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USA’s Blue Ribbon Commission has no answer to long term nuclear waste disposal

the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit advocacy group, questioned some of the report’s findings.

“Efforts to site an interim storage facility could distract from the far more important goal of finding a repository site,”

U.S. needs long-term site for nuclear waste: panel  By Ayesha Rascoe, WASHINGTON  Jan 26, 2012   (Reuters) – The United States must urgently work to find a new central site to house its spent nuclear fuel and probe whether Japan’s nuclear disaster has any safety implications for storage at the country’s plants, a federal panel said on Thursday.

The U.S. government has struggled with how to manage the 65,000 tons of radioactive waste produced by its nuclear reactors over decades and stored throughout the country.. Continue reading →

January 27, 2012 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Nuclear fuel could be corroded by seawater

How sea water could corrode nuclear fuel, UC Davis, January 26, 2012, Japan used seawater to cool nuclear fuel at the stricken Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear plant after the tsunami in March 2011 — and that was probably the best action to take at the time, says ProfessorAlexandra Navrotsky of the University of California, Davis.

But Navrotsky and others have since discovered a new way in which seawater can corrode nuclear fuel, forming uranium compounds that could potentially travel long distances, either in solution or as very small particles. The research team published its work Jan. 23 in the
journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“This is a phenomenon that has not been considered before,” said Alexandra Navrotsky, distinguished professor of ceramic, earth and environmental materials chemistry. “We don’t know how much this will increase the rate of corrosion, but it is something that will have to
be considered in future.”….
In the new paper, the researchers show that in the presence of alkali metal ions such as sodium — for example, in seawater — these clusters are stable enough to persist in solution or as small particles even when the oxidizing agent is removed.

In other words, these clusters could form on the surface of a fuel rod exposed to seawater and then be transported away, surviving in the environment for months or years before reverting to more common forms of uranium, without peroxide,  and settling to the bottom of the
ocean. There is no data yet on how fast these uranium peroxide clusters will break down in the environment, Navrotsky said… http://www.news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=10131

January 27, 2012 Posted by | 2 WORLD, oceans, Reference, technology, wastes | Leave a comment

Lynas rare earths company still in trouble over radioactive wastes in Malaysi

Locals say market won’t buy Lynas’ recycled waste, Malaysia, By Shannon Teoh, January 26, 2012 KUALA LUMPUR, Jan 26 — Lynas Corp’s plans to recycle waste from its controversial RM2.5 billion rare earth plant in Kuantan into a commercial product will not be accepted by the market, local residents opposed to the refinery said today.

The Stop Lynas Coalition (SLC) and Save Malaysia Stop Lynas (SMSL) groups said in a joint submission to the government that the synthetic gypsum the Australian miner hopes to produces from its waste is the subject of an international safety campaign due to radiation fears. The use of phospho-gypsum plaster-board and plaster cement in buildings as a substitute for natural gypsum may constitute an additional source of radiation exposure to both workers and members of the public,” the document quoted from Internet-based environmental organisation Zero Waste America. Continue reading →

January 27, 2012 Posted by | ASIA, wastes | Leave a comment

UK govt not happy with GE Hitachi’s plan for plutonium waste

the UK stockpile of waste plutonium – the biggest civilian stash in the world 

UK Nuclear Watchdog Toughens Stance On Waste Reuse, Planet Ark 25-Jan-12,  BRITAIN by Oleg Vukmanovic Britain’s nuclear watchdog has hardened its stance against a proposal by U.S.-Japan joint venture GE Hitachi to dispose of UK radioactive waste in a plutonium-burning reactor but has not ended talks.

The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), which advises the government on how best to manage the UK’s growing plutonium stockpile, is considering a number of options including the fast-reactor design proposed by GE Hitachi in November.

The NDA has repeatedly ruled the multi-billion pound 600 megawatt (MW) reactor out of the running on the grounds that the technology lacks credibility for the purposes of plutonium disposal. Continue reading →

January 26, 2012 Posted by | - plutonium, UK | Leave a comment

USA’s practically unsolvable dilemma about nuclear wastes

 The Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future’s report is arriving in an election year, a time when Congress has traditionally been unwilling to take decisive action. And the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982, which instructed the Energy Department to pursue a repository, has historically been interpreted to forbid establishment of an interim storage place until a final site is established.


But with a final resting place more elusive than ever, the three groups believe that Congress or the Energy Department should be moving in that direction.

Wanted: Parking Space for Nuclear Waste  http://green.blogs.nytimes com/2012/01/24/wanted-parking-space-for-nuclear-waste/   NYT, By MATTHEW L. WALD,  January 24, 2012,   When the Obama administration killed a plan to create a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada, the government established a “blue-ribbon commission” to study what to do next. Its final report is due on Sunday, and this week three organizations began a public lobbying campaign for several of the recommendations that they assume the commission will make.  Yucca was supposed to store nuclear waste, but the emphasis now is on “managing” it, especially the waste at scattered locations where reactors no longer operate.

At places like Maine Yankee, Connecticut Yankee andRancho Seco in California, reactors have been torn down, but the fuel remains in small concrete-and-steel silos that require maintenance and monitoring by a guard force. Sometimes the presence of nuclear waste prevents re-use of the sites by industry.  Continue reading →

January 25, 2012 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Taxpayers to fund massive nuclear waste dump, damaging to Cumbria

A public inquiry and appeal agreed with Cumbria County Council 15 years ago that the risk of radioactive waste migrating to the surface was too great for geological disposal of intermediate level waste.

Today, that same authority is a partner in the plan which now includes high-level waste.

A nuclear dump would blight Cumbria’s major industries of agriculture and tourism…. MRWS is now sinking taxpayers’ millions into a timetabled process too big to fail.

NUCLEAR DEBATE: RADIATION FREE LAKELAND:   JUST SAY NO:  Times and Star By Marianne Birkby,  19 January 2012 The last government set up a quango called Managing Radioactive Waste Safely. MRWS aims to give lucrative contracts, courtesy of the taxpayer, to private companies for a mine 3,280ft deep by 269 sq ft.

Put in perspective, Scafell Pike is 3,208ft. Imagine that size mine filled with high-level radioactive waste by 2026, setting a world first. Continue reading →

January 20, 2012 Posted by | UK, wastes | 1 Comment

Idaho National Laboratory did not properly assess plutonium risks

The effects of radiation worsen the longer radioactive material remains in the body.
Plutonium is considered more dangerous when inhaled than ingested because particles lodge in the lungs instead of being eliminated by the body, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Federal panel faults Idaho lab for radiation exposure mishap, By Laura Zuckerman SALMON, Idaho   Jan 18, 2012  (Reuters) – The radiation exposure of 16 workers at a nuclear research lab in Idaho stemmed from a failure to properly assess the risks posed by the handling of decades-old plutonium fuel cells, federal investigators concluded on Wednesday. Continue reading →

January 20, 2012 Posted by | - plutonium, USA | Leave a comment

Whistleblower on dangers at Hanford nuclear waste facility

During her testimony to the board she gave different answers than top-level officials with the Department of Energy and contractors Bechtel National and URS. Afterward, she says her managers asked her to change her answers. Busche said “No.”

She says she was … “Raised by a very good mother, that said, ‘Just don’t lie. ‘Cause once you tell your first one it’s real hard to … they just continue to grow.’”…

Audio http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=145326474&ft=3&f=145326474  Hanford Nuclear Safety Manager Questions Waste Treatment Plant NPR by ANNA KING  January 17, 2012 from N3 RICHLAND, Wash. – Waste in underground tanks at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation may have much more plutonium than previously thought. That’s according to a report by a Hanford contractor that’s just been leaked to public radio. It’s also according to the latest high profile whistleblower to raise serious concerns about a waste treatment plant being built at the Nuclear Reservation in southeast Washington. Continue reading →

January 18, 2012 Posted by | - plutonium, Reference, secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA | Leave a comment

Indigenous peoples fight against nuclear waste dumping on their land

No nuclear Northwest: Grand Chiefs Kenora Daily Miner and News, By Jon Thompson, 10 Jan 12 Grand chiefs representing every inch of Northwestern Ontario are publicly taking a hard line against burying nuclear waste in their traditional territory, claiming it would violate international law. Continue reading →

January 11, 2012 Posted by | Canada, indigenous issues, wastes | Leave a comment

Slovakia wrestles with nuclear question, and costs of “decommissioning”

amidst the country’s nuclear quandary, one state agency seems poised for growth. Jadrova a vyradovacia spolocnost, a.s., Slovakia’s nuclear decommissioning company, 

Slovakia’s Nuclear Schizophrenia: Shut Down, Continue As Usual, or Boldly Go — Where? Minyanville,  by John C.K. Daly of Oilprice.com.Jan 06, 2012  The answer is anything but clear. “…….the last two decades have devolved into a series of unseemly squabbles between Brussels and new Eastern European members, with the EU demanding the prompt shutdown of Soviet-era nuclear power plants, while governments east of Berlin plead understanding and extended timelines to shut down the facilities that provide major electrical input as they search for alternatives.

The latest post-Cold War post-Soviet space energy front line is Slovakia. What to do in Bratislava on the way to becoming good, clean, green members of the European Union?  “……Slovakia currently has four operational nuclear reactors at complexes in Jaslovske Bohunice and Mochovce, commissioned between 1984 and 1999. The facilities’ threeoldest reactors have been shut down in accordance with EU mandates….. Continue reading →

January 7, 2012 Posted by | decommission reactor, EUROPE | Leave a comment

Dilemma of USA’s Nuclear Waste Confidence Rule

 Environmental Impact Statement (EIS)  is part of the agency’s 2010 Waste Confidence Decision and Rule regulations,

“There has been talk of creating regional disposal sites but really there should not be any new nuclear power plants built until they can figure out what to do with the nuclear waste we have now.’’

Federal regulators seek public comment on nuclear fuel storage, Agency to review 200-year storage plan, APP.com  by Bob Vosseller, 4 Jan 12 The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission is seeking public feedback on a report about the impact of storing spent fuel from the nation’s commercial nuclear power plants for as long as 200 years.

According to a release from NRC officials Tuesday, the feedback would be used for the agency’s plan to update its Environmental Impact Statement, or EIS.

The EIS is a document used for decision-making and to determine whether there are any negative environmental effects caused by a proposed action. Continue reading →

January 5, 2012 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Murmank, the world’s atomic dustbin, has fire on nuclear submarine

Bellona, a respected Norwegian NGO which monitors Russia‘s nuclear fleet, said the number of casualties may have been higher…..

The desolate region around Murmansk contains the biggest concentration of old nuclear reactors in the world and, since the cold war ended, has become the world’s atomic dustbin. 

Russian nuclear submarine blaze injures nine after crew remain inside, Guardian UK, 31 Dec 11 President orders inquiry into fire on board vessel docked in Arctic but officials play down any fears of radiation leak

The Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, has ordered an investigation after a nuclear submarine caught fire during repairs in the Arctic, injuring at least nine people. Continue reading →

December 31, 2011 Posted by | incidents, Russia, wastes | Leave a comment

America no closer to finding a tomb for its accumulating nuclear wastes

In July, with little fanfare, the Obama administration’s Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future released a draft report to the Secretary of Energy on a post-Yucca Mountain solution. The report calls for development of “one or more geologic disposal facilities.”

So far, federal officials say they haven’t even started looking for a specific state or single site.

Northland rock considered for nuclear waste storage With Nevada’s Yucca Mountain out of the running as the permanent graveyard for U.S. nuclear waste, scientists now are looking for other places to entomb the stuff, including rock formations common in northern Minnesota and Wisconsin. That’s the message from a 114-page study from the Sandia National Laboratory that surfaced last week. By: John Myers, Duluth News Tribune, 25 Dec 11, Continue reading →

December 26, 2011 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

Desperate international quest for nuclear waste disposal

Nuclear nations wrestle with problem of permanent waste storage CANADA.COM BY IAN MACLEOD, POSTMEDIA NEWS DECEMBER 20, 2011 Ottawa Citizen With more than 400 nuclear power plants in 32 countries, nuclear waste disposal is no longer an afterthought. A global nuclear waste race is underway.

International research and co-operation has exploded. So has public decision-making in the once-private affairs of the nuclear power industry. Deep underground burial in hard rock cavities for hundreds of thousands of years is now considered the best long-term solution for the 240,000 tonnes of highly radioactive spent reactor fuel stacked in temporary storage around the globe.

No nation yet has opened a permanent geological repository. But plans are well advanced in some countries, notably Finland and Sweden. Canada plans to open a deep repository for high-level waste around 2035, though much work lies ahead, including finding a suitable site. Transferring the estimated four million spent fuel bundles into the vault will take an additional 30 years.

The United States, meanwhile, is in an increasingly desperate situation. The Obama administration’s recent decision to cancel the 2015 opening of a repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada’s remote desert country has left jittery and angry American nuclear power producers sitting on enormous amounts of spent fuel crammed into interim storage for an indefinite additional period. The country’s 104 commercial power reactors churn out more every day……..

The biggest issue for any repository design is assessing how it will perform far into future to allow the spent fuel products to decay into harmlessness. No one alive today, or for generations to come, will ever know the answer – hopefully. That means extensive, lengthy and expensive scientific studies. In geology alone, where time scales are measured in billions of years, research requires time.

There’s also hydrology, thermohydrology, hydrogeology, geochemistry, climate change modelling, materials behaviour, radionuclide migration and much, much more. Paying for the repositories is far simpler. Most countries, Canada included, require the radioactive waste producers to finance all the multibillion-dollar costs… http://www.canada.com/Nuclear+nations+wrestle+with+problem+permanent+waste+storage/5889554/story.html

December 21, 2011 Posted by | 2 WORLD, wastes | Leave a comment

Canadian tribes say NO to nuclear waste

No nuclear waste here, North Shore Tribal Council says,SooToday.com, December 20, 2011    Chiefs of the North Shore Tribal Council say no! to a multi-billion dollar nuclear waste disposal project in their territory CUTLER, ON – The First Nations of the North Shore Tribal Council strongly reject the prospect of the North Shore of Lake Huron becoming a site for the long-term storage of nuclear waste for the Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO). The City of Elliot Lake has publicly expressed interest in possibly becoming one of the sites for the long-term disposal of nuclear waste for Canada’s nuclear industry.

Elliot Lake has a long history of uranium mining that resulted in the boom and bust of the city, as well as significant and lasting environmental damage to the local watershed and nearby ceremonial grounds.  In addition, there are dozens of tailings ponds surrounding Elliot Lake currently waiting for a solution for their safe disposal.

“We cannot idly stand by and watch as they inject Mother Earth with this cancer,” says Chief Lyle Sayers, chairman of the North Shore Tribal Council. “We must ensure that the future natural resources of this area are there for our children, generations to come, and businesses alike.”

The half-life of this material is hundreds of thousands of years old and could impact generation after generation.  No site can ever be totally safe for nuclear waste storage. “Natural disasters sometimes happen, such as we’ve seen in Japan. It could make this whole area a nuclear wasteland suitable for only that industry,” says Chief Sayers.

Our statement to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission and to the Nuclear Waste Management Organization is: Do not waste your financial resources if you plan to conduct a study in this area because a nuclear waste dump is not going to happen here.

The North Shore Tribal Council represents seven First Nation communities across the North Shore of Lake Huron.Chief Lyle Sayers is the chief of the Garden River First Nation and also the chairman of the North Shore Tribal Council. http://www.sootoday.com/content/news/details.asp?c=37141

December 21, 2011 Posted by | Canada, indigenous issues, opposition to nuclear, wastes | 1 Comment

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