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                         NUCLEAR POLICY
 
1 TIME.com: Why Iran Has the Upper Hand in the Nuclear Showdown --
2 Guardian Unlimited: Europe Warns Over Iran Nuclear Tactics
3 Guardian Unlimited: EU Expects Nuke Talks With Iran Soon
4 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Trying to Weaken Nuke Opposition
5 Guardian Unlimited: Former Iranian Leader Suggests Dialogue
6 Guardian Unlimited: Poll: Diplomacy Key in Iran Nuke Dispute
7 Reuters: Iran, U.S. need to be more flexible in talks-China
8 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Bush's remarks repetitve and baseless 
9 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Bushehr plant under IAEA supervision 
10 AFP: Six world powers discuss 'next steps in Security Council' for I
11 AFP: Canada, Italy, Japan envoys in Berlin for Iran nuclear talks -
12 AFP: Six world powers discuss 'next steps in Security Council' for I
13 AFP: Six world powers meet over nuclear defiant Iran 
14 AFP: Madrid urges Iranian nuclear negotiator to be 'flexible' -
15 AFP: Iranian nuclear negotiator arrives in Spain 
16 AFP: Bush warns Iran, defends anti-terrorism credentials
17 AFP: Rhetoric needs to end for US-Iran dialogue - Khatami 
18 Guardian Unlimited: U.S. Warns Against N. Korean Nuke Test
19 Korea Herald: Lee urges N. Korean leader's visit to China   
20 RIA Novosti: Russia says further talks on N.Korea nuclear problem ne
21 US: Las Vegas SUN: Chafee Delays Vote on Bolton Nomination 
22 US: Reno Gazette-Journal: Former BLM supervisor wins whistleblower s
23 UPI: Analysis: Renewables effect uncertain
24 Reuters: Russia demands equal access to nuclear market
 
                         NUCLEAR REACTORS
 
25 US: [NukeNet] Feds deny Mothers for Peace - NRC calls premature a
26 US: NRC: NRC to Discuss Preliminary Results of Inspection for Oyster
27 US: NRC: Closure of Safety Conscious Work Environment Issue at Salem
28 US: Scripps News: Future won't favor new nuclear plants | 
29 RIA Novosti: Rosenergoatom to start building nine nuclear power unit
30 RIA Novosti: Lithuania PM vows to build new nuclear power plant
31 US: OC Register: America's nuclear dark age
32 US: toledoblade.com: Leak in condenser forces shutdown of Davis-Bess
33 US: NRC: Draft Regulatory Guide: Issuance, Availability
34 SA CMEN: SA's nuclear power-gen capacity could double over next two 
35 US: theday.com: Dominion Disputes Activist's Charges Over Millstone 
36 SNA: Westinghouse to Provide New Equipment for Bulgaria's Nuke
 
                          NUCLEAR SECURITY
 
37 US: Las Vegas SUN: Warner talks homeland security in Nevada 
38 US: Guardian Unlimited: Nuclear Courier accused of theft, Fraud
39 US: NRC: NRC to Hold Annual Public Meeting on Nuclear Security On Se
40 RIA Novosti: No energy blackmail, Russia to defend nuclear interests
41 US: APP.COM: A split at NRC on risk of attack | 
42 US: President: Extension of National Emergency
 
                          NUCLEAR SAFETY
 
43 Moscow Times: Nuclear Submarine Blaze Kills 2 Sailors
44 Guardian Unlimited: Fire Aboard Russian Nuclear Sub Kills 2
45 AFP: Fire on Russian nuclear submarine kills two 
46 US: UPI: Bush nominates nuke safety board members
47 UPI: Russian nuclear submarine fire kills 2
48 Whitehaven News: Fluor fires starting gun with бё400m BNG bid
 
                         NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE
 
49 US: Markey and allies call for securing of nuclear waste fuel
50 US: Deseret News Interior Department decisions stop nuclear-waste st
51 The Australian: Ferguson supports nuclear waste site 
52 Sydney Morning Herald: ANSTO to take nuclear 'responsibility' - 
53 US: AU ABC: SA Govt accused of hypocrisy over uranium stance
54 US: DailyBulletin.com: Rialto, county need to tackle real polluters
55 US: Salt Lake Tribune: State says fees from nuke site lawyers too hi
56 US: kutv.com: Interior Dept. Rejects Utah Nuclear Waste Site
57 US: The Mercury: Borough may ask that spent fuel be sent elsewhere
58 edie news centre: From atomic bomb site to nature reserve
59 US: UPI: Markey backs nuke waste safety campaign
60 US: NRC: Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste; Meeting on Planning an
 
                           PEACE
 
 
                        US DEPT. OF ENERGY
 
61 Las Vegas SUN: Nevada governor candidate denies role in whistleblowe
62 Knox News: OR company looks at buildings that housed Remotec
63 KnoxNews: Nanotech center is goal for project on ORNL campus
64 DOE: DOE Announces $60 Million in Projects to Accelerate 
65 kgw.com: Cost for Hanford plant grows to $12.2 billion 
66 NRC: Energy Northwest; Environmental Assessment and Finding of No 
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                         FULL NEWS STORIES
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 1 TIME.com: Why Iran Has the Upper Hand in the Nuclear Showdown --
     
Analysis: Despite the U.S. hard line, Tehran's diplomatic
strategy is based on the world's desire for an alternative to
confrontation 

By TONY KARON               

    + Background: Why the U.S. Is Holding Its Fire on Iran 	 		
	 	 
    + Related Blogs: Click here for blog postings from around
the web that are related to the topic of this article. 	 	 		[

Posted Thursday, Sep. 07, 2006

         Vignette StoryServer 5.0 Thu Sep 07 20:53:29 2006                      Iran
has defied the U.N. Security Council demand that it suspend
uranium enrichment by August 31; now it must feel the
consequences. That's the demand of the Bush Administration, as
the Security Council powers met onThursday to discuss the next
steps in the showdown. Washington wants to see a series of
sanctions imposed, the scope of which will expand as long as
Iran remains defiant ≈ and the Administration refuses to
discount the possibility of military action if sanctions don't
force Iran to back down. But even Iran's defiance of a Council
ultimatum has not raised the enthusiasm of even key U.S. allies
such as Germany ≈ let alone Russia and China ≈ to opt for
sanctions. In fact, the suggestion by U.S. officials that they
may have to rely on sanctions by a "coalition of the willing"
outside of the Security Council is a clear indicator that
Washington is struggling to prevail on the issue. 		

 		Iran's Game 

Iran's leaders have displayed an almost insouciant calm in the 
face of U.S. efforts to isolate and pressure them. They responded 
to the U.S.-backed incentive package ≈ which Washington cast as a 
final, take-it-or-leave-it offer ≈ more than six weeks after the 
deadline preferred by Washington, and then only to send it back 
with a "can do better" grade and a 21-page counterproposal. But 
Iran's defiance may be based on a sound diplomatic calculation. 
The international community demands that Iran go the extra mile 
to satisfy concerns over its atomic energy program, but it also 
insists that the issue be resolved via diplomacy rather than 
confrontation. For reasons ranging from the price of oil to the 
turmoil in neighboring Iraq, much of the world outside of the 
U.S. fears that a confrontation between America and Iran would 
have disastrous consequences.           

Aware of the danger of isolating itself, the U.S. insists that 
it, too, favors, a diplomatic solution. But Washington's version 
of a "diplomatic solution" certainly includes sanctions to bring 
Iran to heel, while for many of Washington's European allies, and 
for such key Security Council powers as Russia and China, 
sanctions represent a slippery slide to confrontation. Iran is 
unlikely to change its position in response to the limited 
sanctions that will probably be adopted, and it knows that the 
international community is unlikely to risk the impact on world 
oil prices of cutting off Iran's crude exports. Many diplomats 
fear that moves to isolate Iran will harden the position of its 
regime, and make military confrontation more likely.                 

 		A Counteroffer 

Mindful of the need to play to the international consensus, Iran 
has not rejected suspending uranium enrichment on principle. But 
any suspension of enrichment, the Iranians say, must be an 
outcome of negotiations rather than a precondition for talking, 
as the current offer requires. For Tehran, it's a question of 
leverage. Iran voluntarily suspended enrichment during three 
years of negotiations with the European Union that began in 2002, 
and its leaders believe they received nothing as a result. This 
time, analysts say, the regime wants to hold onto its cards and 
press for a more favorable deal.          

Iran's top priority in any negotiated solution will be to secure 
cast-iron security guarantees that would require the U.S. taking 
"regime-change" off the table. That's an issue on which the Bush 
administration remains divided. Under pressure from European 
allies, Washington eventually agreed last spring to join talks 
with Iran if it first halted uranium enrichment. That shift 
angered hawks in and around the administration. Yet it was 
substantially less than the Europeans had hoped for. They have 
long argued that a diplomatic solution will require direct talks 
between the U.S. and Tehran on all issues that jeopardize the 
peace. The premise of much of the thinking in Europe is that 
global security will be better served by integrating Iran into 
the international community, rather than isolating it.          

 		What's Next 

So, despite Iran's defiance of the Security Council's deadline, 
the Europeans, Russia and China want to pursue further talks with 
Tehran in search of an acceptable formula for suspending 
enrichment. To that end, E.U. foreign policy chief Javier Solana 
is to meet with Iran's nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, in Paris 
on Saturday. But the fact that the demand for an unconditional 
suspension of uranium enrichment is now set in stone by a 
Security Council resolution limits their room for maneuver.               

Still, while the U.S. in the coming weeks will remind the 
international community of its commitment to prevent Iran from 
developing nuclear weapons, Tehran will be working just as hard 
to tempt the Security Council players to restrain Washington by 
offering a diplomatic path that averts confrontation.                            

  Copyright ╘  Time Inc. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
 2 Guardian Unlimited: Europe Warns Over Iran Nuclear Tactics
 
From the Associated Press        

[UP] 

Thursday September 7, 2006 6:46 PM

AP Photo COP802 

By GEORGE JAHN 

Associated Press Writer 

BERLIN (AP) - Key European nations warn that Iran is trying to
weaken international opposition to its contentious nuclear
program by stalling on giving a clear response to terms set by
six world powers for negotiations, according to a confidential
document obtained Thursday. 

``The Iranian goal obviously is to split the international
community,'' said the document, drawn up by Britain, France and
Germany, and made available to The Associated Press ahead of a
key meeting of the five U.N. Security Council nations plus
Germany. 

Participants did not immediately comment after the closed
meeting in Berlin to coordinate joint strategy over Iran's
refusal to suspend uranium enrichment. 

The European Union's foreign policy chief said in Denmark that
he expects to hold nuclear talks Saturday with Iranian nuclear
envoy Ali Larijani. Javier Solana did not release the location
of the meeting. 

The talks are considered a final attempt to see if there is
common ground to start negotiations between Iran and the six
powers. 

Iran's foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, said in Belarus
that the Saturday meeting was not likely to resolve the
disagreement over the scope and agenda of the broader
negotiations. 

``Debates will continue about the method of holding talks and
the agenda,'' Mottaki said. 

Larijani was in Spain on Thursday for talks with Prime Minister
Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan
is also in Spain for talks with Zapatero. It was not immediately
known if he and Larijani will meet. 

Italian Premier Romano Prodi will meet with Larijani on Friday
to discuss the nuclear standoff, the crisis in Lebanon and
Iran's role in the region, the premier's spokesman said. 

At U.N. headquarters in New York, Britain's U.N. Ambassador,
Emyr Jones Parry, said that ``unless Solana is able to get
Iranian movement on suspension of enrichment quickly, then the
prospect of sanctions against Iran will be on the (Security)
Council agenda soon.'' 

Jones Parry said the six nations agree on strategy and the
``goal of denying Iran nuclear weapons.'' 

The European assessment of Iran's strategy in the nuclear
negotiations is described in a 1 page document labeled ``In
Confidence'' that was sent to dozens of capitals last week. 

It summarizes Iran's response to a six-power offer to Iran
dangling the prospect of technical, economic and political
rewards if it agrees to suspend enrichment before talks begin
and consider a long-term moratorium on the technology, which can
be misused to make nuclear arms. 

While not specifically threatening U.N. sanctions, it says the
Security Council will have to consider ``further steps'' if
Tehran continues to defy the council by refusing to stop
enrichment. 

The six-power package warned of punishments, including U.N.
sanctions, if Tehran does not halt enrichment - something Iran
refused to do by an Aug. 31 deadline set by the U.N. Security
Council. 

Iran's Aug. 22 response to the six-power offer has been kept
confidential. But the United States and its allies have
described it as unsatisfactory, primarily because of Tehran's
refusal to consider freezing enrichment. 

Diplomats familiar with the document said it was drawn up by
Britain, France and Germany, which are among the six nations
that made the June incentives offer, to inform other nations of
the substance of Iran's counteroffer and share the Western view
that it was inadequate. 

``The reply is along the lines of previous Iranian statements in
that typically it neither accepts nor rejects outright'' the
six-power proposal, said the document sent to dozens of capitals
last week. 

By hinting that it is prepared to resume suspension of uranium
enrichment, the document says, Iran's goal ``obviously is to
split the international community and draw us into a process of
talks about talks, on Iranian terms, while making no commitments
of its own while continuing with its enrichment programme.'' 

The document described Iran's response as ``verbose and
complicated, and ambiguous in many places.'' 

Iran promises that it is prepared to discuss the suspension of
uranium enrichment ``in the course of negotiations but not
before,'' the document said. In addition, Iran demands the
``termination'' of Security Council involvement in its nuclear
file. 

Iran's nuclear defiance was the topic of the talks in Berlin by
U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns and counterparts
from the other five powers - Russia, China, Britain, France and
Germany. 

Iran's unyielding stance appears to be based on the calculation
that sanctions will be opposed by Russia and China, both
veto-wielding Security Council members that have major
commercial ties with Tehran. 

On Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said any
sanctions must exclude military force, suggesting Moscow was
contemplating the possibility of sanctions but remained opposed
to harsh and quick punishment. 

Lavrov said the Security Council's recent resolution on the
issue holds out the possibility of further measures on Iran such
as economic penalties, banning air travel or breaking diplomatic
relations, but not the use of armed force. 

U.S. and European diplomats have said they are focusing at first
on low-level punishment such as travel bans on Iranian officials
or a ban on the sale of dual-use technology, to win backing from
Russia and China. 

More extreme sanctions would be a freeze on Iranian assets or a
broader trade ban, but those would likely be opposed by Russia,
China and perhaps others, particularly since the trade ban could
cut off badly needed oil exports from Iran. 

Iran insists it has a right to enrich for generation of nuclear
power. But suspicions are growing it wants to develop the
technology to enrich uranium to the weapons-grade level for the
fissile core of nuclear warheads. 

--- 

Associated Press writers Jan. M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark,
and Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this
report.	 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 3 Guardian Unlimited: EU Expects Nuke Talks With Iran Soon
 
From the Associated Press        

[UP] 

Thursday September 7, 2006 9:46 AM

AP Photo XHS101 

COPENHAGEN, Denmark (AP) - The European Union's foreign policy
chief Javier Solana said Thursday he expects to hold nuclear
talks with Iran ``in the coming days.'' 

Solana told The Associated Press that a planned meeting in
Vienna, Austria, this week fell through because of calendar
problems, ``particularly from their side.'' 

A senior Iranian envoy on Wednesday abruptly announced that the
meeting between Solana and Iranian nuclear envoy Ali Larijani in
Vienna had been postponed. 

The talks were a final attempt to see if there was common ground
to start negotiations between Iran and the six nations that have
been trying to persuade Iran to limit its nuclear program. 

Iran has refused demands by the five permanent members of the
U.N. Security Council plus Germany to suspend uranium
enrichment, paving the way for possible sanctions. 

In his first public comments since the Iranian announcement,
Solana told the AP that the two sides had never agreed on a
fixed date. ``No meeting has been canceled, no meeting has been
arranged at a fixed date,'' Solana said in Denmark. ``I hope it
will be held in the coming days.'' 

He did not give any details on the time or place of the meeting. 

Larijani, meanwhile, arrived in Madrid, Spain, on Thursday for
talks with Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and other
leaders. U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is also in Madrid for
talks with Zapatero, but it was not immediately known if he and
Larijani will meet. 

Larijani is reportedly to go to Italy and then to Vienna after
his visit in Spain. 

Russia, along with China, has steadfastly opposed efforts by the
United States and other Western nations to bring sanctions
against Iran for its nuclear program. Washington says Tehran is
seeking to build nuclear weapons; Tehran says its programs are
for electricity generation. 	 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 4 Guardian Unlimited: Iran Trying to Weaken Nuke Opposition
 
From the Associated Press        

[UP] 

Thursday September 7, 2006 12:01 PM

AP Photo XHS101 

By GEORGE JAHN 

Associated Press Writer 

BERLIN (AP) - Key European nations warn that Iran is trying to
weaken international opposition to its contentious nuclear
program by stalling on giving a clear response to terms set by
six world powers for negotiations, according to a confidential
document obtained Thursday. 

``The Iranian goal obviously is to split the international
community,'' said the document, drawn up by Britain, France and
Germany, and made available to The Associated Press ahead of a
key meeting of the five U.N. Security Council nations plus
Germany. 

The nations are scheduled to meet in Berlin on Thursday to
coordinate joint strategy over Iran's refusal to suspend uranium
enrichment. 

The 1 page document, labeled ``In Confidence,'' was sent to
dozens of capitals last week. 

It summarizes Iran's response to a six-power offer to Iran
dangling the prospect of technical, economic and political
rewards if it agrees to suspend enrichment before talks begin
and consider a long-term moratorium on the technology, which can
be misused to make nuclear arms. 

While not specifically threatening U.N. sanctions, it says the
Security Council will have to consider ``further steps'' if
Tehran continues to defy the council by refusing to stop
enrichment. 

The six-power package warned of punishments, including U.N.
sanctions, if Tehran does not halt enrichment - something Iran
refused to do by an Aug. 31 deadline set by the U.N. Security
Council. 

Iran's Aug. 22 response to the six-power offer has been kept
confidential. But the United States and its allies have
described it as unsatisfactory, primarily because of Tehran's
refusal to consider freezing enrichment. 

Diplomats familiar with the document said it was drawn up by
Britain, France and Germany, which are among the six nations
that made the June incentives offer, to inform other nations of
the substance of Iran's counteroffer and share the Western view
that it was inadequate. 

``The reply is along the lines of previous Iranian statements in
that typically it neither accepts nor rejects outright'' the
six-power proposal, said the document sent to dozens of capitals
last week. 

By hinting that it is prepared to resume suspension of uranium
enrichment, the document says, Iran's goal ``obviously is to
split the international community and draw us into a process of
talks about talks, on Iranian terms, while making no commitments
of its own while continuing with its enrichment programme.'' 

The document described Iran's response as ``verbose and
complicated, and ambiguous in many places.'' 

Iran promises that it is prepared to discuss the suspension of
uranium enrichment ``in the course of negotiations but not
before,'' the document said. In addition, Iran demands the
``termination'' of Security Council involvement in its nuclear
file. 

Iran's nuclear defiance is the thrust of Thursday's talks in
Berlin by U.S. Undersecretary of State Nicholas Burns and
counterparts from the other five powers - Russia, China,
Britain, France and Germany. 

In Denmark, meanwhile the European Union's foreign policy chief
said Thursday he expects to hold nuclear talks with Iranian
nuclear envoy Ali Larijani ``in the coming days.'' Javier Solana
did not give any details on the time or place of the meeting. 

The talks are considered a final attempt to see if there is
common ground to start negotiations between Iran and the six
powers. 

Larijani, meanwhile, was in Spain on Thursday for talks with
Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. U.N.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan is also in Spain for talks with
Zapatero, but it was not immediately known if he and Larijani
will meet. 

Iran's unyielding stance appears to be based on the calculation
that sanctions will be opposed by Russia and China, both
veto-wielding Security Council members that have major
commercial ties with Tehran. 

On Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said any
sanctions must exclude military force, suggesting Moscow was
contemplating the possibility of sanctions but remained opposed
to harsh and quick punishment. 

Lavrov said the Security Council's recent resolution on the
issue holds out the possibility of further measures on Iran such
as economic penalties, banning air travel or breaking diplomatic
relations, but not the use of armed force. 

``This article envisages measures to exert influence on a
country that is not cooperating, including economic ones, but it
is written unambiguously there that this excludes any kind of
forceful measures of influence,'' ITAR-Tass quoted him as
saying. 

U.S. and European diplomats have said they are focusing at first
on low-level punishment such as travel bans on Iranian officials
or a ban on the sale of dual-use technology, to win backing from
Russia and China. 

More extreme sanctions would be a freeze on Iranian assets or a
broader trade ban, but those would likely be opposed by Russia,
China and perhaps others, particularly since the trade ban could
cut off badly-needed oil exports from Iran. 

Iran insists it has a right to enrich for generation of nuclear
power. But suspicions are growing it wants to develop the
technology to enrich uranium to the weapons-grade level for the
fissile core of nuclear warheads. 	 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 5 Guardian Unlimited: Former Iranian Leader Suggests Dialogue
 
From the Associated Press        

[UP] 

Friday September 8, 2006 12:16 AM

By ANNE GEARAN 

AP Diplomatic Writer 

WASHINGTON (AP) - The most senior Iranian to visit Washington in
25 years said Thursday the two nations' long estrangement should
be repaired through dialogue instead of threats, as world powers
moved closer to imposing punishments on Iran over its disputed
nuclear program. 

Mohammed Khatami, a two-term Iranian president once seen as the
harbinger of moderation and better relations with the United
States, also said three of the nations that have offered to
bargain with Iran may be willing to change the terms. 

Khatami said Russia, China and France would agree to negotiate
without preconditions that Iran has said are unacceptable, but
he did not elaborate. Those nations, with the United States,
Britain and Germany, have offered trade and aid incentives to
Iran if it rolls back a nuclear program that the West fears
could produce a weapon, with United Nations sanctions the price
of refusal. 

The group agreed that Iran must agree to shelve its uranium
enrichment program before talks on the package could start and
no nations have said publicly that they would reconsider. 

``Even now I believe that relations between our two respective
governments should be resolved through dialogue,'' Khatami said
during a news conference with U.S. and other reporters. He spoke
through a translator. 

``Using violence by every side and violent language by every
side is not conducive to dialogue and it will increase and
exacerbate the problems,'' Khatami said. 

He took a swipe at the Bush administration for what he called
human rights abuses in the Iraq war and the pursuit of
terrorists. 

``I do not deny the existence of problems in Iran, but I would
certainly say those are not (worse than) the violations in
places like Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo,'' Khatami said. ``Let's
condemn the violation of human rights wherever it takes place.'' 

Khatami will not meet with any U.S. officials. The trip has
angered some conservatives in Congress, some influential Iranian
exiles in the United States and some of the diplomats and
employees held captive a quarter-century ago. 

Khatami is the most senior Iranian to visit the capital since
Islamic fundamentalists seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in
1979 and held Americans hostage for 444 days. 

President Bush and his administration are not giving Khatami a
warm reception, although the U.S. government is providing and
paying for security agents for the former Iranian president. 

The administration allowed the visit to demonstrate good will
toward Iranians in general, if not their leaders, and to point
up the free speech and freedom of movement that are possible in
the United States. Before Khatami arrived, State Department
spokesman Sean McCormack said he hoped the universities and
others hosting Khatami would ask him tough questions. 

The centerpiece of Khatami's visit to Washington was an address
Thursday at Washington National Cathedral, a few miles from the
White House. 

In remarks prepared for delivery, the cleric made a scholarly,
theological plea for greater dialogue among cultures but stayed
away from current events. 

The address coincides with what may be a turning point in the
long and largely fruitless international effort to deny Iran
technology and expertise that the West fears could lead to a
nuclear weapon. 

If the United States gets its way, world powers could vote in
the next few weeks to impose the first in a series of
punishments intended to further increase pressure on Iran to
roll back its nuclear development program. 

Iran claims its program is aimed only at generating nuclear
energy. The nuclear program, begun in secret nearly two decades
ago, has become a point of national pride for Iran and its
hard-line president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. 

Diplomats from the countries that have offered to bargain with
Tehran met Thursday in Berlin to discuss the next step now that
Iran has defied a U.N. deadline to shelve uranium enrichment
activities. In different forms, enriched uranium can be used
either for nuclear energy or weapons. 

Khatami defended what he said is a peaceful nuclear program. He
said Russia, China and France, which were part of Thursday's
meeting ``want negotiations without precondition ... and this is
the right position.'' 

The State Department granted Khatami a visa to visit the United
States for a two-week speaking tour despite severe trade and
other penalties the U.S. imposed on Iran after the 1979
revolution. 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 6 Guardian Unlimited: Poll: Diplomacy Key in Iran Nuke Dispute
 
From the Associated Press        

[UP] 

Thursday September 7, 2006 4:16 AM

By ROBERT WIELAARD 

Associated Press Writer 

BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) - Most Americans and Europeans believe
diplomacy is the key to resolving the nuclear dispute with Iran,
according to a survey released Wednesday. But sizable groups of
respondents back force if talks fail. 

The poll found that 84 percent of Europeans and 79 percent of
Americans want diplomacy to continue to get Tehran to comply
with a U.N. Security Council demand it suspends nuclear
enrichment. 

If that doesn't work, less than half - 45 percent of Americans
and 37 percent of Europeans - support the use of force,
according to poll, conducted yearly by the German Marshall Fund
of the United States. 

The survey polled 1,000 people in the United States and 12
European nations in face-to-face and telephone interviews from
June 6 to 24. It has a margin of error of 3 percentage points. 

On one front, Americans and European appear to be in increasing
agreement: their position on President Bush's foreign policy. 

The 2006 poll found for the first time found that most Americans
- 58 percent, up from 48 percent in 2005 - disagree with Bush's
policy initiatives abroad; in Europe, disapproval held steady at
about 75 percent. 

Five years after the Sept. 11 attacks, the survey also found
that Europeans and Americans - by majorities of 70 percent or
more - agree on the significance of terrorism, increasing
illegal immigration, and militant Islamic fundamentalism as
growing threats. 

Nine out of 10 Americans and Europeans called Islamic
fundamentalism an ``important'' or ``extremely important''
threat, the survey found. 

The survey also found Europeans and Americans disagree slightly
over what the rise of China means: 37 percent of Europeans see
it as an economic threat, compared to 29 percent of Americans.
Thirty-five percent of Americans see China as a military threat,
against 22 percent in Europe. 

The European countries involved in the survey were Germany,
France, Great Britain, Italy, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal,
Slovakia, Spain, Turkey, Romania, and Bulgaria. 

--- 

On the Net: 

www.gmfus.org 

www.compagnia.torino.it 

www.flad.pt 

www.fbbva.es	 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 7 Reuters: Iran, U.S. need to be more flexible in talks-China

Friday September 8, 4:27 AM
 
 LONDON (Reuters) - China hopes Tehran and Washington can be
more flexible in talks about Iran's nuclear ambitions in order
to reach a diplomatic solution, officials said on Thursday, but
a top U.S. diplomat suggested that was unlikely. 

Noting that diplomats from six major world powers were in Berlin
to consider what steps to take after Iran ignored a U.N.
Security Council deadline to stop uranium enrichment, Xu
Feihong, political counsellor at the Chinese embassy in London,
said relations between Iran and the United States were central. 

"The core of this issue is the relations between Iran and the
U.S. because Iran has said it wants direct talks with the U.S.
We hope that both Iran and the U.S. will be more flexible in
their stance in the talks," Xu said. 

"We still hope that this issue will be solved through diplomatic
means at the negotiations because it is the most effective way,"
he said. 

However, U.S. Ambassador to Britain Robert Tuttle, speaking at a
Reuters event, suggested Washington would keep its hardline
stance. 

"Now that Iran has pulled the sanctions trigger the consequences
must be serious," Tuttle said. 

The Chinese officials were speaking to reporters ahead of
Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's trip to London next week when he
will discuss Iran, the Middle East and Sudan, among other
issues, with British Prime Minister Tony Blair. 

Iran failed to heed the Aug. 31 deadline set by the Security
Council to halt enrichment, a process which can be used to make
fuel for power stations or material for warheads. 

Negotiators from Germany and the five permanent Security Council
members -- the United States, Britain, France, Russia and China
-- are expected to consider imposing sanctions on Iran. China
has made it clear that it dislikes this idea. 

"This is a very sensitive issue. We have stated our policy very
clearly that the most important thing is that this issue is
solved through peaceful means," Xu said. 

CHINA'S INFLUENCE IN AFRICA 

Wen and Blair are also expected to discuss a United Nations
proposal to send a UN peacekeeping force to Sudan's Darfur
region, where an African Union force has been unable to end the
humanitarian crisis in the lawless west of the country. 

A senior British official said China was in a unique position
because of its booming trade links with Africa to bring its
influence to bear on the matter. 

"China now has the clout with many African countries to add real
weight to the achievement of important international objectives.
We're very keen to work with China more than we have done in the
past on the problems of Africa," he said. 

China, which is developing close contacts with Africa as a
source of raw materials and market for cheap exports, abstained
from a UN vote at the end of August which was in favour of
creating the UN peacekeeping force. 

"We think that for this issue ... it should get the agreement of
the Sudan government beforehand because (it) is a very important
party in this issue," Xu said. 

Wen and Blair will also sign an agreement on climate change, the
Chinese official said. 

Wen is due in London on Sept. 12, with a delegation including
Commerce Minister Bo Xilai and Foreign Minister Li Zhaoxing, who
will likely meet British Foreign Minister Margaret Beckett.     

Copyright ╘ 2005 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
 8 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Bush's remarks repetitve and baseless 
  2006/09/07   
  

Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi said that the
remarks of American President George W. Bush are repetitive and
baseless' and aiming to divert attention from the facts about
Iran's peaceful nuclear activities and pressurize his allies.
 
According to a report released by the Foreign Ministry Media
Department, he said that in the face of Iran's strong reasoning
and firm determination to restore and protect its legitimate
rights, America still continues its chantage and creating a
negative atmosphere against Iran.
 
"America has not been invited to the region. Its presence in
Iraq has promoted terrorism. There is now the general belief
that the terrorist moves in Iraq take place under America
direction and support.
 
"On the threshold of the anniversary of the September 11
explosion of twin towers and five years past the event, which is
still ambiguous, American officials intend to justify their
failure and blunder," he noted.
 
He said that Bush's definition of 'Dictator' and 'Dictatorship'
not comprehensible to the international community, adding that
it is not clear why he insists on using such an unfamiliar
literature on the international scene.
 
"If George W. Bush is seeking freedom and his true ideals are
freedom, justice and security, he will accept our call for
debate. "On account of the wrong policies of the White House and
Bush, today he is not respected by the world. Therefore, as
American president, he had better deeply contemplate about it,"
he said.
 
Asefi recommended Bush not to pass on his blunders and wrong
policies mainly aiming to protect America's national interests
to the country's future president, but rather be rational, avoid
unilateralism, end American government's current medieval
policies and not create chaos and instability in the world.   

  Copyright 2004, All Rights Reserved By Islamic Republic of Iran 
Broadcasting News Network Sponsored By IRIB News Computer Center. 
E-Mail: Info@IRIBNEWS.ir     
*****************************************************************
 9 IRIB PERSIAN NEWS: Bushehr plant under IAEA supervision 

  2006/09/07   
  
Foreign Ministry Spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi said Wednesday that
construction of the 1,000mw Bushehr power plant, 93 percent of
which is already completed, is under full supervision of the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
 
According to a report of the Foreign Ministry Press and
Information Department, Asefi said the power plant complies with
highest international safety standards.
 
Commenting on a final statement issued by the Persian Gulf
Cooperation Council at the conclusion of its 100th session in
Jeddah on Monday, he said all yardsticks for environmental
protection have been complied with in the plant's construction.
 
Underscoring the importance IRI attaches to protecting the
environment in the Persian Gulf, he said it has apprised all
regional states of its concerns over possible effects of the
power plant's operations on the marine environment in the region
and steps it is taking in this regard.
 
Asefi further welcomed the PGCC's support for dialogue and
continued negotiations on IRI's nuclear issue.
 
However, he rejected portions of the PGCC statement which
ineffect disputed IRI's ownership of the three Persian Gulf
islands of Lesser and Great Tunbs and Abu Moussa, saying the
"islands are inalienable parts of Iranian territory. The
allegations in the statement (respecting the islands) have no
legal basis and are rejected by the Islamic Republic of Iran,"
Asefi said.
 
He said the allegations are the result of a misunderstanding
between IRI and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) over the 1971
letter of understanding on Abu Moussa island which can be
settled through continued negotiations.
 
He called for efforts to strengthen solidarity among regional
states and to defend peace and stability in the region.
 
M/D   

  Copyright 2004, All Rights Reserved By Islamic Republic of Iran 
Broadcasting News Network Sponsored By IRIB News Computer Center. 
E-Mail: Info@IRIBNEWS.ir     
*****************************************************************
 10 AFP: Six world powers discuss 'next steps in Security Council' for Iran - 

 by Michael Adler Thu Sep 7, 3:37 PM ET 		 	 

BERLIN (AFP) - Six world powers discussed in Berlin "the next 
steps in the (UN) Security Council", a senior European diplomat 
said in a clear allusion to possible sanctions against Iran" /> 
Iranover its nuclear program. 

 "We had a first discussion of the next steps in the Security
Council, following the lines of (Security Council) Resolution
1696," which calls for possible sanctions if Iran defied, as it
has, a call to suspend uranium enrichment, said the diplomat who
attended the meeting. 

The diplomat, who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity
of the issue, said the Berlin talks was "actually quite a
productive meeting. There was common analysis on where we were." 

Washington leads international concerns that Iran is covertly
trying to develop nuclear weapons, something Tehran denies, and
the US is also spearheading the push for sanctions. 

US President George W. Bush" /> President George W. Bush,
invoking the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and
Washington, said Thursday that Iran must not be allowed to
acquire nuclear weapons. 

"The world is uniting to send a clear message to the regime in
Tehran: Iran must end its support of terror, it must stop
defying its international obligations and it must not obtain a
nuclear weapon," Bush said in a speech in Atlanta. 

But Russia and China, both major trading partners with Iran, are
reluctant to support sanctions, fearing they will worsen the
current confrontation or even lead to war. 

Diplomats and analysts have said that while Russia and China may
eventually agree to low-grade sanctions, such as banning travel
by Iranian nuclear officials, they would oppose sweeping trade
sanctions that could hurt their economies. 

Italy and Japan have also expressed concern that strong trade
sanctions could harm their economies, analysts said. 

A second diplomat from the Berlin meeting said the discussion of
measures to take in the Security Council was just a "first step"
in the process of reacting to Iran's failure to meet an August
31 Security Council deadline to freeze enrichment, which makes
nuclear reactor fuel but also atom bomb material. 

A report by the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency"
/> International Atomic Energy Agency"makes clear that Iran
hadn't met the requirements of the Security Council and the
IAEA," the first diplomat said. 

The diplomat said the six nations - Britain, China, France,
Germany, Russia and the United States - "remain committed" to an
agreement they reached in June to offer Iran talks on receiving
trade, security and technology benefits if Tehran would suspend
uranium enrichment. 

The six nations had also said in June however that if Iran did
not halt enrichment the Security Council could move to impose
sanctions. 

This dual approach was enshrined in Security Council resolution
1696 adopted on July 31. 

The diplomat said that all six nations including China and
Russia had a "commitment to the implementation of the
resolution". 

The resolution states clearly that "if Iran hasn't complied,
measures under Article 41 need to be adopted," the diplomat
noted. 

Article 41 allows for economic and other sanctions but not
military action. 

The four-hour meeting in Berlin was the first time the five
permanent UN Security Council and Germany had gathered since
Iran flouted the Security Council deadline. 

The next stage in the bid to break the impasse seems likely to
come on Saturday when EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana is
set to meet with Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani. 

"I hope that will be in two days. I prefer not to say the place
because there are difficult negotiations underway," Solana said
on a visit to Denmark. 

Ali Asghar Soltanieh, the Iranian ambassador in Vienna to the UN
nuclear watchdog agency there, told AFP Wednesday that Larijani
and Solana would meet in the Austrian capital. 

In Tehran, a national security council official said Larijani
wants to have "serious and constructive negotiations with the 5
plus 1 group ... especially on the nuclear question." 

However, in a sign of mounting international impatience, Russian
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Wednesday Russia was
considering support for Security Council economic sanctions
against Iran. 	 		 			

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 11 AFP: Canada, Italy, Japan envoys in Berlin for Iran nuclear talks -
     
 Thu Sep 7, 8:00 PM ET 		 	 

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Canada, Italy and Japan have sent envoys to 
Berlin to meet with top powers on the Iran" /> Irannuclear 
crisis, the State Department said. 

 The three newcomers to the Iran talks were to have dined with
the State Department's representative to the talks, Under
Secretary for Political Affairs Nick Burns, State Department
spokesman Sean McCormack said. 

"I haven't had a chance to talk to Nick about his meetings. I
think he's still having an informal dinner with the Canadians,
the Italians and the Japanese. 

"That was after the P-5-plus-1 meeting," he said, using
diplomatic shorthand for the UN Security Council's five
permanent members, Britain, China, France, Russia and the United
States, plus Germany. 

"I would expect they also had meetings with the other members of
the P-5," McCormack said, but their main purpose was "to meet
with Nick." 

Canada supported without reservations a UN Security Council
resolution that gave Tehran until August 31 to cease enriching
uranium, which could eventually be used in making nuclear bombs.
Iran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes. 

Italy, one of Iran's top trade partners, calls the nuclear
program "legitimate" provided that its goal was for "peaceful
purposes." 

Japan, a non-permanent member of the UN council, relies on Iran
for much of its energy and imagines its economy would be hard
hit if UN sanctions deprived it of oil. 

All the countries are members of the Group of Eight advanced
countries, excepting China. 

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 12 AFP: Six world powers discuss 'next steps in Security Council' for Iran - 

 by Michael Adler Thu Sep 7, 6:17 PM ET 		 	 

BERLIN (AFP) - Six world powers discussed in Berlin "the next 
steps in the (UN) Security Council", a senior European diplomat 
said in a clear allusion to possible sanctions against Iran" /> 
Iranover its nuclear program. 

 "We had a first discussion of the next steps in the Security
Council, following the lines of (Security Council) Resolution
1696," which calls for possible sanctions if Iran defied, as it
has, a call to suspend strategic nuclear fuel work, said the
diplomat who attended the meeting. 

Iran failed to meet an August 31 deadline, laid out in the
resolution, to freeze uranium enrichment, which makes nuclear
reactor fuel but also atom bomb material. 

A report by the UN watchdog International Atomic Energy Agency"
/> International Atomic Energy Agency"makes clear that Iran
hadn't met the requirements of the Security Council and the
IAEA," the first diplomat said. 

Halting enrichment is also the condition the six nations --
permanent Security Council members Britain, China, France,
Russia and the United States, plus Germany -- have made for
opening negotiations on giving Iran trade, security and
technology benefits. 

The diplomat, who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity
of the issue, said the Berlin talks were "actually quite a
productive meeting. There was common analysis on where we were." 

The diplomat did not give details of what was discussed and
stressed that "there is obviously more work that needs to be
done. That work is going to continue next week." 

Russia and China, both major trading partners with Iran, are
reluctant to support sanctions, fearing they will worsen the
current confrontation or even lead to war. 

Another diplomat close to the talks said that US Under Secretary
of State Nicholas Burns had "made a strong case for sanctions,"
saying the Security Council should take such action by the end
of the month. 

"But the Russians and Chinese want to go a bit slower," the
diplomat said. 

Specific measures were discussed from a list of graduated
sanctions that begin with symbolic gestures such as limiting
travel by Iranian nuclear scientists and progress towards
widespread international economic bans. 

But "the Russians in general just don't want to move that
quickly," the diplomat said. 

The diplomat said the six nations would be closely watching a
meeting planned for Saturday, probably in Vienna, between
European Union" /> European Unionforeign policy chief Javier
Solana and top Iranian nuclear negotiator Ali Larijani "to see
if there is room for further discussion with the Iranians." 

"We would all much prefer Iran to meet the requirements of the
international community so that negotiations could begin on the
package that was put forward by the six countries back in June,"
the first diplomat said. 

Larijani will also meet with Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi
in Rome on Friday. 

Prodi said earlier this week: "I am very preoccupied (by Iran's
nuclear programme) but there is still space for talks and even
if we (Italy) are not part of them, we will do what we can." 

Washington leads international concerns that Iran is covertly
trying to develop nuclear weapons, something Tehran denies. 

US President George W. Bush" /> President George W. Bush,
invoking the September 11, 2001 attacks on New York and
Washington, said Thursday that Iran must not be allowed to
acquire nuclear weapons. 

The first diplomat said the six nations "remain committed" to
their agreement in June to offer Iran benefits but to threaten
sanctions if Iran did not halt uranium enrichment. 

This dual approach was enshrined in the Security Council's
resolution 1696 adopted on July 31. 

The diplomat said that all six nations including China and
Russia had a "commitment to the implementation of the
resolution". 

The resolution states clearly that "if Iran hasn't complied,
measures under Article 41 (of the UN Charter) need to be
adopted," the diplomat noted. 

Article 41 allows for economic and other sanctions but not
military action. 

In Tehran, a national security council official said Larijani
wants to have "serious and constructive negotiations with the 5
plus 1 group ... especially on the nuclear question." 

However, in a sign of mounting international impatience, Russian
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Wednesday Russia was
considering support for Security Council economic sanctions
against Iran. 	 		 			

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 13 AFP: Six world powers meet over nuclear defiant Iran 

 by Michael Adler Thu Sep 7, 6:51 AM ET 		 	 

BERLIN (AFP) - The six world powers trying to get Iran" /> Iranto 
give up strategic nuclear fuel work will meet in Berlin to figure 
out how to handle a defiant Tehran, with the United States 
pushing for UN sanctions. 

 It is the first meeting of permanent UN Security Council
members Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States,
plus Germany, since Iran failed on August 31 to honor a Council
deadline to halt uranium enrichment, the process which makes
nuclear reactor fuel but also atom bomb material. 

The six are offering Iran talks on a package of trade, security
and technology benefits if it freezes enrichment. 

In another development, Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali
Larijani said Thursday he plans to meet EU foreign policy chief
Javier Solana within days to discuss what he said were
"ambiguities" in the benefits offer. 

Ali Asghar Soltanieh, the Iranian ambassador in Vienna to the UN
nuclear watchdog agency there, told AFP that the Larijani-Solana
meeting would be in the Austrian capital, after having been
postponed there Wednesday. 

Larijani was in Spain on Thursday for talks with Foreign
Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos and was also expected to briefly
meet Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. 

In Berlin, "they're going to talk about sanctions, and my guess
is that they're going to come up with not very much,"
Chicago-based non-proliferation expert Gary Samore said about
the meeting of the six nations' foreign ministry political
directors. 

US Under Secretary of State for political affairs Nicholas Burns
arrived in Berlin Thursday for the meeting, which was due to
start at 11:45 am (0945 GMT) with a lunch. The formal meeting
was to be from 3:00 to 6:00 pm (1300 GMT to 1600 GMT) at a
German government villa in northwest Berlin, diplomats said. 

A Western diplomat said the gathering was "not a decision-making
meeting. It is the first conversation on where we go from here." 

Washington leads international concerns that Iran is covertly
trying to develop nuclear weapons, something Tehran denies, as
well as the push for sanctions. 

But Iranian allies and major trading partners Russia and China
are reluctant to take such measures, fearing they will worsen
the current confrontation or even lead to war. 

In a sign of mounting international impatience, Russian Foreign
Minister Sergei Lavrov said Wednesday Russia was considering
support for Security Council economic sanctions against Iran. 

"We will consider this from all points of view, in totality,
based on our goal of not allowing the spread of WMD (weapons of
mass destruction) and technology that is linked with this,"
state-run RIA Novosti quoted him as saying. 

Lavrov said however that Russia still had reservations about
imposing sanctions on Iran and he underlined Moscow's opposition
to military action. 

But a senior US official said it was "essential" for the
Security Council to impose sanctions on Iran, saying the
prospect of Tehran with a nuclear arsenal was "intolerable." 

Robert Joseph, US under secretary of state for arms control and
international security, said he believed a vote on sanctions
could come this month, and he expected Russia and China would
sign on. 

The campaign picked up pace after President George W. Bush" />
President George W. Bushon Tuesday branded Iran's leaders
"tyrants" and said they must not be allowed to get nuclear
weapons, "the tools of mass murder." 

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad hit back saying Bush was
"nothing" compared to God's will. 

"I am telling him (Bush) that all the world is threatening you
since the general path that the world is taking is towards
worshipping God and divinity," Ahmadinejad told a conference in
Tehran. 

Joseph said he expected China and Russia to support sanctions
since they had already backed "a resolution that is going to
have an impact on their decision-making," referring to UN
Resolution 1696, which threatened sanctions if Iran missed the
deadline. 

"The fundamental bargain has been struck," Joseph said. 	 		 			

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 14 AFP: Madrid urges Iranian nuclear negotiator to be 'flexible' -
     
 Thu Sep 7, 6:16 PM ET 		 	 

MADRID (AFP) - Spain's foreign minister urged Iran" /> Iranto 
show flexibility in the crisis over its atomic program, as he met 
Tehran's chief nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani, a Spanish 
diplomatic source told AFP. 

 Foreign Minister Miguel Angel Moratinos held a one-hour meeting
with Larijani in Madrid "to ask the Iranians to be flexible and
be open to negotiations." 

Moratinos' comments came as EU foreign policy chief Javier
Solana said he expected to meet with Larijani on Saturday to
discuss the nuclear crisis. 

"I have said it will be in two days," Solana told reporters
during a trip to Denmark. 

For his part, Larijani told Iranian state television after his
talks in Madrid that he would meet Solana in the "next few
days." 

"In the next few days I will meet with Mr Solana to discuss the
ambiguities between the two sides," he said, referring to an
offer of a package of incentives from the international
community in return for a pledge from Tehran to halt its uranium
enrichment activities. 

It was not clear on Thursday where the meeting between the two
men might take place however. 

A Spanish news agency quoted Larijani as saying the talks would
be held "somewhere in Europe," and Iranian radio said they would
happen in Vienna. 

Larijani had been expected to meet Solana in Vienna on Wednesday
but the meeting was "delayed for several days", according to
Ali-Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's ambassador to the Vienna-based
International Atomic Energy Agency" /> International Atomic
Energy Agency(IAEA), the United Nations" /> United Nations'
nuclear watchdog. 

The 25-nation EU still hopes that it will be possible to find a
diplomatic solution to the crisis over Iran's nuclear program,
and is eager to try and convince Tehran to accept the
international community's offer. 

But Tehran has already ignored an August 31 deadline from the UN
to stop producing enriched uranium -- which can be used both as
nuclear fuel and as material for atomic bombs -- insisting on
its right to a peaceful nuclear power program. 

Following Thursday's meeting, Larijani said in a statement that
Tehran was still willing to negotiate with Western powers, who
fear that Iran's civilian nuclear program may be a screen for
developing atomic weapons. 

"(He) underlined Iran's desire and determination to conduct
serious and constructive negotiations with the Five plus One
group on all bilateral problems, including the nuclear
question," Iran's Supreme Council for National Security, of
which Larijani is secretary, said in a statement. 

"(Larijani also) said he hoped the forthcoming talks with Mr
Solana would be fruitful," it added. 

The Five plus One group refers to the five veto-wielding members
of the UN Security Council -- Britain, China, France, Russia and
the United States -- plus Germany. 

These six powers were meeting in Berlin on Thursday to work out
a new strategy for tackling the crisis. Iran's rebuttal of the
UN's demand that it halt uranium enrichment could, in theory,
lead to sanctions against Tehran. 

In comments to Iranian state television before travelling to
Madrid, Larijani reiterated Tehran's position. 

"Talk of punitive measures against Iran has no legal basis and
is counter to international rules and those of the IAEA," he
declared. 

Larijani's unexpected trip to Madrid, where he also briefly met
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, coincided
with a visit to the Spanish capital by UN Secretary General Kofi
Annan" /> Kofi Annan. 

Both men were staying at the Ritz hotel but UN and Spanish
sources said they were not expected to meet. 

Annan told reporters in Madrid that the UN wanted Tehran to
provide guarantees that its nuclear program was genuinely
peaceful. 

In talks with the secretary general at the weekend, Iranian
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had said he was prepared to
negotiate on Iran's nuclear program but would not agree to
suspend uranium enrichment first. 

Both Annan and Larijani also discussed the latest crisis in the
Middle East in their separate talks with Spanish leaders. 

"(Larijani) welcomed the constructive and positive role Europe
and Spain have played in Lebanon and Palestine and said Iran was
ready to help them in this area," the Iranian security council
statement said. 	 		 			

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 15 AFP: Iranian nuclear negotiator arrives in Spain 

 Thu Sep 7, 6:53 AM ET                   

MADRID (AFP) - Iran" /> Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Ali 
Larijani has arrived in Madrid for talks with Spanish leaders set 
to focus on the crisis over its nuclear programme. 

 Larijani was to meet with the Spanish Foreigh Minister Miguel
Angel Moratinos as well as Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis
Rodriguez Zapatero. 

He was staying at the Ritz Hotel where UN chief Kofi Annan" />
Kofi Annanhas also taken a room during a trip to the Spanish
capital, although UN and Spanish sources said the two men would
not meet. 

Larijani's surprise visit came a day after talks on Iran's
suspect nuclear programme with EU foreign policy chief Javier
Solana, tentatively set for Wednesday in Vienna, were postponed. 

On Thursday, a Spanish news agency quoted Larijani as saying he
would meet with the EU foreign policy chief in two days time
"somewhere in Europe" without giving further details. 

The European Union" /> European Unionis hoping to give diplomacy
one last chance to persuade Tehran to halt uranium enrichment in
return for a package of incentives. 

But Tehran has ignored an August 31 deadline to halt enrichment,
which can be used for both nuclear fuel as well as providing
material for atomic bombs, insisting on its right to a peaceful
nuclear programme. 

International concerns are growing that Tehran is hiding a
programme to develop nuclear arms and the United States is
leading a push to impose UN economic sanctions on the Islamic
republic. 

The five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus
Germany were Thursday meeting in Berlin to discuss the crisis. 

An EU source in Brussels said Solana would be in Copenhagen all
day Thursday and therefore would not be meeting Larijani in
Madrid. 

The Spanish news agency Europa Press earlier reported that
Moratinos was expected to press Larijani to respond positively
to the deal on the table, even though Iranian President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad remained defiant in talks in Tehran with Annan at
the weekend. 

Ahmadinejad told Annan he was prepared to negotiate on Iran's
nuclear programme, but would not agree to suspend the enrichment
process first. 

	 		 			
Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 16 AFP: Bush warns Iran, defends anti-terrorism credentials
 
 by Laurent Lozano Thu Sep 7, 3:15 PM ET                         

ATLANTA, United States (AFP) - US President George W. Bush" /> 
vowed that the Taliban will not retake power in Afghanistan" /> , 
despite a surprising resurgence, and again said that Iran" /> 
cannot be allowed to have a nuclear weapon. 

 Bush was making the fourth of a series of speeches to defend
his national security credentials ahead of November legislative
elections that many in his Republican Party fear will be
dominated by the unpopular war in Iraq" /> . 

For a second straight day, Bush urged the US Congress to help
derail court challenges to some of his most controversial
anti-terrorism policies and drew a rosy picture of his
achievements since the September 11, 2001 strikes. 

Invoking the specter of those attacks days before five-year
commemoration events, Bush said they showed how critical it was
to keep nuclear, chemical and biological weapons out of the
hands of terrorists and hostile governments. 

"When we saw the damage the terrorists inflicted on 9/11, our
thoughts quickly turned to the devastation that could have been
caused with weapons of mass destruction," he told a warmly
supportive crowd. 

"And now the world is uniting to send a clear message to the
regime in Tehran: Iran must end its support of terror, it must
stop defying its international obligations and it must not
obtain a nuclear weapon," he said. 

He also accused Tehran and Damascus of having "continued their
support for terror and extremism" since the September 11
attacks, citing their support for the Shiite militia Hezbollah
and its war with Israel" /> . 

Washington has called for UN Security Council sanctions on Iran
for refusing to freeze sensitive nuclear activities. Tehran
denies US allegations that it seeks atomic weapons, saying it
seeks only to produce power for civilian use. 

Bush also urged the US Congress to pass legislation to safeguard
his controversial warrantless wiretap program and said his
administration was appealing a federal ruling that the program
is illegal. 

Bush, who said the war on terrorism must tackle potential
threats preemptively, cited the US-led ouster of the Taliban
Islamist militia in Afghanistan in 2001 as a major early success
and vowed that the latest uprising would fail. 

"Five years later, Taliban and Al-Qaeda remnants are desperately
trying to retake control of that country. They will fail," the
president said as US forces faced their bloodiest year in
Afghanistan since 2001. 

"They will fail because the Afghan people have tasted freedom.
They will fail because their vision is no match for a democracy
accountable to its citizens. They will fail because they are no
match for the military forces of a free Afghanistan, a NATO" />
alliance and the United States of America," he said. 

His comments came as supporters of the former Taliban regime
have stepped up an insurgency in southern and eastern
Afghanistan, while US officials say Afghan President Hamid
Karzai's fragile government can barely control more than the
capital, Kabul. 

There are almost daily attacks against NATO and coalition
forces, the Afghan army, police and non-governmental
organizations. 

The North American Treaty Organization's military commander
called Thursday for allied nations to provide more troops to
combat the insurgency and said he would press allied defense
officials on the matter on Friday and Saturday. 

NATO's force has met with strong resistance not only from the
fundamentalist Taliban militia, but also from drug runners and
fighters loyal to various warlords in the region near the
Pakistan border. 

Nearly 30 foreign troops have been killed in hostile action
since the takeover, most of them in southern Afghanistan, with
Canadian and British casualties sparking some calls in those
countries for a withdrawal. 

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 17 AFP: Rhetoric needs to end for US-Iran dialogue - Khatami 

 Thu Sep 7, 7:54 PM ET 		 	 

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Former Iranian president Mohammad Khatami" /> 
, the most senior Iranian to visit the United States in 25 years, 
said dialogue between top Iranian and US officials will only 
happen when both sides stop verbally assaulting each other. 

 Separately, Khatami insisted that the West should not set
pre-conditions for negotiations over Iran" /> 's controversial
nuclear work. 

The United States did not seek any official meeting with
Khatami, although the US State Department is proving security
for the ex-president, who was in office from 1997-2005. 

He is the most senior Iranian to visit the United States since
Washington broke off diplomatic relations following the 1979
takeover of the US embassy in Tehran. 

"Before we can talk and engage in dialogue we have to eliminate
the language of threat -- for this dialogue to be successful,"
Khatami told reporters before speaking to a select crowd at
Washington National Cathedral. 

"Relations between our respective governments should be resolved
through dialogue," said Khatami, who arrived in the United
States last week. 

"Using violent language by every side is not conducive to
dialogue and would exacerbate the problem," Khatami added. 

Meanwhile, Khatami said the West's call for Iran to suspend
uranium enrichment could be discussed during negotiations but
that the suspension should not be a pre-condition to talks. 

"During the course of negotiations we could even talk about
suspension, the nature of suspension, the timing of suspension
and the duration of suspension," he said. 

Iran failed to meet an August 31 deadline, laid out in a United
Nations" /> resolution, to freeze uranium enrichment, which
makes nuclear reactor fuel but also atom bomb material. 

Halting enrichment is also the condition that Security Council
members Britain, China, France, Russia and the United States,
plus Germany, have made for opening negotiations on giving Iran
trade, security and technology benefits. 

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 18 Guardian Unlimited: U.S. Warns Against N. Korean Nuke Test
 
From the Associated Press        

[UP] 

Thursday September 7, 2006 1:16 AM

By FOSTER KLUG 

Associated Press Writer 

WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States said Wednesday that a North
Korean nuclear test would be a ``deeply provocative act'' and
urged the world to let Pyongyang know such a test would further
isolate the already reclusive nation. 

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack called for ``all the
members of the international community, including China, to
state very clearly to North Korea that this would be a very
provocative act and it would only add to and deepen their
isolation. 

His comments came amid worry that North Korea might soon test a
nuclear bomb. South Korea's main spy agency warned last week
that Pyongyang could test a nuclear device at any time. 

``This is a matter of concern,'' South Korea's national security
adviser, Song Min-soon, said of a potential nuclear test after
meeting Wednesday with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. ``We
will remain watchful on any possibilities.'' 

Song said he and Rice did not speak about the matter during
their talks; they discussed broad issues relating to South
Korean President Roh Moo-hyun's visit next week to Washington. 

McCormack told reporters that a North Korean nuclear test
``would clearly be a deeply provocative act to the international
community.'' 

China, seen as North Korea's last major ally, South Korea, the
United States, Japan and Russia are working to persuade North
Korea to scrap its self-declared nuclear weapons production
program. 

Negotiations have been stalled since November, however, with the
North demanding the United States lift financial restrictions
imposed for alleged financial wrongdoing, including what
Washington says is state-sponsored counterfeiting of U.S.
currency. 

In July, the North defied repeated international warnings and
test-fired seven missiles, prompting China to join in a U.N.
Security Council resolution condemning the tests. At that time,
the White House described the tests as ``provocative.'' 

McCormack said of the U.S. financial restrictions that ``North
Korea has earned its way to this position the honest way:
through their misbehavior and through their actions.'' 

``It's pretty simple,'' he said. ``Don't engage in
counterfeiting, don't engage in illicit behavior, and you won't
have these kinds of problems.'' 

Separately, Undersecretary of State Robert Joseph said Wednesday
that ``North Korea has been, I think, the principal supplier to
Iran of ballistic missile technologies.'' He would not comment
on the nuclear connections between the countries. 

The United States says Iran is continuing to make strides toward
building nuclear weapons. Iran maintains that its program is for
peaceful purposes. 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 19 Korea Herald: Lee urges N. Korean leader's visit to China   
        
Unification Minister Lee Jong-seok yesterday said that it would
be a "highly positive" move for North Korean leader Kim Jong-il
to visit China.

 But he said Seoul did not have any evidence of an imminent
visit.

 Speculations are rampant that the reclusive leader is set to
visit China soon, possibly after U.S. nuclear negotiator
Christopher Hill ends his China visit next week.

 "In order to break though this very difficult situation, the
basic method of dialogue must be used more and the most
meaningful form would be talks between the leaders," Lee said
during a press briefing, referring to the security situation in
Northeast Asia. 

Lee has been maintaining a low profile since the failed
inter-Korean ministerial meeting in July. His weekly press
briefing was suspended for seven weeks until yesterday.

 But Lee continued to remain ambiguous, hinting that no progress
was being made in the aggravated security situation with the
North.

 North Korea, aside from boycotting nuclear negotiations,
test-fired seven missiles in July.

 "We are keeping up efforts but there are no (developments) as
of now to report," Lee said to a question on whether there was
any change of attitude by the North.

 Lee also avoided making comments on recent speculations that
Kim Jong-il was having health problems. 

Main opposition Grand National Party lawmaker Chung Hyung-keun
claimed yesterday that Kim Jong-il was having difficulty walking
due to diabetes and kidney and liver problems.

 Chung said that Kim, 65, needs an assistant holding a chair to
follow him because he cannot walk more than 30 meters at once.

 Chung did not specify his sources nor offer more details.

 Kim has three sons from multiple relationships. His eldest son
is Kim Jong-nam, 35.

 Jong-nam reportedly has backing from China to succeed his
father but is disliked by his father for his libertine
lifestyle. 

(angiely@heraldm.com)

By Lee Joo-hee
2006.09.08
*****************************************************************
 20 RIA Novosti: Russia says further talks on N.Korea nuclear problem needed
 
07/ 09/ 2006

MOSCOW, September 7 (RIA Novosti) - A deputy Russian foreign
minister said Thursday that six-nation talks on North Korea's
controversial nuclear programs should be resumed. 

Speaking at a reception in the North Korean Embassy in Moscow,
Grigory Karasin said: "Despite continuing difficulties, there
are real opportunities and a pressing need to resolve the
nuclear problem on the Korean peninsula." 

The six-nation talks, which involve North and South Korea,
Russia, China, Japan and the United States, opened in 2003, but
stalled in last November. 

In early July, North Korea, which claims it has nuclear weapons,
conducted test launches of ballistic missiles, including a
long-range Taepodong-2, which many countries qualified as an
attempt to force the international community, especially the
U.S., to make concessions during nuclear talks. 

Russian President Vladimir Putin said during the Group of Eight
summit in St. Petersburg later in July that China, which has
emerged as a major figure at talks with the North, had briefed
the G8 leaders on the results of negotiations with the country
and expressed cautious optimism that the problem could be
resolved through diplomacy. 

But media in the U.S. cited in mid-August a senior military
official as saying U.S. intelligence had observed suspicious
vehicle movements at a North Korean test site. An unidentified
senior State Department official later said the U.S.
intelligence community considered a test to be a real
possibility. 

The U.S., which has also accused North Korea of making fake
dollars and laundering money via foreign banks, has pressed the
Macao bank to freeze Korean accounts. 

Karasin said the six-nation talks were the best possible format
for addressing the issue. 

He said Moscow also backed the need for further contacts between
the North and South, which would promote stability on the
peninsula. 

╘ 2005 RIA Novosti   
*****************************************************************
 21 Las Vegas SUN: Chafee Delays Vote on Bolton Nomination 

Today: September 07, 2006 at 10:30:14 PDT 

By ANNE PLUMMER FLAHERTY ASSOCIATED PRESS 

WASHINGTON (AP) - 

Sen. Lincoln Chafee has pulled the plug on a push by his fellow
Republicans to confirm John Bolton as U.N. ambassador, saying he
had more questions that needed to be answered. 

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee was expected to vote
along party lines during a committee meeting Thursday to approve
Bolton. But the panel postponed the vote after Chafee, R-R.I.,
expressed doubt. 

"Sen. Chafee said he still had questions that were not
answered," said the senator's spokesman, Stephen Hourahan. 

Chafee was expected to send a letter to Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice later in the day outlining his questions about
Bolton, Hourahan said. 

During the hearing, Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman
Richard Lugar, R-Ind., gave no reason for the delay and did not
say when the vote would be held. Bolton had been opposed by many
Democrats but was expected to be confirmed by the Republican-led
panel. 

Lugar said he removed the nomination from the agenda of
Thursday's committee meeting after conferring with several
senators. 

Joseph Biden, the top Democrat on the panel, said he did not
know what the delayed vote means for Bolton, or whether
Democrats would push for a filibuster. Sen. Christopher Dodd,
D-Conn., said he plans to recommend his colleagues filibuster
the floor vote on Bolton to keep him from being confirmed. 

Democrats have questioned Bolton's brusque style and whether he
could be an effective bureaucrat who could force reform at the
U.N. 

Biden did say Democrats would not push for a committee vote any
time soon. "I feel zero urgency with Mr. Bolton," said Biden,
D-Del. 

Bolton's approval by the committee would have paved the way for
a confirmation vote on the Senate floor, which Republicans have
wanted for more than a year. Bush temporarily installed Bolton
as U.N. ambassador on Aug. 1 of last year while Congress was in
recess, an appointment that will expire in January. The recess
appointment, provided for by the Constitution, came after
Democrats blocked repeated attempts by GOP leaders to grant
Bolton Senate confirmation. 

The panel's meeting comes as the United Nations is playing
pivotal roles in trying to resolve confrontations with North
Korea and Iran over their nuclear programs, and in keeping peace
in the Middle East. 

Except for Chafee, Republicans on the committee have promised to
support Bolton. 

Sen. Chuck Hagel, R-Neb., said Wednesday he had a "direct
conversation" with Bolton earlier in the week. When asked
whether he thinks Bolton is the right man for the job, Hagel
would only say: "I'm going to vote for him." 

Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, who last year sided with
Democrats in opposing the president's nomination, has said he
had been won over by Bolton's hard work in recent months. 

All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 22 Reno Gazette-Journal: Former BLM supervisor wins whistleblower suit

September 07, 2006 Reno, Nevada, USA 775-788-6200 

Staff Report

RENO ≈ The firing of a former Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
supervisor overseeing cleanup at the old Anaconda Mine site west
of town was recently ruled unjust via a federal administrative
law judge in Reno.

Former BLM Supervisor Earle Dixon said he was illegally
dismissed as manager overseeing the cleanup in October 2004. The
filed whistleblower complaint charged his termination was a
result of having brought to light worker safety and radiation,
air and water pollution violations relating to the site. 

In the ruling, Federal Administrative Judge Richard Malamphy
ordered the defendant to pay Dixon two years of back pay and
benefits totaling more than $120,000 saying it was clear ⌠Dixon
was fired for this whistleblowing activities■ at the former
copper mine. 

The BLM is also ordered to reimburse Dixon for $10,000 in moving
expenses following his termination and to reimburse for
attorney▓s fees and costs, which are expected to exceed $50,000. 

⌠This is both a victory for Earle Dixon and for the idea that
the federal government is not above the law,■ General Counsel
Richard Condit, of Public Employees for Environmental
Responsibility (PEER), said. ⌠The people of Nevada should now be
asking hard questions about whether they are being put at risk
by the very public agencies that are supposed to be protecting
them.■ 

Condit co-counseled the case with Dixon▓s lead counsel Mick
Harrison. 

⌠Earle Dixon▓s courage helped shield Nevadans from the neglect
of their own government,■ Condit said Friday. 

Malamphy denied Dixon▓s request for up to $1 million in
exemplary damages and stopped short of ordering BLM to reinstate
the former supervisor; however, the Bureau was ordered to give
him a ⌠favorable or at least neutral job reference.■

Condit has stated the latter portion could be appealed in order
to give Dixon the option of returning to the BLM. Following his
termination, Dixon went to work as an environmental consultant
for Tsali Associates in Gallup, NM. 

Also, on several occasions, Dixon has continued to act as an
independent consultant and/or key speaker regarding mine site
cleanup issues at meetings such as those held via the Yerington
Community Action Group (YCAG) in Yerington. 

As for the ruling, BLM also has an option to appeal; however,
the Bureau did not immediately return calls earlier this week
and it is unclear whether they wish to file an appeal. 

Dixon, whose annual salary was approximately $58,000, had
charged his termination was a result of his publicizing the
increasing health and safety hazards being unearthed at the mine
site. This included unsafe levels of uranium, which he claims
state regulators have had knowledge of and have covered up since
the mid 1980s. 

As Dixon had previously advocated, and since his termination,
the EPA has assumed the role of lead agency in the mine cleanup
effort under Section 106 of the Comprehensive Environmental
Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA). 

During a three-day administrative hearing in Reno in February,
Dixon said the cleanup costs at the abandoned mine had increased
dramatically from an estimated $10 million or $20 million to
potentially more than $200 million as a result of research he
conducted or directed on dangers from uranium and other toxins.

Tests conducted while Dixon was in charge in the summer 2004
found unusually high levels of radiation in soil samples at the
mine. Earlier groundwater tests showed high concentrations of
uranium in onsite wells up to 200 times the U.S. drinking water
standard.

Dixon said BLM responded by criticizing him for his disclosures,
ordering him not to speak to the media and censoring and editing
his technical communications and memos. 

Kevin Mack, an Interior Department lawyer representing the BLM,
argued Dixon was fired because he undermined efforts of the
state agency and state regulators to get mine site managers
Atlantic Richfield Company to voluntarily clean up contamination
as the lead party responsible for the effort.

During the hearing, Mack said that Dixon was ⌠a hardworking,
serious-minded federal employee;■ however, his tactics became
⌠more strident, unforgiving ... and obstructionist.■

⌠Mr. Dixon▓s inability to work cooperatively with partner
agencies became a serious impediment for the BLM,■ he said.

At said hearing, Dixon▓s immediate supervisor said he gave Dixon
a satisfactory job appraisal a month before he was fired. Two
other higher ranking supervisors also testified that they
opposed Dixon▓s firing.■

Vicki Rosen, Community Involvement Coordinator for the EPA,
offered brief comments on the ruling Wednesday saying the EPA
always enjoyed working with Dixon and he always performed ⌠sound
work■ when it came to the site. Also, she noted the EPA always
perceived Dixon to have the community▓s best interests at heart. 

As for the ruling, she said the EPA will continue in performing
to the best of its ability to address cleanup issues at the
mine. To this, Rosen said the ruling is another part of the mix
and indicated it would not have an impact on current cleanup
efforts.

YCAG Group Contact Peggy Pauly said she believes the ruling is a
⌠victory for Earle Dixon and the community.■ 

⌠This lawsuit was never about money,■ she said in an email,
⌠After Earle was fired, he did not have any other way to make
sure the truth about the dangers at the site came out to the
public. Since he was not working on the site any longer, the
publicity about (the) lawsuit was his only voice.■

-Portions of this story were taken from an article written by
Associated Press Reporter Scott Sonner. 


╘ Copyright Reno Gazette-Journal, a Gannett Co.
Inc.Newspaper.
*****************************************************************
 23 UPI: Analysis: Renewables effect uncertain
     
United Press International - Energy - 

9/7/2006 2:20:00 PM -0400

 By HANNAH K. STRANGE UPI U.K. Correspondent

LONDON, Sept. 7 (UPI) -- Efforts to expand renewable energy
generation will not prevent climate change, the head of one of
Britain's leading scientific societies has warned. Frances
Cairncross said world leaders needed to face up to the reality
of climate change and focus on adaptation rather than
mitigation. 

In comments that will lend succor to U.S. arguments against the
Kyoto Protocol, Cairncross, president of the British Association
for the Advancement of Science, said that the international
treaty to cut greenhouse gas emissions was "largely
ineffectual." 

Climate change was, to an extent, an inevitability that the
world would have to learn to live with, she told the
association's Festival of Science at the University of East
Anglia Monday, attended by more than 300 of the country's
leading scientists and engineers. 

Emissions would have to be cut by 60 percent to stop levels of
the gases responsible for climate change increasing, she said,
adding: "That's simply not going to happen." 

All the known sources of renewable energy combined could only
supply 2 percent of world electricity consumption at present,
she maintained. Meanwhile, coal accounted for 40 percent of all
electricity generated. 

"Even if our electricity from renewables rose tenfold we would
still be generating half as much electricity from that source as
we do from coal," she added. 

In a commentary for the Independent newspaper Tuesday,
Cairncross continued to question the viability of attempts to
reduce world energy consumption. A "particularly intractable"
issue was the extent to which people would be willing to alter
their lifestyles for the benefit of future generations, she
wrote. 

"Just reflect on the fact that oil today costs more than $70 a
barrel -- the equivalent of a tax that no politician would have
dared to suggest when the Kyoto Protocol was negotiated -- and
yet our roads are still crammed with cars and our skies with
planes." 

And, while the costs of climate change would be huge, the costs
of taking action to avert it would undoubtedly be enormous, she
argued. 

Cairncross said even with the best of intentions, the fact was
the world simply did not yet have the technology to prevent
global warming. She cited a recent study by the International
Energy Agency which concluded that even rapid introduction of
energy efficiency measures and substitutes for fossil fuels
would not be enough to prevent the atmospheric concentration of
greenhouse gases from continuing to rise. 

Some places might actually benefit from global warming, she
argued. "If swathes of Arctic ice melts, it will be easier to
extract the oil and gas reserves -- perhaps one-quarter of the
world's remaining buried stocks, much of them on Russian
territory." This meant it could be difficult to persuade Russia
or other world powers to sign up to a stricter global emissions
treaty, she suggested. 

"The trouble is, our living standards are inextricably related
to our use of energy, and especially to fossil fuel," Cairncross
noted. While it was possible to increase energy from renewable
sources such as wind and solar power, these currently only
provided a tiny fraction of world energy generation, as opposed
to coal, which would dominate for the foreseeable future. While
carbon capture and storage that could reduce the harmful
emissions from coal is going to be essential, the technology had
hardly begun to be used commercially, she said. 

While energy efficiency would ultimately be key to the reduction
of emissions, lag times on the commercial deployment of
technology were long, she said, pointing out that many of the
technologies in use today were invented a century ago. 

Cairncross's argument will bolster those in the United States
who contest that the economic and lifestyle sacrifices necessary
to tackle climate change are too great a price to pay. President
George W. Bush declined to ratify the Kyoto Protocol in part due
to concerns over the economic effects of binding emissions
targets, and has argued that it is unrealistic to expect people
to eschew the trappings of modern life, a position that British
Prime Minister Tony Blair appears to have come round to in
recent times. 

But while Cairncross insists she is not advocating the
abandonment of efforts to tackle climate change, some experts
claim her argument is misconceived. 

Peter Smith, special professor of sustainable energy at the
University of Nottingham, said he agreed with Cairncross's
argument "up to a point." He said at the festival that while
certain consequences of climate change were inevitable because
of momentum already in the system, touting "a doctrine of
despair" would make people think there was no point in trying.
Many countries, particularly Britain, had plentiful renewable
energy resources, he noted. 

Some environmentalists argue that Cairncross is being overly
pessimistic about the potential of renewable energy. In Britain,
for example, the British Wind Energy Association estimates that
wave power alone could supply 20 percent of the country's energy
needs with the necessary investment. Neither has Cairncross made
any mention of the impact of nuclear power, which many developed
nations are now eyeing with renewed interest. 

But many scientists agree that some climate change is now
inevitable. Cairncross's warning came as researchers from the
British Antarctic Survey presented an ice core study showing
that current levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are now
higher than at any time in the past 800,000 years and increasing
at an unprecedented rate. 

Presenting the study at the festival, the BAS scientists said
the core showed there had been eight cycles of atmospheric
change in that time frame when greenhouse gases peaked, and each
had been accompanied by warming in the climate. 

But the current peak levels are far above anything seen in the
past and the rate of change is alarming, the scientists said. 

Liberal Democrat Shadow Environment Secretary Chris Huhne said
the ice core study showed that more -- not less -- action was
needed to combat climate change. 

"Recent scientific findings are increasingly worrying," he said.
"We need to act quickly if we are to stabilize carbon dioxide at
even double its pre-industrial level." 

It was time to start talking about how to limit fossil fuel use
through tax-driven changes of behavior, he suggested. 

But that is a move for which governments on both sides of the
Atlantic have little appetite. 

(Comments to energy@upi.com)

╘ Copyright 2006 United Press International, Inc. All Rights
Reserved
*****************************************************************
 24 Reuters: Russia demands equal access to nuclear market

Friday September 8, 2:50 AM
 
 MOSCOW, Sept 7 (Reuters) - President Vladimir Putin said on
Thursday said he wanted equal access for Russian companies to
the world nuclear market, Interfax news agency reported. 

"We still do not see equal relations on the market for atomic
energy. Russia's interests are here being infringed upon," Putin
told Russian reporters on his plane from Casablanca in Morocco,
Interfax reported. 

"Russia will obtain relations that are more balanced on the
market for atomic energy and make sure they answer her national
interests," Putin said. "Here we have something to speak about
with our partners." 

Putin visited Casablanca on Thursday as he sought to improve
ties with Morocco, which leaned towards the West, and away from
Russia, during the Cold War. 

Moroccan newspapers had reported that Russia was interested in
building a nuclear power station in Morocco. 

Putin has complained about barriers to sales of Russian nuclear
materials to the European Union and senior Russian officials
have demanded an end to U.S. anti-dumping measures against
Russian nuclear materials. 

Russia is merging its civilian nuclear companies into one state
company -- along the lines of gas giant Gazprom -- to help it
compete on the world nuclear market. 

Kremlin officials see energy -- particularly oil, gas and
nuclear -- as a new arrow in Russia's geopolitical quiver. 

Russian nuclear officials say they want to be able to sell
nuclear fuel directly to U.S. companies and that they want
changes to a deal that gives U.S. uranium trader USEC Inc. an
exclusive right to import Russian nuclear fuel to the United
States. 

Russia is helping Iran build its first atomic power station at
the Gulf port of Bushehr and is interested in further nuclear
cooperation. The United States and European countries suspect
Tehran is trying to develop nuclear weapons.           <img
src="http://sg.yimg.com/i/sg/adv/yahoo/yedu_161204.gif"
width=180 height=150 border=0>[ src=]   

Copyright ╘ 2005 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
 25 [NukeNet] Feds deny Mothers for Peace - NRC calls premature a
 
Date: Thu, 07 Sep 2006 15:22:46 -0700

X-Nohoney: yes white-hard - relay H=adsl-63-203-231-61.dsl.snfc21.pacbell.net (borg.energy-net.org) [63.203.231.61]
X-Sender-Host-Address: 63.203.231.61
X-Sender-Host-Name: adsl-63-203-231-61.dsl.snfc21.pacbell.net
X-Spam-Class: HAM-VERY-WHITELIST

<x-flowed>
NukeNet Anti-Nuclear Network (nukenet@energyjustice.net)

http://www.sanluisobispo.com/mld/sanluisobispo/15454095.htm
Posted on Wed, Sep. 06, 2006

Feds deny Mothers for Peace
NRC calls premature a motion to stop Diablo from storing radioactive fuel
Stephen Curran
scurran@thetribunenews.com

Saying the matter was "unnecessary and premature," the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission on Wednesday denied a San Luis Obispo environmental group's
request to invalidate PG&E's license to store spent fuel at Diablo Canyon.

Lawyers for anti-nuclear group Mothers for Peace filed the motion to stop
the utility from loading spent fuel pending the outcome of an
Environmental Impact Review to study ecological impacts from a potential
terrorist attack.

Commissioners denied the motion, they wrote, because any potential work at
the site is more than a year away.

"We see no urgent reason to consider now the validity of PG&E's ISFSI
license and PG&E's right to load spent fuel into its ISFSI," they wrote in
a memorandum of their decision. "Neither issue has practical significance
until late in 2007 at the earliest."

PG&E officials said last month they planned to appeal to the Supreme Court
a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that requires federal regulators to
analyze the effects of a terrorist attack on an above-ground,
radioactive-waste-storage facility now under construction at Diablo Canyon
nuclear power plant.

Group members had argued that PG&E's dry-cask storage for highly
radioactive spent reactor fuel needs more scrutiny because it could be
vulnerable to terrorists. Those casks, made out of concrete and steel,
would be mounted above ground on a hillside behind the power plant.

-- Stephen Curran



- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
"I came to America because of the great, great freedom which I heard
existed in this country. I made a mistake in selecting America as a land of 
freedom, a mistake I cannot repair in the balance of my lifetime." - Albert 
Einstein, who would accumulate nearly 100,000 pages of FBI files before he 
died.

"Liberty and democracy become unholy when their hands are dyed red with
innocent blood": Gandhi, Non-violence in Peace and War, 1948

Molly Johnson
6290 Hawk Ridge Place
San Miguel, CA  93451
Cell: 805 296-0524

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*****************************************************************
 26 NRC: NRC to Discuss Preliminary Results of Inspection for Oyster Creek Nuclear Plant
License Renewal Application

News Release - Region I - 2006-05 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY 
COMMISSION 

Office of Public Affairs, Region I No. I-06-050                          
September 5, 2006 CONTACT:     Diane Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil 
A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331                     E-mail: 
opa1@nrc.gov  
  
Preliminary results of an NRC inspection conducted as part of the 
agencys review of the Oyster Creek nuclear power plants license 
renewal application will be presented during a public meeting on 
Wednesday, Sept. 13. Located in Lacey Township (Ocean County), 
N.J., the plant is owned and operated by AmerGen Energy Co., LLC. 

The meeting is scheduled to begin at 6:30 p.m. at the Lacey 
Township Municipal Building, at 818 W. Lacey Road in Lacey. NRC 
staff will discuss the preliminary results with plant management 
and then provide a question-and-answer session for the public. 

The focus of the meeting will be the inspection results. The NRC 
team inspected the plants aging management programs as they are 
applied to systems, structures and components within the scope of 
license renewal. The team also inspected whether 
non-safety-related systems, structures and components were 
properly screened to ensure they are appropriately addressed. 

The NRC still must determine whether further inspections are 
needed as part of its review of the application. 

Under NRC regulations, the original operating license for a 
commercial nuclear power plant has a term of 40 years. The 
license can be renewed for up to an additional 20 years if NRC 
requirements are met. The current operating license for the 
Oyster Creek plant is due to expire on April 9, 2009. 

In July 2005, AmerGen submitted an application to extend the 
plants license by 20 years. The inspection is one of a number of 
NRC activities involved in evaluating a license renewal 
application. 

Additional information concerning license renewal in general and 
the Oyster Creek application in particular can be found at: 
http://www.nrc.gov/reactors/operating/licensing/renewal.html.   



  


 	Last revised Wednesday, September 06, 2006 	   
*****************************************************************
 27 NRC: Closure of Safety Conscious Work Environment Issue at Salem and Hope Creek Nuclear
Plants to be Subject of Sept. 14th Open House

News Release - Region I - 2006-05 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY 
COMMISSION 

Office of Public Affairs, Region I No. I-06-051                          
September 7, 2006 CONTACT:     Diane Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil 
A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331                     E-mail: 
opa1@nrc.gov  

NRC staff will hold an open house session on Thursday, Sept. 14,
to discuss the process followed by the agency as it evaluated
whether a regulatory performance concern involving Safety
Conscious Work Environment had been adequately addressed at the
Salem and Hope Creek nuclear power plants. 

The NRC in 2004 identified Safety Conscious Work Environment as
a substantive cross-cutting issue, or an issue that affects
multiple areas of plant performance, for the site, which is
located in Hancocks Bridge (Salem County), N.J. In the NRCs Aug.
31st Mid-Cycle (or mid-year) Assessment letters for the
PSEG-owned plants, the agency stated that the issue was being
closed out based on substantial, sustainable progress confirmed
through inspections and assessment results. 

The Sept. 14th open house session is scheduled for 6 to 8 p.m.
at the Hampton Inn, 429 North Broadway in Pennsville, N.J. NRC
staff will be available to discuss, on an informal basis, the
process by which the agency reviewed and evaluated the area of
Safety Conscious Work Environment. 

This is an opportunity for the public to engage our staff in
discussions about the numerous inspections we performed and the
kinds of information we gathered before we arrived at our
decision, NRC Region I Administrator Samuel J. Collins said.
Unlike traditional meetings where the audience waits for its
turn to weigh in with questions, this session will be devoted
entirely to an exchange of information between agency staff and
members of the public. 

In the NRCs 2004 Mid-Cycle Assessment letters for Salem and Hope
Creek, the agency said it had identified a substantive
cross-cutting issue in the area of Safety Conscious Work
Environment. The NRC staff said this finding was based on
numerous indications of weaknesses in corrective actions and
management efforts to establish an environment in which
employees were consistently willing to raise safety concerns.
That finding led the NRC to devote additional resources to the
facility to determine if those issues were being adequately and
appropriately addressed. On multiple occasions, the NRC said the
issue would not be closed out until there was evidence of
substantial, sustainable progress toward improving the work
environment for raising safety issues. 

An NRC inspection report dated July 31 and the 2006 Mid-Cycle
Assessment letter state that such progress has been achieved.
Therefore, the plants will now receive oversight that consists
of baseline, or routine, inspections. The Mid-Cycle Assessment
letter for the Hope Creek plant is available at:
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/hope_2006q2.pdf
. The Mid-Cycle Assessment letter for the Salem units is
available at:
http://www.nrc.gov/NRR/OVERSIGHT/ASSESS/LETTERS/salm_2006q2.pdf
.   
Last revised Thursday, September 07, 2006          
*****************************************************************
 28 Scripps News: Future won't favor new nuclear plants | 

 Commentary 

Editorial

The climate for building new nuclear power plants in the United
States hasn't been this good for decades. The Bush
administration is solidly behind them. Some prominent foes have
changed sides, embracing uranium-derived electricity as the best
available answer to global warming. Boosters are wearing
told-you-so smiles. 

And Congress is doing its best to help. After establishing
liability limits and start-up assistance for new plants, it
voted last year to offer utilities a variety of direct
incentives and structured them to favor the first half-dozen
plants to leave the drawing boards. Companies that design and
build reactors are also said to be trying to jump-start new
business by offering limited-time discounts. 

The results, so far? Exactly one utility, Constellation Energy
in Maryland, has contracted to buy parts for a new reactor, the
first such order since 1973. While the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission has been saying for months that perhaps two dozen new
plants are getting active consideration, polls of utility
executives find that most think any notion of a nuclear
renaissance is fanciful _ that nuclear power will, at best,
maintain its 20 percent share of U.S. power generation, with a
dozen new reactors at the most. And the reasons have less to do
with Three Mile Island or Yucca Mountain than with Wall Street. 

When utilities began canceling orders for new reactors in 1973,
everyone still assumed the problem of storing spent fuel would
be solved. The crisis at Three Mile Island was six years away;
the first true nuke-plant catastrophe, at Chernobyl, wouldn't
happen for seven years after that.

Safety and environmental concerns have shaped public opinion,
but the core reasons for America's 30-year hiatus in building
new nuclear plants lie in unfavorable balance sheets. Industry
analysts say the outlook is no brighter today despite the many
factors _ tougher pollution caps for coal plants, higher
natural-gas prices, pending controls on greenhouse gas emissions
_ that theoretically should favor more cheap, clean nukes.

But to consider nuclear power "clean," you have to ignore the
pesky problem of permanent waste disposal, and to consider it
"cheap" you have to focus only on the ultimate cost to make a
kilowatt-hour of juice over a span of decades. Nuclear plants
are more expensive than fossil-fueled counterparts to site,
license, build, operate and secure; and they are slower to pay
off on investment, for which the front-end needs are larger. 

These factors, plus additional uncertainties of regulation, make
them harder to finance. For any kind of power plant, a utility
typically tries to pre-sell the power before it breaks ground,
and customers just aren't as quick to sign long-term contracts
for their power supplies when the electricity will be coming
from uranium.

So for every utility like Constellation that opts for a new
nuke, there will be multiple others that invest elsewhere _ like
Constellation's competitor, PPL, which decided to invest $1.5
billion in cleaning up emissions from its coal burners. Besides
environmental benefits, PPL expects further payoffs as pollution
limits get tighter and, perhaps, as emissions reductions become
tradeable assets. 

On a smaller scale, but at an accelerating pace, private
investment is moving toward alternative technologies of
sustainable power generation, conservation and efficiency. The
nuclear era that began with promises of electricity "too cheap
to meter" has given way to a time when a dollar invested in
conserving electricity returns six or seven times value of a
dollar invested in making more of it. 

So today the consensus seems to be that nukes have served their
purpose, and will continue for a while to do so, but the future
lies somewhere else.

ScrippsNews.
*****************************************************************
 29 RIA Novosti: Rosenergoatom to start building nine nuclear power units in 2007
 
07/ 09/ 2006                                  

MOSCOW, September 7 (RIA Novosti) - Rosenergoatom, Russia's
state-run nuclear power generating monopoly, said Thursday it
planned to begin construction of nine nuclear power-generating
units in 2007. 

"Next year we will work under entirely new conditions prompted
by the market," the concern's general director Sergei Obozov
said. "We have once again to prove our business efficiency." 

Russia's nuclear industry is under major revamp aimed at
boosting nuclear energy production and increasing Russia's
competitiveness on the global nuclear market. 

Under a plan, approved this summer by President Vladimir Putin,
Russia will merge its civilian nuclear companies into one state
company, Atomprom, to form a giant capable of competing on the
world nuclear market. 

"During the transitional period to Atomprom, in which we see
ourselves as the core, we have to prove our soundness by
improving [NPPs'] safety," Obozov said. 

Rosenergoatom runs a total of 31 power-generating units at 10 of
Russia's nuclear power plants. 

If the plan is implemented, Atomprom will also absorb the
civilian units of Rosatom, including TVEL, the nuclear fuel
producer and supplier, Tekhsnabexport (Tenex), the state-owned
uranium trader, and Atomstroiexport, Russia's leading
organization implementing intergovernmental agreements on the
construction of nuclear facilities abroad. 

Rosatom is set to amalgamate all of Russia's nuclear power
generation, uranium production and enrichment, as well as the
building and export of nuclear products. 


╘ 2005 RIA Novosti   
*****************************************************************
 30 RIA Novosti: Lithuania PM vows to build new nuclear power plant
 
07/ 09/ 2006                                  

VILNIUS, September 7 (RIA Novosti) - Lithuania's prime minister
said Thursday a new nuclear power plant would be built in the
republic to replace a Soviet-era station that will be closed on
the European Commission's request. 

The current nuclear power plant at Ignalina, scheduled to be
shut down by 2009, is similar to the one in Chernobyl, Ukraine,
where the world's worst nuclear accident happened in 1986. The
three former Soviet Baltic republics earlier agreed to build a
new nuclear power plant to resolve an energy crisis expected in
2009 and meet the European Union's nuclear safety requirements. 

"Today I am already convinced that this project will be
implemented," Gediminas Kirkilas said in an interview with the
Lithuanian radio station Zinios. 

Kirkilas said he had discussed the issue with Polish Prime
Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski and the head of Czech power utility
CEZ, Martin Roman. 

In addition to CEZ, E.ON Nordic, the Swedish division of E.ON,
and France's nuclear reactor producer Areva have also displayed
interest in the project.
 
╘ 2005 RIA Novosti   
*****************************************************************
 31 OC Register: America's nuclear dark age

Opinion - Today's editorial: 

 [OCRegister.com] Thursday, September 7, 2006 <img

Given the regulatory hurdles still in place, the energy sector
is wary of re-investing in plants
 
What if the United States rolled out the welcome mat for the
construction of new nuclear power plants ... and no one showed
up to build them? For the no-nukes crowd, that would be a
victory. But it would be a hollow victory for the rest of
Americans, who get 20 percent of their electricity from an aging
nuclear energy industry that's just hanging on by its electrons. 

Some alarmists dread a nuclear energy revival in the United
States, evoking specters of meltdowns, Chernobyls and three-eyed
fish to bolster their naysaying. 

But a growing number of Americans also seem to recognize that
nuclear energy, while not without risks, is on balance a
"cleaner" and better alternative than the same old, same old.
Concerns about climate change have even prompted some pragmatic
environmentalists to take a second look at the nuclear option,
given that these facilities don't emit so-called greenhouse
gases. The Bush administration, Department of Energy and some
members of Congress have been offering proposals meant to
stimulate a revival. 

But as The New York Times has reported, it may be hard
attracting companies back into nuclear energy, even with a
helping hand from the federal government, given a regulatory and
political climate that makes such ventures risky. 

Despite Washington's dangling of incentives, "utility executives
are sharply divided over whether nuclear power offers an
attractive choice as they seek to satisfy a growing demand for
electricity," reported the Times. "For them, the question comes
down not so much to safety and environmental impact but to
whether the potential reward is worth the financial risk." 

Given the regulatory and political roadblocks that can stand in
the way, it can take up to 10 years to construct a new nuclear
power plant. And one of the biggest uncertainties confronting
would-be builders is what to do about the long-term storage of
spent nuclear fuels, since this country's efforts to deal with
that issue have bogged down in politics and protests. 

Even after years of study, and billions of dollars paid by
utilities to the federal government for the design and
construction of an underground waste repository at Yucca
Mountain, Nev., that project is in trouble and a solution
recedes from view. 

Until the nation moves forward on a serious storage solution √
and we believe Yucca Mountain is still the best option out there
√ the energy sector likely will remain skittish about
reinvesting in nuclear plants. New reactors can operate for
years in spite of the nonsolution of storing waste on-site in
temporary facilities. But why would companies and potential
investors think about betting on atomic power again, if the
country can't address this central, but not insurmountable
challenge? 

In one hopeful note, a consortium of energy companies last month
broke ground on a $1.5 billion uranium enrichment plant near
Eunice, N.M. √ the first major nuclear facility built in this
country in 30 years. Whether it will supply American reactors is
far from certain, however, a point underscored when New Mexico
Sen. Pete Domenici, while heralding the groundbreaking as the
start of a "nuclear renaissance," talked mostly about what a
great thing this would be for the folks in Brazil and Asia. 

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has 27 potential new reactors
under consideration, to augment the 103 aging units currently
operating. But "under consideration" shouldn't be confused with
"under construction." While a few companies remain bullish on
nuclear, "there is still a high degree of skepticism within the
utility industry," reports the Times. One Pennsylvania utility
that operates two reactors seems disinclined to invest in new
ones. "There are better places to put the money of
shareholders," a company executive told the newspaper. 

While nuclear power plants may not disappear from the American
landscape altogether, most of 100 senior utility executives
surveyed said they did not expect "a future where nuclear
generation represents a larger share of generation" than it does
today. 

Instead of a nuclear renaissance, in other words, what the
country seems to be inviting is a nuclear dark age, even while
the rest of the world boldly moves forward. 

√This first appeared in the Colorado Springs Gazette, a sister
newspaper of the Register in Freedom Communications Inc. 

*****************************************************************
 32 toledoblade.com: Leak in condenser forces shutdown of Davis-Besse

Article published Thursday, September 7, 2006
 
OAK HARBOR, Ohio - FirstEnergy Corp. was forced to shut down its
Davis-Besse nuclear plant in Ottawa County yesterday because an
air leak developed in the plant's main condenser.

 
Officials said that broke the vacuum needed for drawing steam
through the non-nuclear, secondary loop system where electricity
is generated. Steam spins the turbines that generate
electricity. Condensers are used to convert the steam back into
water.

 Condenser leaks are not safety issues in themselves. The units
are separate from nuclear reactors, which provide heat for plant
generators that make steam.

 But plants are forbidden from operating if they don't have
enough pressure to move condensed steam, a Nuclear Regulatory
Commission spokesman said.

 The 29-year-old plant is expected to be back online within days.

 The vacuum loss was noticed by plant operators at
1:38 a.m.

 

 The Toledo Blade Company, 541 N. Superior St., Toledo, OH 43660
, (419) 724-6000 
*****************************************************************
 33 NRC: Draft Regulatory Guide: Issuance, Availability
 
                        FR Doc E6-14865 
[Federal Register: September 7, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 173)] 
[Notices] [Page 52826-52827] From the Federal Register Online via 
GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr07se06-93]                         
 
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) has issued for 
public comment a draft of a new guide in the agency's Regulatory 
Guide Series. This series has been developed to describe and make 
available to the public such information as methods that are 
acceptable to the NRC staff for implementing specific parts of 
the NRC's regulations, techniques that the staff uses in 
evaluating specific problems or postulated accidents, and data 
that the staff needs in its review of applications for permits 
and licenses.
 
The draft regulatory guide, entitled ``Combined License 
Applications for Nuclear Power Plants (LWR Edition),'' is 
temporarily identified by its task number, DG-1145, which should 
be mentioned in all related correspondence. This proposed 
regulatory guide contains guidance for use in submitting combined 
license (COL) applications in compliance with the Commission's 
regulations in Title 10 Part 52 of the Code of Federal 
Regulations (10 CFR Part 52), ``Early Site Permits; Design 
Certifications; and Combined Licenses for Nuclear Power Plants.'' 
Specifically, 10 CFR Part 52 governs the issuance of early site 
permits, standard design certifications, and combined licenses 
for nuclear power plants.
 
In February 1972, the NRC initially published Regulatory Guide 
1.70, ``Standard Format and Content of Safety Analysis Reports 
for Nuclear Power Plants (LWR Edition),'' which the nuclear 
industry has since used in preparing applications for 
construction permits and operating licenses for new nuclear power 
plants. The NRC most recently revised Regulatory Guide 1.70 in 
November 1978 and, since that time, the Commission has 
established a new process for licensing new reactors. That 
process, described in detail in 10 CFR Part 52, allows an 
applicant to reference an early site permit (ESP), a design 
certification (DC), both, or neither, in a COL application. The 
NRC has developed Draft Regulatory Guide DG-1145 to provide 
guidance to applicants who plan to use this new process.
 
The NRC initially issued 10 CFR Part 52 in April 1989 to offer 
alternative licensing (ESP, standard DC, COL, and manufacturing 
license) processes for new nuclear power plants. More recently, 
the agency proposed a revision of the rule on March 13, 2006, (71 
FR 12782), to clarify the applicability of various requirements 
to each of the licensing processes. This Draft Regulatory Guide, 
DG-1145, is based on the proposed revised rule. The specific 
requirements pertaining to technical requirements for content of 
applications are contained in proposed 10 CFR 52.79, ``Contents 
of applications, general requirements'' and proposed 10 CFR 
52.80, ``Contents of applications, additional technical 
information.'' The final Regulatory Guide will be conformed to 
the final rule that is adopted by the Commission, and will be 
issued when that final rule is available.
 
At this time, the NRC staff is soliciting comments on Draft 
Regulatory Guide DG-1145. Comments may be accompanied by relevant 
information or supporting data, and should mention DG-1145 in the 
subject line. Comments submitted in writing or in electronic form 
will be made available to the public in their entirety through 
the NRC's Agencywide Documents Access and Management System 
(ADAMS).
 
Personal information will not be removed from your comments. You 
may submit comments by any of the following methods.
 
Mail comments to: Rules and Directives Branch, Office of 
Administration, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, 
DC 20555-0001.
 
E-mail comments to: NRCREP@nrc.gov. You may also submit comments 
via the NRC's rulemaking Web site at 
http://ruleforum.llnl.gov/cgi-bin/rulemake?source=rg&st=draftrg. 
Address questions about our rulemaking
 
[[Page 52827]] Web site to Carol A. Gallagher at (301) 415-5905 
or by e-mail to

 
CAG@nrc.gov. Hand-deliver comments to: Rules and Directives 
Branch, Office of Administration, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland 20852, 
between 7:30 a.m. and 4:15 p.m. on Federal workdays.
 
Fax comments to: Rules and Directives Branch, Office of 
Administration, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission at (301) 
415-5144.
 
Requests for technical information about Draft Regulatory Guide 
DG- 1145 may be directed to the NRC Project Manager, Eric 
Oesterle, at (301) 415-1365 or ERO1@nrc.gov. Comments would be 
most helpful if received by October 21, 2006. Comments received 
after that date will be considered if it is practical to do so, 
but the NRC is able to ensure consideration only for comments 
received on or before this date. Although a time limit is given, 
comments and suggestions in connection with items for inclusion 
in guides currently being developed or improvements in all 
published guides are encouraged at any time.
 
Electronic copies of Draft Regulatory Guide DG-1145 are available 
through the NRC's public Web site under Draft Regulatory Guides 
in the Regulatory Guides document collection of the NRC's 
Electronic Reading Room at 
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/ Electronic copies 
are also available in ADAMS (http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/. 
ding-rm/.
 
In addition, Draft Regulatory Guide DG-1145 and other related 
publicly available documents, including public comments received, 
can be viewed electronically on computers in the NRC's Public 
Document Room (PDR), which is located at 11555 Rockville Pike, 
Rockville, Maryland. The PDR reproduction contractor will make 
copies of documents for a fee. The PDR's mailing address is USNRC 
PDR, Washington, DC 20555-0001. The PDR can also be reached by 
telephone at (301) 415-4737 or (800) 397-4205, by fax at (301) 
415-3548, and by e-mail to PDR@nrc.gov. Please note that the NRC 
does not intend to distribute printed copies of Draft Regulatory 
Guide DG-1145, unless specifically requested on an individual 
basis. Such requests for single copies of draft or final guides 
(which may be reproduced) or for placement on an automatic 
distribution list for single copies of future draft guides in 
specific divisions should be made in writing to the U.S. Nuclear 
Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001, Attention: 
Reproduction and Distribution Services Section; by e-mail to 
DISTRIBUTION@nrc.gov; or by fax to (301) 415-2289. Telephone 
requests cannot be accommodated. Regulatory guides are not 
copyrighted, and Commission approval is not required to reproduce 
them.
 
(5 U.S.C. 552(a)) Dated at Rockville, Maryland, this 1st day of 
September, 2006.
 
For the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Charles E. Ader, 
Acting Director, Division of Risk Assessment and Special 
Projects, Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research.
 
[FR Doc. E6-14865 Filed 9-6-06; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P

 
*****************************************************************
 34 SA CMEN: SA's nuclear power-gen capacity could double over next two decades
                        
 Creamer Media's Engineering News Online, 

South African Industry

  South Africas nuclear generation capacity could double over
the next 19 years.

Currently, South Africas nuclear generation capacity is 1 840
MW; we expect it to be between 2 000 MW and 5 000 MW by 2025,
says National Energy Regulator of South Africa (Nersa) regulator
member Thembani Bukula.

Last year, Nersa estimated future annualised costs for different
energy sources. Coal will cost R0,28/kWh, nuclear around
R0,50/kWh, and wind power about R1,50/kWh, he reports.

The unit price of coal is still cheaper than for nuclear, and
we are in a very fortunate position in South Africa because we
still have enough coal reserves, he points out.

But these coal reserves are concentrated in certain parts of the
country; the Western and Eastern Cape provinces are far removed
from them and their associated coal-fired power stations  coal
is also a bulk product which makes long-distance overland
transport difficult and relatively expensive; long-distance
transmission lines are also expensive and liable to disruption.

This makes nuclear an alternative for coal in at least these two
coastal provinces.

National electricity utility Eskom is known to be carrying out
various studies on nuclear options, including another
Koeberglike nuclear power reactor as well as South Africas own
pebble-bed modular reactor.

The mix of types and categories of power stations that the
country will need in future is currently being considered in the
process of develop- ing the third edition of the National
Integrated Resource Plan (NIRP III). Currently, NIRP II is the
guiding policy document for the power sector.

However, NIRP II is based on the assumption of national annual
economic growth of less than 4%; NIRP III will assume economic
growth of more than 4%, explains Bukula.

NIRP III will be released within the next six months; it will
be a living document which will be reviewed every year  but
its skeleton is expected to remain constant, he elucidates.
This constancy of the core of NIRP III will be because of the
time period needed to construct and commission power plants.

While an open-cycle gas-turbine peaking power station may take
only 18 months to build, base-load power stations  whatever
their power source  take years to construct, he highlights.

Should new nuclear power plants be part of the countrys energy
matrix, their development would be subject to two regulatory
agencies  Nersa, and the National Nuclear Regulator (NNR) The
NNR is concerned about the internal workings of a nuclear power
station, whereas we are concerned with the electricity output
from what is, for us, a black box  the overlap of
responsibility between us and the NNR is at the interface of
these concerns, says Bukula.

As far as Nersa is concerned, when we get an application for a
generation licence for a nuclear power station, we will look at
the normal generation licence issues, he affirms.

These are: Is there a need for generation capacity in that area?
Does the type of generation licence being applied for fit the
NIRP? Are the applicants competent to operate that kind of power
plant? Is there a power- purchase agreement, and, if so, what
are its conditions? Do the operators have the required
environmental approvals from the Department of Environmental
Affairs and Tourism, the Department of Minerals and Energy, and,
in the case of nuclear plants, the NNR? When it comes to
nuclear waste, we will want assurances that this waste, whether
it is to be stored on the reactor site or elsewhere, will be
stored in accordance with the regulations, he assures. While
these assurances have to be supplied by the utility planning to
build and operate the power station, they must have prior
approval from the NNR.

Without the approval from the NNR, we wont issue a licence for
a nuclear power station, he warns.

But a new nuclear power station is not likely to come into
operation in this country until almost ten years from now. No
commitment has been made; its one option and its still in the
prefeasibility stage, concludes Bukula.   
    

Published: 2006/09/08

  Author: Keith Campbell
Portfolio: Senior Contributing Editor
E-mail: newsdesk@engineeringnews.co.za  

  Copyright б╘ Creamer Media (Pty) Ltd   
*****************************************************************
 35 theday.com: Dominion Disputes Activist's Charges Over Millstone Safety  
    
  By Patricia Daddona Day Staff Writer\, Millstone\/business 
trends E-mail: p.daddona@theday.com Phone No.: (860) 701 - 4324   
  
  Published on 9/7/2006 in Business ╩ Business Local


The owner of Millstone Power Station has disputed an anti-nuclear 
activist's assertion that lack of resolution in a whistleblower 
case under state review has endangered public safety.

Dominion's legal counsel advised the state Department of Public 
Utility Control in a letter this week that the Nuclear Regulatory 
Commission has exclusive jurisdiction over safety at the 
Millstone reactors, so lack of action by the state has no bearing 
on safety because only the NRC can consider that issue.

Whistleblower Sham Mehta of East Lyme has claimed that his 
position at the nuclear power complex was eliminated after he 
pursued concerns that the intruder alert system was routinely 
turned off because of false alarms, but Dominion disputes those 
assertions, wrote attorney David Bogan of Robinson and Cole.

Nancy Burton, director of the Connecticut Coalition Against 
Millstone, chastised the state agency last week for failing to 
act on Mehta's complaint. She also alleged that failure to 
reinstate him, as recommended by the state agency's prosecutorial 
unit, has a chilling effect on employees and creates an unsafe 
condition at Millstone.

The federal Department of Labor's division of Occupational Safety 
and Health Administration dismissed the case earlier this month, 
saying the company did not retaliate against Mehta. Mehta's 
lawyer, Hank Murray, has appealed and a hearing is set for Oct. 
24.

Beryl Lyons, a spokesperson for the DPUC, said Wednesday that the 
exchange is considered correspondence and, as such, is not a 
motion on which the agency needs to act. It is not clear when the 
agency might issue a draft decision on the matter.

p.daddona@theday.com   
    
New London, CT  |  б╘ 1998-2006 The Day Publishing Co. [Beacon 
*****************************************************************
 36 SNA: Westinghouse to Provide New Equipment for Bulgaria's Nuke

Fri 8 September 2006

   					      					     				
Business: 7 September 2006, Thursday.

US-based Westinghouse Electric will provide Bulgaria's Kozloduy
Nuclear Power Plant with a chemistry analysis system, the
Pittsburgh Business Times reported.
 	
 The company won the bidding for the contract but the financial
parameters of the deal haven't been mentioned.
 
The online analysis system that Westinghouse will introduce in
the plant will come as a replacement to manual sample collection
and lab analysis of a number of primary chemistry parameters.
 
Apart from providing the hardware system, Westinghouse will also
be in charge of managing and installing the project. 

Kozloduy Nuclear Power Plant's Unit 5 will be equipped with the
new technology in the spring of 2008. Unit 6 will follow
shortly, in the fall of 2008.

 All Rights Reserved ╘ Novinite Ltd., 2001-2006 - Copyright

Bulgaria news Novinite.com (Sofia News Agency -
www.sofianewsagency.com) is unique with being a real time news
provider in English that informs its readers about the latest
Bulgarian news. The editorial staff also publishes a daily
online newspaper "Sofia Morning News." Novinite.com (Sofia News
Agency - www.sofianewsagency.com) and Sofia Morning News publish
*****************************************************************
 37 Las Vegas SUN: Warner talks homeland security in Nevada 

September 06, 2006 

By KATHLEEN HENNESSEY ASSOCIATED PRESS 

LAS VEGAS (AP) - Former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner said Wednesday
that the Bush administration's "unilateral focus on Iraq" had
diverted attention and resources from homeland security efforts. 

"While we are safer, Americans are not safe enough five years
after 9/11. And I believe we need to make some immediate changes
in the operations and renew focus on homeland security," said
Warner, in the state's first visit from a likely Democratic
presidential candidate since Nevada won an early slot on the
party's nomination calendar. 

Democrats last month scheduled Nevada's presidential caucus for
Jan. 19, following first-in-the-nation Iowa. The move was
intended to let more union and minority voters weigh in on the
2008 nominee. 

Warner met privately with local state legislators and held a
news conference with Democratic gubernatorial candidate Dina
Titus on homeland security. 

He called for better screening at the nation's ports, improved
coordination between the intelligence agencies and more police
on the street. He said the Federal Emergency Management Agency
should be pulled out of the Homeland Security Department and
report directly to the president. He criticized Congress for
spending federal homeland security dollars on pork-barrel
projects. 

"The fact that Las Vegas actually saw a decrease in homeland
security (funding) shows, I think, misplaced priorities," he
said. 

Titus, state Senate Minority Leader, touted her own efforts to
improve security systems for Nevada police agencies and
criticized Congress for making "hardly a peep" when Las Vegas
lost funding. 

Nevada Republican Party Chairman Paul Adams accused Warner of
making "political hay" out of security. 

"I think there's no question that national security is going to
be an issue in this election, but the immediate knee-jerk
response from Democrats is, 'We're not doing enough and we're
not safe.' But, there has not been an attack in five years,"
Adams said. 

Limited to a since term as governor, Warner left office in
January. He has since set up a presidential exploratory
committee, Alexandria, Va.-based Forward Together, and toured
the country raising money for Democrats. The former executive
who made millions of dollars in the cell phone business bills
himself as a Democrat who can connect with rural voters in red
states. 

"You've got to offer folks hope ... neither party has offered
much hope, the Republicans have offered fear," he said. "You got
to offer a sense that these communities have got a future." 

As governor, Warner, 51, was credited for rebuilding depressed
communities by courting new businesses to southern Virginia - in
some cases with large state incentives. 

Warner said he had not spent much time in Nevada, but said he
believed it faces similar growth and rural issues as Virginia.
He said he was opposed to federal efforts to dump nuclear waste
at Yucca Mountain, 90 miles north of Las Vegas. 

"I'll be the first to admit I've got more to learn about the
state," he said. "I hope to get to know it better." 

Aide Lars Anderson said Warner's political action committee had
not hired any Nevada staff. 

Warner was scheduled to attend a fundraiser for Titus Wednesday
evening and appear with Democrat Tessa Hafen, a candidate in
Nevada's 3rd Congressional District, on Thursday. 

All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 38 Guardian Unlimited: Nuclear Courier accused of theft, Fraud
 
From the Associated Press        

[UP] 

Thursday September 7, 2006 5:16 AM

AMARILLO, Texas (AP) - A former nuclear materials courier with
top secret clearance was indicted Wednesday on charges that he
used his position to obtain restricted items and sell them over
the Internet. 

Joe Allen Sizemore, 41, of Amarillo, was charged with wire
fraud, theft of government property and possession of
unregistered firearms, U.S. Attorney Richard B. Roper announced
Wednesday in a news release. 

Roper said Sizemore was expected to surrender to federal
authorities and make his initial court appearance within the
next two weeks. 

No telephone listing for Sizemore could immediately be found in
the Amarillo area. 

Sizemore worked as a nuclear materials courier for the Office of
Secure Transportation under the Department of Energy and was
assigned to the Pantex Plant, a nuclear weapons assembly and
disassembly facility near Amarillo. 

Couriers transport nuclear weapons and obtain body armor, night
scopes and weaponry restricted to government and law-enforcement
officials. They agree to return equipment the DOE that has been
provided to them during their employment, according to Roper's
statement. 

From July 2003 until August 2005, Sizemore prepared purchase
requests of restricted items on DOE letterhead and submitted
them to his supervisors, who signed them, according to the
indictment. After he received the items, he posted them for sale
on the Internet, prosecutors say. 

Authorities recovered two submachine guns when they searched
Sizemore's home in October, according to the release. The fully
automatic weapons are required by law to be registered in the
National Firearms Registry. 

Sizemore had worked at Pantex since 1990 and had top secret
clearance, according to a previous report published in the
Amarillo Globe-News.	 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 39 NRC: NRC to Hold Annual Public Meeting on Nuclear Security On Sept. 14 in Rockville, Maryland
 
News Release - 2006-10 U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office 
of Public Affairs     Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 
20555-0001     E-mail: opa@nrc.gov No. 06-106     September 7, 
2006   

The Nuclear Regulatory Commission will hold a public meeting
Sept. 14, 2006, in Rockville, Md., to discuss security
enhancements required by the agency and actions taken by
licensees to implement these enhancements. Topics to be
discussed include reactor security oversight, force-on-force
exercises, nuclear material security initiatives, security
activities related to the Energy Policy Act of 2005, and new
reactor security. 

Much of the meeting, hosted by the agencys Office of Nuclear
Security and Incident Response, will be conducted as a
roundtable discussion among invited participants and NRC
officials. The meeting is open and members of the public will
have the opportunity to offer comments and ask questions. A
detailed agenda is available at:
http://www.nrc.gov/public-involve/public-meetings.html. 

The meeting will be held at the NRCs Two White Flint North
Auditorium, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Md. Please allow
time to process through NRC security. Attendees are requested to
pre-register for this conference by e-mailing securemtg@nrc.gov,
including name, affiliation, and phone number. More information
about NRC security requirements is available at:
http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/fact-sheets/securit
y-enhancements.html.   



  


 	Last revised Thursday, September 07, 2006 	   
*****************************************************************
 40 RIA Novosti: No energy blackmail, Russia to defend nuclear interests - Putin

07/ 09/ 2006                                  

CASABLANCA, September 7 (RIA Novosti) - Russian President
Vladimir Putin said Thursday Russia would seek to defend its
interests in the global nuclear-fuel market and dismissed
suggestions that his country was using its vast energy resources
to blackmail other countries. 

Russia has been looking to increase its presence on the world's
market for nuclear fuel, but has encountered resistance,
particularly in the United States.

 "We see no equality here and our interests are being infringed
upon," he said. "We will seek to make our relations [in this
sphere] more balanced so that they correspond to our interests."

 Restrictions on imports from Russia of low-enriched uranium
have been in force since the Soviet era. Russia is currently
allowed to operate on the U.S. market without a 116% import duty
only through the United States Enrichment Corporation (USEC), a
special intermediary agent, under the HEU-LEU Conversion
program. 

The U.S. International Trade Commission voted on July 18 to keep
the 116% import duty on Russian uranium products, claiming that
the lifting of anti-dumping restrictions would seriously harm
the American economy. Putin earlier said Russia opposed U.S.
discrimination against its nuclear companies and wanted to
supply uranium directly.

 Putin, who is currently on a visit to Morocco, also denied
allegations that Russia was using its huge energy resources to
make other countries dependent on it.

 "We are increasing production and the share of energy resources
on the world market," he said. "This is a significant
contribution to restraining prices and resolving energy problems
in general. Concerns [about Russia's use of its resources] have
been dreamed up and are caused by the striving to use them in
the competitive struggle."

 In a speech made in Vilnius in May U.S. Vice President Dick
Cheney accused Russia, which has the world's largest natural gas
and considerable oil reserves, of using its energy resources to
blackmail and intimidate its neighbors.

 President Putin also reiterated that Russia had always been a
reliable supplier of energy resources.

"We have been and will be for all our partners," he said.

╘ 2005 RIA Novosti   
*****************************************************************
 41 APP.COM: A split at NRC on risk of attack | 

Asbury Park Press Online

 September 7, 2006

Decision put off on DEP's concern about Lacey plant
 Posted by the Asbury Park Presson 09/7/06 

BY NICHOLAS CLUNN STAFF WRITER

Although a decision on whether terrorism should be made part of
a special safety review of the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant
was postponed Wednesday, one of the nation's chief regulators
disagreed with the delay, saying the threat should be analyzed.

In a lone dissenting opinion, Gregory B. Jaczko, one of the five
top officials at the federal agency that regulates nuclear
reactors, agreed with a challenge filed by the New Jersey
Department of Environmental Protection.

The DEP argues that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is
wrongfully excluding the threat of terrorism from its review of
Oyster Creek. Regulators are evaluating the Lacey plant to
determine if it is safe enough to run for another 20 years under
a renewed license.

At issue is whether the DEP officials, and now Jaczko, are
correct in their view that the National Environmental Policy Act
requires license-renewal reviews to include vulnerability to
terrorism.

Jaczko said New Jersey's challenge could have national
implications.

"This particular case presents a timely opportunity for the
commission to resolve these matters, providing clarity and
certainty for the potential increase in licensing reviews the
commission may conduct in the next few years," he wrote.

The operators of six other plants have applied for renewed
licenses, while those running 22 others have notified the NRC
that they intend to do the same. The NRC initially licensed all
reactors for 40 years, then later presented the option for a
20-year renewal.

Exercises, inspections 

As it stands, renewal reviews do not include terrorism because
the threat is evaluated regularly through force-on-force
exercises and inspections, according to the NRC.

During the exercises, plant security guards engage in simulated
combat against commandos attempting to cause a radioactive
release by damaging key safety systems.

The inspection program looks at how people enter and exit
sensitive areas, security equipment and whether guards are fit
for duty.

Four of the five NRC commissioners voted Wednesday in Rockville,
Md., to postpone their vote until the U.S. Supreme Court decides
whether it will review an appellate court decision on the
terrorism issue.

Utility holding company Pacific Gas &Electric Co. said last week
that it plans to appeal to the Supreme Court a ruling that
blocked a plan to store more radioactive waste at the Diablo
Canyon power plant in California.

In June, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco
ruled that federal regulators must consider more seriously the
likelihood of a terrorist attack at the Diablo Canyon site
before granting approval for additional storage.

The judges unanimously disagreed with the NRC, which proffered
that an attack was "remote and speculative" and therefore
unnecessary to consider.

A New Jersey DEP spokeswoman said the department would not
comment on the postponment until its lawyers finished reviewing
commission comments released Wednesday afternoon.

In their vote, whenever it will occur, the commissioners will
either affirm or strike down a ruling made by a separate NRC
panel on the terrorism issue.

That panel of three administrative law judges, a lower court of
sorts, rejected the DEP's request for a hearing on the terrorism
contention and two other challenges in February.

More formal than most governmental hearings, NRC hearings of
this kind would involve lawyers presenting positions before the
three-judge panel. It offers a chance for those directly
affected by the plant to bring a quasi-legal case against it. In
the end, the judges can require plant operators to meet certain
conditions to obtain a renewal.

Other appeals dismissed 

The two other appeals raised by the DEP were turned aside by the
commission on Wednesday. Environmental officials had argued that
Oyster Creek should be required to use tougher safety standards
when it comes to assessing the condition of metal parts. They
also took issue with a backup power source that would be used to
run the plant during a blackout. The power supply is off-site
and is operated by another company, according to the DEP.

If the state wanted to pursue those issues further, it would
have to file an appeal in federal court, NRC spokeswoman Diane
Screnci said.

A fourth appeal, one raised by six activist groups opposed to
Oyster Creek, was also denied by the commission Wednesday. The
group wanted the commission to allow evidence in their challenge
of an Oyster Creek plan that would monitor a key radiation
barrier for signs of aging. The plan for the barrier, called the
drywell liner, is inadequate, the groups argued. 

Nicholas Clunn: (732) 643-4072 or nclunn@app.com

  Copyright ╘ 2006 Asbury Park Press. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
 42 President: Extension of National Emergency


                         FR Doc 06-7527 
[Federal Register: September 7, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 173)] 
[Presidential Documents] [Page 52733] From the Federal Register 
Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr07se06-115] 
Presidential Documents 

Title 3--
The President

[[Page 52733]]

                Notice of September 5, 2006
 
Continuation of the National Emergency With Respect to Certain 
Terrorist Attacks Consistent with section 202(d) of the National 
Emergencies Act (50 U.S.C. 1622(d)), I am continuing for 1 year 
the national emergency I declared on September 14, 2001, in 
Proclamation 7463, with respect to the terrorist attacks at the 
World Trade Center, New York, New York, the Pentagon, and aboard 
United Airlines flight 93, and the continuing and immediate 
threat of further attacks on the United States. Because the 
terrorist threat continues, the national emergency declared on 
September 14, 2001, and the measures adopted to deal with that 
emergency must continue in effect beyond September 14, 2006. 
Therefore, I am continuing in effect for an additional year the 
national emergency I declared on September 14, 2001, with respect 
to the terrorist threat. This notice shall be published in the 
Federal Register and transmitted to the Congress.
                
                
                    (Presidential Sig.) THE WHITE HOUSE, 
September 5, 2006. [FR Doc. 06-7527 Filed 9-6-06; 8:45 am] 
Billing code 3195-01-P
 
*****************************************************************
 43 Moscow Times: Nuclear Submarine Blaze Kills 2 Sailors

Friday, September 08, 2006 / Updated Moscow Time         
  
Friday, September 8, 2006. Issue 3493. Page 3. Nuclear Submarine

Lev Fedoseyev / Itar-Tass The St. Daniel of Moscow moored at the
Vidyayevo port in August 2005.   

A fire on board a nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea killed
two crewmembers, but there was no threat of a radiation leak,
the Navy said. 

Navy chief Vladimir Masorin said the submarine was overdue for
scheduled repairs -- raising fresh concerns about safety
standards in the country's aging submarine fleet. 

Submarine safety has been under scrutiny since the Kursk nuclear
submarine sank in the Barents Sea six years ago, killing all 118
crewmembers. 

The submarine, the St. Daniel of Moscow, has been towed back to
port. Admiral Masorin said the fire broke out in an electricity
control panel, away from the reactor, and was put out by the
crew. 

The victims, a 28-year-old sailor and a 35-year-old warrant
officer, had been fighting the fire. They died of smoke
inhalation. 

"It seems likely our equipment has let us down again," Masorin
said on state-run Rossia television. "This boat is 16 years old
and it is overdue for an overhaul." 

Former submarine commander Igor Kudrin said the St. Daniel of
Moscow should have undergone repairs after no more than eight or
nine years. "If we cannot afford the timely maintenance of
submarines then we should dock them, weld them to the dock, seal
the shafts and wait until there is money for repairs and
maintenance," Kudrin said. 

In an apparent reference to the senior command of the Northern
Fleet and the Navy, he added: "One should be looking for those
responsible for such lapses on shore rather than on board." The
submarine belonged to the Northern Fleet. 

Still, Masorin noted that ongoing repairs had been carried out
on the submarine over the years and that the vessel was in
working order. He said the fire was most likely caused by a
short circuit. 

Another problem may have been inadequate training. Kudrin noted
that some sailors appeared not to have followed standard
operating procedures. 

Mikhail Barabanov, an editor at Moscow Defense Brief who has
written extensively on the Navy, agreed. "The main problem of
the Russian Navy is not in the hardware but in the personnel,"
he said. 

The submarine was north of the Rybachiy Peninsula, near the
border with Finland, when it caught fire, Interfax quoted navy
sources as saying. 

It is a Viktor-class attack submarine armed with torpedoes but
not nuclear weapons, defense experts said. It was not clear
whether the St. Daniel of Moscow was carrying any weapons. 

The submarine entered service in 1990, making it one of the
fleet's more modern submarines. The St. Daniel of Moscow had a
fire in its torpedo compartment in 1994, said the Norwegian
environmental group Bellona, which monitors Russia's submarine
fleet. 

"This is a very serious incident," said Alexander Nikitin, a
former nuclear engineer in the navy who now works as an
environmental activist. 	 

(Reuters, MT)   

Copyright 2006. The Moscow Times. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
 44 Guardian Unlimited: Fire Aboard Russian Nuclear Sub Kills 2

From the Associated Press        

[UP] 
 	 
Thursday September 7, 2006 11:01 AM

By MIKE ECKEL 

Associated Press Writer 

MOSCOW (AP) - A fire broke out aboard a Russian nuclear
submarine, killing two crew members and injuring another, but
the navy said there was no radiation threat, Russian news
agencies reported Thursday. 

The blaze ignited Wednesday night in a mechanics room on the
Daniil Moskovsky submarine of the Northern Fleet, which plies
Russia's northern and Arctic waters, the Interfax and ITAR-Tass
news agencies reported. The ship's nuclear reactor was shut down
automatically, the reports said. 

``There is no threat of nuclear contamination,'' Interfax quoted
an unnamed Northern Fleet spokesman as saying. 

Russia's top naval officer, Admiral Vladimir Masorin, said the
likely cause was a short circuit. 

A warrant officer and a sailor were killed by carbon monoxide
poisoning, Interfax reported. Another sailor was injured in the
incident. 

The submarine was later towed along the surface of the water to
its base at Vidyayevo, news agencies reported. An investigation
has been opened on charges of violation of navigation rules. 

``We didn't notify our neighbors because there were rather
enough ships, in particular, two rescue tugboats in the vicinity
of the incident,'' Masorin was quoted as saying by ITAR-Tass.
``We decided to do nothing while at sea, and instead tow it to
its home port where it was launched.'' 

No one could be reached immediately at Russian naval
headquarters or the Northern Fleet for confirmation. 

The Northern Fleet has suffered a series of tragic accidents on
its submarines in recent years. The navy suffered its worst
post-Soviet disaster when the Kursk nuclear submarine exploded
and sank in the Barents Sea in 2000, killing its entire crew of
118. 

In August 2003, nine members of a 10-man crew died when their
submarine sank in gale-force winds in the Barents Sea as it was
being towed to a scrap yard. 

ITAR-Tass said that the Daniil Moskovsky has a crew of 96, and
that is it armed with PK-55 Granat cruise missiles, as well as
Shkval and Vodopad torpedoes. 	 
		 	 	   
Guardian Unlimited ╘ Guardian Newspapers Limited 2006
*****************************************************************
 45 AFP: Fire on Russian nuclear submarine kills two 

 Thu Sep 7, 7:58 AM ET 		 	 

MOSCOW (AFP) - Two submariners have been killed in a fire aboard 
a nuclear submarine in the Barents Sea belonging to Russia's 
northern fleet, but the incident posed no risk of radioactive 
contamination. 

 "The fire was extinguished around midnight Moscow time" (2000
GMT Wednesday), Interfax news agency quoted a northern fleet
press officer as saying on Thursday. 

"The submarine's nuclear energy protection apparatus was
activated. There is no kind of nuclear contamination threat,"
the unnamed press officer said. 

The submarine, the Daniil Moskovsky, was on the surface of the
sea north of the Rybachy peninsula in the Barents Sea at the
time of the fire late Wednesday. 

"The fire broke out... due to a short-circuit in the energy
supply system in one of the nose sections," according to a fleet
spokesman quoted by ITAR-TASS news agency. 

Following the incident, the submarine was being towed to
Vidyayevo, near the northern fleet's headquarters at
Severomorsk, the officer said. 

Russia's submarine fleet has experienced numerous such incidents
since the Soviet Union's 1991 collapse, most notably the sinking
of the Kursk in the Barents Sea in August 2000 with the loss of
all 118 on board. 

Copyright ╘ 2006 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
 46 UPI: Bush nominates nuke safety board members
     
United Press International - Security &Terrorism - 

9/6/2006 11:25:00 AM -0400

WASHINGTON, Sept. 6 (UPI) -- President George W. Bush is
nominating Larry W. Brown of Virginia to be a member of the U.S.
Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board. 

Brown will serve for the remainder of a five-year term expiring
Dec. 18, 2010. Brown currently serves as senior policy adviser
at the U.S. Department of Energy. He previously served as a
captain in the U.S. Navy. Brown received his bachelor's degree
from the University of Colorado, his master's degree from the
United States Naval War College and his JD from Georgetown
University in Washington. 

The U.S. government also announced Tuesday that President Bush
also intends to nominate John E. Mansfield of Virginia to be a
member of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board for an
additional five-year term expiring Dec. 18, 2011. Mansfield is
already a member of the DNFSB. He previously served as associate
administrator for space access and technology at the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration. 

Mansfield earlier served as a staff member on the U.S. Senate
Armed Services Committee. He received his bachelor's degree from
the University of Detroit, his masters' degrees from St. Louis
University and Harvard University, a PhL degree from St. Louis
University and a PhD from Harvard University. 

The DNFSB is an independent federal agency set up by the U.S.
Congress in 1988 that provides safety oversight of the nuclear
weapons complex operated by the U.S. Department of Energy.

╘ Copyright 2006 United Press International, Inc. All Rights
Reserved
*****************************************************************
 47 UPI: Russian nuclear submarine fire kills 2
     
United Press International - NewsTrack - 

        9/7/2006 7:30:00 AM -0400
 
MOSCOW, Sept. 7 (UPI) -- Two Russian sailors were killed and
another injured in a fire on a nuclear submarine in the Barents
Sea, Russia's defense ministry said. 

A ministry spokesman in Moscow said the fire was caused by an
electrical malfunction and there was an automatic shutdown of
the nuclear reactor, the Novosti news agency reported. 

The fire broke out Wednesday night on the St. Daniil of Moscow
submarine, part of Russia's Northern Fleet, the Interfax news
agency said. 

The vessel surfaced after the fire was extinguished and the Itar
Tass agency said the submarine was being towed by a naval ship,
although its destination was not disclosed. 

The 15-year-old submarine was part of the failed rescue effort
in the Kursk nuclear submarine tragedy in August 2000 when 118
sailors suffocated in the paralyzed vessel.

╘ Copyright 2006 United Press International, Inc. All Rights
Reserved
		 		 			 				* 				Email: 			 			 		 		 			 				* 				Comments:
*****************************************************************
 48 Whitehaven News: Fluor fires starting gun with бё400m BNG bid
 		 		 		 		 		 	 	 	
Published on 07/09/2006

By David Siddall
 
US engineering giant Fluor has made an offer of up to бё400m for 
British Nuclear Group. 

But two other bidders have demanded a hearing over the proposed 
sale of CopelandБ─≥s biggest employer.
 
Services company Serco is putting together a consortium to bid 
for British Nuclear Group.
 
The Fluor bid has, in effect, fired the starting gun on a bidding 
race for BNG, which is poised for a boom in business after the 
GovernmentБ─≥s decision to replace BritainБ─≥s nuclear power 
stations. 

The final price for BNG could be about бё1bn, while the contract 
to clean up the Sellafield nuclear power plant alone is estimated 
to be worth up to бё40bn. 

A spokesman for Serco confirmed the groupБ─≥s interest in BNG. 
Б─°We are very interested in nuclear decommissioning. That is why 
we are in the process of putting together a consortium to do the 
work. We would be taking the lead on the project.Б─² 

The company declined to name the members of the consortium, but
it is rumoured that American company Bechtel is likely to be
involved. 

SercoБ─≥s planned consortium is the first serious British
interest in the business. Other companies thought to be
considering a bid are American engineering business The
Washington Group and the French nuclear plant design company
Areva. 

BNFL had been planning to sell BNG as part of the GovernmentБ─≥s
privatisation plan, but following disputes between BNFL and the
Nuclear Decommissioning Authority Б─⌠ BNGБ─≥s biggest UK
customer Б─⌠ a decision was made to sell off BNG piece-meal. 

But last week, Fluor went to the Government direct and told them
it would prefer to buy BNG intact. And MP Jamie Reed said he
wanted to see BNG sold as a Б─°single entity, and not carved up
for piecemeal saleБ─².
 
The Government and BNFL have now agreed to reconsider the way
BNG is sold. 

FluorБ─≥s chief executive, Alan Boeckmann, wrote to BNFLБ─≥s
board and to several government departments. Senior Fluor
executives followed the letter up by travelling to London to
lobby the Government to accept the offer. 

In a statement, Fluor said: Б─°Fluor Corporation confirms that
earlier this week the Corporation submitted an offer to British
Nuclear Fuels to acquire British Nuclear Group Limited in its
entirety.
 
Б─°FluorБ─≥s offer recognises that BNG as a whole is worth far
more than its individual parts... were BNG to be split up, its
collective value would not be captured for BNGБ─≥s stakeholders.
The UKБ─≥s ability to compete in the worldБ─≥s nuclear markets
would be undermined and many BNG employees would have limited
career opportunities once their particular site was cleaned
up.Б─²
 
BNFL spokesman Paul Vallance said: Б─°It is not speculation: we
have had a letter and an offer from Fluor. The board is
considering and discussing it with our shareholder [the
Government] and the NDA.Б─²
 
Commenting on the bidding process, the NDA told The Whitehaven
News : Б─°A sale of BNG by competitive process, together with a
new contract for our biggest and most important site, is a
complex challenge on which we and BNFL have been working
together since the end of March when the sale and our Strategy
were approved by Government. Contrary to media speculation,
there has been no attempt by either party to delay the process
as both NDA and BNFL wish to see progress in the earliest
possible timeframe. Both organisations now have a better
understanding about how a sale combined with a new Sellafield
contract could be achieved in the context of EU procurement
procedures and the implications for the timescale. Good progress
has been made on the development of a new Sellafield contract
which remains on track to be ready by March 2007 as previously
anticipated.Б─²
 
Although the board of BNFL is running the sell-off it is
government ministers who will ultimately give approval or not to
bids for BNG.
 
The DTi spokesman Nick Turton said he could not comment on the
matter.
 
Fluor, along with fellow American company Bechtel, has been
among the keenest potential buyers of BNG, which is in charge of
cleaning up waste at Sellafield, one of the largest and most
high-profile nuclear sites anywhere in the world.
 
Fluor has used Lord Jack CunninghamБ─≥s lobbying firm Sovereign
Strategy to push its interest in buying BNG.
 
Meanwhile another US bidder Bechtel employed another lobbying
firm LLM, which also has close Government links.
 
UK company AMEC said it was Б─°certainly interestedБ─² in
bidding for BNFLБ─≥s third share in AWE, the Aldermaston-based
nuclear weapons establishment.
*****************************************************************
 49 Markey and allies call for securing of nuclear waste fuel
 
September 7, 2006

Contact: Paul Gunter, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, 
301 270 6477

U.S. Representative Edward Markey and other Members of Congress 
Join with Safe Energy Groups in Call for Hardened Storage of 
On-Site Reactor Waste

(Washington, DC)  To mark the five-year commemoration of the 
September 11 attacks, members of Congress led by Massachusetts 
Democrat Congressman Edward Markey joined with the nationwide 
Nuclear Security Coalition to call for prompt actions to secure 
the U.S. commercial power reactors' nuclear waste storage system. 
He proposed implementation of a storage technology known as 
"Hardened On-Site Storage" (HOSS) - by which over-filled atomic 
waste storage pools at reactor sites are off-loaded into dry 
storage casks that have been "hardened" against terrorist attack. 
A 14-minute compact disc presentation entitled "Nuclear Spent 
Fuel & Homeland Security: the Case for Hardened Storage" was hand 
delivered to every member of Congress in support of the joint 
call.  

Rep. Edward Markey, a senior member of the House Homeland 
Security and Energy and Commerce Committees, said, "The NRC 
engages in faith-based nuclear security planning, choosing to 
ignore expert report after expert report, and instead relying on 
the voluntary half-measures of the profit-conscious nuclear 
industry." 

To emphasize their concern, the Nuclear Security Coalition 
identified that 32 boiling water reactors around the country are 
particularly vulnerable, with their so-called "spent" fuel 
storage pools installed six to ten stories up on top of the 
reactor building outside the reactor containment. These pools 
typically contain in excess of 400 metric tons of thermally hot 
and highly radioactive used reactor fuel, which must be 
continuously cooled in water 40-feet deep in the elevated pools. 
None of the nation's reactor fuel storage buildings are designed 
as containment structures to withstand attack by aircraft, rocket 
or a variety of improvised explosive devices.

 "The National Academy of Sciences has identified that the 
nation's current nuclear reactor waste storage system is 
vulnerable to deliberate attack," said Paul Gunter of Nuclear 
Information and Resource Service and spokesperson for the 
citizens' coalition.  "Robust on-site storage of nuclear waste - 
hardened against rocket propelled munitions or explosive laden 
aircraft - provides the public with the first responsible steps 
towards a protective strategy from a nuclear waste fire that 
could induce tens of thousands of cancer fatalities out hundreds 
of miles," said Gunter.

"No technical fix will ever erase the catastrophic risk that 
reactor operations pose because of the intensely radioactive 
waste that is inherent to their production of electricity," said 
Christopher Nord, a coalition member and creator of the CD 
presentation. "Reactor sites will continue to be attractive 
targets.  However, offloading the radioactive waste from these 
overcapacity filled fuel pools and the hardening of on-site dry 
cask storage systems will dramatically reduce the risk and 
off-site consequences to public health and safety should the 
attack come on a more robust nuclear waste storage system."

The HOSS strategy is viewed only as an interim security measure 
and not as a solution to the still insoluble and mounting 
long-term management problem of atomic wastes being generated by 
U.S. power reactors.

"Today, these reactor storage pools are very dangerous dumpsites, 
and Congress must act vigorously for the sake of the health, 
safety and security of the American public to change this ad hoc 
treatment of high-level waste," said Deb Katz, Executive Director 
of Citizens Awareness Network.  "Given that Yucca Mountain 
remains mired in scientific and legal controversy, Congress must 
simultaneously continue the search for truly feasible long-term 
methods for managing nuclear waste for the next tens of thousands 
of years to ensure that the nuclear fuel stored at reactor sites 
is hardened to protect reactor communities," said Katz.  

The compact disc presentation draws upon three scientific studies 
in making the case for hardened on-site storage.[1] Two key 
scientific studies have been published in scientific journals 
identifying the critical national security risk that "spent" fuel 
pools pose at over 100 US nuclear power plants and how the risk 
can be dramatically reduced by offloading pools into dry storage 
casks. In 2003, Congress then requested a third technical and 
scientific study to address this national security vulnerability 
from the National Academy of Sciences. The NAS study, made public 
in April 2005, states, "The committee believes that knowledgeable 
terrorists might choose to attack spent fuel pools because:

-          at U.S. commercial nuclear power plants, these pools 
are less well protected structurally than reactor cores; (p.36)

-          they typically contain inventories of medium - and 
long-lived radionuclides that are several times greater than 
those in individual reactor cores; (p.36)

-          a loss-of-coolant event resulting from damage or 
collapse of the pool could have severe consequences. (p.49)"

One of the two earlier studies was authored by Dr. Gordon 
Thompson for coalition member Citizens Awareness Network. It 
outlined how a more robust storage system of dry casks is 
essential for the protection of the nuclear waste from attack. 
Such a system first involves reconfiguring pool storage of hot 
and highly radioactive used fuel assemblies from current high 
density storage racks to low density storage. This is achieved by 
moving irradiated fuel assemblies that have cooled from reactor 
temperatures at least 5 years to retrievable qualified dry casks 
hardened against attack in fortified onsite structures. 

-30-

 

Included in the Press Packet:

З         Nuclear Security Coalition letter to Congress

З         A copy of the CD - "Nuclear Spent Fuel and Homeland 
Security: the case for Hardened Storage"

З         Background piece accompanying CD

З         Diagram off HOSS system

Linda Gunter is Director of Development and Media Relations. She 
can be reached at: 301.270.6477 ext. 23

[1] "Safety and Security of Commercial Spent Nuclear Fuel 
Storage, National Research Council, 
http://www7.nationalacademies.org/ocga/briefings/Safety_and_Security_Commercial_Spent_Nuclear_Fuel_Storage.asp 
, National Academy of Sciences, 2006

"Reducing the Hazards Stored Spent Power Reactor Fuel in the 
United States" (Taylor and Francis, Alveraz, et al), 2003

"Robust Storage of Spent Nuclear Fuel," Citizens Awareness 
Network, Dr. Gordon Thompson , 2003

http://www.nukebusters.org/uploads/media/Thompson_Report.pdf#search=%22%E2%80%9CRobust%20Storage%20of%20Spent%20Nuclear%20Fuel%2C%E2%80%9D%20Citizens%20Awareness%20Network%22
*****************************************************************
 50 Deseret News Interior Department decisions stop nuclear-waste storage plans, Hatch says
 
[deseretnews.com] 

Thursday, September 7, 2006                              

By Suzanne Struglinski

Deseret Morning News                                          

WASHINGTON ≈ Private Fuel Storage no longer has a lease to use 
tribal lands to store nuclear waste in Tooele County, after 
decisions made by two Interior Department agencies Thursday.

       The Bureau of Indian Affairs opted to "disapprove" the
lease after the Bureau of Land Management denied the consortium
access to the federal land it would need to build a
transportation facility.

       "Utah spoke and the BLM listened," said Sen. Orrin Hatch,
R-Utah. "PFS is dead. It's that simple."

       PFS has a license through the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission to store 40,000 tons of used nuclear fuel rods on the
Goshute site. But when President Bush signed a bill late last
year that protects the Utah Test and Training Range, the measure
also cut off PFS's preferred route for a railroad that would
take waste to the site. Heavy-haul trucks could still move the
waste, but the consortium would need to build a special facility
on public land.

       Hatch convinced the BLM to reopen a public-comment period
on the right of way, and the BLM asked again if it was in the
public's best interest to allow PFS access to federal land in
order to ship nuclear waste to the Skull Valley Goshute Indian
reservation.

       "It proves that every citizen can make a difference,"
Hatch said.

       Private Fuel Storage spokeswoman Sue Martin said neither
she or consortium chairman John Parkyn had received or reviewed
the documents from the Interior Department late Thursday, so she
could not yet comment on their contents.

       "We have to take a look at exactly what their reasoning
is and what this all consists of," Martin said. She did say that
Hatch's proclamation that the project is dead "is a bit
premature."

       Hatch, however, said that any notion that PFS could still
put waste in Utah after Thursday's news is "pure hogwash."

 
E-mail: suzanne@desnews.com			  		 		   

╘ 2006 Deseret News Publishing Company           [ /]                                                   
*****************************************************************
 51 The Australian: Ferguson supports nuclear waste site 

 September 08, 2006 
 
 Dennis Shanahan September 08, 2006 

LABOR resources spokesman Martin Ferguson has warned his
colleagues to stop "scaremongering" over radioactive waste and
backed a low-level nuclear waste centre in Australia.

 Mr Ferguson told parliament there needed to be a debate about
whether Australia was "mature enough to select a site where we
should store our low-level and intermediate-level nuclear
waste". 

The Labor frontbencher's comments come only weeks after the
deputy Labor leader, Jenny Macklin, used an accident at the
Lucas Heights reactor in Sydney to campaign against nuclear
reactors. 

Ms Macklin told parliament that residents near Lucas Heights
needed to be told of accidents within the plant and it showed
"the community is right to be concerned about the safety of
nuclear reactors". 

"This accident is a stark reminder that things can go wrong with
nuclear reactors," Ms Macklin said. 

But yesterday, Mr Ferguson said in a debate about radioactive
waste sites in the Northern Territory that the Australian
Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation, which runs Lucas
Heights, played a vital role in nuclear medicine. 

"ANSTO is too often pilloried for their own political purposes
by those who should know better," Mr Ferguson said. "It is one
thing to run an anti-nuclear campaign underpinned by sound
science, logic and belief. It is quite another to stoop to
ludicrous fearmongering about ANSTO and the Lucas Heights
nuclear facility." 

He said the amendments dealing with ANSTO dealt with "the
unavoidable consequences of nuclear medicine and nuclear
technology in industry". 

The federal, state and territory governments have long debated
the site of a low- to medium-level nuclear waste facility for
radioactive material from medicine and research. "It is time the
games stopped at a state, territory and national level and at a
political level," Mr Ferguson said. 

Mr Ferguson said those who stooped to fearmongering "in the
suburbs of our capital cities and regional communities" ignored
that low-level radioactive waste, such as gloves, plastic cups
and glassware, were already stored in 100 locations in cities
around Australia. 

╘ The Australian 
*****************************************************************
 52 Sydney Morning Herald: ANSTO to take nuclear 'responsibility' - 

www.smh.com.au
 
September 7, 2006 - 2:24PM

Australia's nuclear research organisation is set to take
responsibility for dangerous radioactive material in the event
of nuclear terrorism. 

ANSTO will be able to take control of radioactive material or
waste if an Australian nuclear facility becomes the target of a
terrorist or criminal attack or accident under changes passed by
the House of Representatives. 

Under present laws, ANSTO can only provide advice to
governments. 

Science Minister Julie Bishop said the legislation would also
allow ANSTO to assist police and emergency services in event of
a radiological incident. 

Ms Bishop said current legislation required a specific
regulation to be made every time ANSTO was requested to provide
waste management services. 

She said Labor was supporting the bill, although some Labor
speakers had made opportunistic and blatantly false assertions. 

"The Australian government has no intention of establishing a
long-term storage facility at Lucas Height for non-ANSTO waste,"
she said. 

"In July 2005 the government made clear its intention in
relation to radioactive waste management when three potential
sites in the Northern Territory were nominated for the
Commonwealth radioactive waste management facility." 

Ms Bishop said any Australian government waste treated at Lucas
Heights would be later transferred to the NT facility. 

She said any additional waste requiring treatment at Lucas
Heights amounted to less than a quarter of what waste was
already there. 

Labor attacked the government over the plan to establish a waste
storage facility in the Northern Territory. 

"The decision of the Howard government to dump waste in the
Northern Territory was a clear breach of an election promise,"
NSW Labor MP Peter Garrett told parliament. 

"There is no doubt the interests and rights of the people in the
Northern Territory were both ignored and compromised by the
Howard government." 

Mr Garrett said there was growing recognition it was not
ethically acceptable for a society to impose a nuclear waste
storage facility on an unwilling community. 

He said the government was pushing for a full-scale nuclear
industry and wanted to offer up Australia as the world's storage
base of all long-lived nuclear waste. 

The Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation
(ANSTO) Amendment Bill 2006 now goes to the Senate. 	
╘ 2006 	AAP
Brought to you by [aap] 	 
When news happens:send photos, videos &tip-offs to 0424 SMS SMH
(+61 424 767 764), or emailus. 

Copyright ╘ 2006. The Sydney Morning Herald. <img
*****************************************************************
 53 AU ABC: SA Govt accused of hypocrisy over uranium stance

 Thursday, 7 September 2006. 14:46 (AEDT)Thursday, 7 September

 A Federal Labor backbencher has accused the South Australian
Government of hypocrisy for supporting more uranium mining but
blocking a nuclear waste facility. 

In Parliament last night the Member for the Northern Territory
seat of Lingiari, Warren Snowdon, attacked the CLP's Member for
Solomon, Dave Tollner's position. 

He accused Mr Tollner of ruling out a nuclear waste facility in
the Territory before the last federal election in 2004, but
supporting it soon afterwards. 

But Mr Snowdon told the chamber he agreed 100 per cent with Mr
Tollner on South Australia's position. 

"And I regard it as hypocrisy for the South Australian
Government to be advocating the expansion of uranium mining in
the way they're doing in South Australia and at the same time
say they refuse to accept any responsibility for nuclear waste,"
he said. 

"They want to be in one part of the nuclear fuel cycle, but not
in another." 

*****************************************************************
 54 DailyBulletin.com: Rialto, county need to tackle real polluters

  Article Launched: 09/06/2006 09:29:15 PM PDT  

  The perchlorate issue really could be the pits, if Rialto and
San Bernardino County remain pitted against each other. 

Both should be working to solve the massive contamination
problem afflicting the citys north end rather than going at
loggerheads with each other. And working together would be the
best end. 

The chemical that has polluted 22 wells serving Rialto, Fontana
and Colton is a massive imposition on the cities where the wells
are located; on the county that owns some of the land polluted
by others; and on residents, who, at this point, are subjected
to paying for the pollution via higher water bills that reflect
the costs of cleanup.

 In an effort to get the responsible parties to pay for the
cleanup, Rialto filed a lawsuit in 2004. It named as defendants
the county, the Department of Defense and 40 corporations that
used the chemical during the 1950s and 60s for rocket fuel and
fireworks. 

The city has made scant progress, however, in achieving
satisfactory results. B.F. Goodrich, for one, paid $4 million
toward the effort in 2003, without admitting liability or fault.
But that largely sums up Rialtos success, from a legal
standpoint. The city has had to clean up the mess, nonetheless,
and its been costly, with full containment estimated at $200
million. 

So, its understandable that Rialto officials would be eager to
look to other sources for reimbursement. But here, wed have to
question why the city, which represents citizen taxpayers, would
look to the county, which represents more of the same, as bigger
pockets when it comes to paying for the cleanup, when, clearly,
its the man in the middle  or Joe taxpayer  who would be hurt
by such an arrangement. Especially when the county already has
paid Rialto for the pollution it has claimed responsibility for. 

The lawsuit claims the county is responsible for contributing to 
efforts to clean up perchlorate flowing from land the county
owns but did not contaminate itself. But rather than playing
adversary, the city should be seeking cooperative resources from
the county even more than financial. 

The city and the county need to put their heads together to
figure out how to get the companies actually responsible for
unleashing perchlorate into the groundwater to pay their debt to
the community  so that ratepayers and taxpayers arent left
with the bill. 

What has become clear, county Supervisor Josie Gonzales wrote
in a June 8 letter to Rialto Mayor Grace Vargas, is that we
need to work toward a resolution with all of the parties of the
lawsuit, not just between the city and the county.

 Gonzales makes a good point. Would that such enlightenment also
had struck others of the defendants charged with polluting the
water, and that they now would come forward and admit their
role. And help pay for the cleanup. 

The Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board will hold
hearings at the end of the year to determine what role a number
of corporations played in the water contamination and what those
corporations should do to clean it up. 

In the meantime, Rialto and the county need to look toward the
same goal, and that is working toward the best interests of the
residents they serve. First and foremost, Rialto and the county
need to do what is necessary to clean up the water  both share
a responsibility in that regard. 

Then, they need to join hands to go after those who really are
morally and financially responsible for the pollution at hand.   
                  
www.dailybulletin.com  

Los Angeles Newspaper Group 
*****************************************************************
 55 Salt Lake Tribune: State says fees from nuke site lawyers too high

  Article Last Updated: 09/07/2006 01:09:09 AM MDT  

Federal court: A magistrate directs the two sides to work out an 
equitable agreement

  By Judy Fahys The Salt Lake Tribune 
  
    
  Lawyers behind the planned Skull Valley nuclear waste site
presented Utah government last winter with a $1.3 million bill
for their work in getting five anti-waste state laws struck down
as unconstitutional. 

    The state's lawyers insist that's way too much, but a
federal magistrate isn't taking sides yet. 

    Last week U.S. Magistrate Brooke C. Wells directed the
parties to work out an agreement on lawyer fees over the next
month. She also ordered the attorneys to present their
resolution to her by month's end. 

    Both lawyers for Private Fuel Storage, a group of electric
companies with nuclear reactors, and the Skull Valley Goshutes,
a tiny Indian tribe leasing reservation land for the storage,
have said they submitted a cut-rate bill for their work. 

    Together, they sued the state in 2001 over five laws openly
intended to block the waste site, which would hold up to 44,000
tons of high-level nuclear waste for up to 40 years under a
license approved in February by federal nuclear regulators. A
federal judge dismissed the case before it went to trial, and
the U.S. Supreme Court declined to weigh in. 

    Lawyers for the state have called the fees ⌠excessive.■ 

    ⌠We don't know where [the discussions] will lead,■ said Bill
Hanson, an assistant attorney general. ⌠But we will negotiate in
good faith.■ 

    When presented last winter, the bill raised questions about
the Legislature's process for vetting proposed bills. Lawmakers
in years past had their counsel perform in-depth reviews of
so-called "message bills" that were likely to attract lawsuits,
but that practice changed a couple of years ago. Now, most bills
go through a cursory screening. 

    If the lawyers are unable to strike a deal before Sept. 26,
the federal magistrate will go forward with a hearing on Oct. 5. 

    fahys@sltrib.com 
    
б╘ Copyright 2006, The Salt Lake Tribune. 
*****************************************************************
 56 kutv.com: Interior Dept. Rejects Utah Nuclear Waste Site
          
Sep 7, 2006 9:01 pm US/Mountain 

SALT LAKE CITY The U.S. Interior Department on Thursday rejected
a nuclear waste stockpile at an American Indian reservation in
Utah's west desert. 

Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said the decision kills a plan to
store 44,000 tons of spent fuel rods on the Goshute Indians'
Skull Valley reservation, about 50 miles southwest of Salt Lake
City. 

But a spokeswoman for the utility consortium that won a license
for the storage site suggested it was premature to call it dead. 

The Interior Department used its power to veto a lease Goshute
leaders approved for the stockpile. The agency also refused to
yield federal land for a transfer station where fuel rods would
be transferred from rail cars to tractor-trailers. 

It was the final obstacle for Private Fuel Storage, known as
PFS, a group of nuclear-power utilities that won a license from
the Nuclear Regulatory Commission in February. 

``PFS is dead,'' Hatch said. ``To me, it's a great day for
Utah.'' 

The Interior Department's refusal came in two decisions totaling
47 pages released to The Associated Press by Hatch's office.
Private Fuel Storage said it had not been informed. 

``We have not seen the decisions or figured out what our options
may be,'' PFS spokeswoman Sue Martin said. ``For that reason, I
don't think it's safe to say that PFS is dead. 

``Hatch would want you to believe that PFS has no options, but I
don't know if that's true,'' she said. 

A public-health group also adopted a cautious posture. 

``We're a little hesitant to declare full victory on this
because PFS has a license. It's like having a license but no
car, and they've been told to stay off the road,'' said Vanessa
Pierce, executive director of Healthy Environment Alliance of
Utah. 

In one decision, a high-ranking Interior official overruled a
Bureau of Indian Affairs subordinate who gave conditional
approval in 1997 for the PFS lease on reservation land. The
report said the subordinate, who wasn't named, exceeded his
authority. 

That decision referred frequently to judgments made by the
Interior secretary, Dirk Kempthorne, but it was signed by his
associate deputy secretary, James E. Cason, who was carrying out
duties of Indian Affairs secretary, a position that's currently
vacant, a department spokesman said. 

Cason decided nuclear waste threatened the ``long-term viability
of the Skull Valley Goshutes reservation as a homeland'' for 125
enrolled members, though only about 30 members live on the
18,540-acre reservation. 

PFS was to have leased 820 acres in a corner of the reservation. 

In the other decision, Chad Calvert, acting assistant secretary
for land and minerals management, denied PFS the right to run a
rail spur across a wilderness area or build a transfer station
on federal land. 

The Interior Department said Kempthorne √ Idaho's former
governor √ delegated decisions to Cason and Calvert and didn't
make any himself. 

Cason said two recent developments worked against the plan for
nuclear waste storage. One came in January, when President Bush
created a 100,000-acre Cedar Mountain Wilderness Area, cutting
off the potential for a rail spur PFS wanted to build down the
length of Skull Valley to the reservation. 

And in 2004, Salt Lake City and other communities began sending
baled trash to the reservation for disposal, adding more than
130 truck trips a day onto narrow State Route 196 in Skull
Valley. 

PFS, looking for an alternative to a rail spur to deliver spent
uranium fuel, would have added ``slow moving, 150-foot-long
heavy haul trucks traveling with a frequency of about two per
week.'' The department said that was too much traffic and wear
for a two-lane road without shoulders. 

U.S. Rep. Jim Matheson, D-Utah, ``rejoiced'' at news of the
rejection, saying, ``now we can celebrate the demise of this
dangerous disposal scheme.'' 

Private Fuel Storage billed the Goshute stockpile as temporary
until the federal government can open a national repository at
Nevada's Yucca Mountain. Yet Matheson said Utah could have
become a ``de facto'' home for nuclear waste given troubles at
the Yucca project, which he said won't open until 2017, if then. 

``Utahns stand united against the East Coast dumping its nuclear
garbage on the West. Today's decisions prove that perseverance
pays and I couldn't be more relieved,'' Matheson said.
 
(╘ 2006 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material

*****************************************************************
 57 The Mercury: Borough may ask that spent fuel be sent elsewhere
             
Evan Brandt, ebrandt@pottsmerc.com

09/07/2006

POTTSTOWN -- Borough Council will vote Monday on whether to 
request that the spent nuclear fuel planned for outdoor storage 
at the nuclear power plant in Limerick instead be sent somewhere 
else.                                                        

Barring that, the recommendation on which the council is set to 
vote asks that at least some additional monitoring be considered 
at the site once the construction is completed and the highly 
radioactive fuel storage begins.

The requests were made in a recommendation by the borough▓s 
Environmental Advisory Council and discussed briefly by the 
council on Wednesday night.

Exelon Nuclear, which owns the facility, has plans to erect 24 
steel and concrete containers on the site of its power plant. The 
containers will hold the spent fuel that has been accumulating in 
a 45-foot-deep pool of water inside the reactor building since 
the plant▓s reactor went on-line.

Like nuclear plants across the country, space in the pool at the 
Limerick plant is running out and the federal government▓s 
promise to have a national depository for spent fuel beneath 
Nevada▓s Yucca Mountain is decades from fulfillment.

Don Read, the chairman of Pottstown▓s EAC, said the request to
have the fuel stored elsewhere is really meant as an indicator
of how dissatisfied Pottstown is with the federal government▓s
progress on this issue.

"No one likes the idea of dry cask storage, including Exelon,"
said Read. "And we realize they have little choice. We just want
to go on record as expressing our disappointment with the way
the federal government has bungled this issue."

Contacted Wednesday night, Exelon spokeswoman Elizabeth
Rapczynski agreed.

"Our first choice has always been permanent storage at the
federal repository at Yucca Mountain," she said.

The recommendations note, "the EAC would prefer that the spent
fuel rods be stored at some other location, but understands that
determination is made at the federal level and is more than
likely beyond the scope of anything which local municipalities
can control."

Limerick Township▓s control over the project was limited to the
July 27 site plan approval for the concrete slab on which the
casks will be set. 

The only other approval needed is a "general license" issued by
the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to Transnuclear, the company
that builds the casks systems.

Assuming that the request for storage elsewhere cannot be
accommodated, the EAC, which received a presentation about the
project from Exelon on March 27, requests that additional
monitoring measures be taken.

It asks that a permanent "real time" monitoring system be
installed in addition to the periodic measurements Exelon has
proposed.

"If we▓re going to have a nuclear dump site in our backyard, we
think it should be monitored for temperature and radiation in
real time," Read explained. "We don▓t want four or five hours
going by with radiation leaking out of a cask and the monitoring
hasn▓t taken place yet for that day."

 Rapczynski said, "We appreciate their input, but we have
confidence in the system that will be put in place by
Transnuclear and we believe the monitoring system they have
recommended is optimal for that system."

None of the recommendations conveyed to the council Wednesday
becomes official until the council votes to adopt them, Read
stressed. That vote happens Monday night.

"This is council▓s decision," said Read. "We are simply
fulfilling our charge to make recommendations to them about
issues that we feel have the potential to have a serious
environmental impact on Pottstown," Read said.

He added that these are not the only recommendations the EAC
plans to present to the council about this project.

"We think the additional monitoring is a reasonable request,"
said Read. 

"The next set of recommendations may be a little harder for
Exelon to swallow as we plan to ask that terrorism and the
possibility of an attack be looked at more thoroughly as a
threat to the casks," he said.

This is not the first time Pottstown has taken a position on an
issue that rests within Limerick Township▓s jurisdiction.

When Limerick was considering allowing a slots parlor to be
built near the Sanatoga exit of Route 422, the Pottstown School
Board took a strong position against it, although the borough
council declined, after a discussion, to do the same.

Read said he hopes that Pottstown▓s willingness to consider
commenting on things with a regional impact, like the dry cask
storage project, will inspire other neighboring towns to speak
up.

"I really wish other officials in other towns would let their
voices be heard on things like this," said Read. "Something like
this affects far more than just Limerick Township. It has the
potential to affect us all, and our children and our
grandchildren." 

╘The Mercury 2006                                       
*****************************************************************
 58 edie news centre: From atomic bomb site to nature reserve
 	
(7 September 2006)                      

A site once used for tests leading to the creation of the world's 
first atomic bomb has been made into a nature reserve in one of 
the most unusual regeneration projects in recent years.
			
 The Rhydymwyn Valley site in North Wales went from a chemical 
weapon production and storage plant in the late 1930 to a nuclear 
research facility in the 1940s, used by scientists investigating 
the production of enriched uranium for the US atomic bomb. The 
same scientists went on to work on the Manhattan Project - the US 
government's drive to build an atomic bomb ahead of Germany and 
Japan. 

Taken over by Defra in 1994 after a long period of lying derelict 
or being used for storage, the site was tested for remaining 
contamination, including the drilling of boreholes to monitor 
water quality. 

The latest stage in the history of the Rhydymwyn site has been 
the establishment of a nature reserve, formally handed over to 
the North Wales Wildlife Trust at a ceremony on Tuesday, with 
visitors invited to experience its "rich variety of wildlife, 
including grass snakes, owls and the common lizard." 

Peter Green, head of Defra's estates division, said: "North East
Wales Wildlife have made a contribution to the transformation of
this site from a derelict munitions factory to a haven for
wildlife, so it seems entirely appropriate that their invaluable
input should be formally recognised in a legal agreement." 

Pippa Perry of North East Wales Wildlife Trust, said: "We are
delighted to be formally given responsibility for the wildlife
at the site, and for working with the public and the local
community to raise awareness of the hugely diverse wildlife at
the site." 

For more on the Rhydymwyn site see here. 

Goska Romanowicz 
			
╘ Faversham House Group Ltd 2006. edie news articles may be
*****************************************************************
 59 UPI: Markey backs nuke waste safety campaign
     
 United Press International - Security &Terrorism - 

/7/2006 4:43:00 PM -0400

WASHINGTON, Sept. 7 (UPI) -- Several members of Congress have
called for intensified action to secure the nuclear waste
generated by U.S. civilian power reactors. 

Members of Congress led by Rep. Edward Markey, D-MA, joined with
the nationwide Nuclear Security Coalition to call for prompt
actions to secure the U.S. commercial power reactors' nuclear
waste storage system. The Nuclear Security Coalition is a
national group of 47 U.S. public interest organizations
advocating for improved security at nuclear power plants. 

Markey proposed implementation of a storage technology known as
"Hardened On-Site Storage", or HOSS, by which over-filled atomic
waste storage pools at reactor sites are off-loaded into dry
storage casks that have been "hardened" against terrorist
attack. A 14-minute compact disc presentation entitled "Nuclear
Spent Fuel &Homeland Security: the Case for Hardened Storage"
was hand delivered to every member of Congress in support of the
joint call, the NSC said in a statement Thursday. 

Markey, a senior member of the House Homeland Security and
Energy and Commerce Committees, said, "The NRC engages in
faith-based nuclear security planning, choosing to ignore expert
report after expert report." 

The Nuclear Security Coalition identified that 32 boiling water
reactors around the United States that, it said, were
particularly vulnerable. Those 32 reactors maintained their
"spent" fuel storage pools six to 10 stories high their reactor
building and outside th protective containment structures that
housed the nuclear reactors themselves, the group said. 

"These pools typically contain in excess of 400 metric tons of
thermally hot and highly radioactive used reactor fuel, which
must be continuously cooled in water 40-feet deep in the
elevated pools," the NSC statement said. 

"None of the nation's reactor fuel storage buildings are
designed as containment structures to withstand attack by
aircraft, rocket or a variety of improvised explosive devices,"
it said.

╘ Copyright 2006 United Press International, Inc. All Rights
Reserved
*****************************************************************
 60 NRC: Advisory Committee on Nuclear Waste; Meeting on Planning and 
 
                         FR Doc 06-7504 
[Federal Register: September 7, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 173)] 
[Notices] [Page 52826] From the Federal Register Online via GPO 
Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr07se06-92]                         
 
Procedures; Notice of Meeting The Advisory Committee on Nuclear 
Waste (ACNW) will hold a Planning and Procedures meeting on 
September 18, 2006, Room T-2B1, 11545 Rockville Pike, Rockville, 
Maryland. The entire meeting will be open to public attendance, 
with the exception of a portion that may be closed pursuant to 5 
U.S.C. 552b(c)(2) and (6) to discuss organizational and personnel 
matters that relate solely to internal personnel rules and 
practices of ACNW, and information the release of which would 
constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.
 
The agenda for the subject meeting shall be as follows: Monday, 
September 18, 2006--8:30 a.m.-9:30 a.m. The Committee will 
discuss proposed ACNW activities and related matters. The purpose 
of this meeting is to gather information, analyze relevant issues 
and facts, and formulate proposed positions and actions, as 
appropriate, for deliberation by the full Committee.
 
Members of the public desiring to provide oral statements and/or 
written comments should notify the Designated Federal Official, 
Mr. Antonio F. Dias (Telephone: 301/415-6805) between 8:15 a.m. 
and 5 p.m. (ET) five days prior to the meeting, if possible, so 
that appropriate arrangements can be made. Electronic recordings 
will be permitted only during those portions of the meeting that 
are open to the public.
 
Further information regarding this meeting can be obtained by 
contacting the Designated Federal Official between 8:15 a.m. and 
5:00 p.m. (ET). Persons planning to attend this meeting are urged 
to contact the above named individual at least two working days 
prior to the meeting to be advised of any potential changes in 
the agenda.
 
Dated: August 31, 2006.
 
Michael R. Snodderly, Branch Chief, ACRS/ACNW.
 
[FR Doc. 06-7504 Filed 9-5-06; 10:18 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P

 
*****************************************************************
 61 Las Vegas SUN: Nevada governor candidate denies role in whistleblower firing 

Today: September 07, 2006 at 14:35:19 PDT 

ASSOCIATED PRESS 

LAS VEGAS (AP) - Republican gubernatorial nominee Jim Gibbons is
denying involvement in an attempt to silence a former mine
manager who won a federal whistleblower case after speaking
about conditions at a contaminated mine site. 

"I don't even know this individual. I've never met him. I've
never talked to him. I've never talked to anyone about him,"
Gibbons said Wednesday. "This is an empty political charge by
the Democrats." 

The five-term congressman and mining industry ally was attacked
this week by Democrats citing the dismissal of Earle Dixon,
former site manager of the abandoned Anaconda copper mine near
Yerington. 

A federal administrative law judge ruled last week that Dixon
was fired illegally for speaking about the dangers of uranium,
arsenic and other toxic materials at the site about 65 miles
southeast of Reno. 

"Gibbons had the chance to do the right thing when dangers at
the mine were being exposed," Kirsten Searer, spokeswoman for
the Nevada Democratic Party, said in a statement. "Instead, he
chose to use his position to protect his cronies and himself." 

In a Sept. 9, 2004 letter, Gibbons urged the Bureau of Land
Management to shift oversight of the former mine site from
Carson City to the Nevada State Office in Reno. A month later,
Dixon was fired. Gibbons' letter was cited in an internal human
resources memo explaining reasons for the dismissal. 

Gibbons said he had nothing to do with Dixon's firing. He said
he wrote the letter to push for a reorganization to keep the
mine from being designated a federal Environmental Protection
Agency priority Superfund cleanup site. 

Gibbons said he believed Superfund designation would stigmatize
Yerington and hurt the local economy. 

"At that point in time, it was my view that the state's
involvement was the best way to find a solution to the problem,"
he said. "My letter simply said the site should have unified
management. I thought that the three agencies could do best
under Nevada leadership and that (then-BLM Nevada Director) Bob
Abbey's leadership was best for the problem. It was about
jurisdiction, not about personnel." 

The letter was written after Dixon began aggressively pursuing
measurement of uranium radiation on the site. 

At the time, the Nevada Department of Environmental Protection
was the lead agency with BLM and the EPA to get the former mine
site cleaned up. The site is owned by Atlantic Richfield Co., a
subsidiary of energy giant British Petroleum. 

Since Dixon's departure, the EPA has been heading the cleanup.
But no official Superfund designation has been made. 

Gibbons has accepted more than $4,000 in donations from Atlantic
Richfield during his nearly two decades in politics. He said
Wednesday his advocacy was related only to his feelings about
state and federal control. 

"I'm a firm believer today that the state of Nevada is far
better to handle that," he said. "But whenever you leave it to
the federal government, you're going to end up with delays and
problems that are characteristic of the government bureaucracy
in Washington, D.C. You've got to try to keep the federal
government out of it." 

Gibbons is vying for governor against Democratic state Sen. Dina
Titus. 

--- 

Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal, http://www.lvrj.com 

All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
 62 Knox News: OR company looks at buildings that housed Remotec

By BOB FOWLER, fowler@knews.com 
                                
September 7, 2006

OAK RIDGE - A company that analyzes water and soil samples taken 
from the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge Reservation wants to 
move into buildings formerly occupied by Remotec Inc. in Oak 
Ridge's Valley Park. 

Remotec, which designs and makes robots, relocated in 2005 to a 
site in Clinton's Eagle Bend Industrial Park. 

The robot-building firm had outgrown its high-profile Oak Ridge 
site on Union Valley Road. 

Commodore Advanced Sciences Inc. wants to move in there, even 
though the Remotec complex is "a little bigger than what we 
planned,'' company President Mack Jones said Wednesday. 

"It's certainly suitable for growing our business,'' Jones said. 
"It's a wonderful location.'' 

Jones' request for a special exception to allow the company's 
operations at the Remotec site goes before the Oak Ridge Board of 
Zoning Appeals on Tuesday. 

Some soil and water samples that will be temporarily stored at 
the former Remotec building before they are shipped elsewhere for 
analysis will be slightly radioactive, Jones said. 

He said the Remotec buildings are in an industrial zone that 
allows temporary storage of radioactive materials. 

About 30 employees would be moved to the Remotec complex, 
including some personnel now in offices in Oak Ridge's Jackson 
Square, Jones said. 

Equipment from other company sites will be moved to the new Oak 
Ridge location for storage, Jones said. Some "light assembly of 
test equipment'' is planned in a warehouse on the 8.7-acre site, 
he said. 

His company's upcoming appearance before the Oak Ridge zoning 
appeals board "is more an exercise in the board's full 
understanding of our activities at the facility,'' Jones stated 
Wednesday in a memo. 

Commodore Advanced Sciences is now housed in building K-1035 at 
East Tennessee Technology Park. 

That space is leased from the Community Reuse Organization of 
East Tennessee, a nonprofit group that seeks to boost economic 
development at underused DOE facilities. 

The K-1035 building is scheduled to be demolished early next year 
as part of the cleanup of ETTP, the former uranium enrichment 
complex called K-25. 

"It's not with great pleasure that we ask people to leave space 
that we've rented to them, but it's all part of the accelerated 
cleanup program,'' CROET official Jeff Deardorff said. 

Bob Fowler, News Sentinel Anderson County editor, may be reached 
at 865-481-3625.

╘ 2006 - Knoxville News Sentinel
*****************************************************************
 63 KnoxNews: Nanotech center is goal for project on ORNL campus

Public-private development to target firms for subleases

By BOB FOWLER, fowlerb@knews.com 

September 7, 2006

OAK RIDGE - An office building at Oak Ridge National Laboratory 
is expected to become a regional center for private-sector 
nanotechnology development in a unique new technology park taking 
shape next to the lab's central campus. 

Nanotechnology is the study of basic structural components at the 
microscopic level and has evolved into a cutting-edge science. 

The Department of Energy is preparing to lease the 
31,000-square-foot building to a nonprofit organization for 
sublease to companies involved in nanotechnology research and 
commercialization. 

Building 2033 is within the boundaries of the new Oak Ridge 
Science and Technology Park that is the first private-company 
park on national lab property. 

The nonprofit group, Community Reuse Organization of East 
Tennessee, will lease the building from the Department of Energy. 

The 40 people now there will be transferred to various other lab 
buildings by next summer, when the lease is targeted to start, 
DOE spokesman John Shewairy said. 

"This is an exciting opportunity,'' CROET President Lawrence
Young said of the lease arrangement. 

Technology 2020, working with a consortium called the Innovation
Valley Nano Alliance, will manage the building. 

Tom Rogers, president of Technology 2020, said the building will
be subleased to private firms, including startup companies that
are interested "in pursuing nanotechnology commercialization and
leveraging the science facilities at the lab.'' 

Said Rogers, "It's a project to try to ensure that the regional
economy capitalizes on nanoscience.'' 

Technology 2020, based in Oak Ridge, is a public-private
partnership that promotes the growth of new technology-based
companies. 

The 12-acre Oak Ridge Science and Technology Park at ORNL could
eventually grow to a 40-acre park, said Alex Fischer. 

Fischer is director of technology transfer and economic
development for UT-Battelle, the contractor that manages the lab
for DOE. 

"Candidly, we have been sort of overwhelmed by the early
interest in the park,'' Fischer said. 

Groundbreaking for a 100,000-square-foot building for the park's
first tenant, Pro2Serve, is expected soon. 

Pro2Serve, an engineering and national security firm, is now
located on Oak Ridge Turnpike but has outgrown that leased
building. 

Its new headquarters would be called its National Security
Engineering Center. 

Fischer said a Knoxville development company, Holrob Investments
LLC, "is anxious and ready to get started'' on construction of a
100,000-square-foot building at the park. 

That project won't begin until the "exact footprint'' of the
Pro2Serve building is pinpointed, Fischer said. 

Bob Fowler, News Sentinel Anderson County editor, may be reached
at 865-481-3625.

╘ 2006 - Knoxville News Sentinel
*****************************************************************
 64 DOE: DOE Announces $60 Million in Projects to Accelerate 
Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing
 
  September 7, 2006
 
WASHINGTON, D.C.  The U.S. Department of Energys (DOE) Office
of Science today announced approximately $60 million in new
awards annually for 30 computational science projects over the
next three to five years.  The projects are aimed at
accelerating research in designing new materials, developing
future energy sources, studying global climate change, improving
environmental cleanup methods and understanding physics from the
tiniest particles to the massive explosions of supernovae.  

Advanced computing is a critical element of President Bushs
American Competitiveness Initiative and these projects represent
an important path to scientific discovery, DOE Under Secretary
for Science Raymond Orbach said.   We anticipate that they will
develop and improve software for simulating scientific problems
and help reduce the time-to-market for new technologies. 

Sponsored by the DOEs Scientific Discovery through Advanced
Computing (SciDAC) program, SciDAC-2 will bring together some of
the nations top researchers at the departments national
laboratories and U. S. universities to create the software and
infrastructure needed to help scientists effectively utilize the
next generation of supercomputers.  DOEs supercomputers tackle
complex scientific challenges  some of which can only be
studied through high performance computation and simulation. 
These projects, selected from a total of 240 proposals, involve
70 institutions and hundreds of researchers and students. 

Seventeen science application projects will receive
approximately $26.1 million in awards annually to study problems
ranging from quarks to genomes to astrophysics.  Two new
scientific areas to be addressed under SciDAC-2 are groundwater
transport of underground contaminants, an important factor in
DOEs environmental cleanup mission, and computational biology
focused on how biological systems may be tapped to help provide
new energy sources or help with environmental remediation. 
These new project areas will complement research in fusion
energy, global climate, turbulence, stress corrosion cracking,
computational chemistry and quantum chromodynamics. 

In support of these scientific applications, approximately $24.3
million in annual awards will allow SciDAC-2 to establish nine
Centers for Enabling Technologies. Multidisciplinary teams will
be led by national laboratories and universities and will focus
on meeting the specific needs of SciDAC science applications
researchers as they move toward petascale computing.  The
centers will specialize in applied mathematics, computer
science, distributed computing or visualization and will be
closely tied to specific science applications. 

SciDAC-2 will also increase the presence of the program in the
academic community by creating four university-led SciDAC
institutes with thirteen participating universities.  The
institutes will receive approximately $8.2 million in awards
annually.  Through hands-on workshops and tutorials, the SciDAC
institutes will help a broad range of researchers prepare their
applications to take advantage of the increasing capabilities of
supercomputing centers around the country as well as help foster
the next generation of computational scientists.  

SciDAC-2 expands on the original SciDAC program by collaborating
with the National Science Foundation (NSF) and DOEs National
Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) as new funding partners. 
The NSF is contributing nearly $3 million a year to the Open
Science Grid that supports the large, international physics
collaborations supported by DOE and the NSF.  The NNSA is
contributing nearly $3 million a year for physics and materials
research. 

The newly announced projects build on the success of the
original SciDAC projects launched in 2001.  Those projects
achieved a number of scientific breakthroughs, including: 
  + For the first time, astrophysicists simulated the conditions
which trigger massive stellar explosions know as Type 1a
supernovae, which are critical to understanding the nature of
our universe. 
  + Climate modeling tools developed and improved under SciDAC
enabled U.S. climate scientists to make the largest contribution
of global climate modeling data to the worlds leading body on
climate studies, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. 
  + A better understanding of combustion, which provides 80
percent of the energy used in the United States.  Scientists
created the first laboratory-scale 3-D flame simulation, an
achievement which will likely help improve efficiency and reduce
pollution. 

Additional information on all 30 SciDAC projects, along with
descriptions of the Institutes, Centers for Enabling Technology
and Science Applications, can be found at .  Researchers from
industry, academia and laboratories can also get information and
advice from the SciDAC Outreach Center at . 

Media contact(s): Jeff Sherwood, (202) 586-5806     [ ]   

  U.S. Department of Energy | 1000 Independence Ave., SW | 
Washington, DC 20585 1-800-dial-DOE | f/202-586-4403
*****************************************************************
 65 kgw.com: Cost for Hanford plant grows to $12.2 billion 

News for Oregon and SW Washington | AP Wire
 
09/07/2006 

By SHANNON DININNY  / Associated Press 

The cost to build a massive waste treatment plant at the Hanford
nuclear reservation rose to $12.2 billion Thursday, as the U.S.
Department of Energy announced the results of a new review by
the Army Corps of Engineers. 

The new estimate does not include any fee to be paid to Bechtel
National, the contractor hired to build the plant at the highly
contaminated site. 

The vitrification plant is being built to convert millions of
gallons of radioactive waste to glasslike logs for permanent
disposal in a nuclear waste repository. The plant has long been
considered the cornerstone of cleanup at the Hanford site, but
the project has been mired in cost overruns, construction
problems and delays. 

In 2000, the construction cost was estimated at $4.3 billion. In
May, the Energy Department announced a new cost estimate of
$11.55 billion, which was then to be reviewed for validation by
the Army Corps of Engineers. 

The Corps review, released Thursday, added $650 million to the
cost. The review also extended the projected completion date by
three months to November 2019. 

The federal government created Hanford in the 1940s as part of
the top-secret Manhattan Project to build the atomic bomb.
Today, it is the nation's most contaminated nuclear site, with
cleanup costs expected to total as much as $60 billion. 

Key to the cleanup is the removal of 53 million gallons of
toxic, radioactive waste from 177 aging underground tanks.
Dozens of the tanks have leaked into the groundwater,
threatening the nearby Columbia River and making construction of
the one-of-a-kind vitrification plant a priority. 

Once completed, the plant will stand 12 stories tall and be the
size of four football fields. 

This text is invisible on the page, but this text is affected by
the invisible item's flow. This text is invisible on the page,
but this text is affected by the invisible item's flow.     

&copy; 2006, KGW-TV  
*****************************************************************
 66 NRC: Energy Northwest; Environmental Assessment and Finding of No 
 
                        FR Doc E6-14774 
[Federal Register: September 7, 2006 (Volume 71, Number 173)] 
[Notices] [Page 52824-52826] From the Federal Register Online via 
GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr07se06-91]                         
 
Significant Impact The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) 
is terminating Construction Permit No. CPPR-134 issued to 
Washington Public Power Supply System (permittee, now doing 
business as Energy Northwest) for the Nuclear Project No. 1 
(WNP-1). The facility is located at Energy Northwest's site on 
the Department of Energy's Hanford Reservation in Benton County, 
Washington, approximately 8 miles north of Richland, Washington.
 
Environmental Assessment Identification of Proposed Action The 
proposed action is issuance of an Order that would terminate 
Construction Permit No. CPPR-134 for the partially completed and 
previously deferred WNP-1 facility. Because the construction 
permit for Unit 4 (WNP-4) was effectively subsumed in the Unit 1 
construction permit on November 27, 1985, the proposed action 
would terminate NRC oversight at the Unit 1 and Unit 4 site area. 
The proposed action is in response to Energy Northwest's request 
dated August 9, 2005, supplemented by letter dated July 7, 2006.
 
The Need for the Proposed Action The proposed action is needed to 
allow the permitee to undertake other activities (aside from the 
construction and possible future operation of a nuclear power 
plant) at the WNP-1 and WNP-4 site area. For example, Energy 
Northwest is investigating the possible use of the WNP-\1/4\ site 
for an industrial park. An application for an operating license 
was filed with the NRC for WNP-1; the Operating License 
Proceeding was terminated by the Atomic Safety and Licensing 
Board on July 26, 2000. The construction permit for Unit 1 would 
have expired on June 1, 2011. Energy Northwest requested the 
termination of the WNP-1 construction permit because it has 
determined that it will not complete construction of either WNP-1 
or WNP-4; it has terminated the construction of the nuclear power 
plants as well as the maintenance of layup activities such that 
neither unit can be operated as a utilization facility.
 
Environmental Impacts of the Proposed Action The WNP-1 and 
adjacent WNP-4 sites are located on a portion of the Hanford 
Reservation in Washington State that the permittee has leased 
from U.S. Department of Energy. The environmental impacts 
associated with the construction of the facility have been 
previously discussed and evaluated in the Final Environmental 
Statement (FES) prepared as part of the NRC staff's review of the 
construction permit application, NUREG-75/012, March 1975. 
Construction was suspended on the partially- completed WNP-1 
Project in 1982.
 
The construction of WNP-1 was approximately 65 percent complete; 
therefore, most of the construction impacts discussed in the FES 
have already occurred. This action would terminate the 
authorization to conduct any of the remaining construction 
activities described in the FES and would also terminate NRC's 
oversight for activities at the site area.
 
Restoration of the site is being conducted in accordance with 
Washington State Energy Facility Site Evaluation Council (EFSEC) 
Resolution No. 302 (Resolution). This resolution contains the 
requirements and schedule for restoration of the WNP-1 and WNP-4 
sites, as agreed to by Energy Northwest, Bonneville Power 
Administration, U.S. Department of Energy, and the State of 
Washington. This agreement, approved by the four parties in 
December 2003, stipulated restoration activities in two 
phases--near term (within 18 to 24 months) and final restoration 
(within approximately 26 years, or by the end of 2029). The NRC 
staff assessed the scope of the restoration activities addressed 
in the Resolution and has determined that the goals and 
objectives of such activities, when carried out, would achieve an 
environmentally stable and aesthetically acceptable site. Energy 
Northwest has stated that all near term activities have been 
completed.
 
Near term restoration activities that have been completed at the 
WNP-1 and WNP-4 site area include: removal of hazardous materials 
(such as asbestos, mercury vapor lights, transformer mineral oil 
or polychlorinated biphenyls [PCBs], diesel fuel, lubricants, and 
solvents); installation of secure access doors or permanent 
sealing of points of entry to the remaining structures on the 
sites; relocation of fencing and installation of new fencing to 
minimize the land area and to reduce unauthorized entry potential 
such that security patrols are not required; installation of ``No 
Trespassing'' signs; elimination of fall hazards; fencing of 
exterior substations and distribution load centers to minimize 
the potential for entry; and removal of temporary buildings that 
are neither safe nor feasible for reuse.
 
The Unit 1 Containment Building has been cleaned to remove trash, 
debris, overhead hazards, scaffolding, and formwork. Under the 
Resolution, this building will remain intact as constructed--no 
further actions will be needed for the Unit 1 containment at the 
final restoration phase.
 
The Unit 4 Containment Building has been cleaned to remove trash, 
debris, overhead hazards, scaffolding, and formwork. This 
building was filled with compacted earth to elevation 479' and a 
6'' thick concrete floor was poured at that level. (The ground 
elevation around the containment and general services buildings 
at WNP-1 and WNP-4 is approximately 455' above mean sea level.) 
Openings in the Unit 4 Containment Building were either sealed or 
fitted with anti-bird roosting screens; building protrusions were 
minimized or fitted with anti-bird roosting screens. Provision 
was made for water drainage. Under the Resolution, this building 
will remain in its existing condition--no further actions will be 
needed for the Unit 4 containment at the final restoration phase.
 
 
[[Page 52825]] The Unit 1 General Services Building has had 
concrete roofs poured at elevations 518' and 543'. Under the 
Resolution, this building will remain intact as constructed. The 
upper levels of the Unit 4 General Services Building interior has 
been cleaned to remove trash, debris, overhead hazards, 
scaffolding, and formwork. The lower areas of the Unit 4 General 
Services Building, where no access is required, will not be 
cleaned. The walls have been demolished to the 501' elevation. 
Metal roofing with a (painted polystyrene) coating has been 
installed at elevations 501' and 479' to seal the building. Under 
the Resolution, both buildings will remain in their current 
configuration--no further actions will be needed for the Unit 1 
or the Unit 4 General Services Building at the final restoration 
phase.
 
The interior of the Unit 1 Turbine-Generator Building has been 
cleaned to remove trash, debris, and overhead hazards. This 
building will be demolished and removed at the Final Restoration 
phase.
 
Under the Resolution, the Unit 1 turbine pedestal will remain 
after demolition and removal of the building.
 
Construction of the WNP-4 Turbine-Generator Building was halted 
following completion of the building shell (structural steel, 
floor slabs, walls, roof, exterior siding, etc.). These elements 
were demolished in 1990 prior to the restoration agreement with 
EFSEC. Only the turbine pedestal and portions of the ground floor 
slab remain. Under the Resolution, the Unit 4 turbine pedestal 
will remain intact as constructed--no further actions will be 
needed for the Unit 4 turbine pedestal at the final restoration 
phase.
 
The Unit 1 and Unit 4 spray ponds have had separate fences 
installed around the ponds. The interiors of the Unit 1 and Unit 
4 Pump House Buildings have been cleaned to remove trash, debris, 
overhead hazards, scaffolding, and formwork. Under the 
Resolution, final restoration for these structures will consist 
of removal of the buildings and backfilling of the spray ponds.
 
The Unit 1 and Unit 4 cooling towers have had chain link fences 
with locked gates installed to secure access to the cooling tower 
stairwells. Anti-bird screens have been added to minimize access 
by birds. Under the Resolution, final restoration activities for 
the Unit 1 and Unit 4 cooling towers will include demolition of 
the existing structures to grade and removal of the basin slabs.
 
During the final restoration phase, all slabs and most structures 
(except for the Containment Buildings, General Services 
Buildings, and turbine pedestals) will be removed. The landfill 
will be closed and capped, the large underground circulating 
water lines will be backfilled, all roads and rail lines will be 
removed and graded, and all yard areas will be cleaned, 
contoured, graded and seeded implementing best management 
practices. After the final restoration activities have been 
completed, the structures remaining permanently in place at the 
sites will be limited to the Units 1 and 4 Containment Buildings, 
General Services Buildings, and turbine pedestals.
 
The permit issued by the Army Corps of Engineers for the 
submerged river water intake structure requires that if Energy 
Northwest decides to abandon the intake structure, Energy 
Northwest must restore the area to a condition satisfactory to 
the district engineer. At this time, the river intake structure 
may be a part of future plans for use of the site and abandonment 
is not under consideration.
 
The NRC staff conducted an audit of the site area encompassing 
WNP- 1 and WNP-4 on April 24 and 25, 2006, to determine whether 
posession of source, byproduct or special nuclear material was 
controlled as authorized, to determine whether the site area is 
being maintained in a safe and stable manner, and to assess key 
environmental aspects of the site. The staff observed selected 
portions of the Containment Buildings, General Services 
Buildings, spray ponds, cooling towers, the Unit 1 
Turbine-Generator Building, Pump House Buildings, and other site 
buildings. The staff also observed that erosion controls were 
being maintained. The staff assessed the effectiveness of the 
measures already taken under the near term phase of site 
restoration plan and concluded that restoration activities appear 
to meet the goals and objectives of Washington State EFSEC 
Resolution No. 302. Based on the foregoing, the NRC staff has 
concluded that the proposed action would have no significant 
environmental impact.
 
The staff also concluded that there is reasonable assurance that 
the remaining site restoration activities under the Resolution 
will achieve an environmentally stable and aesthetically 
acceptable site for whatever non-nuclear use may conform with 
local zoning laws and Department of Energy authorizations.
 
The site area cannot be used for the utilization facility 
envisioned under CPPR-134. No nuclear fuel was ever received on 
site. The site area is in an environmentally stable condition 
that poses no significant hazard to persons onsite. The facility 
cannot be operated in its present condition. Because this 
proposed action would only terminate the construction permit, it 
does not involve any different impacts or involve a significant 
change to those impacts described and analyzed in the FES. 
Consequently, an environmental impact statement addressing the 
proposed action is not required.
 
Because the proposed construction permit termination Order is for 
a project that was suspended 24 years ago, the action is judged 
to be administrative in nature and would have no significant 
environmental impact. It does not involve any different impacts 
as described and analyzed in the Staff's FES and will not involve 
any impacts beyond those already described and analyzed in the 
FES. The proposed action will terminate the NRC's involvement on 
the project.
 
Alternatives to the Proposed Action The only alternative to the 
proposed action would be to deny the request, i.e., the ``no 
action'' alternative. This alternative would still result in the 
conduct of the activities prescribed for final restoration in the 
four-party agreement dated December 3, 2003.
 
This alternative would necessitate continued oversight by NRC of 
a project that has ceased construction and has no likelihood of 
completion; that will not be operated as a utilization facility; 
that has stable environmental conditions; and that continues to 
be subject to oversight by other regulatory agencies--all with no 
significant environmental benefit. The environmental impacts of 
the proposed action and the ``no action'' alternative are 
similar.
 
Alternative Use of Resources This action does not involve the use 
of resources not previously considered in the FES for WNP-1.
 
Agencies and Persons Contacted In accordance with its stated 
policy, on August 31, 2006, the staff consulted with the 
Washington State Official, Mr. Richard Cowley, regarding the 
environmental impact of the proposed action. The State official 
had no comments.
 
Finding of No Significant Impact On the basis of the 
environmental assessment, the NRC concludes that this action will 
not have a significant effect on the quality of the human 
environment. Accordingly, the NRC has determined not to prepare 
an environmental impact statement for this action.
 
 
[[Page 52826]] For further details with respect to this action, 
see the licensee's request for construction permit termination 
dated August 9, 2005, supplemented by letter dated July 7, 2006. 
Documents may be examined, and/or copied for a fee, at the NRC's 
Public Document Room, located at One White Flint North, 11555 
Rockville Pike (first floor), Rockville, Maryland. Publicly 
available records will be accessible electronically from the 
Agency wide Documents Access and Management Systems (ADAMS) 
Public Electronic Reading Room on the internet at the NRC Web 
site, http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/adams.html. Persons who do 
not have access to ADAMS or who encounter problems in accessing 
the documents located in ADAMS should contact the NRC PDR 
Reference staff by telephone at 1-800-397-4029 or 301-415-4737, 
or send an e-mail to pdr@nrc.gov. Dated at Rockville, Maryland 
this 31st day of August 2006.
 
For the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
 
Brian J. Benney, Project Manager, Plant Licensing Branch IV, 
Division of Operating Reactor Licensing, Office of Nuclear 
Reactor Regulation.
 
[FR Doc. E6-14774 Filed 9-6-06; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 7590-01-P

 
    
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