TEPCO’s understanding of ‘meltdown’ questioned
A new finding is raising questions about the explanation first offered for what was happening inside damaged reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in 2011.
Nuclear fuel in 3 reactor cores melted following the earthquake and tsunami that March.
But Tokyo Electric Power Company officials failed to describe these as meltdowns.
They said there were no grounds for reaching that conclusion.
But 2 months later the utility formally admitted all 3 had melted down.
NHK has learned that the firm’s own manual says a meltdown has occurred if at least 5 percent of a core has melted. Nuclear fuel is housed in the core.
The operator told NHK it discovered this definition in the course of responding to a request from a Niigata Prefectural Government panel investigating the accident.
An NHK reporter says this would suggest TEPCO did not understand the precise definition of a meltdown until nearly 5 years after the accident.
The utility says it will continue to investigate why it didn’t use the word meltdown soon after the crisis began.
http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20160224_27/
Fukushima ice wall shown to media
An incinerator in Fukushima Daiichi means more incineration, which add more radioaticle nanoparticles dispersed into the air and into the environment.
The operator of the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant has shown media outlets the site where work has been completed for an underground ice wall. The wall is designed to stop underground water from flowing into the plant’s reactor buildings.
Tokyo Electric Power Company, or TEPCO, began construction of the wall in 2014. Its work was completed earlier this month.
The wall is designed to freeze the soil around the Number 1 to Number 4 reactor buildings in order to keep groundwater from seeping into the structures.
TEPCO has driven about 1,500 pipes carrying refrigerant liquid into the ground around the buildings. The pipes and cooling devices were shown to the media on Tuesday.
But workers have not yet injected a freezing agent into the pipes. This is due to concerns that a sudden drop in groundwater levels may result in the release of radioactive water. TEPCO officials are examining the situation with the Nuclear Regulation Authority, or NRA.
Masato Kino of the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy is in charge of dealing with the contaminated water. He says now that the ice wall is completed, his agency is consulting with the NRA to reduce the volume of radioactive water at the plant.
TEPCO officials also showed the media an incinerator that will burn contaminated waste such as used protective suits.
Officials plan to start testing the incinerator on Thursday.
They hope it will help reduce about 66,000 cubic meters of waste that has accumulated at the plant.
http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20160223_32/
Nuclear watchdog gives nod on safety to two aging reactors for first time
The No. 1 reactor, in the background on the right, and the No. 2 reactor beside it are seen at Takahama nuclear power plant in the town of Takahama, Fukui Prefecture. The No. 3 reactor, in the foreground on the right, restarted its operation in January this year while the No. 4 reactor next to it is expected to restart its operation Feb. 26 at the earliest.
For the first time, Japan’s nuclear watchdog has disclosed that two aging nuclear reactors in operation for more than their basic lifespan of 40 years have passed the new safety standards set after the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
The No. 1 and No. 2 reactors of the Takahama nuclear power plant in Fukui Prefecture could now have their operations extended for a further 20 years as the Nuclear Regulation Authority made the announcement on Feb. 24.
To extend the operational lives of the two reactors, operator Kansai Electric Power Co. must receive NRA approval by July on three outstanding items–safety measures, detailed designs and extension of operations.
This is the fourth time the NRA has acknowledged that nuclear reactors are meeting the new safety standards, but the first time for those that are at least 40 years old.
The other three cases were the No. 1 and the No. 2 reactors at the Sendai nuclear power plant in Kagoshima Prefecture, operated by Kyushu Electric Power Co.; the No. 3 and the No. 4 reactors at the Takahama plant; and the No. 3 rector at Ikata nuclear power plant in Ehime Prefecture, operated by Shikoku Electric Power Co.
After the triple meltdown at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in March 2011, laws on nuclear safety were revised. As a result, it was stipulated that the operation period of nuclear reactors is a basic 40 years but that can be extended by up to 20 years–but just one time–with NRA approval.
Although the No. 1 and the No. 2 reactors at the Takahama plant have been operating for more than 40 years, it is a transitional measure until July as Kansai Electric Power has yet to obtain NRA approval for a 20-year extension.
In March 2015, the utility asked to be screened by the NRA to ensure it was meeting the new safety standards. In April 2015, it applied for an additional 20 years for each reactor.
The NRA has been conducting intensive screenings on the reactors because if Kansai Electric Power cannot obtain approval on safety measures, detailed designs and extension of operations by the July deadline, it will have to decommission the two reactors.
In the safety screenings, the main focus was on fire-prevention measures with regard to electric cables. The No. 1 and No. 2 reactors were using cables totaling 1,300 kilometers in length, but they were not fire-retardant.
The utility responded by replacing 60 percent of them with fire-retardant cables, and wrapping the remaining 40 percent with fire-retardant sheets. This met with NRA approval.
With regard to earthquake and tsunami resistance, the utility used the same levels as those for the No. 3 and the No. 4 reactors at Takahama plant, both of which had already been approved by the NRA as meeting the new safety standards.
The NRA devoted 389 pages of the screening paper to its opinion that the No. 1 and the No. 2 reactors at Takahama are meeting the new safety standards. The NRA will collect opinions from the public about its conclusions for 30 days from Feb. 25 and then formally decide whether the two reactors are meeting the new standards on safety measures.
At the same time, it will go ahead with screenings on the remaining two items–detailed designs and the extension of operations. The screening on the detailed designs will focus on quake-resistant capabilities of important facilities. The screening on the extension of operation will check on the deterioration of facilities.
Even if Kansai Electric Power obtains approval on all of the three items, it will take about three years for the utility to finish work on safety measures. Because of that, the operations of Takahama’s No. 1 and No. 2 reactors are not expected to be restarted before autumn 2019.
http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/social_affairs/AJ201602240072
How banned “Mislabeled” Fukushima food products are making it onto international store shelves.
by Robert Harrington
It is being reported that tainted food from Fukushima, Ibaraki, Gumma, and Chiba is making its way into local supermarkets in Taiwan due to the irresponsibility of mislabeling. What’s more, these food products were banned in Taiwan since March of 2011.
The first question is: Why are food products from the concerned Japanese prefectures surrounding Fukushima mislabelled?
The second question is: Why is Japan attempting to foist its unsafe and inferior radioactive foods on Taiwan?
Instead of humbly acquiescing to Taiwan’s wishes, Japan takes an aggressive approach even threatening WTO arbitration.
Taiwan’s Food and Drug Administration said the latest enforcement was in line with radiation safety management practices that other countries have put in place on Japanese food imports following the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster.
It said it “is necessary to protect the safety of food consumption” for Taiwanese.
But Japan is protesting the move, with the government warning that it may escalate the matter to the World Trade Organization, potentially deepening the conflict between Taipei and Tokyo.
Japan Created Their Predicament by Building All of Their Nuclear Reactors on Their Island Coastlines
Rather than own the problem which successive Japanese governments are fully responsible for, they appear to be taking advantage of their neighbors. No one ever forced Japan to locate their entire nuclear power generation industry on the shoreline.
Even after 4 plus years beyond the Fukushima nuclear disaster, Japan has still failed to satisfactorily address the fallout from the meltdown(s) that occurred after the March 11, 2011 earthquake-generated tsunami.
Report: 20,000 Square Miles Contaminated by Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi
Even more inexplicably, the Japanese government has voted to continue the operation of their nuclear power plants in spite of their vulnerability to both frequent earthquakes and potential tsunamis. Being located in one of the most seismically active earthquake zones in the Ring of Fire, such an ill-advised decision can only set up another nuclear catastrophe. Which begs the question:
“Does anyone in their right mind believe that nuclear power plants can ever be designed, engineered or constructed to withstand 9.0 earthquakes followed by 15 meter high tsunamis?
The obvious answer is as follows:
“Japan should never have sited 55 nuclear reactors (plus 12 others) on its coastlines.”
Therefore, why are countries like Taiwan paying a serious price for Japan’s extraordinarily bad judgment and serious mistakes? They have known for centuries that they reside on one of the most earthquake-prone pieces of real estate in the entire world. To continue with the same nuclear energy model despite the obvious lessons of Fukushima seems to defy common sense.
Conclusion
Japan made some extremely fateful decisions post World War II concerning the ways it would satisfy the nation’s energy needs. In light of their direct experience with atomic energy during WWII, it would seem that they would have opted for non-nuclear energy alternatives. Instead, they went full bore constructing nuclear power plants as quickly as they could convince the prefectures with the targeted coastlines.
Here they are now still dealing with the Fukushima meltdown(s) — a set of intractable nuclear challenges which may have no practical solutions. That means that those prefectures surrounding Fukushima may always have an environment suffering from a proliferation of radionuclides. What exactly are radionuclides?
A radionuclide or radioactive nuclide is a nuclide that is radioactive. Also referred to as a radioisotope or radioactive isotope, it is an isotope with an unstable nucleus, characterized by excess energy available to be imparted either to a newly created radiation particle within the nucleus or via internal conversion. During this process, the radionuclide is said to undergo radioactive decay, resulting in the emission of gamma ray(s) and/or subatomic particles such as alpha or beta particles.These emissions constitute ionizing radiation. (Source: Wikipedia — Radionuclide)
Radionuclides, and especially the ionizing radiation which they emit, are certainly not something that anyone would want in their back yard, much less in their food. Nevertheless, Japan feels it can maintain the same policies that got them into this calamitous predicament. Hopefully, Taiwan will not relent to demands so unreasonable they strain credulity. After all, Japan needs to learn some critical lessons for their own benefit as well as for their trading partners.
http://naturalsociety.com/how-fukushima-produce-is-making-its-way-into-international-stores/
Calls for Reopening Investigation of Corruption at Los Alamos Nuclear Lab and of Suspicious Suicide of Ex-Deputy Director Richard Burick
![Los Alamos National [Nuclear] Laboratory, UPSHOT KNOTHOLE Grable Color photo](https://miningawareness.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/image53.jpeg?w=1024&h=738)
Los Alamos National [Nuclear] Laboratory, UPSHOT KNOTHOLE Grable
Questionable Suicide of Los Alamos National Lab Retired Deputy Director
At the beginning of February, 2016, three “whistleblowers sent a certified letter to Mr. Damon Martinez, the US Attorney for the District of New Mexico, asking him to reopen an investigation into fraud and corruption at the Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and the questionable suicide in 2002 of the then-recently retired Lab Deputy Director“, Richard Burick. http://nukewatch.org/pressreleases/NM-US-Atty-LANL-Fraud-PR.pdf
Why does it matter?
“Renewing the investigation of Burick’s death, the whistleblowers say, may lead to evidence of greater corruption within the lab’s scandal-plagued management.“ See: “Whistleblowers Call for Inquiry into LANL Employee’s Death“, February 2, 2016: http://www.pogo.org/blog/2016/02/whistleblowers-call-for-inquiry-into-lanl-employee-death.html
Justice cannot be justice if it has time limits and Crimes May Continue
“Many of Burick’s peers remain in leadership positions at LANL. Under their watch, two employees stole millions…
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February 23 Energy News
World:
¶ The International Energy Agency is warning consumers not to let cheap oil lull them into a false sense of security. In a report, the IEA said it expects prices to start recovering in 2017. But it forecasts a subsequent sharp jump in price as supply shrinks following under-investment by struggling producers. [BBC]
Consumers should expect oil prices to recover
¶ The operator of South Australia’s vast network says it has no concern about the growing penetration of renewable energy on its grid, and is encouraging remote towns to look at renewable micro-grids to cut costs. South Australia is likely to get over 50% of its electricity needs from wind and solar power this year. [CleanTechnica]
¶ At the recently concluded Invest Karnataka summit, two different entities pledged to add a total of 3 GW of solar power capacity in the southern Indian state. Karnataka…
View original post 644 more words
The Case of the Leaky Valve and Radioactive Water Spill at Takahama Nuclear Reactor Unit 4, Feb. 20, 2016
According to KEPCO, at Takahama Unit 4 PWR (pressurized water reactor) in Japan an alarm indicating “caution on the primary system floor drain” went off at 15:42 on February 20, 2016. The operator conducted a field inspection and found a radioactive puddle on the floor in front of the condensate demineralizer (filtering system which uses resins to eliminate impurities from the reactor coolant) in the reactor auxiliary building. Leaked radioactive water was also collected by the auxiliary building sump and other components. The total leakage was an estimated 34 liters with a total amount of radioactivity of 60,000 Becquerels (Radioactive disintegrations or shots per second.) This would be 1,764 Bq per liter. (See original English KEPCO press release at bottom).
US NRC Schematic of PWR nuclear power station layout
What caused the leak? Valve Problems, of course
Anyone who is of a certain age, or has a house…
View original post 1,133 more words
February 22 Energy News
World:
¶ Japan’s solar installations are expected to peak this year somewhere between 13.2 GW and 14.3 GW, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance. Japan installed 7.1 GW of solar in 2013, 10.3 GW in 2014, and as much as 12.3 GW in 2015. However, BNEF is predicting a drop in installations for 2017. [CleanTechnica]
Rooftop solar installation in Japan. Photo by CoCreatr (some rights reserved)
¶ SkyPower has signed four power purchase agreements with the Indian state of Telangana to build and operate a total of 200 MW of solar energy projects. The deals bring the total number of solar projects agreed by the company in India to 400 MW, with the other 200 MW planned for the state of Madhya Pradesh. [reNews]
¶ Scotrenewables Tidal Power has completed the deployment of its advanced modular anchoring system at the European Marine Energy Centre in Orkney…
View original post 534 more words
Radioactive Waste Dump Owner Semnani Paid Govt Official $600,000; Official Went to Jail, Got Cancer; Semnani Got Fined, Became Iran Policy “Expert”, “Philanthropist”
The $40 million being given by the US DOE to a US nuclear reactor “start-up” company, X-energy, owned by Iranian Kam Ghaffarian, brings to mind the case of Iranian immigrant Khosrow Semnani and the Envirocare – Clive Radioactive Waste Dump, now owned-managed by former Goldman Sachs Investment Bankers (e.g. David Lockwood, CEO of EnergySolutions; Doug Kimmelman, CEO of EnergyCapital).[a]
In 1996, “Mr. Semnani publicly admitted, in court filings, that he had secretly paid Mr. Anderson hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash, gold coins, and a ski resort condominium. These payments were made by Mr. Semnani to Mr. Anderson during the period in which Mr. Anderson was the chief official responsible for issuing the Envirocare license, granting the Envirocare exemption, and allegedly authorizing disposal of DOE waste at the Clive, Utah site.” (WCS v. DOE, 1997)
Clive Nuclear Waste Dump Looks Like A Radioactive Junkyard, just west…
View original post 3,511 more words
Japan Olympic teams to train in nuclear clean-up zone
Piles of used protective clothing worn by workers inside the contaminated ‘exclusion zone’, seen in 2011 at J-Village, a football training complex serving as an operation base for those battling Japan’s nuclear disaster in Fukushima
Tokyo (AFP) – Japan’s Olympic football teams will train for the Tokyo 2020 Games at a complex currently being used as a base for thousands of workers cleaning up the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant.
The Japan Football Association (JFA) said Monday that the Japanese men’s and women’s teams would hold their training camps at J-Village, once the country’s centre of excellence until it was taken over by plant operators following the 2011 nuclear disaster.
“The teams will use the J-Village facility as a training base,” JFA communications chief Takato Maruyama told AFP.
“It is something the JFA had been talking about but a timeline hadn’t been formally approved by the executive board, until now,” Maruyama said.
J-Village is on the fringes of the old 12-mile (20-kilometre) exclusion zone around the stricken plant, which suffered a triple reactor meltdown after a giant tsunami slammed into it in March, 2011, causing massive radiation leaks and forcing the evacuation of more than 150,000 people.
As the nuclear crisis raged, J-Village became the front line in the fight to control the situation, with helipads, medical centre and dormitories hastily erected for workers filing in and out of the plant in their protective suits and masks.
Workers queue for a bowl of soup at J-Village, a football training complex serving as an operation base for those battling Japan’s nuclear disaster in Fukushima prefecture, in 2011
Following the removal of the no-entry zone last September, the sprawling site located in the sleepy town of Naraha will undergo large-scale reconstruction with a view to a partial reopening by July 2018.
“Obviously the complex will need some refurbishment but that is the time frame we have heard from TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company) and J-Village,” said Maruyama.
Japanese officials plan to reopen the facility — originally constructed by TEPCO and donated to the regional government in 1997 — to serve as a symbol of recovery for the Tokyo Olympics.
Venues in the tsunami-ravaged northeastern Tohoku region also hoping to be involved in the Games.
“J-Village has always been an important venue and it has a large role to play in the recovering of Fukushima,” JFA director Eiji Ueda told local media.
Despite the symbolic value of training at the complex, the JFA insisted that safety was of utmost importance.
“We can’t make any specific comment on radiation but clearly you can’t play football in places where it isn’t safe for people to go,” said Maruyama, referring to the proposal to reopen J-Village in 2018.
“Obviously it will be opened on condition that all decontamination work has been completed safely,” he added.
“We can’t say (at this point) if that decontamination will have been fully carried out and whether there will be zero effect from radiation by that time.”
Fukushima governor disappointed over Seoul event cancellation
He says he is dismayed, what a f@%king hypocrite! Shameless and criminal, contaminated food should not be eaten, sold and how much more exported to other countries. Do not push your contaminated foods to other people!
Fukushima Gov. Masao Uchibori expressed regret Monday over cancellation of an event that the Foreign Ministry had planned to hold in Seoul over the weekend to promote the recovery of the Tohoku region from the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
“I know that it will take time to eliminate the unfavorable reputation in other countries,” given the nuclear crisis, he said at a news conference in Tokyo.
The Foreign Ministry canceled the event after failing to secure necessary approval from authorities in Seoul amid lingering concern over the safety of food from Tohoku.
The event was to fun Saturday and Sunday, promoting specialties from the disaster-hit areas, including sweets and sake.
“I’m dismayed by this (cancellation),” Uchibori said, adding that he thought the event would provide a good opportunity for people in South Korea to deepen their understanding of Fukushima and the rest of Tohoku.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2016/02/22/national/fukushima-governor-disappointed-seoul-event-cancellation/#.VstQzebzN_k
Japan’s nuclear reactor restarts anger Minami Soma mayor
Katsunobu Sakurai: ‘It is necessary for all of Japan to change its way of thinking and its way of life’
TOKYO (TR) – One video made him one of the most well-known faces of the Fukushima nuclear crisis.
In the 11-minute YouTube video uploaded on March 24, 2011, mayor Katsunobu Sakurai begged for help for his city of Minami Soma, located 15 miles away from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.
Five years later, Sakurai says his city still hasn’t fully recovered. Making matters worse, he says, is Japan’s reversion to nuclear energy: After a nationwide halt, two power companies restarted reactors in Fukui and Kagoshima prefectures beginning last year and Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO), which operates Fukushima Daiichi, is scheduled to bring two reactors back online in Niigata Prefecture later this year.
“As a resident of an area affected by the nuclear power plant disaster, I must express great anger at this act,” said Sakurai at a press luncheon at he Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Japan on Thursday. “When we look at how all of the affected areas of Japan, including Minami Soma, can rebuild following the disaster, it is necessary for all of Japan to change its way of thinking and its way of life.”
After the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011, the meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi plant resulted in the halting of all nuclear power plants in Japan. In 2013, stricter safety regulations were implemented by the Nuclear Regulation Authority.
In August and October of last year, the first two reactors under the new regulations were brought back online at Kyushu Electric Power’s Sendai Nuclear Power Plant in Kagoshima. A third reactor was restarted by Kansai Electric Power at the Takahama Nuclear Power Plant in Fukui earlier this month.
This summer, TEPCO is expected to restart two reactors at its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa Nuclear Power Plant in Niigata. When asked to comment on the restart, Yukako Handa, a TEPCO spokesperson, wrote in an email, “For the restart, we will accurately respond to (any requests for) review with safety as a top priority while proceeding by putting our best efforts into sincere explanations about safety concerns (obtained) from local residents.”
Recovery
An evacuation order issued after the earthquake forced many residents in Minami Soma to leave their homes. But the population is recovering, says Sakurai. Having dipped as low as 10,000, the number of residents in Minami Soma is approximately 57,000, about 80 percent of the total before the disaster.
Radiation levels are being continually monitored. According to Sakurai, 70 percent of the children in Minami Soma have returned since the disaster, with 99.86 percent of those tested being radiation-free.
But, according to Sakurai, there remains lingering fears of high radiation levels and that compensation from the government may disappear. This, he says, is having social and economic implications: The city is suffering from a shortage of workers, especially for schools and nursery facilities.
“Our hope is for as many people as possible to be able to return to Minami Soma and also join or become involved in the ongoing recovery process,” said Sakurai. “However, we are also faced with the reality that five years has passed since the disaster. During that time, many of the younger generation have moved away and built new homes and new lives in their places of evacuation or in the places they have moved to.”
Normalizing radiation – Japan’s nuclear policy “Fukushima is clean and safe again!”
“Instead of taking corrective measures to protect its people, Japan has simply increased internationally recognized exposure limits. It seems that the priority – as we’ve seen in so many other industrial disasters in so many other countries – is to protect industry and limit its liability rather than to ensure the long-term health and well being of the masses. Go figure.”
No bliss in this ignorance: the great Fukushima nuclear cover-up, Extra Sensory News, Media Propaganda Reanalysis Linda Pentz Gunter, 21 Feb 16 Dr. Tetsunari Iida is the founder and executive director of the Institute for Sustainable Energy Policies (ISEP) in Japan……… in person, Iida was most interested in conveying the extent to which the Japanese people were lied to before, during and after the devastating nuclear disaster at Fukushima-Daiichi, precipitated on that same fateful day and by the deadly duo of earthquake and tsunami.
The media may have played the willing government handmaiden in reassuring the public with falsehoods, but in July 2012, the Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission concluded that the disaster was really no accident but “man-made“. It came about, the researchers said, as a result of “collusion” between the government, regulators and the nuclear industry, in this case, Tepco.“There should be a Tepco trial like the post-war Tokyo Trials”, Iida said, referring to the post World War II war crimes trial in which 28 Japanese were tried, seven of whom were subsequently executed by hanging.
Hope for such accountability – without advocating hanging – is fleeting at best. In 2011, while addressing a conference in Berlin hosted by the Heinrich Böll Foundation, I suggested the Tepco officials should be sent to the International Criminal Court at The Hague, (a body the US still conveniently refuses to recognize) to answer for what clearly amounts to crimes against humanity.
The remark caused a bit of a stir and earnest questions about the mechanism by which Tepco could be brought there. Needless to say, nothing of the kind ever happened, or is likely to.
Instead, the Abe’s government’s preferred tactic is to go full out to restart reactors and move everybody back home as soon as possible, as if nothing serious had happened. Just scoop off a little topsoil, cart it away somewhere else and, Abracadabra!Everything is clean and safe again!
Normalizing radiation, a policy and now a practice Continue reading
Takahama Nuclear reactor leaking radioactive water
Nuclear reactor in Japan leaking radioactive water amid nationwide restart RT.com 21 Feb, 2016 A nuclear power station in Japan is leaking, this time the Takahama plant, about 380km west of Tokyo. The radioactive water leak comes amid a nationwide push to restart reactors after the catastrophic meltdown at Fukushima five years ago.
The reactor would have been the fourth to come on after the shutdown. The push by the government and utility companies came amid protests across Japan against the continued reliance on nuclear energy, prompted by failures to get the Fukushima crisis under control.
Now Kansai Electric Power says about 34 liters of radioactive water have escaped the plant’s reactor No. 4. An investigation is underway. “Resumption procedures related to the incident have been suspended as we are still investigating the cause,” a Kansai spokesman said, according to AFP……..
In March 2011, following the devastating tsunami and earthquake that shut down Fukushima Daiichi, the government introduced strict new safety checks. But, apparently, not every reactor lucky enough to pass the new standards was returned to normal operation.
In fact, two of Takahama’s reactors (3 and the currently leaking 4) were both given a ‘no’ by a local judge, who firmly sided with the people last April…….. https://www.rt.com/news/333154-nuclear-reactor-japan-leak/
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USA Presidential candidates: their policies on nuclear power
Here’s Where The 2016 Candidates Stand On Nuclear Power ANDREW FOLLETT, The Daily Caller 21 Feb 16 Energy and Environmental Reporter “……..Here’s a breakdown of what all the major presidential candidates think about nuclear power:Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton: The former Secretary of State claimed to be “agnostic about nuclear power” in the 2007 YouTube Democratic Primary debate. As a result, she rarely directly discusses nuclear energy, though one of her campaign fact sheet claims she favors “advanced nuclear,” which requires “expand[ing] successful innovation initiatives, like ARPA-e, and cut those that fail to deliver results.”
Sen. Bernie Sanders: The Vermont senator vehemently opposes nuclear power. He opposes the construction of new nuclear reactors “when we do not know how we get rid of the toxic waste from the ones that already exist.” Sanders’ campaign website states “Bernie has called for a moratorium on nuclear power plant license renewals in the United States.”
Donald Trump: The real estate mogul has made strong public statements supporting nuclear power, but tends to favor further development of natural gas.
In the aftermath of the 2011 Japan Fukushima nuclear disaster, Trump told Fox News “nuclear is a way we get what we have to get, which is energy.”
The permitting process for nuclear power needs to be reformed, Trump nuclear is a way we get what we have to get, which is energy.”
The permitting process for nuclear power needs to be reformed, Trump explained. He qualified this statement saying “we have to be careful” because nuclear power “does have issues.” Trump specified that he favored the development of natural gas over nuclear energy in the same interview: “we’re the Saudi Arabia times 100 of natural gas, but we don’t use it.”
Sen. Ted Cruz: The Texas senator has not said much about nuclear power, and also lacks a substantive voting record on the issue.
Cruz’s website states he wants an “all-of-the-above” energy approach that adopts “an energy plan that embraces the Great American Energy Renaissance.” It does not specifically mention nuclear energy. Cruz has also repeatedly stated he opposes all energy subsides.
Cruz’s campaign declined comment to The Daily Caller News Foundation.
Sen. Marco Rubio: The Florida senator has received praises for his energy policy. The National Review claimed “Rubio has the best and most serious energy plan” last November. Rubio also has a history of supporting nuclear energy.
Rubio’s campaign website says he will help nuclear power by “modernizing regulations and permitting processes will help develop both traditional and alternative energy sources and encourage energy diversity.”
When Rubio was running for Senate in 2010, his campaign website stated he supported “a comprehensive energy plan that encourages nuclear energy.” The Senator also wrote in a 2006 that “[c]lean, safe nuclear energy is another promising option to diversify Florida’s energy portfolio.”
Gov. John Kasich: As Ohio’s governor, Kasich hasn’t said much on nuclear energy, but is a firm supporter of green energy mandates that benefit solar and wind power.
Kasich has been embroiled in a fight with his own party over Ohio’s green energy mandate. Republican state legislators have threatened to gut a law mandating Ohio get 25 percent of its power from green energy by 2025. Kasich threatened to veto any legislative efforts that tamper with his green energy goals.
The Kasich campaign did not respond to request for comment.
Dr. Ben Carson: Not only is Carson a famed neurosurgeon, but he’s also a strong supporter of nuclear power.
“I think it is a huge mistake that we are not developing the next generation nuclear power plants faster,” Carson wrote in an August Facebook post. ……..
need to figure out how to build them with even more safety and expedite the process to lower the cost of construction. As I have said here before, we need to ignite the fire of the American economy and low-cost power is a critical ingredient to gaining a rebirth of manufacturing jobs in this country.”
Former Gov. Jeb Bush: Florida’s former governor is a strong supporter of nuclear power. Bush authored a pro-nuclear power opinion piece in a Florida newspaper in 2008, and was a member of the pro-nuclear Clean and Safe Energy Coalition. As governor, Bush encouraged the use of federal funds for nuclear cleanup. http://dailycaller.com/2016/02/20/heres-where-the-2016-candidates-stand-on-nuclear-power/#ixzz40pvjfPza
1 This Month
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
of the week–London Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Tell the Ukrainian Government to Drop Prosecution of Peace Activist Yurii Sheliazhenko
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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