Justification of new nuclear power in the UK
Justification of new nuclear power in the UK By: Paul Dorfman 26 May 09 “……………………………………There are real problems – for example, information on how radiation-waste and radiation spent fuel from any new nuclear build could possibly be managed, or the health impact of radiation-discharges will not be fully assessed until after the “Justification” decision is taken.
“Justification” of new-build nuclear power will be decided even before the new reactor design is assessed.Also there are significant data gaps in the Nuclear Industry Association (NIA) Application on which “Justification” is built.
There is simply not enough information presented by the NIA in their application to make a rational decision about whether new nuclear build is warranted or not.
For such a significant process, the Justification timeline is short, and decisions will take place in closed session – far from public scrutiny.
The Nuclear Consultation Group believe that it is unfair that that the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change is to be the Justifying Authority – the person who makes the final decision – this is because he has already expressed clear support for new nuclear reactors.Given that Justification, once finalised, may foreclose on any future discussion on issues crucial to nuclear power, it is vital that this process is opened up in order to allow for meaningful and realistic examination of evidence a public forum…………………………..
Uranium mining and weapons poisoning, on the Navajo Nation
Uranium mining and weapons poisoning, on the Navajo Nation – Examiner.com Ann Garrison 27 May 09 “………………
He had almost gone to Flagstaff to enlist just before the Gulf War, in 1991, but had gotten a job making better wages on the reservation instead. Eight of his friends had gone, and all eight had returned alive, but then, all eight had died of cancer, within two years. All eight had believed that uranium weapons poisoning caused their cancers; all eight had been on the deck of an aircraft carrier when a black cloud of munitions blowback descended upon them.
The Veterans Administration denied that their cancers had anything to do with uranium weapons, or, any sort of other toxic exposure in the Gulf,……………. I’m not going to name my friend, or the friends he lost, because the recruiting pressure in Native America is like nothing I’ve ever seen outside New Orleans.
I also learned about the horrific, ongoing post-World War II legacy of uranium mining contamination in Navajoland, which had killed many Navajo people and left many others suffering birth defects and illnesses, including cancer in numbers far disproportionate to the general population.
The uranium in the weapons that the Navajo vets had believed to be the reason they were dying might well have been mined, in their own poisoned homeland, as the U.S. built its post World War II nuclear power, weapons, and war machine.
SF Energy Policy Examiner: Uranium mining and weapons poisoning, on the Navajo Nation
Nuclear waste reprocessing plan melting down?
Nuclear waste reprocessing plan melting down? Examiner.com Robyn Monaghan May 25,
The Obama administration may be melting down a program that would have shipped deadly radioactive wastes from around the world to a reprocessing facility eyed for Chicago’s Southwest suburbs.“The program has been terminated,” Department of Energy spokesman Brian Quirke told Chicago Page One Examiner last week about the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership.That happened in late March, when GNEP was chopped from the new budget, he said.The controversial Global Nuclear Energy Partnership [GNEP] was a pet project of the DOE during the Bush years. It called for transporting radioactive waste from the nation’s 104 nuclear reactors and from 25 foreign countries signed on as “GNEP Partners.”…………………..
……………………Slicing GNEP from the budget doesn’t mean the DOE is completely abandoning the idea of nuclear waste re-processing. The budget funnels $145 million for the Advanced Fuel Cycle Initiative, for conducting research on “proliferation-resistant” recycling and nuclear waste reduction technologies. The 2009 budget also includes $143 million for “defense nuclear waste disposal” activities, which some sources say means to developing Yucca Mountain………………………….It may technically correct to say GNEP is terminated, said David Kraft, with the Chicago-based Nuclear Energy and information Service. In fact, the new administration has simply renamed and re-budgeted it.‘You can dress up a pig in silk and marry it and call it your wife, but it’s still going to be a pig,” Kraft said.
Opponents say nuclear reprocessing nuclear waste has devastated local and regional environments wherever it’s done – in the UK, France, and Russia. They say France’s decision to reprocess reactor fuel has contaminated seas as far as the Arctic Circle and point to studies that radioactive discharges from La Hague in France contributed to elevated rates of leukemia among young people close to the site…………………………..Obama’s Energy Secretary Steven Chu is Nuclear is promoting nuclear as “clean” in global warming terms, despite “huge issues associated with the waste, in its transport, reprocessing emissions, and storage,” Headington said.
Doctors urged to use diagnostic alternatives to reactor-produced isotopes
Doctors urged to use diagnostic alternatives to reactor-produced isotopesLaura Eggertson CMAJ Laura Eggertson 26 May 09 The Canadian affiliate of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War is urging doctors to use diagnostic alternatives to procedures that require reactor-based ionizing radiation, because of links between the way medical isotopes are produced and the nuclear weapons industry…………………….. Edwards, a professor at Vanier College in Montréal, Quebec, and consultant on nuclear issues, says that makes the uranium a potential target for terrorists in search of material to build a nuclear bomb. “Now I know that most doctors don’t think there’s a connection between medical isotopes and bombs, but unfortunately there is,” Edwards, who is also president of the Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, told CMAJ. The connection is that molybdenum-99 is broken down into technetium-99m, that is used in about 1.5 million nuclear medicine procedures in Canada annually, Edwards earlier said to about 40 physicians at St. Paul’s University in Ottawa, Ont.
Arab nuclear ambitions embolden spurs nuclear renaissance
Arab nuclear ambitions spur nuclear renaissdance
The Huffington Post Ahmed Shihab Eldin 25 May
The nuclear deal with the UAE would allow joint ventures with US firms to assist the UAE in building several civilian nuclear power plants and has been signed despite the UAE’s record as a transshipment port for weapons-related materials to Iran.The “123 agreement”, as it is known, includes an “exchange of scientific and technical information and documentation…an exchange and training of personnel…technical assistance and the transfer of material, equipment and components.”……………..
………………..Israel is the only country in the Middle East that currently has nuclear weapons, estimated at between 100-200 warheads. Unlike its Arab neighbours, Israel has yet to sign the NPT………………. The Middle East is filled with various elements of unresolved conflict. Israel possesses formidable nuclear weapons capabilities and Iran has latent potential and appears to be set on advancing its enrichment capabilities.
The Arab world sits anxiously between the two foes, making plans for its own nuclear ambitions and energy programmes inextricably linked to the reality of being wedged between Iran and Israel.
Ahmed Shihab-Eldin: Arab nuclear ambitions embolden spurs nuclear renaissance
No to progress or peril? Revisiting the case for or against nuclear energy
what’s the case against nuclear power? Business Mirror 25 May 09 “……………………It boils down to two things: safety and economics, according to Prof. Roland Simbulan of the University of the Philippines, National Chairman of the Nuclear-Free Philippines Coalition (NFPC). “The major issue is safety considering that we do not have an effective disaster management culture especially to handle nuclear technology,” Simbulan told the BusinessMirror.
“Even industrialized countries have difficulty confronting this problem.” Simbulan adds that the safety issue concerning storage of nuclear waste will hound the country considering the Philippines is an agricultural country dependent on a fishing industry.
He also argued that the BNPP was constructed under a “conspiracy of corruption” as it is an overpriced, unsafe plant and one that has left the Filipinos with $2.2 billion of debt. Simbulan suggests that the best alternative to nuclear power is safe, clean and less expensive renewable energy such as solar, wind, wave, tidal, geothermal energy, among others.
“We have an eternal abundance of these renewables. Also, energy conservation and efficient technologies that require less energy to generate can be considered such as light bulbs that consume less energy for more light. We also have to simplify lifestyles,” he explained. Simbulan adds that renewables are easier to utiilize compared to nuclear energy. “In the long run, they are cheaper…………………..
……………. “It is a known fact that nuclear power is an expensive technology that is risky to operate and creates deadly radioactive waste. Congress must realize that every Filipino citizen aspires for a safe and secure future. This will not be achieved through nuclear power technology,” said Greenpeace Southeast Asia campaigner Francis de la Cruz.
Greenpeace argued that the history of nuclear power in the world shows us that aside from being costly and risky, it discourages energy efficiency and impedes the development of renewable energy sources that are cleaner, sustainable and safe.
No to progress or peril? Revisiting the case for or against nuclear energy
Government Urged To Step Up Anti-nuke Campaign
Government Urged To Step Up Anti-nuke Campaign Voxy.co.nz 26 May, 2009 – 15:14
The Government should take the advice of former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser and launch a new anti-nuclear campaign, says Labour’s disarmament spokesperson Phil Twyford.
Mr Fraser met the Prime Minister yesterday and is advocating New Zealand and Australia form a ginger group of countries to push for the abolition of nuclear weapons in light of US President Obama’s strong support for the cause.
“After meeting Mr Fraser, Mr Key told Radio New Zealand he would consider ‘whether we may maybe take a bolder and… larger step forward’,” Phil Twyford said.
“Because of our anti-nuclear legislation and longstanding commitment to disarmament New Zealand is well placed to champion the cause of ridding the world of nuclear weapons.
US nuclear accord with a Persian Gulf state raises concerns about proliferation
By Howard LaFranchi | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
US nuclear accord with a Persian Gulf state raises concerns about proliferationBackers says the agreement with the United Arab Emirates is a model for other countries in the region. But critics worry about the UAE’s ties with Iran.
from the May 23, 2009 edition
Washington – The Obama administration, anxious to demonstrate America’s willingness to deepen relations with reliable partners in the Muslim world before the president’s much-heralded speech to that community early next month, has signed a controversial nuclear cooperation agreement with the United Arab Emirates.
The nuclear accord, negotiated by the Bush administration but left for President Obama’s sign-off, is touted by the new administration – as it was by the former – as a model for future civilian nuclear cooperation with Arab countries……………………..opponents of the accord blast it as a short-sighted plan designed to secure lucrative contracts for US corporations that build nuclear reactors, yet one which may result in a string of plants producing nuclear fuel across a very volatile region.
“The US does not have a strategy to deal with this very real issue of proliferation, all they have is a sale,” says Joseph Cirincione, president of the Ploughshares Fund, an organization that promotes a nuclear-weapons-free world. “We shouldn’t be sprinkling the Middle East with nuclear power reactors until we figure out how to stop them from turning out nuclear bombs.”……………………………………Ploughshares’ Mr. Cirincione says….”What got these countries scrambling for nuclear technology was the summer of 2006, the war in Lebanon and Iran’s support for Hizbullah in that conflict.
US nuclear accord with a Persian Gulf state raises concerns about proliferation | csmonitor.com
Tribes protest nuclear waste plan
Tribes protest nuclear waste plan By Loa Iok-sin
STAFF REPORTER
TAIPEI TIMES May 24, 2009 Led by a royal descendant of an ancient line of Aboriginal Paiwan kings, residents and environmentalists yesterday staged a parade in Daren Township (達仁), Taitung County, to protest Taiwan Power Co’s (Taipower) plan to build a storage facility for nuclear waste there………………Opposed to the plan, more than 100 Paiwan and Puyuma Aborigines and environmentalists rallied outside a local elementary school yesterday morning, where they were blessed by Paiwan elders in a traditional ritual before they departed. The demonstrators then carried a cross on a two-hour march to the site selected for the facility.After arriving at the site, the demonstrators erected the cross and made a smoke signal to inform their ancestral spirits of their determination to defend their ancestral homeland………………………..“This region has long been a traditional domain of the Tacupul Kingdom, and it’s the job of all descendants of Tacupul to defend it,” said Sauljaljuy Ruvaniyaw, a member of the Ruvaniyaw family — the royal family of the Tacupul Kingdom that ruled in Daren and its neighboring areas hundreds of years ago………………….The rally and the march are only the beginning of the mobilization against the nuclear waste dumping ground, Ruvaniyaw said.
Asse nuclear waste workers getting radiation scans
Asse nuclear waste workers getting radiation scans The Local : 22 May 09 12:31 CETOnline: http://www.thelocal.de/national/20090522-19443.htmlThe Federal Office for Radiation Protection (BfS) announced Friday they will take on a large operation to test radiation-exposure levels of both current and former workers at the atomic waste depot Asse near the town of Wolfenbüttel in Lower Saxony. With this health monitoring programme, we want to find out if the cases of cancer and leukaemia of former Asse workers had anything to do with the radiation exposure of their work,” BfS spokesman Werner Nording said in a statement on the authority’s website…………………….Officials are now trying to determine what to do about dangerous nuclear waste which has been stored at the increasingly unstable site since 1978.
Asse nuclear waste workers getting radiation scans – The Local
French Court Turns Away Veterans Plea for Compensation
French Court Turns Away Veterans Plea for Compensation The Chosun Ilbo 23 May 09 A French appeals court has rejected demands by military veterans for millions of dollars in compensation for illnesses allegedly contracted during 30 years of nuclear testing in Algeria and French Polynesia. Still, the French government is preparing draft legislation to compensate some nuclear testing victims.
The court case is just one in a series of long-running complaints that French nuclear testing between the 1960s and the 1990s sickened many people. The latest case involves a dozen French veterans who claim the cancers they subsequently fell ill to are linked to radiation exposure from the testing. France conducted 210 nuclear tests in Algeria and French Polynesia over the three decades.But a Paris appeals court rejected their compensation demands, claiming they pertained to events before 1977 — when a law on compensation took effect………………………….Separately, another court in French Polynesia began to hear this year complaints from former workers at France’s nuclear test sites there.
Obama lying about nuclear warhead
Barack Obama is lying about the Reliable Replacement Nuclear Warhead
Examiner.com by Ann Garrison May 20, 2009 Barack Obama is lying about the Reliable Replacement Nuclear Warhead (RRW). He says that it’s not in his budget.
However, the RRW is in the $50 billion Pentagon “black budget,” and this is Commander-in-Chief Obama’s budget too.
- Obama and the rest of the Pentagon are free to use the black budget at will, because Congress would rather not know or take responsibility for it.
In January 2009, the London Guardian reported that the RRW is still being developed at Britain’s nuclear weapons laboratory, Aldermaston.
Neither President and Commander-in-Chief Obama, nor Energy Secretary Chu, nor any Pentagon spokesperson denied the report.
As Director of the Lawrence Livermore Nuclear Weapons Laboratory, Energy Secretary Chu oversaw the development of the Reliable Replacement Nuclear Wahead from 2006 until 2008, when Congress finally defunded it, under pressure in an election year.
It is inconceivable that Energy Secretary Chu does not know that the RRW’s development proceeds at Aldermaston, but, Chu was at least telling the truth, in a very deceptive sense when, earlier this year, he said that it would not be in his Energy Department budget.
Barack Obama, however, is lying. He is President and Commander-in-Chief Obama, with Constitutional, and military executive authority over the Pentagon. The Pentagon’s $50 billion black budget is Obama’s budget, first and foremost. He is lyiing when he says that his budget does not include the Reliable Replacement Nuclear Warhead .
Nuclear cleanup funds mismanaged
- Nuclear cleanup funds mismanaged New American by Steven J. DuBord Wednesday, 20 May 2009 As part of President Barack Obama’s stimulus package, “the Energy Department has begun releasing more than $6 billion in stimulus money to clean up 18 nuclear sites from New York to California, more than doubling the typical yearly funding for the program,” a May 18 Washington Post story recounts.
- The sites were involved in Cold War-era nuclear weapons production, and the cleanup will deal with radioactive and chemically hazardous waste. But it is another type of waste that is causing a concerned reaction and prompting “sharply worded warnings from some government officials and lawmakers who say the stimulus funding is ripe for abuse.”
The Washington Post points out that “contractors helped shape the stimulus package and are lined up to get the work, including many that have been cited for serious safety violations and costly mistakes.” The cleanup program “has long been plagued by cost overruns and delays and is designated by the Government Accountability Office as ‘at high risk for fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement.’ Over the past two years, estimated cleanup costs at all 22 sites have escalated from $180 billion to $240 billion, according to the Energy Department.”
http://www.thenewamerican.com/tech-mainmenu-30/environment/1136
Herbert, Utah Leaders Urge Stop to Nuclear Waste Arrival
Herbert, Utah Leaders Urge Stop to Nuclear Waste Arrival
Fox13now David Wells Senior Web Producer
May 18, 2009 SALT LAKE CITY – A federal judge has removed a major roadlock for EnergySolutions in its quest to to import Italian nuclear waste. U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart has ruled that a compact of several states doesn’t have the authority to ban foreign imports. Many Utahns, including Gov. Jon Huntsman, Jr. and Lt. Gov. Gary Herbert, have spoken out against the company’s plan to bring 1,600 tons of Italian nuclear waste to its facility in Utah’s west desert.
Utah Representatives Jason Chaffetz (R) and Jim Matheson (D) are co-sponsors of a national bill that could block imports of nuclear waste. FOX 13’s Katy Carlyle has more. http://www.fox13now.com/news/kstu-judge-compact-of-states-cant-block-foreign,0,7394556.story
Conn. high court backs anti-nuke plant activist
Associated Press
Conn. high court backs anti-nuke plant activist
By DAVE COLLINS , 05.20.09 A Connecticut environmental activist on Wednesday scored a significant legal victory in her fight over how the Millstone nuclear power complex manages its wastewater.
The state Supreme Court unanimously decided to allow Nancy Burton to challenge the state process that led to a preliminary decision to allow Millstone to renew its wastewater discharge permit. The state Department of Environmental Protection released a draft decision in August 2006 to renew the permit
Burton claims Millstone’s water intake and discharge system has destroyed billions of fish and other marine life in Long Island Sound and alleges the permit renewal process that began in 1997 has been tainted by bias, state favoritism toward Millstone and a disregard for environmental laws.
The five justices overturned a lower court judge’s ruling that Burton had no standing under state law to challenge the permit process.
“We conclude that the plaintiff’s complaint adequately sets forth facts to support an inference that unreasonable pollution, impairment or destruction of a natural resource will probably result from Millstone’s operation,” Justice Richard N. Palmer wrote in the court’s decision………………………A federal appeals court ruled in 2007 that power plants, including nuclear facilities, must use the best technology available to avoid harming aquatic life…………
1 This Month
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/2352741955560
of the week–London Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
Tell the Ukrainian Government to Drop Prosecution of Peace Activist Yurii Sheliazhenko
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity – go to https://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com
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