UK -MARYPORT HOSTS ‘CRISIS’ TALKS ON SOLWAY NUCLEAR DUMP
Last updated at 13:31, Friday, 16 November 2012
A CAMPAIGN to stop an underground nuclear waste storebeing built on the Solway Plain will step up a gear next week.
[Picture – CAMPAIGNERS: Kath Ostell, left, and Chris Graham]
A series of what are described as “crisis” meetings will be held in Maryport and Silloth.
A recently formed protest group, Solway Plain Against Nuclear Dump, will hold its first public meeting at Maryport’s Wave Centre on Wednesday.
It will be followed by another public meeting at the Solway Community College, Silloth, on Thursday. Both meetings start at 7pm.
The group has invited what it says are two leading authorities on geological disposal of nuclear waste.
They are Stuart Haszeldine, Professor of Geology, and David Smythe, Emeritus Professor of Geophysics.
Campaign posters have started appearing throughout the area following concern that the Solway Plain has been identified as having geology suitable for hosting a controversial 23 square kilometre high-level nuclear waste dump.
A petition against the dump has been set up on the Government’s website and in shops.
Dr Jeremy Dearlove, who identified the Solway Plain rock strata as being potentially suitable, has been invited to give a presentation at the Silloth meeting.
Twenty-five per cent of West Cumbria has already been ruled out as geologically unsuitable.
USA Ploughshares -Sid Drell on the Logic of Nuclear Zero
Here at FAS, the first organization organized after Hiroshima and Nagasaki to address the grave new challenge to civilization posed by nuclear weapons, I call on my colleagues in the science and technology community to meet this challenge, and work to disarm the skeptics and cynics who dismiss zero as an unrealistic unachievable goal.
Recall the wisdom of Austrian philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer who said: “All truth passes through three stages:
- First, it is ridiculed;
- Second, it is violently opposed;
- Third, it is accepted as self-evident.
BY ADMIN
NOVEMBER 16, 2012
Is it illogical to think of a world without nuclear weapons? Must we accept the world as it is, with nuclear weapons, as many in the high priesthood of strategic policy insist? That was a broad reaction to the effort to get rid of them that Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev made at the Reykjavik Summit 26 years ago in what George Shultz has called “the highest stakes poker game ever played.” And I still hear it frequently today.
Accepting a world with nuclear weapons as inescapable means nothing less than also accepting it to be inevitable that, sooner or later, there will be a nuclear explosion somewhere – deliberate or otherwise. Things happen; there are errors in systems involving humans, like the 6 nuclear armed cruise missiles that were mistakenly loaded on a B-52 enroute from North Dakota to Louisiana in 2007 without being missed for 36 hours. Just consider the consequences, long term as well as immediate, of a nuclear bomb exploding in Washington, Moscow, Beijing, or wherever. They will be so appalling that people everywhere will demand that governments do something about it. Wouldn’t it be wise to do something before rather than after such an explosion?
What prevents us from attaining a goal of a world without nuclear weapons? Why is it dismissed as illogical?
Since the end of the Cold War two decades ago, we have shown that it is possible to make substantial progress in reducing nuclear arsenals; U.S. and Russia are down to a fraction of their peak level of about 70 thousand warheads at the time of Reykjavik. In the New START treaty of 2011 we have negotiated intrusive and cooperative on-site inspections, including actually counting the numbers of deployed warheads, as well as all delivery vehicles. This was unthinkable during the Cold War. Thus far we are implementing them without a hitch.
But the numbers of existing nuclear weapons are still very large – in the thousands. Their absurdly large number is a good example of what to me is truly illogical. We are still caught in the Cold War trap of nuclear deterrence more than two decades after the demise of the Soviet Union. But what are they deterring now?
They are credited with deterring a nuclear holocaust, or worse, during the Cold War but what else did they deter? Not the Korean War, not the squashing of the Hungarian and Czech uprisings. We have recently marked the 50th anniversary of the Cuban missile crisis, but there were other close calls during the Cold War.
South Korea- power blackouts after nuclear plant closures – Increase in thermal underwear sales!
“..A further 3,000 MW is targeted from power savings including less heating at firms and public places, switching off neon lights and even a campaign to wear thermal underwear…”
16 November 2012
South Korean Economy ministry sources said the country may have to bring in rolling power blackouts this winter after the closure of two nuclear plants for safety checks means the electricity network will have under a third of normal reserve capacity.
Asia’s fourth-largest economy said it plans to add 4,000 megawatts (MW) of power supply capacity through savings and new plants in a bid to head off potential blackouts.
The nuclear problems have increased the risk of power shortages in the harsh Korean winter after the closure of the two reactors to replace parts with fake certificates and an extended shutdown of another reactor where microscopic cracks were found.
The northeast Asian country is heavily dependent on oil, gas and coal imports, but usually supplies about a third of its electricity from nuclear power generation from its 23 reactors.
Economy minister Hong Suk-woo said it remained uncertain whether reactors would be restarted in December after parts were replaced because the approval of the regulator was necessary, as well as support from residents.
“This winter will be very, very difficult for us to cope with,” he said, when asked what would happens if reactors did not restart as planned in December
Report: ‘Explosive’ UK PV growth will diminish need for nuclear
By Peter Bennett | 16 November 2012, 14:55 Updated: 16 November 2012, 15:45
A new report published by the green campaign group Energy Fair shows that rapid renewables growth in the UK spearheaded by solar photovoltaics (PV) will severely eat into nuclear’s market by the time any new nuclear stations are brought online in 2020 or later.
The report, titled The financial risks of investing in new nuclear power plants, states: “By the time any new nuclear plant can be built in the UK, the market for its electricity will be disappearing, regardless of any possible increase in the overall demand for electricity.
“The rapidly declining cost of PV with the falling costs of other renewables, and the likely completion of the European internal market for electricity with the strengthening of the European transmission grid, will be transforming the market for electricity in the UK.”
The authors of the report believe that solar PV’s popularity will grow to such an extent that it will be capable of generating much of the profitable peak-time market for electricity – this would only leave less profitable gaps in the electricity market to be plugged by nuclear. However, the report contests that there are better suited renewable sources for the gap-filling role than nuclear, such as wind power at night.
CUMBRIAN MUSICIAN RECORDS NUCLEAR DUMP PROTEST SONG
First published at 14:03, Friday, 16 November 2012
Published by http://www.cumberlandnews.co.uk
It might not be Blowin’ in the Wind but a musician hopes his newly-recorded protest song will do its bit to stop a nuclear dump being built.
Songwriter Geoff Betsworth, who is also president of Silloth Rotary Club, is so incensed at the possibility of having nuclear waste stored underground in the Solway Plain that he has put pen to paper to vent his feelings.
Titled Wrong Rock Blues – the Other Road to Hell, the blues-tinged hard rock song features lyrics against the proposed developments.
A description on the song’s YouTube video notes that it was inspired by “scheming, conniving, gravy-training politicians.”
Mr Betsworth, 60, said: “I’ve never written a protest song before but I live at the epicentre of where this could go.
“What’s annoying is the fact that the geologists are saying it’s the wrong area to put it. If the geology was correct I would not feel so strongly. That’s why I felt so incensed.”
Currently the majority of nuclear waste in the area is stored above ground at Sellafield but the Government believes that the best solution is to store it underground.
Report: Anti-nuclear blogger’s home raided by police — Computer equipment seized (VIDEO)
http://enenews.com/report-anti-nuclear-blogger-home-raided-police-computer-equipment-seized
Published: November 15th, 2012 at 2:41 pm ET
By ENENews
Title: Anti-nuclear protest blogger’s home raided by police, computer equipment seized
Source: Japan Daily Press
Author: Adam Westlake
Date: November 15, 2012
Anti-nuclear protest blogger’s home raided by police, computer equipment seized
Yuzuru Kaneko, a blogger who has been filming the anti-nuclear protests in Fukui Prefecture, had his home raided by police on October 1st in order to search for evidence of potential demonstrators who had committed crimes. […]
On June 30th [… an] activist there that day was later arrested in September, accused of damaging property, threat and assault at the gate, and causinginjury. In order to gain more evidence, the police searched Kaneko’s home, despite he having no relation to the man arrested, and seized all of his computer equipment, cameras, and memory cards. His property was still un-returned on November 5th when his supporters began pressuring the authorities to return Kaneko’s equipment, which they stated they would on November 8th.
Fukui Prefecture is home to Japan’s only operating nuclear power plant.
Via Global Voices: Below is a recent video filmed by Yuzuru Kaneko on Friday, November 9. It captures the ‘no-nuke’ demonstration in front of Kansai Electric Power Co., Inc (KEPCO), where protesters asked employees of KEPCO to cease nuclear power generation activities at the power plant.
Please see ENENEWS link for video
IAEA : Cernavoda is a successful nuclear project – True or false?
Cernavoda is a successful nuclear project, said on Monday, in the opening of the tenth edition of the NucInfo Day 2012 symposium, the Deputy Director General of the International Atomic Energy, Alexander Bychkov.IAEA official said, in the context of this international event in Cernavoda (south-east of Bucharest), that the Fukushima nuclear accident has not marked a reversal trend in respects of the global perspectives of the nuclear energy.’We try to …
Meanwhile a week earlier….,,,,
Unexpected Shutdown of Cernavoda Nuke Plant in Romania -Registered radiation in Switzerland
“Switzerland registered a 2 microsievert/hour peak before 10.00 am 08/11/2012
There is a suspicious switch off on the monitor for the day before..
The emissions from this plant were lofted high and reached the Swiss alps”
[…]
“did not effect the safety of the population or the environment”, says the Government
[…]
8 November 2012
Another complaint for professional negligence against TEPCO -13,000 signatories
FUKUSHIMA, Japan, Nov. 15, Kyodo
A group of 13,000 people across Japan on Thursday filed a criminal complaint against 33 senior officials of Tokyo Electric Power Co. and the government’s now-defunct Nuclear Safety Commission over the nuclear disaster at the company’s Fukushima Daiichi power plant following the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami.
In the letter of complaint filed with prosecutors, the complainants asked that the accused be investigated and indicted on suspicion of professional negligence resulting in deaths and injuries.
The complaint was the second in a series by the group, following one made in June by 1,300 people mainly from Fukushima Prefecture.
Nature magazine Slams Japans nuclear industry -Editorial
“Similarly troubling is the rush with which the government reopened two of the country’s shuttered nuclear reactors in July without fully evaluating the seismology of the ground beneath”
“Japan was supposed to emerge from the Fukushima crisis with a new respect for reactor safety and better awareness of the need to convince people of that safety. It hasn’t made a very good start.”
A shaky restart
Japan still has lessons to learn from Fukushima if it is to convince the public about nuclear energy.
The nuclear disaster that followed the March 2011 tsunami in Japan uncovered serious flaws in the country’s nuclear-safety regulations. Japan learned its lesson: it started putting a premium on safety, and is doing everything it can to assure a wary public that similar mistakes will not be made again. Well, that was the hope. Two recent revelations show that it could still do much more.
The country’s Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) was set up to right the wrongs of the previous regulatory 
infrastructure. One of its first tasks was to draw up new safety standards for reactor operations. The NRA formed an investigation team of six experts, which held its first meeting on 25 October. The team is expected to submit its report in time for the NRA to put the standards up for public comment in the spring and to make them law in July 2013.
Last week, Japanese media reported that four of those experts have received regular stipends or one-time grants from the nuclear industry. Nuclear engineer Akio Yamamoto of Nagoya University, for example, has received at least ¥50,000 (US$630) over the past three years from each of three companies related to nuclear energy, including Nuclear Engineering, a firm in Osaka that is affiliated with Kansai Electric Power. Although there is no suggestion that Yamamoto has done anything wrong, he also received some ¥27 million in grants from eight nuclear-energy companies during that period, as well as an undisclosed amount from Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which builds reactors.
ASEAN – deeply flawed Human Rights Declaration – Affects Japans Human rights petitions?
Wilder Tayler, Secretary General of the International Commission of Jurists. “Balancing human rights with responsibilities turns on its head the entire raison d’être of human rights,”
In a letter sent to ASEAN Heads of State, leading international human rights organizations called for the postponement of the adoption of the ASEAN Human Rights Declaration, pointing out that in its current form, the Declaration falls short of existing international human rights standards and risks creating a sub-standard level of human rights protection in the region.
Of particular concern are the General Principles in the Declaration. Under General Principles 6,7 and 8 of the current draft, enjoyment of rights is to be “balanced with the performance of duties”, subjected to “national and regional contexts” and to considerations of “different cultural, religious and historical backgrounds.” Also, all the rights in the Declaration may be restricted on a wide array of grounds including “national security” and “public morality”.
“The idea that all human rights are to be ‘balanced’ against individual responsibilities contradicts the very idea of human rights agreed upon in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was affirmed by all States, including ASEAN Member States, in 1993 in the Vienna Declaration andProgramme of Action,” said Wilder Tayler, Secretary General of the International Commission of Jurists. “Balancing human rights with responsibilities turns on its head the entire raison d’être of human rights,” he further emphasized.
Furthermore, international law prohibits governments from derogating under any circumstances from a broad set of rights. Other rights can only be subject to specific, narrow, and clearly defined restrictions in certain circumstances. Finally, international law imposes on all ASEAN Member States the duty, regardless of their political, economic and cultural systems, to respect and protect all human rights and fundamental freedoms.
“It is clear that in its current form the Declaration purports to make a significant and worrying departure from existing international human rights law and standards, including those found in other regional human rights instruments, in Europe, the Americas, and Africa,” said Souhayr Belhassen, President of the International Federation for Human Rights.
“Unless significant changes are made to the text, ASEAN will be adopting in 2012 a Human Rights Declaration that grants ASEAN Member States additional powers to violate human rights instead of providing the region’s people with additional safeguards against such violations”, said Michael Bochenek, Director of Amnesty International’s Law and Policy Programme.
British PM refuses to apologize for selling arms to rights abusers -Press TV
The Prime Minister was heavily slammed for his three-day controversial visit to Saudi Arabia, Oman and the United Arab Emirates last week, during which he acted as a salesman for the country’s arms industry that involved the selling of 100 Typhoon jets to dictatorial regimes in the region.
Amnesty International accused David Cameron of a “deeply disturbing trade-off” between business and strategic interests and the issue of human rights.
The Prime Minister defended his trip to the Middle East region during his annual Mansion House speech, adding that he was collecting support to the UK economy with defence strategies.
Cameron’s controversial move comes as the British government continues to sell itself as an advocate of human rights.
Ex-British PM’s bloody legacy stops his reemergence -Press TV
Students and campaigners from the Stop the War Coalitionused the occasion to reiterate their demand that the former prime minister be tried for war crimes and criticised the university for hosting the event.
Chris Nineham, vice chair of Stop the War Coalition, which organised the protest said: “It is completely insane for a man who lied to parliament to be speaking at a conference supported by one of Britain’s premier educational institutions. It is an absolutely mad situation.”
Wed Nov 14, 2012 6:30PM GMT
Tony Blair’s attempts to buy himself prestige as a globetrotting speechmaker-for-hire are damaged by the spectres of a million Iraqi dead during and after the U.S.-led invasion of the country in March 2003.
The disgraced war criminal was given a platform at UniversityCollege London (UCL) to speak on Tuesday morning, where he was greeted with hundreds of protesters who gathered outside the College and highlighted Blair’s bloody crimes.
China’s Nuclear Development Cause For Concern, US Report
EDF, Areva’s New Nuclear Reactor Design to Be Approved in UK By Year End -Reports
Published November 14, 2012
Dow Jones Newswires
The design of the new EPR nuclear reactor currently elaborated by French power utility Electricite de France SA (EDF.FR) and nuclear engineering firm Areva SA (AREVA.FR) is on course to be approved by U.K. regulators by the end of the year.
MAIN FACTS:
– EDF said the update from regulators means that the UK EPR remains on schedule to be approved by the end of this year, in time for a decision from EDF Energy on whether to proceed with the project.
– The EPR reactor design is planned for new nuclear power stations at Hinkley Point and Sizewell.
– According to EDF, a report from the U.K. regulator recognizes “the improvements in the quality and timeliness of the submissions” made by EDF Energy and AREVA to address issues during the last six months, and concludes that “closure of all issues should be achievable before the end of the year”.
New reactors quarterly report published
- Date:
- November 14, 2012 – 10:24 am
- Continue reading
China, Macau -19 government departments participate in nuclear accident exercise
“..While China, Hong Kong, Korea, Macau, Taiwan, Singapore, Brunai still ban the import of Fukushima produce,…”
Macau Daily Times
14/11/2012 07:47:00
What would the government do if nuclear radiation occurs in Macau? Yesterday, a nuclearexercise directed by the Fire Services Bureau (FSM) and joined by 19 government departments took place simulating emergency procedures in the event of a nuclear accident.
The four-hour simulation started with a nuclear accident occurring at a mainland nuclear power plant 70 miles from Macau. At about 8:30 a.m. the authority informed the population that the region might be affected within three hours and instructed residents to remain indoors. Nineteen official departments, involving some 200 people, participated in the simulation.
At the Nam Yue market in the northern area, cargo load full of vegetables from the mainland had just arrived. Staff from the Civic and Municipal Affairs Bureau (IACM) inspected the produce with a nuclear radiation detection device before the food was distributed to wholesale markets. After that IACM also examined the quality of water supplied from Zhuhai. The authority declared the existence of an emergency plan if any abnormality is detected in data.
The Meteorological and Geophysical Bureau (SMG) introduced the tools and methods used to detect nuclear risk. Besides these, the exercise covered emergencies concerning food supply, examination of the quality of the environment, checks for imported visitors at border gates, amongst others.
1 This Month
26 April – Chernobyl: Inside the Meltdown airs on National Geographic on Sunday 26th April from 4pm
29 April – Nuclear Expert Webinar #1 – Radiation Impacts on Families with Mary Olson and Cindy Folkers
- 12:15 PM MT – 1:45 PM MT
- Location: Virtual – REGISTER TODAY
4 May -West Suburban Peace Coalition to discuss Iran war at May Educational Forum
Monday, May 4, 7:00 – 8:00 PM Central Standard Time
Title: : How Trump’s Narrative Tries to Shape the Reality of the War on Iran.
Contact Walt Zlotow, zlotow@hotmail.com 630 442 3045 for further information
14 May – online event From Bombs to Data Centres: the Face of Nuclear Colonialism
Pine Ridge Uranium is the real threat, not Tehran- Tell Burgum: Stop the Extraction.
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
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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