhaps the most relevant publication to answer this pertinent question.” Over the past decade, levelised cost estimates for utility-scale solar dropped by 88 per cent, wind by 69 per cent, while nuclear increased by 23 per cent. New solar plants can compete with existing coal fired plants in India, wind turbines alone generate more electricity than nuclear reactors in India and China. But new nuclear plants are also much slower to build than all other options, eg, the nine reactors started up in 2018 took an average of 10.9 years to be completed. In other words, nuclear power is an option that is more expensive and slower to implement than alternatives and therefore is not effective in the effort to battle the climate emergency, rather it is counterproductive, as the funds are then not available for more effective options. The rather surprising outcome of the analyses is that even the extended operation of existing reactors is not climate effective as operating costs exceed the costs of competing energy efficiency and new renewable energy options and therefore durably block their implementation. “You can spend a dollar, a euro, a forint or a ruble only once: the climate emergency requires that investment decisions must favor the cheapest and fastest response strategies. The nuclear power option has consistently turned out the most expensive and the slowest,” Mycle Schneider concludes. The WNISR2019 assesses in 323 pages the status and trends of the international nuclear industry and analyses the potential role of nuclear power as an option to combat climate change. Eight interdisciplinary experts from six countries, including four university professors and the Rocky Mountain Institute’s co-founder and chairman emeritus, have contributed to the report.Source: https://www.domain-b.com
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India's installed renewable energy capacity reaches 132.15 GW

Image by andreas160578 from Pixabay
  • As of 29 February 2020, India’s cumulative renewable energy capacity stood at 132.15 Giga Watts, with an additional capacity of 46.69 GW under various stages of implementation and 34.07 GW under various stages of bidding.
  • As on same date, the country had cumulative installed capacity of 138.93 GW from non-fossil fuels sources. The cumulative renewable energy capacity and cumulative capacity from non-fossil fuel sources constituted 35.80 per cent and 37.63 per cent of total electricity generation capacity of 369.12 GW installed in the country as on 29 February 2020, respectively.
  • As part of Intended Nationally Determined Contributions as per the Paris Accord on Climate Change, India has undertaken to install at least 40 per cent of its total electricity generation capacity from non-fossil fuel sources by 2030.
  • India has set itself an ambitious target of 175 Giga Watts (GW) of renewable capacity by the year 2022, and is aiming at 450 GW by 2030.
  • India’s primary energy consumption hit 809.2 million tonnes of oil equivalent in 2018, according to BP’s Statistical Review of World Energy. On this metric, the country is behind only China and the US.
  • India’s installed capacity — for all energy sources — was a little under 369 GW at the end of January 2020, according to government figures. Source: https://www.domain-b.com/
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Spain: Government expects solar to dominate by 2030 with up to 77 GW

Spain has currently an installed PV power of around 4.8 GW. Image: Solaria Energía
In a new report, the Spanish Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Digital Agenda has predicted that solar will become the country’s largest electricity source by the end of the next decade. Cumulative installed PV power could even reach 77 GW by the end of 2030, according to the most bullish scenario drafted by the Spanish government.APRIL 3, 2018 EMILIANO BELLINI

Spain’s Ministry of Industry, Tourism and Digital Agenda has published a new report, including new growth scenarios for the future of the Spanish energy market, which recognizes solar as the future cheapest source of power, and the dominance of PV above all other energy sources by 2030.

The first scenario, called the “distributed generation scenario” (DG), forecasts strong development of renewable energy distributed generation coupled with storage systems.

According to the most optimistic figures provided by the ministry, solar is expected to reach a power production capacity of 47.1 TWh by 2030, thus becoming the country’s leading power source, followed by wind (31.0 TWh), combined cycle plants (24.5 TWh), hydropower (23.0 TWh), cogeneration facilities (8.5 TWh), and nuclear power (7.1 TWh). Overall, storage is expected to account for 2.3 TWh of total demand.

Under this scenario, renewables would have a 70% share in Spain’s electricity mix, while solar PV technology would reach a cumulative installed power of around 77 GW, followed by wind with 47.5 GW.

A second, less ambitious scenario, called “sustainable transition scenario” (TS), also expects solar to become the largest and cheapest source of power by 2030, but with “only” 40 TWh of power production capacity, and no storage deployed. Under this scenario, however, renewables would still account for 67% of total power generation capacity, although part of the missing 7 TWh from solar would be partly replaced with 4 TWh of power generation from coal.

The country’s power demand is expected to increase from around 253 TWh currently, to 285 TWh (TS scenario) and 296 TWh (DG scenario), respectively. Costs of power generation, meanwhile, would range from €52/MWh in the TS scenario to €32.7/MWh in the DG scenario.

Commenting on the scenario with the highest penetration of solar and renewables, the Spanish government said that their increasing share would significantly reduce power generation costs, thus enabling savings of around €9.6 billion.

This would negatively impact the profitability of thermal back-up capacity, which will still be necessary in order to deal with fluctuations, while also making renewable energy project investment returns more problematic, the ministry said.

CO2 emissions, however, would be more than halved, and power exports to France would increase by around 236%, as a consequence of the price spread with the neighboring country, the report’s authors noted.

Spanish solar association, UNEF has welcomed the findings of the report, claiming that the Spanish government has finally acknowledged the high value of the PV technology.

“The forecast of a considerable increase in installed PV capacity by 2030, which would increase tenfold compared to current levels, is a key opportunity to allow citizens to have access to cheaper energy and to reach a more stable development model, in contrast to the dynamics of acceleration-braking-acceleration that has characterized the last years,” said association president, José Donoso.

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Researchers develop novel method to turn footsteps into usable electricity

New York: Researchers at University of Wisconsin-Madison have developed an inexpensive, simple method that allows them to convert footsteps into usable electricity. The method puts to good use a common waste material -- wood pulp.

The pulp, which is already a common component of flooring, is partly made of cellulose nanofibers.

They are tiny fibers that, when chemically treated, produce an electrical charge when they come in contact with untreated nanofibers.

When the nanofibers are embedded within flooring, they are able to produce electricity that can be harnessed to power lights or charge batteries.

And because wood pulp is a cheap, abundant and renewable waste product of several industries, flooring that incorporates the new technology could be as affordable as conventional materials.

While there are existing similar materials for harnessing footstep energy, they are costly, nonrecyclable, and impractical at a large scale.

"We've been working a lot on harvesting energy from human activities. One way is to build something to put on people, and another way is to build something that has constant access to people. The ground is the most-used place," said Xudong Wang, Associate Professor at University of Wisconsin-Madison.

The team's method published in the journal Nano Energy is the latest in a green energy research field called "roadside energy harvesting" that could, in some settings, rival solar power -- and it does not depend on fair weather.

Researchers like Wang who study roadside energy harvesting methods see the ground as holding great renewable energy potential well beyond its limited fossil fuel reserves. Source: ummid.com
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