***************************************************************** 12/04/05 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 13.281 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** Send News Stories to news@energy-net.org with title on subject line and first line of body NUCLEAR POLICY 1 SF Chronicle: What Happened to Iraq's WMD / How politics corrupts in 2 albawaba.com: Iran rejects US presence in nuke talks 3 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Moves Closer to Blocking Inspections 4 Xinhua: Iran owes escape from nuclear referral to resistance 5 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Optimistic About Renewed Nuke Talks 6 Xinhua: Iran plays down arms deal with Russia 7 AFP: Iran ready to resume nuclear talks with Europeans - Russian FM 8 Guardian Unlimited: U.S. Nuke Talks With N.Korea Sidetracked 9 US: DenverPost.com: A sustainable energy future possible 10 US: News-Miner: Amchitka lecture set for Thursday 11 BBC: Jargon obscures Montreal message 12 Daily Times: IAEA will not get direct access to AQ Khan 13 Japan Times: First nuclear carrier based in Japan named 14 Pakistan News: Information about any nuclear scientist to be provide 15 AFP: Japanese governor to try and stop US nuclear ship deployment - 16 Deutsche Welle: Secret Files Reveal Potential Horror of Cold War Arm NUCLEAR REACTORS 17 Observer: 'Who puts up the cash?' 18 Guardian Unlimited: Britain 'could bury greenhouse gases' 19 Observer: Getting to the core of the problem 20 London Times: Nuclear safety net - 21 London Times: McConnell ‘powerless to stop new nuclear plants’ - 22 theage.com.au: Minister 'wrong' on N-power - National - 23 Sunday Herald: Over 200 abnormal events at nuclear plants since 2000 24 Sunday Herald: This country needs new nuclear reactors - 25 Sunday Herald: Beneath the surface of nuclear power - 26 US: Casper Journal Star-Tribune: Study cites rising costs at nuclear 27 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Monticello lends hand as cases of cancer rise 28 Toronto Star: Europe divided over expansion of nuclear facilities 29 Toronto Star: Nuclear still a big part of Ontario's energy future 30 UK: Observer: 'We have no other option' 31 UK: Observer: Grasping the nuclear nettle NUCLEAR SECURITY 32 US: 9/11 Panel Says Nuke Power Plants Vulnerable To Terror Attacks NUCLEAR SAFETY 33 US: Daytona Beach News-Journal: Making too little of plutonium load 34 North County Times: Chilling true-life account of nuclear close call 35 US: Herald News: Elevated tritium levels not a danger 36 US: FLORIDA TODAY: Pluto mission comes with risk NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 37 Las Vegas SUN: Critics tackle a mountain of comments on Yucca 38 Independent: Waste whistleblowers to go to tribunal 39 UK: Independent: BNG finds US partner for clean-up bid 40 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Raw deal: Utah gets California pollution 41 US: Salt Lake Tribune: Goshutes' fight over exclusion continues 42 canada.com: Pembroke divided over effects of nuclear waste 43 UK: Observer: BNFL chief wants to keep Westinghouse PEACE US DEPT. OF ENERGY 44 Santa Fe New Mexican: LANL: Feds deny plutonium missing from lab 45 Las Vegas SUN: Proposal for Test Site plant is undecided 46 Paducah Sun: Past 2 years of DOE cleanup win praise as improvement ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 SF Chronicle: What Happened to Iraq's WMD / How politics corrupts intelligence Scott Ritter Sunday, December 4, 2005 The recent exchange of vitriol between Republican and Democratic lawmakers over the issue of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and more specifically the disconnect between the intelligence data cited by the Bush administration as justification for invading Iraq and the resultant conclusion by the CIA that all Iraqi WMD had already been eliminated as early as 1991, has once again thrust the issue of the use of intelligence for political purposes front and center. Democrats accuse the president and his supporters of deliberately misleading them and the American people about the nature of the Iraqi threat. Republicans respond that the Democrats are rewriting history, that all parties involved had access to the same intelligence data and had drawn the same conclusions. Typical of the Republican-led rebuttal are statements made by Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who noted that "every intelligence agency in the world, including the Russian, French, including the Israeli, all had reached the same conclusion, and that was that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction." But this is disingenuous. The intelligence services of everyone else were not proclaiming Iraq to be in possession of WMD. Rather, the intelligence services of France, Russia, Germany, Great Britain and Israel were noting that Iraq had failed to properly account for the totality of its past proscribed weapons programs, and in doing so left open the possibility that Iraq might retain an undetermined amount of WMD. There is a huge difference in substance and nuance between such assessments and the hyped-up assertions by the Bush administration concerning active programs dedicated to the reconstitution of WMD, as well as the existence of massive stockpiles of forbidden weaponry. The actions and rhetoric of the Bush administration were aided by the tendency by most involved to accept at face value any negative information pertaining to Hussein and his regime, regardless of the source's reliability. This trend was especially evident in Congress, responsible for oversight on matters pertaining to foreign policy, intelligence and national security. One might be inclined to excuse lesser members of the legislative branch for such actions, given their lack of access to sensitive intelligence, but not so senior figures who sit on oversight committees, such as California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who occupied a seat on the Senate Select Intelligence Committee. Today, Feinstein all-too conveniently "regrets" her vote in favor of war on Iraq, but defends her yes vote in 2002 by noting that "the intelligence was very conclusive: Saddam possessed biological and chemical weapons." This is a far different from the statement Feinstein made to me in the summer of 2002, when she acknowledged that the Bush administration had not provided any convincing intelligence to back up its claims about Iraqi WMD. In contrast to Feinstein's actions, Sen. Bob Graham, a Florida Democrat who also sat on the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, noted in September 2002 that the Bush administration's decisions regarding Iraq had been made in the absence of a National Intelligence Estimate from the CIA. The CIA hastily rushed to produce such a document, but the resulting report appeared as much to be an example of intelligence being fixed around policy, as opposed to policy being derived from intelligence. Graham, his eyes opened by the seemingly baseless rush toward conflict in Iraq, voted no on the war. Feinstein and others, their eyes wide shut, voted yes. The crux of the problem of this Iraqi WMD intelligence "failure" lies in the fact that the U.S. intelligence community and the products it produces are increasingly influenced by the corrupting influences of politics. The politicization of the intelligence community allows the process of fixing intelligence around policy to become pervasive, and the increasingly polarized political climate in America prevents any real checks and balances through effective oversight, leaving Americans at the mercy of politicians who have placed partisan politics above the common good. The recent overhaul of the U.S. intelligence community, which resulted in the creation of the national intelligence chief, only reinforces this politicization, because the new director reports directly to the president and is beyond the reach of congressional oversight. The only true fix to the problems of intelligence that manifested themselves in the Iraqi WMD debacle is to depoliticize the process. The position of national intelligence chief should be a 10-year appointment, like that of the director of the FBI, and subject to the consent of Congress. Likewise, all intelligence made available to the president to make national security policy should be shared with select members of Congress, from both parties, so that America will never again find itself at war based upon politically driven intelligence. Finally, and perhaps most important, the American people should start exercising effective accountability regarding their elected officials, so that those who voted yes for a war based on false and misleading information never again have the honor and privilege of serving in high office. Who: Scott Ritter What: Former U.N. weapons inspector will deliver a speech on the truth behind yellowcake uranium, missiles and Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. When: Friday, noon Where: Commonwealth Club, 595 Market St., San Francisco Reservations and information: (415) 597-6700; www.commonwealthclub.org Scott Ritter is a former U.N. weapons inspector in Iraq (1991-98) and the author of "Iraq Confidential: The Untold Story of the Intelligence Conspiracy to Undermine the UN and Overthrow Saddam Hussein" (Nation Books, 2005). Page E - 5 The San Francisco Chronicle] ***************************************************************** 2 albawaba.com: Iran rejects US presence in nuke talks middle east news Posted: 04-12-2005 , 12:58 GMT Iran's Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi o Sunday rejected the need of US presence in the Iran-Europe nuclear talks saying, "Tehran believes Washington's interference is one of the reasons behind talks becoming more complicated." [asefi src=] Asefi was commenting on recent comments made by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei on the necessity of US presence in the talks. "This is ElBaradei's personal viewpoint and talks with the United States is not on our agenda," he told domestic and foreign reporters, according to Irna. Asked about the resumption of Iran-Europe talks, he said, "We have reached an agreement with the Europeans on holding talks at the level of senior experts but the exact time and venue have not been determined yet." In response to a question on remarks made by the Russian and German foreign ministers as well as unconfirmed reports on an enrichment plan outside Iran, he stated, "We have not received such a plan. The Islamic Republic will not accept negotiations with preconditions. Our rights should be observed." © 2005 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com) ***************************************************************** 3 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Moves Closer to Blocking Inspections From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday December 3, 2005 9:16 PM AP Photo ANK106 By NASSER KARIMI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran's hard-line constitutional watchdog approved a bill Saturday blocking international inspections of atomic facilities if the nation is referred to the U.N. Security Council for possible sanctions, state-run television reported. The ratification by the Guardian Council means the bill - overwhelmingly approved by parliament last month - now needs just a presidential signature to become law. It was not clear when that would take place. The bill will strengthen the government's hand in resisting international pressure to permanently abandon uranium enrichment, a process that can produce fuel for either nuclear reactors or atomic bombs. Iran has been under intense pressure to curb its nuclear program, which the United States claims is part of an effort to produce weapons. Iran says its program is aimed at generating electricity. While Iran has frozen its enrichment program, it restarted uranium conversion - a step toward enrichment - in August. The International Atomic Energy Agency has warned Iran that its nuclear program could be referred to the Security Council, which has the power to impose sanctions for violations of a nuclear arms control treaty. ``If Iran's nuclear file is referred or reported to the U.N. Security Council, the government will be required to cancel all voluntary measures,'' the bill says, meaning Iran would stop allowing in-depth inspections by the IAEA. Iran has been allowing short-notice inspections of those facilities under a protocol to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. The United States and European Union want Iran to permanently halt uranium enrichment. But Tehran says the nonproliferation treaty allows it to pursue a nuclear program for peaceful purposes, and it maintains it will never give up the right to enrich uranium to produce nuclear fuel. In May, the Guardian Council ratified a bill compelling the government to continue the nuclear program, including uranium enrichment activities. The law set no timetable, however, allowing the government room to maneuver during negotiations with the European Union. Those talks with Britain, France and Germany broke off in August after Tehran restarted uranium conversion. Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Wednesday that talks would resume within the next two weeks. ``We expect the international community not to waste any time. It is clear to Iran that time is of the essence. We are patient and will continue patiently in making decisions based on future expedience,'' Ali Larijani, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, told state-run television. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 4 Xinhua: Iran owes escape from nuclear referral to resistance www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2005-12-03 10:02:34 TEHRAN, Dec. 2 (Xinhuanet) -- A senior Iranian official here Friday owed the country's recent escape from a referral of its nuclear case to the UN Security Council to its resistance against foreign pressure, the official IRNA news agency reported. The Western countries' retreat from their position on Iran's nuclear case was a result of Tehran's resistance against their pressure, said Ahmad Jannati, Chairman of the election and legislation supervising Guardian Council. The Iranian people had shown they were ready to "confront with the western countries' bullying", Jannati was quoted as saying. The Iranian chief supervisor also praised a recent bill passed by the country's Majlis (parliament) on Nov. 20, saying the approval "shows if the western countries want to ignore the NPT (Non-Proliferation Treaty) and its obligations and regulations, the Iranian government won't have the duty to implement its voluntary obligations". The bill requires the government to cease all voluntary confidence-building measures with the Europeans, including the suspension of uranium enrichment and the implementation of the additional protocol of the NPT, if the country's nuclear case is referred to the UN Security Council. The International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) in late September urged Iran to re-suspend its uranium conversion activities resumed in early August, or to face a referral of its nuclear case. However, the agency's board of governors decided on Nov. 24 to postpone the referral in order to offer more time for Tehran and the European Union to discuss an alleged Russian proposal. According to the proposal, Iran will be allowed to conduct uranium conversion activities on condition that the enrichment stage be moved to Russia, a measure keeping Tehran from obtaining nuclear technology crucial to making atom bombs. Iran has categorically rejected the suggestion over enrichment abroad, insisting that uranium enrichment is its legal righten shrined by the NPT. The United States accuses Iran of developing nuclear weapons secretly, a charge rejected by Tehran as politically motivated. Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 5 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Optimistic About Renewed Nuke Talks From the Associated Press [UP] Sunday December 4, 2005 11:46 AM By NASSER KARIMI Associated Press Writer TEHRAN, Iran (AP) - Iran said Sunday a resumption of talks with Europe over Tehran's nuclear program could lead to important results. But Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi reiterated that Iran would not accept conditions to the talks, which broke off in August. ``If Europeans respect our right, we are optimistic about Iran-Europe talks,'' Asefi told reporters. ``Important talks could be held and important results could be gained.'' The talks with Britain, France, Germany broke off in August after Tehran restarted uranium conversion. Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said Wednesday that talks would resume within the next two weeks. No date has been set yet for the talks, which will be held at the level of senior experts, Asefi said. Iran has been under intense pressure to curb its nuclear program, which the United States claims is part of an effort to produce weapons. Iran says its program is for generating electricity. While Iran has frozen its enrichment program, it restarted uranium conversion - a step toward enrichment - in August. Uranium enrichment is a process that can produce fuel for either nuclear reactors or atomic bombs. The International Atomic Energy Agency has warned Iran that its nuclear program could be referred to the U.N. Security Council, which has the power to impose sanctions on the country. ``Iran follows logic. It has supported reasoning since the beginning. In fact, it was the other side who politicized the issue,'' Asefi said. Asefi rejected the possibility of talking with the United States over the case. ``Negotiations with the United States are not on our agenda. There is no need for it. Actually the U.S. intervention in the case is one of the reasons for its complexity.'' The United States and Iran have not had regular diplomatic relations since militant students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979. Last week, the U.S. State Department announced that Zalmay Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador to Baghdad, had been authorized to meet with Iranian officials about Iraq. On Saturday, Iran approved a bill that would block international inspections of its atomic facilities if it is referred to the Security Council. The step strengthens the government's hand in resisting international pressure to permanently abandon uranium enrichment. The United States and European Union want Iran to permanently halt uranium enrichment. But Tehran says the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty allows it to pursue a nuclear program for peaceful purposes. It has said that it will never give up the right to enrich uranium to produce nuclear fuel. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 6 Xinhua: Iran plays down arms deal with Russia www.xinhuanet.com www.chinaview.cn 2005-12-03 23:46:42 TEHRAN, Dec. 3 (Xinhuanet) -- Iran played down on Saturday an air defense system deal with Russia, saying it was not a secret or sensitive issue, the official IRNA news agency reported. "Iran sells arms to some countries and buys them from others and that there is no need to explain such transactions," Secretary of Supreme National Security Council Ali Larijani was quoted assaying. Larijani added the military cooperation between Iran and Russia was not new and should not be viewed as a sensitive issue. It was reported Russia has agreed to sell 29 mobile surface-to-air M-1 short-range missile systems to Tehran in a deal worth more than 700 million US dollars. The United States expressed concern on Friday over the deal, saying any arms sales to Iran would be a source of concern for Washington, but the Russian Foreign Ministry explained on Saturday that Moscow just supplied Iran with purely defensive weapons and the deal was not contradictory to Russia's commitments to the international society. Washington accuses Iran of developing nuclear weapons secretly and labels the country as a threat to regional peace. Copyright ©2003 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 7 AFP: Iran ready to resume nuclear talks with Europeans - Russian FM - Sat Dec 3, 2:51 PM ET MOSCOW (AFP) - Iran" /> is ready to resume talks on its nuclear program with the European Union" /> , Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, expressing hope negotiations will resume in the near future. Lavrov said that thanks the close contacts Russia has maintained with the parties "we have succeeded in keeping the Iranian question within the framework of the IAEA ... which gives us the possibility of relaunching negotiations between the EU-3 and Tehran, and Iran is ready for that," Lavrov told journalists. Last month the UN nuclear watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency" /> (IAEA) put off taking Iran to the UN Security Council, which could impose sanctions, after the EU-3 -- Britain, France and Germany -- agreed to give more time for new Russian diplomacy to work. Backed by the United States, the European Union is trying to resume talks with Iran on guaranteeing the Islamic Republic is not secretly developing nuclear weapons, as Washington claims. Talks on a Russian proposal to allow Iran to conduct uranium enrichment -- in Russia, rather than Iran, so Tehran does not obtain the nuclear technology crucial to making atom bombs -- are likely to take center stage at talks at new talks, the date and location of which have yet to be fixed. Lavrov said the talks will take place "in the near future," after a meeting with his new German counterpart, Frank-Walter Steinmeier. EU-Iran talks collapsed in August when Iran ended its suspension of uranium conversion, the first step towards making enriched uranium, which can be used to fuel nuclear reactors or as the explosive core of atom bombs. On Wednesday Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said preliminary negotiations on resuming talks between Iran and the EU will start within two weeks. AFP Copyright © 2005 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 8 Guardian Unlimited: U.S. Nuke Talks With N.Korea Sidetracked From the Associated Press [UP] Saturday December 3, 2005 10:01 AM AP Photo DCHG101 By BARRY SCHWEID AP Diplomatic Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - American negotiator Christopher Hill is signaling North Korea there are limits to U.S. patience in trying to reach an agreement to end the insular regime's nuclear weapons programs in exchange for economic benefits and security assurances. ``I don't want to threaten walkout,'' Hill told The Associated Press in an interview Friday. ``But I do have to see progress.'' Hill said the impoverished country could face a bright future if it would only agree to a monitored halt to enriching plutonium and other aspects of an acknowledged nuclear weapons program. ``If they get rid of their weapons we can start opening the country,'' he said. ``And being Korean people they are going to be successful.'' But after more than two years of six-nation negotiations, and an apparent breakthrough in September, talks have been sidetracked. Hill said he assumed bargaining would begin again around January, and that preliminary meetings might be held in South Korea, one of the six countries engaged in the talks. Besides the United States and North Korea, they are China, Japan, South Korea and Russia. Hill said he was hoping for a windup within months, not years. ``We can't just sit there stalemated session after stalemated session,'' he said. Stressing the importance of denuclearizing North Korea, Hill, an assistant secretary of state, registered limited patience with Pyongyang in a 45-minute interview. ``If there is a value to the talks we will keep on talking,'' he said. Yet, he added, ``We need to see progress.'' The United States and its partners have offered North Korea economic incentives in exchange for halting its development of nuclear weapons. In an effort to calm the government in Pyongyang, the Bush administration also has offered assurances it would not be attacked. Since September, North Korea has toughened its rhetoric while demanding it be provided with a civilian nuclear reactor if it gave up developing nuclear weapons. Hill said North Korea had been promised only consideration of its request, but he said it first would have to scrap its nuclear weapons programs. The U.S. negotiator said he would be willing to go to Pyongyang ``in the right circumstances if it would further progress.'' But he said he was not ``interested in making gestures. We are interested in making progress.'' ``I just think it is a very difficult process,'' he said. In recent days, in a torrent of hostile rhetoric, North Korea has railed against U.S. financial sanctions and accused Hill of questioning even North Korea's right to exist. Hill shrugged off the invective in the AP interview. ``They seem to want to talk about everything'' but ending their weapons programs and renewing legal commitments to international inspection, he said. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 9 DenverPost.com: A sustainable energy future possible OPINION Article Launched: 12/04/2005 01:00:00 AM perspective By Michael J. Brandemuehl Awareness of energy challenges comes in waves, and one seems to be building today. A big wave hit about 30 years ago with the first OPEC oil embargo and resulting energy crisis. In 1973, President Richard Nixon proposed, "Let us set as our national goal, in the spirit of Apollo, with the determination of the Manhattan Project, that by the end of this decade we will have developed the potential to meet our own energy needs without depending upon any foreign energy source." Every president since then has offered similar statements of stirring resolve. Much of the recent discussion has focused on oil, the security of its supply and its role in transportation. However, transportation accounts for only about 28 percent of the energy consumed in this country. By comparison, commercial and residential buildings account for almost 40 percent of total U.S. energy use and 70 percent of electricity use. When it comes to the big picture of U.S. energy consumption and its impact on the global environment, our buildings dominate the scene. As we look to meet our future energy demands, renewable energy inevitably comes up - as it has for more than 30 years. Renewable energy resources are well matched to building needs for heating and electricity. Solar heating technologies are well understood and have been used for decades, around the world, to heat buildings and to provide hot water. Wind power and solar photovoltaic technologies are also readily available to directly generate electricity from the sun. These energy sources are clean, reliable and widely distributed. And yet, the energy from wind and solar resources combined account for only 0.2 percent of total U.S. energy use. In fact, solar energy production in the U.S. has actually decreased over the past 10 years. Nevertheless, the tide is about to change. First, public interest seems to be higher than ever. The Solar Decathlon, a public demonstration of solar building technologies by university students held last month in Washington, D.C., attracted more than 125,000 people. Twenty-two states currently have some type of renewable portfolio standard, setting a target for state energy use to be generated from renewable sources. Last year, the Colorado Renewable Energy Initiative (Amendment 37) became the first state renewable energy standard to be mandated directly by voters. Renewable energy becomes more economical as markets mature, incentives expand and fuel costs continue to rise. In most cases, wind now competes head-to-head with other energy-generation options, and builders and power companies are gaining greater experience with photovoltaic technologies. Beginning next year, the cost to the Colorado home or business owner of installing a solar system will likely be less than half of today's costs - assuming that products will be available. Driven by markets in Europe and California, photovoltaic manufacturers worldwide are currently scrambling to build more manufacturing plants as they struggle to keep up with the demand. It could also be argued, though, that most of our buildings are not ready for photovoltaic energy. From a purely economic standpoint, it is still much more cost-effective to conserve energy than to produce more of it. With decades of incremental improvements in building codes and equipment efficiency, our buildings are more energy efficient. With the growing application of integrated and sustainable building design - including efficient lighting, passive heating and cooling strategies and more natural building materials - our buildings are also more comfortable, healthy and productive indoor environments. Today, given current fossil fuel prices, it is typically still smarter to invest in energy-efficiency improvements - more insulation, better windows, efficient lighting and appliances and better controls - than to put solar on the roof. On the horizon, though, is a future of efficient solar-powered buildings that produce more energy than they consume. How close is a sustainable energy future? It depends where you look. The recent energy bill offers little more than tax incentives, mostly for the nuclear and fossil fuel industries. Federal funding for energy efficiency and renewable energy is only 5 percent of the federal Department of Energy budget and is expected to decrease by 4 percent next year. The annual budget of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory is less than $200 million, less than a third of the spending last year on the continuing cleanup of Rocky Flats. We didn't reach the moon or win World War II with industry incentives and tax credits. If we expect to reach a sustainable energy future, we need substance behind the rhetoric. We need a federal policy that recognizes the true costs of our energy appetite - not only the cost to get it out of the ground, but the impact on the global environment and the lives of our sons and daughters. We need national leadership. Of that I wish I could be as optimistic. Michael J. Brandemuehl is an associate professor of civil, environmental and architectural engineering at the University of Colorado. All contents Copyright 2005 The Denver Post or other copyright ***************************************************************** 10 News-Miner: Amchitka lecture set for Thursday Fairbanks Daily News-Miner 200 North Cushman Street •Fairbanks, AK 99707 • (907) 456-6661 Staff Report The Atomic Energy Commission detonated three nuclear bombs on the western Aleutian island of Amchitka between 1965 and 1971. The final test of a five-megaton bomb was the largest in U.S. history and opposition to the test gave birth of the environmental organization Greenpeace. Ted Merrell Jr. of Juneau was responsible for monitoring the commission's activity on the island from 1969 to 1974, when he worked as a biologist for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Merrell, now retired, will present a public lecture at the University of Alaska Fairbanks on Thursday on the effects the tests had on the physical environment. The presentation will include photographs of the area rarely seen by the public, said Terrence Cole, director of public history at the University of Alaska Fairbanks. "Merrell was there and the slides are really interesting," Cole said. Amchitka was the only nuclear testing ground in Alaska. During the five years he studied the island, Merrell was responsible for reviewing the commission's research plans, monitoring its contractor's activities and recommending ways to minimize harm to the environment. The lecture is being sponsored by UAF's Office of Public History. The lecture will be held at 7:30 p.m. Thursday in the Schaible Auditorium. Admission is free. MediaNews Group, Inc. and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, Inc. ***************************************************************** 11 BBC: Jargon obscures Montreal message Last Updated: Saturday, 3 December 2005 By Tim Hirsch BBC Environment correspondent, Montreal [Climate change protesters in Montreal, Canada] Environmental groups are struggling to communicate their message At the halfway point of the UN climate change talks in Montreal, environmental groups are struggling a bit to work out who the latest villain is in this long-running drama. Usually it is very straightforward. The US is generally a dead cert for the award of 'Fossil of the Day', reviled by green groups for its rejection of the Kyoto protocol, closely followed by Saudi Arabia for what are regarded as obstructive tactics. After some opening salvos refusing any involvement in talks about future global climate change action, the American delegation here has been fairly quiet in recent days, largely because the discussions have mainly been about the detail of the protocol itself, from which the US has excluded itself. So it was with some surprise that delegates saw that the award, announced each afternoon in a small ceremony in the Palais des Congres, had been given to Japan. After inquiries with some of the green activists, the BBC News website learned that the sin of the Japanese delegation was to table a conference paper entitled, "Proposal for criteria for cases of failure to submit information relating to estimates of greenhouse gas emissions by sources and removals by sinks from activities under Article 3.3 and 3.4 of the Kyoto Protocol". That must be bad, probably worse than clubbing baby seals on the head. Procedural maze But somehow the activists who immerse themselves in the jargon and procedural labyrinths of the climate change process seem to have lost sight of how to communicate their message to the other six billion people on the planet. Another example came earlier in the week when community leaders were brought all the way from Africa to stand in the freezing Montreal winter to back a proposal to protect the world's forests. The even greater challenge wi be to find any of the 8,000 or so participants who can explain to the rest of the world what on earth has been going on The catchy slogan on the posters read "Support Agenda Item Six Now!" It has a certain ring to it, but it is not quite "Save the Whale" or "No Nukes". To be fair, it is not just the green activists who speak another language in these conferences - the same is true of the government delegates themselves, the business lobbyists and even sometimes the journalists who have spent too long covering the issue. I am told that the process has been going on so long that there are now second-generation climate change junkies who have been brought up knowing exactly what is meant by certified emissions reductions, joint implementation and the Marrakech Accords. Bargaining tool For the record, the Marrakech Accords are the series of agreements signed in Morocco in 2001, after years of painful negotiation, on the rules of meeting the targets set by the Kyoto protocol. Because Kyoto only came into force earlier this year, it is at this conference that the accords have finally passed into international law, in a series of unopposed decisions hailed immediately as historic by the conference organisers. This may have simply been a rubber-stamping of decisions made four years ago, but in a process as troubled as this one, navigating any stretch of water without hitting a rock is understandably a cause for great celebration. And in fact the bringing into force of the Kyoto system is not out of the rapids yet. A procedural objection by Saudi Arabia means that the system of enforcing the rules has not yet been agreed. The suspicion is that this is being held as a bargaining tool to gain other concessions later in the conference. The great challenge at the end of this conference will be to judge whether it has been a success or failure in terms of ensuring the long-term future of global action on climate change The even greater challenge will be to find any of the 8,000 or so participants who can explain to the rest of the world what on earth has been going on. ***************************************************************** 12 Daily Times: IAEA will not get direct access to AQ Khan Sunday, December 04, 2005 ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has reiterated that the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) will get information about any Pakistani nuclear scientist only through the government. Foreign Office spokeswoman Tasneem Aslam said this in response to IAEA Director General Mohammad ElBaradei’s statement that he wanted to speak directly to Dr Abdul Qadeer Khan. Aslam said that Pakistan had extended complete cooperation to the IAEA on nuclear non-proliferation, and the latter appreciated this commitment. President Pervez Musharraf had made it clear on several occasions that any information regarding any nuclear scientist will be provided only through government channels, she said. ElBaradei had said on Friday that direct talks with the disgraced Pakistani nuclear scientist would help the nuclear watchdog quickly solve questions regarding the latter’s clandestine network. online Daily Times - All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 13 Japan Times: First nuclear carrier based in Japan named Sunday, December 4, 2005 WASHINGTON (Kyodo) The U.S. Navy announced Friday that the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier George Washington will replace the conventional flattop Kitty Hawk in 2008 at the Yokosuka naval base in Kanagawa Prefecture. "GW," as it is sometimes known, will be the first nuclear-powered carrier to be stationed in Japan. The move comes despite lingering local calls for replacing the Kitty Hawk with a conventional carrier and widespread opposition to hosting nuclear-powered vessels in Japan, the only nation that has suffered an atomic bombing. The two nations agreed in October that the U.S. Navy would send a nuclear-powered carrier to replace the Kitty Hawk, which will be decommissioned and retired in 2008. The agreement came days before the two nations struck a comprehensive deal on realignment of the U.S. military presence in Japan, including the removal of 7,000 U.S. Marine Corps troops from Okinawa and a new alternative plan for relocating functions of Futenma Air Station, also in Okinawa. The government was initially reluctant to accept a nuclear-powered carrier, and the U.S. Navy earlier this year had come up with the two options of either keeping the Kitty Hawk on active duty or replacing it with the only other remaining conventional carrier, the John F. Kennedy. The George Washington, a Nimitz-class carrier commissioned in 1992 and capable of carrying more than 80 aircraft, is now based in Norfolk, Virginia, and is receiving necessary maintenance and upgrades at a shipyard to facilitate its new forward deployment, the navy said in a statement. The Japan Times: Dec. 4, 2005 (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 14 Pakistan News: Information about any nuclear scientist to be provided to IAEA through govt channels: FO PakTribune.Com Ziqad 3, 1426 Hijri December 05, 2005 Sunday December 04, 2005 (0038 PST) ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has said information about any Pakistani nuclear scientist will be provided to International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) through government of Pakistan. This was said by foreign office spokesperson Ms Tasneem Aslam while commenting on IAEA Director Mohamed El Baradei statement in which he had said that he wanted to see and talk directly with father of Pakistan nuclear program Dr A.Q. Khan. FO spokesperson said Pakistan had been extending full cooperation to IAEA with reference to nuclear non proliferation. The IAEA has also appreciated this cooperation from our side. President General Pervez Musharraf had made it clear on several occasions that any information in respect of any nuclear scientist will be provided through the channel of government of Pakistan, she underlined. Pakistan News Service © PakTribune.com Pvt Ltd 2003-2004 ***************************************************************** 15 AFP: Japanese governor to try and stop US nuclear ship deployment - Sat Dec 3, 6:46 AM ET TOKYO (AFP) - The governor of a prefecture hosting the largest US Navy base in Japan has said he would continue to seek to stop the deployment of a nuclear-powered ship there in 2008 as announced by Washington. "It doesn't mean that we have exhausted all possibilities" of stopping the deployment of a nuclear-powered ship at Yokosuka, Kanagawa governor Shigefumi Matsuzawa said in a statement Saturday. The US Navy announced Friday in Washington that the USS George Washington would replace the USS Kitty Hawk in 2008 as its first nuclear-powered aircraft carrier based in Japan. Japan, a close US ally, announced in October it had agreed to host a Nimitz-class nuclear-powered aircraft carrier at the port from 2008 prompting protests in the only nation to have suffered nuclear attack. More than 210,000 people died when Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed by US forces in 1945. "I'll continue urging the Japanese and US governments to solve the noise problem caused by carrier-based aircraft as soon as possible and to try my best to see that a conventional carrier is deployed here," Matsuzawa said. Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso, currently visiting Washington, is scheduled to meet US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld on Saturday and to discuss the realignment of US forces in Japan. Copyright © 2005 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 16 Deutsche Welle: Secret Files Reveal Potential Horror of Cold War Armageddon Europe | 04.12.2005 Secret Files Reveal Potential Horror of Cold War Armageddon [The files show plans for the nuclear destruction of Poland and Europe] Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: The files show plans for the nuclear destruction of Poland and Europe Poland's post-communism transparency has led to the opening of secret files predicting the extent of a massive nuclear exchange over Europe between the two Cold War rivals. For the more than three decades of the Cold War -- from 1955 to 1991 -- the Warsaw Pact was the military rival of the West. Both sides, NATO and the Soviet Union's eastern European satellite countries, were armed to the teeth, separated by what became known as the Iron Curtain. Nuclear weapons and conventional arms parity prevented the two sides from pursing a military solution to their standoff. The consequences for Europe of a military conflict are well documented in secret Warsaw Pact files recently made public by the Polish government. Just how damning the Polish archives are is slowly coming to light. The first document excerpts prove that the Warsaw Pact -- counter to its own previous declarations -- had indeed been prepared to risk a first-strike nuclear war with the West. Leon Kieres, the director of Poland's Institute for National Remembrance, said he was shocked when he first read the top-secret papers. Warsaw Pact allies would have sacrificed Poland "It was planned to accept heavy losses among the Polish population in the event of a military conflict with NATO," Kieres said. "More than two million people would have died. Some 43 cities on Polish territory would have been targets in a nuclear war. We never knew that our lives were the object of such war games. Polish society has a right to learn what its fate would have been, had a military conflict become a reality." [After the nuclear exchange, Soviet tanks would have entered Europe] Bildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: After the nuclear exchange, Soviet tanks would have entered Europe Leon Kieres was referring to war game plans from the Polish military command in 1979. The war game assumed a provocation by NATO with a massive Russian nuclear response that would have obliterated all of West Germany’s major cities. Afterwards, tank divisions with two million Soviet troops would invade a nuclear and chemically contaminated Central Europe and march as far as the Netherlands and Belgium. It's not surprising, the Polish historian Pavel Piotrovski added, that Poland was agreeing to its territorial annihilation by a Western nuclear counterattack by being part of this plan. Plan detailing annihilation forced on Poles "We were not a sovereign state," Piotrovski said. "All the important decisions were forced on us. The Polish government, as well as the governments of the other Socialist countries, had to carry them out." [Soviet plans would have seen Polish cities laid to waste] Bildunterschrift: Großansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Soviet plans would have seen Polish cities laid to waste The decision to make public classified war plans of the Warsaw Pact is a complete reversal of an agreement by its member states when it disbanded in 1991 to keep these documents under lock and key. The papers were written in Poland and have been kept in Polish archives. For that reason, they are subject only to Polish law, said Poland's Defense Minister Radoslav Sikorski, defending his government's decision to publish them. "This is the end of the post-communist era in Poland," he said. "A time when such obvious things as the archives of a defunct military pact no longer need to remain secret." Gregg Benzow (nda) DW-WORLD ***************************************************************** 17 Observer: 'Who puts up the cash?' | Business [Guardian Unlimited] [UP] The nuclear debate The case against by energy professor Gordon MacKerron Sunday December 4, 2005 The Observer The headline arguments for building a new generation of nuclear power stations are familiar. The main lines are that nuclear is carbon-free in operation and that it might improve security of supply. The security argument is weak. A decision to proceed might be made in 2007, followed by a commercial choice of reactor and supplier, a safety licensing process, a public inquiry and a period for construction and commissioning. If all these were to run smoothly, the first power from a new reactor might be produced around 2018 - or more likely around 2020. A series of reactors through the 2020s might significantly improve security of supply, but so might other measures that might be at least as cost-effective. The climate change argument is, in principle, much more persuasive. Over a time horizon to 2030 and beyond, nuclear could make a significant dent in UK carbon emissions. But an important question is how nuclear power might get financed and built, given that no direct government money will be involved. Nuclear is a large-scale technology, requiring large unit sizes and substantial numbers of reactors if costs are to be at their lowest. This is a serious inflexibility. Nuclear power is an extreme case of 'lumpy' investment. The nuclear industry argues that it is worth taking the nuclear road only if there is a commitment to eight or 10 reactors. These would generate about 10,000 MW, equivalent to about 20 per cent of peak electricity demand. This represents some £15 billion or more. This would affect investment in conventional gas-powered generation, which competes directly with nuclear. If markets expected a major programme of nuclear investment, they would be unlikely to commit to any further gas-based investment. The worst-case scenario following a commitment to nuclear new-build would be a sterilisation of non-nuclear investment while the nuclear programme itself stalled. Such a scenario is far from a remote chance - the last time a UK government committed to 10 nuclear stations (Margaret Thatcher's in 1979) only one station was built, Sizewell, and then only after 15 years. If that were to happen again, security of supply would substantially worsen in the 2010s. While the inflexibility is problematic, it may not be fatal. Capital markets can raise billions if the relation between risk and reward is good enough. The risks attaching to nuclear investment are several. There are three types, corresponding to the nuclear life-cycle - construction risk, electricity market risk and decommissioning and waste risk - plus a more general and pervasive political/regulatory risk. In the construction process, risks are substantial. First, nuclear plants are large and capital-intensive, at something between £1bn and £2bn a throw. Second, the only designs seriously competing for the UK market are the Westinghouse AP1000, which has yet to be built anywhere in the world, and the French EPR design, the first unit of which has just started construction in Finland. It is not hard to imagine how financiers will react to the idea that they should stump up for eight or 10 reactors of a kind that no one has yet come near to completing. They will want to lay off this risk to the consortium offering to build the plant or plants. These consortiums may try to absorb the risk by offering a fixed-price or 'turnkey' contract. Something like this is happening in Finland, but such contracts will inevitably contain force majeure clauses, especially in the event of political and regulatory risk becoming manifest. And a turnkey contract may well turn into a 'cost-plus' contract on later plants. The market risks are also big. In the present electricity market no one can tell the price of electricity more than three years into the future and therefore buyers will not sign long-term contracts to purchase power. But in a capital-intensive project such as a nuclear plant, investors need to know their minimum income stream at least 10 to 15 years after power flows - some 20 or 25 years from now. This could be done only by guaranteeing a minimum nuclear price for such a period. This could be achieved by setting a 'Nuclear Obligation' at a minimum price, but at the cost of dismantling the painfully constructed electricity wholesale market and inviting State Aids (subsidy) cases to be considered by the European Commission. These risks could be overcome, and rewards guaranteed, but at potentially high cost to consumers, not only from excess nuclear costs but also from a major weakening of competitive forces in the electricity market as a whole. In the face of such risks, the cost of capital for nuclear projects will be higher than for conventional projects. The premium over a low-risk rate cannot be determined in the absence of detailed project plans but an inflation-adjusted cost of 10 per cent is likely on early projects. For a capital-intensive project such a relatively high cost of capital is a serious handicap. None of this means that a new nuclear programme could not proceed. But the benefits are delayed and the inflexibility pronounced. The risk for the nuclear industry is that if it argues for 10,000 MW or nothing, it may get nothing. If nuclear is to have the chance to make a serious long-term contribution to climate change, a more flexible and incremental case would seem better than current proposals. · Professor Gordon MacKerron chairs the Committee for Radioactive Waste Management [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 18 Guardian Unlimited: Britain 'could bury greenhouse gases' Robin McKie and Juliette Jowit Sunday December 4, 2005 The Observer MPs will launch an investigation this week into a technology some scientists believe is our best hope for saving the world from global warming: carbon capture and storage. The technology - still in its infancy - involves taking carbon dioxide before it is released at power stations and burying it in disused oil or gas fields. Billions of tons of carbon dioxide could be dumped under the North Sea this way, say engineers. Britain could continue burning carbon dioxide at coal, gas and oil power plants for decades and still meet its Kyoto obligations. The technology could also prove to be a major earner for the nation. As a result, a consortium - which includes BP - announced recently it wanted to build a pilot electricity plant in Peterhead, near Aberdeen. Its carbon dioxide would be pumped into the nearby Miller Field in the North Sea. The gas would force out the field's remaining reserves of oil and would be stored there indefinitely. 'The technology is in its early stages,' said Edinburgh University geologist Professor Stuart Haszeldine. 'However, Britain is perfectly poised to exploit it. We have strong North Sea oil experience and have plenty of old fields. If we act now, we could take a five-year lead over the rest of the world. 'There is enough space beneath the North Sea to store Europe's entire carbon output for at least the next 70 years, possibly up to 200 years.' However, some supporters of carbon storage believe the government is in danger of missing its potential in its rush to back nuclear power and have pressed for an urgent investigation of the technology. This has resulted in the decision by the Parliamentary Committee on Science and Technology to interview industrialists and green groups this month. 'The great thing about the North Sea is that drilling on its seabed was well regulated,' said Dr John Loughhead, executive director of the UK Energy Research Centre. 'It's not like Texas, which is peppered with wells. If you stick carbon dioxide down one, the gas could pop up all over the place.' Green groups also support the technology, though less enthusiastically. 'We have - painfully - had to change our minds about carbon storage,' said Germana Canzi, of Friends of the Earth. 'It's like sweeping the world's carbon dioxide problem under the carpet. Countries should stop producing carbon dioxide and rely on renewable power. However, given the worrying plight that our climate is in now, carbon storage at least buys us time.' Critical issues remain to be decided, however. BP is backing a £600m investment at Peterhead. The money would go on plants that would remove carbon dioxide from natural gas, and on equipment to pump the gas down into the seabed. At present, that is not commercially viable, the company says. BP says it cannot afford to run its Miller Field experiment unless it is given some form of tax break, either on the oil it reclaims when pumping carbon dioxide into the field, or for the electricity it runs from the generators it will build at Peterhead. 'Electricity made from plants this way would cost about 4p a kilowatt hour,' added Haszeldine. 'That compares with 3p, the price claimed for new nuclear plants. However, that includes no cost for decommissioning nuclear plants when they are completed. So carbon storage holds up very well. We should look at it carefully before we leap at nuclear power.' This point is backed by Professor Gordon MacKerron, of Sussex University. Writing in Observer Business today, he says that a pro-nuclear policy risks undermining UK energy security. Government support for atom plants could deter gas and renewable energy suppliers from investing, leaving the nation with a shortage of capacity if the nuclear program was stopped by protests or financial problems, says Mackerron who is also chair of the Committee for Radioactive Waste Management. Useful link Green party of England and Wales Email your comments for publication to politics.editor@guardianunlimited.co.uk [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 19 Observer: Getting to the core of the problem | Letters [Guardian Unlimited] /* for turning the MPU off */ [UP] The big issue: nuclear power Sunday December 4, 2005 The Observer Henry Porter is right to call for a debate about the role nuclear power might play in the UK's energy strategy (Comment, last week). By placing nuclear power in the context of energy security and dependency, he has done this embryonic debate a service. For a new nuclear power build, MPs and the public need to agree that the risks are sufficiently low. Energy dependency is one we must grapple with; another, practically ignored, is the risk of a terrorist attack. Are we satisfied that the risk of nuclear terrorism over the period each new nuclear power station will operate will remain low enough to risk the consequences of one successful attack? We need to discuss this issue in a sensible and open manner. James Kemp Oxford Research Group Oxford Henry Porter's hard-hitting article convincingly brought together Iraq, world energy policy, nuclear power and the global environment. He also focused on why this 'game of the century' is being played out. The Bush and Blair administrations have been root of the current situation and it remains to be seen which side of the Atlantic will be the first to fully recognise just how much the public have been misled. In the UK before the invasion of Iraq, many had grave reservations, but were too weak to stand against the Bush/Blair rhetoric. On this side of the Atlantic the Liberal Democrats were right but lacked a powerful PR machine to convey their views. The Conservative party was at its weakest position for decades and 'true Labour' were too afraid of 'New Labour' to challenge the message from the top. It remains to be seen whether the people of the USA or the UK will be the first to recognise the true folly of the Iraq policy and its subsequent effects. I hope both sides simultaneously reach the same conclusion, but now suspect it could the USA. Malcolm Mackley Cambridge Those of us proclaiming 'No Blood for Oil' cannot take the moral high ground about Iraq and continue using energy as if supplies are limitless. Nuclear power is not the answer, as demonstrated by Chernobyl. The insoluble problem is of waste disposal, the risk of nuclear terrorism and the prohibitive costs of building and decommissioning. Fortunately the UK is ideally suited to develop wind, wave and tidal power. But we must also use far less energy to prevent further wars over supplies and the nightmare of climate chaos. The scale of the crisis facing the world is so great that only radical and immediate changes in lifestyle can hope to avert catastrophe. Anne Dismorr Norwich Why does Blair want to build nuclear power stations? Because the American people hate nuclear power so much that the Bush administration cannot build new power stations. So they have a problem with obtaining weapons-grade plutonium. So Blair wants us to provide it instead. Hence the false choices between wind power or anything else. Michael Brett London N13 Useful links British Energy Department of Trade and Industry British Nuclear Fuels Ltd Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament Greenpeace HSE nuclear glossary Come Clean WMD awareness programme UK atomic energy authority National Radiological Protection Board Friends of the Earth World Nuclear Association World Nuclear Transport Institute [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 20 London Times: Nuclear safety net - Sunday Times - Times Online Let BE sell its power at 10p a unit, make a large profit and build the new nuclear stations. And, for a marketing strategy to attract customers, how about three months’ free electricity for July-August? Ian McWilliam Northwich, Cheshire GREEN BENEFITS? Any decision to build a new generation of nuclear reactors (Now for Blair’s dodgy nuclear dossier, News Review, last week) must carry with it the intention to generate a much larger percentage of the national requirement with them than the existing UK stations have provided hitherto. Reactors supply more than 70% in France. The two fusion programmes in France and Japan hold the prospect of almost unlimited energy without environmental penalties in the second half of this century. Kenneth Wood Exeter, Devon AVOIDING A CRISIS: The UK is a world leader in nuclear generation expertise (what other manufacturing industry can say this?). If nuclear energy electricity generation is stifled, this expertise will suffer. In other words, set the nuclear industry free. Regulate it for safety and economic purposes, but ensure that an energy crisis does not happen here. Barry Hawkes Bourne End, Buckinghamshire FREE BRUSSELS FUEL: Jonathan Leake claims that “about half of the 17 coal-fired power stations that supply more than a third of Britain’s electricity are so old and inefficient that they contravene European Union rules and must close by 2016.” I have a solution: use the paper on which these EU rules are printed as fuel. The rules will then disappear and there will be an inexhaustible supply of fuel from Brussels. Mike Lawden Dorchester-on-Thames Copyright 2005 Times Newspapers Ltd. ***************************************************************** 21 London Times: McConnell ‘powerless to stop new nuclear plants’ - Sunday Times - Times Online THE Scottish executive has no power to block the wholesale building of new nuclear power stations north of the border, according to one of the architects of devolution. Lord Sewel said the Scotland Act — which he helped to draft and steer through Parliament — includes provision to ensure that the will of Westminster should prevail on the matter. Sewel, a former minister of state at the Scottish Office, said the issue of nuclear plants had even been considered by Donald Dewar, then Scottish secretary, while the legislation was being prepared. Section 29 of the Act and an amendment to Section 4 were inserted following concerns that the Scottish executive might attempt to block the implementation of reserved legislation in Scotland. Jack McConnell, the first minister, has stated that the Scottish executive could block the building of nuclear power stations in Scotland. His view was supported this week by Annabel Goldie, leader of the Scottish Conservatives. Nicol Stephen, the leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats, said he was prepared to make his opposition to the siting of nuclear plants on Scottish soil a coalition-busting issue with Labour at the 2007 Scottish election. However, Sewel said such a decision was not in the gift of McConnell and he accused politicians on all sides of having a “loss of collective memory”. “The executive could not use its planning powers to prevent, as a matter of policy, the construction of nuclear power stations in Scotland,” he said. “If there were legitimate planning grounds they could object to a particular site — they could say the place you’ve chosen is not appropriate. But they could not use the planning laws to thwart the entire policy.” Sewel told The Sunday Times: “I was in charge of the bill. There was no politician who is a member of the Scottish parliament who was a member of the Lords at that time. There has also been a change in civil service and perhaps people are not aware of the full background.” Last week the first minister’s office reiterated his hostility to the building of any new stations until a report on the disposal of radioactive waste is completed next summer. However, pressure is growing on him to stop “fence-sitting” after Tony Blair signalled that nuclear power is likely to play a big role in Britain’s future energy programme. The partnership agreement between Labour and the Lib Dems contains a commitment that no new nuclear power stations will be built in Scotland unless the difficult question of what to do with radioactive waste is dealt with adequately. In an interview with The Sunday Times, Stephen said he could not envisage the waste problem being solved. “I’d be very surprised if the Lib Dems could be persuaded to change their attitude towards nuclear power in Scotland, partly due to the cost, partly due to the waste issue, and partly because of the impact it would have on enlarging the renewables industry.” The Scottish National party is to conduct its own review, including an assessment of alternatives to nuclear power. However an SNP-led administration at Holyrood would be equally powerless to prevent the building of nuclear power stations on Scottish soil if legislation was passed at Westminister, according to Sewell. “Clearly it would have to be tested in the courts, but in my opinion I think it is unlikely that the Scottish executive could use its planning powers to reject a policy of constructing nuclear power stations in Scotland,” he said. Nuclear power accounts for 35% of the total electricity generated in Scotland. But both ScottishPower and the Scottish and Southern Energy are net exporters to the national grid and rely heavily on nuclear for their domestic load supply. Scotland has two of the seven operating advanced gas-cooled nuclear power stations: Torness, in East Lothian, and Hunterston B, in north Ayrshire. Torness is due to be decommmissioned in 2023, while Hunterston B is due for decommissioning in 2011. LEADERS BACK CAMPAIGN Some of Scotland’s most senior politicians have agreed to discuss the formation of a cross-party body aimed at pushing for more powers for the Scottish parliament. Nicola Sturgeon, deputy leader of the SNP, Murdo Fraser, deputy leader of the Scottish Conservatives, and Jim Wallace, former leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats, said they were prepared in principal to join an informal group to advance the process of devolution. Only the Labour party dismissed the idea. The agreement between the leaders follows the launch of a Sunday Times campaign: More Powers for Scotland? this week. The Lib Dems have said that they are keen for the Scottish Constitutional Convention, the unofficial cross-party body that paved the way for devolution, to reconvene. The SNP said that it would be suspicious of joining something seen as a successor to the SCC, which it boycotted. Copyright 2005 Times Newspapers Ltd. ***************************************************************** 22 theage.com.au: Minister 'wrong' on N-power - National - www.theage.com.au By Jewel Topsfield, Canberra December 5, 2005 FEDERAL Liberal MP Dennis Jensen has fuelled the growing debate over nuclear energy, disputing claims by federal Environment Minister Ian Campbell that nuclear power is not an economically viable option for Australia. Dr Jensen, a former CSIRO scientist from Western Australia, said the planet was facing an oil crisis that would cause massive increases in the price of gas and coal, leading to higher-cost electricity. He said Senator Campbell was simply ill-informed when he said he remained to be convinced that nuclear power was likely to be an economic option for Australia for a "seriously long amount of time". "At some stage we will reach an oil crunch when we can't extract oil quickly enough to meet demand," Dr Jensen said. "When demand outstrips supply, the price of oil will skyrocket — we saw a short-term example of this after hurricane Katrina. Following on from the oil price shock will be significantly increased demand for coal and gas as nations maximise power production from coal and gas to compensate for the shortage and high cost of oil." Despite supplying 24 per cent of the world's primary production of uranium last year, the development of nuclear power in Australia is illegal. Science Minister Brendan Nelson and Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane have recommended that the Prime Minister establish a $1 million study into a nuclear power industry. It would be carried out by the Australian Academy of Science in collaboration with other academies. Dr Nelson said last week: "We can't responsibly dig 30 per cent of the world's uranium out of the ground, export it overseas and allow some 440 reactors to operate and expand in other parts of the world and not seriously consider this as an option for ourselves." Prime Minister John Howard, Treasurer Peter Costello, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer and former deputy prime minister John Anderson have all called for a rethink on the nuclear power industry. But Senator Campbell last week said that while he welcomed a debate, it would be difficult to expand Australia's nuclear power industry in light of public opposition and it was not economically feasible. Dr Jensen said that while nuclear power was now marginally more expensive than fossil-fuelled power, it would not be in the medium to long term. "Any increases in coal prices is going to make nuclear power look very attractive in the longer term," he said. A nuclear power industry would significantly reduce the amount of carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide emissions. Dr Jensen said the public had "moved on" since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986, which killed 31 people and caused about 2000 thyroid cancer cases. "As far as public sentiment goes, it is at worst 50 per cent in favour and 50 cent opposed to nuclear power." Dr Jensen said fourth-generation power stations were "inherently safe". A melt-down similar to that at Chernobyl was impossible because nuclear reactors' temperatures did not get that high. | Copyright © 2005. The Age Company Ltd. ***************************************************************** 23 Sunday Herald: Over 200 abnormal events at nuclear plants since 2000 - Scotland's award-winning independent newspaper Est 1999 By Rob Edwards A DELIBERATE attempt to disrupt security with a tripwire is one of more than 200 abnormal events at Scotlands two nuclear power stations revealed in documents obtained by the Sunday Herald. Other safety incidents recorded at Torness in East Lothian and Hunterston in North Ayrshire include unauthorised waste discharges and problems with reactor fuel and fires. The environment and equipment at the sites have also been contaminated with radioactivity. On a couple of occasions, manning levels have breached those required by site emergency arrangements. And once the wrong computer software was loaded into a reactor control system. The incidents were all reported to the governments Health and Safety Executive (HSE) by the nuclear power company British Energy in the last five years. The HSE released summaries of the incident reports in response to a freedom of information request from the Sunday Herald. The most serious incident was the discovery of the tripwire at Torness. Police were called to the plant in March 2003 after a black cable was found stretched across the top of a flight of stairs. This had caused a security guard patrolling the nuclear site to trip and fall down the stairs. Both the police and British Energy launched investigations to try and trace the culprit. The cable was found to have been cut from a coil at Torness, but forensic and other tests were unable to track down the culprit. Investigations had to be abandoned due to a lack of evidence. The revelation of the incident has rekindled fears that nuclear plants could be vulnerable to sabotage by terrorists. Police chief superintendent David McCracken told East Lothian councillors last week that Torness was a target for international terrorist groups. Pete Roche, a consultant to the anti-nuclear group Greenpeace, described the tripwire incident as particularly worrying. The unknown insider who had set the trap could still be working at Torness, he pointed out. He said: When considering whether we want another nuclear station at Torness, we should ask ourselves what kind of energy policy would Osama bin Laden want us to adopt. Roche argued that many of the other incidents at Torness and Hunterston were not trivial. They illustrate well that just saying we have never had a serious accident doesnt mean we never will, he said. Between June 2000 and June 2005 British Energy filed 230 incident reports about Torness to the HSE, 39 of then in the past six months. A further 59 reports were filed for Hunterston B, 26 of them in 2005. On February 17, 2005 at Torness, according to one report, a nuclear safety-related door in the essential supply building was left open, thus degrading the hazard boundary. At Hunterston on March 26, 2001 there was a potential discharge of boiler water via unconsented discharge route. British Energy, however, argued that most of the incidents were minor, reflecting the fact that it reported any anomaly to the safety regulators. By capturing and dealing with the minor anomalies, the company and the industry ensures nothing serious ever happens, said a company spokeswoman. The regulator is also able to prove that it is holding us to account on the minute details so that the public can be reassured about the attention to detail on safety. We believe the public wouldnt want it any other way. The tripwire incident had been taken very seriously by British Energy, but nothing like it had happened before or since. Safety is one of the companys fundamental priorities and any safety contravention is treated very seriously, the spokeswoman added. In the nuclear industry there are no grey areas. Something is either right or it is not. There are no degrees of right or wrong. 04 December 2005 © newsquest (sunday herald) limited. all rights reserved ***************************************************************** 24 Sunday Herald: This country needs new nuclear reactors - Scotland's award-winning independent newspaper Est 1999 John Home Robertson Electricity generation is important for Scotland, and especially in my constituency of East Lothian where we have coal, nuclear and wind generators. We generate enough electricity to meet our own needs, and we export power through the national grid to other parts of the UK. But this important sector of our economy, and thousands of Scottish jobs, will be put at risk if we fail to make sensible decisions for the future. The two coal-fired stations at Cockenzie and Longannet and the Hunterston B nuclear station are close to the end of their design lives. So 4646 megawatts of Scottish generating capacity will have to be decommissioned soon. Failure to take strategic decisions about new plant for this key industry would hit the Scottish economy, and it would create a risk of supply problems and blackouts as has happened in the US and Italy. I support the Scottish Executives aim to generate 40% of our electricity from renewables. But that ambitious target leaves 60% of our baseload electricity to be generated from other sources cleaner coal, gas, nuclear or a mixture of all three. I am often entertained by newspaper articles that criticise nuclear power. But detractors have a responsibility to tell us how they would fill that 60% gap. Nuclear power is back on the agenda for two good reasons: first, the urgent need to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases from power stations burning coal, oil or gas; and secondly, real concerns about the reliability of supplies of diminishing resources of hydrocarbons from central Asia and the Middle East. Nuclear power does not emit carbon dioxide, but it does create small volumes of radioactive waste which must be stored safely. That issue has to be resolved regardless of whether we build new nuclear plants or not. Finland has started a new reactor programme after resolving the issue with deep storage of waste, and we should learn from best practice around the world. A two-year national debate in Finland concluded that nuclear energy was the best way to provide cost-efficient and reliable supplies of electricity. I hope that our energy review can promote a sensible discussion about the nuclear option here in the UK, and as the MSP for East Lothian, I am looking forward to the prospect of new reactors at Torness B to replace the coal-burning station at Cockenzie when it has to be decommissioned. 04 December 2005 © newsquest (sunday herald) limited. all rights reserved ***************************************************************** 25 Sunday Herald: Beneath the surface of nuclear power - Scotland's award-winning independent newspaper Est 1999 Readers views IF your report about the fact that sites for nuclear plants will be under water, as a result of climate change, wasnt so serious I might have laughed. However, given Tony Blairs craven speech to the CBI last week, I wouldnt be surprised if he ignored these and other warnings and pushed on regardless. A return to nuclear power is nothing less than an admission by Tony Blair that he has failed to do what he promised on climate change. Perhaps he should resign now and leave others with more vision to do the job properly. Max Foster Glasgow THE warning from Nirex that nuclear plant sites are at risk of flooding and coastal erosion is yet more bad news for the nuclear industry. Visions from the 1950s of a brave new world with shining reactors and endless clean electricity have been proven wrong. The folly of the past has left the UK with the prospect of contamination and toxic wastes and a £56 billion (and rising) bill for dealing with existing waste. Political leaders should be making tough choices, choices that are not based solely on the next election. Its now time for the next generation, and the one after that, to be foremost in ministers minds. Chris Ballance MSP Green speaker on nuclear issues IT is true that most UK nuclear power plants are located on coasts, near sea level (Global warming scuppers Blairs nuclear power plans, News, November 27), but if sea levels rise as you describe, the flooding of the power stations will be a minor consequence compared with the more extensive flooding that will drown much of the country, including major cities like London. Steuart Campbell Edinburgh IN reference to the Rob Edwards article of 27 November, we must correct the fundamental error on which the story is based. The Nirex report in question was written in reference to the effects of climate change and rising sea levels on radioactive waste storage facilities (timescale in the order of 300 years plus), and not, as claimed, in reference to new nuclear power stations (timescale in the order of 50 years). The report can be found on our website (www.nirex.co.uk). It is plain and obvious that when considering which technical option to take forward (which the independent Committee on Radioactive Waste Management is currently doing), and then where to site any radioactive waste storage facility (the next stage in the process), you take into account the effects of climate change. That is why Nirexs preferred option is a phased deep geological repository, which is designed to protect the waste against such changes in the environment, and why surface stores do not constitute a safe, long-term option. Chris Murray Chief Executive, Nirex © newsquest (sunday herald) limited. all rights reserved ***************************************************************** 26 Casper Journal Star-Tribune: Study cites rising costs at nuclear plant Casper, Wyoming - Saturday, December 03, 2005 SEATTLE (AP) -- Construction of a new plant to treat radioactive waste at the Hanford nuclear reservation could cost as much as 67 percent more than first estimated and take an additional four years, a newspaper reported Thursday. The report confirms earlier accounts of the skyrocketing cost to build the plant and once again raises concerns about its future. The vitrification plant is being designed to convert radioactive waste into glasslike logs for permanent disposal in a nuclear waste repository. The project has encountered numerous problems and delays in the past decade, and the U.S. Department of Energy slowed construction on large portions of the plant several months ago amid rising costs and seismic concerns. The Energy Department, which manages cleanup at the south-central Washington site, requested a review by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers last year after a report showed the DOE had underestimated the impact a severe earthquake would have on the plant. The corps' report, completed in May, estimated costs could soar nearly $4 billion, from $5.8 billion to $9.65 billion, making it among the most costly construction projects in the country, The Seattle Times reported. The plant also might not be completed until 2015, four years after the 2011 deadline mandated under the Tri-Party Agreement, the cleanup pact signed by state and federal officials, according to the corps' report. The Energy Department has repeatedly refused to release the corps' report or a new cost estimate or schedule for completing the project. The Times said a copy of the report was leaked to the newspaper. The report confirms an estimate Congress announced earlier this year, which found the cost could rise as high as $10 billion. The Energy Department notified state officials and members of Congress two months ago that the cost would rise by more than 25 percent and that the department likely would not meet the deadline. State officials are considering whether they will need to go to court to enforce cleanup deadlines. "We're not interested in suing the federal government, we're not interested in having a federal judge control the cleanup budget, but we don't have a lot of other options," said Jay Manning, director of the state Department of Ecology. The Energy Department and Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman already are taking steps to address problems with the project, including some of those detailed in the report, department spokesman Mike Waldron said Wednesday. "When the issues related to the waste treatment plant came to the secretary's attention, he immediately began to personally review the project," Waldron said. "And he has been engaged in formulating a path forward." The corps also cannot confirm the estimates of cost and schedule overruns, so the department did not want to release unproven information, Waldron said. "Our intention is not to add to any speculation but rather to make commitments that we can keep based on verifiable facts," Waldron said. But the chairman of a congressional committee that controls the Department of Energy's budget said the report raises legitimate concerns. "It ought to raise a lot more red flags than just from us," U.S. Rep. Dave Hobson, R-Ohio, chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Energy and Water, told The Times. Hobson had seen the report earlier this year because of his leadership position. "It ought to send real messages that either somebody doesn't know what they're doing, or somebody's not watching the door. We've got to clean it up, but somebody has got to watch out for the taxpayer." According to the report, there was little evidence that the contractor hired to build the plant, Bechtel National, was trying to control costs. In addition, the Energy Department appeared to need more people to oversee the massive and complex project. Both the contractor and the Energy Department were overly optimistic in some assumptions and reluctant to recognize the potential for higher costs, the report said. A Bechtel spokeswoman, Carrie Meyer, said she couldn't respond to details in the report because her company also had not been provided a copy of it. But she defended the company's work at Hanford. "I can say that Bechtel does try to control our costs," Meyer said. "We are trying to do what's right for our customer." The plant has long been considered the cornerstone of cleanup at the Hanford site, which was created in the 1940s as part of the top-secret Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb. Today, Hanford is the most contaminated nuclear site in the nation, with cleanup costs expected to total $50 billion to $60 billion. Copyright © 19952005 Lee Enterprises ***************************************************************** 27 Salt Lake Tribune: Monticello lends hand as cases of cancer rise Article Last Updated: 12/03/2005 01:34:08 AM Travel expenses: Many residents take an economic beating when they must go a long way for treatment By Lisa Church Special to The Tribune MONTICELLO - In the two years since he was diagnosed with leukemia, Fritz Pipkin has been forced to mortgage his home to pay for travel and other out-of-pocket costs incurred from his treatment at a St. George hospital. The lifelong Monticello resident is one of many in the southeastern community of about 2,000 who believe their illnesses were caused by prolonged exposure to contaminants from a uranium and vanadium processing mill constructed inside town boundaries 50 years ago. Two informal community surveys in 1993 and 2005 of past and present residents have uncovered almost 400 cancer cases - including 17 cases of leukemia - among those who responded. And Pipkin's wife, Barbara, who conducted the 2005 survey, says she receives telephone calls and newly completed surveys almost every week showing new cancer cases. A 1997 report by the Division of Health Assessment and Consultation, a branch of the federal Department of Health and Human Services, concluded that a town the size of Monticello should see about one case of leukemia every 30 years. Now, as residents seek scientific studies that might confirm their worst fears about the numbers and source of the cancers, the city of Monticello has moved to provide financial help for those seeking treatment. In November, the City Council voted unanimously to set aside $50,000 and to use the accrued interest to help residents cover travel expenses for cancer treatment. The money is owed to the city by the Department of Energy as part of the Monticello Mill site cleanup begun in the 1990s and completed in 2001. Groundwater cleanup at the site is ongoing. The city expects to receive the $50,000 by February, and once the account is established, members of the VMTE " Victims of Mill Tailings Exposure " committee, a citizen group that works with the city to raise public awareness about Monticello's cancer rates and other mill issues, will take applications from area residents and disperse the funds. Councilman Steve Young, who lost a brother to cancer four years ago, says establishing the account is "just a start" and the town hopes private donors will contribute to the fund, making more money available for those who need it most. "I know what it cost [my brother] to fight cancer, and how much it costs other people," he says. "But a little bit is a little bit. If the city can give somebody $200 for travel, that's $200 they don't have to pay out of their pocket." Residents hope to convince federal officials to provide millions of dollars in funding for study of those who lived in Monticello between 1940 and 1967, or worked at the Cold War-era mill while it was in operation to gauge their exposure to cancer-causing contaminants. The San Juan County Commission and regional health department officials recently agreed to send letters supporting the study to state and federal agencies, and local residents hope to meet with Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr. to discuss the issue, Barbara Pipkin said. The process has moved slowly, in part because without a study there is no scientific evidence that the cancer rates in Monticello now or among past residents is higher than other similarly sized communities in the state. But Barbara Pipkin is hopeful that action will be taken. "Sometimes it takes a lot of years," she said. "But I do think the government will one day have to admit what they've done." Meanwhile, people are getting sick, and some are dying. Like Fritz Pipkin, Monticello residents who have cancer must travel to medical facilities in larger cities to receive treatment. The cost can be staggering. Barbara Pipkin says the couple spent more than $50,000 last year alone for travel, and medical expenses not covered by health insurance. They save some money by staying with relatives in St. George. Pete Steele, a City Council member who has lived in Monticello for almost 50 years, has seen the cost of treatments. "It's the same for everybody," Steele says. "You have to travel somewhere else for treatment, and the cost really adds up." About a year ago, Steele was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a rare form of cancer that affects the bones. Once each month, Steele travels to Grand Junction, Colo. - about three hours away - for treatment. The expenses have taken a toll on Steele, but he says he is lucky: His insurance picks up most of the medical costs, and he stays in motels that offer half-price rates, thanks to an agreement with the American Cancer Society. But for those with less comprehensive or no health insurance, treatment and travel take a huge toll he says. "It's a terrible burden," Steele says. "Some people have lost almost everything just fighting to stay alive." © Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 28 Toronto Star: Europe divided over expansion of nuclear facilities France offer contrast Disposal of waste a contentious issueDec. 3, 2005. 01:00 AMSANDRO CONTENTAEUROPEAN BUREAU LONDONA train carrying treated radioactive waste from France to Germany has become a symbol of Europe's divided approach to nuclear power. Thousands of German protestors repeatedly blocked its route and clashed with police before the train delivered 170 tonnes of radioactive cargo to a storage site southeast of Hamburg 10 days ago. The waste, produced by Germany's nuclear power reactors, had been sent to France to be diluted and encased in glass before being shipped back for temporary storage in a disused salt mine. The reprocessing shipments  there have been nine since 1996  link two countries with sharply opposing views about the future of nuclear power. France is the world's largest nuclear power generator per capita, with 58 reactors producing almost 80 per cent of its electricity. The state-owned companies that control the industry recently began a massive program to upgrade existing reactors and build a new generation of them. Germany has turned its back on nuclear power, which currently generates 30 per cent of its electricity. It is implementing a 2000 deal with nuclear power companies to phase out all 19 reactors. Two have already shut down and the other 17 are expected to be closed by 2020. German's new chancellor, conservative Angela Merkel, campaigned on extending the phase-out period. But her minority government had to drop the proposal in order to strike a coalition deal with the defeated Social Democratic party. Since the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear accident in the former Soviet Ukraine, the Western European trend has largely been on Germany's side. Italy implemented a 1987 referendum decision by banning nuclear power and shutting down its four reactors. That was followed by Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and Belgium all adopting laws to phase out reactors. Spain's prime minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, recently announced he would do the same. On average, about 30 per cent of Europe's electricity is generated by nuclear power, according to the OECD Nuclear Energy Agency. The Paris-based agency's director general, Louis Echavarri, expects the number to remain stable for the next 15 years. In countries like Belgium and Sweden, where nuclear power generates about half of the electricity, some experts doubt targets to reduce carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases can be met without keeping some of the reactors, which produce clean energy, turned on. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi recently suggested the country's reactors should be restarted, and Britain is debating whether to build a new generation of nuclear plants. Finland is currently building its fifth nuclear reactor  the only Western European country other than France to do so since the Chernobyl accident. Despite a strong safety record, the biggest hurdle to nuclear power remains public opinion, Echavarri says. "You can't do nuclear against the civil society. Civil society has to be convinced, in a big majority, that it's the right thing to do," he says. Most European countries are split between conservative political parties that generally back nuclear power and those on the left that oppose it, Echavarri says. That confrontation doesn't exist in France. The French left's embrace of nuclear power has its roots with Marie Curie, the scientist whose discoveries paved the way for nuclear physics and cancer therapy and earned her two Nobel Prizes in the early 1900s, Echavarri says. France's post-World-War-II drive to be fully independent, especially of U.S. influence, led partly to its development of nuclear weapons. When the oil crisis hit in the 1970s, France launched a huge expansion of its nuclear power plants to reduce its reliance on energy imports. Until recently, state-owned companies exercised a monopoly on the production and distribution of French energy. State-owned Areva is the world's largest nuclear group, doing everything from designing and building nuclear power stations to supplying and recycling the uranium that fuels them. France hasn't solved the most contentious problem with nuclear power  where and how to dispose of its 978,000 cubic metres of nuclear waste. After 15 years of research, the French government has set next year as the deadline for a decision. The most likely option is a clay shaft in the Champagne wine region. But 10,000 people turned out in protest last September when tests were done in the area. It was a much-noted event in the country that embraces nuclear energy. The troubling legacy of nuclear waste, some of which remains radioactive for tens of thousands of years, was the main reason Germany decided to phase out its nuclear plants. Former Social Democratic chancellor Gerhard Schroeder agreed to do so after striking a coalition deal with the Green party. For years, Germany's nuclear power industry was heavily subsidized by government. The policy shift resulted in a sharp growth in renewable energy sources, such as wind turbines, and energy efficiency programs. "These alternative forms of energy would not have developed if we still had a policy of favouring nuclear energy," says Eberhard Bohne, former adviser to the German federal ministry of environment, nature conservation and nuclear safety. Renewable energy sources have almost doubled in the past five years and now generate about 10 per cent of electricity. The government's goal is to hit 20 per cent by 2020. Energy efficiency regulations have been passed for new buildings, and homeowners have been given financial help to better insulate old ones. Industry has received incentives to build cleaner coal- and gas-powered plants. Bohne says some countries want nuclear power plants because it brings them close to developing nuclear weapons. But in Germany's case, he says, concerns about global warming will eventually give a new lease on life to reactors scheduled to close. "There will be a kind of biological solution," he says. "When today's protestors are too old to take to the streets, things will change. The problem then is we may no longer have nuclear experts to operate the plants." Copyright Toronto Star ***************************************************************** 29 Toronto Star: Nuclear still a big part of Ontario's energy future Report on power plans next week Demand outstrips electrical capacity Dec. 3, 2005. 01:00 AMRICHARD BRENNANQUEEN'S PARK BUREAU Energy-starved Ontario is waiting for someone, anyone, to point it toward the light. The government is awaiting the Ontario Power Authority's (OPA) much-anticipated report spelling out the various power sources needed over the next several years in order to keep the lights on. There is a sense of urgency as Ontario's energy demands rapidly outstrip supply, forcing the government to once again look to nuclear power to bail it out of the current crisis. In short, the province's electricity future is not a rosy one. Consumption is going through the roof, the existing nuclear fleet reaches it life expectancy by 2020, new nuclear plants take a decade and more to get up and running, gas-powered plants are running into environmental and economic problems, conservation initiatives aren't aggressive enough, and hydro power is virtually tapped out. The province needs at least 25,000 megawatts of new supply over the next 15 years, especially since the Liberal government decided to close down all the coal-fired power plants by 2009, representing a loss of 7,500 megawatts. It would take two facilities the size of the Darlington nuclear station to replace the power now being generated by coal-fired plants. There is little doubt that controversial nuclear power is going to play a big part in the mix of generation recommended in the OPA report expected Friday. Industry experts estimate the province could easily be looking at 10,000 megawatts of nuclear power. Given the high price tag on nuclear plants, the province is looking at various sources of financing to try to reduce the cost risks borne by the public sector. Ontario's 15 operating nuclear reactors produce roughly half of the province's power supply. Dwight Duncan, former energy minister and now finance minister, held his breath this past summer when hot, humid days pushed the system to the limit, forcing the province to buy expensive imported power. On several occasions, Ontario experienced brownouts as the Independent Electricity System Operator (IESO) tried to conserve power. Energy consumption hit record levels, despite the fact the government promised to cut demand by 10 per cent. The IESO noted the alarming trend. "The peak Ontario demand of 25,414 megawatts (MW) set in August 2002 was exceeded on seven separate occasions this past summer, resulting in a new Ontario peak demand record of 26,160 MW on July 13, 2005," the system operator said. "Sustained high temperatures and humidity levels combined with limitations on supply, both from domestic generation and imports, presented a number of challenges for the IESO in managing the reliability of the electricity system." The system operator's 10-year outlook, released in the summer, noted that, among other things, Toronto and its suburbs need either more wires or more generators to supply their increasing thirst for power. "Significant transmission reinforcement is required in the Greater Toronto Area in order to maintain an acceptable level of supply reliability over the outlook period." It is particularly acute in downtown Toronto. With demand increasing and one local source of power, Lakeview generating station, already closed, there are two choices: Build new generators in the Toronto area or add more wires to bring power in from elsewhere. One solution is a 550-megawatt gas-fired generating plant for Toronto's portlands area, a joint venture between Ontario Power Generation and Trans-Canada Corp. It has all the environmental approvals and is waiting for provincial authorities to give it the nod. Copyright Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All ***************************************************************** 30 UK: Observer: 'We have no other option' [UP] The nuclear debate The case for by former energy minister Brian Wilson Sunday December 4, 2005 The Observer By acknowledging that nuclear power should continue to be part of our future energy mix, Tony Blair has responded to pressing realities and also moved in the same direction as public opinion. The challenge now is to turn this nod in nuclear's direction into something more substantial - while promoting a policy that is not only accepted but positively approved of. Two opinion polls taken last month, before the Prime Minister's speech to the CBI launched the debate, showed growing support for nuclear new-build. But perhaps the most interesting finding from these surveys came from a second question asked by the one commissioned by Deloitte's - would you support nuclear new-build if it was part of a strategy that also included increased reliance on renewables? At that point, support jumped to 62 per cent. In other words, it is essential for ministers to stress and mean that nuclear and renewables are not rivals but two sides of the same coin - namely, the overriding imperative of an energy mix that reduces carbon emissions and combats global warming. As Energy Minister, I developed the mantra that there has never been a nuclear moratorium in this country. It is just that nobody has, for some time, wanted to build them. In today's changed circumstances, that gets over the first hurdle - we don't need legislation to build new nuclear stations. But it still leaves the second - who will want to do it? It is only three years since British Energy, our main nuclear generator, was driven to the verge of bankruptcy by a brief period of unsustainably low electricity prices. For excellent reasons of safety and regulation, there are irreducible costs that nuclear stations must meet. You can't switch reactors on and off, like coal or gas-fired stations. So there has to be some degree of certainty in the market if investors are going to back nuclear power. With generating capacity now reduced, it is unlikely that prices will again fall to their 2001-03 levels. So the guarantees needed for nuclear - in terms of either security of demand or a minimum price - will be quite modest. There may even be a case for concluding that such a risk no longer has to be factored in. We just need an early agreement on what guarantees, if any, government needs to offer to private investors in order to give substance to a pro-nuclear policy. Another key area to be sorted out without waiting for the energy review is planning. We can be sure that, in the light of last week's activity, every anti-nuclear group in the land is gearing up for the three-ring circuses of public inquiries with a view to dragging the process out for as long as is possible. Historically, the system has played straight into their hands. Yet the likelihood is that any applications for new-build will be on sites already licensed for nuclear generation. So do we really need a process that stretches over years rather than months? Plans for new stations should be subjected to proper scrutiny - but not to the timewasting tactics that have bedevilled the process in the past. It is unlikely that reactor designs will be proposed that have not been used elsewhere in the world. There will be a huge body of existing knowledge to draw on. The third key area in which there should be early progress is waste. This is still the biggest public worry yet any serious scientist will tell you that the necessary decisions have not been delayed by technical obstacles but by the political failure to get on with it. That failure, in turn, has been driven by the tactical ploy adopted by opponents of nuclear power - first insist that you cannot have new-build until you have a 'solution' on waste and then ensure that the 'solution' is indefinitely delayed. If the government now wants to deal with the legacy problem of waste and also deal with an ongoing issue of public concern, it has to be courageous and designate a site that meets the technical specifications. Alongside action on these three issues, the government has to enhance support for renewables. That does not only mean battling a bit harder for onshore windfarms. We need to stop talking about the 'potential' of biomass and marine technologies - wind, wave and tidal - and instead get real impetus behind them. The alternative to pushing ahead rapidly with these actions is not to stand still but to become ever more dependent on, and therefore vulnerable to, the vagaries of imported gas. In this whole debate, the key statistic to remember is that - on the basis of existing policies - 70 per cent of the UK's electricity will come from gas by 2020 and 90 per cent of that gas will be imported. Take a look at what is happening to gas prices at present - for reasons which Lord Browne of BP delicately describes as 'opaque' - and the urgency of making other arrangements quickly becomes apparent. · Brian Wilson is a non-executive director of Amec Nuclear [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 31 UK: Observer: Grasping the nuclear nettle The Guardian [UP] The nuclear debate With a review of UK energy policy about to get under way, expert writers from both sides of the atomic power argument explain the issues behind this crucial question Malcolm Wicks, Energy Minister Sunday December 4, 2005 The Observer Fierce winds of change are battering the global energy agenda. This was quite literally the case three months ago when Hurricane Katrina made landfall on the Louisiana/Mississippi border, devastating the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans. It also sent shockwaves through the global energy market, raising profound questions about the interdependence of our economies. Here in the UK, the reality check was twofold. For years an energy island with surplus supplies of cheap oil and gas from the North Sea, we have now become a net importer, exposed to the international energy market. Katrina's impact on supplies and prices left us in no doubt of how volatile that can be. Since becoming Energy Minister in May, one question has repeatedly come to my mind. How comfortable are we about being dependent on imported gas? On the face of it, there's plenty of gas in the world. There could be enough supply from Russia, for instance, to keep the EU's fires burning for decades to come. Projections, however, show that by 2050, if we don't take stock now, the UK will be generating some 60 per cent of its electricity using gas. We would be more exposed to the risk both of natural disasters like Katrina and political instability in distant producer countries. And the chances of us achieving our ambitious 2050 carbon emission targets would be seriously threatened. Should we therefore be looking more to cleaner home-grown sources of energy? These are the strategic challenges the Prime Minister has asked me to consider in a review of energy policy for the decades beyond 2010. A lot of rubbish has been written about the energy review before it has even started. Let me dispel some myths. First, the idea that nothing has changed since we last looked at energy policy is nonsense. Faster-than-expected North Sea decline, global oil prices rising by 50 per cent in just three years, hardening of the scientific consensus around climate change and, with 30 per cent of the UK's generating capacity set to close by 2020, critical investment decisions on new capacity fast approaching. This is a very different world from just three years ago. Now is the right time for a cool-headed, evidence-based assessment of the options open to us. It is a matter of tremendous national importance. Nuclear raises particular demons, often born out of the politics of their time. For the record, I marched on Aldermaston in the 1960s, long before a more recent (and more official) visit to Sellafield. So let me now counter a second myth. On my watch, in my review, there is no foregone conclusion to the prospect of new nuclear power stations. Our 12 existing nuclear stations, currently providing a fifth of our electricity, will reach the end of their lives over the next 30 years. Given that nuclear power is a source of low-carbon energy, it has to be one of the options considered for filling this gap. If some green campaigners choose to swing from the rafters, rather than engage in serious discussion, that is their mistake. I am open-minded, but I go into this with my own concerns. It is a disgrace that, only since this government came to power, have we got to grips with the legacy of previous civil nuclear programmes. What I won't do is leave future generations in the same boat. We have established the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority, which has already set out plans to speed up the clean-up process. By next summer, the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management will report on how best to dispose of the nuclear waste that's been left sitting in storage for decades. I nevertheless go into this review nuclear-neutral, keen to see what today's more advanced civil nuclear technologies can offer. I want to sweep away historic prejudice and put in its place evidence and science. It is about time we grasped the nuclear nettle and decided one way or another. The answer could be yes. But it could be no. A third myth meets a similar fate to the first two. There is no one panacea out there. There will inevitably be trade-offs to be made in arriving at the right package of policy proposals, but only through maintaining diversity within the energy mix can we ensure true energy security. As an island nation, we would be foolish not to exploit to the full all the natural resources that affords. Research from Oxford University recently confirmed that Britain has the best wind resource in Europe, providing most energy during peak daytime and winter periods. I am wedded to increasing the amount of energy we source from this and other forms of renewables. This year, there's been record growth in the industry and our drive to reach our 10 per cent target by 2010 is undiminished. And, regardless of any decision on nuclear, fossil fuels will need to remain in the mix for decades to come. This is why we've already put aside £25 million to invest in technologies like carbon capture and storage, which could cut emissions of damaging CO2 from gas and coal fired power stations by up to 90 per cent. The Norwegian energy minister, Odd Roger Enoksen, and I have just this week agreed to work in partnership with governments around the North Sea rim to help realise the full potential of sub-sea CO2 storage. The last myth to be put out of its misery is the one that says this will be a review conducted in Whitehall, behind closed doors. Tough decisions need to be taken, and it is crucial that we engage the public throughout the process, as well as academic, business, industry, scientific, NGO and other experts. The British public is notoriously difficult to gauge. Amid the plethora of polls commissioned by one lobby or another, what I'm sure of is that the effects of farflung events like Katrina, together with dire warnings on climate change, have planted energy at the forefront of people's minds. I sense an appetite for debate on this issue and that's what I intend to tap into as I conduct this review over the coming months. · Malcolm Wicks is Minister of State for Energy at the Department of Trade and Industry [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 32 9/11 Panel Says Nuke Power Plants Vulnerable To Terror Attacks Date: Mon, 5 Dec 2005 00:48:49 -0500 X-Fingerprint: smirnowb@ix.netcom.com-127.127 CRAC-2 Report [Greatly Watered Down] On Fatalities, Deaths, Injuries, $$ Damage From NPP Meltdowns: http://www.mothersalert.org/crac.html [Mandated By NRC, Study Carried Out By Sandia Labs] Nuke Terror Site: http://www.tmia.com/sabter.html http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/politics/politics-security-usa.html September 11 Panel Leaders Say US Still at Risk a.. E-Mail This b.. Printer-Friendly c.. Save Article By REUTERS Published: December 4, 2005 Filed at 6:26 p.m. ET WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is still unprepared for another inevitable terrorist attack after not doing enough to improve communications for emergency personnel and bolster security at nuclear plants, the heads of the former September 11 Commission said on Sunday. Skip to next paragraph Former commission chairman Thomas Kean said preparing for another attack has not been a high enough priority for President George W. Bush and Congress. ``A lot of the things we need to do really to prevent another 9/11 just simply aren't being done by the president or by the Congress,'' Kean, the former Republican governor of New Jersey, said on NBC's ``Meet the Press.'' The comments come ahead of the commission's final update, which will be released Monday, grading the status of its post-September 11 security recommendations and in most cases the Bush administration and U.S. lawmakers earned a failing grade, said Kean and Lee Hamilton, the former Democratic representative from Indiana who was the September 11 Commission's vice chairman. While there has been a little progress in some areas, several major issues remain, Kean and Hamilton said. Among the major shortcomings they cited was setting aside radio airwaves for police, firefighters and other first responders to use in an emergency. Allocating funds in areas most at risk and setting up a central command system with clear leaders also is floundering, they said. ``We believe that another attack will occur and we had better get to it and protect the American people,'' Hamilton said. ``It's not a question of if.'' In the last of a series of updates since the commission's official report was released in August 2004, Hamilton said they plan to highlight ``that there is a lack of a sense of urgency'' in making reforms. Work by the Department of Homeland Security to evaluate the risk of attack at nuclear power plants and chemical plants was ''totally inadequate,'' Kean said. ``It doesn't set the priorities out,'' he said. ``It just sets basically vague guidelines, what the priorities should be.'' Congress is working to finish two bills on the first responder issue and the appropriations process. ``If these two bills are passed on radio spectrum and allocation of funds, the grades will quickly switch to a B or an A,'' Kean said. The chairmen also criticized the Transportation Security Administration's decision last week to allow small scissors and screwdrivers back on U.S. airplanes as a step backward. They said efforts to conduct random passenger checks were misguided and more should be done to screen cargo for explosives. ***************************************************************** 33 Daytona Beach News-Journal: Making too little of plutonium load Editorials INDEPENDENT VOICE OF VOLUSIA & FLAGLER COUNTIES By KARL GROSSMAN Special to The News-Journal Last update: December 04, 2005 Editor's note: Grossman, professor of journalism at the State University of New York/College at Old Westbury, is author of "The Wrong Stuff: The Space Program's Nuclear Threat To Our Planet." NASA is again rolling dice with the lives of the people of Florida. The space agency intends to launch an Atlas rocket carrying a space probe with 24 pounds of plutonium fuel in January. Once it separates from the rocket, the probe, on what NASA calls its New Horizons mission, would move on through space powered by conventional chemical fuel. The plutonium is contained in a radioisotope thermoelectric generator, or RTG, that is to provide on-board electricity for the probe's instruments -- a mere 180 watts when it gets to its destination of Pluto. But if the Atlas rocket with the space probe and RTG it is to loft undergoes a catastrophic accident at launch, some of that plutonium could be dispersed -- affecting life in Florida. NASA calculates the chances of a successful mission at 94 percent. As to the release of plutonium -- long-considered the most deadly radioactive substance known -- NASA puts the odds at 1-in-300. These figures are contained -- and repeated -- in NASA's "Final Environmental Impact Statement for the New Horizons Mission." If people knew they had a 1-in-300 chance of winning the Florida lottery, there would be lines miles long at every store selling lottery tickets from Daytona Beach to Key West. Of course, the payoff with the 1-in-300 New Horizons odds wouldn't be cold cash but hot plutonium. The plutonium could spread far and wide -- up to 62 miles from the launch site at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, according to the NASA impact statement. "Should a release of radioactive material occur in the launch area," states the impact statement, "the state of Florida, Brevard County and local governments would determine an appropriate course of action for any off-site plans -- such as sheltering in place, evacuation, exclusion of people from contaminated land areas, or no action required." You think Hurricane Wilma was a problem. And if this storm is radioactive, it wouldn't be a matter of people with chain saws, roofers and carpenters cleaning up the mess. The impact statement says the cost to decontaminate land on which the plutonium falls would range from "about $241 million to $1.3 billion per square mile." In "addition," says NASA, "costs may include: temporary or longer term relocation of residents; temporary or longer term loss of employment; destruction or quarantine of agricultural products including citrus crops; land use restrictions which could affect real estate values, tourism and recreational activities; restrictions or bans on commercial fishing; and public health effects and medical care." As to the death toll, NASA projects that the dispersed plutonium could result in 100 people dying from cancer. This is regarded as "totally ridiculous" by Dr. Ernest Sternglass, professor emeritus of radiological physics at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. Plutonium is considered the most lethal radioactive substance because a millionth of a gram of plutonium dust lodged in the lung can be a fatal dose. "The problem is that it takes just a tiny amount of plutonium to cause cancer," says Dr. Sternglass. "I suppose if immediately everybody in the direction to which the wind is blowing was evacuated, that could hold the numbers down but that's impossible. It's totally unrealistic," he says. "If there's an explosion, that stuff will come down within minutes. How do you prevent people from inhaling it -- even while evacuating." Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space, says "one thing we know is that space technology can and does fail and when you mix deadly plutonium into the equation, you are asking for catastrophe." The last time NASA launched a space probe with plutonium onboard from Florida was 1997 on a mission called Cassini. At that time, Gagnon was asked to speak to the Cape Canaveral City Council whose members told him, he recounts, that officials of NASA and the Air Force had assured them "that Cassini was the last plutonium mission." Now moving ahead with New Horizons, NASA is "playing nuclear Russian roulette with the public," charges Gagnon. (The Global Network's Web site: www.space4peace.org) Indeed, NASA is planning a series of additional launches of plutonium-fueled space probes and other shots involving nuclear material. Under its $3 billion Project Prometheus program, the agency is working on nuclear reactors to be carried up by rockets for placement on the moon and building and launching actual atomic-propelled rockets. Even if disaster doesn't strike on the New Horizons mission, sooner or later nuclear space tragedy will occur. Indeed, accidents have already happened. Of the 25 U.S. space missions using plutonium fuel, three have undergone accidents, admits the NASA impact statement on New Horizons. That's a 1-in-8 record. The worst occurred in 1964 and involved, notes the impact statement, the SNAP-9A RTG with 2.1 pounds of plutonium fuel. A satellite it was to provide electricity to failed to achieve orbit and dropped to Earth. The RTG disintegrated in the fall, spreading plutonium widely. Release of that plutonium caused an increase in global lung cancer rates, says Dr. John Gofman, professor emeritus of medical physics at the University of California at Berkeley. After the SNAP-9A accident, NASA pioneered the development of solar energy in space. Now all satellites -- and the International Space Station -- are solar powered. But NASA keeps insisting on plutonium power for space probes -- even as the Rosetta space probe, launched by NASA's counterpart, the European Space Agency, with solar power providing all on-board electricity, heads today for a rendezvous with a comet near Jupiter. And, along with the U.S. military, which for decades has been planning for the deployment of nuclear-energized weapons in space, NASA seeks wider uses of atomic power above our heads. In its New Horizons impact statement, NASA maintains the risks to people from the mission aren't so bad in view of a chart it presents titled "Calculated Individual Risk and Probability of Fatality by Various Causes in the United States." The chart lists the probability of getting killed by lightning or in a flood or by a tornado as higher than someone dying of cancer because of plutonium dispersed in New Horizons. But we can't control lightning or floods or tornadoes. These are involuntary assaults. NASA's game of space-borne Russian roulette is being carried out by choice -- with the people of Florida on the front lines in this reckless, mindless NASA adventure using our tax dollars. (The taxpayer cost of New Horizons: $650 million, not counting data analysis.) A hurricane can't be stopped, but we can -- and should -- stop NASA's deadly dangerous nuclear space operations. 2005 News-Journal Corporation | news-journalonline.com (SM) ***************************************************************** 34 North County Times: Chilling true-life account of nuclear close call North San Diego and Southwest Riverside County News December 3, 2005 8:25 PM By: NORMAN N. BROWN - Associated Press "Red Star Rogue: The Untold Story of a Soviet Submarine's Nuclear Strike Attempt on the U.S." (Simon &Schuster, $25) is as exciting as any novel. It is full of dramatic circumstances, tales of impending world danger and the possibility of a nuclear war. But this is not fiction. It is a true story that will horrify readers as they realize that a nuclear attack on the United States was seconds away from occurring on March 7, 1968. These events have been brought to light by co-authors Kenneth Sewell, a nuclear engineer and a veteran of intelligence operations with the U.S. Navy's submarine branch, and Clint Richmond. In 1968, the Cold War was raging. The Soviet Union continued its saber-rattling and attempts to spread communism. The United States was involved in Vietnam and was concerned with military preparedness for threats from the communist world including China, a growing military power and a dangerous foe. But the Soviet empire was becoming bankrupt trying to keep its military on a par with America's while supporting the armies of its satellite countries. There was dissension within the Soviet government fueled by hardliners. One possible solution: provoke a war between China and the United States. Such a war would destroy China and open it to Soviet occupation and future dominance. It would also weaken America's military, and undermine its will and capacity to stand up to world communism. It is not known who set in motion Russia's plot to launch a nuclear missile at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, from a purportedly Chinese submarine. But such an attack would trigger an immediate American response, and the Kremlin would have only to sit back and enjoy watching its two enemies battle it out. According to the plan, a Soviet submarine, the K-129, based in Siberia, would perpetrate the attack. It was the same type of ship the Soviets had sold to China when the two nations were on friendlier terms. The type of missile to be fired was similar to that deployed by the Chinese navy except that China's version had a much shorter range than the Russian missile. So, to reinforce the pretense that China was the attacker, the Russian sub would have to get much closer to its target than would have otherwise been necessary. The K-129 was ordered to sea in late February 1968 with its usual crew plus 11 men who were not members of the submarine branch. They had gone aboard without explanation shortly before the K-129 left port. It is surmised that these men, who have never been identified, were to seize the submarine from its crew at the appropriate moment and fire the missile. The mission failed when the missile exploded in its tube. The submarine and all aboard were lost about 350 miles northwest of Hawaii. U.S. Navy intelligence eventually reconstructed the track of the K-129 and found spy-satellite evidence of the explosion. Subsequent activity by the Soviet navy pointed to a search for a lost submarine. The U.S. Navy investigated the area where the explosions had been recorded and found the remains of K-129. The wreck was photographed and explored, and later recovered by the U.S. The story of the recovery was kept secret at first but was later leaked, although full of falsehoods. Since the end of the Cold War, information from American and Russian sources has clarified the circumstances. In "Red Star Rogue," Sewell and Richmond have written a coherent version of this obscure and frightening episode. webmaster@nctimes.com © 1997-2005 North County Times – Lee Enterprises editor@nctimes.com ***************************************************************** 35 Herald News: Elevated tritium levels not a danger [SuburbanChicagoNews.com] • Braidwood plant: Recent discovery should not be of concern to the public By STAFF WRITER BRACEVILLE An elevated level of tritium recently discovered on the Braidwood Generating Station properties poses no risk to the public, officials say. Tritium is a naturally occurring isotope of hydrogen that emits a very low level of radiation and is a natural part of water. It is found in more concentrated levels in water used in nuclear reactors. High exposure to tritium increases the risk of developing cancer. "Higher than normal concentrations of tritium were discovered close to an underground pipe inside the plant's northern boundary," said Exelon Nuclear spokesman Craig Nesbit. "The station has begun a remediation program. At no time did we exceed the EPA guidelines." The closest private residential wells to the site showed no tritium amounts above the naturally occuring amount. Nesbit said a sample of water from a pond 50 yards north of the plant property line had 2,400 picocuries per liter of tritium. "This is less than one-eighth of the federal drinking water limit," Nesbit said. "The residential and pond test samples were taken with the consent of the property owners." The underground pipe that passes near the site where the high tritium levels were discovered carries water containing tritium from the plant to the Kankakee River, where it is periodically discharged under federal guidelines as part of normal plant operations. Nesbit said the pipe has been emptied. High levels of tritium were also found on company property about 50 feet from the pipe. The amount tapered down as testing was done about 250 feet away on plant property. The higher tritium concentrations were near the location of a 1998 valve malfunction where several million gallons of water sent through the underground pipe to the river escaped onto the top of the ground and pooled. Nesbit said the spill did not violate environmental regulations or permits and was contained entirely on plant property. Exelon Nuclear's environmental experts believe the contaminated water later seeped into the shallow groundwater there and began drifting. "The important thing is there are no safety or health threats from this tritium," said Keith Polson, site vice president. "We know where the tritium is, we know that no more of it is being introduced into the ground and we know we can clean it up." The tritium concentrations were discovered by an enhanced ground-water monitoring program launched at the Braidwood site several months ago. Tritium is used commercially as a source of light for exit and safety signs. Its most significant use is as a component used to trigger thermonuclear weapons. - Reporter Kim Smith can be reached at (815) 729-6067 or via e-mail at 12/03/05 SuburbanChicagoNews.com — © Digital Chicago & Sun-Times ***************************************************************** 36 FLORIDA TODAY: Pluto mission comes with risk December 4, 2005 Threat is small of plutonium release BY TODD HALVORSON Prep work. Technicians work on the New Horizons probe at Kennedy Space Center. NASA image Protecting the public: Probe powered with plutonium - Flash Launch accident safety measures Clip this and stick it on your refrigerator. The chances of a launch accident involving NASA's plutonium-powered New Horizons spacecraft are remote. But if an accident occurs and a cloudlike plume drifts toward you, follow these instructions: CAPE CANAVERAL - NASA plans to stage the world's first mission to Pluto next month, launching a plutonium-powered spacecraft on an Atlas 5 rocket at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Destined to explore the icy edges of the solar system, the probe is equipped with a generator that will convert heat from the decay of 24 pounds of plutonium into electricity to heat and run the spacecraft systems. Government studies show that the mission poses more danger to Central Florida than a typical rocket launch. So much so, in fact, that White House approval -- which is expected early next year -- is required to give the go-ahead for launch. There is a 1 in 350 chance that a launch area accident could release radioactive plutonium somewhere in a six-county area surrounding Cape Canaveral, according to a review of public records and interviews with government officials. Anti-nuclear activists worry about worst-case scenarios spelled out in safety reports, saying an accident could devastate nearby communities, although the studies indicate the likelihood of such a disaster is about 1 in 18 million. The plutonium fuel aboard the spacecraft is not the highly explosive material used in nuclear weapons. It is a different grade only dangerous to people if reduced to fine dust. The maximum dose a person might be exposed to in most accident scenarios would be similar to seven or eight medical X-rays, according to the government studies. The type of radiation, alpha radiation, is easily shielded. It cannot penetrate the skin, clothing or even a piece of paper. It is only dangerous if inhaled or ingested. The regional risk drops to nil 40 seconds after liftoff. By that time, the 205-foot Atlas rocket will have arced out over the Atlantic Ocean, and the studies found no chance of a plutonium release if the rocket crashes into water. Nonetheless, emergency management officials ask people to be aware of plans to launch the New Horizons spacecraft between Jan. 11 and Feb. 14. If the rocket explodes, sending a cloudlike plume drifting toward populated areas, officials say there would be no cause for alarm or evacuation. As with any launch accident that releases toxic rocket propellant, people might be asked to seek shelter in homes, buildings or cars. They might be asked to bring pets inside, close doors, windows and fireplaces, and turn off air conditioners. "The biggest danger is the possibility of public panic, and there is no reason for that at all," said Bob Lay, director of the Brevard County Office of Emergency Management. "You have a heck of a lot higher risk driving down I-95 than being hurt in this thing." Others beg to differ. Anti-nuclear protesters say the government studies also outline alarming worst-case scenarios. Should the Atlas 5 rocket fail early in flight and crash into hard ground, people within 62 miles of Cape Canaveral could be exposed to fine particles of plutonium. That would increase the chance that up to 100 people in the area could get cancer some time in the next 50 years, according to studies by NASA and the Department of Energy. Up to 115 square miles of land could be contaminated. Clean-up costs could range from $241 million to $1.3 billion per square mile, in an area that could stretch from Daytona Beach to Vero Beach and Orlando. The odds The odds of that: about 1 in 18 million. That's similar to the chance of correctly choosing the winning combination of six numbers in the Florida Lotto: one in 23 million. Considering the potential consequences, some say the risk is not worth taking. "You think hurricanes are a problem? Think of the mess cleaning up after a plutonium release," said Bruce Gagnon, coordinator of Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, based in Maine. "Imagine making that area a nuclear wasteland," he said. "That's always been our deep concern. The possibility of accidents and the reality of contamination." The controversy is about the craft's electrical power system, a device known as a Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator. Similar generators enabled the U.S. to send robotic scouts to the outer planets, destinations too far from the sun for solar panels that convert sunlight into electricity. Over the past half century, the nuclear generators were used on 25 U.S. missions, including the Apollo flights to the moon and voyages to Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune as well as a mission to study the sun's poles. The generators for the most part have proved safe and reliable. But there have been problems. In April 1964, a U.S. Navy satellite failed to reach a stable orbit and its nuclear generator disintegrated, as designed, during atmospheric re-entry. About 2 pounds of plutonium dispersed, increasing by 4 percent the amount in the global environment, most of which came from the fallout of atmospheric nuclear weapons testing. Redesigned for safety The incident prompted a generator redesign geared at ensuring the devices would not spew plutonium in an atmospheric re-entry accident. The redesigned generator was put to the test on its first mission. A NASA weather satellite had to be destroyed by Air Force safety officials when its carrier rocket went off course shortly after a 1968 launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The mangled satellite was recovered from the Santa Barbara Channel, its nuclear generator intact. Its plutonium fuel was reclaimed and used to power another satellite launched the next year. Another nuclear generator was aboard the Apollo 13 lunar lander, which served as a lifeboat for three astronauts when their 1970 mission was aborted on the way to the moon. The astronauts ultimately returned to Earth safely in the command module, which was seriously damaged when an oxygen tank exploded. Their lunar lander re-entered Earth's atmosphere separately, plunging into the South Pacific Ocean. It came to rest at the bottom of the 20,000-foot-deep Tonga Trench. Extensive sampling of the remote ocean area showed no plutonium was released. Detection teams For New Horizons, the federal government plans to station 16 teams at sites between the southern ends of Brevard and Volusia counties. In a launch accident, radiation detection devices would enable them to determine whether plutonium was released and the relative danger, if any, to launch site workers or people in surrounding communities. People living in communities downwind from any drifting plume likely would hunker down inside their houses for about an hour or so, Lay said. That's the estimate for how long it would take for field teams to determine the risk to local communities. If none, county emergency management officials would broadcast an "all clear" and normal life would resume. "I think Mr. and Mrs. Brevard County should feel very comfortable" with the approaching launch as well as emergency plans, Lay said. "But as with any launch, Mr. and Mrs. Brevard need to be aware that there is a launch, and if there is a contingency, they need to know what action to take," he said. "The absolute worst case I can imagine would be having to tell people to shelter in place. Not to evacuate, but to shelter in place." Contact Halvorson at 639-0576 or ***************************************************************** 37 Las Vegas SUN: Critics tackle a mountain of comments on Yucca Las Vegas SUN Today: December 04, 2005 at 13:22:44 PST By Benjamin Grove Las Vegas Sun WASHINGTON -- Yucca Mountain has been the focus of controversies big and small . Call the latest Commentgate. At issue: Just how many public comments were submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency about its draft radiation standard for the proposednuclear waste repository? The EPA is reviewing the comments before making the proposed standard final . The agency had posted 186 comments as of Friday (the comment d is over). But several Yucca activists say there are far more than that. Five of the comments are marked as "mass comment campaigns" organized by anti-Yucca groups including Citizen Alert in Nevada and the Washington-based Nuclear Information and Resource Service, in which people signed identical postcards and e-mails. A total of 2,259 people took part in the campaigns. Citizen Alert leader Peggy Maze Johnson said the EPA should count each as an individual comment even if they are identical, which would mean an overwhelming majority of the comments opposed the standard. Another controversy: The EPA had posted the public comments on its Web site until last weekend when the posts suddenly disappeared, prompting Yucca critics to wonder if their criticisms had been trashed already. Conspiracy? No, the EPA said. Just bureaucracy. The comments were moved to a government documents clearing house at www.regulations.gov. But the comments last week were not easily found. Users must navigate a complex search and they must know to type in the Yucca docket ID number -- OAR-2005-0083 -- into the Web sites search engine. "Its just nuts," Johnson said. "They dont make it easy to be an informed or concerned citizen." An EPA spokeswoman apologized for moving the comments without notice and for the comments being so hard to find. "Sometimes there are a few glitches in the system," spokeswoman Suzanne Ackerman said. The Politics of Iraq The House returns to Washington this week after a Thanksgiving recess amid heightened political tensions over Iraq (the Senate is due back next week). As expected, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., continued to trade barbs with Republicans during the holiday break. After a widely anticipated Bush speech at the Naval Academy last week, Reid said the president had "missed an opportunity to lay out a real strategy for success in Iraq that will bring our troops safely home." The Republican National Committees research department fired an e-mail about Reid to reporters under the heading "Senator Sieve." It contained the words of conservative columnist John Fund who blasted Reid for telling a Nevada television news program that he had been informed that Osama bin Laden was killed in the Pakistan earthquake. "Heres hoping al-Qaida figures arent soon appearing on Al Jazeera television chortling about the clueless Mr. Reid," Fund wrote. Reids PR Machine As an extension of Reids communications war room efforts, Senate Democrats have primed their public relations operation in advance of a muchanticipated roll-out of a sweeping new party agenda expected in January, Roll Call reported. The plan includes a new media booking effort to get more Senate Democrats on radio and cable television talk shows to compete with Republicans, the Capitol Hill newspaper reported. Democratic leaders are keeping careful notes about who appears and who doesnt -- 32 senators appeared on 175 cable shows and 73 radio programs between Oct. 3 and Nov. 18, aides to Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., told Roll Call. There is overt pressure to join the effort: Democratic senators at a weekly party lunch are subjected to a "highlight" video of senators who best delivered the party message in speeches and interviews that week. Waste Reprocessing Concerns Some prominent scientists and public policy experts are shocked that some members of Congress are giddy over the prospects of "reprocessing," or recycling, nuclear waste. Congress this year set aside $50 million to research the controversial technology that removes plutonium from waste and could reduce the toxicity of waste bound for Yucca Mountain. The process has not been used in this country largely because of fears of whether the plutonium could fall into the hands of terrorists. Some experts outside Congress say there is no reason to pursue the technology. Last week a three-member panel at a Federation of American Scientists conference in Washington said reprocessing is expensive, unnecessary, and undermines U.S. efforts to reduce proliferation of nuclear material. The government is going to have a difficult time telling other countries not to reprocess if it kickstarts its own program, said Steve Fetter, dean of the School of Public Policy at the University of Maryland. It would be "catastrophic" to U.S. nonproliferation policy, agreed Frank N. von Hippel, co-director of the Program on Science and Global Security at Princeton University. "It certainly doesnt make economic sense," he added. Reprocessing is being wrongly viewed by some as a solution to the "political problem" that is Yucca Mountain, said Ernest Moniz, head of the Physics Department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He also added that there was no "technical pressure" to put waste underground at Yucca, just political pressure. The panel members generally agreed that storing waste at above-ground interim waste sites was a good waste solution. Benjamin Grove can be reached at (202) 662-7436 or at grove@lasvegassun.com. All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 38 Independent: Waste whistleblowers to go to tribunal By Tim Webb Published: 04 December 2005 Two ousted board members of the organisation that decides how to store the UK's nuclear waste are taking the Government to an employment tribunal. One was sacked from the government-appointed organisation after accusing it of being incompetent, and after claiming some board members had conflicts of interest. The other resigned in protest. There are also fears that some remaining members could reject the organisation's recommendations, which are now due at the end of April, and publish a "minority report" proposing a different solution on how to store the waste. A source close to the board said that a minority report would be a "final sanction", but added that the remaining 11 members would try to find a consensus. The revelations will be hugely embarrassing to the Government, which has avoided making a decision about what to do with the 470,000 cubic metres of current and future nuclear waste currently stored at more than 30 sites in the UK. Last week, Tony Blair announced the long-awaited energy review that will decide whether new nuclear reactors should be built in the UK. Critics have cited the failure to solve current waste problems in their opposition to more nuclear power. The Committee on Radioactive Waste Management (CoRWM) was set up by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) in March 2003. It must make its final recommendation to the Government next summer, but will issue draft proposals in April. Dr Keith Baverstock, the former head of the radiation protection division at the World Health Organisation, was sacked earlier this year after complaining to the Government that CoRWM's methods were unscientific. One solution put forward by CoRWM was to blast the waste into outer space. It was also revealed by The Independent on Sunday that four CoRWM board members worked for its largest suppliers. The chairman, Gordon MacKerron, denied this affected decision-making. Dr Baverstock is claiming around £30,000 in lost earnings and another £20,000 in compensation for unfair dismissal. Professor David Ball, who resigned in protest at Dr Baverstock's sacking, wants a similar sum for his constructive dismissal claim. Dr Baverstock said: "If you form an independent committee to advise government on such an important subject and sack those with dissenting views or those who question the probity of the process, I do not believe the public is well served." A Defra spokeswoman said: "Defra will be defending its position and believes it has a strong case." CoRWM has drawn up a shortlist of options for nuclear waste. It proposes either storage in a deep underground bunker or at on-surface sites. © 2005 Independent News and Media Limited ***************************************************************** 39 UK: Independent: BNG finds US partner for clean-up bid By Tim Webb Published: 04 December 2005 British Nuclear Group (BNG) is teaming up with a little-known US company to bid for the first competitive contract for the estimated £56bn of nuclear clean-up work in the UK. BNG is preparing a joint bid with Maryland-based clean-up company Duratek for the initial contract for the low-level waste facility at Drigg in Cumbria. The contract, which will be for around three years, could be worth £20m. The Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA), which now has responsibility for most of the UK's nuclear liabilities, will issue the contract for the 110-hectare Drigg site next summer. The NDA says it will cost £1.3bn and take until 2150 to clean up and close the site, where nuclear waste has been stored since 1959. Other companies have already begun contacting the NDA about the Drigg contract. By 2008, the NDA must put out half of its total clean-up work to competitive tender. The UK company Amec and US giants Fluor, Jacobs and Bechtel are all interested in bidding. Bechtel is currently advising the NDA. A BNG spokesman declined to comment on Duratek. He said: "Whether we team up - and, if so, who with - is commercially confidential." A spokeswoman for Duratek said it had spoken to UK companies including BNG about the Drigg contract. "We are looking at teaming and partnering with companies," she said. "We have not disclosed who with. But we think [teaming up] with a UK company is the right thing to do." © 2005 Independent News and Media Limited ***************************************************************** 40 Salt Lake Tribune: Raw deal: Utah gets California pollution Article Last Updated: 12/03/2005 02:04:24 AM Dirty air: Utahns pay with their environment for selling coal-generated power to the Golden State By Patty Henetz The Salt Lake Tribune While Utah vehemently resists being regarded as the nation's dumping ground for radioactive waste, it is one of four Western states apparently willing to serve the same purpose for California's air pollution. That's the message of a new report on coal-fired electric plants in the interior West. The report's authors calculate the amount of pollution spewed in the interior West, where coal plants supply about 20 percent of California's electricity. The plants - Intermountain Power Project in Utah, Four Corners and San Juan in New Mexico, Mohave and Reid Gardner in Nevada and the Navajo Generating Station in Arizona - emit 10 times more sulfur dioxide than all the plants in California, 10 times more smog-forming nitrogen oxide, 200 times the mercury and 67 million tons of carbon dioxide, which feeds global warming. By comparison, stringent clean-air regulations ensure the power plants within California's borders emit virtually no sulfur dioxide or mercury, two of the most noxious pollutants tied to the electricity industry, says the report compiled by the Center for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Technologies, Environmental Defense and Western Resource Advocates. Despite steps taken during the past six months to curtail the problem, California's pollution is likely to blanket the West for decades to come due to long-term contracts with Western power plants. If the greenhouse gases continue to be emitted at current levels - equivalent to the emissions from more than 11 million cars - they will equal reductions California expects to see due to strict new tailpipe emissions standards, essentially wiping out the gains. "While the power from these coal plants is transmitted many miles to customers in California, the pollution and environmental disturbances stay behind, sending a cascade of human health and environmental impacts across the American West and the globe," says the report that uses data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Department of Energy and the California Energy Commission. It's as if millions of ghostly California drivers are motoring about the West trailing clouds of exhaust. According to the EPA, during 2002 and 2003, the IPP plant near Delta emitted an average of 14.95 million tons per year of carbon dioxide. "These annual emissions are equivalent to those from 2.6 million cars," said Jana Milford, Environmental Defense senior scientist. By comparison, in 2003, 1.7 million cars, trucks and motorcycles were registered in Utah, said Peter Verschoor, a Utah Division of Air Quality scientist who monitors vehicle-related emissions. The power plants highlighted in the report, called "Clearing California's Coal Shadow from the American West," are located in remote areas near the Grand Canyon, Canyonlands, Bryce Canyon, Arches, Capitol Reef and Zion national parks. According to the advocates who wrote the report released Thursday, air quality in the areas around the plants regularly exceed California's ozone pollution standards. "This is the first time anyone has ever actually taken a total-picture look at the results of selling power to California," said Tim Wagner, the Utah Sierra Club's Smart Energy Campaign director. "It [negates] the long tradition this state has with coal, and this automatic assumption this is a safe thing and we don't have to worry about it." California is the biggest potential customer for so-called merchant plants, built to sell power on the open market. The state needs to add about 1,000 megawatts a year - enough for about 1 million homes - to its grid to meet its growing needs. More than 20 new coal-fired plants are being proposed in seven Western states with an eye to selling electricity to California. But in June, amid increased concern about global climate change, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger issued an executive order making a top priority of protecting the environment, including that of states from which California imports power. On Oct. 6, the California Public Utilities Commission has validated the governor's order. Last week, the state's Energy Commission solidified the initiative. From now on, the state's primary goal is energy efficiency, followed by having energy from renewable sources account for a third of its electricity by 2020. The rest would be subject to greenhouse gas performance standards that would exclude the kind of power now generated from coal in the West. That doesn't mean coal would no longer be used to create electricity. Experiments with coal gasification, which strips out pollutants and allows the capture of greenhouse gases, are close to proving the technology is economically achievable. Reed Searle, IPP's general manager, says states, including Utah, are forming regional partnerships to pursue carbon sequestration - that is, capturing carbon dioxide for reuse or deep injection into the earth. Two of those projects are in Utah, where carbon dioxide will be injected into oilfields. Though gasification can add 20 percent to the cost of generation, "what's going on in California will drive that technology. It should come pretty fast," Searle said. Sarah Wright, executive director of Utah Clean Energy, a nonprofit public interest group working to speed the transition to sustainable alternative energy, says power from wind, landfill methane, biomass and geothermal sources are all less expensive than any new fossil fuel approaches, including gasification. "If you look at the risk of future carbon regulation and the risk of volatile fuel cost, the cost of renewables is offset," she said. "We're at a crossroads in our energy decisions. If California is willing to pay the incremental increase for renewables, it should jump-start the market." Meanwhile, because California's contracts with Western power plants are long-term - for example, IPP's electricity generation contract with the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power doesn't expire until 2027 - the pollution likely will continue. Milford, the Environmental Defense scientist, calculated California's share of IPP's greenhouse gas emissions will total 329 million tons during the next 22 years. Copyright Salt Lake City Tribune ***************************************************************** 41 Salt Lake Tribune: Goshutes' fight over exclusion continues Article Last Updated: 12/04/2005 12:53:19 AM The band wants to know exactly who is trying to stop its nuclear waste plans By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune The Skull Valley Goshutes have fought for more than two years to expose how Utah politicians have maneuvered in the halls of the U.S. Interior Department to scuttle the Goshutes' plan to store high-level nuclear waste on their Tooele County reservation. At first, tribal Chairman Leon Bear tried to unearth details through the federal Freedom of Information Act to learn about "secret meetings" the Interior Department held with opponents of the waste project. Then, last year, Bear's attorney filed a federal lawsuit claiming the Interior Department was illegally withholding important documents that told who was at those meetings and what was said. "The band was not being dealt with fairly or, more importantly, honestly," said Tim Vollmann, an attorney for Bear and the Skull Valley Band. The lawsuit documents reveal not only how bitter Goshute leaders have felt about not being invited to the political table on their own multibillion-dollar project, but also how doggedly state leaders have tried to win over the Interior Department - which serves as a trustee to all U.S. tribes - to help kill the waste project. The venture is worth millions to the 121-member Skull Valley Band, and Utah state government has virtually no authority over it because of the band's legal status as a sovereign nation. The document fight has dragged on for 19 months. And the Washington, D.C., court has yet to decide the case. Vollmann said Thursday it began when band leaders became frustrated over how they had been treated by the Interior Department after a meeting in the fall of 2002. At the meeting, Neal McCaleb, then-director of the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs, told tribal leaders the waste project had been marginalized. Court papers say Goshute leaders restated their commitment to the waste project. But they also agreed to tell the BIA how it could help the tribe. McCaleb retired at the year's end. It wasn't until the following March that Deputy Interior Secretary J. Steven Griles responded to the Goshutes' recommendations, suggesting "possible economic development projects that could be considered in lieu of that proposed [nuclear waste] project." He offered the Goshutes 26,800 acres of state and federal land - more than doubling the tribe's 18,000-acre reservation in the western Utah desert - along with an unspecified economic development project sponsored by the state, expanded hunting and fishing rights and a state-sponsored university tuition waiver for eligible tribe members. But his letter also said: "We are unable to meet the sum" of $50 million Bear said was needed "to position the band for economic success and fruitfulness." The Goshutes angrily disputed there had been a "proposal" or a "counterproposal" and called the Interior Department's offer "disingenuous." And they became furious after a news report that the state, the Interior Department and the Goshutes were discussing "alternatives" to the waste project. It had been McCaleb who insisted the discussions be confidential, the legal papers say. "It was clearly an attempt to embarrass the band and to put a wedge between the band and PFS," the consortium of nuclear energy companies behind licensing, building and operating the waste site, said Vollmann. Utah's opposition to the Skull Valley plan has never been secret. Former Gov. Mike Leavitt, declaring the waste would come to his state "over my dead body," supported more than five state and two federal laws intended to block the project, which is to be nearly big enough to hold all of the waste commercial reactors ever have produced, up to 44,000 tons. His administration has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to fight the Goshutes' lawsuits to strike down the state laws, paid the legal fees of waste site opponents within the band and mounted an unsuccessful fight to prevent the site from getting a license from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Leavitt even organized a government-private effort to mobilize public opinion against the project. But the state's ability to block the facility is limited because the tribe is a sovereign nation that has the right to do as it chooses on its lands, regardless of what surrounding neighbors think. The U.S. Attorney's Office, which is handling the lawsuit for the Interior Department, did not respond to a request for comment on the case. Nor did Bear. However, the court documents make it clear the two sides regarded the fight as politically supercharged. In court filings, the Goshutes complained the Interior Department, which released more than 600 pages of its records at one point, had redacted whole pages and hadn't even thoroughly reviewed its records. "They haven't given us what we think is most important," Vollmann said. "This is an election year, both for many state and federal officials (including the President) and for the Executive Committee of the Band," the Goshutes say in their lawsuit. "In Utah, politicians flog their efforts to block the transportation and storage of spent nuclear fuel rods within the state. The Skull Valley Band has attempted to play a role in that political process, but it needs to know the efforts which have been made by political opponents of the Band's project to influence the administrative process in the government agencies in Washington, D.C." The Interior Department defended itself by saying it has complied with the information request, only protecting details not available under the law, such as phone numbers and internal document drafts. The Goshutes argue "they are entitled to obtain and use the secret records of any government official who opposes their license application for their own political purposes," said Interior Department lawyers in one court filing. "Such a view is unfounded." Former Utah Rep. Jim Hansen served until 2003 as point man on the issue for the congressional delegation and often spearheaded lobbying efforts - such as letters and meetings - aimed at derailing the waste project. He said most of the state's opposition was largely open. "Personally, no one was out to hurt the Goshute band," Hansen said. Danielle Endres, a University of Utah communications professor, noted that the information request signaled the breakdown of trust between the Goshutes and their supposed advocates in the federal government. The Interior Department "does have the idealized role of protecting Indian land and resources and providing social services and promoting tribal autonomy," she said. Bob Miller, a professor at the College of Lewis and Clark in Oregon and member of the Eastern Shawnee tribe of Oklahoma, said it's understandable that the Goshutes feel like pawns in the handling of their own multibillion-dollar project. Many tribes have been battling such treatment for all 200 years of federal-tribal relations. "They get talked about, their futures get decided, and they don't even have a seat at the table." The Goshutes are asking the judge in their lawsuit to bar the Interior Department from "secretly communicating" with its opponents in state government and within the tribe. fahys@sltrib.com © Copyright 2005, The Salt Lake Tribune. ***************************************************************** 42 canada.com: Pembroke divided over effects of nuclear waste Ottawa Citizen Residents say manufacturer has polluted area; mayor labels them 'anti-nuclear' A Pembroke company that uses nuclear waste to manufacture glow-in-the-dark signs has contaminated the town's groundwater with radioactive material and created a rift among its residents. Registered 7-day subscribers to the Ottawa Citizen newspaper or electronic edition will enjoy full access to all OttawaCitizen.com content. © 2005 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest ***************************************************************** 43 UK: Observer: BNFL chief wants to keep Westinghouse [Guardian Unlimited] [UP] Oliver Morgan Sunday December 4, 2005 The Observer Gordon Campbell, chairman of British Nuclear Fuels, believes that the state-owned group should not dispose of its US reactor-building subsidiary Westinghouse, currently for sale at up to £1.1 billion. Campbell, also chairman of engineer Babcock International, said he believed that, with global demand for nuclear power rising and with last week's launch of a government review into building new stations in the UK, Britain should not abandon ownership of the technology to make reactors. Rival manufacturers and utilities have stepped up their lobbying after the announcement of the energy review. There are concerns among British Energy executives that aggressive lobbying by Electricite de France may have sidelined the UK company in Whitehall circles. EDF has made clear it wishes to be involved in any plans to build new reactors, and has said companies with strong balance sheets and technical records are best placed to lead a programme. British Energy ran into trouble in 2002 when electricity prices slumped and it faced technical problems. BNFL put Westinghouse up for sale in July and it has since attracted bids from General Electric and Shaw Group of the US, as well as Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and Toshiba of Japan. Westinghouse, designer of the AP1000 reactor, is - with Areva of France - one of two leading global reactor manufacturers. It is bidding to build four in China in a project worth $8bn. BNFL bought Westinghouse in 1999 as part of a strategy to create an integrated nuclear group, from design to decommissioning, that would be ripe for privatisation. But with the abandonment of these plans, the company has sought to auction off its divisions one by one. It has been under pressure to sell Westinghouse from Downing Street and from the Department of Trade and Industry's Shareholder Executive, both of which question state ownership of a commercial reactor builder, particularly if the UK were to opt for new-build. But Campbell told The Observer any potential investor would demand full competition between all builders, regardless of ownership. He also believes that, although most of Westinghouse's workforce is in the US, it is better to own and control development of the technology than to buy it. [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2005 ***************************************************************** 44 Santa Fe New Mexican: LANL: Feds deny plutonium missing from lab By ANDY LENDERMAN | The New Mexican December 3, 2005 The federal government has shot down allegations that plutonium is missing from Los Alamos National Laboratory, as claimed by a nuclear-watchdog group earlier this week. We dont think anythings missing, spokesman Don Ami of the National Nuclear Security Administration said. We just think theres a discrepancy. There are two different databases used to track plutonium and plutonium waste, and different rules, or reporting requirements, for each, Ami explained. Officials with the Maryland-based Institute for Energy and Environmental Research came to Northern New Mexico on Wednesday and issued a report that called for the lab to do a better job tracking plutonium, the highly radioactive material used in nuclear bombs. That report said an analysis of government documents showed major discrepancies among U.S. Department of Energy accounts of plutonium, and as many as 1000 kilograms could be missing. Ami said this same issue has been dealt with about a year ago. The report that was compiled that theyre referring to today was a report that was finalized last year, Ami said. Lab officials thought they had put that to rest, he said. The watchdog groups report compared two very different LANL databases, the NNSA said in a written response. Special nuclear material has been tracked since 1943 and has been safeguarded through the use of the Nuclear Materials Control and Accounting Database since 1968. But another database tracks nuclear waste, the NNSA explained. The waste management database, which began collecting data in 1971, gathers information to ensure protection of health, safety and the environment, an agency release said. Department of Energy orders outline how to collect information for each database, the NNSA statement continued. The difference in the analysis and reporting requirements account for the discrepancies in the report, the NNSA wrote. And the plutonium embedded in waste  things like gloves and rags  cant be extracted and used again, Ami said. Contact Andy Lenderman at 995-3827 or alenderman@sfnewmexican.com. ***************************************************************** 45 Las Vegas SUN: Proposal for Test Site plant is undecided December 03, 2005 Nevadan in charge of federal office plans high-tech operation By Benjamin Grove <> Sun Washington Bureau WASHINGTON -- One year after Government Printing Office chief Bruce James floated a proposal to locate a high-tech document production plant at the Nevada Test Site, the idea is still stuck in a study. James, a Nevadan who took over the agency in 2002, proposed last December that the remote, high-security Test Site would be the perfect place for a GPO facility that would produce security and intelligence documents, as well as a new generation of "electronic passports" complete with computer chips. It also would serve as a second digital printing center for Federal Register and Congressional Record documents. The new Nevada plant was to be humming as early as July 2006, according to a GPO "strategic vision" unveiled in December 2004. But the proposal is caught up in a comprehensive real estate review commissioned by the GPO as it seeks to move out of its massive eight-story, red-brick headquarters in downtown Washington into more modern facilities. The entire agency under James has been undergoing a transformation from the government's paper-document printing operation to a digital document center. The GPO in September 2004 hired The Staubach Company, a real estate consulting firm led by former National Football League star Roger Staubach, to conduct the $750,000 study. Part of the study is complete, and a headquarters relocation plan has been sent to Congress. But the GPO's proposal for a new remote facility -- such as the one proposed for the Test Site -- will not be presented to Congress until the first quarter of next year, GPO spokeswoman Veronica Meter said. Meter declined to say why plans for the new plant had stalled. A Staubach spokesman did not return phone calls Friday. Meter could not say whether it is likely the Test Site will be considered the best location for a new plant. She declined to say how many other sites might be under consideration for it. But she added, "Bruce James would like to see this get done in Nevada. Right now we are going through a planning process as required by Congress." James is a Lake Tahoe resident who retired a millionaire after 30 years in the printing business. The Nevada Test Site, home to above- and below-ground nuclear tests from 1951 to 1992, is now home to bomb-legacy clean-up programs as well as counter-terrorism training. Benjamin Grove can be reached at (202) 662-7436 or at grove@ lasvegassun.com. All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 46 Paducah Sun: Past 2 years of DOE cleanup win praise as improvement Paducah, Kentucky By Joe Walker jwalker@paducahsun.com 270.575.8656 Sunday, December 04, 2005 The U.S. Department of Energy is making good strides to clean up the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant since signing a September 2003 agreement to speed things up, state regulators say. “There´s a lot to be done yet, but a couple of years down the road I believe the state is satisfied with the progress, said Tony Hatton, assistant director of the Kentucky Division of Waste Management. “They´ve completed some fairly significant projects. Hatton said lead DOE contractor Bechtel Jacobs and its support firms have: • Cleaned up an old drainage ditch that for decades was a catchall for contaminated runoff to the northern plant boundary. Some former workers say it once was a regular dump site for barrels of toxic, radioactive waste. The $8 million cleanup — removing more than 3,000 tons of contaminated soil — was completed five months ahead of schedule and within budget, DOE said earlier. • “Dramatically increased waste removal, particularly scrap metal shipped to disposal facilities. • Continued cleaning up several old buildings, notably one called the “feed plant that was closed in 1976. It was among the plant´s most dangerous work areas because of traces of highly radioactive plutonium and neptunium. • Laid groundwork for a $40 million project to extract soil contamination around a plant cleaning building that is the leading cause of billions of gallons of groundwater pollution. Construction will begin next year, and by 2007 workers are expected to begin heating the ground far below the surface and vacuum out vaporized contamination for carbon-filter treatment. • Begun investigating a plume of contaminated groundwater in the southwestern area of the plant. Two pump-and-treat systems on the northeastern and northwestern plant boundaries remove about 16 million gallons a month, and have cleaned up more than a billion gallons. But the systems only remove the highest concentrations of the contamination, which covers much of the area from the plant to the Ohio River. • Submitted a plan to investigate several old waste disposal areas about which little is known. The areas will be cleaned up collectively. • Moved ahead of schedule in characterizing contaminated material storage areas. The work has continued amid uncertainty about who will succeed Bechtel Jacobs. On Thursday, DOE continued the firm´s contract for another three months, to April 23. There have been repeated extensions since 2003 when DOE announced it would replace Bechtel Jacobs with a smaller contractor to try to be more cost-efficient. North Wind Paducah Cleanup Co. won a $303 million cleanup contract in January, but several other bidders balked. Their protests were dismissed with DOE´s agreement to rebid the work. Hatton said the state wants the issue resolved so that regulators can establish rapport with the new lead cleanup contractor. But essentially the same local people do the work regardless of who pays them, so the extensions probably have had little effect on cleanup, he said. DOE has not explained the extensions, except to say it is “working expeditiously toward a contract award. No award date is set. Hatton said state regulators have been told only that “there are some internal issues that need to be resolved. The extensions do breed uncertainty, but workers are accustomed because the delays have been ongoing since September 2003, said Bechtel Jacobs project manager Bob Giroir. “We like the extensions because the longer we stay here the more we´re going to accomplish for this work force. He credited the company´s 157 employees and 400 subcontract workers with focusing on getting the work done safely and efficiently. Using “out-of-the-box thinking, they saved $15 million over 10 months by using Envirocare of Utah to dispose of scrap metal rather than using government facilities, Giroir said. The work plans call for getting rid of the remaining nearly 20,000 tons of scrap metal by the end of 2006. “Our impression is we´re going to beat that schedule, he said. Disposing of old waste is one of three priorities, Giroir said. The others are to hasten the cleanup of heavily contaminated buildings and start cleaning up the soil area that is the major source of groundwater contamination. Some take a more skeptical view of the cleanup progress. Environmentalist Mark Donham, former chairman of the plant´s citizens advisory board, questions what will happen to contaminated scrap metal and material in old uranium burial grounds. “Right now the big plan on a lot of that stuff is to haul it out to Envirocare, yet the people in Utah are growing increasingly concerned about them being a dumping ground for us, he said. Donham said there is gradual progress, as there was under a previous cleanup agreement, but it covers only a “very small percentage of the total contamination at the plant. He cited an earlier General Accounting Office report that cast doubt on DOE´s ability to clean up the mess by 2010 even at a cost of $1.3 billion. ***************************************************************** NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more information go to: *****************************************************************