USA « nuclear-news

Radioactive tritium escaping from Pilgrim nuclear power plant

there are not enough monitoring wells, and that the EPA standards for allowable tritium are outdated.

Elevated levels of radioactive isotope at Pilgrim nuclear power plant – Boston Globe, By Carolyn Y. Johnson, 14 July 2010, Continue reading →

July 14, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | safety, USA | antinuclear, nuclear, radiation, radioactive | Leave a comment

USA’s ‘Blue Ribbon’ Nuclear Waste Commission at Hanford

Even if Yucca had opened as planned 10 years ago, it would not have enough space for all of Hanford’s wastes,……there is no final resting place for these “vitrified” wastes……..

A Watchdog’s Warning on Nuclear Waste, NYTimes.com, By MATTHEW L. WALD, July 12, 2010, “…. a new report suggests that Hanford has a lot more plutonium waste that the Energy Department had acknowledged.This week, a blue-ribbon commission on nuclear waste established to seek alternatives to Yucca will hold two days of hearings near Hanford. Continue reading →

July 13, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, wastes | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear wastes, nuclear weapons, plutonium, radiation, radioactive, uranium, water | Leave a comment

USA Nuclear Weapons Modernization to Cost $275 Billion

the NNSA intends to spend more than $175 billion (in then-year dollars) over the next two decades on building new nuclear weapons factories, testing and simulation facilities, and modernizing and extending the life of the nuclear weapons in the stockpile…..The plan does not include the more than $100 billion the Department of Defense is expected to spend in 2010-2030 on the platforms needed to deliver the warheads.

Nuclear Plan Shows Cuts and Massive Investments » FAS Strategic Security Blog, By Hans M. Kristensen, 12 July 2010, The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) has sent Congress the FY 2011 Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan (SSMP) with new information about what the administration plans to spend on maintaining and modernizing nuclear weapons and facilities over the next 15-20 years…. Continue reading →

July 13, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, weapons and war | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear secrecy, nuclear spin, nuclear weapons, uranium | Leave a comment

Three times more plutonium waste than they thought, at Hanford!

.“What is reasonably foreseeable is that there are people who will be drinking the water in the ground at Hanford at some point in the next few hundred years,” Mr. Pollet said. “We’re going to be killing people, pure and simple.”

Analysis Triples U.S. Plutonium Waste Figures, NYTimes.com, by Matthew Wald, 12 July 2010, The amount of plutonium buried at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington State is nearly three times what the federal government previously reported, a new analysis indicates, suggesting that a cleanup to protect future generations will be far more challenging than planners had assumed. Continue reading →

July 13, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, wastes | antinuclear, cancer, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear secrecy, nuclear spin, nuclear weapons, plutonium, radiation, radioactive, reprocessing, uranium | Leave a comment

Continued battle to save Colorado Valley from uranium mining

Geologists have warned that mining could deplete and contaminate aquifers that discharge into Grand Canyon and that cleaning them up would be next to impossible.

Appeal Filed in Lawsuit to Protect Grand Canyon From Uranium Mining, Center For Biological Diversity, July 12, 2010, GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz.— Conservation groups and Native American tribes today appealed a federal court decision that denied a request to halt uranium mining just six miles north of Grand Canyon National Park. Continue reading →

July 13, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Legal, USA | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear technology, nuclear wastes, radiation, radioactive, uranium | Leave a comment

USA taxpayer liable for costs of French owned new reactor

Paris-based Areva would provide the reactor technology. Electricite de France and Areva are 85 percent owned by the French government…..“To build the plant with the loan guarantee in today’s power market would be an assurance the taxpayers would get stuck with part of the loan obligation,”

(USA) Maryland nuclear reactor raises foreign ownership concerns, Washington Examiner, By: Hayley PetersonExaminer StaffJuly 12, 2010 “……….. the project at Calvert Cliffs faces many hurdles.

Nuclear energy opponents are challenging the reactor’s licensing qualifications with charges that the amount of foreign ownership violates the Atomic Energy Act — which bars nuclear projects with “foreign ownership, control or domination.” Continue reading →

July 13, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | business and costs, USA | antinuclear, AREVA, EDF, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear spin, nuclear technology, reactors, uranium | Leave a comment

Nuclear power getting more costly than solar

proposed new nuclear plants would generate power at a cost of 14 to 18 cents per kilowatt-hour. But commercial-scale solar developers are already offering utilities electricity at 14 cents or less per kWh.

(USA) Solar power now cheaper than nuclear in North Carolina FACING SOUTH 12 July 2010, While the price of solar photovoltaic systems has been falling for decades, the cost of new nuclear plants has been climbing — and a historic crossover point has been reached in North Carolina, where solar power is now cheaper than nuclear. Continue reading →

July 12, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | renewable, USA | antinuclear, climate change, energy efficiency, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear spin, renewable energy, renewables, solar | 1 Comment

Nevada to export solar energy, not import nuclear wastes

“Nevadans are well positioned to use their world-class natural resources and talented workforce to be an exporter of clean solar energy rather than an importer of hazardous nuclear waste and polluting fossil fuels,”

Nevada Nuclear Test Site to Host Solar Demonstration Zone, Environment News Service, LAS VEGAS, Nevada, July 9, 2010 (ENS) – Advanced utility-scale solar energy technologies soon will be tested at a sprawling federal site in the Nevada desert where nuclear weapons were tested 60 years ago. Continue reading →

July 10, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | renewable, USA | antinuclear, climate change, energy efficiency, global warming, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear weapons, renewable energy, renewables, solar | Leave a comment

New Colorado clean-up law could put the brakes on uranium industry

The new Colorado law requires Cotter to restore polluted groundwater to safe levels before restarting operations. ….Ripple effects of the Colorado law could reach beyond state lines.

Mopping up uranium’s mess, High Country News, States push to clean up mine and mill sites, July 09, 2010 by Nathan Rice When Sharyn Cunningham moved to Cañon City, Colorado in 1994, no one told her the groundwater was contaminated – not her real estate agent, not the county health department, not state regulators. Continue reading →

July 10, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, water | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear technology, radiation, radioactive, uranium, water | Leave a comment

Ever more radioactive – they don’t know what to do with Depleted Uranium

Depleted uranium, unlike other forms of nuclear waste, grows more dangerous as it ages, making storage difficult.

DOE seeks home for depleted uranium, SALT LAKE CITY, July 9 (UPI) — The U.S. government is looking for even a temporary storage site for 10,000 drums of depleted uranium from a South Carolina nuclear plant, Utah officials said.The waste was supposed to have been stored permanently in Utah by EnergySolutions Inc. But the state intervened as the first shipment arrived, seeking more information from the Salt Lake City company and a review of the site………

Depleted uranium, unlike other forms of nuclear waste, grows more dangerous as it ages, making storage difficult.

The first shipment from the Savannah River site, 5,400 barrels, is now in an EnergySolutions storage cell in Utah. The rest is still in South Carolina.….DOE seeks home for depleted uranium – UPI.com

July 10, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | USA, wastes | antinuclear, depleted, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear secrecy, nuclear spin, nuclear weapons, radiation, radioactive, uranium | Leave a comment

Christians against nuclear weapons

most voiced disappointment that his [Obama’s] administration’s fiscal year 2011 defense budget–even when adjusted for inflation–surpasses any Pentagon budget since World War II………

Nuclear swords to God’s plowshares – On Faith at washingtonpost.com, 9 July 2010, “………radical Christian pacifists want to dismantle bombs, not detonate them. More than 180 peace activists convened last weekend to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the Plowshares movement, an anti-nuclear weapons movement spearheaded by religious pacifists. Continue reading →

July 10, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | Religion and ethics, USA | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear weapons | Leave a comment

Hanford radioactive waste needs more, not less, safety regulation

A nuclear disaster at a cleanup site like Hanford is to be avoided at all costs. The persistence of radioactivity in the environment for thousands of years makes large areas of land uninhabitable, and wreaks an ongoing and incalculable human health toll. Prevention, rather than reaction, to such tragedies should be driving law and policy.

(USA) Nuclear cleanup regulation could put public at risk, Seattle Times, July 9, 2010, The weaknesses of federal regulatory agencies have been exposed by recent high-profile accidents. Tom Carpenter fears the Department of Energy will reduce its oversight of cleanup at the nation’s nuclear waste sites.
Millions of gallons of oil gush continue to rush unabated from BP’s mile-deep well in the Gulf of Mexico, and 11 workers are dead from the massive explosion that caused the biggest oil spill in decades. Weeks before this event, the news was dominated by the preventable explosion that killed 29 West Virginia coal miners……………. Is nuclear next? Continue reading →

July 10, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | safety, USA | antinuclear, nuclear, nuclear costs, nuclear weapons, radioactive | Leave a comment

USA govt $2 billion funding to France’s nuclear company AREVA

Areva accepts $2 bil US loan guarantee for uranium enrichment plant, Washington (Platts)–8Jul2010/ Areva Wednesday said it accepted the US Department of Energy’s offer of a $2 billion loan guarantee to help finance construction of the Eagle Rock uranium enrichment plant in Bonneville County, Idaho, which Areva estimates will cost $3 billion to build. The DOE offer to Areva is the first of two loan guarantees DOE is expected to extend to front-end nuclear facilities, with USEC the expected recipient of the second. Platts: RSS Feed Detailed News

July 9, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | politics, USA | antinuclear, AREVA, France, nuclear costs, nuclear spin, reactors, uranium | Leave a comment

AREVA’s “renewable energy” a front for nuclear reactor sales

renewable generation..…….“window dressing” to the nuclear reactor.”Their (Areva’s) core business is nuclear and it is going to remain nuclear going forward,”

Areva has big plans in U.S. New Brunswick Business Journal, Christine Dobby 8 July 2010, Last June, French nuclear company Areva announced plans to take part in an alliance to pursue the development of America’s first clean energy park – including a nuclear reactor – in Piketon, Ohio. Continue reading →

July 9, 2010 Posted by Christina Macpherson | spinbuster, USA | antinuclear, AREVA, climate change, energy efficiency, France, global warming, nuclear secrecy, nuclear spin, nuclear technology, reactors, renewable energy, renewables, solar, wind | Leave a comment

USA federal govt threatening financial renewable eneergy initiatives

The PACE program provides a great incentive for homeowners to switch to renewable energy or reduce their energy consumption….If PACE is to be saved, the Obama Administration needs to send a clear message to all federal agencies, including those bailed-out, quasi-private bodies like Fannie and Freddie, to get on the green energy train. Today.