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Congress readies for battle over nuclear policy, The Hill, 
On issues ranging from the size of the U.S. nuclear arsenal to whether to leave open the possibility of launching a nuclear first strike, leading Democrats in the House and Republicans in the Senate have been meticulously laying out their cases. Those debates will come to a head soon, as the Senate Armed Services Committee begins to consider its version of the defense policy bill in two weeks………
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated modernizing the nuclear arsenal will cost more than $1 trillion over the next 30 years.
House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith (D-Wash.), who has long lambasted the price tag for nuclear modernization, pledged to make the issue a priority when he took control of the gavel after Democrats won back the House.
……. In late January, Smith also re-introduced his “No First Use Act” — with backing from presidential candidate Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) — that would make it U.S. policy not to strike first with nuclear weapons.
…….. One thing Smith did say is likely to be in the bill is language supporting the New START Treaty, which caps the number of deployed nuclear warheads allowed to the United States and Russia. The treaty is up for extension in 2021, and Trump has indicated he wants China to join the pact as a condition for renewal — something supporters of the treaty describe as a “poison pill.”……. https://thehill.com/policy/defense/443197-congress-readies-for-battle-over-nuclear-policy
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May 13, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics, USA |
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Federal panel rejects all objections to proposed New Mexico nuclear dump https://www.krwg.org/post/federal-panel-rejects-all-objections-proposed-new-mexico-nuclear-dump?fbclid=IwAR1ROpcdsAWDegwnW0vib6ICXXy3q2lzDVTrrOuEbKN4ZbM90Q169XCM6Cc
By SIERRA CLUB • MAY 7, 2019 On Tuesday, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced that its Atomic Safety and Licensing Board had rejected every objection made by intervenors challenging Holtec International’s application to build a storage facility for high-level nuclear waste in southeast New Mexico.
Among the requests the panel refused to consider was the objection raised by Sierra Club that U.S. law clearly prohibits nuclear waste being moved to interim facilities before a permanent storage site has been identified. No such permanent sites exist in the U.S.
“This ‘interim’ storage facility could well become a permanent repository without the protections of a permanent repository,” Sierra Club attorney Wally Taylor said in response to Tuesday’s ruling. “Now it is up to the people and public officials in New Mexico to protect New Mexicans from this boondoggle.”
“New Mexico citizens should be very concerned about this project,” Sierra Club Rio Grande Chapter Nuclear-Waste Co-Chair John Buchser said. “Energy Secretary Rick Perry has indicated he is OK with the storage-site proposal in Texas, just across the New Mexico border, becoming a permanent facility. The Sierra Club is very concerned about possible radioactive releases from 
containers designed for short-term storage. The transport of this highly radioactive waste is even more risky, and the nation’s rail system is not safe enough to transport this waste.”
Taylor, representing the Sierra Club Rio Grande Chapter, and attorneys for Beyond Nuclear, Fasken, AFES and transportation intervenors raised nearly 50 different contentions before the three-judge board during oral arguments in January in Albuquerque.
The panel, charged with ruling on petitioners’ standing and the admissibility of their contentions under NRC regulations, agreed that some of the six petitioners, including the Sierra Club, had standing, but ruled that not not a single one of nearly 50 contentions raised were admissible for even an evidentiary hearing.
“The board won’t even consider transportation risk,” Buchser said.
“This decision is a perfect example and a lesson for the citizens of New Mexico and the United States of how the NRC process is shamelessly designed to prevent the public from participating,” Taylor said.
“It’s clear from the hearings across the state that the people of New Mexico don’t want this. They need to join forces and make that clear to New Mexico officials,” Taylor said. “State officials can pass and enforce laws that would require permits or other protections from the dangers posed by the transport of high-level radioactive waste to southeast New Mexico.”
The next step for Sierra Club is to appeal to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
May 13, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
legal, safety, USA |
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 https://www.jacksonville.com/opinion/20190510/guest-column-nuclear-power-isnt-needed-for-green-new-deal By David Kyler, 10 May 19, Recently Tim Echols, vice chairman of the Georgia Public Service Commission, made comments that were critical of the proposed Green New Deal.Echols’ comments could hardly have been more misleading, misinformed and cynically ironic.
In dismissing the progressive proposal, Echols defended Georgia’s energy policy and portrayed the Plant Vogtle nuclear plant as a praiseworthy centerpiece of the state’s achievements. But even casual observers recognize Plant Vogtle as a wasteful fiasco and a tribute to extravagant corporate welfare.
Plant Vogtle is now double the starting cost at $30 billion. It is years behind schedule. And it remains a horrendous yet profitable hoax foisted on U.S. taxpayers and Georgia Power customers.
Even if Vogtle were running on schedule and within budget, there are very good reasons why so few nuclear plants are now being built — and why nuclear power has been omitted from the Green New Deal. Here are just some of those reasons:
• Accidents such as Chernobyl and Three Mile Island demonstrate the dangerous public safety risks of nuclear power.
• Mining and processing nuclear fuels produce huge amounts of carbon emissions.
• There is still no acceptable method for long-term storage of deadly radioactive waste.
• The cost of building a nuclear plant requires corporate financing that is lavishly supplemented by government-guaranteed loans.
• Unlike nuclear power, solar equipment can be scaled down to ownership by individual households.
One of the Green New Deal’s major goals is correcting unfair income disparities that have been facilitated by public policies that reward corporations at the public’s expense.
By supporting decentralized energy technology like rooftop solar and omitting corporate-dependent power sources — like nukes — the Green New Deal will help working people build economic security.
Contrary to Echols’ claims, the Green New Deal’s aims are legitimate if ambitious.
Providing clean energy is a commendable and timely enterprise that is vital to America’s future.
David Kyler is the executive director of the Center for a Sustainable Coast in St. Simons Island, Ga.
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May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
climate change, politics, USA |
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Congress tries to defund US nuclear transfers to Saudi Arabia. Al-Monitor Bryant Harris May 9, 2019 House Democrats are trying to use the power of the purse to block the transfer of US nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia amid concerns that the Donald Trump administration is too keen to strike a deal with the kingdom.
The House foreign aid panel’s spending bill for fiscal year 2020, released today, would bar the use of federal funds to “support the sale of nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia.” The provision comes as Democrats accuse the Trump administration of using a legal loophole to provide undisclosed nuclear technology and assistance to Riyadh.
“Given the administration’s failure to share important information about these activities with Congress, we included this provision, which prevents the administration from allowing the sale of nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia,” a House Democratic aide who did not want to be identified told Al-Monitor. “We hope this will force much-needed transparency on this issue.”
Lawmakers are concerned that Riyadh has not agreed to terms that would preclude it from enriching uranium or reprocessing plutonium on its territory, precursors to a nuclear weapons program. Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman notably raised eyebrows last year by vowing that Saudi Arabia would pursue a nuclear weapon if Iran obtained one.
But some nonproliferation experts are skeptical that the legislation unveiled today would effectively deter the administration, which is determined to strike a civil nuclear deal with Riyadh, from continuing nuclear transfers……… https://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2019/05/congress-tries-defund-us-nuclear-transfers-saudi-arabia.html
May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
business and costs, politics, USA |
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In Middle of Nuclear Standoff, U.S. Seizes North Korean Cargo Ship Illicitly Exporting Coal, Slate, By ELLIOT HANNON, 9 May 19
The U.S. has seized a North Korean cargo ship that it alleges has been used to illicitly export coal from the country in violation of international sanctions, the Department of Justice announced Thursday. The move, though many months in the making, is sure to stir resentment in Pyongyang as the two countries try to negotiate denuclearization.
This is the first time the U.S. has seized a North Korean ship for sanctions violations and U.S. officials say it is part of a broader push to increase pressure on Pyongyang to dismantle its nuclear program. The coal sector is key to the North Korean economy and its nuclear weapons program. The ship, named Wise Honest, was also importing heavy machinery…….
May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
incidents, North Korea, politics international, USA |
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Trump’s Bet on Kim Might Not Pay Off, All that’s preventing the collapse of talks is that North Korea’s missiles haven’t flown far enough yet. The Atlantic URI FRIEDMAN, 10 May 19
President Donald Trump claimed his deal-making prowess and great relationship with Kim Jong Un had averted a devastating war and neutralized the threat from North Korea’s nuclear weapons. South Korean President Moon Jae In said he was building an “irreversible and lasting peace” on the Korean peninsula.
What’s become glaringly obvious, however, is that all this progress was as provisional as Kim Jong Un’s promise last spring to halt tests of nuclear weapons and long-range missiles.
The spectacular summits between the North Korean leader and his American and South Korean counterparts, the lofty joint statements that emerged from them, the Trump-Kim love letters and demolitions of a nuclear-test site and guard posts along the border between the Koreas—all of it was resting on an exceedingly fragile foundation, a foundation that is starting to crumble.
We’ve now descended to the point at which all that is keeping diplomacy with North Korea from collapsing is how many miles its missiles are flying.
Angered and humiliated by Trump’s decision to walk away from their second summit in Vietnam in February, Kim has gradually been dialing up the pressure on the United States and its allies. He’s reminding audiences at home and abroad that he’s quite capable of renewing his arms buildup in earnest if he doesn’t get his way in nuclear talks. (At the summit, Trump rejected North Korea’s offer to dismantle a nuclear facility in exchange for the lifting of most international sanctions against Pyongyang.)
“North Korea’s military posturing is partially for domestic political consumption and partially an effort to complicate politics for Trump and Moon to elicit concessions,” Leif-Eric Easley, a professor at Ewha Womans University in Seoul, told me. “But while the Kim regime is likely aiming its provocations just below the threshold for a response from the U.S. and its allies in terms of increasing sanctions or scaling up military exercises, it may miss the mark.”
Ahead of the Vietnam summit came the rebuilding of a rocket-launch site that Kim had partially demolished. Then came the test of a mysterious conventional weapon in April, the firing last weekend of what the South Korean government euphemistically referred to as “projectiles” that traveled between 45 and 125 miles, and the launch this week of two short-range missiles that flew 260 and 170 miles, respectively—after more than 500 days of no testing. To make sure the message wasn’t lost on the Americans, the latest weapons demonstration came as Trump’s North Korea envoy, Stephen Biegun, was visiting South Korea and as the U.S. military tested a nuclear-capable intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM, in California.
What Kim hasn’t done yet is break last year’s vow and resume nuclear and long-range missile tests, the actions that nearly precipitated a military conflict between the United States and North Korea in 2017 as the North refined its capability to target the U.S. homeland with nuclear-tipped ICBMs……
……… If negotiations fall apart and North Korea returns to expanding its nuclear-weapons arsenal (a program it has quietly continued to work on while negotiating with the United States), it would leave hopes of peace and denuclearization on the peninsula in tatters. It would also raise the risk of military conflict, whether by design or by accident, between the United States and North Korea…….https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/05/trump-and-kim-might-not-save-us-north-korea-diplomacy/589180/
May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
North Korea, politics international, USA |
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Perry Supports DOE Reconsideration of High-Level Waste Definition, Exchange Monitor, BY CHRIS SCHNEIDMILLER, MAY 10, 2019
Energy Secretary Rick Perry on Thursday voiced support for his agency’s potential reinterpretation of the definition of high-level radioactive waste.
The Department of Energy proposed the reinterpretation in October and is now reviewing public comments submitted through Jan. 9 on the matter.
Ultimately, DOE could determine the definition should emphasize the radiological threat waste poses to human health, rather than where or how it was generated. That could open the door to disposal methods now prohibited for high-level waste.
The department has not given a timeline for a decision……
Subcommittee Vice Chairman Jerry McNerney (D-Calif.) suggested the reinterpretation could lead to high-level waste being dispoosed of “in less secure sites.” He asked Perry to specify the amount of material DOE is considering reclassifying. The DOE chief did not provide a specific figure.
The Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 and the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 define HLW as highly radioactive material that comes from spent nuclear fuel. That generally involves separating contents in irradiated nuclear fuel and target materials, such as plutonium.
There is roughly 90 million gallons of solids, liquids, and sludge left over from decades of nuclear weapons production, the Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future said in 2012. By law, that material must go into a geologic repository – which the United States does not yet have, after decades of efforts to bring the Yucca Mountain disposal site into existence.
Some high-level waste that is redesignated as another waste type could be shipped to the Nevada National Security Site, the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico, and the privately held Waste Control Specialists facility in West Texas, the nongovernmental Energy Communities Alliance has said. The Washington, D.C.-based group, which represents communities near DOE sites, has said it does not expect any decision from the department until late 2019. https://www.exchangemonitor.com/perry-supports-doe-reconsideration-high-level-waste-definition/
May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
USA, wastes |
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Chelsea Manning released from jail after refusing to testify in Wikileaks case, Mirror UK
The former US army intelligence analyst spent 62 days in prison after refusing to testify over her histroy with Wikileaks, By Toby Meyjes Chelsea Manning has been released after being jailed for refusing to testify in a Wikileaks case, say reports.10 MAY 2019 The former US army intelligence analyst spent 62 days in prison for refusing to testify about her past association with the whistleblowing site.
However, despite her release she could be returned to custody as early as next week after her legal team was served a subpoena demanding she appears before a different grand jury on May 17, reports Gizmodo.
Her lawyers told the website: “Chelsea will continue to refuse to answer questions, and will use every available legal defense to prove to District Judge Trenga that she has just cause for her refusal to give testimony.”
Manning was previously jailed by US district judge Claude Hilton after being found in contempt of court.
Manning, a former US Army intelligence analyst, leaked more than 725,000 classified documents to the website, while serving in Iraq. …..
The files she handed over to the whisteblowing organisation, headed by Julian Assange, included a video of a US aircraft killing 12 people in Iraq.
In the footage, recorded in 2007, one crew member can be heard bragging ‘hahaha, I hit ’em.’
Manning confessed to her crimes in a 2013 court martial, pleading guilty to 10 offences. https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/us-news/breaking-chelsea-manning-released-jail-15023606
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May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
civil liberties, USA |
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PRESIDENT KENNEDY GAVE ISRAEL A STRONG WARNING ABOUT ITS NUCLEAR REACTOR IN 1963
Kennedy, who was otherwise close to Israel, was furious with its ostensible nuclear weapons program., Jerusalem Post, BY RON KAMPEAS/JTA MAY 8, 2019 WASHINGTON (JTA) — Declassified documents show President John Kennedy warned Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol in 1963 that U.S. support for the young country would be “seriously jeopardized” if Israel did not allow the United States periodic inspections of Israel’s nuclear reactor.
A telegram from Kennedy dated July 4, 1963, congratulates Eshkol on assuming the prime ministership after David Ben-Gurion’s resignation and recounts talks between Kennedy and Ben-Gurion about inspections at the reactor in Dimona.
“As I wrote Mr. Ben-Gurion, this government’s commitment to and support of Israel could be seriously jeopardized if it should be thought that we were unable to obtain reliable information on a subject as vital to peace as Israel’s effort in the nuclear field,” the telegram said.
The telegram was declassified in the 1990s but was not widely available until last week when the National Security Archives, a project affiliated with George Washington University, posted it on its website…….https://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/President-Kennedy-gave-Israel-a-strong-warning-about-its-nuclear-reactor-in-1963-589107
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May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
history, Israel, politics international, USA |
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Holtec clears hurdle for proposed nuclear-waste storage facility https://www.courierpostonline.com/story/news/2019/05/09/holtec-lea-county-new-mexico-storage-site-uranium-nuclear-waste/1155441001/
A three-judge panel this week rejected nearly 50 objections to the Camden firm’s proposal for a “consolidated interim storage facility” that would initially hold up to 8,680 metric tons of uranium in a remote area of southeastern New Mexico.
The radioactive waste would be stored underground in 500 canisters made at Holtec’s Camden plant and elsewhere. The spent fuel would come from nuclear power plants across the country, including some being decommissioned by a Holtec affiliate.
The ruling keeps Holtec’s proposal “on track for licensing in 2020,” the company said.It describes the planned facility as “safe and secure” and says the sealed metal canisters, to be buried in steel and concrete vaults, are “terror-resistant.”
“Provided funding is obtained … and if construction could start in 2021, the (storage facility) could be ready to accept spent fuel shipments beginning in 2023,” Holtec spokeswoman Joy Russell said Thursday.
“This ‘interim” storage facility could well become a permanent repository without the protections of a permanent repository,” Sierra Club attorney Wally Taylor said in a statement.
Beyond Nuclear, a Maryland-based nonprofit, said it was “astounded” by the ruling.
It estimates the Holtec complex, with plans for 19 expansion phases over 20 years, could ultimately hold more than 173,000 metric tons of uranium.
Environmentalists have also expressed concern over the potential danger of transporting spent fuel from nuclear plants across the country.
In its ruling, the board said only three of six challengers had standing to request a hearing on Holtec’s license application.
It said Sierra Club and Beyond Nuclear have members living near the proposed storage site, while an oil-and-gas company, Fasken Land and Minerals, has business operations in the area.
But the board said none of the petitioners’ objections were admissible. As a result, it concluded, “this proceeding is terminated.”
Jim Walsh: @jimwalsh_cp; 856-486-2646; jwalsh@gannettnj.com
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May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
USA, wastes |
1 Comment
Radiation therapy consent forms too difficult to read, Reuters, Lisa Rapaport 10 May 19,
(Reuters Health) – Cancer patients usually get written consent forms to sign before radiation that are supposed to clearly spell out the treatment risks, but a new U.S. study suggests these forms are too complex for most patients to easily understand.
While radiotherapy has become more precise in recent years, it can still damage some healthy cells and tissues in addition to destroying the cancer. Common short-term side effects can include fatigue as well as skin problems like itching, blistering and peeling. Lasting side effects depend on the type and location of radiation therapy and can include more serious problems like new malignancies elsewhere on the body.
In theory, informed consent is a cornerstone of modern cancer treatment. But the study results suggest that paperwork patients receive to explain radiation is falling short of this goal.
“We looked at the readability of these forms and discovered that, even using the most conservative estimates, they were at far higher reading levels than most patients understand,” said study co-author Dr. Andrew Einstein of the Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York City. …… https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-radiotherapy-informed-consent/radiation-therapy-consent-forms-too-difficult-to-read-idUSKCN1SE2FR
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May 11, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
health, USA |
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U.S. Issues New Sanctions as Iran Warns It Will Step Back From Nuclear Deal, NYT, By David E. Sanger, Edward Wong, Steven Erlanger and Eric Schmitt, May 8, 2019
WASHINGTON — Iran’s president declared on Wednesday that he would begin to walk away from the restrictions of a 2015 nuclear deal, and the Trump administration responded with a new round of sanctions against Tehran, reviving a crisis that had been contained for the past four years.
The escalation of threats caught the United States’ allies in Europe in the crossfire between Washington and Tehran. And while the announcement by President Hassan Rouhani of Iran did not terminate the landmark nuclear accord that was negotiated by world powers, it put it on life support.
Britain, France and Germany all opposed President Trump’s move a year ago to withdraw the United States from the accord that limited Iran’s capacity to produce nuclear fuel for 15 years. Ever since, the Trump administration has ramped up a pressure campaign against Iran’s military and clerical leaders, including blocking global oil exports and expediting warships and B-52 bombers to the Persian Gulf this week to face down what officials described, without evidence, as a new threat by Tehran against American troops in the Middle East.
European officials had promised to set up a bartering system to evade American sanctions imposed against Iranian oil. But that effort has largely failed, even as Iran complied with its obligations under the agreement, from production limits to inspections.
On Wednesday morning in Tehran, Mr. Rouhani declared he had run out of patience.
“The path we have chosen today is not the path of war, it is the path of diplomacy,” he said in a nationally broadcast speech. “But diplomacy with a new language and a new logic.”
Rather than exit the deal entirely, Mr. Rouhani announced a series of small steps to resume the production of nuclear centrifuges and to begin accumulating nuclear material.
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Mr. Rouhani also set a series of carefully calibrated deadlines for European leaders — essentially forcing them to either join the United States in isolating Iran or uphold the nuclear deal that world powers spent years negotiating with Tehran.
He said the Europeans had 60 days to assure that Iran could “reap our benefits” under the nuclear accord, by making up for lost oil revenues and allowing the country back into the international financial system.
If the Europeans agree, they will be subject to sanctions by the United States. If they dismiss Mr. Rouhani’s claims, he says Iran will take more dramatic steps.
Hours later, the White House announced that it was taking additional measures to squeeze Iran’s economy by imposing sanctions on its steel, aluminum, iron and copper sectors. Iran’s industrial metals industries account for about 10 percent of its exports, according to a Trump administration estimate.
Mr. Trump said in a statement that the move “puts other nations on notice that allowing Iranian steel and other metals into your ports will no longer be tolerated.”
Under John R. Bolton, the national security adviser who has long advocated pressing for regime change in Iran, the White House has been urging ever-escalating sanctions…….Hours later, the White House announced that it was taking additional measures to squeeze Iran’s economy by imposing sanctions on its steel, aluminum, iron and copper sectors. Iran’s industrial metals industries account for about 10 percent of its exports, according to a Trump administration estimate.
Mr. Trump said in a statement that the move “puts other nations on notice that allowing Iranian steel and other metals into your ports will no longer be tolerated.”
Under John R. Bolton, the national security adviser who has long advocated pressing for regime change in Iran, the White House has been urging ever-escalating santions……Hours later, the White House announced that it was taking additional measures to squeeze Iran’s economy by imposing sanctions on its steel, aluminum, iron and copper sectors. Iran’s industrial metals industries account for about 10 percent of its exports, according to a Trump administration estimate.
Mr. Trump said in a statement that the move “puts other nations on notice that allowing Iranian steel and other metals into your ports will no longer be tolerated.”
Under John R. Bolton, the national security adviser who has long advocated pressing for regime change in Iran, the White House has been urging ever-escalating sanctions…….https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/08/us/politics/iran-nuclear-deal.html
May 9, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Iran, politics international, USA |
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 NNSA Won’t Start Savannah River Plutonium Disposal Until 2028 https://www.exchangemonitor.com/mfff-alternative-wont-running-2028-nnsa-says/?printmode=1BY EXCHANGEMONITOR 8 May 19 The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) indicated Monday it will not start disposal of 34 metric tons of surplus weapon-usable plutonium in South Carolina until 2028 — a date by which the agency could accrue more than $1 billion in financial penalties for failing to remove the material from the South Carolina facility.The semiautonomous Department of Energy cited the schedule for startup of the Surplus Plutonium Disposition Project in a chart in the “NNSA Strategic Integrated Roadmap 2020-2044.”
The unfunded, unauthorized Surplus Plutonium Disposition Project, also sometimes called dilute-and-dispose, is the NNSA’s new method of getting rid of the plutonium under an arms-reduction pact signed with Russia in 2000.
The NNSA once planned to dispose of the plutonium by turning it into commercial reactor fuel in Savannah River’s now-canceled Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility (MFFF) — a partially built structure the agency now wants to turn into a factory for fissile nuclear warhead cores called pits.
Under federal law, the NNSA must pay the state of South Carolina a maximum of $100 million annually for every year after Jan. 1, 2016, that the agency fails to remove 1 metric ton of surplus weapon-usable plutonium from the Savannah River Site.
South Carolina in 2016 sued DOE in federal court to collect after the agency ditched the MFFF in favor of dilute-and-dispose — chemically weakening the plutonium, suspending it in an inert material known as stardust, and burying it deep underground at DOE’s Waste Isolation Pilot Plant near Carlsbad, N.M.
In a separate lawsuit in 2017, a U.S. District Court judge in South Carolina ordered the NNSA to remove 1 metric ton of the formerly MFFF-bound plutonium from Savannah River. The NNSA folded that metric ton of material back into its weapon-production pipeline and, some time last year, shipped half of that amount to the Nevada National Security Site over Nevada’s loud objections.
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May 9, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
- plutonium, USA |
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 Nevada Warns of Impacts of Rad Waste Disposal Bill https://www.exchangemonitor.com/nevada-warns-impacts-rad-waste-disposal-bill/ BY EXCHANGEMONITOR, 8 May 19, The proposed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada could conceivably end up receiving 150,000 metric tons of radioactive waste by the second half of this century, according to a Nevada state government analysis of a proposed U.S. Senate bill to speed up that project.The April 29 memo from Bob Halstead, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, is another salvo in the state’s decades-long fight against the planned Department of Energy disposal site. In this case, the target is legislation pending from Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wy.).
The discussion draft of the Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act of 2019 also, according to Halstead: would allow a mobile retrievable storage facility in Nevada; does not guarantee the nation’s nuclear wastes would avoid Las Vegas while being sent to Yucca Mountain; and ignores adverse economic impacts if something goes wrong with the transportation and storage of the wastes.
Barrasso’s draft is effectively identical to 2017 legislation from Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) that died in the Senate. It contains a set of measures to advance both temporary storage of the nation’s nuclear waste in a small number of locations and the final repository in Nevada.
The proposed bill would increase the limit of wastes at the proposed Yucca Mountain repository from 70,000 metric tons to 110,000 metric tons. “If this change is permitted, Congress will almost certainly further revise upward or eliminate the capacity limit,” Halstead wrote in his memo to the state’s congressional delegation and Gov. Steve Sisolak (D).
The analysis estimated that the United States will create 150,000 metric tons of high-level radioactive waste and spent fuel by 2050. While a second repository closer to the East Coast had at one been considered in the disposal plan, Congress in 1987 limited the disposal approach to Yucca Mountain.
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May 9, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
USA, wastes |
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Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant To Close, Latest Symbol Of Struggling Industry, NPR, May 8, 2019, 40 years after the nation’s worst commercial nuclear accident, the remaining reactor still operating at Three Mile Island in South-central Pennsylvania is closing.
Exelon announced Wednesday that Three Mile Island Generating Station Unit 1 will shut down by September 30th.
The company says the plant has been losing money for years. The nuclear industry generally has struggled to compete with less expensive electricity generated from natural gas and renewable energy.
Exelon first announced it would close two years ago unless lawmakers stepped in to keep it open. It then campaigned to save the plant by seeking a subsidy from Pennsylvania’s legislature. The company argued that, in light of climate change and efforts to address it, the plant deserves compensation for the [supposedly] carbon-free electricity it produces.
When it became clear the subsidy legislation wouldn’t pass within the next month Exelon decided to retire the plant, which was licensed to operate for 15 more years. …….. https://www.npr.org/2019/05/08/721514875/three-mile-island-nuclear-plant-to-close-latest-symbol-of-struggling-industry
May 9, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics, USA |
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