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NUCLEAR POLICY
1 Xinhua: EU troika, Iran to hold nuclear talks
2 Guardian Unlimited: Koreas Can't Break Nuclear Impasse
3 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: North, South take a break from edgy talks
4 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: You can hide, but you cannot escape
5 White House Report, May 19: North Korea
6 Guardian Unlimited: U.S., N. Korean Officials Met Last Week
7 Guardian Unlimited: N. Korean Nuke Program a Topic at Meeting
8 US: FCNL: Another Victory, Another Chance to Cut Funds for New
9 US: csmonitor.com: Nukes: weapons or meal tickets? |
10 US: Guardian Unlimited: Bush likely to back weapons in space
11 [du-list] Arms race feared over 'death stars' and 'rods from
12 RIA Novosti: RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTRY: ADAMOV'S EXTRADITION TO
13 NewsFromRussia.Com: Russia requests extradition of former atomic
14 Guardian Unlimited: Russia Urges Swiss on Ex-Nuclear Chief
NUCLEAR REACTORS
15 US: Nuclear power: The most menacing predator on the Lower
16 US: INPO Hits Another Exelon Plant
17 US: INPO Hits Another Exelon Plant
18 US: greenpeace reactor gag
19 US: NRC: NRC to Discuss 2004 Performance Assessment for Quad Cities
20 Guardian Unlimited Rule out more nuclear power, Lib Dems urge
21 US: NRC: NRC to Discuss 2004 Performance Assessment for Fermi Nuclea
22 US: SignOnSanDiego.com: Public offers comments on plan to extend lif
23 US: Platts: House earmarks NRC FY-06 increase for risk analyses
24 US: NRC: NRC Reports Preliminary Results of Millstone 3 Special Insp
25 US: Herald Tribune: Nuclear plant accident created no health risk
26 US: Cincinnati Post: Monitoring Fernald
27 Xinhua: Power companies await October outcome
28 FAZ Weekly: No thanks to nuclear power policy -
29 US: NRC: Notice of Availability of Environmental Assessment and Find
30 US: NRC: Notice of Availability of Environmental Assessment and Find
31 US: NRC: Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Subcommittee Meet
32 US: NRC: Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards Meeting of the
33 US: NEIS: Next Step Citizen Epidemeology Conference
34 The Globe and Mail: Ducking the 'N' word won't keep the lights on
35 St. Petersburg Times: Nations on Baltic Extend Nuclear Power Plans -
NUCLEAR SECURITY
36 US: Secrecy News -- 05/19/05
37 Interfax: Russia, France call for support of convention on nuclear t
38 Xinhua: Paris backs on withdrawal of US nuclear weapons from Germany
NUCLEAR SAFETY
39 [du-list] (Con) Senate OK's bill to study health effects of
40 The Australian: Fears over health after nuclear tests
41 US: Seattle Times: Jury rules for only two Hanford downwinders
42 Xinhua: France denies accusations of neglecting Polynesians in nucle
43 US: Hawk Eye: Grassley to meet with HHS' Leavitt
44 US: Paducah Sun: Sick worker claims date on track - U.S.
45 US: Tidepool: Downwinders Pay a Secret Price--In the rush to keep pa
46 ZNet: BRAVO and Today
47 US: WTNH.com: Senate OK's bill to study health effects of depleted u
48 US: WOI: Grassley plans meeting on benefits for ammunition plant wor
NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE
49 US: Brattleboro Reformer: No deal yet on dry cask storage
50 US: Bradenton Herald: Angry Tallevast residents halt water project
51 Las Vegas RJ: Indian tribe's plea to block Yucca denied
52 Las Vegas RJ: Panel urges stopgap waste sites
53 Las Vegas RJ: Judges allow parts of worker complaints to remain secr
54 Interfax: Sweden allocates $30mln for Russia's nuclear waste recycli
55 Las Vegas SUN: New rules for Yucca budget sought
56 Las Vegas SUN: Judge denies Shoshone request to stop Yucca work
57 Las Vegas SUN: Funds could be used to reduce amount of waste in Yucc
58 US: WCAX.com: Nuke storage talks to continue today
59 US: Cañon City Daily Record: Cotter Corp. responds to violations
PEACE
60 NZ: Scoop: $3 million towards global disarmament
US DEPT. OF ENERGY
61 Guardian Unlimited: U.S. Seeks New Manager for Los Alamos Lab
62 Albuquerque Tribune: Lab bid process to focus on leader
63 Tri-City Herald: 1,000 Fluor workers face layoff
64 Tri-City Herald: Opinions: Industry poor option for Hanford 300 Area
65 DOE: DOE Response to Recommendation 2005-1 of the Defense Nuclear
66 DOE: Office of Science; Notice of Renewal of the Basic Energy
67 PRN: Statement of Plaintiffs' Lead Counsel Regarding Jury Verdict
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FULL NEWS STORIES
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1 Xinhua: EU troika, Iran to hold nuclear talks
www.xinhuanet.com
www.chinaview.cn 2005-05-19 04:34:05
PARIS, May 18 (Xinhuanet) -- British Foreign Secretary Jack
Straw, French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier and German Foreign
Minister Joschka Fischer, joined by EU foreign policy chief
Javier Solana, will meet with Iran's top nuclear negotiator
Hassan Rowhani next Tuesday in Brussels, diplomatic source said
Wednesday.
The meeting, aiming at saving the negotiation process
between the European Union and Iran over Teheran's nuclear
program, will follow another preparatory meeting also in
Brussels.
The meeting was described by Iranian Foreign Minister Kamal
Kharazi as possibly the "last round of negotiations" between the
European troika and the Islamic republic, while Teheran insists
that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes and it will
never give up its rights on nuclear energy.
Iran froze its enrichment activities on Nov. 22, 2004 in
exchange for EU's promised economic and technological incentives
after the two sides reached a fragile agreement in Paris.
However, during the consequent talks, the EU turned down
Tehran's proposal of keeping restricted enrichment activities
while providing other guarantees of the peaceful nature of its
nuclear program, which angered Iran.
Last week Britain, France and Germany warned Iran that
breaking the deal would lead to the result that the UN Security
Council has to discuss the matter after Tehran announced it
would resume uranium conversion work.
Several top-level Iranian officials have said this week that
they held out little hope of reaching an agreement with the
EU-3, saying the Europeans were hostage to the hardline US
position.
The United States has accused Iran of developing nuclear
weapons, but Iran rejected the charge as politically motivated.
Enditem
Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
2 Guardian Unlimited: Koreas Can't Break Nuclear Impasse
From the Associated Press
[UP]
Thursday May 19, 2005 1:31 PM
AP Photo SEL802
By PAUL ALEXANDER
Associated Press Writer
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - The two Koreas concluded their first
face-to-face talks in 10 months Thursday without making any
progress on the impasse over the North's nuclear program,
although they did agree to hold Cabinet-level talks next month.
The agreement came hours after word emerged of a secret meeting
last week between U.S. and North Korean officials. The focus of
both efforts was to get Pyongyang to rejoin six-nation talks on
getting it to abandon its nuclear program, but the reclusive
communist country - which regularly uses brinksmanship to wring
aid from the West - clearly resisted any public commitment.
The U.S. Embassy in Tokyo said American officials met with North
Korean officials in New York last week.
``This channel is used to convey messages about U.S. policy, not
to negotiate,'' an embassy official said on condition of
anonymity.
The meeting was first reported in The Boston Globe on Thursday.
A statement issued Thursday at the conclusion of the two-day
meeting between the Koreas said both nations agreed to work for
peace on the Korean Peninsula. It said a follow-up Cabinet-level
meeting would be held June 21-24 in Seoul, and South Korea would
begin providing 200,000 tons of fertilizer to the North starting
May 21.
The Cabinet-level meeting was a minor victory for South Korea,
which had proposed it, and the nuclear issue undoubtedly will be
on the agenda then.
Seoul also will send a delegation to Pyongyang in June for the
fifth anniversary of a historic summit between the two rivals.
South Korean media said Unification Minister Chung Dong-young
was expected to lead the delegation, and there was a possibility
he would meet North Korean leader Kim Jong Il.
``For this event to take place in an atmosphere of
reconciliation and cooperation, both sides agreed to actively
cooperate and ... hold working-level talks,'' the statement
said.
Seoul has provided fertilizer to the impoverished North in
recent years to help alleviate widespread famine. It said the
shipments would start almost immediately - out of ``humanitarian
and brotherly love position'' - as Pyongyang had requested, in
time for the spring planting season. The North earlier this year
asked for 500,000 tons.
Talks between the two Koreas broke off in July after mass
defections to South Korea that the North labeled kidnappings.
South Korea has found itself walking a tightrope during the
talks in the North border town of Kaesong, trying to appease
domestic pressure for some improvement in relations while
international allies - including Washington - pressed for action
on the nuclear issue.
The Bush administration earlier this month offered a couple of
carrots to the North - direct talks and recognition of its
sovereignty - in a bid to derail its nuclear weapons program.
The communist state declared Feb. 10 that it has nuclear weapons
and would indefinitely boycott the six-nation disarmament talks
- involving the two Koreas, the United States, China, Japan and
Russia - until the United States dropped its ``hostile'' policy
toward it.
Washington has said repeatedly it has no intention of invading
the North.
The North's nuclear claim has not been verified, but U.S.
intelligence and other estimates say North Korea has as many as
six atomic weapons.
The Boston Globe reported that Friday's meeting with the North
was attended by Joseph DiTrani, the U.S. special envoy to the
six-nation nuclear talks, and Jim Foster, the head of the State
Department's Office of Korean Affairs.
Japan's Asahi newspaper reported that senior U.S. State
Department officials went to North Korea's U.N. office with
assurances that Washington recognizes North Korea as a sovereign
nation under the leadership of Kim, and the Bush administration
does not intend to attack it.
Kyodo News agency, citing anonymous sources, reported that North
Korea responded that it would have a response to the discussions
in two weeks.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
3 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: North, South take a break from edgy talks
May 19, 2005 ¤Ñ Representatives of the two Koreas stepped back
yesterday from efforts to advance bilateral relations after
negotiations bogged down following two days of talks. The
delegations said they intended to resume their discussions today
as South Korea's representatives returned yesterday to the
capital for consultations.
Seoul had held out hope that the contacts in Kaesong, North
Korea, would conclude Tuesday with the announcement of a joint
statement, but the two sides failed to reach agreement on almost
every issue discussed, including North Korea's nuclear arms
development, whether to revive family reunions and detailed
arrangements for a visit to Pyongyang by South Korean officials
next month.
Unification Ministry officials in Seoul said a chief
disagreement was whether the principle of keeping the Korean
Peninsula nuclear-free would be cited in a statement at the end
of the talks. Determined to address North Korea's nuclear
programs, Seoul insisted the issue be included, but North Korea
rejected the idea.
"North Korea said nuclear issues should be dealt with at
ministerial-level talks and cannot be handled at a working
level," a Seoul official said. "But we wanted to include the
stance of denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula, already
agreed in 1992 between the two Koreas."
The official said the disagreement affected other issues.
"Because of the difference, we could not fix a date for an
inter-Korean ministerial meeting in South Korea next month."
A Seoul government official said South Korea will likely back
down on the point when the talks resume.
"Since our first aim is restoring relations between the two
Koreas, South Korea will likely adjust its position over the
nuclear issues," he said.
The official also denied earlier reports from the joint press
corps that North Korea has requested more fertilizer aid in
addition to the 200,000 tons Seoul promised.
"There was no disagreement over the fertilizer aid," he said.
"The North asked us to ship the aid as soon as possible for its
planting season."
But with the talks at loggerheads, Seoul policymakers gathered
yesterday to discuss their options. As soon as the delegates
returned from Kaesong yesterday morning, Rhee Bong-jo, vice
minister of unification and the chief delegate for the talks,
and his aides rushed into a meeting with other top officials.
Lee Jong-seok, vice head of the National Security Council, and
Song Min-soon, Seoul's chief delegate for the six-party talks
aimed at ending Pyongyang's nuclear programs, attended the
meeting.
Choi Jun-taek, the National Intelligence Service's director in
charge of North Korea affairs, also joined the session, which
was led by Unification Minister Chung Dong-young.
Separately, Foreign Minister Ban Ki-moon gave a blunt warning to
Pyongyang. "Cooperation and reconciliation between the two
Koreas will be difficult if the principle of a nuclear-free
Korean Peninsula is not respected," Mr. Ban said.
by Ser Myo-ja, Lee Young-jong myoja@joongang.co.kr>
Copyright by Joins.com, Inc. Terms of Use |
*****************************************************************
4 INSIDE JoongAng Daily: You can hide, but you cannot escape
2005.05.18
North Korea's military industrial complex is top secret. The
level of secrecy is so great that the supervising body in charge
of the industry is not even listed on the government's official
organizational chart. However, it is a well-known fact that the
2nd Economical Committee, which is not a subordinate body to the
cabinet, is the responsible organization. The committee consists
of general bureaus numbered from 1 to 10, with the second one
being the largest and No. 26 Factory at Jagang province (part of
the Kanggye Tractor Factory) at its core. It is at the factory
that 40 percent of North Korea's military industry production
occurs, and it is rumored that the missiles manufactured at the
factory are exported to the Middle East, bringing in 45 percent
of the nation's foreign currency.
Because of the large earnings, it is natural for the workers at
the factory to receive special treatment. Whereas common
citizens receive food rations with equal amounts of cereal and
rice, workers at the factory are provided with 70 percent of
their ration in rice. They also receive cooking oil, vitamins
and electronic goods and those assigned to key positions also
collect an additional 10 kilograms of beans every month. There's
even a bonus for them.
This information is from "Secret Destruction Weapon Factory," a
book written by a former supply officer at the Kim Il Sung
Revolution Historic Memorial and rations control officer at
Kanggye's administrative committee who defected in 1993.
A notable feature is that many of the workplaces at No. 26
Factory are located underground. It is suspected that there are
some 8,000 underground military facilities, and 1,800 are
located near the Demilitarized Zone. But unlike the old days,
being underground has little importance with today's modern
weaponry. It's because aiming two Bunker Busters, which are
being utilized in Operation Iraqi Freedom, at the facility's
entrance and exit leaves them with nowhere to go.
The world's eyes are focusing on the underground tunnel that
North Korea has built in Kilju, North Hamgyong province. If
South Korea's denial that it is a nuclear arms test site is
true, then it is certain that the North is planning another one
of its dreams underground, a dream that will become desolate
with modern weapons.
The writer is a deputy political news editor at the JoongAng
Ilbo.
by Ahn Sung-kyoo askme@joongang.co.kr>
Copyright by Joins.com, Inc. Terms of Use |
*****************************************************************
5 White House Report, May 19: North Korea
The White House confirmed May 19 that U.S. and North Korean
officials had "working-level" contacts May 13 in New York City.
"As in the past, this channel has been used to convey U.S.
policy messages to North Korea, not to negotiate, and that was
the motivation and the use of this channel this time," White
House Deputy Press Secretary Trent Duffy told reporters aboard
Air Force One while en route to Milwaukee.
"The channel was used to reiterate the message that the North
Koreans need to return to the Six-Party Talks without
conditions, so we can pursue a policy of a nuclear-fee Korean
Peninsula," Duffy said.
The spokesman noted that the last such contacts between U.S. and
North Korean officials took place in December 2004.
"The President has been delivering this message publicly and
directly in the recent weeks and days, and the decision was made
to use this channel to communicate directly with North Korean
officials," the spokesman said.
The Six-Party Talks have been stalled since completion of the
third round of talks in June 2004, when Pyongyang refused to
continue participation. The other nations involved in the
Six-Party Talks are China, South Korea, Japan and Russia.
*****************************************************************
6 Guardian Unlimited: U.S., N. Korean Officials Met Last Week
From the Associated Press
[UP]
Thursday May 19, 2005 10:16 AM
By JOSEPH COLEMAN
Associated Press Writer
TOKYO (AP) - U.S. officials met with North Korean officials in
New York last week, the U.S. Embassy in Tokyo said Thursday, in
an apparent effort to draw the volatile nation back into
six-nation nuclear talks.
The meeting, reportedly at the North Korean representative
office at the United Nations, came as concerns are mounting that
the reclusive regime is moving toward extracting weapons-grade
plutonium and could be preparing for a nuclear test.
``We can confirm that we had working-level contact with North
Korean officials on Friday, May 13, in New York,'' an embassy
official said. ``This channel is used to convey messages about
U.S. policy, not to negotiate.''
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, did not
elaborate.
Kyodo News agency, citing anonymous sources, reported that the
North Korean side said in the meeting that it would have a
response to the discussions in two weeks.
The United States, China, South Korea, Japan and Russia are
trying to persuade North Korea to return to six-nation talks on
its nuclear weapons programs. The talks have been stalled since
June, and North Korea has boycotted efforts to arrange a new
session.
The last time U.S. officials had contact with North Korean
officials appeared to be a January congressional delegation to
Pyongyang led by Rep. Curt Weldon, vice chairman of the House
Armed Services Committee.
Weldon, R-Pa., said after that trip that North Korea appeared
ready to negotiate ``in a matter of weeks.''
The Bush administration earlier this month offered a couple of
carrots to the North - direct talks and recognition of its
sovereignty - in a bid to derail its nuclear weapons program.
But Washington has also talked tough with Pyongyang, saying that
a nuclear test would be punished, and that the U.S. had not
ruled out bringing the case before the U.N. Security Council for
consideration of sanctions.
The Boston Globe reported in its Thursday edition that Friday's
meeting was attended by Joseph DiTrani, the U.S. special envoy
to the six-nation nuclear talks, and Jim Foster, the head of the
State Department's Office of Korean Affairs.
Japan's Asahi newspaper reported in its Thursday evening edition
that senior U.S. State Department officials told North Korean
officials in the meeting that Washington recognizes North Korea
as a sovereign nation under the leadership of Kim Jong Il.
The U.S. officials also told the North Korean side that the
administration of President Bush does not intend to attack North
Korea, the Asahi said.
The report said the meeting took place at North Korea's
representative office at the United Nations.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
7 Guardian Unlimited: N. Korean Nuke Program a Topic at Meeting
From the Associated Press
[UP]
Thursday May 19, 2005 12:16 PM
AP Photo SEL802
By PAUL ALEXANDER
Associated Press Writer
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - South Korea raised North Korea's
worrisome nuclear program again as the rival nations sought to
wrap up their first face-to-face talks in 10 months Thursday, as
word emerged of a secret meeting last week between U.S. and
North Korean officials.
The focus of both efforts was to get Pyongyang to rejoin
six-nation negotiations on the denuclearization, but the
reclusive communist country - which regularly uses brinksmanship
to wring aid from the West - was clearly resisting any public
commitment.
The U.S. Embassy in Tokyo said U.S. officials met with North
Korean officials in New York last week. ``This channel is used
to convey messages about U.S. policy, not to negotiate,'' an
embassy official said on condition of anonymity.
Japan's Asahi newspaper reported that senior U.S. State
Department officials went to North Korea's U.N. office with
assurances that Washington recognizes North Korea as a sovereign
nation under the leadership of Kim Jong Il and that the Bush
administration does not intend to attack it.
Kyodo News agency, citing anonymous sources, reported that North
Korea responded that it would have a response to the discussions
in two weeks.
While Seoul on Thursday pressed to get some mention of the
nuclear issue in a final joint statement at the talks in the
North Korean border town of Kaesong, it also was working to
salvage some good will, saying that normalizing strained
relations was the top priority.
South Korea has found itself walking a tightrope during the
talks, trying to appease domestic pressure for some improvement
in relations with the North.
``An agreement will be reached,'' North Korea's chief negotiator
Kim Man Gil said.
However, an agreement seemed more likely on setting up a
Cabinet-level meeting next month than any real progress on
breaking the nuclear impasse.
Vice Unification Minister Rhee Bong-jo, head of the South's
delegation, reported he brought up the nuclear issue again, as
he said he has during every session since the talks opened on
Monday.
``We repeatedly emphasized that North Korea return to the
peaceful resolution of North Korean nuclear issue and the fourth
round of six-party talks,'' Rhee told reporters.
The last time U.S. officials had contact with North Korean
officials appeared to be a January congressional delegation to
Pyongyang led by Rep. Curt Weldon, R-Pa., vice chairman of the
House Armed Services Committee. Weldon said after that trip that
North Korea appeared ready to negotiate ``in a matter of
weeks.''
The Bush administration earlier this month offered a couple of
carrots to the North - direct talks and recognition of its
sovereignty - in a bid to derail its nuclear weapons program.
But Washington has also talked tough with Pyongyang, saying that
a nuclear test would be punished, and that the U.S. had not
ruled out bringing the case before the U.N. Security Council for
consideration of sanctions.
North Korea claimed in February that it has nuclear weapons and
said it would indefinitely boycott six-party arms talks -
stalled since last June - until Washington drops its ``hostile''
policy. It said last week it would strengthen its nuclear
arsenal and that it had removed spent fuel rods from a reactor,
a possible step toward extracting weapons-grade plutonium.
Washington has resisted direct negotiations sought by North
Korea but has said it was willing to hold discussions with
Pyongyang in the context of the six-party talks involving the
United States, China, Japan, Russia and the two Koreas.
On Monday, South Korea promised a major new ``proposal'' if the
North returns to the nuclear bargaining table. No details on the
proposal were given, but South Korean media speculated that
Seoul would offer massive aid to the North.
U.S. officials reported last week that spy satellites spotted
construction of a tunnel and a reviewing stand in North Korea -
possible indications of a coming nuclear test. South Korean
officials have dismissed such reports as lacking firm evidence.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
8 FCNL: Another Victory, Another Chance to Cut Funds for New
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 15:52:34 -0500 (CDT)
Your emails and phone calls to the House of Representatives made a
difference. Last week, two committees in the House of Representatives
blocked the administrations plans for the nuclear "bunker
buster." While this is good news, we now need the Senate to follow
suit.
The Senate has still not made up its mind on whether to ditch the Bush
administrations plans to research a new nuclear bomb called the
nuclear "bunker buster." This weapon, if ever used, could
lead to a million casualties according to a recent study by the
National Research Council,
http://capwiz.com/fconl/utr/1/LSNFESANAI/DBQZESANFW/ It is a new weapon
of mass destruction.
Despite the impracticality of this weapon, the Senate may decide as
early as next week whether to restart funding for research into such a
bomb. The Senate will consider legislation that includes millions of
dollars in funding for the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator, or bunker
buster bomb. That legislation could reach the Senate floor as early as
next week.
With the remarkable wins in the House, now we need to mobilize again to
get the Senate to slam the door on new nuclear weapons--for good!
TAKE ACTION NOW!
Please contact your Senators today! Urge them to eliminate funds for
the bunker buster. Tell them that new nuclear weapons will not make the
world more secure. Developing new nuclear weapons sends a message to
the rest of the world that nuclear weapons are necessary and usable.
This undermines U.S. security.
Contacting your Senators is easy. You can email or fax your Senator for
free by going to http://capwiz.com/fconl/utr/1/LSNFESANAI/BHILESANFX/
Once there you will also find talking points to help you write your
letter. It is best to write your message in your own words since
congressional staff often ignore "form letters."
Because this issue is so urgent, please forward this FCNL action
message on to family and friends.
Background: The Bush administration has renewed its effort to develop a
"bunker busting" nuclear bomb that would penetrate the ground
before exploding in order to destroy underground targets. This bomb
would be 70 times more powerful than the bomb that was dropped on
Hiroshima. And its explosion would not be contained underground.
The Bush administration is asking for $4 million in the Energy
Department budget to develop this new nuclear bomb, also known as the
"Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator." The administration is also
asking for $4.5 million in the Air Force budget for non-nuclear tests
that would evaluate the bunker busters ability to penetrate into the
earth before exploding.
While the amount requested is small relative to the overall military
budget, spending any funds on the bunker buster keeps alive a program
that will cost hundreds of millions of dollars once it moves from
research to acquisition. In addition to the cost to the taxpayer, the
program undermines U.S. efforts to convince other countries not to
develop nuclear weapons.
Last year, Congress zeroed out all funding for the nuclear bunker
buster. We need your help again to make sure your victory is not
reversed.
_______________________________________
Stop New Nuclear Weapons! Find out how,
http://capwiz.com/fconl/utr/1/LSNFESANAI/NNKSESANFY/
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Order FCNL publications and "War is Not the Answer" campaign
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fcnl@fcnl.org * www.fcnl.org
phone: (202)547-6000 * toll-free: (800)630-1330
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9 csmonitor.com: Nukes: weapons or meal tickets? |
Commentary > Daniel Schorr
from the May 20, 2005 edition
By Daniel Schorr
WASHINGTON Since 1945 when America ushered in the nuclear age
with bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, a lot of energy has been
devoted to trying to limit the number of countries with nuclear
weapons. Nonproliferation, they call it.
An exception was made for Britain, which came up with its bomb
in 1952. In 1955, at a summit in Geneva, President Eisenhower
tried to persuade Nikita Khrushchev to join in a peaceful atomic
program, but the Soviet boss would have none of that. The Soviet
Union had already tested its first bomb in 1949, fashioned with
the aid of espionage at Los Alamos labs.
Then in 1960, came France, whose notion of French glory required
a nuclear force de frappe (nuclear strike force). And, in 1964,
China ... and probably in 1967, although never officially
confirmed, Israel. The world was getting very unsafe. And so, in
1970, 187 countries signed a nonproliferation treaty, offering
to help nations develop peaceful nuclear energy programs if they
would forswear weapons and agree to submit to international
inspection. That did not keep India from testing its first
nuclear weapon in 1974, and Pakistan in 1998.
Every five years the signatories to the treaty would meet, as
they have been doing in New York, for some joint nail-biting
about who would be the next to crash the nuclear club. Today's
top candidates, as you might expect, are North Korea and Iran.
Iran denies it's working on weapons, although without unimpeded
inspection it's hard to know. North Korea, which expelled
international inspectors, has announced that it has nuclear
weapons and hasn't denied reports that it's planning to test
one. The White House says if it happens "action would have to be
taken," implying punitive measures.
What makes the current situation so complicated is that
countries have discovered that the belief that they may have
nuclear weapons gives them an enormous bargaining chip in
negotiation for economic aid and diplomatic recognition.
An example of the manifold uses of nuclear-development-hinting
is Iran, which has advised European powers that it is willing to
give negotiation a try before making a "final" decision about
resuming its nuclear program.
Just whisper "uranium enrichment" and you gain the anxious ear
of the big powers. Six decades into the nuclear age it's harder
to tell whether a country is lying when it says it is going
nuclear or when it says it isn't.
" Daniel Schorr is the senior news analyst at National Public
Radio.
www.csmonitor.com | Copyright © 2005 The Christian Science
Monitor. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
10 Guardian Unlimited: Bush likely to back weapons in space
Arms race feared over 'death stars' and 'rods from God'
Julian Borger in Washington
Thursday May 19, 2005
The Guardian
President George Bush is expected to issue a directive in the
next few weeks giving the US air force a green light for the
development of space weapons, potentially triggering a new global
arms race, it was reported yesterday.
The new weapons being studied range from hunter-killer satellites
to orbiting weapons using lasers, radio waves, or even dense
metal tubes dropped from space by a weapon known as "Rods from
God" on ground targets.
The national security directive on space has been sought by the
air force since last year. The New York Times yesterday quoted a
senior administration official as saying a decision is expected
within weeks. Neither the air force nor the White House returned
calls seeking comment.
The directive will replace a 1996 directive signed by Bill
Clinton which was vaguely worded but which emphasised the
peaceful use of space, in line with almost unanimous global
opinion. Plans for potential space weapons were vetoed by the
Clinton White House.
Space warfare experts said they expected the Bush administration
directive to be similarly vague but also to signal a shift in
attitude towards exploring ways of affirming US dominance in
space militarily.
"Up to now, this has been a campaign by the air force to have the
freedom to do what they want to do in space," said Theresa
Hitchens, vice-president of the Centre for Defence Information.
"This will, for the first time in US history, will give them the
go-ahead."
Ms Hitchens argued the directive would trigger an arms race in
space. "Let's think of a world where US has 'death stars'
everywhere in space that are going over countries every 10
minutes. Do you think other countries are going to accept that?"
she said.
The new push to develop space weapons comes as the earth-based
missile defence system, intended to hit an incoming missile with
another missile and which was heavily promoted by the Bush
administration, has been set back by technical problems and
failed tests. The air force's intentions were spelt out last
September by General Lance Lord, head of its space command, who
said satellites had given US military power a decisive advantage
with their spying, communications and targeting capacities. That
advantage had to be maintained by "space superiority".
"It can be our destiny if we work it hard and continue to
aggressively follow that," he said.
The potential weapons fall into two main categories as defined by
a 2002 Pentagon planning document: "space control" or
anti-satellite warfare, and "space force application" or
attacking the ground from orbit. The air force claims that it can
design military satellites that could protect US military and
civilian satellites already in orbit. However, most space experts
argue that the satellites are aimed at destroying other country's
satellites.
"Space force application" weapons include the global strike
programme, which envisages a space plane armed with half a ton of
munitions. The "Rods from God" scheme would aim tungsten,
titanium or uranium cylinders at targets on the ground from a
position in low earth orbit. By the time they hit the earth they
would be travelling at around 7,500mph , with the impact of a
small nuclear warhead.
Another option would use mirrors to focus an intense laser beam
onto terrestrial targets, referred to as a "death star" by its
critics. But according to one estimate a space-based laser would
cost $100m (around £55m) per target.
"It's an enormously expensive way of hitting the ground," said
Laura Grego, a space weapons expert at the Union of Concerned
Scientists. She said the "space control" satellites were more
likely to be deployed, but even they could trigger an arms race.
"We're legitimising the idea of attacking other people's
satellites and we have the most to lose. This technology is
diffusing rapidly," Ms Grego said. "To be the masters of space
you'd have to not allow anyone else to launch into space. But you
can't blow up everyone's launch pads."
[UP]
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
11 [du-list] Arms race feared over 'death stars' and 'rods from
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 14:28:00 -0700
"Dense metal tubes" proposed by dense arms cartel exploring the final
frontier profit margins.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1487124,00.html
Arms race feared over 'death stars' and 'rods from God'
Julian Borger in Washington
Thursday May 19, 2005
The Guardian
President George Bush is expected to issue a directive in the next few
weeks giving the US air force a green light for the development of space
weapons, potentially triggering a new global arms race, it was reported
yesterday.
The new weapons being studied range from hunter-killer satellites to
orbiting weapons using lasers, radio waves, or even dense metal tubes
dropped from space by a weapon known as "Rods from God" on ground targets.
he national security directive on space has been sought by the air force
since last year. The New York Times yesterday quoted a senior
administration official as saying a decision is expected within weeks.
Neither the air force nor the White House returned calls seeking comment.
The directive will replace a 1996 directive signed by Bill Clinton which
was vaguely worded but which emphasised the peaceful use of space, in line
with almost unanimous global opinion. Plans for potential space weapons
were vetoed by the Clinton White House.
Space warfare experts said they expected the Bush administration directive
to be similarly vague but also to signal a shift in attitude towards
exploring ways of affirming US dominance in space militarily.
"Up to now, this has been a campaign by the air force to have the freedom
to do what they want to do in space," said Theresa Hitchens, vice-president
of the Centre for Defence Information. "This will, for the first time in US
history, will give them the go-ahead."
Ms Hitchens argued the directive would trigger an arms race in space.
"Let's think of a world where US has 'death stars' everywhere in space that
are going over countries every 10 minutes. Do you think other countries are
going to accept that?" she said.
The new push to develop space weapons comes as the earth-based missile
defence system, intended to hit an incoming missile with another missile
and which was heavily promoted by the Bush administration, has been set
back by technical problems and failed tests. The air force's intentions
were spelt out last September by General Lance Lord, head of its space
command, who said satellites had given US military power a decisive
advantage with their spying, communications and targeting capacities. That
advantage had to be maintained by "space superiority".
"It can be our destiny if we work it hard and continue to aggressively
follow that," he said.
The potential weapons fall into two main categories as defined by a 2002
Pentagon planning document: "space control" or anti-satellite warfare, and
"space force application" or attacking the ground from orbit. The air force
claims that it can design military satellites that could protect US
military and civilian satellites already in orbit. However, most space
experts argue that the satellites are aimed at destroying other country's
satellites.
"Space force application" weapons include the global strike programme,
which envisages a space plane armed with half a ton of munitions. The "Rods
from God" scheme would aim tungsten, titanium or uranium cylinders at
targets on the ground from a position in low earth orbit. By the time they
hit the earth they would be travelling at around 7,500mph , with the impact
of a small nuclear warhead.
Another option would use mirrors to focus an intense laser beam onto
terrestrial targets, referred to as a "death star" by its critics. But
according to one estimate a space-based laser would cost $100m (around
£55m) per target.
"It's an enormously expensive way of hitting the ground," said Laura Grego,
a space weapons expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists. She said the
"space control" satellites were more likely to be deployed, but even they
could trigger an arms race.
"We're legitimising the idea of attacking other people's satellites and we
have the most to lose. This technology is diffusing rapidly," Ms Grego
said. "To be the masters of space you'd have to not allow anyone else to
launch into space. But you can't blow up everyone's launch pads."
----------
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12 RIA Novosti: RUSSIAN FOREIGN MINISTRY: ADAMOV'S EXTRADITION TO
THE US INADMISSIBLE WITHOUT RUSSIA'S AGREEMENT
MOSCOW, May 19 (RIA Novosti) - Russia has warned Switzerland of
the inadmissibility of extraditing ex-Nuclear Energy Yevgeny
Adamov to the US without prior agreement with Russia, says the
commentary of the ministry's press department.
"The Swiss side has been informed through diplomatic channels of
our serious concern over the detainment of Yevgeny O. Adamov,
which was made, we believe, without due regard for certain norms
of international law," the commentary says.
"We proceed from the assumption that criminal persecution of the
former minister and former member of the Government of Russia in
the territory of a foreign state and his extradition for this
purpose to a third country bears on the national security
interests of Russia," the ministry stressed.
According to Russian diplomats, "at least several charges
brought against Yevgeny O. Adamov date back to the time when he
was a minister."
"According to the norms of international law, such actions have
immunity to foreign criminal legislation, which rules out the
possibility of criminal persecution of Yevgeny Adamov in a
foreign state without the agreement of concerned Russian
agencies," the commentary says.
The Russian ministry believes that if there are reasons for a
criminal persecution of Adamov, it should be done in Russia
according to Russian laws.
Yevgeny Adamov, Russia's Atomic Energy Minister in 1998-2001,
was detained in Bern on May 2. The arrest warrant for the
66-year-old former minister was issued by the court of the
western district of Pennsylvania. The man is expecting
extradition to the US in a Bern prison.
The US authorities accuse Adamov and his business partner, US
national Mark Kaushansky of embezzling $9 million granted by the
US government to Russia for improving nuclear safety systems.
Adamov faces up to 60 years in prison and a fine of $1.75
million in the US.
© 2005 "RIA Novosti"
*****************************************************************
13 NewsFromRussia.Com: Russia requests extradition of former atomic
energy minister from Switzerland
Pravda.RU:Russia:More in detail
13:51 2005-05-19
Russia has made an official request that Switzerland extradite
to Moscow former Russian atomic energy minister Yevgeny Adamov,
who is being held in a Swiss prison on a U.S. warrant,
authorities here said Thursday.
Switzerland received the Russian request earlier this week, the
Justice Ministry said in a statement. Adamov was arrested
earlier this month in the Swiss capital Bern after U.S. justice
officials accused him of diverting up to US$9 million (-7
million) from funds intended to improve Russian nuclear
security.
The content of the Russian extradition request is different from
the U.S. warrant, but both concern the "illegal appropriation of
money intended for nuclear security," the Justice Ministry said.
The United States has until June 30 to file an official request
for Adamov's extradition, but Swiss authorities did not say if
Washington has already done so.
Adamov has been indicted by a U.S. federal grand jury in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, on conspiracy to transfer stolen money
and securities, conspiracy to defraud the United States, money
laundering and tax evasion.
On Wednesday, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement
that the accusations against Adamov could relate to his
activities as a government minister and that any prosecution
should take place in Russia rather than in a foreign criminal
jurisdiction.
Last week, a legislator from Russia's Liberal Democratic Party
suggested in parliament that if Russia is unable to get the
former atomic energy minister returned home, he should be
"eliminated."
If Washington were to submit an extradition request, Switzerland
would then have to decide between extraditing Adamov to the
United States, to Russia or not extraditing him at all.
"The question of which application takes priority is still
unclear and will be examined in the course of extradition
proceedings," the Justice Ministry said.
According to international law, Switzerland would have to make
its judgment based on the seriousness and location of the
alleged crimes, the dates of the extradition requests and the
nationality of the person involved.
Adamov had come to Switzerland to see his daughter and to help
her regain access to blocked accounts in Swiss banks.
ONNA CORAY, Associated Press Writer
pravda.ru
Copyright ©1999 by "Pravda.RU". When reproducing our materials
*****************************************************************
14 Guardian Unlimited: Russia Urges Swiss on Ex-Nuclear Chief
From the Associated Press
[UP]
Thursday May 19, 2005 3:16 AM
MOSCOW (AP) - Russia asked Switzerland Wednesday to send its
detained former atomic energy minister back home for prosecution
and reject demands to extradite him to the United States.
Yevgeny Adamov was arrested earlier this month in the Swiss
capital Bern after U.S. justice officials accused him of
diverting up to $9 million from funds intended to improve
Russian nuclear security. He is being held in a Swiss prison on
a U.S. warrant.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement late Wednesday
that the accusations against Adamov could relate to his
activities as a government minister and that any prosecution
should take place in Russia rather than in a foreign criminal
jurisdiction.
``We believe that if there are grounds for criminal prosecution
of Adamov, this should take place in Russia according to Russian
law,'' said the ministry.
Lawyers for Adamov said earlier Wednesday that they had appealed
in a Swiss criminal court against his detention on the basis
that Switzerland violated his immunity as a former minister.
Adamov has been indicted by a U.S. federal grand jury in
Pittsburgh on conspiracy to transfer stolen money and
securities, conspiracy to defraud the United States, money
laundering and tax evasion.
Russia had originally appeared to distance itself from Adamov,
noting he was facing charges in connection with his commercial
activities in the early 1990s prior to his appointment as
Russian atomic energy minister.
Last week, an ultranationalist legislator suggested in
parliament that if Russia is unable to get the former atomic
energy minister returned home, he should be ``eliminated.''
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
15 Nuclear power: The most menacing predator on the Lower
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 14:28:26 -0700
Editor:
----------
May 19, 2005
There is a loud and growing chorus of nuclear power proponents who
refuse to
acknowledge the daily threats to clean air and water produced by the
³peaceful atom².
These folks persist in trotting out well-worn canards even after the Better
Business
Bureau (BBB) concluded, ³The process currently used to produce at least
some, if not
most, of the uranium enriched fuels that are necessary to power nuclear
energy plants
emits substantial amounts of environmentally harmful greenhouse gases.²
However, when it comes to water consumption, fish kills, chemical leaks,
thermal
inversion and effluent discharges, nuclear power plants are viewed as a
benign monster.
Most Pennsylvanians are unaware of the damage inflicted on the Susquehanna
River
by nuclear generating stations. These plants consume millions of gallons
daily to cool their
superheated reactor core and perform normal industrial applications.
Since they began operating in 1974, Three Mile Island-1 and Peach Bottom-2 & 3
have returned water at temperatures in excess of 110 degrees, and
discharged chlorinated
water (necessary to minimize bacterial contamination of turbines) and
Clamtrol (chemical
agent used to defeat Asiatic clam infestation) directly into the
Susquehanna River.
Millions of fish, fish eggs, shellfish and other organisms are sucked out
of the Lower
Susquehanna River and killed by nuclear power plants annually.
On July 9, 2004, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued
the Final
Phase II rule implementing Section 316(b) of the Clean Water Act. The first
national
standards for reducing fish kills at existing power plants was the result
of over ten years
of litigation by environmentalists and six states. The regulations must be
implemented
by September 7, 2005.
The problem is that the proposed remediation system is dependent on a
culture of
corporate reporting that has failed miserably for over 30 years. Moreover,
Exelon has
slashed staffing at TMI and Peach Bottom by 10-25% over the last fiver
years, and two
of the hardest hit departments have been Health Physics and Environmental
Monitoring.
A former Peach Bottom nuclear plant employee said he was "sickened" by
the large
numbers of sport fish he saw sucked out of the Susquehanna. "When the water
comes in,
fish would swim in through tunnels and swim into wire baskets," the
southern Lancaster
County resident stated. "There were hundreds and hundreds of fish killed
each day. Stripers
and bass and walleye and gizzard shad and all kinds of fish. It took a
forklift to carry them
out² (Ad Crable, Lancaster New Era, January 15, 2005).
At Three Mile Island, "If they get that far, they're not going back," said
Pete Ressler,
a spokesman for TMI owner Exelon Nuclear. "They are dumped into a container and
disposed of.²
For over three decades, nuclear power plants have been the most menacing
predator
on the Lower Susquehanna River. Finally, nuclear power plants are compelled
to invetorize
mortality rates and identify species of aquatic life affected by water
intakes.
Sincerely,
Eric Epstein,
Harrisburg, PA
717-541-1101
* Mr. Epstein is Coordinator of the EFMR Monitoring group, a nonpartisan
community based organization established in 1992. EFMR monitors radiation
levels at Peach Bottom and Three Mile Island nuclear generating stations,
invests in community development, and sponsors remote robotics research.:
efmr.org
He is also the Chairman of Three Mile Island Alert , Inc., a safe-energy
organization based in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania and founded in 1977. TMIA
monitors Peach Bottom, Susquehanna, and Three Mile Island nuclear
generating stations: tmia.com
*****************************************************************
16 INPO Hits Another Exelon Plant
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 14:28:38 -0700
By Kristen McNamara
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--The Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, an
industry-funded group that evaluates nuclear reactors, has lowered its rating
of
Public Service Enterprise Group Inc.'s (PEG) Hope Creek reactor to the second
lowest rung on its five-tier system, three people familiar with the plant's
operations said.
The institute, known as INPO, reduced Hope Creek's rating to 4 from 3
following a recent site evaluation, the people said. They asked not to be
identified, because the institute's ratings are confidential.
Downgrades can raise companies' insurance premiums. The reduced ranking for
Hope Creek echoes ongoing problems dogging PSEG and its nuclear operations.
Spokesmen from PSEG and INPO declined to comment on the rating.
"The information is private and confidential between the company and INPO,"
PSEG spokesman Chic Cannon said.
He did, however, say the draft report the institute presented to senior PSEG
managers described overall plant performance as acceptable. It noted areas of
improvements, such as operating efficiencies, and said the station is
heading in
right direction, Cannon said. "We don't talk about any specific activity
related
to a member," Terry Young, INPO's director of communications said.
No Safety Warning
INPO says its rankings don't reflect hard scores on particular criteria, but
instead are qualitative assessments of how well plants operate.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and INPO have an agreement through
which the institute alerts the NRC to any significant safety concerns at
the nation's
more than 100 nuclear plants. The institute didn't notify the NRC of
any such concerns at Hope Creek during its recent inspection, commission
spokesman Neil Sheehan said.
1
The NRC, which conducts its own plant evaluations each year, has scheduled a
public meeting on June 8 to discuss PSEG's efforts to better identify and
resolve problems at its Salem and Hope Creek reactors in southern New
Jersey and
to ensure workers feel comfortable raising safety concerns.
The agency stepped up its oversight of those plants last summer after finding
PSEG failed to resolve recurring problems and didn't make safety its top
priority.
Exelon Corp. (EXC), the biggest and arguably best nuclear operator in the
U.S., announced in late December its intention to purchase PSEG. It began in
January running day-to-day operations at Hope Creek and the two-unit Salem
plant, which it co-owns. Exelon's oversight expected to improve the plants'
performance.
Insurance Costs
The Nuclear Electric Insurance Ltd, which insures domestic and international
nuclear utilities for the costs associated with interruptions, damages and
decontaminations, can increase premiums up to 25% for nuclear sites that don't
meet INPO's standard of acceptable performance.
PSEG doesn't disclose its nuclear insurance costs or comment on whether those
costs could increase, spokeswoman Leslie Cifelli said. The insurance payments
that nuclear companies make vary widely.
The insurance company said its pegs premiums to INPO's evaluations, rather
than to the NRC's, because the institute provides more detail.
American Nuclear Insurers, which writes third-party nuclear liability
insurance, doesn't factor a plant's INPO rating into its premiums. It looks
instead at a reactor's output, location and performance, according to John
Hoffman, the organization's director of underwriting.
Nuclear Fort Knox
The nuclear industry created INPO in 1979, after the Three Mile Island
accident, to establish standards of excellence against which to measure U.S.
reactors.
Teams of 15 to 20 assess safety and operations at the country's working
nuclear units every 18 to 24 months. Composed of INPO staff and
representatives
from the industry, including workers from other plants, they identify a site's
strengths and weaknesses across a range of categories such as equipment
reliability,
safety culture and radiological protection.
2
The organization copyrights its evaluations and maintains a secure Web site
accessible only to members. INPO presents its evaluations to companies' top
executives, but its written reports don't include the 1-5 grade, INPO
spokesman
Terry Young said. That information is provided orally.
The confidentiality is meant to ensure an open exchange of information
between the institute and its members, he said.
Participation in INPO is voluntary, but all U.S. nuclear operators are
members. Those companies are also members, through INPO, of the World
Association of Nuclear Operations, an international self-regulating group
established after the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident.
-By Kristen McNamara, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-2061;
kristen.mcnamara@dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
19-05-05 1200GMT
3
*****************************************************************
17 INPO Hits Another Exelon Plant
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 17:22:58 -0700
By Kristen McNamara
Of DOW JONES NEWSWIRES
NEW YORK (Dow Jones)--The Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, an
industry-funded group that evaluates nuclear reactors, has lowered its rating
of
Public Service Enterprise Group Inc.'s (PEG) Hope Creek reactor to the second
lowest rung on its five-tier system, three people familiar with the plant's
operations said.
The institute, known as INPO, reduced Hope Creek's rating to 4 from 3
following a recent site evaluation, the people said. They asked not to be
identified, because the institute's ratings are confidential.
Downgrades can raise companies' insurance premiums. The reduced ranking for
Hope Creek echoes ongoing problems dogging PSEG and its nuclear operations.
Spokesmen from PSEG and INPO declined to comment on the rating.
"The information is private and confidential between the company and INPO,"
PSEG spokesman Chic Cannon said.
He did, however, say the draft report the institute presented to senior PSEG
managers described overall plant performance as acceptable. It noted areas of
improvements, such as operating efficiencies, and said the station is
heading in
right direction, Cannon said. "We don't talk about any specific activity
related
to a member," Terry Young, INPO's director of communications said.
No Safety Warning
INPO says its rankings don't reflect hard scores on particular criteria, but
instead are qualitative assessments of how well plants operate.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission and INPO have an agreement through
which the institute alerts the NRC to any significant safety concerns at
the nation's
more than 100 nuclear plants. The institute didn't notify the NRC of
any such concerns at Hope Creek during its recent inspection, commission
spokesman Neil Sheehan said.
1
The NRC, which conducts its own plant evaluations each year, has scheduled a
public meeting on June 8 to discuss PSEG's efforts to better identify and
resolve problems at its Salem and Hope Creek reactors in southern New
Jersey and
to ensure workers feel comfortable raising safety concerns.
The agency stepped up its oversight of those plants last summer after finding
PSEG failed to resolve recurring problems and didn't make safety its top
priority.
Exelon Corp. (EXC), the biggest and arguably best nuclear operator in the
U.S., announced in late December its intention to purchase PSEG. It began in
January running day-to-day operations at Hope Creek and the two-unit Salem
plant, which it co-owns. Exelon's oversight expected to improve the plants'
performance.
Insurance Costs
The Nuclear Electric Insurance Ltd, which insures domestic and international
nuclear utilities for the costs associated with interruptions, damages and
decontaminations, can increase premiums up to 25% for nuclear sites that don't
meet INPO's standard of acceptable performance.
PSEG doesn't disclose its nuclear insurance costs or comment on whether those
costs could increase, spokeswoman Leslie Cifelli said. The insurance payments
that nuclear companies make vary widely.
The insurance company said its pegs premiums to INPO's evaluations, rather
than to the NRC's, because the institute provides more detail.
American Nuclear Insurers, which writes third-party nuclear liability
insurance, doesn't factor a plant's INPO rating into its premiums. It looks
instead at a reactor's output, location and performance, according to John
Hoffman, the organization's director of underwriting.
Nuclear Fort Knox
The nuclear industry created INPO in 1979, after the Three Mile Island
accident, to establish standards of excellence against which to measure U.S.
reactors.
Teams of 15 to 20 assess safety and operations at the country's working
nuclear units every 18 to 24 months. Composed of INPO staff and
representatives
from the industry, including workers from other plants, they identify a site's
strengths and weaknesses across a range of categories such as equipment
reliability,
safety culture and radiological protection.
2
The organization copyrights its evaluations and maintains a secure Web site
accessible only to members. INPO presents its evaluations to companies' top
executives, but its written reports don't include the 1-5 grade, INPO
spokesman
Terry Young said. That information is provided orally.
The confidentiality is meant to ensure an open exchange of information
between the institute and its members, he said.
Participation in INPO is voluntary, but all U.S. nuclear operators are
members. Those companies are also members, through INPO, of the World
Association of Nuclear Operations, an international self-regulating group
established after the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident.
-By Kristen McNamara, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-2061;
kristen.mcnamara@dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
19-05-05 1200GMT
3
*****************************************************************
18 greenpeace reactor gag
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 14:33:00 -0700
--
Peace,
owlswan
"Whenever 'A' attempts by law to impose moral standards upon 'B',
'A' is most likely a scoundrel."
-- H. L. Mencken (1880-1956) American Journalist, Editor
aa645.jpg
aa660.jpgaa66a.jpgaa675.jpgaa680.jpgaa68c.jpg
aa696.jpg
aa69f.jpg aa6a9.jpg aa6b5.jpg Wisecrackers: To demonstrate how they feel
about the safety of nuclear energy, Greenpeace activists paint a crack on
the reactor in Borssele, Netherlands.
aa6cb.jpg aa6d4.jpg
Day In Pictures Archive
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*****************************************************************
19 NRC: NRC to Discuss 2004 Performance Assessment for Quad Cities Nuclear Power Plant
News Release - Region III - 2005-02
U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Office of Public Affairs, Region III
No. III-05-026 May 19, 2005
CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663
Viktoria Mitlyng (630) 829-9662 E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with
representatives of Exelon Generation Co. Wednesday, May 25, to
discuss the agencys assessment of safety performance last year
at the Quad Cities Nuclear Power Plant. The plant is located
near Cordova, Ill.
The meeting, which will be open to public observation, is
scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. at Best Western Steeplegate Inn,
100 West 76th Street, Davenport, Ia.
Before the meeting is adjourned, NRC staff will be available to
answer questions from the public on the safety performance of
the Quad Cities plant, as well as the role of the NRC in
ensuring safe plant operation.
The NRC continually reviews the performance of the Quad Cities
plant and the nations other commercial nuclear power facilities,
NRC Region III Administrator James Caldwell said. This meeting
will provide an opportunity for a discussion of our annual
assessment of safety performance with the company and with local
officials and residents who live near the plant. Our goal is to
explain the NRC oversight process and make as much information
as possible available to the public regarding our regulation of
these facilities.
The NRCs assessment concluded that the Quad Cities plant
operated safely during the period.. The NRC uses color-coded
inspection findings and performance indicators to assess nuclear
plant performance. The colors start with green and then increase
to white, yellow or red, commensurate with the safety
significance of the issues involved.
All of the inspection findings and performance indicators for
Quad Cities during 2004 were determined to be green. As a result
of this performance, the NRC will conduct the normal, baseline
level of inspections during the upcoming year. In addition, the
NRC will inspect activities related to the proposed steam dryer
replacement of Unit 2.
Routine inspections are performed by two NRC Resident Inspectors
assigned to the plant and by inspection specialists from the
Region III Office in Lisle, Ill., and the agencys headquarters
in Rockville, Md. Among the areas of plant operations to be
inspected this year by NRC specialists are emergency plan
changes, power uprate, operator requalification, fire protection
and access control.
A letter sent from the NRC Region III 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:
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/quad_2004q4.pdf
[PDF Icon] .
Current performance information for Quad Cities is available on
the NRCs web site at:
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/QUAD1/quad1_chart.html
and
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/QUAD2/quad2_chart.html.
Last revised Thursday, May 19, 2005
*****************************************************************
20 Guardian Unlimited Rule out more nuclear power, Lib Dems urge
More on the Liberal Democrats
Matthew Tempest and agencies
Thursday May 19, 2005
The Liberal Democrats today called on the government to rule out
a return to nuclear power, as MPs discussed climate change and
the environment in the debate on the Queen's Speech.
The party's environment spokesman, Norman Baker, said in
deciding whether to commission a new generation of nuclear power
stations, it should be born in mind there was "no solution" to
nuclear waste and that such plants were "hopelessly uneconomic".
His intervention comes as the prime minister faces a decision -
controversial within his own party as well as the country at
large - on whether to give the go-ahead to more nuclear power
stations or invest in sustainable alternatives such as wind,
solar and tidal power.
Mr Baker congratulated Mr Blair on focusing on climate change but
said: "Nuclear power has no role in the future energy supply of
this country. It has no role for a couple of very sound reasons.
"First, there is no solution to the problem of nuclear waste,
which is enormous in its acreage. The other reason is a
financial one. Nuclear power is hopelessly uneconomic."
He said the Lib Dems would "not countenance" the idea that
taxpayers should pay for new nuclear power stations. Their cost
would "choke off" money that might be spent on renewable
technology.
British carbon emissions had risen since 1997 and the UK was now
in danger of missing its targets under the Kyoto climate change
treaty, he said.
He said energy consumption had risen 7% in Britain, while less
than 4% of power was coming from renewable resources. Aviation
emissions were set to rise 83% by 2020, car use was "running out
of control" and the government was doing nothing to curb it.
Andrew Miller, the Labour MP for Ellesmere Port and Neston,
agreed "a lot more needs to be done with wind and solar
technologies".
Calling the Liberal Democrats "anti-science" and "somewhat
Luddite", he said: "The idea that we cut out fusion research and
not see that as an attack on the very foundation of Britain's
scientific base is utterly absurd."
In its white paper on energy in the previous parliament, the
government ruled out more nuclear plants in the short term. Its
expanded its targets for wind power usage to 10% of the energy
supply by 2010 and 20% by 2020, but left longterm options open.
A debate is thought to be brewing within the upper echelons of
government between the environment secretary, Margaret Beckett,
who is sceptical about the benefits of nuclear power, and Mr
Blair's No 10 advisers, such as Lord Birt and David King, who
are in favour.
The Tory former minister Michael Jack accused the government of
having "no coherent policy" for tackling rising CO2 emissions
from transport and said ministers must do more to develop a
biofuels industry.
"If we really are serious about saving the world's environment,
saving bio-diversity and encouraging sustainability, we would be
addressing the issue of the degradation of the Brazilian
rainforest," he said.
Greenhouse gas emissions have been rising in the UK, due to the
use of coal for electricity power generation, figures out today
show. According to the Office for National Statistics, emissions
rose 1.6% in 2003 on the previous year. Yet between 1990 and
2003 greenhouse gas emissions fell 8.1% from 786m tonnes to
722m.
[UP]
Guardian Unlimited ¿ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
21 NRC: NRC to Discuss 2004 Performance Assessment for Fermi Nuclear Power Plant
News Release - Region III - 2005-02
U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Office of Public Affairs, Region III
No. III-05-027 May 19, 2005
CONTACT: Jan Strasma (630) 829-9663
Viktoria Mitlyng (630) 829-9662 E-mail: opa3@nrc.gov
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff will meet with
representatives of Detroit Edison Co. Wednesday, May 25, to
discuss the agencys assessment of safety performance last year
at the Fermi Nuclear Power Plant. The plant is located near
Newport, Mich.
The meeting, which will be open to public observation, is
scheduled to begin at 6 p.m. at the Monroe County Board Of
Commissioners Chambers of the County Courthouse, 125 E. Second
Street, in Monroe, Mich.
Before the meeting is adjourned, NRC staff will be available to
answer questions from the public on the safety performance of
the Fermi plant, as well as the role of the NRC in ensuring safe
plant operation.
The NRC continually reviews the performance of the Fermi plant
and the nations other commercial nuclear power facilities, NRC
Region III Administrator James Caldwell said. This meeting will
provide an opportunity for a discussion of our annual assessment
of safety performance with the company and with local officials
and residents who live near the plant. Our goal is to explain
the NRC oversight process and make as much information as
possible available to the public regarding our regulation of
these facilities.
The NRCs assessment concluded that the Fermi plant operated
safely during the period. The NRC uses color-coded inspection
findings and performance indicators to assess nuclear plant
performance. The colors start with green and then increase to
white, yellow or red, commensurate with the safety significance
of the issues involved.
During 2004, Fermi had one white performance indicator that had
to do with the unavailability of emergency AC power. The NRC
also identified several findings related to human performance.
Routine inspections are performed by two NRC Resident Inspectors
assigned to the plant and by inspection specialists from the
Region III Office in Lisle, Ill., and the agencys headquarters
in Rockville, Md. Among the areas of plant operations to be
inspected this year by NRC specialists are radioactive waste and
transportation, fire protection, problem identification and
resolution, radiological access control, and safety system
design and performance.
A letter sent from the NRC Region III 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:
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/ferm_2004q4.pdf
[PDF Icon] .
Current performance information for Fermi is available on the
NRCs web site at:
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/FERM2/ferm2_chart.html.
Last revised Thursday, May 19, 2005
*****************************************************************
22 SignOnSanDiego.com: Public offers comments on plan to extend life of San Onofre plant
By Adam Klawonn UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
May 19, 2005
OCEANSIDE Hailing from Solana Beach to Riverside, about 60
people came here Tuesday to argue against or support a proposed
$813 million project to extend the life of the San Onofre
Nuclear Generating Station.
California Public Utilities Commission member Geoffrey Brown was
in town to get public comments on the price tag and
environmental impact of replacing four worn-out steam generators
at the plant.
What he got was a three-hour debate or rather, a vent session
on whether nuclear power or renewable energy should dominate
the state's energy portfolio.
"I'm not so sure it's the complete answer," Brown said of
nuclear power after the Oceanside meeting. "The question is
whether it has a place."
The town hall-style meeting at the Civic Center focused on the
plant's most expensive maintenance project ever: replacing the
steam generators that convert water to steam to power turbines,
because their tubes are cracking.
Officials for the plant's majority owner, Southern California
Edison, have said new generators are needed to keep the two
reactors from shutting down well before 2022, when their
operating license expires.
But many of the people attending Tuesday grandparents,
small-business owners, a pastor, a baker and others expressed
concerns that if the commission approves a proposed 2 percent
average rate increase this fall, that will allow the plant to
apply for a 20-year license renewal and operate until 2042.
They see opposing the rate case as a way to close the plant
early and get the state and utilities to spend more money on
such things as solar or wind power.
"If we don't start now, if we keep putting back into projects
that are already doomed, we're taking away from those projects
that could be successful," said Maegan Prentice, 57, a video
editor from Oceanside.
Others cited the environmental and safety benefits of closing
the plant, which draws millions of gallons of seawater for
operations and is surrounded by the cities of Dana Point, San
Clemente, San Juan Capistrano and Oceanside and the Camp
Pendleton Marine base.
Supporters of the project, many of whom have spent decades in
the nuclear industry, said there is no economical substitute for
nuclear energy, that it burns cleaner than fossil fuels, and
that the rate increase for electricity should be approved.
Al Tschaeche, 76, a retired nuclear health physicist for
Lockheed Martin, said there is "absolutely nothing wrong with
nuclear power."
"I think we need to replace the steam generators at (San Onofre)
so that the plant can operate longer and hopefully be
re-licensed," said Tschaeche, who lives in Encinitas.
Richard McPherson, a Laguna Niguel resident who has been in the
nuclear industry since 1963, said the country needs more nuclear
plants and described the rate increase as fair.
"I'm going to pay about as much a month for a Dove bar at the
local convenience store," said McPherson, 61. "To me, that's a
fair investment."
Whether ratepayers in San Diego County will fund the project is
still unclear because San Diego Gas & Electric Co., a part owner
of San Onofre, doesn't want to participate.
Brown, who held a similar meeting later Tuesday in San Clemente,
joked at times with the Oceanside audience.
"I would say this is really what democracy's all about," he said
afterward.
The comments will go back with Brown to San Francisco for review
by the other members of the Public Utilities Commission, which
is awaiting a decision from an administrative law judge on the
project's price tag and environmental impacts.
A decision from the five-member commission could come by late
fall.
If the commission approves funding for the generator replacement
project, the earliest the equipment could arrive would be 2009.
Adam Klawonn: (760) 476-8245; adam.klawonn@uniontrib.com
© Copyright 2005 Union-Tribune Publishing Co.
*****************************************************************
23 Platts: House earmarks NRC FY-06 increase for risk analyses
+ NRC would get $21-million more than its $701.7-million FY-06
request under a measure approved today by the House
Appropriations Committee.
The additional funding is to be used by the NRC for performing
technical analyses on spent fuel storage risks and to respond to
other security-related recommendations in a July 2004 study by
the National Academy of Sciences (NAS).
The committee said in a report accompanying the budget bill that
it "expects NRC to redouble its efforts to address the
NAS-identified deficiencies, and to direct, not request, industry
to take prompt corrective actions."
The agency would have to recoup the additional money through fees
charged to its licensees.
Washington (Platts)--18May2005
Copyright © 2005 - Platts, All Rights Reserved
[The McGraw-Hill Companies]
*****************************************************************
24 NRC: NRC Reports Preliminary Results of Millstone 3 Special Inspection
News Release - Region I - 2005-02
U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION
Office of Public Affairs, Region I
No. I-05-029 May 18, 2005
CONTACT: Diane Screnci (610) 337-5330
Neil A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331 E-mail: opa1@nrc.gov
An NRC special inspection team sent to the Millstone 3 nuclear
power plant to review an April 17th shutdown has preliminarily
concluded the event was caused by an apparent failure of a
circuit card in a computerized reactor protection system. The
team has also determined the unit was safely removed from
service by operators, any radiological releases were well below
regulatory limits and there were no public health and safety
consequences. However, the team did identify several inspection
findings.
NRC staff will present the preliminary results of the inspection
this evening at a meeting of Connecticuts Nuclear Energy
Advisory Council (NEAC). NEACs meeting, which is open to the
public for observation, is scheduled to get under way at 6 p.m.
at Waterford Town Hall, 15 Rope Ferry Road in Waterford, Conn.
The Millstone 2 and 3 nuclear power plants are located in
Waterford and operated by Dominion Resources.
On April 17, Millstone 3 experienced an automatic shutdown from
full power. The event involved the activation of various safety
subsystems. As the reactor was shutting down, main steam line
safety valves opened to automatically remove heat generated
after the reactor shutdown. One main steam line safety valve
remained open for an extended period of time. It was this
condition that resulted in the declaration of an Alert the
second-lowest of four levels of emergency classification.
In response to the event, the NRC sent a special inspection team
to the facility on April 20 to evaluate the circumstances
surrounding the shutdown with complications. Consisting of four
full-time and four part-time inspectors, the team was a
multi-disciplined group with diverse backgrounds.
The team has identified several findings, including issues
involving the failure of a turbine-driven pump that is part of a
system sometimes used to help cool down the plant, control-room
indicator design issues, minor operator response issues, a delay
in the activation of a computer program used to evaluate plant
conditions and the adequacy of the companys boric acid control
program. The NRC has preliminarily determined these findings to
be green.
The NRC uses color-coded inspection findings and performance
indicators to assess nuclear power plant performance. The colors
start with green and then increase to white, yellow or red,
commensurate with the safety significance of the issues
involved.
The special inspection team has also noted that in response to
the event, Dominion made a timely assessment of radiological
conditions and has since launched a review of the shutdown by
its own evaluation team, implemented multiple corrective actions
and planned additional evaluations.
After presenting its preliminary findings this evening, the NRC
special inspection team will document its findings and
conclusions in a report to be issued within 45 days.
Last revised Thursday, May 19, 2005
*****************************************************************
25 Herald Tribune: Nuclear plant accident created no health risk
heraldtribune.com
It is absolutely clear that none of the health problems suffered
by the author of the letter Tuesday titled "Only time will tell
about nuclear accident" or by her former neighbors could be due
to the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania. Extensive
measurements showed that nobody received more than a one-time
exposure of a few millirem (rem being the unit used to measure
the effect of various forms of radiation on the human body).
By comparison, exposure from natural background radiation in the
U.S. varies widely, from about 200 mrem to over 1,000 mrem every
year. Despite this, no health effects are seen for the regions
with higher exposure rates. If no health effects have ever been
seen for annual exposures of hundreds of (additional) mrem, then
it is clear that a one- time exposure that is a hundred times
smaller would have no health effect.
Numerous formal scientific studies have thoroughly confirmed
this (obvious) conclusion. The jury is not out on this issue!
There is complete scientific consensus that TMI had no health
effect at all.
James Hopf
The letter writer is a member of the Public Information
Committee of the American Nuclear Society, a Washington-based
group, and resides in San Jose, Calif.
Last modified: May 19. 2005 12:00AM
Sarasota Herald-Tribune. All rights reserved. Initializing : 15ms
*****************************************************************
26 Cincinnati Post: Monitoring Fernald
Land returning to former habitat By Michael Collins
Post Washington Bureau
Jane O’Dell, right, leaves a pond located next to a forested
area, carrying a trap filled with tadpoles and other small water
creatures. Ohio Environmental Protection Agency scientists are
working to restore the wetlands and wildlife on the Fernald
Plant property.
BRUCE CRIPPEN/The Post
For years, neighbors around the old Fernald plant in Crosby
Township have eagerly looked for signs of progress as the
wetlands and forests surrounding the former uranium-processing
facility were being restored.
Lately, nature's critters have emerged.
Property that was once so contaminated that it was considered a
danger to humans is now teeming with animal life. Residents have
reported seeing deer, ducks and geese near the site, while
scientists involved in the restoration have spotted turtles,
turkeys, mink, frogs, bugs and other aquatic insects.
On Wednesday, they made another promising discovery: Salamander
larvae in two new man-made pools, suggesting that the tiny
amphibians are making the surroundings their home.
"It's encouraging that the salamanders are colonizing those
wetlands so soon, and it's probably a sign of good wetland
design," said Tom Schneider, Fernald project manager for the
Ohio Environmental Protection Agency.
Scientists have been working since the late 1990s to return the
land to nature.
Fernald processed uranium for the government's nuclear weapons
program for 37 years before it ended production in 1989.
Its history spanned the early stages of the Cold War, which
prompted its use as a weapons plant, to the year the Soviet
Union collapsed.
Total cleanup at the facility is expected to top $4 billion.
Cleanup work is to be completed next year.
The restoration work is the result of a settlement in a lawsuit
the Ohio EPA brought against the U.S. Department of Energy. The
suit contended that Fernald contamination had damaged natural
resources.
About half of the 1,000-acre site already has been turned into
wetlands, forests and prairies. Work on another 400 acres should
be completed by June 2006.
When the work is finished, the site will be one of the largest
restoration projects in the state, Schneider said.
"It's going to be a mosaic of different habitats - everything
from forest and forest species to prairies and prairie species,
with a lot of wetland areas that will provide a good breeding
habitat," he said.
A land survey guidebook from 1806 is helping scientists return
the property to the habitat that existed prior to European
settlement in the United States.
Original surveyors who mapped out the townships in the area made
notes of the different plant and animal species they saw.
Those historical references have helped today's scientists
determine what kinds of species would be appropriate for the
restored site and then figure out whether it's possible to
return them to the property.
As part of the restoration, compost had to be brought to the
site to replace topsoil that was removed in the contamination
cleanup.
Soil containing bugs and plant seeds from a nearby park also was
trucked to the property. The land then was seeded for grasses
and flowers, and a number of trees, shrubs and small plants,
such as rushes and sedges, that are native to the area were set
out.
To create the wetlands, ground holes left from the removal of
contaminated soil were turned into small retention ponds.
In some cases, groundwater was released into the ponds, while in
other cases they simply filled up with rainwater, Schneider said.
"Because of the high clay content of the soils, it's pretty easy
to create wetlands or water-holding areas," he said.
Some salamander egg masses and larval salamander were brought to
the site. But for the most part, animals started returning to
the property on their own.
In March, scientists set salamander traps to check for signs
that the lizard-like amphibians were breeding. No salamanders
turned up, but the traps did catch bullfrogs, dragon fly larvae,
caddis flies, beetles and tadpoles.
When the traps were reset this week, salamander larvae were
found in areas where they had never before been seen, suggesting
that the amphibians are taking to the newly restored habitat,
Schneider said.
"We are very encouraged," he said.
So are neighbors who have been pushing for the cleanup and
restoration work for two decades.
"I think they're doing an excellent job," said Lisa Crawford,
president of the neighborhood advocacy group Fernald Residents
for Environmental Safety and Health (FRESH).
"We've been watching this closely for 20 years, and it's coming
along really well.
"We've seen the light at the end of the tunnel. It took 20 years
to see it. But we've finally seen it."
Still, a couple of questions remain unresolved:
Whether the federal government will continue to maintain the
wetlands and forest areas once the restoration work is done
Whether it will build an educational center that will provide a
history of the contamination and the cleanup efforts.
"Wetlands should go back to their natural state at some point,
but sometimes these wetlands need help for a few years," said
Steve Depoe, president of the Fernald Living History Project, a
non-profit organization that is documenting the history of the
site.
Depoe said he doesn't expect the Department of Energy to monitor
the restored site forever, but believes the government should
continue its commitment to the project for a few years.
As for the proposed educational center, lawyers for the state
and the federal government are still haggling over whether the
facility should be built. Residents, however, think it's
necessary to keep Fernald's history from being forgotten.
"The other thing I think that's important is to show the
American public that you can clean up a nasty dirty bomb
factory," said Crawford, who lives about a mile from the site.
"We've clearly shown that it can be done, and I think that is
really important. There is a lot of history here, there are a
lot of artifacts, and I just think if we lose all of that, we
are going to lose a lot more than people really realize."
Most of the 1,000-acre site will become a wildlife area, with
123 acres housing permanent underground storage of lower-level
radioactive wastes.
Publication date: 05-19-2005
[Cincinnati.Com]
Copyright2005 The Cincinnati Post, an E.W. Scrippsnewspaper.
*****************************************************************
27 Xinhua: Power companies await October outcome
www.xinhuanet.com
www.chinaview.cn 2005-05-20 07:54:51
BEIJING, May 20 -- The final winner of a US$8-billion
contract to build four nuclear reactors at two power plants in
Zhejiang and Guangdong provinces will most likely be hammered
out by October.
One of three competitors Paris-based Areva, Pittsburgh-based
but UK-owned Westinghouse Electric Company and Russia's
AtomStroyExport is expected to get the nod from the National
Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), said Fu Manchang,
secretary-general of Chinese Nuclear Society (CNS) during an
exclusive interview with China Daily yesterday.
"It's hard to predict which one will be the final winner,"
said Fu. "We are offering equal and fair chances to
international bidders."
Construction is expected to start a year after the signing
of contracts.
The three submitted final bids for the February 28 deadline.
If won by Westinghouse, the project will be the first
contract in the Chinese nuclear power sector for the US unit of
State-owned British Nuclear Fuels Plc, which designs half the
world's nuclear reactors.
"China's decision over the bidding will be made in September
at the earliest," Donald J. Miller, deputy project manager in
China of nuclear power plants, Westinghouse Electric Company,
told China Daily.
"We have the quality and competitive price to back our bid,"
said Miller. He refused to elaborate on its price offer.
"The possibility for us to win is still 50-50," said Miller.
Insiders said the US-based reactor builder is also counting
on the US Government to help unseat France's Areva as the leader
in China's nuclear-power market as US President George W. Bush's
administration pushes to boost his country's involvement in
China's nuclear programme.
After supplying four of China's nine working nuclear plants
over 20 years, the world's biggest reactor builder, Areva, is
also gearing up its sales pitch in China.
Recently, the French builder has signed two contracts with
China to supply the primary circuits and instrumentation and
control systems for the third and fourth units of the Ling Ao
power plant extension project in Guangdong Province, which
together amounts to almost 400 million euros (US$500 million),
said company sources.
Besides business relations, industry analysts said political
concerns are also vital in the final the bidding.
"China's relations with France are different from those with
the United States," said Jen-Shih Chang, a professor in nuclear
engineering at Canada-based McMaster University.
Meanwhile, Russian company AtomStroyExport is helping build
two 1,060-megawatt reactors in Tianwan, East China's Jiangsu
Province, which are expected to go online by the end of the year
- one year later than the originally planned construction
schedule.
Improper management has resulted in construction delay, said
a senior engineer with Jiangsu Nuclear Power Corp, who is in
charge of the Tianwan project assessment.
To meet surging energy demands, China has vowed to increase
nuclear power generation fourfold to 40,000 megawatts by 2020.
It will eventually account for 4 per cent of the country's
installed capacity - which means at least 30 new nuclear plants
will need to be built within 15 years.
"Two of the new four reactors are set for the Sanmen nuclear
power plant, East China's Zhejiang Province and the others will
be installed in the Yangjiang plant of South China's Guangdong
Province," Fu said. He is among delegates attending the five-day
13th International Conference on Nuclear Engineering (ICONE13),
which wraps up today in Beijing.
(Source: China Daily)
Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
28 FAZ Weekly: No thanks to nuclear power policy -
FAZ.NET -
Issue: May 20, 2005
20. Mai 2005 By Stefan Dietrich
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
Many of the politicians who are in power today cut their
political teeth in battles waged under the banner of Atomic
energy? No thanks! Now, as responsible, mature politicians they
might look back on some of their beliefs from those good old
days and chuckle. But the memory of the fight against nuclear
energy remains sacrosanct. As a result, Germany has taken an
energy course that is hard to comprehend and even harder to
justify.
For a long time, the majority of the public shared the parties'
objection to nuclear energy. But this feeling has faltered for
those who have now grasped the correlation between rising energy
prices and the asparagus fields of wind turbines that the
government has planted on once pristine countrysides. These
doubts are likely to grow as the nuclear shutdown plan created
by the national coalition of Social Democrats and Greens takes
hold. The process will make clear that Germany will have few
followers among the 31 countries that use atomic energy.
So far the coalition's turnaround has been consistent only in
its destructive element: The use of nuclear energy, which
provides half of the basic load supply of electricity, will be
discontinued under a plan that will shut down all 19 nuclear
power plants by 2020. The planned nuclear waste storage
facilities in Gorleben and Konrad are on hold. And public
research funding in this area has been basically halted.
But the federal government still has left a central question
unanswered: How will a continuous supply of energy be secured
once all of the nuclear plants are out of service?
The government is planning to more than double the generating
capacity of wind energy, in particular with large, sea-based
wind farms in the next 10 years. On paper, at least, the
generating capacity of 36,000 megawatts would make up for the
lost production from the nuclear plants. But, in reality, one
can expect only a fixed increase of 2,200 megawatts, according
to a report by the German Energy Agency. Wind is just too
unreliable. Ninety-four percent of the energy supply would have
to be covered some other way. Solar power will be able to make
only a symbolic contribution. A substitute for nuclear energy is
supposed to come from natural-gas power plants. But they produce
carbon dioxide.
Because wind energy is produced so far away from consumers, we
will soon need 850 kilometers (528 miles) of new power lines,
projected to cost about €1.1 billion ($1.4 billion). In northern
Germany, people are already calling for subterranean lines,
which would increase the price by at least eight times.
Investments in the high double-digit billions will be devoured
by the wind farms at sea and the necessary sea cables. The law
on renewable energy already states that consumers will have to
pay for that.
The Greens and environmental associations are surprisingly
insensitive when it comes to the potential environmental hazards
that arise from the industrial generation of electricity with
wind rotors. In the past, the existence of hamsters and bats was
enough to stall important infrastructure projects for decades.
Today, bird strike by wind turbines is just as negligible as the
greatly increased threat of ship accidents. The top priority is
to comply with the Kyoto protocol, which is designed to reduce
pollution caused by green house gases. But when it comes to
reducing carbon dioxide, the use of wind energy is not the best
solution. To achieve this goal, it costs four times as much as
investing in the increased efficiency of conventional power
plants or electrical appliances. With solar energy, the ratio is
even more unfavorable.
Environmental Minister Jürgen Trittin is betting on global
market prices for fossil fuels to finally reach the level that
the Greens wanted it to attain back in the 1990s: DM5 per liter
of gasoline. That amounts to €2.56 today. The federal government
has driven this process quite far already by imposing various
surtaxes and compensation regulations. But the effort has scared
off investors who are frightened not only by high wages and
taxes, but also by the highest energy prices in Europe. Only the
awakening of a new generation will be able to chase away this
ghost.
[Syndikation/Nachdrucke] Syndikation/Nachdrucke [RSS] RSS
[FAZ.NET-Impressum] FAZ.NET-Impressum [redaktioneller Kodex]
redaktioneller Kodex [Nutzungsbedingungen] Nutzungsbedingungen
[Online-Werbung] Online-Werbung
['' width=1 height=14] © F.A.Z. Electronic Media GmbH 2001 -
2005
*****************************************************************
29 NRC: Notice of Availability of Environmental Assessment and Finding
FR Doc E5-2508
[Federal Register: May 19, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 96)] [Notices]
[Page 28963] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access
[wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19my05-105]
of No Significant Impact for License Amendment for Allegheny
General Hospital's Facility at 3290 William Pitt Way in
Pittsburgh, PA AGENCY: Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Notice of availability.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Sandra Gabriel, Medical Branch,
Division of Nuclear Materials Safety, Region I, 475 Allendale
Road, King of Prussia, Pennsylvania 19406, telephone (610)
337-5182, fax (610) 337-5269; or by email: .
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: I. Introduction The Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC) is issuing a license amendment to Allegheny
General Hospital for Materials License No. 37- 01317-01, to
authorize release of its facility at 3290 William Pitt Way in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for unrestricted use. NRC has prepared
an Environmental Assessment (EA) in support of this action in
accordance with the requirements of 10 CFR Part 51. Based on the
EA, the NRC has concluded that a Finding of No Significant Impact
(FONSI) is appropriate. The amendment will be issued following
the publication of this Notice.
II. EA Summary The purpose of the action is to authorize the
release of the licensee's facility at 3290 William Pitt Way in
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, for unrestricted use. Allegheny General
Hospital was authorized by NRC from March 31,1994, to use
radioactive materials for research and development purposes at
the site. In 1998, Allegheny General Hospital ceased operations
with licensed materials at the 3290 William Pitt Way site, and on
April 7, 2004, requested that NRC release the facility for
unrestricted use. Allegheny General Hospital has conducted
surveys of the facility and provided information to the NRC to
demonstrate that the site meets the license termination criteria
in Subpart E of 10 CFR Part 20 for unrestricted use.
The NRC staff has prepared an EA in support of the license
amendment. The facility was remediated and surveyed prior to the
licensee requesting the license amendment. The NRC staff has
reviewed the information and final status survey submitted by
Allegheny General Hospital. Based on its review, the staff has
determined that there are no additional remediation activities
necessary to complete the proposed action. Therefore, the staff
considered the impact of the residual radioactivity at the
facility and concluded that since the residual radioactivity
meets the requirements in Subpart E of 10 CFR Part 20, a Finding
of No Significant Impact is appropriate.
III. Finding of No Significant Impact The staff has prepared the
EA (summarized above) in support of the license amendment to
release the facility at 3290 William Pitt Way in Pittsburgh,
Pennsylvania for unrestricted use. The NRC staff has evaluated
Allegheny General Hospital's request and the results of the
surveys and has concluded that the completed action complies with
the criteria in Subpart E of 10 CFR Part 20. On the basis of the
EA, the NRC has concluded that the environmental impacts from the
action are expected to be insignificant and has determined not to
prepare an environmental impact statement for the action.
IV. Further Information Documents related to this action,
including the application for the license amendment and
supporting documentation, are available electronically at the
NRC's Electronic Reading Room at .
From this site, you can access the NRC's Agencywide Document
Access and Management System (ADAMS), which provides text and
image files of NRC's public documents. The ADAMS accession
numbers for the documents related to this Notice are:
Environmental Assessment (ML050900146), letter dated April 7,
2004 with attached closeout survey results (ML042020449), letter
dated September 29, 2004 (ML042750483), and electronic mail dated
March 24, 2005 (ML050880370). Persons who do not have access to
ADAMS or who encounter problems in accessing the documents
located in ADAMS, should contact the NRC PDR Reference staff by
telephone at (800) 397-4209 or (301) 415-4737, or by email to .
These documents may also be examined, and/or copied for a fee, at
the NRC PDR, located at One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville
Pike (First Floor), Rockville, MD 20852. The PDR is open from
7:45 a.m. to 4:15 p.m., Monday through Friday, except on Federal
Holidays; and at the Region I Office, 475 Allendale Road, King of
Prussia, Pennsylvania 19406.
Dated at King of Prussia, Pennsylvania, this 10th day of May,
2005.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Pamela J. Henderson, Chief, Medical Branch, Division of Nuclear
Materials Safety, Region I.
[FR Doc. E5-2508 Filed 5-18-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P
*****************************************************************
30 NRC: Notice of Availability of Environmental Assessment and Finding
FR Doc E5-2509
[Federal Register: May 19, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 96)] [Notices]
[Page 28964] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access
[wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19my05-106] [[Page 28964]]
of No Significant Impact for License Amendment for Princeton
Healthcare System's Facility in Princeton, NJ AGENCY: Nuclear
Regulatory Commission.
ACTION: Notice of availability.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Sandra Gabriel, Medical Branch,
Division of Nuclear Materials Safety, Region I, 475 Allendale
Road, King of Prussia, Pennsylvania 19406, telephone (610)
337-5182, fax (610) 337-5269; or by e-mail: slg2@nrc.gov.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: I. Introduction The Nuclear Regulatory
Commission (NRC) is issuing a license amendment to Princeton
HealthCare System for Materials License No. 29- 06750-01, to
authorize release of its facility at Princeton House Behavioral
Health, 905 Herrontown Road in Princeton, New Jersey for
unrestricted use. NRC has prepared an Environmental Assessment
(EA) in support of this action in accordance with the
requirements of 10 CFR Part 51. Based on the EA, the NRC has
concluded that a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) is
appropriate. The amendment will be issued following the
publication of this Notice.
II. EA Summary The purpose of the action is to authorize the
release of the licensee's facility at Princeton House Behavioral
Health, 905 Herrontown Road in Princeton, New Jersey, for
unrestricted use. Princeton HealthCare System was authorized by
NRC from July 21, 1993, to use radioactive materials at this site
for research and development involving absorption, dilution,
metabolism, and excretion studies in humans, in association with
Bristol Myers Squibb. In 1998, Princeton HealthCare System ceased
operations with licensed materials at the Princeton House
Behavioral Health site, and in 2004 requested that NRC release
the facility for unrestricted use. Princeton HealthCare System
has conducted surveys of the facility and determined that the
facility meets the license termination criteria in Subpart E of
10 CFR Part 20.
The NRC staff has prepared an EA in support of the license
amendment. The facility was remediated and surveyed prior to the
licensee requesting the license amendment. The NRC staff has
reviewed the information and final status survey submitted by
Princeton HealthCare System. Based on its review, the staff has
determined that there are no additional remediation activities
necessary to complete the proposed action. Therefore, the staff
considered the impact of the residual radioactivity at the
facility and concluded that since the residual radioactivity
meets the requirements in Subpart E of 10 CFR Part 20, a Finding
of No Significant Impact is appropriate.
III. Finding of No Significant Impact The staff has prepared the
EA (summarized above) in support of the license amendment to
release the facility at Princeton House Behavioral Health, 905
Herrontown Road Way in Princeton, New Jersey, for unrestricted
use. The NRC staff has evaluated Princeton HealthCare System's
request and the results of the surveys and has concluded that the
completed action complies with the criteria in Subpart E of 10
CFR Part 20. On the basis of the EA, the NRC has concluded that
the environmental impacts from the action are expected to be
insignificant and has determined not to prepare an environmental
impact statement for the action.
IV. Further Information Documents related to this action,
including the application for the license amendment and
supporting documentation, are available electronically at the
NRC's Electronic Reading Room at
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. From this site, you can
access the NRC's Agencywide Document Access and Management System
(ADAMS), which provides text and image files of NRC's public
documents. The ADAMS accession numbers for the documents related
to this Notice are: Environmental Assessment (ML050900333),
letter dated November 24, 2004 with attached closeout survey
results (ML043410218), and letter dated March 14, 2005
(ML050830030). Persons who do not have access to ADAMS or who
encounter problems in accessing the documents located in ADAMS,
should contact the NRC PDR Reference staff by telephone at (800)
397- 4209 or (301) 415-4737, or by email to pdr@nrc.gov. These
documents may also be examined, and/or copied for a fee, at the
NRC PDR, located at One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike
(First Floor), Rockville, MD 20852. The PDR is open from 7:45
a.m. to 4:15 p.m., Monday through Friday, except on Federal
Holidays; and at the Region I Office, 475 Allendale Road, King of
Prussia, Pennsylvania 19406.
Dated at King of Prussia, Pennsylvania this 10th day of May,
2005.
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Pamela J. Henderson, Chief, Medical Branch, Division of Nuclear
Materials Safety, Region I.
[FR Doc. E5-2509 Filed 5-18-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P
*****************************************************************
31 NRC: Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards; Subcommittee Meeting
FR Doc E5-2510
[Federal Register: May 19, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 96)] [Notices]
[Page 28964-28965] From the Federal Register Online via GPO
Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19my05-107]
on Planning and Procedures; Notice of Meeting The ACRS
Subcommittee on Planning and Procedures will hold a meeting on
May 31, 2005, Room T-2B1, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville,
Maryland. The entire meeting will be open to public attendance,
with the exception of a portion that may be closed pursuant to 5
U.S.C. 552b(c)(2) and (6) to discuss organizational and personnel
matters that relate solely to the internal personnel rules and
practices of the ACRS, and information the release of which would
constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.
The agenda for the subject meeting shall be as follows: Tuesday,
May 31, 2005--10 a.m.-11:30 a.m. The Subcommittee will discuss
proposed ACRS activities and related matters. The Subcommittee
will gather information, analyze relevant issues and facts, and
formulate proposed positions and actions, as appropriate, for
deliberation by the full Committee.
Members of the public desiring to provide oral statements and/or
written comments should notify the Designated Federal Official,
Mr. Sam Duraiswamy (telephone: 301-415-7364) between 7:30 a.m.
and 4:15 p.m. (ET) five days prior to the meeting, if possible,
so that appropriate arrangements can be made. Electronic
recordings will be permitted only during those portions of the
meeting that are open to the public.
Further information regarding this meeting can be obtained by
contacting the Designated Federal Official between 7:30 a.m. and
4:15 p.m. (ET). Persons planning to attend this meeting are urged
to contact the above named individual at least two working days
prior to the meeting to be advised of any potential changes in
the agenda.
[[Page 28965]] Dated: May 11, 2005.
Michael R. Snodderly, Acting Branch Chief, ACRS/ACNW.
[FR Doc. E5-2510 Filed 5-18-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P
*****************************************************************
32 NRC: Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards Meeting of the
FR Doc E5-2511
[Federal Register: May 19, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 96)] [Notices]
[Page 28965] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access
[wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19my05-108]
Subcommittee on Plant License Renewal; Notice of Meeting The ACRS
Subcommittee on Plant License Renewal will hold a meeting on May
31, 2005, Room T-2B3, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland.
The entire meeting will be open to public attendance.
The agenda for the subject meeting shall be as follows: Tuesday,
May 31, 2005--12:30 p.m. until 5 p.m. The purpose of this meeting
is to discuss the License Renewal Application and associated
Safety Evaluation Report (SER) with Open Items related to the
License Renewal of the Point Beach Nuclear Plant, Units 1 and 2.
The Subcommittee will hear presentations by and hold discussions
with representatives of the NRC staff, the Nuclear Management
Company, LLC, and other interested persons regarding this matter.
The Subcommittee will gather information, analyze relevant issues
and facts, and formulate proposed positions and actions, as
appropriate, for deliberation by the full Committee.
Members of the public desiring to provide oral statements and/or
written comments should notify the Designated Federal Official,
Mr. Cayetano Santos (telephone 301-415-7270) five days prior to
the meeting, if possible, so that appropriate arrangements can be
made. Electronic recordings will be permitted.
Further information regarding this meeting can be obtained by
contacting the Designated Federal Official between 7:30 a.m. and
4:15 p.m. (ET). Persons planning to attend this meeting are urged
to contact the above named individual at least two working days
prior to the meeting to be advised of any potential changes to
the agenda.
Dated: May 11, 2005.
Michael R. Snodderly, Acting Branch Chief, ACRS/ACNW.
[FR Doc. E5-2511 Filed 5-18-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P
*****************************************************************
33 NEIS: Next Step Citizen Epidemeology Conference
Nuclear Energy Information Service
For those attending our "Next Step" conference, information on
Hotels in Chicago can be found here:
http://chicago-hotels.tripadvisor.com/Hotels-g35805-c3-Chicago_Il
linois-Hotels.html
A map of Northwestern's Evanston campus can be found here and
interactive maps of the campus can be found here.
Here are two sample survey forms, one which is generic and one
intended for Veterans Changes to the conference and schedule can
be viewed here
May 20-22, 2005
at Northwestern University, Evanston, IL (USA) Campus
Invited Speakers:
· Dr. Chris Busby, Wales, European Committee on Radiation
Risk (ECRR); director, Green Audit
· Dr. Ernest Sternglass, USA, co-founder of the “Tooth
Fairy” Project
· Dr. Judith Johnsrud, USA, Environmental Coalition on
Nuclear Power; Sierra Club National Radwaste Advisor
· Cindy Folkers, USA, staff researcher, Nuclear
Information and Resource Service
· Dr. Jawad Al-Ali, Iraq, Oncologist in Basra (due to
difficulty obtaining a visa, Dr. Al Ali will be here only in a
taped interview, and through a videotape of a Conference in
which he participated earlier this year)
· Two Important Video Contributions:
"The Doctor, the DU, and the Dying Children," with Dr.
Sigmund Horst Gunter
"Nuclear Controversies (Atomic Lies - updated)," from
Wladimir Tchertkoff, broadcasted on Swiss TV, 2004.
Tuition: $30 US (€24 for European guests)
Sponsoring groups:
NEIS and Northwestern SEED, USA; GAAA, Germany; Science for
Peace, Canada
Registration form here for downloading; or contact the NEIS
office by phone, e-mail, or fax
The long awaited follow-up to the highly successful 2003 World
Depleted Uranium/Uranium Weapons Conference is here. Save the
dates, and make plans to attend! Please publicize this event by
posting it in newsletters and on websites, and sending it to your
members and other interested people. Co-sponsors and
contributors are both needed and welcome. For more information,
contact:
Dave Kraft, NEIS
Neis@neis.org
(847)869-7650; -7658 fax
(in Europe:)
Marion Kuepker, GAAA
marion@motherearth.org
+49-40-430-7332
THE PROPOSED PROGRAM:
This is a special educational, organizing conference to enable
and empower people in their own investigation into contamination
and exposures from nuclear facilities and sources.
Over the course of 2-1/2 days, participants will hear detailed
presentations from several noted, professionally trained
international researchers who have actually conducted this kind
of independent survey, who will share their methods, expertise,
and results.
Next, participants will engage in workshops with these
researchers, who will assist in helping develop investigative
plans for those attending the sessions. On the final day,
discussion of furthering the goal of the "free university"
concept will take place.
Sessions will be supplemented by DVD, PowerPoint
and video presentations; and copies of existing epidemiological
tools used by the researchers will be made available.
WHO SHOULD ATTEND:
+ Activists and organizers dealing with nuclear facilities and
populations exposed to ionizing radiation
+ Citizens not satisfied with or denied health and exposure
information from existing public health and regulatory
institutions, who want to independently check their findings
and statements
+ Public health professionals and practitioners dealing with
populations potentially or actually exposed to ionizing
radiation
+ Public officials responsible for the public health safety and
welfare, looking to more critically examine existing health data
+ People who want to know how to convert “anecdotal stories”
about possible or actual radiation exposures into more credible
facts and statements about them
WHAT THE CONFERENCE WILL AND WON'T DO:
Let's be clear - attending this Conference will not make a
professional epidemiologist out of anyone. The intent is rather:
· to provide people with successful examples of where and under
what circumstances these techniques have worked;
· to inform activists on the latest thinking and understanding
of the effects of low-dose exposures to radiation;
· to have trained professionals teach people the important and
useful techniques to begin the process of collecting their own
data for use and analysis;
· to provide useful, easily understood tools and materials to
help with this data gathering, and guidance as to where and how
these tools can or shouldn't be used;
· to examine the role and use of so-called "anecdotal
evidence," and how it can contribute to a more thorough
understanding of radiation exposure issues;
· to publicly announce the message that the credibility of
existing institutions on the issue of radiation exposure is
seriously in doubt, and possibly irreparable; and that, in the
absence of believable public institutions and information,
people have a right to protect themselves, their families and
homes by collecting the data they need to get their legitimate
questions answered to their own satisfaction and understanding.
We welcome the support of additional co-sponsors, endorsing
groups, and financial contributors. In the US, all contributions
would be tax deductible.
Noted Abolitionist Frederick Douglas accurately observed that,
"Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it
never will. Find out just what people will submit to, and you
have found the exact amount of injustice and wrong which will be
imposed upon them; and these will continue until they are
resisted with either words or blows, or both. The limits of
tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they
oppress."
Knowledge IS power. The purpose of this Conference is to provide
people with the ability to get the knowledge they need to take
back their own power on nuclear and health issues; and to
demand the kind of accountability from public health and
regulatory institutions that is currently lacking.
Here is the Schedule planned for the conference:
NOTE: The following schedule is subject to change. For the most
current information, contact the NEIS office in the USA.
The site planned for the Conference is the Evanston
Campus of Northwestern University; the buildings to be used are
the Annenberg Center and Harris hall at the south end of the
Campus (near downtown Evanston.) Evanston is the community
immediately north of Chicago. It is easily reached through public
Metra and CTA trains and buses ($1.75-$3.00), as well as by car
and taxi from O'Hare Field Airport (cost: ~$30.00 for taxi;
$10-$15 by shuttle buses).
Copyright 2005 NEIS, Nuclear Energy Information Service
Last Revised May 3, 2005
*****************************************************************
34 The Globe and Mail: Ducking the 'N' word won't keep the lights on
theglobeandmail.com
EUROPE: ENERGY
By CARL MORTISHED
Thursday, May 19, 2005 Page B14
LONDON -- For every candidate in the recent British election, it
was the elephant in the room. Its threatening presence was
ignored, an issue too difficult and too dangerous to broach for
all but the very brave or very foolish.
The issue is nuclear power. Britain has a looming energy
deficit; a fifth of the country's electricity is generated from
an ancient fleet of nuclear reactors, many dating from the
1960s. Half of these must be decommissioned by 2010, and by the
end of the following decade generating capacity representing
some 15 per cent of Britain's power consumption will have been
shut down.
What will replace the nukes is the question from which Prime
Minister Tony Blair and his cabinet colleagues duck and dive.
Like the British public, Mr. Blair is probably agnostic about
nuclear power and indifferent to what keeps the lights on, but
several of his colleagues are staunchly anti-nuclear. Others
fear the wrath of the vociferous and sometimes mendacious
British environmental groups, and for many Labour Party
loyalists the "N" word even arouses passions associated with the
romance of Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament marches during the
Cold War.
Nuclear is an issue Mr. Blair would like to bury along with the
waste, but even that mess keeps sullying his in-tray because
successive environment ministers, including his own, have ducked
the issue of long-term underground storage.
In the wake of the blackouts that swept the globe in 2003,
Downing Street made a token gesture toward rising global and
domestic concern about energy security, publishing a white paper
that studiously avoided addressing the only pressing question:
the problem of replacing the nukes.
Instead, pages and pages were devoted to Mr. Blair's big issue,
global warming, and the calamitous consequence of continued
reliance on fossil fuels. His solution was a mad dash to build
windmills.
In a quixotic bid to lead the world in reducing greenhouse gas
emissions, while at the same time keeping the nuclear genie in
the lamp, the Prime Minister has set the nation on a desperate
path. By 2010, electricity suppliers must purchase a 10th of
their power from renewable sources and by 2020, a fifth. It is
folly, not least because nukes are the obvious carbon-free
energy source but also because the current yield from renewables
is just 3 per cent of total power consumption.
Wind turbines are hopelessly inefficient and on those calm,
clear days of intense heat or cold, they require 80 per cent
backup from fossil-fuel generators. Yet, the compliant power
companies are erecting monster whirligigs on every sandbank and
hilltop, and new environmental battles are looming.
Post-election, Downing Street is beginning to notice the
fragility of Britain's energy security. North Sea oil is
beginning to peter out. Supplies of natural gas, too, are
dwindling and Britain is shifting within the space of a few
years from major exporter to large-scale importer of
hydrocarbons.
Alan Johnson, the new Secretary of State for Trade and Industry
uttered the "N" word last week, the first indication that policy
might change. Rival designers of nukes, including Atomic Energy
of Canada, Westinghouse and France's Framatome are eyeing a
potential opportunity but, as yet, there is no customer. The
British government will not underwrite another nuclear venture;
the private sector must provide.
Apart from France, which generates 78 per cent of its
electricity from an army of state-owned nukes and a maverick
Finnish nuclear project, Europe is hissy about fission but
dangerously exposed without it.
Last week, Germany shut down its second nuclear generator, an
event greeted with glee by triumphant Greens and dismay by the
state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, which lost 400 jobs. In thrall to
the single-issue campaigners, Germany's Social Democrats have
promised to close the remaining 17 nukes that supply a third of
Germany's power, creating an even greater deficit than in
Britain.
However, Germany will make up its shortfall not with wind but
with Russian gas. German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, who is
less worried than Mr. Blair by global warming, was pleased as
punch earlier this month when Russian President Vladimir Putin
blessed a major Russo-German gas field and pipeline investment.
Britain was built on an abundance of cheap fuel and more is
required. The coal that powered the first steam engines is still
there but too dirty for modern tastes, and the oil wells that
fuelled the 1980s Thatcherite revolution are beginning to run
dry. Having finally noticed the elephant, Britain needs to set
it free before it tears down the house.
Carl Mortished is international business editor for The Times in
London.
carl.mortished@thetimes.co.uk Search
globeandmail.com
Thursday, May 19, 2005
+ © Copyright 2005 Bell Globemedia Publishing Inc. All Rights
Reserved.
Globeandmail.com:
*****************************************************************
35 St. Petersburg Times: Nations on Baltic Extend Nuclear Power Plans -
#1071, Friday, May 20, 2005
By Irina Titova
STAFF WRITER Nations around the Baltic look set to continue
operating nuclear power plants for many years despite Western
fears about their safety.
The Leningrad Nuclear Power Plant, or LAES, located in the
settlement of Sosnovy Bor west of St. Petersburg operates
reactors similar to the one involved in the 1986 Chernobyl
disaster. Plans are advanced for an about $350-million project
to lay an undersea cable from the plant to Finland that will
allow LAES to sell electricity to its northern neighbor.
In addition, former Nuclear Power Minister Yevgeny Adamov,
speaking before he was detained in Switzerland, said Lithuania's
Ignalina plant is safe and should not be shut down.
Ignalina also operates Chernobyl-type reactors.
As part of its agreement to join the EU, Lithuania pledged to
shut down one reactor before 2005, which it did in December, and
to set a date for the closure of the other - probably 2009.
Meanwhile, Russian ecologists say it's not right for Russia to
sell nuclear energy to other countries.
"Such sales are a commercial matter, but when nuclear waste
from producing energy for other countries remains in the country
where it's produced, it also means additional risk for our
population," said Alexander Nikitin, an ecologist for the St.
Petersburg branch of Norwegian-based ecological organization
Bellona.
Plans to lay a power cable across the Finnish Gulf were
approved by the Finnish foreign and trade and industry
ministries and the Russian government last year.
Sergei Averyanov, spokesman for LAES, said Wednesday that the
cable would be constructed so that energy could flow in either
direction.
It will require Russia and Finland to build substations to
transform alternating current into direct current when
transmitting energy and to transform it back when receiving it,
he said.
It is yet not clear when the project will be started because
ecological evaluations have not yet been conducted and not all
the funding has yet been found, he said.
LAES itself will not receive any financial benefit from the
project because its energy is sold in Russia on the federal
market. Electricity sold to Finland also comes from other
Russia's energy sources, which are all united into one energy
system, he said.
Finland's interested in Russian energy is probably not because
it didn't have enough power of its own, but because it hopes to
buy energy from Russia at a profitable price, Averyanov said.
Nikitin said that regardless of the sales, the plans to extend
the operations of LAES are of concern.
"LAES has reactors of Chernobyl type, which despite having been
or are getting modernized, still belong to that unsafe type of
reactor," Nikitin said.
Averyanov said each of the two new reactors, planned for 2013
and 2015, will produce 1,500 megawatts compared to the 1,000
megawatts of the four existing reactors. The new reactors would
not be Chernobyl-type and will meet international safety
standards.
However, construction of the new reactors was still under
discussion and no financial decisions on them have yet been made.
Finns have long been concerned about LAES' four reactors, built
in 1970s and 1980s, the Helsingin Sanomat wrote this week.
Although the initially planned 30-year life span of two of the
reactors has come to an end, the Russian power company running
the units wants to extend their operation by another 15 years.
The Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority of Finland, or RNSA,
has provided 7 million euros ($8.9 million) to upgrade safety at
the plant.
Heikki Reponen, the head of the expert service unit of the RNSA
said weaknesses were noted in operational and fire safety
systems, and in the shielding of the plant, the Helsingin
Sanomat wrote.
Finland supplied the plant with fire detectors and fire
fighting equipment, turnstile gates, card readers, and other
access control devices. A radiation monitoring network has been
built around the power plant and the readings can be seen in
Finland.
Meanwhile, Bellona reported that the closure of Lithuania's
Ignalina plant might be postponed.
The first unit of the Ignalina nuclear power plant started in
1983, and having an operating life lasting until 2029, was shut
down on Dec. 31. Lithuania also pledged that it would shut down
the second unit. It was designed to work until 2031 but is to be
shut down in 2009.
The plant plays a considerable role in Lithuania's economy and
it has exported much of its production to neighboring countries.
Lithuania is receiving billions of dollars from the European
Union to close it down.
Unified Energy Systems is building a non-nuclear plant in
Kaliningrad that is intended to make up some of the shortfall to
the region and its neighbors.
However, Adamov said in April that Ignalina had been upgraded,
was safe, and that the only reason to close it is political.
More top stories:
Finnish Guard's Strike May Close Border | EU Distant Despite
Will In Provinces |
Something to say? Write to the Opinion Page Editor.
E-mailor online form:
If you are willing for your comment to be published as a letter
to the editor, please supply your first name, last name and the
city and country where you live.
[Copyright] copyright The St. Petersburg Times 1993-2004
*****************************************************************
36 Secrecy News -- 05/19/05
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 11:22:14 -0400
SECRECY NEWS
from the FAS Project on Government Secrecy
Volume 2005, Issue No. 47
May 19, 2005
** REPORT ON OVERSEAS BASES REMOVED FROM WEB
** NUCLEAR ATTACK PLANNING BASE 1990
** CRS STUFF
** ARMY BAND LEADER HANDBOOK
REPORT ON OVERSEAS BASES REMOVED FROM WEB
A report to Congress from the Overseas Basing Commission was
removed from the Commission's web site last week after the
Department of Defense complained that its publication involved
"unauthorized disclosure of classified information."
But "The commission is confident that everything in our report
was obtained from unclassified sources or settings," Commission
chairman Al Cornella told the Washington Post.
Along with forthright criticism of current Pentagon planning, the
suppressed Commission report concluded ironically that "The nation
would benefit from a more inclusive discussion on how best to
ensure the greater security of the United States." (p. C&R 3).
The main body of the May 9 report of the Overseas Basing
Commission, not including several appendices, was preserved on the
web site of Rep. Solomon Ortiz (D-TX). A copy is posted here (5.4
MB PDF file):
http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/dod/obc.pdf
See also "Report Critical of Rumsfeld Is Pulled After DOD Protest"
by Mike Allen, Washington Post, May 16, 2005:
http://tinyurl.com/auvr6
NUCLEAR ATTACK PLANNING BASE 1990
The Final Report of the Nuclear Attack Planning Base 1990 (NAPB 90)
project, a little-known classic of the late cold war era on the
consequences of a nuclear war, was released under the Freedom of
Information Act and is now available online.
NAPB-90 was undertaken by the Federal Emergency Management Agency
(FEMA) in 1985-86 to estimate the physical effects of a Soviet
nuclear strike against the United States.
It presents detailed assessments of casualties and other damages
due to nuclear weapons blast overpressure, fire and radiation.
"NAPB-90 cannot be used to predict how a nuclear war would be
fought against the U.S. but merely identifies areas and
populations which are at potential risk from nuclear weapon
effects," the final report states.
"It represents a credible estimate of the potential risk from a
large-scale nuclear attack on the U.S., having been constructed on
logical, studied assumptions and available empirical data." (p.2).
The approximately 800 page final report, originally marked Limited
Distribution and Not for Public Release, has long been hard to
find. In response to a Freedom of Information Act request from
Allen Thomson, FEMA courteously provided its library reference
copy on loan.
The full text of "Nuclear Attack Planning Base-1990 Final Project
Report," April 1987, is now here:
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/napb-90/index.html
CRS STUFF
Some recent reports of the Congressional Research Service obtained
by Secrecy News include these.
"Federal Counter-Terrorism Training: Issues for Congressional
Oversight," May 16, 2005:
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/terror/RL32920.pdf
"Military Retirement: Major Legislative Issues," updated May 9,
2005:
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/IB85159.pdf
"Bioterrorism Countermeasure Development: Issues in Patents and
Homeland Security," May 6, 2005:
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/terror/RL32917.pdf
ARMY BAND LEADER HANDBOOK
It seems improbable that anyone would join the military in order to
serve as a musician. But bands and orchestras are an established
part of military ceremony, and so they even have their official
guidelines and "doctrine."
The U.S. Army this month issued an updated Handbook for Army Band
Leaders.
It includes an informative account of the origin and history of
instruments used in Army bands, and provides practical guidance
for band organization and rehearsal.
Among the band leader's more subtle and profound duties is to
appraise his band members, so as to integrate them into a
cohesive and well-tempered unit.
"Every section leader must know each player's capabilities before
effectively employing those capabilities. This is a continually
ongoing process, beginning with evaluating a new player, through
daily observation of their development, until the day that Soldier
leaves the band."
See "Army Band Section Leader Handbook," Training Circular 12-44,
dated 23 May 2005 (70 pages, 1.1 MB PDF file):
http://www.fas.org/irp/doddir/army/tc12_44.pdf
_______________________________________________
Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the
Federation of American Scientists.
To SUBSCRIBE to Secrecy News, send email to
secrecy_news-request@lists.fas.org
with "subscribe" in the body of the message.
To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a blank email message to
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OR email your request to saftergood@fas.org
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Secrecy News has an RSS feed at:
http://www.fas.org/sgp/news/secrecy/index.rss
_______________________
Steven Aftergood
Project on Government Secrecy
Federation of American Scientists
web: www.fas.org/sgp/index.html
email: saftergood@fas.org
voice: (202) 454-4691
*****************************************************************
37 Interfax: Russia, France call for support of convention on nuclear terror
Updated: May 20 2005 9:39AM (MSK) Ðóññêàÿ âåðñèÿ
-----------------------------------------------------------------
May 19 2005 5:06PM
MOSCOW. May 19 (Interfax) - Russia and France have called for
support of the new international convention on fighting nuclear
terrorism in the framework of the Organization for Security and
Cooperation in Europe, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a
statement on Thursday.
Russia and France "have proposed adopting a declaration by the
OSCE foreign ministers containing the political commitment of
all 55 member states to sign a new counter terrorist convention
the day it will be opened for signing - on September 14, 2005 in
New York," the statement says. The two countries also called for
the convention to be promptly ratified.
The international convention on nuclear terrorism was developed
at Russia's initiative and approved by the UN General Assembly
on April 13, 2005. Before it comes into effect, it must be
ratified by 22 states.
© 1991-2005 Interfax
All rights reserved
*****************************************************************
38 Xinhua: Paris backs on withdrawal of US nuclear weapons from Germany
www.xinhuanet.com
www.chinaview.cn 2005-05-19 19:06:10
PARIS, May 19 (Xinhuanet) -- French Defense Minister Michele
Alliot-Marie said on Thursday her country backs Germany's demand
to discuss with fellow NATO allies the withdrawal of US nuclear
weapons from German territory.
The French minister made the remark in an interview with the
Paris-based daily the International Herald Tribune published on
Thursday.
The French defense minister said she understood the demand
by the German government to discuss the issue but stopped short
of calling on Washington to pull the nuclear weapons out from
Germany.
Among a total of about 480 US nuclear weapons in Europe,
some 150 are stationed on German soil.
Also in the interview, Michele Alliot-Marie said NATO's
ongoingpost-cold war transformation had made the question of
France's rejoining the organization's integrated military
structure irrelevant.
"There is a future for NATO and France is participating in
its transformation," said the minister.
Reaffirming France's commitment to NATO, she said Paris had
no intention to rejoin NATO's integrated military command from
which France pulled out in 1966.
"We don't need to rejoin the military structure because the
structure itself, the functioning of NATO has considerably
changedand we are part of all operations," she said, adding that
France is the second-biggest contributor of troops to NATO.
The minister stressed that both NATO and European military
structures can coexist and complement each other in dealing with
the security challenges that have emerged since the end of the
Cold War, noting "NATO remains our ultimate security guarantee
if there was a massive attack". Enditem
Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
39 [du-list] (Con) Senate OK's bill to study health effects of
Date: Thu, 19 May 2005 14:27:59 -0700
Hartford-AP, May 18, 2005 9:50 PM) _ Connecticut today moved closer to
becoming the first state to study the health effects on military personnel
of depleted uranium and other toxic substances.
In a 34-to-zero vote, the Senate approved legislation that also
establishes a health registry for Connecticut veterans and military
personnel returning from Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere.
Depleted uranium is a heavy metal used in armor-piercing weapons. There
are concerns that some soldiers have become seriously ill after being
exposed to the substance.
The bill awaits action in the House.
************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
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40 The Australian: Fears over health after nuclear tests
[May 20, 2005]
From correspondents in Papeete, French Polynesia
INHABITANTS of the Gambier islands in French Polynesia have
called for access to defence ministry files on the impact on
their health of 30 years of French nuclear tests on Pacific
atolls.
In the request, Gambier mayor Monique Richeton and several
inhabitants of Mangareva island asked "that they be granted
access to information and documents to enable them to understand
the effects on their health and that of their descendants of the
nuclear tests carried out in French Polynesia".
Roland Oldham, president of the "Murura e Tatou" (Mururoa and
us) association of some 5000 Polynesians who worked on the two
nuclear sites in Polynesia between 1966 and 1996, said "reports
stamped 'Secret' from 1966 found (they) mention considerable
radioactive fallout on the inhabited islands and atolls close to
Mururoa, in particular on the island of Mangareva, in the Gambier
archipelago".
Mr Oldham also recalls the very powerful "Aldebaran" nuclear
test carried out in Mururoa from a barge on July 2, 1966 in the
presence of then French leader General Charles de Gaulle.
"The program of the presidential visit required that one carried
out the launch despite bad atmospheric conditions, and a launch
from a barge always causes intense nuclear pollution because the
debris is carried up."
Mr Oldham said that the fallout was carried by the wind to
Gambier, 500 kilometres away.
"The United States recognised that fallout could be carried for
700 kilometres around in good weather and that, naturally, one
could not control the winds," he said.
In Rikitea, the main village on Mangareva, two bunkers were
built in 1967 to shelter the population during atmospheric
nuclear tests.
"A sprinkler system allowed the roof of the bunker to be washed
after the test," said islander Tihoni Riesing, "and the
population could spend up to 48 hours locked up in the bunker
when you did not have the right to leave and where the air was
filtered through special apparatus".
The French defence ministry today described as "baseless"
allegations by two French newspapers that the army knowingly
exposed the people of French Polynesia to heightened risks
during nuclear tests in the 1990s.
"The conditions under which the people of French Polynesia were
protected at the time of the atmospheric nuclear tests were
strictly the same as those applied to military personnel
conducting the tests," defence ministry spokesman Jean-Francois
Bureau said.
For 30 years, French Polynesia provided Paris with a site for
nuclear tests on the Pacific atolls of Mururoa and Fangataufa,
west of the Gambier islands, where a total of 193 tests took
place - 41 atmospheric and 152 underground.
The last atmospheric test, under a tethered balloon dubbed
"Aquarius", took place on September 14, 1974, and the last
underground test was on January 27, 1996, in Fangataufa.
© The Australian
*****************************************************************
41 Seattle Times: Jury rules for only two Hanford downwinders
Thursday, May 19, 2005 - Page updated at 11:55 a.m.
By Warren Cornwall
Seattle Times staff reporter
1,000 Hanford workers face layoff
A Spokane jury today ruled that two people living downwind of
the Hanford nuclear weapons factory were probably sickened by
radiation leaked from the plants, and awarded them a total of
nearly $500,000 in damages.
It's a decision that could have widespread ramifications for the
2,300 other people suing over illnesses. The ruling is the first
verdict involving lawsuits that began in 1991, five years after
it was revealed that Hanford had quietly leaked radiation into
the surrounding region for years.
The jury also ruled against three plaintiffs, and couldn't reach
agreement on one.
The defendants in the case were General Electric and DuPont, the
contractors that operated Hanford for the federal government
during the height of the airborne releases in the 1940s and
1950s. But any damages would be paid by the federal government,
which agreed to indemnify contractors running the plants.
Beginning in 1944, Hanford converted uranium into plutonium for
the core of nuclear bombs. First built as part of the World War
II-era Manhattan Project, it produced the plutonium for the
first nuclear explosion during the Trinity test in New Mexico,
and for the bomb dropped on the Japanese city of Nagasaki.
The factories also spewed radioactivity into the air and water.
Most notably, it sent off radioactive iodine, I-131, which is
linked to increased risks of thyroid disease and thyroid cancer.
The six cases before the jury all involved people suffering
thyroid problems who were children during the height of the
iodine releases in the 1940s and early 1950s.
Hanford continued producing plutonium for decades, but that work
stopped in the 1990s. The facility is now largely the site of a
massive cleanup effort in response to years of pollution from
radioactive and toxic materials.
Copyright © 2005 The Seattle Times Company
*****************************************************************
42 Xinhua: France denies accusations of neglecting Polynesians in nuclear
tests in 1960s
www.xinhuanet.com
www.chinaview.cn 2005-05-20 02:52:09
PARIS, May 19 (Xinhuanet) -- French Defense Ministry on
Thursday denied the report as "baseless" accusing the French
army of knowingly exposing the people of French Polynesia
without protection during nuclear tests in the region in the
1960s.
"We say in the most formal way... that all of these
allegations are baseless," French Defense Ministry's spokesman
Jean-Francois Bureau said at a weekly news conference on
Thursday.
"The conditions under which the people of French Polynesia
were protected at the time of the atmospheric nuclear tests were
strictly the same as those applied to military personnel
conducting the tests," he said.
The left-leaning French newspaper Liberation quoted in its
Wednesday edition a "secret military document", saying France
has "concealed the risks that nuclear tests posed to the
Polynesians" and had not knowingly protected citizens during a
test on July 2, 1966.
French daily Le Figaro published in its Thursday edition
some extracts from the "secret documents" indicating that the
preventive evacuation of the Gambier islands in the Pacific
Ocean was ruled out for "political and psychological reasons".
For 30 years, French Polynesia provided Paris with a site
for nuclear tests on the Pacific atolls of Mururoa and
Fangataufa, west of the Gambier islands, where a total of 193
tests took place-- 41 atmospheric and 152 underground. Enditem
Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
43 Hawk Eye: Grassley to meet with HHS' Leavitt
Thursday, May 19, 2005 Site updated daily at 11 a.m. CST
Iowa senator will renew push for Army plant workers
compensation.
By KILEY MILLER
What a difference a day makes.
On Tuesday, all anyone following the effort to secure medical
compensation for sick Iowa Army Ammunition Plant workers could
ask was, "Would the letter go out on time?"
By Wednesday, Sen. Charles Grassley was arranging a head–to–head
with the man on the receiving end of the letter to muscle the
matter further along.
And just what is this all–important letter? It contains a
recommendation to speed $150,000 compensation payments to men
and women diagnosed with cancer after working in the ammunition
plant's nuclear weapons program during the Cold War.
Paul Ziemer, chairman of the Advisory Board on Radiation and
Worker Health, mailed the letter Tuesday afternoon to Department
of Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt.
Advisory board members offered unanimous support last month to a
petition requesting the ammunition plant be added to the Special
Exposure Cohort of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness
Compensation Program, a designation that would slash the time it
takes for former plant workers with cancer to get financial
help.
Leavitt is one link above the advisory board on the compensation
chain. He now has 30 days to make his own recommendation to
Congress.
The secretary was scheduled to speak to the Senate Finance
Committee today. Since Grassley chairs that committee, the Iowa
Republican secured some one–on–one time to urge Leavitt to
follow the advisory board's lead, and to do it quickly.
"Secretary Leavitt knows about my support for the IAAP
petition," Grassley said Wednesday in a prepared statement, "but
this gives me a chance to reiterate the suffering of these
former workers and the obstacles they have overcome to get to
this point."
The board members gave themselves a three–week window to get
their recommendation to Leavitt following a meeting late last
month in Cedar Rapids.
The alarm clock actually rang Tuesday with the letter still
missing in action. Marc Wolfson, a spokesman for Leavitt, said
it had not arrived at the Health and Human Services office
Wednesday afternoon, but he did have confirmation that it had
been sent by Federal Express the night before.
Leavitt returns to the Capitol today after spending a week in
Geneva at the World Health Forum. Wolfson declined to say when
the secretary would issue his recommendation, but he said the
advisory board's letter would be read "closely."
That close reading will reveal three main factors behind the
board's recommendation. First, the 19,000–acre plant in
Middletown was one of the "earliest environments where nuclear
materials were handled." Second, radiation monitoring there was
limited, at best. And third, the National Institute of
Occupational Safety and Health believes the radiation doses
presented a health hazard.
That amounts to a slam–dunk case in the eyes of Sen. Tom Harkin,
D–Iowa, who has led the drive to help workers since the nuclear
program came to light five years ago.
"The advisory board voted unanimously to give closure, justice
and immediate compensation to IAAP workers and this should not
be further delayed," Harkin said in his own prepared statement
Wednesday. "I urge Health and Human Services Secretary Mike
Leavitt to act quickly in sending this recommendation to
Congress so that these workers are not subject to any additional
delays. It is long overdue that these workers be recognized for
their service and sacrifice."
Of course, a pair of Iowa senators and one expert panel are not
the only voices Leavitt will hear over the next month.
The compensation program legislation requires John Howard, NIOSH
director, to make his own recommendation to the secretary.
It was scientists working under Howard who gave the strongest
resistance to the Special Exposure Cohort designation,
contending they had the necessary information to estimate
individual radiation doses for each worker, a claim repudiated
by the advisory board members.
Howard could not be reached Wednesday for comment.
The Hawk Eye 800 S. Main St., Burlington, Iowa 52601 319-754-8461
· 1-800-397-1708 · FAX 319-754-6824 ·
*****************************************************************
44 Paducah Sun: Sick worker claims date on track - U.S.
Joe Walker
The Department of Labor was given until May 26 to have
regulations set up for the claims backlog and says it is 'on
track.'
By Joe Walker jwalker@paducahsun.com 270.575.8656
Thursday, May 19, 2005
Raleigh Struble and other sick former nuclear workers will be
watching closely starting next week to see how well the U.S.
Department of Labor expedites a huge claims backlog inherited
from the Department of Energy.
Federal law signed Oct. 28 by President Bush gave the department
210 days (to May 26) to issue regulations and have staffing and
procedures in place to compensate workers sickened from toxic
exposure.
"The department is on track to have the regulations completed by
May 26," Victoria Lipnic, assistant secretary for employment
standards, said Wednesday in a prepared statement.
Congress transferred the program from the Energy Department,
which had 25,000 claims backlogged nationwide, including nearly
3,400 at Paducah. Last year, just before the transition, Struble
received a finding from a DOE physicians' panel that he was
suffering from lead poisoning stemming from his machinist work
at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant from 1967 to 1978.
Despite favorable findings for Struble and other former plant
workers, there was no way under the DOE system to force
employers or their workers' compensation insurers to pay claims.
Congress changed that by making the Labor Department the payer,
but the time lag has added another six months to the several
years some workers have waited for checks.
"I'm getting to where I can't walk across the room without my
walking stick or holding onto furniture," said Struble, 83, of
Paducah, who also has diabetes and suffers from neuropathy. "My
feet are completely dead — I can't feel a thing in them — and
it's going into my hands."
He said he has been told it will be at least June before the new
program begins paying a substantial number of claims.
Earlier this year, Labor Secretary Elaine Chao said she could
not estimate how long it would take to work through the backlog
but said her agency would do its best. To absorb the load, the
Labor Department was hiring 200 more claims examiners either
directly or by contract.
The revised law provides that nuclear workers exposed to toxins
could get up to $250,000 for lost wages and bodily impairment.
Some of the sickest workers, who were paid $150,000 under a
separate program for radiation-induced cancer and beryllium
disease, could receive as much as $400,000 under both programs.
The new program allows surviving spouses and dependent children
of workers who died from toxic exposure to receive up to
$175,000. For inclusion, at the time of the worker's death an
eligible child must have been under 18, a full-time student
under 23, or any age and incapable of self-support.
In previous public meetings, adult children of deceased workers
complained that the child-survivor provision is unfair and
should be changed. Lawmakers have expressed empathy, but say it
was extremely difficult to pass the entitlement law even with
existing provisions.
Struble hopes for enough money to help him afford assisted
living for him and his wife, Velta, who is in a nursing home
rehabilitating from a leg injury. He said he retired from the
plant after managers threatened to fire him because of excessive
absenteeism related to illness.
Workers used "white lead" spray lubricant to tap holes until the
Occupational Safety and Health Administration banned the aerosol
cans, Struble said, but the plant continued to mix the lead with
cutting oil to lubricate large drilling machinery.
"It slung the oil all over everything, including the operators.
You might as well say we took a bath in it," he said. "But they
didn't tell us it would cause health problems."
*****************************************************************
45 Tidepool: Downwinders Pay a Secret Price--In the rush to keep pace during
the Cold War, residents near Hanford were knowingly exposed to harmful
radiation - Rebecca Clarren
Writers on the Range
Growing up in Richland, Wash., in the shadow of the Hanford
Nuclear Reservation, where the Department of Energy produced
plutonium for bombs, Trisha Pritikin never imagined that the
milk she drank or the air she breathed was poisonous. Her
father, a safety engineer at the plant, was supremely patriotic,
and the entire family felt proud that his work was helping to
win the Cold War.
What she and the thousands of other nearby residents didn't know
was that throughout the 1940s and 1950s, the government
intentionally released radioactive material, in particular,
iodine-131, into the environment. The largest such release,
known as the "Green Run," occurred in 1949, when the government
secretly released about 8,000 curies of radioactive iodine in
order to evaluate equipment it could use to determine the
location of similar Soviet plutonium production facilities.
Radioactive debris fell onto the surrounding grass, where it was
eaten by cows, which then transferred the radiation to their
milk, which local children -- like Pritikin -- drank by the
frothy glassful.
Scientists knew even then thatiodine-131 collects in the thyroid
gland and can wreak havoc, causing thyroid cancer or other
diseases. Yet neither the DOE nor General Electric and DuPont,
the contractors that ran the facility, alerted nearby residents.
Not until the late 1980s, when a newspaper reporter in Spokane
sued the government for access to classified documents, did the
truth emerge.
Meanwhile, Pritikin's mother and father had both developed
thyroid disease and died of cancer. She herself has extreme
hypothyroidism, a condition resulting in slow metabolism and
excessive fatigue.
Now, she and over 2,000 other people who grew up downwind of the
reservation claim that iodine-131 emissions crippled their
health. Last month, on April 25, after 15 years of legal
wrangling, the downwinders opened a trial in federal court,
suing GE and Dupont, the government contractors that ran the
Hanford Reservation for the federal government in the 1940s and
1950s. But under the 1957 Price Anderson Act, the government
indemnified the contractors, so any claims, which could amount
to tens of millions of dollars, will be paid by taxpayers.
"Right now, people like me are very disheartened and
disillusioned by a government that told us everything was safe
at Hanford and then basically let us die," said Pritikin, who
lives in Berkeley, Calif., but traveled to Spokane to attend the
trial. "It's amazing that you could do this to people and just
not talk about it."
Even today, the Energy Department continues to dodge
responsibility. The government is using as its main defense a
study that the National Academy of Sciences says is riddled with
flaws. Called the Hanford Thyroid Disease Study, it was a
congressionally ordered $20 million project by the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention and the Fred Hutchinson Cancer
Research Center. It found no increased risk for thyroid disease
among those who were exposed to Hanford releases of iodine-131.
Yet no parent or close relative was available to provide
information about childhood milk consumption for 38 percent of
the nearly 5,000 individuals interviewed for the study.
Furthermore, the Thyroid Disease Study failed to compare those
living near Hanford to a sample population from the general
public who would not have been exposed to iodine-131 emissions.
When the Northwest Radiation Health Alliance, a group of
scientists and doctors affiliated with Oregon Physicians for
Social Responsibility, surveyed 800 downwinders and compared
their health problems with those in the canon of medical
literature, they found that the downwinders had a 300 percent
higher rate of some types of thyroid disease.
Their research, published last year, found strong evidence of a
link between Hanford's radioactive emissions and juvenile
hypothyroidism, and hyperthyroidism, a condition where the
thyroid is overactive, leading often to fatigue, weight loss and
depression. They also found that Hanford downwinders had high
rates of cancers of the thyroid, central nervous system and
female reproductive organs.
A friend of mine just returned from Hiroshima, Japan. He
described the destruction of that city at the end of World War
II from an atomic bomb made in America. What happened there is
acknowledged the world over as horrific. Yet here in this
country, victims of our Cold War bomb production remain
unacknowledged.
We can't bring back Pritikin's parents. But we can be honest
with her, and with the thousands like her who suffer from
disease and who need help with treatment. In its rush to build
bombs to protect America, our government failed to worry about
the impact on human health here at home. It is time for us to
reconcile that devastating oversight.
Rebecca Clarren is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a
service of High Country News (hcn.org). She writes in Portland,
Oregon.
Writers on the Range is an op-ed service of High Country News.
Please contact Betsy Marston
*****************************************************************
46 ZNet: BRAVO and Today
US Nuclear Tests in the Marshall Islands
by Tony de Brum May 19, 2005
It is an honor for me to be able to speak to you today on behalf
of indigenous people throughout the world whose lives have been
dramatically affected by the proliferation of weapons. I bring
you the greetings of the people of the Marshall Islands, and
more specifically the paramount leaders of the Ralik chain,
Iroijlaplap Imata Kabua, and Iroijlaplap Anjua Loeak, whose
domains have borne the brunt of United States military weapons
development -- from the nuclear bombs of the Cold War to the
missiles that carry them today.
I lived on the island of Likiep in the northern Marshalls for
the entire 12 years of the US atomic and thermonuclear testing
program in my country. I witnessed most of the detonations, and
was just 9-years old when I experienced the most horrific of
these explosions, the infamous BRAVO shot that terrorized our
community and traumatized our society to an extent that few
people in the world can imagine.
While BRAVO was by far the most dramatic test, all 67 of the
shots detonated in the Marshall Islands contributed one way or
another to the nuclear legacy that haunts us to this day. As one
of our legal advisors has described it, if one were to take the
total yield of the nuclear weapons tested in the Marshall
Islands and spread them out over time, we would have the
equivalent of 1.6 Hiroshima shots, every day for twelve years.
But the Marshall Islands' encounter with the bomb did not end
with the detonations themselves. In recent years, documents
released by the United States government have uncovered even
more horrific aspects of the Marshallese burden borne in the
name of international peace and security. US government
documents clearly demonstrate that its scientists conducted
human radiation experiments with Marshallese citizens. Some of
our people were injected with or coerced to drink fluids laced
with radiation. Other experimentation involved the purposeful
and premature resettlement of people on islands highly
contaminated by the weapons tests to study how human beings
absorb radiation from their foods and environment. Much of this
human experimentation occurred in populations either exposed to
near lethal amounts of radiation, or to "control" populations
who were told they would receive medical "care" for
participating in these studies to help their fellow citizens. At
the conclusion of all these studies, the United States still
maintained that no positive linkage can be established between
the tests and the health status of the Marshallese. Just in the
past few weeks, a new US government study has predicted higher
than 50% higher than expected incidence of cancer in the
Marshall Islands resulting from the atomic tests.
Although the testing of the atomic and thermonuclear weapons
ended 48 years ago, we still have entire populations living in
social disarray. The people of Rongelap Atoll, the inhabited
island closest to the ground zero locations, remain in exile in
their own country. I might also add that although the people of
Rongelap were evacuated by the US government for earlier smaller
weapons tests, the US government purposefully decided not to
evacuate them prior to the detonation of the BRAVO event -- a
thermonuclear weapon designed to be the largest device ever
detonated by the United States. The people of Rongelap were
known to be in harms way but were not warned about BRAVO in
advance and had no ability or knowledge of how to protect
themselves or reduce their exposure.
Throughout the years, America's nuclear history in the Marshall
Islands has been colored with official denial, self-serving
control of information, and abrogation of commitment to redress
the shameful wrongs done to the Marshallese people. The
scientists and military officials involved in the testing
program picked and chose their study subjects, recognized
certain communities as exposed when it served their interests,
and denied monitoring and medical attention to subgroups within
the Marshall Islands. I remember well their visits to my village
in Likiep where they subjected every one of us to tests and
invasive physical examinations which, as late as 1978, they
denied ever carrying out. In later years when I was a public
servant for the RMI I raised the issue requesting that raw data
gathered during these visits be made available to us. United
States representatives responded by saying that our
recollections were juvenile and did not consider the public
health missions of the time.
For decades, the US government has utilized slick mathematical
and statistical representations to dismiss the occurrence of
exotic anomalies, including malformed fetuses, and abnormal
appearances of diseases in so called "unexposed areas," as
coincidental and not attributable to radiation exposure. We have
been told repeatedly, for example, that our birthing anomalies
are the result of incest or a gene pool that is too small --
anything but the radiation. These explanations are offensive,
and obviously wrong since these abnormalities certainly did not
occur before we became the proving ground for US nuclear
weapons. Selective referral of Marshallese patients to different
military hospitals in the United States and its territories also
made it easier for the US government to dismiss linkages between
medical problems and radiation exposure. The several unexplained
fires that led to the destruction of numerous records and
medical charts for the patients with the most acute radiation
illnesses further underscores this point. In spite of all these
studies and findings, we were told that positive linkage was
still impossible because of what they called "statistical
insignificance."
I have been a student of the horrific impacts of the nuclear
weapons testing program for most of my life. I served as
interpreter for American officials who proclaimed Bikini safe
for resettlement and commenced a program to repatriate the
Bikini people who for decades barely survived on the secluded
island of Kili. I accompanied the American High Commissioner of
the Trust Territory just a few years later to once again remove
the repatriated residents from Bikini because their exposure had
become too high for the US government's comfort. I was also
personally involved in the translation of the Enewetak
Environmental Impact Statement that declared Enewetak safe for
resettlement. I voiced my doubts in a television interview at
the time by describing the US public relations efforts
associated with the Enewetak clean-up as a dog-and-pony show.
Later, during negotiations to end the trust territory
arrangement with the United States, we discovered that certain
scientific information regarding Enewetak was being withheld
from us because, as the official US government memorandum
stated, "the Marshallese negotiators might make overreaching
demands" on the United States if the facts about the extent of
damage in the islands were known to us.
The outcome of our negotiations was the end of the United
Nations Trusteeship and a treaty, which, among other things,
provided for the ongoing responsibilities of our former trustee
for the communities impacted by the nuclear weapons tests. This
assistance provided by the US government for radiation damages
and injuries is based on a US government study that purports to
be the best and most accurate knowledge about the effects of
radiation in the Marshall Islands. Our agreement to terminate
our United Nations trusteeship that the US government
administered was based largely on those assurances. We have
since discovered that even that covenant by the United States
was false. Today, not only is the US government backpedaling on
this issue but its official position as enunciated by the
current administration is to flee its responsibilities to the
Marshall Islands for the severe nuclear damages and injuries
perpetrated upon them.
After spending decades of my life trying to persuade the US
government to take responsibility for the full range of damages
and injuries caused by the testing of 67 atmospheric atomic and
thermonuclear weapons in the Marshall Islands, a new global arms
system arrived at the door of the Marshall Islands. After years
of ICBM testing, the Marshall Islands now has the dubious
distinction of hosting the US government's missile shield
testing program. The US government shoots Intercontinental
Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs) at the Marshall Islands. From an area
leased by the US Army on Kwajalein Atoll, the Ronald Reagan
Missile Defense Test Site, the US launches interceptor missiles
at the incoming ICBMs to test the ability of these interceptors
to track and destroy incoming missiles. These tests impact every
aspect of our lives... from the local people who are relocated
from their homes, to the whales, sea turtles, and birds that
have lived in harmony with human beings in our region of the
world for centuries.
As history repeats itself in the Marshall Islands, the people of
Kwajalein have been removed from their homelands, crowded into
unbearable living squalor on a 56-acre island with 18,000
residents called Ebeye. This is the equivalent of taking
everyone here in Manhattan and forcing them to live on the
ground floor -- can you imagine the density of Manhattan if
there were no skyscrapers? The US Army base depends on Ebeye for
housing its indigenous labor force, but the US Army has also
erected impenetrable boundaries keeping the Marshallese at arm's
length; Marshallese on the island adjacent to the US base are
unable to use the world-class hospital in emergencies, to fill
water bottles during times of drought, or to purchase basic food
supplies when cargo ships are delayed. One does not have to be a
rocket scientist to suspect that the lands, lagoon, and
surrounding seas of Kwajalein, are being damaged from depleted
uranium and other substances. Unfortunately, our efforts to seek
a clear understanding of the consequences of the missile testing
program -- data we need to make informed decisions regarding our
future or the prerequisite rehabilitation of our lands before
repatriation -- have been spurned by the United States
government. Perchlorate additives in the missiles fired from
Kwajalein have been detected in the soil and the water lenses
but to date no real data has become available for meaningful,
independent study. The lands leased by the United States
military are compensated far below market. Efforts by the
Kwajalein leadership to deal with the realities which face them
when the current agreement expires in 2016 have been largely
ignored as the US openly and callously discusses the uses of our
lands beyond 2016 and into 2086...all without our consent. Our
Constitution specifically prohibits the taking of land without
consent or proper compensation.
We call upon the international community to extend its hands to
assist the people of the Marshall Islands to extricate
themselves from the legacy of the nuclear age and the burden of
providing testing grounds for weapons of mass destruction. In
the countries that produce these weapons we have come together
to protest, if a person's land or resources become contaminated,
persons so affected have the option to buy another house and
move elsewhere. For indigenous people it is not that simple. Our
land and waters are sacred to us. Our land and waters embody our
culture, our traditions, our kinship ties, our social
structures, and our ability to take care of ourselves. Our lands
are irreplaceable.
When we talk about the importance of non-proliferation of
weapons we also must include in our discourse the essential
non-proliferation of illness, forced relocation, and social and
cultural ills in the indigenous communities that pay
disproportionately for the adverse consequences resulting from
the process, deployment, and storage of weapons. A relatively
small number of world leaders and decision-makers do not have
the right to destroy the well-being and livelihood of any
society, whether large or small, in the name of global security.
Security for indigenous people means healthy land, resources and
body -- not the presence of weapons and the dangers they
engender. Global leaders do not have, nor should they be allowed
to assume the right, to take my security away so that they may
feel more secure themselves.
MAY PEACE BE WITH YOU.
Thank you.
Tony de Brum, of the Lolelaplap Trust, delivered this address on
behalf of Indigenous People throughout the world to the Seventh
Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference at the United Nations
on May 11, 2005.Â
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47 WTNH.com: Senate OK's bill to study health effects of depleted uranium, toxins
May 20, 2005
(Hartford-AP, May 18, 2005 9:50 PM) _ Connecticut today moved
closer to becoming the first state to study the health effects
on military personnel of depleted uranium and other toxic
substances.
In a 34-to-zero vote, the Senate approved legislation that
also establishes a health registry for Connecticut veterans and
military personnel returning from Afghanistan, Iraq and
elsewhere.
Depleted uranium is a heavy metal used in armor-piercing
weapons. There are concerns that some soldiers have become
seriously ill after being exposed to the substance.
The bill awaits action in the House.
Content © Copyright 2000 - 2005 WorldNow, WTNH, and Associated
Press. All Rights
*****************************************************************
48 WOI: Grassley plans meeting on benefits for ammunition plant workers
May 20, 2005
DES MOINES _ Senator Chuck Grassley says he will meet tomorrow
with Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt to discuss
health benefits for former workers at a southeast Iowa weapons
plant.
Leavitt has received a recommendation from a federal advisory
board on radiation and worker health to speed payment of medical
claims to workers who have said they were sickened by their
exposure to radiation.
Nuclear weapons were assembled and test-fired at the Iowa Army
Ammunition Plant near Burlington from the mid-1940s through the
mid-1970s.
Grassley and Democratic Senator Tom Harkin have publicly
chastised the federal government for taking so long to compensate
the southeast Iowa workers.
Grassley says he'll push Leavitt to approve the payments for the
workers.
Leavitt has 30 days to consider a petition seeking payment and
forward his recommendation to Congress.
Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
Copyright 2000 - 2005 WorldNow and WOI. All Rights Reserved.
*****************************************************************
49 Brattleboro Reformer: No deal yet on dry cask storage
May 19, 2005 Brattleboro, VT
By CAROLYN LORIÉ
Reformer Staff
MONTPELIER -- A House bill calling on Entergy Nuclear Vermont
Yankee to pay the state a minimum of $4 million a year for dry
cask storage will most likely receive committee approval today.
The Natural Resources and Energy Committee, which crafted the
bill, spent most of Wednesday finalizing the particulars. A
final vote was expected Wednesday evening, but was postponed as
last minute negotiations between the state and Entergy officials
continued.
Representatives from the Department of Public Service, three
members of the Natural Resources and Energy Committee and
Entergy officials have been meeting in an effort to forge a
memorandum of understanding between the corporation and the
state.
"It would be nice to have a [memorandum of] understanding, so
the bill can reflect it," said committee chairman Robert Dostis,
D-Waterbury.
Dostis is one of the representatives involved in direct
negotiations with Entergy.
A memorandum would insure Vermont Yankee's compliance with the
conditions and quell concerns that the company might close the
plant prematurely.
Company officials have consistently opposed any kind of fee,
claiming that it would be unfair and a financial hardship,
forcing the plant to shut down.
As of Wednesday evening, Vermont Yankee spokesman Rob Williams
would not say whether the company was prepared to negotiate on
the matter, saying only that "talks are continuing."
Recent testimony provided by Richard Cowart, consultant to the
committee from the Regulatory Assistance Project, showed that
the company stood to make an additional $40 million to $50
million a year, if the bid to increase power by 20 percent is
approved. At its peak, the company could make as much as $83
million a year.
The figures, however, are estimates based on data revealed
during the sale of the plant in 2002. Entergy officials have not
released the company's actual earnings, claiming the information
is proprietary.
Included in the bill are instructions to the Vermont Public
Service Board -- which must also approve dry cask storage -- to
investigate whether the charge would be a hardship.
Producing more power would not only increase profits for the
company, but would also fill up the pool where the spent fuel is
now stored at a faster rate.
Because the national high-level nuclear waste site at Yucca
Mountain in Nevada has not opened -- and no one is sure when it
will -- nuclear power stations around the country are having to
come up with alternative storage plans for spent fuel, as the
pools fill to capacity.
Moving the fuel into dry casks, which are large concrete and
steel containers, has become the industry standard.
According to company officials, the Vermont Yankee pool will
run out of room by 2008 or 2007 if the power boost get approved
by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Without dry casks, the
plant will have to shut down before its license expires in 2012.
The company supplies one-third of the state's electricity and
does so at a much cheaper rate than what it costs on the open
market, because of an agreement made between the state and
Entergy during the sale of the plant.
Money from the annual charge for dry cask storage would go into
a renewable energy fund, which would be administered by the
Department of Public Service.
In addition to the $4 million charge, the bill also calls for a
$45 annual charge per kilowatt-hour to be imposed on electricity
generation facilities that produce in excess of 510 megawatts,
which Vermont Yankee does.
The condition is meant to address a recent decision made by the
Independent Service Operator of New England -- overseer of the
region's electricity grid -- to provide utilities with financial
incentives for increasing power production. The money will come
from ratepayers, who will soon see an increase in their monthly
bills.
Vermont and other New England states strongly disagree with the
decision and are actively opposing it.
Under the ISO plan, Vermont Yankee stands to make an additional
$5 million to $6 million a year if it increases power by 20
percent. The per kilowatt-hour charge would allow the state to
recoup those additional profits subsidized by ratepayers and add
it to the renewable energy fund.
Not all members of the committee agreed with this or other
financial conditions.
Rep. Joseph Krawczyk, R-Bennington, accused the committee of
treating Vermont Yankee like a "cash cow."
"Whether we want to say it or not, we're trying to drive them
out of Vermont," said Krawczyk.
In addition to financial matters, the bill also addresses
concerns raised by many Windham County residents voiced during a
joint committee hearing held in Brattleboro early this year.
Included in instructions directed to the Public Service Board
is the mandate that the board require that Entergy use "best
practices for the environmental management of dry cask sites."
This includes considering, among other things, how and where the
casks are placed, the distance from the river and temperature
and radiation monitoring.
Committee members Reps. Sarah Edwards, P-Brattleboro and Steve
Darrow, D-Putney, both said they were pleased with the bill.
"Any issues related to the environment, economy and aesthetics
are in the bill," said Edwards. "It covers all the bases."
Once it is voted out of the Natural Resources and Energy
Committee, it will be considered by the Ways and Means Committee
before going to the House floor for a full vote.
Copyright ©1999-2005 New England Newspapers, Inc.,
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50 Bradenton Herald: Angry Tallevast residents halt water project
| 05/19/2005 |
County heeds community's demand to put work on hold
DONNA WRIGHT
Herald Staff Writer
Community outrage has shut down a county water main project at
the intersection of Tallevast Road and 15th Street East.
But angry Tallevast leaders say the breach of trust between the
community and the county won't be as easily smoothed over.
Bowing to pressure from Tallevast residents, county staff agreed
to halt the water main project, cover the trench and repave the
road, until issues over the possible spread of toxic pollutants
can be addressed.
But the action comes too late for Tallevast leaders who feel
they have been betrayed by county officials who held a private
meeting to discuss the timing of the project.
"If the health department or the county were truly concerned,
they would have handled this project differently," said Wanda
Washington, vice president of Tallevast community advocacy group
Family Oriented Community United and Strong.
"We would have been consulted."
FOCUS leaders fear the digging and road closure have further
exposed residents to toxins identified in an underground
contamination plume stemming from the old Loral American
Beryllium plant.
By the latest measurement, the plume now covers more than 131
acres surrounding Tallevast, according to a report issued in
April by Lockheed Martin Corp. As the former owners of the
beryllium plant, Lockheed Martin has assumed responsibility
cleaning up the toxic spill.
"Why were we not included in the deliberations on this project?"
demanded Dr. Billie Ward, a Tallevast resident and local
dentist. "Why dig when you don't know what these contaminants
might do?"
FOCUS leaders walked in to Wednesday's meeting at Mount Tabor
Missionary Baptist Church expecting answers from at least a
dozen county staff members.
Instead only three county employees showed up - Tim Hocholi,
Mike Limoge and Scott Pevy of the Project Management Department.
After being pelted with questions on the lack of notification
and timing of the project, Hocholi said he could address only
the specifics of replacing the old water main. He defended the
project's timing, saying the county health and environmental
management departments had given the go-ahead. All of the data
released so far, Hocholi said, showed no risk to the community
because the intersection was not in the delineated plume.
Billie Ward scoffed at Hocholi's answer, pointing out that
Lockheed's own reports say the final outline has yet to be
determined and the intersection lies within sight of the plant
that is the source of the plume.
"All of the other projects in the community are on hold, but you
go right in the heart of the plume and start to dig," an angry
Washington said.
Laura Ward, president of FOCUS, accused county staff of using a
double standard, requiring Tallevast residents to cap their
private wells and suspend all construction projects, while
county road crews dig deep trenches without taking the advice of
the county's own consultants on how to minimize risk to the
community.
FOCUS leaders dismissed the health department's conclusion that
the project posed no risk.
Charles Henry of the Manatee County Health Department said soil
samples and vapor studies taken so far indicate no health risk
to residents.
But Washington countered that soil has been tested from only a
few areas of Tallevast and vapor studies are flawed.
"The health department needs to do its own testing, instead of
relying on reports from Lockheed Martin," Washington said.
That responsibility, said Henry, falls to the state Department
of Environmental Protection. Health officials then have the
responsibility to interpret that data in terms of health risk,
Henry said.
"And we know of no health risks," said Henry, picking up a map
to show where monitoring had been done.
Washington pushed his hand away.
"Don't show me that," she said. "You don't know what the health
risks are."
Washington said the community's lack of trust in government
officials continues to erode.
"The health department," she said, "needs to learn how to do its
job . . . but I can't lay all of the problems on the health
department. The problem goes all of the way up. I think that
they are all looking for data to hide behind."
Tallevast's lack of trust, Washington said, now extends to
County Administrator Ernie Padgett, once considered an ally.
"We felt that Ernie was the one person in the county government
we could trust," Washington said. "We felt he had a sympathetic
ear. But today that trust is gone."
That loss of faith did not need to happen, Washington said, had
Padgett and county staff invited Tallevast residents to May 5
meeting at which the road project and latest Lockheed report
were discussed.
Late Wednesday afternoon, Padgett said he could understand the
mistrust and anger rampant among Tallevast leaders.
"I know there is anxiety among the folks in Tallevast," Padgett
said in a phone interview. "You hear about big government
protecting big business. I understand why they are very
sensitive. But we do have their concerns at heart."
Padgett said he could put himself in their shoes.
"If my wife and I lived in Tallevast, I might be talking the
same way," Padgett said. "I have to keep that in mind, but from
my perspective as county administrator, I also know we have been
sensitive to their needs."
Padgett vowed that he will continue to do whatever he can to
keep information flowing to Tallevast residents.
"We need to meet more often," Padgett said. "If the Tallevast
people say that would give them a comfort level, I would be
willing to have my staff available."
Donna Wright, health and social services reporter, can be
reached at 745-7049 or at dwright@ HeraldToday.com. n Read The
Herald's archive coverage on the Tallevast contamination.
• Find a map of the Tallevast contamination plume area.
*****************************************************************
51 Las Vegas RJ: Indian tribe's plea to block Yucca denied
Thursday, May 19, 2005
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
A federal judge has denied an Indian tribe's plea to block plans
for a nuclear waste dump in Nevada based on a claim that the
project would violate a 19th century treaty.
U.S. District Judge Philip Pro ruled Tuesday that the Western
Shoshone National Council could not demonstrate "immediate and
irreparable" harm because the Yucca Mountain repository has yet
to open and a disputed rail line has yet to be built.
The judge, however, left open a chance for the tribe to seek
another injunction.
He also gave the government until July 20 to seek dismissal of
the tribe's lawsuit.
An attorney representing the tribe said Wednesday that no
decision had been made whether to appeal. A spokesman for the
Energy Department declined to comment.
In 2002, Congress picked Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of
Las Vegas, as the site to entomb 77,000 tons of spent nuclear
fuel now stored in 39 states.
The site is at the western edge of the Nevada Test Site, within
ancient Shoshone lands.
The tribe claimed the Ruby Valley Treaty of 1863 allowed only
settlements, mining, ranching, agriculture, railroads, roads and
communication routes on Western Shoshone ancestral lands.
The treaty recognized vast stretches in present-day Nevada,
California, Utah and Idaho as tribal land.
An Indian Claims Commission decided in 1946 that the tribe lost
the land through "gradual encroachment."
Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal
*****************************************************************
52 Las Vegas RJ: Panel urges stopgap waste sites
Thursday, May 19, 2005
Delays at Yucca Mountain cause House members to seek interim
plan for spent fuel
By STEVE TETREAULT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON -- A House committee approved a bill Wednesday that
presses the Department of Energy to pursue stopgap storage sites
for nuclear waste as delays mount at Yucca Mountain.
The panel directed the department to consider placing spent
nuclear fuel on federal reservations in Washington state, Idaho
or South Carolina or other federally owned sites, closed
military bases or fuel storage facilities not operated by the
government.
The proposal, led by Rep. David Hobson, R-Ohio, represents a
turn in the decades-long effort to dispose of high-level
radioactive spent fuel gathering at nuclear power plants.
Hobson, who leads a House energy subcommittee, said his purpose
was not to replace plans for a Yucca Mountain repository in
Nevada but to provide a cushion for the project.
It has been set back in recent years by legal rulings,
underfunding by Congress and allegations that quality-assurance
documents might have been falsified.
"Yucca Mountain is going to happen, but in the interim, I have
to have some solution," Hobson said.
"It helps bridge the time until (Yucca Mountain) is open, and
it helps underwriters," Hobson said.
Underwriters will decide whether to loan billions of dollars to
utilities to build new power plants amid uncertainty about how
their spent fuel will be managed.
In the late 1990s, the Energy Department supported storing
nuclear waste at a temporary site near Yucca Mountain. Hobson's
proposal marks the debut of an idea to gather nuclear waste on
government land elsewhere, officials said.
The bill approved Wednesday must navigate the House and the
Senate. The measure has gotten a lukewarm reception from the
Energy Department and some in the nuclear industry who fear it
might distract attention from completing the Nevada repository.
"We're trying to say let's look at this and let's get it
started," Hobson said.
Nevada lawmakers, who oppose Yucca Mountain, were split on the
proposal.
Rep. Jon Porter, R-Nev., said he saw it as a sign that
lawmakers are recognizing flaws at the Yucca site, which critics
call unsafe and unsuitable for nuclear waste storage.
"The fact that they are looking at alternatives is a positive,"
Porter said.
But Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., said setting up interim
storage in other states does little to stop a Nevada repository.
"I don't think it takes the pressure off Yucca Mountain," she
said. "It's just a temporary solution."
Hobson inserted his provision into a report with the Energy
Department's annual spending bill.
As approved Wednesday by the House Appropriations Committee,
the bill allocates $661 million to continue work at Yucca
Mountain, $10 million more than the Energy Department requested.
The committee told the agency to use the $10 million, plus
another $10 million within its budget, to start exploring
interim storage. The committee told DOE to send Congress a study
within four months.
The proposal was coupled with a new push for the Energy
Department to speed research of recycling technologies that
could reduce the volumes and toxicity of spent nuclear fuel.
The committee directed DOE to recommend by October 2008 some
form of waste reprocessing.
New forms of reprocessing being used in Europe can reduce risks
that caused the United States to abandon commercial reprocessing
in the 1970s, the committee said in its report.
Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal
*****************************************************************
53 Las Vegas RJ: Judges allow parts of worker complaints to remain secret
Thursday, May 19, 2005
Ruling aims to protect identities of witnesses in nuclear dump
probes
By STEVE TETREAULT
STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON -- A trio of administrative law judges said Wednesday
they intend to shield portions of Yucca Mountain worker
complaints during licensing hearings for the nuclear waste
repository.
The judges issued a tentative ruling they described as a middle
ground that aimed to protect the confidentiality of Energy
Department and contractor employees involved in investigations
of problems on the Nevada project.
Enough substantive information would be made available without
revealing identities to Nevada lawyers probing for flaws at
Yucca Mountain, they said.
The ruling aimed to defuse one of the early disputes over
documents that will come into play when the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission weighs an Energy Department license application for
the Nevada nuclear waste repository.
Judges will hear arguments in coming weeks as Nevada tries to
force the Energy Department to supply a copy of a repository
draft license application, a comprehensive licensing game plan
the Energy Department says is privileged and shouldn't be
released.
On the worker complaint documents, the administrative judges
announced their intended ruling after Energy Department
officials promised to scale back the number of documents for
which they would seek privacy protections.
Of 5,000 documents collected by the repository Employee Concerns
Program, about a thousand or more would enjoy restricted access,
according to DOE lawyers.
The remainder would be posted to an Internet database.
Judge Thomas Moore said the panel was reluctant to grant any
special privileges to the documents. But, he said, "We recognize
the importance and serious policy implications."
DOE lawyers had argued that the threat of disclosure would have
a chilling effect on workers reporting safety problems or other
flaws.
"The chill factor troubled me and was a concern," Moore said.
The judges instructed DOE to place redacted copies of the
shielded documents on a private database, and to consider
individual requests to view them. Examiners would sign a
protective order not to publicize the material.
Examiners should be able to glean useful information from them
without compromising identities of complainants or people
interviewed by complaint investigators, judges said.
"At this stage, we are hard-pressed to imagine a situation
where the problems revealed by employee concerns would not be
revealed if redacting is done reasonably," Moore said.
Nevada officials were satisfied with the compromise, attorney
Joe Egan said.
Copyright Las Vegas Review-Journal
*****************************************************************
54 Interfax: Sweden allocates $30mln for Russia's nuclear waste recycling
Interfax.com Text version Site map
May 19 2005 7:03PM
MURMANSK. May 19 (Interfax) - Sweden will help Russia in the
utilization of liquid nuclear waste on the Kola Peninsula.
Sweden will allocate $30 million for this project, the SevRAO
nuclear waste management facility told Interfax.
A group of inspectors from the donor countries - Sweden, Great
Britain and Norway - is currently visiting the Murmansk region.
On Wednesday, they visited the Kola Peninsula's major nuclear
waste storage on Guba Andreyeva, where the international project
is underway. The inspectors said they were satisfied with the
speed of its implementation.
© 1991-2005 Interfax
All rights reserved
News and other data on this web site are provided for
information purposes only, and are not intended for
republication or redistribution. Republication or redistribution
of Interfax content, including by framing or similar means, is
expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of
Interfax.
*****************************************************************
55 Las Vegas SUN: New rules for Yucca budget sought
May 18, 2005
By Suzanne Struglinski SUN WASHINGTON
BUREAU
WASHINGTON -- Key House members are meeting to look at how they
can get Congress to change budget rules for the Yucca Mountain
project.
Efforts to change congressional budget rules on the Nuclear
Waste Fund have failed in the past, but House Energy and
Commerce Chairman Joe Barton, R-Texas, said he is talking with
David Hobson, R-Ohio, House Appropriations Energy and Water
subcommittee chairman, on how to get the funding change passed
this year.
The Bush administration and the nuclear industry strongly
support a change in the budget rules that would allow Congress
to put money into the Nuclear Waste Fund, an account paid into
by nuclear power users specifically earmarked to pay for the
Yucca Mountain project. They want Congress to funnel money
toward the project without taking money away from other federal
programs.
Under current rules, the Yucca project is subject to spending
bill caps just like all other federal programs. If lawmakers
want to put more money toward Yucca, they must take it from
other items in the energy and water spending bill to stay within
the limit.
The industry objects to this because the proposed nuclear waste
storage site at Yucca, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, has
billions of dollars sitting in the fund yet Congress routinely
under-funds the program.
Barton did not describe a specific proposal but said he had
concerns that roughly $750 million gets put into the fund each
year but Congress only spends about $300 million on the project.
Other portions of the Yucca budget come from the Defense
Department budget because the repository will hold some material
from nuclear weapons.
At the nuclear energy conference Tuesday, Barton said he would
have to find a way to get the votes, particularly based on
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid's position in the Senate and
strong objection to the proposal, but that it still could happen.
He is looking to add it during House and Senate negotiations on
an energy bill, the energy and water spending bill, or a budget
bill.
Reid, like Nevada's other lawmakers, strongly objects to the
proposal, saying it would remove congressional oversight of the
project. Money often translates into how much Congress supports
a certain project or how Congress can hold a project accountable
by pulling at its purse strings.
Also at Tuesday's conference, Senate Environment and Public
Works Committee Chairman James Inhofe, R-Okla., said he plans to
hold a hearing examining the Environmental Protection Agency's
work on setting a new radiation standard for the project.
The conference, know as the Nuclear Energy Assembly, sponsored
by the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's main lobbying
group, put a positive spin on the industry's attempts to build
new nuclear power plants. A new nuclear power plant has not been
ordered for more than 25 years, according to the Energy
Department.
NEI President Skip Bowman said he wants the industry to "pull
the defense off the field and put in the offense."
"The problems of the past are simply problems of the past,"
Bowman said. "We are in a new day."
Bowman listed Yucca as one of the industry's challenges and
urged the audience to put a positive spin on the project,
despite the numerous obstacles the projects faces.
"We must make it clear that no one wants this project designed
and built correctly and operated safely more than our industry,
more than the people in this room," Bowman said. "The Yucca
Mountain repository is an industry priority. But it is clear
that this project requires some adjustments in our approach to
ensure that federal government stewardship of commercial reactor
fuel becomes a reality in the near term. We need to tell the
truth about Yucca Mountain."
Bowman said "the truth" includes that the repository is not a
"dump" where the department intends to throw in waste and walk
away but a site that will be monitored for hundreds of years.
He said the department approved storing waste at Yucca after
3,000 scientists and engineers evaluated the site, "a number
larger than three and you know what I am talking about," Bowman
said, alluding to the ongoing controversy related to U.S.
Geological Survey employees who may have falsified scientific
information.
"Yucca is not dead," Bowman said at least twice.
*****************************************************************
56 Las Vegas SUN: Judge denies Shoshone request to stop Yucca work
Today: May 19, 2005 at 10:03:06 PDT
By Mary Manning LAS VEGAS SUN
A federal judge Tuesday denied an injunction requested by an
Indian tribe to stop government work at the planned Yucca
Mountain nuclear waste repository.
U.S. District Judge Philip Pro issued a nine-page ruling that
put aside an injunction at this time because the Western
Shoshone National Council could not demonstrate "immediate and
irreparable" harm at the mountain, which the tribe claims is
protected under the 1863 Treaty of Ruby Valley.
Attorney Robert Hager of Reno, representing the Western
Shoshone, said late Wednesday that a decision on whether to
appeal has not been made. "It's a well-reasoned decision," he
said.
Pro's ruling allows the tribe to seek an injunction if work
begins at Yucca Mountain in the future, Hager said.
"To the Western Shoshone people the past and ongoing
desecration of Yucca Mountain and Mother Earth hurts their
individual and collective spirit, although we understand that
kind of harm is not recognized by the law as 'immediate and
irreparable injury' that is required for a preliminary
injunction," Hager said.
Pro said that the tribe did not prove that prayer sites had
been declared off-limits and ancestral remains had been removed
from graves during preparations at Yucca Mountain. Tunneling and
drilling have ceased, the judge said.
*****************************************************************
57 Las Vegas SUN: Funds could be used to reduce amount of waste in Yucca
Energy secretary maintains he won't back down on repository
By Suzanne Struglinski SUN WASHINGTON
BUREAU
WASHINGTON -- The House Appropriations Committee on Wednesday
approved an extra $5.5 million for the Energy Department to
decide how to recycle nuclear waste in hopes of cutting down the
amount of high-level waste that would eventually wind up in
Nevada if the Yucca Mountain repository opens.
The extra money comes as part of a two-pronged effort to deal
with nuclear waste while the Energy Department battles delays in
building the proposed dump at Yucca, 90 miles northwest of Las
Vegas.
Through the Spent Fuel Recycling Initiative, Rep. David Hobson,
R-Ohio, who heads the House Appropriation subcommittee that
writes the bill, wants to see used fuel possibly moved to
existing department facilities in Washington, Idaho or South
Carolina, until Yucca opens. He also wants the government to
move forward on plans to reduce the amount of waste now and in
the future.
The House Appropriations Committee approved the $29.7 billion
bill that includes $24.6 billion for the Energy Department, of
which $661 million is for the Yucca Mountain project.
The bill also includes $75.5 million for the Advanced Fuel
Cycle Initiative, a research program designed to find a way to
reuse spent nuclear fuel and reduce its radioactivity, while not
creating any weapons-grade nuclear material.
The $75.5 million is $5.5 million more than the department's
request. The committee directs the department to use the
additional funds to select an advanced reprocessing technology
and start a competitive process to select one or more sites to
develop integrated spent fuel recycling facilities.
Hobson has insisted the money for recycling and interim storage
is to get the department to take a look at the options but that
the department should still work on Yucca.
A House report that comes with bill says shifting to recycling
"does not eliminate the need for a geologic repository for
future spent fuel disposal because significant quantities of
high-level waste that will require long-term geologic isolation
will remain."
Hobson said he does not want to put fuel that could be used
again into Yucca and by reducing the volume of waste, the
government could avoid having to expand the repository beyond
the 77,000-ton limit or trying to pick another site. The report
acknowledges there will be more waste than Yucca can hold after
2010.
The House report specifically directs the department to use the
extra $10 million to begin moving commercial spent fuel to one
of its facilities as early as next year.
The report said the department already requested $10 million
within the Yucca budget for transportation casks, so this
additional money would put $20 million toward "the early
acceptance of spent fuel."
"Common sense dictates that these materials would be better
stored in fewer, centralized interim storage facilities in
remote locations, away from population centers and water
supplies," according to the House report that accompanies the
bill.
If sites that already accept fuel from foreign nuclear reactors
or have high-level radioactive waste cannot accept the domestic
fuel, the report recommends looking at closed military bases,
nonfederal fuel storage facilities or other federally owned
sites.
Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said at a nuclear industry
conference Tuesday that he has not evaluated the interim storage
proposal, but emphasized he will not back down on Yucca.
"We are very focused on following through on what I view as my
legal obligation," Bodman told reporters. "There are lots of
issues swirling around, but I intend to be single-minded on
this."
Bodman said his legal obligation flows from Congress and the
president approving the site and the department's commitment to
the nuclear industry to remove used nuclear fuel off reactor
sites.
Also included in the bill is $3.5 million for Nevada and $7
million for local governments to spend on scientific research
and participating in licensing activities. There's also $3
million for the Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board.
*****************************************************************
58 WCAX.com: Nuke storage talks to continue today
May 19, 2005
MONTPELIER, Vt. _ Talks will continue between Entergy Nuclear and
lawmakers over what price Entergy will pay to build a high-level
radioactive waste facility next to the Vermont Yankee nuclear
power plant.
The House Natural Resources and Energy Committee had hoped to
complete a bill by yesterday afternoon but plans to continue to
review the measure today.
Lawmakers are also negotiating simultaneously with Entergy
officials.
The bill is strongly opposed by Entergy - because it would charge
the nuclear plant roughly four (m) million dollars a year.
Most of the money would be used to establish a renewable energy
fund to help promote the development of alternative sources of
energy.
Copyright 2005 Associated Press. All rights reserved.
All content © Copyright 2001 - 2005 WorldNow and WCAX. All
Rights Reserved.
*****************************************************************
59 Cañon City Daily Record: Cotter Corp. responds to violations
www.canoncitydailyrecord.com
Publish Date: 5/19/2005
Jason Starr Daily Record Staff Writer
Cotter Corp. submitted a defiant response to a Notice of
Violations that the Colorado Department of Public Health and
Environment filed last month.
In its response, filed May 6 with the health department, Cotter
denies the premise of all six violations written up in the April
12 Notice of Violations and disputes the necessity of most of
the corrective actions demanded by the health department.
Four of the violations involved one employee who ingested
uranium on two separate occasions and was found, via urinalysis,
to have elevated internal levels of uranium. The employee
ingested the uranium through a break in a pipeline temporarily
set up to transfer radioactive material.
Cotter conceded the line failed and said breaks should be
expected given the thousands of feet of pipeline the company
uses for material transfers.
“The fact that an individual transfer line might somehow fail on
occasion should not be a surprise … given the nature of the
facility; this is a chemical plant, and line breaks can occur,”
Radiation Safety Officer and Environmental Coordinator Jim Cain
wrote in Cotter’s response to the health department.
Cotter places most of the blame for the ingestion on the
employees involved in the incident, which occurred Oct. 18.
Cotter said an employee caused the line to break by stepping on
it, while the other employee ingested the uranium because he had
his mouth open during the operation and didn’t adequately rinse
his mouth afterward.
In the other incident of ingestion, which occurred Jan. 17,
Cotter said the same employee failed to use the required
protective gear during routine operations. Since the incidents,
Cotter has re-assigned the employee to a lower exposure area.
But the health department demanded more sweeping changes in its
Notice of Violations. The department said the incidents reveal a
lack of proper procedures to limit uranium intake among
employees during routine operations and a failure to outline
specific guidelines for non-routine procedures.
It demanded Cotter implement a radiation safety program that
would outline procedures for routine activities, maintenance of
equipment and training of employees to assure that intakes of
uranium are as low as reasonably achievable.
The department also said Cotter should create temporary
guidelines for non-routine procedures, such as the uranium
transfer Oct. 18 that led to the employee ingestion and conduct
reviews of accidents if they occur.
In its response, Cotter said it “disagrees that the radiation
protection program is inadequate … the program is functioning
satisfactorily.”
However, the company did concede that improvements can be made
to further limit employee’s exposure to radiation and that it
can improve its investigation into abnormal incidents. It said
it already has taken steps toward those ends.
“That will play out,” said Steve Tarlton with the Hazardous
Materials and Waste Management Division of the health
department. “When we do more inspections, we’ll determine
whether or not they’re meeting their requirements.”
The second main area of violation noted by the health department
deals with Cotter’s on-site radiochemistry laboratory that it
uses to measure radiation in the workplace and flowing from the
plant. The department rejected the lab’s calculations saying
they had “numerous errors, inconsistencies and incomplete
explanation keys for data fields.”
“The cumulative effect of the laboratory deficiencies renders
the laboratory results unacceptable …,” the health department
said in the NOV.
The department demanded prompt action not only to correct the
deficiencies of the laboratory, but also to employ an outside
laboratory to analyze the amount of radiation in and around the
plant. It also required a timeline of corrective actions and
deadlines to correct the problems with the lab.
Cotter has thus far refused to employ an outside laboratory for
these functions. It did, however, bring in an outside laboratory
manager from RETN, Inc., in Westminster.
“The RETN team will be working closely with our laboratory
management and staff to ensure that the procedures, spreadsheets
and other products developed within the scope of work assigned
to RETN are implementable and fully integrated into current
laboratory operations,” Cotter’s said in its response.
Cotter also laid out a list of improvements it plans to
implement at the laboratory, but fell short of offering a
timeline.
“Cotter is taking prompt action to correct the deficiencies
identified by CDPHE within the laboratory … Cotter is working to
have this completed in a timely manner,” the company said in its
response.
Cotter said it will update the department on its progress at the
lab within 45 days.
Tarlton said the health department has been pleased with
Cotter’s progress on the lab.
“I’m pretty confident with how they are progressing in dealing
with some of the issues we’ve identified,” he said. “It’s an
ongoing process.”
The health department and Cotter repeatedly have met over the
past several months in regards to operations at the lab. Cotter
said it already has submitted documents that answer many of the
health department’s issues.
2005, The Cañon City Daily Record
*****************************************************************
60 NZ: Scoop: $3 million towards global disarmament
Thursday, 19 May 2005, 3:23 pm
Press Release: New Zealand Government
Hon Marian Hobbs
Minister for Disarmament and Arms Control
Disarmament and Arms Control Minister Marian Hobbs is delighted
that New Zealand has committed more than $3 million over the
next four years to the G8 Global Partnership Against the Spread
of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction (WMD).
"This contribution underscores New Zealand's practical
commitment to disarmament and to the fight against WMD
proliferation," Marian Hobbs said. "The projects being carried
out under this G8 programme will help to make a safer world for
everyone."
Leaders of the G8 economies (Canada, France, Germany, Italy,
Japan, Russia, Britain and the United States) launched the
Global Partnership in 2002 against the backdrop of the 11
September terrorist attacks and concerns about unsecured
nuclear, chemical and biological weapons legacies in the former
Soviet Union.
Projects include securing and disposing of nuclear material, the
destruction of chemical weapons stocks, and dismantling
decommissioned nuclear submarines.
"This funding will build on the contribution of $1.2 million New
Zealand made to the G8 Global Partnership last year, towards
funding the chemical weapons destruction project in Shchuch'ye,
Russia," Marian Hobbs said.
"The next step for us will be to work with G8 partners to
identify further suitable projects for New Zealand funds.
"G8 partners welcomed New Zealand's contribution to the chemical
weapons destruction project in Russia. We want to look for
similar opportunities for New Zealand to make a practical
contribution."
ENDS
*****************************************************************
61 Guardian Unlimited: U.S. Seeks New Manager for Los Alamos Lab
From the Associated Press
[UP]
Friday May 20, 2005 12:01 AM
By ERICA WERNER
Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) - Aiming to install new management at the
troubled Los Alamos National Laboratory, the government will pay
up to $79 million to a contractor - nearly 10 times the amount
the University of California now makes for the job.
A final request for proposals, released Thursday in the
first-ever competition to run the New Mexico nuclear weapons
lab, also requires the contractor to assume more risk and create
a new pension plan to replace the university's version.
The changes are designed to improve operational efficiency at
the storied lab where the atomic bomb was designed. Los Alamos'
reputation has been stained by a recent series of problems,
including the reported disappearance of two classified computer
disks that were later discovered never to have existed.
The lab's director, Pete Nanos, resigned earlier this month.
The University of California has managed Los Alamos since the
lab was established in 1943 and makes up to $8 million a year
for the job. The university's governing board has not yet voted
on whether to bid, but the university is moving in that
direction, recently announcing it is teaming with Bechtel for a
potential bid.
Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman have announced plans to
compete, and the University of Texas System is planning to join
Lockheed's bid.
``I think that what people will see over time is good operations
and good business aren't the enemies of great science; they
enable it,'' said Tyler Przybylek, chairman of the board of
National Nuclear Security Administration officials who will
evaluate proposals.
Bidders have until July 19 to submit proposals, and the NNSA,
part of the Department of Energy, aims to award a new contract
Dec. 1.
The new contractor will take over on July 1, 2006.
The contract will be for seven years, with potential extensions
for 13 more. The government is asking for proposals ranging from
$53 million to $79 million annually. Whatever the final amount,
30 percent of it will be guaranteed and the remainder available
as incentives.
The University of California runs Los Alamos as an essentially
nonprofit venture, using most of its management fee for lab
research. The prospect of transforming Los Alamos into a
for-profit enterprise concerns some.
``It appears that the final RFP is skewed toward a corporate
structure, rather than a not-for-profit entity,'' the local
Democratic congressman, Tom Udall, said. ``I hope this
requirement does not affect the science at the lab - or result
in an exodus of employees - as many have feared.''
Przybylek said Los Alamos would continue to be a world-class
scientific institution.
``The skepticism, the openness, the need to collaborate, the
need to publish, the need to exchange - I think all of that will
be maintained and enhanced,'' Przybylek said.
The evaluation criteria in the contract proposal will give most
weight to science and technology, followed by key personnel and
oral presentation, with laboratory operations weighted third.
Business operations, laboratory organization, past performance
and a proposed transition plan also will be considered.
---
On the Net: http://www.lanl.gov
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005
*****************************************************************
62 Albuquerque Tribune: Lab bid process to focus on leader
By James W. Brosnan and Sue Vorenberg
May 19, 2005
The National Nuclear Security Administration will take a hard
look at leadership when it decides who will run Los Alamos
National Laboratory, aid Tyler Przybylek, chairman of the
Source Evaluation Board for the agency.
The NNSA started a historic competition this morning over who
will run the nation's premier nuclear bomb lab, releasing its
final request for proposals for the operating contract to run
the lab. The University of California has held the contract for
more than 60 years since the lab was founded.
The document grades the competitors on a 1,000-point system: 325
points for science and technology; 250 for key personnel and
their oral presentation; 175 for laboratory operations; 75 each
for business operations, lab organization and past performance;
and 25 points for transition plan.
The 250-point oral presentation will be done by the bidders'
proposed new lab directors, indicating the importance of
leadership in the process, Przybylek said.
So far, only two competitors have put forward their director
candidates: C. Paul Robinson, former director of Sandia National
Laboratories, is leading the Lockheed Martin-University of Texas
team; and Michael Anastasio, director of Lawrence Livermore
National Laboratory in California, is leading the University of
California-Bechtel Corp. team.
"Sometime in August . . . we'll spend a day with each offerer,
propose problems to them in science and technology, operations
and business, and the director will answer those questions,"
Przybylek said.
Northrop Grumman has also said it intends to bid on the lab's
contract but hasn't announced who its new Los Alamos director
would be.
Bidders were given 60 days - until 2 p.m. MST on July 19 - to
submit their applications. The proposal envisions that the new,
seven-year contract would be awarded on Dec. 1, with a six-month
transition period ending May 31, 2006.
*****************************************************************
63 Tri-City Herald: 1,000 Fluor workers face layoff
This story was published Thursday, May 19th, 2005
By Annette Cary, Herald staff writer
Fluor Hanford plans to lay off up to 1,000 of its 3,886 workers
in late September, chief executive Ron Gallagher announced in a
message to employees Wednesday afternoon.
"The pace of cleanup has reached a point where significant
changes to the work force are necessary to reflect the work
scope that remains for the balance of our contract," Gallagher
told employees. Fluor's contract is set to expire in September
2006.
Although the employee message did not discuss the Hanford
budget, the contractor likely will get less money for cleanup
projects under the budget proposed for fiscal year 2006.
Gallagher warned employees in early March that both a near-term
layoff and more layoffs over the balance of Fluor's contract
would be needed. A month ago, layoff notices were given to 148
workers.
The Fluor layoffs are in addition to 700 construction workers
who lost their jobs with Bechtel National at its vitrification
plant project this spring. Also, 300 nonconstruction workers at
Bechtel National will lose their jobs by June.
Fluor is the primary contractor for cleanup of the Hanford
nuclear reservation, where plutonium was produced for the
nation's nuclear weapons program. It manages the site and does
some of the cleanup work, including work in the central plateau.
The Fluor layoffs could include workers for Fluor and for its
contractors Day &Zimmermann Protection Technology Hanford,
Duratek Federal Services of Hanford and Numatec Hanford Corp.
Fluor is asking for volunteers for layoffs. All employees except
for those in the Hanford Patrol are eligible.
While layoffs are being planned, Fluor is preparing to hire a
significant number of security officers, said Fluor spokesman
Geoff Tyree. Security concerns since Sept. 11 with the
weapons-grade plutonium that remains at the site are driving the
increase.
Hanford officials would like to ship the plutonium to a central
national location, likely in South Carolina, but that requires a
national policy decision that has yet to be made.
Because of security concerns, Fluor cannot discuss the number of
officers to be hired, Tyree said. Work also is planned to
consolidate plutonium and make physical improvements to
safeguard plutonium.
Employees will have until the end of the month to volunteer for
layoffs. Those who are laid off will receive a week's severance
pay for every year worked up to 20 years, as well as counseling
and job search help through WorkSource Columbia Basin and
continued payment of the company portion of monthly medical
insurance premiums for up to a year.
DOE has proposed budget cuts of up to $290 million for Hanford
next year, although a House committee on Wednesday restored
about $200 million of the cuts to an appropriations bill.
DOE has said the cuts were made partly as a result of work being
completed at the site. But state officials and all 14 U.S.
representatives from Oregon and Washington have said that as
projects are completed, spending must be shifted to other
cleanup work at Hanford on which little progress has been made.
Over the last year, Fluor has stabilized 20 tons of plutonium
material at the Plutonium Finishing Plant and removed 2,300 tons
of spent fuel from Hanford's K Basins.
In the coming months, Fluor expects to complete several more
projects, including getting radioactive sludge at the K East
Basin into containers and removing plutonium residues from
thousands of feet of process and drain lines and equipment at
the Plutonium Finishing Plant.
It also expects to finish draining liquid sodium from the Fast
Flux Test Facility.
© 2005 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services
*****************************************************************
64 Tri-City Herald: Opinions: Industry poor option for Hanford 300 Area
This story was published Thursday, May 19th, 2005
It's not especially shocking to learn that there's little
interest in any industrial uses for Hanford's 300 Area.
Light manufacturing or similar activities hardly represent the
best and highest use for the property.
Granted, the Department of Energy and its predecessors may have
used the approximately 1.5 square miles of riverfront land just
north of Richland for manufacturing nuclear fuel, but the site
was selected for that task decades ago.
Today, the potential is much higher.
With its proximity to Richland and its prime location along the
Columbia River, a restored 300 Area will become the de facto
southern entrance to the Hanford Reach National Monument.
An industrial park won't be the best face to show visitors
arriving to explore the section of the Columbia that's most like
the natural flow that existed before dams, channels and locks
changed its character.
A preliminary assessment by a committee formed by the city of
Richland recommended the land be considered for a mix of uses,
including a bike trail along the Columbia River, a business
research park, homes, a golf course and a park with a boat
launch.
The only thing standing in the way of such mixed uses is the
radioactive material and other contaminants from the nation's
nuclear weapons program that remain at the site.
Leaving dangerous contaminants along the river corridor is a bad
idea regardless of how the land is eventually used. Once
contamination reaches the river, containment is impossible.
DOE, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Washington
State Department of Ecology plan a workshop from 8 a.m. to 4:30
p.m. today at Washington State University Tri-Cities to talk
about the 300 Area's future.
One message officials from the three agencies need to hear is
that protecting the public by simply restricting future use of
contaminated areas is not an acceptable cleanup plan, especially
adjacent to the river.
© 2005 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press &Other Wire Services
*****************************************************************
65 DOE: DOE Response to Recommendation 2005-1 of the Defense Nuclear
FR Doc 05-10000
[Federal Register: May 19, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 96)] [Notices]
[Page 28927-28930] From the Federal Register Online via GPO
Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19my05-60]
Facilities Safety Board, Nuclear Material Packaging.
AGENCY: Department of Energy.
ACTION: Notice.
SUMMARY: The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board
Recommendation 2005-1, concerning nuclear material packaging was
published in the Federal Register on March 21, 2005 (70 FR
13482). In accordance with section 315(b) of the Atomic Energy
Act of 1954, as amended, 42 U.S.C. 2286d(b), and the Secretary
transmitted the following response to the Defense Nuclear
Facilities Safety Board on May 6, 2005.
DATES: Comments, data, views, or arguments concerning the
Secretary's
[[Page 28928]] response are due on or before June 16, 2005.
ADDRESSES: Send comments, data, views, or arguments concerning
the Secretary's response to: Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety
Board, 625 Indiana Avenue, NW., Suite 700, Washington, DC 20004.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Mr. Robert J. McMorland, Nuclear
Engineer, Departmental Representative to the Defense Nuclear
Facilities Safety Board, Department of Energy, U.S. Department of
Energy, 1000 Independence Avenue SW., Washington, DC 20585.
Issued in Washington, DC on May 17, 2005.
Mark B. Whitaker, Jr., Departmental Representative to the Defense
Nuclear Facilities Safety Board.
BILLING CODE 6450-01-U
[[Page 28929]] [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TN19MY05.045
[[Page 28930]] [GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] TN19MY05.046 [FR Doc.
05-10000 Filed 5-18-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6450-01-C
*****************************************************************
66 DOE: Office of Science; Notice of Renewal of the Basic Energy
FR Doc 05-9999
[Federal Register: May 19, 2005 (Volume 70, Number 96)] [Notices]
[Page 28927] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access
[wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr19my05-59]
Sciences Advisory Committee Pursuant to Section 14(a)(2)(A) of
the Federal Advisory Committee Act, App. 2, and Sec. 102-3.65,
title 41, Code of Federal Regulations and following consultation
with the Committee Management Secretariat, General Services
Administration, notice is hereby given that the Basic Energy
Sciences Advisory Committee has been renewed until June 30, 2005.
The Committee will provide advice to the Office of Science (DOE),
on the basic energy sciences program. The Secretary of Energy has
determined that renewal of the Basic Energy Sciences Advisory
Committee is essential to the conduct of the Department's
business and in the public interest in connection with the
performance of duties imposed by law upon the Department of
Energy. The Committee will continue to operate in accordance with
the provisions of the Federal Advisory Committee Act (Pub. L.
92-463), the General Services Administration Final Rule on
Federal Advisory Committee Management, and other directives and
instructions issued in implementation of those acts.
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ms. Rachel Samuel at (202)
586-3279.
Issued in Washington, DC, on May 11, 2005.
James N. Solit, Advisory Committee Management Officer.
[FR Doc. 05-9999 Filed 5-18-05; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6450-01-P
*****************************************************************
67 PRN: Statement of Plaintiffs' Lead Counsel Regarding Jury Verdict
in Hanford Nuclear Reservation Litigation
SPOKANE, Wash., May 19 /PRNewswire/ -- A Spokane jury in
federal court today awarded damages to two plaintiffs who were
babies at the time that the Hanford Nuclear Weapons Reservation
produced plutonium in the 1940s. These plaintiffs developed
thyroid cancer, which the jury found was caused by releases of
Iodine-131 from Hanford. These verdicts totaled $544,759. There
was a hung jury for a third cancer victim. Three hypothyroid
cases were lost.
Statement of Louise Roselle (Waite, Schneider, Bayless &
Chesley Co., L.P.A.):
"This is a landmark decision. This is the first time that
offsite residents have proven that a Department of Energy nuclear
weapons plant has caused their cancer. This jury's verdict is a
very strong message to the government and to these corporate
defendants. More than $60 million of taxpayers' money have been
paid to the defendants' law firms. It's time for the government
to stop spending taxpayer dollars to fight their own citizens."
Statement of Richard Eymann (Eymann Allison Fennessy Hunter
Jones, P.S. of Spokane, WA):
"For 18 years the U.S. Department of Energy and these two
corporations, after 40 years of cover-up, have insisted that
their enormous releases of radioactive iodine from Hanford caused
no harm to anyone. Now a 12-member jury, for the first time, has
shown they are wrong. This jury has determined that Hanford's
emissions caused thyroid cancer. The defendants gave it their
best shot and lost the biggest issue in the trial. The fact that
three other plaintiffs suffering thyroid disease did not see
justice today does not change our very strong belief that Hanford
also caused thyroid diseases among many hundreds of people. The
science from places like Chernobyl teaches us more every day.
The real lesson to take from today's verdict is that the time is
now for our government to do the right thing by all of these
victims, and offer fair and reasonable settlements."
SOURCE Waite, Schneider, Bayless &Chesley Co., L.P.A.
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