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South Carolina Woefully Underprepared for Nuclear Disaster

FITSNEWS,  ByDylan Nolan, 23 May 22,    Oconee Nuclear Station emergency sets off alarm bells,   

 South Carolina state government can’t get a nuclear reactor up and running, as was made clear by the spectacular failure of government-run utility Santee Cooper — which five years ago officially pulled the plug on the proposed V.C. Summer nuclear generating station expansion (a.k.a. NukeGate). The botched construction of this project cost Palmetto State ratepayers and taxpayers more than $10 billion.

What is less known, but potentially more ominous, is the fact that sources close to the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control (SCDHEC) Radiation Nuclear Safety unit say the state is woefully underprepared to respond to potential nuclear disasters.

Staffing this specialized unit has allegedly become an increasingly serious issue for SCDHEC in recent years. The unit dwindled from seven to three full-time employees as frustration with ineffective management led to employees finding work elsewhere.

The remaining full-time employees are stretched thin. The map below [on original] illustrates South Carolina’s nuclear facilities, as well as those in neighboring states that have the potential to harm South Carolinians in the event of a disaster.

The SCDHEC unit is responsible for more than just those facilities though, it also handles transportation incidents involving radiological materials

This seems like a herculean task for three individuals — one that could have ended poorly in early February when two of the (at that time) four employees of the unit were out of town at a training event when an incident involving a potential release of radiological material at the Oconee Nuclear Station threw the remaining two employees into high gear.

As the first light of dawn penetrated the darkness of the lakeside sky, it cast a dull glow over the three reactors — built in 1974 on the Keowee River at the foot of the Blue Ridge Escarpment. This still morning would soon be broken, however.

At 3:57 a.m. EST February 5, the west penetration room adjacent to one of the three reactors filled with smoke and prevented personnel from entering. At this time, officials at the plant filled out their initial nuclear power plant emergency notification form (ENF).

Nuclear facilities experiencing emergencies issue warnings indicating the severity of an accident. In this instance, employees at the Oconee station chose the second of four alert levels. According to the emergency response guide posted on plant operator Duke Energy’s website, this indicates “there is no impact to the public.” The plant’s resident Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) inspector concurred with that assessment.

Had they chosen the next level of alert — a site area emergency warning — plant operators would have indicated they believed the event to be a “major operational/ security event that could affect plant safety” and would have likely warned the public of the event’s occurrence.

The Oconee County Fire Department responded by sending five trucks on-site with more staged off site.

SCDHEC’s response was solely conducted remotely. A source close to this unit characterized this response as “strictly for show” — adding that managers frequently refuse to allow the responders to go to the scene of the emergency.

SCDHEC’s director of media relations Ron Aiken told FITSNews that “because both the facility and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission confirmed no off-site release occurred, no emergency field-monitoring by SCDHEC was required.”

One SCDHEC insider frustrated with the response contended that “this unit is set up to be the state’s assurance that nothing is/was being released.”

“We should not have sat by and waited for the plant to tell us that there was no leak,” the insider said. “If there was a leak, it would have been too late to perform any protective actions.”

While plant operators did not issue a warning that would notify residents surrounding the plant, they sent employees to their Charlotte, N.C.-based emergency operations facility — which allows engineers to have off-site control of the plant in the event it had to be evacuated.

SCDHEC didn’t conduct independent soil and vegetation testing until three days after the incident. According their internal after-action report (below) “taking the soil, water and vegetation samples three days after the incident and with rain being present diminished the possibility of detecting anything.” A source familiar with the report added that “we don’t have any option but to take them (nuclear plant operators) at their word.”

……………….a federal response would take hours to arrive given both the complexity of responding to a nuclear disaster and the fact that federal officials are primarily located out of state. A failure to properly handle a situation in the hours before the feds arrive could turn an emergency into a tragedy

……….  Individuals familiar with the operations of the unit have voiced concerns that none of the stakeholders truly care about the efficacy of the unit. The state’s nuclear power plant operators care a great deal about the state continuing to provide the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) with “reasonable assurance” that the state can adequately respond to nuclear disasters since their ability to operate plants is dependent on federal approval of state safety measures…………………………… https://www.fitsnews.com/2022/05/23/south-carolina-woefully-underprepared-for-nuclear-disaster-sources-say/. State and local officials must therefore be ready to stand in the gap during those crucial first hours.

May 26, 2022 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Magnitude 6.0 quake shakes Japan’s east and northeast

 https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/05/22/national/earthquake-ibaraki-fukushima/An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.0 struck Fukushima and other prefectures in Japan’s east and northeast on Sunday, but there was no threat of a tsunami, the Meteorological Agency said.

There were no immediate reports of injuries or serious property damage following the quake, which occurred around 12:24 p.m.

The quake’s magnitude was later revised upward from the initial estimate of 5.8, the agency said.

The quake registered lower 5 on the Japanese seismic intensity scale to 7 in the city of Iwaki in Fukushima, according to the agency. Its focus was at a depth of about 30 kilometers in the Pacific off Ibaraki Prefecture.

The quake registered 4 in some other parts of Fukushima and 3 in the neighboring prefectures of Miyagi, Yamagata, Ibaraki, Niigata and Tochigi.

No abnormalities were found at the Tokai No. 2 nuclear power plant on the coast of Ibaraki or at the Fukushima No. 1 and No. 2 nuclear power plants, their operators said.

There were also no major transport disruptions. JR East said it briefly suspended services on a section of the Tohoku Shinkansen line between Fukushima and Miyagi prefectures.

May 23, 2022 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

3 unplanned shutdowns of French nuclear reactors due to corrosion concerns, in the Framatome-designed piping

EDF revealed on Thursday that it will shut down the 1.3 GW Paluel 2, Penly
2 St Alban 2 and Cattenom 1 reactors next year, when no shutdowns were
planned so far, to check whether their auxiliary pipes to the primary
circuit are affected by corrosion. The dates of these shutdowns, which will
occur in the second quarter of 2023, must be published imminently on Remit,
said the deputy director of EDF’s nuclear production department Régis
Clément at a press conference in Paris.

The French group intends to check the rest of these 56 reactors by the end of 2023, or even the beginning of 2024, during the planned shutdowns which will be extended and the ten-year
visits, seven of which are scheduled for the rest of this year, he added.

Earlier on Thursday, EDF on Thursday revised the dates for thirteen
scheduled outages at nuclear power plants in 2022-23 due to
corrosion-related checks and repairs. Mr. Clément also asserted that the
“preponderant” cause of cracks due to corrosion on the auxiliary piping
to the primary circuit of certain reactors in the nuclear fleet was the
design of these circuits, developed by the EDF subsidiary Framatome. “Today
what we have as a clear conviction is that the design [of the auxiliary
circuits] appears to us as a preponderant cause”, he said.

 Montel 19th May 2022

https://www.montelnews.com/news/1322042/corrosion-edf-rvle-les-4-units-quelle-arrtera-en-2023

May 23, 2022 Posted by | France, safety | Leave a comment

Seismic Concerns at Los Angeles Nuclear Laboratory and Expanded Plutonium Pit Production

Seismic Concerns at LANL and Expanded Plutonium Pit Production http://nuclearactive.org/, May 19th, 2022, Ongoing  Plutonium operations at Los Alamos National Laboratory’s Technical Area 55 are centered in the middle of the 36-square mile national nuclear weapons facility.  LANL is the only U.S. facility with the capabilities to fabricate plutonium triggers, or the fissile pits, for nuclear weapons.  However, Technical Area 55, or TA-55, is located within the complex Pajarito Fault Zone between two young, north – south running faults called the Guaje Mountain and    Rendija Canyon faults.  Visual evidence of faulting     can be found in the canyons to the north of TA-55.  http://nuclearactive.org/gilkeson/ see Seismic Documents.

The U.S. Department of Energy owns LANL.  It has plans for expansion of all things plutonium-pit production at the Plutonium Facility and at least five new support buildings at TA-55.  CCNS anticipates that DOE will continue its efforts to conceal and ignore the reality of the growing seismic threats of the young faults.

We witnessed similar efforts in the mid-2000s when DOE began to design a new super Walmart-sized Nuclear Facility within TA-55 next door to the Plutonium Facility.  DOE was so bold as to dig into the volcanic tuff with heavy equipment to prepare a pad for future construction.  http://www.nuclearactive.org/news/030510.html  In the end, public opposition and escalating costs forced the cancellation of its plans.  http://nuclearactive.org/livestreamed-nuclear-safety-board-hearing-on-february-21st-in-albuquerque/

Fabricating plutonium pits for nuclear weapons involves many steps – some using aqueous processes that result in water contaminated with radiation and hazardous materials.  That water is treated across the street from the Plutonium Facility at the Radioactive Liquid Waste Treatment Facility and for decades was discharged through an industrial outfall into Effluent Canyon.  Since November 2011, though, the treated water has been evaporated into the air at a mechanical evaporator.  

In April, the Environmental Protection Agency renewed the five-year industrial permit for LANL to discharge through Outfall 051 into Effluent Canyon.  https://www.epa.gov/nm/los-alamos-national-laboratory-lanl-industrial-wastewater-permit-final-npdes-permit-no-nm0028355

We note that on May 11th, CCNS, Honor Our Pueblo Existence, and the Albuquerque Veterans for Peace, Chapter No. 63, appealed the EPA decision to permit the outfall and five others to the Environmental Appeals Board.  https://yosemite.epa.gov/oa/EAB_Web_Docket.nsf/f22b4b245fab46c6852570e6004df1bd/ba987f24df0c356085258837004f3dcd

Then on May 5th, the New Mexico Environment Department approved for the first time a ground water discharge permit for not only for the Radioactive Liquid Waste Treatment Facility, the outfall and Mechanical Evaporator, but for two large solar evaporative tanks, and a new low-level radioactive liquid waste treatment facility.  In addition, DOE plans to build a liquid waste treatment facility for the transuranic plutonium liquid waste.  https://www.env.nm.gov/public-notices/, go to Los Alamos County, and scroll down to DP-1132 where the draft permit is posted, but not the final permit.

These facilities are all in support of DOE’s plans for expanded plutonium pit production at LANL.

May 21, 2022 Posted by | - plutonium, safety, USA, weapons and war | 1 Comment

UK Public Accounts Committee warns on need to double-check on safety of aging nuclear reactors

Ageing nuclear reactors must be ‘double-checked’ for safety before
being kept going to ease energy crisis. Closure of seven nuclear reactors
by 2028 will ‘significantly reduce’ UK energy generation, the Public
Accounts Committee warns, and taxpayers face billions of pounds in extra
costs.

 iNews 20th May 2022

https://inews.co.uk/news/business/ageing-nuclear-reactors-double-checked-safety-ease-energy-crisis-costs-1640564

May 21, 2022 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

France’s woes with nuclear power plants means more energy uncertainty for Europe

The utility cut its forecast as it realised that “stress corrosion” issues affecting some of its reactors will require more checks and repairs. Irish Examiner, THU, 19 MAY, 2022. LARS PAULSSON, JESPER STARN AND FRANCOIS DE BEAUPUY

The woes facing the nuclear power stations at France’s EDF — Europe’s largest electricity producer — will increase the pressure on war-hit European energy markets after the summer. 

EDF, which is the backbone of Europe’s integrated power system, cut its nuclear output target for a third time this year, the latest sign that Europe’s power crisis is worsening. 

Western Europe has for decades relied on exports of power from EDF’s nuclear stations. The cuts are another blow to European energy security just as the region is weaning itself off Russian supplies of everything from natural gas to coal and oil because of the war in Ukraine.

Less output from EDF is sending prices higher just as soaring inflation is pushing up costs for everything from petrol to food. It could get even worse in winter as France, traditionally an exporter of electricity, may be forced to import more from its neighbours.

French prices are the most expensive in Europe, with contracts for the period almost double levels in Germany. The utility cut its forecast as it realised that “stress corrosion” issues affecting some of its reactors will require more checks and repairs. The outlook for the following year remains unchanged for now, the firm said. 

“We fine-tuned the repairs to be made,” Regis Clement, deputy head of the company’s nuclear division, said during a media conference. “We’ve got to cut more pipes” to carry out further checks “and more repairs to handle”, he said.The big test will come when temperatures start to fall toward the end of the year. It won’t take many days of cold weather to jeopardise French power supplies, according to Emeric de Vigan, chief executive officer at French energy analysis firm Cor-e.“With such poor nuclear availability, if we reach 2 degrees Celsius below normal in the winter for a few days we could be in trouble, it would be really tight,” Mr de Vigan said. Paying customers and factories to lower consumption are steps that likely will need to be taken, he said. ……………….   https://www.irishexaminer.com/business/economy/arid-40876541.html

May 21, 2022 Posted by | business and costs, France, politics international, safety | Leave a comment

Chernobyl nuclear fears as forest near Exclusion Zone in FLAMES – emergency triggered 

https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1612039/Chernobyl-nuclear-warning-forest-fire-Exclusion-Zone-emergency-Ukraine-latest

CHERNOBYL nuclear fears have surged after a forest near the Exclusion Zone erupted in flames as emergency services battled to extinguish the huge blaze.

By PAUL WITHERS, May 18, 2022  The State Emergency Service of Ukraine reported that litter in the forest near the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone had caught fire. More than a dozen firefighters and four units of equipment were involved in battling to put out the massive fire. At 2.10am local time, the fire had been localised to an area of 45 hectares. 

Video footage shared on Twitter shows the forest next to the Exclusion Zone engulfed in flames that are several metres high.

Rescue workers wearing protective face masks are also seen leading a local resident to safety.

The State Emergency Service of Ukraine shared footage of the fire on its Telegram channel.

The service also wrote alongside this: “May 17 near the village.   “In the forest of Vyshhorod district, forest litter caught fire.

“During the fire, our firefighters rescued a local resident.

“At 02:10 on May 18, the fire was localized on an area of 45 hectares.

“As of 09:00 there is decay of dry grass and stumps.

“Sixteen rescuers and four units were involved in the firefighting techniques.

The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone is an officially designated 1,000 square mile area in Ukraine around the site of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor disaster.

It covers an area where radioactive contamination is highest and public access and habitation are restricted.

The Exclusion Zone aims to restrict access to hazardous areas, reduce the spread of radiological contamination, and conduct radiological and ecological monitoring activities.

It remains one of the most radioactively contaminated areas in the world, attracting widespread interest over the high levels of radiation exposure in the environment.

The Exclusion Zone had been established by the Soviet Armed Forces soon after the nuclear power plant disaster in 1986.  This initially existed as an area with a radius of 30 miles from the structure, designated for evacuation and placed under military control.

Over the years, its borders have been widened to cover a much larger area of Ukraine.  

May 19, 2022 Posted by | climate change, incidents, Ukraine | 1 Comment

Sellafield Update 2022

nuClear News, May 2922, Executive Summary
Reprocessing
Spent fuel from the UK’s first-generation Magnox reactors is still being reprocessed. It was
scheduled to end in 2012 to help the UK meet its international obligations to end the radioactive
pollution of the north-east Atlantic. It’s now scheduled to end later this year.
Storage
At the end of 2021, the First Generation Magnox Storage Pond (FGMSP), one of Sellafield’s most
hazardous facilities, and the Pile Fuel Storage Pond (PFSP) still contained 75% of the legacy
spent fuel which has to be removed and placed in interim storage. This degraded fuel won’t be
in interim storage until 2025. It will then have to be conditioned, and eventually transferred to
the proposed Geological Disposal Facility by 2125.

Spent fuel
The Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant (THORP) has closed, and almost 5,000 tonnes of unreprocessed spent fuel from the UK’s second-generation Advanced Gas-cooled Reactors (AGRs)
will be stored in ponds at Sellafield until at least 2075. In addition, an estimated 141 tonnes of
exotic fuel will remain in storage once the Magnox reprocessing plant closes, and isn’t expected
to be in a modern interim storage facility until 2028. Sellafield is also contracted to receive and
store spent submarine fuel from the MoD.

Plutonium
The government has yet to decide about possible re-use or disposal of the 140 tonnes of
plutonium stored at Sellafield. Its preferred option is to re-use it in Mixed Oxide Fuel (MOX) for
nuclear reactors, but some plutonium will be unsuitable for this and will need to be immobilised
and treated as a waste for disposal. Some of the older plutonium packages and facilities are
amongst the highest hazards on the Sellafield site. All plutonium needs to be gradually transferred to a new store, and two more stores are likely to be required – one is expected to be
ready in 2033 and the second in 2040.

High Level Waste
High Level Waste (HLW) Liquors, left over after reprocessing, need to be constantly cooled
otherwise they would start to boil causing radioactivity to escape and contaminate the
surrounding environment. Conversion of these liquors into a solid form and emplacement in
storage is not expected to be complete until 2030. The solid waste will remain in storage until
‘disposal’ by 2104. All HLW belonging to overseas customers should be returned by 2025.
Levels of risk
In 2013 Sellafield was described as posing an “intolerable risk”. Then in 2018 it was reported
that “work to reduce risk and high hazard at Sellafield has taken an encouraging turn for the
better”. Since then, the site has not been much in the news, but there is still a lot of work to do,
as many of the risks remain. And the timescales for carrying out this work are simply
staggering. According to the UK Radioactive Waste Inventory decommissioning won’t be
complete until around 2090 and then all buildings won’t be demolished until 2120 – almost a
century from now. (1)

Continue reading →

May 19, 2022 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

France’s nuclear corrosion problem will need a ”large scale” plan, and ”several years” to fix.

The head of French nuclear regulator ASN said on Tuesday (17 May) that
fixing corrosion problems at some of state-controlled utility EDF’s
nuclear reactors would require a “large scale” plan and “several
years” as he warned of a risk more reactors could be halted.

 Euractiv 18th May 2022  https://www.euractiv.com/section/electricity/news/fixing-edfs-reactors-corrosion-mystery-to-take-several-years-french-regulator-warns/

Fixing EDF’s reactors corrosion mystery to take several years, French regulator warns

May 19, 2022 Posted by | France, safety | Leave a comment

France’s Nuclear Safety authority struggles with the problems realated to corrosion in 12 reactors

Nuclear: faced with the problem of corrosion, a “large-scale” control
program. The president of the Nuclear Safety Authority, Bernard Doroszczuk,
gives a “general positive assessment” of the safety of the park, but
underlines “points of vigilance”.

The traditional exercise aimed to take
stock of the state of nuclear safety in 2021. In the end, it was the events
that occurred during the very last weeks of the year, but also during the
first months of 2022, that was at the heart of Bernard Doroszczuk’s speech
to the members of the Parliamentary Office for the Evaluation of Scientific
and Technological Choices on Tuesday 17 May.

The President of the Nuclear
Safety Authority (ASN) returned to the consequences of the “stress
corrosion” phenomenon observed on parts of the pipes which allow water to
be injected into the main primary circuit in order to cool the core. of the
reactor in the event of an accident.

Since mid-December, EDF has shut down
or extended the shutdown of twelve units in order to carry out in-depth
assessments or repairs related to this problem. If the origin of this
corrosion is not completely determined, Mr. Doroszczuk indicated that it
could be due to the “design” of the reactors: the oldest and most
widespread in the fleet are based on an original technology American, while
the most recent were designed according to a model adapted by EDF. However,
the piping that goes from the primary circuit to the first valve is longer
and more complex on the second, and this route could generate greater
thermomechanical stresses.

 Le Monde 17th May 2022

https://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2022/05/17/nucleaire-face-au-probleme-de-corrosion-un-programme-de-controle-de-grande-ampleur_6126537_3244.html

May 19, 2022 Posted by | France, safety | Leave a comment

Atomic energy chief: Ukraine’s nuclear safety situation ‘far from being resolved’

Russian troops are still occupying Europe’s largest nuclear power plant at Zaporizhzhia. Politico  BY LOUISE GUILLOT The risk of a nuclear accident in Ukraine is still a source of concern, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency said Tuesday, calling the situation “far from being resolved.”

Speaking at European Parliament hearing, IAEA chief Rafael Mariano Grossi said the agency’s main “preoccupation” remains Zaporizhzhia, Ukraine’s largest functioning nuclear power plant, which has been under Russian military control since early March.

“We have been living in a very fragile situation,” he said, explaining that the plant is currently run by Ukrainian state nuclear operator Energoatom but occupied by Russian troops.

Grossi added that Russian nuclear experts are also on site, but said their function “is not entirely clear.” Their presence “goes against every safety principle that we have” and creates the “potential for disagreement, for friction, for contradictory instruction,” he warned.

Russian military control of Zaporizhzhia in eastern Ukraine is also raising questions about the status of nuclear material at the site.

Because IAEA experts currently don’t have access to the plant, they can’t perform regular nuclear safeguard activities, including physical inventories and monitoring, according to Grossi.

“Without that we cannot ensure to the international community where the nuclear material is or what’s happening with it,” he said.

He added that IAEA had no evidence that Ukraine had started a nuclear weapons program before the war — contrary to Russian allegations.

“But when I’m confronted with a situation … where we have more than 30,000 kilograms of enriched uranium and a similar amount of plutonium and I cannot go and inspect … the situation with this nuclear material, it is a very real danger and something that should be considered in all its seriousness,” he said.

…………  Talks are ongoing with both sides, according to Grossi. “We’re not at a dead end.”

He added that a group of IAEA experts will make a second trip to the decommissioned Chernobyl nuclear power plant “very soon” to carry out additional repairs, but that the situation “appears to have been stabilized.”……..  https://www.politico.eu/article/iaea-rafael-mariano-grossi-ukraine-nuclear-safety-situation-not-resolve/

May 12, 2022 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Meltdown at Three Mile Island- USA’s closest nuclear close shave

Shortly after 4am on 28 March 1979, a pressure valve failed to close in
the Unit 2 reactor at Three Mile Island, a nuclear power plant on a strip
of land in central Pennsylvania’s Susquehanna River. The technical
malfunction, compounded by human error – control room workers misread
confusing signals and halted the emergency water cooling system – heated
the nuclear core to dangerously high levels.

The film The China Syndrome
was still in theaters, starring Jane Fonda as a television reporter
investigating cover-ups at a nuclear power plant whose meltdown could
release radioactive material deep into the earth, “all the way to
China”. Three Mile Island – still the worst commercial nuclear accident
in US history – was no China Syndrome, but it got terrifyingly close to
catastrophic, Chernobyl-level damage.

As the Netflix docuseries Meltdown:
Three Mile Island recounts, Unit 2 came less than half an hour from fully
melting down – a disaster scenario that would have sickened hundreds of
thousands in the surrounding area. Two days after the accident, an
explosive bubble of hydrogen gas was found in the reactor. The plant’s
operator, Metropolitan Edison, tried to downplay the risk of radioactive
releases, but panic ensued; more than 100,000 people fled the surrounding
area. Plant technicians were eventually able to slowly bleed the gas from
the cooling reactor, avoiding a deadly explosion.

Though workers inside theplant were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation, it remains unknown how
much contamination escaped the facility into the surrounding community. In
its second half, Meltdown, directed by Kief Davidson, homes in on the story
of Rick Parks, a cleanup supervisor turned whistleblower on the Bechtel
Corp, the company hired to conduct the billion-dollar cleanup by
Metropolitan Edison and supervised by the government’s Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC).

“While a lot of people know about the disaster, they
don’t know about what happened in the cleanup phase and how close we were
to another disaster,” Davidson told the Guardian. “We dodged a bullet a
second time, and it was entirely due to the fact that Rick Parks and
[fellow whistleblower] Larry King stood up. “We should know about these
stories,” he added. “We should be able to look at the people who risk
everything in order to save communities from a potential disaster.”

 Guardian 5th May 2022

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2022/may/05/meltdown-three-mile-island-netflix-us-nuclear-accident

May 7, 2022 Posted by | incidents, media, USA | Leave a comment

UK Nuclear Waste Services to airgun blast the Irish Sea – the public not consulted

 Nuclear Waste Services and the “Community Partnerships” of South and
Mid-Copeland plan to airgun blast the Irish Sea this summer to test the
sub-sea geology.

This plan is to take place over the heads of the public
who have had no say on the matter despite seismic testing being a dangerous
and controversial technology with damaging impacts on marine life. We have
sent a letter to Living Seas North West to ask them not to collaborate with
this terrible plan.

There is also a petition to sign – the more shares and
signatures the more we will raise awareness and opposition to this plan to
airgun blast the Irish Sea every 10 seconds, 24 hours a day for four weeks
in July/August. 

Radiation Free Lakeland 5th May 2022https://mariannewildart.wordpress.com/2022/05/05/halt-seismic-testing-of-irish-sea-for-deep-nuclear-dump-this-summer/

May 7, 2022 Posted by | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Meltdown: Three Mile Island – powerful new Netflix documentary series

The partial meltdown at the nuclear power plant at Three Mile Island in
Pennsylvania in 1979 was a perfect coalescing of factors in two senses.
First, a series of cascading mechanical and human errors brought the plant
close to a catastrophe that would have potentially made much of the East
Coast uninhabitable, we’re told in the new documentary “Meltdown: Three
Mile Island.”

Second, coming as it did both within memory of the height
of Cold War paranoia and days after the release of the film “The China
Syndrome,” the disaster was perfectly primed to set off anxieties about
the danger of atomic energy. “Meltdown: Three Mile Island,” a new
four-part documentary on Netflix, does an elegant job of braiding those two
truths — that Three Mile Island was a narrowly averted nightmare scenario
and that it lives on in the public imagination as an argument against
nuclear energy. It can default, especially in its early going, to tools of
the trade that feel underbaked — reenactments of, say, a phone ringing in
a school where children wait for news about the disaster, the camera
somewhat schlockily pushing in to amp up what’s already dramatic enough.

But the power of the story “Meltdown” tells, as well as the insight of
those on whom director Kief Davidson trains his camera, ultimately carries
the day.

 Variety 3rd May 2022

https://variety.com/2022/tv/reviews/meltdown-three-mile-island-netflix-1235256986/

May 5, 2022 Posted by | incidents, media, USA | Leave a comment

Asahi Shimbun – Japan’s nuclear industry needs to be more aware, more careful about terrorism risks.

Utilities urged to look far and wide to tackle nuclear terrorism threat, Asahi Shimbun, May 4, 2022 Despite a contrary assessment by nuclear regulators, a spate of recent security breaches at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant should not be considered endemic to the facility.

The Nuclear Regulation Authority compiled an interim report on its follow-up inspections on the unauthorized use of an employee ID card and disabled intrusion detection equipment at the plant in Niigata Prefecture.

……………………..   the report did not discuss why this was the case with Kashiwazaki-Kariwa alone or how this potentially disastrous situation could have remained overlooked.

It raises fears of a potential breach that could allow terrorists to seize control of the plant.

In our view, the NRA’s examination of the problems was far from comprehensive.

For instance, the interim report reiterated that practically no on-site inspections of the plant’s department that oversees the physical protection of nuclear materials were undertaken by top executives of the plant or TEPCO’s headquarters.

The nature of TEPCO’s overall organization and its management culture still raises many questions.

The report made eight demands of TEPCO. They include: A fundamental review of procedures for the physical protection of nuclear materials; reinforcement of intrusion prevention facilities and their maintenance system; more active use of input from on-site staff; and greater management participation and investment of management resources.

NRA Chairman Toyoshi Fuketa said at a meeting the onus was on TEPCO to prove its equipment and facilities for the physical protection of nuclear materials are fool-proof, even if the company’s corporate culture and attitude are below the line and its employees try to cut corners.

An urgent need exists for a framework to ensure that nuclear materials are protected should human error enter the equation, which obliges TEPCO to rectify its operations.

The company needs to not only meet the NRA’s demands but also go the extra mile to address issues needing attention as a matter of routine.

We also strongly urge the NRA to conduct more rigorous inspections.

Nuclear terrorism would have a catastrophic impact on society. An attack against a nuclear power plant could prove too much for its operator or regulatory authorities to handle alone……….. https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/14613482

May 5, 2022 Posted by | incidents, Japan | Leave a comment

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