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Officials blast handling of nuclear secrets case

Officials blast handling of nuclear secrets case
swisinfo.ch January 22, 2009
Parliament has strongly criticised the government for ordering documents destroyed in a case of Swiss engineers suspected of involvement in a nuclear smuggling ring.A delegation looking into the matter said that the reasons the government gave for doing so were not convincing and that briefings given to members of parliament were not sufficient. Destroying the documents had also compromised an investigation.Urs and Marco Tinner, along with their father, were arrested starting in 2004 on suspicion of aiding Libya’s atomic ambitions through a trafficking ring run by Abdul Qadeer Khan, the founder of Pakistan’s nuclear programme.In November 2007, the cabinet ordered the case documents destroyed, saying it was in the interests of international security. The documents reportedly included designs for nuclear warheads. …………..
………….It is widely believed the Tinners worked as undercover agents for the United States intelligence service and that Washington asked Bern to destroy the documents.

A committee found that Switzerland’s government was wrong to destroy documents in a nuclear smuggling case. – swissinfo

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January 23, 2009 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties | Leave a comment

Feds: Audit of SC nuclear complex whitewashed

Feds: Audit of SC nuclear complex whitewashed Associated Press By BEN EVANS 21 Jan 09 WASHINGTON – A company managing South Carolina’s Savannah River Site nuclear complex altered findings in a 2007 financial audit to justify expenses to the government, federal investigators said in a report released Wednesday.

Feds: Audit of SC nuclear complex whitewashed – MSNBC Wire Services- msnbc.com

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January 23, 2009 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties | Leave a comment

Safety critical in nuclear power stations

Safety critical in nuclear power stations

‘New Delhi THE HINDU (PTI) Environment safety issues are attracting more attention at national and international level due to adverse impact on the ecological balance, said Management Consultant, SCOPE, M K Suri.: As India makes forays into nuclear power, the issue of safety will become critical for averting a mishap, head of a leading government-owned firm said on Thursday.”There is a need to take adequate safety measures to avoid any disaster as the country is going for nuclear power,” National Projects Construction Corporation Chairman and Managing Director Arbind Kumar said…………………………Environment safety issues are attracting more attention at national and international level due to adverse impact on the ecological balance, said Management Consultant, SCOPE, M K Suri.

The Hindu News Update Service

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January 23, 2009 Posted by | safety | Leave a comment

: Nuclear Fallout

Nuclear fallout Fort Worth Weekly 23 Jan 09 Luminant announced plans to expand Comanche Peak at an estimated cost of $20.4 billion. There is, however, a caveat to the utility’s grand plan: The Mitsubishi-designed reactors it has ordered have not been approved by the NRC for use in this country and have not been tested under real-world conditions anywhere, a fact that makes Harper even more nervous.“What?” she asked. “Are they going to test them on us?”………………Lon Burnam will be the lead plaintiff in a lawsuit being planned by a coalition of public interest groups…………………………..Environmentalists, many of them veterans of the first battle of Comanche Peak, will have evidence of actual, rather than just theoretical, health effects in the area around the plant: Cancer rates in Hood County, Somervell’s nearest downwind neighbor, have increased significantly since the plant came on line. And other issues will be in play that weren’t germane last time around — like water. In a drought-damaged area of Texas with predictions of more drought to come, the plant’s voracious thirst for water is high on the list of objections.

“We can live without a lot of things,” Harper said. “But we can’t live without water.” ………………………………….

Luminant’s environmental impact documents show that each of the two existing reactors uses a million gallons of water every minute for the circulating water system that provides cooling. The new, higher- capacity ones will need 1.2 million gallons of coolant water per minute. In order to meet such a huge demand, Luminant will draw 103,717 acre feet per year from Lake Granbury. (An acre foot is the volume of water that would cover one acre to a depth of one foot.) That would be about three-fourths of Lake Granbury’s total storage capacity of 136,823 acre feet, according to the Brazos River Authority.

The water needs of Lake Granbury’s other customers pale beside that of the plant — 2 billion gallons per year in 2006, according to the river authority, versus 33 billion to be used by the expanded plant, drawn from both Squaw Creek and Granbury.

FWWeekly: Feature: Nuclear Fallout

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January 23, 2009 Posted by | politics | Leave a comment