Pompeo tells China continued North Korea sanctions enforcement neededDavid Brunnstrom WASHINGTON (Reuters)29 June 18 – U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has stressed to China the importance of continued enforcement of sanctions on North Korea to press it to give up its nuclear weapons, after warning of signs of backsliding by Beijing.
The State Department said Pompeo had spoken to his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on Thursday and discussed efforts “to achieve our shared goal of the complete, verifiable, and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.”
Pompeo reiterated that North Korea would have a bright future if it denuclearized and emphasized “the continued importance of full enforcement of all relevant UN Security Council resolutions related to North Korea,” the department said in a statement.
It said this was especially important when it came to preventing North Korea’s illegal export of coal and imports of refined petroleum through ship-to-ship transfers prohibited by the United Nations.
……… Pompeo also spoke with South Korean Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha on Thursday to discuss the next steps on engagement with North Korea, the State Department said. It said they agreed on the need to maintain pressure until North Korea denuclearizes.
In a recently published fact sheet, OSHA reminds contractors, subcontractors, and licensees of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and contractors and subcontractors of the Department of Energy (DOE) that their employees are protected from retaliation for reporting potential violations of the Energy Reorganization Act (ERA) or the Atomic Energy Act (AEA) to their employers or to the government.
According to OSHA, retaliation comprises a wide range of actions, including firing or laying off, blacklisting, demoting, denying overtime or promotion, disciplining, denying benefits, failing to hire or rehire, intimidation, reassignment affecting promotion prospects, reducing pay or hours, and making threats.
Affected employers
Under the ERA, employees of the following employers are protected from retaliation for engaging in protected activity:
NRC licensees and applicants for licenses, including the Tennessee Valley Authority;
NRC contractors and subcontractors;
Contractors and subcontractors of NRC licensees and applicants for licenses;
Agreement state licensees and applicants for licenses from agreement states, including their contractors and subcontractors; and
Certain DOE contractors and subcontractors.
Protected actions
Employees of the above entities may not be discharged or otherwise retaliated against because the employee:
Notified the employer of an alleged violation of the ERA or the AEA;
Refused to engage in any practice that is unlawful under the ERA or the AEA if the employee has identified the alleged illegality to the employer;
Testified before Congress or at any federal or state proceeding regarding any provision (or proposed provision) of the ERA or the AEA;
Commenced a proceeding, caused a proceeding to be commenced, or is about to commence or cause to be commenced a proceeding under the ERA or the AEA;
Testified, assisted, or participated in or is about to testify, assist, or participate in a proceeding under the ERA or AEA; or
Assisted, participated in, or is about to assist or participate in any other action to carry out the purposes of the ERA or the AEA.
Filing requirements
The major burden for an employee seeking redress for alleged illegal retaliation is that the complaint must be filed with OSHA within 180 days after the employee was notified of the action taken against her or him. Otherwise the process is relatively simple. The employee or his or her representative can file an ERA complaint with OSHA by visiting or calling his or her local OSHA office, sending a written complaint to the closest OSHA office, or filing a complaint online. No particular form is required, and complaints may be submitted in any language. Also:
Written complaints may be filed by fax, electronic communication, hand delivery during business hours, U.S. mail (confirmation services recommended), or other third-party commercial carrier.
The date of the postmark, fax, electronic communication, telephone call, hand delivery, delivery to a third-party commercial carrier, or in-person filing at an OSHA office is considered the date filed.
What OSHA will do
If the complaint is filed on time, OSHA will investigate it according to procedures at 29 CFR Part 24.
“If the evidence supports an employee’s complaint of retaliation, OSHA will issue an order requiring the employer to, as appropriate, put the employee back to work, pay lost wages, restore benefits, and provide other possible relief,” states OSHA. “The exact requirements will depend on the facts of the case. If the evidence does not support the employee’s complaint, OSHA will dismiss the complaint.”
After OSHA issues a decision, the employer and/or the employee may request a full hearing before an administrative law judge of the Department of Labor (DOL). The judge’s decision may be appealed to DOL’s Administrative Review Board. The employee may also file a complaint in federal court if the Department does not issue a final decision within 365 days.
DOE’s program
Also, the DOE has established regulations at 10 CFR Part 708 to protect employees of DOE contractors against reprisal by the employer for specific employee actions that largely mirror OSHA’s protected actions listed above.
Procedures for filing a complaint under Part 708 differ from OSHA’s procedures and are generally considered more difficult to navigate. For example, the complaint must be filed within 90 days of the alleged retaliation; the complaint must be filed in writing; and the complaint may not be filed if it is based on the same facts for which the employee already requested a remedy from OSHA, under Federal Acquisition whistleblower protection regulations for contract employees, or from a state government.
In July 2016, the Government Accountability Office reported on DOE’s Part 708 program and recommended improvements.
,In order to remove 1 metric ton of defense plutonium from South Carolina within two years, as a federal court has required, the U.S. Department of Energy is considering the plutonium’s nuclear weapon uses.
According to a June 13 progress report, the DOE and its National Nuclear Security Administration are re-examining the possibility of repurposing some Savannah River Site plutonium for “future defense programs.”
“Approximately 1 metric ton was identified for possible use by the weapons production program,” the report reads. “The amount of candidate programmatic material at SRS is limited; most of the surplus material is not suitable for weapons program use.”
The DOE’s prospective plan would shift the plutonium from SRS to another site, either for interim storage or plutonium pit production.
Plutonium pits are nuclear weapon cores, often referred to as triggers.
Potential out-of-state relocation sites for the 1 metric ton of plutonium have been identified, according to the DOE.
The June report did not specify where. Site studies concluded in April.
Environmental impact assessments for moving the plutonium, required by the National Environmental Policy Act, are already underway and could be completed by the end of 2018, the report notes.
In 2017, a U.S. District Court judge ordered the DOE to remove 1 metric ton of plutonium from the state within two years, the result of a lawsuit launched by S.C. Attorney General Alan Wilson. At the time, Wilson celebrated the ruling as a major win.
The DOE has stated disposing 1 ton of plutonium via downblending, also known as dilute-and-dispose, would take until fiscal year 2025 to complete at current funding and operation levels. A court-received declaration made by Henry Allen Gunter, then a plutonium program manager and technical adviser at SRS, reinforced the DOE’s claim.
More funding and more trained personnel, according to the June report, would speed things up.
But planning related to dilute-and-dispose – mixing plutonium with inert material for burial at the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico – ceased in June due to another court order that protected the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility.
The defense- and weapons-use option, according to the DOE’s report, vastly undercuts the 2025 estimate: “Indeed, the department believes that it is possible that, if successful, this option might allow the department to meet the current two-year timeline imposed by the district court,” the report reads.
According to the DOE, the plutonium is “safe and secure in its present location.” Moving it costs money and poses radiological, safety and security concerns, all of which are listed at the end of the report.
Eventually, the plutonium would have to be moved to Los Alamos National Laboratory or back to SRS for pit production.
On May 10, the DOE and the U.S. Department of Defense recommended a pit production mission for SRS, which muddies the waters a bit. Those plans have not yet been finalized.
Los Alamos currently does not have enough room for the 1 metric ton, the DOE report states. Holding it at an interim location incurs additional costs.
More information and detail, including timing, will be made available in December, the June report states.
Reuters 28th June 2018, U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry said on Thursday that bailing out
struggling coal and nuclear power plants is as important to national
security as keeping the military strong, and that the cost to Americans
should not be an issue. https://uk.reuters.com/article/us-gas-conference-perry-grid/nuclear-coal-bailout-worth-any-cost-to-keep-america-free-u-s-energy-chief-idUKKBN1JO2J
Nuclear testing during the Cold War sent radioactive fallout far away from the actual test sites. Politicians are moving to expand who can be compensated by the government for getting sick after exposure to that fallout.
The tests mostly happened in Nevada but winds sent radioactive materials far and wide. Idaho Sen. Mike Crapo said one detonation in 1952 was particularly memorable to his constituents.
“Idahoans that I’ve spoken to in Emmett and elsewhere have shared their memories of waking to find their pastures and orchards covered with a fine grey-white dust that seemingly appeared out of nowhere. It looked like frost, yet it was not cold to touch,” Crapo said in a Senate Committee on the Judiciary hearing Wednesday.
In 1990 Congress created a program to compensate people who became seriously ill after radiation exposure.
According to the Department of Justice, since the programstarted more than $2 billion has been given in compensation. People like miners who worked directly with radioactive materials can get $100,000, people who were on site during nuclear tests get $75,000 and people who lived downwind of a major test site in Nevada get $50,000. So-called “downwinders” have to have lived in certain counties within Utah, Nevada and Arizona at the time of testing to be considered eligible.
“Unfortunately, the science at the time failed to recognize that radioactive fallout is not restricted by state lines,” said Crapo.
According to the National Cancer Institute, some of that fallout landed on fields across the country and especially in the Mountain West. It was consumed by animals like cows and eventually made it into milk cartons. Because of that, people who were milk-drinking children at the time are considered to have a higher risk of thyroid cancer.
Senators, including Crapo, have sponsored a bill that would expand the group of eligible “downwinders” to people who lived in parts of Idaho, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico and Guam at the time that tests were conducted.
The bill would also establish a grant program for further research into the health impacts of uranium mining and would extend the deadline for filing claims from 2022 to the late 2030s.
This story was produced by the Mountain West News Bureau, a collaboration between Wyoming Public Media, Boise State Public Radio in Idaho, Yellowstone Public Radio in Montana, KUER in Salt Lake City and KRCC and KUNC in Colorado.
The Trump administration just sent a tsunami through America’s electrical energy world when a leaked memo revealed that it had a new plan to shovel millions of dollars to the coal and nuclear power industries.
The memo, leaked to Bloomberg News and written by a member of Trump’s National Security Council, said that the nation faced a “grid emergency” because so many coal and nuclear power plants had shut down. The memo argued that the government could simply order private utility companies to buy high-cost electric power, because “national security” concerns mandated using “fuel-secure” sources to protect national security.
The memo claimed that “resources that have a secure, on-site fuel supply, including nuclear and coal fired power plants … are essential to support the nation’s defense facilities and critical energy infrastructure.” And it added that “due largely to regulatory and economic factors, too many of these fuel-secure facilities have retired prematurely.”
Prematurely? There is no shortage of electric power generation in the United States. The historic shift in this country toward cleaner, renewable energy is driven by national and international energy markets, not by tax breaks or government regulations. Countries around the world are investing in cheaper solar and wind power to address climate change and air pollution. One might think that free-market conservatives would be delighted to see competitive markets providing abundant, low-cost electricity from diverse sources to American consumers — all without interference from government. But apparently this case is different.
As for any threats to our national security, Vermont Law School professor Peter A. Bradford has pointed out: “We have no military crisis and no threats to our system reliability or resilience that require this drastic and expensive governmental intervention. The facts are being fixed around the desired end result.”
A political explanation seems like the real reason behind the administration’s determination to prop up coal. Trump’s staff has found a way to fulfill his campaign promise to rescue the dying coal industry, whose production has dropped 38 percent in the last decade. Robert Murray, CEO of Murray Energy, who gave Trump $300,000 for his inauguration, presented Energy Secretary Rick Perry with an “action plan” last March that included ending pollution controls on coal plants and stopping the rapid shift toward wind and solar energy.
Perry tried to direct federal subsidies to coal, only to be blocked last September by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. The leaked National Security Council memo noted that the Trump administration could use laws, such as the Federal Power Act and the Defense Production Act, to force utilities to buy high-cost power from coal and nuclear plants, though neither act has been used for these purposes before.
The memo also stated that natural gas is vulnerable to “cyber attacks” that make its supply unreliable, though record supplies of natural gas exist throughout the country. What the memo ignores is the reality that wind and solar, which make up about a quarter of power generation in this country, are abundant resources — nowhere near scarce.
Ever since horizontal drilling — fracking — transformed the oil and gas industry, this country has been producing large amounts of natural gas. Prices have dropped dramatically, and many coal-burning plants have converted to natural gas. Natural gas, however, is also a potent contributor to global climate change, and the continued flaring of methane during gas production is a significant, largely uncalculated source of pollution.
The Nuclear Information and Resource Service, a nonprofit that supports nuclear-free renewable energy, estimates that the coal and nuclear plant subsidies proposed in the memo could cost consumers up to $35 billion per year. Tim Judson, the group’s executive director, said, “Betting on old, increasingly uneconomical nuclear and coal power plants as a national security strategy is like gold-plating a Studebaker and calling it a tank. It could destroy the booming renewable energy industry, which is already employing more Americans than coal and nuclear combined.”
At a Senate hearing on June 11, Washington Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell characterized the proposal as nothing more than “political payback” for the coal industry, and members of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission who testified agreed that there is no “grid emergency.” Citing market interference, even the American Petroleum Institute testified against subsidizing coal and nuclear power.
Trump, who apparently developed his ideas on energy policy back in the 1970s, has shown little interest in any of the major changes to America’s energy picture since then. His effort to turn back the clock to fulfill his campaign promises to coal miners and repay political contributions could throw tens of thousands of people out of work, forfeit America’s leadership in energy technology, and worsen global warming.
America’s environmental and energy future depends upon a vigorous public pushback against this wrongheaded move.
(CNN) — On Wednesday, the North Korea watchers at 38 North released satellite imagery that shows North Korea making improvements to the Yongbyon Nuclear Scientific Research Center. While this report is unsettling, it is not at all surprising.
More unsettling than the report is the possibility that President Donald Trump believed that the North Korean nuclear threat could be solved by a handshake. In the immediate aftermath of the Singapore Summit, Trump said that, “There is no longer a Nuclear Threat from North Korea.” That statement was false, and the North Korean activity at Yongbyon proves it.
But North Korean nuclear activity is not in violation of the terms of the summit, since Trump and Kim Jong Un did not sign paperwork regarding immediate and complete denuclearization. Instead, they signed an agreement that includes a vague statement that North Korea will “work toward” denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula.
So far, the Trump administration is the only side moving in that direction — by agreeing to suspend joint military exercises with South Korea in exchange for vague promises. The improvements at Yongbyon, however, do not even violate Kim’s vague promise, which was only to stop nuclear and ballistic missile testing.
But, more importantly, Kim has little incentive to cease nuclear activity, and for that he can thank the incoherent strategy of Trump. The “maximum pressure” campaign of ever-tightening, crippling sanctions against North Korea is all but forgotten by Washington, and even Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says, “I am not going to put a timeline on [denuclearization].”
Additionally, Trump’s statements that the problem is solved gives China little incentive to apply pressure on its southern ally and gives America little leverage over China. Historically, China has been reluctant to apply too much pressure on Pyongyang for fear of a North Korean collapse that would both inundate China with refugees and potentially bring US troops to the Chinese border. It was Kim’s nuclear program that brought China into the sanctions regime. If, as the President said, the nuclear program is solved, then Washington has little recourse if China chooses to resume trading with North Korea.
CNN reports that the upgrades at Yongbyon were long-planned. These upgrades and further actions to strengthen Pyongyang’s nuclear deterrent will continue overtly in absence of an explicit agreement to stop them. And if such an agreement is reached, upgrades to the nuclear program and further research and development will likely continue in underground facilities. North Korea is not likely to give up its nuclear weapons for any reason or for any price.
Trump may think that a warm handshake and a few shared laughs will solve the North Korean problem, but Kim is not so naive. One of the world’s most brutal and repressive dictators, according to Human Rights Watch, is not going to be won over by Trump’s public remarks that he “got along great with Kim Jong Un, who wants to see wonderful things for his country” or that the two leaders share a “special bond.” Kim is going to take advantage of Trump’s pathological desire for praise and promise him the world, while continuing to develop his weapons programs.
The new developments at Yongbyon are not, on their face, cause for concern. But there are reasons to worry about the 38 North report. If Trump thinks that Kim agreed not to continue with his program, then this report (if discussed on his preferred news network) might cause Trump to return to his previous belligerent rhetoric vis-a-vis North Korea. If Trump thinks that this report makes him look weak, then he may be susceptible to John Bolton’s argument that there is a “legal case” to mount a preventive strike against North Korea.
Trump may think that the summit in Singapore prevented a war, but that is only true in the sense that it stopped him from starting one. That said, the summit does not need to be futile — it could also be the start of a genuine and serious set of arms control and limitation negotiations. These negotiations would require patience and skill without an obvious or immediate photo-op or half-clever tweet.
But since Trump is neither known for his patience nor his restraint on social media, we can expect North Korean nuclear research and facilities upgrades to continue apace.
Being a flight attendant has its bonuses, like getting to travel the world for free, meet new people, and earn well above the average American salary. But it’s not all free snacks and flights to Paris. The job comes with some costs too—like erratic schedules, aggressive passengers, and significant delays.
But those, while frustrating, may be the tip of the iceberg. This week, new research is boosting concerns about an even more severe hazard: the increased risk of cancer. The study, published in the journal Environmental Science, is the second wave of a 2007 Harvard Flight Attendant Health Survey aimed at analyzing how “occupational exposures impact the health of flight attendants.”
The initial 2007 study analyzed the general health of flight attendants, finding elevated rates of things like sleep disorders, fatigue, and depression. For this new study, the researchers from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health focused on cancer, recruiting more than 5,000 current and former flight attendants— 80 percent of whom were female—to share their history.
Once cataloged, the stats were compared with the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), a nationwide study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The conclusion is stark. Flight attendants show a higher prevalence of every cancer studied, including breast, uterine, gastrointestinal, thyroid, cervical, melanoma and non-melanoma skin cancer.
Although the authors were not able to nail down an exact reason, concerns have been building for years about the exposure to cancer-causing agents (called carcinogens) on airlines. In this case, the two significant identified risks—which may be driving these numbers—are disrupted circadian rhythms and what’s called “cosmic ionizing radiation.”
Cosmic ionizing radiation is radiation that comes from outer space and is caused by things like solar flares. While only a small amount of it reaches earth, it’s present in much higher doses at flight altitudes. According to the CDC, flight attendants and pilots are exposed to it on every single flight, exposing them to the largest annual ionizing radiation dose of all U.S. workers.
For years, the World Health Association (WHO) has declared a direct link between long-term exposure of this cosmic ionizing radiation and cancer. As a result, the European Union has placed limits on the amount of radiation exposure for flight crew members, specifically for pregnant women, to lessen the risk of cancer and other health effects. Although the CDC offers warnings about the dangers, it doesn’t suggest that the ionizing radiation levels are actively monitored for U.S. flight crews.
On top of that potential carcinogens, the Harvard researchers also point out pervasive disruption of sleep circadian rhythms among flight attendants, due to things like night shifts and changing time zones. While changing sleep cycles may seem benign, a chronically disrupted sleep cycle has been linked to multiple types of cancer including skin and breast.
In the wake of the study, former flight attendants have taken to Twitter to express their concern about how long the information has been concealed.
Echoing their thoughts is Harvard epidemiologist Irina Mordukhovich, one of the researchers involved. “Our study informs future research priorities regarding the health of this understudied group of workers, who have a wide range of job-related exposures to known and probable carcinogens,” she said in a statement. “Our findings raise the question of what can be done to minimize the adverse exposures and cancers common among cabin crew.”
With its spate of right-wing rulings this week, the Supreme Court has paved the way for Donald Trump and the Republican-dominated Congress to intensify their attacks on human rights, workers and the country’s democratic institutions, dragging the US deeper into the abyss.
US political culture has long been dominated by oligarchical corporate and financial interests, militarism and jingoism, but the current Trumpocracy represents a new level of neoliberal cruelty. Indeed, the United States is turning into a pariah nation, a unique position among Western states in the second decade of the 21st century.
What factors and the forces produced this radical and dangerous shift? How did Trump manage to bring the Republican Party under his total control? Is Trumpocracy a temporary phenomenon, or the future of American politics? Is the Bernie Sanders phenomenon over? In the exclusive Truthout interview below, world-renowned scholar and public intellectual Noam Chomsky, Emeritus Professor of Linguistics at MIT and currently Laureate Professor of Linguistics at the University of Arizona, tackles these questions and offers his unique insights.
Qn. “…… how do we explain the fact that he has essentially taken over the Republican Party without any serious opposition?”
Noam Chomsky: Part of the solution to the puzzle is Obama’s performance in office. Many were seduced by the rhetoric of “hope” and “change,” and deeply disillusioned by the very early discovery that the words had little substance………
Quite apart from Obama’s disappointing policies, he and the [Democratic] Party were victims of the intense racism that is deeply rooted in large parts of American society. The visceral hatred of Obama cannot be explained in other terms.
But there is far more than that. For some time, candidates for Republican primaries who emerged from the base have been far off the traditional spectrum. The establishment was able to suppress them and gain their own candidate, but that didn’t change the basis for their support. For years, both parties have drifted to the right — the Republicans off the spectrum of normal parliamentary politics. Their dedication to wealth and corporate power is so extreme that they cannot get votes on their actual policies
……. For the actual Republican constituency of wealth and corporate power, these are glory days, so why object, even if his antics sometimes cause some grimaces? The core constituency of Evangelicals is solidly in Trump’s pocket, thanks to the crumbs thrown their way. Many working people maintain the illusion that Trump cares about them and will bring back lost days of steady jobs in mining and manufacturing.
……… Trump himself seems to be having the time of his life. He’s constantly in the limelight, his loyal base worships his every move, he’s free to defy convention, to insult anyone he chooses, to disrupt the international economic and political order at will — whatever comes to mind next, knowing that he’s the biggest thug on the block and can probably get away with it — again, for a while, at least.
“….Qn: How do we explain the fact that Trump continues to cause chaos on all fronts, both domestically and internationally, and yet his popularity remains at quite high levels?
As I mentioned, Trump’s popularity among Republicans is unusually fervent and high, though not uniquely so. The affluent are doing fine. The economy is continuing the slow growth under Obama, though wages are barely rising and job security is low.
North Korea understands U.S. on ‘complete denuclearization’: Pompeo, Patricia Zengerle, WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Wednesday he was confident that North Korea understood the scope of the U.S. desire for complete denuclearization as the two countries negotiate after President Donald Trump’s summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
“We’ve been pretty unambiguous in our conversations about what we mean when we say complete denuclearization,” Pompeo told a Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing on funding for the State Department.
A new report draws a close connection between cancer and Coldwater Creek in north St. Louis County.
A two-year health assessment by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry concluded that radioactive waste in the creek could have increased the risk of developing bone, lung, skin or breast cancer as well as leukemia for those who lived nearby or who played in the creek as children.
“Our street was right next to the creek. My parents moved there when I was two and I moved away as an adult,” said Kathryn Fults Ward.
Ward was diagnosed with leukemia in August.
“I had been healthy all my life but then boom, all of a sudden leukemia,” she said.
Ward was one of many who attended Wednesday’s public meeting at St. James United Methodist Church held by the federal agency, known as ATSDR, to explain the results of the study and answer questions.
Radioactive waste from the Manhattan Project was stored north of Lambert-St. Louis International Airport starting in 1946. Some of it was in piles that were uncovered. It’s widely believed that wind and rain carried some of the radioactive waste into nearby Coldwater Creek. Some of that waste was later moved to another location near the creek on Latty Avenue.
Those contaminated sites have been cleaned up and currently, the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers is testing for contamination along the creek and removing soil with elevated levels of radioactivity. The contamination removed during the current efforts has been below the surface and not posing a risk to the public.
“I lost my son, he was born with a brain tumor. It’s a brain tumor that occurs in 60-year-old men,” said Kim Visintine.
Visintine was one of the original members of a group of former north St. Louis County residents concerned about the frequency and types of cancers diagnosed in loved ones and former classmates they grew up with. They worried cancer could have a connection to contamination in the creek.
“So what this health assessment is for us is a validation of everything we’ve been working for since 2011,” said Visintine.
The ATSDR health assessment recommended further testing for dangerous levels of radioactive contamination in homes that flooded, along tributaries of Coldwater Creek and areas where likely contaminated soil was taken from near the creek was used at construction sites.
The agency is also recommending those who lived or played near the creek to talk to their doctor about their potential exposure.
Another public meeting will be held Thursday from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. at St. James United Methodist Church at 315 Graham Road in Florissant.
France’s EDF, GE to co-build reactors for huge Indian nuclear plant, Reuters Staff, NEW DELHI (Reuters) 28 June 18- GE and French utility EDF have agreed to team to build six reactors for a nuclear power project in western India, which is due to be the world’s biggest when finished……… The six European Pressurised Water reactors will be for a 9,900 mw nuclear power project at Jaitapur, south of Mumbai in the state of Maharashtra, GE and EDF said in a joint statement released on Tuesday…….
EDF will be responsible for engineering integration of the entire project, while GE Power will design the critical part of the plant and supply its main components, the companies said.
GE will also provide operational support services and a training programme to meet the needs of the state-run Nuclear Power Corp. of India Ltd, the plant’s owner and operator.
Electric rates may be cut after failed nuclear plants, TD, By JEFFREY COLLINS Associated Press, 28 June 18
COLUMBIA — Customers of South Carolina Electric & Gas could see their rates temporarily cut by nearly 15 percent, under a compromise plan passed Wednesday by lawmakers after the company spent billions on two failed nuclear plants that never produced power.
The bill passed with enough margin to overcome a promised veto from Gov. Henry McMaster. It could end up doing a lot more than lowering rates for the average South Carolina Electric & Gas customer by about $22 a month for several months.
Speaking ahead of the week-long World Gas Conference, Perry cited his experience with natural gas, saying he had “sung its praises for a long time,” the Washington Examiner reported.
According to a draft memo from the Department of Energy (DOE) that surfaced at the start of June, the Trump administration plans to direct the federal government to purchase electricity or generation capacity from coal and nuclear plants for two years. The DOE’s bailout package for at-risk generators remains unclear.
Dive Insight:
“We are looking at all the contingencies and different impacts,” Perry told reporters on Monday.
Perry’s comments echoed previous statements to the press made by Energy Undersecretary Mark Menezes earlier this month at an Energy Information Administration conference. Menezes said the DOE draft memo was being considered as one of several options.
Perry highlighted the importance of a bailout plan to keep coal and nuclear power plants open in competitive power markets. The DOE draft memo proposed using Perry’s executive authority under the Federal Power Act’s and the Defense Production Act’s emergency provisions to subsidize select plants.
Responding to criticisms that federal intervention would disrupt the electricity market and raise prices, Perry said, “The economics is secondary from my perspective. There is the potential to see some really chaotic attacks in this country. That is DOE’s responsibility to make sure that does not happen.”
Natural gas companies have opposed any market interference for coal and nuclear, joining renewable energy companies. Perry said those concerns won’t stop him from acting, to ensure people have access to electricity.
Regarding natural gas, the Trump administration has said pipeline infrastructure is vulnerable to physical and cyberattacks, thus increasing the need to ensure baseload generation options.
https://apnews.com/dc5e3c60042741c696dd062462a03cca– 28 June 18, ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — Advocates for New Mexicans who many believe were sickened by U.S. uranium mining and nuclear weapons testing have urged Congress to acknowledge their sacrifice and authorize compensation for them.
Navajo Nation Vice President Jonathan Nez and the co-founder of the Tularosa Basin Downwinders Consortium testified during a hearing Wednesday in Washington on a compensation measure.
Sponsored by U.S. Sen. Tom Udall, it proposes expanding eligibility for payouts under the Radiation Exposure and Compensation Act of 1990, which currently covers claims from areas in Nevada, Arizona and Utah that are downwind from a different test site.
Tina Cordova, co-founder of the Tularosa consortium, said many who lived in the area weren’t told about the dangers of the Trinity Test on generations of residents.
They could benefit from the proposal, along with post-1971 uranium mine workers in Northwestern New Mexico.
nuclear-news 