JUSTIN TRUDEAU FACES CALLS TO RESIGN RE: SNC-LAVALIN SCANDAL
As reported by Newsweek.
Liberal Party Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau now faces calls from his Conservative Party challenger in this autumn’s election to resign over a scandal involving SNC-Lavalin, a giant engineering firm based in Montreal, Quebec. SNC-Lavalin has been accused of bribery, fraud, and other corruption over its practices in Libya. If convicted of such 
wrongdoing, SNC-Lavalin could be barred from Canadian federal contracts for a decade. (SNC-Lavalin has been previously barred for a decade from World Bank contracts.)
Holtec International has teamed with SNC-Lavalin to form a nuclear power plant decommissioning consortium. Already, the Holtec/SNC-Lavalin consortium has taken over ownership of the permanently shutdown Oyster Creek atomic reactor in NJ. This includes on-site irradiated nuclear fuel management.
Holtec & SNC-Lavalin are also vying for taking over the ownership of such other soon-to-be decommissioning nuclear power plants as Pilgrim in MA, and Palisades in MI.
Holtec is also the proponent for a national centralized interim storage facility for irradiated nuclear fuel in southeastern New Mexico.
Its partnership with a corrupt company like SNC-Lavalin calls into question Holtec’s own judgment.
However, Holtec itself has engaged in bribery, at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Browns Ferry nuclear power plant; in addition, Holtec CEO Krishna Singh has been accused by whistleblowers Oscar Shirani (Commonwealth Edison/Exelon) and Dr. Ross Landsman (NRC Region 3) of attempting to bribe them into silence, re: QA violations (see below).
And Holtec CEO Krishna Singh has also made racist remarks re: his own African American and Puerto Rican American workers in Camden, NJ.
Holtec is also infamous for QA (Quality Assurance) violations in the manufacture of its irradiated nuclear fuel canisters, brought to light by whistleblowers.
See these previous Beyond Nuclear website posts, for more info. on concerns re: SNC-Lavalin:…….. http://www.beyondnuclear.org/centralized-storage/
March 9, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Canada, politics, secrets,lies and civil liberties |
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Trump’s endeavour to nuclearise Saudi Arabia is driven by family business interests and tacitly approved by Israel. Aljazeera, by Hamid Dabashi, 8 Mar 2019 Like chronic indigestion that refuses to go away, presidential son-in-law Jared Kushner is back causing much discomfort to the general public.
“Kushner meets Saudi’s MBS for the first time since Khashoggi murder,” Al Jazeera recently reported, “The meeting focused on ‘increasing cooperation’ between Washington and Riyadh, as well as the Middle East peace process.”
But there might be more on their plate than just another bogus “peace process”.
Kushner has two paramount concerns while sitting comfortably in the big pocket of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MBS): pursuing his own personal financial gains and helping Israel steal what is left of Palestine. MBS also has two objectives while playing with Kushner, like a shiny marble in his pocket: To confront Iran and to establish himself as a ruling tyrant not just in Saudi Arabia but throughout the Arab and Muslim world.
The slaughter of innocent men, women and children in Yemen and the butchery of Jamal Khashoggi are the first flowers of his dream of a Saudi Spring. But in his pursuit of power and glory through murder and destruction, MBS does not seem to be satisfied with using only conventional means. It appears that he is now harbouring a great desire to go nuclear and the Trump administration is more than willing to oblige.
As the New York Times recently revealed, the Trump administration has been pursuing a deal with Saudi Arabia to develop its nuclear energy sector. “By ramming through the sale of as much as $80 billion in nuclear power plants, the Trump administration would provide sensitive know-how and materials to a government whose de facto leader, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, has suggested that he may eventually want a nuclear weapon as a hedge against Iran and has shown little concern for what the rest of the world thinks,” the newspaper claimed.
At the forefront of these efforts, of course, are Kushner and his business interests. It turns out a company that bailed out his family after an ill-conceived real estate deal in New York brought them close to bankruptcy now intends to sell nuclear reactors in Saudi Arabia.
That, along with other shenanigans, has gotten the US security establishment worried. Their attempts to cancel his security clearance, however, have been repeatedly overridden by his father-in-law.
Hence, Kushner remains undeterred in his pursuit to nuclearise Saudi Arabia.
In exposing this worrying reality, the US media, however, has made two very wrong assumptions: one, that a nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia somehow contradicts the interests of the Israeli leadership; two, that it is the result of some kind of a Gulf-money entrapment.
……. Given that President Donald Trump’s son-in-law has been the principal driving force behind a “peace plan” that aims to strip Palestinians of all their legitimate rights and legalise the Israeli occupation, it is hard to believe that he is now pursuing a policy that contradicts Israeli interests. …….
The reason why a Saudi nuclear programme is in the interest of the Israeli settler colony is very simple: It would fuel Saudi-Iranian rivalry, keeping them in a permanent state of war in the shadow of nuclear proliferation, which is good for Zionism, and of course, for the Israeli arms industry. It would keep the populations of both countries preoccupied with the imagined Sunni-Shia conflict and make them increasingly oblivious to the plight of the Palestinian people and the desecration of the holy sites in Jerusalem. …….. https://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/making-nuclear-mbs-190307135114759.html
March 9, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Saudi Arabia, secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA |
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Act would give states voice on nuclear waste dumps, Las Vegas Sun, March 5, 2019 The Nuclear Waste Informed Consent Act would require approval of the governor and impacted local governments and tribes before any money could be spent on a nuclear waste repository from the federal Nuclear Waste Fund. The act would be applicable to all states.
The act was introduced by most of the Nevada delegation, including U.S. Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen and U.S. Reps. Dina Titus, Susie Lee and Steven Horsford, all Democrats.
Members of Nevada’s congressional delegation are attempting to ensure states have a voice in the construction of nuclear waste repositories.
Nevada is home to the dormant Yucca Mountain nuclear waste depository.
Titus, who has introduced a similar bill multiple times in the past, said the federal government should not force a waste site on any community.
“The Trump Administration’s attempt to treat our state as the dumping ground for the nation’s nuclear waste is based on dirty politics, not sound science. No state or community should have a nuclear waste dump forced upon them. I’m reintroducing this legislation as part of our strategy to put an end to the Yucca Mountain project once and for all,” she said in a statement…….
Lee, Horsford and Titus characterized Yucca Mountain as a push to turn Nevada into the nation’s dumping ground.
“I refuse to sit by and watch my community be used as a dumping ground for the nation’s nuclear waste,” Horsford said in a statement. “Yucca Mountain is an ongoing threat to the safety of Nevada families and to the Silver State’s $40 billion tourism industry.” https://lasvegassun.com/news/2019/mar/05/act-would-give-states-voice-on-nuclear-waste-dumps/
March 7, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics, USA, wastes |
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Activists challenge license extension for Peach Bottom nuclear plant, Lindsay C. VanAsdalan, York Dispatch, 5 Mar 19, An anti-nuclear watchdog aims to challenge Exelon Generation’s bid to extend the operating license at its Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station through 2054.
The group’s request for a hearing will not be approved unless the U.S. Atomic Safety and Licensing Board deems its arguments admissible at a preliminary hearing March 27.
Exelon’s application to extend its 60-year operating license an additional 20 years is among the first in the country, according to Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman Neil Sheehan.
The anti-nuclear group Beyond Nuclear contends that Exelon did not meet NRC standards for renewal because it did not provide evidence of studying its aging equipment.
“Exelon could be gathering evidence from closed stations to harvest materials to look at things like how weld material has fared under 49 years of similar operation,” said Paul Gunter, director of the reactor oversight project at Beyond Nuclear.
If approved, Exelon’s proposal could extend the life of Peach Bottom’s Unit 3 through 2053 and Unit 4 through 2054.
The proposed extension at Peach Bottom comes as Exelon bids for support in the General Assembly for legislation that would benefit its nuclear facilities in Pennsylvania, including Dauphin County facility Three Mile Island, which the firm has said it will close without state support.
Opponents of the legislation — which has yet to roll out in Harrisburg — have already labeled it a “bailout.”
It’s unknown how aging equipment at Peach Bottom would fare with such a long service life, Gunter said.
Most nuclear plants in the U.S. have received initial renewals extending their licenses from 40 to 60 years, said Sheehan, but a request for a second renewal is rare.
Only three plants — including Peach Bottom — are seeking their second license extension, this time from 60 years to 80. …… The group is looking for Exelon’s application to demonstrate it has “sufficient” knowledge — not just a little — on the issues that could affect aging equipment.
Exelon’s decommissioned Oyster Creek plant has the same boiling-water reactor as Peach Bottom, so there are opportunities to do extensive destructive analysis on larger equipment that wouldn’t be possible at Peach Bottom, Gunter said.
“A little bit of knowledge can be dangerous, particularly when talking about an inherently dangerous technology,” Gunter said…….ttps://www.yorkdispatch.com/story/news/2019/03/05/activists-challenge-license-extension-peach-bottom-nuclear-plant/3060252002/
March 7, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
safety, USA |
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https://www.wabe.org/atlanta-adopts-plan-to-get-off-fossil-fuels-and-nuclear-by-2035/
MOLLY SAMUEL • MAR 4, 2019 Atlanta will move to 100 percent “clean energy” by 2035, according to a resolution passed Monday by Atlanta City Council.
The goal is to have Atlanta use renewable energy, like wind and solar, and move away from power sources like coal, natural gas and nuclear.
In the plan approved by City Council, both the city of Atlanta and all residences and businesses in it would achieve that goal by 2035. That’s a change from the original proposal that set a deadline of 2025 for city operations, and 2035 for everything and everyone else.
The City Council had already voted unanimously to transition to what it calls clean energy, but Monday’s vote officially adopts the plan laying out how to do, and modifies those earlier dates. The resolution emphasizes finding ways to save energy and to make sure the switch is affordable.
March 7, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics, renewable, USA |
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Lawyer: Ex-SCANA officials ‘whitewashed,’ lied about defects at failed nuclear plant John Monk, The State Greenville News, March 5, 2019 COLUMBIA — SCANA executives deliberately lied to investors about the future of a doomed nuclear construction project, a lawyer representing former SCANA shareholders argued in court Monday.
“The bottom line is they (SCANA executives) lied to everyone, and they did it intentionally,” attorney John Browne told U.S. Judge Margaret Seymour.
The cost was tremendous, said Brown, whose lawsuit argues shareholders lost some $2.7 billion in stock value when the company’s stock price plummeted.
Seymour has a crucial decision to make about Browne’s lawsuit that alleges SCANA executives committed civil fraud that deflated investors’ stock valuations. She will decide whether to allow Browne’s lawsuit to go forward or dismiss it. She gave no hint Monday on how she might rule, or when.
Watching the proceedings Monday at the federal courthouse in Columbia were several attorneys from the U.S. Attorney’s office, which is working with the FBI to investigate criminal fraud allegations against SCANA and some of its former executives……….
During the hearing, Browne referred repeatedly to a document known as the Bechtel Report, which SCANA commissioned in 2015 to evaluate progress on the V.C. Summer nuclear plant under construction.
The Bechtel report, a draft of which was presented to SCANA the fall of 2015, detailed substantial cost overruns, construction delays and shoddy work at the nuclear plant site. But the report was never publicly released or discussed.
The company, which was publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange, hid its findings from investors, the press and the public, Browne said. …….. https://www.greenvilleonline.com/story/news/2019/03/05/lawyer-says-former-scana-officials-lied-failed-south-carolina-nuclear-plant/3065200002/
March 7, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
legal, USA |
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Meet America’s Secret Weapon To Kill China’s ‘Underwater’ Nuclear Weapons
The Navy just ordered 19 more sub-hunting Poseidon Aircraft – Could they stop Chinese SSBNs? by Kris Osborn
(Washington, D.C. ) 6 Mar 19 “…….The increasing global reach of Chinese nuclear-armed ballistic missile submarines, armed with JL-2 weapons reportedly able to hit parts of the US, continues to inspire an ongoing Navy effort to accelerate production of attack submarines, prepare long-dwell drones for deployment to the Pacific and continue acquisition of torpedo-armed sub-hunting planes such as the P-8/A Poseidon.
Seeking to overcome the Pacific’s “tyranny of distance” dispersed geography, and track China’s expanding fleet of submarines, the Navy is working with Congress to produce as many as three Virginia-class submarines per year, moving beyond the current plan to build two. In the air, the Navy has been moving to place its new Triton sea drones in Guam and has recently awarded Boeing a $2.4 billion deal to produce 19 more P-8A Poseidon surveillance and attack planes………. https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/meet-americas-secret-weapon-kill-chinas-underwater-nuclear-weapons-46247
March 7, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
USA, weapons and war |
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Adults failed to take climate action. Meet the young activists stepping up, Some are calling climate change this generation’s civil rights movement. These are the young activists leading the charge, Guardian, by Adrian Horton, Dream McClinton and Lauren Aratani, 4 Mar 19,
Despite being barely two years old, the Sunrise Movement has outpaced established environmental groups in the push to radically reshape the political landscape around climate change. Closely allied with new congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the youth-led Sunrise Movement has helped set out a sweepingly ambitious plan to address climate change in the form of the Green New Deal.
The movement comprises a small core team of young organizers, supported by a larger group of several hundred volunteers. The group’s elevation of the Green New Deal has clearly riled Trump, who has falsely but repeatedly claimed that the plan would result in the banning of cars, air travel and even cows.
The Guardian spoke to Sunrise members on how the organization has shaken the political and environmental establishment in the US…….. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/mar/04/can-they-save-us-meet-the-climate-kids-fighting-to-fix-the-planet
March 5, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
environment, USA |
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Team Trump Keeps Pushing Deal to Send Nuclear Tech to Saudis
Congress raised ‘grave concerns’ about the Trump administration’s past attempts to send nuclear technology to the Saudis. But Team Trump isn’t done trying. The Daily Beast, Erin Banco, Betsy Woodruff 03.04.19 The Trump administration is still actively working to make a deal to send U.S. nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia, according to two U.S. officials and two professional staffers at federal agencies with direct knowledge of those conversations. American energy businesses are still hoping to cash in on Riyadh’s push for energy diversification,
“This could be a very big contract. This administration is all about contracts,” said Hussein Ibish, a resident scholar at the Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington. “And there is a big market here that U.S. companies can get in on. The question is if the U.S. will decide, in the end, to go through with an official agreement or not.”
During the first few months of President Trump’s administration, members of his team tried to pull together a nuclear export deal that included private U.S. companies, according to three people with direct knowledge of those efforts and a congressional
report issued in late February.
That pursuit raised concerns at the time among professional staff inside the Departments of Energy, State, and Commerce. Those worries grew as it became clear that members of the administration had not engaged in regulatory and legal conversations about the export of such technology. Worse, the nuclear export plan was, in essence, the work of a single company. The firm, IP3, was connected to a pack of former generals, including then-National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and its proposal was “not a business plan,” one senior political official told investigators from the House Oversight and Government Reform committee, but rather “a scheme for these generals to make some money.” …….
A letter obtained by The Daily Beast shows how CEOs from six different energy companies, as well as members of IP3, courted Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and pitched the idea of working together on a nuclear plan called the “Iron Bridge Program.” (Iron Bridge is an IP3 subsidiary that counted Flynn as one of its advisers.)
The letter, which was reportedly sent to MBS in January 2017, says the nuclear plan would “create long term government to government and commercial to commercial partnerships between the United States and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.”………. https://www.thedailybeast.com/team-trump-keeps-pushing-deal-to-send-nuclear-tech-to-saudis
March 5, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics international, Saudi Arabia, USA |
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The Nuclear Energy Industry Goes MAGA to Win Over Trump
A U.S. uranium company set up shop at CPAC and started spreading Clinton scare stories. The Daily Beast, Lachlan Markay, 03.03.19 A leading U.S. uranium producer is confident that President Donald Trump is going to crack down on its foreign competitors. But in the spirit of not taking any chances, the company rented space at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, enlisted a top Trumpworld public relations executive, and invoked a well-worn Trump attack line on his 2016 campaign opponent to try to nail down a policy win.
The Texas-based Uranium Energy Corporation posted up in the exhibition hall of the annual conservative confab this week, where it courted conservative activists, radio hosts, and at least one senior White House official with its pitch to crack down on foreign competition in the name of national security.
Specifically, the company is pressing the Department of Commerce to impose quotas on uranium imports that would carve out a quarter of the market purely for domestic producers. The department is scheduled to present its findings to President Trump in April, when he will decide whether to invoke his authority to impose “national security” trade restrictions.
UEC’s pitch isn’t just boilerplate national security or protectionist rhetoric. It has something most other companies vying for attention at this year’s CPAC do not: an opponent that’s been repeatedly called out and demonized by President Trump and his allies—Uranium One.
A Canadian company, Uranium One is a major uranium importer to the U.S., which pits it against UEC’s policy agenda. It is also a boogeyman for conservatives, who believe that then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton shepherded its acquisition by Rosatom, a nuclear energy company owned by Russia’s state atomic energy agency, after Uranium One’s chairman donated millions of dollars to her family’s foundation.
The conspiracy theory fails to account for the fact Clinton was just one of a board of nine federal officials who signed off on the deal. But that didn’t stop Scott Melbye, UEC’s executive vice president of Uranium Energy Corp, from warning about it while manning the company’s booth at CPAC……..
The UEC company’s presence at CPAC underscores the ways in which private interests frequently attempt to leverage the conference, and its influential attendees, often by tailoring communications and advocacy strategies to the pet issues and causes that animate the moment’s conservative voters, activists, and officials.
UEC wasn’t listed on the conference’s website as either a sponsor or an exhibitor. But a source familiar with its work there said it signed on late as an exhibitor—the lowest level of CPAC sponsorship—which comes at a $4,000 price tag.
Helping to organize UEC’s CPAC presence was Alexandra Preate, a public relations executive who works closely with former White House strategist and leading protectionist Steve Bannon, who formerly ran the pro-Trump website Breitbart. Also mulling about UEC’s exhibit was Matt Boyle, Breitbart’s political editor. ……….
UEC is using the access CPAC offers its sponsors and exhibitors to pursue a strategy tailor-made for Trump-era conservatives. https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-nuclear-energy-industry-goes-maga-to-win-over-t
March 5, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
business and costs, Canada, politics, Uranium, USA |
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What Deadly Disaster Is the Criminal, Bankrupt PG&E So Desperately Hiding at Its Diablo Canyon Nukes, https://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/55293-rsn-what-deadly-disaster-is-the-criminal-bankrupt-pgae-so-desperately-hiding-at-its-diablo-canyon-nukes
By Harvey Wasserman, Reader Supported News, 3 Mar 19, 
s the bankrupt federal felon Pacific Gas & Electric desperately hiding something very deadly at its Diablo Canyon Power Plant? Will we know by March 7, when the company wants to restart Unit One, which is currently shut for refueling? Will YOU sign our petition asking Governor Gavin Newsom and other officials to inspect that reactor before it can restart?
In 2010, PG&E blew up a neighborhood in San Bruno, killing eight people.
In 2018, it helped burn down much of northern California, killing more than eighty people. The company has now admitted its culpability in starting that infamous Camp Fire and has questioned its own ability to continue to operate.
On February 6, it incinerated five buildings in San Francisco.
The company is bankrupt. It has been convicted of numerous federal felonies. It actually has a probation officer.
But the real terror comes at its Diablo Canyon nuclear reactors, nine miles west of San Luis Obispo on the central California coast.
The reactors are embrittled. They may be cracked. As with the gas pipes in San Bruno and the power poles in northern California, PG&E’s maintenance at these huge reactors has been systematically neglected.
But the company does NOT want the public to inspect them. WHY?
Right now, Diablo Unit One is shut for refueling. Critical inspections for embrittlement, cracking and deferred maintenance could be easily and cheaply done. Public discussions could also be held on vulnerability to earthquakes, waste management, and corporate competence.
The public does not need Diablo’s power, which often overloads the grid, forcing the shutdown of cleaner, safer wind and solar capacity. Reopening a cracked reactor would turn the fuel assemblies on-site into high-level radioactive waste, converting a multi-million-dollar asset into a huge fiscal liability.
Diablo Unit One is in particular danger because it was designed in the 1960s. Its original blueprints did not account for the dozen earthquake faults since discovered nearby. Copper used in key welds is now known to be inferior. Older reactors like those at Diablo are susceptible to embrittlement and cracking, which could be catastrophic.
In 1991 the Yankee Rowe Reactor in Massachusetts was forced to shut because of embrittlement. It was younger then than Diablo One is now.
Because PG&E is in bankruptcy and on federal probation, the state has extraordinary power right now. Normally such issues are pre-empted by the feds.
But at this time the governor, state agencies, the California Public Utilities Commission, and the courts have the right to demand these inspections. Certainly the public has a legitimate expectation to be protected.
The downwind consequences of a major accident are beyond comprehension. Diablo is less than 200 miles upwind from Los Angeles. A radioactive cloud from a likely disaster would threaten the lives of millions. Damage to property and the natural ecology, including some of the world’s most productive farmland, would be essentially impossible to calculate.
US Representative Salud Carbajal (D-San Luis Obispo) has already questioned PG&E’s competence to run these two huge reactors. A number of Hollywood stars, along with State Senator Ben Allen (D-Santa Monica), San Luis Obispo Mayor Heidi Harmon, and numerous towns and party organizations, have already joined with more than a thousand grassroots activists to ask the governor to require these critical tests and to subject the findings to public scrutiny.
Given PG&E’s bankruptcy and criminal convictions, and the extreme vulnerability of reactors as old as those at Diablo Canyon, we must seriously wonder why the company would now ask to be exempt from a simple set of inspections.
To protect the health, safety, economy and ecology of our state, the governor, regulatory agencies, CPUC, and the courts must step in to demand these aged reactors be immediately subjected to painstaking public scrutiny.
There is no good reason not to do this, and no excuse for PG&E to be asking for an exemption from a simple, long-overdue inspection.
The last thing California can afford is a radioactive replay of what has happened with that pipeline explosion in San Bruno or those catastrophic fires in what’s left of the northern forests.
Next month marks the 40th anniversary of the accident at Three Mile Island, and the release of The China Syndrome, which told a terrifying tale we also do not want to see repeated.
You can sign our petition asking Governor Newsom and our public officials to step in at Diablo Canyon NOW, before it is once again too late.
March 5, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
safety, USA |
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U.S. still has no place for spent nuclear fuel, so Maine Yankee’s owner gets millions
The award will help pay for the roughly $10 million per year to maintain the repository at the closed nuclear plant in Wiscasset. PressHerald, BY TUX TURKEL STAFF WRITER 3 Mar 19, For the fourth time since 1998, a federal judge has awarded the owners of three closed nuclear power plants, including Maine Yankee, millions of dollars for the federal government’s failure to remove spent nuclear fuel.
According to Connecticut Yankee Atomic Power Co., Yankee Atomic Electric Co., and Maine Yankee Atomic Power Co., the owners won a partial summary judgment last week totaling $103.2 million. Maine Yankee’s share is $34.4 million.
The award will help offset the roughly $10 million per year cost of operating an interim spent fuel storage site on plant property in Wiscasset. It will indirectly benefit ratepayers, who otherwise foot the bill. The actual financial impact hasn’t been determined, but is expected to be minimal.
In 2016, for instance, Maine Yankee was awarded about $24.6 million. Roughly $3.6 million of the total award was returned to utilities, including Central Maine Power. The balance, $21 million, went to operate the spent fuel storage site…….
Wayne Norton, president of the three companies urged Congress to authorize funding for a pilot program to remove and consolidate spent nuclear fuel and high-level waste from closed reactor sites, and to complete a review for a permanent repository at Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
Maine Yankee operated from 1972 to 1996. Although activists fought for years to close the plant, it was the company’s board that ultimately voted to pull the plug rather than fix expensive, safety-related problems.
Yankee, in Rowe, Massachusetts, closed in 1992. Connecticut Yankee shut down in 1996.
By law, the federal government is charged with coming up with a long-term solution for disposing of radioactive waste from nuclear reactors. It was supposed to begin removing waste in 1998. Facing ongoing public and political opposition, that process hasn’t happened.
Plans to build a permanent waste repository in the Nevada desert were scrapped in 2009 by President Obama. The Trump administration has sent mixed signals about whether it supports reviving Yucca Mountain.
For the foreseeable future, highly radioactive fuel rods are being stored in 60 airtight steel canisters and housed in concrete casks in Wiscasset. Another four canisters hold radioactive steel from the decommissioning process. Maintaining them costs roughly $10 million a year, according to Maine Yankee.
The current award is for a period from 2013 to 2016, and the three companies are seeking an additional $1.2 million in costs. The federal government has 60 days to appeal the award.
Tux Turkel can be contacted at 791-6462 or at:
tturkel@pressherald.com https://www.pressherald.com/2019/02/25/judge-awards-34-million-to-offset-costs-of-storing-spent-fuel-rods-in-wiscasset/
March 4, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics, USA, wastes |
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US, S. Korea officially call off annual military exercises amid nuclear talks with N. Korea, By KIM GAMEL | STARS AND STRIPES March 2, 2019
SEOUL, South Korea — The United States and South Korea canceled key war games in favor of low-profile drills, the allies said Sunday, in a major concession to North Korea days after its nuclear summit with President Donald Trump collapsed without agreement.
The springtime exercises known as Key Resolve and Foal Eagle, along with their autumn counterpart Ulchi Freedom Guardian, have long been the lynchpin of the alliance between Seoul and Washington.
The drills, which include computer simulations and live-fire bombing runs, also have been a touchstone for tensions as the North considers them a rehearsal for an invasion.
The decision to cancel Key Resolve and Foal Eagle had been widely expected after Trump reiterated his own antipathy for the drills, which he has called “very expensive” and “provocative.”
Rebranding exercises
A rebranded “combined command post exercise” will be held from Monday to March 12, according to a separate statement issued Sunday by the top U.S. and South Korean commanders on the divided peninsula.
Commanders and other military officials insisted they can maintain a strong defensive posture with scaled-back training…… https://www.stripes.com/news/pacific/us-s-korea-officially-call-off-annual-military-exercises-amid-nuclear-talks-with-n-korea-1.571119
March 4, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics international, South Korea, USA, weapons and war |
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Jared and the Saudi Crown Prince Go Nuclear? https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/02/opinion/sunday/saudi-arabia-jared-kushner-nuclear.html
There are too many unanswered questions about the White House’s role in advancing Saudi ambitions. By Nicholas Kristof, March 2, 2019
Jared Kushner slipped quietly into Saudi Arabia this week for a meeting with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, so the question I’m trying to get the White House to answer is this: Did they discuss American help for a Saudi nuclear program?
Of all the harebrained and unscrupulous dealings of the Trump administration in the last two years, one of the most shocking is a Trump plan to sell nuclear reactors to Saudi Arabia that could be used to make nuclear weapons.
Even as President Trump is trying to denuclearize North Korea and Iran, he may be helping to nuclearize Saudi Arabia. This is abominable policy tainted by a gargantuan conflict of interest involving Kushner.
Kushner’s family real estate business had been teetering because of a disastrously overpriced acquisition he made of a particular Manhattan property called 666 Fifth Avenue, but last August a company called Brookfield Asset Management rescued the Kushners by taking a 99-year lease of the troubled property — and paying the whole sum of about $1.1 billion up front.
Alarm bells should go off: Brookfield also owns Westinghouse Electric, the nuclear services business trying to sell reactors to Saudi Arabia.
Saudi swamp, meet American swamp.
It may be conflicts like these, along with even murkier ones, that led American intelligence officials to refuse a top-secret security clearance for Kushner. The Times reported Thursday that Trump overruled them to grant Kushner the clearance.
This nuclear reactor mess began around the time of Trump’s election, when a group of retired U.S. national security officials put together a plan to enrich themselves by selling nuclear power plants to Saudi Arabia. The officials included Michael Flynn, Trump’s national security adviser, and they initially developed a “plan for 40 nuclear power plants” in Saudi Arabia, according to a report from the House Oversight and Reform Committee. The plan is now to start with just a couple of plants.
As recently as Feb. 12, Trump met in the White House with backers of the project and was supportive, Reuters reported.
These are civilian nuclear power plants, and Saudi Arabia claims it wants them for electricity. But the Saudis insist on producing their own nuclear fuel, rather than buying it more cheaply abroad. Producing fuel is a standard way for rogue countries to divert fuel for secret nuclear weapons programs, and the Saudi resistance to safeguards against proliferation bolsters suspicions that the real goal is warheads.
Trump may be vigilant (destructively so) about Iran’s nuclear plants, but in the Saudi case his response seems to be: There’s money to be made! When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu raised objections to the transfer last year, Axios reported, “Trump and his advisers told Netanyahu that, if the U.S. does not sell the Saudis nuclear reactors, other countries like Russia or France will.”
Trump seems to believe that the Saudis have us over a barrel: If we don’t help them with nuclear technology, someone else will. That misunderstands the U.S.-Saudi relationship. The Saudis depend on us for their security, and the blunt truth is that we hold all the cards in this relationship, not them.
Why on earth would America put Prince Mohammed on a path to acquiring nuclear weapons? He is already arguably the most destabilizing leader in an unstable region, for he has invaded Yemen, kidnapped Lebanon’s prime minister, started a feud with Qatar, and, according to American intelligence officials, ordered the murder of the Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi.
The prince has also imprisoned and brutally tortured women’s rights activists, including one who I’m hoping will win the Nobel Peace Prize, Loujain al-Hathloul. As Representative Brad Sherman, a California Democrat, has noted, “A country that can’t be trusted with a bone saw shouldn’t be trusted with nuclear weapons.”
There’s another element of Trump’s Saudi policy that is simply repulsive: the fawning courtship of a foreign prince who has created in Yemen the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, murdered a journalist and tortured women’s rights activists. The White House genuflections are such that Prince Mohammed had a point when, according to The Intercept, he bragged that he had Kushner in his “pocket.”
No one knows whether Prince Muhammed will manage to succeed his father and become the next king, for there is opposition and the Saudi economic transformation he boasts of is running into difficulties. Trump and Kushner seem to be irresponsibly trying to boost the prince’s prospects, increasing the risk that an unstable hothead will mismanage the kingdom for the next 50 years. Perhaps with nuclear weapons.
March 4, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
business and costs, politics international, Saudi Arabia, secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA |
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Why the collapse of a historic nuclear treaty could lead to a Cold War-like arms race, ABC News,
By Tasha Wibawa 3 Mar 19 The United States and Russia have ripped up a Cold War-era nuclear missile treaty, leaving analysts fearing a potential arms race with global ramifications.
Key points:
- The landmark INF treaty was integral to ending the Cold War
- Short and intermediate range missiles were banned because of the short flight time
- Analyst say it’s unlikely to be renegotiated within the six-month notice period
Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Russia was ready for a Cuban Missile-style crisis if the US wanted one, referring to the 1962 standoff that brought the world to the edge of nuclear war.
Decades later, tensions between the two nations are heating up again.
Mr Putin warned that Moscow would retaliate if the US placed new missiles closer to Russia, telling local media that Moscow could deploy hypersonic missiles on ships and submarines outside US territorial waters.
The comments were made after the Trump administration announced it would officially abandon a historic nuclear pact that had kept nuclear missiles out of Europe for three decades.
Here’s a look at what the treaty is, what may come next, and why analysts believe its demise could lead to a 21st-century arms race.
The Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) bans the US and the Russian Federation, previously the Soviet Union, from developing, testing and possessing short- and intermediate-range missiles that could be launched from the ground, as opposed to the sea or sky.
The treaty — signed by former US president Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in December 1987 — declared that “nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought” and took seven years to negotiate.
Both sides agreed to destroy a total of 2,692 short-, medium- and intermediate-range missiles with a range between 500 and 5,500 kilometres that were stationed in, or aimed at Europe.
The treaty is credited with helping to ending the Cold War.
Maria Rublee, a former US intelligence officer and nuclear politics expert at Monash University, told the ABC these missiles were seen as a “hair trigger for nuclear war” due to how quickly they could strike a target.
“You don’t have time to talk, to pick up the phone, the red hotline, to say what’s going on and ask if this is a mistake.”
Washington and its North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) allies claim Moscow has been violating the terms of the treaty by developing missiles within the range for years, but Russia has repeatedly denied the allegations.
Earlier this month the Trump administration declared it would suspend US obligations under the treaty, with the intention of withdrawing because of Russia’s alleged non-compliance.
The day after the announcement, Russia also said it would withdraw from the treaty, and accused the US of fabricating the allegations so it could develop new missiles.
The treaty is not dead just yet — both parties must give six months notice before they can officially withdraw — but Dr Rublee said the chances of the treaty being revived were low, although there was some hope.
“[The first step] is not going to come from the Trump administration and it’s not going to come from Russia,” she said.
“It would need to come from NATO because the countries most at risk are European countries.”…….. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-03-03/collapse-of-treaty-could-lead-to-new-arms-race/10845950
March 4, 2019
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics international, Russia, USA, weapons and war |
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wrongdoing, SNC-Lavalin could be barred from Canadian federal contracts for a decade. (SNC-Lavalin has been previously barred for a decade from World Bank contracts.)
However, Holtec itself has engaged in bribery, at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s Browns Ferry nuclear power plant; in addition, Holtec CEO Krishna Singh has been accused by whistleblowers Oscar Shirani (Commonwealth Edison/Exelon) and Dr. Ross Landsman (NRC Region 3) of attempting to bribe them into silence, re: QA violations (see below).
