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The heavy health and environmental toll of rare earths mining in China

Rare-earth mining in China comes at a heavy cost for local villages https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2012/aug/07/china-rare-earth-village-pollution Pollution is poisoning the farms and villages of the region that processes the precious minerals, Guardian,  Cécile Bontron, 7 Apr 18,

From the air it looks like a huge lake, fed by many tributaries, but on the ground it turns out to be a murky expanse of water, in which no fish or algae can survive. The shore is coated with a black crust, so thick you can walk on it. Into this huge, 10 sq km tailings pond nearby factories discharge water loaded with chemicals used to process the 17 most sought after minerals in the world, collectively known as rare earths.

The town of Baotou, in Inner Mongolia, is the largest Chinese source of these strategic elements, essential to advanced technology, from smartphones to GPS receivers, but also to wind farms and, above all, electric cars. The minerals are mined at Bayan Obo, 120km farther north, then brought to Baotou for processing.

The concentration of rare earths in the ore is very low, so they must be separated and purified, using hydro-metallurgical techniques and acid baths. Chinaaccounts for 97% of global output of these precious substances, with two-thirds produced in Baotou.

The foul waters of the tailings pond contain all sorts of toxic chemicals, but also radioactive elements such as thorium which, if ingested, cause cancers of the pancreas and lungs, and leukaemia. “Before the factories were built, there were just fields here as far as the eye can see. In the place of this radioactive sludge, there were watermelons, aubergines and tomatoes,” says Li Guirong with a sigh.

It was in 1958 – when he was 10 – that a state-owned concern, the Baotou Iron and Steel company (Baogang), started producing rare-earth minerals. The lake appeared at that time. “To begin with we didn’t notice the pollution it was causing. How could we have known?” As secretary general of the local branch of the Communist party, he is one of the few residents who dares to speak out.

Towards the end of the 1980s, Li explains, crops in nearby villages started to fail: “Plants grew badly. They would flower all right, but sometimes there was no fruit or they were small or smelt awful.” Ten years later the villagers had to accept that vegetables simply would not grow any longer. In the village of Xinguang Sancun – much as in all those near the Baotou factories – farmers let some fields run wild and stopped planting anything but wheat and corn.

A study by the municipal environmental protection agency showed that rare-earth minerals were the source of their problems. The minerals themselves caused pollution, but also the dozens of new factories that had sprung up around the processing facilities and a fossil-fuel power station feeding Baotou’s new industrial fabric. Residents of what was now known as the “rare-earth capital of the world” were inhaling solvent vapour, particularly sulphuric acid, as well as coal dust, clearly visible in the air between houses.

Now the soil and groundwater are saturated with toxic substances. Five years ago Li had to get rid of his sick pigs, the last survivors of a collection of cows, horses, chickens and goats, killed off by the toxins.

The farmers have moved away. Most of the small brick houses in Xinguang Sancun, huddling close to one another, are going to rack and ruin. In just 10 years the population has dropped from 2,000 to 300 people.

Lu Yongqing, 56, was one of the first to go. “I couldn’t feed my family any longer,” he says. He tried his luck at Baotou, working as a mason, then carrying bricks in a factory, finally resorting to selling vegetables at local markets, with odd jobs on the side. Registered as farmers in their identity papers, the refugees from Xinguang Sancun are treated as second-class citizens and mercilessly exploited.

The farmers who have stayed on tend to gather near the mahjong hall. “I have aching legs, like many of the villagers. There’s a lot of diabetes, osteoporosis and chest problems. All the families are affected by illness,” says He Guixiang, 60. “I’ve been knocking on government doors for nearly 20 years,” she says. “To begin with I’d go every day, except Sundays.”

By maintaining the pressure, the villagers have obtained the promise of financial compensation, as yet only partly fulfilled. There has been talk of new housing, too. Neatly arranged tower blocks have gone up a few kilometres west of their homes. They were funded by compensation paid by Baogang to the local government.

But the buildings stand empty. The government is demanding that the villagers buy the right to occupy their flat, but they will not be able to pass it on to their children.

Some tried to sell waste from the pond, which still has a high rare-earth content, to reprocessing plants. The sludge fetched about $300 a tonne.

But the central government has recently deprived them of even this resource. One of their number is on trial and may incur a 10-year prison sentence.

This article originally appeared in Le Monde

April 9, 2018 Posted by | China, RARE EARTHS | Leave a comment

Powerful volcanic eruption at Mount Shinmoe, and more to come -ONLY 40 MILES FROM Sendai Nuclear power station

Another powerful eruption observed at Mount Shinmoe , Japan Times, 5 Apr 18   FUKUOKA – Another powerful eruption was observed at Mount Shinmoe in southwestern Japan early Thursday, with ash sent spiralling into a plume around 5,000 meters high, the Meteorological Agency said.

The eruption at the 1,421-meter volcano that straddles Miyazaki and Kagoshima prefectures was the largest since March 25, according to the agency.

Mount Shinmoe erupted violently for the first time in about seven years on March 6, and the agency said a week later that it was expected to continue explosive eruptions for several months or more……..https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/04/05/national/another-powerful-eruption-observed-mount-shinmoe/#.WsggQIhubIU

April 7, 2018 Posted by | Japan, safety | Leave a comment

The end for Japan’s expensive Monju nuclear fast breeder dream

Japan prepares to shut troubled ‘dream’ nuclear reactor https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/Japan-prepares-to-shut-troubled-dream-nuclear-reactor

Decades-old plant has cost almost $10bn and hardly ever operated    KAZUNARI HANAWA, Nikkei staff writer

TOKYO — Japan is set to start decommissioning its troubled Monju fast-breeder reactor after decades of accidents, cost overruns and scandals. It is the beginning of the end of a controversial project that exposed the shortcomings of the country’s nuclear policy and the government’s failure to fully explain the risks and the costs.

In July, the Japan Atomic Energy Agency will begin decommissioning what was hailed as a “dream” reactor that was expected to produce more nuclear fuel than it consumed. The government has so far spent more than 1 trillion yen ($9.44 billion) on the plant, which has barely ever operated.

The plan approved by the Nuclear Regulation Authority on March 28 to decommission the reactor, located in central Japan’s Fukui Prefecture, calls for the extraction of spent nuclear fuel to be completed by the end of the fiscal year through March 2023. Full decommissioning is expected to take about 30 years.

 Total costs to shut down the reactor are currently estimated at 375 billion yen, but that could climb, as the full technical requirements and the selection of the nuclear waste sites are not well understood.

Japan does not have the technological ability to manage the decommissioning process on its own, and must enlist the help of France, which has more experience with fast-breeder reactors. Among the technical challenges is handling the plant’s sodium coolant, which is highly reactive and explodes on contact with air.

Many of the problems with Japan’s nuclear policy were brought to light by the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster caused by the tsunami and earthquake of March 2011. Such problems have included the high costs of plants, the selection of nuclear disposal sites, and the threat of shutdowns due to lawsuits. Japan’s nuclear policy has largely been gridlocked since the disaster.

But the Monju project had many problems before the Fukushima catastrophe.

Planning for the project began in the 1960s. Its fast-breeder technology was considered a dream technology for resource-poor Japan, which had been traumatized by the oil crisis of the 1970s. The reactor was supposed to generate more plutonium fuel than it consumed.

The reactor finally started operating in 1994, but was forced to shut down the following year due to a sodium leak. It has been inoperative for most of the time since. The decision to decommission it was made in December 2016 following a series of safety scandals, including the revelation that many safety checks had been omitted.

Recent experience suggests the government’s estimated cost of 375 billion yen to decommission Monju could be on the low side. In 2016, the estimate for decommissioning the Fukushima Daiichi plant ballooned to 8 trillion yen from an initial 2 trillion yen in 2013, largely due to inadequate understanding of the decommissioning process.

While “the JAEA will try to keep costs down,” said Hajime Ito, executive director with the agency, the process of extracting sodium, the biggest hurdle, has yet to be determined. Future technical requirements will also involve significant costs.

The Monju reactor is not the only example of failure in Japan’s nuclear fuel cycle policy — the cycle of how nuclear fuel is handled and processed, including disposing nuclear waste and reprocessing used fuel.

Central to this policy is a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in the village of Rokkasho in northern Aomori Prefecture that was supposed to extract plutonium and uranium by reprocessing spent nuclear fuel to be reused at nuclear plants.

More than 2 trillion yen has been spent on the plant so far. Construction was begun in 1993, but completion has been repeatedly postponed due to safety concerns. On Wednesday, the NRA decided to resume safety checks on the plant, but if it chooses to decommission it, the cost would be an estimated 1.5 trillion yen.

Had Japan taken into consideration the costs of decommissioning plants and disposing of spent nuclear fuel, it probably would not have been able to push ahead with its nuclear policy in the first place, said a former senior official of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, who was involved in formulating the country’s basic energy plan.

April 6, 2018 Posted by | Japan, reprocessing | Leave a comment

Satellite imagery of North Korea’s Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center

North Korea’s Yongbyon Nuclear Research Center: Construction Progressing Rapidly Near Reactors; No Signs of Reprocessing   BY: 38 NORTH  [EXCELLENT SATELLITE PHOTOS] APRIL 6, 2018   SATELLITE IMAGERY  A 38 North exclusive with analysis by Frank V. Pabian, Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., and Jack Liu.  Commercial satellite imagery of the Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center from April 4 shows significant progress in the modifications underway associated with the 5 MWe reactor’s secondary cooling system. (Figure 1)   [on original]  Over the past five days, a rectangular, concrete-walled, vault-like foundation has been erected.[1] (Figures 2 and 3) [on original] The purpose of this new structure remains unclear, but it could be for a new pump house comparable to the one serving the ELWR. Given recent efforts to dam the river below this point to create a reservoir, this could be part of a larger effort to provide a steady flow of water into that reactor allowing it to run more continuously and safely in the future. Alternatively, since its location is near where the reactor cooling water used to be expelled during previous reactor operations, it could be part of a new cooling water outflow system to enhance the overall efficiency and potentially the cooling capacity of the secondary cooling loop………. https://www.38north.org/2018/04/yongbyon040618/

April 6, 2018 Posted by | North Korea, politics | Leave a comment

Decommissioning of Japan’s nuclear stations: is it really worth the cost – to reactivate any of them?

Japan Times 1st April 2018, The recent decision by Shikoku Electric Power Co. to decommission the aging
No. 2 reactor at its Ikata nuclear facility in Ehime Prefecture serves as
yet another reminder that tightened safety regulations and market
conditions in the aftermath of the 2011 Fukushima crisis are imposing a
heavy financial burden on power companies that run nuclear power plants.

Whether or not they push for reactivating the reactors idled in the wake of
the 2011 accident, both the government and the power industry are urged to
reassess the economics of nuclear power to determine whether they are still
worth the cost.

The Ikata reactor is the ninth at six nuclear power plants
across Japan to be decommissioned after the 2011 disaster, not including
the six at Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s Fukushima No. 1 plant, which was
crippled by the meltdowns at three of its six reactors in March 2011 after
the plant was flooded by giant tsunami in the Great East Japan Earthquake.

All of the reactors were aging and nearing the 40-year limit on their
operation, and the power companies were faced with the question of whether
to decommission the reactors or apply to the Nuclear Regulation Authority
for approval of a one-time extension of their operation for another 20
years — which would have entailed costly additional investments to bump
up their safety under the post-Fukushima rules.  https://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2018/04/01/editorials/reassess-economics-nuclear-power/

April 6, 2018 Posted by | business and costs, Japan | Leave a comment

Researchers from 30 countries call for boycott of South Korean university, in campaign against lethal autonomous weapons

We are locked into an arms race that no one wants to happen, global researchers warn
A CHILLING letter claims the world is on the cusp of opening a dangerous Pandora’s box — and there is no going back.  http://www.news.com.au/technology/innovation/we-are-locked-into-an-arms-race-that-no-one-wants-to-happen-global-researchers-warn/news-story/fc6dfa060c66ed876beb79d1b7530cc6  Nick Whigham@NWWHIGHAM  5 Apr 18 

The boycott comes in advance of a meeting next Monday in Geneva, Switzerland, of 123 member nations of the United Nations discussing the challenges posed by lethal autonomous weapons. Twenty-two of those nations have already called for an outright and pre-emptive ban on such weapons.

The open letter announcing the boycott against the South Korean university said autonomous weapons are the “third revolution in warfare” and warned about letting the genie out of the bottle.

“At a time when the United Nations is discussing how to contain the threat posed to international security by autonomous weapons, it is regrettable that a prestigious institution like KAIST looks to accelerate the arms race to develop such weapons,” the letter said.

“We therefore publicly declare that we will boycott all collaborations with any part of KAIST until such time as the President of KAIST provides assurances, which we have sought but not received, that the Center will not develop autonomous weapons lacking meaningful human control,” the researchers said.

“If developed, autonomous weapons will be the third revolution in warfare. They will permit war to be fought faster and at a scale greater than ever before. They have the potential to be weapons of terror. Despots and terrorists could use them against innocent populations, removing any ethical restraints. This Pandora’s box will be hard to close if it is opened.”

Professor Walsh organised the boycott which involves researchers from 30 countries and includes three of the world’s top deep learning experts, Professor Stuart Russell from the University of California, Berkeley, who authored the leading textbook on AI and roboticist Prof Wolfram Burgard, winner of the Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz Prize, the most prestigious research prize in Germany.

“Back in 2015, we warned of an arms race in autonomous weapons,” Professor Walsh said in a statement alongside the letter. “We can see prototypes of autonomous weapons under development today by many nations including the US, China, Russia and the UK. We are locked into an arms race that no one wants to happen.

“KAIST’s actions will only accelerate this arms race. We cannot tolerate this.”

Professor Walsh has long campaigned against the development of autonomous weapons.

He has previously travelled to speak in front of the United Nations in an effort to have the international body prevent the proliferation of so-called killer robots with the ability to think for themselves.

Speaking to news.com.au last year he said “the arms race is already starting.”

He believes it’s no longer a question of whether military weapons are imbued with some level of autonomy, it’s just a matter of how much autonomy — which poses a number of worrying scenarios, particularly if they fall into the wrong hands.

“They get in the hands of the wrong people and they can be turned against us. They can be used by terrorist organisations,” he warned.

“It would be a terrifying future if we allow ourselves to go down this road.

April 6, 2018 Posted by | South Korea, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Japanese Foreign Minister’s Reports of Tunneling at Punggye-ri:  not supported by Commercial Satellite Imagery 

Japanese Foreign Minister’s Reports of Tunneling at Punggye-ri: What Commercial Satellite Imagery Shows  [excellent photos] BY: 38 NORTH, APRIL 2, 2018A  Analysis by Frank V. Pabian, Joseph S. Bermudez Jr., and Jack Liu.

On March 31, 2018, Japan’s Foreign Minister, Taro Kono, in a lecture in Kochi city, is reported to have said that North Korea appears to be “working hard to get ready for the next nuclear test,” and the associated reporting claims that he had added that soil had been “removed from the tunnel at the nuclear test site where past tests were conducted.” The reporting also suggested that his remarks “may be based on satellite imagery provided by the United States.”

While it is unclear whether the Foreign Minister was referring to activity observed over the last few days or from earlier work conducted after North Korea’s September 2017 nuclear test, commercial satellite imagery from March 23 shows quite a different picture: namely, that activity at the test site has been significantly reduced compared to previous months. Tunneling at the West Portal, a site not associated with any of North Korea’s previous tests, had been active earlier this year but has slowed down significantly as has other personnel and vehicular movement around the site. (It appears that only a small amount of new spoil has been excavated from the tunnel recently).[1]

Nevertheless, it is highly likely that the North Koreans continue to maintain the readiness of the nuclear test facility—one indication is recent roadwork—to allow nuclear testing in the future should Pyongyang decide to do so.

1. Precise determination of the extent of new spoil accumulation is made difficult from March 17 to 23 due to variations in the imagery deriving from different sensors on different satellites from different vendors having different look angles and slightly different amounts of melted snow together with vegetative shadowing.

 

April 4, 2018 Posted by | North Korea, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Tepco facing huge costs in Fukushima disaster, but still plans to help fund restart of Tokai nuclear power station.

TEPCO, Tohoku Electric to give Japan Atomic financial boost to help restart reactor https://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20180329/p2a/00m/0na/015000c,  (Mainichi Japan)  Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. (TEPCO) and Tohoku Electric Power Co. have decided to help Japan Atomic Power Co. cover the some 174 billion yen needed to finance preparations to restart its Tokai No. 2 nuclear power station.

The hefty sum is the estimated cost of safety upgrades required by the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) to restart the plant in the village of Tokai, Ibaraki Prefecture. The NRA, which carries out mandatory plant inspections ahead of any reactor restart, has requested Japan Atomic to submit a plan to secure the necessary funds for the safety measures.

However, Japan Atomic’s sole business is nuclear power generation, and both its two reactors are currently stopped. The company has only survived this far thanks to the basic annual fee of about 100 billion yen included in its power supply contracts with Japan’s five big electric utilities. Under these conditions, it looked extremely difficult for Japan Atomic to cover the Tokai No. 2 station upgrade costs on its own, and the firm appealed to TEPCO and Tohoku Electric — both of which have power purchase contracts for electricity from the plant — for support.

TEPCO and Tohoku Electric are set to decide on March 30 to accept Japan Atomic’s plea for financial help and open discussions, and notify the power producer. Japan Atomic will in turn present the outside aid to an upcoming NRA inspection committee meeting.

Regarding the aid, TEPCO and Tohoku Electric will consider guaranteeing loans to Japan Atomic from its creditors. However, the utilities plan to make that decision once they have evaluated progress on the inspections needed for the Tokai No. 2 plant to be restarted, and examined the formal construction cost estimates for the necessary safety upgrades.

The announcement of TEPCO and Tohoku Electric’s financial backing for Japan Atomic will bolster the case for the Tokai No. 2 station’s return to operation. However, the restart faces hurdles, including obtaining local resident approval and the need for the surrounding local governments to draw up evacuation plans in case of a serious accident at the plant. Thus, even if the power station does pass the NRA inspections, there is no guarantee it can be restarted.

Furthermore, TEPCO is also liable for tremendous costs associated with dealing with the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant disaster, and the company could face criticism for offering financial aid to Japan Atomic under these conditions.

April 4, 2018 Posted by | business and costs, Japan | Leave a comment

Submarines with nuclear weapons bring nuclear war closer for India and Pakistan

India and Pakistan are quietly making nuclear war more likely, Both countries are arming their submarines with nukes. Vox, 
By Tom Hundley  Apr 2, 2018 “……….The audacity of a bloody attack inside one of the most heavily secured naval facilities in Pakistan was jarring enough. Even more jarring was the source of the attack: al-Qaeda, which claimed responsibility for the strike and praised the dead men as “martyrs.” Five more naval officers implicated in the plot were later arrested, charged with mutiny, and sentenced to death.

The Zulfiqar incident is the most serious in a long string of deadly security breaches at Pakistani military installations, from multiple attacks on nuclear facilities near Dera Ghazi Khan (2003 and 2006) and on the air force bases at Sargodha and Kamra (2007 and 2012) to the the gruesome 2014 attack on a school for the children of military officers in Peshawar that left more than 140 people dead, including 132 children.

But even if Pakistani bases have been hit before, the Zulfiqar strike is particularly alarming. That’s because Pakistan is preparing to arm its submarines and possibly some of its surface ships with nuclear weapons — which means terrorists who successfully fight their way into a Pakistani naval base in the future could potentially get their hands on some of the most dangerous weapons on earth.

The Pakistan navy is likely to soon place nuclear-tipped cruise missiles on up to three of its five French-built diesel-electric submarines. It has also reached a deal with China to buy eight more diesel-electric attack submarines that can be equipped with nuclear weapons. These are scheduled for delivery in 2028. Even more disturbing, Pakistani military authorities say they are considering the possibility of putting nuclear-tipped cruise missiles on surface vessels like the Zulfiqar.

Pakistan says its decision to add nuclear weapons to its navy is a direct response to India’s August 2016 deployment of its first nuclear submarine, the Arihant. A second, even more advanced Indian nuclear submarine, the Arighat, began sea trials last November, and four more boats are scheduled to join the fleet by 2025. That will give India a complete “nuclear triad,” which means the country will have the ability to deliver a nuclear strike by land-based missiles, by warplanes, and by submarines.

The submarine is the key component. It’s considered the most “survivable” in the event of a devastating first strike by an enemy, and thus able to deliver a retaliatory second strike. In the theology of nuclear deterrence, the point of this unholy trinity is to make nuclear war unwinnable and, therefore, pointless.

When it comes to India and Pakistan, by contrast, the new generation of nuclear submarines could increase the risk of a devastating war between the two longstanding enemies, not make it less likely. ……..

……. India and Pakistan are mortal enemies that have dozens of nuclear warheads aimed at each other. That was scary when those nukes were only on land. It’s a much scarier situation now that those nukes have been put onto submarines that move deep underwater, holding the deadliest payloads imaginable.

Tom Hundley is a senior editor at the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.https://www.vox.com/2018/4/2/17096566/pakistan-india-nuclear-war-submarine-enemies

 

April 4, 2018 Posted by | India, Pakistan, weapons and war | Leave a comment

375 billion yen (2.86 billion euros) to dismantle Japan’s Monju breeder nuclear reactor

Le Monde 1st April 2018, [Machine Translation] By validating, on Wednesday 28 March, the project to
dismantle the Monju breeder reactor, the Nuclear Regulatory Authority (ARN)
thwarting Japan’s ambition to control the fuel cycle and adds a new nuclear
bill in the archipelago. The project involves a dismantling over thirty
years of the facility built in Tsuruga in the department of Fukui (center).
It should cost 375 billion yen (2.86 billion euros). The operation will
start as soon as July by the removal of the fuel. Then the sodium –
liquid delicate cooling to handle because flammable on contact with air –
will be removed. Disassembly will follow, with an end scheduled for 2048.
http://www.lemonde.fr/energies/article/2018/04/01/nucleaire-les-ambitions-contrariees-du-japon_5279295_1653054.html

April 4, 2018 Posted by | decommission reactor, Japan | Leave a comment

Japan warns that North Korea is digging new tunnel, “preparing for nuclear test”

North Korea is ‘preparing for nuclear test by digging tunnel’   http://www.news.com.au/world/asia/north-korea-is-preparing-for-nuclear-test-by-digging-tunnel/news-story/69fe873a70328b72addac06b9924c3d2  JAPAN has warned that North Korea is “doing everything possible” to prepare for the next nuclear test by digging a new tunnel. 

NORTH Korea is gearing up for a new nuclear test by digging an underground tunnel, Japan has warned.

The country’s Foreign Minister Taro Kono said: “[North Korea] is doing everything possible to prepare for the next nuclear test: it is currently extracting earth from an underground tunnel where the previous test was carried out.”

The minister said previously the secretive state “does not reveal its intentions to the outside world in terms of denuclearisation”.

The claim comes just days after Kim Jong-un promised to bin his beloved nuclear weapons if he could be guaranteed security and US military threats against North Korea were to stop.

At the end of last year the tyrant declared his country a fully fledged nuclear power after launching a new missile he claimed was capable of hitting anywhere on the planet.

Nuclear devices are often tested underground to prevent radioactive material released in the explosion reaching the surface and contaminating the environment — this method also ensures a degree of secrecy.

The release of radiation from an underground nuclear explosion — an effect known as “venting” — would give away clues to the technical composition and size of a country’s device.

A test site is carefully geologically surveyed to ensure suitability — usually in a place well away from population centres.

The nuclear device is placed into a drilled hole or tunnel usually between 200-800m below the surface, and several metres wide. Last year a tunnel at an underground North Korean nuclear site was said to have collapsed.

Up to 200 people were thought to have died at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site in the northeast of the country.

The accident was believed to have been caused by Kim Jong-un’s sixth nuclear test which weakened the mountain, according to the report.

Former British Defence Secretary Sir Michael Fallon previously warned that Britain is at risk from North Korea’s long-range nuclear missile program as some cities are closer than American targets.

Revised estimates suggest the total number of missiles the rogue state has is believed to be between 13 and 21.

And the regime is estimated to have at least four nuclear warheads.

Satellite images of Jong-un’s main missile test site in August revealed North Korea’s weapons were more powerful than initially thought.

Careful analysis of North Korean tests sites, using images from Planet, reveal the regime has been gradually building up the size of its missiles.

April 2, 2018 Posted by | North Korea, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Closing down of Fukushima nuclear power plant has skyrocketed to US$75 billion

Oil Price 30th March 2018, The decommissioning of the Fukushima nuclear power plant will cost an
annual US$2 billion (220 billion yen) until 2021, an unnamed source told
the Japan Times. Half of the money will be used to tackle the radioactive
water buildup at the site of the plant and for removing radioactive fuel
from the fuel pools. A small amount of funds will be used to research ways
of retreating melted fuel from the reactors that got damaged during the
2011 tsunami disaster.

The US$6 billion for the three years is only part of
the total estimated cost for taking Fukushima out of operation. The total
decommissioning tally came in at US$75 billion (8 trillion yen), as
estimated by the specially set up Nuclear Damage Compensation and
Decommissioning Facilitation Corp (NDF).

That’s four times more than the initial estimate of the costs around the NPP’s decommissioning. Now theoperator of Fukushima, Tepco, and the NDF are due to submit their financial plan for the facility to the government for approval by the energy industry
minister. In addition to the US$6 billion allocated for the cleanup, Tepco
will spend another US$1.88 billion (200 billion yen) on preparing to start
extracting the melted fuel from the three damaged reactors. This seems to
be the biggest challenge for the cleanup efforts because of the still high
radiation levels as well as technical difficulties. https://oilprice.com/Latest-Energy-News/World-News/Total-Tally-For-Fukushima-Decommission-Is-75-Billion.html

April 2, 2018 Posted by | Fukushima continuing | Leave a comment

China expanding its nuclear marketing overseas, with the help of Bill Gates

 

Chinese nuclear giant continues to expand overseas cooperation, 2018-03-03  Editor: Xiang Bo BEIJING, March 3 (Xinhua) — China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC), one of the country’s two leading nuclear power companies, is stepping up its overseas cooperation, the chairperson said Saturday.

Progress is being made in cooperation with CNNC’s local partners in countries like Pakistan, Argentina, Saudi Arabia, Ghana and the United States, CNNC chairperson Wang Shoujun said on the sidelines of the annual session of the country’s top political advisory body…….

Last year, the CNNC signed a joint venture agreement with TerraPower, LLC to form the Global Innovation Nuclear Energy Technology Co., Ltd. to work together on the Travelling Wave Reactor technology, marking a new stage in China-U.S. nuclear cooperation, Wang added. ……http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-03/03/c_137013831.htm

April 2, 2018 Posted by | China, marketing | Leave a comment

USA Commerce Department sanctioned seven Pakistani companies – alleges links to nuclear trade

Axios 29th March 2018,  The Commerce Department this week sanctioned seven Pakistani companies for
alleged links to nuclear trade. Their place on an “Entity List”
requires them to obtain special licenses to do business with the U.S. This
move follows other U.S. penalties against Pakistan, including a successful
push to put Pakistan on a “gray list” of countries not doing enough to
stem terrorist financing and a freeze on all U.S. security assistance to
Pakistan.

But Commerce’s action should not be seen as part of the
existing campaign to pressure Pakistan to crack down harder on terrorists.
Why it matters: Commerce’s move does underscore Washington’s concerns
about Pakistan’s nuclear proliferation record — even as nuclear
watchdog groups cite improvements in Pakistan’s nuclear security.
https://www.axios.com/nuclear-security-worries-drive-latest-us-penalties-on-pakistan-1522259525-d5bea2f2-a2aa-47e6-a5e8-b376e8e3853a.html

April 2, 2018 Posted by | Pakistan, secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA | Leave a comment

Toshiba to own Nuclear Fuel Industries, join Hitachi Ltd. and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries ?

Japan News 31st March 2018, Toshiba Corp. said Friday that it will take full control of Nuclear Fuel
Industries Ltd., a Japanese nuclear fuel supplier, by the end of June.
Toshiba, which last October agreed to acquire 52 percent of Nuclear Fuel
Industries from Westinghouse Electric Co., newly signed agreements to
purchase the remaining stake from Sumitomo Electric Industries Ltd. and
Furukawa Electric Co.

Sumitomo Electric and Furukawa Electric own 24
percent each of Nuclear Fuel Industries. Toshiba’s move to fully own
Nuclear Fuel Industries is expected to help accelerate its talks with
Hitachi Ltd. and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. on integrating their
respective nuclear fuel operations in Japan.

Nuclear fuel suppliers owned by Japanese nuclear plant makers have been struggling with sluggish demand
as many nuclear plants in the country remain suspended. Toshiba, Hitachi
and Mitsubishi Heavy previously aimed to merge their domestic nuclear fuel
operations in spring last year, but the talks have been stalled due to
Toshiba’s financial crisis.  http://the-japan-news.com/news/article/0004340845

April 2, 2018 Posted by | business and costs, Japan | Leave a comment

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