The THTR Circulars from 2012

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THTR Circular No. 138, April 2012

Content:

Mud battle against Moormann

Mysterious globules found at THTR!

Protest in front of the RWE annual general meeting in Essen!

Mud battle against Moormann

"Whistleblower in the nuclear-industrial complex"

We had already reported on the award of the whistleblower award to the Jülich scientist Rainer Moormann in THTR circular No. 136 and published the jury's reasoning. In the meantime, a 122-page booklet has been published this year with the contributions of several authors and by Moormann himself about the award ceremony. The book deals with the incidents in the two pebble bed reactors in Jülich and Hamm, with cover-up attempts by operators and in the Jülich Research Center (FZJ). And the struggle of a single scientist to make the truth accessible to a wider public after all.

When the end of the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) in South Africa, which was being prepared with Jülich know-how, became apparent three years ago, the THTR lobby gave its last vigor to the propaganda counterattack in order to save what could still be saved. She made use of the nuclear industry's in-house magazines and their agreeable scribes. In 2011, shortly after the Fukushima disaster, the FAZ praised the “most beautiful of all machines” (1), "Die Welt" also had Prof. Hurtado, of all people, who is dependent on THTR research funds, lecture on the alleged advantages of pebble bed technology (2). The THTR circular reported on this in detail.

Right-wing “leading media” spread brazen lies

Some of the readers may not have taken these bizarre reports very seriously because they were obviously interest-driven and thoroughly embarrassing. Facts and incidents spoke so obviously against these reports that a closer look at them perhaps seemed downright ridiculous to some readers. In his laudation printed in the book, WDR journalist Martin Herzog vividly described what irritating effect the writing of some “leading media” about the supposedly “inherently safe” and oh so much misunderstood “miracle reactors” still has. During the preparation and filming about THTR and PBMR in South Africa (3), the following happened:

“We were approached by several friends, but also by in-house editors who knew about our work, but had not dealt with the topic any further. Those are important aspects and no one knew that this type of reactor was so harmless. A core meltdown is not even possible - ingenious! So the propaganda of the globular cluster community had already borne fruit.

Without a Rainer Moormann, we would have been in a pretty losing position at this point. And our broadcasts on the problems of the Jülich reactor would never have taken place like this. Or, what is perhaps even worse, they would also have degenerated into promotional events for the pebble-bed reactor. All of our critical questions should have come to nothing: The 1978 accident? A routine matter! The radioactive ground under the reactor? Can happen in an experimental reactor, not bad. The persistent problems with the dismantling? Everything on schedule! The increased leukemia rates in children in the area? A connection cannot be proven!

Without Rainer Moormann and his patient explanations, we would not have been able to follow up on other interviews. We should have accepted the arguments presented to us. We would have had to surrender to the constant fire with highly technical vocabulary. We would never have found out about the behavior of this reactor in the event of a water ingress, Chernobyl quite comparable, never even got a nose at the fact that this reactor in Jülich at that time probably only escaped a nuclear explosion by a hair-crack width. "(Page 42)

1978: Covered up near disaster in Jülich!

In retrospect, one of the most important events in the history of pebble bed reactors was 34 years ago. Dr. Dietrich Deisenroth, judge at the Federal Administrative Court in Leipzig and member of the whistleblower award jury, writes in the introductory article of the book:

“On May 13, 1978, as a result of an initially unnoticed leak in the superheater part of the steam generator, 27,5 t of water entered the primary helium circuit and thus into the reactor core. In the “Report on special events in the nuclear power plants of the Federal Republic of Germany in 1977 and 1978” presented to the public by the Federal Ministry, the “incident” classified in category “C” is succinctly described as follows: “Water leakage into the primary system”. However, the AVR should not “survive” this incident. It was finally shut down. The exact reasons for this were never revealed openly.

Dr. Moormann, who for a long time had been an advocate of the use of atomic energy in reactors, came to the conclusion in 2008 in a study that he had carried out at FZ Jülich that the AVR only narrowly "slipped past" a disaster when the accident occurred in 1978. Dr. Moormann: “I have ... investigated a serious incident, a water ingress that occurred in 1978. Had the leak been greater at the time, there could have been a catastrophe - triggered by an explosion like the one experienced in Fukushima (Japan). In 2007 I wrote a report for those responsible for the nuclear sector at the research center, which of course did not help. I then turned to the board of directors of Forschungszentrum Jülich and, one year later, after lengthy internal discussions, published a study that caused a sensation. This has certainly contributed to the fact that the construction of a pebble bed reactor in South Africa is no longer pursued. ”(Page 29)

Rainer Moormann writes the following about the publication practice of the operators on this dangerous incident: “In the 2009-page book of AVR GmbH published in 100 on the AVR (50 years of the AVR) there are 3 meaningless sentences about water ingress. There is only a hairline crack that 30 tons of water ran into the reactor, it is not said. In AVR's public relations work, water ingress is suppressed as far as possible. "(Page 110)

Ball fuel elements radioactively contaminated the reactor

In his acceptance speech for the award of the whistleblower prize, Moormann also talks about the different ways in which the characteristic tennis ball-sized ball fuel elements react:

“The pebble bed reactor thus shows good retention of the iodine and noble gas nuclides, which are problematic in conventional reactors. The positive picture is clouded when other problem nuclides such as cesium, silver or strontium are considered, which can slowly penetrate even intact barriers of the spherical fuel element even at normal operating temperatures. This effect, known as diffusion, does not exist in conventional fuel assemblies. The really huge contamination of the Jülich AVR reactor with cesium and strontium that has built up under the eyes of the supervisory authorities, which makes its dismantling extremely complex, is due to such diffusion processes. They limit the responsible use of current spherical fuel elements to relatively low, less attractive temperatures.

Finally, a few remarks on the less well-known operating experiences of German pebble bed reactors: The friction of the balls in the reactor was much stronger than assumed, which led to jamming, broken fuel elements and a lot of dust. The dust absorbed radioactivity, which turned out to be a major problem as the dust could not be removed from the cooling circuit. In addition, the fuel element balls in the reactor core did not move as predicted: the fuel was distributed differently than expected, and the chain reaction was out of step. Presumably for this reason, too, some areas of the reactors became much too hot, while others remained too cold. The result was damage to fuel assemblies and components. Real-time measurements in the reactor core, for example of temperatures, can therefore not be dispensed with. Such measurements are not always possible in pebble bed reactors. "(Page 53)

The investigations by Moormann and his unvarnished conclusions went and go to the nitty-gritty, they pose a threat to previous research practice in Jülich. Martin Herzog gives the background:

“It's all about business interests. And it's about money. In the short term for funding, for doctoral and permanent positions in research institutions, for consultant and expert fees. Medium-term for orders for German industry. In the long term, the big cake of power supply in times of global upheaval in the energy market. ”(Page 38)

THTR addicts fight Moormann with slander

Accordingly, the reactions from the directly affected colleagues from Moormann, the THTR-dependent researchers and the FZJ have failed. Martin Herzog reports that after his South Africa film was broadcast on WDR even from Beijing, where work is being done on a THTR research reactor, a nuclear physicist uttered shrill insults and slander against Moormann by email:

“In the days, weeks and months that followed, we received a series of other e-mails and letters in a similarly high pitched tone. In the letters it was mentioned that the “WDR-Rotfunk” had broadcast a “show piece” in which a “pseudo-expert” had appeared, a “Mr. Moormann” who “happily fantasizes” and maliciously lies. One letter writer even went so far as to say that Rainer Moormann was a “skilful agitator” who shamelessly exploited us for his personal revenge. (...)

We asked ourselves what drives these gentlemen to their outbursts of anger? Most of the originators of the foul accusations were well known to me: All of them were advocates of globular pile technology. This is a small and noisy community - mostly former employees of the Jülich reactor. Obviously, they can hardly bear the fact that their life's work, which started with high hopes in the 60s, ended so silently and without a sound as it happened with the "Atomic Experimental Reactor" in Jülich at the end of the 80s.

This group dreams of the resurrection of the pebble bed or high temperature reactor. The renaissance is not supposed to take place in "technology hostile" Germany, where they have probably given up hope, but in countries such as South Africa, China, Australia, Indonesia and, more recently, Poland, where people can still appreciate German engineering. Someone like Rainer Moormann interferes with his criticism. "(Pages 37 and 38)

Moormann's early criticism of the THTR

For us as a citizens' initiative that has been active against the THTR-1975 in Hamm since 300, it is of course interesting to find out in retrospect what has happened behind the scenes in Jülich over the past decades. Critical statements by Moormann were ignored or opposed a long time ago. Here is a little chronology from Rainer Moormann himself:

“1984: A published publication on the endangerment of pebble bed reactors by air ingress / graphite fire was prevented by the pebble bed community, argument (before Chernobyl): Graphite fire is impossible.

1987: Calculations for air ingress and graphite fire at the THTR-300 (Hamm) in the wake of Chernobyl. I had to withdraw a corresponding technical note on the instructions of the acting institute director, Prof. Schulten, "because it could endanger the THTR-300."

1987: Critical comment on the allegations at the time that in pebble bed reactors the radioactivity retention in the graphite would improve with increasing temperature.

1988: Approval procedure for the HTR module in Lower Saxony: I pointed out that iodine release in accidents caused by water ingress that had not been taken into account, which led to a controversy with the provider Siemens.

1992: Indications of licensing problems with pebble bed reactors due to radioactive dust and iodine in pressure relief accidents.

1994: Critical statement on the corrosion instability of the pebble bed reactor material silicon carbide.

2005: The South African reactor construction company PBMR, which wanted to build a pebble bed reactor, was informed by me about problems with the pebble bed mechanics in the AVR and in the THTR-300 that had never been resolved as part of my work in the security area. Among other things, I arranged a meeting of PBMR experts in spring 2005 with retired German experts. This led to disputes with the Jülich globular cluster community, who saw this as a danger to their technology. (...)

2006, May: FZJ-internal discussion event on the problem of highly radioactive dust: Prof. Kugeler accuses me of endangering a globally recognized approach to solving the energy problem and of dragging the pebbles in the dirt through my activities.

2006, Sept .: In autumn I gave a lecture on the dust problem in Johannesburg at the HTR2006. Reaction of the South Africans: "Why do we only find out now?" "(Page 60)

Escalation and allegations: "You are taking us all to prison ..."

The dispute over the publication and discussion of the critical investigations on the AVR escalates: “Feb. 2007: An AVR employee warns me against further research on the water ingress accident of 1978 "They are taking us all to prison ..." "(page 60)

25.07.2008/2008/XNUMX: Prof. Allelein rejects my participation in the HTRXNUMX in writing.

July 26, 7.2008: A press release from the South African company PBMR (confirmed by the PBMR company) contains the passage "that in the opinion of the other Jülich experts my report is so bad that I am not allowed to go to the HTR2008."

01.08.2008/2008/XNUMX: Prof. Bachem disregards Prof. Allelein's vote and approves my participation in the HTRXNUMX

Sept. 2008: In the run-up to the HTR2008 conference, FZJ board member Prof. Bolt refused to consent to an interview that the international magazine Nucleus Week had asked me to do. (...)

Oct. 2008: HTR2008 - My presentation met with great interest (all seats occupied)

Oct. 2008: According to information from Prof. Bachem, PBMR Ltd asks FZJ to withdraw my report and threatens to cancel orders to FZJ. Prof. Bachem announced that he had refused.

Autumn 2008: I receive the request to publish it in the magazine Kerntechnik. Prof. Allelein rejects my draft without valid reason. (...)

December 2008: Since the attempts of the HTR proponents to portray myself as mentally ill etc. increase, I urge FZJ to take action against it in the sense of the duty of care, in particular against the author of Annex 6 (of the book, HB). FZJ rejects this in writing because it is not a matter of insults and there is no risk of repetition. "(Page 63)

FZJ: Cover up, deny, promise, hold off ...

Trying to find a balance, the jury for the whistleblower award also asked Forschungszentrum Jülich about the incidents and incidents. In view of the fact that the AVR narrowly missed a major catastrophe and the only one who had critically dealt with it all was insulted and slandered, the statement is a sheer mockery and an outrageous cheek:

“During the years in which the AVR test reactor was set up and operated in Jülich, research was carried out on various topics relating to HTR technology. This research-based examination of HTR technology has contributed to the fact that problems of AVR design became transparent, were scientifically processed and could be received abroad for HTR projects pursued there. (...)

The fact that the Arbeitsgemeinschaft Versuchsreaktor GmbH (AVR GmbH) and the Forschungszentrum Jülich have founded a working group on AVR safety is not related to the work or media appearances of Dr. Moormann, but is a reaction to the reactor accident in Fukushima. It amazes me that you question the composition, the ability to work and the independence of the working group even before it has even started its work. ”(Page 103)

However, we are “amazed” that no results have been published to date! Because this letter is from May 19, 5. As a reminder: FZ Jülich had already announced full-bodied on April 2011, 11: “The working group is supposed to report subject-related on interim results of its work. To this end, she should invite representatives of the municipality, the district and the regional environmental and nature conservation associations to exchange rounds. Public information and discussion rounds are also planned. The working group is to present a first interim report to the partners of the research center and the responsible supervisory authorities by the end of the year "(4). - Nothing but fine words and cheap promises!

Energy companies buy their professorships - after 3 years the taxpayer pays!

In the introduction Dieter Deiseroth addresses an often neglected aspect of the influence of large corporations on the direction of science and research:

"According to a message from the Goethe Institute, there are now more than 660 endowed professorships in Germany, 114 in Bavaria alone and 103 in Baden-Württemberg". (Page 18)

“The corporations have largely agreed on regional responsibilities for the financing of these professorships. EnBW is involved in Baden-Württemberg, Vattenfall in the new federal states, RWE in Aachen and E.ON in Munich. The energy company EnBW alone holds eleven endowed professorships at German universities. E.ON donated 40 million euros to the Research Institute for Energy of the RWTH Aachen University, thereby financing five professorships at the institute. (...)

Well, one could sing the Song of Songs on patronage. But this quickly turns into a tragedy: the endowed professorships are only financed privately for between three to five years, after which they are further financed from state or university funds. I. E. Here, big money buys the science she wants and the scientists he (co) selected, only to sack them on the taxpayer in the long run ”. (Seite 19)

"What comes as patronage or charitable civil society engagement is the big money that shapes the course of science or the social discourse and thus also social development with endowed chairs and research assignments". (Page 21)

The energy companies determine what and how research is carried out for their own benefit without any democratic control. Although the FRG is "withdrawing" from nuclear power, certain research is still going in a completely different direction.

AVR operators hide real disposal costs!

Rainer Moormann writes about the dismantling of the contaminated AVR and the disposal costs:

“Here, salami tactics have been and are generally followed. First cost estimate: 39 million DM and dismantling time 5 years, today: 612 million euros by 2015 alone. However, the original plan to market the dismantling as a major technological feat seems to have been abandoned.

Authority: Although the authority is mistaken in terms of AVR disposal by the operator and FZJ, information on problems and costs continues to be passed on only hesitantly and only in response to parliamentary inquiries. It is still unclear what the costs mentioned in 2010 of 612 million euros by 2015 really include (e.g. floor cleaning?).

Operator: The operator tries to gloss over the disposal problem in a massive way. The operator's book, published in 2009, contains a lot of propaganda. In the case of costs, the operator often only spreads partial costs in order to downplay the problem ”. (Page 111)

The topic of AVR dismantling as well as storage and transport of the 288.161 radioactive THTR fuel elements from Jülich to Ahaus will determine the domestic political discussion in the coming years. This little book about the committed whistleblower Rainer Moormann offers extensive background information on why this dangerous situation, which has been muddled for decades, has come about. We will come back often to this important work, which was published by a renowned publisher.

Horst Blume

Whistleblowing in the nuclear-industrial complex

Award ceremony 2011 - Dr. Rainer Moormann

Deiseroth, Dieter; Falter, Annegret (Ed.)

Berliner Wissenschaftsverlag (BWV) 122 pages, 12,80 euros

Notes:

1 and 2. THTR circular no. 135: "The hour of miracle perpetrators"

3. THTR-Rundbrief No. 126 "WDR-Film: Nuclear Power for Africa"

4. See: http://www.fz-juelich.de/SharedDocs/Pressemitteilungen

On February 28, 2012, the pupil of the Werler Ursulinengymnasium, Samantha Seithe, received the second prize from "Jugend forscht" in Dortmund in the field of geo and spatial science. The topic was: "Has the decommissioned Hamm-Uentrop nuclear power plant affected its environment?"

In soil samples near the THTR, Samantha Seithe and the biologist Achim Hucke, as supervisor, discovered conspicuous microscopic spheres that resemble the PAC spheres (plutonium, americium, curium) from the THTR fuel elements.

Through her elaborate statistical recording of 35.000 dates of birth and death in the cemeteries within 15 kilometers of the reactor, she found that the average life expectancy in the vicinity of the THTR is lower than in places further away.

Together with around 40 other competition participants, Samantha Seithe presented her research results in the DASA hall in Dortmund. The microscope with the beads and the model with the representation of life expectancy near the THTR could be examined by the visitors, among them Günther Dietrich from the HKG. A spicy detail on the side: The main sponsor of "Jugend forscht" in Dortmund is Kruppthyssen, who with their subsidiary Uhde in Dortmund built the spherical fuel element factory for the planned high-temperature reactor in South Africa just a few years ago (1). The reactor itself was not completed, however, but 1,5 billion (!) Euros were wasted.

As a citizens' initiative, we issued a press release on the same day in which we presented and analyzed the facts and the necessary consequences in a differentiated manner:
"A few days after the reactor catastrophe in Chernobyl, there was an accident in 1986 with jammed and destroyed radioactive fuel element balls. Since the operators of the reactor had switched off the recording devices for monitoring the radioactivity release at precisely this time, they now have the evidence measurable in the exhaust chimney deliberately made impossible for ball breakage and contamination of the environment. (...)

However, it is hardly possible to determine without a doubt with microscopes and normal measuring devices whether it is actually the PAC beads (plutonium, americium, curium) from the THTR. Ultimately, only a very expensive, specialist examination (such as a neutron activation analysis) can provide certainty. It is very significant that in the 26 years after the incident, no state institutions have been found to look for the tiny THTR globules that have escaped and that an 11-year-old girl now has to deal with this important topic with comparatively modest means. That is why the BI environmental protection Hamm calls on the NRW supervisory authorities and the Federal Environment Ministry to carry out extensive investigations. "

In the meantime, the State Institute for Work Design has agreed to examine the globules on behalf of the NRW Ministry of Labor. It is important that not only the radioactivity is measured, but also that the exact composition is researched using modern analytical methods (ICP-MS) in order to be able to determine whether this material is coming out of the reactor. With only a short "ball pass" or in the initial operating phase at low power, the radioactive radiation of the fuel element pellets does not necessarily have to be very high today. The material analysis, on the other hand, could provide important evidence that destroyed fuel elements were actually "released" from the THTR.

Notes:

THTR No. 100: "The renaissance of nuclear power has already begun"

THTR circular no. 111: "Uhde in focus"

More information about the PAC beads in the THTR newsletters:

No. 82 (2003): "THTR microspheres: Plutonium in the garden"

No. 108 (2006): * "THTR microspheres in Geesthacht"

The annual general meeting of the coal and nuclear power group RWE will take place on April 19 in the Grugahalle in Essen. Every year all those who want to earn money from the destruction of nature and health hazards from the energy giant, such as Allianz Versicherung and Munich Re, gather there.

Undeterred by Fukushima and man-made climate change, the company is sticking to its nuclear-fossil fuel policy. RWE still owns two nuclear power plants in Germany, holds shares in the uranium enrichment plant in Gronau and is even planning new buildings beyond the borders, for example in the Netherlands. As the operator of 3 huge opencast mines and 5 coal-fired power plants in the Rhenish lignite district, RWE is Europe's largest CO2 producer. Here, too, the group is expanding and plans to massively expand the Niederaussem lignite power station.

Despite a ridiculous share of renewable energies of 3%, RWE presents itself as a green company, with the outgoing CEO Großmann repeatedly attracting attention as a top lobbyist against an energy turnaround. The new climate-skeptical book from RWE's ranks "Die Kalte Sonne", in which the non-specialist scientists Vahrenholt and Lüning put the consequences of climate change into perspective, also fits into this picture. In other words: You are in favor of building more coal-fired power plants and the associated destruction of ecology and livelihoods around the world. Already last year there were various actions against the annual general meeting, which disrupted the process considerably and were very effective in the public eye. It was possible to bring activists from different energy struggles together. We want to build on this this year in order to face the energy giant together and to fight for a decentralized, renewable and social energy supply. Participate in the resistance to the annual general meeting.

Socialize RWE, leave coal and uranium in the ground! We stand against an atomic and carbon-free energy supply!

PROTEST CAMP

from April 18.04 until April 19.04.2012, XNUMX in front of the Grugahalle Essen

The energy transition remains manual work!

http://rweunplugged.blogsport.eu

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