Auf Wiedersehen Atomkraft!

The German decision to abandon nuclear power after the Fukushima Daiichi accident is well known and the source of continued debate over its wisdom.  I picked up a reminder of the opposition to nuclear power in Germany this weekend while visiting Berlin. It combines the classic logo "Nuclear Power? No Thanks!" [Atomkraft? Nein Danke] with the nostalgic "Ampelmann" figure used on crossing lights to guide pedestrians at intersections throughout East Berlin under the former communist regime in the German Democratic Republic (DDR). The Ampelmann is so popular that he's been adopted in former West Berlin as well.

Above you see the Ampelmann (roughly the "traffic light man") in the "Stop" position.

And here's our man in both the "stop" and "go" positions. The Ampelmann is now sold on merchandise of all kinds - clothing, ornaments, candy, etc. - in Ampelmann stores and souvenir shops throughout Berlin. It's an ironic symbol of the victory of capitalism over communism, I suppose. As for Germany, the government has decided to shut down all nuclear plants by 2022. Here are two postcards of the Krümmel plant on the Elbe in Schleswig-Holstein which had suffered some performance problems and was shut down in 2011 at the time of the decision. It won't reopen.

The backs of these cards tout the plant for providing  safe and environmentally friendly electric power since 1984 for the north German region. "Energie ist Leben!" - "Energy is life!" - they say. The life of the plant, however, is now over.

Gentilly into the night...

A few reactors ended their operating life at the end of 2012. In Spain the 41 year old Garoña reactor was shut down permanently in December 2012 based in part on a new €153 million energy tax as well as refurbishment costs. Hydro Quebec recommended to the Quebec government closure of Gentilly 2, a 675 Mw CANDU 6 plant that began operation in 1983. Operation ceased December 28, 2012, and the plant now goes into a long-term storage pending final dismantling and decommissioning, expected in 2062.

Gentilly 1, a smaller 250-MW CANDU-BWR prototype that shut down in 1977. The Gentilly site hosted the only operating  reactors in Quebec; plans for a third unit were scrapped.

This card was posted in Trois Rivieres, Quebec, the ancestral home of the Burns (Brulé) family before they emigrated to the U.S. in the 19th century.

Happy Nuke Year!

I found a couple holiday themed items. The first is an anti-nuke button produced for the New Hampshire Seacoast Concerned Citizens group, sometime in the 1980's, when controversy boiled over the licensing of the Seabrook plant in New Hampshire. 

And I thought Santa was non- partisan! And for those wanting their holiday dessert, here's the Dounreay Fast Reactor, which operated from 1962 to 1977 at the tip of northern Scotland, dressed up like a Christmas pudding. 

The reverse of the card completes the phrase "The proof of the pudding..." with "is in the heating," and then gives a seasonal drink suggestion - the "Meltdown": "Put a lump of sugar, a twist of lemon peel, a twist of orange peel and a lot of brandy into a flameproof mug; light the mixture, stir and strain. Add strontium 90 to taste." Hmmm....The reverse of the card, which did not scan well, shows a crowd of revelers watching our pudding in flames. Well, if you're tired of the polemic, here's a simple winter scene courtesy of  Electricité de France of the snowy shoreline of the Moselle river with the Cattenom plant in the distance.

It's still the holiday season, so let's all sit back and raise a glass (I'll stick with champagne over a Meltdown!).

Bonne année à tous! Happy new year to all!

Happy New Year!

I've been away for a few weeks but look forward to new posts in 2013.  Although not on the "nuclear" theme, this is a great vintage postcard for the new year sent to my grandmother over 100 years ago. Strange!

Visit a Nuke! Wear your best!

Here are a few postcards from visitors centers promoting nuclear power. Don't you love the fashions?

This is a scene from the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago at the Commonweath Edison exhibit with a model of the Dresden Power Station Unit 1. Our ladies, with legs coyly forward, are learning how electricity produced by nuclear reactors serves American homes and industries.

Dad and sons are figuring out their tour at Quad Cities, another Commonwealth Edison (now Exelon) plant. What big feet these guys have!

Finally, here's the visitors' center at the Brunswick Plant in Southport, NC, south of Wilmington. Do you think the shoes on the family in the lower right hand corner could be any whiter?!? For me this plant is memorable because I was hit by a car in a convenience store parking lot in Southport while on a plant visit for NRC in 1983.  Not serious - I live to tell the tale!

Fermi achieves chain reaction 70 years ago.

On December 2, 1942, Enrico Fermi obtained the first chain reaction controlled fission in Chicago Pile-1 underneath Stagg Field in Chicago. 

The cards show the 94 MWe prototype fast breeder reactor near Detroit named for Fermi, who died in 1954. Fermi Unit 1 started construction in 1957, achieved criticality in 1963, and went into "high power" ascension in December 1965.

 On October 5, 1966 Fermi 1 suffered a partial fuel meltdown. According to the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, there was no abnormal radiation release to the environment.  Nearly four years later, Fermi 1 was restarted.  In November 1972, the Power Reactor Development Company made the decision to decommission Fermi 1. Fermi Unit 2, a General Electric Boiling Water Reactor  received an operating license in 1985. Fermi Unit 3, an ESBWR, is under consideration.

The Atomium at Expo 1958: Nuclear Optimism

This card depicts the "Atomium", the symbol of Expo 58, the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels, the first such fair since World War II.  As described on the Atomium's website,  the structure "symbolised the democratic will to maintain peace among all the nations, faith in progress, both technical and scientific and, finally, an optimistic vision of the future of a modern, new, super-technological world for a better life for mankind. The peaceful use of atomic energy for scientific purposes embodied these themes particularly well and, so, that is what determined the shape of the edifice." The structure is 102 metres high and represents an elementary iron crystal. Engineer André Waterkeyn and architects André and Jean Polak contributed to the design. Although intended to be disassembled after the fair, the Atomium has survived and been refurbished, much like other exposition icons like the Eiffel Tower and the Unisphere from the 1964-65 New York World's Fair.

Among the national and industrial exhibits at the fair (I love that there were pavilions for chocolate - after all this is Belgium -- and tobacco), Westinghouse had an exhibition which included a model reactor, depicted on this card. On the reverse the card states that the reactor will be completed between 1960 and 1962, and will be used at the Yankee plant in the U.S. (Yankee Rowe in Massachusetts) and the SELNI plant in Italy.