Bridgwater Mercury 12th Feb 2018, West Somerset Council not invited to key Hinkley C meeting. WSC was
‘unaware’ of a meeting in which the leader of Sedgemoor District
Council (SDC) travelled to Westminster to discuss uncertainty over Hinkley
C money with senior officials. Cllr Duncan McGinty met with MP Jake Berry,
parliamentary undersecretary for Housing, Communities and Local Government
to discuss the uncertainty surrounding ‘Community Benefit’ funding for
Sedgemoor and West Somerset from Hinkley C.
Councillor McGinty said: “It was a really positive meeting. Sedgemoor has taken the lead in raising this
issue at a national level. But while Hinkley C falls within West Somerset,
the district council was not invited to send a representative.
http://www.bridgwatermercury.co.uk/news/15988334.West_Somerset_Council_not_invited_to_key_Hinkley_C_meeting/
February 14, 2018
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics, UK |
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Radiation Free Lakeland 10th Feb 2018, On the 23rd January 2018 the Swedish Environment Court gave the thumbs down
to the Swedish equivalent (SKB) of the UK’s quango Radioactive Waste Management (RWM previously Managing Radioactive Wastes Safely previously
NIREX) tasked with implementing Geological Dumping of nuclear wastes.
The Swedish court said it could not recommend that their Government agree the application for a Geological Disposal Facility (Nuclear Underground Dump) unless and until the industry can prove that the copper capsules that would contain the spent nuclear fuels would not leak.
Sweden and Finland are regularly put forward by RWM and the UK Government as the fore-runners of the ‘international consensus’ on deep waste repositories. Radiation Free Lakeland have sent a letter of thanks to the Swedish Court and a request to the Environment and Justice Ministers of Sweden that the Courts findings are upheld. We urge our own UK government to abandon the dishonest and dangerous plan for “Implementation” of Geological Disposal. https://mariannewildart.wordpress.com/2018/02/10/a-letter-of-thanks-to-the-swedish-environment-court-for-saying-no-to-geological-disposal-of-nuclear-wastes/
February 12, 2018
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Sweden, UK, wastes |
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GDF Watch 10th Feb 2018, Radioactive Waste Management (RWM) have announced the appointment of
Lorraine Baldry OBE as Chair of their new Advisory Council. According to
RWM, “the Advisory Council will provide expertise, balanced perspective
and strategic support to RWM as it moves into a significant phase of its
programme to deliver a geological disposal facility. Its members, including
experienced leaders from a variety of business, engineering, infrastructure
and society backgrounds, will provide vital input to one of the most
complex and important long-term projects ever undertaken in the UK.”
Lorraine Baldry hails from the Financial Services sector, and is also
currently: Chair of the Central London Partnership, a non-profit
organisation that focuses on improving the working environment in central
London Chair of London & Continental Railways Limited, a property
development and land regeneration business within the railway and
infrastructure sectors Chair of Schroder Real Estate Investment Trust
Limited Independent Non-Executive Director at Thames Water She is an
Honorary Member of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), a
Past President of the British Property Federation, and was previously
Chairman of the London Thames Gateway Development Corporation.
http://www.gdfwatch.org.uk/2018/02/10/chair-announced-new-rwm-advisory-council/
February 12, 2018
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UK, wastes |
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Times 11th Feb 2018, Bringing Britain’s energy system back under public ownership is the best
way of tackling climate change, according to Jeremy Corbyn. In his most
pro-green speech to date, the Labour leader said his government would sweep
away the “centralised system” of energy delivery by private firms in favour
of “new sources of energy large and small”.
Speaking yesterday at a conference in London on alternative models of ownership, Corbyn said: “The
greenest energy is usually the most local but people have been queuing up
to connect renewable energy to the national grid. “With the national grid
in public hands we can put tackling climate change at the heart of our
energy system, committing to renewable generation from tidal to onshore
wind.”
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/nationalising-energy-grid-will-help-fight-climate-change-says-corbyn-z93xvqm50
February 12, 2018
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politics, renewable, UK |
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Cumbria Trust 10th Feb 2018, Andrew Blowers OBE is Emeritus Professor of Social Sciences at The Open
University and is presently Co-Chair of the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy/NGO Nuclear Forum. This is one of a series of
articles drawn on his latest book, “The Legacy of Nuclear Power” (Earthscan from Routledge, 2017). The views expressed are personal.
What is Sellafield? Fundamentally, these days, it is the UK’s primary nuclear waste-processing, management and clean-up facility. Concentrated on a
compact site of 1.5 square miles is a jumble of buildings, pipes, roads, railways and waterways, randomly assembled over more than half a dozen decades, which together manage around two-thirds by radioactivity of all the radioactive wastes in the UK.
The Sellafield radioactive waste component includes all the high-level wastes (less than 1% by volume, over half the radioactivity) held in liquid form or stored in vitrified blocks, and half the volume of intermediate-level wastes (the other half being heldat various sites around the country). The nation’s radioactive waste is mainly held at Sellafield and there it must remain, at least until the programme of management and clean-up is concluded.
New production facilities such as for MOX or reprocessing are exceedingly improbable, theproposed new reactors at nearby Moorside are doubtful, and although a GDF, if one is ever developed, might yet be located in West Cumbria, Sellafield will for long be caretaker of the nation’s wastes. Where and when the undertaker will come to bury them remains unclear, and may remain so for the foreseeable future.
https://cumbriatrust.wordpress.com/2018/02/10/sellafield-britains-nuclear-heartland/
February 12, 2018
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Reference, UK, wastes |
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– excitingly entitled “Central Government Supply Estimates 2017-18” – detailing changes to planned public expenditure since last Autumn’s
Budget 2017. At pages 162-64 you can find the Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) extra expenditure requests and clarification of
perceived liabilities.
These include several covering the privately-owned commercial nuclear industry sector. Below are the sections on nuclear, and
the most common read-out message is how often the liabilities for which the taxpayer is expected to take long term financial responsibility are
described as “unquantifiable.”
That is accurate, but what is omitted is the numbers are – based on accumulated experience to date, likely to be astronomically huge. This worryingly unacceptable situation,- whereby one industry (nuclear) of the electricity generating sector is being promised a massive future bailout from its liabilities- really should be examined in detail by our elected Parliamentarians and peers in several relevant committees and in the Estimates Debate on the floor of the Commons.
http://drdavidlowry.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/nuclears-unquantifiably-huge-future.html
February 12, 2018
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business and costs, politics, UK |
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Because of the risk of possible terrorist attacks at the 15 UK nuclear reactors and >20 nuclear reactors in nearby countries, and because of the advanced ages of UK nuclear reactors, there is a need for greater preparedness to deal with nuclear accidents and incidents.
For these reasons, in June 2016, the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee set up an Inquiry on Science in Emergencies: chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear incidents. However neither the Committee’s subsequent poor Report nor the Government’s anodyne response dealt with the real issues in a forthright and open matter. In particular, they discussed neither the problems of evacuations (which I have discussed) nor the scientific evidence which amply supports the pre-distribution of stable iodine as occurs in most other EU countries.
In the event of a nuclear accident or incident, the three main responses are shelter, evacuation, and stable iodine prophylaxis. This article deals solely with iodine prophylaxis.
It is important to note that stable iodine ingestion only protects against thyroid cancer, and not any other cancers which could arise after exposure to the many nuclides which would be released if a serious nuclear accident or incident were to occur. However it is the only cancer that we can prevent or mitigate if advance preparations are made.
The prior ingestion of stable iodine (often potassium iodide, ie KI) is an effective means of protecting the thyroid gland from thyroid cancer and other thyroid effects, especially among children. But it is necessary to consume stable iodine immediatelyafter a nuclear incident: the best way to provide for this is the advance distribution of stable iodine prior to any accident or incident.
In the UK, the Government has decided not to pre-distribute stable iodine tablets to the public. This is a poor decision. It was probably influenced by the Government’s strong support, bordering on obsession, for nuclear power. In other words, political considerations are held to be more important than public safety. Information on the locations of stale iodine supplies, stocks held, and arrangements for their distribution in the event of a nuclear incident or accident is unavailable in the UK.
After the warning of a nuclear accident or incident, it appears that the Government intends to distribute stable iodine to “…schools, hospitals and evacuation reception centres…” and “collection centres” for collection by the public. It is likely that such distribution would take at least two days or longer, depending on the sizes of the affected areas. During this time, plumes would continue to cross such areas depending on the nature of the accident, wind direction and wind velocity.
At present, the Government assumes that most thyroid doses (from the radioative iodine in the plumes) will occur via the food pathway, mainly from the ingestion of milk and leafy green vegetables. This pathway could take a few days and could give time for stable iodine distribution to take place. However recent scientific evidence indicates that inhalation is much more important than ingestion for radio-iodine doses. This means advance stable iodine distribution is vitally necessary. The Government is ignoring this information, thereby putting the UK public at risk.
Several EU countries have already pre-distributed KI to all families. In addition, KI supplies and dose information are available on line from non-UK sources. It is therefore recommended that
- Stable iodine tablets, with clear dose instructions and the reasons for their advance distribution, should be distributed to all families within at least 30 km of nuclear facilities in the UK without waiting for an incident or accident to occur.
- Since radioactive plumes could reach cities with large populations (e.g. >500,000 people) located beyond 30 km, stable iodine pre-distribution should carried out here as well. This is because rapid evacuations from such large cities would be impractical, but their inhabitants should be afforded some protection.
- For this reason, and to deal with the possibility of radioactive plumes from nuclear reactors on the continent, the Government should pre-distribute stable iodine to all families throughout the UK, as occurs in most other European countries.
A more detailed (9 pages) report can be found here main report on KI.
February 10, 2018
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Reference, safety, UK |
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Daily Record 8th Feb 2018, SNP slam ‘folly of Trident’ as cost of replacing Britain’s nuclear
submarines rockets by £1billion. The cost of replacing Britain’s nuclear
submarines has risen by almost £1billion in a year. SNP defence spokesman
Stewart McDonald MP will raise questions in the Commons about the soaring
cost of the £31billion Trident replacement programme after the
Government’s spending watchdog rapped MoD chiefs. A recent National Audit
Office report on the MoD’s financial plan for equipment slammed the
defence budget as unaffordable and unrealistic as it failed to include a
string of costs.
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/snp-slam-folly-trident-cost-11989163
February 9, 2018
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UK, weapons and war |
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Julian Assange ‘has suffered enough’, his lawyers tell British judge, SMH, Nick Miller, 7 Feb 18, London: Julian Assange has suffered enough and shouldn’t face prison for absconding from justice, his lawyers have told a court.
The Wikileaks editor is depressed, in constant pain from an infected tooth, and has been stuck in the Ecuador Embassy in London’s Kensington far longer than the maximum 12-month jail penalty for breaching bail, his barrister said.
On Tuesday Assange lost a legal bid at Westminster Magistrates Court to quash the arrest warrant that has awaited him since he entered the Ecuador embassy in June 2012.
However his lawyers immediately launched a new push to end the UK government’s attempt to bring him to justice – arguing that it is against the public interest to punish him for refusing to leave the embassy.
It is a criminal offence for someone on bail to refuse to surrender to police without “reasonable cause” – and Assange refused to leave the embassy despite a court order for his arrest.
But Assange’s barrister Mark Summers QC told Judge Emma Arbuthnot that it was not in the interests of “justice and proportionality” to bring an action against Assange.
Assange went into the embassy after he exhausted his line of appeal against a decision to extradite him to Sweden to face rape allegations. Sweden last year ended its investigation into the allegations, and the European arrest warrant against Assange was cancelled. However the British warrant for his arrest still stood – and judge Arbuthnot said she was not persuaded it should be quashed simply because the underlying investigation had stopped.
Mr Summers said Assange was not “thumbing his nose” at justice and his five and a half years in the embassy were “adequate if not severe punishment for the actions that he took”.
Assange had genuine fears – later proved correct – that the US were keen to prosecute him over his work with Wikileaks, Summers said.
If arrested he would face rendition to the USA, treatment similar to that meted out against Wikileaks whistleblower Chelsea Manning – and possible “persecution, indefinite solitary confinement and the death penalty”, Summers said in a written submission……….
Judge Arbuthnot said it was a “very interesting” case.
She will rule on the public interest application on February 13.
Outside court, Assange’s lawyer Jennifer Robinson said whether or not the warrant is quashed Assange would not leave the embassy until he had an assurance he wouldn’t be extradited to the US.
“Mr Assange remains willing to answer to British justice in relation to any argument about breaching bail, but not at the expense of facing injustice in America,” she said.
“This case is and always has been about the risk of extradition to the United States and that risk remains real.” http://www.smh.com.au/world/julian-assange-has-suffered-enough-his-lawyers-tell-british-judge-20180206-p4yzjt.html
February 9, 2018
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civil liberties, Legal, UK |
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Carlisle News and Star 7th Feb 2018, The £7.5 million National College for Nuclear is due to be officially
opened today. The college, at Lillyhall, near Workington, will train
thousands of technicians and engineers to support Britain’s future
nuclear programmes, create cleaner energy and provide a highly skilled
workforce.
The National College for Nuclear will have hubs in Cumbria and
Somerset and facilities which include virtual, simulated laboratories. It
is one of five national colleges being established by government as part of
its Industrial Strategy.
http://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/business/75-million-National-College-for-Nuclear-due-to-open-today-0a0f3e9b-7c2d-4320-8b08-55c9b28c51d6-ds
February 9, 2018
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culture and arts, politics, UK |
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Whitehaven News 6th Feb 2018, Hazadous nuclear waste will be taken out of Cumbria’s Sellafield plant in
massive stainless steel containers which have just come off the production line.
The highly-engineered 1.3 tonne boxes are playing a major part in the decommissioning of the West Cumbrian plant as the waste is moved into safe
storage for centuries to come. Darchem Engineering, of Stockton on Tees, and Metalcraft in Cambridgeshire have finished manufacturing the first
batch of containers.
A total of 2,200 of the boxes will be needed to hold legacy waste from one of the world’s oldest nuclear stores,
Sellafield’s Pile Fuel Cladding Silo. Sellafield bosses have described it as the most significant step yet towards getting the waste out of the
facility next year.
http://www.whitehavennews.co.uk/news/business/First-batc
February 9, 2018
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UK, wastes |
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there will be no room in this new world of flexible, decentralised generation for large, rigid nuclear reactors. “There are going to be increasingly frequent periods when we have too much power,” says Mr Burke. “But if you are the energy minister, how do you explain to people why you are having to switch off cheap renewables in order to use the much more expensive nuclear power which you have committed to pay for over the next 35 years?”
FT 4th Feb 2018, The UK’s Hinkley Point C has become a critical test of developers’ ability to compete with cheap gas and renewables. Across an expanse of scarred earth the size of 250 football pitches beside the Bristol Channel in south-west England, 3,000 workers are building what will be, by some estimates, the most expensive structure on the planet.
At a cost of almost £20bn, the Hinkley Point C power station in Somerset is the first nuclear plant to be built in the UK since the 1990s. Clusters of cranes and cement silos loom over a warren of earthworks crawling with excavators and
100-tonne dumper trucks. At the centre of the site, foundations are taking shape for two 1.6 gigawatt reactors intended to meet 7 per cent of UK electricity demand, with a target for completion by the end of 2025.
Hinkley is crucial to UK energy security as the country faces the closure of old coal and nuclear plants accounting for about 40 per cent of the country’s reliable electricity generating capacity by 2030. But it also has wider significance as a test of the industry’s ability to compete in a rapidly changing energy landscape. Nuclear power has been under threat
since the meltdown at the Fukushima plant in Japan in 2011 revived safety fears.
But the biggest threat is now economic as the spiralling cost of building new reactors collides with a world of cheap and plentiful gas and renewable power. The UK is now one of the few western countries committed to renewing its ageing reactors. More than 70 per cent of the 448 reactors around the world are in the OECD club of wealthy nations, and more than half of them are at least 30 years old.
Many will reach the end of their operational lives in the next two decades, yet the prospects of replacing
them are uncertain, at best, in countries such as the US, Japan and France, while others including Germany, Switzerland and South Korea are planning to phase out nuclear power altogether. The days of networks dominated by a few large, centralised power stations are drawing to a close, according to many analysts. In their place will come more dispersed sources of renewable generation. Battery storage and digital “smart grid” technology will help smooth out supply and demand, and increase efficiency.
Tom Burke, chairman of E3G, an environmental think-tank, says there will be no room in this new world of flexible, decentralised generation for large, rigid nuclear reactors. “There are going to be increasingly frequent periods when we have too much power,” says Mr Burke. “But if you are the energy minister, how do you explain to people why you are having to switch off cheap renewables in order to use the much more expensive nuclear power which you have committed to pay for over the next 35 years?”
Progress at Hinkley, therefore, is being watched as closely in Beijing as in Paris and London. A repeat of the delays at Olkiluoto and Flamanville could sign the death warrant for western reactor developers, while dealing a setback for
China’s international expansion. Mr Rossi is aware of the high stakes: “We need to make sure that Britain will be happy about the choice it made.” https://www.ft.com/content/8307c266-066b-11e8-9650-9c0ad2d7c5b5
February 5, 2018
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business and costs, politics, UK |
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SPRU 2nd Feb 2018, Blog by Dr Charlie Wilson (Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research).
UK homes account for just under a quarter of national greenhouse gas
emissions. Improving their efficiency not only reduces emissions, but also
improves health and wellbeing, and creates jobs.
The Department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) recently retweeted the
headline findings of UKERC-CIED research published last year: up to 50% of
energy used in homes can be saved through energy efficient renovations and
other measures, contingent on supporting policies.
Are these supporting policies in place? The Green Deal was introduced with fanfare in 2013,
replacing obligations on utilities with a market-based approach for
informing homeowners about cost-effective efficiency measures and providing
‘pay-as-you-save’ loan financing.
Our research found that although the Green Deal did effectively raise the salience of energy efficient
renovations, it failed in other important ways:
First, it treated energy efficiency as special rather than as a ‘mundane’ feature of broader
home improvements.
Second, it emphasised financial aspects of renovation
decisions rather than tap into the underlying tensions in domestic life
which renovations could help resolve. A
And it was attractive to homeowners only once they had already decided to renovate, so didn’t help boost
renovation rates. Uptake rates of Green Deal finance were extremely low,
and confidence in the scheme plummeted. Less than 2 years after its
introduction, it was largely shelved. The Clean Growth Strategy published
last October includes measures for improving the efficiency of fuel-poor
and low-income homes, but offers little to the two thirds of owner-occupied
homes in the UK, nor the private rental sector (beyond an aspiration to
“develop a long-term trajectory” to improve energy performance). The
post-Green Deal policy vacuum persists.
http://blogs.sussex.ac.uk/sussexenergygroup/2018/02/02/energy-efficiency-policy/
February 5, 2018
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ENERGY, UK |
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Xinhuanet 1st Feb 2018, China General Nuclear Power Corporation (CGN), a major Chinese nuclear
power operator, said Wednesday that nuclear projects in Britain were
proceeding well. He Yu, chairman of the board of CGN, said since the deals
were inked in 2016 with French energy company EDF and the British
government, CGN has invested 1.7 billion British pounds in order to advance
the projects. CGN signed agreements in 2016 for Hinkley Point C (HPC), a
nuclear project in Somerset, and a suite of agreements relating to the
Sizewell C (SZC) in eastern England and Bradwell B projects (BRB) in Essex.
“A total of 15 Chinese suppliers and contractors have passed a preliminary
qualification assessment for the HPC project,” He said. “HPC, which is
Britain’s first new nuclear power station in a generation, is the largest
construction in Europe.”
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2018-02/01/c_136940068.htm
Reuters 31st Jan 2018, Notable Chinese investments in Britain include the Hinkley C nuclear power
station which is being built by China General Nuclear Power Corp and the
British arm of France’s EDF (EDF.PA), while British firms, such as Rolls
Royce (RR.L), have won large deals from Chinese firms to supply items like
plane engines. Both May and senior Chinese officials have restated their
commitment to the “golden era” in ties but a row over May’s decision
to delay approval for the Chinese-funded Hinkley nuclear plant in late 2016
chilled relations. However, Britain was the first Western country to sign
up to the China-backed Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and it sent
Finance Minister Philip Hammond to a Beijing summit last year about
President Xi Jinping’s flagship ‘Belt and Road Initiative’ – a
trillion-dollar infrastructure-led push to build a modern Silk Road.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-britain/chinas-li-says-ties-with-britain-to-stay-unchanged-through-brexit-idUSKBN1FK023
February 3, 2018
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business and costs, China, marketing, politics international, UK |
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NDA 1st Feb 2018, Specialist scuba divers are plumbing new depths to haul radioactive waste
out of the nuclear fuel storage pond at Sizewell A. The team of American
underwater experts tackled their first UK ‘nuclear dive’ at Dungeness A
in 2016 where, wearing full protective suits and shielded from radiation by
the water, they were able to cut up empty fuel storage skips and retrieve
other pieces of submerged equipment.
The ponds were used to store thousands
of used nuclear fuel rods, held in metal skips, after they were discharged
from the reactors. After the last of the fuel was transported to Sellafield
for reprocessing, the skips and a range of redundant items, including
sludge, were left behind in the water.
Pond clean-out conventionally takes
place using remotely operated equipment to lift the whole radioactive skips
clear of the water, exposing them to the air, where they are carefully cut
up before decontamination, storage and eventual disposal. This process is
slow with potential radiation dose risks for workers. By doing the work
under water, the divers can cut up the skips more safely, access awkward
areas more easily, making the whole process safer, faster and more
productive.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/diving-into-innovation-at-sizewell
February 3, 2018
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employment, UK, wastes |
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