Thornbury MP fights for Hinkley Point environmental protections
Claire Young is rallying to preserve essential environmental protections.
Lewis Clarke, 21 Nov 24
An MP has joined South Gloucestershire Council in calling on the Secretary
of State for Energy, Security, and Net Zero to block plans to remove
important environmental protections from the Hinkley Point C project.
In a letter to Ed Milliband, Thornbury & Yate MP Claire Young has expressed her
concern about proposals to remove Acoustic Fish Deterrent measures from the
project – warning that millions of fish, and connected wildlife, could be
affected by the plans. This is not the first time removing this
environmental mitigation tool has been proposed, with a similar push to do
so being blocked back in 2022 due to the impact it would have on local fish
stocks.
Bristol Live 21st Nov 2024, https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/thornbury-mp-fights-hinkley-point-9686572
Call to Action! Stop LANL Tritium Venting and Protect the Most Vulnerable
https://nuclearactive.org/call-to-action-stop-lanl-tritium-venting-and-protect-the-most-vulnerable/ November 21st, 2024
On Monday, Tewa Women United released two independent scientific reports about the harm that would be done to public health and the environment should Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) be allowed to vent radioactive tritium from four Flanged Tritium Waste Containers stored at LANL’s Area G radioactive and hazardous waste dump.
It is another important step taken by Tewa Women United to hold LANL and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) accountable to the law.
The two new reports reveal that the proposed venting of tritium, a form of radioactive hydrogen, into the environment would not meet the current EPA or Department of Energy (DOE) regulations.
Tewa Women United collaborated with German scientist Bernd Franke, a Director of the Institute für Energie und Umweliforschung (IFEU), and Dr. Arjun Makhijani from the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research. The first report, Review of LANL Radiation Dose Assessment for the Venting of Flanged Tritium Waste Containers (FTWC) at TA-54 at LANL, authored by Franke, contains results from computer models used to assess the possible range of radiation doses to the public across various weather scenarios.
Dr. Makhijani stated, “According to the EPA regulatory radiation standards, Title 40 Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) 61 Subpart H, require[s that] the radiation dose to ‘any member of the public’ should be less than 10 millirem per year.” Dr. Makhijani noted, “EPA allowed LANL to ignore children and infants in its dose calculations.”
Further, the second report, authored by Dr. Makhijani and titled Out of Order: An evaluation of the regulatory aspects of Los Alamos National Laboratory’s proposal to vent tritium from waste containers, similarly assessed LANL’s compliance with the Clean Air Act regulations and DOE Order 458.1 to keep public exposure to “as low as reasonably achieveable.”
Over the past four years DOE and EPA have ignored repeated requests from Tewa Women United to release their 53 alternatives to the proposed venting.
Kathy Wan Povi Sanchez, member of Pueblo de San Ildefonso and one of Tewa Women United’s co-founders, said, “Tritium makes water, our sacred source of life, radioactive. We were shocked to learn that LANL’s compliance calculations did not take infants and other children into account.
Talavi Cook, the Environmental Justice Program Manager at Tewa Women United, explained: “…Tewa Women United believes … radiation protection should extend to pregnant women due to fetuses comprising of 70% – 90% water; pregnant members of the public are not currently protected by the Clean Air Act or any other radiation protection regulation…. It is a matter of simple environmental justice for future generations.”
For more information, please visit https://tewawomenunited.org/2024/11/press-release-new-report-reveals-lanl-tritium-venting-could-have-triple-the-radiation-exposure-to-infants-compared-to-adults
Somerset church would ‘become’ island if ‘ham-fisted’ Hinkley saltmarsh plans go-ahead
Sunday 17th November
Somerset church would ‘become’ island if ‘ham-fisted’ Hinkley saltmarsh
plans go-ahead. Steve Bridger (Yatton, Independent), a local councillor for
the village on North Somerset Council, told a full meeting of the council
on November 12 that the plan was “ham-fisted.”
He said: “Landowners
who would be directly impacted by the proposals were sent letters in
September, completely out of the blue, with a rather threatening tone
talking about compulsory purchase of their land.” When Somerset’s new
nuclear power station was granted planning permission, it was told to
install speakers to scare off fish from getting sucked into its cooling
systems.
But EDF now says this would be “dangerous to install,” and
wants to compensate for the 44 tonnes of fish expected to die each year by
creating 340 hectares of saltmarsh along the Severn. Peter Burden
(Portishead South, Conservative) told the council chamber: “It is crazy,
chairman, to destroy habitat to mitigate for killing fish.”
West Somerset Free Press 17th Nov 2024, https://www.wsfp.co.uk/news/somerset-church-would-become-island-if-ham-fisted-hinkley-saltmarsh-plans-go-ahead-739509
‘The sixth great extinction is happening’, conservation expert warns. ‘Window of time to save climate is closing’
Dr Goodall says taking action to slow down the warming of our planet is
more urgent than ever. “We still have a window of time to start slowing
down climate change and loss of biodiversity,” Dr Goodall says. “But
it’s a window that’s closing.” Destruction of forests, and other wild
places, she points out, is intrinsically linked to the climate crisis.
“So much has changed in my lifetime,” she says, recalling that in the
forests of Tanzania where she began studying chimps more than 60 years ago,
“you used to be able to set your calendar by the timing of the two rainy
seasons”. “Now, sometimes it rains in the dry season, and sometimes
it’s dry in the wet season. It means the trees are fruiting at the wrong
time, which upsets the chimpanzees, and also the insects and the birds.”
BBC 17th Nov 2024, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c93qvqx5y01o
Leaked tritium reached the Mississippi
by beyondnuclearinternational, https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2024/11/17/leaked-tritium-reached-the-mississippi/
False assurances by Xcel Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have now been retracted by the regulator, reports John LaForge
In April, I reported on false assurances made by Xcel Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) regarding the November 2022 leak from the Monticello, Minnesota nuclear reactor of some 829,000 gallons of cooling water containing a huge concentration of radioactive tritium (technically, 5.2 million picocuries per liter).
In eye-opening remarks at the Monticello Community Center on May 15, NRC Senior Environmental Project Manager, Stephen J. Koenick, apologized for the commission staff’s often-repeated claims that leaked tritium from the 53-year-old reactor had not reached the Mississippi River — drinking water source for 20 million people, including the Minneapolis/St. Paul metro area.
In his underreported apology, Koenick said, “I would like to take a moment to address and clarify some miscommunication regarding the presence of detectable tritium in the Mississippi River. I know we … reported there were no indication[s] of [a] tritium leak [which] made it to the Mississippi.
“However, … in our Draft Environmental Impact Statement, we … conclude there were some very low concentrations of tritium in the Mississippi River.” Koenick went on to say, “So we apologize for this miscommunication.”
The weekly Monticello Times reported on the vanishingly rare public confession and its crucial admission that radioactive tritium from the massive 2022 leak had contaminated the Mississippi. The paper published a report on the front-page on Jun. 6, under the headline: “NRC apologizes, changes its stance on tritium leak: Now says low concentrations got into Mississippi River.”
What Koenick meant by “miscommunication” were false assurances made to the press that no tritium had been found by Xcel’s testing of the river. On Mar. 18, 2023, NRC spokesperson Viktoria Mitlyng even told the press, “There is no pathway for the tritium to get into drinking water.”
As recently as May 7, 2024, NRC presenters at a separate NRC-sponsored public hearing, also held in Monticello, said that Xcel had found “no detectable levels” of tritium in the river.
Tritium is the radioactive form of hydrogen. It cannot be removed by any kind of filtering and contaminates huge volumes of regular water that it contacts. Tritium is a danger to health if taken internally, by drinking or breathing, because it moves like water to every part of the body, and because it crosses the placenta where it endangers the fetus and causes birth abnormalities and problem pregnancies.
Xcel has applied for a second operating license extension for the Monticello jalopy which, if granted, would allow the reactor, one of the three oldest in the country, to run until the age of 80. Over 3,000 public comments have been sent to the NRC regarding its Draft Environmental Impact Statement on the 80-year-risk — most of them voicing alarmed opposition.
While studying the NRC’s Draft EIS, Nukewatch’s Lindsay Potter discovered an extremely odd coincidence.
As with any environmental impact study, the NRC has to establish a formal calendar for information-gathering. The data collection time-frame for the Monticello draft officially ended on August 18, 2023.
According to Xcel Energy and NRC documents, August 18 was the very same day that radioactive tritium contamination in Xcel’s groundwater tests near the Mississippi River exceeded the federal EPA drinking water limit. (Technically 20,000 picocuries per liter.)
Curiously, high and rapidly increasing levels of tritium (from the plume created by the major 2022 leak) was detected in a monitoring well near the river, beginning July 27, 2023. Then, tests over the following three weeks show the concentration of tritium grew five-fold, the documents show, until on August 18 when the tritium concentration exceeded the United States EPA’s drinking water allowable max.
As a result of the NRC’s data collection cut-off date, the Draft EIS omits the critical time-frame immediately after August 18, when tritium levels were above permitted limits and still increasing.
Likewise, Xcel’s “2023 Annual Radioactive Effluent Release Report” submitted to the NRC, fails to provide precise data on groundwater monitoring tests results following Aug. 18, 2023, noting in general terms only that tests done after Aug. 18, 2023 found no unsafe levels of contamination.
Based on past “miscommunications,” readers can decide whether such public assurances are reliable.
John LaForge is a co-director of Nukewatch, a peace and environmental watchdog group in Wisconsin, edits the group’s quarterly newsletter, and with Arianne Peterson co-edited Nuclear Heartland, Revised Edition: A guide to the 450 land-based missiles of the United States.
This article first appeared on Southside Pride and is republished with permission of the author.
North Somerset Council says no to ‘crazy’ EDF salt marsh plan
Chard and Ilminster News, By John Wimperis, 15 Nov 24
NORTH Somerset Council is set to urge the government to block “crazy” plans to flood hundreds of acres of farmland near Kingston Seymour.
Power company EDF wants to turn a huge swath of farmland by the village into a salt marsh to make up for fish killed at Hinkley Point C.
But councillors are calling for EDF to drop the plan and instead invest in biodiversity in ways the area wants and needs.
“It is crazy, chairman, to destroy habitat to mitigate for killing fish,” Peter Burden, Conservative Portishead South, told a full council meeting November 12.
Burden tabled a motion, amended by Annemieke Waite (Winford, Green), for the council to urge the government to insist that EDF obey the original planning conditions.
Councillors voted to pass the resolution unanimously.
Steve Bridger (Yatton, Independent), a local councillor for the village on North Somerset Council, described the EDF plan as “ham-fisted.”
Farmers and businesses dismayed
Farmers and local businesses have expressed dismay at the plans. Third generation young farmer Sophie Cole, whose entire farm could be affected, said in September: “No amount of money can compensate me for the loss of my livelihood and exciting plans for the future.”
When Somerset’s new nuclear power station was granted planning permission, it was told to install speakers to scare off fish from getting sucked into its cooling systems.
But EDF now says this would be “dangerous to install,” and wants to compensate for the 44 tonnes of fish expected to die each year by creating 340 hectares of saltmarsh along the Severn……………………..
Mr Burden said any changes to sea defences should be dealt with in the same way as other shoreline changes.
“I think we should ask for serious amounts of cash to be put into proper nature conservation and environment improvements in the wider area, not set up a completely new scheme by an organisation that’s interested in making power,” he said.
Involving central government
The council resolution sees it commit to continue working with the Environment Agency and local communities to develop a strategy to protect residents and the natural habitat, and to write to Angela Rayner and Ed Miliband, as the secretaries of state responsible for local government and energy, to urge them to enforce the original planning conditions on EDF, and not let them swap them for creating salt marshes……….. https://www.chardandilminsternews.co.uk/news/24725089.north-somerset-council-says-no-crazy-edf-salt-marsh-plan/
Farmers slam ‘crazy’ plans to flood 1,500 acres to save fish from a power plant.
Farmers and locals say their ‘lives will be destroyed’ by ‘crazy’ plans to
flood 1,500 acres – to compensate for fish lost to a nuclear power plant.
EDF Energy wants the land – much of it used for agriculture and businesses
like camping and tourism – to create a saltmarsh habitat.
Hinkley Point C is currently being built and will ingest 44 tonnes of fish a year – and EDF
wants to mitigate that loss and the wider environmental impact of the site.
It wants to compensate the death of the fish and its carbon footprint by
creating the saltmarsh at one of four sites along the River Severn in
Somerset. Plans are currently focused on Kingston Seymour, between Clevedon
and Weston-super-Mare, where landowners have received letters and documents
from EDF.
SWNS 10th Nov 2024 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1IDkPWZ46g
The Guardian view on Trump’s planet-wrecking plans: the UK government’s resolve will be tested
The new president’s disruptive policies will challenge Sir Keir Starmer’s green goals. But with strong leadership he could enhance Britain’s global influence.
Donald Trump’s electoral earthquake in America will complicate Sir Keir Starmer’s plans. Nowhere will the shock of Mr Trump’s win be more intensely felt than in environmental policy. His stance on climate – advocating a US exit from the Paris climate agreement and rallying behind “drill baby drill” – is more disruptive than constructive. This should concentrate Sir Keir’s mind as he heads to Cop29, the UN’s annual climate summit, in Baku, Azerbaijan.
At last year’s conference, world leaders agreed to “transition away” from fossil fuels in a just and orderly manner for the first time. Mr Trump, however, dismisses the climate crisis as a hoax. With this year likely to be the hottest on record, the devastating effects of global heating are undeniable, as extreme weather batters the planet. Mr Trump may ignore the facts, but the trail of climate-related chaos and destruction speaks for itself.
This ought to steel the prime minister’s resolve. Mr Trump’s plan to give the US an advantage in world trade through tariffs will complicate Labour’s goals of greening the economy, producing zero-carbon electricity, and cutting energy prices. The worst move Sir Keir could make would be to listen to rightwing voices arguing that if other nations are dropping green commitments, so should Britain. That would be a serious misstep, as leadership on climate not only reduces Britain’s carbon emissions but builds strategic alliances around the globe.
Mr Trump’s trade war threatens to disrupt supply chains, hike costs, jeopardise Britain’s green transition and stall its growth. His push for higher Nato defence spending could, in the UK, divert public funds from environmental initiatives. But this misses the point: Britain’s growth will be turbocharged by embracing green energy, leveraging its strengths in areas like offshore wind. Plus, most voters see a green shift as a path to lower energy costs and a stronger economy – a cause Sir Keir would be smart to champion.
The prime minister should double down on the plans of his energy secretary, Ed Miliband, rather than waver in the face of Trumpian pressure that prioritises short-term gains over a cleaner future. Mr Trump’s stance may also soften. He wants to gut Joe Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act and eliminate its clean tech subsidies. Yet most investment under the act has flowed to red and swing states in America’s south and midwest that voted for Mr Trump. Republican leaders in those states have vowed to protect these projects.
The profits of Elon Musk’s electric vehicle company Tesla would gain under Mr Trump’s deregulatory agenda. Mr Musk was $26bn richer the day after Mr Trump won. That reveals how the world’s richest person’s wealth is tied to political forces undermining green protections. Once a critic, Mr Musk now cosies up to Mr Trump. The quid pro quo is clear: Mr Trump, who once mocked electric cars, pandered to Mr Musk, telling a rally in August: “I’m for electric cars … because Elon [Musk] endorsed me.”
Mr Trump’s absence from future Cop meetings would be a mixed blessing. On one hand, he would hinder proceedings rather than help them. But having Mr Trump in the room might be preferable to him causing trouble from the outside. With some European leaders backing off green leadership due to domestic challenges, and others likely to follow Mr Trump’s lead, Sir Keir has a chance to step up on the world stage. This is a popular position at home. It would also be welcomed by his embattled counterparts on the continent – and beyond.
Radioactive pollution from bomb plant sparks cancer fears
The Ferret Rob Edwards, November 4, 2024
Radioactive air pollution from the nuclear weapons plant at Coulport, on the Clyde, has more than doubled over the last six years, prompting cancer warnings from campaigners.
Emissions of the radioactive gas, tritium, from the Royal Naval Armaments Depot on Loch Long, have risen steadily between 2018 and 2023 from 1.7 billion to 4.2 billion units of radioactivity, according to the latest official figures.
Campaigners say that tritium is “very hazardous” when it is breathed in, and can increase the risk of cancers. But according to the Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa), the emissions are well within safety limits.
The Ministry of Defence (MoD) has declined to say what has caused the increased pollution. Tritium is known to leak from ageing nuclear submarine reactors, and is also an essential component of nuclear bombs.
Coulport, eight miles from the nuclear submarine base at Faslane on the Gareloch, is where Trident missiles and nuclear warheads are stored. They are loaded on and off Vanguard nuclear-powered submarines at an explosives handling jetty.
The rising tritium emissions from Coulport have been revealed in Sepa’s Scottish Pollution Release Inventory. The inventory was updated in October 2024 to include figures for 2023.
Rising tritium pollution from Coulport
| Year | Tritium emitted to air (MBq) |
|---|
| 2018 | 1,770 |
| 2019 | 2,046 |
| 2020 | 2,298 |
| 2021 | 3,038 |
| 2022 | 3,472 |
| 2023 | 4,224 |
| Total | 16,848 |
Source: Scottish Pollution Release Inventory
The inventory also disclosed that Faslane has discharged liquids contaminated with tritium into the Gareloch, amounting to a total of over 50 billion units of radioactivity from 2018 to 2023. The discharges peaked at 16.6 billion units in 2020.
A report released by Sepa under freedom of information law revealed that in 2019 it changed the rules to allow certain tritium-contaminated effluents from nuclear submarines at Faslane to be discharged into the Gareloch.
“Low levels” of tritium had been discovered in waste, sewage and ballast water from submarines. Sepa agreed a “minor variation” to radioactive waste regulations to allow the continued treatment and disposal of the effluents.
Tritium discharges into the Clyde from Faslane
| Year | Tritium discharged to water (MBq) |
|---|
| 2018 | 5,817 |
| 2019 | 6,510 |
| 2020 | 16,609 |
| 2021 | 13,416 |
| 2022 | 1,582 |
| 2023 | 6,946 |
| Total | 50,880 |
Source: Scottish Pollution Release Inventory
Increasing tritium air pollution from Coulport was described as “worrying” by Dr Ian Fairlie, an expert on radioactivity in the environment and a former UK government advisor. He is now vice-president of the UK Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.
“First, they are large, more than four billion becquerels per year; second, they are steadily increasing; and third, they are of tritium – which is very hazardous when it’s inhaled or ingested,” he told The Ferret.
The discharges from Faslane into the Gareloch were also of concern, he said. “Any dose of radiation is hazardous to some degree, so that these discharges – especially of tritium – are disquieting.”…………………………………………………………………………………
https://theferret.scot/radioactive-tritium-coulport-cancer/
Endangered Bees Halt Meta’s Nuclear-Powered AI Data Center Plans
Mark Zuckerberg is trying to find more renewable energy sources for his AI ambitions.
By Kate Irwin, Nov 05, 2024, https://au.pcmag.com/ai/108105/endangered-bees-halt-metas-nuclear-powered-ai-data-center-plans
Meta’s plans to set up a nuclear-powered AI data center in the US have been halted in part because a rare bee species was found on the land, the Financial Times reports.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg told staff about the issue in an all-hands meeting, according to sources familiar with the situation. The project has also faced other environmental and regulatory hurdles, and Meta is now looking for other ways to access carbon-free energy for its AI data centers.
Zuckerberg previously said Meta would build bigger AI computing clusters if the company could get the electricity to do so, admitting that limited energy resources are the main bottleneck for AI expansion.
Because AI uses a lot of electricity (and water), energy is one of its biggest challenges. Because of existing rules, adding new sources to US grids can take years, and utility firms may not want to add large, new power plants to their systems because of the challenges associated with the additions, MIT researcher and energy council member Robert Stoner previously told PCMag.
A 2017 report from the Center for Biological Diversity found that there are 347 endangered bee species in North America and Hawaii. It noted that 90% of wild plants require pollinator activity in order to survive, meaning that disrupting bee habitats could result in not only extinct species but also a loss of plant life, which could further accelerate climate change.
The 1973 Endangered Species Act currently only protects one species of endangered bee in the continental US: the Rusty Patched Bumblebee. While it’s unclear which bee species has posed a challenge to Meta’s nuclear plans, according to a map from the US Fish and Wildlife Service, there are only about 471 Rusty Patched Bumblebees left, and most of them are in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, and around the Virginia-West Virginia border.
Meta’s website currently lists nearly two dozen data centers worldwide, with the majority concentrated in the US. A map shows 26 data centers either completed or being built in addition to 75 different solar power locations, 21 wind power locations, and 25 “Water Restoration” projects.
Meta isn’t the only big tech firm eyeing nuclear power, though. Google has ordered six or seven small modular nuclear reactors from Kairos Power, and Microsoft has made plans to reopen Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania to power its AI plans.
‘Two sides of the same coin’: governments stress links between climate and nature collapse
Representatives at the Cop16 summit in Colombia negotiated against a backdrop of extreme weather and ecosystem collapse
Patrick Greenfield and Phoebe Weston in Cali, Guardian 4th Nov 2024
As world leaders gathered in Colombia this week, they also watched for news from home, where many of the headlines carried the catastrophic consequences of ecological breakdown. Across the Amazon rainforest and Brazil’s enormous wetlands, relentless fires had burned more than 22m hectares (55m acres). In Spain, the death toll in communities devastated by flooding passed 200. In the boreal forests that span Siberia, Scandinavia, Alaska and Canada, countries were recording alarming signs that their carbon sinks were collapsing under a combined weight of drought, tree death and logging. As Canada’s wildfire season crept to a close, scientists calculated it was the second worst in two decades – behind only last year’s burn, which released more carbon than some of the world’s largest emitting countries.
In global negotiations, climate and nature move along two independent tracks, and for years were broadly treated as distinct challenges. But as negotiations closed at the Cop16 biodiversity summit in Cali on Saturday, ministers from around the world underscored the crucial importance of nature to limiting damage from global heating, and vice versa – emphasising that climate and biodiversity could no longer be treated as independent issues if either crisis was to be resolved. Countries agreed a text on links between the climate and nature, but failed to include language on a phase out of fossil fuels.
The UK environment secretary, Steve Reed, said that attending the summit in Colombia had brought home the links between climate and biodiversity. “One of the other things that’s really struck me coming here and speaking to the Colombians in particular is how for them the nature crisis and the climate crisis are exactly the same thing. In the UK, perhaps more widely in the global north, we tend to talk a lot about climate and particularly net zero, and much less about nature – perhaps because we’re already more nature-depleted. But those two things connect entirely,” he said.
The Cop16 president, Susana Muhamad, Colombia’s environment minister, has sought to put nature on a level with global efforts to decarbonise the world economy during the summit, warning that slashes to greenhouse gas emissions must be accompanied by the protection and restoration of the natural world if they are to be effective. Her presidency has repeatedly described nature and climate as “two sides of the same coin”.
“There is a double movement humanity must make. The first one is to decarbonise and have a just energy transition. The other side of the coin is to restore nature and allow nature to take again its power over planet Earth so that we can really stabilise the climate,” she has said throughout Cop16 and during the buildup……………………………………………………………………………. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/nov/04/two-sides-of-the-same-coin-governments-stress-links-between-climate-and-nature-collapse
Inside the radioactive island with mutant sharks that was used to test nuclear bombs
The water….remains undrinkable and sealife and plants cannot be eaten due to the radioactive water and soil.
The Defence Department concluded in the ’70s that the soil was so contained with cesium-137 and strontium-90 – both taking about three decades to decay, called a half-life – that the best course of action was to just let it rot.
Plutonium-239, however, takes a little longer; 24,000 years..…………………
Josh Milton, Oct 26, 2024,
https://metro.co.uk/2024/10/26/inside-radioactive-island-mutant-sharks-caused-nuclear-bombs-21376332/
Mutant sharks. White sand laced with plutonium. Water tainted with strontium. Hub cap-sized hermit crabs eating coconuts containing caesium. A dome ‘coffin’ crammed with radioactive material in plastic bags.
The Marshall Islands, a ring of coral reefs in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, looks like the perfect place to throw on a floppy sun hat and read a book below swaying palm trees.
But in the 1940s and ’50s, the US used two of the far-flung atolls, Bikini and Enewetak, to test out 67 nuclear bombs.
One was 1,000 times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb, according to Hibakusha Worldwide, which tracks nuclear incidents.
This was part of Operation Crossroad, an atomic testing programme that came out of the anxiety of the Cold War.
With 52,000 Marshallese people calling the islands home at the time, the 20 islands are the remnants of ancient volcanoes halfway between Hawaii and Australia.
Yet entire islands were vaporized and craters gouged into its shallow lagoons, forcing hundreds of people out of their homes, never to return.
Bikini Atoll now has such a reputation for groovy wildlife it inspired the setting of Spongebob Squarepants.
While the islands are unlikely home to talking sponges, the radiation that lingers in its waters is impacting the wildlife.
Nurse sharks with just one dorsal fin swim around the Bikini Atoll and car-sized coral grows along the seafloor.
‘Popular belief is that radiation causes mutations, and you know what, it’s true,’ Steve Palumbi, a professor of marine sciences also at Stanford, told The Sun.
Even low levels of radiation can cause genetic mutations. Caesium, strontium and other radioactive isotopes break apart DNA, compressing thousands of years of evolution into a few decades in what one paper once described as ‘unnatural selection‘.
Marine life is on the rebound in Bikini. ‘The fact there is life there and the life there is trying to come back from the most violent thing we’ve ever done to it is pretty hopeful,’ said Steve Palumbi, a professor in marine sciences at Stanford University.
The water, though, remains undrinkable and sealife and plants cannot be eaten due to the radioactive water and soil.
People living on nearby islands, now part of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, during and after the testing show a higher risk of developing cancer – not one of the top two causes of death – and birth defects.
The list of woes for the Marshallese does not end there, with rising sea levels fuelled by climate change slowly swallowing up the habitable atolls.
The largest nuclear detonation was the hydrogen bomb Castle Bravo, fired on March 1, 1954, in Bikini. As the mushroom-shaped clast cast a shadow over the island, the radioactive fallout and debris spewed well beyond the shorelines.
‘Traces of radioactive material were later found in parts of Japan, India, Australia, Europe, and the US,’ says the Atomic Heritage Foundation.
‘This was the worst radiological disaster in US history and caused worldwide backlash against atmospheric nuclear testing.’
Bikini, the colonial spelling of Pikinni, became so radioactive there’s little hope it’ll ever be habitable.
After the Limited Test Ban Treaty of 1963 put an end to atmospheric nuclear testing, this left American officials – and the islands’ displaced citizens – with one option: wait.
The Defence Department concluded in the ’70s that the soil was so contained with cesium-137 and strontium-90 – both taking about three decades to decay, called a half-life – that the best course of action was to just let it rot.
Plutonium-239, however, takes a little longer; 24,000 years. The US dumped 437 plastic bags filled with lumps of plutonium that had spewed after a bomb misfired into a 33-foot crater left behind in 1958 by a nuke on Runit Island.
That, and about 35 Olympic-sized swimming pools’ worth of radioactive soil and nuclear waste.
The crater was plugged up by a 350-foot-wide slab of concrete called the Runit Dome, which locals call ‘The Tomb’, in the ’70s. The dome almost looks like something from a science fiction movie, surrounded by a tropical paradise.
And the dome is leaking. ‘The dome is a significant visible scar on the landscape,’ Ken Buesseler, a marine radioactivity expert at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI), told Oceans magazine in 2020.
But it’s a relatively small source of radioactivity.’
Overall, more than half of the 167 original inhabitants of Bikini Atoll have died. Some started showing cancers related to radiation exposure in the 1960s, while people living downwind of the explosions suffered burns and low blood counts.
Several generations later, about 5,400 Bikinians are still living in exile. Some live on a lone Pacific island called Kili, roughly 400 miles from Bikini, and others from Honolulu to the ‘Wheat Capital’ of Oklahoma, Enid.
Bikini Atoll largely remains uninhabited, with a tiny caretaker team taking care of the island infrastructure and divers pop in from time to time.
Bikinians continue to fight, however. Lobbying the US Congress for money to redevelop and clean up the place they once called home.
Scientists are hopeful. Remediation efforts include sprinkling affected areas with potassium fertilizer which reduces how much cesium-137 seeps into locally grown crops. How radioactive the soil is has also been decreasing.
The Marshall Islands Program advises that, once resettlement finally begins, a radiation monitoring programme be set up.
‘In this way, the Kili-Bikini-Ejit Local Government and the people of Bikini can be assured that radiological conditions on the islands remain at or below applicable safety standards, and the United States Government can avoid mistakes of the past,’ the programme says.
Wildlife Refuge’s Toxic Past Still A Colorado Concern
A national wildlife refuge that was contaminated by plutonium from the 1950s through the early 1990s is still a health concern for nearby Colorado communities.
Gary Stoller, Forbes, Oct 25, 2024
For many decades, Rocky Flats has been a controversial contaminated site south of Boulder, Colorado, about 20 miles north of Denver. The controversy continues, as nearby communities refuse to further develop the 6,200-acre site that’s now a wildlife refuge with trails for walkers and cyclists.
Rocky Flats, which housed facilities to produce nuclear weapons components from 1952 through the early 1990s, was contaminated by plutonium and other nuclear materials. Cleanup ended in 2006, and, a year later, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designated the site as the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. Federal government officials say the area used for the refuge is safe for human visitors, but neighboring cities Westminster and Broomfield and the town of Superior apparently remain unconvinced.
For many decades, Rocky Flats has been a controversial contaminated site south of Boulder, Colorado, about 20 miles north of Denver. The controversy continues, as nearby communities refuse to further develop the 6,200-acre site that’s now a wildlife refuge with trails for walkers and cyclists.
Rocky Flats, which housed facilities to produce nuclear weapons components from 1952 through the early 1990s, was contaminated by plutonium and other nuclear materials. Cleanup ended in 2006, and, a year later, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designated the site as the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. Federal government officials say the area used for the refuge is safe for human visitors, but neighboring cities Westminster and Broomfield and the town of Superior apparently remain unconvinced.
Last month, Westminster withdrew from an intergovernmental agreement to fund the building of a tunnel and a bridge into the refuge. Such construction would improve access to the refuge — home to more than 200 wildlife species— for hikers, walkers, cyclists and outdoor enthusiasts. Broomfield and Superior had previously withdrawn their support.
The refuge is part of the Rocky Mountain Greenway, a 25-mile trail that reaches from Commerce City, a Denver suburb, into Boulder and Jefferson counties. The trail links Rocky Flats with the Rocky Mountain Arsenal, land outside of downtown Denver that also was cleaned up after contamination from the manufacture of chemical warfare agents, including mustard gas, for World War II.
In a 2006 report, the U.S. Government Accountability Office said $10 billion had been spent since 1995 to clean up Rocky Flats. The amount of cleanup waste that had to be removed “was equivalent to a 65-story building the length and width of a football field,” the GAO said…………….
The majority of Westminster city councilors said last month they feared foot traffic could stir up plutonium, according to a story published by Colorado Community Media, which has publications in eight Colorado counties. Critics said measurable radioactive materials remain in and around the Rocky Flats site and will remain for thousands of years, the media group reported. https://www.forbes.com/sites/garystoller/2024/10/25/wildlife-refuges-toxic-past-still-a-colorado-concern/
Fears salt marsh plan could lead to ‘destruction’ of Severn Vale
Gazette, 21st October 24
THERE are fears plans for new salt marshes linked to the construction of nuclear power plant Hinkley C would lead to “wholesale destruction of the Severn Vale”.
EDF bosses have been severely criticised for their environmental improvement plans in Gloucestershire which are linked to the new Hinkley C site in Somerset.
Their original plan for Hinkley Point was to install an acoustic fish deterrent system to scare fish away from the site as the Bristol Channel is home to numerous species such as eels, herring, salmon and sprats.
However, the French government-owned energy firm feel this will no longer be viable and have instead drawn up alternative plans to create salt marshes along the River Severn.
In the area, they have identified sites in Arlingham and Littleton Upon Severn near Thornbury in South Gloucestershire.
Other proposed sites include Rodley near Westbury-on-Severn in Gloucestershire and Kingston Seymour in Somerset.
But the proposals, which were aired at a recent parish council meeting, have been met with strong opposition in the Severn Vale.
David Seal, a local resident, believes the plans would “likely bring an end to most ideas of future development of the village, farming, farmland, miles and miles of hedgerow, trees and just about everything we all love about the green serenity of the village”.
“All this to ‘offset’ Hinckley C destroying 182 million fish in the estuary per year over 60 years,” he said.
“EDF has all the technical know-how to dig two enormous cooling water tunnels 3.3km out under the Bristol Channel, yet they say it’s ‘too risky’ to fit an acoustic deterrent to mitigate the problem at source in the same estuary.
“What is too risky is messing about with the River Severn and destroying the land we and nature live off…………………………………………………….
https://www.gazetteseries.co.uk/news/24665869.fears-salt-marsh-plan-lead-destruction-severn-vale/
‘Millions of fish could die’ under current Hinkley Point C plan
Environmental advocates demand EDF takes action
By Lewis Clarke, Somerset Live , 22nd Oct 2024
A solutions-focussed, scientifically backed answer to the critical environmental situation at Hinkley Point C has been released by a coalition of scientists, engineers, and innovators, showing that the Acoustic Fish Deterrent (AFD) is both a necessary and feasible requirement for the builders of Hinkley Point C – EDF Energy – to apply.
An AFD Delivery Report, launched on October 16, gives evidence that the AFD can be installed safely and effectively in the Severn Estuary. It highlights the innovations in technical ability, technology, logistics, and science which will reduce maintenance times from 72 days per year down to just 19. The report debunks common misconceptions about noise levels, diving time, and more with scientifically backed evidence, and urges EDF to ensure the system is installed, tested, and operational before the station starts to abstract cooling water.
In light of the critical environmental situation at Hinkley Point C, a parliamentary debate led by Sir Ashley Fox MP was held last week on Wednesday 9th October 2024. During the debate, Sir Ashley Fox addressed that EDF Energy’s mosaic of mitigation measures, specifically the proposed saltmarsh plans, are a completely illogical choice.
The saltmarsh plans are a proposed alternative to the Acoustic Fish Deterrent (AFD), a system designed to protect aquatic life by deterring fish from entering the cooling systems of the power plant, and was included in the initial design plans of Hinkley Point C.
The AFD system remains mandated in the Development Consent Order (DCO). It is also considered best practice for screening estuarine intakes in the UK by the Environment Agency, and has been scrutinised by a Welsh Government Report (2021), a Public Inquiry (2022), and the ruling by Secretary of State Kwasi Kwarteng (2022) which all stated that the AFD must be installed. EDF Energy has been working to remove this vital environmental protection measure for nearly eight years, arguing on the grounds of health and safety concerns, noise pollution and effect on mammals, and further delay of the completion of Hinkley Point C.
The AFD Delivery Report provides a solution to the current impasse, but without the AFD, it has been warned by the Welsh Government Commission that approximately 182 million fish would be killed annually, including sensitive species like shad, sprat, Atlantic salmon, and herring.
In the AFD Delivery Report, Professor Mark Everard, University of West of England says “There can in my scientific view be no justification for removal of AFD. It makes absolutely no sense to permit very substantial damage to marine biodiversity and hope then that modest mitigation entailing a degree of recruitment only of species reliant on the saltmarsh can offset it.
“Cost reduction is cited by EDF as one element of its plan to remove the mandated AFD and would appear to be its principal consideration, but one that obviously overlooks the vital purpose of deflecting fish from the intake. Ideally, saltmarsh restoration should be implemented ADDITIONALLY to the AFD to mitigate the still substantial likely entrainment of multiple life stages of fish and invertebrates, even with deflection from the intake.”
South Gloucestershire Council understands that EDF will make another application to the Secretary of State to remove the requirement for an AFD in the new year, and so has written to the Secretary of State for Energy, Security & Net Zero, the Rt Hon Ed Milliband, requesting that he upholds the existing requirement to install an AFD.
Councillors Maggie Tyrrell and Ian Boulton, said in their letter to the Secretary of State: “We are writing to express our gravest concern regarding the scale of impact on the migratory fish populations of the Severn Estuary Special Area of Conservation (SAC) which will result from the massive water abstraction at Hinkley Point C of 120,000 litres of seawater a second for 60 years once the power station is operational.
“This impact would be made significantly worse by the proposed application for a change to the 2013 Development Consent Order to remove the required Acoustic Fish Deterrent (AFD).
“A Welsh Government report on the AFD cites evidence that removal of the AFD would capture at least 182 million fish per year, a significant proportion of which would be killed. Put simply, removing the AFD would cause critical levels of wildlife destruction.”
The council is also concerned that EDF are approaching local landowners about a plan to create new salt marshes, which they would propose as alternative compensation habitat for fish in place of the AFD. It is understood that local landowners are deeply concerned about the idea, which has been turned down in other areas when raised by EDF, and experts query EDFs claims that new saltmarshes would offer suitable habitat for fish killed by the water intake of the new power station.
The council’s letter also highlighted that even with the AFD, that compensation will still be needed as some fish will still be drawn into the intake and killed. Alongside the letter, the Secretary of State was also provided with information about priorities to deliver improvements for fish passage in the Bristol Avon river and Coastal Catchments……………………
https://www.somersetlive.co.uk/news/somerset-news/millions-fish-could-die-under-9641529
1 This Month
26 September – International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons
PLEASE OPPOSE HR 8255 AND S.3639 – bills would accelerate satellite deployment, with no environmental review or safeguards – https://ncstd5li.quorum.us/campaign/169331/
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
-
Archives
- September 2026 (219)
- August 2026 (330)
- July 2026 (355)
- June 2026 (287)
- May 2026 (306)
- April 2026 (356)
- March 2026 (251)
- February 2026 (267)
- January 2026 (308)
- December 2025 (358)
- November 2025 (359)
- October 2025 (375)
-
Categories
- 1
- 1 NUCLEAR ISSUES
- business and costs
- climate change
- culture and arts
- ENERGY
- environment
- health
- history
- indigenous issues
- Legal
- marketing of nuclear
- media
- opposition to nuclear
- PERSONAL STORIES
- politics
- politics international
- Religion and ethics
- safety
- secrets,lies and civil liberties
- spinbuster
- technology
- Uranium
- wastes
- weapons and war
- Women
- 2 WORLD
- ACTION
- AFRICA
- Atrocities
- AUSTRALIA
- Christina's notes
- Christina's themes
- culture and arts
- Events
- Fuk 2022
- Fuk 2023
- Fukushima 2017
- Fukushima 2018
- fukushima 2019
- Fukushima 2020
- Fukushima 2021
- general
- global warming
- Humour (God we need it)
- Nuclear
- RARE EARTHS
- Reference
- resources – print
- Resources -audiovicual
- Weekly Newsletter
- World
- World Nuclear
- YouTube
-
RSS
Entries RSS
Comments RSS
nuclear-news 
