Connie's Corner

Sneezing....

I've been sneezing like crazy this morning...cold or allergies...allergies, I hope. If it's a cold, it means I have been getting out and about too much .

I've been reading about the nuclear reactors at Three Mile Island, which is an island in the Susquehanna River near Pittsburgh. There are two untis, one and two, and it was unit two that had the partial core meltdown in March of 1979. The interesting thing I did not realize was Unit 2 had only been online a little over three months. It was brand new. That throws out my theory that old reactors should not have their licenses renewed...maybe. I read on to find that human error contributed to the accident after identifying a valve failure in the cooling system. Hopefully, in the last forty years, we have learned and made improvements. The NRC says so....

Unit 2 was too badly damaged to ever resume operations, and the core has since been removed to "somewhere". This is not the case for Unit 1 which began operating in 1974, and it just had its license renewed in late 2009 so it is good to go until 2034. It has the same design and was made by the same company, Babcock and Wilcox. (The problem reactors in Japan were made by GE.) Unit 1, according to Exelon Corp, the current owner, has had all design flaws corrected...so we can put our fears to rest. I am so relieved.

The NYSE is not liking all the "talk" of dangerous nuclear power. The utility index, of which Exelon is the heaviest weighted of fifteen component companies, is in turmoil, as one would expect. A small index compared to the Dow, it is down over 5% since last Friday, clearly showing concern for the future of the nuclear industry.

One unusual thing I see in the Japanese industry is the concentration of reactors in one area. The Fukushima Power Plant has six reactors on site. Even to me, that seems like too many in one spot...

until next time....c