Regeringens el-fiasko
I fredags var elen 1600 procent dyrare i södra Sverige jämfört med norra.
Enligt Löfvén har elöverskottet aldrig varit större. Vilken sopa. Nu kommer den elkris som oppositionen varnade för. Total oförmåga att se helheten.
I fredags var elen 1600 procent dyrare i södra Sverige jämfört med norra.
Enligt Löfvén har elöverskottet aldrig varit större. Vilken sopa. Nu kommer den elkris som oppositionen varnade för. Total oförmåga att se helheten.
The estimated total cost of bringing plants into compliance with current standards sits at roughly 4.8 trillion yen ($44.2 billion), according to a Nikkei survey of nine of the 10 big regional electricity providers along with Japan Atomic Power and Electric Power Development. The survey excluded Okinawa Electric Power, which has no nuclear capacity.
In January 2013, the utilities had pegged the cost of safety measures at just 900 billion yen. About six months later the Nuclear Regulation Authority -- the country's nuclear watchdog -- imposed some of the world's toughest safety standards to prevent a recurrence of the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, triggered by an earthquake and tsunamis.
These requirements are poised to drive up the cost of nuclear power generation. In 2015, the government estimated that nuclear energy would cost as little as 10.3 yen per kilowatt-hour to generate in 2030 -- less than coal at 12.9 yen, or solar at 12.5 to 16.4 yen.
But the price of nuclear rises by 1 yen per kilowatt-hour for every 100 billion yen that safety-related expenses add to the cost of a new reactor. Meanwhile, solar and wind have become cheaper, dropping below 10 yen per kilowatt-hour in a growing number of cases overseas and even becoming competitive with nuclear in certain areas."
The total costs to implement government-mandated safety measures, maintain facilities and decommission commercially operated nuclear power plants in Japan will reach around 13.46 trillion yen ($123 billion), a Kyodo News tally showed Wednesday.
The amount, which could balloon further and eventually lead to higher electricity fees, was calculated based on financial documents from 11 power companies that own 57 nuclear reactors at 19 plants, as well as interviews with the utilities.
Two years after the 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis, the Japanese government introduced new safety standards which made measures against natural disasters and major accidents mandatory for restarting reactors.
The power companies have been given the option of either maintaining their idled nuclear power plants and restarting them once they had implemented the required safety measures, or decommissioning their plants. But it has become clear either choice required massive costs.
Of the total costs, 5.4 trillion yen was for safety measures implemented as of last month at 15 power plants they are trying to restart."
Then in November 2012, a much bigger and broader scandal emerged involving fake safety certifications for reactor parts, sub-standard reactor parts, and bribery.2,3
"In 2012 KHNP [Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power] discovered that it had been supplied with falsely-certified non-safety-critical parts for at least five power reactors. The utility told the ministry that eight unnamed suppliers – reportedly seven domestic companies and one US company – forged some 60 quality control certificates covering 7682 components delivered between 2003 and 2012. The majority of the parts were installed at Hanbit (Yonggwang) units 5 and 6, while the rest were used at Hanbit units 3 and 4 and Hanul (Ulchin) unit 3. Hanbit units were taken offline while the parts were replaced.
"Then in May 2013 safety-related control cabling with falsified documentation was found to have been installed at four reactors. The NSSC [Nuclear Safety and Security Commission] ordered KHNP immediately to stop operation of its Shin Kori 2 and Shin Wolsong 1 units and to keep Shin Kori 1, which has been offline for scheduled maintenance, shut down. In addition, the newly-constructed Shin Wolsong 2, which was awaiting approval to start commercial operation, could not start up. All would remain closed until the cabling has been replaced, which was expected to take about four months. Shin Kori 1&2 and Shin Wolsong 1 were cleared to restart in January 2014. Completion of Shin Kori 3&4 was delayed, to 2015, due to the need to replace control cabling which failed tests. In October 2013 about 100 people were indicted for their part in the falsification of documentation."
The Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety states:5
Safety-related equipment was installed on the basis of falsified documentation, and according to a whistleblower, equipment had actually failed under Loss-Of-Coolant-Accident conditions during at least one concealed test.6
...
The New York Times reported in August 2013 that despite the government's pledge to ban parts suppliers found to have falsified documents from bidding again for 10 years, KHNP imposed only a six-month penalty for such suppliers.12 The New York Times continued: "And nuclear opponents say that more fundamental changes are needed in the regulatory system, pointing out that one of the government’s main regulating arms, the Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety, gets 60 percent of its annual budget from Korea Hydro."12
Worse still, a 2014 parliamentary audit revealed that some officials fired from KEPCO E&C (Korea Electric Power Corporation Engineering and Construction) over the scandals were rehired.9
The scandal was still on the boil in 2014. Korea Times reported on 25 June 2014:8
"The government has discovered irregularities yet again that could threaten the safety of nuclear reactors. This time, the perpetrators are parts suppliers that presented fake quality certificates in the course of replacing antiquated parts used in nuclear power plants. Six state testing facilities were also found to have failed to conduct adequate tests before issuing certificates. A two-month audit of the six testing facilities by the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy showed that 39 quality certificates presented by 24 companies were fabricated. ...
"Most disheartening in the latest revelation of irregularities is that the state-run certifiers failed to detect fabrications by skipping the required double-testing. ... Given the magnitude of corruption in the nuclear industry arising from its intrinsic nature of being closed, the first step toward safety should be to break the deep-seated food chain created by the so-called nuclear mafia, which will help enhance transparency ultimately. With the prosecution set to investigate the suppliers, the certifiers will face business suspension. But it's imperative to toughen penalties for them, considering that light punitive measures have stood behind the lingering corruption in the nuclear industry. ""
I fredags var elen 1600 procent dyrare i södra Sverige jämfört med norra.
Enligt Löfvén har elöverskottet aldrig varit större. Vilken sopa. Nu kommer den elkris som oppositionen varnade för. Total oförmåga att se helheten.