The THTR Circulars from 2004

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THTR Circular No. 88 February 2004

The nuclear lobby strikes back:

HTRs in operation in China and Japan!

EU funds for HTR further development!

Neither apartheid in South Africa nor the massacre on Tiananmen Square in Beijing in 1989 prevented the nuclear industry and its beneficiaries from lobbing their high-temperature reactor technology, which is already in decline, in these countries. As a result of more than 70 work on HTRs by the Jülich nuclear research facility between 1990 and 1995, these reactors were built almost completely unnoticed by the world in Japan and China, where they first became critical in 1998 and 2000, respectively. In recent years, the nuclear lobby has created the HTR-TN (Technology Network), an instrument in which 17 European research institutions and corporations worldwide are working to establish the HTR line as the main component of the allegedly inherently safe "fourth reactor line".

At least 17 million euros were made available at EU level in 2001 for the comeback of the HTR. Greenpeace accuses German Foreign Minister Fischer of having "silently watched during the debate on the EU constitution in the European Convention as the promotion of nuclear power is anchored in the draft as the only form of energy."

The Japan Atomic Research Institute (JAERI), a scientific cooperation partner of the Forschungszentrum Jülich (FZJ), has been working since 1969 on the development of the High Temperature Engineering Test Reactor (HTTR).

In 1987, one year after Chernobyl, the Japanese Atomic Energy Commission decided to build this reactor. in the March 1991 The construction of a 30 MW HTTR began at the Oarai research center. This reactor is not for electricity generation, but for that Process heat supply thought. It is intended to accelerate the use of higher temperatures in HTRs by examining the direct application of high-temperature heat via a helium intermediate heat exchanger.

Construction was completed in 1996 with the exception of the spent fuel storage facility and an experimental hall. This was followed by functional tests and improvements to the rod drives due to excessive heating of the upper concrete shield.

Im December 1997 the production of the fuel elements for the first loading with 900 kg uranium by the Japanese company Nuclear Fuel Industries Ltd (NFI) was completed. At the The first criticality took place on November 10, 1998, and the zero energy tests took place in January 1999. After the power test operation from September 1999 to November 2001, the HTTR reached full load for the first time. However, the so-called high-temperature operation could not take place afterwards due to technical problems. In the various articles in the magazine "Atomwirtschaft" (atw) it was pointed out several times that the extensive know-how from Germany was used in the development of the HTTR. This applies particularly to the "recipe" in fuel element technology.

In its list of scientific publications on the Internet, which is limited to the years 1990 to 1995, Forschungszentrum Jülich lists over 70 (!) Works and investigations which, despite the shutdown of the THTR and the official abandonment of this reactor line in Germany, deal directly with the further development of the HTR . Five studies from 1992 and 1995 can be seen in connection with the HTTR in Japan. Three papers were presented at the "International Conference on Design and Safety of Advanced Nuclear Power Plants, Proceedings" from October 25-29, 1992 in Tokyo presented:

HJ Rütten and E. Teuchert "Advanced Safety Features of Pebble Bed HTRs with Thorium Utilization" and "Thorium Utilization in the Pebble Bed HTR with Advanced Safety Features".

K. Kugler on "Design Options for Advanced HTR".

On the "World Energy Council 16^th Congress from October 8-13, 1995 in Tokyo This was followed by the lecture "Catastrophe-free nuclear technology for the future world energy supply" by K. Kugler and PW Phlippen.

On Annual nuclear technology conference 1995 In Germany, the Jülich authors Baba, Hada, Singh and Barnert gave the lecture "Evalutions for heat utilization systems for process demonstrations with HTTR in Japan".

It would be really very interesting to find out what topics this busy research center worked on after 1995. But strangely enough, the list of scientific publications ends in 1995. Conicidence?

And now, in the simplicity offered here, a few hints for laypeople on how the HTTR works. We know from THTR Hamm that the shut-off rods poked around in the spherical pebbles made of graphite-coated spherical fuel elements and then the well-known problems arose: The rods bent, the spheres were partially destroyed, the spheres broke and the graphite dust was blown out.

The HTTR pressure vessel in Japan is 13,2 m high and 5,5 m in diameter, the reactor core has a total height of 2,9 m and a diameter of 2,3 m and is surrounded by a ring hexagonal graphite blocks. To put it more simply: these blocks all have the shape of honeycombs lined up next to one another. In this 58 cm long hollow cylinder are according to the method "pin in block" Control rods are retracted from above and the cooling gas helium, known from THTR, flows through the cavity of a total of 7 mm remaining between the rod and the hollow cylinder.

The fuel elements do not have the shape of spheres, but of honeycomb hollow cylinders, which with "Coated Particles"(PAC spheres, fuel particles) are filled, as we know it from the THTR spheres.

Since Japan is very prone to earthquakes, the outer graphite structures are surrounded by elaborately designed tension rings, which are supposed to act like hard-set springs. This HTTR, "solidly built" according to atw, should represent the latest state of the art in many areas. But since there is a "worldwide drift of interest" because of the competing HTR modules of the PBMR in South Africa, the HTTR "has gotten a bit of a sideline and against this background it is not easy for JAERI to secure further funding for the project" (atw 8-9, 2001). Nonetheless, the next tests are planned for 2008. "The first results on the release of fission products are very satisfactory. (...) On the one hand, the good, low release results are not surprising, since the fuel elements have practically no burned-up ..." (atw 7, 2002).

Since at the Japanese company NFI "the knowledge about the production of HTR fuel from the classic HTR countries flowed together", would be a future supply of new HTRs "even for Germany" (!) (atw 2, 1999) ensured. This is how the nuclear power friends from Jülich would like it to be. 

Maybe we should visit her at the FZJ's open day on June 27, 2004?

When, on January 19, 1978, the deputy Chinese energy minister, Chang Pin, visited the THTR, which was then under construction in Hamm-Uentrop, with a 17-person delegation, German-Chinese contacts had already been established two years earlier. Engineers from the Association of Large Power Plant Operators (VGB), based in Essen, were traveling to China at the time, where they purposefully promoted the HTR and invited them to Germany.

The Chinese energy minister was received at the THTR by the VEW board chairman Klaus Knizia (WR-WAZ from January 20, 1; this newspaper was still available in Hamm with a local edition at that time!). In the following years the Innotec Energietechnik KG from Essen market smaller HTRs worldwide, for which 35 million DM were estimated, whereby 70% of the costs had to be raised by the German federal government.

"A feasibility study is currently being carried out with the Chinese cooperation partner, which will recommend the HTR 100 both for power generation and for process steam generation and heat generation for coal gasification" (Westfälischer Anzeiger of January 21, 1). During this time there were already intensive contacts between the Nuclear Research Center Jülich and the Institute of Nuclear Engineering Technology (INTERNET) at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

In the 223-page report "Assessment of domestic and foreign concepts for small high-temperature reactors", prepared on behalf of Greenpeace, Lothar Hahn wrote in 1990: "China's interest in HTR is primarily focused on heavy oil production by means of steam injection, the so-called tertiary oil production. For research and Development projects were started together with the German nuclear research facility Jülich Incidents in China all negotiations have been broken off ... "

In addition to the inevitable Jülich nuclear research facility, the Siemens subsidiary was also on board interatom. A large HTR module system with 300 MW was also with the Swedish-Swiss group Asea Brown Boveri (ABB) planned. As is well known, ABB and Siemens launched the "HTR-GmbH" founded to build high-temperature reactors in the Soviet Union.

The massacre on Tiananmen Square in Beijing in 1989 did not, however, deter the nuclear industry and its scientists in the slightest from further subsequent cooperation with China, as we shall see later. "If it comes to such deals, then only if they receive massive financial support from the German side and because the manufacturers absolutely have to build a reference system somewhere," wrote Lothar Hahn, the former chairman of the German Reartor Safety Commission.

The Chinese began 1995 on the grounds of Tsinghua University in Beijing with the construction of a 10 MW high-temperature reactor. It is a pebble bed reactor like the one in Hamm-Uentrop. On December 1, 12, the reactor became critical for the first time. "The tests of the hot gas systems were successfully completed and the drying of the ceramic reactor internals is well advanced. 103 kg of water have been removed. The HTR-10 initially works with a steam generator circuit, but plans have already started to convert the reactor into a single-circuit system with a direct helium turbine "(atw 8-9, 2001). It provides the basis for a 200 MW module HTR from 2005 built and, if used successfully, is to be used commercially.

In the above-mentioned list of over 70 works on HTRs at the FZJ, the following document the German-Chinese cooperation between the massacre on Tiananmen Square and the start of construction in Beijing:

• At the annual nuclear technology conference 1990 reported Fröhling, Schwarzkopp, Kugeler, Waldmann and Harzberger on "Use of the HTR in heavy oil production and in the chemical industry in China - results of a project study".

• 1991 held Fröhling, Waldmann, Schwarzkopp, Steinwarz, Zhong and Ye on the "5^th UNITAR / UNDP-Conference on 'Heavy Crude and Tar Sands' "in Caracas, Venezuela:" Transfer of Nuclear Stream Generation Technology for Heavy Oil Recovery and Petrochemical Industry in China ".

• In August 1993 wrote Zhang, Gerwin and Scherer: "Analysis of the gas-diffusion process during a hypothecial air ingress accident in a modular high temperature gas cooled gas reactor."

On the occasion of the first criticality of the HTR in China took place from March 19-21, 2001 in Beijing an international conference with 46 participants from China, France, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Russia, South Africa and the USA. The "Atomwirtschaft" (8 - 9, 2001) speaks of an "uplifting feeling", "finally being able to celebrate the criticality of an HTR again." The facility made "a very neat and clean impression" and the author of the report was pleased that the "HTR landscape is on the move again". The atw rapporteur is, however, no stranger. It is dr re. nat. Chrysanth Marnet, attentive THTR newsletter readers known as a board member of the Düsseldorfer Stadtwerke and the "Association of Large Power Plant Operators (VGB) and later AVR managing director in Jülich, who had to cancel his planned lecture tour to South Africa in 1987 due to public protests by the anti-apartheid movement (see RB No. 84).

In the atw article, Marnet gives an overview of the 21 research departments of INET with their 551 employees, including 68 full professors and 191 lecturers. Interesting in this publication from 2001 is the table "Overview of new HTR systems", where, in addition to reactors in China, Japan, USA and South Africa, Germany also appears with a 200 MW HTR: "Status: detailed planning". We would like to have learned more about this!

A few years ago, the Department of Energy (DOE) began preparations in the USA for the construction of a new supposedly disaster-proof reactor line, with which the US government wants to justify its offensive for the construction of a large number of new nuclear power plants to critics. It is the "generation IV".

The European atomic companies and their research institutes want to get something from the big cake to be distributed in the future and have got the "European Commission" to agree to the 5th EU Framework Program (FP5) to get more involved in the HTR line. In this way, they want to promote the acceptance of HTRs as promising candidates for this new generation of atomic energy. For this purpose, various companies and research institutions founded the HTR Technology Network (HTR-TN) in 2000. Here is a little chronology:

• Im January 2000 a conference was held in Brussels with participants from 11 countries.

• Im November 2000 A steering committee was formed with Cogema (France), VTT (Finland) and the Bund Deutscher Techniker e. V., Hagen (BDT, Germany).

• Im March 2001 the cooperation with the Chinese INET was agreed at the already mentioned HTR congress in Beijing.

• Im April 2001 VUJE (Slovenia) and Ciemat (Spain) were added at the third meeting of this committee.

• Im June 2001 the HTR network was presented in Moscow at the ISTC conference (international scientific and technical center; this organization is mainly financed by the USA according to "Russia currently") and a cooperation with the Russian Kurchatow Institute and the OKB (experimental design office ; obviously part of the military-industrial complex).

• From the April 22 to 24, 4 Over 160 experts from all over the world met in Petten (Netherlands) as part of the HTR network. A total of 46 lectures were given.

Joel Guidez, Member of the European Commission and head of the "High Flux Reactor Unit" in Petten, is one of the speakers and propagandists of this HTR network. In the magazine "Nuclear Europe World-scan" (7-8, 2001) he writes that in 2001 it was in the budget of the 5th EU framework program 17 million euros were spent on the HTR subproject!

In the "Scientific Results Report" 2002 of the Research Center Jülich the report by HJ Rütten and KA Haas "Investigations on the combustion of plutonium 2.3.2.3nd generation in HTR" (underlining in the original) can be read under point 68 on page 2. Rütten gave a lecture on the HTR in Tokyo in 1992 (see this RB under Japan) and has been writing numerous studies on the HTR in the FZJ since 1990. Haas too. And he even registered with others on June 15, 6, four years after the THTR was shut down in Germany Patent to: "Pebble bed reactor with batch operation".

In 2002 these two scientists created within the 5th EU framework program, subproject HTR-N1, "A first basic study on the recycling and incineration of plutonium of the so-called '2nd generation' in a ball bed HTR". Since different fuel loading strategies with plutonium and uranium are examined and compared, this work goes far beyond a "safety research" for nuclear power plants, as it is still tolerated in Germany by the responsible red-green ministries.

Among other things, it operates as a contractor for the FZJ "Institute for Nuclear Energy and Energy Systems" (IKE) of the University of Stuttgart at HTR research (see also RB No. 79, p. 5). From May 1, 5 to April 1999, 30, work was carried out here on the "Gas Cooled HTR Network" (GHTRN) research project. From July 4st, 2001 to December 1st, 7, the FZJ and the nuclear company Framatome commissioned the "HTR-TN" project to help the European nuclear industry to construct this type of reactor.

So we have to state that the nuclear industry has been researching its HTR line at the EU level, which is more difficult to understand and control, and has also been cooperating intensively with non-European countries. All the questions we asked the German ministries about the PBMR in South Africa are appropriate again this time.

There are half a dozen other countries that are involved or very interested in HTR research but have not yet been mentioned here due to lack of space. So: to be continued.

Horst Blume

The Foreign Office wrote on January 10.01.2004, XNUMX to the citizens' initiative for environmental protection in Hamm:

"Thank you for your letters to Federal Minister Fischer of July 11.07th and November 27.11.2003th, XNUMX. Due to an office mistake, your first letter has not yet been answered, for which I ask for your indulgence.

There is no cooperation between the Federal Foreign Office and the South African energy company ESKOM. According to the Federal Ministry of Education and Research responsible for Forschungszentrum Jülich (FZJ), there is an exclusively commercial cooperation between the FZJ and ESKOM, which relates to the safety aspects of PBMR technology. There is no financial support from the federal government for this.

The Foreign Office was informed by the FZJ about the trip of Prof. Treusch from the FZJ to South Africa, as is usual in such cases. This did not include any support from the Federal Foreign Office for a possible mission by Prof. Treusch in matters of nuclear cooperation with South Africa.

The Federal Foreign Office is not responsible for questions regarding the assessment of experiences with high-temperature reactor technology. However, you can contact the Federal Ministry of Education and Research in this regard.

I am pleased to inform you that the Federal Government is also advocating with increasing success that German technology in the field of generating renewable energies is also introduced in South Africa. She hopes that this will also give impetus to the energy policy discourse there. Nevertheless, it has no influence on the option opened up by the Non-Proliferation Treaty for the peaceful use of nuclear energy in South Africa. As far as the question of human rights is concerned, the Federal Foreign Office has not received any negative information about the ESKOM company. "

Ahaa and Ohoo!

The Federal Foreign Office denies support for nuclear cooperation with South Africa. In contrast to this, the FZJ expressly emphasizes an "agreement with the Foreign Ministry" and, with reference to the Foreign Office, proclaims: "So everything went quite legally" (WDR 5 on December 23.12.2002, 80; documented in THTR-RB No. XNUMX). These two statements do not quite fit together. 

In any case, the Foreign Office was used to create the appearance of official legitimation for the activities of Forschungszentrum Jülich in South Africa. 

Of our questions, in particular the one about the proliferation risk was not answered (see RB No. 84) and our detailed arguments in our second letter were not discussed in detail either. In contrast to the public pressure on Iran to avoid proliferation, the Foreign Office is not aware of any such activities in South Africa. It is also very astonishing how many "office mistakes" there are in German ministries.

By the way: The press spokesman for the Ministry of the Environment, Michael Schroeren, said over the phone to answer our questions in the near future. Perhaps, six weeks after our second urgent reminder, the urge to get in touch through an almost full-page article in the Young world On this very day (05.01.2004), the Ministry of the Environment was explicitly approached about the HTR export and Trittin was shown with a large suitcase with nuclear know-how.

The very active Böll Foundation has launched another initiative in South Africa to support the local environmentalists:

"As part of the 'environmental program' of the Heinrich Böll Foundation In Southern Africa, we have promoted the civil society dialogue on planning and developments in the nuclear field (fuel production, power plant construction and waste processing and disposal) in the last few months.

These efforts will now reach a preliminary climax in a hearing of the South African Parliament in February, which is organized by the Parliament's Environment Committee at our suggestion. The foundation has organized three regional workshops in preparation for this hearing and will ensure that those affected from the vicinity of the three "atomic centers" (Pelindaba, Koeburg and Vaalputs) can take part in the hearing.

From our point of view, the aim of the measure is a parliamentary resolution on an exit law similar to the German model "(hopefully with more success !; HB).

The conference will take place in Cape Town on February 16-17.

Gottfried Wellmer, author of the article "The meaning of ESKOM for the apartheid system" in THTR-Rundbrief No. 84, wrote the above-mentioned book together with Birgit Morgenrath, which in the current February issue (No. 285) of the "Grassroots Revolution" - and here of course - discussed in detail by Horst Blume. 

South Africa is an excellent example of the fact that corporations do not want to be restricted in their pursuit of profit by human rights. The fact that a lawsuit has now been filed against the German collaborators with the apartheid regime updates the discussion about the role of international corporations also in the present. In the thorough research, some company names that have to do with NRW's energy policy also appear. 

Robben Island, the former prison island of the apartheid state, is now Cape Town's biggest tourist attraction. Where people have been locked in prison cells for decades, comedy shows and banquets are now being held for paying celebrities, who then spend the night in the prison guards' houses as a highlight. This form of "remembrance" of the apartheid era is hardly better than forgetting.

When I was accompanying some members of non-governmental organizations in the Ruhr area on their round trip to alternative energy locations, a walker came across us with an indifferent trotting dog, which elicited the remark from a black participant that German dogs are obviously more peaceful than South African dogs. The shadows of the past are still there.

For decades, German capital reaped maximum profits from the exploitation and oppression of blacks. Here in Germany, too, there was a broad anti-apartheid movement that protested against the violation of human rights. But after apartheid was finally abolished ten years ago and transformed into a formal Western democracy, the conditions in South Africa are no longer an issue that attracts a lot of attention.

Morgenrath and Wellmer's book remedies this deficiency through a well-founded presentation and analysis of German-South African business relations and shows in shocking reports how badly the vast majority of the population of South Africa was then as it is today and in what ignorant way Germans are still doing now Corporations wash their hands in innocence.

This book also appears in the context of the indictment before a US court in which 91 South African victims accuse 22 international companies of serious human rights abuses. The Khulumani Support Group represents 32.000 apartheid victims as a self-help organization and argues with the legal principle of "secondary co-responsibility", which was introduced into international jurisprudence by the Nuremberg Trials. According to this, accomplices of a regime bear indirect responsibility for crimes committed. The following German companies are sued: Rheinmetall, Commerzbank, Deutsche Bank, Dresdner Bank, Daimler Chrysler and AEG. In Germany itself, these companies cannot be prosecuted.

"Apartheid meant: no unions, low taxes, cheap labor, high profits - and a beautiful life in a beautiful country with extremely cheap service personnel." For fifty years "unproductive" natives such as old people, children and women were forcibly resettled in mostly sterile areas, while strong young men were allowed to move into the cities as wage slaves. In this way, 70 percent of the population were penned in so-called homelands, which made up only 13 percent of the area of ​​South Africa.

In order to protect itself from economic sanctions from abroad, the regime centralized the economy in state corporations. From 1980 onwards, Germany gave most of the world's loans to these institutions of the apartheid government, thus providing the lifelines of this unjust social order with the necessary financial resources.

One of the most important state-owned companies was the energy supply company ESKOM, about which one of its managers testified to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in 1997: "It is true that ESKOM operated effectively as an institution of apartheid and thereby mainly served white interests." ESKOM operated 14 coal-fired power plants and two nuclear power plant blocks in Koeberg near Cape Town. "The Deutsche, the Dresdner, the Commerz-, the Westdeutsche Landes- and the Bayrische Vereinsbank gave 30-70% of their loans to ESKOM." The huge portion of the electricity went to the coal and gold mining industry and not to the black population.

As part of a cultural exchange (!) There were lively mutual visits by nuclear scientists between the FRG and South Africa. In particular, experts from the Society for Nuclear Research in Karlsruhe and the state-owned Essener Steinkohle-Elektrizitäts AG (STEAG) stood out and at the end of the development South Africa was in possession of several atom bombs!

Hermes guarantees for German exports have been gladly given by every German government in the past few decades and a large part of the loans went back to ESKOM. According to the two authors, the foreign minister of the grand coalition in the 60s, Willy Brandt, reacted to human rights violations "with tactful restraint on the political level and clear approval in the economic field." That the good old connections of the nuclear industry and its scientists are still excellent today shows the fact that more than 30 years after Brandt, under the Green Foreign Minister Fischer, the nuclear cooperation with the post-apartheid state is being continued: under his leadership, the German high-temperature reactor was established -Know-how for the planned Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) near Cape Town sold to an ESKOM company.

In several separate chapters, the two authors show how the companies Siemens, the Düsseldorfer Waffenfabrik Rheinmetall and Mercedes have provided the South African ruling apparatus with military equipment in a key area despite UN Resolution 1977 for a mandatory arms embargo, which was passed in 418. In the case of Mercedes, these corporations even participated directly in the repression: "These Mercedes managers wore beautiful suits with ties during the day and camouflage suits at night and shot and killed unarmed young people, old people, and even small children . They did door-to-door raids. "

In their detailed study, the two authors show point by point that the 400 German companies with their branches in South Africa were not only "helpful" to the regime, they were part of the system. Corporations' claims that there was no discrimination in their operations are exposed as crude lies.

In 1983/84 around 40 percent of the total budget was spent on arming the security forces and the repressive apparatus. The state coffers emptied. In the 80s, "the generation of young lions" took up the fight in the factories and demanded their human right to equality and dignity with incredible strength and fearlessness. For me, the descriptions of the war in the factories are among the most impressive in the book. It is also noticeable here that in 1990 and 1991, when the liberation movements were allowed again, repression and layoffs were worst at the Hoechst company because the group wanted to rationalize quickly and inexpensively before the final end of apartheid.

This was followed by disillusionment when the new democratic government did not correct the unjust social structures created by apartheid, but instead intensified it with neoliberal economic policy since 1996. The red carpet was rolled out again for international corporations. Germany quickly developed into the number one trading partner for South Africa. However, not a single German company testified before the truth commission, in which the past was supposed to be dealt with. Tens of thousands of those who were abused and tortured, as well as the relatives of the murdered, had hoped for financial compensation. Because for many people it is still a matter of survival in the face of extreme social inequality. But there is no longer any money for this; it is needed for debt servicing.

The self-help organization Khulumani, together with 4000 other initiatives, demands that banks and corporations acknowledge the injustice they have committed and is demanding individual and collective compensation. They are demanding the cancellation of the despicable debt because it was the apartheid regime that ruined the state finances. "The call for international reparations is a call for economic redistribution, political change and the restoration of equality among nations."

The coordination group of the campaign for debt relief and compensation sought and demonstrated the dialogue with the apartheid financiers, attended company general meetings, gave speeches and wrote letters. The apartheid helpers weigh it down and even refuse to open the company archives, which would reveal the full extent of their reprehensible actions. The opponents of today's social apartheid will keep fighting and hope for our solidarity. This stimulatingly written and startling book shows very clearly that the South African past is also our history.

Horst Blume

Birgit Morgenrath / Gottfried Wellmer: "German capital at the Cape. Collaboration with the apartheid regime", Edition Nautilus, 160 pages, 12,90 euros

Dear readers!

You can see for yourself, there is not enough space to accommodate the new Castor transports from Rossendorf to Ahaus to go into more detail. They should happen soon and there is something going on in the Münsterland almost every week. On March 06.03.2004th, XNUMX a Autobahn action day held along the route. Just have a look at the internet www.bi-ahaus.de

Our, this homepage is by the way very often visited by FZ Jülich and the US military, which is no wonder in view of the proliferation problem and the nuclear plans of the US government.

On the citizens' application: Exchange of experience between Hamm and Cape Town on the subject of the dangers of high-temperature reactors. The mayor's opinion and our response to his negative attitude.

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