nuclear-news

The News That Matters about the Nuclear Industry Fukushima Chernobyl Mayak Three Mile Island Atomic Testing Radiation Isotope

CEO, staff suddenly depart New Brunswick reactor developer ARC Clean Technology

“reactor developers would not normally terminate staff after hitting a regulatory milestone.

“If they were going to move forward, basically, they would be hiring people,”

MATTHEW MCCLEARN 26 June 24,  https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/article-ceo-staff-depart-new-brunswick-reactor-developer-arc-clean-technology/

ARC Clean Technology Canada, a developer of small modular reactors in New Brunswick, has revealed the sudden departure of its Canadian chief executive, raising questions about its future.

Alongside Tuesday’s announcement of CEO William Labbe’s exit, other ARC employees also received layoff notices, according to a report from the Telegraph Journal, a Saint John, N.B., newspaper. The company did not respond to questions from The Globe about those reported departures, or how many staffers remain with the company.

In a statement, ARC spokesperson Sandra Donnelly said the company had nearly completed a phase of a pre-licensing process with the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, and was “realigning personnel and resources to strengthen our strategic partnerships and rationalize operations to best prepare for the next phase of our deployment.”

Ms. Donnelly said ARC Canada will be led by Bob Braun, chief operating officer of its Washington-based parent ARC Clean Technology Inc., and two vice presidents, Lance Clarke and Jill Doucet.

The company’s staff changes follow the resignation of New Brunswick energy minister Mike Holland, announced June 20. Mr. Holland had been an advocate for the province’s SMR program, but had previously announced he would not stand for re-election.

ARC set up offices in Saint John several years ago, as part of an initiative to build SMRs at the province’s only nuclear power plant, Point Lepreau Nuclear Generating Station. The plant’s owner, NB Power, has promoted plans for demonstration units of two different reactors built there by 2030. The second reactor would be designed by another startup, Moltex Energy, which would include a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant.

ARC is one of several vendors jockeying to sell SMRs to Canadian utilities. All existing commercial power reactors in Canada – including the existing one at Point Lepreau – are of the homegrown Candu design. (The newest, at Ontario’s Darlington Nuclear Generating Station, was completed in the early 1990s.)

The company is in the early stages of designing a reactor known as the ARC-100, a next-generation reactor that would use sodium as coolant – a striking departure from Candus and nearly all other commercial power reactors used today, which are water-cooled. The ARC-100 is also marketed as having the ability to consume reprocessed spent fuel, something that has not been done historically in Canada.

As ARC rationalizes its work force, some of its better-established competitors are staffing up. U.S.-based GE-Hitachi and Ontario Power Generation are preparing a site at Darlington for potential construction of a BWRX-300 small modular reactor. Westinghouse, which is marketing several reactors including its AP-1000 large reactor and eVinci microreactor, announced a new 13,000-square-foot office in Kitchener, Ont., this month along with plans to hire 100 engineers to staff it by next year.

Last year, Mr. Labbe said developing the ARC-100 would cost around $500-million. But so far, the company has raised only a small fraction of that. In 2022, it announced it had raised $30-million from the provincial government and the private sector. In October, the federal government awarded it another $7-million. Its partner, NB Power, has not contributed any funding.

ARC submitted an application to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission in 2023 for a license to prepare a site at Point Lepreau for its demonstration unit. At an industry conference in April, Mr. Labbe said ARC was also preparing to apply for a license to construct the reactor, which it planned to issue within the next year.

“We’ve been at this for about seven years,” he told the audience. “And we really have another six, seven years until we get that commercial deployment.”

Mr. Labbe became ARC Canada’s CEO in May, 2021. His predecessor, Norm Sawyer, is now president of ION Nuclear Consulting Ltd., an adviser to investors, energy companies and First Nations. Mr. Sawyer said that, while he had no inside information on the company, reactor developers would not normally terminate staff after hitting a regulatory milestone.

“If they were going to move forward, basically, they would be hiring people,” he said.

“If you’re on hold and you’re thinking that you’re going to move forward in a short time period, you maintain your staffing levels.”

Susan O’Donnell, a researcher at St. Thomas University who studies energy technologies, said that, while ARC has managed to attract some private funding, it has remained almost wholly dependent on government money. She added that the federal government is unlikely to provide the billions of dollars required to build new reactors at Point Lepreau.

“I just don’t see how this is going to work, where the money’s going to come from,” she said. “And I think this is why we’re seeing this with ARC today.

“They can’t afford to have that number of staff.”

As recently as November, NB Power chief executive officer Lori Clark had said SMRs were “a key part” of the utility’s plans to phase out coal by 2030. On Tuesday, NB Power said it will continue to provide technical expertise to ARC and Moltex, and that it regards SMRs as a “potential option” to achieve net zero emissions electricity production by 2035.

“We continue to work toward the goal of having an SMR on the grid by the early 2030s,” spokesperson Dominique Couture wrote in an e-mail.

With a report from Emma Graney

June 27, 2024 Posted by | business and costs, Canada | Leave a comment

Assange Is Free, But US Spite Will Chill Reporting for Years

ARI PAUL, 26 June 24  https://fair.org/home/assange-is-free-but-us-spite-will-chill-reporting-for-years/

In some ways, the nightmare for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is coming to an end. After taking refuge at the Ecuadorian embassy in London in 2012, he was arrested in 2019 by Britain, who have since been trying to extradite him to the United States on charges that by publishing official secrets he violated the Espionage Act (FAIR.org, 12/13/20; BBC, 6/25/24). Once he enters a guilty plea, he will be sentenced to time served and walk away a free man (CBS, 6/25/24).

Assange’s case has attracted the attention of critics of US foreign policy, and those who value free speech and a free press. His family has rightly contended that his treatment in prison was atrocious (France24, 11/1/19; Independent, 2/20/24). A group of doctors said he was a victim of “torture” tactics (Lancet, 6/25/20). In 2017, Yahoo! News (9/26/21) reported that the “CIA plotted to kidnap the WikiLeaks founder, spurring heated debate among Trump administration officials over the legality and practicality of such an operation” and that CIA and Trump administration insiders “even discussed killing Assange, going so far as to request ‘sketches’ or ‘options’ for how to assassinate him.”

His supporters noted that the charges against him came after he harmed the US imperial project, particularly by leaking a video showing US troops killing Reuters journalists in Iraq (New York Times, 4/5/10). Under his watch, WikiLeaks also leaked a trove of diplomatic cables that the New York Times (11/28/10) described as an “unprecedented look at back-room bargaining by embassies around the world, brutally candid views of foreign leaders, and frank assessments of nuclear and terrorist threats.”

Press freedom and human rights groups like the International Federation of Journalists and Amnesty International had long called for his release. Several major news outlets from the US and Europe—the New York Times, Guardian, Le Monde, Der Spiegel and El País—signed a letter calling for his release (New York Times, 11/28/22). They said his “indictment sets a dangerous precedent and threatens to undermine America’s First Amendment and the freedom of the press.

Hostility toward press freedom

Assange’s loved ones and supporters are certainly glad to see him come home (Guardian, 6/25/24). But let’s be perfectly clear-eyed: The entire ordeal and his plea deal are proof of a hostile climate toward a free press in the United States and the wider world, and its chilling effect on investigative journalism could substantially worsen.

Assange’s deal has echoes of the end of the West Memphis Three case, where three Arkansas men were wrongfully convicted as teenagers of a heinous triple homicide in 1993 (Innocence Project, 8/19/11). The three re-entered guilty pleas in exchange for time served. They won their freedom, but their names were still attached to a terrible crime, and the state of Arkansas was able to close the case, ensuring the real killer or killers would never be held accountable. It was an imperfect resolution, but no one could blame the victims of a gross injustice for taking the freedom grudgingly offered.

Something similar is happening with Assange. It compounds the persecution already inflicted on him to force him to declare that exposing US government misdeeds was itself a high crime.

“On a human level, we’re thrilled that he’s out of prison, including the time in the embassy,” said Chuck Zlatkin, a founding member of NYC Free Assange, a group that has held regular protests calling for his release. “We’re thrilled for him personally.”

But the deal shows how eager the US government is to both save face and remain a threatening force against investigative reporters.

‘Criminalization of routine journalistic conduct’

As Seth Stern, the director of advocacy at the Freedom of the Press Foundation (6/24/24), said in a statement:

It’s good news that the DoJ is putting an end to this embarrassing saga. But it’s alarming that the Biden administration felt the need to extract a guilty plea for the purported crime of obtaining and publishing government secrets. That’s what investigative journalists do every day.

The plea deal won’t have the precedential effect of a court ruling, but it will still hang over the heads of national security reporters for years to come. The deal doesn’t add any more prison time or punishment for Assange. It’s purely symbolic. The administration could’ve easily just dropped the case, but chose to instead legitimize the criminalization of routine journalistic conduct and encourage future administrations to follow suit. And they made that choice knowing that Donald Trump would love nothing more than to find a way to throw journalists in jail.

And that is all happening while threats against leakers and journalists remain. Edward Snowden, the source in the Guardian’s investigation (6/11/13) into National Security Agency surveillance, still resides in Russia in order to evade arrest. I recently wrote about the excessive sentencing of the man who leaked tax documents to ProPublica and the New York Times showing how lopsided the tax system is in favor of the rich (FAIR.org, 2/2/24). NSA contractor Reality Winner was sentenced to five years in prison for leaking documents to the Intercept on the issue of Russian interference in the 2016 US election (Vanity Fair, 10/12/23)

Laura Poitras, one of the journalists who brought Snowden’s revelations about NSA surveillance to light, said that Assange’s conviction could silence reporters doing investigative reporting on the US government (New York Times, 12/21/20). Chelsea Manning, Assange’s source for these investigations, spent only seven years in prison out of the 35 years of her sentence thanks to presidential clemency, but that is still a harrowing experience (NPR, 5/17/17).

‘Not transparency’ but ‘sabotage’

Worse, some in the so-called free press have rallied behind the government. The Wall Street Journal editorial board (4/11/19) cheered the legal crusade against Assange, arguing that the leaks harmed national security. “Assange has never been a hero of transparency or democratic accountability,” the Murdoch-owned broadsheet proclaimed.

The neoconservative journal Commentary (4/12/19) dismissed the free press defenders of Assange, saying of Wikileaks’ investigations into US power: “This was not transparency. It was sabotage.”

And the British Economist (4/17/19) said, in support of Assange’s extradition to the US:

WikiLeaks did some good in its early years, exposing political corruption, financial malfeasance and military wrongdoing. But the decision to publish over 250,000 diplomatic cables in 2010 was malicious. The vast majority of messages revealed no illegality or misdeeds. Mr. Assange’s reckless publication of the unredacted versions of those cables the following year harmed America’s interests by putting its diplomatic sources at risk of reprisals, persecution or worse.

Unsurprisingly, Murdoch outlets gave the plea deal a thumbs down. “Don’t fall for the idea that Mr. Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, is a persecuted ‘publisher,’” the Wall Street Journal editorial board (6/25/24) warned.

The New York Post editorial board (6/25/24) disparaged Assange’s motives, saying he “wasn’t interested in justice or exposing true abuse; he simply relished obtaining and releasing any secret government or political material, particularly if US-based.” Alleging that the documents he published were sensitive, the paper argued in favor of government secrecy: “Uncle Sam needs to keep some critical secrets, especially when lives are on the line.”

In reality, US intelligence and military officials have never been able to trace any deaths to WikiLeaks‘ revelations (BBC, 12/1/10; Guardian, 7/31/13; NPR, 4/12/19)—and certainly have never identified any damage anywhere nearly as serious as the very real harms it exposed. (NPR did quote a former State Department lawyer who complained that WikiLeaks‘ exposes “can really chill the ability of those American personnel to build those sorts of relationships and have frank conversations with their contacts.”)  Alas, some publications side with state power even if journalistic freedom is at stake (FAIR.org, 4/18/19).

‘Punished for telling the truth’

Assange’s case is over, but he walks away a battered man as a result of the legal struggle. And that serves as a warning to other journalists who rely on brave people in high levels of power to disclose injustices. Stern is right: Another Trump administration would be horrendous for journalists. But the current situation with the Democratic administration is already chilling.

“All he was being punished for was telling the truth about war crimes committed by this country,” Zlatkin told FAIR.

And without a real change in how the Espionage Act is used against journalists, the ability to tell the truth to the rest of the world is at risk.

“We’re still not in a situation where we as a general population are getting the truth of what’s being done in our name,” Zlatkin said. “So the struggle continues.”

June 26, 2024 Posted by | civil liberties, media, USA | Leave a comment

The U.S. power structure is blindly dedicated to Israel

When the board of the Columbia Law Review clumsily censored a pro-Palestinian article it revealed the degree to which pro-Israel ideology is enmeshed in the U.S. power structure. Luckily, a generational shift is changing this before our eyes.

BY PHILIP WEISS  , Mondoweiss

Recently there was an important event at Columbia Law School. The school’s law review published a piece on a sweeping legal theory of the Nakba by Harvard law student Rabea Eghbariah — and the board of the law review stepped in in unprecedented fashion to shut down the publication online. After the Intercept reported that the website had been “nuked,” the authoritarian move became an embarrassment; and the piece was restored. Though students obviously feel chilled.

This story reminds us that the U.S. establishment is firmly and blindly pro-Israel. The board that squashed the students included operators of the highest order: professor Gillian Metzger, who also serves in the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel; Justice Department senior counsel Lewis Yelin; and Ginger Anders, a former assistant to the U.S. Solicitor General.

We used to call people like this the ruling class. These high appointees understand what American values are, and today American values are standing by Israel even as it massacres thousands of children. These values surely have to do with the importance of Zionist donors to Joe Biden and universities, but they go beyond that to the makeup of the U.S. establishment. Pro-Israel voices — including Jewish Zionists — are a significant element of corporate culture. They are a generational force. Young progressives and young Jews are rejecting Israel. But they aren’t in the power structure…………………………………………………………………………………………………. more https://mondoweiss.net/2024/06/the-u-s-power-structure-is-blindly-dedicated-to-israel/

June 26, 2024 Posted by | Israel, politics, USA | Leave a comment

The US nuclear arms control community needs a strategic plan

in By Stewart Prager | June 24, 2024

It is a commonplace that the danger of nuclear weapons is becoming more severe year by year. This is reflected in the Bulletin’s Doomsday Clock, for which the time to midnight has declined steadily since 1996. At this trend, the international security situation will continue to grow even more perilous, despite the ongoing efforts of the US arms control community.

To avert such a tragic outcome and drastically slash nuclear risk, the arms control community needs a new approach. It is usual within the scientific community, when faced with a grand challenge, to erase the blackboard, think fresh, and develop a new vision and strategic plan—with great positive effect in many sub-fields. Yet, such brainstorming and planning is not underway in the field of US nuclear arms control.

The US nuclear arms control community has been extremely resourceful and effective, with many past successes despite its constrained resources. However, the current approach of the collection of arms control organizations—each with independent efforts and plans—is unlikely to map to a more secure future. It is now the time for members of this community to challenge themselves with a community-wide effort to develop a strategic plan commensurate with the challenge of reducing nuclear risk.

Losing the debate. Currently, the United States is increasing the capability of its nuclear weapons through its massive modernization program. With this escalating capability—and the growing political pressure for further expansion to respond to nuclear plans in China and Russia—in 10 years the prominence of nuclear weapons will likely be even greater than it is today.

Societal forces that argue for increased dominance of nuclear weapons as providers of security have far larger influence on US policy than arms control advocates—and are winning the debate.

Funding for the nuclear weapons complex in 2024 is approaching $70 billion. The annual congressional lobbying effort that spawns is funded at over $100 million. Lobbying for nuclear weapons exceeds by several-fold the entire budget for all activities within the arms control community, which includes research, education, information dissemination, policy analysis, and lobbying. The relative persuasive power of arms control advocates likely exceeds its relative funding; ideas are not measured by the dollar. But the current level of effort and the approach for nuclear threat reduction advocacy are sorely inadequate, despite the creative, savvy, and persistent work of this community.

The arms control community is sufficiently under-resourced that it is difficult to free up the energy and time for a process of strategic planning, given the challenges of preserving even the funding currently available. However, it is at such a time that strategic planning is most crucial and must be provided priority.

The need for a strategic plan. The US arms control and disarmament community is united in the overarching goal of reducing the salience of nuclear weapons in international relations. But the community lacks not only a plan on how to fulfill that goal, but even a common statement of its grand challenge. An example of such a statement is “to alter the US nuclear arsenal and posture to accomplish global arms reduction in 10 years and disarmament in 20 years.”…………………………………………………………………………………………………………… more https://thebulletin.org/2024/06/the-us-nuclear-arms-control-community-needs-a-strategic-plan/?utm_source=Newsletter+&utm_medium=Email&utm_campaign=MondayNewsletter06242024&utm_content=NuclearRisk_USNuclearArmsControlPlan_06242024

June 25, 2024 Posted by | 1 NUCLEAR ISSUES, USA | Leave a comment

Senate Nuclear Fetishists Take Lid Off of Pandora’s Box

“It’s extremely disappointing that, without any meaningful debate, Congress is about to erase 50 years of independent nuclear safety oversight by changing the NRC’s mission to not only protect public health and safety but also to protect the financial health of the industry and its investors

19 June 2024, David Kraft, Director, NEIS

CHICAGO—In a lopsided 88-2 vote (with 10 not voting, including Sen. Richard Durbin), the Senate passed S.870 – the so-called ADVANCED Act, a bill which quite literally takes the lid off of the nuclear safety box, both domestically and internationally.

So proud and confident were the Senators in nuclear power’s promises, rather than being introduced as stand-alone legislation, the 93-page bill had to be snuck into the 3-page Fire Grants and Safety Act – a bill reasonably assured to pass at a time when huge parts of the nation are again in the process of burning to the ground.

Using the logic similar to that of an adolescent purchasing a first car (“If it’s red, fast, and a convertible – that’s it! What could go wrong?”), bill advocates trotted out the usual litany of at best contestable at worst discredited arguments for its passage:  nuclear is clean and green, is needed to fight the climate crisis, creates jobs, and is over-regulated.

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), the bill’s lead sponsor, (quite erroneously) stated, “Today, nuclear power provides about 20% (18.2% in 2022; 18.6% in 2023) of our nation’s electricity. Importantly, it’s emissions-free electricity (allowed to release radionuclides into the air and water, below regulatory limits) that is 24/7, 365 days a year. (except for outages and maintenance)”

While critics of the legislation warned of significant weakening of regulatory oversight built into the bill, John Starkey, director of public policy at the pro-nuclear American Nuclear Society, stated the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), “is a 21st century regulator now.”

That statement alone should send shivers up the spine, since that list would include: the FAA allowing Boeing to self-regulate in designing the 737-MAX, resulting in two crashes and hundreds of deaths, and the revelation that sub-standard parts have been manufactured into new planes; Norfolk Southern preventing desperately needed rail safety measures from passing in Congress, resulting in the East Palestine train disaster; and the federal pipeline regulatory agency PIMSA being asleep at the wheel, resulting in the Sartortia, Mississippi CO2 pipeline explosion.

Residents of Illinois – the most nuclear state in the U.S., which recently repealed its nuclear construction moratorium, opening the door to new reactors – might begin to feel some elevated distress, but – relax.  There’s nothing you can do about it, since homeowners are unable to obtain private insurance coverage against nuclear disasters.

Nuclear safety expert Dr. Ed Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists had this to say about the ADVANCED Act:

“It’s extremely disappointing that, without any meaningful debate, Congress is about to erase 50 years of independent nuclear safety oversight by changing the NRC’s mission to not only protect public health and safety but also to protect the financial health of the industry and its investors.  Just as lax regulation by the FAA—an agency already burdened by conflicts of interests—can lead to a catastrophic failure of an aircraft, a compromised NRC could lead to a catastrophic reactor meltdown impacting an entire region for a (many) generations.

“Make no mistake: This is not about making the reactor licensing process more efficient, but about weakening safety and security oversight across the board, a longstanding industry goal.  The change to the NRC’s mission effectively directs the agency to enforce only the bare minimum level of regulation at every facility it oversees across the United States.

“Passage of this legislation will only increase the danger to people already living downwind of nuclear facilities from a severe accident or terrorist attack, and it will make it even more difficult for communities to prevent risky, experimental reactors from being sited in their midst.”

The Biden Administration legislation of the past few years has lavished more than $7 billion on the development of experimental, still non-existent “small modular nuclear reactors” (SMNRs) as a way to fight climate change. Yet, only one design has passed NRC licensing muster to date, and these reactors will not be commercially available in sufficient numbers to have an appreciable effect on climate disruption until well into the 2030s – assuming the proposed designs actually work.

As alarming as the domestic implications of the ADVANCED Act are, the international implications can be devastating.  The Act fast-tracks the development of SMNRs, which nuclear industry companies intend to sell oversees.  Some of these reactor designs require fuel that is more highly “enriched” – just barely below weapons-grade concerns – than that used in contemporary reactors.  Currently, the only available source for this fuel – called “HALEU”, for “high assay low-enriched uranium” – is RUSSIA.  Another design, using a different fuel concept, requires specially refined carbon, the main source of which is CHINA.

It is not unreasonable to ask:  just where would SMNRs have been placed in, say – Mariupol, Ukraine?  Or in Gaza?  Or any of the other world hot spots?  Again, not an unreasonable line of questioning since a recent priority of the Biden Administration is to sell nuclear technology to Saudi Arabia – where apparently the sun no longer shines, and journalists are hacked to pieces for covering such controversial topics.

Viable alternatives to nuclear expansion do exist: renewable energy, energy efficiency, energy storage, and transmission improvements are ALL cheaper, quicker to implement, reduce carbon emissions, produce no radioactive wastes, create no nuclear proliferation issues, and, most importantly – ALREADY EXIST.  Nothing more needs to be invented; just implemented.

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) stated in December, 2023 that roughly 2,600 giga-watts (GW) of electric power projects – over twice the entire electrical use of the US, and roughly 27 times the entire output of all current US reactors combined.  The large majority of this backlog are renewable energy projects awaiting connection access to the aging transmission grid.  New EXISTING transmission technologies like reconductoring could double the capacity of the grid, creating greater ease of access for renewables and storage.

To summarize, The ADVANCE ACT:

•           kick-starts more radioactive releases and exposures using tax dollars;

•           spreads contamination to more places in the US and abroad;

•           ignores the potential increased harm from nuclear reactors large and small;

•           creates more intensely radioactive fuel;

•           less regulatory oversight;

•           export to other countries, and

•           foreign control of nuclear sites within our homeland.

Yet, the nuclear zealots continue to pour tax dollars into the nuclear power black hole by means of the ADVANCED Act.  This legislation was indeed a Trojan Horse – filled with killer bees. And they don’t make honey.

Nuclear Energy Information Service (NEIS) was formed in 1981 to watchdog the nuclear power industry, and to promote a renewable, non-nuclear energy future.

June 24, 2024 Posted by | politics, USA | Leave a comment

U.S. and China hold first informal nuclear talks in five years

By Greg Torode, Gerry Doyle and Laurie Chen, June 22, 2024

HONG KONG, (Reuters) – The United States and China resumed semi-official nuclear arms talks in March for the first time in five years, with Beijing’s representatives telling U.S. counterparts that they would not resort to atomic threats over Taiwan, according to two American delegates who attended.

The Chinese representatives offered reassurances after their U.S. interlocutors raised concerns that China might use, or threaten to use, nuclear weapons if it faced defeat in a conflict over Taiwan. Beijing views the democratically governed island as its territory, a claim rejected by the government in Taipei.

“They told the U.S. side that they were absolutely convinced that they are able to prevail in a conventional fight over Taiwan without using nuclear weapons,” said scholar David Santoro, the U.S. organiser of the Track Two talks, the details of which are being reported by Reuters for the first time.

Participants in Track Two talks are generally former officials and academics who can speak with authority on their government’s position, even if they are not directly involved with setting it. Government-to-government negotiations are known as Track One.

Washington was represented by about half a dozen delegates, including former officials and scholars at the two-day discussions, which took place in a Shanghai hotel conference room.

Beijing sent a delegation of scholars and analysts, which included several former People’s Liberation Army officers.

A State Department spokesperson said in response to Reuters’ questions that Track Two talks could be “beneficial”. The department did not participate in the March meeting though it was aware of it, the spokesperson said.

Such discussions cannot replace formal negotiations “that require participants to speak authoritatively on issues that are often highly compartmentalized within (Chinese) government circles,” the spokesperson said.

Members of the Chinese delegation and Beijing’s defence ministry did not respond to requests for comment.

The informal discussions between the nuclear-armed powers took place with the U.S. and China at odds over major economic and geopolitical issues, with leaders in Washington and Beijing accusing each other of dealing in bad faith…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. more https://www.reuters.com/world/us-china-hold-first-informal-nuclear-talks-5-years-eyeing-taiwan-2024-06-21/

June 23, 2024 Posted by | China, politics international, USA | Leave a comment

US greenlights new arms sale to Taiwan 

RT News 20 June 24

The $360 million deal will provide Taipei with hundreds of armed drones and missiles, the State Department has said

The US State Department has approved a new weapons sale to Taiwan involving hundreds of armed drones and missiles worth $360 million, the Pentagon’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA) has said.

Under the deal that was concluded on Tuesday, Taiwan will receive Altius-600M systems, which are unmanned aerial vehicles equipped with warheads, and related equipment at an estimated cost of $300 million, the agency said.

The US will also provide 720 Switchblade kamikaze drones known as “extended-range loitering munitions” along with accompanying fire control systems worth $60.2 million, according to the DSCA. Loitering munitions are small guided missiles that can fly around a target area until they are directed to attack.

………………………US defense contractor AeroVironment, which has been supplying Ukraine with the Switchblade suicide drones, said in April that the company had been “gratified by overwhelming user feedback and demand for additional systems.”

The Altius-600M drone can accommodate “multiple seeker and warhead options,” and can be launched from ground, air or sea, according to its manufacturer, Anduril…………………………  https://www.rt.com/news/599548-us-approves-taiwan-arms-sale/—

June 22, 2024 Posted by | Taiwan, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Former Official: Biden State Department Bending US Law to Send Israel Weapons

Earlier this year, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he had determined that there were four Israeli units who had committed human rights violations,.. ………….only receiving three months of community service as a result. Though these units committed violations, the State Department determined that they were still eligible for U.S. assistance and required no further remediation.

“The bottom line on Secretary Blinken’s actions is this: there are no ineligible Israeli units, and therefore no list to Israel,”

State officials have carved out an entirely unique vetting system for Israel in US foreign assistance law.

By Sharon Zhang , TRUTHOUT, June 18, 2024

The Biden administration is in “non-compliance” with a U.S. law regarding foreign military assistance in allowing Israeli forces to dodge scrutiny over their brutality against Palestinians and otherwise, according to a new, scathing analysis by a former top State Department official.

A report written for Just Security by Charles Blaha, who retired from his position as the director of the State Department’s Office of Security and Human Rights last year after seven years in the role, says that top State officials have purposefully carved out an entirely unique vetting system for Israel’s compliance with human rights guidelines and eligibility to receive U.S. arms under the Leahy Law.

This system appears to be specifically designed to allow Israeli military units to commit gross human rights violations with little scrutiny from the U.S., and to allow U.S. officials to continue sending Israel weapons unconditionally. If Israeli units were found to be in violation of the Leahy Law, it would require the State Department to prohibit said units from receiving U.S. arms.

Blaha explains that the process undertaken by the Israel Leahy Vetting Forum (ILVF), which first met in 2020, to vet incidents by Israeli forces is extremely slow compared to the process for other countries. It requires in-person meetings involving higher-level officials and for allegations against units to undergo a request for information about the unit to the Israeli government.

“Department officials insist that Israeli units are subject to the same vetting standards as units from any other country. Maybe in theory. But in practice, that’s simply not true,” Blaha wrote. “[I]n actual ILVF practice, the standard for ineligibility is almost impossibly high. Information that for any other country would without question result in ineligibility is insufficient for Israeli security force units.”

Further, even if a determination is made by lower-level officials about a violation by an Israeli unit, the final decision about a unit’s eligibility lies with the Deputy Secretary of State. “This is true for no other country in the world,” wrote Blaha, who oversaw an office that is key in making determinations under the Leahy Law………………………………

The exception carved out for Israel is evident in recent determinations made by the Biden administration.

Earlier this year, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he had determined that there were four Israeli units who had committed human rights violations, including one involved in an incident in which an Israeli soldier shot and killed a Palestinian man on the side of the road in the West Bank, only receiving three months of community service as a result. Though these units committed violations, the State Department determined that they were still eligible for U.S. assistance and required no further remediation.

In a fifth case, Blinken determined that a unit involved in killing a 78-year-old Palestinian American man, Omar Assad, would still be eligible for assistance.

This is despite the fact that Assad was killed in a brutal way — stopped by Israeli forces at a checkpoint, dragged out of his car, bound, blindfolded, and then left on the ground overnight. He died after having a heart attack; the soldiers abandoned him to avoid scrutiny after discovering he was dead.

As Blaha points out, Blinken said that the department would work with the Israeli government “on identifying a path to effective remediation” for the unit responsible for Assad’s death — something made up by Blinken to give the unit a pass.

“This language appears nowhere in the Leahy law; it appears invented to avoid finding this Israeli unit ineligible,” Blaha said. “For any other country, a unit found to have committed a violation is immediately ineligible until remediation is complete.”

“The bottom line on Secretary Blinken’s actions is this: there are no ineligible Israeli units, and therefore no list to Israel,” Blaha continued, referring to a list of ineligible Israeli units that the State Department is supposed to report to Congress under the Leahy Law. “Even a unit responsible for the death of an American is eligible for assistance. As long as this remains the status quo, the department remains in non-compliance with the law.”

Blaha’s report is a show of how far the Biden administration is willing to go to continue sending weapons to Israel as it continues its extermination campaign in Gaza and severe repression of Palestinians in the West Bank.

The administration has reportedly spent the last months covertly pressuring members of Congress to approve sending yet more military assistance to Israel.

Two Democrats in Congress, Rep. Gregory Meeks (New York) and Sen. Ben Cardin (Maryland) recently signed off on advancing a sale of F-15s and munitions, including JDAMs, to Israel after pressure from the administration, The Washington Post reported on Monday. Meeks and Cardin, the top Democrats of their chambers’ respective foreign relations committees, had held up the sale for months, both citing human rights concerns.  https://truthout.org/articles/former-official-biden-state-department-bending-us-law-to-send-israel-weapons/

June 22, 2024 Posted by | Israel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Gavin Newsom’s $12 Billion Radioactive Diablo Scam Could Soon Be Twisting In The Wind

-by Harvey Wasserman, 20 June 24,  https://www.downwithtyranny.com/post/gavin-newsom-s-12-billion-radioactive-diablo-scam-could-soon-be-twisting-in-the-wind

Diablo Canyon’s infamous $12 billion nuclear war is raging hot and heavy in Sacramento. Citizen action may soon decide the outcome.

In the midst of a massive budget crisis, Governor Gavin Newsom is slashing social programs left and right. But he still wants to subsidize PG&E’s two money-losing atomic reactors near San Luis Obispo. The cash he wants from the state comes as part of a $1.4 billion package he strong-armed through the legislature in 2022. Much of that is coming from the feds.

But now he wants $400 million from California taxpayers.

And the legislature— amidst a fierce public uproar— may be on the brink of a definitive “NO!” Safe energy groups like the San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace are rallying public pressure to stop the bailout.    

The fight is doubly galling, because when he was Lieutenant-Governor, Newsom co-signed a 2017 landmark plan to phase out Diablo’s twin uninsured reactors. They have a long history of structural and legal problems. They are surrounded by at least a dozen significant seismic faults… and sit just 45 miles from the San Andreas.  

 

Now four decades of age, their innards are cracked, rotted and embrittled. They risk spewing apocalyptic clouds that could turn California into a radioactive wasteland. They regularly emit heat, chemical pollutants and radioactive carbon-14 into the eco-sphere. 

Rooftop solar, off-shore wind and advancing battery technologies have long since left Diablo in the dust on safety, price, reliability, efficiency and job creation. For at least several hours on most days now, the state gets more than 100% of its electricity from renewables.  

 

Photovoltaic panels in central California now regularly produce below-market electricity that is literally “too cheap to meter.” Without Diablo gumming up the grid, and with limits on how much locally-generated power can be sold out of state, rates would plummet with no serious threat of blackouts. 

Independent experts now calculate that it would cost California more than $12 billion in over-market pricing to run Diablo through 2030. The company itself concedes the cost would exceed $8 billion. PG&E has also petitioned the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to run Diablo through 2045, with potential excess costs gouging the public for tens of billions, accompanied by enormous job losses.  

Amidst a “Solartopian” tsunami of new renewables and storage batteries, Diablo expensively jams the grid and raises the risk of blackouts. It employs just 1500 workers, versus more than 70,000 in rooftop solar alone, not counting wind, efficiency and battery production. 

To better serve PG&E, Newsom’s personally appointed Public Utilities Commission has thrown the state’s rate structure into chaos, slashing at least 17,000 solar jobs while sticking California with the nation’s second-highest electric rates (behind Hawaii).

 

In 2022, Newsom trashed the nuclear phase-out he signed in 2017. With no public hearings and a strong-armed midnight vote, he demanded a $1.4 billion “forgivable loan” for PG&E, whose record profits went in part to the company’s CEO, who in 2022 was paid some $40 million.  

 Most Californians get zero power from Diablo. But Newsom wants to soak all taxpayers to cover the PG&E bailout and to foot the multi-billion dollar bills for its on-going over-market costs.

Fierce legislative resistance has put Diablo’s future in doubt.  Consumer and safe energy activists throughout the state are campaigning hard against the bailout. On June 15, the Legislature voted nearly unanimously to slash it by $400 million.  

 If the legislators and their green backers succeed, California’s transition to a non-radioactive carbon-free energy economy could create countless new jobs while saving the state billions… and ducking the next Three Mile Island, Chernobyl and/or Fukushima. 

With the world’s fifth-largest economy, California could join the world’s fourth-largest economy— Germany, which shut 19 reactors on the road to  converting to wind, solar and batteries— in a sustainable post-nuclear world.  

Harvey Wasserman co-hosts California Solartopia which airs most Wednesdays, 5-6 pm, at KPFK/Pacifica, 90.7fm-Los Angeles. He wrote Solartopia! Our Green-Powered Earth. He was arrested at Diablo Canyon in 1984.

 

June 22, 2024 Posted by | politics, USA | Leave a comment

Why Won’t the US Help Negotiate a Peaceful End to the War in Ukraine?

In the course of 2014, Putin called repeatedly for a negotiated peace, and this led to the Minsk II Agreement in February 2015 based on autonomy of the Donbas and an end to violence by both sides. Russia did not claim the Donbas as Russian territory, but instead called for autonomy and the protection of ethnic Russians within Ukraine. The UN Security Council endorsed the Minsk II agreement, but the U.S. neocons privately subverted it. Years later, Chancellor Angela Merkel blurted out the truth. The Western side treated the agreement not as a solemn treaty but as a delaying tactic to “give Ukraine time” to build its military strength. In the meantime, around 14,000 people died in the fighting in Donbas between 2014 and 2021.

Jeffrey Sachs, 19 June 24,  https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/role-of-us-in-russia-ukraine-

For the fifth time since 2008, Russia has proposed to negotiate with the U.S. over security arrangements, this time in proposals made by President Vladimir Putin on June 14, 2024. Four previous times, the U.S. rejected the offer of negotiations in favor of a neocon strategy to weaken or dismember Russia through war and covert operations. The U.S. neocon tactics have failed disastrously, devastating Ukraine in the process, and endangering the whole world. After all the warmongering, it’s time for Biden to open negotiations for peace with Russia.

Since the end of the Cold War, the U.S. grand strategy has been to weaken Russia. As early as 1992, then Defense Secretary Richard Cheney opined that following the 1991 demise of the Soviet Union, Russia too should be dismembered. Zbigniew Brzezinski opined in 1997 that Russia should be divided into three loosely confederated entities in Russian Europe, Siberia, and the far east. In 1999, the U.S.-led NATO alliance bombed Russia’s ally, Serbia, for 78 days in order to break Serbia apart and install a massive NATO military base in breakaway Kosovo. Leaders of the U.S. military-industrial complex vociferously supported the Chechen war against Russia in the early 2000s.

To secure these U.S. advances against Russia, Washington aggressively pushed NATO enlargement, despite promises to Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin that NATO would not move one inch eastward from Germany. Most tendentiously, the U.S. pushed NATO enlargement to Ukraine and Georgia, with the idea of surrounding Russia’s naval fleet in Sevastopol, Crimea with NATO states: Ukraine, Romania (NATO member 2004), Bulgaria (NATO member 2004), Turkey (NATO member 1952), and Georgia, an idea straight from the playbook of the British Empire in the Crimean War (1853-6).

Brzezinski spelled out a chronology of NATO enlargement in 1997, including NATO membership of Ukraine during 2005-2010. The U.S. in fact proposed NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia at the 2008 NATO Bucharest Summit. By 2020, NATO had in fact enlarged by 14 countries in Central Europe, Eastern Europe, and the former Soviet Union (Czech Republic, Hungary, and Poland in 1999; Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovakia, and Slovenia in 2004; Albania and Croatia, 2009; Montenegro, 2017; and Northern Macedonia, 2020), while promising future membership to Ukraine and Georgia.

The White House is dead wrong to evade negotiations just because of disagreements with Russia’s proposals. It should put up its own proposals and get down to the business of negotiating an end to the war.

In short, the 30-year U.S. project, hatched originally by Cheney and the neocons, and carried forward consistently since then, has been to weaken or even dismember Russia, surround Russia with NATO forces, and depict Russia as the belligerent power.

It is against this grim backdrop that Russian leaders have repeatedly proposed to negotiate security arrangements with Europe and the U.S. that would provide security for all countries concerned, not just the NATO bloc. Guided by the neocon game plan, the U.S. has refused to negotiate on every occasion, while trying to pin the blame on Russia for the lack of negotiations.

In June 2008, as the U.S. prepared to expand NATO to Ukraine and Georgia, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev proposed a European Security Treaty, calling for collective security and an end to NATO’s unilateralism. Suffice it to say, the U.S. showed no interest whatsoever in Russia’s proposals, and instead proceeded with its long-held plans for NATO enlargement.

The second Russian proposal for negotiations came from Putin following the violent overthrow of Ukraine’s President Viktor Yanukovych in February 2014, with the active complicity if not outright leadership of the U.S. government. I happened to see the U.S. complicity up close, as the post-coup government invited me for urgent economic discussions. When I arrived in Kiev, I was taken to the Maidan, where I was told directly about U.S. funding of the Maidan protest.

The evidence of U.S. complicity in the coup is overwhelming. Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland was caught on a phone line in January 2014 plotting the change of government in Ukraine. Meanwhile, U.S. Senators went personally to Kiev to stir up the protests (akin to Chinese or Russian political leaders coming to DC on January 6, 2021 to rile up the crowds). On February 21, 2014, the Europeans, U.S., and Russia brokered a deal with Yanukovych in which Yanukovich agreed to early elections. Yet the coup leaders reneged on the deal the same day, took over government buildings, threatened more violence, and deposed Yanukovych the next day. The U.S. supported the coup and immediately extended recognition to the new government.

In my view, this was a standard CIA-led covert regime change operation, of which there have been several dozen around the world, including sixty-four episodes between 1947 and 1989 meticulously documented by Professor Lindsey O’Rourke. Covert regime-change operations are of course not really hidden from view, but the U.S. government vociferously denies its role, keeps all documents highly confidential, and systematically gaslights the world:

“Do not believe what you see plainly with your own eyes! The U.S. had nothing to do with this.” Details of the operations eventually emerge, however, through eyewitnesses, whistleblowers, the forced release of documents under the Freedom of Information Act, declassification of papers after years or decades, and memoirs, but all far too late for real accountability.

In any event, the violent coup induced the ethnic-Russia Donbas region of Eastern Ukraine to break from the coup leaders, many of whom were extreme Russophobic nationalists, and some in violent groups with a history of Nazi SS links in the past. Almost immediately, the coup leaders took steps to repress the use of the Russian language even in the Russian-speaking Donbas. In the following months and years, the government in Kiev launched a military campaign to retake the breakaway regions, deploying neo-Nazi paramilitary units and U.S. arms.

In the course of 2014, Putin called repeatedly for a negotiated peace, and this led to the Minsk II Agreement in February 2015 based on autonomy of the Donbas and an end to violence by both sides. Russia did not claim the Donbas as Russian territory, but instead called for autonomy and the protection of ethnic Russians within Ukraine. The UN Security Council endorsed the Minsk II agreement, but the U.S. neocons privately subverted it. Years later, Chancellor Angela Merkel blurted out the truth. The Western side treated the agreement not as a solemn treaty but as a delaying tactic to “give Ukraine time” to build its military strength. In the meantime, around 14,000 people died in the fighting in Donbas between 2014 and 2021.

Following the definitive collapse of the Minsk II agreement, Putin again proposed negotiations with the U.S. in December 2021. By that point, the issues went even beyond NATO enlargement to include fundamental issues of nuclear armaments. Step by step, the U.S. neocons had abandoned nuclear arms control with Russia, with the U.S. unilaterally abandoning the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in 2002, placing Aegis missiles in Poland and Romania in 2010 onwards, and walking out of the Intermediate Nuclear Force (INF) Treaty in 2019.

In view of these dire concerns, Putin put on the table on December 15, 2021 a draft “Treaty between the United States of America and the Russian Federation on Security Guarantees.” The most immediate issue on the table (Article 4 of the draft treaty) was the end of the U.S. attempt to expand NATO to Ukraine. I called U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan at the end of 2021 to try to convince the Biden White House to enter the negotiations. My main advice was to avoid a war in Ukraine by accepting Ukraine’s neutrality, rather than NATO membership, which was a bright red line for Russia.

The White House flatly rejected the advice, claiming remarkably (and obtusely) that NATO’s enlargement to Ukraine was none of Russia’s business! Yet what would the U.S. say if some country in the Western hemisphere decided to host Chinese or Russian bases? Would the White House, State Department, or Congress say, “That’s just fine, that’s a matter of concern only to Russia or China and the host country?” No. The world nearly came to nuclear Armageddon in 1962 when the Soviet Union placed nuclear missiles in Cuba and the U.S. imposed a naval quarantine and threatened war unless the Russians removed the missiles. The U.S. military alliance does not belong in Ukraine any more than the Russian or Chinese military belongs close to the U.S. border.

The fourth offer of Putin to negotiate came in March 2022, when Russia and Ukraine nearly closed a peace deal just weeks after the start of Russia’s special military operation that began on February 24, 2022. Russia, once again, was after one big thing: Ukraine’s neutrality, i.e., no NATO membership and no hosting of U.S. missiles on Russia’s border.

Ukraine’s President Vladimir Zelensky quickly accepted Ukraine’s neutrality, and Ukraine and Russia exchanged papers, with the skillful mediation of the Foreign Ministry of Turkey. Then suddenly, at the end of March, Ukraine abandoned the negotiations.

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson, following in the tradition of British anti-Russian war-mongering dating back to the Crimean War (1853-6), actually flew to Kiev to warn Zelensky against neutrality and the importance of Ukraine defeating Russia on the battlefield. Since that date, Ukraine has lost around 500,000 dead and is on the ropes on the battlefield.

Now we have Russia’s fifth offer of negotiations, explained clearly and cogently by Putin himself in his speech to diplomats at the Russian Foreign Ministry on June 14. Putin laid out Russia’s proposed terms to end the war in Ukraine.

“Ukraine should adopt a neutral, non-aligned status, be nuclear- free, and undergo demilitarization and de-nazification,” Putin said. “These parameters were broadly agreed upon during the Istanbul negotiations in 2022, including specific details on demilitarization such as the agreed numbers of tanks and other military equipment. We reached consensus on all points.

“Certainly, the rights, freedoms, and interests of Russian-speaking citizens in Ukraine must be fully protected,” he continued. “The new territorial realities, including the status of Crimea, Sevastopol, Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics, Kherson, and Zaporozhye regions as parts of the Russian Federation, should be acknowledged. These foundational principles need to be formalized through fundamental international agreements in the future. Naturally, this entails the removal of all Western sanctions against Russia as well.”

Let me say a few words about negotiating.

Russia’s proposals should now be met at the negotiating table by proposals from the U.S. and Ukraine. The White House is dead wrong to evade negotiations just because of disagreements with Russia’s proposals. It should put up its own proposals and get down to the business of negotiating an end to the war.

There are three core issues for Russia: Ukraine’s neutrality (non-NATO enlargement), Crimea remaining in Russian hands, and boundary changes in Eastern and Southern Ukraine. The first two are almost surely non-negotiable. The end of NATO enlargement is the fundamental casus belli. Crimea is also core for Russia, as Crimea has been home to Russia’s Black Sea fleet since 1783 and is fundamental to Russia’s national security.

The third core issue, the borders of Eastern and Southern Ukraine, will be a key point of negotiations. The U.S. cannot pretend that borders are sacrosanct after NATO bombed Serbia in 1999 to relinquish Kosovo, and after the U.S. pressured Sudan to relinquish South Sudan. Yes, Ukraine’s borders will be redrawn as the result of the 10 years of war, the situation on the battlefield, the choices of the local populations, and tradeoffs made at the negotiating table.

Biden needs to accept that negotiations are not a sign of weakness. As Kennedy put it, “Never negotiate out of fear, but never fear to negotiate.” Ronald Reagan famously described his own negotiating strategy using a Russian proverb, “Trust but verify.”

The neocon approach to Russia, delusional and hubristic from the start, lies in ruins. NATO will never enlarge to Ukraine and Georgia. Russia will not be toppled by a CIA covert operation. Ukraine is being horribly bloodied on the battlefield, often losing 1,000 or more dead and wounded in a single day. The failed neocon game plan brings us closer to nuclear Armageddon.

Yet Biden still refuses to negotiate. Following Putin’s speech, the U.S., NATO, and Ukraine firmly rejected negotiations once again. Biden and his team have still not relinquished the neocon fantasy of defeating Russia and expanding NATO to Ukraine.

The Ukrainian people have been lied to time and again by Zelensky and Biden and other leaders of NATO countries, who told them falsely and repeatedly that Ukraine would prevail on the battlefield and that there were no options to negotiate. Ukraine is now under martial law. The public is given no say about its own slaughter.

For the sake of Ukraine’s very survival, and to avoid nuclear war, the President of the United States has one overriding responsibility today: Negotiate.

June 21, 2024 Posted by | history, politics international, Ukraine, USA | Leave a comment

Blinken made secret weapons promise to Israel – Netanyahu

 https://www.sott.net/article/492412-Blinken-made-secret-weapons-promise-to-Israel-Netanyahu 18 June 24

The Secretary of State said the White House “is working day and night” to resume all arms shipments, according to the PM.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has claimed to have pressured the United States over arms supplies that his country needs in its war with the Palestinian militant group Hamas.

The US paused delivery of weapons to Israel in early May amid calls for it to scale back its assault on the densely-populated city of Rafah in southern Gaza. The shipment reportedly included 3,500 bombs for fighter jets. The Jewish state’s offensive on Rafah has left thousands of Palestinians dead and injured, according to the local Hamas-run authorities.

In a video posted on X (formerly Twitter) on Tuesday, Netanyahu said in English that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has assured him the White House“is working day and night to remove these bottlenecks,” referring to arms supplies.

The statement confirms the latest media reports that during a meeting with Blinken last week in Jerusalem, Netanyahu had demanded the removal of barriers to the flow of munitions.

Netanyahu stated:

“When Secretary Blinken was recently here in Israel, we had a candid conversation. I said I deeply appreciated the support the US has given Israel from the beginning of the war. But I also said something else, I said it’s inconceivable that in the past few months, the administration has been withholding weapons and ammunitions to Israel.”

The Israeli leader stressed that an increased flow of US weapons would help bring the end to the struggle with Hamas.

“During World War II, [Winston] Churchill told the United States, ‘Give us the tools, we’ll do the job.’ And I say, give us the tools and we’ll finish the job a lot faster.”

Comment: When Israel demands, US complies.

Netanyahu has reportedly told Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and other high-ranking officials to make sure that arms transfers are fully resumed during upcoming meetings with American counterparts in Washington this week.

US President Joe Biden has repeatedly warned Israel he would halt arms shipments over the situation in Rafah, but despite those warnings his administration had reportedly kept weapons and ammunition flowing. According to a Wall Street Journal report, the US proceeded with a transfer of $1 billion worth of ammunition and vehicles for Israel in May, the same month it stopped the delivery of bombs.

On Monday, the Washington Post reported that the White House had successfully pressured Democrats in Congress to support a major arms sale to Israel that includes 50 F-15 fighter jets worth more than $18 billion.

Israel declared war on Hamas after militants killed around 1,200 people and took more than 200 hostage in a surprise attack on October 7. More than 37,000 Palestinians have been killed in the months of fighting that have followed, according to the latest figures from Gaza’s health ministry.

Comment: Regarding his recent reticence, Biden is roleplaying for the masses in an election year. He supports only one outcome: fulfilled, unimpeded.

June 20, 2024 Posted by | Israel, politics international, USA | 2 Comments

Very late and over budget: Why newest large nuclear plant in US is likely to be the last

Fereidoon Sioshansi Jun 20, 2024

With a lot of exaggerated fanfare, in early May 2024 the Georgia Power Company announced that the 1,114 MW Unit 4 nuclear power reactor at Plant Vogtle near Waynesboro, Georgia, entered commercial operation after 11 years of construction.

The former CEO of the company reportedly had installed a TV screen in his office remotely monitoring the progress of the work at the construction site. It must have been the most boring show to watch since on most days very little was actually happening at the site. He was mostly watching delays.

Vogtle unit 3 began commercial operation in July 2023. The plant’s first two older reactors, with a combined capacity of 2,430 MW, began operations in 1987 and 1989, respectively. The Plant Vogtle’s total generating capacity is nearly 5 GW surpassing, the 4,210-MW Palo Verde nuclear plant near Phoenix in Arizona.

Construction of the last 2 reactors began in 2009 and was originally expected to cost $US14 billion with a start date in 2016 and 2017. But as often happens the project suffered construction delays and cost overruns – exceeding $US30 billion ($A45 billion).

It is the latest – and possibly the last – addition to the US nuclear installed capacity, which is currently around 97 GW and accounted for nearly 19% of domestic electricity production in 2023, making it the second-largest source of electricity generation after gas, which was around 43% last year. 

Vogtle Units 3 and 4 use the Westinghouse AP1000 design (cited enthusiastically by Australian opposition leader Peter Dutton this week) which includes new passive safety features that allow the reactors to shut down without any operator action or external power source. 

Two similar reactors were planned for South Carolina, but the utilities halted construction in 2017 amidst escalating costs and delays.

The Executive Director of American Nuclear Society (ANS) Craig Piercy congratulated Southern Company, the parent of Georgia Power Company, and Westinghouse:

“This milestone … secures a generational investment in clean energy. Now complete, Vogtle 3 and 4 will deliver 17 million MWhrs of carbon-free power to Georgia annually – equivalent to the energy from all California’s wind turbines – and will be available 24/7.”

Fair enough but Mr. Piercy failed to mention that it took 11 years and $US30 billion of ratepayer money to build it – few private investors can afford the time or the capital.

Nor did he mention that currently there are no other nuclear reactors under construction anywhere in the US and none are presently contemplated. It may be the end of an era despite ANS’ obviously biased praise of the technology.

The story is much the same in France where the state-owned nuclear power giant Électricité de France (EDF), which operates a fleet of 56 reactors in one of the most nuclear dependent countries in the world, has been struggling to complete its last reactor.

The 1.6 GW Flamanville plant in northwest France is 12 years behind schedule and more than four times over budget – for the usual reasons. A faulty vessel cover needs to be fixed, pushing operation date to 2026.

In the meantime, the estimated cost to construct 6 new nuclear reactors, ordered by President Emanuel Macron, has risen to €67.4 billion ($A110 billion), from the original €51.7 billion, and is likely to go higher before they are completed. Nuclear plants are not cheap…………………………………………………

One of the few places where new reactors are being built without long delays is China, but even there the scale of nuclear build is dwarfed by solar and wind by orders of magnitude. 

 In the past 10 years, more than 34 GW of nuclear power capacity were added in China, bringing the country’s number of operating reactors to 55 – barely shy of the 56 in France – with net capacity of 53.2 GW as of April 2024 (visual on right on original ). Some 23 reactors are reported under construction in China

Globally, nuclear, while a low-carbon and baseload form of generation, is struggling to make much of a dent despite a few isolated places where it is maintained on the agenda – generally by government fiat and through generous subsidies.

It is hard to come up with a conceivable scenario where its fortunes will significantly improve. A hefty global carbon tax, for example, may help but even in this case, it will simply make renewables, not nukes, even more attractive than they already are.

Fereidoon Sioshansi is editor and publisher of EEnergy Informer, and president of Menlo Energy Economics, based in California.  https://reneweconomy.com.au/why-the-newest-large-nuclear-plant-in-the-us-is-likely-to-be-the-last/

June 20, 2024 Posted by | politics, USA | Leave a comment

Top lawmakers sign off on massive US arms sale to Israel

The approval of the F-15 sale comes the month after US President Joe Biden promised to hold off on arms to Israel if it chose to expand the assault on Rafah

The Cradle News Desk, JUN 18, 2024

Two Democratic lawmakers in the US Congress have signed off on a massive arms sale to Israel, which will include $18 billion worth of F-15 fighter jets, the Washington Post reported on 17 June. 

Representative Gregory Meeks and Senator Ben Cardin agreed to the deal after months of holding up the sale due to concerns over Israel’s conduct in its genocidal war on the Gaza Strip. 

“Any issues or concerns that Chair Cardin had were addressed through our ongoing consultations with the administration, and that’s why he felt it appropriate to allow this case to move forward,” Eric Harris, Communications Director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, told the Washington Post……………………

The end of the informal consultation process will allow the US State Department to move ahead with officially notifying Congress of the arms sale, marking the last step before the deal is fully approved. 

The State Department has declined to comment on the arms sale to Israel, which was one of the largest in years……………………………………

The Biden administration has already approved over 100 US arms sales to Israel since the start of the war in Gaza in October. https://thecradle.co/articles/top-lawmakers-sign-off-on-massive-us-arms-sale-to-israel

June 20, 2024 Posted by | business and costs, Israel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Vandenberg Conducts Test Launch for Development of New Weapon System

by Janene Scully | Noozhawk North County Editor, June 18, 2024 

A Minotaur I rocket launch late Monday night at Vandenberg Space Force Base tested a new re-entry vehicle, which carries the warhead, under development for the Air Force for the intercontinental ballistic missile weapon system.

The Minotaur I rocket equipped with an unarmed Mk21A reentry vehicle blasted off at 11:01 p.m. flying over the Pacific Ocean as Vandenberg officials remained mostly mum about the mission beyond issuing a warning notices for boaters and pilots. Vandenberg officials finally released vague details a few hours before the launch window opened Monday night……………………………

The Air Force has contracted with Lockheed Martin for the Mk21A engineering and manufacturing development phase. 

Once deemed fully operational, the Mk21A RV will be integrated on the nation’s intercontinental ballistic missile weapon system. 

The Air Force Nuclear Weapons Center, based in New Mexico, is currently spearheading development of Mk21A. …………

Northrop Grumman equipped the rocket with modern flight-proven avionics and other subsystems to produce what the military calls “cost-effective, responsive launch vehicles to support missile defense testing and other suborbital applications.” 

A similar test took place two years ago, but ended in failure 11 seconds after launch from Vandenberg.

The Air Force is developing a next-generation intercontinental ballistic missile under the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent weapons system, also known as Sentinel………………………………. more https://www.noozhawk.com/vandenberg-conducts-test-launch-for-development-of-new-weapon-system/

June 20, 2024 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Chutzpah: Netanyahu demands Biden give him more genocide weapons “to finish the job a lot faster.”

Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL 19 June 24

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is seething that President Biden withheld one measly shipment of 2,000 lb. bombs Israel uses to obliterate most of Gaza’s 139 square miles. All schools, hospitals, sewage and water infrastructure kaput under Joe’s billions in genocide weapons, and still Netanyahu is not satisfied.

He released a scathing video charging “When Secretary Blinken was recently here in Israel, we had a candid conversation. I said I deeply appreciate the support the US has given Israel from the beginning of the war. But I also said it is inconceivable that in the past few months, the administration has been withholding weapons and ammunition to Israel.”

Netanyahu then pivoted to the Good War: “In WWII Churchill told the US, ‘Give us the tools and we’ll do the job…and I say, ‘give us the tools and we will finish the job a lot faster.”

Netanyahu then pivoted to the Good War: “In WWII Churchill told the US, ‘Give us the tools and we’ll do the job…and I say, ‘give us the tools and we will finish the job a lot faster.”

June 20, 2024 Posted by | Israel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

« Previous Entries     Next Entries »