– excitingly entitled “Central Government Supply Estimates 2017-18” – detailing changes to planned public expenditure since last Autumn’s
Budget 2017. At pages 162-64 you can find the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) extra expenditure requests and clarification of
perceived liabilities.
These include several covering the privately-owned commercial nuclear industry sector. Below are the sections on nuclear, and
the most common read-out message is how often the liabilities for which the taxpayer is expected to take long term financial responsibility are
described as “unquantifiable.”
That is accurate, but what is omitted is the numbers are – based on accumulated experience to date, likely to be astronomically huge. This worryingly unacceptable situation,- whereby one industry (nuclear) of the electricity generating sector is being promised a massive future bailout from its liabilities- really should be examined in detail by our elected Parliamentarians and peers in several relevant committees and in the Estimates Debate on the floor of the Commons.
http://drdavidlowry.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/nuclears-unquantifiably-huge-future.html
February 12, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
business and costs, politics, UK |
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BBC 9th Feb 2018, Russian security officers have arrested several scientists working at a
top-secret Russian nuclear warhead facility for allegedly mining
crypto-currencies. The suspects had tried to use one of Russia’s most
powerful supercomputers to mine Bitcoins, media reports say.
The Federal Nuclear Centre in Sarov, western Russia, is a restricted area. The centre’s
press service said: “There has been an unsanctioned attempt to use computer
facilities for private purposes including so-called mining.” The
supercomputer was not supposed to be connected to the internet – to prevent
intrusion – and once the scientists attempted to do so, the nuclear
centre’s security department was alerted. They were handed over to the
Federal Security Service (FSB), the Russian news service Mash says.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-43003740
February 12, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Russia, secrets,lies and civil liberties |
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Romandie 9th Feb 2018, [Machine Translation] EDF and the director of the Cruas-Meysse nuclear power plant (Ardèche) were sentenced on Friday by the Privas police court to fines of several thousand euros for nuclear waste management problems.
The French energy group has been sentenced to six fines of 1,000 euros and the director of the site to six fines of 500 euros suspended. The network
Outir du Nucléaire, initiator of the lawsuit, criticized EDF and its director for failing to meet several waste management obligations, citing the detection, on November 6, 2015, of nuclear waste in a waste container, conventionals that was about to leave the site.
https://www.romandie.com/news/EDF-condamne-pour-sa-gestion-des-dechets-radioactifs-a-la-centrale-de-Cruas-Ardeche/889092.rom
February 12, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
France, Legal |
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LAWSUIT OVER DEPLETED URANIUM AGAINST 19 MEMBERS OF NATO https://inserbia.info/today/2018/02/lawsuit-over-depleted-uranium-against-19-members-of-nato/
The first in a series of meetings that should lead to the formation of a Council to prepare a criminal lawsuit against the 19 member states of NATO, who bombed Serbia in 1999, was held on Thursday night in Nis. According to the lawyer Srdjan Aleksic each country will be sued separately and invites lawyers and doctors to join them.
“We have been preparing documentation for the writing of the lawsuit for years. Several countries had to pay damages to the soldiers who were hired in Kosovo. I believe that citizens of Serbia, especially those who have cancer, have identical rights. Because of the depleted uranium our health is endangered and the environment is polluted,” says Aleksic.
February 12, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
depleted uranium, EUROPE, Legal |
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I had a bit of a laugh, reading this one.
Russia is using the same pathetic old comics and jolly stories that Western nuclear companies have now 
given up on.
And once again – it’s the macho nuclear men that are doing the nuclear spinning to kids. (The West now uses sophisticated young women as much as they can, with more subtle propaganda)
Nuclear ABC: Rosatom Explains Nuclear Science to Indian School Children, https://sputniknews.com/asia/201802091061516702-nuclear-eduction-indian-children/
As part of the celebrations marking 30 years of Indo-Russia cooperation in nuclear energy, a Festival of Science was organized in the Indian capital New Delhi. The festival was sponsored by the Russian State Energy Corporation Rosatom which also came up with a children’s book on nuclear science.
New Delhi (Sputnik) — During the festival that was held from 6 to 9 February, experts gave presentations and held interactive sessions with children and teachers from different schools in Delhi. The occasion was designed to nurture the interest of children towards nuclear physics, Rosatom officials told Sputnik.
Nuclear experts and scientists of Rosatom also visited some schools in Delhi and conducted awareness sessions for children on the peaceful use of the atomic energy. Rosatom also released a book titled ‘Nuclear ABC’ in English and Hindi to help in the awareness drive. The book was jointly released on Thursday by Russian Ambassador to India Nikolay Kudashev, Professor Emeritus of Jawaharlal University R Rajaraman, Fedor Rozovskiy, Director of Russian Center along with officials of Rosatom at the Russian Centre for Science and Culture, New Delhi. The book launch was attended by hundreds of school children.
“The book is yet another instance of the rich history of Indo-Russian scientific cooperation dating back to the Soviet era,” professor R. Rajaraman said during the launch.
Prof Rajaraman hailed Russia’s assistance in achieving its nuclear energy targets.
February 10, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Education, India, Russia |
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https://www.sciencenews.org/article/50-years-nuclear-fusion-still-hasnt-delivered-clean-energy
Excerpt from the February 17, 1968 issue of Science News, BY MARIA TEMMING , FEBRUARY 8, 2018 Magazine issue: Vol. 193, No. 3, February 17, 2018, p. 4
Power within 30 yearsControlled thermonuclear fusion is moving so well that full-scale development could begin within five years, says Dr. David J. Rose….It might take 20 to 30 years beyond that before fusion could move into the power grid, though, he predicts. — Science News, February 17, 1968
Update
Governments and private-sector start-ups are still trying to wrangle thermonuclear fusion — the process that lights up stars and ignites hydrogen bombs — for clean energy, with limited progress (SN: 2/6/16, p. 18). One of the biggest ongoing projects is ITER in France, an international effort to build the first magnetic fusion reactor that pumps out more energy than it consumes. ITER plans to flip on the machine in 2025. Optimistic estimates put the first fusion power plants on the grid no sooner than 2040.
February 10, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
France, technology |
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Because of the risk of possible terrorist attacks at the 15 UK nuclear reactors and >20 nuclear reactors in nearby countries, and because of the advanced ages of UK nuclear reactors, there is a need for greater preparedness to deal with nuclear accidents and incidents.
For these reasons, in June 2016, the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee set up an Inquiry on Science in Emergencies: chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear incidents. However neither the Committee’s subsequent poor Report nor the Government’s anodyne response dealt with the real issues in a forthright and open matter. In particular, they discussed neither the problems of evacuations (which I have discussed) nor the scientific evidence which amply supports the pre-distribution of stable iodine as occurs in most other EU countries.
In the event of a nuclear accident or incident, the three main responses are shelter, evacuation, and stable iodine prophylaxis. This article deals solely with iodine prophylaxis.
It is important to note that stable iodine ingestion only protects against thyroid cancer, and not any other cancers which could arise after exposure to the many nuclides which would be released if a serious nuclear accident or incident were to occur. However it is the only cancer that we can prevent or mitigate if advance preparations are made.
The prior ingestion of stable iodine (often potassium iodide, ie KI) is an effective means of protecting the thyroid gland from thyroid cancer and other thyroid effects, especially among children. But it is necessary to consume stable iodine immediatelyafter a nuclear incident: the best way to provide for this is the advance distribution of stable iodine prior to any accident or incident.
In the UK, the Government has decided not to pre-distribute stable iodine tablets to the public. This is a poor decision. It was probably influenced by the Government’s strong support, bordering on obsession, for nuclear power. In other words, political considerations are held to be more important than public safety. Information on the locations of stale iodine supplies, stocks held, and arrangements for their distribution in the event of a nuclear incident or accident is unavailable in the UK.
After the warning of a nuclear accident or incident, it appears that the Government intends to distribute stable iodine to “…schools, hospitals and evacuation reception centres…” and “collection centres” for collection by the public. It is likely that such distribution would take at least two days or longer, depending on the sizes of the affected areas. During this time, plumes would continue to cross such areas depending on the nature of the accident, wind direction and wind velocity.
At present, the Government assumes that most thyroid doses (from the radioative iodine in the plumes) will occur via the food pathway, mainly from the ingestion of milk and leafy green vegetables. This pathway could take a few days and could give time for stable iodine distribution to take place. However recent scientific evidence indicates that inhalation is much more important than ingestion for radio-iodine doses. This means advance stable iodine distribution is vitally necessary. The Government is ignoring this information, thereby putting the UK public at risk.
Several EU countries have already pre-distributed KI to all families. In addition, KI supplies and dose information are available on line from non-UK sources. It is therefore recommended that
- Stable iodine tablets, with clear dose instructions and the reasons for their advance distribution, should be distributed to all families within at least 30 km of nuclear facilities in the UK without waiting for an incident or accident to occur.
- Since radioactive plumes could reach cities with large populations (e.g. >500,000 people) located beyond 30 km, stable iodine pre-distribution should carried out here as well. This is because rapid evacuations from such large cities would be impractical, but their inhabitants should be afforded some protection.
- For this reason, and to deal with the possibility of radioactive plumes from nuclear reactors on the continent, the Government should pre-distribute stable iodine to all families throughout the UK, as occurs in most other European countries.
A more detailed (9 pages) report can be found here main report on KI.
February 10, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Reference, safety, UK |
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Le Monde 7th Feb 2018 [Machine Translation] Can France catch up in renewables? A laggard compared
to many of its neighbors, the Hexagon must redouble efforts if it wants to
achieve the goals it has set in terms of “green” energies. “Let’s
accelerate the growth of renewable energies in the face of the climate
emergency. The theme chosen for the 19th annual conference of the Union of
Renewable Energy (SER), Thursday, February 8 in Paris, summarizes the
situation of an economic sector in the middle of the ford. A laggard
compared to many of its neighbors, France must redouble its efforts if it
wants to achieve the goals it has set in terms of “green” energy.
http://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2018/02/08/la-france-peut-elle-rattraper-son-retard-dans-les-renouvelables_5253487_3244.html
February 10, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
climate change, France, politics |
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Adoption of revamped nuclear doctrine by US destroys global strategic stability — diplomat http://tass.com/politics/989106, It’s important to pinpoint the fact openly, the Russian deputy foreign minister said , NOVOSIBIRSK, February 8. /TASS/. Adoption of a revamped nuclear doctrine by the US destroys global strategic stability, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said on Thursday.
“By passing the revamped nuclear doctrine, the US Administration undermines strategic stability if not simply destroys it in the most immediate way,” he said. “It’s important to pinpoint the fact openly and that’s what we’ll be doing.”
“I hope we’ll have an opportunity to discuss it with my counterpart [US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Thomas] Shannon shortly,” Ryabkov said.
February 9, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics international, Russia, USA |
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France to spend 37 bn euros on upgrading nuclear arsenal, Digital Journal, By Daphné BENOIT (AFP) , 8 Feb 18
February 9, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
France, weapons and war |
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Daily Record 8th Feb 2018, SNP slam ‘folly of Trident’ as cost of replacing Britain’s nuclear
submarines rockets by £1billion. The cost of replacing Britain’s nuclear
submarines has risen by almost £1billion in a year. SNP defence spokesman
Stewart McDonald MP will raise questions in the Commons about the soaring
cost of the £31billion Trident replacement programme after the
Government’s spending watchdog rapped MoD chiefs. A recent National Audit
Office report on the MoD’s financial plan for equipment slammed the
defence budget as unaffordable and unrealistic as it failed to include a
string of costs.
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/snp-slam-folly-trident-cost-11989163
February 9, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
UK, weapons and war |
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Uranium caused cancer – probe http://www.ansa.it/english/news/politics/2018/02/07/uranium-caused-cancer-probe_560c540f-b60e-4f90-8ce4-29c0dc42cd6d.html But expert denies saying there was causal link, Redazione ANSA, 7 Feb 18 ANSA) -Rome – The final report of a commission on depleted uranium said Italian soldiers had been exposed to “shocking” levels of it in Italy and on foreign missions, and that it had “helped sow deaths and illnesses”.
However, the doctor whose expert opinion informed the panel’s conclusions denied a link between uranium and cancer. Levels of uranium in the sectors of security and workplace health for soldiers had been toxic and deadly, said the report from the parliamentary commission of inquiry. The report highlighted that military chiefs had been in “denial” on the phenomenon, and also stressed the “deafening silences maintained by government authorities.” Experts heard by the panel had verified the links between exposure to depleted uranium and tumours, the report said.
Commission Chair Gian Piero Scanu of the Democratic Party said “repeated judicial sentences have consistently affirmed the existence of a causal link between exposure to depleted uranium and the pathologies cited by the soldiers: this is a milestone and now those who were exposed will have the possibility of getting justice without having to struggle as they have done so far”.
But the Italian doctor whose expert testimony was cited by the commission as evidence that depleted uranium caused cancer in soldiers denied “ever saying that”. “That is absolutely not my thinking, I never said that depleted uranium is responsible for the tumours found in the soldiers,” said Giorgio Trenta of the Italian association for medical radioprotection. Trenta’s report was cited by the panel as proof of the causal link between depleted uranium and cancer.
The relatives of soldiers who died of uranium-linked cancer have been suing the government for years and pursuing cases in the courts, amid denials from military authorities.
In 2016 a Rome appeals court upheld a guilty verdict for the defence ministry in the 1999 death from leukemia due to depleted uranium exposure of 23-year-old Corporal Salvatore Vacca who handled uranium-tipped munitions during a 150-day mission in Bosnia in 1998-99.
The court found the ministry guilty of not having protected Vacca.
It ordered the ministry to pay more than one and a half million euros in compensation to Vacca’s family.
The families of other victims are suing the ministry for deaths allegedly due to depleted uranium exposure on several Italian missions.
Domenico Leggiero of the Military Observatory group said the sentence was “historic, because it confirms that the ministry was aware of the danger the soldiers sent to those zones were subject to”.
He said “I am sure Defence Minister Roberta Pinotti will bear this ruling in mind when she appears before the parliamentary depleted uranium commission”.
Italian authorities consistently played down the uranium risks
February 9, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
deaths by radiation, depleted uranium, EUROPE, legal |
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Julian Assange ‘has suffered enough’, his lawyers tell British judge, SMH, Nick Miller, 7 Feb 18, London: Julian Assange has suffered enough and shouldn’t face prison for absconding from justice, his lawyers have told a court.
The Wikileaks editor is depressed, in constant pain from an infected tooth, and has been stuck in the Ecuador Embassy in London’s Kensington far longer than the maximum 12-month jail penalty for breaching bail, his barrister said.
On Tuesday Assange lost a legal bid at Westminster Magistrates Court to quash the arrest warrant that has awaited him since he entered the Ecuador embassy in June 2012.
However his lawyers immediately launched a new push to end the UK government’s attempt to bring him to justice – arguing that it is against the public interest to punish him for refusing to leave the embassy.
It is a criminal offence for someone on bail to refuse to surrender to police without “reasonable cause” – and Assange refused to leave the embassy despite a court order for his arrest.
But Assange’s barrister Mark Summers QC told Judge Emma Arbuthnot that it was not in the interests of “justice and proportionality” to bring an action against Assange.
Assange went into the embassy after he exhausted his line of appeal against a decision to extradite him to Sweden to face rape allegations. Sweden last year ended its investigation into the allegations, and the European arrest warrant against Assange was cancelled. However the British warrant for his arrest still stood – and judge Arbuthnot said she was not persuaded it should be quashed simply because the underlying investigation had stopped.
Mr Summers said Assange was not “thumbing his nose” at justice and his five and a half years in the embassy were “adequate if not severe punishment for the actions that he took”.
Assange had genuine fears – later proved correct – that the US were keen to prosecute him over his work with Wikileaks, Summers said.
If arrested he would face rendition to the USA, treatment similar to that meted out against Wikileaks whistleblower Chelsea Manning – and possible “persecution, indefinite solitary confinement and the death penalty”, Summers said in a written submission……….
Judge Arbuthnot said it was a “very interesting” case.
She will rule on the public interest application on February 13.
Outside court, Assange’s lawyer Jennifer Robinson said whether or not the warrant is quashed Assange would not leave the embassy until he had an assurance he wouldn’t be extradited to the US.
“Mr Assange remains willing to answer to British justice in relation to any argument about breaching bail, but not at the expense of facing injustice in America,” she said.
“This case is and always has been about the risk of extradition to the United States and that risk remains real.” http://www.smh.com.au/world/julian-assange-has-suffered-enough-his-lawyers-tell-british-judge-20180206-p4yzjt.html
February 9, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
civil liberties, Legal, UK |
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Bellona 7th Feb 2018, In a major step toward cleaning up the world’s worst nuclear disaster,
workers at Chernobyl have begun moving much of the stricken facility’s
liquid nuclear waste into long term storage.
The commissioning of Chernobyl’s liquid radioactive treatment plant is meant to tackle the
22,000 tons of irradiated water gathered not only since the plant’s
number 4 reactor exploded in 1986, but from continued operation of the
plant’s other three reactors, which continued producing electricity for
14 years after the disaster.
Surprisingly, these reactors were not decommissioned until 2000, nine years after the collapse of the Soviet
Union, when the Chernobyl plant became the newly-independent Ukraine’s
inheritance from Moscow. That the rest of the plant’s reactors continued
to operate in the middle of a irradiated disaster zone serves shows how
heavily Ukraine has depended on nuclear power since it struck out on its
own. That dependence – despite atomic energy’s domestic unpopularity
– hasn’t dropped with time: Kiev still relies on its other 15 reactors
to produce a little over half the country’s electricity.
http://bellona.org/news/nuclear-issues/2018-02-chernobyl-starts-tackling-its-liquid-radioactive-waste
February 9, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Ukraine, wastes |
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Le Monde 7th Feb 2018, [Machine Translation] Bure landfill: the impossible scientific proof of
safety. “The World” had access to the thesis of a researcher who studied
the management of uncertainties surrounding the storage of nuclear waste in
the Meuse.
It is an embarrassing document for the promoters of the
Industrial Center of geological storage (Cigeo) aiming to bury, in the clay
subsoil of the village of Bure, in the Meuse, the most dangerous French
nuclear waste.
It describes how the National Agency for the Management of
Radioactive Waste (Andra), unable to formally demonstrate the safety of
this facility for hundreds of thousands of years, dedicates its efforts to
convince the nuclear control authorities of the feasibility of such
storage. At a loss to present some of his results in a biased or incomplete
way. Beyond this public institution, under the tutelage of the ministries
in charge of energy, research and the environment, it is also the chain of
evaluation of nuclear safety in France that is questioned.
http://www.lemonde.fr/planete/article/2018/02/07/centre-d-enfouissement-de-bure-l-impossible-preuve-scientifique-de-la-surete_5252802_3244.html
February 9, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
France, safety |
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nuclear-news 