Weapons delivered to Ukraine ‘beginning to filter’ to Africa: Nigeria
https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/weapons-delivered-to-ukraine-beginning-to-filter-to-africa: By Al Mayadeen English , Source: Agencies, 3 Dec 22
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari urges heads of states from neighboring states participating in the Lake Chad Basin Commission to confront the issue of Western arms smuggling from Ukraine.
Weapons supplied to Ukraine from Western countries are “starting to flow” into the Lake Chad basin region, Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari warned this week.
Addressing the heads of states from neighboring states participating in the Lake Chad Basin Commission on Tuesday in the Nigerian capital of Abuja, the president said, “Regrettably, the situation in the Sahel and the raging war in Ukraine serve as major sources of weapons and fighters that bolster the ranks of the terrorists in the region.”
Buhari then urged his counterparts to increase security cooperation in order to confront the issue of arms smuggling.
The Nigerian president agreed to step up military coordination in their countries’ war against Boko Haram and ISIS terrorists, who are now apparently receiving weapons from Ukraine, alongside the leaders of Benin, Chad, Niger, and the Central African Republic.
Last month, Finnish police said that some of the “huge quantities” of weapons being shipped to Ukraine had made their way to Finland, where “three of the world’s largest motorcycle gangs” now operate, including Bandidos MC, which “has a branch in every major city in Ukraine.”
In August, an American news outlet unmasked that a shockingly large amount of weaponry heading for Ukraine was untraceable. “Like 30% of it reaches its final destination,” said a tweet that was later deleted after a swarm of online trolls attacked it.
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu had previously said the arms supplied by the West to Ukraine were ending up on the black market and spreading across West Asia.
Similarly, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov had pointed out that Stingers and Javelin missiles, supplied by the West to Kiev, were already being sold at a discount on the black market and have surfaced in Albania and Kosovo, which Russia has warned for so long.
Ukraine has received billions and billions of dollars in donated arms from the United States and its allies such as the United Kingdom and other NATO states in the past few months.
Ukraine Crisis Highlights Security Needs Of Civilian Nuclear Power
[[Ed – “a secure environment for the proliferation of nuclear energy.”? Pigs might fly?]
Ariel Cohen, Forbes, 16 Dec 22,
On November 27-28 a conference in Paris addressed a broad spectrum of challenges humanity is facing. Renowned thinkers, including Nuriel Roubini and Jacob Frenkel, the former Chairman of JP Morgan International, and three central bankers from Iceland, Tunisia, and Armenia, warned about inflation and the growing mountain of debt threatening the global economy. The panel at which this author addressed civilian nuclear security was organized by Dialogue of the Continents, a project of the Astana Club, the brainchild of the Nazarbayev Foundation. The panel was chaired by the veteran nuclear policy expert Ambassador Kairat Abusseitov, the former First Deputy Foreign Minister of Kazakhstan.
Today the planet shudders at the prospect of Russia’s first use of nuclear weapons and its military attacks on Ukrainian nuclear reactors. The world faced nuclear crises before. On October 27th, 1962 Vasili Arkhipov, a former Vice Admiral in the Soviet Navy, prevented a nuclear war when he countermanded the orders of two other officers and prevented a nuclear attack against the US Navy during the Cuban Missile Crisis. In September 1983 Soviet Airforce Colonel Stanislav Petrov manually overrode a missile launch system that erroneously detected an American attack. Two months later in November 1983 the NATO military exercise Able Archer almost triggered World War III when the Soviets believed it to be a real attack. In 1995 a Norwegian weather missile almost triggered a Russian massive strike on the U.S., which President Yeltsin canceled.
In every instance, nuclear war was prevented by the judgment of individuals where systems had failed. This was possible as adversarial powers recognized the “rules of the game” and created an atmosphere of cooperation to avoid nuclear confrontation amidst other profound disagreements.
That atmosphere is gone, and the next time a Russian alert system goes off we may not have a Colonel Petrov to save us. And it won’t be the ballistic missiles that may be the cause of a massive nuclear disaster.
International law explicitly provides for the immunity of nuclear power plants during war. There are even measures that specifically plan for their safety. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) for instance has promulgated 16 legally binding conventions rand protocols under the international legal framework for nuclear security to prevent, detect and respond to threats to nuclear security within one state. Nevertheless, the international community has proven unable to stymy Russian actions [and Ukrainian] around Chernobyl and the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plants that amount to nuclear blackmail and flagrantly violate these laws.
Enforcing the existing international law is easier said than done. International law presupposes an agreement between state actors, which is sorely lacking today. Calling counter-terrorism instruments into action requires UN approval, created by an ad hoc committee……………..
Being a nuclear state under the non-proliferation treaty Russia is under no obligation to place the Zaporizhzhia plant under IAEA safeguards and given the likelihood that it will not recognize that the plant comes under Ukraine’s comprehensive safeguards agreement, IAEA may find access to the plant completely denied next fall.
This is not just a Russian or Ukrainian problem; this is an emerging structural problem of the international energy security system that will reoccur if nothing is done now……………………………………. The future ubiquity of civilian nuclear power means that currently lacking international frameworks must be overhauled – or civilian nuclear power would be un-investable and too risky.
……………. A false sense of security after the Cold War has dangerously numbed many to the existential threat that nuclear weapons represent, with polls repeatedly showing an alarming lack of concern towards these tools of extinction………………………………………………. more https://www.forbes.com/sites/arielcohen/2022/12/16/ensuring-the-security-of-civilian-nuclear-power/?sh=25e66be71f24
Russia installs sheild over Zaporizhzhia nuclear storage site
A shield is being set up over a storage site for spent nuclear waste at the
Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in southern Ukraine to protect it from
shelling and drones, a Russian-installed official said on Saturday. Video
footage published by Vladimir Rogov, a Russian-appointed official in
Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia province, showed workers mounting a screen of what
appeared to be some kind of transparent sheeting on wires above dozens of
concrete cylinders about 5 metres (16 feet) high.
Reuters 17th Dec 2022
U.S. troops deployed near Russian border
U.S. troops deployed near Russian border –Estonia’s defense ministry has announced the arrival of an American infantry company as part of NATO’s presence in the country | 16 Dec 2022 | A United States infantry company arrived in Estonia this week as part of NATO’s effort to bolster the military bloc’s eastern border with Russia, the Baltic country’s defense ministry has revealed.
A statement published on the ministry’s website on Friday said that U.S. service members are stationed at Taara base in the town of Voru, some 20 kilometers from the Russian border. Commenting on the U.S. service members’ arrival, Colonel Mati Tikerpuu, the commander of the 2nd Infantry Brigade of the Estonian Defense Forces, said he expects to be able to “integrate our allies on a brigade level and gain an additional maneuver unit.” Colonel Richard Ikena, U.S. 1st Infantry Division Artillery Commander, said American troops are “excited to be in Estonia” and “look forward to working shoulder-to-shoulder, alongside our Allies.”
New Delay, Cost Overrun For France’s Next-gen Nuclear Plant
https://www.barrons.com/news/new-delay-cost-overrun-for-france-s-next-gen-nuclear-plant-01671212709 By AFP – Agence France Presse, December 16, 2022
Welding problems will require a further six-month delay for France’s next-generation nuclear reactor at Flamanville, the latest setback for the flagship technology the country hopes to sell worldwide, state-owned electricity group EDF said Friday.
The delay will also add 500 million euros to a project whose total cost is now estimated at around 13 billion euros ($13.8 billion), blowing past the initial projection of 3.3 billion euros when construction began in 2007.
It comes as EDF is already struggling to restart dozens of nuclear reactors taken down for maintenance or safety work that has proved more challenging than originally thought.
EDF also said Friday that one of the two conventional reactors at Flamanville would not be brought back online until February 19 instead of next week as planned, while one at Penly in northwest Farnce would be restarted on March 20 instead of in January.
The French government has warned of potential power shortages this winter because of the shutdowns at around two-dozen of the 56 reactors across the country that normally generate around 70 percent of its electricity needs.
EDF said the latest problems at Flamanville, on the English Channel in Normandy, emerged last summer when engineers discovered that welds in cooling pipes for the new pressurised water reactor, called EPR, were not tolerating extreme heat as expected.
As a result, the new reactor will be start generating power only in mid-2024.
The French-developed European Pressurised Reactor was designed to relaunch nuclear power in Europe after the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe in Russia, and is touted as offering more efficient power output and better safety.
But similar projects at Olkiluoto in Finland, Hinkley Point in Britain and the Taishan plant in China have also suffered production setbacks and delays, raising doubts about the viability of the new technology.
French President Emmanuel Macron said in February that he wants a nuclear “renaissance” that would see up to 14 new reactors in France as the country seeks to reduce use of fossil fuels.
Twice as many people support onshore wind compared to nuclear power, according to UK Government survey.
Renewable energy of all sorts is at
least twice as popular with the British public compared to nuclear power
according to the newly released ‘BEIS Public Opinion Tracker Autumn
2022‘. Solar power was supported or strongly supported by 89% of
respondents, offshore wind by 85% and onshore wind by 79%. This was
compared to only 37% for nuclear power, 25% for fracking and 44% for carbon
capture and storage. The survey recorded that just 29% of people believe
that nuclear energy ‘provides a safe source of energy in the UK’.
100% Renewables 15th Dec 2022
For the Western leaders, Minsk Agreements were designed to buy time for Ukrainians to get ready for conflict with Russia
Former German chancellor Angela Merkel’s astonishing admission vis-a-vis Minsk II, made during an interview with German newspaper Die Zeit recently merely confirms that Putin was played for a fool when he entered negotiations for Minsk II with Germany, France and Ukraine in 2015. Russia entered said negotiations in good faith while the other parties involved did not. Thousands of lives lost and counting seven years on is the result.
Again and again, Ukraine’s future prosperity, security and stability upon becoming independent in 1991 was always dependent on it being a bridge between Russia and the West not the battlefield it became.
Merkel admits Minsk Agreements were designed to buy time for Ukrainians to get ready for conflict with Russia, yet Putin? Medium, John Wight, 13 Dec 22.
Sooner or later people in the West are going to have to wake up to the hard truth that their enemy is not at the gates but within the gates — this in the shape of ruling elites that have driven our world to the brink of destruction economically, ecologically, environmentally, and militarily with their lust for power, hegemony, domination and riches.
Before we go on, though, let us take a moment to deal with the usual ordure that gets shovelled in the direction of those in writing in the West who dare not type the name Putin in a sentence without also including words such as ‘tyrant’, ‘dictator’, ‘monster’ either before or after it — and preferably both. Here it is just as Eduardo Galeano said: “The marketplace of fear requires a steady supply of monsters.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin is a brutal man leading his country through a brutal period in human affairs. But he is not the architect of this brutal period; on the contrary, the Russia he has led since 2000 has been among the most grievous victims of it.
Canadian author and journalist Naomi Klein, in her remarkable work Shock Doctrine, describes how Russia was used as a laboratory by US free market think tanks, gurus and economists, who descended on the country while still reeling from the shock of the implosion of the Soviet system in the early 1990s. Their objective was the establishment of a pure market economy shorn of state intervention, wherein the market would decide who worked and who did not, who could heat themselves and who could not, who ate and who could not — and ultimately who would live and who would not………………………
The primary aim of the free market economic ‘hitmen’ who arrived in Russia in early 1990s was the decimation of every vestige of state involvement in the nation’s economy or economic life. Rather than the arbiter of social justice and guarantor of economic stability, the government was now to be reduced to the role of facilitator and guardian of the interests of international investors, shareholders, speculators, and global corporations.
This process entailed the deregulation of the banking system, the removal of social protections and safety nets, the lifting of price controls and the privatisation of all state owned sectors of the economy, sold off to speculators at a fraction of their true value. The aforementioned reforms were laid down as conditions of post-Soviet Russia’s membership of the IMF, when it applied to join under its first post-Soviet president, Boris Yeltsin, in 1992.
Moscow at this point was on the verge of bankruptcy, burdened with an external debt of $66 billion in the wake of the Soviet’s Union’s dissolution. The creditor nations of the G7 made it a condition of their cooperation in rescheduling the country’s debt that the IMF play a central role as policy advisor, lender and coordinator of assistance. Russia’s sovereignty, in other words, was to be suborned to the diktats of the IMF in Washington…………………………………………
the impact of this economic medicine on Russian society was nothing short of devastating. Most Russians consumed 40 percent less in 1992 after a year of shock therapy than they consumed in 1991, while a third of the population fell below the poverty line……………………
That the country managed to recover from this horrific decade was in large part down to the stewardship of Vladimir Putin. He it was who restored national pride, faced down the oligarchs who’d taken control of the nation’s economy, and reasserted the primacy of the state over that of blind economic forces.
Benefiting from its domination of the European energy market and an extended period of high oil and gas prices, Russia’s economic growth from 1999 — when Putin first became prime minister — to 2008 was exponential……………………..
The Putin so demonised in the West today is the same Putin that broached the possibility of Russia becoming a member of NATO with US President Bill Clinton in 2000. The Putin so demonised in the West today is the same Putin who was the first leader to call US President George W. Bush to express his condolences after 9/11 and offered the use of Russian airbases in Central Asia for US airstrikes against Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan, staged in response.
That Putin is now to all intents engaged in conflict against the West in Ukraine marks an abject failure not of Russian but Western foreign policy in the wake of the demise of the Soviet Union.
Former German chancellor Angela Merkel’s astonishing admission vis-a-vis Minsk II, made during an interview with German newspaper Die Zeit recently merely confirms that Putin was played for a fool when he entered negotiations for Minsk II with Germany, France and Ukraine in 2015. Russia entered said negotiations in good faith while the other parties involved did not. Thousands of lives lost and counting seven years on is the result.
Again and again, Ukraine’s future prosperity, security and stability upon becoming independent in 1991 was always dependent on it being a bridge between Russia and the West not the battlefield it became.
In the words of Professor John J. Mearsheimer:
U.S. and European leaders blundered in attempting to turn Ukraine into a Western stronghold on Russia’s border. Now that the consequences have been laid bare, it would be an even greater mistake to continue this misbegotten policy. https://johnwight1.medium.com/merkel-admits-minsk-ii-was-designed-to-buy-time-for-the-ukrainians-to-get-ready-for-conflict-with-504191f7872d
Can France rely on its nuclear fleet for a low-carbon 2050?
Map above refers to 2016 – many of the nuclear plants above are not currently in operation
Nuclear Engineering International, 14 Dec 22,
EDF has not shown its 900 MW units can be operated that far ahead, says ASN’s annual assessment of nuclear safety in France. Decisions have to be taken soon if nuclear is to play a big part in 2050 – and a ‘Marshall Plan’ is needed to rebuild the industry’s capability
France may have to go back to the drawing board with regard to options for decarbonising its economy, because assumptions it has made on the lifetime of the 900 MW reactors in its nuclear fleet may be unwarranted.
That was the warning in French nuclear safety authority ASN’s annual report on safety in the country’s nuclear industries.
The annual “ASN report on the state of nuclear safety and radiation protection in France in 2021”, published earlier this year, warned of “new energy policy prospects which must address safety concerns at once”. And it reminded operators that “quality and rigour in the design, manufacture and oversight of nuclear facilities, which were not up to the required level in the latest major nuclear projects conducted in France, constitute the first level of Defence in Depth in terms of safety.”
ASN noted that five of the six scenarios presented in a report by French system operator Re´seau de Transport d’Electricite´ (RTE) report on “Energies of the future”, which aims to achieve a decarbonised economy by 2050, are based on continued operation of the existing nuclear fleet. But with regard to the 900 MW fleet, ASN says, it cannot say that those plants can be operated beyond 50 years, based on information it received during the generic examination of the fourth periodic safety review of that reactor series. It added, “Due to the specific features of some reactors, it might not be possible, with the current methods, to demonstrate their ability to operate up to 60 years”.
EDF has 32 operating 900 MWe reactors commissioned between 1978 and 1987 and they are reaching their fourth periodic safety review. This safety review has “particular challenges”, ASN says. In particular:
Some items of equipment are reaching their design-basis lifetime……………………
Too optimistic on new-build?
The safety authority also noted that one RTE scenario had almost 50% nuclear in its electricity mix in 2050. It said, consultation with industry revealed that the rate of construction of new nuclear reactors in order to achieve such a level would be hard to sustain……………………………………
Broad concerns
More broadly, ASN said whatever France’s energy policy, it will “imply a considerable industrial effort, in order to tackle the industrial and safety challenges.
If nuclear power is needed for 2050, the nuclear sector will have to implement a ‘Marshall Plan’ to make it industrially sustainable and have the skills it needs.
It warned that “Quality and rigour in the design, manufacture and oversight of nuclear facilities… were not up to the required level in the latest major nuclear projects conducted in France”.
It also warned that more work was also needed in fuel chain facilities. It said a series of events “is currently weakening the entire fuel cycle chain and is a major strategic concern for ASN requiring particularly close attention”. Most urgent is a build-up of radioactive materials and delays in construction of a centralised spent fuel storage pool planned by EDF to address the risk of saturation of the existing pools by 2030. The need for the pool was identified back in 2010, but work has not begun.
ASN said the combination of shortcomings between fuel cycle and nuclear plants meant the electricity system “faces an unprecedented two-fold vulnerability in availability”. New vulnerabilities like the discovery of stress corrosion cracking mostly “stem from the lack of margins and inadequate anticipation,” ASN said, and “must serve as lessons for the entire nuclear sector and the public authorities.”……………….
An energy policy comprising a long-term nuclear component “must be accompanied by an exemplary policy for the management of waste and legacy nuclear facilities,” ASN said………………………………….. more https://www.neimagazine.com/features/featurecan-france-rely-on-its-nuclear-fleet-for-a-low-carbon-2050-10436984/
For Heaven’s Sake – Examining the UK’s Militarisation of Space
December 13, 2022, By Dr. David Webb of the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
I have been working on behalf of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND) with Peter Burt from Dronewars UK on a new joint publication called “For Heaven’s Sake: Examining the UK’s Militarisation of Space”. It was launched in June and looks at the UK’s emerging military space programme and considers the governance, environmental, and ethical issues involved.
The UK’s space programme began in 1952 and the first UK satellite, Ariel 1, was launched in 1962. Black Arrow, a British rocket for launching satellites, was developed during the 1960s and was used for four launches from the Woomera Range Complexin Australia between 1969 and 1971. The final launch was to launch Prospero, the only British satellite to be placed in orbit using a UK rocket in 1971, although the government had by then cancelled the UK space programme. Blue Streak, the UK ballistic missile programme, had been cancelled in 1960andspace projects were considered too expensive to continue. 50 years on and things have changed.
Space is now big business – the commercial space sector has expanded and the cost of launches has decreased. The UK is now treating space as an area of serious interest. The government has also recognised that space is now crucial for military operations. So, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) now has a Space Directorate, which works closely with the UK Space Agency and is responsible for the military space policy and international coordination. UK Space Command, established in April 2021 ,is in charge of the military space programme and is closely linked with US Space Command and US Space Force. While the UK typically frames military developments as being for defensive purposes, they are also capable of offensive use………………………………………………………..
Although many of these launches may be for commercial companies, space use has evolved into a fuzzy military/commercial collaboration and Alexandra Stickings, a space policy and security analyst at the Royal United Services Institute in London, believes that the Shetland and Sutherland spaceports will need military contracts to be viable. She said “I am of the opinion that the proposed spaceports would need the MoD as a customer to survive as well as securing contracts with companies such as Lockheed” and the military will want to diversify their launch capabilities“so the Scottish locations could provide an option for certain future missions.” She also warned that: “There is also a possibility that if these sites become a reality, there will be pressure on the MoD to support them even if the cost is more than other providers.”………………………………..
Although many of these launches may be for commercial companies, space use has evolved into a fuzzy military/commercial collaboration and Alexandra Stickings, a space policy and security analyst at the Royal United Services Institute in London, believes that the Shetland and Sutherland spaceports will need military contracts to be viable. She said
“I am of the opinion that the proposed spaceports would need the MoD as a customer to survive as well as securing contracts with companies such as Lockheed” and the military will want to diversify their launch capabilities“so the Scottish locations could provide an option for certain future missions.” She also warned that: “There is also a possibility that if these sites become a reality, there will be pressure on the MoD to support them even if the cost is more than other providers.”…………………….
…………………… https://safetechinternational.org/for-heavens-sake-examining-the-uks-militarisation-of-space/
Paul Dorfman: Nuclear power is just a slow and expensive distraction.
Despite recent breakthroughs in nuclear fusion, renewables remain the most
important technology for reaching net zero. “Fissile fuel” is back –
or so say the UK’s policy teams and press.
Rishi Sunak and Emmanuel
Macron are about to strike a deal on nuclear cooperation, and recent
editorials across national newspapers all reckon everything in the garden
is nuclear. Where, however, is the evidence for its efficacy?
The British and French governments can sign any deal they like – if key financial
investors don’t take up the remaining 60 per cent of construction costs,
the planned Sizewell C plant in Suffolk is going nowhere. The omens
aren’t good.
Recently Sir Nigel Wilson, group CEO of Legal & General, one
of the UK’s largest real assets firms, told BBC Radio Four: “We are not
big fans of Sizewell C.” Sir David King, the UK’s former chief
scientific adviser and a long-standing nuclear supporter, told LBC that the
plant would be “very difficult to protect from flooding” due to rising
sea levels on the Suffolk coast.
New Statesman 13th Dec 2022
Opinion is split on UK government plan for new nuclear and hydrogen projects
Ministers are considering requiring that all new domestic boilers be
“hydrogen-ready” from 2026, as they announced £100m for nuclear and
hydrogen projects. The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial
Strategy (BEIS) has launched a consultation on improving boiler standards,
and has argued there is a strong case for introducing hydrogen-ready
boilers in the UK from 2026.
The government is examining options to replace
polluting fossil fuel gas in Britain’s energy system and has offered
grants for households to install heat pumps. A ban on gas boilers in new
homes comes into force in 2025, although uncertainty remains over the
timeframe for the phase-out of fossil gas in existing homes.
While hydrogen
is expected to play a significant role in the decarbonisation of heavy
industry and the transport network, opinion is split on the practicality of
using it in Britain’s gas network and the resulting cost to households.
Plans for a pilot to examine the effectiveness of using hydrogen have met
local opposition in Whitby, outside Ellesmere Port, where residents have
expressed concerns over becoming “lab rats”. The consultation, which
closes in late March, will also examine the cost of hydrogen-ready boilers.
“The government needs confidence that consumers will not face a premium
for their purchase,” it said.
Guardian 13th Dec 2022
A Tale of Two Nuclear Plants Reveals Europe’s Energy Divide
An upgraded power plant in Slovakia has angered neighboring Austria and fueled the debate over nuclear power and independence from Russian gas.
Wired, MORGAN MEAKER, DEC 13, 2022
……………………………………….. Europe remains deeply divided on the use of nuclear power. Of the European Union’s 27 member states, 13 generate nuclear power, while 14 do not. “It’s still a very national debate,” says Bunsen. That means public attitudes can drastically change from one side of a border to the other. Surveys show that 60 percent of Slovakians believe nuclear power is safe, while 70 percent of their neighbors in Austria are against it being used at all—the country has no active nuclear plants.
……… workers are preparing a new reactor—where nuclear fission will take place—for launch in early 2023.
………….. Europe remains deeply divided on the use of nuclear power. Of the European Union’s 27 member states, 13 generate nuclear power, while 14 do not. “It’s still a very national debate,” says Bunsen. That means public attitudes can drastically change from one side of a border to the other. Surveys show that 60 percent of Slovakians believe nuclear power is safe, while 70 percent of their neighbors in Austria are against it being used at all—the country has no active nuclear plants.
For the two neighbors, Mochovce has become a focal point in the debate over how Europe should transition away from fossil fuels. To supporters in Slovakia, Mochovce’s expansion—the launch of Unit Three is expected to be followed two years later by Unit Four—demonstrates how even a small country can become an energy heavyweight. Unit Three will make Slovakia the second-largest producer of nuclear power in the EU, after France. But neighboring Austrians cannot ignore what they consider to be the drawbacks: the mammoth costs associated with building or improving aging facilities, the problems associated with disposing of nuclear waste, and the sector’s reliance on Moscow for uranium, the fuel which powers the reactor. Last year, the EU imported one fifth of its uranium from Russia.
For years, politicians and activists in Austria have also alleged that Mochovce is not safe, with local newspapers using maps to illustrate how close Mochovce is to Vienna: just 150 kilometers. “It’s a Soviet design from the 1980s, without a proper containment,” claims Reinhard Uhrig, an antinuclear campaigner with Austrian environmental group GLOBAL 2000. The containment is one of a series of safety systems that prevents radioactive material being released into the environment in case of an accident. “Apart from these inherent design problems, there have been major issues with the quality control of the works,” he says, describing nuclear power as a dangerous distraction from real solutions to the climate crisis.
Concerns in Austria about Mochovce’s safety were exacerbated by Mario Zadra, an engineer turned whistleblower who worked on Mochovce units Three and Four between 2009 and 2018. Zadra alleges the plant’s emergency diesel generators were suffering serious technical issues and cooling towers fundamental for safety were built with the wrong material. “Other components important for safety, like the main steam isolation valves, were in a shameful condition,” says Zadra, whose video and photo evidence have been verified by GLOBAL 2000. Since Zadra and other whistleblowers went public in 2018, Mochovce has been accused of corruption, raided by police, and inspected by the International Atomic Energy Agency. “I’m sure things have improved since the inspections,” Zadra says, but he still doesn’t believe the plant is safe due to what he calls the company’s “poor safety culture.”
………………………………….. Long-term, Austria is aiming to run 100 percent on renewables by 2030. Wind, solar, and hydro power currently account for 77 percent of the country’s power generation.
Austria is now agitating to spread its antinuclear message on an EU level. Officials have criticized nuclear power plants not just in Slovakia, but also in other neighboring countries, including the Czech Republic and Hungary. On New Year’s Eve 2021, the European Commission released a proposal which defined nuclear as well as natural gas as “green investments.” In response, Austria launched a legal challenge, calling for the inclusion of the two energy sources to be annulled. “Neither nuclear energy nor fossil gas are green investments,” says Gewesseler.
Zwentendorf and Mochovce demonstrate the extremes of Europe’s nuclear power debate. But between those extremes, it’s messy. The EU might have agreed to become the first climate-neutral continent by 2050, but consensus on how that will happen remains elusive. Weish, the Austrian scientist, believes there’s a lot more debating to be done. “The EU needs to have the debate Austria had back in the 1970s,” he says. https://www.wired.com/story/nuclear-energy-europe/
Hungary’s risky bet on Russia’s nuclear power
By Nick Thorpe, BBC News, Hungary, 15 Dec 22,
“If this new power plant is built,”, says Janos, a tall, friendly nuclear engineer who works in Reactor block 2 of the existing nuclear power station at Paks, “it will be good for the town, and good for the country.”
It’s a big if.
Despite the Hungarian government’s unswerving commitment to the Paks 2 project, despite the Russian commitment to supply the finance and technology, the Russian war in Ukraine is making the new power station less likely by the day.
It is the biggest single investment in Hungarian history.
The government claims it will make the country less dependent on Russia, from which Hungary gets most of its oil and gas. Critics say it will make Hungary even more dependent on Russia for much of this century.
Paks 1 nuclear power station, on the shore of the Danube and an hour’s drive south of Budapest, was built by the Soviet Union in the 1980s, and its four reactors still supply around 40% of Hungary’s electricity needs.
Their working life is due to end in the 2030s. In 2014, Prime Minster Viktor Orban signed a deal with Russian President Vladimir Putin to build two new 1,200 MW reactors beside the old ones.
Russia will finance the plant with a €10bn loan, which Hungarian consumers should pay back in their electricity bills, starting in 2026, when the plant was due to come on line.
Years of delays with permits meant that ground-clearing work at the site only began last August.
While Hungary has pressed ahead with Paks 2, last May Finland cancelled a similar, Russian-built plant on the Hanhikivi peninsula in mid-construction, because of the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The war in Ukraine is now hanging like a dark cloud over the Paks project, too.
Fighting in the early days of the war around Ukraine’s former nuclear plant at Chernobyl and artillery duels around the Zaporizhzhia plant, the biggest in Europe, have harmed the project.
Even those who believe in Paks 2 with an almost religious zeal sound worried.
“Isolation of Russia is not a solution, even in this war situation,” says Attila Aszodi, former government commissioner for Paks 2.
Died-in-the-wool opponents such as former Green MEP Benedek Javor are more blunt.
“Paks 2 is a purely political project,” he says, pointing to close relations established by Viktor Orban with Russian Vladimir Putin since 2009.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Hungarian leader has pushed back repeatedly against EU sanctions on Russia and its officials have maintained close diplomatic ties with Moscow.
“From an energy perspective it’s not necessary to build [Paks 2], and it’s definitely not necessary to build it with the Russians,” says Mr Javor.
Died-in-the-wool opponents such as former Green MEP Benedek Javor are more blunt.
“Paks 2 is a purely political project,” he says, pointing to close relations established by Viktor Orban with Russian Vladimir Putin since 2009.
Since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Hungarian leader has pushed back repeatedly against EU sanctions on Russia and its officials have maintained close diplomatic ties with Moscow.
“From an energy perspective it’s not necessary to build [Paks 2], and it’s definitely not necessary to build it with the Russians,” says Mr Javor.
He argues the money would be better spent on renewables like solar, from which Hungary already gets 10% of its energy, and improving the electricity grid.
This autumn, the government abruptly ended subsidies for households installing solar panels, because the grid could not cope with the new inputs.
The Fidesz government has also made wind power practically impossible, by banning the construction of turbines within 10km (6.2 miles) of a settlement.
“We might arrive at a point where Paks 2 cannot be constructed but there is no alternative,” says Mr Javor. “Then Hungary will have a serious problem with the security of supply.”
The list of complications from the war in Ukraine is long.
Many major components of the plant are supposed to be built in Russia, and transported overland.
The original plan was to bring them through Ukraine and there are no obvious alternative routes.
Several thousand welders are supposed to be employed.
Back in 2014, everyone I asked said Ukrainian welders would be found. And the plant is not simply a Russian one.
Under EU pressure, it is now a hybrid, using Russian hardware and a control system to be built by the Siemens-led, French-German consortium Framatome.
The turbines are supposed to be built by GE Hungary, a subsidiary of US firm General Electric. It is hard to imagine US, German and French engineers working shoulder to shoulder with their Russian comrades, 400 km from the border of a country the Russians shell day and night.
There are other question marks, too. How will Russia supply nuclear fuel? How will Hungary send highly radioactive used fuel elements back to Russia?
And will the EU eventually extend sanctions to nuclear technology and employees of Russian state nuclear firm Rosatom?……………………. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-63964744
Safety of Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant hangs in the balance
Guardian, Julian Borger 13 Dec 22,
Shelling near the six-reactor facility plus a shortage of workers and uncertain backup power could be making it the most dangerous place on Earth…….
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant’s silhouette – with its two fat cooling towers and the row of six squat blocks – has become globally familiar since it was dubbed the most dangerous place on Earth: six nuclear reactors on the frontline of a catastrophic war.
On a fairly typical night last week, the Russians on the left bank of the river fired 40 shells and rockets into Nikopol, a town on the Ukrainian-held right bank, falling on its rows of krushchevky, five-storey blocks of flats built for factory workers in the 1960s and named after the Soviet leader of the time.
After 10 months of war, the blocks are half empty, so there are fewer people to kill. The only reported casualty on this particular night was a 65-year-old man who was taken to hospital, and whose flat now afforded such a comprehensive view of the power plant.
By the next morning, the repairs had already begun. An electrician restored power to the rest of the building, and two men were in the remains of the apartment itself, sweeping up and putting chipboard in place of absent walls.
There were four loud bangs as the Ukrainian army guns on the nearby riverbank opened fire on Russian positions and, a few minutes later, Nikopol’s air sirens sounded in anticipation of a Russian response, though none was forthcoming that morning.
The basements of the krushchevky have been turned into shelters with beds and school desks but most of the remaining population are so inured to bombardment, they just carry on with their day.
The Ukrainians insist they are extremely careful about what they shoot at, even when they receive fire from the vicinity of the Zaporizhzhia plant. On Thursday, the Ukrainian nuclear power company, Energoatom, accused Russia of bringing Grad multiple launch rocket systems near reactor number 6, which is near the area of where spent nuclear fuel is kept. The likely aim, Energoatom alleged, was to shell Nikopol and the nearby town of Marzanets, using their position as cover.
The walls of the reactors are thick enough to withstand artillery fire, but a direct hit on the spent fuel containers could well lead to the release of radioactive material into the atmosphere. Since seizing control of the power station in March, the Russians have begun building a concrete shelter over the spent fuel, but Ukrainian officials say it is being done without following the normal international safety protocols.
Earlier in the week, Russia’s defence minister, Sergei Shoigu, accused Ukraine of “nuclear terrorism”, saying its armed forces had fired 33 large calibre shells at the Zaporizhzhia plant over the previous two weeks. The most recent report from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which has four inspectors at the Russian-occupied site, said last Friday there had been no shelling of the plant since 20 November, although artillery fire had landed in the vicinity………………………………………..
It was not possible to verify Kotin and Orlov’s accounts of the shelling, or the counter-claims from Moscow. Satellite imagery however, has confirmed that the Russian army is storing military equipment inside the plant.
The IAEA inspectors on site could theoretically determine the trajectory of incoming rockets or shells but such detective work is not within their mandate. The agency is negotiating the creation of a security no-fire zone around the reactors, but Kyiv is insisting Russia must first withdraw all its weapons and armour from the power station, something Moscow has not so far agreed to.
Meanwhile there is a parallel safety threat from within the plant itself: the steady attrition of its workforce over the 10 months of the conflict. Many key workers have left because of the danger to their families or because they refused to work for the Russians. Of the 11,000-strong workforce before the full-scale invasion, just 4,000 are left. In an attempt to stop the exodus, the Russians have circulated lists of plant staff to all military checkpoints in the region with orders they are not be allowed to leave, but it has been too late to stop a major outflow.
“In some cases, there’s only three people to cover a seven or eight-person shift,” Orlov said. “People don’t have enough rest. It causes exhaustion.”
Operating under armed occupation adds to the stress. The workers still at the plant are under constant pressure to sign contracts with Rosatom, the Russian energy company, signifying acceptance of Moscow’s control.
Melynchuk said there were just enough staff left to maintain the plant in its current state of suspended animation, with all the reactors shut down, and two of them deliberately kept hot, to provide heating for Enerhodar.
But keeping reactors in this hot standby mode is a difficult and delicate process, adding to the burden on the operators. The situation could get worse still. The Zaporizhzhia plant is currently connected to the Ukrainian grid, but there have been times the transmission lines have been brought down by shelling, forcing the power station to fall back on diesel generators to keep the cooling system running and prevent the reactor vessel from meltdown.
If the connection to the grid was severed again, it would add to the pressure on the overstretched workforce and on the generators, which were only designed as a temporary backup. They will need maintenance and no one knows how much diesel fuel the plant has left. Once the diesel generators failed, meltdown would begin in a matter of hours……… https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/dec/12/safety-of-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-plant-hangs-in-the-balance
UK government ‘s announcement was NOT yet a funding decision for Sizewell C nuclear, just an exclusion of China from the project
Steve Thomas: The UK government’s announcement of November 29, 2022 on
funding the Sizewell C nuclear power project was widely reported as a
decision to invest in the plant and to complete the exit of China General
Nuclear (CGN) from the project.3
However, close examination of the press
releases by the Government4 and by EDF5 suggest it was no more than the
long-anticipated buying out of China General Nuclear from the project and
funds to allow the development of the project to the point of a Final
Investment Decision (FID).
The budget set up by EDF and CGN to fund this
phase of the project appears to be spent and new funds were needed if the
project was not to stall. Nevertheless, this announcement has important
implications not only for the Sizewell C project but also for the Hinkley
Point C and Bradwell B projects and for the nuclear stations expected to
follow Sizewell C.
Stop Sizewell C 12th Dec 2022
1 This Month
of the week– Nuclear Reactor Information Task Force
14 May – online event From Bombs to Data Centres: the Face of Nuclear Colonialism
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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