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The News That Matters about the Nuclear Industry Fukushima Chernobyl Mayak Three Mile Island Atomic Testing Radiation Isotope

250,000 tonnes of nuclear waste to be stored for 100,000 years

there’s a big question mark over whether future generations will have the knowledge to understand nuclear waste’s silent but deadly threat.

Where do you put 250,000 tonnes of nuclear waste? Wired UK, By Duncan Geere 20 September 2010 Around the world, nuclear power plants are churning out high-level radioactive waste at a rate of knots. It’s estimated that about 250,000 tonnes of the material is currently in interim storage, submerged in huge tanks of water in facilities that keep it safe — temporarily.

But there’s very little agreement on what to do with the stuff long-term, as it will remain a danger for around 100,000 years — almost as long as humans have existed, and far longer than we’ve been using tools. Continue reading

September 21, 2010 Posted by | 2 WORLD, wastes | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Call for referendum on Germany’s nuclear power plants

“Angela Merkel’s nuclear deal brings people onto the streets because when a government leader makes deals in the backroom that call into question the security of old nuclear plants, this is a recipe for political disenchantment,”

German Opposition Seeks Nuclear Referendum, NYTimes.com, By JUDY DEMPSEY  September 20, 2010 * BERLIN — In what is seen as a direct challenge to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s energy strategy and style of leadership, the opposition Social Democrats called Monday for a referendum on the future of the country’s nuclear power plants………….. Continue reading

September 21, 2010 Posted by | Germany, politics | , , , , | Leave a comment

USA losing the battle to sell nuclear plants to India

the chances of altering how the legislation works appear to be dimming….it looks increasingly likely that the Obama visit will center instead around job-creating deals for the U.S………..Nowhere did the statement contain a reference to the nuclear deal.

U.S. Chances Dim on India Nuclear Revision – India Real Time – WSJ, by Paul Beckett, September 20, 2010, “…. the U.S. government and nuclear-equipment industry have been scrambling to alter the impact of nuclear-liability legislation passed by the Indian parliament that the U.S. side views as unfavorable to U.S. nuclear suppliers as the Indian market opens up. Continue reading

September 21, 2010 Posted by | India, politics international | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Unsolved nuclear waste problem may stop nuclear industry in USA and EU

On Wednesday last week, Greenpeace launched a broadside against the European repository plans, arguing that leaders were being misled over safety issues – particularly relating to groundwater contamination. It appears the repository battle is about to go nuclear here, too.

President Barack Obama’s Yucca Mountain decision is a blow to US nuclear power- Telegraph UK, By Garry White 20 Sep 2010, US President Barack Obama appeared to deal a decisive blow to America’s nuclear power industry earlier this year, when he pulled the funding for a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. Continue reading

September 21, 2010 Posted by | USA, wastes | , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Cover-up of uranium news in India

As we shuttled between the police station and the district court in Jamshedpur for a week to get our equipment back, we got a glimpse into the kind of helplessness local villagers experience throughout their lives. If a journalist working for a national newsmagazine could be arrested and booked for visiting villages that have an overview of the mine, who would listen to the villagers?

Uranium mines afecting health of workers and local communities, India Info Online, 20 Sept 10, “…….UCIL seems to believe that national interest overrides the baggage of liabilities the pursuit of nuclear ambitions carries. Is it in our national interest to stand by silently as this scenario plays out in other uranium mines in the next year? Continue reading

September 21, 2010 Posted by | India, secrets,lies and civil liberties, Uranium | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Opposition to nuclear waste transport across Great Lakes

the Great Lakes and St. Lawrence Cities Initiative, which represents municipalities in the region, says the amount of nuclear waste in the proposed shipment exceeds by 50 times the International Atomic Energy Agency’s radioactivity standard for a single freight vessel. The cities group says the commission hasn’t released enough information about how it assessed potential ecological damage.

Plan to ship nuclear boilers stirs fears CBC News, September 20, 2010 9The Associated PressEnvironmentalists and some local government officials in the U.S. are protesting an Ontario power company’s proposal to haul 16 scrapped nuclear steam boilers with radioactive components across three of the Great Lakes on their way to a recycling plant in Sweden. Continue reading

September 21, 2010 Posted by | opposition to nuclear, USA | , , , , | Leave a comment

German anti nuclear movement to keep up the pressure on Merkel

rallies were planned on October 6 in the southern city of Stuttgart, on October 9 in Munich and on November 6 against the arrival of a shipment of highly radioactive nuclear waste in the northern region of Wendland.

German anti-nuclear movement vows to continue protests,  Expatica Germany, 20 Sept 10, After a major protest that drew tens of thousands of people to the streets of Berlin, Germany’s anti-nuclear movement vowed Sunday to keep up the pressure on Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government. Continue reading

September 20, 2010 Posted by | general | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Nuclear power costs out of control as it becomes a socialised ‘ward of the State’

“This analysis shows the greatest danger is not that the U.S. will import French technology, but that it will replicate the French model of nuclear socialism,”…”Nuclear power will remain a ward of the state, as has been true throughout its history in France.”

U.S. Nuclear Industry Will Remain Ward of the State, as in France, Report Warns By Sara Stroud   SolveClimateThu Sep 16, 2010 Government subsidies of nuclear power plans could hitch U.S taxpayers to a technology that suffers out-of-control costs while pushing aside renewable energy development, according to a study released last week by the Vermont Law School’s Institute for Energy and the Environment. Continue reading

September 20, 2010 Posted by | politics, USA | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Radiation poisoning of Navajo due to uranium mining

The Church Rock flood is only one incident among many in the “slow-motion disaster” investigative journalist Judy Pasternak comprehensively recounts in her chilling new book, “Yellow Dirt: An American Story of a Poisoned Land and a People Betrayed.”

“Yellow Dirt”: Radioactive reservation, The shocking story of how industry and government poisoned and then abandoned the Navajo Nation, Salon.com,  Laura Miller, 19 Sept 10,

In the summer of 1979, an earthen dam over the town of Church Rock, Utah, broke, flooding the arroyo below and then the bed of the Rio Puerco (an intermittent stream) on the southern border of the Navajo Nation. It was a small flood, but a dangerous one. It burned the feet of a boy who stepped into it, and caused sheep and crops along the banks to drop dead. That’s because the pond it came from had been used by a nearby uranium mine to store the tailings (residue) of its excavations — the water kept the radioactive dust from blowing away. The 93 million gallons of contaminated water that poured into the Rio Puerco remains the largest accidental release of radioactive material in U.S. history, bigger than the notorious Three Mile Island reactor meltdown that occurred 14 weeks later. Continue reading

September 20, 2010 Posted by | indigenous issues, resources - print, Uranium, USA | , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Berlin protest as thousands reject nuclear power

the anti-nuclear movement  has not seen  such strong public support since the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in the Soviet Union, in 1986.

Berlin / Munich – Two Cities / Different Crowds, EU Australia Online , September 19th, 2010 Weekend events in Germany saw a large protest in Berlin over nuclear power stations,…….CONFRONTATION OVER NUCLEAR STATIONS  Crowds estimated at between 40-100000, depending on who was counting, paraded to the office of the German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, in Berlin, objecting to government plans for extending the life of ageing nuclear power plants. Continue reading

September 20, 2010 Posted by | Germany, opposition to nuclear | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu awarded international peace prize

Vanunu’s data showed that Israel possessed over 200 bombs with boosted devices, neutron bombs, F-16 deliverable warheads, and Jericho warheads.

Medal for Israeli nuclear whistleblower, tehran times,  September 20, 2010, A human rights organization has planned to present a peace prize to the whistleblower of Israel’s secret nuclear program.The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) said it would give the award to former Israeli nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu, the Israeli newspaper Maariv reported on Sunday.
Vanunu will receive the 2010 Carl von Ossietzky medal. German journalist Ossietzky won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1935 for speaking out against the Nazi Party. Continue reading

September 20, 2010 Posted by | 2 WORLD | , , , | Leave a comment

So called “clean” nuclear technology might return to Hanford

Among the first decisions that DOE is expected to make is whether to lease land to Energy Northwest that’s near the Hanford 300 Area, which is just north of Richland, for a (?) clean energy park……At some point Energy Northwest might look at energy production through new small nuclear modules,

Future of Hanford land up for debate, Northwest News – The News Tribune By Annette Cary, 09/19/10 HANFORD — At the start of the 1940s, most of the 586 square miles that now make up the Hanford nuclear reservation was crop land and sagebrush range land where 20,000 sheep grazed…. Continue reading

September 20, 2010 Posted by | USA, wastes | , , , | Leave a comment

Nuclear missile shields are a provocation, not a prevention

No missile shield system will be able to prevent every missile from reaching its target. The expansion of the shield encourages more nations to develop means of penetrating it. The penetration and detonation of one modern nuclear weapon and its radioactive fallout would be so devastating as to traumatize any nation and its neighbors.

Stop the Missile Shield Now PETER G. COHEN FOR BUZZFLASH/TRUTHOUT, 20 Sept 10, The United States is now installing a missile shield from Northern Poland through the Mediterranean and Black Sea to Asia and Japan. The nations and warships involved are near to or bordering on Russia and China, though the stated intent is to protect our allies from the missiles of Iran and North Korea. Continue reading

September 20, 2010 Posted by | EUROPE, weapons and war | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Ralph Nader spells out the case against nuclear power

Nader shares locals concerns about uranium, GoDanRiver.com,  19 Sept 10, “…… Nader pushed for more energy efficiency and conservation and clean energy, which he said didn’t include more nuclear reactors or uranium mining.

“We don’t believe the country needs nuclear power,” Nader said in a Thursday interview. “It’s too costly. The opportunities for energy efficiency and electric generation to the consumer are far greater.”…

Nader said money should be invested in solar, wind and other forms of renewable energy rather than nuclear power, which he called a “gigantic technological lemon.” Nuclear plant projects can’t go forward without federal loan guarantees, he said, because Wall Street won’t invest in them without that backing.

Additionally, nuclear plants have the problem of radioactive waste, he said. The enrichment of uranium to concentrate it for use in fuel rods for nuclear reactors also takes coal-fired power, Nader said.

“Why do we need uranium mines?” Nader said. “They are extremely dirty.”….

Nader shares locals concerns about uranium | GoDanRiver.com

September 20, 2010 Posted by | general | , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Russian nuclear powered ice-breaker in the Arctic

Russians go nuclear in bid to crack pole   The Australian  September 20, 2010 THE Arctic icecap faces a new threat from Russian plans to build the world’s largest icebreakerThe new ship will be capable of smashing its way across the polar region even in winter.The nuclear-powered vessel would create shipping lanes across the Arctic Ocean while helping energy companies exploit the region’s gas and oil reserves.
The proposal coincides with reports last week that the Arctic icecap had shrunk to 4.66 million sq km, the third-lowest recorded since 1979. Its average winter thickness at the North Pole has also halved, to about 2.4m, since 1976.……Russians go nuclear in bid to crack pole | The Australian

September 20, 2010 Posted by | environment, Russia | , , , | Leave a comment