atw 2018-05v6
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<strong>atw</strong> Vol. 63 (<strong>2018</strong>) | Issue 5 ı May<br />
354<br />
NUCLEAR TODAY<br />
Author<br />
John Shepherd<br />
Shepherd<br />
Communications<br />
3 Brooklands<br />
West Sussex<br />
BN43 5FE,<br />
United Kingdom<br />
Links to reference<br />
sources:<br />
IAEA announcement<br />
on Akkuyu<br />
https://bit.ly/<br />
2JmW0Wa<br />
Der Spiegel<br />
https://bit.ly/2IIZfpH<br />
JAIF report<br />
https://bit.ly/2IKKQt4<br />
Joe Lassiter article<br />
https://hbs.me/<br />
2uVYPua<br />
Nuclear Newcomer Turkey and ‘Comeback<br />
Kid’ Japan Show the Way Ahead<br />
Around 20 years ago, when I took my first tentative steps into writing about the nuclear sector there was one<br />
story that cropped up again and again – and I was frequently told: “Forget that – it will never happen, they’ve been<br />
talking about it for years.”<br />
The subject was Turkey and its desire to build the country’s<br />
first nuclear power plant. Many of those I encountered in<br />
my early nuclear years and who had much more experience<br />
could list a myriad of reasons why Turkey’s ambition would<br />
probably not come to pass.<br />
The mainstream media too, I recall, was less than<br />
enthusiastic about Turkey going nuclear. One such article<br />
I’ve managed to dig up from Germany’s Der Spiegel in 2008<br />
asked of Turkey’s nuclear aspirations: “In a country prone<br />
to earthquakes, is it safe?” The article went on to say:<br />
“By acquiring nuclear energy, the country hopes to make<br />
itself independent of its main energy suppliers, Russia<br />
and Iran.”<br />
Well fast forward to today and think again! In early<br />
April, Turkey finally reported the start of construction of its<br />
first nuclear power plant to the International Atomic Energy<br />
Agency’s (IAEA) Power Reactor Information System. First<br />
safety-related concrete was poured for unit 1 of the Akkuyu<br />
nuclear power plant on 3 April, following the granting<br />
of a construction license by the Turkish Atomic Energy<br />
Authority the day before.<br />
Four units are planned at the site on the Mediterranean<br />
coast, 500 kilometres south of Ankara, all scheduled to<br />
be in operation by 2026. Akkuyu will apparently have a<br />
total installed generating capacity of 4,800 megawatts<br />
( electrical) (MWe). The technology will be Russian<br />
VVER following an agreement between Russia and<br />
Turkey to build and operate the plant at the Akkuyu site<br />
signed in May 2010.<br />
So much for that 2008 article reflecting on how Turkey<br />
wanted “energy independence” from Russia! Politics<br />
makes strange bedfellows, but let’s leave politics aside for<br />
now. Turkey has become the fourth country in recent years<br />
to have started construction of its first nuclear power plant,<br />
following the United Arab Emirates in 2012, Belarus in<br />
2013, and Bangladesh in 2017.<br />
There was progress too on the international nuclear<br />
front in April from Japan, where Kansai Electric Power<br />
Company confirmed that the third unit of its Ohi nuclear<br />
power plant, in Fukui Prefecture, had resumed commercial<br />
operation.<br />
According to the Japan Atomic Industrial Forum (JAIF),<br />
the Ohi-3 PWR had been restarted on 14 March and was<br />
followed by Kyushu Electric Power Co’s Genkai-3 PWR<br />
restart on 23 March.<br />
JAIF said the restarts brought the total number of the<br />
country’s nuclear reactor units clearing the country’s new<br />
post-2011 safety regulations to seven.<br />
Japan was another country ‘written off’ by the nuclear<br />
naysayers just seven short years ago after the earthquake<br />
and tsunami led to the Fukushima nuclear accident.<br />
In a related move, JAIF said as of 26 March, the Russian<br />
government had lifted almost all prohibitions on marine<br />
products from Japan that had been introduced due to fear<br />
of radioactive contamination following the accident.<br />
Some countries had seized on the most recent accident<br />
in nuclear history to justify their own attempts to kill off<br />
nuclear at any cost and for spurious reasons. Yet Japan is<br />
‘back in the game’.<br />
Both Japan and Turkey highlight the art of the possible.<br />
They also underline the planet’s continuing, undeniable<br />
need for nuclear to remain a part of the energy mix.<br />
With the future in mind, the IAEA has formed a technical<br />
working group to push ahead with work on small, mediumsized<br />
or modular reactors (SMRs) and to provide a forum<br />
for the agency’s member states to share information and<br />
knowledge. By the time you read this article, the first<br />
meeting of the group, comprising some 20 IAEA member<br />
states and international organisations, is likely to have<br />
been held in Vienna.<br />
According to IAEA deputy director-general Mikhail<br />
Chudakov, who heads the agency’s Department of Nuclear<br />
Energy: “Innovation is crucial for nuclear power to play a<br />
key role in decarbonising the energy sector. Many member<br />
states that are operating, expanding, introducing or<br />
considering nuclear power are quite keen on the<br />
development and deployment of SMRs.”<br />
The first three advanced SMRs are expected to begin<br />
commercial operation in Argentina, China and Russia<br />
between <strong>2018</strong> and 2020, the IAEA has said. “SMR<br />
development is also well advanced in about a dozen other<br />
countries.”<br />
In a recent Op-Ed for the Harvard Business School<br />
Joe Lassiter, who is a faculty fellow of the Harvard<br />
Environmental Economics Program and a faculty associate<br />
of the Harvard University Center for the Environment, said:<br />
“I have high hopes for the promising technology category<br />
known as “new nuclear,” which offers the potential to<br />
dramatically reduce costs and rapidly ramp up installations<br />
when compared to today’s nuclear power plants. But<br />
the success of new nuclear – and perhaps the future of the<br />
planet – requires big, immediate investments from the<br />
private sector.”<br />
Lassiter said that while he is “all for renewables, I<br />
believe every effort should be made to make nuclear power<br />
one of the world’s low-cost alternatives for meeting the<br />
urgent demand for power while winning the race with<br />
fossil fuels”. This is especially the case in Asia, “where the<br />
demand for energy is so pressing and the resulting fossil<br />
fuel CO 2 emissions are forecast to grow for the foreseeable<br />
future”, Lassiter said.<br />
Lassiter’s article is spot on and should be recommended<br />
reading to nuclear industry leaders and policymakers.<br />
There will of course be setbacks (challenges) along the<br />
way in any venture. That’s life and that’s how we learn. But<br />
the nuclear industry would be in a dark place today if it<br />
had given in to those who talked down the aspirations of<br />
countries such as Turkey – or given in to those who said the<br />
accident in Japan meant it was time for the world to turn<br />
its back on nuclear.<br />
I believe that nuclear’s best days are yet to come. But<br />
that will require vision and determination and an<br />
unwavering commitment to grow the industry safely for<br />
the benefit of all.<br />
Nuclear Today<br />
Nuclear Newcomer Turkey and ‘Comeback Kid’ Japan Show the Way Ahead ı H. Breitkreutz, J. Shi, R. Jungwirth, T. Zweifel, H.-Y. Chiang and W. Petry