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Congress Must Investigate Corruption in Nuclear Energy Industry

Real Clear Energy, By Craig Shirley, April 10, 2024


In their zeal to achieve a carbon-free environment, Democrats have done a big turnaround to promote nuclear energy as a safe, clean energy source.  Some states are moving as fast they can to reactivate idle reactors.  In 2022, Congress passed the Inflation Relief Act (IRA) to grant $30 billion for nuclear subsidies.

Scandals involving bribery over nuclear energy have toppled high-level state officials and corporate executives in Ohio, Illinois and other places.

In 2020, federal prosecutors brought charges against officials on Commonwealth Edison (ComEd), an Illinois company, for offering jobs and favors to friends of the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives in exchange for a  bill to bailout the company’s nuclear division.

At nearly the same time, Ohio-based FirstEnergy executives were charged with paying $60 million in bribes to state legislators.  Former Ohio Speaker of the House Larry Householder is currently serving a 47 year prison sentence. 

Floodlight, a non-profit environmental news service, wrote a piece that appeared in the liberal magazine Mother Jones that perfectly encapsulates the corruption in the nuclear industry:

“Utility fraud and corruption—in Florida, Illinois, Mississippi, Ohio, and South Carolina—have cost electricity customers at least $6.6 billion, according to Floodlight’s analysis. Ratepayers have bankrolled nuclear plants that never got built, transmission systems that were over-engineered to beef up profits, and aging coal facilities that couldn’t compete with cheaper plants powered by methane, which the industry calls natural gas.”

Before these scandals erupted, and before Congress passed the Inflation Recovery Act, the nuclear industry had become so unpopular, it was a tempting target for political corruption.

According to the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists:

“Changes in the economics of electricity markets are threatening the profitability of nuclear power plants, a shifting reality driving a demand for these financial bailouts. As the New Jersey-based energy company Public Service Enterprise Group (PSEG) explained in October 2020, across the nation “nuclear plants continue to struggle economically to survive. Since 2018, three nuclear plants have closed in the eastern US, all for economic reasons, and the impact has had a ripple effect.”

Over the past several years, the Justice Department and the courts have done their jobs in prosecuting and sentencing bad actors in the nuclear industry.  It is time for Congress to investigate the root causes of the corruption.  Executives and experts alike must be brought before congressional committees to explain why the nuclear industry has been allowed to fall into corruption at the expense of the taxpayer and the consumer……………………………………….
https://www.realclearenergy.org/articles/2024/04/10/congress_must_investigate_corruption_in_nuclear_energy_industry_1024272.html

November 3, 2024 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA | Leave a comment

Lest we forget – Nuclear Power Runs on Dirty Money: The Corporate Scandal of the Proposed National Nuclear Subsidy

August 5, 2021

A few days ago, we published a piece showing the cost of federal nuclear bailout proposals. It’s a big, big number — $50 billion. But all of that money would not create a single new job, nor reduce greenhouse gas emissions by a single pound. In fact, as a new report released last month found, investing that $50 billion in wind, solar, and efficiency instead would accelerate our transition to a zero-emissions electricity system. And, as we showed last week, a national nuclear bailout would prevent the creation of 60,000 new jobs in renewable energy, efficiency, and other clean energy infrastructure.

So with all of these strikes against it, why are members of Congress pushing so hard to give a slate of old, uneconomical nuclear power plants so much money out of a large, but still limited, budget for energy investments needed for a just transition to a carbon-free future? 

There’s one tried-and-true way to answer that question: follow the money. We wondered: who would actually receive the money proposed to bail out nuclear reactors? The answer is revealing.

From our analysis, we found that there are 33 reactors at 19 nuclear power plants, located in eight states, which would qualify for the proposed bailouts. Those power plants are owned and operated by only eight large power companies (along with four smaller companies that are minority co-owners of three of the plants). Note: because both proposed bailouts would subsidize the same group of reactors, we combined the amounts for our calculations. As a result, nearly the entire $50 billion–94% of the total–would go to these eight corporations. 

However, because ownership of nuclear reactors is highly concentrated, over $35 billion of the bailout (70%) would go to just three of those corporations:

  • Exelon $24.5 billion (49%)
  • Energy Harbor $5.5 billion (11%)
  • PSEG $5.1 billion (10%)

All three of these companies have been lobbying for subsidies for their nuclear reactors for years. As we speak, Exelon is pushing for a nuclear subsidy in Illinois and threatening to close four reactors within the next few months if the state legislature does not convene a special session and enact a new law with at least $700 million in nuclear subsidies within weeks.

In fact, both Exelon and Energy Harbor (a spinoff of FirstEnergy), are the subjects of federal corruption cases over billion-dollar nuclear bailouts for which they lobbied in Illinois and Ohio, respectively. In both cases, prosecutors have indicted former company lobbyists and staff to the Speakers of the House of Representatives in each state. Also in both cases, Exelon and FirstEnergy have signed deferred prosecution agreements with federal prosecutors to pay fines and restitution and to cooperate with the prosecutions. As the investigations proceed, more corporate executives, legislators, and lobbyists could be indicted. 

In the case of FirstEnergy and Energy Harbor, there are also multiple state-level investigations of these nuclear bailout scandals. At the heart of that case, FirstEnergy made $61 million in bribes and payments to former House Speaker Larry Householder’s political action committee. Through the scheme, FirstEnergy helped win Householder the speakership after the 2018 election, by also buying the support of Republican legislators and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine. As a result, FirstEnergy was able to get Ohio to enact a $1 billion nuclear bailout, which was key in winning the support of the corporation’s creditors in a major bankruptcy proceeding. The bankruptcy settlement resulted in FirstEnergy spinning off its power plants into Energy Harbor, a new, unaffiliated corporation that only owns the unprofitable nuclear and coal power plants. As a result of the federal corruption case, Ohio legislators repealed the nuclear bailout earlier this year, leaving Energy Harbor without the subsidies its creditors were assured it would have when they agreed to the bankruptcy settlement.

In addition to the federal corruption case, states where FirstEnergy operates want to know where the $61 million in bribes came from. In April, under pressure in the federal case, FirstEnergy filed a report with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission indicating that “all 14 of its power-providing companies” in five states misappropriated ratepayer monies for a decade. State utility commissions in three of those states–Maryland, New Jersey, and Ohio–are investigating how much money the corporation misappropriated from state residents’ power bills to fund the nuclear bailout corruption scheme. 

Back to Exelon

The corruption investigation in Illinois stems from two bills that have cost electricity consumers billions of dollars: a 2011 “smart grid” law, and a 2016 energy law. The latter awarded Exelon a 10-year, $2.35 billion subsidy for three uneconomical reactors that Exelon threatened to close without the bailout. Consumers have already paid out $1 billion over the last four years. Exelon awarded jobs to associates and relatives of former House Speaker Michael Madigan and other legislators, in exchange for lucrative legislative outcomes. Despite the ongoing investigation, Exelon is now pursuing subsidies in Illinois for its other eight reactors in Illinois, which it claims are also under economic pressure. 

In the same year as the Illinois bailout, Exelon won a massive 12-year, $7.6 billion subsidy for four reactors in New York, and won final approval of a deal that has made it the largest utility company in the country. In those cases, there were eyebrow-raising reports of backroom lobbying, employment favors, and political contributions. And in 2018, Exelon and PSEG (the other big winner from a federal bailout) got New Jersey to enact a $300 million/year subsidy for three reactors in that state. Exelon pulls in about $85 million/year through its ownership stake in two of the New Jersey reactors. 

In total, Exelon is receiving nearly $11 billion in nuclear subsidies at the state level. $24.5 billion in federal subsidies may assist Exelon in winning investors’ support for its plan to spin off its nuclear business, as FirstEnergy did. But how is any of this going to help the country solve the climate crisis?

With $30 billion of a federal nuclear subsidy accruing to two companies that are the subject of federal corruption cases over state-level nuclear subsidy laws, this could become an even larger scandal. President Biden and Congressional leaders should not risk the American Jobs and Families Plan being derailed over corporate corruption cases. And as we’ve shown, the infrastructure bills will do more for climate, jobs, and justice without a nuclear bailout, and by simply investing in the transition to 100% renewable energy. 

There are many reasons why we cannot afford to sacrifice the climate to a nuclear bailout. Our economic future, justice for all communities impacted by climate chaos and the nuclear fuel chain, and our environment all depend on real action and true investment in clean energy, good jobs, and a just transition. Short-sighted corporate interests–once again–block the path towards the liveable, just, and equitable future. We cannot allow the pockets of nuclear corporations and their shareholders to grow as our window for climate action shrinks. 

[Tables of subsidies etc included here on original]

Take Action! 

We can’t let our leaders sacrifice the economy and environment to a corporate nuclear bailout scandal! Tell President Biden, Vice-President Harris, and your representatives in Congress: “No Corrupt Nuclear Bailouts in the American Jobs and Families Plan – Invest in American Jobs and a Just Transition to 100% Renewable Energy by 2035”

November 3, 2024 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA | Leave a comment

Despite History of Fabrication, Press Uncritically Covers IDF-Provided Documents on Hamas

a pattern of Israel engineering misleading narratives to shape public opinion, and fabricating the evidence needed to do so.

Bryce Greene, FAIR, 1 Nov 24

Earlier this month, the New York Times (10/12/24), Washington Post (10/12/24) and Wall Street Journal (10/12/24) each published front-page articles based on different sets of documents handed to them by the Israeli military.


Israel claims it seized all the documents—in the form of meeting minutes, letters and planning documents—in its ground invasion of Gaza, and that they reveal insights into Hamas’s operations prior to the October 7 attacks. The documents include alleged evidence of Hamas’s pre-10/7 coordination with Iran, plans to blow up Israeli skyscrapers, and even a scheme to use horse-drawn chariots in an attack from Gaza.

Documents received directly from intelligence agencies should always be treated with skepticism, and that’s especially true when their government has a well-documented history of blatant lying. Yet leading newspapers took these Israeli document dumps largely at face value, advancing the agenda of a genocidal rogue state.

A history of lying

Israel’s use of fabrications to shape public perception is well known, and was put on display early in the assault on Gaza that began last October. After an explosion at Al Ahli hospital killed and injured hundreds (misreporting of which caused a great deal of confusion), the media naturally pointed the finger at Israel. The Israeli government, concerned about the public backlash, denied responsibility, claiming that the explosion was caused by a misfired rocket from Palestinian Islamic Jihad. (See FAIR.org, 11/3/23.)

To back up their claims, Israel released a recording allegedly capturing two Palestinian militants discussing Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s responsibility for the strike. However, an analysis by the firm Earshot found that the audio was the result of two separate channels being edited together (Channel 4, 10/19/23). In other words, Israel engineered a phony audio clip in an attempt to clear itself of war crimes  in the public mind.

Investigations based on open sources have since come to various conclusions about the attack (Guardian, 10/18/23; Bellingcat, 10/18/23; Human Rights Watch, 11/26/23; AP, 11/22/23; Michael Kobs, 2023; New Arab, 2/19/24), but Israel’s fraudulent attempt to manipulate evidence certainly suggests that they had something to hide, and demonstrates their lack of reliability as a media source. Recently, the UN released a report accusing Israel of systematically targeting healthcare infrastructure in Gaza, making their denials of this earlier attack far less credible.

In another instance, Israel presented 3D renderings of a supposed Hamas “command center” beneath Al Shifa hospital, claiming it was based on intelligence. However, no such command center was ever found (FAIR.org, 12/1/23). Upon storming the hospital, Israel staged scenes in order to bolster claims that the facility was used by militant groups. The deception was so blatant that mainstream outlets were openly calling it out.

Recently Israel was caught actually providing fabricated documents to the press with the aim of manipulating public opinion. Earlier this year, the Israeli government provided documents to both the Jewish Chronicle (9/5/24) and the German paper Bild (9/6/24) that purportedly showed that Hamas had no interest in a ceasefire, and had a plan to sneak the late Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar out of Gaza to Iran, along with some of the remaining hostages. The reports were then uncritically repeated in outlets like the Times of Israel (9/6/24).

Shortly after these documents were published, the Israeli paper Yedioth Ahronoth (9/8/24) reported on an internal IDF investigation that found that they had been leaked to foreign media as part of a campaign to “shape public opinion on Israel.” The documents were determined to be forgeries, after a comprehensive search of all databases containing documents found in the wake of Israel’s operations. The IDF told the paper that an investigation was underway to determine the origin of the leak.

This non-exhaustive list of examples demonstrates a pattern of Israel engineering misleading narratives to shape public opinion, and fabricating the evidence needed to do so.

Questionable authenticity

Whether they are authentic or not, it is clear that the documents leaked to the Wall Street Journal, New York Times and Washington Post serve the same purpose of propagandizing on behalf of Israel. In an attempt to preserve some journalistic integrity, the Post and Times both gave separate justifications for why they believed the respective documents leaked to them were authentic.

The Post was quick to note that “the documents’ authenticity could not be definitively established,” but gave readers the impression there was reason to believe they were real. First, it claimed that the contents of the documents it received were

“broadly consistent” with US and allies’ post–October 7 intelligence assessments about Hamas’s long-range planning and complex relationship with Iran.

…………………………………………..While Haaretz made no note of the leaked documents provided to the Wall Street Journal, the article ironically acknowledged that

having them published by Fox News or even the Wall Street Journal would have looked like an Israeli public diplomacy operation rather than a legitimate journalistic investigative report.

Haaretz noted that the documents promote narratives that “Israel would be happy to burn into the world’s consciousness,” namely the well-known propaganda effort to equate Hamas with organizations that are universally reviled by Americans. The Post documents purportedly outlined a Hamas plan to blow up a skyscraper in Tel Aviv, evoking the September 11 attacks against the World Trade Center:

The Hamas documents are supposed to bolster Netanyahu’s claim that Israel isn’t fighting against a liberation movement seeking to free the occupied Palestinian people, or even against a paramilitary organization that is poorly funded and trained and lacks planes, the Iron Dome anti-missile system, tanks and artillery….

Rather, it is fighting a terrifying “axis of evil” led by Iran that threatens to destroy Western culture as a whole.

Haaretz also argued that this kind of propaganda campaign was designed to ensure that the violence continues to escalate:………………………………………………………….

………………….Israel’s campaign of genocide in Gaza and greater war in the Middle East has been successful in part because the Israeli government can count on Western press to present and contextualize facts in a way that advances their narrative. Despite Israel’s long history of fabrications, the corporate media will dutifully republish documents, statements and explanations with complete credulity. https://fair.org/home/despite-history-of-fabrication-press-uncritically-covers-idf-provided-documents-on-hamas/

November 2, 2024 Posted by | Israel, media, USA | Leave a comment

Report: US Sitting on Nearly 500 Reports of US Weapons Killing Civilians in Gaza

Officials are reportedly ignoring the Biden administration’s own weapons guidance to continue fueling Israel’s genocide.

By Sharon Zhang , Truthout, October 30, 2024,  https://truthout.org/articles/report-us-sitting-on-nearly-500-reports-of-us-weapons-killing-civilians-in-gaza/

iden administration officials are sweeping aside hundreds of reports of Israeli forces using U.S.-provided weapons to slaughter civilians in Gaza, new reporting finds, flouting the administration’s own policies regarding weapons to give Israel a pass.

According to a new report by The Washington Post published Wednesday, the State Department has received nearly 500 reports of U.S. weapons being used in attacks that caused “unnecessary harm” to civilians amid Israel’s genocide. But, despite policies requiring these reports to be urgently investigated, hundreds of the cases are still unresolved, former and current officials cited by the Post said.

In August of last year, the Biden administration established a process for responding to incidents of U.S.-made weapons killing civilians. Under the system, known as the Civilian Harm Incident Response Guidance, officials must recommend actions like a suspension of arms transfers if U.S. weapons are found to have been used to kill civilians by U.S. allies. At the time, the initiative was lauded as a step toward reducing civilian harm and boosting the U.S. commitment to human rights.

The State Department receives the reports from within the government, as well as humanitarian aid groups, media reports and eyewitness accounts. As media reports have demonstrated numerous times over the past year of the genocide, many reports are accompanied by photographic evidence of fragments of U.S. weapons at sites of attacks.

However, as the U.S. has done countless times over the last year of the genocide (and in the decades of Israeli apartheid preceding it), officials are ignoring their own regulations in order to continue fueling Israel’s atrocities in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, Lebanon, and beyond.

Even though the guidance requires investigations to be done within two months, over two-thirds of the cases are unresolved, “with many pending response from the Israeli government, which the State Department consults to verify each case’s circumstances,” the Post writes.

Officials have not taken a single case to the final stage, where action is recommended, officials said, despite the deadlines.

One of the cases reportedly concerns the Israeli military’s killing of 6-year-old Hind Rajab and the paramedics who came to save her — despite U.S officials’ public insistence that they are relying only on Israel’s own investigation into the killing. Another regards a horrific Israeli strike in July on the Gaza “humanitarian safe zone” in al-Mawasi, in which Israeli forces dropped eight 2,000-pound bombs on civilian areas and killed at least 90 Palestinians.

Humanitarian groups, Gaza officials and weapons experts — including ones within the State Department — have repeatedly said that Israel is making extensive use of U.S. weapons to commit war crimes against Palestinians in Gaza. In fact, experts have said that it would be impossible for Israel to carry out the level of destruction it has in Gaza without U.S. help.

The Washington Post report is the latest evidence that the Biden administration is purposefully sidestepping domestic law in its support of Israel.

In a bombshell finding last month, ProPublica found that, this spring, two U.S. agencies had recommended a suspension of weapons transfers to Israel, citing Israel’s humanitarian aid blockade and attacks on aid efforts.

But Secretary of State Antony Blinken lied to Congress about the findings, saying that the government did not assess that Israel has been blocking humanitarian aid just as Israel embarked on its Rafah invasion that would mark the beginning of an even harsher Israeli aid blockade. Now, months later, aid entry into Gaza has hit record lows, as disease and famine plague the population.

November 2, 2024 Posted by | Gaza, Israel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Department of Defense Releases Fiscal Year 2024 Military Intelligence Program Budget – just the bare $29.8 billion

https://www.defense.gov/News/Releases/Release/Article/3952746/department-of-defense-releases-fiscal-year-2024-military-intelligence-program-b/

Today, the Department of Defense released the Military Intelligence Program (MIP) appropriated top line budget for FY2024. The total was $29.8 billion and is aligned to support the National Defense Strategy.

The Department determined that releasing this top line figure does not jeopardize any classified activities within the MIP.  No other MIP budget figures or program details will be released, as they remain classified for national security reasons.

November 2, 2024 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Nuclear Energy “Renaissance”: Should You Buy NuScale Power Stock?

The Motley Fool, By Brett Schafer – Oct 27, 2024

Key Points

The stock is incredibly risky at the moment.

NuScale Power stock is up close to 500% this year.

The company wants to disrupt the energy market with small modular reactors.

Companies are betting big on nuclear energy to power AI…………..

Tens of billions are going to be spent on nuclear power in the next few decades, but there are few publicly traded nuclear energy stocks one can buy. One, NuScale Power Corp (SMR -0.68%), plans to disrupt the market with its new small modular reactors (SMRs). Its shares are up close to 500% this year as investors pile into the nuclear energy trade. Should you follow them and buy some shares yourself?

………………………NuScale won’t generate meaningful revenue for years

The problem is, NuScale Power is far from this reality. The company has never sold an SMR and has virtually zero revenue today. Many companies in multiple countries have proposed deals with NuScale, but none are operational and, if they ever get built, they won’t be ready until 2030 or later. That is over five years until NuScale Power is generating any form of revenue, let alone profits.

Given all the upfront costs in research and development, Nuscale is currently burning a lot of cash. Over the last 12 months, its free cash flow was negative $170 million. That is more than the cash it holds on the balance sheet ($130 million). What this means is NuScale is set to run out of money within a year but needs over five years of runway — if not more — before getting its SMRs commercialized. Management is going to need to raise money in the form of stock offerings or debt to bridge the gap between this cash burn and the time when its SMRs finally get sold.

The stock is shaky, at best

Investors in NuScale Power are thinking all about the upside of SMR technology right now. That is why the stock is up close to 500% in less than 12 months. However, there is a lot of potential downside that they may be forgetting right now, and that is how investors can get in trouble.

For one, it trades at a market cap of $1.7 billion and has zero revenue. Shareholders are likely going to be weighed down by stock offerings or debt, which will need to happen within the next 12 months. This will present a headwind to long-term shareholder returns.

Two, we don’t even know if the SMR technology will work. It isn’t proven, and it is unclear whether utilities want these solutions or the older large nuclear reactors. The idea of SMRs makes sense, but it is only an idea. And ideas don’t generate positive cash flow.

NuScale Power is a pre-revenue business burning a ton of cash that will likely stay pre-revenue through 2030. Even though the stock is soaring, smart investors will stay far away from this risky stock. There are better places to store your money right now.  https://www.fool.com/investing/2024/10/27/nuclear-energy-renaissance-should-you-buy-nuscale/?fbclid=IwY2xjawGQ6g9leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHTdbZQF5x3-PErplyYXEJmIRC-1UX_k9hjjgDgdnSdU8KfJLMojZSpSrlQ_aem_felvtV_-cil14iXalVC_yg

November 2, 2024 Posted by | business and costs, USA | Leave a comment

Technical troubles delay new tests at huge Eastern WA radioactive waste melter

BY ANNETTE CARY, Tri City Herald, June 21, 2024 

The Department of Energy is unlikely to meet a deadline set by a federal court for the next step to prepare the Hanford site’s vitrification plant to treat radioactive waste for disposal. On Thursday DOE notified the Washington state Department of Ecology that it was at risk of not meeting the Aug. 1 deadline to start cold commissioning of the plant, a test of vitrification using nonradioactive chemicals to simulate waste before radioactive waste is introduced into the plant.

DOE is asking the Department of Ecology to agree to a four-month extension to Nov. 29 of this year. “The process for commissioning this first-in-kind facility is comprehensive and dynamic,” said DOE Hanford Manager Brian Vance in a message to Hanford employees Thursday…………………..

DOE remains committed to starting treating radioactive waste by the federal court consent decree deadline of August 2025, Vance said, despite the shortened time proposed between the start of cold commissioning and introducing radioactive waste into the plant for hot commissioning. DOE broke ground 22 years ago on the vitrification plant at the Hanford nuclear reservation to turn much of the 56 million gallons of radioactive and hazardous chemical waste stored in underground tanks into a stable glass form for disposal.

The waste is left from chemically processing uranium fuel irradiated at the Hanford site adjacent to Richland in Eastern Washington to produce nearly two-thirds of the plutonium for the nation’s nuclear weapons program from World War II through the Cold War.

The current plan is to begin treating some of the least radioactive tank waste next year as DOE continues to work toward meeting a consent decree deadline to also start treating high level radioactive waste in the tanks by 2033.

The 2010 consent decree resulted from a Department of Ecology lawsuit over legal deadlines that DOE had missed or was near certain to miss. The consent decree deadlines originally called for cold commissioning to treat both low activity radioactive waste and high level radioactive waste to begin in 2018. Consent decree deadlines have been extended several times over the last 14 years, including to allow DOE more time due to work delays caused by the COVID pandemic. The Department of Ecology said Thursday morning that it was reviewing the notification from DOE, which also was sent to Oregon.

If the Department of Ecology agrees to the extension, the federal court must then sign off on the change. TECHNICAL ISSUE AT HANFORD PLANT DOE told the Department of Ecology in its notification Thursday that it has had technical issues with the glass former system at the vitrification plant’s Low Activity Waste Facility.

Glass forming materials are planned to be mixed with waste and then heated to fill canisters with a molten glass mixture. After cooling, the radioactive waste will be immobilized and ready for disposal.

The glass forming material is trucked to 12 vertical tanks outdoors at the vitrification plant in central Hanford. From there horizontal pipes with a screw conveyor are used to move the solid glass forming material into vessels inside the plant before the glass forming material and waste or waste simulant are added to melters.

There have been problems with clogging as the system has been used so far to move 40,000 pounds of glass forming material into the plant. The issue with the glass forming system is the main reason DOE has asked for a deadline extension, but it also has some other issues it is addressing at the vitrification plant that might interfere with the Aug. 1 deadline to start cold commissioning. Other issues are with the thermal catalytic oxidizer, the steam plant Morrison tubes and the overall reliability of the mechanical handling system, DOE told the Department of Ecology.

The delay comes as DOE and its vitrification plant contractor Bechtel National have been making progress on preparing to treat waste at the vitrification plant……….

The first shipment of 10,000 gallons of the simulated waste, which is liquid sodium hydroxide, has been delivered to the vitrification plant for the start of cold commissioning after technical issues with the glass forming system are resolved……..  https://www.tri-cityherald.com/news/local/hanford/article289415648.html?fbclid=IwY2xjawGQ85pleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHXSOmqPdX05-ob45hMlDtydxbNAUQaYy3hZHsjjJN36uXswbGOitN8vfCw_aem_T6xrJeHnpOhqhMLAvIemaQ

November 2, 2024 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

The Rise and Fall of NuScale: a nuclear cautionary tale

Kelly Campbell, October 29, 2024 ,
https://oregoncapitalchronicle.com/2024/10/29/the-rise-and-fall-of-nuscale-a-nuclear-cautionary-tale/

A decade ago, NuScale, the Oregon-based small modular nuclear company born at Oregon State University, was on a roll. Promising a new era of nuclear reactors that were cheaper, easier to build and safer, their Star Wars-inspired artist renditions of a yet to be built reactor gleamed like a magic bullet.

As of last year, NuScale was the furthest along of any reactor design in obtaining Nuclear Regulatory Commission licensing and was planning to build the first small modular nuclear reactor in the United States. Its plan was to build it in Idaho to serve energy to a consortium of small public utility districts in Utah and elsewhere, known as UAMPS. 

This home-grown Oregon company was lauded in local and national media. According to project backers, a high-tech solution to climate change was on the horizon, and an Oregon company was leading the way. It seemed almost too good to be true. 

And it was. 

image

Turns out, NuScale was a house of cards. The UAMPS project’s price tag more than doubled and the timeline was pushed back repeatedly until it was seven years behind schedule. Finally, UAMPS saw the writing on the wall and wisely backed out in November, 2023.

After losing their customer, NuScale’s stock plunged, it laid off nearly a third of its workforce, and it was sued by its investors and investigated for investor fraud. Then its CEO sold off most of his stock shares. 

NuScale’s project is the latest in a long line of failed nuclear fantasies.

Why should you care? A different nuclear company, X-Energy, now in partnership with Amazon, wants to build and operate small modular nuclear reactors near the Columbia River, 250 miles upriver from Portland.

Bill Gates’s darling, the Natrium reactor in Wyoming is also plowing ahead. Both proposals are raking in the Inflation Reduction Act and other taxpayer funded subsidies. The danger: Money and time wasted on these false solutions to the climate crisis divert public resources from renewables, energy efficiency and other faster, more cost-efficient and safer ways to address the climate crisis. 

A recent study from the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis concluded that small modular nuclear reactors are still too expensive, too slow to build and too risky to respond to the climate crisis.

While the nuclear industry tries to pass itself off as “clean,” it is an extremely dirty technology, beginning with uranium mining and milling which decimates Indigenous lands. Small modular nuclear reactors produce two to thirty times the radioactive waste of older nuclear designs, waste for which we have no safe, long-term disposal site. Any community that hosts a nuclear reactor will likely be saddled with its radioactive waste – forever. This harm falls disproportionately on Indigenous and low-income communities.

For those of us downriver, X-Energy’s plans to build at the Hanford Nuclear Site on the Columbia flies in the face of reason, as it would add more nuclear waste to the country’s largest nuclear cleanup site. 

In Oregon, we have a state moratorium on building nuclear reactors until there is a vote of the people and a national waste repository. Every few years, the nuclear industry attempts to overturn this law at the Oregon Legislature, but so far it has been unsuccessful. This August, Umatilla County Commissioners announced they’ll attempt another legislative effort to overturn the moratorium. Keeping this moratorium is wise, given the dangerous distraction posed by the false solution of small modular nuclear reactors. Let’s learn from the NuScale debacle and keep our focus on a just transition to a clean energy future–one in which nuclear power clearly has no place. 

October 31, 2024 Posted by | Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, USA | Leave a comment

Biden to Bibi: ‘OK to continue Gaza genocide till after election’

Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coaliton, Glen Ellyn IL, 27 Oct 24

On October 14, President Biden sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu giving Israel 30 days to allow more aid of food, water and medicine into Gaza’s 139 square miles being utterly destroyed by Israel for the past year. It’s noteworthy that the 30 day time limit ends 9 days after the US election. Biden’s letter is brilliant politics and grotesque governance. Biden, who has been funding, supporting and enabling the yearlong genocide in Gaza, desperately needs to appear peace loving ahead of the election. He knows a majority of his Democratic voters are horrified by his genocide enabling. They want him to end the so far 50,000 tons of weapons he’s already given Israel to demolish Gaza.

The letter, designed to promote his concern for the devastation he’s enabled, will do nothing to end the genocide in Gaza. Netanyahu has ignored every one of Biden’s pleas for supplying life sustaining aid there. The letter doesn’t even state Biden will cut off aid to Israel. It merely implies that if US demands aren’t met, the US might consider enforcing foreign assistance laws. Those laws forbid the US from sending weapons to any nation committing wholesale destruction of civilian populations. But not one word about actually cutting off those weapons destroying Gaza.   

Every day dozens, hundreds, even a thousand or more Palestinians die in Gaza, obliterated by Biden’s 2,000 lb. bombs, or killed more slowly from disease or starvation. Biden does not care. His toothless letter begging for more aid to the 2,300,000 Palestinians will do nothing to alleviate their suffering. But it may mollify his antiwar critics enough to help achieve Democratic victory Election Day.

Win or lose November 5, Biden is unlikely to do anything substantive to end the genocidal ethnic cleansing of Gaza. It goes against everything he’s believed in and supported about Israeli colonial domination of Palestine for his entire 52 year governmental career. But it will ensure he descends into historical infamy for enabling the worst genocide of the 21st century. 

October 29, 2024 Posted by | Israel, politics international, USA | Leave a comment

US nuclear regulator kicks off review on Three Mile Island restart

By Laila Kearney, October 26, 2024

  • Summary
  • Companies
  • NRC holds first public meeting on Three Mile Island restart
  • Constellation wants to restore Unit 1’s operating license
  • NRC requests more emergency, environmental restart plan details
  • Watchdog group questions plans, including simulator

NEW YORK, Oct 25 (Reuters) – U.S. nuclear regulators kicked off a long-winding process to consider Constellation Energy’s (CEG.O), opens new tab unprecedented plans to restart its retired Three Mile Island nuclear power plant in an initial public meeting held on Friday.

Constellation, which announced last month that it had signed a 20-year power purchase agreement with Microsoft that would enable reopening the Unit 1 reactor at Three Mile Island, made its case before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to restore its operating license for the plant.

The company also sought to extend the life of the plant and change its name to the Crane Clean Energy Center.

Three Mile Island, which is located in Pennsylvania on an island in the Susquehanna River, is widely known for the 1979 partial meltdown of its Unit 2 reactor. That unit has been permanently shut and is being decommissioned.

Members of the NRC requested details about the emergency evacuation plans for the restarted plant and information about the commercial deal with Microsoft, while imploring Constellation to quickly work on permitting related to its water use for the plant.

The NRC also raised questions about how the restart of Unit 1 would intersect with the decommissioning of Unit 2, which began last year, nearly 45 years after the partial meltdown.

Utah-based nuclear services company EnergySolutions owns Unit 2 and related infrastructure, while Constellation owns Unit 1 and the site’s land.

Unit 1 shut down due to economic reasons in 2019, some 15 years before the operating license was set to expire. At the time, Constellation said it did not anticipate a restart.

Constellation now expects to restart the 835-megawatt Unit 1 in 2028, delivering power to the grid to offset electricity use by Microsoft’s data center in the region.

A recent jump in U.S. electricity demand, driven in part by Big Tech’s energy-intensive AI data center expansion has led to a revival of the country’s struggling nuclear industry.

No retired reactor has been restarted before. The Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan, owned by Holtec, is also in the process of being resurrected.

…………………..The physical work to restore Three Mile Island, which is expected to start in the first quarter of 2025, cost at least $1.6 billion, and could require thousands of workers, still needs licensing modifications and permitting.

Local activists have also vowed to fight the project over safety and environmental concerns, including the storage of nuclear waste on the site.

Scott Portzline, who is with nuclear watchdog group Three Mile Island Alert in Harrisburg, questioned the site’s backup power and criticized the proposed nuclear control room simulator used for training.

“I have a constitutional right to know how my nuclear plants are operating and the utility ought to be able to answer that,” Portzline said during the meeting……….

Under the National Environmental Policy Act, the NRC will be required to complete an environmental assessment within the final year of any restart. The plant will require other environmental permits, including ones for air emissions and water pollutants. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-nuclear-regulator-hears-three-mile-island-power-plant-restart-plan-2024-10-25/

October 28, 2024 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Wildlife Refuge’s Toxic Past Still A Colorado Concern

A national wildlife refuge that was contaminated by plutonium from the 1950s through the early 1990s is still a health concern for nearby Colorado communities.

Gary Stoller, Forbes, Oct 25, 2024

For many decades, Rocky Flats has been a controversial contaminated site south of Boulder, Colorado, about 20 miles north of Denver. The controversy continues, as nearby communities refuse to further develop the 6,200-acre site that’s now a wildlife refuge with trails for walkers and cyclists.

Rocky Flats, which housed facilities to produce nuclear weapons components from 1952 through the early 1990s, was contaminated by plutonium and other nuclear materials. Cleanup ended in 2006, and, a year later, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designated the site as the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. Federal government officials say the area used for the refuge is safe for human visitors, but neighboring cities Westminster and Broomfield and the town of Superior apparently remain unconvinced.

For many decades, Rocky Flats has been a controversial contaminated site south of Boulder, Colorado, about 20 miles north of Denver. The controversy continues, as nearby communities refuse to further develop the 6,200-acre site that’s now a wildlife refuge with trails for walkers and cyclists.

Rocky Flats, which housed facilities to produce nuclear weapons components from 1952 through the early 1990s, was contaminated by plutonium and other nuclear materials. Cleanup ended in 2006, and, a year later, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designated the site as the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. Federal government officials say the area used for the refuge is safe for human visitors, but neighboring cities Westminster and Broomfield and the town of Superior apparently remain unconvinced.

Last month, Westminster withdrew from an intergovernmental agreement to fund the building of a tunnel and a bridge into the refuge. Such construction would improve access to the refuge — home to more than 200 wildlife species— for hikers, walkers, cyclists and outdoor enthusiasts. Broomfield and Superior had previously withdrawn their support.

The refuge is part of the Rocky Mountain Greenway, a 25-mile trail that reaches from Commerce City, a Denver suburb, into Boulder and Jefferson counties. The trail links Rocky Flats with the Rocky Mountain Arsenal, land outside of downtown Denver that also was cleaned up after contamination from the manufacture of chemical warfare agents, including mustard gas, for World War II.

In a 2006 report, the U.S. Government Accountability Office said $10 billion had been spent since 1995 to clean up Rocky Flats. The amount of cleanup waste that had to be removed “was equivalent to a 65-story building the length and width of a football field,” the GAO said…………….

The majority of Westminster city councilors said last month they feared foot traffic could stir up plutonium, according to a story published by Colorado Community Media, which has publications in eight Colorado counties. Critics said measurable radioactive materials remain in and around the Rocky Flats site and will remain for thousands of years, the media group reported.  https://www.forbes.com/sites/garystoller/2024/10/25/wildlife-refuges-toxic-past-still-a-colorado-concern/

October 26, 2024 Posted by | environment, USA | Leave a comment

Mission Innovation should not send tax-payer money to Bill Gates’ nuclear dream

We cannot trust billionaire philanthropists to lead the way on climate action, Online Opinion, By Noel Wauchope , 16 December 2015  “…….At the opening of the Paris Climate Summit (COP21), with the blessing of the White House, Bill Gates announced the Breakthrough Energy Coalition (BEA), with an ambitious goal to deal with climate change. 24 billionaire philanthropists have joined in the BEA. They include Richard Branson, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos.

Simultaneously 19 governments, including the United States, China and India, announce “Mission Innovation”, a project that will involve tax-payer money to explore and invent new ways to develop low carbon energy.

Not surprisingly, the two organisations will work in tandem. The billionaire philanthropists plan a public-private partnership between governments, research institutions, and investors that will focus on new energy methods especially for developing countries……

For a start, this twin project is directed at researching new forms of low carbon energy. A lot of money therefore is to go into trying out new plans, that exist at best, only in blueprint form. Yet already there are in operation large scale and small scale renewable energy projects that could be deployed. In particular, small scale solar energy is very well suited to being deployed in rural India, Africa, and other developing nations, as well as in Australia and other developed nations. It is happening now. Projects such as Barefoot Power have operated for years now, bringing affordable solar power to millions of rural poor in Africa, Asia Pacific, India and the Americas.

The energy need now for poor countries is deployment of existing technologies, not years of research and testing of so far non-existent ones………

  • The one and only University that has joined BEA is the University of California, which runs the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, well known for its nuclear research.
  • Bill Gates is co-founder and current Chairman of the innovative nuclear energy company TerraPower Gates has a long term history of enthusiasm for small nuclear power reactors. Since the Fukushima nuclear disaster, USA’s Nuclear Regulatory Commission has tightened the rules for new reactors. Fortunately for Mr Gates, China is less fussy about this, so Gates has been able to do a deal with the China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC). TerraPower and CNNC will build the first small 600 MW unit in China, and later deploy these nuclear reactors globally.

Gates and Branson

I don’t doubt that Bill Gates is sincere in his goal of reducing greenhouse gases. It’s just that I have reservations about Small Nuclear Reactors having any impact on global warming.

If Small Nuclear Reactors did in fact reduce greenhouse gases, the world would need thousands of them to be up and running quickly, but they’re still at the planning stage. They’re supposed to be much safer than conventional nuclear reactors, but still produce radioactive wastes, and are targets for terrorism. Each and every one of them would need 24 hour guarding. It gets expensive………

The term selected “Breakthrough Energy Initiative” gives the game away. For many years now, America’s Breakthrough Institute has lobbied and publicised “new nuclear” as the solution for climate change. The Breakthrough Institute has many well-meaning and enthusiastic environmentalists as members. Its philosophy, expressed in “The Ecomodernist Manifesto” is full of beautiful motherhood statements about climate and environment, and only a few paragraphs about new nuclear technology.

This Manifesto, by the way, appears as a Submission to the South Australian Nuclear Fuel Cycle Royal Commission.

The effect of the Breakthrough Institute, over the years, has been to slow down action on reducing the use of fossil fuels. It has also aimed to discredit renewable energy……..http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=17899

October 25, 2024 Posted by | technology, USA | Leave a comment

The New Nuclear Push: New Package, Same Lies

Karl Grossman,  https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/10/23/the-new-nuclear-push-new-package-same-lies/

Nuclear power zealots are engaged in their biggest push in years in the United States and internationally. Headlines of recent pieces online about nuclear power include: “Japan’s top business lobby proposes maximum use of nuclear energy.” And, U.S. “looks to resurrect more nuclear power.” And, “European nations back nuclear power ahead of major climate summit.” And, “The super-rich are looking at nuclear power for emission-free yacht voyages.” And, “France plans to turn nuclear waste into forks, doorknobs and saucepans.”

Central to the drive: they’re trying to latch on to climate change as a new reason for nuclear power with the claim that it is “carbon-free” or “emissions-free.”

This is untrue especially when the “nuclear fuel chain” is taken into account.

“The dirty secret is that nuclear power makes a substantial contribution to global warming. Nuclear power is actually a chain of highly energy-intense industrial processes,” Michel Lee, an attorney and chair of the Council on Intelligent Energy & Conservation Policy, has said. “These include uranium mining, conversion, enrichment and fabrication of nuclear fuel; construction and deconstruction of the massive nuclear facility structures; and the disposition of high-level nuclear waste.”

In a two-page fact sheet that is online titled “How Nuclear Power Worsens Climate Change,” the Sierra Club Nuclear Free Campaign says: “Nuclear power has a big carbon footprint. At the front end of nuclear power, carbon energy is used for uranium mining, milling, processing, conversion, and enrichment, as well as for formation of [fuel] rods and construction of nuclear…power plants….All along the nuclear fuel chain, radioactive contamination of air, land and water occurs. Uranium mine and mill cleanup demands large amounts of fossil fuel. Each year 2,000 metric tons of high-level radioactive waste and twelve million cubic feet of low-level radioactive waste are generated in the U.S. alone. None of this will magically disappear. Vast amounts of energy will be needed to isolate these dangerous wastes for generations to come.”

The main release of carbon occurs during this nuclear fuel cycle; however, nuclear plants themselves also emit carbon, a radioactive form, Carbon 14.

Still, many politicians and much of media continue to use the words “carbon-free” or “emissions-free” when it comes to nuclear-generated electricity. Consider the front-page story in the business section of The New York Times this month that began: “Technology companies are increasingly looking to nuclear power plants to provide the emissions-free electricity needed to run artificial intelligence and other businesses.”

And there was an Associated Press article last month in the Long Island daily newspaper Newsday which started: “Amazon on Wednesday said that it was investing in small nuclear reactors, coming just two days after a similar announcement by Google, as both tech giants seek new sources of carbon-free electricity to meet surging demand from data centers and artificial intelligence.”

Among the politicians buying into the climate change claim appears to be New York Governor Kathy Hochul who just organized a “summit” with a focus on nuclear power. At it, a “Draft Blueprint for Consideration of Advanced Nuclear Technologies” from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) was released. It asserted that “a growing and innovative group of advanced nuclear energy technologies has recently emerged as a potential source of carbon-free power.”

As the Washington, D.C. organization Food & Water Watch says: “Governor Hochul’s latest bad idea is to build new nuclear power plants in New York. In September, she hosted an ‘Energy Future Summit’ in Syracuse where she wined and dined the nuclear industry, and now her administration has published a ‘blueprint’ for promoting the construction of new nuclear reactors.”

I live on Long Island, New York where for decades the now defunct Long Island Lighting Company (LILCO) planned to build seven to eleven nuclear power plants. Long Island was to become in the parlance of nuclear promoters what they called a “nuclear park.”

It took years, but the scheme was stopped by strong actions at the grassroots, opposition by Suffolk County government and also then New York Governor Mario Cuomo, and the creation by the state of the Long Island Power Authority (LIPA) with the power to utilize condemnation if LILCO persisted in its nuclear plans. The first nuclear power plant LILCO constructed, at Shoreham, was turned over to the state for $1 after problem-plagued low-power testing and was decommissioned as a nuclear facility.

Safe-energy activists on Long Island are now concerned that the area might again be targeted for nuclear power plants. The 120-mile-long island jutting out into the ocean east of Manhattan has been regarded as an advantageous area for nuclear power plants because of it being surrounded by vast amounts of water which can be tapped as coolant—a nuclear power plant needs up to a million gallons of water a minute as coolant.

Moreover, established on Long Island in 1947 by the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) was Brookhaven National Laboratory with developing civilian uses of nuclear technology as a main mission. Its staff included many scientists and engineers who had worked at the Manhattan Project who at BNL sought to develop uses of atomic energy in addition to nuclear bombs. At the start of 1947, on January 1, 1947, the Manhattan Project, the World War II crash program to build nuclear weapons, was succeeded by the AEC.

BNL scientists and engineers joined with LILCO attorneys at hearings on LILCO nuclear plant projects and they formed an organization, Suffolk Scientists for Cleaner Power and Safer Environment, to promote them.

BNL’s administrators were closely involved with LILCO. Phyllis Vineyard, wife of BNL’s long-time director, George Vineyard, was a member of the board of directors of LILCO, advocating nuclear power. And in the years before LILCO went under due to its failed nuclear power pursuit, its CEO and chairman was William Catacosinos, a former assistant director of BNL

Long Island safe-energy activists —some who were veterans of the battle against LILCO’s drive for nuclear power—are now readying a letter to the board of trustees of LIPA stating they “reaffirm the long-held consensus that nuclear power has no place on Long Island. We are also convinced that nuclear power has no place in planning New York’s energy future.”

“LIPA exists because the people of Long Island said no to nuclear power. Public safety, the impossibility of evacuation and ever-rising costs and electric rates were the reasons for this decision. Nuclear energy was neither necessary nor appropriate for Long Island.  This is still true,” it continues.

“A recent study by the Nature Conservancy found that ‘Long Island has enough low-impact solar PV siting potential to host nearly 19,500 megawatts (19.5 gigawatts) of solar capacity in the form of mid-to large-scale installations (250 kilowatts and larger),’” the letter went on. “A gigawatt of energy can power 750,000 homes. These estimates, totaling almost three times more power than is currently required, do not even include the potential for residential solar. Additionally, solar is the most widely accepted and supported form of renewable energy in the nation. By contrast, nuclear power garnered the most public opposition.

“Long Island’s abundant energy resources also include offshore wind. According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, the full offshore wind potential in our region is 323,000 megawatts or 323 gigawatts of energy. LIPA has led the way with the South Fork Wind Farm. Clearly, there is no shortage of renewable energy potential on Long Island. Nuclear energy will not be needed here.”

Also, the letter points out, “LIPA’s enabling legislation clearly states that the ‘authority shall utilize to the fullest extent practicable, all economical means of conservation, and technologies that rely on renewable energy resources, cogeneration and improvements in energy efficiency which will benefit the interests of the ratepayers of the service area.’”

It calls for opposing “any effort” by the state’s Public Service Commission or NYSERDA to site nuclear power facilities on Long Island.

Food & Water Watch is asking that people to relate their views about the Hochul administration’s advocacy of nuclear power by letter or email to Hochul and Doreen Harris, president of NYSERDA, both in Albany, before a November 8th deadline set for comments. “Take action: Demand they stop this fast-track to danger and instead chart a path to the renewable energy future we need,” asks the group.

This month, the U.S. Department of Energy released a report saying: “U.S. nuclear capacity has the potential to triple from 100 GW [gigawatts] in 2024 to 300 GW by 2050.” It said: “In 2022, utilities were shutting down nuclear reactors; in 2024, they are extending reactor operations to 80 years, planning to uprate capacity [pushing nuclear power plants to run harder and generate more electricity]; and restarting formerly closed reactors.”

The nuclear power issue remains—indeed, is getting even more intense.

“We are up against the biggest push for nuclear power that I’ve ever experienced in 32 years of anti-nuclear power activism,” said Kevin Kamps of the Takoma Park, Maryland-based organization Beyond Nuclear in a TV program I hosted this year. It and a follow-up program were syndicated by Denver, Colorado-based Free Speech TV and broadcast on nearly 200 cable TV systems in 40 states and the major satellite TV networks and also on internet platforms.

Of the new main argument for nuclear power, that it is “carbon-free,” Kamps stated: “It’s not true. It’s not carbon-free by any means,” and “not even low carbon when you compare it to genuinely low carbon sources of electricity, renewables like wind and solar.” But the nuclear industry, he said, is involved in a “propaganda campaign” attempting to validate itself by citing climate change. He speaks of many in government having “fallen for this ploy.”

Karl Grossman, professor of journalism at State University of New York/College at Old Westbury, and is the author of the book, The Wrong Stuff: The Space’s Program’s Nuclear Threat to Our Planet, and the Beyond Nuclear handbook, The U.S. Space Force and the dangers of nuclear power and nuclear war in space. Grossman is an associate of the media watch group Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR). He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion.

October 25, 2024 Posted by | politics, USA | Leave a comment

Harris admits to US/Israeli genocide in Gaza….then says ‘Oops, never mind’.

Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL

At a campaign stop in Milwaukee, Kamala Harris was confronted by a protester who charged the Biden administration “invested “billions of dollars in genocide in Gaza that has resulted in massive child casualties.”

Before Harris could consult her scripted genocide denial playbook, she blurted out “What he’s talking about, it’s real. That’s not the subject that I came to discuss today, but it’s real.”

Mainstream news didn’t cover Harris’ US genocide agreement comment. But just to be safe her campaign issued a statement that Harris “doesn’t agree with defining the war as a genocide, and she has not expressed such a stance in the past, as this is not her position.”

Perhaps the guilt of participating in the most grotesque genocide in this century is beginning to weigh on the conscience of Kamala Harris. If so campaign protesters, keep holding up the mirror of Biden/Harris genocide enabling in Gaza to Kamala at every campaign stop. She must be constantly reminded she cannot escape the depravity into which she has sunk to achieve the US presidency.

Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL

October 25, 2024 Posted by | politics, USA | Leave a comment

US authorizes CIA mercenaries to run biometric concentration camps in Gaza Strip

A private intelligence corporation billed as “Uber for war zones” is preparing to create what Israel hopes will be the model for supplanting Hamas rule in Gaza.

Uncaptured Media, Dan Cohen, Oct 22, 2024

The Biden administration has approved the deployment of 1,000 CIA-trained private mercenaries as part of a joint U.S.-Israeli plan to turn Gaza’s apocalyptic rubblescape into a high-tech dystopia.

Starting with Al-Atatra, a village in the northwestern Gaza Strip, the plan calls to build what the Israeli daily Ynet calls “humanitarian bubbles” – turning the remains of villages and neighborhoods into tiny concentration camps cut off from their environs and surrounded and controlled by mercenaries.

This comes as Israel carries out daily massacres and ethnic cleansing in northern Gaza, enacting the proposal known as The Generals’ Plan, originally crafted by former national security chief Giora Eiland to turn Gaza into “a place where no human being can exist.”

The plan, approved by White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, calls for the Israeli military to clear out pockets of Palestinian resistance, which it has failed to achieve, demonstrated by the recent killing of Israeli Colonel Ehasn Daksa, the highest ranking officer to lose his life in the year long war.

48 hours after stamping out resistance, they plan to erect separation walls around the neighborhood, forcing its residents, and no one else, to enter and exit using biometric identification under the CIA contractors’ control. Those who do not accept the biometric regime would be refused humanitarian aid…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. https://open.substack.com/pub/uncaptured/p/us-authorizes-cia-mercenaries-to

October 25, 2024 Posted by | Gaza, Israel, secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA | Leave a comment

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