nuclear-news

AREVA to Supply Nuclear Fuel for a Jordanian Research Reactor -And Saudi expansion moves with EDF

……“Following the signature in 2011 of contracts for supplying DAEWOO with low enriched uranium and for delivering prototype fuels to the KAERI/DAEWOO consortium, this success confirms the quality of the collaboration between AREVA and its Korean partners in the sector of nuclear fuel for research reactors.”…. 1st article

……”Oursel told Al Arabiya that the firm is already training Saudi engineers to prepare them for nuclear energy projects, which he said are expected to create “thousands of jobs”.

Areva and EDF have already set up an office in Riyadh to lay the groundwork for a possible bid for tender, and have established links with local Saudi companies and engineers. That followed a 2011 agreement between France and Saudi Arabia that offered the Saudis atomic know-how and training for local staff.

“Thanks to the subsidiary we have created in Riyadh with EDF, we are contacting all the Saudi suppliers which can play a role in this very important program,” said Oursel.”……. 2nd article

…..Following the lessons learned from Fukushima, the U.S. nuclear industry developed an approach to reinforce the safety measures at nuclear power plants, which includes the development of the regional response centers…….. 3rd article

(Please note the peak after the financial crash of 2008.. straight after the crash 200 billion Euros, to begin with, went into the only “safe” financial bet.. nuclear, the “green” saviour   .. Arclight2011)

AREVA to Supply Nuclear Fuel for a Jordanian Research Reactor

AREVA has just signed a contract with the Korean KAERI/DAEWOO consortium to supply fuel elements for the JRTR (Jordan Research and Training Reactor) currently being built in Jordan –
The agreement concerns the supply of nuclear fuel for the first reactor core and for a reload batch. Delivery of the fuel elements is scheduled for the beginning of 2015.

Construction of the JRTR research reactor by the KAERI/DAEWOO consortium is an essential step for Jordan in acquiring the capabilities required for nuclear R&D and producing nuclear power. AREVA (areva.com) is proud to be a part of this project together with the Korean consortium, who is one of the research reactor suppliers, and stands ready to offer its experience regarding construction of a power reactor in Jordan, for which the selection of a supplier is now in progress.

Benoît Bazire, Senior Vice President of the Propulsion and Research Reactors BU, stated:

“Following the signature in 2011 of contracts for supplying DAEWOO with low enriched uranium and for delivering prototype fuels to the KAERI/DAEWOO consortium, this success confirms the quality of the collaboration between AREVA and its Korean partners in the sector of nuclear fuel for research reactors.”

The thermal power of the JRTR will be 5 MW, which can be extended to 10 MW in the future. It will be used for neutron beam research, neutron irradiation services such as medical radioisotope production, and training of Jordanian engineers and scientists.

AREVA Press Office:
Julien Duperray / Katherine Berezowskyj / Jérôme Rosso / Alexandre Thébault

http://www.przoom.com/news/127532/AREVA-to-Supply-Nuclear-Fuel-for-a-Jordanian-Research-Reactor/

French aim to subcontract Saudi firms in hope of nuclear win

April 18, 2013 Posted by arclight2011 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Noam Chomsky: How Close the World Is to Nuclear War!

…….The pressure was so strong that the United States accepted it in principle and claims to be committed to it, but Hillary Clinton said the time’s “not ripe for establishing the zone.” And the administration just endorsed Israel’s position, essentially saying, “Yes, but only after a comprehensive peace agreement in the region,” which the US and Israel can delay indefinitely.

So, that’s basically saying, “it’s fine, but it’s never going to happen.” And this is barely ever reported, so nobody knows about it. Just as almost nobody knows about Obama informing India and Israel that the resolutions don’t apply to them.

All of this just increases the risk of nuclear war…….

Noam Chomsky: How Close the World Is to Nuclear War
A powerful excerpt from the new book, “Nuclear War and Environmental Catastrophe.”
April 17, 2013 h/t http://www.alternet.org/books/noam-chomsky-how-close-world-nuclear-war

The following is an excerpt from the new book Nuclear War and Environmental Catastrophe, by Noam Chomsky and Laray Polk, which takes the form of a series of interviews with MIT Professor Noam Chomsky (Seven Stories, 2013).

Laray Polk:

What immediate tensions do you perceive that could lead to nuclear war? How close are we?

Noam Chomsky:

Actually, nuclear war has come unpleasantly close many times since 1945. There are literally dozens of occasions in which there was a significant threat of nuclear war. There was one time in 1962 when it was very close, and furthermore, it’s not just the United States. India and Pakistan have come close to nuclear war several times, and the issues remain. Both India and Pakistan are expanding their nuclear arsenals with US support. There are serious possibilities involved with Iran—not Iranian nuclear weapons, but just attacking Iran—and other things can just go wrong.

It’s a very tense system, always has been. There are plenty of times when automated systems in the United States— and in Russia,it’s probably worse—have warned of a nuclear attack which would set off an automatic response except that human intervention happened to take place in time, and sometimes in a matter of minutes. That’s playing with fire. That’s a low-probability event, but with low-probability events over a long period, the probability is not low.

There is another possibility that, I think, is not to be dismissed: nuclear terror. Like a dirty bomb in New York City, let’s say. It wouldn’t take tremendous facility to do that. I know US intelligence or people like Graham Allison at Harvard who works on this, they regard it as very likely in the coming years—and who knows what kind of reaction there would be to that. So, I think there are plenty of possibilities. I think it is getting worse. Just like the proliferation problem is getting worse. Take a couple of cases: In September 2009, the Security Council did pass a resolution, S/RES/1887, which was interpreted here as a resolution against Iran. In part it was, but it also called on all states to join the Non-Proliferation Treaty. That’s three states: India, Pakistan, and Israel. The Obama administration immediately informed India that this didn’t apply to them; it informed Israel that it doesn’t apply to them.

If India expands its nuclear capacity, Pakistan almost has to; it can’t compete with India with conventional forces. Not surprisingly, Pakistan developed its nuclear weapons with indirect US support. The Reagan administration pretended they didn’t know anything about it, which of course they did. India reacted to resolution 1887 by announcing that they could now produce nuclear weapons with the same yield as the superpowers. A year before, the United States had signed a deal with India, which broke the pre-existing regime and enabled the US to provide them with nuclear technology—though they hadn’t signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty. That’s in violation of congressional legislation going back to India’s first bomb, I suppose around 1974 or so. The United States kind of rammed it through the Nuclear Suppliers Group, and that opens a lot of doors. China reacted by sending nuclear technology to Pakistan. And though the claim is that the technology for India is for civilian use, that doesn’t mean much even if India doesn’t transfer that to nuclear weapons. It means they’re free to transfer what they would have spent on civilian use to nuclear weapons.

And then comes this announcement in 2009 that the International Atomic Energy Agency has been repeatedly trying to get Israel to open its facilities to inspection. The US along with Europe usually has been able to block it. And more significant is the effort in the international agencies to try to move toward a nuclear-weapon-free zone in the Middle East, which would be quite significant.6 It wouldn’t solve all the problems, but whatever threat Iran may be assumed to pose—and that’s a very interesting question in itself, but let’s suppose for the moment that there is a threat—it would certainly be mitigated and might be ended by a nuclear-weapon-free zone, but the US is blocking it every step of the way.

Laray Polk: Now that Iran’s reactor at Bushehr is running, the current fear is that they’re going to use the plutonium produced from the fuel cycle to make weapons. The questions raised about Iran’s possible nuclear weapons program are similar to those asked of Israel–

Continue reading →

April 18, 2013 Posted by arclight2011 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment