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NASA will allow plutonium powered spacecraft – reversing previous policy prohibiting this dangerous system

NASA to allow nuclear power systems for next Discovery mission, Space News by Jeff Foust — WASHINGTON — Citing progress in producing plutonium-238, NASA will allow scientists proposing missions for an upcoming planetary science competition to use nuclear power sources.

In a statement issued March 17, Jim Green, director of NASA’s planetary science division, said the agency was reversing an earlier decision prohibiting the use of radioisotope power systems for spacecraft proposed for the next mission in the agency’s Discovery program.

A “long-range planning information” announcement about plans for the competition, issued Dec. 12, said that the use of such power systems would not be allowed, although missions could use radioisotope heater units, which use a very small amount of plutonium to keep spacecraft elements warm.

NASA made that decision based on projected use of existing stocks of plutonium-238 for upcoming missions, such as the Mars 2020 rover. Dragonfly, one of the two finalists for the next New Frontiers medium-class planetary science mission, also plans to use a radioisotope power system, as well as potential future missions the moon that require nuclear power to operate through the two-week lunar night.

“We have some liens against the radioisotope power,” Green said at a Feb. 21 meeting of NASA’s Planetary Science Advisory Group, citing those upcoming missions. The agency, he said, needed to balance mission demands against existing stocks of plutonium and efforts currently ramping up to produce new supplies of the isotope, which should reach a goal of 1.5 kilograms a year by around 2022. “The last thing we want to do is to select a mission and then not be ready to fly it.”

At the time of the meeting last month, though, Green said the agency was reviewing the prohibition against using nuclear power for the Discovery competition at the request of the scientific community, but didn’t offer a schedule for completing that review……. http://spacenews.com/nasa-to-allow-nuclear-power-systems-for-next-discovery-mission/

 

March 21, 2018 Posted by | technology, USA | Leave a comment

MP wants to stop Britain’s supplying of weapons grade nuclear materials to Russia

MP calls for sanctions on nuclear materials trade, Cambrian Newsby Alex Jones – Meirionnydd, Arfon & Dwyfor reporter @alexj_cn  alexj@cambrian-news.co.uk  

DWYFOR Meirionnydd’s MP has challenged the prime minister about nuclear materials following the suspected attempted murder of a former Russian double agent and his daughter.

Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia were in Salisbury earlier this month when both were found in a critical condition on a public bench.

It has since transpired that both had been inflicted with a nerve agent which has left both, and a police officer who attended, fighting for their lives.

The incident has sparked a marked decline in UK and Russian relations.

It has been suggested that Russian involvement was “the only plausible explanation” but the Kremlin has denied responsibility.

In a meeting in the House of Commons last week, Theresa May gave an update on the situation, prompting MP Liz Saville Roberts to challenge the Prime Minister regarding trade of nuclear materials with the former Cold War adversary.

Mrs Saville Roberts said: “Alongside many colleagues in the House, I speak on behalf of my party in calling for a robust and immediate response.

“Sources inform us that Russia is the UK’s biggest weapons-grade nuclear substances export market, despite several attempts at a moratorium on depleted uranium by the European Parliament and the United Nations.

“Will the Prime Minister confirm whether the UK is still exporting nuclear substances to Russia?

“If so, surely this should be among the very first sanctions imposed?”……..http://www.cambrian-news.co.uk/article.cfm?id=119768&headline=MP%20calls%20for%20sanctions%20on%20nuclear%20materials%20trade&sectionIs=news&searchyear=2018

March 21, 2018 Posted by | politics, UK | Leave a comment

How a scientist studying earthquakes spent his career working to prevent nuclear explosions,

This earthquake expert dodged Russian surveillance to try to halt nuclear testing , How a scientist studying earthquakes spent his career working to prevent nuclear explosions, The Verge By Rachel Becker  

At 5AM on a June morning in 1974, seismologist Lynn Sykes awoke to a phone call from the Department of Defense. The voice on the other end of the line asked Sykes to be ready to leave for Moscow that evening. The DoD needed his help to negotiate a treaty that would cap the size of the US and Russia’s underground nuclear explosions.

Sykes, now a professor emeritus at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, was invited because of his unusual expertise. Sure, he was an expert on earthquakes. But he was also an expert on underground nuclear explosions, which — like earthquakes — can send vibrations ringing through the Earth. So the same devices that monitor and measure quakes can do double duty as secret nuclear test sensors.

In his new book, Silencing the Bomb: One Scientist’s Quest to Halt Nuclear Testing, Sykes chronicles his efforts to end explosive nuclear testing. When Sykes visited Russia in 1974, nuclear testing in the atmosphere, underwater, and space had already been banned by the Limited Test Ban Treaty signed in 1963 — the result of public pushback against the perils of radioactive fallout.

But there was an ongoing debate about whether it was possible to tell the size of an underground nuclear explosion from the seismic wiggles picked up by monitoring stations. If there were no sure way to check if someone was cheating on the deal, then neither the US nor Russia wanted to stop underground tests altogether. That’s why Sykes was in Russia: to confirm that detecting underground tests was scientifically possible, and to help negotiate a treaty that would limit underground nuclear tests to 150 kilotons or less.

The negotiations were a success, and President Richard Nixon and Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev signed the treaty about a month later. But the quest for a complete ban on nuclear testing continues. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which would ban all nuclear tests of all sizes, was finalized in 1996. But the US, China, Iran, and North Korea still need to ratify it in order for the treaty to enter into force.

March 21, 2018 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

New plan for fracking method of isolating nuclear wastes

This Father-Daughter Team Says It Has a Cheaper, Safer Way to Bury Nuclear Waste,  Startup Deep Isolation wants to use fracking tech to drill horizontal disposal tunnels a mile below the Earth’s surface.  Bloomberg  By Ashlee Vance, 20 March 18  Richard and Elizabeth Muller have come up with one of the more unusual father-daughter businesses in recent memory. On March 20 they announced a startup called Deep Isolation that aims to store nuclear waste much more safely and cheaply than existing methods. The key to the technology, according to the Mullers, is to take advantage of fracking techniques to place nuclear waste in 2-mile-long tunnels, much deeper than they’ve been before—a mile below the Earth’s surface, where they’ll be surrounded by shale. “We’re using a technique that’s been made cheap over the last 20 years,” says Richard, a famed physicist and climate change expert. “We could begin putting this waste underground right away.”

…….. The U.S. has about 80,000 tons of nuclear waste, mostly sitting at about 70 sites, in aboveground water pools.
……….With each passing year, the U.S. produces an additional 2,000 tons of nuclear waste, and the total is already more than Yucca Mountain was meant to hold. While President Trump has sought a modest $120 million to restart the program, Congress has made clear it’s not going to broach the subject in an election year. “It’s quite a serious problem,” says Rodney Ewing, a Stanford professor of geological sciences who specializes in nuclear security. “As a country, we seem to not be paying attention to the obvious difficulties we have with the waste.”
Nuclear waste experts have contemplated deep-drilling for half a century, mostly by proposing to bore straight down into granite and crystalline rock. But tests of these techniques haven’t gotten very far, being blocked, on occasion, by the public. These approaches have been deemed costly and possibly unsafe, because stacking containers on top of one another puts so much weight on the bottom drums. The Mullers say it’s much cheaper and safer to drill horizontal tunnels, and to do so in shale. They can fit the typical waste canisters (each 1 foot in diameter and 14 feet long) quickly and safely into shale tunnels, they say, given advances in fracking equipment. “Drilling the holes takes a couple weeks at most,” says Elizabeth.
…….. It’d be best to keep the tunnels close to existing nuclear waste sites, the Mullers say. The U.S. is so shale-rich that the waste disposal tunnels could be placed near nuclear production sites, so no hauling of waste would be required. The boreholes would also be much deeper than something like Yucca, vastly reducing the chance of radioactive waste leaking into the water supply. “The goal is to get this stuff out of the biosphere, and the farther down you go, the less things change,” Elizabeth says. “The waste will have 1 billion tons of rock on top of it and be in shale that has held methane gas and other volatiles for tens to hundreds of millions of years. Things don’t leak out.” Also, unlike at Yucca, machines could handle all the tunnel work, says Richard: “We’re cheaper because we remove a lot less dirt and don’t put people underground.”
The elder Muller first made his name dealing with radiation much farther away. As a professor at the University of California at Berkeley and senior scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Richard did that pioneering research on dark energy and cosmic radiation, including work on projects that eventually earned Nobel Prizes. After he and Elizabeth co-founded Berkeley Earth, a nonprofit that measures global temperature and climate change, he went from being one of the most prominent global warming doubters to one of the loudest voices confirming that climate change is real and caused by humans.
…….. Before the Mullers can drill any holes in shale, they have massive challenges to overcome. Stanford’s Ewing says Deep Isolation will likely struggle to persuade dozens of communities to accept having a long-term nuclear waste site nearby and to persuade the government to let commercial companies tackle the problem.  The two have drafted federal legislation that could lead to private nuclear waste disposal. “The government might allow this,” says Allison Macfarlane, former chair of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. “The real question is whether such a small startup company would have the resources to go through the licensing over such a long time period.”……..https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-20/this-father-daughter-team-says-it-has-a-cheaper-safer-way-to-bury-nuclear-waste

March 21, 2018 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Over 15 miles of piping at former uranium enrichment facility to be monitored by robots

Pipe-crawling robot will help decommission DOE nuclear facility, Radiation-measuring robots go where humans cannot Science Daily 

Date:
March 20, 2018
Source:
Carnegie Mellon University
Summary:
A pair of autonomous robots will soon be driving through miles of pipes at the US Department of Energy’s former uranium enrichment plant in Piketon, Ohio, to identify uranium deposits on pipe walls.

A pair of autonomous robots developed by Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute will soon be driving through miles of pipes at the U.S. Department of Energy’s former uranium enrichment plant in Piketon, Ohio, to identify uranium deposits on pipe walls.

The CMU robot has demonstrated it can measure radiation levels more accurately from inside the pipe than is possible with external techniques. In addition to savings in labor costs, its use significantly reduces hazards to workers who otherwise must perform external measurements by hand, garbed in protective gear and using lifts or scaffolding to reach elevated pipes.

DOE officials estimate the robots could save tens of millions of dollars in completing the characterization of uranium deposits at the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon, and save perhaps $50 million at a similar uranium enrichment plant in Paducah, Kentucky.

…….. Shuttered since 2000, the plant began operations in 1954 and produced enriched uranium, including weapons-grade uranium. With 10.6 million square feet of floor space, it is DOE’s largest facility under roof, with three large buildings containing enrichment process equipment that span the size of 158 football fields. The process buildings contain more than 75 miles of process pipe.Finding the uranium deposits, necessary before DOE decontaminates, decommissions and demolishes the facility, is a herculean task. In the first process building, human crews over the past three years have performed more than 1.4 million measurements of process piping and components manually and are close to declaring the building “cold and dark.”

“With more than 15 miles of piping to be characterized in the next process building, there is a need to seek a smarter method,” said Rodrigo V. Rimando, Jr., director of technology development for DOE’s Office of Environmental Management……….https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/03/180320084315.htm

March 21, 2018 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Japanese Court sides with power company over Oma nuclear plant

Court sides with power company over Oma nuclear plant http://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/AJ201803190056.html, By KAZUKI NUNOTA/ Staff Writer, March 19, 2018   HAKODATE, Hokkaido–A court in northern Japan on March 19 dismissed a lawsuit to halt construction of a nuclear power plant in Aomori Prefecture on grounds there was no realistic possibility of a serious accident occurring.

Electric Power Development Co. (J-Power) is overseeing construction of the Oma nuclear plant in Oma, across the sea from Hakodate.

The facility is undergoing screening by the Nuclear Regulation Authority to ensure it meets new safety standards imposed after the 2011 Fukushima disaster.

Presiding Judge Chikako Asaoka at the Hakodate District Court said in her ruling, “At the moment, it is difficult to readily recognize the tangible danger of a grave accident likely to occur at the plant.”

The lawsuit focused on whether an active seismic fault existed in the seabed near the construction site, the dangers posed by the possibility of volcanic eruptions in the area and concerns about using only mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel, consisting of plutonium and uranium, as nuclear fuel.

The suit was filed in July 2010 by a group of 1,000 or so plaintiffs.

March 21, 2018 Posted by | Japan, legal | Leave a comment

UK Conservatives – inconsistent, incoherent, policy – agreeing to Russia’s involvement in UK’s nuclear power development

Times 18th March 2018, Ed Davey: Vladimir Putin’s ambitions have been evident for some time, but
the Conservatives’ position has long been incoherent and inconsistent.
During the coalition years, the Conservatives seemed torn between the
national security evidence of the country’s wrongdoings and the billions
of roubles it had to invest.

Russian industrial investment plans would
never have stood up to the sort of detailed scrutiny we gave to Chinese
ones. I was particularly astonished when David Cameron agreed to Putin’s
request that the Russian state nuclear power company, Rosatom, be
introduced to the UK’s civil nuclear power market and develop an
international consortium with Rolls-Royce.

It was left to the Lib Dems to insist of downgrading this to a simpler, meaningless memorandum of
understanding. I was gobsmacked that even after Putin’s annexation of
Crimea, the prime minister clung on to the idea — even as we searched
around for sanctions to impose.  https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/former-energy-minister-ed-davey-tories-position-on-russia-is-incoherent-and-inconsistent-fhnvfkmgp

March 21, 2018 Posted by | politics international, UK | Leave a comment

Japan-led Turkish nuclear plant project mired in cost overruns. 

Nikkei Asian Review 18th March 2018   Another
setback looms for Tokyo’s infrastructure export drive. A Japan-led nuclear
power plant project in Turkey looks to cost more than twice as much as
initially projected, highlighting challenges for Tokyo’s push to export
Japanese infrastructure.

The Japanese and Turkish governments agreed on the
public-private project in 2013. The estimated total cost, pegged at around
2 trillion yen ($18.8 billion at current rates) at the time, has since
ballooned to more than 5 trillion yen, according to sources close to the
matter, due largely to the need to meet tougher safety standards
implemented after the March 2011 meltdowns at Tokyo Electric Power Co.
Holdings’ Fukushima Daiichi plant.

The plan is to build four reactors with
a total output of 4,500 megawatts in the Black Sea coastal city of Sinop,
using Atmea1 reactors Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is developing
with France’s Areva.

Though the goal is to put the first reactor into
service in 2023, in time for Turkey’s centennial, the cost problem could
cause that date to slip.

Japan views nuclear power as an integral part of
efforts to export infrastructure around the world. As Mitsubishi Heavy and
the others hash out the Turkish project, a group led by Hitachi is putting
the finishing touches on plans to build two nuclear reactors in the U.K.,
on the Welsh coast.

Yet the Fukushima accident still casts long shadows
over the nuclear industry, and hurdles are growing higher. Vietnam has
cancelled orders for Japanese nuclear facilities amid financial concerns
and local opposition. Partly because of the rising cost of safety measures,
the financial risks of building nuclear plants abroad have grown too large
for companies alone to bear.

So Japan’s government has stepped in with
public financing and other aid, eager to support infrastructure exports,
which it considers a key economic growth strategy. Pursuing projects abroad
is in effect the only way for such companies as Mitsubishi Heavy and
Hitachi to maintain and profit from their nuclear technologies.

All nuclear power plants in Japan halted operations in the years after the Fukushima
disaster, and only a few have been approved to restart. Expanding plants or
building new ones is likewise difficult.
https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics-Economy/Economy/Japan-led-Turkish-nuclear-plant-project-mired-in-cost-overruns

March 21, 2018 Posted by | business and costs, Japan, politics | Leave a comment

Senator wants U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry for details on funding for proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump

Cortez Masto seeks details on Yucca spending since Trump’s election, The Nevada Independent, Humberto Sanchez , March 19th, 2018 , Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto has called on Energy Secretary Rick Perry to provide details on how the White House would spend funds requested for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, as well as how money has been spent since President Donald Trump was elected.

In a letter to Perry dated Monday, Cortez Masto, an opponent of the controversial project, noted that while the president has requested $120 million in both of his fiscal year (FY) 2018 and 2019 budget blueprints, with regard to the Department of Energy (DOE), neither of the budget documents provides a detailed account of how funding will be, or has been, spent.

“The FY 2019 Budget Justification, like the FY 2018 Budget Justification, provides little meaningful information on how DOE would actually spend these funds to participate in U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing activities for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository,” the letter said. “Moreover, neither of these budget documents provide any information on DOE expenditures from the Nuclear Waste Fund for Yucca Mountain activities during FY 2017 and FY2018.”

Cortez Masto wants Perry to disclose what the unobligated balances were in DOE’s Defense Nuclear Waste Disposal and Nuclear Waste Disposal accounts at the beginning of FY 2017, which started on Oct. 1, 2016, as well as for FY 2018.

She also wants to know how much was spent from these accounts during FY 2017 and 2018 for Yucca licensing activities; pension fund and related obligations for retired Yucca Mountain workers; administration of the Nuclear Waste Fund, financial audits; investment guidance; maintenance of records and technical and scientific information, including preservation and security of geologic samples. ……..https://thenevadaindependent.com/article/cortez-masto-seeks-details-on-yucca-spending-since-trumps-election

 

March 21, 2018 Posted by | politics, USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Don’t let Idaho become the transportation hub for radioactive material

  http://magicvalley.com/opinion/letters/letter-don-t-let-idaho-become-the-transportation-hub-for/article_69ca6d43-c8bd-52d5-a7c4-1bb00edf7174.html  Donna Pence   What is it that Governors Andrus and Batt knew that current state officials seem to not understand concerning highly radioactive material entering Idaho? Could it be these gentlemen were more concerned about the people of Idaho than the money entering the state through the Department of Energy? I was disturbed, but not surprised, when I read that the DOE now wants our state to become the transportation hub for highly radioactive nuclear waste from all around the country. This will include nearly 50 million gallons from the Hanford site in the state of Washington. This hazardous material will need to be transported by rail or truck through southern Idaho to its destination at the Idaho Nuclear Laboratory (INL) in eastern Idaho. I still remember when Governor Andrus placed a blockade at the Idaho border to stop such shipments because of the risk to the public should an accident occur.

 
The existence of the Magic Valley depends on the viability of its water resources both from the Snake River and the Eastern Snake Plain Aquifer (ESPA). An “accidental” spill from waste entering or being stored for processing at the INL could place our way of life at extreme risk. Many people don’t understand the interaction between the river and the aquifer. If one water source is contaminated so is the other. The INL is situated directly above the ESPA, our most valuable resource. Without it, life could not exist in a large part of our region. Once contamination hits the many springs flowing into the Snake River from above and below American Falls Reservoir, much of the irrigation on the north and south sides of the Snake would be unusable, not to mention those waters downstream from Magic Valley. Remember the adage “Trust me, I’m from the government and I’m here to help.”

March 21, 2018 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Finland’s nuclear power plant’s price tag – at least $11 billion

Costlier Than Pyramids: Finnish NPP Becomes World’s Second-Priciest Building, Sputnik News
EUROPE 19.03.2018 

The Finnish Olkiluoto-3 nuclear reactor has been touted as the “flagship of European nuclear energy,” but has taken more than a decade to complete and cost the Nordic nation an arm and a leg.

When completed, the third reactor at Finland’s Olkiluoto nuclear power plant will have the distinction of being the world’s second most expensive building, higher than that of a number of luxury hotels, sports arenas, skyscrapers and even pyramids, Finnish national broadcaster Yle reported.

With a breathtaking price tag of €8.5 billion ($11 billion), Olkiluoto-3 is expected to be finished in 2019, 14 years after the start of the construction. For the sake of comparison, the Cheops Pyramid, the largest of the pyramids at Giza, took about 20 years to build. However, construction of the 4,500-year-old pyramid turned to be far more efficient, as it was built over roughly the same period of time and without access to modern technology. Also, its cost in today’s money has been estimated at only €4 billion ($4.9), half the Olkiluoto price tag.

To offer a more modern building for comparison, New York’s replacement One World Trade Center cost an estimated $3.8 billion to build. …….https://sputniknews.com/europe/201803191062679754-finland-npp-price/

 

March 21, 2018 Posted by | business and costs, Finland | Leave a comment

Nuclearization and the public’s need to know

 The Hill Times By MILAN ILNYCKYJ, PETER H. RUSSELL      MAR. 19, 2018  The consequences of any large-scale nuclear attack are also now known. Unlike weapons tested in remote regions those targeted, as Russia’s and the U.S.’s are, on cities will inject masses of soot into the upper atmosphere dimming the sun for years with severe consequences for agriculture. Nuclear winter could result in omnicide: the extinction of most living creatures, including humankind.

TORONTO—For matters states keep secret, history unfolds in onion layers as memoirs are written and documents are declassified. This matter should be remembered when interpreting the world’s cautious relief about possible talks on denuclearization by Donald Trump and Kim Jung Un. These new accounts of possessing nuclear weapons make it nuclear that a nuclear detonation can arise as plausibly from a tool dropped in a silo as from a deliberate act of policy and that nuclear war is…….(subscribers only) https://www.hilltimes.com/2018/03/19/nuclearization-publics-need-know/137667

March 21, 2018 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Fukushima Mother Calls at UN Rights Body Hearing for Full Implementation of “Fukushima Recommendations” by the Japanese Government

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Mother calls for full implementation of “Fukushima recommendations” at UN rights body hearing
GENEVA, March 19 (Xinhua) — The UN Human Rights Council (HRC) on Monday adopted the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) outcome of Japan, but a mother from the Fukushima area pleaded at the hearing for the Japanese government to take measures to fully implement the “Fukushima recommendations.”
“The Japanese government has been ignoring people who want to avoid radiation,” Akiko Morimatsu, a mother, and evacuee from Koriyama in Fukushima, told the HRC.
Seven years after the meltdown of three reactors at Fukushima Daiichi, owned by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) after a massive earthquake hit Japan, the accident is still ongoing, as was recently admitted by Japan’s nuclear regulator, Greenpeace told the HRC.
The NGO said that its radiation investigations in Fukushima recently reported on the high levels of radiation that evacuees will be exposed to if they were to return to their homes.
It said this will pose an unacceptable risk for 40-100 years or more depending on the level of contamination.
At the UPR the Japanese government accepted UN recommendations to provide essential financial, housing and medical support for self-evacuees.
Yet in 2017 the government removed as many as 29,000 Fukushima citizens from the official record as self-evacuees and terminated housing support, said Greenpeace.
Morimatsu, is one of those who was “disappeared by the government,” said Greenpeace.
“I thank United Nation member states for defending the rights of Fukushima citizens and I call on you to continue to help all the victims and evacuees of nuclear disasters and to protect the people of Fukushima and East Japan, especially children, from radiation exposure,” said Morimatsu.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-03/20/c_137050961.htm
 
Fukushima evacuee asks for support at UN
A Japanese woman who evacuated Fukushima after the 2011 nuclear accident has called for international support at the United Nations Human Rights Council.
Akiko Morimatsu delivered a speech at the Council in Geneva on Monday. She moved to Osaka with her 2 children after the accident.
Morimatsu criticized the Japanese government for focusing only on policies that encourage former residents to return to the affected areas.
She called on the international community for support to protect children from further radiation exposure.
A Japanese official said the government will do all it can to expedite reconstruction, keeping in mind that those affected still face difficulty in their daily lives.
The Human Rights Council recommended last November that Japan should continue to support affected residents and voluntary evacuees, in line with requests from Germany and other member states.
The Japanese government says it accepts Council recommendations related to the accident. But it also says it has been providing necessary support in accordance with laws.
https://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/en/news/20180320_06/

March 20, 2018 Posted by | Fukushima 2018 | , , | Leave a comment

A message from Ms. Akiko Morimatsu, an evacuee from Fukushima

Ms. Akiko Morimatsu, an evacuee from Fukushima, sent a message to citizens who live near a nuclear power plant.
“–What is the hardest thing for you, seven years after the evacuation?
 
The hardest thing is being exposed to low-level radiation. It does not cause any immediate symptoms. It has no color and no odor. It does not cause pain; you do not feel hot or itchy. If you could feel the effects of nuclear exposure, it would be lethal. In Fukushima, when you are facing a low-level radiation exposure, none of the five senses can detect it. Therefore, it’s possible to get the impression that you are not affected by radioactivity while there.
…
According to the logic of those who want to operate nuclear power plants, there is nothing to worry about. These people are taking advantage of the fact that we cannot see radioactivity. It’s not right. In Fukushima, we’ve started to experience cases of thyroid cancer and other health issues, including unknown illnesses.”

 

“There is a reality that many residents in Japan continue to live away from their homes to avoid radioactivity in contaminated areas due to the nuclear accident.
In this country, there are many so-called “mother-child evacuees” where mothers have evacuated without their husbands to protect their children. However, the Japanese government does not keep the accurate number nor the situation of those evacuees, and continues to promote policies to lift evacuation orders for areas near the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant and encourages residents to return there.
…
A lesson from Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Fukushima is that we should not create any more nuclear disasters or nuclear victims. It is a fundamental human right to live free from radiation exposure and to have the right to health, which are directly related to people’s lives and health that needed to be respected the most.”

March 20, 2018 Posted by | Fukushima 2018 | , , | Leave a comment

Northern Japan court rejects lawsuit against construction of Ohma nuclear plant

higashidori, aomori NPP
Japan court rejects lawsuit against construction of nuclear plant
A court in northern Japan on Monday rejected a lawsuit to halt construction of a nuclear plant, said the company building the facility, Electric Power Development Co (J-Power).
 
The ruling by the Hakodate District Court in Hokkaido prefecture on the Ohma plant will be welcomed by many utilities as they push for a return to nuclear power following the 2011 Fukushima disaster, despite strong opposition from chunks of the public.
More than 1,100 residents in Hokkaido, among others, had filed the lawsuit in 2010 to prevent Ohma from starting. The construction of the 1,383-megawatt plant, which will use mixed oxide fuel, a blend of uranium and plutonium recycled from spent nuclear fuel, started in 2008, but work was suspended after Fukushima in 2011.
 
Building resumed in 2012, but has been delayed as the company has to meet new safety requirements imposed after the 2011 disaster, a company spokesman said. The station is about 38-percent complete, he said.
 
J-Power in 2016 pushed back the planned start of operation by two years to 2024/25.
“We are doing all we can for the start of operations in the 2024/25 business year,” the spokesman added.
 
The ruling marks the latest judgement on atomic power in the country, with critics of nuclear energy having more success in some other cases.
 
A high court in western Japan sided with residents last December to prevent the restart of a nuclear plant idled for scheduled maintenance, although lower court decisions have usually been turned down on appeal.
https://www.yenisafak.com/en/world/japan-court-rejects-lawsuit-against-construction-of-nuclear-plant-3137038
 
 
Court rules against bid to halt Ohma construction
A Japanese court today rejected a lawsuit seeking to stop construction and subsequent operation of Japan Electric Power Development Corp’s (J-Power’s) Ohma nuclear power plant, being built in Aomori prefecture.
 
More than 1100 residents of Hakodate city filed a suit and claims for damages with the Hakodate District Court against J-Power and the government in July 2010. A further eight complaints have since been filed with the court.
 
The lawsuit focused on whether there is an active seismic fault in the seabed near the Ohma plant site and the risk of volcanic eruptions in the area. The plaintiffs also expressed concerns about the plant using purely mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel. Ohma 1 would be the first Japanese reactor built to run solely on MOX fuel incorporating recycled plutonium.
 
“Until now, we have asked the court to dismiss the claims, and we have carefully insisted on and verified that the safety of the Ohma nuclear power plant is secure,” J-Power said.
 
The company announced today that the Hakodate District Court had “recognised” its argument and ruled in its favour. The ruling dismisses both the injunction on the plant’s construction and the claims for damages, it noted.
 
Presiding Judge Chikako Asaoka was quoted by the Asahi Shimbun as saying: “At the moment, it is difficult to readily recognise the tangible danger of a grave accident likely to occur at the plant.”
 
“We will continue to respond appropriately to the conformity assessment by the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) to the new regulatory standards and we will work throughout the entire company to create a safe power plant,” J-Power said. “In addition, we will strive to provide information about the plan of the Ohma nuclear power plant to the people concerned.”
The start of construction of the Ohma plant was originally due in August 2007, with commercial operation planned for March 2012. However, the imposition of more stringent seismic regulations put back the start of construction to May 2008 and commercial operation to November 2014.
 
Work to build the first unit at Ohma – a 1383 MWe Advanced Boiling Water Reactor – was about 40% complete in March 2011 when a tsunami caused the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. Construction of Ohma 1 was suspended following the accident, but was resumed in October 2012. At that time, J-Power said it would strive to establish a safe power plant by, among other things, ensuring reinforced safety measures are implemented that take into account the lessons learned from the Fukushima accident.
 
In December 2014, J-Power submitted an application to the NRA to make changes to Ohma 1’s reactor installation to strengthen the unit’s protection. These measures – including tsunami countermeasures, ensuring power supplies, ensuring heat removal functions, and severe accident responses – were originally expected to be completed by the end of 2020.
 
However, in September 2015, the company announced a one-year delay in the start of safety equipment construction, pushing back the start of operation to around 2021. This delay was attributed to the prolonged screening process by the NRA after the company was requested to submit additional information about its plans.
 
A year later, J-Power said it expects a further delay of around two years in the completion of the NRA’s review and approval process for Ohma 1. It now expects construction of the safety upgrades to begin this year and to be completed in the second half of fiscal year 2023.
“We are doing all we can for the start of operations in the 2024/25 business year,” a J-Power spokesman told Reuters.
 
http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS-Court-rules-against-bid-to-halt-Ohma-construction-1903184.html

March 20, 2018 Posted by | Japan | , | Leave a comment

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