Coal-fired and oil-fired electricity in New England

In New England today, the only significant use of coal is in a dwindling number of coal-fired electricity generating stations. [1] Just after World War II, almost all electricity and most industrial and space heating in the region were coal-fired, [2] but twenty years later most energy users had migrated to fuel oil, which remained remarkably cheap until the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973. Around that time, much more demanding safety requirements rapidly raised costs of nuclear power plants. Then the Three Mile Island disaster of 1979 chilled remaining interest in nuclear power.

In the 1970s and 1980s, some New England generating units were adapted to use coal again, including ones in the large Salem Harbor plant and the giant Brayton Point plant in Somerset, MA. [3] Residents and business owners located nearby protested the pollution, and over time they were partly successful. After a campaign against the "filthy five" (actually six) most polluting power plants, [4] in 2001 Massachusetts issued fairly stringent new emissions rules for existing power plants, reaching full effects in 2012. [5] A similar but later campaign in Connecticut attacked the "sooty six" plants in that state, [6] resulting in less stringent regulations. [7]

In 2003, Exelon took over the giant Mystic plant in Everett, MA, which had been coal-fired, then oil-fired and equipped for steam-cycle natural gas; it was repowered using combined-cycle natural gas. [8] Exelon slid into bankruptcy because of poor earnings, lost its Massachusetts plants and reacquired them years later. [9] As fuel oil became uneconomic over the next few years, Mirant put the large, mostly oil-fired Canal plant in Sandwich, MA, into hibernation, [10] operating it only at extreme peaks of summer demand. That largely disposed of two of the six most polluting power plants in Massachusetts.

In 2007, NRG Energy proposed to convert the smaller, coal-fired Montaup plant in Somerset to coal gasification, [11] but in 2011 it closed the plant instead. [12] GDF Suez tried buying emission credits to keep running the smaller coal-fired Mt. Tom plant in Hoyoke, MA, but the plan became uneconomic; it announced that Mt. Tom will be delisted in 2016. [13] As agreed under a federal court order, in 2012 Dominion announced it would close the coal-fired Salem Harbor plant by the summer of 2014. [14] It sold the property to Footprint Power, which has received preliminary environmental approval to repower Salem Harbor using combined-cycle natural gas. [15] Five of the six most-polluting plants in Massachusetts were thus being closed, idled or repowered.

With the giant, coal-fired Brayton Point, Dominion tried to buck trends, spending over $1 billion to install cooling towers that replace water drawn from Mt. Hope Bay and pollution controls that substantially reduce emissions of sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides and mercury. [16] However, those efforts were financially undercut by declines in the prices of natural gas, and the plant ran at less than 20 percent of capacity after 2011. Dominion sold the plant in 2013 at a heavy loss. In October, 2013, new owner EquiPower announced that Brayton Point would be delisted by the summer of 2017. [17]

That development completed the disposition of all six of the most polluting power plants in Massachusetts. Just to the north, in Bow, New Hampshire, Merrimack became the one large remaining, frequently operated coal-fired power plant in New England. [18} Like Brayton Point, its output has been made uneconomic much of the time by natural gas prices. In May, 2012, Public Service of New Hampshire announced that Merrimack would be closed for all but peak periods of demand in summer and winter. [19] A 2006 New Hampshire law required Merrimack Station to achieve 80 percent reduction in mercury emissions. The company is in disputes over about $422 million spent through 2011 to retrofit the plant with more than the minimum pollution control specified in the law. [20]

Although stronger state regulations made differences in Massachusetts, Connecticut and New Hampshire, shifts in the economics of power generation accelerated changes. Effects on New England power plants in recent years are shown in the following table, which tallies the outputs of large power plants for 2010, 2011 and 2012, compiled by the federal government. [21]


New England power plants with over 1 million megawatt-hours annual outputs

Plant name	Location	MW *	2010 MWh	2011 MWh	2012 MWh
Brayton Point	Somerset, MA	1,100	6,574,727	3,382,751	1,817,889
Merrimack	Bow, NH	451	2,667,326	1,982,492	1,185,688
** All large	coal plants	1,550	9,242,052	5,365,243	3,003,577
Mystic	Everett, MA	1,382	9,093,560	9,234,268	8,466,252
Lake Road Plant	Dayville, CT	745	3,721,965	5,279,444	4,536,819
Fore River	Weymouth, MA	688	4,247,152	4,781,876	4,048,023
Granite Ridge	Londonderry, NH	678	3,241,127	3,839,821	4,824,841
Kleen Energy	Midldetown, CT	628	0	2,040,433	4,062,939
R.I. State	Johnston, RI	528	3,043,081	3,076,553	2,415,704
Newington En.	Newington, NH	525	1,920,852	2,712,026	2,122,028
Milford Power	Milford, CT	507	3,395,512	3,920,883	3,651,538
Westbrook	Westbrook, ME	506	2,689,175	2,659,935	2,446,083
Maine Indep.	Veazie, ME	490	2,657,587	1,775,905	1,243,500
Bellingham	Bellingham, MA	475	1,728,914	1,095,126	1,728,447
Bridgeport	Bridgeport, CT	454	3,294,276	2,861,180	2,913,274
Manchester St.	Providence, RI	447	1,928,019	2,399,970	2,455,440
Ocean State	Harrisville, RI	437	1,434,006	1,448,894	1,551,102
Blackstone	Blackstone, MA	437	1,746,412	2,087,965	2,098,048
Millennium	Charlton, MA	325	2,033,339	2,407,211	2,002,904
Tiverton Power	Tiverton, RI	250	1,099,210	1,578,676	1,610,946
Verso Paper	Bucksport, ME	250	1,380,078	1,346,241	1,382,575
Berkshire Power	Agawam, MA	229	1,002,963	1,060,233	761,901
Kendall Square	Cambridge, MA	218	1,485,468	1,053,133	1,346,268
** All large	gas plants	10,199	51,142,696	56,659,773	55,668,631
Seabrook-1	Seabrook, NH	1,247	10,910,055	8,362,807	8,189,181
Millstone-3	Waterford, CT	1,233	9,335,738	9,344,084	10,751,630
Millstone-2	Waterford, CT	869	7,414,566	6,583,753	6,326,257
Pilgrim	Plymouth, MA	685	5,917,813	5,085,220	5,859,540
Vermont Yankee	Vernon, VT	620	4,782,473	4,907,355	4,989,338
** All operating	nuclear units	4,655	38,360,645	34,283,219	36,115,946

               * Rated summer output: operating, non-peaking units

In 2008, outputs of New England's remaining coal-fired power plants began to fall, and in 2010 they entered rapid decline. For 2012, the largest ones operated at only 22 percent of capacity on average, with further declines in 2013. Plants powered by combined-cycle natural gas have been filling most of the gaps. However, only some of the gas-fired plants prospered during these years. Granite Ridge, in New Hampshire, and Tiverton, in Rhode Island, saw large increases in outputs. After a terrible explosion a few months before it was to open in 2010, [22] the Kleen Energy plant in Connecticut was repaired and has done well. Half the other large natural gas-fired plants in New England suffered declines in outputs, shown in the table.

Financial pressures have also affected the five remaining nuclear power units in New England. In August, 2013, Entergy threw in the towel with Vermont Yankee, located in Vernon. [23] It will close by the end of 2014. Of the ten New England nuclear power units, Seabrook-2 was abandoned before completion, and four others were previously closed. [24] The Seabrook-1 unit in New Hampshire shows a substantial drop in output. Prolonged subnormal outputs at Seabrook-1 and at Millstone-2 in Connecticut suggest those units might be threatened.

Although several combined-cycle natural gas-fired plants became successful by 2010, during the 20 years before that the owners of such plants suffered through many problems and financial losses. Besides increases in total electricity powered by combined-cycle natural gas, the recent declines in coal-fired and nuclear power have been partly offset by increased outputs of wind and solar power, contributing to reduced total outputs from fossil-fueled and nuclear plants. [25] A problem that will continue to need attention is limited transmission capacity to convey power from generators to customers. [26]

So-called "congestion" on transmission lines has been a chronic factor in low outputs from plants using combined-cycle natural gas that are distant from the major demand centers in Connecticut and Massachusetts. [27] [28] Plants notably affected include Maine Independence in Veazie, Berkshire Power in Agawam, MA, Bellingham Energy, also in Massachusetts, and Ocean State Power in Harrisville, RI. Wind farms in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont have also encountered transmission restrictions. [29]

Through the bramble of changes, however, one result has remained consistent and strong. In New England, the long era of coal-fired, then oil-fired electricity generation has ended. A surge in natural gas from shale has provided an opportunity to expand renewable power sources, whose costs still remain so high that they operate mainly because of mandates and subsidies. If those costs can be reduced enough before prices of natural gas rise again, then coal and fuel oil will never return to dominate New England electricity.

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[1] Lindsey Konkel, Coal's slipping grip: New England, virtually coal-free, leads the way, Environmental Health News, July 1, 2013 at http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/ehs/news/2013/new-england-coal

[2] Utilities promoted efficiency. Unattributed, Edgar steam-electric station in Weymouth, Massachusetts, 1925: a national historic mechanical engineering landmark, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, 1976, at https://www.asme.org/getmedia/3f6395d3-c8d6-48fe-bd38-2f8144940638/17-Edison-Electric-Illuminating-Co.aspx Today the former Edgar, now Fore River plant in Weymouth has been repowered with combined-cycle natural gas.

[3] New England Region Annual Report, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1982, at http://nepis.epa.gov/Exe/ZyPURL.cgi?Dockey=901K0G00.txt EPA issued coal-conversion permits in 1979 for Brayton Point, in 1981 for Mt. Tom and in 1982 for Salem Harbor, all in Massachusetts.

[4] Rob Sargent, Cleaning up the filthy five, Environment Massachusetts and Massachusetts Public Interest Research Group, 2007, at http://www.environmentmassachusetts.org/clean-air/power-plants

[5] Emission standards for power plants, Statement of reasons and response to comments for 310 CMR 7.29, Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection, 2001, at http://www.mass.gov/dep/air/laws/finalrsn.doc

[6] The Connecticut campaign concentrated on mercury and sulfur dioxide emissions. Unattributed, Sooty six power plants, Clean Water Action (CT), 2003, at http://cleanwater.org/story/sooty-six-power-plants

[7] Liz Halloran, [Connecticut] takes action on mercury, Hartford Courant, 2003, at http://articles.courant.com/2003-07-03/news/0307030486_1_coal-burning-power-plants-coal-fired

[8] Jon Chesto, Mystic and Fore River plants are about to get yet another owner, Mass. Markets, 2011, at http://blogs.wickedlocal.com/massmarkets/2011/04/28/mystic-fore-river-plants-are-about-to-get-yet-another-owner-but-this-one-is-familiar/

[9] Unattributed, Boston Generating LCDS (loan-only credit default swap) auction results, CDS Market Information, 2010, at http://blog.creditlime.com/2010/09/29/boston-generating-lcds-auction-results/

[10] Chuck Kleekamp, Why oil is on the way out for New England's electric grid, Cape Cod (Hyannis) Times, 2007, at http://www.capecodtoday.com/blogs/index.php/Footnotes/2007/09/21/wind_the_beginning_of_the_end_of_oil_gen

[11] John Moss, Somerset Power gets OK to begin coal gasification, Wicked Local Somerset (MA) and Herald News, 2008, at http://www.wickedlocal.com/somerset/archive/x603847019

[12] Marc Munroe Dion, Somerset's NRG power plant closing down, Fall River (MA) Herald News, November, 2011, at http://www.heraldnews.com/business/x1312013989/Somersets-NRG-power-plant-closing-down

[13] Shanna Cleveland, Familiar cautionary tale unfolding at Mt. Tom, Conservation Law Foundation (MA), March 7, 2013, at http://www.clf.org/blog/clean-energy-climate-change/familiar-cautionary-tale-unfolding-at-mt-tom/

[14] U.S. District Court for Massachusetts, Conservation Law v. Dominion, Case cv-11069, Consent decree, February, 2012, available at http://www.clf.org/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Signed-Consent-Decree-12_11.pdf See 26. Shutdown of Salem Harbor Station.

[15] Tom Dalton, Salem power plant gets tentative state approval, Salem (MA) News, October 9, 2013, at http://www.salemnews.com/local/x1442581214/initial-State-OK-for-power-plant

[16] Jo C. Goode, Financial future of Somerset's Brayton Point is bleak, Fall River (MA) Herald News, March 1, 2013, at http://www.heraldnews.com/news/x898140479/Report-Financial-future-of-Somersets-Brayton-Point-is-bleak

[17] Steve Urbon, Brayton power station to close by 2017, New Bedford (MA) Standard-Times, October 8, 2013, at http://www.southcoasttoday.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20131008/NEWS05/310080337 The event was ignored at the time by large general-interest news media in New England.

[18] A few coal-fired plants, including 530 MW Bridgeport Harbor, remain in standby for extreme summer peaks and emergencies. However, in 2012 Bridgeport Harbor ran an average of only 3 percent of rated capacity. Brian Lockhart, Bridgeport Harbor Station gets permit for five more years, (Bridgeport) Connecticut Post, November, 2012, at http://www.ctpost.com/local/article/Bridgeport-s-Harbor-Station-plant-gets-permit-for-4010666.php

[19] Kathryn Marchocki, Merrimack Station power plant in Bow temporarily shut down, Manchester (NH) Union Leader, May, 2012, at http://www.unionleader.com/article/20120508/NEWS05/705089931

[20] Bob Sanders, Public Service of New Hampshire turns to New Hampshire Supreme Court in scrubber showdown with state's Public Utilities Commission, New Hampshire Business Review, October 4, 2013, at http://www.nhbr.com/October-4-2013/PSNH-turns-to-NH-Supreme-Court-in-scrubber-showdown-with-PUC/ PSNH installed wet gas desulfurization when it might have gotten by with less expensive sorbent injection and fabric filters.

[21] Power plant operating data, Form EIA-923 and related forms, U.S. Energy Information Admimistration, 1970-2012, at http://www.eia.gov/electricity/data/eia923/

[22] Unattributed, Kleen Energy natural gas explosion, U.S. Chemical Safety Board, 2010, at http://www.csb.gov/kleen-energy-natural-gas-explosion/

[23] Matthew L. Wald, Entergy will close the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant, New York Times, August 28, 2013, at http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/28/science/entergy-announces-closing-of-vermont-nuclear-plant.html

[24] Unattributed, Nuclear power safety in New England, Union of Concerned Scientists (MA), April, 2012, at http://www.ucsusa.org/assets/documents/nuclear_power/nuclear-power-safety-in-new-england.pdf

[25] Massachusetts state profile and energy estimates, U.S. Energy Information Admimistration, 2013, at http://www.eia.gov/state/?sid=MA See similar data for other New England states.

[26] New England congestion area of concern, in National Electric Transmission Congestion Study, U.S. Department of Energy, 2009, pp. 52-58 at http://congestion09.anl.gov/documents/docs/congestion_study_2009.pdf

[27] Unattributed, Transmission congestion cost rising in New England, Electric Light and Power, 2001, at http://www.elp.com/articles/2001/10/transmission-congestion-cost-rising-in-new-england.html

[28] Brad Kane, Billion-dollar transmission project anticipates power weaknesses, Hartford (CT) Business Review, 2010, at http://www.hartfordbusiness.com/article/20101129/PRINTEDITION/311299991/billion-dollar-transmission-project-anticipates-power-weaknesses

[29] Diane Cardwell, Intermittent nature of green power is challenge for utilities, New York Times, August 15, 2013, at http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/15/business/energy-environment/intermittent-nature-of-green-power-is-challenge-for-utilities.html

Uncertain promises of thorium-fueled nuclear power

Since the 1940s, thorium-fueled nuclear power has been an occasional matter of interest. The late Dr. Glenn Seaborg first isolated the fissile isotope uranium-233 from neutron-irradiated thorium in 1941. He predicted a potential for thorium as a nuclear fuel in 1946. [1] The late Dr. Alvin Weinberg, former director of Oak Ridge National Laboratory, was an early advocate for developing a thorium fuel-cycle.

Despite perennial interest, thorium has remained a research topic and has never been used to fuel commercial power reactors for sustained operation. The early days of nuclear energy were dominated by development of weapons, for which plutonium-239 produced from neutron-irradiated uranium-238 proved more versatile than uranium-233. Because of greater investment and technical knowledge, a uranium-based fuel cycle enhanced by its plutonium byproducts was adopted for military reactors and then for commercial power reactors. It has remained entrenched as the only sustained, commercial nuclear-power fuel-cycle. [2]

There is much speculation and considerable misinformation [3] available on thorium-fueled nuclear power but relatively little solid knowledge, as compared with knowledge of uranium-fueled power. Three main approaches have been actively investigated: pressurized heavy-water reactors, now active mainly in India, molten salt reactors, now active only in China, and high-temperature gas-cooled reactors, such as the former Fort St. Vrain thorium-fueled reactor in the U.S. and former THTR in Germany, now active nowhere at commercial scale. All these approaches have been found to suffer from major, unsolved problems.

Thorium has no long-lived fissile isotope as a minor constituent, comparable to uranium-235. As with production of plutonium, thorium-232 must be transmuted to fissile uranium-233 using neutron irradiation. That can be provided from a uranium-235-enriched or a plutonium fuel-cycle, in a light water-reactor, or from a natural or an enriched uranium fuel-cycle, in a heavy-water reactor. In any case, a substantial "breeding" period is needed to produce enough uranium-233 to contribute substantially to power output.

India appears committed by technology-lock-in to heavy-water reactors, which it began to develop with U.S. and Canadian help in 1956. India surreptitiously used spent fuel from its first CIRUS reactor to obtain plutonium for nuclear weapons. Efficient use of thorium in heavy-water reactors involves high burn-up, at least two to three times the current industry practice with light-water reactors, and extended fuel-rod exposure, ten years or more. Zirconium alloy cladding for fuel rods has not been validated for such conditions, and conventionally manufactured fuel rods probably would not survive. No other technology is currently proven. [4]

China has announced development of a molten-salt reactor, leveraging knowledge from the MSRE project at Oak Ridge, 1961-1969. While avoiding some problems associated with heavy-water reactors, molten-salt reactors used for power generation have other problems. One is heat-transfer piping, which must function reliably for 40 or more years in corrosive, hydrogen-bearing molten salts at very high temperatures and pressures. The MSRE project validated Hastelloy-N piping--but only at lower temperatures and pressures and only for 18 months at full power. Key, unsolved engineering problems for heat-transfer piping in molten-salt reactors are neutron and hydrogen embrittlement and corrosion-promoted stress-cracking. [5]

Of the large, high-temperature thorium-fueled reactors, Fort St. Vrain in Colorado opened first, in 1979. It suffered from leaks and component faulting. After a fire in 1987 and the discovery of pipe cracks in 1988, Public Service of Colorado shut it down. The plant reached full rated power for only two days and averaged less than 15 percent of rated capacity during nine years of commercial operation. THTR in Germany opened in 1985 and closed in 1988, with similar episodes of major problems. It averaged about 40 percent of capacity. Neither effort solved problems of fuel reprocessing, which is made especially difficult by chemically inert coatings on fuel elements of high-temperature reactors. [6]

Most thorium-fueled reactors, including all those noted, involve fuel reprocessing to extract uranium-233 and remove neutron poisons and other fission products. All reprocessing is complicated by highly penetrating gamma radiation from nuclear decay products of uranium-232, which is always being released in thorium-fueled reactors from neutron reactions with uranium-233 and its precursor, proactinium-233. Among the decay products are polonium-212 and thallium-208, which both emit high-energy gammas at about 2.6 MeV. [7]

Typical of thorium-fueled reactors, the one at Fort St. Vrain was enclosed in 15-foot-thick concrete. A smaller but more expensive alternative shield employs depleted uranium. Adequate radiation shields for bulk quantities of irradiated thorium, for its uranium-produced decay products and for radioactive waste from thorium-fueled reactors are too heavy to transport by standard rail, highway or air services. [8] Only relatively small quantities could be packaged for shipment in those ways.

Rationales for developing thorium fuel-cycles have usually focused on four claims: (1) more plentiful, less hazardous fuel at lower costs, (2) intrinsic resistance to diversion for nuclear weapons, (3) smaller amounts of nuclear waste and (4) more stable operation. [2] None of those claims stand up robustly to review. Potential thorium-fueled power reactors would present hazards and limitations similar to those of uranium-fueled power reactors, differing mainly in details.

As to claim (1), more plentiful, less hazardous fuel at lower costs: While the geologic abundance of thorium is greater than that of uranium, much of that thorium is at low concentrations that are impractical to mine. Thorium-bearing substances extracted from rare-earth mines can be more toxic than substances from uranium mines. [9] They have been associated with high incidences of severe mining-induced diseases. [10]

As to claim (2), intrinsic resistance to diversion for nuclear weapons: Uranium-233, which can be extracted from neutron-irradiated thorium by a chemical process, is a more powerful nuclear explosive than bomb-grade uranium, highly enriched in uranium-235. [11] Its claimed resistance to diversion comes from contamination at parts-per-million levels by uranium-232, with highly penetrating radiation from decay products. However, that would not necessarily deter terrorists, who often mount suicide missions. [12]

As to claim (3), smaller amounts of nuclear waste: While the fission daughter and actinide products in thorium-fuel waste are substantially less and shorter-lived than those in uranium-fuel waste, for the same yield in energy, [7] requiring isolation for perhaps ten thousand years instead of a million or more years, the shorter-term components of thorium-fuel waste, with deeply penetrating gamma radiation that remains hazardous for at least a thousand years, are much more difficult to handle safely. [13]

As to claim (4), more stable operation: While the neutron cross-section of uranium-233 is more uniform than those of other fissile isotopes, helping to stabilize performance, [7] in practice thorium-fueled reactors have been plagued with leaks, component faulting, power excursions, fires and materials failures. The practical history of thorium-fueled reactors--as contrasted with theory--recalls the long learning curves with uranium-fueled reactors. While no major disaster has occurred yet with thorium-fueled reactors, the experiences with them so far amount to only a tiny fraction of experiences with uranium-fueled reactors.

The notion of a permanently enclosed thorium-fueled reactor, operating continuously for 30 or more years, has been proposed. [14] It has not yet been proven practical from either a scientific or an engineering perspective. The gradual build-up of neutron poisons from fission would be a key challenge for long-term operation, and the unresolved engineering issues of long-term embrittlement and corrosion are at least as challenging for such an approach as for other types of thorium-fueled reactors.

Cost of nuclear fuel has long been a prominent argument for developing thorium fuel-cycles but is clearly a red herring. [15] Capital costs of reactors have dominated for more than 30 years, and fuel costs have sometimes been considered negligible. Because of requirements for extremely heavy shielding, fully robotic operations inside shielding, and fuel reprocessing, thorium-fueled reactors could be more expensive than uranium-fueled reactors of equal capacity, so costs of electricity from them might be higher. [16]

Until a shortage of uranium emerges, at least decades from now, there will not be any strong financial or environmental reason for industrially developed countries to pursue thorium fuel-cycles. Even with such a shortage developing, reprocessing spent uranium fuel to obtain plutonium fuel might be less costly and no more hazardous. The interests of power generation will be better served by long-term research investigating the unsolved engineering problems of thorium-fueled reactors.

Some 60 years ago, the late U.S. Admiral Hyman Rickover, an early leader in military applications of nuclear reactors, summarized what he already saw as jejune enthusiasms for nuclear technologies--comparing what he called "academic" reactors with practical ones. [17] Abbreviated here:

Academic	Practical
------------	------------
Simple	Complicated
Small	Large
Cheap	Expensive
Light	Heavy
Easy to build	Hard to build
Not available	Available now

Most enthusiasts for thorium-fueled reactor technologies are academics, researchers or gadflies. Few have practical, daily working experience designing, developing, operating, maintaining, testing, regulating or certifying nuclear reactors or power systems of any kind. History has shown that such backgrounds fail to yield dependable estimates for energy technologies, so that any estimates from such sources ought to be discounted.

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[1] U.S. Secretary of State, Report on the international control of atomic energy (the Acheson-Lilienthal Report), March, 1946, available at http://www.learnworld.com/ZNW/LWText.Acheson-Lilienthal.html. Unattributed, United Press, Third nuclear source bared, Tuscaloosa (AL) News, October 21, 1946, available at http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=ckxBAAAAIBAJ&pg=6357%2C2252004

[2] F. Sokolov, K. Fukuda and H.P. Nawada, Thorium fuel cycle: Potential benefits and challenges, International Atomic Energy Agency, 2005, at http://www-pub.iaea.org/mtcd/publications/pdf/te_1450_web.pdf

[3] Unattributed, quoting Prof. Reza Hashemi-Nezhad, Thorium reactor, Thorium Enthusiasts, 2011, at http://www.thorium.tv/en/thorium_reactor/thorium_reactor_1.php

[4] Paul R. Kasten, Review of the Radkowsky thorium reactor concept, Science and Global Security 7:237-269, 1998, available at http://www.princeton.edu/sgs/publications/sgs/pdf/7_3kasten.pdf

[5] Kun Chen, Thorium-fueled molten salt reactor research in Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Department of Nuclear Engineering, University of California at Berkeley, August 6, 2012, announcement at http://events.berkeley.edu/index.php/calendar/sn/NUC.html?event_ID=51922&date=2012-08-06

[6] Tony Kindelspire, Colorado nuclear plant at Fort St. Vrain had short, troubled life, Longmont (CO) Weekly, March 28, 2011, at http://www.longmontweekly.com/ci_17701792

[7] Michel Lung and Otto Gremm, Perspectives of the thorium fuel cycle, Nuclear Engineering and Design 180:133-146, 1998, available at http://thorium.tym.sk/TP/sizi/Perspective%20of%20the%20thorium%20fuel%20cycle.pdf

[8] L.H. Brooks, R.G. Wymer and A.L. Lotts, Progress in the thorium and urainium-233 reprocessing, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, 1974, at http://www.osti.gov/bridge/servlets/purl/4309002-8Dky0W/4309002.pdf

[9] Comparing thorium-232 with natural uranium, in Radionuclides (occupational limits), U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 2012, at http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/part020/appb/

[10] Cécile Bontron, En Chine, les terres rares tuent des villages, Le Monde (France), July 19, 2012, at http://www.lemonde.fr/asie-pacifique/article/2012/07/19/en-chine-les-terres-rares-tuent-des-villages_1735857_3216.html

[11] Rene G. Sanchez, Minimum critical mass: Analytical studies, Los Alamos National Laboratory, 1993, available at http://www.fas.org/sgp/othergov/doe/lanl/lib-www/la-pubs/00215722.pdf

[12] Cameron Reed, A thorium future?, American Scientist 98(5):364, 2010, at http://www.americanscientist.org/issues/pub/2010/5/a-thorium-future

[13] Kevin Hesketh and Andrew Worrall, The thorium fuel cycle, UK National Nuclear Laboratory, 2011, at http://www.nnl.co.uk/media/27860/nnl__1314092891_thorium_cycle_position_paper.pdf

[14] Gabriele Rennie, Self-contained, portable reactor, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 2004, at https://www.llnl.gov/str/JulAug04/Smith.html

[15] Robert Hargraves and Ralph Moir, Liquid-fuel nuclear reactors, Forum on Physics and Society, American Physical Society, January, 2011, at http://www.aps.org/units/fps/newsletters/201101/hargraves.cfm

[16] Arjun Makhijani and Michele Boyd, Thorium fuel: No panacea for nuclear power, Physicians for Social Responsibility, 2009, at http://ieer.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/thorium2009factsheet.pdf

[17] Hyman G. Rickover, Letter to the Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, June 5, 1953, quoted in Nuclear and Radiation Studies Board, Internationalization of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle: Goals, Strategies and Challenges, National Academies Press, 2009, p. 60, at http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=12477&page=60

Cause of Gulf blowout remains only partly known

Unlike the Final Report of the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, the Chief Counsel's Report, released February 17, 2011, provides some technical analysis of the disaster, along with new information. [1] The most striking new information discloses that, after cementing, the Macondo well reservoir of oil and gas under very high pressure was left with a potential channel into the well's production casing through an open float collar. It confirms that blowout oil, gas and sand flowed upward inside the casing rather than through the annulus around the production casing, as most early descriptions had estimated.

The Chief Counsel's Report describes some steps performed after the July 15, 2010, actions that ended the flows of oil and gas. BP personnel, using Development Driller II, recovered an upper section of the production casing, the attached casing hanger and samples of annulus contents [p. 43]. The annulus samples had low hydrocarbons, and the outside of the casing hanger showed no erosion [Fig. 4.1.4], indicating that blowout flow did not occur in the annulus between the production casing and outer casing. The inside of the casing hanger showed severe erosion, indicating that abrasive blowout flow traveled inside the casing--evidence that appears conclusive.

Unless there was a downhole rupture in the production casing, blowout flow ran through the casing shoe. Evidence cited in the Chief Counsel's Report shows that check valves in a float collar above the shoe probably failed to activate and interrupt back-flow [pp. 88-90]. A mud flow rate was never measured that would have been enough to displace the auto-fill tube propping the check valves open. Pressures applied while trying to displace the auto-fill tube may instead have broken some element of the casing string. The check valves would not have fully sealed out oil and gas flow, but they would have reinforced the shoe track cement barrier, had they been closed.

Although the Chief Counsel's Report does not describe pressure balances, displacing about 3,300 feet of drilling mud with seawater, following the cementing operation, left over 1,200 psi of pressure difference on shoe track cement. Highly foamed cements may achieve less than 2,000 psi compressive strength, and the foamed cement used for the Macondo well may have been unstable. Three out of four laboratory tests performed by Halliburton and nine out of nine tests later performed by Chevron, as requested by the National Commission, showed instability, resulting in porous structures with low strength. A collapse of shoe track cement, unrestrained by check valves, could have allowed oil and gas to enter the production casing.

The Chief Counsel's Report has been criticized for preparation by lawyers rather than engineers. However, the National Commission and its staff were both headed by lawyers. No working engineers served on its staff. Its assistant staff director was an economist. Its "senior scientist" had been communications network manager. The commission did not form an advisory team of engineers and scientists. Its access to practical and scientific knowledge and assessment of deepwater drilling was very limited. Out of its 85 named consultants, only one is a petroleum drilling engineer, currently working as an independent. One is a petroleum chemist. One is a former Interior Department oil and gas well regulator. Three are petroleum engineering professors, all from the same university. At least 30 of the named consultants are lawyers, and at least 40 are policy analysts.

Despite an order from President Obama stating it would be "focused on...environmental and safety precautions," the National Commission focused on determining responsibility for the disaster. About half of the commission's Final Report describes background and events of the disaster, detailing who did what and when. [2] Those issues are critical when determining comparative negligence for settling damage claims, but they are peripheral to a technical analysis of how the Macondo well blowout occurred. The Chief Counsel's Report amplifies the emphasis on assigning blame, providing an essentially forensic analysis of events, illustrated by a company that serves trial lawyers by preparing exhibits. It is mainly fortuitous that forensic analysis resulted in public release of new technical information.

The Chief Counsel's Report lodges more responsibility for the disaster than was previously clear with haphazard cement preparation and testing by Halliburton [pp. 121-123]. It gives no explanation for a discrepancy between laboratory test conditions and downhole conditions. The report shows a plastic test cell for foamed cement, with brass fittings [Fig. 4.4.3], probably rated for no more than 1,000 psi. Downhole pressures were around 13,000 psi, substantially compressing foam bubbles and resulting in cement densities higher than specified and higher than measured by laboratory tests. The report cites several obstructions by Halliburton to investigations: providing irrelevant references to industry standards [p. 120], refusing to provide company documents [pp. 118, 120 and 121], refusing to describe test methods [p. 119], refusing to provide materials for third-party testing [p. 119] and refusing to provide testimony by company personnel [pp. 118, 120, 121 and 122].

The main likely impact of the National Commission's work will be to help defend whatever penalties the federal government levies against BP, Transocean and/or Halliburton for the disaster. Much of the Chief Counsel's Report could populate a trial brief, for use in a lawsuit challenging the penalties. A major opportunity was lost to examine the cause of the blowout while evidence was fresh.

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[1] National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, Chief Counsel's Report, February, 2011, available from https://s3.amazonaws.com/chief_counsel/pdf/C21462-407_CCR_for_print.pdf .

[2] National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling, Final Report, January, 2011, available from https://s3.amazonaws.com/pdf_final/DEEPWATER_ReporttothePresident_FINAL.pdf .

Recapturing carbon dioxide from the air

Would-be practitioners of "climate engineering," once called "geoengineering," are stumbling across a minefield of problems. Early investigations assumed the key issue would be finding ways to block sunlight from reaching the lower atmosphere. [1] [2] Reducing solar inputs could retard and possibly reverse warming trends. However, more recent investigations, using weather modeling and weather records after large volcanic eruptions, show that blocking sunlight reduces rainfall. [3] Land areas already at low rainfall could become deserts.

Discovery of major hazards from blocking sunlight sparked renewed interest in recapturing carbon dioxide already released by human activity, a difficult prospect that would face three key challenges:
(1) a very large amount of carbon dioxide to be recaptured
(2) low concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere
(3) lack of storage capacity for gaseous carbon dioxide

The total carbon dioxide released to the atmosphere from human activities has been about 800 billion tons since the early 1800s. [4] [5] [6] A large majority came from burning coal. Since 2000, the total has been increasing an average of 2.0 percent per year. [4] Those observations set practical requirements for any proposals to recapture carbon dioxide. A realistic approach must extract and permanently store several hundred billion tons.

Carbon dioxide penetrates some solid materials, including many rubbers and plastics, more than other gases do, making possible separation by a solid, semi-permeable membrane. Other potential membrane separations depend on molecular size differences and porous membranes. [7] Commercial membrane systems for removing carbon dioxide from pressurized gas streams are available. As applied to recapture from the atmosphere, key limitations are the need to compress very large air volumes, the need for a cascade of separation stages because of the low carbon dioxide concentration, and the low permeabilities and flow kinetics of known membranes. Recapture systems using membranes would be enormous, energy-intensive and costly; practical systems have not yet been demonstrated.

Absorption of carbon dioxide by strong alkali is a well known separation technique, widely applied in equipment that maintains sealed environments. It has been demonstrated for recovery of carbon dioxide at atmospheric concentrations, and a closed-cycle process is known. [8] The last process stage is calcining lime at very high temperatures, as used to make cement. It yields concentrated carbon dioxide but takes large amounts of energy, about 2 MWh per ton of carbon dioxide. [9] To recapture the atmospheric inventory of carbon dioxide released by human activities would require a total of about 2 billion GWh. Supplying that energy from fossil fuels would work at cross-purposes. Supplying it from nuclear power would take 5,000 large, 1 GWe reactors about 50 years. Costs would approach US$100 trillion for energy, [10] plus costs of chemical processing steps.

Those and other methods of recapturing carbon dioxide would be useless alone, because there would be no place to put all the carbon dioxide. Even when compressed to a liquid, carbon dioxide occupies about six times the volume of the same amount of carbon as coal. In all the world's mines and wells combined, there is no space for more than a small fraction of the carbon dioxide that human activity has released. Most mines and wells have rock fissures that allow carbon dioxide to seep back to the atmosphere. Permanent storage requires combining carbon dioxide into a stable, solid mineral. While not difficult, most mineralization processes start with a substrate that was made from a carbonate, by driving off carbon dioxide. Obviously that will not do.

Rock formations containing substantial fractions of calcium and magnesium oxides readily combine with carbon dioxide, making carbonates. The formations useful as substrates are geologically young, because when weathered alkaline earth oxides have been consumed. Suitable formations are uncommon and variable in reactivity. [11] Rock formations containing substantial calcium silicate as wollastonite or magnesium silicate as forsterite are also potential substrates. [12] [13] Suitable formations are more common than those containing alkaline earth oxides but are also variable in reactivity. Reaction rates are slower than those of alkaline earth oxides, taking many hours to reach only modest yields.

Silicate carbonation is enhanced when rock substrates are pretreated at very high temperatures and ground to very fine dust. About three-fourths of silicate will then carbonate with a half-hour exposure. The process is energy-intensive; costs have been estimated at about US$70 per ton of carbon dioxide. [14] An unanswered question is emission of carbon dioxide from high-temperature pretreatment. Using the process to store the inventory of carbon dioxide released by human activities, costs would approach US$50 trillion.

Known technologies can recapture carbon dioxide from the air and store it permanently. However, potential costs of applying them to recapture all carbon dioxide released by human activities probably approach US$200 trillion. With total emissions of carbon dioxide increasing at two percent per year, incremental costs to recapture from the atmosphere the current carbon dioxide emissions probably approach US$4 trillion per year. Such an amount could be viewed as remediation of potential environmental damage. It could be raised by taxing carbon dioxide emissions at about US$900 per ton of carbon. That is far more than US$1 to US$50 tax rates factoring in recent political controversies.

Taxing carbon dioxide emissions enough to pay for their recapture from the air and their permanent storage, using those known technologies, would probably raise U.S. retail gasoline prices from about US$3 to about US$6 per gallon. It would probably raise wholesale U.S. prices for coal-fired electricity from about US$.05 to about US$.60 per KWh. Ending further carbon dioxide additions and recapturing all the releases from human activity, carried out over 50 years, would probably cost about 12 percent of the gross world product, estimated from the current level. Less expensive technologies may eventually be developed. For example, carbon dioxide capture from power-plant flue gases is being tested and will probably be less costly. Catalysts that reduce energy consumption have been conjectured, but so far no economically effective catalyst has been found. Substantial improvements are not likely to be found quickly in such longstanding, well known areas of technology.

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[1] James E. Hansen and Andrew A. Lacis, Sun and dust versus greenhouse gases, Nature 346:713-719, August 23, 1990.

[2] Edward M. Teller, Lowell Wood and Roderick Hyde, Prospects for physics-based modulation of global change, UCR Livermore National Laboratory Report UCRL-JC-128715, August 15, 1997, available at www.osti.gov/accomplishments/documents/fullText/ACC0229.pdf.

[3] Gabriele C. Hegerl and Susan Solomon, Risks of climate engineering, Science 325:955-956, August 21, 2009.

[4] Pieter Tans, Mauna Loa carbon dioxide records, U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Earth Systems Research Laboratory, 2010, available through www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/.

[5] D.M. Etheridge, L.P. Steele, R.L. Langenfelds, R.J. Francey, J-M. Barnola and V.I. Morgan, Historical CO2 record derived from ice cores, Australia Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, Division of Atmospheric Research, 1998, available at http://cdiac.ornl.gov/ftp/trends/co2/lawdome.smoothed.yr20.

[6] Kevin E. Trenberth and Lesley Smith, The mass of the atmosphere, Journal of Climate 18(6):864-875, 2005.

[7] Colin A. Scholes, Sandra E. Kentish and Geoff W. Stevens, Carbon dioxide separation through polymeric membrane systems for flue gas applications, Recent Patents on Chemical Engineering 1:52-66, 2008, available at www.bentham.org/cheng/samples/cheng%201-1/Sandra%20E.%20Kentish.pdf.

[8] Gregory V. Lowry, Joshuah Stolaroff and David Keith, CO2 extraction from ambient air using alkali-metal hydroxide solutions, American Chemical Society, Division of Fuel Chemistry Proceedings 49(1):362-363, 2004, available at www.anl.gov/PCS/acsfuel/preprint%20archive/Files/49_1_Anaheim_03-04_0861.pdf.

[9] Wicky Moffat and M.R.W. Walmsley, Understanding lime calcination kinetics for energy cost reduction, Australian Pulp and Paper Industry Technical Association Proceedings 59:487-494, 2005, available at www.tappsa.co.za/archive2/Journal_papers/Understanding_lime_calcination/understanding_lime_calcination.html.

[10] Craig A. Severance, Business risks and costs of new nuclear power, Electricity Journal 22(4):112-120, 2009, draft version available at http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009.pdf.

[11] N. Koukouzas, V. Gemeni and H.J. Ziock, Sequestration of CO2 in magnesium silicates, International Journal of Mineral Processing 93:179-186, 2009, available at www.lanl.gov/source/orgs/ees/ees14/pdfs/09/Koukouzas09.pdf.

[12] Sebastian Teir, Sanni Eloneva and Ron Zevenhoven, Production of precipitated calcium carbonate from calcium silicates and carbon dioxide, Energy Conversion and Management 46(18):2954-2979, 2005.

[13] George D. Guthrie, Jr., J. William Carey, Deborah Bergfeld, Darrin Byler, Steve Chipera, Hans-Joachim Ziock and Klaus Lackner, Geochemical aspects of the carbonation of magnesium silicates, Los Alamos National Laboratory, National Conference on Carbon Sequestration, Washington D.C., May 14-17, 2001, available at www.netl.doe.gov/publications/proceedings/01/carbon_seq/6c4.pdf.

[14] W.K. O'Connor, D C. Dahlin, G. E. Rush, C. L. Dahlin and W. K. Collins, Carbon dioxide sequestration by direct mineral carbonation, Minerals and Metallurgical Processing 19(2):95-101, 2002.

Disaster by design, the Deepwater Horizon blowout

The April 20, 2010, blowout of an oil and gas well in the Gulf of Mexico, south of the Louisiana coast, created the worst environmental crisis for the United States since the massive dust storms of Great Depression years. Both occurred because of mismanaged natural resources, but otherwise they greatly differed. The Dust Bowl was a result of hundreds of thousands of farmers tilling marginal land without crop rotation, leaving soils vulnerable to severe drought. [1] The well blowout came from a highly concentrated activity, involving a few hundred people attempting to access a high-pressure reservoir, drilling from the high-technology Deepwater Horizon platform in about one mile water depth without adequate margins of safety. [2]

Both disasters might have been prevented by adequate government regulation. In the 1920s, when it would have mattered most, there was hardly any government presence in agriculture other than the field stations set up by states and the federal government to assist with, but not to regulate, crop management. The federal government and many states were in the grip of deeply conservative, even reactionary administrations, firmly opposed to government regulations. Their closest approach had been the federal Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, passed during the Theodore Roosevelt administration and largely aimed at unsanitary meat packing. [3]

The 2010 Gulf of Mexico well blowout came 41 years after a similar disaster, the 1969 well blowout in Santa Barbara Channel, a few miles off the California coast. Shocked by gross pollution of the Pacific coastline, Congress swiftly passed the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969. [4] It formed a basis of regulation that had become institutionalized in missions of government agencies by the time of the 2010 disaster. Yet like the Pure Food and Drug Act, the National Environmental Policy Act proved susceptible to manipulation and evasion. Regulations created and enforced under it failed to prevent a catastrophe, even though when one occurred the federal government was a progressive administration committed to environmental protection.

The major cause of the 2010 Gulf of Mexico well blowout was quickly assessed, only several days after public release of a well schematic. [5] Dr. Arthur Berman, a Houston petroleum geologist, showed that unsafe design for the Macondo 1 well had left unrestrained areas of bare drillhole, above a high-pressure oil and gas reservoir, connected to the sea floor through an annulus between metal casings. [6] His analysis of the final cementing operation was soon confirmed through a public release of data from the well owner. [7] What had yet to be released at that point were documents showing the faulty design as submitted to and approved by the Minerals Management Service (MMS), an agency of the U.S. Department of the Interior set up to supervise offshore oil and gas operations.

As of 2010, MMS had managed federal leases of outer continental shelf lands and supervised their operations for 28 years, under authority of the Federal Oil & Gas Royalty Management Act of 1982. Many responsibilities were created by the National Environmental Policy Act, which requires environmental impact statements for such activities. During several years before the 2010 blowout, MMS had been repeatedly troubled by mismanagement and corruption. In 1998 and subsequent years major blunders occurred. Faulty contracts allowed leaseholders to avoid many billions of dollars in oil and gas royalties, disclosed by the New York Times February 15, 2006. Although the problems were discovered within MMS in 2004, MMS took no action to correct them until the public disclosure, according to the inspector general for the Interior Department. [8]

MMS had long paid cash bonuses to employees for expediting work related to oil and gas development, a key element in creating a corrupt job environment. [9] In 2008 MMS was found by its inspector general to host what he called a "culture of ethical failure." Abuses cited included patronage, inside dealing, kickbacks, revolving door employment and misuse of federal property--extending over a period of at least four years. As a result of the investigation several employees were reassigned, some quit, and at least one was convicted of a felony. [10]

In 2010 the Macondo 1 well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico led reporters to discover that its lease and many other projects in the Gulf of Mexico had been exempted by MMS from environmental reviews. As a result, companies had not been required to prepare and document emergency responses. The Deepwater Horizon platform lacked a fail-safe blowout preventer, and the Macondo 1 well owner lacked salvage equipment. In budget documents MMS had claimed efficiency from using "categorical exclusion" for a "streamlined" form of environmental review. [11] What the agency did was generate a prepackaged deal for companies. A pro-forma environmental review was prepared by and approved within the agency. After companies paid for leases, they were automatically exempted from reviews, and their applications to conduct operations were, quite literally, rubber-stamped.

The Macondo 1 well was mainly regulated under a "multisale EIS" (Environmental Impact Statement) covering 11 Gulf of Mexico leases, prepared by MMS staff in 2007. Its risk analysis finds that over 40 years, "there is a 69-86 percent chance of one or more spills [of] 1,000 barrels [or more] occurring" [page 4-231]. The "multisale EIS" finds substantial risk that a spill of 1,000 or more barrels will pollute many miles of coastline [page 4-234]. It also indicates that pollution can persist for many years [page 4-238]. Thus MMS knew that a disaster in this area was likely and that consequences would probably be widespread and long-lasting. [12]

The exploration plan filed with MMS to drill the Macondo 1 well described a worst-case oil discharge as 300,000 barrels per day, giving a number without saying "barrels." However, MMS instructions for such plans show daily volume in barrels. In less than 12 days such a discharge would exceed the world's worst ocean oil disaster, the 1979 Ixtoc 1 well blowout, also in the Gulf of Mexico. MMS knew the Macondo 1 well had the potential to cause a catastrophe, yet it gave the plan routine approval, letting the owner go ahead without documented procedures for responding to such a radical emergency. [13]

Immediately after the Macondo 1 well blowout the U.S. Coast Guard failed to mount coordinated rescue, control and salvage operations. Years of focusing on terrorism rather than natural and industrial disasters had left it unprepared for such an event. MMS permitted relief wells without requiring any more safety preparation than it had required for the well that blew out. The U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration distributed a hasty assessment of the crude oil discharge rate that was soon shown to be scientifically faulty, and then it refused to release data and methods. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a hasty decision endorsing untested use of large quantities of dispersants, when environmental evidence showed that similar chemicals had led to long term environmental damage. [14]

Despite contributions to the problems, the Coast Guard and MMS were put in charge of an initial investigation. [15] Outrage over crude oil reaching beaches and marshland and protests over a compromised investigation led to a rapid series of actions: reorganization plans for the MMS, resignation of the MMS director, suspension of all offshore drilling in deep water, new drilling permits and offshore oil and gas leasing, and appointment of a Presidential investigating commission. [16] The U.S. Geological Survey prepared an estimate of the discharge, putting it at 12 to 19 thousand barrels (500 to 800 thousand gallons) of crude oil per day. [17]

Through May, 2010, the Macondo 1 well owner tried a series of maneuvers to trap or plug the oil discharge, without much success. Similar maneuvers had been tried with previous subsea well blowouts, notably the 1979 135F platform, Ixtoc 1 well blowout in the Bay of Campeche off Mexico. Despite the same kinds of attempts, that blowout flowed for 290 days, discharging an estimated 120-200 million gallons of crude oil into the southern Gulf of Mexico, the world's greatest accidental ocean oil disaster so far. [18]

Sometimes such maneuvers succeeded, as with the 1977 Bravo platform, well B14 blowout in the North Sea off Norway. But when reservoir pressure was high and consequent gas flow was strong they failed, as they recently did with the Montara platform, well H1 blowout in the Timor Sea off northwest Australia, which flowed for 70 days. [19] Company and U.S. officials lied, saying the Macondo 1 well blowout was "unprecedented," and success of the maneuvers would be unpredictable. All that was really unprecedented was water depth. There was otherwise substantial experience with similar blowouts, but there was an unprepared industry and a similarly unprepared government. [20]

The blowout preventer (BOP) configured for the Deepwater Horizon platform failed; otherwise the blowout would have been prevented. That failure was also by design, as the U.S. Minerals Management Service has been made fully aware. [21] Current-generation blowout preventers depend on shearing blind rams (SBRs) to cut drill pipe, so as to allow floating platforms like Deepwater Horizon to seal a well, disconnect from it and move away. Current-generation SBRs cannot cut through pipe joints, the enlarged, hardened sections of steel that join segments of drill pipe. About ten percent of the lineal extent of drill pipe is joint. However, BOP rams do not close with a snap. Their hydraulic systems are regulated, and they take most of a minute to close. During that time the force of a blowout is pushing drill pipe upward. As an SBR nears the point of full closure, inevitably an upward-moving pipe joint lodges in it. After trapping the pipe joint, the SBR then cannot cut it.

U.S. government says it will revise offshore oil and gas regulations and agency organizations. However, few if any people working in U.S. government actually know what to do. In the aftermath of the 1969 Santa Barbara disaster laws were written, but then they were often ignored. If the aftermath of the 1979 Bay of Campeche catastrophe, industry developed a slightly improved blowout preventer (in use at the Macondo 1 well), and U.S. government prepared a few internal studies. [22] As a result, MMS knew that existing offshore oil and gas well development was unsafe and knew that neither government nor industry was prepared for a major emergency, but it failed to generate plans, conduct relevant research, arrange for improved equipment and supplies, perform engineering evaluations or coordinate such efforts with companies or other agencies. Decades of opportunity were squandered, leading to another catastrophe.

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[1] R. Douglas Hurt, The Dust Bowl: An Agricultural and Social History, Burnham, 1981.

[2] Tom Fowler, Experts have their doubts on well's design, Houston Chronicle, May 26, 2010, available at www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/deepwaterhorizon/7022355.html. Ian Urbina, Documents show early worries about safety of rig, New York Times, May 30, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/30/us/30rig.html.

[3] James Harvey Young, Pure Food: Securing the Federal Food and Drugs Act of 1906, Princeton University Press, 1989.

[4] Matthew J. Lindstrom and Zachary A. Smith, The National Environmental Policy Act: Judicial Misconstruction, Legislative Indifference and Executive Neglect, Texas A&M University Press, 2002.

[5] U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee, Testimony of Timothy Probert, May 12, 2010, available at http://energycommerce.house.gov/Press_111/20100512/Probert.Testimony.05.12.2010.pdf.

[6] Arthur E. Berman, What caused the Deepwater Horizon disaster? The Oil Drum, May 21, 2010, available at www.theoildrum.com/node/6493.

[7] U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee, BP presentation: Deepwater Horizon interim incident investigation, May 24, 2010, available at http://energycommerce.house.gov/documents/20100527/BP.Presentation.pdf (19 MB), page 14.

[8] Edmund L. Andrews, U.S. has royalty plan to give windfall to oil companies, New York Times, February 15, 2006, available at www.nytimes.com/2006/02/14/business/14oil.html. Edmund L. Andrews, Oil lease chief knew of error, report asserts, New York Times, January 18, 2007, available at www.nytimes.com/2007/01/17/washington/17royalty.html. Inspector General, Interior Department, Lack of price thresholds in Gulf of Mexico oil and gas leases, January 2007, available at www.doioig.gov/upload/MMS%20ROI%20REDACTED.pdf.

[9] Edmund L. Andrews, As profits soar, companies pay U.S. less for gas rights, New York Times, January 24, 2006, available at www.nytimes.com/2006/01/23/politics/23leases.html. William Yardley, Arctic drilling proposal advanced amid concern, New York Times, May 20, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/science/earth/20alaska.html. Juliet Eilperin, U.S. agency overseeing oil drilling ignored warnings of risks, Washington Post, May 25, 2010, available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/24/AR2010052401974.html.

[10] Charlie Savage, Sex, drug use and graft cited in Interior Department, New York Times, September 10, 2008, available at www.nytimes.com/2008/09/11/washington/11royalty.html. Inspector General, Interior Department, OIG investigations of MMS employees, Re: Gregory W. Smith, MMS Oil Marketing Group and Federal Business Solutions contracts, September 9, 2008, available at www.doioig.gov/upload/FBS%20REDACTED%20with%20Transmittal%209_10%20date.pdf.

[11] Juliet Eilperin, U.S. exempted BP's Gulf of Mexico drilling from environmental impact study, Washington Post, May 5, 2010, available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/04/AR2010050404118.html. Minerals Management Service, Budget justification and performance information, fiscal year 2010, available at www.mms.gov/adm/PFD/2007BudgetJustification.pdf, page 85.

[12] Minerals Management Service, Gulf of Mexico Oil and Gas Lease Sales, 2007-2012, Nos. 204, 205, 206, 207, 208, 210, 213, 215, 216, 218 and 222, Final Environmental Assessment, Volumes 1 and 2, April 2007, available at www.gomr.mms.gov/PDFs/2007/2007-018-Vol1.pdf and www.gomr.mms.gov/PDFs/2007/2007-018-Vol2.pdf.

[13] Minerals Management Service, Initial exploration plan, lease OCS-G32306, block 252 Mississippi Canyon area, March 10, 2009, available at www.gomr.mms.gov/PI/PDFImages/PLANS/29/29977.pdf (rubber-stamped NOTED-SCHEXNALIDRE). Minerals Management Service, Contents of plan (Appendix A NTL No. 2006-G14 Guidance for MMS-137 OCS Plan Information Form, August 2003), available at www.gomr.mms.gov/homepg/regulate/regs/ntls/ntl03-g17.pdf.

[14] Scott Berinato, Coast Guard, DHS and Deepwater: same ship, different day, CSO Magazine, May 1, 2004, available at www.csoonline.com/article/219221/Coast_Guard_DHS_and_Deepwater_Same_Ship_Different_Day. Susan Saulny, Finger-pointing, but few answers at hearings on drilling, New York Times, May 12, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/us/12spill.html. Ian Urbina, U.S. said to allow drilling without needed permits, New York Times, May 14, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/14/us/14agency.html. Justin Gillis, Scientists fault U.S. response in assessing Gulf oil spill, New York Times, May 20, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/20/science/earth/20noaa.html. Lynn Yaris, Caution required for Gulf oil spill clean-up, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, May 4, 2010, available at http://newscenter.lbl.gov/feature-stories/2010/05/04/gulf-oil-spill-clean-up/. Jason Dearen and Ray Henry, Associated Press, Chemicals used to fight Gulf of Mexico oil spill a trade-off, New Orleans Times-Picayune, May 5, 2010, available at www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/chemicals_used_to_fight_gulf_o.html.

[15] The White House, President Barack Obama, Administration-wide response to BP spill, May 3, 2010, available at www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2010/05/03/comprehensive-update-administration-wide-response-bp-spill. "Secretary Napolitano and Secretary Salazar signed an order establishing the next steps for a joint investigation that is currently underway into the causes of the explosion of the drilling rig Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico. The U.S. Coast Guard (USCG) and the Minerals Management Service (MMS) share jurisdiction for the investigation." Matthew L. Wald, Independent inquiry into oil spill is urged, New York Times, May 15, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/15/us/politis/15inquire.html.

[16] John M. Broder and Shaila Dewan, White House to create panel to study Gulf oil spill, New York Times, May 18, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/18/us/18spill.html. Juliet Eilperin and Scott Wilson, Birnbaum 'took fall' after MMS played catch-up after lapses in ethics, oversight, Washington Post, May 29, 2010 available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/28/AR2010052804855.html. Debbi Wilgoren and Michael D. Shear, Obama to ban new deepwater oil wells, cancel lease sales off Virginia and Alaska coasts, Washington Post, May 27, 2010, available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/27/AR2010052701172.html. Juliet Eilperin and David A. Fahrenthold, Graham, Reilly to lead investigation of oil spill, Washington Post, May 22, 2010, available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/21/AR2010052102403.html. The White House, President Barack Obama, Executive order, National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling. May 22, 2010, available at www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/executive-order-national-commission-bp-deepwater-horizon-oil-spill-and-offshore-dri.

[17] Tom Zeller, Jr., Estimates suggest spill is biggest in U.S. history, New York Times, May 28, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/28/us/28flow.html. Flow Rate Technical Group, U.S. Geological Survey, Flow Rate Group provides preliminary best estimate of oil flowing from BP oil well, May 27, 2010, available at www.doi.gov/news/pressreleases/Flow-Rate-Group-Provides-Preliminary-Best-Estimate-Of-Oil-Flowing-from-BP-Oil-Well.cfm.

[18] Energy Resources Co., Ixtoc oil spill assessment, final report, U.S. Bureau of Land Management, March, 1982, available at www.gomr.mms.gov/PI/PDFImages/ESPIS/3/3977.pdf. March Schliefstein, BP's "top kill" process fails, forced officials to attempt yet another strategy, New Orleans Times-Picayune, May 30, 2010, available at www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/bps_ballyhooed_top_kill_proces.html. Jeffrey Kluger, As top kill drags on, BP's credibility problems grow, Time, May 28, 2010, available at www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1992627,00.html.

[19] David Prestipino, Cause of western Australia oil spill revealed, Western Australia Today, November 10, 2009, available at www.watoday.com.au/environment/cause-of-wa-oil-spill-revealed-20091109-i59k.html. Montara Commission of Inquiry, Australia Ministry for Resources and Energy, multiple documents available at www.montarainquiry.gov.au.

[20] Steven Mufson and Michael D. Shear, Pressure grows for action by BP, Washington Post, May 1, 2010, available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/30/AR2010043002715.html. Debbi Wilgoren, Joel Achenbach and Anne E. Kornblut, Gulf Coast oil spill may take months to contain, officials say, Washington Post, May 3, 2010, available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/03/AR2010050301669.html

[21] West Engineering Services, Shear ram capabilities study, Minerals Management Service, September, 2004, available at www.mms.gov/tarprojects/463/(463)%20West%20Engineering%20Final%20Report.pdf.

[22] PCCI Marine and Environmental Engineering, Oil spill containment, remote sensing and tracking for deepwater blowouts, Minerals Management Service, August, 1999, available at www.mms.gov/tarprojects/311/311AA.pdf. West Engineering Services, Mini shear study, Minerals Management Service, December, 2002, available at www.mms.gov/tarprojects/455/Final%20Report.pdf. West Engineering Services, Evaluation of secondary intervention methods in well control, Minerals Management Service, March, 2003, available at www.mms.gov/tarprojects/431/FinalReport431.pdf.

Making an energy extraction disaster worse

Extracting energy from natural resources often carries hazards that are not well known. Because of the April, 2010, explosion at the Upper Big Branch mine in West Virginia, some hazards of coal mining are once again widely publicized, [1] although coal mine disasters have been common for near two centuries. [2] But other coal mining hazards, including stream disturbance from subsidence, methane discharges, underground fires and the vast destruction of environment from surface mining, remain little known to most of the public. [3]

When disasters occur while extracting energy from natural resources, human errors can make them worse. April of 2010 has been a cruel month. Several incidents during the Macondo 1 well blowout in the Gulf of Mexico, including origins of the blowout itself, appear to come from human errors that should have been preventable. [4] Few of the many errors are more vexing than acts of U.S. government agencies trying to respond to that disaster.

Evidence from news reports suggests little or no U.S. Coast Guard planning and coordination for responses to the immense fire. Water, sprayed from several vessels on the fire, entered pontoons of the semi-submersible Deepwater Horizon platform, causing it to capsize and sink after about a day and a half. [5] The huge volumes of natural gas and oil discharges continued to burn at the sea surface, but water sprays were then used to extinguish the fire. As previous ocean oil disasters showed, like the 1979 Ixtoc 1 well blowout in the southern Gulf of Mexico, sea surface fires can burn more than half of blowout discharges, reducing environmental impacts. [6] Through mid-May, 2010, the Coast Guard had provided no detailed public explanation of its actions.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued instructions allowing the U.S. Air Force and BP, owner of the Macondo 1 well, to apply hundreds of thousands of gallons of dispersant chemicals, both on the sea surface and on the sea floor in the vicinity of discharges from the Macondo 1 well. [7] Short-term effects of dispersant chemicals on marine environments are only partly known, and long-term effects are often unknown.

There have been controversies over the use of dispersants in ocean oil disasters ever since their first major application, following the 1967 Torrey Canyon disaster off the southwest coast of England. Studies suggest long-term hazards, leaving treated coastal environments more disturbed than environments where no cleanup was attempted. [8] The EPA has had decades to evaluate dispersants, but its research has been meager, leaving the agency unprepared in emergencies to respond on the basis of thorough scientific knowledge. In an apparent attempt to mitigate hazards of dispersants being used for the Macondo 1 well blowout, EPA issued supplementary instructions to BP on May 20, 2010. [9] A simultaneous press release said that EPA intended to require use of "less toxic" chemicals. [10]

EPA maintains short-term acute toxicity information for dispersants. [11] Two marine species are used to rate "50 percent lethal concentration" (LC50) in parts per million for approved dispersants: the inland silverside (Menidia beryllina), an estuary fish, after 96 hours exposure, and the oppossum shrimp (Mysidopsis bahia), also an estuary dweller, after 48 hours exposure. In addition, there are "effectiveness" ratings for two crude oils, "Prudhoe Bay Crude" and "South Louisiana Crude." EPA has published testing procedures for the ratings. [12]

As of mid-May, 2010, the EPA-maintained National Contingency Plan Product Schedule included fifteen dispersant products, three of them under multiple trade names. [13] They are listed here in the order of least toxic to most toxic, by 96-hour exposure LC50 ratings in parts per million for Menidia beryllina:

Dispersant	Toxicity LC50, ppm	Toxicity LC50, ppm	Effectiveness
Product	Menidia beryllina	Mysidopsis bahia	So. La. Crude
MARE CLEAN 200	1996    96-hr	938    48-hr	84.1%
JD-2000	407.00 96-hr	90.50 48-hr	77.8%
NEOS AB3000	91.1   96-hr	33.0   48-hr	89.8%
NOKOMIS 3-AA	34.22 96-hr	20.16 48-hr	65.7%
ZI-400	31.76 96-hr	20.96 48-hr	89.8%
SEA BRAT #4	30.00 96-hr	14.00 48-hr	60.6%
NOKOMIS 3-F4	29.80 96-hr	32.20 48-hr	64.9%
SAF-RON GOLD	29.43 96-hr	63.00 48-hr	53.8%
COREXIT EC9500A	25.20 96-hr	32.23 48-hr	54.7%
SPILLCLEAN	24.30 96-hr	10.00 48-hr	N/A
COREXIT EC9527A	14.57 96-hr	24.14 48-hr	63.4%
BIODISPERS	13.46 96-hr	78.90 48-hr	63.0%
FINASOL OSR 52	11.66 96-hr	9.37 48-hr	71.6%
DISPERSIT SPC 1000	3.5   96-hr	16.6 48-hr	105   %
JD-109	1.90 96-hr	1.18 48-hr	91   %

In the May 20, 2010, EPA instructions to BP the key sentence reads, "...BP shall identify...dispersant products from the National Contingency Plan Product Schedule that...have a toxicity value less than or equal to 23.00 ppm LC50 toxicity value for Menidia or 18.00 ppm LC50 for Mysidopsis...." News reports indicated BP was following EPA instructions literally, [14] saying BP had been using Corexit EC9500A, rated at 96-hour LC50 of 25.2 parts per million for Menidia beryllina, but after the May 20 EPA instructions was ordering Dispersit SPC 1000, rated at 96-hour LC50 of 3.5 parts per million for Menidia beryllina.

EPA has provided no rationale for the specific criteria in its May 20 instructions. Their obvious effect is to allow use of the dispersant products Finasol OSR 52, Dispersit SPC 100 and JD-109. It is not clear whether Spillclean would qualify; it has LC50 for Mysidopsis less than 18 but LC50 for Menidia greater than 23, and it lacks an "effectiveness" rating. It is also not clear whether Corexit EC9527A or Biodispers would qualify; they have LC50 for Menidia less than 23 but LC50 for Mysidopsis greater than 18. The instructions say "or" as to LC50 ratings but have ambiguous grammar.

Well known to environmental workers, "a lower LC50 means the substance is more toxic," such as effects of metal ions in fish ponds. [15] Whoever wrote and whoever approved the May 20 EPA instructions apparently did not know that lower LC50 means higher toxicity. Whoever generated specific criteria for dispersants seems to have been choosing products to endorse rather than applying environmental knowledge. Superior products in EPA listings, on the basis of their LC50 toxicity ratings, include Mare Clean 200 and JD-2000. However, those products would not satisfy the misguided EPA criteria.

Adverse consequences in this situation were avoided. BP cancelled its order for Dispersit SPC 100 and responded to EPA that it could not find a qualifying dispersant "in sufficiently large quantities to be useful at the time of the spill." EPA rescinded the erroneous instructions, saying it would issue new ones. [16] It is likely that someone at BP saw through the mistake and realized its potential to make an energy extraction disaster worse. Major news media never told and therefore most of the public never learned about gross incompetence shown by the government during this incident.

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[1] Jerry Markon, David A. Fahrenthold and Kimberly Kindy, Mine company faulted on safety issues, Washington Post, April 8, 2010, available at www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/06/AR2010040604984.html.

[2] H. B. Humphrey, Historical summary of coal mine explosions in the United States, Bulletin 586, U.S. Bureau of Mines, U.S. Government Printing Office (1960). United States Mine Rescue Association, Historical data on mine disasters in the United States, available at www.usmra.com/saxsewell/historical.htm. U.S. Mine Safety and Health Administration, Coal fatalities, 1900-2009, available at www.msha.gov/stats/centurystats/coalstats.asp.

[3] Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection, The Effects of Subsidence Resulting from Underground Bituminous Coal Mining on Surface Structures and Features and Water Resources (2005), 25 files, available at www.dep.state.pa.us/dep/deputate/minres/bmr/act54_2004_report/toc_01_pdf.htm. Robert R. Seal II, Environmental processes that affect mineral deposits in the eastern United States, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Department of the Interior (1999), available at http://pubs.usgs.gov/info/seal1/. Evironment: The price of strip mining, Time 97(12), March 22, 1971, available at www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,904921,00.html. Davie Rennie, How China's scramble for 'black gold' is causing a green disaster, London Telegraph, February 1, 2002, available at www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/1383465/How-Chinas-scramble-for-black-gold-is-causing-a-green-disaster.html.

[4] Janet McConnaughey and Holbrook Mohr, Associated Press, Oil rig reported explosion 3 hours before fire, WFMJ, Youngstown, OH, April 22, 2010, available at www.wfmj.com/Global/story.asp?S=12353917. "James," Deepwater Horizon: A firsthand account, Mark Levin Show, WABC, New York City, April 30, 2010, transcription available at http://nigeriavillagesquare.com/forum/main-square/54217-deepwater-horizon-firsthand-account.html.

[5] Campbell Robertson, Search continues after oil rig blast, New York Times, April 22, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/04/22/us/22rig.html. Russell Gold, Safety device questioned in 2004, Wall Street Journal, May 3, 2010, available at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703969204575220630638397628.html. Les Blumenthal, McClatchy, Blowout preventers often fail, report says, Tacoma, WA, News Tribune, May 1, 2010, available at www.thenewstribune.com/2010/04/30/1169719/us-report-found-failure-of-offshore.html. Michael Kunzelman and Richard T. Pienciak, Associated Press, Feds let BP avoid filing blowout plan for Gulf rig, WTOP, May 6, 2010, available at www.wtop.com/?nid=111&sid=1950669. Susan Saulny, Finger-pointing, but few answers at hearings on drilling, New York Times, May 12, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/12/us/12spill.html. Scott Pelley, interviewer, Blowout: The Deepwater Horizon disaster, 60 Minutes, CBS News, May 16, 2010, available at www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/05/16/60minutes/main6490197.shtml.

[6] Energy Resources Co., Ixtoc oil spill assessment, final report, Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Department of the Interior (1982), available at www.gomr.mms.gov/PI/PDFImages/ESPIS/3/3977.pdf

[7] Jason Dearen and Ray Henry, Associated Press, Chemicals used to fight Gulf of Mexico oil spill a trade-off, New Orleans Times-Picayune, May 5, 2010, available at www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/chemicals_used_to_fight_gulf_o.html. Ted Jackovics, Air Force C-130s spray chemical to help break up oil spill, Tampa Tribune, May 10, 2010, available at www2.tbo.com/content/2010/may/10/air-force-c-130s-spray-chemical-help-break-oil-spi/. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Dispersant monitoring and assessment directive for subsurface dispersant application, May 10, 2010, available at www.epa.gov/bpspill/dispersants/subsurface-dispersant-directive-final.pdf.

[8] Committee on Effectiveness of Oil Spill Dispersants, Marine Board, National Research Council, Using Oil Spill Dispersants on the Sea, National Academies Press (1989), Appendix B, Torrey Canyon, pp. 317-318, available at www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=736&page=317. Robert J. Fiocco and Alun Lewis, Oil spill dispersants, in Pure and Applied Chemistry 71(1), 1999, special issue on oil spill countermeasures, pp. 27-42, available at http://old.iupac.org/publications/pac/special/0199/pdfs/fiocco.pdf.

[9] U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Dispersant monitoring and assessment directive, Addendum 2, May 20, 2010, available at www.epa.gov/bpspill/dispersants/directive-addendum2.pdf.

[10] U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA: BP must use less toxic dispersant, May 20, 2010, available at http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/d0cf6618525a9efb85257359003fb69d/0897f55bc6d9a3ba852577290067f67f!OpenDocument.

[11] U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, FSOC dispersant pre-approval guidelines and checklist (1995), Table 1, LC50 toxicities and toxicity indices of crude oils for marine organisms, p. A-10.

[12] U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Methods for measuring the acute toxicity of effluents and receiving waters to freshwater and marine organisms, at www.epa.gov/waterscience/methods/wet/disk2/. U.S Environmental Protection Agency, Swirling flask dispersant effectiveness test, 40 CFR 300, Appendix C (1997), pp. 224-246, available at www.epa.gov/oem/docs/oil/cfr/appendix_c.pdf.

[13] U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Contingency Plan Product Schedule, for Category select Dispersant, at www.epa.gov/emergencies/content/ncp/product_schedule.htm.

[14] Campbell Robertson and Elisabeth Rosenthal, Agency orders use of a less toxic chemical in Gulf, New York Times, May 21, 2010, available at www.nytimes.com/2010/05/21/science/earth/21disperse.html.

[15] Tim Gilbert, Copper in fish ponds, Koi Fish Ponds, Denver, Colorado, at www.koifishponds.com/copper.htm.

[16] Paul Purpura, BP can continue using controversial dispersant, New Orleans Times-Picayune, May 24, 2010, available at www.nola.com/news/gulf-oil-spill/index.ssf/2010/05/epa_bp_can_continue_using_cont.html.

Nuclear fallout

Among the biggest nuclear power hazards in the United States have been financial ones. Of 259 orders for nuclear power reactors from 1955 through 2005, 124 were cancelled and 3 terminated for other causes. Making it through to an operating license were 132 reactor orders [1], a success rate of 51 percent. Nuclear fallout continued with early shutdowns of the licensed reactors. Through 2005, 28 had been shut down, leaving 104 in operation. Operating lives of the reactors shut down ranged from less than 1 year to 35 years, all less than the expected 40 years, with an average operating life of 14.1 years [2]. Survival rate to mature operation was 40 percent.

Of the 124 reactor orders cancelled, 15 were under construction. All those abandoned reactors occurred between 1982 and 1988 for construction that started between 1972 and 1977 [3]. Financial losses totalled $22.3 billion at times of abandonment, or $60 billion adjusted to the start of 2010. Following is a list of the abandoned United States nuclear power reactors (reactor name, location, start year, stop year, adjusted loss):

WNP-1	Hanford, WA	1975	1982	$2.0 billion
WNP-4	Hanford, WA	1975	1982	$1.4 billion
WNP-5	Satsop, WA	1977	1982	$1.6 billion
Zimmer 1	Moscow, OH	1972	1983	$5.5 billion
Cherokee 1	Gaffney, SC	1976	1983	$1.7 billion
WNP-3	Satsop, WA	1977	1983	$1.6 billion
Midland 1	Midland, MI	1973	1984	$4.4 billion
Midland 2	Midland, MI	1973	1984	$7.6 billion
Marble Hill 1	New Washington, IN	1977	1984	$4.7 billion
Marble Hill 2	New Washington, IN	1977	1984	$2.4 billion
Perry 2	North Perry, OH	1974	1985	$2.7 billion
Bellefonte 1	Hollywood, AL	1974	1988	$9.3 billion
Bellefonte 2	Hollywood, AL	1974	1988	$6.2 billion
Seabrook 2	Portsmouth, NH	1976	1988	$4.9 billion
Watts Bar 2	Spring City, TN	1977	1988	$4.1 billion

This discussion and the list of abandoned reactors do not count military or research programs, including the Clinch River Breeder Reactor at Oak Ridge, TN, abandoned in 1983 after spending about $1.6 billion in then-current dollars. Nor do they count losses from the 109 power reactors cancelled before construction, which have rarely been reported and never summarized. Those losses may have totalled $100 billion or more in 2010 dollars, based on a Missouri rate increase approved, but never implemented, for an unbuilt reactor [4]. The last reactor order cancellation occurred in 1994, ending a long run of heavy losses for electric utilities.

The period from the mid-1970s through the mid-1980s was a wild ride for the nuclear power industry. For a few years around the Arab Oil Embargo of 1973 orders surged. Then the industry found new demands for electricity well short of projections. At the same time, federal regulations rapidly tightened safety requirements, a trend that strengthened after the disaster at Three Mile Island 2 in 1979, greatly increasing construction costs. Hyperinflation of the late 1970s further increased costs, as interest rates on construction loans spiraled. When planned in 1971, the Vogtle plant in Georgia was estimated to cost $0.66 billion for four reactors, but when completed in 1989 it actually cost $8.87 billion for two reactors, including financing [5]. Cost escalation per reactor was about a factor of 9, adjusted for inflation.

The U.S. began a second half-century of nuclear power with promises of "third generation" reactors that would be safer, more reliable and more predictable to build and operate. The new reactor designs are supposed to be certified for operation before starting construction, unlike the earlier generations that were certified only on licensing to operate. There are more than twenty orders pending for those reactors. However, risks of failure remain high. As of early 2010 the construction cost for 1,200 MW of nuclear power capacity was estimated at around $7.9 billion [6], while the construction cost for the same coal-fired capacity was estimated at around $4.2 billion [7]. As of 2010, no proposed reactor could be built without a loan guarantee from the federal government. Protracted negotiations were needed to set loan guarantee fees. There also remain liability caps for major disasters (the Price-Anderson Act of 1957) underwritten by the federal government.

Dr. Paul Joskow, an MIT economist, estimated the cost of bulk power from "third generation" commercial nuclear reactors at 6.7 cents per kWh in 2006, based on $2.4 billion in construction costs for 1,200 MW of capacity [8]. In comparison, he estimated costs from 3.8 to 5.2 cents per kWh for power from coal-fired and gas-fired units. Dr. Joskow based his estimates on so-called "overnight" costs of construction, without interest or inflation, but of course reactors cannot be built overnight, so his models include some allowances for cost growth.

In view of the nuclear power industry's history, radically underestimating construction costs and cost growth, it would be prudent to substitute current, fully loaded cost estimates in place of the "overnight" costs, hoping that actual cost escalation will not break the budget of allowances in economic models. At $7.9 billion for 1,200 MW of capacity, the cost for nuclear power in Dr. Joskow's estimates would grow to 17.7 cents per kWh [9].

Recently Dr. John Parsons, an MIT Sloan School economist, showed that published costs for "third generation" nuclear plants use different approaches [10]. Some bundle in transmission upgrades; some include interest; some allow for cost escalation. The variations produce large discrepancies. Dr. Parsons' estimate of the "overnight" cost in 2007 for the power plant in reference [6] works out to $5.7 billion for 1,200 MW of capacity.

Probably more significant than specifics of estimates is a pattern of cost growth. The works of both Dr. Joskow and Dr. Parsons indicate that they trusted a 2002 "base case" of $2.00 a watt for the "overnight" cost of a "third generation" nuclear power plant. As of 2007, Dr. Parsons' estimate became $3.95 a watt, for an average of 5 plants with 10 reactors [10]. Cost estimates from these economists nearly doubled in only 5 years.

Only radical increases in costs of fossil-fuel plants and prices of fossil fuels could compensate for such huge differences between costs of power from nuclear and competing new sources. For the forseeable future, nuclear power looks like a high-risk, high-cost option for the United States, and for that reason it is unlikely to grow rapidly, even with strong support from the federal government.

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[1] U.S. Energy Information Agency, History of energy in the United States: Nuclear Energy (2002), available at www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/eh/nuclear.html.

[2] U.S. Energy Information Agency, Nuclear generating units 1955-2008 (2009), available at www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/pdf/pages/sec9_3.pdf. U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Commercial nuclear power reactors formerly licensed to operate (2005), available at www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/nuregs/staff/sr1437/v1/part07.html.

[3] Compiled from public records, Cancelled nuclear units ordered in the United States (2005), available at http://clonemaster.homestead.com/files/cancel.htm

[4] U.S. PIRG, A history of action in the public interest, 1980s (2002), available at www.uspirg.org/results/a-history-of-action-in-the-public-interest/1980s.

[5] U.S. Energy Information Administration, Vogtle nuclear power plant, Georgia (2009), available at www.eia.doe.gov/cneaf/nuclear/page/at_a_glance/reactors/vogtle.html.

[6] Rob Pavey, Feds back two new reactors at Plant Vogtle, Augusta Chronicle, February 16, 2010, available at http://chronicle.augusta.com/latest-news/2010-02-16/obama-announce-loan-guarantee-vogtle (two 1,100 MW units).

[7] Stacey Roberts, Utility's rate-rise request tapered, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, October 15, 2009, available at www.arkansasonline.com/news/2009/oct/15/utilitys-rate-rise-request-tapered-20091015/ (one 600 MW unit).

[8] Paul L. Joskow, Prospects for nuclear power, a U.S. perspective (2006), available at http://econ-www.mit.edu/files/1187. See Comparative Base Load Costs, page 23.

[9] See Craig A. Severance, Business risks and costs of new nuclear power, Electricity Journal 22(4):112-120 (2009), draft version available at http://climateprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/nuclear-costs-2009.pdf. Extended analysis in this study predicts bulk cost for nuclear power from "third generation" nuclear reactors of 25-30 cents per kWh.

[10] John E. Parsons, Financing new nuclear generation (2009, updating Future of nuclear power, 2003), available at www.mit.edu/~jparsons/Presentations/090709%20EPRG%20CEEPR%20GDF%20Summer%20Workshop.pdf. See Table 4.

A climate puzzle

Despite widely advertised commitment to open government,[1] on climate issues the Obama administration seems to have become as intolerant as its predecessor, although with different bias. CBS News reported June 26, 2009,[2] that EPA officials had suppressed in mid-March a paper by Dr. Alan Carlin, a senior economist in the National Center for Environmental Economics, working at EPA since 1971.

Dr. Carlin's error was a review of climate change skeptical about the potential for carbon dioxide emissions to explain it.[3] The report has been made available on a Web site maintained by political opponents of government regulation. Dr. Carlin was reassigned from climate change analysis to updating a grants database. CBS News may have picked up the story from WorldNet Daily, which reported it about a day earlier.[4]

Dr. Carlin began investigating climate change issues in 2003 and does not have a career invested in them. He operates as an outside critic, looking for problems with assumptions, methods and data. The main theme of his March, 2009, paper was to ask whether global temperature measurements since the last major review by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) called into question that review's conclusions about rising temperatures and their potential associations with carbon dioxide emissions.


In contrast to a rapid run-up of temperatures leading to a spike in 1998, the last three years show a declining trend in satellite temperature measurements, about 0.1 Centigrade degrees per year, based on data summarized by the Hadley Center at the University of Alabama, Huntsville. Until moderated by the current deep recession, world carbon dioxide emissions continued to accelerate. Dr. Carlin shows that recent temperature measurements are in substantial disagreement with IPCC predictions published in 2007.

In an article published the year before his run-in with EPA management,[5] Dr. Carlin surveyed familiar potential contributors to global temperatures: solar output, clouds and water vapor, greenhouse gases, aerosols and urbanization of land. He describes IPCC numerical modeling and notes its susceptibility to the choices of data used to estimate effects that cannot be adequately described by physical principles alone. He recalls fears of an impending ice age that seized climate researchers a few decades ago and emphasizes major uncertainties remaining in determining conditions that could lead to run-away temperature changes under positive feedback.

Dr. Carlin's main conclusion in [5] was that it is impossible to estimate reliably the economic consequences of decreasing emissions of greenhouse gases (GHGs) as the exclusive approach used to control global warming: "Climate sensitivity, the key technical variable describing climate [response] to increased GHG levels, appears to be unknowable in advance."[6] His reasoning calls to mind the discovery of intrinically chaotic mathematics by Prof. Edward Lorenz at MIT in 1961, while trying to develop models of weather systems.[7]

The suppressed Carlin paper later develops an adversarial tone: "One of the most glaring problems of all with the EPA's Endangerment TSD (technical support document) is the nearly complete disregard of observed trends...."[8] The paper contains internal evidence suggesting a document that circulated within its agency over an extended period. For example, a footnote on p. 67 says "comment by Ken Gregory--June 21, 2008." A discussion of climate model assumptions notes that IPCC modeling assumed nearly constant global humidity, while long-term data show declining trends, opposing the effects of increases in atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide.[9]

Dr. Carlin's style tends to hyperbole, for example, the assertion that climate sensitivity is "unknowable in advance," which could be a factor in his current situation. The article he cites from Gerard S. Roe and Marcia B. Baker [6] shows instead that climate sensitivity can be described through probability distributions. However, the distributions are extremely broad, with significant probabilities over a tenfold or greater range. So in terms of economics, Dr. Carlin appears to be correct. Based on available evidence, we cannot reliably predict effects of control strategies that depend on climate sensitivities to greenhouse gases.

In a 2007 article,[10] Dr. Carlin reviewed mid-1990s proposals by Dr. Edward Teller and collaborators, reported from Livermore National Laboratory, for airborne or spaceborne solar reflectors.[11] The Teller report, in turn, claims derivation from ideas of Dr. James Hansen and collaborators at NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, published several years earlier.[12] Some ill-informed criticism of those proposals [13] suggests that physical intervention in solar absorption would be inconsistent with claims about lack of reliable ability to predict climate. However, some of the approaches proposed in the Teller report are reversible or have short decay times, allowing them to be adapted to ongoing climate behavior. The central point of Dr. Carlin's review is that the probable cost of solar reflection would be far lower than the probable cost of greenhouse gas control.

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[1] Lisa P. Jackson, Statement by Administrator-designate, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, January 23, 2009, available at http://yosemite.epa.gov/opa/admpress.nsf/0/2297C12A9F4773D285257547006497D4. "...I will ensure EPA’s efforts to address the environmental crises of today are rooted in three fundamental values: science-based policies and programs, adherence to the rule of law, and overwhelming transparency."

[2] Declan McCullagh, EPA may have suppressed report skeptical of global warming, CBS News, June 26, 2009, available at www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/06/26/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry5117890.shtml.

[3] Proposed NCEE comments on draft technical support document for endangerment analysis for greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act, U.S. National Center for Environmental Economics, March 16, 2009, made available at http://cei.org/cei_files/fm/active/0/DOC062509-004.pdf.

[4] Chelsea Schilling, EPA's own research expert 'shut up' on climate change, WorldNet Daily, June 25, 2009, at www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=102031 (retrieved June 27, 2009, from Google cache).

[5] Alan Carlin, Why a different approach is required if global climate change is to be controlled efficiently or even at all, Environmental Law and Policy Review, 32(3):685-757, 2008, full text available on the Internet at http://carlineconomics.googlepages.com/Endangermentcommentsv7b1.pdf.

[6] Cited: Gerard S. Roe and Marcia B. Baker, Why is climate sensitivity so unpredictable?, Science 318(5850):629-632, October 26, 2007, full text available on the Internet at http://earthweb.ess.washington.edu/roe/Publications/RoeBaker_Science07.pdf.

[7] Recounted in: James Gleick, Chaos: Making a New Science (1987, Viking), The butterfly effect, pp. 11-31.

[8] Ref. [3], p. 64.

[9] Ref. [3], pp. 67-70.

[10] Alan Carlin, Global climate change control: Is there a better strategy than reducing greenhouse gas emissions?, University of Pennsylvania Law Review 155(6):1401-1497, June, 2007, available at http://pennumbra.com/issues/pdfs/155-6/Carlin.pdf.

[11] Edward M. Teller, Lowell Wood and Roderick Hyde, Global warming and ice ages: Prospects for physics-based modulation of global change, UCR Livermore National Laboratory Report UCRL-JC-128715, August 15, 1997, available at www.osti.gov/accomplishments/documents/fullText/ACC0229.pdf.

[12] James E. Hansen and Andrew A. Lacis, Sun and dust versus greenhouse gases: An assessment of their relative
roles in global climate change, Nature 346:713-719, August 23, 1990.

[13] "Eris,"Re: CEI releases global warming study censored by EPA, Message 3, Colbert Nation, June 27, 2009, at http://forum.colbertnation.com/tcr/board/message?board.id=conspiracy&message.id=4655. "Carlin appears to be a big fan of geo-engineering, but how this squares with his apparent belief that we know nothing about what drives climate, is puzzling. A sine qua non of geo-engineering is that we need models to be able to predict what is likely to happen."