The decision of the United States to wage war against Iraq in 2003 was one of the worst mistakes our country has ever made. Was Saddam Hussein a brutal dictator? Yes, but he didn’t have weapons of mass destruction, and toppling his regime had profound consequences—bringing the deaths of thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis, promoting deep instability in the region, inflicting lasting damage on American credibility, and imposing enormous costs on American taxpayers.
Joining the Senate in 2013 as a member of the Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committees, I vowed to learn something from that mistake. My top priority is keeping Americans safe, which includes reducing the risk of unnecessary war and raising the likelihood of decisively winning any war we must fight. I owe that to the American public, and I owe it to our servicemembers.
I fear the United States is on the verge of blundering into another unnecessary war with Iraq’s next-door neighbor Iran. The same warning signs are on the horizon, and I hope we will turn back from the foolish path we seem to be taking.
The first warning sign is the Trump administration’s rejection of the prospect of diplomacy to reduce tensions. The U.S. led many nations in developing the 2015 comprehensive nuclear deal with Iran, which contained in its first paragraph the affirmation that Iran would never “seek, develop or acquire” nuclear weapons. The agreement contained specific commitments, including an inspection protocol designed to make sure that Iran complied and clear consequences if it didn’t. Donald Trump’s administration has backed out of the deal, even though our allies and the chief international nuclear inspection agency have verified that Iran is in full compliance with it. With the U.S. out, Iran might back away from its commitments and restart its nuclear-weapons program. As the present struggle to curb a nuclear North Korea demonstrates, giving Iran an excuse to resume its program is foolishly dangerous.
Second, there has been an uptick in bellicose rhetoric from the Trump administration toward Iran.
The president stated at the recent NATO summit that there might be an “escalation” between the U.S. and Iran. When he was a member of Congress, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo opposedthe diplomatic deal to end Iran’s nuclear ambition and opined that a series of attacks could take out Iran’s nuclear capacity. Pompeo recently promised that “the world’s wrath” would fall on Iran should it resume a quest for nuclear weapons, omitting that his own boss had decided to tear up the deal preventing Iran from pursuing them. United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, National-Security Adviser John Bolton, and the president’s personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani have made similar belligerent comments about Iran. Israeli and Saudi leaders are also encouraging increased U.S. action against Iran. Axiosrecently reported that the U.S. and Israel have formed a joint working group focused on efforts to pressure the Iranian regime by provoking internal unrest and protests.
Third, tensions between Israel and Iran in Syria and the potential for direct confrontation are on the rise. Iran has long been a backer of the Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad. Iran and Russia are currently propping up his butcherous regime, and both nations have a military presence in Syria. In mid-June, an Israeli air strike killed numerous Iranian-backed militia members deep in Syrian territory, along the Iraq–Syria border. Some press reports attributed this strike to the United States. These accusations raise the risk to U.S. forces in the region and represent an escalation in the Syrian war that could trigger a wider regional conflict.
Exacerbating these warning signs, the administration has shown that it believes it can take military action without even coming to Congress to seek permission. President George W. Bush came to Congress months before his administration took military action in Iraq, but the Trump administration has twice struck Syria with missiles and also directed U.S. air attacks against Syrian military positions even though it did not have specific legal authority to do so. When pressed on how those military actions comply with domestic and international law, the administration simply asserts that the president can use military force if it is in the “national interest.” The view that the president can just assert “national interest” as a magic password and bypass the constitutional requirement that Congress declare war should worry every American. There is little doubt that this president might use the same rationale to justify military action against other nations, including Iran.
IS IRAN A THREAT TO THE MIDDLE EAST? YES, AND PRESIDENT TRUMP’S SHORTSIGHTED REJECTION OF THE NUCLEAR DEAL SHOULD MAKE THE U.S. EVEN MORE WORRIED ABOUT IRAN’S AGGRESSION IN THE REGION. THE U.S. SHOULD DO WHAT IT REASONABLY CAN TO PUNISH IRAN’S BAD BEHAVIOR AND HELP OUR ALLIES PROTECT THEMSELVES. THAT’S WHY I HAVE ADVOCATED TOUGH SANCTIONS IN RESPONSE TO IRAN’S SUPPORT OF PROXY GROUPS, ITS HUMAN-RIGHTS ABUSES, AND ITS VIOLATIONS OF UN RESOLUTIONS, AND ALSO WHY I’VE SUPPORTED ROBUST AMERICAN MILITARY ASSISTANCE TO ISRAEL, JORDAN, AND OTHER KEY PARTNERS IN THE REGION. BUT IRAN DOES NOT POSE AN EXISTENTIAL THREAT TO THE UNITED STATES. WE SHOULD NOT GET PULLED INTO ANOTHER OFFENSIVE WAR IN THE MIDDLE EAST.
I HOPE I AM WRONG ABOUT WHAT I SEE COMING. BUT WATCHING THIS ADMINISTRATION TEAR UP A DIPLOMATIC DEAL WITH IRAN, USE INCREASINGLY BELLIGERENT RHETORIC ABOUT THAT NATION, AND ASSERT THAT IT CAN WAGE WAR WITHOUT COMING TO CONGRESS LEADS ME TO SOUND AN ALARM. WE CANNOT AFFORD ANOTHER UNNECESSARY WAR, AND CONGRESS AND THE PUBLIC MUST BE VIGILANT TO STOP IT.
In the 1950s, nuclear reactors and weapons were all the rage. Bombs were getting bigger, people were hosting nuclear parties, and reactors were enabling the Navy to launch submarines and ships that could go years without refueling.
But all that nuclear activity had a dark consequence — and no, we’re not talking about the fun Super Mutants of Fallout. As most everyone knows, using radioactive materials to generate power also creates waste. Triggering the nuclear process in a material (which is what you need to do to create said power) is basically irreversible. Once activated, nuclear material is dangerous for thousands of years.
The Navy was still in the process of learning that fact in the 1950s as they tried to decide what to do with a newfound problem: dealing with nuclear waste.
Their initial solution, unsurprisingly, was similar to how they dealt with chemical waste and other debris at the time. They dumped it — usually in 6,000 to 12,000 feet of water.
At this point, Godzilla is your best-case scenario.
Sailors like George Albernaz, assigned to the USS Calhoun County in the ’50s, were left to decide how they’d go about their job dumping the materials, typically low-level nuclear waste.
They would take about 300 barrels per trip out into the ocean from docks on the Atlantic Coast and roll them to the edge of the ship. When the ship tipped just right on the waves, they would push the barrels over.
Most of them, filled with dense metals, salts, and tools encased in concrete inside the barrel, would sink right away. Barrels that bobbed back up were shot with a rifle by a man standing on the end of the ship, which usually sent it directly to the bottom of the sea.
But the rifle fire wasn’t always enough.
In July 1957, two barrels bobbed back up during a dumping mission and simply would not sink. So, the Navy sent two aircraft to fire on them with machine guns until they finally sank to Poseidon’s depths.
While shooting radioactive barrels actually sounds sort-of fun, the sailors involved said that the Navy failed to properly inform them of the dangers of working with radiation, took shortcuts on safety and detection procedures, and failed to provide necessary safety gear.
That left men like Albernaz susceptible to a number of diseases and conditions associated with radiation, including cancer and other lifelong ailments.
A 1992 article in the New York Times detailed other shortcomings of the Navy’s programs, including instances where dumps occurred mere miles from major ports, like Boston, in only a few hundred feet of water, increasing the chances that radioactive particles could make their way into civilian population centers.
These days, Navy nuclear waste is taken to be stored on land, but the U.S. still lacks permanent storage for high-level nuclear waste. Instead, nearly all high-level nuclear waste in the U.S. is stored in temporary storage, often on the grounds of nuclear power generation facilities.
It’s not ideal, and a number of potential permanent sites have been proposed and debated, but at least barrels probably won’t come bobbing back up.
If they do, well, even the F-35 could probably sink them.
US to open new military bases in Iraq, Kuwait: Reports , Press TV , 14 July 18
New reports say the United States will open new bases in Iraq and Kuwait in defiance of widespread calls to end its military presence in the region.
The Erbil-based BasNews reported on Friday that the US is planning to inaugurate its third military base in Iraq, near the town of al-Qa’im in western Anbar Province bordering Syria.
The report quoted a source from Anbar Province as saying that the new American facility will join the already operating US airbases in Iraq, namely Ain al-Assad in Anbar and Habbaniya, both in Anbar.
The source also noted that the new base will oversee several Anbar cities, the western desert of Iraq and the strategic international road connecting Baghdad to Damascus………
Iraqi officials have in numerous occasions called on the US-led coalition forces to withdraw from their homeland.
Separately on Friday, Kuwait’s al-Rai newspaper reported that the US will soon open a major military air hub near the country’s international airport.
Citing a statement from the US command in Kuwait, the Kuwaiti daily said the facility is intended to serve as a strategic military logistics supply point and the largest aerial port of debarkation in the Middle East.
The facility, the statement said, is further meant to fill the gap until the opening of West Al-Mubarak Airbase in Kuwait in 2023.
A legislator says he isn’t getting any answers out of the administration of Gov. Susana Martinez to questions about a proposed interim storage site for spent nuclear fuel in southeastern New Mexico.
Sen. Jeff Steinborn, D-Las Cruces, chairman of the Legislature’s Committee on Radioactive and Hazardous Materials, sent nearly 60 questions to the heads of several state departments in April.
Only one responded.
“It raises the obvious conclusion that this governor and her administration have done no analysis on this project,” Steinborn said. “The citizens of the state deserve to have answers on our state’s ability to handle this facility.”
The senator wrote in a July 9 letter to the governor that the New Mexico Environment Department did respond to his questions “but without providing substantive information on the issues raised.”
The Environment Department provided that letter to the Journal.
In it, department Secretary Butch Tongate said NMED would review the Environmental Impact Statement in progress at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission “and provide comments to the NRC as necessary.”
“The Senator’s questions should be directed to the NRC – the agency overseeing the process,” NMED spokeswoman Katy Diffendorfer said in an email.
Diffendorfer also said it is still unclear what role the NMED would play in the permitting and oversight of the proposed facility.
Questions were also directed to the Department of Transportation, Energy, Minerals and Natural Resources Department, Homeland Security and Emergency Management Department and Department of Military Affairs, which did not respond to Steinborn’s inquiries at all, he said.
Steinborn asked for details about transporting the waste through the state, safety protocol should a leak or other event occur and how the state’s oil and gas industry could be affected by the project, and other issues.
Martinez has expressed support for the project.
The facility, proposed by Holtec International, would house spent nuclear fuel from nuclear power plants around the country.
The NRC is considering the facility’s license, a process that could take years.
The existing accord, officially called the Agreement for Cooperation Between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of Japan Concerning Peaceful Uses of Nuclear Energy, recognizes Japan’s extraction of plutonium from spent nuclear fuel and use of mixed oxide (MOX) fuel as part of its “nuclear fuel cycle.” Renewing the pact will enable Japan to continue with its nuclear fuel cycle policy.
However, after the pact is renewed, if either Japan or the U.S. gives notice, then the agreement will be halted after six months — which would mean that Japan’s nuclear policy would be more easily affected by the will of the U.S.
The nuclear energy agreements that the U.S. has in place with other countries control the handling of nuclear materials and related equipment — from the standpoint of non-proliferation — whenever the U.S. provides nuclear technology to those other nations.
Under the existing agreement between Japan, a non-nuclear nation, and the U.S., nuclear fuel cycle operations such as the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel and also uranium enrichment are recognized, in what is considered an exceptional case.
With the pact coming into effect in July 1988, the 30-year deadline of the current agreement will be reached on July 16, 2018. As long as neither Japan nor the U.S. give notice to withdraw six months prior to the deadline, the pact will be automatically renewed.
The Japanese government did try to negotiate with the U.S. about maintaining the agreement as it is. However, the administration under U.S. President Donald Trump has not been in a position to negotiate, and so the pact looks set to renew automatically, without any serious negotiations taking place.
PLYMOUTH — The owner of Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station is looking to eliminate the 10-mile emergency planning zone around the reactor less than a year after it powers down for the final time, shrinking the radius under its protection to its property line.
Entergy Corp. plans to permanently shut down the Plymouth plant by June 1, 2019, after 46 years of operation.
The company submitted its request to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for an exemption from the federal requirements to maintain an emergency planning zone beginning April 1, 2020, saying the requirements are expensive and unnecessary.
“Entergy currently provides in excess of $2.25 million to fund Emergency Management programs in the state and local communities,” said Joseph Lynch, senior government affairs manager for Entergy. “At least for the EPZ (emergency planning zone) communities, they will get the same level of funding for approximately one year after the plant is shut down.”
Plymouth, Kingston, Marshfield, Duxbury and Carver have sections falling within Pilgrim’s 10-mile radius.
UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA HEALTH SCIENCES Researchers at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix are attempting to create a better diagnostic test for radiation exposure that potentially could save thousands of lives.
Jerome Lacombe, PhD, an assistant professor and researcher at the UA Center for Applied NanoBioscience and Medicine, recently published a peer-reviewed study in the Public Library of Science journal PLOS ONE.
His study compiled a list of genes reported to be affected by external ionizing radiation (IR), and assessed their performance as possible biomarkers that could be used to calculate the amount of radiation absorbed by the human body.
“In the case of a nuclear event, a lot of people can be radiated,” Dr. Lacombe said. “That is why it’s so important that we can quickly and accurately assess the absorbed radiation so we can give patients the proper medical treatment as fast as possible.”
Jerome Lacombe, PhD, an assistant professor and researcher at the UA Center for Applied NanoBioscience and Medicine, recently published a peer-reviewed study in the Public Library of Science journal PLOS ONE.
His study compiled a list of genes reported to be affected by external ionizing radiation (IR), and assessed their performance as possible biomarkers that could be used to calculate the amount of radiation absorbed by the human body.
“In the case of a nuclear event, a lot of people can be radiated,” Dr. Lacombe said. “That is why it’s so important that we can quickly and accurately assess the absorbed radiation so we can give patients the proper medical treatment as fast as possible.”……..https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-07/uoah-urp071018.php
Nuclear power predicted to ‘virtually disappear’ in the US Power Technology 5th July 2018 By Scarlett Evans, Researchers from Carnegie Mellon University’s Department of Engineering and Public Policy have released a report detailing nuclear power’s dwindling significance in the US, stating that it is unlikely to make any noteworthy contributions to the country’s decarbonised energy system over the next few decades.
The report, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, examined the potential contribution of large, light water nuclear reactors (LWRs) to the US energy system over the next three or four decades…… The researchers also examined whether advanced reactor designs and factory-manufactured smaller light water reactors (known as small modular reactors or SMRs) would play a significant role in US energy markets, being the only other option for the large-scale deployment of nuclear power. The study took several scenarios into account, such as using SMRs as wind or solar back-ups, to desalinate water, produce heat for industrial processes, or serve military bases.
EPA’s new leader lobbied for Colorado uranium company on Bears Ears . Scott Pruitt resigned on Thursday https://durangoherald.com/articles/230585 By Mark Harden As Originally Reported by Colorado Politics, July 6, 2018
The man who will replace Scott Pruitt at the helm of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency – at least temporarily – is a former lobbyist who represented a Colorado uranium company.
Andrew Wheeler was narrowly confirmed by the Senate as EPA’s deputy administrator in April despite opposition from environmentalists and most Senate Democrats. He will step in as acting administrator on Monday following Thursday’s resignation of Pruitt in the face of a storm of controversy over his conduct in office.
Wheeler, 53, could serve as acting administrator for more than a year without further Senate action.
As NPR’s Rebecca Hersher noted in a March report, Wheeler “has spent much of his career working for less oversight from the agency” he will now lead.
Between 2009 and this year, Wheeler was a consultant and lobbyist, often representing large energy companies.
Wheeler has worked as a registered lobbyist for, among others, a major uranium mining company – Energy Fuels Resources Inc. – based in Colorado. Last year, the company lobbied to shrink Bears Ears National Monument.
Colorado Public Radio’s Stephanie Wolf reported last December that the Lakewood-based company – also known as Energy Fuels Inc. – “owns a conventional uranium processing mill and a mine just outside the original boundaries of Bears Ears,” and that the company wrote a letter to the U.S. Department of the Interior, which runs Bears Ears, “expressing concerns that operations might be disrupted or limited by the monument’s original boundaries.”
Fortune magazine says that “while working as a lobbyist, Wheeler worked, along with Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke, to open part of Utah’s Bears Ears National Monument for uranium mining.”
Bears Ears was established in late 2016 by then-President Barack Obama near the end of his term in office. Its original size was 1.35 million acres.
The May 25, 2017, letter to the Interior Department from Mark Chalmers, Energy Fuels’ chief operating officer, says:
“We are concerned that the presence of a new national monument literally adjacent to the privately-owned land acquired specifically for constructing and operating a uranium and vanadium processing facility could affect existing and future mill operations.”
The Washington Post reported last December that:
“Energy Fuels Resources did not just weigh in on national monuments through public-comment letters. It hired a team of lobbyists at (law firm) Faegre Baker Daniels – led by Andrew Wheeler … – to work on the matter and other federal policies affecting the company. It paid the firm $30,000 between Jan. 1 and Sept. 30, according to federal lobbying records, for work on this and other priorities. The company’s vice president of operations, William Paul Goranson, joined Wheeler and two other lobbyists, including former congresswoman Mary Bono (R-Calif.), to discuss Bears Ears in a July 17 (2017) meeting with two top Zinke advisers.
President Donald Trump, whose administration has been promoting expansion of nuclear energy as a means to produce electricity, last December reduced the size of Bears Ears monument by 85 percent. At the time, Chalmers issued a statement saying the company has “no intention of mining or exploring anywhere within the originally designated (Bears Ears monument).”
Wheeler also has represented Xcel Energy, Colorado’s largest power utility, which has invested heavily in renewable energy.
Secretary of state predicts ‘productive’ meeting on his third visit, joking: ‘If I come one more time, I will have to pay taxes here’, Guardian, Julian Borger in Washington and Justin McCurry in Tokyo 7 Jul 2018
Mike Pompeo and a US delegation held talks in Pyongyang with North Korean officials on Friday, in an effort to make progress towards disarmament and improved bilateral relations three weeks after Donald Trump’s Singapore summit with Kim Jong-un.
The US secretary of state is seeking to persuade the North Korean leadership to take concrete steps that Trump said he was promised in Singapore, including the destruction of a missile engine testing site and the repatriation of remains of US soldiers killed in the Korean war.
Pompeo is also asking for more substantial steps towards disarmament, reportedly including an inventory of the North Korean arsenal of warheads and missiles.
Mike Pompeo and a US delegation held talks in Pyongyang with North Korean officials on Friday, in an effort to make progress towards disarmament and improved bilateral relations three weeks after Donald Trump’s Singapore summit with Kim Jong-un.
The US secretary of state is seeking to persuade the North Korean leadership to take concrete steps that Trump said he was promised in Singapore, including the destruction of a missile engine testing site and the repatriation of remains of US soldiers killed in the Korean war.
Pompeo is also asking for more substantial steps towards disarmament, reportedly including an inventory of the North Korean arsenal of warheads and missiles.
…….. He is under time pressure to produce results by August, when the US and South Korea were due to hold joint military exercises. Those exercises were cancelled on Trump’s orders in Singapore as an up-front concession. Adding to the pressure, the president has repeatedly claimed that the testing site has already been destroyed, and that the soldiers’ remains have been sent back, neither of which has happened.
Trump has also made extravagant claims about what was agreed in Singapore. At a rally in Montana on Thursday, he claimed: “We signed a wonderful paper saying they’re going to denuclearise their whole thing. It’s going to all happen.”
In a joint statement with Trump, Kim agreed to move towards “complete denuclearisation” but that has been a stock phrase in North Korean rhetoric since 1992 and signifies a vague and long-term process of multilateral disarmament on the Korean peninsula. Since the Singapore meeting, satellite images and intelligence leaks have suggested that North Korea is upgrading critical parts of its nuclear programme
……….. The meeting lasted two hours and 45 minutes and Pompeo then had dinner with his senior aides. The next session is due to start at 9am. It is unclear whether Pompeo will meet Kim Jong-un on this trip.
There were reports before Pompeo began his visit, that he might relax the US demand for complete, verifiable, irreversible disarmament (CVID), and settle for mutual confidence-building measures that defused tensions without dismantling the North Korean arsenal.
His spokeswoman, Heather Nauert, denied those reports on Thursday, saying: “Nothing could be further from the truth. Our policy toward North Korea has not changed.
Russian state media claimed on July 2 that the United States is preparing to send the next generation of B61 guided nuclear gravity bombs to NATO bases in European countries, including Turkey.
The U.S. Department of Energy’s National Nuclear Security Administration (DOE/NNSA) and the U.S. Air Force completed two non-nuclear system qualification flight tests of the B61-12 gravity bomb on June 9 at Tonopah Test Range in Nevada, according to a June 29 statement by DOE/NNSA.
The test, which was reportedly the first of its kind, was aimed at extending the B61 bomb’s service life by adapting it to next generation aircraft, including B-2A Spirit Bomber.
“The B61-12 LEP will consolidate and replace the existing B61 bomb variants in the [U.S.] nuclear stockpile. The first production unit is on schedule for completion in fiscal year 2020,” the statement said.
Russia’s state-run RIA news agency claimed on July 2 that the nuclear bomb will also be adapted to the F-35 aircrafts.
“The United States continues to invest in weapons of mass destruction. The NATO bases in Turkey, Germany and Italy will receive the new bombs in 2020,” Russian nuclear expert Alexandr Jilin was quoted as saying by the agency.
The United States has a total of 150 nuclear weapons in five NATO member countries, including Turkey, according to a report on worldwide nuclear arms prepared by the Turkish Parliament in October 2017.
Among those weapons, B61 type bombs are still in the İncirlik air base in the southern Turkish province of Adana.
According to data from the Federation of American Scientists (FAS), the number of B61s in Turkey is estimated to be nearly 50.
U.S. officials neither confirm nor deny reports about NATO’s nuclear weapons in Turkey.
Nevada’s office of Nuclear Projects has called on David Wright to recuse himself from any further proceedings involving the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump.
Wright is a member of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. But Bob Halstead, executive director of the Governor’s Agency for Nuclear Projects, says he’s biased.
“Your participation in the Yucca Mountain licensing process would violate Nevada’s due process right to a neutral and unbiased decision-maker,” Halstead wrote in his formal request for Wright’s removal.
He cited Wright’s participation as an adviser to South Carolina as a member of that state’s Public Service Commission and support for the move by the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners to force the Department of Energy to continue with the licensing process, which DoE shut down after the budget for licensing was cut by the Obama administration.
Halstead pointed to Wright’s “frequent and long-standing expressions of opinion that a repository at Yucca Mountain is necessary and will be safe, your criticism of Nevada for daring to oppose the Yucca Mountain repository and your formation of and active participation in at least one organization whose sole focus was the advancement and completion of the Yucca Mountain repository.” …….https://www.nevadaappeal.com/news/government/nevada-wants-official-removed-from-yucca-mountain-process/
Nuclear plant pushes for state assistance, Ledger Enquirer The Associated Press July 06, 2018 WATERFORD, CONN.
Owners of a Connecticut nuclear plant say the facility faces closure unless the state reverses course and fully considers the plant’s benefits to the environment and regional grid in an upcoming electricity auction.
The Day reports that Dominion Energy is urging state regulators to give the Millstone Power Station an “at risk” of closing distinction in an electricity auction. Dominion Energy claims rising expenses and competition from natural gas have weakened the plant.
“At risk” facilities have an advantage because they’re evaluated on their price as well as environmental benefits and grid reliability.
The Department of Energy and Environmental Protection says facilities won’t be considered for their risk status until 2023.
The vanishing nuclear industry, Science Daily, July 2, 2018, Source: College of Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University
Summary:
Could nuclear power make a significant contribution to decarbonizing the US energy system over the next three or four decades? Probably not.
Could nuclear power make a significant contribution to decarbonizing the U.S. energy system over the next three or four decades? That is the question asked by four current and former researchers from Carnegie Mellon University’s Department of Engineering and Public Policy (EPP). Their answer: probably not.
In a paper, “U.S. nuclear power: The vanishing low-carbon wedge,” just published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science (PNAS), the team examined the current U.S. nuclear fleet, which is made up of large light water nuclear reactors (LWRs). While for three decades, approximately 20% of U.S. power generation has come from these LWRs, these plants are ageing, and the cost of maintaining and updating them along with competition from low cost natural gas, makes them less and less competitive in today’s power markets.
In place of these LWRs, the team asked whether advanced reactor designs might play a significant role in U.S. energy markets in the next few decades. They concluded that they probably would not. Then, the team examined the viability of developing and deploying a fleet of factory manufactured smaller light water reactors, known as small modular reactors (SMRs). The team examined several ways in which a large enough market might be developed to support such an SMR industry, including using them to back up wind and solar and desalinate water, produce heat for industrial processes, or serve military bases. Again, given the current market and policy environments, they concluded that the prospects for this occurrence do not look good. …https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/07/180702154736.htm
Mike Pompeo under pressure to secure nuclear progress in North Korea visit , Guardian Justin McCurry in Tokyo and agencies 5 Jul 2018 Secretary of state faces pressure to establish timeline for denuclearisation as well as duty to reassure regional allies Weeks after Donald Trump declared the world a safer place following his historic summit with Kim Jong-un, Mike Pompeo is due to arrive in Pyongyang on Friday amid growing doubts over the regime’s willingness to abandon its nuclear weapons.
Pompeo will also use his visit to consult and reassure Washington’s allies in the region, with meetings planned with Japanese and South Korean officials in Tokyo on Sunday. Japan has voiced support for the leaders’ Singapore declaration, but reacted cautiously to Trump’s decision to cancel a joint US-South Korea military exercise scheduled for August.
Pompeo must establish how far North Korea’s nuclear and missile programmes have advanced before US officials can even attempt to draw up a potential timeline for America’s central demand – their complete, irreversible and verifiable dismantlement [CVID].
At present, the US has no reliable information on where all of North Korea’s production and testing facilities are located or the size of its ballistic inventory.
In a tweet this week, Trump said Washington and Pyongyang had been having “many good conversations” with North Korea over denuclearisation. “In the meantime, no Rocket Launches or Nuclear Testing in 8 months, he said. “All of Asia is thrilled. Only the Opposition Party, which includes the Fake News, is complaining. If not for me, we would now be at War with North Korea!”
Sceptics have pointed out that Kim no longer believes such tests are necessary now that the North has successful developed an intercontinental ballistic missile, and that dismantling North Korea’s missile and nuclear infrastructure represents a much tougher diplomatic challenge that could take years and cost billions of dollars, if it happens at all.
“Denuclearisation is no simple task,” Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, wrote in a commentary. “There is no precedent for a country that has openly tested nuclear weapons and developed a nuclear arsenal and infrastructure as substantial as the one in North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons.”
Experts have played down Trump’s upbeat appraisal of his 12 June meeting with Kim in Singapore, where the leaders made a loose commitment to work towards the denuclearisation of the Korean peninsula and agreed goodwill measures such as the possible return of the remains of US soldiers from the 1950-53 Korean war.
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