21Dec

Germany Uses More Renewable Energy Than Ever Before, Surpassing Nuclear

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Germany Uses More Renewable Energy Than Ever Before, Surpassing Nuclear

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Among the world’s most developed countries, Germany seems to be on the right track concerning renewable energy production. The country’s renewable resources have been used more than the classic ones this year, reports BDEW, Germany’s Federal Association of Energy.

Therefore, nuclear power dropped to 17.4 percent after Chancellor Angela Merkel had decided to show down the oldest eight reactors, as a reaction to the disaster at Fukushima, Japan. Plans are that by 2022 they’ll have phased out all of the nuclear power plants today in function.

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30Nov

Germany vs. the UK on Nuclear Power

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While Germany and Japan are backing away from nuclear power, the United Kingdom is looking in completely the opposite direction – 8 new nuclear plants are scheduled to be built. As a close neighbor, Germany has a number of words on the topic (all of them polite, but not particularly flattering).

Germany’s announcement of zero nuclear was prompted by the Sendai quake and the Fukushima nuclear meltdown last spring, as Clean Technica readers may remember, but those phase-out plans were already in place. The announcement gave rise to fears of insufficient power feeding into the grid anyway. However, Jochen Flasbarth, president of Germany’s EPA, pretty much thinks the entire idea is ridiculous, and furthermore that nuclear power is not the answer to a stable power supply:

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21Nov

Still plugging new nuclear power tech post-Fukushima

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If you thought the Fukushima disaster derailed nuclear power worldwide, look again.

Evacuations and the havoc caused by meltdowns at four reactor cores at the Fukushima power plant earlier this year prompted Japan to shift away from nuclear power and recatalyzed a nuclear phase-out in Germany. But many countries remain enthusiastic about nuclear power, and interest in newer technologies has increased because they are safer, according to a panel of industry professionals here at the MIT Energy Finance Forum on Friday.

“Our investors have a very long time horizon and the reason they supported it is the long-term societal implications and the potentially significant returns from that (so) we haven’t seen any wavering of support,” said Tyler Ellis, a project manager at TerraPower. “Our development partners are trying to accelerate the time scale (of building plants) due to the energy security and safety.”

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26Oct

Fukushima Nuclear Plant Released Far More Radiation than Government Said

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Global radioactivity data challenge Japanese estimates for emissions and point to the role of spent fuel pools

The disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in March released far more radiation than the Japanese government has claimed. So concludes a study1 that combines radioactivity data from across the globe to estimate the scale and fate of emissions from the shattered plant.

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12Oct

UK nuclear safety review finds 38 cases for improvement

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UK nuclear safety review finds 38 cases for improvement

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A review of nuclear safety in the UK has found 38 areas where safety could be improved, in lessons drawn from the Fukushima incident in Japan early this year.

The review, ordered by the government following the Japanese experience, pinpointed critical areas for concern, including risks associated with flooding, the layout of plants, and the state of preparedness for emergencies. Ministers and the relevant regulators will be asked to look at these as a matter of urgency.

However, the review published on Tuesday also concluded that the UK’s nuclear industry is broadly safe, with “no fundamental safety weaknesses”. If the areas of concern raised in the light of the Fukushima are addressed, the industry will be “even safer”, the report said. The relatively clean bill of health was rapidly seized on by the government.

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10Sep

Fukushima disaster: it’s not over yet

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Fukushima disaster it's not over yet

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Fu Nishikata, eight, and her brother Kaito, 12, on the playground of the school they left on 1 April to evacuate to Yonezawa, 50km away. Their mother, Kanako Nishikata, is member of a group of parents for the protection of Fukushima children. Photograph: Jeremie Souteyrat

It was an email from an old friend that led me to the irradiated sunflower fields of Fukushima. I had not heard from Reiko-san since 2003, when I left my post as the Guardian’s Tokyo correspondent. Before that, the magazine editor had been the source of many astute comments about social trends in Japan. In April, she contacted me out of the blue. I was pleased at first, then worried.

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26Aug

WikiLeaks cables reveal fears over China’s nuclear safety

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China has “vastly increased” the risk of a nuclear accident by opting for cheap technology that will be 100 years old by the time dozens of its reactors reach the end of their lifespans, according to diplomatic cables from the US embassy in Beijing.

The warning comes weeks after the government in Beijing resumed its ambitious nuclear expansion programme, that was temporarily halted for safety inspections in the wake of the meltdown of three reactors in Fukushima, Japan.

Cables released this week by WikiLeaks highlight the secrecy of the bidding process for power plant contracts, the influence of government lobbying, and potential weaknesses in the management and regulatory oversight of China’s fast-expanding nuclear sector.

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9Jul

Japan’s Mitsui Plans to Construct Solar Power Plants in Tsunami Zone

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Japan’s Mitsui Plans to Construct Solar Power Plants in Tsunami Zone

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Residents of Japan are still feeling the effects of the tsunami and earthquakes that hit earlier this year, but Japan’s trading house, Mitsui and Co., is hoping to bring some hope to the dire situation by building large-scale solar plants capable of supplying energy to 30,000 households. The investment by Mitsui is estimated to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars, and construction is expected to kick off next March.

Mitsui’s endeavor hopes to revive Japan’s tsunami-damaged northeast coast. The company’s plan would create thousands of jobs and boost the power supply in the region, which is still struggling to meet capacity in the wake of the ongoing nuclear crisis at the Fukushima plant.

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