Nuclear Power

Development of a new nuclear power plant in Maryland suffered a major setback last week with the disclosure that Constellation Energy Group has withdrawn from the federal loan guarantee program. Without those guarantees, it would appear unlikely that Calvert Cliffs 3 will be developed by Constellation and its partner in the project, Electricite de France. That can't thrill shareholders in Constellation, as the company has already sunk hundreds of millions of dollars into the project, nor EDF, which invested in Constellation in order to participate in what many believe is a coming nuclear renaissance in this country.

Claudio Filippone is convinced that the jury-rigged gadget in his College Park lab can help solve the world's energy problems - even if it does look like it was designed by Rube Goldberg. The University of Maryland researcher bought wiring and other parts from hardware stores to build a "heat cavity," a sandwich of six-foot steel sheets with a razor-thin space between them. Bolted together, sealed on each side with silicone putty and connected by wires to a portable generator that can heat up the sheets like burners on a stove, the device is designed to simulate what happens in a nuclear reactor - minus the radioactive material.

Tucked behind a ruined grain elevator at a pier along an industrial stretch of Baltimore's waterfront lies a still-gleaming white vessel that was once one of the nation's proudest maritime achievements — the only nuclear cargo and passenger ship ever built in the United States. She's the N.S. Savannah, a floating time capsule from the mid-20th century that has made Baltimore her retirement home. For a few brief years during the Kennedy and Johnson administrations she was a nautical superstar, touring the world as an ambassador for the peaceful use of nuclear energy and playing host to royalty.

I've enjoyed reading letters and articles by Ajax Eastman for several decades now and generally found them grounded in progressive thinking and well reasoned. I was surprised to read her article "Wind power and hot air" (Feb. 7) in which she presents an argument in favor of nuclear power but against wind and solar power. Nuclear power should be considered in addition to, not instead of, wind and solar power generation. Her biggest fault with wind and solar energy is the intermittent nature of these energy sources.

While some sectors of Maryland's economy struggle to shake free of the Great Recession, the biotechnology parks adjacent to Baltimore's two top teaching hospitals stubbornly continue to add laboratories, offices and — most importantly for the city — jobs. The gains have been both large and small, and not always along the path or at the pace envisioned when the parks were created. But the growth is unmistakable, fueled by the critical mass of expertise, resources and discoveries at both the Johns Hopkins and University of Maryland Baltimore medical campuses.

Fred Schmidt, 75, a physicist on the Manhattan Project and an expert on energy policy and nuclear power, died Jan. 17 of cancer in Seattle. Mr. Schmidt wrote "The Energy Controversy: The Fight Over Nuclear Power." Recently, he specialized in the use of nuclear accelerators to date archaeological materials. He was a professor emeritus of physics at the University of Washington.

WASHINGTON -- The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said yesterday that it has removed the Calvert Cliffs nuclear power plant from its "watch list" of plants requiring extra regulatory oversight.Calvert Cliffs, owned by Baltimore Gas and Electric Co., was put on the list in December 1988, largely because of a management philosophy that emphasized production over safety, according to NRC reports.The Southern Maryland plant has "continued to improve performance in all previously identified problem areas and has demonstrated a sustained period of safe operations," according to a letter from the NRC to BG&E Chairman George McGowan.

A Columbia-based company has been awarded a $10 million contract to build a training system for the Temelin Nuclear Power Plant in Czechoslovakia.General Physics International Engineering and Simulation Inc., which specializes in nuclear training and simulation, is working on the project with ORGREZ, the leading simulator manufacturer in Czechoslovakia.GP International, a 2-year-old firm with 61 employees, will provide Czechoslovakia with computer software and training. The equipment will simulate problems that operators of power plants might confront.

With the recent settlement between the state of Maryland and Constellation Energy Group, the power company is once again championing Calvert Cliffs as the site of a new nuclear power plant. This is not a cause for celebration. On July 13, Constellation submitted the first new application to build a nuclear power plant in the U.S. since Three Mile Island. But the company threatened to go elsewhere if Maryland lawmakers re-established state regulatory control on new power plants.

JAMES L. NICKLE, Age 68, died at home in Florida on July 25, 2005. He was born in Overton, TX. He graduated from Towson High School in 1955. He was in the US Navy Submarine Service and served aboard the USS Batfish. Graduated from Nuclear Power School and served aboard the USS Robert E. Lee SSBN601. In 1967 he graduated from the University of Maryland with a BS in electrical engineering. He went to work for General Electric Nuclear Division and was in start up for nuclear power plants all over the world.