Aging nuclear plants: increased danger as U.S.utilities want their lives extended to 80 years
Bonnie Rippingille looked out at the wisps of steam curling from the Turkey Point Nuclear Power Plant across Biscayne Bay with a sense of dread. In December federal regulators approved Florida Power & Light Co.’s request to let the facility’s twin nuclear reactions remain in operation for another 20 years beyond the end of their current licenses. By that point they’ll be 80, making them the oldest reactors in operation anywhere in the world.
“That’s too old,” said Rippingille, a lawyer and retired Miami-Dade County judge. “They weren’t designed for this purpose.”
With backing from the Trump administration, utilities nationwide are preparing to follow suit, seeking permission to extend the life of reactors built in the 1970s to the 2050s as they run up against the end of their 60-year licenses.
“We are talking about running machines that were designed in the 1960s, constructed in the 1970s and have been operating under the most extreme radioactive and thermal conditions imaginable,” said Damon Moglen, an official with the environmental group Friends of the Earth. “There is no other country in the world that is thinking about operating reactors in the 60 to 80-year time frame.”
Indeed, the move comes as other nations shift away from atomic power over safety concerns, despite its appeal as a carbon-free [ whaaat?] alternative to coal and other fossil fuels. Japan, which used to get more than a quarter of its electricity from nuclear power, shut down all its plants in 2011 after a tsunami caused a nuclear meltdown at three reactors in Fukushima. Only a handful have restarted while others that can’t meet stringent new standards are slated to close permanently. Germany decided that year to shutter its entire fleet by 2022 and is now having trouble meeting its ambitious climate goals.
By contrast, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is poised to decide this year on requests by subsidiaries of Exelon Corp. to extend the life of two nuclear reactors at its Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania and Dominion Energy Inc. to extend the life of two nuclear reactors at a power plant in Surry, Virginia.
Dominion has notified the commission it intends to ask permission to extend the life of two more reactors north of Richmond, Virginia. Duke Energy Corp. has said it plans to seek license extensions for its entire fleet of 11 nuclear reactors, starting with three in Seneca, South Carolina……
The nuclear industry has been buffeted by a wave of early reactor retirements in the face of competition from cheap natural gas and subsidized renewable power. Constructing a new nuclear plant – the only one being built in the U.S. is years behind schedule and over budget – can cost billions of dollars. Retrofitting an existing one is more likely to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars range. ……
Opponents such as Edward Lyman, a nuclear energy expert with the Union of Concerned Scientists, argue that older plants contain “structures that can’t be replaced or repaired,” including the garage-sized steel reactor vessels that contain tons of nuclear fuel and can grow brittle after years of being bombarded by radioactive neutrons. “They just get older and older,” he said. If the vessel gets brittle, it becomes vulnerable to cracking or even catastrophic failure.
Other concerns surround the durability of components such as concrete and electric cables, but an advisory board to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the independent government agency that gave Turkey Point the green light to operate into the 2050s, said those risks could be managed safely.
The commission’s decision doesn’t sit well with Philip Stoddard, mayor of South Miami, a city of 13,000 on about 18 miles away from the Turkey Point plant. He keeps a store of potassium iodide, used to prevent thyroid cancer, large enough to provide for every child in his city should the need arise.
“You’ve got hurricanes, you’ve got storm surge, you’ve got increasing risks of hurricanes and storm surge,” said Stoddard, 62. All of this not only increases the likelihood of a nuclear disaster, it also complicates a potential evacuation, which could put even more lives at risk…….
“They are going to be flooded,” Cox said. “If we are relicensing a major utility we need to be preparing for the impacts of sea level rise.”…….. https://www.goerie.com/business/20200209/our-aging-nuclear-plants
Natural Resources Defense Council: It’s Time to Pursue a Genuine Solution for Nuclear Waste
 NRDC: It’s Time to Pursue a Genuine Solution for Nuclear Waste
February 07, 2020 WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump bowed to reality as he said his administration would end its attempts to force nuclear waste into the unsafe Yucca Mountain site in Nevada.
Following is a statement by Geoff Fettus, senior attorney in the Nuclear Program at the Natural Resources Defense Council: “With this change of direction by the Trump administration, decades of unfortunate attempts to shove nuclear waste down Yucca Mountain officially come to an end. Congress must now move in a new direction, one based on sound science, the consent of the state and local citizens, and compliance with all environmental laws.” Please see this analysis for more information on this issue: https://www.nrdc.org/experts/geoffrey-h-fettus/final-resting-place-nuclear-waste The National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 3 million members and online activists. Since 1970, our lawyers, scientists, and other environmental specialists have worked to protect the world’s natural resources, public health, and the environment. NRDC has offices in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Bozeman, MT, and Beijing. Visit us at NRDC.org and follow us on Twitter @NRDC. |
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Sea-level rise – an Unmanaged climate risks to spent fuel from U.S. nuclear power plants.
Unmanaged climate risks to spent fuel from U.S. nuclear power plants: The case of sea-level rise https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0301421519306937?fbclid=IwAR3G1uXQ-mz1KU1_ENXztdqIdICVZPsgO6Rw-qvQ1jHHPiGPUuumd7OHcjw
U.S. Democrats call for five-year extension to nuclear arms treaty with Russia
Dems call for five-year extension to nuclear arms treaty with Russia, . https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/feb/5/dems-call-five-year-extension-nuclear-arms-treaty-/ By Lauren Meier – The Washington Times – Wednesday, February 5, 2020
The leading Democrats on the House and Senate Foreign Relations Committees are urging President Trump to strike a renewed nuclear arms treaty with Russia as the last such treaty between the two nuclear powers is set to expire in one year.
In a statement Wednesday, Rep. Eliot Engel of New York and Sen. Robert Menendez of New Jersey called on Mr. Trump to negotiate an extension with Russian President Vladimir Putin to continue the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START) for an additional five years.
“This treaty has constrained Russia’s nuclear forces, provided strong and detailed verification measures to ensure Russia adheres to its commitments, and allowed the United States the flexibility to maintain a safe, secure, modern, and effective nuclear deterrent,” the members wrote.
They highlighted data exchanges and on-site inspections of nuclear facilities that are authorized under the Obama-era treaty that “provide unique insights into Russia’s nuclear forces and greatly assist our military in carrying out its deterrence mission.”
The U.S. and Moscow are the major signatories of the treaty, which limits the number of deployable American and Russian nuclear weapons to no more than 1,550.
The White House already pulled the U.S. out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia dealing with shorter-range “tactical” nuclear weapons, over what the U.S. says is Moscow’s continued noncompliance with the terms of the Cold War-era pact.
Mr. Putin has opened the door to immediately extending the treaty, which is set to expire in February 2021
Weather reporters joining the battle against climate change
Weathercasters Are Talking About Climate
Change—and How We Can Solve It https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2020/02/weathercasters-are-talking-about-climate-change-and-how-we-can-solve-it/
In recent years there’s been a seismic shift on climate change within the weather reporting community. MADDIE STONE THIS piece was originally published in Grist and appears here as part of our Climate Desk PARTNERSHIP.
For many years, as the science of human-caused climate change grew ever clearer, TV meteorologists avoided discussing the topic on air. Today, many weathercasters bring up climate change regularly. By embracing the science and presenting it in a simple, locally-relevant manner, TV meteorologists have managed to become some of the most effective and trustworthy climate change educators in the country.
Now some meteorologists are taking the conversation a step further and talking not just about the science of climate change, but how we can solve it.
At the 100th annual meeting of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) in Boston earlier this month, a panel of broadcast meteorologists, climate communicators, and policy experts assembled to discuss how solutions to the climate crisis can be woven into TV weather reporting. While wading into politics on the air can carry career risks for many meteorologists, weathercasters are also uniquely positioned to educate the public about climate solutions in a nonpartisan way, whether that’s by delivering locally tailored forecasts of renewable power production or discussing climate resilience strategies in the wake of a major storm.
“Broadcasters have an unusually good platform from which to engage,” said Ed Maibach, the director of the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University, during the panel. “You not only have the access but consistency of relationships with an audience.”
In recent years there’s been a seismic shift on climate change within the weather reporting community. In a 2011 survey of AMS members and the National Weather Association, less than 20 percent felt sure humans are the primary driver of global warming, a statistic that Maibach attributes, in part, to an “aggressive misinformation campaign by the Heartland Institute,” a climate change–denying think tank. But by 2017 that figure had jumped to 80 percent. That’s thanks largely to the efforts of the educators who organized Climate Matters, a climate reporting resource developed by the nonprofit Climate Central, the AMS, and various governmental and academic partners
A really bad idea – The Navy’s New Mini-Nuclear Warheads
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The Navy’s New Mini-Nuclear Warheads Are A Really Bad Idea, In other words, a new tactical nuclear weapon is supposed to convince Russia that the U.S. could respond in kind to Moscow’s use of tactical nukes. Delivering the warhead by sub-launched ICBM means Russian air defenses can’t stop it. Unfortunately, there are questionable assumptions behind this thinking. National Interest, by Michael Peck . 31 Jan 2020, Why Does America Need New Mini-Nuclear Warheads for Its Submarines? America’s strategic ballistic missile submarines are getting tactical nuclear weapons……..
The U.S. military doesn’t discuss the deployment of nuclear weapons as a matter of policy. But it’s no secret why the Trump administration wants them. To understand why requires an appreciation of the unwritten rules that have governed the U.S. vs. Soviet Union/Russia nuclear arms race since 1949. The U.S. government fears that Russia is embracing a new military doctrine that envisions selective use of tactical nuclear weapons, such as during a conflict in Eastern Europe and the Baltic States. ……….
a new tactical nuclear weapon is supposed to convince Russia that the U.S. could respond in kind to Moscow’s use of tactical nukes. Delivering the warhead by sub-launched ICBM means Russian air defenses can’t stop it.
Unfortunately, there are questionable assumptions behind this thinking. The Cold War witnessed similar fears of nuclear blackmail if one superpower or the other fell behind in the arms race. Yet no one has employed nuclear weapons – tactical or strategic – since 1945. Perhaps that’s because the leaders of the U.S., Russia and other nuclear-armed states have realized that the nuclear threshold is crossed, events could easily spiral into full-scale atomic war.
Then there is the whole idea of using ICBMs to deliver mini-nukes. Just as with Prompt Global Strike, a controversial idea to mount conventional warheads on ICBMs, the problem is that no one can be sure whether the nose cone of a strategic ballistic missile contains high-explosive or a hydrogen bomb. Michael Peck is a contributing writer for the National Interest. He can be found on Twitter, Facebook. or on his Web site. https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/navys-new-mini-nuclear-warheads-are-really-bad-idea-118831 |
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Nuclear weapons- the USA bomb making companies are doing great!
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The Cost and Composition of America’s Nuclear Weapons Arsenal
Visual Capitalist January 29, 2020, By Nick Routley The American nuclear weapons arsenal is nowhere near its 1960s peak, but there are still thousands of warheads in the stockpile today.The U.S. nuclear program is comprised of a complex network of facilities and weaponry, and of course the actual warheads themselves. Let’s look at the location of warheads, how they’re deployed, and the costs associated with running and refurbishing an aging nuclear program. Let’s launch into the data. [ Excellent graphs] Nuclear Weapons Map……Deployment Data……America’s Nuclear Weapons BudgetThe Congressional Budget Office (CBO) is required to project the 10-year costs of nuclear forces every two years. Though much of the program is shrouded in secrecy, the budget below [on original] provides an overview of the costs of running America’s nuclear weapons arsenal……. Back in the Bomb BusinessGenerally, we think of nuclear weapons stockpiles as a sunsetting resource, slowly being dismantled; however, since the treaty that ended the arms race collapsed in mid-2019, the flood gates may be opening once again. New warheads are reportedly rolling off the production line, and in the beginning of this year, Lockheed Martin was tapped by the U.S. Navy to manufacture low yield submarine-based nuclear missiles…. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/cost-and-composition-of-americas-nuclear-weapons-arsenal/ |
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U.S. sanctions Iran’s atomic power chief for nuclear violations
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U.S. sanctions Iran’s atomic power chief for nuclear violations
By Don Jacobson Jan. 31 (UPI) — The U.S. Treasury has imposed fiscal sanctions against Iran’s nuclear energy chief and ordered his U.S.-linked assets frozen, amid ongoing tensions between the Washington, D.C., and Tehran.The Treasury on Thursday sanctioned Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, saying the agency has played a significant role in Tehran violating nuclear regulations……. https://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2020/01/31/US-sanctions-Irans-atomic-power-chief-for-nuclear-violations/3251580482287/
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USA’s new low-yield nuclear warhead increases likelihood of nuclear war
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U.S. MILITARY HAS DEPLOYED NEW NUCLEAR WEAPON THAT HAS EXPERTS WORRIED ABOUT WAR, REPORT SAYS, NewsWeek,
BY TOM O’CONNOR ON 1/31/20 THE UNITED STATES HAS DEPLOYED A NEW LOW-YIELD NUCLEAR WARHEAD THAT EXPERTS WARNED COULD INCREASE THE LIKELIHOOD OF A CONFLICT GOING NUCLEAR, ACCORDING TO A NEW REPORT.
The Federation of American Scientists reported Wednesday that the W76-2 low-yield nuclear warhead was supplied to Ohio-class USS Tennessee ballistic missile submarine, which deployed to the Atlantic Ocean from Kings Bay, Georgia, late last month. The report estimated that the new warhead was fitted on at least one or two of the vessel’s 20 Trident submarine-launched ballistic missiles, each of which could carry up to eight warheads. The report was authored by military analyst William M. Arkin and Federation of American Scientists Nuclear Information Project director Hans M. Kristensen. Earlier this month, Arkin authored a Newsweek article featuring quotes by Kristensen on how the recent introduction of the W76-2 was the result of Pentagon planning a potential first strike scenario against adversaries, especially Iran……. Non-proliferation activists say the W76-2 does little bring the world back from the brink. Tim Wright, treaty coordinator of the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, called the new nuclear warhead deployment an “alarming development that heightens the risk of nuclear war.” “The United States’ new ‘low-yield’ nuclear warheads are still powerful enough to kill many tens of thousands of people,” he tweeted Wednesday…… https://www.newsweek.com/us-new-nuclear-weapon-experts-worried-1485150 |
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Waste Isolation Pilot Plant to cease accepting nuclear wastes from Feb. 14 to March 15
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New Mexico nuclear waste facility to pause operations, https://www.kob.com/new-mexico-news/new-mexico-nuclear-waste-facility-to-pause-operations/5629204/ The Associated Press, January 30, 2020
CARLSBAD, N.M. (AP) – A New Mexico nuclear waste plant will temporarily stop its waste acceptance and other operations to complete multiple maintenance projects. The Carlsbad Current-Argus reported that the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant is expected to cease its primary operations of receiving and disposing nuclear waste from Feb. 14 to March 15. Federal energy officials say the maintenance projects are expected to take multiple days or be conducted in critical areas of the facility. Officials say waste shipments would also be put on hold until the projects are completed. |
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A new serious problem with stainless steel canisters for nuclear wastes
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By David Szondy January 28, 2020 A new study by researchers at Ohio State University suggests that stainless steel may not be the best choice for containing high-level nuclear waste. By simulating long-term storage conditions, the team found that the storage materials interact with each other more than previously thought, causing them to degrade faster.
The storage of nuclear waste is more than a perennial political football, it is an existential problem. Whatever one’s opinions about nuclear power or weapons, there are thousands of tons of nuclear waste temporarily stored around the world, meaning that a way must be found to store it all
safely in the long term.
The most important type of nuclear waste is the high-level waste left over from reprocessing nuclear fuel or from nuclear weapon production. Such waste is made up of a complex mixture of radioactive isotopes with half-lives ranging from years to millennia. Though reactors have been operating all over the world for over 75 years, only Finland has started to build a permanent storage facility for such very dangerous waste.
That may show a remarkable lack of political will or even courage, but perhaps this reluctance will turn out to be serendipitous. That’s because the favored way of storing high-level waste is to vitrify it. That is, to mix the isotopes with molten glass or ceramics to form a chemically inert mass that can be sealed in stainless steel canisters before being sealed in an underground storage facility.
That plan may now have to change if the Ohio study is correct. Led by Xiaolei Guo, the team took glasses and ceramics and put them in close contact with stainless steel in various wet solutions for 30 days in conditions similar to those that would be found in the proposed US Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository.
In the real-life scenario, the glass or ceramic waste forms would be in close contact with stainless steel canisters,” says Xiaolei. “Under specific conditions, the corrosion of stainless steel will go crazy. It creates a super-aggressive environment that can corrode surrounding materials.”
They found that the steel interacted with the glass or ceramic to produce severe and localized corrosion that both damaged the steel and corroded and cracked the glass and ceramics. According to the team, this is because the iron in stainless steel has a chemical affinity with the silicon in glass, accelerating corrosion. This indicates that the current models may not be sufficient to keep this waste safely stored,” says Xiaolei. “And it shows that we need to develop a new model for storing nuclear waste.” The research was published in Nature Materials. Source: Ohio State University |
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The danger in deploying new US nuclear warhead on a submarine
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Deployment of new US nuclear warhead on submarine a dangerous step, critics say
First submarine to go on patrol armed with the W76-2 warhead makes a nuclear launch more likely, arm control advocates warn, Guardian Julian Borger in WashingtonThu 30 Jan 2020 The US has deployed its first low-yield Trident nuclear warhead on a submarine that is currently patrolling the Atlantic Ocean, it has been reported, in what arms control advocates warn is a dangerous step towards making a nuclear launch more likely. According to the Federation of American Scientists, the USS Tennessee – which left port in Georgia at the end of last year – is the first submarine to go on patrol armed with the W76-2 warhead, commissioned by Donald Trump two years ago. It has an explosive yield of five kilotons, a third of the power of the “Little Boy” bomb dropped on Hiroshima and considerably lower than the 90- and 455-kiloton warheads on other US submarine-launched ballistic missiles. Advocates of W76-2 argued that the US had no effective deterrent against Russian tactical weapons because Moscow assumed Washington would not risk using the overwhelming power of its intercontinental ballistic missiles in response, for fear of escalating from a regional conflict to a civilian-destroying war. Critics of the warhead say it accelerates a drift towards thinking of nuclear weapons as a means to fight and win wars, rather than as purely a deterrent of last resort. And the fielding of a tactical nuclear weapon, they warn, gives US political and military leaders a dangerous new option in confronting adversaries other than Russia…… https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/jan/29/us-submarine-trident-nuclear-warhead-patrols-atlantic-ocean The Trump administration’s nuclear posture review (NPR) in February 2018, portrays this warhead as a counter to a perceived Russian threat to use its own “tactical” nuclear weapons to win a quick victory on the battlefield. |
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Long Island Power Authority ratepayers will have to Subsidize Upstate Nuclear Power Plants
LIPA Customers To Subsidize Upstate Nuclear Power Plants.wshu, By JAY SHAH 29 Jan 2020 Long Island Power Authority ratepayers could spend more than $800 million over the next decade to help fund upstate nuclear power plants.
LIPA will have to buy zero-emission credits through a state agency, which subsidizes energy generators that don’t emit greenhouse gases, like [?] nuclear power plants. …….https://www.wshu.org/post/lipa-customers-subsidize-upstate-nuclear-power-plants#stream/0
Nuclear recycling is a bad idea
claiming that nuclear power is safe and finding a solution for its toxic waste is easy. If it’s so easy, why don’t they have a workable solution? Is it really just peoples’ unreasonable fears that obstruct the industry and the federal government from creating a final solution?Originally we were told that there was no waste problem because the waste would be reprocessed and used again in bombs and new “breeder” reactors. That idea failed! Miserably! The only reprocessing facility for commercial nuclear waste that ever existed was West Valley in upstate New York and it shuttered after only five years because it contaminated the land and water around it with radiation. It remains a Superfund site to this day. Without the technology to safely reprocess it, nuclear fuel waste remains in fuel pools and dry storage at reactor sites all over the country.
All this was codified under the 1982 Nuclear Waste Policy Act (NWPA). Once established, investigations began to determine the best dump site/s. But every state that was identified as a potential site for a repository threatened to sue. Instituting the NWPA was in crisis. The NWPA was amended and Congress targeted Yucca Mountain because
failed to meet the necessary criteria for safe isolation of the deadly material. With the failure of the federal government and the nuclear industry to establish Yucca Mountain as the national repository for nuclear waste, nuclear corporations were forced to establish onsite storage at their operating and shuttered reactor sites. Six out of nine reactors in New England have shuttered due to significant public opposition and their inability to compete with gas and renewables. These six sites are in varying degrees of cleanup. Without a “solution” as to dealing with the nuclear waste, these sites have devolved into ad hoc nuclear waste dumps. All have created onsite storage for their high level waste. It costs a lot to store the waste onsite — at least $5 million out of pocket for each year. This waste could remain onsite for decades if not centuries. So costs could really add up for corporations without any revenue. Naivety, arrogance, and thoughtlessness add up to a lot of money!With waste piling up at shuttered reactor sites throughout the country, the industry has a perception problem. This is not a favorable image for an 
industry trying to reinvent itself as the answer to global warming. So what’s the industry’s answer? It wants to create “interim storage” dump sites in west Texas and New Mexico in working poor, Hispanic communities to make this problem disappear. These sites don’t have to meet the strict environmental standards that sunk Yucca Mountain— i.e., isolation from the environment for 1,000 years and isolation from groundwater for 10,000 years.
This “interim storage” initiative is a statement of the failure of the nuclear industry and the federal government to address the most toxic waste we have ever created. We don’t need more nukes; we don’t need half baked “solutions”. We need a commitment to put our best minds to solve this thorny problem. What is needed is a scientifically sound and environmentally just solution, not more magic or wish fulfillment. A qualified “panel” must be established and funded to create the standards required to meet the health and safety of the public and the planet, not the profit-driven, short-sighted monetary bottom line of a moribund industry.
Deb Katz is the executive director of the Citizens Awareness Network, which was founded locally in 1991 and has offices in Shelburne Falls and Rowe. Here’s a link to our website www.nukebusters.org.
Democratic presidential candidates not well informed on nuclear weapons
2020 Dems Need To Get Up To Speed on Nuclear Weapons. Fast. https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2020/01/democratic-presidential-candidates-need-get-speed-nuclear-weapons-fast/162577/ Last week, U.S. voters had two opportunities to inspect the leading Democratic presidential candidate’s national security credentials. In both the Democratic debate in Iowa and the New York Times editorial board’s interview series, candidates were asked to explain their views on key aspects of nuclear weapons policy. Unfortunately, all three of the leading candidates flubbed some of their responses. For the existential sake of the country, the candidates need to get up to speed on nuclear weapons policy. Fast.
- Despite being a leader on a number of nuclear weapons issues, including a promise to commit the United States to a No First Use doctrine, Sen. Elizabeth Warren seemed unaware of the controversial existence of U.S. nuclear weapons in Turkey. Even though the issue made headlines as recently as October.
- Despite giving an answer that spoke eloquently of his long abhorrence of nuclear weapons, Sen. Bernie Sanders did not seem to know how many countries have nuclear weapons. The number is nine, not the eleven or twelve the senator claimed.
- Despite his compelling recent defense of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal he helped obtain, Vice President Joe Biden seemed to mischaracterize President Trump’s North Korea policy. Speaking of the North Koreans at the Democratic debate, he said the President “weakened the sanctions we have against them.” CNN’s fact-checkers soon rebuked the Vice President. As they put it, “Trump has not weakened the sanctions his administration has placed on North Korea to date, and has in fact ratcheted them up from the Obama administration.”No one is perfect, but these mistakes matter for several reasons. Nuclear weapons are the most acute national security threat we face. From Iran to North Korea, South Asia to Russia, they are still drivers of major international dangers. Any lack of clarity on such a grave topic should be alarming. But there are also more specific implications of each of the candidate’s misstatements. With tensions between the U.S. and Turkey increasing on a number of fronts, the question of whether to keep basing U.S. nuclear weapons at Incirlik is a serious one, especially when one considers that Turkey might attempt to steal them.
- With the 2020 Nonproliferation Treaty Review Conference looming, the question of how many countries have nuclear weapons is a crucial barometer for judging the success of that agreement. And by criticizing nonexistent sanctions relief, Vice President Biden ignores the real failure of the Trump administration’s North Korea policy, which has been its inability to translate summitry into productive diplomacy.Clearly, the country should expect better on this important issue from the leading Democratic candidates. Moreover, it is also to the candidates’ electoral benefit to get up to speed on nuclear weapons policy.
- First, the candidates should remember that the emerging consensus within the Democratic Party on nuclear weapons issues is politically popular. All three aforementioned candidates support a No First Use policy, as do 57 percent of voters in Iowa and 73 percent of voters in New Hampshire. All three support extending key arms control agreements with Russia, like New START. They are in the company of eight in ten registered voters, including over 75 percent of Republicans. And all three prefer the diplomacy of the Iran nuclear deal to starting another endless war in the Middle East – as do the American people.
- Second, nuclear policy issues are frequently used as ‘gotcha’ questions by the media. The media will keep asking questions on nuclear policy and it’s important for candidates to be ready. For instance, during the 2016 primaries the media infamously tripped candidate Trump up with a ‘gotcha’ question on the nuclear triad. Trump took the hit but recovered in the general election, by which time he had learned his way to a more coherent responseThird, nuclear issues simply aren’t going away. With tensions high from South Asia to the Korean Peninsula and Iran, the candidates will likely need to address a nuclear-related foreign policy crisis soon. Such moments can be politically decisive – there’s no faster way to solidify support than by handling a crisis well; it was only in the heat of the financial collapse of 2008 that Sen. Obama’s lead over Sen. McCain solidified. Candidates should do their homework in advance of such a moment.The three front-runners have each made important contributions to preventing the use and spread of nuclear weapons, although voters could use more policy specifics. Unlike some of their competitors, they have also had the courage to answer pressing questions about nuclear weapons. But with the Iowa caucus just days away, they need to do more.
Akshai Vikram is the Roger L. Hale Fellow at the Ploughshares Fund, a global security foundation. Before coming to Ploughshares, he worked as an opposition researcher for the Democratic National Committee and a campaign staffer for the Kentucky Democratic Party
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