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                         NUCLEAR POLICY
 
1 [southnews] Britain's press split over Blair WMD apology
2 Bush Continues to Mislead on WMD
3 BBC: Report concludes no WMD in Iraq
4 Guardian Unlimited: Iraq had no WMD - inspectors
5 US: UK Independent: Rumsfeld, Bremer and WMD inspectors cast shadow 
6 Scotsman.com: Blair 'Should Quit over Iraq Weapons Report'
7 UK Independent: Iraq Survey Group to concede defeat in search for WM
8 Aljazeera: Iran will not meet IAEA nuclear demands - 
9 Las Vegas SUN: Official: N. Korea Nuclear Talks Too Slow
10 Xinhuanet: DPRK demands inclusion of S. Korean nuclear experiments i
11 Channelnewsasia: Seoul cooperating well in nuclear inspections - IAE
12 Korea Times: ElBaradei Discounts Seoul's Nuclear Lab Test 
13 US: AP Wire: U.S. Report Undercuts Bush War Rationale
14 US: Bulletin: Scientists on the stump | 
15 Las Vegas SUN: Diplomats: IAEA, Brazil Reach Agreement
 
                         NUCLEAR REACTORS
 
16 US: Las Vegas RJ: Local company fined over nuclear license issue 
17 US: Brattleboro Reformer: NRC plans pre-hearing on uprate
18 US: Pulse of the Twin Cities: 20 More Years of Nuclear?
19 Mos News: Cracked Reactor Lid Delays Start of Russia’s Nuclear Power
20 Guardian Unlimited: High price of change
21 US: NRC: Pacific Gas and Electric Company; Notice of Partial Withdra
22 US: PoughkeepsieJournal.com: Meeting centers on nuke plant closing
23 US: NRC: STP Nuclear Operating Company; Notice of Consideration of 
24 Sofia Morning News: Bulgaria Scraps Nuclear Plant Consultancy Tender
25 CBC: Nuclear shutdown leaves ratepayers on the hook
26 US: NRC: Notice of Availability of Environmental Assessment and Find
 
                          NUCLEAR SAFETY
 
27 US: [du-list] Supporting the truth - new coalition launches
28 US: XTRAMSN: Nuclear Test Vets Want Legal Costs
29 US: Insurance Journal: Congress Debates Reforms to Nuclear WC Progra
30 US: Las Vegas SUN: Firm pays $6,000 fine for selling radioactive ite
31 US: Bradenton Herald: Spreading scandal
 
                         NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE
 
32 Las Vegas SUN: U.S. Plutonium Shipment Reaches France
33 UPI: Nuclear fuel reprocessing too costly - 
34 Las Vegas RJ: NUCLEAR REPOSITORY: Yucca court challenge alive 
35 Interfax: Iran, Russia may sign nuclear waste deal in November
36 Las Vegas SUN: Government considers appealing Yucca ruling
37 Las Vegas SUN: Option on Yucca appeal left open
38 US: Arizona Daily Sun: Radioactive truck shipments put on hold
39 US: TheBostonChannel.com: Water Cleanup Project Under Way On Cape 
40 Pahrump Valley Times: Yucca realist 
41 US: Spokesman-Review: Report raises warning on transport of nuclear 
42 UK Independent: Plutonium ship arrives at French port
43 KRNV: Kerry makes bold guarantees about Yucca, Reno campaign stop
44 asahi.com: Nuclear recycling costs fail to add up 
45 US: Globe and Mail: Hot uranium prices push Cameco shares past $100 
46 Pahrump Valley Times: State low-level waste target 
47 Pahrump Valley Times: DOE GAVE AWAY EQUIPMENT IN LIEU OF AUCTION SAL
 
                         NUCLEAR WEAPONS
 
 
                        US DEPT. OF ENERGY
 
48 Columbian: I-297 supporters push for no more Hanford waste
49 Tri-City Herald: Russian envoys make Tri-City nuclear visit 
50 Tri-City Herald: Transition of FFTF work halted 
51 Tri-City Herald: Tribes join lawsuit against DOE 
52 AP Wire: Judge allows whistleblowers lawsuits against Paducah plant 
53 Daily Californian: Government Sets Bid Timeline for UC-Run Lab - 
54 insightmag: Faith-Based Whistleblowers Need Support - 
55 DOE: Environmental Management Site-Specific Advisory Board, Savannah
 
                          OTHER NUCLEAR
 
56 Maine Today: Navy looks to private sector for refueling, overhaul jo
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                         FULL NEWS STORIES
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 1 [southnews] Britain's press split over Blair WMD apology
 
Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 22:56:46 -0500 (CDT)

 
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Britain's press was divided after Prime Minister Tony Blair's annual 
speech to the Labour Party conference, some giving him credit for 
admitting the intelligence was wrong over Saddam Hussein's alleged 
weapons of mass destruction, while others slated him for refusing to 
apologise over the war in Iraq.

Britain's press split over Blair speech

AFP Wednesday September 29, 2:07 PM

Britain's press was divided after Prime Minister Tony Blair's annual 
speech to the Labour Party conference, some giving him credit for 
admitting the intelligence was wrong over Saddam Hussein's alleged 
weapons of mass destruction, while others slated him for refusing to 
apologise over the war in Iraq.

"Fallible Blair admits 'I am Labour's trust problem'," said The Times, 
after the prime minister's carefully crafted speech aimed at reasserting 
his authority over a party still divided over Iraq and facing a likely 
general election next year.

The Financial Times saw the speech as a more humble effort from Blair 
who at the annual conference last September famously told delegates, in 
the context of significant opposition to the Iraq war, that he had "no 
reverse gear".

"Tony Blair came down from his pulpit yesterday," said the FT.

"There was none of the messianic tone which the prime minister often 
employs on Iraq," it said.

Britain's most widely-read daily newspaper, The Sun, whose backing for 
Labour was seen as important to his last two election victories, said 
the prime minister "largely accomplished" his mission to satisfy the 
party over Iraq.

"Tony Blair told his party he wanted to deal with the Iraq issue 
head-on. And he did just that in a forceful manner," it said.

"Blair didn't flinch from uncomfortable truths -- like his 'evidence' 
that Saddam had WMD being wrong. But powerfully and convincingly, he set 
out his heartfelt belief he did what was right."

"That is why he did not apologize for removing Saddam," said the Sun.

"He did not need to. The world is a better place with him in prison."

But with British hostage Ken Bigley still in the hands of Islamic 
extremists and the announcement on Tuesday that two British soldiers had 
been killed in an ambush in Basra, Blair's speech was panned in many of 
the other newspapers.

"Blair refuses to say sorry," said the headline in the Guardian.

The right-wing Daily Mail tabloid went further.

"In the real world two more British soldiers lie dead. In the real 
world, Ken Bigley lives in torment from minute to minute, never knowing 
when or if he will be killed. In the real world, Iraq descends even 
deeper in to bloody chaos," it said.

"Once the applause has died away, what will be most remembered about 
this speech is its threadbare content, its shameless disregard for 
truth, and the chasm it reveals between the prime minister's rhetoric 
and reality."

As seems to be the case at all Labour Party conferences these days, the 
eternal question of the rivalry between Blair and his heir apparent, 
Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown, hung over the hall and 
featured much in the newspaper coverage.

While Blair's leadership is seen by many in Labour as vital to securing 
the support of middle-class English voters, many others -- particularly 
in the socialist heart of the party -- would prefer Brown to be leader.

The constant lobbying by so-called Brownites and Blairites, without a 
great deal of obvious ideological difference between the two camps, 
proved too much for the BBC's respected political correspondent Andrew Marr.

"What a bizarre conference it has been," he wrote in his column in the 
Daily Telegraph.

"My conclusion is that the dispute is now almost entirely personal and 
tribal. It's the Macdonalds and the Campbells, the Montagues and the 
Capulets, the Left-Footers and the Proddy Dogs," he said.

The archives of South News can be found at
http://southmovement.alphalink.com.au/southnews/ 

Yahoo! Groups Links

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 2 Bush Continues to Mislead on WMD
 
Date: Wed, 6 Oct 2004 15:20:33 -0500 (CDT)

 
===============================
THE DAILY MIS-LEAD
< www.Misleader.org >
===============================

BUSH CONTINUES TO MISLEAD ON WMD

In the lead up to war, President Bush argued that America must invade Iraq because it possessed weapons of mass destruction. For example, on 9/28/02 President Bush said, "the Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons."[1] On 10/7/02, President Bush said, "Iraq is reconstituting its nuclear weapons program."[2] Long after it became clear that there were no stockpiles of WMD in Iraq, President Bush has continued to insist that before the invasion "Iraq was a gathering threat."[3]

A comprehensive 1000-page report to be released today by the Bush administration's handpicked weapons inspector, Charles A. Duelfer, will reveal "Saddam Hussein posed a diminishing threat at the time the United States invaded and did not possess, or have concrete plans to develop, nuclear, chemical or biological weapons" according to the Washington Post.[4] According to Duelfer's report, U.N. sanctions prevented Hussein from reconstituting his weapons programs.[5]

Sources:

1. "Radio Address by the President to the Nation," The White House, 09/28/02, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1435098&l=61146.
2. "President Bush Outlines Iraqi Threat," The White House, 10/07/02,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1435098&l=61147.
3. "Remarks by the President at Victory 2004 Rally," The White House, 09/16/04, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1435098&l=61148.
4. Report Discounts Iraqi Arms Threat, Washington Post, 10/06/04,
http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1435098&l=61149.
5. Ibid, http://daily.misleader.org/ctt.asp?u=1435098&l=61149.

Visit www.Misleader.org for more about Bush Administration distortion. ;

===========================================================

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http://daily.misleader.org/unsubscribe/ and follow the instructions
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*****************************************************************
 3 BBC: Report concludes no WMD in Iraq
 
  Last Updated: Thursday, 7 October, 2004
 
[Saddam Hussein pictured in 2002]                               

Saddam Hussein had used chemical weapons in the past                                                           

Iraq had no stockpiles of biological, chemical or nuclear weapons 
before last year's US-led invasion, the chief US weapons 
inspector has concluded. 

Iraq Survey Group head Charles Duelfer said Iraq's nuclear 
capability had decayed not grown since the 1991 war. 

But in a 1,000-page report his group said Saddam Hussein intended 
to resume production of banned weapons when UN sanctions were 
lifted. 

The US and UK used allegations of Iraqi WMDs as a key reason for 
going war. 

It is also clear that the was every intention on Saddam's part to 
develop weapons and that he did not have any intention of 
complying with the UN resolutions Tony Blair UK Prime Minister 
Blair: Report confirms fears 
	 	 	
But despite the lack of actual weapons, the White House said the 
report showed Saddam Hussein's intent and capability and 
justifies the decision to go to war. 

Democrats, on the other hand, used the report to attack the Bush 
administration, claiming the president misled the American 
people. 

UK Prime Minister Tony Blair said that while he now accepted that 
Iraq held no stockpiles of WMD ready to be deployed at the time 
of the invasion, the report showed that UN sanctions had not been 
working. 

Key findings in the report: 

+ "The ISG has not found evidence that Saddam possessed WMD 
stocks in 2003, but [there is] the possibility that some weapons 
existed in Iraq, although not of a militarily significant 
capability." 

+ "There is an extensive, yet fragmentary and circumstantial body 
of evidence suggesting that Saddam pursued a strategy to maintain 
a capability to return to WMD after sanctions were lifted... " 

+ "The problem of discerning WMD in Iraq is highlighted by the 
pre-war misapprehensions of weapons which were not there. Distant 
technical analysts mistakenly identified evidence and drew 
incorrect conclusions." 

'Unaffordable risk' 

The BBC's Adam Brookes in Washington says the report will be used 
by both sides in the US election race - while laying to rest the 
myth of WMDs it will inflame the argument over whether Iraq under 
Saddam Hussein constituted a true threat. 

President Bush again defended last year's invasion, though he 
made no reference to the report. 

He told supporters on his election campaign trail that the world 
was better off without Saddam Hussein, and the risk of him 
passing weapons of mass destruction (WMD) to terror groups was "a 
risk we could not afford to take". 

But the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee, Senator 
Carl Levin, said Mr Duelfer's findings undercut the government's 
main arguments for war. 

"We did not go to war because Saddam had future intentions to 
obtain weapons of mass destruction," Mr Levin said. 

High political stakes 

Mr Blair said the report showed that Saddam Hussein had planned 
to develop WMD. 

IRAQ SURVEY GROUP                       

Set up in May 2003 Firs leader, David Kay, quit in Jan 2004 
stating WMD would not be found in Iraq   New head, Charles 
Duelfer appointed by CIA 1,200 experts from the US, Britain and 
Australia      HQ in Washington, offices in Baghdad and Qatar    

"I welcome the report because I think it will show us that it is 
far more of a complicated situation than people thought," he told 
reporters during a trip to Ethiopia. 

Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister, Barhem Saleh, said anyone who 
doubted that Saddam Hussein had WMDs only needed to visit Halabja 
- where the former Iraq dictator had gassed thousands of Kurds. 

But former chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix said he hoped Mr 
Blair and Mr Bush would now admit that the invasion of Iraq was a 
mistake. 

"Had we had a few months more [of inspections before the war], we 
would have been able to tell both the CIA and others that there 
were no weapons of mass destruction [at] all the sites that they 
had given to us," he said, quoted by the Associated Press news 
agency. 

The ISG's verdict has been widely anticipated since the former 
head of the group, David Kay, resigned in January, and following 
the leaking of a draft copy of the report last month. 

The group plans to continue translating and evaluating an 
estimated 10,000 boxes of documents seized in Iraq. 



*****************************************************************
 4 Guardian Unlimited: Iraq had no WMD - inspectors
 
[UP] 

Mark Oliver Wednesday October 6, 2004               
 		
The group searching for Iraq's alleged weapons of mass 
destruction publishes its final findings tonight and is expected 
to say it found no evidence of any illegal stockpiles.

Charles Duelfer, the head of the US-led team that spent 15-months 
searching for chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, will 
deliver the Iraq Survey Group (ISG)'s final report to the US 
senate at around 1930BST.

US officials cited by the Washington Post today said that the 
1,000-page document concludes that Saddam Hussein had the desire 
but not the capability to create weapons that could attack the 
west.

A leak of a draft of the report earlier this month said Saddam 
planned to rebuild his WMD capability had UN sanctions been 
lifted. 

Critics of US and British policy towards Iraq will hope to use 
the ISG report as evidence that the policy of containment was 
working, while the White House and Downing Street will hope that 
the report draws a line under the politically damaging issue.

The prime minister, Tony Blair, appealed for the "fullness" of 
the ISG report to be analysed, rather than only one aspect of it. 

Mr Blair, who is in Sudan on the first leg of a three-day Africa 
visit, was asked whether he would now go back to the Commons to 
correct any misleading impression about WMDs that he had given to 
MPs in the run-up to war.

"I think we have already been through this. I will say some more 
about it when the report is actually published. I hope what's 
actually published is the fullness of the ISG report and not 
simply one aspect of it," the prime minister told reporters. 

Speaking in Baghdad, the foreign secretray, Jack Straw, said that 
the report shows that the threat from Saddam "in terms of his 
intentions ... [was] even starker than we have seen before". 

Both George Bush and Tony Blair used allegations of WMD as a 
prime justification for last year's invasion of Iraq and 
officials are unlikely to be relishing the publication of the 
ISG's final findings. 

Mr Bush has argued that it stopped a long-term risk posed by 
Saddam and insisted during his campaign for re-election that Iraq 
had been a "gathering" threat. 

But the leaked draft - obtained by the New York Times - said that 
the only biological or chemical weapons Saddam's regime was 
working on before last year's invasion were small quantities of 
poisons, most likely for use in assassinations. 

The draft does not rule out the possibility that WMD stockpiles 
could have been moved out of Iraq but there is apparently no 
evidence to suggest this. Earlier this year Mr Duelfer told the 
Guardian he expected the final report would leave some unanswered 
questions.

The failure to find stockpiles of WMD had been anticipated since 
the former head of the ISG, David Kay, quit in January. "We were 
almost all wrong" in thinking Saddam had stocks of such weapons, 
he said.

At the Labour party conference last week Mr Blair urged his party 
to put aside its differences over Iraq and focus on winning a 
third term in power. 

Mr Blair told the conference he accepted that the evidence about 
Saddam having "actual biological and chemical weapons, as opposed 
to the capability to develop them, has turned out to be wrong". 

"I simply point out such evidence was agreed by the whole 
international community, not least because Saddam had used such 
weapons against his own people and neighbouring countries," he 
said. 

"And the problem is I can apologise for the information that 
turned out to be wrong, but I can't, sincerely at least, 
apologise for removing Saddam. The world is a better place with 
Saddam in prison not in power." 

Today the shadow defence secretary, Nicholas Soames, said it 
would be "no great surprise" if the ISG reported that no evidence 
of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons had been found. 

"I don't think it alters the case for war one way or another 
personally, but I think it is difficult for the Americans and for 
the prime minister to explain," he told BBC Radio 4's Today 
programme. 
	
 	
        Special report Iraq

Chronology Iraq timeline: Feb 1 2004 - present 
[http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/page/0,12438,1151021,00.html] 
Iraq timeline: July 16 1979 - Jan 31 2004 
[http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/page/0,12438,793802,00.html] 

Useful links
Provisional authority: rebuilding Iraq
[http://www.rebuilding-iraq.net/] 
Iraqi-American chamber of commerce
[http://www.i-acci.org/main.shtml] 
cnn.com: David Kay's evidence to US Senate committee
[http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/01/28/kay.transcript/] 

[UP] 

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
*****************************************************************
 5 UK Independent: Rumsfeld, Bremer and WMD inspectors cast shadow on war
 
By Rupert Cornwell in Washington
 
06 October 2004

President George Bush's rationale for the Iraq war, and his 
subsequent handling of the conflict, have been separately 
undermined by two of his own top officials ­ handing precious new 
ammunition to the Democrats as the election campaign enters a 
crucial phase. 

The first blow came when Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary 
and a prime architect of the war, told foreign policy experts 
that he had never seen "strong, hard evidence" linking Saddam 
Hussein with al-Qa'ida. 

His words, answering questions at a Council of Foreign Relations 
meeting in New York, implicitly take issue with one of Mr Bush's 
long-standing arguments to justify the March 2003 invasion. They 
were also likely to be seized upon by John Edwards in his debate 
last night with Vice-President Dick Cheney, who has laid special 
stress on the Saddam-al-Qa'ida connection. 

Hours later, the man who was the US pro-consul in Iraq for 15 
months until June 2004 complained that the Bush administration 
failed to send a large enough force to deal with the violence and 
looting after Saddam had been toppled. "We never had enough 
troops on the ground," Paul Bremer told an insurance conference 
in West Virginia. Yesterday the Democratic challenger, John 
Kerry, leapt on the admission by Mr Bremer, who headed the 
Coalition Provisional Authority until it was disbanded. "Now we 
learn that America's top official in Iraq acknowledges that we 
didn't deploy enough troops and didn't contain the violence ­ I 
hope that Mr Cheney can acknowledge those mistakes tonight," Mr 
Kerry declared. 

Mr Bremer tried to repair the damage, issuing a statement that he 
was referring only to the immediate post-war period and that he 
fully supported current efforts to train an Iraqi force to take 
over security duties. But the damage was done, with the remarks 
from a man who has been a staunch supporter of the President. 

In an earlier and hitherto unnoticed speech at DePauw University 
in Indiana last month, Mr Bremer confessed he "should have been 
even more insistent" in his advice to the administration. Had he 
been so, the situation today in Iraq might be much improved, he 
said. 

If that were not enough, almost every day brings new reminders of 
how Mr Bush's main rationale for the war ­ the threat posed by 
Saddam's supposed arsenal of illicit chemical, biological and 
nuclear weapons ­ has crumbled. At the weekend, The New York 
Times published new evidence that the administration presented 
Saddam's purchase of aluminium tubes as proof that he was 
reconstituting Iraq's nuclear programme ­ even as it was being 
told by its own experts that the tubes were destined not for 
centrifuges to enrich uranium, but for much smaller (and 
perfectly legal) artillery rockets. 

Today, Charles Duelfer, the chief US arms inspector in Iraq, is 
due to present a 1,500-page report to Congress concluding that 
Iraq neither had weapons of mass destruction, nor significant WMD 
production programmes at the time of the invasion. The only crumb 
Mr Duelfer can offer the White House is that Saddam intended to 
reactivate his plans to produce such weapons once UN sanctions 
were lifted. 

The array of challenges to his Iraq strategy comes at a bad 
moment for the Bush campaign, as the President tries to regain 
the ground lost after his heavily panned showing in his first 
debate with Mr Kerry. 

The debate's topic of foreign policy was assumed to favour Mr 
Bush. Instead the President appeared testy, lacklustre and poorly 
prepared. Mr Kerry by contrast shone, and has now pulled back 
level in the polls. 

In a sign of the mounting concern at the White House, Mr Bush's 
handlers abruptly tore up a speech on medical liability he was 
due to deliver in the swing state of Pennsylvania today. Mr Bush 
will now make a "significant" address dealing with the economy 
and the "war on terror" ­ the latter is still his strongest suit, 
polls say. 

Whether Mr Rumsfeld's candour will change the way the country 
thinks is another matter. A CNN/Gallup poll has found that 42 per 
cent of Americans still believe that the former Iraqi leader was 
involved in the attacks, and an astonishing 32 per cent that 
Saddam had planned them in person.                 


UK Independent Ltd.
*****************************************************************
 6 Scotsman.com: Blair 'Should Quit over Iraq Weapons Report'
 
Wed 6 Oct 2004   			 			

By Jamie Lyons, Political Correspondent, PA News 

Tony Blair was facing renewed calls to quit today ahead of 
official confirmation that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of 
mass destruction.
 
The group hunting for the dictator’s arsenal is expected to 
announce it has found no evidence of chemical, biological of 
nuclear weapons.
 
The Liberal Democrats said the Iraq Survey Group’s findings 
further demolished the case for war.
 
And the father of a British soldier killed in Iraq said the Prime 
Minister must now resign after telling the country “a pack of 
lies”.
 
The head of the ISG, Charles Duelfer, will set out his findings 
in his final report to the US Senate tonight.
 
He is expected to say Saddam did not have WMD at the time of the 
US-led invasion.
 
The failure to find WMD will be particularly damaging to the 
Prime Minister because of his reliance on them as the 
justification for going to war.
 
He has already accepted intelligence suggesting Saddam had WMD 
was wrong, and he has taken full responsibility for any mistakes 
in British intelligence.
 
The timing could scarcely be worse for President Bush, coming 
just weeks before the presidential election. But the case for war 
in the US always rested less on WMD than it did in Britain.
 
Although the report will not be released until tonight, much of 
its contents were revealed in a leaked draft last month.
 
The failure to find stockpiles of WMD had been anticipated since 
the former head of the ISG, David Kay, quit in January.
 
The report is understood to say the former Iraqi dictator planned 
to start producing weapons in defiance of UN sanctions.
 
Shadow defence secretary Nicholas Soames said it would be “no 
great surprise” if the ISG reported that no evidence of 
chemical, biological or nuclear weapons had been found.
 
“I don’t think it alters the case for war one way or another 
personally, but I think it is difficult for the Americans and for 
the Prime Minister to explain,” he said.
 
Tory leader Michael Howard accused Mr Blair last week of lying 
over the war.
 
Speaking on the BBC, Mr Soames said: “It does matter that the 
Prime Minister quite clearly was less than frank, is the politest 
way of possibly putting it.” 

The Lib Dems opposed the war from the outset. Today they said the 
ISG report was further proof that the Government was wrong to 
take Britain to war.
 
The party’s foreign affairs spokesman, Sir Menzies Campbell, 
said: “This report justifies the policy of containment and 
deterrence. 

“It most certainly does not provide any support for the 
Government’s view that the threat from Saddam Hussein was so 
acute that only immediate military action would do.
 
“Brick by brick, the Government’s case for going to war is 
being demolished.”
 
Reg Keys, whose son Lance Corporal Thomas Keys, 20, was killed by 
a mob of Iraqis, said the buck had to stop with the Prime 
Minister.
 
“The Prime Minister fed us a pack of lies,” he said.
 
“He told us we were going to war to defend our shores from a 
WMD strike.
 
“My son was told he was going off to fight a country that was 
threatening to use WMD. Now we know he was lied to. That has been 
affirmed and reaffirmed again by this report.”
 
Lance Corporal Keys was one of six Red Caps killed by a mob of 
Iraqis last year.
 
Mr Keys added that Greg Dyke had quit as director general of the 
BBC because of the corporation’s failings, highlighted in the 
Hutton Report.
 
He said, as the head of the Government, Mr Blair should accept 
full responsibility for his failings and resign.
 
He also said John Scarlett, the former chairman of the Joint 
Intelligence Committee, should not be allowed to head M16.
 
He should be punished, not “rewarded”, for his failings, Mr 
Keys said.
 
“Blair and Scarlett have no credibility,” he went on.
 
“Could we have any faith in them if they took us into another 
war?”
 
But Mr Blair appealed for the “fullness” of the report to be 
analysed – rather than only one aspect of it.
 
Mr Blair, in Sudan on the first leg of a three-day Africa visit, 
was asked whether he would go back to the Commons to correct any 
misleading impression he had given.
 
The Prime Minister said: “I think we have already been through 
this. I will say some more about it when the report is actually 
published.
 
“I hope what’s actually published is the fullness of the ISG 
report and not simply one aspect of it.”
 
Speaking last week at the Labour Party conference, Mr Blair 
accepted the evidence about Saddam having “actual biological 
and chemical weapons, as opposed to the capability to develop 
them, has turned out to be wrong”.
 
“I simply point out such evidence was agreed by the whole 
international community, not least because Saddam had used such 
weapons against his own people and neighbouring countries,” he 
said.
 
“And the problem is, I can apologise for the information that 
turned out to be wrong, but I can’t, sincerely at least, 
apologise for removing Saddam. The world is a better place with 
Saddam in prison, not in power.”                [ border=]             

		   		   
scotsman.com
*****************************************************************
 7 UK Independent: Iraq Survey Group to concede defeat in search for WMD
 
By Rupert Cornwell in Washington
 
06 October 2004

 	 

The Iraq Survey Group is expected to report today that it has
found no evidence of chemical, biological or nuclear weapons in
post-war Iraq. 

Charles Duelfer, the chief UN arms inspector in Iraq, is due to
present the findings in a 1,500-page report to Congress. 

He is expected to conclude that Iraq had neither weapons of mass
destruction, nor significant WMD production programmes at the
time of the invasion. However, he will assert that Saddam
Hussein had plans to produce weapons once UN sanctions were
lifted, according to US officials. 

The verdict of Mr Duelfer, who will present the findings to the
Senate Armed Services Committee, has been widely anticipated
since the resignation of David Kay, the former head of the Iraq
Survey Group, in January. When he stepped down, Mr Kay voiced
serious concerns about allegations of weapons stockpiles. "We
were probably all wrong about whether Iraq had stockpiles of
nuclear, chemical or biological weapons," he said. 

There were claims last night that the report would reveal new
evidence that Saddam had planned to break UN-imposed sanctions
and renew the production of banned weapons. 

Anonymous US officials told The New York Times that the report
would detail efforts by Iraq to sidestep the sanctions while
undermining international support for them. This was reportedly
manifested in the use of clandestine laboratories to manufacture
small amounts of chemical and biological weapons for use in
assassinations, according to the officials. 

Today's document will stop short of offering a final judgement
about the situation before the war. The Iraq Survey Group is
expected to continue translating and evaluating an estimated
10,000 boxes of documents seized in Iraq. 	           


UK Independent Ltd.
*****************************************************************
 8 Aljazeera: Iran will not meet IAEA nuclear demands - 

www.aljazeera.com

  10/6/2004 2:21:00 PM GMT   
  
"We have suspended enrichment voluntarily and we will not accept 
any constraints," Rowhani said. 

Iran will not comply with IAEA nuclear demands and the Islamic 
republic is open for both confrontation and negotiations, Iran’s 
senior national security official said. 

"We have said clearly that we will not apply the second part of 
the resolution concerning the total suspension of enrichment," 
Iran's top nuclear negotiator Hassan Rowhani was cited as saying 
by local television. 

"We have suspended enrichment voluntarily and we will not accept 
any constraints," he added. 

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on September 18 
adopted a resolution demanding Iran to "immediately" suspend all 
uranium enrichment-related activities -- such as making 
centrifuges, converting yellowcake into UF6 feed gas, and 
building a heavy water reactor. 

The resolution also sets a November 25 deadline. If Iran doesn’t 
comply with its demands, the Islamic republic will be referred to 
the UN Security Council for possible sanctions. 

"To sort out this case, there are two possibilities," Rowhani 
said. "Either we find a political solution and close the case (at 
the IAEA) or we move towards confrontation. We are ready for 
both." 

In a separate statement, Iranian President Mohammad Khatami said 
that Tehran would not give in to international pressure that aims 
at stopping the country’s peaceful nuclear ambitions. 

"We will continue our cooperation with the IAEA but at the same 
time we will not subdue ourselves or our nuclear program because 
of foreign pressure," Khatami said.  

"It is our duty and right to use this nuclear energy for peaceful 
purposes and I'd like to assure the international community that 
we will not go to the extent of producing nuclear weapons." He 
added. 

Another diplomat close to the IAEA said that the uranium 
processing was "under the watchful eye" of the IAEA. 

The IAEA has installed monitoring cameras at the Isfahan uranium 
conversion reactor in Iran to supervise the production of uranium 
hexafluoride, the feed material for centrifuges used in 
enrichment. 

"They (the IAEA) were aware that the production had begun," the 
diplomat said. 

The U.S. and Israel accuse Iran of using its nuclear program for 
covertly developing atomic arms. Iran denies the allegations and 
maintains that it is only seeking the peaceful generation of 
electricity. 

The Islamic republic stresses that uranium enrichment is 
permitted for peaceful purposes under the Non-Proliferation 
Treaty (NPT)- which Iran has signed.  

U.S. plutonium shipment arrives in France 

Meanwhile, an American plutonium shipment arrived in France 
Wednesday, increasing international nuclear arms proliferation 
risk. 

French nukes company Areva confirmed Wednesday that it has 
received the U.S. weapons-grade plutonium from the U.S. National 
Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). 

Areva plans to convert the plutonium into an experimental fuel 
known as 'MOX' (mixed plutonium uranium oxide fuel). It will then 
transport it back to the United States in 2005, to be tested in 
U.S. facilities over 3 years. 

Greenpeace International organization rejects the transport 
because it is part of an international program led by the French 
state-owned nukes company Areva, along with the governments of 
the United States and Russia, to commercialize the large-scale 
use of weapons-grade plutonium as fuel in nuclear facilities. 

Shaun Burnie of Greenpeace International said that "the French 
government is determined to ignore the security and safety risks 
posed by plutonium transports by claiming that it’s secret. It 
will be too late if there is a disaster to inform the people of 
France - that is what Greenpeace is determined to do over these 
coming days," 

If this weapons-grade plutonium fuel experiment succeeds, a total 
of 68 tons of weapons-grade plutonium from the American and 
Russian weapons stockpiles - enough to develop more than 15,000 
nuclear bombs - will be exposed to theft, diversion and 
accidents. 

In addition, France and the UK have an estimated 180 tons of 
'civil' plutonium created by the reprocessing of nuclear fuel, 
which adds to the growing nuclear proliferation threats. 

    

        [Make Aljazeera.com my Homepage]   

   Copyright 2004 AlJazeera Publishing Limited   
*****************************************************************
 9 Las Vegas SUN: Official: N. Korea Nuclear Talks Too Slow

 By SOO-JEONG LEE ASSOCIATED PRESS 

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - 

The international community is losing patience over the
slow-moving six-nation talks on North Korea's nuclear weapons
program, and the U.N. Security Council should act on the matter,
the U.N. nuclear chief said Wednesday. 

Mohamed ElBaradei, director of the International Atomic Energy
Agency, said a passive response by the Security Council could
set "the worst precedent of all." He did not specify what
measures should be taken. 

ElBaradei spoke in Seoul, where he was attending a conference on
global security and holding talks with officials about
undeclared nuclear experiments by South Korea. 

The six-party talks include the two Koreas, the United States,
Russia, China and Japan. Three rounds of talks have been held in
Beijing, but yielded little progress. A fourth round was set for
September, but North Korea has refused to attend. 

"Six-party talks have been going on for quite a while,"
ElBaradei told a news conference. "I think people in the
international community are getting impatient." 

In a speech, ElBaradei urged the U.N. Security Council to act on
the North Korean problem because the North had withdrawn from
the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty early last year, shortly
after the latest dispute erupted over its nuclear activity. 

"Naturally, all of these actions were promptly reported by the
agency to the Security Council - but with little to no
response," ElBaradei said in his speech. "This type of reaction
by the council may be setting the worst precedent of all, if it
conveys the message that acquiring a nuclear deterrent, by
whatever means, will neutralize any compliance mechanism and
bring about preferred treatment." 

The Security Council could eventually consider economic
sanctions against North Korea, though the council is likely to
be divided over such punitive measures. 

ElBaradei earlier said the dispute over the North's nuclear
development was far more serious than revelations that South
Korea conducted two nuclear experiments in 1982 and 2000 without
declaring them. 

"These are not two situations to be compared," ElBaradei said.
"However, we wish that we resolve both issues as quickly as
possible. Obviously, we expect to resolve the South Korean issue
much quicker." 

He noted the South Korean experiments were conducted at a
"laboratory level" while North Korea has been fully operating
its reprocessing plant. 

ElBaradei praised South Korea for "good cooperation and good
transparency," and said U.N. experts will visit it this month to
further probe its nuclear activities. 

"We haven't seen any cover-up but again, I do not want to jump
to any conclusion because we are still going through the
process," he said. 

South Korea recently said it conducted a plutonium-based nuclear
experiment in 1982 and a uranium-enrichment experiment in 2000.
North Korea says the two experiments and what it calls a
"hostile" U.S. policy have blocked progress in the talks. 

On Wednesday, North Korea reiterated that "it would not be
possible for it to take part in any effort for a solution to the
nuclear issue with confidence unless the nuclear issue of South
Korea is settled understandably." 

South Korea has secretly pursued nuclear weapons but IAEA
officials are trying to "hush it up as early as possible while
downplaying the gravity of the case," a North Korean Foreign
Ministry spokesman was quoted as saying by its official news
agency, KCNA. 

Plutonium and enriched uranium are two key ingredients of
nuclear weapons. 

-- 



*****************************************************************
 10 Xinhuanet: DPRK demands inclusion of S. Korean nuclear experiments in six-party talks   

  www.xinhuanet.com

  www.chinaview.cn 2004-10-06 22:53:01   

    PYONGYANG, Oct. 6 (Xinhuanet) -- The Democratic People's 
Republic of Korea (DPRK) said on Wednesday that the six-party 
talks on the denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula should 
include discussionof South Korea's secret nuclear experiments. 

    "South Korea's secret nuclear experiments are raising 
suspicion in the international community over whether it has 
pursued a clandestine nuclear weapons program even though it 
declared a halt to the program in the 1970s," a DPRK Foreign 
Ministry spokesman said. 

    "The reality proves that the nuclear issue of South Korea 
should be discussed and clarified at multilateral negotiations in 
the future," he added. 

    Pyongyang has repeatedly said it will not attend the fourth 
round of the six-party talks unless South Korea's nuclear 
experiments are probed. Originally to have taken place before 
end-September, the fourth round deadline expired without a new 
date being set. 

    "Considering that South Korea is under the US nuclear 
umbrella,it would not be possible for the DPRK to take part in 
any effort to seek a solution to the nuclear issue with 
confidence unless thenuclear issue of South Korea is settled 
understandably," the spokesman said. 

    The spokesman also accused the United States and the 
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) of applying double 
standards to the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula. 

    "The US said that there is nothing to worry about, calling it 
no more than experiments for the purpose of research, even before 
the results of inspection are available," said the spokesman. 

    "The IAEA has applied double-dealing standards when dealing 
with the nuclear issue on the Korean Peninsula in the past, away 
from the principle of impartiality," he said. 

    The South Korean government admitted last month that its 
scientists conducted plutonium- and uranium-based experiments in 
1982 and 2000 without the authorization or knowledge of the 
government. 

    But Seoul stressed that the one-off experiments were purely 
academic activities that had nothing to do with nuclear weapons. 

    The six-party talks involve the DPRK, South Korea, Japan, 
China,Russia and the United States. Enditem   

  Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. 
*****************************************************************
 11 Channelnewsasia: Seoul cooperating well in nuclear inspections - IAEA 
 
[http://www.channelnewsasia.com]       

  Mohamed ElBaradei with South Korean Unification Minister Chung 
Dong-young.   

 Posted: 06 October 2004 1254 hrs 

SEOUL : The head of the UN nuclear watchdog said he expected an 
early settlement of the controversy over South Korea's nuclear 
experiments, praising Seoul for cooperating fully with the probe.
 
Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic 
Energy Agency (IAEA), also said the agency would dispatch one or 
two more teams this month to look into South Korea's past record 
of clandestine nuclear tests.

"No, we have not seen any cover-up," ElBaradei told a news 
conference.
 
"We are getting good cooperation from the South Korean 
government."
 
North Korea, citing concern about Seoul's nuclear experiments 
among other issues, has put on hold multilateral talks aimed at 
defusing tensions over its own atomic weapons drive.
 
North Korea has accused the United States of applying double 
standards concerning the nuclear issues of the two Koreas but 
ElBaradei said there were no parallels between the two cases.
 
"North Korea has a full-fledged reprocessing plant operating 
while South Korea has been continuously under safeguard and under 
verification," he said, noting that North Korea had reneged on 
its commitments to comply with non-proliferation safeguards.
 
"We wish to resolve both issues as quickly as possible. We expect 
the South Korean issue to be resolved much quicker ... Since (it 
is) complicated, the North Korean issue will take much longer 
time," said the IAEA chief, here for an anti-nuclear weapons 
proliferation conference.
 
The IAEA sent inspectors here twice last month after Seoul 
revealed that its scientists secretly enriched a tiny amount of 
plutonium in 1982 and uranium in 2000.
 
South Korea says the lab experiments with potential ingredients 
for bombs were not linked to nuclear weapons programs. ElBaradei 
earlier expressed "serious concern" about the activities.
 
He said the IAEA would send one or two more teams this month to 
South Korea.
 
"We are going to have one mission or two this month," he said, 
adding that he expects to report to IAEA members about the 
outcome of the inspections in November.
 
- AFP
*****************************************************************
 12 Korea Times: ElBaradei Discounts Seoul's Nuclear Lab Test 

Hankooki.com > The Korea Times   

By Ryu Jin Staff Reporter

 The United NationˇŻs chief nuclear inspector rejected 
suggestions Wednesday that South Korea had a nuclear arms program 
and said there is no evidence that it tried to cover up past 
nuclear experiments.

 Mohamed ElBaradei, director general of the International Atomic 
Energy Agency (IAEA), said in a news conference that there was 
nothing illegal about the two isolated nuclear-related tests that 
came to light last month.

 ``These experiments are completely legal. They are not 
prohibited per se. The problem is they were not reported (to the 
IAEA),ˇŻˇŻ he told reporters at a hotel in Seoul, just before 
leaving to Japan.

 ``I donˇŻt want to jump to conclusions because we are still in 
the process (of investigating),ˇŻˇŻ the IAEA chief said, adding 
the South Korean government has been fully cooperating with the 
U.N. agencyˇŻs inspections.

 He said the IAEA will dispatch one or two more inspection teams 
to the country this month depending on the number of facilities 
and equipment they have to check.

 The international nuclear watchdog has sent two special 
inspection teams so far, after Seoul admitted early last month to 
the two isolated experiments _ one in 1982 and the other in 2000. 
They produced tiny amounts of plutonium and enriched uranium, 
respectively, the two key materials for building nuclear bombs.

 ElBaradei, however, said the additional inspections are only 
part of a process to ensure full understanding of the country's 
past nuclear activities, including their motivation and the kind 
of equipment used.

 ``That is normal to fully bring the issue to a close,ˇŻˇŻ he 
said.

 South Korea's past nuclear activities have also caused 
difficulties in the six-way talks aimed at ending the 24-month 
standoff over the NorthˇŻs nuclear weapons programs. The two 
Koreas, the United States, Japan, Russia and China agreed at 
their last round of talks in Beijing in June to meet before the 
end of September for the fourth plenary session in the Chinese 
capital. However, they have been unable to schedule the meeting 
as North Korea has refused to return to the negotiating table 
before the U.S. presidential election next month, taking issue 
with the South's nuclear activities.

 The IAEA chief stressed there is no comparison between the 
nuclear activities of the South and North.

 ``South Korean activities are simply experiments while North 
Korea has a fully operational reprocessing process,ˇŻˇŻ he said. 
``I am getting full cooperation and transparency from the South 
Korean government. The North moved out of the nonproliferation 
regime over two years ago now.''

 Regarding recent reports that more than 200 kilograms of 
plutonium were missing in Japan, the IAEA chief said it was the 
first time he had heard of such an allegation. But he did not 
completely rule out the possibility by saying he has yet to 
receive a report on the incident.

 ElBaradei came to Seoul on Sunday to attend the Pugwash 
Conference on Science and World Affairs, an annual meeting of the 
international body for consultations on nonproliferation and 
disarmament. He flew to Japan yesterday after making a speech at 
the conference, ending his four-day stay in Seoul. 

jinryu@koreatimes.co.kr 10-06-2004 17:08         
  
*****************************************************************
 13 AP Wire: U.S. Report Undercuts Bush War Rationale

 | 10/06/2004 | 


JOHN J. LUMPKIN

 Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Undercutting the Bush's administration's rationale 
for invading Iraq, the final report of the chief U.S. arms 
inspector concludes that Saddam Hussein did not vigorously pursue 
a program to develop weapons of mass destruction after 
international inspectors left Baghdad in 1998, according to 
lawmakers and others briefed on the report. 

In drafts, weapons hunter Charles Duelfer concluded that Saddam's 
Iraq had no stockpiles of the banned weapons but said he found 
signs of idle programs that Saddam could have revived if 
international attention had waned. 

"It appears that he did not vigorously pursue those programs 
after the inspectors left," a Bush administration official said, 
speaking on condition of anonymity in advance of the report's 
release. 

Duelfer was providing his findings Wednesday to the Senate Armed 
Services Committee. His team compiled a 1,500-page report after 
his predecessor, David Kay, who quit last December, also found no 
evidence of weapons stockpiles. 

Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., briefed on the report earlier 
Wednesday, said Duelfer found Iraq's capability to produce and 
develop weapons of mass destruction had degraded since 1998. 

The report was "inconclusive" about what ultimately happened to 
Saddam's supposed weapons stockpiles from earlier in the 1990s, 
which might have been destroyed or transferred to Syria, said 
Roberts, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. 

Pointing to apparent prewar confusion inside the country itself, 
the report suggests that Saddam's senior advisers, and perhaps 
Saddam himself, actually believed Iraq had weapons of mass 
destruction even when it did not, Roberts said. 

A Democratic senator briefed on the report, Dick Durbin of 
Illinois, said the Bush administration, in justifying war, 
"created a worse-case scenario on virtually no evidence." 

"There were no weapons of mass destruction," Durbin said. "At 
most, there was an intention or desire to create them." 

The White House continued to maintain that the findings support 
the view that Saddam was a threat. 

"We knew the dictator had a history of using weapons of mass 
destruction, a long record of aggression and hatred for America," 
President Bush said in a speech Wednesday in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. 
"There was a risk, a real risk, that Saddam Hussein would pass 
weapons or materials or information to terrorist networks. In the 
world after Sept. 11, that was a risk we could not afford to 
take." 

Saddam was importing banned materials, working on unmanned aerial 
vehicles in violation of U.N. agreements and maintaining 
industrial capability that could be converted to produce weapons, 
officials have said. Duelfer also describes Saddam's Iraq as 
having had limited research efforts into chemical and biological 
weapons. 

Duelfer's report will come on a week that the White House has 
been put on the defensive in a number of Iraq issues. 

Remarks this week by L. Paul Bremer, former U.S. administrator in 
occupied Iraq, suggested he argued for more troops in the 
immediate aftermath of the invasion, when looting was rampant. A 
spokesman for Bush's re-election campaign said Bremer indeed 
differed with military commanders. 

Bush's election rival, Democrat John Kerry, pounced on Bremer's 
statements that the United States "paid a big price" for having 
insufficient troop levels. On weapons, however, the Massachusetts 
senator has said he still would have voted to authorize the 
invasion even if he had known none would be found. 

White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the Duelfer report 
"will continue to show that he was a gathering threat that needed 
to be taken seriously, that it was a matter of time before he was 
going to begin pursuing those weapons of mass destruction." 

Compare that to the words of Vice President Dick Cheney, in a 
speech on Aug. 26, 2002, 6 1/2 months before the invasion: 

"Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has 
weapons of mass destruction," Cheney said then. "There is no 
doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our 
allies and against us." 

On Wednesday, the White House also continued to assert that there 
were clear ties between Saddam before the invasion and the 
al-Qaida linked terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. But a CIA report 
recently given to the White House found no conclusive evidence 
that Saddam harbored al-Zarqawi before the war, two U.S. 
government officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity 

They stressed, though, that the report did not make a final 
conclusion and the question of the al-Zaraqwi-Saddam ties is 
still being pursued. One of the officials said it is clear that 
al-Zarqawi had been planning terrorist attacks while operating 
out of Baghdad. 

The CIA report was first revealed by Knight-Ridder. 

During Tuesday night's debate, Cheney said "there is still debate 
over this question." But he added: "At one point, some of 
Zarqawi's people were arrested. Saddam personally intervened to 
have them released." 

In a speech on Oct. 7, 2002, Bush laid out what he described then 
as Iraq's threat: 

_"It possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It 
is seeking nuclear weapons." 

_"We've also discovered through intelligence that Iraq has a 
growing fleet of manned and unmanned aerial vehicles that could 
be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons across broad 
areas." 

_"Iraq possesses ballistic missiles with a likely range of 
hundreds of miles - far enough to strike Saudi Arabia, Israel, 
Turkey and other nations - in a region where more than 135,000 
American civilians and service members live and work. "   

*****************************************************************
 14 Bulletin: Scientists on the stump | 

Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

[http://www.thebulletin.org/clock.html] 
 								
[http://www.thebulletin.org/issues/nukenotes/nukenote.html] 
 									
Volume 60, No. 6 					 						

By Peter J. Kuznick
 							
Scientists who have grumbled about George W. Bush's
unilateral, bellicose, and preemptive foreign policies and
dangerous embrace of nuclear weapons but have not worked
actively for his defeat might learn a valuable lesson from the
forces behind Lyndon Johnson's lopsided victory over Barry
Goldwater in 1964. Although that election has become part of
American political folklore, its uncanny resemblance to and
striking differences with the 2004 election have gone largely
unnoticed. Unlike in 1964, when Democrats and allied scientists
made the nuclear threat the centerpiece of the campaign, they
have, this time, remained almost silent about the president's
systematic lowering of the nuclear threshold, his blurring the
distinction between nuclear and conventional weapons, and his
destabilizing pursuit of a new generation of nuclear weapons.
						

For many, the enduring symbol of the 1964 campaign was a Johnson
ad in which a scene of a young girl plucking petals off a daisy
dissolves into a nuclear explosion. Few, however, remember
American scientists' extraordinary contribution to defining the
campaign's issues and mobilizing the public against what they
saw as Goldwater's foreign policy extremism and nuclear
recklessness. Throwing themselves into the campaign with
unprecedented unanimity and resolve, scientists helped convince
a wary public that Goldwater's slogan "In Your Heart You Know
He's Right" should be transformed to "In Your Heart You Know He
Might." 						

As Theodore White noted in The Making of the President, 1964,
"The campaign of 1964 was that rare thing in American political
history, a campaign based on issues." And Goldwater's nuclear
policies topped the list. 						

Goldwater's troubles began with an October 1963 press conference
at which he said that NATO's six divisions could "probably" be
cut by one-third or more if NATO commanders had the power to
decide to use tactical nuclear weapons. His repeated attempts to
clarify his position, such as introducing the term "conventional
nuclear weapons," only muddied it more. Goldwater had already
appeared to support battlefield use of nuclear weapons in his
1960 book The Conscience of a Conservative, in which he urged
the United States to "perfect a variety of small, clean nuclear
weapons." 						

Goldwater repudiated disarmament efforts, contending instead
that a buildup was necessary, and opposed the nuclear test ban
treaty, the Washington-Moscow "hot line," and the Arms Control
and Disarmament Agency. He threatened the use of nuclear weapons
in Vietnam and expressed contempt for those who questioned
American unilateralism. And he made matters worse for himself by
harping on the nuclear issue, mentioning nuclear weapons and
wartime devastation 26 times in one 30-minute speech. [1] 						

After Goldwater won the Republican nomination, scientists began
to hammer his nuclear stance. Physical chemist Donald MacArthur
set the scientists' anti-Goldwater campaign in motion. Married
to Lady Bird Johnson's niece, MacArthur took advantage of his
social ties and political connections to launch Scientists and
Engineers for Johnson, which later became Scientists and
Engineers for Johnson-Humphrey (SEJH). He enlisted three of the
scientific community's chief luminaries: Jerome Wiesner, dean of
science at MIT and White House science adviser under John F.
Kennedy and Johnson; George Kistiakowsky, the Russian-born
Harvard chemist who played a prominent role in developing the
plutonium bomb and was science adviser to Dwight Eisenhower; and
Detlev Bronk, president of the Rockefeller Institute, chairman
of the National Science Board, and former president of the
National Academies of Science (NAS), who began recruiting
prominent colleagues to form a national organizing committee.
						

About a dozen members of the organizing committee met to
strategize from August 10 to 11, 1964. They decided to form
bipartisan, grassroots activist organizations in every state to
push Johnson's candidacy. On August 13, they unveiled the
42-member committee, which included Luis Alvarez, Michael
DeBakey, Richard Buckminster Fuller, Polykarp Kusch, and Harold
Urey, among others. The committee members extolled the
contributions of science and technology to the nation's
security, health, and economic strength; disavowed "extremist"
solutions; and commended the Kennedy administration on the
Limited Test Ban Treaty. They were dedicated to international
disarmament and offered "unqualified support for the time-tested
policy of exclusive presidential determination of the use of
nuclear arms, whether strategic or tactical." They warned that
"those whose will-to-victory is not tempered by a
will-to-understand the nature of modern security, could not lead
this nation safely." Prominent figures such as Benjamin Spock,
Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, and Julius Stratton quickly joined SEJH.
						
Nuclear worries unite scientists 						

Colleagues clamored to sign up, including some with no previous
record of political involvement. On August 12, Francis Bittner,
just back from Los Alamos and apparently unaware of what was in
the offing, wrote a letter to Wiesner asking, "Can you suggest
something useful for me to do, and someone to write to, about
helping defeat Goldwater and his supporters in the coming
election? I'd be glad to do anything--lick postage stamps, phone
people, etc. Bear in mind that I am politically an ignoramus."
Others, like Warren Weaver, were lifelong Republicans who were
aghast at Goldwater's politics. As Weaver wrote in a September
1964 letter, "The idea of Goldwater being president of our
country simply appalls me." [2] 						

Bittner and Weaver were part of a large groundswell. By early
October, Science magazine reported 20,000 SEJH members in 32
states; more than 1,000 people were signing up each day. [3] 
Connecticut co-chair Arthur Galston, a Yale plant physiologist,
acknowledged being "overwhelmed with the eagerness of people to
help." [4]  The November 1, 1964 Bridgeport Sunday Herald
reported "more political activity on the Yale campus this year
than ever before," due in substantial measure to the SEJH
effort. "By the hundreds, faculty and students have been
contributing funds and putting in volunteer man-hours." In
offices across the country, Nobel laureates and young industrial
researchers worked together around the clock, stuffing flyers
into thousands of envelopes. By the time of the election,
membership surpassed 100,000. 						

Scientists' sense of urgency derived from a palpable and
oft-expressed fear that a Goldwater victory would heighten the
threat of nuclear annihilation. Helen Taussig, of Johns Hopkins
Medical School, wrote, "If a quick-tempered person has the power
to press the button for nuclear war, it may well occur. Indeed
if the [Soviet Union] seriously thinks we may do it, they may do
it first. If half a dozen people in the United States have that
right, the chances of escaping a thermonuclear war are indeed
small." Only an overwhelming Goldwater defeat would reassure the
world that the American people desired peace, Taussig said. [5]
						

Others traced the danger to Goldwater's intellectual
limitations. Roger Revelle, director of the Scripps Institute of
Oceanography, felt Goldwater had poor judgment, saying, "With
his lack of education, his know-nothingism, and his nostalgia
for a past that never was, he might irretrievably damage our
country and foreclose the future for all of us." [6]  						

SEJH activists seized opportunities to shape the public
discourse. Kistiakowsky, Emanuel Piore, and DeBakey testified
before the Democratic Platform Committee. In the October 16,
1964 issue of Science, Kistiakowsky debated Edward Teller,
decrying Goldwater's statement that "a general war is probable."
And Wiesner and Herbert York, chief Pentagon scientist during
the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations, told Scientific
American readers that "steadily increasing military power" was
producing "steadily decreasing national security," a view
endorsed by both the Washington Post and Des Moines Register
editorial pages. [7] 						

Scientists traveled far and wide to press their point. Wiesner
logged the most miles, crisscrossing the country to address SEJH
events. Many others pitched in. MIT chemist John Sheehan told a
meeting of Delaware Scientists, Engineers, and Physicians for
Johnson and Humphrey that the "paramount issue in this election
is the threat of nuclear war," which he described as unthinkable
for most--but not for Goldwater. "Most scientists I've talked to
aren't only against him as being trigger-happy with nuclear
weapons, but because of his general concept of the use of force
in all parts of the world to settle our problems," he said.
Although scientists often ignored politics, "This time many of
us feel we have no choice." [8] 						

Nobel laureate and Manhattan Project veteran Urey combined a
lecture in Madison, Wisconsin, on "The Moon and the Planets"
with an SEJH press conference, at which he observed, "Goldwater
seems to have the idea that we can have our way in the modern
world if we only stand up militarily. This is incorrect. We
cannot tell the rest of the world what to do." [9] 						

More than 4,000 people attended an October 11 SEJH "citizens'
rally" in Washington, D.C., including celebrities Carol
Channing, Frederic March, Tony Bennett, and Louis Armstrong. The
band played a special "Johnson March" composed by Szent-Gyorgyi.
On stage sat 20 leading scientists, among them national
co-chairman Bronk, who told the crowd that scientists "deplore
neurotic nostalgia for an outworn past." Hubert Humphrey was
more forceful, calling Goldwater's desire to give control of
nuclear weapons to battlefield commanders a "policy of twentieth
century disaster." He added, "You know the power of nuclear
weapons, the horrors of radioactive extermination. I say
Americans know these dangers and repudiate any candidate for
high public office who seems not to sense these dangers." 						

The Massachusetts chapter of SEHJ, more than 3,000 strong, may
have been the most active. All 25 members of Kistiakowsky's
Harvard chemistry department, despite a wide range of political
leanings, signed a letter declaring their unanimous commitment
to Goldwater's defeat, urging colleagues throughout the nation
to join SEJH and set up state chapters. [10] 						

The Massachusetts branch organized an impressive symposium
entitled "The Presidency in the Atomic Age." Speakers included
Kistiakowsky, Wiesner, MIT provost and physics professor Charles
Townes, MIT arms control expert Lincoln Bloomfield, and Harvard
professor Stanley Hoffmann, who derided "Goldwater's mixture of
the big stick, the large mouth, and the small brain." [11] 						

The Georgia chapter of SEJH embarked on what its executive
committee described as "a forced-pace effort, which at times has
verged on the feverish." During the final week of the campaign,
leaders urged members to redouble their efforts through
accelerated fundraising, recruiting, and writing letters to the
editor. The executive committee recommended emphasizing the
prominence of local and national members ("point out that 75
percent of American Nobel laureates are members of our
organization") and stressing the bipartisan nature of the
scientists' support. They advised members to focus on the
nuclear threat and educational policy, exhorting, "Above all, BE
ACTIVE during these final days of the campaign. The few hundreds
or thousands of votes which we can swing may very well be
crucial to the way Georgia goes in this election." [12] 						

Their final blitz included an address by Wiesner, newspaper ads,
and one-minute spots on local radio. Addressing an audience at
Emory University, Wiesner criticized past government experts who
overestimated Soviet military strength and had "probably
misinterpreted their intentions as well." As a result, he
contended, weapons production had exceeded all reasonable
bounds. "We already have more power than we know how to
use--enough to destroy most of the world and contaminate the
entire world at the same time," Wiesner said. [13] 						

The Georgia scientists' message hit home. Atlanta Constitution
political editor Reg Murphy reported that women throughout the
South were voting against Goldwater because they feared his
nuclear policies. In an October 26 article called "Goldwater and
the A-Bomb Scaring Off Women," Murphy wrote, "Women have been
convinced, in many cases, that the bomb and strontium 90 and
fallout are what this campaign is all about." A sentiment Murphy
said he heard repeatedly from women was, "Goldwater scares me to
death. I don't know what he would do with the bomb." A Gallup
poll found the same attitude among women across the nation.
						

On the eve of the election, Atlanta Constitution editors weighed
in on Goldwater's nuclear policies, warning on October 31:
"Against a backdrop of the hydrogen fireball and the mushroom
cloud, mistakes of judgment look fatal." "Goldwater's policies
would make accidental nuclear war not possible, but probable,"
the editors said, alluding to a remark made by Sen. William
Fulbright. Georgia's Nashville Herald ran a piece, titled
"Nuclear Issue Is Most Decisive," that argued cogently that all
other issues pale beside "the ultimate survival of all the
people of this nation." [14] 						

In mid-October, 33 of America's 40 Nobel Prize winners, all but
one of whom were scientists, publicly endorsed Johnson. "The
great issue of the impending election is the issue of war and
peace," they declared, insisting that the next president
understand "the nature of a nuclear age." 						

Ganging up against Goldwater 						

The scientists' campaign had the desired effect. Oak Ridge
nuclear experts' concerns led the Nashville Tennessean to
condemn the "hideous dangers" resulting from Goldwater's nuclear
policies in an October 3 editorial called "Why Scientists
Shudder." On October 7, nationally syndicated columnist Marquis
Childs wrote that Republican candidates across the nation had
become "acutely aware that the nuclear issue--the
'trigger-happy' charge--is Sen. Barry Goldwater's greatest
handicap as the campaign moves into the final phase." 						

"For this reason," Childs explained, "the battle of the
scientists takes on special meaning. In unprecedented numbers,
including many who ignored politics in the past, they are
signing up under the banner of Scientists and Engineers for
Johnson and Humphrey." [15] 						

Johnson agreed. "About the best supporters I have are the
scientists and engineers," he said in late October, on the
campaign trail in Albuquerque, as he pointed to a sign that read
"New Mexico Scientists and Engineers Welcome LBJ." [16] 						

Humphrey and Johnson emphasized the nuclear angle in the final
days of their campaign, subordinating everything--even the Great
Society--to the topic of war and peace in the atomic age. On
October 26, Humphrey told Chicago listeners, "It's dangerous
enough to have the Chinese Communists with the atomic bomb. But
it's unbelievably dangerous to have the Chinese Communists with
an atomic bomb and have Senator Goldwater with his finger on the
nuclear trigger. This we can't take." 						

Johnson sounded the same warnings that day in Florida, Georgia,
and South Carolina, condemning Goldwater's nuclear
brinksmanship. "He urges that we consider using atomic weapons
in Vietnam, even in Eastern Europe if there should be an
uprising," Johnson charged. The stakes in the 1964 election, he
continued, were "the highest ever presented to any generation of
Americans." No less than "the peace of the world and the
survival of the nation" were at risk. [17] 						

"The entire world is waiting to see whose thumb you want on the
nuclear button, who you want to answer that hot line from
Moscow," Johnson told a huge crowd in Macon, Georgia, according
to the October 27 Augusta Chronicle. "The only real issue in
this campaign," Johnson told Los Angeles listeners on October
28, "is who can best keep the peace? In the nuclear age the
president doesn't get a second chance to make a second guess. If
he mashes that button--that is it." 						

The next day, at an airport rally in Detroit, Johnson contended
that by voting for him, "the world you save will be your own."
						

"For 20 years now a mushroom cloud has shadowed our lives," he
said, warning that a Goldwater presidency might bring the
ultimate nightmare. "One reckless impulsive move of a single
finger could incinerate our civilization." [18] 						

The scientists' campaign pulled out all the stops, airing a
half-hour prime-time television broadcast two days before the
election. Henry Fonda introduced the show, telling viewers, "Now
you are going to meet six of the most brilliant and able men
this country has produced"--Spock, York, Wiesner, Kistiakowsky,
Urey, and Adm. William F. Raborn, the "father" of the Polaris
submarine. 						

York told viewers that scientists, physicians, and engineers
didn't usually play active political roles, but that the 1964
election was different. "National security in every sense is our
deepest concern," York said. All the men except for Spock, York
pointed out, "have spent much of our professional careers
helping to develop either the nuclear weapons themselves or the
means of delivering them, or both." Yet he found Goldwater's
notion of treating nuclear weapons as conventional "personally
horrifiying." York was also appalled that Goldwater "could be so
wrong on the basic facts of our weaponry." 						

The other speakers continued to hammer Goldwater on his nuclear
policies. Spock criticized Goldwater's opposition to the nuclear
test ban; Urey feared that Goldwater would frighten both
European allies and Soviet foes, thereby strengthening the
"aggressive group" in the Soviet Union. 						

Wiesner, who had spent years working on nuclear bombs and
ballistic missiles, predicted that more nations would acquire
nuclear weapons. "The world must work for effective and safe
disarmament," Wiesner explained. "But Senator Goldwater has
ridiculed these efforts, and he's even said that he expects that
there will be a nuclear war." Kistiakowsky added that, in light
of major international developments--the ouster of Nikita
Khrushchev in the Soviet Union and China's nuclear test--an
abrupt break with U.S. arms control policy would be especially
ill-advised. Scientists weren't surprised by the Chinese test,
Urey said, but feared that other nations--Italy, Germany, even
Egypt--could soon do the same. 						

"The basic question--the most important question--is how can we
prevent this proliferation of weapons all over the world," Urey
maintained. York ended by reiterating the message: "Sorry,
Senator Goldwater, the country just can't risk it. The country
just can't risk your election." [19]  A series of radio ads
recorded by the participants were broadcast throughout the
country 3,000 times. In one, Urey charged, "Many Goldwater
statements regarding the use of nuclear weapons are shockingly
irresponsible." [20] 						

The president and Lady Bird Johnson telegrammed Kistiakowsky,
applauding the television show, convinced that it would "do much
good for our cause." [21]  Reportedly, Johnson had recommended
the scientists' election-eve broadcast and radio ads to further
drive home the nuclear threat. A "high Democratic party leader"
told Science's Dan Greenberg, "The president saw that it was the
nuclear issue that was killing Goldwater, and he decided that
the best way to hit Barry on the bomb was with the scientists
who made the bomb." [22] 						

A sort-of success                                               

As the campaign wound down, many wondered if the scientists'
foray into electoral politics--based more on opposition to
Goldwater than support for Johnson--would evaporate after the
election. Greenberg reported that younger scientists, especially
in California and Massachusetts, hoped SEJH would continue to
function as a political action organization. "More than 50,000
scientists, engineers, and physicians have just passed through
an exciting and successful political baptism," Greenberg
commented. "It is not likely that they are going to consider
that experience to be irrelevant to their future professional
and political concerns." Or, as one scientist put it, "Having
tasted political blood, we'll never be the same." [23] 						

Some, like American Association for the Advancement of Science
(AAAS) President Alan Waterman, felt that scientists'
disappearance from the political arena was unlikely for other
reasons--such as their sense of accountability. "I suppose it is
fair to say that scientists as a class have deeper concern about
the present state of the world than most groups," Waterman wrote
in the January 1, 1965 issue of Science. "[Their concern]
undoubtedly had its origin in World War II in such dramatic
developments as the atomic bomb and biological warfare, which
disclosed new and awesome possibilities of man's destroying
himself through the findings of scientific research." 						

On November 3, 1964, Johnson won the election, defeating
Goldwater with more than 60 percent of the popular vote (the
electoral vote count came in at 486 to 52 in favor of Johnson).
Afterwards, his assistant wrote to Kistiakowsky on behalf of the
new president, thanking him for the "tremendous support" from
scientists, engineers, and physicians and expressing Johnson's
hope "to continue to merit your confidence." [24] 						

But scientists' "confidence" in Johnson was stunningly
short-lived. Within little more than a month of the election,
leaders of the World Federation of Scientific Workers were
writing to Johnson, expressing "great alarm" over U.S. plans to
escalate military operations in Vietnam. They applauded
Johnson's campaign statements about the constructive uses of
U.S. power, but warned that, "The great achievements of American
science would be seen by the many . . . not as an instrument for
the improvement of the lot of the people, but as a terrible and
hateful scourge." [25] 						

When the leaders of the World Federation wrote Kistiakowsky in
March 1965, U.S. involvement in Vietnam had deepened. The
scientists were again worried about "the risk of escalation into
a full scale international conflict with incalculable
consequences, including the possible use of nuclear weapons."
[26] 						

Many American scientists felt as if they'd been stabbed in the
back. The New York Times published a letter from Szent-Gyorgyi
on March 31, 1965: "In the last election we scientists stood as
one man behind President Johnson, being afraid of what Mr.
Goldwater, as president, might do. Now President Johnson does in
Vietnam what we feared. . . . I feel disappointed, alienated, if
not betrayed. I am sure many of my fellow scientists feel as I
do. We are deeply concerned because it was our work which opened
the way both to a better future for mankind or its final
catastrophe. We are going the wrong way, and it is time for
scientists to get together once more, this time to sound a
warning." [27] 						

Scientists heeded Szent-Gyorgyi's advice and, stating repeatedly
that U.S. involvement in Vietnam made nuclear war more likely,
opposed the war earlier and more forcefully than any other group
in society. The AAAS went on record against the war before the
end of 1965; no publication was more prescient in this regard
than the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. 						

By spring 1968, the breach between Johnson and the scientists
was beyond healing. After Johnson announced that he would not
seek reelection, scientists demonstrated their disgust with the
administration's Vietnam policy by rejecting Humphrey and
flocking to support antiwar candidate Eugene McCarthy. In May
1968, Scientists and Engineers for McCarthy announced its
formation, with 5,000 dues-paying members, including more than
115 members of the NAS and 12 Nobel Prize winners. Frustrated
Humphrey supporters confessed that they had abandoned attempts
to organize a scientists' support group. As one top Humphrey
adviser admitted, "Physical scientists for Humphrey are
conspicuous by their absence." As to scientists who may have
been on the Republican side, neither Richard Nixon nor Nelson
Rockefeller had made any effort to recruit their support. [28]
						

Despite their subsequent frustration with Johnson's Vietnam
policies, the scientists' extraordinary mobilization against
Goldwater and forceful repudiation of his nuclear and foreign
policy extremism offer a powerful demonstration of the political
influence scientists can wield in American society. Those
committed to defeating the latest expression of Republican
extremism cannot take much comfort in scientists' relative
quiescence in the 2004 elections. Perhaps we will see an upsurge
in the final weeks of the campaign. 						

Peter J. Kuznick is an associate professor of history and
director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University
in Washington, D.C. Nickolas Roth provided research assistance
for this article. 						

1. David Halberstam, The Best and the Brightest (New York:
Random House, 1972), p. 515. 						

2. Warren Weaver to Carlyle F. Stout, September 3, 1964,
Personal Papers of Diana T. MacArthur, Correspondence: National
Organizing Committee, August-November 1964, box 1, Lyndon B.
Johnson (LBJ) Library. 						

3. D. S. Greenberg, "The Election: Partisan Activity of
Scientists Unlikely to Sow Discord in Scientific Community,"
Science, vol. 146, no. 3,641 (October 9, 1964), p. 233. 						

4. "Two Scientists Direct Group Endorsing LBJ," Yale Daily News,
October 5, 1964, p. 1. 						

5. Helen Taussig to Edgar, undated, copy in MacArthur Papers,
Correspondence: National Organizing Committee, August-November
1964, box 1, LBJ Library. 						

6. Roger Revelle to Walter S. Mack, August 17, 1964, MacArthur
Papers, Correspondence: National Organizing Committee,
August-November 1964, box 1, LBJ Library. 						

7. Howard Simons, "Arms Race Called Road to Oblivion,"
Washington Post, September 24, 1964, pp. 1, 8. 						

8. Tom Malone, "Scientist for LBJ Cites Peace Issue," Wilmington
Morning News, October 28, 1964. 						

9. Elliot Maraniss, "Urey Says Politics Must Solve Peace,"
Capital Times, October 14, 1964, p. 1. 						

10. J. D. Baldeschwieler et al., October 1, 1964, copy in George
Kistiakowsky Papers, Harvard University Archives, HUGFP 94.8,
box 36, Scientists and Engineers for LBJ folder. 						

11. Harrison Young, "Leading Scientists Support Johnson;
Hoffmann Aims Barbs at Goldwater," Harvard Crimson, October 15,
1964, available online. 						

12. Executive Committee, Georgia Scientists, Engineers, and
Physicians for Johnson-Humphrey, "Action to Date and in Final
Weeks of Campaign," Wiesner Papers, MIT Archives, MC 420, box
90, L. B. Johnson Committee folder 1/2. 						

13. "Scientist Sees U.S. Creating Better World," Atlanta Times,
October 27, 1964, p. 6; Marjory Rutherford, "Scientist Hails
U.S. Might, Asks Push to a New World," Atlanta Constitution,
October 27, 1964, p. 33. 						

14. "Press View: Nuclear Issue Is Most Decisive," reprinted from
Nashville (Georgia) Herald, Atlanta Journal, October 26, 1964,
p. 19. 						

15. Marquis Childs, "A Scientific View of the Campaign,"
Washington Post, October 7, 1964, p. 20. 						

16. D. S. Greenberg, "Ventures into Politics: Scientists and
Engineers in the Election Campaign (I)," Science, vol. 146, no.
3,650 (December 11, 1964), pp. 1,440-44. 						

17. "President Charges Atom Recklessness," Atlanta Constitution,
October 27, 1964, p. 2. 						

18. Theodore H. White, The Making of the President, 1964 (New
York: Atheneum, 1965), p. 374; "Barry Hit on A-War by Johnson,"
Atlanta Times, October 30, 1964, p. 1. 						

19. News release, SEJH, October 29, 1964, Wiesner Papers, MC
420, box 90, L. B. Johnson Committee folder 2/2; transcript,
television broadcast, October 18, 1964, SEJH, Kistiakowsky
Papers, box 36, Scientists and Engineers for LBJ folder. 						

20. D. S. Greenberg, "Ventures into Politics: Scientists and
Engineers in the Election Campaign (II)," Science, vol. 146, no.
3,651 (December 18, 1964), p. 1,563. 						

21. President and Mrs. Lyndon B. Johnson to George Kistiakowsky,
November 2, 1964, Kistiakowsky Papers, box 33, President Johnson
folder. 						

22. Greenberg, "Ventures into Politics (II)," pp. 1,562-3. 						

23. Ibid., pp. 1,561-3; McGeorge Bundy, Danger and Survival:
Choices About the Bomb in the First Fifty Years (New York:
Random House, 1988), pp. 537-8. 						

24. Ivan Sinclair to George Kistiakowsky, November 27, 1964,
Kistiakowsky Papers, box 33, President Johnson folder. 						

25. P. Biquard and C. F. Powell to Lyndon B. Johnson, December
10, 1964, copy in Kistiakowsky Papers, box 36, T-Z folder. 						

26. P. Biquard and C. F. Powell to George Kistiakowsky, March
20, 1965, copy in Kistiakowsky Papers, box 36, T-Z folder. 						

27. Albert Szent-Gyorgyi, letter to the editor, New York Times,
March 31, 1965, p. 38. 						

28. Philip M. Boffey, "McCarthy Takes Lead in Lining Up Support
of Scientists," Science, vol. 160, no. 3,830 (May 24, 1968), p.
867. For more on the scientists' opposition to U.S. policy in
Vietnam, see Peter J. Kuznick, "Creating a 'Science of
Survival': The Early Years of the Scientists' Anti-Vietnam War
Movement," presented to the History of Science Society, November
22, 2003. 						

 					 					
© 2004 Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 					 					 						
*****************************************************************
 15 Las Vegas SUN: Diplomats: IAEA, Brazil Reach Agreement

 By GEORGE JAHN ASSOCIATED PRESS 

VIENNA, Austria (AP) - 

Brazil has tentatively agreed to let the U.N. atomic watchdog
agency view parts of its equipment to enrich uranium - a deal
that would end squabbling over access to technology that can be
used to build nuclear weapons, diplomats said Wednesday. 

The diplomats, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of
anonymity, said the International Atomic Energy Agency was
satisfied the agreement would allow its inspectors to verify
that uranium is neither enriched to weapons-grade levels nor
diverted to other sites. 

"They came upon a formula that gives the agency enough and yet
lets Brazil save face," said one diplomat at a mission that
deals with the IAEA. He said an agreement could be signed as
early as this week, ahead of a scheduled visit by inspectors in
mid-October. 

The tentative compromise would allow inspectors to see some
parts of the centrifuges while other parts would remain covered
from view, another diplomat said. Diagrams would be provided to
the agency experts to flesh out what they are not allowed to
see, he said. 

He said the plan would allow the inspectors to monitor more than
entry and exit points of the centrifuge cascades used to spin
hexafluoride gas into enriched uranium - which is what Brazil
had initially insisted on. 

IAEA spokeswoman Melissa Fleming said there had been "some
progress in discussion with the Brazilians although these
discussions have not yet been conclusive." She said the team of
experts would "discuss (inspection) practicalities on the
ground" during its visit later this month. 

Diplomats say the IAEA has little concern that Brazil is trying
to make nuclear weapons. 

Still, any deal with the IAEA short of full visual inspection
would do little to settle questions about whether Brazil's
enrichment program is based on illicitly acquired technology. 

Brazil's reluctance to let the inspectors see all of its nuclear
program also has heightened concerns that it could serve as a
precedent for other nations being asked to provide full access
to their nuclear programs, such as Iran and possibly North Korea
if it again accepted international inspections. 

Brazil has for months refused to give IAEA inspectors visual
access to its centrifuges at its plant in Resende, about 60
miles northwest of Rio de Janeiro, asserting that the advanced
technology could be stolen by other countries if outsiders get a
glimpse of it. 

But experts doubt Brazil has developed centrifuges radically
different from equipment used at other uranium enrichment plants
and point out that technological advances are normally protected
by patents. 

One of the diplomats familiar with Brazil's nuclear dossier, as
well as a nuclear expert, said the nation's reluctance to fully
open its centrifuge program to outside scrutiny could partially
be due to fears that it would expose past illicit purchases. 

Brazil ran a secret nuclear military program before giving it up
in the 1980s - much of it based on secret procurement. 

"They never came clean about their illicit procurement and
jealously guarded their secrets," said former U.N. nuclear
inspector David Albright, who worked in the 1980s with Brazilian
physicists on the plan that let Brazil's government gradually
accept outside perusal of its nuclear program. 

Albright - now head of the Institute for Science and
International Security in Washington - said Brazil worked to
further develop the same German-designed centrifuges purchased
later by Iran and Libya from the nuclear black market led by
Pakistani scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan. 

But he said Brazil's procurements predated the creation of the
Khan network. 

Uranium enriched to low levels is used for fuel to generate
power. More highly enriched, weapons grade uranium is a
component in nuclear warheads. 

Brazil vehemently denies it is interested in building such arms. 

Secretary of State Colin Powell said Tuesday that he believes
them. 

"We know for sure that Brazil is not thinking about nuclear
weapons in any sense. Brazil is not a potential proliferator,"
Powell said Tuesday at a meeting with business leaders in Sao
Paulo, Brazil. 

--- 

On the Net: 

International Atomic Energy Agency: http://www.iaea.org
[http://www.iaea.org] 

-- 



*****************************************************************
 16 Las Vegas RJ: Local company fined over nuclear license issue 
 
Wednesday, October 06, 2004

By EVAN MCLAUGHIN STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU 


WASHINGTON -- A Las Vegas company was fined by the federal
government for selling gun accessories containing a radioactive
ingredient, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission announced Tuesday. 
The company, 21st Century Technologies Inc., paid a $6,000 fine
on Friday for distributing gun sights containing tritium without
a proper license, NRC spokesperson Sue Gagner said. 

After concluding a two-year investigation in October 2003, the
agency proposed the fine on April 13. 

A company appeal was denied on Aug. 30. The violation did not
pose a health threat, but it was enforceable because of a
"history of compliance problems with 21st Century's NRC-licensed
activities," according to an NRC letter sent Aug. 30 to company
president and chief executive officer Kevin Romney. 

"The violation has nothing to do with the safety of the storage
and handling of radioactive materials," company spokesman Troy
Lovick said. "There was no public health or safety issue at any
time." 

The company has hired a consultant to address radiation safety,
NRC compliance and radioactive materials licensing, Lovick said. 

The NRC said it doubled a $3,000 base penalty because the
company has been subject to agency enforcement twice before. 

In 1991 and 1996, 21st Century Technologies was found to be
distributing gun sights with radioactive material without proper
authorization. 

NRC spokesman Victor Dricks said 21st Century Technologies is
licensed by the NRC to distribute nine types of gun sights
containing radioactive material. 

Tritium is a low-level radioactive isotope of hydrogen gas. 

The Environmental Protection Agency said tritium increases the
risk of cancer but it emits very weak radiation and leaves the
body relatively quickly.
 
 
Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal
*****************************************************************
 17 Brattleboro Reformer: NRC plans pre-hearing on uprate

[http://www.reformer.com/]   

October 06, 2004 Brattleboro, VT                                                                                 
 			 								 					
By CAROLYN LORIÉ Reformer Staff

BRATTLEBORO -- The intervention process in the Entergy Nuclear 
Vermont Yankee uprate case moves a step further next week, when 
the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board holds a pre-hearing 
teleconference.

 On Oct. 13, the board, which is part of the Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission, will discuss the need for oral arguments on standing 
as well as the contentions and other issues raised by the Vermont 
Department of Public Service and the New England Coalition. 
Representatives from all the parties will participate.

 According to Neil Sheehan, NRC spokesman for Region I, the call 
is to lay the ground rules for a possible pre-hearing meeting on 
Oct. 21 and 22. If the board decides that pre-hearing meeting is 
warranted, it will be held at the Maria Lawrence Room at the 
Vermont Agricultural Business Education Center in Brattleboro. 

During the teleconference and possible subsequent meeting, the 
state and the coalition will have the opportunity to argue the 
merits of their opposition to Vermont Yankee proposed power 
boost.

 Although the NRC staff has already stated which of the parties' 
contentions warrant consideration -- portions of two of the 
state's five contentions and only one of the coalition's seven -- 
it is the board that decides which contentions, if any, to admit. 
Parties, however, may appeal the board's decision to the full 
Commission.

 The coalition and the state filed petitions to intervene on Aug. 
30. Both have requested formal hearings, which is what the board 
is considering. This is the first time that an uprate application 
has ever been challenged.

 If the meeting on Oct. 21 and 22 does occur, the public will be 
allowed to attend but not participate.

Copyright ©1999-2004 New England Newspapers, Inc., 
*****************************************************************
 18 Pulse of the Twin Cities: 20 More Years of Nuclear?

PulseTC.com

Thursday 16 September @ 16:58:18           

XCel Energy seeks to extend license of state's three reactors

by Carey L. Biron 

Minnesota’s three nuclear plants, the source of three decades of 
bitter political fights between Xcel Energy and grass-roots 
coalitions, will keep on running 20 years past their expiration 
dates if the company gets its way. 

The nuclear facility in Monticello and the two at Red Wing’s 
Prairie Island have been operating for more than three decades, 
and are nearing the end of their federally-licensed life 
spans—currently scheduled for 2010, 2013 and 2014. For the 
conservation and Native American groups who despise the use of 
nuclear power and the local storage of radioactive waste, those 
dates were the light at the end of the tunnel. 

Then, on the first of this month, the plants’ owner, 
Minneapolis-based Xcel Energy, announced it will seek approval to 
keep on running the plants for 20 more years. 

To keep the plants going, Xcel needs two things: federal approval 
from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and somewhere to put 
all the waste. The first is not expected to be much trouble for 
the company, as the NRC has never rejected a re-licensing 
application. The second requirement might also have become easier 
for the company since last year, when the legislature gave away 
its power to the governor-appointed Public Utilities Commission 
(PUC). 

“The people of Minnesota have a lesser ability to influence PUC’s 
decisions,” than the decisions of elected officials, warned Scott 
Elkins, the Sierra Club’s state director. “So the public will get 
less of an opportunity to be heard both in the relicensing 
process, as well as in the nuclear waste storage process than 
they did in the past.”
 
The author of last year’s bill putting the PUC in charge of 
regulating Xcel was Sen. Steve Murphy (DFL-Red Wing)—a paid 
employee of Xcel Energy at the same time he was writing a 
legislative bill to help the company. 

In 1994—the first time the energy company came to the state with 
a storage request, to stockpile high-level nuclear waste in 
temporary casks at the Prairie Island facility—there were 
political fireworks. Although Xcel has more lobbyists than any 
company in the state, grassroots groups were able to force a 
compromise; the company could store some waste if it invested in 
alternative energy. 

“Now it appears that they’ve totally thrown in the towel on 
making that sort of transition,” suggested Elkins.
 
Current projections by the Minnesota Department of Commerce 
estimate that Minnesota’s energy consumption needs will increase 
by 2,700 megawatts in the upcoming decade —assuming that the 
current nuclear plants continue operating. Xcel’s Jim Alders, 
manager of regulator projects, says that this extraordinary 
increase in need is where the conversation for renewable 
resources needs to begin.
 
“Nuclear power plants are part of our baseload facilities; they 
operate around the clock,” he said. “We’re going to have to add 
hundreds and hundreds of megawatts of new power plants, just to 
keep up with the demand for electricity. That’s where there 
should be a vigorous debate about how much of that should be in 
renewables. You don’t increase the potential for renewable 
resources by doing away with nuclear power plants. What you do 
instead is make the cost of electricity more expensive.”
 
For the people of Monticello, any misgivings about the plant and 
stored waste seem to have been snowed under long ago. Monticello 
City Administrator Rick Wolfsteller recently told the Monticello 
Times that Xcel will pay just under half of the city’s taxes this 
year. Back when the plant first opened, that figure was closer to 
75 percent.
 
Next door to the Prairie Island plants, the Mdewakantonwan 
community—paid $1 million per year as long as the plants continue 
operating—“has been a reluctant neighbor of the plant and 
storage,” said Jake Reint, a spokesman for the community. Reint 
says that, while the tribal council is not surprised by the news, 
“the council does still believe that there needs to be a 
permanent storage solution before we get too far down the line of 
operating the plant indefinitely.”
 
That appears to be significantly easier said than done. Although 
the federal government did finally name Nevada’s Yucca Mountain 
as the only option for long-term waste storage, it has 
encountered legal and logistical problems. 

“We found that radiation release standards wouldn’t protect the 
health of future generations,” said the Public Citizen’s Michelle 
Boyd. “They arbitrarily gerrymandered the site boundary so that 
radiation release standards would go 18 kilometers to a control 
area,” Boyd argued. “According to their own standards, for 10,000 
years no one’s supposed to drink the water or grow food on that 
land. However, there are already wells on that land and there is 
farming just south of there. 

Boyd says that this 10,000-year period doesn’t even get to the 
waste material’s most dangerous period. “It’s ludicrous: 
according to the National Academy of Sciences, the maximum doses 
are likely to occur at 30,000 years or more,” she said. 

Even if Yucca Mountain were to open today, the Sierra Club’s 
Scott Elkins says that it wouldn’t even be big enough to handle 
all of the waste material. “So there’s the concern on the part of 
a lot of folks that these storage sites on the flood plain of the 
Mississippi River will in essence become permanent nuclear waste 
storage facilities,” he said.
 
Not only is Xcel shirking its legal mandates by not investing in 
more renewable energy sources, says George Crocker of the North 
American Water Office, but doing so would be significantly easier 
and more economical than the public is usually told.
 
“Minnesota exports about $10 billion to import its energy; about 
a third of that is for electricity,” he said. “In other words, 
the money train leaves each year with about $3 billion … There 
are so many ways that we could channel that money—that we are 
spending on energy anyway—and use it instead for local economic 
development with locally available community based renewable 
energy. That’s exactly what Xcel is trying hard not to do.”
 
The state’s reactors account for about 20 percent of Xcel’s 
overall capacity, Crocker emphasizes. “We could easily have a 
system in which 20 percent was wind and still not be in the way 
of reliability of the system. So that means that wind, all by 
itself, could displace the energy and the capacity that these 
reactors produce.” 

Since the 1994 agreement, Crocker says that progress made in 
Minnesota’s energy infrastructure has been backsliding. He says 
that he’s not surprised by Xcel’s decision to renew their nuclear 
licenses, but he is saddened.
 
“The reason we’re not doing [renewables] and instead are doing 
nuclear is because that’s the way that the people running Xcel 
make their money,” he said. “It has everything to do with 
privilege and the sunk investment that’s already made into these 
obsolete and terribly, increasingly dangerous nuclear 
technologies. What’s probably even more disturbing, though, is 
that there are so many people in this state that are functionally 
illiterate about how their utility services are delivered that 
Xcel could even dream of trying to do such an irresponsible 
development.

Copyright © Pulse of the Twin Cities and Hosting Ave LLC
[http://hostingave.net] 
*****************************************************************
 19 Mos News: Cracked Reactor Lid Delays Start of Russia’s Nuclear Power Plant
          
- NEWS - MOSNEWS.COM
 
5th power block of Novovoronezh power plant / Photo from
nvnpp.vrn.ru 

Cracked Reactor Lid Delays Start of Russia’s Nuclear Power Plant
 
Created: 06.10.2004 17:52 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 17:52 MSK 

MosNews
 
Cracks have been discovered in the reactor lid of the 
Novovoronezh nuclear power plant in South Russia, a 
representative of Russia’s nuclear agency Rosenergoatom told the 
Interfax news agency on Wednesday. The discovered fault caused 
the delay of the running in of the fifth energy block, initially 
scheduled for September 2004, till January 2005. 

“The reason behind the delay was the discovery of cracks in the 
welded seams of the reactor lid of the fifth block,” a 
representative of Rosenergoatom has said. Experts hold that the 
cracks had appeared due to a production defect. 

The Novovoronezh nuclear power plant in the first Russian power 
plant that uses the water-water reactors. The 30 years service 
period of the fifth block expires in 2010, but Russian experts 
say that it may be prolonged for another 20-year period. 

At present, only the third block of Novovoronezh power plant is 
working. The first and the second blocks have been shut down and 
the fourth and the fifth blocks are undergoing repairs. 

In Russia, 30 power blocks are currently running at 10 nuclear 
power plants. SEE ALSO
 
Bank Failure Endangering Nuclear Plants - Companies 
[http://www.mosnews.com/news/2004/07/02/dialog.shtml] 

Russia Not to Allow NATO Observers Visit Nuclear Sites - DM 
[http://www.mosnews.com/news/2004/08/09/ivanov.shtml] 

Additional Troops Deployed to Guard Russian Nuclear Sites
[http://www.mosnews.com/news/2004/09/01/nuclear.shtml] 
    
    
*****************************************************************
 20 Guardian Unlimited: High price of change
 
Terry Macalister
Thursday October 7, 2004
The Guardian [http://www.guardian.co.uk]  		
 		
Britain was warned yesterday it would need to build 100 nuclear 
power stations or 100,000 wind turbines to convert all cars and 
trucks from petrol to hydrogen fuel. 

Researchers from Warwick University admitted the results were 
"startling" and said there were still good reasons to consider 
switching from oil to hydrogen. 

But economics professor Andrew Oswald and energy consultant Jim 
Oswald said few realised what the impact of such a change might 
be. 

"The enormity of the green challenge is not understood," said Jim 
Oswald. "Many people think that hydrogen is a simple alternative 
to oil, but in fact it will require a huge investment in either 
wind farms or nuclear plants." 

About 100,000 wind turbines would cover a land mass the size of 
Wales if they were all onshore. And if all were placed offshore, 
they would form a six-mile deep strip encircling the coastline of 
the British Isles, the Warwick study says. 

The warning in an article entitled the Arithmetic of Renewable 
Energy came as a host of new wind projects were given the 
go-ahead. 
	
Interactive guide
Offshore wind farms
[http://www.guardian.co.uk/flash/0,5860,998530,00.html] 

Useful links
Friends of the Earth [http://www.foe.org.uk] 
Greenpeace [http://www.Greenpeace.org] 
British Wind Energy Association
[http://www.britishwindenergy.co.uk/] 

[UP] 

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004
*****************************************************************
 21 NRC: Pacific Gas and Electric Company; Notice of Partial Withdrawal
 
                        FR Doc 04-22401 
[Federal Register: October 6, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 193)] 
[Notices] [Page 59968] From the Federal Register Online via GPO 
Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr06oc04-138]                         
 
of Application for Amendments to Facility Operating Licenses The 
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (the Commission) has granted 
the request of Pacific Gas and Electric Company (the licensee) to 
partially withdraw its May 29, 2003, application for proposed 
amendments to Facility Operating License Nos. DPR-80 and DPR-82 
for the Diablo Canyon Power Plant, Unit Nos. 1 and 2, 
respectively, located in San Luis Obispo County, California.
 
The proposed amendments would modify several surveillance 
requirements (SRs) in Technical Specifications (TSs) 3.8.1 and 
3.8.4 on alternating current and direct current sources, 
respectively, for plant operation. The revised SRs would have 
notes deleted or modified to allow the SRs to be performed, or 
partially performed, in reactor modes that are currently not 
allowed by the TSs. The current SRs are not allowed to be 
performed in Modes 1 and 2. Several of the current SRs also 
cannot be performed in Modes 3 and 4.
 
The Commission had previously issued a Notice of Consideration of 
Issuance of Amendment published in the Federal Register on July 
8, 2003 (68 FR 40715). However, by letter dated May 7, 2004, the 
licensee partially withdrew that portion of the amendment request 
pertaining to the proposed changes to TS 3.8.4. For further 
details with respect to this action, see the application for 
amendments dated May 29, 2003, and the licensee's letter dated 
May 7, 2004, which partially withdrew the application for license 
amendments. Documents may be examined, and/or copied for a fee, 
at the NRC's Public Document Room (PDR), located at One White 
Flint North, Public File Area O1 F21, 11555 Rockville Pike (first 
floor), Rockville, Maryland. Publicly available records will be 
accessible electronically from the Agencywide Documents Access 
and Management Systems (ADAMS) Public Electronic Reading Room on 
the internet at the NRC Web site, 
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams/html 
[http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leaving 
FR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams/html] 
. Persons who do not have access to ADAMS or who encounter 
problems in accessing the documents located in ADAMS, should 
contact the NRC PDR Reference staff by telephone at 
1-800-397-4209, or 301-415-4737 or by e-mail to

 
pdr@nrc.gov [ pdr@nrc.gov] . Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 
28th day of September 2004.
 
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
 
Jack N. Donohew, Project Manager, Section 2, Project Directorate 
IV, Division of Licensing Project Management, Office of Nuclear 
Reactor Regulation.
 
[FR Doc. 04-22401 Filed 10-5-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P

 
*****************************************************************
 22 PoughkeepsieJournal.com: Meeting centers on nuke plant closing

  Wednesday, October 6, 2004
 
Sides give views on Indian Point
 Journal wire services

 WHITE PLAINS -- Other communities have survived the closing of 
nuclear power plants over the years, according to an advocate of 
a group pushing to shut down the Indian Point nuclear plant.

But a spokesman for the company that owns the plant argued a 
feasibility study into such an option was a waste of taxpayer 
dollars that could be better spent.

Fewer than 20 residents turned out for a public meeting Monday by 
the two consulting firms hired by the county to study the 
possibility of closing the Indian Point nuclear plant in 
Buchanan, Westchester County.

The majority of those who spoke represented environmental groups, 
with the exception of two employees from Indian Point-owner 
Entergy Nuclear Northeast, who said they were there to speak as 
residents and taxpayers.

Westchester County Legislator Michael Kaplowitz, D-Somers, also 
attended and spoke.

Environmental groups and other organizations have stepped up 
calls to close Indian Point in the wake of the 2001 terrorist 
attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. They argue 
the plant's proximity to the densely populated metropolitan area 
makes it a highly desirable target for terrorists.

The plant is along the Hudson River, some 15 miles south of 
Beacon.

Three representatives from the two consulting firms studying the 
issue sat at a table on a stage in the County Center's Little 
Theater, listening and taking notes as one by one the speakers 
stepped up to a microphone and asked that a variety of topics be 
addressed in the consulting report.

Weigh the possibilities

Kyle Rabin, a policy analyst for the environmental group 
Riverkeeper, asked the panel to consider a scenario in which the 
federal government ordered the Buchanan plant suddenly closed 
over national security concerns and to consider how the energy 
needs in the region could be met under such circumstances.

''I think the writing is on the wall that we can live without 
Indian Point,'' Rabin said, adding several nuclear reactors have 
been successfully shut down across the country over the last two 
decades. ''The lights didn't go out, the schools didn't close, 
the sky didn't fall.''

Jim Steets, an Entergy spokesman, said the $385,000 study was a 
politically motivated waste of taxpayer funds.

''This whole thing is such a political exercise. There are at 
least 10 other genuine potential dangers that the county ought to 
be studying, like the Kensico Dam, for example,'' Steets said. 
''The only good thing that can come from this study is that it 
might produce additional evidence that Indian Point is a safe and 
valuable asset to Westchester and New York City.'' 
  

HOME [http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/] News | Business | 
*****************************************************************
 23 NRC: STP Nuclear Operating Company; Notice of Consideration of 
 
                        FR Doc 04-22402 
[Federal Register: October 6, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 193)] 
[Notices] [Page 59969-59971] From the Federal Register Online via 
GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr06oc04-139] [[Page 
59969]]
 
Issuance of Amendment to Facility Operating License, Proposed No 
Significant Hazards Consideration Determination, and Opportunity 
for a Hearing The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC, the 
Commission) is considering issuance of an amendment to Facility 
Operating License No. NPF-80, issued to STP Nuclear Operating 
Company (the licensee), for operation of South Texas Project 
(STP), Unit 2 located in Matagorda County, Texas.
 
The proposed amendment would change Technical Specification 
4.4.4.2 to not require block valve testing should the block valve 
be required to be closed in accordance with the required actions 
of the associated limiting condition for operation.
 
Elevated temperatures were observed on the pressurizer discharge 
header due to minor power operated relief valve (PORV) 655A 
leakage during startup from 2RE10. Following valve reseating 
attempts, temperatures were elevated (compared to historical 
values), but remained below the alarm setpoint. When the alarm 
setpoint was reached on September 7, 2004, the PORV block valves 
were closed in accordance with plant procedures and 
troubleshooting efforts were initiated to determine the cause. 
Subsequent testing and investigation confirmed that PORV 655A was 
leaking-by, and as a result of the leak-by PORV 655A momentarily 
lifted when its associated block valve was re-opened. It should 
be noted that due to the PORV design (pilot-assisted) and the 
fact that the PORV leak-by had allowed the piping between the 
block valve and the PORV to depressurize during the 
troubleshooting time period, the momentary lift of the PORV was 
not an unexpected occurrence. Further engineering evaluation was 
initiated to determine whether PORV 655A continued to remain 
Operable. This engineering analysis concluded that PORV 655A was 
operable, however if the PORV block valve were to remain open and 
the PORV to continue to leak-by, the resulting elevated 
temperatures would degrade the Equipment Qualification of the 
PORVs solenoid and switch cover gaskets before the projected end 
of the current Unit 2 operating cycle. Therefore, the decision 
was made on September 9, 2004, to declare PORV 655A inoperable 
due to excessive seat leakage, and to close the associated block 
valve in accordance with TS 3.4.4 Action a. The quarterly 
surveillance test for the PORV 655A block valve, performed in 
accordance with SR 4.4.4.2, requires operating the block valve 
through one complete cycle of full travel. Because PORV 655A is a 
pilot-assisted valve, it is expected that the PORV will lift 
momentarily during the block valve stroke. Although the PORV is 
expected to reseat, performance of this surveillance represents 
an unnecessary challenge to the RCS pressure boundary. The SR 
4.4.4.2 surveillance test for the PORV 655A block valve is due to 
be performed on September 28, 2004, and the associated grace 
period expires on October 21, 2004.
 
Entry into the required action of TS 3.4.4 could not have been 
reasonably foreseen or anticipated. Therefore, STPNOC requests 
approval of this license amendment application on an exigent 
basis by October 21, 2004 (the block valve surveillance due date, 
including grace period) in order to avoid unnecessary operation 
of the PORV.
 
Before issuance of the proposed license amendment, the Commission 
will have made findings required by the Atomic Energy Act of 
1954, as amended (the Act) and the Commission's regulations.
 
Pursuant to 50.91(a)(6) of Title 10 of the Code of Federal 
Regulations (10 CFR) for amendments to be granted under exigent 
circumstances, the NRC staff must determine that the amendment 
request involves no significant hazards consideration. Under the 
Commission's regulations in 10 CFR 50.92, this means that 
operation of the facility in accordance with the proposed 
amendment would not (1) involve a significant increase in the 
probability or consequences of an accident previously evaluated; 
or (2) create the possibility of a new or different kind of 
accident from any accident previously evaluated; or (3) involve a 
significant reduction in a margin of safety. As required by 10 
CFR 50.91(a), the licensee has provided its analysis of the issue 
of no significant hazards consideration, which is presented 
below: 1. Does the proposed change involve a significant increase 
in the probability or consequences of an accident previously 
evaluated? Response: No.
 
The block valve for the pressurizer power operated relief valve 
is not a potential accident initiator. Therefore, not requiring a 
surveillance of the block valve while it is being used to isolate 
its associated power operated relief valve will not increase the 
probability of an accident previously evaluated. Not requiring 
the surveillance of the block valve may slightly reduce the 
probability of a loss of coolant accident from a stuck open power 
operated relief valve since it will eliminate the challenge to 
the power operated relief valve from the pressure transient that 
results from cycling the block valve.
 
If pressurizer spray is not available or is not effective, either 
one of the two pressurizer power operated relief valves may be 
manually actuated to depressurize the reactor coolant system to 
mitigate the consequences of a steam generator tube rupture. Not 
performing the surveillance on the block valve is not relevant to 
the primary system for depressurizing the reactor coolant system 
(pressurizer spray). The block valves have been demonstrated by 
operating experience to be reliable and are also subject to the 
motor-operated valve testing program. Consequently, the proposed 
change does not significantly reduce the confidence that the 
block valve can be opened to permit manual actuation of the power 
operated relief valve to depressurize the reactor coolant system 
to mitigate an accident. Therefore, the proposed change does not 
involve a significant increase in the consequences of an accident 
previously evaluated.
 
2. Does the proposed change create the possibility of a new or 
different accident from any accident previously evaluated? 
Response: No.
 
The proposed change only affects the performance of the 
surveillance test for the block valve and does not introduce any 
operating configurations not previously evaluated.
 
Therefore, the STPNOC concludes the proposed change does not 
create the possibility of a new or different kind of accident 
from any accident previously evaluated.
 
3. Does the proposed change involve a significant reduction in a 
margin of safety? Response: No.
 
The proposed change to the surveillance requirement for the block 
valve for the pressurizer power operated relief valve does not 
affect the assumptions in any accident analyses. There are no 
changes in plant performance parameters associated with the 
proposed change to the surveillance requirement for the block 
valve.
 
Therefore, the STPNOC concludes the proposed change does not 
involve a significant reduction in the margin of safety.
 
The NRC staff has reviewed the licensee's analysis and, based on 
this review, it appears that the three standards of 10 CFR 
50.92(c) are satisfied. Therefore, the NRC staff proposes to 
determine that the amendment request involves no significant 
hazards consideration.
 
The Commission is seeking public comments on this proposed 
determination. Any comments received within 14 days after the 
date of publication of this notice will be considered in making 
any final determination.
 
Normally, the Commission will not issue the amendment until the 
expiration of the 14-day notice period.
 
 
[[Page 59970]] However, should circumstances change during the 
notice period, such that failure to act in a timely way would 
result, for example, in derating or shutdown of the facility, the 
Commission may issue the license amendment before the expiration 
of the 14-day notice period, provided that its final 
determination is that the amendment involves no significant 
hazards consideration. The final determination will consider all 
public and State comments received. Should the Commission take 
this action, it will publish in the Federal Register a notice of 
issuance. The Commission expects that the need to take this 
action will occur very infrequently.
 
Written comments may be submitted by mail to the Chief, Rules and 
Directives Branch, Division of Administrative Services, Office of 
Administration, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, 
DC 20555-0001, and should cite the publication date and page 
number of this Federal Register notice. Written comments may also 
be delivered to Room 6D59, Two White Flint North, 11545 Rockville 
Pike, Rockville, Maryland, from 7:30 a.m. to 4:15 p.m. Federal 
workdays. Documents may be examined, and/or copied for a fee, at 
the NRC's Public Document Room (PDR), located at One White Flint 
North, 11555 Rockville Pike (first floor), Rockville, Maryland.
 
The filing of requests for hearing and petitions for leave to 
intervene is discussed below.
 
Within 60 days after the date of publication of this notice, the 
licensee may file a request for a hearing with respect to 
issuance of the amendment to the subject facility operating 
license and any person whose interest may be affected by this 
proceeding and who wishes to participate as a party in the 
proceeding must file a written request for a hearing and a 
petition for leave to intervene. Requests for a hearing and a 
petition for leave to intervene shall be filed in accordance with 
the Commission's ``Rules of Practice for Domestic Licensing 
Proceedings'' in 10 CFR part 2. Interested persons should consult 
a current copy of 10 CFR 2.309, which is available at the 
Commission's PDR, located at One White Flint North, Public File 
Area 01F21, 11555 Rockville Pike (first floor), Rockville, 
Maryland. Publicly available records will be accessible from the 
Agencywide Documents Access and Management System's (ADAMS) 
Public Electronic Reading Room on the Internet at the NRC Web 
site, http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/ 
[http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leaving 
FR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collecti 
ons/cfr/] .
 
If a request for a hearing or petition for leave to intervene is 
filed by the above date, the Commission or a presiding officer 
designated by the Commission or by the Chief Administrative Judge 
of the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board Panel, will rule on the 
request and/or petition; and the Secretary or the Chief 
Administrative Judge of the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board 
will issue a notice of a hearing or an appropriate order.
 
As required by 10 CFR 2.309, a petition for leave to intervene 
shall set forth with particularity the interest of the petitioner 
in the proceeding, and how that interest may be affected by the 
results of the proceeding. The petition should specifically 
explain the reasons why intervention should be permitted with 
particular reference to the following general requirements: (1) 
The name, address and telephone number of the requestor or 
petitioner; (2) the nature of the requestor's/petitioner's right 
under the Act to be made a party to the proceeding; (3) the 
nature and extent of the requestor's/petitioner's property, 
financial, or other interest in the proceeding; and (4) the 
possible effect of any decision or order which may be entered in 
the proceeding on the requestor's/petitioner's interest. The 
petition must also identify the specific contentions which the 
petitioner/requestor seeks to have litigated at the proceeding.
 
Each contention must consist of a specific statement of the issue 
of law or fact to be raised or controverted. In addition, the 
petitioner/requestor shall provide a brief explanation of the 
bases for the contention and a concise statement of the alleged 
facts or expert opinion which support the contention and on which 
the petitioner intends to rely in proving the contention at the 
hearing. The petitioner/requestor must also provide references to 
those specific sources and documents of which the 
petitioner/requestor is aware and on which the 
petitioner/requestor intends to rely to establish those facts or 
expert opinion. The petitioner/requestor must provide sufficient 
information to show that a genuine dispute exists with the 
applicant on a material issue of law or fact. Contentions shall 
be limited to matters within the scope of the amendment under 
consideration.
 
The contention must be one which, if proven, would entitle the 
petitioner/ requestor to relief. A petitioner/requestor who fails 
to satisfy these requirements with respect to at least one 
contention will not be permitted to participate as a party.
 
Those permitted to intervene become parties to the proceeding, 
subject to any limitations in the order granting leave to 
intervene, and have the opportunity to participate fully in the 
conduct of the hearing.
 
If a hearing is requested, the Commission will make a final 
determination on the issue of no significant hazards 
consideration. The final determination will serve to decide when 
the hearing is held. If the final determination is that the 
amendment request involves no significant hazards consideration, 
the Commission may issue the amendment and make it immediately 
effective, notwithstanding the request for a hearing. Any hearing 
held would take place after issuance of the amendment. If the 
final determination is that the amendment request involves a 
significant hazards consideration, any hearing held would take 
place before the issuance of any amendment.
 
Non-timely requests and/or petitions and contentions will not be 
entertained absent a determination by the Commission or the 
presiding officer of the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board that 
the petition, request and/or the contentions should be granted 
based on a balancing of the factors specified in 10 CFR 
2.309(a)(1)(i)-(viii). A request for a hearing or a petition for 
leave to intervene must be filed by: (1) First class mail 
addressed to the Office of the Secretary of the Commission, U.S. 
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001, 
Attention: Rulemaking and Adjudications Staff; (2) courier, 
express mail, and expedited delivery services: Office of the 
Secretary, Sixteenth Floor, One White Flint North, 11555 
Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland, 20852, Attention: Rulemaking 
and Adjudications Staff; (3) e-mail addressed to the Office of 
the Secretary, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 
hearingdocket@nrc.gov [hearingdocket@nrc.gov] ; or (4) facsimile 
transmission addressed to the Office of the Secretary, U.S. 
Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC, Attention: 
Rulemakings and Adjudications Staff at (301) 415-1101, 
verification number is (301) 415-1966. A copy of the request for 
hearing and petition for leave to intervene should also be sent 
to the Office of the General Counsel, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001, and it is requested that 
copies be transmitted either by means of facsimile transmission 
to 301-415-3725 or by e-mail to

 
OGCMailCenter@nrc.gov [ OGCMailCenter@nrc.gov] . A copy of the 
request for hearing and petition for leave to intervene should 
also be sent to Mr. John E. Matthews, Morgan, Lewis & Bokius, 
LLP, 1111 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., Washington, DC 20004, 
attorney for the licensee.
 
 
[[Page 59971]] For further details with respect to this action, 
see the application for amendment dated September 30, 2004, which 
is available for public inspection at the Commission's PDR, 
located at One White Flint North, Public File Area O1 F21, 11555 
Rockville Pike (first floor), Rockville, Maryland. Publicly 
available records will be accessible electronically from the 
ADAMS Public Electronic Reading Room on the Internet at the NRC 
Web site http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm.html 
[http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leaving 
FR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm.html] . 
Persons who do not have access to ADAMS or who encounter problems 
in accessing the documents located in ADAMS, should contact the 
NRC PDR Reference staff by telephone at 1-800-397-4209, 
301-415-4737, or by e- mail to pdr@nrc.gov [pdr@nrc.gov] . Dated 
at Rockville, Maryland, this 30th day of September 2004.
 
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
 
Mohan C. Thadani, Senior Project Manager, Section 1, Project 
Directorate IV, Division of Licensing Project Management, Office 
of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
 
[FR Doc. 04-22402 Filed 10-5-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P

 
*****************************************************************
 24 Sofia Morning News: Bulgaria Scraps Nuclear Plant Consultancy Tender
 	 	 	 	 	 	
[Sofia News Agency]                                                           

novinite.com

Business: 6 October 2004, Wednesday.

The tender for selecting an engineering consultant for Bulgaria's 
second nuclear power plant construction project saw a 
cancellation, after only two candidates filed bids by the 
deadline.
 
By law, at least three candidates must supply their bids to 
proceed with public tenders.
 
London-based Parsons and Spain's Impresarios Agrupados were the 
only companies to have shown interest in the Bulgarian nuclear 
plant project, but their bidding offers were not opened as the 
procedure was scrapped.
 
The Board of Directors of the National Electricity Transmission 
Company is expected to decide which legal option to prefer 
further on. The law envisages that the procedure is either ended, 
or the deadline for submitting bids is prolonged within 30 days.
 
The Parsons consultants are currently engaged in the 
modernization works at 5th and 6th units of Kozloduy power plant 
and serves as consultant on the preparation of the draft report 
on the ecological impact of the Belene construction project and 
its technical and economical analysis.
 
Spain's Impresarios Agrupados have had experience with bidding 
for Romania's Tcehrna Voda power plant consultancy project, as 
well as in the pre-drafted construction research of Turkey's 
first nuclear power plant.
 
The construction of the second Bulgarian nuclear plant was 
unfrozen end of last year after being shelved in since 1992 due 
to environmentalists' pressure.[ width=] 

Click here to receive realtime news about this topic in the 
future. [ width=] 

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 All Rights Reserved © Novinite Ltd., 2001-2004 - Copyright
   

Novinite.com (thebulgariannews.com also) is unique with being a
real time news provider in English that informs its readers
about the latest Bulgarian news. The editorial staff also
*****************************************************************
 25 CBC: Nuclear shutdown leaves ratepayers on the hook
 	 	 
   [http://www.cbc.ca/]

 WebPosted Oct 6 2004 09:06 AM ADT

 SAINT JOHN  —  NB Power's nuclear power plant at Point Lepreau
will remain closed at least until the weekend, costing
ratepayers an estimated $5 million for replacement power. 

The utility's vice-president of nuclear power says technicians 
discovered a new problem shortly after they fixed a piece of 
equipment that burned out when a circuit failed Saturday. Rod 
White says the latest problem is a cracked steam pipe. "We know 
from other nuclear plants that they've experienced the occasional 
resistor failing. We did some checks on ours some years back, and 
at that point we didn't find any issues with these resistors." 

White says the pipes in the non-nuclear part of the plant were 
last refurbished about 10 years ago. 

The cracked pipe has been fixed, but White says all the pipes in 
the same section will be checked just to make sure. When Lepreau 
is down, NB Power buys power or burns more oil at a cost of up to 
$800,000 per day. That means by week's end, ratepayers could be 
on the hook for more than $5 million in extra costs. 

 [deb_nobes@cbc.ca] 

Copyright © CBC 2004 
*****************************************************************
 26 NRC: Notice of Availability of Environmental Assessment and Finding
 
                        FR Doc 04-22403 
[Federal Register: October 6, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 193)] 
[Notices] [Page 59971-59972] From the Federal Register Online via 
GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr06oc04-140]                         
 
of No Significant Impact For Exemption From Certain Control and 
Tracking Requirements in 10 CFR Part 20, Appendix G, Section 
III.E for Connecticut Yankee Atomic Power Company, East Hampton, 
CT AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
 
ACTION: Notice of availability.
 
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Theodore B. Smith, Project 
Manager, Decommissioning Directorate, Division of Waste 
Management and Environmental Protection, Office of Nuclear 
Material Safety and Safeguards, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission, Rockville, Maryland, 20852. Telephone: (301) 
415-6721; fax number: (301) 415-5397; e-mail: tbs1@nrc.gov 
[tbs1@nrc.gov] .
 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: I. Introduction The Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission (NRC) is considering the issuance of an exemption from 
certain requirements in 10 CFR Part 20 for Connecticut Yankee 
Atomic Power Company to relax certain control tracking 
requirements related to transportation of low-level radioactive 
waste from the Haddam Neck Plant (HNP) in East Hampton, 
Connecticut. The HNP site consists of one permanently shutdown 
nuclear reactor facility located near East Hampton, Connecticut.
 
Inherent to the decommissioning process, large volumes of 
slightly contaminated rubble and debris are generated and require 
disposal. On June 1, 2004, Connecticut Yankee Atomic Power 
Company (CYAPCO, the licensee) requested an exemption from the 
requirements in 10 CFR Part 20, Appendix G Section III.E to 
investigate and file a report to the NRC if shipments of 
low-level radioactive waste are not acknowledged by the intended 
recipient within 20 days after transfer to the shipper.
 
This exemption would extend the time period that can elapse 
during shipments of low-level radioactive waste before the 
licensee is required to investigate and file a report to the NRC 
from 20 days to 35 days. The exemption request is based on a 
statistical analysis of the historical data of low-level 
radioactive waste shipment times from the licensee's site to the 
disposal site using truck or combination truck/rail shipping 
methods. NRC has prepared an Environmental Assessment (EA) in 
support of this amendment in accordance with the requirements of 
10 CFR Part 51. Based on the EA, the NRC has concluded that a 
Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) is appropriate. The 
exemption will be issued following the publication of this 
Notice.
 
II. EA Summary The purpose of the proposed action is to authorize 
an exemption to extend the 20-day investigation and reporting 
requirements for shipments of low-level radioactive waste to 35 
days from the licensee's East Hampton, Connecticut facility. 
Specifically, since 2003, the licensee has made over 40 shipments 
of low-level radioactive waste as part of the decommissioning 
efforts at the facility. MHF Logistical Solutions (MHF) is the 
carrier company used by the licensee to perform these shipments. 
MHF has a tracking system that monitors the progress of the 
shipments from their originating point at HNP until they arrive 
at their final destination at Envirocare in Clive, Utah. The 
shipments are made by either truck or combination truck/rail. 
According to the licensee, the transportation time alone by 
either truck or combination truck/rail took over 21 days on 
average, with one shipment taking 25 days to arrive at 
Envirocare.
 
In addition to this time, administrative procedures at Envirocare 
and mail delivery could add up to 4 additional days. Based on 
historical data and estimates of the remaining waste at HNP, the 
licensee could have to perform over 400 investigations and 
reports to the NRC during the next three years, if the 20-day 
shipping criteria is maintained. The licensee affirms that the 
low-level radioactive waste shipments are tracked throughout 
transportation until they arrive at their intended destination. 
The licensee believes that the need to investigate, trace, and 
report to the NRC on the shipment of low-level radioactive waste 
packages not reaching their destination within 20 days does not 
serve the underlying purpose of the rule and it is not necessary. 
As a result, the licensee states that granting this exemption 
will not result in an undue hazard to life or property.
 
The staff has prepared the EA in support of the proposed license 
amendment. The NRC has examined the licensee's proposed exemption 
request and concluded that it is procedural and administrative in 
nature. There are no significant radiological environmental 
impacts associated with this exemption, and it will not result in 
significant nonradiological environmental impacts.
 
III. Finding of No Significant Impact On the basis of the EA, NRC 
has concluded that there are no significant environmental impacts 
from the proposed amendment and has determined not to prepare an 
environmental impact statement.
 
IV. Further Information Documents related to this action, 
including the application for exemption and supporting 
documentation, are available electronically at the NRC's 
Electronic Reading Room at 
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html 
[http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leaving 
FR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html] 
.
 
From this site, you can access the NRC's Agencywide Document 
Access and Management System (ADAMS), which provides text and 
image files of NRC's public documents. The ADAMS accession 
numbers for the documents related to this notice are: (1) The 
licensee's exemption request letter dated June 1, 2004, is 
ML041680573, and (2) the EA is ML042370633. If you do not have 
access to ADAMS or if there are problems in accessing the 
documents located in ADAMS, contact the NRC's Public Document 
Room (PDR) Reference staff at 1-800-397-4209, 301-415- 4737, or 
by e-mail to pdr@nrc.gov [pdr@nrc.gov] . These documents may also 
be viewed electronically on the public computers located at the 
NRC's PDR, O 1 F21, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, 
Rockville, MD 20852. The PDR
 
[[Page 59972]] reproduction contractor will copy documents for a 
fee.
 
Dated at Rockville, Maryland this 30th day of September 2004.
 
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
 
Daniel M. Gillen, Deputy Director , Decommissioning Directorate, 
Division of Waste Management and Environmental Protection, Office 
of Nuclear Material Safety and Safeguards.
 
[FR Doc. 04-22403 Filed 10-5-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P

 
*****************************************************************
 27 [du-list] Supporting the truth - new coalition launches
 
Date: Wed, 06 Oct 2004 14:33:17 -0700

 
<x-flowed>

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Contact:  Sue Hilderbrand
October 13th Alliance
(602) 481-9506
sue_hilderbrand@yahoo.com
www.oct13alliance.org

Does Depleted Uranium Cause Birth Defects in Children
of US Military Personnel?
Dennis Kyne Answers This Question and Others at ASU

TEMPE, ARIZONA, October 1, 2004 - The Counter
Recruitment Coalition and the
October 13th Alliance present Supporting the Truth:
Depleted Uranium, the Draft,
and the Iraq War on October 12th at 5:30 in Neeb Hall
on Arizona State
University campus.  Dennis Kyne, Gulf War I veteran,
will share his Iraq War
experience, including his exposure to depleted uranium
and its resulting
effects, and will discuss the implications of a
military draft.  These critical
issues were not discussed during the Presidential
Debate in Miami.  This event
is free to the public.

As confirmed cases of depleted uranium contamination
from exposure during the
current conflict in Iraq rise, the damaging effects of
exposure to depleted
uranium must be counted as part of casualties of war.
Exposure also effects
future generations, as Gerard Darren Matthew knows,
testing positive for
depleted uranium contamination.  Matthew's wife gave
birth to a daughter,
Victoria Claudette, who is missing three fingers and
most of her right hand.
Matthew stated on Democracy Now "We don't know if
there's going to be any
cognitive issues in the long run..."

Dennis Kyne, an Army medic during the Gulf War I,
recounts watching soldiers
become sick with unexplainable symptoms after entering
an area in Iraq that had
been bombed for forty-five days with rounds of
depleted uranium.  Kyne will
explain the effects of left-over depleted uranium from
the first Gulf War on the
soldiers of the current war in Iraq.  Kyne will argue
the military targets the
"bottom third of America" for military recruits to act
as the frontline in areas
contaminated with low level nuclear materials.

The Arizona Counter-Recruitment Coalition opposes the
military recruitment
strategy of targeting high school and college students
and other youths, poor
and working class people, and minorities. The
coalition is working locally to
end the current military model and provide
alternatives to an imperial agenda.

The October 13th Alliance is a diverse, non-partisan,
grassroots coalition
formed in response to concerns that critical issues
will not be discussed during
the Presidential Debate.  Events, forums, and marches
are scheduled to begin
October 9th and continue through the day of the
Presidential debate on October
13th.  More events are being planned everyday and all
groups are invited to
participate in the planning of more events.  Visit the
website for scheduling
and contact information at www.oct13alliance.org. ews



	
	
		
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</x-flowed>
*****************************************************************
 28 XTRAMSN: Nuclear Test Vets Want Legal Costs
         
[news@xtramsn.co.nz] 

Today In New Zealand News  

07/10/2004 11:42 AM NewstalkZB

Operation Grapple veterans want reimbursement of their legal 
costs fighting for recognition that they were harmed by 
radiation.

Seven nuclear test veterans made submissions to Parliament's 
health select committee, which has acknowledged that Vietnam 
veterans suffered from exposure to Agent Orange, but has not 
offered an apology or compensation.

However the veterans who witnessed atmospheric nuclear testing in 
the Pacific are not mentioned.

Spokesman Trevor Humphrey says his group got limited legal aid to 
take court action, but the Government put a lien on their 
properties and will recoup the money when they die.

He believes the Government should at least repay that.


Copyright 2003 Newstalk ZB News. 
*****************************************************************
 29 Insurance Journal: Congress Debates Reforms to Nuclear WC Program

[http://www.insurancejournal.com]                                                                                                                      

October 6, 2004                                          

Congressional lawmakers agree a program to compensate sick 
nuclear weapons workers is broken, but how to fix it is the 
subject of debate on Capitol Hill. 

The program is for tens of thousands of people nationwide who 
helped build Cold-War era bombs or cleaned up the waste left 
behind. Many got sick from harsh toxins and are seeking lost 
wages for time spent off the job. 

In Ohio, the program was designed to help workers from 35 sites, 
including the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon and 
the Mound site in Miamisburg. 

Others worked at facilities in Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Kentucky, 
New Mexico, South Carolina, Tennessee and the state of 
Washington. 

Legislation passed by the Senate would move the program from the 
Energy Department to the Labor Department, which is said to be 
doing a good job handling a separate compensation program for 
nuclear workers. In contrast, the program run by the Energy 
Department has been bogged down by delays. 

The Energy Department is supposed to help workers file for 
assistance under state worker compensation systems. Federal 
contractors pay the claims and get reimbursed. 

The Senate proposal would require the government — not the 
contractors — to pay the bills. In some cases, contractors are 
long gone. In other instances, the government can't compel 
contractors to pay the claims, because they are privately 
insured. 

The Senate proposal is included in a larger defense bill. The 
House defense bill does not include such a measure, and lawmakers 
from both chambers are trying to negotiate a compromise. 

Some lawmakers who represent the workers say a proposal put 
forward by the House negotiators doesn't go far enough. 

"The House plan I have seen is a far cry from the sound plan the 
Senate passed,'' said Republican Rep. Ed Whitfield, who 
represents workers at a uranium enrichment facility in Paducah, 
Ky. 

House negotiators agree the Energy Department program should be 
moved to the Labor Department. However, they disagree with House 
and Senate members who represent the sick workers over the level 
of benefits the workers should get. 

The proposal in the Senate bill would require the Labor 
Department to use individual state worker compensation laws when 
determining how much employees should get. 

House members believe such a system is too complicated. They say 
a better approach is to offer various lump sum benefits which 
varydepending on how sick a person is. 

House and Senate lawmakers who represent the workers say that 
approach fails to give workers something equivalent to what they 
have lost. 

The compensation program run by the Labor Department program is 
entirely different from the Energy program. It pays workers a 
lump sum of $150,000 only if they got cancer due to radiation or 
lung diseases associated with beryllium or silica. 

Workers are now allowed to apply for benefits under both 
compensation programs, and many of them do that. 

Lawmakers who represent the workers say that's only fair since 
the lump sum is an apology for putting workers in harm's way, 
while the other program is supposed to replace lost wages. 

A House proposal would limit the degree to which workers could 
apply for assistance under both programs. 

"It just seems like we are once again trying to sock it to the 
worker, while pretending to reform a program,'' said Rep. Ted 
Strickland, D-Ohio. "I don't think it's fair.'' 

A call to the House Armed Services Committee seeking comment on 
the negotiations was not immediately returned. 

The government previously kept quiet about the toxins the workers 
were exposed to at the nuclear sites. Four years ago, after the 
Clinton administration apologized to the workers, Congress passed 
the dual compensation programs. 

House and Senate negotiators are trying to work out their 
differences so they can produce a compromise defense bill before 
Congress adjourns next week for a lengthy recess. 

Copyright 2004 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This 
material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or 
redistributed.                                  

[http://www.insurancejournal.com/terms/] 		 	 
*****************************************************************
 30 Las Vegas SUN: Firm pays $6,000 fine for selling radioactive items
 
Today: October 06, 2004 at 11:09:56 PDT 

 By Suzanne Struglinski <suzanne@lasvegassun.com 
[suzanne@lasvegassun.com] > SUN WASHINGTON BUREAU

 WASHINGTON -- A local gunsight manufacturer paid a $6,000 fine
to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission for selling radioactive
items not covered by its license.

 After an inspection in October 2003, commission staff found
that 21st Century Technologies had four violations and issued
the fine for two of them. The company distributed at least
60,000 gunsights containing tritium and other radioactive
material for which the company was not authorized to sell and
did not properly document the handling of the radioactive
materials, according to the commission.

 The company protested the fine in May, but the commission
issued a response on Aug. 30 saying the fine had to be paid. The
commission received the payment on Oct. 1, spokeswoman Sue
Gagner said.

 In a letter sent in August, the commission said the violations
did not result in any immediate danger to the public but stopped
short of saying the violations could not somehow endanger the
public in the future.

 A letter to the commission from attorney James Tourtellotte
said 21st Century misinterpreted or misunderstood its license
but is committed to comply with the right procedures in the
future.

 Company spokesman Troy Lovick said the company has a more
stringent quality assurance program in place and has worked with
a certified health physicist at UNLV to prevent any future
problems. Lovick said this was not a willful violation and there
was never a public safety threat.

 "We are happy to put this matter behind us and anticipate no
future problems," Lovick said.

 NRC said based on the fact that there had been at least one
previous violation and based on the severity of the most recent
violations, the fine would still be imposed.

 

*****************************************************************
 31 Bradenton Herald: Spreading scandal

Updated Wednesday, Oct 06, 2004   

More beryllium victims awaiting help

The toxic pollution scandal at the American Beryllium Co. plant 
in Tallevast continues to grow. Almost every month, new 
information emerges about additional potential victims of decades 
of lax handling of a carcinogenic material, beryllium. 

The latest group with potential health threats to seek federal 
help is a group of former American Beryllium Co. employees who 
may have suffered organic damage due to exposure to beryllium 
dust at the plant. Some 144 of them have sought medical tests to 
qualify for compensation under the Energy Employees Compensation 
Program Act. But as Herald staff writer Donna Wright reported 
Sunday, many face a red tape maze in trying to prove their 
employment and to complete forms required for blood tests to 
determine if they have signs of berylliosis, or chronic beryllium 
disease. 

This is similar to the problems Tallevast residents faced in 
trying to find out more about the plume of poisonous liquid that 
leaked from the plant into their community, contaminating wells 
and soil for several blocks around the plant. Only after 
Tallevast residents organized and hired their own attorneys were 
their concerns taken seriously by state and federal officials who 
were aware of the potential threat for up to three years before 
notifying residents. 

We realize officials must verify the identities of ex-employees 
and work histories seeking to file claims under the Energy 
Employees Compensation Program Act. Some will always try to 
defraud the government. But it should be a relatively simple 
process through payroll records, Social Security rolls and 
employees' own documents. One former employee said even a service 
award on letterhead was not accepted as adequate proof of 
employment. 

Normal processing of a claim is supposed to take about 45 days. 
But each time a form is kicked back with a request for more 
information, a new 30-day clock begins ticking to resolve that 
issue. Just one of the 144 former employees filing claims with 
the U.S. Labor Department has received compensation. 

"All this hassle is about to drive me crazy," said Richard 
Deutsch, a former prototype machinist at the Tallevast plant who 
has trouble breathing due, he thinks, to beryllium dust exposure. 
He believes the red tape is in place "to disgust you so you 
forget it." 

It's shocking to learn that plant officials - and the regulators 
who were supposed to be on guard - didn't do more to protect 
employees from exposure to beryllium dust in the 1980s. 
Apparently, lack of proper protection against this known 
carcinogen extended to careless disposal of beryllium-laden rinse 
water that was either dumped or allowed to leak into the soil and 
spread into the Tallevast neighborhood. 

We wonder: What if neighbors hadn't started inquiring about the 
test-well-drilling last fall trying to pinpoint the area of the 
pollution spill? Would they still be drinking water from 
contaminated wells? And would the former plant workers even know 
about their potential eligibility for compensation? Doubtless 
most would have merely accepted any chronic illness as a natural 
result and lived with the consequences. 

These employees and residents deserve better. They deserve prompt 
processing of claims with whatever help is needed to obtain 
needed documentation. They don't deserve endless run-arounds 
through bureaucracies in hopes they will become discouraged and 
give up. 

The impact of the American Beryllium scandal continues to grow. 
Its victims need answers, not red tape.   

*****************************************************************
 32 Las Vegas SUN: U.S. Plutonium Shipment Reaches France

 By FREDERIC VEILLE ASSOCIATED PRESS 

CHERBOURG, France (AP) - 

Working under tight security from helicopters and police, port
crews unloaded U.S. military plutonium from a British ship on
Wednesday after its arrival in northwest France, nuclear
industry officials said. 

The nuclear material was unloaded from the Pacific Pintail while
another ship in the convoy, the Pacific Teal, remained at bay
following its role as escort vessel and decoy. The two heavily
armed vessels left from Charleston, S.C., on Sept. 20. 

"The plutonium is going to now be unloaded with the greatest
precaution," said Henri Jacques Neau, a spokesman for Cogema,
the French company responsible for treating the plutonium,
moments before the unloading. It was to be taken to a company
processing plant in the La Hague by way of a secret itinerary,
he said. 

A small flotilla of boats from environmental group Greenpeace
mounted a peaceful protest against the arrival of the shipment
in the Normandy port of Cherbourg at about 7:20 a.m. local time. 

"This shipment of weapons plutonium is a wake-up call to the
world," said Tom Clements of Greenpeace International. "Rather
than ship this dangerous material worldwide now is the time for
aggressive steps to halt proliferation of all nuclear weapons
materials." 

The military nature of the arrival in France clearly
demonstrates that nuclear weapons materials are a threat to
global security and have no place in commerce," he said in a
statement. 

Greenpeace led a string of protests against the shipment of 308
pounds of military-grade plutonium - enough to make nearly 10
Hiroshima-style bombs - taken from U.S. nuclear warheads. 

A French court ruled that the environmental group could face
fines if any of its boats got closer than 300 yards at sea or
100 yards in port. 

The highly radioactive substance has been brought to France for
conversion into a commercial fuel called MOX at the Cadarache
factory in southeast France. 

On Tuesday, a dozen militants holding a "Stop Plutonium" banner
chained themselves to a truck and blocked a regional highway
leading to the Cogema company plant, where the plutonium is to
be treated. 

France's state-of-the-art nuclear technology is being used to
help fulfill the terms of a September 2000 U.S.-Russia
disarmament accord in which both countries promised to destroy
34 tons of military plutonium. 

France has received shipments of radioactive material in the
past for conversion into MOX fuel, a mixture of plutonium oxide
and uranium oxide, but this is the first time weapons-grade
plutonium is involved. 

The U.S. Energy Department must ship the plutonium overseas for
conversion because there isn't a plant in the United States that
can do it. 

-- 



*****************************************************************
 33 UPI: Nuclear fuel reprocessing too costly - 

(United Press International)
 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 
October 06, 2004                         

Tokyo, Japan, Oct. 6 (UPI) -- The cost of reprocessing used 
nuclear fuel from power plants is up to 1.8 times higher than 
burying it, Japan's Atomic Energy Commission estimates. 

According to the estimate, reprocessing spent nuclear fuel would 
cost 1.6 yen (1.4 cents) per kilowatt-hour of output, whereas it 
costs 0.9 yen (0.8 cents) per kilowatt-hour to dispose of the 
fuel without reprocessing, the Yomiuri Shimbun reported 
Wednesday. 

But the commission observed that if the government did not 
reprocess the fuel, it would still incur costs from dismantling a 
reprocessing plant in Rokkashomura, Aomori prefecture, which is 
scheduled to start operations soon. 

The commission will submit its report Thursday to a panel, which 
will discuss the future direction of the government's nuclear 
energy policy.

[UPI Perspectives]                                                                    
*****************************************************************
 34 Las Vegas RJ: NUCLEAR REPOSITORY: Yucca court challenge alive 
 
Wednesday, October 06, 2004
 
Justice Department still may ask courtto keep disputed radiation
rules intact 

By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU
 
WASHINGTON -- The White House on Tuesday distanced itself from a
Justice Department document suggesting the Bush administration
might ask the Supreme Court to keep intact disputed radiation
rules for the Yucca Mountain Project.
 
 Despite previous statements from Bush administration officials
that there would be no appeal of a July court ruling that set
back the nuclear waste project, Justice Department attorneys on
Sept. 23 filed a document in federal court stating the U.S.
solicitor general has final say over Supreme Court actions.
 
 "At this writing, the solicitor general has not yet made any
decision regarding Supreme Court review in this case," the
department said.
 
 The document's disclosure aroused Democrats and critics of the
Yucca project. They charged President Bush, who appoints the
solicitor general, may be angling to prolong legal fights over
Yucca Mountain if he is re-elected.
 
 The deadline for filing a Supreme Court appeal in the matter is
Nov. 30, according to attorneys for the Nuclear Energy
Institute, which already has indicated it will seek court review.
 
 A Justice Department source said it is unlikely that acting
solicitor general Paul D. Clement will take Yucca Mountain to
the Supreme Court, consistent with the views expressed by the
Bush administration.
 
 But with Justice Department officials claiming they have an
option, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., charged Bush was violating a
statement he made in Nevada on Aug. 12 that he would let the
courts rule on the nuclear waste repository.
 
 "My concern once again is that the president on Yucca Mountain
is talking out of both sides of his mouth," Reid said.
 
 "This sounds like George Bush wasn't exactly honest when he was
out here last time," said Sean Smith, Nevada spokesman for
Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry. "He's giving
himself the option to push forward. It fits the pattern of him
not leveling with the people of Nevada on this issue and other
issues."
 
 Attorney General Brian Sandoval, who also is co-chairman of the
Bush campaign in Nevada, disagreed. He said federal agencies
appear to be in a turf battle over who calls the shots on
Supreme Court appeals, and Justice Department officials were
claiming their turf. 
"I don't think politics has anything to do with this," Sandoval
said. "The solicitor is viewing this purely from a legal
perspective."
 
 Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said Democrats "are trying to take a
cheap shot here." He said the Justice Department document was
not inconsistent with what Bush told Nevadans in August. 
But, Ensign said, "I would love to drive a stake through Yucca
Mountain and be done with it."
 
 Tracey Schmitt, a spokeswoman for the Bush campaign in Nevada,
said the criticism of Bush is "disingenuous when Kerry misled
the state on his record for months." 
Republicans have criticized Kerry on seven specific votes he
cast on the project over the course of two decades, including
his vote for the "Screw Nevada" bill that singled out Yucca
Mountain for study in 1987. Democrats note Kerry opposed the
project in key votes in recent years and has promised to kill
the program if elected. 
The exchange marked a new skirmish over the Yucca Mountain
Project, seen as a key wedge issue for the presidential
campaigns in Nevada, a battleground state. 
It stems from a July 9 ruling in the U.S. Court of Appeals for
the District of Columbia that ruled in favor of the government
on a number of issues but threw the proposed nuclear waste
repository into uncertainty by voiding a 10,000 year radiation
standard written by the Environmental Protection Agency.
 
 White House spokesman Ken Lisaius said the president's position
has been expressed by Energy Department and EPA officials who
have said they see little value in prolonging a court case in
which the government won most of the arguments.
 
 "My understanding is that the circumstances have not changed,"
Lisaius said, adding he could not explain the Justice Department
court filing.
 
 Energy Department spokesman Joe Davis said: "We believe that
the framework the Court decision requires is workable and that
therefore the best way to proceed is not to engage in further
litigation but to allow EPA to work to develop an appropriate
regulatory response to address the issued raised by the Court." 
Justice Department spokesman Blain Rethmeier would not comment
on the court filing. He said the department's stance "is in line
with the White House."
 
 A Justice Department source indicated that Sandoval's reading
of the matter may be closest to correct.
 
 
Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal
*****************************************************************
 35 Interfax: Iran, Russia may sign nuclear waste deal in November

Interfax.com [http://www.interfax.com]     Text version

Oct 6 2004 4:10PM
 
MOSCOW. Oct 6 (Interfax) - Iran and Russia may sign an agreement
on the repatriation of spent nuclear fuel during Russian Atomic
Energy service head Alexander Rumyantsev's visit to Tehran which
is expected in the second half of November, Iranian Ambassador
to Russia Gholam Reza Shafei said. 

"We will be working for the sides to sign it during Alexander
Rumyantsev's visit to Iran," he told Interfax on Wednesday. 

"If the visit of the head of the Russian nuclear agency takes
place on time, the questions related with fuel for the [Bushehr]
nuclear power station will be settled on the scene," he said. 

Asked whether the time of commissioning the station may be
postponed, the diplomat said: "Fuel questions can hardly become
a reason for postponing the station's launch." 

He said that during Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov's
visit to Tehran on October 10-11, emphasis will be put on
Iranian-Russian nuclear cooperation.     

© 1991-2004 Interfax
 All rights reserved
 
*****************************************************************
 36 Las Vegas SUN: Government considers appealing Yucca ruling

By Benjamin Grove <grove@lasvegassun.com [grove@lasvegassun.com] 
> SUN WASHINGTON BUREAU

 WASHINGTON -- The federal government is maintaining its option
to seek a Supreme Court review of a lower court ruling against
Yucca Mountain.

 The request for appeal remains unlikely and would contradict
stances made by the Environmental Protection Agency and the
Energy Department. The two agencies have signalled they have no
interest in a Supreme Court appeal.

 The Energy Department has said the best way to proceed "is not
to engage in further litigation but to allow EPA to work to
develop an appropriate regulatory response to address the issues
raised by the courts," department spokesman Joe Davis said.

 Still, a court document filed by the Justice Department on
Sept. 23 asserts that the department's solicitor general is
clinging to the Supreme Court option. The deadline to request an
appeal is Nov. 30.

 At issue is a July 9 ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for
the District of Columbia Circuit. It said the EPA's 10,000-year
radiation standard for the proposed waste repository at Yucca
unlawfully deviated from stricter National Academy of Sciences
recommendations.

 The ruling was a significant setback to the Energy Department
plan to bury the nation's high-level nuclear waste at Yucca,
Nevada officials said.

 White House spokesman Ken Lisaius this week gave no new signal
that President Bush wants to appeal to the nation's highest
court.

 "There is nothing changed" in Bush's stance, Lisaius said.

 Lisaius noted that after the ruling Energy Secretary Spencer
Abraham said his department would work with the Environmental
Protection Agency and Congress -- he notably did not mention
courts -- to respond to the ruling.

 Both the Energy Department and the EPA declined to file appeals
to the federal appeals court by an Aug. 24 deadline.

 And on Sept. 7, in response to Sun questions about whether the
EPA would appeal the ruling to the Supreme Court, the EPA issued
a statement saying the agency "has elected not to seek further
court review."

 In addition, an EPA official told a National Academy of
Sciences Board on Sept. 20 that the agency was reviewing how to
best comply with the lower court. The official made no mention
that the EPA considered a Supreme Court appeal an option.

 But "final authority" on Supreme Court appeals rests with the
nation's Solicitor General, according to the Justice Department
court document. And Acting Solicitor General Paul Clement has
not signalled whether he would appeal, Justice Department
spokesman Blain Rethmeier said.

 Generally, the Solicitor General reserves the right to appeal
whether he intends to or not.

 The solicitor general is keeping his cards close to the vest by
design, Nevada Senior Deputy Attorney General Marta Adams said.
For strategy reasons lawyers often wait until the last minute to
file a Supreme Court appeal, she said.

 

*****************************************************************
 37 Las Vegas SUN: Option on Yucca appeal left open

By Benjamin Grove <grove@lasvegassun.com [grove@lasvegassun.com] 
> SUN WASHINGTON BUREAU

 WASHINGTON -- The federal government is maintaining its option
to seek a Supreme Court review of a lower court ruling against
Yucca Mountain.

 The request for appeal remains unlikely and would contradict
stances made by the Environmental Protection Agency and the
Energy Department. The two agencies have signalled they have no
interest in a Supreme Court appeal.

 The Energy Department has said the best way to proceed "is not
to engage in further litigation but to allow EPA to work to
develop an appropriate regulatory response to address the issues
raised by the courts," department spokesman Joe Davis said.

 Still, a court document filed by the Justice Department on
Sept. 23 asserts that the department's solicitor general is
clinging to the Supreme Court option. The deadline to request an
appeal is Nov. 30.

 At issue is a July 9 ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for
the District of Columbia Circuit. It said the EPA's 10,000-year
radiation standard for the proposed waste repository at Yucca
unlawfully deviated from stricter National Academy of Sciences
recommendations.

 The ruling was a significant setback to the Energy Department
plan to bury the nation's high-level nuclear waste at Yucca,
Nevada officials said.

 White House spokesman Ken Lisaius this week gave no new signal
that President Bush wants to appeal to the nation's highest
court.

 "There is nothing changed" in Bush's stance, Lisaius said.

 Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said she expects Bush will push
for a Supreme Court challenge after the election.

 "George Bush is desperate to pick up Nevada's five electoral
votes," Berkley said.

 

*****************************************************************
 38 Arizona Daily Sun: Radioactive truck shipments put on hold
 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 	 
[http://www.azdailysun.com]                                                                                                   

By SETH MULLER Sun Staff Reporter 10/06/2004

The U.S. Department of Energy reported to Gov. Janet Napolitano 
that it has halted radioactive trucking shipments through Arizona 
along Interstate 40 after police discovered a tractor-trailer 
leaking its cargo west of Flagstaff in August. 

In a phone interview with the Daily Sun Tuesday, Napolitano said 
that she received a response from Paul Golan, an environmental 
management secretary for the Department of Energy, to let her 
know that uranium shipments have been suspended pending 
corrective measures. 

"The letter is a good, strong response to our concerns," she 
said. "The Department of Energy said that it should have never 
happened." 

In a copy of the letter received by the Sun, Golan also wrote to 
Napolitano that he regretted "the trouble and inconvenience 
experienced by the officials and citizens in your state as a 
result." 

Attempts to reach Golan Tuesday were unsuccessful, as he was 
reportedly traveling, but the letter explained that the 
Department reduced its payments and fees to the contracted 
commercial trucking carrier by $450,000 as a result of the 
violation. 

It did not offer a timeline for restoring transport of 
radioactive material, but when it does, the Department of Public 
Safety will be ready. 

"We will be watching very carefully," Napolitano said. "We'll 
make sure that the DPS folks on the I-40 corridor are 
well-trained and responsive. It's not just the radioactive 
material, we have a lot of drug trafficking along that route. 
It's kind of a busy place that I-40." 

According to Department of Public Safety reports, a shipment of 
low-level radioactive waste that was part of a four-truck caravan 
pulled over in Bellemont on Aug. 15 after one of the truck 
drivers noticed one of the other rigs had been leaking white, 
granular solids and a clear-like gel. 

Experts called to the scene determined that the leakage was not 
radioactive but instead originated from the packing material. 
Reports showed that the waste had been traveling from the 
Department of Energy's Oak Ridge Laboratories in Tennessee to the 
Nevada Test Site, northwest of Las Vegas. 

Reporter Seth Muller can be reached at 913-8607 or at 
smuller@azdailysun.com.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 
				 				 			   		 		
 © 2000-2004 Arizona Daily Sun
*****************************************************************
 39 TheBostonChannel.com: Water Cleanup Project Under Way On Cape 

Camp Edwards Project Could Take 10 to 15 Years 

UPDATED: 9:27 pm EDT October 5, 					 					2004

BOURNE, Mass. -- The destruction of explosives and munitions for 
more than two decades at Camp Edwards resulted in groundwater 
contamination that threatened Cape Cod's water supply.

NewsCenter 5's Amalia Barreda reported that after years of 
controversy and pressure from surrounding communities, the Army 
turned on the system that will clean up the contaminated water 
Tuesday.

There was much celebration over a glass of clean water, but it 
signaled the beginning of a long awaited clean up of groundwater 
pollution traced back to an area of the base known as Demolition 
Area 1. Scientists found dangerously high levels of explosives, 
chemical cyclotrimethylenetrinitramine, or RDX, and perchlorate 
in the plume of groundwater flowing towards Bourne.

The massive project uses giant tanks to extract contaminated 
groundwater at Camp Edwards. Everyday, the system will extract 
and purify 500,000 gallons of contaminated water and re-inject it 
into the aquifer -- critical for Cape Cod's water supply.

"This is where the upper portions of Cape Cod gets its water 
supply, this aquifer, right beneath this land, and it's critical 
that we keep this water clean," said Mark Forest, aide to Rep. 
William Delahunt.

The Army has already cleaned up 50,000 tons of contaminated soil 
from Demolition Area 1. The soil has been trucked to a location 
where it will be put through a system that cleanses it with 
extremely high heat.

Mark Harding, of the Mashpee Wompanoag Tribe, called Tuesday a 
good day, but said more work needs to be done with other 
contaminated areas at Camp Edwards.

"There's going to be many, many years of work. We still have the 
whole Southwest Operational Unit," said Harding. "With a lot of 
the pollutants migrating towards Falmouth and some of their water 
supply, this is a continuing effort to remediate some of the past 
problems of past practices."

The water cleanup project will take 10 to 15 years. 


Copyright 2004 by TheBostonChannel. All rights reserved. This 
*****************************************************************
 40 Pahrump Valley Times: Yucca realist 
 
October 6, 2004

Get real, people. If you think that that big hole in the mountain 
is going to get plugged and everybody walks away you are 
definitely living in Never-Never Land. I quote the article (PVT 
July 28) and then make my comments.

 "Nevada is running short of money to challenge the government's 
licensing bid for a Yucca Mountain repository, a state official 
and attorneys said Thursday as they applied for a $13.75 million 
grant to continue their efforts."

 Hmm, grant? That money would come from where? Would it be the 
federal government? You know what a grant is: fill out the 
paperwork correctly and you get other people's money. Our tax 
dollars at work?

 "The financial squeeze comes at a bad time for the state." Why 
would that be? The state is loaded with extra dough because of 
the illegal taxes laid on its citizens from the last legislature 
get together.

 "Nevada had relied heavily on federal appropriations to pay for 
its Yucca work, but only got $1 million from Congress last year."

 Politicians and/or lawyers are expensive and they only got $1 
million.

 "Attorney General Brian Sandoval is suing the Department of 
Energy for more funding."

 So, he sues the feds to get more money from the feds to fight 
the feds. Right?

 "Loux said the Nevada Protection Fund that Gov. Kenny Guinn 
established for a Yucca Mountain fight contains about $800,000 
and that also is being tapped.

 Gee, I'm surprised they didn't say ONLY $800,000. So, what's the 
problem? A fund of our tax dollars, again. Not enough? What did 
it start with? Who's in charge of this "fund?"

 Think about this: You pay your federal income tax, it goes to 
WDC via the IRS and the sitting congress "appropriates" your 
dollars. In this case they appropriate dollars to the state of 
Nevada to fight Yucca Mountain. Is there something seriously 
wrong with this picture?

 MAGGIE LAWSON

For comment or questions, please e-mail 
[webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com] 
Copyright © Pahrump Valley Times, 1997 - 2004 
*****************************************************************
 41 Spokesman-Review: Report raises warning on transport of nuclear waste 

- Karen Dorn Steele
 
Government disputes group's claim of trucking risks along I-90,
I-205 or I-405 

Karen Dorn Steele Staff Writer October 5, 2004 

Seattle activist Jerry Pollett fretted that he couldn't find a
big enough rental truck in Spokane early Monday to fully
dramatize his point: that hundreds of people, including
teenagers at Lewis and Clark High School, will be put at risk if
the Bush administration proceeds with a plan to ship more
truckloads of nuclear waste via Interstate 90 to Hanford. 

Heart of America Northwest, a Hanford watchdog group, parked a
panel truck with a large radioactive waste symbol at Fourth and
Howard, across the street from the South Hill high school.

Trucks rumbled overhead on I-90. 

Lewis and Clark students were inside studying and missed the
political event staged for the press. 

The group distributed a new report, "Unnecessary Risks," that
challenges the government's assertion that the nuclear waste
transport plan poses little risk to people in 25 cities. 

Nuclear physicist Marvin Resnikoff used computer modeling to
conclude that an accident or terrorist attack on a nuclear waste
truck along I-90, I-205 through Portland or I-405 through
Bellevue could result in hundreds of square miles becoming
contaminated and up to 1,500 fatal cancers. 

Even routine shipments "are likely to result in 160 cancers in
children and adults along the truck routes, and over 50 fatal
cancers in children and adults, even if there is no accident or
terrorist attack," it says. The report assumes that children
would be stuck in traffic next to the radiation casks. 

A U.S. Department of Energy official in Richland hadn't seen the
report, but said the activist group is exaggerating the public
risks. 

"We are deeply concerned that they're saying simply sitting in
traffic next to a waste truck could be a health risk. That's not
true. They are trumping up false concerns," said department
spokeswoman Colleen French. 

The U.S. Department of Energy, in its own computer assessment of
public health risks to adults from the proposed waste shipments,
says nine or 10 fatal cancers could eventually result from
"incident-free" transport due to radiation exposures. 

The Energy Department hasn't yet made public its preferred
routes as it responds to questions from a federal judge. But
Resnikoff's report says I-90 could easily become one of the most
heavily used routes – carrying up to 24,829 truckloads over
several decades. 

That's an exaggeration, French countered. 

In June, when it published its record of decision on the
transportation plan, the Energy Department scaled it back to
less than a quarter of its original scope. Now, the plan calls
for no more than 5,800 trucks to come to Hanford over the entire
project, she said. At the same time, Hanford has begun shipping
out 8,500 truckloads of plutonium-contaminated waste on other
highways to New Mexico for burial at the government's new Waste
Isolation Pilot Plant. 

"We'll be exporting more than we'll be importing," French said. 
Last year, Heart of America Northwest and Washington Attorney
General Christine Gregoire won a federal court injunction
against the Energy Department's plans to ship
plutonium-contaminated waste to Hanford because the agency
hadn't evaluated the transportation risks. 

The department is seeking to have the injunction lifted and
resume shipments of transuranic waste containing plutonium and
other elements that remain radioactive for tens of thousands of
years. Meanwhile, Gregoire has gone to federal court in an
effort to halt all new waste shipments to Hanford. 

Heart of America Northwest has provided much of the $750,000
raised so far for Yes on I-297, an initiative on the Nov. 2
ballot that would ban any new shipments of nuclear trash to
Hanford until the 586-square-mile nuclear reservation – still
the most polluted nuclear weapons site in North America – is
cleaned up. 

I-297 has been endorsed by the Spokane City Council, many state
environmental groups and the Washington State Medical
Association. It is opposed by the Tri-City Industrial
Development Council and the Washington Association of Business.
The opponents say it could threaten the $2 billion in annual
funds from Congress to clean up Hanford. 

*****************************************************************
 42 UK Independent: Plutonium ship arrives at French port
 
By Sam Marsden and Chris Court, PA News
 
06 October 2004

 	 

The first of two ships carrying weapons-grade plutonium from the
US docked in France early this morning, Greenpeace said today. 

The British-registered Pacific Pintail, said to be carrying
enough plutonium to make 40 nuclear bombs, reached the port of
Cherbourg after more than a fortnight at sea. 

Campaigners on board the environmental group's own ship MV
Esperanza are waiting off Cherbourg for a second vessel, Pacific
Teal, to arrive. 

Greenpeace spokeswoman Louise Edge said the group had been told
that only Pacific Pintail was carrying the nuclear cargo. 

She added: "We are not sure if that is a ruse or not - Pacific
Teal is not in the area at the moment." 

The Esperanza located the two ships about 20 miles off the
French coast at 4.20am today and accompanied them towards
Cherbourg. 

Greenpeace has also begun staging protests ashore, which it has
pledged to maintain as the plutonium is transported 745 miles by
road to Cadarache, southern France, where it will be processed
into experimental fuel. 

Five protesters against the shipment, including world-famous
yachtsman Eugene Riguidel, were arrested in Cherbourg days ahead
of the arrival of the two ships. 

The vessels are carrying the material for the US National
Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). 

The plutonium is being carried by vessels operated by the PNTL
shipping company, whose main shareholder is British Nuclear
Fuels. 

NNSA spokesman Bryan Wilkes has said from Washington DC that the
275lb (125kg) of plutonium was being shipped across the Atlantic
as a result of an agreement between the US and Russia to dispose
of weapons-grade plutonium. 

It was being sent to a nuclear reprocessing plant at Cadarache -
a facility not yet available in the US. 

There the plutonium would be converted into plutonium-uranium
oxide fuel rods which would be returned to the US for use in a
nuclear reactor. 

If the treatment was successful, the "green light" would be
given for such a facility in the US, negating the need for
further plutonium to be taken overseas, said Mr Wilkes. 

Once converted into fuel rods, the plutonium could not be used
in a nuclear weapon or for a nefarious purpose, he said. 

The two ships left Charleston, South Carolina, on September 20. 

The US government has said the plutonium was being transported
by sea as a one-off exercise. 

But Shaun Burnie, nuclear co-ordinator for Greenpeace
International, said the shipment "did not need to happen". 

He added: "This is bomb material that cannot be, and should not
be, treated as if you're just handling bananas or something." 

A BNFL spokesman said PNTL had carried more than 170 shipments
for a total of about five million miles without any incidents. 

It has been reported that the ships have double hulls and are
each guarded by 13 commandos and armed with a 30mm cannon. 

Before the two ships arrived in Cherbourg, Greenpeace activists
blocked the road to be used for transporting the plutonium. 

A truck was bolted to the main road between the Cherbourg
military port and the state nuclear company Areva-Cogema
reprocessing complex on the La Hague peninsula. Ten activists
were locked to the truck and the road. 

Greenpeace said that, after being unloaded on the dockside, the
plutonium would be escorted by the French army 11 miles to La
Hague, before being transported to Cadarache. 	           


UK Independent Ltd.
*****************************************************************
 43 KRNV: Kerry makes bold guarantees about Yucca, Reno campaign stop
   
October 6, 2004   

Democrat John Kerry says if he is elected president he will 
refuse to fund efforts crucial to the construction of Yucca 
Mountain to keep the nation's nuclear waste dump from being built 
in Nevada. 
   
Kerry told a News 4 in a satellite feed from Iowa Tuesday that he 
does not think Yucca Mountain is safe. 
   
He told KRNV-TV, "I'll guarantee you, if I'm president, Yucca 
Mountain is not going to happen. Nevada can take that to the 
bank." 
   
Kerry repeatedly has pledged to kill the high-level radioactive 
waste repository planned 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. But 
Republicans argue he's powerless to do anything about it and that 
the federal courts ultimately will decide the fate of the 
project. 
   
Kerry told News 4's Karen Rueter Tuesday he has a number of ways 
to keep the dump from being built, beginning with his budget. He 
says refusing to fund things necessary to make Yucca Mountain a 
reality is a good place to start. 
   
In addition, Kerry says the Department of Transportation, 
Department of Energy and Environmental Protection Agency have to 
approve various health and safety standards for the dump to be 
built. As president, he says he would have the power to make sure 
those signoffs don't occur. 

Republicans have criticized Kerry as changing his position on 
Yucca Mountain in order to win votes. 

They point out that Kerry voted seven times in favor of Yucca 
including the famouse "Screw Nevada" bill in which lawmakers 
rejected other sites and agreed to study only Yucca Mountain as a 
potential nuclear waste dump.
   
Kerry also guaranteed Rueter that he would come to northern 
Nevada at least once before election day.   

[http://www.worldnow.com]     All content © Copyright 2001 -
2004 WorldNow and KRNV. All Rights Reserved.
*****************************************************************
 44 asahi.com: Nuclear recycling costs fail to add up 

The Asahi Shimbun 

Report reveals it's cheaper to bury the waste underground. 

The controversial program to recycle nuclear fuel for power 
generation has just triggered another alarm. This time, the toxic 
data is radiating from within the government's own camp. 

A report by the Atomic Energy Commission has shown it is much 
cheaper to bury spent nuclear fuel rather than reprocess and 
re-use it. 

Adding to the embarrassment for officials who pushed the 
recycling policy, the report has a sting in its tail: It may be 
too late to backtrack because of the money already spent. 

According to sources close to the commission, which works out 
long-term plans for the country's nuclear energy policy, 
recycling plutonium, the material used for nuclear power 
generation, pushes up the cost of generating 1 kilowatt-hour of 
electricity by 0.5 yen to 0.7 yen, or roughly 40 percent, 
compared to burying the spent plutonium after using it once. 

The difference translates into an increase of 600 yen to 840 yen 
in the annual electricity bill for a single household, the 
sources said. 

The report, expected to be presented at the panel's meeting on 
Thursday, is the first official government study to look at the 
economic viability of recycling spent fuel. 

It was compiled as part of the commission's ongoing work to 
revise the nation's long-term nuclear energy development program, 
and is intended as a basis for deciding whether the country 
should pursue the building of a nuclear recycling system. 

Four scenarios in the report compare the estimated costs of 
generating electricity over the next 60 years. 

In the scenario for reprocessing all spent fuel from nuclear 
reactors for re-use, the estimated cost-including disposal of 
associated nuclear wastes-was 1.6 yen per 1 kilowatt-hour of 
electricity. The assumption is that loans carrying a 2 percent 
interest rate are used to fund the process. 

In contrast, the cost estimate in the scenario for burying all 
spent fuel deep underground after being used once worked out at 
0.9 yen to 1.1 yen. 

The overall costs of power generation, including the reprocessing 
and disposal costs, too, have proven higher for the reprocessing 
scenario at 5.2 yen per 1 kilowatt-hour of electricity generated, 
compared to 4.5 yen to 4.7 yen for the burying scenario. 

Despite the clear cost advantage of disposing of spent nuclear 
fuel, the report indicates it may not make economic sense to 
scrap the recycling effort. 

The report notes that 2.4 trillion yen has already been spent on 
building a fuel reprocessing plant in the village of Rokkasho, 
Aomori Prefecture. It says if this sum is added to the cost of 
dismantling the plant, as well as other related expenses in 
abandoning the recycling program, the burial method would 
actually cost 5.4 yen to 6.2 yen per 1 kilowatt-hour generated. 

The case for pursuing the nation's nuclear-fuel recycling program 
was called into question in July when the former Ministry of 
International Trade and Industry, the predecessor to the Ministry 
of Economy, Trade and Industry, was found to have concealed 
estimates indicating that recycling nuclear fuel was more 
expensive than burying it.(IHT/Asahi: October 6,2004) (10/06) 

[Copyright Asahi Shimbun. All rights reserved. No reproduction
*****************************************************************
 45 Globe and Mail: Hot uranium prices push Cameco shares past $100 mark   
 	 		 		 		 		 				 				 				 			 
[http://www.theglobeandmail.com/]

  Improved prospects have also increased exploration spending in
Saskatchewan
 
By WENDY STUECK MINING REPORTER Wednesday, October 6, 2004 - Page 
B6 

VANCOUVER -- After nearly 20 years in the doldrums, spot uranium 
prices are soaring, a trend that has seen enthused investors push 
Cameco Corp. shares over the $100 mark for the first time since 
they were listed in 1991. 

Improved prospects for uranium have also lit a fire under the 
share prices of several junior resource companies with uranium 
projects in their portfolio and boosted exploration spending in 
Saskatchewan, where companies are scouring the Athabasca Basin 
for new deposits of the mineral. 

While uranium prices are notoriously difficult to predict, 
analysts expect the upward trend to continue for at least the 
next few years. 

"While the recent price move brings a variety of new projects 
into economic viability, we believe that the time lag necessary 
to review, permit and construct these projects will result in 
continued tightness in the market for the next several years," 
CIBC World Markets Inc. analyst Stephen Bonnyman said in a recent 
report. 

Cameco shares fell 79 cents to close at $103.96 on the Toronto 
Stock Exchange yesterday. They have risen 39 per cent in the past 
12 months. 

Cameco, with uranium mines in Canada and the United States, is 
the world's largest uranium producer. It also provides refining 
and conversion services that process uranium for use in nuclear 
reactors, and owns 31.6 per cent of Bruce Power, which runs six 
nuclear plants in Ontario. 

Cameco spokeswoman Alice Wong said current market conditions 
reflect shifting supply and demand trends. Over the past 20 
years, uranium consumption has exceeded mined production, but the 
difference has been made up from stockpiles coming on the market, 
including uranium recovered from former nuclear weapons. 

Currently, those supplies appear to be dwindling. 

"The drawing down of the inventory, which we have been 
forecasting for many years now, is coming to fruition," Ms. Wong 
said. 

Uranium prices spiked in the 1990s, only to fall back when new 
supplies came on the market, but analysts say they are not 
expecting similar surprises this time around. 

"If there had been any excess inventories, we would have seen 
them by now," said Raymond Goldie, an analyst at Salman Partners 
Inc. 

Prices are also being influenced by uncertainty over some sources 
of supply, Ms. Wong said, such as Rio Tinto PLC's Rossing mine in 
Namibia. Rossing produces about 6 per cent of the world's 
uranium. 

Rio Tinto is currently assessing whether to keep the mine 
operating until 2017, or close it earlier. 

Even though uranium prices soared in U.S. dollar terms in the 
past three years, Rossing has not enjoyed the full benefit of 
higher prices, because its costs are in Namibian dollars, which 
are pegged to the South African rand, which has appreciated 
against the U.S. dollar. 

The improved outlook for uranium, now trading at about $20 (U.S.) 
a pound, has boosted exploration spending in the Athabasca Basin, 
home of the world's biggest and highest-grade uranium deposits. 

Gary Delaney, director of the northern geological survey at 
Saskatchewan's Ministry of Industry and Resources, said companies 
are expected to spend about $25.9-million (Canadian) on uranium 
exploration this year, up from $13.3-million last year. 

The total mineral exploration spending for the province is 
expected to exceed $50-million this year, up from $31.3-million 
last year.   

Copyright 2004 Bell Globemedia Publishing Inc. All Rights
*****************************************************************
 46 Pahrump Valley Times: State low-level waste target 
 
October 6, 2004

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 

LAS VEGAS - Nevada is worried the federal government might want 
to find new sites in the state to dispose of low-level 
radioactive waste, the governor's top anti-nuclear administrator 
said. 

"Nevada has done its share in this arena," said Bob Loux, Nevada 
Nuclear Project Office executive director. 

His comments came after Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said Thursday 
that the federal government might have to find sites because 
states have failed to open facilities for disposal of low-level 
radioactive waste. 

The materials include contaminated clothing, tools, machinery and 
laboratory equipment from industry and research sites, and 
hospital waste from nuclear medicine. 

Aides to Domenici, the Republican Energy and Natural Resources 
Committee chairman, and Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., said legislation 
could come next year. 

The hearing came after a recent report by the federal General 
Accounting Office that the nation's three commercial low-level 
waste dump sites in South Carolina, Utah and Washington might no 
longer meet national needs. 

"While not an immediate problem, we must now pay close attention 
to prevent a potential future crisis," Domenici said in a 
statement prepared for a hearing in Washington. He did not 
mention possible locations. 

The federal government already has a low-level radioactive waste 
repository at the Nevada Test Site 50 miles northeast of Pahrump, 
for waste generated by the Energy Department. 

The Energy Department also plans to develop the nation's only 
dump at nearby Yucca Mountain for high-level radioactive waste 
produced by nuclear reactors in 39 states.

For comment or questions, please e-mail 
webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com 
[webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com] Copyright © Pahrump Valley 
Times, 1997 - 2004 
*****************************************************************
 47 Pahrump Valley Times: DOE GAVE AWAY EQUIPMENT IN LIEU OF AUCTION SALE 
 
October 6, 2004

 AUDIT RESULTS 

Yucca waste 

By STEVE TETREAULT PVT WASHINGTON BUREAU 

WASHINGTON - The Department of Energy in 2003 gave away 1,300 
pieces of equipment no longer needed at Yucca Mountain, including 
a refurbished rock boring machine and thousands of tons of iron 
and steel that could have raised more than $450,000 for the 
financially strapped nuclear waste project, according to federal 
auditors.

 A conveyer belt feeder that was never used and a generator 
listed as new were among the items turned over to a disposal 
contractor rather than sold at auction or offered to other 
federal agencies through normal procedures.

 A refurbished rock-boring machine called a roadheader valued at 
$792,000 was put up for sale on the Internet by the contractor 
who advertised it as being "in very good condition with only 165 
hours of use."

 The property disposals were detailed in a Sept. 27 report by the 
Energy Department inspector general that was made public on 
Monday.

 Auditors estimated DOE lost $458,000 from "poor property 
management practices" when it rid itself of excess inventory 
after largely completing site studies for the proposed nuclear 
waste repository.

 DOE gave the contractor about 9,000 metric tons of property "and 
the government received no monetary benefit from the sale of 
potentially reusable property," auditors said. 

"With the uneconomic disposal of Yucca Mountain property, the 
department lost the potential to recover funds that could have 
been used to satisfy pressing mission needs," they said.

 Additionally, auditors said, two diagnostics trailers that 
belonged to the National Nuclear Security Administration for use 
at the Nevada Test Site were mistakenly turned over for disposal. 
And a drilling rig was sold even after Test Site manager Bechtel 
Nevada requested it for transfer.

 The critical report comes as the Energy Department is scrambling 
to avert financial shortfalls that could cripple the Yucca 
Mountain Project. 

Responding to the audit, DOE officials said they were revising 
their property management. But they defended their actions as the 
most cost-effective way to dispose of material they contended had 
little value.

 The property included 4,580 tons of scrap metal, plus fencing, 
piping, drill rigs and other heavy equipment, mining implements, 
water tanks and other industrial material that was stored in 
equipment yards and remote locations on the Yucca site, according 
to a DOE official.

 Critics said the report highlighted ongoing management problems 
in the Yucca Mountain Project.

 "You've heard the phrase 'waste, fraud and abuse.' Now you can 
add mismanagement to that," said Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev. "We're 
not talking about chump change, this is a half million dollars."

 Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., was researching ways that Congress 
could force DOE to repay $458,000 to taxpayers, spokeswoman Amy 
Spanbauer said. 

Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., said the report "highlights the ongoing 
mismanagement of the Yucca Mountain Project and is further 
evidence the project is misguided and unmanageable."

 Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said, "I can assure you that the 
half-million (dollars) is just the tip of the iceberg. The more 
auditors probe they will find millions and millions (of dollars 
in) waste."

 Government rules normally require offering excess equipment to 
other federal agencies or selling it at auction. But auditors 
said DOE paid $73,000 to a specialized contractor to dispose of 
the material.

 A DOE spokesman identified the contractor as Toxco, Inc., a 
metals recycling firm in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

 Responding to the audit, John Arthur, the Yucca project's deputy 
director, said DOE chose the most cost-effective method to get 
rid of the material. He said some of it had been sitting around 
after being shipped to Nevada when DOE abandoned repository 
studies in Texas and Washington state in 1987. 

The equipment had little value after "years of non-use and harsh 
exposure to the desert environment," Arthur said, adding the 
material that did have value was limited because of its age, 
remote location and lack of maintenance records.

 But inspectors said they found that, contrary to DOE's claim, 70 
percent of the equipment was less than 10 years old and still had 
value. The department's financial estimates were unreliable 
because of failure to properly inventory the age and condition of 
the equipment, they said.

 "The financial advantage of disposing of excess property was 
shifted, essentially in its entirety, from the government to the 
disposal contractor," auditors said. 

Arthur also said disposal rules would have required the equipment 
to have been surveyed for possible radiological contamination at 
a cost of more than $250 per metric ton.

 "Since there was 9,000 metric tons of property, these 
radiological release surveys would have cost the program over a 
million dollars, which exceeded any estimated value of the 
property," he said. 

Auditors said the disposal contractor identified only five items 
that were contaminated out of 1,300 turned over for disposal.

For comment or questions, please e-mail 
webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com 
[webmaster@pahrumpvalleytimes.com] Copyright © Pahrump Valley 
Times, 1997 - 2004 
*****************************************************************
 48 Columbian: I-297 supporters push for no more Hanford waste

  [http://www.columbian.com] Serving Clark County, Washington 
    
Wednesday, October 6, 2004 

By KEN OLSEN, Columbian staff writer 

The Hanford Nuclear Reservation shouldn't accept any more 
radioactive waste from around the nation until the toxic mess at 
the Eastern Washington site is cleaned up, supporters of 
Initiative 297 said in Vancouver on Tuesday. 

    They said the Columbia River already is being polluted by the 
untreated waste languishing at the 586-square mile nuclear 
weapons complex that sits astride the river near the Tri-Cities. 
"Initiative 297 is based on a simple concept we all learned in 
kindergarten: Clean up your last mess before you make another 
one," Holly Forrest, Clark County chairwoman of Washington 
Conservation Voters, said during a press conference in 
Vancouver's Waterfront Park. It was the fourth stop in a 10-city 
tour that urges support for the anti-nuclear waste measure in 
November. 

    Last summer, the Bush administration decided to ship 
radioactive waste from more than 100 nuclear weapons sites around 
the nation to Hanford. I-297 backers not only oppose the 
radioactive waste coming to the Evergreen State, they also are 
concerned with the risks associated with trucking the nuclear 
trash. 

    "Clark County residents should care because the Columbia 
River flows right through our community," Forrest said. "So waste 
is flowing down our waterways and it's going to be coming down 
our highways." 

    "We are irradiating truckers, we are irradiating a bunch of 
humans driving down the road, we're dumping the waste at Hanford 
and calling that cleanup," added Greg deBruler of Columbia 
Riverkeeper, an advocacy group based in White Salmon. 

    I-297 backers estimate as many as 77,000 truckloads of waste 
could end up at Hanford, effectively doubling the amount of 
radioactive waste stored at the defunct nuclear weapons works. 
And "there's never any guarantee that any waste will be shipped 
out of here," said Robert Pregulman of the Washington Public 
Interest Research Group. Indeed, he fears that if Hanford takes 
more nuclear weapons waste, it will become a repository for 
nuclear waste from around the world. 

    The U.S. Department of Energy disagrees. Initiative 
proponents' claims that the amount of waste at Hanford will be 
doubled is "categorically false," said Colleen French, Energy 
Department spokeswoman in Richland. 

    There are currently 750,000 cubic meters of nuclear waste at 
Hanford. The plan announced in June calls for an additional 
82,000 cubic meters of waste. 

    While that means the Department of Energy will bring 5,800 
truckloads of waste to Hanford, it simultaneously will ship 8,500 
truckloads of other radioactive waste to a repository in New 
Mexico. "All of the nasty, long-lived isotopes are scheduled to 
be shipped off of the Hanford Reservation over the life of the 
cleanup," French said. 

    The Department of Energy doesn't take a position on 
initiatives. But Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi is 
opposing all ballot initiatives this election, including I-297. 
Democratic gubernatorial candidate Christine Gregoire's campaign 
did not respond to a request for comment on the initiative. 

    The Association of Washington Business and the Tri-Cities 
Industrial Development Council also oppose the measure. 

    "The results of Hanford cleanup are significant and 
measurable," the Tri-Cities group said in a press release. "This 
initiative will cause problems for the Tri-Cities community and 
for Washington state. 

    "If this initiative passes, there will be legal action 
protesting it, most likely stalling its implementation for 
years." 

The debate 

    Should Washington voters pass Initiative 297, which
prohibits the U.S. Department of Energy from moving additional
radioactive waste to the Hanford Nuclear Reservation until
current Hanford contamination is cleaned up? 

    On one side: "Initiative 297 simply says to the U.S.
Department of Energy, 'Enough is enough clean up the mess you
made before you bring in more waste.'" Holly Forrest, Clark
County chairwoman, Washington Conservation Voters. 

    On another side: "The results of Hanford cleanup are now
significant and measurable. This initiative will cause problems
for the Tri-Cities community and for Washington state." Carl
Adrian, president, Tri-Cities Industrial Development Council. 

    How to get involved: Voters will decide the issue in the
Nov. 2 general election. 

[http://www.columbian.com/archives] 

Copyright © 2004 by The Columbian Publishing Co. P.O. Box180,
Vancouver, WA 98666. No part of this publication may be storedin
*****************************************************************
 49 Tri-City Herald: Russian envoys make Tri-City nuclear visit 

This story was published Wednesday, October 6th, 2004 

By Jeff St. John Herald staff writer 

A legacy of plutonium production on the wane and a future that 
depends on economic diversification -- these are some of the 
things that the Tri-Cities and Zheleznogorsk, Russia, have in 
common. But the two places also share a bond through a joint 
U.S-Russian program meant to help Russia's "closed" nuclear 
cities survive a post-plutonium future and keep nuclear weapons 
material and expertise out of the hands of rogue nations or 
terrorists. 

On Tuesday, Zheleznogorsk's deputy mayor, Pavel Yakushin, visited 
the Tri-Cities with representatives of other closed cities where 
the Soviet Union produced plutonium for nuclear weapons. The 
group hoped to learn more about how the Tri-Cities is adapting to 
a post-Hanford future. 

The trip was sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy's Nuclear 
Cities Initiative, which also brought Yakushin to the 
Mid-Columbia in 1998. 

"We've been cooperating since then," Yakushin said during a 
Tuesday news conference at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory. 
The 1998 trip led to the 2000 opening of Zheleznogorsk's 
International Development Center to help train and assist those 
starting new businesses. 

Modeled in part on other PNNL economic development efforts, the 
development center has helped bring about 500 new jobs to the 
city of 100,000 in southcentral Siberia, said Ron Nesse, PNNL's 
Nuclear Cities Initiative program manager. 

"They have been the most successful of the closed cities in terms 
of economic development," Nesse said of Zheleznogorsk, which 
produced weapons-grade plutonium for decades in an underground 
complex that didn't appear on any maps. 

Economic development is meant to help the scientists and 
engineers involved with nuclear weapons work find gainful 
employment, so they aren't tempted to sell material or expertise 
to parties seeking nuclear weapons for nefarious ends. 

The Russian visitors toured Hanford on Tuesday and also met with 
Richland city officials to talk about how their American "nuclear 
city" has worked to diversify its economy. 

Nikolay Kuzmenko, mayor of Seversk, a closed city seeking to join 
the NCI program, explained the difficulties of shifting from a 
centrally controlled, Soviet-style economy. 

Not only does the Siberian Chemical Combine, the entity which 
operates the city's nuclear reactors, make up about 70 percent of 
the city's overall economy, but the city itself operates many of 
the functions handled by private businesses in America. 

"We are helping small companies take root," Kuzmenko said. 
"Perhaps the large combine will have to undergo changes as well." 

© 2004 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services
*****************************************************************
 50 Tri-City Herald: Transition of FFTF work halted 

This story was published Wednesday, October 6th, 2004 

By Annette Cary Herald staff writer 

A protest of the contract award for permanently shutting down 
Hanford's Fast Flux Test Facility has stopped the transition of 
work from current contractor Fluor Hanford to winning bidder SEC 
Closure Alliance. 

Protests have been filed with the Government Accountability 
Office, which led to a halt to the transition, and the Small 
Business Administration. 

The two teams of small businesses that were finalists for the 
contract with winner SEC Closure Alliance are accusing Safety and 
Ecology Corp. of Knoxville, Tenn., of not qualifying as a small 
business. 

The $235 million contract to shut down, then dismantle, Hanford's 
research reactor was set aside by DOE as an award to a small 
business. To qualify, the contract must have at least 51 percent 
of the work done by companies with no more than 500 employees. 

Neither of the contracting teams filing a protest based on 
small-business qualifications would discuss details of why they 
believed SEC did not qualify as a small business Tuesday. The 
FFTF Restoration Co. is headed by Federal Engineers and 
Constructors and Nuvotec, both of Richland, and the other team is 
led by Environmental Chemical Corp. of Burlingame, Calif. 

The FFTF Restoration Co. also filed a GAO protest related to 
procedural issues, said Lori Ramonas, vice president of strategic 
communication for Nuvotec. The protest is related to cost and to 
environmental safety and health, she said. 

DOE announced Sept. 24 that SEC Closure Alliance had won the 
contract to shut down and dismantle FFTF because its proposal 
provided the best value to the taxpayer. It was to begin work at 
Hanford in early January. 

The contract awarded was for less than half the amount DOE listed 
as the upper limit for the contract, $500 million. It also had 
projected at one time that the work would take until 2018 and 
cost $600 million. SEC Closure Alliance would complete the work 
by 2011 under the terms of the contract. 

However, the scope of the contract is uncertain because DOE has 
yet to do an environmental study on the extent of work to 
dismantle FFTF. It could be entombed or the underground 
components could be removed to leave a cleaner site. 

SEC has been barred from bidding on environmental cleanup work at 
DOE's Oak Ridge, Tenn., nuclear reservation after it dripped 
radioactive waste along a state highway in May. SEC expects soon 
to have issues resolved so it can again bid on work subcontracted 
by Bechtel Jacobs, which holds the environmental remediation 
contract at Oak Ridge, SEC said last week. 

SEC well understands the requirements for qualifying as a small 
business and meets those requirements, said Anne Smith, 
spokeswoman for SEC. 

"Because this is the largest of the small-business set-asides, we 
made sure all were aware of the rules," said Colleen French, 
spokeswoman for the Richland DOE office. Representatives of the 
Small Business Administration were available to discuss 
requirements with bidders, she said. 

SEC Closure Alliance is headed by SEC and also includes Los 
Alamos Technical Associates, Hart Crowser, Parallax, Areva and 
Resource Consultants. 

"We hope the protest does not jeopardize the future of small 
business procurements," Smith said, quoting Chris Leichtweis, SEC 
chief executive. 

The protests add more cost to the taxpayers for what Leichtweis 
believes was "a very comprehensive and fair process," she said. 

© 2004 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services
*****************************************************************
 51 Tri-City Herald: Tribes join lawsuit against DOE 

This story was published Wednesday, October 6th, 2004 

By Annette Cary Herald staff writer 

The Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation has 
notified the Department of Energy that it intends to join a suit 
proposed by the states of Washington and Oregon. 

In July the two states notified the federal government that they 
intended to sue DOE if it does not assess environmental harm 
caused by past plutonium production at Hanford. The states were 
required to give DOE 60 days notice before filing suit but have 
not sued yet. 

"We have had discussions with Energy and have not waived any of 
our options at the moment," said Gary Larson, spokesman for the 
Washington State Office of the Attorney General. 

The federal Superfund law covering sites where hazardous wastes 
have been released requires that an assessment of harm to natural 
resources be completed. 

The tribes "are not asking for money damages," said Armand 
Minthorn, a member of the board that governs the tribes, in a 
prepared statement. "We are asking the court to order the 
Department of Energy to openly assess the environmental harm at 
Hanford." 

Only when the extent of damage to plantsand animals from Hanford 
pollution is know, can plans be developed to restore resources, 
he said. 

The states agree that a thorough assessment of damages would help 
make better decisions about cleanup work. But DOE has argued that 
damages should not be assessed while it still is cleaning up the 
nuclear reservation. 

For more than 40 years, radioactive materials were released to 
the air, the Columbia River and to shallow ponds on the Hanford 
site, say the confederated tribes, which include the Umatilla, 
Cayuse and Walla Walla people. 

Scientists for the tribes believe contamination of the Columbia 
River with radioactive waste and other hazardous substances from 
Hanford could be contributing to the decline in Northwest salmon 
populations. 

The tribes say they own treaty rights to use natural resources on 
Hanford and other historic tribal lands, including fishing, 
hunting and gathering traditional foods and medicines. 

The Yakama Nation filed a similar suit in federal court in 2002. 
The suit proposed by Washington, Oregon and the tribes could be 
joined with the Yakama suit. 

© 2004 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services
*****************************************************************
 52 AP Wire: Judge allows whistleblowers lawsuits against Paducah plant to continue

| 10/06/2004 | 

Associated Press

PADUCAH, Ky. - A federal judge has ruled that two whistleblower 
lawsuits filed against the former owners of the Paducah Gasous 
Diffusion Plant may go forward. 

U.S. District Judge Joseph McKinley Jr. on Thursday denied 
motions by Lockheed Martin Energy Systems Inc. and Martin 
Marietta Energy Systems to dismiss the allegations. The companies 
are accused in the lawsuits of filing false claims with the U.S. 
Department of Energy that allowed them to collect hundreds of 
millions of dollars in undeserved operating and management fees. 
The firms operated the plant and did cleanup from 1984 until 
1997. 

The judge approved a motion by Lockheed Martin Corp., the parent 
company of Lockheed Martin Energy Systems and Martin Marietta 
Energy Systems, that it be dismissed as a defendant. 

The first suit was filed in June 1999 by current and former plant 
workers Ronald B. Fowler, Charles F. Deuschle and Garland Jenkins 
and the Natural Resources Defense Council, a Washington-based 
environmental group. The second suit was filed in February 2000 
by former plant worker John Tillson. After investigating the 
claims for three years, the U.S. Department of Justice found 
merit in the claims and joined in the suits. 

McKinley also allowed the two suits to be consolidated, except 
for a claim made by Tillson that he was fired from his job for 
earlier attempts to notify the federal government of the false 
claims allegations. 

Officials of the two companies have denied they filed false 
claims. 

If Lockheed is ordered to repay the fees, the current and former 
employees could receive up to 25 percent of the proceeds. The 
rest would go to the federal government and could be used to help 
pay for cleanup at the plant, where nuclear fuel has been 
produced for more than 50 years. 

Information from: The Paducah Sun, http://www.paducahsun.com
[http://www.paducahsun.com]   

*****************************************************************
 53 Daily Californian: Government Sets Bid Timeline for UC-Run Lab - 

 [http://www.dailycal.org/]       
  
By RACHEL LUNA Contributing Writer Wednesday, October 6, 2004

        One of the UC-run Department of Energy labs could be one 
step closer to changing hands or staying under UC-management, 
after the National Nuclear Security Administration released a 
guide last week outlining the conditions for managing the Los 
Alamos National Laboratory. 

        The administration’s Formal Acquisition Plan provides a 
timeline that calls for bids as early as the middle of this 
month. 

        In the first national bidding process in the lab’s 
61-year history, the administration is looking to ensure “the 
safety, security and reliability” of the lab’s weapons stockpile 
and integrate “world class science and technology,” according to 
the plan. 

        The plan preserves the jobs of all personnel under new 
management, except for senior administration. Employees will also 
be guaranteed pension plans comparable but not identical to those 
they currently have under UC stewardship. 

        The plan sets the initial contract for management for 
five years, with a possible extension to 20 total years if the 
manager achieves the “highest performance rating attainable.” 

        Although the DOE pays $2.2 billion annually to run the 
nuclear weapons facility, the five-year contract will carry a 
$2.1 billion annual price tag. 

        According to the plan, the administration is expected to 
release a formal Request for Proposals in mid-October although no 
specific date has been released. If UC loses control of the lab 
when the winner is announced by July 1 of next year, it will turn 
over the reigns Sept. 30. 

        While UC has expressed interest in competing for control 
of the lab, the university must wait for the UC Board of Regents 
to give it the green light before submitting the bid. 

        “The university is aggressively preparing as if we will 
compete for continued management of LANL,” said UC spokesperson 
Chris Harrington. “UC is planning so that we may respond quickly, 
strongly and efficiently to the (request for proposals).” 

        In last month’s Regents meeting, the UC President’s 
Council on the National Laboratories urged the university to move 
forward with the competition, and the UC Academic Senate showed 
overwhelming faculty and staff support last spring. 

        “The important question for the university to ask is why 
is managing Los Alamos relevant for the university’s future,” 
said UC Berkeley physics professor Charles Shank, who managed the 
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory for 15 years. 

        The university showed interest in partnering with 
Lockheed Martin, a private contractor, to place a bid, but the 
corporation bowed out of the competition in July, leaving the 
university to turn elsewhere for a corporate partner. 

        “The UC is having ongoing discussions with other 
potential partners regarding the management of LANL, but it is 
too premature to discuss the content of those discussions,” 
Harrington said. 

        The DOE put the lab up for national bidding in April 2003 
amid reports of financial mismanagement and security blunders. 
UC-run Lawrence Berkeley and Lawrence Livermore National labs 
were put up last fall after Congress passed a law requiring all 
labs that had not been put up for bid in 50 years to be put up 
for grabs. 

Contact Rachel Luna at newsdesk@dailycal.org.

 (c) 2004 Berkeley, California dailycal@dailycal.org  

*****************************************************************
 54 insightmag: Faith-Based Whistleblowers Need Support - 

Insight on the News -Commentary
 
[http://www.insightmag.com/

Posted October 6, 2004 By Joe Carson 

I am a deeply concerned, licensed nuclear safety engineer at the 
US Department of Energy (DOE). To honor my professional 
responsibilities, I have "blown the whistle" when necessary to 
protect public health and safety. That meant putting my 
professional standards and honest public service ahead of my 
economic and career self interest at DOE.
 
Unfortunately, it also has meant a stiff penalty for doing so 
that continues to this day. Why have I been so foolhardy to 
actually suffer to defend my profession's code of ethics and my 
obligations as a federal employee?
 
It is because I believe my work matters to God. I believe that my 
trustworthy service - as a member of the engineering profession 
and employee of the federal government - is consistent with God's 
Commands to love Him and to love my neighbor.
 
For instance, the Hebrew word "avohah" has two distinct, but 
intertwining, meanings in the Bible - work and worship. I believe 
God gave mankind a stewardship mandate for creation and that the 
trustworthy execution of my professional duties is both "work" 
and a type of "worship." 

In my specific case, I repeatedly have been vindicated in my 
concerns about radiation releases from nuclear weapons 
facilities, and associated national security threats. My 
disclosures, the price I paid and lawsuits I filed to fight back 
are detailed on my website www.carsonversusdoe.com. 

Despite this, my frank advice to any federal employee is stark: 
"If you can live with yourself looking the other way, look the 
other way. You must be ready to suffer horribly if you act, 
however responsibly." We are all at greater risk of a nuclear 
9/11, when licensed nuclear safety engineers in DOE, which has 
vital responsibilities for nuclear weapon security and 
non-proliferation, are afraid to do their duty out of fear of 
reprisal. 

This is something DOE Secretary Abraham himself has protested. In 
my opinion, he owes all beleaguered DOE whistleblowers an apology 
for consistent harassment when we honor our duty as public 
servants by "committing the truth" to expose betrayals that 
threaten the safety of America's communities. We have been 
treated like we committed a crime.
 
My current mission is to help concerned federal employees of 
faith, if they act on their consciences about concerns 
threatening the taxpayers. 

Unfortunately, they must now trust solely in God. The 
Whistleblower Protection Act will not help them against workplace 
harassment. In fact, employees who assert their rights generally 
dig their own professional graves.
 
Thanks to by The Federal Circuit Court of Appeals, which has a 
monopoly on judicial review, has engaged in almost obsessively 
hostile judicial activism until the law degenerated into a 
caricature of its original good government mandate and is a good 
reason to be a silent observer or look the other way. It has been 
judicially rewritten until it is irrelevant against fraud, waste 
and abuse that federal workers discover when performing their job 
duties. It actually creates far more victims than are helped.
 
Whistleblowers have a 1-95 track record at the court for 
decisions on the merits since 1994, when Congress strengthened 
what on paper was the strongest free speech law in history.
 
Given the vital, God-ordained responsibility our government has 
to fairly and faithfully execute laws to promote and protect the 
welfare of all Americans, federal employees should be able to 
trust federal law, not just God, to protect them from workplace 
retribution when they responsibly honor their duty to our 
country's citizens. 

It doesn't have to stay this way. After five years of bi-partisan 
work and unanimous Senate and House committee approvals, the 
Whistleblower Protection Act is on the verge of being born again. 
Unfortunately, it may be killed in the back rooms and killed 
without floor votes. 

We are waiting for leadership at the House of Representatives, 
and the White House. They have not yet decided to permit its 
almost certain unanimous approval if Congress could vote on it. 
That would be a wise decision for any politician. When 
unanimously passed in 1989 and unanimously strengthened in 1994, 
the law was nicknamed the "Taxpayer Protection Act." If 
politicians expect taxpayers to find time to vote for them, they 
should find time to pass the Whistleblower Protection Act. 

Joe Carson is a licensed, professional nuclear safety engineer at 
the U.S. Department of Energy.
 
[webmaster@insightmag.com
*****************************************************************
 55 DOE: Environmental Management Site-Specific Advisory Board, Savannah 
 
                        FR Doc 04-22500 
[Federal Register: October 6, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 193)] 
[Notices] [Page 59900] From the Federal Register Online via GPO 
Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr06oc04-52]                         
 
River AGENCY: Department of Energy.
 
ACTION: Notice of open meeting.
 
SUMMARY: This notice announces a meeting of the Environmental 
Management Site-Specific Advisory Board (EM SSAB), Savannah 
River. The Federal Advisory Committee Act (Pub. L. 92-463, 86 
Stat.770) requires that public notice of these meetings be 
announced in the Federal Register.
 
 
DATES: Tuesday, October 12, 2004, 8:30 a.m.-4:30 p.m.
 
ADDRESSES: Ramada Limited, 2100 Boundary Street, Beaufort, SC 
29902.
 
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Gerri Flemming, Closure Project 
Office, Department of Energy Savannah River Operations Office, 
P.O. Box A, Aiken, SC, 29802; Phone: (803) 952-7886.
 
 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Purpose of the Board: The purpose of 
the Board is to make recommendations to DOE in the areas of 
environmental restoration, waste management, and related 
activities.
 
Tentative Agenda Tuesday, October 12, 2004 8:30 a.m. Approval of 
Minutes, Agency Updates 8:45 a.m. Public Comment Session (5 
Minute Rule) 9 a.m. Chair and Facilitator Update 9:30 a.m. 
Administrative Committee Report/Bylaws Amendment Proposal 10 a.m. 
Waste Management Committee Report 11:30 a.m. Public Comment 12 
Noon Lunch Break 1 p.m. Facility Disposition & Site Remediation 
Committee Report 1:30 p.m. Closure Business Unit Update 2:15 p.m. 
Plutonium Operations 3 p.m. Public Comments 4 p.m. Adjourn Public 
Participation: The meeting is open to the public.
 
Written statements may be filed with the Board either before or 
after the meeting. Individuals who wish to make the oral 
statements pertaining to agenda items should contact Gerri 
Flemming's office at the address or telephone listed above. 
Requests must be received five days prior to the meeting and 
reasonable provision will be made to include the presentation in 
the agenda. The Designated Federal Officer is empowered to 
conduct the meeting in a fashion that will facilitate the orderly 
conduct business. Each individual wishing to make public comment 
will be provided equal time to present their comments. This 
notice is being published less than 15 days before the date of 
the meeting due to Hurricane Jeanne, the Board had to be cancel 
the meeting scheduled for September 27-28 and reschedule for 
October 12, 2004.
 
Minutes: The minutes of this meeting will be available for public 
review and copying at the Freedom of Information Public Reading 
Room, 1E-190, Forrestal Building, 1000 Independence Avenue, SW., 
Washington, DC 20585 between 9 a.m. and 4 p.m., Monday through 
Friday, except Federal holidays. Minutes will also be available 
by writing to Gerri Flemming, Department of Energy Savannah River 
Operations Office, PO Box A, Aiken, SC 29802, or by calling her 
at (803) 952-7886.
 
Issued at Washington, DC, on September 30, 2004.
 
Rachel M. Samuel, Deputy Advisory Committee Management Officer.
 
[FR Doc. 04-22500 Filed 10-5-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6450-01-P

 
*****************************************************************
 56 Maine Today: Navy looks to private sector for refueling, overhaul job 

[http://www.mainetoday.com]

Wednesday, October 6, 2004 7:45 pm 

KITTERY, Maine  The leader of a group advocating for Portsmouth 
Naval Shipyard said the Navy´s decision to consider private 
sector firms for a refueling and overhaul project does not bode 
well for the Navy´s oldest shipyard. 

The move seems like "a signal from the administration that 
they´re planning to close us" during a 2005 round of base 
realignment and closure, said Neil Rolde, president of the 
Seacoast Shipyard Association, the yard´s advocacy group. 

Lawmakers expressed concern Monday that at least two 
nuclear-powered depot modernization projects could be given to 
the private sector instead of equally distributing the workload 
to the nation´s six shipyards. 

Delegates sent a letter on Oct. 1 to Adm. Vern Clark, chief of 
naval operations, urging him to assign the refueling and overhaul 
of the USS Hartford to Portsmouth. No information was available 
on the second project. 

The letter was sent and signed by U.S. Sens. Judd Gregg, R-N.H.; 
Olympia Snowe, R-Maine; Susan Collins, R-Maine; and John Sununu, 
R-N.H.; and Reps. Tom Allen, D-Maine, and Jeb Bradley, R-N.H. 

According to the letter, the Navy has been considering sending 
the nuclear attack submarine to one of two privately owned yards, 
Northrop Grumman Newport News in Virginia or General Dynamics 
Electric Boat in Connecticut. 

The letter expressed dismay about a "departure from the Navy´s 
past practice" of equally distributing the workload to private 
and public yards. 

"As you know, the workload situation at the Portsmouth Naval 
Shipyard is a major concern of ours, and we are troubled about 
the impact this new policy of sending larger availabilities to 
the private sector will have on the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard and 
the public shipyard community," the letter states. 

The shipyard employs nearly 4,600 people, contributing daily to 
the Seacoast economy, making the 2005 base realignment and 
closure round a major concern for members of Congress in both 
Maine and New Hampshire. 

John Joyal, a member of American Federation of Government 
Employees who works at the shipyard, said he was glad to hear 
that members of Congress were advocating for additional work. 

"On the doorstep on BRAC, I´m not surprised they are requesting 
to have (the USS Hartford) sent to Portsmouth," Joyal said. "And 
I am not surprised the Navy would seek to send that to private 
industry. The private sector continually wants more and more of 
our work." 

Rolde said he feels the current administration seems "bent on 
privatizing everything ... This shows were not just crying wolf 
about the future of the yard; were very concerned." 

[http://news.mainetoday.com/apwire/] 
Copyright © Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc.   
    
*****************************************************************

NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this 
material is distributed without profit or payment to those who 
have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for 
non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more 
information go to: 
<http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.shtml> 
    
*****************************************************************