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line and first line of body
NUCLEAR POLICY
1 US: Platts: House Energy Committee passes energy legislation
2 US: AFP: DOE secretary calls on lawmakers to pass energy bill Messen
3 US: Newsweek: Nuclear Options - Do we need new nukes?
4 Guardian Unlimited: Lib Dems set out environment plans
5 Bellona: Murmansk Shipping Company might loose nuclear icebreakers
6 Bellona: Nuclear icebreakers to reach lifetime limit in 2010
7 Xinhua: China, US hold annaul forum on global issues
NUCLEAR REACTORS
8 [du-list] Russia's oldest nuclear plant under investigation
9 US: Don't close HIA tower overnight
10 US: Utne: Greens Go Nuclear?
11 US: JS Online: Electric bills rising over nuclear plant shutdown
12 US: NRC: NRC to Discuss 2004 Performance at Watts Bar Nuclear Power
13 US: NRC: NRC Approves Extended Power Uprate for Waterford Nuclear Po
14 US: NRC: Exelon Generation Company, LLC; Correction; Notice of Publi
15 US: Mercury: Nuclear plant gets high grades for safety
16 US: NRC: Sunshine Federal Register Notice
NUCLEAR SECURITY
17 UN Reports 'removal' At Iraqi Nuclear Sites, But No Conclusions Can
18 Guardian Unlimited: IAEA Calls for Review of Key Iraqi Sites
19 US: Las Vegas RJ: Prospects for nuclear terrorism study in air
20 AFP: South Korea scraps US military plan on North Korea Messenger
21 US: Honolulu Star-Bulletin: Radioactive material destroyed
22 Korea Herald: 'N. Korea nuclear ambition only a tactic'
23 AU: NKorea celebrates with nuclear threat
NUCLEAR SAFETY
24 US: NRC: NRC to Discuss Preliminary Results of Special Inspection at
25 US: Idaho Statesman: Crapo takes important step to help downwinders
26 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Blister Weapons: Pentagon should give up
27 Xinhua: IAEA reports removal activities at Iraqi nuclear sites
28 Japan Times: Students translate hibakusha anthology into English
29 US: Ironton Online: Strickland fights for plant pension plan
NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE
30 [NukeNet] Aomori OKs MOX fuel plant plan
31 US: Brattleboro Reformer: Dry cask or fuel pool?
32 US: Bradenton Herald: Report to map plume edges
33 US: San Luis Obispo Tribune: Nuclear fuel case is no laughing matter
34 Las Vegas RJ: E-mails more fodder for Nevada officials
35 US: Bellona: Kazakhstan increases uranium production
36 US: Las Vegas SUN: Editorial: How about us, too?
37 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Lawmakers handed session 'to do' list
38 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Envirocare hearing a moot point for now
39 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Bear pleads guilty to U.S. tax charge
40 US: ICT: American Indian delegation to Washington urges clean energy
41 US: NRC: Advisory Committee On Nuclear Waste; Revised
42 Japan Times: Aomori OKs MOX fuel plant plan
43 US: Vermont Guardian: Jobs, economy overshadow nuclear waste questio
44 US: News-Record: Uranium mine plans expansion
45 AU ABC: Aust invention to clean up nuclear waste site.
46 US: AU ABC: Environment group launches nuclear tour.
47 US: Deseret News: Goshute chairman to repay $30,000 he got illegally
PEACE
US DEPT. OF ENERGY
48 Seattle Times: Hanford contractor to lay off 700
49 Tri-City Herald: Bechtel to cut 700 more jobs
50 Times-News: INL highlights changes in contractor, vision
51 lamonitor.com: DOE to sample airport ash site
52 The Paducah Sun: DOE again delays plant cleanup
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FULL NEWS STORIES
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1 Platts: House Energy Committee passes energy legislation
+ Energy legislation cleared the House Energy &Commerce
Committee late April 13.
The 39-16 voice vote came after three days of debate in which
Republicans rejected an attempt by committee Democrats to remove
controversial language shielding producers of the gasoline
additive MTBE from defective-product lawsuits.
That language stymied Senate action on the bill last year,
killing it. Sen. Pete Domenici (R-N.M.), chairman of the Senate
Energy &Natural Resources Committee, today praised House Energy
Committee Chairman Joe Barton (R-Texas) for his leadership and
bipartisan effort on the bill.
Domenici said he was particularly pleased to see that the bill
passed the House committee "by such a wide, bipartisan margin."
He said he would try to build on Barton's success when the Senate
Energy Committee takes up the bill this spring. The bill is
expected to move to the House floor for a vote next week.
Washington (Platts)--14Apr2005
Copyright © 2005 - Platts, All Rights Reserved
[The McGraw-Hill Companies]
*****************************************************************
2 AFP: DOE secretary calls on lawmakers to pass energy bill Messenger
Friday April 15, 05:22 PM
WASHINGTON (AFX) -- Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman on Friday
called on Congress to quickly pass comprehensive energy
legislation to begin to address high domestic energy costs. 'The
status quo is clearly not working,' Bodman told a room of
industry representatives attending a U.S. Energy Association
meeting. The secretary said high energy prices are not the chief
problem, but they are a symptom of a larger supply issue. The
administration is seeking to boost supplies of natural gas,
coal, and nuclear, Bodman said.
This story was supplied by MarketWatch. For further information
see www.marketwatch.com.
Copyright © 2005 AFP AFX. All rights reserved. Republication or
redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly
prohibited without the written consent of AFX
*****************************************************************
3 Newsweek: Nuclear Options - Do we need new nukes?
By Fred Kaplan
slate.msn.com
Posted Friday, April 15, 2005, at 2:19 PM PT
Back on the horizon
The nuclear gurus are staging a comeback. Their wedge of
opportunity is a technical debate that's emerged inside the
weapons labs, a debate so arcane that probably only a few
hundred scientists can engage its issues fully. Yet the outcome
of this debate could zap new jolts of life into a vast nuclear
complex—of strategic thinking, nuclear testing, warhead
production, and missile deployment—that's lain moribund for
more than a decade.
The spark of all this is a nuclear warhead called the W-76, the
hydrogen bomb packed inside roughly 3,300 of the United States'
5,000 or so strategic nuclear weapons. Eight of them are packed
inside every Trident I and Trident II missile, which are loaded
into the U.S. Navy's fleet of submarines that roams the oceans,
under the surface, undetectable and therefore invulnerable to
pre-emptive attack. In short, the W-76 is the mainstay of
America's nuclear deterrent.
When the W-76s came into the arsenal between 1972 and 1987, they
were expected to have a 20-year lifespan. Most of the warheads
have long passed that expiration date, and the remaining few are
approaching it. So, this is the question: Is the W-76 literally
obsolete? Does it work anymore? If the president pushed the
button, would these bombs explode? If it seems very likely that
they wouldn't, should we build a new warhead? And if we go that
far, should we test it to make sure it works—that is, explode
it underground and, in the process, break the Comprehensive Test
Ban Treaty, which the United States signed in 1995 and started
observing under the first President Bush in '92? (Every country
in the world except India, Pakistan, and North Korea has signed
it, though the United States and China haven't ratified it.) And
as long as we're building and testing a new warhead, should we
simply go with a remodeled W-76—or design something new for
the post-Cold War era?
In other words, uncertainties about the W-76's reliability open
a back door for a slew of nuclear weapons programs—mini nukes,
bunker-busters, electromagnetic-pulse enhancers, and so
forth—that critics in Congress and elsewhere have managed to
block when the assault has been frontal.
Two questions need to be considered in this exercise: First, is
there anything to this claim that the W-76s are duds? Second,
does it matter?
The first question is complicated, but one thing is clear: The
initial forecast that the W-76 would have only a 20-year
lifespan is almost certainly wrong. Since the early '90s, the
Department of Energy's weapons labs have put the W-76 through
several elaborate modifications—new or more refined neutron
generators, re-entry bodies, safety locks, arming and fusing
systems, and so forth. A new round of refurbishment, called the
W-76 Life Extension Program, scheduled to get under way in two
years, will supposedly give the warhead an additional 30 years.
(For a detailed description of all these enhancements, click
here.)
Yet some veteran weapons scientists claim the W-76 had a crucial
design flawall along. The warhead was jam-packed with electronic
gear, yet it had to be sufficiently small and light for eight of
them to fit into a single Trident missile. As a result, the
casing is very thin—so thin that, these scientists say, the
slightest shockwave (say, the shock of being launched out of a
submarine missile tube or separating from the missile-rocket's
first stage in outer space) could disable the explosive
mechanism inside; in short, the warhead would not explode with
nearly enough power to destroy targets of much size or
resilience. (For a slightly more elaborate explanation, click
here.)
As a result, these scientists say, a life-extension program is a
waste of time and money. Instead, they propose phasing out the
W-76 and accelerating the Reliable Replacement Warhead, a
little-known but already fast-growing R&D program, which is
consuming $1.3 billion in this year's military budget alone.
Which side is right on this question? The answer is probably
beyond the ken of any outsider. This month, Donald Rumsfeld
instructed the Defense Science Board to appoint a Task Force on
Nuclear Capabilitiesto evaluate the controversy. But the two men
named to chair the panel—John Foster and retired Gen. Larry
Welch—all but predetermine its conclusions. Foster was for
years the director of the Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory, which built the hydrogen bomb and most of the U.S.
warheads built in the half-century since. A very intelligent and
articulate scientist who has served on countless government
advisory boards over the decades, Foster has long been an ardent
advocate of new and more refined nuclear weapons. Welch capped
his long career as the U.S. Air Force chief of staff, and in
recent years has headed panels that call for accelerating
missile defense and, more pertinently, expanding the lifespan of
the nuclear arsenal.
In short, it's a pretty sure bet that this panel will conclude
we need new warheads.
Which leads to the second question: Does any of this matter?
Would America's power and influence erode—would our leaders be
less able to deter aggression or fight wars—if it suddenly
appeared that two-thirds of our nuclear weapons might as well be
cardboard cutouts?
A case can be made that it doesn't much matter; that beyond a
certain number, nuclear weapons exert no influence on the
international balance of power; and that, if nuclear war does
break out, all the fine-tuned strategies for waging such a
thing—and which have justified a large nuclear arsenal—will
almost certainly go up in smoke.
My own view is that we could get by with far fewer nukes. But a
case could be made for a different view. In any event, the
question is too important to be left to the random grind of
attrition. It's intellectually evasive to disarm by
default—i.e., by passively letting the warheads wear out. More
to the point, it's not a politically sustainable position; there
are nuclear advocates in positions of power who will not allow
it.
A new nuclear debate is getting ready to rage. In many ways,
it's a resumption of a debate that took center stage in national
security politics for a 30-year run, from the outset of the
U.S.-Soviet arms race in the early 1960s through the end of the
Cold War in the early '90s. The setting is brand new, but the
questions are the same: What roles do nuclear weapons play in
war and peace? How many do we need? What kinds of targets should
they be aimed at in order to fulfill those roles? One side of
this debate—the side for "many roles," "more weapons," and
"lots of targets"—has already begun to make its case. The
other side will get steamrollered unless it gets started, too.
Fred Kaplan has written about mini nukes and President Bush's
empty nuclear-proliferation rhetoric.
Fred Kaplan writes the "War Stories" column for Slate and is the
author of The Wizards of Armageddon, a history of U.S. nuclear
strategy.
Photograph of mushroom cloud by AFP Photo/Department of Energy.
©2005 Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive Co. LLC |
*****************************************************************
4 Guardian Unlimited: Lib Dems set out environment plans
Election blog: our man at the press conference
Tom Happold and agencies
Friday April 15, 2005
[Charles Kennedy launches the Lib Dems' environmental policies]
Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA
Charles Kennedy today promised the Liberal Democrats would take
"responsibility for the future generations" by acting to protect
the environment and stop global warming.
The Lib Dem leader, who became a father earlier this week,
warned that it would be "our children who reap the consequences"
if the government allowed greenhouse emissions to rise.
Launching his party's environmental policies, Mr Kennedy claimed
that environmentally damaging behaviour cost Britain Ł67bn last
year - equivalent to the budget of the NHS.
"If Tony Blair had devoted even a tenth of the political energy,
wealth and resources that have been expected over Iraq, to
convincing George Bush of the urgency of the environmental
threat, imagine where we would be by now," he said.
However Mr Kennedy was more cagey about his personal record on
the environment. Asked if he was using reusable nappies, he
replied only that he was "determined to keep this baby out of
politics" before claiming he used low-energy light bulbs and
recycled his household waste.
Mr Kennedy was more keen to outline the green policies contained
in the Liberal Democrat manifesto, which was launched yesterday.
The party promises it would ensure that Britain took the lead on
international negotiations for the next set of targets for
greenhouse gas emissions, if elected to government.
Its other pledges include recycling 60% of all household waste
by 2012, generating 20% of electricity by renewable sources by
2020 and a moratorium on new incinerators and no new nuclear
power stations.
Mr Kennedy pledged the party would put a series of
"environmental incentives" in place to encourage green
behaviour, and ensure that industries - including passenger
airlines - pay the "environmental cost" of their activities.
The Labour party accused Mr Kennedy of having a "brass neck"
over his party's environmental policy.
Fraser Kemp, Labour's campaign spokesman, picked out some key
inconsistencies between the party's newly avowed manifesto
pledges and previous Lib Dem moves.
"The Lib Dems want 20% renewable energy use by 2020 yet he
opposed wind farms in his own constituency," Mr Kem said.
"Norman Baker says the Lib Dems want to extend road charging
across the UK, yet the Lib Dems campaigned against it fiercely
in Edinburgh because it was not an 'attractive' option for them.
It's the same old story from the Lib Dems. Fine words in
Westminster, rank opportunism locally."
The Conservative party lunged at Lib Dems' proposals to extend
the congestion charge. "It is very characteristic of them to
promise everything while being unable to deliver anything
without taxing people to the hilt," a Conservative spokeswoman
said. "They are trying to be everything to every man."
[UP]
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
5 Bellona: Murmansk Shipping Company might loose nuclear icebreakers
Over one year the Russian Accounts Chamber has been trying to
prove the Murmansk Shipping Company operates the nuclear
icebreakers illegally and ineffectively.
2005-04-15 19:02
The Russian Accounts Chamber stated last month that its decision
from 2004 when effectiveness and proper use of the nuclear
icebreakers by the Murmansk Shipping Company, or MSC, was
inspected, has not been fulfilled. According to the statement,
the Russian government has not taken measures on depriving
Murmansk Shipping Company of the federal property, the nuclear
icebreakers, which were transferred to the company illegally in
1998.
The Accounts Chamber claims the trust management is ineffective
and damages the state interests. So, the MSC keeps renting out
nuclear icebreakers to the foreign companies for the cruises to
the North Pole when the profit of the foreign companies is four
times bigger than the rent pay what shows that some part of the
money stays abroad. Besides, the MSC did not pay the state for
the rent of the nuclear icebreakers, so just in 2002-2004 Russia
lost 468 million roubles (about $16.7m). The collegium of the
Audits Chamber decided to send a note to the president, the
government and the general prosecutors’ office.
On the other side, the Murmansk Shipping Company informed media
about the profit due to the effective nuclear icebreakers’
operation in 2004. After paying all taxes the profit was equal
to 139.9 million roubles ($5m). According to the Russian law,
all the profit received from the federal property operation in
trust management should be transferred to the state budget. The
MSC is expecting all the bank details from the authorities to
transfer the 2004 profit. Besides, the MSC stated that in 2003
it had transferred 180.62 million roubles ($6.5m) profit to the
state budget what can be confirmed by the account documents.
The Murmansk Shipping Company is the only Russian company
operating in Arctic all year around. The MSC has been operating
the nuclear icebreakers since 1959, and from 1998 they were
transferred under the trust management of the MSC. The company
is the monopoly on the strategic market of the icebreaker
assistance in the Arctic. It delivers cargo for various oil and
mining companies as well as ships goods to the remote Russian
cities in the Arctic region.
Some transport experts believe it hardly possible to operate the
nuclear icebreakers with better profit. ”It is no doubt, the MSC
manages the icebreakers’ fleet in the best possible way” said to
RBC-daily one of the directors of the SeaNews information agency
Alexey Bezborodov. He added that hardly the state itself could
operate it better, and only some foreign management team might
get better results. Besides, the experts believe, the MSC
contributed the state budget quite well in comparison with the
other Russian natural resources monopolies. For example, in 2003
the MSC paid 0.05 roubles for one rouble of the assets, while
the giant gas monopoly Gasprom paid just 0.002 roubles,
concluded Alexey Bezborodov to the RBCDaily.
Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge
Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact:
webmaster@bellona.no
Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box
2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway
*****************************************************************
6 Bellona: Nuclear icebreakers to reach lifetime limit in 2010
Advisor of Marine and River Transport Federal Agency Alexander
Ushakov stated this at the round table meeting on actual
problems of the Russian sea ports and the state’s role in their
solution organised by the Rosbalt agency.
2005-04-15 19:53
According to Alexander Ushakov, the last nuclear icebreaker
entered service in 1991. It was built in Finland and received
the Russian equipment. The construction of the ”50 years
victory” nuclear icebreaker began in 1989 and is still
unfinished. ”It never happened before, as it usually took from 5
to 6 years” he said. Today it would take from 10 to 11 years to
design and build a nuclear icebreaker. The nuclear icebreakers
lifetime will be over by 2008-2010 and ”ice pause” is possible.
”When the resources of the nuclear icebreakers are exhausted,
many Russian ports would not be able to work in winter” believes
Ushakov, Rosbalt reported.
Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge
Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact:
webmaster@bellona.no
Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box
2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway
*****************************************************************
7 Xinhua: China, US hold annaul forum on global issues
www.xinhuanet.com
www.chinaview.cn 2005-04-15 10:59:05
BEIJING, April 15 -- China and the United States have held
the first of what is planned to be an annual forum focusing on
global issues.
The first session of the China-US Global Issues Forum was
headed by China's Assistant Minister of Foreign Affairs Shen
Guofang, and Paula Dobriansky, US Under Secretary of State for
Global Affairs.
The proposed UN reform and Japan's bid for the permanent
membership in it were the focus at Thursday's meeting.
Shen Guofang says the two sides agree on the need for reform
but he says the detailed process needs more discussion.
"We all believe the major purpose of the UN reform is to
increase its efficiency and its capability of dealing with
challenges. Besides, we all believe reform of the Security
Council needs multilateral and comprehensive discussions to
reach consensus since it's a very sensitive issue. And we are
all against setting a timetable."
When asked about the Sino-US discussion on Japan's bid for
the permanent membership in the UN Security Council, Shen
Guofang had this to say.
"We have made our stance clear, and they did so too. They
said the US now is open to every plan."
The Sino-US Global Issues Forum will be held annually with
the second session to be held in Beijing next year.
Also on Thursday, Chinese ambassador to the US, Zhou
Wenzhong met with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
It was the first meeting since he took the position earlier
this month.
The Chinese ambassador says the US is expressing willingness
to strengthen bilateral ties.
"We've exchanged ideas on Sino-US relationship, and the
nuclear situation of North Korea. The US says it's willing to
cooperate."
(Source: China Daily)
Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
8 [du-list] Russia's oldest nuclear plant under investigation
Date: Fri, 15 Apr 2005 17:59:47 -0700
http://www.isn.ethz.ch/news/sw/details.cfm?id=11110
ISN SECURITY WATCH (14/04/05) - After decades of warnings from ecologists
and denials from authorities, a criminal investigation has been launched
into the extent of ecological damage caused by Russia's oldest nuclear fuel
reprocessing plant, Mayak.
Russian Prosecutor General Vladimir Ustinov ordered the investigation
earlier this week, and a team of experts from his office and the Federal
Security Services (FSB) arrived on the site on Thursday.
The Mayak facility stores and reprocesses spent nuclear fuel from Russian
atomic power stations and nuclear submarines. It is also planned that Mayak
will reprocess fuel returned from Iran's Russian-built Bushehr atomic power
station.
The criminal case against Mayak was launched after prosecutors checked
radiation levels and concentrations of toxic agents in the rivers around
the plant, which is located in the Ural mountains. Inspectors found that
the radiation level in the river Techa exceeds the allowed level by an
order of several hundredfold. In 2004 alone, Mayak was found to have dumped
more than 60 million cubic meters of toxic waste into the Techa.
Mayak officials deny any wrongdoing, saying that the plant operated in line
with all safety requirements. If convicted, the plant's managers face up to
five years in prison.
In 1957, Mayak was the site of a major ecological disaster that many
ecologists said was second only to the Chernobyl catastrophe.
A highly radioactive liquid waste spilled over from Mayak's storage pools,
contaminating thousands of square kilometers. Hundreds of thousands of
local citizens have been affected by the disaster, which the Soviet
government attempted to cover up.
After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Mayak became a major target for
Russian ecologists who have persistently demanded that the plant be shut
down and the people living in the contaminated zone be resettled.
Russian ecologists have also frequently reported new leaks at the plant,
with authorities consistently denying those reports.
On Thursday, Russia's chief ombudsman, Vladimir Lukin, sent a letter to
Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov outlining a program to solve the problems
arising from radioactive leaks at Mayak.
Greenpeace will also launch an international campaign to bring global
attention to the situation, the coordinator of the Russian branch of the
ecological watchdog, Vladimir Chuprov, said on Thursday.
(By Nabi Abdullaev in Moscow)
» Reference links » Current issues links » Earlier news
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9 Don't close HIA tower overnight
Date: Fri, 15 Apr 2005 17:59:19 -0700
The Patriot-News: Holden: Don't close HIA tower overnight
FAA seeks to darken 42 airports for 5 hours
Friday, April 15, 2005
BY BRETT LIEBERMAN
Of Our Washington Bureau
WASHINGTON - The potential of threats to Three Mile Island will be
considered before a decision is made on whether to close the control tower
at Harrisburg International Airport overnight, a senior federal official
said yesterday.
The Federal Aviation Administration is considering closing the towers at HIA
and 41 other airports between midnight and 5 a.m. to save money.
Advertisement
At a congressional hearing yesterday, Russ Chew, the FAA's chief operating
officer for air traffic organization, said the agency is early in a review
of air traffic control towers that would go dark.
Control towers at Lehigh Valley International Airport and Williamsport
Regional Airport also may be unmanned overnight. The plan would call for
operations at those airports to be monitored from more distant regional
centers.
Lawmakers, the air traffic controllers union and airport officials worry
that it is an unwise cost-cutting move that would undercut safety.
Rep. Tim Holden, D-Schuylkill County, cited HIA's proximity to Three Mile
Island and the Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station. He said the regional
center in New York cannot monitor air traffic below 5,000 feet.
"If a plane with malicious intent is flying below 5,000 feet near [Three
Mile Island or Peach Bottom Atomic Power Station], there will be no one who
could see it between midnight and 5 a.m.," Holden said.
Chew estimated closing the towers nationally would save $6 million for the
agency, which has a proposed budget of nearly $14 billion next year. But
Holden and union officials said they have been told that savings could be as
low as $2 million.
HIA officials put the annual savings at $50,000 to $70,000 for the cost of
one flight controller.
"When you're talking about saving one-tenth of 1 percent to put into
jeopardy the airspace surrounding two nuclear plants, this is something that
would not be wise at all," said Holden, who raised the issue during a House
Transportation and Infrastructure Aviation subcommittee hearing yesterday.
The affected airports average four or fewer flights per hour from midnight
to 5 a.m., according to an FAA operations study last June, July and August.
HIA averaged 3.7 flights per hour during the study.
But Holden told Chew that operations per hour should not be the sole
criterion.
Holden cited HIA's homeland security role for TMI and Peach Bottom and the
use of the airport by the 193rd Special Operations Wing of the Pennsylvania
Air National Guard as factors the FAA should consider.
HIA is a backup airport for aircraft, including Air Force One, diverted from
Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington, D.C. The airport also controls the
airspace for the Capital City Airport and the Reading and Lancaster airports
overnight.
"We cover such a wide area," said Tim Edwards, HIA's deputy director. "Even
though the traffic associated with HIA may slow down considerably after the
midnight hour, there's still considerable traffic-control requirements in
our area."
While noting it's "important to maintain standards of safety," Chew said,
"Under the right conditions, it's perfectly safe."
There are more than 5,000 airports in the United States, but only about 10
percent have control towers, he said.
Ken Montoya, a lobbyist for the National Air Traffic Controllers
Association, questioned whether what he describe as minuscule budget savings
are worth the safety risks.
"More controllers who have their eyes out there looking at the sky, the
safer it is," Montoya said.
BRETT LIEBERMAN: (202) 383-7833 or blieberman@patriot-news.com
Attachment Converted: "c:\program files\eudora\attach\TMI worthless.pdf 1.pdf"
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10 Utne: Greens Go Nuclear?
Environmentalists embrace a former foe to combat global
warming
—By Leif Utne, Utne.com
April 14, 2005 Issue
The environmental movement was largely built on opposition to
nuclear power. Who can forget the high seas adventures of
Greenpeace's flagship, the Rainbow Warrior, in the 1970s and 80s,
sailing its ragtag crew into danger zones in the Pacific to stop
US and French nuclear tests? Or the anti-nuke campaigns of the
German Green Party, whose members laid themselves across train
tracks to block shipments of nuclear fuel and radioactive waste?
No issue is as integral to the identity of modern
environmentalists.
No issue, that is, except perhaps global warming; which is why a
number of prominent environmentalists have begun to rethink their
positions on nuclear power. In the past year, British scientist
James Lovelock, developer of the Gaia theory, futurist Stewart
Brand, founder of the Whole Earth Catalog, Hugh Montefiore,
longtime trustee of Friends of the Earth, and others have
publicly called for massive new investments in nuclear energy.
"The primary cause of global climate change is our burning of
fossil fuels for energy," writes . "So everything must be done to
increase energy efficiency and decarbonize energy production."
The argument is that nuclear power is a proven technology, which
has come a long way in terms of safety and efficiency since the
days of the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl disasters. "Clean
coal, solar-powered roof tiles, wind farms in North Dakota --
they're all pie in the emissions-free sky," converted nuke
boosters . "But zero-carbon reactors are here and now. We know
we can build them. Their price tag is no mystery. They fit into
the existing electric grid without a hitch. Flannel-shirted
environmentalists who fight these realities run the risk of
ending up with as much soot on their hands as the slickest
coal-mining CEO."
Problems like waste storage, accidents, high construction costs,
and the danger of weapons-grade material falling into the wrong
hands are surmountable, says Brand, if environmentalists would
take the reins. "The best way for doubters to control a
questionable new technology is to embrace it, lest it remain
wholly in the hands of enthusiasts who think there is nothing
questionable about it."
As for slick energy company CEOs: Paul Anderson, chief of Duke
Energy, a North Carolina coal and nuclear utility, has undergone
something of a climate-change conversion. In a letter to
shareholders last week, , he announced his company's decision to
lobby for a tax on carbon-dioxide emissions. His argument, as
outlined in a recent speech: "If we (the US energy industry)
ignore the issue, we would be the easy target. The worst scenario
would be if all 50 states took separate actions and we have to
comply with 50 different laws."
*****************************************************************
11 JS Online: Electric bills rising over nuclear plant shutdown
Utility warns of more increases for extended work
By THOMAS CONTENT
tcontent@journalsentinel.com Posted: April 14, 2005
An electricity price increase to compensate for the shutdown of
the Kewaunee nuclear plant took effect Thursday.
The increase came on the same day that one of the utilities that
owns the plant warned customers to expect more increases because
Kewaunee won't return for several more weeks.
The state Public Service Commission on Thursday voted to approve
a $26.4 million increase for customers of Madison-based
Wisconsin Power &Light Co. That translates to an increase of
2.6%, or $1.52 per month for the average residential customer,
while business customers will see an increase of more than 4%,
company spokeswoman Janice Mathis said.
Later Thursday, WP asked permission from state regulators to
recover another $10 million from customers at a later date,
Mathis said.
More time off-line
The Kewaunee reactor was originally scheduled to be back in
service by mid-April, but the shutdown has been extended by at
least a month. Both WP and Green Bay-based Wisconsin Public
Service Corp., the plant's principal owner, are facing higher
costs because they must replace low-cost nuclear power with more
expensive electricity generated by natural gas-fired plants.
Modifications that the nuclear plant east of Green Bay may need
are being reviewed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which
will meet with plant managers next week to discuss the status of
the shutdown, said Jan Strasma, a spokesman for the agency.
Kerry Spees, a spokesman for Wisconsin Public Service, said the
shutdown was extended because the plant is conducting a more
exhaustive review of the facility, beyond the reactor's backup
cooling water pump. The plant was taken out of service Feb. 20
to assess problems relating to NRC inspections concerning the
ability of the cooling water pump to withstand a tornado.
The prices approved Thursday for Wisconsin Power &Light
customers aren't permanent, but were set on an interim basis,
pending a full audit of the rate request, the commission said.
Dane County customers
The increase affects customers primarily in Dane County and
southwestern Wisconsin, but the utility also has customers in
Fond du Lac, Sheboygan, Dodge, Kenosha and Walworth counties.
The request for a price increase comes as Wisconsin Power &Light
already has a request for a $58 million, or 7%, price increase
pending with the commission. Customers can weigh in on that
price increase during public hearings next Friday in Fond du
Lac, Madison and Janesville. In that case, a typical residential
electric customer would see a monthly increase of approximately
$4.27.
The size of that increase is being challenged by customer
groups. The utility hopes that case is decided in time for the
rates to take effect July 1, Mathis said.
Also Thursday, the commission voted to launch investigations
into whether to reduce the electricity prices of customers of
Madison Gas &Electric Co. and Wisconsin Public Service Corp.
Lower generation costs
Last month the two utilities said their fuel costs were lower
than expected during the first two months of the year. MG was
more than 10% below the amount predicted for fuel costs, and
Wisconsin Public Service was nearly 6% below for the first two
months of 2005, the commission said.
MG spokesman Steve Krause said an unusually warm February
resulted in lower furnace use, which contributed to the lower
fuel costs. At WPS, John Guntlisbergen, director of revenue and
margin analysis, said the company's decision to defer costs
associated with the Kewaunee shutdown contributed to the change.
As a result, the real issue is when customers should pay higher
costs relating to the shutdown, he said.
Robert Norcross, administrator of natural gas and energy at the
commission, said the review could determine that WPS customers
should get a refund now, and an increase later.
From the April 15, 2005, editions of the Milwaukee Journal
Sentinel
*****************************************************************
12 NRC: NRC to Discuss 2004 Performance at Watts Bar Nuclear Power Plant
News Release - Region II - 2005-02
U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Office of Public Affairs, Region II
No. II-05-020 April 15, 2005
CONTACT: Ken Clark (404) 562-4416
Roger D. Hannah (404) 562-4417 E-mail: opa2@nrc.gov
with Tennessee Valley Authority officials April 18 to discuss
the NRCs annual assessment of safety performance at the Watts
Bar nuclear power plant, located near Spring City, Tenn. The
period covered is the calendar year 2004.
The 3:00 p.m. meeting at the Watts Bar Training Center near the
plant is open to public observation. Before the meeting ends,
NRC staff will be available to answer public questions on the
plants safety performance, as well as the agencys role in
ensuring safe operation of the facility.
Each year the NRC staff rates the performance of the Watts Bar
plant and all of the nations other commercial nuclear power
plants, NRC Region II Administrator William Travers said. This
meeting gives us a chance to discuss our assessment with the
company, with local officials and with residents near the plant.
Our aim is to make this information available to the public and
answer any questions people may have about our oversight.
Overall, the Watts Bar plant operated safely during 2004. The
NRC uses color-coded inspection findings and performance
indicators to assess performance. The colors start with green
and increase to white, yellow or red, commensurate with the
safety significance of the issues involved.
Based on the plants performance during 2004, Watts Bar will
receive the baseline, or normal, level of inspections during
2005. The NRC also plans to conduct non-routine inspections of
the plants preparations for steam generator replacement.
A letter sent from the NRC Region II Office to plant officials
addresses the performance of the plant during the period and
will serve as the basis for the meeting discussion. It is
available on the NRC web site at
www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/wb_2004q4.pdf [PDF
Icon] .
Routine inspections are performed by NRC Resident Inspectors
assigned to the plant and by specialists from the Region II
Office in Atlanta, and the agencys headquarters in Rockville,
Md.
Current information for the Watts Bar plant is available on the
NRC web site at:
www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/WB1/wb1_chart.html.
Last revised Friday, April 15, 2005
*****************************************************************
13 NRC: NRC Approves Extended Power Uprate for Waterford Nuclear Power Plant
News Release - 2005-06 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office
of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC
20555-0001 E-mail: opa@nrc.gov No. 05-067 April 15, 2005
Waterford nuclear power plant by approximately 8 percent. The
NRC staffs review determined that Entergy can safely increase
the reactors power output after upgrading several plant
components and complying with a license condition. Entergy must
submit an amendment for NRC review and approval to account for
instrument uncertainty.
NRC staff also reviewed Entergys evaluations that showed the
plants design can handle the increased power level. The NRC's
safety evaluation focused on several areas, including nuclear
steam supply systems, instrumentation and control systems,
electrical systems, accident evaluations, radiological
consequences, operations, and other technical specification
changes.
Extended power uprates involve significant modifications to
plant equipment such as the high pressure turbines, main
generators, and/or transformers. The power uprate at the plant,
located 20 miles west of New Orleans, La., will increase the
plants generating capacity from approximately 1075 to 1143
megawatts electric. The licensee intends to implement the uprate
following its spring refueling outage.
NRC previously published a notice about the power uprate
application in the Federal Register, providing the public an
opportunity to comment or request a hearing. No comments or
hearing requests were received by the NRC. The agencys
evaluation of the Waterford uprate will be available through the
NRCs ADAMS electronic document database by entering ML051030082
on this Web page: http://adamswebsearch.nrc.gov/dologin.htm.
Last revised Friday, April 15, 2005
*****************************************************************
14 NRC: Exelon Generation Company, LLC; Correction; Notice of Public
FR Doc 05-7566
[Federal Register: April 15, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 72)]
[Notices] [Page 19973] From the Federal Register Online via GPO
Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr15ap05-86]
Meeting on the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for an Early
Site Permit (ESP) at the Exelon ESP Site; Correction AGENCY:
Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Notice of public meeting; correction.
SUMMARY: This document corrects a notice appearing in the Federal
Register that announced a public meeting to be held to discuss
the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for an ESP at the Exelon
ESP Site and to accept public comments. This action is necessary
to correct an erroneous street address in the April 8, 2005
notice (70 FR 18063).
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. Thomas Kenyon, Project
Manager, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, telephone (301)
415-1120.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: In the April 8, 2005 notice (70 FR
18063) on page 18063, in the second column, the street address is
changed from ``401 N. Center Street'' to ``701 Illini Drive.''
Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 12th day of April 2005.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Samson S. Lee, Acting Program Director, License Renewal and
Environmental Impacts Program, Division of Regulatory Improvement
Programs, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation.
[FR Doc. 05-7566 Filed 4-14-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P
*****************************************************************
15 Mercury: Nuclear plant gets high grades for safety
04/15/2005 -
LIMERICK -- Exelon’s Limerick Generating Station had a smooth
year of operation, according to its annual assessment meeting
with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Thursday.
"We’re very proud of the quality of work we do at the site, but
we’re also committed to continuous improvement to make sure we
stay at the highest levels of operation," Plant Manager Bryan
Hanson said.
The discussion was held in a public forum with members from
several organizations also in attendance.
Resident inspector Greg Bowman illustrated the reactor oversight
process and the evaluation process for the plant.
The facility was given a green score for both performance
indicators and inspection findings, meaning there were very low
safety issues and the NRC will perform only baseline inspections
during the current year.
"The bottom line is, we would not allow a plant to operate if we
were not fully confident it was operating safely," Bowman said.
Senior resident inspector Sam Hansell said there were 5,660
hours of inspection-related activities in the last calendar
year, with two resident inspectors working at the plant full
time.
Seven regional inspector visits and two team inspections are
scheduled for the current calendar year, compared to nine
regional inspections and four team inspections last year.
NRC branch chief Mohamed Shanbaky outlined some of the
additional security measures the commission has issued in the
post-Sept. 11 era, such as enhanced training, expanded
force-on-force exercises, and stricter facility access by
administering background checks.
Shanbaky encouraged the public to become informed and involved
in the regulatory process. Anyone can do this by participating
in NRC meetings, joining the mailing list, visiting the NRC Web
site regularly, publicly commenting on proposed licensing
actions, participating in open symposiums or contacting the NRC
via e-mail, mail or phone to address questions or areas of
concern.
Members from a couple of organizations heeded Shanbaky’s advice
and voiced some of their concerns at the meeting.
Jeff Hornstein, organizing director for a local chapter of the
Service Employees International Union, said he was concerned
with how the NRC addresses force-on-force exercises. Hornstein
took issue with the hiring of Wackenhut Corp., a private firm,
to train adversaries to simulate terrorist attacks in order to
test security at nuclear plants. Wackenhut also provides guards
to many plants across the country.
"Wackenhut guards the plant and also trains the forces that are
supposed to simulate attacks on the plants so Wackenhut, because
they’re the same company, has some incentive to cheat,"
Hornstein said. "If you’re going to privatize, at least have
some competition so one company is handling one side and another
company is handling the other, and there’d be no incentive to
cheat."
"While Wackenhut is the adversary team in those force-on-force
exercises, the NRC develops the scenarios and plays a big part
in controlling how those exercises go," Bowman said. "We’re
there watching them and we evaluate, so while Wackenhut is
involved, we do have a lot of oversight on the adversarial group
that is involved."
Joseph Mangano, head of the Radiation and Public Health Project,
asked the NRC to address its eight-page critique of Mangano’s
studies that is posted on its Web site. Mangano has proposed
that levels of radioactivity are highest in those who live
closest to nuclear power plants. Specifically, strontium-90 is
the cancerous chemical that attaches to bone and is produced by
nuclear power plants.
Shanbaky cited several studies that refute Mangano’s findings,
which were done in relatively small sample groups.
"The project has been examined extensively by many experts at a
national level in many fields and the material on our Web page
depicts where the NRC strongly disagrees with the study,"
Shanbaky said. "We have other studies on the National Institute
of Health, ICRP, NCRP, American Cancer Society and numerous
studies which did not reach the same conclusions as your study.
The conclusion is that there is no relationship between the
instance of cancer and nuclear relationships in the area."
Shanbaky said that the critique on the Web site goes into great
detail about the studies performed, with well-founded
experimental design, analysis, controls and conclusions.
Members in the audience from the Department of Environmental
Protection concurred with Shanbaky’s analysis, saying they have
conducted similar independent monitoring studies to test
radioactivity in the air, water, milk, and in people near
nuclear plants.
©The Mercury 2005
Copyright © 1995 - 2005 PowerOne Media, Inc.All Rights
*****************************************************************
16 NRC: Sunshine Federal Register Notice
FR Doc 05-7654
[Federal Register: April 15, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 72)]
[Notices] [Page 19974] From the Federal Register Online via GPO
Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr15ap05-88]
Agency Holding the Meetings: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Dates: Weeks of April 18, 25, May 2, 9, 16, 23, 2005.
Place: Commissioner's Conference Room, 11555 Rockville Pike,
Rockville, Maryland.
Status: Public and closed.
Matters to be Considered: Week of April 18, 2005 Tuesday, April
19, 2005 9 a.m.--Discussion of Enforcement Issue (Closed--Ex. 5).
9:30 a.m.--Discussion of Security Issues (Closed--Ex. 1).
Wednesday, April 20, 2005 12:55 p.m.--Affirmation Session (Public
Meeting) (Tentative) (Note: New Meeting Time).
a. (1) EXELON GENERATION COMPANY, LLC (Early Site Permit for
Clinton ESP Site), Docket No. 52-007-ESP; (2) DOMINION NUCLEAR
NORTH ANNA, LLC (Early Site Permit for North Anna ESP Site),
Docket No. 52- 008-ESP; (3) SYSTEM ENERGY RESOURCES, INC. (Early
Site Permit for Grand Gulf ESP Site), Docket No. 52-009-ESP; (4)
LOUISIANA ENERGY SERVICES, L.P. (National Enrichment Facility),
Docket No. 70-3103-ML; (5) USEC Inc. (American Centrifuge Plant),
Docket No. 70-7004 (Tentative) 1 p.m.--Briefing on Office of
Nuclear Reactor Regulation (NRR) Programs, Performance, and Plans
(Public Meeting) (Contact: Laura Gerke, 301-415-4099) (Note: New
Meeting Time).
This meeting will be Web cast live at the Web
address--http://www.nrc.gov .
3:15 p.m.--Meeting with Advisory Committee on the Medical Uses of
Isotopes (ACMUI) (Public Meeting) (Contact: Angela McIntosh,
301-415- 5030) (Note: New Meeting Time).
This meeting will be Web cast live at the Web address--htt://
http://www.nrc.gov. Thursday, April 21, 2005 1:30
p.m.--Discussion of Security Issues (Closed--Ex. 1). 3
p.m.--Discussion of Security Issues (Closed--Ex. 1). Week of
April 25, 2005--Tentative Tuesday, April 26, 2005 9:30
a.m.--Briefing on Grid Stability and Offsite Power Issues (Public
Meeting) (Contact: John Lamb, 301-415-1446).
This meeting will be Web cast live at the Web
address--http://www.nrc.gov .
Week of May 2, 2005--Tentative There are no meetings scheduled
for the Week of May 2, 2005.
Week of May 9, 2005--Tentative Wednesday, May 11, 2005 10:30
a.m.--All Employees Meeting (Public Meeting). 1:30 p.m.--All
Employees Meeting (Public Meeting). Week of May 16,
2005--Tentative There are no meetings scheduled for the Week of
May 16, 2005.
Week of May 23, 2005--Tentative Monday, May 23, 2005 1:30
p.m.--Discussion of Security Issues (Closed--Ex. 1). Wednesday,
May 25, 2005 9:30 a.m.--Briefing on Results of the Agency Review
Meeting (Public Meeting) (Contact: Lois James, 301-415-1112).
This meeting will be Web cast at the Web
address--http://www.nrc.gov .
1:30 p.m.--Briefing on Threat Environment Assessment (Closed--Ex.
1). *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. * * *
* * 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. 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. Dated: April 12, 2005.
Dave Gamberoni, Office of the Secretary.
[FR Doc. 05-7654 Filed 4-13-05; 9:22 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-M
*****************************************************************
17 UN Reports 'removal' At Iraqi Nuclear Sites, But No Conclusions Can Yet Be Drawn
Date: Fri, 15 Apr 2005 13:00:59 -0400
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UN REPORTS ‘REMOVAL’ AT IRAQI NUCLEAR SITES, BUT NO CONCLUSIONS CAN
YET BE DRAWN
New York, Apr 15 2005 1:00PM
Satellite imagery reveals “significant dismantling and removal activities”
at 37 Iraqi sites linked to Saddam Hussein’s clandestine
nuclear programme since his fall two years ago, but without on-site
inspections no conclusions can be drawn, the United Nations
atomic watchdog says in its latest <"http://www.un.org/Docs/journal/asp/ws.asp?m=s/2005/243">report.
Since the United States-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the International
Atomic Energy Agency (<"http://www.iaea.org">IAEA) has
been largely absent from the country and has had to rely on satellite
imagery and other analysis for its twice-yearly reports to
the Security Council.
Previously it had carried out widespread inspections of Saddam Hussein’s
nuclear installations in an effort to verify his obligation
to destroy his weapons of mass destruction following the 1991
Persian Gulf War.
“In the course of this assessment, IAEA also focussed on areas where
destroyed equipment from the former nuclear programme had bee
stored or discarded,” the agency’s Director-General, Mohamed ElBaradei,
says in the latest report. “Satellite imagery has indicated
that at least one site containing buried contaminated rubble has
been extensively excavated.
“The above assessments, however, need to be followed up through verification
in Iraq in order for the Agency to draw conclusions,”
he adds.
He also says the IAEA has received no additional information that
could shed light on the more than 340 tons of high explosives subject
to UN monitoring that the Iraqi authorities reported stolen
from a Government facility last October.
2005-04-15 00:00:00.000
________________
For more details go to UN News Centre at http://www.un.org/news
To change your profile or unsubscribe go to:
http://www.un.org/news/dh/latest/subscribe.shtml
*****************************************************************
18 Guardian Unlimited: IAEA Calls for Review of Key Iraqi Sites
From the Associated Press
[UP]
Friday April 15, 2005 10:01 PM
By EDITH M. LEDERER
Associated Press Writer
UNITED NATIONS (AP) - The U.N. nuclear watchdog expressed
concern Friday at the removal of equipment and ``significant
dismantling'' at 37 key sites in Iraq previously monitored for
potential nuclear activity.
In a letter to the U.N. Security Council, the head of the
International Atomic Energy Agency also said satellite imagery
has revealed extensive excavation at one site where contaminated
rubble from Saddam Hussein's nuclear program was buried.
IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei said these assessments
need to be investigated in person ``in order for the agency to
draw conclusions.''
Getting U.N. nuclear inspectors back into Iraq, however, remains
problematic.
IAEA inspectors left Iraq just before the March 2003 U.S.-led
war, along with inspectors searching for biological and chemical
weapons. The Bush administration then barred all U.N. inspectors
from returning, deploying U.S. teams instead in what turned out
to be an unsuccessful search for Iraqi weapons of mass
destruction.
Nonetheless, IAEA teams were allowed into Iraq in June 2003 to
investigate reports of widespread looting of storage rooms at
the main nuclear complex at Tuwaitha, and in August 2004 to take
an inventory of natural uranium in storage near Tuwaitha.
Last month, Security Council members said the time to start
examining the future of U.N. weapons inspectors is getting
closer, although no timetable has been set.
The Iraqi government has been waging a public campaign to stop
using Iraqi oil revenue to pay the U.N. weapons inspectors,
calling them ``irrelevant'' and costly. It argues that the more
than $12 million annually for chemical and biological inspectors
and the $12.3 million over the next two years for IAEA
inspectors should be used for Iraq's reconstruction.
Since 2003, ElBaradei said, the IAEA has analyzed satellite
imagery of 141 of the 175 locations it previously identified as
primary sites that contributed to Saddam's clandestine nuclear
program or had technical capabilities to restart a nuclear
program.
``This assessment has revealed significant dismantling and
removal activities at 37 of the most capable sites since March
2003,'' ElBaradei said, without giving any details.
The IAEA also focused on sites where destroyed equipment from
Iraq's former nuclear program had been stored or discarded, he
said.
At the request of Iraqi authorities, ElBaradei said the IAEA has
compiled information to assist in future cleanups.
ElBaradei also expressed concern in his last report in October
at the disappearance of high-precision equipment that could be
used to make nuclear weapons. He said some industrial material
that Iraq sent overseas had been located in other countries, but
not high-precision items.
In late October, ElBaradei released an Iraqi report on the
disappearance of 377 tons of high explosives from the al-Qaqaa
site south of Baghdad, including one capable of igniting a
nuclear weapon. The missing explosives became a heated issue in
the final days of the U.S. presidential campaign.
Investigations were promised, but ElBaradei said in Friday's
report that ``to date, IAEA has received no additional
information that could shed light on this matter.''
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
19 Las Vegas RJ: Prospects for nuclear terrorism study in air
Friday, April 15, 2005
By STEVE TETREAULT
STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON -- Federal and Utah officials threw cold water
Thursday on a report the Department of Homeland Security would
study terrorism threats to nuclear waste shipping.
A department spokesman said Homeland Security Secretary Michael
Chertoff made no promise at a meeting this week with Utah Gov.
Jon Huntsman Jr.
"The secretary said he was asked to review the issue, and he
agreed to review the issue as to whether the DHS would need to
complete any sort of vulnerability assessment," spokesman Brian
Roehrkasse said.
Chertoff's reading of the meeting was different from what
Huntsman told a Utah newspaper. He was reported to say Chertoff
had agreed to study the risk of shipping nuclear waste to a
proposed temporary repository in Utah.
Huntsman's comments prompted Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., to
send a letter to Chertoff that urged any nuclear waste study to
focus on Yucca Mountain, where the Energy Department proposes to
transport 77,000 tons of highly radioactive spent fuel and
nuclear waste.
Huntsman spokeswoman Tammy Kikuchi said Thursday the governor's
chief of staff, Jason Chaffetz, was in on the meeting and
confirmed Chertoff's version.
Kikuchi would not comment on whether Huntsman might have been
mistaken or whether his remarks might have been misinterpreted.
Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal
*****************************************************************
20 AFP: South Korea scraps US military plan on North Korea Messenger
Friday April 15, 09:03 AM
SEOUL (AFX) - South Korea said it has vetoed a joint US and
South Korean combined forces plan for armed intervention in
North Korea in the event of instability there.
The country's National Security Council said it has ordered the
classified plan to be scrapped because it could infringe on
South Korean sovereignty.
Under a bilateral treaty, the South Korean military comes under
US command only in times of war.
But analysts said that under the scrapped plan the US military
wanted control of South Korean forces in the event of massive
disruption caused by a collapse of impoverished North Korea.
The goal of the top secret military operation, codenamed 5029,
would be to secure North Korea's nuclear weapons sites and
materials, they said.
In an unusual statement from the nation's top decision-making
body on security matters, the NSC said it had killed off the
plan earlier this year.
'After receiving a report in December 2004 from the (South
Korean) joint chiefs of staff that the combined forces command
has been working on Operation plan 5029, the NSC, along with
related government agencies, studied its contents,' the
statement said.
'After reviewing it, the NSC determined that some points in the
plan could serve as factors limiting South Korea's exercise of
its sovereignty...
'In January 2005, the NSC's standing committee concluded that
it is necessary to stop the promotion of the operation plan. The
Defense Ministry, then, notified the Combined Forces Command of
its decision.'
Copyright © 2005 AFP AFX. All rights reserved. Republication or
*****************************************************************
21 Honolulu Star-Bulletin: Radioactive material destroyed
News /2005/04/15/
Starbulletin.com">
Friday, April 15, 2005
A former professor's research could have been used in a bomb
Star-Bulletin staff
Radioactive material loaned to the University of Hawaii-Manoa
since the 1960s was safely removed and disposed of through a
program designed to prevent it from ending up in terrorists'
hands.
In a news release, the National Nuclear Security Administration
said it removed a "substantial quantity" of radioactive
cobalt-60 from a research irradiator at UH-Manoa.
The NNSA said the material could have been used in a "dirty
bomb," a combination of explosive and radioactive material that
could spread and contaminate a large area with radioactive
material.
The removal was part of a nationwide effort to secure
radioactive materials, the federal agency said in the news
release.
UH-Manoa radiation safety officer Irene Sakimoto said the
material was safely secured and kept under 12 feet of water to
prevent any threat of exposure to people who worked with it. She
said there are no other such materials on campus.
The material had been used by a UH-Manoa professor who recently
retired. His experiments focused on irradiating tropical fruits
to kill fruit flies, said UH-Manoa spokesman Jim Manke.
Sakimoto said the irradiator was also used over the years to
sterilize fruit flies and in genetic experiments to isolate DNA,
and by astronomy and physics researchers to test how radiation
affects certain materials that could be used in space.
The radioactivity of the material has also been declining, and
once the professor retired, no one had any use for the
irradiator, Sakimoto said.
She said UH-Manoa asked the NNSA to take care of the disposal,
since the Department of Energy owned the material. Funds were
available to remove and dispose of the material through the new
anti-terrorism program, which is part of the Bush
administration's Global Threat Reduction Initiative.
If the university had to dispose of the material, "it would
have been very expensive," Sakimoto said. She estimates the cost
would have been about $1 million.
The university had about 1,000 curies of cobalt-60, a
measurement that is also an indication of its radioactivity,
Sakimoto said. Cobalt-60 has a half-life of about five years,
meaning its radioactivity and mass declines in half every five
years. Originally, the material was about 42,000 curies, she
said.
The material was removed by a contractor on March 25 and
disposed of at a secure NNSA facility on Tuesday, the agency
said.
Sakimoto said about 100 pieces of material fit into a
2-by-3-foot lead box.
National Nuclear Security Administration
www.nnsa.doe.gov/
University of Hawaii
www.hawaii.edu
© Honolulu Star-Bulletin -- http://starbulletin.com
*****************************************************************
22 Korea Herald: 'N. Korea nuclear ambition only a tactic'
The Nation's No.1 English Newspaper
HERALD INTERVIEW]
North Korea's nuclear weapons ambitions are merely a tactic to
draw attention and gain economic support from other countries, a
leading Iranian newspaper editor said yesterday. Hamid Najafi,
managing director of Kayhan International, also said in an
interview with The Korea Herald that the United States is using
Iran's nuclear project as an excuse to add pressure against his
country.
"North Korea is just using this (nuclear ambition) as a tactic
to get (attention). I don't think this is something serious,"
said Najafi, who is in Seoul this week at the invitation of the
Korea Foundation as part of its exchange programs.
He has been the managing director for 10 years of Kayhan
International, Iran's leading English language newspaper which
is also circulated to subscribers in such countries as Germany
and the United States.
The daily is part of the large Kayhan Group of Newspapers and
Publications, which includes daily papers in Farsiand Arabic, a
sports daily, weeklies targeting the Iranian diaspora, women and
children, and monthlies for culture and academics. The Kayhan
International promulgates Iran's conservative voices.
Najafi explained that whichever country possesses nuclear
weapons, none would dare to use them.
"Let's suppose Iran or any country own one hundred atomic bombs.
Can North Korea use it? Can India or Pakistan use it? No," he
said. "There is no question that these nuclear weapons have
become obsolete" because anyone using one faces virtually
certain destruction from a retaliatory strike.
North Korea declared Feb. 10 it has nuclear weapons and will
indefinitely boycott the six-party talks involving the two
Koreas, the United States, China, Japan, and Russia.
Pyongyang has so far refused to back down, continuously warning
that it is developing its nuclear projects, while Washington
keeps urging the North to return to the talks and forego its
nuclear ambitions.
"I think the U.S. is not at all concerned (about North Korea)"
despite its rhetoric, Najafi said.
Commenting on Washington's allegations over Iran's nuclear
development program, he said, "There is no point in (saying)
that Iran is going to do this and that. This is just
propaganda."
He said he believed the United States is raising suspicions
about Iran's nuclear ambitions to strengthen opinion against his
country.
The International Atomic Energy Agency suspects Iran of
processing fuel which would enable production of 15 to 30
nuclear weapons in five to 10 years. Iran contends its nuclear
development is solely to produce atomic energy for peaceful
uses.
"The Europeans, like the French and Germans, are fully aware of
all these things. They just cannot openly object to the U.S.,"
Najafi said, referring to Washington's allegations.
Because Iran is "the only country that has been saying 'no' to
the U.S." the European countries are also keen on not letting
Iran "fall on the lap of the U.S.," he said.
Asked about how he saw future relations developing with
Washington, Najafi said a friendly relationship will be possible
when the United States acknowledges Iran and there is mutual
respect.
Noting this is his first visit to Seoul, he commented on South
Korea's vast economic growth. "(It is) quite remarkable how they
(Korea) built up so soon after the war in the 1950s."
He said average Iranians go to work in South Korean cars, use
Korean refrigerators, Korean washing machines at home and watch
television made by either Samsung or LG. Future trade relations
between Iran and Korea would continue to prosper, he added.
"I believe Iran could look at South Korea and learn from this
country in developing Iranian industry," Najafi said.
(angiely@heraldm.com)
By Lee Joo-hee
2005.04.15
*****************************************************************
23 AU: NKorea celebrates with nuclear threat
Breaking News 24/7 - NEWS.com.au (15-04-2005)
NEWS.com.au
NKorea celebrates with nuclear threat
From correspondents in Seoul April 15, 2005
From: Agence France-Presse
NORTH Korea marked the birthday of its founding father, the late
Kim Il-Sung, today with fond recollections of his military
prowess and a chilling threat to use nuclear weapons to settle a
standoff with the outside world. Though he died more than 10
years ago at age 82, the late leader is still revered as
president for eternity and his birthday is marked as the "Day of
the Sun", North Korea's top national holiday.
In remarks to celebrate the anniversary, North Korea's number
two leader Kim Young-Nam said Kim had defeated Japanese
colonialists and led the country to victory against US
"imperialist aggressors" once in the past, a reference to the
1950-53 Korean War.
Now it was the turn of his successors to carry the torch and do
the same again, he said.
North Korea explicitly stated in February that it possessed
nuclear weapons, and Kim, nominal head of state, said the
country was now ready to use its deterrent.
"We will continue expanding our self-defensive nuclear
deterrent against the enemy's policy to isolate and suffocate
us, a policy that is becoming more blatant every day," Kim was
quoted as saying in a speech reported by North Korea's official
Korean Central News Agency.
"If the US causes a war on the Korean peninsula, we will crush
the aggressors by exerting all of our self-defence power and
forming a strong unity among our people."
The comments came amid an impasse over North Korea's nuclear
weapons drive with six-party talks, the only avenue to resolve
the crisis, stalled for nearly a year following North Korea's
decision to boycott the forum.
The number two leader's call to arms came late Thursday and
coincided with international condemnation of North Korea's human
rights record.
The regime of Kim Jong-Il, the founding father's son and heir
to the Stalinist dictatorship, denies abusing the human rights
of its 23 million people.
However the UN Human Rights Commission said in Geneva today the
Pyongyang regime was built on "systemic, widespread and grave
violations of human rights".
The late Kim, a former anti-Japanese guerrilla fighter who was
installed as North Korean leader prior to the Korean War, was
lauded as a military genius who liberated the country from
Japanese occupation and beat invading US forces in the Korean
War.
"These are the political and military miracles wrought by Kim
Il-Sung, a military genius and illustrious commander born of
Heaven, on behalf of the era, the revolution, the country and
the people," Kim Young-Nam said.
Hereditary dictator Kim Jong-Il had inherited the mantle and
was opening a "wide avenue" to socialism centred on the masses
and a watershed to reunification with South Korea, he added.
*****************************************************************
24 NRC: NRC to Discuss Preliminary Results of Special Inspection at South Bend Hospital
News Release - Region III - 2005-01
U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Office of Public Affairs, Region III
No. III-05-017 April 15, 2005
CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663
Viktoria Mitlyng (630) 829-9662 E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov
Nuclear Regulatory Commission experts will meet with officials
of St. Joseph's Regional Medical Center in South Bend, Ind.,
Thursday, April 21 to discuss an NRC team's review of the
misapplication of nuclear medicine to five cancer patients in
2004.
The meeting, which will be open to public observation, will
begin at 2 p.m. at Saint Joseph Regional Medical Center, at the
Education Center of the South Bend Campus, 801 East LaSalle
Street, South Bend.
The hospital reported to the NRC in March 2005 that several
patients had received unintended radiation exposures to their
legs during treatment for cervical cancer. The unintended
exposures occurred when a small sealed capsule containing a
radiation source shifted during treatment, resulting in the
radiation dose to the skin of the patients leg instead of the
intended treatment area.
The medical center has notified the patients and their
physicians of the treatment problems.
The NRC dispatched an Augmented Inspection Team to look into the
event and review the hospitals plans to address the problems
that caused it. An NRC medical consultant has been retained to
evaluate the medical aspects of the unintended radiation
exposures.
This inspection reviewed the circumstances surrounding these
medical events and the actions the medical center has taken to
make sure this does not happen again, said Geoffrey Grant, NRC
Deputy Regional Administrator.
The written report of the inspection will be available in May in
the NRCs online document collection, known as ADAMS, at:
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. Help in using ADAMS is
available by contacting the NRCs Public Document Room at
1-800-397-4209 or 301-415-4737 or by e-mail at PDR@nrc.gov.
Last revised Friday, April 15, 2005
*****************************************************************
25 Idaho Statesman: Crapo takes important step to help downwinders
04-15-2005
Editorials
Additional Information What the law allows
Payments: The government pays $50,000 to eligible people who
were in any of the designated counties downwind of the Nevada
Test Site during atmospheric nuclear testing and who later
became sick.
Who is eligible: A sick person must have lived or worked in one
of the counties in Utah, Nevada and Arizona for at least two
years between Jan. 21, 1951, and Oct. 31, 1958, or between June
30 and July 31, 1962.
What illnesses qualify: Leukemia (other than chronic lymphocytic
leukemia), multiple myeloma, lymphomas (other than Hodgkin's
disease), and primary cancer of the thyroid, male or female
breast, esophagus, stomach, pharynx, small intestine, pancreas,
bile ducts, gall bladder, salivary gland, urinary bladder,
brain, lung, colon, ovary or liver (except if cirrhosis or
hepatitis B is indicated).
Source: U.S. Justice Department
How to speak up
Here's how to contact your congressional delegation:
• Sen. Larry Craig:
520 Hart Building, Washington, DC 20510. (202) 224-2752.
225 N. 9th St., Suite 530, Boise, ID 83702. 342-7985.
• Sen. Mike Crapo:
239 Dirksen Building, Washington, DC 20510. (202) 224-6142.
251 E. Front St., Suite 205, Boise, ID 83702. 334-1776 .
• Rep. C.L. "Butch" Otter
1711 Longworth Building, Washington, DC 20515. (202) 225-6611.
802 W. Bannock, Suite 101, Boise, ID 83702. 336-9831.
• Rep. Mike Simpson:
1339 Longworth Building, Washington, DC 20515. (202) 225-5531.
802 W. Bannock, Suite 600, Boise, ID 83702. 334-1953.
Edition Date: 04-14-2005
Email This ArticlePrinter Friendly Page
Idaho downwinders have been waiting for help from their
government since 1997.
So give Sen. Mike Crapo credit for working ahead on their
behalf. It will take a lot of effort to get these cancer victims
the same federal payments that similar victims in three other
states have received.
Crapo, R-Idaho, has written a bill to compensate Idahoans who
may have developed cancer from radiation carried by the breeze
during nuclear weapons tests in Nevada in the 1950s and 1960s.
The federal government has paid out nearly half a billion
dollars to cancer victims in the West but not a dime to any
Idahoans, because they are not eligible under the law.
The National Academy of Sciences is studying whether the law,
the 1990 Radiation Exposure Compensation Act, should be expanded
to include Idaho and other areas. The report is due to Congress
on June 30.
Crapo, who was a lawyer before he was elected to Congress in
1992, already has powerful evidence in hand. Exhibit A is a 1997
National Cancer Institute report that estimated exposure to
radioactive iodine, just one ingredient in the isotopic soup
unleashed during the weapons tests. Gem, Lemhi, Blaine and
Custer counties were four of the five hardest-hit counties
nationwide and harder-hit than all 21 Western counties now
covered under RECA.
It's tragic that cancer victims from these four counties are
fighting for their lives and still fighting for $50,000
payments from the federal government. No matter what the NAS
report says, Crapo said Wednesday that he still will push a bill
to extend the federal payments to these Cold War victims. Crapo
says, "It's only a matter of fairness," and considering the 1997
study, he's right.
Crapo's draft bill covers cancer victims across Idaho's 44
counties; he may change it depending on the NAS report. We
expect the other members of Idaho's congressional delegation
Sen. Larry Craig and Reps. Mike Simpson and C.L. "Butch" Otter
to respond to the NAS report with a bill that reflects the
latest science on fallout and gets Idaho downwinders their due.
For a bill to pass, all four members of the Idaho delegation
should get behind a single plan that is fair for their
constituents. After all, other politicians are advocating for
their downwinders. Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, issued a report
Tuesday on cancer rates in Utah counties. Several counties
including Salt Lake County, home to Salt Lake City have higher
rates of cancer linked to radiation than the 10 Utah counties
covered by RECA. Matheson "wants to examine further reports"
before acting to expand the law, the Deseret Morning News
reported Wednesday. Does it help or hurt to have other
politicians active on the issue? Crapo isn't sure. More
politicians pushing for more cancer victims raise the profile of
the issue, and that could build momentum. More payments raise
the price tag, and that can galvanize critics.
One thing is certain. Idaho's congressional delegation needs to
work hard to finally come through for downwinders. The
politicians need to convince their colleagues that these
Idahoans are, indeed, eligible for federal money. Then they need
to push to put money into a compensation program that's
basically broke. That's a tall task; Crapo is taking an
important first step.
*****************************************************************
26 Salt Lake Tribune: Blister Weapons: Pentagon should give up
shipping mustard weapons to Utah
Article Last Updated: 04/15/2005 12:50:22 AM
Opinion
Like a dog on a bone, the Pentagon won't give up the idea of
moving mustard weapons from Colorado to Utah for destruction.
Never mind that Congress passed a law in 1994 that prohibits
moving these weapons across state lines, and the U.S. Senate
delegations of both states oppose the move.
That should be enough to deter the Pentagon, but it insists
on studying the idea. The reason, according to Undersecretary of
Defense Michael Wynne, is so that Congress knows all its options
to meet a treaty deadline in 2012 by which the United States is
supposed to have destroyed all its chemical weapons.
The treaty deadline is part of the story, but saving money is
the other. It might be cheaper for the Army to ship the stuff to
the Deseret Chemical Depot near Tooele for incineration than to
build a chemical neutralization plant near Pueblo, Colo.
But safety hazards inherent in moving the stuff make
transportation across Utah and Colorado a bad idea. That's why
the Army decided in 1987 to destroy its chemical weapons on site
at the eight depots in the continental United States where they
are stored. That's still the safest strategy.
Utah has done more than its part in this effort. Before the
campaign to destroy these weapons began, this state had the
dubious honor of playing host to 44 percent of the nation's
chemical weapons arsenal in Tooele County. The Army built a $400
million incinerator there, and, since 1996, it has burned 54
percent of the original stockpile and 88 percent of the
munitions.
That includes the entire inventory of GB nerve agent, and
officials expect to burn the last of the VX nerve agent weapons
by the end of June. Then they will move on to GA weapons. The
big furnace will be adjusted to burn blister agent, commonly
called mustard, about a year from now. The schedule calls for
finishing off the last of the mustard sometime in 2007.
The Army has built incinerators at three other depots in the
lower 48 and chemical neutralization plants at two others. But
nothing has been done at Pueblo. Planners in the Pentagon might
be thinking they could send the Colorado mustard weapons to Utah
for incineration after 2007 and still meet the 2012 deadline.
But that would once again make Utah a national environmental
sacrifice zone.
And that's too high a price for Utahns to pay.
© Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune.
*****************************************************************
27 Xinhua: IAEA reports removal activities at Iraqi nuclear sites
www.xinhuanet.com
www.chinaview.cn 2005-04-16 06:13:40
UNITED NATIONS, April 15 (Xinhuanet) -- Satellite imagery
reveals "significant dismantling and removal activities" at 37
Iraqi sites linked to Saddam Hussein's clandestine nuclear
program since his fall two years ago, but without on-site
inspections no conclusions can be drawn, the UN atomic watchdog
said in a new report issued Friday.
Since the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been largely
absent from the country and has had to rely on satellite imagery
and other analysis for its twice-yearly reports to the Security
Council.
Previously it had carried out widespread inspections of
Saddam Hussein's nuclear installations in an effort to verify
his obligation to destroy his weapons of mass destruction
following the 1991 Persian Gulf War.
"In the course of this assessment, IAEA also focused on
areas where destroyed equipment from the former nuclear program
had been stored or discarded," IAEA Director-General Mohamed
ElBaradei said in the latest report. "Satellite imagery has
indicated that at least one site containing buried contaminated
rubble has been extensively excavated."
"The above assessments, however, need to be followed up
throughverification in Iraq in order for the agency to draw
conclusions, "he added.
He also said the IAEA has received no additional information
that could shed light on the more than 340 tons of high
explosives subject to UN monitoring that the Iraqi authorities
reported stolen from a government facility last October. Enditem
Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
28 Japan Times: Students translate hibakusha anthology into English
Thursday, April 14, 2005
KOBE (Kyodo) Students at Kwansei Gakuin University in
Nishinomiya, Hyogo Prefecture, have translated an anthology
compiled by atomic-bomb survivors into English.
[News photo]
The book "The Day Never to be Forgotten," an English version
of an anthology compiled by survivors of the 1945 atomic
bombings, is shown at Kwansei Gakuin University in Nishinomiya,
Hyogo Prefecture.
The students have been sending paper cranes to Hiroshima Peace
Memorial Park since August 2003, when one of their peers was
arrested for setting alight the paper cranes donated by
well-wishers at the park.
When the students visited the park last August with a fresh
batch of paper cranes, they met members of a Kanagawa
Prefecture-based survivors' group, who asked them to translate
"The Day Never to be Forgotten."
The book contains 44 drawings by survivors as well as Japanese
and English poems depicting the landscape of Hiroshima just
after it was devastated by an A-bomb in August 1945.
"It is very important that the anthology was translated by
young people, as most A-bomb survivors are aging and have to
pass on their experience to the next generation," said Yuko
Nakamura, 72, secretary general of the survivors' group. "We
want people around the world to read this book."
The group plans to distribute about 1,000 copies of the
anthology at a meeting of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty
review conference to be held in New York next month.
The students spent about four months translating the work,
interviewing the survivors and seeking the advice of students
from English-speaking countries.
The Japan Times: April 14, 2005
(C) All rights reserved
*****************************************************************
29 Ironton Online: Strickland fights for plant pension plan
| Friday, April 15, 2005
From Staff Reports
WASHINGTON - In his efforts to help workers at the Portsmouth
Gaseous Diffusion Plant (GDP), Congressmen Ted Strickland
successfully inserted language into the energy bill in Congress
that will protect worker pensions and benefits as new
contractors take over remediation and infrastructure services at
the site.
"This is simply an issue of fairness," Strickland said regarding
the amendment. "The Department of Energy is not acting to
protect these workers, so Congress must. The passage of my
amendment is great news for the workforce at the Piketon plant,
but it is far from the last word."
The amendment forces the Secretary of Energy to continue doing
what has been done historically by ensuring that contract and
subcontract workers at both the Portsmouth and Paducah GDPs will
continue to be eligible to participate in or transfer into the
existing pension and health care benefit plans as the contractor
changeover occurs.
For example, in 1998, when Bechtel Jacobs was awarded the prime
cleanup contract at Portsmouth and Paducah, the parties involved
contributed to the development of a multiple-employer pension
plan and health system to ease the transition to a new
contractor.
These multiple plans made it possible for employees to work for
multiple contractors or subcontractors over time without losing
benefits each time he or she changed employers.
and to shift from USEC to Bechtel Jacobs without penalty.
Today's amendment would continue that system.
Strickland worked with Republican Congressmen Ed Whitfield
(R-KY) to get the amendment attached to the Energy Policy Act of
2005 as the legislation works its way through the Energy and
Commerce Committee, on which the Congressmen sit. The amendment
will also affect workers at the Paducah GDP. The overall
legislation must now be passed by the full House of
Representatives as well as the Senate and be accepted by the
President.
"Today's successful efforts were a first step, but an important
step," Strickland noted. "I will continue to fight to make sure
these worker protections stay in the bill as it moves through
the legislative process."
The eligible workers would include those doing cleanup at
Portsmouth working for USEC who are already vested in the
Multiple Employer Pension Plan, and USEC hourly employees.
Copyright © 2005Ironton Tribune
*****************************************************************
30 [NukeNet] Aomori OKs MOX fuel plant plan
Date: Fri, 15 Apr 2005 17:58:44 -0700
NukeNet Anti-Nuclear Network (nukenet@energyjustice.net)
Aomori OKs MOX fuel plant plan
AOMORI (Kyodo) Aomori Gov. Shingo Mimura on Thursday accepted Japan Nuclear
Fuel Ltd.'s request to build a plant to process plutonium-uranium mixed
oxide fuel in the village of Rokkasho. (Click link below for full article.)
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/getarticle.pl5?nn20050415a9.htm
Citizens' Nuclear Information Center
3F Kotobuki Bdg, 1-58-15, Higashi-Nakano, Nakano-ku, Tokyo 164-0003
Phone: 81-3-5330-9520
Fax: 81-3-5330-9530
http://cnic.jp/english/
cnic@nifty.com
_______________________________________________________________________
Subscribe/Unsubscribe Here: http://www.energyjustice.net/nukenet/
Change your settings or access the archives at:
http://energyjustice.net/mailman/listinfo/nukenet_energyjustice.net
*****************************************************************
31 Brattleboro Reformer: Dry cask or fuel pool?
April 16, 2005 Brattleboro, VT
By CAROLYN LORIé
Reformer Staff
BRATTLEBORO -- Crystal Shoufler, a fourth-generation Vermonter
and mother of a 6-month-old daughter, encouraged state officials
to approve legislation for dry cask storage, as the continued
operation of Vermont Yankee would be in everyone's best interest.
Minutes later, Tom Bodett of Dummerston struck a very different
note, cautioning committee members to think long and hard as
they weighed the matter.
"I urge you to accept no half measures on dry cask storage at
Entergy Nuclear Vermont Yankee," he said.
Both sentiments were typical of the pro and con testimony given
at Thursday's hearing held by the Senate and House Committees on
Natural Resources and Energy at Brattleboro Union High School.
The legislative hearing was one of several that have been held
this year on Vermont Yankee's bid to install dry cask storage,
but it was the first to be held in Windham County.
Between 300 and 400 people attended, many sporting large green
stickers that read "I Support VY," and others wearing pins in
support of Nuclear-Free Vermont.
In addition to Nuclear-Free Vermont, several other anti-nuclear
groups were represented, including the New England Coalition and
Traprock Peace Center, based in Deerfield, Mass.
A long list of individuals testified before the committees,
which will be responsible for crafting legislation on the
matter, possibly before the end of this legislative session.
Once the Legislature decides on the issues, it will then go
before the Vermont Public Service Board.
According to officials at Vermont Yankee, the plant's fuel pool
-- which is currently where all spent fuel is stored -- will run
out of room in 2008. If the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
approves the plant's bid to increase power by 20 percent, that
date gets bumped to 2007.
Without dry cask storage, Vermont Yankee officials say they
will be forced to shut down the plant before its license expires
in 2012.
While both supporters and opponents of nuclear power agree that
storing spent nuclear fuel in concrete containers -- or dry
casks -- is safer than the current system of holding it in a
spent fuel pool, there is disagreement on the particulars.
The advantage of dry casks is that it allows the fuel to be
dispersed. Right now there are 2,787 spent fuel assemblies in
Vermont Yankee's pool, which is in the reactor building. If
there were an accident or act of terrorism involving the pool,
the radiation release would be massive. Putting the fuel in
separate reinforced casks would reduce that risk.
Opponents, however, allege that because Vermont Yankee
officials do not intend to empty the pool, but only transfer a
portion of assemblies to casks, they are simply creating
additional targets. There are also allegations that Entergy will
use the fact that the plant has extra storage space as leverage
to get a 20-year license extension.
While plant officials claim to need a decision on the matter
this year, some state representatives have expressed
reservations.
Rep. Tony Klein, D-Montpelier, said he was concerned about
rushing a decision that could have such long-term ramifications.
Without a federal repository, he said, Vermont Yankee could turn
into a permanent waste site.
That sentiment was echoed repeatedly by local residents. Among
them was Ellen Kaye of Brattleboro, who charged that the waste
problem was a reason to shut down the plant.
"When you make waste and you can't get rid of it, you stop
making it," she told the committees.
Copyright ©1999-2005 New England Newspapers, Inc.,
*****************************************************************
32 Bradenton Herald: Report to map plume edges
| 04/15/2005 |
SCOTT RADWAY
Herald Staff Writer
TALLEVAST - This tight-knit community plagued by widespread
groundwater contamination has been a little quieter lately.
But Laura Ward, president of Tallevast community group FOCUS,
cautioned that the decrease in public outcry should not be
interpreted as a lessening of resident concerns. It's just the
quiet before the storm.
"People are really disturbed about the whole situation. But we
are trying to wait and see," Ward said.
Today, the report the community has been waiting to see is
expected to be delivered to the Florida Department of
Environmental Protection. It should give residents a good idea
of the extent of contamination.
Lockheed Martin, which is responsible for cleaning up the
industrial solvents leaked from the old American Beryllium Co.
plant, started a comprehensive project to map the contamination
late last year and filed the bulk of its assessment in February.
But drilling and water tests were continued to map the edges of
the plume, which turned out to extend farther than Lockheed
expected. Today, Lockheed plans to deliver a report to the state
and residents that should be the near final word on the plume's
boundaries.
In February, it measured 50 acres.
"This is going to be a big report," Ward said. "This should
identify the plume."
FDEP spokeswoman Brenda Arnold said the agency expects to issue
its review a week to 10 days after the latest report is filed
with the state.
Lockheed spokeswoman Meredith Rouse Davis said the company has
only two more locations where it needs to drill testing wells,
areas held up because permission was needed from property
owners. The biggest hurdle was getting on Sarasota-Bradenton
International Airport property. But access agreements are nearly
completed for the airport and one parcel in the northwest part
of Tallevast, she said.
"For the most part the plume is defined. They are very small
segments," she said.
Perhaps the last remaining piece of the plume puzzle will be the
water well testing planned by the residents. The community is
concerned about differences in contamination levels in testing
from their wells from last year and recent testing near homes.
That testing - funded for residents by Lockheed - should be
performed later this month.
A community meeting about all the new information and how
Lockheed plans to rid Tallevast of the contamination is expected
in May.
Scott Radway, environmental reporter, can be reached at 708-7919
or at sradway@HeraldToday.com.
HeraldToday.com
*****************************************************************
33 San Luis Obispo Tribune: Nuclear fuel case is no laughing matter
04/15/2005 |
Editorial Opinion of The Tribune
The Tribune
Doh! Stealing a scene from "The Simpsons," Pacific Gas and
Electric Co. managed to lose track of three 18-inch chunks of
highly radioactive, spent reactor fuel from the defunct Humboldt
Bay nuclear plant.
The Government Accountability Office is calling the handling of
the spent fuel "uneven."
In the Humboldt Bay case, the fuel was supposed to have been
shipped to an Ohio lab in 1968. It never arrived, but the
disappearance went undetected until a records review last year.
PG&E officials have been researching the case the past several
months, but say they can't determine what happened to the fuel
"with any accuracy."
The company's best guess is that the rods may be at the bottom
of the spent fuel pool or were shipped to a reprocessing
facility in New York. They've been trying to solve the mystery
for months.
But here's some information that might help you rest easier:
They don't believe the unaccounted-for-fuel was of sufficient
quantity to make an effective bomb.
As Homer Simpson would say at the Springfield Nuclear Power
Plant: Doh!
*****************************************************************
34 Las Vegas RJ: E-mails more fodder for Nevada officials
Friday, April 15, 2005
Scientists debated water movement
CORRECTION -- 04/16/05 -- Key words were removed from a sentence
in a story about Yucca Mountain Project e-mails in Friday's
Review-Journal. The sentence should have read: They (Nevada
officials) said the documents, discovered by a geology
researcher, may give Nevada pieces of ammunition to fire during
upcoming license challenges to the Yucca project.
By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON -- Nevada officials said they have discovered e-mail
messages that raise new questions about how water might travel
through Yucca Mountain toward caches of nuclear waste.
The messages suggest that scientists thought that cracks in
volcanic mountain rock might be large enough to drain
substantial amounts of water during rare but intense storms and
desert flash floods.
According to a message written by one geologist, some research
was suggesting "we could drain a lake over 2,000 feet deep
through these fractures."
When the Department of Energy recommended the Nevada site for a
repository in 2002, it estimated minimal amounts of water, less
than half an inch per square meter per year, would escape
evaporation in the remote desert and find its way into the rock
under current climate conditions.
Nevada officials said the e-mail messages raise questions about
how the government reached its conclusions.
They said the documents, discovered by a geology researcher,
might give Nevada in license challenges to the Yucca Mountain
project.
"We are seeing this stuff in the e-mails that tells me the state
would have a field day in any sort of license proceeding," said
Bob Loux, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear
Projects.
The episode illustrates the role that archived e-mails are
playing in the Yucca Mountain debate as the Energy Department
reviews them and posts them online for license preparations.
A collection of e-mails from 1998 to 2000 whose authors discuss
possible document falsification has fueled congressional and
criminal investigations. Another set raised questions about the
calibrations of scientific instruments used in repository
research.
Energy Department spokeswoman Anne Womack Kolton said the latest
e-mails reflect discussions that are expected among scientists.
DOE plans to build a safe repository, and questions about Yucca
Mountain science will be made clear in a license application
that will be submitted to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, she
said.
"These e-mails are part of the back and forth that is reflective
of any collaborative scientific process," Womack Kolton said.
"DOE's application will address all appropriate public health
and safety, scientific and technical issues as part of the NRC's
thorough and public review process."
Steve Frishman, a Nevada technical consultant, said after
examining hundreds of e-mails about water and Yucca Mountain
that a story appeared to be taking shape.
"The things that seems to be driving this at least partially is
an undercurrent that DOE wanted this site to be as dry as
possible" to support a repository recommendation, Frishman said.
The messages disclosed this week were written in 1997, when
scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey, national
laboratories and contractors were evaluating geology and climate
to calculate rates at which water might infiltrate the mountain
toward the repository level 1,000 feet below the surface.
Water infiltration is a key issue in determining when moisture
might seep into repository tunnels, accelerate corrosion of
special-alloy nuclear waste containers and carry decaying
radiation particles deeper through the mountain to groundwater.
Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal
*****************************************************************
35 Bellona: Kazakhstan increases uranium production
Kazakhstan's national atomic energy company said Tuesday it
plans to boost production more than fourfold over the next five
years as it aims to become the world's largest uranium producer.
2005-04-15 20:13
KazAtomProm said in a statement that it produced 3,719 metric
tons (4,000 short tons) of uranium in 2004, a 10 percent
increase on the previous year. It plans to boost output to more
than 4,000 metric tons (4,409 short tons) this year, rising to
as much as 15,000 metric tons (16,500 short tons) annually in
2010, making it the world's largest uranium producer, the
statement said. The Central Asian nation has 30 percent of the
world's uranium reserves and is currently the fourth biggest
uranium producer, according to KazAtomProm. It produces
low-enriched uranium tablets for nuclear power plants, AP
reported.
Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge
Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact:
webmaster@bellona.no
Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box
2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway
*****************************************************************
36 Las Vegas SUN: Editorial: How about us, too?
April 15, 2005
LAS VEGAS SUN
We were glad to learn that the Bush administration will
consider the terrorist dangers of shipping 44,000 tons of
high-level nuclear waste cross-country and storing it
temporarily in Utah versus leaving it at the reactors where the
waste is now kept. Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. told the Salt Lake
Tribune that the commitment to review the situation was made to
him by none other than Homeland Security Secretary Michael
Chertoff. The pledge did surprise us, however, since Chertoff's
predecessor, Tom Ridge, two years ago said his office had
reviewed a similar plan -- shipping 77,000 tons of high-level
nuclear waste to Nevada and permanently burying it in Yucca
Mountain -- and found that it would be safe from a terrorist
attack.
At the time we found Ridge's attempt to reassure Nevadans as
being ludicrous, especially in light of the fact that sending
nuclear waste to Nevada would require thousands of shipments
across thousands of miles from other states. It's hard to
imagine a more inviting target for terrorists. Although Utah's
governor opposes Yucca Mountain, skeptics might speculate that
Chertoff's review is more about politics. That's because Utah's
two U.S. senators have backed the permanent burial of nuclear
waste in Nevada on the condition that the Bush administration
would help block any efforts by utilities to temporarily store
nuclear waste on an Indian reservation in Utah. We hope,
however, that Chertoff actually will take a serious look at the
plan to ship nuclear waste to Utah. For that matter, Chertoff
should also undertake a comprehensive review of plans to
transport man's deadliest waste to Yucca Mountain, a project
riddled by mismanagement and the falsifying of scientific
documents.
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37 Salt Lake Tribune: Lawmakers handed session 'to do' list
Article Last Updated: 04/15/2005 08:52:44 AM
By Rebecca Walsh The Salt Lake Tribune
Utah lawmakers will debate everything from the rules governing
HMOs to the partisan balance of legislative task forces at a
special legislative session next week.
Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. on Thursday issued a 15-item "to do"
list for legislators to tackle beginning Tuesday. At the top:
legislation limiting Utah's implementation of federal No Child
Left Behind education requirements.
Lawmakers also will consider bonding for the state's $4.5
million share of a veterans nursing home in Ogden, starting a
$1.4 million drug treatment program for convicts and setting
aside $4 million for expansion of the Salt Palace Convention
Center. Huntsman wants lawmakers to consider giving his Cabinet
members, the lieutenant governor, state auditor and treasurer a
4.5 percent pay raise. Legislators also will do cleanup,
striking three errant words out of a tourism bill, authorizing
funding already appropriated for nonprofit legal assistance and
jail expansions, and re-adopting legislation requiring new
computerized voting machines to produce a paper record - the
wrong version of that bill was sent to Huntsman for his
signature.
Noting the length of the list, Huntsman legislative
liaison Mike Mower calls the April 19 meeting an "extra-special
session." The governor's staff rejected between 15 and 25
requests. One notable omission: a resolution to allow Envirocare
to expand its radioactive waste landfill.
"It's more than we expected," Huntsman Chief of Staff Jason
Chaffetz said of the items on list. "We have an aggressive
agenda. But it's the right thing to do. There were several bills
where the clock just ran out."
House Speaker Greg Curtis, R-Sandy, believes the agenda for
the session is one lawmakers can handle over two days.
"It's a little broader than I think it should be," Curtis
said. "But there's nothing that's overly controversial."
Still, the No Child Left Behind legislation, Salt Palace
expansion plan and Transportation Investment Act are virtually
guaranteed to spark debate.
Huntsman Education Deputy Tim Bridgewater has been
negotiating with U.S. Education Secretary Margaret Spellings to
get flexibility under No Child Left Behind. While Bridgewater
and Chaffetz insist they have made progress - "They have come
miles from where they were before," Chaffetz said - lawmakers
are less convinced.
The No Child Left Behind law gives state school officials
authority to buck provisions deemed to conflict with state
education priorities.
Animosity for Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson still
colors lawmakers' views of the Salt Palace funding compromise,
hammered out last week by state, county and city leaders. Under
the deal, the state pays $4 million and repeals legislation that
diverts almost $20 million from city coffers over 10 years to
the convention center. Instead, the city would pay $8 million.
---
Tribune reporters Thomas Burr, Ronnie Lynn and Heather May
contributed to this story.
© Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune.
*****************************************************************
38 Salt Lake Tribune: Envirocare hearing a moot point for now
Article Last Updated: 04/15/2005 01:48:36 AM
By Patty Henetz The Salt Lake Tribune
Envirocare of Utah will not be able to grow as quickly as it
would have liked because Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. declined to put
on next week's legislative special session agenda a resolution
allowing the company to expand to an adjacent parcel of land.
Meanwhile, the state Division of Radiation Control Board on
Thursday night conducted a public hearing to take comment on
Envirocare's proposal to expand on land its new owners bought
along with the company two months ago. The deadline to submit
comment is today.
"Jon Huntsman believes strongly the public comment period
needed to play out," Jason Chaffetz, the governor's chief of
staff, said Thursday. "DEQ needed time to digest the comments
and make a ruling. Unfortunately, the timing just barely
missed."
Envirocare says the expansion is necessary to replace
equipment the company has been using for more than 20 years at
its 536-acre facility near Clive, 80 miles northwest of Salt
Lake City.
Company officials want to build a new rail line and replace
equipment that empties the waste from the train cars on the
543-acre parcel it acquired from a potential competitor.
When Envirocare applied to Radiation Control last month to
amend its license, the company included a request to build a
waste disposal cell on the new property.
After hearing from some environmental activists and others
concerned about the request, company officials on Monday changed
the request to exclude disposal.
The license change requires legislative and gubernatorial
approval. The next chance for Envirocare to take their case to
lawmakers will be the January general legislative session.
Radiation Control Board executive secretary Dane Finerfrock,
who conducted the hearing, has already given preliminary
regulatory approval to the license amendment. He declined to
predict when his final ruling would be ready.
© Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune.
*****************************************************************
39 Salt Lake Tribune: Bear pleads guilty to U.S. tax charge
Article Last Updated: 04/15/2005 01:51:02 AM
By Patty Henetz The Salt Lake Tribune
Controversial Goshutes leader Leon Bear will avoid a trial
with his guilty plea to a federal tax count. (Rick Egan/Tribune
file photo )
Disputed Skull Valley Band of Goshutes tribal leader Leon Bear
pleaded guilty Thursday to filing a false federal tax return.
Bear, who signed a controversial agreement to store tons of
spent nuclear fuel on the reservation 45 miles southwest of Salt
Lake City, also agreed to pay $13,000 in back taxes and repay
the tribe $25,242 in various duplicate stipends he received,
plus an additional $6,300. In exchange, the federal government
will drop five charges of embezzlement and fraud at Bear's June
27 sentencing, as long as he doesn't violate any local, state or
federal laws in the interim.
The plea deal means Bear will avoid a two-week trial
scheduled to begin Monday on five felony indictments handed up
in December 2003, when Bear, 48, was charged with three counts
of embezzling $160,952 from tribal programs.
He also was charged with three counts of tax fraud.
The trial could have led to disclosures of details of the
tribe's secret contract with a consortium of eight utilities to
store spent nuclear fuel.
Prosecutors originally alleged Bear reported being unemployed
on his personal tax filings even though he was paid more than
$192,316 for tribal business.
The guilty plea carries a possible three-year prison
sentence, a year of supervised release and a $100,000 fine. But
under the plea bargain, prosecutors agreed to recommend Bear be
sentenced at the lowest end of the federal sentencing
guidelines.
Bear's attorney Joseph Thibodeau declined to comment until
after the sentencing. Prosecutors could not be reached for
comment.
Bear has been involved in tribal power struggles since
striking a deal in 1997 with Private Fuel Storage, a nuclear
utility consortium, to build a $3.1 billion high-level
radioactive waste storage facility on Goshute land.
His critics, including a former tribal secretary who was
scheduled to be the government's star witness against Bear, were
dismayed at what they fear could turn out to be a light
sentence.
"I wanted the financial information to be disclosed. Most of
the tribal members don't know anything about what he is
spending, even today. He's spending like mad," said Rex Allen,
who with his sister Mary Allen were to testify against Bear.
Rex Allen said he recently sent letters to Interior Secretary
Gale Norton and the Bureau of Indian Affairs complaining about
Bear's refusal to hold tribal elections in November and again in
March.
"He's embarrassing the tribe, not only with his financial
dealings but with contracts with other businesses related to
Private Fuel Storage," Allen said.
Margene Bullcreek, who considers Bear an illegitimate
leader, said she was "shocked and very disappointed" Bear had
been allowed a plea deal. "This is nothing to him. He's got all
the tribe's money to pay this."
Last month Bullcreek and five other tribal members filed a
lawsuit in federal court against the Interior Department, Norton
and two BIA superintendents alleging the federal government
acted illegally when it gave conditional approval to plans for
the PFS facility in spite of the ongoing leadership dispute. The
lawsuit also contends the BIA acted illegally when it recognized
Bear as tribal leader.
"We still want an election. He pled guilty," she said. "We
shouldn't have people who have been indicted in council seats.
He should step down."
Late last month, Skull Valley Band of Goshutes member Sammy
Blackbear, who is fighting to be recognized as tribal leader,
pleaded guilty to misusing $1,000 in tribal funds and agreed to
help the federal government in its cases against other tribal
members also caught up in the leadership dispute.
In exchange, the U.S. Attorney's Office agreed to drop five
bank-fraud charges against Blackbear. Whether Bear's plea will
affect Blackbear's agreement was unknown Thursday.
Two other tribal members - Marlinda Moon and Miranda Wash -
and their attorney, Duncan Steadman, were charged in December
2003 with embezzlement and bank fraud after they used what
prosecutors alleged were bogus legal documents to take control
of nearly $1.4 million in tribal funds.
Blackbear contends Bear never was elected tribal leader.
Blackbear has said that as the legitimate tribal leader, he
had a right to move the funds to prevent Bear from spending
them.
© Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune.
*****************************************************************
40 ICT: American Indian delegation to Washington urges clean energy
[2005/04/15]
Posted: April 15, 2005
by: Brenda Norrell / Indian Country Today
WASHINGTON - A coalition of American Indians recently lobbied
Congress for clean energy and a halt to the long-held tradition
of making Indian country a dumping ground for nuclear waste,
disease-producing coal mines and power plants that destroy the
environment.
''American Indians and Alaska Natives disproportionately suffer
health and environmental damage from the cradle to the grave of
the nuclear fuel chain,'' Tom Goldtooth, executive director of
the Indigenous Environmental Network, told the National Press
Club on April 5. ''Locating high-level radioactive waste
facilities on Indian lands violates the trust responsibility of
the United States government, federal laws and treaties, and is
an extreme example of the continuing environmental racist
policies against Indian people.''
American Indians urged Congress to reject the energy bill again,
saying it was essentially the same controversial, pro-industry
bill favored by the White House that failed to pass in previous
years - and instead initiate legislation to cut levels of
greenhouse gases, promote energy efficiency and reduce the
nation's dependence on foreign oil.
American Indian environmental groups said in a statement that
Indian country should no longer be a sacrifice zone for the
nation's energy policy: ''Indigenous peoples reject the concept
that lands we rely upon to meet our physical, cultural, spiritual
and economic means should be viewed as a short-term solution to
offset the U.S. energy dilemma. Our cultures should not be
sacrificed for the high energy consumption needs of America.''
American Indian groups maintained their opposition to nuclear
waste dumping on Goshute tribal land in Utah and on Western
Shoshone's Yucca Mountain in Nevada.
As part of the nuclear industry's revitalization, the Bush
administration and the Republican majority in Congress have
proposed that the first new nuclear reactors in 30 years would
initially be built on or near Indian lands in Idaho and Alaska.
Clean water along the Yukon River in Alaska is also at risk. The
U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is considering granting a
license for a new reactor in Galena, Alaska. Among those
concerned is the Yukon River Inter-Tribal Watershed Council,
representing 76 Alaska Native governments in the United States
and Canada that depend on the Yukon River for clean drinking
water and healthy salmon.
Goldtooth said the council has questions regarding ''this nuclear
experiment to build this untested reactor on the Yukon River.''
''The high-level radioactive waste from this new reactor in
Alaska could end up being transported and dumped at the Private
Fuel Storage facility on the Skull Valley Goshute Reservation in
Utah.''
Currently, Native environmental groups and the state of Utah
oppose the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's granting of a
license to the proposed Private Fuel Storage high-level
radioactive waste dump. The proposed dump, located 45 miles
southwest of Salt Lake City, would ''temporarily'' store 44,000
tons of irradiated fuel in above-ground dry cask containers.
Goldtooth pointed out that Xcel Energy, formerly known as
Northern States Power, is one of the chief proponents for the
Private Fuel Storage dump targeted at the Skull Valley Goshutes
in Utah.
He noted that since 1987, the nuclear establishment in government
and industry has targeted dozens of American Indian reservations
for high-level radioactive waste facilities.
''Currently, all have been stopped by concerned Indian grassroots
members and our families that have held strong to our traditional
spirituality, values and culture. We have formed alliances with
other Indian and non-Indian environmental and environmental
justice organizations across the country.''
© 1998 - 2005 Indian Country Today. All Rights Reserved
*****************************************************************
41 NRC: Advisory Committee On Nuclear Waste; Revised
FR Doc E5-1782
[Federal Register: April 15, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 72)]
[Notices] [Page 19973-19974] From the Federal Register Online via
GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr15ap05-87]
The 159th Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste (ACNW) meeting
scheduled to be held on April 18-19, 2005, Room T-2B3, Two White
Flint North, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland had been
changed. The agenda for the meeting on April 18, 2005, has been
modified as noted below: 10:30 a.m.-10:40 a.m.: Opening Remarks
by the ACNW Chairman (Open)--The Chairman will make opening
remarks regarding the conduct of today's sessions.
10:40 a.m.-12 noon: Preparation of ACNW Reports/Letters
(Open)--The Committee will discuss letters on Groundwater
Recharge Model Abstraction and Validation, and Time-Period of
Compliance for a Proposed High-Level Waste Geologic Repository.
1:30 p.m.-3 p.m.: NMSS Division Directors' Quarterly Program
Update (Open)--The NMSS Division Directors will brief the
Committee on recent activities of interest within their
respective programs.
3 p.m.-3:45 p.m.: Low Level Waste Annual Update (Open)-- NRC
staff will brief the Committee on planned activities and emerging
issues in the area of Low Level Waste.
4 p.m.-5 p.m.: ACNW White Paper on Low-Level Radioactive Waste
(Open)--The Committee will comment on the draft outline for the
proposed
[[Page 19974]] White Paper. In addition, the Committee will
discuss progress on specific sections of this White Paper, for
example Section 1, ``Origins and History.'' 5 p.m.-6 p.m.:
Discussion of April 14-15, 2005, Visit to the Center for Nuclear
Waste Regulatory Analyses (CNWRA) (Open)--An ACNW Subcommittee
will report on the outcome of its recent visit to the CNWRA to
review ongoing technical assistance work for NMSS' HLW programs.
All the other items remain the same as previously published in
the Federal Register on Thursday, April 7, 2005 (70 FR 17722).
For further information, contact Mr. Richard K. Major (telephone
301-415-7366), between 8:15 a.m. and 6 p.m. e.t. Dated: April 11,
2005.
Andrew L. Bates, Advisory Committee Management Officer.
[FR Doc. E5-1782 Filed 4-14-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P
*****************************************************************
42 Japan Times: Aomori OKs MOX fuel plant plan
Friday, April 15, 2005
AOMORI (Kyodo) Aomori Gov. Shingo Mimura on Thursday accepted
Japan Nuclear Fuel Ltd.'s request to build a plant to process
plutonium-uranium mixed oxide fuel in the village of Rokkasho.
JNFL is expected to hold an executive board meeting Friday to
approve a draft contract from Aomori Prefecture, paving the way
for the two sides to sign the agreement along with Rokkasho as
early as the beginning of next week.
Mimura said Aomori Prefecture and Rokkasho will each receive
980 million yen per year in central government subsidies for two
years beginning fiscal 2006 in return for hosting the facility.
The subsidies are in line with electricity provision laws.
The MOX Fuel Fabrication Plant will process plutonium and
uranium from spent nuclear fuel into MOX fuel to be used in
plutonium-thermal nuclear power plants.
JNFL said the MOX fuel plant is expected to have a maximum
annual capacity of processing 130 tons of plutonium and uranium
metallic content.
It will be built within the grounds of the existing Rokkasho
nuclear spent-fuel reprocessing plant at an estimated
construction cost of 120 billion yen. The two plants will be
connected underground for the delivery of plutonium and uranium.
The plutonium-thermal energy project is a key element of the
central government's policy on nuclear fuel cycles. Shikoku
Electric Power Co. and Kyushu Electric Power Co. are also
proceeding with similar projects but have yet to set specific
implementation targets.
The Japan Times: April 15, 2005
(C) All rights reserved
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43 Vermont Guardian: Jobs, economy overshadow nuclear waste question at hearing
By Kathryn Casa | Vermont Guardian
Posted April 15, 2005
BRATTLEBORO It was supposed to be about the dry-cask storage of
nuclear waste, but the overwhelming subtext of a legislative
hearing at Brattleboro high school Thursday night was jobs and
the economy.
Vermont has a problem from an energy perspective, Rockingham
resident and former Gov. Tom Salmon told the lawmakers,
referring to the states long-term nuclear and hydro power
contracts that begin to sunset in 2012.
We must hold on to these competitive sources of energy as long
as possible, Salmon advised. Calamitous failure cannot occur. We
cannot sit by and see rate hikes. We cant give these good 600
people a pink slip.
Salmon joined hundreds of Vermont Yankee employees and Vernon
residents who turned out to urge a joint session of the House
and Senate Energy and Natural Resources committees to allow the
nuclear power plant to put its radioactive waste into dry casks
so the plant could continue to operate.
If the plant does not get dry cask storage I will not have work,
implored one VY worker.
Vermont Yankee isnt some nameless, faceless, three-letter
corporation on a Wall Street ticker tape, said another, Mark
Castranova of Swanzey, NH. Vermont Yankee is the people who work
there, many who you have seen here tonight.
Entergy officials say without dry-cask storage, they will have
no place to put the radioactive waste, and that their
32-year-old nuclear reactor which supplies about a third of the
states power would have to be shut down between 2007 and 2008.
They routinely refer to the earlier date, which is when they say
the plants already overcrowded spent-fuel pool will run out of
room if they are allowed to increase power output by 20 percent.
An uprate would also increase the amount of spent fuel the plant
produces by about the same percentage.
Brattleboro resident Ellen Kaye portrayed the uprate as
something of a Faustian bargain. When you make waste and you
cant get rid of it and its poisoning the environment, you stop
making it, Kaye told the lawmakers.
The twin uprate and dry-cask proposals have lawmakers some of
whom have expressly opposed the power increase over something
of a barrel. The price of VY power is well below the regional
market price, wrote Rep. Steve Darrow, D-Putney, in a recent
op-ed published on the Vermont Guardian website. If VY closed in
2007, it would cost more than $100 million to replace this power
through 2012.
The legislature legally has no say over the uprate. For that,
Entergy must get approval from the governor-appointed Public
Service Board and the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
However, federal and state laws do give the Legislature limited
authority over how nuclear waste is disposed of in Vermont.
Although I am aware that you, as legislators, do not have
jurisdiction over safety, there is a connection between safety
and the environmental, health and economic concerns that you do
have statutory authority over, said Dummerston resident Judy
Davidson.
The problem is that (Entergy) is not going to use dry-cask
storage to reduce the risk to our environment or economy by
thinning the amount of fuel in the pool, she continued. No, this
proposal is only so that they can continue to create more lethal
waste.
Like others nuclear skeptics at the meeting, Davidson urged
lawmakers to limit the number of casks to only the number
Entergy needs to get Vermont Yankee through 2012, and then
require that (Entergy) come back to the Legislature in plenty of
time when it seeks re-licensing and would need more cask, she
said.
Many critics say Entergy has known it would need dry-cask
storage since it bought the Vernon reactor three years ago, and
question why plant officials appear to be hurrying lawmakers to
make a decision this session.
The House Natural Resources and Entergy Committee, which is
expected to draft legislation for a dry-cask facility, has hired
an independent expert to verify the need to expedite the plan.
The committee will not be held to Vermont Yankees timetable,
said Darrow.
Vermont Guardian
PO Box 335
Winooski, VT 05404
site map| contact information| privacy policyNorthern Vermont:
PO Box 335, Winooski, VT 05404
Southern Vermont: 139 Main Street, Suite 702, Brattleboro, VT
05301
Contact: 802.861.4880 (ph) | 802.861.6388 (fax) | 877.231.5382
(toll-free)
©2004-2005 Vermont Guardian | info@vermontguardian.com
*****************************************************************
44 News-Record: Uranium mine plans expansion
Gillette, Wyoming Friday, April 15, 2005
With prices triple what they were less than five years ago,
Wyoming's only active uranium mine is adding workers to pump up
production.
"Everybody's got a bit of jump in their step. The future looks
good," said Chuck Foldenauer, manager of Power Resources Inc.'s
Smith Ranch-Highland mine north of Douglas.
The number of employees at the Canadian-owned operation recently
increased from 82 to 92, with projections to reach 100 by next
year, the Douglas Budget reported.
Uranium produced at Smith Ranch is typically yellowish powder,
or "yellowcake," which is sealed in barrels and shipped to
plants outside Wyoming to be enriched and formed into pellets to
fuel nuclear reactors. About 20 percent of America's electricity
comes from steam generated by nuclear fission.
Yellowcake prices plummeted to $7.10 per pound in December 2000
but have risen steadily since and last year surpassed $20 for
the first time since 1984.
This week, the spot price was $23.20, according to the Ux
Consulting Co., of Roswell, Ga., up 20 cents from the previous
week.
For the complete story see today's News-Record.
On the Net:
Cameco Corp.: http://www.cameco.com
Ux Consulting: http://www.uxc.com
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45 AU ABC: Aust invention to clean up nuclear waste site.
16/04/2005. ABC News Online
"Australian Broadcasting Corporation Online">
[Australian invention to entrap UK nuclear waste.] Australian
invention to entrap UK nuclear waste. [ border=]
Aust invention to clean up nuclear waste site
An Australian invention that immobilises radioactive waste is to
be used to clean up five tonnes of nuclear waste at Sellafield
in the United Kingdom.
Synroc is a synthetic rock that entraps plutonium and can be
used to prevent it from being used to manufacture weapons.
The Sellafield clean-up will be made possible by 25 years of
research at the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology
Organisation (ANSTO).
ANSTO executive director Ian Smith says Synroc can prevent
environmental contamination and means nuclear technology can be
used without its offcuts falling into the hands of those who
want to make weapons.
"It puts that material out of touch and it securely locks this
material away for millions of years," Dr Smith said.
"In this case [in Sellafield], it represents a way of
restraining plutonium so that it can't escape into the
environment and can't be separated for any weapons use," he said.
"Over the past two years, ANSTO has worked to develop a
tailor-made glass-ceramic matrix to imprison the Sellafield
waste ready for long-term storage and eventual permanent
disposal," Dr Smith added in a statement.
"The matrix is specifically designed for their particular
needs, as ANSTO's technology can be adapted for a variety of
radioactive waste requirements."
Synroc has been around since the 1970s but Dr Smith says the
Sellafield project is the first demonstration of how it can be
adapted to meet the specific needs of different nuclear sites.
ANSTO hopes to use the Sellafield clean-up as a pilot program
for other initiatives.
© 2005 ABC| Privacy Policy
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46 AU ABC: Environment group launches nuclear tour.
16/04/2005. ABC News Online
="Australian Broadcasting Corporation Online">
Thirty-two people from Victoria and South Australia begin a tour
with a difference today, travelling to remote sites to look at
uranium mining and radioactive waste dumps.
The group will visit waste dumps at Port Pirie and Woomera,
uranium mines at Olympic Dam and Beverley, as well as Lake Eyre
to assess the industry's impact on water resources.
Michaela Stubbs from Friends of the Earth says the group has
organised the nine-day tour to show people how the nuclear
industry works.
"To show them the impacts of uranium mining, speak with people
in the community, local and Indigenous communities that are
affected the most," she said.
"It's really a life-changing experience for them because when
you're living in the city you don't often get to see exactly
what these companies are up to and the damage that's being
caused."
© 2005 ABC| Privacy Policy
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47 Deseret News: Goshute chairman to repay $30,000 he got illegally
[deseretnews.com]
Friday, April 15, 2005
By Angie Welling Deseret Morning News
The chairman of the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes has agreed to
pay back more than $30,000 he illegally received in duplicate
stipends and salary for his work for the band.
Goshute tribal leader Leon Bear signed an agreement for
repayment as part of a deal to resolve a criminal case, avoiding
a trial that was scheduled to begin Monday.
Johanna Workman, Deseret Morning News
The agreement comes as part of a deal with prosecutors to
resolve a criminal case against Leon D. Bear and avoid a trial
that had been scheduled to begin Monday.
Bear pleaded guilty Thursday to making a false statement
on his 1999 income tax return, admitting that he failed to claim
approximately $67,000 in income he received from the Skull
Valley band and saving himself $13,101 in taxes.
The embattled Goshute leader, currently locked in a
contentious tribal dispute over his controversial plan to store
nuclear waste on Goshute land in Utah's west desert, faces up to
three years in prison and a $100,000 fine when he is sentenced
June 27.
In exchange for his plea, federal prosecutors have agreed
to dismiss similar counts relating to Bear's allegedly
fraudulent 2000 and 2001 income tax returns, as well as charges
that Bear embezzled some $160,000 by double-billing the band for
his travel expenses and inappropriately accepting a salary for
his work as tribal secretary.
Court documents filed Thursday indicate Bear has agreed
to pay back $6,300 for his secretary salary and $25,242 received
in duplicate travel stipends. He has also agreed to settle all
outstanding tax issues regarding his 1999, 2000 and 2001 returns.
Prosecutors, in turn, will recommend that U.S. District
Judge Bruce Jenkins will sentence Bear at the low end of federal
sentencing guidelines and give the Goshute chairman credit for
accepting responsibility for his actions.
The tiny Tooele County band began making news in 1997,
when Bear signed a lease with Private Fuel Storage, a consortium
of utility companies seeking to store nuclear waste on the
reservation pending the construction of a permanent facility at
Yucca Mountain in Nevada. The decision divided the band, and
Bear has been struggling to retain leadership since.
A faction opposed to the nuclear-waste plan attempted
unsuccessfully to oust Bear through a tribal election,
ultimately leading to a number of federal indictments against a
handful of those opposed to Bear.
Earlier this month, Sammy Blackbear, who had claimed to
have been elected vice chairman in the election, pleaded guilty
to one count of theft from an Indian tribal organization for
embezzling at least $1,000 — though federal prosecutors claim it
is as much as $25,000 — from the band.
Three others who were charged along with Blackbear —
tribal members Marlinda Moon and Miranda Wash, and tribal
attorney Duncan Steadman — are scheduled to stand trial on
similar charges in June.
Last week, Bear's attorneys lost a bid to subpoena former
Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt to testify in the Bear case. Bear's
attorneys alleged the former governor had helped finance the
splinter group's attempts to remove Bear as tribal chairman.
Leavitt, now President Bush's secretary of Health and Human
Services, was one of the state's most vocal critics against the
plan to store as much as 40,000 tons of high-level nuclear waste
on the Goshute land.
E-mail: awelling@desnews.com
© 2005 Deseret News Publishing Company
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48 Seattle Times: Hanford contractor to lay off 700
Friday, April 15, 2005 - Page updated at 12:11 a.m.
By Shannon Dininny
The Associated Press
YAKIMA The contractor handling construction of a nearly $6
billion waste-treatment plant at the Hanford nuclear reservation
announced plans yesterday to lay off 700 workers as the plant's
design is reviewed to determine whether it could withstand a
severe earthquake.
Bechtel National had announced layoffs of about 300 workers in
the past two weeks. An additional 350 workers were laid off
yesterday, reducing the total number of construction workers at
the site by almost half.
The company employed about 1,400 construction workers as of
March 1.
Another 350 employees not handling construction work also were
to receive 60-day layoff notices. Bechtel employs about 2,400
such employees at the site.
"We will periodically review our staffing plan, but I am hopeful
that no further reductions in the waste-treatment-plant work
force will be necessary," Project Director Jim Henschel told
Bechtel employees.
The plant is being built to treat millions of gallons of
radioactive waste left from Cold War-era nuclear-weapons
production.
The layoffs come as Bechtel and the U.S. Department of Energy,
which manages the Hanford site near Richland, review the plant's
design after a new study found that the impact a severe
earthquake could have on the plant was 38 percent greater than
previously estimated.
In 2002, the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board ruled that
the Energy Department had failed to adequately investigate the
impact a severe earthquake might have on the plant.
The agency had gathered seismic data from the 586-square-mile
Hanford reservation to determine the impact such a quake might
have on the plant, but it did not conduct a seismic
investigation of the plant site.
The Energy Department and Bechtel have stressed that the chances
of a severe earthquake at the site are slim. However, the new
seismic data could have a significant impact on the cost and
schedule of the project.
Design of the plant is about 70 percent complete, and
construction is about 35 percent complete. Bechtel had planned
to lay off about 800 engineers this year as work shifted more
toward construction, but those plans are on hold while engineers
review the plant's design, spokesman John Britton said.
In addition, costs of building the one-of-a-kind plant have
ballooned since the original estimate of $4.35 billion before
the contract was awarded in 2002.
The current estimate is close to $5.8 billion, an increase of
more than 30 percent. Last year, the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers concluded there is a significant risk of additional
cost increases.
That review came even before the seismic issues were raised.
Under the proposed 2006 federal budget, funding for the project
falls about $65 million to about $625 million.
The Energy Department cited the unresolved seismic issues as one
reason for the budget cut.
The impact of the new seismic data on the final cost of the
building and the construction schedule should be released in
about two weeks, Energy Department spokesman Erik Olds said.
The current schedule requires the plant to be operating in 2011.
For 40 years, the Hanford reservation made plutonium for the
nation's nuclear-weapons arsenal. Today, work there centers on a
$50 billion to $60 billion cleanup, to be finished by 2035.
Much of the cleanup involves treating 53 million gallons of
highly radioactive waste stewing in 177 aging underground tanks
less than 10 miles from the Columbia River. The waste-treatment
plant will use a process called vitrification to turn some of
the waste into glass logs for permanent disposal in a
nuclear-waste repository.
Copyright © 2005 The Seattle Times Company
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49 Tri-City Herald: Bechtel to cut 700 more jobs
This story was published Friday, April 15th, 2005
By Annette Cary, Herald staff writer
Bechtel National announced it is laying off another 700 workers
Thursday, bringing the total jobs cut at the Hanford
vitrification plant in recent weeks to nearly 1,000 workers.
The layoffs announced Thursday include about 350 union
construction workers, who received notices in their paychecks.
The additional 350 are not construction workers and will be
notified over the next week that their jobs will end in 60 days.
"We will periodically review our staffing plan, but I am hopeful
that no further reductions in the Waste Treatment Plant work
force will be necessary," Jim Henschel, project manager for
Bechtel National, said in a message to employees.
The cuts will drop the staff from about 3,800 a month ago to
2,800, which will include about 2,050 nonconstruction workers
and 750 union construction workers.
Work at key buildings of the plant has slowed to allow the
engineering to advance further ahead of construction, in part
because of concerns about earthquake safety.
The $5.8 billion plant is being built by Bechtel National for
the Department of Energy to turn thousands of gallons of
radioactive waste now held in underground tanks into a stable
glass form for permanent disposal. The waste is left from more
than 40 years of plutonium production at Hanford for the
nation's nuclear weapons program.
Some workers may be offered the chance to work at other Bechtel
construction or engineering projects across the nation or
abroad. Bechtel also is looking for pipefitters for a project in
Southern California.
In addition, the layoffs for construction workers may be eased
by expected temporary work at Energy Northwest as it begins a
planned 35-day outage May 6 at the nuclear power plant north of
Richland. Workers are expected to be needed temporarily to do
maintenance work that cannot be done while the plant is
operating.
When or whether workers might be hired back at the vitrification
plant won't be known until after decisions are made based on
Bechtel's annual estimate on the cost and schedule for
completion of the plant. DOE faces a legal deadline of 2011 to
complete the plant.
Bechtel will continue looking at staffing every three months,
with the first review set for June.
The layoffs are needed as work is substantially slowed at the
two massive buildings at the plant that will handle highly
radioactive waste -- the Pretreatment Facility and the
High-Level Waste Vitrification Facility.
Work will continue on schedule on the third large building at
the plant, the Low-Activity Waste Vitrification Facility, and at
the Analytical Laboratory and scores of support facilities.
In December, results of a new study indicated that design
standards at the two buildings handling high-level radioactive
waste might not be adequate to withstand a worst-case
earthquake.
To meet legal deadlines and to get waste out of underground
tanks sooner, construction on the plant started as design work
continued. Building is about 35 percent complete, and the design
is about 70 percent complete.
The design standard must be increased 38 percent for earthquake
safety at the buildings that will handle high-level radioactive
waste. Engineers have started reviewing and validating the
thousands of calculations already completed on the design.
Bechtel had expected to lay off about 800 engineers steadily
through 2005 as a substantial portion of the design work was
completed. Instead, many of those engineers will keep their jobs
to work on the more robust design calculations.
The design changes are expected to be greatest at the upper
levels of the buildings, which would move more in an earthquake,
limiting the improvements that may be needed on construction
already completed.
The walls are about half way up on the largest building, the
Pretreatment Facility, where waste will be separated into
high-level and low-activity waste streams for treatment. The
building will have a footprint the size of four football fields
and stand about 120 feet high.
DOE also has decided that the design work needs to be completed
further ahead of construction as the plant has faced other
challenges. Getting materials and equipment produced to
nuclear-grade standards has been a challenge since manufacturing
experience has diminished after the United States stopped
building new nuclear plants.
The slowdown in construction will allow more time for the
purchase and delivery of commodities, such as piping and pipe
hangers.
About 275 construction workers already had been laid off in the
last week of March and early April. About half worked the night
shift until Bechtel decided to cancel most night work at the
Pretreatment and High-Level Waste Vitrification Facilities.
Bechtel is expected to give DOE two versions of its annual
estimate at completion report by the end of the month.
One will look at how much work can be accomplished and how soon
if $690 million annually is spent on construction, which is the
amount of funding DOE has said is needed for the project this
year. The other would make projections for work if more money is
spent.
The cost of the plant will be more than the $5.8 billion planned
for construction and testing now, DOE has warned.
© 2005 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services
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50 Times-News: INL highlights changes in contractor, vision
www.magicvalley.com The Times-News | AG Weekly |
Originally published Friday, April 15, 2005
By Megan Hinds Times-News writer
ARCO -- A contractor change at the former Idaho National
Engineering and Environmental Laboratory means more than just a
name change to the Idaho National Laboratory -- it's a change of
vision.
That's what the INL's new management team, Battelle Energy
Alliance, told a group of about 30 south-central Idaho business
and community leaders, educators and public officials this week
during a two-day tour of the INL's facilities in Idaho Falls,
Pocatello and near Arco. The group learned about research and
cleanup efforts at the site, and INL staff showcased the
facility's economic development opportunities.
"It's an opportunity to build relationships that we haven't had
before," said Jan Rogers, director of the Southern Idaho
Economic Development Organization, which organized the tour.
Last November, Battelle, a nonprofit organization based in
Columbus, Ohio, teamed up with Boise-based Washington Group
International Inc., BWXT Services Inc. and three research
institutes to secure a 10-year contract over existing INEEL
contractor Bechtel Corp. and three other bidders. In February,
the alliance, known as BEA, began merging the two research
efforts at the site -- the INEEL laboratory and the Argonne
National Laboratory-West -- into one operation in order to
radically elevate its status in nuclear energy research and
development.
The contracting change means a potential wealth of opportunities
for Idaho businesses, said Fran Williams, BEA's director of
environmental safety, health and quality. New technology is
being developed every day at the INL's research and development
facilities, and possibilities exist for licensing these
inventions for commercial use.
For example, an invention known as GEOPS, or Geologic and
Environmental Probe System, was developed in recent years by INL
scientists. The system probes below the subsurface at the INL's
hazardous waste cleanup sites to determine the type of
contamination there. By using the probe, scientists could
retrieve a small sample of hazardous waste to evaluate it
without digging up a large amount of soil.
The GEOPS system earned its inventors a coveted research and
development award from the Department of Energy, and it's now
being marketed to commercial businesses for licensing, said Gary
Smith, a senior account executive for the INL's technology
transfer and commercialization department.
The GEOPS system can be used in a variety of commercial
applications, from determining soil moisture to evaluating
contamination at old gasoline stations. An American Falls-based
soil sampling company has shown interest in licensing the system
and adopting it as part of its operations, Smith said.
Besides the licensing efforts, Rogers said, opportunities exist
for southern Idaho businesses to subcontract with the INL to
provide other services. Subcontracting could benefit businesses
in sectors ranging from logistics to food services, she said.
And developing a strong relationship with the INL can also be a
major recruiting tool for economic development.
"From an economic development perspective ... that can help
recruit new companies to the area," Rogers said.
Tour participants were guided through a number of INL
facilities, from a radiation testing facility in Pocatello to
the research center in Idaho Falls to the advanced nuclear test
reactor near Arco.
The information was welcome but seemed a bit overwhelming at
times, some tour participants said.
"When I left, my wife told me to come back and tell her
everything I learned," said Ward Maxfield of First Federal
Savings Bank in Rupert. "But I've learned so much that I don't
know what to tell her."
Times-News business writer Megan Hinds can be reached at
735-3238 or megan.hinds@lee.net.
Copyright © 2005, 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.
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51 lamonitor.com: DOE to sample airport ash site
The Online News Source for Los Alamos
DARRYL NEWMAN, Monitor Staff Writer
The Department of Energy is scheduled to begin sampling an old
ash pile near the Los Alamos Airport next week, heralding a new
era in the cleanup process involving the county and the New
Mexico Environmental Department.
The sampling effort is a first step in the development of a work
plan that will eventually be approved by the NMED and the
county. DOE will conduct the sampling to identify the
composition of the ash and determine the best method for its
removal off the disposal site, which dates back to the 1940s.
The work will be executed by Innovative Technical Solutions, a
contractor with DOE. Sampling is slated to begin Monday and run
four to five days, said Bernard Pleau, public affairs specialist
with the National Nuclear Safety Administration.
The legacy Solid Waste Management Unit is located on the
north-facing slope of Pueblo Canyon, several hundred feet
northwest of the airport. The old ash pile is approximately 150
feet wide and another 150 feet below the mesa top.
The work plan is expected to be delivered to the NMED by May 31.
A public meeting will be held to discuss the cleanup process
once the sampling is completed and the DOE reviews the results,
Pleau said.
"We will discuss the removal activity options," he said. "We
want to let the public know of the path forward."
The location, date and time of the public meeting will be
announced following the approval of the work plan.
The DOE is expecting to remove approximately 4,500 cubic yards
of ash debris material from the site with the topography of a
steep canyon wall, which will present unique technical
challenges, Pleau said.
The old disposal site is the result of incinerator operations
that were last active in 1947. The waste primarily consisted of
office and municipal waste that was burned in the old
incinerator building, located just northwest of the airport.
The area is clearly marked and road access to the site is
restricted. The site is one of two that is scheduled for clean
up as part of the Land Transfer Project in which DOE is
gradually contributing some of its land holdings to the county.
"We are pleased that the lab and DOE are continuing their
commitment to clean up sites as well as parcels that are slated
for transfer to the county," County Administrator Max Baker said
this morning.
Previously, DOE representatives proposed and received approval
from the NMED to collect and cap the solid waste on the landfill
sites.
For additional information, call Pleau at 667-6691 or e-mail him
at bpleau@doeal.gov.
© 2003 Los Alamos Monitor All Rights Reserved.
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52 The Paducah Sun: DOE again delays plant cleanup
Paducah, Kentucky
All bids from contractors at the gaseous diffusion plant are to
be re-evaluated. Meanwhile, a proposal could help keep worker
benefits.
By Joe Walker jwalker@paducahsun.com 270.575.8656
Thursday, April 14, 2005
Sen. Jim Bunning has opposed the nomination of David Garman as
new undersecretary of energy because of a two-year delay in
replacing Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant cleanup contractor
Bechtel Jacobs with two smaller firms overseeing 550 workers.
Bunning voiced his opposition Wednesday during a Senate Energy
and Commerce Committee hearing on Garman's nomination. Although
the committee nominated Garman, he still must be approved by the
entire Senate and it was unclear whether Bunning would put a
hold on the nomination from the floor.
Starting in October 2003, procurement was slowed several times
by the Energy Department and further delayed earlier this year
by multiple bid protests after North Wind Paducah Cleanup Co.
was awarded a $303 million environmental contract. The General
Accountability Office dismissed one protest March 28 and two
more Tuesday.
In preparation for the hearing, and in consultation with the
GAO, "We decided to re-evaluate the bids in an effort to make a
selection as quickly as possible," DOE spokesman Mike Waldron
said. "Our goal is to ensure that quality cleanup continues, and
we hope to have the new contractor in place as quickly as
possible."
He said the department will reconsider both technical and cost
evaluations given by bidders in making a new award decision.
Bechtel Jacobs' contract has repeatedly been extended, most
recently until Aug. 31. Waldron said the contract would be
extended again if a replacement isn't picked by the end of
August.
During the hearing, Bunning said it could be months before DOE
reaches a final decision.
"I am not advocating that protests are not ever necessary," he
said. "But I have a community, workers and an environmental
cleanup program that have been waiting in limbo for over two
years for something to happen. I want this fixed quickly."
The hearing came while the House Energy and Commerce Committee
approved Whitfield's amendment requiring DOE to maintain pension
and retiree health-care plans for USEC Inc. workers who might
eventually be hired for cleanup work.
Leon Owens, former president of the Paducah nuclear workers'
union, said it is the first legislation to force DOE to do what
it has been unwilling to do since it decided to replace Bechtel
Jacobs with two smaller firms, one for cleanup and another for
infrastructure.
Last month, Paducah's Swift & Staley was awarded a $39.9 million
infrastructure contract, but its status is unclear because of
DOE's decision to re-evaluate bids.
The re-evaluation "means more delays and frustration," Whitfield
said. "I am very disappointed that we do not have our new
contractor in place. DOE needs to take action to correct this
situation immediately."
He told the House Energy Committee on Tuesday that DOE has not
provided pension and benefit continuity despite lawmakers'
statements that it would not be costly.
He said the amendment directs the department to maintain
benefit-transfer policies that have existed for about 50 years.
Current workers of Bechtel Jacobs and its leading subcontractors
— many of whom are former plant employees — participate in
multiple-employer pension and retiree health insurance plans.
Union leaders have repeatedly complained that at least 500 more
hourly USEC workers would be denied those benefits in seeking
contractor jobs. USEC plans to close the plant starting in 2010.
"This has been nearly a two-year fight, so we're very pleased to
at least get to this point," Owens said. "We're very hopeful and
optimistic of getting it passed."
Attached to the House Energy Bill, the amendment would provide
enforcement authority under previous legislation privatizing
USEC, which leases the plant from DOE.
The Energy Bill must still be approved by the House. Prospects
in the Senate are uncertain, but Bunning and Sen. Mitch
McConnell of Kentucky carry considerable clout in nuclear
issues, Owens said. McConnell is the Senate majority whip.
The bipartisan amendment was co-sponsored by Whitfield,
R-Hopkinsville, and by Rep. Ted Strickland, D-Ohio, who
represents nuclear workers at Piketon. Similar bid protests have
held up cleanup procurement at Piketon.
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