It was a 12-year-old activist, Severn Cullis-Suzuki, who silenced the world for six minutes at the first UN Earth Summit at Rio de Janeiro in 1992. Twenty-five years later, young people across the globe are still fighting to save the planet. Wary of the repeated failure of adults to take decisive action on climate change, […]
“There is a nation, which in all its strength and virtue is in the grips of a group of ruthless men, preaching a gospel of intolerance and racial pride –unrestrained by law, by parliament, or by public opinion…” — Winston Churchill, 1934 Let us pray that we do not become such a nation. That we […]
Nucnet 25th June 2018, A full-scale in-situ system test for spent nuclear fuel disposal is
expected to begin this week at Posiva’s planned final deep geologic
disposal facility at Olkiluoto, Finland. Posiva’s owner Teollisuuden
Voima Oyj (TVO) said the test will be the first of its kind and means that
Posiva is making progress towards the operational test phase of its final
disposal system and technology.
According to TVO, the test will last for
several years. It aims to prove that the prototype processes for geological
storage at Posiva’s repository are “all working concepts”. The test
has been in preparation since December 2017, TVO said. The processes
include placing fuel assemblies packed in copper-steel canisters inside
holes drilled in the bedrock tunnels. This is followed by backfilling the
tunnels with bentonite clay and sealing them with a cast plug. Two test
canisters will be equipped with thermal resistors simulating the residual
temperature of spent nuclear fuel, TVO said. A TVO official said the
temperature and pressure in the canisters, test holes and the surrounding
bedrock, and the behaviour of the backfill of the tunnels, will be
monitored by some 500 sensors over several years. https://www.nucnet.org/all-the-news/2018/06/25/finland-s-posiva-to-begin-world-s-first-in-situ-system-test-at-final-repository-site
https://apnews.com/dc5e3c60042741c696dd062462a03cca– 28 June 18, ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Advocates for New Mexicans who many believe were sickened by U.S. uranium mining and nuclear weapons testing have urged Congress to acknowledge their sacrifice and authorize compensation for them.
Navajo Nation Vice President Jonathan Nez and the co-founder of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium testified during a hearing Wednesday in Washington on a compensation measure.
Sponsored by U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, it proposes expanding eligibility for payouts under the Radiation Exposure and Compensation Act of 1990, which currently covers claims from areas in Nevada, Arizona and Utah that are downwind from a different test site.
Tina Cordova, co-founder of the Tularosa consortium, said many who lived in the area weren’t told about the dangers of the Trinity Test on generations of residents.
They could benefit from the proposal, along with post-1971 uranium mine workers in Northwestern New Mexico.
Morning Star 27th June 2018,A PIONEERING new report argues that thousands more engineering jobs could
be created by stopping the renewal of the Trident missiles system. The
report, Defence Diversification: International Learning for Trident Jobs,
was published today by the Nuclear Education Trust.
Unearthed 26th June 2018 ,This week national governments will meet in Brussels to vote on a deal –
part of the EU’s clean energy package – that would recognise the right
of people and communities to produce their own energy. It could represent
possibly the biggest systematic change to Europe’s electricity market in
a generation. Unearthed has got hold of the final text of the renewable
energy directive, which could boost the take-up of renewable energy from
households and small producers in the EU. The UK appears unsure as to
whether it will integrate the policies into national law after Brexit. https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2018/06/26/eu-makes-it-a-right-for-people-to-sell-renewable-energy-here-are-5-things-you-need-to-know/
Guardian 27th June 2018 Letter Gideon Amos: When I and my fellow planning inspectors spent the best
part of a year examining and reporting on both the principle and the detail
of the project in Swansea, it was clear that this pathfinder project had
important environmental, cultural and regeneration benefits.
Vitally, itwould provide baseload generation capacity to complement our welcome but
increasing reliance on wind energy. In addition, while being “first of a
kind” presents big investment and consenting headaches for a promoter, the
potentially infinite lifespan of the generating station means these early
upfront costs need to be discounted over a much longer timeframe than other
projects.
Failing to weigh these benefits and costs in the Treasury
economist’s balance sheet is a major mistake and one that misses a massive
opportunity to put the planet back at the centre of our nation’s future.
NFLA 27th June 2018 The Nuclear Free Local Authorities (NFLA) is hugely disappointed in the
decision announced on Monday by UK Business and Energy Secretary Greg Clark
to cancel potential financial support for the Swansea Tidal Lagoon scheme.
This is a retrograde step for a nascent and exciting technology, and
compares negatively with the billions being offered to prop up new nuclear
reactor schemes like Wylfa B. http://www.nuclearpolicy.info/news/cancellation-support-swansea-tidal-lagoon-scheme-error-uk-energy-industrial-strategy-policy/
Russia’s Rosatom and the Ministry of Infrastructure of Rwanda have signed a Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. The document was signed on 22 June by Rosatom Deputy Director General Nikolay Spassky and Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Republic of Rwanda to the Russian Federation Jeanne d’Arc Mujawamariya……
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