The basic thesis of a post I wrote in January was that the Chernobyl accident was far enough in the past that the younger generation in the nuclear industry did not have the first-hand memories of the experience, and therefore lacked some of the emotional understanding of the event. I suggested that there should be a conscious effort to pass on how Chernobyl and Three Mile Island affected the culture of the industry.

It's not as much fun as you might think to stand in front of an auditorium of young people, speaking about energy, and knowing that they simply do not believe you. No, it wasn't that they didn't believe me about nuclear safety-although that may also have been the case-it's that they didn't believe me about the role of renewables. Specifically, they didn't understand the difference between a net-zero energy facility and a zero-use energy facility.

The 53rd Carnival of Nuclear Energy Blogs is up at CoolHandNuke. The carnival features blog posts from the leading U.S. nuclear bloggers and is a roundup of featured content from them.

Time again for another video from the Texas Atomic Film Festival. The video, Money Mobile Goes Nuclear, was the winner at the 2010 festival in the Best Editing category.

The nation's nuclear energy bloggers have their say about what to do with used fuel

On May 13, the Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future released its draft conclusions and recommendations. Despite its more general sounding title, the commission's work mostly concerned the nuclear waste issue. It was created by President Obama's administration primarily to investigate alternatives to the proposed Yucca Mountain repository, after the administration moved to shut that program down. While the commission did release some recommendations on other issues such as advanced reactors and Fukishima, this post will focus on its recommendations concerning nuclear waste policy.

For those of us involved in the design of nuclear reactors in the 1970s and 1980s, it was fairly common to walk into somebody's office and see a wall chart depicting the reactor that was being developed or serviced. These were foldout charts that were technically accurate. They were 3D renditions of the reactor, with cutouts showing the internals of the plant, and were made available by the magazine Nuclear Engineering International in the 1950s through the 1990s as inserts in the magazine. Now, several decades later, many of these charts were lost to the publisher due to the multitude of reorganizations and moves that have occurred.

The third annual Texas Atomic Film Festival (TAFF) was held on May 5, 2011, by the Cockrell School of Engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. The 2011 TAFF featured seven films produced by students from UT-Austin as well as distance-learning students from Iowa State University, in Ames, Iowa. The goal of the TAFF is to allow students to communicate technical subjects to their peers by using digital movie content.

A collaborative effort celebrates a one-year milestone

Russia and Turkey say not so fast

As an artist I have been lucky to find a place in the nuclear community, but I haven't forgotten what it feels like to be confused about energy (there was a time when I thought that biofuels and solar panels were a viable solution). I want to describe a situation that many young Americans are facing right now, in order to offer perspective on what energy issues look like from the outside. Do your best to put yourself in someone else's shoes for a moment:

A recent event in Vermont was a Chernobyl 25^th anniversary gathering at Dartmouth College's Dickey Center. The event featured a photo exhibit and a panel presentation. Former ambassador to Belarus in the 1990s, Kenneth Yalowitz, heads the center and he chaired and sat on the panel. Yalowitz was on a larger panel on Chernobyl on its 20^th anniversary five years ago. This year's event was sponsored by the Sierra Club and was widely advertised in the local press.

The 51st Carnival of Nuclear Energy Blogs is up at NuclearGreen. The carnival features blog posts from the leading U.S. nuclear bloggers and is a roundup of featured content from them.

The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments on March 22, 2011, for the lawsuit brought by three private citizens of Washington State challenging the president's authority to cancel the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.

Many American Nuclear Society members and groups across the United States have been energetically involved in the media, in their communities, and on campus during the recent events at the Fukushima plant. These members and groups have provided their knowledge and expertise to improve the accuracy of public discussions about the Fukushima events during a time when it has been sorely needed. This effort continues around the country as ANS members provide accurate, scientifically-sound information in front of TV cameras, at campus symposia, on local radio, in newspapers and journals, and by many other ways.

The 50th Carnival of Nuclear Energy Blogs is up at Next Big Future. The carnival features blog posts from the leading U.S. nuclear bloggers and is a roundup of featured content from them.

The New York Times recently published an op-ed by Dr. Helen Caldicott titled Unsafe at Any Dose in which she summarized her theory that even the tiniest doses of radiation cause both negative health consequences for the victim and undetectable genetic defects that will affect many generations to come. Here is an example of the language that she uses to propagate this theory:

The hard-copy May issue of Nuclear News will soon be in the hands of American Nuclear Society members. It will also be available electronically to members.

On April 12, one month after the initiation of the tragedy at the Fukushima Daiichi I nuclear power plant, the Japanese government labeled the event a level seven accident-the most severe rating on the International Nuclear Events Scale (INES). This announcement heightened international concerns about the severity of the event and the potential for circumstances to worsen. This posting is intended to provide some clarification about these events in historical context.

In March, Entergy's Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant received a 20-year license extension from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission; the NRC extension ends in 2032. Vermont's legislature, however, voted last year to shut down the plant in 2012, when its state certificate runs out.