LED streetlights to take over downtown Ann Arbor

From LED magazine

17 Oct 2007

Ann Arbor plans to become the first US city to convert 100 percent of its downtown streetlights to LED technology, with the installation of more than 1000 LED fixtures.

LED maker Cree and the City of Ann Arbor, Michigan, have announced that Ann Arbor will join Raleigh, North Carolina and Toronto, Canada, in the growing LED City initiative.

In an effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption, Ann Arbor plans to become the first U.S. city to convert 100 percent of its downtown streetlights to LED technology.

Ann Arbor expects to install more than 1,000 LED streetlights beginning next month, after a successful trial of 25 fixtures. The City anticipates a 3.8-year payback on its initial investment. Each LED fixture draws 56 watts and is projected to last 10 years, replacing fixtures with bulbs that use more than 120 watts and last only two years.

“This decision is based on three years of extensive research on the energy and maintenance savings associated with LED lighting, citizen surveys and a very successful pilot of 25 LED lights spanning an entire city block,” said Mayor John Hieftje.

As a result, the City received a $630,000 grant from the Ann Arbor Downtown Development Authority to fund retrofits for the downtown lights. “This initial installation should save the City more than $100,000 per year and reduce annual greenhouse gas emissions by approximately 294 tons of CO2. Our plan is to retrofit all downtown lights with LED alternatives over the next two years.”

Full implementation of LEDs is projected to cut Ann Arbor’s public lighting energy use in half and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2,425 tons of CO2 annually, the equivalent of taking 400 cars off the road for a year. Detroit Edison, Ann Arbor’s local utility provider, will meter the new LED streetlights with the intent to gather sufficient information to develop new LED-based tariffs.

The LED streetlights currently installed in Ann Arbor are based on the New Westminster Series made by Lumec, Inc., which contain LED light engines from Relume Technologies, Inc. In turn, the Relume light engines contains Cree XLamp LEDs.

Could Georgia Drought Threaten Farley Nuclear Reactors?

Luckily, the Farley Nuclear Reactor site is cooled with Towers, which means their water needs run into hundreds of millions of gallons of water use a day, instead of billions of gallons of water use each day in a once through system like Entergy's Indian Point where the licensee has been fighting for 30 plus years the citizens demand that they keep their commitment to go to a Closed Cooling System. Still, hundreds of millions of gallons of water use on a daily basis is a LOT OF WATER, and there are serious reasons to suspect that Georgia's desperate conditions due to a continuing drought might be, or are threatening the Farley Reactors ability to continue running.

Water fights between Georgia, Alabama and Florida is not new, each state having their own positions on how water sharing is done...problem is, as we are seeing now, in a catastrophic drought situation as the one now being faced in Georgia, with the citizens of Atlanta on water rationing, practical life needs have nothing to do with legal battles, and differing water needs in three different states.

Here is the problem right now...Georgia, specifically middle Georgia does not have enough water to meet its own citizens water needs, and is less than 90 days from running out of water. The time has come to turn off the spicket that supplies Alabama water for its nuclear reactors, and water that Florida contends it needs to protect its Panhandle.

The tri-state battle pits Florida's concerns about preserving endangered species of mussels and sturgeon and the effects of booming population growth in Atlanta against those of Georgia, which worries that the water needed to keep the species alive draws from dwindling sources such as Lake Lanier outside of Atlanta. Alabama, meanwhile, contends Georgia needs to loosen its hold on water from Lake Allatoona in the Atlanta metro area so that the state can replenish much-needed water supplies and continue running a nuclear power plant in the southern part of the state.

Sat, Oct. 20, 2007
http://www.ledger-enquirer.com/news/story/157712.html

Can someone have a V-8 here? We have Alabama demanding Lake Allatoona water in Georgia be released so they can continue operating NUCLEAR REACTORS! Here is a wake up call to Alabama, and to Farley...people not nuclear reactors come first. Shut down Farley, put it into COLD STORAGE until the drought is over.

In the meantime, for all the communities where the nuclear industry wants to build their new generation of reactors...how precious are your water supplies? Are you as citizens ready to face water rationing in the name of Nuclear Profits?

John Edwards says No New Nukes!

Last night, on HBO's Bill Maher Show, John Edwards publicly stated that his energy plan for America did not include any new nuclear power plants, He was very emphatic in saying no new nukes.

I think he is the only main candidate who holds this policy, the others all say new nukes are necessary.

Susan Corbett
jscorbett@mindspring.com
SC Sierra Club Conservation Chair

From The Little Bird Department...Is Entergy About To LOSE Bid To Relicense Vermont Yankee?

We all love rumors, and even hints of rumors. Well, there are some serious rumors being whispered throughout the Northeast that Entergy may be about to LOSE its bid to relicense their trouble plagued Vermont Yankee Nuclear Reactor.

First, lets face facts here...the people of Brattleboro and the surrounding area do not want the plant in their community. With the recent serious SAFETY problems at the plant, including the now infamous collapsing cooling tower incident, can any one blame them? Are we about to see the beginning of an Enron like COLLAPSE of this supposed NUCLEAR GIANT? Has Vermont's PSB finally had enough of Entergy's decreased Safety Margins and lies...let's not forget Entergy's experts doing everything in their power to have the cooling tower contention TOSSED in the License Renewal Process, and the NRC was more than happy to obliege at the time.

Indian Point is far from a shoe in for Entergy what with their failing reactor vessel heads, and so many leaks that some citizens of Westchester County refer to the Indian Point Entergy Center as the Titanic on the Hudson. If Vermont Yankee is closed, which it should be, and Entergy loses the twin monsters at Indian Point, their fleet strength will have been decimated...it may just be wishful thinking, but word on the street says to be expecting some fireworks up in Vermont in the coming days and weeks. Might be a good time to hedge your bets where Entergy stock is concerned...they lose three reactors here in America, and you will see a SERIOUS TUMBLE.

TEPCO Earthquake Damage FAR WORSE Than Thought

Earlier this summer when the TEPCO reactors were struck down by a massive earthquake in Japan, Green Nuclear Butterfly said the damage was FAR MORE EXTENSIVE than the company was actually letting on. We further said, that the IAEA, NEI and the NRC in the name of the Nuclear Renaissance would try to cover it all up...one slight problem with their devious plan. We here at Green Nuclear Butterfly were right on target...in breaking news today, TEPCO is announcing they have a SERIOUS PROBLEM with a stuck control rod! LET THE DECOMMISSIONING BEGIN! For those keeping score, we remind you that Entergy's Indian Point was also egegiously built on an Earthquake Fault.

Control rod stuck in Kashiwazaki Kariwa unit
19 October 2007

Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) reported that a control rod cannot be removed from the reactor of unit 7 of its Kashiwazaki Kariwa nuclear power plant. The unit shut down automatically when an earthquake struck the plant on 16 July.

A control rod is moved in or out of the central core of a nuclear reactor in order to control the neutron flux - increase or decrease the number of neutrons which will split further uranium atoms. This in turn affects the thermal power of the reactor, the amount of steam generated, and hence the electricity produced. They are usually combined into control rod assemblies and inserted into guide tubes within a nuclear fuel element.

In an emergency, the control rods are quickly inserted all the way into the fuel assembly to stop the fission reaction and shut down the reactor unit. All 205 of the 4-metre-long control rods at Kashiwazaki Kariwa 7's reactor were automatically inserted into the fuel as soon as the 6.8 magnitude earthquake hit, Tepco said.

Control rods stand vertically within a reactor core. In pressurised water reactors (PWRs), they are inserted from above, the control rod drive mechanisms being mounted on the reactor pressure vessel head. However, due to the necessity of a steam dryer above the core of a boiling water reactor (BWR), such as the Kashiwazaki Kariwa units, this design requires insertion of the control rods from underneath the core. BWRs require the hydraulic insertion of control rods in the event of an emergency shutdown, using water from a special tank that is under high nitrogen pressure.

Tepco said that in order to conduct in-core inspections, it had removed the lid of the reactor's pressure vessel and has started removing fuel assemblies and control rods from the reactor core to the fuel storage pools. So far, 106 control rods have been removed from the reactor. However, the company discovered that one of the control rods was jammed in the reactor core.

Company officials said that one reason for the rod becoming stuck could be that devices intended to prevent the rod from slipping remained locked. Another possibility is that the earthquake distorted the shape of the facility, preventing the rod from moving. Checking the exact cause, however, is likely to take some time as water that fills the reactor must first be drained before its interior can be examined.

At the time of the earthquake, three of the seven reactors at Kashiwazaki Kariwa - units 3, 4 and 7 - were in operation. Those reactors shut down safely as tremors began. Unit 2 was in the process of starting operation, and shut down automatically as well. Units 1, 5 and 6 were not operating as periodic inspections were being carried out.

The earthquake resulted in water being shaken from cooling pools of all the units and some of this drained away to be discharged to sea. In addition, many barrels of solid low-level radioactive waste were knocked over and an external electrical transformer failed and caught fire.

The discovery of the jammed control rod is likely to further delay the resumption of plant operations. All seven reactors at the plant remain offline while damage from the earthquake is assessed.

Cancer & Nuclear Workers

Workers at nuclear weapons plants were federal employees, and their health records (minus personal identifiers) are publicly available. But after Dr. Tom Mancuso and Dr. Alice Stewart published a paper in 1976 stating that Hanford workers had higher-than-average cancer rates, the government withheld the records.

Lawsuits followed, and the government only relented in 1990 (after the Cold War ended).

In 2000, DOE issued a report on a series of studies of worker health, concluding that cancer rates were higher. Congress passed a law later that year allowing workers with a variety of cancers to be compensated - although the progress has been very slow since then.

Workers at nuclear power plants are different, as they work for private companies, who are under no obligation to share health records or records of exposure (all employees wear badges measuring radiation exposure each day). As a result, there has been virtually no studies on this topic.

There was one for the Calvert Cliffs plant in Maryland years ago, but it was small and inconclusive. I know of one for Canadian workers that was in a journal a few years ago, but again, that found nothing.

Truly, I don't know of anything we can do to force the release of these records.

Joe Mangano
Executive Director
Radiation and Public Health Project

Advisory Board
FUSE USA

Impacts of Climate Change on Nuclear Power Station Sites

Greenpeace UK
12-03-2007

This review looks at the impacts that climate change will have on the coastal environment around a selection of power station sites, over the lifetime of both existing and proposed nuclear reactors, and examines the risks to which they would be exposed by rising tide levels, coastal erosion and storm surges. It also highlights the even more disastrous consequences that would ensue upon the loss of a significant area of land-based ice such as the Greenland ice shelf, which could result in a catastrophic global sea level rise.

The impacts of climate change on nuclear power station sites: full report (PDF)
The impacts of climate change on nuclear power station sites: executive summary (PDF)
Watch an animation to see how rising seas will threaten both existing and new nuclear power stations

Thanks to Chris Dudley at MDSolar for the story tip.
Mirrored from my new blog WinaFish.

The Hudson River Without Indian Point 2 and 3

The Hudson River Without Indian Point...Let's Go Back To The Future

Entergy wants to relicense for another 20 years its creaking, dilapidated reactors known as IP2 and IP3, or collectively the Indian Point Energy Center. Those reactors are leaking strontium 90, tritium, cesium and other radiological poisons into our environment, into the Hudson River. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has decided it is acceptable for some of us to die from horrid cancers with each passing day, month and year that Indian Point continues to operate. They spout out formulas, and speak about vague idealistic concepts like Acceptable Risk. Acceptable Risk by what standard? ALARA, where the licensee can state they are doing the best that they can, and the NRC says that is good enough?

Have you, your mother, your daughter, even your grandmother suffered the tragic pains of breast cancer? Has one of your children or relatives been struck down with leukemia, or gone through the painful process of being treated for thyroid cancer? If you can answer yes to any of these, you need to look UP RIVER to Indian Point each and every time you flip your light switch, or turn on a lamp...are those kilowatts of electric power worth it? Should we instead be looking at other alternatives such as conservation, wind, hydro, and as yet unknown and under funded alternatives to a power source that indiscriminately kills?

We have choices, alternatives to a radiological death knocking indiscriminately at the doors of our families, our neighbors. We can choose as a community to tell the NRC no to the Grime Reaper living among us, its strontium 90, tritium spreading cancer like some silent plague can be vanquished. Imagine a Hudson River without these two spires of death rising into the air. Go back to the future, remember the view before those towers rose into the Sky, and then demand in unison that the NRC deny Entergy's License Renewal Application.

New York's future is OURS TO DECIDE. We have the power to take back our choices by marching on Entergy, by taking back the Public Regulatory Process, by demanding accountability. A few weekends where tens of thousands of concerned citizens camped out in front of Entergy, would give the NRC pause for thought. A few hundred protesters showing up in front of Hilary Clinton and Chuck Shumer's district offices would force them to give us more than lip service and a few false promises.

Saying no to $50 Billion in loan guarantees is only a part of the answer. We need musicians, politicians and average citizens to stand up for the 67 American communities being forced to continue hosting dangerous old reactors. We as a nation need to demand that Washington ABOLISH the Price Anderson Act. We saw what happened to the citizens of New Orleans...should we see hundreds of thousands of Americans loose everything in a nuclear incident or terrorist attack on a Nuclear Reactor because our government has given the nuclear industry a FREE FROM LIABILITY CARD? Should Americans be denied the right to insure their homes for the losses that would occur as a result of one of these old reactors visiting a Chernobyl on our communities?

Please, if you live within the 50 mile circle of death that is Indian Point, if you live in New Jersey, New York or Connecticut join the fight to close these dangerous facilities. It takes a village to raise a child, it takes two aging nuclear reactors to kill thousands of those same children.

Riverkeeper's Masquerade ~ Oct 30th

RIVERKEEPER'S
Mischief Night: A Masquerade
Tuesday, October 30, 2007
8:30PM until the witching hour

Mischief Night: A Masquerade (Masquerade Attire)
Cocktails, hors d'oeuvres and dancing
Music by DJ GRANDMASTER FLASH The Turntable Legend
Burlesque Performers

$250 per person

Hosted by
Andre Balazs
Lorraine Bracco
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
Alex Matthiessen
Moby
Summer Rayne Oakes
Mike Richter

Riverkeeper Committee
Ann Colley
Debbie Bancroft
George Hornig
Alison Mazzola
Heather Mnuchin
Bob Pittman
Veronique Pittman
Carole Radziwill
Julie Taymor

ESQUIRE NORTH
111 Central Park North, New York City

Come visit the Ultimate Bachelor Pad created by New York's top designers:
-Campion Platt for Versace: The Living Room
-Dean Maltz for Hugo Boss: The Media Room
-Rockwell Group for St. Pauli Girl: The Ultimate Bachelor Bar
-Dean Maltz for Valcucine: The Kitchen
-Comma for Intel and Kenneth Cole: The Gaming Room
-Barclay Butera for Bally: The Library
-Christopher Maya for Louis Vuitton: The Master Bedroom
-Kristen McGinnis for ASICS: The Home Gym
-Ildiko Sragli for Lufthansa: The Home Office
-Robin Wilson for Rockport: The Lower Terrace
-Coldagh for Westin: The Upper Terrace

To purchase tickets online click here.
For further information or to purchase tickets over the telephone, please call Karen Tumelty at 914.478.4501 ext 238.

Founded originally as the Hudson River Fishermen's Association

41 years ago, Riverkeeper is credited with spearheading the grassroots battle to wrest control of the Hudson from polluters. The campaign has been so successful that Riverkeeper has become the inspiration and model for a movement of 160 "waterkeeper" organizations across the globe.

New England Specific Opposition to 50 Billion in Nuclear Loan Guarantees

(GNB urges you to support and sign the Nuke Free + MoveOn petition to halt the $50 Billion loan guarantee. GNB feels there is an additional pressing need to address the issues stated below by Sherwood Martinelli. RemyC)

The full court press is on, and the lobbyist for the Nuclear Industry (NEI) are walking the halls of both the house and senate in the hopes of pushing through $50 BILLION in loan guarantees for new nuclear reactors...Green Nuclear Butterfly is giving itself ONE WEEK to collect 1,000 co-signers on our Petition opposing these loan guarantees. Give us a hand by sharing this post, or linking to our Petition on your blog on web site.

For HTML code email uraniumhotspot@aol.com

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/oppose-50-billion-in-nuclear-loan-guarantees

Petition overview letter

Oppose 50 Billion in Nuclear Loan Guarantees

Target:

All Grassroots Environmental Organizations and Individual Activists

Created by:

Sherwood Martinelli, Green Nuclear Butterfly

The picture you see is a serious infrastructure crack, and radioactive leak at Entergy's Indian Point. Our children, our spouses, and our parents and relatives are dying from allowable radiological releases of strontium 90, and tritium. No United States home owner can get insurance to cover their personal losses from a nuclear incident or terrorist attack. Now, this failing industry wants to build over 200 new reactors in your neighborhoods, and use your money to pay for it.

The Congress and Senate in committee can give the nuclear industry a blank check in the form of 50 Billion in loan guarantees, or they can strip them out.

Sign The Petition Right Now

Petition powered by ThePetitionSite.com

Indian Point Leaky Maps

Indian Point Two Tritium Map-Above
Indian Point Ground Water Contaminant Flows-Below



Study these test well results, and the print we have bolded...if this tritium is NOT characteristic of what one would expect to find in the Spent Fuel Pool, then WHERE is the tritium LEAKING FROM? In short, it is leaking from the HOT SIDE of Indian Point...more specifically, from the reactor coolant system, or the reactor itself, as in the internals. Further, the fact that the tritium is being found, means it is contaminating ground water, and in more than one way.

Well Sample Date Location Tritium

MW-34 12/13/2005 Transformer Yard 63,900 p/CI/l
MW-35 12/13/2005 Transformer Yard 42, 300 p/CI/l
MW-33 12/13/2005 Transformer Yard 142,000 p/CI/l

These results are above drinking water standards but below the levels found in MW-1 11. No other isotopes characteristic of spent fuel pool water was found in any of these sample results. These wells are test wells and are not part of any drinking water system and do not pose a threat to workers or the general public. These wells will continue to be sampled as results can vary due to environmental conditions especially rainfall, at the time the sample is drawn.

NOW, moving on in the same document...STORM DRAINS. If they are taking tritium samples from storm drains, this means, contrary to NRC and Entergy claims, that the tritium IS LEAVING THE SITE.

Storm Water Drains Now Included in Test Program In order to develop a comprehensive data set that will lead to a conceptual model of ground water movement on site, samples for tritium were taken from the storm drains in and adjacent to the transformer yard.

Test results showed detectable levels for tritium in the storm drains ranging from less than 2000 pCi/L in sample locations 17, 18 and 19 to a high of between 12,000 and 51,000 pCi/L at sample location MHI-6 nearmonitoring well MW- 11. The remaining wells tested between 2000 and 5300 pCi/L. Storm drains at Indian Point flow into the discharge canal. True...but, that STORM RUN OFF then flows INTO THE HUDSON River.

There are three NRC ADAMS documents that one should look at to start, and these are:

ml061320083
ml061160481
ml061320105

Lastly, under the heading, "One picture is worth 1,000 words, I give you two."

This one is rather interesting...Notice the crack running in a horizontal direction. Notice the sign hanging there warning people that the area is RADIOACTIVELY CONTAMINATED. Two schools of thought surround this photograph that was taken on the Indian Point site...one, is a picture of the crack in spent fuel pool number two. The other, that it is a picture taken along the wall of the reactor itself...either way, it is pretty damning.

NYC Wants Say on Indian Point

NYC Asks to Intervene in Indian Point Relicensing

October 16, 2007

(Associated Press) - New York City, which counts on the electricity provided by the Indian Point nuclear power plants but could be vulnerable in a reactor attack or accident, wants a say in whether the plants can stay open for 20 more years.

Without taking a position, but stating that the decision "will affect the welfare of all New Yorkers," the city has filed a request to intervene in the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's relicensing process.

"The city has a clear interest in potential public health and safety issues associated with the issue of relicensure, notably in ensuring the safety of its food and water supplies," says the petition, signed by Vice President Michael Delaney of the city's Economic Development Corp.

"In addition, there is a continued need for the provision of lower-cost electric power to residential and commercial customers in New York City."

The public safety argument is often used by opponents of the Indian Point plants; the cheap electricity argument is often used by supporters. The petition was dated Oct. 1 and made public Tuesday by the NRC.

A call to Delaney was not immediately answered.

Entergy Nuclear, owner of the two Indian Point plants in Buchanan, 35 miles north of midtown Manhattan, has applied for new licenses that would allow the plants to run until 2033 and 2035.

Many of the groups that have been trying to close Indian Point since the 2001 terrorist attacks are now trying to block the relicensing.

The nuclear plants have been plagued with recent problems ranging from radioactive water leaks to balky emergency sirens to a guard caught sleeping. Opponents have long believed that the densely populated suburbs around the plants could not be quickly evacuated.

Entergy spokesman Jim Steets said, "It's sensible for New York City to take an interest, since their public buildings and infrastructure _ subways, schools, firehouses, streetlights, airports _ rely on Indian Point power."

NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said the city's request would be forwarded to the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, a quasi-judicial body which will assess the city's standing.

He said intervention is ordinarily granted only to those who take a position against relicensing, but sometimes a government agency "can be a party to proceeding without being an active participant."

Others who have asked to intervene include an anti-Indian Point group, Friends United for Sustainable Energy, and a pro-Indian Point industry group, the New York Affordable Reliable Electricity Alliance.

Michael J. Delaney, Esq.
Vice President – Energy Regulatory Affairs
New York City Economic Development Corporation
110 William Street, 4th Floor
New York, NY 10038
(212) 312-3787
mdelaney@nycedc.com

Top of page http://money.cnn.com/news/newsfeeds/articles/apwire/bf93ba551df592a17644407bc44853be.htm

(Thanks to Lisa Rainwater, PhD, Policy Director Riverkeeper, Inc. for the head's up on this article. Lisa can be reached at 914-478-4501 http://www.riverkeeper.org)

Comments from Sherwood Martinelli:

I am actually very disturbed about what else was included in the article about the city of New York's filing for intervener status. Tucked in, almost as an after thought was the information that NY AREA has also asked to be accepted in as an intervener...further, it states that USUALLY only those who OPPOSE relicensing are granted such status.

This is a very alarming industry move that MUST BE OPPOSED. NY AREA is a super PRO-NUCLEAR group that was actually started and funded by Entergy...if they get status, every other group that Entergy has out there who supports Nuclear and/or Entergy is going to come in through that same door.

Sherwood
(914) 293 7458 or 734 1955

Betcee May in Earth First! Journal

Excerpt from:

Our Bodies, Our Causes
By Sophia

Earth First! Journal

Eostar 2007
Volume 27, Issue 3

"I came across a campaign to shut down Indian Point, a nuclear power plant in New York State. One extremely vocal man in this fight said that he was determined to find the prettiest girl on the Internet to support his campaign, and he did, indeed, find a model to stand beside him. One of their main publicity stunts—doing a photo shoot in front of this nuclear power plant—brought lots of traffic to the campaign website. Photos from the shoot, some of which were readily hung up in the power plant’s lunchroom, depicted the model posing in heels in front of the reactor, as well as lounging on a hybrid car. How could this be attracting people who really care about the environment? It doesn’t make sense to appeal to people using a method that needs to be obliterated."

hmm...

To read the entire article and comments click here.