***************************************************************** 10/19/04 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 12.250 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** Send News Stories to news@energy-net.org with title on subject line and first line of body NUCLEAR POLICY 1 Korea Times: US Probe of Nuclear Tests Unlikely - Seoul 2 US: Daily Sentinel: Promises and manipulation 3 US: Las Vegas SUN: Public Citizen blasts president 4 US: Mos News: Russian Expert Says U.S. ABM System Dangerous, Promise 5 US: Boston.com: George W. Bush / On energy and environment, a vast d 6 BBC: Can Britain go back to coal? 7 Xinhuanet: China marks anniversary of atomic bomb explosion 8 Xinhuanet: NATO nuclear weapons deployment denied 9 Xinhuanet: Brazil insists on limited access to IAEA inspections 10 New Zealand News: Nuclear arms claims rock PM's visit to Indian fact NUCLEAR REACTORS 11 US: [NukeNet] Did Sabotage Start The Accident At 3 Mile Island? 12 US: [NukeNet] Bush Admin. Lax on Nuke/Chem. Plant Security 13 US: NRC: Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Meeting of the 14 US: NRC: Sunshine Act Meeting 15 US: news observer: Study: Nuke plant in southeastern N.C. has $901 m 16 Taipei Times: Think tank says a new nuclear program is unlikely 17 US: Brattleboro Reformer: NRC moves hearing location 18 ITAR-TASS: Russia to keep using Chernobyl type reactors 19 CBC - New Brunswick: Point Lepreau bills still adding up 20 US: nynewsday: Challenges to Millstone license rejected by appeals c 21 US: nynewsday: Hope Creek to begin refueling outage early 22 US: TheDay.com: NRC To Discuss Millstone's Reactor Monitoring Wednes 23 US: TheDay.com: Court Backs Millstone Relicensing 24 US: NRC: NRC Staff to Meet Oct. 28 with FirstEnergy Officials to 25 US: NRC: New Location Announced for Oral Arguments on Petitions Seek NUCLEAR SAFETY 26 US: [du-list] Pentagon DU Study 27 US: [NukeNet] Danger From Depleted Uranium Is Found Low in 28 US: [du-list] Capstone report on DU exposure in military operations 29 US: [du-list] radioactive contamination in scrap metal shipment 30 Democrat & Chronicle: Plutonium from UR revealed in Niagara 31 US: Times-News: Group hosts nuclear fallout meetings 32 Korea Times: Seoul Quells Concerns Over Liquid Uranium 33 AGI: DEPLETED URANIUM: OBSERVATORY LAMENTS DENIAL 34 Idaho Press-Tribune: Locals invited to speak on fallout exposure 35 US: Public Citizen: Bush Administration Leaves Chemical and Nuclear NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 36 SA News24: Ship's nuclear waste fears 37 UK The Times: Uranium find in Russian dump 38 RGJ: Water, Yucca Mountain are issues in Assembly 36 race 39 US: press-citizen.com: EPA to hold groundwater meeting in Hills 40 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Panel urges no hotter waste at Envirocare 41 US: Mos News: Tramps Find Uranium in Central Russia - 42 Times & Star: Mox plant won't close say bosses 43 US: Maine Today: Schools shouldn't be chemical dump sites NUCLEAR WEAPONS 44 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: In pursuit of nuclear diplomacy 45 BBC ON THIS DAY | 20 | 1986: Nuclear technician missing after secret US DEPT. OF ENERGY 46 [du-list] re Batelle, alleged "study" 47 ABQjournal: Men Admit to LANL Purchasing Scam 48 AP Wire: Scientist Envisions Small-Scale Hydropower 49 Guardian Unlimited: Two Plead Guilty in Los Alamos Lab Probe 50 Daily Camera: Tracking Rocky Flats 51 ITAR-TASS: Chernobyl-type reactor safety to be considered at confere 52 Daily Camera: Tracking Rocky Flats OTHER NUCLEAR 53 [du-list] DU in the news - 19th Oct (Part Deux) 54 [du-list] DU in the news - 20th Oct 04 55 Las Vegas SUN: Renowned European Laboratory Turns 50 56 eTaiwanNews.com: Nuclear 'solution' would bred disaster 57 USATODAY.com: Interest in lost H-bomb resurfaces ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 Korea Times: US Probe of Nuclear Tests Unlikely - Seoul Hankooki.com > The Korea Times > Nation By Reuben Staines Staff Reporter Seoul officials on Tuesday rejected a report that the United States is considering sending a team of nuclear experts to conduct its own investigation into recently revealed plutonium and uranium experiments carried out by South Korean scientists during the past two decades. Local daily the Donga Ilbo reported yesterday that a U.S. official recently hinted a team of scientists may be dispatched to look into the controversial tests, which are already under investigation by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). According to the report, Alex R. Burkart, deputy chief of nuclear affairs at the U.S. State Department, told Seoul officials that Washington will decide whether to launch its own investigation after the U.N. nuclear watchdog releases its findings next month. Burkart, visiting South Korea to discuss cooperation on nuclear energy research, discussed the possible U.S. investigation with Oh Joon, deputy director for international organizations at SeoulˇŻs Foreign Ministry, and Cho Chung-won, chief of the nuclear energy bureau at the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Donga Ilbo said. But a senior official at the Foreign Ministry denied that the U.S. is considering carrying out a separate probe. ``There was a discussion, but the U.S. official did not mention that the U.S. would send a team to conduct an independent investigation of the experiments,ˇŻˇŻ he told The Korea Times on condition of anonymity. A probe by the U.S. would be a further embarrassment for the government, which has strongly protested speculation surrounding the laboratory tests. It stresses the experiments were conducted purely out of academic curiosity and denies suggestions of a larger government-run nuclear weapons program. But some experts raised concerns that the U.S. may place limits on cooperation with South Korea in nuclear power research if it considers the experiments to be a breach of trust. North Korea has condemned the SouthˇŻs nuclear experiments, citing them as one reason for refusing to return to six-party talks on dismantling its nuclear weapons programs. The isolated tests _ one conducted in 1982 to extract plutonium and the other in 2000 to enrich uranium _ were not revealed by the government until last month. Since then, investigators from the U.N. nuclear have visited South Korea twice to take samples from facilities where the experiments were carried out and interview scientists. A further fact-finding visit is likely. IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei said early this month that South KoreaˇŻs research activities did not appear to break nuclear safeguards but should have been reported to the nuclear watchdog earlier. The IAEA will make its decision on whether the issue is serious enough to be sent to the U.N. Security Council when it meets again in Vienna next month. rjs@koreatimes.co.kr 10-19-2004 17:24 ***************************************************************** 2 Daily Sentinel: Promises and manipulation Tuesday, October 19, 2004 By MICHAEL C. BENDER President George Bush manipulates science to fit his political goals and promises more of the same on failed domestic policy, Elizabeth Edwards, wife of Democratic presidential candidate John Edwards, told a Grand Junction crowd on Monday. Its not just environmental issues, its a number of issues where theyve manipulated the science, Edwards said. They want to allow their friends to do whatever their friends want to do so they just change the science. Edwards, whose husband is a U.S. senator from North Carolina, said the Bush administration has ignored sound science on environmental and medical issues and instead manipulated science to allow for the storage of nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada and to suggest a link between abortions and breast cancer in women. Edwards answered 13 questions during a 75-minute town hall meeting held Monday at Liff Auditorium at Mesa State College. More than 500 people packed the auditorium, as about two-dozen Bush supporters demonstrated outside. The questions for Edwards, a former attorney and mother of three, ranged from the war in Iraq to education, health care, same-sex marriage and advice on how to convince a Bush supporter to instead vote for Democratic presidential candidate U.S. Sen. John Kerry. In terms of security, the current administration has not taken the steps they need to take, Edwards said. When I try to talk to people, though, who say their lives are better now that they were four years ago, theyre hard to convince. Edwards was interrupted six times by audience applause and several other times elicited laughs from the crowd. Thanks for trying, Edwards told a mother guiding two young girls out of the meeting after about 20 minutes. I have a couple small children myself and I applaud you for even trying. Edwards, who left Grand Junction on Monday evening for a similar town hall meeting today in Florida, said her 21-year-old daughter was in Iowa on Monday campaigning while her husband was stumping in Pennslyvania. I grew up in a military family, so Im used to having someone gone doing something important, she said. And Im concerned about military families today who have loved ones on long deployments in Iraq. So I just refuse to complain about (campaigning). After the meeting, Edwards told reporters she was troubled by the Republican backlash over comments made by her husband and Kerry about Mary Cheneys sexual orientation. Whats disturbing is how this has distracts the American public from whats important, she said. If thats the discussion, it means real issues are being glossed over. The focus should be on the issues. Michael C. Bender can be reached via e-mail at mbender@gjds.com [mbender@gjds.com] . © 2004 Cox Newspapers, Inc. - The Daily Sentinel ***************************************************************** 3 Las Vegas SUN: Public Citizen blasts president Report: Bush's ties to industries hurt security By Benjamin Grove SUN WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- President Bush's opposition to new terrorism security measures reflects his ties to five major industries -- nuclear power, hazardous materials transport, chemical manufacturing, ports and shipping, and water utilities, a public interest group said. Bush's support for a high-level nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain is further evidence that Bush puts industry interests above security, Public Citizen said in its report "Homeland Unsecured," released Monday. "We think this increases our vulnerability to terrorists," Public Citizen president Joan Claybrook said of the Yucca Mountain project. Bush officials strongly denied the claim that Bush's national security decisions have been tainted by his relationship with industry leaders who resist new regulations. Bush has done much to make the nation's infrastructure more secure from terrorist threats, Bush advocates say. The report and the timing of its release are cheap shots. It's a "ludicrous charge" to suggest that Bush's ties to industry have hindered national security, Bush campaign spokeswoman Tracey Schmitt said. Infrastructure improvements are the No. 1 priority of the Department of Homeland Security, she said. "President Bush bases his decisions on sound policy, not politics," she said. The report said 85 percent of the nation's critical infrastructure is owned by the private sector. Business leaders in the five industries in the report raised at least $19.9 million for the Bush campaigns and Republican National Committee since the 2000 election cycle, the report said. The Bush administration has opposed new regulations for industry, including new rules to ensure drinking water safety and rules to tighten security at chemical and nuclear plants and ports, the report said. Thirty of the Bush "Rangers" and "Pioneers" -- campaign fund-raisers who raise $200,000 and $100,000 respectively -- come from the five industries, the report said. The nuclear industry gave Bush nearly $8 million since 2000 and hazardous materials shippers gave about $2.9 million, the report said. But nuclear industry officials say they have made significant security improvements on their own since Sept. 11. Security forces were increased by one-third at 64 nuclear sites, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's top lobby group. By the end of the year, the nuclear industry will have spent $1 billion for security upgrades at nuclear plants, Nuclear Energy Institute spokesman Mitch Singer said. "This is simply a rehashing of security concerns that have already been discredited," Singer said of the report. Yucca waste containers are not terrorist-proof, and thousands of shipments to Yucca over decades would be inviting targets, Claybrook said in an interview. But the massive waste-shipping campaign to Yucca could be conducted safely, industry leaders have said. The likelihood of a terrorist attack is remote, they say. Public Citizen was founded in 1971 by Ralph Nader, but Nader is no longer affiliated with the group. The Washington-based consumer advocacy group has been highly critical of Bush policies, but has not endorsed a candidate. ***************************************************************** 4 Mos News: Russian Expert Says U.S. ABM System Dangerous, Promises Reciprocal Response - NEWS - MOSNEWS.COM Standard U.S. Missile-2 Block IV Launch, photo from www.acq.osd.mil Created: 19.10.2004 14:57 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 20:01 MSK MosNews A leading Russian defense specialist has said that the U.S. plans to deploy an anti-missile defense system pose a threat to Russia’s national security and that Russia was working on various measures which could render U.S. developments in the defense sphere useless. Radmir Smirnov, the deputy general director of the research and development company Vityaz XXI Century, writes in an article in the Nezavisimaya Gazeta daily that the ABM system developed by the United States is designed to not only guard against possible nuclear attacks launched by terrorist organizations and rogue states but also from a massive nuclear strike. If the system is successfully deployed, Russia will face a strategic threat to its security and negative geopolitical consequences, the expert writes. There is a possibility that after the United States finishes the deployment of their ABM system in the next 10 to 12 years the effectiveness of the Russian “nuclear triad” (the Air Force, ICBMs and the strategic Submarine Fleet) will fall below an admissible level. In this context Smirnov calls for a correction of the concept of national security not only in Russia but throughout the world. He writes that the development of effective response measures to counter the unilateral deployment of anti-missile systems by the United States must be considered a priority by the Russian authorities. Otherwise, Russia and other countries may find themselves practically unprotected against the latest U.S. military potential. On the other hand, Smirnov writes that Russian specialists are already working on systems that would render the new U.S. developments useless. Among these he mentioned projects that would cut the time of the initial boost of intercontinental missiles and lower the altitude of warhead separation to 80-100 kilometers and also the latest combat spacecraft that will destroy elements of the U.S. ABM system before it comes into action. “It is possible that after spending billions of dollars on the development of the national ABM system the U.S.A. will suddenly discover that Russia has developed some effective response measures costing less than a hundredth of the U.S. spending,” the expert writes. SEE ALSO Copyright © 2004 MOSNEWS.COM ***************************************************************** 5 Boston.com: George W. Bush / On energy and environment, a vast divide On energy and environment, a vast divide Boston Globe Nothing highlights the ideological differences on energy and the environment between George W. Bush and John F. Kerry as starkly as the black coal that fuels more than 50 percent of the nation's electricity. Beth Daley October 19, 2004 --> [http://www.boston.com/news/globe/] DUELING IDEOLOGIES On energy and environment, a vast divide By Beth Daley, Globe Staff | October 19, 2004 Nothing highlights the ideological differences on energy and the environment between George W. Bush and John F. Kerry as starkly as the black coal that fuels more than 50 percent of the nation's electricity. Coal, including millions of tons extracted from the swing states of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and Ohio, is poised to make a renaissance in America as natural gas and oil prices spike. The federal government estimates it will need more than 100 new coal-fired power plants by 2025 to keep up with electricity demand. Bush is focused on boosting the use of coal and other domestic fossil fuels, emphasizing US production to limit dependence on foreign oil. He is against federal environmental regulations he considers too strict and wants more market-driven controls to help limit pollution from power plants. During his presidency, he has eased some pollution laws and refused to limit carbon dioxide, a byproduct of fossil fuel plants that contributes to global warming. Kerry, who hails from New England, which suffers from wafting pollution from some of the country's biggest coal-fired plants, wants to limit demand for fossil fuels, reducing foreign dependence through a $30 billion, 10-year suite of renewable energy and conservation efforts. He favors stricter federal environmental rules, especially those that will limit carbon dioxide and other types of pollution from power plants. Despite a multitude of polls that suggest voters care about environmental issues, only about 2 percent actually pick a candidate based on those beliefs, said Robert Blendon, a Harvard professor who specializes in public opinion. Mostly, these ''2 percent issues" are local ones being used in swing states to sway voters. In Michigan, the two candidates are sparring over Great Lakes issues, with each candidate contending he will protect the waters. In Nevada, the debate has centered on the Yucca Mountain nuclear storage facility. And in coal country, Bush and Kerry are attacking each other over who would do the most to ensure that the coal industry thrives. Kerry is the darling of the environmentalists, winning a 96 percent approval rating from the League of Conservation Voters when they endorsed him early this year, the highest any presidential candidate has ever received. Bush received an ''F" and environmentalists have accused him of being deceptive about his environmental record and working too closely with industry in crafting his energy blueprint for the future. But Kerry too, has fielded criticism, with some alleging that he is running on his proenvironment Senate record rather than offering a bold, detailed vision for the future. Pieces of his platform are purposefully vague for an environmentally minded candidate, they say, with no clear commitment on some of the most important issues of the day -- such as signing an international agreement to slow global warming or pushing harder for fuel-efficiency standards on specific vehicles. - Kent Portney, a Tufts University professor of political science, said Kerry may be reticent to be specific about certain environmental subjects ''because there may not be [broad] public support for those issues." He added that it doesn't behoove Kerry to be specific on environmental matters, since ''he's going to get [environmental] votes anyway." The soundbites sound similar: Both Kerry and Bush want to lower and stabilize gasoline prices -- and do it with the least harm to the environment. But Bush is calling for drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a 2000 campaign goal he has not been able to fulfill because of opposition from environmentalists. Kerry was and remains a leading opponent to drilling there, threatening to lead a filibuster to block it. Bush wants nuclear power to make a comeback as a clean-burning fuel and supports a federal repository for nuclear waste in Yucca Mountain. He has moved to open broad swaths of federal lands to oil and gas drilling and supports the construction of more liquefied natural gas terminals to receive super-chilled gas from abroad to meet America's growing energy demand. Kerry, meanwhile, while supportive of nuclear power, is against using Yucca Mountain to store nuclear waste, pledging it won't be put there ''on my watch." He wants drilling to take place in noncontroversial areas already mapped out for extraction, such as the deep waters in the Gulf of Mexico, and wants to buy more oil from countries that are not members of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. Like Bush, he wants to increase liquefied natural gas imports, but he has supported more offshore terminals to address safety concerns. Regarding renewables, Bush pledges to continue his $1.7 billion, five-year plan toward a ''hydrogen economy" that is designed to make cars and homes far more clean-burning, by making hydrogen fuel cell technology more reliable and affordable. Kerry, meanwhile, has set a goal of producing 20 percent of the nation's electricity from renewable sources, such as wind, solar, and biomass, by 2020. He says 500,000 jobs will be created over 10 years by investment in such cleaner technologies. Even ardent environmentalists grudgingly applauded Bush earlier this year for strictly limiting emissions from off-road diesel engines such as tractors and forklifts. In all, harmful emission levels will be reduced by more than 90 percent from construction, agricultural, and industrial diesel-powered equipment, pollution that is blamed each year for thousands of premature deaths from asthma, respiratory ailments, and heart attacks. But with transportation accounting for about 70 percent of America's oil consumption -- and a great deal of its pollution -- analysts say that Bush and Kerry should both be more hard-hitting in how they will make passenger cars and trucks more fuel efficient and clean-burning. Bush has largely been opposed to increased fuel efficiency standards, siding with the automotive industry, which says the switch is too expensive and will cost jobs. Still, light trucks will soon have to get 1.5 miles per gallon better fuel efficiency. Kerry cosponsored an energy bill amendment in 2002 that tried to raise the average fuel efficiency up to 36 miles per gallon, but it failed. Although he was calling for the same increase several months ago, he has since backed off mentioning any specific miles-per-gallon figure, although his platform and a spokeswoman stressed fuel efficiency was a cornerstone of his energy and environmental plan. Bush and Kerry have called for tax credits for consumers of cleaner-burning cars, and both have pledged to increase the use of alternative fuels, such as corn-based ethanol and soy-based biodiesel. Kerry promises to have 20 percent of motor fuels from renewable or alternative sources by 2020 and wants to give carmakers $10 billion over 10 years to help reach those goals. Meanwhile, Bush is promising to fulfill his commitment for $1.4 billion to make homes more energy-efficient. Kerry says he will cut the federal energy bill by 20 percent and expand weatherization programs for the poor to help insulate their homes. It is on clean air, however, where Bush and Kerry differ the most, especially over carbon dioxide. Bush has come under heavy fire from environmentalists over his Clear Skies initiative -- now stalled in Congress -- as failing to clamp down on carbon dioxide coming from fossil fuel plants. The plan would allow cleaner-burning plants to sell credit to dirtier ones to limit overall emissions of mercury, sulfur dioxide, and nitrogen oxides. Meanwhile, Bush pulled out of an international agreement called the Kyoto Protocol to limit carbon dioxide and has also been criticized for allowing old power plants to upgrade without using modern pollution controls. Kerry has pledged to limit carbon dioxide. He has supported measures targeting air pollution during his time in the Senate and has pledged to strengthen air quality standards on smog and soot. Kerry is in favor of international talks to limit carbon dioxide, but he said he is and will remain opposed to the Kyoto Protocol until developing countries such as China, which are exempt, join. In coal country, both Kerry and Bush have called for ''clean coal" technologies that will emit less pollution. Bush is continuing a $2 billion, 10-year ''clean coal" program that includes a public-private partnership to build a coal power plant that is emission free. Kerry, meanwhile, has promised an investment of $10 billion over 10 years. Earlier installments of thisseries can be found atwww.boston.com/politics.Beth Daley can be reachedat bdaley@globe.com. c Copyright 2004 Globe Newspaper Company. ***************************************************************** 6 BBC: Can Britain go back to coal? Last Updated: Tuesday, 19 October, 2004 By Finlo Rohrer BBC News Online It's black, dirty and desperately unfashionable, but without it the UK may be heading for winter blackouts. Could coal really be the future of British energy? The last 25 years have not been kind to the British coal industry. Pit closures, the Miners' Strike and the so-called "dash for gas" of the 1990s have all left the black stuff in a precarious position. [A miner on his last day at Stillingfleet Colliery in Yorkshire] Bad years for coal have blighted lives and torn up communities On Friday the industry will suffer another body blow, when the last pit at the Selby complex in Yorkshire shuts, ending the life of what was once the jewel in the crown of British mining. Yet as coal appears to be on its last legs, power and engineering industry union Amicus is claiming the UK needs to be using more. It says the prospect of colder winters and over-reliance on gas imported from unstable countries will otherwise leave the UK exposed to power cuts - a claim the government dismisses. Can coal really be the future of British energy and are UK mines in any position to meet extra demand anyway? Industrial might Coal power currently accounts for just 28% of UK electricity production, down 4% over the past year, the latest government figures show. Most of these old min couldn't compete in the 1970s and 1980s and since then Mother Nature has filled up the holes Stuart Oliver UK Coal At the same time, use of gas is still rising and now makes up 44% of all electricity generation. In 2003 the UK produced just 28.2 million tonnes of coal - less than 10% of the amount mined in 1900, when it fuelled the might of Britain's manufacturing and heavy industry. Current UK coal production is also exceeded by Britain's imports of 31.9 million tonnes. There are just nine fully working deep mines left, eight of them belonging to UK Coal and the independent Tower Colliery in Wales. These mines are operating at very near to capacity. If the UK wanted to produce more coal, it would need to reopen old mines or sink new shafts - something easier said than done. Dangerous gamble "There are additional reserves that could be developed, deep reserves in various parts of the country," says UK Coal's Stuart Oliver. "But it is likely to take 15 years to get into full production, four to five years of getting planning permission and then 10 years before full production." Unless the workforce gathered up in the next 12 months, unless something is done to pump the water out of the shafts, the plant will be useless [ src=] Dave Douglass Hatfield NUM One possible site is the Witham "prospect" on the border of Nottinghamshire and Lincolnshire. To get a complex up and running there would cost in the region of Ł400m, a dangerous gamble without significant state intervention in a time of fluctuating energy prices. Furthermore, mines closed during coal's years of doom and gloom cannot be resurrected, Mr Oliver says. "It is not a simple matter. They don't exist. They have been demolished. Most of these old mines couldn't compete in the 1970s and 1980s and since then Mother Nature has filled up the holes. "The tunnels flood, they become gassed up, the whole thing can cave in." Additional problems are posed by the fact that mines closing now will soon be unusable and that the industry has an ageing workforce. Dave Douglass, of the National Union of Mineworkers', represents the small band of men still working at the pit at Hatfield in South Yorkshire, mothballed a year ago. "Miners are mostly middle-aged now. There are no new miners," he says. Renewable energy For its part, the Department of Trade and Industry says it is putting money into modernising coal power. But its focus is on renewable energy like wind power, and guaranteeing security of supply. The Lib Dems, meanwhile, are opposed to increased use of coal, its DTI spokesman Malcolm Bruce dismissing support for greater use of coal as "fantasy land", because "coal power pollutes". His argument is given weight by Professor Ian Fells, chairman of the New and Renewable Energy Centre, who says current coal-fired plants produced a kilogram of carbon dioxide for every unit (KWh) of energy produced. In contrast, gas produces only half a kilogram and nuclear just 30g. Amicus and the National Union of Mineworkers are among those who claim the UK should be investing "clean-burn coal technology" to cut the risk of pollution. One alternative is for expensive new plants which operate by converting coal into gas and burning the gas in a similar way to a gas plant. Unfortunately for proponents of coal power, Britain's coal-fired plants are ancient, with the most recent plant, Drax, started in the 1970s. Unstable exporters Kenneth Fergusson, president of the Combustion Engineering Association, and a former head of the UK's Coal Authority agrees that finding cleaner ways to use fossil fuels is the next step. "We can and should be building our next generation of both coal and nuclear plants," he says. "In clean coal, the Americans are well on their way." If supporters of clean-burn technology manage to persuade the government of the need to find more secure sources of energy, it could well be that coal plays a part. But even if that happens the part UK miners will get to play seems far from certain. ***************************************************************** 7 Xinhuanet: China marks anniversary of atomic bomb explosion www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2004-10-19 14:00:33 BEIJING, Oct. 19 (Xinhuanet) -- Chinese scientists, army veterans and students marked the 40th anniversary of the explosion of the country's first atomic bomb over the weekend. China's first atomic bomb was exploded Oct. 16, 1964 in the desert of Xinjiang. At a base in Malan, northwest China, where the government conducted nuclear experiments 40 years ago, Gen. Xu Ruichen, a retired army official of national defense, said that China's decision to develop atomic bomb was of great historical significance at the time when the county was in an adverse international environment. At Beijing-based Tsinghua University, students were urged to learn from scientists who devoted themselves to the country's nuclear programs. Many of the Tsinghua graduates participated in the country's first atomic bomb experiments. Chen Xi, the university's secretary of the Communist Party of China, urged students in Tsinghua to learn the spirit of cooperation and perseverance the older generation of scientists had showed in their work. China's first atomic bomb was exploded at 3:00 PM, on Oct. 16, 1964 in the desert of Xinjiang. The night after the explosion, the Chinese government published a declaration, announcing that the bomb was made for defense use and in order to break the "nuclear monopoly." The Chinese government suspended its nuclear weapons program July 30, 1996. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 8 Xinhuanet: NATO nuclear weapons deployment denied www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2004-10-19 14:00:03 BEIJING, Oct. 19 (Xinhuanet) -- Lithuanian Defense Minister Linas Linkevicius says his country does not plan to deploy nuclear weapons from NATO members on its own territory. Russian media reported that NATO is planning to store ammunition in depots of a former Soviet strategic aviation base in Siauliai, reported China Radio International. Linkevicius said he was surprised at the report, adding that the rumors were absolutely groundless. Linkevicius, however, said he would like to point out that the base is being used to provide security for Lithuania and NATO in strict compliance with international law and Lithuania's international obligations. (CRIENGLISH.com) Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 9 Xinhuanet: Brazil insists on limited access to IAEA inspections www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2004-10-19 10:59:22 RIO DE JANEIRO, Oct. 18 (Xinhuanet) -- The Brazilian government reaffirmed on Monday that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) could only be allowed a limited access to its new uranium-enriching plant. But it didn't mean that Brazil feared any secrets would be revealed by the nuclear watchdog, said Odair Goncalves, president of Brazil's National Atomic Energy Commission. The new facilities at the town of Resende, in Rio de Janeiro state, was built up to produce uranium used in producing electricity, he said. The facilities was part of Brazil's efforts to become independent of imported uranium for power generation, he added. The inspection mission arrived in Brazil on Monday after it agreed on Oct. 6 to allow the IAEA to see some of its nuclear facilities. The tentative compromise is aimed at allowing inspectors to verify that Brazil has neither enriched uranium to weapons-grade levels nor diverted the nuclear material to other places. Brazil has refused to allow IAEA inspectors to conduct a full visual inspection of the Resende plant, saying the plant's advanced technology could be stolen by other countries should outsiders be allowed into it. The IAEA's response would only be known after the team returns to its headquarters in Vienna. Enditem Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 10 New Zealand News: Nuclear arms claims rock PM's visit to Indian factory [http://watch.nzherald.co.nz/] Indian factory workers claim their firm is manufacturing nuclear weapons. File picture / Reuters UPDATE - The Prime Minister's trip to India was embroiled in controversy last night when staff at a factory she was visiting said the firm made nuclear weapons. Helen Clark was visiting Larsen and Toubro, one of India's biggest private sector companies, in support of two New Zealand firms trying to clinch deals with the Mumbai-based conglomerate. While the Prime Minister was with senior company executives, journalists covering her official Indian visit were told three times by Larsen and Toubro public relations staff that the firm, which specialises in engineering and construction, also made nuclear weapons. At a briefing over lunch, the firm's PR woman twice said the company produced nuclear weapons which she said were sold to Russia and Sweden. A second company spokesman also said L and T produced nuclear weapons. The remarks sparked a flurry of activity from New Zealand Foreign Affairs officials and press staff travelling with Helen Clark. Another Larsen and Toubro manager appeared, and firmly denied that the company produced nuclear weapons. The manager said that by law in India, only the Government was involved with the nuclear weapons programme. The company does construct nuclear power plants. Sweden does not possess nuclear weapons and has signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Russia however has an extensive nuclear arsenal. India has tested nuclear weapons. Its weapons are under the control of the Strategic Nuclear Command, a political council chaired by the Indian Prime Minister. Helen Clark's staff did not comment directly at the time. She remained in the company of officials and left the factory after lunch to fly to Delhi where she is due to hold talks with India's Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh. But the Prime Minister said today that if New Zealand officials stopped visiting all companies connected to defence, Finance Minister Michael Cullen couldn't have made his recent visit to aircraft manufacturer Boeing. "You could never go to General Electric, you could never go to any company in the world which had some association with the military industry," she told National Radio. She said she was there to talk to company directors about earthquake engineering and food processing in New Zealand. The issue of Kashmir and New Zealand's support for a comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty are due to be discussed in Delhi. According to a report in Jane's Defence Weekly in July 2001, Larsen and Toubro was contracted by the Indian military to work on parts of a highly classified nuclear submarine and test launcher for a nuclear-tipped sub-launched cruise missile (SLCM). A website specialising in strategic affairs, stratmag.com, reported that the Indian Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) released work to the private sector to make parts of the submarine, known as the Advanced Technology Vessel (ATV) and the test launcher for the Sagarika (Oceanic) nuclear-armed SLCM. This is the second time that nuclear issues have surfaced around the Prime Minister's Indian visit. Before she left last week, she was reported in an Indian newspaper as describing "Kashmir as a nuclear flashpoint" and saying"we will tell India to sign the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty". Helen Clark called the report a low-value beat-up and said New Zealand officials had contacted India to clarify the situation. Larsen and Toubro * India's largest engineering and construction conglomerate * Additional interests in IT and electrical business. * 2003-04 profit 5327 million Rupees ($170 million) - additional reporting NZPA © Copyright 2004, New Zealand Herald [http://www.nzherald.co.nz/privacypolicy/] | ***************************************************************** 11 [NukeNet] Did Sabotage Start The Accident At 3 Mile Island? Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:12:53 -0700 In actuality, the FBI was planning to meet with confidential sources who believed that sabotage was to blame. An openly public source was Pennsylvania State Representative Joseph Zeller. Both the Senate and President's Commission investigations were called off the hunt and instructed that a criminal investigation was not their responsibility. It is not entirely unusual for a valve or switch to be in the wrong position, but this many "errors" should have been investigated for criminal activity. The NRC Office of Inspection and Enforcement reasoned that it would take a monumental effort to interview each of the more than 750 people who had access to the emergency feedwater valves. The NRC claimed its investigators from the Office of Inspection and Enforcement were sensitive to any evidence of sabotage. But there is some disturbing and eye-opening evidence that wasn't criminally investigated. In fact, the NRC never even discovered the initiating event. http://www.tmia.com/tmisab.html Sabotage at Three Mile Island? Investigators suspected sabotage at Three Mile Island There is evidence to suggest that sabotage played a role in the "accident" at Three Mile Island. (This publication details only the evidence that has been documented by official government or NRC investigations.) Several days before the emergency, an unannounced NRC inspection of the plant's physical protection discovered access control infractions. Previous announced inspections found TMI to be in compliance with regulations. At the time of the accident, Three Mile Island was not required to enforce the then new "two-man rule." The two-man rule was designed to prevent a worker from being alone in vital areas. Additionally, TMI had not met the deadline for other newly required security upgrades. In the first moments of the accident, emergency feedwater was prevented from entering the system because the "emergency feedwater valves" were closed. Indicator lights on a control room panel should have alerted the operators that these valves were closed. The two lights were hidden from view by a maintenance tag that was covering them. The valves are supposed to stay open so that emergency pumps can deliver water to the steam generators if the normal circulation is interrupted. The steam generators remove enormous amounts of heat from the reactor. Without feedwater, the steam generators boiled dry within two minutes. The temperature and pressure soared inside the reactor vessel. The licensee's internal investigation did not consider intentional closure. The NRC Office of Inspection and Enforcement reasoned that it would take a monumental effort to interview each of the more than 750 people who had access to the emergency feedwater valves. The NRC claimed its investigators from the Office of Inspection and Enforcement were sensitive to any evidence of sabotage. But there is some disturbing and eye-opening evidence that wasn't criminally investigated. In fact, the NRC never even discovered the initiating event. THE INITIAL PROBLEM The accident started at exactly 4:00:37am on March 28, 1979. This was precisely to the minute of the one year anniversary of start-up or what is known as criticality. This aroused suspicions of worker celebrations involving drinking. The workers testified that they had their normal coffee and doughnuts only. The trouble started somewhere in the condensate polisher system. Some unknown event caused the polisher outlet valves to close. There are several ways that a saboteur could have made this happen without being detected by plant telemetry or subsequent investigations. The NRC Office of Investigation and Enforcement hypothesized that the initial failure was a result of a stuck-open check valve allowing water to pass into an instrument control air line and thereby cause the condensate polisher outlet valves to close. The investigators tried to duplicate this condition to test their theory. Despite pouring 15 gallons of water into this line, they could not cause the valves to shut. But, this remained the best guess as to what the first failure might have been. Because the NRC believed that the accident could have been averted at several points if human errors weren't committed, they were satisfied with not knowing the initiating event. Still, the investigators did conclude, "The problems encountered with the condensate system and condenser vacuum significantly detracted the operator's attention from the accident." Then in the first seconds of the accident, a condensate polisher pump failure was followed by the immediate shutdown of its paired pump. The NRC investigators reported that a "wiring error" caused this second pump to quit when the first one had. A criminal investigator never assumes that an error is "only an error." A broken air line in the condensate polisher system was ignored by NRC investigators who believed that air was prevented from leaking out by the actuation of another automatic valve. But, at least one worker testified that he had heard the broken line blowing air during the emergency. The licensee claimed that the air line was broken by a water hammer which caused equipment to shift two or three feet. (A water hammer is a sudden pressure change or a slug of water like the one that can rattle your household pipes when turning off a water faucet.) The NRC investigators reported that based on their visual inspection, the air line movement was not as great as the licensee claimed. The cause was never determined or considered necessary. An hour into the accident, workers needed to re-establish water circulation by opening a bypass valve. The handwheel was missing from this important valve. A search for the handwheel delayed bypassing the condensate polisher system where the failed pumps were located. The radiological releases began when a safety valve on top of the reactor failed to close. This valve opened to relieve the rapidly increasing pressure. Control room operators did not know that the Pilot Operated Relief Valve (PORV) was still open because the telemetry system was improperly engineered. The operators were fooled by a panel light which only indicated that an electrical signal had been sent to close the valve and not its actual status. Thousands of gallons of water in the form of steam spilled out of the reactor in what is known as a loss of coolant accident. For a short while the contamination was contained inside the reactor building. Although these valves had failed before at other plants, the PORV at Three Mile Island has yet to be inspected. A TMI engineer who believes that the valve simply failed said that sabotage could not be dismissed. (Eighteen months before the TMI accident, the reactor at the Davis-Besse plant in Ohio started going out of control in what was actually a precursor to the Three Mile Island emergency. The PORV stuck open and operators struggled to understand the situation. Another design problem caused confusion about the water level inside the reactor. This problem reoccurred at TMI since both reactors were designed by Babcock & Wilcox. Davis-Besse was operating at only 9 percent compared to 97 percent at TMI when the troubles began. The Davis-Besse operators were able to return the plant to a safe condition. Afterwards, an investigation of the reactor revealed that an electrical relay had been removed from the PORV. Someone suggested sabotage. The reactor manufacturer finally decided that the relay was probably "borrowed" for usage in another part of the plant since it was compatible with several systems.) The highly radioactive water steaming out of the TMI reactor would normally be pumped into an immense holding tank inside the reactor building. For some unknown reason the valve for this sump pump had been switched so that the contaminated water was transferred into the auxiliary building. >From here the radioactivity was released to the environs through open vents. INADEQUATE INVESTIGATION In June 1979, an NRC special review group conceded that the NRC investigators of the TMI accident had "no training in investigative techniques or knowledge of the laws of evidence or criminal procedures." The NRC investigators did not have the authority to administer oaths and felt that the quality of the information they had obtained would have been enhanced if oaths were given. The NRC actually did have the authority to administer oaths and didn't appear to know this until after the interviews were conducted. The report also said: ".... a trained investigator should have been dispatched with the initial response team to organize and retain portions of the supportive evidence (notes, logs, etc.) which were lost during the initial days of the accident." Additionally, the review group found that the NRC investigation was hindered by the delay of receiving transcripts of worker interviews (Also noteworthy is that the control room alarm printer fell behind by almost two hours. The printer was designed to store alarms in its memory until they can be printed. So many alarms were going off in the early stages of the emergency that the control room operators had to dump the stored alarms to get to the current ones. The information was forever lost.) A technical investigator for the President's Commission on the accident questioned the adequacy and efforts of the Office of Inspection and Enforcement. Nuclear Regulatory Commission investigators had not even arrived at the plant until two weeks had passed. He also questioned the licensee's internal investigation. The President's Commission obtained an internal TMI memo which had been written ten months before the accident. It said, "It's time to really do something on this problem before a very serious accident occurs. If the polishers take themselves off line at any high power level the resulting damage could be very significant." The Chief Counsel for the President's Commission requested the licensee to examine its personnel files for "any person who might have long-standing grievances against the company." This was requested specifically as an attempt to discover workers who might have had incentive to close the emergency feedwater valves. Interrogation of the five workers who were identified by the company was considered. On August 7, 1979 the President's Commission requested the FBI to determine the feasibility of an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the closed valves. The President's Commission had the authority to ask for assistance from any Executive agency and by vote had decided that the FBI was needed. But, the FBI went right back to the NRC which informed them that human errors and equipment failures were to blame for the accident; therefore, an investigation was not necessary. An encrypted telegram sent by the FBI to the White House Situation Room around April 6, 1979 informed the President that sabotage was not responsible for the accident according to the NRC's Harold Denton. There was no reasonable way for Denton to have drawn this conclusion. The telegram which is now in the National Archives is labeled "encrypted for transmission purposes only." Portions of it are blacked-out even though it has been unclassified. On August 15, 1979 the President's Commission asked NASA to perform an inspection of the condensate polisher system. Three Mile Island did not even have the "as built" technical drawings needed for a proper inspection. How could the NRC inspectors have done a thorough job without these? The fact was that they didn't. Investigators from NASA's Office of Flight Assurance found wires that were disconnected at five of the eight polisher panels. Operating and engineering personnel didn't know when or why they were disconnected. They also noted that an instrument air valve on the back of the polishing system control panel permits the air to be shut off and thus cause the outlet valves to close. Paul Leventhal, co-director of the US Senate investigation of the Three Mile Island accident (now director of The Nuclear Control Institute), wanted to perform a special sabotage investigation. "The initiating event was always so mysterious in that so little was known about it," Leventhal divulged in an interview. "I wanted to hire someone like a former FBI agent to do an investigation but the Minority co-director objected." Just four days into the accident, the FBI had already announced that sabotage was ruled out and the investigation was closed. Maybe they were trying to quiet the fears of the public which had just seen the new film "The China Syndrome." (Some people actually wrote to the NRC accusing Hollywood of a sick publicity stunt.) In actuality, the FBI was planning to meet with confidential sources who believed that sabotage was to blame. An openly public source was Pennsylvania State Representative Joseph Zeller. Both the Senate and President's Commission investigations were called off the hunt and instructed that a criminal investigation was not their responsibility. It is not entirely unusual for a valve or switch to be in the wrong position, but this many "errors" should have been investigated for criminal activity. Soon after the emergency, the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory concluded: "There was very little protection against insider sabotage. ...There was very little or no control of the whereabouts of people inside the vital area; so it cannot be said that sabotage to the auxiliary feedwater system was impossible." and "...some vital area doors that should have been locked or guarded were found to be open and unguarded. Actually, there was very poor protection against the sabotage actions of the insider." and "The conclusion can be drawn that the protection against the activities of an insider is still inadequate at TMI..." And an embarrassing incident did happen several months after the TMI accident when a newspaper reporter was hired as a security guard. He told of entering the control room unchallenged (only armed guards were permitted access). There was no lock on the door and a piece of clothesline hung where the doorknob should have been. A college textbook used this incident as an example of poor security. The book cited the reporter's headline -- "Three Mile Island: It's a Paradise Island for the Saboteur." General Public Utilities sought an injunction to block publication of the article on the grounds that it could compromise national security. [return to nuclear terrorism homepage] _______________________________________________________________________ Subscribe/Unsubscribe Here: http://www.energyjustice.net/nukenet/ Change your settings at: http://energyjustice.net/mailman/listinfo/nukenet_energyjustice.net ***************************************************************** 12 [NukeNet] Bush Admin. Lax on Nuke/Chem. Plant Security Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:14:25 -0700 *** Apologies for cross-posting *** *** Please forward widely *** *** P R E S S R E L E A S E *** For Immediate Release: Oct. 18, 2004 Contact: Angela Bradbery (202) 588-7741; LuAnn Canipe (202) 588-7759 Bush Administration Leaves Chemical and Nuclear Plants, HazMat, Ports and Water Systems Vulnerable to Terrorists Bush Aversion to Regulation and Allegiance to Campaign Contributors Has Blocked Progress on Homeland Security, New Report Shows WASHINGTON, D.C. - The Bush administration has consistently ignored or opposed commonsense measures to protect Americans from potentially catastrophic terrorist attacks - an inaction that reflects officials' aversion to regulating private industry and allegiance to key campaign contributors, a new Public Citizen report shows. The report, Homeland Unsecured: The Bush Administration's Hostility to Regulation and Ties to Industry Leave America Vulnerable, details how the Bush administration has failed to harden our defenses against terrorism and secure the most vulnerable, high-impact targets. The report is based on an analysis of five key areas - chemical plants, nuclear plants, hazardous material transport, ports and water systems. The report is available at www.HomelandUnsecured.org . "Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, President Bush has made protection of the American people from terrorism the rhetorical centerpiece of his presidency," said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook. "Yet this administration has failed to use its executive powers or support legislation to mandate regulatory requirements that should be taken. Bush has abdicated his responsibility to protect America from the risk of terrorist attacks because he is fundamentally hostile to regulation of private industry and is loath to cross his big money campaign contributors." Eighty-five percent of the nation's critical infrastructure is controlled by the private sector. However, the Bush administration has been notoriously hostile toward the reasonable regulation of private industry, including the industries mentioned in this report. It has blocked efforts to create rules to strengthen security at chemical and nuclear plants, make the transportation of hazardous materials more secure, ensure the safety of the drinking water supply or secure the nation's ports. The report suggests that this is in part because industries representing the five homeland security areas examined in this study collectively have: * Raised at least $19.9 million for the Bush campaigns, the Republican National Committee or the Bush inauguration since the 2000 cycle. * Provided 10 Rangers and 20 Pioneers - individuals who raise at least $200,000 and $100,000, respectively - to the Bush presidential campaigns. * Spent at least $201 million lobbying the White House, executive branch agencies and Congress from 2002 through June 2004. Among the report's other findings: CHEMICAL PLANTS: A strike at one or more of the 15,000 chemical plants across the United States could cause thousands, even millions, of injuries and deaths. But the Bush administration and the chemical industry have blocked legislation that would require chemical plants to shift to safer chemicals and technologies, and blocked Environmental Protection Agency efforts to compel security improvements via the Clean Air Act. NUCLEAR PLANTS: Twenty-seven state attorneys generals warned Congress in October 2002 that the consequences of a catastrophic attack against one of the country's 103 nuclear power plants "are simply incalculable." The plants were not designed to withstand the impact of aircraft crashes or explosive forces, and the government does not require nuclear plants to be secure from an aircraft attack. Radioactive waste is stored in standing pools or dry casks, making it vulnerable, and the plants have grossly inadequate security. But the Bush administration and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) have resisted congressional efforts for additional security regulation. In fact, the NRC proposed weakening fire safety regulations, which would make it harder for a reactor to be safely shut down in the event of a terrorist attack. HAZARDOUS MATERIALS TRANSPORT: The trains and trucks that carry tens of millions of tons of toxic chemicals and other hazardous materials annually on our highways make tempting terrorist targets. More than half of the nation's 60,000 rail tank cars carrying hazardous materials are too old to meet current industry standards and thus are more likely than newer cars to break open after derailing. A weapon as simple as the legal, widely available 50-caliber rifle has the potential to inflict serious damage on a train car or truck carrying lethal materials, by penetrating tanks and causing an explosion or derailment. Despite the risk, though, there are insufficient checks on where trucks carrying hazardous materials may drive; insufficient oversight and tracking of the types, amounts and locations of trucks moving these lethal loads; and insufficient controls on the issuance of commercial licenses for drivers of trucks carrying hazardous materials. Legislation to assess rail security has been blocked by members of the president's party, and other safety proposals have been dropped because of industry opposition. PORT SECURITY: Every year, 8,100 foreign cargo ships make 50,000 visits to the United States. International sea transport is an attractive terrorist target because there are millions of shipping containers, hundreds of ports and dozens of methods to damage infrastructure, disrupt the world economy, undermine our military readiness and harm Americans. Just 4 to 6 percent of shipping containers are inspected today. Inspectors are not adequately trained. And innovative pilot security programs have not been implemented. At least one important security initiative has been adopted since 9/11, the Maritime Transportation Security Act (MTSA) of 2002, but new security measures and proposed funding put forward by the Bush administration fall far short of what is needed. DRINKING WATER SYSTEMS: Few acts of sabotage against the public could be more insidious than delivering poison into a family's home through tap water. The water distribution network -- the pumping stations, storage tanks and pipes that might cover thousands of miles within a metropolitan area -- provides countless opportunities to introduce biological, chemical or radiological contaminants. But there is no funding mechanism for the federal government to provide direct grants to cities to upgrade water security, and the private water utility industry's campaign to take over public water systems is getting a push from the Bush administration. This could make securing our water supply even more difficult because private water companies, like chemical companies, nuclear power companies and other industries, will resist strong security standards mandated by the government. The terrorist threat is particularly acute in Washington, D.C., where 8,500 rail cars carrying hazardous materials travel through the city each year. Ninety-ton rail cars that regularly pass within four blocks of the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., contain enough chlorine to potentially injure or kill 100,000 people within 30 minutes and could endanger 2.4 million people. The D.C. Council considered a bill requiring the rerouting of hazardous material-carrying trains away from the city, but it was postponed because the federal government promised to study the matter. In May 2004, though, a Transportation Security Administration official told Congress that the federal government intended to continue allowing trains and hazardous materials to pass close to the Capitol. "A year of hearings, meetings and entreaties to the Bush administration has failed to persuade them to take obvious action to protect the safety of Washington residents," said D.C. Councilmember Kathy Patterson. "I am urging my colleagues to move ahead with our legislative remedy, and urge other communities to follow suit." Added Rick Hind, legislative director of the Toxics Campaign at Greenpeace USA, "The good news is that threats to chemical plants and train shipments are preventable. In fact, the most serious threats can actually be eliminated thanks to safer available chemicals and safer rail routes. The bad news is that the Bush administration would rather listen to the Dow and Exxon lobbyists than take action to prevent a disaster." ### Public Citizen is a national, nonprofit consumer advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.citizen.org . _______________________________________________________________________ Subscribe/Unsubscribe Here: http://www.energyjustice.net/nukenet/ Change your settings at: http://energyjustice.net/mailman/listinfo/nukenet_energyjustice.net ***************************************************************** 13 NRC: Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Meeting of the FR Doc 04-23391 [Federal Register: October 19, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 201)] [Notices] [Page 61529-61530] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19oc04-93] Subcommittee on Fire Protection; Notice of Meeting The ACRS Subcommittee on Fire Protection will hold a meeting on October 27, 2004, Room T-2B3, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland. The entire meeting will be open to public attendance. The agenda for the subject meeting shall be as follows: [[Page 61530]] Wednesday, October 27, 2004--1:30 p.m. until 5:30 p.m. The purpose of the meeting is to hear presentations on current rulemaking activities which would allow for the use of certain manual operator actions to satisfy the requirements of 10 CFR Part 50, Appendix R. The Subcommittee will hear presentations and hold discussions with representatives of the Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation and other interested persons regarding this matter. The Subcommittee will gather information, analyze relevant issues and facts, and formulate proposed positions and actions, as appropriate, for deliberation by the full Committee. Members of the public desiring to provide oral statements and/or written comments should notify the Designated Federal Official, Mr. Marvin D. Sykes (telephone 301/415-8716), five days prior to the meeting, if possible, so that appropriate arrangements can be made. Electronic recordings will be permitted. Further information regarding this meeting can be obtained by contacting the Designated Federal Official between 7:30 a.m. and 4:15 p.m. (ET). Persons planning to attend this meeting are urged to contact the above named individual at least two working days prior to the meeting to be advised of any potential changes to the agenda. Dated: October 12, 2004. John H. Flack, Acting Branch Chief, ACRS/ACNW. [FR Doc. 04-23391 Filed 10-18-04; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P ***************************************************************** 14 NRC: Sunshine Act Meeting FR Doc 04-23425 [Federal Register: October 19, 2004 (Volume 69, Number 201)] [Notices] [Page 61530] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19oc04-94] Dates: Weeks of October 18, 25, November 1, 8, 15, 22, 2004. Place: Commissioner's Conference Room, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland. Status: Public and closed. Matters to be Considered: Week of October 18, 2004 There are no meetings scheduled for the Week of October 18, 2004. Week of October 25, 2004--Tentative There are no meetings scheduled for the Week of October 25, 2004. Week of November 1, 2004--Tentative There are no meetings scheduled for the Week of November 1, 2004. Week of November 8, 2004--Tentative Monday, November 8, 2004 9 a.m.--Briefing on Plant Aging and Material Degradation--Part One (Public Meeting) (Contact: Steve Koenick, 301-415-1239) 1:30 p.m.--Briefing on Plant Aging and Material Degradation Issues-- Part Two (Public Meeting) (Contact: Steve Koenick, 301-415-1239) This meeting (both parts) will be webcast live at the Web address-- http://www.nrc.gov [http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leaving FR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.nrc.gov] . Tuesday, November 9, 2004 9:30 a.m.--Briefing on Reactor Safety and Licensing Activities (Public Meeting) (Contact: Steve Koenick, 301-415-1239) This meeting will be webcast live at the Web address--http://www.nrc.gov [http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leaving FR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.nrc.gov] . Week of November 15, 2004--Tentative Tuesday, November 16, 2004 9:30 a.m.--Briefing on Threat Environment Assessment (Closed--Ex. 1) Wednesday, November 17, 2004 9:30 a.m.--Discussion of Security Issues (Closed--Ex. 1) Week of November 22, 2004--Tentative There are no meetings scheduled for the Week of November 22, 2004. The schedule for Commission meetings is subject to change on short notice. To verify the status of meetings call (recording)--(301) 415- 1292. Contact person for more information: Dave Gamberoni, (301) 415- 1651. * * * * * The NRC Commission Meeting Schedule can be found on the Internet at: http://www.nrc.gov/what-we-do/policy-making/schedule.html [http://frwebgate.access.gpo.gov/cgi-bin/leaving.cgi?from=leaving FR.html&log=linklog&to=http://www.nrc.gov/what-we-do/policy-makin g/schedule.html] . * * * * * The NRC provides reasonable accommodation to individuals with disabilities where appropriate. If you need a reasonable accommodation to participate in these public meetings, or need this meeting notice or the transcript or other information from the public meetings in another format (e.g. braille, large print), please notify the NRC's Disability Program Coordinator, August Spector, at 301-415-7080, TDD: 301-415- 2100, or by e-mail at aks@nrc.gov [aks@nrc.gov] . Determinations on requests for reasonable accommodation will be made on a case-by-case basis. * * * * * This notice is distributed by mail to several hundred subscribers; if you no longer wish to receive it, or would like to be added to the distribution, please contact the Office of the Secretary, Washington, DC 20555 (301-415-1969). In addition, distribution of this meeting notice over the Internet system is available. If you are interested in receiving this Commission meeting schedule electronically, please send an electronic message to dkw@nrc.gov [dkw@nrc.gov] . Dated: October 14, 2004. Dave Gamberoni, Office of the Secretary. [FR Doc. 04-23425 Filed 10-15-04; 10:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-M ***************************************************************** 15 news observer: Study: Nuke plant in southeastern N.C. has $901 million in impact [http://www.newsobserver.com] Tuesday, October 19, 2004 The Associated Press WILMINGTON, N.C. -- A nuclear power plant owned by Progress Energy Inc. in Brunswick County had an economic impact of $901 million in southeast North Carolina, according to a study by economists from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. The study by Claude Farrell and William Hall Jr. also found a total of 2,030 jobs, or 13 out of every 1,000 workers in the region, are supported by the plants operation - either by direct employment and local service providers or by indirect means such as housing, retail and taxes. Progress Energy asked the pair in July to take on the study of the Brunswick Nuclear Power Plant's influence on the economies of Brunswick, New Hanover, Columbus and Pender counties. The Brunswick Plant supported $184.7 million in property income and $100.8 million in personal income, the study found. The largest impact was in Brunswick County, where 540 of the plants 1,000 employees live. Last year, the facility supported $490.2 million in output, almost 40 cents out of every dollar of economic activity produced in the county, Hall said. In New Hanover County, where 390 employees live, almost $352 million, or 8 percent of the county's total output, was attributed to the Brunswick plant. --- Information from: The Star-News, http://starnewsonline.com © Copyright 2004, The News &Observer Publishing Company ***************************************************************** 16 Taipei Times: Think tank says a new nuclear program is unlikely [http://www.taipeitimes.com] Tue, Oct 19, 2004 Think tank says a new nuclear program is unlikely DEAD END: US and international pressure would likely halt any thoughts by Taiwan to make nuclear weapons -- a move that could lead to an unwinnable arms race AFP , TAIPEI Tuesday, Oct 19, 2004,Page 4 Any attempt by the nation to acquire nuclear weapons would leave it isolated in its stand-off with China and spark a dangerous arms race, analysts said. Such a move would risk losing the support of the US, which is obligated to help Taiwan defend itself against any invasion by China. "I really don't think Taiwan would benefit from operating nuclear bombs," said Homes Liao (ąů§»˛»), a researcher of the Taiwan Research Institute private think tank. "It would not help enhance Taiwan's military strategic profile in dealing with China." Liao's comments followed denials last week by the government that it was trying to develop nuclear weapons. It also dismissed reports from Austria that the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had uncovered evidence that the former Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government carried out plutonium separation experiments in the 1980s. But David Albright, president of the Washington think tank Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), had said that in US circles "there is presently concern that Taiwan may be doing nuclear weapons planning now or thinking about it, particularly after the comment in the Taiwanese parliament." Taiwan was forced by Washington in the 1980s to scrap its plans to develop nuclear warheads. The plan surfaced after a senior researcher was smuggled out of the country by the US, according to Democratic Progressive Party Legislator Lee Wen-chung (§ő¤ĺ©ľ). Under the constraints set up by the US and IAEA, Taipei would not be able to resume a nuclear weapons research program without being caught, analysts said. Taiwan's leaders "aren't thinking in this direction," Liao said. Shuai Hua-min («Ó¤ĆĄÁ), a retired lieutenant-general, warned of the danger of getting nuclear weapons. "Developing nuclear weapons will only force Taiwan into an arms race with a powerful nuclear country like China. There is no return if we walk down that road," he said. Chung Chien (Áé°í), professor of National Tsing Hua University's nuclear science department, estimated that it would cost billions of dollars to reopen the nuclear program. "The United States strongly opposes Taiwan's efforts to develop nuclear weapons," he added. Fears of a possible move toward nuclear arms were heightened by Premier Yu Shyi-kun's reference last month to the "mutually assured destruction" which prevented open hostilities between the US and the Soviet Union during the Cold War. "You [China] have the capability to destroy me and Taiwan should have the capability to counter. You strike me with 100 missiles and I should at least strike back with 50," Yu was reported as saying, although he later said he was quoted out of context. Alarmed by China's arms build-up, Taiwan's government is seeking the legislature's approval for a controversial US$18 billion special defense budget over a 15-year period beginning next year. This story has been viewed 497 times. + Advertising [ height=] Copyright © 1999-2004 The Taipei Times. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 17 Brattleboro Reformer: NRC moves hearing location [http://www.reformer.com/] October 19, 2004 Brattleboro, VT BRATTLEBORO -- The Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Atomic Licensing and Safety Board decided Monday to move the location of Thursday's hearing related to Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee's proposed uprate. The meeting, which will hear oral arguments as well as the contentions and other issues raised by the Vermont Department of Public Service and the New England Coalition, will now be held at Brattleboro Area Middle School, starting at 9 a.m. Additional hearing time has been scheduled for Friday in case there isn't enough time on Thursday. According to the board, it has granted a total of 20 minutes each to the state, the coalition, the NRC and Entergy for preliminary remarks. The state and the coalition will then have 20 minutes each to discuss their contentions and argue the merits of their opposition to Vermont Yankee's proposed power boost. Entergy will have 15 minutes and the NRC staff will have 10 minutes to respond to each of the arguments. "Participants should keep in mind that the Board will have read their pleadings and should focus solely on the critical points in controversy as those issues have emerged in the pleadings," the board wrote in a memorandum issued on Monday. "The main purpose of the oral argument is to allow the Board to elicit legal and factual points that will assist it in deciding the issues presented by the pleadings." The public may attend the hearing, but will not be allowed to speak. In the memo, the board said it "intends to conduct an orderly hearing and signs, banners, posters, and displays are prohibited." All who wish to attend the meeting are advised by the board to arrive early to allow sufficient time to pass through security screening. ***************************************************************** 18 ITAR-TASS: Russia to keep using Chernobyl type reactors 19.10.2004, 19.45 MOSCOW, October 19 (Itar-Tass) -- In spite of pressures from the West Russia will not shut down the RBMK graphite moderated (Chernobyl type) reactors before the end of their service life, the Deputy General Director of the Rosenergoatom nuclear power concern, Nikolai Sorokin has told Tass. In the course of debates at an international conference on the problems posed by channel-type reactors and ways of their solution Sorokin said, though, that despite the upgrade work carried on all of Russia’s RBMK reactors they “deserve the closest attention.” “In the long term no such reactors are planned to be built,” Sorokin said. © ITAR-TASS. All rights reserved. You undertake not to copy, store in any medium (including in any other website), distribute, transmit, re-transmit, broadcast, modify or show in public any part of the ITAR-TASS website without the prior written permission of ITAR-TAS. ***************************************************************** 19 CBC - New Brunswick: Point Lepreau bills still adding up [http://www.cbc.ca/] WebPosted Oct 19 2004 08:04 AM EDT SAINT JOHN — NB Power has begun firing up the Point Lepreau nuclear power plant after an unplanned shutdown that has so far cost $13 million. When the plant is down, the utility has to compensate by buying extra fuel for its other generating stations. The trouble at Point Lepreau started Oct. 2, when a circuit failure triggered a shutdown, and workers noticed leaky steam pipes while fixing the problem. + From Oct. 15, 2004: NB Power spokesperson Pamela McKay says the plant is now fixed and is getting ready to go back to work. "The start-up process commenced [Monday] night. We believe that the work carried out is complete and the start-up process is in the works." McKay says it could take several days before Lepreau is fully operational, which means the final bill for this unexpected shutdown has yet to be tallied. When Point Lepreau is up and running, it supplies almost one-third of the province's electricity. [deb_nobes@cbc.ca] Copyright © CBC 2004 ***************************************************************** 20 nynewsday: Challenges to Millstone license rejected by appeals court [http://www.newsday.com/shopping/ny-shoppingmap.story] October 19, 2004 WATERFORD, Conn. -- A federal appeals court has rejected two appeals by an organization that has been fighting to block operating license renewals for the Millstone nuclear power complex. The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has dismissed appeals brought by the Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone. The court has also issued an order disbarring coalition lawyer Nancy Burton of Redding from serving as legal counsel in federal court. Last year the Connecticut Supreme Court issued a similar disbarment order at the state level. Dominion Nuclear Connecticut, is seeking to renew the original, 40-year operating licenses of the nuclear complex with 20-year extensions through 2035 at Millstone 2 and 2045 at Millstone 3. A third reactor, Millstone 1, has been permanently shut down and is not up for license renewal. In a statement issued by Judges Roger J. Miner, Jose A. Cabranes, and Chester J. Straub on Thursday, the court refused to review a Nuclear Regulatory Commission decision denying the coalition an administrative law hearing. Burton had argued that the hearing was a necessary part of the license renewal process, citing cancer clusters near Millstone, inadequate steps taken to prevent terrorism and other concerns. In rejecting Burton's appeal of the NRC decision, the court stated it could only overturn an NRC ruling if it found the agency's actions to be "arbitrary and capricious." The coalition did little more than meet legal requirements that gave it standing to petition for the hearing, the court ruled. In a related matter, the court also refused to review an NRC decision that found the coalition's original petition for a hearing, filed the day before new hearing rules were enacted, to be premature. ___ Information from: The Day, http://www.theday.com Copyright © 2004, The Associated Press Copyright © Newsday, Inc. Produced by Newsday Electronic ***************************************************************** 21 nynewsday: Hope Creek to begin refueling outage early October 19, 2004 LOWER ALLOWAYS CREEK, N.J. -- A scheduled refueling outage at the Hope Creek nuclear reactor will begin sooner than planned so that issues surrounding the recent rupture of a steam line can be addressed, the plant's owner said. The reactor originally was scheduled to be shut down for refueling from Oct. 28 to mid-December. Control room operators manually shut down the reactor on Oct. 10 when an 8-inch steam pipe in the turbine building ruptured. PSEG said Monday that the reactor will remain shut down until the refueling is complete and safety issues related to the mishap are resolved. "Our preliminary investigation of the event has revealed equipment and personnel performance issues which we will address prior to the restart of the unit," Chris Bakken, president and chief nuclear officer of PSEG Nuclear, said in a prepared statement released Monday. The federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission is conducting a special inspection at the plant, which is one of three reactors at the Artificial Island nuclear generating complex along the Delaware River in Salem County. Copyright © 2004, The Associated Press ***************************************************************** 22 TheDay.com: NRC To Discuss Millstone's Reactor Monitoring Wednesday Tuesday, Oct 19, 2004 Waterford By PATRICIA DADDONA Day Staff Writer, Waterford The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will discuss how the owner of Millstone Power Station monitors the aging of its nuclear reactors at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Town Hall. The public meeting between the federal agency and Dominion Nuclear Connecticut is part of the company's application for license extensions at Millstone 2 and 3, and follows in-depth inspections by NRC officials at the two power plants. Dominion has applied to the federal agency to extend the original 40-year licenses for another 20 years each, through 2035 at Millstone 2 and 2045 at Millstone 3. Millstone 1 has been permanently shut down. The federal agency has found certain programs used to monitor the aging of nuclear reactors to be key to safe operation of the plants during the 20-year extensions, said NRC Spokesman Neil Sheehan. Environmental and safety issues for the re-licensing proposal are still under review, he added. A public question-and-answer period will follow discussion between NRC and Dominion officials. A final decision is expected in July 2006. The NRC applications for both power plants are available at the Waterford Public Library, Three Rivers Community College's Thames River campus library, and at: www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/licensing/renewal/applications/mil lstone.html [http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/licensing/renewal/applicat ions/millstone.html] . 1998-2004 The Day Publishing Co. ***************************************************************** 23 TheDay.com: Court Backs Millstone Relicensing Tuesday, Oct 19, 2004 Coalition's Appeals Dismissed, Group's Lawyer Disbarred By PATRICIA DADDONA Day Staff Writer, Waterford The Second Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has dismissed two separate appeals brought by the Connecticut Coalition Against Millstone in an effort to challenge proposed license renewals at Millstone Power Station. In doing so, the three federal judges for the New York City court also issued an order disbarring coalition lawyer Nancy Burton of Redding Ridge from serving as legal counsel in federal court, a decision that mirrors one made at the state level by the Connecticut Supreme Court last year. The Waterford power station owner, Dominion Nuclear Connecticut, is seeking to renew the original, 40-year operating licenses with 20-year extensions through 2035 at Millstone 2 and 2045 at Millstone 3. A third reactor, Millstone 1, has been permanently shut down and is not a candidate for license renewal. In a summary statement issued by Judges Roger J. Miner, Jose A. Cabranes, and Chester J. Straub on Thursday and distributed publicly by the NRC, the court refused to review an NRC decision that supports denials by the NRC's Atomic Safety &Licensing Board to grant the coalition an administrative law hearing. This summer, Burton argued that the hearing was a necessary part of the license renewal process, citing cancer clusters near Millstone, inadequate steps taken to prevent terrorism and other concerns. The safety board, an adjudicatory arm of the NRC, twice found that Burton failed to back up her assertions according to basic legal standards and didn't relate the issues to the aging of the reactors, as the NRC requires. In rejecting Burton's appeal of the NRC decision, the court stated it could only overturn an NRC ruling if it found the agency's actions to be arbitrary and capricious. The coalition did little more than meet legal requirements that gave it standing to petition for the hearing, the court ruled. In a related matter, the court also refused to review an NRC decision that found the coalition's original petition for a hearing, filed the day before new hearing rules were enacted, to be premature. The coalition had argued that the new rules eliminating rights of discovery and cross-examination were unfair. The court has no jurisdiction in that matter because no proceedings for relicensing had begun by Feb. 12, the day that petition was filed. Burton, who has spearheaded the grass-roots anti-nuclear power organization as both attorney and co-founder, said Monday she would fight the court order for disbarment by requesting a stay of that decision. She is running as a Green Party candidate in the 135th House District on a platform that includes a vow to shut down the power plants. In a written statement, she called the court's decisions erroneous rulings (that) ... reward a nuclear industry with diminished radiation-control requirements and avoid entirely public oversight of the mega-issue of Millstone re-licensing. These decisions deal a heavy blow to the public's right to participate in critical matters affecting their health and safety. Judges directed Burton to inform her clients of her changed status as a lawyer in federal court. They also underscored the NRC's assertion that dismissal of the coalition's recent claims would not prevent the group from pursuing future issues with different legal representation. In September, the coalition challenged a state agency's permit for storage of spent fuel at Millstone in New Britain Superior Court. A Groton lawyer, Paulann Sheets, is representing the group. Dominion has indicated it plans to ask the court to dismiss the case. 1998-2004 The Day Publishing Co. ***************************************************************** 24 NRC: NRC Staff to Meet Oct. 28 with FirstEnergy Officials to Review Performance Improvement Activities at Perry Nuclear Plant News Release - Region III - 2004-04 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region III No. III-04-047 October 19, 2004 CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663 Viktoria Mitlyng (630) 829-9662 E-mail: [opa3@nrc.gov] The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet Oct. 28 in Painesville, Ohio, with officials of FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company to discuss the utilitys performance improvement plan for the Perry Nuclear Power Station. The meeting will be at 6 p.m. in the Barberry Room at the Renaissance Quail Hollow Resort, 11080 Concord-Hambden Road, in Painesville. The public is invited to observe the business portion of the meeting and will have an opportunity to make comments and ask questions of the NRC staff before the meeting is adjourned. The staff will also be available after the meeting for informal discussions with the public. In August the NRC increased its regulatory scrutiny over the Perry plant as a result of safety equipment problems which have occurred since late 2002 and the utilitys failure to take sufficiently comprehensive corrective actions. The Perry plant continues to operate safely, said James Caldwell, NRC Regional Administrator. We want to hear from the company about the steps it is taking to address these past equipment and corrective action problems as well as other measures it will undertake to improve performance. The NRC will also discuss its planned activities as part of the increased oversight, including an extensive inspection next year to assess plant performance, periodic public meetings with utility officials, and continued inspections by the NRC resident inspectors and other NRC personnel. NRC inspection findings and performance statistics for Perry are available on the NRC web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/PERR1/perr1_chart.html. Documents related to the Perry Nuclear Power Plant are available in the online document library on the NRCs web site at: http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams/web-based.html. Use Docket Number 05000440 in the advanced search function to locate Perry documents. Assistance in using the online document library is available from the NRCs Public Document Room staff at 800-397-4209. Last revised Tuesday, October 19, 2004 ***************************************************************** 25 NRC: New Location Announced for Oral Arguments on Petitions Seeking Hearings on Proposed Vermont Yankee Power Uprate News Release - Region I - 2004-04 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region I No. I-04-048 October 19, 2004 CONTACT: Diane Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331 E-mail: [opa1@nrc.gov] The location has been changed for Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB) oral arguments on two requests for hearings regarding a proposed power uprate at the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant. The proceedings will now take place on Oct. 21 and 22 at the Brattleboro Area Middle School, 109 Sunny Acres in Brattleboro, Vt., beginning at 9 a.m. each day. (In an Oct. 12 press release, the NRC announced the oral arguments were to take place at the Vermont Agricultural Business Education Center in Brattleboro. However, to ensure that there is sufficient room for all who might wish to attend, a decision has been made to change the location to the Brattleboro Area Middle School.) Members of the public are welcome to attend and observe the sessions. However, oral arguments will be limited to participants in the petition process. Because of the adjudicatory nature of the proceedings, signs, banners, posters and displays are not allowed. All interested persons should arrive early enough to allow sufficient time to pass through security screening. Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee, LLC, which operates the plant in Vernon, Vt., is seeking permission from the NRC to increase the reactors power output by 20 percent. To do so, its operating license must be amended. An amendment application was submitted to the NRC late last year and deemed complete as of late January. The NRC is currently reviewing that filing and will not grant approval unless the agency concludes the changes can be safely implemented. The NRC announced on Oct. 15 that although the review was expected to be completed by next Jan. 31, that process will be extended for several months to allow the agency more time to gather information about the proposal. The request for the amendment created an opportunity for those with concerns about the power uprate to request a hearing. On Aug. 30, the Vermont Department of Public Service and the New England Coalition filed petitions with the NRC requesting a hearing on a number of issues. The ASLB, which is part of the NRC but renders decisions independently of the agencys staff, conducts all licensing and other hearings as directed by the Commission that oversees the NRC. An ASLB panel has been designated to review the Vermont Yankee petitions and determine whether a hearing is warranted. ASLB Judge Alex Karlin will lead the panel. During the oral arguments, the ASLB will hear from participants on such issues as standing, admissibility of contentions and other preliminary issues to assist the board in expeditiously deciding such matters. The participants will include representatives of the Vermont Department of Public Service, the New England Coalition, NRC staff and Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee. Last revised Tuesday, October 19, 2004 ***************************************************************** 26 [du-list] Pentagon DU Study Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:14:03 -0700 The New York Times ------------------------------------------------------------------------ October 19, 2004 Danger From Depleted Uranium Is Found Low in Pentagon Study *By MATTHEW L. WALD* WASHINGTON, Oct. 18 - A Pentagon-sponsored study of weapons made from depleted uranium, a substance whose use has attracted environmental protests around the world, has concluded that it is neither toxic enough nor radioactive enough to be a health threat to soldiers in the doses they are likely to receive. In a five-year, $6 million study, researchers fired depleted uranium projectiles into Bradley fighting vehicles and Abrams tanks, in a steel chamber at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland, and measured the levels of uranium in the air and how quickly the particles settled. The conclusion, said Dr. Michael E. Kilpatrick, deputy director of the Deployment Health Support Directorate of the Defense Department, is that "this is a lethal but safe weapons system." The new study did not seek to measure how depleted uranium traveled through the environment or its potential for entering drinking water or crops. But it did measure how quickly uranium that is inhaled was passed through the body. Lt. Col. Mark A. Melanson, the program manager for health physics at the Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine, said that the aerosolized particles of depleted uranium were "moderately soluble," and that inhaled particles would dissolve in lung fluids and eventually pass through the kidneys and enter the urine, with half the uranium being excreted in 10 to 100 days. Uranium that is eaten would pass through far faster and with little absorption, Colonel Melanson said. He said the long-term risks were tiny compared with the risk of being killed outright by the weapon. The study, conducted by contractors led by the Battelle Memorial Institute, is scheduled to be released Tuesday. Dr. Kilpatrick said the test results and the findings would be publicly posted for peer review. But opponents of using depleted uranium, who have not yet seen the study, were skeptical of the findings. "We do know that depleted uranium is radioactive and toxic," said Tara Thornton, of the Military Toxics Project, a nonprofit group in Lewiston, Me., which seeks to clean up military pollution. "Studies have shown health impacts on rats and other things." Depleted uranium is a byproduct of nuclear weapons production. It is almost entirely a form called Uranium 238, which is left after the more valuable Uranium 235, the kind useful in bombs and reactors, has been removed. Depleted uranium is 1.7 times more dense than lead and penetrates armor easily. The United States military has never confronted an opponent that used depleted uranium. Most exposure to American military personnel has been a result of fire from their own forces. -- Steve Taylor National Organizer Military Toxics Project "Networking for Environmental Justice" www.miltoxproj.org (207) 783-5091 [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> $9.95 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything. http://us.click.yahoo.com/J8kdrA/y20IAA/yQLSAA/FGYolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 27 [NukeNet] Danger From Depleted Uranium Is Found Low in Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:13:16 -0700 The study, conducted by contractors led by the Battelle Memorial Institute, is scheduled to be released Tuesday. Dr. Kilpatrick said the test results and the findings would be publicly posted for peer review. http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/19/politics/19uranium.html Danger From Depleted Uranium Is Found Low in Pentagon Study By MATTHEW L. WALD Published: October 19, 2004 ASHINGTON, Oct. 18 - A Pentagon-sponsored study of weapons made from depleted uranium, a substance whose use has attracted environmental protests around the world, has concluded that it is neither toxic enough nor radioactive enough to be a health threat to soldiers in the doses they are likely to receive. Advertisement In a five-year, $6 million study, researchers fired depleted uranium projectiles into Bradley fighting vehicles and Abrams tanks, in a steel chamber at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds in Maryland, and measured the levels of uranium in the air and how quickly the particles settled. The conclusion, said Dr. Michael E. Kilpatrick, deputy director of the Deployment Health Support Directorate of the Defense Department, is that "this is a lethal but safe weapons system." The new study did not seek to measure how depleted uranium traveled through the environment or its potential for entering drinking water or crops. But it did measure how quickly uranium that is inhaled was passed through the body. Lt. Col. Mark A. Melanson, the program manager for health physics at the Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine, said that the aerosolized particles of depleted uranium were "moderately soluble," and that inhaled particles would dissolve in lung fluids and eventually pass through the kidneys and enter the urine, with half the uranium being excreted in 10 to 100 days. Uranium that is eaten would pass through far faster and with little absorption, Colonel Melanson said. He said the long-term risks were tiny compared with the risk of being killed outright by the weapon. The study, conducted by contractors led by the Battelle Memorial Institute, is scheduled to be released Tuesday. Dr. Kilpatrick said the test results and the findings would be publicly posted for peer review. But opponents of using depleted uranium, who have not yet seen the study, were skeptical of the findings. "We do know that depleted uranium is radioactive and toxic," said Tara Thornton, of the Military Toxics Project, a nonprofit group in Lewiston, Me., which seeks to clean up military pollution. "Studies have shown health impacts on rats and other things." Depleted uranium is a byproduct of nuclear weapons production. It is almost entirely a form called Uranium 238, which is left after the more valuable Uranium 235, the kind useful in bombs and reactors, has been removed. Depleted uranium is 1.7 times more dense than lead and penetrates armor easily. The United States military has never confronted an opponent that used depleted uranium. Most exposure to American military personnel has been a result of fire from their own forces. _______________________________________________________________________ Subscribe/Unsubscribe Here: http://www.energyjustice.net/nukenet/ Change your settings at: http://energyjustice.net/mailman/listinfo/nukenet_energyjustice.net ***************************************************************** 28 [du-list] Capstone report on DU exposure in military operations Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:14:27 -0700 Capstone report on DU exposure in military operations has now been published http://deploymentlink.osd.mil/ http://deploymentlink.osd.mil/du_library/du_capstone/index.pdf http://www.deploymentlink.osd.mil/du_library/ On October 19, 2004, the Department of Defense released the report, "Depleted Uranium Aerosol Doses and Risks: Summary of U.S. Assessments," detailing the results of testing conducted to estimate depleted uranium exposure levels for those service members in, on, or near an armored vehicle when it is perforated by a depleted uranium munition. The conclusions of the Capstone Depleted Uranium Aerosol Characterization and Risk Assessment Program indicate that the chemical and radiological risks to human health of inhaling depleted uranium aerosols in a perforated vehicle are low. The most important factor for reducing exposure and dose after vehicle perforation is the use of onboard vehicle ventilation. Ventilation systems operating during or soon after a depleted uranium perforation can significantly reduce the intake and its associated exposure received by the crewmembers. The Capstone Program, sponsored by the Army and the Deployment Health Support Directorate, was designed to provide a peer reviewed, rigorous scientific estimate of the health risks to military personnel in and around armored vehicles perforated by large caliber depleted uranium munitions. To read the Capstone report and its related Human Health Risk Assessment along with previous studies of depleted uranium, go to http://www.deploymentlink.osd.mil/du_library/. Fred Dawson London UK ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> $9.95 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything. http://us.click.yahoo.com/J8kdrA/y20IAA/yQLSAA/FGYolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 29 [du-list] radioactive contamination in scrap metal shipment Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:13:20 -0700 http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/news/world/9953644.htm?1c ...In February, Martirosian said a powerful source of radiation was found on the Armenian-Iranian border, among scrap metal headed for Iran. while this story has nothing to do with DU directly, as the contamination appears to come from armenia, it does provide more evidence that scrap metal shipments are a route by which such contamination travels. This cargo was intercepted, but how many others are not? __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Make a clean sweep of pop-up ads. Yahoo! Companion Toolbar. Now with Pop-Up Blocker. Get it for free! http://us.click.yahoo.com/L5YrjA/eSIIAA/yQLSAA/FGYolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 30 Democrat & Chronicle: Plutonium from UR revealed in Niagara Tuesday, October 19, 2004 [Rochester, NY] MAX SCHULTE staff photographer In the right foreground is the cattail marsh in Lewiston, Niagara County that was once the University of Rochester’s Burial Area. [Day in Photos] Strong's injections may lead to lawsuit (March 9, 1994) Justice not swift in radiation cases (March 10, 1994) U.S. settles plutonium suit (Nov. 20, 1996) U.S. apology hits home (Dec. 17, 1996) The UR burial area + It was used from 1944 to 1953 to dump radioactive laboratory wastes from UR research facilities. + It’s part of a 30-acre former military site, one of three contiguous areas where radioactive contamination is suspected by the U.S. Department of Energy. + In 1972, 512 cubic yards of soil, drums and debris were removed from there by the DOEand likely stored at the nearby Niagara Falls Storage Site. + In 2002, prompted by citizen concerns, a new investigation uncovered traces of plutonium-239, plutonium-240, radium-226, thorium-230, strontium-90, actinium-227, uranium 233/234, uranium 235/236 and uranium-238. Only the plutonium and strontium are historically associated with UR. + There were eight traces of plutonium. The man-made radioactive metal, first made in 1941 and secret until 1948, was used to make nuclear weapons, including the atom bomb dropped on Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945. It is highly toxic if inhaled. + The radioactive half-life of just the two isotopes of plutonium found in Niagara County is 24,100 years (Pu-239) and 6,560 years (Pu-240). “Half-life” is a term used to quantify the natural decay of radioactive isotopes. Plutonium-239, for instance, will lose half its radiological potency in that period of time. Background During the years 1945 and 1946, 11 unwitting patients at UR’s Strong Memorial Hospital were injected with soluble plutonium, a man-made radioactive metal used to make atomic bombs. The seven women and four men ranged in age from 18 to 68. All are dead, though none apparently as a result of the experiment, which was intended to help establish safe levels of exposure to the metal. A 12th patient, 24-year-old Mary Jean Connell, was injected with uranium salts in 1946 during an experiment intended to see how much of the material was needed to damage the kidneys. The retired factory worker is still alive and living in Livonia, Livingston County. In November 1996, the federal government agreed to pay $4.8 million to 12 families affected by such experiments, including nine from the Rochester area. A federal advisory panel then investigating human radiation experiments found evidence of at least 436 “experiment series” done by the U.S. Department of Energy and its predecessors from 1944 to 1974. There were at least 10,000 subjects in 4,000 separate experiments. To read 1994-1996 coverage of the plutonium experiment, the federal lawsuit and the settlement, log on to DemocratandChronicle.com and click on this story. Perceptions of harm There are two main activist groups in Niagara County concerned about radiological contamination on the former Lake Ontario Ordnance Works, a 12-square-mile section of the county. Neither claims harm from long-buried radiation at the University of Rochester Burial Area, located within the works. But both Residents for Responsible Government (from Porter) and Residents Organized for Lew-Port’s Environment (from Lewiston) say the discovery points to the need for a comprehensive federal investigation of the site, which is now largely back in private hands. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the agency investigating similar old military sites nationwide, says the radiation in the UR burial area was too little and too remote to have done harm. But it says the find was enough to warrant further investigation of adjacent land. [cireland@democratandchronicle.com] Staff writer (October 19, 2004)  LEWISTON — About 90 miles west of Rochester, in rural Niagara County, is a historical remnant of the University of Rochester’s role in the making of the atom bomb. It doesn’t look like much: a cattail marsh 21 feet by 21 feet in size, within an undulant field of weeds and wildflowers. But the so-called University of Rochester Burial Area is in the heart of what used to be a 12-square-mile military site. In 1943, part of that site was turned over to the Manhattan Project, the top-secret federal operation that created the atomic bomb. In those days, UR did research on the health effects of radiation, using the remote Niagara County burial area to entomb the remains of thousands of laboratory animals contaminated by radiation, including more than 270,000 mice. Artifacts of darker UR experiments — some injecting unwitting patients at Strong Memorial Hospital with plutonium — were apparently also buried there. The site was investigated and cleaned up by the U.S. Department of Energy 30 years ago. But a 2002 investigation by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers — made public this year, with a report due this fall — turned up plutonium and other radioactive metals. The corps, the federal authority for cleaning up such sites, said that the traces of radioactivity found were not enough to have endangered human health or the environment. But they are enough to warrant further investigation. (UR is not liable, because the radioactive material was part of a federally financed program, the Manhattan Project.) Finding radioactive metals at the UR Burial Area — a site supposedly long ago cleaned up — has sounded a major chord of concern in Niagara County. It was a sign to many that the federal government has not adequately investigated radiation at the former military site known as the Lake Ontario Ordnance Works. Lewiston resident Lou Ricciuti, who thinks of Niagara County as “an atomic wasteland,” called the UR Burial Area “fascinating and frightening.” Finding radioactive metals at the UR Burial Area — a site supposedly long ago cleaned up — has sounded a major chord of concern in Niagara County. It was a sign to many that the federal government has not adequately investigated radiation at the former military site known as the Lake Ontario Ordnance Works. Lewiston resident Lou Ricciuti, who thinks of Niagara County as “an atomic wasteland,” called the UR Burial Area “fascinating and frightening.” The one-time Niagara Falls tourism expert has been studying nuclear contamination in his home county for four years, compiling 50 cubic feet of documents. Other residents say that if radioactive metals were found in the tiny UR burial area, they could be elsewhere — buried and forgotten, or missed in earlier federal investigations and cleanups. To the west just more than a mile is the Niagara River, to the north, Lake Ontario. “The federal government hasn’t done its job” investigating radioactivity in the area, said William Choboy, a member of the Lewiston Town Board. Part of the old ordnance works site, once 7,500 acres, is still in federal hands. Included is the 191-acre Niagara Falls Storage Site, one of about 20 former U.S. military installations contaminated with bomb-related radioactive waste. Buried there is 22,000 tons of radioactive waste, including one-third of the world’s supply of mined uranium. But most of the ordnance works site — 5,000 acres, including the forgotten UR burial area — was sold back to private interests starting in 1945. Buying it up were farmers, developers and even a school district. The Lewiston-Porter Central School District campus, on the southwest edge of the former ordnance site, was where Tim Henderson went to school in the 1960s. Now a water-treatment worker, he put two children through school on the same campus and today has a grandson there. “There is plenty to be feared” about the site, he said, including more buried radioactive waste hinted at by the UR burial area. At a public meeting this summer about the radiation find, Henderson said, a thousand people turned out. ‘Lightning rod’ The UR burial area is on an unused portion of a 710-acre landfill now owned by CWM Chemical Services LLC, a subsidiary of Houston-based Waste Management Inc. Dick Sturgis, CWM district manager, said the radiation found at the UR burial area “was so small it was difficult to gather a sample for analysis.” But the long-forgotten UR site “has become a lightning rod” on radiation issues, said William Rolland, who lives in Porter, on a creek downwind and downstream from CWM. The discovery not only focused local criticism on the government, he said, but also it focused attention on CWM, the only commercial hazardous waste landfill in the Northeast. It takes in high-level toxic waste from 30 states and Canada, as well as other foreign customers. Add in radioactive waste, said Rolland, and CWM’s toxic waste business becomes an issue of environmental justice. That’s a principle in the federal and state law that says waste sites should be distributed equitably. The retired engineer is secretary of Residents for Responsible Government, a Niagara County group calling for radiological testing of CWM land near the UR burial area. Sturgis said a plan for radiological monitoring on the site is being designed with state health officials and will include the monitoring of soil, surface water, groundwater and air. But any cleanup of the old ordnance property, he said, is a federal responsibility. Linda Shaw, a Rochester environmental lawyer, said local ire should focus on the federal government and not CWM. She represents Eileen Syms of Grand Island, Erie County, who with her husband, John, bought part of the old ordnance site in 1970. But Syms has not been able to use the land since 1973 because of radiation contamination not revealed during the sale. Thirty years later, said Shaw, the federal government “has still not fully investigated” the ordnance site. The UR burial area is a signal that more radioactive waste is there to be found, she said. “It’s minor, but it’s uncontained.” The corps’ discovery In May and September of 2002, contractors working for the corps’ Buffalo district office used a hand-drawn map from the 1950s to locate the old UR burial area. They excavated 300 feet of ground in six trenches as deep as 12 feet. Found were traces of plutonium, strontium and uranium. The traces were peppered through laboratory debris, including an animal bone, old lab gloves, glass slides, syringes — and an emesis basin, a device used in hospitals to catch and contain human vomit. James Karsten, a project manager at the corps’ Corps’ Buffalo district office, called the dig results “not surprising.” The plutonium and other debris was too little and buried too deep, and on land too remote to be harmful, he said. UR officials are cautious. “The people living near that site have the right to know what materials were buried there, and what risks they may pose,” said UR spokesman Christopher DiFrancesco. In 2002, UR provided historical information to the corps “to help them answer those questions,” he added, “and we’ll continue to provide any assistance they ask for.” Surface soil at the site, according to a corps fact sheet, “exhibited near-background” radiation levels. The buried material, once uncovered, was 20 to 80 times higher than background levels normally found from natural radiation sources. These would be harmful only after prolonged close contact. The artifacts are hot enough to be “noteworthy from a regulatory standpoint,” said radiation expert P. Andrew Karam, a research assistant professor of biology at the Rochester Institute of Technology. “But this is not going to hurt anyone,” he said, “unless people are over there munching on small animal bones and soil.” The corps agrees that the radioactive find was significant enough to warrant more investigation, and this year applied for additional federal funding. Karam was UR’s radiation safety officer in 2002, when the corps investigation was under way. He called the isotopes found “consistent with research that took place at (UR) under the Manhattan Project.” The recovered material is now stored in drums at the Niagara Falls Storage Site, awaiting final disposal in Texas. [CIRELAND@DemocratandChronicle.com] ***************************************************************** 31 Times-News: Group hosts nuclear fallout meetings www.magicvalley.com The Times-News | AG Weekly | Tuesday, October 19, 2004 • Twin Falls, Idaho TWIN FALLS -- A nuclear watchdog organization will hold two meetings this week to provide information on nuclear fallout and public health. The Snake River Alliance has geared its meeting toward migrant communities and individuals facing language barriers in Magic Valley. The group encourages those who believe they may have been affected by nuclear testing fallout during the 1950s and 1960s to attend. The meetings serve as a precursor to the National Academy of Sciences public hearing scheduled for Nov. 6 in Boise. Idahoans impacted by fallout will testify in front Dr. Isaf Al-Nabulsi, who is heading research on expanding the fallout compensation program. Tonight, the Snake River Alliance hosts an informational session at the College of Southern Idaho Taylor Building, Room 276. The group will be there from 6 to 8 p.m. On Oct. 19, a second meeting will be held at the Burley City Council chambers, 1410 Overland Ave., from 6 to 8 p.m. Copyright © 2004, Lee Publications Inc. Magicvalley.com is an on-line division of The Times-News, published daily at 132 W. Fairfield St., Twin Falls, Idaho 83301 by Lee Publications, Inc., a subsidiary of Lee Enterprises. ***************************************************************** 32 Korea Times: Seoul Quells Concerns Over Liquid Uranium Hankooki.com > The Korea Times By Kim Tae-gyu Staff Reporter A small amount of liquid uranium that sneaked into Korea last June caught the nation by storm but it proved to be a storm in a teacup as its quality is lower than even that of natural uranium. Rev. Kim Suk-joon from the main opposition Grand National Party revealed on Monday 10 grams of liquid uranium was found by the Pusan police in June, raising concerns about the nation's security. Some media went even further, presenting the possibility that bombs could be made with the uranium and terrorists were using Korea as a stop-over before smuggling the dangerous materials to rogue nations. According to the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute (KAERI), however, the enrichment level of the uranium is just 0.7 percent, far short of the 90 percent level which is needed to make atomic bombs. ``It doesn't make any sense to talk about weapons with this. Only 46 percent of the liquid was uranium with the enrichment level of 0.7 percent. It was coarse with many impurities,'' KAERI president Chang In-soon said. The KAERI conducted laboratory tests with the liquid uranium after the Pusan police received the material in June and sent it on to the state-owned KAERI for analysis. Uranium found in nature consists largely of two isotopes; U-235 and U-238. The former is a highly fissionable ingredient, which plays a key role in creating great amounts of energy when its atom splits. But, the natural uranium contains about 0.7 percent of U-235 and the remaining 99.3 percent is mostly U-238, which does not directly contribute to the fission process. So scientists separate the two isotopes and increase or enrich the proportion of U-235 to 4-5 percent for nuclear reactors and to more than 90 percent for weapons. The Ministry of Science and Technology joined in efforts to snuff out claims that the liquid is related to terrorists, who try to build up weapons through the material. ``The liquid uranium is actually nothing. You can touch it with your hands and we don't plan on reporting this material even to the International Atomic Energy Agency,'' a MOST official said. Also the Pusan maritime police confirmed the uranium was not smuggled but delivered to them. ``An ethnic Korean called me in May and said he wanted to send a uranium sample. I said okay and it was delivered by a woman,'' said police officer Lee Kyung-ryol, who received the material. voc200@koreatimes.co.kr 10-19-2004 16:30 ***************************************************************** 33 AGI: DEPLETED URANIUM: OBSERVATORY LAMENTS DENIAL Agenzia Giornalistica Italia - News In English [http://www.agi.it/] Wednesday October 20, 2004 h.05.46 Today in Italy Special service by AGI on behalf of the Italian Prime Minister's office - Rome, Italy, Oct. 19 - According to the Italian Military Health Observatory a total of 109 Italian soldiers have died thus far due to exposure to depleted uranium. The observatory stressed the fact that 41 pct of active personnel casualties relate to disease. According to Domenico Leggiero at the Military Health Observatory, "The total of 109 casualties exceeds the total number of persons dying as a consequence of road accidents. Anyone denying the significance of such data is purely acting out of ill faith, and the truth is that our soldiers are dying out there due to a lack of adequate protection against depleted uranium". Leggiero pointed out the fact that the Senate has to date failed to establish a probe committee on this matter: "it is proof of a worrying lack of oversight on matters which are frankly dramatic". Members of the Observatory have petitioned a urgent hearing "in order to study effective prevention and safeguard measures aimed at reducing the death-toll amongst our serving soldiers". (AGI) - 191947 OTT 04 COPYRIGHTS 2002-2003 AGI S.p.A. [Invia questo articolo] ***************************************************************** 34 Idaho Press-Tribune: Locals invited to speak on fallout exposure Health: Hearing will give those affected chance to seek compensation Idaho Press-Tribune staff BOISE -- Idaho residents who may have been affected by the fallout from nuclear weapons testing in Nevada will have a chance to let their views be known locally. A hearing will be held Nov. 6. providing an opportunity for Idaho residents to testify about their health experiences resulting from fallout that spread as a result of the atomic tests. It runs from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the Taco Bell Arena at Boise State University. The National Academy of Sciences is charged with recommending to Congress whether a federal compensation program for downwinders should be expanded. Idaho has four of the five hardest-hit counties in the United States from iodine-131 fallout from Nevada bomb tests in the 1950s and 1960s. The National Cancer Institute reports that Gem County had the second-highest exposure level to radioactive iodine in Idaho, behind Custer County in the central part of the state. Several residents in the Emmett area attended a previous hearing hosted by U.S. Sen. Mike Crapo of Idaho. Officials are trying to determine if cancer cases in the Emmett area -- and elsewhere in Idaho -- were caused by iodine-131. Idahoans could receive compensation if it is determined they were affected by the nuclear weapons testing. So far, just 21 counties in Utah, Nevada and Arizona are included in the radiation exposure compensation act. Scientists estimate that about 25 percent of the radioactive materials released during atomic bomb testing in Nevada reached the ground somewhere in the United States. The National Cancer Institute says that exposure to I-131 -- a form of radioactive iodine -- is a potential risk factor for thyroid cancer. A leading theory on how the radiation caused cancer involves cows. Radiation may have settled on grass, which was eaten by cows. The radiation then wound up in unprocessed, or raw, milk consumed by residents. Because of that, and migration between local communities, radiation exposure could be even more widespread throughout Southwest Idaho. Tona Henderson of Emmett has said she is convinced there is a connection between cancer cases in Idaho and the nuclear testing program in Nevada. "I have 33 people in my family who have cancer or have had cancer," she told the Idaho Press-Tribune. "My father and his brother both had thyroid problems. My mother has had cancer. My brother has had cancer." How you can testify Testimony at the Nov. 6 "downwinders" meeting will be allowed only from those who register in advance to speak. To register, contact U.S. Sen. Larry Craig's Boise office at 342-7985 or e-mail Dr. Isaf Al-Nabulsi at [ialnabul@nas.edu] . Registration will not be allowed the day of the hearing. Copyright © 2004 Idaho Press- Tribune All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 35 Public Citizen: Bush Administration Leaves Chemical and Nuclear Plants, HazMat, Ports and Water Systems Vulnerable to Terrorists Oct. 18, 2004 Bush Aversion to Regulation and Allegiance to Campaign Contributors Has Blocked Progress on Homeland Security, New Report Shows WASHINGTON, D.C.  The Bush administration has consistently ignored or opposed commonsense measures to protect Americans from potentially catastrophic terrorist attacks  an inaction that reflects officials aversion to regulating private industry and allegiance to key campaign contributors, a new Public Citizen report shows. The report, Homeland Unsecured: The Bush Administrations Hostility to Regulation and Ties to Industry Leave America Vulnerable, details how the Bush administration has failed to harden our defenses against terrorism and secure the most vulnerable, high-impact targets. The report is based on an analysis of five key areas  chemical plants, nuclear plants, hazardous material transport, ports and water systems. The report is available at www.HomelandUnsecured.org [http://www.homelandunsecured.org/] . Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, President Bush has made protection of the American people from terrorism the rhetorical centerpiece of his presidency, said Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook. Yet this administration has failed to use its executive powers or support legislation to mandate regulatory requirements that should be taken. Bush has abdicated his responsibility to protect America from the risk of terrorist attacks because he is fundamentally hostile to regulation of private industry and is loath to cross his big money campaign contributors. Eighty-five percent of the nations critical infrastructure is controlled by the private sector.  However, the Bush administration has been notoriously hostile toward the reasonable regulation of private industry, including the industries mentioned in this report. It has blocked efforts to create rules to strengthen security at chemical and nuclear plants, make the transportation of hazardous materials more secure, ensure the safety of the drinking water supply or secure the nations ports. The report suggests that this is in part because industries representing the five homeland security areas examined in this study collectively have: + Raised at least $19.9 million for the Bush campaigns, the Republican National Committee or the Bush inauguration since the 2000 cycle. + Provided 10 Rangers and 20 Pioneers  individuals who raise at least $200,000 and $100,000, respectively  to the Bush presidential campaigns. + Spent at least $201 million lobbying the White House, executive branch agencies and Congress from 2002 through June 2004. Among the reports other findings: + Chemical plants  A strike at one or more of the 15,000 chemical plants across the United States could cause thousands, even millions, of injuries and deaths. But the Bush administration and the chemical industry have blocked legislation that would require chemical plants to shift to safer chemicals and technologies, and blocked Environmental Protection Agency efforts to compel security improvements via the Clean Air Act. + Nuclear plants Twenty-seven state attorneys generals warned Congress in October 2002 that the consequences of a catastrophic attack against one of the countrys 103 nuclear power plants are simply incalculable. The plants were not designed to withstand the impact of aircraft crashes or explosive forces, and the government does not require nuclear plants to be secure from an aircraft attack. Radioactive waste is stored in standing pools or dry casks, making it vulnerable, and the plants have grossly inadequate security. But the Bush administration and the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) have resisted congressional efforts for additional security regulation. In fact, the NRC proposed weakening fire safety regulations, which would make it harder for a reactor to be safely shut down in the event of a terrorist attack. + Hazardous materials transport The trains and trucks that carry tens of millions of tons of toxic chemicals and other hazardous materials annually on our highways make tempting terrorist targets. More than half of the nations 60,000 rail tank cars carrying hazardous materials are too old to meet current industry standards and thus are more likely than newer cars to break open after derailing. A weapon as simple as the legal, widely available 50-caliber rifle has the potential to inflict serious damage on a train car or truck carrying lethal materials, by penetrating tanks and causing an explosion or derailment. Despite the risk, though, there are insufficient checks on where trucks carrying hazardous materials may drive; insufficient oversight and tracking of the types, amounts and locations of trucks moving these lethal loads; and insufficient controls on the issuance of commercial licenses for drivers of trucks carrying hazardous materials. Legislation to assess rail security has been blocked by members of the presidents party, and other safety proposals have been dropped because of industry opposition. + Port security Every year, 8,100 foreign cargo ships make 50,000 visits to the United States. International sea transport is an attractive terrorist target because there are millions of shipping containers, hundreds of ports and dozens of methods to damage infrastructure, disrupt the world economy, undermine our military readiness and harm Americans.   Just 4 to 6 percent of shipping containers are inspected today.   Inspectors are not adequately trained. And innovative pilot security programs have not been implemented. At least one important security initiative has been adopted since 9/11, the Maritime Transportation Security Act (MTSA) of 2002, but new security measures and proposed funding put forward by the Bush administration fall far short of what is needed. + Drinking water systems Few acts of sabotage against the public could be more insidious than delivering poison into a familys home through tap water. The water distribution networkthe pumping stations, storage tanks and pipes that might cover thousands of miles within a metropolitan areaprovides countless opportunities to introduce biological, chemical or radiological contaminants. But there is no funding mechanism for the federal government to provide direct grants to cities to upgrade water security, and the private water utility industrys campaign to take over public water systems is getting a push from the Bush administration. This could make securing our water supply even more difficult because private water companies, like chemical companies, nuclear power companies and other industries, will resist strong security standards mandated by the government. The terrorist threat is particularly acute in Washington, D.C., where 8,500 rail cars carrying hazardous materials travel through the city each year. Ninety-ton rail cars that regularly pass within four blocks of the U.S. Capitol building in Washington, D.C., contain enough chlorine to potentially injure or kill 100,000 people within 30 minutes and could endanger 2.4 million people. The D.C. Council considered a bill requiring the rerouting of hazardous material-carrying trains away from the city, but it was postponed because the federal government promised to study the matter. In May 2004, though, a Transportation Security Administration official told Congress that the federal government intended to continue allowing trains and hazardous materials to pass close to the Capitol. A year of hearings, meetings and entreaties to the Bush administration has failed to persuade them to take obvious action to protect the safety of Washington residents, said D.C. Councilmember Kathy Patterson. I am urging my colleagues to move ahead with our legislative remedy, and urge other communities to follow suit. Added Rick Hind, legislative director of the Toxics Campaign at Greenpeace USA, The good news is that threats to chemical plants and train shipments are preventable. In fact, the most serious threats can actually be eliminated thanks to safer available chemicals and safer rail routes. The bad news is that the Bush administration would rather listen to the Dow and Exxon lobbyists than take action to prevent a disaster. ### To read Public Citizen President Joan Claybrook's statement, click here [http://www.citizen.org/pressroom/release.cfm?ID=1809] . ***************************************************************** 36 SA News24: Ship's nuclear waste fears [http://www.news24.com] Enrico Claassen East London - There are serious concerns that the cargo ship BBC China, which ran aground on a sandbank along the Wild Coast on Sunday evening, might have nuclear waste on board. This comes after it was learned that the American coast guard investigated the ship in a Honolulu harbour in February after a crew member indicated that there were dangerous materials on board. Captain William Dernier, operations manager of the South African maritime safety authority in Cape Town, said on Monday that an investigation into the accident would be conducted on Tuesday. The ship, en route from Spain, stranded about 150m from the beach at Port Grosvenor - just 120 nautical miles short of its final destination of Durban. Durban's harbour management airlifted sixteen crew from the ship by helicopter. Poor weather conditions hampered the rescue operation. Dernier said the 120-metre-long freighter of 5 500 tons was carrying about 58 tons of fuel, 60 tons of marine gas oil and eight tons of crude oil. He said the oil started leaking from the ship on Sunday night. "It's not yet clear how much oil has spilled into the sea," Dernier said. Neresh Sewnath of Durban harbour management said members of the salvaging company, Smit Marine, spent the whole of Monday transporting oil from the ship. When asked whether the ship was carrying nuclear waste, Dernier said this could not be confirmed. "If the BBC China was transporting nuclear waste, special arrangements must be made to remove this waste." If the possible radioactive materials spill into the sea, there could be long-term negative effects such as cancer in humans, said Prof. Geoff Brundrit of the department of oceanography at the University of Cape Town. The Democratic Alliance called on the minister of environmental affairs and tourism to declare whether there are any dangerous materials onboard. ***************************************************************** 37 UK The Times: Uranium find in Russian dump October 20, 2004 Jeremy Page reports from Moscow Tramps who found radioactive material and tried to sell it sparked security alert RUSSIAN security forces have seized two containers full of highly radioactive uranium-238 that were found by tramps at a waste dump in central Russia and taken to a scrapyard to sell. Radiation levels at the dump in Saratov, a town on the River Volga, were 358 times higher than normal, officials said. Depleted uranium, where uranium-238 is usually found, can be used to make nuclear “dirty bombs”. The find will renew fears that radioactive material at dozens of poorly-guarded sites around Russia might fall into the hands of terrorist groups. The United States and other countries have been pressing Russia, which has the world’s second biggest nuclear arsenal, to do more to protect its atomic sites since the September 11 attacks on New York and Washington in 2001. One of the few points on which President Bush and his election challenger, Senator John Kerry, agreed in recent television debates was that the possibility of terrorist groups acquiring nuclear material was the biggest threat to the United States. “This is obviously a worry,” said a Western diplomat. “There is a huge amount of nuclear material just lying around in Russia. Not only is it a threat to local people, but it is potentially a threat to the world at large.” Nuclear officials in Moscow said yesterday that they could not confirm the report. The Interfax news agency said that a number of homeless people found three stainless steel containers at the dump and took them to a local dealer in scrap non-ferrous metal. The scrap dealer raised the alarm and alerted emergency services in the town. Atomic energy experts were called in and were quoted by the news agency as saying that one of the containers was used for the transportation of uranium, and the other two for the storage of depleted uranium- 238, which is an extremely dense and highly toxic material mainly used in ammunition and armour. A spokesman for the Russian Atomic Energy Agency said: “That type of uranium looks very much like lead, so I would not be surprised if someone had simply mistaken it and dumped it at the scrapyard.” Highly enriched uranium and plutonium — found in spent nuclear fuel — can be used to manufacture a standard nuclear bomb. Spent fuel, as well as other by-products of uranium enrichment such as uranium-238, can also produce a “dirty bomb” that spreads radioactive material through a non-nuclear explosion. Ecodefense, the independent Russian environmental group, has claimed that more than 16,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel is kept stored in dozens of Soviet-era nuclear facilities in Russia alone. To keep radioactive material safe, the UN atomic agency has suggested building the world’s first global nuclear waste dump in Russia, where it can be stored. Meanwhile, a truck carrying radioactive materials was seized yesterday at the far eastern port of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky, the Ria-Novosti news agency reported. Elsewhere, a number of lead containers holding uranium, plutonium and strontium were last week found on a train on its way from Moscow to the southern town of Mineralniye Vody, not far from Chechnya, according to local media reports. Covering documents mentioned only that the sender was The Ministry of Nuclear Industry and the recipient Ingushetia State University. The radioactive materials were enough to make a“dirty bomb”, specialists from the FSB, the KGB’s successor, were quoted as saying. A smuggler was last month arrested in Kyrgyzstan after trying to sell weapons-grade plutonium to undercover security officers. The Kyrgyz national, identified by the national security service only by the initial B, kept 60 small lead containers of plutonium-239 in an abandoned sheepfold, state media said at the time. Radiation in the area was several hundred times the legal limit. Russia has consistently denied Western suggestions that the instability of the post-Soviet years had made its nuclear arsenals easy prey. But in May, Moscow and Washington agreed to lock away tonnes of highly enriched uranium (HEU) stored in dozens of poorly guarded research reactors around the world. Under the plan, Moscow will secure the return of all fresh Russian-origin HEU fuel by the end of 2005 and all spent fuel by 2010 from more than 25 reactors in 17 states. Copyright The Times - timesonline.co.uk ***************************************************************** 38 RGJ: Water, Yucca Mountain are issues in Assembly 36 race [http://www.rgj.com/] [stimko@rgj.com] RENO GAZETTE-JOURNAL 10/18/2004 11:56 pm Nevada needs to conduct an inventory of the water it has available so it knows what level of population it can sustain, Assembly District 36 incumbent Roderick “Rod” Sherer said. “It’s vital for the economy to grow and to know that you have enough of it,” said Sherer, R-Pahrump, who listed water as the No. 1 issue in the district that stretches from Nye and Lincoln counties into Mineral County. Sherer, 40, proposes charging more to people who export water from one county to another. “We want to raise the transfer tax from $6 per acre-foot to a minimum of $20 per acre-foot,” he said. The money goes back to the county losing the water. Challenger Jackie Holmgren of Hawthorne and the Independent American Party, said water and the nuclear waste dump planned for Yucca Mountain tied as the two most important issues in the assembly district. “Nevada is about the worst state you could pick to have a nuclear repository because of the seismic activity,” said Holmgren, 51, who has a geology degree from the University of Oregon. “However, they’re putting it here because Nevada is basically the garbage can of the United States of America.” If Nevada does end up with the nuclear dump at Yucca Mountain, she said Nevada and her district in particular need more money to offset its impacts and there has to be more safeguards built in. Holmgren said her background as a geologist would give her more credibility in the Nevada Assembly to talk about its problems. The thing that sets her apart from Sherer is that she has more independence on issues, Holmgren said. “I am not controlled by the Republican machine,” Holmgren said. “I do not have strings attached.” Sherer said the thing that separates him is his commitment to communicating with his constituents. During the last legislative session his email list was more than 1,300 people, Sherer said. He also conducted several town meetings in his district. “I’m very easy to get to,” Sherer said. “I’m easy to talk to. I answer all my emails. I answer all my questions. I spend time in the whole district.” He learned the importance of keeping in touch with voters from previous assembly races, he said. Voters “saw people when they ran but after that they never saw them again,” Sherer said. © Copyright Reno Gazette-Journal, a [http://www.gannett.com] ***************************************************************** 39 press-citizen.com: EPA to hold groundwater meeting in Hills [http://www.press-citizen.com] Tuesday, October 19, 2004 By Deidre Bello Iowa City Press-Citizen The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 7 will have a community meeting Dec. 1 about ongoing groundwater and soil sampling efforts in Hills. The meeting is from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Hills Community Center, 110 E. Main Street. EPA scientists are attempting to find the source of a plume of perchlorate contamination in shallow groundwater. During its July visit, the EPA added one more household to the list of residents who are receiving bottled water for having wells with contaminants higher than 18 parts per billion, according to Craig Smith, project leader with EPA Region 7. The list now totals 25 households. EPA scientists have been trying to find the source of a plume of perchlorate contamination in shallow groundwater in Hills since August 2003. The plume now is moving westward, but its speed is unknown, Smith said. Quarterly sampling will resume Dec. 6-15 when scientists will use ground penetrating radar and a magnetometer to investigate a field on the north edge of a cornfield, west of the railroad tracks, Smith said. Perchlorate is the main ingredient in the production of solid rocket fuel. Levels higher than 18 parts per billion can interfere with iodine intake by the thyroid gland, which can affect metabolism and could cause thyroid tumors. One part per billion is equal to a half teaspoon in an Olympic-size pool; 66 parts per billion would equal two-thirds of a cup in an Olympic-size pool. ***************************************************************** 40 Salt Lake Tribune: Panel urges no hotter waste at Envirocare [http://www.sltrib.com] Article Last Updated: 10/19/2004 09:57:45 AM But no ban: Critics say an attempt to make strong policy failed because no all-out prohibition was put in place By Patty Henetz The Salt Lake Tribune After meeting for two years, a legislative task force on hazardous waste regulation is recommending Envirocare of Utah not be allowed to accept hotter radioactive waste, but stopped short of advocating an all-out ban of such waste in Utah. The task force will meet at 9 a.m. today at the Capitol for a hearing on the draft report and proposed legislation that would enhance oversight of Enviro- care's facility in Tooele County. The panel of seven state senators and 11 House members decided against drafting legislation governing who owns the site during the so-called perpetual care time period, that is, 100 years after the site is cleaned up and padlocked. Public testimony will be taken at the hearing, and critics already are lining up to denounce the draft report. "There were attempts by some members of the task force to set strong policy for the state. But at the end of the day, what we end up with is a murky policy that doesn't give direction for the Legislature," said Jason Groenewold, spokesman for the nonprofit Healthy Environment Alliance. "There's not a lot of teeth in this, given they've been studying it for two years." Groenewold said it was a mistake for the task force not to take up the perpetual care time-period ownership, putting taxpayers at risk far into the future. "This is the point where all your liability accrues. There are no revenues," he said. "Where is the money to protect taxpayers from this liability?" State regulators in 2001 signed off on Envirocare's technical plan for taking class B and C radioactive waste, which is more dangerous than the low-level class A waste it now takes. Envirocare takes about 98 percent of all the class A waste in the nation. The task force was set up to decide the hotter waste question and take a look at the taxes Envirocare pays. B and C waste can be thousands of times more radioactive, and includes some waste from nuclear power plants. State law now says Envirocare can't accept B and C waste without the permission of both the governor and the Legislature. Only two other commercial sites are available in the nation for B and C waste, and those will be closed to 39 states beginning in 2008, increasing the pressure on Utah's commercial disposal options. Envirocare now pays $400,000 each year into a so-called perpetual care fund, and is committed to spend nearly $41 million in closure and post-closure costs. The task force grappled with the question of whether that was enough, but the report doesn't answer the question except to propose the periodic reviews in a law that the 2005 Legislature would consider. The panel also will consider whether to adopt the position that Envirocare's low-level radioactive waste operations "pose a lower risk than many other chemical and mining facilities that currently operate in the state." The legislative hazardous-waste task force is proposing to: l Set up new oversight requirements for the Solid and Hazardous Waste Control Board, which every six years would have to review whether enough money is being set aside to manage the Envirocare waste site in Tooele County after it closes. l Increase the fines for violating state law on hazardous waste. l Make new rules covering the disposal of polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), toxic compounds used in transformers and other electrical equipment. The task force decided not to call for a ban on class B and C radioactive waste, nor did it propose legislation to cover what happens to the Envirocare site in the centuries after it shuts down. © Copyright 2004, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 41 Mos News: Tramps Find Uranium in Central Russia - NEWS - MOSNEWS.COM Created: 19.10.2004 15:27 MSK (GMT +3), Updated: 15:28 MSK MosNews Homeless people found three containers with depleted uranium in the Central Russian city of Saratov. They brought these stainless steel containers to a local who gathered scrap non-ferrous metal, Interfax news agency reported. The scrap dealer reported the discovery to the local emergency directorate. Local experts, quoted by the agency, said one of the containers was used for the transportation of uranium and the other two for the storage of depleted uranium-238. The level of the radioactive background was found to be 358 times higher than normal. The incident is likely to raise fears that the Soviet Union’s massive nuclear program is poorly guarded and dangerous elements could fall into the hands of terrorists for use in a so-called ’dirty bomb’. SEE ALSO Write us: [info@mosnews.com] Copyright © 2004 MOSNEWS.COM ***************************************************************** 42 Times & Star: Mox plant won't close say bosses times and star workington lake district, Published on 19/10/2004 BRITISH Nuclear Fuels says it is confident about the future of the Sellafield Mox plant despite reports that the Government is discussing closing it before it has even completed a contract. The controversial plant has so far cost the taxpayer more than Ł600 million but has not yet generated any income. A series of delays getting the Ł470 million factory operational has meant Sellafield has sub-contracted some of its orders to firms in France and Belgium. Former environment minister Michael Meacher called for an investigation in July. The inquiry by Sir John Bourn, head of parliament’s watchdog, the National Audit Commission, has now revealed that the option of closure is being discussed. But BNFL bosses do not believe Mox will be closed. A spokesman said: “The economic case for the Sellafield Mox Plant is robust. “We are disappointed with recent delays but they are to be expected by the very nature of the plant. It has always been our intention to slowly ramp up production at SMP. This remains the case.” ***************************************************************** 43 Maine Today: Schools shouldn't be chemical dump sites Communities, state should deal with this before something really bad happens. --> [http://www.mainetoday.com] Tuesday, October 19, 2004 EDITORIAL: Copyright © 2004 Blethen Maine Newspapers Inc. Though "Better living through chemistry" may have been the DuPont Co.'s advertising slogan for years, it's not what a number of Maine schools are saying after substantial amounts of hazardous materials were found in long-closed closets and drawers. Apparently, what you don't know can indeed hurt you. A program to get materials containing mercury out of school labs, maintenance departments, art and vocational classrooms and nurses' offices has uncovered many more hazards than were suspected. The materials, some of which could even be used as chemical warfare agents, were apparently accrued over many years by school officials who may have been buying in bulk amounts to save money. Some schools had a 100-year supply of some agents, even though the state only recommends a two-year supply be stored. In addition, though schools are required to have chemical management and removal plans, they were often incomplete or neglected. That's frightening indeed, considering that elements such as chlorine and bromine, the ingredients of mustard gas, along with pesticides, acids, 700 pounds of mercury and even radioactive materials, have been uncovered in dozens of schools. According to one state official, some of the materials, stored in unlocked drawers, cabinets and closets, were so hazardous that, if they had leaked, they could have killed teachers and students "instantly." Even scarier is the fact that the mercury-reduction program has so far only surveyed about 80 schools, or 18 percent of the state's total. A bond proposal that included $500,000 to cover the initial cost failed in the Legislature, and now officials say a proper cleanup could take millions more. So, it looks as though much more state help will be necessary to keep students and teachers safe. Some schools may have opened themselves to fines, but the state says it is less interested in penalties than remediation. That's the right attitude. Public funds should be spent entirely on the costs of cleanup, which is a far higher priority right now. Schools also should be sure they have plans in place to purchase only limited supplies of necessary chemicals, keep them under safe conditions and dispose of them properly when they are no longer needed. The search for weapons of mass destruction turned up empty in Iraq. It shouldn't be successful in our schools. ***************************************************************** 44 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: In pursuit of nuclear diplomacy [http://joongangdaily.joins.com Octorber 20, 2004 KST 12:34 (GMT+9) October 20, 2004 ¤Ń WASHINGTON ˇŞ Concerned that the International Atomic Energy Agency will condemn South Korea for conducting nuclear experiments barred by its obligations under international treaties, a senior official from Seoul has arrived in the United States to plead and clarify the case. Last month, South Korea acknowledged that its scientists conducted a plutonium-based experiment in 1982 and a uranium-enrichment experiment in 2000. One source said although the IAEA has declared that South Korea's activities differ from those of North Korea, the chance remains that the nuclear watchdog may confront Seoul over the experimentation. If that happens, South Korea's case could be brought before the Security Council. The IAEA is expected to announce the results of its investigations on Nov. 25. On Sunday, Deputy Foreign Minister Choi Young-jin made an unannounced visit to Washington. He is expected to present Korea's view to U.S. officials. On his appointments list are: Deputy Secretary of States Richard Armitage, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security John Bolton and Deputy National Security Council Adviser Steven Hadley. On Thursday and Friday, the deputy foreign minister is expected to visit Canada, which currently heads the secretariat of the nuclear watchdog. by Kang Chan-ho africanu@joongang.co.kr> [http://joongangdaily.joins.com/faq.html] ***************************************************************** 45 BBC ON THIS DAY | 20 | 1986: Nuclear technician missing after secrets leak [http://www.bbc.co.uk] Fears are growing for the missing nuclear technician who disappeared in London after revealing details of Israel's nuclear weapons programme. The American magazine, Newsweek, claimed earlier this week that Mordechai Vanunu had been abducted from a yacht in the Mediterranean by agents of the Israeli intelligence service, Mossad. But these reports have been rejected by a close friend of Mr Vanunu. The Rev John McKnight, who is an Australian priest, says he believes the nuclear technician was kidnapped in London and is now being held for trial in Israel for treason. So far Israeli officials have refused to confirm reports Mr Vanunu is being held on remand at Gadera military prison near Jerusalem, a jail normally used to house Palestinian rebels. He is being held probably for trial for treason for disclosing nuclear arms' secrets [ /] Rev John McKnight Scotland Yard confirmed Mr Vanunu left a London hotel on 30 September in unexplained circumstances. On 5 October an article appeared in The Sunday Times newspaper based on an interview with Mr Vanunu in which he gave details of Israel's nuclear weapons stockpile, with photographs of the research plant at Dimona in the Negev desert. Mr Vanunu, who was born in Morocco, moved to Israel with his family in 1963 and spent almost 10 years working at the Dimona plant. He came to the attention of the Israeli authorities for his affiliation to a group called Movement for the Advancement of Peace and his alleged sympathies for the Palestinians. He was sacked from Dimona and set off round the world, arriving in Sydney, Australia, where he was befriended by Rev McKnight and converted to Christianity. Mr McKnight said his friend had spoken to him of his fears he would be captured and returned to Israel after his newspaper interview. He said: "My sources in the media in Israel tell me that he is being held probably for trial for treason for disclosing nuclear arms' secrets." Mr McKnight also rejected suggestions Mr Vanunu was a Palestinian sympathiser, saying: "He was at the crossroads of his life and started becoming involved with peace groups and was concerned about nuclear weapons and Israeli policies. "He did what he did for his own reasons, because he felt he had to give details about Israel's nuclear arsenal." The vicar said he would remain in Britain until he had discovered the whereabouts of his friend. Your Memories? Write your account of the events. [ ] [ src=] [ ] [ src=] E-mail this story to a friend [ ] [ src=] [ /] [ /] [ /] [Mordechai Vanunu] Mordechai Vanunu disappeared from a London hotel on 30 September [ /] [ /] [ /] In Context It was later confirmed Mordechai Vanunu had been befriended in London by an American Mossad agent, Cheryl Bentov, who was masquerading as an American tourist. She lured him to Rome with her on holiday on 30 September. Once there he was kidnapped and drugged and returned to Israel on a freighter. The details were revealed by Mr Vanunu himself, who wrote them on the palm of his hand which he held up against the window of a van while being transported from prison so waiting journalists could get the information. The Sunday Times article based on an interview with Mr Vanunu contained the most substantive evidence at the time of Israel's nuclear weapons programme. It led the international community to revise sharply upwards the number of weapons it believed Israel held in its stockpile. Mr Vanunu was subsequently put on trial in March 1987 on charges of treason and espionage and sentenced to 18 years in prison. Eleven of those were spent in solitary confinement. He was freed on 21 April 2004 and has since been refused permission to leave Israel. Stories From 20 Oct 1967: Thousands join anti-war movement 1983: Prime minister of Grenada 'assassinated' 1986: Nuclear technician missing after secrets leak 2000: British activist freed from Burma 1973: Dalai Lama makes first UK visit 1988: New law could erode right to silence [/] [/] BBC News >> [0] [Mordechai Vanunu] 29 May 2004 Vanunu wanted 'to avert holocaust' Web Links [http://www.nonviolence.org/vanunu/] [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,1-1081668_1,00.html] The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites ***************************************************************** 46 [du-list] re Batelle, alleged "study" Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:13:33 -0700 http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/19/politics/19uranium.html?ex=1098849600&en=31e8ab0bd704d828&ei=5006&partner=ALTAVISTA1 Includes.... "Uranium that is eaten would pass through far faster and with little absorption, Colonel Melanson said. He said the long-term risks were tiny compared with the risk of being killed outright by the weapon. The study, conducted by contractors led by the Battelle Memorial Institute...." LOL. (Does this refer to the risks to the "enemy" natives targeted or from "friendly fire"?) a.. UT-Battelle (Management Contractor for DOE's Oak Ridge National Laboratory) UT-Battelle is a partnership between the University of Tennessee and Battelle that manages and operates the Oak Ridge National Laboratory for the U.S. Department of Energy. ... About UT-Battelle. The UT-Battelle Plan ... www.ut-battelle.org - 3k - Cached - More from this site a.. a.. Battelle develops new technologies, commercializes products, and provides solutions for industry and government. Category: B2B > Research and Development www.battelle.org - 37k - Cached - More from this site a.. Battelle Memorial Institute ... Battelle Memorial Institute. 425 King Avenue - Columbus, OH 43201 ... Web Site: www.battelle.org/chembio/default.htm. Battelle Memorial Institute provides certified facilities and ... www.nbcindustrygroup.com/battel.htm - 8k - Cached - More from this site a.. Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Info Battelle operates the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (Pacific Northwest) for the U.S. Department of Energy's national security and energy missions. www.hanford.gov/contrctr/ battelle.htm - 3k - Cached - More from this site [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> $9.95 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything. http://us.click.yahoo.com/J8kdrA/y20IAA/yQLSAA/FGYolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 47 ABQjournal: Men Admit to LANL Purchasing Scam Tuesday, October 19, 2004 Albuquerque Journal--> By Martin Salazar Journal Staff Writer Two men implicated in a Los Alamos National Laboratory purchasing scandal in 2002 pleaded guilty Monday to charges stemming from improper buys of items ranging from television sets to power tools to bathroom fixtures. Peter Bussolini, 66, and Scott Alexander, 42, formerly highly paid LANL employees, each pleaded guilty in federal court to mail fraud and to conspiracy to commit a felony against the United States. As part of a plea agreement with prosecutors, the defendants acknowledged that their actions cost the lab between $120,000 and $200,000. They agreed that they "knowingly and intentionally devised a scheme" to defraud the labs of money and property. U.S. District Judge James A. Parker said he would wait for a pre-sentencing report before deciding whether to accept the pleas from Bussolini and Alexander. In exchange for the pleas, the U.S. Attorney's Office has agreed to drop 26 other charges against each defendant. The two face a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and restitution on the mail fraud charge. The conspiracy charge carries a maximum five-year prison sentence. Attorneys for Bussolini and Alexander said the sentencing ranges would likely be 12 to 18 months under the terms of the agreement. According to the plea agreement, prosecutors have agreed to recommend the low end of the sentencing range. A sentencing hearing is tentatively set for Jan. 24. Bussolini was a 24-year lab employee and former facilities maintenance manager at the labs making $150,000 a year when the scandal broke. Alexander was a $75,000-a-year purchaser who reported to Bussolini. They were accused of making hundreds of thousands of dollars in questionable purchases using taxpayer money. Among the items found at Bussolini's and Alexander's homes were a Sony 36-inch flat-screen TV, numerous Hoover vacuum cleaners, a gas grill, performance tires, shock absorbers, power tools and a motorcycle racing helmet. Assistant U.S. Attorney Fred J. Federici said that about $10,000 worth of items were found in Bussolini's possession. Alexander, he added, had $19,000 worth of items in his or his family's possession. The two were eventually fired after the purchasing irregularities came to light. Congressional hearings and a federal investigation of the actions of Bussolini and Alexander and other purchasing and property control problems at LANL led to more than a dozen senior managers at the lab losing their jobs or being reassigned. Attorneys for both defendants said they felt the pleas were in their clients' best interests. "My client did have property at his home," Douglas Couleur, Bussolini's attorney, told Parker. He added that his client had already admitted everything to federal agents. Joe Cruz Castellano, Alexander's attorney, said his client said several witnesses were prepared to testify against Alexander. "There are various documents containing my client's signature," he said. According to the plea agreement, Bussolini and Alexander carried out the embezzlement, in part, by misstating what had been purchased on lab records. A grill rotisserie attachment was misleadingly described as a "basket positioner" and a 36-inch, flat-screen television was described as a "command center monitor." The two also came up with a cover story, whereby Bussolini pretended to reprimand Alexander orally in front of others and in writing for allowing some "monitors" to fall off the back of a truck, the agreement states. They later created a paper trail, saying some of the stolen property had been sent to LANL's salvage property unit as damaged property. The two admitted they stored some of the property at a remote bunker site on lab property with restricted access because it was easier to take the property from there after the purchases. The plea agreement contained a stipulation from each of the defendants as to their actions. Among the stipulations were that: + Between Feb. 1, 2001 and Oct. 31, 2002, the two "knowingly and intentionally devised a scheme" to defraud the labs of money and property, and that they used the U.S. Postal Service in their scheme; + The two arranged for LANL to pay for property and equipment that was supposed to be purchased only for legitimate laboratory business, but that they "actually planned to steal, embezzle and convert" the items, contrary to their fiduciary responsibilities to the lab. + The two men were in a position to discover weaknesses and vulnerabilities in the lab's property purchasing and control system, and they ultimately exploited those weaknesses for their own personal gain. [Get Copyright Clearance] Copyright 2004 Albuquerque ***************************************************************** 48 AP Wire: Scientist Envisions Small-Scale Hydropower | 10/19/2004 | Associated Press IDAHO FALLS, Idaho - A scientist says the United States could more than double its hydropower supply by harnessing the energy of smaller streams. Doug Hall with the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory said the feat can be achieved using small turbines or generators instead of dams. Small-scale hydropower, he said, could help the country meet its energy needs while reducing pollution and the need to import fossil fuels. "There is a huge untapped resource in the U.S.," Hall said. "Our project's mission is to lead and facilitate the next generation of hydropower, which will be small, distributed hydropower without the use of dams because of their environmental impacts." The United States ranks fourth in the world in available undeveloped hydropower, according to the team's report. Hall and his team have developed a map of all the streams in the nation that could be used for hydropower. The project, sponsored by the Department of Energy, will include a catalogue of low-power hydropower technologies, calculations to determine how much installing one would cost and regional maps to evaluate whether a particular site would be good to develop. There are several factors to consider, Hall said, including stream accessibility to roads, power lines and communities that would use the power. Not including wild and scenic rivers and streams and those that run through wildlife areas or national or state parks, about 170,000 megawatts of power could be developed in the nation, the INEEL resource assessment found. That is more than twice what is developed now, according to the report. In the United States, about 80,000 megawatts of power provide about 7 percent of the nation's energy demand, according to the Department of Energy. About 12,000 megawatts of that power is from "low-power hydropower," energy seized from streams that would produce less than 1 megawatt on average. One megawatt is enough power to run about 830 homes. Large power companies are typically not interested in low-power sites because they want bigger bang for their buck, said Hall. But the investment could make sense for people who live in remote areas and want to provide their own power. The biggest obstacle is cost, he said, because hydropower requires more of an upfront investment and then pays off in savings during its 50-plus-year life span. Hall said that could be mitigated by federal tax incentives. In the 1980s, when such tax incentives were in place, installation of small hydropower plants boomed. But when the tax credits ended in the early 1990s, so did the development. ***************************************************************** 49 Guardian Unlimited: Two Plead Guilty in Los Alamos Lab Probe From the Associated Press [UP] Tuesday October 19, 2004 11:31 AM ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) - Two former Los Alamos National Laboratory employees accused of being part of a purchasing scandal that rocked the nuclear lab two years ago have pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy and mail fraud. Peter Bussolini, 66, and Scott Alexander, 42, each entered guilty pleas in federal court Monday. U.S. District Judge James Parker said he would not formally accept the deal until he receives a pre-sentencing report. Attorneys for the two said their clients face 12 to 18 months in prison under the deal, which also specifies that the federal government could still mount a civil case. Bussolini had worked at the lab for 24 years and was a team leader in facilities management. Alexander was part of the facilities management team. They were fired in December 2002 after being accused of making hundreds of thousands of dollars in questionable purchases using a lab account. Between Feb. 1, 2001, and Oct. 31, 2002, the two bought television sets, CB radio equipment, vacuum cleaners, barbecues, hunting gear, automobile tires and many other items, according to a 20-page indictment. The case was part of a scandal that broke in November 2002 when allegations surfaced of fraud and mismanagement at the lab. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2004 ***************************************************************** 50 Daily Camera: Tracking Rocky Flats Plutonium remains in Flats foundation Nuclear waste relics worry some environmentalists By Todd Neff, Camera Staff Writer October 19, 2004 During 40 years of nuclear bomb-making, tons of plutonium passed through Building 771 at Rocky Flats. About 1.3 grams will remain, entombed in the building's cement foundation. Rocky Flats officials and regulators said they're confident it won't infiltrate nearby fields and streams. "This is fixed contamination," said John Corsi, spokesman for Kaiser-Hill, the contractor responsible for the $7.2 billion cleanup of the former nuclear weapons plant. "There's no evidence that it's going to migrate." Corsi said crews have been able to remove more plutonium than expected: A year ago, Kaiser-Hill expected 13 grams of plutonium to remain. And given the negligible environmental risks, it wasn't worth jeopardizing worker health and safety to dig out the entire foundation to get every last bit, Corsi said. Kaiser-Hill estimates that plutonium oxide equivalent in weight to a small paper clip remains embedded in the 70,000-square-foot cement foundation of the building once called America's most dangerous. It doesn't sound like much, but 1.3 grams of plutonium yields about 82 billion picocuries of radiation. By comparison, surface soil across the entire 6,300-acre site must be cleaned up to 50 picocuries per cubic centimeter. That amount was estimated to elevate a full-time wildlife worker's lifetime risk of cancer by a thousandth of a percent or less. After the cleanup's completion, scheduled for December 2006, the site will become the Rocky Flats National Wildlife Refuge. Kaiser-Hill and state cleanup regulators are confident plutonium will stay encased in concrete yards below the surface. Crews mechanically peeled away layer after layer of the slab, removing blocks of it for offsite disposal when it couldn't be decontaminated to the 7,000 picocuries-per-gram limit set by state and federal regulators. What's left will be buried between 7 feet and 30 feet deep. Decades of groundwater monitoring at Rocky Flats have shown no presence of plutonium, said Steven Gunderson, who oversees the Rocky Flats cleanup for the state health department. The element is virtually insoluble in water, but Gunderson said the Department of Energy had agreed to dig a well downslope of Building 771 for later groundwater testing. Long-term erosion of the buried slab is a concern, said Shirley Garcia, environmental coordinator for the city and county of Broomfield. The Department of Energy has committed to periodic groundwater monitoring once the site closes, but just how often they'll test is an open question. Garcia said DOE has talked of checking for plutonium just once every five years, which she deemed "unacceptable." Contact Camera Staff Writer Todd Neff at (303) 473-1327 or nefft@dailycamera.com. [http://www.scripps.com] Copyright 2004, The Daily Camera ***************************************************************** 51 ITAR-TASS: Chernobyl-type reactor safety to be considered at conference 19.10.2004, 08.19 MOSCOW, October 19 (Itar-Tass) - The main subject of discussion at an international scientific and technical conference opening here on Tuesday will be how to raise the safety of Chernobyl-type reactors (RMBK) -- high-powered pressure-type reactor -- extend their service life, and subsequently withdraw them from service. An official at Russia's Federal Atomic Energy Agency (RosAtom) told Itar-Tass on Monday that the conference will be attended by representatives of practically all Russian atomic-industry companies and enterprises that operate or produce reactors. Specialists of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Kazakhstan, Lithuania, Ukraine, Britain, Germany, Italy, Canada, France, and Sweden will also participate in the conference. The RosAtom official recalled that the RMBK-1, 000 and RMBK-1, 500 "were developed for the power sector of the Soviet Union at the end of the 1960s-mid-seventies". Such reactors were built and began to operate at the Leningrad, Kursk, Chernobyl, and Smolensk nuclear power stations (NPS). Nowadays, Russia's atomic-power industry comprises 30 operating power units at ten NPS with an aggregate installed power of 22,242 megawatts. "Two types of reactors still remain the principal ones -- the RMBK-11 units with an aggregate power of 11,000 mgw and VVER ones (water-water reactors) -- 14 power units", the RosAtom official specified. © ITAR-TASS. All rights reserved. You undertake not to copy, ***************************************************************** 52 Daily Camera: Tracking Rocky Flats October 19, 2004 Last we knew: The $7.2 billion cleanup of the former nuclear-weapons plant, directed by U.S. Department of Energy contractor Kaiser-Hill Co., continues. The 903 Pad lip area decontamination was completed in September. Latest: Workers scoured the foundation slab of Building 771 — formerly one of the nuclear-weapons complex's most contaminated structures — to the point that just 1.3 grams of plutonium remain permanently. Oversight officials want to make sure it doesn't migrate into ground or surface water in the long-term. Next: Decontamination and decommissioning work continues at Building 776/777 and elsewhere on the site. Building 771 has been demolished and is being filled with tons of clean fill dirt. The frequency of long-term water monitoring near Building 771 remains an open issue. [webmaster@dailycamera.com] ***************************************************************** 53 [du-list] DU in the news - 19th Oct (Part Deux) Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:13:18 -0700 Danger From Depleted Uranium Is Found Low in Pentagon Study New York Times Mon, 18 Oct 2004 8:11 PM PDT A study of weapons made from depleted uranium has concluded that it is not toxic enough to be a threat to soldiers in the doses they are likely to receive. Baghdad Rap (Bagdad Rap) Variety via Yahoo! News Mon, 18 Oct 2004 10:36 AM PDT Camera (color, DV-to-35mm), Cisneros, Yagoba Manterola, Gustavo Ortiz, Nestor Felli; editor, Artiz Gorostiaga; music, Frank T, Ari, Zenit, Selektah Kolektiboa, Case O, Sr. Rojo, Mikel Salas, Guilleaume Marsan. Reviewed on DVD in Los Angeles, Aug. 17, 2004. (In Los Angeles Latino Film Festival.) Original title: Bagdad Rap. Running time: 75 MIN. [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> $9.95 domain names from Yahoo!. Register anything. http://us.click.yahoo.com/J8kdrA/y20IAA/yQLSAA/FGYolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 54 [du-list] DU in the news - 20th Oct 04 Date: Tue, 19 Oct 2004 14:14:19 -0700 Reuters via Yahoo! Australia & NZ News, Tue, 19 Oct 2004 5:20 AM PDT Radioactive Materials Seized in Central Russia http://au.news.yahoo.com/041019/15/ra7i.html MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian security services seized two containers filled with highly radioactive material at a scrap yard in central Russia, Interfax news agency said on Tuesday. Electronic Iraq, Tue, 19 Oct 2004 6:41 AM PDT Jo Wilding, Electronic Iraq, 19 October 2004 http://electroniciraq.net/news/1674.shtml The US has asked the British government to send you north to free up forces for another offensive against Falluja. I'm writing to ask you to refuse any orders to deploy to Baghdad or other areas currently under US control. I was an ambulance volunteer in Falluja during the April siege [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor --------------------~--> Make a clean sweep of pop-up ads. Yahoo! Companion Toolbar. Now with Pop-Up Blocker. Get it for free! http://us.click.yahoo.com/L5YrjA/eSIIAA/yQLSAA/FGYolB/TM --------------------------------------------------------------------~-> To unsubscribe from this groups send a message to du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com. In the body of the message type unsubscribe and send. Yahoo! Groups Links <*> To visit your group on the web, go to: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/du-list/ <*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to: du-list-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com <*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to: http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ ***************************************************************** 55 Las Vegas SUN: Renowned European Laboratory Turns 50 ASSOCIATED PRESS GENEVA (AP) - A European laboratory that was the birthplace of the World Wide Web and home of Nobel prize-winning developments in the quest to understand the makeup of matter wished itself a happy 50th birthday Tuesday. Spain's King Juan Carlos and France's President Jacques Chirac were among representatives of the 20 member nations attending ceremonies commemorating the founding of the European Organization for Nuclear Research, which goes by its original French initials, CERN. "When the 12 founding member states ratified the CERN convention Sept. 29, 1954, they gave the new organization a mission to provide first class facilities, to coordinate fundamental research - in particle physics - and to help reunite the countries of Europe after two world wars," said CERN's Director-General Robert Aymar. After the U.S. Congress pulled the plug on the construction in Texas of the proposed Superconducting Super Collider in 1993, CERN became the focus of much of the world's research into matter and into understanding the origins of the universe. Many scientists from the United States, which still has major rival laboratories, are among the hundreds of physicists who take turns conducting experiments with the particle accelerators underground on the French-Swiss border in Geneva. Other observer nations whose physicists work at CERN include India, Israel, Japan, Russia and Turkey. CERN scientists won the Nobel physics prize in 1984 for the discovery of two subatomic particles and in 1992 for the development of a new way to track particles. In 1990, British scientist Tim Berners-Lee was working at CERN when he proposed a way of linking related pieces of information across the Internet in what became the World Wide Web. The CERN member states are Austria, Belgium, Britain, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland. -- ***************************************************************** 56 eTaiwanNews.com: Nuclear 'solution' would bred disaster [http://www.etaiwannews.com/] Editorial 2004-10-19 / Taiwan News / Since the military pressure from China has gradually intensified over the past few years, international concern has risen over whether Taiwan authorities might consider nuclear weapons as a "deterrent." People First Party Legislator and ex-navy chief of staff Nelson Ku raised his suspicion last Friday that "there is a five-person team, including some active and past members from the current administration, planning the development of nucleaer weapons." Reacting to the PFP lawmakers's statements, Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security President Daniel Albright indicated that United States authorities are concerned that Taiwan might be thinking about nuclear weapons planning. However, in response to Ku's leading question, Premier Yu Shyi-kun solemnly denied that Taiwan was developing nuclear weapons. Moreover, the Ministry of Defense declared Saturday that Taiwan's policy on the issue consisted of "four noes," namely "no research, no production, no storage and no use" of nuclear weapons. Given his status as a former senior military officer, Ku's decision to openly make this speculation in the Legislative Yuan has damaged Taiwan's reputation and the credibility of the Democratic Progressive Party government's commitment to upholding regional peace and stability. Four noes to nukes We affirm the decision by Premier Yu and other Cabinet officials to issue a categorical denial for a so-called "nuclear solution" is neither feasible or desirable for Taiwan and offers no "solution" to the rising intimidating missile or other military threats by the People's Republic of China. First, it would simply be impossible for Taiwan to even take any steps toward developing nuclear weapons due to strict monitoring by the United States.Initial moves in this direction taken by the former Kuomintang regime in the 1970s and 1980s under its martial law dictatorship failed to escape the attention of U.S. monitors and it should be self-evident that no such program could be kept under wraps now in our open and vibrant democratic system. Under the eyes of U.S. nuclear monitors, Taiwan has no equipment or technology that could permit it to develop such weapons and no government in Washington could conceivably transfer to Taiwan the relevant equipment, technology or knowhow for such a program. Moreover, Taiwan's relations with the U.S., our most important security partner and ally, would be irreparably and gravely harmed if Taipei attempted to develop such weapons with assistance from other sources. Second, although the cross-strait conundrum seems unsolvable in principle at present, the differences between Taiwan and the PRC are by no means inevitably leading to military conflict or mutual destruction. Certainly, Beijing's unification proposals have no market in Taiwan, especially as the PRC refuses to renounce the use of force. But it also should be noted that PRC leaders have reiterated their decades-long strategy to achieve "peaceful unification" through closer cross-strait economic ties. The use of force will be the last resort for PRC leaders. As the intensity of hostility between Taiwan and China is far short of the moral and ethical ceiling for either side to consider the prospect of mutually destroying each other. Hence, the slightest consideration by either side of "nuclear solutions" should be roundly morally and ethically condemned and rebuked by the elites in both sides. Third, one of the most fundamental principles of the DPP, and of its antecedents in Taiwan's grassroots democratic, social and environmental movements, is its firm opposition to nuclear power and nuclear weapons, a position now embodied in the basic law for a "nuclear-free home" adopted by the Legislature. Despite the inability of President Chen Shui-bian's administration to date to halt the construction of the fourth nuclear power plant, DPP supporters will not allow the construction of a fifth nuclear power facility and the party leadership and backers will never support the adoption of the far more grave environmental and moral crime of developing nuclear weapons. No matter the severity of our differences with the PRC government, the people of Taiwan will not demonize the Chinese people to such an extent as to permit consideration of the use of nuclear weapons. It should also be kept in mind that thousands of Taiwanese also reside in the PRC. Either from idealistic or pragmatic viewpoints, the pursuit of nuclear weapons makes no sense for Taiwan. From a geo-strategic point of view, Taiwan can play a proactive intermediate role to bridge continental Asia and the advanced economies of North America, Europe and Japan and should aim to play a "positive sum" game and cultivate a position as a generator of value-added innovations and a solvent for cultural frictions. Taiwan's best path for development and survival is to be a peace-maker. It should be apparent that being a peace-maker is at odds with the pursuit of so-called "nuclear solutions." Facing the undeniable and rising military threat from the PRC, Taiwan certainly requires sufficient weapons to defend herself, but nuclear weapons are not a proper option and definitely provide no "solution." Taiwan needs more subtle and sophisticated diplomacy to form formal or tacit alliances with neighboring countries which pursue similar democratic values and build goodwill in global civil society by offering a positive model through following our own "Taiwan road" of "democracy, freedom, human rights, sustainability and peace." Taiwan should also cultivate possible strategic alliance with democratic advocates within China. It is quite plausible that the next wave of dissent in China will be dominated by social appeals in the wake of the widespread political frustration amid economic achievements in the PRC. The range of issues that will be raised will include human rights, environmental protection, living and welfare improvement and preservation of community culture. Taiwan has rich and valuable experience in all of these fields and may be able to gain support among the Chinese people through social and cultural exchanges. As a small but energetic island, Taiwan's lasting source of strength clearly lies in developing "soft power" instead of "hard power." Developing nuclear weapons would only alienate democratic allies and turn Taiwan into a pariah among global advocates of peace and human rights. Far from ensuring Taiwan's survival, such an irresponsible course would bring only global censure and unthinkable disasters. © 2001-2004 Taiwan News. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 57 USATODAY.com: Interest in lost H-bomb resurfaces Home [http://www.usatoday.com/] Posted 10/19/2004 1:45 AM Updated 10/19/2004 9:20 AM By Larry Copeland, USA TODAY TYBEE ISLAND, Ga. — This seaside resort town 18 miles east of Savannah is the very personification of "laid back." The primary pursuits seem to be sunbathing and people-watching. Islanders tend to ignore hurricane evacuation orders, and the city manager wears shorts and sandals to work. Scientists search the waters of Wassaw Sound looking for an H-bomb lost over 46 years ago. By Gerald Weaver, Getty Images So folks here aren't about to fret over a hydrogen bomb that might  or might not  be buried off their coast, left there since a crippled Air Force bomber jettisoned it in 1958. "The only time it even comes up is when one of these groups brings it up. It's been out there since '58. What are you gonna do?" says Michael Buttimer, a bartender-manager at Doc's, a legendary drinking establishment near the beach. He's wearing a baseball cap that says "Tybee Island Bomb Squad  Wassaw Sound." Wassaw Sound, about 10 miles south of Tybee Island City Hall, is the latest likely site of the long-lost bomb. Late last month, a federal government team of 20 experts spent two days searching a football-field-sized area in Wassaw Sound. The team collected water and sand samples and radiation readings and took them to Los Alamos and Sandia national laboratories in New Mexico for analysis, says Lt. Col. Frank Smolinsky, an Air Force spokesman. "We feel comfortable that we will be able to provide an answer of yes, it can be located at this site, or no, it cannot," Smolinsky says. He says that process will take "several weeks or a little more." LOST WEAPONS The U.S. military lost an estimated 11 nuclear bombs during the Cold War that have never been recovered. Some of those incidents: 1956: A B-47 bomber from MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa carrying two nuclear weapon cores in their carrying cases disappeared over the Mediterranean Sea. No trace of the aircraft, weapon cores or crew was found. 1957: A C-124 cargo plane from Dover Air Force Base in Delaware lost power and was forced to jettison two unarmed nuclear bombs in the Atlantic Ocean. The incident was kept secret for more than 10 years. 1959: A Navy plane that had caught fire jettisoned a nuclear bomb in water 8,500 feet deep near Whidbey Island, Wash. The incident was kept secret for more than 10 years. Source: The Brookings Institution And if it is the bomb? "That's the second million-dollar question," Smolinsky says. "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. The same experts would need to reconvene and decide what would be the appropriate action. "We will do whatever is best for the local area in regards to removing the bomb or not removing the bomb. Moving it would not be an easy endeavor to undertake." The Air Force estimated in 2001 that it would take up to five years and cost $5 million to $11 million to recover the bomb. The military searched for the bomb for more than nine weeks in 1958 before declaring it irretrievably lost. Several years ago, Derek Duke, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel who lives in Statesboro, Ga., about 90 miles northwest of here, asked the military to search again. The Air Force said in a July 2001 report that the bomb, likely buried beneath 6 to 40 feet of water and more than 5 feet of mud, posed little threat if left undisturbed. The 7,600-pound bomb is about 12 feet long and about 1˝ feet in diameter. It contains about 400 pounds of conventional explosives plus an undisclosed amount of uranium. It is incapable of a nuclear explosion because it does not have the plutonium capsule necessary to trigger an atomic blast, the Air Force says. If it were armed, the bomb's destructive power would be 100 times greater than that of the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, in 1945  strong enough to incinerate almost everything within a 5-mile radius. It would produce a 160-mile radius of deadly radioactive fallout. The bomb was dumped into the Atlantic Ocean off the Georgia coast the morning of Feb. 5, 1958. A B-47 bomber on a simulated combat mission from Homestead Air Force Base near Miami collided with an F-86 fighter jet. The F-86 pilot bailed out, and his jet crashed. The crew of the damaged B-47 attempted three landings at nearby Hunter Air Force Base with the bomb onboard. Crewmembers then were given permission to jettison the bomb offshore, dropping it from an altitude of about 7,200 feet. They did not see an explosion when the bomb hit the water, and they later landed safely at Hunter. Duke's interest in the bomb dates to 1998, when he learned of the missing bomb. He used radiation and metal detection equipment to search Wassaw Sound. Military authorities decided to search the sound last month after Duke reported finding unusually high radiation levels in that area. Duke initially maintained that the bomb did have the arming capsule. Now, he says, that's not really a consideration. "With (the search team) having come, it's a moot point with me right now," Duke says. "If it is armed or not, unless it creates any additional danger, I'm not going to go there. That's for someone higher up the food chain than me." Duke, 59, says he started searching for the bomb because "if I didn't do it, I didn't see anyone else that would or could do it." He says the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on New York and the Pentagon added urgency to his search. "We've got a very real terror threat." That might suggest that island denizens are sitting on pins and needles awaiting the military's test results. Not so, Tybee Island Mayor Walter Parker says. "We've always been fairly laid back, and we're not all that concerned," says Parker, 69 and in his 15th year as mayor. "I have not heard one person on Tybee Island say they're concerned. We've been assured there's no chance of a nuclear explosion at all. "The only concern some people might have is that it might deter some tourists, but we have not seen or heard anything to support that." Tybee Island, which boasts a famous lighthouse, earns up to half of its annual budget from tourism. Its population of 3,600 year-round residents swells to as much as 12,000 during the summer. Some weekends, 40,000 sun worshipers crowd its beaches. "I have not heard from one property manager, one hotel manager or one condo manager about this hurting their business," City Manager Bob Thomson says. "And I would have heard." Louie Williford, 59, is nursing a beer at Doc's and not pondering the bomb. "I don't really think about it," he says. "If it's gonna happen, it's gonna happen. Ain't nothing I can do about it." Quest for lost H-bomb in Ga.10/19/2004 9:20 AMBy Larry Copeland, USA TODAYTYBEE ISLAND, Ga.Scientists search the waters of Wassaw Sound looking for an H-bomb lost over 46 years ago. 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