13 Comments

  1. Let’s be careful. I have a 29 year old degree and an 18 year old PE license. Maybe I am getting too long in the tooth? 😉
    Seriously, I think Mr. Gunderson needs to read up a little: he referred to LNT as a theory. Both the ICRP and the NAS refer to LNT as a hypothesis as there is no data showing cancer at doses below 10 rem as Mr. Gunderson implied.

    1. @R
      My comment is not focused on the age of Mr. Gundersen’s initial degrees, but rather on the resume that follows that initial good start. (He apparently did pretty well in a well respected academic program.)
      There are many facets of Gundersen’s various testimonies that he needs to read up on. My point is that he claims a lot more experience than his resume supports. I think it was you who once told me that I put you at risk of criticism at work when I said something about you being an operator. As you know, licensed nuclear power plant operators are rightly proud of their licenses and the work that it takes to earn one and maintain it.
      How would they feel about a guy who claims expertise in nuclear power plant issues because he was “a licensed operator” if they found out that the only license he ever had was permission to operate a 100 watt open pool reactor at a university?
      How would professional engineers feel about the fact that Gundersen has been hired to do the kind of work for his state government that requires a PE license in most states?

      1. Yes I agree with you. Good thing Mr. Gundersen did not claim the SRO license as the operator corps is rightly proud of that special qualification.

  2. Great one Rod, I worked breifly with Arnie at NES in the early 80’s and he wound up claiming all sorts of stuff.
    Great posting!!!!!!!

  3. Yesterday David Albright, ?resident of the Institute for Science and International Security, a private group in Washington that tracks nuclear proliferation? told the New York Times (and they happily repeated it), ?ou can have a Chernobyl-style accident with this kind of reactor [the Bushehr VVVR-1000].?
    So now another ?uclear expert?says a PWR, with a negative moderator and voids coefficient, a western-style containment, modern safety-injection system, and containment spray can repeat a Chernobyl?
    Since comments weren? enabled, I wrote to the author, begging him to do a little skeptical research before he puts the imprimatur of the NYT behind idiotic statements like that.

    1. “Yesterday David Albright, … told the New York Times (and they happily repeated it), …”
      It’s the New York Times. They parted ways with reality a long time ago.

  4. Thanks Rod its unfortunate that the public in general and those in Vermont in particular are rarely skeptical of those who reinforce their preconceived notions. We at Vermont Yankee are well acquainted with Arnie and his exaggerations. He plays to a public and a legislature that has zero knowledge of nuclear power or engineering and is willing to accept any negative claim as truth. He claims to be the Chief Engineer of Fairewinds Associates but doesn’t mention he is the only engineer. A reputable engineer would not consider himself the Chief Engineer of anything if he had no direct reports. His latest claim is that VY has discharged fission products into ground water despite 100s of samples of ground water indicating the opposite.
    What is really interesting is what he doesn’t mention: why he had to leave NES and why he lost his lawsuit and he doesn’t mention that while at NES he sold spent fuel racks to Vermont Yankee which could not be used due to dimensional issues. Any engineer who reads his resume would quickly note that he really has never designed anything himself. Claims like managed and contributed on a resume with nothing else substantive are clear giveaways that he has done nothing substantial in his career.
    The one thing he does well is manipulate a small state legislature who are impressed with terms like Nuclear Engineer when they come from someone who is clearly against nuclear power. He also has done very well for himself lately, taking $300/hr and expenses for work on the Comprehensive Reliability Assessment and $185/hr for consulting with the legislature (all paid by Entergy). This also allows him to parley this consulting into other consulting roles providing “expert” testimony. Its well paying if dishonest work, not worthy of a Professional Engineer which, of course, he is not.
    In the interest of disclosure I’ve been a PE since 1984, worked for 7 nuclear plants in over 30 years, have more design experience than managerial or contributory and hope that I can finish my career at VY after license renewal (Arnie claims that he has worked for 70 plants in ~20 years before leaving NES). Clearly inflated but he probably includes those he has provided “expert” testimony against.

    1. Jim – thank you. With your permission, I would like to elevate this comment to an update on the original post.

    2. I have a question about that Compehensive Reliability Assessment that he’s billing $300/hr to work on – is there any oversight at all to ensure he’s not billing Entergy endlessly without actually producing any work or ever finishing?

  5. What does it take to be an expert witness anyway? I’m thinking I need a career change if a bad expert witness can make 150+/hr. I noticed in the video he mentioned how he testified as an expert on the river issues. He also noted that there were 16 fish in the river, and repeated that number several times (i assume he meant to say a number much larger but just forgot the zeros, or meant # of species of fish). His audience doesn’t know that though.
    Did you catch that? I left some units off the 150 number. Did you catch it right away or did you mind automatically fill in the missing data? A common tactic used by such expert witnesses. Works best when they have time to condition a unit of measure with an audience first. I could have a study that show verifiable evidence that he makes 150 coconuts/hr. Depending on the $/coconuts ratio i can imply a larger or smaller number based on how I say it and what units i use or exclude.
    I’m sure all you engineers on here notice how very inconsistent articles are with keeping units and switching back and forth. I know from practice the only reason to constantly switch units or leave them off numbers is to create confusion, problems, and cause probes to crash in to mars.

  6. And now Gundersen is plastered on CNN as an expert, talking about how dangerous it would be to drop water on melting fuel rods because the water might push them closer together and create critical mass.

  7. Hi Rod & AI ,
    As a UK Civil Engineer & Structural Engineer ( absolutely no nuclear experience ) thanks to Rod Adams and all Postings for illuminating what to many is a mysterious & fearful area of expertise & nuclear risk . Especially the radiation superstition debates . The Gundersen matter shows just how much complete integrity is necessary , when dealing with this area , to my mind perhaps the most crucial yet overlooked area of global risk evaluation ?
    Again , one more example of the questionable integrity of people being the real problem & real risk , rather than the technical problems themselves .
    So often one has to waste irreplaceable time & energy arguing the ethics & conduct of a person , rather than the problem itself .
    There are so many armchair experts , especially the Green Political Lobbyists , in the UK , who simply regurgitate “sound bite theories” and who are then wheeled out to educate the masses into the “real risks” of nuclear power , with a minimum of accurate facts , and more importantly , little or even zero quantative numerical ability .
    Take the irrational growth of Wind Farms in the UK .
    The level of rational economic engineering debate is stifled as much as possible by those with vested self interest .
    Sadly corruption is everywhere , the target usually being Public Funds .
    I was taught A level Physics in Todmorden Grammar School in 1960 , and in a glass case next to my desk were a number of school physics exercise books which had belonged to Sir John Cockroft , Old Boy & Nobel Prize winner , who , “split the atom” .
    One wonders what he would have thought about the Nuclear Industry today , and the integrity of some of it’s self professed experts ?

    Geoffrey Stansfield

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