The US election is a vote on climate change for the whole world
“Covid will be overcome, the climate crisis cannot be overcome unless we have American leadership.”
The US election is a vote on climate change for the whole world, By Helen Regan, Ivana Kottasová and Drew Kann, CNN, November 2, 2020 The climate crisis has become a key issue not just for American voters in this US election — but people across the world.
It’s too late to stop all the impacts of climate change. They are already happening. Wildfires have torched homes across the Western US this year, unprecedented floods have inundated large swathes of Asia, and the past decade — — featuring deadly heatwaves and droughts — was the hottest ever recorded. The ice caps that bookend our planet are also seeing rapid loss and glacial melt.
Why Paris matters
Global momentum
315 nuclear bombs and ongoing suffering: the shameful history of nuclear testing in Australia and the Pacific
315 nuclear bombs and ongoing suffering: the shameful history of nuclear testing in Australia and the Pacific, https://theconversation.com/315-nuclear-bombs-and-ongoing-suffering-the-shameful-history-of-nuclear-testing-in-australia-and-the-pacific-148909, Tilman Ruff, Associate Professor, Education and Learning Unit, Nossal Institute for Global Health, School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Dimity Hawkins, PhD Candidate, Swinburne University of Technology
November 3, 2020 The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons received its 50th ratification on October 24, and will therefore come into force in January 2021. A historic development, this new international law will ban the possession, development, testing, use and threat of use of nuclear weapons.Unfortunately the nuclear powers — the United Kingdom, France, the United States, Russia, China, Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea — haven’t signed on to the treaty. As such, they are not immediately obliged to help victims and remediate contaminated environments, but others party to the treaty do have these obligations. The shifting norms around this will hopefully put ongoing pressure on nuclear testing countries to open records and to cooperate with accountability measures.
For the people of the Pacific region, particularly those who bore the brunt of nuclear weapons testing during the 20th century, it will bring a new opportunity for their voices to be heard on the long-term costs of nuclear violence. The treaty is the first to enshrine enduring commitments to addressing their needs.
From 1946, around 315 nuclear tests were carried out in the Pacific by the US, Britain and France. These nations’ largest ever nuclear tests took place on colonised lands and oceans, from Australia to the Marshall Islands, Kiribati to French Polynesia.
The impacts of these tests are still being felt today.
All nuclear tests cause harm
Studies of nuclear test workers and exposed nearby communities around the world consistently show adverse health effects, especially increased risks of cancer.
The total number of global cancer deaths as a result of atmospheric nuclear test explosions has been estimated at between 2 million and 2.4 million, even though these studies used radiation risk estimates that are now dated and likely underestimated the risk.
The number of additional non-fatal cancer cases caused by test explosions is similar. As confirmed in a large recent study of nuclear industry workers in France, the UK and US, the numbers of radiation-related deaths due to other diseases, such as heart attacks and strokes, is also likely to be similar.
Britain conducted 12 nuclear test explosions in Australia between 1952 and 1957, and hundreds of minor trials of radioactive and toxic materials for bomb development up to 1963. These caused untold health problems for local Aboriginal people who were at the highest risk of radiation. Many of them were not properly evacuated, and some were not informed at all.
We may never know the full impact of these explosions because in many cases, as the Royal Commission report on British Nuclear Tests in Australia found in 1985: “the resources allocated for Aboriginal welfare and safety were ludicrous, amounting to nothing more than a token gesture”. But we can listen to the survivors.
The late Yami Lester directly experienced the impacts of nuclear weapons. A Yankunytjatjara elder from South Australia, Yami was a child when the British tested at Emu Field in October 1953. He recalled the “Black Mist” after the bomb blast:
It wasn’t long after that a black smoke came through. A strange black smoke, it was shiny and oily. A few hours later we all got crook, every one of us. We were all vomiting; we had diarrhoea, skin rashes and sore eyes. I had really sore eyes. They were so sore I couldn’t open them for two or three weeks. Some of the older people, they died. They were too weak to survive all the sickness. The closest clinic was 400 miles away.
His daughter, Karina Lester, is an ambassador for the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons in Australia, and continues to be driven by her family’s experience. She writes:
For decades now my family have campaigned and spoken up against the harms of nuclear weapons because of their firsthand experience of the British nuclear tests […] Many Aboriginal people suffered from the British nuclear tests that took place in the 1950s and 1960s and many are still suffering from the impacts today.
More than 16,000 Australian workers were also exposed. A key government-funded study belatedly followed these veterans over an 18-year period from 1982. Despite the difficulties of conducting a study decades later with incomplete data, it found they had 23% higher rates of cancer and 18% more deaths from cancers than the general population.
An additional health impact in Pacific island countries is the toxic disease “ciguatera”, caused by certain microscopic plankton at the base of the marine food chain, which thrive on damaged coral. Their toxins concentrate up the food chain, especially in fish, and cause illness and occasional deaths in people who eat them. In the Marshall Islands, Kiritimati and French Polynesia, outbreaks of the disease among locals have been associated with coral damage caused by nuclear test explosions and the extensive military and shipping infrastructure supporting them.
Pacific survivors of nuclear testing haven’t been focused solely on addressing their own considerable needs for justice and care; they’ve been powerful advocates that no one should suffer as they have ever again, and have worked tirelessly for the eradication of nuclear weapons. It’s no surprise independent Pacific island nations are strong supporters of the new treaty, accounting for ten of the first 50 ratifications.
Negligence and little accountability
Some nations that have undertaken nuclear tests have provided some care and compensation for their nuclear test workers; only the US has made some provisions for people exposed, though only for mainland US residents downwind of the Nevada Test Site. No testing nation has extended any such arrangement beyond its own shores to the colonised and minority peoples it put in harm’s way. Nor has any testing nation made fully publicly available its records of the history, conduct and effects of its nuclear tests on exposed populations and the environment.
These nations have also been negligent by quickly abandoning former test sites. There has been inadequate clean-up and little or none of the long-term environmental monitoring needed to detect radioactive leakage from underground test sites into groundwater, soil and air. One example among many is the Runit concrete dome in the Marshall Islands, which holds nuclear waste from US testing in the 1940s and 50s. It’s increasingly inundated by rising sea levels, and is leaking radioactive material.
The treaty provides a light in a dark time. It contains the only internationally agreed framework for all nations to verifiably eliminate nuclear weapons.
It’s our fervent hope the treaty will mark the increasingly urgent beginning of the end of nuclear weapons. It is our determined expectation that our country will step up. Australia has not yet ratified the treaty, but the bitter legacy of nuclear testing across our country and region should spur us to join this new global effort.
No guarantee that Britain’s £20 billion Sizewell nuclear project will actually go ahead
Planet Radio 1st Nov 2020, No one should assume Sizewell C is now a foregone conclusion’. Campaign group Stop Sizewell C say there are still many obstacles to overcome, following reports that the Government is ‘close’ to giving the project the green light. The group say they’ve written to the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Secretary of State, Alok Sharma, to seek assurances about the due process behind the Sizewell C project.https://planetradio.co.uk/greatest-hits/norfolk/news/sizewell-not-a-forgone-conclusion/
Before the UK’s govt White Paper, approval to be given for Sizewell nuclear development
 UK to approve new nuclear plant at Sizewell C ahead of White Paper: report, S and P Global Author, Henry Edwardes-Evans Editor, Norazlina Jumaat 3 Nov 20,
HIGHLIGHTS EDF’s second UK twin reactor EPR plant Details of new funding model awaited 10-point plan and White Paper imminent London — The UK government is close to approving Sizewell C, the 3.2 GW EPR nuclear power station project proposed by EDF Energy in Suffolk, England, the BBC reported late Oct. 30…… Key to the new project would be the funding model, RBC said. “It may be that the government takes a direct stake in the project, and that the construction will be remunerated under some form of RAB [regulated asset base] model with a “regulated” return,” the bank said. RAB modelThe government has been working on a RAB-based funding model for new nuclear plants, but a proposal due last summer has yet to materialize. Under a RAB model, energy regulator Ofgem would establish an estimated allowable cost for the project and set a fixed rate of return for investors. Payments from UK retail power consumers would be made during construction and operation to a project company, with payments increasing over the construction period in line with cumulative spending.Sizewell C could generate power at a cost of GBP40-GBP60/MWh if construction was funded via a RAB model, Sizewell C’s finance director Julia Pyke said on Oct. 21. The final cost of power within the estimated range would be “determined by how government allocates risk in terms of the cost of money,” she said.
Further details on a funding model for Sizewell C were likely to be included in the government’s Energy White Paper, Pyke said.In October, 2015, EDF and China’s CGN signed a heads of terms agreement to develop two 1.65 GW EPR reactors at Sizewell C — EDF taking 80% and CGN 20% during the development phase.
Europe’s first EPRs, being built in Finland and France, are many years behind schedule and billions of euros over budget.,…… https://www.spglobal.com/platts/en/market-insights/latest-news/electric-power/110220-uk-to-approve-new-nuclear-plant-at-sizewell-c-ahead-of-white-paper-report |
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Nuclear wastes from Sellafield UK to arrive in Germany
A ship carrying six containers of waste from the Sellafield reprocessing plant in England docked in the early morning in Nordenham, news agency dpa reported. From there, it is to be transported by train to the now-closed Biblis nuclear power plant south of Frankfurt, several hundred kilometres (miles) away.
Germany has a strong anti-nuclear movement and waste transports have often drawn large protests. Activists question the safety of the waste containers and storage sites.
Following the Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan nine years ago, Germany decided to phase out its own nuclear power generation by the end of 2022. The Biblis plant is one of several that was taken offline in 2011, but the site remains in use as a provisional storage facility for nuclear waste.
Germany recently launched a new search for a permanent site to store its most radioactive waste. A final decision is slated for 2031 and the aim is to start using the selected site in 2050.
Bill Gates and ORANO (formerly the bankrupt AREVA) aim to start nuclear shipping, despite its history of failures.
UK-Based Startup Proposes a Renaissance for Nuclear-Powered Shipping, The Maritime Executive 11-02-2020, A UK-based startup with backing from some of the biggest names in nuclear energy has applied to the U.S. Department of Energy for cost-sharing support for the development of a new generation of nuclear power for commercial ship propulsion.Nuclear-powered civilian shipping had a small heyday during the Cold War, when the United States, the Soviet Union and Japan invested in demonstration vessels that could operate for years without refueling. In the U.S., the Eisenhower administration conceived of a nuclear-powered “peace ship” that would carry passengers and cargo in small quantities to serve as a demonstration of the potential for civilian nuclear energy projects. The result, the NS Savannah, entered service in 1962 and operated until 1972, when the Maritime Administration decommissioned her over cost concerns.
Japan’s entrant, the freighter Mutsu, entered service in 1974. She suffered a minor reactor shield fault on her maiden voyage, which led to a wave of negative publicity, and her operators had to negotiate with port communities in order to find her a new berth. She was not fully repaired until 1982 and did not set sail again until 1991. She was decomissioned one year later, and her reactor core was removed so that she could be converted into a conventionally-powered oceanographic research vessel.
The Soviet-built icebreaking LASH vessel Sevmorput is the only remaining nuclear-powered merchant cargo ship in civilian use. Operated by Atomflot, the agency charged with running Russia’s nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet, Sevmorput carries containerized cargo and project cargo along Russia’s Northern Sea Route (NSR). Shortly after she entered service in 1988, four Russian ports in the Siberian Far East refused to allow her to enter over fears that her nuclear reactor posed a public safety hazard. Similar concerns have been raised by foreign port operators, and she has generally been deployed on domestic intra-Russian routes only; however, this year she was dispatched to resupply Russia’s Antarctic research station. (As of Monday, she was broadcasting restricted maneuverability 
and moving north at a slow bell off the port of Luanda, Angola.)
Despite the past difficulties encountered by nuclear vessel operators, nuclear innovation company TerraPower – chaired by Microsoft founder and serial entrepreneur Bill Gates – has decided to partner with utility firm Southern Company and nuclear tech company Orano USA to back a new reactor designed to power commercial ships. The reactor’s developer, UK-based Core Power, sees molten salt reactor (MSR) nuclear “batteries” as a sustainable alternative for decarbonizing the world’s merchant fleet in the decades ahead. ….. https://www.maritime-executive.com/article/uk-based-startup-proposes-a-renaissance-for-nuclear-powered-shipping
84% of Finland’s population support signing up to the U.N. Nuclear Weapons Ban Treaty
It is time to end our reliance on nuclear weapons Nuclear non-proliferation is a fundamentally European issue which is not yet part of any EU agenda https://ecfr.eu/article/it-is-time-to-end-our-reliance-on-nuclear-weapons/, Erkki Tuomioja, – View from the Council 2 November 2020, Finland did not participate in the negotiations leading up to the treaty, and it did not vote for it. Public opinion is, however, in favour of the treaty, with one poll showing that 84 per cent of Finns would support signing up. Three parties in Finland’s coalition government also want the country to join. Foreign ministry officials have argued in hearings of the Finnish parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee that joining would weaken the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) – a faulty reasoning that the Committee unanimously rejected.
“The prohibition treaty is an important reinforcement to the half-century-old Non-Proliferation Treaty, which, though remarkably successful in curbing the spread of nuclear weapons to more countries, has failed to establish a universal taboo against the possession of nuclear weapons. The five nuclear-armed nations that had nuclear weapons at the time of the NPT’s negotiation — the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China — apparently view it as a licence to retain their nuclear forces in perpetuity. Instead of disarming, they are investing heavily in upgrades to their arsenals, with plans to retain them for many decades to come. This is patently unacceptable.”
It is precisely the frustration at the lack of progress with nuclear disarmament – to which the nuclear weapons states committed themselves in the grand bargain to get the non-nuclear countries to accept the NPT treaty signed in 1968 – that gave decisive impetus to the prohibition treaty. Obviously, without the participation of the nuclear weapons states, not one nuclear weapon will be dismantled. But without pressure from the non-nuclear weapons states in the form of this treaty, neither will they engage in serious efforts at disarmament. Nuclear weapons states will instead continue the present trend of modernising existing and developing new nuclear weapons systems.
Support in NATO countries for doing away with all weapons of mass destruction is growing, as evidenced by the signatories to the statement above. This is important because one argument made in Finland and Sweden, although it is rarely made in public, for opposing joining the prohibition treaty is the displeasure the US would show at such a step, which could hinder the deepening of these countries’ partnership relations with NATO. Given the growing demand in non-nuclear NATO countries to sign the treaty this is just as spurious as the NPT argument against joining.
The time has come for all states in the world to bring an end to the misguided, illegitimate, and immoral reliance on nuclear weapons. An all-out nuclear war is a threat to human life as a whole and would immediately bring about all the disasters we are trying to avoid with our efforts to curtail climate change and implement the Sustainable Development Goals of Agenda 2030.
No responsible leader disputes this. Yet we continue to conduct exercises in preparation for a nuclear war. The risk of accidental or miscalculated nuclear weapon use may today be even greater than at the height of the cold war. The Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons is, as the statement quoted says, “a beacon of hope in a time of darkness”.
There is one nuclear weapons state in the EU (formerly two) and 21 EU member states in NATO, but nuclear weapons and related issues have never formed part of the EU’s agenda. This is a fundamentally European issue, given the likelihood that Europe would face the greatest level of destruction in the event of a conflict and because of the European preference for achieving change through rules-based processes. All EU member states should address it and join the treaty banning all nuclear weapons. Three member states in the EU have already done so; others should follow them.
Erkki Tuomioja is ECFR member and former Minister for Foreign Affairs in Finland.
Cuban missile crisis -a reminder that nuclear war could so easily still happen
Yes, nuclear war could still happen https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/523951-yes-nuclear-war-could-still-happen, BY JOHN DALE GROVER, — 11/02/20 The recent anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis should be a reminder to American citizens and policymakers that nuclear war is not impossible. For 13 days from Oct. 16, 1962, to Oct. 28, 1962, America and the Soviet Union nearly killed each other in a nuclear war. Today, the passing of that anniversary should warn us that through a crisis that spirals out of control, sheer accident, or miscommunication, Washington could still find itself in a nuclear exchange with Moscow, Beijing, or Pyongyang.
Today, relations with China are strained and tensions with North Korea — though on an uneasy pause — will likely resume sooner rather than later. America’s relationship with Russia is also contentious and only one arms control treaty remains in place between Washington and Moscow. The 2011 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) is set to expire in February 2021, but last-minute negotiations are underway to extend that treaty for another year.
Kennedy considered many options, including bombing the missile sites or invading Cuba, but thankfully decided against military action. Instead, he ordered a “quarantine” of Cuba. While America enforced its de-facto blockade, negotiations commenced, and a secret agreement was made: Moscow would remove its nuclear missiles from Cuba if Washington removed its Jupiter missiles from Turkey. However, Washington kept its end of the deal quiet to make it look as if Moscow had backed down — a decision which has incorrectly given the impression to later generations of policymakers that hard power is all that matters when facing a crisis.
The Cuban Missile Crisis nearly spiraled into a nuclear war as accidents, errors, and miscommunication was commonplace. For example, the CIA incorrectly estimated that only around 12,000 Soviet troops were in Cuba. In reality, there were over 40,000 and if any of them had died, Moscow would surely have retaliated.
Kennedy considered many options, including bombing the missile sites or invading Cuba, but thankfully decided against military action. Instead, he ordered a “quarantine” of Cuba. While America enforced its de-facto blockade, negotiations commenced, and a secret agreement was made: Moscow would remove its nuclear missiles from Cuba if Washington removed its Jupiter missiles from Turkey. However, Washington kept its end of the deal quiet to make it look as if Moscow had backed down — a decision which has incorrectly given the impression to later generations of policymakers that hard power is all that matters when facing a crisis.
The list goes on. Shortly after being ordered to Defcon 2, General Thomas Powers, commander of America’s nuclear bombers and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) dangerously broadcast some of his orders without code and out in the open. America also conducted a routine ICBM test even though such a move may have looked like an attack.
A guard at Duluth Air Base mistook a bear for a saboteur and pulled an alarm, which accidentally rang the nuclear attack warning at Volks Field in Wisconsin. The nuclear-armed fighter jets nearly took off but were halted by an officer who drove onto the runway with his lights flashing.
There were also not one — but two — simultaneous U-2 spy plane incidents. One American spy plane accidentally got lost over the Soviet Union for at least an hour and a half, while another U-2 over Cuba was actually shot down by Russian troops that acted unilaterally without authorization from Moscow.
Britain to nationalize its nuclear weapons industry
Britain to nationalize its nuclear weapons industry. https://www.upi.com/Defense-News/2020/11/02/Britain-to-nationalize-its-nuclear-weapons-industry/5981604341239/ By Ed Adamczyk Nov. 2 (UPI) — Britain announced on Monday that management of its nuclear weapons facilities will return to government control instead of leadership by an industry consortium.
Atomic Weapons Establishment PLC builds nuclear weapons inBritain and has been operated since 2000 by a groupof manufacturers led by Lockheed Martin.
The contract was expected to be completed in 2025 but British Defense Secretary Ben Wallace told Parliament this week that the AWE will be wholly owned by the Ministry of Defense, beginning in June 2021.
“Following an in-depth review, the MOD concluded that AWE plc will become an arms-length Body, wholly owned by the MOD,” Wallace wrote in a Ministry of Defense statement.
“The change in model will remove the current commercial arrangements, enhancing the MOD’s agility in the future management of the U.K.’s nuclear deterrent, whilst also delivering on core MOD objectives and value for money to the taxpayer,” Wallace wrote.
AWE is based at Aldermaston, England, and develops nuclear warheads for the Royal Navy’s submarines.
In February, the ministry announced plans to develop new nuclear warheads, and nationalizing the British nuclear weapons industry reflects the government’s interest in creating a better alignment between AWE and the ministry’s priorities.
The end of the lucrative 25-year contract can be seen as a blow to Lockheed Martin, Serco Group and Jacobs Engineering, all AWE owners. In 2019, AWE paid $105 million to shareholders, despite controversial cost overruns and worker safety violations, and has been the subject of criticism from Britain’s National Audit Office.
The Ministry of Defense has also been a target of demands by the government, under Prime Minister Boris Johnson‘s leadership, to control wasteful spending.
A USA Senator reflects on the anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis
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Sam Nunn on Cold War & nuclear weapons, Technique, Hope Williams on November 2, 2020 2020 marks the 75th anniversary of the end of World Word II and the start of the Cold War, a conflict that shaped former United States Senator Sam Nunn’s time while serving in Congress, as well as his work afterwards with the Nuclear Threat Initiative.On Oct. 14, Nunn discussed how nuclear weapons still pose a threat to the world today in a talk with the Georgia Historical Society.
Nunn, who was born in Macon, Georgia, attended Tech, Emory University and Emory Law School. He then served in the U.S. Coast Guard and Georgia House of Representatives before being elected in 1972 to the U.S. Senate. One of his earliest experiences with the intersection of foreign policy and nuclear war was the Cuban Missile Crisis in October 1962, during which he was attending a NATO Conference with the Armed Services Committee in Europe. “We were actually briefed by the Air Force with photographs and all the classified information, sort of every step of the way once the Cuban Missile Crisis broke out,” said Nunn. “… We were at Wiesbaden Air Force Base, which was sort of the head of the U.S. Air Force Europe, on the night where it really looked like we were going to war.” That night, Nunn sat next to the top Air Force General in Europe during dinner. “He had a whole big computer back [with] him with all sorts of communication equipment,” said Nunn. “During the course of the dinner, he told me that he had about 20 to 30 seconds, once he got the signal, to basically turn loose his aircraft to go after the Soviet Union, because we thought we were going to war.” This experience shaped his view of nuclear war. “That brought home a sense of reality to me about the dangers of nuclear war that had an effect on the rest of my life,” said Nunn. “… It brought home to me two things: how close we came to war and how much subjective judgment was involved in the [John F.] Kennedy decisions and the [Nikita] Khrushchev decisions to avoid war and second, how little warning time we had.” Nunn points out that during the 1960s, leaders had more decision time because planes flew much slower. “Having very little decision time in a moment of great crisis is extremely dangerous for the world and that’s, to me, one of the prime goals we should have today, which is to give both U.S. and Russian leaders more time so that we do not move into a nuclear war by blunder,” said Nunn. New technology adds additional danger. “When you introduce cyber and possible interference in command and control and warning systems, I still very much worry about compressed decision time,” said Nunn. “And if I had my way today, and I’ve told President Obama this, I’ve told President Trump this and I’ve told President Putin this, that if I had my way, the leaders would call in their military and say ‘Look, we have a mutual existential interest to give each other more warning time.’”………. Relating decisions about the usage of nuclear weapons to presidential politics, Nunn served under six presidents during his terms as a Senator: Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton. As commander-in-chief, presidents have the sole authority to authorize the use of nuclear weapons. “It is a moral question, but every military commander is charged with the responsibility of carrying out orders from the commander-in-chief,” said Nunn. “But those orders have to be moral orders, and how do you determine that?”……. In conclusion, Nunn reiterates there is currently less of a chance of premeditated nuclear attacks than there was during the Cold War, but with a more compressed decision time for leaders, there is a higher risk of a mistake. “We’ve got a lot of work to do so that our children and grandchildren can live in a world that does not have the perils of nuclear, biological and climate change, all of those things hanging over us,” said Nunn. “So it’s very hard under these circumstances to get out to the voters, to get seen.”…….. In conclusion, Nunn reiterates there is currently less of a chance of premeditated nuclear attacks than there was during the Cold War, but with a more compressed decision time for leaders, there is a higher risk of a mistake. “We’ve got a lot of work to do so that our children and grandchildren can live in a world that does not have the perils of nuclear, biological and climate change, all of those things hanging over us,” said Nunn. “So it’s very hard under these circumstances to get out to the voters, to get seen.”…… https://nique.net/life/2020/11/02/sam-nunn-on-cold-war-nuclear-weapons/ |
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Climate Policy – Scotland
The National 2 Nov 2020 , EXTINCTION Rebellion have walked away from the Scottish Government’s
Climate Assembly, accusing ministers of allowing “vested interests” to
take over. They claim the civil service has tried to water down the urgency
of the summit due to start this weekend.
https://www.thenational.scot/news/18838753.extinction-rebellion-quit-scottish-governments-citizens-assembly-climate/
Shares in nuclear weapons company Serco crash, As UK govt nationalises the industry
Serco shares crash as outsourcer loses role on nuclear weapons consortium, City A.M. Edward Thickness, 2 Nov 20,
Shares in Serco plummeted this morning after the outsourcing giant confirmed that the government had taken back management of its atomic weapons development facility.
Shares dropped nearly 12 per cent as markets opened as traders digested the news.
Yesterday Sky News reported that the government was due to announce that it would take over the running of the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) from next year.
AWE has been run by a consortium made up of US defence giant Lockheed Martin, Serco and Jacobs since 2000.
The contract was due to expire in 2025, so the government’s decision to renationalise the facility is a considerable blow to the FTSE 250 company.
Serco said that it was expecting to make £17m in profit from its 24.5 per cent stake in AWE this year. In its last full year results the firm reported profit of £120m.
However, it said that it would stick to its full year financial forecasts for 2020/21……..
AWE, which makes nuclear warheads for the UK’s submarines, will pass back into government ownership on 30 June.
Earlier this year the facility came under fire from spending watchdog the National Audit Office (NAO).https://www.cityam.com/serco-shares-crash-as-outsourcer-loses-role-on-nuclear-weapons-consortium/
Nukes in space
Russian company with powerful connections withdraws from Turkish nuclear plant operation
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Russian company with powerful connections withdraw from Turkish nuclear plant operation, Greek City Times,
by PAUL ANTONOPOULOS, 2 Nov 20, A Russian company withdrew from plans to build Turkey’s first nuclear power plant following tensions between Moscow and Ankara over issues including the conflicts in Libya, Syria, and Artsakh, a columnist for Turkish newspaper Dünya, and translated by Ahval, said on Saturday.The construction of the Akkuyu Nuclear Power Plant to the north of Cyprus is a joint project between Turkey and Russia.Although Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin signed the deal in 2010, major construction only started in March 2018 and the first unit of the four to be constructed will not become operational until at least 2023. According to Dünya columnist Kerim Ülker, Inter RAO, one of Russia’s largest public energy companies, withdrew from the project following a board meeting on October 26 partly because of the Turkish-sponsored invasion attempt of Artsakh by the Azerbaijani military and Syrian mercenaries. ……..https://greekcitytimes.com/2020/11/02/russian-turkish-nuclear-plant/ |
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Bill Gates has another go at getting taxpayer funding, for another nuclear venture (ships this time)
Bill Gates joins nuclear-powered shipping push, Splash Sam ChambersNovember 2, 2020 Bill Gates, one of the richest men in the world, has turned his attention to getting ships powered by nuclear energy.
The Microsoft co-founder, who turned 65 last week, is also chairman of TerraPower, a nuclear tech company that today announced a new venture with Mikal Bøe’s CORE POWER, French nuclear materials handling specialist Orano and American utilities firm Southern Company. The four companies plan to develop molten salt reactor (MSR) atomic technology in the United States………
The four companies have submitted an application to the US Department of Energy to take part in cost-share risk reduction awards under the Advanced Reactor Demonstration Programme to build a prototype MSR, as a proof-of-concept for a medium-scale commercial-grade reactor.
……. we seek to build scale-appropriate technology and broad acceptance of modern and durable liquid-fuelled atomic power to shape the future of how we deal with climate change,” Bøe commented today…….
Thorium is a weakly radioactive metallic chemical element found most commonly in India and is a substance that Gates’ TerraPower has been studying closely of late.
Admitting the technology would not be cheap to install on ships, Bøe has proposed a leasing model for his batteries, similar to those deployed for aircraft engines………. https://splash247.com/bill-gates-joins-nuclear-powered-shipping-push/
1.This Month
EVENTS
25 January Takoma Park USA Commemorating ‘Nuclear-Free Zone’
with Virtual Film Screening
Hibakusha: A-bomb survivor, 95, never giving up the
battle to eliminate nuclear weapons
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20201229/p2a/00m/0na/032000c
December 30, 2020 (Mainichi Japan)
Tsuboi released comments expressing his joy after he
learned that the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear
Weapons would enter in force.
“I am filled with excitement, thinking, ‘At long last.
This is great.’ It is a major step toward my long-held,
earnest desire for nuclear weapons to be banned
and eliminated,” he said. At the same time, he
noted that states with nuclear weapons, as well
as Japan, had not ratified the treaty and said, “The road hereafter may be rough.”
Still, each time I have met Tsuboi, he has
repeatedly stated, “I won’t give up until there ar
e zero nuclear weapons. Never give up!”
JAN 28 AT 7 AM UTC+11 – JAN 28 AT 8:30 AM UTC+11
Webinar: Ending the global security threats of nuclear power
Event by Coalition for Responsible Energy Development in New Brunswick, Beyond Nuclear and 2 others
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