The week that has been in nuclear news

International relations seem to become ever more complicated and risky. Donald Trump says ” I probably have a very good relationship with Kim Jong Un”. It is really hard to make sense out of Trump’s utterances, and the climate of “new media” makes that all the more difficult, and dangerous. Donald Trump’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster thinks it’s about time to bomb North Korea. 17 former nuclear launch officers warn Congress about Trump’s power to destroy.

European powers urge US not to withdraw from Iran nuclear deal. If he did, it would certainly not help international efforts to persuade North Korea to cease its nuclear weapons drive.

The new media landscape allows Donald Trump’s lies and brutal language to be “normal“.

Time for new movies to raise awareness of nuclear bombing.

U.S. and Russia Race to Build Nuclear Weapons They Can Actually Use Against Each Other.

Accidental nuclear weapons launches could result from cyber attacks.

Fukushima Darkness: Radiation of Triple Meltdowns Felt Worldwide.

Atomic batteries, including plutonium pacemakers – not monitored.

USA.

Donald Trump’s mental health – a matter of public interest. Donald Trump’s national security adviser, H.R. McMaster thinks it’s about time to bomb North Korea. Donald Trump wants to kill the Iran nuclear deal – but not just yet. U.S. Secretary of State Tillerson to attend North Korea talks in Canada.- Former nuclear weapons launch officers call for restricting Trump’s access to ‘nuclear button’
Radiation problem so serious that Hanford Plutonium Plant demolition has been stopped.
USA’s Federal Energy Regulatory Commission makes a fact-based decision against subsidies for coal and nuclear power.
New Bill in USA Congress for compensation for sick nuclear workers.
USA Energy Dept must pay South Carolina $1million daily for MOX facility failure, and non removal of plutonium wastes. Connecticut lawmakers anxious about accumulating nuclear radioactive trash. Ticking Time Bomb at San Onofre Nuclear Plant.
– California regulators OK closing state’s last nuclear plant.
Will Trump allow irreparable damage to the Grand Canyon, and expand uneconomic uranium mining?
US Man Indicted for Allegedly Bribing Russian Nuclear Energy Official

NORTH KOREA. North and South Korea agree on Winter Olympics, but not on denuclearization. Chromosome defects found among N. Korean defectors who lived near nuke test site.

EUROPE. European civic leaders worried about dangers of nuclear facilities stationed near borders of their counties.

JAPAN. HELEN CALDICOTT: THE FUKUSHIMA NUCLEAR MELTDOWN CONTINUES UNABATED. Bill calling for “immediate halt” to Japan’s reliance on nuclear power. Regulator urges release of treated Fukushima radioactive water into sea. Experts anxious about lifting of Japan food ban.

CHINA. China becoming the global leader in renewable energy. China unlikely to go ahead with AREVA’s nuclear reprocessing plan, despite Macron’s support. China’s huge bunker for leaders to survive nuclear war

UK. Japanese and British taxpayers at risk as their governments commit to $20 billion loan for Wylfa nuclear project– Cumbria not the safest, nor cheapest, nor easiest place to bury UK’s nuclear waste. Westinghouse saved – nuclear industry must not be allowed to go belly up?- Nuclear Liability – UK government sets out new rules for ‘intermediate risks’. Protest opposing USA military use of Ireland’s Shannon Airport. UK Trident bomb base in Scotland has ‘significant’ radioactive waste problem.

RUSSIA. Putin fears that terrorists might attack nuclear power stations, using drones.

FRANCE. The troubled and exorbitantly expensive history of the EPR nuclear reactor.

BRAZIL. Armed raid on nuclear workers’ housing raises fears over Brazil’s two reactors.

1.This Month

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Gender and Radiation Impact Project

Tri-Valley CAREs – Communities Against a Radioactive Environment

What About the Ozone Hole | Global Weirding

Another glossy new nuclear film advertisement – “The New Fire”

Film review: ‘The New Fire’ and the old Gen IV rhetoric Author: Jim Green ‒ Nuclear Monitor editor NM866.4751, October 2018 The New Fire is a pro-nuclear propaganda film directed and produced by musician and film-maker David Schumacher.It’s similar in some respects to the 2013 film Pandora’s Promise.1,2 The New Fire premiere was held in October 2017 and it can be streamed online from 18 October 2018…..

The film includes interviews with around 30 people (an overwhelming majority of them male) interspersed with footage of interviewees walking into buildings, and interviewees smiling. The musical underlay is a tedious drone ‒ a disappointment given Schumacher’s musical background……..Interviewees are mostly aging but the film’s main message is that young entrepreneurs may save the planet and its inhabitants with their Generation IV reactor projects……..

These climate heroes are contrasted with anti-nuclear environmentalists. One interviewee says that “people of our generation are the first ones that have the opportunity to look at nuclear power without all the emotional baggage that previous generations have felt…..

Another interviewee attributes opposition to nuclear power to an “irrational fear of the unknown” (which surely poses a problem for the exotic Generation IV concepts promoted in the film) and another says that “once people sort of understand what’s going on withnuclear, they are much more open to it”.

The film trots out the usual anti-renewables tropes and falsehoods: 100% renewables is “just a fantasy”, renewables can contribute up to 20% of power supply and the remainder must be baseload: fossil fuels or nuclear power………

Accidents such as those at Fukushima and Chernobyl get in the news because they are “so unusual” according to interviewee Ken Caldeira. And they get in the news, he might have added, because of the estimated death tolls (in the thousands for Fukushima5, ranging to tens of thousands for Chernobyl6), the costs (around US$700 billion for Chernobyl7, and US$192 billion (and counting) for Fukushima8), the evacuation of 160,000 people after the Fukushima disaster and the permanent relocation of over 350,000 people after the Chernobyl disaster…….

Transatomic Power’s molten salt reactor concept The film spends most of its time promoting Generation IV reactor projects including Transatomic Power’s molten salt reactor (MSR) concept. [Ed note. recently failed and abandoned] .

Scott Nolan from venture capital firm Founders Fund says that Transatomic satisfies his four concerns about nuclear power: safety, waste, cost, proliferation. And he’s right ‒ Transatomic’s MSRs are faultless on all four counts, because they don’t exist. It’s doubtful whether they would satisfy any of the four criteria if they did actually exist……. https://nuclear-news.net/2018/10/01/another-nuclear-film-advertisement-the-new-fire/

EVENTS

November-December 2018 International Uranium Film Festival – U.S. Southwest tour

November 29th and 30th and December 1st, Navajo Nation Museum, Hwy 264 & Post Office Loop, Window Rock, Navajo Nation, AZ

December 2nd, Flagstaff, AZ

December 6th, Guild Cinema, 3405 Central Ave, Albuquerque, NM

December 7th, Grants, NM

December 9th, Jean Cocteau Cinema, 418 Montezuma Ave, Santa Fe, NM

PETITIONS

Tell Congress: Stop Trump from ordering a nuclear first strike without a Congressional declaration of war.

PREVENT UNNECESSARY RADIOACTIVE RISKS ACROSS THE USA NATION

Protect Idaho’s water. Stop nuclear waste.

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