Lawmaker says he can’t get info on waste plan https://www.abqjournal.com/1195897/legislator-citizens-deserve-to-have-answers-about-nuclear-facility.html, By Maddy Hayden / Journal Staff Writer July 12th Albuquerque Journal
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20180116/p2a/00m/0na/005000c (Mainichi Japan)
A nuclear energy cooperation agreement between Japan and the U.S. will renew automatically in July 2018, it is expected to be confirmed on Jan. 16.
The existing accord, officially called the Agreement for Cooperation Between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of Japan Concerning Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy, recognizes Japan’s extraction of plutonium from spent nuclear fuel and use of mixed oxide (MOX) fuel as part of its “nuclear fuel cycle.” Renewing the pact will enable Japan to continue with its nuclear fuel cycle policy.
However, after the pact is renewed, if either Japan or the U.S. gives notice, then the agreement will be halted after six months — which would mean that Japan’s nuclear policy would be more easily affected by the will of the U.S.
The nuclear energy agreements that the U.S. has in place with other countries control the handling of nuclear materials and related equipment — from the standpoint of non-proliferation — whenever the U.S. provides nuclear technology to those other nations.
Under the existing agreement between Japan, a non-nuclear nation, and the U.S., nuclear fuel cycle operations such as the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel and also uranium enrichment are recognized, in what is considered an exceptional case.
With the pact coming into effect in July 1988, the 30-year deadline of the current agreement will be reached on July 16, 2018. As long as neither Japan nor the U.S. give notice to withdraw six months prior to the deadline, the pact will be automatically renewed.
The Japanese government did try to negotiate with the U.S. about maintaining the agreement as it is. However, the administration under U.S. President Donald Trump has not been in a position to negotiate, and so the pact looks set to renew automatically, without any serious negotiations taking place.
Nucnet 12th July 2018 , Europe’s second highest court has rejected Austrian objections to the
planned Hinkley Point C nuclear station in southwest England, saying
British government aid offered to the project did not violate EU rules.
The European Commission approved the project in October 2014, saying it did not
see any competition issues, but a previous Austrian government took issue
with the decision and filed a case with the General Court in 2015, arguing
that it contradicted EU policy of supporting renewable energy.
Luxembourg has also challenged the approval, backed by a group of more than 20
academics, politicians and renewable energy officials who say it distorts
competition and flouts rules on government subsidies. But the court noted
in its decision today that the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Poland,
Romania, Slovakia and the UK intervened in support of the EC.
The General Court dismissed Austria’s arguments against the project. The court said:
“The General Court confirms the decision by which the Commission approved
the aid provided by the UK in favour of the Hinkley Point C nuclear power
station,” judges said. The judges said Britain has the right to choose
between the different energy sources.
https://www.nucnet.org/all-the-news/2018/07/12/european-court-dismisses-austria-s-objections-to-hinkley-point-c
Pilgrim seeks exemption from post-closure emergency plans, http://www.capecodtimes.com/news/20180714/pilgrim-seeks-exemption-from-post-closure-emergency-plans By Christine Leger, 14 July 18
PLYMOUTH — The owner of Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station is looking to eliminate the 10-mile emergency planning zone around the reactor less than a year after it powers down for the final time, shrinking the radius under its protection to its property line.
Entergy Corp. plans to permanently shut down the Plymouth plant by June 1, 2019, after 46 years of operation.
The company submitted its request to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for an exemption from the federal requirements to maintain an emergency planning zone beginning April 1, 2020, saying the requirements are expensive and unnecessary.
“Entergy currently provides in excess of $2.25 million to fund Emergency Management programs in the state and local communities,” said Joseph Lynch, senior government affairs manager for Entergy. “At least for the EPZ (emergency planning zone) communities, they will get the same level of funding for approximately one year after the plant is shut down.”
Plymouth, Kingston, Marshfield, Duxbury and Carver have sections falling within Pilgrim’s 10-mile radius.
EurekAlert, 10 July 18
Jerome Lacombe, PhD, an assistant professor and researcher at the UA Center for Applied NanoBioscience and Medicine, recently published a peer-reviewed study in the Public Library of Science journal PLOS ONE.
His study compiled a list of genes reported to be affected by external ionizing radiation (IR), and assessed their performance as possible biomarkers that could be used to calculate the amount of radiation absorbed by the human body.
“In the case of a nuclear event, a lot of people can be radiated,” Dr. Lacombe said. “That is why it’s so important that we can quickly and accurately assess the absorbed radiation so we can give patients the proper medical treatment as fast as possible.”
Jerome Lacombe, PhD, an assistant professor and researcher at the UA Center for Applied NanoBioscience and Medicine, recently published a peer-reviewed study in the Public Library of Science journal PLOS ONE.
His study compiled a list of genes reported to be affected by external ionizing radiation (IR), and assessed their performance as possible biomarkers that could be used to calculate the amount of radiation absorbed by the human body.
“In the case of a nuclear event, a lot of people can be radiated,” Dr. Lacombe said. “That is why it’s so important that we can quickly and accurately assess the absorbed radiation so we can give patients the proper medical treatment as fast as possible.”……..https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-07/uoah-urp071018.php
The claim that new nuclear power will solve climate change is spurious. This ignores life-cycle CO2 emissions Nuclear energy is not zero carbon. Emissions from nuclear will increase significantly over the next few decades as high grade ore is depleted, and increasing amounts of fossil fuels are required to access, mine and mill low-grade ore.
The “Generation IV” demonstration plants projected for 2030-2040 will be too late, and there is no guarantee the pilots will be successful.
James Hansen states that 115 new reactor start-ups would be required each year to 2050 to replace fossil fuel electricity generation ‒ a total of about 4,000 reactors. Let’s assume that Generation IV reactors do the heavy lifting, and let’s generously assume that mass production of Generation IV reactors begins in 2030. That would necessitate about 200 reactor start-ups per year from 2030 to 2050 ‒ or four every week. Good luck with that.
Moreover, the assumption that mass production of Generation IV reactors might begin in or around 2030 is unrealistic.
… a US Government Accountability Office report on the status of small modular reactors (SMRs) and other ‘advanced’ reactor concepts in the US concluded: “Both light water SMRs and advanced reactors face additional challenges related to the time, cost, and uncertainty associated with developing, certifying or licensing, and deploying new reactor technology, with advanced reactor designs generally facing greater challenges than light water SMR designs. It is a multi-decade process …”
Renewables are much faster to roll out.
It gets even more ridiculous when the nuclear lobbyists tout Small Modular Nuclear Reactors. (SMRs) . If the large reactors are required in many thousands – to be effective – how many millions of small ones would be needed?
And – don’t lets us forget. All nuclear reactors are themselves very vulnerable to the effects of climate change. (from Jim Green, REneweconomy)
“This is incredibly deadly material. It’s like having Fukushima sitting in your backyard ready to go off,” a lawmaker asserted of the nuclear waste site.
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FALLOUT: Disasters, Lies and the Nuclear Age by Fred Pearce
includes, of course, Chernobyl, pictured here immediately after the disaster began.
http://nuclearhotseat.com/2018/07/11/fallout-author-fred-pearce-intl-nuclear-disasters-lies/
Podcast: Download
NO! Put away the cell phone and get back in the car! Selfies in the Fukushima radiation zone are never a good idea!
Photo by U. G. Kaneko. Used with permission.
Tokyo electric power is responsible for the nuclear power accident and can’t afford to support Japan Nuclear power costs 
❗
“Tokai ( 1 minutes )” (1 minutes 40 seconds) Video
[NHK] a shareholder of Tokyo Electric Power Co Ltd. has given the intention to support the cost of safety measures in Japan’s nuclear power plant, for the re-operation of tokai second nuclear power plant. I have appealed to the court for a provisional disposition.
In Ibaraki Prefecture, tokai THE second nuclear power plant is in fact, on the 4th of this month, to be reviewed by the Government, and Tokyo Electric Power Co Ltd. Will Support 1,740 billion yen for safety measures. It shows the intention.
As for this, 3 shareholders of Tokyo electric power were not able to expect to recover from the management of Japan’s original [phone], and tepco was a connected to the nuclear power accident and could not afford to support Japan. I appealed to Tokyo District Court for the president and Vice President of Tokyo electric power to give up their support.
Hiroyuki Kawai, who served as an agent of a shareholder who had filed a meeting, was damaged by the tokai second nuclear power plant, and the central part of the capital area and the center of the country were damaged. I have criticized the support of Tokyo electric power, and it is an act of throwing money away. ‘
Source Japanese only https://www3.nhk.or.jp/lnews/mito/20180712/1070003202.html
Other info about TEPCO
Where is TEPCOs billions?
what about the victims compensation? https://nuclear-news.net/2017/11/14/where-is-tepcos-billions-what-about-the-victims-compensation/
People who evacuated from Fukushima Prefecture have not only been exposed to radiation, but to prejudice and misunderstanding regarding compensation that they may or may not have received. The truth about Fukushima nuclear disaster compensation March 2017
The famed Renaissance-era philosopher’s sage words describe to a tee the allegation that Syrian forces attacked the city of Douma, 10km northeast of Damascus, with nerve gas on April 7, 2018.
Even more seriously, not to mention condemnatory, is the way this lie – fashioned by Salafi-jihadist extremists, who at the time were struggling to hang on in a part of the country they’d been occupying for the best part of seven years in the face of a determined campaign by the Syrian Arab Army with Russian support to liberate it – was allowed to take the West on a collision course with Russia, when the Trump administration, supported by France’s Emmanuel Macron and Britain’s Theresa May, decided to launch a missile strike against Syria on the back of it.
Not since the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962 has the world come so close to WWIII as it did then. And it was only down to astute leadership in Moscow, the willingness of the Russian government to accept a temporary loss of face in refusing to respond to what was an act of naked aggression by Washington and its allies, that disaster was averted.
The findings of the OPCW’s interim report, produced on the back of its on-site investigation into allegations that a nerve gas attack took place in Douma on April 7, make grim reading for the army of morally bereft Western ideologues and their apologists who’ve made a career out of defending the indefensible. Or at least, that is, they should make grim reading.
To wit:
“The results show that no organophosphorous nerve agents or their degradation products [emphasis added] were detected in the environmental samples or in the plasma samples taken from alleged casualties.”
When Churchill opined, as only a dyed-in-the-wool imperialist such as he was could, that, “In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies,” he penetrated the fog of obfuscation and propaganda that has always been employed to confuse the public mind over the unending wars of conquest and domination unleashed by the West in the course of its blood-soaked history.
When it comes to Syria, those lies have been legion, framed in such a way as to make that which is unreal appear real and that which is real appear unreal. We have thus been invited over the years of this brutal conflict to believe that bands of Western backed religious sectarian fanatics – intent on the mass slaughter, enslavement, and extirpation of a non-sectarian secular society – are actually Jefferson democrats in disguise, fighting oppression in the name of liberty. We have been asked to accept that those fighting and dying to prevent Syria entering the abyss are evil while those fighting to push Syria into the abyss are virtuous.
It is interesting to ponder at this juncture how for neocons and assorted other regime-change Western extremists the world is reduced to a giant chessboard upon which non-Western nations, governments and peoples are no more than pieces to be moved around, removed and replaced at their whim. It suggests a Manichean worldview that has been lifted from those old B Western Hollywood movies – a cultural fare which has supplanted reality in the minds of people intoxicated with a sense of their own exceptionalism.
This exceptionalism has wrought, over the decades in which Western hegemony has held sway, more chaos, mayhem, carnage, and dislocation than any number of natural disasters.
It is why, just as the conflict in Vietnam was more than the sum of its parts in terms of its wider significance and importance, so it is with the conflict that’s been raging in Syria in our time. This conflict is not and has never been primarily a civil war, or even a regional war. It has been and remains primarily an anti-imperialist struggle with the outcome assuming world-historical importance as a consequence. And, to be sure, this outcome is reflected in the vast ocean of propaganda, lies, untruths, and distortion that has been unleashed in support of regime change and military intervention.
Never mind the former Yugoslavia, never mind Iraq, and never mind Libya; the ease with which this propaganda machine rolls on from one country and society, destroyed under its tracks, to the next is redolent of a beast whose appetite for domination is completely insatiable.
Thus in Syria, this beast is being slayed not only in the interests of a Syrian people whose suffering and sacrifice has been inordinate – supported by Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah in an example of internationalism which in the last analysis is the only antidote to Western hegemony capable of breaking its asphyxiating grip militarily, economically, culturally, and geopolitically. It is also being slayed in the interests of a world suffering under the dead weight of a Pax Americana which for far too long has gone unchallenged.
Douma will forever stand as a milestone in the moral degeneracy of those handsomely remunerated champions of regime change who colonize the opinion columns of mainstream newspapers, the vast network of neoconservative think tanks made up of privately educated cranks and crackpots whose dishonesty is only exceeded by their mendacity, and those who occupy the corridors of power in Western capitals.
They are the very people Shakespeare had in mind when he wrote, “Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”
John Wight has written for a variety of newspapers and websites, including the Independent, Morning Star, Huffington Post, Counterpunch, London Progressive Journal, and Foreign Policy Journal.
A new, shocking report by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s Department of Engineering and Public Policy (EPP), Harvard University, and the University of California San Diego School of Global Policy and Strategy discovered that the U.S. nuclear power industry could be on the verge of a collapse — a reality that many have yet to realize.
Published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS), “US nuclear power: The vanishing low-carbon wedge” examined 99 nuclear power reactors in 30 states, operated by 30 different power companies. As of 2017, there are two new reactors under construction, but 34 reactors have been permanently shut down as many plants reach the end of their lifespan.
“We’re asleep at the wheel on a very dangerous highway,” said Ahmed Abdulla, co-author and fellow at the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UC San Diego. “We really need to open our eyes and study the situation.”
For more than three decades, approximately 20 percent of U.S. power generation has come from light water nuclear reactors (LWRs). These plants are now aging, and the cost to service or upgrade them along with fierce competition from Trump’s economic order to prop up failing coal and heavily indebted shale oil/gas companies make nuclear power less competitive in today’s power markets.
In return, the American shale boom could trigger a significant number of US nuclear power plant closures in the years ahead, the researchers warned. The country is now at a critical crossroad that it must abandon nuclear power altogether or embrace the next generation of miniature, more cost-effective reactors.
The researchers noted that small modular reactors might play a significant role in US energy markets in the next few decades. This new design would effectively swap out the current aging, LWRs that the Atomic Energy Commission allowed to rapidly expand across the country in the 1960s and after. The researchers described several scenarios where new nuclear power plants could be used to back up wind and solar, produce heat for industrial processes, or serve military bases.
Given the current market structure and policy dynamics, the researchers were not convinced that nuclear power would be competitive in the future power market.
While efforts continue to advance batteries for storing electricity from solar and wind, utilities have made an impressive push into natural gas. As of 2018, fossil fuel now produces nearly 32 percent of US power.
Given the impending collapse of the nuclear industry, the researchers questioned whether renewable energy would be enough to offset losses from retiring nuclear power plants.
“The reality is you cannot actually replace 20 percent of the need with wind and solar, unless you want to wallpaper every square inch of many states,” said Christian Back, vice-president of nuclear technologies and materials at General Atomics. “It’s not efficient enough.”
Back said with the right political support, nuclear reactors operating today could be retrofitted to increase safety and lifespan, while smaller, more cost-effective ones could be strategically placed on the grid.
“This is a situation like Nasa when you’re putting someone on the moon where the government needs to recognize the long-term benefit and investment that’s required and help support that,” Back added. “This is where political will matters.”
Researchers also suggested that many civilians overlook nuclear energy and do not realize the urgency of the situation.
In the article’s conclusion, the researchers warn, “It should be a source of profound concern for all who care about climate change that, for entirely predictable and resolvable reasons, the United States appears set to virtually lose nuclear power, and thus a wedge of reliable and low-carbon energy, over the next few decades.”
Is the Era of Nuclear Power Coming to an End?
By Zerohedge.com
Source https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Nuclear-Power/The-Downfall-Of-US-Nuclear-Power.html
On July 3, the Cabinet of the Japanese government approved the country’s 5th Strategic Energy Plan after receiving the final draft the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). The plan is significant as it sets forth the government’s approach to energy policy for the future and is considered one of the key documents indicating the government’s direction with respect to national energy supply and energy markets. It is closely watched by the corporate and civil sectors alike both home and abroad.
The Japanese government is required by law to reevaluate and issue a strategic energy plan at least every three years and, while it is not a binding legal instrument, it has become a de facto policy tool that has been followed by the various government agencies and departments in each of its iterations. It also serves as a market signaler and seeks to provide long-term certainty to energy market participants and allay any fears of a sudden policy shift.
Future Energy Mix
A key element of the strategic energy plan is the government’s future energy mix predictions, with the current benchmark date being 2030. In the plan, METI maintained the same energy source ratio for 2030 as it had outlined in the previous strategic energy plan in 2013 and in its long-term energy supply and demand outlook issued in 2015. The desired energy ratios set forth a balanced approach to the full range of power generation options, including both renewables (22 to 24 percent) and nuclear (20 to 22 percent).
Note: The percentages provided in the Plan for Renewable Energy and Nuclear Energy were 20-22 percent and 22-24 percent, respectively. For the purposes of this chart, the higher of the range of percentages has been used.
While the ratios have remained the same, what is new is that renewable energy sources were designated as a “main source of power generation” for the first time. Some see this as a major shift in government policy that recognizes that in the future renewable energy has a role to play as a baseload power source and not only as auxiliary power. As it currently stands, renewable energy in Japan accounted for 15 percent of the energy mix in 2017, up from 10.7 percent in 2010. Renewable energy proponents are encouraged by the upward trend in market penetration but also consider that Japan could do more to extend the 20-22 percent target for 2030, especially as the renewable energy target is significantly lower than similar targets set by other G7 countries.
The Future Challenge of Nuclear and Coal Power
The plan makes it abundantly clear that the Japanese government still sees nuclear power as playing a significant role in the energy market as well as being an important method of meeting its environmental commitments. However the resumption and expansion of the nuclear power industry in Japan remains controversial.
Following energy demand predictions, to reach the proposed level of nuclear generation in the overall energy mix, it becomes clear that new nuclear reactors will need to be constructed in addition to all of Japan’s existing nuclear reactors being restarted and having their operational life extended.
The stigma of nuclear power runs deep and strong as reconstruction efforts from 2011 are still underway and fearful local communities have successfully campaigned to block the restarting or construction of new reactors. Cases have been filed with respect to most nuclear power plants, with residents and citizen groups seeking injunctions from the courts to block any decision to restart the reactors. Multiple suits are underway across the country with appeals being heard on a regular basis but no conclusive position has yet been determined. In addition to grassroots movements, prefectural governors have openly come out in opposition to the national government’s plans to restart the reactors in a bid to gain public favor as local election season begins.
Clearly, this level of opposition puts the government’s proposed energy mix in jeopardy as questions are raised over whether the government will be able to implement the measures necessary to reach the proposed percentages.
In such a climate of uncertainty over the future of the nuclear industry, utility operators too are skeptical. In the wake of the Fukushima disaster, nuclear reactors were shut down and utility companies turned to large-scale thermal coal power plants to make up the shortfall. As a result, as the share of nuclear power fell from 28.6 percent in 2010 to nil in 2014, thermal coal power rose from 25 percent to 31 percent over the same timeframe. In the last two years to date, eight new power plants have come online and 36 new projects are scheduled to come online in the next decade, which will increase total coal power generation capacity by approximately 40 percent. The upward trend in coal generation is at direct odds with the Plan’s forecast of coal generation falling from its current share of approximately 30 percent to only 26 percent of total energy generation.
This too is out of step with other major economies around the world such as the U.K., which plans to shutter all coal-fired power plants by 2025, and France, a former nuclear power heavyweight, which plans to cease coal power generation by 2021.
With that in mind, similar to the nuclear industry, the feasibility of increased coal generation is being questioned. International and domestic pressure is mounting for a more balanced approach to be adopted. Environmental groups, using the Paris Agreement as justification for their opposition, and local citizen groups have been mobilizing against the construction of new coal power plants. Local citizen groups in Chiba and Hyogo Prefectures have recently successfully forced utility operators to completely abandon construction plans for several new large scale power plants. Three of Japan’s mega-banks, Mizuho, Mitsubishi-UFJ Bank, and Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, also released over the past two months new lending policies that will significantly restrict the amount of finance that they will make available for new and existing coal generation projects.
While the Strategic Energy Plan is designed to give energy market participants policy certainty, the latest iteration has thrown up more questions than answers. The feeling is that the pro-nuclear and pro-coal position of the ruling government is out of step with what is practically achievable given the changing community and business landscape. Maintaining the status quo of the 2014 and 2015 predictions is intended to give a sense of continuity but, given concerns over changes in context and evolving situations that may pose significant problems to the achievement of those targets, doing so may have instead only contributed to an already unpredictable outlook.
Peter Bungate is an Australian corporate lawyer working in Japan since 2014, specializing in energy markets and policy both domestic and international.
https://tribunecontentagency.com/article/plotting-japans-energy-future/
Crazy for Loving You – Patsy Kline video – Listen while reading, recommended 🙂
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A state legislator says he isn’t getting any answers out of the administration of Gov. Susana Martinez to questions on a proposed interim storage site for spent nuclear fuel in southeast New Mexico.
Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces, chairman of the Legislature’s Committee on Radioactive and Hazardous Materials, sent nearly 60 questions to the heads of several state departments in April.
ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — A state legislator says he isn’t getting any answers out of the administration of Gov. Susana Martinez to questions on a proposed interim storage site for spent nuclear fuel in southeast New Mexico.
Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces, chairman of the Legislature’s Committee on Radioactive and Hazardous Materials, sent nearly 60 questions to the heads of several state departments in April.
Only one responded.
“It raises the obvious conclusion that this governor and her administration have done no analysis on this project,” Steinborn said. “The citizens of the state deserve to have answers on our state’s ability to handle this facility.”
The senator wrote in a July 9 letter to the governor that the New Mexico Environment Department did respond to his questions, “but without providing substantive information on the issues raised.”
The Environment Department provided that letter to the Journal.
In it, department Secretary Butch Tongate wrote NMED would review the Environmental Impact Statement currently in progress at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission “and provide comments to the NRC as necessary.”
“The Senator’s questions should be directed to the NRC — the agency overseeing the process,” said NMED spokeswoman Katy Diffendorfer in an email.
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
of the week–London Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Tell the Ukrainian Government to Drop Prosecution of Peace Activist Yurii Sheliazhenko
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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