Saving Japan's Nuclear Reactor Industry (from Japan Inc. Magazine)

[bananas]

Al Gore, Joe Romm, and Amory Lovins are being proven right again.
And jpak and kristopher, of course.

http://www.japaninc.com/node/4459

August 4, 2010 Posted by Japan Inc
Saving Japan's Nuclear Reactor Industry
By Robert K. Temple

... failure in the American State of Texas might be the end for Japanese vendors of commercial nuclear reactors ...

The solution isn’t complicated—but it is not inexpensive either. It will require Japanese vendors to take the lead and secure financing for plant construction and commitments for the power produced. ...

... one project is dead, another project was ordered by a company that now lacks the balance sheet to complete it, and the last project developer appears unlikely to be able to secure financing. ...

In two of the three Texas nuclear projects the Japanese reactor vendor is already on both sides of the transaction, as reactor vendor and project developer. ...

Another approach to address the financial weakness of the Texas developers is for the Japanese to guarantee a larger portion of the project risk. This could come in the form of guarantees for repayment of DOE-backed loans or additional direct project support from the Japan Bank for International Cooperation. ...

This is getting silly - having Japan Inc guarantee the DOE loan guarantees for loans from Japan Inc so that Japan Inc can build these reactors.
This is all to make a bad investment look good.

Some previous discussion from February:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x231521

Nuclear Loan Guarantees Aren’t Just Guarantees: They are Actual Taxpayer Loans

http://www.nirs.org/press/02-17-2010/1

February 17, 2010
Nuclear Loan Guarantees Aren’t Just Guarantees: They are Actual Taxpayer Loans

President Obama’s announcement yesterday of a “conditional” $8.3 billion loan “guarantee” to the Southern Company for construction of two nuclear reactors in Georgia obscured an important fact about the loan guarantee program: taxpayers are not just providing a guarantee, they also will be providing the actual loans.

...

The Federal Financing Bank (FFB) is a little-known government entity that more typically makes loans to universities, colleges, rural electric co-ops and other small-scale projects. Interest rates from the FFB may be lower than offered by private financial institutions. Use of the FFB means that the loans themselves for new reactor construction will come from taxpayers, putting taxpayers in the risky business of both providing the loans and guaranteeing to themselves that the loans will be repaid.

...

Kristopher was right: he said that even with the loan guarantees, they wouldn't find any takers, and they didn't:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=228077&mesg_id=228106

These are loan guarantees, not direct money to build. Unless the underlying economics change, it won't matter if the total amount is $500B or the current $18B. As long as investors have a 50/50 chance of either 1) a successful project that starts generating low (6% or so) ROI in 15-29 years or 2) receiving your principle back when the loan defaults after 10 or so years of lost earnings; then there will be no takers.

...

[Nederland]

1. Nuclear power may not be affordable in places like the US and Japan

Ultimately, a nuclear reactor is little more than a very expensive building. As such, the cost of building a reactor is significantly determined by the cost of labor in the country in question. Labor is expensive in the US and Japan, but fairly cheap in India and China. The degree to which property rights are observed in a country has impacts too, and in places like China the government pretty much gets to do whatever it wants without regard to the objections of its citizens. These two things put together is why Westinghouse wants 9.4 billion dollars to build two AP1000 reactors in Florida, but only 5.3 billion to build two AP1000 reactors in China. Once China starts building reactors of their own design based off the AP1000, the CAP1400 and CAP1700, they expect costs to plummet to slightly more than 1000/kW.

As a result, I would not be surprised of the next decade shows few new reactors in first world countries. This does not mean that jpak and kristopher were right however. They have repeatedly claimed that nuclear has no future in the global energy solution. The truth is that although it may have little role in the first world, it will have a significant role in the third...

[Confusious]

2. Finland, Sweden, norway, Germany, italy

Have all reversed decisions not to build new nuclear plants.

The united states is building new plants, and so is china.

[Nederland]

5. That's why I said "may"

IMHO, a great deal hinges on the success of building small reactors that can be mass produced like airplanes are. A dozen designs by companies all over the world are in the works in an effort to create reactor vessels that can be built in a factory and then shipped to the customer. The potential cost savings of this process over the traditional in situ construction process could be enormous.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%26W_mPower

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperion_Power_Generation

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NuScale

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshiba_4S

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_small_nuclear_reactor_designs

[diane in sf]

3. Time for nuclear power to die its natural death. The idea of it was much better than the reality.

It is expensive and dirty.

[DrGregory]

4. that's not what the scientists say...

The Directors of the Dept. of Energy's National Laboratories,
acting on behalf of their staff scientists put out this
white paper in August 2008 which says nuclear power is essential
for a sustainable energy economy:

http://www.ne.doe.gov/pdffiles/rpt_sustainableenergyfuture_aug2008.pdf

Note the 3rd signature in the first column. That
is Dr. Steven Chu; Nobel Prize in Physics winner
who was then the Director of Lawrence Berkeley
National Lab; but is now President Obama's
Secretary of Energy.

Dr. Greg

[kristopher]

6. That is a perverted recommendation

Similar to the safety award received by BP just prior to the blowout. The "paper" presents an unsubstantiated opinion by a group with a vested interest in the pursuit of nuclear technology. Their conclusions related to the needs of the global energy structure have no foundation.

[DrGregory]

7. BALONEY!!

So what "vested interest" does our
Secretary of Energy, Dr. Steven Chu
have in the pursuit of nuclear
technology?

These are some of our FINEST
scientists - and you dismiss
them because their conclusions
don't agree with your ill-founded
and unsubstantiated conclusions.

The Lab Directors have the
scientific credentials - and you
don't.

Dr. Greg

[kristopher]

8. Just fact.

As directors of national labs, those signatures come from not just scientists, but bureaucrats with vested interest in the budget and continued existence of the agencies they oversee. To ignore that reality is nothing more than an exercise in dishonesty.

Where is the analysis of the needs of the globes electrical systems and the cost benefit studies comparing nuclear to the available alternatives that supports their conclusions?

[DrGregory]

12. You know not of what you speak

The national labs are NOT dependent on the nuclear
industry or the energy industry.

The labs have been funded by politicians of BOTH
parties as a resource of INDEPENDENT scientific
knowledge and opinion.

The whole idea of the labs is to have that
independence. It is the Government putting
a bunch of scientists on "retainer" if you will.

The labs don't need the nuclear industry nor
the energy industry, and they have been constructed
to be INDEPENDENT of the commercial sector.

Dr. Greg

[madokie]

9. Ah theres that Baloney again

to be a dr you sure do like to use that word a lot. :hi:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=256113&mesg_id=256562

[joshcryer]

11. It's similar to the safety award that BP recieved despite not having safety reviews?

Half of BPs rigs weren't actually looked at by the government.

[jpak]

10. In the meantime - Japanese PV manufacturers are expanding production by GW

nuclear?

not so much