Readers of this blog are invited to meet the publisher to share their likes, ideas, comments, and views on what this blog should cover in the coming year.

The Winter Meeting of the American Nuclear Society takes place in Washington, DC, the last weekend of this month and into the first week of November.  The details of the program, how to register, and where to stay are online at the ANS web site.

I’ll be there not only to attend various technical sessions, but also because I serve on the the ANS Communications Committee.  Its business meeting takes place at the conference.  This is my second tour on the committee having previously served on it 2010-2013.

What Do You Want to Read About on this Blog?

For the most part this blog reflects the unique judgment and perspective of the publisher, that’s me, on a weekly basis to figure out what stories are going to be interesting to readers.  I’ve tried over the past ten years to cast a wide net covering everything from advanced nuclear technologies to zirconium cladding on fuel bundles. A lot of what I write about is focused on the “so what” question of why a story deserves your attention.

What Readers Have Been Interested in So Far?

I know there are a lot of people who read the blog because WordPress provides anonymous data on the number of readers, the articles that interest them, and their country of origin. Here is a brief summary for the calendar years 2015 & 2016, and 2017 year-to-date.

• There were 118,474 visitors to the the blog
• There were 200,443 page views
• 63% of all page views are from U.S. locations
• The next most frequent countries for readers, in descending order, are Canada, U.K., France, India, Japan, South Korea, and Australia.

Vogtle & V C Summer are Top Reader Topics

The top nine article this year so far are all about the financial and management failures at the two U.S,. nuclear projects under construction in Georgia and South Carolina and the factors that led to them including the action by Westinghouse parent Toshiba to cook the books by claiming $1.2 billion in revenue that never existed.

This situation continues to be a story of diverging destinies for the two site.  This week the Vogtle project got a lifeline from the Department of Energy in terms of an increase in loan guarantees.  The project is expected to continue to completion. The now cancelled V C Summer site got more bad news with medias reports about efforts to cover up a critical technical report and a raft of lawsuits from ratepayers and stockholders among others.

In the next ten most read article this year readers were interested in NuScale’s progress with its SMR, TerraPower’s work to develop an advanced reactor with China, NASA’s efforts to restart production of PU-238 for RTGs, China’s work on advanced nuclear reactors including HTGRs, and various developments related to TRIOS fuel.

One article stands out from all the technical, management, and business aspects of the industry. It is the inside story of how the Temelin nuclear site in the Czech Republic got wrapped around the axle by a swimsuit company’s public relations stunt that used it as backdrop for the rollout of a new product line.  You cannot  make this stuff up.

What’s Next for the Next 12 Months?

This is where you come in.  I’ll be at the ANS Winter meeting from Saturday afternoon 10/28 through Tuesday evening 10/31. Work commitments require that I return to Cleveland  Wednesday morning 11/1.

I’m offering an invitation to meet, greet, talk, discuss, kick around ideas, and consider any thoughts you have for what this blog should cover in the next year.  These discussions can be ad hoc in the halls, over coffee, or if you want, we can set a mutually convenient time for dialog.

I’m interested in what topics you think will be of interest to readers and how best to cover them. I’m also interested in constructive ideas of where the blog can do better. If you are in the DC area, but not attending the ANS meeting, and have some ideas you want to share, get in contact with me so we can work something out.

This is probably also a good place to set expectations. The blog is very much a part-time effort done at home after hours. I have a consulting business during the day. I publish about 100 posts a year, usually two a week, and each post is usually 1,000-2000 words.

Within these limits I’m looking for the best ways to publish a pro-nuclear blog in what is clearly a challenging era for the industry.  I hope you will take some time to share your views with me about how to do this.

How to Contact Me

On the main menu of my blog click on the About tab. There you will find my phone, email, and Twitter links.  Pick the one that works for you and let me know when and where I can talk to you.

A good place to start is the President’s Reception Sunday evening. I look forward to hearing from you.  BTW: Here’s what I look like.

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