Energy firm with alleged Trump ties wants Memphis Light, Gas and Water to switch to unfinished nuclear power plant
Energy firm with alleged Trump ties wants MLGW to ditch TVA for its unfinished nuclear plant, Biz Journals By Samuel Hardiman – Staff Reporter, Memphis Business Journal, 10 Oct 18
Nuclear Development LLC said MLGW could save $400 million annually if it purchases power from the Bellefonte Nuclear Generating Station instead of from the TVA.
The plant in the north Alabama town of Hollywood could be complete by 2024 if the company receives the federal funding it’s seeking……….
Franklin Haney, a Chattanooga developer who is a principal with Nuclear Development, has come under scrutiny after allegedly offering President Donald Trump’s former associate, Michael Cohen, $10 million if he could help Haney land the federal loan.
MLGW is one of TVA’s largest customers. It accounted for 10 percent of the power provider’s operating revenues in 2017, according to filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. https://www.bizjournals.com/memphis/news/2018/10/09/energy-firm-with-trump-ties-wants-mlgw-to-leave.html
SCANA kept quiet about a ‘potential fraud’ at SC nuclear project.
SCANA execs uncovered ‘potential fraud’ at SC nuclear project. They didn’t tell the cops. By Andrew Brown abrown@postandcourier.com, Oct 8, 2018 COLUMBIA — SCANA’s executives in 2015 learned about a million-dollar bid-rigging scheme during the construction of their South Carolina nuclear project but never reported the discovery to state and federal law enforcement officials.
Rather, they kept the matter quiet to avoid negative publicity about the project, according to a source with direct knowledge, avoiding unwanted attention from regulators and the public.
The alleged fraud highlights the secrecy that SCANA’s leaders cloaked the failed $9 billion project in over the past decade. The previously undisclosed episode has come to light amid continued debate about why the project failed and who is responsible.
Documents show SCANA’s employees confirmed Compuworld, a company based in Lexington County, undermined the purchasing rules for the V.C. Summer nuclear expansion project in order to win contracts to supply office furniture.
An investigation by SCANA’s corporate compliance office showed Alan Saleeby, Compuworld’s owner, submitted bids for his business and allegedly forged the applications for two other companies — allowing him to rake in money while making the purchases look competitive.
SCANA hired attorneys from Atlanta to complete background checks on all of the people involved in the scheme. They studied whether the utility had to report the questionable purchases under federal nuclear oversight regulations. And they considered “possible civil and criminal fraud claims” against Chicago Bridge and Iron, the contractor that approved the purchases.
News of the suspicious activity traveled quickly to SCANA’s top executives as the company’s leaders worked behind the scenes to fix other aspects of the struggling power project. One of the nuclear project’s top executives flagged the case for SCANA’s nuclear chief Jeff Archie. In an email, the executive described the purchases as “potential fraud.”
…….. the allegations leveled against Compuworld mark the most serious issue yet with the purchasing process at V.C. Summer — a project now considered the biggest economic failure in state history.
SCANA inadvertently disclosed its investigation into Compuworld earlier this year in legal bills it filed with the state Public Service Commission. But since then, SCANA’s attorneys have fought to keep other emails and documents about the investigation secret.
Eric Boomhower, SCANA’s spokesman, confirmed that the utility quietly settled the issue with Chicago Bridge and Iron in late 2015. He described the investigation into Compuworld as a “financial dispute.”
SCANA’s investigators referred to it simply as fraud.
……… The investigation became more serious when SCANA discovered evidence that Saleeby also was submitting bids for companies that were purportedly competing against Compuworld. Email addresses and the handwriting on some of the documents showed Saleeby was personally filing the other offers, too, guaranteeing that Compuworld came out on top……… https://www.postandcourier.com/business/scana-execs-uncovered-potential-fraud-at-sc-nuclear-project-they/article_0eb5960a-c63b-11e8-a6a0-cf8c595ea1ed.html
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International threat of hacking, to nuclear weapons
Hacking nuclear weapons is a global threat https://thehill.com/opinion/international/410472-hacking-nuclear-weapons-is-a-global-threat
For example, if a leader doesn’t believe that nuclear retaliation will occur, he or she may not be inhibited from attacking and nuclear deterrence will not be effective.
Madness, mistake and miscalculation all operate independently of nuclear deterrence. These pose great concern for the human future. An insane or suicidal leader could launch his or her nuclear arsenal without concern for retaliation. A mistake could also lead to the launch of a nuclear arsenal without concern for retaliation. Likewise, miscalculation of the intent of a nuclear-armed country could lead to a nuclear launch without concern for retaliation.
A new, and possibly even greater, concern is coming over the horizon. That concern, related to cyberattacks on an enemy’s nuclear systems, could be labelled as “manipulation.” It is emerging due to the growing sophistication of hackers penetrating cyber-security walls in general. It would be disastrous if hackers were able to penetrate the walls protecting nuclear arsenals.
Imagine a cyberattack on a nuclear weapons system that allowed an outside party to launch a country’s nuclear arsenal or a portion of it at another country. This could occur by an outside party, working with or independently of a state, hacking into and activating the launch codes for a country’s nuclear arsenal. Can we be sure that this could not happen to any of the nine current nuclear-armed countries? It would pose a particular danger to those nuclear-armed countries that keep their nuclear arsenals on high-alert status, ready to be fired on extremely short notice, often within minutes of a launch order.
The Royal Institute of International Affairs in the UK, issued a research paper recently noted, “As an example of what is possible, the US is reported to have infiltrated parts of North Korea’s missile systems and caused test failures. Recent cases of cyber-attacks indicate that nuclear weapons systems could also be subject to interference, hacking, and sabotage through the use of malware or viruses, which could infect digital components of a system at any time. Minuteman silos, for example, are believed to be particularly vulnerable to cyber-attacks.”
Even if eight of the nine nuclear-armed countries had adequate cybersecurity, the weakest link could potentially have vulnerabilities that would allow for a cyberattack. It is also probable that new means of penetrating cybersecurity will be developed in the future. It is within the realm of imagination that terrorist groups could have skillsets that would allow them to breach the cybersecurity of one or more nuclear-armed countries, and set in motion a nuclear attack with highly threatening and dangerous consequences.
The gaps in nuclear deterrence theory cannot be filled by throwing money at them, or with more new missiles with larger or smaller warheads. The problem with nuclear deterrence is that it cannot be made effective, and the potential for breaching the cybersecurity of nuclear arsenals only adds to the vulnerabilities and dangers.
The only meaningful response to nuclear weapons is to stigmatize, delegitimize, and ban them. This is exactly what the new Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons seeks to accomplish. This treaty deserves the full support of the world community. As of now, however, it is only receiving the support of the countries without nuclear arms, and is being opposed by the countries possessing nuclear arms and those sheltering under the U.S. nuclear umbrella. This must change, for the benefit of all the world’s people and especially the citizens of the nuclear-armed countries who would likely be the first victims of a nuclear attack.
David Krieger is a founder of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, and has served as its president since 1982. His latest book is “In the Shadow of the Bomb: Poems of Survival.”
Was it close to a nuclear emergency, when Hurricane Florence hit USA East coast?
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Was Three a Near-Fukushima Event on the Atlantic During Hurricane Florence? ObRag, Ocean Beach California by on OCTOBER 10, 2018 Nuclear Shutdown News for September 2018 Black Rain PressNuclear Shutdown News chronicles the decline and fall of the nuclear power industry in the US and beyond, and highlights the efforts of those working for a nuclear free future. Here is our September 2018 report.
A Near-Fukushima on the Atlantic? On September 17 the Raleigh News & Observer reported, “Floods limit access to Duke’s Brunswick nuclear plant: crews us partopotties, cots.” Did the Atlantic coast have a near-Fukushima event when during September Hurricane Florence made landfall? Utility Duke Energy’s Brunswick two nuclear reactors are located 30 miles south of Wilmington, NC, where the former Category 4 hurricane made landfall as a tropical storm in mid September. It was reported that “workers are sleeping on cots and using portable toilets because the water is currently shut off and the toilets can’t flush”, and that there was “limited access to the plant, and some workers have been able to leave the site and check up on their homes nearby. After the storm passed some drove to a Walmart in Southport to stock up on provisions.” Brunswick’s twin reactors started up in the 1940s, and are now approaching their designed operating life, 40 years. They are called boiling water reactors, the same model as the three Fukushima reactors that melted down in 2011, and were built by the same company, General Electric. US nuclear plants are required to shut down if hurricane force winds, 73 miles per hour or higher, are moving in. Fortunately the winds weren’t quite that strong when Florence hit the East Coast. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission reported, “Flooding of roads and downed trees prevented fresh crews from relieving the nearly 300 Duke Energy ‘storm riders’ who had been on site for days. And the blocked roads made it impossible to reach the 10 mile emergency evacuation zone if a higher level emergency is declared” Food had to be brought in by helicopters…….https://obrag.org/2018/10/was-three-a-near-fukushima-event-on-the-atlantic-during-hurricane-florence/ |
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