Nuclear power plants are terrorist bait, need extra protection – ex-IAEA chief to RT Rt.com. 11 Oct, 2016Nuclear power plants are one of the best protected facilities in the world, but they still remain likely targets for terrorists and therefore require extra protection, Hans Blix, former IAEA chief, told RT.
“One has to be very careful, of course, about installations like nuclear power plants and enrichment plants,” said Blix, who headed the International Atomic Energy Agency between 1981 and 1997…..
Blix stressed that modern nuclear facilities “are getting more digitalized – earlier, they weren’t – and they now have to be given a special new protection” from potential cyber-attacks.
He recalled the hack at Iran’s uranium enrichment facility at Natanz back in 2010 “where a malware called ‘Stuxnet’ was smuggled in and managed to stop several hundred enrichment centrifuges.”…….
According to Blix, the risk of radicals creating a so-called ‘dirty bomb,’ which combines radioactive material with conventional explosives, shouldn’t be ignored either.
“Caesium [which is extracted from waste produced by nuclear reactors] is something that is used in hospitals in many places and if it’s stolen or goes astray it can also be used in a dirty bomb and exploded somewhere in the center of a city – whether Moscow, New York or Washington. We have to be careful everywhere,” he said……
Also on Tuesday, current IAEA head, Yukiya Amano, warned that risks of terrorist attacks against nuclear power plants or militants eventually making a “dirty bomb” are very real. He stressed that terrorist groups, such as Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL), pose a serious threat to nuclear power stations.
Bailing out aging nuclear power plants can impact development of renewable energy technologies, Enformable, 17 Oct 2016 “…………Beyond Dollars—It’s About Life
And this, most importantly, is beyond dollars—it’s about life.
The most comprehensive study of the consequences of a nuclear plant meltdown with loss of containment was done for the U.S. Nuclear Regulation Commission, which succeeded the Atomic Energy Commission, by Sandia National Laboratories in 1982. It’s title: Calculation of Reactor Accident Consequences or CRAC2.
The study projected “peak early fatalities,” “peak early injuries,” peak cancer deaths” and “scaled costs” in the billions of dollars for such a meltdown at every nuclear plant in the United States. In “scaled costs” the study itemizes “lost wages, relocation expenses, decontamination costs, lost property” but it is noted that “the cost of providing health care for the affected population” is not included. The nuclear industry and nuclear promoters in government were so upset with the release of this analysis that I doubt there will ever be anything like it again. I’ve distributed a breakdown of the CRAC2 numbers done by the House Subcommittee on Oversight & Investigations for your review.
The figures—and we’re speaking here of lives not mere numbers—for the four nuclear plants that would be bailed out under the Cuomo plan are: Ginna — 2,000 fatalities, 28,000 injuries, 14,000 cancer deaths and $63 billion in costs—based on the value of the 1980 dollar. It would be three times that now. FitzPatrick – 1,000 fatalities, 16,000 injuries, 17,000 cancer deaths and $103 billion in costs. Nine Mile Point which consists of two nuclear power plants.
Unit 1 — 700 fatalities, 11,000 injuries, 14,000 cancer deaths, $66 billion in costs.
And Nine Mile Point 2 – 1,400 fatalities, 2,600 injuries, 20 000 cancer deaths, $134 billion in costs.
Also, as we have seen from Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and Fukishima, nuclear accidents are not rare events, like the BNL scientists told me, and not minor. With a little more than 400 nuclear power plants in the world, 100 in the U.S., disaster has occurred nearly every decade.
And if the next nuclear disaster is to strike anywhere, it could easily happen at these four old nuclear plants. Nuclear plants were only seen as operating for 40 years. After that, the metals would become embrittled from radioactivity creating unsafe conditions. So they were given 40-year operating licenses. But the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has gone ahead in recent times and given 20-year license extensions to now more than 80 of the nuclear plants in the U.S.—including the four upstate plants. This would allow them to run for 60 years. And the NRC is considering having an additional license extension program to allow nuclear plants to run for 80 years. It’s just asking for disaster. Considering taking a 60-year car on to the LIE or an Interstate and driving it at full speed—and that’s also part of the NRC program, allowing the nuclear plants given extensions to “uprate”—run hotter and harder to produce more electricity.
In terms of age, Nine Mile Point Unit 1 went online in 1969 and is one of the two oldest nuclear plants in the U.S., tied with Oyster Creek in New Jersey. Ginna started operating in 1970. FitzPatrick in 1975. These are from-the-past machines prone to mishap.
Excelon: 800 Pound Nuclear Gorilla
But there’s an 800 pound nuclear gorilla heavily involved in the bail-out plan—a company called Excelon. It’s the major owner of three of the plants—Ginna and the two Nine Mile Point plants—and Excelon has made a $110 million deal to buy FitzPatrick from Entergy with the bail-out deal in mind……….http://enformable.com/
Terror-Plagued Pakistan Just Turned On Another Nuclear Reactor, Daily Caller ANDREW FOLLETT, Energy and Science Reporter , 18 Oct 16
Pakistan’s fourth nuclear power plant began providing electricity to citizens Sunday with some help from China, despite concerns about radical Islamist groups operating in the country.
Engineers began final testing of the new 340 megawatt reactor at the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant, which is expected to reach its full capacity in December with the help of China. Local Pakistani Islamic radical groups and the Islamic State have expressed interest in stealing nuclear material from the country’s reactors to build a dirty bomb.
Nuclear (Information) Power, UCS, DAVE LOCHBAUM, DIRECTOR, NUCLEAR SAFETY PROJECT | OCTOBER 18, 2016DISASTER BY DESIGN/SAFETY BY INTENT #54
Safety by Intent
Robin Morgan wrote that “Knowledge is power. Information is power.”
Among many lessons learned from the March 1979 core meltdown at Three Mile Island was the need to collect, assess, and disseminate relevant operating experience in a timely manner. In other words, nuclear information has the power to promote nuclear safety, but only when that information is shared so as to replicate good practices and eradicate bad ones. Both the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and the nuclear industry undertook parallel efforts after Three Mile Island to improve operating experience efforts.
NRC’s Information Sharing
The centerpiece of the NRC’s operating experience efforts is its generic communications program. The NRC instituted this program before the Three Mile Island accident, but took steps following the accident to expand the program and to shorten the time between events and advisories. The NRC also lowered the threshold used to screen the information to share more operating experience with plant owners.
The NRC has issued thousands of generic communications since the Three Mile Island accident.Bulletins and Generic Letters typically alert owners to a potential problem and require them to either confirm their facilities are not vulnerable or implement measures to reduce vulnerabilities.Regulatory Issue Summaries and Information Notices typically apprise owners about operating experience but do not require that the owners take specific actions in response.
Examples illustrating these various generic communications are:
Bulletin 2003-01, “Potential Impact of Debris Blockage on Emergency Sump Recirculation at Pressurized Water Reactors,” warned owners that a rupture inside containment of a pipe filled with steam or water could generate large amounts of debris as the high pressure fluid jetting from the broken pipe ends scoured coatings off equipment, insulation off piping, and even paint off walls…….
Generic Letter 2007-01, “Inaccessible or Underground Power Cable Failures that Disable Accident Mitigation Systems or Cause Plant Transients,” warned owners about a rash of unexpected failures of electrical cables. Many of the electrical cables had been qualified for 40 years of service, but failed before the end of their qualified lifetimes due to submergence in water. Several of the failed cables had been routed through underground metal conduits and buried concrete trenches. Groundwater or rainwater leaked into the conduits and trenches, subjecting the cable insulation to more rapid deterioration than anticipated………
Information Notice 2011-13, “Control Rod Blade Cracking Resulting in Reduced Design Lifetime,” warned owners of boiling water reactors about experience at a foreign nuclear plant. Workers discovered severe degradation of the control rods caused by irradiation-assisted stress-corrosion cracking. …….
Regulatory Issue Summary 2015-11, “Protective Action Recommendations for Members of the Public on Bodies of Water,” reminded owners of their obligations under Appendix E, “Emergency Planning and Preparedness for Production and Utilization Facilities,” to 10 CFR Part 50. Specifically, the regulatory issue summary reinforced the NRC’s expectation that owners’ emergency plan measures account for all affected members of the public whether on land or on water.
Regulatory Issue Summary 2014-12, “Decommissioning Fund Status Report Calculations—Update to Low-Level Waste Burial Charge Information,” informed owners that they could use data in Revision15 of NUREG-1307, “Report on Waste Burial Charges: Changes in Decommissioning Waste Disposal Costs at Low-Level Waste Burial Facilities,” in preparing periodic funding status reports required by 10 CFR 50.75(f). Owners are required to estimate the cost of decommissioning their facilities based on (1) labor rates, (2) energy costs, and (3) low-level waste disposal costs. The U.S. Department of Labor periodically publishes data on labor and energy costs that owners can use. The regulatory information summary identified a source of low-level waste disposal cost data acceptable to the NRC.
Nuclear Industry’s Information Sharing
The nuclear industry formed the Institute for Nuclear Power Operations (INPO) in December 1979 as part of its responses to the Three Mile Island accident. Information sharing is one of several functions performed by INPO to support the nuclear industry……..
UCS’s Disaster by Design/ Safety by Intent series of blog posts is intended to help readers understand how a seemingly unrelated assortment of minor problems can coalesce to cause disaster and how effective defense-in-depth can lessen both the number of pre-existing problems and the chances they team up.
Is Lancashire ‘at risk of nuclear contamination’? Langashire Evening Post , 12 Oct 16 Nuclear convoys carrying warheads routinely drive on the M6. If one crashed, or was attacked by terrorists, more than 260,000 people could be in danger of contamination, according to a new report. Nuclear bomb convoys on the M6 are putting more than a quarter of a million people at risk from radioactive contamination in Lancashire, according to a report by campaigners.
Anti-nuclear campaigners warn 165 schools, seven hospitals and four railway stations could all be affected if transporters carrying Trident warheads crashed along the route through the county. The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons UK, which compiled the report, is demanding an end to the road convoys which routinely pass close to the city en route from the South of England to Scotland. It claims an accident or an explosion could pose a serious threat to people in a 10-kilometre radius. That puts Fylde coast towns and villages including Pilling, Garstang, Great Eccleston, Elswick, Inskip, Wharles, Treales, Newton, and Clifton, within the radius.
There is a fully-prepared and well-tested major incident plan for the whole of Lancashire which is co-ordinated by Lancashire County Council in partnership with Lancashire Constabulary, Lancashire Fire and Rescue Service and all Lancashire-based councils. “Yet most of the millions of people in the communities they pass by are unaware of what’s happening – and the risks they could be facing,” said the report’s author Rob Edwards. The “Nukes of Hazard” reveals that the Ministry of Defence has confirmed there were eight accidents involving nuclear weapons convoys between 1960 and 1991.
But, following Freedom of Information requests, the MoD has now revealed a further 180 “safety incidents” have happened between 2000 and 2016. The report says convoys have crashed, broken down, got lost and have suffered brake failure and other mechanical problems. “A terrorist attack on a nuclear convoy, according to the MoD, could cause considerable loss of life and severe disruption both to the British people’s way of life and to the UK’s ability to function effectively as a sovereign state. “ Convoy accidents could spread radioactive contamination over at least 10 kilometres, depending on the direction of the winds. “Hundreds of thousands of people could find their lives seriously disrupted as communities are evacuated, essential infrastructure disabled and emergency services overwhelmed. “Contamination and worries about cancer would linger for decades.”……….
The campaign group Nukewatch says the 20-vehicle convoys, made up of huge dark green trucks accompanied by military Land Rovers and police, carry warheads from a bomb factory at Berkshire to the Royal Navy armaments depot near Glasgow. The 900-mile round trip is carried out between two and six times a year and has two routes, one via Leeds and Newcastle and the other past Birmingham and Preston heading north to Glasgow. Components for the warheads are made at the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) at Aldermaston in Berkshire. From there they are transferred to nearby AWE Burghfield to be assembled, before making the long road journey north to Coulport on Loch Long, north of Glasgow. At Loch Long the carriers are unloaded and the warheads placed in underground bunkers. When needed they are moved to the explosive handling jetty at Coulport and fitted into the Trident submarines………. http://www.lep.co.uk/your-lancashire/south-ribble/bamber-bridge/is-lancashire-at-risk-of-nuclear-contamination-1-8176201
On the domestic front, opposition to nuclear decision-making is silenced. Our colleagues in Ukraine, who have been voicing safety concerns, were sued in 2015 by Energoatom, Ukraine’s nuclear operator, and the state nuclear regulator joined in later. Eventually, the court backed the plaintiffs, who argued the public critique of the nuclear revival programme was inappropriate. Meanwhile, EU institutions keep on paying to support Ukraine’s aging nuclear fleet and claim to support democracy and rule of law in the country.
Nuclear proponents, Ukrainian governmental officials and the state nuclear power operator Energoatom argue these extensions are necessary. But is it really? And who benefits from the continued operation of Ukraine’s aging nuclear fleet? Continue reading →
IAEA chief: Nuclear power plant was disrupted by cyber attack, Yahoo News By Andrea Shalal, October 11, 2016 BERLIN (Reuters) – A nuclear power plant became the target of a disruptive cyber attack two to three years ago, and there is a serious threat of militant attacks on such plants, the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog said on Monday.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director Yukiya Amano also cited a case in which an individual tried to smuggle a small amount of highly enriched uranium about four years ago that could have been used to build a so-called “dirty bomb”.
“This is not an imaginary risk,” Amano told Reuters and a German newspaper during a visit to Germany that included a meeting with Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier.
“This issue of cyber attacks on nuclear-related facilities or activities should be taken very seriously. We never know if we know everything or if it’s the tip of the iceberg.”
Amano declined to give details of either incident, but said the cyber attack had caused “some disruption” at the plant, although it did not prove to be very serious since the plant did not have to shut down its operations. He said he had not previously discussed the cyber attack in public.
“This actually happened and it caused some problems,” he said, adding while the plant did not have to shut down, it “needed to take some precautionary measures.”……..
Concerns about cyber attacks on nuclear sites have grown in recent years after the emergence of computer malware that can be used to attack industrial controls. The issue flared again after Belgian media reported that the suicide bombers who killed 32 people in Brussels on March 22 originally looked into attacking a nuclear installation.
Korea Hydro & Nuclear Power Co Ltd, which operates 23 nuclear reactors in South Korea, said in 2014 it was beefing up cyber security after non-critical data was stolen from its computer systems, although reactor operations were not at risk.
In April, German utility RWE increased its security after its Gundremmingen nuclear power plant was found to be infected with computer viruses. The company said they did not appear to have posed a threat to operations.
Security experts say blowing up a nuclear reactor is beyond the skills of militant groups, but the nuclear industry has some vulnerabilities that could be exploited…..
In order to gauge the spread of radioactivity in the event of a leak, authorities need to consider the prevailing conditions, Guardian, Paul Brown, 11 Oct 16,
he way the wind is blowing at the time of a nuclear disaster is crucial to the action the authorities need to take to protect the civilian population. Among the first priorities is issuing iodine tablets to protect people’s thyroid from absorbing the radioactive particles from the fallout that may later cause cancer.
But in October 1957, when a plume of radioactivity spread out from the burning pile at Windscale in Cumbria, the reaction of the authorities was not to warn the public but to reassure them. Everything was under control. Children continued to pick potatoes in the fields surrounding the plant while the radioactivity showered down on them.
While this disaster was not quite on the scale of Chernobyl orFukushima, there was a radioactive plume that spread for hundreds of miles on a westerly wind across the north of England and deep into Europe. However, on the first day of the disaster, the wind was said to be blowing from the east, across the Irish Sea and dusting Ireland in radioactive fallout.
It remains a sensitive issue and Ireland remains implacably opposed to Britain’s continuing nuclear programme. This is partly based on the belief of those along the Irish coast, closest to Sellafield, that a spate of birth defects in the area after the fire was a result of exposure to radioactivity.
The official inquiry into the accident was later acknowledged as a whitewashdesigned to protect the UK’s atomic weapon programme. The pages for the Met Office’s October record of wind direction at the Windscale plant were missing and replaced with a note “No records, mast dismantled”.
Waste Isolation Pilot Plant sees third ceiling
collapse, Aiken Standard, By Thomas Gardinert gardiner@aikenstandard.comOct 8 2016 New Mexico’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant has suffered its third ceiling collapse.
The first collapse was discovered Sept. 27, and the following two happened this past week. The third collapse was identified on Friday morning and was found to have followed the cave-in earlier in the week.
According to a WIPP update sent Friday evening, the area of the collapse continues to remain restricted for workers and employees. According to SRS Watch Director Tom Clements, who has been inside the facility, material regularly comes off of the walls and ceiling.
WIPP is an underground facility, cut into salt beds. Over time, groundwater and other natural forces are designed to form the salt deposits around the waste containers. He said the facility was designed to encase the nuclear waste buried there to permanently dispose of the material…
The WIPP facility was shut down in 2014 after a containment leak and an underground salt-truck fire. The facility is set to reopen in December 2016 and shipments are expected to resume in the fall of 2017.
WIPP is the intended resting place for some of the nuclear material at South Carolina’s Savannah River Site near Aiken. The Energy Department is currently disposing of plutonium through a process called dilute and dispose. That material is among those eventually intended for WIPP disposal.
According to the WIPP update, emergency evacuation routes were also out of date. The routes were still based on the facility before sections were closed, including the areas where the cave-ins occurred. The update said, “The Department of Energy identified a deficiency in the WIPP Mine Escape and Evacuation Plan, which still relied on evacuation routes established before some areas had been posted as prohibited. NWP had identified compensatory measures – immediate changes that could be made while the Evacuation Plan is formally updated.”
What to do with radioactive waste has long been the Achilles heel of nuclear energy. Plans for storing all waste in Nevada seemed good by all the states, except Nevada. Not wanting to be the nations nuclear waste dump, the Yucca Mountain Nuclear Waste Repository site has been cancelled. Now the waste sits mainly at the plants in “temporary” storage. The steel canisters buried in thick concrete, inert gas and water are estimated to protect for a hundred years. With the radioactivity dangerous for 400,000 to a millions years, you get a good idea of just how “clean” nuclear energy is, let alone subsidize it.
Despite Three Mile Island, Daiichi Power Plant in Japan and Chernobyl, the industry still poo-poos the danger. At Chernobyl, after the initial explosion, the 185 tons of melting nuclear waste was still melting down. When it reached the water a thermonuclear explosion would have occurred. It was estimated it would have wiped out half of Europe and made Europe, Ukraine and parts of Russia uninhabitable for 500,000 years. This was prevented when three workers volunteered to dive in the radioactive water and open the valves to drain the pool and prevent a second explosion, knowing it would mean death by radioactive poisoning. They succeeded in draining the pool, but died of radiation sickness within a few weeks. Their bodies remained radioactive and were buried in lead coffins.
If a similar “incident,” as the nuclear industry insists they be called, happens in Clinton, do you think Rep. Bill Mitchell, the Clinton School Board, DeWitt County Board of any of the 700 workers or any other advocates of keeping the plant open will step forward?
Preparing the country for nuclear terrorism http://thebulletin.org/preparing-country-nuclear-terrorism9985JEROME M. HAUER Jerome M. Hauer has served in cabinet-level positions at the local and state level and as an acting assistant secretary for the Office of Public Health Emergency Preparedness at the US Department…
The candidates for president of the United States continue to discuss preventing nuclear proliferation and the threat of nuclear terrorism, yet we hear little about how well prepared the nation is to manage the aftermath of terrorist use of an improvised nuclear device. Some may think the notion of such an attack is apocryphal. So allow me to explain just how likely such a possibility is, how devastating the result of such a detonation would be, and—in particular—just how poorly prepared the United States is to respond.
In 2005, Kofi Annan, former secretary general of the United Nations, said, “Nuclear terrorism is still often treated as science fiction. I wish it were. But unfortunately we live in a world of excess hazardous materials and abundant technological know-how, in which some terrorists clearly state their intention to inflict catastrophic casualties. Were such an attack to occur, it would not only cause widespread death and destruction, but would stagger the world economy … [creating] a second death toll throughout the developing world.
In 2007, US Sen. John McCain was quoted as saying, “My greatest fear is the Iranians acquire a nuclear weapon or North Korea and pass enough highly enriched uranium (HEU) to a terrorist organization. And there is a real threat of them doing that. Just 55 kilograms, roughly 122 pounds of HEU, can be used to make a 10 kiloton IND, similar to the bomb dropped over Hiroshima.”
In 2005, Graham Allison, director of Harvard University’s Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, asked, “Is nuclear mega-terrorism inevitable? Harvard professors are not known for being subtle or ambiguous, but I’ll try to the clear. Is the worst yet to come? My answer: Bet on it. Yes.
Matthew Bunn, also at the Belfer Center, argued in 2007, “Theft of the essential ingredients of nuclear weapons is not just a hypothetical worry, it is an ongoing reality.”
Nuclear physicist Frank Barnaby has been quoted as saying “The really frightening thing about HEU is that it is so easy to make an atom bomb out of it. You only need a couple of PhD students and a small amount of material. I think we should be very frightened about the possibility of nuclear terrorism; I’m surprised it hasn’t happened yet.”
The aftermath of a detonation of a relatively small improvised nuclear device—one that is roughly the yield of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima—in a US city would be almost unimaginably gruesome. In New York City, for example, most buildings within one quarter of a mile would be destroyed. Some 300,000 to 400,000 people would be killed instantly, with several hundred thousand more requiring various levels of medical care. Electrical and communications systems would be severely damaged, at best. And medical and other responders would face radiation dangers and a host of other problems.
In a search of both media and scholarly literature, however, I was able to find only one mention of US preparedness for nuclear terror. “The United States is unprepared to mitigate the consequences of a nuclear attack,” Pentagon analyst John Brinkerhoff wrote in a July 2005 confidential memo to the Joint Chiefs of Staff. “We were unable to find any group or office with a coherent approach to this very important aspect of homeland security.”
Several federal agencies have been aggressively working to address this deficit. The Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of the Assistant Secretary for Preparedness and Response has made significant strides in medical and public health preparedness. But much more work needs to be done across the federal behemoth.
After spending untold millions of dollars since its establishment, the Department of Homeland Security—the umbrella agency in which the Federal Emergency Management Agency resides—still does not have adequate radiation detection technology for use in the aftermath of a nuclear detonation and confuses local responders with inconsistent units of measure for radiation emitted by various nuclear isotopes. In Homeland Security advisories to first responders, the terms REM, rad, Sieverts and Gray are thrown about as if interchangeable. They’re not, and knowing the difference is important if responders are to feel and be safe in the aftermath of a nuclear blast.
Because there is such a clear history of concern about the threat of nuclear terrorism, the presidential candidates must cross the bridge from merely accepting the possibility of an attack with an improvised nuclear device, to planning an effective response that reduces the mass morbidity and mortality such an attack inevitably will cause—and then leads beyond the attack, toward recovery.
The road to preparedness. The detonation of a Hiroshima-yield improvised nuclear device in New York would level or significantly damage a significant portion of the city and instantaneously kill and maim hundreds of thousands of people. Trauma, burns, and radiation damage to organ systems are just some of the injuries that would place extraordinary demands on health care systems. In most multi-casualty incidents, there are one or two triage points where victims are taken for assessment and routing to treatment. Following a nuclear detonation in a major city, there could be need of 25 to 75 such triage points—or more—because of the vast geographical footprint of the detonation and the number of victims involved. Coordination will be difficult; much of the communication infrastructure will be demolished or rendered unusable. Moving patients to definitive care will be a monumental task and deciding which patients are triaged for medical care and which are triaged to receive end-of-life services will vary by triage point.
C. Norman Coleman and colleagues at the Department of Health and Human Services have developed criteria for establishing a triage network in the event of a nuclear explosion, but training for emergency physicians and pre-hospital care providers has not been integrated into the fabric of primary or continuing education for those responders.
Finally, studies—including research I conducted in 2012— have shown that between 30 and 50 percent of critical personnel will not be present at or be unable to travel to work in the aftermath of a nuclear detonation. Many of those non-responding responders will want to be with their families; others will fear the personal health threat of radiation.
This dismal picture of US preparation for an incident of nuclear terrorism could be improved with strong leadership at the White House, particularly from the homeland security advisor to the president. The following areas need support, both in terms of funding and in developing uniform plans for managing a nuclear incident in a major city:
Threat-based funding is important. We no longer have the luxury of giving money to buy toys—aka equipment that is unlikely to be used—to smaller cities and rural counties. Walla Walla, Washington is a lot less likely to be attacked with an improvised nuclear device than Washington, DC. But hundreds of millions of dollars have been wasted on inappropriate terrorism-response “toys” for small governments that will likely never use them. A robust, mobile medical infrastructure needs to be created—one that is capable of handling tens of thousands of patients at once. The Department of Defense will be central to any response plan developed by Health and Human Services; the White House should make certain they are cooperating on that plan—starting yesterday.
The president should request and Congress should approve additional funding for communication systems that don’t rely on the local infrastructure likely to be destroyed or heavily damaged in a nuclear terror attack. Satellite-based operability would meet the need, making a seamless transition to undamaged communication channels available in high-threat cities. Competition as to which cities are included in such a system needs to be transparent, and political gamesmanship must be discouraged. The communications issue is too central to any effective response to delay it through influence peddling.
HHS funding should be increased to accelerate research on medical countermeasures for acute radiation sickness. Such research is being conducted, but at an insufficient scale, given to potential for mass death that an improvised nuclear device poses. This research program should be the new Manhattan Project.
A commission that includes the best minds in radiation, emergency medicine, emergency medical services, the fire service, law enforcement, the Defense Department, HHS, radiation medicine, and high target states and cities should be formed to address the gaps in response plans for a nuclear detonation. That commission should finalize a report to the new president in 180 days. There is no room for delay.The report should suggest the funding required to close each gap.
A federal government structure for responding to an improvised nuclear device detonation in a major city should be completed within one year in the new administration.
I realize that the program I’ve suggested is daunting. But it’s absolutely not an insurmountable goal. Millions of lives depend on it. What is more important to an incoming administration than saving millions of lives?
What if Hurricane Matthew Hits Florida’s Nuclear Reactors?, Clean Energy Footprints, October 5th, 2016Hurricane Matthew has already caused devastation in Haiti and elsewhere in the Caribbean. Tracking this dangerous storm’s path, which Bloomberg reported as a “$15 billion threat,” as it moves towards Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas and potentially up the Eastern seaboard is proving difficult. But despite unclear predictions, communities are wisely mobilizing and calling for evacuations (or are already in the process of doing so) and/or declaring states of emergency.
Extreme weather events have widespread ramifications on our electricity systems. A Department of Energy review of responses to Hurricanes Irene and Sandy from nuclear reactors in the Northeast highlighted a number of strategies to protect the reactors. According to the Department of Energy, “Some reactors were shut as a precaution to protect equipment from the storm; others were forced to shut down or reduce power output due to damage to plant facilities or transmission infrastructure serving the plant; and still others were forced to reduce power output due to reduced power demand caused by widespread utility customer outages.”
Two nuclear power plants exist on Florida’s eastern coast: the St. Lucie and Turkey Point facilities. Based on the current National Hurricane Center projections, it appears that Hurricane Matthew will come closest to the St. Lucie nuclear facility early Friday morning. Storm surge near the St. Lucie nuclear reactors may reach 2-5 feet, and with hurricane force winds of 130 miles per hour. Meanwhile, a significant water quality problem in the Southeast is the ongoing pollution at Florida Power and Light’s (FPL) Turkey Point cooling canal system. It’s unclear what effects high winds and storm surge could have on Turkey Point’s open air industrial sewer.
After flooding caused a nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactor in Japan, the Miami News Times published an article, “Five reasons Turkey Point could be the next nuclear disaster.” The article noted: “Just like in Japan, Turkey Point is susceptible to a meltdown caused by a natural disaster. A hurricane-spurred tidal surge from Turkey Point’s neighboring Biscayne Bay could create catastrophic conditions identical to those in Japan. With power down, the plant would be forced to rely on emergency diesel generators to pump water to cool the reactors….those generators would ‘certainly’ become inundated with water from the tidal surge, causing them to drown and fail.” (Southern Alliance for Clean Energy and Tropical Audubon with Friends of the Everglades filed a lawsuit this summer to resolve the pollution problem caused by Turkey Point.)……….http://blog.cleanenergy.org/2016/10/05/nuclearhurricanematthew/
Japan nuclear reactor shuttered for safety work, Channel News Asia 06 Oct 2016 TOKYO: A reactor at the centre of Japan’s national debate over nuclear power was halted on Thursday (Oct 6) under stricter post-Fukushima safety standards, as Tokyo struggles to bring back atomic energy.
Utility Kyushu Electric is shutting down the No. 1 reactor at its Sendai plant in southern Kagoshima for a few months of inspections and maintenance, leaving Japan with just two operating reactors.
But there is speculation that the reactor’s safety work could drag on longer.
Thursday’s shutdown follows demands from the region’s top politician that Kyushu Electric conduct extra safety inspections at its two operating reactors in the Sendai plant – after deadly quakes hammered a neighbouring prefecture in April.
Last month, the company refused governor Satoshi Mitazono’s demands to immediately shut down the reactors over safety concerns.
But it agreed to what it called “special inspections” in addition to regular maintenance work. Sendai’s No. 2 reactor will be shut down for a similar review starting in December………
Opposition to nuclear power has seen communities across the country file lawsuits to prevent restarts, including the Sendai plant.
the real problem is that the nuclear industry lost its credibility almost at its inception, and has never recovered. It was hastily launched, endowed with the sort of government indulgence that breeds sloppiness, and has tried to conceal its faults through secrecy and legal bluster
GIL SCOTT HERON – WE ALMOST LOST DETROIT
50 years after ‘we almost lost Detroit,’ America’s nuclear power industry faces even graver doubts, LA Times, 5 Oct 16 Michael HiltzikContact ReporterThe history of nuclear power in the United States has been marked by numerous milestones, many of them bad — accidents, construction snafus, engineering incompetence, etc., etc. One anniversary of an incident that has cast a long shadow over the nuclear power industry’s claim for safety will be marked this week. On Oct. 5, 1966 — that’s 50 years ago Wednesday — Detroit Edison’s Fermi-1 nuclear plant suffered a partial meltdown, caused by a piece of floating shrapnel inside the container vessel.
One anniversary of an incident that has cast a long shadow over the nuclear power industry’s claim for safety will be marked this week. On Oct. 5, 1966 — that’s 50 years ago Wednesday — Detroit Edison’s Fermi-1 nuclear plant suffered a partial meltdown, caused by a piece of floating shrapnel inside the container vessel. Continue reading →
Watchdog Finds Flaws in Canada’s Nuclear-Safety Practices Audit recommendations focus on documenting and on conducting site inspections WSJ, PAUL VIEIRA Oct. 4, 2016 OTTAWA—Canada’s nuclear-safety regulator is facing criticism from the country’s environmental watchdog for failing to prove it conducted adequate power-plant inspections and falling short on staffing levels.
The shortcomings were highlighted in an independent audit released Tuesday by the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, which is tasked with ensuring the country’s nuclear power plants are operating safely……
Canada’s commissioner of the Environment and Sustainable Development looked at the nuclear agency’s operations over a two-year period ended March 31, 2015, and focused on whether the regulator adequately managed its site inspections.
“We concluded that the (Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission) could not show that it had adequately managed its site inspections of nuclear power plants,” Commissioner Julie Gelfand wrote. The audit issued five recommendations for the regulator to improve operations, focused largely on documenting and conducting site inspections……http://www.wsj.com/articles/watchdog-finds-flaws-in-canadas-nuclear-safety-practices-1475609449
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