***************************************************************** 09/06/07 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 15.209 ***************************************************************** 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: Iran Nuke Moves Hint at Interest in Deal 2 ICH: U.S. Staging Nukes for Iran? 3 [NYTr] Nuclear Hypocrisy in the Middle East 4 US: Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction 5 US: Times-News: Idaho eyes future without Craig NUCLEAR REACTORS 6 The Hindu Nuke issue: Parliament adjourns repeatedly 7 tvnz.co.nz: Nuclear power debate reignited 8 AU ABC: Howard focuses on nuclear, climate issues at APEC - 9 Indiatimes| N-war rages as Left takes on Sibal 10 TheStar.com: Down with nuclear energy 11 CANOE: World: Canada to lead world in fight against climate change, 12 BBC NEWS: Nuclear towers to be demolished 13 Platts: French nuclear vendor Areva says UK nuclear relaunch 'essent 14 The Hindu: BJP says it will force govt. to set up JPC on nuke deal 15 The Guardian: `New nuclear row as green groups pull out 16 US: Times Argus: Nuclear industry should be honest 17 US: APP.COM: Turn against coal leaves nuclear as power option | 18 US: Burlington Free Press 19 IHT: Finnish plant demonstrates nuclear power industry's perennial p 20 US: Brattleboro Reformer: Vernon mulls possibility of VY-less future 21 Economist.com: Energy | Nuclear power's new age 22 Economist.com: Nuclear power | Atomic renaissance | 23 Economist.com: Germany's government | A coalition of the unwilling | 24 Reuters: China notes differences on India-U.S. nuclear deal 25 Reuters: Nuclear industry hails climate-driven renaissance 26 Reuters: APEC rift opens over climate change debate 27 UPI: Indian law rejects foreign role in nuclear 28 US: TCPalm: Nuclear plant to test sirens at noon today 29 UPI: China may soften stand on India nuke deal 30 US: MHNN: Mid-cycle NRC report gives Indian Point good grades 31 ITAR-TASS: Russia and Indonesia sign 8 agreements 32 Radio New Zealand News: Ministers sidestep nuclear energy issue at A 33 US: Tulsa World: AEP Not Interested in Nuclear Plants (Pursuing Coal 34 Radio New Zealand News: Nuclear power dismissed as solution to clima 35 US: Amarillo.com: Another drop in flood of response to nuclear react 36 IAEA: A Nuclear Crystal Ball? Experts to Look 25 Years Ahead 37 US: Daily Sentinel: TVA serious about COL 38 SMN: Bulgaria: Varna TPP Makes up for Nuke Unit Emergency Shutdown i 39 tvnz.co.nz: Nuclear energy not an option for NZ NUCLEAR SECURITY 40 US: Government Inc.: The Nuke Detection Beat Goes On NUCLEAR SAFETY 41 US: BBC NEWS: US embarrassed at nuclear blunder 42 US: DHHS: Exposure Cohort 43 US: DHHS: Exposure Cohort 44 US: DHHS: Exposure Cohort 45 US: HT: Huntsville EMA officials to brief congressman on nuclear fal 46 US: Guardian Unlimited: Shakeup after nuclear missiles flown across 47 US: UPI: Nuclear bombs take unplanned flight NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 48 US: Bradenton.com: Tallevast development moves forward 49 US: The State: Critics fault DHEC on radioactivity data 50 Las Vegas SUN: Editorial: Yucca Mountain low 51 ReviewJournal.com: A rare victory over Energy Department 52 ReviewJournal.com: State notifies DOE 53 US: AFP: US not worried by Russia-Australia nuclear deal - Rice 54 US: News-Leader: Photo exhibit looks at effects of depleted uranium 55 Las Vegas SUN: Nevada to DOE: Hands off water for Yucca Mountain 56 US: DailyBulletin.com: Environmental groups find fault with state's 57 US: DailyBulletin.com: Rialto may see more of the EPA 58 US: LA Daily News: Field-lab cleanup bill goes to Arnold 59 US: Guardian Unlimited: ND Wary of Renewed Uranium Interest 60 UPI: Court sides with Nevada in nuclear case 61 US: Sydney Morning Herald: PM to sign nuclear deal with Russia - 62 US: Reuters: Leading uranium firms and scientists meet in London 63 US: AJC: Plutonium shipments may roll through Georgia 64 KVBC.com: Runaway tanker rekindles Yucca Mountain concerns PEACE 65 RIA Novosti: Russia says NATO jets escort its bombers on long-range 66 Japan Times: Definition of 'all' in nuclear talks 67 Caribbean Net News: Dominican Republic ratifies nuclear test ban tre 68 AFP: Russia-US talks on missile defence set for Paris - 69 US: WP: Early Warning: Six of Our Nukes Went Missing -- But Don't Wo US DEPT. OF ENERGY 70 The State: SRS to get tons more plutonium 71 ENS: Surplus Plutonium to Be Consolidated in South Carolina 72 Aiken Today: Surplus of plutonium to be sent to SRS 73 Seattle P-I: Judge denies Hanford dismissal motion 74 Platts: DOE picks Savannah River for plutonium consolidation 75 Tri-City Herald: DOE to ship plutonium off Hanford 76 Tri-City Herald: More Class C waste -- thanks but no thanks 77 Inside Bay Area: Livermore Lab to move surplus plutonium east 78 Ventura County Star: Field Lab cleanup measure approved 79 Knoxville News Sentinel: Two Y-12 workers hit with radioactive liqui 80 Business Report & Journal: Feds to Ship Surplus Plutonium to Savanna 81 Oak Ridger: Y-12 evaluating two incidents of radiation contamination 82 KNDO/KNDU Tri-Cities, Yakima, WA: Ecology Calls DOE Proposal "Unacce ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 IPS-English POLITICS: Iran Nuke Moves Hint at Interest in Deal Date: Thu, 06 Sep 2007 15:21:57 -0700 POLITICS: Iran Nuke Moves Hint at Interest in Deal Analysis by Gareth Porter* WASHINGTON, Sep 6 (IPS) - Iran's unexpected agreement with International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) head Mohamed Elbaradei to resolve old issues surrounding its nuclear programme in less than two months, and the fact that it has installed only two-thirds of the centrifuges previously announced, indicate that Tehran may be positioning itself for another bid for a diplomatic solution. The IAEA report circulated to board members last week, which is still unpublished but has been leaked to the press, says only 2,000 centrifuges have been activated. In mid-2006 and again in January 2007, Iranian officials had said they planned to have a 3,000-centrifuge cascade by sometime in spring 2007. Iran had told IAEA nuclear inspectors in April that more than 1,300 centrifuges were already in operation, but the pace has slackened since then. In an interview with Der Spiegel published Sep. 3, ElBaradei admitted that both technical difficulties and political considerations could have been factors in the shortfall. But he said, ”My gut feeling tells me that Iran has responded positively to my repeated demands that it scale back the programme.” President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announced this week that Iran had actually achieved the goal of 3,000 operational centrifuges. That was obviously aimed at appealing to his own domestic base of people who regard the uranium enrichment programme as a matter of national pride. But as Peter Beaumont, foreign affairs editor of The Observer, reported last January, Western diplomats and technical experts have long been ”extremely doubtful that Iran has yet mastered the skills to install and run” such a large cascade of centrifuges. Iranian officials are well known for always looking for bargaining chips, and a centrifuge target that Tehran knew it could not actually achieve anytime soon nevertheless gave Iran a potential source of leverage in any future negotiations with the IAEA -- and particularly its most powerful member, the United States -- on its nuclear programme. It also allowed Iran to appear responsive to ElBaradei's pleas to slow down the programme. Iranian willingness to reach formal agreement in three separate meetings with ElBaradei in July and August to resolve all remaining issues on its past nuclear research by November was clearly aimed at moving the Iran nuclear dossier from the Security Council back to the IAEA and averting a military confrontation with the United States. Based on Iran's own previous offers, such a deal would involve a guarantee against any nuclear weapons programme through an intrusive inspections regime, in return for an approved enrichment programme limited to a number of centrifuges well short of what would be required to produce nuclear weapons. In the brief 2005 negotiations with Britain, France and Germany, Iran submitted a formal proposal offering to negotiate a mutually acceptable ceiling on the number of centrifuges at Natanz, which would be producing low enriched uranium that could not be used to make weapons, and ”continuous on-site” inspection by IAEA nuclear specialists at all facilities to provide ”unprecedented added guarantees”. The EU-3 refused to discuss the proposal with Tehran. In May 2006 the representative of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on the Supreme National Security Council, Hassan Rohani -- who had been Khatemi's top nuclear negotiator -- offered a similar plan in a Time magazine essay. Rohani wrote that Iran agreed to negotiate with the IAEA and ”states concerned” on the ”scope and timing of its industrial-scale uranium enrichment” and accept a ”verifiable cap on enrichment limit of reactor grade [i.e., low enriched] uranium”. He repeated the earlier proposal's acceptance of a ”continuous presence of inspectors” to verify that no diversion takes place. Finally Khamenei's representative offered to ”consider” ratification of an IAEA ”Additional Protocol, which would require ”intrusive and snap inspections”. The argument that Iran cannot be allowed to have any uranium enrichment assumes that a sufficient number of centrifuges by itself would allow Iran to have the capability to build nuclear weapons. News media have routinely repeated the statement that 3,000 centrifuges could enrich enough uranium to make a bomb, provided the machines run for the requisite periods. But ElBaradei observed in an interview with the Financial Times on Feb. 19 that even if Iran had 3,000 or more centrifuges operating, they could not go beyond 5 percent enrichment, which would be far below what would be required for weapons-grade uranium, as long they remain under an IAEA inspection regime. In February 2006, ElBaradei suggested that Iran should be allowed a small-scale enrichment programme on Iranian soil in exchange for guarantees of no full nuclear fuel production that could be diverted for military purposes. Such an agreement would allow the international community to know with certainty rather than having to guess whether Iran is actually enriching uranium to weapons-grade level or not. The United States has insisted that it would not negotiate with Iran on the nuclear issue until it has agreed to suspend enrichment completely, but Iran has said it would only enter into talks without preconditions. The Bush administration is furious with Elbaradei for taking the steam out of its campaign of pressure on Iran. The IAEA report that Iran had made ”a significant step forward” by agreeing to a work plan for addressing remaining nuclear issues by the end of the year makes it more difficult for the administration to get support for ratcheting up pressure on Iran at a meeting of the IAEA next week. Even worse for the administration, according to a report by Tom Olmstead in U.S. News this week, the agreement ”could well blunt any rapid moves at the Security Council for further sanctions.” The Washington Post, which has been vocal in support of the administration's aggressive policy toward Iran, attacked Elbaradei Wednesday in an editorial for using his agency to ”thwart” U.S. policy. The Post accused him of refusing to ”carry out the policy of the [U.N.] Security Council or the IAEA board” and acting ”as if he were independent of them...” The administration has long regarded the IAEA chief as an obstacle to its policy of using military threats and economic sanctions to coerce Iran to give up its nuclear programme and has tried repeatedly to remove Elbaradei as general director or to get him to follow its line toward Iran. Neoconservatives in the administration were furious with him for having rejected its charge that Saddam Hussein was actively pursuing a nuclear weapons programme before the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003. But Elbaradei angered administration officials again by refusing to go along with its policy of accusing Iran of having a secret nuclear weapons programme. Then Secretary of State Colin Powell confirmed in mid-December 2004 that he had asked Elbaradei to step down the previous summer. Despite U.S. diplomatic pressure on its allies, however, in an April 2005 showdown in the IAEA board, the United States was the only one of 35 members who did not support another term for ElBaradei. *Gareth Porter is an historian and national security policy analyst. His latest book, ”Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam”, was published in June 2005. ***** + POLITICS: Bush Indictment of Iran Tops Usual Rhetoric (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39061) + RIGHTS-IRAN: Dissidents Encouraged to Go Into Exile (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39165) + POLITICS-US: Candidates Hop Aboard the Iran Sanctions Bus (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=38632) (END/IPS/NA/MM/IP/NU/BW/GP/KS/07) = 09070126 ORP002 NNNN ***************************************************************** 2 ICH: U.S. Staging Nukes for Iran? Resent-Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2007 02:02:57 -0500 (CDT) What a stupendous, what an incomprehensible machine is man! Who can endure toil, famine, stripes, imprisonment & death itself in vindication of his own liberty, and the next moment .. inflict on his fellow men a bondage, one hour of which is fraught with more misery than ages of that which he rose in rebellion to oppose: Thomas Jefferson = "Since when do you have to agree with people to defend them from injustice?": Lillian Hellman - (1905-1984) American playwright and memoirist = "For in a Republic, who is 'the country?' Is it the Government which is for the moment in the saddle? Why, the Government is merely a servant -- merely a temporary servant; it cannot be its prerogative to determine what is right and what is wrong, and decide who is a patriot and who isn't. Its function is to obey orders, not originate them." -- Mark Twain [Samuel Langhornne Clemens] (1835-1910) === Read this newsletter online http://tinyurl.com/dy6yy === Number Of Iraqis Slaughtered Since The U.S. Invaded Iraq 1,032,938 http://www.justforeignpolicy.org/iraq/iraqdeaths.html === Number of U.S. Military Personnel Sacrificed (Officially acknowledged) In America'sWar On Iraq 3753 http://icasualties.org/oif/ Cost of U.S. War and Occupation of Iraq $449,244,288,334 See the cost in your community http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182 === U.S. Staging Nukes for Iran? By Larry Johnson Why the hubbub over a B-52 taking off from a B-52 base in Minot, North Dakota and subsequently landing at a B-52 base in Barksdale, Louisiana? That's like getting excited if you see postal worker in uniform walking out of a post office. And how does someone watching a B-52 land identify the cruise missiles as nukes? It just does not make sense. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18325.htm === Bush Knew Saddam Had Ho Weapons Of Mass Destruction By Sidney Blumenthal On Sept. 18, 2002, CIA director George Tenet briefed President Bush in the Oval Office on top-secret intelligence that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, according to two former senior CIA officers. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18324.htm === Billions over Baghdad By Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele Between April 2003 and June 2004, $12 billion in U.S. currency-much of it belonging to the Iraqi people-was shipped from the Federal Reserve to Baghdad, where it was dispensed by the Coalition Provisional Authority. Some of the cash went to pay for projects and keep ministries afloat, but, incredibly, at least $9 billion has gone missing, unaccounted for, in a frenzy of mismanagement and greed. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18323.htm === Leaving Home... By Riverbend - Iraqi Girl Blog I cried as we left- in spite of promises not to. The aunt cried. the uncle cried. My parents tried to be stoic but there were tears in their voices as they said their goodbyes. The worst part is saying goodbye and wondering if you're ever going to see these people again. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18322.htm === The Shock Doctrine The Rise of Disaster Capitalism A Must Listen Audio Interview With Naomi Klein Klein argues that instability is being both fostered and used as a way to engage in policies of economic engineering around the world whether in Pinochet's Chile or today, in Iraq. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18327.htm === Class Is Still The Issue By John Pilger Just as elite power seeks to order other countries according to the demands of its privilege, so class remains at the root of our own society's mutations and sorrows. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18328.htm === Who Are The Fanatics? By Paul Craig Roberts In the US it is acceptable, even obligatory in many circles, to hate Muslims and to support violence against them. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18326.htm === Lebanon Cries Victory, But Is It Too Soon? By Robert Fisk The Lebanese army has lost - since April of this year - just five men fewer than the total 163 British dead in Iraq since the invasion of 2003; it is an impressive, dramatic, solemn toll of dead and will only emphasise the army's unique role in the political life of this sorely broken country. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18329.htm === Iraq: At least 44 killed in another bloody day of U.S. occupation: Eleven bodies were found in different districts of Baghdad on Wednesday, police said. http://tinyurl.com/39lshx === US strikes in Baghdad kill 14 sleeping civilians : US combat helicopters and tanks bombarded a Baghdad neighbourhood in pre-dawn strikes on Thursday, killing 14 sleeping civilians and destroying houses, angry residents and Iraqi officials said. http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jMF2P75B8c4dTOw9h8IEgsAmW7FA === Bombings kill 8 U.S. troops: The U.S. military said three soldiers were killed Tuesday in eastern Baghdad. Two other soldiers died Wednesday during combat operations in the eastern part of the capital, one was killed in a western neighborhood Tuesday, the military said. Also, two soldiers died Wednesday after an explosion near their vehicle in Salahuddin province, the military said. http://www.insidebayarea.com/news/ci_6815657 === Samarra Under U.S. Attack: Residents are fleeing Samarra city in the face of fierce fighting between U.S. forces and resistance groups. http://www.dahrjamailiraq.com/hard_news/archives/iraq/000633.php === Who Will Cry for Innocent Iraqis?: 70 percent of Iraqi children suffer from symptoms of traumatic stress syndrome manifested in psychiatric and psychological symptoms. These children daily witness death and destruction in their neighborhood. This is not surprising since a third of our own soldiers in Iraq return with symptoms of mental illness and traumatic stress disorder. http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/4519 === U.S. Deports Parents of Dead Soldiers: One tenth of the U.S. soldiers who have died in Iraq have been immigrants. But not all of their parents have qualified for green cards. http://www.alternet.org/rights/61729 === Iraq says won't disband police despite U.S. report: Iraq's Interior Ministry said on Thursday it would not disband the national police despite a report by an independent U.S. panel that will recommend scrapping and reorganising the force. http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/COL638041.htm === Iraqi Army Withdraws From Fallujah: The last battalion of Iraqi soldiers with 2nd Brigade, 1st Iraqi Army Division, withdrew from the Anbar Province city of Fallujah, Sept. 1, leaving the city's security and stability in the hands of the local police and government. http://snipurl.com/1qe5i === Fallujah, Pummelled Into Submission, Now a Potemkin Village: A brave new attempt is under way to project that all is well now with Fallujah. Residents know better -- or worse. http://www.alternet.org/waroniraq/61740/ === Families Cracking Under War Pressure: U.S. military families have become the unseen victims of the war in Iraq, with those left behind suffering when Soldiers go off to fight and when they finally return home. http://snipurl.com/1qe50 === Nine Palestinian's killed Thursday by Israeli occupation forces in the Gaza Strip. The strike came as IDF troops backed by tanks and bulldozers moved a kilometer inside the occupied Gaza Strip to strike at Palestinian "militants" on Thursday. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/901636.html === Rights group: IDF indiscriminately struck Lebanon civilians : In its harshest condemnation of Israel since the Second Lebanon War, Human Rights Watch charged that most of the Lebanese civilian casualties came from indiscriminate Israeli air strikes, according to a report to released Thursday. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/901620.html === Norway diplomats urge Oslo to criticize Israel over torture : Norway's embassy in Tel Aviv has urged the government to criticize Israel for the alleged use of torture in prisons, the state radio network NRK reported Thursday. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/901673.html === Syria accuses Israel of bombing its territory: Syria accused Israel of bombing its territory on Thursday and said it could respond to the Jewish state's "aggression and treachery." http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070906/ts_nm/syria_israel_dc === Syrian Minister: We are seriously considering our response to IAF airspace violation : Syrian Information Minister Mohsen Bilal said Thursday that Damascus is giving serious consideration to its response to a reported incident overnight Wednesday, in which the Syrian military fired on an Israel Air Force warplane that had violated its airspace and dropped ammunition. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/901684.html === Syria: We won't be dragged into a war: Syrian Information Minister Mohsen Bilal was enraged over the alleged incident. "Israel in fact does not want peace. It cannot survive without aggression, treachery and military messages," he said. http://tinyurl.com/3ctdqr === Study: US Jews distance themselves from Israel: Feelings of attachment to Israel declining among non-Orthodox American Jews, and are replaced by indifference and even alienation, study finds http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3446492,00.html === Top Reform Rabbi Gives Watershed Address to Largest U.S. Muslim Group : A "profound ignorance" about Islam in the United States had helped spread the image of Muslims as the enemy, Yoffie said, pushing for a more active denunciation of those promoting such beliefs. http://www.forward.com/articles/11554/ === Bush, Iran and Israel's Hidden Hand: Nuclear Hypocrisy in the Middle East: The Israel lobby will desperately oppose efforts to impeach Bush and Cheney, because it will recognize instantly that the two top U.S. leaders are the lobby's strongest backers of war with Iran http://www.counterpunch.org/christison09062007.html === Iran says has deal on nuclear plant, Russia denies: Iran said on Thursday it had agreed a timetable with Russia for the start-up of the Islamic state's first nuclear power plant, but an official in Moscow said negotiations with Tehran were still under way. http://tinyurl.com/33ct2t === US more eager than Europe for military strikes on Iran: survey : The report suggested that 47 percent of Americans believe in reserving the option of military action against Iran if diplomatic talks over its nuclear program collapse. In Europe, the equivalent figure was just 18 percent, while 47 percent wanted military force against Tehran to be ruled out. http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070906/wl_mideast_afp/useueuropeiranpoll === Russian Leader Calls For Urgent Delivery Of Anti-aircraft Missile Systems To Iran : Vice Chairman of Russia's Parliament Duma, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, has urged the fast delivery of the sophisticated S-400 anti-aircraft missile systems to Iran to enable the Middle Eastern country to defend its air space, http://tinyurl.com/2vdotb === 40 "insurgents", 2 NATO soldiers killed in Afghanistan: Afghan and coalition forces claim to have killed around 200 Taleban insurgents in central and southern Afghanistan in recent weeks. The Taleban have admitted some losses, but say many of the dead are civilians - a charge denied by the coalition. http://tinyurl.com/32rl9g === Romanian soldier killed in Afghanistan: - A Romanian soldier died and three others were injured, one seriously, Thursday when their tank hit a mine and exploded in the south-east Afghan province of Zabul http://tinyurl.com/32dyrw === Pakistani military kills six pro-Taliban militants: Pakistani helicopters Thursday destroyed a suspected vehicle in the restive tribal areas bordering Afghanistan, killing six militants including some foreign fighters with al-Qaeda links, officials said. hhttp://tinyurl.com/2rckop === China conducts surprise military drill: China's military entered its third day on Wednesday of a surprise, four-day military exercise in northeast China that has jarred Taiwan with maneuvers widely interpreted as practice for an invasion of the self-governing island. http://www.japantoday.com/jp/news/417302 === Norwegian, British fighters scrambled to intercept Russian bombers: Norwegian and British fighters scrambled Thursday to intercept eight Russian bombers that neared the Nordic country's territory in the latest show of air power by the Kremlin, defence officials said. http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/World/2007/09/06/4474540-ap.html === Defense Dept. pays $1B to outside analysts : The Defense Department is paying private contractors more than $1 billion in more than 30 separate contracts to collect and analyze intelligence for the four military services and its own Defense Intelligence Agency, according to contract documents and a Pentagon spokesman. http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2007-08-29-dia_N.htm === Depleted Uranium, Increased Risk: Weapons the Department of Defense claims are harmless have serious and lasting effects. http://campusprogress.org/opinions/1912/depleted-uranium-increased-risk === Psychological "torture bible" published in 1961 reappears online: The book is a compilation of seven research reports, and funded at least in large part by the United States government. You can even track down the table of contents online, and your jaw may drop when you read the chapter titles: http://www.boingboing.net/2007/09/05/psychological-tortur.html === Judge Strikes Down Part of Patriot Act: A federal judge struck down parts of the revised USA Patriot Act on Thursday, saying investigators must have a court's approval before they can order Internet providers to turn over records without telling customers. http://tinyurl.com/37absj === Is China quietly dumping US Treasuries?: A sharp drop in foreign holdings of US Treasury bonds over the last five weeks has raised concerns that China is quietly withdrawing its funds from the United States, leaving the dollar increasingly vulnerable. http://tinyurl.com/2u6vw9 === New Foreclosures Set Record In Latest MBA Survey : The number of mortgage loans entering the foreclosure process in the second quarter set another record, according to the latest data from the Mortgage Bankers Association. http://tinyurl.com/2laxve === Let Us Work Towards Peace & Joy Tom Feeley ICH: U.S. Staging Nukes for Iran? ***************************************************************** 3 [NYTr] Nuclear Hypocrisy in the Middle East Date: Thu, 6 Sep 2007 16:28:40 -0500 (CDT) Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit Counterpunch - Sep 6, 2007 http://www.counterpunch.org/christison09062007.html Nuclear Hypocrisy in the Middle East Bush, Iran and Israel's Hidden Hand By KATHLEEN and BILL CHRISTISON Former CIA Analysts The internet is loaded these days with reports of the inevitability of a U.S., or a U.S.-Israeli, attack on Iran. Some writers allege that the attack is imminent. Others, including the writers of this article, argue only that the attack will happen sometime before January 2009, when the Bush administration leaves office. Many of these stories have by now been picked up by the mainstream media. In fact, it is probably safe to say that today a majority of the traditionally cautious and so-called respectable foreign policy experts in the U.S. think it is at least possible that Bush will attack Iran before he leaves office. Such is the power of recollection with respect to how Bush bulled his way into invading Iraq in 2003 that many people simply accept that he might gamble on doing it again. He has made it clear that in this "War on Terror," victory means everything to him. He might also believe that a win in Iran could reverse current setbacks in Iraq and also bring victory closer for the U.S. and Israel in Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine. And he has already shown that he is willing to accept the killings of hundreds of thousands or even a million people in the hope of going down in history as a great commander-in-chief. The people of the United States are the only ones with a chance of stopping him, and it can only happen if a powerful majority of voters will join in a maximum effort to impeach both Bush and Cheney right now. This has to happen before the U.S. and/or Israel undertake any expanded military efforts against Iran. All of this will be difficult, and many will think it impossible. We citizens of the U.S. who do not want our country to become involved in a greater war with Iran will not have most of the print and TV media with us, nor the military-industrial complex that wants more wars. The Israel lobby will desperately oppose efforts to impeach Bush and Cheney, because it will recognize instantly that the two top U.S. leaders are the lobby's strongest backers of war with Iran. At the same time, most of the Democratic Party leadership and all but one or two of the Democratic presidential candidates will be reluctant to support impeachment because they are competing with the Republicans in an effort to show that each party supports Israel more strongly than the other. But the people of this country have plenty of power to defeat all these forces if they will use it to support justice, particularly in the Middle East, which is today the highest priority area where U.S. and Israeli foreign policies play a major role, and the area where those policies are the most unjust. We believe it will be by no means impossible to persuade a majority of American voters, given their already established distaste for U.S. failures in Iraq, to rip off the cocoon of pleasant but apathetic consumerism in which they have encased themselves, and participate more seriously in the political processes of our country than they ever have in recent years. The impeachment itself will have more to do with the past than the future, since a legal action can only indict (impeach) and then convict a person for past actions, not for actions that may be likely in the future. So impeachment will concern Iraq and domestic policies of the Bush administration, not Iran. But at the same time, once we get their interest, people should have a heightened awareness of future planned acts as well as of past policies of the government. If we can move fast, we will have time to show how the plans to attack Iran create a greater need than ever for an impeachment effort to succeed, and to succeed now. The first point to make in persuading people is that Iran itself claims it has no nuclear weapons now, and no intention to produce them in the future. The first part of this statement is true; the supporting evidence is overwhelming. But Iran's claim that it will not in the future develop nuclear weapons is subject to doubt, even though the International Atomic Energy Agency has found no evidence to the contrary. The other nations in the Middle East and South Asia that have been developing nuclear weapons over the last 50 years -- Israel, India, and Pakistan -- all lied to the U.S., the U.N., and other countries, claiming that they were not building nuclear weapons when in fact they were. Iran might well do the same. More important is the sheer logic of the situation. As one nation-state in a world of nation-states, Iran knows that it has every bit as much right to develop nuclear weapons as the U.S., Israel, and other present nuclear powers. Compared to Israel, Iran has both a population and a land mass that are much larger. So why is it permissible for Israel to have several hundred nuclear weapons and impermissible for Iran to have any? The answer given by Israel supporters that Israel never signed the NonProliferation Treaty of 1970 while Iran did, is spurious. The NPT is, for practical purposes, a dead letter. Under the treaty, the U.S. and other signatory states already possessing nuclear weapons promised to begin serious negotiations to eliminate their own weapons, but they have never done so, or even tried, in the years since 1970. If Iran were in fact discovered to be developing its own weapons, Iranian officials could say, hand on heart, that they would be pleased to quit violating the treaty when the U.S. did. Since the U.S. right now is embarking on a program to upgrade its nuclear weapons and delivery systems capabilities, and shows absolutely no intention to negotiate toward eliminating those capabilities, Iran would seem to have quite a strong legal case. Iran might also argue that the situation has so changed in its region of the world (with Israel, India, and Pakistan all now having their own nukes) that it must withdraw from the treaty and obtain its own deterrent force. It has not done that yet because it still claims that it does not want any nuclear weapons, but that option is always, and quite legally, open to it. By the way, any argument that Israel is a more moral and "better" country than Iran -- and thus more deserving of nuclear weapons -- is a bit of sanctimony worthy only of being rejected out of hand. The key point here is that Iran's nuclear capabilities are not now, and will not be at least for a few more years, a significant threat to the U.S., although over the same period they could be seen in Israel as a somewhat greater threat. Therefore, to the extent that Iran's nuclear weapons potential is at all a real cause of present U.S. and Israeli aggressive policies toward Iran, these aggressive policies are being carried out more to benefit Israel than the U.S. It is actually likely that the main motive behind U.S. and Israeli policies (as was the case in Iraq) has nothing to do with nuclear weapons but is rather to bring about regime change in Iran and strengthen the joint dominion of the U.S. and Israel over the entire Middle East. This raises the broader question of whether such joint dominion is truly in the best interest of the United States, or whether it is favored in Washington mainly because it is being pushed by the Israel lobby. Another point needs to be made that should also help persuade U.S. voters to oppose a war against Iran with all their strength. Bush is fond of saying that Iran is the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism. Of course, when he says this, he never tells his listeners what his definition of terrorism is. In fact, we cannot recall any occasion or speech since the so-called War on Terror was launched in which Bush has spelled out what he means when he uses the word. The best definition of terrorism is "the use of violence against civilians for a political purpose." If one buys this definition, which is widely used, Bush's statement that Iran is the leading state sponsor is plainly false. Using any criterion you choose that covers all civilians -- killings, destruction of homes, shootings or beatings or mistreatment of the sick at checkpoints -- what governments would you say were the leading purveyors of terrorism in the last five years? Hint: creating "shock and awe" is a good definition of at least one form of terrorism using aircraft, modern bombs, and missiles. Sniper shootings of children in Gaza is another. Destroying the olive trees that provide basic income for an entire family and then forcibly confiscating the land on which the olive trees stood is yet another form. But then, there are numerous others, including the use of torture on prisoners. It is so easy, yet so reprehensible to list Iran as the number-one terrorism culprit. At a minimum, we Americans must understand that many others around the world regard us as far worse terrorists than any in Iran. For pushing "terrorism" as a justification for waging war against Iran when the U.S. is just as guilty of even greater terrorism, Bush and Cheney must beyond question be impeached and convicted with all possible speed, so that they can never start that war. [Bill Christison was a senior official of the CIA. He served as a National Intelligence Officer and as Director of the CIA's Office of Regional and Political Analysis. Kathleen Christison is a former CIA political analyst and has worked on Middle East issues for 30 years. She is the author of Perceptions of Palestine and The Wound of Dispossession. They can be reached at kathy.bill.christison@comcast.net ] * ================================================================= .NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems . Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us . .339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org . List Archives: https://blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/ . Subscribe: https://blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr ================================================================= ***************************************************************** 4 Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction Date: Thu, 6 Sep 2007 19:36:47 -0500 (CDT) http://www.salon.com/opinion/blumenthal/2007/09/06/bush_wmd/index_np.html?source=whitelist Bush knew Saddam had no weapons of mass destruction Salon exclusive: Two former CIA officers say the president squelched top-secret intelligence, and a briefing by George Tenet, months before invading Iraq. By Sidney Blumenthal Sep. 06, 2007 | On Sept. 18, 2002, CIA director George Tenet briefed President Bush in the Oval Office on top-secret intelligence that Saddam Hussein did not have weapons of mass destruction, according to two former senior CIA officers. Bush dismissed as worthless this information from the Iraqi foreign minister, a member of Saddam's inner circle, although it turned out to be accurate in every detail. Tenet never brought it up again. Nor was the intelligence included in the National Intelligence Estimate of October 2002, which stated categorically that Iraq possessed WMD. No one in Congress was aware of the secret intelligence that Saddam had no WMD as the House of Representatives and the Senate voted, a week after the submission of the NIE, on the Authorization for Use of Military Force in Iraq. The information, moreover, was not circulated within the CIA among those agents involved in operations to prove whether Saddam had WMD. On April 23, 2006, CBS's "60 Minutes" interviewed Tyler Drumheller, the former CIA chief of clandestine operations for Europe, who disclosed that the agency had received documentary intelligence from Naji Sabri, Saddam's foreign minister, that Saddam did not have WMD. "We continued to validate him the whole way through," said Drumheller. "The policy was set. The war in Iraq was coming, and they were looking for intelligence to fit into the policy, to justify the policy." Now two former senior CIA officers have confirmed Drumheller's account to me and provided the background to the story of how the information that might have stopped the invasion of Iraq was twisted in order to justify it. They described what Tenet said to Bush about the lack of WMD, and how Bush responded, and noted that Tenet never shared Sabri's intelligence with then Secretary of State Colin Powell. According to the former officers, the intelligence was also never shared with the senior military planning the invasion, which required U.S. soldiers to receive medical shots against the ill effects of WMD and to wear protective uniforms in the desert. Instead, said the former officials, the information was distorted in a report written to fit the preconception that Saddam did have WMD programs. That false and restructured report was passed to Richard Dearlove, chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (MI6), who briefed Prime Minister Tony Blair on it as validation of the cause for war. Secretary of State Powell, in preparation for his presentation of evidence of Saddam's WMD to the United Nations Security Council on Feb. 5, 2003, spent days at CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., and had Tenet sit directly behind him as a sign of credibility. But Tenet, according to the sources, never told Powell about existing intelligence that there were no WMD, and Powell's speech was later revealed to be a series of falsehoods. Both the French intelligence service and the CIA paid Sabri hundreds of thousands of dollars (at least $200,000 in the case of the CIA) to give them documents on Saddam's WMD programs. "The information detailed that Saddam may have wished to have a program, that his engineers had told him they could build a nuclear weapon within two years if they had fissile material, which they didn't, and that they had no chemical or biological weapons," one of the former CIA officers told me. On the eve of Sabri's appearance at the United Nations in September 2002 to present Saddam's case, the officer in charge of this operation met in New York with a "cutout" who had debriefed Sabri for the CIA. Then the officer flew to Washington, where he met with CIA deputy director John McLaughlin, who was "excited" about the report. Nonetheless, McLaughlin expressed his reservations. He said that Sabri's information was at odds with "our best source." That source was code-named "Curveball," later exposed as a fabricator, con man and former Iraqi taxi driver posing as a chemical engineer. The next day, Sept. 18, Tenet briefed Bush on Sabri. "Tenet told me he briefed the president personally," said one of the former CIA officers. According to Tenet, Bush's response was to call the information "the same old thing." Bush insisted it was simply what Saddam wanted him to think. "The president had no interest in the intelligence," said the CIA officer. The other officer said, "Bush didn't give a fuck about the intelligence. He had his mind made up." But the CIA officers working on the Sabri case kept collecting information. "We checked on everything he told us." French intelligence eavesdropped on his telephone conversations and shared them with the CIA. These taps "validated" Sabri's claims, according to one of the CIA officers. The officers brought this material to the attention of the newly formed Iraqi Operations Group within the CIA. But those in charge of the IOG were on a mission to prove that Saddam did have WMD and would not give credit to anything that came from the French. "They kept saying the French were trying to undermine the war," said one of the CIA officers. The officers continued to insist on the significance of Sabri's information, but one of Tenet's deputies told them, "You haven't figured this out yet. This isn't about intelligence. It's about regime change." The CIA officers on the case awaited the report they had submitted on Sabri to be circulated back to them, but they never received it. They learned later that a new report had been written. "It was written by someone in the agency, but unclear who or where, it was so tightly controlled. They knew what would please the White House. They knew what the king wanted," one of the officers told me. That report contained a false preamble stating that Saddam was "aggressively and covertly developing" nuclear weapons and that he already possessed chemical and biological weapons. "Totally out of whack," said one of the CIA officers. "The first [para]graph of an intelligence report is the most important and most read and colors the rest of the report." He pointed out that the case officer who wrote the initial report had not written the preamble and the new memo. "That's not what the original memo said." The report with the misleading introduction was given to Dearlove of MI6, who briefed the prime minister. "They were given a scaled-down version of the report," said one of the CIA officers. "It was a summary given for liaison, with the sourcing taken out. They showed the British the statement Saddam was pursuing an aggressive program, and rewrote the report to attempt to support that statement. It was insidious. Blair bought it." "Blair was duped," said the other CIA officer. "He was shown the altered report." The information provided by Sabri was considered so sensitive that it was never shown to those who assembled the NIE on Iraqi WMD. Later revealed to be utterly wrong, the NIE read: "We judge that Iraq has continued its weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs in defiance of UN resolutions and restrictions. Baghdad has chemical and biological weapons as well as missiles with ranges in excess of UN restrictions; if left unchecked, it probably will have a nuclear weapon during this decade." In the congressional debate over the Authorization for the Use of Military Force, even those voting against it gave credence to the notion that Saddam possessed WMD. Even a leading opponent such as Sen. Bob Graham, then the Democratic chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, who had instigated the production of the NIE, declared in his floor speech on Oct. 12, 2002, "Saddam Hussein's regime has chemical and biological weapons and is trying to get nuclear capacity." Not a single senator contested otherwise. None of them had an inkling of the Sabri intelligence. The CIA officers assigned to Sabri still argued within the agency that his information must be taken seriously, but instead the administration preferred to rely on Curveball. Drumheller learned from the German intelligence service that held Curveball that it considered him and his claims about WMD to be highly unreliable. But the CIA's Weapons Intelligence, Nonproliferation, and Arms Control Center (WINPAC) insisted that Curveball was credible because what he said was supposedly congruent with available public information. For two months, Drumheller fought against the use of Curveball, raising the red flag that he was likely a fraud, as he turned out to be. "Oh, my! I hope that's not true," said Deputy Director McLaughlin, according to Drumheller's book "On the Brink," published in 2006. When Curveball's information was put into Bush's Jan. 28, 2003, State of the Union address, McLaughlin and Tenet allowed it to pass into the speech. "From three Iraqi defectors," Bush declared, "we know that Iraq, in the late 1990s, had several mobile biological weapons labs ... Saddam Hussein has not disclosed these facilities. He's given no evidence that he has destroyed them." In fact, there was only one Iraqi source -- Curveball -- and there were no labs. When the mobile weapons labs were inserted into the draft of Powell's United Nations speech, Drumheller strongly objected again and believed that the error had been removed. He was shocked watching Powell's speech. "We have firsthand descriptions of biological weapons factories on wheels and on rails," Powell announced. Without the reference to the mobile weapons labs, there was no image of a threat. Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, Powell's chief of staff, and Powell himself later lamented that they had not been warned about Curveball. And McLaughlin told the Washington Post in 2006, "If someone had made these doubts clear to me, I would not have permitted the reporting to be used in Secretary Powell's speech." But, in fact, Drumheller's caution was ignored. As war appeared imminent, the CIA officers on the Sabri case tried to arrange his defection in order to demonstrate that he stood by his information. But he would not leave without bringing out his entire family. "He dithered," said one former CIA officer. And the war came before his escape could be handled. Tellingly, Sabri's picture was never put on the deck of playing cards of former Saddam officials to be hunted down, a tacit acknowledgment of his covert relationship with the CIA. Today, Sabri lives in Qatar. In 2005, the Silberman-Robb commission investigating intelligence in the Iraq war failed to interview the case officer directly involved with Sabri; instead its report blamed the entire WMD fiasco on "groupthink" at the CIA. "They didn't want to trace this back to the White House," said the officer. On Feb. 5, 2004, Tenet delivered a speech at Georgetown University that alluded to Sabri and defended his position on the existence of WMD, which, even then, he contended would still be found. "Several sensitive reports crossed my desk from two sources characterized by our foreign partners as established and reliable," he said. "The first from a source who had direct access to Saddam and his inner circle" -- Naji Sabri -- "said Iraq was not in the possession of a nuclear weapon. However, Iraq was aggressively and covertly developing such a weapon." Then Tenet claimed with assurance, "The same source said that Iraq was stockpiling chemical weapons." He explained that this intelligence had been central to his belief in the reason for war. "As this information and other sensitive information came across my desk, it solidified and reinforced the judgments that we had reached in my own view of the danger posed by Saddam Hussein and I conveyed this view to our nation's leaders." (Tenet doesn't mention Sabri in his recently published memoir, "At the Center of the Storm.") But where were the WMD? "Now, I'm sure you're all asking, 'Why haven't we found the weapons?' I've told you the search must continue and it will be difficult." On Sept. 8, 2006, three Republican senators on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence -- Orrin Hatch, Saxby Chambliss and Pat Roberts -- signed a letter attempting to counter Drumheller's revelation about Sabri on "60 Minutes": "All of the information about this case so far indicates that the information from this source was that Iraq did have WMD programs." The Republicans also quoted Tenet, who had testified before the committee in July 2006 that Drumheller had "mischaracterized" the intelligence. Still, Drumheller stuck to his guns, telling Reuters, "We have differing interpretations, and I think mine's right." One of the former senior CIA officers told me that despite the certitude of the three Republican senators, the Senate committee never had the original memo on Sabri. "The committee never got that report," he said. "The material was hidden or lost, and because it was a restricted case, a lot of it was done in hard copy. The whole thing was fogged up, like Curveball." While one Iraqi source told the CIA that there were no WMD, information that was true but distorted to prove the opposite, another Iraqi source was a fabricator whose lies were eagerly embraced. "The real tragedy is that they had a good source that they misused," said one of the former CIA officers. "The fact is there was nothing there, no threat. But Bush wanted to hear what he wanted to hear." -- By Sidney Blumenthal ***************************************************************** 5 Times-News: Idaho eyes future without Craig Magicvalley.com, Twin Falls, ID Last modified on Thursday, September 6, 2007 10:44 AM MDT Key issues at stake include INL, dairies and salmon By Matt Christensen Times-News writer TWIN FALLS - When, and if, Sen. Larry Craig resigns, his departure from the Senate could significantly affect environmental issues in Idaho. The senator announced last week he intended to resign after he pleaded guilty to an arrest stemming from an airport bathroom incident, and he was stripped of committee leadership posts by high-ranking Republicans. Craig is now indicating he may not resign if lawyers overturn his guilty plea. Either way, the loss of his leadership roles will likely reshape environmental policy in Idaho. Craig's potential departure could threaten recent and significant environmental progress, such as nuclear waste cleanup at the Idaho National Laboratory. But some indicate it could also pave the way for a greener future. "There are times Sen. Craig used his position and ability to make things less-desirous, at least for me," said Rick Johnson, executive director for the Idaho Conservation League, a prominent environmental group. Johnson points to Craig's efforts to cut funding for salmon recovery, limit dairy manure regulation and bolster funding for mining and logging operations. "His is a position that touches many, many issues," he said. The League of Conservation Voters, a nonprofit group that rates politicians' environmental voting records, ranks Craig among the most environmentally unfriendly senators. During his tenure in the Congress, the LCV rated Craig at 8 percent out of a possible 100. The organization declined to comment for this story because Craig is yet to resign and it didn't want to speculate on how a potential resignation could affect Idaho's environment. But Kristin Lee, an LCV spokeswoman said, "I think 8 out of 100 really speaks for itself. Scores vary, but that's really quite low." Others, however, say losing Craig, who wielded immense political clout, could prove costly for the environment. "He's been a huge champion for environmental cleanup initiatives and funding," said Amy Lientz, a spokeswoman for CWI, the company contracted to remove nuclear waste from the INL site. "And he knows our issues intimately." Lientz worries Craig's departure could mean fewer dollars for nuclear waste removal, but she doesn't expect the project to halt completely. Other politicians will champion the cleanup, she said, though it's unlikely those lawmakers will wield as much influence as Craig did, particularly in appropriations committees. INL management met Wednesday to discuss how a Craig resignation could affect funding for the cleanup project, but INL spokesman John Walsh said it's too early to speculate and declined comment. Also up in the air is how a Craig resignation could affect agriculture. Craig has a strong pro-ag voting record that some say was to the detriment of the environment. He resisted legislation that would have categorized dairy manure as toxic waste. But he fought hard for immigration reform that Magic Valley farmers say would have bettered the regional economy, said Rick Naerebout of the Idaho Dairymen's Association. "He was a senior leader," said Chris Galen, a spokesman for the National Milk Producers Federation. "Now someone else will have to step up to the plate." Craig, it seems, still hopes someone else won't have to. He's hired an attorney and hinted he might not resign. "He still feels there's a–lot he can do for Idaho if he can stay in the Senate," said Craig spokesman Sid Smith. "It's very clear that–if–he does step aside, any replacement is–not going to have the kind of committee assignments that he has. If he (can't) clear his name and have ranking status … that's an even bigger loss for Idaho." Matt Christensen may be reached at 735-3243 and at matt.christensen@lee.net Copyright © 2006, Lee Publications Inc. Magicvalley.com is an on-line division of The Times-News, published daily at 132 W. Fairfield St., Twin Falls, Idaho 83301 by Lee Publications, Inc., a subsidiary of Lee Enterprises. ***************************************************************** 6 The Hindu Nuke issue: Parliament adjourns repeatedly Thursday, September 6, 2007 : 1325 Hrs New Delhi, Sept. 6 (PTI): Uproar over the Indo-US nuclear deal stalled both Houses of Parliament today as determined NDA and Third Front members insisted on their demand for a Joint Parliamentary Committee to go into the agreement. The Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha were adjourned for an hour minutes after they assembled for the day and the scene was no different when the Houses met at noon, leading to their adjournment till 1400 hours. In both the Houses, opposition members were in no mood to listen to chair's repeated pleas to allow the Question Hour. They rushed into the well chanting slogans "we want JPC" and "JPC lao, desh bachao". Some counter slogans came from treasury benches in the Rajya Sabha where a short debate on the issue was listed for the day. Amid the din, Lok Sabha Speaker Somnath Chatterjee rushed through the business listed for the day while Rajya Sabha Deputy Chairman K Rahman Khan ensured laying of papers. Important bills -- Competition (Amendment) Bill and Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of Advertisement and Regulation of Trade and Commerce, Production, Supply and Distribution) Amendment Bill, 2007 -- were passed without discussion in the Lok Sabha. A Calling Attention Motion on the Panchayati Raj was also disposed of. In the Rajya Sabha, Home Minister Shivraj Patil, who was to reply to a Short Duration Discussion on the flood situation in the country, was not allowed to do so. But, Khan said the discussion and the reply were over. Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the ***************************************************************** 7 tvnz.co.nz: Nuclear power debate reignited Sep 6, 2007 7:18 PM Opposition to nuclear power is something many New Zealanders see as a defining characteristic of the nation. But the growing demand for electricity and concern over global warming is reigniting the debate. Nuclear weapons always grab the headlines but opposition to nuclear power has also been strong, both politically and socially. Anti-nuclear activist Maire Leadbeater says New Zealanders are very educated about the close link between nuclear power production and nuclear weapons production. "Byproducts of a nuclear power station can always be used to make nuclear weapons," she says. Arguments against nuclear power have ranged from the ideological, to lack of need, to fear - especially after a Three Mile Island accident in the United States in 1979 and the Chernobyl disaster seven years later in the Soviet Union. "We have no technological or economic infrastructure to deal with nuclear power and there's no solution for the nuclear waste that would be produced," says Bunny McDiarmid from Greenpeace. But although nuclear weapons may never be accepted, the possibility of nuclear power has been bubbling away. In 1991 then Environment Minister Rob Storey was ridiculed by Labour leader Mike Moore for suggesting it but the idea refuses to die. Ron Smith from the University of Waikato says New Zealand should "give up our attachment to anti-nuclearism as a kind of religion". Europe, the United States, and increasingly China are all reliant on nuclear power and now Australia is seriously considering it. "The things we are relying on from here on are not really going to be major sources of power 30 years from now, and so we're really going to need to be a bit more sensible," Smith says. In a recent American study, 70% of people said they would have no objection to a new nuclear power plant beng built within 16 kilometres of their homes. But to find similar attitudes in New Zealand would require dramatic social change and even if there was that change, it would be at least 20 years before a nuclear reactor could start producing electricity locally. Source: ONE News ***************************************************************** 8 AU ABC: Howard focuses on nuclear, climate issues at APEC - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) By Matt Peacock for the 7.30 Report Posted September 6, 2007 19:39:00 Mr Bush and Mr Howard prefer 'aspirational targets' and they appear keener to suggest nuclear power as the solution. (AAP: John Grainger News Limited/Pool) Prime Minister John Howard clearly believes there is still domestic value in his close relationship with US President George W Bush, with lots of picture opportunities on the first day of pre-APEC functions, plus two hours of official talks yesterday. There were two announcements; the first an unsurprising new defence treaty. The second announcement was a little harder to read, politically at least. The two leaders stood side by side in their enthusiasm for nuclear power as an answer to the problems of climate change while also talking up an emission-free clean coal prototype power plant. Australia also received a gilt-edged invitation to join an exclusive nuclear club proposed by America, that would enrich uranium and lease it to client countries for civil nuclear energy and then take the waste back. The club is some way from becoming reality, but it poses some ticklish questions for Australia. Australia has placed global warming top of the list for this APEC's agenda, a move that has prompted one Singaporean commentator to object that the 'E' in APEC is for 'economic', not environment. Peter Charlton of the APEC Business Advisory Council says that is cynical. "Economics and the environment are absolutely intertwined, inextricably," he said. He says the region's business leaders have focused on the challenges of climate change, but they need the certainty of emission targets and timetables. "Business can't be expected to invest heavily if the goal posts change weekly, daily, monthly or annually," he said. Nuclear is 'the solution' But Mr Bush and Mr Howard prefer 'aspirational targets' and they appear keener to suggest nuclear power as the solution. "If you believe that greenhouse gases are a priority, like a lot of us, if you take the issue seriously like I do and John [Howard] does, then you should be supportive of nuclear power," Mr Bush said. Mr Howard announced on Wednesday that Australia had agreed on a nuclear energy action plan with the US, one that gives it entry into the Bush administration's Global Nuclear Energy Program, or GNEP, and access to research on the next "generation four" nuclear power plants. "Australia intends to participate in the global nuclear energy partnership and there will be great benefits in terms of access to nuclear technology and non-proliferation," he said. "The United States will support Australian membership in the Generation for International Forum which involves [research and development] to develop safer and better nuclear reactors." GNEP proposes that countries that enrich uranium then lease nuclear fuel to other countries, then take back their waste. Waste management issues That suggests Australia is about to start enriching its own uranium. But not so, says Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, who warns the US is no convinced we should be doing that, and the Minister is even less keen on taking back other countries' waste. "We won't agree to do that, and we've always made that clear, we're not planning and we've never planned and we've never said we would," he said. "We've always said we wouldn't, take nuclear waste back to Australia. The plan is at this stage to convene a meeting in Vienna." Steve Shallhord, chief executive of Greenpeace Australia, says the announcement is in fact a "non-announcement". "It is two countries that have been avoiding their Kyoto responsibilities by refusing to ratify the treaty and instead trying to take us down the nuclear route," he said. "The so-called 'generation four' reactors are at least two decades away, far too long to even be considered as part of the climate change mix, even if that was a legitimate response to climate change." Trusting Russia But Grigory Pasko, a Russian journalist who spent two-and-a-half years in a Siberian jail, is in Sydney to warn Australians about another nuclear deal to be announced on Friday, this time selling Australia's uranium to Russia. "The Russian authorities have already so often deceived both the Russian people and the foreign community as well," he said. "I honestly think its not a good idea to blindly trust them about something so serious." It is believed the uranium would end up at Angarsk, an enrichment plant deep in Siberia's pine forests, where one anti-nuclear activist was recently killed by thugs wielding metal bars. Russia says the uranium will be used for its civilian nuclear program, but Mr Pasko warns that the Putin Government cannot be trusted "Who's going to monitor compliance with this understanding, and whether or not this understanding will be complied with? I don't think anybody would say they can guarantee that," he said. Greens Senator Christine Milne agrees. "The Government is naive in the extreme if it thinks that Australian uranium going to Russia will be purely for civilian nuclear power," she said. "The Russians had on the table before the US a proposal that Russia should become a nuclear fuel service centre for the rest of the world. "They've already proposed an enrichment facility where they'll take uranium, enrich it and pass it on to other regimes. There's nothing to say they won't pass it on to Iran." Mr Downer says debate on the issue is a cover-up. "All of these arguments really, about India about Russia are just a cover for the basic argument these people are making which is we don't want to export uranium. If you don't want to export uranium people should say so, that's their position," he said. Mr Bush and Mr Howard will be joined by President Putin on Friday when the Russian nuclear deal is expected to be finalised. Tags: industry, environment, world-politics, agreements-and-treaties, nuclear-energy, uranium-mining, apec-2007, australia, russian-federation, united-states ***************************************************************** 9 Indiatimes| N-war rages as Left takes on Sibal Updated: 7 Sep, 2007, 0306 hrs IST | Powered by Indiatimes NEW DELHI: Barely hours after the Congress’ attempts to de-emphasise the importance of the UPA-Left nuclear panel, it’s now the Left’s turn to hit back with full force. On Thursday, the comrades left no one in doubt that the government would have to abide by the assessment of the committee. The Left leaders, who were reacting to Union science and technology minister Kapil Sibal's assertion that the Centre was not bound by the views of the panel, said such statements did not augur well for the ruling alliance. “Mr Sibal's comments also show that he does not understand coalition politics,” CPI MP Gurudas Dasgupta said. Mr Sibal had held that the government had merely stated that it would take into account the concerns raised by the Left parties. “Taking into account their concerns never means you are bound by it,” he said on Wednesday. The Left leaders’ take is the government could not ignore the concerns raised by them. They also indicated their plans to prolong the discussions for upsetting the government's timeline for the operationalisation of the nuclear deal. The government leadership has been maintaining that the deal will be ready for the ratification by the US Congress only if the government succeeds in clearing the remaining hurdles — working out India-specific safeguards with the IAEA and support of the NSG countries — as quickly as possible. The two negotiations will be as complicated as the 123 Agreement itself. But the Left has made it clear that it will not allow the government to operationalise the agreement in its present form. Addressing a meeting in Andhra Pradesh's Ongole, CPM general secretary Prakash Karat said the operationalisation of the Indo-US nuclear pact was not acceptable to the majority in Parliament. He also asked the BJP to join others to prevent the government from proceeding with the agreement. “The question will boil down to whether Parliament can ratify this agreement. If we take that position, there is no point in asking for a JPC or a vote,” Mr Karat, who was leading a Left rally against the joint naval exercises in the Bay of Bengal involving the US, said. “We can all tell the government not to proceed with the deal. And I don't see why the BJP cannot take that position.” The CPM general secretary took the line that Parliament should discuss the nuclear issue threadbare. “Let the country know whether this government has any support in Parliament on the nuclear deal. That will be the best way to make sure that this deal is not proceeded with. How can a government go against the majority in Parliament?” he wondered. There is a realisation in the Left camp that the nuclear agreement has come in the larger context of a strategic partnership with the US that “pressurises India to shift from its independent foreign policy positions and draw India into strategic and military relationships like the current joint naval exercises”. Copyright © 2007 Times Internet Limited. All rights reserved. For ***************************************************************** 10 TheStar.com: Down with nuclear energy comment - | Today's Toronto Star | Star P.M. Sep 06, 2007 04:30 AM Key questions for candidates The key issue for the people of Ontario in the coming election is whether or not we want the province to be dominated by nuclear power and its waste for generations to come. This is our chance to put Ontario's environment clearly on the path of clean, renewable wind and solar energy, or to be plagued by generations of nuclear-waste disposal problems, security issues, cost overruns and continued dependence on coal when nuclear reactors are being repaired. Parents like myself do not want to replace one set of environmental problems with another to leave for future generations. Nuclear energy is definitely not the answer. Aggressively promoting energy conservation and investing in renewable energy are much better uses of Ontario taxpayers' money. We are still paying for reactors that are now becoming obsolete, so pouring more money into nuclear reactors is a complete dead end. Dominique Bruce, Toronto © Copyright Toronto Star 1996-2007 | ***************************************************************** 11 CANOE: World: Canada to lead world in fight against climate change, says PM September 7, 2007 By BRUCE CHEADLE Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and his wife Laureen wave upon their arrival for the APEC summit. (CP PHOTO/Tom Hanson) SYDNEY, Australia (CP) - Prime Minister Stephen Harper took another international swipe at Canada's environmental record Friday while promising to become a "world leader in the fight against climate change." Harper referred to the "growing menace of climate change" and called it one of the world's most important challenges in a speech to a business gathering at the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation forum. His speech came amidst reports that the 21 APEC economies have failed to endorse any language regarding emission targets for the final summit communique, which remains under wraps. Australian Prime Minister John Howard, the summit host, had hoped to have unbinding "aspirational" targets included in the communique, and had at one point earlier this year dubbed the 15th APEC leaders' meeting "one of the most important international gatherings of leaders to discuss climate change since the 1992 Rio Conference" Harper, a former skeptic on the science of climate change, balked while in Opposition at the former Liberal government's agreement to strict greenhouse gas emission targets under the 1997 Kyoto protocol - which itself was an outcrop of Rio. Canada never came close to meeting those targets, and in fact saw emissions rise significantly from 1990 levels. Now that he leads Canada's government, Harper told about 200 invited business leaders at the Sydney Opera House that Canada was among many countries who only paid "lip service" to climate change. "For at least a decade most governments, including Canada's government, paid what can charitably be called lip service to the issue of climate change," Harper said in a draft copy of remarks. "Because they were unwilling to tell the public that reducing carbon emissions must entail real economic costs in the short term, governments responded to the problem with little more than rhetoric." The main leaders' summit in Sydney gets underway Saturday and wraps up Sunday - although a series of high-level bilateral meetings between the major APEC players has been underway here for the past 48 hours. Harper was to hold bilateral meetings later Friday with New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark and Peruvian President Alan Garcia. Peru will host next year's APEC summit in Lima. It was not clear whether Harper had sought bilateral meetings with the leaders of China, Japan and Russia, but none had been announced by Friday morning. Harper, in his speech to the business group, said "one of the top priorities of our new government has been to restore Canada's stature and influence on the world stage." The prime minister has been consistently panning the previous Liberal government's record on climate change in speeches to international forums for the past year. In a speech in Berlin in June, Harper likened Canada's 2006 change in government to the fall of the Berlin wall. After acknowledging the nearby historic Brandenburg gate, Harper told a G8 gathering that, "Like Germany, we in Canada are also renewing - both at home and abroad - through new leadership." On Friday in Sydney, Harper said Canada would reduce its emissions by 20 per cent by 2020, relative to 2006 emission levels. That's a far cry from Canada's unmet targets under the Kyoto protocol, which called for six per cent reductions from 1990 levels by 2012. But Harper said Canada wants international reduction strategies that are "comprehensive, practical and realistic." "Obviously, to make this plan operational and economically successful we need industry onside," he said. "We recognize it will take time for Canadian companies to adjust to the new regulations. And so we're making compliance mechanisms as flexible as possible." ***************************************************************** 12 BBC NEWS: Nuclear towers to be demolished Last Updated: Thursday, 6 September 2007, 09:01 GMT 10:01 UK The cooling towers will soon disappear Giant cooling towers at the Sellafield nuclear plant in Cumbria are due to be demolished later this month. Test blasts on four towers, originally part of the Calder Hall facility, took place last month. Officials say they were a success and have named 29 September as a date for the total demolition of the 290ft (88m) high structures. The project is part of the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority's (NDA) plan to dismantle ageing facilities throughout the UK. Cooling ponds Jill Marsden, one of the project co-ordinators, said: "Weather will play a part in this. We do not want to see lightning or hurricane-force winds. "The explosions should see the towers fall straight down into their own footprint, with debris only spreading about 15 or 20 metres. "We do not have nuclear facilities in that area so they should just come straight down to the ground." After the final demolition, debris from the towers will be recovered, processed and used to fill in the voids of the cooling ponds beneath the towers, making the site available for reuse in the future. Calder Hall was the world's first nuclear reactor and opened by the Queen in 1956. It ceased operating in 2003 after almost 50 years in service. * BBC Copyright Notice ***************************************************************** 13 Platts: French nuclear vendor Areva says UK nuclear relaunch 'essential' London (Platts)--6Sep2007 French nuclear vendor Areva NP says that the revival of a nuclear power program in the UK is "absolutely essential." CEO Luc Oursel, speaking at a conference in London Thursday, said that the UK would be the first in Europe to relaunch on a large scale a nuclear power effort. Therefore, he said, it has to be successful. Success in the UK could lead other European countries planning to exit nuclear power to reconsider their plans. Also significant is that the UK is one of the most competitive markets in Europe, so a successful relaunch here would demonstrate that nuclear power is competitive with other energy sources. Copyright © 2007 - Platts, All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 14 The Hindu: BJP says it will force govt. to set up JPC on nuke deal Thursday, September 6, 2007 : 1850 Hrs New Delhi, Sept. 6 (PTI): The BJP, which stalled Parliament over its demands for setting up of a Joint Parliamentary Committee on the Indo-US nuclear deal, today claimed it would be able to get the panel constituted. "We will get it done," senior party leader Sushma Swaraj told reporters as she recalled that joint parliamentary committees were finally set up on the Bofors deal and the security scam after initial refusal by then government. NDA leaders, she said, would meet tomorrow again to chalk out their strategy after their high-pitched demands in both the Houses today for a JPC on the 123 agreement. Senior BJP leader L K Advani met NDA MPs earlier in the day after his party decided to press demands for a JPC and voting in parliament on the nuclear accord. "Nothing is categorical in Parliament. It's a war of nerves," Swaraj remarked when reminded about the government's rejection of the NDA's call. "We do not consider (the government's response) to be categorical." Swaraj said the BJP has asked the government to spell out what objections it could have in setting up a JPC on the nuclear accord. Copyright © 2007, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the ***************************************************************** 15 The Guardian: `New nuclear row as green groups pull out * Sep 7 2007: Today's paper Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and WWF describe consultation as sham * John Vidal, environment editor Britain's leading environmental groups are poised to formally withdraw from a government consultation today that will determine whether ministers will be able to push ahead with plans to build a new generation of nuclear power stations. The coalition which was asked to provide evidence to inform the debate believes the government has failed to fairly reflect the arguments for presentations that will be given to more than 1,100 members of the public that are due to start tomorrow. The process was forced upon the government by the high court, which ruled in February that a previous consultation was "seriously flawed" and "manifestly inadequate and unfair". At least six groups, including Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, WWF and Green Alliance, claim the government is distorting the evidence and say they are considering whether to take the case to court again. The accusations are damaging because the government is bound by its own guidelines to keep an open mind on new nuclear power stations until after the "fullest public consultation". If the government is forced into a third consultation it could delay major energy decisions being made for at least a year. Eight meetings are to be held tomorrow in cities around the UK to present all sides of the nuclear debate. More than 1,100 people will be asked to assess the case for and against nuclear power; they will then be asked to vote. The process is being run by Opinion Leader Research (OLR), a market research organisation contracted by the government to convene the meetings. Concern about the direction of the consultation has been growing within the environmental groups, which were invited by ministers to provide their own arguments. They have now drawn up a document which details their anxiety. Some of their concerns may be outlined to ministers today. The document accuses the government of "conducting a public relations stitch-up designed to deliver a preordained policy on new nuclear power" and "rushing" a consultation process that its advisers say should take at least nine months. "The new consultation is no different from the government's previous attempt at a nuclear consultation," it says. "It skirts over the many negative aspects of nuclear power, such as its enormous cost, what to do with all the radioactive waste new build will create, and how little nuclear power will do to help cut carbon emissions and guarantee energy security." The document continues: "It has become clear that the government has already made up its mind ... and that this new consultation is nothing more than an expensive sham. " Ben Ayliffe, a spokesman for the groups, said: "We have given the government every chance to make the information they give to the public impartial, but they have chosen to ignore it. It has not wanted an open debate. We would rather not go to court, but it is an option that we are considering." The groups also cite Gordon Brown, who told parliament at prime minister's question time that a decision to continue with nuclear power had been taken "and that is why the security of our energy supply is best safeguarded by building a new generation of nuclear power stations". The prime minister qualified his remarks a week later after a warning letter from Greenpeace's lawyers. "Brown's original statement prejudged the whole consultation and totally undermined the pretence that the government has an open mind on the future of nuclear [power] in the UK," says the document. "Greenpeace, with other NGOs, trade unions, renewable energy companies and representatives of the nuclear industry met with OLR and the government in July to discuss this stakeholder briefing pack. This document was full of pro-nuclear opinion masquerading as fact ... This document is fundamentally flawed and cannot form the basis for a full public consultation." Last night, John Hutton, the secretary of state for business, enterprise and regulatory reform, said: "The government's preliminary view is that nuclear should play a part in providing our homes and businesses with the low-carbon energy we need to make sure the lights stay on and to protect the health of our planet. We want to know whether the public and other organisations share this view. I would be extremely disappointed if Greenpeace and others decide not to participate in this full consultation they called for." A spokesman for OLR said the information to be presented to the public was based on the government's own consultation document. "We have included some of the views of other organisations, including environment groups, energy companies and renewable organisations. The government has decided what information is given to people. There is a good range of views," said a spokeswoman. "The information people get is not structured in a 'for or against nuclear' way. They get the background information about energy policy and then find out more about nuclear energy. The document talks about risks and how waste and safety is managed. Some of the information is from Greenpeace and environment groups," she said. The government has made no secret that it believes nuclear power is needed to avoid future energy shortages. Tony Blair was a champion of the industry. The official line is that the nuclear option in the energy mix must be kept open. ***************************************************************** 16 Times Argus: Nuclear industry should be honest September 5, 2007 With the disparity between future energy supply and demand in this nation, nuclear power represents a vital segue to a long-term energy solution. Uranium supplies are finite and will become increasingly expensive and contested as they dwindle, but for now our other options are not sufficient to remove nuclear power from the energy equation. Recent developments at Vermont Yankee and other aging reactors around the nation may force us to prematurely shut down existing reactors and will likely, in a fashion similar to Three Mile Island, effectively halt the research and development of new, modern facilities. There is little that would stop the newly resurgent nuclear industry faster than a failure of an existing facility. As such, it is very much in all of our best interest for the nuclear industry to stop glossing over issues and to shut down sites that pose a significant risk to the present and future of our nation and the nuclear industry. To do otherwise is classic penny wise and pound foolish and will ultimately lead to the premature demise of America's nuclear power industry, resulting in a large negative economic impact. We should be looking across the Atlantic Ocean for answers where many European nations are using smaller, efficient nuclear sites while developing clean, renewable sources for the inevitable post nuclear era. The NRC and Entergy's current "pay no attention to that man behind the curtain" approach does nothing but insult the intelligence of New Englanders and remove any semblance of credibility from both entities. Anders Holm Middlebury ***************************************************************** 17 APP.COM: Turn against coal leaves nuclear as power option | Asbury Park Press Online Thursday, September 6, 2007 BY JAMES MCGOVERN Post Comment In the past few months, this country has witnessed something previously unknown: political leaders are turning against coal. Despite political differences between them, a number of prominent Democrats and Republicans now oppose the construction of new coal-burning power plants. For decades, U.S. utilities needing to add power turned to coal. Cheap and reliable, coal power supplies roughly half of the nation's electricity. Even in New Jersey, where we rely mostly on nuclear energy and gas-fired plants for our electricity, we still get 16 percent of our power from coal plants, as does New York state. But in Pennsylvania, coal supplies 57 percent of the electric power, and in Ohio almost 90 percent. Among sources of electricity, coal is by far the worst environmental offender. Coal plants account for most of the carbon dioxide emitted in the United States, about 30 percent of the total. A single large plant spews about 60 million pounds of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each day, along with many noxious chemicals and soot that pose a danger, especially to people with asthma and lung diseases. As recently as May, U.S. utilities had plans to build as many as 160 new power plants that use coal, which would have increased carbon dioxide emissions by 10 percent. But as plans for the new plants have moved forward, an increasing number have been canceled for environmental reasons. There's no easy way to capture carbon emissions. The emissions could be pumped deep underground into salt caverns or abandoned oil fields, sealed away from the atmosphere. Some pilot tests of carbon sequestration are under way in Europe, and tests are planned in this country. But U.S. energy officials say it will be 20 years at least before it is known if the process is safe or economical. Meanwhile, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that the Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide as a pollutant. Congress is considering measures to tax carbon emissions from power plants. Old-timers in the coal industry may scoff at environmentally minded people who oppose coal power. But public concern about global warming gases from coal plants is growing, especially in Florida. Its low landscape makes it particularly vulnerable to rising sea levels and dangerous storms that might result from warmer air and oceans. Florida Republican Gov. Charlie Christ believes coal does not have much of a future in his state. "We're moving in a different direction," he said recently. In California, where Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is determined to reduce carbon emissions, state regulators have effectively banned the use of coal-generated power. In Nevada, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is opposing the construction of three coal plants, warning they would pollute national parks in Nevada and Utah and emit large quantities of carbon dioxide. In Texas, one of the biggest utilities came under heavy fire earlier this year from Republicans and Democrats for its intention to build 11 coal plants. None of the plants would use carbon dioxide-capturing equipment. Then the company backed off and announced it had shelved plans for eight of the plants. Whether it will be able to get permits to build the remaining three units is questionable. Public utility commissioners in a number of states have warned companies to avoid investing in coal plants. It seems implausible that so little attention has been given to the need for replacement power. The Energy Information Administration has said that, even with aggressive improvements in energy efficiency, demand for electricity will grow 50 percent by 2030. There is only one source that can provide large amounts of "base-load" electricity for our nation's growing economy and population without emitting carbon dioxide or polluting the air — nuclear energy. Nuclear technology has become a lot safer and more affordable over the years. Nuclear plants now generate electricity 90 percent of the time, compared to 60 percent in the early 1980s, eliminating the need for costly outages. Coal plants generate power about 70 percent of the time. Solar and wind energy, along with other renewables, can provide power during times when the sun shines and the wind blows. But nuclear power is the only option for supplying large quantities of uninterrupted clean power. The 104 U.S. nuclear plants produce nearly 75 percent of the electricity that comes from emission-free sources. The question really is not whether more nuclear plants will be built but rather how many and when. To maintain nuclear energy's 20 percent share of the nation's electricity generation in 2030, we will need to build another 60 nuclear plants. But if we hope to stabilize and eventually reduce carbon emissions, additional units would be needed. Turning the growing opposition to coal into an alliance that works to achieve support for nuclear power would demonstrate that our nation is serious about combating global warming and protecting public health. James McGovern, Ocean Township, has been an energy consultant to government and industry. Copyright © 2007 Asbury Park Press. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 18 Burlington Free Press burlingtonfreepress.com | Burlington, Vermont Thursday, September 6, 2007 Editorial: Vermont Yankee adds to reasons for concern Published: Thursday, September 6, 2007 Recent problems at Vermont Yankee stress the need for elected leaders and other policy makers to begin thinking about an energy future without the state's lone nuclear power plant. That's what the state might have to deal with if owner Entergy along with state and federal regulators fail to restore public confidence in the plant's safety. Where Vermont will get its electricity and how much Vermonters will pay for it is a critical question because the state's economy needs reliable and affordable power to thrive. But when it comes to nuclear power, safety must be the priority. That means making sure the plant is safe and convincing the public of that fact. The second will likely prove to be the more difficult of the two tasks. Vermont Yankee went back online Tuesday at 50 percent of capacity after a stuck steam valve caused an automatic shutdown on Aug. 30. The Brattleboro Reformer reported that the valve, which sends steam from the turbine to the electric generator, lacked grease. The plant had been running at about two-third full power since Aug. 21 when a portion of a cooling tower collapsed. The tower is used to bring down the temperature of the water used to cool the plant before returning it to the Connecticut River. Vermont Yankee supplies about a third of the state's power needs at a fixed price, which has turned out to be cheaper than what utilities would pay on the open market. That deal is one of the reason that Vermont utilities can boast some of the lowest electricity rates in New England. When Vermont Yankee power isn't available, state utilities must buy electricity from the regional grid at higher prices, a difference that's likely to eventually find its way into electricity bills. That power deal lasts through 2012 when Vermont Yankee's operating license expires at the end of the plant's originally intended life span. Entergy is seeking to extend that license by 20 years, a process in which the legislators who must heed the voice of concerned Vermonter will have a voice along with federal regulators. Despite vocal opposition -- amplified by the two incidents last month -- there is wide agreement that the state has no immediate alternatives to Vermont Yankee to meet its power needs at a comparable cost. But two high-profile incidents in less than two weeks bodes ill for gaining the public's confidence in Vermont Yankee. Entergy and the regulators must make sure that the public receives detailed information about what happened and how it won't happen again. Delivering that information quickly -- not months from now -- and in a form that ordinary Vermonters can easily access and digest are necessary steps for those watching over the safety of Vermont Yankee to regain their credibility. ***************************************************************** 19 IHT: Finnish plant demonstrates nuclear power industry's perennial problems - International Herald Tribune By Alan Katz Bloomberg News Published: September 6, 2007 OLKILUOTO ISLAND, Finland: Martin Landtman hunched forward in his shirtsleeves as a June storm on Finland's Baltic coast drenched the construction site of the world's most powerful nuclear reactor. As project manager for TVO, the joint venture buying the plant, Landtman has weathered far worse annoyances than rain. Flawed welds for the reactor's steel liner, unusable coolant pipes and suspect concrete in the foundation already have pushed back the delivery date of the Olkiluoto-3 unit by at least two years. "Substantial delays, I think you can use that word, yes," Landtman said. Olkiluoto-3, the first nuclear plant ordered in Western Europe since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, is also more than 25 percent over its budget of €3 billion, or $4.1 billion. The Finnish plant is not the only nuclear project to run into delays. The commercial startup in May of China's Tianwan project came more than two years later than planned. In Taiwan, the Lungmen reactor project has fallen five years behind schedule. Today at Olkiluoto-3, a behemoth whose excavation site covers the equivalent of 55 soccer fields, the pressure is on the group led by Areva of France that is building the reactor. At stake is much more than Areva's bottom line or the cost of electricity crackling out from the Finnish coast. As the ownership of utilities around the world has shifted from state to private hands, the delivery of new reactors on time and on budget has become critical. Keeping construction costs in check is a vital ingredient in nuclear power's drive for economic parity with coal and natural gas generation. A new U.S. atomic plant could be 30 percent to 50 percent more expensive to build than a coal-fired plant of the same size, and the margin widens for natural gas, which is the least-expensive option. Nuclear power's costs balloon partly because plants must be built to more exacting safety standards and stand up to more stringent oversight, leading to lost time and extra expense, said Timo Kallio, an executive for TVO. TVO's owners include the country's biggest utility, state-controlled Fortum, as well as the paper makers Stora Enso and UPM-Kymmene. Proponents of nuclear power argue that the higher cost to build is balanced by lower fuel costs. Still, after accounting for costs from construction and fuel to maintenance, electricity from a new U.S. nuclear plant in 2015 would be 15 percent more expensive over the reactor's life than natural gas and 13 percent more than coal, according to 2007 estimates by the U.S. Energy Information Administration. "The nuclear industry has put forward very optimistic construction cost estimates, but there is no experience that comes even close to backing them up," said Paul Joskow, director of the Center for Energy and Environmental Policy Research at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Some investors already are treading cautiously, even amid rising demand for electricity. "You have to go in with your eyes wide open," said Robin Kendall, director of project finance at Société Générale in Paris, which is among the banks that lent €1.95 billion to TVO for the Finland reactor. The bank is looking into providing loans for other nuclear projects in Europe and Asia. After a 23-year career in shipyards, Landtman started overseeing the Olkiluoto-3 European pressurized water reactor, or EPR, in 2003. The first big jolt came in October 2005, during the installation of the reactor's base slab. It was supposed to take five days to pour 12,000 cubic meters, or 424,000 cubic feet, of concrete. "An hour after it started, our supervisors saw that something was wrong," Landtman said. "It was first too lumpy, then it was fine. It wasn't consistent." Autumn rain had soaked the crushed stone aggregate used to make the concrete. The pour had been intended for sunny May, Kallio said. Instead, the sacks sat unprotected while Areva worked to complete detailed base designs and get them approved. The delay meant that the water content in the mixed concrete exceeded levels allowed by Finnish nuclear regulators. Areva then had to test concrete already poured to make sure it met requirements. No more was poured in the nuclear section of the plant until April 2006, Kallio said. "Local contractors did not have the breadth of operations expected or needed to carry out such a big project," said Ray Ganthner, senior vice president for new plant deployment at the U.S. headquarters of Areva NP, the company's reactor construction unit. Landtman learned the same lesson. Still, he said, there is nothing to do but push on: "Now, we are trying to complete this as fast as possible." It comes down to a series of seemingly mundane tasks, from pouring concrete to using a broom handle to scrape metal shavings from a coolant tube. Without perfect execution, components will fail regulators' inspections. Areva executives said delays were to be expected for such a huge project, especially when it was the first of a kind. The company plans to have 35 of its latest reactors operating around the world in 2020. "When you build the first in a series, there is inevitably a certain number of costs that you discover, and when you have delays, your people stay in place, so your costs go up," says Luc Oursel, chief executive of Areva NP. Areva's investment certificates - nonvoting shares that represent about 4 percent of capital - are up 28 percent this year at ?720.12 and have nearly quadrupled over the past four years. The French government and state-controlled entities own 93 percent of Areva. Landtman's office is down the road from two boiling-water reactors built at Olkiluoto in the 1970s. A digital display showed their output at 844 and 852 megawatts. At 1,600 megawatts, Olkiluoto-3 will be almost twice as large. The construction snags have not shaken the Finn's belief in nuclear power. "We need this single power plant in Finland to meet Kyoto requirements," Landtman said, referring to the international treaty that limits greenhouse gas emissions. "One plant cuts the equivalent emissions of all the transport in Finland. If someone says this is minor, then I don't understand what they are talking about. To cope without nuclear? We don't think we can make it in this country." Copyright © 2007 the International Herald Tribune All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 20 Brattleboro Reformer: Vernon mulls possibility of VY-less future for town BRATTLEBORO, VT By PAUL H. HEINTZ, Reformer Staff Thursday, September 6 VERNON -- Selectboard chairwoman Annette Roydon sounded alarm bells at Tuesday's meeting, saying the town needs to prepare for the possibility that Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant may close in 2012. In a presentation to fellow board members, Roydon said she hoped this year's budgeting process would include difficult conversations about the town's crumbling infrastructure, its growing school budget and the potential loss of an enormous portion of its tax base. The budgeting process "hasn't been easy in the past, and I have it be less easy now," Roydon told the board. "We're going to be turning down things that may not be frivolous to the people who are asking for them. But in the macro picture, I don't see how we can afford anything until there's some decision made on VY." On the one hand, Roydon argued, years of penny-pinching has led to a situation in which some town facilities are in need of expensive improvements. She said the board should consider hiring a building inspector to find out which town buildings need work, and then get that work done. "For a long time it was hurry up and wait and nothing got done. Now there are things that are screaming for attention," she said, citing a recent $30,000 appropriation to replace moldy town office windows -- an expenditure that was approved at a special town meeting in July. On the other hand, Roydon said, the town should also be discussing reining in spending as much as possible. That is particularly true with the school budget, she said. "I've been involved for three years in cutting corners and saving money. But our town taxes compared to our school taxes are a drop in the bucket," she said. Citing Brattleboro Union High School's ever-growing budget, Roydon advocated for Vernon residents to become more involved and make their voices heard. "It's time to get militant," she said. According to town treasurer Sally Brassor, Entergy Nuclear, which owns Vermont Yankee, pays the town $1.3 million in property taxes each year, which accounts for 68 percent of the town's budget. Those numbers do not include what Entergy pays to the state to offset Vernon's school budget costs. According to Brassor, residents' tax bills would likely quadruple if Vermont Yankee were to close its doors. Roydon told the board that recent problems at Yankee have called into question whether the plant will be relicensed in 2012 for another 20 years of operation. "For the record, I'm not an anti-nuker. I never have been and I never will be," she said. "But is it a lock that Entergy is going to be relicensed right now? I don't think it's a lock." "I'm not dissing nuclear power. I'm not dissing Entergy. I'm just saying it's a possibility (that Yankee will not be relicensed). Is it a probability? Probably not. But it's a possibility, and we cannot just breathe a sigh of relief if they're relicensed and start spending a lot of money like they did in the '60s and '70s," she said. The board did not discuss or debate Roydon's comments at the Tuesday meeting. But two fellow board members said Wednesday they agreed with some of her comments and see them as a good starting point for budget discussions. "It was interesting. She was speaking truthfully," said board member David Andrews. "I think October, November, as we're getting into budget season, is going to be very interesting." The purchase of a $37,000 Fire Department rescue truck and recent discussions about buying a new town van for seniors are two examples of places where the town may have to think about saying no, Andrews said. "I think she was setting the groundwork in terms of making it known that the idea of 'spend and spend and spend' doesn't cut it," he said. "I think there's going to be some very interesting discussions and debates and back and forth going on between the different departments, the taxpayers and the board." Andrews, who is a Vermont Yankee employee, said he agrees that many people in the area see the power plant's relicensing as less likely since problems with its cooling towers came to light. But he does not think that changes the equation for the Selectboard, because sooner or later the town will have to learn how to live without Yankee -- be it in five years or 20 years. "I don't think that's significantly changed as of the last few weeks," he said. Board member Jim Polhemus said that while he believes Yankee will be relicensed, the uncertainty of the situation makes it tough to plan for the future. "As the Selectboard, we're in charge of putting together the budget, and the outlook as we look forward of what the town is facing is a little difficult. If we knew for a fact that we weren't getting the license renewal in five years, then I think we would look at things very, very differently," Polhemus said. Paul Heintz can be reached at pheintz@reformer.com or 802-254-2311, ext. 275. ***************************************************************** 21 Economist.com: Energy | Nuclear power's new age Thursday September 6th 2007 Sep 6th 2007 A nuclear revival is welcome so long as the industry does not repeat its old mistakes IN MARCH 1986 this newspaper celebrated “The Charm of Nuclear Power” on its cover. The timing wasn't great. The following month, an accident at a reactor at Chernobyl in Ukraine spread radioactivity over Europe and despair in the Western world's nuclear industry. Some countries never lost their enthusiasm for nuclear power. It provides three-quarters of French electricity. Developing countries have continued to build nuclear plants apace. But elsewhere in the West, Chernobyl, along with the accident at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania in 1979, sent the industry into a decline. The public got scared. The regulatory environment tightened, raising costs. Billions were spent bailing out lossmaking nuclear-power companies. The industry became a byword for mendacity, secrecy and profligacy with taxpayers' money. For two decades neither governments nor bankers wanted to touch it. Now nuclear power has a second chance. Its revival is most visible in America (see article), where power companies are preparing to flood the Nuclear Regulatory Commission with applications to build new plants. But the tide seems to be turning in other countries, too. Finland is building a reactor. The British government is preparing the way for new planning regulations. In Australia, which has plenty of uranium but no reactors, the prime minister, John Howard, says nuclear power is “inevitable”. Managed properly, a nuclear revival could be a good thing. But the industry and the governments keen to promote it look like repeating some of the mistakes that gave it a bad name in the first place. It's going nuclear's way Geopolitics, technology (see article), economics and the environment are all changing in nuclear power's favour. Western governments are concerned that most of the world's oil and gas is in the hands of hostile or shaky governments. Much of the nuclear industry's raw material, uranium, by contrast, is conveniently located in friendly places such as Australia and Canada. Simpler designs cut maintenance and repair costs. Shut-downs are now far less frequent, so that a typical station in America is now online 90% of the time, up from less than 50% in the 1970s. New “passive safety” features can shut a reactor down in an emergency without the need for human intervention. Handling waste may get easier. America plans to embrace a new approach in which the most radioactive portion of the waste from conventional nuclear power stations is isolated and burned in “fast” reactors. Technology has thus improved nuclear's economics. So has the squeeze on fossil fuels. Nuclear power stations are hugely expensive to build but very cheap to run. Gas-fired power stations—the bulk of new build in the 1980s and 1990s—are the reverse. Since gas provides the extra power needed when demand rises, the gas price sets the electricity price. Costly gas has therefore made existing nuclear plants tremendously profitable. The latest boost to nuclear has come from climate change. Nuclear power offers the possibility of large quantities of baseload electricity that is cleaner than coal, more secure than gas and more reliable than wind. And if cars switch from oil to electricity, the demand for power generated from carbon-free sources will increase still further. The industry's image is thus turning from black to green. Nuclear power's moral makeover has divided its enemies. Some environmentalists retain their antipathy to it, but green gurus such as James Lovelock, Stewart Brand and Patrick Moore have changed their minds and embraced it. Public opinion, confused about how best to save the planet, seems to be coming round. A recent British poll showed 30% of the population against nuclear power, compared with 60% three years ago. An American poll in March this year showed 50% in favour of expanding nuclear power, up from 44% in 2001. Fear of fission Yet the economics of nuclear still look uncertain. That's partly because its green virtues do not show up in its costs, since fossil-fuel power generation does not pay for the environmental damage it does. But it is also because nuclear combines huge fixed costs with political risk. Companies fear that, after they have invested billions in a plant, the political tide will turn once more and bankrupt them. Investors therefore remain nervous. How, then, to get new plants built? America's solution is to lard the industry with money. That is the wrong answer. Nuclear and other clean energy sources do indeed deserve a hand from governments—but through a carbon tax which reflects the benefits of clean energy, not through subsidies to cover political risk. Exposure to public nervousness is a cost of doing business in the nuclear industry, just as exposure to volatile prices is a cost in the gas industry. It may be that fears of nuclear power are overblown: after all, the UN figure of around 4,000 eventual deaths as a result of the Chernobyl accident is lower than the official annual death-rate in Chinese coal mines. Yet there are good reasons for public concern. Nuclear waste is difficult to dispose of. More civil nuclear technology around the world increases the chance of weapons proliferation. Terrorists could attack plants or steal nuclear fuel. Voters will support nuclear power only if they believe that governments and the nuclear industry are doing their best to limit those risks, and that such risks are small enough to be worth taking in the interests of cheap, clean energy. One of the reasons why the public turned against nuclear power last time round is that it found itself bailing the industry out. It would be wrong, not just for taxpayers but also for the industry, to set up another lot of cosy deals with governments. The nuclear industry needs to persuade people that it is clean, cheap and safe enough to rely on without a government crutch. If it can't, it doesn't deserve a second chance. ***************************************************************** 22 Economist.com: Nuclear power | Atomic renaissance | Sep 6th 2007 America's nuclear industry is about to embark on its biggest expansion in more than a generation. This will influence energy policy in the rest of the world Illustration by Dettmer Otto OVER the next few months America's Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) expects to receive 12 applications to build new nuclear-power reactors at seven different sites. It is preparing to see plans for another 15 at 11 more locations next year. These will be the first full applications to build new nuclear plants in America for 30 years. If they are all successful, the number of reactors in the country will increase by roughly a third. The output of nuclear electricity would grow even more sharply—the new reactors would be more powerful than older ones. The new enthusiasm for building reactors means America's long-awaited “nuclear renaissance” is about to become reality. Whether it is a leap forwards or a step backwards remains to be seen. Since the 1970s, far from being “too cheap to meter”—as it proponents once blithely claimed—nuclear power has proved too expensive to matter. The problem is finance: nuclear plants cost a lot to build but are relatively cheap to run, unlike gas-fired ones, for which the reverse is true. So to be profitable they must be built quickly, to minimise the period when no revenue is coming in and interest payments are piling up on construction loans. Yet America's previous generation of nuclear plants was plagued by safety scares, design revisions and time-consuming regulatory procedures, which resulted in ruinously protracted construction. America's most recent nuclear plant, at Watts Bar in Tennessee, started operations in 1996. But it took 23 years to complete at a cost of $6.9 billion; a second reactor at the site has been under construction, on and off, since 1973. Another plant, at Shoreham in New York, was completed and tested, but never allowed to start commercial operations because of local opposition. By the time it was decommissioned, in 1994—21 years after construction had begun—the costs had exploded from $70m to $6 billion. The local utility was able to pass most of this bill on to its customers. Not all energy firms have been so lucky: in 1988 Public Service Company of New Hampshire became the first American utility to go bust since the Depression, thanks largely to the fallout from a much-delayed nuclear project. Even when they were switched on, nuclear-power stations did not fulfil their promise. They were supposed to run almost constantly, but proved much less reliable. In the early 1970s, for example, the average nuclear plant produced power for under half the time. Since most utilities had planned to run them flat out to generate enough revenue to repay their debts, this poor performance led to further financial troubles. And, as anti-nuclear activists complain, all this happened despite the government's generous subsidies to help cover the costs of developing new designs and building prototypes. As for safety... What is worse, nuclear power has a spotty safety record. There have never been any catastrophic releases of radiation in Western countries. But one did occur in 1986 at Chernobyl, in what was then the Soviet Union and is now Ukraine. America came perilously close to such a disaster in 1979, when a reactor at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania overheated and began to melt down. There have been lesser safety scares and scandals in many countries, including Britain, Germany and Sweden. In August an earthquake resulted in several small leaks of radioactive material from a nuclear reactor in Japan. The next generation of nuclear plants is said to be very different. Firms which make them, such as America's General Electric and Westinghouse, and foreign manufacturers like France's AREVA, insist that such episodes will soon be a thing of the past. Their latest designs, they maintain, are simpler and safer than existing nuclear plants. That should make it easier to obtain operating permits, allow them to be built faster and be cheaper to run—and so much less risky financially. Meanwhile, contractors are said to be getting better at building them, the NRC better at regulating them and utilities better at running them. Although nuclear power's boosters welcome a smorgasbord of new subsidies that Congress has approved to nourish the industry, they say that in the long run even this will not be necessary because the industry will be able to move forward under its own nuclear-generated steam. Consolidating reactors America's utilities have certainly warmed to their existing nuclear-power plants now that they are running them more efficiently. In the 1970s, says Colette Lewiner, of Capgemini, a consultancy, even small municipally owned firms ordered nuclear reactors, imagining they would be no more complicated to operate than their existing power stations, except in so far as workers would need uranium to shovel into the furnace instead of coal. But they found that they had neither the expertise to maintain their new investments, nor the scale to absorb all the extra regulatory costs, nor the clout to secure fuel and parts at competitive prices. Many ended up putting their nuclear plants up for sale. That allowed bigger firms to acquire reactors on the cheap, and thus to achieve economies of scale and to capitalise on their experience. These nuclear specialists have been able to speed up the refuelling process, keep shutdowns for maintenance to a minimum and so keep the reactors going more of the time. Last year the average nuclear reactor in America was in use 90% of the time. Better still, utilities have found ways to improve the non-nuclear parts of the power station, such as the steam turbines. These so-called “uprates” have increased America's nuclear capacity by almost 5,000MW since 1977, the equivalent of about five new nuclear reactors, according to the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group. At the same time, the NRC has agreed to extend the working life of about half of America's nuclear plants for an extra 20 years. All this has turned nuclear-power plants into virtual mints—as long as the bill for construction has been paid down or written off. In most of America, the wholesale power price is closely linked to the price of natural gas, since gas-fired plants tend to provide the extra power required at times of peak demand. So the price of power has risen along with that of gas over the past few years, whereas the operating costs of nuclear plants have remained relatively stable. According to the Energy Information Administration, a government agency, the average wholesale power price in 2005 was 5 cents per kilowatt-hour (kWh); the Nuclear Energy Institute, an industry group, reckons that the average operating cost of America's nuclear plants was 1.7 cents per kWh that year. So their margins were almost 200%. No wonder that utilities are rushing to the NRC with their plans for new reactors. But to get any of them off the ground they must not only persuade the NRC of the safety of their designs, but also convince potential creditors that there will be no repeat of the financial meltdowns of the 1970s and 1980s. They point to three reasons for optimism: changing conditions in the energy business, a streamlining of the NRC's process for obtaining permits and an overhaul of construction techniques. Until recently coal-fired plants seemed to be safer investments. But nowadays most utilities expect—and in some cases are calling for—Congress to limit emissions of greenhouse gases in the near future to temper climate change. Coal-fired plants, which have a working life of 40 years or more, spew out globe-warming pollution, whereas nuclear ones produce almost no greenhouse gases at all. So coal is now subject to a massive “regulatory risk” of its own. Utilities are piling into green-generation technologies, such as wind turbines and solar panels. But for a constant source of clean power, they have few choices other than nuclear. Meanwhile, to avoid the fiascos of the past the NRC has simplified its procedures. It used to require utilities to obtain two different licences, the first to build a nuclear plant and after that a second licence to start it up. Both applications involved lengthy reviews, which culminated in interminable public hearings. New reactors, like the one at Shoreham, could be finished at great expense and yet never secure an operating licence. So the NRC is combining the two stages: utilities can now apply for a single “combined construction and operating licence”. Construction need not start—and for most bits of the plant is not allowed to—until the licence is issued. To speed things up even more, the NRC is allowing firms selling nuclear reactors to get designs cleared in advance. That way, when a utility applies to build a reactor of an approved design, the NRC will only need to review the modifications that are unique to its site. Westinghouse has already got its AP-1000 model cleared; the NRC is in the process of certifying GE's latest design, called the ESBWR, and AREVA is about to submit an application for its new offering, the EPR. By the same token, utilities can now ask the NRC to approve a location as suitable for a nuclear-power station before they go to the trouble and expense of applying for a combined licence. Four firms have asked for these “early site permits” and two have already received them. Another short cut involves submitting the environmental part of a combined licence before the part that deals with the design. UniStar, a joint venture between America's Constellation and Électricité de France (EDF), filed that sort of paperwork in July for a new reactor in Maryland. The NRC has also made a point of asking utilities about their nuclear plans before any applications arrive. This is so it can be sure it will have enough staff to handle them—which is how it knows how many new plants are in the works. It is hiring about 200 new staff every year, and since most of the utilities contemplating nuclear plants are in the South, has set up a field office in Georgia to co-ordinate with them directly. It is even planning to suggest to Congress possible amendments to the relevant laws to reduce the hassle and uncertainty of licensing even more. The process will still be time-consuming: the NRC reckons it will need two and a half years to review each application and a further year to conduct hearings on its conclusions. Certification of new reactor designs might take as long as four years: AREVA says its application for the EPR runs to 17,000 pages and fills a small bookcase. Nonetheless, the NRC aims to issue its first new licences at some point in 2011. Obstreperous local authorities could still put a spanner in the works. It was opposition from county and state officials, for example, that finally did in the Shoreham plant. Although they have no explicit authority to block a new reactor, local officials can withhold permits to use the water from a river for cooling, for example, or refuse to co-operate on emergency planning. But utilities are hoping to avoid such pitfalls by locating their new reactors only in welcoming jurisdictions—preferably next door to existing ones. Locals in such places know that expanding existing nuclear facilities will bring more jobs and produce more tax revenue. Moreover, they have grown accustomed to having nuclear reactors nearby and do not find the idea particularly frightening. As Dale Klein, chairman of the NRC, puts it, the staff and management of nuclear plants, and local residents, all go to church together. Fast builders Utilities are also confident that they can build new reactors more quickly than before. Many have already placed orders for the parts that take a long time to build. They have also brought in partners that have completed nuclear projects on time and on budget in other countries. Westinghouse, for example, points to the exemplary record of its parent company, Toshiba, in Japan. Similarly, GE has teamed up with Hitachi, another respected Japanese nuclear contractor. AREVA, meanwhile, looks to the series of successful plants it has built in conjunction with EDF in France. All three vendors say they plan to save time and money by using as many identical parts as possible for the different nuclear plants they build in America—unlike the bespoke designs of the past. All this should reduce the time required for construction to four years, they say, which would allow the first new reactors to enter service in 2015 or 2016. But bankers are still sceptical. They are worried that when the new designs and the NRC's new procedures are put to the test, hidden flaws will emerge. After all, the first of AREVA's EPR designs is under construction in Finland and is two years behind schedule and dramatically over budget. To avoid such nasty surprises, NRG Energy, a power-generation company that is applying to build two new reactors in Texas, has opted for one of GE's older and already-proven designs, even though GE insists that its ESBWR will be cheaper to build and to run. Other utilities are planning to build nuclear plants in the regulated markets of the South, in the hope that the regulators will allow them to pass any cost over-runs on to their customers. Even so, says David Crane, NRG's boss, banks are simply not prepared to lend money to build nuclear plants in America without some extra surety. The Energy Policy Act, which Congress approved in 2005, is supposed to provide that. It offers four different types of subsidies for new reactors. First, it grants up to $2 billion in insurance against regulatory delays and lawsuits to the first six reactors to receive licences and start construction. Second, it extends an older law limiting a utility's liability to $10 billion in the event of a nuclear accident. Third, it provides a tax credit of 1.8 cents per kWh for the first 6,000MW generated by new plants. Fourth, and most importantly, it offers guarantees for an indeterminate amount of loans to fund new nuclear reactors and other types of power plant using “innovative” technology. The scope of these loan guarantees is the subject of great controversy. Some politicians fear that the costs of the programme might balloon; others complain that the Department of Energy, which will administer it, is too stingy. Meanwhile, some financial experts argue that the rules, as drafted, would not allow issuing banks to repackage and sell on the loans in question, making them less attractive. There is also some debate about what proportion of a nuclear plant's debt should be covered: the act says up to 80% of the costs of construction, but that might be sufficient to cover the full amount borrowed, leaving banks with no risk at all. Until all this is settled, utility bosses insist, new nuclear plants will not get built. Clearing up afterwards The fate of America's nuclear waste, which the government has vowed to sequester for a million years, is another unresolved issue. In theory, the Department of Energy is in charge of looking after it all. It requires utilities to set aside a tenth of a cent for each kilowatt-hour of nuclear power they generate to help defray the costs of transporting nuclear waste to a safe repository and storing it there permanently. The only hitch is that no such repository yet exists. Illustration by Dettmer Otto Most countries with nuclear power have determined that the safest way to store their waste is underground, deep in the bedrock in air- and watertight containers. But no one has actually built such a facility. America has got as far as selecting a site for one, at Yucca Mountain, a ridge in the middle of a former nuclear-testing ground in Nevada. The Department of Energy is planning to submit an application to the NRC next year to build a repository there. The NRC, in turn, thinks the application will take about three years to review. Officials say the facility will be open for business in 2017. But Harry Reid, a senator from Nevada, has vowed to derail the scheme. As it is, Congress has been cutting funding for the Yucca Mountain project, which was first proposed in 1978 and has since been the subject of several lawsuits. Now that Mr Reid has become Senate majority leader the odds of the repository ever getting built have diminished. Meanwhile, nuclear waste continues to pile up in ponds and containers at nuclear plants around the country. The NRC monitors these and claims that they are safe for the foreseeable future. But Mr Klein, its chairman, tactfully hints that it would be prudent for the government to find a more permanent solution, especially since it is encouraging a dramatic expansion of nuclear power. Nonetheless, Mr Klein believes that the expansion of nuclear energy is now in motion and is unlikely to be slowed down by concerns about what to do with the waste. The only thing that could stop a nuclear renaissance now, he suggests, is a serious accident at an existing plant. Unfortunately, it would not be the first. America's Department of Energy publishes details of the Yucca Mountain repository. The Nuclear Energy Institute describes the “key issues” relating to nuclear power. The Energy Information Administration provides statistics. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has information on radioactive waste and nuclear security. See also GE's ESBWR, AREVA's EPR and UniStar. ***************************************************************** 23 Economist.com: Germany's government | A coalition of the unwilling | Thursday September 6th 2007 From The Economist print edition At half-time, the grand coalition seems subdued—maybe too much so AFP THE interval is over, and the actors in Germany's grand coalition have come back onstage. The script for the next two years calls for the Christian Democrats (CDU) and Social Democrats (SPD) to live together until they disband to fight each other in a federal election by September 2009. But it is between the lines that one finds the real plot: complacency and angst, meaning that the second act will hardly be action-packed (unless terrorism strikes, see article). The government's goals, says the CDU chancellor, Angela Merkel, are to “strengthen the bases of the economic upswing” and “leave nobody behind.” Yet unlike France's president, Nicolas Sarkozy, Ms Merkel has no big plans to achieve them. Boosting long-term growth would take painful reforms that appeal to few, especially when the economy seems to be doing fine without them. There is more talk of inclusion, but the parties disagree over how to deliver it. Both are committed to eliminating the federal budget deficit by 2011, ruling out big spending. “Over the next two years there will be lots of symbolic gestures and nothing real,” predicts Klaus Zimmermann, president of DIW, an economic research institute in Berlin. For now, symbolism may suffice. Exports are booming, unemployment is falling and the economy may grow by some 2.5% in 2007 and 2008, its best performance in years. In the first half of 2007 the public sector overall recorded a surplus for the first time since unification in 1990. Yet the mood of the three coalition partners (the CDU's Bavarian ally, the Christian Social Union, is the third) is jittery. In January their popularity will be tested in elections in two important states, Hesse and Lower Saxony. Bavaria votes in September 2008. The SPD is especially nervous. Voters have not forgiven the party for the cuts in unemployment benefits made under Ms Merkel's predecessor, Gerhard Schröder. The Left Party, a new party formed by the ex-communists and some left-wing defectors from the SPD, is luring away traditional supporters. Further liberalising reforms would be electoral poison. Ms Merkel's coalition-management skills create an illusion of progress. At a recent get-together in a Prussian palace, the cabinet found enough common ground to produce 12 pages of promises, but even the best are only timid steps in the right direction. For example, from November Germany will open its job market to foreign engineering students at German universities and to engineers from all 12 new members of the European Union. And the payroll tax to finance unemployment benefits will be trimmed from 4.2% to 3.9% to encourage hiring. More might have been hoped for from a coalition with a big majority and a strong economy. The opening to foreign engineers will ease but not resolve a labour shortage that costs industry an estimated €20 billion ($27 billion) in lost output a year. All the other old EU members bar Austria have either opened their labour markets fully to easterners already, or plan to do so by 2009. Holger Schmieding, an economist at Bank of America, reckons that the government could afford to cut unemployment-insurance contributions to 3%, which might create 250,000 new jobs. The government has bravely introduced a gradual increase in the retirement age (to 67), but it has been less bold in restructuring the health system, which threatens to gobble up an ever rising share of GDP at the expense of investment in education and infrastructure. It has no plans to tackle the network of regulations that makes it expensive to fire workers, and thus risky to hire them. A second instalment of Germany's federal redesign, which would limit states' debts but allow them to raise (or lower) taxes, may just squeak through. In place of reform, the coalition offers comforting but vague promises. There will be help for the working poor in higher child benefits and subsidies to childless households. The number of school drop-outs will be cut by half by 2010. A bonus will be paid to firms that train more people than average. Workers in soon-to-be-liberalised postal services will get a minimum wage (which the SPD would like to extend across the economy). The government may help states to finance more crčches for children; it has mooted the idea of ten days' paid leave for workers to arrange nursing for sick parents. Such benevolence carries “clear social-democratic handwriting”, boasts the vice-chancellor (and labour minister), Franz Müntefering. Yet to his dismay, it is Ms Merkel who gets the credit. In most polls, the CDU is ten points ahead of the hapless SPD, which remains divided over whether to defend Mr Schröder's reforms and over its own role in the coalition. The SPD has championed the coalition's boldest policy, an “integrated energy and climate programme” aimed at cutting Germany's greenhouse-gas emissions by 40% from 1990 levels by 2020. But Ms Merkel is its most visible defender. The foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, is from the SPD (he was Mr Schröder's chief of staff), but it was the chancellor who lectured her hosts about human rights on a trip to China last month. Such stances help to make Ms Merkel appealing to the Greens, who could yet be an alternative to the SPD as a coalition partner. The odds remain that both the economic upswing and the coalition will survive until the 2009 election. But there are risks to both. As so often, German banks have suffered disproportionately from the subprime mortgage mess in America (see article). If the American economy buckles, Germany's export-led growth could quickly fade. And the SPD may yet be tempted to bail out of the coalition rather than go on seeing Ms Merkel gather both credit and strength. ***************************************************************** 24 Reuters: China notes differences on India-U.S. nuclear deal Thu Sep 6, 2007 3:31PM IST BEIJING (Reuters) - China said on Thursday there were "different views" about a nuclear power pact between the United States and India and called for such deals to stay in line with international safeguards -- but left its own stance ambiguous. The agreement between New Delhi and Washington would offer India U.S. fuel and reactors while allowing it to stay out of the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, keep nuclear arms and protect its military atomic complex from international inspections. Even if the agreement survives opposition from Indian leftists, China's veto could kill it at an international level. Indian newspapers have suggested that Beijing could block the deal at the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), a 45-nation club that works by consensus. Washington will need to go to the NSG, which is supposed to discourage nuclear trade with countries outside full safeguards, to ask for special leeway for India. Noting various opinions on the deal in the NSG, China's Foreign Ministry suggested that Washington and New Delhi should address worries that it would damage safeguards against the spread of nuclear weapons. "We have also noted that within the Nuclear Suppliers Group there are different views about relaxing the restrictions on nuclear exports to India," ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told a regular news briefing. "China believes that, with the precondition of abiding by their international responsibilities, all countries can develop cooperation in the peaceful exploitation of nuclear power." Leftist Indian parties have demanded that New Delhi put on hold talks with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to secure a safeguards pact needed to clinch the deal. Continued... ***************************************************************** 25 Reuters: Nuclear industry hails climate-driven renaissance Thu Sep 6, 2007 2:07PM BST By Jeremy Lovell LONDON (Reuters) - The nuclear power industry said on Thursday it provided a clean alternative to fossil fuels and a global warming crisis, shrugging off environmentalist concerns about nuclear waste and atomic security. The term "renaissance" was the buzz word as nuclear industry players emerged from the 21-year-long shadow of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster and gathered in London for two days of talks at the 32nd annual symposium of the World Nuclear Association. "Nuclear power is now a fully competitive electricity source," said WNA chairman Ralf Gueldner. "Today we see the nuclear renaissance begin to reach full bloom." Nuclear power now provides 16 percent of a world electricity demand predicted to at least keep pace with the 50 percent growth in population expected by 2075 -- and nuclear optimists see that share rising. Gueldner said he even expected his own country Germany to reverse its current policy of phasing out nuclear power plants. Scientists predict that global average temperatures will rise by between 1.8 and 4.0 degrees Celsius this century due to carbon gases from burning fossil fuels for power and transport, bring climatic and humanitarian disasters. As the world wakes up to the threat governments are seeking to curb carbon emissions through clean sources of power that do not harm economic growth. The nuclear power industry, despite environmentalists' worries about security, nuclear weapons proliferation and the fact that nuclear waste remains deadly for thousands of years, sees itself as an obvious choice. Continued... ***************************************************************** 26 Reuters: APEC rift opens over climate change debate Thu Sep 6, 2007 9:02AM EDT By Bill Tarrant SYDNEY (Reuters) - Leaders at an Asia-Pacific summit appeared deadlocked on Thursday over what their "Sydney Declaration" on climate change and cutting greenhouse gas emissions should say. China's President Hu Jintao gave only qualified support to Australia's initiative on climate change, while some developing nations criticized Australian and U.S. moves to put climate change at the top of the agenda of the APEC gathering in Sydney. President George W. Bush raised climate change with Hu during a bilateral in Sydney and said he would support a strong climate statement by the 21 leaders and urged Hu to do the same. "They concluded the importance of addressing this pressing problem cooperatively and responsibly ... and in a manner that did not stall or stunt economic growth," said Dan Price, Bush's deputy national security adviser for international economic development. Bush indicated the U.S. would support a "strong leaders' declaration on climate change" and encouraged the Chinese leader to do likewise, as well as consider eliminating tariffs on environmental and clean energy technologies, said Price. In a rare news conference after meeting Australian Prime Minister John Howard, Hu said he preferred the U.N. framework for handling climate change proposals. "We very much hope that this Sydney Declaration will give full expression to the position that the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change would remain the main channel for international efforts to tackle climate change," Hu said. The declaration should also reflect U.N. principles of "common but differentiated responsibilities" towards lowering harmful greenhouse gas emissions, he added. Malaysia Trade Minister Rafidah Aziz said APEC should not be dealing with emission targets at all. "It should be the U.N. and the appropriate forums," she told Malaysian journalists. Continued... ***************************************************************** 27 UPI: Indian law rejects foreign role in nuclear United Press International - International Security - Published: Sept. 6, 2007 at 10:26 AM NEW DELHI, Sept. 6 (UPI) -- India says it has no measures in place to allow foreign direct investment in the civilian nuclear sector. "As far as the supply chain is concerned, for selling equipment and components to nuclear utilities, some foreign companies have initiated dialogues of a purely exploratory nature, with their Indian counterparts," said Prithviraj Chavan, minister of state in the Prime Minister's Office. He said, however, the government was not considering any concrete proposals. The comments, made in a written statement to Parliament, were reported by the semi-official Press Trust of India. Chavan said only a state-run firm, in which the federal government owns a 51-percent share, can take part in the production of nuclear energy. © Copyright United Press International. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 28 TCPalm: Nuclear plant to test sirens at noon today : St. Lucie County : staff report Originally published 06:00 a.m., September 6, 2007 ST. LUCIE COUNTY ? Sirens within a 1-mile radius of the St. Lucie Nuclear Power Plant will wail at noon today as part of a quarterly test of Florida Power & Light Co.'s emergency warning system. The test, conducted by the St. Lucie County Department of Public Safety and the Martin County Department of Emergency Services, will involve a 1-minute sounding of all 90 sirens. Before and after the sirens sound, a message will be broadcast on the sirens' public address system stating, "This is only a test." A 15-second siren blast will follow the final test announcement. In the event of an actual emergency at the nuclear plant, the sirens would sound for 5 minutes, followed by official instructions and another 5-minute sounding. Detailed instructions for the general population then would be broadcast over local radio and television stations. FPL spokesman Tom Veenstra said there was "absolutely no connection" between the siren test and the shutdown of Reactor Unit 2 last month. The unit was shut down Aug. 18 after crews noticed a leak in a 3/4-inch diameter pipe that carries water to one of the reactor seals inside the unit's dome-shaped containment building as the unit starts up. The reactor was shut down when the leak reached 0.28 gallons per minute, Veenstra said. The leaked radioactive water was captured in a sump pool at the bottom of the concrete and steel containment building. Federal regulators and power company officials said there was never a danger to public safety. For more information, contact the St. Lucie County Public Safety Department at (772) 461-5201 or visit www.stlucieco.gov/eoc. © 2007 The E.W. Scripps Co. ***************************************************************** 29 UPI: China may soften stand on India nuke deal United Press International - International Security - Published: Sept. 6, 2007 at 10:45 AM BEIJING, Sept. 6 (UPI) -- China’s concerns appeared to have eased Thursday on the U.S. civilian nuclear deal with India. China, a member of the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the body that must approve uranium sales to India, said the group was weighing different options to relax nuclear exports to India. "To relax nuclear exports to India, there are still some different ideas within the NSG based on abiding by relevant international obligations to conduct the cooperation in peaceful use of nuclear energy," Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Jiang Yu said. The comments were reported by the semi-official Press Trust of India. India possesses nuclear weapons but has refused to sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, the cornerstone of global anti-proliferation efforts for the past few decades. The NSG is only allowed to sell uranium to signatories to the NPT, but a special exception is being made for India at the behest of the United States. © Copyright United Press International. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 30 MHNN: Mid-cycle NRC report gives Indian Point good grades September 6, 2007 Copyright © 2007 Mid-Hudson News Network, a division of Statewide Washington – The Indian Point 2 and 3 nuclear reactors in Buchanan received very good grades from the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission in a report released Thursday. For Indian Point 2, the NRC gave it top grade – green – in reactor safety and radiation safety. For IP 3, both categories received top grades; however, the NRC noted it had a number of unplanned shutdowns earlier this year. As a result, the federal agency wants to keep a closer eye on the situation to determine what caused them. “It’s a positive thing for us and a positive thing for the community that they note that even though issues come up from time to time, we are addressing them appropriately and they are of relatively low significance and that the plans are ultimately operating very safely and very well.” Entergy is now putting together data for FEMA in hopes of getting final approval to place its new siren system online. It was supposed to be up and running on August 24th, but missed the deadline because FEMA sought more answers. HEAR today's news on MidHudsonRadio.com, The Hudson Valley's only Internet radio news report. ***************************************************************** 31 ITAR-TASS: Russia and Indonesia sign 8 agreements 06.09.2007, 12.28 JAKARTA, September 6 (Itar-Tass) - Russia and Indonesia have concluded eight agreements during an official visit of Russian President Vladimir Putin to Jakarta. Russian Deputy Finance Minister Sergei Storchak and his Indonesian colleague signed an intergovernmental agreement on granting a state credit to the government of Indonesia. Russia’s Vnesheconombank and the Indonesian Finance Ministry concluded a technical agreement on servicing the credit to be granted to the Indonesian government. Representatives of the two countries’ foreign ministries signed a memorandum on mutual understanding between the governments of the two countries on cooperation in combating terrorism. Besides, the sides concluded an intergovernmental agreement on encouragement and protection of capital investments. The Federal Service for Ecological, Technological and Nuclear Supervision of Russia (Rostechnadzor) and the Indonesian Ministry of Environmental Protection signed a memorandum on cooperation in the sphere of liming negative influence on the environment. Besides, the sides sealed an agreement on cooperation between the Russian Audit Chamber and the Audit Department of Indonesia, as well as a memorandum on cooperation in the field of physical culture and sports. The Russian Federal Agency for Culture and Cinematography and the Indonesian Ministry of Culture and Tourism also singed a program of cooperation for 2008-2010. © ITAR-TASS. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 32 Radio New Zealand News: Ministers sidestep nuclear energy issue at APEC Posted at 6:16pm on 06 Sep 2007 Trade and foreign ministers were winding up their meeting at APEC in Sydney on Thursday afternoon, leaving the contentious issue of nuclear energy for leaders to deal with at the weekend. Ministers from the 21 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum members have been in Sydney this week thrashing out a draft declaration on issues such as climate change and trade for the leaders to consider. Foreign Affairs Minister Winston Peters says there are a number of unresolved issues in the draft declaration. However, he says the use of nuclear power to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is the subject everyone seems to be focusing on. Mr Peters says it will be up to leaders to decide on what level of reference is made to nuclear energy, but he stresses New Zealand's anti-nuclear stance is well known internationally. Not an option for NZ The Government has said nuclear power is not an option for New Zealand. Australia and the United States advocate nuclear technology as a way of dealing with climate change. There's pressure at the APEC leaders summit for aspirational goals, rather than binding targets, to be adopted. Mr Peters says nuclear power is part of the discussion but whether it is part of the solution is a different matter. Trade Minister Phil Goff says New Zealand would prefer to see the development of sustainable energy and other energy measures designed to achieve the same ends. While nuclear power could help cut greenhouse gas emissions, he says it creates other problems and remains a no-go for New Zealand. Mr Goff also says New Zealand has succeeded in getting APEC ministers to agree to a new initiative aimed at encouraging further progress in world trade talks. Copyright © 2007 Radio New Zealand ***************************************************************** 33 Tulsa World: AEP Not Interested in Nuclear Plants (Pursuing Coal Instead) Thu, 06 Sep 2007 00:25:19 -0400 http://www.energycentral.com/centers/news/daily/article.cfm?aid=8832374 Sep 01 - Tulsa World American Electric Power Co. isn't planning to build any new nuclear power plants because delays will push operational starts to 2020, CEO Michael Morris said Tuesday. The first permit to build and operate a new U.S. reactor would be delayed by a court challenge that will probably reach the Supreme Court, Morris told reporters in Washington, D.C. Builders would also have to queue for certain parts and face "realistic" costs of about $4,000 a kilowatt, he said. Power producers proposing to build reactors have suggested they could be operating by 2015 or 2016. About 20 percent of U.S. electricity is generated by nuclear power today. Proposals to build as many as 28 new reactors have come after Congress in 2005 offered billions in loan guarantees and tax credits to those building new nuclear power plants. Reactors produce no greenhouse emissions, which contribute to global warming. [Note: the number of proposed new nuclear reactors in the U.S. is now up to at least 43, not 28. The line about reactors producing no greenhouse emissions is also BS, since the nuclear fuel chain produces quite a bit... comparable to natural gas, all told. -Mike] "I'm not convinced we'll see a new nuclear station before probably the 2020 timeline," Morris said. Instead of nuclear plants, Columbus, Ohio-based AEP is proposing to build advanced coal-fired generation that would be able to capture carbon dioxide emissions. Morris said the company's proposed coal-gasification plants will cost about $3,500 a kilowatt to build. AEP owns Public Service Company of Oklahoma. ***************************************************************** 34 Radio New Zealand News: Nuclear power dismissed as solution to climate change Time:7 September, 2007 The concept of moving to nuclear power as a way of fighting global warming is described as an over-simplification of the problem. The proposal has come from the leaders of the United States and Australia, at the APEC meeting in Sydney. But Dr Peter Kouwenhoven from Waikato University's International Global Change Institute, says it ignores the need to cut energy use in order to combat climate change. National Energy Research Institute director Dr Stephen Batstone, says New Zealand has plenty of renewable energy options, such as geothermal or wind power generation. He says nuclear power plants are too big for New Zealand's needs. However, the New Zealand Atomic Energy Advocacy Council says much of the fear of nuclear power is based on misinformation. It says the waste from nuclear power plants can be effectively and safely dealt with. Council chair Phillip Ross believes eventually New Zealand will have nuclear power plants. He predicts that by 2020, this country will either have a plant or will be in the process of planning one. The Government has said nuclear power is not an option for New Zealand. Copyright © 2007 Radio New Zealand ***************************************************************** 35 Amarillo.com: Another drop in flood of response to nuclear reactor letter Opinion: Letters: 09/06/07 (Re: Aug. 27 letter, "No reason for Panhandle to say no to nuclear reactor," by Andrew Harper.) I'd like to add to the other responses regarding the need for tremendous amounts of water to operate a nuclear power plant, a point Harper neglected to mention in his letter. George Chapman of Amarillo Power announced last year his intention to build "in the vicinity of Amarillo" a 2,700-megawatt nuclear power plant. Now, unless Chapman considers the Gulf of Mexico to be "in the vicinity of Amarillo," the only source of water in the Panhandle sufficient for the needs of a 2,700-mw plant is the Ogallala Aquifer. A 2,700-mw power plant would consume approximately 10 billion gallons of water per year. This is probably equivalent to the water consumption of all the farmers, ranchers and feedlots; the cheese factory; the dairies; the ethanol plants; Amarillo and Lubbock; and all the various commercial businesses in the Panhandle. The Ogallala Aquifer recharges very slowly. Do we really want to turn our irreplaceable groundwater into unneeded electric power? Mansel E. Phillips Amarillo Copyright 2007 Amarillo Globe-News & Amarillo.com ***************************************************************** 36 IAEA: A Nuclear Crystal Ball? Experts to Look 25 Years Ahead IAEA Scientific Forum 18-19 September at General Conference Staff Report 5 September 2007 IAEA timeline of the past 50 years. (Credit: IAEA) While no crystal ball, the IAEA´s Scientific Forum this month promises to offer far-reaching insights into where nuclear development is headed over the next quarter century. Many of the world´s top authorities are examining issues of nuclear power, safety and security, safeguards, and international development. The Forum is taking place 18-19 September as part of events during the IAEA General Conference at the Austria Centre in Vienna. Opening the Forum are IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei and Gareth Evans, the Forum´s Chair and head of the International Crisis Group, an independent multinational non-governmental organisation. Dr. ElBaradei has stressed the range of challenges and tasks remaining to be done, singling out issues in health care, agricultural production and water and energy supplies; radiation safety and security; and non-proliferartion and arms control. "We need to look for creative approaches in all these areas so that nuclear technology can continue to play a significant role in social development and the promotion of peace," he says in the Forum announcement. Four sessions are being held: Nuclear Power. This session will look at energy in the 21st century and the potential for nuclear power, particularly for developing countries and countries in the Middle East. Other presentations will examine nuclear fuel services in the next quarter century; managing residues; innovation, research and development in the next quarter century; and expectations for fusion research and ITER. Meeting New Challenges in Food, Agriculture and Health. Speakers at this session will talk about cancer as a global health issue; future trends in radiation therapy as as effective tool to fight cancer in women; global challenges in food and agriculture, controlling animal diseases; and sustainable agriculture. Global Safety and Security Regime: Building Robust Safety and Security Infrastructures. This session´s invited speakers will address challenges to a harmonized global safety regime; transport of radioactive material; nuclear reactor ageing; safety and security of innovative reactors; safety and security of radioactive sources; decommissioning; and enhancing global emergency preparedness. Safeguards and Nuclear Verification: A Long-Term View. The focus of this session will be on the expected world security context for the next 25 years; outlook on the global nuclear non-proliferation regime; understanding clandestine nuclear procurement networks; and consolidation of safeguards and non-proliferation in the context of a nuclear renaisance. The Scientific Forum has been a regular feature and useful addition to the IAEA´s annual General Conference since 1998. It customarily brings together experts and decision-makers in specific fields to network with their peers, share experiences, review latest developments, and stimulate discussion on scientific and other issues relating to the IAEA´s activities, which are of interest to Member States. Previous fora have dealt with subjects ranging from water resources, nuclear waste, safeguards and verification, nuclear safety, technical cooperation, and the nuclear fuel cycle, among others. This year´s Scientific Forum is the tenth since 1998 to run parallel with the annual General Conference. This year´s theme has been especially chosen to coincide with the commemoration of the Agency´s 50th year anniversary in 2007. See Story Resources for more information. Copyright ©, International Atomic Energy Agency, P.O. Box 100, Wagramer Strasse 5, A-1400 Vienna, Austria Telephone (+431) 2600-0; Facsimilie (+431) 2600-7; E-mail: ***************************************************************** 37 Daily Sentinel: TVA serious about COL Friday, September 7, 2007 By Dewayne Patterson Published September 6, 2007 Tennessee Valley Authority News Bureau Staff Senior Manager John Moulton told The Daily Sentinel Wednesday that TVA is "seriously pursuing" an application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) for two nuclear reactors at the Bellefonte Nuclear Plant near Hollywood. TVA had stopped work on Bellefonte in the 1990s after spending more than $4.6 billion on its construction. The NRC will hold a public meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 11 to discuss how it will review the expected Combined Operating License (COL) for two Westinghouse AP1000 next generation nuclear reactors at Bellefonte. Moulton confirmed that TVA will likely file its application by the end of October. NuStart Energy, a consortium of utility and reactor manufacturing companies, has been implementing the process leading to the completion of TVA's application. NuStart Energy is partly funded by the federal government to help give the companies expertise in navigating through the new NRC licensing guidelines. Moulton said the COL is actually new. In the past, applications had to be filed for a construction license, then later for an operating license. Once TVA files its application, the long process will begin, Moulton said. "It is a long process," he said. "The NRC will take 60 days to review what's been filed, to make sure it's accurate." Assuming everything is fine with the application, Moulton said the NRC will then set a schedule at the beginning of 2008 to review the application. The review process, according to Moulton, will take between 3-4 years. Moulton said a decision could come before then to get in line for purchase of equipment. However, the decision to build would not come before the license is approved by the NRC, Moulton added. © 2007 The Daily Sentinel. All rights reserved. Published in Scottsboro, Alabama. A Southern Newspapers publication. ***************************************************************** 38 SMN: Bulgaria: Varna TPP Makes up for Nuke Unit Emergency Shutdown in 6 September 2007, Thursday Varna thermal power plant has six units generating up to 1.26MW. Photo by Varna TPP Varna thermal power plant has connected to the national power grid three additional 210-megawatt units following a recent emergency shutdown at the country's sole nuclear power station. Kozloduy nuclear power station underwent automated safety system shutdown of its 1000-megawatt VVER type unit five on September 1. Varna units will make up for the losses incurred by the shutdown to generate the electricity needed for the Bulgarian market and keep the energy balance. The plant has six units generating up to 1.26MW. Three of the units are put online only at the request of the state-owned power grid operator NEK in case of electricity shortage. CEZ, the largest Czech power distributor, acquired the 1,260-megawatt coal-fired Varna plant in May last year, increasing the group production capacity by 10%. Click here to receive realtime news about this topic in the future. novinite.com Forum Google Tourism Business MobileBulgaria Bulgaria news Novinite.com (Sofia News Agency - www.sofianewsagency.com) is unique with being a real time news provider in English that informs its readers about the latest Bulgarian news. The editorial staff also publishes a daily online newspaper "Sofia Morning News." Novinite.com (Sofia News Agency - www.sofianewsagency.com) and Sofia Morning News publish the latest economic, political and cultural news that take place in Bulgaria. Foreign media analysis on Bulgaria and World News in Brief are also part of the web site and the online newspaper. News Bulgaria ***************************************************************** 39 tvnz.co.nz: Nuclear energy not an option for NZ Sep 6, 2007 6:36 AM In the face of US-Australia nuclear energy action plan annnounced on Thursday, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says nuclear power is still not an option for New Zealand. At a joint media conference ahead of the Apec meeting in Sydney, Australian PM John Howard and US President George Bush have endorsed nuclear power as a form of clean energy to cut greenhouse gas emissions and save the world from global warming. Under the agreement, the countries will work together developing nuclear reactors in a bid to tackle climate change. Associate Professor Stephen Hoadley from Auckland University, says the agreement is appropriate for countries that do not have hydroelectricity but he says those who support Kyoto, by reducing green house emissions through new technology, will regard the agreement as a cop-out. Hoadley says despite the agreement he doubts New Zealand relations with Australia or the US will be strained. However, Energy Consulting Engineer Bryan Leyland says nuclear power is a lot more reliable than the options the New Zealand government is looking at, which include wind generators. He believes Prime Minister Helen Clark should reconsider the government's objections to nuclear power. Peters, who was involved in pre-Apec talks on Wednesday, says nuclear power is still not an option for New Zealand. Peters met with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and invited her to New Zealand. He says the visit will show the importance New Zealand has placed on rebuilding its relationship with the US. Peters has described his meeting with Rice as a very "warm" and "excellent" encounter. But the two countries are still at odds over Iraq and climate change - both issues which are set to dominate the Apec agenda. Howard says he won't be scaling down the number of Australian troops in Iraq. Source: Newstalk ZB/ONE News TVNZ RSS, Widget and Gadget ***************************************************************** 40 Government Inc.: The Nuke Detection Beat Goes On The to-and-fro on the Department of Homeland Security's $1.2 billion worth of contracts for new radiation detectors continues apparently. In an Aug. 30 memo, DHS under secretary Paul A. Schneider said Customs and Border Protection officials want two more months of testing before the department decides whether the machines are worth the investment. That means the project, announced in July 2006 as a key to protecting against nuclear and dirty bombs, will be delayed by at least a year. The memo from Schneider to DHS Secretary Michael Chertoff and Deputy Secretary Michael Jackson said the CBP "has recommended an additional two months of testing after a new software update which will be installed next week." The delay follows some pointed disputes between the department and lawmakers and the Government Accountability Office over the effectiveness of the machines. The GAO has repeatedly raised questions about the department's testing methods and suggested that DHS officials have not been forthcoming with Congress about the project. DHS officials have questioned whether the GAO has the necessary expertise to judge. After a story in the Washington Post about the problems with the contract, Chertoff announced an independent review by a "highly experienced team of technical and programmatic" experts would examine test procedures and results. As required by Congress, Chertoff was expected this month to review the department's most recent tests of the new radiation portal monitors and certify the results for lawmakers, before full deployment of the machines. "Accordingly, we plan to defer recommending Secretarial Certification until the additional testing is complete," Schneider wrote in his memo. There's no way to know when the department will actually move forward. That's in part because lawmakers are so skeptical about how DHS has handled the contracts and whether the complicated, costly new machines will work as billed to protect against a fearsome threat. By Robert O'Harrow | September 6, 2007; 6:42 AM ET | © 2007 The Washington Post Company ***************************************************************** 41 BBC NEWS: US embarrassed at nuclear blunder Last Updated: Thursday, 6 September 2007, 11:27 GMT 12:27 UK The US military has launched an investigation into how a B-52 bomber flew the length of the US mistakenly loaded with nuclear weapons. BBC world affairs correspondent Nick Childs considers the political and military fallout from the incident. The US Air Force is investigating how one of its bombers mistakenly flew six nuclear warheads across the United States last week without anyone knowing about it. The missiles were mounted on the wings of a B-52 bomber US officials insist there was never any risk to public safety. And experts agree there was no danger of an accidental nuclear explosion. But it is still difficult to overestimate the embarrassment to the Pentagon, and especially the US Air Force, caused by this incident. Nuclear weapons are the "crown jewels" in the US arsenal, and are meant to be protected by many safety procedures. The US military is not supposed to lose track of them, even for a few hours. As well as the investigation, there is likely to be a major review of the way the US Air Force handles its weapons. Daily updates The political embarrassment lies in the fact that the Bush administration has made much of its worries about nuclear proliferation. Washington has made no secret of its concerns over the years about the safety and security of the ex-Soviet nuclear arsenal, and whether those weapons might fall into the hands of terrorists. The Pentagon's awkwardness over the incident was clear. Its chief spokesman said publicly that he could neither confirm nor deny what happened, because the department does not discuss nuclear weapons procedures. But he did say that what he called "an error in the transfer of munitions" took place. And it was sufficiently serious that US President George Bush and US Defence Secretary Robert Gates were informed, and Mr Gates has had daily updates since. * BBC Copyright Notice ***************************************************************** 42 DHHS: Exposure Cohort FR Doc E7-17617 [Federal Register: September 6, 2007 (Volume 72, Number 172)] [Notices] [Page 51229-51230] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr06se07-60] ======================================================================= ----------------------------------------------------------------------- DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health; Designation of a Class of Employees for Addition to the Special Exposure Cohort AGENCY: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). ACTION: Notice. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) gives notice of a decision to designate a class of employees at the Rocky Flats Plant, Golden, Colorado, as an addition to the Special Exposure Cohort (SEC) under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000. On August 6, 2007, the Secretary of HHS designated the following class of employees as an addition to the SEC: Employees of the Department of Energy (DOE), its predecessor agencies, or DOE contractors or subcontractors who were monitored or should have been monitored for neutron exposures while working at the Rocky Flats Plant in Golden, Colorado, for a number of work days aggregating at least 250 work days from April 1, 1952, through December 31, 1958, or in combination with work days within the parameters established for one or more other classes of employees in the Special Exposure Cohort. This designation will become effective on September 5, 2007, unless Congress provides otherwise prior to the effective date. After this effective date, HHS will publish a notice in the Federal Register reporting the addition of this class to the SEC or the result of any provision by Congress regarding the decision by HHS to add the class to the SEC. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Larry Elliott, Director, Office of Compensation Analysis and Support, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), 4676 Columbia Parkway, MS C-46, Cincinnati, OH 45226, Telephone 513-533-6800 (this is not a toll-free number). Information requests can also be submitted by e-mail to OCAS@CDC.GOV. [[Page 51230]] Dated: August 30, 2007. John Howard, Director, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. [FR Doc. E7-17617 Filed 9-5-07; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 4160-17-P ***************************************************************** 43 DHHS: Exposure Cohort FR Doc E7-17618 [Federal Register: September 6, 2007 (Volume 72, Number 172)] [Notices] [Page 51230] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr06se07-61] ----------------------------------------------------------------------- DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health; Designation of a Class of Employees for Addition to the Special Exposure Cohort AGENCY: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). ACTION: Notice. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) gives notice of a decision to designate a class of employees at the Rocky Flats Plant, Golden, Colorado, as an addition to the Special Exposure Cohort (SEC) under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000. On August 6, 2007, the Secretary of HHS designated the following class of employees as an addition to the SEC: Employees of the Department of Energy (DOE), its predecessor agencies, or DOE contractors or subcontractors who were monitored or should have been monitored for neutron exposures while working at the Rocky Flats Plant in Golden, Colorado, for a number of work days aggregating at least 250 work days from January 1, 1959, through December 31, 1966, or in combination with work days within the parameters established for one or more other classes of employees in the Special Exposure Cohort. This designation will become effective on September 5, 2007, unless Congress provides otherwise prior to the effective date. After this effective date, HHS will publish a notice in the Federal Register reporting the addition of this class to the SEC or the result of any provision by Congress regarding the decision by HHS to add the class to the SEC. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Larry Elliott, Director, Office of Compensation Analysis and Support, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), 4676 Columbia Parkway, MS C-46, Cincinnati, OH 45226, Telephone 513-533-6800 (this is not a toll-free number). Information requests can also be submitted by e-mail to OCAS@CDC.GOV. Dated: August 30, 2007. John Howard, Director, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. [FR Doc. E7-17618 Filed 9-5-07; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 4160-17-P ***************************************************************** 44 DHHS: Exposure Cohort FR Doc E7-17620 [Federal Register: September 6, 2007 (Volume 72, Number 172)] [Notices] [Page 51230] From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr06se07-62] ----------------------------------------------------------------------- DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health Determination Concerning a Petition to Add a Class of Employees to the Special Exposure Cohort AGENCY: National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). ACTION: Notice. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- SUMMARY: The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) gives notice of a determination concerning a petition to add a class of employees at the Rocky Flats Plant, Golden, Colorado, to the Special Exposure Cohort (SEC) under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act of 2000 (EEOICPA), 42 U.S.C. 7384q. On August 6, 2007, the Secretary of HHS determined that the following employees do not meet the statutory criteria for addition to the SEC as authorized under EEOICPA: Department of Energy employees or its contractor or subcontractor employees at the Rocky Flats plant in Golden, Colorado, who were exposed to radiation dose from 1967 through 2005 and who were exposed to any radiation dose other than neutron dose from 1952 through 1966. FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Larry Elliott, Director, Office of Compensation Analysis and Support, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), 4676 Columbia Parkway, MS C-46, Cincinnati, OH 45226, Telephone 513-533-6800 (this is not a toll-free number). Information requests can also be submitted by e-mail to OCAS@CDC.GOV. Dated: August 30, 2007. John Howard, Director, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. [FR Doc. E7-17620 Filed 9-5-07; 8:45 am] BILLING CODE 4160-17-P ***************************************************************** 45 HT: Huntsville EMA officials to brief congressman on nuclear fallout preparedness - The Huntsville Times - al.com Posted by Staff reports September 06, 2007 12:10 PM Two Huntsville emergency management officials will brief a member of Congress Tuesday on the city's preparedness for nuclear fallout, according to a news release from the city. John "Rusty" Russell, director of Huntsville/Madison County Emergency Management Agency, and Kirk Paradise, emergency plans coordinator for the EMA, will meet with U.S. Rep. Charles Dent, R-Pennsylvania. Dent, a member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, requested the meeting. The briefing will highlight Huntsville's revitalization of its fallout shelter system, the training of responders on radiological safety, its use of radiological monitoring and detection equipment, including using government vehicles equipped with detection devices. Paradise recently presented details of the community's fallout shelter revitalization at a national symposium and had articles published in several trade journals focused on homeland security, nuclear/radiological situations and the revitalization of the fallout shelter program. Community Rules apply to all content you upload or otherwise submit to this site. Contact interactivity management. ©2007 al.com. All Rights Reserved. RSS Feeds | Complete Index ***************************************************************** 46 Guardian Unlimited: Shakeup after nuclear missiles flown across US by mistake Simon Jeffery in Washington Thursday September 6, 2007 As many as six nuclear warheads, each with a destructive potential almost 10 times that of the Hiroshima bomb, were mistakenly flown across the US, Pentagon officials conceded yesterday. The incident last week saw nuclear-armed cruise missiles mounted on the wings of a B-52 bomber and flown from an airbase 40 miles below the Canadian border to the southern state of Louisiana. The 1,500 mile journey from the Minot airbase in North Dakota to Barksdale in Louisiana lasted three and a half hours, during which time the crew were unaware of their nuclear load. Pentagon officials said a munitions squadron commander had been relieved of his duties and crews involved with the mistaken load - including ground crew workers - have been temporarily "decertified" from handling munitions. The director of air and space operations at US air combat command is to lead an investigation into how the plane was able to mistakenly fly nuclear weapons without anybody realising. The cruise missiles were being transferred to Louisiana for decommissioning, as part of a programme to retire 400 of them. Three air force officers who spoke to the Military Times newspaper said the nuclear warheads should have been removed before the missiles were loaded under the bomber's wings. It is unclear why they were not. The W80-1 warheads have an explosive yield of 150 kilotons. The Hiroshima bomb is calculated to have had an explosive yield of 16 kilotons. A US air force spokesman, Lieutenant Colonel Ed Thomas, claimed the public was never at risk. "All evidence we have seen so far points to an isolated mistake. The error was discovered during internal checks. The weapons remained in air force control and custody at all times." The missiles were not armed and safety features in the warheads would have prevented a nuclear detonation in the event of a crash, according to military officials. "The main risk would have been [had] the air force responded to any problems with the flight, because they would have handled it much differently if they would have known nuclear warheads were on board," Steve Fetter, a former Pentagon official who worked on nuclear weapons policy, told the Military Times. The US air combat command has suspended all similar operations until September 14, pending a review. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 47 UPI: Nuclear bombs take unplanned flight United Press International - NewsTrack - Top News - Published: Sept. 6, 2007 at 2:26 AM MINOT, N.D., Sept. 6 (UPI) -- Six nuclear warheads were mistakenly flown from North Dakota to Louisiana, triggering a call to the president and a probe into how the Air Force goofed up. The plan was to have transported non-nuclear cruise missiles mounted on the wings of a B-52 for a flight from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana Aug. 30, The Military Times reported Wednesday. But somehow six nuclear devices, without detonating devices, were strapped to the aircraft instead. The snafu left the squadron commander in charge of Minot’s munitions crews stripped of all duties pending an investigation, the newspaper said. The munitions mistake wasn't discovered until the B-52 arrived in Louisiana, meaning the nuclear warheads were unaccounted for during the approximately 3 1/2-hour flight, officers told the Times. President George Bush was immediately alerted and Maj. Gen. Douglas Raaberg was put in charge of the probe, Air Force spokesman Lt. Col. Ed Thomas said. Defense Robert Gates has requested daily briefings on the matter and Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-N.D., a member of the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, requested a full classified briefing. © Copyright United Press International. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 48 Bradenton.com: Tallevast development moves forward Posted on Thursday, September 06, 2007 By DUANE MARSTELLER dmarsteller@bradenton.com TALLEVAST -- Plans to develop commercial, office and light-industrial space on Tallevast's eastern edge are moving forward despite contamination beneath the community. Today Manatee County commissioners are scheduled to consider a developer's request to rezone 28.9 acres near the northeast corner of U.S. 301 and Tallevast Road. Developer Trey Desenberg is seeking the rezone to allow commercial development on the land, which is part of a larger project called The Forum that is already approved for 43,291 square feet of light-industrial space. At the southwest corner, The Richardson Group's proposed Tallevast Palms Commerce Center would have 158,900 square feet of construction services, warehouse and office space. Tallevast residents have expressed concern that construction and digging could increase the risk of exposure to a 200-acre plume of toxic waste that leaked from the former American Beryllium Co. Residents also worry about traffic the new development would bring. "The county allowed American Beryllium to come in and destroy this community and now the county might allow others to come in and continue to destroy our community," said Laura Ward, president of FOCUS, the Tallevast residents' advocacy group. While the rezoning request requires a public hearing before commissioners, both development proposals do not. They instead are slated through the administrative review process, in which county planners will make the final decision. The county's land-use regulations allow proposed development of industrial-zoned land to be handled administratively, as long as the proposed uses are permitted under that zoning, said County Planner Lisa Barrett. Both The Forum and Tallevast Palms Commerce Center satisfy that criteria, she said. Today's zoning meeting begins at 9 a.m. in the commissioners' chambers at 1112 Manatee Ave. W. The item is No. 19 on the agenda. Duane Marsteller, transportation and growth/development reporter, can be reached at 745-7080, ext. 2630. ***************************************************************** 49 The State: Critics fault DHEC on radioactivity data 09/06/2007 By SAMMY FRETWELL - sfretwell@thestate.com Conservationists are blasting South Carolina’s environmental agency for failing to disclose records that reveal “alarmingly high” radioactivity in the groundwater at a nuclear waste dump in Barnwell County. The Conservation Voters of South Carolina will hold a news conference this morning to air concerns about the S.C. Department of Health and Environmental Control — and what critics say is a reluctance to disclose pollution data. In March, lawmakers defeated a bill to keep the 36-year-old state-owned landfill open to the nation beyond 2008. But some expect site operator Energy Solutions to bring the matter back next year. The landfill is one of three commercial low-level nuclear waste sites in the country, but the only one that will accept all types of the waste from every state. “DHEC’s general reluctance to offer pertinent information raises larger questions about whether the agency is adequately notifying both the public and policymakers about the state of South Carolina’s environment,” Conservation Voters director Ann Timberlake said Wednesday. Maps showing elevated tritium levels in more than 30 groundwater monitoring wells were not made public until after lawmakers debated the bill to keep the landfill open to the nation, records show. The maps, obtained by The State newspaper under the Freedom of Information Act, show some tritium levels in groundwater were hundreds of times higher than a federal safe drinking water standard. The pollution also had been detected in about a dozen wells below the landfill’s boundary, the newspaper reported Aug. 19. The maps from 2004 and 2006 had previously been sealed from public view — at the request of Energy Solutions because the company said it contained “proprietary’’ information. DHEC for years has acknowledged tritium leaked from the landfill, but says it poses no danger to the public. Agency spokesman Thom Berry said DHEC disclosed what lawmakers asked for. “We have had nothing to hide,” he said. “There is no advantage to gain.” The agency’s Web site contains a letter saying staff members discussed tritium contamination during legislative debate. But environmentalists and about half of the House agriculture committee’s members say they don’t remember hearing about the contamination maps or the number of polluted wells. Timberlake said groundwater samples “taken from monitoring stations near the facility show alarmingly high levels of radioactive tritium.’’ Tritium can increase the risk of cancer, but also can foreshadow the flow of more dangerous pollutants in groundwater. Critics say it is DHEC’s duty to volunteer important information that can provide insight, even if legislators don’t ask for it. “Whether we asked the right questions or not does not excuse them from their responsibility to disclose that,’’ said Rep. Joan Brady, a Richland County Republican who served on a subcommittee that held public hearings on the landfill. “This would have been pertinent information.’’ Reach Fretwell at (803) 771-8537. ***************************************************************** 50 Las Vegas SUN: Editorial: Yucca Mountain low Today: September 06, 2007 at 7:21:54 PDT Energy Department's bad behavior continues in its push to make Nevada a nuclear dump In a rightfully harsh opinion, U.S. Chief District Judge Roger Hunt saw the Energy Department's latest duplicitous attempt to dump nuclear waste in Nevada for what it was. "The issues here are credibility and good faith," Hunt wrote. The Energy Department once again has failed on both counts. Hunt was asked to intervene to stop Nevada from enforcing a cease-and-desist order, which was issued after it was found the Energy Department was illegally taking water to drill bore holes at Yucca Mountain in violation of a court-sanctioned agreement. Hunt denied the Energy Department's request, and although he did not rule on the merits of the case, the department and its attorneys should be ashamed for even bringing the action. For example: The judge noted the department, in attempts to support its case, "misconstrued" one of his previous orders in the case and mischaracterized a ruling made by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals regarding Yucca Mountain. Despite the government's claim that the drilling was necessary, Hunt said the drilling was "without any demonstrable, legitimate purpose other than to look busy and keep DOE's contractors busy." The department, the judge said, argued that federal law governing Yucca Mountain was the " 'Supreme Law of the Land' and that gives the DOE the right to do anything it pleases, anything it wishes." That sums up the Energy Department's view of things because it cannot support the project. Time and again it has been shown that the plan to dump 77,000 tons of deadly radioactive waste in Nevada is fraught with problems and is based on faulty science. Hunt wrote that the Energy Department may have "misled Congress and the president in its application for approval of the site" in 2002. Hunt noted the department was, by law, to be done with its preliminary "site characterization" studies before then to prove its case. Department officials told Congress there was no more study needed. Yet Energy Department documents call the bore-hole drilling site characterization work. The department's lies and law-breaking have gone on too long. It is beyond time for Congress to shut down this disastrous plan once and for all. All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 51 ReviewJournal.com: A rare victory over Energy Department Opinion - EDITORIAL Sep. 06, 2007 But celebrating demise of Yucca Mountain would be premature In a rare victory in its struggle to block construction of the nation's high-level nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain, the state of Nevada last week found a compelling issue and a sympathetic judge. The federal Department of Energy and its subcontractors have demanded the use of 4 million gallons of groundwater to cool and lubricate drill bits and make mud for collecting rock samples as they proceed to drill 80 new bore holes at the site, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The drilling is to demonstrate that the facility will be safe from earthquakes and floods. But the water belongs to the state, and the state engineer has ordered the department to stop using it. The Energy Department asked the federal court to instruct the state engineer to butt out. But last week, U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt instead ruled for the state in a strongly worded states-rights opinion. The unauthorized use of the state's water is "a violation of state water law, a violation of an agreement it (the state) entered in good faith, and interference with its obligation to its citizens to enforce its laws and preserve its water," Judge Hunt wrote Friday. "There has been no act by Congress which pre-empts Nevada's state water laws," the judge continued -- implying the dangerous and unconstitutional but hardly surprising doctrine that the federal Congress might do so if it wished. "The only public interest issue is whether ... a federal agency can run roughshod over a state's rights or interests without specific authority and mandate to do the precise activities it wishes to do." A bill proposed by the Bush administration to grant the Energy Department just such power to grab water over Nevada's objections seems to be going nowhere this year. And Bob Loux, executive director of the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, contends the state engineer also has power to forbid the federals from trucking in water from out of state or from elsewhere within the state. Finally, Judge Hunt boldly tackled the question of why the Energy Department is digging bore holes at this late date, anyway. Either the current work is "unreasonable and without demonstrable, legitimate purpose," the judge wrote, "or, alternatively, it (the DOE) shows a complete lack of confidence in its ability to obtain a license from the NRC (Nuclear Regulatory Commission) because of weakness in its original scientific studies." Hunt agreed with Nevada's contention that the Energy Department's site characterization work was supposed to have been completed by 2002, when then-Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham recommended the site to President Bush. "Either that is so and this is not site characterization, or it would appear that the DOE misled Congress and the president in its application for approval of the site," Judge Hunt ruled. "DOE attempts to deny that this is further site characterization. However, its own documents contradict that argument." The ruling is solid, logical, principled and based on facts. It is also a ringing rebuke to the Energy Department -- though it does contain that dangerous assertion that Congress could eventually overrule Nevada water law, if it wished. So, is it time for Yucca Mountain opponents to take up dancing in the streets? No. In the real world, judges are political appointees, and remain subject to political pressures. Yucca Mountain is currently unpopular with Nevada officials, and sympathetic rulings by Nevada-based judges are not unprecedented. Marta Adams, the senior deputy Nevada attorney general who represented Mr. Loux in this case, expresses the opinion that "This is going to be tricky for them to appeal, and they have some real public relations issues here." Ms. Adams may overrate the reluctance of the Energy Department to suffer "bad publicity," as well as their reticence to reconvene this debate in a friendlier locale, whether before the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals or the Supreme Court itself. Generally speaking, the doctrine that the central government can do anything it damned well pleases is likely to find a far more sympathetic hearing in those venues. Celebrations of the demise of the Yucca Mountain Project may be premature. Links powered by inform.com douglas wrote on September 06, 2007 01:38 PM: from the occasional demonstrations i've noticed it appears that those who object to *profitably* siting such a nuclear repository on worthless land are the same as the "ban the bomb" folks of yesteryear. hey, those vw minibuses with the flowers are amusing. of course, reducing the use of nuclear power electric generation will demand an increase in petroleum products imported from abroad. if the anti-nuclear, anti-coal zealots play their cards right, they can get the u.s. to over 90 percent dependence on politically controlled crude oil supplies. and the more u.s. refiners are closed, the faster. the same crowd seems to be the "save the endangered mosquito habitat" zombies who would eliminate the u.s. from harvesting whatever energy sources we aleady have. watch them whine about u.s. [fewer than there ustabe] oil companies when that world supply propels the auction price over $100 a barrel. pump gas numbers might someday get to $10 a gallon. a friend/business associate years ago was tasked by a major electric utility to site new generating plants. he was the guy who represented the company at all "town hall" meetings explaining the need to expand generating capacity. the company had most all varieties... nuclear, natural gas, diesel, and small inefficient wind and solar projects. invariably consumers complained about any new facility no matter the fuel. on deaf ears, my friend would point out that as consumers bought more electrical gizmo's, the company needed to supply more electricity. so it is today. those who think that solar, wind, or geothermal projects will for decades ever displace imported oil as the primary energy sources, are in dreamland. sadly, that coma is induced by some political agenda, surely not common sense. Ken Brown wrote on September 06, 2007 11:59 AM: This project will be built regardless of every screaming Nevadan. Instead of whining, get behind the project and demand what can Nevadans get from the Federal Goverment for its location. Art Caprario wrote on September 06, 2007 08:15 AM: Energy is a matter of national security. Nevada's refusal to let the Yucca Mountain project go forward will mean that the 200 operating nuclear power plant units will have to continue to store nuclear waste on site, resulting in 200 potential terrorist targets, rather than one that the critics of Yucca Moutain contend.Additionally, the Federal Government has the responsibility for accepting the nuclear waste from the plants, as they have made payments to the Government specifically for that. The utilities are in the process of filing suit(s) against the Federal Government because for their failure to accept the waste. Lawrence Hyde wrote on September 06, 2007 07:35 AM: If there is so much water in the ground in Clark county why are the trying to steal water from the northern counties? Use you own leave us alone. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2007 ***************************************************************** 52 ReviewJournal.com: State notifies DOE Sep. 06, 2007 Officials follow up on Yucca water ruling By KEITH ROGERS REVIEW-JOURNAL State Engineer Tracy Taylor put the Department of Energy on notice Wednesday to stop using Nevada's water to drill bore holes at the planned Yucca Mountain nuclear waste site and let inspectors from his office visit the site to confirm compliance with his order. His letter to Scott Wade, director of DOE's Environmental, Safety and Health Division of the Yucca Mountain site office in Las Vegas, follows U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt's denial Friday of an emergency motion by U.S. attorneys to block Taylor's June 1 cease-and-desist order. The order, which had been temporarily lifted then reinstated on July 20, "is still in full force and effect," Taylor wrote in his letter to Wade late Wednesday. "I ask that you immediately confirm that you have stopped using water ... and that you contact me to make arrangements to allow officials of the Office of the Nevada State Engineer to enter your facilities on Friday," Taylor's letter reads. An Energy Department spokesman for the Yucca Mountain Project wouldn't comment on Taylor's letter or say whether the bore hole operations were in progress this week. Hunt ruled that the Department of Energy had violated a court-approved agreement by using Nevada's water to drill bore holes to extract rock samples for data needed to build surface facilities near the mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The water is used to cool and lubricate drill bits and to make mud for collecting the core samples. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission requires data about the potential for earthquakes and floods at the site to be included in a license application for the planned repository that DOE intends to submit by June 2008. In a telephone interview Wednesday from his office in Carson City, Allen Biaggi, director of the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, which includes the State Engineer's office, said Hunt's decision "was pretty clear and convincing." "We want them to confirm to us that they have stopped using the water, and we're going to send somebody down there on Friday to verify," Biaggi said. "I want to make it clear that we're very appreciative that the judge's order upholds Nevada's 103-year-old water law and the state's jurisdiction over the resource." He said Gov. Jim Gibbons "has taken a strong stand on Nevada's water law in this case and a strong stand against Yucca Mountain." "We had worked out a way they could use water for certain things. What they're doing with the water at the site was not in that agreement," Biaggi said. Links powered by inform.com Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2007 Stephens Media, LLC Privacy Statement ***************************************************************** 53 AFP: US not worried by Russia-Australia nuclear deal - Rice Thu Sep 6, 9:39 AM ET SYDNEY (AFP) - The United States is not concerned by the prospect of Australia selling uranium to Russia for civilian use under a deal expected to be signed on Friday, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said. Russia already had a large stockpile of nuclear weapons and the uranium was unlikely to end up in Iranian hands, she told Australian television. "This isn't an issue for us," she said late on Wednesday. "The Russians have plenty of weapons, let's be realistic about it. The Cold War produced more than a surplus." Australian Prime Minister John Howard is expected to sign the deal on Friday with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who is due in Sydney for a summit of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum. The uranium would be for domestic use in Russian civilian reactors and the deal would include safeguards against selling it on to other countries, Australian officials have said. Howard said Thursday he would not approve the sale of uranium to Russia if there was any possibility it could be resold to hostile countries for possible bomb production. "The conditions on our selling uranium is that we obtain the guarantees necessary to satisfy us that it won't go to Iran and Syria," Howard told commercial radio. "We will be taking the Russians through the ropes in relation to any arrangement we have and we will be wanting to satisfy ourselves completely that won't occur." Australia already sells uranium to Russia, but only for handling by a third party. The anticipated deal has been widely criticised and follows a similarly controversial one with India last month. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 54 News-Leader: Photo exhibit looks at effects of depleted uranium used in the first Gulf War ozarks Updates - News Published at 7:33 pm | September 5, 2007 A photo exhibit documenting the effects of depleted uranium used in the first Gulf War will be displayed at Pool Hall Art Center, 940 N. Clay, Friday during Art Walk. The exhibit of photos by Japanese photographer Takashi Morizumi, “Children of the Gulf War,” is sponsored by the Drury University chapter of Amnesty International and the Peace Network of the Ozarks. “Exhibits of these photos are profoundly moving, as they document the horror of war, not only for the people experiencing its mayhem and havoc, but for the future generations who struggle to live in a poisoned environment,” the news release announcing the event said. Morizumi was present in the conflict to document the effects of the illegal weapon on innocent civilians, combat soldiers and children born terribly maimed. The free art exhibit will be open to the public 6:30-9 p.m. The exhibit portrays accurately the horrors of war without being overly graphic, but viewers are advised that the photographs may not be suitable for all. Some of the pictures may not be appropriate for children. For more information, call 881-2576. © 2007 Springfield News-Leader. Users of this site agree to the ***************************************************************** 55 Las Vegas SUN: Nevada to DOE: Hands off water for Yucca Mountain Today: September 06, 2007 at 13:50:6 PDT CARSON CITY, Nev. (AP) - Nevada's top water official has put the federal Energy Department on notice to stop using Nevada water to drill bore holes at the planned Yucca Mountain nuclear waste site and let state inspectors confirm compliance. A letter Wednesday to a top Yucca Mountain site official in Las Vegas follows U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt's refusal on Friday to block a State Engineer Tracy Taylor's June 1 cease-and-desist order on water for the site. The order, which was temporarily lifted then reinstated on July 20, "is still in full force and effect," Taylor wrote in the letter to Scott Wade, director of the Energy Department's Environmental, Safety and Health Division. "I ask that you immediately confirm that you have stopped using water ... and that you contact me to make arrangements to allow officials of the Office of the Nevada State Engineer to enter your facilities on Friday," Taylor's letter reads. The Energy Department got the letter and was formulating a response, said department and Yucca Mountain project spokesman Allen Benson. He declined to say whether water was still being used or if bore hole drilling had been suspended. The judge ruled the Energy Department violated a court-approved agreement by using Nevada's water to drill to extract rock samples for data project officials say they need to build surface facilities near the mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas. The water is used to cool and lubricate drill bits and to make mud for collecting core samples. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission requires data about the potential for earthquakes and floods at the site to be included in a license application for the planned repository that DOE intends to submit by June 2008. Allen Biaggi, director of the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, which includes the State Engineer's office, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal for a Thursday report that Hunt's decision "was pretty clear and convincing." "We want them to confirm to us that they have stopped using the water, and we're going to send somebody down there on Friday to verify," Biaggi said. "I want to make it clear that we're very appreciative that the judge's order upholds Nevada's 103-year-old water law and the state's jurisdiction over the resource." He said Gov. Jim Gibbons "has taken a strong stand on Nevada's water law in this case and a strong stand against Yucca Mountain." "We had worked out a way they could use water for certain things. What they're doing with the water at the site was not in that agreement," Biaggi said. --- Information from: Las Vegas Review-Journal, http://www.lvrj.com All contents copyright 2005 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 56 DailyBulletin.com: Environmental groups find fault with state's perchlorate standard proposal Jason Pesick, Staff Writer The state is in the final stages of setting a standard dictating how much perchlorate can be in your drinking water. The cap on the amount of the widespread contaminant that can be in the drinking water could be in place within weeks. But the proposal of 6 parts per billion is not one that will sit well with the environmental community. It could also lead to hikes in water rates, as water purveyors are forced to begin cleaning perchlorate from the water they serve. "We're disappointed that in light of all the accumulating evidence that perchlorate is harmful at levels well below this that California decided to stick with 6 ppb," said Bill Walker, vice president for the Environmental Working Group's West Coast office. Perchlorate has been discovered in drinking water throughout areas of Southern California used for agricultural, industrial and military purposes. On Aug. 6, the state Department of Public Health submitted a standard of 6 ppb to the state Office of Administrative Law. Once its review is complete, it will send the regulation to the secretary of state to sign off on. Since the state began developing the standard, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a study showing that even at low levels, perchlorate can affect hormone levels in a large percentage of women. The proposed standard is also higher than the 2 ppb set by Massachusetts last year. Perchlorate is used in the production of explosives like fireworks and rocket fuel. Chilean fertilizer used in agricultural areas around the Southland is also thought to be responsible for perchlorate contamination. It can affect the functioning of the thyroid, which is important for metabolism and neurological development. Between August 2002 and August 2007, 251 wells had reported having perchlorate at a level of 4 ppb or higher in California. Of those, 114 are in San Bernardino and Riverside counties. The process of setting a standard began in August last year when the state Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment set a public health goal of 6 ppb. Its task is to only take public health into consideration when setting that goal. Then the Department of Public Health takes into account how practical the proposed standard would be. A few months after the public health goal was set, the CDC study came out in October. "This is going to be important information for those people who are setting acceptable levels (for perchlorate)," one of the study's co-authors James Pirkle, said when the study came out. Massachusetts officials said they came to a level of 2 out of caution and a difference of a opinion with California officials over how much perchlorate people ingest from other sources besides water, like food. Massachusetts officials said they thought people take in a fair bit of perchlorate from other sources besides water, so they wanted to set a lower standard for perchlorate in water. While environmentalists aren't satisfied with California's proposed standard, because they see it as too high, some water purveyors have a very different complaint. It will cost them millions of dollars to clean perchlorate out of water and lead to rate hikes. The East Valley Water District will have to spend tens of millions of dollars building facilities to treat perchlorate ranging from levels of 6 to 12 ppb in some of its wells, said General Manager Bob Martin. He said there will be an 11 percent rate increase this year, and that's just the beginning. "For us it's more of a nuisance," said Ken Manning, CEO of the Chino Basin Watermaster. A combination of treatment systems, blending contaminated water with clean water, and shutting down some wells has worked for his agency, he said. If California adopts Massachusetts' standard of 2 ppb, that would have presented more of a challenge, he said. Agencies around Rialto, where industrial sites on the city's north end have led to perchlorate contamination of up to 10,000 ppb, say they aren't too concerned over the new standard. This is because with the help of grant money, they've been treating the water to the point where they can't detect perchlorate in it. "We're pretty well geared up for it," said Anthony "Butch" Araiza, general manager of the West Valley Water District. Representatives of water purveyors said that if California set a standard of 2 ppb, the costs would have been much higher because of the low levels of perchlorate found throughout the region and the fact that the Colorado River, a major source of water in Southern California, is contaminated with low levels of perchlorate. The level in the river has been decreasing, but it is still at about 2 ppb, said Mic Stewart, water quality manager for the Metropolitan Water District. After the CDC study came out, environmentalists asked the state to review the proposed standard early and start the process over again, but the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment declined, citing a lack of information. The next review of the standard will be in 2009, said Sam Delson, deputy director of the office. Last year, Schwarzenegger vetoed a bill authored by then-state Sen. Nell Soto that included provisions allowing the state to compare its standard with other states' standards and would have made the process of determining a standard more transparent. Walker called the new standard a compromise. "I think frankly it's a political calculation by the Schwarzenegger administration that there are obviously lots of voices out there in industry and much more powerfully in the military establishment who don't want a strong perchlorate standard set because it's going to cost a lot more to clean it up," he said. Copyright © 2007 Los Angeles Newspaper Group ***************************************************************** 57 DailyBulletin.com: Rialto may see more of the EPA Jason Pesick, Staff Writer RIALTO - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is likely to play a larger role in cleaning up drinking water contaminated with perchlorate around the city. That's the word after a meeting on Thursday in San Francisco of city and EPA officials. "We haven't made up our mind," Superfund project manager Wayne Praskins said of how the EPA plans to move forward. "Proposing to add the site to (the Superfund program) is on the table here, and an increased EPA role in working with the (potentially responsible parties) is on the table." The Superfund is a federal program to clean up the nation's uncontrolled hazardous waste sites. Rialto officials have resisted becoming a Superfund site. Councilman Ed Scott, who attended the meeting, said his preference is not to go the Superfund route. But he is looking for a way for all sides to work together. "No matter who takes the lead, there has to be a leader," Scott said. The EPA's plans should be clearer by the end of September, Praskins said. Perchlorate is used in the production of explosives and can harm humans by interfering with the thyroid gland. High concentrations of perchlorate are flowing through the city from industrial sites on the city's north end. It was first discovered in 1997, but state regulatory agencies have been unable to get it cleaned up. In recent weeks, three of the suspected polluters - Goodrich, Black & Decker and Pyro Spectaculars - were able to get a court to call a temporary halt to state water board hearings after raising concerns about the board's bias against them. At a separate meeting Wednesday between state officials - including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's deputy chief of staff, Dan Dunmoyer, and City Council members - Dunmoyer broached the idea of declaring a state of emergency in the city. In two weeks, the state will complete an analysis of the pros and cons of declaring a state of emergency. The city will also examine the idea. "Actually, right at the moment it doesn't sound like there's a whole lot of cons," said Councilwoman Winnie Hanson, who attended the Sacramento meeting along with Mayor Grace Vargas and a host of other officials. If Rialto and the governor agree to declare the city in a state of emergency because the current drought plus perchlorate contamination have drastically reduced the city's water supply, it will be easier for Rialto to snag state funds. There's a downside to this strategy, however. It could be more difficult to approve future developments as the city must guarantee a 20-year water supply for new projects, said Scott Sommer, one of Rialto's lawyers. Regardless of the decision on the state of emergency issue, Rialto's water plight and the cleanup delay has started to attract statewide attention. On Wednesday, state Senate President Pro-Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland, held up Senate Rules Committee confirmation hearings on two of Schwarzenegger's water board nominees. "But what has become absolutely clear is the state is woefully inept at enforcing its clean water laws," Perata wrote in a letter to Schwarzenegger on Wednesday that mentioned the Rialto contamination. The state board is working to address some of Perata's concerns and hopes the courts will allow the perchlorate hearing to quickly move forward, said its spokesman, Bill Rukeyser. Bill Maile, a spokesman for Schwarzenegger, said the governor wants to see the nominees confirmed. "The governor shares Sen. Perata's priorities for California to have the best possible water quality, and he looks forward to working with the Legislature to improve water quality throughout the state," Maile said. Scott said Rialto's contamination is becoming a more sensitive political issue in Sacramento. "I really think that water should be the No.1 priority of this state right now," he said. Contact writer Jason Pesick at (909) 386-3861 or via e-mail at jason.pesick@sbsun.com. Copyright © 2007 Los Angeles Newspaper Group ***************************************************************** 58 LA Daily News: Field-lab cleanup bill goes to Arnold Boeing would be under strict rules BY HARRISON SHEPPARD and KERRY CAVANAUGH Staff Writers Article Last Updated: 09/05/2007 11:38:43 PM PDT After years of struggle, efforts to require stricter standards for cleaning up the Santa Susana Field Lab site gained momentum Wednesday as state lawmakers sent new legislation to the governor's desk. The bill by Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Los Angeles, would prevent the Boeing Co. site in the hills above Chatsworth and Simi Valley from being transferred or sold unless it is cleaned up to federal Superfund standards. Kuehl and co-author Assemblywoman Julia Brownley, D-Santa Monica, believe the federal Department of Energy is currently using lower standards for cleanup that could leave some contamination in the area and endanger local residents. "If they don't clean it up, it can't be sold and developed," Brownley said. "That becomes critically important, because in my opinion it is going to protect lives." Although several previous legislative efforts by Kuehl to increase cleanup at the site have failed in the face of heavy lobbying by Boeing, she said she is hopeful now of winning Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's support because at least six Republicans voted for it in the Assembly. The support by Republican Assembly members Cameron Smyth, R-Santa Clarita, and Audra Strickland, R-Westlake Village, was seen as particularly important because their districts border the site. Strickland is on maternity leave, but a letter of support from her was read on the Assembly floor Wednesday. "I hope that this has a positive impact on the governor's willingness to understand how important this high level of cleanup is," Kuehl said. The bill passed 49-20 through the Assembly. That was a significant improvement from the Senate vote in May, when it passed with a bare majority, 21-16, with no Republican support. Schwarzenegger's spokesman said Wednesday after the vote that he still has not taken a position on the measure. Boeing spokesman Dan Beck said the company would comment on the legislation after the governor makes his decision, but he added that Boeing is committed to cleaning up the site. "We've been doing everything we can in terms of a thorough and timely cleanup of the facility," he said. Assemblywoman Sharon Runner, R-Lancaster, said she voted against the bill, in part because the business community - including her local chamber of commerce and the California Chamber - opposed it. She said it didn't seem fair to write a bill that applies to only one company and one facility, and that seems to change the rules in the middle of the game. "I think we're seeing a dangerous precedent," Runner said. "They have abided by the rules that were in place, and now we're going to say we're changing the rules and we want you to do this and this. "To me, it's something that just targets this one company, Boeing, to do things over and above what they were required to do before they are able to get rid of this property." The vote was cheered by local environmental activists, who have been frustrated in their dealings with Boeing and the federal government in efforts to push for tough standards to remove the contaminants at the site. "Boeing is in a considerably weaker position now," said activist Dan Hirsch of the Committee to Bridge the Gap. "There has been a shift in the balance of power." This year, a U.S. District Court threw out the Department of Energy's planned cleanup of radioactive contaminants at the site and ruled that the agency had conducted a flawed study. Previously the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency warned that the DOE's cleanup would leave the land unsafe for anything more than limited day hikes. "It's huge. This is the one guarantee that we can have that a full (Environmental Protection Agency) cleanup will finally be effected at the site," said Elizabeth Crawford, founder of RocketdyneWatch. "For me, it seems to represent a new era of seriousness by the state of California to benefit the people of California." Located in the hills above Simi Valley and Chatsworth, the Santa Susana Field Lab was developed in the late 1940s for rocket-engine tests and nuclear-energy research. While the DOE cleanup of its 90-acre portion of the lab is nearly complete, Boeing is at least a decade away from decontamination of the rest of the 290-acre site, which is tainted with chemicals from rocket engine and laser development. The land is considered prime real estate that could eventually be used for homes. harrison.sheppard@dailynews.com (916) 446-6723 Copyright © 2007 Los Angeles Newspaper Group ***************************************************************** 59 Guardian Unlimited: ND Wary of Renewed Uranium Interest Thursday September 6, 2007 8:46 AM By JAMES MacPHERSON Associated Press Writer BELFIELD, N.D. (AP) - Geiger counters were a hot item in this small town a half century ago. Nearly every business, including the pool hall, sold the instruments to wannabe uranium prospectors. ``People weren't worried about it then because they had no idea what it was,'' said Barbara Thompson, a Belfield resident for nearly 60 years. ``Now we know what it is and what's going on.'' What's going on is a renewed interest in uranium exploration in the West. Worldwide demand for nuclear power pushed the price of uranium from roughly $7 a pound in 2002 to about $135 by midsummer. It dropped to around $90 in late August. North Dakota state geologist Ed Murphy said his office is beginning to field inquiries from mining companies interested in staking new claims - the first since the state's uranium mines shut down in the late 1960s. ``We've got a lot of people looking,'' he said. Many locals wish the radioactive element had never been found in their backyards. They lament the environmental damage caused by the unregulated uranium mines and fret about lingering threats to their health. Some accused the mines of causing livestock to glow and humans to die of cancer. Health officials have said they found no evidence of either. An industry representative agrees that uranium mining companies are grappling with their past. ``There are legacy issues,'' said Jon Indall, attorney for Uranium Producers of America, a trade group that represents more than a dozen companies. ``We're willing to work with states and everybody else to make sure it's done right this time,'' he said. ``We feel it can be done in a safe manner.'' Cory Smith, 36, who ranches near Belfield, said he was approached in early August by a speculator wanting to lease rights for uranium exploration. ``I wouldn't take a million dollars,'' he said. Both of his grandfathers, who had uranium mines named for them, died of cancer at a young age, Smith said. Another rancher in the area, who had a mine named for him, also died young of cancer, he said. No studies have been done on the number of people in the area who died of cancer, said Dave Glatt, a state Health Department official. The region's sparse population - Belfield has only about 880 residents - renders any attempt to link cancer to uranium mining statistically inaccurate, he added. Federal Department of Energy studies determined ``that the health risk was low related to those sites,'' Glatt said. Uranium was mined from at least nine sites in southwestern North Dakota. The exact number is unknown because of poor record-keeping by the state and by mining companies, Murphy said. Mining companies burned lignite, often called brown coal, to reach the uranium within it, Murphy said. Companies used old tires or diesel fuel to ignite the open pits. The uranium-laden ash was then shipped to Utah, Colorado or South Dakota to be processed further, he said. Uranium mining nationwide predated federal regulations. North Dakota adopted regulations in 1968, a year after uranium mining stopped in the state, Murphy said. Lesley Fritz, 92, said he's proof that the mines did not cause cancer in everyone who lived near them. The Fritz Mine near Belfield bears his name. However, the mines did have an affect on local cattle during the 1960s, he said. ``You could see a different tinge to their hair color,'' Fritz said. Stan Soderstrom's late father, Stanley, said in a newspaper article in the early 1970s that his sheep ``glowed a blue hue'' and he suspected uranium mining was the cause. ``I believe it caused a lot of health problems but I've never been satisfied with the answers,'' Stan Soderstrom said. ``A lot of people are still complaining about the long-term effects.'' All but one of the known uranium mine sites in North Dakota have been cleaned up, said Jim Deutsch, who heads the state's Public Service Commission's reclamation division. ``We didn't get access from the landowner to go in and reclaim it,'' he said of the remaining site. A total of 460 acres was reclaimed, at a cost of $3.2 million, he said. The work was financed by a federal abandoned mine reclamation fund, supported by a tax that coal companies pay. North Dakota's mines produced about 592,000 pounds of uranium oxide while they were in operation between 1962 and 1967, Murphy said. New mines probably would produce a greater amount, he said. Any new mining would involve a process that uses chemicals and water to leach out uranium and pump it to the surface. None of the mines would become burning pits - a process Murphy calls ``an environmental disaster.'' Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007 ***************************************************************** 60 UPI: Court sides with Nevada in nuclear case United Press International - NewsTrack - Top News - Published: Sept. 6, 2007 at 6:48 AM PAHRUMP, Nev., Sept. 5 (UPI) -- A federal judge has ruled in favor of Nevada in its opposition to the use of the state's water in the construction of a planned nuclear waste site. In his 24-page ruling last week, U.S. District Judge Roger Hunt rejected an emergency motion by attorneys for the U.S. Department of Energy that would have allowed the continued use of the state's water supply at the Yucca Mountain site, the Las Vegas Review-Journal said Wednesday. DOE workers had been using the state's water supply in the drilling of boreholes at the mountain until a state engineer ordered the practice to stop. The fact that DOE officials appeared to be dramatically behind their initial schedule at the Yucca Mountain site was especially troubling to Hunt, the newspaper said. "Either that is so, and this is not site characterization, or it would appear that the DOE misled Congress and the president in its application for approval of the site," Hunt wrote in his decision. © Copyright United Press International. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 61 Sydney Morning Herald: PM to sign nuclear deal with Russia - www.smh.com.au September 7, 2007 - 6:08AM Prime Minister John Howard is expected to sign a deal today that will allow mining companies to export Australian uranium to Russia for its domestic use. As Sydney holds an official public holiday, Russian President Vladimir Putin will become the first Russian or Soviet leader to visit Australia as he touches down ahead of the APEC leaders' meeting. He will meet Mr Howard early today and they are expected to sign a nuclear safeguards deal allowing the export of Australian uranium to Russia for use in its nuclear reactors. Australia already exports uranium to Russia for processing, but under the current agreement it must be sold on to other countries that Canberra permits. Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark will also arrive today, along with leaders from Mexico, Chinese Taipei and APEC 2008 summit hosts Peru. Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono will be among the last to arrive, along with the leaders of Thailand and Malaysia. Fresh from meeting Mr Howard yesterday, China's President Hu Jintao will early today speak with Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd. But Mr Rudd has already made a good first impression, after delivering part of a welcome speech to Mr Hu in fluid Mandarin during a luncheon hosted by the prime minister yesterday. AAP Copyright © 2007. The Sydney Morning Herald. ***************************************************************** 62 Reuters: Leading uranium firms and scientists meet in London 06 Sep 2007 08:00:06 GMT LONDON, Sept 6 (Reuters) - This week leaders and scientists of the global nuclear power industry meet this week in London at the World Nuclear Association's (WNA) 2007 Annual Symposium. The private-sector organisation promotes nuclear power in times of heightened concern about security of energy supply. The industry is also back in focus as fear of climate change has helped to overcome years of opposition to nuclear power after the 1986 Chernobyl disaster in Russia. NUCLEAR POWER The first commercial nuclear power plants started operation in the 1950s and today there are 439 stations accounting for 16 percent or 2,658 billion kWh of the world's energy consumption. In the OECD, the total fuel costs of a nuclear power plant are typically about one third of those for a coal-fired plant. FROM ORE TO ENERGY Uranium ore is mined and purified at the mine site. The end product of the mining and milling stages is uranium oxide concentrate (U3O8) and this is the form in which it is sold. Ore concentrate, or yellow cake, is then chemically converted into uranium hexafluoride (UF6), a gas which is transported to enrichment plants. Once the concentration of U-235 reaches 3 to 5 percent, from 0.7 percent in natural uranium, it is possible to use the converted uranium pellets in power stations where fission releases thermal energy necessary for electricity generation. When the fuel has been in the reactor for about three years, it is removed and stored. URANIUM SUPPLY Primary supply in 2006 was 46,530 tonnes or 65 percent of total supply. The rest, 25,350 tonnes, came from secondary supplies such as utility stockpiles and scrapped atomic weapons. In 2006 Canada supplied world markets with 14,000 tonnes or about one third of world production and Australia exported some 23 percent. The other top 10 producers were Kazakhstan, Niger, Russia, Namibia, Uzbekistan, the U.S., Ukraine and South Africa. It is estimated that Australia has about 24 percent of the world's recoverable uranium deposits, Kazakhstan holds 17 percent and Canada some 9 percent. The 7 largest producers in 2006 were Cameco , Rio Tinto , Kazatomprom, Areva , TVEL, BHP Billiton and Navoi. URANIUM DEMAND Uranium demand in 2007 was at 66,526 tonnes. This leaves a shortfall of around 20,000 which is met by secondary supplies, mainly from a deal between the U.S. and Russia. The agreement, on the conversion of highly enriched uranium (HEU) extracted from dismantled Russian nuclear warheads into low-enriched uranium for use in power reactors, runs out in 2013. There are some 439 reactors operating, 34 more are under construction, 81 are planned and 223 more proposed. The WNA estimates demand to reach 149,000 tonnes by 2030. URANIUM PRICE The spot price of uranium hit an all-time high of $136 per pound in June, up from $7 in 2000. The increased interest in uranium prompted the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) to launch a five-year futures contract together with Ux Consulting Company (UxC) in May. Ahead of this contract there was no formal exchange for uranium and price indicators have therefore been developed by a small number of private business organisations, like the UxC. Around 85 percent of all uranium is sold under long-term contracts, ranging from two to 10 years. Sources: The World Nuclear Association, Rio Tinto ***************************************************************** 63 AJC: Plutonium shipments may roll through Georgia | ajc.com Plutonium shipments may roll through Georgia next month Energy Department to send plutonium to S.C. complex By H. JOSEF HEBERT Associated Press Published on: 09/05/07 The department said Wednesday that the plutonium shipments, involving 3,000 coffee can-size canisters, could begin as early as next month and last three years. The consolidation "is a key part of the department's efforts to properly manage surplus plutonium," said James Rispoli, assistant energy secretary for environmental management. He said it will allow for greater security at much less cost. The consolidation involves plutonium — some mixed with highly enriched uranium — that was produced decades ago for use in nuclear weapons, but is no longer needed, as well as a small amount of plutonium in fuel rods from a closed government reactor. The transfer does not involve plutonium that is being taken out of dismantled nuclear warheads or plutonium that will continue to be needed for weapons-related research and production of warhead triggers called pits. The department said the amount of plutonium that will be shipped is classified. Rispoli said each canister has a maximum capacity of 9.7 pounds, but that the amount is significantly less than that since the canisters are not full. About 2,700 canisters are kept at the department's Hanford complex in Washington state and another 700 canisters are at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory near San Francisco and at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Officials didn't provide a breakdown of amounts kept at each of the labs. But the plutonium at Lawrence Livermore has been a focus of controversy for years as local activists have maintained its presence poses a danger to nearby residential communities and represents a potential terrorist target. Aware that officials in South Carolina have expressed concerns that their state not become a permanent dump for the country's unneeded plutonium, Rispoli emphasized at a news conference that the DOE plans include getting the material out of the state. "The intent is not only to bring the plutonium there, but dispose of it at the (Savannah) site and then have pathways for all of this material to leave the state," Rispoli said. He said a facility to store the plutonium at Savannah River is being prepared with increased security. Department officials acknowledged that it will likely take more than a decade — and possibly much longer — before much of the plutonium will be processed and moved elsewhere. The plan calls for the plutonium to be either converted into a mixed-oxide fuel, or MOX, for use at commercial nuclear power plants or be encased in glass logs for eventual transfer to the Yucca Mountain high-level nuclear waste repository being planned in Nevada. However, the MOX production facility at Savannah River won't be completed before 2017 at the earliest. And the future of the proposed Yucca Mountain underground repository is in doubt and is not expected to be completed before 2018 if it is built at all. There already is some plutonium at Savannah River and the MOX facility is being built primarily to process much of the 34 metric tons of plutonium that will come from dismantled warheads. State officials have agreed to accept plutonium shipments, partly because the construction of the processing facilities — and the processing itself — means hundreds of jobs. Federal officials view the consolidation — and eventual disposal of much of the excess plutonium — as essential to meet increased security requirements since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. Edwin Lyman of the Union of Concerned Scientists, a leading nuclear nonproliferation advocacy group, said the group supports consolidation "as long as it's done as safely and securely as possible." © 2007 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution ***************************************************************** 64 KVBC.com: Runaway tanker rekindles Yucca Mountain concerns Wednesday's runaway tanker could have been disaster Runaway railcar comes to rest at Harmon and Valley View Last week a runaway train got a lot of attention in the valley. It was filled with liquid chlorine, which can be hazardous to humans. Had the tanker ruptured, evacuations would have likely been ordered. Thankfully, it didn't come to that. Union Pacific says it now has new protections to make sure it doesn't happen again. Mitch Truswell shows us a different kind of rail car that may be getting your attention in the near future. Yucca Mountain may be years away from accepting the nation's nuclear waste. But the Department of Energy has ideas on how to eventually get the waste here. By rail, it'll be housed in specialized containers. Tested to withstand fires, accidents, even an assault by an airplane, the DOE claims. What many people may not know is that some of the waste, primarily from southern California, may have to go through our valley to get to the repository. By rail, the DOE has drafted a couple of options. One proposal would bring the shipments through the heart of Las Vegas. It proposes to use the existing tracks that cut through the valley, near the Strip, behind Clark County Headquarters, through downtown, to a new rail line. That new line would then carry the shipment by Indian Springs then to the repository. Another option would avoid Las Vegas altogether and involve the building of a special rail line from Jean to Yucca Mountain. If some of the southern California shipments came by truck, again in specialized containers, the DOE has proposed using the 215 to avoid moving the waste through the most heavily populated areas. The trucks would go past a proposed mall, the Red Rock hotel/casino, and thousands of homes, eventually getting on US 95 for the trip to Yucca Mountain. Keep in mind it's not liquid nuclear waste. It's been formed into little radioactive pellets. It is the source for power for a nuclear reactor, one of the little pellets generates nearly the equivalent amount of energy as a ton of coal. But coal isn't as potentially toxic on the road as radioactive waste. We still don't know exactly how many shipments will actually come through the valley. But in light of the concern and questions about last week's chlorine incident, this too may garner a lot of headlines. Keep in mind, nothing has been decided in terms of which routes might be chosen or even if the waste will be coming through Las Vegas. There are public hearings scheduled on the rail lines this fall. As soon as there announced, we'll pass it on. All content © Copyright 2000 - 2007 WorldNow and KVBC. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 65 RIA Novosti: Russia says NATO jets escort its bombers on long-range patrols 15:08 | 06/ 09/ 2007 MOSCOW, September 6 (RIA Novosti) - NATO jets escort almost all Russian strategic bombers engaged in long-range patrols, Alexander Drobyshevsky, an aide to the commander of Russia's Air Force told RIA Novosti Thursday. He said the flights were resumed late on September 5 in accordance with a previously-approved plan. The Tu-95MC Bear bombers fly over the Pacific, the Atlantic, and Arctic oceans, and are refueled in mid-air. Drobyshevsky said six Tu-95MC aircraft had landed and eight were still flying. "All the Russian strategic bombers' flights are performed in accordance with international rules. The aircraft fly over neutral waters, and do not get close to air borders of foreign states," he said, adding that the aircraft had each flown for up to 17 hours. President Vladimir Putin announced the resumption of patrol flights August 17, and said that although the country halted long-distance strategic patrol flights to remote regions in 1992, other nations continued the practice, creating certain problems for Russian national security. Although it was common practice during the Cold War for both the U.S. and the Soviet Union to keep nuclear strategic bombers permanently airborne, the Kremlin cut long-range patrols in 1992. The decision came as a result of the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the ensuing economic and political chaos. However, the newly-resurgent Russia, awash with oil dollars, has invested heavily in military technology, and the resumption of long-range patrols is widely seen among political commentators as another sign of its drive to assert itself both militarily and politically. RIA Novosti ***************************************************************** 66 Japan Times: Definition of 'all' in nuclear talks japantimes.co.jp Web Thursday, Sept. 6, 2007 Emerging from a bilateral meeting in Geneva this week between the United States and North Korea, top U.S. negotiator Mr. Christopher Hill said that both parties agreed that North Korea "will provide a full declaration of all their nuclear programs and will disable their nuclear programs by the end of this year, 2007." After the meeting, the North Korean Foreign Ministry said that the U.S. has decided to remove the country from a list of terrorism-sponsoring states and to lift economic sanctions against it. But Mr. Hill said later that North Korea needs to take additional steps before it is taken off the list. The declaration and disablement of all of North Korea's nuclear programs is the second stage contained in the Feb. 13 six-party agreement, following the shutdown and sealing of the reactor and other nuclear facilities in Yongbyon. But it is unclear whether "all their nuclear programs" will include programs for enriching uranium to weapons grade, in addition to the plutonium-based nuclear programs. It must be remembered that a 2002 North Korean admission of the existence of a program to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons has given rise to the current nuclear crisis. In August, Mr. Hill dropped the U.S. insistence on irreversible disablement of North Korean nuclear programs. Instead, he said that disablement means making it difficult to reverse the facilities to their original state. The Bush administration, facing difficulty in Iraq, may be ready to make concessions to North Korea in order to attain a quick diplomatic achievement. Japan needs a careful approach both to have North Korea denuclearized and to resolve the issues of the abduction of Japanese nationals by North Korea. The Japan Times ***************************************************************** 67 Caribbean Net News: Dominican Republic ratifies nuclear test ban treaty Published on Thursday, September 6, 2007 VIENNA, Austria (Reuters): The Caribbean nation of Dominican Republic has ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, raising to 140 the number of full member states, the Vienna-based agency that administers the pact said on Tuesday. But the treaty, which prohibits all nuclear explosions, will not enter into force before it is ratified by all 44 states listed in an annex that took part in the 1996 treaty negotiations and have nuclear power or research reactors. Ten of the 44 have signed but not ratified the pact, including Iran, Israel, North Korea, India, Pakistan, China and the United States. The last five are declared nuclear weapons states, while Israel is widely assumed to be one but never confirmed this. Iran denies Western suspicions that it is secretly trying to build nuclear weapons, insisting its uranium enrichment programme is for electricity generation only. The treaty organisation plans a September 17-18 conference in Vienna to raise pressure on laggard signatories to ratify the accord. Copyright © 2003-2007 Caribbean Net News All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 68 AFP: Russia-US talks on missile defence set for Paris - Thu Sep 6, 3:10 PM ET MOSCOW (AFP) - Russian and US diplomats will meet in Paris on Monday to discuss Washington's plans for an anti-missile defence system in central Europe, a Russian foreign ministry official told AFP Thursday. "There will be a second round of consultations on the US anti-missile shield project on September 10 in Paris," the ministry representative, Boris Malakhov, said. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Kislyak will lead the Russian team, he said. A first round of talks on the plans, which have angered Moscow, took place in late July in Washington. They were also likely to come up during talks between US President George W. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of an Asian regional summit in Sydney this weekend, the Kremlin said. Washington says it needs to install missile defences in Poland and the Czech Republic to guard against potential threats from Iran and North Korea. Moscow says the true aim of the system would be to aim at Russia and dent the country's offensive nuclear capability. Moscow has suggested that the US military instead use a Russian-leased radar system already in place in the ex-Soviet republic of Azerbaijan. Talks between Azerbaijani, Russian and US experts are expected in the Azerbaijani capital Baku on September 15. Copyright © 2007 Agence France Presse. All rights reserved. The ***************************************************************** 69 WP: Early Warning: Six of Our Nukes Went Missing -- But Don't Worry - William M. Arkin on National and Homeland Security An Air Force B-52 bomber flew over the heartland last week with six nuclear-armed cruise missiles attached to its wings. The pilots and crew evidently had no clue what they were carrying. Nor did the munitions crew that accidentally loaded the missiles. No one noticed that six nuclear warheads were missing for more than 12 hours. And of course the American public didn't know what was happening until now. All of which raises the question: How worried should we be? More worried than the Pentagon says we should be, certainly -- but not as worried as some of its critics want us to be. This incident has followed the usual pattern: a small leak in the Military Times newspapers, followed by mainstream media attention, followed by lame statements from the military, followed by angry remarks from members of Congress and apocalyptic statements by anti-nuclear groups. And finally it becomes tabloid fodder: "A BUNCH OF 'NUKE'LEHEADS," screams the headline in the New York Post. Air Force chief of staff Gen. Michael T. ("Buzz") Moseley has been providing Secretary of Defense Robert Gates personal briefings about the incident daily. (I'm sure that this is not the kind of face time Moseley wants with the boss.) President Bush has been receiving daily briefings as well. The Air Force now assures that the stealthy Advanced Cruise Missiles with their W80 Mod 1 warheads were never armed in flight and posed no threat to the public. The missiles themselves are slated to be retired from the U.S. nuclear weapons inventory, but it is unclear whether the movement from Minot Air Force Base in North Dakota to Barksdale Air Force Base in Louisiana was actually a consolidation of assets. Officially, the military neither confirms nor denies the presence of nuclear weapons at any location, and the Pentagon uses tortured language to avoid using the word "nuclear." Despite the huffing and puffing of the professional concerned, the danger to the good people of the United States from the B-52 crashing or a missile spontaneously exploding was probably infinitesimal. Still, the reality is that six nuclear warheads were removed from their bunkers in North Dakota, loaded onto a bomber, flown across the United States for three and a half hours, and then left on a parking apron for another 10 hours -- and no one noticed. "The weapons were always in our custody," an Air Force spokesman assures. Of course they were in Air Force custody, at least as far as the paperwork goes. That doesn't mean a group of terrorists, aided by people on the base, couldn't have stolen the weapons from the North Dakota bunker. There is no explanation for this incident other than gross incompetence on the part of the munitions and flight crews. This has nothing at all to do with the Bush administration's commitment to arms control, the military's attention being focused elsewhere or the fact that we have too many nuclear weapons in too many places. Still, I would wager that if Congress wants to push the issue, we are going to find out that there have been hundreds of similar incidents over the years. (Although I wonder if records are even kept on them, at least in one place.) The Pentagon's "neither confirm nor deny" policy shields those records, and its out-of-sight-out-of-mind attitude about nukes falsely calms the public. An update on The The Generals and the Candidates post from last week: Retired Army Gen. Barry McCaffrey writes: "I have not endorsed any Presidential Candidate nor will I. I am not an Advisor to the McCain Campaign." By William M. Arkin | September 6, 2007; 7:18 AM ET | Category: Nuclear Weapons Mr. Thulin Retired Court Officer State of Michigan P.O. Box 6279 Jackson,Michigan 49204-6279 Publish this front page of your paper if your not a COWARD. The following was most recently sent directly to comment@ dps.state.ok.us, webmaster@www.ok.gov, webmaster@ocjrc.net, letters@ washpost.com; © 2007 The Washington Post Company ***************************************************************** 70 The State: SRS to get tons more plutonium 09/06/2007 Adding radioactive material extends life of S.C. facility, safeguards jobs By RODDIE BURRIS - rburris@thestate.com Federal officials say they will ship up to 15 additional tons of surplus plutonium to the Savannah River Site over the next three years, as the Energy Department moves to consolidate future processing and safekeeping of the radioactive material. SRS will receive the entire nonweapons-grade plutonium inventory from the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington by 2010, along with non-essential inventories from the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore national laboratories in New Mexico and California. The move confirms SRS as the key national player in the disposal of tons of plutonium left over from nuclear weapons production during the Cold War. It also extends the life of a 1950s-era chemical processing facility at the site — the H-Canyon — for at least another 12 to 20 years, officials said, and ensures about 1,000 operations jobs. The move is not without controversy, but the Energy Department said consolidation of nuclear materials aids in nonproliferation, national security and environmental management. “It makes sense to bring the material to SRS because it’s the place where plutonium is to be dispositioned,” said James Rispoli, Energy Department assistant secretary for environmental management. “Today’s decision continues the momentum for the safe disposition of surplus materials.” The department already is constructing a $4 billion plant at SRS to convert 34 metric tons of weapons-grade plutonium into a mixed oxide substance, or MOX, which can be used to power commercial nuclear reactors that generate electricity. This new plant is to process approximately 3,000 coffee can-sized canisters of nonweapons -grade plutonium, using the MOX plant, the H-Canyon processing facility, and possibly a new, small-scale vitrification plant still under consideration. Columbia environmental activist Ruth Thomas said she is concerned about consolidating plutonium at SRS. But she said the Energy Department probably picked South Carolina because the state offers so little political resistance. “This is really unbelievable; it’s horrible,” said Thomas, who heads an organization long critical of the plant. “It’s as if they are trying to destroy South Carolina.” Criticism of the plutonium plan at SRS has been wide-ranging, including fears the federal government would use SRS as a dumping ground for the toxic plutonium, shipping it to South Carolina then failing to appropriate the money necessary to process the material and ship it out of state to a federal waste depository. “We have said all along we are interested that the plutonium be processed, not stored” at SRS, said Fred Humes, executive director of Aiken’s Economic Development Partnership. “We wanted some assurances that all the right stuff is here to do that, including proper funding.” U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Congress is showing its greatest commitment yet to a MOX mission at SRS. “This is very good for the site and the country as a whole,” Graham said in a phone interview from New Hampshire, where candidates vying for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination debated Wednesday evening. Graham said the 2008 House budget includes $169 million for MOX funding at SRS, which he predicted will get Senate support. But Graham said Congress will need to find an additional $50 million to keep the H-Canyon running next year. Energy officials said the 34 tons of weapons grade plutonium has a $3 billion “street value” in uranium sales to commercial utility plants, while the H-Canyon could strip out $500 million in uranium from the non-weapons plutonium headed for SRS. Plutonium is one of the more dangerous radioactive materials to humans and the environment, where small amounts can increase cancer risk. Staff writer Sammy Fretwell contributed. Reach Burris at (803) 771-8398. Reach Fretwell at (803) 771-8537. ***************************************************************** 71 ENS: Surplus Plutonium to Be Consolidated in South Carolina WASHINGTON, DC The U.S. Department of Energy, DOE, says it will consolidate surplus radioactive plutonium at its Savannah River Site, a 310-square-mile complex bordering the Savannah River between South Carolina and Georgia. The facility is one of several that manages the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile and nuclear materials. Starting in 30 days, the agency will move some 3,000 plutonium storage containers across the country to their new location, a process that will not be finished until 2010. The plutonium will come from the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, and the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. "Consolidation is a key part of the department's efforts to properly manage surplus plutonium and follows our dedication to non-proliferation, environmental management and national security," said Assistant Secretary of Energy for Environmental Management James Rispoli announcing the move on Wednesday. "Today's decision continues the momentum for the safe disposition of surplus materials," he said. Some 2,300 plutonium storage containers from Hanford and close to 700 from Lawrence Livermore and Los Alamos Labs will be transported to the Savannah River Site. The agency said moving the plutonium to Savannah River would reduce the number of sites holding special nuclear material, "enhancing the security of these materials and reducing the costs associated with plutonium storage, surveillance and monitoring, and security at multiple sites." Only non-pit plutonium will be shipped, that is plutonium which comes from sources other than nuclear weapons triggers, or pits. Once the material is at the Savannah River Site, the department plans to make mixed oxide, MOX, fuel by mixing plutonium and uranium oxides to use in specially equipped nuclear power reactors. The first U.S. MOX Fuel Fabrication Facility is currently under construction. In another disposal plan, the agency says it will use the existing H-Canyon facility, so called because of the long, narrow shape of the building in which chemical separations of radioactive materials takes place. H Canyon provides a path for recycling the uranium into commercial nuclear power plant fuel in lieu of planned disposal at a federal geologic repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, which is stalled in budgetary and political conflict. A third plan is to immobilize some of the surplus plutoniuim in a proposed new, small-scale plutonium vitrification plant that would encase it in glass. "DOE will evaluate reducing and possibly eliminating the need for the vitrification capability, and instead disposing of all the surplus plutonium through the MOX facility and H-Canyon," the agency said today. The citizens group Nuclear Watch South says it "acknowledges the urgent need to provide security for plutonium" but opposes MOX manufacturing. Coordinator Glenn Carroll warns that "Transporting highly toxic plutonium - one-millionth of a gram can induce lung cancer in a human - risks the health of millions of citizens along transportation routes. No analysis of risk of terrorism for shipping plutonium has been done." The MOX plutonium fuel program "is already nine years behind schedule" and the plutonium proposed to be shipped for storage to Savannah River Site is of similar quality to 12 tons of "orphan" plutonium already at the site that is unsuitable for conversion to MOX fuel, Carroll says, cautioning that the plutonium arriving at the site "is likely to add to the stockpile that has defied disposition to date." "The plutonium 'disposition' program is in disarray," Carroll says, pointing out that MOX is dependent on 30 years of sustained Congressional support and Congress has displayed increasing discomfort with the MOX program, cancelling it completely for several months earlier this year. Plutonium vitrification, also called immobilization, a process that encases the radioactive material in glass, is supported by Nuclear Watch South and other environmentalists, and the junk "orphan" plutonium is well suited to vitrification, says Carroll. He notes that DOE's commitment to immobilization is weak. "We recognize the unique infrastructure of Savannah River Site and abilities of its workforce to perform the mission of plutonium disposition via immobilization," said Carroll. "We oppose shipping the plutonium until DOE has reconciled the conflicts in its internal vision and created a solid plan for plutonium disposition." The DOE says it has notified Congress and provided a plan for the disposal of the surplus plutonium once it gets to Savannah River, as required under the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2002. Consolidation of surplus plutonium at Savannah River has been analyzed in a Supplement Analysis and DOE issued an Amended Record of Decision for the Storage and Disposition of Weapons-Usable Fissile Materials Final Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement. To see these documents, click here. Separately from this consolidation announcement, the Energy Department is preparing a Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement for Surplus Plutonium Disposition at the Savannah River Site to evaluate the potential environmental impacts of alternative methods of disposing of the surplus, non-pit plutonium materials. Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2007. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 72 Aiken Today: Surplus of plutonium to be sent to SRS AikenStandard.com Thu, Sep 6, 2007 By JOSH VOORHEES Staff writer An estimated 3,000 storage containers filled with the nation's surplus, non-pit plutonium will be consolidated at the Savannah River Site, the Department of Energy announced Wednesday. The decision to consolidate the waste was made by federal officials to reduce storage costs, enhance security and consolidate the plutonium at the site best suited for its disposition, said James Rispoli, assistant secretary of energy for Environmental Management, during a conference call with reporters Wednesday. "Consolidation is a key part of the Department's efforts to properly manage surplus plutonium and follows our dedication to non-proliferation, environmental management and national security," he said. "Today's decision continues the momentum for the safe disposition of surplus materials." The containers will come from three other DOE sites: the Hanford Site in Washington state, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California, and the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Each container is roughly the size of a large coffee can and can hold a maximum of 4.4 kilograms of plutonium. Rispoli was unable to provide the exact amount of plutonium that will be shipped to SRS because many of the containers are not filled to capacity. If they were, the 3000 containers would represent around 13.2 metric tons. The plutonium in question will be "non-pit" plutonium, which comes from sources other than nuclear weapons triggers or pits. The department plans to begin the consolidation after the 30-day wait period required by federal law and expects to complete the process by 2010. Once the material is consolidated at SRS, the current plan for disposing of the materials, said Rispoli, will involve three SRS facilities: the currently under construction mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel fabrication facility, the existing H-Canyon facility and the proposed new, small-scale plutonium vitrification facility. Rispoli said the department is considering plans to reduce or eliminate the vitrification facility's role in the disposition. Aware that officials in South Carolina have expressed concerns that their state not become a permanent dump for the country's unneeded plutonium, Rispoli emphasized that the DOE plans include getting the material out of the state. "The intent is not only to bring the plutonium there but dispose of it at the site and then have pathways for all of this material to leave the state," Rispoli said. He said a facility to store the plutonium at Savannah River is being prepared with increased security. Department officials acknowledged that it will likely take more than a decade ? and possibly much longer ? before much of the plutonium will be processed and moved elsewhere. The Associated Press contributed to this article. Contact Josh Voorhees at jvoorhees@aikenstandard.com. © 2005 The AikenStandard. All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 73 Seattle P-I: Judge denies Hanford dismissal motion Last updated September 5, 2007 11:44 p.m. PT Judge denies Hanford dismissal motion THE ASSOCIATED PRESS YAKIMA -- A judge has denied the federal government's request to dismiss part of a lawsuit seeking an assessment of natural resource damages caused by decades of plutonium production at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The Yakama Nation sued the U.S. Department of Energy in 2002, seeking restoration of soil, water, plant and animal life that may have been damaged by radioactive waste and other hazardous releases. The Nez Perce Tribe later joined the lawsuit, as did Washington and Oregon. The Energy Department, which manages Hanford cleanup, argued it was too soon to determine if there were injuries to the environment or whether reparations should be paid. In a ruling Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Lonny Suko of Yakima did not order the federal government to pay for the assessment. However, Suko denied the federal government's request to dismiss the part of the lawsuit that would hold it liable for any costs associated with the assessment. 101 Elliott Ave. W. Seattle, WA 98119 (206) 448-8000 Send comments to newmedia@seattlepi.com Send investigative tips to iteam@seattlepi.com ©1996-2007 Seattle Post-Intelligencer ***************************************************************** 74 Platts: DOE picks Savannah River for plutonium consolidation Washington (Platts)--5Sep2007 The Savannah River Site is where DOE will consolidate its non-pit plutonium, the department said September 5. In a press statement, DOE said most of the material collected at the South Carolina site would come from the Hanford Site in Washington state, with the rest coming from two national laboratories, Lawrence Livermore in California and Los Alamos in New Mexico. During a conference call with reporters, DOE Assistant Secretary for Environmental Management James Rispoli declined to give specifics on the amounts of plutonium involved. He said there was a "suite of reasons" for consolidating the material, which comes from sources other than nuclear weapons triggers, or pits. The move will reduce security and environmental risks, as well as costs to the individual sites for storing plutonium, he said. The shipments are to begin "no sooner than 30 days" from September 5 and end by 2010, DOE said. Copyright © 2007 - Platts, All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 75 Tri-City Herald: DOE to ship plutonium off Hanford Published Thursday, September 6th, 2007 ANNETTE CARY HERALD STAFF WRITER The Department of Energy could begin shipping weapons-grade plutonium and unused nuclear fuel off the Hanford nuclear reservation in 30 days. Sending the material to Savannah River, S.C., will clear the way for the demolition of the Plutonium Finishing Plant and save more than $100 million in security costs. The plutonium is stored in a vault at the Plutonium Finishing Plant in central Hanford. "This is a key part of the Department of Energy's efforts to dispose of plutonium," James Rispoli, DOE assistant secretary of environmental management, said in a media conference call Wednesday. In addition to 2,300 canisters of plutonium from Hanford, DOE also plans to ship 700 canisters of plutonium from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Each canister, the size of a large coffee can, can hold almost 10 pounds of plutonium, but their weights vary. DOE notified Congress of its decision to consolidate plutonium at Savannah River on Wednesday and now must wait 30 days before shipments may begin. "Once the 30-day notification runs, we plan to begin with the campaign at Hanford," Rispoli said. DOE had planned an accelerated cleanup schedule at the Plutonium Finishing Plant where plutonium produced in Hanford reactors was made into metal buttons the size of hockey pucks for eventual conversion for weapons use. But because of delays in shipping the plutonium from the plant, demolition work slowed in the last two years and some of the funds intended for cleanup of the plant were shifted to radioactive sludge vacuuming and removal at the K Basins. DOE expects the nationwide consolidation of plutonium not yet made into nuclear weapons triggers to take about three years. Once the weapons-grade plutonium and unused fuel left over from the Fast Flux Test Facility are removed from the Plutonium Finishing Plant, heavy security at the plant will be reduced, making cleanup there more efficient. DOE is required to have all the buildings in the complex, many of them heavily contaminated with radioactive material, torn down by 2016. Under new security standards set after 9/11, the Plutonium Finishing Plant needs more than $100 million in security upgrades. However, those have been waived on the condition that the plutonium is shipped off site. Savannah River has long been discussed as the site where plutonium would be consolidated. But before designating it as the consolidation site, DOE was required to prove it had a definite disposition path for the waste before adding more plutonium to the plutonium already stored there. In August at Savannah River, DOE began building the Mixed Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility which will be used to turn some of the surplus plutonium into fuel for commercial nuclear power reactors. DOE also plans to use another existing facility in Savannah River, the H Canyon, and possibly a proposed new, small-scale plutonium vitrification Facility there to recycle surplus materials, then prepare waste for disposal at Yucca Mountain, Nevada. "I applaud the leadership shown by DOE officials in achieving this plan," Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., said in a statement. "Consolidation will make our country and community more secure, will save taxpayers' millions and will simplify Hanford cleanup." © 2007 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press & Other Wire Services ***************************************************************** 76 Tri-City Herald: More Class C waste -- thanks but no thanks Opinions Published Thursday, September 6th, 2007 Adding nuclear waste helter-skelter to Hanford is an idea so dumb even the Department of Energy ought to recognize it. Still, DOE is holding meetings nationwide to see which community gets to take metal from decommissioned nuclear power plants, medical and industrial waste, including some from nondefense projects, much of which is contaminated with plutonium, americium and cesium. Quite a rich stew to lure the tourist trade. Hanford, of course, is already a nuclear waste site, the worst in the United States. Trying to hide that would be like trying to conceal an elephant behind a palm tree. Some waste must inevitably be brought to Hanford for treatment or disposal. Low-level medical wastes from Seattle and other points in the Northwest come immediately to mind. But this is different stuff. Lots of it. The volume isn't so much -- 7,280 cubic yards of Class C waste. But it contains an estimated 140 million curies of radioactivity, compared with 190 million curies in the 53 million gallons of waste in Hanford's underground tanks. The American people are spending billions of dollars to clean up the Hanford site. The people of the state voted overwhelmingly, if in some degree unwisely, to ban additional wastes at Hanford. Reality, common sense and the courts have caused many to reconsider whether the absolutist language of Initiative 297 is in the public good. But even opponents of I-297, which includes the Herald's editorial board, aren't for turning Hanford into a dumping ground for out-of-state wastes. At the most recent public hearing, held in Pasco late last month, the state of Washington opposed keeping Hanford on the list of possible sites. Oregon had already opposed using Hanford for the waste. "We believe it is ludicrous for DOE to again propose to bring additional waste to Hanford for disposal when it still is unable to safely manage the wastes that currently exist at the site," Ken Niles, assistant director of the Oregon Department of Energy, said in a statement recently. Besides, there is already an agreement in place that says DOE will import no more of these kinds of wastes until a comprehensive Hanford waste study called the Tank Closure and Waste Management Environmental Impact Statement is completed. The study is intended to take a comprehensive look at the effects waste will have on Hanford ground water, but it does not include the additional 7,280 cubic yards of nondefense waste. The Tri-Cities is making real headway in explaining to the rest of the state, region and country that there is more here than hazardous wastes dating back to World War II. Water, weather and wine, emphasizes the Tri-Cities Visitor & Convention Bureau. Our permanent population is soaring. Pasco leads the state in growth. Retailing is strong and growing stronger. This is not a "not in my backyard" argument. Our backyard is already full. We've done and are still doing our part. w If you'd like to send your own comments to DOE, write James Joyce, document manager, Office of Regulatory Compliance (EM-10), Department of Energy, 1000 Independence Ave. S.W., Washington, DC 20585-0119, or e-mail gtcceis@anl.gov w On the Net: www.gtcceis.anl.gov © 2007 Tri-City Herald, Associated Press & Other Wire Services ***************************************************************** 77 Inside Bay Area: Livermore Lab to move surplus plutonium east Plan aims to boost security, reduce costs By Betsy Mason, STAFF WRITER Article Last Updated: 09/06/2007 02:39:13 AM PDT Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's surplus plutonium will be moved to South Carolina by 2010. The Department of Energy announced plans Wednesday to consolidate 3,000 coffee-can-size canisters of surplus plutonium at its Savannah River Site near Aiken, S.C. "It's in our best interests, certainly from a security standpoint, to consolidate as much plutonium as possible," DOE spokesman John Belluardo said. The radioactive element is used to make fission cores for nuclear bombs. Close to 700 canisters are at Livermore Lab and Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Belluardo said most of them are at Livermore Lab. The rest, about 2,300 canisters, is at the DOE's Hanford Site in Washington. The canisters will be moved by "secure transport," the nature and timing of which is classified. The move is designed to both enhance security and lower costs associated with storage, surveillance and security at the three sites. The surplus plutonium at Livermore Lab is primarily plutonium oxide, basically powdered plutonium rust, and makes up half of all the plutonium at the lab, said lab spokesman David Schwoegler. The other half is in metal form and will stay at the lab for research. In December the National Nuclear Security Administration, the branch of the DOE in charge of the nuclear-weapons complex, began moving weapons-grade plutonium and highly enriched uranium from Livermore to Los Alamos Lab. All but tiny amounts of plutonium will be removed from Livermore by 2014. "Consolidating material is one of our main goals to transform the Cold War-era nuclear weapons complex to be even more secure, more efficient and more modern," then-NNSA chief Linton Brooks said at the time. "We are taking concrete steps to reduce the number of locations where we process and store significant quantities of nuclear weapons materials." The surplus plutonium will not stay in South Carolina permanently. Some will be processed at Savannah River and then sold to energy companies as mixed-oxide fuel. "It's all about finding extra uses for this stuff," a DOE official said. Not everybody is convinced the consolidation plan is a good idea. "We're of course happy any time plutonium is moved out of Livermore, but we're not about to break out the champagne on this one," said Jedidjah De Vries of Livermore watchdog group, Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment. "This plan doesn't have a final resting place for the plutonium," he said. "They're just shuffling around the plutonium with no clear plan. Anytime you transport plutonium it's a dangerous proposition." Betsy Mason covers science and the national laboratories. She can be reached at 925-952-5026 or bmason@bayareanewsgroup.com. © 2000-2006 ANG Newspapers | Privacy Policy ***************************************************************** 78 Ventura County Star: Field Lab cleanup measure approved Bill on development now goes to governor By Timm Herdt and Teresa Rochester Thursday, September 6, 2007 SACRAMENTO — Capping a six-year legislative battle, the Assembly on Wednesday sent to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger a bill that would require the Boeing Co. to clean its Santa Susana Field Laboratory site to the highest environmental standards before the land can be developed. The measure was approved on a bipartisan, 49-29 vote, and was supported by all the members whose districts surround the site. Ventura County Assemblywoman Audra Strickland, R-Moorpark, who is home expecting to give birth any day, had a statement of support read on the Assembly floor. Assemblywoman Julia Brownley, D-Santa Monica, also supported the bill. "This will protect the community from Boeing selling the property and having it developed until it's cleaned up to the highest standards," she said. "This is a really toxic place." The 2,849-acre property in eastern Ventura County is the home of a laboratory established in 1946 and has been the site of rocket engine tests and nuclear energy research. It housed a nuclear reactor that experienced a partial meltdown in 1959. A cleanup program conducted by Boeing, the federal Department of Energy and NASA is under way as environmental studies continue. The work is being overseen by the state Department of Toxic Substances Control. Boeing Co. spokesman Dan Beck said the company was disappointed in the bill's passage. "We had been working hard to find a way to continue to clean up the site in a thorough and timely manner that was in the best interest of the state and public," Beck said. "We are going to continue to work with all of the appropriate agencies to keep moving forward with the cleanup of the site and the proper disposition of the property." Sen. Sheila Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, has tried repeatedly to get similar legislation approved. This year, she said, supporters finally convinced a majority of lawmakers that "we're not making this up. People don't remember the cowboy days of nuclear reactors. They can't believe this is real." Brownley said she hopes the support of seven Republicans — six who voted for the bill and Strickland — will help convince Schwarzenegger that the effort has bipartisan support and should be signed. A spokeswoman for the governor said the administration has not yet taken a position on the measure. Kuehl said she has requested a meeting with Schwarzenegger to discuss the issue. "I think the governor is being lobbied very, very aggressively by Boeing," she said. Assemblyman Cameron Smyth, R-Santa Clarita, whose district includes much of Simi Valley, said he spent much of his summer recess touring the site and talking with people on both sides of the issue. "I couldn't come up with a logical reason to oppose the bill," he said. Local activists who have long lobbied for strict cleanup legislation said they were pleased with Wednesday's vote. "I can't begin to tell you how happy I am," said Christina Walsh of Canoga Park. "The evidence is speaking for itself." The measure was supported by the boards of supervisors in Ventura and Los Angeles counties and by the Simi Valley City Council, which weighed in for the first time this year. "It falls in line with Simi Valley's position that public safety is paramount for us," said City Councilman Glen Becerra. Daniel Hirsch, a co-founder of the nuclear watchdog group Committee to Bridge the Gap, said the bipartisan cooperation among area legislators was the key to putting the measure over the top after years of failure. "If you're persistent, it shows that even the weak and the powerless can overcome a big corporation," he said. Schwarzenegger will have 30 days after the Legislature adjourns to act on the bill. Lawmakers are expected to adjourn for the year sometime next week, no later than Friday. ***************************************************************** 79 Knoxville News Sentinel: Two Y-12 workers hit with radioactive liquids last month By Frank Munger (Contact) Thursday, September 6, 2007 OAK RIDGE — Two workers had to be decontaminated after being splashed with radioactive liquids during separate incidents last month at the Y-12 nuclear weapons plant, the government’s contractor confirmed Wednesday. Bill Wilburn, a spokesman for BWXT Y-12, said the two employees are still being evaluated, although he said they “face little health risk from the contamination.” Eight other workers are being monitored for possible exposures as a result of one of the August incidents, Wilburn said. The incidents took place in Y-12’s enriched uranium operations complex, which has been plagued with spills and equipment failures during the past year. A.J. Eggenberger, chairman of the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, earlier this year wrote a letter to Y-12’s federal management to express his concern and raise questions about the safety of the uranium operations. Eggenberger was unavailable for comment Wednesday. BWXT, which manages the warhead factory for the National Nuclear Security Administration, said the Aug. 14 and Aug. 16 incidents are under investigation. “These were the first incidents of personal skin contamination at the site in nearly four years,” Wilburn said. In the first incident, Y-12 workers were testing a valve after doing maintenance in the plant’s Enriched Uranium Operations Building, Wilburn said. “As part of the test, an equipment pump was switched on to check for leaks,” Wilburn said in a prepared release by e-mail. “Upon turning on the pump, uranium-contaminated liquid sprayed through a drain valve that was slightly open onto the upper leg of an engineer who was observing the test.” A radiation survey determined that the solution had soaked through the engineer’s clothing and contaminated his upper leg. “The employee was taken to Y-12’s on-site medical facilities and decontaminated,” Wilburn said. As a precaution, the engineer is being monitored for contamination, as are eight other workers who were in the area at the time of the incident, he said. On Aug. 16, another incident occurred in the same building. According to Wilburn, a safe bottle — a slender bottle used to keep enriched uranium solution in a stable configuration and prevent a possible nuclear criticality — slipped from a worker’s grasp and hit the floor, causing some of the liquid to splash. Even though the chemical operator was wearing “anti-contamination” clothing, some of the liquid went through a gap onto the worker’s shoulder, Wilburn said. The worker also was decontaminated at Y-12’s medical clinic and later released, the spokesman said. The worker is still being monitored, he said. Wilburn said Jim Barker, Y-12’s manager of radiological control, is heading an investigation team to evaluate the incidents and “determine what kinds of corrective actions need to be taken.” Steven Wyatt, a spokesman for the National Nuclear Security Administration, said federal authorities are working close with BWXT “to address these incidents” to prevent a recurrence. “We take all matters regarding the health and safety of the Y-12 work force very seriously,” Wyatt said. Senior writer Frank Munger may be reached at 865-342-6329. © 2007, Knoxville News Sentinel Co. ***************************************************************** 80 Business Report & Journal: Feds to Ship Surplus Plutonium to Savannah River Site Thursday, September 06, 2007 By Stephen Sacco TBR Staff The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced Wednesday that will begin shipping what could be as much as 13.2 metric tons (29, 100 pounds) of plutonium for reprocessing from federal facilities in California, Washington and New Mexico to the Savannah River Site in Aiken, S.C. - near Augusta and upriver from Savannah. The shipments are slated to begin within 30 days, according to the DOE. While federal officials contend the plutonium won't be in South Carolina permanently, it appears it will be there for at least several decades. The transcontinental shipments of plutonium are part of a DOE plan to consolidate the reprocessing of excess plutonium at SRS, a federal nuclear facility. At the site, the plutonium -some of which is weapons-grade - will be reprocessed either for storage or as fuel usable in commercial nuclear reactors, according to the DOE. "Consolidation is a key part of the department's efforts to properly manage surplus plutonium," James Rispoli, assistant secretary of energy for environmental management said in a conference call that accompanied the DOE announcement. Close to 3,000 canisters, each with a capacity of roughly 9.7 lbs., will be shipped to SRS by 2010, according to a DOE announcement. Some of the canisters may not be filled to capacity. This will not include plutonium that is stored in nuclear "pits" or triggers, which are hockey-puck-sized components for nuclear weapons. Rispoli said that the consolidation effort will save money and enhance security. But it also brings a larger concentration of radioactive material and waste, indefinitely, to an area where population is growing exponentially and to the banks of a river that serves as a drinking water source. In addition, SRS is a prime candidate for the Global Nuclear Partnership Program (see The Business Report & Journal, July 30) and, if chosen, would be receiving nuclear material from all of the world for reprocessing. Sara Barczak, safe energy director with the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy in Savannah, said she was not surprised by the announcement. "This is something we have been concerned about for a long time, " she said. "I don't think there are too many states that are raising their hands in the hopes of (being the recipient) of large amounts of plutonium." South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford is willing to work with the DOE but had a measured response, according to Joel Sawyer, his press secretary. "The governor will be sending a letter to the DOE outlining our concerns," he said. Rispoli held a press conference on Wednesday where he said, in response to a question, that the DOE was not required to get "permission" from South Carolina but that he was unaware of any opposition. He also said that SRS was the largest federal project in South Carolina but did not have figures on the economic impact of the move for the region or on how much the federal government expects to save by consolidating its excess plutonium management. Further, he stated that the exact amount of plutonium was classified information. The plutonium is coming from the Hanford Site in Washington, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California and the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. Rispoli said that the plutonium has a "pathway" out of the site through one of three forms of reprocessing - a chemical separation process which produces uranium for commercial use, a process where the plutonium is turned into MOX or mixed oxide fuel for commercial nuclear reactors and a process which will encase the plutonium in glass for storage at Yucca Mountain Repository. "I want to stress that the plutonium is not staying in South Carolina," Rispoli said. Critics of this program, however, say that the plutonium could be left at SRS for a long time. Glynn Caroll of Nuclear Watch South has been opposed to the MOX from the beginning. She fears that much of the plutonium shipped will be unusable for MOX fuel and that there is little demand in the nuclear industry for the fuel. "The only company that was interested in using the (MOX) fuel was (North Caroline's) Duke Energy," she said. "So, the plutonium is not going very far." The MOX facility will not be completed until 2017 and is expected to be in operation for roughly 20 years. The Yucca Mountain Repository has faced numerous setbacks on its way to opening and is now scheduled to open in 2017. This is not the first time that plutonium has been shipped to SRS by the federal government. In 2002, then-South Carolina Governor Jim Hodges lost his court battle to block the shipment of roughly 34 metric tons of plutonium from three federal facilities to SRS. The SRS facility, owned by the federal government but operated under contract by private industry, was launched in the early 1950s near the beginning of the Cold War for production of components of nuclear weapons. Software © 2007 The Business Report & Journal 340 Eisenhower Dr. . Suite 240 Savannah, GA 31406 912.351.9122 Software © 1998-2007 1up! Software, All Rights Reserved ***************************************************************** 81 Oak Ridger: Y-12 evaluating two incidents of radiation contamination - Story last updated at 12:42 am on 9/6/2007 Radiation protection specialists at the Y-12 National Security Complex are evaluating two August incidents where workers were splashed or sprayed with liquids in the Enriched Uranium Operations building. These were the first incidents of personal skin contamination at the site in nearly four years, according to an e-mail from Bill Wilburn, BWXT Y-12 spokesman. In an Aug. 14 incident, Y-12 employees were performing a valve test when an engineer was sprayed with uranium-contaminated liquid through a slightly opened drain valve, Wilburn stated in the e-mail. A superviser immediately closed the valve, stopping the liquid flow. A radiological control survey determined there was limited contamination on the skin of the engineer’s leg and also on his clothing. The second incident occurred on Aug. 16 when a safe bottle slipped from the grasp of a chemical operator and bumped a floor, causing the liquid inside the safe bottle to splash onto the worker’s anti-contamination clothing, the e-mail said. Safe bottles are specially designed bottles used to store enriched uranium solutions. The chemical worker was wearing protective equipment, including a heavy plastic apron and sleeves. However, the liquid splashed through a gap on the worker’s shoulder where the protective clothing joins. The employees in both incidents were taken to Y-12’s on-site medical facilities and decontaminated, and both workers will also be monitored, the e-mail said. Y-12 radiological control personnel said the workers face little health risk from the contamination. Wilburn’s e-mail said Y-12’s manager of radiological control is heading up a team that is looking into these two incidents to determine what kinds of corrective actions need to be taken to prevent similar incidents. As a precaution, samples to detect internal contamination were requested from eight workers in the area when the first incident occurred, Wilburn’s e-mail said. | © 2004 The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 82 KNDO/KNDU Tri-Cities, Yakima, WA: Ecology Calls DOE Proposal "Unacceptable" RICHLAND, Wash.- The Department of Ecology calls the Department of Energy's proposal to bring more "Greater than Class-C" waste to Hanford is unacceptable. DOE has proposed Hanford as one of eleven sites around the country to store more waste. In a letter to Department of Energy heads, Ecology leaders say it's the plan to send more waste here to Hanford is unacceptable and says DOE doesn't address current cleanup plans or the fact that cleanup is already years behind schedule. The proposal names Hanford as a potential site for the Greater than Class-C waste. That's the highest level of radioactivity that's still considered low-level waste. Ecology says Hanford doesn't need that and even more, the state and DOE already agreed hanford wouldn't be the site for waste shipments from any other DOE sites. "We already have 53-million gallons of high-level tank waste that we're still waiting to start treating and that's gonna be ten years from now, and we have over 80 square miles of groundwater that's contaminated above drinking water standards," said Ron Skinnarland with Ecology. Skinnarland also says the plan doesn't address how it would integrate with the planned disposal of waste already stored on site. 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