as published by NOAA on March 1, 2012.
In the model below, the highest radioactivity (in red) starts to appear in Fukushima after about 0 UTC on March 14, 2011, and it continues until around March 21, 2011. Japan is nine hours ahead of UTC. On March 14, 2011, TEPCO was attempting the vent of Reactor 2 and Reactor 3. The explosion of Reactor 3 building happened at 11:01 AM that day.(Much More) http://ex-skf.blogspot.com/
Radiation detection pods attached to the wing of a drone supplied by the Border Patrol for a test flight (Photo by Joe Sanders, Sandia National Laboratories)
Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have developed radiation-detection pods that can monitor airborne radiation using drones, without endangering human flight crews.
The “Harvester” system is designed to detect detonations of nuclear weapons. It can guide a drone to the site of a nuclear explosion by following the plume of gamma radiation where no onboard pilot could safely venture.
The system could also be used to monitor fallout from accidents at nuclear reactors, Sandia officials said.
Two years ago, on March 14, 2011, the National Nuclear Security Administration sent flight crews to Japan to monitor airborne and ground contamination from the still developing nuclear crisis at the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear plant.
The crews arrived four days after the 24-foot tsunami had swept the plant, and in the ensuing 10 weeks they logged 507 flight hours crisscrossing the skies over Japan in a Beechcraft C-12 twin engine turboprop out of nearby Yokota Air Base.
The crews produced vital maps of the plume of radiation escaping from the crippled reactors.
Had Sandia’s Harvester system been available then, the NNSA might have flown drones instead.
Having seen charges dropped against them during a hearing in Plymouth District Court early Wednesday afternoon, a group of anti-nuclear protesters immediately hopped in their cars and headed back down to Pilgrim Nuclear Station in the hopes of being arrested once again!
Anti-nuclear activists make their way towards the main entrance of Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station,.
They didn’t want to be forgiven for their trespasses.
Having seen charges dropped against them during a hearing in Plymouth District Court early Wednesday afternoon, a group of anti-nuclear protesters immediately hopped in their cars and headed back down to Pilgrim Nuclear Station in the hopes of being arrested once again.
This time they made it almost to the power plant’s main parking lot before being confronted by security and Plymouth police. Almost a year ago, 14 people were placed under arrest after trying to deliver a letter to Pilgrim station management calling for the facility to be shut down down.
They group wanted to stand trial on trespassing charges in the hopes of furthering their case against the continued operation of Pilgrim Station. They hoped to invite a number of noted anti-nuclear activists to testify about the dangers of nuclear power.
Those hopes were dashed when Judge Katherine Hand accepted a prosecution motion to drop the charges. The assistant district attorney argued that holding a trial would tax the DA’s office limited resources and that the defendants only wanted a trial to make a political point. A position the defendants and their attorneys did not dispute.
Police are warning of possible travel disruption caused by a planned protest in the Aldermaston and Burghfield area on Saturday.
Protesters are expected to march between the two Atomic Weapon Establishments between 1pm and 4pm.
Superintendent Robin Pickard, local area police commander, said: “Measures are already in place to notify local residents and those who might be affected by protests of this nature.
“Our aim is to ensure that there is minimal disruption caused to local residents.
“We respect the right to protest and will respond if necessary in a proportionate and appropriate way to minimise any negative impact on communities in the area.”
Police have created a twitter account to keep people up to date with the protest at @WBprotestinfo
This year on April Fools’ Day (April 1st),we will highlight the on-going development of the government’s Trident nuclear weapons programme at AWE Aldermaston. We will gather around the base in our thousands with music, colour, and speeches.
Why protest at Aldermaston?
The Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) at Aldermaston is the bomb factory that designs and manufactures nuclear warheads. The warheads for the current Trident system were built at Aldermaston. Since 2002, the government has invested in building new facilities at AWE, and recruited new staff to test, design and build the next generation of nuclear weapons…..
Only five years ago, industry executives and leading politicians were talking about an American nuclear renaissance, hoping to add 20 or more reactors to the 104-unit U.S. nuclear fleet.
But today those companies are holding back in the face of falling natural gas prices and sluggish and uncertain electricity demand. Only five new plants are under construction, while at least that many are slated for permanent closure or shut down indefinitely over safety issues.
[…]
But Caren Byrd, executive director of Morgan Stanley’s global power group, said at the same conference that, on an economic basis, “it is hard to make the case for nuclear.”
[…]
Dominion, the owner of the Kewaunee nuclear plant in Wisconsin, and Duke Energy, owner of Crystal River Unit 3 in Florida, recently announced plans to permanently close these reactors because of economic factors, even though the plants have licenses extending well into the future. Wind and natural gas are cheaper…..
The UK has been joined by 11 other EU countries in signalling their interest in a nuclear future.
A communiqué between the nations sets out a belief that nuclear power can play a part of Europe’s future low-carbon energy mix and outlines a commitment to collaborate on safety and creating greater certainty for investors.
Representatives from Britain, as well as Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Finland, France, Hungary, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Spain signed the document in London yesterday.
The EU member states also agreed that each individual country should be able to freely determine its own energy mix and press ahead with their decarbonisation objectives using “the fullest range” of low carbon technologies.
The UK and French governments also committed £12.5 million of funding to the Jules Horowitz research reactor, being built in southern France.
Energy secretary Ed Davey said: “This communiqué signals a move to a stronger, better and closer working relationship between member states on nuclear energy. By working together to enable low carbon energy projects to come forward we will go some way to reducing the EU’s carbon emissions and ensuring greater energy security.”
After the 60 days expired, the NRC put the application on indefinite review. But when no US company stepped up to partner with EdF on the project, the NRC opted on Monday to deny the appeal. EdF could continue to search for a US partner but would need to start a new application for the Calvert Cliffs site.
March 13, 2013 |
On a day when thousands around the world are protesting nuclear power to mark two years since the deadly Fukushima nuclear accident began in Japan, another door has slammed shut on nuclear expansion plans in the US.
Beyond Nuclear hailed Monday’s decision by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to deny an appeal by UniStar, wholly owned by French utility, Électricité de France (EdF), for a third reactor at the Calvert Cliffs nuclear power plant site on the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland.
“Électricité de France sank into the financial quicksand that is new reactor construction,” said Paul Gunter, Director of the Reactor Oversight Project at Beyond Nuclear, an environmental advocacy group based in Takoma Park, MD. “US nuclear corporations are clearly unwilling to join EdF in nuclear energy’s economic quagmire, a pattern that has been only too evident at EdF’s other reactor projects in Europe.”
EdF had hoped to build an Evolutionary Power Reactor (EPR), a French Areva design originally targeted for six US nuclear sites. But the EPR, a new, untested design, already has a lamentable history in Europe.
The EPR reactors under construction in Flamanville, France and Olkiluoto, Finland, are years behind schedule and enormously over-budget and the design has been challenged by safety authorities in France, Finland and Britain. Olkiluoto may now not be operational until 2016 — four years later than the original target date — and its price has more than doubled, soaring to $10 billion. Flamanville’s original budget has tripled. EdF’s UK reactor plans have been marked by the departure of a series of business partners.
“This decision could not be more timely, coming on the second anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear accident and on the heels of the recent decision of the Maryland State Legislature to adopt and invest in the development of offshore wind energy,” Gunter added.
The NRC Order denied the EdF appeal on two grounds: on the agency’s policy regarding foreign ownership, which is based on longstanding language in the Atomic Energy Act (AEA), which prohibits foreign ownership and control of US nuclear reactors; and that the applicants “continue to look for a U.S. partner, and have not amended their application.”
The applicant for a third Calvert Cliffs reactor was in trouble as soon as EdF’s US partner, Constellation Energy, withdrew. On August 30 2012, the NRC had given UniStar 60 more days to comply with the Atomic Energy Act (AEA) in order to be granted a license for a third reactor at Calvert Cliffs.
After the 60 days expired, the NRC put the application on indefinite review. But when no US company stepped up to partner with EdF on the project, the NRC opted on Monday to deny the appeal. EdF could continue to search for a US partner but would need to start a new application for the Calvert Cliffs site.
Hiroaki Koide, Master of Science in Nuclear Engineering, Assistant Professor at the Kyoto University Research Institute, Nuclear Waste Management & Safety Expert:
The Tohoku and Kanto Regions of Japan were extremely contaminated with radiation. […]
If the laws of Japan were strictly observed, areas with soil contaminated over 40,000 Bq per sq. meter would be designated as radiation controlled areas.
However, the contamination areas was as large as 20,000 sq. km (7,700 sq. miles), which meant a vast zone in the Tohoku and Kanto Regions would have to be evacuated.
Faced with such a reality, the Japanese government decided it would never be able to help the people in these contaminated areas, and that the people would be abandoned and left there.
As of today, about 10 million people have been left in areas that should have been designated radiation controlled areas, and they are exposed to continual radiation every day.
Advisory, some swearing on this passionate speech about Helen Caldicott`s Symposium
Published on 13 Mar 2013
3/13/13; Herbert Abrams, Stanford University School of Medicine, said yesterday; that without question there is Cesium in the monetary marine biologist’s cage tuna, @
Sean Thomas, Reporter: 80 kilometers from the actual reactor itself and 60 kilometers from the edge of that zone was Fukushima City, we found a spot there in our own personal reporting that was 1,000 times the acceptable limit, or a safe dosage if you will.
This was on a spot where kids walked to school, and here I am not in any particular safety gear, but I’m in an area that the government says it’s safe to be.
So certainly very eerie to be in a place that’s supposed to be safe, but obviously with our radiation detectors, a very dangerous place to be.
This exhibition, jointly presented by SGI and the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), and shown in Arabic for the first time, highlights the devastating effects of nuclear weapons use and examines the need to abolish nuclear weapons from the perspective of human security. “We hope this showing in Manama will contribute to the discussion of establishing a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons and all weapons of mass destruction,” said Arielle Denis, ICAN Campaign Director.
SOURCE Soka Gakkai International (SGI); International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN)
TOKYO, March 13, 2013 /PRNewswire/ — The anti-nuclear weapons exhibition “From a Culture of Violence to a Culture of Peace: Toward a World Free From Nuclear Weapons,” created by Buddhist association Soka Gakkai International (SGI), opened on March 12 for the first time in the Middle East at the Bahrain National Museum in Manama.
Our drive to produce plutonium created a toxic stew that outpaced our capacity to contain it. Now, Congress must step in: Independent, long-term oversight is needed to stop waste from entering the environment, to contain all of the most dangerous waste and to stop nuclear waste from threatening public health and the Columbia River. Our communities depend on it.
By Guest Columnist
on March 13, 2013 at 5:00 AM, updated March 13, 2013 at 5:07 AM
Oregan Online
Workers last week walk on a covered area where tanks containing radioactive waste are buried at the T Tank Farm at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The Associated Press
The Energy Department’s mismanagement of Hanford continues to result in a loss of the public’s trust. The leaks raise serious questions about the department’s ability to protect the Columbia River from Hanford’s nuclear legacy. The Energy Department has been guarding the henhouse for too long, and it is time for some independent oversight of Hanford’s cleanup.
Over the decades, Hanford’s single-shell tanks leaked more than 1 million gallons of radioactive waste into the ground, contaminating groundwater and threatening the Columbia River. Then, nearly 10 years ago, the Energy Department told us that it had stabilized the slurry of nuclear waste stored in the 149 single-shell tanks. Now we learn that the tanks are actually leaking and have been for who knows how long.
Using nuclear weapons against a meteorite threat to the planet was discussed in the meeting held by the Russian Federation Council on Tuesday.
[Boris Shustov, Director, Russian Academy of Sciences]:
“The unexpected appearance of out-of-space objects close to the Earth is not an exception but a typical situation and we may have very little time to make a decision to counteract.”
Officials from the Russian nuclear corporation Roscosmos, the defense and foreign ministries took part in the meeting.
Oleg Shubin is the deputy director for nuclear weapons management at Rosatom.
[Oleg Shubin, Director for Nuclear Weapons Management]:
“Now we understand the technologies that can provide us with a sub-surface nuclear explosion within a meteorite body. At the same time, such an explosion, depending on the depth of the sub-surface explosion, can be equivalent to 10 to 50 megatons.”
He went on to explain what would happen.
[Oleg Shubin, Director for Nuclear Weapons Management]:
“The effect of such an interception will make a phenomenal and beautiful show in the sky but still it will be safe for people. We will have a very limited amount of time to prevent the collision. About a year, including the launch of an interceptor and separating fragments in space. It’s also worth mentioning that an interception of a meteorite with a size of one kilometer will need the use of nuclear explosive devices with a capacity well exceeding the megaton class.”
Head of Russian Federal Space Agency, Vladimir Popovkin, who also took part in the conference, said that Russia is planning to build a system that is meant to protect the Earth from meteorites.
The project, called “Citadel”, would cost about 500 million U.S. dollars, and can only be implemented with the help of international cooperation.
[Vladimir Popovkin, Russian Federal Space Agency Head]:
“In our opinion it’s necessary to develop documents on the international level that will avoid testing and deployment of weapons in space under the cover of the fight against cometic-meteorite attack.”
The meeting comes a month after a meteorite entered the Earth’s atmosphere undetected and crashed in Russia’s Urals, injuring more than one thousand people.
Today is the One Year Anniversary of Nuked Radio…since it’s the day after the 2 year Fuku Disaster — Activist/Comedian Lee Camp said he’d come on to cheer us up 🙂
The video I got in trouble for playing on a radio show, lol: Radioactive metals to be used in beltbuckles, silverware… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kc0q0Q…
Prague, March 11 (CTK) – Czech environmental activists from associations Calla and South-Bohemian Mothers yesterday called on the State Authority for Nuclear Safety (SUJB) to push through cancellation of limited liability for damage that might be caused by nuclear power plants Temelin and Dukovany.
The activists are considering turning to the European Commission in the matter because the situation in other European countries is similar.
“The goal of the appeal is to start to change the Czech unsatisfactory situation that enables an operator of a nuclear power plant to be liable for nuclear damage only to the amount of Kc8bn,” Edvard Sequens of the Calla association told CTK.
Sequens noted that the amount of damage after the accident in Japanese power plant Fukushima is estimated to reach Kc4,300bn after conversion into Czech crowns.
The amount of liability for nuclear damage is set by the atomic law. Sequens said nuclear damage liability in the Czech Republic is lower than the amount required by international conventions.
Electricity company CEZ which operates both the Czech nuclear power plants told CTK it is liable for its facilities in line with the law.
“The Czech Republic has signed the Vienna convention and Brussels protocol on nuclear damage liability. This means we are operating in a similar mode as any other nuclear power plant in the European Union or Switzerland,” CEZ spokeswoman Barbora Pulpanova said.
“There was not any single reason for our rejection: it was an accumulation of ten reasons. It’s a huge disappointment that the Government have failed to recognise the depth of feeling in Cumbria.”
By Emily Parsons
Last updated at 12:17, Wednesday, 13 March 2013
Councillors who ruled Cumbria out of the running to host a nuclear repository “misunderstood the process” the Energy Minister claims.
Baroness Verma
Baroness Verma was responding to a letter from leader of Cumbria County Council Eddie Martin and deputy Stewart Young, in which they outlined the council’s decision and reasons behind it.
The Energy Minister’s response, which has been published online, refutes some of the reasons given by the council for voting against progressing to the next stage of the Managing Radioactive Waste Safely (MRWS) process.
Baroness Verma wrote: “In responding, I also feel it is necessary to note there were a range of errors in your letter and to draw attention to some key points, which I believe betray a misunderstanding of the process and the Government’s position.
“This is all the more surprising given your response to me in which you accepted the assurances and commitments the Government had made.”
Jeff McMahon Contributor 
nuclear-news 