ECA Update: November 3, 2011
Published: Thu, 11/03/11
Energy Department couldn't manage stimulus money, watchdog says
Ed O'Keefe, The Washington Post November 2, 2011 In his first appearance on Capitol Hill since the scandal surrounding the now-defunct solar company Solyndra broke, the federal watchdog who first raised concerns said Wednesday that the Energy Department has struggled to quickly distribute $35.2 billion in economic stimulus funding.
Gregory H. Friedman told a House subcommittee hearing on the Obama administration's efforts to promote "green jobs" that the department's stimulus haul eclipsed its annual budget by more than $8 billion and placed strains on federal, state and local officials charged with distributing the funds.
In some cases, state government personnel charged with distributing the federal dollars had been furloughed as part of state budget crunches, Friedman said.
The $35.2 billion in American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funding received by the Department of Energy did not "live up to its expectations" of creating long-lasting jobs on a national level, but local officials said that in the CSRA, Recovery Act funding at the Savannah River Site was clearly beneficial.
The House committee on Oversight and Government Reform heard testimony Wednesday from several witnesses, including DOE Inspector General Gregory Friedman, who said the Recovery Act was more challenging than initially intended, and that, by last month, 45 percent of DOE's Recovery Act funding had not yet been spent.
NNSA Announces H-Canyon to Support Plutonium Disposition at the Savannah River Site NNSA Press Release Oct 31, 2011 WASHINGTON, DC: The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) this week approved the use of the H-Canyon Complex to provide approximately 3.7 MT of plutonium oxide feed for the MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility from the non-pit plutonium currently stored at Savannah River Site (SRS). The use of the H-Canyon Complex will result in the retention of approximately 90 high-quality jobs in South Carolina, and demonstrates NNSA's commitment to remove plutonium from the state.
"This joint effort between NNSA and DOE's Office of Environmental Management helps us implement President Obama's nuclear security agenda while keeping 90 high-quality jobs in South Carolina," said Administrator Thomas D'Agostino. "This decision will help us dispose of surplus weapons-grade plutonium while also investing in our current infrastructure at the Savannah River Site."
Plan would send contaminated SRS plutonium to New Mexico Rob Pavey, The Augusta Chronicle October 26, 2011 About 500 kilograms of weapons grade plutonium now stored at Savannah River Site could leave South Carolina within four years, according to a proposal to send the tightly guarded material to a permanent disposal site in New Mexico.
The plutonium is among six metric tons that is contaminated or otherwise unsuitable for conversion to commercial nuclear reactor fuel in the government's mixed oxide "mox" plant under construction at the site.
The defueled reactor compartments of the USS Enterprise, the world's first nuclear-powered naval aircraft carrier, could be coming to the Hanford nuclear reservation.
The Navy has used a trench in central Hanford since 1986 to dispose of reactor compartments and other reactor components from 114 nuclear-powered ships. To date, that has included compartments from just submarines and cruisers.
But the Navy is proposing also adding compartments from the Enterprise's eight reactors to Trench 94 in Hanford's 200 East Area about seven miles from the Columbia River.
Some Nuclear Experts Question Ramp-up in U.S. Tritium Production Elaine M. Grossman, Global Security Newswire October 28, 2011 WASHINGTON -- The U.S. nuclear complex is expanding production of an exotic gas widely seen as essential for keeping nuclear weapons functioning, but some progressive issue experts cast doubt on just how much new fabrication is required (see GSN, Aug. 25).
The Energy Department's semiautonomous National Nuclear Security Administration plans over the next few years to more than triple capacity to produce tritium at the commercial Watts Bar reactor in eastern Tennessee, according to the agency's fiscal 2012 "Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan."
Supercomputers offer tools for nuclear testing -- and solving nuclear mysteries David E. Hoffman, The Washington Post November 1, 2011 LIVERMORE, CALIF. -- A group of nuclear weapons designers and scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory conducted a what-if experiment several years ago, deploying supercomputers to simulate what happens to a nuclear weapon from the moment it leaves storage to the point when it hits a target.
They methodically worked down a checklist of all the possible conditions that could affect the B-83 strategic nuclear bomb, the most powerful and one of the most modern weapons in the U.S. arsenal, officials said. The scientists and designers examined how temperature, altitude, vibration and other factors would affect the bomb in what is called the stockpile-to-target sequence.
Nuclear Cleanup [in Japan] Faces 'NIMBY' Challenge Yumiko Ono, The Wall Street Journal October 31, 2011 In handling the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear crisis, Japan has gotten help from American scientists and imported American robots. Now comes a popular American phrase: NIMBY.
"Of course, this is tough," Hideki Minamikawa, vice minister of the environment ministry, told JRT in an interview, explaining where to store all the contaminated waste after the disaster after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. "The natural response is NIMBY - not in my back yard."
"NIMBY" was an oft-used phrase during the big International Symposium on Decontamination in Fukushima city in October. Nuclear experts from around the world urged Japan to take extra care to explain their efforts to local residents, because the knee-jerk reaction is "NIMBY," they warned.
Nuclear reactor in southern Japan goes back online, but new trouble besets tsunami-hit plant
Associated Press November 1, 2011 TOKYO -- Radioactive particles associated with nuclear fission have been detected at Japan's tsunami-damaged atomic power plant, officials said Wednesday, suggesting one of its reactors could have a new problem.
The fresh concerns at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility came as a reactor in southern Japan was restarted and brought back online, marking a first since the March 11 disaster created an outcry over the safety of Japan's nuclear power sites.
Utility officials said gas from inside the Fukushima plant's No. 2 reactor indicated the presence of radioactive xenon, which could be the byproduct of unexpected nuclear fission. Boric acid was injected through a cooling pipe as a precaution because it can counteract nuclear reactions.
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