Taiwan Cabinet officials clarify that nuclear power is not “green”

BY GIORGIO LEALI, OCTOBER 31, 2023 https://en.rti.org.tw/news/view/id/2010213

A Cabinet spokesperson on Wednesday said that nuclear power does not qualify as “green energy”, despite recent comments made by Premier Chen Chien-jen (陳建仁). Cabinet Spokesperson Lin Tze-luen (林子倫) was responding to Chen’s comments in the legislature the previous day.

During questions from legislators on Tuesday, Chen said that nuclear energy is green energy, but that the issue of nuclear waste disposal must also be taken into account. Lin says that several people including Chen himself and Economic Minister Wang Mei-hua (王美花) have all made clarifying comments. Wang in her comments said that although nuclear power generates very few emissions, that does not necessarily define it as “green”. She says that is why international environmental organizations such as RE100 do not list nuclear energy as green.

Lin says that some media reports did not faithfully report the full context of the premier’s comments, which could be misleading. He adds a nuclear-free Taiwan remains the national consensus and that the government’s position has not changed. He says the government continues to move ahead with its four goals of reducing coal, increasing gas, developing green energy, and denuclearizing. He adds that the government will also continue working toward the goal of net-zero carbon emissions by the year 2050. #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | environment, politics, Taiwan | Leave a comment

Civilian casualties in Gaza don’t matter – top US senator

Lindsey Graham insists no amount of Palestinian deaths should make the Washington put the brakes on Israel

https://www.rt.com/news/586356-senator-graham-no-limit-civilian-casualties-gaza/ 1 Nov 23

The US should stand by Israel in its campaign against Hamas no matter how heavy a toll it takes on the civilian population in Gaza, Senator Lindsey Graham has argued. He likened Israel’s military operation against the militants to the allies’ struggle against Nazi Germany and Japan during World War II.

In an interview with CNN on Tuesday, Graham was asked if there was a “threshold” for him, after which he would start questioning Israel’s tactics. The Republican replied in the negative, saying there is no limit as to “what Israel should do to the people who are trying to slaughter the Jews.”

“This idea that Israel has to apologize for attacking Hamas, who’s embedded with their own population, needs to stop,” the senator insisted, adding that it is Hamas that is “creating these casualties – not Israel.”

Graham noted that Israel does need to “be smart” by trying to “limit civilian casualties.” The lawmaker also called for the delivery of humanitarian aid to “areas that protect the innocent.”

During his visit to Israel last month, US President Joe Biden assured Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that “as long as the United States stands, and we will stand forever, we will not let you ever be alone.”

Soon after Hamas’ deadly attack on Israel last month, Washington scrambled to provide its long-standing ally with additional defense aid worth billions of dollars.

The US has also deployed two aircraft carrier groups and other naval assets, a squadron of F-16 fighter jets, air-defense systems, and 900 troops to the Middle East, saying this increased military presence should serve as a deterrent to other states tempted to join the conflict.

Meanwhile, on Tuesday, the director of the UN’s human rights office (OHCHR) in New York, Craig Mokhiber, described Israel’s actions in Gaza as a “text-book case of genocide” and the “wholesale slaughter of the Palestinian people, rooted in an ethno-nationalist settler colonial ideology.”

The official handed in his resignation, arguing that the UN had failed in its duty to prevent the killing of Palestinian civilians. He claimed that the international organization had “surrendered to the power of the US” and given in to the “Israeli lobby.”
Mokhiber also accused European nations of being “complicit in the horrific assault” on Gaza and “giving political and diplomatic cover for Israel’s atrocities.”

Echoing Mokhiber’s assessment on Tuesday in Geneva, a spokesman for the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF), James Elder, claimed that “Gaza has become a graveyard for thousands of children,” and a “living hell for everyone else.” He called for a humanitarian ceasefire in the Palestinian enclave.

The conflict has so far left more than 1,400 Israelis and over 8,000 Palestinians dead, with thousands more injured. #Israel #Palestine

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, USA | Leave a comment

Book review of “Too Hot to Touch: The Problem of High-Level Nuclear Waste”

This is a book review of “Too Hot to Touch: The Problem of High-Level
Nuclear Waste” and the best book I’ve read on the topic, as well as
additional research on the topic. Now that world wide production of
conventional and unconventional oil probably peaked in 2018 (coal in 2013,
and perhaps natural gas in 2019), our top priority should be to bury
nuclear wastes as soon as possible. Once severe shortages arrive, remaining
oil will to to agriculture and other essential needs. This short window of
time now may be our only chance to bury nuclear wastes — our descendants
certainly won’t have the energy, diesel equipment, or technology. Yucca
mountain is the best possible place to put nuclear waste in the U.S. The
only place to put it actually, a $15 billion facility that models put
through thousands of permutations of multiple calamities such as
earthquakes, volcanoes, flooding and more. Yucca was found to be a safe
place to put nuclear waste.

Energy Skeptic 1st Nov 2023 https://energyskeptic.com/2023/book-review-nuclear-waste-too-hot-to-touch/ #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

Nuclear waste will harm future generations for a million years without underground storage

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | media, resources - print, wastes | Leave a comment

Netanyahu Rejects Calls for Ceasefire as Gaza Death Toll Surpasses 8,300

https://youtube.com/watch?v=bTn6UL1RUJI%3Fsi%3DWhoGNiU2j8sZspNR

By Chris Walker , TRUTHOUT, October 31, 2023 https://truthout.org/articles/netanyahu-rejects-calls-for-ceasefire-as-gaza-death-toll-surpasses-8300/?utm_source=Truthout&utm_campaign=cd5af912ac-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_3_20_2023_13_41_COPY_06&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bbb541a1db-cd5af912ac-650192793&mc_cid=cd5af912ac&mc_eid=73e1cd43d0

Hundreds of thousands of protesters worldwide have demanded an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and an end to the occupation.By Chris Walker , TRUTHOUTPublishedOctober 31, 2023

sraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected international calls for an Israeli ceasefire in Gaza during a press conference on Monday.

Since the Hamas-led infiltration attack on October 7 that killed around 1,400 people, Israeli forces have waged a genocidal bombing campaign against Palestinians, killing more than 8,300 people in Gaza — more than a third of whom are children, according to the latest figures from the Gaza Health Ministry. Thousands more Gazans are estimated to be trapped under the rubble.

Israeli airstrikes have displaced millions of Gazans from their homes, many of whom are now struggling to survive — and resorting to drinking contaminated sea water — as Israel blocks food, water, electricity and medicine from entering Gaza.

“Just as the United States would not agree to a cease-fire after Pearl Harbor or after the terrorist attack of 9/11, Israel will not agree to a cessation of hostilities with Hamas after the horrific attacks of October 7,” Netanyahu told reporters on Monday.

Netanyahu’s comments come as hundreds of thousands of protesters worldwide have demanded an immediate ceasefire and for Israel to allow desperately needed aid into Gaza, as well as for an end to Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian land. Although Netanyahu has claimed that aid has been reaching those in need, observers on the ground have disputed these claims.

“Very few trucks, slow processes, strict inspections, supplies that do not match the requirements of UNRWA and the other aid organizations, and mostly the ongoing ban on fuel, are all a recipe for a failed system,” read a report from Thomas White, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency’s top official for Gaza.

Hundreds of thousands of people protested against the Israeli military’s siege of Gaza in cities across the globe over the weekend, including in Melbourne, Australia; London, United Kingdom; Toronto, Canada; New York, United States; Rome, Italy; Amman, Jordan; Berlin, Germany; Pretoria, South Africa; and more.

Netanyahu, who faces calls to resign from his role as prime minister for failing to prevent the October 7 attack from Hamas, didn’t appear to be moved by the calls for a ceasefire and an end to the occupation. “This is a time for war,” he said instead.

Meanwhile, residents of Israel appear to be changing their views on the attacks in Gaza. Polling from last week, taken prior to the Israeli military launching a ground campaign, indicates that close to one in two Israeli residents (49 percent) wanted the Israel Defense Forces to pause consideration of such moves, with only 29 percent stating they wanted the military to immediately launch a ground campaign, a decrease from a poll asking the same question a week before.

Other polling taken earlier this month found that the vast majority of Israeli residents agree that Netanyahu was largely responsible for failing to prepare for an attack from Hamas, with 80 percent in that poll saying so.

Evidence suggests that Netanyahu did in fact have advance warning about the Hamas attack on October 7. Egyptian officials say they repeatedly warned the prime minister days ahead of the attack that the action from Hamas was imminent. Netanyahu’s office has denied that they received any information from Egypt, although the chairman of the U.S. House Intelligence Committee, Texas Republican Rep. Michael McCaul, has said that he and other members have seen evidence of the warnings. #srael #Palestine

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Israel, weapons and war | 1 Comment

Deb Katz: There’s no end in sight to the crisis in nuclear waste

Clean water, clean air, clean land, and a safe place to live are our right. We must fight for the cleanup of all communities and stop the targeting of Black, brown and white communities alike to nuclear contamination.

November 1, 2023, by Deb Katz, executive director of the Citizen Awareness Network, based in Shelburne, Mass. https://vtdigger.org/2023/11/01/deb-katz-theres-no-end-in-sight-to-the-crisis-in-nuclear-waste/

What remains at the site of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant? Millions of curies of high-level waste on the banks of the Connecticut River with no destination, no solution.

The NorthStar plan? To ship its problem 2,000 miles away to Andrews County in Texas for “temporary storage.” The 5th Circuit shot down NorthStar’s plans to shuffle its toxic waste problem off on a working poor Hispanic community. This waste will be dangerous for a million years.

This is the colossal failure of nuclear power. There is no present solution to deal with the legacy of Vermont Yankee or any other reactor. This is the abject failure of the nuclear industry and the federal government.

The nuclear industry promised a solution by the time reactors shuttered. Sixty years later, there is no solution and no permanent solution forthcoming. There is waste with nowhere to go.

The industry routinely engages in environmental racism to deal with its waste problems. It is reprehensible. The industry targets working poor, people of color, and Indigenous tribes for its nuclear fuel chain. It pits reactor and targeted communities against each other over who will suffer nuclear power’s final solution.

Citizens Awareness Network opposes these false solutions. Without a permanent repository, any establishment of centralized interim storage is merely a way to make the industry’s waste problem disappear. Potentially it will de facto become the industry’s “permanent” solution.

We can’t accept that another community will suffer to clean our community up. We accept that the waste must remain onsite until the government does its job. This isn’t easy.

Dangers remain, whether from acts of malice or climate disruption. Vermont Yankee’s canisters sit in the open on a pad on the banks of the river.

The National Governors’ Council stated that the high-level nuclear waste at reactor sites were pre-deployed weapons of mass destruction. It urged Congress to take action to protect these sites. Congress has yet to act.

Then there is climate change. The National Academy of Science in February began a study to address what it calls “probability of maximum precipitation” events. The study focuses on infrastructure, dams and energy generation including nuclear sites. It addresses their vulnerability to PMP events. Included in the study are representatives from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Both acknowledged that there is no guidance in place to direct their actions to address these events and the vulnerability of these sites.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the U.S. Geological Survey acknowledged that they were 20 years behind the curve in addressing these issues. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission acknowledged that the agency concerns were raised in response to the Fukushima accident.

For all its claims, nuclear power is neither clean nor green. It is a dirty, toxic technology. It relies on its invisibility to keep its lies going.

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear Ban Treaty Members to Meet in November

Arms Control Association, November 2023, By Shizuka Kuramitsu

States-parties to the 2017 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) will hold their second meeting in New York on Nov. 27-Dec. 1. Amid the crisis facing the international arms control and disarmament regime, they are expected to review and continue implementing their plans for a total ban on nuclear weapons.

The TPNW, which entered into force on Jan. 22, 2021, bans states-parties from involvement in any nuclear weapons activities, including the use, threat of use, production, development, possession, and stationing of these weapons. Spearheaded by non-nuclear-armed states and civil society groups, the treaty originated from their frustration over the long stalemate among nuclear-weapon states to engage in serious nuclear disarmament as called for by the nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).

At their first meeting, in June 2022, TPNW states-parties produced two documents aiming to advance the treaty, a 50-point action plan and a political statement. (See ACT, July/August 2022.)

They established three informal working groups to make progress during the intercessional period on important topics such as nuclear disarmament verification, victim assistance, environmental remediation, and universalization of the treaty. In addition, the action plan agreed to create a scientific advisory group, to implement gender provisions in the treaty, and to promote TPNW complementarity with existing treaties.

For the November meeting, each working group is preparing reports on their respective intersessional activities. The meeting is expected to issue a final document, according to the provisional agenda and government officials……………………………………………………… more https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2023-11/news/nuclear-ban-treaty-members-meet-november #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | opposition to nuclear, weapons and war | Leave a comment

How well protected are Ukraine’s nuclear power plants?

“This incident again underlines the extremely precarious nuclear safety situation in Ukraine, which will continue as long as this tragic war goes on,” Grossi said. “The fact that numerous windows at the site were destroyed shows just how close it was. Next time, we may not be so fortunate.”

DW, Lilia Rzheutska, 1 Nov 23

Ukrainian air defense systems recently downed Russian attack drones near the Khmelnitsky nuclear power plant. But falling debris still damaged the site. Are power plants in danger?

On the night of October 25, Ukrainian authorities reported downing Russian Shahed kamikaze drones near the Khmelnitsky nuclear power plant, in the country’s west. Falling debris and a wave of detonations caused significant damage to the town of Netishyn, where power plant employees live. The nearby town of Slavuta was also affected. Some buildings belonging to the nuclear facility itself were also damaged. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said the drones were likely sent to attack the power plant.

Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) who are at the nuclear plant confirmed two loud explosions had occurred near the plant. They were later informed that two drones had been shot down at a distance of five and 20 kilometers, respectively.

AEA director General Rafael Grossi later stated on the organization’s website that powerful explosions near the power plant that night had temporarily cut off power to two radiation monitoring stations. According to Grossi, the detonations did not, however, disrupt the plant’s operations, nor did they affect the power grid. The explosion did, meanwhile, shatter several windows at the plant. “This incident again underlines the extremely precarious nuclear safety situation in Ukraine, which will continue as long as this tragic war goes on,” Grossi said. “The fact that numerous windows at the site were destroyed shows just how close it was. Next time, we may not be so fortunate.”

……………………………… A nuclear power plant is more than just a reactor, says Dmytro Humenyuk, who heads the safety and analysis unit of Ukraine’s scientific and technical center on nuclear and radiation safety. It is a complex facility that consists of safety systems that provides electricity for the plant itself, and transports power generated by the plant. Falling debris or shelling powerlines and substations could lead to a power outage at the nuclear power plant and trigger a dangerous situation, Humenjuk says.

High-voltage substations, through which electricity produced at the nuclear power plant is fed into the power grid and without which the facility cannot function safely, must be well protected from missile and drone attacks well as falling debris. “When substations come under fire, the nuclear power plant’s emergency protection is activated,” says nuclear energy expert Olha Kozharna. “Such an emergency stop is very dangerous for the power plants.”…………………………………………………………… https://www.dw.com/en/how-well-protected-are-ukraines-nuclear-power-plants/a-67271615 #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Australia must lobby US for ‘no first use’ of nuclear weapons, says ex-minister Gareth Evans

Former foreign minister says it is ‘sheer dumb luck’ that arms have not been used in the past 78 years and urges leadership on control measures

Daniel Hurst, Guardian, 1 Nov 23

Labor luminary and former foreign minister, Gareth Evans has urged Australia to lobby the US to promise “no first use” of nuclear weapons, warning that global arms control agreements “are now either dead or on life support”.

Evans says that in the wake of sealing the Aukus nuclear-powered submarine deal, the Albanese government should give “some comfort to ALP members and voters that we are really serious about nuclear arms control”.

Evans told Guardian Australia it was “sheer dumb luck” that the world had avoided a nuclear attack in the 78 years since the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and “it is utterly wishful thinking to believe that this luck can continue in perpetuity”.

Evans joined arms control experts and former senior diplomats in urging the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, to take “a leadership role in addressing the rising nuclear threats in our region”.

Australia should appoint “a high-level envoy to engage our regional partners on an agenda of nuclear confidence building and preventive diplomacy measures”, according to a letter from the Asia-Pacific Leadership Network for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament (APLN).

While the group’s letter to Albanese is not specific about policy measures, Evans offered his own view that Australia’s status as a close US ally “gives us a particularly significant potential role” in pushing to reduce nuclear risks.

“The most immediately useful step we could take would be to support the growing international movement for the universal adoption of No First Use doctrine by the nuclear-armed states,” Evans told Guardian Australia…………………………………….

In a stark warning about the security environment, Evans said the risk of nuclear weapons being used through human error, miscalculation or system error was “greater than ever, not least given new developments in AI and cyber-offence capability”.

“Nearly 13,000 nuclear warheads are still in existence, with a combined destructive capability of close to 100,000 Hiroshima- or Nagasaki-sized bombs, and stockpiles, especially in our own Indo-Pacific region … are now growing again,” he said.

“The taboo against their deliberate use is weakening, with Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, talking up this prospect in language not heard since the height of the cold war.”

In addition to seeking universal support for “no first use”, Evans said other potential risk-reduction measures include cutting the number of weapons ready for immediate use……………………………………………….

The APLN letter gained support from high-powered experts including John Carlson, the former head of the Australian Safeguards and Non-Proliferation Office, and Ramesh Thakur, a former UN assistant secretary general.

Other signatories included John Tilemann, a former diplomat and international civil servant with the International Atomic Energy Agency, and Gary Quinlan, a former Australian ambassador to the UN.

The leader of the Greens in the Senate, Larissa Waters, backed the letter with the former Australian Democrats leader Natasha Stott Despoja and the former Labor minister for international development Melissa Parke. https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/nov/01/australia-must-lobby-us-for-no-first-use-of-nuclear-weapons-says-ex-minister-gareth-evans #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | AUSTRALIA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Small modular nuclear reactor merger plan falls through

X-energy, Ares drop merger plan, 31 October 2023

Small modular reactor (SMR) and advanced fuel technology developer X-Energy Reactor Company – known as X-energy – and Ares Acquisition Corporation (AAC) have “mutually agreed to terminate their previously announced business combination agreement, effective immediately”.

In December last year, X-energy and AAC – a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company affiliated with global alternative investment manager Ares Management Corporation – entered into a definitive business combination agreement. The combination was set to establish X-energy as a publicly traded company, a move that was expected to accelerate the company’s growth strategy.

………………………………….., given challenging market conditions, peer-company trading performance and a balancing of the benefits and drawbacks of becoming a publicly traded company under current circumstances, X-energy and AAC jointly determined that it was the best course of action at this time not to proceed with their previously announced transaction.”

……………………….”In view of the termination of the Business Combination Agreement, AAC determined that it will not be able to consummate an initial business combination within the time period required by its amended and restated memorandum and articles of association,” the statement said. “As such, AAC intends to dissolve and liquidate in accordance with the provisions of the articles.”

X-energy is the developer of the Xe-100 pebble bed high-temperature gas reactor…………………… https://www.world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/X-energy,-Ares-drop-merger-plan #nuclear #antinuclear #nuclearfree #NoNukes

November 3, 2023 Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, USA | Leave a comment