Scandinavian farmers still impacted by radioactive fallout from Chernobyl nuclear disaster
Chernobyl: 33 Years On, Radioactive Fallout Still Impacts Scandinavian Farmershttps://www.forbes.com/sites/davidnikel/2019/06/08/chernobyl-33-years-on-radiation-still-impacts-scandinavian-farmers/#390eeebd949f, David Nike 8 June 19
The smash-hit HBO series ‘Chernobyl’ has introduced an entire new generation to the nuclear disaster that shook the world in 1986. Initially covered up by Soviet authorities, the disaster only came to light when nuclear power stations in Sweden – hundreds of miles away – detected high levels of radiation and began to ask questions. 33 years later, radiation remains a problem in both Sweden and Norway especially for farmers.
“Who would have thought that a small northern Norwegian mountain village could be hit by a nuclear accident in Europe. Overnight we were powerless. The Chernobyl accident shows that our food production is vulnerable. It’s scary,” sheep farmer Laila Hoff from Hattfjelldal told Norwegian state broadcaster NRK. She said all meat had to be destroyed in the first year following the accident. But even now in 2019, animals in 37 Norwegian municipalities are subject to radiation testing and control before they can be slaughtered. One leading researcher says it will take “decades” for the controls to no longer be necessary.
How Chernobyl hit farming in Norway and Sweden
The radioactive substance cesium-137 takes many years to break down with an estimated half-life of 30 years. It still exists in the earth in the areas affected by the Chernobyl accident, including large parts of Norway and Sweden. The substance is taken up from the soil by plants and fungi, which in turn are eaten by sheep, reindeer and other grazing animals.
In the wake of the 1986 accident, cesium-137 spread over much of northern and central Scandinavia. The weather conditions were such that Norway and Sweden were two of the countries worst hit outside the Soviet Union. In Sweden, the areas around Uppsala, Gävle and Västerbotten were hardest hit, while in Norway the area between Trondheim and Bodø along with mountainous areas further south suffered, mainly because of rainfall.
The radiation impacted vegetation to varying degrees, but also led to radioactivity in grazing animals, primarily sheep and reindeer. In reindeer calf meat, up to 40,000 becquerels per kilogram (Bq/kg) were measured, with up to 10,000 Bq/kg in sheep meat. Norwegian authorities set the highest acceptable level in meat at just 60 Bq/kg, which led to the widespread feeding of animals with non-contaminated feed. This process of feeding livestock from contaminated pastures with non-radioactive feed for a period to reduce radioactivity in meat or milk is known as nedfôring.
Energy experts doubt the viability of Small Modular Nuclear Reactors (SMRs)
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Caution urged over modular nuclear reactors, New Civil Engineer, 9 JUNE, 2019 Energy heavyweights have urged caution over the idea of rolling out small modular reactor (SMR) technology to replace cancelled and decommissioned nuclear power projects.
The warnings came during a discussion on the potential ‘clean energy gap’ left by cancelled nuclear projects like Wylfa and older plants being decommissioned early. One potential solution to the gap would be to accelerate the progress of SMR development, which are marketed by their supporters as a more affordable nuclear power option, and safer than larger projects, such as Hinkley Point C. However National Infrastructure Commission chief economist James Richardson warned that the industry had failed to deliver on technological promises in the past. “You have to have a degree of caution with new nuclear technology,” he said. “We have been promised things time and time again and typically the industry tends to be more expensive and take longer than planned. I would be cautious against SMRs, they are a question for the 2030s.” “SMRs are not going to help in the next decade because they are just not available. By the time they turn up we can see if they are still cost effective or if renewable’s have gone beyond.” UK Energy Research Centre director Jim Watson agreed, and added we need to decarbonised power before SMR’s can be deployed. “I would also be cautious; we need to remember that 2030 is when we need to have decarbonised our power system by and I think there is a limit to which nuclear can help deliver that. We don’t know what the real cost of these SMRs are. History does make us cautious.” ……. https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/caution-urged-over-modular-nuclear-reactors/10042995.article |
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USA court deliberates on whether or not global warming violates children’s rights
US court weighs if climate change violates children’s rights Business Mirror, By The Associated Press, June 10, 2019 PORTLAND, Oregon—In a courtroom packed with environmental activists, federal judges wrestled last week with whether climate change violates the constitutional rights of young people who have sued the US government over the use of fossil fuels.Suing to stop sea turtle kills — Beyond Nuclear International
Nuclear plant built on sea turtle nesting beach continues to kill them
via Suing to stop sea turtle kills — Beyond Nuclear International
Uranium Enrichment in the UK – in Leafy Cheshire! —
The following is from our friends at Close Capenhurst Campaign. The UKs Uranium Enrichment Plant in Cheshire is closely linked to Springfields Nuclear Fuel Manufacturing Plant in Preston Telling the Real Tail About Tailings A New Plant at Capenhurst. Having spent almost One Billion pounds, and over four years late to complete, the new URENCO […]
ENVIRONMENT AND CLIMATE CHANGE SUBCOMMITTEE ANNOUNCES LEGISLATIVE HEARING ON NUCLEAR WASTE CLEANUP BILLS — Mining Awareness +
More nuclear waste hearings… “ENVIRONMENT AND CLIMATE CHANGE SUBCOMMITTEE ANNOUNCES LEGISLATIVE HEARING ON NUCLEAR WASTE CLEANUP BILLS Jun 6, 2019 Press Release Energy and Commerce Chairman Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ) and Environment and Climate Change Chairman Paul Tonko (D-NY) announced today that the Environment and Climate Change Subcommittee will hold a legislative hearing on Thursday, […]
Leading Russian Journalist Detained On Apparently Trumped Up Narcotics Charges — Mining Awareness +
From VOA News: “Leading Russian Journalist Detained on Narcotics Charges June 07, 2019 11:33 AM UPDATE June 07, 2019 5:45 PM, by Charles Maynes A leading Russian journalist has been detained on drug charges that he and his supporters say are retaliation for his investigative reporting work into alleged misdeeds by the authorities. Ivan […]
via Leading Russian Journalist Detained On Apparently Trumped Up Narcotics Charges — Mining Awareness +
June 9 Energy News — geoharvey
Science and Technology: ¶ “Arctic Melt: Threat Beneath The Ice” • The Arctic is heating up twice as fast as the global average, causing massive melting of sea ice. While we know climate change is warming the Arctic air, there is a lot more happening under the ice that we don’t fully understand. We have […]
Whistleblowers will be effectively silenced: the result of Australia’s police raids on journalists
It sends shockwaves through your life’: how the media raids will silence whistleblowers, Guardian Christopher Knaus@knausc 9 Jun 2019
Those forces have already exacted a crippling toll.
“[My ex-wife] would probably say – and I think there’s an element of truth in it – it killed David McBride,” he says. “The man that she married was killed by the defence force, and I’m someone who’s different.
“Doing something like this, taking on the whole government, it sends shockwaves through your life, and not much survives, really.”
Wednesday’s raid on the ABC prompted outrage among civil rights groups, transparency campaigners, journalists and unions. It came just a day after federal police searched the home of the News Corp reporter Annika Smethurst, searching for documents related to her coverage of proposed new surveillance powers for the Australian Signals Directorate. 2GB host Ben Fordham’s revelation about asylum seeker boats attempting to reach Australia from Sri Lanka is also the subject of a home affairs investigation, as the department attempts to identify his source.
The raids have not occurred in isolation. Multiple whistleblowers who revealed government wrongdoing are currently being pursued through the courts with alarming vigour.
The government is prosecuting Witness K and Bernard Collaery, who revealed an unlawful spy operation against Timor-Leste during oil negotiations. Richard Boyle, the tax office worker who revealed the government’s heavy-handed approach to recovering debts, faces a long stint in jail if convicted.
Assoc Prof Joseph Fernandez, a journalism lecturer at Curtin University, has spent years studying source protection and the Australian media. He says the consequences of this week’s raids are clear, regardless of whether journalists are charged.
“Such raids, regardless of what happens here to journalists or to others, will have an immeasurable censoring effect on contact people have with journalists,” Fernandez says.
“In my research in this area over the years, it was clear that even senior public servants are apprehensive about having contact with journalists, even about mundane things, in the wake of laws that enable the authorities to track down sources.”
The McBride matter had been bubbling away for some time before Wednesday’s raid. Guardian Australia understands police have been talking to the ABC since at least September, trying to find a way to access the documents without resorting to a very public raid. …….
Denis Muller, from the University of Melbourne’s Centre for Advancing Journalism, says arguments about the police operating at arm’s length from government miss the point. “The point is that the politicians have constructed a repressive legal regime designed to protect the executive branch of government, impede accountability to the public and exert a chilling effect on the press,” Muller wrote in the Conversation………. https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/jun/08/it-sends-shockwaves-through-your-life-how-the-media-raids-will-silence-whistleblowers
USA in a real mess over nuclear wastes: stalemate in storage options
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House Panel Highlights Risks Over Nuclear-Storage Stalemate, https://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2019-06-07/house-panel-highlights-risks-over-nuclear-storage-stalemate
Members of Congress say America’s long stalemate over where to put its nuclear waste needs to end _ and as soon as possible. By Associated Press, Wire Service Content June 7, 2019 BY MICHAEL R. BLOOD, LAGUNA NIGEL, Calif. (AP) — Southern California‘s San Onofre nuclear power plant was permanently closed in 2013, but the site remains home to 3.5 million pounds (1.59 million kilograms) of nuclear waste that has nowhere else to go. Members of a House subcommittee held a hearing Friday not far from the defunct plant to highlight the urgency behind efforts to build a long-term national repository for used radioactive fuel, a proposal that has languished for decades in Washington. “The federal government has failed, and continues to fail, to find a solution to our country’s nuclear waste problem,” said Rep. Harley Rouda, a Democrat whose district is up the coast from the seaside San Onofre plant. Even if a bipartisan agreement is reached soon, development of a site would be at least a decade away, he said. In the meantime, 8.4 million residents live within 50 miles (about 80 kilometers) of the plant, which is within sight of a busy freeway and in a region crossed by earthquake faults. Nationally, one in three Americans lives within 50 miles of nuclear waste, Rouda said. The nation does “not have any more time to waste” to find a solution, he said, citing potential safety risks. Development of a proposed long-term storage site at Nevada‘s Yucca Mountain was halted during the Obama administration, although the Trump administration has moved to restart the licensing process while the plan continues to face stiff resistance in Nevada. Meanwhile, proposals in New Mexico and Texas for temporary storage sites are also facing criticism. On Friday, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham said she’s opposed to plans to build the facility in her state. Building a long-term storage site would lead to another question: How would the radioactive waste get there from nuclear power plants? “There is not consensus about health and safety standards, including whether commercial spent fuel is safe where it is,” said Don Hancock of the Southwest Research and Information Center, a nonprofit watchdog group. “If it is safe where it is, why move it? If it’s not safe where it is, how can it be safe to transport through many other communities?” During the hearing, Democratic Rep. Mike Levin, whose 49th District includes the plant site, urged federal regulators to increase oversight at San Onofre, which received approval in 2015 to move tons of highly radioactive fuel from storage pools into steel canisters sheathed by concrete. Those transfers were halted about a year ago after a 50-ton canister of spent fuel was left hanging and at risk of being dropped rather than lowered 18 feet (5.5 meters) into a storage vault. Federal regulators later fined plant operator Southern California Edison $116,000. Levin has asked the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to appoint a full-time inspector at the plant, which is no longer producing power. NRC Administrator Scott Morris told the panel it would take a change in policy by the commission. The NRC has given Edison permission to resume transferring canisters filled with nuclear waste to the separate storage site. But the commission announced this month it will conduct surprise inspections at the plant to help make sure it’s running smoothly. Edison said in a statement that it strongly encourages action by Congress, but warned that “misrepresenting the science and potential consequences of spent nuclear fuel makes the challenge of finding a … location for storage more difficult.” “The federal government must honor its decades-long obligation to create a permanent repository and begin the process of relocating spent nuclear fuel from reactor sites throughout the country,” the company said. San Onofre was shut down in January 2012 after a small radiation leak led to the discovery of extensive damage to hundreds of tubes inside the virtually new generators. The plant never produced electricity again. Edison closed San Onofre for good in 2013 amid a fight with environmentalists over whether the plant was too damaged to restart safely. |
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Mike Pompeo thinks that climate change is not really a serious problem, could be good for trade
“The climate’s been changing a long time. There’s always changes that take place,” Pompeo said during an interview with the Washington Times published Friday, when asked whether he thought climate change was man-made and how best to address it. He did not mention anything about man-made pollution in his remarks…..
The comments aren’t Pomepo’s first foray into controversial climate assessments.
In May, Pompeo praised the Arctic’s rapidly shrinking sea levels for their subsequent economic opportunities, despite continued warnings about the catastrophic effects of climate change….. https://myfox8.com/2019/06/09/pompeo-downplays-climate-change-suggests-people-move-to-different-places/
Chernobyl 2.0? Cracks found in UK nuclear reactor could lead to evacuation of millions.
radioactive contamination and full evacuation of major Brit cities, experts
have said in a terrifying warning. Experts have warned that in the very
worst case the hot graphite core could become exposed to air and ignite
leading to radioactive contamination and evacuation of a large area of
Scotland’s central belt – including Glasgow and Edinburgh.
currently making a case for turning them back on, with help from trade
union GMB. Although the probability of a meltdown is still low, the
consequences could be incredibly severe.
Edinburgh would need to be entirely evacuated due to radioactive
contamination. According to Dr Ian Fairlie, an independent consultant on
radioactivity in the environment, and Dr David Toke, Reader in Energy
Policy at the University of Aberdeen, the two reactors definitely should
not be restarted. Speaking about the cracks in the barrels, they warned:
“This is a serious matter because if an untoward incident were to occur –
for example an earth tremor, gas excursion, steam surge, sudden outage, or
sudden depressurisation, the barrels could become dislodged and/or
misaligned.
Theresa May will ignore cost warnings and bring in net zero emissions goal
Business Green 7th June 2019 Theresa May will ignore cost warnings and bring in net zero emissions goal before her successor takes over in Downing Street, reports suggest. The Prime Minister will set in law a target for the UK to reach net zero
greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 before she leaves office, although she is
unlikely to bring forward any new policy or detailed action plan for
achieving the goal, according to reports.
As recommended by the Committee
on Climate Change (CCC) in its landmark report last month, Theresa May is
set to announce a net zero goal for 2050 and could do so as soon as next
week, in a move the government expects to garner broad parliamentary
support, reports The Independent.
Chernobyl disaster: how radiation affected the UK, and which parts of Britain are most radioactive today
Background radiation levels are much higher in some parts of the UK than in others,
The poisonous radiation that spewed into the atmosphere drifted over to Western Europe, causing a spike in radiation-related diseases and deaths in the years following the disaster.
How was the UK affected by Chernobyl?
In the immediate aftermath of the accident, the UK government banned the sale of sheep across thousands of farms on the basis that the animals had likely ingested radioactive material from fallout absorbed by plants.
In June of the same year, almost 9,000 British farms were affected by restrictions brought in on the movement and sale of sheep meat. This meant livestock had to be scanned by government officials before they were allowed to enter the food chain.
Parts of Cumbria, Scotland and Northern Ireland were impacted, and North Wales was hardest hit, with sheep in Wales still failing radioactive tests 10 years after the accident in 1996.
The last restrictions on the movement and sale of sheep in the UK were lifted in 2012, 26 years after the meltdown.
There have also been some studies linking increased incidences of infant leukaemia in Britain to the Chernobyl disaster but results are not conclusive.
Which parts of the UK are most radioactive?
Most of the background radiation present in the UK today comes from radon rather than fallout from Chernobyl.
Radon is an odourless, colourless gas formed by the radioactive decay of the small amounts of uranium that occur naturally in all rocks and soils.
Due to the variations in terrain across the UK, this means that some areas nationwide have far higher levels of background radiation than others……. https://inews.co.uk/news/science/chernobyl-disaster-radiation-uk-today-most-radioactive-areas-britain/
A mistake for USA to deploy the low-yield Trident nuclear warhead
The Trump administration’s 2018 Nuclear Posture Review called for a low-yield warhead on some Trident D5 submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs). The plan modifies a W76-1 warhead, which has an explosive yield of 100 kilotons — seven times the size of the weapon used against Hiroshima — to produce the W76-2, reportedly with a yield of “just” five-seven kilotons.
Adding this weapon to the arsenal would risk lowering the nuclear threshold. To be sure, Pentagon officials assert that new low-yield weapons would not lower the threshold.
Yet the Nuclear Posture Review argued for low-yield weapons out of concern that Russia might feel it could use its “small” nuclear weapons free of concern about U.S. retaliation because the United States arsenal consists mainly of large-yield weapons.
So, at a minimum, the goal of new U.S. low-yield nuclear weapons would appear to be to persuade Moscow that the United States is more likely to go nuclear.
It is in the U.S. interest to maintain the highest possible threshold against the use of any nuclear arms. We should avoid steps that might signal, even inadvertently, that the use of “small” nukes is somehow acceptable………
SLBMs on submarines at sea constitute the most important and most survivable leg of the U.S. strategic triad, because the submarines can hide underwater and have lots of ocean in which to roam. Each submarine at sea carries a significant portion of the survivable U.S. nuclear deterrent.
The problem with launching an SLBM with a W76-2 is that it would reveal the submarine’s location. The submarine could maneuver away from the launch point, but it still would have compromised its general position, putting at risk the boat and the other 80-90 warheads it carried. Would the U.S. military run that risk, particularly given the availability of other low-yield options?
A bigger problem is discrimination. The Russians could not tell whether a launched SLBM carried a W76-2 or a W76-1 (100 kilotons) or, for that matter, a W88 (450 kilotons) until the weapon (or weapons) detonated………
The problem is that a launch from many parts of the Atlantic toward the Baltics would also appear, at least initially, to be a launch against Moscow.
Would the U.S. leadership launch a W76-2 — and run the risk that the Russians misread it as larger warhead intended to flatten Moscow in a decapitation strike — when F-35s and B61-12 bombs are available in Europe (as they will be in the early 2020s)?
The W76-2 makes little strategic sense, could inadvertently lower the nuclear threshold and likely would never be used, even in the most dire circumstances.
The Trump administration made a mistake by deciding to produce it. Congress should use the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act to correct that mistake and prohibit its deployment.
Steven Pifer is a William Perry fellow at Stanford University’s Center for International Security and Cooperation. https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/447514-stop-the-low-yield-trident-nuclear-warhead
1 This Month.
Let’s keep radioactive waste away from our river!
Nuclear Power? -Never again
(Switzerland –https://www.greenpeace.ch/de/handeln/atomkraft-nie-wieder/+)
PETITION – Close Down the Monticello Nuclear Reactor on the Mississippi River!
Now until to February 10, 2026 Radioactive waste storage in France: the debate is finally open! How to participate?
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