When glaciers calve: Huge underwater tsunamis found at edge of Antarctica, likely affecting ice melt.
Bulletin, By Michael Meredith | July 15, 2024
Antarctica is huge, it affects pretty much every place and every living thing on our planet, and it is changing. This should be a concern for all of us, and yet we know troublingly little about some key aspects of the great white continent.
Despite its position in the far distant south, Antarctica is a vital component in the functioning of the planet. It is central to global ocean circulation, thus exerting a profound influence on the world’s climate (Figure 1 on original). The vast Southern Ocean that surrounds Antarctica absorbs huge quantities of heat and carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and distributes them around the rest of the world, thereby slowing the rate of global warming elsewhere. This “climate favor” has comes at a cost, however—the Southern Ocean is overheating and acidifying, with marked impacts on the marine ecosystem. The extra heat in the ocean is also melting the fringes of the Antarctic Ice Sheet, destabilizing its glaciers, and increasingly pushing up sea levels worldwide. The sea ice around Antarctica—formed in the fall and winter of the Southern Hemisphere, when the ocean surface freezes—has now reached record low extents, affecting the Earth’s energy budget and acting to further accelerate climate change.
All the information we have from Antarctica comes from sparse networks of sensors and equipment deployed directly, augmented with satellite measurements of the ice and ocean surface and computer simulations. While we know more about Antarctica and the Southern Ocean than ever before, it is still one of the least-well measured places on our planet, with some areas still remaining “data deserts.” We need to know more, so that we can better understand the causes of the changes happening here, how they will continue to change in future, and hence what the global impacts are likely to be.
One feature of the Southern Ocean that is often overlooked is how (and how strongly) it is mixed. This is a key process that redistributes heat, carbon, nutrients, plankton, and all other things in the sea, with profound consequences.
………………………………………glacier calving event had caused a sudden massive burst in the mixing of the ocean, stretching many kilometers from the ice front.
How did it do this? The data revealed that the glacier calving had triggered an underwater tsunami event. In essence, large waves (the height of a two-story house) were generated and moved rapidly away from the glacier, riding the interface between layers in the ocean that were tens of meters down. When these internal tsunami waves finally broke—like surface waves on a beach—they caused massive churn and mixing…………………………………………………………………………
This process—of glacier calving generating internal tsunamis and bursts of ocean mixing—is entirely absent from the computer models that are used to simulate our climate and ecosystem, hampering our ability to reliably project future changes. We need to know more about how this process works, how it will change, and what its consequences will be. ……. https://thebulletin.org/premium/2024-07/when-glaciers-calve-huge-underwater-tsunamis-found-at-edge-of-antarctica-likely-affecting-ice-melt/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=ThursdayNewsletter08152024&utm_content=ClimateChange_HugeUnderwaterTsunamis_07152024&utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=ThursdayNewsletter08152024&utm_content=ClimateChange_HugeUnderwaterTsunamis_07152024
Nuclear waste dump debate heating up over AUKUS, Coalition plans
Australia’s AUKUS agreement with the US and Uk will pave the way for nuclear submarines – and nuclear waste. But some experts say the government has not learned the lessons of three past attempts to deal with that material.
protesters in the South Australian town of Port Augusta in 2018 were pushing back against a government proposal for a nuclear waste dump near the town of Kimba.
They took their fight all the way to the Federal Court, forcing Labor to ultimately abandon the plan.
But the issue of nuclear waste in Australia remains a controversial one.
Emeritus Professor Ian Lowe says that for now, much of Australia’s nuclear waste is stored near the nation’s only reactor at Lucas Heights in south-west Sydney, which is mostly used to make medicine, mining materials, and for research.
Low-level waste is also being stored in hundreds of cupboards, labs and hospitals nationally.
“Intermediate level waste is nastier. And it needs to be stored basically permanently for geological time, and it probably needs to be stored deep underground because the isotopes that are there can be harmful for thousands of years. At the moment, they’re in temporary storage at Lucas Heights near the research reactor. And the capacity there is okay for perhaps 10 years, but sooner or later we’re going to have to find a way of permanently disposing of the intermediate level waste. And that’s a more serious issue than the low level waste. It needs to be deep underground and it needs to be in a properly engineered storage site. And we’re talking big sums of money.”
That waste is safe and secure for now but the Australian Radioactive Waste Agency says this is not a sustainable solution long-term.
The government, opposition and Professor Lowe all agree.
“I mean, basically the temporary waste storage at Lucas Heights is just a very large shed with drums of radioactive waste.”
Australian Conservation Foundation campaigner Dave Sweeney says efforts to site a new nuclear dump have focused more on PR – and managing outrage.
“There has been 30 years of a divisive debate, of coercive attempts to impose radioactive waste, and there have been multiple fights at multiple sites, mainly in the Northern Territory and South Australia, where affected communities and particularly Aboriginal communities have been very very strident, strong and sustained in their opposition – and have defeated a proposal to put waste on their Country and the Canberra caravan has moved on.”
A spokesperson for Resources Minister Madeleine King has said the government is reflecting on lessons learned from past siting processes as it assesses options for safely disposing of nuclear waste.
But Dr Lowe says the government has not learned the lessons of history.
I think successive governments are just kicking the can down the road. If there is a plan, nobody knows about it.”
The debate is being revived because of the waste that will come from the on-board reactors of AUKUS subs.
This will be high-level waste – a more hazardous form Australia does not have right now.
The government plans to dispose of this weapons-grade waste on defence land – and Defence Minister Richard Marles says we have time to get it right.
“To be clear, we will not have to dispose of the first reactor from our nuclear-powered submarines until the 2050s. I want to assure the Parliament that there will be appropriate public consultation, particularly with First Nations communities to respect and protect cultural heritage. This will not be a matter of set and forget.”
In March last year Mr Marles told parliament the government would set out the process for selecting a site within 12 months, but 17 months on those details are yet to be announced.
Professor Lowe has criticised the bipartisan AUKUS agreement as being irresponsible without a waste management plan.
“I think if we’re being asked to approve nuclear power reactors or nuclear submarines, we’re entitled to see a clearly spelt out intellectually and morally and politically defensible solution for the problem that will inevitably be created. It’s just not responsible to create a problem saying, we hope future generations will figure out a way to deal with it.”
Campaigner Dave Sweeney opposes any high-level waste, but says we need to face up to the challenge of intermediate waste – although he doesn’t want to see the process rushed.
“I think we need to just every party take a breath, acknowledge that radioactive waste is in this country, acknowledge that it has been poorly managed to date, realise that we have because of hard efforts of contests from Aboriginal people and local communities, we have now won ourselves some breathing space with the interim storage of intermediate level waste securely at the ANSTO facility and use that time not to regroup in our trenches, but use that time to gather at the table and genuinely consider pathways forward.”
There appear to be some promising developments.
One company, called Tellus Holdings, has forged a new way forward for low-level waste, establishing a disposal site in West Australia – the first private firm ever licensed to do so.
CEO Nate Smith says the company has disposed of 6,000 cubic metres of radioactive material since its facility opened one-and-a-half-years ago – after ten years of consultation.
“With Kimba and others, I think government has announced the site, and then done engagement, and I think that puts people on the back foot. It all starts with trust. For us that was sitting down over cups of tea or going to the pub, it was sharing our vision of what we wanted to do and really understanding the community’s perspective but also their aspirations, and I think one of the biggest things we did that was in stark contrast to government is look we gave our Traditional Owners a veto right. For us, the whole concept from the start was, this is their land.”
Tellus Holdings will not accept intermediate or high-level waste, but Mr Smith says the company is eager to take on more low-level material, arguing this would free up space for interim storage at Lucas Heights.
“It would allow ANSTO and ARWA and others to focus on the real challenge right now, which is intermediate and high-level waste, because it’s coming with AUKUS and it’s already in existence from the Lucas Reactor.”
The Coalition’s plan for a nuclear power industry would also create more high-level waste if it goes ahead.
In a statement to SBS, the Opposition’s resources spokeswoman Susan McDonald said the Coalition anticipates that it would be stored on-site with the proposed nuclear power reactors and eventually disposed of permanently alongside the AUKUS material.
Professor Ian Lowe says the public deserves to know more.
“The one thing we know about nuclear reactors, they produce high level waste that has to be managed for geological time. And if we were to go ahead and build seven nuclear reactors by 2035, by 2036, we would be producing high level radioactive waste. So we really need to hear from the Coalition how they propose to resolve that problem.”
Sellafield apologises after pleading guilty to cybersecurity failings
By Ollie Rawlinson @ORawlinsonNews, Reporter
The charges, brought by the Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR), cover a four-year period from 2019 to 2023 and were heard in Westminster Magistrates Court.
According to The Guardian newspaper, the court heard that three-quarters of Sellafield’s servers were vulnerable to cyberattacks, leaving the world’s largest store of plutonium exposed to potential threats.
The ONR revealed that sensitive nuclear information (SNI) had been left at risk due to outdated technology, including the use of Windows 7 and Windows 2008.
It was also discovered that critical IT health checks, which Sellafield claimed were being performed, were not conducted.
A report by external IT firm Commissum found that even a ‘reasonably skilled hacker’ could have accessed and compromised sensitive data.
Sellafield CEO Euan Hutton apologised in a written statement, asserting that the company has since addressed these issues………………………………….
Chief Magistrate Paul Goldspring is expected to deliver a final sentencing in September. Sellafield has agreed to pay £53,000 in legal costs.
The case marks the first time a nuclear site has been prosecuted for cybersecurity offences.
Carlisle News & Star 14th Aug 2024
How climate change has pushed our oceans to the brink of catastrophe
For decades, the oceans have absorbed much of the excess heat caused by greenhouse gases. The latest observations suggest they are reaching their limits, so how worried should we be?
New Scientist, By Madeleine Cuff, 14 August 2024
…………………………………………………………………….. Something isn’t right in the world’s oceans. From orange algal blooms in the North Sea and a boom in gelatinous Bombay duck fish off China to disappearing “bottom water” in the Antarctic, there is growing evidence that extreme temperatures are wreaking havoc in our waters. After years of the oceans acting as silent sinks for excess human-caused heat, they are starting to creak under pressure – and we are finally waking up to how worried we should be……………………….(Subscribers only) https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg26335040-100-how-climate-change-has-pushed-our-oceans-to-the-brink-of-catastrophe/
Congressman Garamendi Asks “Why does America need nuclear weapons?”
August 15th, 2024 https://nuclearactive.org/
On August 13th, U.S. Congressman John Garamendi of California delivered a speech at the United States Strategic Command 2024 Strategic Deterrence Amidst Global Transformation Symposium in which he asked “Why?” as in “Why does America need nuclear weapons?” and mostly importantly asked, “How do we deter in a way that ensures there is a tomorrow worth protecting? Must we continue a 50-year-old triad strategy without considering the alternatives? Why, why are we stuck in a logic silo with the blast door closed?” To read Congressman John Garamendi’s (CA-08) full statement, 240813 Garamendi U.S. Strategic Command 2024 Deterrence Symposium Remarks 1
While the focus of the speech was about “Why the Sentinel is a Costly and Dangerous Mistake,” he began by describing the efforts in 1985 of Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev, whom he called “two cold warriors at the head of the world’s largest nuclear arsenals.
“Leaders like Reagan, JFK, Eisenhower, Carter, and Obama knew that nuclear weapons could end civilization and, with those heavy moral and ethical considerations in mind, negotiated significant safety measures and a serious reduction in nuclear weapons.
“These leaders demonstrated vision and commitment. They knew that war was not an option, so they had to create a vision for a safer future. Unfortunately, too many today shrug their shoulders and say the time for negations is not now. Which brings us to yet another question…Why not try? Over the next 30 years, we will spend almost 2 trillion dollars on our nuclear weapons… what if we spent just 1% on diplomatic and risk reduction efforts?”
To read Congressman John Garamendi (CA-08) full statement, 240813 Garamendi U.S. Strategic Command 2024 Deterrence Symposium Remarks 1
US approves new $20bn weapons sale to Israel
Rt.com 14 Aug 24
The arms package includes dozens of fighter jets, as well as mortar and tank ammunition
The US government has approved more than $20 billion in new arms sales to Israel, despite pressure on President Joe Biden’s administration to end the bloodshed in Gaza.
In a series of notifications to Congress on Tuesday, the State Department said Washington is “committed to the security of Israel, and it is vital to US national interests to assist Israel in developing and maintaining a strong and ready self-defense capability.”
The main part of the package, worth about $18.8 billion, consists of 50 new F-15IA fighter jets and the upgrade of 25 of the aircraft already in service. Israel also intends to buy Medium Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM) for the jets, nearly 33,000 120mm tank cartridges, up to 50,000 high-explosive mortars, and new military cargo vehicles………………………………..more https://www.rt.com/news/602589-us-weapons-sales-israel/—
South Korea’s Yoon seeks dialogue with North, path to unification
Reuters, By Hyonhee Shin, August 16, 2024
Summary
- Yoon unveils blueprint for unification in Liberation Day speech
- Offers to form consultative body for inter-Korean cooperation
- Yoon says to keep offering humanitarian aid to the North
- South Korean opposition boycotts speech over Japan outreach
SEOUL, Aug 15 (Reuters) – South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol offered on Thursday to establish a working-level consultative body with North Korea to discuss ways to ease tension and resume economic cooperation, as he laid out his vision on unification of the neighbours.
In a National Liberation Day speech marking the 79th anniversary of independence from Japan’s 1910-45 colonial rule after World War Two, Yoon said he was ready to begin political and economic cooperation if North Korea “takes just one step” toward denuclearisation……………………………………………………………………………………more https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/south-koreas-yoon-offers-working-level-talks-with-north-korea-2024-08-15/
Germany’s Grafenrheinfeld nuclear power plant demolished after short delay
Construction of the Grafenrheinfeld NPP in the southern state of Bavaria began in 1975 with the plant beginning commercial operations in 1982. It was Germany’s oldest nuclear power plant but was closed in 2015 as part of the government’s policy to transition away from nuclear power.
Germany’s decommissioned nuclear power plant at Grafenrheinfeld has been demolished after a short delay.
The demolition of the plant’s two, 143-metre cooling towers was originally planned to take place at 17.30 local time but was pushed back to almost 20:00 after a pro-atomic energy activist scaled one of the pylons in protest at its destruction.
Police spokesperson Denis Stegner said the unnamed activist chained themselves to the pylon 10 metres above the ground and a special team was deployed to free him before he was taken away by police.
Construction of the Grafenrheinfeld site in the southern state of Bavaria began in 1975 with the plant beginning commercial operations in 1982. It was Germany’s oldest nuclear power plant.
But as part of the government’s policy to transition away from nuclear power, it was closed in 2015.
The then Environment Minister Barbara Hendricks said its closure was “a visible signal that the nuclear exit is moving forward.”
“Every nuclear power station that goes offline reduces the so-called residual risk that is linked to the use of nuclear power plants and moves us a step forward in the reorganization of our energy supply,” she said in 2015……………………………………………………………Euro News 17th Aug 2024
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Antiques Roadshow
As new U.S. nuclear construction grinds to a halt, one company aims to restart a Michigan reactor that violated fifty codes—in just one year.
The Progressive Magazine, by Roger Rapoport , August 6, 2024
This summer marks the first time since 1954 that not a single large light water nuclear reactor will be under construction in the United States. As dozens of reactors have closed coast to coast—and countries like Germany and Japan have trimmed or shut down their nuclear fleets—the exorbitant price of building this power source has forced industry giants like Westinghouse Electric Company into bankruptcy.
Business is so bad that the industry’s last-ditch attempt to rebrand itself by launching so-called small modular reactors (SMRs) has run aground. The first American attempt to open one in Idaho was abandoned in November 2023 due to soaring costs. As it turns out, these SMRs are neither small nor modular. Another in Wyoming that might come online in six years will produce energy that costs three times the cost of readily available wind power.
The last two nuclear power plants to open in the United States, at the Vogtle plant in Georgia, have come in at $21 billion over the original $14 billion cost estimate—seven years late. Georgia Power customers are being hit with a 10 percent rate increase to cover these astounding Vogtle cost overruns.
Even worse, in New York, Illinois, New Jersey, and Connecticut, a group of obsolete older reactors are on life support, thanks to more than $14 billion in bailouts. In 2021, Republican Ohio Governor Mike DeWine signed a bill repealing a $1.1 billion bailout for two reactors cratered by a $60 million bribery scandal. One defendant, the former speaker of the state’s House of Representatives, was sentenced to twenty years in federal prison for his role in this scandal. At the same time all this was going on, Ohio’s legislature blocked a $4.2 billion investment in wind power.
Stanford University professor and climate expert Mark Z. Jacobson, whose research is central to the Green New Deal, pointed out on my podcast that electricity from Vogtle comes in at $16 per watt vs. $1 per watt for wind and $0.8 for solar. Wind, water, and solar power sources can be up and running in one to five years, he said, compared to a ten- to twenty-two-year wait for new nuclear power sources in the United States and Europe.
Despite all these obstacles, industry cheerleaders fall back on the lie that nuclear power is central to reversing climate change.
“The clean nuclear power argument from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Department of Energy is nonsense,” Jacobson told me. “Mined uranium does not show up in perfect form. It must be refined, which takes a lot of energy and causes pollution. Nuclear reactors are belching huge amounts of water vapor and heat, contributing to local and global warming. Evaporated water from the giant steam generators is a greenhouse gas.
“New nuclear power plants cost 2.3 to 7.4 times those of onshore wind or utility solar [photovoltaic panels] per [kilowatt-hour] of electricity, take five to seventeen years longer between planning and operation, and produce nine to thirty-seven times the emissions per [kilowatt-hour] as wind.”
In Michigan, where I live, wind, water, and solar investments can pay for themselves, cutting annual energy cost rates by more than 60 percent, eliminating potential blackouts, and creating 242,000 jobs in the process.
In view of these undeniable facts, the always-optimistic nuclear power industry has come up with a new strategy, attempting, for the first time, to resuscitate the closed Palisades nuclear reactor on Lake Michigan, sold for decommissioning just two years ago. For decades, Consumers Energy operated this nuclear power plant that did not meet more than fifty standard Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) codes.
After buying the plant for scrap and decommissioning it in 2022, Holtec, a company that has never built or operated a nuclear reactor, is now trying to reopen Palisades. Thanks to an estimated $8.3 billion in state and federal subsidies, Holtec optimistically plans to put the plant back into service by the end of 2025. This timeline seems even more unrealistic considering that operating Canadian reactors take a to refurbish.
If this controversial company successfully reopens Palisades, other abandoned reactors could potentially be brought back to life. Should Holtec fail, the industry may lose out to vastly less expensive carbon-free energy, including wind, solar, and water. One thing we have learned in this business is that the industry is only as strong as its weakest player,” said Blind in an interview on my podcast. A former vice president for nuclear at Consolidated Edison, he served as Palisades design engineering manager for six years after the Entergy takeover in 2007. “If this first-time nuclear power plant operator fails at Palisades, it will reflect poorly on the entire nuclear industry and will result in the waste of many millions in taxpayer and rate payer dollars.”
Considering this possibility, it’s hard to understand why state and federal legislators want to prop up a nuclear industry plagued by the vast unresolved nuclear waste problem. After all, carbon-free renewables coupled with enhanced battery storage eliminate the risk of another Three Mile Island, Fermi 1, Chernobyl, or Fukushima disaster. Equally troubling, said Jacobson, is the fact that 1.5 percent of nuclear reactors have experienced meltdown………………………………
“I know this plant,” said Blind, “and I can assure you that a combination of aging equipment and the lack of spare parts from suppliers that are out of business will create endless challenges. Failure to comply with standard Nuclear Regulatory Commission code has led to many failures, a culture of accepting problems, and spills of radioactive tritium into Lake Michigan.”
“Past accidents with nuclear fuel rods have left behind so much radiation inside the reactor containment vessel that it will be very difficult and extremely expensive to make long overdue mandatory repairs,” Blind added. “There are also ethical questions surrounding the need to subject workers to all this harmful radiation. I seriously question whether this plant will ever be able to safely reopen.” https://progressive.org/magazine/the-nuclear-regulatory-commissions-antiques-roadshow-rapoport-20240806/?fbclid=IwY2xjawEraPxleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHWLSDQTizLHXHGoX_UASX3rKairLXOXRJQWiSfvCZf99bZwCXQapfZiQNQ_aem_raWHaFTGWtBkrU7RIO3ONQ
The Price of the Sentinel Nuclear Weapons Program Keeps Going Up—But the True Costs Are Even Higher
analysis of the root cause of the Sentinel’s ballooning cost estimates has not been released to the public.
policymakers have not made a compelling or coherent argument about how silo-based ICBMs make the country more secure.
Because of their vulnerability, silo-based missiles can be destabilizing in a crisis.
August 14, 2024 Jennifer Knox, https://blog.ucsusa.org/jknox/the-price-of-the-sentinel-nuclear-weapons-program-keeps-going-up-but-the-true-costs-are-even-higher/
Early this year, the Air Force notified Congress that the proposed Sentinel program—which would replace every single US nuclear intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) and update related infrastructure—would be at least 37% more expensive than the previous estimate in September 2020. After another round of review, the program’s estimated costs have further ballooned to $140.9 billion, an 81% increase from the 2020 estimate.
The staggering growth in price triggered the Nunn-McCurdy Act, which was passed to give Congress and the public more oversight of out-of-control defense spending. Once a defense program exceeds its initial cost estimates by a certain percentage, the Department of Defense is required to notify Congress and provide information about the cost overruns.
The most severe cases, however, also require the Department of Defense to conduct an investigation into the factors driving cost growth. The program in question will be automatically terminated unless the department certifies that:
the program is essential to national security,
the increased costs are reasonable,
the program is more important than other programs that will need to be cut to cover cost increases, andprogram managers will be able to control additional costs.
On July 8, the Department of Defense certified that the Sentinel program met all relevant criteria to continue. Unfortunately, its analysis of the root cause of the Sentinel’s ballooning cost estimates has not been released to the public. This leaves several outstanding questions for the public, which limits the ability of the Nunn-McCurdy Act to achieve its goal of effective oversight.
What are driving cost increases in the Sentinel program?
During a press conference, Undersecretary of Defense William A. LaPlante said there were “reasons, but no excuses” for the cost growth of the Sentinel program, but provided few details. The majority of cost growth has been attributed to the program’s “command-and-launch segment, which includes extensive communications and control infrastructure” that allow US ICBMs to be launched within minutes of an order.
But there is evidence that mismanagement contributed a great deal to the Sentinel’s explosive costs. Aerospace and defense company Northrup Grumman was awarded a sole-source contract for the program in 2020. Since then, the company has experienced staffing problems, delays with clearance processing, information technology infrastructure challenges, and supply chain disruptions, according to a 2023 report from the Government Accountability Office.
Relying on a single contractor has obvious risks, and the Pentagon failed to intervene when Northrup Grumman’s performance fell below standards. Representative Adam Smith, the ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee, said, “There’s gross malfeasance here both by the people who oversee the project and the contractor.”
What defense programs will be cut to make room for the Sentinel program?
One of the requirements of the Nunn-McCurdy act is for the Department of Defense to evaluate which programs will be reduced to cover the increased costs of the Sentinel program. As part of its review, the department certified that the Sentinel program is a higher priority than those that would need to be cut as a result.
Yet there is no indication of what programs will be cut—or even if the Department of Defense made concrete assessments about such trade-offs in the first place. While the overall budget for the program has exploded, the Associated Press reports that, “The majority of the cost increases to the Sentinel program will take place outside of the next five fiscal years of budget planning, meaning no difficult choices on program cuts will need to be made immediately.”
This attitude of kicking the can down the road is not unusual in defense planning, but it means that the consequences of the Sentinel’s cost overruns on national security remain to be seen.
What alternative solutions were considered?
Part of the root-cause analysis required by the Nunn-McCurdy Act is an evaluation of “reasonable alternatives to the program.” Without access to the report, the public cannot know which, if any, alternatives were considered because of the Sentinel program’s cost overruns.
In 2014, the Air Force completed an Analysis of Alternatives to the Sentinel program, which included the possibility of extending the life of the current fleet of US ICBMs rather than replacing them entirely. This report has not been released publicly either, so we cannot know exactly what metrics or assumptions were involved. But based on its analysis, the Air Force concluded that a full replacement of US ICBMs was the “’most cost-effective option’ for nuclear modernization.”
When its Analysis of Alternatives was conducted, the Air Force estimated that replacing US ICBMS would cost $60 billion. Since then, the price tag has increased by more than 134% to the current estimate of $140.9 billion. This certainly warrants a re-investigation of alternatives, especially since the justification for the Sentinel program was its supposed cost advantage.
Is the Sentinel program actually essential to national security?
The biggest unresolved question is the most important—and demands the full attention of our leaders. Whether the Sentinel program has been mismanaged or whether there are cheaper alternatives, policymakers have not made a compelling or coherent argument about how silo-based ICBMs make the country more secure.
The United States traditionally maintains three different ways to deliver nuclear weapons to a target: by air from bombers carrying cruise missiles or gravity bombs, by sea from submarines carrying ballistic missiles, and by land from silos containing ICBMs. This three-pronged structure is referred to as the nuclear triad, and proponents argue that each “leg” of the triad brings different characteristics to the table.
In the case of the Sentinel and its predecessors, what distinguishes it from other options is its fragility. Compared to aircraft and submarines, the silos that house these missiles are sitting ducks, easy to target and destroy by an adversary’s nuclear forces.
Because of their vulnerability, silo-based missiles can be destabilizing in a crisis. Since they are such obvious, fixed targets, a decisionmaker has very little time to decide whether to use these weapons in a conflict—or during a false alarm. This pressure shortens decisionmaking time and requires the missiles to be on high alert at all times.
Advocates for the land-based leg of the nuclear triad often rebrand this weakness as “responsiveness,” but a hair trigger is a liability that increases the risk of accidental use and escalation.
The Pentagon’s policymakers have failed to offer the public their vision for how silo-based nuclear missiles improve US security, instead repeating the same empty platitudes about nuclear deterrence. Because it offers no strategic value and introduces unacceptable risks, the Sentinel program should be cancelled, regardless of its cost. One penny is too much to spend on weapons that are unsafe and unnecessary.
Fans of peace call for nuclear-free Northeast Asia
https://cathnews.com/2024/08/14/fans-of-peace-call-for-nuclear-free-northeast-asia/
A three-nation Catholic peace meeting in Japan has appealed for an end to militarisation and nuclear arms race in Northeast Asia. Source: UCA News.
In a joint press statement on August 10, the participants of the Catholic Peace Forum at Nagasaki also released the “Nagasaki Appeal for Peace”, seeking peace and reconciliation in the region.
In his keynote address, Bishop Emeritus Peter Kang U-il of Jeju, co-president of Pax Christi Korea, recalled the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II and urged Christians to denounce militarisation.
“Political leaders who believe in and promote security through nuclear weapons in the face of such human tragedies can only be seen as prisoners of madness, incapable of normal thinking,” Bishop Kang said.
“It is up to Christians, who know and practice the peace of Christ, to constantly criticise and call attention to such illusions and beliefs so that they may be awakened.”
This year’s forum, themed “Nagasaki Catholic Peace Forum for a Nuclear Weapon-Free World,” was attended by more than 40 participants from Japan, South Korea, and the US.
Bishops of Nagasaki, Hiroshima, and Santa Fe dioceses were among the forum participants.
The forum was held as part of the 79th anniversary of the atomic bombings in Japan and the first anniversary of the Partnership for a World Without Nuclear Weapons, which was launched on August 9, 2002.
The forum’s appeal consisted of five “Key Asks” that were aimed at reducing militarisation and nuclear weaponry and promoting reconciliation in the region.
The forum urged to stop and reject militarisation and the arms race, a peace treaty among parties to the conflicts on the Korean peninsula, and ratify and implement the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, among others.
The forum also called for the promotion of a Common Security Framework and the Northeast Asia Nuclear Weapons Free Zone and reconciliation among the nations and peoples of the countries of past conflicts.
FULL STORY
EDF cuts nuclear production in reaction to soaring temperatures
euro news, By Eleanor Butler, 14/08/2024
The energy provider insists there are no looming safety risks as three French regions face heatwave warnings.
EDF has reduced its electricity production at nuclear sites in France in response to soaring temperatures.
Three reactors are currently affected, although the energy provider has said “there is no safety risk”.
A reactor located at the Bugey nuclear power plant, a site near Lyon, has been closed since 12 August.
Also near Lyon, the Saint-Alban nuclear plant has experienced production cuts since 11 August, and similar measures are being taken at the Tricastin site. This is located in the South East of France, north of Avignon.
Heat-related incidents aren’t a new complication for EDF but rather a recurring problem, as exemplified when the firm published a climate change action plan last month……
High temperatures can interfere with nuclear processes as reactors are heavily reliant on water.
Heat from nuclear reactions is used to transform water into steam, which then drives turbines to produce electricity.
Another current of water, outside of the closed loop system, is then drawn from surrounding rivers to cool the reactor…..
During periods of extreme heat, this can produce a number of complications.
If surrounding water sources are warmer than usual, reactors cannot be cooled as efficiently.
French regulations also prevent sites from discharging water that is too hot back into rivers and lakes, to avoid the accidental killing of fish and other wildlife.
EDF told Euronews that it had temporarily reduced production to “respect regulations relating to thermal discharges”.
The firm explained that “discharge limits are established individually for each plant” by the French Nuclear Safety Authority (ASN).
Three departments in France are currently affected by heatwave warnings, with storms now replacing hot weather in some areas. https://www.euronews.com/business/2024/08/14/edf-cuts-nuclear-production-in-reaction-to-soaring-temperatures
‘The dumbest climate conversation of all time’: experts on the Musk-Trump interview
Trump talked about ‘nuclear warming’ while Musk said the only reason to quit fossil fuels is that their supply is finite
Oliver Milman, Wed 14 Aug 2024 https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/aug/13/trump-musk-x-climate
Donald Trump and Elon Musk both made discursive, often fact-free assertions about global heating, including that rising sea levels would create “more oceanfront property” and that there was no urgent need to cut carbon emissions, during an event labeled “the dumbest climate conversation of all time” by one prominent activist.
Trump, the Republican US presidential nominee, and Musk, the world’s richest person, dwelled on the problem of the climate crisis during their much-hyped conversation on X, formerly known as Twitter and owned by Musk, on Monday, agreeing that the world has plenty of time to move away from fossil fuels, if at all.
“You sort of can’t get away from it at this moment,” Trump said of fossil fuels. “I think we have, you know, perhaps hundreds of years left. Nobody really knows.” The former US president added that rising sea levels, caused by melting glaciers, would have the benefit of creating “more oceanfront property”.
Trump, who famously once called the climate crisis a “hoax”, also said it is a “disgrace” that Joe Biden’s administration did not open up a vast Arctic wilderness in Alaska to oil drilling, claimed baselessly that farmers are having to give up their cattle because of climate edicts and that a far greater threat is posed by the prospect of nuclear war.
“The one thing that I don’t understand is that people talk about global warming or they talk about climate change, but they never talk about nuclear warming,” Trump pondered during the exchange.
Musk, meanwhile, said it was wrong to “vilify” the oil and gas industry, the key driver of planet-heating pollution, and that the only imperative to ditch fossil fuels was that they will one day run dry.
“If we were to stop using oil and gas right now, we would all be starving and the economy would collapse,” said Musk, who is also chief executive of the electric car company Tesla. “We do over time want to move to a sustainable energy economy because eventually you do run out of oil and gas.
“We still have quite a bit of time … we don’t need to rush and we don’t need to like, you know, stop farmers from farming or, you know, prevent people from having steaks or basic stuff like that. Like, leave the farmers alone.”
Musk said the main danger of allowing carbon dioxide to build up in the atmosphere was that at some point it will become difficult to breathe, causing “headaches and nausea” to people. This would occur with CO2 at about 1,000 parts per million of the Earth’s atmosphere, more than double the current record-breaking concentrations.
Scientists have been clear that current global temperatures are hotter than at any point in human civilization, and probably long before this time too, which is causing mounting disastrous impacts in terms of heatwaves, droughts, floods and the destruction of the natural world.
Governments have agreed to restrain the global temperatures rise to 1.5C above the preindustrial era, with researchers warning of cascading catastrophes beyond this point. The world faces the steep task of rapidly cutting emissions in half this decade, and then to net zero by 2050, to avoid these worst impacts.
Despite Trump’s claims of new beaches, sea levels are rising faster along the US coastline than the global average, with up to 1ft of sea level rise expected in the next 30 years – an increase that equals the total rise seen over the past century, US government scientists have found.
Instances of significant flooding have risen by 50% since the 1990s, with millions of Americans set to be affected as homes, highways and other infrastructure are inundated. In Florida, where Trump has his own coastal property at Mar-a-Lago, several insurers have decided to exit the state due to the increasing costs of flooding from the rising seas and fiercer storms.
Trump and Musk’s discussion on the climate crisis, therefore, “spelunked down into entirely new levels of stupidity”, according to Bill McKibben, a veteran climate activist and co-founder of 350.org. McKibben wrote it was “the dumbest climate conversation of all time”.
“The damaging impacts of climate change, and in particular from more extreme weather events, such as wildfires, floods, heatwaves, more intense hurricanes, are actually in many respects exceeding the predictions made just a decade ago,” said Michael Mann, a leading climate scientist and author. “It is sad that Elon Musk has become a climate change denier, but that’s what he is. He’s literally denying what the science has to say here.”
Mann said that if CO2 levels get so high breathing becomes difficult, then the impacts of the climate crisis “will be so devastating as to have already caused societal collapse. It’s actually Elon’s ill-informed and ill-premised statements that are causing headaches and nausea.”
Mann added that Trump’s statement that sea level rise will lead to more oceanfront property “does not betray a lack of understanding of climate physics. It betrays a lack of understanding of grade school geometry.”
During his election campaigning, Trump has routinely denigrated electric vehicles but has recently changed his stance towards them after an endorsement from Musk, who previously described himself as a moderate Democrat.
Trump, the former president convicted of 34 felonies, has vowed to undo the “lunacy” of Biden’s climate policies should he return to the White House, with his presidency expected to unleash a glut of new oil and gas drilling, accelerate gas exports and remove the US, once again, from the Paris climate agreement.
Data centers want to tap existing nuclear power. Is that good or bad?
Tech giants are working to divert round-the-clock nuclear power to massive new data centers. Regulators and climate advocates are concerned.
Canary Media, By Jeff St. John, 14 Aug 24
Across the U.S. East Coast, nuclear power plant owners are proposing marriages to tech giants who are both desperate for electricity to fuel their massive data-center expansion plans and publicly committed to using clean energy. The proposals go like this: Build data centers that connect directly to our round-the-clock, carbon-free nuclear power, and secure long-term financial and clean-energy benefits for the both of us.
The companies looking to tie the knot say these are matches made in heaven. But a growing number of critics are objecting at the altar.
The first such announcement came in March, when Amazon Web Services agreed to spend $650 million to buy an existing 960 megawatt data center campus that’s already hooked up to Talen Energy’s 2.5 gigawatt Susquehanna nuclear power plant in northeastern Pennsylvania. Several similar proposals are in the works, with nuclear power plant owners Constellation Energy, Vistra, Dominion Energy, and Public Service Enterprise Group eyeing prospects, according to company statements and analyst reports.
Nuclear energy and tech company trade groups say these “colocation” projects will bring stability to a nuclear industry that provides the country’s largest share of zero-carbon energy. By allowing data centers to circumvent the overtaxed U.S. grid and get online faster, these linkups will also bolster U.S. competitiveness in artificial intelligence and other high-tech fields, they say, positioning the deals as a partial solution to the problem of meeting fast-rising electricity demand from industrial customers.
…mounting scrutiny from energy analysts and climate advocates, who fear that a rush to divert existing zero-carbon nuclear energy to power-hungry data centers could end up raising ratepayer bills, reducing grid reliability, and increasing power sector emissions overall.
Those are the risks outlined in a July blog post by Jackson Morris, director of state power sector policy at the Natural Resources Defense Council. “We’re not anti–data center and anti–load growth,” Morris told Canary Media. “But we want to make sure that actions being taken don’t lead to negative impacts in terms of emissions reductions or costs to consumers.”
Lawmakers and regulators in Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania are raising similar concerns……………………..
When a new data center comes online, new electricity generation has to be built — either to support the facility directly or to plug the massive hole created when the data center siphons off electricity from an existing power source.
Unless those data center owners can build enough clean energy to make up that gap, that replacement power will largely come from existing fossil-fueled power plants………………………………………………………………………………………………….more https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/nuclear/data-centers-want-to-tap-existing-nuclear-power-is-that-good-or-bad
Iran’s future FM says nuclear deal broken, favors military-diplomatic path
Niloufar Goudarzi, Iran International, 14 Aug 24
Iran’s foreign minister-designate has dismissed the 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal as irreparable, advocating instead for a strategy that blends military force with diplomacy, according to an Iranian MP.
Abbas Araghchi, who has openly aligned himself with IRGC values, firmly rooted in anti-Western and anti-Israel stances, is currently defending his proposed action plan in parliament, where he seeks approval as the nominated minister.
Speaking after Araghchi’s parliamentary session, MP Mohsen Fathi quoted him as stating, “The JCPOA is beyond revival. In the new government, our focus is not on restoring the nuclear deal but on lifting the sanctions. We are dedicated to a strategy integrating diplomatic efforts with military strength.”
It is not clear how Tehran wants to have the sanctions lifted without a nuclear agreement, unless Araghchi was referring to using diplomatic-military pressure on the United States.
In 2015, Iran and global powers signed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) to limit Iran’s nuclear activities for sanctions relief. In 2018, then-president Donald Trump withdrew, claiming it failed to address Iran’s missile program. Since then, efforts to revive the JCPOA have involved indirect talks, with European diplomats mediating between US and Iranian officials.
Araghchi’s remarks mirrored those of the outgoing Acting Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri-Kani who asserted in July that the primary objective of the JCPOA was lifting sanctions………………………………https://www.iranintl.com/en/202408142991
1 This Month
petition to oppose the rapid increase of space-military industry threatening Jeju Island and the region.
[Petition by April 19th (KST)] Stop the joint military-Hanwha Systems-Jeju Provincial Government Sea Launch!
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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