Record breaking heat in Verkhoyansk, north of the Arctic Circle
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A Siberian town near the Arctic Circle just recorded a 100-degree temperature https://www.vox.com/2020/6/21/21298292/siberia-temperature-100-climate-change
One of the coldest towns on Earth clocks a potentially record-breaking — and worrying — temperature. By Zeeshan Aleem@ZeeshanAleem Jun 21, 2020,A small town in Siberia reached a temperature of 100.4 degrees Fahrenheit on Saturday, which, if verified, would mark the hottest temperature ever recorded north of the Arctic Circle. Temperatures have jumped in recent months to levels rarely seen in the Russian region, and it’s a sign of a broader trend of human-caused climate change that’s transforming weather patterns in the Arctic Circle. The town of Verkhoyansk is one of the coldest towns on Earth — temperatures dropped to nearly 60 degrees below zero there this past November — and the average June high temperature is 68 degrees. The 100.4 reading in Verkhoyansk, which sits farther north than Fairbanks, Alaska, would be the northernmost 100-degree reading ever observed. The Washington Post reports that while there are questions about the accuracy of the record temperature, a Saturday weather balloon launch that found unusually high temperatures in the lower atmosphere supports the reading. And on Sunday, the town reached 95.3 degrees, according to the Post. CBS News meteorologist and climate specialist Jeff Berardelli wrote on Saturday that 100-degree temperatures in or near the Arctic are “almost unheard of.” Before Saturday, Siberia was already experiencing an extraordinary heat wave. Surface temperatures in Siberia were 18 degrees higher than average in May, making it the hottest May in the region since record-keeping began in 1979, according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service. “It is undoubtedly an alarming sign, but not only May was unusually warm in this region,” said Freja Vamborg, a senior scientist at the Copernicus Climate Change Service, in a statement about the finding. “The whole of winter and spring had repeated periods of higher-than-average surface air temperatures.” Climate scientist Martin Stendel said on Twitter that the temperatures recorded in northwestern Siberia last month would be a 1-in-100,000-year event — if not for climate change. Berardelli said the average heat across Russia between January and May actually matches what current models project to be normal for the region in 2100, if carbon emissions continue. “Due to heat trapping greenhouse gases that result from the burning of fossil fuels and feedback loops, the Arctic is warming at more than two times the average rate of the globe,” he explained in his analysis of the Verkhoyansk reading. “This phenomenon is known as Arctic Amplification, which is leading to the decline of sea ice, and in some cases snow cover, due to rapidly warming temperatures.” He noted that if the climate continues to heat up, extreme heat waves will become more of the norm. |
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Explaining ionising radiation -a film about nuclear fallout
Invisible Fallout https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2020/06/21/invisible-fallout/,June 21, 2020
There are many ways to teach people about radiation. But if you want to make that lesson accessible, compelling and even moving, then this film is the way to do it.
Let’s go on a journey. A journey to learn about radiation exposure from fallout after a nuclear power plant accident. We have the perfect guide. It is the independent French radiation research laboratory known as CRIIRAD, and its director, Dr. Bruno Chareyron.
The organization’s full name in French is Commission de Recherche et d’Information Indépendantes sur la RADioactivité, hence the acronym. In English it is translated as Commission for Independent Research and Information about RADiation.
For those not familiar with CRIIRAD, our journey begins with a little history, and so does CRIIRAD’s brilliant new 45-minute film — Invisible Fallout (Invisibles retombées is the French title), which can be viewed in its entirety on YouTube and above. The film, written and produced by CRIIRAD staff and directed by Cris Ubermann, is in French and Japanese with English subtitles.
When the Chernobyl nuclear disaster hit in April 1986, the French government engaged in a notorious cover-up, claiming that France “has totally escaped any radioactive fallout.” The whole thing was a lie. Five days before the government denial, Chernobyl’s radioactive cloud had covered all of France.
As Invisible Fallout recounts, after Chernobyl, it took 15 years until the French government published fallout maps of France. But the CRIIRAD laboratory, formed right after Chernobyl precisely to establish that France’s immunity was a myth, had already done the work that debunked the official line that the disaster was just a Soviet problem. French citizens not only got dosed by Chernobyl fallout, but would live in perpetual danger of a similar catastrophe at home, with a country almost 80% reliant on nuclear-generated electricity from its 58 reactors.
But Invisible Fallout does not linger long in the past. It segues quickly to the next nuclear catastrophe — the 2011 Fukushima-Daiichi meltdowns in Japan — and it is there that the CRIIRAD team, led by Chareyron, take us to learn about the effects of radiation exposure from nuclear power plants.
Just sixteen days after the Fukushima disaster, Japanese citizens began to detect fallout. They desperately needed to do independent monitoring but found it hard to get their hands on Geiger counters. The downplays and cover-ups by Japanese authorities, attempting to minimize the dangers and avoid mass evacuations, meant official figures could not be trusted.
An unlikely leader stepped forward in the person of composer and artist, Wataru Iwata, who, one month after the disaster, asked CRIIRAD for Geiger counters. They sent them, along with email tutorials on radioactivity, its health risks and how to protect against them. The laboratory also prepared a series of simple, clear, instructional “emergency” videos in English, designed for non-specialists, which they put online for everyone to access. This included an instructional segment on how to use a Scintillometer, one of the dozen devices CRIIRAD had sent to the Japanese activists.
We then get a short instructional video of our own on exactly how the Scintillometer is able to rapidly detect Gamma radiation in counts per second, and what those measurements mean. It glides into clarity for us, abetted by the smooth tones of the film’s excellent French narrator, Nicolas Planchais. We forget completely we are in class. Everything is, indeed, illuminated.
And we see Iwata taking his device into Fukushima Prefecture where he helps others measure the radiation levels. At a restaurant 55km away from the destroyed reactors, where people were going about their daily lives, he is shocked to record radiation levels that are 50 times higher than normal. In other areas, levels are 1,000 times higher.
Two months after the accident, CRIIRAD decided to show up in person, and Japan’s Citizens Radioactivity Monitoring Stations (CRMS), were born. CRIIRAD set up nine CRMS in Fukushima Prefecture and one in Tokyo.
Quickly realizing that ingestion of radioactively contaminated foodstuffs was as much of a threat as external exposure, Iwata asked for ways to measure radiation in food. This would help the people who had stayed — or who had been forced to remain — in contaminated areas to make informed choices about the food they consumed. CRIIRAD brought over a device sensitive enough to detect radiation in food, then conducted a seminar for residents of Fukushima City on on how to use it. We too, as viewers, get the tutorial.
Indeed, all of these lessons in science are subtly woven into the film, but cleverly attached to the lived experiences of real people in Japan, making it relevant and relatable.
And then, as we learn how to measure radiation levels and what they mean, we start to meet the people to whom it matters the most. We encounter a farmer who abided by the rules not to sell contaminated crops but whose family ate the food themselves so it would not go to waste. And we watch his palpable emotion as he recounts his attachment to the land and the known risks he and his family took.
CRIIRAD and its Japanese partners begin to find radioactive particles everywhere— on rooftops, in soil and vegetation, at the foot of trees, in the cracks of tarmac, even inside greenhouses.
At a school which, in denial, refused to have radiation measurements taken, Iwata is shown taking readings in the school grounds. They start at 6,000 to 7,000 counts per second, but rise to 27,000 counts per second at ground level.
The CRIIRAD team encounter what they describe as their most difficult moment when an elderly peasant farmer asks them to conduct measurements on her land just 30km away from the nuclear site. She herself was forced to evacuate, but her farm was not in the zone designated for permanent evacuation. So she came back with CRIIRAD to assess the situation.
We watch them take measurements, then gently show the results to her. She begins to sob. Then she tells them, “Thank you for coming all this way. I was in darkness and you have brought me light.” But, she knows she must now abandon the farm forever.
After an interlude for another lesson, this time on gamma rays, we are back to some chilling truths about their effects. In Fukushima City, we learn that at an elementary school there, children are asked to frequently change places in class so that the same children are not always sitting by the window where the radiation levels are higher.
This prompts CRIIRAD to remind us that, “when it comes to radiation protection, there is no threshold below which it is harmless.” And they point out that the Japanese decision to raise the annual allowable radiation dose from 1mSv to 20mSv, “means accepting a risk of cancer 20 times higher, and this applies equally to children and pregnant women” for whom such doses present a far higher risk.
CRIIRAD warns that people living in the contaminated region will be exposed for decades and across vast areas. They will be exposed to external radiation from powerful gamma rays emitted by the soil and contaminated surfaces. They will be exposed through inhalation of radioactive dust suspended every time the wind blows, and by activities such as sowing crops, ploughing and construction work. And they will be exposed through eating foodstuffs cultivated on contaminated land in contaminated soil.
But thanks to CRIIRAD, many of them will now know how to measure these levels, what they mean and how to protect themselves. It’s a lesson that’s well worth learning for all of us.
For more information, please see the CRIIRAD website, in its original French, and in English.
FAIR exposes the false claims about China and COVID-19
Debunking Trump and Corporate Media’s WHO/China Coverup Conspiracy Theories FAIR
The Trump administration suspended funding to WHO in April—the UN’s primary infectious disease–fighting body—accusing it of “severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus,” and of taking China’s allegedly deceptive claims about its handling of Covid-19 at “face value.” But corporate media had already been boosting these same talking points.
The Wall Street Journal’s “The World Health Organization Draws Flak for Coronavirus Response” (2/12/20) effectively accused WHO of being “too deferential to China in its handling of the new virus,” and criticized WHO Director-General Tedros Ghebreyesus for “bending to Beijing” after lauding China’s unquestionably effective swift quarantine of 60 million people, and for declaring that “China is actually setting a new standard for outbreak response” and identifying the virus in “record time.” The Journal further expounded the conspiracy theory of a seemingly omnipotent China having WHO under its thumb:
Over its decades of battling epidemics, the WHO has rarely had to deal with an entity as politically and economically powerful as China today. It can’t afford to alienate the country’s leadership, whose clout and financial largess it aims to attract to global health causes. It needs Beijing’s cooperation in preventing a full-blown pandemic—and this may not be the last time. China is the source of many emerging pathogens, which jump from animals to humans in its teeming live markets and can cause deadly epidemics.
According to the Journal’s logic, when WHO praises China for an effective response containing Covid-19 and giving the rest of the world ample time to take health precautions, it is “compromising its own epidemic response standards, eroding its global authority, and sending the wrong message to other countries that might face future epidemics.” When Dr. Bruce Aylward—a Canadian medical expert with 30 years of experience combating polio, Ebola and other global health emergencies—concluded that he “didn’t see anything that suggested manipulation of numbers,” after leading a team of experts visiting China for WHO, that can’t be an accurate observation. For corporate journalists, it can only be because he was duped by the devious Chinese government “underreporting both total cases and deaths it’s suffered from the disease” (Bloomberg, 4/1/20).
The Journal flimsily explained that China wields such formidable control over the WHO because China is a “future source of funds and a partner with which to tackle the biggest global health problems,” and not as a “current donor.” That would be because a cursory examination of WHO’s funding would reveal that the US donated more than 10 times more money to WHO ($893 million) than China ($86 million), despite the US having almost $200 million in arrears before suspending payments (Axios, 4/15/20).
Neither does the Journal explain how or why WHO could possibly withhold information from Western nations even if it wanted to, when its leadership is stacked with Americans and Europeans, and 15 US officials were embedded with the WHO in Geneva, given that the US is the most “politically and economically powerful” nation on Earth. This makes the Trump administration’s declaration of the US terminating its membership in WHO after threats to permanently cut funding especially egregious.
Nor can the Journal explain the source of China’s fearsome influence over independent and prestigious medical journals like Nature (5/4/20), Science (3/28/20) and the Lancet (3/7/20), which also credited the effectiveness and transparency of China’s response for saving thousands of lives (CGTN, 5/1/20, 5/10/20). Does China’s mysterious and awe-inspiring influence extend over Western medical journals as well?
When Foreign Policy (5/12/20) reported on the exclusive scoop of a leaked dataset of coronavirus cases and deaths from the Chinese military’s National University of Defense Technology, it confirmed that the leaked information “matches” the publicly available numbers the Chinese government posts online—which poses an inconvenience to those spouting conspiracy theories of a Chinese government coverup. Corporate media accounts of Chinese deception and fake statistics also fail to explain how the Chinese government possesses the fantastical ability to deceive governments and independent medical experts around the world, even if it wanted to. As FAIR’s Jim Naureckas (4/2/20) pointed out earlier:
The reality is that it’s very hard to hide an epidemic. Stopping a virus requires identifying and isolating cases of infection, and if you pretend to have done so when you really haven’t, the uncaught cases will grow exponentially. Maintaining a hidden set of real statistics and another set for show would require the secret collusion of China’s 2 million doctors and 3 million nurses—the kind of improbable cooperation that gives conspiracy theories a bad name…. If China is merely pretending to have the coronavirus under control, the pathogen will rapidly surge as people resume interacting with their communities. Once international travel is restored, it will be quite obvious which countries do and don’t have effective management of Covid-19.
Countries revising their figures upon receiving new information is to be expected, and is not necessarily evidence of deceit, as plenty of nations besides China revise their data upwards. Yet only China is singled out as being exceptionally deceptive. For example, in the same week New York revised its death toll upwards by nearly 3,800, China’s adding almost 1,300 dead to its Wuhan data was presented as a possible coverup (Politico, 4/14/20; Guardian, 4/17/20). The Moon of Alabama blog (4/1/20) explained some of the complexities in reporting numbers during a pandemic in real-time:
Does one include co-morbids or not in the count? What about casualties of a car accident that also test positive for Covid-19 when they die? What about those who died with Covid-19 symptoms but could not be tested for lack of test kits? Are the tests really working reliably?… What about asymptomatic cases that test positive. Are these false positives, or do these people really have the virus? One can only know that by testing them a month later for antibodies………
this manipulation of public opinion by the US government and corporate media appears to be working. According to a recent Ipsos survey, more than 30% of Americans have witnessed someone blaming Asian people for the coronavirus pandemic (even though new research indicates that travel from New York City was the primary source of the US outbreak, with New York’s outbreak originating in Europe). Pew Research (4/21/20) found that around two-thirds of Americans have an unfavorable view of China, which is the most negative rating for the country since Pew began asking the question in 2005. This suggests that public opinion has been turned against China, despite it being the first to detect the virus, alert the world and provide a model for containing it.https://fair.org/home/debunking-trump-and-corporate-medias-who-china-coverup-conspiracy-theories/
Anti-nuclear resistance in Russia: problems protests, reprisals
Mayak victims’ organizer, Nadezhda Kutepova, a Nuclear-Free Future Award winner, was eventually forced to flee the country. (Photo: ©Orla Connolly)
Standing up to Rosatom
https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2020/06/21/standing-up-to-rosatom/ June 21, 2020 by beyondnuclearinternational
Anti-nuclear resistance in Russia: problems protests, reprisals
The following is a report from the Russian Social Ecological Union (RSEU)/ Friends of the Earth Russia, slightly edited for length. You can read the report in full here. It is a vitally important document exposing the discrimination and fear tactics used against anti-nuclear organizers in Russia and details their courageous acts of defiance in order to bring the truth of Russia’s nuclear sector to light.
Rosatom is a Russian state-owned corporation which builds and operates nuclear power plants in Russia and globally. The state-run nuclear industry in Russia has a long history of nuclear crises, including the Kyshtym disaster in 1957 and Chernobyl in 1986. Yet Rosatom plans to build dozens of nuclear reactors in Russia, to export its deadly nuclear technologies to other countries, and then to import their hazardous nuclear waste.
This report is a collection of events and details about the resistance to Russian state nuclear corporation, Rosatom, and other activities that have led to the pollution of the environment and violation of human rights. Social and environmental conflicts created by Rosatom have been left unresolved for years, while at the same time, environmental defenders who have raised these issues, have consistently experienced reprisals.
Nuclear energy: failures and Lies
To protect our planet – we need to transform, not grow, the economy
“So, we have to get away from our obsession with economic growth – we really need to start managing our economies in a way that protects our climate and natural resources, even if this means less, no or even negative growth.”
Overconsumption and growth economy key drivers of environmental crises https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-06/uons-oag061820.php
21 June, 20, , Scientists’ warning on affluence, UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES, A group of researchers, led by a UNSW sustainability scientist, have reviewed existing academic discussions on the link between wealth, economy and associated impacts, reaching a clear conclusion: technology will only get us so far when working towards sustainability – we need far-reaching lifestyle changes and different economic paradigms.
In their review, published today in Nature Communications and entitled Scientists’ Warning on Affluence, the researchers have summarised the available evidence, identifying possible solution approaches.
“Recent scientists’ warnings have done a great job at describing the many perils our natural world is facing through crises in climate, biodiversity and food systems, to name but a few,” says lead author Professor Tommy Wiedmann from UNSW Engineering.
“However, none of these warnings has explicitly considered the role of growth-oriented economies and the pursuit of affluence. In our scientists’ warning, we identify the underlying forces of overconsumption and spell out the measures that are needed to tackle the overwhelming ‘power’ of consumption and the economic growth paradigm – that’s the gap we fill.
“The key conclusion from our review is that we cannot rely on technology alone to solve existential environmental problems – like climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution – but that we also have to change our affluent lifestyles and reduce overconsumption, in combination with structural change.”
During the past 40 years, worldwide wealth growth has continuously outpaced any efficiency gains.
“Technology can help us to consume more efficiently, i.e. to save energy and resources, but these technological improvements cannot keep pace with our ever-increasing levels of consumption,” Prof Wiedmann says.
Reducing overconsumption in the world’s richest
Co-author Julia Steinberger, Professor of Ecological Economics at the University of Leeds, says affluence is often portrayed as something to aspire to.
“But our paper has shown that it’s actually dangerous and leads to planetary-scale destruction. To protect ourselves from the worsening climate crisis, we must reduce inequality and challenge the notion that riches, and those who possess them, are inherently good.”
In fact, the researchers say the world’s affluent citizens are responsible for most environmental impacts and are central to any future prospect of retreating to safer conditions.
“Consumption of affluent households worldwide is by far the strongest determinant – and the strongest accelerator – of increased global environmental and social impacts,” co-author Lorenz Keysser from ETH Zurich says.
“Current discussions on how to address the ecological crises within science, policy making and social movements need to recognize the responsibility of the most affluent for these crises.”
The researchers say overconsumption and affluence need to be addressed through lifestyle changes.
“It’s hardly ever acknowledged, but any transition towards sustainability can only be effective if technological advancements are complemented by far-reaching lifestyle changes,” says co-author Manfred Lenzen, Professor of Sustainability Research at the University of Sydney.
“I am often asked to explain this issue at social gatherings. Usually I say that what we see or associate with our current environmental issues (cars, power, planes) is just the tip of our personal iceberg. It’s all the stuff we consume and the environmental destruction embodied in that stuff that forms the iceberg’s submerged part. Unfortunately, once we understand this, the implications for our lifestyle are often so confronting that denial kicks in.”
No level of growth is sustainable
However, the scientists say responsibility for change doesn’t just sit with individuals – broader structural changes are needed.
“Individuals’ attempts at such lifestyle transitions may be doomed to fail, because existing societies, economies and cultures incentivise consumption expansion,” Prof Wiedmann says.
A change in economic paradigms is therefore sorely needed.
“The structural imperative for growth in competitive market economies leads to decision makers being locked into bolstering economic growth, and inhibiting necessary societal changes,” Prof Wiedmann says.
“So, we have to get away from our obsession with economic growth – we really need to start managing our economies in a way that protects our climate and natural resources, even if this means less, no or even negative growth.
“In Australia, this discussion isn’t happening at all – economic growth is the one and only mantra preached by both main political parties. It’s very different in New Zealand – their Wellbeing Budget 2019 is one example of how government investment can be directed in a more sustainable direction, by transforming the economy rather than growing it.”
The researchers say that “green growth” or “sustainable growth” is a myth.
“As long as there is growth – both economically and in population – technology cannot keep up with reducing impacts, the overall environmental impacts with only increase,” Prof Wiedmann says.
One way to enforce these lifestyle changes could be to reduce overconsumption by the super-rich, e.g. through taxation policies.
“‘Degrowth’ proponents go a step further and suggest a more radical social change that leads away from capitalism to other forms of economic and social governance,” Prof Wiedmann says.
“Policies may include, for example, eco-taxes, green investments, wealth redistribution through taxation and a maximum income, a guaranteed basic income and reduced working hours.”
Modelling an alternative future
Prof Wiedmann’s team now wants to model scenarios for sustainable transformations – that means exploring different pathways of development with a computer model to see what we need to do to achieve the best possible outcome.
“We have already started doing this with a recent piece of research that showed a fairer, greener and more prosperous Australia is possible – so long as political leaders don’t focus just on economic growth.
“We hope that this review shows a different perspective on what matters, and supports us in overcoming deeply entrenched views on how humans have to dominate nature, and on how our economies have to grow ever more. We can’t keep behaving as if we had a spare planet available.”
BOLTON BOOK: Trump Endorsed Israeli Airstrike On Iranian Nuclear Reactors
BOLTON BOOK: Trump Endorsed Israeli Airstrike On Iranian Nuclear Reactors https://www.theyeshivaworld.com/news/featured/1874761/bolton-book-trump-endorsed-israeli-airstrike-on-iranian-nuclear-reactors.html
Bradwell nuclear project “unsustainable, unsuitable and unacceptable” – and not a done deal
Clacton Gazette 20th June 2020, CAMPAIGNERS fighting plans for a new nuclear power station at Bradwell are calling for the proposals to be scrapped. Opposition group Banng – Blackwater Against New Nuclear Group – has prepared a 13,000-word response to the stage one public consultation.a joint operation between CGN and EDF Energy. Banng chairman Andy Blowers said: “This is not a done deal as CGN would have us believe. A new nuclear power station is not needed, and especially it is not needed at this site.”
Explaining the India-China conflict
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Nuclear powers, a disputed border and an uneasy truce: Explaining the India-China conflict A border clash between the two nuclear armed neighbors has drawn the world’s gaze to a disputed region in the Himalayas NBC News, June 20, 2020, By Saphora Smith High up in the Himalayas, Indian and Chinese armed forces warily eye each other across a disputed border region that has become the scene of a tense standoff between the two nuclear powers. The conflict in the remote Galwan Valley that spans their shared border sparked into life Monday with the killing of 20 Indian soldiers, the first reported deaths in 45 years. China has not disclosed whether its forces suffered any casualties, according to a report in its state-run newspaper, the Global Times. The deaths have drawn the world’s gaze to a region that the two most populous countries have been contesting for decades. The implications go far beyond the lonely snowcapped mountains of this geopolitically complex region.
………Thousands of troops have been camped either side of the Galwan Valley, in the mountainous region of Ladakh, for weeks.
The tense standoff started in early May, when Indian officials said Chinese soldiers crossed the boundary in Ladakh at three different points, erecting tents and guard posts and ignoring verbal warnings to leave, according to The Associated Press. That triggered shouting matches, stone-throwing and even fistfights between the two sides, much of it replayed on television news channels and social media, the news agency reported……. Among the reasons raised by analysts include China’s objection to India’s construction of a road through the Galwan Valley connecting the region to an airstrip, New Delhi’s increasing close alliance with Washington, and Beijing’s support for Pakistan in its dispute with India over the Kashmir region. ……… https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/nuclear-powers-disputed-border-uneasy-truce-explaining-india-china-conflict-n1231310 |
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Heaviest load ever through Nevada, the 770-ton reactor pressure vessel from dead SanOnofre nuclear station
A heavy chunk of the San Onofre nuclear plant is slowly moving to Utah, San Diego Tribune,
The 770-ton reactor pressure vessel from Unit 1 is part of the plant’s decommissioning efforts, By ROB NIKOLEWSKI, JUNE 19, 2020
A reactor pressure vessel that helped Unit 1 at SONGS generate electricity left the plant’s premises May 24 via railand is now at an industrial park in North Las Vegas, Nevada, about to be taken some 450 miles north on roads, accompanied by a pair Nevada Highway Patrol trooper pilot cars, to the Utah border.
The shipment will then continue, reaching the Energy Solutions disposal site in the town of Clive, Utah, located about 75 miles west of Salt Lake City.
The old reactor vessel and its contents are designated as Class A low-level waste, considered by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission as the least hazardous of radioactive waste classifications. Encased in a carbon steel cylinder for the trip, the vessel contains pieces of radioactive metal and grout.
Officials with the Utah Department of Transportation are awaiting a permit from Emmert International, a company based in Oregon contracted to move the vessel to its final destination…..
According to the Las Vegas Review-Journal, officials expect the vessel to leave North Las Vegas June 29 and arrive in Clive seven days later.
The vessel will be loaded onto a trailer 122 feet long, with 45 axles. The trailer’s eight pieces are being put together with cranes at the Apex Industrial Park. Once assembled, the trailer will then take to the road, avoiding Interstate 15 by traveling on U.S. Highway 93, state Route 318, U.S. Highway 6, back to Highway 93 and eventually taking Interstate 80 into Utah.
Six heavy-duty Class 8 trucks with combined 4,000-horsepower will haul the vessel. The entire configuration will use 460 tires that are 18 inches wide to prevent damaging roads, bridges and public infrastructure. Emmert International will use hydraulic jacks to reinforce drainage culverts.
“It’s the heaviest load to ever traverse Nevada roadways,” Nevada Department of Transportation spokesman Tony Illia told the Review-Journal. ….. https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/business/story/2020-06-19/a-heavy-chunk-of-the-san-onofre-nuclear-plant-slowly-moving-to-utah
Environmental problems, and legal holdup for Russia’s $20 billion nuclear power project in Turkey
Russia’s $20 billion nuclear power project located in Mersin on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast has long come under fire over safety and environmental concerns, including claims of large cracks in the concrete foundations due to loose and unstable ground in the area.
Officials broke ground on the Akkuyu power plant in 2018, which is set to be Turkey’s first nuclear power station and is due to come online in 2023 – the 100th anniversary of the Republic of Turkey.
But engineers and workers began ringing alarm bells over a potential nuclear disaster soon after its inception, and a group of NGOs filed a lawsuit with a Turkish court demanding for construction to be halted…….
A Turkish court in the southern province of Mersin ruled on Friday to accept a request by the NGOs for relevant ministries and the National Security Council (MGK) to be able to intervene in the project, Cumhuriyet newspaper reported.
The court said the case would be reported to the MGK, which has no obligation to intervene in construction, but may now choose to do so. Lawyers involved in the case hd also said that the Russian power power plant could pose a national security threat to Turkey.
The court also gave the green light to a request by the NGOs for the involvement of a number of Turkish ministries in the case, including the Health Ministry, the Treasury and Finance Ministry, as well as the Food, Agriculture and Livestock Ministry.
How this latest development will play out in the ambitious Russian-Turkish joint-venture remains to be seen. But it arrives at a time of ongoing tensions between Ankara and Moscow over Idlib province in northwest Syria, where the two countries back opposing sides……https://ahvalnews.com/nuclear-energy/turkeys-russian-nuclear-power-project-hits-legal-hurdle
Now, the nuclear arms race has become even worse
[Andreas Kluth] Nuclear arms race worse than last one Korea Herald, By Bloomberg 21 June 20, As long as the pandemic rages, the world’s leaders are understandably preoccupied with the threat of disease. But there are other dangers to humanity that demand attention. One of the most frightening is nuclear war. Unfortunately, the risk of that happening keeps rising.
The headline numbers are misleading. Yes, the global stockpile of nuclear warheads decreased slightly last year, according to the latest report by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. But that’s only because the US and Russia, the two countries that still account for more than 90 percent of global nuclear stocks, dismantled some of their obsolescent warheads.
Even more worryingly, states are reviewing their strategies for using these weapons. Gone is the amoral but logical stability of the Cold War, when two superpowers kept each other and the world in check with a credible threat of “Mutual Assured Destruction.”
Russia, for instance, increasingly sees smaller “tactical” warheads as a possible way to compensate for weaknesses in its other military forces. It’s conceivable that a conflict starting with hybrid warfare — ranging from disinformation campaigns to soldiers in unmarked uniforms — could escalate to a conventional war and a limited nuclear strike, inviting a counter strike and so forth.
There’s also speculation that India could soften its policy, adopted in 1998, never to be the first to use a nuclear weapon. Such thought experiments are no small matter for a country with two hostile and nuclear-armed neighbors, Pakistan and China. Just this week, India and China clashed again over their disputed border in the Himalayas. What North Korea could get up to in a crisis that it itself provokes is anybody’s guess.
Meanwhile, all efforts to limit or reduce nuclear weapons have ground to a halt. A treaty between the US and the Soviet Union that eliminated land-based missiles with short and intermediate ranges collapsed last year, after the US accused Russia of cheating.
And the two old foes aren’t even close to extending their only remaining arms-control agreement, called New START, which expires in February. One reason for that failure was America’s insistence that the third and rising superpower should join the negotiations. But China, which sees itself as merely catching up with the two nuclear kingpins, balks at accepting any limits.
Progress has also stalled in updating the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, exactly 50 years after it took effect. It sought to keep additional countries from making bombs by encouraging them to use fissile material (uranium or plutonium) only for civilian purposes such as generating electricity. But five countries have gone nuclear since it was signed. Worse, game theory suggests that it’s rational for more states to follow. Iran could be next.
The only international agreement to ban these evil weapons altogether, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons passed by the United Nations in 2017, has the same chance as a snowball in a fission event. No member of the nuclear club intends to ratify it, nor do many other countries……….
USA’s secret plan for “dominance”by exploding a nuclear bomb on the moon
REVEALED: The US wanted to detonate a nuclear bomb on the MOON in 1959 to counter the Soviet lead in the space race and show dominance
- New details of an astonishing scheme, first detailed in 1999, have been revealed
- John Greenewald, Jr writes in Secrets from the Vault about numerous plans
- He says a nuclear bomb on the moon was ‘one of the stupider things’ considered
- The US government also wanted to build a military base on the moon by 1966
By HARRIET ALEXANDER FOR DAILYMAIL.COM
PUBLISHED: 10:28 AEST, 21 June 2020 | UPDATED: 15:01 AEST, 21 June 2020
New details about a U.S. plan to blow up a nuclear bomb on the moon as a Cold War ‘show of dominance’ have been revealed in a recently-published book.
The secret mission, code-named Project A119, was conceived at the dawn of the space race by an Air Force division located at New Mexico‘s Kirtland Air Force Base.
A report authored in June 1959 entitled ‘A Study of Lunar Research Flights’ explained plans to explode the bomb on the moon’s ‘terminator’ – the area between the part of the surface that is illuminated by the sun, and the part that’s dark.
The explosion would have likely been visible with the naked eye from Earth because the military had planned to add sodium to the bomb, which would glow when it exploded
A nuclear bomb on the surface of the moon was definitely one of the stupider things the government could do,’ said John Greenewald, Jr., author of Secrets from the Vault.
The book, published in April, details some of the more surreal suggestions made in history.
Greenewald, 39, has been interested in U.S. government secrets since he was 15 and has filed more than 3,000 Freedom of Information Requests……… https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8443569/US-wanted-detonate-nuclear-bomb-moon-1959-dominance.html
False fright: religious group advertisement claims “Islam” about to make nuclear strike
Horrific’ Ad Suggesting Nuclear Attack From ‘Islam’ Appears In Nashville Newspaper, Paper Apologies
Nicholas ReimannForbes StaffBusinessI’m a news reporter for Forbes, primarily covering the U.S. South.
The Tennessean issued an apology Sunday after “a bizarre, pseudo-religious” full-page ad appeared in the newspaper’s Sunday edition claiming that “Islam” was planning a nuclear strike on the city of Nashville, Tennessee, on July 18, saying that the ad violated the paper’s standards forbidding hate speech and that it is investigating how the ad from a “fringe religious group” was able to be published in the Sunday paper.
The paper said Sunday that it immediately pulled the ad from future editions, which appeared in the “A” section—the front section—of Sunday’s newspaper. …… https://www.forbes.com/sites/nicholasreimann/2020/06/21/horrific-ad-suggesting-nuclear-attack-from-islam-appears-in-nashville-newspaper-paper-apologies/#138034315c03
UN nuclear watchdog seeks to inspect old nuclear sites in Iran
UN nuclear watchdog seeks to inspect old nuclear sites in Iran https://www.vaticannews.va/en/world/news/2020-06/un-nuclear-watchdog-seeks-to-inspect-old-nuclear-sites-in-iran.html The board of the UN atomic watchdog agency has issued a condemnation of Iran for stonewalling its nuclear inspectors.By Nathan Morley The United Nations’ atomic agency is continuing to put pressure on Iran.
In a new resolution, the international body has insisted Iran provide access to two sites where nuclear activity may have taken place in the last two-decades.
The resolution, which was put forward by France, Germany, and Britain with support by the United States, was passed by 25 votes in favour.
China and Russia voted against while seven other countries abstained
The UN is calling on the Iranians to satisfy the Agency’s requests without any further delay. It wants access to two sites in order to clarify whether undeclared nuclear activity took place there in the past.
However, Iran has been blocking access to the sites since early 2020, a move which has fuelled a diplomatic dispute. It is reported that the sites in question are not directly relevant to Iran’s current nuclear programme.
Speaking after the vote, Kazem Gharib Abadi, the Iranian ambassador to the IAEA, said he strongly rejected the resolution and would respond appropriately in due course.
For its part, the IAEA said it still has the access it needs to inspect Iran’s declared nuclear facilities according to its mandate under the nuclear deal reached in 2015.
EDF’s failing nuclear reactors in UK
- NuclearNews No 126 20 June 20,Hinkley’s sister reactors at Hunterston B (all 4 reactors have operated since 1976) have both been closed for much of the past two years. Reactor 3 has been offline for more than two years, since March 2018. Reactor 4 was first shutdown on 2nd October 2018 but was allowed a trial operation between August 2019 and 10th December 2019. The safety case for restarting Reactor 3 was finally been submitted to the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) for its assessment in mid-May and for Reactor 4 on 29th May. EDF now says it is hoping that Reactor 3 can restart on 13th July 2020 and Reactor 4 on 27 July 2020.
EDF may be hoping to restart the two reactors in July but there are increasing concerns regarding revelations the graphite cores have begun to crumble as cracks spread. At least 58 fragments and pieces of debris have broken off the graphite bricks that make up the reactor cores. According to the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) there is “significant uncertainty” about the risks of debris blocking channels for cooling the reactor and causing fuel cladding to melt. Such a disaster could result in a radiation leak and contamination right across the central belt of Scotland. Small wonder then that many local residents are pressing ONR to refuse EDF permission to restart these decrepit 44-year old reactors. (3)
EDF says it has spent more than £200 million on tests, inspections and creating quarter-scale models of the reactor cores that are shaken to mimic a quake to try to prove that the graphite is safe. EDF hopes the new safety cases will be approved in July to allow for six months of operation. That may pave the way for approval for Hinkley Point B with “pretty much the same safety case”.
£200 million may seem like a lot of money, but it’s only about one reactor’s income for one year, so if it helps EDF keep its fourteen AGRs generating for longer it will have been well worth it for the Company.
But, like Hinkley Point B, the two Hunterston reactors are due to shut for good in 2023. EDF chose not to enter the two Hunterston B reactors into the capacity market auction for the period October 2022 to September 2023. Although Hinkley Point B entered into the auction “it exited above the clearing price and therefore did not get an agreement. The revenues at the clearing price did not provide sufficient reward to take on the risk of penalties arising from non-delivery” (4) – probably indicating a lack of confidence at EDF that any of the 4 reactors will make it as far as September 2023.
Another signal that minds at EDF are switching from generation to decommissioning is the fact that the generator has announced plans to submit scoping requests to North Ayrshire Council ahead of planning applications for waste facilities to support future decommissioning activities.
As part of the preparations for decommissioning, EDF is planning to build a new intermediate level waste (ILW) store and two waste processing facilities on the B site with applications for planning permission submitted by early 2021, following a period of consultation with a range of stakeholders.
A final decision has still to be taken on the best route for storage of ILW from Hunterston B and EDF is still looking at a range of options including the shared use of the Hunterston A ILW store. But to ensure the site can move into de-fuelling with no unnecessary downtime, applications are being lodged now to speed up the process should EDF decide to build a new store.
Discussions are also reported to be underway between BEIS, EDF Energy and the NDA, to examine the future decommissioning of the AGR fleet when it is time for the reactors to come off line. As yet no decisions have been made, and those discussions continue.
But it’s not just Hunterston B and Hinkley Point B which are causing sleepless nights for EDF. As Emily Gosden, writing in The Times, points out, all of “the AGRs are scheduled to close permanently between 2023 and 2030, but all also have graphite cores that bring their lifespans into doubt.”
- All the AGRs will eventually exhibit some form of cracking towards the end of life says Richard Bradfield, chief technical officer for generation at EDF Energy: “There are two irreplaceable components on an advanced gas-cooled reactor: the graphite and the boilers.”
- Hartlepool and Heysham 1 Hartlepool and Heysham 1 are both due to shut-down in 2024. Although they were entered into the capacity market auction for October 2023 to September 2024 and EDF says “we are confident they will operate to their scheduled closure date of 2024, they exited above the clearing price and therefore did not secure agreements. The revenues at the clearing price did not provide sufficient reward to take on the risk of penalties arising from non-delivery.” (5)
Heysham 1 Power Station was recently served with an improvement notice by the Office for Nuclear Regulation after contravening safety regulations regarding the pressure systems of their nuclear reactor. The notice was served on June 4 after shortfalls were discovered in the examination and inspection of the Reactor 1 pressure vessel. Nuclear reactor pressure vessels feature hundreds of sealed penetrations which must be routinely inspected to ensure they are free from defects. Out of the 600 penetrations in one of the reactors ONR found that EDF Energy had failed to examine 11 penetrations within the intervals specified in the written maintenance scheme. EDF must comply with the improvement notice served to them by the ONR and complete the 11 overdue examinations by December 18, 2020. (6)
Dungeness B On 27 August 2018 Dungeness B shut down Reactor 22 for its planned statutory outage. On 23 September 2018 Reactor 21 was also shut down for the planned double reactor outage. Both reactors have been shut since. The regular inspections on the reactors in Kent in late summer 2018 identified the need for repairs on steam pipes. The inspections showed that seismic restraints, pipework and storage vessels associated with several systems providing a safety function were found to be “corroded to an unacceptable condition” according to ONR. (7) Measures are being taken to eliminate the corrosion, including the upgrading of more than 300m of pipeline associated with reactor cooling systems and renewal of numerous seismic pipework supports and remediation of carbon dioxide storage vessels. On 26th February 2020 EDF Energy announced further extended outages at the two reactors The Dungeness B21 reactor was due to come back online on April 20 but the outage was extended to July 18. The Dungeness B22 unit was previously due back online on May 2 but that was extended to July 8. The dates given now are 21st September and 11th September. (8)
- The boiler design at Dungeness was “very different” to the other AGRs and probably would be the life-limiting factor for the plant. However, EDF says the issues are “manageable” and that the company aimed to present a safety case shortly to seek to restart in September. (9)
- Torness and Heysham 2 The Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) published its Project Assessment Report which allows Torness and Heysham 2 to continue operating for the period 2020 – 2030. (10) The Ferret website reported that cracks in the graphite core are now expected to start appearing six years sooner than previously thought (11)
- ONR said that the cracking could cause debris to inhibit vital cooling of highly radioactive reactor fuel beginning as soon as 2022 rather than 2028. It said Torness and Heysham 2 will be able to keep operating until 2030 – but only if inspections to check for cracks are intensified. ONR promises to “robustly challenge” the plant’s operators, EDF Energy, to ensure that it “remains safe”.
- Campaigners fear that Torness will become increasingly unsafe, and warn it may have to close down sooner than expected. EDF, however, insists that the station will keep generating electricity safely until 2030. NFLA has called on ONR to keep Torness under close scrutiny. “These safety reservations surrounding the Torness periodic safety review need to be cleared up as soon as possible,” said the group’s Scotland convenor, SNP Glasgow councillor, Feargal Dalton. “Whilst EDF is having to spend large resources trying to persuade the regulator that it is safe to restart the Hunterston B reactors, this report emphasises that similar issues with ageing are likely to arise at Torness over coming years.” Councils would press ONR “to forensically scrutinise what look like significant weaknesses in the EDF safety case,” Dalton added. “In the meantime, the Scottish Government should start discussions about a ‘just transition’ for the workers at both Hunterston and Torness so that Scotland can move to a safe, sustainable and nonnuclear economy as quickly as possible.”
ONR made nine recommendations to remedy major “safety shortfalls” at Torness and Heysham 2 and raised 41 minor matters with EDF. These include “weaknesses” in health reviews, as well as issues with “structural integrity”, “corrosion management” and “cyber security”.
Although no cracks have yet been detected, ONR inspectors pointed out there was a significant difference in the design of Torness and Heysham 2 compared to that of Hunterston. The newer stations have seal rings between the graphite bricks that make up the reactor core. ONR quoted EDF saying that there could be “a systematic failure” of the seal rings after cracking. “This could lead to debris with the potential to challenge the ability to move or adequately cool fuel,” said ONR. “If keyway root cracking predictions are realised, then the safety case is unlikely to remain robust for the next ten years periodic safety review period,” observed ONR inspectors.
It could, in fact, be cheaper to build new renewable capacity rather than continue to operate these ageing reactors. This could soon be the case with Torness, especially if it has to keep being turned on and off to inspect the graphite core. Scotland clearly needs to be prepared for the possibility that Torness might be forced to close not long after 2022.
- Flexible Return Dates
- Paul Brown asked EDF “At what point do you cut your losses and close the stations permanently?” but failed to get a sensible reply. On Dungeness B it said: “For the past two years we have undertaken a major investment programme at Dungeness to secure the station’s longer-term future. Since the start of the year we have made great progress in tackling some of the complex problems our works identified. However we still have further engineering works to complete, and a detailed safety case to finalise, before we ask for restart approval from our regulator. Our present position for estimated return to service is 11 September for Reactor 22 and 21 September for Reactor 21.”
Stephen Thomas, professor of energy policy at the University of Greenwich, commented on the constantly postponed start-up dates for the ageing reactors: “It is clear, given that shutdowns expected to take two months are now expected to take two years or more, that EDF has found huge unanticipated problems”, he said. “It is hard to understand why, when the scale of the problems became clear, EDF did not cut its losses and close the reactors, but continues to pour money into plants to get a couple more years of operation out of plants highly likely to be loss-makers. It is depressing that ONR, which has a duty to keep the public informed on such important issues, chooses to hide behind bland statements such as that it will take as long as it takes, and that it will not comment on EDF’s decisions.” (12)
1 This Month
23 April – WEBINAR – Why new nuclear reactors are the wrong tools for decarbonization Thursday, April 23 • 1 AM – 2 AM AEST
World Nuclear Power. Reactors 1951-2026, 75 Years of Nuclear Power.
Interactive Map– https://dv.worldnuclearreport.org/
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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