UK has no idea how to dispose of 38 nuclear submarines – saw Scotland as a “nuclear dustbin”
Detailed and highly confidential MoD studies concluded the plan was “feasible” and would “obviate the international problems which we would face were we to dispose of these vessels in international waters.”
According to one MoD official the aim was “to remove submarines from public view”. Another hoped that “everyone will forget about these submarines and that they will be allowed to quietly rot away indefinitely.”
The revelations have sparked anger and outrage from politicians and campaigners, who accused the MoD of seeing Scotland as a “nuclear dustbin”. The MoD stressed that current submarine disposal plans met the strictest standards of safety and security.
The 1989 sea-dumping plan ended up being quietly dropped. But the MoD has still not solved the problem of what to do with the accumulating number of nuclear submarines that have now been taken out of service.
Since the 1980s seven defunct submarines have been laid up at the Rosyth naval dockyard in Fife. Since the 1990s, thirteen have been laid up at Devonport naval dockyard in Plymouth, nine of them still containing radioactive fuel.
There are a further eight nuclear submarines in service, one in overhaul and nine due to come into service at Faslane on the Clyde, including the proposed new generation of four Trident-armed submarines. That’s a total of 38 nuclear submarines that will eventually require disposal……..https://theferret.scot/nuclear-submarines-dump-scotland/
UK’s Ministry of Defence setting up a smokescreen about the British nuclear bombing disgrace in Australia
Hiding Britain’s H-bomb secrets https://www.theguardian.com/global/2018/dec/27/hiding-britains-h-bomb-secrets Sue Rabbitt Roff is alarmed at files being withdrawn by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority That the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority has withdrawn files relating to the development of the British H-bomb in Australia 70 years ago (Nuclear weapons and energy files removed from archives, 24 December) is indeed alarming to those of us trying to get behind the smokescreens already set up by the Ministry of Defence’s closing access to files over the past decades.
My own research has been into why Sir Mark Oliphant, Australia’s premier nuclear physicist and a prime mover in the Tube Alloys group that showed the Americans how to build atomic bombs in time to use in the second world war, never spoke out about the contamination (from H-bomb tests) of his beloved home state of South Australia and further eastward just weeks before the 1956 Olympic Games took place in Melbourne.
He told me in 1993: “The Brits thought they could ensure any fallout or contamination was not too big. They were very pigheaded about it. The people in control were very haphazard about the estimates.” Why didn’t he speak out about the residual radioactive contamination at Monte Bello, Maralinga and Emu Field, even when he was governor of South Australia? He replied: “You can really decontaminate Maralinga by leaving it alone. Plutonium alpha particles contamination, I think, is grossly overplayed. The Aborigines are using it to the full. At the same time it was very naughty of the British to leave it, and to think of spreading it that way in the first place was very nasty. The British people were very reticent about revealing contamination, especially regarding food contamination. They hugged that to their chests very closely.”
I suggest that Sir Mark Oliphant was Australia’s – and Britain’s – J Robert Oppenheimer. The evidence is set out on my website www.rabbittreview.com and was mostly found in the files I accessed in the UK National Archives.
Inconvenient truths on nuclear waste ignored or buried by UK Government (again).
Industrial Strategy (BEIS) department published two important new documents dealing with the UK radioactive waste strategy.
http://drdavidlowry.blogspot.com/2018/12/inconvenient-truths-on-nuclear-waste.html
Bizarre way in which Britain planned to kill their allies! – Russian soldiers during World War 2
Blue Peacock was designed to be buried on German soil along likely Soviet routes of advance. As the British were pushed back, the Soviet Army would advance, and probably would set up things like headquarters, supply depots, and other units directly above a buried Blue Peacock mine. Once the bomb went off, a ten-kiloton atomic explosion would made a significant dent in the Soviet invasion force.
The weapon could go off in one of three ways: an 8-day timer, remote control, or if someone tampered with it. One proposed arming mechanism was placing chickens in the bomb along with just enough food for the chickens to die of starvation after eight days. Seriously. https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a25645798/blue-peacock-land-mine/
Britain’s historic nuclear records removed from public view
 British nuclear archive files withdrawn without explanation https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/dec/23/british-nuclear-archive-files-withdrawn-without-explanation
Historical papers removed from public view by Nuclear Decommissioning Authority
Thousands of archive files relating to Britain’s nuclear weapons and atomic energy programmes have been withdrawn without warning from public view. A vast cache of material dating from 1939 until the 1980s and including more than 1,700 files about the creation of Britain’s first nuclear bombs at Aldermaston has been unexpectedly withdrawn by the National Archives within the last week, researchers have reported. The files were withdrawn at the instruction of the government’s Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, according to the National Archives. They range from the private papers of Sir John Cockcroft, the Nobel Prize-winning physicist who split the atomic nucleus, to reports of atomic bomb tests carried out as part of the creation of Britain’s nuclear deterrent in Australia and the Pacific. Attempts to access them online are met with the message: “This record is closed whilst access is under review.” Neither the National Archives at Kew nor the NDA were able to comment on Sunday about why they had been removed. Speculation among academics who rely on the papers for their research ranged from whether the NDA had realised there was something in the files that shouldn’t have been made public to more prosaic suggestions such as a reorganisation of the files or a shift in location. The papers are in two sections. The records of the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) and its predecessors concern the research, development and testing of Britain’s atomic weapons including bomb trials, feasibility reports on new systems and notes on the theoretical physics behind nuclear weapons. They include files with titles such as “structural vulnerability of aeroplanes to blast from atomic bomb” and “measurement of air blast using petrol cans and toothpaste tubes”. The records of the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority largely concern the civilian nuclear energy programme. They include photographs detailing the construction of nuclear reactors and daily log books from nuclear power stations. “We would like to know what is going on,” said Jon Agar, a professor of history of science and technology at University College London. “We would be alarmed as historians that it has been taken out of public view. These are important records for understanding the nuclear project in the UK. A couple of days ago a PhD student noticed that everything in the catalogue is coming up as temporarily retained. We are scratching our heads. It is all a bit mysterious.” A spokeswoman for the National Archives said: “We have been asked to temporarily withdraw these records, which is why they now appear on our catalogue as ‘access under review’. For further information, please speak to the transferring authority.” The transferring authority is the NDA, which comes under the auspices of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. A spokesman for the NDA said he could not yet explain why the records had been removed, but said: “The NDA is absolutely committed to openness and transparency.” |
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Outages extended at Hunterston nuclear plant in Britain
plant in Britain, where two reactors were taken offline after cracks were
discovered in March and October. The Hunterston B-7 reactor is now expected
to return to service on April 30 while Hunterston B-8 is expected to be
back online from March 31, EDF Energy said on its website. No one from EDF
Energy, owned by French energy group EDF, was available immediately to
comment on why the outages had been extended.
https://www.reuters.com/article/britain-nuclear/edf-extends-outages-at-british-nuclear-plant-where-cracks-were-found-idUSL8N1YN3IX
University of Manchester partners with Chinese government agency
Birmingham joins China’s nuclear regulator for safe and clean energy research
https://www.birmingham.ac.uk/news/latest/2018/12/safe-and-clean-energy-research.aspx19 Dec 2018 University of Birmingham experts are partnering with Chinese nuclear regulators in helping develop cleaner, safer and more sustainable civil atomic energy.
The University has signed an agreement with the Nuclear and Radiation Safety Centre (NSC), Ministry of Ecology and Environment to work on collaborative education and research in nuclear policy, safety and regulation, as well as the environmental impact and assessment of nuclear radiation.
Following an earlier visit of a University of Birmingham team to NSC headquarters in Beijing, a senior delegation headed by Deputy-Director General CHAI Guohang visited Birmingham to further develop the collaboration and sign the agreement. The visit was attended by a representative from the Chinese Embassy in London.
Signing the agreement on behalf of the University of Birmingham, Pro-Vice-Chancellor Professor Andy Schofield commented: “The University of Birmingham is delighted to partner with NSC, to work together in the research and education of civil nuclear safety, policy and regulation. This is such an important area for both our countries as we develop civil nuclear power as a key part of clean and sustainable energy production.
“We are very proud of the University’s accomplishments in having the largest and longest continually-running civil nuclear education programmes in the UK, matched by a diverse research capability, and with influence on the development of UK nuclear energy policy. We look forward to working with NSC to continue the development of safe and efficient civil nuclear system in UK and China.”
As the nuclear regulator of China, NSC affiliates directly to the Chinese Ministry of Ecology and Environment, and provides all-round support and assurance in safety regulation and administration of China’s civil nuclear facilities and radiation protection.
In the development of civil nuclear power in China to meet its increasing energy demand, NSC is actively forming a wide range of collaborations with high level domestic and internal partners, including with IAEA and the UKs ONR.
The NSC Deputy-Director General Mr CHAI Guohang said: “As one of the top 100 world universities, the University of Birmingham strength in nuclear science and engineering, its work in nuclear policy and its long standing achievements in civil nuclear education and research are well-known. For these reasons we chose Birmingham as our first international university partner. We believe our collaboration will deliver successful and mutually beneficial results.”
Hitachi having trouble financing new nuclear reactors in Wales – may pull the plug on Wylfa project
Hitachi may freeze British nuclear project due to swelling costs, https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/12/16/business/corporate-business/hitachi-may-freeze-british-nuclear-project-due-swelling-costs/#.XBawLdIzbGg
KYODO 17 Dec 18, Hitachi Ltd. is considering freezing its plan to build nuclear reactors in Wales after facing difficulties in finding investors to finance the project’s ballooning costs, sources close to the matter said Sunday.
If the Japanese conglomerate freezes the ¥3 trillion Wylfa Newydd plant construction, all of the overseas nuclear projects promoted by the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as part of his growth strategy would have faltered.
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. is mulling withdrawing from a nuclear project in Turkey amid swelling safety-related costs following the 2011 Fukushima nuclear accident, while Toshiba Corp. has decided to exit from the nuclear plant business outside Japan after incurring huge losses in the United States.
Hitachi has said it wants to lower its stake in Horizon Nuclear Power Ltd., a wholly owned unit it acquired in 2012 from two German electric utilities to take over the nuclear project, to below 50 percent to limit the impact on the Hitachi group of the construction of two advanced boiling water reactors on the Isle of Anglesey in Wales.
Hitachi is likely to have told the British and Japanese governments of its plan to freeze the project, the sources said. The issue will likely be discussed at the planned meeting between Abe and British Prime Minister Theresa May in January, they said.
The company has been contacting prospective investors in the project, including Japanese utilities, but little progress has been made amid concerns that costs will further swell, they said.
Hitachi also remains at odds with the British government over the purchase price of electricity to be generated by the plant, a key factor in determining the project’s profitability for the company and potential investors.
Given the current turmoil in British politics over May’s proposed deal with the European Union on the United Kingdom’s departure from the bloc, price-setting talks are at a “deadlock,” a senior Hitachi official said.
Cost of Chinese-designed and largely Chinese-owned nuclear reactor for Bradwell UK will probably blow out hugely
Dave Toke’s Blog 16th Dec 2018 The UK’s Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) has requested a long series of safety improvements to the proposed design of the Chinese HPR1000 (‘Hualong’) reactor proposed to be built at Bradwell in Essex. Previous experience suggests this could presage a big increase in costs for the plant which is likely to cost a lot more than similar plant built in China. The HPR100 design Bradwell, UKis based on one being built in China at by China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN). CGN will own around two-thirds of the project, with EDF owning the remaining share.‘follow up’ point materials must severely question any financial estimates of the plant’s costs that have been based on the plant being built in
China.
https://realfeed-intariffs.blogspot.com/2018/12/office-for-nuclear-reactor-demands.html
Hitachi calling on Britain to further subsidise new nuclear reactors for Wales
Hitachi to ask UK for further funding as nuclear project stalls https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Companies/Hitachi-to-ask-UK-for-further-funding-as-nuclear-project-stalls
Company struggles to find other Japanese parties willing to invest TAKAFUMI HOTTA and SHINICHIRO IBUSUKI, Nikkei staff writers, DECEMBER 18, 2018
TOKYO — Hitachi will ask the British government for additional support for a nuclear power project in Wales as it struggles to recruit other Japanese investors amid international headwinds for atomic energy.
The company will consider scrapping the project, worth more than 3 trillion yen ($26.6 billion), should negotiations with London fail to reach a conclusion by January.
Aborting Japan’s last active proposal to build an overseas nuclear power plant would deal a blow to the government’s plan to expand exports of energy-related infrastructure, as similar projects face setbacks around the world.
“It is a fact that it is facing a difficult situation,” Hitachi Chairman Hiroaki Nakanishi said at a news conference Monday. “I told the British government that we are already reaching the limit.”
Nakanishi was speaking in his capacity as chairman of the Japan Business Federation, the nation’s top business lobby, better known as Keidanren. The news conference was held after reports emerged that Hitachi is considering scrapping the project altogether due to the difficulty of securing funding from Japanese companies.
With aid from the British government, Hitachi’s nuclear power segment intends to build two reactors on the Welsh island of Anglesey through British subsidiary Horizon Nuclear Power. It was scheduled to make a decision on the project’s economic feasibility sometime in 2019 but will probably push that decision forward by more than six months as the business environment worsens.
Nuclear power is losing its competitiveness as the price of renewable energy falls. The U.K. government also plans to buy electricity from the Wales plant for lower prices than those charged by other nuclear power facilities.
The Japanese government has promoted overseas nuclear power plant construction as a pillar of its strategy to boost infrastructure exports. Since the 2011 Fukushima disaster, no new reactors have been approved inside Japan. To maintain nuclear expertise and talent, Japan’s public and private sectors have teamed up to sell the technology abroad.
But ground has not broken on any project to date. A Japanese public-private consortium led by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is planning to scrap a nuclear power plant in Turkey, for instance. Should the nuclear industry lose its legs, it could affect the restating and decommissioning of existing plants.
Hitachi has said it will move forward with the project if it can limit its exposure by reducing its 100% stake in Horizon Nuclear to around 30%. The U.K. has pledged more than 2 trillion yen in loans for the project, with the remaining cost of about 900 billion yen to be split among investments from Hitachi, the British government and business as well as the Japanese government and businesses.
Lining up Japanese investors, however, has proved to be a challenge. Tokyo Electric Power Co. Holdings, also known as Tepco, is reluctant to provide funding. Chubu Electric Power and other Japanese companies probably will follow its lead. Without other investors on the horizon, Hitachi is asking the British to share more of the burden.
Aside from Tepco and Chubu Electric, Hitachi also solicited investments from Japan Atomic Power, the Japan Bank for International Cooperation, the Development Bank of Japan and other parties. But the industrial conglomerate is having trouble gathering the necessary 300 billion yen.
The British government is no position to acquiesce to these demands. Having already pledged around $18 billion in loans, it risks backlash from the public by providing further financial support. Prime Minister Theresa May can ill afford another fight as her government risks collapse over negotiations to leave the European Union.
At a separate news conference held by Hitachi, Toshiaki Higashihara, the company’s president and CEO, did not attempt to downplay the situation. “Hitachi is a private company,” he said, “and there is a limit to how much risk it can take. If the project is not economically rational, it is possible that the project will be halted.”
Higashihara added that the final investment decision will be made by the end of 2019.
Hitachi Executive Vice President and Executive Officer Toshikazu Nishino also spoke, saying the company “has not given up yet,” though it recognizes “the negotiations are not easy.”
Britain’s nuclear nightmare -the Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant
UK’s dream is now its nuclear nightmare https://climatenewsnetwork.net/uks-dream-is-now-its-nuclear-nightmare/?fbclid=IwAR3CEunSXXOxdK_-N8Ka9kwpCMzvHFXNkZf23VGjd6oFuDecember 14, 2018, by Paul Brown
Nobody knows what to do with a vast uranium and plutonium stockpile built up in the UK by reprocessing spent fuel. It is now a nuclear nightmare.
LONDON, 14 December, 2018 − Thirty years ago it seemed like a dream: now it is a nuclear nightmare. A project presented to the world in the 1990s by the UK government as a £2.85 billion triumph of British engineering, capable of recycling thousands of tons of spent nuclear fuel into reusable uranium and plutonium is shutting down – with its role still controversial.
Launched amid fears of future uranium shortages and plans to use the plutonium produced from the plant to feed a generation of fast breeder reactors, the Thermal Oxide Reprocessing Plant, known as THORP, was thought to herald a rapid expansion of the industry.
In the event there were no uranium shortages, fast breeder reactors could not be made to work, and nuclear new build of all kinds stalled. Despite this THORP continued as if nothing had happened, recycling thousands of tons of uranium and producing 56 tons of plutonium that no one wants. The plutonium, once the world’s most valuable commodity, is now classed in Britain as “an asset of zero value.” Continue reading
Some good news in the climate battle – over 1000 institutions to divest from fossil fuels
Climate change: More than 1000 institutions pledge to withdraw investment from fossil fuels https://www.independent.co.uk/environment/fossil-fuels-divest-climate-change-global-warming-emissions-campaign-a8681931.html ‘This is a moral movement as well as a financial one,’ campaigners say Josh Gabbatiss Science Correspondent @josh_gabbatiss 14 Dec 18, Governments, universities and banks have quit fossil fuels in their hundreds after a global campaign to convince institutions to pull their investments.
Just the bare 60 years later, they will start to dismantle UK’s Dounreay nuclear reactor
Scotland’s oldest nuclear reactor to go as demolition contract awarded, The decommissioning of Dounreay’s oldest nuclear reactor has taken a major step forward with the award of a multi-million pound contract Gov. UK 14 December 2018
Concern that Hinkley Point C will have ‘devastating’ impact on sea fish numbers in Burnham
Burnham-on-Sea 13th Dec 2018 . Concern that Hinkley Point C will have ‘devastating’ impact on sea fish
numbers in Burnham. Proposals to scrap plans for an acoustic fish deterrent
system in the sea next to Hinkley Point C will have a ‘devastating’ impact
on fish stocks in the sea around Burnham-On-Sea and the Bristol Channel, it
has been predicted this week. Sea anglers in Burnham claim EDF’s plans
not to install a fish deterrent system around the cooling water intakes in
the channel will lead to “significant” numbers of fish being killed.
https://www.burnham-on-sea.com/news/concern-over-hinkley-point-c/
Mayor of London has plan to tackle the climate emergency
London mayor unveils plan to tackle ‘climate emergency’https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/dec/11/london-mayor-sadiq-khan-city-climate-emergency, – Matthew Taylor, Sadiq Khan accuses government of dragging its feet and calls for investment to avert catastrophe London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, has declared a climate emergency and urged the UK government to do more to avert an ecological breakdown that he says poses an existential threat to future generations.
Speaking as City Hall outlined its new climate change plan, Khan said he was implementing measures to protect people from floods, fires and the political upheaval caused by climate change. He accused central government of “dragging its feet” on dealing with these issues.
“We are in the midst of a climate emergency which poses a threat to our health, our planet and our children and grandchildren’s future,” Khan told the Guardian. “City Hall is doing everything in our power to mitigate the risk in London but the stark reality is that we need urgent government action and funding.”
The acknowledgement of the scale and nature of the ecological crisis by the leader of one of the world’s major cities comes amid growing concern about the impact of climate change. A succession of scientific reports have laid bare the scale of the unfolding disaster, including one from the UN that said there were only 12 years left to avert the most extreme consequences of climate breakdown.
On Sunday 100 academics, philosophers and authors wrote to the Guardian to back a new civil disobedience group – Extinction Rebellion – and called for people around the world to rise up and organise against the “paralysis” of political leaders.
Khan’s intervention follows that of civic leaders in the UK and around the world. Last month Bristol declared a climate emergency and set a goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2030, while Manchester said it would become “carbon zero” by 2038. Both are more ambitious than the UK’s national target of an 80% reduction in emissions by 2050. It follows similar moves by several US cities.
London’s existing plan, unveiled by Khan in May, was for the city to be carbon neutral by 2050. But last week the London Assembly passed a motionsaying that target should be brought forward to 2030 and called on Khan to draw up “a specific emergency plan”.
Caroline Russell from the Green party, who proposed the motion, said it was crucial Khan backed a more radical target and called on the government to give him the appropriate powers and funding.
“Catastrophic climate breakdown might be as little as 12 years away,” she said. “This would have profound impacts on every aspect of our lives in London from flooding and overheating in summers, disruption in our food supply chains as well as in the wider natural world.
“The mayor needs to be at the forefront of this challenge, declaring a climate emergency and an urgent updating of his carbon reduction targets to make London carbon neutral by 2030, decades ahead of his current plans, setting a precedent for other major and world cities.”
Khan said he had already introduced a series of measures to tackle climate breakdown – from investing £500m in low carbon technologies to divesting pension funds from fossil fuels.
But he said a City Hall analysis due to be published on Wednesday showed London would need a huge programme of investment as well as new powers to bring forward its zero-carbon target to 2030. The cash would be used to:
• Retrofit hundreds of thousands of homes and offices to make them more energy efficient.
• Decarbonise the national grid.
• Install low-carbon heating systems, such as heat pumps.
• Move private and public transport away from diesel and petrol, and towards electric.
Khan said: “My message to ministers is clear – stop dragging your feet and gambling with our future and give London and cities across the UK the real powers and funding needed to protect our future generations.”
The Green party welcomed Khan’s move and backed his call for more help from central government. But Russell said there was more that could be done now. “Sadiq should start this mission by cancelling the Silvertown road tunnel and fighting harder against things that will make the climate crisis worse.
“He should call right now for a halt to climate-wrecking aviation expansion, including at Gatwick, and ask his C40 [global green city network] counterparts to join him.”
1 This Month
PLEASE OPPOSE HR 8255 AND S.3639 – bills would accelerate satellite deployment, with no environmental review or safeguards – https://ncstd5li.quorum.us/campaign/169331/
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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