Indigenous Fight Against Nuclear Colonialism – theme for July 16
Indigenous Fight Against Nuclear Colonialism
Indigenous people protest EPA’s nuclear plans
“Indian Point” New Documentary Investigates Nuclear Power from New York to Fukushima
New Documentary Investigates Nuclear Power from New York to Fukushima, Earth Island Journal BY ED RAMPELL – JULY 8, 2016 A Conversation with Indian Point Director Ivy Meeropol
“…………..The Brooklyn-born, Massachusetts-raised Meeropol’s absorbing, incisive, new documentary Indian Point investigates this 1960s-built nuclear power facility, which sits just 35 miles north of New York City and is currently working to relicense two of its reactors. It also probes the 2012 ousting of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s chairman, Gregory Jaczko, who was accused of bullying and intimidating employees, plus the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, triggered by a 2011 earthquake and tidal wave that caused meltdowns and the release of radioactive isotopes at the Japanese nuclear power plant.
The writer/director skillfully interweaves these three strands into a cohesive, comprehensive 94-minute tapestry exploring the controversial nuclear industry. In doing so, she evenhandedly interviews employees and executives of Entergy Corporation, which operates Indian Point, as well as activists opposing it. Her rare access enabled the intrepid filmmaker to enter both the Fukushima and New York facilities, allowing unusual insight into the inner workings, and politics, of the plants.
Like a cinematic sleuth, Meeropol doggedly pursued the different threads of the saga. If Woodward and Bernstein “followed the money” during Watergate, Meeropol followed the radiation, so to speak. In a balanced yet bold, unflinching way, Meeropol proves once again in Indian Point that the personal is political, and reveals that controversies swirling around nuclear power are anything but a tempest in a teapot……..
Your film has three main leitmotifs: Indian Point, Fukushima, and former NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko. Do you think that Jaczko was subjected to allegations about his treatment of employees and eventually left his position as chairman because he was too critical of the nuclear industry?
Yes, I do. I do. It was a confluence of events but they really raked him over the coals. This is a guy who self-admittedly says Fukushima changed how he viewed his job. He was a regulator who worked for a powerful industry and probably didn’t feel like he had a lot of power. Before Fukushima he bought into what the industry line was and what a lot of the NRC members believe, which is that a meltdown like Fukushima couldn’t happen.
Then when Fukushima happened, it changed the way he viewed his job. He became more of an activist chairman. He gathered the staff around him.
Much of what he was proposing wasn’t anything all that radical… He really was just trying to respond to Fukushima, to figure out what happened there and try to make sure it didn’t happen here in the US. Not the tsunami part — but the meltdown. He directed his staff to look closely at Fukushima and come up with recommendations for the NRC, which they did. The rest of the commissioners didn’t like it because — I’m totally convinced of this — they’re too close to the industry and knew it would cost the industry a lot to make the new changes and they weren’t going to do it.
I’m sure there was some real friction there, but the NRC blew it up into a different story, saying that Jaczko was a horrible boss and yelled at people. That he was an angry boss, he kept things from them, and he kept people out of meetings. When that didn’t really stick, the story became that he yelled at women staffers and made them cry. His staff, when he did resign, made this beautiful book for him, because they knew what he had been through and how he was really railroaded out of there.
I got to know him really well — he’s a gentle person, he’s not a tyrant. The NRC painted this picture of him but none of the allegations stuck in the end. The NRC’s Inspector General’s report came back with absolutely nothing on him. He’s unemployed now. ……..
I came out of there [Indian Point Nuclear Station] really, really respecting everyone who worked there and feeling better about it in some ways, but also ultimately feeling this is a dying industry. Especially now, with solar and wind, we don’t need it.
Well, those employees at the plant concerned with safety are literally on the frontlines.
Exactly………
In 2015, Indian Point was denied a permit to continue withdrawing water from the Hudson River, right?
Yes. Basically, the New York Department of Environmental Conservation decided after many years of looking at how the plant abuses the river that Indian Point should not be allowed a water permit because of the impact on the fish population. Water withdrawals just destroy too much fish larvae and disrupt the river’s aquatic life.
Indian Point Movie CLIP – Water (2016) – Documentary
Indian Point uses 1.5 billion gallons of water a day, sucked through the plant from the Hudson River, then spit back out, hotter — another way nuclear power plants affect the environment. Indian Point creates terrible pollution in the river and it’s destroying the river. The plant uses as much water in one day as everyone in New York City uses combined.
So the DEC denied the plant a water permit. It’s a great way to try and shut the plant down because the Nuclear Regulatory Commission requires plants to have a water permit from the state they operate in in order to get relicensed.
This is precedent-setting, because as far as I’m aware, at no other time has a plant been shut down because a water permit was denied. They haven’t done it yet. That’s why we’re so optimistic in the film, because the water permit denial could be the way the plant gets shut down. There’s a lot of momentum. New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, New York State, and the DEC are not giving up on shutting down the plant.
In the midst of all this, licenses for both reactors ran out, and they haven’t been renewed by the NRC, so Indian Point is operating the reactors without a license. [Indian Point reactors can continue operating without a license during the relicensing process. The plant has experience several difficulties this year, however, including two shutdowns of the Unit 2 reactor since late June.]……..
Indian Point will be theatrically released July 8 in New York at the Film Society of Lincoln Center and on July 22 in Los Angeles, and released on DVD Oct. 25. For more information, visit the Indian Point website. http://www.earthisland.org/journal/index.php/elist/eListRead/documentary_investigates_nuclear_power_new_york_to_fukushima/
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Mayors For Peace call on next US President and Congress to reduce nuclear weapons spending
There Are 15,000 Nuclear Weapons Still Posing an Intolerable Threat to Humanity
These mayors are trying to change that. The Nation By Mayor Frank Cownie, 8 July 16 The members of Mayors for Peace, an international organization of cities dedicated to eliminating nuclear weapons, are keenly aware that these devices were designed to wipe cities off the map. As the mayor of Des Moines, I can expect that my city is an unlikely target, but the same cannot be said for many of my counterparts. Cities around the world are utterly unprepared to respond to a catastrophe of that scale. Prevention is the only cure. Yet the presidential candidates have said little about how they would address the existential threat posed by nuclear weapons.
Motivated by growing concern about rising international tensions and a disquieting presidential campaign, the United States Conference of Mayors (USCM), at its recent annual meeting in Indianapolis, unanimously adopted a strong resolution put forward by members of Mayors for Peace, warning that “the nuclear-armed countries are edging ever closer to direct military confrontation in conflict zones around the world,” and calling on the next president of the United States “to pursue new diplomatic initiatives to lower tensions with Russia and China and to dramatically reduce U.S. and Russian nuclear stockpiles.”
The USCM is the nonpartisan association of American cities with populations over 30,000, and resolutions adopted at its annual meetings become official policy. The USCM has annually adopted resolutions introduced by Mayors for Peace since 2006. This resolution was cosponsored by 22 of my counterparts, including New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio and Washington, DC, Mayor Muriel Bowser. (See below for full list of sponsors.)
Cautioning that “more than 15,000 nuclear weapons, most orders of magnitude more powerful than the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombs, 94% held by the United States and Russia, continue to pose an intolerable threat to cities and humanity,” and that “the largest NATO war games in decades, involving 14,000 U.S. troops, and activation of U.S. missile defenses in Eastern Europe are fueling growing tensions between nuclear-armed giants,” the USCM resolution “calls on the next President of the United States, in good faith, to participate in or initiate…multilateral negotiations for the elimination of nuclear weapons as required by the 1970 Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.”
The resolution commends President Obama for visiting Hiroshima and concluding negotiations with Iran, but notes that “the Obama Administration has laid the groundwork for the United States to spend one trillion dollars over the next three decades to maintain and modernize its nuclear bombs and warheads, production facilities, delivery systems, and command and control,” and that “federal funds are desperately needed in our communities to build affordable housing, create jobs with livable wages, improve public transit, and develop sustainable energy sources.”
The USCM resolution “calls on the next President and Congress of the United States to reduce nuclear weapons spending to the minimum necessary to assure the safety and security of the existing weapons as they await disablement and dismantlement, and to redirect those funds to address the urgent needs of cities and rebuild our nation’s crumbling infrastructure.”……….
The full text of the resolution can be read here. https://www.thenation.com/article/there-are-15000-nuclear-weapons-still-posing-an-intolerable-threat-to-humanity/
America’s major taxpayer liability – the Department of Energy
How the Department of Energy became a major taxpayer liability http://www.cnbc.com/2016/07/05/how-the-department-of-energy-became-a-major-taxpayer-liability.html Mark Fahey | @marktfahey Wednesday, 6 Jul 2016 If you were to guess which government agency has had to pay out the most in court in recent years, the Department of Energy probably wouldn’t come to mind.
And according to the department itself, the bloodletting as far from over. The DOE has failed to make good on some of its most important contractual obligations for years, and its private partners have been collecting billions in damages.
The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 requires that the DOE dispose of nuclear waste being produced at civilian energy plants around the country, which in turn pay fees for a long-term storage facility. The department’s contracts with dozens of energy companies said it would start disposing of the waste in 1998.
The companies held up their end, feeding about $750 million into the Nuclear Waste Fund each year. But the department did not manage to set up any facility to receive the waste, forcing energy companies to store it themselves on-site.
All those partial breaches of contract haven’t come cheap. As of the end of 2015, the DOE has paid $5.3 billion for failing to fulfill its obligations, and even if it manages to start disposing of waste in the next 10 years, it could still be on the hook for nearly $24 billion in additional liability.
“Because the United States has no facility available to receive spent nuclear fuel (SNF) and high-level radioactive waste (HLW) under the Nuclear Waste Policy Act, it has been unable to begin disposal of SNF from utilities as required by the standard contract with utilities,” said a DOE spokesperson in an email. “Significant litigation claiming damages for partial breach of contract has ensued as a result of this delay.”
At the end of 2015, the DOE had settled 35 lawsuits and resolved 33 with judgments, with 19 cases pending, according to the Congressional Budget Office. A court ruling halted the collection of storage fees in 2014, but energy companies are still seeking to recoup the money they’re spending every year on waste storage. Even after settlements for back pay are reached, the department is usually required to reimburse those costs going forward.
The hang-up has been in finding a location for the centralized storage facility. For decades, Yucca Mountain in Nevada was the only location that could legally be considered, despite fierce opposition from state and local groups. The Obama administration eventually abandoned the site as “unworkable” in 2011.
At the recommendation of the administration’s Blue Ribbon Commission (BRC), the department is now pursuing a “consent-based” approach, meaning that the DOE will seek the approval of relevant communities before construction, rather than trying to force all of the country’s spent nuclear waste on a pre-decided site in Nevada.
“The administration concurs with the conclusion of the BRC that a fundamental flaw of the 1987 amendments to the NWPA was the imposition of a site for characterization,” wrote then-Energy Secretary Steven Chu in the department’s most recent guiding strategy document from January 2013. “In practical terms, this means encouraging communities to volunteer to be considered to host a nuclear waste management facility.”
The DOE plans to have a pilot interim storage facility by 2021, initially to accept waste from reactor sites that were shut down years ago. Limiting the government’s massive liabilities is a major focus of the department’s strategy, according to the document.
The question isn’t whether the DOE will continue to have to pay out an exorbitant amount of money, but just how exorbitant that sum will end up being. The department itself projects that its total liabilities based on previous payouts will ultimately come to $29 billion in 2015 dollars, but that’s assuming it manages to start accepting waste in the next decade.
Neither the Department of Energy nor the Department of Justice could provide a list of related judgments and settlements so far, and the DOE said an updated liability estimate will not be available until its fiscal 2016 financial report comes out later this year.
“The department is currently developing a consent-based siting process for storage and disposal of SNF [spent nuclear fuel] and HLW [high-level radioactive waste],” said the department spokesperson. “Since January, DOE has held a series of public meetings and received feedback on how best to develop this process.”
The energy industry does not seem optimistic about a quick solution. According to the Nuclear Energy Institute, the department’s total liabilities could stretch to more than $50 billion. But that’s a more pessimistic figure that assumes a “total default” by the DOE.
The DOE’s own documentation for the Yucca Mountain project forecasts that if it failed completely and waste had to stay at the current sites indefinitely, it would cost between $75 billion and $82 billion in 2015 dollars over the first 100 years (including the cost of decommissioning Yucca).
Jay Silberg, a prominent energy industry attorney, said his estimate for total liability is closer to the $50 billion figure.
“I think that number is going to bear out, because I unfortunately don’t have much faith that the government will do what they promised to do in 1982,” said Silberg. “We all hope they can get their act together, but whether that will actually happen and whether it will be at large enough scale to remove the fuel piled up on these sites, I don’t have a lot of confidence in that.”
Nuclear smuggling in Georgia
Georgia: Nuclear Smuggling Cases Raise Concern, Eurasianet July 8, 2016
Three incidents within the past six months involving the attempted smuggling of radioactive materials – uranium 235 and 238, and cesium 137 – are driving concerns about Georgia. Turkey was the materials’ presumed destination, some experts say…….
Officials are not commenting on precisely how the radioactive materials were transported to Georgia. ……Gedevanishvili and other Georgian officials sidestepped questions about the recent spate of arrests for transporting such materials. Unrest to the south of Turkey, in Syria and Iraq, would seem one possible contributing factor. Little doubt exists, however, that Turkey is smugglers’ ultimate destination……..http://www.eurasianet.org/node/79576
USA economy’s climate threat if Donald Trump’s energy plan adopted
 Trump’s energy plan poses climate threat to U.S. economy, Skeptical Science, 6 July 2016 by  Robert Kopp, Rutgers University Last December in Paris, the nations of the world agreed to an ambitious goal forgreenhouse gas emissions: to bring net emissions to zero in the second half of this century. Their objective: to limit global warming to 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius (2.7 to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial temperatures, or equivalently about 0.5 to 1.0°C (0.9 to 1.8°F) above the current global average temperature.The Paris Agreement set up a process by which countries commit to emissions targets and then, every five years, report on their progress and make increasingly stringent new commitments. Current national commitments, which lay out targets for the 2025-2030 time frame, aren’t enough to get us to the long-term goal. But the current commitments and the new process constitute a major step toward breaking the dangerous fossil fuel addiction of the last two centuries.
Market forces and public policy in the U.S. and around the world are already helping push the world away from carbon-intensive fuels and toward renewable energy. U.S. carbon dioxide emissions peaked in 2007, and it’s possible that Chinese emissions peaked in 2014. This market-led, policy-accelerated shift is making reduction goals more attainable than they seemed a decade ago. Donald Trump’s “America First” energy plan, outlined in May and focused on expanding fossil-fuel production, would reverse these advances. Trump has promised to “cancel” the Paris climate agreement and pledged to reopen coal mines – a pledge which, given the unfavorable economics of coal mining, he could fulfill only through a massive expansion of corporate welfare for coal companies. Backing out of the Paris Agreement would undermine U.S. leadership and stallgreenhouse gas reduction efforts around the world. And expanding production of coal could return us to the pathway of rapidly rising emissions that characterized the 2000s. The climate consequences of such a great leap backwards would be severe. Far from placing America first, they would threaten the health of Americans and of the American economy – not to mention people and economies throughout the world……….http://www.skepticalscience.com/trump-energy-plan-threat-us-economy.html |
Toxic vapors affecting Hanford nuclear workers – effort being made to limit this problem
Hanford nuclear contractor makes offer to cut vapor exposure, Bellingham Herald, 8 July 16
The contractor that operates radioactive waste storage tanks on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation has proposed that employees who move tank farm waste perform their shifts on nights and weekends to reduce exposure to chemical vapors, after dozens of employees said they were sickened from vapors associated with the tanks. BY NICHOLAS K. GERANIOS Associated Press SPOKANE, WASH.
The contractor that operates radioactive waste storage tanks on the Hanford Nuclear Reservation has proposed that employees who move tank farm waste perform their shifts on nights and weekends to reduce exposure to chemical vapors, after dozens of employees said they were sickened from vapors associated with the tanks.
Washington River Protection Solutions this week asked unions to approve making evenings, nights and weekends the standard shifts for employees who transport the waste and work close to waste tanks. The request came a month after union leaders demanded that work that could release vapors be limited at the sprawling facility during the day when many more employees are present.
More than 8,000 people work at Hanford, but only about 700 have jobs involving waste transport and regular tasks at the waste tanks. Tank farm work involving the movement of nuclear waste is suspected in the release of the non-radioactive chemical vapors.
More than 50 Hanford workers in recent months have sought medical examinations for possible exposure to chemical vapors. Some reported smelling suspicious odors and some experienced respiratory problems. Nearly all were cleared to return to work……….
Hanford for decades made plutonium for nuclear weapons, work that generated a massive inventory of nuclear waste that is stored in 177 underground tanks. The site is now dedicated to cleaning up the waste, a process expected to last decades and cost billions of dollars. WRPS is a contractor for the U.S. Department of Energy, which owns the Hanford site near Richland, Washington.
The union coalition had also asked management to supply air respirators for all work performed within the Hanford zones that contain steel-lined waste tanks. Some of the tanks are protected by single steel walls while newer ones have double walls.
Workers must already wear respirators while near the single-wall tanks known to emit vapors………http://www.bellinghamherald.com/news/article88411777.html#storylink=cpy
Britain’s nuclear submarines’ radioactive wastes will NOT be going to Scotland
Chapelcross site ruled out for nuclear submarine waste BBC News 8 July 2016 The Ministry of Defence has ruled out a Scottish site as a possible location to store waste from nuclear submarines.
Chapelcross near Annan was on a shortlist of five potential locations.
Capenhurst in Cheshire has been selected to store the nuclear components, with Aldermaston in Berkshire as a “fall back” option. The Scottish site was ruled out along with Sellafield in West Cumbria and Burghfield in Berkshire following public consultation…….
The nuclear components are from 18 redundant submarines and nine still in service.
The redundant Royal Navy submarines are currently stored afloat at Devonport in Plymouth and Rosyth in Fife, but cannot be dismantled until the reactor components have been removed.
The radioactive parts will be stored until after 2040, when the UK’s Geological Disposal Facility, for the permanent disposal of spent fuel and nuclear waste, is planned to come into operation……..http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-south-scotland-36745287
Old submarines’ nuclear waste – leaks – trash to be sent to North of England
Nuclear waste from scrapped Plymouth subs to be sent up country, Herald, UK WMNlynbarton July 08, 2016Radioactive fuel cells on a dozen disused nuclear submarines languishing in Plymouth are to be removed and taken to a site in the North of England for storage and eventual disposal.
The Ministry of Defence yesterday revealed the fate of the boats which are currently stationed at Devonport but said no date has yet been fixed for the process to begin
Defence Minister Philip Dunne said the highly toxic part of the decommissioned submarines would be removed at a date to be set.
“When submarines in the Royal Navy fleet reach the end of their lives, we need to dispose of them in a way that is safe, secure and environmentally sound,” he said………
It emerged last year that the ministry was spending £16million to store the vessels, with the ones in Plymouth having been taken out of service in 1994.
The MoD said it was working on a plan to safely dispose of the Reactor Pressure Vessels (RPV), the thick steel containers which weigh between 90-135 tonnes and held nuclear fuel when the reactors operated.
There have been a number of leaks of nuclear waste associated with the submarines based in Devonport.
*March 25, 2009: radioactive water escaped from HMS Turbulent while the reactor’s discharge system was being flushed.
*November 2008: 280 litres of water likely to have been contaminated with the radioactive isotope tritium, poured from a burst hose as it was being pumped from the submarine.
*October 2005: 10 litres of water leaked out as the main reactor circuit of HMS Victorious as it was being cleaned to reduce radiation.
*November 2002: Around ten litres of radioactive coolant leaked from HMS Vanguard……..In May this year, it was revealed extra radioactivity could be discharged into the atmosphere during the refit of a nuclear submarine at Devonport Dockyard.
Babcock’s Devonport Royal Dockyard Limited submitted an application for a variation to an environmental permit which covers operations on their Dockyard site in Plymouth.
If approved, the application will enable them to increase discharges of carbon-14 to the atmosphere during the refit of the Royal Navy submarine, HMS Vanguard…..http://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/disused-nuclear-submarines-at-devonport-will-be-broken-up-says-mod/story-29490710-detail/story.html
Generous subsidies proposed for Upstate New York nuclear plants
NY regulators propose generous Upstate nuclear subsidies By Tim Knauss | tknauss@syracuse.com SYRACUSE, N.Y. – State utility regulators today released a proposal to subsidize Upstate nuclear plants with annual payments totaling an estimated $482 million a year.
The proposal from the Public Service Commission staff seems likely to please nuclear plant operators, who say their facilities deserve subsidies for providing carbon-free power, and to infuriate anti-nuclear advocates who want more resources devoted to wind and solar.
The public has a brief window to comment — until July 18 – an indication that the PSC is likely to rule on the proposal at its Aug. 1 meeting.
Exelon Corp., which owns three of the four Upstate nuclear reactors, recently told the commission that the facilities might close unless subsidies were approved by September.
The proposal unveiled today recommends that the PSC sign 12-year agreements with nuclear operators, as Exelon had previously recommended.
The subsidies would be set administratively by the PSC. According to estimates provided in the proposal, the subsidies would start at $17.48 per megawatt-hour for the first two years and rise gradually to $29.15 per MWH in years 11 and 12.
At the expected combined output of 27.6 million MWH for the Upstate nukes, the total cost would be $482 million a year during the first two years, rising to $805 million per year for the final two years…….http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2016/07/ny_regulators_proposed_generous_upstate_nuclear_subsidies.html
Court reject nuclear company EOn’s claim for compensation
Court rejects EOn’s compensation claim, World Nuclear News, 5 July 16 A regional court in Hannover has ruled that EOn is not entitled to €382 million ($426 million) in compensation it sought for the forced shut down of its Isar 1 and Unterweser nuclear power units in 2011……The court’s ruling echoes that of a decision in April by a regional court in Bonn to throw out a similar compensation claim by EnBW for the shutdown of its Neckarwestheim 1 and Phillipsburg 1 units in the state of Baden-Würtemberg. That court ruled the utility, which also filed its lawsuit in 2014, had not used immediately “all legal means available” to avert the consequences of the forced shut down of its nuclear power units.
EnBW had sought compensation of €261 million, citing German court decisions in 2013 and 2014 in favour of rival utility RWE, which had sued for damages of €235 million against the forced closure of its Biblis reactor immediately after the moratorium.http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/C-Court-rejects-EOns-compensation-claim-0507164.html
America’s aggressive $1 Trillion Nuclear Weapons Plan
The Doomsday Forum”: Senior Military, Nuclear Weapons Officials Convene… America’s “$1 Trillion Nuclear Weapons Plan”. Take out Russia, Iran and North Korea? By Prof Michel Chossudovsky Global Research, July 08, 2016 On June 21, 250 top military brass, military planners, corporate military-industrial ”defense” contractors, top officials and scientists from the nuclear weapons laboratories as well as prominent academics gathered at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Albuquerque, New Mexico to discuss, debate and promote the Pentagon’s One Trillion Dollar Nuclear Weapons program.
Russia is threatening the Western World. The objective is to develop the pre-emptive use of nuclear weapons (i.e. nuclear war as a means of self-defense).
The event organized by “The Strategic Deterrent Coalition” (a non profit organization) was funded by Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Orbital ATK, BAE Systems among other generous donors.
Among the main speakers (see program here) were Adm. Cecil Haney, Commander of the US Strategic Command (STRATCOM), Lt. Gen. Jack Weinstein, Dep. USAF Chief of Staff for Nuclear Integration, Gen. Robin Rand, Commander, Air Force Global Strike Command, Gen. (ret.) Frank Klotz, Administrator, National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA), as well senior officials from America’s top weapons labs including Sandia, Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore. Representatives from the UK, Canada, Denmark and the Republic of Korea (ROK) were also in attendance……..
Propaganda: Sensitizing “Top Officials”
The SDC’s “educational endeavor” largely consists in building a consensus in favor of pre-emptive nuclear war (within the Armed Forces, the science labs, the nuclear industry, etc). It’s is a form of “internal propaganda” intended for senior decision makers (Top Officials) within the military as well as the weapons industry. The emphasis is “building peace” and “global security” through the “pre-emptive” deployment of nukes (Air, Land and Sea) against four designated “rogue” countries, which allegedly are threatening the Western World.
The debate was coupled with veiled threats pointing to the possible use of nuclear warheads on a first strike basis against Russia, North Korea and Iran:……
Hillary Clinton –whose election campaign is also supported by Lockheed Martin, Northrup Grumman et al favors the first strike use of nuclear weapons:
… “the nuclear option should not at all be taken off the table. That has been my position consistently.” (ABC News, December 15, 2015)
“I want the Iranians to know that if I’m president, we will attack Iran. In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them.” (ABC “Good Morning America.”, quoted by Reuters, April 22, 2008)
The World is at a dangerous crossroads. A new arms race has been launched. It’s planning horizon is thirty years. The money allocated by the US federal government to the development of America’s pre-emptive nuclear war arsenal is of the order of one trillion dollars, that is the preliminary estimate, an astronomical amount (which could be increased):…..
The nuclear weapons plan constitutes a multibillion dollar bonanza, ironically, for the military industrial contractors which generously financed the Symposium: ”…Air Force nuclear weapons replacements and upgrades are expected to cost hundreds of billions of dollars. Much of that money would go to the sponsors of this symposium.”
This important event –which consists in building a consensus in favor of a possible first strike pre-emptive US nuclear attack against Russia, China, Iran and North Korea– has barely been covered by the mainstream media….http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-doomsday-forum-senior-military-nuclear-weapons-officials-convene-americas-1-trillion-nuclear-weapons-plan/5534549
Japan joins the crowd marketing nuclear reactors to Britain
Japan Atomic Power to join Hitachi’s nuclear plant business in Britain http://www.japantimes.
co.jp/news/2016/07/07/business/corporate-business/japan-atomic-power-join-hitachis-nuclear-plant-business-britain/#.V39eRdJ97GhJapan Atomic Power Co. will join Hitachi Ltd.’s nuclear power plant business in Britain, informed sources said Thursday.
The two companies will soon sign a cooperation agreement to make Japan Atomic Power the first Japanese power supplier to take part in an overseas nuclear power plant business in full scale.
Japan Atomic Power will become part of a project to build nuclear reactors in Britain, which is undertaken by Horizon Nuclear Power Ltd., a Hitachi unit in Britain, possibly engaging in licensing procedures for reactor construction.
Japan Atomic Power hopes that overseas operations will become a new source of revenue at a time when its nuclear reactors in Japan have been suspended following the 2011 core meltdowns at Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc.’s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.
Hitachi, which has no experience as a nuclear plant operator, asked for Japan Atomic Power’s cooperation over the British project.
FPL has delayed construction plans of two new nuclear generators at Turkey Point
FPL’s plan to not charge customers $22 million in fees is approved, Miami Herald
FPL has delayed construction plans of two new nuclear generators at Turkey Point
The $22 million in fees is money FPL is permitted to collect for planning and construction of nuclear plants
Because of the construction delay, the utility doesn’t want to collect the fees in 2017
BY MARY ELLEN KLAS Herald/Times Tallahassee Bureau TALLAHASSEE , 8 July 16
The Florida Public Service Commission on Wednesday unanimously approved a request from Florida Power & Light to take a one-year break from charging customers in advance for planning and construction of its proposed new nuclear power plant.
The decision is expected to save customers $22 million in nuclear cost recovery fees that regulators typically approve to allow the company FPL to charge for planning and construction of the company’s proposed nuclear units at its Turkey Point site on Biscayne Bay. Since 2008, FPL has charged customers $282 million in advance for the construction, under the advanced nuclear cost recovery fee it helped to push through the Legislature in 2006……..
The decision to stop charging customers follows the decision by FPL to delay nuclear construction. After eight years of planning, FPL announced in April it was postponing construction on units 6 and 7 of its nuclear fleet until at least 2020. It said, however, it would continue to pursue a federal license that would clear the way for construction. The company has yet to receive federal approval to construct the plant.
The delay means two next-generation reactors initially projected to go online as early as 2018 and 2020 likely would not fire up for perhaps another decade. http://www.miamiherald.com/news/business/article88228052.html
Hinkley nuclear costs now estimated at £37bn
Estimated cost of Hinkley Point C nuclear plant rises to £37bn Critics point to volatility of scheme but energy department says price ‘will not affect bill payers’, Guardian, Terry Macalister, 8 July 16, The total lifetime cost of the planned Hinkley Point C nuclear power plant could be as high as £37bn, according to an assessment published by the UK government. The figure was described as shocking by critics of the scheme, who said it showed just how volatile and uncertain the project had become, given that the same energy department’s estimate 12 months earlier had been £14bn.
The latest prediction comes amid increasing speculation about the future of the controversial project in Somerset, whose existence has been put in further doubt by post-Brexit financial jitters.
Hinkley has been a flagship energy project for the British government and in particular for the chancellor, George Osborne, who lobbied hard and successfully for China to take a stake in the scheme…….
Critics of the scheme have claimed that the fall in the value of the pound since the referendum vote will increase the costs of the scheme to EDF’s French contractors, who work in euros………. the EDF staff council last month began legal action to try to force the company to release documents relating the project, including all the contracts it had signed with the British government and its co-investor, the Chinese utility CGN.
The fall in power prices in the UK and continental Europe that has influenced the latest lifetime cost assessment for Hinkley is also responsible for some of the financial difficulties at EDF.
There have also been suggestions that Chinese investors are becoming more nervous about Hinkley and are demanding more concessions from EDF, so that more Chinese project managers and suppliers are involved. EDF has denied this. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jul/07/hinkley-point-c-nuclear-plant-costs-up-to-37bn
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5 January -Webinar-What is Trump’s Golden Dome?
REGISTER AT Massachusetts Peace Action Education
New book – https://www.amazon.com/dp/1923372157?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Now until to February 10, 2026 Radioactive waste storage in France: the debate is finally open! How to participate?
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