some skeptics think the whole energy argument coming out of Riyadh is merely a cover for its military ambitions.
Trump might be distracted by the prize of winning multibillion-dollar contracts for US nuclear construction companies in desperate need of business. The temptation to settle for a deal that gives the Saudis a path to the bomb might just be too great to overcome.
Saudi Arabia is an outstanding candidate for using solar energy to power much of the country. Its vast and extremely sunny deserts are naturally suited to providing electricity to the country during the day.
Given that Saudi Arabia can build solar power facilities and produce solar energy at incredibly low costs, Romm says, it “doesn’t make a lot of sense from an energy point of view” that Saudi is leaning so much toward the nuclear option, which is notoriously expensive.
The power play shows that the world’s most iconic oil giant is serious about reducing its near-total reliance on oil — and it’s also raising questions about whether the country intends to seek out nuclear weapons in the future.
Saudi Arabia says it’s looking to expand its energy portfolio. If it uses nuclear reactors to generate electricity, that will allow the Gulf country to export more of its oil rather than consume it at home. More exports mean more money for the country’s government.
Energy experts say that Saudi Arabia is trying to make money from its oil reservesas quickly as possible because global demand is expected to decline in the future, with breakthroughs in renewable energy technology and the eventual ubiquity of electric cars. In the long run, it’s aiming to diversify its economy away from oil to generate revenue from sectors like tech and entertainment services.
Currently, Riyadh is in talks with firms from more than 10 countries about buying nuclear technology to build its first two reactors — and American firms are top candidates. But before any US sale, the Trump administration needs to strike a nuclear cooperation pact, known as a “123 agreement,” with Saudi Arabia. In those agreements, countries make promises about how they will and won’t use the powerful nuclear equipment they could buy from the US in the future.
Talks between the Trump administration and Saudi Arabia about such a deal are already underway — US Energy Secretary Rick Perry met with Saudi officials in London earlier this month to discuss the matter, and President Trump almost certainly discussed it during his meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman last week.
But nuclear proliferation experts and US lawmakers from both parties are deeply worried about the deal. They’re concerned that Riyadh could try to use the technology to start a nuclear weapons program and make one of most volatile regions in the world even more unstable. In fact, some skeptics think the whole energy argument coming out of Riyadh is merely a cover for its military ambitions.
It’s more than just a hunch. In an interview with CBS’s 60 Minutes on March 18, the Saudi crown prince, widely known as MBS, openly admitted it was a possibility: “Saudi Arabia does not want to acquire any nuclear bomb, but without a doubt, if Iran developed a nuclear bomb, we will follow suit as soon as possible.”
The Trump administration can try to ensure that never happens. In the 123 agreement, it can get the Saudis to make a legally binding pledge that they won’t pursue uranium enrichment or spent fuel reprocessing down the road — the activities that would allow it to build nuclear weapons.
But the Trump administration is reportedly considering allowing Saudi Arabia to enrich uranium in current negotiations. Experts say there are two main reasons the president may do this.
Second, Trump might be distracted by the prize of winning multibillion-dollar contracts for US nuclear construction companies in desperate need of business. The temptation to settle for a deal that gives the Saudis a path to the bomb might just be too great to overcome.
Saudi says it wants nuclear power for energy purposes. That may not be the whole story.
Saudi Arabia has generally described its ambitions for a civil nuclear energy program as a way to increase energy production and said it doesn’t want to use the program to build weapons.
“Not only are we not interested in any way to diverting nuclear technology to military use, we are very active in non-proliferation by others,” Saudi Energy Minister Khalid al-Falih said at a joint press conference with Secretary Perry in December.
Energy experts say that it certainly makes sense for Saudi Arabia to look into new ways to generate energy so that it can export more of its oil before the value of oil plunges in the future. But they also say that it’s strange that the country is focusing so much on nuclear, rather than renewable, energy.
Joe Romm, a former assistant secretary of the Department of Energy during the Clinton years, told me that Saudi Arabia is an outstanding candidate for using solar energy to power much of the country. Its vast and extremely sunny deserts are naturally suited to providing electricity to the country during the day.
Given that Saudi Arabia can build solar power facilities and produce solar energy at incredibly low costs, Romm says, it “doesn’t make a lot of sense from an energy point of view” that Saudi is leaning so much toward the nuclear option, which is notoriously expensive.
Comparing Saudi Arabia’s plans to invest in renewable energy versus its planned investments in nuclear energy, Romm estimated that Riyadh would be trying to generate at least three times more electricity from nuclear reactors than from renewable energy.
And American foreign policy and nuclear nonproliferation experts generally think that the motive behind emphasizing one program over the other is obvious: building weapons.
“I think a main driver, if not the main driver [of Saudi Arabia’s nuclear program], is its security competition with Iran,” Kingston Reif, a nonproliferation expert at the Arms Control Association, told me.
Iran is Saudi Arabia’s archrival in the Middle East, and Saudi Arabia is worried that Iran could use its civil nuclear program to make weapons in the future, and tip the balance of power in the region in its favor. The nuclear deal that Iran signed on to in 2015 heavily restricts Iran’s ability to make the materials required for a nuclear bomb, but crucial restrictions in the agreement begin to expire around 2030.
Since MBS has openly admitted that Saudi Arabia would feel compelled to chase after a bomb if Iran did, it’s clear that it must see a civil nuclear program as a potential military asset.
Can Trump actually make a strong deal with the Saudis?
The Trump administration is currently in ongoing talks with the Saudis about a nuclear cooperation agreement, and it probably came up when the crown prince met with Trump at the White House on March 20. (Neither Saudi Arabia nor the US’s official readouts of the meeting explicitly mention the nuclear cooperation agreement, but both allude to “new commercial deals.”)
Recent reports suggest that the White House may allow Saudi Arabia to enrich uranium as part of the arrangement. A country can enrich uranium to produce fuel for its nuclear reactors, but that same process can also be used to make an atomic bomb — and that has US lawmakers on both sides of the aisle very concerned.
“The Crown Prince’s interview just last week is reason enough to have the administration pump the breaks on the negotiations and insist that there will be no 123 agreement that includes enriching and reprocessing,” Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Middle East and North Africa, said in a statement on Wednesday.
“Unfortunately, from the little we do know from the administration, it is looking at this deal in terms of economics and commerce, and national security implications only register as a minor issue, if at all,” she said.
Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has told the administration that there’s bipartisan opposition in Congress to a 123 agreement that allows for enrichment.
The White House has to submit the agreement to Congress for review, and lawmakers have the option to pass a joint resolution of disapproval to block it.
But if that were to happen, it could ultimately backfire: The Saudis might turn to Russian or Chinese bidders for nuclear tech if they’re rebuffed by the US. And analysts say the Russians and Chinese are less likely to be stringent about restricting Saudi Arabia’s enrichment or reprocessing ambitions. For that reason, some analysts argue that Washington might have to consider a compromise with Riyadh.
“I would prefer to have America’s nuclear industry in Saudi Arabia than to have Russian or China’s, so I think it’s useful that we’re reengaging with the Saudis. We should try to get the best restraints on enrichment and reprocessing, including a ban for some significant length of time, say 20 or 25 years,” Robert Einhorn, a former State Department adviser for nonproliferation and arms control, told the Washington Post. “We should show some flexibility.”
Saudi Arabia considers the ability to enrich uranium its “sovereign” right, and it wasn’t able to settle on a 123 agreement with the Obama administration precisely because President Obama refused to grant them that capacity.
Alexandra Bell, an Obama-era State Department arms control expert, told me that the Saudis won’t budge “without high-level pressure from the White House.” That means sustained pressure from people like the president himself or top officials like Energy Secretary Perry are key to extracting any kind of concession on enrichment from Saudi Arabia.
But Trump might not be all that interested in staying focused on that goal. He looks at the issue through a different lens than his predecessor — the prospect of boosting American business could eclipse security concerns for him. Last year, when Trump struck his enormous $110 billion arms deal with the Saudis, he was eager to sell it to the public as a way to create “jobs, jobs, jobs” for the US.
In this case, a deal to build nuclear tech with the Saudiswould provide a boost to struggling US nuclear construction companies. Westinghouse, the most prominent US bidder,is currently going through bankruptcy proceedings and has shed thousands of US jobsbecause of it.
When the Saudis negotiate with the Trump administration in the coming weeks, they’ll probably consider Trump’s eagerness to claim another job-creating deal to be a source of leverage.
Israeli claims on Iran divide US, allies WP, By Associated PressMay 1 JERUSALEM— The Latest on the Israel’s allegations that Iran concealed a nuclear weapons program before signing a deal with world powers in 2015 (all times local):
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s latest accusations about Iran’s past nuclear activities have received a warm welcome in Washington but a far cooler reception in Europe.
The claims appear to have deepened divisions among Western allies ahead of President Donald Trump’s decision on whether to withdraw from the international nuclear deal later this month.
6:45 p.m.
German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas says the International Atomic Energy Agency should quickly follow up on allegations by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who claims that Iranian leaders covered up a nuclear weapons program before signing a deal with world powers in 2015.
Maas told the Bild daily on Tuesday that “the IAEA must as quickly as possible get access to Israeli information and clarify if there are indeed indications of a violation of the deal.”
…….. Netanyahu provided no direct evidence that Iran has violated the 2015 deal, which it signed with the U.S., Germany, Britain, France, China and Russia.3:55 p.m.
Britain’s foreign minister says the alleged new evidence presented by Israel about Iranian nuclear intentions shows why the international nuclear deal with Iran must remain in place.
…… British Foreign Minister Boris Johnson, however, said the presentation “underlines the importance” of keeping the deal’s constraints on Iran in place. He says the deal is not based on trust about Iran’s intentions, but instead is based on verification and inspections.3:30 p.m.
The U.N. nuclear agency says it believes that Iran had a “coordinated” nuclear weapons program in place before 2003, but found “no credible indications” of such work after 2009.
The agency issued its assessment on Tuesday, a day after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu released what he said was a “half ton” of seized documents proving that Iran has lied about its nuclear intentions.
The documents focused on Iranian activities before 2003 and did not provide any explicit evidence that Iran has violated its 2015 nuclear deal with the international community.
Tuesday’s IAEA assessment, which repeated an earlier 2015 report, did not directly mention Netanyahu’s claims.
But it noted that in its 2015 report, its board of governors “declared that its consideration of this issue was closed.”
Trump should strengthen the Iran nuclear deal, not blow it up https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/global-opinions/wp/2018/05/01/trump-should-strengthen-the-iran-nuclear-deal-not-blow-it-up/?utm_term=.cbcfee8d797eBy Max BootMay 1 Credit Israeli intelligence for another coup: Its agents smuggled 100,000 pages of documents out of Iran about that country’s nuclear program. The mullahs will now have to patch a major security leak. But the revelations contained in those papers are not quite as newsworthy as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed in a made-for-American-TV presentation on Monday. “I’m here to tell you one thing: Iran lied. Big time,” Netanyahu said. So what did Iranian leaders lie about? That they had a secret nuclear-development program called Project Amad … that was shelved in 2003.
No kidding. Iran’s nuclear-weapons development program was widely known — and it was, in fact, the justification for the United States, Russia, China, the European Union, Germany, Britain and France to conclude the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran in 2015, imposing strict limitations on Iran’s ability to enrich and reprocess fissile material.
Netanyahu claims that Iran has violated the JCPOA, a.k.a. the “Iran nuclear deal.” But on that score his evidence is thin. “In 2017,” he said, “Iran moved its nuclear weapons files to a highly secret location in Tehran.” It’s possible that Iran did not come clean about its past nuclear activities, as it was supposed to do under the deal, but no one ever expected that the agreement would eradicate Iran’s nuclear know-how. It was only supposed to stop the actual development of nuclear weapons. Netanyahu is clearly eager to torpedo the nuclear deal, and if he had compelling evidence of Iranian violations he would have presented it — but he doesn’t and didn’t.
There is nothing in Israel’s revelations that contradicts that assessment of the U.S. intelligence community that Iran is complying with the terms of the nuclear deal. In February, Dan Coats, director of national intelligence, stated that “the JCPOA has extended the amount of time Iran would need to produce enough fissile material for a nuclear weapon from a few months to about one year” and that it “has also enhanced the transparency of Iran’s nuclear activities.” Just last week, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told Congress that, after reading the entire text of the nuclear agreement three times, he was impressed that “the verification, what is in there, is actually pretty robust.”
These sober assessments hardly justify President Trump’s hyperbolic claims that the Iran nuclear agreement is the “worst deal ever.” It is, in fact, a successful deal that appears to be constricting Iran’s nuclear development — just as intended.
There were, of course, real limitations on the scope of the nuclear deal, which is why I and other critics argued that President Barack Obama should have held out for tougher terms. It doesn’t allow unfettered inspection of all Iranian military bases. It doesn’t ban Iranian nuclear development in perpetuity; the caps on centrifuges will begin expiring in 2026. It doesn’t ban ballistic missile testing. And it doesn’t prevent Iran from destabilizing its neighbors.
But that’s not an argument for blowing up the JCPOA, as Trump seems intent on doing as early as May 12 (the next deadline for reimposing sanctions lifted under the deal). That’s an argument for strengthening it. French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, in their visits to Washington last week, offered Trump a way to accomplish this goal by negotiating a side agreement with the Europeans. The United States and European Union could state their intent to apply sanctions on Iran if it tests ballistic missiles, continues destabilizing its neighbors, dramatically expands the number of working centrifuges, or attempts to weaponize its nuclear program at any point in the future. The United States could also declare that it will keep troops in eastern Syria to contain Iranian power — something Trump is loath to do.
The beauty of a side agreement is that it would not require the assent of Iran, Russia and China — which is unlikely — and it would give Trump the ability to boast, truthfully, that he had increased the pressure on Iran. But it would require him to cease his incessant denigration of the nuclear deal, which he seems to hate mainly because he wasn’t the one who negotiated it, and force him to admit that he failed to rewrite it.
That would be the grown-up thing to do, which is why our juvenile president is unlikely to do it. As Macron said, he is likely to “get rid of this deal on his own, for domestic reasons.” Netanyahu’s performance on Monday night, clearly coordinated with the Trump administration, is intended to give the president the excuse he needs to act on his impulse.
But has Trump thought about what comes next? Silly question, I know. If the United States reimposes nuclear sanctions on Iran, even though there is no evidence that Iran is cheating on the nuclear deal, Iran may continue abiding by its limitations — or it may not. The Europeans may go along under threat of secondary sanctions — or they may not. No one knows what will happen next, but the likelihood is that nuking the JCPOA will undermine, rather than strengthen, attempts to limit the Iranian threat.
Trump is already dealing with one nuclear crisis in North Korea. It is hard to know why he wants to start another one in the Middle East.
Trump glows in Noble Peace Prize chatter, The Hill, BY REBECCA KHEEL –05/01/1President Trump is basking in the glow of chatter that he deserves a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts on the Korea peninsula.
Trump’s supporters — and even the South Korean president — say that getting North Korea to denuclearize and end the Korean War would be a monumental achievement worthy of the prize.
……. Trump was definitely nominated both this year and last — but the Nobel Committee said the public nominations appear to be forgeries, and both were referred to Norwegian police.
……. on last week’s inter-Korea summit, ICAN credited South Korea for the progress rather than Trump.
“The dangerous rhetoric from Donald Trump and the U.S. brought us to the brink of nuclear war, and only careful diplomacy from South Korea has brought us back from it,” ICAN said in a statement Friday.
….. If successful, however, there is little doubt that solving the conflict on the Korean peninsula would be considered an exceptionally important contribution to global stability, and worthy of a prize,” Henrik Urdal, director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo ,said in an email.
“If Trump makes a major contribution to such achievement, he will be considered for the Peace Prize, and it is quite possible that he could get it. However, he has been playing a high-stake game so far, so he needs to demonstrate statesman skills beyond threats and [deterrence] for that to happen.” http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/385735-trump-glows-in-noble-peace-prize-chatter
The atomic bombing of Hiroshima at the end of World War II, alongside the bombing of Nagasaki days later, one of the deadliest military actions undertaken in human history. A new study has been able to use human tissue samples to understand precisely how much radiation victims absorbed in their bones. It’s nearly twice the lethal amount.
A weapon drastically different than any other ever used in war, the atomic bomb in Hiroshima instantly killed over 100,000 people and left thousands more dealing with radiation fallout. By the end of 1945, it is estimated that 160,000 people had been killed directly from the bombing. Several historians have argued that while the bombs effectively ended World War II, their unprecedented destructive capabilities started the next global conflict, the Cold War, at the exact same time.
Attempting to measure the damage done to Hiroshima by the atomic bomb overwhelmed science for decades. There were simply no computers or radiation-measuring devices capable of understanding the damage. Personal stories, like those of the survivors describe in John Hershey’s Hiroshimaand art works of survivors, took hold as the dominant narratives.
But that didn’t mean scientists weren’t trying. When the Atomic Bomb Casualty Commission (ABCC) formed in 1947, the agency quickly realized it would need long term study to understand what had happened. Japanese scientists like E. T. Arakawa and Takenobu Higashimura were releasing studies about the effects of the bombings by the early 1960s.
In 1973, Brazilian physicist Sérgio Mascarenhas was trying to date archaeological items in his home country based on radiation absorption. Radiation occurs naturally in sand through elements like thorium, and techniques like radiocarbon dating use similar principles.
However, Mascarenhas realized that this method might have applications beyond archaeological items. He flew to Hiroshima and, with help from the Institute of Nuclear Medicine in Hiroshima, was able to obtain a jawbone from a bombing victim’s body. While he gained some understanding of what the victim’s body had endured, technical issues stood in his way. He was unable to separate background radiation levels from the bomb blast radiation.
Flash forward four decades later and Angela Kinoshita of Universidade do Sagrado Coração in São Paulo State has reexamined the jawbone using modern technology. Kinoshita’s team was able to determine that the jawbone absorbed 9.46 grays of radiation. A mere 5 grays can be fatal. That number lines up with measurements taken of bricks and other inorganic objects measured at the time. The work is published in PLOS ONE.
Beyond gaining a better understanding of what happened to the victims of Hiroshima, who ranged from prisoners of war to soldiers to civilians, the study offers insight into what might happen if a nuclear weapon was ever used again.
“Imagine someone in New York planting an ordinary bomb with a small amount of radioactive material stuck to the explosive. Techniques like this can help identify who has been exposed to radioactive fallout and needs treatment,” says study co-author Oswaldo Baffa of the University of São Paulo in a press statement. Source: Discover
Thomas Jones digs up Carol Barton’s research article from 2001, in which she relayed her findings that, between 1972 and 1996, the risk of child leukaemia within ten kilometres of Aldermaston and Burghfield was double the rate for the UK as a whole (LRB, 5 April). Barton was then a consultant haematologist at the Royal Berkshire Hospital. ‘Until the cause of cancer is fully understood, and what the part of radiation in the process could be,’ she wrote, ‘no firm measures can be taken to redress the balance.’
Research has moved on since then. More than sixty epidemiological studies worldwide have examined the incidence of cancer in children near nuclear power plants (NPPs): most indicate increases in leukaemia. These include the landmark 2008 KiKK study commissioned by the German government, which found relative risks of 1.6 in total cancers and 2.2 in leukaemias among infants living within five kilometres of all German NPPs.
A number of hypotheses have been proposed to explain these findings. One is that the increased cancers arise from the exposure of pregnant women near NPPs to radiation. However, any theory has to account for the greater than a thousand-fold discrepancy between official estimates of radiation doses from nuclear emissions and the observed increases in cancer risk. It may be that radiation exposures from spikes in NPP radionuclide emissions are significantly larger than the averages recorded in official estimates. In addition, the risks to embryos and foetuses from radiation exposure are much greater than to adults, and the blood-forming tissues in embryos and foetuses are even more radiosensitive.
Times 2nd May 2018 , The boss of Hitachi is expected to meet the prime minister tomorrow in an
attempt to secure UK government investment in its proposed nuclear plant on
Anglesey. Hiroaki Nakanishi is scheduled to meet Theresa May as the clock
ticks on the company’s deadline to agree the outlines of a financial
support package by the middle of this year.
Hitachi, the Japanese conglomerate, has spent £2 billion so far on its Horizon venture, which is
developing plans for a new power station at Wylfa. It has threatened to
withdraw funding unless it receives assurances that financial support can
be agreed. The 2.9-gigawatt power station is due to start generating in the
mid-2020s, becoming Britain’s second new nuclear plant after the £19.6
billion Hinkley Point plant being built in Somerset. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/business/hitachi-seeks-to-clear-clouds-over-horizon-hpfk9gpjd
Meeting on Holtec proposal fills conference room; Opinions polarized on plan to store nuclear waste in southeast New Mexico, Roswell Daily Record By Vistas
These two words demonstrate how polarized opinions were at a public meeting Monday night at ENMU-Roswell hosted by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to hear comments on a proposed interim storage facility for spent nuclear fuel: “Benign” and “genocide.”
A conference room in the Campus Union Building was filled to its capacity of 95. There were around 50 people who requested to speak, each given four minutes to offer their support for the project or say why they want the NRC to deny the application by Holtec International, the private corporation requesting a 40-year license to store solid nuclear waste on a site in Lea County about halfway between Carlsbad and Hobbs.
According to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the initial request is for storage of up to 8,680 metric tons of waste.
But according to a Holtec official, the “ultimate target” is for up to 100,000 metric tons of spent rods. If the company’s application is approved, the high-level nuclear waste would be stored at the interim facility “until a permanent storage option is available”…
Both sides of the issue were represented at the open house.
Bobbi Riedel, a doctoral student in nuclear physics attending the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque, was there with five other UNM students to speak in favor of the proposed storage site. “We’ve come down here from Albuquerque to inform people about nuclear safety,” she said. “I think this is a perfectly safe project.” She said storing nuclear facility at the site would save taxpayers about $30 billion a year.
Wearing a blue T-shirt that said, “No Holtec International,” Melanie Deason of Roswell said she is against the project.
“I can sum up Holtec in one word — ‘genocide,’” she said.
Deason said that among her concerns were transportation, geology, water issues and the Rio Grande Compact, an interstate compact to equitably portion the waters of the Rio Grande Basin between New Mexico, Colorado and Texas.
“I don’t think Texas wants radioactivity in their food chain,” she said. Deason also was on the list of speakers…
John Heaton, a spokesperson for the pro nuclear from the Eddy-Lea Energy Alliance, said while Holtec’s proposal is not a permanent solution to nuclear waste storage, when a permanent site is built in will most likely be in the western U.S., possibly Nevada, and not in the east …
“It is going to be benign,” Heaton said. “It just sits there and gets cooler.”…
Al Squire, a member of the Dairy Producers of New Mexico who said he was attending as a private citizen, had a much different opinion on the self-ventilating cooling system. He said the temperature of the fuel rods stored at the site would be between 200 to 700 degrees.
“What happens if it plugs up?” he said. “Murphy’s Law says it will happen. We could have another Chernobyl or Fukushima (a nuclear disaster that occurred in Japan in 2011..
Helen Henderson, a rancher from Chaves County, stressed the impact the facility could have agriculture and gas and oil, which are the stalwarts of the economy in southeast New Mexico.
She said while the Holtec facility would only provide 55 permanent jobs in New Mexico, ranching, farming, gas and oil combined provide 23,000. If an accident occurred, Henderson said, “It would destroy New Mexico.”….
The first speaker was Sister Joan Brown, a Franciscan nun from Albuquerque.
She said in the Christian tradition the desert is a place where people find God and not a wasteland.
She then spoke of “environmental justice,” not just for humans but for all living things.
“A life is a life and it is not dispensable,” she said. “In this state we have a history of not respecting that.”
Brown referred to a group who call themselves the “Downwinders,” who say that they, along with their preceding generations, have been contaminated by the radioactive fallout from the 1945 test explosion at the Trinity Site near Alamogordo. She added that uranium workers in New Mexico also have been harmed by radiation and that Holtec’s proposed facility is located in an area with predominantly low incomes and a majority Hispanic population.
Founded in 1986, Holtec provides solutions for managing the backend of the nuclear power cycle for commercial nuclear power plants.
The company is headquartered in New Jersey and has locations throughout the world, including Pennsylvania and Florida.
Another public meeting will be held today in Hobbs tonight and third meeting will be held Thursday in Carlsbad.
The public also can mail comments to the NRC at One White Flint North Building, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852–2738, or post comments online at regulations.gov. The deadline for public comments is May 29.
NRC officials said a transcript of the meetings should be posted on their website within two or three weeks.
Transcend 30th April 2018 , Iraq was the fertile crescent of antiquity, the vast area that fed the
entire Middle East and Mediterranean, and introduced grains to the world.
It was Mesopotamia, the cradle of civilization, which propelled us forward
with its invention of writing, domestication of animals and settled life.
Now its groundwater and soil store the radioactivity of 630 tons of
depleted uranium weapons. The waste that has been thrown onto civilian
targets has permanent consequences. It pollutes southern Iraq, Kuwait and
Saudi Arabia with uranium oxide dust that spreads as far as 26 miles,
blowing with sand, weathering into water.
Uranium 238, with a half life 4 ½ billion years, lies on the region in the scattered tons of wreckage.
Contamination is permanent. Its radiological and chemical toxicity exposes
the population to continuous alpha radiation that is breathed into lungs,
absorbed through the skin, touched by the unwashed hands of kids who roam
the scrap metal yards for parts to sell to help their families.
France’s Macron and Iran’s Rouhani agree to work on saving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, CNBC, 29 Apr 18
French President Emmanuel Macron and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani spoke by telephone on Sunday and agreed to work save the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement.
Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel were in Washington last week, tyring to persuade President Trump not to pull out of the Iran deal.
Given that offshore wind is expected to continue falling in price and is being built at the moment, unlike nuclear, the economic case for new reactors in the U.K. appears to diminish by the day.
Similar challenges face nuclear elsewhere in Western Europe.
But the situation in the U.S. is even worse. In America it is now no longer economically viable to keep existing plants running, let alone build new ones.
How the Nuclear Industry Is Fighting Back, The beleaguered nuclear power sector has launched a charm offensive in a bid to stay relevant. Greentech Media , APRIL 30, 2018 The West’s nuclear industry has embarked on its biggest public relations push ever in a bid to stay relevant to policymakers increasingly focused on renewables.
Recent weeks have seen a coordinated campaign by two of the sector’s top agencies to claw back support for a technology that is struggling to remain economically viable and is in danger of being sidelined in discussions over future energy pathways in Europe and North America.
In the U.S., the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) kicked off proceedings in an apparently low-key fashion. With little fanfare, the Institute’s website had a facelift in early March, dispensing with its former staid design and adopting a more modern look with bold type and plenty of video.
In the place of headlines about developments in nuclear technology, the NEI’s site now plays inspirational messages over images of children, cityscapes and electric cars. “Carbon-free. Available 24/7. Powering communities,” it says. “Vital to our clean energy future.”
Soon after, the NEI began talking up its annual briefing for the financial community, which, for the first time, was being streamed live on Facebook.
Ominously for an industry where new developments always seem plagued with delays, the livestreaming event started late due to technical problems.
Once underway, NEI president and CEO Maria Korsnick lost no time in stating the case for ongoing nuclear energy support. . …..
OECD’s nuclear group weighs in Less than 24 hours after the NEI event, the Nuclear Energy Agency of the Organization for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD) took the helm of the industry’s communications machine with the launch of a major report.
The Full Costs of Electricity Provision was unveiled by the NEA’s director-general, William D. Magwood IV, and senior economist, Jan Horst Keppler, along with NEI’s senior director of policy development, Matthew Crozat, and nuclear advocate Kirsty Gogan. …..
A glance through the 214-page document shows it to be a serious attempt by the NEA to reframe the parameters of current energy policy discussions and head off one of two major threats facing the sector.
While nobody disputes nuclear power’s ability to deliver significant quantities of baseload, [?] carbon-free energy, the industry has long wrestled with safety concerns and more recently found itself outflanked by the economics of Western electricity markets.
It is likely that the nuclear sector has learned to take safety accusations in its stride. For years, advocates have been claiming that nuclear power is safer than any other form of electricity generation (although Greenpeace disputes this).
Those arguments didn’t stop nations such as Germany or Italy from turning against nuclear in the wake of the Fukushima Daiichi disaster, however.
And more recently, nuclear plant operators in Europe and, particularly, the U.S. have been worrying over an even bigger concern: cost. In markets such as the U.K., new nuclear is looking increasingly pricey next to renewables.
Last September, for instance, offshore wind — theoretically one of the most expensive forms of mainstream renewable energy generation — undercut the strike price for the U.K.’s Hinkley Point C project by almost 38 percent.
Given that offshore wind is expected to continue falling in price and is being built at the moment, unlike nuclear, the economic case for new reactors in the U.K. appears to diminish by the day, even though the government has restated its commitment to a diverse energy mix.
Similar challenges face nuclear elsewhere in Western Europe. Only two commercial nuclear reactors, Flamanville 3 and Olkiluoto 3, are under construction in the European Union. Both are massively delayed and over budget. But the situation in the U.S. is even worse.
In America it is now no longer economically viable to keep existing plants running, let alone build new ones.
The dire situation facing reactors in U.S. markets flooded with cheap gas and renewables is prompting desperate measures from plant owners in states such as Minnesota and New Jersey. And the NEA report is designed to force a rethink in how these markets are set up. …… Its main finding is that the external costs of the normal operations of electricity generation exceed the costs of other phases of the life cycle of electricity generation, as well as the costs of major accidents, “by at least one order of magnitude.”
…… The problem is that the NEA’s clear interest in promoting nuclear energy somewhat taints the impartiality of the report, opening it up to criticism from observers.
….A one-sided interpretation? Amory Lovins, the notoriously anti-nuclear Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) chief scientist and co-founder, pulled no punches over the NEA’s attempt to calculate all-in energy costs. A large body of literature, with widely varying quality and independence, has already done this, he said.
“NEA endorses a one-sided interpretation of that literature,” he said. “The workshop that framed and steered this report was co-chaired by two well-known nuclear advocates, making NEA an extension and official endorser of the nuclear industry’s main advocacy group.”
He offered up a long list of potential flaws in the report, including selective citations, assumed rather than observed technology costs, no analysis of financing cost, no mention of risk premiums or construction times, the use of old pricing data, and factually incorrect claims.
Some points of the analysis are largely or wholly correct, but most sections and the broad conclusions are not, he told GTM. “They will be credible only to the credulous or already-committed,” he said. …
An Oireachtas committee is planning to write a submission to UK authorities to express its concern.
AN OIREACHTAS COMMITTEE will express its concerns to UK authorities about plans to build a new power plant on the west coast of England as environmental experts here claim the government has failed to consider the possible consequences for Ireland.
Attracta Uí Bhroin, of the Irish Environmental Network told the Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government that her intention was not to panic people or cause unnecessary concern, but her organisation wants to ensure Irish people’s rights are upheld.
Although the process for the new nuclear site at Hinckley Point in England, which is 250km from the coast of Ireland, began five years ago, it was only in 2016 that the news about the plans broke.
Hinkley Point C was given the final investment approval by French energy giant EDF, which has a two-thirds share and which is building the plant in conjunction with a Chinese company.
Speaking to TDs and senators today, Uí Broin pointed out that of the eight power plants the UK has planned as part of its energy expansion, “five are on the west coast of the UK, facing Ireland on the most densely populated east coast”.
Some of these plants are planned in locations closer than Hinkley Point C.
The potential economic impact of a nuclear leak or meltdown could be very serious, she explained. A 2016 ESRI report considered a scenario where there was a nuclear incident, but with no radioactive contamination reaching Ireland.
“Even then they estimated that impact economically could be in the order of €4 billion,” she said, explaining that an incident such as this would have serious implications for the agrifood and tourism industries in Ireland.
In the event of an incident where there is a risk of contamination, she said there are no detailed plans in place to protect Irish people, the water supply, or the country’s farm animals and produce.
“Not only would you not have fodder, you would not have livestock. You are talking about the national herd.”
She explained that the UK had made two screening determinations as part of its assessment process ahead of construction.
“There are serious questions about the adequacy of the assessment of impacts on Ireland in particular and the complacency of Ireland in respect of that assessment.”
Despite the fact that Ireland is the nearest state to the plant, Uí Bhroin said it was “entirely omitted” from the severe accident assessment.
She pointed out that other countries like Austria, Denmark and Germany had pushed back and insisted on being consulted and included in the assessment process.
Uí Bhroin was joined by Professors John Sweeney and Steve Thomas, who outlined some of the specific concerns around safety assessment and treatment of waste.
Sweeney was critical of the models used in risk assessments – some older models were used in calculations, for example, despite the fact that more modern ones exist.
Thomas spoke about some of the parts of the plant which are being made in France and which French regulatory authorities will not a clear for use in French nuclear plants.
Uí Bhroin said there was an “extraordinary level of frustration, anger and disappointment” among environmental groups at the government’s reaction to these plans.
“This has been a lone battle by Irish ENGOs [Environmental Non-Governmental Organisations],” she told the committee. She also said there had been a “lack of support and expertise from Irish bodies”.
Responding to the evidence from the witnesses, Green Party Senator Grace O’Sullivan said she was concerned about what impact the committee could have at this late stage.
“We are here not very late in the day.”
The public consultation deadline for the plans is 11 May.
Green groups warn of maritime ‘Chernobyl’ as Russia launches floating nuclear power plant, Telegraph UK 1 MAY 2018
A controversial ship-borne nuclear power plant was launched from St Petersburg as part of a Russian plan to power remote seaside settlements.
The Akademik Lomonosov, which green groups have dubbed “a floating Chernobyl,” was towed from the shipyard where it was built in the Gulf of Finland on Saturday.
It will be towed through the Baltic Sea and around the coast of Norway to Russia’s Arctic port of Murmansk, where it will be loaded with nuclear fuel for sea tests……..Rosatom, Russia’s state owned nuclear energy monopoly, now says it will go into service in Chukotka, the far eastern province opposite Alaska, in 2019.
But the project has drawn fierce opposition from environmentalists alarmed at the prospect of a nuclear accident in stormy, ice-filled oceans.
The Lomonosov was originally meant to be tested at the shipyard in St Petersburg, but plans were changed for an arctic test after protests from other Baltic sea countries.
“To test a nuclear reactor in a densely populated area like the centre of St. Petersburg is irresponsible to say the least,” said Jan Haverkamp of Greenpeace Central and Eastern Europe in a statement.
Seoul: North Korea’s nuclear test site is fully operational, a specialised website reports, corroborating a similar announcement by the North Korean leader earlier.
Pyongyang offered to permanently close down the Punggye-ri nuclear test site in May in the presence of international observers and journalists after the two Koreas agreed on a complete denuclearisation of the Peninsula during a historical summit between South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un on Friday.
“The two mountainous areas accessible by the South and West Portals remain viable, and could support future underground nuclear testing,” the website 38North said after analysing new radar data about the site.
The report also confirmed that the two central tunnels of the site were in good condition, contrary to earlier reports by Chinese experts who said they could have been irreversibly damaged after the sixth and most powerful underground nuclear test carried out by Pyongyang in September.
The report also confirmed Kim’s earlier assertion that Pyongyang was shutting down not defunct but rather operational nuclear facilities, including the Punggye-ri nuclear test site, the centre where it carried out all of its six nuclear tests.
During the historical summit, Kim had proposed that the site should be shut down publicly to highlight Pyongyang’s commitment to denuclearisation.
38North said that although the north portal – used by Pyongyang for five of the six tests – seems to have been abandoned, they had detected construction of new tunnels in another section of the site.
38North – a website linked to the John Hopkins University in the United States – said that the new tunnels could allow the use of underground installations, dismissing analysis by other experts who said North Korea had announced the closure because the facility had become completely unusable.
Scotsman 30th April 2018, The Scottish Government will this week face calls to hold a review into
concerns over nuclear weapons “convoys” travelling through towns and cities
in Scotland. The Greens have said the SNP government, which opposes nuclear
weapons, is responsible for community safety and emergency planning and
cannot dismiss the issue as being reserved to Westminster.
MSPs are preparing to debate the issue at Holyrood on Wednesday, where Green MSP
Mark Ruskell will call for a review.
Up to eight times a year, a convoy of heavy trucks containing weapon materials and nuclear warheads travels
between the Aldermaston and Burghfield atomic weapon plants in Berkshire to
the Royal Navy base at Coulport on Loch Long where the UK’s nuclear weapons
are stored. These trucks will often be carrying weapons materials for
maintenance or replacement. But a Freedom of Information request by Green
MSPs last year found that none of the relevant local authorities the trucks
pass through has conducted risk assessments in relation to the convoys. https://www.scotsman.com/news/politics/greens-seek-review-of-nuclear-convoy-safety-1-4732236
This page has a very useful “SEARCH” function. If you scroll down the right side panel you can use either the categories listed, or the “Search” slot. Type in a name or a place or topic on this slot, and it’s easy to find a related post.
