Delays at Japan’s ill-fated nuclear plant
Delays at Japan’s ill-fated nuclear plant
By Hiroyuki Koshoji
UPI Tokyo, Japan — Japan’s Rokkasho Reprocessing Plant, built to extract plutonium from the spent fuel produced in Japan’s nuclear reactors, continues to be plagued by technical difficulties that have pushed its start-up date for commercial operations to August this year.
The plant in Rokkasho in northern Japan was out of action for nine months from the end of 2007 due to problems in one of its vitrification facilities, a furnace that mixes high active liquid waste with molten glass to seal radioactive waste in glass canisters that can safely be buried in the ground.
Attempts to restart the plant failed last October as problems with the glass melting process persisted. Then in January, 150 liters of high-level liquid radioactive waste leaked from pipes in the vitrification cell, forcing Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd. to postpone operations until August.
The problems at Rokkasho, especially with extracting plutonium from spent nuclear fuel, are a blow to Japan’s nuclear fuel-cycle program,………………. According to the Federation of Electric Power Companies of Japan, out of the 19,240 tons of total storage capacity available in Japan for spent nuclear fuel, 60 percent is already occupied. It is believed that storage capacities at Fukushima and the Tokyo Electric Power Company Inc. would be used up within two to three years.
An open, honest nuclear debate
An open, honest nuclear debate Alberta’s ‘public consultation’ on nuclear power seems designed to quash any opposition to the plan canada.com By Douglas Roche, 19 May 2009
The consultation process launched by the Alberta government to determine if a nuclear power plant should be built in the Peace River area appears designed to dampen any opposition to the plan.
The Alberta nuclear consultation survey is cleverly formulated to intimidate all those without a scientific background, for example, asking the responders if they can explain the details of Alberta’s electricity system or nuclear energy to others. The responder is asked to affirm whether or not: “I was very familiar with the history of nuclear use in Canada.” In other words, if you don’t have a technical background, is your opinion worth much? Why bother to proceed if you’re not an expert?………..
……………………The report of the nuclear power expert panel and the government’s subsequent workbook downplay the risk of nuclear accidents, the staggering costs to taxpayers of nuclear power, the link between nuclear power and nuclear weapons, and the immense new potential of alternate sources of energy……………………………
A new study by the Pembina Institute found Alberta could go from producing more than 70 per cent of its electricity from coal to 70 per cent from clean energy sources in just 20 years, based on existing technology and rates of deployment already seen in other jurisdictions.
Using proven renewable energy technologies, combined with industrial co-generation and a serious commitment to improved consumption efficiency, Alberta could satisfy its growing demand for power while dramatically reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other harmful environmental impacts……………..
……………..For every argument that nuclear power is entering a “renaissance,” there is another that it is headed for obsolescence.
Soviet-Era Uranium Waste Sites Now Threaten Central Asia
Soviet-Era Uranium Waste Sites Now Threaten Central Asia Georgian Daily 19 may Paul goble Storage sites for uranium tailings that were built in Soviet times in Tajikistan are now leaking radiation into the surrounding atmosphere and ground water supplies, undermining the health and well-being of the people of a republic and a broader region that lack the resources to clean up a problem that it did nothing to create………………………..
The impact of the release of radioactive materials on the health of the population is already clear. Not only are the numbers of people suffering from cancer increasing, but the age of onset of cancers is falling, with many local people showing signs of cancer when they are only 15 or 16 years old, something almost unheard of earlier.
Moreover, medical officials from Dushanbe say that the overall health statistics for the areas around the uranium tailings sites are chilling: The number of stillborn children has increased as have the number of newborns with congenital defects. Some 85 percent of women in the region suffer from anemia, as do more than 64 percent of newborns…………………………..he amount of radioactive leavings is enormous, more than 450 million tons.
As a result, Ferghana.ru concludes sadly, the prospects are not good. “The elites have left the area forever because they know that the supplies of uranium are practically exhausted and that sooner or later all the factories and combines involved with the production of nuclear fuel will stop.”
In the end, the news service suggests, the local population will stand alon, facing “only the ruins of nuclear processing and mountains of ecological problems.”
georgiandaily.com – Soviet-Era Uranium Waste Sites Now Threaten Central Asia
Russia starts building world’s first floating nuclear power plant
Russia starts building world’s first floating nuclear power plant MOSNEWS.com 19 May, 11:07 PMRussia began assembling the world’s first floating nuclear power plant on a St. Petersburg wharf on Monday. The enormous platform carrying two nuclear reactors will produce heat and energy and desalinate sea water……………………
Developers of the floating station claim it is environmentally friendly.
The contract for building the first of the floating nuclear power plants is worth 983 billion rubles ($30.6 billion), Interfax reported.
Russia starts building world’s first floating nuclear power plant / MosNews.com
Russia Especially Concerned About Threat of Nuclear War in Asia
Russia Especially Concerned About Threat of Nuclear War in Asia DIGITAL JOURNAL By Carol Forsloff.Published yesterday by ■ Carol Forsloff 19 May 09
Russian newspapers, like those in the West, are concerned about the ratcheting up of violence in Asia. They see the Russian – American nuclear armament race and potential outcome as a stalemate. Pakistan and India, however, play by different rules.Front page news in Russia declares the concern that country has about the possibility of nuclear war between two powers that don’t play by the same rules as other nations have done. This is seen as having serious catastrophic consequences for the entire world, given the threats involved and the extreme political views held by certain factions, especially within Pakistan……………….
………..India already has enormous potential since it expanded its capabilities in 2001 given the fact that the country never signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The government of India believes it is entitled to have the same privileges as Russia, the USA, China, Great Britain and France with nuclear weapons.
Here’s the terrible problem. It is recognized that Pakistan and India are enemies and have been so for decades. China and India have had border clashes that could easily manifest into war. Whereas Pakistan could attack India, it doesn’t have the capability of destroying most of India’s nuclear arms. Pakistan is smaller in size, and India has a greater nuclear capability. Add to that the Aghanistan War and the problems on the border with Pakistan. The chief, however, is China that has enormous capacity compared to either India or Pakistan; and if that sleeping giant enters the fray, the facts are this: war indeed will be hell, as newspapers in Russia detail.
Russia Especially Concerned About Threat of Nuclear War in Asia – Digital Journal: Your News Network
Extent of tritium leaks still unknown
Extent of tritium leaks still unknown APP.com By Todd B. Bates • ENVIRONMENTAL WRITER • May 17, 2009
A month after radioactive tritium was found in a concrete vault and then ground water at the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant in Lacey, experts still are trying to define the scope of the contamination. Plant owner Exelon Corp. also is still investigating the cause of the contamination and whether there are other leaks, according to plant and federal officials. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission decided last month that Oyster Creek was “good for 20 years, and it didn’t last three weeks before something failed,” said Richard Webster, legal director at the Eastern Environmental Law Center in Newark………
…………. Five monitoring wells at the plant were contaminated with up to 265 times government limits for tritium in water, according to May 6 data provided by Sheehan. Tritium is a weak isotope of hydrogen that increases the risk of cancer.
Extent of tritium leaks still unknown | APP.com | Asbury Park Press
Constellation reduces Ginna reactor to half power
Constellation reduces Ginna reactor to half power May 18, 2009
NEW YORK, May 18 (Reuters) – Constellation Energy Group Inc (CEG.N) reduced the 498-megawatt Ginna nuclear power station in New York to about half power on Sunday due to irregularities in the circulating water system, a spokesman for the plant said Monday.
He could not say when the unit would return to full power since workers were still looking for the problem.
The circulating water system moves water to the two low pressure turbines.
The Ginna station, which entered service in 1970, is located in Ontario in Wayne County about 20 miles east of Rochester, New York. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) renewed the plant’s original 40-year operating license in 2004 for another 20 years until 2029.
Shaw Group spent $330K lobbying government in 1Q
Associated Press Shaw Group spent $330K lobbying government in 1Q Forbes.com Associated Press, 05.18.09,
The Shaw Group Inc., an engineering and construction company, spent $330,000 in the first quarter to lobby on federal stimulus spending, funding for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and other issues, according to a recent disclosure report.
The Baton Rouge, La.-based company lobbied Congress and the Department of Energy on issues related to the federal budget, energy tax credits, and nuclear power plants and waste storage, according to the report filed April 17 with the House clerk’s office.
Shaw Engineering Group also lobbied Congress in the January-March period in support of an agreement between the U.S. and United Arab Emirates on the cooperative use of nuclear energy.
Shaw Group spent $330K lobbying government in 1Q – Forbes.com
Lawsuit targets risks of nuclear waste
Lawuit targets risks of nuclear waste Coakley seeks debate on Pilgrim license renewal The Boston Globe By Robert Knox 17 may 09 State Attorney General Martha Coakley is asking a federal court to force nuclear energy regulators to consider risks to public safety caused by storing nuclear waste at the Pilgrim nuclear power plant before deciding whether to extend the facility’s license for 20 years.
Coakley joined with officials from New York and Connecticut to file suit in a federal appeals court in New York. The lawsuit asks the court to force the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to open debate on license extensions for plants such as Pilgrim to the potential threat posed by terrorists and accidents to used nuclear fuel stored inside the plants.
“The risk of a spent-fuel pool catching on fire by accident or due to intentional sabotage is neither remote nor speculative,” the lawsuit, filed May 6, states.
Protests as nuclear ship docks
Protests as nuclear ship docks
Herald Sun May 18, 2009 10:00pm
AN armed vessel with a load of recycled nuclear fuel from France arrived amid heavy security today at a Japanese port where it was greeted by dozens of protesters.
The Pacific Heron – carrying a British police team to head off possible hijackers on its secretive two-month voyage – delivered a load of mixed-oxide or MOX fuel, a blend of plutonium and reprocessed uranium.
Several dozen anti-nuclear activists and residents rallied at a pier of the Omaezaki fishing port as the cargo ship docked under heavy police guard and cranes unloaded metal containers of the nuclear fuel.
Environmental group Greenpeace has called the cargo, which left France in March, “the largest shipment of plutonium in history”, saying the 1.8 tonnes would be enough to make 225 nuclear weapons.
The Pacific Heron is believed to have travelled around Africa, escorted by a second ship, the Pacific Pintail, which was not seen in the port.
Biased pro-nuclear report is challenged
Full of problems or ripe with promise?
Meridian Booster By Graham Mason 14 May 09
With the Uranium Development Partnership report being presented to the public next month there is a question over how much the environment was taken into consideration in its glowing conclusions.
The report, titled Capturing the Full Potential of the Uranium Value Chain in Saskatchewan, was released March 31.
The nuclear and uranium industry were well represented on the 12-person panel with Duncan Hawthorne, president and CEO of Bruce Power, Armand Laferrere, president and CEO of Areva Canada, and Jerry Grandey, president and CEO of Cameco Corporation. ……………
……………Dr. Patrick Moore founding member of Greenpeace, was the only member to identify himself as an environmentalist.
In a statement before a U.S. congressional committee in Apr. 2005, he described his views on nuclear power generation where he described himself as an ‘environmental moderate.’
………………………………The Saskatchewan Environmental Society couldn’t disagree more in a recent nuclear pamphlet.
“The real solutions to climate change lie in the area of energy efficiency and renewable energy,” said the report. “If we were to provide the same level of support for these options as we have done for the nuclear industry, we could move much faster into the sustainable, low-carbon energy economy which is where the future lies.
The report argues nuclear is not an alternative to fossil-fuelled plants, rather they are both part of an environmentally unsustainable approach to the electricity system.
Coxworth questions whether Moore qualifies to be the environmental conscience of the report.
“Patrick Moore … is a paid consultant to the nuclear industry,” said Coxworth. “Labelling him by his past Greenpeace involvement would be somewhat analogous to identifying me solely by the fact that long ago I worked for the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission.”
“Doubtless some of the other partnership members have taken some environmental classes as part of their technical education.”
Local public consultations are at Lakeland College on June 10, the Don Ross Centre in North Battleford on June 11 http://www.meridianbooster.com/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1566432
Relicensing Oyster Creek nuclear plant was a mistake
Relicensing Oyster Creek nuclear plant was a mistake
TriTown News 14 May 09 Paula Gotsch Grandmothers, Mothers and More for Energy Safety
It has been a crisis month for Exelon since federal regulators jumped the gun and relicensed the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in Lacey until 2029.
Failure of a main transformer led to the shutdown of the reactor. That followed the recent discovery of high levels of radioactive tritium contamination at the site.
Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) staff have tracked the tritium leak to two burst pipes, a concrete vault and a monitoring well. Concentrations of radioactive tritium are 300 times the allowable levels in four test wells at the site.
This raises alarm about the plant’s aging management program, which was the basis of the relicensing that is supposed to prevent this sort of dangerous mishap.
Despite assurances from Oyster Creek spokespeople that tritium has not traveled off company grounds, it has entered the water table. Water flows, and at Oyster Creek it will eventually empty into Barnegat Bay, where the state announced this week a huge reseeding program of the oyster beds…………………
…………………Tritium leaks at Oyster Creek are a serious issue for the public. Contrary to reassuring words, tritium, though low energy, is highly radioactive and has a half-life of over 12 years. Low-energy beta particles, like those emitted by tritium, can cause considerable harm.
Tritiated water is handled by the body like regular water, becoming part of the cells. It easily crosses the placental barrier, with risk of spontaneous abortion, stillbirth, congenital malformation and childhood diseases.
Exelon’s record for handling tritium leaks in the past at its other nuclear power stations is horrible. At the Braidwood plant in Illinois, tritium leaked from the site for nine years and state officials were not notified until a citizen noticed and tested a pool of water in his backyard. The test came back positive for tritium, and the state of Illinois subsequently sued Exelon.
………………………..Each day Oyster Creek operates, the public is exposed to continuous doses of low-level radiation. Of all nuclear plants nationwide, Oyster Creek’s airborne emissions for strontium 90 are highest, and they are the second highest for airborne strontium 89. The plant also emits the second highest airborne levels of barium 140. All are radioactive.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission says these discharges are just a normal part of routine nuclear operation, and are below acceptable levels for public health. This claim is dead wrong.
The Bier VII report issued by the NationalAcademy of Sciences stated there are no safe levels of exposure to continuous levels of low-level radiation. Also, the socalled allowable standards are set for the most robust: a healthy 35-year-old male.
The “allowable” doses do not protect the most vulnerable: women, children, infants and the developing fetus……………………… http://tritown.gmnews.com/news/2009/0514/letters/009.html
Village’s fury over radioactive waste plan
Village’s fury over radioactive waste plan
Whitehaven News By Andrew Clarke
13 May 2009
CONTROVERSIAL proposals to bury radioactive waste in Keekle have met with opposition from councillors. French-owned company Sita UK plans to drill 24 exploratory boreholes at Keekle Head to see if the area is suitable for disposing of very low-level radioactive waste.
However, councillors from Frizington, which neighbours the potential site, have voiced their concerns.
“We have had enough rubbish dumped on us,” said parish council chairman Peter Connolly.
“We unanimously agree that we don’t want the proliferation of any waste, in particular low-level nuclear waste.”
Coun Tim Knowles gave Cumbria County Council’s view to the parish council meeting, held on Monday.
“The council is strongly against the dispersal of nuclear waste that I believe these boreholes relate to
Nuclear is not the answer
Nuclear is not the answer
“………………………………….To forestall the reopening of the BNPP, Greenpeace has brought in Yves Marignac, an international consultant on nuclear and energy issues, who is executive director of WISE-Paris, an organization dedicated to “promoting independent information and well-informed decision-making” regarding the use of nuclear energy for power generation…………………………….A mathematician by training, Marignac says he has been going around the world talking about the French “experience” with nuclear energy because French President Nicholas Sarkozy “has been aggressively promoting the French nuclear industry,” convincing governments in the developing world to invest in nuclear power with the help of French-built machinery and expertise……………………………
France is extraordinarily committed to nuclear power generation, with 50 reactors around the country, and some still under construction. But a report on the French nuclear industry, published by Global Chance, an association that includes among its members several of France’s independent nuclear experts, shows that “France’s nuclear promises are a dangerous illusion … locked into nuclear power in a way that presents an obstacle to the development of renewable energy and energy efficiency measures.”
As Marignac puts it, the French nuclear power industry “hasn’t delivered even against its own set targets.”………….
………..Marignac has many tables and charts to show how power generated by nuclear plants provides only a small percentile of the total energy required by the French people, mainly because so much of this demand is created by reliance on gasoline……………………………
BUT the main drawback to an energy program dependent on nuclear power, says Marignac, is that “it approaches the problem from the wrong end.”
In his view, any long-term solution to cut dependence on fossil fuels must be addressed from the “demand side,” that is, reducing dependence on electricity and fuel by cutting down electricity use. Not only is nuclear power dangerous, expensive and wrought with untold health and security issues, it ultimately will not bring an end to the threat of climate change. As France has shown, even with 50 nuclear power plants, the French remain as dependent on fossil fuels as ever.
Nuclear is not the answer – INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos
Britain’s farmers still restricted by Chernobyl nuclear fallout
Britain’s farmers still restricted by Chernobyl nuclear fallout The Guardian by Terry Macalister and Helen Carter 12 may 09 Environmentalists say controls on 369 farms highlight danger of plans to build nuclear plants around UK Nearly 370 farms in Britain are still restricted in the way they use land and rear sheep because of radioactive fallout from the Chernobyl nuclear power station accident 23 years ago, the government has admitted……………………………..
Critics of the nuclear industry expressed alarm at the latest numbers, which they believed would increase public unease about the highly toxic and long-term impact of radioactivity.
David Lowry, a member of Nuclear Waste Advisory Associates, said the figures demonstrated the “unforgiving hazards” of radioactivity dispersed into the environment, whether from Chernobyl in Ukraine, thousands of miles away and 23 years ago, or over decades from the Faslane nuclear submarine base in Scotland, as revealed by the Guardian last month…………………………
…………Revelations about the continuing impact of the Chernobyl accident come weeks after three different sites were bought in auction by EDF and other power companies for building new atomic plants in Britain.
Britain’s farmers still restricted by Chernobyl nuclear fallout | Environment | guardian.co.uk
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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