SECOND MASS COMPLAINT COMING OVER FUKUSHIMA DISASTER
By Masakazu Honda / The Asahi Shimbun / November 2, 2012 /
More than 10,000 people from across Japan are seeking criminal charges against officials of Japan’s government and the utility that operates the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, after a similar mass complaint this summer accused 33 officials of causing death and injurythrough negligence.
Prosecutors in Fukushima Prefecture are currently examining the earlier complaint, filed in June by 1,324 people who were residents of the prefecture at the time of the accident in March 2011.
Complainants behind the new case plan to file it with the Fukushima District Public Prosecutors Office on Nov. 15. The group numbers about 10,850 individuals, from Hokkaido in the north to Okinawa in the south.
The group is led by Ruiko Muto, 59, who traveled around the country seeking support.
Complainants argued that a broadly backed complaint would show that the general public is seeking criminal accountability for those who promoted nuclear power—and hold them responsible for damage from the disaster and for exposing victims to radiation.
h/t
http://fukushimaupdate.com/second-mass-complaint-coming-over-fukushima-disaster/
NHK Documentary March to Recovery Series: “Their Fate In Their Hands” -The dilemma over iodine pills in Fukushima
Published on Nov 3, 2012 by MissingSky101
NHK Documentary March to Recovery
Voices from 3.11
Their Fate in Their Hands
Miharu, Fukushima Prefecture
One year has passed since the Great East Japan Earthquake. Reconstruction initiatives are underway in many places, including the disaster-stricken areas. March to Recovery shows how the nation is recovering from the unprecedented disaster.
The dilemma over iodine pill distribution to Miharu residents affected by radioactive fallout in March 2011.
Aired November 3/2012
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p7QqKtjRsc0
h/t GlowInTheDark -enenews commentor
USA -Feedwater system flaw shuts down Nine Mile Point 1 nuclear plant
It’s the second time this week that Unit 1 shut down.
The first time was Monday, after high winds from Superstorm Sandy blew down a lightning pole in a National Grid switch yard that handles electricity generated by the plant. With nowhere for the plant’s power output to go, two output breakers closed and the plant shut down, Lyon said.
The plant had been restarted and was at 25 percent power when this morning’s shutdown happened. The two events are not believed to be related, Lyon said.
By John Mariani, The Post-Standard
on November 03, 2012 at 5:45 PM, updated November 04, 2012 at 2:39 AM
Scriba, NY – The Nine Point Unit 1 nuclear plant in Scriba shut down this morning after a component failed that controls the water level in the vessel containing its nuclear fuel, the plant’s owner said.
The automatic shutdown took place at 8:23 a.m. when instruments detected too much water in the reactor pressure vessel at Nine Mile Point Nuclear Station Unit 1, said Jill Lyon, speaking for Constellation Energy Nuclear Group, the owner.
Officials believe one of the level control instruments failed in the plant’s feedwater system, which supplies water to the reactor pressure vessel, she said.
There was no release of radiation to the water or the air, Lyon said.
“When the plant gets certain indications, it shuts itself down as a safety feature,” Lyon said. “It wasn’t anything that was a potential safety concern for our employees or for the public, but obviously we designed the plant with certain parameters to ensure safety.”
Officials have returned the water level to normal and now are trouble-shooting to find why the control failed, she said. Workers then will make repairs and perform tests to make sure the fixes were successful before they restart the reactor.
Australia -Talk of a nuclear ‘bonanza’ is just an elaborate con job
- Gavin Mudd, Jim Green
- From:The Courier-Mail
- November 05, 2012
THE push to mine Queensland’s uranium is a con job and the con goes further than the LNP’s decision to take a no-uranium position to the election, only to reverse it months later on the flimsiest of pretences.
Another part of the con concerns jobs. The Australian Uranium Association says 2620 new jobswill be created by uranium mining in Queensland, a figure repeated by state MP Rob Katter among others.
But IBISWorld’s market report says there are just 650 jobs across Australia in uranium mining. The World Nuclear Association puts the figure at 1760 jobs, including exploration and regulation and even that generous figure amounts to less than 0.02 per cent of all jobs in Australia.
Does the AUA really expect us to believe uranium mining will generate more jobs in Queensland than every other state put together? They’re playing us for fools. The AUA itself has commissioned research by Deloitte Insight Economics which estimates a peak increase of 410 jobs from uranium mining in Queensland and an average increase of 155 jobs over the next 20 years.
Claims about export revenue are similarly inflated. Queensland Resources Council chief executive Michael Roche claims the known uranium resource in Queensland is valued at $18 billion. Yet earlier this month the World Nuclear Association updated its paper on Australia’s uranium oxide resources. For Queensland, the total estimate is 74,000 tonnes.
Taiwan -Lawmaker pushes for stronger nuclear safety oversight -Blames World Association of Nuclear Operators!
Meanwhile, the state-owned Taiwan Power Co. (Taipower), which runs the country’s nuclear power plants, said it will seek a review by the World Association of Nuclear Operators (WANO) before the under-construction fourth plant begins operations.
However, Chiau said the credibility of the association has been called into question by the nuclear disaster in Japan last year.
2012/11/04
(By Chen Wei-ting and Scully Hsiao)
Taipei, Nov. 4 (CNA) A ruling Kuomintang lawmaker called Sunday for the establishment of an ad hoc legislative committee to strengthen the oversight of the country’s nuclear safety.
Ting Shou-chung said at a press conference in Taipei that he will launch a signature drive in the Legislature to garner support for his proposal from legislators across party lines.
Legislator Chiau Wen-yan, also of the KMT, said on the same occasion that doubts remain over the safety of the country’s nuclear plants.
The first, second and fourth nuclear plants are close not only to Taipei and New Taipei — which are home to over 5 million people — but also to geological faults and shorelines, which makes them vulnerable to earthquakes and tsunamis, Chiau said.
USA -Questions arise about shuttering of Kewaunee Nuclear PP -Waste storage problems!
According to that report, about 3,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel is in storage at nine sites across the country where commercial reactors have been shuttered.
“This all came as an awful surprise,” said Paplham. “That waste may be sitting there for 200 years.”
In the meantime, the residents around the Kewaunee plant are preparing for life without one of the area’s biggest employers and an indeterminate number of years living next to an impromptu nuclear waste storage facility.
“They were going to bury those rods under a mountain,” said Hardtke. “And yet now they are just going to let them sit there. I have kids here and grandkids, and we’re leaving them a mess.”
WSJ, 4 Nov 12 Residents who live near the Kewaunee Power Station with its 556-megawatt nuclear reactor still are absorbing the recent news that the plant will shut down in May, taking with it 655 jobs and leaving behind — possibly for decades — scores of concrete canisters filled with spent nuclear waste.
The loss of the jobs as well as the hundreds of thousands of dollars Dominion Resources pays locally in lieu of property taxes is unsettling enough, local officials say. More disturbing, they say, are the 42 containers of nuclear waste that will remain sitting just off the shore of Lake Michigan.
“We’ve been lied to for 35 years,” Dave Hardtke, chairman of the town of Carlton, said of the waste. “When they built that plant, the federal government said they were going to move the waste. That was 35 years ago, and look where it is sitting.”
The impending shutdown of the plant renewed attention on the national impasse over the disposal of spent nuclear fuel. And it is not just an issue at Kewaunee. More than 300 assemblies of spent nuclear fuel rods are submerged in a cooling pool on the site of the now-closed nuclear reactor at the Genoa Generating Station on the banks of the Mississippi River near La Crosse. The small reactor, adjacent to a traditional coal plant, was closed in 1987 but the fuel rods, with no central federal storage available, remain.
Australia -Nuclear weapons are a threat to humanity, expert tells conference
- Katrina Stokes
- adelaidenow
- November 04, 201210:30PM
GOVERNMENTS must work towards eliminating nuclear weapons for the sake of humanity or risk devastating effects in the future, a leading expert says.
Australian Red Cross international law expert Dr Helen Durham cited the dangers of immediate and long-term radiation damage to people and the environment, saying nuclear weapons were uniquely destructive weapons.
“They are a deadly and dangerous weapon,” she said.
“They have capacity to create immediate effects and long radiation damage to people and the environment.”
She was a speaker at nuclear discussions held at Uni SA over the weekend and organised by Flinders University and Australian Red Cross.
Dr Durham said Australia did not possess nuclear weapons and she reminded South Australians of their own experience, the nuclear testing at Maralinga in the 1950s.
She said the British tests had left parts of the community with long- term effects, including cancer and growths from the radiation.
Iran Offers to Send Emergency Aid Crew to US After Hurricane Sandy
“Once you see your enemy as a human being similar to yourself, being expressing his love and understand he doesn’t hate you as years of propaganda succeed to make you believe, you can never go back to blind hate, then you can start to know each other and you will be ready for peace.”
Posted by EU Times on Nov 1st, 2012
In the wake of the destruction caused by hurricane Sandy the people of Iran are reaching out in a variety of ways, by offering help and emergency aid relief.
Even the Red Crescent Organization of Iran has offered to send an emergency response team to help with the rescue and clean up effort.
Mahmud Mozaffar, the leader of the Red Crescent Organization told the Fars News Agency that:
“We are ready to help the flood-stricken people of America. Given its preparedness and ample experience in rescuing storms and floods victims, Iran’s Red Crescent can provide relief assistance for those affected in New York.
If American authorities agree, we can send our rescuers with equipment and tools to American cities in the shortest period of time.”
It is very possible that American authorities will not accept this offer because the Red Crescent Organization is known to have deep connections with the Iranian government.
Another organization close with the Iranian government made a similar request a few years ago in offering to help clean up the Deep Horizon BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, this offer was quickly turned down by the US government.
Iran is a much more complicated situation than the half dozen other countries that have already been invaded in this conquest, it’s far more delicate.
Iran’s population and military capabilities far surpass that of Iraq and Afghanistan, it is one of the most powerful countries in the Middle East and has been for a very long time.
Despite their immense power and influence in the region they have not waged a foreign conflict in over a century, and they don’t pose much of a threat today either.
Iran Proposes Live Coverage of Nuclear Talks with World Powers
Source: Fars News Agency
Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehman-Parast said Tehran has “nothing to hide” regarding its nuclear program and has even proposed live broadcast of its talks with the Group 5+1 (the five permanent UN Security Council members plus Germany).
“Iran’s nuclear issue has a specific framework. The talks that we have pursued have been so transparent and our proposals have been so specific that the Iranian side has even proposed a live TV coverage of the whole talks,” Mehman-Parast said in an interview with FNA on the sidelines of Tehran’s 19th International Exhibition of Press and News Agencies on Saturday.
“We have nothing o hide and we are proposing our ideas transparently,” he added.
The Iranian foreign ministry presser further stressed that disputes over Iran’s nuclear program would have been resolved if they had been technical or legal.
“Our disputes with the other party are neither technical nor legal but political,” he stated, and reiterated that the Iranian nation will not retreat from its nuclear rights under the western pressures.
India to build 6,000 MW nuke plant in Andhra Pradesh
The Andhra Pradesh government has quietly set in motion the process for construction of 6,000 MW nuclear power plant at Kovvada block in Srikakulam district.
he state energy department on Thursday night issued an order (GO Ms No. 42 dated November 1, 2012) and a subsequent gazette notification declaring five villages covering 1,916.27 acre of land as “protected zone” for setting of 6 light weight nuclear reactors, each of 1,000 MW capacity by the Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL). The total land being acquired for the nuclear power project is 2,436 acres, including the area assigned for township for the staff and the Central Industrial Security Forces to take care of the security needs of the project.
According to the notification, the five villages which would fall under the nuclear protected zone are: Ramachandrapura, Gudem, Kotapalem, Tekkali and Jeeru Kovvada. In all, 1,983 households with a population of 7,960 would be displaced from the project area and rehabilitated at a distant location, so as to protect them from adverse effect of the nuclear power project.
The notification said since the project is being set up by the NPCIL with the support of the Central government, the rehabilitation and resettlement benefits would be extended to the displaced people as per the provisions of the National R&R policy, 2007.
In fact, the government had issued land acquisition notices in December 2011 itself in order to facilitate the NPCIL to build its office complex, besides staff quarters. The government had constituted a team of 11 officials headed by a deputy collector rank officer, besides appointing another 28 lower rung staff on contract basis for acquisition of land from farmers in and around Ranasthalam area. The entire cost of land acquisition and salaries to the land acquisition staff would be borne by NPCIL.
While the NPCIL would build the nuclear reactors, state-run AP Power Generation Corporation would act as the nodal agency for the execution of the power plant, including overseeing the land acquisition and the project works.
Kovvada was among the first set of four sites identified by the Central government last year for setting up nuclear power plants as part of the civil nuclear agreement with United States.The ambitious Rs.1 lakh crore (US$ 20 billion) power project at Kovvada would be developed with the US technical know-how.
USA -Lawsuit worth $900M filed over new Ga. reactors
ATLANTA (AP) – The contractors building a new nuclear power plant in eastern Georgia have filed a lawsuit seeking more than $900 million from Southern Co. and other plant owners.
The lawsuit filed Thursday at a federal court in Washington is the third between the parties over the construction of 2 new reactors at Plant Vogtle (VOH’-gohl) near Augusta.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution (http://bit.ly/SDEw76 ) reports the dispute centers in part on delays in getting federal permission to build the power plant. Westinghouse Electric Co. and the Shaw Group said they want additional pay for design changes to the plant and a 10-month delay in getting the construction license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Georgia Power denies responsibility for those extra costs.
Utility customers ultimately pay for the cost of building the nuclear plant.
Information from: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, http://www.ajc.com
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
http://www.cbsatlanta.com/story/19993711/lawsuit-worth-900m-filed-over-new-ga-reactors
Urgent! A message from Jill Stein at the pipeline protest -Green Party USA
Green Party Jill Stein arrested while assisting protesters prior to her arrest (Video)
NRC raises concerns about Dresden nuclear plant flood plan via the Chicago Tribune
By norma field – 2012/11/02
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Friday that it has asked Exelon Generation to address concerns over how the company would handle a catastrophic flood at the Dresden Nuclear Station in northern Illinois, after recent inspections indicated potential problems.
Among the concerns is how the company would refuel diesel pumps that circulate water to cool the reactor and how it would keep equipment from becoming clogged with flood debris, NRC spokeswoman Viktoria Mitlyng said. The commission sent a letter to the company Thursday, and Exelon has 30 days to respond.
“We’re not saying their plan won’t work, but we have raised questions,” and Exelon must demonstrate that it would work, Mitlyng said.
She said there is no immediate safety risk, but the goal is to keep the site’s two reactors safe in the event of a worst-case flood, like the one that swamped the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan last year.
Although that is highly improbable, the company must be prepared, Mitlyng said.
Continue reading at NRC raises concerns about Dresden nuclear plant flood plan
4 out of 6 experts in nuclear safety panel got grants from utilities
TOKYO, Nov. 3, Kyodo (Subsciption)
Four out of the six members of a government team drafting new safety standards for nuclear reactors have received between around 3 million yen and 27 million yen each in grants, donations and compensation from utilities in the past three to four years, according to data disclosed by the Nuclear Regulation Authority on Friday.
The regulatory body’s secretariat said the members “have been selected in line with rules, and there should be no problem.” Critics, however, say the members’ judgments might be swayed by the wishes of donors, exposing safety regulations to the risk of being watered down.
The NRA requires experts involved in drafting safety standards for nuclear power plants and other matters to disclose remuneration and donations, but has no provision for disqualifying them in light of such information.
Breaking – TEPCO’s Efforts towards Nuclear Reform on Facebook too!
TEPCO strongly wishes to be a nuclear power plant operator which has the world’s highest level of safety awareness, engineering capabilities and risk communication ability with society.
Thus, we established the “Nuclear Reform Special Task Force” led by our president in order to reform TEPCO’s safety culture, safety measures, disaster prevention measures, risk/crisis control protocol, information disclosure, and risk communication methods.
At the same time, we established “Nuclear Reform Monitoring Committee” which is comprised of domestic and overseas experts and monitors our reform implementation and progress from a purely external point of view as an advisory organization.
We will implement management and safety culture reforms under this new organizational framework.
TEPCO’s Goals
Basic Policies of Nuclear Reform
Continue reading
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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