BUCHAREST — Solar power will eclipse nuclear energy in 2016 in Romania if investment in photovoltaic plants continues at the current pace, official figures released on Monday showed.
“We expect the installed capacity of solar plants to reach 50 to 100 MW at the end of 2012, 500 to 1,000 MW at the end of 2013 and to top 1,500 MW in 2016,” an official of the national energy regulator (ANRE), Zoltan Nagy, told a solar power conference.
The two reactors of Romania’s sole nuclear power plant in Cernavoda produce together around 1,400 MW, accounting for 18 percent of the country’s energy needs.
Romania plans to build two more reactors at Cernavoda but has so far failed to find investors willing to come up with the requisite 4.0 billion euros ($5.0 billion).
The Tennessee Valley Authority has begun replacing 108 sirens near the Sequoyah nuclear plant – part of a $7 million program that will also upgrade sirens at TVA’s Browns Ferry and Watts Bar sites.
Sequoyah’s existing sirens are three decades old and can’t function without power from the grid. The new equipment will include battery backups, rotating sirens and steel poles, the Chattanooga Times Free Press reported. Their locations and number also will change. Four sirens will be added to the system to accommodate changes in development and wind patterns near the plant.
About 80,000 people live within a ten-mile radius of Sequoyah. It is located about 9.5 miles northeast of Chattanooga, Tenn., according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
“The Big Rig Revolt is a chance for communities, groups and individuals across the country to make their voices heard in opposition to this threat. Actions are already planned in Lancashire, Swansea, Somerset, Brighton and London.”
Published on 17th November 2012 | Part of Issue 831
Schnews
get ready for the 1st of December’s Big Rig Revolt
British resistance to fracking is cranking it up a gear. Community groups across the country are organising for a day of action on Saturday 1st December, to make it clear that they do not want to be fracked. Rumours are afoot of actions spanning from fire-eaters to naked flash mobs.
Alternatively, there’s always the yearly climate march in London on the same day, which will have a fracking theme. The day has been titled “The Big Rig Revolt” and at present the default option for those wanting to fit in with the crowd seems to be to build a mock drilling rig and place it somewhere thoughtful, controversial or confrontational, depending on your preference. More inventive ideas will doubtless emerge nearer the time.
And it’s not all about doing it just for the frack of it – this upsurge in resistance is not focused on only one particular technology, as indeed the industry isn’t: the crackpot energy schemes come in many flavours. As easy-to-extract fossil fuels are depleted, prices are rising and the system is desperately scrabbling around to find alternatives, which are necessarily more extreme, dangerous and destructive. Up until now this has mainly been energy sources like tar sands and deep water drilling which are remote to most people. Now, however, with the screws really tightening and the global economy tottering, these sort of extreme energy methods are coming to a field near you. At the same time it is becoming increasingly clear that effects of burning fossil fuels on the climate are not limited to some far future but are already effecting many people. The rash of extreme weather events in the past year have devastated lives and are pushing up food prices threatening to starve many in the third world. Any widespread exploitation of unconventional fossil fuels could be completely catastrophic.
In Scotland, an Australian company called Dark Energy (er, sorry no, Dart Energy) has applied to build Britain’s first unconventional gas development, with 14 sites, 22 wells, over 20 km of pipelines, a processing plant and a waste outfall into the Firth of Fourth. Another 600 Coal Bed Methane (CBM) wells could follow, in this one small area between Falkirk and Stirling.
In Lancashire, Cuadrilla Resources are in the process of drilling their fourth shale gas test well and are preparing to frack the well they drilled last year. The amounts of gas Cuadrilla are bragging they can extract from Lancashire would require them to drill over 6000 wells in the area. In Somerset, UK Methane have applied for the for permission for the first CBM test well in Keynsham near Bristol. Again this is but the tip of a much larger iceberg with in excess of 2000 wells needed to extract the gas that UK Methane hope is there. And in Cheshire, IGas have also been have been drilling for CBM around Warrington and Ellesmere Port and would need around 2000 wells to extract the gas they claim is there.
“This is a technology that will make us even more dependent on private companies, said Greenpeace’s Egypt coordinator Ahmed el Droubi, adding that the need for foreign brainpower and materials is a threat to the country’s long-term “national security.”
“We’ll be importing a minimum of 80 percent of materials and knowledge, and relying on the countries we import from to deal with the uranium after,”
“Egypt has reached a preliminary agreement with a team from the International Monetary Fund for a $4.8 billion loan, a minister said on Tuesday.
“We have a preliminary agreement with the technical team of the IMF,” Planning and International Cooperation Ashraf al-Araby told a news conference with the head of the IMF delegation.”
Residents in Dabaa, the site of a proposed nuclear power plant, have said the government must reassess the feasibility of the project, during a conference with concerned activists last week.
“The conference was a chance for the residents to voice their concerns,” said Baher Shawky of the Habitat International Coalition, who attended the conference.
“The people of Dabaa have been living on this land for four centuries, their livelihood is dependent on it and they possess a unique relationship with it. No one has been told why this land would be ideal for a nuclear power plant.”
The small town on the country’s North Coast, just miles from Marsa Matrouh, is the location of a proposed nuclear plant. The planned site is likely to extend 55 square kilometers. Protesters have been demanding the plant be relocated because they have lost land to the project.
The Ministry of Electricity has yet to accede to residents’ demands. Nuclear energy has long been in the works for Egypt, and the government has pushed to develop it as a source of electricity since 1981. But it wasn’t until the International Atomic Energy Agency signed off on the project site in 2010 that the dream of nuclear power gained traction.
The government has said it plans to construct four nuclear power reactors by 2025, with the first of them to be put into operation in 2019.
But activists have voiced concerns over the impact nuclear power will have on the country’s energy sovereignty. Egypt will have to import the uranium needed to make the reactor work, as well as rely on foreign companies for the construction of the plant.
“But the accident and the response to it have had still greater impact among the 100,000 inhabitants of Angra dos Reis, a town near Brazil’s only functioning nuclear power station. Since its inauguration in 1985, the plant known as Angra I has suffered constant problems and has been forced to suspend operations so often that it is nicknamed the firefly.
More disturbing though, it was discovered two years ago that there was no adequate evacuation plan for the area, nor were there roads and vehicles enough to transport a large population in case of an emergency.”
“The nuclear submarine project is in full swing, with the construction of the test facility reactor that will be used in the submarine.“
“If not for the global economic crisis, growth in the industry would be even more pronounced now than before the accident.”
“The accident did have an impact, but it was much smaller than what analysts had predicted,”
11/19/2012
Power engineering
Investments in Brazilian nuclear energy projects will exceed US$6.5bn by the end of the decade, the sector’s national association Aben has told BNamericas.
Aben president Edson Kuramoto says the industry has made a full recovery after the negative publicity surrounding Japan’s Fukushima disaster last year.
Brazil will boast at least four new nuclear generation facilities before 2030. Projects underway include the Angra 3 power plant in Rio de Janeiro state that will increase the country’s installed nuclear capacity from 1.99GW to 3.40GW by 2016.
“The nuclear area in Brazil is extensive, covering electric power generation, the production of radiopharmaceuticals and radioisotopes as well as the whole fuel cycle,” Kuramoto said.
“There are also investments in uranium enrichment facilities, gasification and production of uranium minerals.
The Karakuwa peninsula in Miyagi Prefecture, which was devastated by the tsunami on March 11, 2011, held an oyster-tasting event to celebrate the first oyster harvest in two years.
Many visitors, including those from Sendai and outside the prefecture, enjoyed the taste of fresh oysters at Sunday’s event, Sankei Shimbun reported. A local tourism association spokesman said the visitors’ support gave them hope that the industry could make a full recovery.
James Deutsch, MD, PhD, FRCP(C) Assistant Professor Faculty of Medicine University of Toronto warns of the danger of ignoring low energy damage to DNA from uranium. here is his video statement
Watch the IAEA get put in their place here by isreal when the IAEA ask about depleted uranium weaponry use in Gaza, the Isreali reply says the dose is too low but no denial
Department of Psychiatry, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ont.
My heartfelt thanks for breaking the medical media’s silence on the destructive attacks on the people of Gaza by the Israeli state. 1,2 I was a member of a Jewish medical delegation to the West Bank and Gaza this past October. We were turned away from crossing into Gaza just 6 days before Israel violated the ceasefire on Nov. 4, 2008. In the West Bank, we observed first-hand the severe impact on children and families of the ongoing occupation.
Many Jewish Canadians are appalled by Israel’s actions against all Palestinians. We do not dismiss the actions of Hamas and other factions, either. However, one must carefully read the history of the region, beginning in 1947–1948 or even earlier, if one is to understand the context for all of these actions. Physicians for Human Rights Israel, along with other medical and human rights organizations, has issued a strong appeal for the government of Israel, as an occupying power that bears overall responsibility for the protection of the right to health of Palestinians, to fulfill its responsibilities under international law.
PUBLISHED: 22:20, 17 November 2012 | UPDATED: 11:02, 18 November 2012
Centrica is expected to turn its back on building new nuclear power stations in Britain and instead focus its expansion in the US.
The owner of British Gas will formally take the decision by January at the latest to end its partnership with French energy giant EDF to build a new Hinkley Point power station in Somerset.
According to senior company sources, only a dramatic change in Government policy on subsidising nuclear power would create a business case for investment.
[…]
Centrica is believed to see itself as the whipping boy for public anger over price increases and it is becoming increasingly disillusioned over the Government’s handling of energy policy, which is making long-term investment decision-making almost impossible.
Executives believe there are not enough incentives to make it worth their while putting more money into developing offshore wind projects.
In 2003, on the eve of the Iraq war, acclaimed filmmaker Iara Lee embarked on a journey to better understand a world increasingly embroiled in conflict and, as she saw it, heading for self-destruction. After several years, traveling over five continents, Iara encountered growing numbers of people who committed their lives to promoting change.
From Iran, where graffiti and rap became tools in fighting government repression, to Burma, where monks acting in the tradition of Gandhi take on a dictatorship, moving on to Brazil, where musicians reach out to slum kids and transform guns into guitars, and ending in Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon, where photography, music, and film have given a voice to those rarely heard, Cultures of Resistance explores how art and creativity can be ammunition in the battle for peace and justice.
Does each gesture really make a difference? Can music and dance be weapons of peace? Director Iara Lee embarked on a two-year, five-continent trek to find out. From MALI, where the music of Tuareg resistance rises from the desert, to BURMA, where monks acting in the tradition of Gandhi take on a dictatorship, moving on to BRAZIL, where musicians reach out to slum kids and transform guns into guitars, and ending in PALESTINIAN refugee camps in LEBANON, where photography, music, and film have given a voice to those rarely heard, CULTURES OF RESISTANCE explores how art and creativity can be the ammunition in the battle for peace and justice.
Featuring: Medellín poets for peace, Capoeira masters from Brazil, Niger Delta militants, Iranian graffiti artists, women’s movement leaders in Rwanda, Lebanon’s refugee filmmakers, U.S. political pranksters, Argentina’s Madres de Plaza de Mayo, indigenous Kayapó activists from the Xingu, Israeli dissidents, hip-hop artists from Palestine, and many more…
“Only around eight shacks, with about 35 families, were moved from this site,” says the community leader, pointing to a yellow outcrop of mine sludge, where Professor Chris Busby, a world expert in uranium, in December found radiation levels inside a shack 15 times higher than regulatory limits. “These people are lying if they say they’ve moved everybody. We’re still here, living in poor conditions.”Hundreds of shacks, and thousands of people, remain in Tudor Shaft. “Look there,” says a dismayed Mariette Liefferink, an environmental activist, as she gestures to a group of children playing on the site where Busby took his radioactivity readings. “Children continue to play on that site (where the shacks were removed),” says Liefferink. “Many are barefoot. What has happened here is not sufficient. People are still living on the tailings, on unsafe land… It’s a really desperate situation.” (Independent Online Nov. 15, 2011)“ “The doses calculated for “realistic” exposure pathways range over four orders of magnitude from about 0.01 mSv to 138 mSv per annum. For approximately 50% of the 47 sampling sites, the calculated incremental doses of the respective critical group are above 1 mSv per annum.”“The newspaper said tests on asparagus, oats and onions produced in the Gerhard Minne wetlands showed that the level of radioactive substances was three times higher than the safe permissible level for human consumption.”“The residue from gold extraction contains uranium,” says the head of the Federation for a Sustainable Environment (FSE), a local environmental organization. By looking at recent analyses, these dump sites also contain, amongst other things, “aluminum, arsenic, mercury and copper,”“South Africa’s National Nuclear Regulator (NNR) recognized, in 2011, that there was a “potentially dangerous situation” and recommended that the residents be “re-housed to a more hospitable environment.”““Before the judge’s final decision, the radioactive dump sites have been surrounded by a plastic security cordon, to prevent children from coming too close. “This land is dangerous; it could make my child sick,” says 20-year-old Poppy Morebondi. But when we asked her if she knew what “radioactivity” meant, like many of the other residents, she shook her head.”“Meat, fish, milk, maize and other crops produced near Wonderfontein Spruit in Gauteng are probably harmful to people as they are seriously contaminated by, among others, radioactive pollutants. This pollution, resulting from overflow from sludge dams during 100 years of mining, affects the area between Randfontein and Potchefstroom, where more than 400,000 people live. International experts say people who eat or drink these products could suffer liver or kidney failure or get cancer. It could also hamper children’s growth and cause mental disability. “
POOR SOUTH AFRICANS LIVING ON TOXIC REMAINS OF DEFUNCT GOLD MINES
By Sébastien Hervieu LE MONDE/WorldcrunchPublished on 2012-11-15 23:10:12
MOGALE CITY – Patience Pumlangadu’s black skin is now a yellowish color. “I put this powder on my face to protect it from the sun,” explains the South African mother of three.
Pumlangadu makes this sun protection herself by mixing water with bits of crushed rock she says are “good for your health.”
But in fact these rocks come from a nearby mound of earth, made up of waste from an old gold mine. It was at the end of 2010, a British specialist, Chris Busby, found that the level of radioactivity here was 15 times higher than normal, and recommended that the residents of the township evacuate as soon as possible.
Situated in the municipality of Mogale City, this informal settlement with a population of 5,000, named Tudor Shaft, is just down the road from one of countless radioactive dumps that dot the horizon in theregion of Johannesburg. For more than a century, the mines of Egoli, “the golden city” in Zulu, have allowed South Africa to become the top economic power on the African continent. However, it has left behind numerous toxic footprints.
In 2011, a report by the regional authorities of Gauteng, the area that surrounds South Africa’s economic capital Johannesburg, confirmed that 1.6 million people were living in townships near to, or even in, one of the 400 zones marked affected by mining waste.
British activists’ group Amnesty International has condemned armed insurgents in Syria for a growing number of serious abuses, potential war crimes and endangering civilians.
Amnesty International, a UK based organization that deals with human rights, stressed that insurgents in Syria, responsible for human rights abuses have not been condemned by British Foreign Secretary William Hague.
UK Syria campaign manager for Amnesty International Kristyan Benedict said, “William Hague must insist on practical actions not just fine words to prevent opposition abuses. We need to see proper accountability, with any fighters accused of abuses detained and proper investigations mounted.” She added, “As we’ve seen in Libya, where militias are largely out of control, a failure to curb abuses from opposition forces can sow the seeds of future disaster.”
Meanwhile, the newly chosen leader of the main foreign-backed Syrian opposition group has admitted that several hundred armed insurgents fighting along the rebels against Syria’s government are foreigners.
The president of the so-called Syrian National Council, George Sabra called on the international community to supply weapons to the insurgents “without any conditions”.
Syria’s unrest began back in March 2011, when peaceful protests were hijacked by foreign-backed terrorists, who have killed many people, including large numbers of army and security personnel since then.
An in-depth portrait into the lives of a population living under the constant threat of radiation in Fukushima, Japan. The film, a work in progress directed by Jake Price, focuses on Fukushima born Shimpei Takeda who was living in New York and working as a visual artist when the Fukushima Daiichi Power Plant began to meltdown.
Excerpts
Being born in Fukushima Prefecture I took on a mission to create a physical record of the worst man made nuclearaccident in history… Using a cameraless process, I want to capture the current state of Japan directly, by exposing photo-sensitive material to traces of radiation emitted from contaminated particles.
I’m afraid Japan will follow in the footsteps of ancient civilizations that vanished like the Egyptians, Mayans and Mesopotamians that came before us.
The tsunami and earthquake well they’re just the earth shivering. The problem is the disaster that man has made.
There are so many possibilities of a tsunami and earthquake happening again. The damaged reactors haven’t been repaired yet… they haven’t been repaired at all.
The resulting destruction will take half the planet along with it. …With one more earthquake or tsunami Japan will cease to exist.
“As people who have worked for decades against the increased militarization of societies and for international cooperation to end war, we are deeply dismayed by the treatment of Pfc Bradley Manning,”
Published: 16 November, 2012, 21:07
RT
Leaders of the United States have insulted the intelligence of the rest of the world, three Nobel laureates write this week, because of their continuously perverse mishandling of the case against accused WikiLeaks source Pfc Bradley Manning.
Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mairead Maguire and Adolfo Pérez Esquivel have authored a statement to be published in an upcoming issue of The Nation that condemns the United States’ persecution of the 24-year-old Army private and implores the rest of America to question the country’s secretive torture of a soldier that the prize winners say defended democracy.
“As people who have worked for decades against the increased militarization of societies and for international cooperation to end war, we are deeply dismayed by the treatment of Pfc Bradley Manning,” the laureates write.
“Questioning authority, as a soldier, is not easy.But it can at times be honorable. The words attributed to Manning reveal that he went through a profound moral struggle between the time he enlisted and when he became a whistleblower. Through his experience in Iraq, he became disturbed by top-level policy that undervalued human life and caused the suffering of innocent civilians and soldiers. Like other courageous whistleblowers, he was driven foremost by a desire to reveal the truth.”
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