Cost Of New Nuclear Power Plant in Switzerland Could Be Up To €45 Billion, Says Report
By David Dalton,
The cost of building a new nuclear power plant in
Switzerland could be between CHF14bn and CHF43bn (€14.9bn and €45.8bn;
$17.4bn and $53.5bn) – a range that reflects varying assumptions about
reactor size, construction conditions and financing costs, according to a
report by the Swiss Academy of Sciences.
Nucnet 26th Aug 2026, https://www.nucnet.org/news/cost-of-new-nuclear-power-plant-in-switzerland-could-be-up-to-eur45-billion-says-report-8-3-2026
Fears Putin will use ‘tactical nuclear weapons
By PATRICK HARRINGTON, UK NEWS REPORTER, 27 August 2026, https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-16082617/Fears-Putin-tactical-nuclear-weapons-Ukraine-peace-talks.html
Fears that Putin will deploy ‘tactical nuclear weapons‘ against Ukraine are growing as Russia becomes increasingly frustrated and diplomatic hopes crumble.
Voices in Moscow calling for nuclear warheads are becoming louder, and the President is surveying his options for escalation, according to sources.
Ukraine and Russia have ramped up attacks against each other in recent months, with Kyiv landing significant strikes deep inside Russian territory against its oil infrastructure.
Meanwhile, negotiations have all but collapsed, with little hope on either side of a peace deal being found.
The Kremlin is adamant it will not end the war under pressure from sanctions or Ukrainian attacks on its refineries.
It is also increasingly indignant at Nato allies supplying Ukraine with weapons and intelligence – leading to threats against the UK that Prime Minister Andy Burnham this week branded ‘outrageous’.
Putin’s conclusion is that he need to intensify his attacks on Ukraine, three Kremlin sources told Bloomberg.
At the weekend, he told a reporter that Ukraine had ‘opened this Pandora’s box’, and warned Kyiv: ‘Be ready to get a blowback on your most sensitive sectors of the economy.’
For now, it is considering how it can ramp up its conventional ballistic assaults, including missile attacks on the centre of the capital, Kyiv.
But a growing number of Russian officials have concluded that Putin could eventually abandon the rules of modern warfare and hit the nuclear button, the sources said.
Tactical nuclear weapons, which are less powerful and have a shorter range, would be more likely than strategic missiles.
They would be used to gain the upper hand in a specific battlefield, rather than to decimate entire cities, like the bombs dropped by America on Japan in 1945.
Throughout the conflict, he has repeatedly flaunted the threat of nukes against Ukraine and its Western allies – even publishing maps showing strikes zones.
And if he made the call, there would be nobody to stand in his way.
Fiona Hill, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who served as a national security advisor to three US presidents including Trump in his first term, said: ‘For Putin there is no sign of collective will anywhere to resist him and so many ways in which he can grind people down.
‘This is why a concerted collective and consistent effort to resist his actions, and to engage in diplomacy, is essential.
‘He has a single-minded focus and we are all over the place.
It was reported this week that the Putin might be abouyt to test a nuclear-powered cruise missile – dubbed the Flying Chernobyl – that can fly for days, according to analysts.
An influx of aircraft and shipping has converged in the Arctic in a telltale sign that a new experimental firing is expected of a weapon powered by its own atomic reactor, say analysts.
The ‘invincible’ Burevestnik missile – with a nickname inspired by the nuclear catastrophe that could be inflicted, much like the Chernobyl power plant explosion in 1986 – carries a nuclear warhead with an ‘unlimited range’ and is designed to fly for days at a time before striking the West, according to the Russians.
While the chance of nuclear weapons still looks remote, the only way to rule them out completely would be a swift diplomatic end to the war – something that now seems out of reach.
The US is preoccupied with the conflict in Iran, and Putin has abandoned its hope of an understanding between Donald Trump and himself that was fostered during at their summit in Alaska last August.
Russia has indicate there may be a path to peace if Ukraine hands over its ‘fortress belt’ of cities in the Donbas that have held firm since the start of armed hostilities in 2014 – but Kyiv has made clear that is not on the table.
A recent indication of the US’s feeling toward Russia came from Secretary of State Marco Rubio in June, when he said: ‘If there had been an agreement, we would have had an end to the war.’
CIA Director John Ratcliffe made a rare visit to Moscow on Tuesday for a diplomatic meeting, though it’s unclear what the focus was.
Germany in talks to help fund Trident
Berlin could bolster Britain’s nuclear programme under plans to end Europe’s reliance on America for defence
Joe Barnes Diplomatic Editor. James Rothwell Berlin Correspondent. James Crisp Europe Editor, 26 August 2026
Germany is in talks to invest in Britain’s nuclear deterrent, The
Telegraph understands. Berlin is considering offering financial support for
Trident as it spearheads efforts to reinforce Europe’s nuclear umbrella.
One well-placed source said Germany wanted to better integrate itself into
the existing British and French nuclear deterrents rather than pursue its
own bomb because of the nation’s wartime guilt.
“We have a very strong
interest that the existing nuclear powers in Europe extend their
capabilities,” the source said. The discussions between Paris, Berlin and
London have accelerated in recent months amid fears the Trump
administration will withdraw its military from Europe.
Telegraph 26th Aug 2026, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2026/08/26/germany-talks-help-fund-britains-trident-nuclear-deterrent/
Nuclear Hotseat #774: Nuke Tax Costs You HOW MUCH ?! Nuclear Weapons Tax Calculator.
9 May 2026
WHO WE ARE: Nuclear Hotseat is the weekly international news magazine keeping you up to date on all things nuclear… from a different perspective. We’re a show for people who know nothing about nuclear who want to know something, and people who know something about nuclear who would like to know just a little bit more. Since June 14, 2011, only three months after the Fukushima nuclear disaster began, producer/host Libbe HaLevy — a survivor of the nuclear accident at Three Mile Island — has presented nuclear news, expert interviews, activist actions, and ways for citizens concerned about nuclear to take action.
WHAT IS COVERED IN THIS EPISODE:
How much are nukes really costing us? The answer is astounding – and every year, Physicians for Social Responsibility provides an updated answer, created by long-term veteran member and board member Dr. Robert Dodge. Bob’s latest numbers for 2026 were released on April 15 – tax day – as is appropriate for tracking the outrageous financial nuclear tax burden place on every woman, man, child, and even infant in this country. Where does that $137 BILLION dollars go? Sit back and fasten your seatbelt and you find out.
And Physicist Lynda Williams is great at breaking down complex nuclear issues and giving us the bare bones to be able to understand the truth behind all that nuclear industry gobbledygook. Here, she explains the need for comments on three new rule changes the NUclear Regulatory Commission – the NRC – is proposing and the tiny window of opportunity we have to comment on them… and why we must. We spoke on April 26, 2026.
Poland rules out hosting nuclear weapons.
August 27, 2026 , By Victor Jack, https://www.politico.eu/article/poland-rules-out-hosting-nuclear-weapons-despite-russian-threat/
BRUSSELS — Poland “does not want” allied nuclear weapons stationed on its territory, the country’s Deputy Defense Minister Paweł Zalewski said Thursday, despite growing worries of a Russian incursion into NATO territory.
“I would like to say very clearly and openly: Poland does not want to have nuclear warheads on its territory,” he told reporters at NATO headquarters in Brussels. “We want to participate in NATO nuclear deterrence, [which] does not mean to have a nuclear warhead on our territory.”
Zalewski’s statement is Warsaw’s most categorical statement on the topic. While it has previously expressed skepticism toward hosting nuclear weapons, Poland has also said it was in early-stage talks with the U.S. around a potential expansion of Washington’s nuclear deterrent in Europe, and had in parallel joined a French initiative aimed at extending Paris’ own deterrent in Europe.
Separately, Polish President Karol Nawrocki has left the door open to Warsaw eventually building its own nuclear weapons program.
Western officials have warned Russia could attack NATO territory by the end of the decade, while recent U.S. intelligence suggests an attack could come even sooner.
Newcleo-Led Consortium Chosen For French Project On Floating Nuclear Power Plants
By David Dalton, 27 August 2026, https://www.nucnet.org/news/newcleo-led-consortium-chosen-for-french-project-on-floating-nuclear-power-plants-8-4-2026
Maritime sector a ‘largely unexplored opportunity’ for reactor industry
A consortium led by France-based advanced reactor and nuclear fuel company Newcleo has been selected to take part in a project supporting the decarbonisation of the French maritime sector.
The project, managed by France-based investment bank Bpifrance and named “n-Floating”, aims to demonstrate the relevance and technical feasibility of an innovative floating nuclear power solution, consisting of a non-self-propelled floating unit housing multiple Newcleo-developed LFR-AS-200 reactors, each offering an electrical output of 200 MW.
The consortium brings together Newcleo, Bureau Veritas Marine & Offshore, a leading classification society, and ABMI Groupe, a French engineering company with expertise both in maritime and nuclear sectors.
The project has been awarded almost €1m ($1.1m) in funding under the programme.
Work has already begun and is expected to run for approximately 18 months.
“Maritime deployment of advanced reactors opens a broader and still largely unexplored market for nuclear energy” said Newcleo chief executive officer Stefano Buono.
“Floating nuclear offers an opportunity to bring reliable, low-carbon power to applications at sea and in coastal locations.”
Newcleo said the project aims to develop a standardised, deployable and competitive solution for low-carbon energy generation at sea and in coastal locations.
The initial phase of the n-Floating project will focus on conceptual studies for a nuclear barge, assessing its potential to deliver reliable, low-carbon and competitive energy across a range of applications. These include supplying isolated regions, ports and associated industrial hubs, and coastal areas, as well as supporting energy-intensive applications such as desalination and the production of low-carbon fuels.
The project will also define the subsequent development programme and roadmap towards potential industrial deployment by 2036, with the ambition to design and build the solution in France.
Claim about Scottish support for nuclear power doesn’t add up
Ni Holmes, St Andrews, 27 Aug 26
I WAS not surprised to find, when I got to the foot of a letter challenging Paul Kavanagh’s assertion that “Scotland does not need nuclear energy and most in Scotland don’t want it” as being “wrong on both counts” (Aug 26), that it was written by Lincoln Hill, the Nuclear Industry Association’s director of policy and external affairs.
Mr Hill appears not to be too good at maths. He cites a YouGov poll showing that fewer than a third of people in Scotland consider nuclear power as the most important energy source and that a similar number identified it as their preferred source of energy. To my understanding, the remaining two-thirds of Scots who do not support nuclear power are indeed most of the people in Scotland.
Mr Hill goes on to assert that Scotland needs “more than one source of electricity”. This suggests that lack of basic counting skills is the foundation of his weakness in maths. We already have multiple sources of electricity: we have had hydro-electric power for decades, we have wave generators, we have onshore and offshore wind turbines, and new technology is making solar power viable even in our climate. By my count those five already add up to the “more than one” that Mr Hill claims we need. We will still have more than one source after the last nuclear power station in our country is finally decommissioned.
It seems to me that it is Mr Hill that is wrong and Mr Kavanagh was entirely correct on both counts. We neither need nor want nuclear power in Scotland, the Nuclear Industry Association, or for that matter the Westminster Labour Party’s small-scale reactors and Starmer’s “GB Energy”. What we do need is our independence so that we can make our own choices in the interest of Scotland and the all of its people, rather than English energy requirements or the wealthy seek to profit from energy production.
Can the Israeli military be trusted to investigate itself? Evidence shows genuine accountability is rare
Shannon Bosch, Associate Professor (Law), Edith Cowan University, August 20, 2026, https://theconversation.com/can-the-israeli-military-be-trusted-to-investigate-itself-evidence-shows-genuine-accountability-is-rare-290142
Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says it’s an “outrage” the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) have decided not to open a criminal investigation into the Israeli strikes that killed an Australian aid worker, Zomi Frankcom, and six of her colleagues in Gaza in April 2024. He added:
It falls far short of the accountability that we expect and consistently called for on behalf of Australia.
International law is clear: states are obligated to investigate alleged war crimes committed by their nationals or armed forces, or on their territory. And, if it’s appropriate, they are obligated to prosecute the suspects.
To this end, military and civilian leaders must report suspected breaches of the law up the chain of command to ensure prompt, independent and impartial investigations are carried out.
On Wednesday, the IDF published the findings of an internal investigation into five incidents in Gaza since the war began in October 2023.
Two incidents were deemed to raise “reasonable suspicion of criminal misconduct”. The IDF ordered the Military Police Criminal Investigation Division, the primary investigative unit within the IDF, to open criminal probes into them. They are:
The killing of Hind Rajab, January 2024: The IDF acknowledged that soldiers opened fire on a vehicle carrying five-year-old Hind Rajab and her family as they fled Gaza City. In addition, the IDF said “a shell was fired toward” an ambulance trying to reach the car, killing two paramedics.
The killings of Palestinian rescue workers, March 2025: The review also referred the killings of 15 Palestinians in southern Gaza – some of whom it recognised as paramedics and medical personnel – to criminal investigators.
It said Israeli troops fired on three vehicles, which were later identified as ambulances, a fire truck and a UN vehicle.
Forensic Architecture, a research group at the University of London, alleges the military tried to cover up the killings by crushing and burying the medics’ vehicles.
The IDF investigators did not recommend further investigations into three other incidents, including:
The strikes on the World Central Kitchen convoy, April 2024: In addition to Frankcom, three British nationals, a Palestinian, a Pole and a dual US-Canadian citizen were killed when the IDF mistakenly identified their vehicles as carrying Hamas operatives.
The investigation found serious operational failures in the soldiers’ actions. Two commanders were stripped of their ranks and three officers were reprimanded. However, the review did not find “reasonable suspicion” of criminal conduct.
The other two incidents related to the killings of four employees of Médecins Sans Frontières in 2023 and 2024.
How often are Israeli soldiers prosecuted?
Statistically, very few complaints against IDF personnel result in investigations or criminal convictions.
The Israeli human rights group Yesh Din analysed complaints made to the IDF in 2019–20 and found 72% were closed without criminal investigation and just 2% led to prosecutions.
Another investigation of 52 Israeli military probes between 2023 and 2025 found 88% were either still under review or had been closed. Only one case had led to a prison sentence for an Israeli soldier.
What are the concerns with the IDF investigating itself?
Human Rights Watch has expressed serious concerns with IDF investigations into incidents involving Palestinian civilians. The group says they are “not impartial, thorough or timely”.
Cases often take months or years to navigate the IDF investigative process). Critics say this undermines the cases and diminishes the prospects for prosecutions.
Human Rights Watch reports that initial investigations largely rely on soldiers’ own accounts. The military advocate general, who advises the IDF during military operations, subsequently determines whether conduct should be criminally investigated or prosecuted.
Critics also argue that investigators frequently fail to contact readily available Palestinian witnesses, lack Arabic-speaking investigators, and rely heavily on Israeli NGOs to locate witnesses and obtain evidence.
Palestinian witnesses are often reluctant to cooperate in investigations because of fears of arrest, retaliation or mistreatment.
The military insists investigations are slowed by the difficulties of ensuring due process for its personnel in an active combat zone.
But rights groups say that by the time detectives are authorised to investigate, physical evidence is often long gone, the scenes have been compromised, and witnesses’ memories have faded.
That said, war crimes are not subject to any statutory limitation, meaning prosecutions can occur decades after an alleged offence.
What happens next in these cases?
The Hind Rajab and paramedic cases will now be transferred to military police for formal criminal investigations. They will collect forensic evidence, review communications logs and interrogate the soldiers and commanders involved.
Once complete, the investigation will be handed back to the military advocate general, who will decide whether to issue criminal indictments.
Structural legal barriers suggest, however, that the cases may not go anywhere.
Under Israeli military law, the legality of conduct in war must be assessed based on what a “reasonable commander” knew (or should have known) at the split-second the trigger was pulled. Did they honestly believe they were firing at a legitimate target?
Unless prosecutors can prove explicit intent to murder civilians, cases are often downgraded to “negligence” or closed entirely.
Lengthy proceedings can also create difficulties for eventual prosecution. As evidence becomes unavailable or less reliable over time, defence lawyers may argue that continued proceedings would prejudice their clients’ rights to a fair trial.
In some cases, concerns such as these can lead to reduced charges, plea agreements or the withdrawal of an indictment.
What other options exist?
The International Criminal Court (ICC) is designed to be a “court of last resort”. This means it only steps in if a nation is “unwilling or unable” to genuinely carry out investigations of suspected war crimes.
Israel has long argued that its investigative procedures in cases such as these are both credible and independent.
However, international observers and groups like the Hind Rajab Foundation maintain these internal probes function primarily as a public relations shield rather than a pathway to genuine accountability for wrongdoing.
As Human Rights Watch has put it: “a system that overwhelmingly closes cases without accountability, years after the fact, and only in response to sustained international pressure, is not justice, it’s a whitewash”.
Cases like these could also be investigated and tried in other countries’ courts under what’s known in international law as universal jurisdiction.
This allows domestic courts to launch prosecutions, even when the countries have no link to the perpetrator, victim, national interest or territory where the incidents occurred.
These prosecutions can be supported by UN-appointed independent international commissions of inquiry. These fact-finding bodies collect evidence, interview witnesses and compile exhaustive archives of offences in war zones.
While these UN panels do not hold trials, their formalised, verified evidence files are designed to be handed over to foreign prosecutors or future tribunals.
Tell NRC: Do Not Weaken Radiation Protection!
Tell the NRC – https://www.protectbetter.org/nrc-comments?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=7a7efaf6-d89b-4f2a-bc04-cb2330ac6bc4
| Nuclear Information & Resource Service, Fri, Aug 28, |
Radiation harms. There is no safe level of exposure—and now the federal government is moving to weaken the standards meant to protect us.
President Trump’s Executive Orders are pushing the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) to weaken radiation protections as part of an effort to accelerate the construction of more nuclear reactors, nuclear-powered data centers, and the expansion of the nuclear weapons complex. These changes could expose people and communities to dramatically more radiation while disregarding decades of evidence about the health risks of even low-dose exposure.
WE MUST MAKE CLEAR:
No exemptions for radiation exposure. Nuclear licensees must be required to track and count all radiation doses and radioactive emissions, with no minimum threshold. Any proposal allowing 25 millirem per year—or any millirem or microrem level—before exposures begin to “count” would effectively permit additional radiation exposure to go untracked. That could mean higher worker doses and increased radioactive releases into our air, water, and sewage, while making it harder to understand the true health impacts of cumulative, low-dose radiation exposure. If radiation is released and people are exposed, it should be tracked and reported and kept to a minimum.- If new nuclear reactors are as safe and clean as the industry claims, why do our existing health and safety protections need to be weakened to build them? The rush to expand nuclear power should not come at the expense of safeguards designed to protect workers, communities, and the public. If nuclear expansion requires weaker radiation standards to move forward, that should raise serious questions—not justify lowering the bar. Don’t weaken the regulations.
- We MUST retain the goal of keeping exposures to radiation As Low As Reasonably Achievable.
This is not an abstract regulatory debate. It is about how much radiation the government considers acceptable for you, your family, and your community to be exposed to.
Weakening already inadequate radiation standards could double or more allowable exposure—and the resulting cancer risk— And that risk is not distributed equally. Women, children, older adults, workers, and communities living near nuclear facilities face greater risks.
The science is clear that radiation’s harms extend far beyond cancer. Radiation causes immune dysfunction and heart and cardiovascular disease. It could cause infertility, and disruption of pregnancy. In 2021, after a six-year review, the NRC itself rejected the industry proposal to do away with the Linear NoThreshold model. NRC should rely on that decision, not weaken it.
Yet instead of strengthening protections, the federal government is trying to move in the opposite direction.
We know what happens when regulators underestimate radiation risk. Billions of dollars in government compensation have already been paid to people harmed by radiation exposure—including people whose exposures occurred below legal levels at the time. We must not repeat those mistakes to make nuclear expansion dirtier and cheaper.
If radiation standards are weakened while nuclear facilities proliferate, more radioactive materials will be produced, transported, processed, stored, and released into our environment. Once radioactive contamination is released, we cannot simply take it back.
This is a moment when we have to act. Regulators and lawmakers need to hear that public health protections are not an inconvenience to be eliminated in the rush to build more nuclear facilities.
NIRS is fighting to defend science-based radiation protections and ensure that the health of our communities comes before the nuclear industry’s expansion plans.
Europe’s Heatwaves Are Putting Nuclear Power Under Pressure
By Haley Zaremba – Aug 26, 2026, https://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/Europes-Heatwaves-Are-Putting-Nuclear-Power-Under-Pressure.html
- Extreme heat and drought are cutting nuclear and hydropower output just as cooling demand increases electricity consumption.
- Hungary’s Paks plant fell to barely 10% of capacity, while heat and environmental constraints have repeatedly curtailed French nuclear generation.
- Europe will need more storage, flexible demand, resilient grids and climate-adapted power plants to cope with hotter summers.
Europe’s energy sector is facing a stress test unlike any it has ever seen before. Not only are the markets being battered by the latest in a long succession of geopolitical supply chain snags thanks to the war in Iran, but the continent is also facing blistering heat waves that are pushing the grid to its absolute limit and increasing the risk of rolling blackouts when temperatures are dangerously high. As the fastest warming continent in the world, Europe needs to adjust to extreme heat as the new normal, and it needs to adapt its power supply accordingly.
“We have to plan our power system so that this might be our new reality,” Zsuzsanna Pató, power system lead for Europe at the non-profit Regulatory Assistance Project, recently told Bloomberg. “We don’t usually have such hot spells, but we just have to get used to it.”
The nuclear industry is facing the hardest test of all, with rising temperatures forcing reactors offline just when their output is most needed. Many nuclear power plants rely on rivers for their cooling systems, and when rivers are too hot or the waters are too low, operators are forced to reduce or shut down output altogether. Earlier this month, Hungary had to reduce output at the Paks nuclear power plant to just over 10 percent and just barely avoided total shutdown, which would have effectively cut off 40 percent of the country’s electricity generation overnight. Even though the Paks plant was never fully taken offline, the sharp reduction in production led to an enormous swing in electricity prices across the region, reaching a blistering €500 a megawatt-hour. And the hottest weeks of the summer could still be yet to come.
In July, France had to reduce output and shut down nuclear reactors at a record pace without sufficient and safe water supplies to cool its reactors as the country recorded its hottest day ever on record. While this might seem to suggest that nuclear power development is incompatible with rising temperatures without overhauling the way we cool them, some experts contend that these reductions are a symptom of policy rather than technological limitations.
“What the heatwave revealed was not a failure of nuclear technology, but rather a narrow, well-understood constraint in how some riverside plants are allowed to operate during extreme heat,” The Conversation recently reported. Furthermore, despite curbing output at reactors across the country, France still had “sufficient generation capacity to meet electricity demand,” according to grid operator RTE.
However, the reduction did have critical impacts on consumers within and outside of France. “It is true that prices rose, exports to neighbouring countries fell, and the grid relied more heavily on gas as well as oil-fired reserve generation,” The Conversation conceded. “Yet these were temporary strains, and at no point was France’s supply in any kind of serious jeopardy.”
However, price spikes and energy poverty are a major concern for consumers, who can expect heat waves to keep getting hotter and more frequent. And turning down the air conditioning is not an option when the mercury is this high. A study from The Lancet found that nearly half a million people in the world died of heat every year between 2000 and 2019, most of whom were elderly. Under these conditions, air conditioning is not a luxury but a life-saving necessity, preventing an estimated 190,000 deaths each year.
Utilities therefore need to adapt their models to account for the changing climate as well as for continued geopolitical volatility, both of which are wreaking havoc on energy markets and squeezing consumers. “Utilities can adapt by planning for summer peaks, making cooling demand more flexible, reinforcing grids for high temperatures, deploying batteries and demand response, and climate-proofing power plants’ cooling systems,” Simone Tagliapietra, senior fellow at economic and policy think tank Bruegel, recently told MIT Technology Review.
Army Selects Vendors, Sites for Nuclear Microreactors
Aug. 27, 2026 | By U.S. Army Communication and Outreach Office , https://www.war.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/4584583/army-selects-vendors-sites-for-nuclear-microreactors/
The Army announced yesterday that the Janus Program selected five nuclear energy vendors and five initial locations to build and operate nuclear microreactors.
In partnership with the War Department’s Defense Innovation Unit, the Army is awarding up to $2.2 billion in total for these microreactors. The project will deliver safe, secure and reliable nuclear power, strengthening the Army’s ability to project power globally, while supporting the revitalization of American industrial capacity and technological leadership.
“Since launching the Janus Program, our mandate from President [Donald J.] Trump and Secretary [Pete] Hegseth has been clear: secure the power our warfighters need to train, deploy and win,” said Dan Driscoll, Army secretary. “Awarding these contracts accelerates our ability to deliver safe, reliable baseload power directly to our installations. We are building the energy resilience necessary to project combat power globally, without relying on potentially vulnerable external grids.”
With private sector funding expected alongside government investment, the Army expects to build and operate more than 20 nuclear microreactors across War Department installations.
The five selected vendors and installations are:
- Antares Nuclear Inc. at Fort Bragg, North Carolina.
- BWXT Advanced Technologies LLC at Fort Campbell, Kentucky.
- General Atomics Electromagnetic Systems at Fort Hood, Texas.
- Radiant Industries Inc. at Fort Benning, Georgia.
- Westinghouse Government Services at Fort Drum, New York.
………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………As the Janus Program moves forward, vendors will bring nuclear technologies to other military installations for continued energy resilience across the entire War Department. The Army will announce additional military sites at a later date and continues to drive toward the September 2028 target outlined in Executive Order 14299 for operation of a first reactor.
“The Army is leading the nation in its return to nuclear preeminence,” said Jason Craft, Janus Program manager. “Our selected industry awardees represent the most viable technologies to achieve this capability, setting conditions for both installation energy resilience and operational energy solutions.”
Using a milestone-based payment model, vendors will receive government funding only after successfully hitting specific technical goals. This investment model brings together approximately $2.2 billion across fiscal years 2027-2031, along with significant capital investment from each vendor.
This technology development model will speed up the delivery of next-generation energy solutions to the warfighter and promote innovation while ensuring accountability, Craft said. The prototype reactors will be contractor-owned and operated. Collaboration with utility providers is needed for the success of the Army’s nuclear power strategy and the Janus Program. The Army will work closely with providers on the program to ensure the best possible outcomes, while continuing to collaborate with them now and in the future.
“The Army’s Janus Program has my full support,” said Emil Michael, undersecretary of war for research and engineering and War Department chief technology officer. “The War Department is acting swiftly to implement President Trump’s executive order. … We are unleashing America’s domestic nuclear industrial base to ensure a more resilient and secure energy supply for the joint force.”
Jellyfish close down France’s largest nuclear reactor
August 28 2026 , https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/9339000/jellyfish-close-down-frances-largest-nuclear-reactor/
Reactor units at France’s largest nuclear power station in Gravelines have once again been shut down due to an influx of jellyfish.
A spokeswoman for the French operator EDF said on Thursday more than 200 metric tonnes of jellyfish had appeared since last night.
Two of the six reactor units have been completely shut down as a precautionary measure to “ensure that this situation has no impact whatsoever on the safety of (EDF’s) facilities.”
EDF said the jellyfish are appearing in the area of the filter systems at the seawater pumping station.
Consequently, no reactor units are currently in full operation, as two other units are being run at reduced power, and the remaining two have also been shut down, partly due to a maintenance inspection.
The jellyfish disrupted operations in the middle of the month and in August last year.
The Gravelines nuclear power station has set up monitoring systems to detect and manage large-scale jellyfish gatherings at an early stage, EDF added.
The EDF spokeswoman explained that support for this had been provided, among others, by the organisation France Pêche Durable (France Sustainable Fishing).
Seven boats are operating round the clock near the nuclear power station to catch the jellyfish and then release them further out to sea.
The spokeswoman stated that it was not yet possible to comment on the causes of the phenomenon.
She added that the plant was working with various partners to gain a better understanding of it.
The spokeswoman said the incident posed no risk to the electricity grid.
Gravelines is one of just under 20 nuclear power stations in France.
It is situated on the northern French coast, roughly halfway between Calais and Dunkirk.
We’re Half a Year Into Trump’s War on Iran. Congress Has Tools to End It.
SCHEERPOST, August 26, 2026, By Hanieh Jodat
The clash over whether the US has a functioning constitutional process for starting and ending wars is coming to a head.
The U.S.-Israeli war on Iran is entering its seventh month after a series of attempts at diplomatic negotiations moderated by Pakistan and other countries in the region. The U.S has embroiled itself in a conflict without a clear exit strategy, and Iran has shown no interest in bending under President Donald Trump’s pressure. As Washington and Tehran continue this agonizing yo-yo of threats, the growing reported number of casualties feel heavy. More than 3,400 Iranians have reportedly been killed, while over 26,000 have been wounded, including at least 4,000 women and more than 1,600 children. On the American side, the Pentagon currently reports that 14 U.S. service members have been killed and more than 700 wounded. However, one Department of Defense (DOD) official accused the Pentagon of “an accounting trick” in order to misrepresent the true casualty figures.
By now it has become obvious that Benjamin Netanyahu played a key role in convincing Trump to start this war of choice, after decades of pushing the United States to attack Iran. In recent years, Israel’s lobby, in collaboration with opposition leaders from the Iranian diaspora — including the son of Iran’s late Shah Reza Pahlavi and his monarchist advisors — and a group of hawkish American officials pushed the U.S. to the brink of this war.
Until recently, those attempts were unsuccessful — that is, until they finally found a U.S. president who would risk a strategic disaster and economic collapse for one of the most quickly unpopular wars in U.S. history. But after half a year of war, the question is no longer how we arrived at this war, but more so how Congress might limit the executive branch and force an end to the military hostilities.
Poll after poll reveals that people in the U.S. are increasingly questioning the motivation and cost of the war. After decades of U.S. military interventions across the Middle East and West Asia that have cost trillions of dollars without any sign of success, Americans have expressed their exhaustion with the financial and human toll of another conflict. A Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted in late July found that only 33 percent of people in the U.S. supported the war with Iran, the lowest level of support measured since the conflict began. Sixty-nine percent said President Trump had failed to explain the objectives of the military operation in Iran clearly.
Diplomacy and negotiations between the U.S. and Iran have repeatedly faltered since Trump entered office for the first time and pulled out of a landmark nuclear deal engineered by the Obama administration. The possibility of a lasting political settlement remains buried beneath the weight of the bombs dropped on civilians, sanctions, military threats, and political calculation. And the consequences of the war of choice with Iran are not confined to the Middle East. Rising food and energy prices, inflation, regular attacks on U.S. bases with an unknown number of U.S. casualties, and the uncertainty over the war’s future have shifted the way both Americans and the rest of the world view U.S. recklessness. And the frustration has only gotten worse; by August, roughly two-thirds of people in the U.S. opposed the war outright, according to Reuters polling.
In the face of clear American opposition to the war, the question now is whether the United States has a functioning and democratic constitutional process for deciding when a war begins, how long it continues, and when it ends.
While Trump and his war cabinet have swung back and forth between the promise of diplomacy and peace or the threats of further military escalation, Congress has unsuccessfully attempted several times to reassert its constitutional authority. Only Congress has the power to declare war, and the 1973 War Powers Resolution gives the president a 60-day clock to terminate hostilities without congressional approval. The president has now blown through that deadline — bringing about several constitutional questions for lawmakers.
An Ever-Expanding War……………………………………………………………….
A Path Forward Beyond More War Powers Resolutions
Congress can strengthen congressional oversight over the war by requiring mandatory reporting, conducting investigations, and using the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to audit the executive branch. How can Congress exercise its war powers if it doesn’t know what the Trump administration seeks to do?…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..https://scheerpost.com/2026/08/26/were-half-a-year-into-trumps-war-on-iran-congress-has-tools-to-end-it/
Beyond China’s humanoid robots, a quieter machine revolution is unfolding
Laura Bicker, 25 Aug 26,
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c62m4zn1q6mo
“I take a nap and the world changes,” says Chen Tianyu.
His world certainly does. The 28-year-old keeps up with the latest technology by spending his spare time in factories that are switching to automation. That way he knows what to prioritise when teaching his class about artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics.
In front of him, around 30 college students are studying code. One of them is typing furiously as his eyes dart from the screen to the robot: “The idea is it will grab that cylindrical piece and move it over there.”
A line of industrial robots are waiting to be programmed, and in another part of the classroom, students are trying to develop robotic medical instruments. As he guides them, Chen declares: “If you are not needed by the world of AI and robotics, then you’ll definitely be among those eliminated”.
For the people in this room, this is a step – or rather a leap – towards a future that China is meticulously building: Xi Jinping’s $20bn (£14.7bn) plan to put his country at the forefront of innovation and in direct competition with the US.
The evidence is all around them. They are in the Hangzhou Technician Institute, one of several huge, purpose-built vocational schools that want to churn out the next generation of tech-savvy engineers. The campus sits on the outskirts of Hangzhou, a former imperial capital whose futuristic skyline is just the first hint of its role as a global tech hub.
Across the country, there are more than two million robots working in China’s factories – which is more than anywhere else – and they are continuing to scale up at extraordinary speed.
It is a commitment that will surely change the world, much like the last time the Chinese economy underwent a massive transformation. It is already shipping its robots across the globe: more than half of the world’s industrial robots are now made in China.
What is less clear is the impact of such sweeping automation in a country that sits at the heart of global manufacturing, trade and innovation. What does this mean for China’s human workforce, for instance? And how would we be able to truly measure the cost of this transformation in a regime that controls information so tightly?
The future of China’s workers is uncertain in the industrial revolution the world has been watching: gleaming solar grids, peak hours made noiseless by electric vehicles, machines that run faster than Usain Bolt. Over the weekend, China hosted the second edition of the World Humanoid Games where robots boxed, sprinted and marched.
What is fuelling this spectacle is another, less visible revolution happening inside factories and classrooms.
The BBC has visited industrial sites where we have been shown robots that do not look human, or dance or leap on stage but weld, paint, lift, assemble and work around the clock without a break or benefits. Some are designed to build more robots. We have also been inside academies where China is training the people who will work alongside its robotic workforce.
This is a front-row seat to what Xi calls China’s “new productive forces” – and how they could reshape the country.
On a factory floor in the southern city of Chengdu, the old and and the new are working side by side.
An assembly line of around 30 middle-aged men and women is screwing, drilling and polishing CRP Technology’s signature product: a robotic arm which performs various industrial tasks. Also in the room are four young engineers crowded around a console, trying to crack the code for a prototype, a new robot that they hope will help build other robots.
One of them, 31-year-old Pang Kai, who is part of the research and development team, pushes the sleek skeleton across the room. Because China’s future workforce is not quite ready to strut out. For now, it can only do simple repetitive movements, such as scan a QR code.
“Maybe in another half year, it can do another task,” Pang says, smiling wistfully. It’s a long road and the team are celebrating every small win.
CRP Technology, which employs around 300 people, has been building robot arms for nine years. Each arm can be tailored to a factory’s needs to help build cars, electronics or wind turbines. The firm says a single arm can be programmed to perform more than 90% of repetitive tasks.
The engineers also wonder if, one day, they can replace the company’s workforce. “We want our new robot to be like human beings. We hope it can think by itself,” says Pang. “We need these kinds of robots because maybe in 10 years, we won’t have enough workers in China.”
A shrinking population and an ageing workforce is another reason Beijing is in a hurry to revolutionise its factories. By 2035, more than a third of China’s population will be over 60, according to official estimates. The country will also lose nearly 60 million people in the next decade – almost equivalent to the population of France – according to some estimates.
The hope is that increased automation will fill this looming gap in the workforce before it starts to affect an already sluggish economy. But the speed of the transition is key. Around 120 million people still work in the manufacturing sector. If China moves too quickly, job losses could follow dealing a catastrophic blow to millions who depend on factory wages.
“In theory, machines can work 24 hours a day, which is certainly an advantage compared with human workers. But machines also require maintenance. Every day we need time for that, and each month the production line also requires inspection and repair,” says Cao Li, vice-president of EV maker Leapmotor.
Increasingly popular in Europe and the UK, the company’s budget-friendly, tech-focused cars come together at the Hangzhou factory with robots aiding the process at every step. At the end of the assembly line, more humans emerge.
The company has more than 25,000 workers and hundreds of them make the final checks as the sparkling new vehicles roll past. Will there be a day when they are no longer needed?
“It’s entirely possible,” Cao says. “And it may come relatively quickly. In workshops, including stamping, welding, and painting, we’ve basically achieved 100% automation.”
China has the edge over the US due to its enormous manufacturing base. Motors, batteries, electronics, gears, sensors – everything needed to build the body of a robot is all at hand.
“China also has an idea. It has a plan. They know where they want to be in five years. They plan at a top level, but they break it down to the regions, to the municipalities,” says Dr Susanne Bieller, General Secretary of the International Federation of Robotics.
“If you want to build a robot in Shenzhen – there’s an entire ecosystem. It takes you less than one hour to source the components you need to make a robot. In Europe it can take you up to a week.”
However, she acknowledges that while China is good at building the body, the US is still leading at building the “brain”, which includes developing the AI to programme robots. And yet Chinese firms, from DeepSeek to Moonshot, have been unveiling new AI models that they say can compete with top US firms.
Driven by an “open-source” approach, where AI start-ups share their code, Chinese innovation has been able to catch up faster than expected, despite US export controls over critical advanced chips. Analysts now believe that the next leg of this race will be determined not by who has the best language model, but who can put this intelligence into millions of machines.
And that is why China is also investing in producing a generation of students learning to imagine what could come next.
At the Hangzhou Technician Institute, for example, children can start from the age of 15. And the scale of what is being taught can feel staggering. There is an entire building dedicated to engines and aeronautics, and a restricted floor for students who will work to keep China at the forefront of processing rare earths – another crucial commodity in the battle with Washington.
Some see this as a solution to China’s stubbornly high youth unemployment rate, with one in five struggling to find a job. “Our students are in demand and can even be pre-booked by companies. They don’t need to worry about employment at all, and we hold competitions as part of their training,” Chen, the young teacher, says.
“It’s better to find your position within the technological wave. In the process of progress, structural changes are bound to occur, and these structural changes are exactly where students’ future employment opportunities lie.”
But China still faces serious economic challenges, from a property crisis that continues to drag on to huge local government debt and persistently low consumption.
Port Hope’s past fuels pushback on nuclear reactor
The Canadian Press, 21 Aug 2026
The Ontario government announced earlier this year that it will build one of the world’s largest nuclear power plants in Port Hope, Ontario. Though the news was welcomed by some, it shocked a generation of Port Hope residents old enough to have lived through or learned of the community’s fraught history with the nuclear industry.
1 This Month
Shut down the radiation-damaged Heysham nuclear reactors now
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Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
Say No to NASA’s Reckless Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
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