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Radioactive sludge heads for landfill sites in US
Thanks
to James McGinnis reporting for the Bucks County Courier Times
and found on the Phillyburbs web pages for the following. Federal and state regulators have agreed to
let Waste Management accept low-activity radioactive
waste (which originated at the Limerick Nuclear Power Plant,
Pennsylvania) at its landfills in Tullytown and Falls.
The
landfill operator said it would transport 750 tons of sludge laced with
radioactive Cesium-137 and Cobalt-60 in special “super sack, polyethylene
bags.” That's enough to fill about 55 transport trucks.
Nuclear
Regulatory Commission senior health physicist Betsy Ulrich said the “extremely
small quantities” of radiation in the sludge pose an “extremely small risk” to
the public. “It is highly unlikely that this would affect anyone.”
Environmental
groups were nonetheless disturbed by the plan to import the radioactive
materials to a municipal landfill along the Delaware River. “Agreeing to store
nuclear waste is a slippery slope,” said James Browning, state director of the
Public Intoerest Research Group.
Images: NTI /
Time.com
Here’s a cautionary tale about the
importance of looking what you’re doing (especially when working with uranium)
from South Carolina brought to you by Andrew Shain writing for The
State web pages. Westinghouse’s nuclear fuel plant in Columbia could face
nearly U$100,000 in fines from federal regulators because a worker accidentally
threw away vials of low-grade uranium.
Plant workers discovered in
February that 16 sample vials containing a total of 4½ ounces of uranium hexafluoride
were missing. The vials with the gel-like material are shipped inside
cushioned, six-gallon steel containers. Lab technicians then remove the vials
from the canisters to test the uranium.
An employee threw away the
canisters, believing they were empty, said Jackie McCoy, spokeswoman for the
plant, which annually produces enough nuclear fuel to provide 10% of the USA’s
electricity.
Company officials using radiation
detectors searched the plant, a scrap metal recycling facility, a metal
shredding facility in Spartanburg and a landfill in Elgin. The federal Nuclear
Regulatory Commission also searched, but nothing was found.
Images: wikimedia /
china daily
Chris Haslam, writing for The Times online web pages this
week, brings us a cautionary tale should you be considering a holiday by the
sea in Scotland. A beach contaminated
by nuclear waste is a “radioactive minefield” that
should be closed immediately, say worried locals.
Sandside
beach, an attractive bay two miles west of the decommissioned fast-breeder
reactor at Dounreay, is a popular stopping off site for tourists on the
Highland coastal route – but campaigners say that thousands of tiny but
potentially lethal radioactive fuel particles have contaminated the sand.
The
Dounreay Particles Advisory Group (DPAG) has estimated that 5,000 particles
have been accidentally discharged from the reactor’s crumbling storage shafts,
with many being washed ashore at Sandside and the popular surf spots at Dunnet
Bay and Murkle, east of Thurso.
The
UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) says that just 27 particles were found on
Sandside beach in 2007, eight of which were large enough to pose a significant
health risk. The Scottish Environment Protection Agency (Sepa) is required to
scan the beach for particles every month and say the risk is minimal.
Images: BBC / flickr
With thanks to Rory Sweeney,
reporting for North Eastern Pennsylvania’s Times Leader web pages for
this information. The only facility available for disposing certain levels of radioactive
waste in Barnwell, South Carolina, closed its
doors to Pennsylvania and 36 other states on July 1, meaning waste producers will have to hold onto their
waste until a new site is found.
Currently
there are three disposal facilities in America for low-level radioactive waste,
but one site is open only to a coalition of 11 western states. A second in Utah
accepts only the lowest level of waste. The third (Barnwell) accepted the other
two levels of low-level waste, but now does so only from the states in its
coalition – Connecticut, New Jersey and South Carolina.
That
leaves the 36 states with no place to send their B- and C-level wastes, which
include medical wastes, certain material from nuclear reactors, both research
and commercial, and some sensing equipment that includes radioactive
components.
Thinking
of buying property in Australia? Well, best read this report from the pages of The
Age news site, then. New
South Wales Health has been accused of failing to effectively clean up
at least four Sydney properties at the site of a former uranium smelter that
operated from 1908-1915. Some years after it closed the land was acquired by
the state health department and subdivided.
NSW
Health still owns the now vacant lots at numbers 7 and 9 Nelson Parade in
Hunters Hill, but neither it nor the DECC could tell a recent inquiry where
contaminated materials from the sites were sent after being removed in 1987.
"The
records talk about it being removed and placed elsewhere but we don't know
precisely where it went to," DECC regulation director Craig Lamberton
said. When challenged about the disposal of the waste, he said: "Well, it
was (more than) 17 years ago."
I
This
emotive story comes courtesy of Ginger Richardson, reporting for The
Arizona Republic and found on the azcentral web pages. The U.S.
government will spend tens of millions of dollars to assess and clean up
uranium contamination across the vast Navajo
Reservation, but the effort is unlikely to erase decades of frustration
over what has been characterized as a slow and sporadic federal response.
The
exploration scarred the three-state Navajo Reservation's landscape and resulted
in what tribal officials call a public-health tragedy on the reservation. The
premature deaths of Navajo miners, cancer clusters and passed-on genetic
defects are all thought to be the result of prolonged uranium exposure.
Today,
the Navajos say the new federal response effort, which includes testing of
water sources and the review of hundreds of homes and buildings for radioactive
materials, is a "good step forward." But they also have grave concerns
about the proposal, which is short on specifics in several key areas.
"It's
a significant step, but there's still a long road ahead of us," said Steve
Etsitty, executive director of the Navajo Nation Environmental Protection
Agency.
Here’s
a tale of military incompetence, brought to you by Demetri Sevastopulo,
reporting for the FT’s web pages.
The
US military cannot locate hundreds of sensitive nuclear
missile components, according to government officials familiar with a
Pentagon report on nuclear safeguards. One official said the number of missing
components was more than 1,000.
Robert
Gates, US defence secretary, recently fired both the chief of staff and
secretary after an investigation blamed the Air Force for the inadvertent
shipment of nuclear missile nose cones to Taiwan. Mr Gates added that the
Pentagon was evaluating the results of an inventory of all nuclear-related
materials that had been conducted to re-establish "positive control"
of such components.
This
incident has raised concerns about US nuclear safeguards as Washington presses
other countries to bolster counter-proliferation measures.
Thanks to World Nuclear News
for this one. Swiss energy company Atel has submitted an application for
framework approval of a new
nuclear power plant to
Switzerland’s Federal Office of Energy.
The Niederamt plant would be built
alongside the Gösgen nuclear power plant, in which Atel owns a 40% stake, but
would be independent of the existing plant. No reactor design is specified in
the application, other than a "third generation light water reactor"
that would use a virtually vapour-free "hybrid" cooling tower.
Kernkraftwerk
Niederamt AG (KKN), a 100% Atel-owned subsidiary, has been set up with
responsibility for planning, building and operating the new and for obtaining
the necessary approvals. Atel says it is looking for partners in the project
and is currently talking to "various interested parties," including
the operators of Switzerland's nuclear power plants. KKN envisages that the new
plant could start up in 2021-2023.
Images: Swiss info /
Nagra.ch
Our
thanks to Glenn Gilbert, reporting for the Oakland Press. It has
taken $4-per-gallon gasoline to get to this point, but the issue appears headed
for some serious debate.
Mike
Rogers, a Brighton Republican whose district includes much of northern Oakland
County, California, aims to have 30
new nuclear plants online as part of his energy independence plan for
the United States to attain energy independence by July 4, 2015. He says that
will save 150,000 barrels of oil per day.
The
climate-change movement is helping to fuel what amounts to a renaissance for
nuclear power. Fossil fuels such as coal are considered harmful to the
environment.
A
spokesman was quoted as saying that nuclear power "is a great carbon
footprint solution. Nuclear is a really good fit with the environmental
climate."
Images: Michael Totten / Motorbooks
This
environmental story comes via Jeremy Loome, reporting for the Edmonton
Sun. Albertans could face a significantly higher risk of radioactive
exposure due to storage transportation, say opponents of a proposal to
build a nuclear power station in Canada.
Canada
is still 20 to 30 years away from completing a national storage facility which
(according to the Nuclear Waste Management Organization) would see spent fuel
rods from across the country being shipped to one central underground storage
location.
According
to environmental activists, a study out of the University of Calgary shows
there is nowhere geologically appropriate at the proposed location that would
suit an underground, temporary, on-site storage chamber.
With
the Peace Country facility expected to take 12-15 years to be approved - if at
all - that would mean transporting it to a storage facility elsewhere in the
province. The risk from transportation will increase, says environmentalist and
municipal councillor Trudy Keillor, when the federal facility is built some 15
years later. "Any time you're putting a lot more of this material on the
roads, you are increasing the risk of public exposure," she said.
Seeing
as there has been quite a few stories about submarines doing the rounds lately,
here’s a very interesting story for you and one that made us think ‘Hello….’
thanks to Lewis Smith writing for the Times On-Line pages. Bob
Ballard, the man who located the wreck of the Titanic
in 1985, has revealed that the discovery was a cover story to
camouflage the real (top secret) mission of inspecting the wrecks of two Cold
War nuclear submarines – the USS Thresher and USS Scorpion. “We handed the data
to the experts. They never told us what they concluded – our job was to collect
the data. I can only talk about it now because it has been declassified.”
Both
of the United States Navy vessels sank during the 1960s, killing more than 200
men and giving rise to fears that at least one of them, Scorpion, had
been sunk by the USSR.
He
was told that the military were not willing to spend a fortune on locating the
Titanic, but they did want to know what had happened to their submarines. The
military were anxious to know how the nuclear reactors had been affected by
being submerged for so long.
Images: One Eternal Patrol / Webtek
Here’s
something from deep in the heart of Texas, courtesy of Enrique Rangel
writing for the Lubbock Online web pages. Starting next year, residents of Andrews County and south-eastern
New Mexico will live with nuclear
waste buried in their large but sparsely populated area.
The Texas Commission on Environmental
Quality agreed to let Dallas-based Waste Control Specialists dispose of
radioactive waste in a dumping site 3.5 miles from the Texas-New Mexico border
and 30 miles from the town of Andrews, the county seat. 
"We're
very pleased. We're very excited," Rod Baltzer, president of Waste Control
Specialists told reporters after the commission voted 2-1 to authorise his
company to dispose of the nuclear waste.
Andrews
Mayor Bob Zap said after the hearing that he and other residents in the
community of 9,652 were supportive of the company.
"Our
town, from the very beginning, looked at this and asked questions. ... We
studied it. We worked closely with them. "We're really supportive of
everything that's being done and supportive of the way WCS has handled it and
will continue to handle it. We don't have any questions or doubts."
Images: Texas escapes
/ mile by mile
This
typical American non-story comes to you thanks to Garry Lenton,
reporting for the Patriot News web pages. A breakdown in security
procedures at Three
Mile Island last summer was of moderate to serious significance,
federal regulators concluded. Public safety was not jeopardized by the
incident, which was first reported to the agency by plant operator AmerGen
Energy.
The
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission will increase inspections at the plant for
at least a year to ensure that corrections have been made, said Neil Sheehan,
agency spokesman. Beyond that, the NRC
is saying little about the incident, except that it did not involve inattentive
or sleeping security officers. Now, where have we heard that before I wonder?
The NRC rates such
incidents by colour coding ranging from green to red: apparently, in this case,
it rated ‘greater than green…’ well no worries there then.
This
environmental tale is brought to you thanks to Susan Smallheer reporting
for the Rutland Herald news pages.
The recent spate of advertisements promoting the electric power
generated at the Vermont
Yankee nuclear plant as "clean and green" doesn't tell the
true story, said two Native Americans whose lands are severely affected by the
nuclear power industry.
Lorraine Rekmans, of the Northern Ojibwa people from Elliot Lake, Ontario, and
Ian Zabarte, from Mercury, Nev., secretary of state of the Western Shoshone
National Council, spoke in Brattleboro
recently, their last stop in a
weeklong visit to Vermont.
Rekmans' home, which is located on the north shore of Lake Huron, was
devastated by the pollution from 11 different uranium mines, which she said had
turned 10 lakes in the area into radioactive waste sites. For every pound of
uranium, she said, there is a ton of mine waste, and the waste was dumped into
lakes.
"People who get their power from nuclear plants should know that uranium
doesn't just fall out of the sky," she said. Much of the Western Shoshone's tribal lands are now operated as
the Nevada test site.
Looking
for a bit of land to develop? Bob
Downing, reporting for the Ohio.com web pages, may have the answer.
A cleaned-up Ohio toxic waste dump is seeking a new owner: The Industrial Excess Landfill, a Superfund
site that has been in the headlines for three decades, will soon be for sale
under proposed consent decrees in U.S. District Court in Youngstown.
Negotiating
terms of the sale will be up to potential buyers and Industrial Excess Landfill
Inc., the Akron-based company that owns the 30-acre site.
But
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has imposed restrictions on what can
be done with the land: No houses, apartments, excavating or wells for drinking
water. Potential buyers, Lake Township, are proposing to use the site as either
green space, or a nature preserve.
Images: mike cardew /
union town oh.com
With
grateful thanks to those nice people at Reuters for the following. Entergy Corp's 1,266-megawatt Grand Gulf
nuclear power station in Mississippi returned to full power yesterday
(Thursday) after having reduced the unit to 48% on Wednesday. Power was lost after a raccoon
crawled into one of the switchgears at the plant! Only in America, people…
The
Grand Gulf station, which entered service in 1985, is located in Port Gibson in
Claiborne County, about 130 miles north of Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
On
a more serious note: In February 2007, Entergy filed with the NRC through
NuStart Energy Development LLC for permission to build one of General Electric
Hitachi's 1,550 MW Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactors (ESBWR) at Grand
Gulf. The company however has not yet decided whether it will build the new
reactor.
I
With
thanks to John Murawski, writing for The Charlotte Observer’s web
pages for this one.
Nuclear
opponents are trying to force Duke Energy of Charlotte to disclose the
projected cost of a proposed nuclear plant
in Cherokee County, S.C., that would serve the Carolinas. The groups have asked
officials in both states to require that Duke disclose the estimate. Regulators
for both South and North Carolina are expected to rule on the request soon –
although by the time you read this, they may have done so already.
Duke
Energy will have to reveal the project cost when it seeks a permit in South
Carolina, but such a disclosure may be a year away. Nuclear opponents say the
public shouldn't have to wait that long for vital information about such an
important decision.
Cost
estimates are available to state regulators, public officials and lawyers who
sign confidentiality agreements. North Carolina's Public Staff agrees with Duke
that the cost estimate qualifies as a trade secret under N.C. law.
Images: mountain area
information network / the blue ridge highlander
Thanks
goes to Owen McAteer, writing in the Northern Echo. The North
East could become a major force in the nuclear power industry, the way it was
for coal, the former head of British Nuclear Group believes. Lawrie Haynes
put the case in favour of nuclear power at a debate in Yarm, near
Stockton, organised by the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE).
He
said it was "inevitable" that nuclear power would become a major
source of the UK's energy and that the North East could become a key hub.
In
January, British Energy, owners of Hartlepool
power station, revealed plans to build a replacement reactor that would
safeguard 700 jobs. The announcement followed the Government's support for a
new generation of nuclear power plants. Mr Haynes later said: "Nuclear
power could provide us with the opportunity to develop a nuclear supply
industry that could position an area as a keen contributor to the world market.
I think there is a real opportunity for the North-East to step in and fill that
vacuum."
Images: FreeFoto /
Nesta25
Gwen DuBois, writing for the Baltimore Sun’s web pages, brings us this
environmental story from Maryland.
With the recent settlement between the
state of Maryland and Constellation Energy Group, the power company is once
again championing Calvert
Cliffs as the site of a new nuclear power
plant. This is not a cause for celebration.
On July 13, Constellation submitted the first new application to build a
nuclear power plant in the U.S. since Three Mile Island. But the company
threatened to go elsewhere if Maryland lawmakers re-established state
regulatory control on new power plants.
Fear of a growing energy shortage is leading to calls for more nuclear power
plants. With wind power already more economical than nuclear power, and solar
power soon to be, one critic predicts nuclear power plants will be economically
obsolete before they are built.
The
following comes under the ‘We don’t want to worry you, but…’ category found
thanks to the Whitehaven news web pages, courtesy of Alan Irving.
Milk on a local farm in the Sellafield area has been
contaminated by higher levels of radioactivity which has entered the food
chain. Abnormal concentrations of iodine-129 have
been detected and sampling is taking place at other farms in the area to see if
there are any traces of the same contamination.
The
Environment Agency has given an assurance that there has been no health risk
from the radioactive iodine but how the increased amounts have got into the
milk is still a mystery. Iodine 129 is said to be present already in local milk
but in very low concentrations, sometimes undetectable. The higher levels have
since gone down on the farm concerned.
The
contamination was picked up by Sellafield’s own monitoring team, which
routinely samples milk around local farms.
This was filed by Danielle MacMurchy for the Tracey Press
web site. The public was invited to speak out for or against a new nuclear weapons complex proposed by the National Nuclear Security Administration at a public
hearing held in California yesterday (Tuesday.)
During the first informal hour, people had a chance to check out booths
set up by the U.S. Department of Energy and Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory and hear the opposing perspective from Tri-Valley C.A.R.E.s, an
anti-nuclear Lab watchdog. Afterward, each person who signed was allowed to
speak for less than five minutes during the public comment portion.
Ted Wykadocument manager for the nuclear weapons complex’s
environmental impact statement, was due
to give a half-hour presentation on the administration’s plans to modernize the
nuclear weapons complex. Lauren
Martinez, spokeswoman for NASA’s Livermore site office, added: “This is
important for the public to know how we want to achieve a smaller, safer, more
secure and less expensive nuclear weapons complex.”
Images: wikimedia /
bizdata
With
thanks to Keith Johnson writing for the Wall Street Journal. “I
think nuclear
power has a great future, and we should look at it again:” so said
California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger when closing The Wall Street Journal’s
“ECO:nomics” recent conference. While he understands some people might still be
afraid of the nuclear option, most Three Mile Island analogies are
“environmentalist scare tactics. The technology has advanced so much,” he said.
That
was the message from the nuclear industry at the same conference, grappling
with a question beguiling policy makers—and plenty of Environmental Capital
readers: If coal is out of the question, and renewables are too small, how will
America get its power if it keeps ignoring the nuclear elephant?
“The
U.S. is far behind the rest of the world,” said Tom Christopher, a top
executive at France’s Areva, which builds nuclear reactors. He chalks that up
to bad nuclear economics a generation ago, a dwindling of home-grown tech, and
a “dysfunctional licensing process” in the U.S.
Here’s something that probably passed you by, courtesy of
the Associated Press and Colorado’s Summit Daily web pages.
Jean Hediger can stand at the edge of her organic wheat farm
in Nunn, Colorado and look west to the Rockies, east toward this
speck-in-the-road town and straight ahead into what she sees as her worst
nightmare.
A Canadian company’s plans to establish a uranium mine
just across the two-lane county road from Hediger’s farm has triggered a bitter
tug-of-war with residents of this fast-growing region about 70 miles north of
Denver who fear the risk of contaminated water and other health problems.
“How do you farm organically next to a uranium mine?” Hediger
asks. “It’s pretty darned scary, isn’t it?”
Powertech Uranium Corp. Chief Executive Officer Richard
Clement insists the firm’s closed-system mining process, in which a solution of
oxygen and sodium bicarbonate is injected to recover the uranium, is safe.
“There’s a lot of misinformation out there about nuclear, about uranium, about
radiation, about the effects of mining,” he said.
Russia
has indicated that it will bid in a tender to build a nuclear power station in Armenia
to replace an ageing Chernobyl-style plant that has provoked safety concerns,
according to a recent Reuters report.
Armenia,
which imports most of its energy, has said it will close down its Soviet-built
Metzamor nuclear reactor only when it can add new generating capacity. The
government said last year it would hold a tender to build a new 1,000 megawatt
reactor at the site near Yerevan, which could be ready by 2016.
"The
Armenian government will hold a tender for a new atomic station," Sergei
Kiriyenko, the general director of Russia's Rosatom state nuclear holding
company, said on a visit to Yerevan. "We will take part and we have good
chances of winning."
Here
is an almost non-story from the pages of the South Florida Sun-Sentinel,
filed by Gabriel Margasak. The St. Lucie nuclear power plant on Hutchinson
Island, Florida, declared the lowest-level type of unusual event
emergency recently after a hydrogen gas leak. No one was hurt and there were no
radiation leaks or danger to the public, officials said.
The incident at the
St. Lucie Plant was the last of three unrelated leaks of different sorts there
since August of last year, but none resulted in injuries or contamination
outside the plant, federal and FPL officials said. Director of nuclear
communications, April Schilpp, said, "None presented any danger to the
public."
Roger Hannah, a public affairs officer for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory
Commission added: "We're not concerned about St. Lucie's ability to
operate the plant safely."
The
following was found thanks to AFP & Yahoo. French
nuclear giant Areva, oil company Total and utility group Suez have reached agreement on plans to build two next
generation nuclear power plants in Abu Dhabi. The two plants would be based on the
third-generation system developed by Areva, the world's largest nuclear power
group.
French
President Nicolas Sarkozy went on a three-nation
tour of Gulf Arab states, having offered to share France's
expertise in civilian nuclear technology with the Islamic world.
France
and the United Arab Emirates are to sign a
framework accord for cooperation in developing civilian nuclear energy, a
source close to talks between the two governments said earlier.
Amid
concerns over Iran's nuclear ambitions, the six Arab monarchies of the Gulf
decided to develop a joint nuclear technology programme for peaceful uses.
The
following item comes to light, thanks to the ’30 year rule’ regarding the UK
Government’s wheeling and dealing in the past and, of course, Iran’s Press
TV web pages. The 1977 British
government records show London was secretly negotiating with Tehran
to build 20 nuclear reactors for the Shah of Iran.
Following talks with the head of Iran's atomic energy program at the time,
senior UK civil servants predicted Tehran would obtain the technology to build
nuclear weapons - from Britain - by the end of the 20th century. In a note to
Prime Minister James Callaghan, Britain's energy secretary Tony Benn said Iran
would invest millions of pounds in pressurized water reactor technology in
return for Britain's agreement to supply the reactors.
The project was postponed when the Shah
fled Iran in 1979.
Russia is looking for cooperation with Uruguay in
the field of nuclear energy, Sergei Koshkin (the Russian ambassador to the
Latin American state) said recently. 'Our countries could maintain cooperation
in the sphere of nuclear energy although Uruguay's legislation bans the use of
nuclear energy.'
The
diplomat said Uruguayan officials had also shown interest in a floating nuclear
power plant. As we mentioned last year, Russia is currently building the
world’s first floating nuclear power plant which should be ready to roll in
2011.
Koshkin said Uruguay's legislation would
not have to be amended as Russian specialists could tow a plant to its coast
and build a power line so that Uruguay could buy electricity. Russia could also
undertake to provide maintenance of the plant and its subsequent disposal, he
added
Due to a projected lack of balance
between supply and demand in energy production in 2008, Turkey is planning to open its first nuclear power plant by 2012 in Sinop
province of the Black Sea region and two more by 2020. In conjunction with this
Russia has expressed interest in purchasing the waste to be produced by the
nuclear plants, rendering the waste problem a moot point for Turkey.
The
Turkish Atomic Energy Agency (TAEK) has presented a report on nuclear power
plants which includes appropriate locations for constructing nuclear plants in
Turkey. The years-long search has shown that the Sinop Inceburun Peninsula is a
prime spot, far from the seismic belt and devoid of the problem of cooling
water. The peninsula is located outside of settled areas, and the Black Sea
would provide the necessary cooling, the report suggests.
Global
giants of the nuclear sector, such as Westinghouse and Mitsubishi, began
keeping their eye on Turkey following the government's announcement that it
would launch bids for nuclear power plants in 2008
With thanks to Tristan J Schweiger, writing for the APP web
pages. A total of 5,304 fish were killed as a result of the unplanned shutdown
of the Oyster
Creek nuclear power plant in Lacey, New Jersey, a company
official confirmed recently.
Operators
manually shut down Oyster Creek's reactor after one of the three pumps that
feed water into the reactor tripped, according to a report on the U.S. Nuclear
Regulatory Commission Web site.
A
final root cause will likely take several weeks to determine. Elaine Makatura, a spokeswoman for the state
Department of Environmental Protection, said the determination of whether to
impose any fines on the operator would be made after the cause of the incident
is known.
The Bush administration has asked Congress for
permission to expand the nuclear facility at Yucca Mountain
in Nevada, as the planned facility would not be able to store all the spent
waste safely. If this was not approved
the Energy Department would probably ask Congress’s permission next year for a
second site to be built at Yucca.
Nevadans and environmental groups believe that Yucca would not be able
to store waste there safely for 1,000 years.
This little gem was found on the web pages of the International
Herald Tribune. President
Bush has approved "a significant
reduction" in the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, cutting it to less than
one-quarter its size at the end of the Cold War, the White House said recently.
At the same time, the Energy Department announced plans to consolidate the
nuclear weapons complex that maintains warheads and dismantle those no longer
needed.
White
House press secretary Dana Perino said: ‘We are reducing our nuclear weapons
stockpile to the lowest level consistent with America's national security and
our commitments to friends and allies. A credible deterrent remains an
essential part of U.S. national security, and nuclear forces remain key to
meeting emerging security challenges.’
For
you number - crunchers out there: there are believed to be nearly 6,000
warheads that either are deployed or in reserve and, under terms of a 2002 arms
control treaty with Russia, the U.S. is committed to reducing the number of
deployed warheads to between 1,700 and 2,200 by 2012. Well, no worries there,
t
The
following nugget is the kind of thing that makes my job worthwhile, thanks to
the First Coast News web site: White Plains, N.Y.
A federal inspector found an armed guard asleep at a gate inside the
Indian Point nuclear power plants but officials said there was no security
breach.
The inspector spent two minutes trying to rouse the unnamed guard before he
"stood up and opened his eyes," said Neil Sheehan, spokesman for the
Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
The five-year veteran was alone on the second of three security rings around
the two plants in Buchanan, about 35 miles north of New York City, but all
other security measures at the gate remained operational. Tapes showed there was no breach but Sheehan
later said “that doesn’t make it any less serious..”
Found
on the Tennessean web pages: An American company that disposes of
radioactive nuclear waste by burying it wants to ship 20,000 tons of the
material from overseas through ports in Charleston and New Orleans. Energy
Solutions Inc. wants to ship about 200,000 cubic feet of waste into the United
States, process it in Tennessee before burying it at a site in Clive, Utah,
where the company is based.
A spokesperson for Energy
Solutions said that it is a leader in the safe
handling and disposal of radioactive solutions.
However, there is a stumbling block to overcome: Byron
Miller, spokesman for the State Ports Authority said: ‘We don’t handle any
radioactive materials.
Found recently on the pages of The Charlotte
Observer: Two cars on a train carrying spent radioactive
nuclear fuel jumped the tracks at the Shearon Harris nuclear plant about 25 miles southwest of Raleigh, North Carolina,
Progress Energy said recently.
No one was injured in the
accident, and the waste -- transported in 75-ton reinforced concrete casks --
was undamaged. Human error has been cited as the cause of the accident; a
spokesman for the nuclear plant said: "It was a miscommunication about
whether or not the preparations on the actual track had been made in order to
move the train."
In case you were wondering, the
train remained upright as it was only travelling at around 4 mph
This
tale comes with thanks to Matthew Santoni writing for the Examiner web pages:
Federal investigators plan more inspections at Peach
Bottom Atomic Power Station in Pennsylvania, because of continuing
concerns emerging from an investigation into guards caught sleeping on the job
(what is it with US security guards?
This is the second story we’ve run on this subject this year).
Nuclear
Regulatory Commission inspectors will visit the nuclear power plant over the
coming year to ensure that operator Exelon Nuclear has taken adequate steps to
deal with the sleeping guards and the supervisors who never reported them.
One guard at the plant secretly videotaped others sleeping
on the job last summer after his complaints to supervisors went unheeded, then
released the tapes to a New York TV station.
Officials
recently scrutinised the handling of a radiation scare at Bahrain
International Airport, which put three men in hospital, according to a
recent report in the Gulf Daily News. Three Nepalese porters were
transferring radioactive material from one Gulf Air flight to another when it
was thought one of the containers had leaked.
They
were taken to Salmaniya Medical Complex (via a Bahrain Airport Services
vehicle!) and were isolated until tests showed them free from any radioactive
contamination. Authorities said later that wetness on one of the containers of
radioactive medical waste turned out to be harmless condensation and that
taking the men to hospital was just a precaution.
Interior
Ministry officials said they had not been informed about the incident by
airport authorities and that the first they heard of it was from the SMC
Accident and Emergency Department doctors
This
little gem may have passed you by, so here’s a report filed by Richard Owen
on the Times online web pages. Anti-Mafia police in
Italy are investigating eight former directors of the country’s energy agency
for alleged illegal trafficking in nuclear waste and “clandestine production of
plutonium”.
Francesco
Basentini, head of anti-Mafia police at Potenza, in southern Italy, said that
the former managers in the National Agency for New Technologies, Energy and the
Environment were accused of connivance with the Cosa Nostra, the Sicilian
Mafia, and the ’Ndrangheta, the Calabrian Mafia. The accusation came after a
12-year inquiry into Mafia involvement in nuclear waste disposal.
Found
on the Sydney Morning Herald website: Northern
Australia would be at risk of nuclear fallout if Indonesia's proposed
nuclear power station suffered a major failure, environmentalists said.
The
Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) said a university study 13 years ago -
when Indonesia last raised the prospect of a nuclear power station - found the
north of Western Australia, the Northern Territory and Queensland "would
be at substantial risk of receiving radioactive fallout" in the event of a
major reactor failure.
Indonesia's
government is expected to make a final decision soon on whether it will pursue
nuclear energy, as it grapples with surging energy needs and is looking at
building up to 4 power plants on Central Java’s Muria Peninsular.
Electricite
de France (EdF), the world's biggest nuclear power generator has joined with Toyota,
the world's biggest car company, to advance plug-in hybrid vehicle technology.
EdF will run a fleet of four Toyota Prius hybrid cars which have been adapted to draw electric power from mains supply.
The public road trial, which will involve the every-day driving of EdF staff,
will begin this autumn in France and could be expanded to other European
countries in future.
Experience gained from the project should help the pair develop Toyota's
existing prototype technology to expand the use of electricity in
transportation.
Current hybrid vehicles are primarily fuelled by traditional petrol or diesel
available at filling stations.
However, the ability to plug a parked hybrid vehicle into mains supply for
battery charges would mean that most short trips could be undertaken solely on
electric power. Furthermore, using grid electricity would mean a car could be
partly powered by low-carbon technologies like hydro, nuclear power or wind
This report comes from Kathryn
Thier, at The
Charlotte Observer, found on the News & Observer website. Plans are
under way to distribute pills to 1.4 million people in North and South Carolina
to protect them in a nuclear
disaster, replacing ones distributed after the
Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Officials are urging the public not to throw away their
old potassium iodide pills as the Food and Drug Administration has extended
their shelf life for two years.
Despite
the shelf life extension, Carolinas officials are ordering new doses now. State
health officials have said new pills are on order with the federal government
to replace the outdated medication for residents living near nuclear reactors:
The pills are expected to arrive around October 2008.
Found
on the Reuters UK site with thanks to Pete Harrison. Britain must keep its ageing
nuclear power stations running as long as possible if it is to avoid a
damaging shortage of power in five to seven years' time, British Energy Chief
Executive Bill Coley said recently.
The
nuclear power firm is assessing the economics of extending the lives of its
Hinkley Point plant in southwest England and Hunterston plant in Scotland, both
due to close in 2011.
Mr.
Coley told Reuters: "What is critically important for the country is to
operate all these units as long as we can.”
"When I take the company view of long-term power prices ... prices
would support life extensions."
Britain
is close to deciding whether to back a new generation of nuclear plants, which
would boost the global industry as it recovers from the 1986 explosion at
Chernobyl.
Picked up from the Sky news site: A
former nuclear weapons base deep in a Czech forest is at the heart of a new Cold War-style row between
Russia and the United States.
Paired with
10 missiles in Poland it will form a 'son of star wars' missile defence
shield. The perceived threat is so-called rogue states like Iran or North
Korea. The trouble is the Russians see the base, right on their doorstep, as a
potential threat to them.
Nuclear
expert Joseph Cirincione thinks they have a point. "Putin isn't making it
up," he said. "Those radars could also track a Russian missile, and
those interceptors could be tipped with nuclear weapons and be used for a
pre-emptive attack on Russia."
Here’s something to make you think whilst packing your
suitcases for your annual jaunt to foreign climes; a little gem found in
yesterday’s Guardian. Apparently, there is a chance that future visitors to the
USA and, possibly, Europe may find themselves being scanned for traces of
radioactive materials!
Because there
are so many radioactive materials and articles going ‘missing’ every year (as
we have mentioned in this section before) officials fear that it would be very
easy to get hold of some of it for nefarious uses!! Our friends at the IAEA
report that there have been 16 confirmed cases of illegal trafficking of
enriched uranium of the past 10 years and also that incidents involving
material with the potential to make a dirty bomb run into 100s.
People who have had radioactive iodine treatment
(been there, done that!) are advised not to travel too soon after treatment as
this, too, can set machines buzzing and bleeping and, in one instance back in
2003, led a bus in a New York tunnel to be stopped by the State Police as a
passenger on board had had similar treatment earlier in the day!!
This
comes from a report filed recently through Reuters: A recent US Energy
Department audit found that some facilities that handle the U.S.
nuclear weapons stockpile misplaced classified bomb components under their
care.
The
department's Inspector General also found there was confusion at the facilities
over who was responsible for keeping track of weapons parts and recommended
changes in how to better safeguard the parts. However, John Broehm, a spokesman
for the department's National Nuclear Security Administration that oversees the
U.S. nuclear weapons arsenal, said his agency disagreed with the
recommendations.
He
said the parts, which he declined to identify, were later found
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The
following comes thanks to Elizabeth Souder’s article on the Dallas Morning News
web site: Support for new nuclear
power plants deteriorated slightly during the past two years among
people living close to existing reactors, according to a recent survey by the
Nuclear Energy Institute.
The
institute said that 82 % of people living near nuclear power plants favour
nuclear energy, and 71 percent are willing to see a new reactor in the
neighbourhood.
Since
the last survey, taken in 2005, nuclear power companies have announced plans to
build nearly 24 more reactors across the U.S. and the government is
streamlining the licensing process and offering loan guarantees to kick-start
the industry. Of course the ‘X’ factor in all this is whether Americans will
protest about having new plants in their back yards…
This little gem is rather old news, but
there are things we just can’t pass by without a mention. According to the
folks at the National Archive it was revealed back in 2004 that there
was once a secret plan to build a nuclear landmine 'run' by live chickens.
Conceived
during the Cold War, the seven tonne device was the size of small truck and was
designed to be buried (or submerged) by a British Army retreating from Soviet
forces.
Scientists working on the project realised that the bomb
could fail in winter if vital components become too cold, so they explored ways
of keeping the inner workings warm. One proposal put forward consisted of
filling the casing of the nuke with live chickens, who would give off
sufficient heat, prior to suffocating or starving to death, to keep the
delicate explosive mechanism from freezing.
The five established nuclear powers - the
United States, Russia, China, France and Britain - possess enough nuclear warheads to obliterate the world many times over.
Yet
it is more than 30 years since they signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
(NPT), which includes a commitment to dismantle these weapons.
In
the intervening period, the Cold War has ended but new nuclear threats have
emerged. The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, signed in 1970, is the most
widely accepted arms control agreement. Back
in 2000 a total of 187 states had signed up to the agreement, the exceptions at
that time being Cuba, Israel, India, and Pakistan.
The
treaty obliges the nuclear powers never to transfer their nuclear technology to
other countries, and forbids other countries from acquiring nuclear capability. In
turn, the nuclear powers are supposed to work towards the elimination of their
stockpiles.
Just in case you weren’t paying
attention, here’s a bit of news from the BBC’s web site: Test explosions on
giant cooling towers at the Sellafield nuclear plant in Cumbria have been declared a success.
Controlled
blasts on four towers took place recently as a prelude to their demolition
later this year. Experts detonated a charge on a small part of each of the
290ft (88m) high towers' shells. The demolition of the towers is part of the
Nuclear Decommissioning Authority's (NDA) plan to dismantle ageing facilities throughout
the UK.
Jack Williamson, the
cooling towers project superintendent, said: "The test was a real-time dry
run of all the safety, engineering and communications systems that will be used
on demolition day. It was an essential and valuable part of our preparatory
work and I'm pleased to report that it was a success."
Radioactive waste exported to Peru
from Scotland almost 10 years ago has been returned to the
Dounreay nuclear plant in Caithness. It was originally exported to Peru to be
used for gas mantles, but as Peru has no specialist treatment or disposal
facilities, moves began last year to return the material to Scotland.
It
has emerged that 2.9 tonnes of thorium nitrate arrived safely at the site after
a marathon sea and road trip from South America in an operation thought to cost
£1.7m. A 12-strong team from Caithness travelled to Lima to prepare the waste
for its month-long return journey.
The
waste was originally produced at the Caithness nuclear plant as a by-product of
reprocessing.
A man who sent a white powder to a nuclear agency (the NDA) in Whitehaven, Cumbria, sparking a
security alert will not face any charges, as police have now decided there was
"no criminal intent".
At
least 20 firefighters, along with police and two ambulance crews were on
standby for more than five hours after mailroom staff alerted them over the
package. Cumbria Police suspected the powder was toxic, but laboratory tests
proved it was harmless.
The
NDA said it was reviewing security procedures as a result of the alert
Never
let it be said that we don’t get around! Georgian Border
Police reported that it had detected radioactive emissions from scrap
metal in a truck on the Georgian-Azerbaijani border on June 15. A
Tbilisi-based TV station reported on June 19 that the Georgian Border Police
had detected nuclear materials – a mixture of plutonium and beryllium – in a
truck coming from Azerbaijan. The truck was sent back to Azerbaijan.
The
Border Police, however, stressed in a statement that only very small
traces had been detected on the scrap metal during a routine customs
check. The truck was carrying different types of scrap metal and there was a
trace of radiation found on one of the pipes. Relevant agencies were informed
and the decision was made to send the truck and its cargo back to Azerbaijan.
Sweden:
Olkiluoto units 1 and 2 will receive new low-pressure steam
turbines under a Eur100 million ($135 million) deal signed by owner
Teollisuuden Voima Oy (TVO) and Alstom. Unit 1 will also receive a new
generator.
TVO said that the work is part of its long-term development plan for the units,
which are boiling water reactors built by Sweden's ABB Atom at the end of the
1970s. Originally rated at 690 MWe each, the power plants have undergone
several technical improvements over the years to reach outputs of 870 MWe each,
and increase their operational periods to 60 years. Between them they provide
about 12% of Finland's electricity.
According
to a recent report released by the Nuclear Information and Resource Service,
radioactive materials are being released from nuclear weapons facilities
to regular landfills and could get into commercial recycling streams.
Diane
D’Arrigo, NIRS’ Radioactive Waste Project Director, said "People around
regular trash landfills will be shocked to learn that radioactive contamination
from nuclear weapons production is ending up there, either directly released by
DOE or via brokers and processors.
Just as ominous, the DOE allows and encourages sale and donation of some
radioactively contaminated materials."
And,
just in case you were thinking about moving to Tennessee (well, you might) the
report found that the State of Tennessee is a leader in licensing processors
that can release radioactive materials for the nuclear waste generators.
"Tennessee is serving as a funnel to bring in nuclear weapons and power waste
from around the country to disperse into the landfills and recycling without
public knowledge," D'Arrigo said
News
from Down Under: Nuclear
Fuel Australia Ltd will submit a preliminary feasibility study on
building a facility to enrich domestically-sourced uranium. An advance briefing
has already been submitted to John Howard's government.
The move comes shortly after the Australian Labour Party (ALP) voted to end its
restrictive uranium mining policy and allow individual states to decide on new
mines. The Uranium Mining, Processing and Nuclear Energy Review commissioned by
the government said that nuclear power was prospective for Australia if
significant costs were put on carbon emissions.
Future plans envisage a 3 million separative work unit (SWU) per year plant
using Urenco 6th-generation centrifuge technology.
Due to the US government’s refusal to reprocess spent
uranium, unlike Europe and Japan, there are some worrying results when
it comes to storing the uranium rods at various plants throughout the
country. Take for instance a story we
found thanks to the Hanford News web site regarding storage at the
Columbia Generating Station in the Pacific North-West (pictured).
When it was recently
shut down in order to refuel its uranium rods the old ones were encased in
special steel cylinders and concrete cases.
These were then ringed with razor wire fences and monitored by security
cameras. Apparently this scenario is
common at dozens of other plants in up to 31 states, before they are shipped to
Nevada (yep, you guessed it - Yucca) along with other by-products, such as plutonium, to sit in the hot
desert sun whilst they decide what to do with it all.
Mohammad
Alavi, a former nuclear engineer, was accused of taking software
back to Iran recently. He told FBI
agents that he left his job at the nation's largest nuclear power plant and
moved to Iran to be closer to relatives. He took the software with him so he
could show off to his family and friends there.
Alavi, who lived in the U.S. as a
naturalized citizen for 30 years and worked at the Palo Verde Nuclear
Generating Station west of Pheonix, Arizona, for 16 years, is charged with
violating a trade embargo with Iran, which carries a maximum penalty of 21
months in prison. Trial is set for July 3. The software he
downloaded onto his personal laptop was part of an emergency-training package
containing details of the plant's control rooms, reactors and designs. It is
not classified, has no links to actual plant workings and can't be used to
affect operations.
Found, courtesy of Reuters: Germany should
reconsider a plan to phase out nuclear energy or it will undermine the security
of its power supply and make it harder to tackle global warming, the
International Energy Agency (IEA) said.
If
the plan to phase out atomic power by the early 2020s goes ahead, Germany is
likely to be increasingly reliant on Russian natural gas, and burn more fossil
fuels. As
Chancellor Angela Merkel hosts a summit of the Group of Eight (G8)
industrialised nations she will press
for more concerted action on combating global warming, although dropping
nuclear power would make this much harder. "While the
phase-out threatens to result in higher overall emissions of carbon dioxide
than today, it will certainly prevent Germany from reaching its full potential
over the long term," the IEA said. "We strongly encourage the
government to reconsider the decision to phase out nuclear power."
Rosatom
(Russia's Federal
Atomic Energy Agency) and United Company Rusal, the world's largest
aluminium and aluminium oxide producer, made joint statements recently,
explaining that they will undertake a feasibility study on an "energy
metallurgical company comprising a nuclear power plant and an aluminium
plant."
A working group is currently preparing a feasibility report which will specify
the parameters of the nuclear power plant and the aluminium plant. Once that
report is complete, at the end of the year, Rusal and Rosatom would prepare a
schedule for the project which would be financed as a public-private
partnership. The new plant is likely to be built in Siberia where Rusal already
has other plants in operation including one in Krasnoyarsk
TOP
Two
Finnish
power companies have launched environmental impact assessment (EIA)
processes for the possible future construction of new nuclear power plants at
the Loviisa and Olkiluoto sites.
Fortum, owner of the two-unit Loviisa plant, started the EIA process in April
2007, with completion expected in the third quarter of 2008. “With the EIA
process, Fortum raises its preparedness to build a new nuclear power unit in
Loviisa,” according to the company's senior Vice President Tapio Kuula.
The nuclear nations'
operational arsenals contain over 21,000 nuclear weapons and their militaries
still retain hundreds of nuclear-armed launchers and nuclear-capable military
units. The threat of a serious nuclear weapons accident has not disappeared;
this is particularly the case where the arms race remains the most active. At
sea where nuclear-armed and nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines still
go on regular patrols at levels that have not changed much if at all from the
height of the Cold War. Here are just a
couple of examples found by Greenpeace: 6 October 1986: The K-219, a Soviet Yankee class (Project 667A) nuclear-powered
ballistic missile submarine armed with 16 SS-N-6 missiles (two warheads each)
and probably also two nuclear torpedoes, sank 600 miles northeast of Bermuda.
It was powered by two nuclear reactors and 34 nuclear warheads were estimated
to be on board.
Meanwhile,
back on land: 19 September 1980: A fire and explosion in a U.S.
Titan II missile silo near Little Rock, Arkansas, blew off the silo door and
catapulted the missile's 9 megaton yield warhead into the air. It landed over a
1,000 feet from the silo, but it was only slightly damaged
. With
radiating waves, a skull and
crossbones and a running person, a new ionising radiation warning
symbol is being introduced to supplement the traditional international symbol
for radiation, the three cornered trefoil. The new symbol,
launched by the IAEA and the International Organization for Standardization
(ISO), is intended for IAEA Category 1, 2 and 3 sources defined as dangerous
sources capable of death or serious injury, including food irradiators and
industrial radiography units. The symbol is to be placed on the device housing
the source, as a warning not to dismantle the device or to get any closer. It
will not be visible under normal use, only if someone attempts to disassemble
the device.
A new UK
policy for managing solid low level radioactive waste has been
published setting out priorities for managing existing and future wastes from
the nuclear energy industry and other sources. In creating a UK-wide strategy for managing low level nuclear industry
waste, the government requires a plan for the optimal use of the country's
existing LLW repository near Drigg, Cumbria.
The policy, published
by the UK Government, follows a public consultation in 2006, and puts proving
public safety at the forefront, while setting out a flexible approach to low
level waste (LLW) management. The policy's key aim is not to be prescriptive
but "to provide a high level framework within which individual LLW
management decisions can be taken flexibly to ensure appropriate safe,
environmentally-acceptable and cost-effective management solutions."
Roosting bats
have caused a four-month delay to the UK's leading clean-up program. A colony
of protected Pipistrelle bats has colonized the structure of the former Capenhurst
plant, which is currently being demolished by British Nuclear Group (BNG).
After hibernating over the winter, the tiny flying mammals are now fully active
and there is a possibility they may begin to breed. BNG is hoping to stick to
its 2009 completion date and is currently consulting with local
conservationists. They are also investing in new roosting boxes to encourage
the bats to live elsewhere
Here’s
one that may have passed you by, courtesy of those nice people at World Nuclear
News: The European
Council reached agreement on a plan that requires greenhouse gas emissions
to be cut by at least 20% from 1990 levels by 2020. The role of nuclear energy was one of the main debating points,
with most countries supporting the role of nuclear power as a means of moving
away from fossil fuels. The official
conclusions were that each EU nation should decide whether to use nuclear power
as opposed to fossil fuels: although it was noted that a recent European
commission report said that nuclear energy could, indeed, contribute to
reducing greenhouse gas emissions!
TOP
The
Pacific Heron, Pacific Nuclear Transport Ltd's (PNTL's) newest
ship, has been launched at the Tamano shipyard in Japan where it is currently
being built by Mitsui Engineering & Shipbuilding.
The launch of the
4500 t ship on 10 May took place in front of a number of senior European and
Japanese nuclear industry representatives. The $60 million vessel has now
been towed to an outfitting berth where its construction will be completed. The
Pacific Heron is expected to be
delivered to PNTL in
November 2007 and to arrive at its home port of Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, UK,
in early 2008.
Just in case you
were interested, the Pacific Heron is an INF 3 certified vessel under
the INF Code of the International Maritime Organization (IMO). The INF Code
regulates shipments by sea of used nuclear fuel, plutonium and high-level
radioactive waste. PNTL's ships have cargo compartments protected by a
reinforced double hull together with back-up availability of all essential
systems to ensure the safety of shipments of radioactive materials.
The
exclusion zone around the Chernobyl nuclear
power station is teeming with life. It may be the most contaminated place on
earth, but in fact it is a perfect place for wildlife. As
humans were evacuated from the area, animals and birds moved in, including
Przewalski’s horses. Existing populations multiplied and species not seen for decades,
such as the lynx and eagle owl, began to return.
There have even been
tantalising footprints of a bear, an animal that has not trodden this part of
the Ukraine for centuries, and birds have been seen nesting in the steel |