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Nuclear energy sector may be permanently discredited over San Onofre debacle

fearSouthern California Edison’s Problems Ensnare Entire Nuclear Energy Sector Forbes, Ken Silverstein, 11 June 13 The nuclear energy sector has taken a blow now that Southern CaliforniaEdison has decided to permanently close its troubled nuclear plant. Safety is a key concern. But so is honesty and transparency. “….. nuclear energy experts are telling this reporter that the episode at SONGS does not boost confidence in the industry or its quality assurance processes. That will all come into play as the utilities seek to renew their older operating licenses. As a practical matter, the industry’s leading voice, the Nuclear Energy Institute, has remained mum on the subject, as has its leading utilities: Exelon EXC -0.61% Corp., Duke Energy, Dominion Resources and Entergy Corp….. the utility estimates that the decommissioning cost will run $2.7 billion, of which 90 percent has already been set aside. Basically, the spent fuel rods must first be cooled in pools of water before they will be stored in above-ground concrete-encased steel casks.

Overall, the price tag associated with the shutdown of SONGS is estimated to be $700 million. Chairman Craver explains that four potential pots of money exists from which to pay that cost: ratepayers, shareholders, insurance companies and Mitsubishi Heavy…..

it is not the decommissioning of the facility that is the big news; rather, it is the events leading up to that closure, which have culminated in criminal and civil inquiries as to whether the utility has been forthright and above board.

Ultimately, it could all settle and allow life at Southern California Edison to normalize. But the same may not hold true for the overall nuclear sector, which has been blemished by the lack of  candor and communications..

June 12, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Urging Prime Minister Abe to stop promoting nuclear power

Abe,-Shinzo-nukeMr. Abe should stop promoting nuclear energy. Even if the Rokkasho plant becomes fully operative, the resulting plutonium production will increase the danger of nuclear proliferation. If Japan and France wish to cooperate on nuclear energy, they should focus their efforts on cleaning up the areas contaminated by the Fukushima disaster and decommissioning the damaged reactors.

Cease promoting nuclear power http://www.japantimes.co.jp/opinion/2013/06/11/editorials/cease-promoting-nuclear-power/#.UbghOudwo6I 11 June 13,   Meeting in Tokyo on June 7, Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and French President Francois Hollande agreed to cooperate on the development of a nuclear fuel cycle and the export of nuclear power technology. Mr. Abe’s decision to push forward with nuclear power technology is deplorable given the damage caused by the ongoing crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. Continue reading →

June 12, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Iran’s nuclear program is peaceful, says Russia’s Putin

Russia’s Putin says Iran nuclear push is peaceful (Reuters) 11 June  -by Alexei Anishchuk, and Steve Gutterman,  Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday he has no doubt that Iran is adhering to international commitments on nuclear non-proliferation but regional and international concerns about Tehran’s nuclear programme could not be ignored.

Putin, whose country is among six world powers seeking to ensure that Iran does not seek to develop nuclear weapons, also said Iranian threats to Israel’s existence were unacceptable.

His remarks appeared aimed to strike a balance between the interests of Iran, on the one hand, and on the other, Israel and global powers seeking to ensure Tehran does not acquire nuclear weapons…………http://in.reuters.com/article/2013/06/11/nuclear-iran-russia-idINDEE95A0E920130611

June 12, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Questions on San Onofre’s radioactive trash disposal

FAQ: How will San Onofre store its spent nuclear fuel? 89.3 KPCC, Sanden Totten | June 8th, 2013 Southern California Edison announced it will permanently close the remaining reactors at the San Onofre nuclear power plant. The spent nuclear fuel will be stored on site “for  a very long time,” said Edison chief executive Ted Craver during a press conference on Friday.

According to Craver, the company has a $2.7 billion fund to help shut down the site. That will include decommissioning the reactors, disposing of equipment and moving radioactive spent fuel to storage units.

The shutdown raises questions about how the potentially hazardous materials will be stored and what risks are involved. We have some answers below.

Q: What will happen to the spent fuel at San Onofre nuclear plant? ……

Q: How much spent fuel is there at San Onofre?……

Q: What is the spent fuel made of?……

Q: How long will the waste be stored at San Onofre?…..

Q: What are the risks involved with storage at San Onofre?…… http://www.scpr.org/news/2013/06/08/37631/faq-how-will-san-onofre-store-its-spent-nuclear-fu/

 

June 12, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Closure of Sann Onofrenuclear plant opens opportunity for renewable energy

Sad Saga of San Onofre Nuclear Is Good News for Renewables   ”The demise of the San Onofre nuclear facility HERMAN K. TRABISH: JUNE 10, 2013 The eighteen-month struggle of the just-shuttered San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) has been chronicled in detail by GTM…………. The final straw was last month’s call by Senator Barbara Boxer (D-Calif) for a Justice Department investigation after letters were discovered showing that SCE purposely misrepresented the renovations to regulators as “like-for-like” (though it knew they weren’t) in order to avoid the costly license review…………. Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies Executive Director V. John White observed that “the prudent economic thing is to recognize the plant is out of the money and it is time to move on.”……….. “Thanks to consumer conservation, energy efficiency programs and a moderate summer, the region was able to get through last summer,” SCE President Ronald Litzinger said, but any 2013 “generation outages, soaring temperatures or wildfires impacting transmission lines would test the system.”

San Onofre staff is expected to be cut from 1,500 to 400 employees by the end of this year. SCE intends to pursue recovery of damages from MHI and NEIL.

The CPUC promised to protect ratepayers by quickly determining financial responsibility and by leading the effort for “energy efficiency and demand response programs, as well as transmission upgrades and enhancements and some new generation resources.”

“This opens up the market to renewables to fill the gap,” former utility official Freeman said. http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/Sad-Saga-of-San-Onofre-Nuclear-is-Good-News-for-Renewables?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+GreentechMedia+%28Greentech+Media%29

June 12, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Hanford nuclear facility – a radioactive horror story

Hanford 2011Paper: U.S. nuclear site “a true horror story” — Officials should be screaming at top of their lungs in outrage — “Problems could lead to explosions or nuclear reactions” #Hanford http://enenews.com/paper-u-s-nuclear-site-a-true-horror-story-officials-should-be-screaming-at-top-of-their-lungs-in-outrage-problems-could-lead-to-explosions-or-nuclear-reactions-hanford
Title: Time is of the essence at Hanford site
Source: Kingston Community News
Author: MARYLIN OLDS, Columnist
Date: June 6, 2013

[…] Hanford’s 56 million gallons of the most contaminated nuclear waste in the western hemisphere is a true horror story. […]
In February, officials announced that six single-shell tanks were leaking. These are not the first leaks; there have been decades of earth contamination. […]

Bechtel National is contracted by DOE to oversee the construction of a vitrification plant. Vitrification means processing the waste into glass logs […]
The decision was made to begin construction of the plant before the design had been vetted. Consequently, there are design problems that could lead to explosions or nuclear reactions. […]

Senators Murray and Cantwell, et al., should be screaming at the tops of their lungs in outrage. Instead, it appears it’s up to us to make our voices heard. Surely they’d all want to hear from their constituents.

See also: ‘Amazing’: Plutonium leak at U.S. nuclear site hidden from public — Official: “A very deliberate cover up… I will use the word that we were lied to” (VIDEO)

June 10, 2013 Posted by | general | 1 Comment

Young whistleblower standing up against might of USA government

whistleblowerNSA spy scandal whistleblower refuses to be bullied by U.S. EXAMINER JUNE 9, 2013 BY:  Edward Snowden, a young former CIA employee, leaked this week’s spy intelligence and says he refuses to be bullied into hiding. “I’m not going to hide,” Snowden, 29, said Sunday afternoon after news reports of his being the whistleblower of America’s spy scandal, a major rights violation.

“Allowing the U.S. government to intimidate its people with threats of retaliation for revealing wrongdoing is contrary to the public interest,” he asserted.

Snowden has been identified as the source who leaked the information to the Guardian‘s Glenn Greenwald this week, according him and Greenwald and confirmed by The Washington Post.

In a Guardian story posted Sunday afternoon, Greenwald and two other reports revealed Snowden as the whistleblower, who works for the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton but has contracted for years with the NSA.The Guardian named Snowden at his own request, the article said.

Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper Jr. announced Saturday that the NSA launched a Justice Department investigation into who leaked the information……. http://www.examiner.com/article/nsa-spy-scandal-whistleblower-refuses-to-be-bullied-by-u-s?CID=examiner_alerts_article

June 10, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Warren Buffett dumps plan for nuclear power plant

Buffett,WarrenWarren Buffett Shelves Plans To Build A Nuclear Plant   MidAmerican Energy utility developer is shelving plans to build a nuclear plant in Iowa, the Des Moines register’s Perry Beeman and William Petroski report. http://au.businessinsider.com/warren-buffett-just-shelved-plans-to-build-a-nuclear-plant-2013-6

MidAmerican decides against Iowa nuclear plant, DesMoines Register 3 June 13 MidAmerican Energy says design plan isn’t approved; environmentalists celebrate   MidAmerican Energy has scrapped plans for Iowa’s second nuclear plant and will refund $8.8 million ratepayers paid for a now-finished feasibility study, utility officials said Monday.

The utility has decided against building any major power plant. ….. “We opted for what was in the best interest of our customers,” MidAmerican vice president for regulatory affairs Dean Crist told The Des Moines Register… Mid­American will focus on its plan to build up to 656 wind turbines in a $1.9 billion project across Iowa, which also will trim power bills by saving fuel costs….

June 5, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Britain is missing its excellent renewable energy opportunities

Renewable energy is clean, cheap and here – what’s stopping us?  Guardian UK, A, 3 June 13 Energies such as solar and wind have seen dramatic price falls. The revolution in non-grid energy should be embraced by the UK The report from the Committee on Climate Change arguing that investing in renewable energy would eventually save consumers a lot of money is spot on.

We are regularly told by conventional utility companies, many politicians and commentators that energies such as solar and wind are hopelessly expensive and reliant on enormous subsidy.

But this is simply wrong. Renewables have seen such dramatic price fallsin the past few years that they are threatening to upset the world as we know it and usher in an almost unprecedented boom in the spread of cheap, clean, home-produced energy.

Solar will be the cheapest form of power in many countries within just a few years. In places such as California and Italy it has already reached so-called “grid parity”. Onshore wind, on a piece of land not constrained by years of planning delays, is already the cheapest form of energy on earth. These are not wild claims – those are figures from General Electric, Citibank and others…….

And solar is starting to pay its subsidy back. Germany now has more than 30 gigaWatt peak (gWp) of solar plants installed, such that on almost all days in the spring, summer and autumn, solar energy surges into the grid at a time when demand is at is strongest (air conditioning etc is running like mad) and when spot market energy prices are at their highest.

This peak price is being forced down by solar, helping to reduce wholesale prices. The big energy companies hate this because this peak is where they make their money. Solar in Germany is almost down to wholesale prices – in sunnier countries it already is…..

so-called “distributed” (ie non-grid) energy is where the real revolution is taking place. Distributed energy not only saves on the huge amount of energy lost in grid distribution, but it helps lighten the load on the grid. Whole German towns are going completely renewable. …. http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/01/renewable-energy-clean-cheap-uk

June 4, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

India a lucrative market for nuclear-selling nations

India quenching nuclear thirst from all around Pakisyan Observer, June 03, 2013 – AFTER entering into an agreement with the United States in 2008 for sharing of civilian nuclear technology, Indian Prime Minister during his recent visit to Japan reached yet another deal with Tokyo to deepen their defense cooperation and to reopen talks for a nuclear-energy agreement that would let Japanese companies export nuclear reactors andtechnology to India.

It reflects Indian quest for quenching nuclear thirst from all around and become a major nuclear power. However it is astonishing that peace loving Japan, the only country that suffered from nuclear weapons during the second world war and had been opposing the nuclear proliferation, has readily agreed to the Indian demand. There is all the possibility that the agreement between Japan and India that could become the key to deepening their nuclear relationship would lead to use of the technology for weapons. It is no secret that India is not a signatory to the CTBT while Japan has all along been urging New Delhi and Islamabad to sign it and in this background Japan’s decision to supply nuclear technology to India would be a source of serious concern in Pakistan. ….. http://pakobserver.net/detailnews.asp?id=208624

June 4, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Indecent haste for Japan to do nuclear deal with India?

Abe,-Shinzo-nuke-1India hopeful of inking civil nuclear deal with Japan: PM, Times of India,  PTI | May 31, 2013 ONBOARD PM’S SPECIAL AIRCRAFT: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Friday expressed confidence that India will soon conclude a civil nuclear deal with Japan that will allow Tokyo to export nuclear reactors to the country.

“There have been discussions with Japan and this visit marked a formal move in that direction. I am hopeful that before long we will be able to put our signatures to a civil nuclear energy agreementwith Japan as well,” Singh told reporters on his way back from Japan and Thailand. 

A joint statement issued at the end of exhaustive talks between Singh and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe this week had said the two leaders reaffirmed the importance of civil nuclear cooperation between the two countries, ….. http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/India-hopeful-of-inking-civil-nuclear-deal-with-Japan-PM/articleshow/20365669.cms#write

June 1, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Higher cancer rates in children who had CT scans

BMJ: Megastudy links pediatric CT to higher cancer rates, Aunt Minnie,  May 23, 2013, May 23, 2013 — The largest study to probe the effects of ionizing radiation since the atomic bomb survivor studies shows that cancer incidence does rise among younger patients — although only in small amounts — in the years following their exposure to CT scans, according to an Australian article published May 21 in BMJ…….
subscribers only http://www.auntminnie.com/index.aspx?sec=log&URL=http%3a%2f%2fwww.auntminnie.com%2findex.aspx%3fsec%3dsup%26sub%3dcto%26pag%3ddis%26ItemID%3d103512

 

June 1, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Finland and Poland to co-operate in renewable energy investments

Poland, Finland seek cleaner Baltic, renewable energy investments GDANSK, Poland, May 31 (UPI) –– Finland and Poland are looking to cooperate on cleaning up the Baltic Sea and renewable energy investments, Finnish Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen says…..  http://www.upi.com/Business_News/Energy-Resources/2013/05/31/Poland-Finland-seek-cleaner-Baltic-renewable-energy-investments/UPI-68641369972920/#ixzz2UvZgFAIt

May 31, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Petition to demand zero nuclear weapons

text-Please-NoteAction of the Week: Make History and Demand Zero Nuclear Weapons http://www.takepart.com/article/2013/05/20/action-week-make-history-and-demand-zero-nuclear-weapons , May 24, 2013

A world free from the threat of nuclear war? It starts today! There are nine countries around the world with more than 17,000 nuclear weapons combined, and many more are on the cusp of developing their own stockpiles. The fragile systems used to control these weapons for the past 50 years are crumbling—in the last two decades, there have been at least 25 cases of nuclear materials being lost or stolen.

The global costs of nuclear weapons are clear: bloated military budgets, more countries becoming weaponized, and the growing possibility that terrorist organizations will get their hands on a missile. This escalating insanity will end only when our leaders decide to make a nuclear-free world a priority. That begins with all of us taking a stand.

Four years ago, President Obama stated that he was committed to a nuclear-free world. It’s time to hold him to his word. In June, he will be meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, the perfect opportunity to negotiate the reduction of nuclear weapon stockpiles.

Since 2008, Global Zero has tirelessly advocated for the elimination of all nuclear weapons, winning broad support from both Republican and Democratic leaders. They’re calling on President Obama to keep his word and begin a step-by-step plan to eliminate all nuclear weapons. Add your name to their petition and tell President Obama that you believe in a nuclear-free world!

May 29, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Abandon useless £100 billion Trident nuclear programme, Hans Blix urges UK

Hans Blix urges Britain to relinquish Trident nuclear programme , , The Guardian,  27 May 2013  Former UN weapons inspector says UK will not be more protected if it extends life of Trident, at a cost of £100bn Former UN weapons inspector Hans Blix has said it is time for Britain to relinquish its Trident nuclear programme.

Speaking at the Hay literary festival, the Swedish international lawyer who led the hunt for weapons of mass destruction in the lead-up to the Iraq war, said he did not see how the UK would be any more protected if it extended the life of the nuclear programme – at an estimated cost of £100bn….. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/may/26/hans-blix-trident-abandon-britain-nuclear

May 27, 2013 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

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