The poisoned environmental legacy of France’s ”Nuclear Park”

The poisoned environmental legacy of the ‘Nuclear Park’ https://culturico.com/2022/05/07/the-poisoned-environmental-legacy-of-the-nuclear-park/ Culturico 7th May 2022, Linda Pentz Gunter, Linda Pentz Gunter is the international specialist at Beyond Nuclear and editor and contributor at Beyond Nuclear International.

France prides itself on its “Nuclear Park”, its fleet of once 58 and now 56 operational nuclear reactors that deliver 70% of the country’s electricity. However, the environmental effects of this considerable use of nuclear power – specifically from the need to mine uranium and the choice to reprocess irradiated nuclear fuel – have negatively impacted the health of the French people.

France is heavily reliant on nuclear energy. Its 56 commercial reactors dot almost every corner of the country, providing 70% of all electricity consumed. France also possesses a nuclear weapons arsenal, fueled by the nuclear power program that predated it.

The possession of nuclear weapons affords France permanent membership status in the UN Security Council — a sense of prestige France is intent on maintaining.

French president, Emmanuel Macron, has now announced that the country will build new nuclear power plants, despite the fact that its current flagship Evolutionary Power Reactor (EPR), is beset by technical mistakes, years behind schedule and billions of Euros over budget at construction sites in France, Finland and the UK. The first of two operational EPRs in China had to be shut down late last year due to vibrations that caused radioactive leakage.

Consequently, it is unpopular to question the use of nuclear power in France and oppositional voices are rarely heard. The French anti-nuclear movement — largely networked under the Réseau Sortir du nucléaire — is snubbed by the press, and its members have been arrested and even convicted of alleged crimes.
However, thanks to the pioneering work of activists, investigative journalists and independent scientists, some of the secrets buried beneath the ’Nuclear Park’, have started to be unearthed.

The damage from uranium mining

Nuclear power plants are fueled with uranium, a radioactive ore that is mined from the earth, typically in dry, desert areas far way, often by an Indigenous workforce offered little to no protection and none of the alleged benefits.
However, between 1948 and 2001, France operated its own uranium mines — more than 250 of them in 27 departments across the country. Those French mine workers, like their Native American, Australian Aboriginal and African Touareg counterparts, labored unprotected and in ignorance of the true health risks.

The mines and the factories that milled and processed the uranium, now lie abandoned, leaving a legacy of radioactive waste that is hidden beneath flowering meadows, forest paths and ornamental lakes. But these radioactive residues and rocks — known as tailings — have also dispersed beyond the old mine boundaries, transported into rivers and streams, absorbed into wild plants, scattered on roadsides, and even paved into children’s playgrounds, homes and parking lots.

There are radioactive hotspots everywhere. France may not yet have opened a high-level radioactive waste repository — still under dispute at Bure — but thanks to the contamination left behind by uranium mining, large swaths of the country are de facto nuclear waste dumps. The widespread dispersal of radioactive contamination across France has been studied extensively by the independent French radiological laboratory, Commission de Recherche et d’Information Indépendantes sur la RADioactivité, known simply as CRIIRAD. Its scientists have traveled all over the world, measuring radiation levels at such notorious nuclear accident sites as Mayak and Chernobyl in the former Soviet Union, and at Fukushima in Japan. But often, they are just as shocked and outraged at the radiation levels they measure at home, and the failure of those responsible to take effective remediation steps to protect the public.

In the 2009 investigative French television program by Pieces de Conviction — entitled Uranium, the scandal of contaminated France — CRIIRAD’s scientific director, physicist Bruno Chareyron, is seen scraping the gravely surface off a parking lot at a cross-country ski club. Under the dusty gray stones we suddenly see a gleam of yellow. It is the telltale sign of uranium and Chareyron’s Geiger counter is recording radiation levels at more than 23mSv an hour. The internationally accepted “safe” dose for the public is 1mSv a year. The public should not have access to this, he says, especially not children who are prone to pick up and pocket pebbles.

In all, there are an estimated 200-300 million tonnes of radioactive tailings dumped across France, exposing those who live, work or play nearby. The contamination comes not only from the uranium, but from its often far more radioactive decay products. And while the state-owned nuclear company Orano (formerly Areva and, before that, Cogema) insists that these sites have been “returned to nature”, it is a purely cosmetic exercise that has granted impunity to the polluter but endangered countless lives.

CRIIRAD subsequently released an urgent appeal to elected officials to take action. The laboratory recorded similar findings at numerous other abandoned uranium mine sites.

Now, with all the French uranium mines closed, the fuel for the Parc Nucléaire must be imported. It comes mainly from Niger, one of the poorest countries in the world, and predominantly from the giant French-owned uranium mine near the town of Arlit. There, CRIIRAD found that mine workers and inhabitants are routinely exposed to radioactivity in the environment as a result of uranium mining activities. A Greenpeace investigation concluded that French uranium mining activities in Niger had left behind a legacy of environmental contamination in that country, as it has in France, that would harm people for “centuries.”
The lethal legacy of uranium mining and processing that has contaminated so much of France is only the beginning of the story, however, just as uranium mining is only the beginning of the nuclear fuel chain.

Operating reactors and childhood leukemia

The electricity generation phase, on which the nuclear lobby bases its low-carbon argument to justify its continued use — while ignoring the front and back ends of the fuel chain, which have significant carbon footprints, (1) — is not without its damage to the environment either. Nuclear reactors release radiation into the environment as part of routine operation. At least 60 epidemiological studies have examined the possible health impacts of these releases, most of which found an increase in rates of leukemia among children living near operating nuclear power plants, compared to those living further away.

The most famous of these studies, conducted in Germany — Case-control study on childhood cancer in the vicinity of nuclear power plants in Germany 1980-2003 (2) — found a 60% increase in all cancers and a 120% increase in leukemias among children living within 5 km of all German nuclear power stations. This study was followed by others, largely supporting the data. But critics speculated that the amount of radioactivity in the releases was too low to have caused these epidemics.

For example, a 2008 study (3) by Laurier et al., of childhood leukemia around French reactors, concluded there was no “excess risk of leukaemia in young children living near French nuclear power plants”. However, the Laurier study was among those rebutted (4) and incorporated into a meta-analysis by Dr. Ian Fairlie and Dr. Alfred Körblein, which concluded that there were statistically significant increases in childhood leukemias near all the nuclear power plants studied and that “the matter is now beyond question, i.e., there’s a very clear association between increased child leukemias and proximity to nuclear power plants.”

The practice of averaging a month’s worth of releases into daily dose amounts ignores a sudden spike in radioactive releases, as happens when a reactor is refueling. Fairlie hypothesizes (5) that these spikes, delivering substantial radiation doses, could result in babies being born pre-leukemic due to exposure in utero, with the potential to progress to full leukemia additionally aggravated by subsequent post-natal exposure. (Nuclear power plants typically refuel every 18 months.)

Radioactive waste — the unsolved problem

At the end of nuclear power operations lies the huge and unsolved radioactive waste problem. Inevitably, the French reliance on nuclear power has generated an enormous amount of radioactive waste that must be managed and, ideally, isolated from the environment.

France is one of the few countries in the world to have chosen reprocessing as a way to try to manage irradiated reactor fuel. Reprocessing involves a chemical separation of plutonium from the uranium products in reactor fuel rods once they have ceased being used in the reactor. This operation is conducted at the giant La Hague reprocessing facility, on the Cherbourg peninsula, which began operation in 1976.

Reprocessing releases larger volumes of radioactivity — typically by a factor of several thousand— than nuclear power plants. Liquid radioactive discharges from La Hague are released through pipes into the English Channel (La Manche), while radioactive gases are emitted from chimney stacks. The liquid discharges from La Hague have been measured at 17 million times more radioactive than normal sea water. La Hague “legally discharges 33 million liters of radioactive liquid into the sea each year,” Yannick Rousselet of Greenpeace France told Deutsche Welle in a 2020 article. This has contributed, among other issues, to elevated concentrations of carcinogenic carbon-14 in sea life (6).

Concentrations of krypton-85 released at La Hague have been recorded at 90,000 times higher than natural background. La Hague is the largest single emitter of krypton-85 anywhere in the world. (7)

A November 1995 study — Incidence of leukemia in young people around La Hague nuclear waste reprocessing plant: a sensitivity analysis (8) — found elevated rates of leukemia. Yet its lead author, Jean-François Viel, was subsequently viciously attacked in attempts to discredit his findings and reputation, attacks that worsened after the publication of a second paper (9) in January 1997.

The cumulative negative health and environmental impacts of the French nuclear sector render the so-called benefits of the resulting low electricity rates a bitter delusion. For while France tries, wrongly, to attribute Germany’s higher electricity rates to that country’s rejection of nuclear power, typical German households use less electricity and actually pay lower monthly electric bills than French ones. Meanwhile, the French rely exclusively on electricity for heat in winter. Unable to meet this demand, France imports coal-fired electricity from Germany, perpetuating an industry that is fatal for the climate. At the same time, renewable energy development in France has been stifled by the decades-long prioritization of nuclear power.

However, a culture of denial in the French nuclear sector is nothing new. In 1986, when the Chernobyl nuclear reactor exploded and melted down in the Ukraine, the French government assured its people that the radioactive plume would not reach France. Unlike in other European countries, the French continued to eat local produce and allowed their children to play outside. This lie of immunity, quickly exposed, was attributed to “fear of jeopardizing the country’s nuclear program and of hurting sales of its agricultural products.”

It was that deception in 1986 that led to the creation of the CRIIRAD laboratory in the first place, as its scientists began to map the hotspots in France where fallout from Chernobyl had deposited high levels of radioactivity.
The insistence on expanding rather than phasing out nuclear power has also cost France progress in its carbon reduction goals. As Euractiv reported in August 2021, “France lagging behind in renewables can be explained in part by the fact that close to 70% of its electricity production is based on nuclear power.”

Many French reactors have been operating since the 1970s and are now well past their expected lifespans. With aging comes degradation of key safety parts and heightened risk of accident. In late December 2021 and in early January 2022, France saw a series of unanticipated reactor shutdowns due to safety issues, causing power shortages during a winter freeze and plunging French nuclear output to its lowest in 30 years. By early May, half of its entire reactor fleet was shut down due to technical problems or scheduled maintenance outages. The health and wellbeing of the French population would be better served both by cleanup of — and reparation for — the existing radioactive contamination so widespread in the country, and by a serious shift away from the continued use of nuclear power and toward true climate solutions such as renewable energy and energy efficiency measures.

May 9, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | environment, France | 2 Comments

Ukraine seeks Russia’s total defeat – top officials

Kiev insists the only document it will sign with Moscow is Russia’s “capitulation”, https://www.rt.com/russia/554887-ukraine-treaty-russia-capitulation/ 3 May 22,

Ukraine’s top security official has said that, instead of a peace treaty, Kiev is only prepared to sign a document with Moscow that would finalize Russia’s defeat. The announcement comes as the conflict between the two countries continues to rage.

During an TV interview on Monday, Alexey Danilov, the head of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council (NSDC), was asked about international security assurances for Kiev and possible peace with Russia.

Danilov replied: “With Russia we can only sign an act of its capitulation. The sooner they do it, the better it will be for their country.”

The official noted earlier in the interview that President Volodymyr Zelensky’s office handles the talks and not the NSDC. “We have our own views. The president knows my stance on the issue,” he said. He added that he believes Zelensky will not violate Ukraine’s constitution, which guarantees the country’s territorial integrity and aspirations to join NATO.

Later on Monday, Zelensky’s adviser Alexey Arestovich brought up Danilov’s remarks during a chat with activist and YouTuber Mark Feygin. “The statement is very simple: there will be no peace treaty with Russia. There will only be the capitulation of the Russian Federation,” Arestovich said.

Asked whether Danilov had been authorized to make such statements, Arestovich said: “He doesn’t just make statements like that. He’s an official of the highest rank. It’s a completely new reality.”

Moscow wants Ukraine to renounce its bid to join NATO, as well as recognize Crimea as part of Russia, and the independence of the Donbass republics. Moscow also seeks the “demilitarization” and “denazification” of Ukraine.

Peace negotiations stalled after a meeting in Istanbul, Turkey, in late March. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov accused Kiev on Sunday of frequently changing positions and “sabotaging” the talks.

Russia attacked neighboring Ukraine in late February, following Kiev’s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements, first signed in 2014, and Moscow’s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German and French brokered protocol was designed to give the breakaway regions special status within the Ukrainian state.

Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked and has denied claims it was planning to retake the two republics by force.

May 7, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Propaganda During Times of War

The Postil Magazine, May 1, 2022 Anne Morelli

This article, by Anne Morelli, is here translated for the first time complete. It is based on her monograph, Principes élémentaires de propagande de guerre (utilisables en cas de guerre froide, chaude ou tiède)—The Basic Principles of War Propaganda (For Use in Case of War, cold, hot, or warm), which was first published in 2001 and then revised and republished in 2010 to include the war in Afghanistan and Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize speech.

Morelli’s ten principles, or “commandments” are often accredited to Lord Arthur Ponsonby. Rather, Morelli summarized Ponsonby’s work, Falsehood in War-Time to formulate them.

The current Russian-Ukrainian conflict is just the latest iteration of the immense reach of war propaganda to fashion consent, in the form of ready sacrifice of blood and treasure.

…………………. Ponsonby’s Ten Commandments

The principles identified by Ponsonby can be easily stated as ten “commandments.” I will state them here, and we will see for each of them to what extent they have been applied by NATO’s propaganda services.

We do not want war
The other side is solely responsible for the war
The enemy has the face of the devil (or in the order of “ugly”)
The real aims of the war must be masked under noble causes
The enemy knowingly commits atrocities. If we commit blunders, they are unintentional
We suffer very few losses. The enemy’s losses are enormous
Our cause is sacred
Artists and intellectuals support our cause
The enemy uses illegal weapons
Those who question our propaganda are traitors

1. We Do Not Want War

Arthur Ponsonby had early noticed that the statesmen of all countries, before declaring war or at the very moment of this declaration, always solemnly assured as a preliminary that they did not want war. ………….

2. The Other Side is Solely Responsible for the War

Ponsonby noted this paradox of the First World War, which can also be found in many previous wars: each side claimed to have been forced to declare war to prevent the other from setting the planet on fire. Each government would loudly declare the aporia that sometimes war is necessary to end wars………..

,………….. in the case of this second principle (“it is the other who wanted the war”), it is obvious that it has been applied many times during the NATO war against Yugoslavia……………………..

…. The Franco-Belgian weekly Le Vif-Express ran this headline: “The dictator of Belgrade has a crushing responsibility in the misfortunes of the Serbian and Albanian people.” The insistence on the person of the leader of the enemy camp is not a coincidence. Ponsonby’s third principle insists on the need to personify the enemy in the person of its leader.

3. The Enemy has the Face of the Devil

It is not possible to hate a whole people globally. It is therefore effective to concentrate this hatred of the enemy on the opposing leader. The enemy thus has a face, and this face is obviously odious…………..

……….. as far as possible, it is necessary to demonize this enemy leader, to present him as a madman, a barbarian, an infernal criminal, a butcher, a disturber of peace, an enemy of humanity, a monster. ………….

Since the Second World War, Hitler has been considered such a paradigm of evil, that any enemy leader must be compared to him. ……………………………..

4. The Real Aims of the War must be Masked under Noble Causes

Ponsonby had noted for the 1914-1918 war that one never spoke, in the official texts of belligerents, of the economic or geopolitical objectives of the conflict. Not a word was said officially about the colonial aspirations, for example, that Great Britain expected and which would be fulfilled by an Allied victory. Officially, on the Anglo-French side, the goals of the First World War were summarized in three points:

to crush militarism
to defend small nations
to prepare the world for democracy

……………………………. One might innocently ask what connection there can be between the defense of oppressed minorities and the free movement of capital, but the first type of discourse obviously conceals less avowed economic goals. Thus, 12 large American companies, including Ford Motor, General Motors and Honeywell, sponsored the 50th anniversary summit of NATO in Washington, in the spring of 1999.

……….. NATO spokesman Jamie Shea announced that the cost of the military operation against Yugoslavia would be more than offset by the longer-term benefits that the markets could realize.

…………. This is also one of the basic principles of war propaganda: the war must be presented as a conflict between civilization and barbarism. To do this, it is necessary to persuade the public that the enemy systematically and voluntarily commits atrocities, while our side can only commit involuntary blunders..

5. The Enemy Knowingly Commits Atrocities. If We Commit Blunders, They are Unintentional

Stories of atrocities committed by the enemy are an essential part of war propaganda. This is not to say, of course, that atrocities do not occur during wars. On the contrary, murder, armed robbery, arson, looting and rape seem to be commonplace in all circumstances of war and the practice of all armies, from those of antiquity to the wars of the 20th century. What is specific to war propaganda, however, is to make people believe that only the enemy is accustomed to these acts, while our own army is at the service of the population, even the enemy, and is loved by them.

6. We Suffer very few Losses. The Enemy’s Losses are Enormous

During the Battle of Britain in 1940, the British greatly “overestimated” the number of German planes shot down by British fighter and the D.C.A………………………………………………..

7. Our Cause is Sacred

God’s support for a cause is always an important asset, and for as long as religions have existed, we have happily killed each other in the name of God. War propaganda must obviously make public opinion believe that “God is on our side;………………………………………..

8. Artists and Intellectuals Support our Cause

During the First World War, with a few rare exceptions, intellectuals massively supported their own side.

9. The Enemy uses Illegal Weapons

There is nothing like affirming the deceitfulness of the enemy in war propaganda by assuring that he fights with “immoral” and condemnable weapons………………………………………

During NATO’s war against Yugoslavia, this old principle of war propaganda, noted by Ponsonby, was reused. Indeed, when the Yugoslavs revealed in June 1999 the use by NATO of depleted uranium weapons, with immeasurable human and ecological consequences, it was not necessary to wait long for the response. By August 1999, the Western media claimed that the Yugoslavs had used chemical weapons in Kosovo, thereby transgressing the rules of “civilized” war.

10. Those who Question our Propaganda are Traitors

Ponsonby’s last principle is that those who do not participate in the official propaganda should be ostracized and suspected of intelligence with the enemy.

Conclusion

As we can see from these examples, the ten “commandments” of war propaganda described by Ponsonby have lost none of their relevance in almost a century. Have they been applied intuitively by NATO propaganda officers or by following the grid that we ourselves have followed? It is always risky to think that propaganda is built by systematically staging it, according to a meticulous plan; and one would rather believe that the possibility of improvement has criss-crossed the old Ponsonby principles……………. Anne Morelli is a Belgian historian at the Université Libre de Bruxelles (ULB). https://www.thepostil.com/propaganda-during-times-of-war

May 7, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | EUROPE, media, spinbuster | 1 Comment

UK PM scuttled Kiev-Moscow peace talks – Ukrainian media

https://www.sott.net/article/467527-UK-PM-scuttled-Kiev-Moscow-peace-talks-Ukrainian-media RT, Thu, 05 May 2022 ,

UK PM Boris Johnson • Ukraine War Last month’s visit by British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was key in persuading Kiev to break off peace negotiations with Moscow, the newspaper Ukrayinska Pravda (UP) reported on Thursday, citing officials close to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. The West had originally advised Zelensky to flee because Russia would win in 72 hours, but was now backing him fully, they claimed.

According to the “behind-the-scenes look” at the ongoing crisis published in the Kiev-based outlet, Ukraine’s western backers were convinced that the Russian military would seize Kiev within three days and offered Zelensky to govern from exile in London or Warsaw.

When this failed to happen, and Russia offered negotiations, Zelensky sent a delegation with the goal of creating the impression he was willing to make a deal. According to UP, the points of agreement made public by Russian envoy Vladimir Medinsky after the March 29 talks in Istanbul, Turkey “are in fact true.”

Then Russian troops withdrew from northern Ukraine and British PM Boris Johnson arrived in Kiev, “almost without warning” on April 9.Johnson brought “two simple messages” with him, according to UP.The first was that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin was “a war criminal, who should be prosecuted and not negotiated with.” The second was that even if Ukraine was ready to sign some kind of agreement with Russia, the West was not.

Johnson’s message was understood as a signal that the collective West “now felt that Putin was not really as omnipotent as they had imagined,” according to Ukrainian officials quoted by UP. Between what they described as Ukrainian military victories and alleged Russian atrocities in “Bucha, Borodyanka and Mariupol,” the West stopped being “isolationist” and pledged to help Ukraine with all sorts of heavy weapons. Kiev officials are now publicly planning for a “total defeat” and “capitulation” of Russia. According to UP:

“The moral and values gap between Putin and the world is so great that even the Kremlin will not have a negotiating table long enough to bridge it.”

Moscow has said its military operation in Ukraine is proceeding as planned, with the “second phase” focusing on destroying or compelling the surrender of Ukrainian forces that have been shelling the Donbass for most of the past decade. The Russian military is also using long-range missiles to destroy railway junctions used to bring NATO weapons into Ukraine, as well as warehouses where they are being stored.

Russia attacked the neighboring state in late February, following Ukraine’s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements, first signed in 2014, and Moscow’s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German and French brokered Minsk Protocol was designed to give the breakaway regions special status within the Ukrainian state.

The Kremlin has since demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join the US-led NATO military bloc. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked and has denied claims it was planning to retake the two republics by force.

May 7, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics international, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Russia’s Rosatom unit seeks compensation, as Finland tears up nuclear power plant contract

Rosatom unit seeks compensation from Finnish group on ditching nuclear power plant contract. May 6 (Reuters) – The Finnish unit of Russia’s state-owned Rosatom said on Friday it will demand compensation from Finnish consortium Fennovoima for “unlawful termination” of contract for the delivery of a planned nuclear power plant in Finland.

Earlier in the week, Fennovoima announced it had scrapped the contract due to “significant delays and inability to deliver the project” by Rosatom’s Finnish subsidiary RAOS Project. The war in Ukraine has worsened risks for the project. ……………….

The cost of the planned facility was initially set at 7.5 billion euros ($7.91 billion). The chairman of Fennovoima’s board Esa Harmala said earlier that the consortium had already spent 600-700 million euros on the facility.https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/rosatoms-unit-seeks-compensation-finlands-fennovoima-2022-05-06/

May 7, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Finland, Legal | Leave a comment

Boris Johnson’s Bold Nuclear Bet Has Echoes ofThatcher Failure.

Britain is poised to usher in another nuclear renaissance, except this
time the government says it will actually happen. A lot has changed since
previous promises — the push to zero out emissions, the high political
stakes to ensure energy security and a different financing model mean now
is the time to build nuclear power stations, energy minister Greg Hands
said.

“We want the U.K. nuclear industry in a fantastic renaissance, to
be able to avail itself of a variety of developers and financiers,” Hands
said in an interview Tuesday in his office in Westminster. “The Russian
invasion of Ukraine has put a premium on energy security, and one of the
huge advantages of nuclear is that it is, very largely, homegrown.”

ED. note – Whaa-aat? Home grown? – they have to import all the nuclear fuel

It’s not the first time the U.K. has tried to revive its nuclear
industry: efforts have been underway since the 1980s under different
governments. But just one plant is being built — Hinkley Point C.

Conservative Prime Minister Boris Johnson committed to building as many as
eight nuclear plants by 2050 in the government’s energy-security strategy
released last month. He tweeted Monday after visiting the plant in
Hartlepool that “instead of a new one every decade, we’re going to
build one every year.”

Achieving that will require a significant
acceleration in the pace of development, and only Electricite de France SA
has firm plans for a large-scale facility at Sizewell. “The U.K.
government has a lot of work to do to deliver on this target,”
BloombergNEF said in an April report.

Hands said the government is talking
with Westinghouse Electric Co., Toshiba Corp., state-owned Korea Electric
Power Corp. and EDF, among others, about building new plants. The intention
is to get them approved this decade to meet the 2050 target.

The biggest hurdle is financing: nuclear plants cost about 20 billion pounds ($25
billion) and compete for investor capital with renewables, which provide
returns much quicker. Boris Johnson’s Bold Nuclear Bet Has Echoes of
Thatcher Failure.

An overhaul of the financing mechanism for atomic plants
was meant to attract more funds. The regulated asset base, or RAB, model is
supposed to encourage private investors and dilute the construction risk
shouldered by the developer and taxpayers. “Traditionally, the problem
with nuclear has always been that you put a lot of money in, and you
don’t get any return for at least 10 years,” Hands said. “In the RAB
model, you allow the investor to get a return from really the point at
which construction starts rather than the point at which electricity is
connected.”

Hands and the department of business, energy and industrial
strategy is working with investment minister Gerry Grimstone and the
department for international trade to attract investors. The financing
model has been “well-received,” Hands said.

The government hasn’t
ruled out taking a stake in the Sizewell project, Hands said. While
building up a large pipeline of nuclear projects may help the U.K.’s
long-term security of supply, it does nothing to alleviate the upward
pressure on energy prices currently affecting ordinary Britons.

Bloomberg 4th May 2022 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-05-04/u-k-says-nuclear-renaissance-will-be-different-this-time-around

May 7, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, UK | 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 Christina Macpherson | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

What is REALLY driving Britain’s seemingly illogical push for small nuclear reactors and nuclear megaprojects?

Beyond and beneath megaprojects: exploring submerged drivers of nuclear infrastructures, Taylor and francis Online, Phil Johnstone & Andy Stirling, Received 15 Mar 2021, Accepted 19 Oct 2021, Published online: 28 Apr 2022

Bernard Levy of EDF said:

”we must continue to build nuclear power plants in France and in Europe – if I had to use one image to describe our situation, it would be that of a cyclist who, in order not to fall, must not stop pedalling.”

Ed. note. Sadly, I have mutilated this remarkable story – chopping so much out of it. The original is written at times in dense language, and with some sections that seem very technical.

I just feared that people might miss the huge significance of this story – the way that the nuclear weapons industry, in particular, nuclear submarines, is cunningly being developed and maintained -hidden through the confidence trick of the unnecessary ”commercial” nuclear power industry.

Abstract

Nuclear power has long offered an iconic context for addressing risk and controversy surrounding megaprojects – including trends towards cost overruns, management failures, governance challenges, and accountability breaches. Less attention has focused on reasons why countries continue new nuclear construction despite these well-documented problems.

Whilst other analysis tends to frame associated issues in terms of energy provision, this paper will explore how civil nuclear infrastructures subsist within wider ‘infrastructure ecologies’ – encompassing ostensibly discrete megaprojects across both civil and military nuclear sectors. Attending closely to the UK case, we show how understandings of megaprojects can move beyond bounded sectoral and time horizons to include infrastructure patterns and rhythms that transcend the usual academic and policy silos.

By illuminating strong military-related drivers modulating civil nuclear ‘infrastructure rhythms’ in the UK, key issues arise concerning bounded notions of a ‘megaproject’ in this context – for instance in how costs are calculated around what seems a far more deeply and broadly integrated ‘nuclear complex’. Major undeclared interdependencies between civilian and military nuclear activities raise significant implications for policymaking and wider democracy.

1. Introduction: nuclear megaprojects in a changing energy system

The global nuclear power industry is facing unprecedented challenges. Despite the clamour since the early 2000s, the long-promised UK and US ‘nuclear renaissance’ has not materialised in these or any other countries (Milne 2011). In the USA, only one new nuclear power station is being constructed – well behind schedule and over budget (Mycle 2020). At the time of writing, European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) construction faces delays of over ten years in Finland and France (Vakarelska 2020) – with significant delays also in the UK (World Nuclear News 2021). Between 2010-2020, global nuclear costs increased by 23% (Dunai and De Clercq 2019). Several major nuclear suppliers went bankrupt; or decided not to invest in the technology on grounds that it is not ‘economically rational’ (BBC News 2019).

why it is that nuclear enthusiasms remain so unabated in a few countries?…………………… In this paper we seek to build an understanding of the dynamics that give momentum to the UK’s persistent enthusiasm for nuclear technology.

…………………………… What emerges in practice from this unusual spanning of attention across infrastructure silos, are some novel empirical findings concerning previously under-researched interdependencies between nuclear energy and submarine-building megaprojects……………………. In short, without a wider national ‘nuclear industrial base’ for maintaining and renewal of large scale nuclear energy infrastructures, it becomes effectively impossible to sustain national capacities to build and operate the nuclear-propelled submarines that lie at the heart of contemporary strategic military nuclear capabilities (Stirling and Johnstone 2018)……………… A clear picture emerges that something beyond energy policy commitments is driving UK nuclear enthusiasm.

………………………………This picture chimes with explicit high-level policy statements in France and the USA, where senior figures have recently begun to acknowledge very directly, how hitherto notionally separate civil and military sectors actually amount to a single complex…………………………………………..

2. Methods

……………………………….. Unlike other nuclear weapons states, UK military nuclear capabilities are entirely dependent on nuclear powered submarines (Ritchie 2012). The UK thus presents an ideal case for interrogating possible cross-sectoral interdependencies between these respectively largest forms of megaproject in the civil and military sectors. ………………. at its core is the practical question: why is a country with such an internationally poor history of nuclear performance and such abundant alternatives, remaining so persistently committed to new nuclear construction?

2. Methods

……………………………… it is worth considering the ……… evidently deep and pervasive strategy of deliberate concealment on the part of the central actor in these policy dynamics: the UK Government………………….

3. Nuclear power in the UK: a history of disappointment

……………………………. The long history of internationally poor performance by the British nuclear industry (Birmingham Policy Comission 2012), is clear. …………………………… The British nuclear industry hit an especially low point at the turn of the 21st century, with the bankruptcy of British Energy and its subsequent bailing out by the tax payer in 2002 (Taylor 2016)…………………………. the UK’s ‘nuclear renaissance’ is performing arguably even worse than the 1979 programme………….. The government’s aim to build several new reactors ‘significantly before 2025’ is simply not happening. This time there is no ‘public inquiry’ nor ‘public opposition’ to blame.

……………….the UK Government – as signalled by the recent Energy White Paper (HM Government 2020) – evidently remains desperate to construct new nuclear plant. In the absence of clear economic, technological, resource or policy rationales, there are big questions over what is driving this deep infrastructural entrenchment? Why does the UK remain so wedded to nuclear megaprojects?

4. Beyond energy megaprojects: civil-military nuclear interdependencies

4.1. Beyond energy policy: the UK ‘nuclear defence enterprise’

………………………………. Relevant here, is that the UK’s leading independent scrutiny body, the National Audit Office (NAO) emphasised in a highly critical report on the Hinkley C project, that factors beyond the ‘energy trilemma’ were evidently influencing these decisions…………………….. With the Hinkley C deal seeing consumers paying higher energy bills for 35 years and transferring tens of billions of pounds from consumers to nuclear supply chains, the consumer rights organisation Citizens Advice Bureau likewise raised major questions over why the nuclear path is pursued at all (Hall 2017). The UK Government has yet to respond to these recommendations………….. Sustaining extremely expensive military nuclear capabilities is one of the most cherished ambitions of successive British Governments.

Arguably itself comprising ballistic missile submarine, attack submarine and nuclear warhead renewal ‘megaprojects’, current renewal of UK nuclear military infrastructures may confidently be recognised as this nation’s largest megaproject. ………………………… The delays, mismanagement and cost overruns that are common in these submarine-building megaprojects are so severe as to jeopardise the entire national defence budget (Bond and Pfiefer 2019)…………………………………..

4.2. Interlinked civil and military nuclear pressures

………………………………. this section will show that a crucial factor in driving these otherwise inexplicably persistent attachments are military pressures to sustain overlapping infrastructures, supply chains, skills, expertise and industrial capabilities around nuclear submarine propulsion.

………………………….. detailed reports by the RAND Corporation highlighted the problem of sustaining the national ‘submarine industrial base’ at a time of civil nuclear contraction.

………………………… Subsequent military policy documentation is replete with confirmations that civil nuclear power and naval nuclear propulsion are inseparably entangled ………… With declared submarine programme costs already on the edge of being insupportable, it was crucial to associated interests, that the bulk of this wider expense be covered by parallel commitment to new civil nuclear power.

With this civil nuclear megaproject more fundable in anticipation of decades of electricity revenues, the trickle-down to shared supply chains would allow associated costs to stay outside the defence budget, off the public books and entirely invisible to critical scrutiny.

……………………………… Permanent Secretary of the MoD confirmed the aim of ensuring that civil nuclear would benefit the nuclear submarine industry: ………….the Nuclear Industry Council (NIC), placed emphasis on ‘…increasing the opportunities for transferability between civil and defence industries’ (Nuclear Industry Council 2017, 37) with ‘greater alignment of the civil and defence sectors with increased proactive two-way transfer of people and knowledge’

………….. maintaining and renewing UK military nuclear capabilities are underwritten by support for an otherwise untenable civil nuclear programme. This is directly conceded by the submarine nuclear reactor manufacturer, Rolls Royce who state clearly that support for notionally civil Small Modular Reactors will ‘…relieve the Ministry of Defence of the burden of developing and retaining skills and capability.

………….. Spending on new civil nuclear projects (at costs much higher than competing zero carbon options) channels funds into a combined civil/military nuclear supply chain that constitutes a de facto hidden subsidy for sustaining the UK’s submarine industrial base.

5. From nuclear megaprojects to a nuclear infrastructure complex

5.1. The nuclear infrastructure complex beyond the UK

…………….. Around the world, it is the leading military powers who are generally and proportionally most committed to large scale new nuclear build. ……………..

The state-owned Russian company Rosatom is responsible for 76% of nuclear reactor exports (Astrasheuskaya 2021). So it is significant that this organisation openly declares that ‘[r]eliable provision of Russia’s defense capability is the main priority of the nuclear industry’ (Rosatom 2017). Another nuclear weapons state that is also vigorously pursuing a nuclear reactor export agenda, China, makes no attempt to conceal that leading firms involved are centrally positioned in the nations nuclear weapons programme (Hayunga 2020).

……………………. under-documented military motivations are responsible for more of the momentum in favour of civil nuclear power than is openly acknowledged.

……………….. ‘without civilian nuclear, no military nuclear, without military nuclear, no civilian nuclear’ (French President Macron 2020).

,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, Bernard Levy of EDF said:

The same dynamics are even more clear in the USA. Here multiple high-level reports highlight that industrial capabilities necessary for a ‘nuclear navy’ are ‘tied to the fate of the commercial nuclear industryThe same dynamics are even more clear in the USA. Here multiple high-level reports highlight that industrial capabilities necessary for a ‘nuclear navy’ are ‘tied to the fate of the commercial nuclear industry……………………………..

5.2. The ‘drumbeats’ of the ‘nuclear infrastructure complex’

……………………………………… this distinctive terminology of the ‘drumbeat’ …. oriiginated in this country ……….– around the intractable industrial challenges associated with constructing nuclear-powered submarines…………….. it seems to signal a policy intimacy that is otherwise effectively concealed.

6. Discussion and conclusion

…………………………………… our findings – that nuclear military and energy policies (and so their associated megaprojects) are intimately entangled………………..

Interdependencies across civil and military nuclear megaprojects

Using extensive evidence from the UK, as well as France and the USA, we have highlighted tight industrial interdependencies between civil nuclear activities and political commitments and industrial capacities in the ostensibly disparate field of nuclear submarine propulsion……….

Economic and policy evaluation of megaprojects

……………. Hinkley Point C in particular has been identified as the most expensive power station on Earth, with leading insurers describing it as a ‘£25 billion waste of money’ (Cockburn 2021). The National Audit Office has pointed out that the subsidy from consumers to the nuclear industry over the next few decades will amount to tens of billions of pounds……………………. nowhere either in UK energy or defence policy debates – let alone in wider political discourse – is there any focus whatsoever on the dynamic at the centre of these manifestly serious problems. ……… this absence of reasoned discussion constitutes a quite shocking failing in official processes, media institutions and academic disciplines alike.

Climate efficacy, policy rigour and democratic accountability

With the slow pace and high cost of power reactors undermining the stated climate policy rationale, it is clear that UK civil nuclear commitments are actually driven to a large extent by military nuclear interests that are almost entirely concealed in energy policy. ………………… The national industrial base is being steered away from the benefits of alternative (more export-viable and jobs-intensive) energy industries. Military-driven national lock-in to nuclear power also means excessive economic burdens are falling on taxpayers and – more regressively – on electricity consumers………. That such large scale political irreversibilities are unfolding with so little attention raises grave queries about the health of British democracy in the widest sense…………………… https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/24724718.2021.2012351

May 5, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, UK | 1 Comment

Ireland condemns Russian TV for showing simulated nuclear attack off Irish coast

A Russian state TV report that simulated a nuclear attack launched off the
coast of County Donegal has caused consternation in Ireland. Dmitry
Kiselyov, a pro-Kremlin presenter on Channel One known as “Vladimir
Putin’s mouthpiece”, on Monday showed a video of an underwater missile
wreaking apocalypse on Ireland and the UK. Russia could “plunge Britain
into the depths of the sea” using an unmanned underwater vehicle called
Poseidon, he said. “The explosion of this thermonuclear torpedo by
Britain’s coastline will cause a gigantic tsunami wave up to 500 metres
high. Such a barrage alone also carries extreme doses of radiation. Having
passed over the British Isles, it will turn what might be left of them into
a radioactive desert.”

Guardian 3rd May 2022

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/may/03/ireland-condemns-russian-tv-for-nuclear-attack-simulation

May 5, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | media, Russia | Leave a comment

Chernobyl radiation is not stable after Russian invasion

Russian troop activity at the Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant since February
has led to an elevated risk of an accident or harmful radiation exposure.
Ukraine regained control of the site near Pripyat in March, but it still
presents a situation that is “not stable,” according to the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the United Nations’ atomic
watchdog.

Speaking at an event last month marking the 36th anniversary of
the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, IAEA Director-General Rafael Mariano Grossi
said the Russian occupation presented an abnormal situation for workers,
plus heightened radiation levels, which are still higher than normal,
although not at a level that is dangerous for one-time exposure; the
radiation level is concerning for continuous exposure, though.

Popular Mechanics 3rd May 2022

May 5, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | environment, Ukraine | Leave a comment

UN nuclear watchdog says situation at Russian-occupied Ukrainian nuclear plant is ‘unsustainable’

May 3, 2022 by Charles Digges, The United Nations nuclear watchdog has warned that Russian troops are
putting “unbelievable pressure” on workers at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear
power plant – which is both the largest in Ukraine and Europe as a whole
– saying the situation is “unsustainable.” Russian forces seized the
plant during a dramatic assault on March 4, and they have since then forced
Ukrainian plant operators to manage the site under extreme conditions. The
UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency has also reported that eight
specialists from Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation, are also
onsite.

https://bellona.org/news/nuclear-issues/2022-05-un-nuclear-watchdog-says-situation-at-russian-occupied-ukrainian-nuclear-plant-is-unsustainable

May 5, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Ukraine’s nuclear power plants caught in the Crossfire of War With Russia

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has triggered fears of another nuclear power disaster in the region, 36 years after the world’s largest nuclear accident. The Revelator, May 2, 2022 – by Jordan Gass-Poore’

It took less than a minute after an unexpected power surge for one of the nuclear reactors at Chornobyl (Chernobyl in the Russian spelling) to explode on April 26, 1986, ripping the roof off and spewing dangerous chemicals into the air.

The event, and emergency cleanup that followed, left 30 workers dead, thousands exposed to cancer-causing nuclear material, and a legacy of radiation. Now, 36 years later and with war raging, Ukraine is desperate to prevent another nuclear disaster.

Nuclear reactors generate more than half of the country’s power. Ukraine is the first country with such a large and established nuclear energy program to experience war, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The country’s 15 nuclear reactors, housed in four power plants, have layers of safeguards to prevent core meltdowns like the one that happened in 1986, when Chornobyl was part of the Soviet Union. But wartime is far from normal conditions, and experts warn that Russian military action poses numerous threats to these facilities.

Andrey Ozharovsky, a Russian engineer turned anti-nuclear activist, said Ukraine’s nuclear infrastructure is “quite vulnerable” to the chaos surrounding military attacks.

Chornobyl, Again

Those attacks have already begun.

The Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant and the 20-mile exclusion zone around it, set up to limit further spread of radioactive material following the 1986 disaster, were captured by Russian forces on Feb. 24. It was in their control until they withdrew from the site on March 31.

Although Chornobyl is not an active nuclear power plant, the massive cap covering the reactor that exploded decades ago still needs to be maintained to prevent further radiation leakage.

Sensors put in place by the Ukrainian Ecocentre in case of an accident reported a spike in radiation levels shortly after the capture, likely due to Russian military vehicles stirring up radiation in the environment.

The IAEA said the rise wasn’t enough to pose a public health hazard.

Ozharovsky, who was one of the first to raise an alarm about the recent spike at Chornobyl, said he’s concerned that radioactive dust from the site could spread across the continent.

“The most dangerous thing is that they can bring radioactive particles in their hair, in their clothes and their boots,” he says………………………

Nuclear Plant Captured

Chornobyl isn’t the only concern. Ukraine’s active nuclear-power facilities are also at risk.

On March 4, Russian forces captured Europe’s largest active nuclear-power plant, Zaporizhzhia, located in southeastern Ukraine. During intense fighting one of the site’s buildings caught fire, but didn’t harm the plant’s six reactors, and no radiation was released.

Ukrainian technicians continue to monitor Zaporizhzhia, but the country’s regulators have claimed that Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear power company, has engineers at the plant who are giving orders to staff. Further, Ukraine reports that plant management actions require approval from the Russian commander, according to the IAEA.

“Who is now in charge of the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant?” asks Ozharovsky. “The Russian army is around, but armies aren’t nuclear engineers.”

Rosatom released a statement on March 12 and denied that they’re managing the operation of Zaporizhzhia. They characterized their staff’s presence at the plant as “consultative assistance” that takes place “on a regular basis.”

Grossi expressed “deep concern” about the situation in a statement last month.

Further Threats

Since then, there’s been more reason for alarm.

On April 16, three missiles flew over the South Ukrainian nuclear power plant, Yuzhnoukrainsk, according to Energoatom, Ukraine’s state-run nuclear power company.

Then on April 26 Energoatom reported that two cruise missiles flew over the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant.

The flight of missiles at low altitudes directly above the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant site, where 7 nuclear facilities with a huge amount of nuclear material are located, poses huge risks,” says Petro Kotin, Energoatom’s acting president, in a statement released on the company’s Telegram channel. “After all, missiles can hit one or more nuclear facilities, and this threatens a nuclear and radiation catastrophe around the world.”

The day before, Energoatom reported that Russia fired missiles over the cooling pond of the Khmelnytskyi Nuclear Power Plant in northwest Ukraine

Kosharna wrote in an email that if a missile would’ve hit one of the plants the consequences wwould have been “catastrophic” for the world.

Typically nuclear plants use back-up generators to maintain power with a grid disruption and keep the cooling systems functioning normally. In wartime fuel shortages are common, and this risks the stability of the generators. Ukraine’s current shortage is only getting worse, according to the Gas Transmission Operator of Ukraine, a gas pipeline operator

If the grid goes down and the generators are out of fuel and the cooling systems fail, there’s a last resort to prevent radiation from spreading. Containment structures around the reactors are designed to block any release of radiation, but they’re also vulnerable to missile attacks.

Reactor failure isn’t the only significant risk to the operation.

Staff operating facilities under extreme stress also poses a problem, Ozharovsky says, because any mistake they make on the job could be calamitous..

There are also other onsite dangers. Spent nuclear fuel storage pools that are a part of the waste-disposal system contain radioactive material. If they’re damaged the liquid could be released from containment, causing a massive spread of radiation. Japanese scientists considered this to be the “worst-case scenario” of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, which had a series of meltdowns after a tsunami struck the plant in 2011.

Ozharovsky said he doesn’t believe the Russian military would deliberately sabotage one of Ukraine’s nuclear power plants because it would threaten their interests. But he added that even the possibility that the nuclear power plants could be harmed accidentally should trigger worldwide alarm.

“For me it’s scary,” he says. “All the other nuclear power plants, like Khmelnytskyi, like Rivne, like South Ukraine (Yuzhnoukrainsk); they can be damaged during this war. And the international community needs to take care of that.”

Any attack on a nuclear plant is a breach of international humanitarian law. The Geneva Convention’s Article 56 considers attacking a nuclear power plant a war crime.

“I hope that many other countries who still have nuclear energy on their territory will rethink physical safety, military safety,” Ozharovsky says. “That’s a challenge no one country can solve.” https://therevelator.org/ukraine-war-nuclear-power/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=ukraine-war-nuclear-power

May 3, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | safety, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Ask me about … the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster and its lingering effects

PATRICIA SABATINI, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, psabatini@post-gazette.com 2 May 22,

Olga Klimova-Magnotta is a lecturer and director of the Russian program at the University of Pittsburgh who teaches a humanities course on the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster.

A native of Belarus, she was 7 years old when a massive explosion at the No. 4 reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in northern Ukraine (then part of the Soviet Union) resulted in a fire and the uncontrolled release of radioactive contamination. Ms. Klimova — who moved to the U.S. in her early 20s ,was living in the Belarus capital of Minsk at the time of the accident, about 200 miles north of the explosion — or about the distance from Pittsburgh to Harrisburg.

She believes her heart problems stem from radiation exposure. “Many children born or growing up during this time had heart diseases,” she said.

“We all had different health issues. … The doctors connected it to the radiation.”

Talk about the course you teach on Chernobyl. What is the goal?

2021 marked the 35th anniversary of Chernobyl. That’s when I decided to develop the course and draw attention to the Chernobyl tragedy. I wanted students to be aware of the disaster and specifically about its continued effects on the ecosystem and the social, economic, political and cultural lives of people in the area.

Many in the United States didn’t know much about the explosion of the Chernobyl plant before the popular 2019 HBO miniseries [“Chernobyl”]. At least half of my students registered because they watched the miniseries and wanted to learn more.

What stands out in your mind about the catastrophe?

I think it’s the fact that none of us who were living in this area knew the real impact of the disaster. Because radiation is invisible … many of us didn’t know. We were not informed by the government about the negative effects of radiation. There was a lack of information.

When I was growing up after 1986 and in the early 1990s, the disaster affected a lot of people in terms of health. A lot of people started to suffer from [cancer and other health issues]. The numbers of these diseases grew dramatically. Doctors would explain it was because you were a child of Chernobyl.

What are some things about the Chernobyl disaster that you think people would be surprised to know?

I think people would be surprised that the government refused to acknowledge that radiation had a big impact on people’s health.

A lot of volunteers went to Ukraine to do cleanup. It was the Soviet Union. A lot of people in Belarus [also formerly part of the Soviet Union] and Russia and also Ukrainians were sent there. People didn’t get disability or special help with their health issues.

People living in the area were severely affected. Many had long battles with the government trying to get support and get treatment at the hospital. The government denied that the health issues people were having were directly connected to the nuclear disaster.

………….. The radiation hasn’t disappeared. It has a constant effect on people’s health……………………………….. https://www.post-gazette.com/business/powersource/2022/05/02/1986-chernobyl-nuclear-disaster-ukraine-olga-kilmova-magnotta-university-of-pittsburgh/stories/202205010040.

May 3, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | health, Ukraine | Leave a comment

UK Greens the party on the rise – a ‘tectonic shift’ among voters.

Local elections 2022: Greens winning hearts in northeast as party eyes ‘tectonic shift’ among voters. Campaigners welcomed on doorstep in Labour stronghold South Shields as internal polls predict party will make large gains across the country.

The Greens are, by any measure, a party on the rise – both in the northeast and across the country. In a series of remarkable election results last year, they won 155 English and Welsh council seats, helping take their total to a record high of 467. They now lead two authorities, in Brighton and Hove, and Lancaster, are in a ruling coalition in another 13, including Oxfordshire, York and Sheffield, and make up the official opposition in eight more including Bristol, Norwich and Solihull.

Now, it is all but certain this growth will continue on 5 May: a realistic good night would see them smash the 500-seat barrier, party bosses suggest. In particular, they are hoping to move beyond their traditional metropolitan powerbases and establish a greater presence in the north’s old industrial heartlands. The increasing acceptance that the planet is, er, dying on its arse – that’s the climate crisis – has attracted plenty of voters in an area that will pretty quickly find itself under water if global temperatures continue rising.

But, perhaps of greater significance, is a tangible anger here at a sense of being taken for
granted by the dominant Labour Party for too long. “They’re sitting tenants,” one resident fumed. “They reckon they’ve a job for life and that’s how they treat it.”

Independent UK, 1st May 2022

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/green-party-local-elections-south-shields-b2067278.html

May 3, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, UK | Leave a comment

Czech state looking for place to store nuclear waste as EU deadline shortens

English Radio CZ 05/02/2022 The Ministry of Industry is looking for ways to speed up the planned construction of a nuclear waste facility in the Czech Republic, which would enable the country to fulfil the EU’s taxonomy plan for using nuclear energy as a clean source. However, the plan is running into opposition from local districts who don’t want nuclear waste stored near their homes. The Czech Republic has two nuclear power plants, but nowhere to store its nuclear waste. At least in the long term. For now, nuclear waste is being stored in barrels located inside the power plants themselves, says Jiří Bezděk, the spokesman for the Dukovany nuclear power plant, who took Czech Radio on a tour of the facility.

You can see we are now in the storage facility for used nuclear fuel. This fuel can be stored in containers for a period of up to 60 years. Thereafter, you can take it out, check the container and put the fuel back in for another six decades.”

……….. the RWRA has nowhere to store the waste.

Originally, the Czech government counted on building a deep nuclear waste storage facility by 2065, but the EUs taxonomy plan which was agreed earlier this year, has cut that deadline to the year 2050.

Both Deputy Industry Minister Tomáš Ehler and the head of the country’s Nuclear Safety Office Dana Drábová have said that fulfilling the shorter deadline is possible on paper. However, it necessitates speeding up relevant research activities as well as finally deciding on where the state wants to build the storage facility.

Founded in 2001, the state’s Radioactive Waste Repository Authority has had over 20 years’ time to find a suitable storage location. And it has. Four locations were approved by the government as suitable prospective sites for a deep storage facility.

However, local residents of each of these proposed sites are strongly against the construction. Some of them have banded into the “Platform against deep storage”, a civic organisation that lobbies for an alternative to deep nuclear waste storage and for the construction of any such facility to be subject to a local district vote. The organisation’s secretary, Edvard Sequens, says that locals have more say in the process in other countries…………….. https://english.radio.cz/czech-state-looking-place-store-nuclear-waste-eu-deadline-shortens-8749305

May 3, 2022 Posted by Christina Macpherson | EUROPE, wastes | Leave a comment

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