***************************************************************** 08/13/07 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 15.189 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** Send News Stories to news@energy-net.org with title on subject line and first line of body NUCLEAR POLICY 1 IPS-English POLITICS-INDIA: Nuke Deal With US Draws Domestic 2 Pakistan Times: US Reports about Location of Pakistan Nuke Assets Sp 3 UPI: Walker's World: The Russian bear is back 4 Pakistan Times: Pakistan to Never Compromise on Nuclear Assets NUCLEAR REACTORS 5 The Hindu: N-deal: Uproar in Lok Sabha 6 US: Guardian Unlimited: Coming clean on going green | Comment | 7 Helsingin Sanomat: Further nuclear reactor construction delays could 8 AU ABC: New alliance to mount anti-nuclear election fight - 9 BBC NEWS: Kazakh stake in nuclear company 10 BBC NEWS: EU's climate targets 'ambitious' 11 The Hindu: N-deal: Samajwadi members stall LS proceedings 12 RIA Novosti: Ukraine's president suspends formation of Ukratomprom 13 Platts: Areva says Olkiluoto-3 construction to take six years 14 US: Macleans.ca: Going nuclear may not be the answer 15 US: recordonline.com: Indian Point sirens at 96% 16 The Hindu: Furore over N-deal, RS adjourns for day 17 US: Cleantech Blog: Goin' Nucular 18 US: IBR: Idaho's energy future looks green 19 Reuters: U.S. nuclear deal protests disrupt Indian parliament 20 Reuters: Toshiba sells Westinghouse stake to Kazatomprom | 21 Telegraph: Government accused of 'environment deceit' - 22 NWW: Nukem awarded contract at PBMR fuel plant 23 Hindustan Times: The ABC of the 123- 24 The Telegraph: Nuclear noises hit high decibel 25 Montreal Gazette: Chalk River reactors a nuclear nightmare 26 AFP: Sarkozy denies plan to sell nuclear reactor to Libya - 27 AFP: US congressman's response to Indian PM on nuclear deal 28 SABCnews.com: Nuclear energy strategy aims to create employment 29 SABCnews.com: Eskom shuts down Koeberg's Unit 1 30 Guardian Unlimited: Indian PM Defends Nuclear Deal With U.S. NUCLEAR SECURITY NUCLEAR SAFETY NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 31 US: Gulfnews: Libya still 'has 200 barrels of uranium' 32 AU ABC: Too much haste to nuclear waste - 33 BBC NEWS: Dounreay chain reaction milestone 34 US: Press TV: Libya to halt disposing uranium 35 US: NUCLEAR WASTE TECHNICAL REVIEW BOARD: Notice of Meeting 36 The Australian: US-backed nuke club 'appealing' PEACE 37 US: UPI: Kucinich calls for nuclear abolition US DEPT. OF ENERGY 38 DOE: Office of Science; Notice of Renewal of the Fusion Energy 39 Knoxville News Sentinel: TVA nuke reactor shut down as power demand 40 Knoxville News Sentinel: Oakley attorneys may not need security clea 41 LocalNews8.com: Crews expand cleanup of nuclear weapons waste at eas ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 IPS-English POLITICS-INDIA: Nuke Deal With US Draws Domestic Date: Mon, 13 Aug 2007 15:34:23 -0700 POLITICS-INDIA: Nuke Deal With US Draws Domestic Opposition Analysis by Praful Bidwai NEW DELHI, Aug 13 (IPS) - The ”breakthrough” United States-India nuclear cooperation agreement finalised three weeks ago in Washington has run into serious all-round opposition in India and put Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in a piquant situation Under the Indian constitution, the legislature does not need to ratify an external agreement or international treaty for it to take effect -- the cabinet's approval is enough. But in the present case, such approval may not ensure the full implementation of the agreement at an early date. Both the left and right ends of the political spectrum, as well as India's regional parties, have decided to oppose the agreement, called ”123 agreement” because it is meant to amend that Section of the U.S. Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act in order to permit civilian nuclear trade with India. (Under the existing Act, nuclear commerce is prohibited with countries which have conducted nuclear explosions and not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of 1970.) The most significant and best-informed opposition to the ”123 agreement” comes from the Left, comprised primarily of the Communist parties, whose support to the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government led by Singh is crucial to its survival. The right, led by the national-chauvinist, and traditionally pro-U.S., Bharatiya Janata Party, has also assailed the agreement from the terrain of nuclear nationalism, contending that it will promote external interference in India's nuclear programme and eventually cap its nuclear weapons arsenal. For the BJP, India's nuclear weapons programme is not only pivotally important to security; it is vital to the nation's self-esteem, prestige and pride. A newly formed grouping of eight regional parties, called the United National Progressive Alliance (UNPA), also opposes the agreement on similar grounds, and holds that the ”123 agreement” is a charter of ”nuclear slavery”. Reinforcing their arguments is a lobby of retired nuclear engineers and scientists. But this lobby has shrunk in size, with a majority falling in line with Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) chairman Anil Kakodkar, who now approves the deal. The left's opposition to the agreement has reportedly left Manmohan Singh utterly dispirited; and several Indian newspapers reported that he at one stage considered resigning from the Prime Minister's position on this issue. The main rationale of the communists' opposition, stated in a considered five-page document, is twofold. First, the ”123 agreement” is inseparable from efforts to forge a close U.S.-India ”strategic partnership” or alliance. The left says the agreement ”must be seen as a crucial step to lock in India into the U.S. global strategic designs” outlined in the Defence Framework Agreement the two countries signed in June 2005, and other agreed measures or moves for closer military collaboration, including joint exercises and promotion of ”inter-operability” between their military services and manoeuvres. India's communists have always opposed India's strategic embrace of the U.S.. It believes that the U.S. is a hegemonic, deeply destabilising power and India cannot become a close ally of Washington without sacrificing or compromising its policy independence and narrowing its room for manoeuvre in world affairs. Second, the left argues that the text of the ”123 agreement” differs significantly from the statements that Singh made in Parliament, promising that it would address all of India's concerns about full civilian nuclear cooperation with the U.S. and autonomy for the Indian nuclear programme. The left says there are specific differences between the agreement and a law passed last December in the U.S. Congress as a prelude to ”123”, called the Henry J Hyde Act. The act mandates annual certification by the U.S. President that India is behaving in conformity with American foreign policy objectives, and also imposes a few other conditions that India said were not acceptable to it. According to the left, the Hyde Act will prevail over the ”123” agreement and can be used arbitrarily to terminate nuclear cooperation with India. The act, it says, falls short of guaranteeing full-scale nuclear commerce with India, which was promised when Singh and President George W Bush inked the deal in July 2005. For instance, the U.S. will not export uranium enrichment or fuel reprocessing technologies to India. The act, argue the communists, will erode India's sovereign decision-making in respect of its nuclear programme. Since the ”123 agreement” essentially derives from the Act, it must be opposed . In addition, the left is concerned at the likely impact of ”123” on India's traditional advocacy of universal nuclear disarmament. It says that by getting ”accommodated in a U.S.-led unequal nuclear order”, India's leading role in championing nuclear disarmament ”as a major country of the non-aligned community” will be given ”the go-by”. The left also says that it is ”debatable” whether nuclear power, which would be promoted under the U.S.-India deal, is a sustainable solution to India's energy problem. ”The bulk of the left's current opposition to the agreement derives from procedural arguments (about Singh's assurances to Parliament), and from differences between its text and what was promised in July 2005, and again in March and August last year,” says M.V. Ramana, a physicist and energy expert attached to the Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Environment and Development, Bangalore told IPS. The present position of the left parties significantly differs from its original stand on the U.S.-India nuclear deal two years ago, which emphasised its negative consequences for India's advocacy of global nuclear disarmament. For decades, said the left parties in July 2005, India ”was àcommitted to nuclear disarmamentà The BJP-led government had begun the journey of accepting a junior partnership of the U.S. in return for a de facto recognition as a nuclear weapon-stateà The current agreement marks an end to India's nuclear disarmament policy”. Nevertheless, the communists have decided not to press for a vote on the ”123 agreement” under Parliament's rules of procedure, unlike most of the non-UPA parties. A negative vote could lead to the fall of the Manmohan Singh government. ”The left is loath to topple the UPA government because it fears that that will pave the way for a return of the BJP,” says Achin Vanaik, a professor of international relations and global politics at Delhi university. However, Vanaik holds the left's viewpoint as valid. ‘'Logically, the left should have stuck to its original arguments about the consequences of the deal for the global nuclear disarmament agenda, and for a close strategic relationship between India and the U.S. Unfortunately, it tailed the lobby of nuclear scientists and engineers who were exclusively concerned about the agreement's consequences for India's autonomy in running its nuclear programme.” In contrast to the all-round political opposition to the agreement, the Singh government also faces intense lobbying pressure from the global nuclear power industry and giant U.S. corporations which are eyeing huge contracts, potentially worth 150 billion dollars. If the U.S.-India nuclear deal is approved by the U.S. Congress, and also by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers' Group, these corporations stand to make windfall gains from an expansion of India's nuclear power programme based on imported reactors, fuel and other equipment. Already, Areva from France, General Electric from the U.S., Japan's Toshiba (which now owns Westinghouse), and Russia's atomic energy agency Rosatom, are exploring possibilities of winning contracts from India's Nuclear Power Corporation for the first phase of expansion of nuclear power generation at four new sites. At immediate stake is business worth 14-16 billion dollars for eight reactors of 1,000 Mw each. ”However it's not clear,” says Ramana, ”if the government will brazen out the opposition and push ahead with the implementation of the deal, or go slow while trying to persuade the opposition. It probably has only a narrow window of opportunity before the U.S. Congress takes up the deal for ratification.” India's Parliament is scheduled to discuss the ”123 agreement” this week beginning with a formal statement by Singh. ***** + Nuclear Ambitions û The World's Deadly Arsenal (http://www.ipsnews.net/new_focus/nuclear/index.asp) + DISARMAMENT: US-India Nuke Deal May Spark Asian Arms Race (http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=38744) + POLITICS: Doomsday Clock Ticking Faster - in Asia (http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=36245) (END/IPS/AP/IP/IF/NA/NU/SC/DV/EN/NR/PB/RDR/07) = 08130615 ORP002 NNNN ***************************************************************** 2 Pakistan Times: US Reports about Location of Pakistan Nuke Assets Speculative : FO 'Pakistan Times' Diplomatic Desk ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Monday dismissed as “speculative” the reports that the United States has information about the location of its nuclear assets. “There is no truth ... essentially such claims are to add spice to contentious speculations and reports that go around,” Foreign Office spokesperson Ms Tasnim Aslam told a weekly media briefing. She was responding to a question about news reports that spoke about the security of Pakistan’s nuclear assets in case of a change at the helm in the country and claimed that the US has information on their location. When asked about the recent telephone call by the US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice to President Pervez Musharraf, the spokesperson said the call was routed through the Pakistan embassy in United States on the Secretary’s request. “The embassy arranged the call after checking his (President Musharraf’s) availability and inclination to attend the call,” Ms Aslam said. She said no calls are made directly to the President and are routed through either Pakistan’s embassy or the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. About the Pak-US relations, she said a lot was happening and despite some negative statements, on which Pakistan has made its position very clear, there were many positive aspects to their ties. To a question about expected visit of US Assistant Secretary of State Richard Boucher, she said she had no dates but added that US officials continue to visit Pakistan regularly and help in building the relationship between the two countries. The spokesperson said President Musharraf did not attend the inaugural session of the Pak-Afghan Peace Jirga at Kabul because of his engagements in the capital. She expressed optimism about the outcome of the joint peace jirga, termed it “a positive development” and hoped that the notables will help in bringing peace to the region. Regarding prospects of inclusion of the Taliban and representatives from Waziristan in the Jirga process, she said, “it is up to the co-chairs to decide how this jirga will interact with those not part of this process.” The spokesperson said the Kabul Jirga took a number of important decisions including establishment of a council of elders of 50 notables, 25 from each side, to sort out the contentious issues.? Copyright © 2002-2007 TIMES Group of Publications All rights reserved PakistanTimes.net | TIMES.com.pk | PakistanTimes.pk ***************************************************************** 3 UPI: Walker's World: The Russian bear is back United Press International - International Published: Aug. 13, 2007 at 11:53 AM By MARTIN WALKER UPI Editor Emeritus WASHINGTON, Aug. 13 (UPI) -- The announcement Saturday by President Vladimir Putin that Russia has launched a vast program to improve the country's missile defense system is being presented as a response to American plans to deploy a similar new U.S. anti-missile system in Eastern Europe. But it comes in the context of other recent Russian steps that suggest a determined and coordinated effort by the Kremlin to assert a return to great-power status by restoring much of the military power of the old Soviet Union. To suspicious observers in the West and to U.S. military commanders who must make their own strategic assessments based on the capabilities of potential rivals, it must look as if the Russian bear is back. In one crucial sense, the bear never went away. Although Russia’s navy has been rusting in dock for more than a decade, and though its army has shrunk in size and very nearly collapsed in morale after its setbacks in the Chechen wars, the nuclear-armed strategic rocket forces have retained much of their traditional power to awe and to deter. Russia remains the only country that could, in theory, destroy organized life in the United States. But something new is happening. Russia is rattling its sabers again. Last week’s planting of a titanium flag on the seabed below the North Pole was one sign. Another was the resumption of long-haul missions into U.S. and NATO-controlled airspace by Russia’s strategic bombers. Two T-95MS ‘Bear’ turboprop bombers last week flew over the Pacific island of Guam, where the United States is upgrading its air and naval bases. "It has always been the tradition of our long-range aviation to fly far into the ocean, to meet (U.S.) aircraft carriers and greet American pilots visually," Maj. Gen. Pavel Androsov told a Moscow news conference. But that tradition was in abeyance in the 1990s, when the Russian military was short of aviation fuel and training flights were cut drastically. Under Putin, all that has changed. Another bomber crew from Engels Air Base in southwest Russia flew to a test range in northern Siberia, hit the assigned targets with cruise missiles and then flew another 3,000 miles to land at a base near the Pacific coast, an air force spokesman said. Engels is one of the main bases for the most modern of Russian bombers, the supersonic Tu-160 Blackjack, known to Russians as the white swan, which holds a special place in Putin’s affections since he took a five-hour flight with one of the Engels crews. Yet a further signal of Russia’s bold new strategic posture was the announcement by navy Commander Adm. Vladimir Masorin of a massive rebuilding of the Russian fleet. Masorin, who also promised the return of a “permanent naval presence” in the Mediterranean Sea, said last month Russia was rebuilding an industrial base to build six new aircraft carriers over the next 20 years. Russia can certainly afford it, so long as energy prices remain close to their current high levels. Dmitri Medvedev, who combines the jobs of being chairman of the Gazprom energy giant and also first deputy prime minister, told Germany’s Stern magazine last week that Gazprom “could become the world's most valuable company.” "Gazprom has the largest natural gas reserves in the world. When I joined the board of directors (in 2000), the concern was worth about $8 billion, but today it is more than $250 billion,” Medvedev said. At current U.S. prices, a fleet of six carriers, along with their aircraft and the training costs of pilots, would cost in the region of $150 billion, about the current level of Russia’s national infrastructure fund. But Russia is spending a great deal more than that. Putin’s announcement of the new early warning and anti-missile facility that he opened at Lekhtusi, 30 miles north of St. Petersburg, was said to be "the first step in the implementation of a major early warning program up to the year 2015." And being based that far north it was not intended to stop missiles from Iran or China or the south, but to guard against missiles coming over the North Pole, which is to say against a potential threat from the United States. Not that Russia is leaving the south unguarded; a similar advanced radar installation is under construction at Armavir in southern Russia. Then there was the announcement this month that the new S-400 Triomf missile defense system, designed to defeat Stealth bombers, has gone onto combat alert in the Moscow region. And in June the Kremlin announced the first successful undersea launch of the new Bulava missile, designed to defeat anti-missile defenses, and to equip the next-generation Borei 955 nuclear submarines. It all sounds very expensive, and very formidable, the first ominous fruits of the $200 billion 10-year rearmament program Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov announced two years ago. The reality is rather less impressive. Indeed, senior Russian defense officials are warning publicly that the rearmament program faces collapse, as wages and other costs soar. The cost of the new T-909 tanks has risen by 25 percent in just three months, and the Defense Ministry has stopped announcing the actual production of tanks, missiles and warplanes. "The targets for increasing armaments have not been met, even when spending for the program consistently increases," Deputy Chairman Vladislav Putilin told the Military-Industrial Commission in April. And Lt. Gen. Vladimir Mikheyev, the Defense Ministry’s deputy head of armaments, is on record saying: "Uncertainty regarding financing means that we will not receive the tanks from Nizhny Tagil-based manufacturer Uralvagonzavod, nor the Su-34 aircraft that the armaments program mandates." The Sukhoi group itself has warned that mass production of the long-planned Su-34 is out of the question this or next year. And Ivanov himself told the last meeting of the Military-Industrial Commission: "There is a deficit of over 1,500 materials needed in defense. That constitutes a threat to the state's defense capability and economic security." The fact is that the Russian military-industrial complex may have impressive technological skills, but it lacks the skilled manpower, the resource base, the cost control and management, and the advanced engineering capabilities that the rearmament program requires. It cannot even meet its lucrative export contracts. The former Soviet aircraft carrier, the Admiral Gorshkov, is being modernized for India at the Sevmash shipbuilding yard under a $1.5 billion contract signed three years ago. It was supposed to be operational in the Indian Ocean next year, along with a wing of MiG-29K warplanes. Not a chance. Last month Sevmash admitted that the Gorshkov would not be ready until 2011 at the earliest, and Sevmash Director General Vladimir Pastukhov was fired. The Russian bear may be coming out of hibernation, but he’s a long, long way from being back -- even with all that oil and gas money at his disposal. And the more the big holes in the rearmament plan become apparent, the more questionable become Sergei Ivanov’s hopes of succeeding Putin as Russian president next year. © Copyright 2007 United Press International, Inc. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 4 Pakistan Times: Pakistan to Never Compromise on Nuclear Assets : Shaukat Aziz ‘Pakistan Times’ Special Correspondent ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz Monday said Pakistan will never compromise on its nuclear assets and will not allow anyone to cause harm, as these are vital for its sovereignty and security. “Pakistan’s strategic capabilities as a nuclear and missile power are an important factor that not only ensures its security and sovereignty but also progress,” he said this while addressing a seminar titled, Let’s think what did we give to Pakistan, organized by Pakistan Ideological Council (PIC) here at Prime Minister Secretariat. The Prime Minister said progress and development are linked with defence and every citizen of the country is ready to defend and will never compromise on national nuclear assets. Shaukat Aziz said Pakistan of today and tomorrow is not the Pakistan of yesterday, adding that over the past 8 years the government has worked hard to implement broad based multi-sectoral reforms that have revived and repositioned the country. The Prime Minister said as a result of reforms process, Pakistan is today an anchor for peace and stability as well as being in a better position to leverage its assets for promotion of its national interests. He said Pakistan has faced many challenges and lost and gained a lot during the last 60 years, but now we have to take the country ahead which can only be achieved through collective efforts, not by a government or a party. Dialogue with Opposition And, according to another report, Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz highlighting the importance of dialogue in political process Monday said discussions with political parties have been based on promoting democracy and to encourage them to contest the elections in free and fair manner. “Dialogue in every civil society between political parties is clearly a encouraging step and that is the purpose of our discussions with Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP),” he said in an interview with Dow Jones. The Prime Minister said the government believes in free and fair elections and wants that every person who has the right to vote should exercise this right and select the representatives of choice. To a question, the Prime Minister said “as we have said many times there is no deal with any party. We have discussions with different parties in the parliament and outside with their leadership.” He said the government is trying to create a common ground on certain basic principles which are in the national interest and added it is not for any one party or for an individual, but it is for the country which comes first. The Prime Minister said it is up to the people of Pakistan and voters to judge who they think will give them better future because the election is all about the future of the people and the country. Regarding President’s uniform, he said President has made absolutely clear that whatever he does will be in line with the constitution and the law. “We believe in him to decide what he wants to do in this regard.” Regarding imposition of emergency, he said the requirements in this regard are clearly mentioned in the constitution. “At the moment we have no desire to impose emergency. We keep looking how the situation develops,” he added. About the recent comments by US administration about using its troops against terrorists in Pakistan’s tribal areas, the Prime Minister said “Pakistan is a sovereign country and it will not allow any other country to launch a attack in its territory to hunt terrorists and extremists.” He said “we are capable of securing and defending ourselves and at the same time we share intelligence with many countries that are combating extremism and militancy.” He said Pakistan wants peace in the region and in the world and resolution of disputes so that the root causes of why people behave in a certain way be analyzed. The Prime Minister said whether it is Iraq, Palestine, Afghanistan and Kashmir, all these issues have to get the attention of the world. Aziz said, “We believe that US and Pakistan can play a role in ensuring peace and security, promoting interfaith harmony, and providing a solution to the issues facing the people. “Clearly we would never compromise on our sovereignty and security and at the same time we want to work closely with the US,” he added. About the Pak-US relations, he said the US is strategic partner of Pakistan and added “We are strengthening this partnership in many spheres. They have helped us in our economic development and growth, capacity building, promoting health and education, helping our defence and security capability.” He said around one million Pakistanis were living in US who are contributing their role and sending their savings to Pakistan. He said Pakistan has attracted a lot of investment because of its economic reforms and got the highest investment of US 8.4 billion dollars in different sectors including telecom, manufacturing, banking, real estate and agriculture. The Prime Minister said the PML-led coalition government has served the masses well by bringing about economic stability in the country and improving governance for people’s welfare. Regarding improvement in Asian financial sector, he said the Asian capital and financial market stand out as one of the most professionally run area. He said in Pakistan “we had reformed the government’s role strictly on policy making and regulation. Capital market has been developed through new technologies and opening up inflow of local and foreign capital. Answering a question, he said on the governance part most of the Asian are heading to improve transparency, public participation, active role of media and active political process. Replying to a question, whether he would contest for the premiership after the next election, he said it would be decided by the party. He expressed the hope the PML and its allied parties would be successful in the election as the choice of the people is continuing on the current path of growth and prosperity. “Now Pakistan is a country which has established a brand. A country which is in a well position to take advantage of globalization,” Prime Minister Aziz added. The nation, he said, has to make a choice that which party would be able to position Pakistan to face the internal and external challenges. “A lot more needs to be done. We have to ensure security and peace of mind. We need more roads, housing, gas, sanitation, water and electricity to improve quality of life of the people. We have to give people education, more health facilities and respect to achieve our vision of prosperous Pakistan,” he maintained. The Prime Minister said present government is well aware of its responsibilities and is committed to providing more opportunities to the people who are vulnerable and is identifying areas which would give a major jump. He said the country needs a smooth political process where every body can express views, adding the government would continue to encourage freedom of the media. Pakistan will be an anchor of peace and stability in this part of the world as it (Pakistan) has a major role to play as a nuclear power, the Prime Minister said.? Copyright © 2002-2007 TIMES Group of Publications All rights reserved PakistanTimes.net | TIMES.com.pk | PakistanTimes.pk ***************************************************************** 5 The Hindu: N-deal: Uproar in Lok Sabha Monday, August 13, 2007 : 1235 Hrs New Delhi, Aug. 13 (PTI): The Lok Sabha was adjourned today for 30 minutes following uproar by Samajwadi Party members who stormed the well demanding scrapping of the Indo-US civil nuclear deal. As soon as the House assembled for the day, SP members trooped into the well shouting slogans denouncing the Government and the Congress. They demanded scrapping of the nuclear deal. Speaker Somnath Chatterjee appealed in vain for calm as SP members were in no mood to listen. They alleged the deal favoured the US. RJD members were also on their feet seeking to raise the issue of flood situation in Bihar. The BJP members raised the Goa issue alleging democracy had been murdered in the state. The Speaker wanted the House to take up Question Hour as scheduled and said the Prime Minister would make a statement on the nuclear deal and then there could be a discussion. As the din continued, Chatterjee adjourned the House for 30 minutes. Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of ***************************************************************** 6 Guardian Unlimited: Coming clean on going green | Comment | Renewables briefing paper Monday August 13, 2007 Politicians who bemoan the lack of trust that citizens have in government should take a look at the revelations that the Guardian publishes today. Shortly after Britain signed up to an EU commitment to generate 20% of its energy from renewable sources by 2020, government officials briefed ministers that Britain had no chance of getting near that target and suggested ways of wriggling out of it. Not only did Tony Blair sign up to the EU commitment in March, he claimed credit it for it. This is what he said at the time: "There is some pride in our country because this agenda very much grew out of what we tried to do in our G8 presidency and our presidency of the EU. It is tremendous to think that 18 months later we have what I think is a historic summit." His words fit uncomfortably with a subsequent internal briefing paper prepared by officials. It said that Britain had achieved "little so far" on wind, solar or hydroelectric sources of power, and even getting to 9% from the current level of 2% would be "challenging". On current policies, renewables would only account for 5% of Britain's overall energy mix by 2020. Rather than change the policies, officials at the relabelled DTI - the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (DBERR) - suggested ways of dodging the target. They advised lobbying EU member states to agree that the target could be interpreted more flexibly by including investment in solar farms in north Africa, or by counting nuclear energy as "renewable". Another section asks ministers to examine "what options there are for statistical interpretations of the target that would make it easier to achieve". Few claim that there are easy choices to be made in reducing Britain's carbon footprint. But the public cannot hold an honest debate or support difficult decisions if it is led by a government that continues to be, despite all the protestation, cynical beyond belief about the presentation of policy. The officials who drafted the options paper obviously think renewables are too expensive, and a better way would be to palm off our carbon emissions through the European Union's all too flexible emissions trading scheme. The paper argues that getting to 9% - less than half of the target we signed up to - by 2020 could cost Ł4bn a year. But this is only one-third of the amount (1% of gross domestic product) that Sir Nicholas Stern recommended rich countries spend a year on combating climate change immediately. The government has two policies on encouraging renewables: the low-carbon buildings programme aimed at homeowners and public housing, and the renewable obligations scheme, which encourages generators to source more power from renewables. Neither works well. Only Ł80m over three years has been allocated in grants to homeowners and businesses, a fraction of the cost of widening part of the M6, and those grants have since been cut back and made more difficult to get. The renewables obligation has had some success in promoting wind power, but little else. There are alternative policies such as those being pursued in Germany, a country with 200 times as much installed solar power and 10 times as much wind power (in spite of the fact that Britain is windier). In Germany a market in solar panels has been created by a price subsidy borne by the consumer. A "feed-in tariff" guarantees that producers of power generated by a renewable source are paid a fixed price, several times higher than the market one. Each year the price is lowered, but as the market in renewables grows, the unit cost of installing such a supply falls. If Gordon Brown privately thinks that renewables are too expensive and should be ditched in favour of expanding the nuclear industry then he should say so. If, as he says, he wants to refresh Britain's democracy, he should reject advice that offers obfuscation in place of transparent debate. Email your comments for publication to politics.editor@guardianunlimited.co.uk Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 7 Helsingin Sanomat: Further nuclear reactor construction delays could lead to electricity shortage International Edition - Business & Finance Safety considerations postpone completion - Greenpeace "astonished" Completion of Finland's fifth commerical nuclear reactor, which is being built in Olkiluoto, where two of the four existing facilities are located, is to be delayed further. The consortium formed by the French Areva and Germany's Siemens informed the electric utility TVO on Friday that a further delay in construction means that the plant will not be ready for use until 2011. This means that the reactor, with a planned output of 1,600 megawatts, will begin operations about two years later than was originally planned. In the interim, Finland will be more dependent on electricity imports. When it is completed, the new power plant will supply about ten per cent of Finland's energy output. Taisto Turunen, director-general of the energy section of the Ministry of Trade and Industry, says that production forecasts have assumed that the third unit at Olkiluoto would be completed on schedule. The delay would mean that in the winter of 2011 Finland will have to keep consumption down during times of peak use. The lower level of relatively cheap nuclear-generated electricity will also put pressure on the price of Finnish electricity. Under the new timetable announced by Areva on Friday, the main construction work on the reactor building will continue into the winter of 2009, and not the summer of 2008 as previously promised. Originally, the whole installation is supposed to have been ready for use in 2009. Martin Landtman, the head of the nuclear power construction project for TVO, says that the company cannot say when exactly when the plant will be ready until the company has made an assessment on how to minimise impact of the delay. Areva says that the security requirements mean that the construction has been more demanding than it had previously understood. The basic processes in the new installation are based on existing technology, but the upgraded security demands came as a surprise. The reactor building must now withstand a plane crash, and the reactor building must have a "core catcher" beneath it to prevent a leak out of the containment vessel if the core melts in a nuclear accident. "The delay that was announced this time is specifically the result of slow progress at the construction site itself. Having to withstand a plane crash, and the requirement of a core catcher mean that there will have to be great changes, compared with previous nuclear plant. These changes require more work", Landtman says. TVO did not want to estimate the costs of the delay in lost electricity sales. When the previous delay was announced in December last year, Helsingin Sanomat estimated on the basis of expert calculations that a delay of a year and a half would cost nearly EUR 600 million in lost electricity production. The environmental organisation Greenpeace commented on the announcement of a further delay in the construction of the power plant by saying that the project continues to wrestle with chronic quality and security problems. "It is astonishing that the builder of the reactor says at this point that making the reactor building capable of withstanding a plane crash is one of the reasons for the delay", says Harri Lammi of Greenpeace. "When the building permit was issued, it was claimed that the reactor would withstand a plane crash, although many suspected that it would be very challenging. The official requirement was known by the planners already from 2001", Lammi says. Greenpeace demanded that TVO and the Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority immediately publish a list of the 1,500 quality and security problems that the project has experienced. Greenpeace claims that the planning of the reactor does not meet the security requirements set by Finnish legislation, even though Finns were told that this was the case. ***************************************************************** 8 AU ABC: New alliance to mount anti-nuclear election fight - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) Posted August 13, 2007 16:22:00 * Alice Springs 0870 Anti-nuclear campaigners say they are confident they can make the future of the nuclear industry in Australia an election issue. Environment organisations, Aboriginal community members and other stakeholders met near Alice Springs over the weekend to form the Australian Nuclear Free Alliance. Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) spokesman Dave Sweeney says the alliance will coordinate a renewed push against the nuclear industry. "The aim is very clearly to make it front and centre for people that we're in a time of choice in this country," he said. "We are drifting towards increasing involvement in the toxic nuclear trade, we are drifting [towards] becoming the world's uranium quarry and the world's radioactive waste dump. "Now that's not a future wanted by the people at this meeting, or by the majority of the Australian community in every opinion poll taken." Indigenous activist Kevin Buzzacott is also adamant the alliance will mount a good fight against the Federal Government's plans. "Any destruction to sacred sites, we're going to stop you fellas from doing it," he said. The group says there has been a lack of consultation over the four Northern Territory sites under consideration for a waste dump. ***************************************************************** 9 BBC NEWS: Kazakh stake in nuclear company Last Updated: Monday, 13 August 2007, 11:04 GMT 12:04 UK Nuclear energy is seeing a resurgence Japanese firm Toshiba has sold a 10% stake in its majority-owned nuclear firm Westinghouse to uranium maker Kazatomprom for $540m (Ł268m). The Kazakh firm hopes the investment will help it to expand. Toshiba aims to gain access to key uranium sources. Toshiba bought 77% of Westinghouse, the US power plant arm of British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL), for $5.4bn in 2006. "By welcoming Kazatomprom - a global leader in resource exploitation - as a Westinghouse investor, Toshiba will strengthen the global development of its atomic energy business," said the Japanese conglomerate. When Toshiba invested in Westinghouse, the final stake it bought was far larger than originally planned after another investor pulled out. Since buying its share, the firm has been trying to spread the cost by including other investors. The latest deal needs to be given the go-ahead by US and Japanese regulators. Expansion Kazatomprom, which holds 10% of the global uranium market, aims to increase that stake to 40% over the next decade or so. The firm hopes to boost uranium production three-fold to 17,500 tonnes a year by 2015. The combination of higher oil prices and the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions has prompted countries to seek an alternative to fossil fuels, including nuclear fuel. * BBC Copyright Notice ***************************************************************** 10 BBC NEWS: EU's climate targets 'ambitious' Last Updated: Monday, 13 August 2007, 15:44 GMT 16:44 UK The EU wants to see an increased use of renewable energy Downing St has said its climate change targets are "ambitious" but it remains fully committed to renewable energy. It was responding to a report in the Guardian that officials had told ministers the UK would miss EU targets by a wide margin. Gordon Brown's official spokesman said: "It will be a major challenge not just for the UK but for the EU." They include a 20% reduction in EU greenhouse gas emissions, compared with 1990 levels, or 30% if other developed nations agree to take similar action. 'On course' The targets also include an increase in the use of renewable energy, to 20% of all energy consumed, and a 20% increase in energy efficiency. Mr Brown's spokesman said the EU's aims were "ambitious", but added that the UK was "on course to meet" its commitments under the Kyoto Protocol, which it ratified in 2002. He added: "It is now for the EU Commission to propose how EU-wide targets should be met by member states." It is a very damning document and it does give a very interesting insight into the way that government operates Mike Childs Friends of the Earth However, the Guardian reported that it had seen an internal briefing paper for ministers from officials at the recently renamed Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. This reportedly said that, under current policies, it would be "challenging" for Britain to reach a target of 9% for energy renewables such as wind, solar or hydropower - well short of the EU's 2020 target of 20%, but up from the current 2%. According to the Guardian, the briefing paper said the UK had "achieved little so far on renewables". The officials suggested ministers lobby other countries to get more flexible ways of reaching the targets, such as including nuclear power, the newspaper said. But Energy Minister Malcolm Wicks strongly rejected claims that the government was not committed to renewables, saying various proposals to meet the targets had been drawn up for discussion. 'Absolutely determined' "At the moment, about 4 to 5% of our electricity comes from renewables. We're on course for that to be three times as much - 15% by 2015. "We've now got this more demanding European target, in other words, not just electricity, but fuel we need for our cars and our heating as well, and the issue is how do we get there?" He added: "We are determined to make our contribution on this... We are moving steadily, year after year, in the right direction. "We're ambitious about renewables and I'm absolutely determined that we move forward on renewables." But environmental group Friends of the Earth said the briefing paper showed the government was trying to water down its commitments. Campaigns director Mike Childs told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "It's very clear that what they're trying to say is 'we want to introduce maximum flexibility within the targets', and they float ideas about saying 'can we use our nuclear power as part of that targets? "Now, clearly nuclear power isn't a renewable industry, so what they are trying to do is weaken it as far as possible. "It is a very damning document and it does give a very interesting insight into the way that government operates." Shadow business, enterprise and regulatory reform secretary Alan Duncan accused the government of "living a lie" over climate change. * BBC Copyright Notice ***************************************************************** 11 The Hindu: N-deal: Samajwadi members stall LS proceedings Monday, August 13, 2007 : 1410 Hrs New Delhi, Aug. 13 (PTI): The protest by agitated Samajwadi Party members over the Indo-US civil nuclear deal stalled proceedings in the Lok Sabha today even as the Government announced that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would make a statement on the issue in the afternoon. The House witnessed two adjournments soon after it met for the day as SP members were in no mood to listen and chanted slogans denouncing the Government and the Congress over the nuclear deal which they alleged favoured the US. It was trouble from the word go with the SP members storming the well on the issue. BJP members later joined them but on the issue concerning political developments in Goa. RJD members sought to raise the issue of flood situation in Bihar. Amidst the din, Leader of the House Pranab Mukherjee informed members that the Prime Minister would make a statement on the Indo-US nuclear deal at 1400 hrs and said the Government had no problem to discuss the issue straightaway. Speaker Somnath Chatterjee said after Prime Minister's statement, the House would take up a special discussion on the flood situation in Bihar. Chatterjee was critical of agitated members and asked them not to take the House to ransom. "People have not sent you here to shout slogans. The country is watching you. If you do not conduct business in a proper manner, then there is no justification for Parliament to exist," he said. As the din continued, the Speaker adjourned the House till 1400 hrs. Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the ***************************************************************** 12 RIA Novosti: Ukraine's president suspends formation of Ukratomprom 21:26 | 13/ 08/ 2007 KIEV, August 13 (RIA Novosti) - Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko suspended Monday the cabinet's decree to create state-run atomic-industrial concern Ukratomprom. On December 26, 2006 Ukraine's Cabinet of Ministers issued a resolution to set up Ukratomprom by merging the national atomic energy enterprise Energoatom with nuclear fuel cycle enterprises into an integrated concern. President Yushchenko said in his Monday decree that the formation of Ukratomprom could lead to the private acquisition of property, which is prohibited from privatization. In addition to Energoatom the mooted concern was also set to include state enterprises "Vostochny GOK" (Eastern Mining and Concentration Complex), "Pridneprovsky Metallurgical Plant", "Polimin", "Smoly" (Resins), "Zirconium", as well as units of National Scientific Research Center "Kharkov Physical-Technological Institute" (KPTI). RIA Novosti ***************************************************************** 13 Platts: Areva says Olkiluoto-3 construction to take six years 2007-08-10 Washington (Platts)--10Aug2007 Areva acknowledged Olkiluoto-3 will take six years to complete, instead of the original target of four years or the more recent estimate of 5.5 years. As recently as late April, Areva officials said the commercial service date was still the turn of 2010-2011, or about 67 months after the May 2005 construction start. In an August 10 statement, Areva said commercial operation is likely to start in 2011. "De facto, its construction period will be six years, which is equal to the worldwide average construction time," it said. Areva said the project "remains challenging" but that "improvement measures put in place" should "prevent or circumvent delays." The 1,600-MW EPR, being delivered to Finnish utility TVO under a turnkey contract with Areva and Siemens, has been plagued by delays, including problems with licensing and with subcontractors meeting concrete specifications. In an August 10 statement, TVO Project Manager Martin Landtman said that, according to Areva and Siemens, the latest delay is because construction is going more slowly than expected, and "the need to satisfy the safety requirements for the new plant is more demanding than the supplier had anticipated." Copyright © 2007 - Platts, All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 14 Macleans.ca: Going nuclear may not be the answer A study suggests leukemia rates in kids are higher near nuclear sites SUZANNE TAYLOR | August 13, 2007 | Amid growing pressure to establish zero-emission energy sources, governments at home and abroad are touting nuclear power -- widely denounced for the environmental catastrophes it produced in the '70s and '80s -- as an answer to the climate change crisis. But its proponents may be getting ahead of themselves, cautions P. J. Baker, a senior biostatistician at Omnicare Clinical Research, which conducts research for pharmaceutical companies. As a Ph.D. candidate at the Medical University of South Carolina, Baker analyzed 17 different studies on leukemia rates in children living near nuclear sites. Although hundreds of these studies have been conducted, most of which found no significant correlation, they have generally involved populations too small to offer broad conclusions. Baker's study, published in the European Journal of Cancer Care, marks the first attempt to summarize past findings from around the world. After processing the collective data, which covered 136 nuclear sites in seven countries, including Canada, Baker concluded that there does appear to be a link between nuclear sites and childhood leukemia. In fact, children ages nine and under living near nuclear facilites are 14 to 21 per cent more likely to be diagnosed with the disease than the average child, and are five to 24 per cent more likely to die from it. "It was a bit of a surprise to us," Baker says. But, he adds, he still cannot definitively conclude the radiation coming from the sites is actually causing the increased cancer rates. "But, when we're talking about going back to nuclear energy, I think it's something that bears looking into again." While Baker insists he doesn't want to start a panic, he admits he wouldn't move his wife and young daughter next door to a nuclear site, either. SUZANNE TAYLOR | August 13, 2007 A study suggests leukemia rates in kids are higher near nuclear sites ***************************************************************** 15 recordonline.com: Indian Point sirens at 96% By The Associated Press August 13, 2007 Buchanan — A new emergency siren system at the Indian Point nuclear power plant cleared an important hurdle when 96 percent of the sirens sounded properly in a test that had previously failed, plant officials said. All but six of the 155 sirens worked properly in a radio-activated test Saturday morning, two weeks before the date plant owner Nuclear Entergy Northeast has said the system will be fully operational. The radio-trigger method had proven a stubborn problem in previous tests, so Saturday's results marked "a big step," Entergy spokesman Jim Steets said. "We had a breakthrough a few weeks ago — it was essentially a software issue," he said. The sirens are meant to alert residents within 10 miles to any emergency at the two-reactor plant in Buchanan, 35 miles north of New York City. The alarms are spread through parts of Westchester, Rockland, Putnam and Orange counties. The new emergency sirens are due to be fully operational by August 24. In the meantime, an existing 156-siren system with a spotty record is still in place and could be used if needed. The old sirens have had various problems in recent years, leading to the move to replace them. The new system didn't do so well in some early tests, either, and Entergy missed an April 15 deadline to have the new sirens running. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission fined the company $130,000, saying the failure reflected "insufficient management attention at senior levels." Save, Share & RecommendWhat's This? Record Online is brought to you by the Times Herald-Record, serving New York"s Hudson Valley and the Catskills. Phone: (845) 341-1100 ***************************************************************** 16 The Hindu: Furore over N-deal, RS adjourns for day Monday, August 13, 2007 : 1715 Hrs New Delhi, Aug. 13 (PTI): The Left, supporter of the ruling UPA, today joined the Opposition BJP and the Third Front in staging a walkout over the Indo-US civil nuclear deal in the Rajya Sabha which was adjourned for the day amidst noisy scenes. As soon as Prime Minister Manmohan Singh rose to make a suo motu statement on the nuclear deal, Leader of the Opposition Jaswant Singh sought to make a submission before the Prime Minister began his speech. When Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Suresh Pachouri said the Prime Minister be allowed to make his statement, Chairman Hamid Ansari called Manmohan Singh to do so. This triggered protests not only from the BJP and the members belonging to the Third Front but also from Left parties which extend crucial outside support to the Congress-led coalition. As the Prime Minister began reading his statement, slogan-shouting began and in the din Singh said since he was not being allowed to speak, he was laying the statement on the table. Simultaneously, the Left and the Opposition staged a walkout. Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the ***************************************************************** 17 Cleantech Blog: Goin' Nucular Monday, August 13, 2007 by Richard T. Stuebi It was pouring rain last Wednesday morning, as I entered an office building near Cleveland Hopkins Airport to attend a meeting convened by Senator George Voinovich (R-OH) to discuss the future of nuclear energy. Unlike many of his peers, Senator Voinovich appears to take the issue of climate change seriously. Also unlike many of his peers, he sees an increasing reliance on nuclear energy as essential in meeting the energy and environmental challenges of the future. The keynote speakers of this 90-minute meeting were Dennis Spurgeon (Assistant Secretary for Nuclear Energy, DOE), Dr. Peter Lyons (Commissioner, NRC) and Adrian Heymer (Sr. Director of New Plant Development, Nuclear Energy Institute). In attendance were representatives of Ohio-based utilities with nuclear fleets AEP (NYSE: AEP) and FirstEnergy (NYSE: FE), as well as major suppliers to the nuclear industry such as locally-based Babcock & Wilcox. The basic message from the speakers was simple: a lot of nuclear plants must be built in the coming decades, and the U.S. urgently needs to take steps to get out of the way to enable the development of these new plants. The speakers outlined the activities required to revive the industry to bring about this nuclear "renaissance": Federal loan guarantees (at 100% of debt requirements, not 90%) for new nuclear plants, opening of Yucca Mountain as a nuclear waste storage facility, increased training and workforce development to replace retiring nuclear engineers, the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP), etc. And, the speakers couldn't reiterate enough how safety was the paramount concern. This is truly an amazing technology if everyone has to emphasize how steps will be taken to ensure disasters don't occur. (I am reminded to recall tour of the Clinton nuclear plant in Illinois in the early 1990's, at which point about 200 of the 1100 site employees -- almost 20% of staffing! -- were dedicated to security, preventing people from doing the wrong things. I can't think of another technology that requires so many band-aids to mitigate perverse effects. Hard to imagine any private investor wanting a piece of that cost structure.) In the open discussion that followed the speakers' remarks, I had the temerity to question the wisdom of furthering our bet on the uranium-fission cycle as the basic technological platform for nuclear power production in the future. While I admitted that the current nuclear fleet was an important contributor to the energy mix that we can't afford to prematurely retire, and I conceded that some new nuclear plants of more-or-less conventional technologies may be necessary as a stop-gap measure for a few years, I also submitted that other fission cycles -- certainly including thorium, maybe others as well -- ought to be explored much more thoroughly, so as to create the possibility of a new and much better generation of nuclear plants offering more than just incremental improvements. This is because, in my view, uranium fission suffers from three unavoidable pitfalls: 1. Uranium supplies are hardly infinite themselves, and have a significant concentration in places like Russia that we ought to prefer NOT to rely upon for precious commodities. 2. Uranium fission creates sizable quantities of transuranic wastes of extreme toxicity and half-lives measured in the thousands of years. 3. Uranium fission makes for excellent bombs -- not only nuclear explosions, but also dirty residues -- that would be highly prized by terrorists and other ne'er-do-wells. I've been told by credible sources that fission from thorium essentially obviates each of these fundamental challenges. Relative to uranium, there are orders of magnitude more thorium in the earth's crust, and it is widely distributed. Thorium fission produces wastes with much lower toxicity and much shorter half-lives (a few hundred years), in much lower quantities to boot. And, thorium doesn't have a positive gradient that facilitates run-away fission that leads to explosions. These all sound like attractive attributes to me, worthy of a lot more exploration. Alas, the nuclear experts at the meeting pooh-poohed thorium and defended uranium. They said that never had any uranium been used by bad guys to make a bomb. (You mean, Yet?) They said that the GNEP would create an effective international pact to prevent nuclear materials from getting into the hands of enemies. (Oh, really?) They said that there was plenty of uranium for the next generation of nuclear plants. (And then what?) They said that the GNEP would dramatically reduce the amount of long-lived nuclear wastes from future uranium fission facilities. (For tens of billions of dollars -- what a bargain!) Ultimately, I was not reassured by the views of the uranium fission advocates. To paraphrase Shakespeare, they doth defend too much. And, note that the nuclear industry is the not-so-pretty offspring of the military-industrial-Oedipal complex of the 1950's. It is hard to think of a less-credible set of proponents than those who carry the combined DNA of the defense and electric utility sectors, niether of which is particularly famous for a commitment to the truth in the light of established facts. Their mantra has often been: "Trust us." I'm typically not paranoid, but in this case, I am very skeptical indeed. Richard T. Stuebi is the BP Fellow for Energy and Environmental Advancement at The Cleveland Foundation, and is also the Founder and President of NextWave Energy, Inc. posted by Richard T. Stuebi @ 12:38 PM 0 comments    SynBlog.com - Blog Directory ***************************************************************** 18 IBR: Idaho's energy future looks green Idaho Business Review Monday, August 13, 2007 22:56 MDT Plans move forward to build state’s first commercial nuclear power plant by Eddie Kovsky The Idaho Energy Complex is ready to move forward with plans to build the first commercial nuclear reactor in Idaho. Alternate Energy Holdings – the Virginia company behind the Idaho Energy Complex – issued a statement July 17 saying the county had already accepted its application, though county planning and zoning administrator Mary Huff had said the July 16 application was incomplete. Owyhee County has now accepted the application for a conditional-use permit to rezone the land where the power plant is expected to be built, Huff said. Don Gillispie, CEO of Alternate Energy Holdings, said in an e-mail “the communications issues are related to semantics and some bureaucracy that is standard in government.” “We did not indicate the conditional-use permit was approved only accepted (received) with the promise to complete it while moving forward with the [Nuclear Regulatory Commission] process,” Gillispie said. “The county has defined accepted to mean complete … that is not the definition of the word by any standard…this is the root of the difference.” The nuclear facility would be located on farm land near the CJ Strike Reservoir off Highway 51. The site location is south of Mountain Home Air Force Base, between Grand View and Bruneau. Gillispie, a retired energy executive, said he was contacted by a group of farmers who wanted to form a co-op to pump electricity to a high area for irrigation near Bruneau and could not afford the Idaho Power rates. Gillispie said he wanted to help with the energy and environmental issues for his family and friends instead of playing golf the rest of his life. The site is currently zoned for agricultural use; Alternate Energy Holdings will need approval of its conditional use application to build a power generating facility on the site. In the application filed with the county, Alternate Energy Holdings describes its facility as “dry” reactor design, which uses 100,000 gallons of water per day to cool the reactor, as opposed to 30 million gallons. The required water would be drawn from the CJ Strike reservoir, using existing water rights and existing pumping stations. As interest in renewable, low-cost and low-emission energy solutions continues to increase, Alternate Energy Holdings’ plan to build a nuclear facility in Idaho comes at the right time. The 2007 Idaho Energy Plan, prepared by the Idaho Legislative Council Interim Committee on Energy, Environment and Technology, found nuclear power should be included in the portfolio of energy sources used by public utilities serving the state, but cautioned: “Nuclear power plants pose a safety risk to surrounding communities and create radioactive waste that must be safely stored for thousands of years.” According to the report, nuclear energy provides only 1 percent of the state’s electricity. Idaho’s total power consumption in 2005 was 2,693 megawatts. The proposed Idaho Energy Complex reactor would produce 1,600 megawatts. All three public utilities serving Idaho – Idaho Power, Avista and PacificCorp – plan to diversify their energy portfolios in the next 20 years by decreasing their dependence on coal and adding nuclear power to the mix. Based on future plans, utilities are moving away from their dependency on fossil fuels, Public Utilities Commission spokesman Gene Fadness said. In its application to Owyhee County, Alternate Energy Holdings emphasizes the green benefits of building a nuclear reactor in the state, saying that the solution to increased energy demand is the development of commercial nuclear power. “Commercial nuclear power is the largest, most reliable, clean base-load power source available, as it emits zero greenhouse gasses,” the company said in its permit application. “Nuclear power is not dependent on weather conditions, as it produces power independently of all external forces. Byproducts are stored safely on-site in concrete-and-steel containers that emit no measurable radiation above background level. Nuclear power is also one of the most reliable power sources known to man.” Alternate Energy Holdings announced July 25 it had selected UniStar Nuclear to build the power plant. The company must still seek approval from federal regulators. Gillispie said the licensing will cost about $80. The zoning application is open to public comment, Huff said. Residents can also testify at a public hearing, though a date has not been set. 2 Comments 1. The AREVA EPR, which is the reactor that AEHI says it will build in Idaho, certainly is NOT a "dry" reactor, whatever that it. Reactors either use cooling towers, which is a consumptive use through evaporation, or a "once through" process which returns almost all the cooling water to the soruce, albiet much warmer than when it went in. That's why most reactors are located on major rivers or fresh water bays and not in remote deserts. For instance, Constellation's plant in Maryland is located on the Chesapeake Bay. The AREVA EPR isn't even licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission so no one really knows what cooling requirements it will have since the design for the US market isn't complete. It would be helpful if you dug a little deeper when reporting on this proposed nuclear plant.Comment By Ohadi Langis Monday, August 13, 2007 @ 4:42 PM 2. Greetings, The European Pressurized Reactor (EPR) being discussed for Idaho is a proto-type reactor, never built before. It is a German-French design and one is under construction in Finland. Just as its predecessors from the 1970's, its completion is already years behind schedule and more that $1/2 billion over budget and climbing, once again demonstrating that nukes are the most expensive way to boil water ever conceieved by man. Moreover, nuclear power remains the most dangerous way to generate electricity. Don't believe it when they say this one is "inherently safe." If these things were so safe why is Alternative Energy Holdings, Unistar, AREVA and everyone one else even associated with the construction and operation of this nuke seeking the protection of the federal government from full liability in the event of an accident? The professional risk assessors, the insurance companies, wont touch nuclear power because of its such risky business. So the federal government has to step in and say it will limit the company's liability to a small fraction of the potential health and economic damage one of these things could cause. Chernobyl is somewhere around $400 billion dollars now and the expansive abandoned zone around the destroyed Ukrainian reactor is still growing 20 years later according to the April 2006 edition of National Geographic magazine. Moreover, why would Idaho be looking to play host to homeless nuclear waste? There still is no place to put this timeless poison once its generated. Fact of the matter is, the only place the nuclear industry and the federal government are looking to dump the nation's nuclear waste is on Yucca Mt., Nevada. And here is what is weird, the only site under consideration for 70,000 metric tons of hot, radioactive waste is already fractured with earthquake faults and surrounded by young volcanoes (the Lathroup Wells cinder cones). And that's just for the current generation of nukes. They haven't even thought about what to do with nuke waste that would come from Idaho. You'd think this is out of a science fiction story. In fact, the Yucca Mt. site is so flawed that it is very likely never going to be licensed and openned. So, if Idahoans do decide to let this infernsal thing get inside your border and fired up, then all its nuclear waste is likely to stay right there in Idaho. And since you all are one of those low density western population states like Nevada, once you start making it you might even get picked to play parking lot yourselves for the rest of the nation's nuclear waste that sitting out here east of the Mississippi. More crazy, the federal government won't let you challenge a nuke construction and operation license based on concerns that the nuclear waste its going to generate still doesnt have any scientifically accepted place to go after 50 years. Moreover, the fed wont let you raise concerns in the licensing process about the consequences of a successful terrorist attacks on one of these potential pre-deployed weapons of mass destruction, either. You think nobody has thought of how to make one of these things into a giant IED? Think again---FBI director Robert Mueller testified before Congress in 2005 and said "Another area we consider vulnerable and target rich is the energy sector, particularly nuclear power plants." There are simply cheaper, cleaner, safer and more secure ways to make electricity wiseer than splittin' atoms. Paul Gunter Director of Reactor Oversight Beyond Nuclear 6930 Carroll Avenue Suite 400 Takoma Park, MD 301 270 2209 www.beyondnuclear.orgComment By Paul Gunter Monday, August 13, 2007 @ 7:45 PM Our History | Our Staff | Idaho Business Review 855 W. Broad Street, Suite 103 Boise, ID 83702 | Phone 208.336.3768 | Fax 208.336.5534 ***************************************************************** 19 Reuters: U.S. nuclear deal protests disrupt Indian parliament Mon Aug 13, 2007 10:11AM EDT NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Noisy protests against a historic but controversial nuclear energy deal between India and the United States disrupted the Indian parliament on Monday as lawmakers demanded the government cancel the agreement. Members of the regional Samajwadi Party, which is opposed to warming ties between Washington and New Delhi, shouted slogans against the deal in the centre of the lower house and refused to return to their seats. "Cancel the nuclear deal", "We don't want to be American stooges", the MPs shouted despite pleas by the speaker, Somnath Chatterjee, to allow the house to function. Chatterjee said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh would make a statement on the deal at 2:00 p.m. (0430 EDT) and address concerns over the landmark deal, seen as a symbol of a blossoming friendship between the two democracies. But the angry lawmakers were unrelenting, forcing the house to be adjourned until Singh's statement. The nuclear deal aims to give India access to U.S. nuclear fuel and equipment for the first time in 30 years to help meet its soaring energy needs, even though it has stayed out of non-proliferation pacts and tested nuclear weapons. First agreed in principle two years ago, the framework deal was approved by the U.S. Congress last December and the pact that governs nuclear trade between the two, called the 123 agreement, was finalized last month. The 123 agreement has to get the backing of the U.S. Congress after India secures other international approvals. The deal has been opposed by critics in both countries who say their governments are making too many compromises in their eagerness to seal it. India's communist parties, whose support is crucial for the survival of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's government, have rejected the deal but Singh has said he would not go back on it and dared the left parties to withdraw support. The opposition Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, which initiated a process of bringing New Delhi and Washington closer when it was in power between 1998 and 2004, has also slammed the deal. Continued... ***************************************************************** 20 Reuters: Toshiba sells Westinghouse stake to Kazatomprom | Mon Aug 13, 2007 7:15AM EDT By Olzhas Auyezov ALMATY (Reuters) - Japan's Toshiba Corp. (6502.T: Quote, Profile, Research) sold a 10 percent stake in U.S. nuclear power plant builder Westinghouse to Kazakh uranium producer Kazatomprom for $540 million on Monday. The deal underscores the Central Asian state's growing clout. Japan generates 25 percent of its electricity from nuclear power and has been courting Kazakhstan as a uranium supplier. "Through this deal Kazatomprom plans to enter new markets for its products," the companies said in a joint statement. "Toshiba aims to enhance its global nuclear power business." The shares are expected to be transferred to state-owned Kazatomprom in about a month, the companies said, but the deal is also subject to approval by U.S. and Japanese regulators. Greenpeace and other environmental groups have written to the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) asking them to reject the Kazatomprom bid. The letter said the sale would undermine efforts to limit nuclear proliferation "and will give sensitive nuclear technology to a brutal, repressive and undemocratic regime, which may lack long-term legitimacy and stability". The United States is the biggest single foreign investor in Kazakhstan, notably in the oil sector through Chevron's interest in the massive Tengiz oilfield, and enjoys warm relations with President Nursultan Nazarbayev, in power since 1989. Asked at the signing ceremony about the environmentalists' letter to CFIUS, Kazatomprom President Mukhtar Dzhakhishev dismissed the challenge. "I can only advise these people to watch Disney cartoons instead of movies like Borat," he told reporters. Toshiba, Japan's second-largest maker of industrial electronics, bought a 77 percent stake in Westinghouse, the U.S. power plant unit of British Nuclear Fuels, for $4.16 billion late last year. The stake was much larger than initially planned after Japanese trading house Marubeni Corp (8002.T: Quote, Profile, Research) decided not to invest in the project. Toshiba has since been looking for new investors to share the financial burden. Dzakhishev said Kazatomprom was financing the deal from its own funds. The company holds about 10 percent of the global uranium market and plans to grow to 40 percent by 2016-2017. It has joint ventures with foreign firms and plans to open new mines as part of a plan to triple annual uranium production to 17,500 tonnes by 2015. ***************************************************************** 21 Telegraph: Government accused of 'environment deceit' - By Brendan Carlin, Political Correspondent Last Updated: 5:01pm BST 13/08/2007 Gordon Brown has been accused of presiding over an environmental policy based on "propaganda and deceit" after a leaked document suggested vital 'green' energy targets will not be met. The report says Britain will get only 9 per cent of it's 20 per cent target for renewable energy by 2020 Government officials also faced charges of seeking to "undermine" specific environmental commitments made by Tony Blair shortly before Mr Brown took over as Prime Minister last June. The former Prime Minister signed up to a new European Union target of achieving 20 per cent of energy from renewable sources such as wind and tidal power. But a leaked document from officials in the former Department of Trade and Industry revealed that Britain has little hope of achieving its target. According to the briefing paper obtained by The Guardian, officials said the best the UK could actually achieve was just nine per cent by 2020. The paper, produced in the early summer when the Government's energy white paper was published, also admitted that the UK "has achieved little so far on renewables". It even suggested that Ministers lobby Brussels to allow nuclear power to be included in the overall renewables aim as part of a more flexible interpretation of the EU environmental target. advertisement Both Downing Street and Malcolm Wicks, the Energy Minister, refused to comment on the contents of the leaked paper. Mr Wicks appeared to try to dismiss the row as a silly-season "summer" story, saying he would not comment on a leaked document that appeared in August. But both he and Number 10 fuelled suspicions that Britain would now seek to negotiate for a much smaller renewables target, insisting that the 20 per cent aim was an EU-wide ambition within which different countries could make their own contributions. Mr Wicks told BBC Radio 4's World at One: "I don't know what we could be arguing for - this is a target across the whole EU, countries are at different levels, some countries have hydro resources because of their natural environment." He added: "I am confident that we will play our role in the EU hitting that very, very demanding target. We are committed on climate change, we are committed on renewables." Mr Wick said: "I reject entirely the idea we are not completely committed to meeting our carbon targets. We are. We have led the world on climate change." The Energy Minister also went out of his way to stress that the most important task was reducing carbon dioxide emissions, not to "build renewables for the sake of it". The Government has already set out ambitions to reduce CO2 emissions by 60pc by 2050. There is also a specific target of producing 10pc of the UK's electricity from renewable sources by 2010 and an "aspiration" to raise that to 15pc by 2015. Currently, about 4.6pc of the country's electricity is provided by windfarms and other environmentally-friendly means. But there is no equivalent British target for energy as a whole, which includes electricity production, fuel for transport and heating homes and businesses. Alan Duncan, the Tory spokesman on business and regulation, said it was now clear that Labour's environmental policy was "based on propaganda and deceit". Under David Cameron, the Tories have put the environment at the heart of their hopes of regaining power. And Mr Duncan sought to use the leaked document to demonstrate that Mr Brown's administration could not be trusted. He told The Daily Telegraph that officials were clearly warning Ministers in private that their public ambitions for "green" energy would not be met. Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrats' environment spokesman, said it was clear that Ministers were trying to "wriggle out" of their renewables commitments. Mike Childs, from Friends of the Earth, said that the document clearly showed that civil servants were seeking "to try to undermine" the EU target. "What they are trying to do is weaken it as far as possible," he said. Jeremy Leggett, a former member of the Government's renewables' advisory board who now runs a solar energy company, accused Whitehall of an anti-renewables' bias. © Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2007. | Terms ***************************************************************** 22 NWW: Nukem awarded contract at PBMR fuel plant 13 August 2007 Nukem Technologies of Germany has been awarded a fourth contract by South Africa's PBMR Pty related to the construction of a pilot fuel plant for the Pebble Bed Modular Reactor (PBMR) project. Pelindaba, where fuel for South Africa's first pebble bed modular reactor will be made The latest contract is for the supply of professional services for the procurement support and supervision of construction and commissioning of the PBMR Pilot Fuel Plant at Pelindaba, near Pretoria. The plant should be completed in 2010 to qualify the fuel manufacturing process and to deliver the first core load for the demonstration PBMR. Nuclear Energy Corporation of South Africa (Necsa) will operate it. The PBMR fuel would be moulded graphite fuel spheres containing coated uranium fuel particles, similar in form to those of the German Thorium High-Temperature Reactor (THTR) . The Pelindaba plant is designed to initially produce 270,000 of the high temperature fuel elements annually. In 2003, environmental approval was given for construction of the demonstration PBMR unit at Koeberg, near Cape Town, and the fuel plant at Pelindaba. In October 2004, the South African government budgeted to allow development of the first PBMR to proceed, which was seen as conditional approval for the demonstration unit at Koeberg. Construction of the unit is expected to begin in 2009, with first fuel being loaded four years later. The Minister of Public Enterprises, Alec Erwin, has stated an intent to eventually produce 4000 to 5000 MWe from pebble bed reactors in South Africa. This equates to between 20 and 30 PBMR reactor units of 165 MWe each. They can be build in modular 'packs' of up to eight to provide larger volumes of power. In April 2005, the PBMR company awarded a $20 million contract to Uhde, a local subsidiary of Germany's Thyssenkrupp Engineering, to build the Pelindaba fuel plant to manufacture the fuel pebbles for the planned demonstration PBMR. In August 2005, RWE Nukem was awarded a contract by PBMR Pty for the detail design of the fuel production process for the PBMR project. The contract covered the detail design of three out of four of the processes for the production of the spherical fuel elements as well as two processes for the recycling of effluents and uranium resulting from scrap material. Nukem has been involved in the PBMR fuel plant project since 2000. The fuel production process follows that of the former Nukem/Hobeg fuel production processes used in Germany's high temperature reactor projects: the AVR 13 MWe experimental high temperature reactor at Juelich and the 300 MWe THTR at Uentrop. ***************************************************************** 23 Hindustan Times: The ABC of the 123- Samajwadi Party workers disrupt LS over N-deal August 13, 2007 Let me try and answer the most simple of questions this week: How good or bad is the Indo-US nuclear deal? I have a feeling that despite all the highfalutin analysis and loud tom-tomming of opinion this straightforward and essential question has been ignored. Yet it’s probably the only one that matters. My answer is the deal is perhaps the best we could have got. More importantly, in all probability it will improve after India receives clearance from the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG). But what you need to know is how and why I’ve come to this conclusion. Well, read on. There are three critical issues on which the deal should be judged. First, does it take away or constrain India’s sovereign right to carry out nuclear tests? The answer is an unequivocal no. The 123 Agreement doesn’t even mention the phrase ‘nuclear testing’ or the word ‘detonation’. More importantly, the Agreement explicitly says (Clause 2.4) that it doesn’t impinge upon India’s military strategic programme. Finally, Nicholas Burns has himself confirmed this. Now, tell me, would he lie? So the next question is: Has it raised the cost of testing unacceptably? This depends on what would happen if India tests. America has a right of return, which, no doubt, it will insist upon. Of course its constrained with multi-layers of consultation and cross-cutting commitments. But even so, I have no doubt Washington will operationalise it. At that stage the critical question will be whether India has been able to immunise its strategic reserves of fuel from this right of return. Let’s consider this carefully. There is no doubt there are many assurances in the 123 that suggest the answer could be yes. The issue is, are we sure? Frankly, as long as there are even a few informed voices saying no, there will be room for doubt. And today there are doubters. But if the NSG countries do not insist on a similar right of return then, at worst, we will lose American-supplied fuel but retain that which has been bought from them. In this eventuality India will have protected its strategic reserves from an American right of return. It therefore follows that the cost of testing will not have gone up unacceptably. But is the NSG likely to insist on a right of return? I have three reasons for saying no. Unlike America, their domestic laws do not require it. If they want to do business with India, as France and Russia do, they will not consider it. And if they want to edge out America from this competition they won’t be tempted to follow America’s example. The second critical issue is has India got the right to re-process spent fuel? Here, at the moment, the answer is yes and no. The right has been granted in principle, but it only becomes effective after “arrangements and procedures” are agreed upon. Although there is an 18-month deadline for deciding, what happens if agreement is not possible? The 123 doesn’t say. Delhi claims it can go ahead. Washington, no doubt, will differ. In all probability we could end up with a crippling difference of opinion. ***************************************************************** 24 The Telegraph: Nuclear noises hit high decibel Calcutta | Tuesday, August 14, 2007 | Advertise with us - Advani calls Karat, govt adamant RADHIKA RAMASESHAN New Delhi, Aug. 13: The government today said it was against any Parliament vote on the nuclear deal, circling its wagon on a day an unusual round of posturing saw the Right courting the Left. The assertion came after the NDA, which had been insisting on a discussion under a rule that entails voting, sent feelers to the Left. BJP veteran L.K. Advani called up CPM chief Prakash Karat and sought cooperation to block the deal in a telling, but largely symbolic, gesture that shed light on the games being played on the nuclear deal. The Centre does not think that the Left will vote with the BJP — such a step would spell the end of the UPA experiment — but it is worried that a vote would formally expose cracks in the political establishment on a deal that is being touted as the high point of Manmohan Singh?s foreign policy. The Congress?s isolation in both Houses of Parliament underlined the gap between its perception of the deal as synonymous with ?national interest? and that of the other parties. The NDA and the ?third front? created a furore in the Lok Sabha and the Left joined in belatedly — perhaps to avoid being seen as making common cause with the BJP — as the Prime Minister read out his statement. The Rajya Sabha was adjourned before Singh could speak. The Prime Minister defended the deal saying it was ?good for India and good for the world? and that ?posterity? would vindicate him. ?I am neither given to exaggeration nor am I known to be self-congratulatory. I will let history judge,? he told the Lower House. For now, the Congress will play for time, especially with the BJP trying to exploit its standoff with the Left, sources said. The Centre was, therefore, only too happy to agree to the Left?s request to postpone a debate on the deal, which had been scheduled for August 14 and 16. The CPM wants to wait till the August 17-18 politburo meeting before it firms up its parliamentary strategy — whether to bail the government out by opting for a simple discussion or insist on a vote. While the CPM waits, foreign minister Pranab Mukherjee will keep talking to the Left leaders. A meeting of the United Progressive Alliance-Left co-ordination committee has been ruled out, though. Mukherjee this evening conveyed the government?s stand to CPM member Sitaram Yechury, telling him it was not possible to take a ?sense of the House? as the Left wanted. The minister later told reporters he had informed Yechury that ?there is no provision in our Constitution for the ratification of international treaties.? The NDA had earlier given notices for ?ratification?, which Parliament cannot do. The Opposition alliance has now filed fresh notices that call for ?renegotiation? of the deal. It is up to the Speaker to decide whether voting will be allowed or not but usually, the Chair does not go against the wishes of the government. Mukherjee said the Prime Minister had followed the example of Indira Gandhi who had shared with the Opposition the details of key agreements although not constitutionally bound to do so. Answering Karat?s charge that the government had flouted the common minimum programme (CMP) by negotiating the deal, Mukherjee said: ?We have strategic cooperation with China, Russia, France, the European Union, Britain, the US and Japan. Should we mention each of these countries in the CMP?? Copyright © 2006 The Telegraph. All rights reserved. Disclaimer | ***************************************************************** 25 Montreal Gazette: Chalk River reactors a nuclear nightmare Designed solely to produce medical isotopes IAN MACLEOD, CanWest News Service Published: 22 hours ago A key safety feature in two nuclear reactors northwest of Ottawa won't work despite years of attempted fixes, according to a new Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission report. The resulting eight-year delay in putting the reactors into commercial production for life-saving medical isotopes could threaten Canada's world dominance of that $3.7-billion global market. It also risks Canada's international reputation as a nuclear technology exporter at a time when concerns about greenhouse gases and oil and gas energy supplies are making nuclear power an attractive option once again. The small MAPLE 1 and MAPLE 2 reactors at the Chalk River Laboratories were built by Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd. for Ottawa's MDS Nordion and were to be the world's first dedicated solely for isotope production. (MAPLE stands for the Multipurpose Applied Physics Lattice Experiment.) Injected into the body, isotopes emit harmless amounts of radiation that can be traced by special equipment to reveal diseases. U.S. physicians alone use them at least 50,000 times daily and an estimated 15 million to 20 million nuclear medicine procedures are performed annually. That number is expected to soar as the populations of developed nations age. As a safety feature, each MAPLE reactor was designed to have a negative "power coefficient of reactivity," or PCR, in which the nuclear reaction in the core decreases as the reactor power increases. But as the reactors were powered up, the reaction in the core increased slightly instead. That discrepancy is important. The safety analysis for the reactors - predicting their behaviour to show safety margins are adequate - assumes they have a negative PCR. This summer, AECL informed the commission only one of seven potential reasons for the MAPLEs' vexing positive PCR problem has been eliminated so far. A new series of tests, in which MAPLE 1 is run at low power to test recent modifications, are under way. MAPLE 2 has been in a shutdown state since 2004. The results will likely be discussed Sept. 12, when the commission holds a hearing into AECL's application for a new 47-month operating licence for the MAPLEs and a related isotope processing facility. The current licences expire at the end of November. AECL insists the reactors are safe, but says its priority is to get to the bottom of the PCR issue. It plans to have the two MAPLEs in commercial operation by October 2008 and October 2009. The facility will produce about half the world supply of short-lived isotopes for use in medical therapies and diagnostic treatments. But AECL's 2007 financial report hints those dates could slip again. Meanwhile, the project - originally to cost $140 million - is projected to see cost overruns of $350 million. Meanwhile, Chalk River's 50-year-old NRU reactor has had its operating life extended to continue making, among other things, the medical isotope molybdenum-99. Ottawa Citizen © The Gazette (Montreal) 2007 © 2007 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest MediaWorks ***************************************************************** 26 AFP: Sarkozy denies plan to sell nuclear reactor to Libya - Mon Aug 13, 1:16 PM ET WOLFEBORO, United States (AFP) - French President Nicolas Sarkozy denied on Monday France planned to sell a latest generation nuclear reactor to Libya. "It's false. It's false," Sarkozy said when asked by journalists about reports of a possible sale of a EPR (European Pressurized water Reactor) nuclear reactor to Libya. Sarkozy, on vacation in the US state of New Hampshire, spoke after a report Monday in the French daily Le Parisien-Aujourd'hui en France said Libya hoped to secure from Paris the latest generation EPR nuclear reactor, the most powerful in the world. Tripoli recently clinched a deal with France on civilian nuclear cooperation which clears the way for delivery of an atomic plant for water desalination. But the newspaper cited an official with the Atomic Energy Commission, the principal shareholder in the French nuclear company Areva, who said the firm was contacted by Libya to deliver an EPR reactor. When asked by AFP, a spokesperson for Areva would not confirm the newspaper report. The cost of a new EPR reactor, which is designed to replace most of the reactors currently in France, is about three billion euros. The agreement signed during a visit to Tripoli by Sarkozy would supply Libya with a nuclear reactor that would convert sea water into drinking water. The French president's visit came a day after Libya freed six foreign medics nurses detained for more than eight years. France played a key role, along with EU officials, in securing their release. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 27 AFP: US congressman's response to Indian PM on nuclear deal Mon Aug 13, 1:43 PM ET WASHINGTON (AFP) - A veteran congressman on Monday branded a landmark US civilian nuclear deal with India as a "capitulation" to New Delhi and demanded details on Indian ties with Iran. Representative Ed Markey released a statement following Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's defense of the accord in a speech to parliament. "The Bush administration claims it is seeking nuclear cooperation, but in reality, the agreement it negotiated is 'nuclear capitulation' to India's every wish," the Massachusetts Democrat said. "Prime Minister Singh's comments today are yet another indication that this agreement does not comply with the law Congress wrote and passed last year ... to condition and restrict any agreement. "As currently drafted, this is a bad deal for our country and a damaging blow to non-proliferation efforts worldwide," Markey said. The accord, which covers civil nuclear technology, was rejected almost immediately by the Indian opposition and Singh's communist allies. But in a speech in parliament, Singh said New Delhi had not agreed to "any provision that mandates scrutiny of our nuclear weapons programme or any unsafeguarded nuclear facilities." "India is committed to a voluntary, unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing," Singh said, adding that the pact did not preclude India from launching future nuclear tests. Markey also warned that India would have to "thoroughly disclose and detail its relationship" with US foe Iran before Congress could act on the deal. The detailed pact governing nuclear trade between India and United States was concluded in India last month but needs the backing of the US Congress. Tom Lantos, Democratic chairman of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs committee this month promised intense scrutiny of the deal. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the top Republican on the committee said she too had concerns, including India's right to reprocess US-origin nuclear fuel under the agreement, and technology that could be used to enhance the Asian giant's nuclear weapons program. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 28 SABCnews.com: Nuclear energy strategy aims to create employment politics/government South African Broadcasting Corporation Copyright © Nuclear energy workers on duty August 13, 2007, 18:15 Tens of thousands of jobs will be created and the country's economy will be boosted if the Nuclear Energy Policy and Strategy is approved. This is according to the department of minerals and energy which released the strategy for public comment. The document proposes the increased use of nuclear energy to supplement current energy sources. Nuclear energy is likely to contribute 15% of South African's energy in the next 30 years. If the strategy is approved an extra 10 000 megawatts could be added to the current 39 000 megawatts in 10 years. This would entail the recapitalising of certain nuclear agencies, financing of others and setting up new agencies. The draft document sets out a phased approach to creating a nuclear industry. Infrastructure would be maintained and upgraded until 2010. Thereafter up to 2015, new nuclear power plants would be constructed. These would be operational in 2025. The department says the abundance of uranium in the country cannot be ignored as an alternative energy source, nor can the economic benefits. The document also proposes that enriched uranium be sold internationally, allowing the country to compete in the global nuclear market. The public now has 60 days to comment on the strategy. ***************************************************************** 29 SABCnews.com: Eskom shuts down Koeberg's Unit 1 south_africa/general South African Broadcasting Corporation Copyright © 2000 - 2005 SABC Koeberg's sub-station August 13, 2007, 16:00 National electricity supplier Eskom has urged consumers to use electricity sparingly over the next three months. This comes after Unit-1 at Koeberg was shut down last night for maintenance refuelling and repairs. Eskom's Fani Zulu says they don't foresee any power outages, but says consumers should conserve electricity wherever possible. Zulu says this time it is going to be a slightly longer outage because there are some modifications that they need to carry out and this is to keep the unit abreast with international developments in the nuclear power generation industry. Zulu says however for as long as they have one unit at Koeberg Power station not operating, the Cape is vulnerable and therefore it would be advisable for electricity users in the Western Cape to be mindful of how they use electricity during this time. He says the province will be receiving supplementary power from other sources during this time. He says in terms of power supply to the Cape they have two new open circle gas turbines in the Western Cape which are fully operational and will come in very handy in meeting the demands for electricity in the Western Cape. ***************************************************************** 30 Guardian Unlimited: Indian PM Defends Nuclear Deal With U.S. Monday August 13, 2007 1:16 PM By MATTHEW ROSENBERG Associated Press Writer NEW DELHI (AP) - India is free to test nuclear weapons under a much-touted nuclear deal with the United States, the country's prime minister said Monday as lawmakers opposed to the pact noisily demanded the agreement be scrapped. The civilian nuclear cooperation deal reverses three decades of American policy by allowing the U.S. to send nuclear fuel and technology to India, which has never signed major international nonproliferation accords and has tested atomic weapons in the past. Since it was first announced in July 2005, the agreement has been praised as a cornerstone of an emerging partnership between India and the United States after decades on opposite sides of the Cold War divide. But it has also drawn criticism in both countries. In India, many critics simply oppose closer ties with the United States, arguing that the pact could allow Washington to dictate foreign policy to New Delhi and undermine the country's cherished nuclear weapons program. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh insisted that was not the case in a speech to lawmakers Monday. The deal, he said, is ``another step in our journey to regain our due place in global councils.'' As for fears it could stymie the weapons program, which does not fall under the scope of the pact, Singh said: ``This agreement does not in any way inhibit, restrict or curtail our strategic autonomy or capabilities.'' While India retained the right ``to undertake future nuclear tests if it is necessary in India's national interest,'' the country nonetheless remained committed to its unilateral moratorium on tests, put in place after New Delhi detonated a weapon in 1998, he added. As he spoke, lawmakers from the Hindu nationalist opposition and from communist parties that support Singh but oppose the deal sought to drown out the prime minister, shouting, ``cancel the nuclear deal!'' Similar protests by lawmakers earlier in the day forced the house to adjourn until Singh spoke in the afternoon. Singh's speech follows the sealing of a technical pact, known as the 1-2-3 agreement, which details how nuclear cooperation between New Delhi and Washington is to work. India got nearly everything it wanted in the 1-2-3 agreement, including the right to stockpile and reprocess atomic fuel. The deal also does not contain a test ban, and some clauses have been interpreted to mean that an Indian test would not automatically scuttle the deal if the move followed tests by either Pakistan or China, India's major rivals. But Congress last year included a test ban when it created an exception for India to American laws that prohibit civilian nuclear cooperation with countries that have not signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. That law, which was needed before the technical agreement could be worked out, has been seized on by Indian opponents as evidence that the U.S. is seeking to constrain the South Asian country's long-standing weapons program. Although the Hindu nationalists have no chance of the defeating the deal, which does not need to be approved by Parliament, Singh's coalition government needs the communists for its parliamentary majority. Still, few people believed the communists would bring down the government over the matter. American critics, meanwhile, worry the deal will stymie U.S. anti-proliferation efforts, especially in Iran, and some have pointed to a lack of a test ban to support their case. Despite those concerns, Sen. Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., told reporters in New Delhi on Sunday that he was confident the pact would get congressional approval. Lieberman, on a three-day visit to India, said he hoped the agreement would transform the U.S.-India relationship ``into the most important bilateral relationship we have in the next century of our history.'' Once U.S. lawmakers approve the deal, India needs to make separate agreements with the U.N. nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, and the Nuclear Suppliers Group, an assembly of nations that export nuclear material. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 31 Gulfnews: Libya still 'has 200 barrels of uranium' Last updated: 11:54 (GMT+04) Monday, August 13, 2007. Gulfnews: Libya still 'has 200 barrels of uranium' The Telegraph Group London: Libya is sitting on a stockpile of almost 200 barrels of uranium despite agreeing in 2003 to dismantle its nuclear programme, The Daily Telegraph has learned. The revelation that Libya has not yet complied with the international agreement to get rid of its supply of uranium will be a particular blow to the French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, after his recent move to deepen ties with the regime of Col Muammar Gaddafi. It will also be an embarrassment to France's first lady, Cecilia Sarkozy, who travelled to Libya last month to help negotiate the release of the six Bulgarian and Palestinian medics accused of infecting children with HIV. Within days of that visit, France signed a memorandum of understanding with Libya involving the possible construction of a nuclear reactor for civilian purposes. The uranium, in the form of 1,000 tonnes of yellow cake ore, is being stored at a military base at the desert town of Sabha. Nuclear experts with knowledge of the stockpile estimate its value at about 200 million pounds(Dh 1.48 billion). Sabha base Uranium is used to power nuclear power stations, but it can also be enriched to make nuclear weapons. The Sabha base was linked with Libya's nuclear weapons programme in a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 2004. The base, some of which is believed to be underground, was also alleged to have been a chemical weapons facility. After Col Gaddafi officially abandoned Libya's nuclear weapons programme in December 2003 in return for the lifting of US and European sanctions, the IAEA was supposed to oversee the country's disposal of its uranium. An official close to the situation said: "Gaddafi has gone through the proforma process with the IAEA but he has delayed and delayed. He wants to use the uranium as a bargaining chip to get a reactor." However, there is a view among nuclear experts that Gaddafi is very unlikely to be allowed to have a nuclear reactor, even if it is used for civilian purposes, due to fears Libya could use the technology to restart its military nuclear programme. The US, UK and other member states of the IAEA, the world's nuclear watchdog, do not believe Libya should be given nuclear know-how, sources said, and are likely to block France's attempt to strike a deal with Gaddafi. Questions might also be asked about how Libya came to possess the uranium in the first place. Industry insiders believe it was mined in Niger and acquired by Libya during the period of sanctions. If France were to strike a deal with Libya over nuclear energy, the work would almost certainly be carried out by Areva, the largest nuclear company in the world. A spokesman for Areva said discussions between France and Libya were "more political and not at this time commercial". © Al Nisr Publishing LLC 2007. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 32 AU ABC: Too much haste to nuclear waste - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) By Helen Caldicott Posted August 13, 2007 08:25:00 Lucas Heights ... Fed Government wants waste to be stored at Muckaty Station in the NT. (File photo) (Getty Images: Ian Waldie) Australia is in grave danger. Not only has the Labor Party joined the Coalition's open-slather uranium mine policy, but the Prime Minister is mooting domestic uranium enrichment, construction of 25 nuclear reactors on the East Coast, storage of foreign radioactive waste in Australia and reprocessing spent radioactive nuclear fuel in a "closed nuclear fuel cycle". Interestingly, Halliburton, Dick Cheney's former company, constructed the railway line between Adelaide and Darwin, now managed by Serco Asia Pacific, a leader in the management and transport of Britain's nuclear waste. It runs adjacent to both the SA Olympic Dam uranium mine and to Muckaty Station at Tennant Creek in the Northern Territory - the preferred site chosen by the Federal Government to store radioactive waste from Lucas Heights. This geologically unstable area recently experienced an earthquake measuring 2.5 on the Richter scale and is laced with underground aquifers supplying water to Indigenous populations, to outback towns and numerous stations. Ominously on June 2, the Liberal Party's federal council also quietly endorsed a foreign nuclear waste dump for Australia. Uranium mining, the railway line and the nuclear waste dump are part of a bigger global picture. The US Department of Energy (DoE) is planning a Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP) to promote a robust future for their nuclear industry. GNEP consists of uranium mining, enrichment, export of fuel rods, return of irradiated rods, reprocessing and construction of generation 1V reactors by selected and trusted countries. Because of the risk of nuclear weapons proliferation posed by non-nuclear-armed nations with access to nuclear power technology, the DoE plans to control the entire nuclear fuel cycle by exporting enriched uranium fuel rods, and re-importing irradiated nuclear fuel to be reprocessed in the US. These intensely radioactive rods will be chopped up, dissolved in concentrated nitric acid, and from this intensely radioactive liquid solution plutonium will be extracted to be fissioned in the new "Generation 1V" or fast reactors (200kg of plutonium is generated yearly in a nuclear power plant). Reprocessing is a filthy process which unavoidably exposes both workers and the public to massive amounts of radioactive, biologically dangerous elements such as tritium, and long-lived elements - krypton 85, carbon 14, iodine 129 and technetium 99. Generation 1V reactors deemed "passively safe" will be fuelled by five to 15 tonnes of plutonium cooled by liquid sodium, a highly reactive and explosive material when exposed to air. If the coolant pipes break, the sodium would burn, triggering a massive spontaneous nuclear explosion scattering tonnes of plutonium to the four winds because only two to three kg of plutonium is critical mass. (Less than one millionth of a gram of plutonium is carcinogenic and it has a half life of 24,000 years - radioactive for 500,000 years). Generation 1V reactors are hailed as part of a closed loop process because the plutonium can be "transmuted" into shorter-lived fission products such as strontium 90 and cesium 137 that only last 600 years, instead of 500,000 years while at the same time generating electricity. But this is a vacuous plan because only 10 per cent of the plutonium is converted to fission products while 90 per cent remains. This deadly radioactive mixture then must be cooled, transported, stored and isolated from the environment virtually forever at enormous expense. Only China, France, Japan and Russia are included in the US GNEP plan, but clearly Australia is involved as John Howard is about to repeal federal legislation banning uranium enrichment, nuclear power and the reprocessing of spent fuel in Australia. The question which begs an answer is this: GNEP is to be handled only by politically stable countries, but given the radiological life and proliferation properties of plutonium, how long can political stability be guaranteed? Dr Helen Caldicott is the founder and president of the Nuclear Policy Research Institute, headquartered in Washington, DC. She has devoted the last 35 years to an international campaign to educate the public about the medical hazards of the nuclear age and the necessary changes in human behaviour to stop environmental destruction. This piece was first published in The Courier-Mail on August 8. ***************************************************************** 33 BBC NEWS: Dounreay chain reaction milestone Last Updated: Sunday, 12 August 2007, 23:59 GMT 00:59 UK The chain reaction occurred on an afternoon in 1957 A chain reaction which provided sustained and controlled nuclear energy in Scotland was achieved for the first time 50 years ago. The experiment at Dounreay put the site in Caithness at the cutting edge of nuclear technology at the time. Half a century on, the plant is being decommissioned at a cost of Ł2.9bn. It is one of 99 facilities cleared from the 140 acre (56 hectare) site so far. Decommissioning is expected to be completed by 2033. The event at Dounreay was the first time a chain reaction had taken place in Scotland and meant nuclear power could be sustained and controlled. The area of Dounreay was farmland until 1954, when the government selected it as the location for the national centre for research and development of fast breeder reactors, a new type of atomic energy. Opened in 1955, it operated for 40 years. * BBC Copyright Notice ***************************************************************** 34 Press TV: Libya to halt disposing uranium Mon, 13 Aug 2007 06:22:55 Source: Agencies Libya is ignoring to dispose off its uranium on a 2003 pledge, with nearly 200 barrels of the material still in its hands, a report said. According to the Daily Telegraph, the uranium is in the form of yellow cake ore and is being stored at a military base in the town of Sabha. Libya abandoned its nuclear weapons program in 2003 in return for the lifting of Western sanctions, and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) was supposed to oversee the disposal of the uranium. The material is worth about 200 million pounds. "The Libyan leader Colonel Muammer Gaddafi has gone through the pro forma process with the IAEA but he has delayed and delayed," a source told the paper. "He wants to use the uranium as a bargaining chip to get a reactor." Last month, France and Libya signed a controversial memorandum of understanding to build a nuclear reactor for water desalination in Libya among a raft of deals. AGB/KB © Press TV 2007. All rights reserved. Our privacy Policy ***************************************************************** 35 NUCLEAR WASTE TECHNICAL REVIEW BOARD: Notice of Meeting FR Doc 07-3937 [Federal Register: August 13, 2007 (Volume 72, Number 155)] [Notices] [Page 45276-45277] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr13au07-100] Board meeting: September 19, 2007--Las Vegas, Nevada; The U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board will meet to discuss U.S. Department of Energy activities related to the possible development of a repository for spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Pursuant to its authority under section 5051 of Public Law 100-203, Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act of 1987, the U.S. Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board will meet in Las Vegas, Nevada on Wednesday, September 19, 2007. The Board was created in the Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act of 1987 and charged with performing an independent review of the technical and scientific validity of U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) activities related to implementing the Nuclear Waste Policy Act. Such activities include characterizing the proposed repository site for disposing of spent nuclear fuel and high-level radioactive waste at Yucca Mountain in Nevada and packaging and transporting the waste. The focus of the meeting, which will be open to the public, will be repository surface-facility designs and operations; other technical issues also may be discussed. A final meeting agenda will be available on the Board's Web site (http://www.nwtrb.gov) or by telephone request approximately one week before the meeting date. The meeting will be held at the Atrium Suites Hotel; 4255 S. Paradise Road; Las Vegas, Nevada 89109; (tel) 702-369-4400; (res) 866- 404-5286; (fax) 702-369-4330. The meeting will begin at 8 a.m. Time will be set aside at the end of the day for public comments. Those wanting to speak are encouraged to sign the ``Public Comment Register'' at the check-in table. A time limit may have to be set on individual remarks, but written comments of any length may be submitted for the record. Transcripts of the meeting will be available on the Board's Web site, by e-mail, on computer disk, and on a [[Page 45277]] library-loan basis in paper format from Davonya Barnes of the Board's staff no later than October 15, 2007. A block of rooms has been reserved for meeting participants at the Atrium Suites. When making a reservation, please state that you are attending the NWTRB meeting. Reservations should be made by August 27, 2007, to ensure receiving the meeting rate. For more information, contact Karyn Severson, NWTRB External Affairs; 2300 Clarendon Boulevard, Suite 1300; Arlington, VA 22201- 3367; (tel) 703-235-4473; (fax) 703-235-4495. Dated: August 7, 2007. William D. Barnard, Executive Director, Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board. [FR Doc. 07-3937 Filed 8-10-07; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6820-NM-M ***************************************************************** 36 The Australian: US-backed nuke club 'appealing' NEWS.com.au Network August 14, 2007 12:32am AEST A US-backed proposal to set up a nuclear energy club, potentially including Australia, holds "considerable appeal", a government advocate of nuclear power has said. Ziggy Switkowski, chairman of the Australian National Science and Technology Organisation, said the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership was a "conceptually appealing" framework for safely expanding the industry internationally. The plan, supported by the US for economic and security reasons, is expected to encourage a select number of friendly nations supplying nuclear fuel to reactors overseas to take back and store the waste generated by their customers. It is likely to be discussed at an annual nuclear energy forum next month, where Australia will be an observer. "As more countries go nuclear ... they will find it very appealing to be able to source enriched uranium and fuel rods from a supplier which will also be responsible for the management and storage of spent fuel," Dr Switkowski said. The former nuclear physicist and Telstra chief executive, who chaired a recent government taskforce into options for developing a nuclear power industry for Australia, considers it the country's "only real option" in curbing its energy emissions without stalling the economy. Australia is one of the world's biggest uranium miners and the Howard Government has shown interest in moving the country up the global nuclear energy supply chain. But it has ruled out accepting nuclear waste from other countries as part of any new arrangement. Dr Switkowski said the group's charter and membership might take a year or more to decide, given the challenges in one nation accepting another's nuclear waste. "But we'll know more in September," he said. Copyright 2007 News Limited. All times AEST (GMT +10). ***************************************************************** 37 UPI: Kucinich calls for nuclear abolition United Press International - NewsTrack - Top News - Published: Aug. 12, 2007 at 11:02 PM WASHINGTON, Aug. 12 (UPI) -- Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, said Sunday the United States should lead the way in ridding the world of nuclear weapons. Appearing on ABC's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos," Kucinich said if he is elected president he would "lead through multilateral nuclear disarmament. I mean, this is something that we have to do together." Kucinich -- a candidate for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination -- said considering the use of nuclear weapons is "insane." "I think that the United States must lead the way for nuclear abolition," he said. "And when any candidate says all options are on the table, notwithstanding remarks that clarify it, what we're talking about is a nuclear option, as well. That's not acceptable." Kucinich said the United States "must have an international peacekeeping process where a president leads the way and talks with nations." "The idea that somehow by having nuclear weapons you make the world a safer place is essentially insane. We need to have the wisdom and the knowledge to know that that nuclear sword of Damocles hangs not only over our country, but the entire world." © Copyright 2007 United Press International. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 38 DOE: Office of Science; Notice of Renewal of the Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee FR Doc E7-15772 [Federal Register: August 13, 2007 (Volume 72, Number 155)] [Notices] [Page 45238] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr13au07-56] DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY Pursuant to Section 14(a)(2)(A) of the Federal Advisory Committee Act, 5 U.S.C., App., and in accordance with Title 41 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Section 102-3.65, and following consultation with the Committee Management Secretariat, General Services Administration, notice is hereby given that the Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee has been renewed for a two-year period. The Committee will provide advice to the Director, Office of Science, on long-range plans, priorities, and strategies for advancing plasma science, fusion science and fusion technology--the knowledge base needed for an economically and environmentally attractive fusion energy source. The Secretary has determined that the renewal of the Fusion Energy Sciences Advisory Committee is essential to the conduct of the Department's business and in the public interest in connection with the performance of duties imposed upon the Department of Energy by law. The Committee will continue to operate in accordance with the provisions of the Federal Advisory Committee Act, the Department of Energy Organization Act (Pub. L. 92-463), the General Services Administration Final Rule on Federal Advisory Committee Management, and other directives and instruction issued in implementation of those acts. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ms. Rachel Samuel at (202) 586-3279. Issued in Washington, DC on August 7, 2007. James N. Solit, Advisory Committee Management Officer. [FR Doc. E7-15772 Filed 8-10-07; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 6450-01-P ***************************************************************** 39 Knoxville News Sentinel: TVA nuke reactor shut down as power demand goes up By Andrew Eder (Contact) Originally published 11:39 a.m., August 13, 2007 A TVA nuclear reactor remained out of service this morning after a faulty sensor caused it to shut down Friday — inopportune timing for a utility working to meet record demand for electricity. The Unit 1 reactor at Browns Ferry Nuclear Plant in northern Alabama automatically shut down Friday evening after a sensor separated from a system that circulates water through the reactor. In a report to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, TVA reported that an unknown amount of coolant system water leaked from the sensing line. Spokesman Terry Johnson said such water is typically contaminated with a low level of radioactivity but that the incident presented no risk to plant employees or the public. Johnson said operators were in the process of restarting the reactor, although TVA does not forecast when out-of-service reactors will be reconnected to the power grid. Unit 1 had been online for 46 consecutive days before Friday’s shutdown, Johnson said. The outage comes as TVA works to meet a record power demand spurred by a heat wave in its seven-state, 80,000-square-mile electric service area. The five weekdays last week represented the five highest power peaks TVA has ever seen, and the utility is predicting new record peaks later this week. “Right now, the Southeast is under quite a bit of heat and demand for electricity is pretty high,” Johnson said. “We’d prefer not to have it offline right now.” Unit 1 at Browns Ferry was restarted in May after a five-year restoration that cost at least $1.8 billion. The reactor had been idled since 1985. Business writer Andrew Eder may be reached at 865-342-6318. © 2007, Knoxville News Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 40 Knoxville News Sentinel: Oakley attorneys may not need security clearances Ex-janitor charged with trying to sell OR equipment to French By Frank Munger (Contact) Updated 04:14 p.m., August 13, 2007 Attorneys for a former Oak Ridge maintenance worker accused of stealing classified uranium-enrichment equipment and offering it to the French government apparently will be able to defend their client without getting security clearances. “Yes, I think so,” Herbert S. Moncier, lead attorney for 65-year-old Roy Lynn Oakley of Roane County, said as he exited U.S. District Court today following a pre-trial conference. Assistant U.S. Attorney David Dake indicated in court today that he and Moncier had already agreed on some rules for the case. Dake is supposed to present a protective order for review by U.S. Magistrate Judge Bruce Guyton by next Monday. The order would outline systems and procedures for court security to prevent classified information from inadvertently being revealed during the legal proceedings. Guyton privately met in his chambers with Moncier, Dake and other members of the legal teams during much of today’s brief pre-trial conference. The magistrate later made mention of another case, the United States vs. Smith, where the defense was able to proceed without security clearances. Moncier has balked at getting a federal security clearance in order to discuss details of the Oakley case, including the so-called “barrier” equipment that was reportedly stolen from the East Tennessee Technology Park — a former uranium-enrichment plant that was built during the World War II Manhattan Project. In court today, the defense attorney did not absolutely refuse to get a security clearance. “We are always open to relooking at that,” Moncier told Guyton. “We’ll be open to the process.” Outside the courtroom, however, he said he felt the government-sanctioned security clearances were unnecessary, and that similar situations have been resolved in many other court cases “more prominent than this.” Having to go through the clearance process would place him under the purview of the executive branch, Moncier said, adding, “That gives me an uncomfortable feeling.” He also suggested that some of the things being safeguarded in this case may be widely available on the Internet, including detailed descriptions of the barrier. Such information is just a “keystroke away,” he said. Moncier said he thought all security issues could be resolved to satisfaction. Oakley, a former employee of Bechtel Jacobs Co., the Department of Energy’s cleanup contractor in Oak Ridge, is accused of stealing sections of “barrier” between October 2006 and January 2007 for the purpose of selling them. He reportedly called the French Embassy and offered to sell the chopped-up pieces of equipment. Although his initial inquiry was rebuffed, court documents indicated that he later got a call from an FBI agent posing as an embassy official. During the conversation, Oakley was supposedly given a code name, and a sale price for the equipment was negotiated. Oakley was temporarily detained after a Jan. 26 sting operation, involving a search of his Midway home, but he was not charged until his federal indictment in July. Moncier acknowledged today that has not seen key evidence in the case, including the pieces of equipment reportedly taken from the Oak Ridge uranium-enrichment plant that is being dismantled by Bechtel Jacobs. Because that equipment is classified, Moncier and other defense attorneys, including co-counsel David Wigler, apparently would not be able to view it without first gaining a security clearance. More details as they develop online and in Tuesday’s News Sentinel. Senior writer Frank Munger may be reached at 865-342-6329. © 2007, Knoxville News Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 41 LocalNews8.com: Crews expand cleanup of nuclear weapons waste at eastern Idaho site Idaho Falls, Pocatello - Associated Press - August 13, 2007 5:04 PM ET IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (AP) - The cleanup of hazardous wastes buried decades ago in the eastern Idaho desert is expanding. Officials with the Idaho Cleanup Project say crews are now focusing excavation efforts on a second set of materials buried on the grounds of the Idaho National Laboratory. In 2005, the U.S. Department of Energy hired two contractors to begin cleaning up Cold War-era nuclear weapons waste generated by the Rocky Flats nuclear weapons plant outside Denver. The radioactive wastes were shipped in drums to Idaho and buried in pits 20-feet below the surface. Idaho Cleanup Project spokeswoman Amy Lientz says excavation work has now expanded to a second pit. The materials awaiting removal include a mix of plutonium contaminated filters, graphite molds used to form weapons, contaminated sludges and oxidized uranium. Once recovered, classified and repackaged, the materials will be shipped via trucks to the federal Waste Isolation Pilot Plant in New Mexico. All content © Copyright 2000 - 2007 WorldNow and KIFI. 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