Three times as many US nukes shut down 1/13/1998 as 1/13/2000

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I have to extend my thanks for Harl for finding the old NRC plant status reports (even though they were not directly linked on the "previous reports" page.) I actually had tried simply playing with URLs but got the date format wrong (guess I had a Y2k problem :-)

http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/DAILY/980113pr.htm and

http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/DAILY/000113pr.htm

I had previously been limited to tediously looking at the event reports for comparisons...

I chose less than 90% as an additional measure for several reasons:

1) I think we can all agree a plant producing less than 10% less power than normal is not significant, but more than 10% potentially is.

2) There are quite a few plants that NEVER go above 98% or 99% power, hence counting numbers at less than 100% is sort of misleading.

In terms of "total shutdowns" there were 22 producing no power 1/13/1998. (107 plants on the NRC list total.)

And only SEVEN producing no power 1/13/200. (104 plants on the NRC status list total..including this so people realize a slight skew from fewer plants today..I assume three decommissions since 1998)

On Jan. 13th, 1998, I show a total of TWENTY-SEVEN plants at less than 90%.

On Jan 13th, 2000, I show a total of TWELVE plants at less than 90%.

Now, for you lazy doomers out there, I've already done your mental gymnastics typically done to turn ANYTHING into a negative.

Feel free to cut and paste the paragraph below to put in a scary TB 2000 post (don't bother attributing it to me :-)

"Clearly, there are so many nukes operating because TPTB realized that the nukes were far more Y2K compliant than the coal or oil plants. They know that the fossil plants are gradually collapsing and need to keep all the nukes running to make it seem like nothing is happening for as long as possible. If we see this many nukes continuing to run without more shutdowns, that's when we KNOW the US power grid is eventually doomed."

-- John H Krempasky (johnk@dmv.com), January 14, 2000

Answers

I think, FWIW, that the only real challenge facing the power companies now is coal delivery, because of the sorry-ass state of the railroads. Not TEOWhatever, it would probably express itself as higher cost, at the very worst, rationing.

Down here below the Mason-Dixon line, summer heat is the issue. Any weaknesses in the grid in general will manifest itself then.

-- Forrest Covington (theforrest@mindspring.com), January 14, 2000.


Well I guess we'll find out this summer.

-- && (&&@&&.&), January 14, 2000.

Okay, John. Relenting, relenting, relenting. I appreciate both the persistence of your posts, the diligence of your research, the fact that you (unlike present spooked company) post under you own name, and that you've lost "the tone" of your first posts. This is a very worthwhile post, comprehensive and to the point, and all but cponclusive. Final question: how many duriong each period were planned; how many were trips, scrams or standbys due to sensor indicators or other safety concerns?

TNX

-- Squirrel Hunter (nuts@upina.tree), January 14, 2000.


I don't get it. Your headline says that 3 times as many nuke plants are shut down between 2 years ago and now, but your message says that 22 plants weren't producing power 2 years ago but only 7 aren't now. Now, my math skills are famously bad - am I missing something?

-- Idontgetit (huh?@whatsup.com), January 14, 2000.

As a friend of mine who worked for the company use to say figures dont lie but liars do figure How do we know we are getting the real Nuke plant numbers that are operating. No citizen oversight here, do you trust the facts being published. We need inside info from insiders about what is really happening.

-- y2k aware mike (y2k aware mike @ conservation . com), January 14, 2000.


--OK, John, I'll hand it to you-here, take it. You're doing a good job digging. No one wants to glow in the dark. these are legitimate concerns folks have, and what you are doing is providing some good info, grant ya that. thanks!

zoggus

-- zog (zzoggy@yahoo.com), January 14, 2000.


"In terms of "total shutdowns" there were 22 producing no power 1/13/1998. (107 plants on the NRC list total.)

And only SEVEN producing no power 1/13/200. " J.H.K.

Um, a quick look at those two URL's shows a stricking difference.

Everyone of those 22 "cold shutdowns" in 1998 were due to Defueling, Refueling or Maintenance Outages.

In comparison, the last two weeks events were SCRAMs, turbine trips, hot shutdowns, "unexplained events".

Try again John.

-- (pigs@do.fly), January 14, 2000.


Today's nuke event:

http://hv.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=002JSs

-- (pigs@do.fly), January 14, 2000.


I noticed that John's e-mail address is the DMV. No wonder it takes half a day to get a driver's license renewal... the gubmint actually hires people like him to work there.

Hey John, I heard they had an extra half a brain floating around over in Pennsylvania. You could put that to good use if you hurry over there and claim it before some other moron gets there first.

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), January 14, 2000.


I too am wondering who oversees these NRC reports. Who compiles them? Is this self-reporting? What penalties are there for false reports? What's the history of NRC reporting [or false reporting? Do they have a good reputation with 'watchdog' groups?

Also John: Forgive me if I've missed it in the past. Could you address the intentional vs. emergency shuttdown issue that was raised above? I'm still not clear that you aren't [unintentionally, I'm sure] comparing apples and oranges.

And finally: John, just what is your personal interest in using these NRC reports to so masterfully defend the integrety of nuclear power's y2k glitch status? I'm sure that others are dying to know just as much as I am. Did you indicate in the past that you were just a relatively poor retiree [driving an old, beat up car]? How have you come to be so expert in these things? Sorry for the scrutiny, but you do present yourself as quite an authority here.

-- tim phronesia (phronesia@webtv.net), January 14, 2000.



DMV is an ISP on the Delmarva Penninsula.

John is a salt water addict who divides his time between fishing in the ocean, and trolling on the Internet.

Still no word so far as I'm aware as to whether his presence here is business or pleasure.

-- Ron Schwarz (rs@clubvb.com.delete.this), January 14, 2000.


John- You're welcome. And I'll leave the heavy lifting to you in answering tim phronesia's post.

Forrest- Good point. Add any difficulties in getting oil to run the trains.....

Idontgetit- 7 plants now, 22 plants then. Ok, so 7x3=21 and not 22, but you want to quibble?

y2k mike- Start at www.nrc.gov. Take everything you read with a grain of salt until you can verify or trust the source (I see you've got that part down). At the same time, you're probably going to have to learn a lot about nuclear physics, or the answers won't mean much. Good luck, you've got a long road ahead of you.

Pigs- Hey, good catch. Could it be that they can no longer drop everything into the 'maintenance outage' category? (What the heck is an Appendix R issue, anyway?) Even so, I find 4 reactors still shut down, with down dates in this year. 1 cooling leak, 1 turbine trip, 1 preparing to restart, and 1 refueling cycle that just began. I haven't the time or the energy to go back through the daily posts of 1998/1997 to figure out why all of those were down (and to figure out if the refueling cycles make sense). But I'll bet if we'd been scrutinizing the industry then as well as we are now, the past two weeks might be mildly over the normal background noise level.

Hawk- .... Nevermind. I'd tell you to see what I said for mike, but that won't help you distinguish between message and messanger.

tim- Good questions. short answers: the NRC, yes, shutdowns and penalties, not familiar, and hell no, but most watchdog groups start with the premise that anything radioactive is bad. Just so you know, almost Every time the reactor is shut down that isn't for refueling, it's unintentional. Maintenance is scheduled to be done during refueling cycle whenever possible. Anything else is to correct a problem, whether it's one the plant found, or one the NRC has said to change. I certainly can't answer personal motives for others. My own is from seeing the number of misconceptions the general public has with nuclear power. (I know, I should really pick smaller windmills)

Ron- define 'troll' for me sometime. I'm afraid I've been using a different definition. Thanks,

-- harl (harlanquin@aol.hell), January 14, 2000.


John,

If you torture statistics long enough
they will confess.

-- spider (spider0@usa.net), January 14, 2000.


I'd be careful about drawing inferences from statistics. I've seen instances where a statistic's actual definition had been contrived to be quite different from what its name would suggest.

-- David L (bumpkin@dnet.net), January 14, 2000.

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