The normalising of nuclear
6 October 2026 Noel Wauchope, https://theaimn.net/the-normalising-of-nuclear/
The facts on the nuclear industry’s effects on health and environment are now seen through a blur of discussion on climate change, and costs, and connection with military power, and it all seems too hard to grasp. When the UK’s Green Party decides to go sorta kinder pro-nuclear, well, nuclear power and nuclear weapons are beginning to look sort of OK and normal.
We are in a strange period of time, in which things previously agreed on, are now up for doubts and denial. Just as an example, in Australia, free infant vaccinations supplied by the government have pretty much been for many decades considered mandatory (although not legally mandatory). Now infant vaccination rates are falling. This fall reflects a loss of trust in health authorities. Most Australian children still do receive the full schedule of vaccines, but there’s a lessening of understanding of the reasons behind the programme. That’s combined with misinformation about vaccination as the cause of autism, among other false claims.
That’s just one very important example of the atmosphere of doubt and distrust that is becoming more prevalent in society at large, and Australia is not immune from this “fog of disbelief” about public health.
The vaccination issue is particularly misunderstood and dangerous, because that programme depends on “herd immunity.” A century ago, Australian families were all too likely to lose several of their many children to infectious diseases. In any old country cemetery in Victoria, you will find a whole lot of graves of infants, who died 100 years ago, many from the same families. Over the 20th Century a universal programme of infant vaccination revolutionised that, and survival rates for children rocketed up.
Well, I certainly have strayed away from my main theme – which is the growing acceptance of the nuclear industry as probably OK. I do think that social media, with its briefness and lack of fact-checking has contributed to the blurring of information, and the growing distrust of genuine experts.
What is happening in the UK, under a Labour government, is a definite case of the blurring of information about the nuclear industry. This started in 2006, with Tony Blair reversing Labour’s opposition to new nuclear, and it steadily moved on to Keir Starmer’s enthusiasm for it in 2025. Now the UK Labour government has a seemingly more moderate and “leftish” Prime Minister, with a more nuanced approach to things nuclear. Their latest effort is acting on the report of the Nuclear Regulatory Taskforce Review, which recommends a “radical reset” of the UK’s nuclear regulatory framework to streamline approvals, reduce costs, and support safe, rapid delivery of civil and defence nuclear projects. So, the The UK’s Environment Agency is moving towards treating nuclear energy more like other industries by implementing a Nuclear Transformation Programme. It is an almost imperceptible change.
But it is such a telling change. No other industry has this extraordinary feature – that it involves the highly toxic fuels of uranium and plutonium, that its very essence is in splitting the atom to release ionising radiation As there has not been a nuclear disaster since 2011, it seems to be accepted by the powers that be that there will never be another one. At the same time, today’s warfare of drones and missiles raises a scary idea that a weapon might strike a nuclear facility. No other industry has this unique vulnerability that a great spread of toxic radiation would result from such a hit.
The dangerous effects of ionising radiation have been recognised since 1896, and confirmed more recently in several scientific studies, such as cancer mortality after low dose exposure to ionising radiation in workers in France, the United Kingdom, and the United States (INWORKS): cohort study. And we all think it’s fine, we don’t think twice, as the radiographer darts out of the room when we have an X-ray.
So the nuclear industry is not like other industries. It has always had exceptional regulations to deal with this unique danger. Now the USA under Trump is denying the danger, and trashing the safety regulations. You might expect a British Labour government to have a more principled approach to health and safety. But, under the pressures of propaganda, of industry lobbying, of determination to stay in power, this process of normalisation of nuclear is underway in the UK.
Who can we turn to, to speak truth to power? Not the UK Greens. They have just voted to end the party’s opposition to nuclear power, dropping a commitment to phase out the technology in a major shift in its energy policy. Matthew Pearce, The Guardian, has explained this – “The Green MP Carla Denyer said the decision recognised there was a role for nuclear while the country moved towards an electricity system based primarily on renewables.” The article quotes Professor Andrew Stirling, who commented that “the motion was “completely irrational”. “Why would a party that pioneered concerns about nuclear power that have been so broadly vindicated by history, choose now to shift its position?”
One does wonder how long it will be, before something happens. We have been extraordinarily lucky in that the big accidents have been relatively few, and not in recent years. Unfortunately, while people are shocked and concerned about big dramatic accidents, the slow insidious spread of “low level” ionising radiation just goes on, unnoticed. It’s “normal”.
I for one am quite saddened at the UK Greens’ decision. You wonder who is left – anyone in politics, in power, in the media, who is not so hell-bent to hang on to their job, that they might stick their head above the parapet and say NO to nuclear.
Flying Scared: The Evacuation of US Bombers from RAF Fairford
From the aggressively pro-American terrain of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Malcom Davis claimed to have identified the crucial lesson: “that in an age of drone warfare, it is no longer sufficient to assume that aircraft parked in the open are invulnerable to attack.”
7 October 2026Dr Binoy Kampmark, https://theaimn.net/flying-scared-the-evacuation-of-us-bombers-from-raf-fairford/
The evacuation of a dozen B-1B bombers of the US Air Force from the RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire is another instalment in the latest rippling of the Iran war that began as a pre-emptive, illegal assault by the US and Israel on the Islamic Republic in late February. This, arguably, came in two parts, the first scripted with the detention and arrest of five men on September 27 in the vicinity of the base on suspicion of committing offences under the Explosives Act and suspicion of preparation of a terrorist act. (Another was arrested on October 1.) All were British nationals based in London and speedily released on police bail. At the time, Assistant Commissioner Laurence Taylor, head of Counter Terrorism Policing (CTP), floated the suggestion that “this may be activity committed by proxies, or individuals either knowingly or unknowingly, working on behalf of a foreign state.” The dust had barely settled before the finger pointing at Iran began. The men in question, according to the police, remained under investigation, with their release “subject to stringent conditions on their movement and contact with others.”
On October 4, the Pentagon announced that “all bombers that were deployed to RAF Fairford have been re-deployed to their home stations in the United States.” The department, wishing to blunt the significance of this hasty decision, added that the US military bomber force of B-1s, B-2s, and B-52s remained “ready to deliver precious global strike capabilities – including through operations that launch and recover from the continental United States.”
Two days later, Counter Terrorism Policing announced that a further arrest had been made of a dual UK-Iranian man regarding “activity that took place close to RAF Fairford.” The arrest was made “on suspicion of terrorist acts under Section 5 of the Terrorism Act 2006.” The Senior National Coordinator for CTP, Vicki Evans, reiterated the line that this remained “a live investigation and our specialist teams continue to pursue multiple lines of enquiry into the circumstances surrounding events near RAF Fairford.”
When asked about whether the movement of the bombers was linked to the September 27 incident, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio proved platitudinous and undetailed. “It’s not unusual to see movement of assets to different parts of the world based on exercises, redeployments, people changing out and new people coming in, new planes coming in and old planes going out.” This front of airy meaninglessness did not take long to vanish. The US Vice President JD Vance added salt to the otherwise dull mix in stating that the bombers had exited the base out of an “abundance of caution.” It was felt that Iran was doing what it had “done for 49 years… which is to engage in acts of terrorism against the US and against a lot of other people.”
President Donald Trump, tongue ever loosened, also told reporters when asked if the bomber redeployment had arisen from any “specific threat” did not hesitate: “Yeah, I think we can say that. They didn’t fly out by accident.” What followed was the usual combination of adulterated facts and twisted tales. There had been “some threats. And rather than tempting the enemy, we’ll capture the enemy and beat the enemy. But why should we leave them there? So we moved them around a little bit. Not very far.” Never one to accept the premise that the US security establishment might err on occasion, the president reiterated the familiar, if long fossilized line: Washington “actually knows the people that made the threat.”
This dramatic decision to move the bombers from a base that hosts the US Air Force’s 501st Combat Support Wing, an important component in the illegal war against Iran, is very much the opposite of what was initially done when a farmer noted the presence of three white vans and a “large group of hooded and masked men” who then attempted to alert the Ministry of Defence police at the airbase. When no response was forthcoming, she made a 999 call to police at 01:36 BST. Within 10 minutes “the village was full of armed police.” She ruminated on the effect of the call: “I believe that my 999 call foiled whatever plans they had.” She was also “absolutely staggered that it was left to me, as a member of the public, to see and report this.” The UK Defence Secretary, Wes Streeting, despite thanking the farmer for her call, suggested she only had “a partial picture” of what was unfolding, while Trump, claimed that the men were placed under surveillance “for a long time, and we got them.”
The swift relocation of such costly, vulnerable military hardware in the face of a threat that would, if inflicted, have cost a fraction of any budget, is also a startling reminder of the turns in modern warfare. The Ukrainians demonstrated with formidable efficacy in Operation Spider’s Web how its drones could strike Russian nuclear-capable bombers, allegedly crippling a third of its capacity. Taking place in June last year, it involved the use of 117 modestly priced drones that had been smuggled into Russia via lorries by unwitting drivers. The strikes, taking place across five different time zones with the assistance of the commercial autopilot software ArduPilot and the use of artificial intelligence for targeting purposes, led to an estimated bill amounting to US$7 billion. Some 41 planes were damaged or destroyed.
Operation Spider’s Web drew swooning praise from the cognoscenti. Katja Bego of Chatham House thought it “offered a glimpse into the future of warfare, transformed by access to cheap, widely available technology such as small drones, in which anything, anywhere can become a target.” This, she went on to say, raised “urgent questions” about NATO’s own preparations in the face of such an attack.
Before mighty odds and expensive machinery, new methods of war are proving resourceful, daring and devastating. One palpable absurdity of the Iran War has been the eye-popping costs accruing from the use of heavy weaponry in offence and anti-ballistic missiles such as the THAAD system in defence. This has drained the US inventory, sending Washington’s allies into fits of concern. On a relatively meagre budget, labouring in the face of superior odds and numbers, Tehran has caused mayhem with its drone and missile strikes across the Gulf region. In the case of RAF Fairford, the Iranians, whatever the speculation, did not even need to launch a single drone for an expensive fleet of bombers to be relocated to the continental US.
Despite no official confirmation that Tehran was actually involved, the commentary circuit has been clogged by assessments of a victory for the Islamic Republic. “I think it is hard to conclude anything other than that this will be seen as a success by Iran,” suggests former UK first national security advisor, Lord Peter Ricketts. “Whether it was the intention or whether it’s the inadvertent outcome, it is certainly the outcome that they have now forced the US into a public bring-back of their forces from one of their allies.”
From the aggressively pro-American terrain of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Malcom Davis claimed to have identified the crucial lesson: “that in an age of drone warfare, it is no longer sufficient to assume that aircraft parked in the open are invulnerable to attack.” The US needed “to invest in hardening bases, including developing new hardened aircraft shelters for forward deployed aircraft.” Another, surely cheaper solution would be to refrain from launching criminally foolish wars in the Middle East, or anywhere else, for that matter.
The war against Iran was meant to conclude in a popular insurrection against the theocrats in Tehran and the blooming of various flowers in the Orangerie of democracy. There was no insurrection and certainly no flowering. Instead, the successor regime to those slayed continues to resist with steeliness and wage its battle in the fields of briefings, psychology and economics. So far, it is winning.
The Pentagon’s Secret Budget
The most obvious place where Congress and the executive branch hide military spending is in the Department of Energy’s budget. That’s where taxpayers can find the bill for the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, which cost around $33.5 billion in 2025.
hundreds of billions of dollars are effectively hidden in the budgets of at least 17 other government agencies and entities. In total, each of these additional sums are larger than what Congress appropriates for every non-military agency
David Vine, CounterPunch. October 2, 2026
News reports that next year’s U.S. military budget will top out at $1.5 trillion if President Donald Trump gets his way are misleading at best. The true total, if Trump’s proposal passes, could be at least $1 trillion higher.
Long before Trump took office, U.S. taxpayers have spent far more on the Pentagon — and its wars — than most know. For decades, Congress, the White House, and the Pentagon have hidden the military’s true cost through little-known bureaucratic practices and budgeting tricks. Journalists, academics, and think tank experts have, with rare exceptions, perpetuated the problem by repeating “official” numbers that don’t come close to telling the full story.
Data shows that the budget was already between $1.5 trillion and $1.8 trillion in the last full fiscal year, 2025, as detailed by a recent Project on Government Oversight, or POGO, report I co-authored. Trump’s requests would add another $781 billion, bringing the potential total to at least $2.581 trillion in 2027.
The troubling revelation that the government is misleading the public and effectively hiding hundreds of billions in military spending reflects the out-of-control nature of the Pentagon budget. It’s also the only sector of government spending that seems largely insulated from public scrutiny: Imagine the outrage if news broke that the government was hiding hundreds of billions in spending for public housing, Medicaid, or hunger prevention programs.
People have a right to know how much tax money goes to military spending. This is critical to debating the proper size of the military budget both on its own and compared to other spending priorities, particularly any program related to education or the social safety net. Understanding the military’s true cost means understanding where and how the government has been hiding the money.
Spending Hidden in Other Budgets
It’s difficult to untangle how much the country actually spends on the military in part because Congress pays for the armed forces and wars from many budgets rather than one. Beyond the agency controlling the military branches that Trump calls the “Department of War” (the official name is still the Department of Defense), hundreds of billions of dollars are effectively hidden in the budgets of at least 17 other government agencies and entities. In total, each of these additional sums are larger than what Congress appropriates for every non-military agency.
For years, TomDispatch and a small but mostly ignored group of budget experts have warned that total military spending is far higher than reported. Our new POGO report consolidates this prior work and five different methodologies for calculating the true military budget. The report shows a consensus that military spending was at least $1.5 trillion, with three of five methods reaching similar estimates of $1.7 trillion to $1.8 trillion.
The newest of the five methodologies provides the easiest way for anyone to see the hidden spending. The methodology uses data from a government website, USAspending.gov, the product of a 2006 law requiring the government “to give the American public access to information on how their tax dollars are being spent.” The site includes the closest thing to actual spending receipts, making it easier to identify military spending beyond the Department of War’s budget.
Let’s take a look at where the money’s hiding.
Hidden Nuclear Weapons Costs: $33.8 Billion
The most obvious place where Congress and the executive branch hide military spending is in the Department of Energy’s budget. That’s where taxpayers can find the bill for the U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, which cost around $33.5 billion in 2025.
The Department of War controls and deploys these weapons, and their costs should properly be part of its budget, not rolled into the Department of Energy. While the Energy Department plays a role in overseeing the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, putting nuclear weapons spending in the DOE’s budget is like a city putting the costs of its police department’s bullets in its transportation department budget rather than in the police budget.
Another $300 million in nuclear weapons spending hides in the budgets of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board and the Army Corps of Engineers, bringing the total to nearly $34 billion.
Hidden Military Personnel (Veterans) Costs: $393.3 Billion
Taxpayers spend huge sums on the military in the Department of Veterans Affairs and related budgets. The existence of a separate veterans’ agency is a sleight of hand that leads the public to believe this is not military spending. It is. The only difference is the appropriation of money to still another agency……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
The True Cost of the Department of War: $1.3 Trillion
The bulk of military expenditures still appear in the Department of War’s budget, which pays for the armed forces and the rest of the Pentagon’s sprawling bureaucracy, including all the weapons, salaries, some benefits, military construction, fuel, maintenance, operational expenses, and much more. USAspending.gov receipts show the Department of War alone spent $1.273 trillion in 2025. The Pentagon controlled another $480 million in spending that hid in the budgets of the State Department, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the Department of Transportation.
Combined with the $444.8 billion tallied previously, total military spending hits $1.718 trillion. That’s more than double the military budget usually reported for 2025: the $850 billion Congress appropriated to the Department of War.
Still Other Costs
The $1.7 trillion estimate for last year is conservative and still may be too low. While the War Department budget contains classified funding for the CIA, National Security Agency, and other intelligence agencies, the government may hide more intelligence spending elsewhere. NASA space research involves considerable military work, which could add another $10.5 billion, according to USAspending.gov data. Some would also count $1.9 billion in FBI salaries and expenses found in the Department of Justice budget.
Other experts consider much larger expenditures in the DHS budget to be military spending, given that department’s role in protecting the “homeland” and the increasingly militarized nature of Immigration and Customs Enforcement as well as Border Patrol. This would add at least $216.9 billion after excluding DHS’s Federal Emergency Management Agency spending. Alternate methodologies also include $211.9 billion in interest payments on the more than $40 trillion in national debt stemming from past military spending and wars.
You can add and subtract forms of spending that you think belong or don’t belong in the true total, thanks to the transparency of the POGO report’s methodologies. In total, these excluded sums could add another $441.2 billion to the USAspending.gov method’s prior total of $1.718 trillion for 2025.
Growing Opposition to Unchecked Pentagon Spending
POGO report’s conservative estimates of the FY2025 budget being $1.5 trillion to $1.8 trillion reveal that the true military budget for 2027 could hit $2.6 trillion if Congress gives Trump what he wants. This includes requested increases totaling $781 billion for just the Department of War ($500 billion), the Iran war ($70 billion), veterans ($144.9 billion), nuclear weapons ($53.9 billion), and the Coast Guard ($12.5 billion), let alone other smaller forms of hidden Pentagon spending.
When mind-numbing numbers like these reach the trillions, it can be tempting to think, What does it matter if it’s $1 trillion or $1.5 trillion or $2.6 trillion?
It helps me to remember that every single dollar spent on the Pentagon is a dollar not spent on our children, on healthcare, on affordable housing, on efforts to slow catastrophic climate change, and much more……………………………………………………………………………………………………………. https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/10/02/the-pentagons-secret-budget/
Fukushima N-Plant Starts New Round of Treated Water Release
Tokyo, Oct. 5 (Jiji Press)–The Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant began its sixth release of treated water for fiscal 2026 on Monday, its operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc., said.
The release from the disaster-stricken nuclear plant in Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan, will involve about 7,800 tons of treated water containing radioactive tritium diluted with large volumes of seawater. The water will be discharged through an undersea tunnel to a point about 1 kilometer offshore by Oct. 23.
This is the 24th release since discharges began in August 2023. In fiscal 2026, which ends in March next year, the plant is set to release 62,400 tons of treated water in eight rounds.
Jiji 5th Oct 2026
https://jen.jiji.com/jc/eng?g=ind&k=2026100500570
Tory plan to cut Scotland’s powers poses a question they cannot dodge.
Andrew Bowie – the shadow energy secretary – who has made crystal clear
what a General Election win for his party would mean: fewer powers for
Scotland.
“We will legislate to ensure that Scotland can host new nuclear
power generation,” Bowie said. The message is this: should the Tories
re-enter No 10, the devolution of planning powers to the Scottish
Government will be stripped back. Bowie did not shy away from this, telling
party faithful at the Tory conference:
“If John Swinney and SNP ministers
want to have a fight over any plans that would deliver thousands of jobs
and protect energy security, then I say bring it on.” The SNP responded
with their own challenge. “Tory politicians proposing to force nuclear
power plants on Scotland should tell us who among them wants one of these
extortionate, wasteful, and unnecessary nuclear plants built in their
constituency,” SNP MSP Laura Mitchell said.
The National 5th Oct 2026,
https://www.thenational.scot/news/26609474.tory-plan-cut-scotlands-powers-poses-question-cannot-dodge/
Tories pledge ‘Britannia Shield’ to protect UK from drone attacks.
Aplanned network of radar, command and control systems and interceptor
missiles would strengthen defences against aerial threats. The
Conservatives have pledged to build a £10bn integrated air-defence system
to protect the UK from missile and drone attacks if they win the next
general election. The proposed system, dubbed “Britannia Shield”, would
involve an improved network of radar, command and control systems, and
interceptor missiles to protect critical national infrastructure and
military bases from aerial threats.
FT 5th Oct 2026,
https://www.ft.com/content/f30a1afc-2aa8-4cdd-a6e8-b18523298456
Labour Government will not override Holyrood to bring in new nuclear, says UK energy minister
Labour Government will not override Holyrood to bring in new nuclear, says
UK energy minister. Michael Shanks said that “ripping up the Scotland Act
to force through new nuclear isn’t the right approach”. The Labour
Government will not override Holyrood to bring in new nuclear reactors, a
UK energy minister has said.
Scotsman 6th Oct 2026, https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/labour-government-will-not-override-holyrood-to-bring-in-new-nuclear-says-uk-energy-minister-9268139
Scotland could get large nuclear reactor under Tories, says shadow energy secretary
Conservatives vow to change the law to override SNP ban on new nuclear
The Scotsman, By Andrew J Quinn, Westminster Correspondent, 5th Oct 2026,
cotland could get a large nuclear reactor under the Tories, the shadow energy secretary has said.
Andrew Bowie told the Conservative Party Conference that “no part of Britain will be off limits” when building a third large-scale reactor in the UK.
The Aberdeenshire West and Kincardine MP vowed to change the law to override the SNP’s ban on new nuclear.
He told the conference in Birmingham: “We will need a third large-scale reactor. We will build that reactor, and no part of Britain will be off limits, including Scotland.
“We will legislate to get it done. No more Mr Nice Guy. No more devolve and forget.
“Energy is a reserved power of the sovereign Parliament of our United Kingdom, and I am fed up with the SNP playing games with devolved planning policy to block our nuclear renewal.
“So we will legislate to ensure new nuclear can and will be built in Scotland, and if the Nationalists want to stop us from delivering thousands of jobs, economic growth, and energy security for Britain, I’ve one thing to say: bring it on.”
The UK government wants to build small nuclear reactors in Scotland. But the SNP, which holds control over planning, has so far blocked it.
Torness in East Lothian, Hunterston in Ayrshire, and Dounreay in Caithness have all been cited as potential sites.
But the prospect of a new large nuclear reactor north of the Border has not been seriously considered before.
Hinkley C in Suffolk and Sizewell C in Somerset are two large nuclear power stations which are being built in the UK.
Torness is Scotland’s last remaining active nuclear power plant. The facility is scheduled to close by 2030.
Hunterston A in North Ayrshire shut down in 1990, while Hunterston B shut down in 2022.
Mr Bowie said: “We once led the world in nuclear power, and we can do so again, ensuring that Britain will always have reliable, plentiful electricity. Cheap energy drove the industrial revolution. Abundant nuclear power will drive Britain’s renewal.
“We will supercharge the rollout of new nuclear in Britain. We will deliver at pace and go further. Where there’s a block, we will break it down. Where there’s red tape in the way we will cut it full steam ahead.
“We’ll invest in small modular, advanced modular reactors and open this country to the newest and most exciting technology in the world.
“But to ensure stability and reliability, we need further large-scale reactors, a gigawatt-scale reactor, standing along Hinkley and Sizewell.
“Now, when I was nuclear minister, I was delighted and proud to be able to announce existing new developments that would create jobs and boost Britain’s energy security across the country, from Wales to the southwest, Hartlepool to East Anglia………………………………….. https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/scotland-could-get-large-nuclear-reactor-under-tories-says-shadow-energy-secretary-9266799
The Decommissioning Waste Challenge
The IAEA, the European Commission and the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency are
working with the World Nuclear Association to consolidate the information
gathered from different initiatives on assessing waste into a single
publication, Status and Trends in Spent Fuel and Radioactive Waste
Management.
The publication is an attempt to systematically summarise the
global status and trends of programmes and inventories for spent fuel and
radioactive waste management. Previous reports were published in January
2018 (covering the situation to the end of 2013) and 2022 (covering the
situation to the end of 2016).
The third edition (up to the end of 2019) is
now available in pre-print. The basic information in this publication has
been collected through submissions to the Spent Fuel and Radioactive Waste
Information System (SRIS), complemented with openly available Joint
Convention National Reports. Approximately 90% of states with operating
nuclear power plants submitted their data to SRIS or their Joint Convention
National Reports, representing almost 92% of all nuclear power reactors.
Data are not available for every country, but available data provide a
clear representation of the radioactive waste that exists and an indication
of the challenges that will arise in the future as facilities still in
operation, or planned, come to the end of their useful lives.
NS Energy 5th Oct 2026, https://www.nsenergybusiness.com/analysis/the-decommissioning-waste-challenge/
UK’s Committee on Radioactive Waste Managemen (CoRWM) visit to Sweden’s radioactive waste facilities
Members of CoRWM recently visited the Forsmark and Clab sites in Sweden.From:Committee on Radioactive Waste Management
5 October 2026
CoRWM members had been hoping to visit Sweden’s radioactive waste
facilities for some time, and our visit in September was well worth the
wait. Sweden is frequently discussed internationally as one of the
countries that has made significant progress towards the geological
disposal of both spent nuclear fuel, and low and intermediate level
operational wastes.
We wanted to understand more about how that progress
had been achieved, and particularly what we might learn from Sweden’s
experience of siting and public engagement. Our visit began at the Forsmark
nuclear site, in the municipality of Östhammar, where the repository for
short-lived radioactive wastes, SFR, has been operational since 1988. In
2009 the Forsmark site was also selected to house Sweden’s deep
geological spent fuel repository.
Construction has been underway since
2025. Our SKB hosts gave us an illustrated account of the history of the
Swedish siting process, drawing attention to what had gone well, as well as
the mistakes made in the early years. We were told that by the late 1980s
it had been established that there was suitable rock everywhere, but the
industry had yet to learn that however suitable the geology, “you can’t
just turn up with a digger”.
The SKB response to initial angry protests
was to embark on a major project of public engagement that began with the
posing of a basic question at a national level. They simply asked whether
people would be interested to find out how a repository for spent nuclear
fuel could affect their municipality? Eight municipalities from across the
country expressed an interest. What followed was much more than a search
for a willing community or a suitable geology. SKB invested heavily in
producing detailed socio-economic surveys of each of the candidate
municipalities, to see if they could identify mutual interests between
industry and residents.
CoRWM 5th Oct 2026, https://www.gov.uk/government/news/corwm-visit-to-swedens-radioactive-waste-facilities
Russia’s nuclear plants are ageing. Who will pay to dismantle them?
by around 2037, Rosatom’s decommissioning and remediation obligations could exceed its net profit. Moreover, the longer decommissioning is delayed, the greater the associated financial, technical and safety risks are likely to become.
Moscow faces a huge decommissioning bill at home even as it expands its nuclear industry abroad.
By Arshak Makichyan, . 4 Oct 2026, https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2026/10/4/russias-nuclear-plants-are-ageing-who-will-pay-to-dismantle-them
The world often discusses the nuclear threat posed by Russia, but far less attention is paid to the nuclear risks within Russia itself, particularly those posed by ageing nuclear power plants, some of whose reactors are already more than 50 years old.
At the same time, Russia is building nuclear power plants around the world, from Turkiye to Bangladesh, while promoting nuclear energy as a “sustainable” alternative to fossil fuels. Russian President Vladimir Putin regularly meets with foreign leaders to discuss existing and potential nuclear projects. Yet one question remains largely overlooked: what happens to these nuclear facilities when they reach the end of their operational lives?
During the Soviet period, nuclear power plants were built across the USSR, including in Lithuania. As part of Lithuania’s accession to the European Union, the country was required to shut down the two Soviet-built reactors at the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant. The first reactor was closed in 2004 and the second in 2009. The decommissioning process has proved both extraordinarily expensive and time-consuming. By 2020, the estimated cost had reached 3.3 billion euros ($3.7bn), with only 49 percent of the planned work completed. The process, initially scheduled for completion in 2038, is now expected to continue until 2049.
Russia itself does not seem to be paying much attention to this question. Rosenergoatom plans to decommission 35 reactors. Yet the company’s own estimates point to a funding shortfall of approximately 18.7 billion euros, while the total estimated cost of decommissioning is about 21 billion euros. And these are Rosenergoatom’s own estimates. Actual decommissioning costs are usually significantly higher than initially projected. For example, the cost of decommissioning the former nuclear power plant in Lubmin, Germany, was initially estimated at 1 billion euros but is now estimated at 10 billion euros.
For the time being, however, Russia appears to be postponing the most costly stages of decommissioning. Rather than fully dismantling reactors soon after shutdown, it often places them in long-term “safe” storage, transferring much of the financial and technical burden into the future. Deferred dismantling does not solve the problem, but merely postpones the costly stages of decommissioning, which is particularly concerning given Russia’s existing funding gap.
Environmental NGO Bellona Foundation reports, based on Rosatom’s own projections, that by around 2037, Rosatom’s decommissioning and remediation obligations could exceed its net profit. Moreover, the longer decommissioning is delayed, the greater the associated financial, technical and safety risks are likely to become.
Another major issue is the legacy of radioactive waste. Russia has inherited approximately 774,000 cubic metres of radioactive waste from the Soviet Union. The upcoming decommissioning of 36 reactor units at eight nuclear power plants is expected to generate an additional 800,000 cubic metres of radioactive waste.
Russia already has experience of what happens when industries leave major environmental liabilities behind. In the Kemerovo region, where around half of Russia’s coal is produced, mountains of waste from coal mining scar the landscape. Some of this waste burns, polluting nearby communities. When coal companies go bankrupt, the cost of dealing with what they leave behind can fall to the state and local communities.
But nuclear waste and decommissioned reactors cannot simply be abandoned if the money runs out. The question therefore becomes even more important as Russia’s economic situation deteriorates: what will happen to all these megaprojects if the money needed to maintain, decommission and eventually dismantle them is no longer available?
The countries where Russia is building its numerous nuclear power plants should therefore think about what happens if these projects cannot be maintained or later decommissioned as planned. They need a Plan B in case something goes wrong in Russia. And, as history has repeatedly shown, Russia’s political situation can change unpredictably.
The political consequences of nuclear mismanagement can also be significant. The Chornobyl disaster demonstrated how the Soviet authorities’ attempts to suppress information and downplay the scale of the accident fuelled public distrust and disillusionment, contributing to growing social and political unrest in the late Soviet period. Today, Russia’s continued neglect of nuclear waste and repeated postponement of nuclear plant decommissioning could similarly create conditions for both another environmental catastrophe and growing social unrest, particularly if authorities once again respond to such a crisis with silence or attempts to conceal its scale.
These risks are compounded by Russia’s deteriorating economic situation. In an effort to sustain the war economy, the Russian government has also drastically weakened environmental regulations. National defence is now by far the largest single item in Russia’s federal budget, while environmental protection accounts for only a small fraction of government spending.
Environmental disasters have repeatedly demonstrated that the Russian regime is unwilling to prioritise long-term environmental safety. Russia continues to operate an ageing shadow fleet to transport oil, and the environmental risks associated with that fleet were highlighted by the 2024 Black Sea oil spill, when two ageing Russian tankers released thousands of tonnes of fuel oil into the sea. The spill was described as the Black Sea region’s worst environmental disaster in decades. This broader pattern of environmental negligence raises questions about how the country will manage its ageing nuclear infrastructure and the growing problem of nuclear waste.
These issues should therefore be raised at every international forum where Russia promotes its nuclear industry, such as COPs, where encountering Russian nuclear lobbyists is a common experience. Russia is seeking to secure its place in the future of energy while continuing to use energy as a tool for exerting political influence and power around the world.
All of these issues are particularly concerning because Russia continues to promote its nuclear industry internationally, while independent voices capable of scrutinising its environmental impacts and safety record are increasingly silenced in Russia. As documented in a recent report by the Environmental Crisis Group, repression and the departure of environmental experts and activists have severely weakened Russia’s environmental movement.
Bellona and Greenpeace have been declared “undesirable” organisations in Russia, while EcoDefence, which organised campaigns around environmental and nuclear issues, has been designated a “foreign agent”, and its members have faced criminal prosecution.
Environmental organisations outside Russia continue to draw attention to these risks. EcoDefence in exile, alongside other German activists, campaigns against continued European cooperation with the Russian nuclear industry, which has largely escaped the sanctions imposed on other parts of Russia’s energy sector. According to Vladimir Slivyak, co-chair of EcoDefence, this continued dependence on Russian nuclear technology and services could itself create vulnerabilities that Russia could potentially exploit for sabotage or political pressure.
The result is a shrinking capacity to independently monitor and expose environmental risks inside Russia. This creates a dangerous information gap: a nuclear accident could happen, its scale could be concealed or downplayed by the authorities, and the public could learn the full extent of the disaster only years or even decades later. This is what happened after the 1957 Mayak disaster, when the Soviet authorities concealed the accident and its consequences and did not publicly acknowledge the disaster until 1989, more than three decades later, while thousands of people were left to suffer the long-term consequences of radioactive contamination.
On the Edge of the Abyss: Putin’s Nuclear Warning, Trump’s Iran Brinkmanship and Europe’s Revolt
Joe Lauria , Consortium News, October 4, 2026
This week:
1. Putin’s Warning;
2. New US Warship to Iran;
3. The Crisis of Europe: French Students Burn Their Schools
PLUS: America’s Barbaric Death Penalty.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned the world could face nuclear catastrophe if the West attacks the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. Putin told the Valdai Club outside Moscow Thursday humanity has entered a “completely new and unprecedented reality.”
The historical changes underway aren’t fully understood, he said. But over the long run, the erosion of corrosive Western hegemony should create a more stable, democratic, and multipolar world order — but the transition is fraught with danger.
Putin said exceptional, narrow Western interests fuels the peril. The West forced Russia into a defensive war against Ukraine, its tool against Moscow. The war has escalated into NATO-backed attacks on Russian soil.
Putin warned that a direct attack on Kaliningrad, which is separated from mainland Russia by a land corridor, would immediately put “all the weapons” at Russia’s disposal.
“If it comes to direct attack on the Russian Federation, in this case, we mean Kaliningrad, maybe some other territories as well, of course, naturally, immediately, what will be on the agenda is the use by the Russian Federation of all weapons that are at the disposal of our country. It is unavoidable.”
Putin pointed to a Russian foreign ministry statement on Kaliningrad does not mention nuclear weapons. “It mentions, as I have just said, the use of all means and all forces at the disposal of our country and we’ll decide what it is,” Putin said.
“This escalation is based on arrogance and self conceit, and this is what pushes us to the edge of the abyss,” he said.
Putin also knows that the West will twist this warning into a threat. “What’s a different way to stand up to an aggressor? We’re not threatening anyone, but we’re just saying that we don’t have many tools of self defense.”
Iranian Quicksand
Meanwhile, Trump keeps making maniacal threats to destroy Iran, this time, if Teheran had anything to do with the attempt to hijack the Dubai-Tel Aviv jet. He talks a big game on Iran because he’s losing the big war with Iran with mid-terms a month away.
He’s in danger of also losing both Houses and of being impeached, if not convicted. He’s in danger of being humiliated before the whole world as a Big ‘L’ Loser.
So he sticks his chest out, Duce style, and proclaims: “Maybe I will, maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll kill you all or maybe I won’t. Maybe I’ll decide to spare you.” A rank and unstable amateur coming to terms with ultimate power.
So he sends another aircraft carrier to Iran to keep up the illusion the U.S. has the upper hand in the conflict. That Trump can dictate to Iran. The Nov. 3 election will tell how many Americans are gullible enough to believe that.
Aux Barricades!
They are not so gullible in France, which has more or less kept the revolutionary spirit alive since 1789,………………………………………………………….https://consortiumnews.com/2026/10/03/watch-twtw-edge-of-the-abyss/
The Day America Deleted a Word
A Pen, a Paper, and the End of “AI”
SinoDataCrit ( Kakajusaiyou ）, Oct 04, 2026
On September 29, 2026, President Trump signed an executive order requiring every federal department and agency to replace the term “Artificial Intelligence” (AI) with “Super Intelligence” (SI) in official correspondence, public communications, websites, reports, and all non-statutory documents.
The order didn’t just promote a new term. It buried the old one. The White House’s own fact sheet states that agencies should “no longer acknowledge the terms ‘Artificial Intelligence’ or ‘AI.’“ Read that again. Not “phase out.” Not “update.” No longer acknowledge.
The same day, the tech titans were summoned to the White House — Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jensen Huang, OpenAI president Greg Brockman, Palantir CEO Alex Karp. They signed the “White House Accord on Super Intelligence,” a voluntary safety pledge with no legal force, which Trump described as working “like a constitution.” Zuckerberg began using “Super Intelligence” in product announcements within 24 hours. The field that was born at Dartmouth College in 1956 had been renamed by executive fiat in 2026 — seventy years, almost to the season, after John McCarthy coined the term his own government now refuses to say.
The official rationale? A White House fact sheet titled “President Donald J. Trump Inaugurates The Era of Super Intelligence” argues that “artificial” implies merely “imitating or automating human intelligence,” while Super Intelligence “conveys the true capabilities” of the technology. Trump himself was blunter: the word “artificial” makes people think of fake.
There was, in fairness, a domestic political reason. A Quinnipiac poll in March 2026 found that 55% of American adults believe AI does more harm than good — up 11 percentage points in a single year. “Artificial intelligence” had become a toxic brand. Rebranding it “Super Intelligence” is, on one level, the world’s most expensive PR relaunch.
But if you think this is just marketing, you’re missing the oldest trick in the innovation empire. And it took a viral post on Chinese Q&A platform Zhihu — 4,700+ upvotes and climbing — to name the mechanism with perfect clarity. This article brings that analysis to an English audience, because it deserves one.
The Category Game: How “0-to-1” Is Manufactured
Start with a question that circulates endlessly in Western commentary: why do Chinese companies never seem to do “0-to-1” innovation?
Here’s the uncomfortable answer: “0-to-1” is not a fact. It’s a category decision — and categories can be gerrymandered.
The Zhihu analysis offers a thought experiment. Suppose a Chinese company invents the electric vehicle. A skeptic says: “That’s not 0-to-1. It’s a derivative of the car — a 1-to-100 improvement. Thank Karl Benz.” Fine — so what if the Chinese had invented the car itself? The skeptic zooms out: “That’s not 0-to-1 either. It’s a refinement of the wheel — a category humans have had for 4,000 years. Thank the ancients.”
See the mechanism? Expand the category far enough, and every invention becomes an increment. Whoever controls the category — whoever gets to decide whether “EV” is a new thing or a subset of “car” — controls whether your work counts as creation or derivation.
Now the flip side. How does anyone ever get credit for a 0-to-1? Not by building it. By naming it. A brand-new word — preferably one with a unique sound and no derivation from existing vocabulary — creates a brand-new category. And a new category has no ancestors. It pops into existence with its inventor standing at its head.
A new word doesn’t describe a new thing. It legislates a new thing into the ledger of human achievement.
Eponyms Are Property Deeds
Look at how English names its own inventions versus everyone else’s.
For its own breakthroughs, English mints eponyms — words with a founder’s name stamped on them like a trademark. Diesel, after Rudolf Diesel. Braille, after Louis Braille. The ballpoint pen that half the world calls a “biro,” after László Bíró. Every one of these is a property deed: the technology and the credit travel together, permanently, in a single syllable.
For everyone else’s breakthroughs, English does something different: it assimilates them into existing vocabulary as derivatives. Paper became “paper” — a word whose root is papyrus, the Egyptian writing reed. Gunpowder became “gunpowder” — a tidy English compound. China invented both; the English words quietly suggest both were variations on something the West already had.
The etymology does the theft silently. To an English speaker, papyrus is “an early, imperfect paper.” To a Chinese speaker, the relationship inverts: papyrus is just a reed that failed to become paper. Same history. Opposite property registry.
This is not a conspiracy. It’s a linguistic reflex — but it has the effect of a colonial land grab. The Zhihu author’s sharp observation: English borrows raw phonetics mainly from “prestige” languages it admires (French, Latin, Greek), or for “exotic, often derogatory” concepts (coolie, ramen). For ideas from civilizations it competes with, it prefers translation — because translation buries the original’s ownership inside a familiar word……………………………………………………………………………………………………..
The Modern Playbook: Metaverse, Sixth-Gen Fighters, DeepSeek
This machinery is not historical. It’s running right now, and you’ve watched it operate three times in recent years.
Metaverse. A word coined in a 1992 science fiction novel, adopted as a company name in 2021. Technologically, “the metaverse” contained nothing that virtual worlds hadn’t contained for two decades — no new architecture, no new interaction paradigm. But it had a minted word, a category nobody had to share with the past. ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Decoding SI: The Hedge Fund of Categories
Now the executive order makes complete sense.
The United States coined “artificial intelligence” in 1956. Its White House proudly asserts — correctly — that America is “the birthplace” of the field and has led it for “over 70 years.” That name, and that founding, is one of America’s greatest narrative assets: the entire global industry carries American words in its name.
But here’s the problem the White House faces in 2026: Chinese models have reached genuine parity — benchmark-for-benchmark, dollar-for-dollar the efficiency argument even favors China. If the race stays called “AI,” then the most likely outcome is that the “birthplace” gets out-innovated in its own category, on its own vocabulary. The founding nation would become the incumbent that lost its own field.
So instead of defending the old category, America redrew the map. Rename the category “Super Intelligence,” decree that the old name shall not be acknowledged — and instantly, every Chinese achievement in “AI” becomes progress in a field that no longer officially exists. Chinese labs will keep doing brilliant work in the old category: that’s a 1-to-100 story now, and America has already stamped itself at the “0” of the new one. Your AI is impressive; our SI is a different thing. You can never beat us at SI, because we invented the word, and the word is the race.
It’s the category game at national scale: when you can’t win the category, delete the category.
Notice the asymmetry of costs. DeepSeek’s efficiency breakthrough took years of engineering under sanctions. Huawei’s chip roadmap took seven years of siege economics. The SI rename took one pen. In narrative warfare, renaming is the cheapest weapon with the longest reach — it costs nothing and repositions everything.
And notice what the order does domestically, too. The same fact sheet announces $5 billion for a “Genesis Mission” and a “National Super Intelligence Policy Framework.” The unpopular, frightening “AI” — the one 55% of Americans distrust — quietly becomes somebody else’s legacy technology. The fear is inherited with the old word. The promise is minted with the new one.
The Counter-Move: China Is Learning to Mint Words
Here’s what makes this moment genuinely interesting, and why I’ve spent days on this question: China’s best answer isn’t to complain about the renaming. It’s to start minting categories of its own……………………………………………………………………………………………………… https://sinodatacrit.substack.com/p/the-day-america-deleted-a-word?publication_id=7110991&post_id=218751184&isFreemail=true&r=3alev&triedRedirect=true&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
‘NAZA’ Exposes Gaza’s Killing Machine—and the People Who Want It Hidden
October 5, 2026, Joshua Scheer, https://scheerpost.com/2026/10/05/naza-exposes-gazas-killing-machine-and-the-people-who-want-it-hidden/
Israel’s leaders have threatened the filmmakers. The documentary’s deeper challenge is to a society that treats technical expertise as an escape from moral responsibility.
A government confident in its account of a war should be able to withstand a documentary. Benjamin Netanyahu’s response to NAZA has been to threaten the citizenship of people who expose what Israeli soldiers say happened in Gaza.
According to Reuters, Netanyahu pledged to pursue legislation allowing citizenship revocation for those who defame Israeli soldiers, alongside sharply increased financial penalties. Directed by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor, NAZA draws on anonymous military and intelligence testimony alleging that civilian deaths were routinely incorporated into targeting decisions. Netanyahu and the military reject those allegations.
The threat raises an obvious question: If the testimony is false, why reach for the power to strip people of their citizenship?
The film’s significance extends beyond Netanyahu. In his October 2 essay for +972 Magazine, Israeli academic Sebastian Ben Daniel argues that NAZA challenges the comforting assumption that responsibility for Gaza’s destruction belongs exclusively to Israel’s openly extremist politicians and settlers.
His focus is on the prestigious institutions that make military violence possible: intelligence units, the Air Force and the professional culture connecting military service to Israel’s technology industry. The people operating that machinery can consider themselves educated, reasonable and politically opposed to the far right while participating in its devastating consequences.
That is a challenge Americans should recognize. We, too, have learned to discuss war through the reassuring vocabulary of expertise: intelligence assessments, precision weapons, operational requirements. The language sounds clean because it removes the people underneath the bombs.
NAZA confronts liberal Israel with an accusation it cannot comfortably assign to Netanyahu and the far right: The destruction of Gaza depends on prestigious institutions staffed by educated, secular professionals who consider themselves the extremists’ opposite. Political moderation does not erase responsibility, and expressions of anguish cannot redeem participation in mass killing. Ben Daniel also describes liberal media commentators attacking a film they have not watched and questioning anonymous testimony—the same kind of sourcing routinely accepted when it serves the military’s narrative. That selective skepticism protects the institutions under scrutiny while shifting attention away from the Palestinians whose lives those institutions have destroyed.
A targeting system does not bury a child. People authorize an attack, carry it out and defend its consequences. Dividing those actions among departments cannot make responsibility disappear.
For some viewers, the testimony has brought historical questions of obedience and accountability into immediate focus. Reporting for Vulture, Rachel Corbett quoted attendee Roland Lewis: “I couldn’t stop thinking about the Nuremberg trials.”
That comparison is an audience member’s reaction, not a judicial finding. Its force lies in the question it raises: How much moral shelter can anyone claim from a chain of command?
Palestinians should not have to wait for Israeli testimony to make their suffering credible. Their reporting, their photographs and their accounts of families destroyed deserve attention on their own terms.
What NAZA can do is confront another audience with testimony from inside the institutions whose assurances it has accepted. The obligation that follows belongs to viewers, journalists and governments—including Washington, whose support for Israel demands scrutiny alongside the conduct of the Israeli military.
Watching a documentary is a beginning. Accountability requires following the chain of responsibility beyond the screen.
This commentary draws on Sebastian Ben Daniel’s essay in +972 Magazine, Rachel Corbett’s reporting in Vulture and Reuters’ coverage of threats against the filmmakers. Readers can read them here Vulture, MS NOW and +972 Magazine.
Big Reactors in Saskatchewan: What could go wrong?
The implication of these experiences and proposals is that a new 1,000-MW reactor could carry a price tag of $15 to $26 billion. That would put the total cost for a two-reactor project, like Saskatchewan is proposing, in the $30-$50 billion range. Estimates of the costs of electricity needed to cover the capital costs of new nuclear plants, if they’re financed through electricity rates, range from the mid-20¢ to more than 40¢ per kilowatt-hour.
October 3, 2026, By Mark Winfield and Susan O’Donnell, https://energi.media/opinion/big-reactors-saskatchewan-what-could-go-wrong/
The Saskatchewan government’s recent announcement of its intention to build two large nuclear reactors has again raised questions of the role of large nuclear energy projects in relatively small provincial economies.
The last new full-scale nuclear reactor project in Canada, the Darlington nuclear power plant east of Toronto, was completed more than 30 years ago. The enormous cost overruns on that project contributed significantly to the effective bankruptcy of the province’s utility, Ontario Hydro, leading to its eventual break-up.
As the memories of these previous experiences with large nuclear construction projects have faded, new projects are now being proposed. These projects, and experiences with the handful of new-build nuclear projects initiated in Europe and the United States in the last two decades, give us some indication of the large reactor options, and their potential costs.
New Brunswick’s experience with its long- troubled Point Lepreau reactor, should give Saskatchewan further cause for reflection on the wisdom of such a pathway. The Lepreau plant is Canada’s lone experience with a large nuclear power plant in a relatively small provincial electricity system and economy, New Brunswick Power is still carrying a C$3.6 billion nuclear debt from the reactor’s original 1975-1983 construction, and the costs of a 2008-2012 refurbishment that was a billion dollars over budget. Since the refurbishment, the poor performance of the Lepreau reactor has been the primary reason New Brunswick Power loses money almost every year.
In Ontario and Alberta, two reactor designs, the CANDU MONARK and the Westinghouse Electric AP1000, have been considered for the expansion of the Bruce Nuclear power plant on Lake Huron, a proposed 10,000-MW Ontario Power Generation plant at Wesleyville on Lake Ontario, and the proposed 4,800-MW Peace River Nuclear Project in Alberta.
The 1,000-MW CANDU MONARK is intended as a successor to the existing CANDU reactors in Ontario and New Brunswick. Although it’s being aggressively promoted to potential international customers, the MONARK design remains incomplete. The situation has already led the Alberta project’s proponents to switch their proposal to favour the AP1000 design by Westinghouse Electric.
Cost information is available on the AP1000 reactor, as two units were completed in 2024 at the Vogtle nuclear power plant in Georgia. The total estimated cost of those two 1,100-MW reactors was US$36 billion, or about $26 billion per reactor in 2026 Canadian dollars. The plant has been described as “the most expensive power plant ever built on Earth.” When it went into service, Vogtle resulted in a nearly 24% increase in Georgia Power’s electricity rates, the largest jump in the utility’s history.
AtkinsRéalis (formerly SNC Lavalin) is currently pitching the CANDU MONARK to Poland, with a reported estimated cost of $45 to $50 billion for a three-reactor plant, or about $15 billion per unit.
The implication of these experiences and proposals is that a new 1,000-MW reactor could carry a price tag of $15 to $26 billion. That would put the total cost for a two-reactor project, like Saskatchewan is proposing, in the $30-$50 billion range. Estimates of the costs of electricity needed to cover the capital costs of new nuclear plants, if they’re financed through electricity rates, range from the mid-20¢ to more than 40¢ per kilowatt-hour.
In the case of New Brunswick, another smaller province considering a large new reactor project, it has been estimated that the project would nearly double to even triple current consumer electricity costs. Such increases would undermine energy affordability, economic competitiveness, and any plans for decarbonization through electrification.
A province could also try to finance the costs through its general tax base. That is the approach that Ontario been taking, at an estimated cost to the provincial treasury of $7 to $8.5 billion per year. Electricity subsidies now account for more than half of Ontario’s deficit, exceeding annual capital expenditures on education and health care by wide margins.
In the case of New Brunswick, the annual costs of that approach, even spread over the decade or more of construction, could exceed the province’s current, record $1.39 billion deficit, and match or exceed its entire annual capital spending plans in all other areas. Although the Saskatchewan economy is almost double the size of New Brunswick, the scale fiscal impacts of trying to finance two reactors out of general provincial tax revenues would be comparable.
Saskatchewan, for its part, has had another idea – asking the federal government to pay three-quarters of the cost of the province’s first nuclear reactor, a contribution of between $11 to $20 billion from federal taxpayers.
In addition to the financial risks a single large reactor in a relatively small electricity system would repeat and magnify a key problem associated with the original Point Lepreau project in New Brunswick —putting very higher portion of a province’s electricity supply eggs in a single, very expensive and high-risk basket.
All of this should suggest a high degree of caution among provinces considering adding large nuclear components for their electricity systems, and a need to think about other ways of decarbonizing their electricity systems while ensuring their affordability and sustainability.
Mark Winfield is a professor at the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change at York University in Toronto, and co-chair of the faculty’s Sustainable Energy Initiative. Susan O’Donnell is adjunct research professor and lead researcher on the CEDAR project in Sustainability and Environmental Studies at St. Thomas University.
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