France says nuclear power is ‘non-negotiable’

EURACTIV.com with AFP 9 June 23
French nuclear power is “an absolute red line” and non-negotiable, Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire said Thursday (8 June), following Franco-German disagreements over the role of nuclear energy in Europe.
Nuclear-reliant Paris has already irked Berlin by insisting on giving nuclear energy a starring role in European plans to produce more green technology in Europe.
“Nuclear power is an absolute red line for France, and France will not relinquish any of the competitive advantages linked to nuclear energy”, Le Maire insisted as he closed the annual conference of the French Electricity Union.
France’s 56 ageing reactors normally provide some 70% of France’s electricity needs.
“French nuclear power is non-negotiable and will never be negotiable. We will have to live with it, and we are convinced that it is not only in France’s interest, but also in the interest of the European continent”, he added.
Spat over EU’s renewable energy directive
Earlier, at the same meeting, German state secretary for economic affairs and climate action Stefan Wenzel acknowledged that France and Germany “often have different approaches in energy policy, especially concerning nuclear energy”
Germany “respects diverging choices for other fossil fuel energy sources by other member states as France that may similarly contribute to achieve climate neutrality,” he added.

However “what we cannot accept is when nuclear energy is defined as renewable, or low-carbon hydrogen is equated with green hydrogen”.
Agreement on the EU’s revised renewable energy directive was delayed last month as France requested further “guarantees” to limit the share of renewable hydrogen production for countries that already have significant amounts of low-carbon hydrogen derived from nuclear power…………………… https://www.euractiv.com/section/energy-environment/news/france-says-nuclear-power-is-non-negotiable/
The warmonger neocons, run the show of the puppet figurehead Biden.

Contribution from readers Tom and Sue Millon, 10 July 23
For Republicans and corrupt democrats, it’s never been about the debt of the USA or ending devastating military conflict. It has never been about domestic tranquility. As the arch neocon Dick Cheney said, “Reagan taught us that the debt doesn’t matter.” It’s about re-allocating the federal budget to the people who put you in office: arms makers, the military. oil companies, slumlords, tech giants. If you don’t have a lobbyist, a PAC or a dark money conduit, you don’t count for a damn thing in Washington dc. America and the world is paying the price of this. The neocons run Biden now. Their think tanks and focus, are heavily funded by arms makers and the military. The warmonger neocons, run the show of the puppet figurehead Biden.
Their goals are out of touch with anything that is rational. They are not preventing the escalation of this potential nuclear confrontation, they are encouraging it.
Eve Ottenberg
From the human-caused climate catastrophe to a nuclear showdown between Washington and Moscow or Beijing, to fascism ascendant, three terrifying disasters loom over humanity like the shadow of death. These threats have lurked for some years, but the Ukraine war, facilitated by Joe Biden’s arrival in the white house in 2021 and his pronounced aggressiveness toward Moscow, shifted nuclear Armageddon to center stage and pushed the doomsday clock close to midnight.
Trust between the Kremlin and western governments vanished long ago, so it’s hard to see how this calamity ever gets resolved. Russian officials watched the U.S. fork over more than $30 billion in armament to Ukraine with billions more in the pipeline, arm neo-Nazis, whitewash them and cover Kiev’s government payroll. They’ve seen (and often destroyed) the weapons Washington sent. Those weapons would never include long-range missiles that could strike inside Russia, Biden promised. Well, that oath wasn’t worth the toilet paper it was written on. The U.S. would never provide Ukraine with tanks, Biden swore up and down – until he changed his mind. American fighter jets, he gave his word, would not fly in Ukraine. Well, now we see what his word is worth. What next? NATO troops in Ukraine? Because then the bombing of U.S., European and Russian cities will commence. It’s called World War III. Biden knows this. So do the Russians. And despite their loud protests in the face of this nonstop U.S. escalation, they have become ominously quiet about their red lines.

Once upon a time in Bucharest back in 2008, Moscow basically told the west that if its neighbor Kiev joined NATO, that would be the end of Ukraine. Feckless Eurocrats and birdbrain American presidents did not listen. Years passed. Washington sponsored a coup against the duly, legally elected leader of Ukraine in 2014, then installed a west friendly, Russophobic regime, or perhaps more accurately a puppet, whose idiotic economic policies led to a population outflow of millions of Ukrainians, as Washington proceeded massively to arm and train far-right fanatics.
Through all of this, until December 2021, Moscow only protested about its red lines in general terms. It also periodically indicated it might snap. Then, in late 2021, the Kremlin sent detailed letters to Washington, listing Russian security concerns, chiefly that Ukraine should not join NATO. Moscow also was alarmed at the fate of Donbas Russians, 12,000 of whom Ukraine had slaughtered since 2014 and on whose borders Kiev had massed troops and, in early 2022, dramatically stepped up assaults, as noted by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Such a deadly uptick signaled assault and possibly ethnic-cleansing for Russian-speaking Ukrainians. But the U.S. blithely responded with hokum about NATO being a defensive organization. Hokum any half-wit can see right through by looking at U.S. missiles in Poland and Romania, two countries that border Russia.
Washington also insisted on every country’s sacred right to join NATO, though decades ago when Moscow mentioned joining, it got the cold shoulder; apparently Russia did not have that right. So the Kremlin could be excused for regarding NATO as a hostile military axis. Indeed, as our leading public intellectual Noam Chomsky said, “Putin’s invasion of Ukraine was clearly provoked, while the U.S. invasion of Iraq was clearly unprovoked.” (He also said whataboutism is “otherwise known as elementary honesty.”) Both invaders wrecked the target country, Russia more slowly, but make no mistake, that will be the outcome if this war doesn’t end soon.
The moral of the story is that if you can avoid war, that is a very good idea. If someone says “I will attack, if you don’t stop threatening me,” well, listen. The peacemakers are blessed, but sadly they were absent from the world’s imperial capital, Washington, in December of 2021. Currently they are absent everywhere they are needed, period.
So now, thanks to Biden, we stare down the barrel of nuclear war. The alternative in 2024 will likely be Trump, who promises accessories like martial law, a presidency for life, show trials of his political enemies and possibly nuclear war with China, in short, fascism. For this lousy choice we can blame our corrupt plutocracy and its media parasites. Put another way, those who rise to the top in Washington are not the cream of the crop, but the cream that curdled, years ago. Obama, Bush, Clinton – slick hustlers all, who slaughtered innocents across the globe, and all very short-sighted about anything other than looking out for the main chance, even if it meant bombing helpless residents of impoverished nations.
Meanwhile in the U.S. imperial capital, blood-soaked neocons run the show. This led to events May 26, when Russia’s foreign ministry summoned U.S. diplomats “over what it called ‘provocative statements’ by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan,” according to RT. “The American official was de facto supporting Ukrainian strikes against Russian territory.” Given that Sullivan’s up to his elbows in blood for his responsibility in this Ukrainian debacle, the blood of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers and tens of thousands of Russian ones, I’m not surprised he was, de facto or otherwise, basically advocating World War III. Moscow called his endorsement of Ukrainian attacks on Russia “hypocritical and untruthful.” That’s called understatement.

Sullivan, secretary of state Antony Blinken and his undersecretary Victoria Nuland are in charge in Washington, instead of the unfocussed, forgetful figurehead, Joe Biden, and they want war, for decades, if they so choose.

Inauspiciously, sane, non-neocons now resign from the Biden regime en masse, a development covered in depth by Moon of Alabama May 25. Rick Waters, head of the state department’s “China House” leaves his post. After the ridiculous spy balloon hysteria, with its wild delusions of assault and evil designs by a mortal enemy, Waters was one of the more rational actors, trying to limit the damage, reportedly emailing state department staff to postpone some sanctions and export controls on China, you know, moves that could have been viewed as, um, hostile.
Also dispiriting to those hoping to restrain imperial war schemes, deputy secretary of state Wendy Sherman announced her retirement. Sherman backed the original Iran nuclear pact and pushed hard to get an inept Biden administration to return to it, something, contrary to campaign promises, Biden couldn’t manage to do. As a result, the Middle East teeters constantly on the edge of regional war, which the pact would have helped prevent. Colin Kahl, a defense undersecretary departs this summer. He opposed escalating the U.S. proxy war in Ukraine. Nor was he popular with lunatic Sinophobes. To make the loss of these realists even worse, Biden tapped a ferocious China hawk to head the joint chiefs of staff, thus replacing the less rabid though rather ineffectual Mark Milley. All these moves spell trouble. They mean maniacal warmongers run the empire.
So the situation has deteriorated dangerously, and this is what Chomsky predicted if Washington didn’t face the “ugly” post-invasion choice of rewarding Moscow by enforcing Kiev’s neutrality and the Minsk Accords for the Donbas. No one has documented the U.S. empire’s depravity as long and relentlessly as Chomsky. His new book, Illegitimate Authority, continues this effort, singling out the triad of cataclysms – climate collapse, nuclear war and fascism – thundering in humanity’s front yard like the crack of doom. These interviews, collected from Truthout, at first zero in on how rich countries burning oil, gas and coal have crushed anything resembling a normal climate, with a few that focus on rising fascism.
For Republicans and corrupt democrats, it’s never been about the debt. As the arch neocon Dick Cheney said, “Reagan taught us that the debt doesn’t matter.” It’s about re-allocating the federal budget to the people who put you in office: arms makers, the military. oil companies, slumlords, tech giants, If you don’t have a lobbyist, a PAC or a dark money conduit, you don’t count for a damn thing in washington dc. Same goes for the , neocons whose think tanks are and focus, are heavily funded by arms makers and the military. The warmonger neocons, that run the show of the demented old, puppet figurehead biden.
Their goals are out of touch with anything that is rational. They are not preventing the escalation of this potential nuclear confrontation, they are encouraging it.
But when the book reaches early 2022, it shifts its emphasis to Ukraine. Chomsky is well aware of Washington’s provocations, while regarding Moscow’s response to them as criminal. He quotes Eastern Europe specialist Richard Sakwa: “NATO’s existence became justified by the need to manage threats provoked by its enlargement.” Well, now NATO has provoked a threat that, according to one whose hands are red with blood from this war, Nuland, could last “16 years.”
Chomsky also addresses the imbecilic fantasy of regime change, noting that historically this has led to worse, more extreme leaders, for which he cites a convincing discussion by Andrew Cockburn. Chomsky called NATO dreams of overthrowing Vladimir Putin “foolish,” because someone far more menacing would very likely take over. Among Kremlin leaders, Putin is, in fact, a moderate, with far less of an appetite for war than the others who advocated invading Ukraine for years, while he demurred.
In March 2022, when neutral countries sponsored talks between Moscow and Kiev, Chomsky warned, “negotiations will get nowhere if the U.S. persists in its adamant refusal to join…and if the press continues to insist that the public remain in the dark by refusing even to report Zelensky’s proposals.” Well, nowhere is exactly where they went, thanks to the then U.K. prime minister, the buffoonish Boris Johnson, who jetted into Kiev, allegedly at Biden’s behest, and clarified to Zelensky that while the Ukrainian president might be ready for peace, the west was not. That scuttled the talks.
That’s where we are now. Washington just extracted itself from losing a 20-year military quagmire in Afghanistan. Now it’s up to its neck in a proxy war its boosters say could last decades. Unfortunately for the imperial team, its opponent in this latest bloodletting is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons. This is not some helpless undeveloped country that Washington can bully and then prevaricate about pusillanimous American behavior not amounting to a military defeat. Russia is a great power and a nuclear one.
Nuclear-Powered Cargo Ships Are Trying to Stage a Comeback
Faced with the difficult task of decarbonizing, some shipping companies are taking another look at a polarizing solution—nuclear fission.
Wired, CHRIS BARANIUK, JUN 9, 2023
“………………………………………..Eisenhower agreed to authorize a nuclear-powered merchant ship that would carry both cargo and passengers. As well as goodwill, naturally.
The nuclear ship Savannah, capable of hauling 14,000 tons of cargo, entered service in 1962. Its reactor was encased behind 4 feet of concrete, as well as thick layers of steel and lead. In the glitzy passenger lounge stood an 8-foot-long table topped with white marble—and an early CCTV system so passengers could keep an eye on the reactor while sipping martinis.
…………….. heed this cautionary tale of nuclear hubris. The NS Savannah was a failure. During its first year at sea, the ship dumped 115,000 gallons of radioactive waste into the ocean. It had inadequate cranes and poorly designed cargo hatches. Egregiously expensive to run, the vessel carried passengers for a mere three years, and cargo alone for another five, before retiring.
Other countries also tried—and struggled—to make nuclear merchant ships work during the 20th century. West Germany’s demonstration nuclear cargo ship, the Otto Hahn, was refused entry to some ports and the Suez Canal on safety grounds. The Mutsu, a Japanese vessel, suffered a minor failure in its reactor’s radiation shielding in 1974, causing outcry. Indignant fishers blocked the ship’s return to port for several weeks.
As of 2023, there is only one active nuclear-powered merchant ship in the world, the Russian-built container-carrying NS Sevmorput. It is tiny compared to most fossil-fuel-powered container ships and has been plagued by breakdowns.
…………………………In February, a gaggle of organizations based in South Korea, including those behind multiple shipping lines, signed a memorandum of understanding. The group aims to develop nuclear-powered merchant ships equipped with small modular reactors. But they won’t say much else about the project.
“We believe it is too early to mention details on the tangible results of this partnership,” Hojoon Lee, a spokesperson for HMM, one of the shipping lines involved, tells WIRED. “We still have a long way to go to achieve the commercial viability of nuclear energy sources.”
There is another project afoot, in Norway, called NuProShip (Nuclear Propulsion of Merchant Ships). The team behind it has come up with a short list of six possible reactor designs that could work in a demonstrator vessel, says project manager Jan Emblemsvåg of the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. “The progress is quite OK,” he adds, via email. He and colleagues plan to convert a liquefied natural gas tanker called the Cadiz Knutsen to run on nuclear power.
Both the South Korean and Norwegian efforts are considering molten salt reactors. Instead of solid fuel rods, the nuclear fuel in these devices is dissolved into, for example, molten fluoride salts. Such reactors first operated in the 1960s and are nothing new, but technical issues, including corrosion occurring inside the reactors, have hampered their widespread rollout. Despite concerns from some over the viability of this technology, multiple countries are pursuing it.
………………………………………. while there are lots of nuclear reactors operating at sea right now, they tend to be on vessels with some of the highest security in the world. Commercial ships are occasionally subject to piracy and accidents, including large fires and explosions—the thought of adding nuclear fuel to such scenarios is unlikely to be met with enthusiasm.
The task of switching to a world in which nuclear-powered vessels are commonly welcomed at commercial ports is “not trivial,” says Stephen Turnock, professor of maritime fluid dynamics at the University of Southampton. “You have to have protocols in place to say what would happen in the event of an emergency associated with a nuclear-powered vessel,” he explains.
Simon Bullock, a shipping researcher at the University of Manchester, says that there is not enough of a regulatory framework to define how nuclear ships would operate globally in the commercial sector, including detail on who would bear responsibility for any mishaps. Would it be the ship owner, the ship operator, the manufacturer of the nuclear reactor, or the country where the ship is registered, known as the flag state? There are six “decade-long problems” of this kind regarding nuclear vessels that the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and other agencies would have to sort out if nuclear-powered commercial ships were ever to become widespread, he says……………………….
The crews on nuclear ships would also require special training and expertise, which raises the cost of running such vessels. Is it worth dealing with all these challenges, given the need to decarbonize right now? Probably not, says Bullock. “The critical thing here is the next 10 years,” he says, referring to the urgency of tackling emissions and climate change right now. “Nuclear can do nothing about that.”
Even the Norwegian NuProShip project won’t convert its first demonstrator ship until at least 2035. Meanwhile, there are other low- or zero-emissions fuels already being deployed in vessels—from methanol to ammonia, electric batteries, and hydrogen. None of these is perfect, and all will jostle for supremacy in the coming years. Nuclear, with its many complications, is “possibly a dangerous distraction” from the main horse race, says Bullock……………….. https://www.wired.com/story/nuclear-cargo-ships/
‘Minor’ leak at nuclear submarine dock

At a glance
- There has been a “minor” seawater leak at a naval base in Plymouth where nuclear submarines are stored
- A £3m contract has been awarded to repair the leak
- Thirteen decommissioned nuclear submarines are stored at 3 Basin at Devonport dockyard
- The Ministry of Defence said there was no environmental risk from the leak
Jonathan Morris, BBC News, 8 June 2023 https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cjejyq3e499o
HMS Valiant, a nuclear-powered attack submarine that was decommissioned in 1994, is set to be the first submarine in Devonport to undergo dismantling.
An MoD spokesperson said: “Work is planned at 3 Basin at HMNB Devonport to address minor seawater leakage from the basin and weathered stone edgings.
“The leak does not present an environmental risk and both the basin and entrance gate remain structurally sound.”
The MoD was criticised in 2019 over its failure to dispose of obsolete nuclear submarines.
It said it would dispose of them “as soon as practically possible”.
There are 20 decommissioned submarines in storage at Devonport and Rosyth.
The estimated cost of fully disposing of a submarine is £96m, the National Audit Office has said.
Mayors call for action against nuclear war
Beyond Nuclear, June 9, 2023
At the close of its 91st Annual Meeting in Columbus, Ohio, on June 5, 2023, the final business plenary of the United States Conference of Mayors (USCM) unanimously adopted a new resolution, titled, “Calling for Urgent Action to Avoid Nuclear War, Resolve the Ukraine Conflict, Lower Tensions with China, and Redirect Military Spending to Meet Human Needs.” This is the eighteenth consecutive year that the USCM has adopted a resolution submitted by U.S. members of Mayors for Peace.
The resolution’s lead sponsor, Mayor Frank Cownie of Des Moines, Iowa, (pictured) and U.S. Vice-President of Mayors for Peace, commented: “This resolution carries on the U.S. Conference of Mayors’ proud tradition for nearly two decades of standing for the non-use and global elimination of nuclear weapons.”
Jackie Cabasso, Mayors for Peace North American Coordinator, added: “For the first time, a U.S. Conference of Mayors resolution on nuclear disarmament lends the organization’s support to a specific legislative measure, H. Res. 77, ‘Embracing the Goals and Provisions of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons’.”
Res. 77, introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA) and Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) on January 31, 2023, calls on the United States to adopt the Back from the Brink Campaign’s comprehensive policy prescriptions for reducing nuclear risks and preventing nuclear war. More than 70 cities, towns, counties and states have passed Back from the Brink resolutions, and more than 400 organizations have endorsed the Back from the Brink platform………………………………………………… more https://beyondnuclear.org/mayors-call-for-action-against-nuclear-war/
Starve the Poor; Feed the Pentagon

As Hartung writes, Congress is bought by the weapons industry. It is a kind of money laundering scheme where increased military spending comes back as campaign donations, a perfect example of the legalized bribery that is the real governing system of the U.S.
BY PATRICK MAZZA, CounterPunch 8 June 23
Once again, while other needs are squeezed, a federal budget deal will literally starve the poor to feed the military. While new work requirements are placed on SNAP recipients that will drive some from the food support program, the military budget (never call it defense) remains untouched. The recent debt ceiling deal leaves Joe Biden’s $886 billion 2024 Pentagon budget request intact while domestic programs are slashed.
In real terms it is the largest military budget in U.S. history, the only exceptions being World War II and the height of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars that came after 9-11. Larger by far than during the Korean and Vietnam Wars, or the Reagan military buildup.
The real military budget is even higher. Adding in nuclear weapons, foreign military aid and “intelligence,” the project puts the current 2023 budget at $920 billion. That is still an undercount. William Hartung, an expert on military spending, calculates that even in fiscal year 2020 the total military expenditure was $1.25 trillion, adding in other costs such as support for veterans and debt service. It’s easily pushing $1.5 trillion by now.
The U.S. by far is the biggest military spender on Earth, with 39% of the total, exceeding the next 10 nations combined, as this chart [on original] shows:
So why is the military budget so unassailable? Why, no matter how often bloated military spending is denounced, does the budget climb toward ever greater heights? Even after Dwight Eisenhower made the famous warning in his farewell address:
“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.
Ike would have known, being one of the progenitors of that complex as the general leading U.S. forces that invaded Europe during D-Day and as the president during the nuclear buildup of much of the early Cold War. One clue as to why his warning went unheeded is in the fact he originally wanted to call it the military-industrial-congressional complex, the “iron triangle” that keeps pumping up military expenditures. As Hartung writes, Congress is bought by the weapons industry. It is a kind of money laundering scheme where increased military spending comes back as campaign donations, a perfect example of the legalized bribery that is the real governing system of the U.S.
But there are deeper reasons, explaining why that “alert and knowledgeable citizenry” for which Ike called has never appeared, at least to the level able to tie back the power of the complex. War and militarism are rooted deep in the U.S. of American experience. As former President Jimmy Carter said, “If you go around the world and ask people which is the most warlike country on Earth, which one do you think they would respond? The United States. Since we left the Second World War, and even before, the United States has constantly been at war in some part of the world. We’ve been in about 30 combats with other countries since the Second World War . . . So I would say that the military-industrial complex, the manufacturers of all kinds of weapons, are very influential in the country and the Congress as well.”
Carter noted that the U.S. hasn’t been at war with someone only 16 years of its 242-year history. (Even that is doubtful ……………………………………………….
We are enmeshed in the ways of empire.
“Empire became so intrinsically our American way of life that we rationalized and suppressed the nature of our means in the euphoria of the enjoyment of the ends . . . It is perhaps a bit too extreme, but only by a whisker, to say that imperialism has been the opiate of the American people.”………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
The planet’s economist: has Kate Raworth found a model for sustainable living?

Her hit book Doughnut Economics laid out a path to a greener, more equal society. But can she turn her ideas into meaningful change?
by Hettie O’Brien, Guardian, 8 June 23
The problem is that there are few templates for an economy that
radically shrinks the world’s carbon footprint without also shrinking our
quality of life. The economist Kate Raworth believes she has a solution.
It is possible, she argues, to design an economy that allows humans and the
environment to thrive. Doing so will mean rejecting much of what defined
20th-century economics. This is the essential premise of her only book,
Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st Century Economist,
which became a surprise hit when it was published in 2017.
The book, which
has been translated into 21 languages, brings to mind a charismatic
professor dispensing heterodox wisdom to a roomful of students. “Citizens
of 2050 are being taught an economic mindset that is rooted in the
textbooks of 1950, which in turn are rooted in the theories of 1850,”
Raworth writes.
By exposing the flaws in these old theories, such as the
idea that economic growth will massively reduce inequality, or that humans
are merely self-interested individuals, Raworth wants to show how our
thinking has been constrained by economic concepts that are fundamentally
unsuited to the great challenges of this century.
Guardian 8th June 2023
Chalk River: Radioactive Wastes and the Honour of the Crown
Background: May 9, 2023
A consortium of multinational corporations, operating under the banner CNL (Canadian Nuclear Laboratories), is contracted to manage all of the federal government’s nuclear facilities. The contract obliges CNL to “reduce the liability” associated with the multibillion dollar legacy of radioactive wastes created in the name of the Crown by uranium processing (mainly at Port Hope, Ontario) and by nuclear fission (mainly at Chalk River). CNL has been given close to a billion dollars a year for the last five years from Canadian taxpayers.
The Port Hope and Chalk River nuclear facilities are outgrowths of the World War II Atomic Bomb project and the subsequent Cold War era. Canada sold uranium and plutonium almost exclusively for nuclear weapons use from 1941 to 1965. In a very real sense, the “legacy radioactive wastes” at these two sites are in large part leftovers of the American bomb program and the Cold War arms buildup.
How does CNL propose to deal with the radioactive legacy of the nuclear age? At Chalk River, CNL proposes to build a huge earthen mound of “low-level” radioactive and toxic chemical wastes within one kilometre of the Ottawa River. The low-level waste is a minute fraction of the total radio-toxic burden at Chalk River, which includes highly radioactive reactor cores, tanks of reprocessing liquid, plutonium handling facilities, and large quantities of high-level and intermediate-level radioactive wastes for which there is as yet no plan at all. The mound is a cheap and convenient way of dealign with the most voluminous material, clearing the decks for building new facilities that will produce even more challenging forms of nuclear wastes, while ignoring the bulk of the radioactivity that afflicts this “Nuclear Sacrifice Zone”.
The engineered mound – a glorified landfall 5 to 7 stories high – will hold a million cubic metres of toxic waste, on a site that drains into Perch Lake and then into the Ottawa River. Called a “Near Surface Disposal Facility” (NSDF), this megadump is planned to be built on lthe unsurrendered territory of several Algonquin communities that have inhabited the Ottawa Valley for thousands of years.
Canada’s nuclear regulator, the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) conducted an environmental assessment of the NSDF and held a week of public hearings in February 2022. Since then, two Algonquin communities – the Keboawek First Nation (KFN) and the Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg (KZA) community, have demonstrated their strong opposition to the proposed megadump, as have more than a hundred communities downstream from Chalk River, including the 18 municipalities comprising the Montreal City Agglomeration Council. KFN has done outstanding work in documenting several key species inhabiting the proposed site that have been totally ignored by the environmental assessment process.CNL is now asking CNSC to grant CNL a licence amendment to prepare the contested site for the NSDF.
Public hearings will be held remotely on June 27 with no opportunity for intervenors to appear in person before the Commission, despite strong requests from the Indigenous communities to allow face-to-face meetings.
All those who intervened in the February 2022 hearings are allowed no more than 5000 words to give their final input on this issue before CNSC renders its decision. Here is the final submission from the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility.
Radioactive Wastes and the Honour of the Crown
Final report submitted to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission
by Gordon Edwards, president, Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility
www.ccnr.org/CCNR_CNSC_NSDF_final_2023.pdf
Contents –
1. The Honour of the Crown
2. Protecting the Environment & the Health and Safety of Persons
3. Communicating with Future Genera>ons
4. Safety Culture and the Justification Principle
5. A Tale of Two Dumps
6. List of radioactive poisons
Water levels at Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant ‘critical’ after dam collapsesin Ukraine.
Water levels at Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant ‘critical’ after dam collapses
in Ukraine. Water levels have fallen below a critical point for being able
to supply cooling water to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station, the
operator of the Kakhovka dam in Ukraine has said.
Mirror 8th June 2023
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/breaking-water-levels-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-30109697
US presidential candidate Nikki Haley says that arming Ukraine is “preventing war”
US presidential candidate Nikki Haley insists on WW3 if Ukraine loses, 9 June 23, https://www.rt.com/news/577539-nikki-haley-ukraine-ww3-cheerleading/
The Republican presidential candidate explained that the only way to prevent war was to “send a message” by fighting one
Allowing Ukraine to lose to Russia on the battlefield will unleash world war, according to US Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley. The former South Carolina governor told a town hall audience in Iowa on Sunday that arming Kiev was all about “preventing war” by “sending a message” to America’s rivals.
“When Ukraine wins, that sends a message to China with Taiwan, it sends a message to Iran that wants to build a bomb, it sends a message to North Korea testing ballistic missiles, it sends a message to Russia that it’s over.”
“It is in the best interests of America, it is in the best interests of our national security for Ukraine to win. We have to see this through, we have to finish it,” Haley declared.
Regarding how the war might finish, Haley was less forthcoming. “It would end in a day if Russia would pull out,” she suggested. “If Ukraine pulls out, then we’re all looking at world war.” To prevent that, she explained, Kiev needed weapons – lots of them.
“A win for Ukraine is a win for all of us, because tyrants tell us exactly what they’re gonna do,” Haley continued, claiming “Russia said Poland and the Baltics are next,” should Ukraine fall. “If that happens, we’re looking at a world war,” she repeated.
While much has been written about the possibility of a Russian invasion of Poland or the Baltic states, even most US experts admit these are unlikely. Invading any of those countries would trigger Article 5, NATO’s mutual-defense clause, turning a conflict many have described as a proxy war between Moscow and Brussels into a direct war between nuclear powers.
Haley has been quick to set herself apart on foreign policy matters from Republican frontrunner Donald Trump, who quipped earlier this year that it was the US, not Russia, that needed regime change, and from challenger Ron DeSantis, who downplayed the conflict in Ukraine as a “territorial dispute.”
During the town hall, she again scoffed at the notion of remaining neutral in the conflict, insisting “This is a war about freedom and it’s one we have to win.”
While Haley served as US ambassador to the United Nations under Trump, she made no secret of her interventionist leanings, even announcing an unexpected round of sanctions against Russia that the White House then had to retract. She has urged the Biden administration to give in to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky’s demands for F-16 fighter jets for months and impose even more sanctions, insisting Washington is too soft on Moscow.
The Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant used water from the destroyed Nova Kakhovka dam. What happens now?
By Felicity Ripper with wires, ABC, 9 June 23
One of the world’s largest nuclear power plants relies on a water reservoir linked to the destroyed Nova Kakhovka dam.
So what does that mean for the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant?
What is the relationship between Nova Kakhovka dam and the Zaporizhzhia plant?
The main line of water used at the plant is pumped out of the reservoir above the dam, and up to the site.
This reservoir is currently draining because the downstream dam has collapsed………………………
But isn’t the plant in shutdown?
Zaporizhzhia was placed in a cold shutdown in September 2022.
While it doesn’t need the large amounts of water it would while operating normally, it still needs some supplies for cooling.
Dwindling water supplies also complicate any future prospects of restarting the power plant.
Has the plant lost its water supply from the dam reservoir?
Not yet.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Rafael Grossi said water could still be pumped out for a few days after the dam’s collapse.
“The rate may reduce as the water lowers,” he said.
Mr Grossi on Tuesday said that the water in the reservoir was sitting at 16.5m, and once it reached 2.7m it could no longer be pumped out.
He said while there was no reason for panic, the plant was facing a serious situation. ………………………….. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-06-09/explainer-zaporizhzhia-nuclear-nova-kakhovka/102454194
Letter. Nuclear plan raises suspicions
By Carrie Parks, Vancouver, June 9, 2023, https://www.columbian.com/news/2023/jun/09/letter-nuclear-plan-raises-suspicions/
I am opposed to using my ratepayer money to subsidize a study for Energy Northwest (Formerly WPPSS or “Whoops”) to start developing small modular nuclear reactors.
First, this idea seems to be getting rushed through without enough public attention or comment. That raises my suspicions right there. Second, WPPSS already stuck the taxpayers of this state once before with huge expenses when nuclear power failed, causing the second-largest municipal bond default in U.S. history.
Third, they are justifying nuclear power to help get us off fossil fuels, but this is a false argument. We still have no way to safely store nuclear waste, which can remain dangerously radioactive for thousands of years. So to build multiple plants that will create more such waste will only substitute one type of environmental poison for another.
We need to find solutions that work in concert with nature, not ones that destroy it. I suggest you review the website https://www.drawdown.org/, which has many practical, science-based ways to both conserve and create energy to meet our needs in a much safer and responsible manner.
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