Buyer beware: NuScale tries a new way to get funding for its small nuclear reactor plan
An Oregon company is going public to raise money for nuclear power ambitions, OPD, 15 Dec 21,
……………NuScale, headquartered in the Portland suburb of Tigard, will go public by merging with what’s known as a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC. The company, Spring Valley Acquisition Corporation, is already publicly traded. Such mergers have recently gained popularity on Wall Street by allowing private companies the option to go public without the costs or risks associated with the more conventional initial public offering, or IPO.
Other Oregon businesses like the vacation rental company Vacasa and battery manufacturer ESS Tech have also gone public by merging with so-called “blank check” companies. In each of those cases, some investors pulled out when news of the mergers dropped, leaving each company with less money than they’d initially hoped……………
Editorial: No, California shouldn’t extend the life of its last nuclear plant. There are better ways to fight climate change
We can and should curb the dangers of fossil fuel combustion and nuclear fission at the same time, not use the threat of one to prop up the other.
Editorial: No, California shouldn’t extend the life of its last nuclear plant. There are better ways to fight climate change https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2021-12-12/diablo-canyon-nuclear-closure BY THE TIMES EDITORIAL BOARD, DEC. 12, 2021
California is approaching an energy crossroads. In three years, its last nuclear plant will begin to power down and the state will lose its largest single source of emissions-free electricity.
A 2018 law requires state regulators to “avoid any increase in greenhouse gases” as a result of closing the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant on the Central Coast. But if they don’t move more quickly to replace its electricity with renewable energy from wind, solar and geothermal, the void will almost certainly be filled by burning more natural gas, which increased last year to account for nearly half of California’s in-state electricity generation.
California can’t allow the retirement of Diablo Canyon’s nuclear reactors to prolong its reliance on gas plants or increase planet-warming and health-damaging emissions. But the state’s preparations for shutdown of an around-the-clock power source that supplies more than 8% of California’s in-state electricity generation have not inspired confidence; there have been no assurances that an uptick in carbon emissions will be avoided.
That uncertainty has created an opening for a new push to extend Diablo Canyon’s life. A recently launched campaign, whose supporters include former U.S. Energy secretaries Steven Chu and Ernest Moniz, and fashion model and nuclear influencer Isabelle Boemeke, wants California to abruptly reverse course and keep Diablo Canyon operating for another 10 or even 20 years.
Proponents say this would reduce climate pollution, bolster grid reliability and buy time during a crucial period in the state’s transition toward solar, wind and other renewable energy sources, citing a recent report by Stanford University and MIT scientists that lends support to the idea. The Biden administration has chimed in receptively, with Energy Secretary Jennifer M. Granholm suggesting in a recent interview that California might reconsider closing the facility to avoid losing an always-on source of clean electricity.
But the idea is misguided, and at this point remains largely divorced from reality. The plant’s closure should instead serve as an impetus for California do more to accelerate the shift to renewable energy and set a realistic course to meet the state’s target of getting 100% of its electricity from carbon-free sources by 2045
Those floating the idea of keeping Diablo Canyon open seem to ignore many practical considerations, including how to address seismic risks, the ecological harm of using seawater for cooling, and what to do with spent nuclear fuel. The cooling system and earthquake safety upgrades that would be required for the facility to keep operating after 2025 are so extensive they would likely exceed $1 billion, according to the Public Utilities Commission.
The plant’s operator, Pacific Gas and Electric Co., agreed in 2016 not to pursue license renewal, in part because closing the plant and replacing it with other zero-carbon energy sources and storage would cost less than keeping it open. The utility has shown no interest in reconsidering, nor has the Public Utilities Commission received any proposals to revisit its 2018 decision to allow the plant to shut down.
Still, the pro-nuclear camp is right in pointing out that the urgency of fighting global warming has only increased in the five years since the decision to close Diablo Canyon. Wildfires and other climate impacts are worsening at an alarming clip. Last year, California experienced its first rolling blackouts in nearly two decades thanks to climate-fueled heat waves that forced the state to burn more planet-warming gas to keep the power on. And the recent global climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland, showed that world leaders aren’t yet acting with the urgency needed to avert catastrophic warming.
But there are good reasons to eschew nuclear power as a solution. The world is still dealing with repercussions from the Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear disasters, which rendered huge zones uninhabitable and spread radioactive isotopes across the globe; and closer to home, the cleanup of the 1959 partial nuclear meltdown at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory near Simi Valley. Because the United States has no designated repository for high-level radioactive waste, spent nuclear fuel is stored on site at power plants across the country, posing ongoing risks. We can and should curb the dangers of fossil fuel combustion and nuclear fission at the same time, not use the threat of one to prop up the other.
U.S. government struggles with the ever-accumulating nuclear waste problem
Government launches push that may remove Maine Yankee’s nuclear waste from Wiscasset
The U.S. Department of Energy wants to know whether communities would be willing to store nuclear waste temporarily while the government finds a permanent solution.
BY KATHLEEN O’BRIEN, TIMES RECORD, 2 Dec 21, The federal government has taken the first step in an effort to move the nation’s spent nuclear fuel, like the 542 metric tons of nuclear waste at the long-decommissioned Maine Yankee facility in Wiscasset, but a Maine Yankee official said that waste likely isn’t going anywhere any time soon.
On Nov. 30, the U.S. Department of Energy released a request for information on a consent-based effort to move the nation’s spent nuclear fuel to other communities willing to hold onto it until the government finds a permanent storage solution for the waste. The DOE is collecting feedback from stakeholders on the effort until March 4, 2022, at 5 p.m
This action is considered long overdue because the Nuclear Waste Policy Act of 1982 required the federal government to remove the radioactive waste from sites including Maine Yankee by 1998, but that commitment was never fulfilled.
Maine Yankee operated from 1972 to 1996 when the company’s board voted to cease operations rather than invest in fixing expensive safety-related problems to keep the plant running. The plant was fully decommissioned in 2005. Since then, the nuclear waste has sat there, waiting for the government to remove it.
Maine Yankee’s spent nuclear fuel is housed in 64 dry storage casks, which stand on 16 3-foot-thick concrete pads. Each concrete cask is comprised of a 2.5-inch-thick steel liner surrounded by 28 inches of reinforced concrete. The site takes up 820-acres on Wiscasset’s Bailey Point.
Maine Yankee Public and Government Affairs Director Eric Howes said moving the nuclear waste elsewhere will be a years-long process, but this movement is, “a positive development, but much more needs to be done to resolve the spent nuclear fuel issue.”
…….. “It’s going to be difficult to get a community willing to be an interim storage facility because what does interim mean?” Howes said. “What’s meant by interim when, at this point, there is no plan for a permanent geologic repository?”………..
Kathryn Huff, principal deputy assistant secretary for nuclear energy at the Department of Energy, said the department recognizes it needs to take responsibility for the 86,000 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel in sites across the country.
………. Huff said it needs to be removed because “the communities that have that spent nuclear fuel never agreed to host the material long-term.”
“We cannot continue to defer the problem for future generations to figure out,” Huff said during a public information session Tuesday. “Inaction on this issue has already cost U.S. taxpayers nearly $9 million on settlements and judgements.”…………
Howes says it costs Maine Yankee roughly $10 million annually to store the nuclear waste safely while waiting for the government to remove it. He said the company pays to store it with funds won in lawsuits against the DOE.
Maine Yankee and its two sister sites, Connecticut Yankee and Yankee Rowe in Mass., have collectively won about $575.5 million in lawsuits and is now in its fifth round of litigation with the department. The money the government concedes in those lawsuits, however, comes from The Judgement Fund, which is funded by U.S. taxpayers………… https://www.pressherald.com/2021/12/12/government-launches-push-that-may-remove-maine-yankees-nuclear-waste-from-wiscasset/
Are We Forever Captives of America’s Forever Wars? This is what needs to be done to finally end our forever wars.
Are We Forever Captives of America’s Forever Wars? This is what needs to be done to finally end our forever wars.
KAREN GREENBERG December 10, 2021 by TomDispatch As August ended, American troops completed their withdrawal from Afghanistan almost 20 years after they first arrived. On the formal date of withdrawal, however, President Biden insisted that “over-the-horizon capabilities” (airpower and Special Operations forces, for example) would remain available for use anytime. “[W]e can strike terrorists and targets without American boots on the ground, very few if needed,” he explained, dispensing immediately with any notion of a true peace. But beyond expectations of continued violence in Afghanistan, there was an even greater obstacle to officially ending the war there: the fact that it was part of a never-ending, far larger conflict originally called the Global War on Terror (in caps), then the plain-old lower-cased war on terror, and finally—as public opinion here soured on it—America’s “forever wars.”
As we face the future, it’s time to finally focus on ending, formally and in every other way, that disastrous larger war. It’s time to acknowledge in the most concrete ways imaginable that the post-9/11 war on terror, of which the bombing and invasion of Afghanistan was the opening salvo, warrants a final sunset.
True, security experts like to point out that the threat of global Islamist terrorism is still of pressing—and in many areas, increasing—concern. ISIS and al-Qaeda are reportedly again on the rise in the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa.
Nonetheless, the place where the war on terror truly needs to end is right here in this country. From the beginning, its scope, as defined in Washington, was arguably limitless and the extralegal institutions it helped create, as well as its numerous departures from the rule of law, would prove disastrous for this country. In other words, it’s time for America to withdraw not just from Afghanistan (or Iraq or Syria or Somalia) but, metaphorically speaking at least, from this country, too. It’s time for the war on terror to truly come to an end.
With that goal in mind, three developments could signal that its time has possibly come, even if no formal declaration of such an end is ever made. In all three areas, there have recently been signs of progress (though, sadly, regress as well).
Repeal of the 2001 AUMF
First and foremost, Congress needs to repeal its disastrous 2001 Authorization for the Use of Force (AUMF) passed—with Representative Barbara Lee’s single “no” vote—after the attacks of 9/11. Over the last 20 years, it would prove foundational in allowing the U.S. military to be used globally in essentially any way a president wanted.
That AUMF was written without mention of a specific enemy or geographical specificity of any kind when it came to possible theaters of operation and without the slightest reference to what the end of such hostilities might look like. As a result, it bestowed on the president the power to use force when, where, and however he wanted in fighting the war on terror without the need to further consult Congress. Employed initially to root out al-Qaeda and defeat the Taliban in Afghanistan, it has been used over the last two decades to fight in at least 19 countries in the Greater Middle East, Africa, and Asia. Its repeal is almost unimaginably overdue…………….
At the moment, some efforts towards repeal again seem to be gaining momentum, with the focus now on the more modest goal of simply reducing the blanket authority the authorization still allows a president to make war as he pleases, while ensuring that Congress has a say in any future decisions on using force abroad……………..
Closing Gitmo
A second essential act to signal the end of the war on terror would, of course, be the closing of that offshore essence of injustice, the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba (aka Gitmo) that the Bush administration set up so long ago. …………
some progress is being made, but as long as Gitmo remains open, our own homemade version of the war on terror will live on.
Redefining the Threat
Another admittedly grim sign that the post-9/11 war on terror could finally fade away is the pivot of attention in this country to other far more pressing threats on a planet in danger and in the midst of a desperate and devastating pandemic. Notably, on the 20th anniversary of those attacks, even former President George W. Bush, whose administration launched the war on terror and its ills, acknowledged a shift in the country’s threat matrix: “[W]e have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within.”
some progress is being made, but as long as Gitmo remains open, our own homemade version of the war on terror will live on.
Redefining the Threat
Another admittedly grim sign that the post-9/11 war on terror could finally fade away is the pivot of attention in this country to other far more pressing threats on a planet in danger and in the midst of a desperate and devastating pandemic. Notably, on the 20th anniversary of those attacks, even former President George W. Bush, whose administration launched the war on terror and its ills, acknowledged a shift in the country’s threat matrix: “[W]e have seen growing evidence that the dangers to our country can come not only across borders, but from violence that gathers within.”
Each of these potential pivots suggest the possible end of a war on terror whose casualties include essential aspects of democracy and on which this country squandered almost inconceivable sums of money while constantly widening the theater for the use of force. It’s time to withdraw the ever-expansive war powers Congress gave the president, end indefinite detention at Gitmo, and acknowledge that a shift in priorities is already occurring right under our noses on an ever more imperiled planet. Perhaps then Americans could turn to short-term and long-term priorities that might truly improve the health and sustainability of this nation. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2021/12/10/are-we-forever-captives-americas-forever-wars
Saudi Arabia Arms Sale Is One of Biden’s Many Militaristic Actions in First Year.
Saudi Arabia Arms Sale Is One of Biden’s Many Militaristic Actions in First Year, Khury Petersen-Smith, Truthout, 12 Dec 21,
Given the brutish approach of his predecessor, many expected President Joe Biden to shift away from the worst practices in U.S. foreign policy and at the border in the previous four years. Indeed, in the first weeks of his presidency, the Biden administration signaled changes. In Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s first press briefing, the State Department announced that it was reviewing weapons sales to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) — which have led the catastrophic war on Yemen with essential U.S. partnership.
A week later, Biden declared in his first foreign policy address as president that “We are ending all American support for offensive operations in the war in Yemen, including relevant arms sales.”
Regarding its practices at the border, Biden administration officials promised a shift away from Trump’s practices of separating families and caging children, calling them a “moral failing.” He said that the new White House would “deal with immigration comprehensively, fairly, and humanely.”
As 2021 comes to a close, however, we are seeing the latter part of a trajectory that settles into familiar, disastrous militarism.
The U.S. is selling Saudi Arabia $650 million worth of missiles and providing $500 million worth of maintenance for U.S.-made aircraft, training and other support for its military operations.
These arrangements come as Saudi Arabia is escalating its devastating bombing in Yemen. In November, Saudi forces carried out the largest number of air strikes since Trump’s last year in office.
These bookends — Biden’s early announcement of an end to U.S. support for the war in Yemen and his subsequent robust material support of that war — capture the set of practices that the Biden White House is settling into, not only in Yemen, but also in the realm of war and imperialism more broadly.
Consider the White House’s approval of a $23 billion weapons sale to the U.A.E., which provides the Emirates with attack drones and F-35 fighter jets. The arrangement was negotiated under the Trump administration as the prize for the U.A.E.’s role in leading the normalization of diplomatic relations between Israel and itself, Bahrain, Morocco and Sudan, despite Israel’s deepening violence against Palestinians.
The Biden administration embraced the normalization agreements, along with Trump’s other actions meant to consolidate U.S. support and extend legitimacy to Israel in a time when Palestinian protest presents a steady challenge to Israeli apartheid, and global Palestine solidarity campaigns have gained more traction than ever……………………. https://truthout.org/articles/saudi-arabia-arms-sale-is-one-of-bidens-many-militaristic-actions-in-first-year/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=4190f671-99bd-42a7-a84d-db9a6d698398
Russia Angered by Senator Roger Wicker’s Nuclear Strike Remarks on Ukraine
Russia Angered by Senator Roger Wicker’s Nuclear Strike Remarks on Ukraine, NewsWeek, BY BRENDAN COLE ON 12/9/21 Russia has condemned GOP Senator Roger Wicker for suggesting that the U.S. should consider launching a nuclear strike to defend Ukraine.
The Russian embassy in Washington also hinted that Wicker was championing businesses in his home state of Mississippi when he called for U.S. military intervention over Moscow’s buildup of troops close to the Ukrainian border.
Wicker provoked the stern Russian response after telling Fox News host Neil Cavuto: “I would not rule out American troops on the ground. We don’t rule out first-use nuclear action.”……
The statement added that “long-term security guarantees” between the U.S. and Russia required “a demonstration of readiness to compromise. It is unlikely that Roger Wicker’s ill-considered statements will help us get out of the current acute phase of Russian-American relations.”……….. https://www.newsweek.com/russia-nuclear-ukraine-roger-wicker-embassy-irresponsible-putin-biden-summit-1657634
Options for the future of the US intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) programme -the Carnegie Endowment fo International Peace.
The Pentagon has asked a Washington thinktank to draw up a report on the
future of the US intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) programme and
deliver it before the end of January. The Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace (CEIP) will present options based on three rounds of
virtual consultations, which began on Tuesday, between Pentagon officials,
nuclear weapons experts and arms control advocates.
Guardian 9th Dec 2021
Opposition to small nuclear reactor project for Oyster Creek
Small Nuclear Reactor Might Be Built At Oyster Creek, Jersey Shore Online, 10 Dec,
”……………….Janet Tauro, who serves as New Jersey Board Chair of Clean Water Action, told The Southern Ocean Times that her organization was not in favor of the idea. “The last thing we need is another nuclear reactor at a site that has millions of gallons of waste material still in their fuel pool.”
She expressed concerns of where Oyster Creek’s current nuclear waste would end up, noting that Holtec’s application to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for a consolidated interim storage facility that would be based in New Mexico has not been approved and is facing resistance by residents and officials of that state.
“Nothing is happening any time soon – if at all – and we don’t want to saddle other people with other state’s nuclear waste.” She noted spent nuclear fuel rods on site at Oyster Creek must be removed from their storage casks every 20 years and put into new containers.
“This is a bad idea. Ocean County shouldn’t be a test case for unproven technology. Oyster Creek is the first nuclear power plant that Holtec has decommissioned. It is needless to expose Ocean County to that risk. Spent fuel rods should be nowhere near another nuclear reactor,” she added.
100% renewables possible for USA – study demonstrates
A study led by Stanford University professor Mark Jacobson has
demonstrated that the US energy system running on wind, water and solar,
coupled with storage, not only avoids blackouts but lowers energy
requirements and consumer costs while creating millions of jobs, improving
health, and freeing up land. The Jacobson-led study conducted with
colleagues from Stanford University analysed grid stability under multiple
scenarios in which wind, water, and solar energy resources powered 100% of
all energy needs in the United States. The study, published in the journal
Renewable Energy, demonstrates a blackout-free energy system under ideal
circumstances, and a much reduced risk of blackouts in extreme weather
events compared to the current fossil fuel-led energy systems.
Renew Economy 10th Dec 2021
DRUMS OF WAR Biden is pushing us to brink of NUCLEAR WAR over Ukraine in chilling echo of Cuban missile crisis, Russia claims
FIRES OF WAR Biden is pushing us to brink of NUCLEAR WAR over Ukraine in chilling echo of Cuban missile crisis, Russia claims, The Sun UK, Katie Davis, 10 Dec 2021
RUSSIA has warned Joe Biden is pushing the nation to the brink of NUCLEAR WAR as tensions over Ukraine hit boiling point.
Sergei Ryabkov, Russia’s deputy foreign minister, has warned a chilling echo of the 1962 Cuban missile crisis is possible as the US closely watches unrest at the border.
“You know, it really could come to that,” he said.
“If things continue as they are, it is entirely possible by the logic of events to suddenly wake up and see yourself in something similar.”
A standoff between Russia and the US brought the world close to nuclear war when Washington blocked Moscow from shipping nuclear missiles to Cuba in 1962 – and Ryabkov has warned escalating tensions between the nations risk a repeat of that.
After strained negotiations, John Kennedy and Nikita Khrushchev reached an agreement, with the Soviet leader dismantling their offensive weapons in Cuba on the condition the US would sign a public declaration to not invade the Caribbean country again.
It comes amid mounting tensions between the West and Moscow over a potential invasion of Ukraine – with growing fears war could break out.
Last week US intelligence detected Russia massing 175,000 troops on the border with Ukraine as fears of a potential invasion in early 2022 are mounting.
Meanwhile, Moscow claimed its fighter jets intercepted a US spy plane that was flying over the Black Sea.
Russia has denied that it plans to attack Ukraine.
Ryabkov’s warning comes after Joe Biden held a high-stakes call with Vladimir Putin as tensions between Washington and Moscow intensify over Ukraine.
The two-hour call between the leaders was held in a bid to de-escalate tensions – with the US President threatening sanctions over the situation at Russia’s border…………….
Russia has been demanded Ukraine not join NATO and raged that the US must stop all military activity in the region.
Ukraine commanders have warned that a Russian invasion would overwhelm the country without help from the West…………
it’s reported Britain and her allies are ready to use force to stop Russia invading Ukraine – despite warnings it would lead to the worst conflict since World War Two…………
a US senator has warned America could “rain destruction” on Russia with nuclear weapons if Putin invades Ukraine……
Senator Roger Wicker said “We don’t rule out first-use nuclear action, we don’t think it will happen, but there are certain things in negotiations, if you are going to be tough, that you don’t take off the table.”
But the Russian Embassy in Washington hit back at Wicker’s remarks, branding his suggestion that the US should consider using nuclear weapons against Moscow in the event of invasion as “irresponsible”.
“Such statements are irresponsible,” the statement, posted on Facebook, said.
“We advise all the unenlightened to read the joint statement of the Presidents of Russia and the United States of June 16, 2021 thoroughly. This document reaffirms the two countries’ commitment to the principle that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.”………. https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/16999520/biden-pushing-brink-nuclear-war-ukraine-russia/
‘The Catalog of Nuclear Death’: The U.S.’s Hair Raising Plan to Obliterate Russia
‘The Catalog of Nuclear Death’: The U.S.’s Hair Raising Plan to Obliterate Russia, The U.S. Air Force’s titled 1956 Atomic Weapons Requirement Study outlined all the targets it planned to hit if World War III broke out and how many bombers and nuclear weapons it would need to get the job done. In short, the report is a catalog of nuclear death. The National Interest, by WarIsBoring 10 Dec 21, Here’s What You Need to Know: The Air Force’s 1956 Atomic Weapons Requirement Study detailed the U.S.’s nuclear plan to attack Russia if the need should ever arrive.
In one scene from Stanley Kubrick’s iconic Cold War film Dr. Strangelove, an irate president Merkin Muffley refuses to get on board with a massive nuclear attack already in progress. Played by Peter Sellers, Muffley is trying to decide what to do after a rogue U.S. Air Force general sends his planes to bomb the Soviet Union.
“You’re talking about mass murder, general, not war!” Muffley angrily tells George C. Scott’s Gen. Turgidson, after the officer suggests the impending strikes could actually work. “Mr. President, I’m not saying we wouldn’t get our hair mussed,” Turgidson quips.
“But I do say no more than 10 to 20 million killed … tops,” the general stammers. “Uh, depending on the breaks.”
Released to a public faced with the ever present threat of nuclear annihilation in 1964, Kubrick probably had no idea just how close he was to the truth. Eight years earlier, the Air Force put together a report detailing how to obliterate the Soviet Union, China and their allies.
The National Security Archive at George Washington University obtained the document through a Mandatory Declassification Review and released it online on Dec. 22, 2015.
The flying branch’s blandly titled 1956 Atomic Weapons Requirement Study outlined all the targets it planned to hit if World War III broke out and how many bombers and nuclear weapons it would need to get the job done. Over the course of more than 800 pages, intelligence analysts identified more than 2,000 potential “designated ground zeroes” in the Soviet Union and elsewhere, including both military bases and cities.
“The SAC study includes chilling details,” William Burr, a nuclear researcher and analyst at the National Security Archive, wrote along with the release. “According to its authors, their target priorities and nuclear bombing tactics would expose nearby civilians and ‘friendly forces and people’ to high levels of deadly radioactive fallout.”
In short, the report is a catalog of nuclear death.
In 1956, Washington no longer had a monopoly on atomic bombs, but appeared to be winning the nuclear arms race. While Moscow had set off its first atomic weapon seven years before, the Pentagon had already started fielding even more powerful thermonuclear hydrogen bombs.
With long-range ballistic missiles still in development, the Air Force relied on a fleet of lumbering bombers and faster fighters to lob the nuclear arsenal in any actual war. The attack would come from warplanes armed with free-fall bombs or from early cruise missiles like the much maligned Snark………………
Those targets or target complexes that do not have a direct bearing on the destruction of SovBloc air power objective are part of the systematic destruction objective,” the authors explained. “The importance of the latter is not minimized.”
H-bombs would be reserved for important military targets, like air bases. American planes would drop atomic bombs on the rest……
The report includes a five-page key to every single category that might appear in the voluminous lists of bombing targets. It includes country codes for various facilities in all eight members of the Warsaw Pact. Depending on the type of target, three digit identifiers for Communist China, North Korea, North Vietnam and pre-Shah Iran might also be present.
Every single entry has a special eight-number code corresponding to an entry in a master “bombing encyclopedia.” The first four digits indicate a general zone, while the last four digits indicate the particular site or collection of sites within that particular area. This recording method theoretically allows for up to 9,999 individual targets within a given space.
The analysts clearly tried to pick out anything and everything that might have any effect on the war effort, from facilities producing cutting tools to rubber tires to the antibiotic streptomycin. Most notably, the Air Force defined “275” as the code for “population.”
Every single entry has a special eight-number code corresponding to an entry in a master “bombing encyclopedia.” The first four digits indicate a general zone, while the last four digits indicate the particular site or collection of sites within that particular area. This recording method theoretically allows for up to 9,999 individual targets within a given space.
The analysts clearly tried to pick out anything and everything that might have any effect on the war effort, from facilities producing cutting tools to rubber tires to the antibiotic streptomycin. Most notably, the Air Force defined “275” as the code for “population.”
“The authors developed a plan for the ‘systematic destruction’ of Soviet bloc urban-industrial targets that specifically and explicitly targeted ‘population’ in all cities, including Beijing, Moscow, Leningrad, East Berlin and Warsaw,” Burr pointed out. “Purposefully targeting civilian populations as such directly conflicted with the international norms of the day, which prohibited attacks on people per se (as opposed to military installations with civilians nearby).”
But other contemporary sources make it abundantly clear the Pentagon saw any person tied to a war effort as a viable military target. A now declassified 1952 U.S. Navy film on chemical and biological warfare specifically states a goal “to incapacitate the enemy’s armed forces and that portion of his human population that directly supports them.” With similar thoughts in mind, the U.S. Army had looked into radiological warfare and built deadly dirty bombs………
“The anonymous authors may not have been scientists,” Burr said. “But in light of the 1954 Castle Bravo test, which spread radioactive debris globally, they should have known better.”……. This first appeared in WarIsBoring here. https://nationalinterest.org/blog/reboot/catalog-nuclear-death-uss-hair-raising-plan-obliterate-russia-197705
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Nuclear Command and Control Satellites Should Be Off Limits – here’s why
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Nuclear Command-and-Control Satellites Should Be Off Limits https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2021/12/nuclear-command-and-control-satellites-should-be-limits/187472/ Blowing up some satellites causes problems. Blowing up these could cause nuclear war. By JAMES ACTON and THOMAS MACDONALD, DECEMBER 10, 2021
When Russia blew up an old satellite with a new missile on November 15, it created an expanding cloud of debris that will menace the outer space environment for years to come.
Hypersonic fragments from the collision with Moscow’s ground-launched, anti-satellite weapon risk destroying other satellites used for communications, meteorology, and agriculture. They even pose a danger to China’s Tiangong Space Station and the International Space Station, where personnel—including Russia’s own cosmonauts—were forced to don spacesuits and flee into their escape capsules ahead of approaching debris.
But the greatest danger that this careless stunt highlighted is to a different potential target: high-altitude satellites used for nuclear command and control. Those critical satellites face the threat of being attacked by co-orbital anti-satellite weapons, that is, other spacecraft with offensive capabilities. Destroying a nuclear command-and-control satellite, even unintentionally, could lead a conventional conflict to escalate into a nuclear war. As such, the United States, China, and Russia have a shared interest in ensuring the security of each other’s high-altitude satellites.
Satellites are integral to the United States’ nuclear command-and-control system. They would be the preferred means to transmit a presidential order to use nuclear weapons and would provide the first warning of an incoming nuclear attack. Russia uses satellites for similar purposes, even if it appears not to rely on them quite as much as the United States. While little is publicly known about China’s nuclear command-and-control system, the U.S. Department of Defense has assessed that China is in the process of developing a space-based early-warning system.
The most important nuclear command-and-control satellites—those for communications and early warning—are located in high-altitude orbits. Fortunately, most are strung out about 22,500 miles above the equator—far above the debris from Russia’s ground-launched anti-satellite weapon test. These satellites, however, are growing more vulnerable, particularly to co-orbital anti-satellite weapons.
Nuclear command-and-control satellites might be attacked deliberately, as the prelude to a nuclear war. In a conventional conflict, if China, Russia, or the United States decided to use nuclear weapons first—or believed that its opponent was about to do so—it might try to degrade the adversary’s nuclear command-and-control system preemptively. China, for example, might attack U.S. early-warning satellites to weaken the United States’ homeland missile defenses. Conversely, the United States might target Chinese communication satellites to interfere with Beijing’s ability to wield its nuclear forces.
In a conventional war, however, nuclear command-and-control satellites might be attacked and threatened for altogether different reasons—creating the risk that nuclear war might be triggered inadvertently. The United States, in particular, is deeply reliant on satellites to enable conventional operations. Moreover, most, if not all, nuclear command-and-control satellites also support nonnuclear missions—making them tempting targets even in a purely conventional conflict. For example, some U.S. satellites transmit orders to both U.S. conventional and nuclear forces. Russia might attack these satellites to try to undermine the United States’ ability to prosecute a conventional war, but with the added and unintended effect of degrading the U.S. nuclear command-and-control system.
Washington would be hard pressed to determine the intent behind such attacks. It could easily misinterpret them as preparations for a nuclear war and respond accordingly. It might threaten to use nuclear weapons unless its adversary backed off. In fact, the Trump administration’s nuclear policy explicitly threatened the use of nuclear weapons in precisely this circumstance. The Biden administration can and should remove this threat as part of its ongoing Nuclear Posture Review.
To make matters worse, it might not take actual attacks against nuclear command-and-control satellites to spark this kind of escalation. Satellites in high-altitude orbits are periodically moved to different positions to optimize their performance. Especially in a conventional conflict, a repositioning operation that led one spacecraft to approach a nuclear command-and-control satellite might appear to the latter’s owner as the beginning of an attack against its nuclearcommand-and-control system. Once again, the potential consequences could be catastrophic.
“Keep-out zones” around high-altitude satellites would be a straightforward way to mitigate these risks. Specifically, the United States, China, and Russia should agree not to maneuver their spacecraft within a certain distance—we propose 430 miles—of one another’s high-altitude satellites. (Exceptions could be made to accommodate occasional repositioning under tightly controlled conditions. Most importantly, the state conducting the maneuver should warn the others at least 24 hours in advance.)
In a conflict, if the belligerents had no intention of attacking each other’s high-altitude satellites, they would have strong reasons of self-interest to respect keep-out zones. If a state did seek to launch such attacks, keep-out zones couldn’t stop it from doing so—but they would buy time that the targeted state could use to try to evade the attack.
Negotiating keep-out zones during a conflict, when they would be most useful, would be next-to impossible. So, Washington, Beijing, and Moscow shouldn’t wait—they should start negotiating right away.
James M. Acton is co-director of the Nuclear Policy Program and holds the Jessica T. Mathews Chair at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Thomas D. MacDonald is a fellow in the Nuclear Policy Program.
Nuclear weapons proliferation: the great danger in the USA exporting advanced fast nuclear reactors
Letter to the Secretary of Energy Regarding Advanced Reactors, Fast Reactors, Nuclear Proliferation https://npolicy.org/letter-to-the-secretary-of-energy-regarding-advanced-reactors-fast-reactors-nuclear-proliferation/ November 29, 2021
Earlier last month, Secretary of Energy Jennifer Granholm touted the Department’s commercialization of advanced fast reactors at the COPO26 Glasgow Climate Conference as a demonstration of America’s commitment to decarbonizing the planet. The State Department announced it’s organizing itself to support the export of such reactors. Yet, a day after Secretary Granholm’s COPO talk, the Pentagon determined that Beijing would acquire at least 1,000 nuclear weapons by 2030, in part, because of the super weapons-grade plutonium China could produce in its advanced fast reactors.
If the United States is serious about preventing the further spread of nuclear weapons, something has got to give. In June, I, Victor Gilinsky (NPEC’s Program Advisor), and 11 other of the nation’s leading nuclear nonproliferation experts wrote the Biden Administration and Secretary Granholm noting the nuclear weapons proliferation dangers posed by the Energy Department’s fast reactor commercialization efforts. The administration has yet to reply to that note, which called for a policy review.
Last week, I sent yet another note (below) to Secretary Granholm recalling the June 20th letter, the Pentagon’s latest China warhead findings, and fast reactor concerns.
It would be best if the United States dropped its plans to export fast reactors as these machines can be used to produce copious amounts of weapons plutonium. At a minimum, such reactors should not be exported unless and until our government can certify that it can technically assure timely warning of possible nuclear military diversions from such plants. This was the requirement that Presidents Ford and Carter demanded be met before the United States ever commercialized plutonium-based fuels. If we are still serious about preventing nuclear proliferation, our government should demand no less today.
It would be useful for the Secretary and the letter’s other addresses to clarify their position as the Department of State has already announced a $25 million-program to promote the export of U.S. advanced reactors and is presently in this business.
Letter to the Secretary of Energy Regarding Advanced Reactors, Fast Reactors, Nuclear Proliferation
November 29, 2021
The Honorable Jennifer M. Granholm
Secretary of Energy
US Department of Energy
1000 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Washington, DC 20585-1000
Re: Advanced reactors, fast reactors, nuclear proliferation
Madam Secretary:
Among the Energy Department’s “advanced reactors” that are being supported for commercialization and export are some — sodium-cooled fast reactors — that shouldn’t be for international security reasons. The natural fuel of such reactors is plutonium. In this mode they are called “breeder” reactors. If they are successful in becoming an export product—which the Department of Energy and the companies designing them advertise as a desirable goal—they will provide easy access around the world to nuclear weapons-grade plutonium. As far back as 1976, President Gerald Ford said we should not rely on plutonium fuel until the world can cope with the proliferation consequences. This determination was subsequently backed by President Jimmy Carter. Does anyone think we are anywhere near meeting this test and that we should now reverse that policy? The short answer is no.
Certainly, the Energy Department’s current enthusiasm to develop and export fast reactors is in direct conflict with the Pentagon’s trepidation about these reactors’ utility as nuclear weapons material production plants. In specific, Pentagon’s latest China military power report, released earlier this month, spotlighted two Chinese fast reactors and their associated reprocessing plants under construction and their role in helping to supply China with the weapons plutonium Beijing needs to acquire more than 1,000 nuclear weapons by 2030.
The head of the Strategic Command, Admiral Charles Richard, amplified this point earlier this year before the Senate Armed Services Committee. “With a fast breeder reactor,” he noted, “you now have a very large source of weapons grade plutonium available to you, that will change the upper bounds of what China could choose to do if they wanted to, in terms of further expansion of their nuclear capabilities.” In speaking of “a large source of weapons-grade plutonium,” Admiral Richard is referring not only to copious plutonium production, but to the “super weapons-grade” quality of about half of plutonium produced in fast reactors, a circumstance that simplifies weapon design and production. Imagine if such facilities spread globally, including to dangerous regions in Asia and the Middle East. We certainly cannot exclude the possibility that some future owners of such reactors may be interested in using these plants to make bombs.
With light water reactors, there is no need to extract plutonium. Also, as noted previously in letter to you with multiple signatures sent June 20th, there’s a major economic penalty for recycling plutonium in light water reactors versus using fresh uranium. As a result, international inspections to afford timely warning of military diversions are feasible. In contrast, with the copious quantities of “super-grade” plutonium that fast reactors produce, no such warning is yet practicable. Nor is there some technical modification of reprocessing technology that promises to make it substantially harder to access the plutonium to make bombs. Exporting “smaller” advanced nuclear plants also won’t help: Nuclear facilities, which are small in commercial terms, can, nonetheless pose very large military threats. A “small” 300 megawatt (electrical) fast reactor, for example, can produce upwards of 300 kilograms of plutonium annually, about half of which is “super-grade.” Contrast that with the requirement for a warhead, which can be as little three kilograms.
Unfortunately, nuclear enthusiasts intrigued with the breeding potential of fast reactors, especially the sodium-cooled category, have largely ignored these international security issues. Instead, they’ve lobbied for “advanced” fast reactors and reprocessing for decades. Yet, their “advanced” design dates back to the mid 1940s and so predates the light water reactor. In the 1970s, a fast reactor demonstration plant, the Clinch River Breeder Reactor, then the largest US energy project ever, was the Atomic Energy Commission’s main focus. Congress canceled it in the early 1980s because it made no economic sense. The Department of Energy, then, tried to revive the fast reactor concept during the George W. Bush administration on grounds that it would help in nuclear waste management, but that got nowhere.
The current Department of Energy flagship fast reactor commercialization demonstration project, TerraPower’s Natrium reactor, is based on an earlier General Electric-Hitachi design for a Prism reactor which is classified as a plutonium-fueled fast breeder reactor. TerraPower executives say they intend to fuel Natrium not with plutonium, but with uranium enriched to below 20 percent and that it would not require reprocessing of spent fuel. They also plan on exporting the reactor.
But fast reactors are very flexible regarding fuel use, and its customers, especially its foreign customers, will view the reactor as a potential “breeder” reactor, indeed it is the main attraction of such machines, and we expect the exporters will accommodate the customers. Consider that while TerraPower is taking advantage of the “small modular reactor” label’s cachet, TerraPower’s CEO expects customers to want the larger 1000 megawatt (electrical) size and expects to accommodate them. It is apparently still true—despite the enthusiasm over small modular reactors—that the larger sizes are more economic. I believe that once the design is established the fuel choice will revert the same way.
The Biden administration and Congress have decided to support nuclear energy as part of the effort to combat climate change. You have said that you are “very bullish on advanced nuclear reactors.” But our government’s support for advanced reactors should not be extended to fast reactors, much less their export, which would make it much easier for those so inclined to manufacture nuclear weapons. At a minimum, our government should not push their export unless and until it can certify that it can technically assure timely warning of possible nuclear military diversions. This was the requirement that Presidents Ford and Carter demanded be met before the United States ever commercialized plutonium-based fuels. If we are still serious about preventing nuclear proliferation, our government should demand no less today.
Sincerely, Henry Sokolski
Executive Director
The Nonproliferation Policy Education Center
CC: Secretary of State Antony Blinken
Administrator of the National Nuclear Security Administration Jill Hruby
Chairman, Nuclear Regulatory Commission Christopher Hansen
Nuns against nuclear weapons
Nuns against nuclear weapons – Plowshares protesters have fought for disarmament for over 40 years, going to prison for peace, https://theconversation.com/nuns-against-nuclear-weapons-plowshares-protesters-have-fought-for-disarmament-for-over-40-years-going-to-prison-for-peace-169918December 9, 2021 Carole Sargent Carole Sargent is a Friend of The Conversation. Literary Historian, Georgetown University In July 2012 Sister Megan Rice, an 82-year-old Catholic nun, and two men walked past multiple broken security cameras and into the heart of a high-security nuclear complex. Y-12 in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, was the birthplace of the atomic bomb and now stores enriched uranium for nuclear warheads. Although thanked by Congress for exposing astoundingly lax contractor security, the three were also convicted and served two years in prison.
Rice, who died in October 2021, was part of a protest tradition called Plowshares. Since 1980, there have been over 100 Plowshares actions in the U.S., the U.K. and Europe. The name comes from the books of Isaiah and Micah in the Bible: “They shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks: nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more.” Isaiah and Micah are accepted as Scripture by Christians, Jews and Muslims.
Civil resistance, not disobedience
Rice’s journey with Plowshares began when she retired after four decades teaching science and math in schools founded in Nigeria by her religious order, the Society of the Holy Child Jesus. At Baltimore’s Jonah House, a faith-based activist peace community, she met Sister Anne Montgomery, a Society of the Sacred Heart nun and the daughter of a prominent World War II naval commander. Montgomery became Rice’s Plowshares mentor.
Montgomery helped develop Plowshares’ legal strategies, such as attempting to put nuclear weapons on trial. This means explaining to juries that nukes have been internationally illegal since the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and even its 1968 predecessor – and also how their use violates the Geneva Conventions and other binding treaties.
When testifying, these nuns do not describe their actions as “civil disobedience,” because that would mean they did something illegal. Instead, they prefer “civil resistance,” which Montgomery called “divine obedience” to higher principles of peace.
One of Plowshares’ most effective strategies is to represent themselves in court, known as pro se, which in Latin means “for oneself.” It allows protesters, including these nuns, to discuss humanitarian law, the necessity defense – meaning you broke a small law to stop a large crime – and the U.S. 1996 War Crimes Act. Lawyers cannot discuss these issues because judges limit cases to mere trespassing or property damage. Using pro se, activists speak freely in ways that might get a real lawyer professionally reprimanded. Lawyers often do, however, stand by as advisers.
Sabotage charges
Rice wasn’t the first nun to be convicted of sabotage. Ten years earlier, Dominican Sister Ardeth Platte, who inspired the nun character on the popular Netflix prison series “Orange is the New Black,” went to prison in Danbury, Connecticut, on the same charge. Platte (pronounced Platty) spent her retirement years engaging in Plowshares and other protests at weapons sites.
In 2002, along with fellow Dominican nuns, Sister Carol Gilbert and Sister Jackie Hudson, Platte breached an intercontinental ballistic missile facility in Colorado. The three poured blood in the shape of a cross to remember victims of war. Then they rapped on the blast lid with a household hammer. The small hammers do not damage such massive weapons in any significant way. The three were accused of preventing the United States from attacking its enemies or defending itself, which is the definition of sabotage.
Just like Rice’s group and many other Plowshares activists, the three nuns carried rosaries, Bibles and other objects in small black bags. Explosives experts, however, thought they might have bombs. Attack helicopters swooped in as they sang and prayed. Police pointed semiautomatic rifles at them and shut down a nearby highway. This was an unusual reaction, since Plowshares protesters are usually stopped and arrested with far less fanfare, and it may be why the prosecutors won a sabotage conviction.
Rice’s prosecutors brought up Platte’s case during her trial, in which she and her companions were also convicted of sabotage. However, two years later an appeals court overturned it, admonishing that “no rational jury could find” they actually injured the national defense.
Just like Rice’s group and many other Plowshares activists, the three nuns carried rosaries, Bibles and other objects in small black bags. Explosives experts, however, thought they might have bombs. Attack helicopters swooped in as they sang and prayed. Police pointed semiautomatic rifles at them and shut down a nearby highway. This was an unusual reaction, since Plowshares protesters are usually stopped and arrested with far less fanfare, and it may be why the prosecutors won a sabotage conviction.
Rice’s prosecutors brought up Platte’s case during her trial, in which she and her companions were also convicted of sabotage. However, two years later an appeals court overturned it, admonishing that “no rational jury could find” they actually injured the national defense.
1 This Month
26 April – Chernobyl: Inside the Meltdown airs on National Geographic on Sunday 26th April from 4pm
29 April – Nuclear Expert Webinar #1 – Radiation Impacts on Families with Mary Olson and Cindy Folkers
- 12:15 PM MT – 1:45 PM MT
- Location: Virtual – REGISTER TODAY
4 May -West Suburban Peace Coalition to discuss Iran war at May Educational Forum
Monday, May 4, 7:00 – 8:00 PM Central Standard Time
Title: : How Trump’s Narrative Tries to Shape the Reality of the War on Iran.
Contact Walt Zlotow, zlotow@hotmail.com 630 442 3045 for further information
14 May – online event From Bombs to Data Centres: the Face of Nuclear Colonialism
Pine Ridge Uranium is the real threat, not Tehran- Tell Burgum: Stop the Extraction.
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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