Author: Adam Bertocci

Japan has chosen a plan to increase the lifespan of its nuclear reactors, signaling a significant change in nuclear policy. The nation also has plans to upgrade outdated reactors and build new ones in light of the paucity of fuel in the world, the rising cost of gas and the requirement to lower its greenhouse gas emissions.

For a nation that had intended to progressively phase out nuclear power in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident in 2011, this is a huge shift.

According to the Financial Times, the public in Tokyo is reconsidering the restarting of its reactors due to the rising cost of energy and concern over blackouts. The 10-year plan for Japan’s updated nuclear strategy, developed by a government advisory council, would hasten the restart of the nation’s current nuclear reactors and extend their operational lives beyond 60 years. Additionally, it would create sophisticated nuclear reactors.

Energy Crisis Is a Possibility.

The panel’s roadmap made reference to the global rise in energy costs that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, as reported by the Financial Times, for the first time since the 1973 oil crisis in the midst of a very difficult scenario. We were reminded of the vulnerability of the energy infrastructure in our nation, which puts our energy security at risk.

Eight more nuclear reactors have been restarted since the Fukushima Daiichi disaster when an earthquake and tsunami crippled the plant’s cooling system and power supply. According to the World Nuclear Association, two of Japan’s nuclear reactors were restarted in August and October of 2015 as a result of the disaster.

Before Fukushima, 54 nuclear reactors provided nearly one-third of Japan’s electricity requirements, according to the Financial Times. Nine of the reactors are currently operational, which has increased the nation’s reliance on natural gas, coal, and fuel oil. By 2050, Japan has pledged to have net zero carbon emissions.

The Japanese government has set a target for nuclear power to account for 20 to 22 percent of the nation’s energy supply by 2030 in the wake of Fukushima, according to The Associated Press. But following the accident in 2011, safety regulations were tightened. Only ten of the 27 reactor restart requests made by utility companies in the previous ten years has been granted.

For reactors that have been operational for 30 years, extensions would be permitted every ten years under a new plan developed by the Economy and Industry Ministry and approved by Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority. Additionally, periods, when a reactor was offline, could be deducted from its operational life.

Read More: Arctic Air Brings Dangerously Cold Weather to The U.S., Which Could Test the Grid in Texas

The Parliament Has Not yet Given Its Approval to The New Safety Inspection Regulations.

Takeo Kikkawa, an economist and energy specialist at the International University of Japan, expressed skepticism regarding the continued use of old reactors, claiming that the new policy would permit utility operators to continue using outmoded equipment instead of investing in modern advancements or renewable energy.

Naturally, we should strive to employ cutting-edge technology safely. Thus, prolonging the lives of reactors is a bad idea, according to Kikkawa, as quoted by the Associated Press.

The majority of Japan’s nuclear reactors are older than three decades, and four of them have been given permission to continue operating after operating for more than four decades. Currently online is one of the reactors, which is 40 years old.

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Atomic energy now provides less than 7% of Japan’s total power. To achieve the government’s target of 20 to 22 percent nuclear electricity by 2030, approximately 27 reactors will be required. According to Kikkawa, who was quoted by the Financial Times, this is our final opportunity to move the delayed nuclear program forward in order to reach carbon neutrality for 2050.

This holiday season, the weather will undoubtedly be dreadful over much of the United States.

Over the Christmas holiday, a storm that the National Weather Service (NWS) in Buffalo, New York, described as occurring just once in a generation is predicted to bring record low temperatures and potentially fatal conditions to most of the central and eastern United States.

Please heed the regional warnings, I implore everyone. So far, we’ve made contact with 26 governors in the impacted areas. Visit weather.gov for more details. According to The Independent, President Joe Biden stated this before the catastrophic weather incident. This is not like the snow days you remember as a child. This is important material.

According to the NWS, there are more than 30 states currently covered by advisories and watches, ranging from Florida in the southeast to Washington in the northwest. As of Thursday at lunchtime, almost 300 million Americans were under some kind of winter weather notice or advisory.

According to BBC News, the chilly and wintry weather is advancing eastward and may intensify into a bomb cyclone by Friday.

When a storm’s core air pressure falls by at least 24 millibars in 24 hours, an indication of rapid intensification, it is referred to as a bomb cyclone. They frequently come with blizzards, torrential rain, or thunderstorms.

The NWS reported that a significant and unusual storm system is expected to spread heavy snowfall, high winds, and dangerously cold temperatures from the northern Great Basin to the Plains, Upper Midwest, Great Lakes, and the northern/central Appalachians through early this weekend.

Travel schedules and power are already being affected by the storm. According to Flight Aware, there were 1,932 cancellations and 4,522 delays for flights into, into, and out of the United States as of 1:56 p.m. Eastern Time. According to PowerOutage.us, there were 17,364 people without power in Texas as of 1:48 p.m. Eastern Time, 14,504 in California, and 9,935 in Oregon.

A mass of Arctic air has been flowing south and east over the country in advance of the storm.

According to the NWS, temperatures behind the front had already dropped by 50 degrees F throughout the central High Plains in a matter of hours, with widespread readings of or below zero occurring across most of the central/northern Plains, the northern Rockies, and the Great Basin.

According to BBC News, the storm and cold spell may cause Florida to have its coldest Christmas in 30 years, while other U.S. regions may also see their coldest Christmas in decades. In some areas, the temperature may drop as low as -50 to -70 degrees Fahrenheit.

Read More: The U.K.’s £2 Bus Price Cap Will Lower Vehicle Emissions in England and Promote Public Transportation.

Extreme cold snaps and winter storms like this weekend may still be climate signals even though winter is often the fastest warming season in the United States and the climate crisis is likely making the classic white Christmas ever more unusual.

According to Newsweek, this is due to the Arctic warming roughly four times faster than the global average over the past 40 years. One theory is that as the Arctic warms, the stratospheric polar vortex that usually confines the arctic air to a small ring becomes unstable.

According to MIT meteorologist Judah Cohen, “the frigid air generally limited to the Arctic can migrate southward to the mid-latitudes, including the U.S., Europe, and East Asia.” This can happen as the circulation around the polar vortex becomes less and less circular in shape.

The polar jet stream typically destabilizes along with the polar vortex as it becomes unstable, changing weather patterns. The contrast between cold, Arctic air and warmer, southerly air can foster the ideal environment for a bomb cyclone that is fast increasing.

According to Jason Furtado, a professor of meteorology at the University of Oklahoma, “the creation of any mid-latitude storm system involves a contrast of warm air from the lower latitudes and cold, polar air masses from the high latitudes.” “As a result, low-pressure areas at middle latitudes benefit from this temperature difference. The intensity will intensify more quickly the greater the temperature difference since there will be more energy available to lower the core pressure.

Although it’s not definite that climate change is to blame for the polar vortex’s instability, similar occurrences have been more often over the past 30 years.

They also affect a population that is generally accustomed to milder weather, even in the winter.

According to NWS Weather Prediction Center warning coordination meteorologist Alex Lamers, there will be a more drastic departure than what people and other living things have been experiencing lately, as The Guardian reported.

Read More: The Uk Met Office Projects that By 2023, Global Temperatures Will Be 1.2°c Higher than Pre-Industrial Levels.!

Since people are not acclimated to temperatures that might result in frostbite in less than five minutes, this change could overburden the electricity supply and put people in danger.

Animals could also experience a shock, particularly bird species whose ranges have grown or whose migration has been postponed due to climate change.

Brooke Bateman, director of climate science at the National Audobon Society, warned The Guardian that birds like bluebirds, which frequently time their migration based on weather and food availability, may find themselves unable to handle the cold spell while also attempting to flee from it.

Could the Climate Crisis Be to Blame for the Coldest Christmas in Decades in the United States?

The lower 48 states are being hit by a bomb cyclone of Arctic air that will bring dangerously low temperatures, copious amounts of snow and rain, and blizzard conditions.

It was a “once in a generation winter storm,” according to the Buffalo, New York office of the National Weather Service, which is used to dealing with severe winter weather. Eastern Wyoming may have wind chills as low as -70 degrees Fahrenheit due to the lowest weather in decades, while the Eastern Seaboard will likely experience its coldest Christmas since Taylor Swift was born.

Tragically, the intense cold is also likely to highlight the devastating effects of harsh weather on those who are homeless.

The cold will certainly test the Texas electrical grid, which fell catastrophically in 2021, primarily as a result of the failure of the methane gas system, in addition to driving methane gas costs even higher for people throughout the central United States. The Texas grid now has more than 7,300 megawatts of additional wind, solar, and energy storage capacity, which might assist maintain grid stability.

Read More: 3M Claims that By the End of 2025, It Will Stop Producing and Using Forever Chemicals.!

Research indicates that the fast-warming Arctic may be contributing to the increased likelihood of cold air descending to the south.

Read More: The U.K.’s £2 Bus Price Cap Will Lower Vehicle Emissions in England and Promote Public Transportation.

To Delve Farther Further:

The Texas grid: The Texas Tribune, The Dallas Morning News, Houston Chronicle, OilPrice; Climate Signals background: The Washington Post, AP, CNN, Axios, Reuters; Texas grid:

Amplified by The Arctic

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A section of the Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhhorod natural gas pipeline in western Russia exploded Wednesday, killing three repair workers. One driver was also experiencing shock, according to Reuters. The pipeline is now the main gas export route from Russia to Europe and carries gas from Siberia to central Europe via Ukraine.

According to local authorities, supplies had been redirected and the gas flare had been put out.

The gas pipeline’s damaged part was quickly localized. According to a statement from the Russian gas business Gazprom Transgaz Nizhny Novgorod, which was obtained by Reuters, gas is being delivered to consumers in full using parallel gas pipelines.

According to The Associated Press, Oleg Nikolayev, the governor of the Russia’s Republic of Chuvashia, said it was unclear how long the explosion-related pipeline repairs would take.

The Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines exploded beneath the Baltic Sea in September, making the Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhhorod pipeline the main route for gas from Russia to Europe. This pipeline was constructed in the 1980s.

With the excuse that there were equipment problems, Russia abruptly halted supplying gas to Germany through Nord Stream 1 in August. Germany denied these assertions, claiming that Russia was attempting to raise gas costs and spread disbelief.

Just before Russia invaded Ukraine, Germany halted the licensing process for Nord Stream 2, and the pipeline was never used.

According to Reuters, Gazprom stated that it planned to flow 1,518.5 million cubic feet of gas through the Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhhorod pipeline to Europe the day after the incident, a volume commensurate with recent deliveries.

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However, according to OilPrice.com, that is just 5.4% of the roughly 5,473.8 billion cubic feet of natural gas that Russia supplied to Europe last year. Europe has started importing liquified natural gas to complement its supply of natural gas from Russia.

A report from the nonprofit organization Environment America claims that a gas pipeline problem occurs in the United States once every 40 hours or thereabouts. Between January 2010 and October 2021, there were around 2,600 pipeline gas discharge occurrences that were significant enough to be reported to the federal government. 328 of them set off explosions and flames, which resulted in 122 fatalities and hundreds of injuries.

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Approximately 26.6 billion cubic feet of methane gas have been released into the Earth’s atmosphere as a result of leaks that the federal government has documented, which has the same impact on global warming as the annual emissions of more than 2.4 million cars.

The reported gas leaks have cost and damaged about $4 billion since 2010.

According to the analysis, the volume of gas seeping into the environment is significantly more than what is indicated by federal leak reporting or emissions projections from the Environmental Protection Agency.

In order to gradually phase out compact fluorescent lightbulbs in favor of even more energy-efficient LEDs, the Biden administration unveiled a new regulation on Monday.

The rule would increase the brightness-per-watt standard from 45 to 120 lumens, more than doubling it. The Department of Energy estimates that the proposed rule will reduce U.S. climate pollution by 131 million metric tonnes of CO2 and 903 thousand tonnes of methane over the next 30 years, or about the annual emissions released by 29 million homes. LED bulbs use significantly less energy and last much longer than CFLs and incandescent bulbs.

The rule is expected to be completed before the conclusion of Biden’s current term, according to the administration.

Read More: Australia Announces Its First Wind Zone out At Sea.!

According to The Hill:

According to calculations from the Energy Department, the proposed regulation that was announced on Monday would save consumers $20 billion in total expenses over the next three decades and stop 131 million metric tonnes of carbon emissions.

Although today’s LEDs are a terrific product, it turns out that the most advanced technology may make the lights much more effective. We use so many light bulbs that this innovation, according to [Appliance Standards Awareness Project]ASAP Executive Director Andrew deLaski, will significantly lower energy expenditures for homes and businesses while reducing climate pollution from power plants.

Compact fluorescent bulbs, which are still available in some stores today but are inferior to LEDs, would likewise come to an end under this proposal.

Read More: The U.K.’s £2 Bus Price Cap Will Lower Vehicle Emissions in England and Promote Public Transportation.

To Delve Farther Further:

Washington Examiner, The Hill, Bloomberg, CNN, and MarketWatch

You may subscribe to daily Hot News, follow Climate Nexus on Twitter and Facebook, and visit their news website, Nexus Media News, for additional information on climate change and clean energy.