nuclear-news

Open a Nuclear Fuel Bank please! says the IAEA – Ignoring the earthquakes again?

…..But in the three years since, the agency and Kazakhstan have not been able to finalize plans. The I.A.E.A. and Kazakhstan should work together to quickly resolve the remaining issues, including determining the seismic stability of the Ulba facility. Given the investment made by both sides in the viability of the site, implementing any required precautions to manage seismic risks should be the highest priority and demands good-faith cooperation.

Image source ; http://earthquaketrack.com/p/kazakhstan/recent

If this site does not meet safety requirements, the parties must find another site in Kazakhstan or the I.A.E.A. must identify another national host to fulfill the 2010 mandate of its board of governors……

WASHINGTON — As the United States and its negotiating partners continue nuclear talks with Iran in Vienna, the pressure is rising. The deadline for a final accord is July 20, and success hinges on Iran agreeing to verifiable commitments to prove to the world that its nuclear program is exclusively peaceful.

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/12/opinion/open-a-nuclear-fuel-bank.html?_r=0

11 July 2014

Unfortunately, at this critical point in the talks, a separate development that could support and reinforce an agreement with Iran has stalled. This development — the creation of an international fuel bank, to be owned and managed by the International Atomic Energy Agency — would allow countries full assurance that they could access nuclear fuel in the unusual case of an interruption of their supply.

A key element of any agreement with Tehran is the number and type of centrifuges Iran will have. Centrifuges can be used to enrich uranium from the level that is found in nature to a level that can fuel a nuclear power plant or to a level that could be used in a nuclear bomb. If a country has the capacity to make low-enriched uranium for a nuclear power plant, it also has the technical capability to make highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon. This is the key source of concern over uranium enrichment in Iran, given the country’s repeated violations of international nonproliferation obligations and the work the Iranians have already done that could lead to the development of a nuclear bomb.

Iran is not the only potential problem. Uranium enrichment is also a concern globally: A world where more and more countries make their own nuclear fuel — and thus can also produce nuclear weapons materials — is a far more dangerous world, as we have seen from North Korea.

According to the International Atomic Energy Agency, or I.A.E.A., over 30 countries are exploring whether to build their first nuclear power plant. Either these countries will import their fuel or make it themselves.

Despite Russia’s commitment to supply the necessary fuel for Iran’s only operating nuclear power reactor at Bushehr, Iran has claimed it needs national enrichment capability to protect against an interruption in its nuclear fuel supply. So, in principle, if Iran’s concerns about security of supply are addressed, it should have no need for a large domestic enrichment program that would raise fears regionally and globally.

To address this issue, the Nuclear Threat Initiative pledged $50 million in 2006 to help create a low-enriched uranium stockpile. The pledge — made possible with financial support from Warren Buffett — was later matched by more than $100 million in contributions from the United States, the European Union, the United Arab Emirates, Norway and Kuwait.

The ability to acquire low-enriched uranium on a nonpolitical basis in case of interrupted supply could be a significant factor in the negotiations with Iran. After the international fuel market and national fuel resources, the fuel bank would provide a final layer of assurance. The I.A.E.A. bank is a last-resort source if the first two backups could not fill the gap.

In addition to its relevance for Iran, the fuel bank could be important for Ukraine, should its nuclear fuel supply from Russia be cut off. This would be an aggressive move, but not unthinkable. President Vladimir Putin of Russia was reported to have announced a nuclear fuel embargo in March, though it has not been carried out.

Unfortunately, at a time when the fuel bank could be a valuable asset for countries making decisions about their nuclear programs, the bank’s completion is stalled.

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July 12, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Top scientist backs Scottish independence to get rid of immoral and expensive Trident nuclear nuclear missiles

“I intend to vote ‘yes’ to independence,” he said. “My principal reason for doing so is because it would finally sever us from a reliance on nuclear weapons, carried by Trident submarines and based in Faslane.

“They are the most conspicuous, useless, immoral and expensive symbols of Westminster’s hankering for imperial grandeur since Winston Churchill first pronounced his determination to defend the empire in November 1942.”

by JANE BRADLEY

11 July 2014

http://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/top-stories/anti-nuclear-stance-draws-top-scientist-to-yes-camp-1-3473384

Distinguished mathematician, Sir Michael Atiyah, has added his support to the Yes campaign, claiming that he backs independence mainly due to a separate Scotland’s anti-nuclear weapon stance.

Sir Michael, one of the only scientists to have been resident of both the Royal Society of Edinburgh and the Royal Society in London, believes the anti-nuclear policy is more important than the issues surrounding academia, which have been cited by many of his contemporaries as reasons for remaining in the union.

Song lyrics from the song in the video above;

In the town where I was born
Live some weapons beside the sea
I was told about their lives
In our yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarines

We all live in a yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine

It’s gonnae cost a bob or two
To buy new missles for me and you
You can’t afford to feed the weans
But their priority is in Faslane

We all live in a yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine

A hundred billion of our pounds
Ignore the misery that’s all around
Let’s buy some nukes! Prepare for war.
While child poverty is one in four.

We all live in a yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine
Yellow nuclear powered ballistic missile submarine

July 11, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Japanese honour for Sir John Beddington for covering up the effects of the Fukushima nuclear disaster!

July 11, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Anti nuclear activist and composer Ryuichi Sakamoto has throat cancer

Since the March 2011 tsunami set off a nuclear catastrophe in Japan, Sakamoto has been one of the most vocal celebrities against nuclear power along with Nobel-winning writer Kenzaburo Oe and visual artist Yoshitomo Nara.

Sakamoto, who also acted in and wrote the score for the 1983 film “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence,” directed by Nagisa Oshima, has appeared at anti-nuclear protests and urged Japan to reflect on what he called the mistake of Fukushima.

In a July 2012 rally, he got up on stage and read from notes on an iPhone, warning Japan not to risk people’s lives for electricity.

“Life is more important than money,” he said in Japanese, then added in English, “Keeping silent after Fukushima is barbaric.”

http://www.miningjournal.net/page/content.detail/id/543338/Japan-musician-Ryuichi-Sakamoto-has-throat-cancer.html?isap=1&nav=5016

July 11, 2014

Associated Press

TOKYO (AP) — Japanese musician Ryuichi Sakamoto, who shared an Oscar for Bernardo Bertolucci’s “The Last Emperor” score, has been diagnosed with throat cancer and has canceled his upcoming performances to focus on his health.

“I promise to return after a full recovery,” Sakamoto, 62, said Thursday on his official website.

He apologized for bowing out of his upcoming events, saying he would not be able to attend the First Sapporo International Art Festival, which starts later this month. He said he was also “deeply upset” at having to cancel a July 30 concert for the Park Hyatt Tokyo’s 20th anniversary, where he had planned to unveil new material.

At “the end of June, I was diagnosed with throat cancer,” he said on his website. “I have decided to take time off of work in order to concentrate on treating it. I deeply regret causing so many people considerable inconvenience.”

Hideaki Tamamushi, spokesman at Avex Group, which manages Sakamoto, said that in early June the musician went for a checkup after feeling a strange sensation in his throat, and the diagnosis came toward the end of the month. He said the company has been deluged with calls asking about Sakamoto. Tamamushi declined to release further details about his condition.

Sakamoto’s daughter and musician Miu Sakamoto said on her Twitter account that her father was going to stay for a while in the U.S., where he is based.

“I would like my father to take a good rest after working so hard all the time. I hope he will recover completely and return to playing his great music with all his heart,” she tweeted.

Sakamoto, born in Tokyo, rose to fame as a member of the electronic pop band Yellow Magic Orchestra in the 1970s and 1980s. He has been based in New York in recent years, although he visits Japan often.

Since the March 2011 tsunami set off a nuclear catastrophe in Japan, Sakamoto has been one of the most vocal celebrities against nuclear power along with Nobel-winning writer Kenzaburo Oe and visual artist Yoshitomo Nara.

Sakamoto, who also acted in and wrote the score for the 1983 film “Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence,” directed by Nagisa Oshima, has appeared at anti-nuclear protests and urged Japan to reflect on what he called the mistake of Fukushima.

In a July 2012 rally, he got up on stage and read from notes on an iPhone, warning Japan not to risk people’s lives for electricity.

“Life is more important than money,” he said in Japanese, then added in English, “Keeping silent after Fukushima is barbaric.”

___

Follow Yuri Kageyama on Twitter at twitter.com/yurikageyama

July 11, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Nuclear power is no answer to global warming – Ian Fairlie

http://www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/2472382/nuclear_power_is_no_answer_to_global_warming.html

Ian Fairlie

10th July 2014

If we’re serious about cutting CO2 emissions, there’s no place for nuclear power, writes Ian Fairlie – because it’s the least cost-effective way to do it. By far the best way is to improve energy efficiency. But tell the Government the truth, and it’ll close you down.

It’s quite clear that climate change is an extremely serious problem for mankind and that we desperately need carbon-free or low-carbon energy and transport policies.

Many people, even a few who claim to be ‘environmentalists’, remain convinced that nuclear power is an important or even necessary way to reduce our CO₂ emissions.

However even the most cursory examination reveals big problems with that view, and when the matter is examined in detail, one wonders how on earth so many people are taken in by it.

Nuclear power stations emit no CO₂ … ?

Let’s take the most obvious issue: surely nuclear reactors don’t produce CO₂ emissions? Well, true, they don’t when in operation, but reactor operation is only one step in the long nuclear fuel chain.

You need to consider uranium mining, milling and concentration, nuclear fuel fabrication and U-235 enrichment, then reactor construction, spent fuel storage and construction of whatever underground nuclear fuel dump is decided upon in future: none has been built yet.

All of these steps have heavy carbon footprints, especially uranium mining, U-235 enrichment, reactor construction and deep underground excavation.

In such situations, it’s normal to carry out Life Cycle Analyses (LCAs) of all the steps involved. Here the nuclear scenario would be modelled to estimate the number of tonnes of CO₂ produced from all the steps per MWh of electricity generated, and compared with similar figures from LCAs of other forms of electricity generation.

Nuclear is low-carbon, not zero-carbon

The problem is that LCAs are prone to different results because of differing assumptions used in modelling scenarios. The most reliable studies are those by independent groups who are not paid by the nuclear industry as their results are less likely to be biased towards industrial viewpoints.

In recent years, two such studies have been published – by the Öko Institut in Germany, and by Dr Storm van Leeuwen and his team in the Netherlands. Both groups found that nuclear produced less CO₂ than coal, oil or gas, but the amounts of carbon saved by nuclear power were relatively small.

Van Leeuwen estimated that nuclear produced about 1/3 as much CO₂as a modern co-gen gas-fired plant. In other words, nuclear is a low-carbon, not a zero-carbon, source of electricity, as often touted by the Government and others.

But you may say, shouldn’t we still promote nuclear, as a 2/3rds saving compared with gas is still worthwhile?

Perhaps, but there are several better ways of reducing CO₂ emissions than gas-fired stations. These include demand reduction measures via greater energy efficiency, and renewables such as biomass, wind, wave, geothermal and solar PV.

DECC refusing to accept the truth

If we’re really serious about reducing CO₂ emissions, then we should be examining how much each method costs per tonne of CO₂ saved. But the Government and its nuclear acolytes seem to be avoiding this.

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July 11, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | 2 Comments

Fukushima’s children are dying as the world looks on!

More than 48 percent of some 375,000 young people—nearly 200,000 kids—tested by the Fukushima Medical University near the smoldering reactors now suffer from pre-cancerous thyroid abnormalities, primarily nodules and cysts

https://www.transcend.org/tms/2014/07/fukushimas-children-are-dying/

by Harvey Wasserman, EcoWatch – TRANSCEND Media Service

ASIA & THE PACIFIC, 7 July 2014

Some 39 months after the multiple explosions at Fukushima, thyroid cancer rates among nearby children have skyrocketed to more than forty times (40x) normal.

More than 48 percent of some 375,000 young people—nearly 200,000 kids—tested by the Fukushima Medical University near the smoldering reactors now suffer from pre-cancerous thyroid abnormalities, primarily nodules and cysts. The rate is accelerating.

More than 120 childhood cancers have been indicated where just three would be expected, says Joseph Mangano, executive director of the Radiation and Public Health Project.

The nuclear industry and its apologists continue to deny this public health tragedy. Some have actually asserted that “not one person” has been affected by Fukushima’s massive radiation releases, which for some isotopes exceed Hiroshima by a factor of nearly 30.

But the deadly epidemic at Fukushima is consistent with impacts suffered among children near the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island and the 1986 explosion at Chernobyl, as well as findings at other commercial reactors.

The likelihood that atomic power could cause such epidemics has been confirmed by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, which says that “an increase in the risk of childhood thyroid cancer” would accompany a reactor disaster.

In evaluating the prospects of new reactor construction in Canada, the Commission says the rate “would rise by 0.3 percent at a distance of 12 kilometers” from the accident. But that assumes the distribution of protective potassium iodide pills and a successful emergency evacuation, neither of which happened at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl or Fukushima.

The numbers have been analyzed by Mangano. He has studied the impacts of reactor-created radiation on human health since the 1980s, beginning his work with the legendary radiologist Dr. Ernest Sternglass and statistician Jay Gould.

Speaking on http://www.prn.fm’s Green Power & Wellness Show, Mangano also confirms that the general health among downwind human populations improves when atomic reactors are shut down, and goes into decline when they open or re-open.

Nearby children are not the only casualties at Fukushima. Plant operator Masao Yoshida has died at age 58 of esophogeal cancer. Masao heroically refused to abandon Fukushima at the worst of the crisis, probably saving millions of lives. Workers at the site who are employed by independent contractors—many dominated by organized crime—are often not being monitored for radiation exposure at all. Public anger is rising over government plans to force families—many with small children—back into the heavily contaminated region around the plant.

Following its 1979 accident, Three Mile Island’s owners denied the reactor had melted. But a robotic camera later confirmed otherwise.

The state of Pennsylvania mysteriously killed its tumor registry, then said there was “no evidence” that anyone had been killed.

But a wide range of independent studies confirm heightened infant death rates and excessive cancers among the general population. Excessive death, mutation and disease rates among local animals were confirmed by the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture and local journalists.

In the 1980s federal Judge Sylvia Rambo blocked a class action suit by some 2,400 central Pennsylvania downwinders, claiming not enough radiation had escaped to harm anyone. But after 35 years, no one knows how much radiation escaped or where it went. Three Mile Island’s owners have quietly paid millions to downwind victims in exchange for gag orders.

At Chernobyl, a compendium of more than 5,000 studies has yielded an estimated death toll of more than 1,000,000 people.

The radiation effects on youngsters in downwind Belarus and Ukraine have been horrific. According to Mangano, some 80 percent of the “Children of Chernobyl” born downwind since the accident have been harmed by a wide range of impacts ranging from birth defects and thyroid cancer to long-term heart, respiratory and mental illnesses. The findings mean that just one in five young downwinders can be termed healthy.

Physicians for Social Responsibility and the German chapter of the International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War have warned of parallel problems near Fukushima.

The United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR) has recently issued reports downplaying the disaster’s human impacts. UNSCEAR is interlocked with the United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency, whose mandate is to promote atomic power. The IAEA has a long-term controlling gag order on UN findings about reactor health impacts. For decades UNSCEAR and the World Health Organization have run protective cover for the nuclear industry’s widespread health impacts. Fukushima has proven no exception.

In response, Physicians for Social Responsibility and the German International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War have issued a ten-point rebuttal, warning the public of the UN’s compromised credibility. The disaster is “ongoing” say the groups, and must be monitored for decades. “Things could have turned for the worse” if winds had been blowing toward Tokyo rather than out to sea (and towards America).

There is on-going risk from irradiated produce, and among site workers whose doses and health impacts are not being monitored. Current dose estimates among workers as well as downwinders are unreliable, and special notice must be taken of radiation’s severe impacts on the human embryo.

UNSCEAR’s studies on background radiation are also “misleading,” say the groups, and there must be further study of genetic radiation effects as well as “non-cancer diseases.” The UN assertion that “no discernible radiation-related health effects are expected among exposed members” is “cynical,” say the groups. They add that things were made worse by the official refusal to distribute potassium iodide, which might have protected the public from thyroid impacts from massive releases of radioactive I-131.

Overall, the horrific news from Fukushima can only get worse. Radiation from three lost cores is still being carried into the Pacific. Management of spent fuel rods in pools suspended in the air and scattered around the site remains fraught with danger.

The pro-nuclear Shinzo Abe regime wants to reopen Japan’s remaining 48 reactors. It has pushed hard for families who fled the disaster to re-occupy irradiated homes and villages.

But Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and the plague of death and disease now surfacing near Fukushima make it all too clear that the human cost of such decisions continues to escalate—with our children suffering first and worst.

July 11, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | 3 Comments

ISIS Terrorist seizure of nuclear materials in Iraq of minimal concern says USA BUT WHAT ABOUT THE COBALT?

July 11, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Sino-American rivalry: Energy consumption, nuclear energy and deadly nukes – RT

Both global powerhouses thus appear to persist in gambling with the Earth’s future. In fact, American and Chinese willingness to continue playing with fire is also demonstrated by their actions in the field of nuclear energy and weapons. Some time ago, the award-winning journalist Ken Silverstein wrote in the Christian Science Monitor that the “Obama administration wants to seed the United States with pint-size nuclear reactors … The US Department of Energy said it would provide $217 million in matching funds over five years to [the private company] NuScale, which builds small, ready-made reactors that can be strung together”. These pint-size nuclear reactors would be added to the already existing “100 commercial nuclear power reactors [that] are licensed to operate at 62 sites in 31 States.”

Meanwhile, in China 20 nuclear power reactors are in operation, with a further 28 under construction, and even more about to start construction. The recent Fukushima disaster in Japan (11 March 2011) and the now-legendary Chernobyl disaster in the Ukraine (26 April 1986) provide ample evidence that the mere principle of nuclear energy seems patently absurd: in order to boil water to operate some turbines, nuclear material is fused to produce high levels of energy (or heat) that is then put to use to boil water basically, or to put it in more formal words, as can be found on the website Three Mile Island (named after another famous nuclear mishap on 28 March 1979): the “only purpose of a nuclear power plant is to produce electricity. To produce electricity, a power plant needs a source of heat to boil water which becomes steam. The steam then turns a turbine, the turbine turns an electrical generator, and the generator produces electricity”. And the dangers of nuclear radiation are manifold, as explained by Dr. Helen Caldicott, the well-known Australian anti-nuclear advocate: “[n] dose of radiation is safe. Each dose received by the body is cumulative and adds to the risk of developing malignancy or genetic disease … Children are ten to twenty times more vulnerable to the carcinogenic effects of radiation than adults. Females tend to be more sensitive compared to males, whilst fetuses and immuno-compromised patients are also extremely sensitive … High doses of radiation received from a nuclear meltdown or from a nuclear weapon explosion can cause acute radiation sickness, with alopecia, severe nausea, diarrhea and thrombocytopenia”.

All in all, the US and China seem well-matched in their dedication to endangering the continued existence of humanity on this earth: either by their use and propagation of fossil fuels leading to disastrous climate change. Or by sticking to nuclear energy as an alternative, which is a dangerous proposition to begin with, while the issue of the resultant nuclear waste material has not even been touched upon.

http://rt.com/op-edge/171824-sino-american-rivalry-energy/

Dr. Can Erimtan is an independent scholar residing in İstanbul, with a wide interest in the politics, history and culture of the Balkans and the Greater Middle East.

The Bank of America recently claimed that the US will continue as the world’s biggest crude oil producer in 2014 after overtaking Saudi Arabia and Russia, as extraction from shale rock fuels the nation’s economic recovery.

And this seems like good news for the United States, struggling to recuperate from the ill-effects of the Bush years, those nightmare-like eight years that had disastrous effects on the national as well as the global economy.

As such, it has to be said that it has been quite a while since the US came out on top of any kind of worldwide ranking.

Famously, last year Education Week, the publication of the Editorial Projects in Education – an initiative that was expressly started “to withstand a concerted challenge to [the US’] technological pre-eminence” in the aftermath of the Soviet launch of Sputnik (1957) when American leaders began to fear the advance of their adversaries – indicated that “[i]n mathematics, 29 nations and other jurisdictions outperformed the United States by a statistically significant margin, up from 23 three years ago”, while “[i]n science, 22 education systems scored above the US average, up from 18 in 2009”.

As such, these “dismal US scores in reading, math and science have not changed since 2003″, remarked NPR’s Claudio Sanchez. As the US is now slowly winding down, with its future prospects looking bleak as judged by the school performance of tomorrow’s US wheelers and dealers, the news that, at least, in the field of crude oil production, the Americans are once again on top of the world must come as some kind of solace.

America’s current principal rival is the People’s Republic of China, a huge country still nominally led along Communist principles but actually really employing a strange ideological sauce that has been described as Capitalist Communism and has even received the moniker “socialist market economy with Chinese characteristics”, adhering to the principle of “using capitalism to develop socialism”, as worded by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Today, the development of capitalist enterprise in China has achieved really rather unthinkable growth figures and has given China a most unlikely appearance, turning the present ‘Middle Kingdom’ into a “country of extremes”, where “European cars swerve through traffic barely missing battered Soviet-era motorcycles laden with bounties of plastic and metal recyclables [and] [c]ollege students carrying iPads walk past street vendors selling 15 cent eggs in various states of decomposition”, as worded by Warren Rizzi, who spent a yearlong fellowship at a university in northeast China.

In addition, China possesses the largest population of any country on earth (officially, the number involved is 1,354,040,000 and that figure excludes the people living in Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macao); while China’s industry has also become one of the largest in the world, with the Forbes Global 2000 List of the world’s biggest public companies, released last May, being topped by three Chinese companies (ICBC, China Construction Bank, and Agricultural Bank of China); and finally, the number of motor vehicles used in China has also exploded, currently possessing the second largest fleet in the world, slightly more than 78 million actual vehicles – about three years ago, the Guardian’s Jonathan Watts insightfully wrote that between the years “2000 and 2010, the number of cars and motorcycles in China increased twentyfold. In the next 20 years it is forecast to more than double again, which means there will be more cars in China in 2030 than there were in the entire world in 2000.”

Therefore, it stands to reason that China has now earned the somewhat onerous sobriquet of being the “world’s largest net importer of petroleum and other liquid fuels”, as expressed by the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) – having imported 5.66 million barrels per day of crude oil in June 2014. China actually overtook the US as net importer in September 2013. China recently signed a lucrative gas deal with Russia, when Putin visited Beijing last May, envisioning the construction of the so-called Power of Siberia gas pipeline to supply Russian gas to China at a cost to Russia of $60-70 billion. This $400 billion deal between Russia’s Gazprom and the China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) had been 10 years in the making, when it was signed as a 30-year agreement. As such, Russia will provide China with 38 billion cubic meters of gas per annum with Russia planning to invest $55 billion in the deal, and China around $22 billion. This Siberian addition to the network of “Pipelineistan” neatly complements the already existing connections with Kazakhstan and Iran.

At the same time, China also trades with Saudi Arabia, Sudan, the Republic of the Congo (also known as Congo-Brazzaville and not to be confused with the DRC or the Democratic Republic of Congo), and Angola, Brazil and Venezuela.

The United States, on the other hand, is trying very hard to increase its domestic production of hydrocarbon assets, giving rise to the above-quoted Bank of America statement. But not just shale gas and shale oil exploration, though detrimental to the environment and human health, are being pushed vigorously by the Obama administration. The research, communication, and clean energy advocacy organization Oil Change International recently released a report detailing the extent to which the US federal and state governments give away more than $21 billion in subsidies to oil, gas, and coal companies to promote increased fossil fuel production and exploration. The report, called Cashing in on All of the Above (July 2014), posits that “Thanks in large part to these huge subsidies, US fossil fuel production is booming. Between 2009 and 2013, natural gas production increased by 18 percent and oil production increased by 35 percent. Although President Obama has pledged to tackle climate change and eliminate fossil fuel subsidies, he champions the oil and gas boom as the centerpiece of his administration’s ‘All of the Above’ energy strategy”. Ominously, the report continues that “[s]ince President Obama took office in 2009; federal fossil fuel subsidies have grown in value by 45 percent, from $12.7 billion to a current total of $18.5 billion. This rise is mostly due to increased oil and gas production: the value of tax breaks and other incentives have increased along with greater production and profits, essentially rewarding companies for accelerating climate change”.

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July 10, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | 1 Comment

Islamist plot to blow up Eiffel Tower, Louvre and nuclear power plant foiled, say French police

Marc Trevidic, one of France’s highest-profile anti-terror judges, said the case of Ali M was far from being isolated. “There are doubtless others on our soil programmed to harm French interests,” he told Le Parisien.

Some 800 French nationals or residents are thought to have left to fight in Syria since the start of the civil war

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/10956636/Islamist-plot-to-blow-up-Eiffel-Tower-Louvre-and-nuclear-power-plant-foiled-say-French-police.html

French police stumbled on terror plans after decrypting coded messages between Algerian butcher living in southern France and high-ranking members of al-Qaeda in the Maghreb

By Henry Samuel, Paris

4:48PM BST 09 Jul 2014

France foiled an Islamist terrorist plot to target the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre and even a nuclear power plant, it emerged on Wednesday, as the country unveiled new, tougher anti-terror rules.

French police stumbled on the plans after decrypting coded messages between a 29-year-old Algerian butcher living in the Vaucluse, southern France, known only as Ali M, and one of the highest-ranking members in al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, or AQIM.

According to Le Parisien newspaper, in April last year, the married father of two who went by the pseudonym Abu Jaji was asked by his AQIM contact, whose web alias was Redouane18, to make “suggestions concerning how to conduct jihad in the place you are currently”.

Ali M suggested targeting nuclear power plants, “planes at the moment of take-off”, and a string of French landmarks, including the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre museum in Paris.

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July 10, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Hamas rockets target Israel’s nuclear reactor

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2014-07/10/c_133472353.htm

English.news.cn   2014-07-10 02:23:06

Image source ; http://socialistwebzine.blogspot.ie/2010/06/dismantling-nuclear-dimona-israels-wmds.html

July 10, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Fukushima farmer takes on nuclear plant operator over wife’s suicide

The next morning, Watanabe resumed clearing brush. In the distance, under the spreading boughs of a tall tree, he noticed a fire. He assumed his wife was burning trash as usual, and continued working.

https://news.yahoo.com/fukushima-farmer-takes-nuclear-plant-operator-over-wifes-210717071–finance.html

By Mari Saito and Lisa Twaronite

YAMAKIYA Japan (Reuters) – A Japanese court is due to rule next month on a claim that Tokyo Electric Power is responsible for a woman’s suicide, in a landmark case that could force the utility to publicly admit culpability for deaths related to the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

In July 2011, nearly four months after the massive earthquake and tsunami that triggered a series of catastrophic failures at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, Hamako Watanabe returned to her still-radioactive hilltop home, doused herself in kerosene and set herself on fire.

She left no suicide note, but her husband Mikio says plant operator Tokyo Electric is directly responsible.

“If that accident hadn’t happened, we would have lived a normal, peaceful life” on their family farm some 50 km (30 miles) from the plant, said Watanabe, now 64, who discovered her charred body.

A district court in Fukushima is expected to rule in late August on Watanabe’s lawsuit, which Tokyo Electric (Tepco) is contesting. The outcome could set a precedent for claims against the struggling utility, said Watanabe’s lawyer Tsuguo Hirota.

The triple meltdowns at the plant forced more than 150,000 people from their homes. About a third, including Watanabe, remain in temporary housing.

The utility has settled a number of suicide-related claims through a government dispute resolution system, but declined to say how many or give details on how much it has paid.

Japan has made public 25 disaster-related death cases that were settled through the resolution system, some for more than 16 million yen ($157,000). Causes of death were not always specified, and include those due to natural causes, such as elderly patients who died in evacuation centers. A Mainichi report this week said arbitrators were encouraged to automatically halve requested damage to expedite the process.

Tepco said it could not comment on pending cases, including Watanabe’s.

Watanabe has so far declined to settle outside of court and has broken off contact with relatives who urged him to drop his suit. His oldest son left his job after co-workers harassed him, accusing him of using his mother’s death for personal gain. Watanabe is seeking more than 91.16 million yen ($896,200) in damages.

“No matter what verdict I get in August, I just want my wife to rest in peace,” said Watanabe.

DEEP DEPRESSION

Like her husband, Hamako had grown up in Yamakiya, a rural pocket of farms and rice paddies surrounded by hills inside Kawamata Town. Being forced to leave plunged her into a sudden and deep depression, he said.

“For them to argue that the suicide is not directly related is unforgivable,” Watanabe said.

Hirota, Watanabe’s lawyer, said the verdict could set the stage for others who have experienced losses as a result of the nuclear disaster to take similar legal action.

“For the claimants, it’s not about the money. They want to know what the meaning of their husband’s death was, or why their mother had to perish this way,” he said.

Kazuo Okawa, an Osaka-based lawyer who has spent over three decades representing victims of Minamata disease, a neurological syndrome caused by mercury poisoning from industrial wastewater, said that courts in Japan generally tend to favor companies in liability cases.

Civil suits are uncommon in Japan, where victims are far more likely to skirt arduous court battles and accept settlements.

“There are massive hurdles to go to court in Japan. It takes a long time for court cases to proceed and this discourages many victims … If they felt they had a chance of winning they still might, but that hasn’t always been the case,” Okawa said.

EMOTIONAL DISTRESS

The case also highlights what advocates call a quiet crisis of depression in Japan’s disaster zone, which many say has gone unnoticed in a culture that values stoicism and stigmatizes mental illness.

“Their houses are still there, but they can’t go back,” said Shinichi Niwa, a professor of psychiatry at Fukushima Medical University, who said that displacement contributed to anger, despair and suicide.

Between 2011 and 2013, suicides declined 11 percent across Japan. Suicides in Fukushima had also been decreasing in the years before the disaster, but deaths have ticked up in the past two years.

Since April 2011, there have been more than 1,500 suicides in the prefecture. Authorities have so far ruled 54 of those deaths to be “disaster related”.

Japan’s government has dispatched counsellors, appointed a government minister in charge of suicide prevention and provided funding to local organizations for survivors and evacuees like Watanabe.

Tepco was bailed out with taxpayer funds in 2012 and expects to spend more than $48 billion in compensation alone, and billions more for a decades-long costly decommission.

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July 10, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Compensation halved over nuclear disaster victims’ deaths during evacuation

A center official defended the practice. “The 50 percent rule is merely an unofficial indication, and not part of the official criteria, so we don’t have to disclose it.”

TEPCO has declined to comment on the amount of compensation paid over the deaths of nuclear victims during evacuation. “We’re not in a position to comment on the contribution ratio of the nuclear disaster, but we understand that mediators at the center propose settlement plans based on the circumstances surrounding each individual case,” said an official with the TEPCO public relations division

Image source; http://riversong.wordpress.com/myth-of-corporate-personhood/

http://mainichi.jp/english/english/newsselect/news/20140709p2a00m0na003000c.html

July 09, 2014(Mainichi Japan)

he government-backed center that handles the alternative dispute resolution (ADR) for the Fukushima nuclear disaster has halved the amount of compensation that the operator of the crippled plant must pay in most cases over the deaths of nuclear disaster victims during evacuation, it has been learned.

The Nuclear Damage Claim Dispute Resolution Center has set the contribution ratio of the nuclear disaster to the deaths of most victims during evacuation at 50 percent to halve the amount of compensation to their bereaved families.

Hiroshi Noyama, former head of the Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology Ministry section that serves as secretariat to the center, made the admission in an exclusive interview with the Mainichi Shimbun.

Noyama defended the practice, saying the center must quickly handle disputes, while admitting that there are some cases for which full amounts of compensation should have been paid.

“In some cases, we can recognize that the contribution ratio of the nuclear accident to deaths is 100 percent. But we assess the ratio is 50 percent in most settlement plans. If we are to carefully deliberate each case, we couldn’t maintain the current pace of deliberations (an average of about six months per case),” he said. “This is the best thing that the center can do. If you’re dissatisfied with the practice, please file a lawsuit,” Noyama said.

The revelations highlight the insufficiency of relief measures for nuclear disaster victims.

In nuclear ADR processes, lawyers who serve as mediators at the center work out settlement plans in response to petitions from victims and show the plans to both the victims and Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), the operator of the tsunami-ravaged Fukushima nuclear plant.

About 260 mediators are supposed to screen petitions independently. However, mediators often consult with the secretariat at the ministry over the details of settlement proposals to prevent conditions for reconciliation from varying from case to case.

Noyama said the secretariat summoned some “influential” mediators to the center and proposed to set the contribution ratio of the nuclear disaster to the deaths of evacuees at about 50 percent, considering that evidence cannot be sufficiently examined. The mediators present at the meeting accepted the proposal.

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July 10, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Japanese engineers struggle to make Fukushima ice wall concept work

Tepco has explained that the water is difficult to freeze because it is flowing at a rate of 2mm a minute. Toyoshi Fuketa, a member of the NRA, told Japan News: “It’s strange that flow on such a scale should prevent the freezing.”

The NRA has commented that the failure to freeze the tunnel made it impossible to create the ice wall around the reactor buildings and that TEPCO should “double or triple” its freezing capabilities.

 

9 July 2014 | By David Rogers

http://www.globalconreview.com/news/japanese-engineers-struggle-make-fukushima876754/

The Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) has been told to re-examine its attempt to create an ice wall around the crippled reactors of the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant.

The instruction was delivered on Monday by Japan’s Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) which is concerned that the container of frozen soil around the partially melted reactors has not yet formed three months after work began.

The NRA ordered Tepco to increase the freezing power of its machinery. It is particularly concerned by the ice failing to contain a 5m2 tunnel filled with heavily contaminated water leading into the number one reactor, which is the one that suffered the greatest damage in the 2011 tsunami.

Tepco had hoped to block this tunnel with the ice, remove about 11,000 tons of radioactive liquid from it and replace it with concrete.

Tepco has explained that the water is difficult to freeze because it is flowing at a rate of 2mm a minute. Toyoshi Fuketa, a member of the NRA, told Japan News: “It’s strange that flow on such a scale should prevent the freezing.”

The NRA has commented that the failure to freeze the tunnel made it impossible to create the ice wall around the reactor buildings and that TEPCO should “double or triple” its freezing capabilities.

Meanwhile, there are reports that Tepco has been forced to switch off the cooling system at the number five reactor after it was discovered that it had been leaking water. The decision was taken after engineers discovered that 1,300 litres of water had leaked from a cooling system intended to stabilise the temperature of the reactor, which was offline  at the time of tsunami, but still loaded with fuel rods.

The source of the leak is understood to be a 3 mm-diameter hole near a flow valve, according to a statement released by Tepco on Sunday. If no water is pumped over the next nine days, the reactor may reach a threshold temperature of 65°C, above which dangerous reactions may take place.

(Arclight2011  notes that the pump is now back on with a temporary repair in place)

July 10, 2014 Posted by arclight2011part2 | Uncategorized | Leave a comment