Sign up to the UN ban on nuclear weapons https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/19/sign-up-to-the-un-ban-on-nuclear-weapons The Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament calls on the British government to support a historic treaty Around the world there are growing fears about the prospect of a nuclear war. The US-North Korea nuclear crisis is a terrifying reminder of the dangers of nuclear weapons and a powerful, yet unwelcome, riposte to the nuclear states who have long argued that these weapons of mass destruction deter war. But there is an alternative. The overwhelming majority of states want abolition of all nuclear weapons and have taken matters into their own hands. A legally binding nuclear weapons ban treaty has been agreed by 122 states at the UN, the culmination of decades of global civil society campaigning.
That treaty opens for signature today, and more than 100 states are set to sign this ground-breaking document. This is an open invitation from the majority of the world’s states to all countries to sign up and work to make the abolition of nuclear weapons a reality. Our government says it is committed to the same aim, yet it boycotted the talks that produced the treaty and insists the UK will never sign. But the opportunity is there; the UK must seize it and work to make a success of it. The alternative is spiralling nuclear proliferation, massively increased danger and inevitable annihilation. For all our futures, we urge Theresa May to sign the treaty. Caroline Lucas MP Chair Parliamentary CND, Malcolm McMahon Archbishop of Liverpool, Kelvin Hopkins MP, Mark SerwotkaPCS union, Stephen Cottrell Bishop of Chelmsford, Mohammed KozbarMuslim Association of Britain, Tommy Sheppard MP, Hywel Williams MP, Kate Hudson CND general secretary, Jill BakerMethodist Church in Britain, Juliet Prager Quakers in Britain, Ronnie Cowan MP
Most Britons would not be happy living near the mini nuclear power stations
that Rolls-Royce and several other international companies want to build in
the UK, a survey has found. The government has promised the developers of
small modular reactors a slice of a £250m funding pot in a race to
position the UK as the place where the first generation of the power
stations should be built.
Polling by YouGov, however, believed to be the
first survey of public attitudes towards the plants, found that 62% of
people would be unhappy living within five miles of one. The poll,
commissioned by the climate change charity 10:10, found that only 24% would
be unhappy living near an onshore windfarm, which the Conservative party
has stymied with tougher planning rules.
The figure fell to 17% for community-owned windfarms. Ellie Roberts, a campaigner at 10:10, said:
“These results show just how wildly out of step with public opinion UK
energy policy has become.” Most small modular reactors (SMRs) would
generate less than a tenth of the power the projected Hinkley Point C will
provide, but are backed by industry as a cheaper option to big nuclear
plants and an opportunity for British firms to be first in a new
technology.
Harry Holt, the president of nuclear at Rolls-Royce, said:
“With demand for energy set to rise in the near future, in part due to
the growing popularity of electric cars, we believe that a UK SMR programme
is a vital addition to our national infrastructure.”
Holy See ratifies treaty on the prohibition of nuclear arms, (Vatican Radio) 21 Sept 17, The Holy See on Thursday became one of the first entities to sign and ratify a new treaty prohibiting nuclear weapons. The treaty was signed by Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, Secretary for Relations with States, for the Holy See, and in the name of and on behalf of Vatican City State.
More than 40 countries signed the treaty during a high level signing ceremony at the United Nations Headquarters in New York. Along with the Holy See, Thailand also ratified the treaty. More nations are expected to sign in coming days, with the treaty set to go into effect 90 days after it has been ratified by at least 50 nations…….http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2017/09/21/holy_see_ratifies_treaty_on_the_prohibition_of_nuclear_arms/1338124
Nuclear is not the way to a clean energy future, Guardian, Emeritus Professor Sue Roaf, Oxford 21 Sept 17 In Agneta Rising’s defence of nuclear generation (Letters, 19 September), she claims that nuclear plants have to occasionally stop for repair and maintenance. But jellyfish also get into seawater inlets, as at Torness in 2011, causing week-long shutdowns. Seaweed can block inlets shutting reactors, and operator incompetence shuts reactors and compromises radioactive cores. Torness was even narrowly missed by a crashing RAF Tornado jet. Most worrying are not such transient manageable events but risks of systematic flooding of nuclear sites.
Nine UK plants are assessed by Defra as currently vulnerable to coastal flooding (Report, 7 March 2012), including all eight proposed new UK nuclear sites and numerous radioactive waste stores, operating reactors and defunct nuclear facilities. EDF claims on its website that “to protect the Hinkley Point C station from such events, the platform level of the site is set at 14 metres above sea level, behind a sea wall with a crest level of 13.5 metres”. Hurricane Katrina in 2005 produced a maximum storm surge of 8.5 metres. It is predicted that sea levels may rise by a metre by 2100. The UK government cannot actually have believed in climate change or surely they would not put future generations at such risk? I bet they believe in it now. The question is: do they care? Is it really too late to stop a retrograde, potentially catastrophic and already unaffordable UK nuclear future? https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/20/nuclear-is-not-the-way-to-a-clean-energy-future
Energy Voice 18th Sept 2017, A plane carrying weapons-grade nuclear waste to the US left the Highlands
the day after the UK’s terror threat level was raised to “critical”.
Armed police and anti-terrorism specialists stood guard at Wick John
O’Groats Airport as the enriched uranium was loaded onto a US Air Force
C-17 Globemaster transporter jet.
But last night opponents slammed the decision to go ahead with the flight on Saturday, just a day after the
London tube bomb attack. Highlands and Islands MSP (Green) John Finnie
said: “Every avenue should have been considered, including the current
threat level, and it would have been appropriate to set that flight aside.
It is the third such flight under a deal agreed between the UK and US
governments to transfer nuclear material in exchange for a medical grade
uranium from the US used to diagnose cancer. The plane firstly travelled to
RAF Lossiemouth on Saturday – before heading for a nuclear facility in
Tennessee – as the runway at Wick is 1,712ft too short for a fully
fuelled Globemaster to get airborne. Wick’s runway was strengthened, but
not lengthened in preparation for the flights in an £8million upgrade. Up
to 10 more flights are expected in the future as the decommissioning at
Dounreay continues.
Mr Finnie added that terrorists would be seeking
“prestigious targets” such as these flights and that the consequences
of a disaster would be “unthinkable”. Tor Justad, chairman of Highlands
Against Nuclear Transport (HANT), said: “I think everyone is aware of the
heightened security and it does not seem to be an appropriate time to be
adding to the risks when these risks are avoidable. There is no reason why
this flight had to happen on Saturday, just after the third terrorist
incident in London in a few months.” https://www.energyvoice.com/otherenergy/nuclear/150794/nuclear-waste-flight-takes-off-despite-attack
Russian-built nuclear plant revives Chernobyl fears, Power station taking shape on Belarus border feeds anxiety in Lithuania and beyond, Ft.com by Richard Milne in Buivydziai and Vilnius and Henry Foy in Ostrovets, 20 Sept 17 Buivydziai is a typical Lithuanian village. A sleepy place with fewer than 300 inhabitants, it has a church, a couple of shops and a school that takes in children from the surrounding countryside. But three years ago, a new neighbour began to take shape. Looming on the horizon just 20km away are the massive cooling towers of a nuclear power station being built near the small Belarusian town of Ostrovets. In a region still scarred by the complex legacy of the Soviet Union and the devastating human consequences of the Chernobyl disaster three decades ago, Belarus’ decision to build a Russian-financed power station on its border with the EU has become a source of deep anxiety. In Buivydziai, Zenobija Mikelevic, the school’s deputy head, says unease about the power plant and changing demographics have already taken their toll, with some families packing up and leaving. “Every year, our school gets fewer and fewer children. I’m a mother of three and my children don’t want to live here,” she says.
Even before the plant is scheduled to open in 2019, the village is preparing for the worst. A small blue triangular sign on a wall outside the school marks the muster point if there is a serious incident. The cellar contains a makeshift shelter to be used by the teachers and 130 children, aged six-18, as they wait to be evacuated. Ana Gricevic, a theology teacher and mother of three who lives in a neighbouring village, says: “My generation [lived through] Chernobyl’s consequences. We saw the birth defects, people dying . . . It’s what I think with Ostrovets: my children might be in danger.” The plant has become a fierce and emotional battleground on the eastern edge of Europe, a region riddled with divisions and suspicion between those inside and outside the EU. It comes at a time of increasing friction between the Brussels-led bloc and Nato allies on the one hand, and Russia and its friends on the other.
Anxiety about the Ostrovets plant is all-encompassing in Lithuania, where the government deems it a threat to national security, public health and the environment. Assertions from Belarus that the facility will be one of the safest in the world cut little ice. The project has fed deep geopolitical fears in Lithuania, a country of fewer than 3m people that in 1990 became the first republic to declare independence from the crumbling Soviet Union. The plant is financed by a $10bn loan from Moscow, and is being designed and built by Rosatom, Russia’s state-owned nuclear power monopoly……….
Across the border in Belarus, the Ostrovets plant is viewed as a source of national pride and a guarantor of energy security. Minsk, which says the facility will use the most sophisticated technology available, rejects Lithuania’s allegations that it has broken international rules and hushed up accidents throughout construction..
………The spectre of Chernobyl, the worst nuclear accident in history, is ever present. The 1986 disaster struck in neighbouring Ukraine but the wind meant that 70 per cent of the nuclear fallout landed on Belarus. The effects were worsened by the secrecy of the Soviets, who did not organise an evacuation of the nearest city — just 3km away — until 36 hours after the blast………https://www.ft.com/content/a98322de-96f7-11e7-b83c-9588e51488a0
The Japanese conglomerate is on the hunt for a project partner to safeguard Europe’s largest planned new nuclear plant after France’s Engie abandoned its support of the venture in the wake of Toshiba’s spiralling financial woes.
China General Nuclear (CGN) confirmed that it is in the running to shore up the 3.8GW project in exchange for an equity share, in a move which would also deepen its stake in the UK’s nuclear ambitions. “We are willing to utilise our experience in nuclear design, construction and operation for more than 30 years to support the development of Britain’s nuclear industry,” CGN confirmed in a statement to Reuters.
The South Korean state-backed utility has harboured an interest in Moorside since 2013, but said it would want to use its own nuclear design rather than one made by Toshiba’s Westinghouse nuclear business.
Westinghouse plunged into Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the US earlier this year after amassing losses of $9bn (£6.6bn) for Toshiba due to a string of struggling US projects.The deal would hand CGN access to a fourth nuclear project in the UK. It has already teamed up with EDF Energy to finance a third of the Hinkley Point C project and a fifth of its Sizewell B nuclear plans.
In the future CGN also plans to lead the plans to build the Bradwell C nuclear plant in Essex with a 66pc stake in the venture.
At Moorside CGN is also likely to want to use its own reactor design, in order to prove its mettle to other prospective new markets. However, it will take at least four years before CGN’s reactor design could be approved by the nuclear authority for use in the UK.
A lengthy approval process would also be required of a Kepco reactor design which could derail the 2025 startdate by at least two years in a further blow to the UK’s new nuclear ambitions.
EDF admitted earlier this year that the start-up date for Hinkley Point C is likely to be two years later than first thought at 2027 and pile a further €1bn (£870m) to €3bn euros on to the construction costs of the £18bn project.
The delays to new nuclear projects raises questions over the UK’s energy supplies in the middle of the next decade. More than two thirds of the country’s power generation capacity will have retired between 2010 and 2030.
Theresa May under growing pressure to sign UN anti-nuclear treaty
Campaigners urge the Prime Minister to back global treaty calling for the total ban of nuclear weapons, Inde[endent Lizzy Buchan Political Correspondent, 17 Sept 17 Pressure is mounting on Theresa May to sign up to a UN treaty calling for the eventual elimination of nuclear weapons.
More than 120 nations endorsed the global treaty at a summit in July, which warns that a complete ban is the only way to prevent the “catastrophic humanitarian consequences” of the use of nuclear weapons.
Britain and other nuclear nations opposed the move, but critics have called on the Prime Minister to change course this week when the treaty will be opened for signatures at the UN’s annual general assembly.It comes amid escalating tensions between the US and North Korea, after a string of nuclear tests from the pariah state and war-like rhetoric from Donald Trump.
Anti-nuclear campaigners called on Britain to take the lead on disarmament, or risk offering a “blank cheque” to other nations seeking to boost their nuclear arsenal.
The UK and other nuclear powers support a non-proliferaton treaty, which prevents the spread of nuclear weapons – but the pact has previously attracted criticism for being ineffective.
Green Party co-leader Caroline Lucas said the Government had “utterly failed” in its commitment to nuclear disarmament, and urged the Prime Minister to back the UN treaty, in which signatories agree not to develop, test, buy or possess nuclear weapons………
Andrew Smith, of the Campaign Against Arms Trade, said: “For far too long, UK foreign policy has been guided by an unbending commitment to militarism and interventionism. Trident has been right at the heart of it.
“Despite this, there is a growing international consensus against nuclear weapons.
“It’s time for Trident-owning countries like the UK to take a lead, and take a crucial step towards a nuclear-free world.
“To continue doing otherwise will only provide an excuse and a blank cheque for every other country that seeks nuclear proliferation.”
Beware nuclear industry’s fake news on being emissions free David Lowry on nuclear not being zero-carbon technology Guardian, 18 Sept 17Your incisive editorial makes many strong points, not least highlighting the exigencies of potential security compromises and terrorism vulnerabilities of the planned new nuclear reactor at Hinkley Point. But there is a fatal flaw in the argument you set out. The editorial asserts: “Nuclear power has a trump card: it is a zero-carbon technology which delivers a continuous, uninterrupted supply.”
This is demonstrably untrue. On the latter point, you only have to consult the published operating record of reactors to see this is an unsustainable claim. All reactors have lengthy planned outages (shutdowns) for operational reasons; some have significant unplanned outages due to operational failures; and in the extreme case of post-accident safety prudence, such as in Japan, their 54 reactors were all closed for years after the 2011 Fukushima disaster – and became hugely expensive “stranded assets”.
On alleged zero-carbon status of nuclear plants, you repeat a similarly erroneous assertion made in your editorial of 1 October 2005 (Pre-empting debate), where you wrote: “The big advantage of nuclear generation is that it does not produce environmentally degrading emissions in the way that fossil fuel generation does.”
You printed my response to this assertion (There is nothing green about Blair’s nuclear dream, 20 October 2005) in which I set out the various ways the carbon footprint of nuclear power is substantial, if the whole “cradle-to-grave” nuclear fuel chain (uranium mining, milling, enrichment, fuel production, in-reactor fuel irradiation, storage and final long-term management) is properly calculated. I pointed out that the nuclear industry’s proponents, such as those gathered at last week’s World Nuclear Association jamboree in London, are fond of spreading fake news such as describing nuclear energy as “non-carbon emitting”. It is about time this dangerous falsehood was confined to the dustbin of history. Dr David Lowry Senior research fellow, Institute for Resource and Security Studies, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/17/beware-nuclear-industrys-fake-news-on-being-emissions-free
Nuclear power plants may not keep Britain’s lights on, say Lib Dems
Party raises concerns over nuclear costs as Vince Cable says record low wind power prices should lead to ‘radical reappraisal’, Guardian, Adam Vaughan and Jessica Elgot, 16 Sept 17, New nuclear power stations may not be the best option for keeping Britain’s lights on and meeting the country’s carbon targets, the Liberal Democrats have said.
“Nuclear power should be kept open as an option – but there is a risk that it may not be able to keep the lights on and that it may not be the lowest-cost option,” said the Lib Dems in a new report, authored by the former coalition minister Lynne Featherstone.
Vince Cable, the party’s leader, said this week that the breakthrough low subsidy prices for offshore windfarms should prompt a “radical reappraisal” of how Britain is powered.
Soldiers on the streets and extra armed police on patrol as Theresa May raises terror level to CRITICAL after ISIS claim Tube bucket-bomb attack was carried out by a cell of several jihadis –IED had timer attached meaning terrorist probably exited at an earlier station but bomb failed to detonateCLG News, 15 Sept 2017 | Soldiers are being deployed on London’s streets as the terror threat level is raised to critical amid fears the Parsons Green bomber could strike again, Theresa May announced tonight.
Operation Temperer will see military personnel replacing police at key sites such as nuclear power plants to free up extra armed police for regular patrols. Scotland Yard said it is making ‘excellent’ progress in hunting the suspected terrorist who set off an improvised bucket bomb on a packed commuter train by Parsons Green tube station in west London at 8.20am. Mrs May said in a statement from Number 10: ‘The Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre has now decided to raise the national threat level from severe to critical – this means their assessment is that a further attack may be imminent.’ Minutes later Assistant Commissioner Mark Rowley suggested there may have been more than one person involved stating that police were ‘chasing down suspects’.
Russia to the United States: Stay in Iran Nuclear Deal https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2017-09-15/russia-to-the-united-states-stay-in-iran-nuclear-dealSept. 15, 2017UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) – Russia’s U.N. ambassador, Vassily Nebenzia, said Moscow’s message to the United States during a likely meeting of the parties to the Iran nuclear deal next week on the sidelines to the United Nations General Assembly was to stay in the deal.
“That is not only our message, but the rest of the participants and those that are outside are trying to send this message across,” Nebenzia told reporters on Friday.
(Reporting by Michelle Nichols; Editing by Leslie Adler)
While lighthouses run on atomic batteries in Russia have become rare, especially along the coasts of the Baltic and Barents Seas, they still have their adherents in the country’s Far East. by Charles Diggescharles@bellona.no While lighthouses run on atomic batteries in Russia have become rare, especially along the coasts of the Baltic and Barents Seas, they still have their adherents in the country’s Far East.
A group of radioactivity tracking sleuths on Sakhalin Island in the Pacific say they have hunted down an abandoned generator that ran on strontium-90 sunk off the shores of one of its premier beach resorts.
But that, they say, is just the tip of the iceberg: The discovery lies in the middle of a radioactive graveyard that includes no fewer than 38 sunken vessels containing nuclear waste, and two nuclear warheads that went down when a Soviet bomber crashed near the island’s southern tip in 1976.
Though the Russian Ministry of Defense recently began acknowledging the lost bomber, tracing the origins of the other nuclear cast offs is not so easy.
But at least, says Nikolai Sidirov, mayor of the coastal town of Makarov on Sakhalin’s Bay of Patience, his town knows what this new discovery is – and they want it raised from the depths with the rest of the glowing junk.
Speaking to Novaya Izvestiya, a popular tabloid that morphed out of the official Soviet-era mouthpiece Izvestiya, Sidirov said satellite photos tracking the location of the crashed bomber have turned up something else lurking under the waves: An RTG.
That’s short for Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator, a small radioactive energy source that for decades powered thousands of Soviet lighthouses and other navigational beacons along Russia’s Baltic, Arctic and Pacific coasts.
After the fall of the Soviet Union and the crash of the Russian economy, officials lost track of many of the RTGs as bureaucracies collapsed and records went missing. Thieves pillaged them for their valuable metal, exposing their strontium innards. Hikers and shepherds, drawn to their atomic heat, would stagger out of the woods sick with radiation poisoning.
Around Murmansk and on the Pacific coast, frightful reports about strontium elements turning up on beaches proliferated in local media. Some newly independent Soviet republics telegraphed anxieties about their inherited RTGs back to Moscow – along with requests to come take them away.
And then there was the biggest fear of all: What if strontium 90 from these virtually unguarded, remotely radiological sources ended up in the hands of terrorists who wanted to make a dirty bomb?
So far, that hasn’t happened – anybody trying to make off with a strontium battery would likely end up very ill or dead. But when three woodsmen in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia turned up in a hospital with radiation burns and caught the attention of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the dangers of orphaned Soviet RTGs were finally on everyone’s mind.
A colossal effort spearheaded by the Norwegian government entirely rid the coasts of the Barents, Kara and White Seas of more than 180 RTGs. By infusing €20 million into the push, Norway helped Russia replace the strontium 90 batteries on these lighthouses and beacons with solar power over a six year period ending in 2015.
In all, Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation, says it has decommission more than 1000 RTGs throughout the country, adding that it has mostly eliminated the hazard of these stray radioactive sources from its coastlines.
But some areas have not been so lucky, at least according to the mayor of Makarov out on Sakhalin Island, six times zones east of Moscow. Sidirov, a feisty campaigner who had been publicly heckling the capital about the nuclear trash in the seas near his town for years, says divers have located the RTG, and that he now has the coordinates of where it lies. He told Novaya Izvestiya he will pass on the RTGs location to what he calls “competent authorities” lest it end up in scheming hands.
How the RTG, which lies in 14 meters of water, came to be there is still anyone’s guess. The Russian Navy sent a statement to the newspaper insisting that all RTGs under the purview of the Pacific Fleet have been hunted down and destroyed.
But Russia’s environmental oversight agency confirmed that there were numerous radioactive foundlings in the oceans off Sakhalin Island, though they didn’t identify Sidirov’s RTG specifically.
It certainly wouldn’t be the first time someone screwed up with an RTG in the area, however. Twenty years ago, in 1997, a helicopter from Russia’s Emergency Services Ministry accidentally dropped a strontium-powered RTG into Sakhalin’s waters. It was later retrieved by the navy.
So far, Rosatom has remained mum on the veracity of Sidirov’s claim about the RTG. But since the history of the downed bomber and the other hazards in his area has been confirmed, there’s every reason to believe him about the RTG. And he wants it gone.
“The ecological authorities and the military, they’re being very stubborn about coming to collect it,” Sidorov told Novaya Izvestiya. “It’s there job to collect it – if they’re ever interested, I’ll be here to show them exactly where it is.”
Nuclear plans ‘should be rethought after fall in offshore windfarm costs’
Lib Dems and green groups say reduced price of state support should sound death knell for plants such as Hinkley Point C, Guardian, Adam Vaughan, 12 Sept 17 The government is under pressure to reconsider its commitment to a new generation of nuclear power stations after the cost of offshore wind power reached a record low.
Experts said green energy had reached a tipping point in the UK after two windfarms secured a state-backed price for their output that was nearly half the level awarded last year to Britain’s first new nuclear power site in a generation, Hinkley Point C.
Vince Cable, the leader of the Liberal Democrats, said the breakthrough should prompt a rethink of the government’s energy plans, which have pencilled in atomic plants at Wylffa in Wales, Sizewell in Suffolk and Bradwell in Essex.
“The spectacular drop in the cost of offshore wind is extremely encouraging and shows the need for a radical reappraisal by government of the UK’s energy provision,” he said.
“The epoch of renewables as the most cost competitive technology has arrived,” said energy analysts Cornwall Insight, while the Economist Intelligence Unit said they showed “the trajectory of cheaper renewable technologies is irreversible”.
Ministers said the multimillion-pound pot of subsidies would generate clean power for 3.6m homes. Two windfarms – the Hornsea 2 project off the Yorkshire coast and the Moray offshore windfarm in Scotland – secured a guaranteed price for their power of £57.50 per megawatt hour (MWh) from the government. This is far below the £92.50 awarded to Hinkley last year.
Express 13th Sept 2017, NUCLEAR plant Sellafield was yesterday branded a potential “coup for
terrorists” as police who protect it warned against budget cuts. Safety
fears were initially raised last year after an investigation into security
at Britain’s main nuclear decommissioning site in Cumbria. Now
Cumbria’s Police and Crime Commissioner Peter McCall has warned his
constabulary must not lose a penny in any forthcoming shake-up of national
police funding. “In my opinion the number of officers in the county is at
an irreducible limit. “We’ve all seen the tragic terrorism events
across the country this year. Cumbria is not immune to that. “We’ve got
a big strategic target here in Sellafield and that would be a great coup
for terrorists.” http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/853568/Sellafield-nuclear-plant-ltd-cumbria-terrorists-peter-mccall
