Expert forum Claverton Energy Group concludes that renewable energy +battery storage can meet UK’s needs – nuclear is not needed.
Open University Professor Bill Nuttall’s updated version of his 2005 ‘Nuclear Renaissance’ book makes a case for nuclear power as low carbon and reliable, although, as the promotional blurb says, it accepts that
‘in recent years it has struggled to play a strong role in global plans for electricity generation in the 21st century’.
The new book also accepts that the much-hyped renaissance didn’t in the event happen- with Fukushima blowing it off course. Do we really want to build new nuclear plants to be ready on standby to provide spinning reserve backup and/or to provide rotational grid stability? Hydro can do that, and wind too to some extent, and virtual inertia can be provided by battery systems fed by PV solar.
Claverton Energy Group (CEG), a UK energy expert forum, has recently summarised some of the key conclusions of current research on energy system mixes and say they show that renewables can supply all our needs, with grid balancing provided in part by battery and heat storage.
Nuclear is not needed. The newly revised and updated 100% renewables global energy scenario produced by Prof Mark Jacobson and his team at Stanford University has come to similar conclusions, with 4 hour battery storage playing major balancing roles. All at competitive costs.
Renew Extra 20th Aug 2022
https://renewextraweekly.blogspot.com/2022/08/nuclear-renaissance-revisited.html
Putin Claim U.S. Is Dragging Out War Isn’t Crazy, Military Expert Says
Newsweek, BY NICK MORDOWANEC ON 8/18/22
aims made by Russian President Vladimir Putin that the United States is intentionally prolonging the Russia-Ukraine conflict may not be as implausible as described, says one U.S. military veteran and journalist.
In a speech this week, Putin called out “Western globalist elites” who he said are “provoking chaos, inciting old and new conflicts,” and attempting “to preserve the hegemony and power that is slipping out of their hands.” He added that the situation in Ukraine shows the U.S. is “trying to prolong the conflict.”
Sean Spoonts, a U.S. Navy veteran and editor-in-chief of Special Operations Forces Report (SOFREP), told Newsweek that President Joe Biden and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky seem to have separate policy goals in mind.
“It seems like while Ukraine would like to end the war quickly and decisively defeat Russian forces and drive them out of their country, U.S. policy almost seems designed to prolong the conflict hoping to bring about the collapse of Russia itself, both militarily and economically,” Spoonts said.
……………. As a recent report by The Washington Post indicated, the U.S. was privy to some of Russia’s plans for the invasion of Ukraine before it officially began on February 24. Spoonts alluded to Biden’s remarks on that day, when he said, “Some of the most powerful impacts of our actions will come over time as we squeeze Russia’s access to finance and technology for strategic sectors of its economy and degrade its industrial capacity for years to come.”
“Biden has said publicly that his goal is to degrade Russia as a world power, never again in the position to threaten its neighbors,” said Spoonts. “That goes a lot further than Zelensky’s goal, which is to simply get Russian armies out of his country and regain lost territories in Donbas, Luhansk and Crimea.”………………………………. https://www.newsweek.com/sean-spoonts-us-russia-ukraine-war-policy-goals-1735019
Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Macron that Ukrainian shelling of Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant risks disaster
Russian President Vladimir Putin warned his French counterpart Emmanuel
Macron that shelling of the Russian-controlled Zaporizhzhia nuclear power
plant in southern Ukraine, which he blamed on Kyiv, could result in a
large-scale disaster.
Reuters 19th Aug 2022
Islanders in Latin America face relocation, because of climate change.
Some 2,000 islanders in Guna Yala will become one of the first indigenous
communities in Latin America to relocate because of climate change.
Islander Magdalena Martínez, who has campaigned for new housing on the
mainland, tells the BBC how she feels about leaving the island she grew up
on.
The Panama government estimates all islands of the Guna people could be
under water by 2050, based on forecasts by an independent group of
scientists, although others think the islands may not all be submerged
until the end of the century.
BBC 20th Aug 2022
Russian Military From Nuclear Plant Showing Signs Of Radiation Sickness – Paramedic
https://ukranews.com/en/news/877286-russian-military-from-nuclear-plant-showing-signs-of-radiation-sickness-paramedic 21 Aug 22, The Russian military men, who were on the territory of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, were hospitalized with symptoms of radiation sickness. To find out what is really happening on the territory of the Zaporizhzhia NPP, it is necessary to immediately demilitarize it and put it under the control of international organizations.
Paramedic Bohdan Bondarenko, who is now on the front line, stated this on Facebook.
“The Russian military, who performed tasks at the Zaporizhzhia NPP, were taken to intensive care with signs identical to radiation sickness. The Russians, of course, talk about chemical poisoning, but brought the wounded from the nuclear plant. Not to mention the level of trust in Russian information. Now, before it is too late, you need to do everything possible to get a true picture of the situation at the station,” Bondarenko said.
He noted that the military from the Zaporizhzhia NPP on July 31 were taken to a military hospital and are in intensive care. The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation distributed information that examination of the victims “revealed the presence of an organic poison of artificial origin.” But this happened when the Russians fired on the Zaporizhzhia NPP.
“Around this time, Russia and Ukraine exchanged mutual accusations of shelling the station. Ukrainian Energoatom announced a possible radiation leak at the Zaporizhzhia NPP. At the same time, Rosatom brought its employees out of the station as an emergency, and the occupiers refused access to the station to IAEA inspectors,” writes Bondarenko.
The paramedic believes that the situation with the concealment of information by Russia resembles the behavior of the leadership of the USSR immediately after the Chornobyl tragedy.
“Something similar was last observed in the first month after the Chornobyl disaster. The leadership of the USSR desperately hid and distorted the truth, which led to catastrophic consequences both for the health and life of millions of people, and for the Soviet government itself, which was not forgiven for this lie. It is necessary to immediately demilitarize the station and put it under the control of the UN, IAEA or other independent structure. It’s a matter of survival. Aware of the level of opportunities of international organizations, or rather their level of helplessness, but there is no other,” Bohdan Bondarenko stressed.
India: Centres to be set up for people exposed to chemical, nuclear attacks
The Union Health Ministry has drawn up a proposal to set up two tertiary level centres for the treatment of people exposed to chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear incidents or attacks,
Press Trust of India | New Delhi , August 21, 2022,
In a first, the Union Health Ministry has drawn up a proposal to set up two tertiary level centres for the treatment of people exposed to chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear incidents or attacks.
It is aimed at managing medical emergencies arising out of incidents such as the Bhopal gas tragedy, Visakhapatnam HPCL refinery blast, Tughlaqabad gas leak, Kanpur ammonia gas leak and other industrial accidents, official sources told PTI.
The detailed project report for setting up of these two chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear (CBRN) facilities at Stanley Medical College in Chennai, Tamil Nadu and Jhajjar Campus, AIIMS has been readied.
The project report has been prepared by HLL Infra Tech Services Ltd (HITES) in consultation with experts drawn from the Ministry of Health, Ministry of Defence and other sectors like the Department of Atomic Energy as well as its affiliate organisations like Bhabha Atomic Research Centre, they said.
The two facilities are to be set up over one-and-half years at an estimated cost of Rs 230 crore……………… more https://www.business-standard.com/article/current-affairs/centres-to-be-set-up-for-people-exposed-to-chemical-nuclear-attacks-122082100174_1.html
Disarmament is the only cure for nuclear weapons
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/08/21/disarmament-is-only-cure-nuclear-weapons/
Gwen DuBois, Baltimore
The writer is a board member of Physicians for Social Responsibility and a member of the steering committee for Back from the Brink.
The Post is to be commended for informing readers about the disturbing study showing nuclear war could lead to mass starvation [“5 billion may starve in nuclear conflict,” news, Aug. 17]. Telling frightening truths should be coupled with hopeful solutions where solutions exist.
In this case, preventing nuclear war is the way to avoid this horrible possibility of massive global starvation. Internationally, 66 nations have endorsed and 86 nations have signed the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. In this country, about 60 municipalities including Baltimore, D.C., Montgomery County and Chicago and seven state legislatures have approved Back from the Brink Resolutions, a road map to nuclear disarmament. In addition to most resolutions endorsing the U.N. treaty, all urge the United States to lead a global effort to prevent nuclear war by actively pursuing a verifiable agreement with the other nuclear nations to eliminate their nuclear weapons. This is the basic message of Physicians for Social Responsibility: “We must prevent what we cannot cure.”
Ukraine nuclear accident fears heightened
Canberra Times 21 Aug 22, New blasts have resounded in the Russian-annexed Crimea peninsula and a Russian missile hit a residential area of a southern Ukrainian town not far from a nuclear power station, wounding 12 civilians, Russian and Ukrainian officials say.
The strike at the Pivdennoukrainsk (south Ukraine) nuclear station and fresh shelling near the Zaporizhzhia station, Europe’s largest such facility, heightened fears of a nuclear accident during the war, Ukrainian officials said. In Crimea, ….the Russian-appointed governor not recognised by the West said a drone had struck a building near the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet on Saturday morning.
“A drone flew onto the roof. It was flying low,” governor Mikhail Razvozhayev said on Telegram. “It was downed right over the Fleet headquarters. It fell on the roof and burned up. The attack failed.”
Ukrainian media reported explosions in nearby towns – including the resorts of Yevpatoriya, Olenivka and Zaozyornoye.
Explosions and fires have struck Crimea in the past week — including a blast at a Russian air base that appeared to destroy large numbers of aircraft according to satellite photos.
Ukrainian officials have made no comment. Analysts have said the attacks were made possible by new equipment used by the Ukrainian army and predicted more would occur………………………………………..
Russia and Ukraine traded fresh accusations of shelling around the Zaporizhzhia station – held by Russia since March.
Vladimir Rogov, a Russia-appointed official in the nearby town of Enerhodar, said Ukrainian forces had launched at least four strikes on the plant. Yevhen Yetushenko, mayor of the Ukrainian-controlled Nikopol on the opposite bank of the Dnipro River, said Russian forces had repeatedly shelled the town.
Talks have been underway for more than a week to arrange for a visit to the plant by the UN nuclear power agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency………………………………….. https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/7869033/ukraine-nuclear-accident-fears-heightened/
We must never forget the risks nuclear stations pose to us all in conflict situations
The Herald, Isobel Lindsay, 19 Aug 22, CURRENTLY there are two different discourses going on in relation to nuclear power with no cross-over (“If Russia turns up the heat, could a nuclear winter follow?”, The Herald, August 17).
There is a cosy consensus among UK politicians and commentators that we should have more nuclear power stations and that this is supposed to be environmentally friendly. This message is, of course, actively promoted by commercial interests. Never mind the huge cost of both the build and the decommissioning, the legacy of radioactive waste we are leaving for future generations, the impact of rising water levels and drought on these plants and the long build time.
But the other discourse playing out is the huge vulnerability of nuclear power plants in conflict situations. Both Russia and Ukraine are playing “dare you” in relation to the Zaporizhzhia power plant. The Russians are using it as a base that is too dangerous to attack and Ukraine has been having a few shots at it to frighten the Russians and the rest of Europe in order to get more help. If the worst happens, it is the wind that will determine who suffers most, not state boundaries.
The threat is not just from war situations. While we have careful security measures, risk is always there. In 2017 a member of a far-right apocalyptic group in the US was arrested with weapons on his way to a nuclear power plant. One of those killed in the January 2021 storming of the US Capitol was an employee of a nuclear plant. In 2014 an insider at a Belgium reactor sabotaged one of the plant’s turbines, leading to months of shut-down. There are plants on earthquake and tsunami vulnerable areas.
We are not short of low-risk methods for the radical reduction in carbon emissions. We need to challenge those who are promoting high-risk choices, https://www.heraldscotland.com/news/20672345.letters-must-never-forget-risks-nuclear-stations-pose-us-conflict-situations/
Malaysia’s Mahathir says US seeking to provoke war in Taiwan
By EILEEN NG, 20 Aug 22,
KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (AP) — Former Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad on Friday accused the U.S. of trying to provoke a war in Taiwan, and in a wide-ranging interview also said he expects Malaysia’s graft-tainted ruling party to hold general elections in the coming months.
Mahathir, a two-time prime minister long known as a critic of the West and its geopolitics, warned that the U.S. was antagonizing China through recent visits to Taiwan by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and others. China considers the self-ruled island democracy part of its territory and regards such visits as meddling in its affairs.
“China has allowed Taiwan to remain by itself. No problem. They didn’t invade. If they wanted to invade, they could have invaded. They didn’t. But America is provoking (them) so that there can be a war, so that the Chinese will make the mistake of trying to occupy Taiwan,” the 97-year-old Mahathir said.
“Then there is an excuse … for the U.S. to help Taiwan, even fight against China and sell a lot of arms to Taiwan,” he added…………………….. more https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-2022-midterm-elections-biden-taiwan-nato-96f52741ce6e9e6a2cdcfce5fd459ad8—
The Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is a fraud as the nuclear Mafia continue to spend $billions on their nuclear arsenals.
By Robin Lloyd of Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) 19 Aug 22
“This a critical moment for nuclear disarmament, and for our collective survival.” wrote Ray Acheson of Reaching Critical Will commenting on the Non-proliferation Treaty Review Conference taking place NOW at the United Nations.
I attended the Conference for several days last week as a NGO delegate from the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), and have been watching closely the negotiations going on for the entire month of August 2022 over an outcome statement for the Conference.
This could be an extraordinary breakthrough towards global nuclear disarmament. 191 nations are represented in this treaty and are seated in the General Assembly hall now, until August 26, listening to each other. In the first week, we heard urgent warning statements from the nations without nuclear weapons, such as “The clouds that parted following the end of the Cold War are gathering once more,” and, from Costa Rica, scolding, “The lack of firm deadlines has provided the nuclear-armed States with a pathway to disregard their disarmament commitments as flagrantly as they have since the last Review Conference.”After two weeks a draft preamble was submitted that reaffirms , amongst other things, “
…that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought, and commits to ensuring that nuclear weapons will never be used again under any circumstances.”
In a hopeful step, in the last year, 89 non-nuclear states have either signed or ratified a binding disarmament treaty, the TPNW (Treaty PROHIBITING Nuclear Weapons) that requires disarmament commitments. These states are no longer tolerating the double talk from the nine nation nuclear mafia.
How can the US consider signing the draft preamble while the House and Senate are finalizing the National Defense Authorization Act which calls for the modernization of our nuclear arsenal? How can our government even take part in this Conference while it is seeking funding for a renewed nuclear edifice of destruction including Modernized Strategic Delivery Systems and Refurbished Nuclear Warheads? Over the next decade, the United States plans to spend $494 billion on its nuclear forces, or about $50 billion a year, according to a 2019 Congressional Budget Office report. Trillions of dollars for submarines and bombers and buried nuclear missiles. Things they are committing to not use. Please, does this make sense?
At one of the NGO meetings I attended in the basement of the UN sponsored by peace groups, I blurted out “This Conference IS A FRAUD.” The nuclear mafia have no serious plans to disarm, as required by Section 6 of the NPT Treaty. Their duplicity could be rebuked to the world by a walkout in the final days of the conference by the countries that have signed/ratified the TPNW, and their supporters.
For the NPT Treaty to collapse would be tragic, but for it to continue when everyone knows it is a lie is a moral and mortal affront to the people of the world.
Bill Gates’ nuclear startup wins $750M, loses sole fuel source
TerraPower notches a record-setting investment round led by South Korea’s SK. But it has no supplier of the enriched fuel it needs, now that sourcing from Russia is off the table.
Canary Media Eric Wesoff, 18 August 2022, Nuclear fission startup TerraPower, founded and chaired by Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, has raised $750 million to develop advanced nuclear reactors to serve as alternatives to the light-water reactors that make up the vast majority of the world’s civilian nuclear fleet. But cash alone won’t be enough to get the startup over the many hurdles that stand in its way.
TerraPower’s Natrium fast reactor design is radically different from the design of traditional nuclear reactors. For starters, it’s smaller. A typical reactor in the U.S. produces 1,000 megawatts of power. TerraPower’s first demonstration reactor, now being planned for a site in Wyoming, will have a capacity of 345 megawatts. The smaller size could enable the reactor to be built cheaply in a factory and not expensively on-site.
The Natrium reactor will also use a different fuel and a different coolant than standard nuclear reactors. It will be fueled by high-assay low-enriched uranium (HALEU), which is enriched with more uranium than the fuel used in traditional nuclear plants. And the coolant will be high-temperature liquid sodium instead of water.
TerraPower’s new funding includes $250 million from South Korean chaebol SK Group. Previous funding for the firm has come from Gates and Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway. The company was also awarded $80 million from the U.S. Department of Energy to work on its Natrium reactor design.
Canary covered TerraPower’s technology in detail last year when the firm announced that Bechtel will build its first reactor in Kemmerer, Wyoming, near the site of a coal-fired power plant that is scheduled to be shut down. The U.S. Department of Energy and private investors will split the cost of the demonstration project.
The startup claims that this first reactor will be in operation by 2028 and will cost $4 billion, including engineering, procurement and construction. If TerraPower comes anywhere close to meeting those wildly ambitious goals, it will strongly differentiate itself from the traditional nuclear industry, which is notorious for missed deadlines and shocking cost overruns. The only two conventional nuclear reactors currently under construction in the U.S., at the Vogtle plant in Georgia, are already six years overdue and will cost utility customers over $30 billion, more than double the original price tag.
Fuel folly?
One big new problem for TerraPower emerged earlier this year: its fuel source. The only facility currently able to supply commercial quantities of HALEU is in Russia. That wasn’t a great situation even before Russia invaded Ukraine. Now that the war in Ukraine has been grinding on for six months and shows no signs of resolution, relying on fuel sourced from Russia is untenable.
In March, TerraPower said it had cut ties with Tenex, the Russian state-owned company from which it had planned to source HALEU, Wyoming-based nonprofit news outlet WyoFile reported. “When Russia invaded Ukraine it became very clear, for a whole set of reasons — moral reasons as well as commercial reasons — that using Russian fuel is no longer an option for us,” said Jeff Navin, TerraPower’s director of external affairs.
TerraPower did just get good news this week when President Biden signed the Inflation Reduction Act into law. The legislation includes $700 million to help build up a domestic supply chain for HALEU. The funding could give a boost to the U.S. Department of Energy’s plans to launch a congressionally authorized HALEU Availability Program. But developing HALEU production capacity in the U.S. will take years.
TerraPower does not have wiggle room to delay. If it doesn’t complete its demonstration project by 2028, it stands to lose out on up to $2 billion in federal funding from the U.S. Department of Energy’s Advanced Reactor Demonstration Program and the opportunity for expedited federal regulatory reviews.
Some experts are skeptical that TerraPower will make the deadline, especially now that it has no source of fuel. “I didn’t think it was doable before this monkey wrench was thrown in,” Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety for the Union of Concerned Scientists, told WyoFile in March.
A nuclear renaissance?
Despite these headwinds, TerraPower did just raise $750 million, so it’s not alone in anticipating a revival of the nuclear power industry.
The Inflation Reduction Act will help not just HALEU-fueled TerraPower but the rest of the nuclear energy sector too: It includes a production tax credit for nuclear power, an incentive that will benefit struggling nuclear plants that already exist across the country as well as developers of new types of nuclear reactors. In addition to TerraPower, that latter category includes U.S. startups NuScale and Oklo.
….. The bipartisan infrastructure law Biden signed late last year contains $6 billion to support existing nuclear plants and $3.2 billion for development of advanced nuclear power technology. The Department of Energy’s Loan Programs Office has $11 billion in funding for nuclear plants and nuclear supply chains, according to Jigar Shah, director of the office. …………….. https://www.canarymedia.com/articles/nuclear/bill-gates-nuclear-startup-wins-750m-loses-sole-fuel-source
South Korean unionists protest US-South Korea war games
Saturday, 13 August 2022, Frank Smith, Press TV, Seoul
Thousands of South Korean unionists and their progressive supporters rallied in downtown Seoul to protest against joint US-South Korea war games planned for later this month.
The drills will be the largest in years, and follow the May election of President Yoon Suk-yeol, who has promised to take a hardline with North Korea. Union leaders worry about risks.
While many South Koreans, especially supporters of President Yoon on the right, favor close ties with the U.S., large numbers also argue the US military and the country’s alliance with Washington, prevent the improvement of ties with North Korea – and generate tension…………….. more https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2022/08/13/687322/South-Korean-unionists-protest-US-South-Korea-war-games
War Propaganda About Ukraine Starting to Wear Thin
Covert Action Magazine, By Chay Bowes – August 13, 2022,
More and More Are Seeing Through the Lies
As Amnesty International confirms the inconvenient truths, which many independent journalists and political observers already knew, about the Ukrainian army’s behavior in Donbass, it’s worth examining how manipulating the truth has become—not only an everyday occurrence but a central element of the West’s proxy war in Ukraine.
An increasing number of mainstream journalists, commentators and ordinary individuals who had rushed to “Stand with Ukraine ” are finding the inconvenient truths about the Zelensky regime and its Army harder and harder to ignore.
It was the icon of American democracy, President Abraham Lincoln that said “You can fool part of the people some of the time, you can fool some of the people all of the time, but you cannot fool all the people all of the time.” Of course, even though Lincoln’s astute observation has been widely misquoted, it certainly has a particular resonance when we consider the recent misadventures and persistent foreign policy failures of his beloved United States.
Most particularly are American efforts to maintain an increasingly skeptical public’s support for its faltering and hugely costly geopolitical ambitions in Ukraine.
So far it hasn’t been too difficult to package a message for general consumption, a drive-through narrative if you will, that is easily accessible and digestible by a trusting public, particularly when that same public has been globally denied key factual insights into the background of a long running complex conflict into which they have been seduced as blindfolded supporters.
The current crisis in Ukraine is however different; it has seen the pro-Western media machine cultivate and disseminate disinformation, propaganda and fake news on a previously unseen scale. While the U.S. and its NATO allies prosecute their proxy conflict on the ground, in the air, and at sea, another illicit battle is being fought on social media, TV and radio.
Of course, propaganda and the winning of “hearts and minds” is nothing new when it comes to conflict. As far back as the 19th century Governments were aware of how important the narrative was at home, they actively sought to suppress details which they thought may be offensive or unhelpful to the home audience.
…………………………………………..Today’s conflict in Ukraine is no exception, a similar narrative is peddled with the historical truths about where conflict grew from remaining unreported. Some of the most critical facts relating to Ukraine are routinely and conveniently rendered invisible by the mainstream media, such as when this civil war began and most crucially, who paid for and built the scaffolding on which it is now burning…………………………..
The “Absolute Truth”
When it comes to Ukraine a new, dangerous and lavishly funded weapon in the counter truth war has been deployed by western governments and media, I call it “Absolute Truth”. The Absolute truth doesn’t tolerate any challenges, when its allegations are proven false those realities are suppressed and ignored.
It immediately and efficiently targets any dissent from the prescribed narrative and brands challengers as “enemies,” “foreign agents,” or “useful idiots.” Critically there is no room for debate of any kind, there is no analysis of facts, there is only their Absolute Truth.
Should a journalist, State or individual question this Absolute Truth or merely suggest an objective analysis of the facts they are immediately and brutally marginalised and then targeted for retribution. This determined and choreographed punishment can range from the loss of a job to the isolation of an entire nation with threats of violence commonplace.
…………… Absolute truth also has a selective attitude when it comes to the behavior of its idols, when Mr Zelensky’s election with the assistance, cash and muscle of a corrupt oligarch is highlighted this is ignored, when his antidemocratic banning of all opposition and the imprisonment of its leaders comes up, its fine. if the Absolute Truth requires the acceptance and deployment of brutal Nazi militias against civilians, (previously designated by the west as terrorists) that is again entirely acceptable.
………………………………. Another sinister element of the cult of Absolute Truth is the reluctance to correct the record or admit when you get it wrong, from the “massacre” at Snake Island that never happened to the fake headlines about the Mariupol maternity hospital to name but a few, there is never any attempt to correct the record which begs the question how sincere were the allegations in the first place?
……………………………… Contrary to the best efforts of those that have funded, molded and justified this proxy war the truth has a habit of resurfacing. It will be impossible to “manage” the oncoming tide of reality that will gush out of Ukraine as the western powers refocus on their self-inflicted domestic troubles this winter, Zelensky himself may become the fall guy for the failed NATO escapade in Ukraine. ,,………
https://covertactionmagazine.com/2022/08/13/war-propaganda-about-ukraine-starting-to-wear-thin/
California nuclear power plant extension challenged in legislative proposal
“This is too little too late, a sham process designed to circumvent citizen enforcement of the National Environmental Policy Act,”
Watchdog groups contend that regardless of the review, the NNSA will march ahead with its production plans for plutonium cores at Los Alamos
S nuclear policy | US nuclear stockpile | Environment protection
AP | Albuquerquue (US) August 20, 2022
The US government is planning to review the environmental effects of operations at one of the nation’s prominent nuclear weapons laboratories, but its notice issued Friday leaves out federal goals to ramp up production of plutonium cores used in the nation’s nuclear arsenal.
The National Nuclear Security Administration said the review being done to comply with the National Environmental Policy Act will look at the potential environmental effects of alternatives for operations at Los Alamos National Laboratory for the next 15 years.
That work includes preventing the spread and use of nuclear weapons worldwide and other projects related to national security and global stability, the notice said.
Watchdog groups contend that regardless of the review, the NNSA will march ahead with its production plans for plutonium cores at Los Alamos.
The northern New Mexico lab part of the top secret Manhattan Project during World War II and the birthplace of the atomic bomb is one of two sites tapped for the lucrative mission of manufacturing the plutonium cores. The other is the Savannah River Site in South Carolina.
The US Energy Department had set deadlines for 2026 and 2030 for ramping up production of the plutonium cores, but it’s unclear whether those will be met given the billions of dollars in infrastructure improvements still needed.
Watchdog groups that have been critical of Los Alamos accused the NNSA of going through the motions rather than taking a hard look at the escalating costs of preparing for production, the future consequences to the federal budget and the potential environmental fallout for neighbouring communities and Native American tribes.
This is too little too late, a sham process designed to circumvent citizen enforcement of the National Environmental Policy Act,” said Jay Coghlan, executive director of Nuclear Watch New Mexico.
The Los Alamos Study Group, another New Mexico-based organisation that monitors lab activities, said there is no indication that NNSA will pause any preparations for the sake of complying with National Environmental Policy Act, which mandates some scrutiny before moving ahead with major federal projects.
The group pointed to more than $19 billion in new construction and operational costs for Los Alamos’ new plutonium core production mission through fiscal year 2033. They say the price tag is expected to grow.
According to planning documents related to the sprawling Los Alamos campus, lab officials have indicated that they need more than 4 million square feet (371,612 square metres) of new construction to bolster one of its main technical areas and the area where the lab’s plutonium operations are located. Several thousand new staff members also would be needed.
This is a completely bogus process in which NNSA seeks to create a veneer of legitimacy and public acceptance for its reckless plans,” said Greg Mello, director of the Los Alamos Study Group……….. more https://www.business-standard.com/article/international/plutonium-cores-review-at-us-nuclear-lab-sham-process-watchdog-groups-122082000062_1.html
1 This Month
Read the Public Inquiry Report, the Commissioners’ report, Surrendering Australia: The AUKUS Deception is available to download for free at aukuspublicinquiry.com. Or just watch the replay of the National Press Club Luncheon.
19 November – Webinar – The Reality of Reprocessing
Time: 11:00 AM Pacific Time (US & Canada) / 2:00 PM Eastern / 7:00 PM UK / 8:00 PM CET
Register for the Zoom Event Here
Shut down the radiation-damaged Heysham nuclear reactors now
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
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