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The very real threat of nuclear terrorism in Pakistan

Nuclear safety http://tribune.com.pk/story/432507/nuclear-safety/   The Express Tribune, September 7th, 2012. The scenario drawn up by think-tanks in the US, of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons falling into militant hands, may just be more real than we think. This, of course, is a terrifying thought. So far, the possibility of such an event has been dismissed at home — but the high-level security alert put in place around Dera Ghazi Khan and the large-scale nuclear facility there, engaged mainly in mining and processing uranium, should force us to think otherwise.

The local police chief of Dera Ghazi Khan, Chaudhry Saleem, has confirmed that a heavy contingent of police and army personnel has been placed around the facility after the ISI intercepted a telephone call suggesting an attack was planned on the site housing nuclear material. Experts point out that these kinds of conversations picked up by intelligence agencies have proved to be accurate in the past.

It is also a fact that just weeks ago, a daring attack was made on the Kamra air base, which also houses our nuclear assets. The ability of the militants to enter high-security facilities is terrifying. It appears that in the latest case, the attacks are intended to act as revenge for the death of Abdul Ghaffar Qaisarani, killed in an encounter with the Dera Ghazi Khan police some time ago. Information about Qaisarani’s whereabouts had apparently come after the capture of other terrorists.

What is alarming, though, is the fact that key nuclear installations are becoming definite targets of the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Despite the death of Qaisarani, which weakened the TTP considerably in the area, it is said to have been able to regroup, and in some parts of southern Punjab, is stated to be growing stronger and more dangerous. This also raises questions about why more action was not taken in the past to defeat the TTP in Punjab and prevent the southern part of the province from becoming what many say is a safe haven for militants — no less so than the tribal areas in the north. It has become essential that we deal with the pockets where extremist groups gather. The possibility of nuclear weapons somehow falling into their hands is one we simply cannot afford. We appear to be getting closer to this horrific reality by the day.

September 7, 2012 Posted by | Pakistan, safety | Leave a comment

French losing faith in nuclear industry following latest incident

confidence is taking a further hit because on 5 September Electricite de France, denied reports of a fire at the Fessenheim nuclear power plant (NPP) in eastern France

Not quite what France’s BFM television reported,…that local authorities said the incident was “the beginning of a fire.”

 the “incident” at Fessenheim NPP in fact raises troubling issues about aging French NPPs.

French Nuclear “Incident” Raises Concerns By John Daly | Wed, 05 September 2012 In the 1960s, as the U.S. “Atoms for Peace” program got into full swing, promoting civilian nuclear electricity propagation, no European country bought into the concept more deeply than France.

Seduced by the concept of electricity “too cheap to measure,” France began developing a massive nuclear energy program with minimal public debate after the first oil crisis in 1974 and continued to support nuclear power even after the 1986 Soviet Chernobyl disaster.

The March 2011 debacle at Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex heightened the French public’s concerns, but France abandoning nuclear power is an order of magnitude more difficult than neighbouring Germany. Continue reading →

September 6, 2012 Posted by | France, incidents | Leave a comment

Serious threat to Pakistan nuclear facility from Taliban

Sources in the military and Punjab Police, on condition of anonymity, told The Express Tribune that the nature of threat at the nuclear installation is ‘serious,’ with an 80% chance of occurrence.

Taliban threat; nuclear site in D G Khan cordoned off, Express Tribune, Pakistan,By Abdul Manan : September 6, 2012, LAHORE: It could be the first-ever security threat to a nuclear facility in Pakistan, and the Army and security forces are taking no risks.
Following ‘serious’ security threats from the homegrown Taliban, the Army and Punjab police have deployed heavy forces at one of Pakistan’s largest nuclear facilities in Dera Ghazi Khan (DG Khan), credible sources told The Express Tribune.

Besides the deployment inside and around the nuclear installation, three divisions in South Punjab have also been asked to launch a crackdown against banned outfits, sources added.

“DG Khan houses one of the largest nuclear facilities in the country, and has faced the first-ever serious security threat from the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP),” said a high ranking military officer currently serving at the installation.
According to an official who works at the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission, a key military and civilian fuel cycle site is located 40 kilometres from DG Khan. The site comprises uranium milling and mining operations, and a uranium hexaflouride conversion plant. Continue reading →

September 6, 2012 Posted by | Pakistan, safety | Leave a comment

Incident at France’s old Fessenheim nuclear power plant

Accident at France’s oldest nuclear plant. THE AUSTRALIAN, AFP ,September 06, 2012  A STEAM leak due to an accidental chemical reaction at France’s oldest nuclear plant led to two people being slightly burnt and renewed calls to reduce the country’s heavy reliance on atomic energy.

The accident occurred at the Fessenheim nuclear power plant in northeastern France within 1.5km of the border with Germany and about 40km from Switzerland.

“It was not a fire,” the local prefecture said, adding that oxygenated steam had escaped after hydrogen peroxide reacted with water in a reservoir.

About 50 firefighters were deployed, an official from the service said……

France is the world’s most nuclear-dependent country, operates 58 reactors and has been a leading international proponent of atomic energy.

But in a deal with the Greens before this year’s parliamentary and presidential elections, President Francois Hollande’s Socialist party promised to reduce reliance on nuclear energy from more than 75 percent to 50 per cent by shutting 24 reactors by 2025.

France’s reliance on nuclear power has been increasingly called into question since the Fukushima disaster in Japan, which prompted Germany to announce plans to shut all of its reactors by the end of 2022…..

 

France’s ecology ministry said there was no safety threat. Ecology Minister Delphine Batho termed it a “workplace accident” and promised that “a complete report on this incident will be made public.”

On stream since 1977, Fessenheim has two water reactors. It is built along a huge canal and draws water for cooling from the Rhine river.

Due to its location, it is considered vulnerable to seismic activity and flooding and is provisionally scheduled to close in 2017.

After the scare, former Green presidential candidate Noel Mamere said: “This incident proves that we must close Fessenheim as soon as possible,” adding that it would be better to spend “billions of euros” on developing renewable energy.  http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/accident-at-frances-oldest-nuclear-plant/story-e6frg6so-1226466141232

September 6, 2012 Posted by | France, incidents | Leave a comment

Continuing danger and ever escalating costs at the Chernobyl and Fukushima cleanups

 It will be especially dangerous to remove the remaining nuclear fuel because of the high levels of radiation that such substances emit.

conditions [at the Chernobyl plant] are still dangerous for the 3,500 workers now cleaning up the site. And some 200 tons of nuclear fuel still remain at the bottom of the reactor.

When reactors die, costs keep climbing. Fukushima Diiachi costs to go through the roof.http://nuclearhistory.wordpress.com/2012/09/03/when-reactors-die-costs-keep-climbing-fukushima-diiachi-costs-to-go-through-the-roof/  4 Sept 12

http://e.nikkei.com/e/fr/tnks/Nni20120815D15HH187.htm Decommissioning Of Fukushima To Be Long, Costly Process FUKUSHIMA (Nikkei)–-The government and Tokyo Electric Power Co. (9501) have made the first revisions to a plan to decommission the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, but the details remain uncertain.

At the Chernobyl plant, efforts are now in full swing to build a massive shelter to stop the site from releasing radiation into the environment.
Among other matters, the revisions involve adding measures to prevent radioactive water from leaking into the environment. But it is still unclear how much time and money this will actually entail. Continue reading →

September 4, 2012 Posted by | Fukushima 2012, Japan, safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Safety flaws in India’s nuclear power plants

AERB detects flaws at nuclear plants Business Standard, Sanjay Jog / Mumbai Sep 04, 2012,  Regulatory inspections of nuclear power plants and research facilities have revealed there have been deviation from technical specifications and other regulatory stipulations, deficiencies and degradations in safety-related systems and procedural inadequacies.

The Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB), which carried out 47 regulatory inspections, comprising 25 scheduled and 22 special inspections in 2011-12, observed there were shortcomings in safetydesign and safety support systems based on operating experience,
including generic deficiencies.

The board has made a strong case for improvement in procedures and design by the respective nuclear power plants. It observed at Narora Atomic Power Station 1 & 2, continuous monitoring of healthiness and availability of seismic trips circuits did not exist. The unavailability of this trip due to loss of power supply or discontinuity in the wiring remain unnoticed till the next surveillance test. The scheme in this regard was under AERB’s review with the designers of Nuclear Power Corporation…….http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/aerb-detects-flaws-at-nuclear-plants/485318/

September 4, 2012 Posted by | India, safety | Leave a comment

Drop in water levels in Fukushima reactors coolant injections

Tepco: “Unknown whether the flow will recover” — No conclusive evidence of why reactors had sudden drop in water injections  August 31st, 2012    By   Follow-up to: Trouble injecting water into Fukushima Reactors 1-3 — Flow falls despite increasing coolant level — Tepco unable to identify cause, thinks pipes are clogged

August 31, 2012 report by Kyodo News translated by EXSKF:

After the amount of water being injected into Reactors 1, 2, and 3′s Reactor Pressure Vessels at Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant had temporarily dropped below the level specified in the safety regulations, TEPCO announced on August 31 that the company flushed the pipes […] TEPCO will wait and see if the amount of water injected into the RPVs recovers before deciding whether the second flushing is necessary.

[…]

According to TEPCO’s Junichi Matsumoto, “There is no conclusive evidence to narrow down the possible causes, and it is unknown whether the flow will recover.”

September 3, 2012 Posted by | Fukushima 2012, incidents | Leave a comment

“multiple system failures on many levels” US nuclear weapons plant safety audit

Weapons Plant Security Issues Are Described in U.S. Audit, NYT, By , August 31, 2012 WASHINGTON — The contractors in charge of guarding the national stockpile of bomb-grade uranium in Tennessee knew well before an 82-year-old nun and two other pacifists broke through three barriers this summer that a lot of the security equipment was broken, and government managers knew it too, according to an internal audit of Energy Department operations at the weapons facility. The inspector general’s investigation found “troubling displays of ineptitude.” The intruders used ordinary bolt cutters to penetrate as far as the uranium storage building before dawn on July 28, and then went undiscovered until they approached an officer in his vehicle and surrendered, according to the audit. The officer failed to draw his gun or even secure his gun from seizure, “and permitted the trespassers to roam about and retrieve various items from backpacks they had apparently brought into the area,” the report said.

The three antiwar protesters — Sister Megan Gillespie Rice, of Las Vegas; Michael R. Walli, 63, of Washington; and Gregory I. Boertje-Obed, 57, of Duluth, Minn. — have been charged with felonies in connection with damage to the building. They said they had brought bread and candles for a Christian ritual.

The guard told The Knoxville News that he was being used as a scapegoat, and that it was obvious that the trio posed no threat.

Internal communications at the weapons plant, Y-12, near Oak Ridge, Tenn., were generally so poor that security officers told the auditors that it was not unusual for roofers or utility repair personnel to show up unannounced, and that when they heard the trespassers banging on the exterior wall of the storage building with hammers, they assumed it was maintenance workers.

The Energy Department’s inspector general, Gregory H. Friedman, said in the report that the episode showed “multiple system failures on many levels.”…. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/01/science/earth/audit-finds-security-lapses-at-y-12-uranium-storage-plant.html?_r=1&smid=fb-share

September 3, 2012 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Activist nun has highlighted poor security at USA nuclear bomb plant

“Troubling ineptitude” in security at nuclear bomb plant  By Roberta Rampton WASHINGTON | Fri Aug 31, 2012   (Reuters) – Guards at a government plant for storing weapons-grade uranium failed to spot activists, including an 82-year-old nun, who cut through its fences until they walked up to an officer’s car and surrendered, an official report said on Friday.

The report from the Energy Department’s inspector general, Gregory Friedman, criticized multiple failures of sophisticated security systems and “troubling displays of ineptitude” at the Y-12 facility in Oak Ridge, Tennessee in July.

Three anti-nuclear activists, including an 82-year-old nun, were not initially spotted or detained as they cut through three perimeter fences on July 28.

They painted slogans and threw what they said was human blood on the outer wall of a building where highly enriched uranium, a key component of nuclear bombs, is stored…. Top nuclear officials from the Energy Department will face scrutiny over the security breach from lawmakers on the House of Representatives’ Energy and Commerce Committee on September …. Friedman’s report said the U.S. government had budgeted about $150 million in taxpayer funds for security at the Y-12 plant for fiscal 2012, yet the officer responding to the alarm did not notice the trespassers until they walked up to his car and “surrendered.”… http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/31/us-usa-security-nuclear-idUSBRE87U0WA20120831

September 1, 2012 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

USA nuclear power plants should never have been built near earthquake faults

Instead of working toward converting to renewable energy production and energy conservation technology, PG&E is stubbornly holding on to nuclear power until the bitter end. It will spend millions on a seismic survey of the faults around Diablo Canyon
Utilities’ nuclear power plants threaten millions  The OcNUke Daily – #Occupy Nuclear by Ed Oberweiser  Aug 25th, 2012 t’s painfully obvious that nuclear power is harmful and dangerous. France has had 12 nuclear accidents between 1969 and 2012. Japan has had 12 since 1978. There were 46 nuclear accidents in the United States between 1955 and 2011.  Utilities’ nuclear power plants threaten millions

http://noyonews.net  By Ed Oberweiser  Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison (SCE) have placed millions of California citizens in danger of a nuclear catastrophe on a par with Fukushima.

They’ve built nuclear power plants near earthquake faults capable of generating earthquakes that could damage the plants and irradiate millions of people.  Continue reading →

September 1, 2012 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s unsatisfactory handling of Davis Besse nuclear safety issuear

Congressman Kucinich Demands Investigation of Nuclear Safety Agency
http://nuclearhistory.wordpress.com/2012/08/30/congressman-kucinich-demands-investigation-of-nuclear-safety-agency/
http://kucinich.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=306494 Washington, Aug 15 – Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) is today demanding the Inspector General of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which oversees safety at our nation’s nuclear power plants, investigate the agency’s handling of the reopening of Davis-Besse in northern Ohio after cracks were discovered in the shield building. Continue reading →

August 30, 2012 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Weakness of India’s nuclear safety agency

India’s nuclear safety report warns of Fukushima-like disaster NDTV, Edited by Sabyasachi Dasgupta  August 23, 2012 New Delhi: The national auditor’s report on India’s nuclear safety has raised concerns over a weak regulatory body. In its report on the
Atomic Energy Regulatory Board’s (AERB) performance audit, the Comptroller and Auditor General has warned a Fukushima or Chernobyl-like disaster if the nuclear safety issue is not addressed by the government. Continue reading →

August 24, 2012 Posted by | India, safety | Leave a comment

Hackers may be able to attack US nuclear power plants

US Nuclear Power Plants May Be Totally Vulnerable To Hackers Jim Finkle , Reuters     | Aug. 22, 2012 BOSTON – The U.S. government is looking into claims by a cyber security researcher that flaws in software for specialized networking equipment from Siemens could enable hackers to attack power plants and other critical systems.
Justin W. Clarke, an expert in securing industrial control systems, disclosed at a conference in Los Angeles on Friday that he had figured out a way to spy on traffic moving through networking equipment manufactured by Siemens’ RuggedCom division.
The Department of Homeland Security said in an alert released on Tuesday that it had asked RuggedCom to confirm the vulnerability that Clarke, a 30-year-old security expert who has long worked in theelectric utility field, had identified and identify steps to mitigate its impact……  http://www.businessinsider.com/flaw-in-us-computer-software-may-allow-hackers-to-control-nuclear-power-plants-2012-8#ixzz24Lul43tb

August 22, 2012 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Hanford nuclear waste tank – a new radioactive leak?

Big, radioactive lump in Hanford nuclear-waste tank: Is it leaking? Seattle Times, 21 Aug 12, A discovery at the Hanford nuclear reservation throws into question the integrity of the double-walled steel tanks where radioactive waste is being temporarily stored. Continue reading →

August 22, 2012 Posted by | incidents, USA | Leave a comment

USA lucky it was a nun, not a terrorist, breaking into nuke site

“We were lucky in that regard that it was the nun and her cohorts, rather than a serious terrorist outfit,”

Intrusion embarrasses ‘Fort Knox of uranium’, Google News, By ERIK SCHELZIG, Associated Press – 19 Aug   OAK RIDGE, Tenn. (AP) — Officials like to refer to the Y-12 National Security Complex as the Fort Knox for highly enriched uranium, which is why an unprecedented incursion by an 82-year-old nun and two fellow protesters has critics mocking the notion that the weapons plant is secure…..

Y-12 makes uranium parts for every warhead in the U.S. nuclear arsenal, dismantles old weapons and is the nation’s primary storehouse for bomb-grade uranium…. Continue reading →

August 20, 2012 Posted by | incidents, USA | Leave a comment

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