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New concerns, questions over soil transfer at DOE Paducah Site

Todd Faulkner, Mason Watkins, Mackenzie Lionberger, Oct 16, 2026, https://www.wpsdlocal6.com/news/new-concerns-questions-over-soil-transfer-at-doe-paducah-site/article_071efe65-415d-4887-b247-2eb06df92de5.html

PADUCAH — There are new questions and concerns involving soil from a parcel of land at the Department of Energy Paducah Site.

WPSD-TV originally reported that soil was being removed from the DOE Paducah Site by General Matter and placed on other properties in McCracken County.

Prior to Sept. 9, WPSD viewers reached out to the station concerned about the soil transfer and wondered if the soil was contaminated.

McCracken County Judge Executive Craig Clymer later received a document from a division of the DOE that said an analysis of the soil was shared with the Environmental Protection Agency which confirmed that the soil is “protective of human health and the environment” and “the soil meets risk standards.”

After that report, a source reached out to WPSD questioning the factual content of that analysis and the statement sent to the judge executive’s office — and whether the soil, in fact, did meet residential and recreational risk standards.

The source provided and cited a number of pieces of information from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. What was provided were dozens of documents and email exchanges that the source claims made clear that the Parcel A soil evaluated by EPA Region 4 was only for “on site industrial conditions” — not off site, or what’s considered “unrestricted-use clearance.”

In an email correspondence between WPSD’s source and an EPA employee, the employee writes: “The EPA did not anticipate that soil located on DOE Paducah Parcel A property (being leased to General Matter) would be transported off DOE property to a residential property. The EPA was informed in June by the Kentucky Department for Environmental Protection (KDEP) that soil from the General Matter lease site was observed being transported to a nearby private property on the east side of Hobbs Road.”

Later, that same employee writes: “Although Parcel A is restricted to industrial use only, cancer and noncancer effects are unlikely for a future resident under unrestricted use/unlimited exposure to Leasing Parcel A soil.”

In a letter to Judge Executive Craig Clymer, as previously reported, the DOE wrote: “This supplemental risk evaluation found that chemicals and radioactive constituents in the soil at Leasing Parcel A are not expected to create unacceptable health risks for resident or recreator scenarios.”


Reporters took the information provided and contacted the EPA for comment.

A public and government affairs manager responded by email: “To confirm, the DOE evaluated soil data from the area now being leased by General Matter. DOE concluded that the soil does not pose an unacceptable risk to human health. The EPA reviewed DOE’s evaluation and conclusion. Based on the data available, there is no unacceptable cancer risk or noncancer health effects posed to hypothetical future residents, recreators, or industrial workers from the soil removed from the leased parcel.”

When asked for comment on this latest concern regarding General Matter removing soil from the site, WPSD received the following statement: “Last month, we finished up our initial soil and grading activity on schedule. We appreciate the EPA’s thorough review and look forward to welcoming our neighbors at next week’s Community Open House.”

Other entities involved in the situation include more than DOE and General Matter. Those include the EPA, the Kentucky Division of Waste Management and other agencies.

General Matter’s public open house is set for 4:30 to 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, Oct 21, at McCracken County High School.

October 20, 2026 Posted by | environment, USA | Leave a comment

Guam Grapples With Pollution As US Military Keeps Expanding

To people who live in Guam, the ongoing Pentagon buildup in the Pacific offers a warning.

Honolulu Civil Beat, By Grist, October 12, 2026

This story by Anita Hofschneider was originally published by Grist and was published in partnership with The Intercept.

Leevin Camacho was brushing his teeth one day last fall when his mother called. The water is contaminated, she said. Moments later she texted him a photo of a flyer issued by the local water authority. “Cancer risk,” it warned. “Increased likelihood of adverse impacts on the liver.” And in bold capital letters, “DO NOT DRINK.”

Camacho stared at the message. Water flowed from the faucets as his children, who were 10 and 12, gulped and spit, their faces reflected in the mirrors above the two bathroom sinks.  

Thumbing at his phone, Camacho googled dieldrin. The results included words like “organochlorine” and “insecticide” and “persistent environmental pollutant” that the United States had banned in 1987. Worse, high levels had been detected in his community’s water since at least 2008. “Our kids have been drinking the water,” he realized. “They’ve been cooking with the water for almost their entire lives at this point.” 

Today, Guam sits at the center of an ongoing military buildup, one that is reshaping the island even as it spreads across the Pacific. On Yap, more than 1,000 graves could be disturbed to make way for an American seaport and airfield. Indigenous leaders on Palau are suing to protect their lands. Less visible but just as impactful are the climate impacts of this expansion. The Pentagon is already the world’s largest institutional emitter of greenhouse gases, and its buildup will do more than contribute to the destruction of the region’s reefs, forests, and Indigenous sacred sites. It will accelerate the climate crisis that threatens the survival of Pacific islands.

To people who live in Guam, the ongoing Pentagon buildup in the Pacific offers a warning

Camacho lives in Yigo, a northern village on the island of Guam. In time, he would learn that the U.S. Air Force base next to the well serving his house had reported “very high levels” of the pesticide, which it had listed as a “chemical of concern” since at least 1993. The Pentagon’s investigation, led by officials at Joint Region Marianas, is in its early stages. Local officials caution that although they suspect the base is a source of the pollution, there may be others because dieldrin was once widely used.

For Camacho, the news felt like the unfolding of a familiar story — one both predictable and infuriating.

Camacho had grown up as an Army brat, raised to think of the United States as Guam’s liberator from Japan during World War II. But over the past two decades, his understanding of that legacy has changed. 

“There are certain actions that the military takes that are contrary to the interests of the people who are from Guam and who live in Guam,” said Camacho, whose measured tone rarely changes, even when discussing something as emotional as what his children have been drinking. 

To Camacho, dieldrin is the latest reminder that the people of Guam continue to bear the costs of militarization. Unexploded ordnance litters jungles and lagoons. PCBs contaminate the fish. Pollutants taint the groundwater. The island and its people, who are U.S. citizens, have been inalterably changed by more than a century of American military presence.

Rear Admiral Brett Mietus, the head of Joint Region Marianas, the U.S. Navy’s regional command for Guam and neighboring islands, said he can’t speak to past pollution but the command is committed to protecting the environment and the people of Guam. 

“We spend a lot of time and we spend a lot of money making sure that we meet every U.S. regulation when it comes to anything that we’re going to do here,” he told Grist. “We’re meeting every letter of every law for environmental regulations and rules, and we’re doing that while we’re spending a ton of money to defend this island from the most advanced missiles in the world.”………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

To Flores, more military presence on Guam heightens the risk of war. In March, President Donald Trump’s decision to bomb Iran prompted military bases on the island to raise their threat level. She feels that, as in World War II, the Indigenous people of Guam are expendable in a broader contest between empires. “What are they really here to protect if there’s so much harm taking place? Are we just collateral damage?” she said. “Because just looking at our history of being occupied by war, being used for weapons testing, it feels like the message is that we don’t matter. Our future doesn’t matter. Our survival doesn’t matter.”……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..


“We’re faced with the reality that we’re part of a larger strategic vision,” conference organizer and former Guam congressman Robert Underwood said. “All of you are in someone’s strategic plans whether you know it or not, whether you like it or not. All of us are in someone’s strategic plan.” 

In Palau, Indigenous people are fighting the Pentagon’s expansion in local courts and international forums. Leaders of Angaur, one of 16 states there, filed a lawsuit accusing the U.S. of violating environmental rules and its treaty with the island nation when it cleared land for a radar facility. Indigenous chiefs from Peleliu are suing to prevent a land transfer that would support American goals. Indigenous Palauan youth filed a complaint at the United Nations alleging the U.S. military violated their right to free, prior, and informed consent to what happens on their land…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

A Plebiscite On Guam’s Status?

…………………….Camacho wants a plebiscite to determine Guam’s political status. He believes the island’s status as a U.S. territory — without a vote for president or voting representation in Congress — isn’t working………………………………………………………………………………………………..https://www.civilbeat.org/?p=1814370&utm_source=Civil+Beat+Master+List&utm_campaign=4226d57df6-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2025_05_12_05_31_COPY_01&utm_medium

October 15, 2026 Posted by | environment, OCEANIA | Leave a comment

Reactors shut by a handfull of jellyfish

A 900-megawatt reactor on the French coast came off the grid at four in the afternoon and a second one overnight, both shut by hand before returning jellyfish could pack the seawater screens and trip them, and both were back inside four days against twenty for the last swarm

Luis Reyes, Auto Notion 14th Sept 2026

An automatic reactor trip is the safety system doing its job, and it’s arguably the most expensive way to solve a problem. The unit drops off the grid in seconds, and then you spend the next several days walking it back up to full power while somebody writes the report explaining why.

So when the jellyfish came back to Gravelines in late August, nobody at the plant sat around waiting for that. At about four in the afternoon on Wednesday, August 26, local time, the crew shut unit 3 down themselves and dialed unit 2 back while they were at it. Overnight they did the same thing to unit 6 and reduced unit 1 too. EDF says it’s all preventive.

So you had a 5,400-megawatt site with nothing running at full power. Units 3 and 6 were off, units 1 and 2 were loafing along at reduced output, unit 4 had been down since August 10, and unit 5 was partway through its ten-year inspection.

If that sounds like a first for Western Europe’s largest nuclear plant, it isn’t.

The same site went to zero output for about ten days last August, and during the first swarm this month the last reactor still running flat out got throttled as well. What’s new is who pushed the button. It’s also been that kind of summer for the operator, which has already spent it idling inland reactors because the rivers beside them ran too warm.

Gravelines drinks the North Sea

If you’ve never looked at how a coastal plant gets its cooling water, it’s simpler than you’d expect. Gravelines doesn’t sit on a river. It pulls seawater from a canal connected to the North Sea, and everything that water carries hits two stages of screening before it reaches the condensers: coarse bar screens at the front, which EDF calls prégrilles, and rotating drum filters behind them. Pack those drums and the flow drops. Let it drop far enough and the protection system takes the unit off the grid for you, ready or not.

So why not let them trip?

A trip is a hard stop. Control rods drop, steam gets dumped, and the plant has to be checked over and lined back up before anyone talks about restarting. Taking a unit down on purpose gets you to the same place more slowly and leaves a shorter list of things to look at afterward. EDF hasn’t spelled that reasoning out, so I’m inferring it, but the restart times back it up.

Unit 3 gives the cleanest comparison, because it went down in both swarms for the same reason. On August 10 it tripped itself at 7:43 in the evening and didn’t come back until 3:55 in the morning on August 18, a bit over seven days. On August 26 the crew took it down deliberately and it was back at 2 a.m. on August 30, about three and a half days. That’s the same reactor and the same cause, and it cost half as much time………………………….
https://www.autonocion.com/us/reactors-shut-by-hand-jellyfish-four-days/

September 19, 2026 Posted by | environment, France | Leave a comment

Nature at risk

 by beyondnuclearinternational,
https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2026/09/06/nature-at-risk/

UK Nuclear regulations will destroy havens for wildlife. This needs to be stopped, argues The Wildlife Trusts

The following is a position statement put out by The Wildlife Trusts in Britain, after the UK government published its response to the Nuclear Regulatory Review 2025.  (Note: Ed Miliband is no longer the the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero since the departure of Prime Minister Keir Starmer.) After a massive public outcry, the most environmentally damaging proposals have been watered down. However, the Labour government has committed to new guidance about how to apply nature rules. This tinkering with protections could still lead to damage to nature-rich spaces. Writes the The Wildlife Trusts, “Resistance to this dismissive approach to nature is growing and we’ll keep sticking up for nature.” Their statement:

Recommendations in the Nuclear Regulatory Review put nature at risk

Wildlife and natural places need more protection, not less. But the UK Government is thinking about making it even easier and cheaper for developers to destroy our last few natural spaces.

A report called the Nuclear Regulatory Review is suggesting that protections for nature should be weakened. It says these protections result in unnecessary costs for developers. This is not true. We can’t afford to destroy the few havens we have for wildlife. 

This isn’t policy yet – there’s still time to stop this from happening. That’s why we encouraged our supporters to take our simple action to send an email to Ed Miliband, the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, and help us to stop this in its tracks. 

The Nuclear Regulatory Review proposes weakening the Habitat Regulations

The Review proposes amending the Habitats Regulations so that developers don’t have to worry about avoiding harm to nature sites when they build nuclear plants. It also proposes removing a duty on public bodies to further the conservation and public access purpose of National Parks and National Landscapes.  

Nature cannot afford this. Evidence continues to show that nature is in decline, and damage to nature is also damage to climate.  

The Prime Minister previously suggested he wants the proposals to apply beyond the nuclear sector

In a speech on 1st December, the [then] Prime Minister said he agreed with all recommendations in the Nuclear Regulatory Review and also asked the Business Secretary to apply them to sectors beyond nuclear in the upcoming Industrial Strategy. This means the harmful recommendations could be extended beyond potential new nuclear energy sites. 

If Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ) gives the green light for the harmful Nuclear Regulatory Review recommendations, it makes a second damaging Planning Bill inevitable. This will slam the door on nature’s recovery and make net zero even harder to achieve. 

If those proposals go ahead, people will suffer as well as wildlife 

The recommendations in the Review will make natural spaces less safe from development and more vulnerable to damage and loss. These spaces might be close to where you live, or special landscapes that you visit and care about. The UK has already lost more biodiversity than any other country over the last few decades.  

The risks of environmental damage through these recommendations will also have knock-on impacts for economic stability, which affects everyone through the cost of living. 

Allowing the natural world to be neglected in this way will only benefit a handful of developers who can cut costs by bending the rules in future.  

In the last year, the UK Government has targeted nature and wildlife, calling spiders and bats and newts ‘blockers’ and deliberately getting rid of legal safeguards and policies that are supposed to help nature recover.  This goes against all evidence, and the public’s views that nature is necessary to everyone. Evidence shows a healthy environment underpins our economy and our wellbeing, and that building with nature in mind helps to ensure development is high quality and sustainable.   

The original published statement can be read here on The Wildlife Trusts website.

September 9, 2026 Posted by | environment, UK | Leave a comment

Three years on, Fukushima’s fishers still deal with impact of treated water release

Japan Times, By Phoebe Amoroso, Aug 24, 2026

March 11 is a date of indescribable weight in Japan — one that conjures images of the devastating earthquake and resulting tsunami that killed nearly 20,000, displaced hundreds of thousands and caused catastrophic damage to the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.

But Aug. 24 has also become a date of significance for the Tohoku region and the rest of East Asia. On this day three years ago, power plant officials began releasing treated water into the Pacific Ocean — a move that, while necessary, is continuing to have an economic impact on the region’s seafood.

“There’s no single perfect method that will ensure understanding among the public (when it comes to the safety of Fukushima’s seafood),” says Tadaaki Sawada.

Sawada is deputy manager of the guidance section for the Fukushima Prefectural Federation of Fisheries Cooperative Associations (FS Gyoren). Even three years on, he laments the difficulty of eliminating the stigma attached to the northeastern coastal prefecture of Fukushima and its produce.

On the day Sawada spoke with The Japan Times, Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. (Tepco) completed its 21st discharge of treated water currently held in storage tanks at the No. 1 nuclear plant. Three years into this process expected to take three decades in total, fears of reputational damage have not explicitly emerged within the domestic market, but other consequences have been profound: geopolitical tensions and an exposure of the vulnerabilities that underlie Japan’s fishing industry as a whole.

Difficult choices

Though the primary disasters of March 2011 are in the past, the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant is far from decommissioned.

Nuclear debris remains inside the damaged reactors and still produces heat, so water has to be circulated through the damaged reactors to keep them cool and eventually discarded. A method known as Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS) can remove up to 62 radioactive compounds from this water to very low concentrations, but it can’t remove tritium, a radioactive isotope of hydrogen. After ALPS and dilution with seawater, the concentration of tritium in the water reaches 1/40 of the maximum threshold mandated by government regulations.

With on-site water tanks nearing capacity, Tepco — backed by the Japanese government and the International Atomic Energy Agency — announced in 2021 that it would conduct periodic, controlled ocean discharges while monitoring the resulting tritium levels.

The decision provoked strong reactions, not least within Fukushima’s fishing industry. The government had promised fishermen that it wouldn’t release the water without the understanding of local communities, and the move was perceived by many as reneging on that commitment, provoking strong fears over further reputational damage.

But three years on, a strong consumer backlash within Japan has not materialized.

Takeshi Hamada, a professor of fisheries science at Sapporo’s Hokkai-Gakuen University, has studied the economic impact on Japan’s fishing industry. He argues that one key difference between domestic reaction in 2011 compared to the years that followed is related to media coverage.

“Following the Great East Japan Earthquake, most media outlets — including major ones — viewed government information with skepticism,” Hamada says via email. “However, during the ocean release of ALPS-treated water, there was relatively little coverage questioning its safety.”

Instead, criticism mostly emanated from somewhere far away from Japan’s northeastern coast: China.

On the day the first batch of ALPS-treated water was released, Beijing banned the import of all Japanese aquatic products (the ban was partially lifted in June 2025 before being reinstated that November after Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s comments on Japan’s role in a hypothetical Chinese naval blockade of Taiwan).

The impact of the import ban on Japan’s fishing industry has been hard to quantify, but experts believe it has been significant. Compared to the year prior, Hamada calculates that Japanese seafood exports fell by about ¥75.8 billion (about $476 million) between September 2023 and August 2024. Analysis of the next 12 months found that exports had improved in some areas, but total seafood exports were still below the prerelease level.

For Fukushima, the exact costs cannot be isolated. Although it exported almost no seafood to China, export-bound Japanese seafood was redirected into the domestic market, weighing on prices. Based on shirasu (whitebait) prices, which were driven down by bumper catches elsewhere, Hamada estimates that average prices decreased by 8.2%.

The lack of clarity has a direct knock-on effect on compensation promised from Tepco as a condition of the water release. Fishers must demonstrate lower catch volume, catch value and sales value compared to pre-2011 to receive funds for the shortfall. Seafood processors, wholesalers and other retailers can also claim compensation by demonstrating reduced sales due to consumers or buyers avoiding their seafood products.

However, many of the costs remain hidden. In a November 2025 symposium held by the Tokyo Fisheries Promotion Foundation, Soichiro Kato, a lawyer representing affected businesses, said fishers were better placed to seek compensation because fishery federations could negotiate collectively, while many seafood processors without the same collective organizations in place had to deal with Tepco individually. He also criticized Tepco’s criteria as being too rigid and not capturing losses from reverse flow effects.

Fishing for solutions……………………………………………………………………..

Coastal landings are still subject to official radiation monitoring by Fukushima Prefecture, while FS Gyoren also conducts voluntary screening at fish markets to reassure buyers. After more than 100,000 inspections, the federation relaxed its system in April this year to cover fewer species and reduce screening from each landing or sales day to at least once a week. It hopes that this will speed up distribution and make the overall system more efficient, paving the way for expanded sales.

But each step back toward normalcy for Fukushima’s fisheries is a double-edged sword.

“When it comes to how wholesalers and distributors have reacted (to relaxed regulations), naturally, to be honest, no one directly criticizes us,” Sawada says. “But I think some people do have concerns internally. That may naturally result in transactions disappearing or decreasing. It does not appear openly, and it is difficult for us on the fisher and producer side to see.”…………………………………………………………………………….

Although Tepco has made progress toward reducing newly generated water, the discharges are set to continue for decades to come. However, FS Gyoren’s call for more support for Fukushima’s fishing industry is unchanged.

“We want to continue fishing in Fukushima Prefecture as a livelihood, not only in our generation but into our children’s and grandchildren’s generations,” says Sawada. “We want the government and Tepco to provide firm support for that.”
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/08/24/japan/fukushima-seafood-treated-water-three-years-impact/

September 1, 2026 Posted by | business and costs, environment, Fukushima continuing | Leave a comment

Jellyfish close down France’s largest nuclear reactor

August 28 2026 , https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/9339000/jellyfish-close-down-frances-largest-nuclear-reactor/

Reactor units at France’s largest nuclear power station in Gravelines have once again been shut down due to an influx of jellyfish.

A spokeswoman for the French operator EDF said on Thursday more than 200 metric tonnes of jellyfish had appeared since last night.

Two of the six reactor units have been completely shut down as a precautionary measure to “ensure that this situation has no impact whatsoever on the safety of (EDF’s) facilities.”

EDF said the jellyfish are appearing in the area of the filter systems at the seawater pumping station.

Consequently, no reactor units are currently in full operation, as two other units are being run at reduced power, and the remaining two have also been shut down, partly due to a maintenance inspection.

The jellyfish disrupted operations in the middle of the month and in August last year.

The Gravelines nuclear power station has set up monitoring systems to detect and manage large-scale jellyfish gatherings at an early stage, EDF added.

The EDF spokeswoman explained that support for this had been provided, among others, by the organisation France Pêche Durable (France Sustainable Fishing).

Seven boats are operating round the clock near the nuclear power station to catch the jellyfish and then release them further out to sea.

The spokeswoman stated that it was not yet possible to comment on the causes of the phenomenon.

She added that the plant was working with various partners to gain a better understanding of it.

The spokeswoman said the incident posed no risk to the electricity grid.

Gravelines is one of just under 20 nuclear power stations in France.

It is situated on the northern French coast, roughly halfway between Calais and Dunkirk.

August 30, 2026 Posted by | environment, France | Leave a comment

One-fifth of France’s nuclear capacity offline due to extreme weather and jellyfish

In total, 13 of the 57 reactors in EDF’s nuclear fleet were affected, resulting in a more than 20% shortfall in nuclear power production capacity, a record deficit.

Le Monde with AFPP, August 12, 2026, https://www.lemonde.fr/en/energies/article/2026/08/12/one-fifth-of-france-s-nuclear-capacity-offline-due-to-extreme-weather-and-jellyfish_6756421_98.html

France on Wednesday recorded a more than 20% shortfall in nuclear power production capacity, a record deficit caused by environmentally related outages linked to drought, extreme heat and a jellyfish invasion. France uses nuclear power to generate around 70% of its electricity. The country has seen nuclear power production disrupted by multiple heatwaves and droughts this year.

According to Agence France-Presse (AFP) calculations based on data published by energy group EDF since 2015, 20.4% of generating capacity was unavailable. Between 9:45 am and 10:00 am, EDF’s nuclear fleet recorded a new peak in outages due to “environmental constraints” or “external environmental causes,” both in terms of the number of reactors shut down or operating at reduced output and in terms of lost generating capacity.

In total, 13 of the 57 reactors in EDF’s nuclear fleet were affected. Eight reactors were completely shut down while five were operating at reduced power. Much of the lost nuclear generating capacity was due to full or partial shutdowns at five of the six reactors at the Gravelines nuclear power plant after a swarm of jellyfish clogged pumps used to cool the units.

Experts say overfishing, plastic pollution and warming seas due to climate change have created conditions allowing jellyfish to thrive and reproduce. Outside the Gravelines plant, the largest in Western Europe, the shutdowns or production reductions affecting other reactors are linked to extreme heat and droughts, depriving the plants of the water they need for cooling.

August 17, 2026 Posted by | climate change, environment, France | Leave a comment

Growing U.S. military Footprint In Guam Intensifies Concerns Over Environmental Damage And Sovereignty

SCHEERPOST,August 15, 2026, Gaea Cabico Prism

In Yigo, the northernmost village in Guam, there is a well that cannot be shut down. 

Known as Y-15, the well sits atop the island’s northern aquifer, which supplies around 80% of the island’s drinking water. Even if contaminants are detected, Y-15 has to keep pumping. There is simply no alternative. 

The well also sits just below a hill near Upi Elementary School—attended by around 400 children—and just outside the back gates of Andersen Air Force Base, which hangs over the community like a permanent shadow. Generations of Indigenous CHamoru families have called Yigo home, relying on these waters for drinking, cooking, and other daily activities.

But in September 2025, one such family learned that the well supplying their home of 17 years was contaminated with high levels of dieldrin, a pesticide once widely used on crops and for termite control beginning in the 1950s. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which classifies dieldrin as a probable human carcinogen, banned all uses of the pesticide in 1987 over concerns about its damage to the environment and links to serious health effects, including cancer, Parkinson’s disease, and reproductive issues such as decreased fertility and increased numbers of stillbirths. Because dieldrin accumulates in the body, long-term exposure—even in small amounts—can cause serious harm, according to the EPA. 

More than 1,200 residents of Yigo were told not to drink water from Y-15 because of dieldrin contamination……………………………………..

Dieldrin is just one piece of a much larger and troubling environmental legacy in Guam. 

Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS)—better known as “forever chemicals”—have also been detected across the island’s water systems. These compounds can persist in soil and groundwater for decades, and they have been linked to a range of health effects, including cancer, immune and thyroid dysfunction, liver and kidney disease, and serious reproductive issues. 

For Monaeka Flores, an advocate with the grassroots environmental organization Prutehi Guåhan, the island’s environmental problems are inseparable from the military buildup that has reshaped the island. From hazardous waste dumping, base construction, and open-air detonations of munitions to live-fire exercises in sensitive habitats, advocates say that Guam’s land and water bear the toxic legacy of the U.S. military………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The long arc of colonization

While Guam is only 30 miles long and nine miles wide, the U.S. Defense Department controls roughly a quarter of its land—and military expansion is accelerating. Much of the military buildup on the island is justified on the grounds of national security as the U.S. seeks to strengthen its position in the Pacific amid tensions with China and North Korea. 

A missile defense system designed to protect the territory from potential outside threats, live-firing range complex, and new Marine Corps base are currently in the works. The buildup could also expose more people to potential environmental contamination. Roughly 10,000 active-duty personnel, their dependents, and government civilians are expected to arrive by 2036.  ………………………………………………………….

What is unfolding in Guam is not happening in isolation. 

From Okinawa, Japan to the Marshall Islands and the Diego Garcia military base in the Chagos Archipelago, communities living near U.S. military bases have documented patterns of environmental harm, including contamination linked to toxic chemicals and hazardous waste. 

There is “very significant environmental damage” due to leaks and the military’s accidental—or sometimes intentional—dumping of hazardous, toxic materials, said David Vine, a political anthropologist and author of “Base Nation: How U.S. Military Bases Abroad Harm America and the World.” “It’s a clear pattern across the network of bases in the Pacific and around the world, including the 50 states,” he told Prism 

Guam’s many environmental problems are concentrated around military bases, the island’s airport, and sites where firefighting occurred. As just one example: A major source of PFAS contamination on the island is the powerful fire suppressant known as Aqueous Film Forming Foam, which is used to extinguish jet fuel fires……………………………………………………………………………………………………

Activists, community leaders, and CHamoru families increasingly frame their struggle against the military’s pollution and contamination not only as an effort to protect fragile ecosystems, but also as a broader fight for demilitarization and decolonization. They are demanding both the removal of militarized infrastructure and the restoration of sovereignty over their ancestral lands………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. https://scheerpost.com/2026/08/15/growing-u-s-military-footprint-in-guam-intensifies-concerns-over-environmental-damage-and-sovereignty/

August 17, 2026 Posted by | environment, OCEANIA, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Major nuclear power station shut down by millions of invading jellyfish

The massive Gravelines nuclear power plant just 30 miles from Britain has been forced to close down in order to avoid disaster after a swarm of jellyfish got sucked into the cooling system on Monday

Joe Smith News Reporter, 11 Aug 2026, https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/nuclear-plant-millions-invading-jellyfish-37540444

Western Europe’s biggest nuclear power station has been shut down after it was invaded by millions of jellyfish.

EDF’s Gravelines plant near Dunkirk, just 30 miles from Britain, was forced to shut down in order to avoid disaster on Monday as the sea creatures swarmed into the plant.

EDF revealed how the jellyfish had been filter drums at the seawater pumping stations, used to cool the giant nuclear reactors at the heart of the plant.

The company was forced to take emergency measures, with reactors two, three and four taken offline, while output from reactor one was halved.

“This situation has no impact on the safety of the facilities, the safety of our personnel, or the environment,” a statement from EDF said.

Only reactor six was operating at full power on Tuesday, with reactor five previously taken offline for scheduled works.

The jellyfish invasion comes exactly a year after another swarm of the creatures took the French nuclear site offline for two days.

An invasive species of jellyfish, called the Asian Moon Jellyfish, have been making themselves at home in the English Channel and North Sea in 2020.

The species, usually native to the Pacific, is thought to have been brought here in the ballast tanks of supertankers and dumped into the seas around France and Britain.

Nuclear plants in China, Japan and India, which also rely of seawater for cooling, have previously been thrown into chaos by the slimy sea creatures. And last year power production at Gravelines came to a standstill after the jellies caused chaos.

The plant installed cameras monitoring the seawater intake and filters after last year’s fiasco and set up a warning system to give advanced notice of swarms heading their way.

The system saw fishing boats sent out of saturday with trawler nets in an attempt to thin the numbers of the invasive jellyfish. This helped to limit the latest invasion, the engineer said.

Meanwhile vacuum trucks are sucking out the jellyfish already trapped inside the plant. The engineer said that since no new jellies are arriving the plant will hopefully be back on line soon.

August 16, 2026 Posted by | environment, France, safety | Leave a comment

Swarming jellyfish overrun French nuclear plant on same date two years in a row 

The jellyfish invasion is the latest in a series of climate change-driven incidents that have affected a record number of French nuclear reactors over the summer.

August 11, 2026 By Nicolas Camut,
https://www.politico.eu/article/swarming-jellyfish-overrun-french-nuclear-plant-on-same-date-two-years-in-a-row/

Aug. 11 is quickly becoming jellyfish invasion day at the Gravelines nuclear power plant in northern France.

Despite spending hundreds of thousands of euros to protect the plant from a jellyfish swarm like the one that saw reactors shuttered on Aug. 11, 2025, French utility provider EDF on Tuesday was again forced to bring the parts of the facility offline due to the presence of “several dozen tons” of jellyfish blocking pumping systems.

“On-site teams are fully mobilized to ensure the safety of the facilities and to reconnect the reactors to the national power grid,” EDF said in a statement.

Three fishing vessels are now “constantly patrolling off the coast of the plant” to conduct “preventive fishing operations […] 24/7,” the company added.

Tuesday’s jellyfish invasion is the latest in a series of climate change-driven incidents that have affected French nuclear energy during a particularly infernal summer.

Nuclear power plants are typically built by rivers or on coastlines so they can use nearby water sources to cool their reactors. But a record number in France this summer have been forced to temporarily shut down due to heatwaves and droughts affecting their water supply.

Rising sea temperatures have made jellyfish swarms more common along the French coast in recent years, and those swarms can affect a plant’s ability to bring in seawater — which is what happened at Gravelines. Following last year’s incident at the plant along the North Sea, EDF installed cameras and deployed fishing boats to monitor the situation.

While the vessels “prevented a massive influx of jellyfish” on Saturday and Sunday, they were eventually overwhelmed as the swarm grew from “about 100 kilograms” to “several dozen tons,” the French state-owned utility giant said.

Opponents of nuclear energy were quick to jump on the incident.

“This only highlights that nuclear power plants are ill-equipped to deal with the consequences of climate change,” the French branch of Greenpeace said in statement.

August 14, 2026 Posted by | climate change, environment, France | Leave a comment

Activities related to nuclear weapons and nuclear power have created a vast archipelago of contamination. 

Can it be remediated? With what effect?

The report is blunt about the limits of any remediation fix: “No solution exists for very long term risks, which extend out to hundreds of thousands of years and beyond.”

Can it be remediated? With what effect?

Nuclear weapons and nuclear power production have created a vast, global archipelago of contaminated sites that have endangered health and the environment and will continue to do so.

 The sources of risk include 10 to 20 billion metric tons of radioactive uranium mine waste, on the order of a billion tons of radioactive mill tailings, over 150 metric tons of separated plutonium (enough for roughly twenty thousand Nagasaki-type bombs) that is now waste, and millions of terabecquerels of fission and activation products dispersed in air, soil, and water bodies due to nuclear weapons testing.

Remediation can mitigate the risks in the short- and medium-term in many cases. The other side of the remediation coin is radioactive waste and its disposal. That too can reduce risk relative to no remediation. However, waste disposal also creates new risks, especially from long-lived radionuclides. As a result, some safety, health, and proliferation risks will remain essentially forever.

This is the finding at the center of a new report the Nuclear Truth Project commissioned from Arjun Makhijani, Ph.D., President of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research (IEER).

Whilst the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) addresses harm from the use and testing of nuclear weapons, as the report clearly states in its preface, the Treaty “does not deal with the upstream harms from nuclear weapons production, which start with uranium mining and milling.” 

Those harms “have been inflicted on many countries, starting with Congo, whose mines, exploited by its Belgian rulers of the time, were the source of most of the uranium for the Manhattan Project.”

The chain begins in Congo

Shinkolobwe was the richest mine in the world– with over 60 percent uranium in its ore. This extremely rich ore was shipped to the United States by the Belgian imperialists who colonised Congo; it became the material foundation of the Manhattan Project, including the bombs used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and the bomb tested in New Mexico, on 16 July 1945.

Congo, like many other countries that have supplied uranium to nuclear weapons or power states, has never had nuclear weapons or nuclear power. Yet, they are all left with the radioactive mine waste from uranium mining.

The scale of the waste

“Each step starting with mining, creates radioactive waste and radioactive contamination.”

The report shows that global uranium mine waste is likely to be between 10 billion and 20 billion metric tons, this is enough to “cover 1.4 million to 2.8 million soccer (football) pitches to a depth of one meter, or fill four million to eight million two-meter deep Olympic-size swimming pools”.

In addition to this, there are about one billion metric tons of mill tailings and over 150 metric tons of excess separated plutonium –  enough for “roughly twenty thousand Nagasaki-type bombs.”

The globally dispersed pollution includes “millions of terabecquerels of fission and activation products dispersed in air, soil, and water bodies due to nuclear weapons testing.”

Nuclear Injustice: The case of the Marshall Islands

A member of a U.S. Atomic Energy Commission advisory committee described the Marshallese, in 1956, as people the U.S. could study “closer to us than the [experimental] mice.” This decision to study them as experimental subjects arose from the contamination of their land and waters due to the 67 nuclear weapons that the United States tested on Bikini and Enewetak Atolls in the Marshall Islands.

Despite the U.S. government undertaking  a ‘cleanup’ at Enewetak Atoll that resulted in over 70,000 cubic meters of waste, the operation only recovered 0.25 kilograms of plutonium, less than 1% of the estimated 30 kilograms on Enewetak Atoll and its lagoon. Other radionuclides were not part of the remediation plan.

Remediation standard

Setting remediation standards requires setting dose limits for people far into the future. Enforcement is not practical to ensure the standard will be met. Modeling is therefore required, which in turn necessitates a choice of who will be exposed at at the remediated site far into the future. A resident farmer family has been a traditional, and reasonable choice. But this is not enough. Diets need to be modeled too.  For adults, the default has been ‘Reference Man’ who is defined as a young, male Caucasian who is “Western European or North American in habitat and custom.”

The report notes that this is “an unsatisfactory generalization”; for instance the ‘Reference Man’ diet would not reflect the traditional diet of the people of the Marshall Islands, besides not taking into account the differences between men and women’s diets.

Moreover, as the report notes, No radiation standard explicitly protects the embryo and fetus of pregnant members of the public, present or future.”

Uranium mine remediation

Large numbers of uranium mine sites remain unremediated. Some remediation proposals, like the ablation of mine wastes to concentrate uranium proposed in the United States would make contamination worse. Some sites in France have been remediated; many await remediation. The report also notes that

“Remediation in Australia is largely similar to that in France. In the United States, plans for the remediation of the Quivira mine site in the Navajo Nation mine site involved their removal from the Nation’s land and disposal in a special cell in a New Mexico State landfill used for municipal waste.”

and that

“The best examples of remediation among those reviewed in this report (which is not a comprehensive review) are the remediation of the Ranger mine in Australia and the remediation after German reunification of various mines in the former East Germany.” In the case of the Ranger mine, it was the resistance of the Mirarr people that led to stringent remediation standards and a commitment to end mining in the area.

Why this matters for the TPNW

“Remediation should be understood as risk reduction because there is always a residual risk… Much of the process is a transfer of some of the risk from future generations who would suffer harm from unremediated places to the present and near future.”

The TPNW’s Articles 6 and 7 commit states parties to victim assistance and environmental remediation. Importantly this report makes the case for extending that same accountability upstream: to the mines and mills, and to the countries and communities that have carried this burden since long before any weapon was tested.

The report’s preface notes that “A part of the reluctance to address upstream issues may stem from the fact that is that there is a large overlap in upstream processes with nuclear power, which needs the same source material – uranium.” It also notes that that the costs can and should be parsed between the two, enabling the proper assignment of responsibility for the harm.

The report is blunt about the limits of any remediation fix: “No solution exists for very long term risks, which extend out to hundreds of thousands of years and beyond.”

download report

August 10, 2026 Posted by | environment | Leave a comment

Nuclear station cleaning balls wash up on beaches

Tom BurgessNorth East and Cumbria, 3 Aug 26, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0l5kln078do

Dozens of bright blue balls used for cleaning a nuclear power plant have washed up on a beach.

Walker Neil Baldwin said more than 40 taprogge balls, which come from Hartlepool power station, were spread along the high tide mark along Redcar beaches.

He said he had seen them regularly during the 20 years he has lived near the beach and was worried about birds or dogs eating them.

EDF Energy, which runs the power station, did not address questions about possible faults in its system, instead the company claimed to have “significantly reduced the number of releases over the past 18 months”.

Taprogge balls are used to clean stretches of pipework and, occasionally, some are released into the environment, according to the company.

EDF said tide patterns can wash debris on to nearby beaches but it had received no reports of similar finds since April.

The firm did not confirm how many balls it had collected in the last year but did say the balls are biodegradable in seawater.

“I noticed a lot of them and I kept seeing more and more as I was walking,” he said.

“I looked for a bag to pick them up in and I found a plastic bottle which I filled on my walk back.”

Saltburn resident John Stevens said he “didn’t understand what they were” when he started litter picking 14 months ago.

“I understand they can cause an ingestion risk to marine wildlife and they contribute to coastal litter in the ocean,” he said.

“I find it ironic that they clean the power plant machines, but there is a potential they come out and mess up the sea life and beaches.”

EDF said anyone who finds taprogge balls should report the exact location to the company or the Environment Agency so debris can be removed.

August 6, 2026 Posted by | environment, UK | Leave a comment

AI Wants Your Land, Water, Power

The bigger data centers, which are in vogue, being built right up next to hospitals, schools, and residences willy nilly use anywhere from 1-to-7 million gallons of water per day. On average, equivalent to moving 15,000-20,000 new families into a neighborhood.

Robert Hunziker, July 27, 2026, https://www.counterpunch.org/2026/07/27/ai-wants-your-land-water-power/

“This is just like a free-for-all. There’s really no oversight. There’s really no regulation.” (Erin Brockovich, Brockovich AI Data Center Reporting)

Erin Brockovich is a well-known American consumer advocate who made her name by exposing evidence that Pacific Gas & Electric poisoned groundwater in Hinkley, California (1996) with toxic hexavalent. Now, she’s investigating AI datacenters.

AI date centers are everywhere, in every state throughout the land. They are starting to quasi-own American citizens via appropriation of resources, both human and natural. This is an invasion of the land, the water, the power, the intellectual resources of America.

Erin Brockovich was recently interviewed about her commitment to investigating AI development by Katie Couric, appearing on YouTube.

Erin: “I’ve never seen in 30 years anything like this… This is every town in every state, and all our resources at once happening.”

The common thread in submissions from individuals in communities across the land: “it feels to them like a takeover.” First, there is a lack of transparency. Local city councils, where “the people” should be represented are hijacked via non-disclosure agreements signed by local officials. This is step number one in gaining approval to build where city regulations and city code control the land. The locals are left out of decisions.

Datacenters Consume Natural Resources

Smaller data centers use about 500,000 gallons of water per day. The average family of four uses ~350 gallons of water per day. Therefore, a newly constructed small data center is equivalent to moving 1,428 new families into a neighborhood.

The bigger data centers, which are in vogue, being built right up next to hospitals, schools, and residences willy nilly use anywhere from 1-to-7 million gallons of water per day. On average, equivalent to moving 15,000-20,000 new families into a neighborhood.


“So, if we build 1,200 data centers… that’s the projection for the total and you just take an average of those between 500,000 to seven million, and the average is 5 million gallons per day, and multiple that by 365 days. You’re looking at numbers of 2.2 to 2.7 trillion gallons of water per year… that are on already drought restricted lands.” (Erin)

(There are already 4, 542 active data centers, 1,500 more are in the planning stage.)

A recent study by The Guardian found that 2/3rds of the planned data centers in the U.S. are in drought-stricken areas.

Datacenters disrupt the regular flow of water. For example, residents sent reports to Erin “of water bills going from $40/month to $250/month… and we’re seeing the exact same thing with electrical.”

According to Katie Couric, Sam Altman, CEO of Open AI, dismisses concerns about AI water use, “fake, completely untrue, totally insane, and having no connection to reality.”

In response, Erin wondered if Altman lives in the areas and experiences what residents report to her. He is implying that the reports by residents are false (16,000 total submissions to Erin by individuals involving various AI issues). “It is insulting.”

Erin asked AI itself in a query to the faceless genius a question of placement of data centers assuming the entire network were to start all over again from scratch, redesigned. AI responded that it would place new data centers based upon one simple rule: “Zero conflict with human resources.” Hmm.

“The people” who submit to Erin from all 50 states are saying the opposite of Sam Altman. And she’s going with the people as a more credible source. After all, they live in the immediate area of data centers. He does not.

Data Center Noise – Wow!

The “hum,” the “buzz” can extend a couple of miles away from a data center. The endless humming is a 24/7 annoyance that’s driving some people nuts. Residents are informing Erin of dizziness, nausea, headachy experiences. This is a common issue tbat’s reported from every one of the facility areas in the country.

Locals Fighting Back

Three hundred (300) municipalities have established moratoriums on data center development, some for one year, some for two years, some six months, some are flat-out bans.

But according to Erin, as usual, “many of them won’t be able to withstand the pressure by huge corporations that have got all the money in the world.”

Yet, public protests can exercise powerful influence. For example, in Utah it was clearly via public opposition that the governor had to scale back the size of the facility coming in.

And New York is the first state to ban development of new data centers as a moratorium for one year and direct state regulators to create standards focused on environmental impacts, energy demand, water usage and other factors: “As datacenter development threatens to hike up utility bills, deplete our natural resources, and create uncertainty for New Yorkers, it’s my responsibility to take action and lead,’ Hochul, a Democrat, said in a statement.” (New York Becomes First State to Impose One-Year Pause on New AI Datacenters, The Guardian, July 14, 2026)

According to Katie, a recent Gallup poll shows 7 out of 10 Americans oppose data centers being built near them, making it one of the few contemporary issues that has broad bipartisan agreement, republicans and democrats alike do not favor AI datacenters in their locales.

Meanwhile, the power source for data centers is passed off to consumers. Infrastructure is required. Erin has received submissions from people stating their utility bills normally $75 went up to $425. A recent submission by a resident out of Texas, which has the most data centers at 417, said their city notified residents to expect a 75% electrical bill increase.

Stated by Katie: According to The New York Times, PJM, the nation’s largest electrical grid operator’s results of an electricity auction will add $6.3 billion costs to consumers within the next 3 years, an increase driven by the power demands of data centers.

AI Ownership

Katie Couric’s interview of Erin Brockovich brought to light the impact AI has on the country’s natural resources but did not discuss nontangible resources like music or speech or art. These human resources, similar to natural resources, are public resources. Who owns these resources?

Bernie Sanders has an interesting take on ownership of resources: “The foundation of AI is based on our collective human intelligence. Our books, songs, artwork, journalism, computer code, scientific research, videos, conversations, images, and ideas span generations. The reality is that Big Tech oligarchs have fed this knowledge into their AI models without permission, without acknowledgement, and without compensation. The creative work of many millions of people – writers, artists, musicians, journalists, teachers, scientists and ordinary people- has been stolen by the wealthiest people in the world. In the coming weeks I will be introducing the American AI Sovereign Wealth Fund Act. This legislation would give the public a direct ownership stake in the largest AI companies in our country. Through a one-time 50% tax, not on the profit of the largest AI companies in the US but something that is far more valuable than that: The Stock. Under this bill the federal government would have the power through its voting shares and an equal representation on each company’s board to block decisions that hurt the public and to push for policies that help them. When a public resource generates wealth, the public should share in that wealth.”

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

August 4, 2026 Posted by | environment, technology | Leave a comment

Federal government proposes to lessen nuclear reactor environmental reviews

Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that the move takes away an education tool for the public.

“If you don’t do the NEPA evaluations, then the public might not even know or understand how bad things could get,” Lyman said. 

Comments:by Rachel Frazin – 07/09/26 

A key government agency is proposing to lessen the scope of environmental reviews for nuclear reactors, limiting public input and exempting some reactors altogether.

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) on Wednesday announced that it is narrowing review under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), a bedrock environmental law.

This includes exempting reviews of some activities altogether, including the reapproval of existing reactors, as well as some new reactors.

For other projects, the agency will still review radiological impacts — but it is proposing to no longer consider factors such as dust, noise and air pollution that it says are beyond its scope.

NRC Chair Ho Nieh also said that the agency is also proposing to no longer issue draft environmental reviews, limiting the public’s ability to weigh in to the start of the process before the environmental impacts are considered. 

Nieh described the move in a written statement as “concentrating on impacts the NRC can address,” adding that it would “strengthen environmental protection while making licensing reviews more timely and predictable.”

However, Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that the move takes away an education tool for the public.

“If you don’t do the NEPA evaluations, then the public might not even know or understand how bad things could get,” Lyman said. 

The move comes amid other deregulatory efforts from the independent agency as the Trump administration pushes to quadruple the nation’s nuclear power capacity.

Last week, the NRC proposed to eliminate a long-standing nuclear power safety principle that directed plants to keep radiation levels “as low as reasonably achievable.”

July 17, 2026 Posted by | environment, USA | Leave a comment

What is it like living near the site of a new nuclear power station?

Richard Daniel,at Sizewell andLaura Devlin, BBC 11th July 2026

New satellite images show how one of the largest construction projects in Europe has transformed the Suffolk countryside. But what is it like living close to the site of a new nuclear power station and associated infrastructure?

Sizewell C itself is yet to take shape – but construction work has already hugely changed the landscape on one part of the Suffolk coast.

Satellite images reveal how the surrounding countryside looked in 2024, before work began, with swathes of green fields around the town of Leiston, up to the existing Sizewell B power station.

Fast forward to April this year, and it is a very different picture. Almost all the sandy-brown areas are construction sites, where a new link road off the A12, a new bypass, two park and ride sites and a new railhead are all being built simultaneously.

Sizewell C has said the infrastructure will ease congestion and improve safety, but residents say they have had to put up with noise, diversions and road closures.

Diane Flowitt-Hill lives beside a recently completed new roundabout at Yoxford. She is also close to the construction site of a four-mile (6.5km) link road, which will take Sizewell C traffic straight to the A12, bypassing the villages of Theberton and Middleton Moor.

“It’s been absolutely horrendous – the vibrations, the dust, the noise,” she explains.

“It’s non-stop.”……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c0lyj21jrxeo

July 14, 2026 Posted by | environment, UK | Leave a comment

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