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Hospital workers expose to too much ionising radiation

Hospital workers say error led to higher levels of radiation exposure inforum, 4 July 13 HUDSON, Wis. – Claiming they have been exposed to excess radiation, four Hudson Hospital & Clinics technologists have filed a lawsuit against the architectural firm that designed the hospital and the construction company that built it 10 years ago.

By: Forum News Service, INFORUM HUDSON, Wis. – Claiming they have been exposed to excess radiation, four Hudson Hospital & Clinics technologists have filed a lawsuit against the architectural firm that designed the hospital and the construction company that built it 10 years ago.

The computed tomography, or CT, technicians say quarter-inch plate glass rather than lead-shielded glass was installed in the windows between the scanning and control rooms, thus exposing the workers to more than 20 times the usual radiation…. http://www.inforum.com/event/article/id/405121/group/News/

July 5, 2013 Posted by | incidents, USA | Leave a comment

Plutonium storage activities halted at Los Alamos

All work halted at U.S. plutonium facility — Concern about ‘inadvertent chain reactions’ (VIDEO) http://enenews.com/all-work-halted-at-u-s-plutonium-facility-concern-about-inadvertent-chain-reactions
Title: LANL puts nuke work on hold over safety concerns
Source: Santa Fe New Mexican
Author: Roger Snodgrass
Date: June 28, 2013

Los Alamos National Laboratory Director Charles McMillan has halted a number of activities at PF-4, the lab’s main plutonium facility, pending a thorough verification of safety procedures. All areas of PF-4 involved in processing nuclear materials and production have been placed on hold. […]

Last month, a safety review by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board identified several problems during an inspection of safeguards against inadvertent chain reactions in the handling and storage of nuclear materials. In one instance, safety board staff identified a prohibited material in a work station. In another situation, workers at the facility identified two containers in a vault that exceeded prescribed limits for the mass and class of materials they contained. During the same period, a worker was found to have been contaminated by a leak from a faulty plug during a pressure test of a glovebox, which is supposed to be a tightly sealed workspace for handling radiological materials. “Multiple infractions” were reported in one particular room from recent months, where operations were already suspended. […]
Watch KRQE’s broadcast here

July 5, 2013 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Need for better judgment in use of medical ionising radiation

We’ve known about the risks of radiation for some time, but these three studies quantify the risks. Essentially, they show that relatively low doses of ionising radiation, previously considered ‘safe’ can translate into excess cancer cases.

We believe that these findings call for a change in imaging practice. First, ionising radiation should be a consideration for the referring doctor when deciding whether a patient needs a scan (and if so, what type). Second, imaging techniques and machines that reduce ionising radiation doses should always be used. Finally, government funding models must be reviewed to ensure there are no inappropriate incentives towards a radiating scan.

For example, in Australia, if a young patient presents to a GP with low back pain and the GP orders a scan, Medicare would fund a CT scan but not a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), even though this may be a safer alternative in terms of radiation.

The body of evidence is growing. We need to start translating evidence into practice

medical-radiationThe risks of ionising radiation: three new studies and their impact on imaging in sports medicine http://www.clinicalsportsmedicine.com/the-risks-of-ionising-radiation-three-new-studies-and-their-impact-on-imaging-in-sports-medicine-jessica-orchard-and-john-orchard~ Jessica Orchard and John Orchard 2 July 13, In 2012, two major studies were published about the risks of ionising radiation from imaging. Pearce and colleagues’ study in The Lancet examined the excess risk of leukaemia and brain tumours for children and adolescents exposed to computed tomography (CT) scans. They found that children exposed to cumulative doses of 50mGy (3-5 CTs) may have triple the risk of leukaemia, and doses of 60mGy may have almost triple the risk of brain tumours.[1] In addition, the Pijpe and colleagues’ GEN-RAD-RISK paper in theBMJ[2] study showed that women such as Angelina Joliewho carry a specific mutation associated with breast cancer (BRCA1/2), and who were exposed to diagnostic radiation before the age of thirty, had almost twice the risk of breast cancer (with a dose-response pattern). This study involved lower doses, which we have previously considered fairly ‘safe’ (e.g. 4mGy from a single mammogram or shoulder X-ray).

On the basis of these studies, we wrote a blog post and started writing an editorial for theBritish Journal of Sports Medicine. While we were in the final stages of preparing the editorial,[3] a third study was published. The Matthews et al Australian data linkage study,[4] with an enormous cohort (11 million) showed that the adjusted overall cancer incidence for young people exposed to a CT scan was twenty-four percent greater than for those who were not exposed.

That is, one in every 1800 scans resulted in an excess cancer case. As the mean follow up time was only 9.5 years (relatively short in relation to the time taken to develop cancer), this suggests the true lifetime risk may be much higher. We await with interest the relative risk in older people to see whether the risks for the young also apply to those in middle age. Continue reading →

July 5, 2013 Posted by | 2 WORLD, health, radiation | Leave a comment

Paladin uranium’s losses, but its CEO does very well financially

Paladin boss earnings increase while Kayelekera cut jobs http://www.nyasatimes.com/2013/02/14/paladin-boss-gets-massive-pay-hike-after-malawi-job-cuts/ By Nyasa Times Reporter February 14, 2013 Despite uranium miner, Paladin Energy limited claiming that its Malawi operations in the northern district of Karonga at Kayelekera are operating on massive losses and that world uranium prices are low, the company’s managing director John Borshoff  elected to cash in his leave entitlementment, Nyasa Times has established.

Paladin’s annual report reveals that despite Borshoff  honouring a promise to cut his salary by 25% between November 2011 and November 2012 – a promise he extended to June 2013, the CEO was able to boost his remuneration after a review of annual leave entitlements thereby pocketing a 52% rise in earnings. The review focused on annual and long-service leave in a bid to cut Paladin’s liabilities, and Borshoff responded by cashing out 220 days of leave.The transaction approaved by the remuneration Committee and the board netted  Borshoff $1,717,000 and helped increase his remuneration to $3,464,000, from $2.26 million in 2012.

The uranium miner recently retrenched 110 staff from its Kayelekera mine in Malawi in an austerity drive which others commentators fault Boshoff for excercising his right to cash in the leave entitlement when local staff just had their calls for a 66 per cent pay rise rejected.

”Its total mockery to the Malawian workers at Kayelekera who were retrenched but have not had their benefits yet. These people are suffering. That’s a wake-up call to Malawi Government that Paladin is making profits despite plunge in prices” Karonga Business Community Chairperson Wavisanga Silungwe said in a statement made available to Nyasa Times.

“While production has gone up, the uranium price has not; hence Kayelekera continues to operate at a loss. We had warned government that this situation was unsustainable and would lead to job losses unless the uranium price improved, which it has not,” said Paladin’s (African) Ltd General Manager, international affairs, Greg Walker.

Walker said the staff reduction is in “response to economic pressures on the company caused by the continuing depressed uranium price” Borshoff’s contract with Paladin has one year left, and provides him with three months’ long-service leave for every five years of service. He is entitled to two years of double base salary when he retires or has his employment terminated.

 

July 5, 2013 Posted by | business and costs, Malawi, Uranium | Leave a comment

Radioactive water being pumped into Fukushima nuclear building

Report: Contaminated water purposely being pumped into basement of Fukushima reactor’s turbine building http://enenews.com/report-contaminated-water-purposely-being-pumped-into-basement-of-fukushima-reactors-turbine-building
Title: Water in all leaky trenches at No. 1 routed to other storage, Tepco says
Source: Kyodo, JIJI
Date: July 3, 2013

Water in all leaky trenches at No. 1 routed to other storage, Tepco says

Tokyo Electric Power Co. has finished pumping out radioactive water from all seven of its huge covered trenches at the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant […]

[…] It was found that the highly radioactive water that had been pumped into the trenches, which are triple-lined, was seeping into the ground. […]

The less-contaminated water was pumped into the basement of the reactor 6 turbine building and will eventually be transferred to above-ground containers, Tepco said late Monday. […]
See also: Japan Engineer: Fukushima contaminated water to go in giant pit — “It can easily be discharged underground” (VIDEO)

July 5, 2013 Posted by | Fukushima 2013 | Leave a comment

VIDEO: No evidence that Iran is developing a nuclear bomb

see-this.wayVideo: Iran and a nuclear bomb: Jack Straw and Melanie Phillips  http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23181459 There was no evidence that Iran has been building a nuclear bomb, said a former British foreign secretary. Jack Straw said he was not naive about Iran, but things were looking “more hopeful” with the new president-elect Hassan Rouhani.

He was debating with columnist Melanie Phillips who claimed on a recent Question Time that Iran should be “neutralised” and she was asked on the Daily Politics how that could be achieved.

The pair disagreed on whether Iran should be invited to a peace summit.

July 5, 2013 Posted by | Resources -audiovicual | Leave a comment

Scope Of French Polynesia Nuclear Fallout Revealed

Link: Pacific Islands Report  http://pidp.org/pireport/2013/July/07-03-10.htm
Pacific Islands Development Program, East-West Center
With Support From Center for Pacific Islands Studies, University of Hawai‘i

Scope Of French Polynesia Nuclear Fallout Revealed
Tests affected more area than atolls listed by military

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (Radio New Zealand International, July 2, 2013) – Declassified French documents show that the fallout from the nuclear weapons tests in French Polynesia was far greater than previously admitted by Paris.

Following the release of more than 2,000 documents about the atmospheric tests of 1966-1974, the test veterans group says the French authorities measured a plutonium concentration in Tahiti of 500 times the safety limit.

Tahiti is about 1,400 kilometers from Moruroa but under current French law it’s outside the zone where compensation claims for poor health can be lodged.

The documents, which include 114 blank pages, confirm that the fallout from the tests affected all areas and not only the 21 atolls, which the French military had listed so far.

The documents also reveal that a total of 26 navy vessels were contaminated.

The Moruroa e tatou test veterans group has called on France to let it know the full truth about the tests’ impact.

July 5, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

The exploding costs of the Savannah River MOX plant

The explosive costs of disposing of nuclear weapons WP,By ,  July 3   Costs can explode like fireworks when it comes to nuclear weapons disposal.

For example, it could cost more money and take longer to get rid of just 37.5 tons of excess, weapons-grade plutonium than it did for the Manhattan Project to produce the atomic bombs that ended World War II. Four weapons — the Trinity plutonium implosion device tested in the New Mexico desert; the Little Boy uranium bomb dropped on Hiroshima; the Fat Man plutonium bomb that hit Nagasaki, and an unused uranium bomb — were produced within six years in current dollars of some $24.1 billion, according to Stephen I. Schwartz’s book, “Atomic Audit.”

In comparison, it will cost more than $24.2 billion and take until 2036 for the United States to get rid of those 37.5 tons of plutonium, according to a Government Accountability Office estimate. It appears in the Senate Armed Services report on the fiscal 2014 defense authorization bill.

Costs have skyrocketed for the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility at the Savannah River plant in South Carolina. The facility is designed to blend the surplus plutonium with uranium oxide to make mixed oxide (MOX) that can be used as fuel in some U.S. commercial reactors. That would make the plutonium unusable for future nuclear weapons.

When the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) originated this MOX program in 2002, design and construction were to cost $1 billion.

By 2005, the estimate was $3.5 billion. When project construction began in 2007, it was three years behind schedule with a $4.8 billion price tag.

According to NNSA’s fiscal 2014 budget request, construction will hit $7.78 billion.

The annual cost to run the facility has also exploded. NNSA estimated in 2002 that it would cost $100.5 million a year to operate the MOX plant. Annual operating costs are now expected to be $543 million. The planned 2017 completion date has slipped another two years, according to a recent Congressional Research Service report.

Here’s another ticking time bomb. A federal facilities agreement in 2002 with South Carolina called for Washington to pay up to $100 million a year to the state if the plant did not produce 1 ton of MOX fuel annually, starting in 2009. That was to compensate the state for the storage of excess plutonium.

Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-S.C.), a main project booster, has used amendments to delay the fines until 2016, according to a study by the Center for Public Integrity.

The cost prompted the Obama administration to propose slowing construction while it reviews the MOX program, including assessing other ways to get rid of the plutonium……… http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/the-explosive-cost-of-disposing-of-nuclear-weapons/2013/07/03/64f896e0-e287-11e2-80eb-3145e2994a55_story.html

July 5, 2013 Posted by | business and costs, reprocessing, USA | Leave a comment

Uranium mining’s threat to Grand Canyon water

Are We Really Okay With a Uranium Mine Next Door to the Grand Canyon? This move would definitely not fall under the good neighbor policy Take Part, July 3, 2013   The Sierra Club has stated that, “Originally approved in 1986, the Canyon Mine has long been the subject of protests by the Havasupai Tribe and others objecting to potential uranium mining impacts on regional groundwater, springs, creeks, and cultural values associated with Red Butte, a Traditional Cultural Property.”

During his recent visit, Brune met with Havasupai Tribal leaders. He tells TakePart: “Sierra Club leaders have been working to stop uranium mining in the area for decades. And working to protect the lands from uranium mining by advocating for the mineral withdrawal issued by then Secretary of Interior Salazar, as well as permanently protecting the area through a Grand Canyon.”

The Obama administration has taken steps to protect one million acres around Grand Canyon from new uranium mining, but Canyon Mine has been permitted to move forward as an existing claim even though the last environmental review of the project is over two decades old.

“Mining has a history of taking precedence over other important issues due in part to the outdated Mining Law of 1872 and the significant political influence of large multinational mining corporations,” says Brune.

“The reviews for Canyon Mine are more than 27 years old, older than a number of the volunteers working on this issue,” he adds. “The mine’s permit was issued with no consideration of significant new information, including the designation of the Red Butte Traditional Cultural Property and the reintroduction of the endangered California condor.”

“Scientific studies published since 1986 demonstrate more strongly the connection between the water in this area and the seeps, springs, and creeks in Grand Canyon. If this mine pollutes the groundwater, it pollutes Grand Canyon,” says Brune………http://www.takepart.com/article/2013/07/03/uranium-mine-next-door-grand-canyon

July 5, 2013 Posted by | environment, Uranium, USA, water | Leave a comment

Solar energy storage in a big way, in Nevada

solar-SevilleSolar towers and storage – about to change the energy game? http://reneweconomy.com.au/2013/solar-towers-and-storage-about-to-change-the-energy-game-91721, By  on 4 July 2013  The 110MW Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Plant, a concentrated solar power project due to be completed in Nevada early next year, will not just be the largest solar power tower plant with fully integrated energy storage built – it could also challenge the way the world thinks about renewable energy. Or even energy sources in general.

The $1 billion Crescent Dunes project near Tonopah in the Central Nevada Desert, some 300kms north of Las Vegas, was developed by the Santa Monica-based SolarReserve and features the company’s market leading molten salt power tower technology with fully integrated energy storage.

What makes it unique and a potential game changer in the electricity industry is the flexibility and dispatchability of its power, meaning that it can deliver electricity whenever it is needed by customers; and its cost, which already beats diesel, is competitive with new build coal and gas generation.

The Crescent Dunes facility will have 10 hours of molten salt storage, which on average will allow it to deliver 110MW of baseload capacity to Las Vegas between the hours of 12 noon and midnight each day, when the city needs it most to power the lights and air conditioning of its casinos and entertainment palaces. It has signed a 25-year power contract with NV Energy, Nevada’s largest utility, to  do that. Continue reading →

July 5, 2013 Posted by | energy storage, renewable, USA | Leave a comment

Plummeting share price, with glut of uranium

Spot uranium price falls to lowest levels in seven years on ample supply Washington (Platts)–Jasmin Melvin,  2 July 13 An ample supply of uranium in the spot market resulting from Japan’s shutdown of all but two of its 50 operational reactors after the nuclear accident at Fukushima I in 2011 dragged the uranium spot price to its lowest levels in seven years, price publisher TradeTech said in reports released Friday and Sunday.

In its weekly report Friday, TradeTech said sellers “with near-term cash-flow concerns and anxious over the drop in the spot price” have concluded deals for “small lots at prices low enough to encourage discretionary buying.” They remain hesitant, however, to part with large quantities of material at prices below $40 a pound U3O8, the once-accepted price barrier among market participants.

Sellers last month began to ease once-firm offer prices in efforts to offload uncommitted material in small volumes, pulling the uranium spot price below $40/lb for the first time since March 2006, according to data from price publishers Ux Consulting and TradeTech……

The Platts NuclearFuel range for the week is $39.25-$40/lb.

TradeTech lowered its weekly uranium spot price by 20 cents to $39.55/lb Friday, while Ux’s weekly price dipped 15 cents to $39.50/lb Monday.

TradeTech’s daily spot price remained $39.55/lb Monday, unchanged from Friday…..http://www.platts.com/latest-news/electric-power/washington/spot-uranium-price-falls-to-lowest-levels-in-21235399

July 5, 2013 Posted by | 2 WORLD, business and costs, Uranium | Leave a comment

Japanese political party to campaign for abolishing nuclear power

Your Party stands against tax hike, nuclear plants Japan Times, 3 July 13 BY REIJI YOSHIDA Your Party will stress its call to freeze the upcoming consumption tax hike and promise to abolish all nuclear power plants by 2030 when the campaign for the Upper House officially starts Thursday, party leader Yoshimi Watanabe
said. Continue reading →

July 5, 2013 Posted by | Japan, politics | Leave a comment

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