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

Wildfire danger to Russia’s top secret nuclear facility

Russian Wildfire Threatens Nuclear Facility, Voice of America, James Brooke | Moscow, 5 Aug 2010, As record hot temperatures reaching 35 degrees Celsius continue to bake Russia, wildfires threaten the nation’s nuclear-weapons laboratory and other military facilities.  A thick haze of wood smoke blankets Moscow……
Eight firefighting planes and 20 trucks are helping to keep flames out of Sarov, the location of the country’s top-secret nuclear research facility and a city closed to foreigners……..

Russian Wildfire Threatens Nuclear Facility | Europe | English

August 5, 2010 Posted by | Russia, safety | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Continuing issue of smuggling of Highly Enriched Uranium

The Georgian ministry of interior has foiled eight attempts of illicit trafficking of enriched uranium during the last ten years, including several cases of weapons-grade enrichment.”

Nuclear Smuggling in the Former Soviet Union, THE HUFFINGTON POST, Rizwan Ladha , 4 Aug 2010, “……..In 2006, a North Ossetian man named Oleg Khintsagov (sometimes spelled Khinsagov) was arrested for selling 100 grams of highly enriched uranium (HEU) to an undercover Georgian official. He was sentenced to 7 years in prison. An excellent detailed report of the entire episode (in PDF format) is available from the Belfer Center here, and is covered briefly in the new feature film,  Countdown to Zero. Continue reading

August 5, 2010 Posted by | EUROPE, secrets,lies and civil liberties, Uranium | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Medical scanners’radiation overdoses, but Toshiba still wants nuclear taxpayer funds

the overdoses were larger and more widespread than previously known, with patients reporting serious health problems. They face long-term risks of cancer and brain damage…..Given the information emerging about Toshiba’s safety record, is that [funding] a risk U.S. taxpayers want to take?

Company seeking nuclear subsidies under investigation for radiation overdoses to stroke patients, FACING SOUTH, By Sue Sturgis August 4, 2010 The U.S. Senate could vote as soon as next month on a proposal to give $9 billion in taxpayer-backed loan guarantees to companies planning to build new nuclear reactors — and one of the companies seeking the aid for a project in Texas is currently under federal investigation for its role in the radiation overdoses of patients who received CT scans on its equipment. Continue reading

August 5, 2010 Posted by | safety, USA | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Public anxiety over plan to use plutonium fuel in Browns Ferry reactors

The plutonium in MOX also makes fuel rods less stable, Lyman said. That increases the chance of a reactor meltdown. Not only is such a meltdown more likely, he said, but the use of plutonium would increase the number of fatalities by about 25 percent compared to a meltdown involving conventional fuel rods.

(USA) Crowd expresses concern over plutonium proposal, The Times Daily | Florence, AL, By Eric Fleischauer Decatur Daily, August 4, 2010 . A frustrated crowd of about 60 people confronted TVA and Energy Department officials at a public hearing Tuesday, and few expressed comfort with a proposal to use plutonium in Browns Ferry reactors. Continue reading

August 5, 2010 Posted by | technology, USA | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

lingering radioactivity affects worker

The site south of Buffalo housed a nuclear fuel reprocessing operation from 1966 to 1972. Uranium and plutonium were extracted from spent fuel. Cleanup has been ongoing since the 1980s.

NY nuke site worker had slight radiation exposure – BusinessWeek, WEST VALLEY, N.Y., 4 Aug 2010, A worker at a New York nuclear cleanup site had to be decontaminated after moisture seeped through her protective clothing while she was cleaning a floor, exposing her to a slight amount of radiation. Continue reading

August 5, 2010 Posted by | safety, USA | , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Fire at UK nuclear weapons factory

Residents evacuated after fire at UK’s main nuclear weapons factory, Telegraph UK, 4 Aug 2010, Residents located near Britain’s main nuclear weapons factory were forced to evacuate after a fire broke out in one of the plant’s buildings. By Andrew Hough An investigation has been launched into what sparked the blaze at the Atomic Weapons Establishment in Aldermaston, Berks, which maintains the warheads for the UK’s Trident nuclear deterrent…….
Both Thames Valley Police and the Royal Berkshire Fire and Rescue Service declined to comment.

In December ministers sold off the Government’s last remaining one-third ownership to a Californian engineering company.

Residents evacuated after fire breaks out at UK’s nuclear weapons factory – Telegraph

August 5, 2010 Posted by | safety, UK | , , , , | Leave a comment

Lingering legacy of Hiroshima’s atomic bombing

“I wanted to pass on the fact that the atomic bombing does not end only with the sufferings of the generation of people who were directly exposed.”

Hibakusha writes to his dead child, BY HAJIMU TAKEDA THE ASAHI SHIMBUN, 3 Aug 2010, An 81-year-old survivor of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima has written a letter addressed to his stillborn daughter, expressing his anguish at the possibility that his exposure to radiation was responsible for her fate. Continue reading

August 3, 2010 Posted by | general | , , , , | Leave a comment

Radioactive isotopes could be used to make a ‘dirty’ bomb

since cesium can be stolen from a hospital and thus can be more easily acquired than, say, uranium or plutonium, it wouldn’t be a stretch to imagine a terrorist group acquiring enough cesium to construct a barrage of low-explosive, highly radioactive bombs and blanketing a major city with them.

The Real Deal With Cesium,THE HUFFINGTON POST, Rizwan Ladha, 2 Aug 2010, The idea has been floated for a long time of using cesium in a radioactive “dirty bomb,” which wouldn’t have the same explosive power as a uranium or plutonium nuclear bomb but would contaminate land, water supplies and living organisms, including people. Continue reading

August 3, 2010 Posted by | 2 WORLD, weapons and war | , , , , | 1 Comment

Boars in Europe – radioactive from Chernobyl nuclear fallout

Because it is illegal to sell contaminated boar meat, Berlin has to compensate hunters who have harvested the radioactive boars that contain high levels of caesium-137. Caesium-137 is an unstable chemical that is water soluble (mushrooms are very absorbent) and toxic in small amounts.

Chernobyl fallout making some German boars radioactive  National Post, Jodi lai, August 2, 2010 “Nearly 25 years after the Chernobyl explosion, Europe still sees signs of radiation. Now it’s even in their wild boars…………Wild boars are particularly susceptible to radiation because they eat mushrooms and truffles, which are very efficient at absorbing radioactivity. Continue reading

August 3, 2010 Posted by | environment, EUROPE | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Hiroshima mayor calls on Japan to leave U.S. nuclear umbrella

As a lawmaker and later Hiroshima mayor, Akiba recognized that his city had the moral obligation to warn the world of the nuclear danger, the Magsaysay Award organizers said. He led a movement called Mayors for Peace that includes more than 4,000 cities in 144 countries.

Hiroshima mayor to urge Japan to leave U.S. nuclear umbrella, The Japan Times Online, Aug. 3, 2010, HIROSHIMA (Kyodo) Hiroshima Mayor Tadatoshi Akiba says he will urge Japan to withdraw from the U.S. nuclear umbrella in his peace declaration Friday at the annual ceremony marking the 1945 atomic bombing of the city. Continue reading

August 3, 2010 Posted by | general | , , , | Leave a comment

Court action to stop uranium drilling

The groups say the government improperly excluded the vent project from federal regulations, deeming it a “special use” rather than a traditional mining operation.
“The agency thus illegally bypassed the strict permitting and environmental protection requirements of its special use regulations,” the groups claim.

Groups Sue to Block Uranium Drilling in Utah, Courthouse News Service,By SUZANNE ASHE  2 Aug 2010,  SALT LAKE CITY (CN) – Three conservation groups want to stop the U.S. Forest Service from allowing a private mining company to drill 16 uranium exploration holes and two 6-foot-diameter vent holes on national forest land in southeast Utah. Continue reading

August 3, 2010 Posted by | Legal, Uranium, USA | , , , | Leave a comment

Images from the people who experienced the atomic bomb

SEE THESE IMAGES  –  artefacts and the stories of the people that they represent.

After the bombs dropped: Hiroshima and Nagasaki,  The Independent.By Matilda BattersbyMonday, 2 August 2010 An exhibition documenting the impact of the nuclear attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II opens in London today. Continue reading

August 3, 2010 Posted by | general | , , , , | Leave a comment

Stop radiation body scanners at airports, use non-radiation types

Given that the two types of machines are both deemed effective by the T.S.A., why doesn’t the agency just abandon backscatters and use the millimeter wave machines, which don’t pose radiation issues?

Radiation Questions Over a Body Scanner, NYTimes.com, By JOE SHARKEY July 26, 2010 IN about two years, if all goes according to the plans of the Transportation Security Administration, those vintage airport magnetometer metal detectors will be replaced by electronic body scanner machines at all 2,200 security checkpoints in all 450 commercial airports in the United States…. Continue reading

August 2, 2010 Posted by | health, USA | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Warning on radiation risks of medical heart imaging

clinicians need to take into account “justification” (is it really necessary?) and optimization (is it at the lowest dose possible?) of the tests.

Cumulative Radiation Doses Seen in Cardiac Imaging, July 9 (HealthDay News) — Cardiac imaging procedures, the use of which has exploded in the United States in recent years, are exposing patients to potentially cumulative doses of radiation, according to the largest analysis of its kind. Continue reading

August 2, 2010 Posted by | health, USA | , , , | Leave a comment

Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission will allow shipment of steam generators across Great Lakes

Bruce Power asked Canada’s nuclear regulator for a licence to ship the steam generators from its power plant on Lake Huron to Sweden, where 90 per cent of the metals inside the generators are to be recycled and resold. The remaining materials that are too radioactive to be recycled will then return to the Bruce plant to be contained for the rest of their radioactive lives.

Public hearing to be held on shipment of nuclear waste through Great Lakes – thestar.com, Brett Popplewell , Jul 30 2010 Canada’s nuclear safety regulator has agreed to hold a public hearing into a controversial plan to ship 1,760 tonnes of radiation-laced steel through Lake Ontario. Continue reading

August 2, 2010 Posted by | Canada, wastes | , , , , , , , | 18 Comments