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NEIS ACTION ALERT: The final battle to stop new nuclear power plants from coming to Illinois begins!! — Beyond Nuclear

Action alert emailed by Dave Kraft, director, NEIS, at 1:50pm ET on Wednesday, April 19, 2023. If you reside in IL, please take direct action. If you do not, please alert everyone you know who does live in IL: NEIS ACTION ALERT The final battle to stop new nuclear power plants from coming to Illinois!!…

NEIS ACTION ALERT: The final battle to stop new nuclear power plants from coming to Illinois begins!! — Beyond Nuclear

April 20, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

NUCLEAR AFTER-LIFE: FROM TRAGEDY TO FARCE, THE CLAIMS OF A NUCLEAR RENAISSANCE

the nuclear industry. It is the option you choose when you have trouble moving on and you embrace absurd self-destruction and the visiting of farce and misery on others.

[ED. I’m not attempting here to reproduce this entire scholarly and well-referenced article, or even to summarise it. I recommend the whole article – but here are extracts, including ones that particularly refer to Australia]

ARENA QUARTERLY NO.13, DARRIN DURANT, MAR 2023

……………….YESTERDAY’S HERO

The World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR) is an annual update charting what is in effect the demise of the nuclear industry. The WNISR (2022) shows that nuclear power’s global share of commercial gross electricity generation peaked at 17.5% in 1996, but by the end of 2021 had dropped to 9.8%. Reactor construction starts peaked in 1979 at 234, but forty-eight of those were later abandoned. Thus 1979 was also a year of peak-abandonment. The number of operating reactors peaked in 2005 at 440. Net operating capacity peaked in 1990 at 312GW and has held roughly steady at 312-381GW until the present; it is what can be called a stagnant industry.

………………………….The false claim of mastery of technological destiny is a key part of the tragedy of nuclear power. A tragedy is not just an unhappy ending, but a story of an imperfect and flawed hero occasioning his or her own downfall. In many Greek tragedies, that flaw was hubris, and hubris characterized the development of the nuclear industry.

While Dwight D. Eisenhower’s ‘Atoms for Peace‘ speech in December 1953 promised to solve the atomic dilemma by turning that power from death to life, that hope was immediately translated into hubristic over-promising. 

…………….The over-confidence of the nuclear industry is illustrated by its failed projections. …………..

The nuclear industry has always tried to distance itself from its parent, the atomic bomb, but in the 1950’s and 60’s the legacy of weapons testing was a litany of environmental, political, and social injustices. British weapons testing in Australia is a case in point. ……………

Nuclear power is also an extractive industry, and uranium mining is a story of environmental degradation, contamination, and health inequalities visited upon vulnerable communities…………………………

The closing of the nuclear fuel cycle is similarly problematic, with waste disposal programs encountering persistent technical and social obstacles. My own volume, Nuclear Waste Management in Canada: Critical Issues, Critical Perspectives, co-edited with Genevieve Fuji-Johnson, shows how public participation initiatives nevertheless retain a scientistic framing of the issue. Only the public’s knowledge was problematized, as either emotively irrational or too diverse to constitute a coherent political demand. …………………….

IS NUCLEAR POWER NECESSARY FOR DECARBONIZATION?

………………… the GenCost 2022 report by Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), in conjunction with the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO), found renewables vastly cheaper than nuclear even after factoring in integration costs such as storage and transmission.

Dumbfounded by such cost comparisons, those new to the nuclear vs renewables debate wonder how nuclear survives as a financial idea at all. Martin Cohen and Andrew McKillop, in The Doomsday Machine: The High Price of Nuclear Energy, provide some clues, revealing an array of nuclear industry accounting tricks and a strategy that amounts to a nuclear asset bubble…………………….Independent energy analysts concluded power from Vogtle 3 & 4 will be five times as expensive as Georgia Power having acquired the same amounts of energy and capacity from renewables plus storage.

A POOR FIT FOR AUSTRALIA

………………………….  The trend is clear: nuclear is being replaced as a source of electricity. The first replacement was by natural gas and the second by non-hydro renewables. Renewables advocates point to such trends as indicators that nuclear power is not necessary for decarbonization.

Australia, which operates an Open-pool lightwater 20MW research reactor at Lucas Heights in New South Wales, has no commercial nuclear power reactors, and is thus an interesting test-case for the ‘nuclear is necessary’ claim.

South Australia is the model for an all-renewables grid, having already had extended runs (10+ days) in which wind and solar accounted for 100% of local demand. Moreover, AEMO’s Quarterly Energy Dynamics report (for 2022) depicts a north/south divide. Northern States (Queensland and New South Wales) are reliant on unreliable coal plants and suffer price spikes, while the southern States (Victoria and South Australia) saw a surge in renewables penetration into the grid, driving prices down. Renewables directly replace coal and lower prices.

Nuclear power is not deemed necessary for decarbonization in the Australian context. AEMO’s Integrated System Plan of 2022 modelled a step-change scenario, regarding it both most likely and compatible with net-zero emissions, in which renewables generate 98% of national electricity market energy by 2050 (including 10GW gas and 26GW dispatchable storage). Successive GenCost reports by AEMO, up to the latest in 2022, have deemed nuclear power in general too costly compared to renewables.

AEMO also skewers Small Modular Reactors (SMR), which are the modern nuclear industry fantasy. AEMO argues that SMR cost estimates are hopelessly biased and unreliable and that evidence of a positive learning rate (capacity to lower costs and build time when scaling up) is absent……..

THE MEANINGS OF NUCLEAR POWER

The Australian example suggests nuclear power is not a solution to climate concerns, but a potentially costly and burdensome engineering redundancy. ……………………………

The World Nuclear Association (WNA_ presents the nuclear industry as the victim of a renewables-biased investment and electricity market and an over-zealous regulatory environment. Calling for a more level playing field, nuclear power here is ‘victimized nuclear power’.

TECHNOLOGICAL DRAMAS

………………………… The far-right are straight climate deniers, yet fans of nuclear power. In Australia, see Pauline Hanson and Craig Kelly. In Europe, see the AfD (Germany), SvP (Sweden), Nye Borgerlige (Denmark), Fdl (Italy), Vlaams Belang (Belgium) and RN (France).  Lukewarmer ecomodernists agree on anthropogenic warming but minimize the climate problem, criticize environmentalism for being alarmist, and support nuclear power on scientistic grounds Some craft their messages in a way that climate deniers and/or advocates for fossil fuels always (just so happen to) find them acceptable. ……………….

GO BIG OR GO HOME

The nuclear renaissance has been offered as a magical and flexible antidote to concerns that we cannot power our way through to decarbonization……..

Chief among the conjuring tricks is a conflation of abundant and minimum power. The World Nuclear Association depicts the future as a big energy world, where electricity demand will rise substantially, engorged by urbanisation and the electrification of end-uses, and outpace total final energy demand. Simultaneously we are told that renewables are intermittent and only nuclear power can supply baseload power (minimum power required to supply average electricity demand). We are told that only baseload (nuclear) gives us reliable power. ‘Reliable’ is made to stand for both abundant and minimum. Unpacking each of those elements is part of demystifying the potential role of nuclear power.

Forecasts of electricity demand vary greatly. Amory Lovins predicts soft energy paths can protect both climate and economy at the same time as curtailing rampant consumption………….


‘Baseload is required for reliable power’ is a myth. Baseload power is more an economic than a technical concept, because baseload power supplies average electricity demand: it is the minimum power a power plant can produce without being switched off. When your car is idling at a traffic light, it is at baseload power. Practical experience and modelling confirm that variable renewables can be balanced by dispatchable (supply on demand) energy sources…………………………………..

THE NUCLEAR RENAISSANCE

………….. Is nuclear power there when you need it, as renaissance rhetoric suggests? France has a fleet of fifty-six reactors supplying 70 per cent of its electricity, but as gas shortages hit Europe in 2022 in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Électricité de France fleet suffered an annus horribilis. Over half of the fleet was shut down for repair, maintenance, and cracking and corrosion issues, resulting in record unplanned outages and nuclear output at a thirty-year low.

 Consider the Japanese nuclear fleet post- Fukushima. Gross electricity generation dropped from 275 TWh in 2011 to about 50 TWh as of July 2022…………..Neither reliable nor resilient, nuclear is often not there when you need it.

Can nuclear be there if we want it? …………………………… In 2019–2021 the mean construction time for reactors connected to the grid was 8.2 years, exceeding ‘expected’ estimates, which are usually quoted in the range of 4–5 years. Moreover, a host of Generation III+ reactor projects, touted as resolving engineering and project management issues that contributed to cost and construction blowouts, have all experienced cost and construction blowouts.

Prime examples are Olkiluoto-3 in Finland (expected 2009 become 2023, costs quadrupled), Flamanville-3 in France (expected 2012, still building, and costs increased fivefold), and Vogtle 3 & 4 in the USA (expected 2016-17, still building, and costs increased fivefold). The nuclear power industry has a negative, almost forgetting by doing, learning curve, rather than a positive learning curve.  Even the IAEA admitted investors were being scared off nuclear power by repeated failure to live up to promises…………….

Can nuclear power change? Advocates often pin their hopes on Small Modular Reactors (SMR), defined as sub-300MWe, designed for either serial construction or as sub-15MWe reactors for remote uses. Yet SMR’s are framed by the same kinds of utopian rhetorical visions we saw in the industry development stage, such as SMR’s as risk-free (extreme reliability and perfect safety), vehicles for indigenous autonomy (remote, portable or infrastructure-lite), and environmental saviours (waste and carbon free). 

Meanwhile material reality reveals the would-be emperor already has excessively expensive clothes. As documented by independent energy analysts at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, the NuScale SMR-plant proposal offered to Utah in the USA has already seen a reduction in units and a 53% jump in costs that render it even less cost-competitive with renewables than its originally uncompetitive offer.

SMRs do more than inherit farcical versions of the nuclear industry’s past over-promising. SMR proponents also push the technology in a way that would be a hindrance to decarbonisation……………..

………………… We should be suspicious about breezy nuclear industry claims that nuclear power and renewables can co-exist. In fact, research on resource allocation between nuclear and renewables finds evidence for the ‘crowding-out hypothesis’: that countries with greater attachment to nuclear will tend to have lesser attachment to renewables and vice versa). Any talk of SMRs should be interrogated for signs of material commitments, such as opposing grid upgrades, that would in fact mitigate against renewables, thus casting doubt on claims of ‘all of the above’ and on lip service paid to renewables as parts of decarbonisation pathways.

NUCLEAR AFTERLIFE

Some will respond to this analysis by suggesting my anti-nuclear stance is anti-technology or anti-science………..

An apt metaphor for nuclear power might thus be that of the afterlife: not the religious one – rather the Netflix series After Life, a dark comedy written and produced by Ricky Gervais. The central character Tony, played by Gervais, has lost his wife and, in his grief, decides he is just going to punish himself and the world by being a complete jerk. That is the nuclear industry. It is the option you choose when you have trouble moving on and you embrace absurd self-destruction and the visiting of farce and misery on others.

April 20, 2023 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, culture and arts | Leave a comment

Civil Society Wants Deeds, Not Words, on Nuclear Disarmament: The G7 Should Listen

The Civil 7 (C7) is a non-governmental organization that brings together thousands of highly-skilled individuals from around the world who work to improve government responses to global environmental, economic, and social problems. The C7 held its annual summit in Tokyo last week to discuss its current recommendations and to present them to emissaries of the Group of 7 (G7) nations—Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and the United States, which will be holding their annual summit in Hiroshima next month.  

For the first time in the history of the C7, it also presented recommendations on nuclear disarmament. I participated in the newly formed C7 Nuclear Disarmament Working Group and spoke about the need for it at the summit in Tokyo. The G7 decision to meet in Hiroshima this year acknowledges growing international concern about the growing risk of nuclear war and the costs of the new nuclear arms race. When US President Barack Obama visited Hiroshima in 2016, he considered, but then decided against, announcing specific steps to reduce the risk of nuclear use. The G7 has given no indication it is willing to halt the arms race that’s developed in the wake of Obama’s failure to act. 

Symbolism is important but it can be misleading. Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida claims credit for getting the powerful group of seven wealthy nations to Hiroshima to make a public statement supporting the ultimate elimination of nuclear weapons. But his government encourages the United States to develop new tactical nuclear weapons and to deploy them in East Asia. President Biden supports expensive and unnecessary upgrades to the US nuclear arsenal. The United Kingdom plans to increase its nuclear stockpile by forty percent and France is building a new generation of nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarines. Germany and Italy recently received upgraded US tactical nuclear weapons and both support US and NATO threats to use them first. 

The C7 recommended the G7 “unequivocally condemn any and all threats to use nuclear weapons and disavow all options to resort to nuclear weapons in conflict.” The G7 already agreed in its 2022 communique that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.” Nevertheless, as noted in the 2023 C7 communique, the three nuclear armed members of the G7 are currently spending over $100,000 a minute preparing for such a war. 

The C7 also recommended the G7 “begin urgent negotiations to achieve the complete elimination, of nuclear weapons before 2045,” the year of the 100th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki…………………………………… more https://blog.ucsusa.org/gregory-kulacki/civil-society-wants-deeds-not-words-on-nuclear-disarmament-the-g7-should-listen/

 

April 20, 2023 Posted by | 2 WORLD, weapons and war | Leave a comment

EU faces legal action after including gas and nuclear in ‘green’ investments guide

European Commission accused of acting unlawfully in two separate cases bought by environment groups

Jennifer Rankin in BrusselsTue 18 Apr 2023  https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/apr/18/eu-faces-legal-action-gas-nuclear-green-investments-guide

The European Commission is being sued by environmental campaigners over a decision to include gas and nuclear in an EU guide to “green” investments.

Two separate legal challenges are being lodged on Tuesday at the European Union’s general court in Luxembourg – one by Greenpeace and another by a coalition including Client Earth and WWF – after the classification of fuels in the so-called taxonomy, a guide for investors intended to channel billions into green technologies.

The EU executive, argues Greenpeace, acted unlawfully when it designated gas and nuclear as bridge technologies in the taxonomy, which is intended to help meet the bloc’s goal of carbon neutrality by 2050. Client Earth, along with three other NGOs, is challenging the inclusion of gas, which it says breaks the EU climate law that sets a legally binding target of reaching net zero emissions by the middle of the century.

The cases are the latest legal action against the EU’s “taxonomy for environmentally sustainable economic activities”. Last year a lawsuit was launched by Austria and supported by Luxembourg.

Eight national and regional Greenpeace organisations including France, Germany and EU office in Brussels are asking the court to rule the inclusion of gas and nuclear invalid.

Nina Treu, the executive director of Greenpeace Germany, said: “The taxonomy was meant to be a tool to meet the 1.5C target [on global heating] and make the European Union climate neutral, fostering social and economic restructuring for the European economy by shifting funds. Instead of hindering greenwashing, it has become a tool for greenwashing.”

Gas and nuclear had been included because of “politically motivated lobbying”, Treu said. Greenpeace will tell the court that gas cannot be considered a “transition fuel” because any gas-powered plant that comes online today will still be running beyond 2050.

The environment group will also say the construction of new nuclear plants – which usually take one to two decades to build in Europe – will delay the move away from coal power, hinder development of renewables, risk accidents and create pollution. “Nuclear is dangerous, expensive, vulnerable to climate change and too slow to stop the climate breakdown,” Treu said.

Greenpeace has hired the lawyer Roda Verheyen, who acted for the group in a landmark case that resulted in Germany’s climate protection laws being ruled inadequate by the country’s constitutional court in 2021.

Verheyen said the inclusion of gas and nuclear was not in line with the EU’s original taxonomy law. “The European Commission has violated the very idea of the taxonomy regulation. This is especially obvious as including nuclear activities does pose significant harm to the environment, which is expressly prohibited by the regulation.”

The lawsuit was “essentially an enforcement claim”, she said. “Observe your own law. Actually carry through with the European green deal,” she said, referring to the EU’s flagship climate plan.

The EU taxonomy became law in July 2020, but legislators left important details to be resolved through so-called delegated acts – secondary legislation meant for technical issues that is not subject to the same degree of ministerial and parliamentary oversight.

The campaign groups are challenging one of the delegated acts.

The separate legal challenge by the coalition including Client Earth and WWF covers the inclusion of gas but not nuclear. Anaïs Berthier at Client Earth said the European Commission had violated a requirement to make science-based policy and broken the EU climate law that required policymakers to carry out checks to ensure all actions by the bloc were consistent with the goal of achieving net zero by 2050.

“Labelling fossil gas as ‘sustainable’ is as absurd as it is unlawful,” said the coalition, which also includes the NGOs Transport & Environment and Bund. “It goes against the EU’s own scientific advice and fundamentally undermines the credibility of the EU’s climate action. Fossil gas is not clean, not cheap and not a secure source of energy.”

A judgment is expected in 2025, although participants expressed the hope the court would act faster. “There is confusion in the market, because the current law infringes European law,” Verheyen said.

April 19, 2023 Posted by | EUROPE, legal | Leave a comment

83 Hiroshimas — New nuclear bombs coming to Europe and UK

US ships powerful new nuke to Europe, heightening tensions

83 Hiroshimas — Beyond Nuclear International

American B61-12 nuclear bombs head to Europe

From ICAN

Since last December, the United States has begun to replace its nuclear weapons on European soil with more modern ones. It is replacing the B61-3, B61-4 and B61-7 thermonuclear bombs with the B61-12, which has become the main US and NATO air-launched nuclear weapon.

Boeing designed the bomb’s new guided-tailkit, giving it additional maneuverability and the appearance of more precision. But, it’s a nuclear weapon, and has different yields, from 0.3kt to 50kt. These bombs can detonate beneath the Earth’s surface, increasing their destructiveness against underground targets to the equivalent of a surface-burst weapon with a yield of 1,250 kilotons––the equivalent of 83 Hiroshima bombs. 

These nuclear weapons are coming to Europe in a time of heightened nuclear tension on the continent, and even as the majority of people in European host countries want to remove nuclear weapons and join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons.

Combined with the lack of transparency around nuclear sharing, this moment raises questions about whether citizens in the host states would agree to be complicit if these weapons are ever used.  Even if the bombs are American and the US retains launch authority, they would most likely be dropped by Europeans. If the US decides to use its nuclear weapons located in Germany, the warheads are loaded onto German planes and a German pilot drops them. 

ICAN is a broad, inclusive campaign, focused on mobilizing civil society around the world to support the specific objective of prohibiting and eliminating nuclear weapons. 

Share this video to spread the word about these new nuclear weapons and join the movement to eliminate them.

And from: Tica Font, member of Centre Delàs and WILPF Spain, published by Pressenza

It is a free-fall bomb equipped with state-of-the-art navigation systems and a versatile warhead that can be configured in four strengths, 0.3 kiloton (kt), 1.5 kt, 10 kt and 50 kt depending on the target, making it a low to medium-yield weapon. This type of weapon is referred to as a ‘first-strike’ weapon. Having a tactical nuclear weapon with higher precision and lower yield could make politicians less reluctant to use them in conventional operations and puts us on an increasingly dangerous front line of confrontation between NATO and Russia.

These new nuclear weapons will replace existing ones on the soil of Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, Germany and Turkey. But Washington has announced that it will also deploy them on UK soil; this time it is not a replacement for more outdated ones, as it reported in 2008 that its nuclear weapons had been withdrawn from the RAF; now it appears that it wants to put new nuclear weapons in the empty bunkers at Lakenheath again.

All this deployment of nuclear weapons represents a violation of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). The NPT prohibits nuclear-weapon States Parties from transferring nuclear weapons to any other State and prohibits non-nuclear-weapon States Parties from receiving nuclear weapons or from manufacturing or acquiring them.

53 years after the entry into force of the NPT, we see that it has not served to achieve nuclear disarmament. Just two years ago, in January 2021, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) entered into force. The TPNW outlaws nuclear weapons and makes it illegal for states that sign the TPNW to possess, develop, deploy, test, use or threaten to use nuclear weapons.

However, for the Spanish government the NPT remains the “cornerstone of the international nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament regime”, considering that this treaty is an adequate and sufficient instrument for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. They therefore consider that the TPNW is not necessary, as the NPT already exists.

But the facts do not support the Spanish government’s position. In addition to the deployment of new weapons in Europe, the new NATO Strategic Concept 2022, approved in Madrid last summer, states that “NATO’s deterrence and defence posture is based on an appropriate mix of nuclear, conventional and missile defence assets (…) and that it will take all necessary steps to ensure the credibility, effectiveness, integrity and security of the nuclear deterrence mission”.

In short, it seems that the NPT is only defended when it comes to imposing nuclear weapons restrictions on countries outside the NATO orbit (the “others”), that compliance with the NPT is not applicable to either the US or NATO, while both re-emphasise deterrence and the nuclear threat. On the contrary, the safest position, the position that would best reflect citizens’ aspirations to completely destroy nuclear weapons, is for Spain to decide to join the TPNW, and for the Spanish government to attend meetings of TPNW states parties, to show genuine support for denuclearisation.

Tica Font is a member of Centre Delàs and WILPF Spain.

April 19, 2023 Posted by | EUROPE, weapons and war | 3 Comments

UK ignites new depleted uranium weapons debate — Beyond Nuclear International

Headline photo shows a painting by Mark Southerland, who served in the Marine Corps from 1988-1994, an unshakable image from ‘Desert Storm’, painted as therapy in recovery from PTSD. Wikimedia Commons.

Wars in Iraq/ Kuwait and the Balkans have left toxic legacy

UK ignites new depleted uranium weapons debate — Beyond Nuclear International

The situation in Ukraine creates a double jeopardy. First, the use of DU weapons by the Ukrainian military might provoke the Russians to use nuclear weapons. And second, simply transporting these weapons from Britain and using them on Ukrainian soil will constitute additional radioactive and heavy metal pollution with long-term effects on human health and the European environment.

Taking all of this into consideration, the known risks of DU weapons are already too great to justify their continued use.

UK will send DU weapons to Ukraine prompting “nuclear” rhetoric from Russia

By Linda Pentz Gunter and Maria Arvaniti Sotiropoulou 

On March 21, 2023 Britain confirmed that it was sending depleted uranium (DU) weapons to Ukraine , prompting a response from Russian president, Vladimir Putin, that, “If all this happens, Russia will have to respond accordingly, given that the west collectively is already beginning to use weapons with a nuclear component.”

Russian defense minister, Sergei Shoigu, warned that such steps moved us closer to a “nuclear collision.”

Days later, Putin announced he had made an arrangement with neighboring Belarus to station tactical nuclear weapons there.

According to ICAN, Putin “will start training Belarusian personnel to use them” and that “up to 10 Belarusian aircraft are already prepared to use these weapons and Russia would complete the construction of a storage facility for nuclear warheads in Belarus by July.”

The Belarus nuclear weapons deal was more likely a response to the continued expansion of NATO — with Finland now the newest member — rather than retaliation for Britain arming Ukraine with depleted uranium weapons.

However, there are many wrongs in this situation to unpack. 

Possessing or threatening the use of nuclear weapons is a violation of the human rights that are embedded in the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. The use of depleted uranium weapons is also abhorrent, with compelling, if still somewhat anecdotal, evidence from the wars in the Balkans and Iraq/Kuwait to suggest these toxic exposures cause serious long-term health effects. 

Despite Putin’s thinly veiled threat mount a nuclear response to DU weapons, the International Campaign to Ban Uranium Weapons (ICBUW) points out that this would be disproportionate because “DU projectiles are not nuclear weapons at all, but conventional weapons of high chemical-radiological toxicity and harmfulness.” 

Adds Dr. Frank Boulton of the British IPPNW affiliate, MEDACT: “Much if not most of the toxicity of DU is biological rather than radiological (DU is a heavy metal with biological effects similar to that of lead)”.

The US and NATO used around 980,000 rounds of uranium shells in Iraq and Kuwait, 10,800 in Bosnia, 31,000 in Kosovo , another 7,000 in S. Serbia and Montenegro, and an unknown number in Afghanistan, while Russia also used such weapons in Chechnya.

The ICBUW quickly spoke out against the export of DU weapons to Ukraine: “The use of DU munitions has been shown to cause widespread and lasting damage to the health of people living in the contaminated area,” the network said in a statement. “Military personnel and those involved in subsequent demining are also exposed to health hazards from DU (remnants). In addition, long-term environmental damage, including groundwater contamination, occurs as a result of DU use.”

Kate Hudson, General Secretary of the long-time British peace and disarmament group Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, also condemned her country’s decision:

“CND has repeatedly called for the UK government to place an immediate moratorium on the use of depleted uranium weapons and to fund long-term studies into their health and environmental impacts,” she said. “Sending them into yet another war zone will not help the people of Ukraine.”

The UK may not be the first country to introduce DU weapons into the current Russia-Ukraine war. In a statement, the ICBUW said that, “According to media reports, Russian forces in Ukraine have also recently received the more modern 3BM60 ‘Svinets-2’ ammunition.” The Guardian reported that “Moscow also has its own Svinets-2 depleted uranium tank shells in its stockpile,” without saying whether or not they had been deployed in Ukraine.

International Humanitarian Law prohibits weapons that cause unnecessary suffering, have indiscriminate effects or cause long-term damage to the natural environment, factors that should apply to outlawing DU weapons.

Several resolutions have been passed in both the UN General Assembly and in the European Parliament calling for a moratorium on the use of DU weapons. The latest such UN resolution was adopted by the General Assembly in 2022. Yet, no treaty regulating — let alone banning — DU weapons exists.

DU is used in weaponry because, due to its high molecular weight, it easily penetrates the steel of armored tanks. Missile-like uranium weapons will pierce any target they hit at 3,600km/h. 

Known as uranium-238, DU is a by-product of the uranium enrichment process needed to produce the fuel for nuclear reactors. It is called ‘depleted’ because it has a lower content of the fissile isotope, uranium-235, than natural uranium. Depleted uranium has a half-life of 4.5 billion years. 

DU is highly toxic, especially when inhaled and can be present in the human body for many years as well as excreted in urine. According to the IPPNW pamphlet — Uranium Weapons. Radioactive Penetrators — “When uranium is inhaled or ingested with foods and beverages, its full pathogenic and lethal effects unfold. On entering the body it is taken up by the blood, which transports it to the organs. It can reach an unborn child via the placenta.” 

Continue reading →

April 19, 2023 Posted by | depleted uranium, Reference, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Germany’s last nukes shut down — Beyond Nuclear

As planned, Germany closed the last of its three operational reactors on April 15. These were kept running beyond their original December 2022 shutdown dates, largely as a political concession to conservative minority partners within the German government, as their electricity was not actually needed. The German winter energy crunch was related to a cutoff of gas imports from Russia, needed for heating. Since German heating is not electric, nuclear power had no role to play in easing that situation.

Amidst all the false propaganda in circulation that the German nuclear shutdown has caused a rise in coal use in Germany, it’s important to note an important historical fact that is the genesis for the German green energy revolution — known in Germany as the Energiewende.

Germany’s last nukes shut down — Beyond Nuclear

The Renewable Energy Act of 2000 stipulated as a pre-condition, that if nuclear power plants were to be shut down, these would be replaced by renewable energy and not by fossil fuels. And by creating a favorable and reliable investment environment for renewables, this is exactly what happened. Given its starting point in 2000, the growth of renewables has been stratospheric and Germany is well on target for its 2045 carbon-neutral goal. It also plans to phase out all coal use by 2038 at the latest and possibly by 2030. Moreover, while the nuclear share of Germany’s electricity market in 2000 was around 30%, today it is less than 6%.

Recent slight increases in brown coal (lignite) production in Germany were not for domestic consumption but market driven and, ironically, to meet winter electricity needs in nuclear France, which saw more than half of its not-so-reliable nuclear power fleet go down. More information about why Germany’s Energiewende is working, can be found in the 5th edition of our Talking Points. (Headline photo: Jakob Huber/Wikimedia Commons)

April 19, 2023 Posted by | Germany, politics | Leave a comment

How Fukushima wastewater into Pacific will disrupt seafood trade


By Ming Wang, Dalian Maritime University, China

Public opinion will dictate how Japanese seafood is received after the wastewater is disposed of into the Pacific Ocean.

The global seafood market faces turmoil with the release of the Fukushima nuclear wastewater from Japan into the Pacific Ocean, computer modelling predicts.

Japan announced in 2021 it would release over 1.25 million tonnes of treated Fukushima radioactive wastewater into the sea as part of its plan to decommission the power station when its storage capacity reaches its limit this year.

Seafood is one of the most important food commodities in international trade, far exceeding meat and milk products. According to the United Nations Comtrade database, global seafood trade has grown from $US7.6 billion in 2009 to $US12.4 billion in 2019, an increase of 63 percent.

The Japanese nuclear wastewater discharge raises global worries about the safety of Japanese seafood as public opinion influences consumers’ preference for seafood.

In this empirical study involving American consumers, 30 percent of respondents said they reduced their seafood consumption following the Fukushima nuclear plant accident and more than half believe Asian seafood poses a risk to consumer health due to the disaster.

Most of Japan’s seafood trading partners, such as China, Russia, India and South Korea, imposed temporary bans on food from several districts around Fukushima in the wake of the accident in 2011.


This paper models the potential impact of the Fukushima nuclear wastewater disposal on the global seafood trade using the import and export data for 26 countries which make up more than 92 percent of the world’s trade in marine products………………..

China, South Korea and the US are expected to increase their seafood imports from Denmark, France, Norway and other community group two countries while reducing seafood exports to them. This is because these three countries have already reduced their seafood trade with Japan.

The increase in exports from community group three to community group two nations leads to a decrease in imports and exports between countries within community group two. For example, the study notes that Denmark, Norway and France are all experiencing a decrease in seafood exports and imports between each other……………………………………..


The model also divided the global seafood market into two segments – the first being the Japanese market and the second comprising 25 other countries. It calculated that Japan’s seafood exports fell by 19 percent in 2021, or $US259 million.

Public opinion after the Fukushima wastewater is discharged will have different impacts on the import and export trade of seafood for each country, especially for countries which trade with Japan.

What people think about the discharge is closely related to the amount of Japanese seafood imported by each country. The higher the amount of Japanese seafood imported by a particular country, the more negative public opinion is likely to be, according to computer modelling…………………………………………………………… more https://www.rnz.co.nz/international/pacific-news/487942/how-fukushima-wastewater-into-pacific-will-disrupt-seafood-trade

April 19, 2023 Posted by | environment, Japan | Leave a comment

Lawsuit seeks to uphold closing California’s last nuke plant

By MICHAEL R. BLOOD, April 11, 2023

LOS ANGELES (AP) — An environmental group on Tuesday sued to block Pacific Gas & Electric from seeking to extend the federal operating licenses for California’s last nuclear power plant.

A complaint filed in San Francisco Superior Court by Friends of the Earth asks the court to prohibit the utility from sidestepping its 2016 agreement with environmentalists and plant workers to close the twin-domed Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant by 2025.

The possibility of a longer operating run emerged last year after Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Legislature opened the way for PG&E to seek an extended lifespan for the twin reactors. The company intends to apply to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission by the end of the year to extend operations by as much as two decades.

The operating license for the Unit 1 reactor expires next year and the Unit 2 license expires in 2025.

Hallie Templeton, legal director for Friends of the Earth, said in a statement that “PG&E has been acting as if our contract has disappeared.”……………..

Newsom’s decision last year to support a longer operating run for Diablo Canyon shocked environmentalists and anti-nuclear advocates because he had once been a leading voice for closing the plant…………….

At issue in the lawsuit is how a complex 2016 agreement figures in the Legislature’s decision reverse itself and to try and keep the reactors running. At the time the agreement to wind down Diablo Canyon was made, California utility regulators, the Legislature and then-Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown agreed to the closure………..

“PG&E acts as if it has no remaining contractual obligations,” the complaint said, while asserting that the utility still has a responsibility to retire the nuclear power plant on schedule.

It’s not clear if the reactors will continue operating beyond the expiration of their 2024 and 2025 licenses — and if so, for how long — since many regulatory milestones and unanswered questions remain. Last year, PG&E CEO Patricia “Patti” Poppe warned that the “permitting and relicensing of the facility is complex and so there’s a lot of hurdles to be overcome.”……

Newsom’s decision last year to support a longer operating run for Diablo Canyon shocked environmentalists and anti-nuclear advocates because he had once been a leading voice for closing the plant…………..

At issue in the lawsuit is how a complex 2016 agreement figures in the Legislature’s decision reverse itself and to try and keep the reactors running. At the time the agreement to wind down Diablo Canyon was made, California utility regulators, the Legislature and then-Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown agreed to the closure.

The complaint describes the 2016 agreement as a “contract,” and asks the court to find it binding. It also asks for an order prohibiting PG&E from violating the contract.

“PG&E acts as if it has no remaining contractual obligations,” the complaint said, while asserting that the utility still has a responsibility to retire the nuclear power plant on schedule.

It’s not clear if the reactors will continue operating beyond the expiration of their 2024 and 2025 licenses — and if so, for how long — since many regulatory milestones and unanswered questions remain. Last year, PG&E CEO Patricia “Patti” Poppe warned that the “permitting and relicensing of the facility is complex and so there’s a lot of hurdles to be overcome.”

For example, it’s not yet publicly known what it will cost to update the plant for a longer run given that the company was preparing to close it for years. The state could consider backing out if capital costs climb over $1.4 billion and a string of state agencies also has to review extending the plant’s lifespan…………………

The lawsuit also named labor groups from the plant that were involved in the 2016 agreement as defendants, including the Coalition Of California Utility Employees.  https://apnews.com/article/diablo-canyon-nuclear-extension-california-reactors-pge-cd398f8251311053b08aa8fbfcfa8ef4

April 19, 2023 Posted by | legal, USA | Leave a comment

SEN. MARKEY AND REP. LIEU ANNOUNCE LEGISLATION TO LIMIT U.S. PRESIDENT’S POWER TO UNILATERALLY START NUCLEAR WAR

 https://www.markey.senate.gov/news/press-releases/sen-markey-and-rep-lieu-announce-legislation-to-limit-us-presidents-power-to-unilaterally-start-nuclear-war

17 Apr 23

Bill would  prevent any American president from launching a nuclear first strike without Congressional approval

Bill Text (PDF)

Washington (April 14, 2023) – Senator Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), co-chair of the Nuclear Weapons and Arms Control Working Group, and Representative Ted Lieu (CA-33) today announced the reintroduction of the Restricting First Use of Nuclear Weapons Act to prohibit any United States President from launching a nuclear strike without prior authorization from Congress. The legislation would also institute safeguards to prevent the president from introducing nuclear weapons in a conflict and reaffirm Congress’ singular constitutional authority to declare war. The reintroduction of Restricting First Use of Nuclear Weapons Act comes after a year of reckless nuclear threats from Russian President Vladimir Putin in his war of aggression against Ukraine. Fifty-four years ago this week, on April 15, 1969, North Korea shot down a U.S. military plane. According to top aides present at the time, an intoxicated President Richard Nixon allegedly ordered a nuclear strike in response. Thankfully, that order was disregarded and never carried out – however, it exposed the dangerous possibility of a rogue U.S. president ordering a nuclear strike without Congressional authorization.

“No president has the right or the constitutional authority to unilaterally declare war, let alone launch a nuclear first strike,” said Senator Markey. “In the face of Vladimir Putin’s nuclear threats, Congress must pass the Restricting First Use of Nuclear Weapons Act to reaffirm its authority and make clear to world leaders that the United States will uphold its commitment to peace, stability, and democracy.”

“Our founders established a system of checks and balances for a reason—no one person should have the ability to launch a war that would end life as we know it,” said Representative Lieu. “Congress alone has the constitutional duty to declare war, and decide whether a nuclear launch is necessary. In the wake of Russia’s unprovoked and illegal invasion of Ukraine, and given the volatility of autocrats like war criminal Vladimir Putin, the threat presented by unpredictable use of nuclear weapons has never been clearer. I’m proud to join Senator Markey in reintroducing this important legislation, which will establish necessary guardrails to the President’s ability to launch nuclear weapons.”

A copy of the legislation can be found HERE.

The Restricting First Use of Nuclear Weapons Act is endorsed by Physicians for Social Responsibility, Council for a Livable World, Foreign Policy for America, Friends Committee on National Legislation, Global Zero, Win Without War, and Ploughshares Fund.

In 2022, Senators Markey and Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Representatives John Garamendi (CA-03) and Don Beyer (VA-08) led 51 of their colleagues in a letter to President Joe Biden urging the U.S. to reduce its reliance on nuclear weapons. On the one-year anniversary of the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the lawmakers condemned President Putin’s nuclear threats and Russia’s violation of the New START Treaty.

April 19, 2023 Posted by | politics, USA | Leave a comment

Disarming the persistent myths of a glowing nuclear renaissance

The trend is clear: nuclear energy is being replaced as a source of electricity. But advocates still rage against the dying of the light

DARRIN DURANT. APR 18, 2023, Crikey.com

Proposals to revive commercially viable large-scale nuclear energy are farcical in the extreme, but what’s behind recent talk of a nuclear “renaissance”? It arose in the late 1990s and early 2000s, driven by concerns about the need to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, decarbonise the electrical grid, and respond to an ageing nuclear fleet due for decommissioning.

Nuclear was claimed to be the only “reliable” alternative to fossil fuels, a coded way to reproduce as much as possible of the political-economic and technical incumbency effects connected to the centralised generation of electricity. 

As we’ve been told, nuclear power — being low-carbon in operation mode — would be necessary to decarbonise. So the main problem with selling new nuclear as necessary is that it is no longer, well, necessary. …….. (Subscribers only)  https://www.crikey.com.au/2023/04/18/nuclear-energy-quelling-myths/

April 19, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Disturbing Sea Level Studies, (Which Threaten All Nuclear Facilities Sited Close To Oceans, Rivers & Lakes)

BY ROBERT HUNZIKER, 14 Apr 23, mhttps://www.counterpunch.org/2023/04/14/disturbing-sea-level-studies/

For decades, climate scientists have been sounding the alarm that unless the nations of the world stop emitting greenhouse gases global warming will bring dangerous consequences. Rather, greenhouse gases, like CO2, have escalated to new highs year-over-year without hesitation.

Now, new climate studies are exposing the results of decades of a couldn’t-care-less world interwoven within a deadly entrapment of free-market dictates of “not to worry, the market will handle it.” It hasn’t!

Ergo, the price for decades of jaded indifference is starting to run very high and maybe irreversible with a sea level calamity poised to spring loose, catching the world unprepared.

Two major new studies paint a sobering picture of unexpected sea levels well beyond anybody’s expectations. Indeed, the world is not braced for this:

1. According to an article in The Guardian d/d April 10, 2023: “What experts are calling a dramatic surge in ocean levels has taken place along the US south-eastern and Gulf of Mexico coastline since 201o. (referenced study: Jianjun Yin, Decadal Acceleration of Sea Level Rise Along the U.S. East and Gulf of Mexico During 2010-2022… Journal of Climate, March 2, 2023)

2. Another new study: Christine L. Batchelor, et al, Rapid, Buoyancy-Driven Ice-Sheet Retreat of Hundreds of Metres Per Day, Nature, April 5, 2023 demonstrates nightmarish rapid sea level rise based upon events in the past when ice sheets retreated in pulses of almost 2,000 feet per day during the end of the last ice age. Conditions today may be similar.

As reported by Inside Climate News, the Batchelor study has alarmed climate scientists, especially glaciologists at the top of the field like Eric Rignot (more to follow) and according to Frazer Christie, polar scientist at Scott Polar Research Center/University of Cambridge: The study showed ice sheet retreat rates up to 20 times faster than previously measured anywhere else: “It’s probably likely, in my opinion, that this rapid buoyancy driven course of retreat, could be all that’s needed to set in motion a chain of events that spirals into a more runaway style of retreat.” (Source: Global Warming Could Drive Pulses of Ice Sheet Retreat Reaching 2,000 Feet Per Day, Inside Climate News, April 5, 2023)

The Batchelor study claims that “pulses of sea level rise could also be much greater than the long-term average rates currently projected by climate models… during past geological intervals of rapid warming, there’s evidence of sea level increasing at a rate of up to 20 inches per decade during episodes of rapid sea level ice sheet disintegration,” Ibid.

According to Eric Rignot, glaciologist at the University of California, Irvine and Caltech’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory: “This is an important study revealing that we have not seen anything yet in terms of how fast an ice sheet can retreat dynamically, not just melting away, but falling apart… This is not a model. This is real data. And it is frankly scary, even to me. These data should keep us awake at night,” Ibid.

Christine Batchelor, geophysicist, and a marine geology researcher at University of Newcastle said that prior studies along the Antarctic Peninsula showed a similar pattern of seafloor ridges near Larsen Ice Shelf suggesting an ice sheet retreat of up to 150 feet per day for 90 days or 6 miles of retreat per year.

The infamous Thwaites (Doomsday) Glacier in West Antarctica has an ocean-bottom that matches the Batchelor study earmarked as a “danger zone” “which has a relatively flat area just a few kilometers inland of where it is currently… so it would be a good candidate of where you might see a pulse of rapid retreat in the future,” Ibid.

According to the International Thwaites Glacier Collaboration: Thwaites is losing ice faster than at any time in the past 5,000 years. And based upon an article in Scientific American d/d November 1, 2022: “Two expeditions to the Thwaites Ice Shelf have revealed that it could splinter apart in less than a decade, hastening sea-level rise worldwide.”

The Batchelor study showed the fastest rate of ice sheet retreat on record, but accordingly, depending upon “the level of warming” even faster rates are possible. This may be what is happening today. According to US climate.gov: Today’s global warming is much faster than warm periods between ice ages over the last million years.

Rignot claims: “During the time period when these events were recorded, sea level was rising 4 meters (13 feet) per century… That is 10 times what we have today. Are you scared yet? Well, you should be,” Ibid.

Meanwhile, the Jianjun Yin, University of Arizona study published in Journal of Climate: “Provides an alarming new assessment of a key ingredient of the escalating climate emergency, particularly in popular but vulnerable areas of the US where millions of people live.” (Source: Miami and New Orleans Face Greater Sea-Level Threat Than Already Feared, The Guardian, April 10, 2023)

Scientists have detected “a dramatic surge in ocean levels” along the US south-eastern and Gulf of Mexico coastlines since 2010, an increase of 5in. This is more than double the global average. The entire region is feeling the impact of sea-level acceleration. Climate scientists claim the surge is unprecedented and amplified by internal climate variabilities. Already, stories of cascading shoreline homes as well as physical movement of houses more inland occur regularly at the Outer Banks, North Carolina.

These are some of the first known studies to identify an actual surge in sea levels over the past decade as well as paleoclimate evidence of rapid pulses of ice sheet retreat and likely disintegration that are well beyond projections of sea levels by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC.

A certain level of wistfulness follows in the footsteps of these studies that depict a worsening, as well as absolutely frightening, global warming scenario that’s hastening the collapse of ice sheets that clearly and impactfully threaten modern-day civilization. But based upon blasé reactions by the world at large, it’s treated lightly, almost like it’s not reality. If it were otherwise, accepting a very harsh reality, major nations of the world would be pulling out all the stops to do whatever is necessary. Alas, this is not happening, not even close.

Robert Hunziker lives in Los Angeles and can be reached at rlhunziker@gmail.com.

April 19, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

US ready to lend Poland $4 billion for nuclear energy plan

A project to develop about 20 small nuclear power reactors in Poland is moving forward as Polish energy company Orlen and two U.S. government financial institutions signed an agreement

abc news, By MONIKA SCISLOWSKA Associated Press, April 17, 2023,

WARSAW, Poland — A project to develop small nuclear power reactors in Poland is moving forward, with Polish energy company Orlen and two U.S. government financial institutions signing an agreement Monday.

Poland is turning toward energy that is renewable [whaa a at – nuclear renewable?] or does not use climate-changing fossil fuels as it tries to break its reliance on coal. Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine also has accelerated Poland’s drive to cut its dependence on Russian oil and natural gas…………………

April 19, 2023 Posted by | business and costs, EUROPE | Leave a comment

Impending 50-nation Pentagon/NATO Ukraine war council will focus on warplanes — Anti-bellum

Stars and StripesApril 17, 2023 Austin, defense leaders to meet again at Ramstein to pledge more support for Ukraine Defense ministers and senior military officials from the U.S. and some 50 partner nations helping Ukraine fight Russia will convene Friday at Ramstein Air Base for the latest round of talks. The meeting of the Ukraine […]

Impending 50-nation Pentagon/NATO Ukraine war council will focus on warplanes — Anti-bellum

April 19, 2023 Posted by | Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Alba MP Neale Hanvey calls for Ministry of Defence to tackle nuclear decontamination at Dalgety Bay

The National, By James Walker @James_L_Walker 19 Apr 23

More than 3,000 radioactive particles have been found at Dalgety Bay.

ALBA Party MP Neale Hanvey has called on the Ministry of Defence to clean-up radiation contamination on the Dalgety Bay shoreline.

In a statement, Hanvey added that “there can be no excuse for inaction”.

Leading a Westminster debate on the issue on Tuesday, the MP for Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath – the constituency which includes the West Fife town – listed and condemned what he described as a “historical backlog in remediation”.

Radioactive material was first detected at Dalgety Bay in 1990 and came from WW2 planes, which had aircraft dials coated in radium to help pilots see in the dark.

More than 3,000 radioactive particles, with a half-life of 1,600 years, have been found on the beach and next to Dalgety Bay Sailing Club.

Restrictions were put in place in 2011, with parts of the beach fenced off.

The MoD admitted responsibility for the radioactive pollution in 2014. But plans to tackle the issue have frequently been delayed.

Balfour Beatty took on a £10.5 million contract in 2020 but decontamination work didn’t get under way until May 2021 and hasn’t yet been completed.

Hanvey has repeatedly condemned the Ministry of Defense for continued silence and delays in tackling the issue.

At the debate, Hanvey asked the Minister for Defence Procurement, Alex Chalk, for further clarification as to when the work would be completed, the costs incurred and whether they will be fully covered by the MoD.

Chalk said the cost would be around £15 million. He said that the costs would be be met by the MoD, but added: “I stress that there was absolutely no legal requirement on the Ministry of Defence to do so. However, we decided to take that step.”

Chalk also stressed that many of the delays were unforeseen, including having to “search through many tonnes of sand and soil for minute radioactive particles”.

He added, however, that he was “delighted” to say that work will be completed by September 2023…………………. more https://www.thenational.scot/news/23464754.alba-mp-neale-hanvey-calls-mod-tackle-nuclear-decontamination/

April 19, 2023 Posted by | environment, history, Reference, UK | Leave a comment

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