***************************************************************** 10/30/01 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 9.255 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER CONTENTS 1 Mail irradiation? 2 ALERT! HELP STOP PRO-NUKE, PRO ANWR ENERGY BILL! 3 HELP NEEDED IN ANALYZING RAD LEVELS IN BABY BOOMER TEETH 4 FAA BAN ON FLIGHTS NEAR NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS [PRIVATE PLANES] 5 High-Level Waste, Low-Level Logic 6 Ofgem weakens nuclear argument 7 Air rules sought near nuclear plant 8 U.N. Environment Agency to Assess Depleted Uranium Sites in 9 CONSTRUCTION OF A NUCLEAR POWERPLANT IS RESUMED 10 IDF denies New Yorker nuke report 11 Flaherty defends deal to lease Bruce nuclear plant to UK firm 12 Wanted: 12 Children of Chornobyl families 13 NRC checks tube problem at Three Mile Isl Pa. nuke 14 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Tuesday, October 30, 2001 15 DOE To Host "Open House" At Yucca Mountain Site 16 Should anti-radiation pills be offered here? 17 Shutdown at Three Mile Island extended 18 Protesters Delay Nuclear Train 19 Norway urges Sellafield curbs 20 Bulgarian nuclear plant boss denies it is not up to European 21 German police detain activists for halting nuclear-waste train 22 Mayak to resume waste processing 23 Russian nuclear generator halted for repairs 24 Japan to host Asian nuclear ministerial gathering 29 November 25 Hope for solution to Sellafield problems 26 Norway urges UK to curb Sellafield emissions 27 UK Will Meet Green Targets Without Nuclear Power 28 American Ecology Posts Quarterly Loss (detailed spreadsheet) NUCLEAR WEAPONS CONTENTS 1 GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION OF NUCLEAR WAR 2 Pak Firmly Rejects Even Thought of Using Nuke Weapon: Spokesman 3 Georgia expert discusses attacks 4 DOE continues on same security track 5 Officials Wary About Soviet Arsenal 6 Brief: Officials to discuss employee compensation 7 Anti-nuclear activists' lawyers seek trial postponement 8 Neptunium levels in 1961 believed not worrisome 9 Little depleted uranium contamination in Kosovo: UN 10 Marshall Islands criticises delay in nuclear compensation 11 Technology:Governor keeps up SRS fight 12 Ukraine Destroys Last Missile Silo 13 US, Israeli team working on how to take out the nukes if Musharraf falls 14 Kandahar bombed for 5 hours -DAWN - 15 Hastings confident of Hanford cleanup 16 Small business owners won't want to miss Hanford vendor forum 17 Energy secretary to visit Thursday 18 Container ships could be used as bombs by terrorists 19 'Torpedo explosion' sank Kursk 20 Pakistan nuclear scientist held 21 Pakistan: Report on sealing nuclear warheads rejected BBC 22 Pasko-trial postponed for another month 23 Kursk was flooded in 8 hours 24 Analysis: Threat from weapon stockpiles 25 Peaceful protest 26 Energy and water legislation has $142 million in Nevada projects 27 Pakistan nuclear weapons in safe hands: Fernandes 28 US edition: Pakistan hands over 3 retired N-scientists to US **************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POWER ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 Fwd: Mail irradiation? Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 11:11:56 -0600 (CST) Organic Issues (organic@iatp.org) Posted: 10/30/2001 By mritchie@iatp.org ===================================================== From: Tim Bowser From journalist Bill Weinberg's "WORLD WAR III REPORT #5. Oct. 27, 2001", avail. from billw@echonyc.com: POSTAL SERVICE TO IRRADIATE MAIL? Facilities used to irradiate produce and poultry are now being proposed for use by postal authorities to decontaminate anthrax-infected mail, Newsday reported Oct. 24. But critics say up to 2.5 times the standard radiation dose would be needed to destroy anthrax spores. Staples and paper clips could become "unacceptably" radioactive, and the process may not even be effective at all. Food sent in the mail, especially meat, cheese or fruit, could turn into mush. And workers would have to be protected from lung-damaging ozone, which is released in the radiation process. "Some are embracing this as the silver bullet to deal with the anthrax problem, when it may be very harmful," said Tony Corvo of Public Citizen, which has long opposed food irradiation. Predictably, the irradiation industry says its ready to go. "We could do a million letters a day," at a cost of about 50 cents per pound, said Jim Jones, sales & marketing president for Food Technology Service Inc., of Mulberry, FLA. "Our business is killing bacteria." The plant uses Cobalt 60 to emit bacteria-killing gamma rays that can penetrate cardboard, aluminum or plastic. The process, which could require 25 kilogrades of radiation rather than the 10 kilogrades used for food, would not make the mail radioactive, Jones said. Although the Cobalt 60 and Cesium 137 used in irradiation plants are not currently recovered from nuclear waste, the industry has long plugged food irradiation as a profitable solution to the waste dilemma and a boon to continued nuclear development. ***************************************************************** 2 Fwd: ALERT! HELP STOP PRO-NUKE, PRO ANWR ENERGY BILL! Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 11:24:55 -0600 (CST) Date: Wed, 24 Oct 2001 10:15:47 -0400 From: michael mariotte Reply-To: nirsnet@nirs.org [Nuclear Information and Resource Service] Organization: NIRS To: nirsnet@nirs.org Subject: ALERT! HELP STOP PRO-NUKE, PRO ANWR ENERGY BILL! Energy industry interests in the U.S. Senate, led by former Energy Committee Chairman Frank Murkowski (R-Alaska) are using our current national security crisis as an immoral, repugnant means of propping up the nuclear and oil industries. Specifically, Murkowski and a few other Senators reportedly have introduced a "stripped-down" energy bill that they intend to attach to any legislation moving through the Senate--no matter how important that legislation is to our country. This "stripped-down" bill (we don't yet have a bill number) would reauthorize the Price-Anderson nuclear insurance scheme (despite the fact that it does not expire until next August, and is only needed to allow construction of new reactors), allow oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), provide some gas pipeline incentives, and provide a minimum of funds for renewable energy projects. This effort is in response to Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle's refusal to bring up energy legislation that includes ANWR to the Senate floor, and his directive to Senate Energy Committee chairman Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) to develop a new bill Daschle can support sufficiently to bring to a vote. Murkowski and his colleagues want to bypass Daschle and get their own bill voted on, and they don't seem to care what kind of harm they do to the nation to get this. We must respond NOW! However, responding is not as easy in these times as it sometimes is. First, there is no guarantee Bingaman will produce a bill without Price-Anderson reauthorization (it was in his initial draft). Thus, we cannot simply support a Bingaman alternative. Second, as you probably know, it is virtually impossible to reach anyone on Capitol Hill right now--most Senate and House offices remain closed due to anthrax scares. It is simply not possible to effectively call, e-mail, or fax anyone in the Senate, and letters absolutely will not be delivered for weeks, if then. Thus, we must be more creative. First, contact your local media. Do they know a small band of right-wing, pro-energy industry senators are threatening to hold up the works of the entire U.S. Senate during this crucial period in our history, simply to help their allies and campaign contributors? Is this really the type of divisive, controversial legislation the Senate should be considering right now? Or should the Senate focus on appropriations bills and keeping the government running in its few days before adjournment? Why does reauthorization of Price-Anderson, which doesn't expire for many months, and even then is only necessary for new reactors, rate such a high priority on these senators' agendas? We urge you to call your local reporters and editorial boards, write letters to the editor and op-eds, call in to radio talk shows, contact your local TV outlets. The more this story is told, the less likely Murkowski et al, will be successful. Please feel free to refer your media to NIRS for additional comment/background info if they would like it. Second, please call your Senators' home offices--since you can't call them on Capitol Hill, call them at home, and urge them to oppose minority efforts to add controversial energy legislation--especially Price-Anderson and ANWR--to urgent bills. Tell them to choose a SUSTAINABLE energy future. Tell them you have contacted your local media to watch their actions. Your Senators' local offices should be listed in the blue (government) pages of your phone book; if you cannot find a number, call NIRS (202-328-0002). Third, ask everyone you know and everyone you meet to do steps 1 and 2! Finally, continue to gather signatures on NIRS' Petition for a Sustainable Energy Future. We have collected many thousands of signatures in just a few weeks, but we need to get more. If you need more copies, you can a) download from NIRS' website, in the Nuclear Relapse section (www.nirs.org); b) call NIRS (202-328-0002) and we will either fax or mail you copies. We will get these to the Senate before any vote occurs. The actions of these few Senators are as opportunistic and disgusting as I have seen in my 17 years at NIRS. But these Senators have some less vocal allies. With some major national environmental groups still sitting on the sidelines after September 11, it's up to us to stop this in its tracks. The nuclear and oil industries are not grieving, they are pressing hard for their own interests. We CAN stop them! I really ask each of you to help. Thank you. Michael Mariotte Executive Director Nuclear Information and Resource Service www.nirs.org ***************************************************************** 3 MESSAGE FROM DR GOULD: HELP NEEDED IN ANALYZING RAD LEVELS IN BABY BOOMER TEETH Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 16:41:49 -0500 MOTHERSALERT HOME PAGE: http://www.mothersalert.org http://www.mothersalert.org/moreinfo.html Please dissemenate this message as widely as you can to all oppossed to nuclear dangers and interested in public health and science: Dear Friend October 30, 2001 The non-profit Radiation and Public Health Project, now conducting the Tooth Fairy Study, has just been given a priceless gift from Washington University in St. Louis, in the form of 85,000 fully identified baby boomer baby teeth, left over from the first study of strontium-90 (Sr90) levels in baby teeth that began in St. Louis in 1958. They will help us ascertain the true health effects of atmospheric nuclear tests on the 80 million American baby boomers born in the years 1945-65, and explore the relation of high exposure levels to health effects such as early diagnoses of cancer. We have had considerable media coverage (including BBC TV) of the fact that for about 3000 children born since 1980 we have found about 1000 with Sr90 levels as high as those found in the late 1950's in the first baby teeth study . That study demonstrated that there had been a 50-fold increase in the Sr90 baby teeth levels of children born in 1964 over children born in 1950. This helped President Kennedy decide to terminate above-ground nuclear tests after asking Dr. E.J. Sternglass (now our scientific director) to address Congress on radiation-induced childhood cancer in 1963. The modern scintillation counters we are using , unlike those used 40 years ago, can measure the small amounts of radioactivity in a single tooth.. For each baby boomer tooth not used in the St. Louis study we have index cards with the birth name, date and place of birth, along with parent names clipped to a baby tooth. We have found that for only $10 per name we can use Internet databases to get current addresses of these baby boomers ( now in their forties) and query them by mail on their medical histories since birth with a positive return rate of 50 percent. Thus for a sum as small as $50,000 we think that we can get such histories for as many as 3000 baby boomers, which may be sufficient to prove that baby boomers were born in the worst time in history. For example we may discover that the percentage of young women diagnosed with breast cancer significantly exceeds the percentage expected based on women born before the nuclear age began. We would have similar information on all rare childhood diseases like asthma, learning problems, leukemia, etc. We will then have enough evidence of the true damage to baby boomers born in those bomb test years to approach large foundations for funds to test the Sr90 level for each of the 3000 baby boomer questionnaires. We will then know the precise medical significance of each above-average Sr90 level in a child born at any time and place. A tax-deductible contribution to the Radiation and Public Health Project of $1000 would pay for analyzing 50 detailed questionnaires; $100 for 5 such requests; $20 for one. If this message can be forwarded to all those who share our concerns about reactor emissions, we hope to get enough contributions, both large and as small as $20, to convince some large foundation of the importance of what we are doing. All tax-deductible checks should be sent to RPHP Box 330, Unionville NY 10988. For more information on the Tooth Fairy project visit our web site (www.radiation.org). Cordially Jay M. Gould, RPHP Director (jaymgould@aol.com) ***************************************************************** 4 FAA BAN ON FLIGHTS NEAR NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS [PRIVATE PLANES] Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 22:08:14 -0500 ONGOING THREAT OF NUCLEAR WINTER IS THE BEST ARGUMENT FOR NUCLEAR ABOLITION: http://www.mothersalert.org/nuclearwinter.html MOTHERSALERT HOME PAGE: http://www.mothersalert.org & http://www.mothersalert.org/moreinfo.html USA SPACE COMMAND & "Vision 2020," THE US PLAN TO DOMINATE EARTH FROM SPACE: http://www.spacecom.af.mil/usspace http://news.excite.com/news/ap/011030/17/attacks-p rivate-planes Planes Banned Near Nuclear Plants Updated: Tue, Oct 30 5:55 PM EST By JONATHAN D. SALANT, Associated Press Writer WASHINGTON (AP) - The Federal Aviation Administration temporarily banned private planes from flying near nuclear power plants after Attorney General John Ashcroft warned of possible new terrorist attacks. The FAA on Tuesday imposed the restrictions "for reasons of national security." The ban on flying within 11 miles of 86 nuclear plants and other nuclear sites such as the Sandia National Laboratory in New Mexico expires Nov. 7. Also in response to Ashcroft's warning, Transportation Secretary Norman Y. Mineta told his department's administrators to make sure that the trucking, aviation, railroad, shipping and other industries maintained high levels of security. The ban on private flights near nuclear power plants will force nearby small airports to close, said Warren Morningstar, a spokesman for the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association. "A small, general-aviation aircraft is not a significant risk to a nuclear facility," Morningstar said. "On the other hand, we also have to accept that there are serious national security threats, and we will do our best to protect the nation and keep people safe." Commercial airplanes, which fly at higher altitudes, will not be affected. Nor will the ban apply to medical, law enforcement, rescue and firefighting operations when authorized by air traffic controllers. The FAA also announced restrictions on private planes because of the World Series. Only pilots who file flight plans with the FAA will be allowed to fly within 34 miles of John F. Kennedy Airport in New York. The restrictions will be in effect from 6:45 p.m. to 2 a.m. EST during all World Series games played at Yankee Stadium. Bans remain in effect on all private planes within 20 miles of Kennedy Airport or Reagan Washington National Airport. In Boston, New York and Washington, all private pilots must file flight plans with the FAA. Blimps, news helicopters and banner-towing planes remain grounded in 30 metropolitan areas. ---- On the Net: Federal Aviation Administration: http://www.faa.gov Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association: http://www.aopa.org ***************************************************************** 5 High-Level Waste, Low-Level Logic Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 22:36:56 -0600 (CST) http://www.thebulletin.org/issues/1994/nd94/nd94Shrader-Frechette.html High-Level Waste, Low-Level Logic By Kristin Shrader-Frechette The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists Four years before the United States began the commercial generation of electricity by nuclear fission, James Conant, who advised President Roosevelt on the atomic bomb, predicted that the world would eventually turn away from nuclear power because of problems with waste disposal. A few years later, in 1957, a panel of the National Academy of Sciences warned: "Unlike the disposal of any other type of waste, the hazard related to radioactive wastes is so great that no element of doubt should be allowed to exist regarding safety." Conant and the NAS panel were prescient. The safe disposal of high-level nuclear waste from power reactors has been a decades-long scientific and political problem in the United States. In an effort to resolve it, Congress in 1982 mandated permanent geological disposal, a policy consistent with the conventional wisdom on the subject. Since the 1982 mandate, the Energy Department has considered sites in Washington, Utah, Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana, Nevada, the Great Lakes area, and the Appalachian range. After much political tugging and pulling, Congress directed in 1987 that the list of possible sites be narrowed to one. Yucca Mountain, located on the Nuclear Test Site in Nevada, would be the only location evaluated for the repository. To date, the United States has spent more than $3 billion studying-or "characterizing"-the proposed Yucca Mountain site. If scientists eventually find it acceptable, and if it survives the legal and political battle that would follow its selection, sometime early in the next century the United States would become the first country to begin permanent geological disposal of high-level radioactive waste and spent fuel from nuclear reactors. Leaky canisters Unhappily for the Energy Department, which oversees the site evaluation, the road to Yucca Mountain has been rocky and pot-holed. Roughly 80 percent of Nevadans oppose the facility, according to a variety of opinion polls, and a host of environmentalists and anti-nuclear activists have dedicated themselves to attacking the siting plan in general and the scientific studies in particular. Officials of the State of Nevada already have tried to veto the site, and they vow to sue the Energy Department if Yucca Mountain is finally selected. Opposition to the repository is well founded. Some 86,000 metric tons of high-level waste and spent fuel from the civilian nuclear program await disposition. Current plans for future storage of high-level nuclear waste call for deep emplacement of steel canisters in the host rock. Federal regulations require the canisters to resist corrosion for as little as 300 years. Nevertheless, the Energy Department admits that the waste will remain dangerous for longer than 10,000 years. Department experts also agree that, at best, they can merely limit the radioactivity that reaches the environment; they claim that "there is no doubt that the repository will leak over the course of the next 10,000 years."1 Many of the radioactive isotopes that would be stored at Yucca Mountain-such as iodine 129, neptunium 237, cesium 137, uranium 238, zirconium 93-have half-lives in the millions of years. During such long time periods of radiotoxicity, changes in climate, groundwater, precipitation, and volcanic activity could occur. A worst-case possibility: massive releases of radioactivity into the environment. To insure even minimum standards of safety, Yucca Mountain risk assessors need to predict precise phenomena associated with future climate, weather, mineralology, and water composition, even though climate and weather are among the most variable and rapid natural processes influencing the repository. Even the Energy Department admits that "the climatic changes that are possible during the next 10,000 years at Yucca Mountain may cause changes in the hydraulic gradient. . . . The extent of these changes is uncertain." 2 Translated: We don't know precisely how soon the water table might be contaminated. Major variations in the climate of Nevada have occurred during the past 45,000 years, and the U.S. Geological Survey claims that future climatic changes probably will occur during the time the waste materials remain hazardous.3 Precipitation patterns are likewise fluctuating, and assessors must be able to predict them in perpetuity. The precipitation data, however, covers only approximately the past 30 years; yet 10,000-year precipitation predictions are crucial to the safety of Yucca Mountain, because percolating water could infiltrate and transport radioactive leachate once the containers have been breached. To assume that the 30-year precipitation data are adequate for precisely predicting the risks associated with a permanent repository represents a questionable methodological value judgment. Criticism of the Yucca Mountain risk assessments generally focuses on scientific issues such as predictions regarding the flow of groundwater. While these concerns are central to characterizing the site, I also suggest that the Yucca Mountain studies exhibit at least three fundamental logical flaws: appeals to ignorance; appeals to authority; and the use of a two-valued, either/or "frame" for assessing site suitability. Given these basic problems in science and logic, it makes sense for Congress to alter its course and postpone the decision about a permanent repository. Instead, the wastes should be stored for 100 years in several "negotiated, monitored retrievable storage facilities" (NMRS). A century from now, our descendants will be in a far better position to determine what to do next. "Delay," said Thomas Jefferson in another context, "is preferable to error." Appeals to ignorance In the everyday world, people often assume that a claim is true simply because it has not been proved false, or that a claim is false because it has not been proved true. In logic, this assumption is an invalid "appeal to ignorance"-and some of the most troubling problems in the Yucca Mountain feasibility studies arise from the repeated use of such invalid reasoning. Appeals to ignorance occur throughout the 1992 Yucca Mountain Early Site Suitability Evaluation (ESSE) and its supporting quantitative risk assessments. For example, a group of assessors noted that a number of key factors, such as water infiltration and fracture flow, had not been considered. Nevertheless, the assessors concluded that Yucca Mountain would cause less than one "health effect" every 1,400 years.4 Similarly, another team of scientists admitted that the hydraulic data at Yucca Mountain were insufficient for performing geostatistical analyses, and that they may "have underestimated cumulative releases of all nuclides during 100,000 years, by an amount that is unknown."5 And yet, the same assessors concluded that the "repository site would be in compliance with regulatory requirements."6 Likewise, the 1992 ESSE admitted that the "the performance analyses did not quantitatively evaluate the potential for . . . disruptive processes or events such as faulting or human intrusion." Even so, the report concluded that scientists had "uncovered no information that indicates that the Yucca Mountain site is . . . likely to be disqualified."7 Obviously, the analyses could not have discovered disqualifying information if the very areas that are most likely to cause problems were not investigated. (Oddly, the authors admit, a few pages later, "that disruptive processes that cause direct releases to the accessible environment provide the only conditions under which the EPA standards might not be met.")8 Accepting appeals to ignorance in Yucca Mountain studies virtually guarantees that, despite major uncertainties, scientists will eventually judge the site to be acceptable. In fact, the Energy Department admitted: "If . . . current information does not indicate that the site is unsuitable, then the consensus position was that at least a lower-level suitability finding could be supported."9 To be sure, most scientists live with uncertainty. Although scientists (and risk assessors) provisionally accept hypotheses after repeated and rigorous attempts to falsify them fail, this provisional acceptance is not the same as an appeal to ignorance. Energy Department investigators have simply ignored whole areas of investigation- such as the possibility of human error, geostatistical analyses, and worst-case scenarios. Because of their omissions, there have not been repeated and rigorous attempts to show the site to be unsuitable, as adherence to scientific methods would require. That being the case, decision-makers lack adequate grounds even for provisionally accepting the site-suitability hypothesis as offered in the ESSE. Appeals to authority In the absence of hard data and the experimental confirmation of many hypotheses about Yucca Mountain, assessors have often used nonquantifiable and subjective judgments to establish site suitability. The 1992 ESSE repeatedly admits that subjective judgments have played a "significant" and "critical" role in the face of inadequate data.10 One assessor, for example, made a number of questionable hydrological assumptions, built a computer model based on these assumptions-and then concluded that the untested model was "an effective tool for the simulation of the performance of the repository systems at Yucca Mountain."11 Similarly, other Yucca Mountain assessors admitted that they had ignored crucial hydrological and geological parameters; nevertheless, they concluded that radioactive releases at the site would be "significantly less" than those permitted by governmental standards.12 Obviously, such subjective opinions are neither inductively reasonable nor deductively valid. That fact has not gone unnoticed. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission and committees of the National Academy of Sciences have questioned the degree of certainty in the Yucca Mountain risk assessments. Although appeals to authority are sometimes unavoidable in science, they should never misrepresent the degree of uncertainty that has been encountered. Because Energy Department assessors often do not admit their uncertainties and instead claim that the Yucca Mountain site will be suitable for 10,000 years-or even 100,000 years-they use their expertise in misleading ways. As one Energy Department peer reviewer put it, if some data are "subjectively" determined, as the Energy Department assessors admit, then "why couldn't it [the decision that the site is "suitable"] just as well be . . . [that it is] unsuitable?"13 A fundamental problem with Yucca Mountain risk assessments is that U.S. government regulations require that assessors guarantee repository safety for 10,000 years. To reach that goal, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission have both spelled out specific, long-term, numerical criteria for safe disposal. Many scientists say that precise prediction over such a timespan is impossible. Kip Hodges, a geologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a peer reviewer for the Energy Department, notes that geology is an explanatory science, not a predictive science. It is "patently absurd," he says, to attempt to predict the precise probability of volcanic disruption at Yucca Mountain for 10,000 years.14 Either/or Why have assessors at Yucca Mountain used problematic appeals to ignorance and to authority? Part of the answer could be that the Energy Department has put its assessors into a box-it does not allow them to conclude that the data are inadequate or that a site decision is not yet possible. Instead, Energy forces them to employ a two-valued, black-or-white "frame" for their judgments: The site is either suitable or it is not suitable. The ESSE peer review panel put it this way: "The DOE General Siting Guidelines . . . do not allow a 'no decision' finding . . . . Thus the ESSE Core Team followed the intent of the guidelines."15 That either/or constraint alarmed some members of the peer review panel. They said that there was "not enough defensible, site-specific information available to warrant acceptance or rejection of this site."16 But there was no third alternative for the authors of the ESSE. They had to use the "site suitable/unsuitable" frame they "were given" by the Energy Department. The warnings of the peer reviewers suggest that when rigorous and precise testing is not possible, a three-value frame (site suitable; site unsuitable; site suitability uncertain at present) would be preferable. Conventional decision theory likewise suggests that even a high probability of site suitability may not be "high enough" if the repository could pose serious consequences for public welfare. Use of an either/or frame may not be reasonable in situations where a mistake in assessment can have potentially grave public consequences. To be sure, one does not need scientific certainty before one acts. In science, absolute certainty is unattainable. Permanent disposal of high-level waste and spent fuel at Yucca Mountain does not require absolute certainty, but it does require more certainty than we now have. Wait and see The Energy Department's imposition of an either/or assessment frame may not be the only reason that Yucca Mountain studies have used problematic appeals to ignorance and authority. Policy-makers may have given the Energy Department an impossible task. According to a National Academy of Sciences committee, the U.S. approach to permanent disposal "is poorly matched to the technical task at hand. It assumes that the properties and future behavior of a geological repository can be determined and specified with a very high degree of certainty. In reality, however . . . the current program is not sufficiently flexible or exploratory."17 Alvin Weinberg, a nuclear power advocate for nearly 50 years, makes a related point. In 1987, he told Congress that U.S. management of high-level waste has been like a football game. We have been trying for a touchdown with permanent geological disposal. But we fumbled. Now we must try for a first down. We can do that, he said, by following the example of Sweden: Develop inherently safe nuclear waste packages "that are completely resistant, even if the repository is invaded by water, for much longer than . . . 300,000 years."18 Current U.S. disposal plans focus more on the repository than the waste containers. The site must be reasonably environmentally secure for 10,000 years or longer; in contrast, the waste packages need to resist leaks for only 300 years. Weinberg's recommendation calls for an improvement in the life of the containers by three orders of magnitude. The first step in following his recommendation, he says, is to cool the wastes for up to 100 years in temporary facilities rather than for the planned 10 years. After 100 years, he estimates, the heat generated per minute by the waste would be only one-fourth as great as that produced after 10 years. Cooling also would reduce the probability of canister leaks once the waste is placed in permanent storage. Although Weinberg favors permanent storage, he is a proponent of temporary monitored retrievable storage for the first 100 years. This wait-and-see position makes a great deal of scientific sense. Wait and see if we can develop more resistant containers. Wait and see if we can devise a way to render radioactive materials less harmful. Wait and see if we can resolve some of the uncertainties regarding long-term safety at a permanent repository. Establishing a system of geographically scattered, retrievable storage sites is an idea that has been around for many years. For temporary storage to be successful, however, government would need to negotiate site selection with potential host communities rather than to impose facilities on them as it is now trying to do at Yucca Mountain. A negotiated system also would require the government to monitor the waste rather than simply bury it and leave it unmonitored, as planned at Yucca Mountain. Most important, it would enable the scientific and regulatory community to learn-in stages-how best to store high-level nuclear waste safely. The overarching rationale for retrievable storage is simple. If some dangerous technologies-like those for high-level nuclear waste disposal-are unforgiving, then it makes sense to lengthen the scientific and regulatory "learning curves." Retrievability buys time and increases our scientific and ethical options. After 100 years of experience with NMRS facilities, we would be in a better position to make decisions regarding disposal schemes. A central geological repository might still look good a century from now. But so might continued surface storage-or even sub-seabed disposal. Transmutation-showering the waste with neutrons to convert fission products to stable or short-lived radioactive isotopes- might prove workable by then, thus making it possible to think in shorter time frames for storing waste. A future ethic In 1972, Alvin Weinberg described the problem of nuclear wastes as a "Faustian bargain." In return for the present benefits of atomic energy, we must export the risks of its wastes to future generations. Because we have already made the bargain, we cannot avoid dealing with the radioactive wastes we have generated. We can, however, choose better or worse ways to live out the consequences of our pact with Mephistopheles. Opposition to the proposed Yucca Mountain repository is bitter in Nevada. Part of the reason is the widespread belief among Nevadans that their state is being treated inequitably; it must bear the high-level nuclear waste burden for the entire nation. The country as a whole made the Faustian bargain, but only Nevadans are supposed to pay the price. And because the Yucca Mountain waste would not be retrievable, future generations would also pay the price. They would not have the option of freely consenting to continued storage. Regional NMRS facilities are desirable, in part, because they would help spread the risk of disposal over time-and over the nation's geography. Neither Nevadans nor members of future generations would bear the sole burden. Multiple NMRS facilities thus would minimize the geographical and temporal inequities associated with a permanent, unmonitored, nonretrievable facility that places the greatest risks on one region and on future generations. NMRS is not just pie in the sky. Although the Energy Department is wedded to permanent geological disposal, a number of communities have already offered to host NMRS facilities. Among them are Nye County, Nevada; Morgan County, Tennessee; and the Yakima Indian Nation, in the state of Washington. In the last issue of the Bulletin, Luther Carter described how the Mescalero Indians of Arizona were pitching such a plan. The willingness of some communities to accept an NMRS suggests that temporary storage might be more politically acceptable than a permanent facility. Of course, the communities that might accept an NMRS facility are likely to be impoverished and looking for an economic boost. In Morgan County, Tennessee, for instance, the unemployment rate is far above the national average and per-capita incomes are low. Schools are poor and other services meager. About half of the local tax collected is needed merely to service the county's bonded debt. In offering to host a temporary waste facility, the representatives of Morgan County made it clear that the operators of the facility would have to underwrite a substantial portion of the county's operating expenses, including servicing its debt. Because poverty can raise serious questions about the voluntariness of a host community's informed consent, the negotiation process would have to maximize consent, equity, and due process. Nevertheless, using NMRS facilities for a hundred years seems preferable to a central permanent repository, because it would require the imposition of fewer and shorter-term burdens on the most vulnerable groups: host communities and future generations. Minimal fairness requires the current generation to clean up its own mess, or to somehow pay its descendants-in full-to do it. Reading the riddle Perhaps the most obvious objections to NMRS sites are that the facilities would be unsafe, that they would be targets for terrorist attacks, and that they would contribute to the proliferation problem. Although the Energy Department argues that a permanent geological repository would be safer than temporary, monitored facilities, the question is, "Safer for whom?" Certainly not safer for members of future generations who might be harmed by leakage from an unmonitored facility. Numerous members of Congress, study groups at sites wishing to host NMRS facilities, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, and the U.S. Monitored Retrievable Storage Review Commission have affirmed the safety of 100-year storage. In 1989, after extensive study, the MRS Review Commission said simply: "MRS options are safe." The commission supported its arguments with detailed calculations. It estimated, for example, that the total radiation doses, both to the public and to workers, would be less in the case of an NMRS facility not linked to a repository than for a permanent facility handling the same amount of waste. The review commission indicated, however, that it did not believe the safety differences were great between the two options. It likewise emphasized that the NMRS option was safer than onsite storage at reactors, in part because the NMRS facility would employ experienced fuel handlers and would have a full staff available.19 Admittedly, temporary storage facilities would be more susceptible to terrorism and sabotage than a permanent geological repository. But the monitoring and management of NMRS sites might make them better able to resist such attacks once they occurred. Also, given current building technology, it should be possible to construct surface structures that are extremely protective. Another objection to deferring the decision about a permanent repository and instead using NMRS facilities for a century is that, over the long term, such storage would be more expensive than permanent disposal. A host of analysts have looked at the cost question, but it is not clear that permanent geological disposal would be cheaper. The economics of permanent disposal depends on when and how much the facility leaks. The sooner and bigger the leaks, the higher the environmental costs. But dollar costs are not the central consideration. The main reason many people claim NMRS sites are often viewed as more expensive is that permanent geological disposal does not achieve the same level of pollution control. As just mentioned, a permanent site would leak. The scientific argument is largely over how quickly it would leak, how much it would leak, and how rapidly the leakage might reach the water table. Permanent disposal is premised on a philosophy of "dilute and disperse." In contrast, NMRS is based on containment. Dilution and dispersal of hazardous substances is always cheaper than containment. The main problem with the economic objection to NMRS sites is that cost considerations, although an important policy determinant, ought not to be the only or the primary determinant of waste policy. After all, if cost were the sole criterion for a reasonable choice, one might be able to argue for dumping radioactive materials into the sea or for using shallow land burial. The use of narrow economic criteria for waste management is also undesirable because we have produced the radioactive materials; we have an ethical obligation to do as much as is necessary and possible to protect subsequent generations. To argue that economics ought to be the principal determinant of waste policy would be to use an expediency criterion for recognition or denial of a basic human right to equal protection of the laws. The U.S. Constitution does not say that we have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness "provided that it is economical to recognize the right." If U.S. nuclear waste policy is to be consistent with existing philosophical, legal, and political doctrines about human rights, then expediency ought not be our primary guide. Yet another objection to NMRS facilities is that they might become de facto permanent repositories. We might avoid such an outcome, however, if the facilities were established with inflexible legal lifetimes. If the consequences of noncompliance were great, NMRS sites would be less likely to become permanent. The argument that NMRS facilities might become permanent is especially weak when one considers the alternative. At the moment, government policy is to push ahead with the permanent, unmonitored, nonretrievable disposal of nuclear waste in the face of grave scientific uncertainties. With the NMRS plan, the government would admit ignorance-and then deal with it in a systematic and conservative way. Humankind has been civilized for only about 10,000 years, yet the United States faces the task of storing radionuclides such as plutonium, which remains dangerous for more than 250,000 years. Given our short experience in handling such materials, how can we deal adequately with long-lived radioactive waste? The short answer is, "We can't." We do not yet know how to do the job right. That's why Yucca Mountain is a profoundly bad idea. Although he did not intend it, J.R.R. Tolkien, in The Lord of the Rings, suggested an answer to the riddle of nuclear waste. The ring gave mastery over every living creature. But because it was created by an evil power, it inevitably corrupted anyone who attempted to use it. How should the Hobbits, who held the ring, deal with it? Erestor articulated the dilemma: "There are but two courses, as Glorfindel already has declared: to hide the Ring forever; or to unmake it. But both are beyond our power. Who will read this riddle for us?" Humankind will eventually read the riddle. But at the moment, in the United States and elsewhere, its complexities are beyond us. In 100 years, that may not be the case. ------------------------------------------------------- 1. Energy Department cited in R. Monastersky, "The 10,000-Year Test," Science News 133, no. 9 (Feb. 27, 1988), pp. 139-41. See also G. Hart, "Address to the Forum," U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Proceedings of a Public Forum on Environmental Protection Criteria for Radioactive Wastes, ORP/CSD-78-2 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, May 1978), p. 6. 2. U.S. Department of Energy, Nuclear Waste Policy Act, Environmental Assessment, Yucca Mountain Site, Nevada Research and Development Area, Nevada, DOE/RW-0073, 3 vols. (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Energy, 1986), vol. 2, p. 6-242. 3. U.S. Geological Survey, Vegetation and Climates of the Last 45,000 Years in the Vicinity of the Nevada Test Site, South-Central Nevada (Reston, Virginia: U.S. Geological Survey, 1985) (Item 394 in U.S. Department of Energy, DE88004834). 4. F. Thompson, F. Dove, and K. Krupka, Preliminary Upper-Bound Consequence Analysis for a Waste Repository at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, SAND83-7475 (Albuquerque, New Mexico: Sandia National Laboratories, 1984), pp. v-vi, 4, 47. 5. S. Sinnock and T. Lin, Preliminary Estimates of Groundwater Travel-Time and Radionuclide Transport at the Yucca Mountain Repository Site, SAND85-270 (Albuquerque, New Mexico: Sandia National Laboratories, 1986), p. 77. 6. Ibid., pp. i-ii. 7. J.L. Younker, W.B. Andrews, et al., Report of Early Site-Suitability Evaluation of the Potential Repository Site at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, SAIC-91/8000 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Energy, 1992), p. 2-150. 8. Ibid., p. 2-157. 9. Ibid., p. E-11. 10. Ibid., pp. 1-18, 2-6. 11. Y. Lin, Sparton-A Simple Performance Assessment Code for the Nevada Nuclear Waste Storage Investigations Project, SAND85-0602 (Albuquerque, New Mexico: Sandia National Laboratories, 1985), pp. i, 1. 12. Sinnock and Lin, Preliminary Estimates, pp. i, 47. 13. J.L. Younker, S.L. Albrecht, et al., Report of the Peer Review Panel on the Early Site-Suitability Evaluation of the Potential Repository Site at Yucca Mountain, Nevada, SAIC-91/8001 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Energy, 1992), p. 112. 14. Ibid., p. 384. 15. Ibid., p. B-2. 16. Ibid., pp. 460, 257, 40-51. 17. F.L. Parker et al., Rethinking High-Level Radioactive Waste Disposal (Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, 1990). 18. Statement of Alvin Weinberg, Hearings Before the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Senate, First Session, Part 2, Nuclear Waste Program (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1987), pp. 2-5; see also N. Lenssen, Nuclear Waste (Washington, D.C.: Worldwatch, 1991), pp. 27-28. 19. A. Radin, D. Klein, and F. Parker, Monitored Retrievable Storage Review Commission, Nuclear Waste: Is There a Need for Federal Interim Storage? (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1989), pp. 30-31. ===== http://www.angelfire.com/mi/smilinks/thirdeye.html http://lists.village.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Exhibits/Track16/fuck_draft.html http://lists.village.virginia.edu/sixties/HTML_docs/Exhibits/Track16/i_want_out.html __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Make a great connection at Yahoo! Personals. http://personals.yahoo.com ***************************************************************** 6 Ofgem weakens nuclear argument Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Terry Macalister Tuesday October 30, 2001 The Guardian The electricity and gas regulator, Ofgem, yesterday undermined the nuclear industry's push for a new generation of power stations by arguing that there was no looming shortage of energy. Callum McCarthy, Ofgem chief executive, said gas and electricity supplies were more secure and diverse than they had ever been and that he was confident about the future. Launching a submission to the government's energy policy review, Mr McCarthy said there was no need for a radical change in energy policy direction. "If it ain't broke, don't fix it," he argued. Ofgem said the government should ensure that planning procedures were speeded up, continental energy markets liberalised and abuse of market power stamped out. Mr McCarthy castigated some of the other contributions to the energy review as "special pleading" based often on "erroneous" assumptions. Asked whether Ofgem's more relaxed attitude was not dangerous, Mr McCarthy replied: "It's not a matter of being complacent. It's a matter of deciding what the facts are." The nuclear industry, led by British Energy, has been campaigning hard for the go-ahead for a range of new plants. The ground has been laid by critics arguing that Britain has failed to prepare itself for a fall-off in North Sea oil production and that the country could become dependent on imported gas. Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2001 ***************************************************************** 7 Air rules sought near nuclear plant (October 30, 2001) Cape Cod Times: Safety and emergency upgrades are discussed in a meeting with Plymouth area residents. By KEVIN DENNEHY STAFF WRITER PLYMOUTH - People who live near the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station stop what they're doing when airplanes fly overhead. They wait until the plane passes, making sure hijackers haven't turned the passenger aircraft into a guided missile, said Plymouth Selectman Kenneth Tavares. It's one of the many post-Sept. 11 worries that plague residents near the state's only nuclear power facility. Tracking a plane is easy; intercepting the aircraft before it wreaks havoc is the problem, residents say. "I know the (FAA) can see a plane as soon as it deviates," said John Anderson Jr., a former pilot and Air National Guardsman from Duxbury. "But what the heck can they do about it?" A cadre of local, state and federal officials met with area residents yesterday at Plymouth Town Hall to discuss Pilgrim safety. Many of the questions remain unanswered, admits U.S. Rep. William Delahunt, D-Mass. Nuclear plants like Pilgrim are generally very durable structures that were well-secured even before the terror attacks, said Jim Wiggins, the deputy regional administrator of the northeast region of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. But the NRC has never conducted tests to determine whether nuclear plants could withstand the impact of a Boeing 757 or 767 if used as a targeted missile, Wiggins said. Wiggins said the best prevention is to keep hijackers from getting into the cockpits of American planes, since there isn't enough money to fly military missions above all 103 nuclear plants in the United States. Delahunt said more money has to be spent to make nuclear plants more durable. Some of the funds could be diverted from the billions of dollars stockpiled to establish a permanent home for nuclear waste, he said. "I don't want to go beyond what is reasonable," Delahunt said. "But I think we have to recognize there is a psychological element to terrorism... the fact that we live our lives differently, the fact that we don't sleep quite as well. "We should spend the money ... so we don't have that sense of unease." Security personnel at Pilgrim have been on the highest level of alert since the hour following the World Trade Center crashes. Last week, the private security hired by Pilgrim management was bolstered with armed National Guardsmen who patrol the plant's perimeter. Coast Guard doubles buffer zone The Coast Guard announced yesterday that it will double the protective buffer zone around the plant to about 1,000 yards. They're also considering putting up permanent buoys to let boaters know where access is restricted, said Capt. Jim Murray of Coast Guard Group Woods Hole. "I think we have a much better comfort level than we did a month ago," said state Sen. Therese Murray, D-Plymouth, who pushed acting Gov. Jane Swift to place National Guard military police at the plant. But there are many who still worry about a terrorist attack, something that seemed unthinkable until Sept. 11. One idea proposed to buffer security is creating a no-fly zone above the plant. That plan would be difficulty to implement, said Bill Ellis, the manager of the FAA's New England region air traffic division. Large commercial jets no longer fly above Pilgrim, and the FAA has advised small-plane pilots to avoid flying over nuclear plants. But pilots of small planes don't have to file flight plans with air-traffic controllers, and Ellis conceded that no-fly advisories won't stop a pilot from flying where he wants to. "It's not going to preclude anyone who wants to get into that airspace to get into that airspace," he said. Still, one resident called for new military rules of engagement in case an airplane does fly too close to nuclear plants. Murray said she'd like to see the FAA at least impose stricter sanctions on pilots who fly in that area. And she says she doesn't want to see just fines - pilots should face the loss of license. Ellis said there is no legislation currently before Congress regarding no-fly zones. Concern on the Cape Most officials recognized the need for local towns to reassess their emergency response plans in case of an incident at Pilgrim. The towns within 10 miles of the plant - Plymouth, Marshfield, Duxbury, Kingston and Carver - must prepare an emergency evacuation plan. Tavares said those plans should be realistic and not simply look good on paper. Yvette Sedlewicz of Brewster said response plans should pay closer attention to towns on Cape Cod, which is not a part of the current state evacuation plan. In fact, residents on the Cape would be urged to stay on the Cape. The Sagamore Bridge would be closed and anyone wishing to leave would have to use the Bourne Bridge. State emergency officials say the potential threat would depend on the incident. Any incident at Pilgrim would result not in an explosion but in a plume of nuclear gas. Sedlewicz said there should be a evacuation plan for the Cape in case that nuclear gas is blown by southeasterly winds. And, she said, it's not encouraging to think about driving toward Plymouth if anything happened. "We on Cape Cod want to know how we are going to get off Cape Cod if there is a worst-case scenario and we are downwind," she said yesterday. While the Cape doesn't fit into evacuation plans, it does fall within a 50-mile "ingestion pathway." Towns within that range would be required to test farm and garden foods and water supplies for safety in the aftermath of nuclear incident. Delahunt said communities should reassess whether that is enough precaution. But, he added, he wouldn't feel unsafe on Cape Cod and wouldn't suggest anyone else should. The Plymouth selectmen are calling for immediate removal of spent fuel that is still kept on site, which they consider a substantial risk. Copyright © 2001 Cape Cod Times. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 8 U.N. Environment Agency to Assess Depleted Uranium Sites in Serbia, Montenegro [Xinhua News Agency] Story Filed: Monday, October 29, 2001 1:45 PM EST UNITED NATIONS, Oct 29, 2001 (Xinhua via COMTEX) -- A team of experts from the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) is visiting the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia this week to investigate sites in Serbia and Montenegro that were targeted by ordnance containing depleted uranium (DU) during the 1999 Kosovo conflict, U.N. officials said here Monday. The team's mission, which was requested by Yugoslav and Montenegrin authorities, will build on a study published earlier this year on the environmental impact of DU in Kosovo, the officials said. "Although our Kosovo report showed no cause for alarm, it did highlight specific situations where risks could be significant," said UNEP Executive Director Klaus Topfer. "There are also scientific uncertainties about the longer-term behavior of DU in the environment." Toepfer noted that UNEP has called for certain precautionary actions, including removing slightly radioactive ammunition parts remaining on the surface, decontaminating areas where feasible, and providing information to local populations on what to do if they discover depleted uranium. "The Kosovo report also recommended conducting scientific studies in other areas where DU has been used," he added. The UNEP team will take samples and measurements at sites in Serbia's Presevo Valley and Montenegro's Cape Arza. The sites have been identified from the coordinate information and maps provided to UNEP by NATO in 2000. Sites targeted during the conflict as well as areas where decontamination work has since taken place will be visited. Led by Pekka Haavisto, the team includes specialists from the Swedish Radiation Protection Authority, AC Laboratorium Spiez of Switzerland, Italy's National Environmental Protection Agency, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the Greek Atomic Energy Commissions Environmental Radioactivity Laboratory, the Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority, and the Russian State Institute for the Safe Development of Nuclear Energy. The team's report on Serbia and Montenegro should be available in February 2002, according to UNEP, which has also conducted environmental assessments in the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Albania. Copyright 2001 XINHUA NEWS AGENCY ***************************************************************** 9 CONSTRUCTION OF A NUCLEAR POWERPLANT IS RESUMED Source: A Information Services [A&G Information Services] Story Filed: Monday, October 29, 2001 6:25 PM EST ST.PETERSBURG, RUSSIA, OCT 28, 2001 (A News via COMTEX) -- The government of Archangelsk region decided to resume the construction of the local nuclear powerplant suspended 10 years ago due to numerous protests by ecological organizations. The decision to continue construction was explained by the fact that the now functioning, but very old, thermoelectric power station has depreciated physically and is long behind the modern era. A new powerplant is the only way to improve the electric power supply of the region. URL: http://www.aginform.com Copyright (C) 2001, A Information Services, all rights reserved Copyright © 2001, A Information Services, all rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 10 IDF denies New Yorker nuke report [The Jerusalem Post Internet Edition] 14 Heshvan 5762 22:10Tuesday October 30, 2001 The IDF Spokesman flatly denied a recent report in the New Yorker magazine that Israeli commandos were training an elite American military unit on how to "exfiltrate" Pakistani nuclear weapons. "This is a baseless report," the spokesman told The Jerusalem Post's Arieh O'Sullivan. We are unaware of any units training with the Americans, military officials said. [The International Jerusalem Post] Click Here to order a one-year subscription to The International Jerusalem Post for ***************************************************************** 11 Flaherty defends deal to lease Bruce nuclear plant to UK firm Tuesday, October 30, 2001 By CP TORONTO -- The deal to lease the Bruce nuclear facility to a British company is fair and necessary to fix the province's aging electricity grid, Ontario's finance minister said yesterday. Jim Flaherty defended during question period against accusations British Energy PLC got a sweetheart deal to lease the $7.7-billion facility for as little as $16 million a year in 2019, when the current lease expires. The company estimates it will make about $160 million in pre-tax profit from the one half of the station now operating on Lake Huron, about 250 kilometres northwest of Toronto. "This is a $3-billion investment of private sector money in electricity production in Ontario," Flaherty told NDP Leader Howard Hampton after a media report questioned the fairness of the deal. "We welcome it." Flaherty said in the first year, British Energy will pay the government $625 million in three instalments and that annual fixed and variable payments in the first year will average about $150 million. Hampton criticized the deal for giving British Energy the option of backing out any time after 2006 if the company deems the plant not financially viable. But Flaherty said the company will have to pay a $175-million penalty to Ontario Power Generation if they terminate the agreement. "These are good protective provisions for the people of Ontario." Later yesterday, Hampton accused Flaherty and the Conservatives of hiding key information about the deal from the public. "They have delayed a provincial auditor's review of it, they have refused to make available any of the documents unless and until the privacy commissioner forced them to make available some limited documents," he said. That profit will be boosted when the market is deregulated sometime later this year, when prices will be determined by open-market costs in neighbouring U.S. states, Hampton added. "(The price of electricity is) at least 50 per cent higher in those states," he said of New York and Michigan. The Bruce transaction is the first big privatization in Ontario's electricity industry under rules the province adopted forcing Ontario Power to reduce its share of the market to 35 per cent from 85 per cent. Copyright © 2001, The London Free Press. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 12 Wanted: 12 Children of Chornobyl families Tuesday, October 30, 2001 Wanted: 12 Children of Chornobyl families By , Free Press Reporter  Wanted: 12 London families with youngsters between the age of nine and 12 willing to take on an experience that will change them -- forever. London's 11-year-old Children of Chornobyl program is now gearing up to recruit families willing to open their homes from Aug. 10 to Sept. 21 to take in children living in the aftermath of the world's worst nuclear disaster. Each year, at least 12 new youngsters join the program while returning youngsters come if their host families are willing to pay their fare. For new youngsters, however, the host family pays only the $150 medical insurance and chips in $30 toward the cost of an interpreter that accompanies the kids. Host families also cover their guests' living expenses. The program's objective is to provide much needed medical and dental care to the children trying to survive in one of the poorest parts of the Ukraine. The devastating Chornobyl explosion that spread a cloud of radiation in 1986 over much of Europe, is blamed for at least 8,000 deaths. London doctors and dentists donate their time and resources to treat the kids. But Linda Dickson, chair of the program, says host families gain as much as they give. "We look for people who can provide a loving and caring household for these kids," Dickson said. To learn more and receive an application, interested families should contact Dickson by Nov. 30 at 461-0553. Copyright © 2001, The London Free Press. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 13 NRC checks tube problem at Three Mile Isl Pa. nuke Tuesday October 30, 7:38 am Eastern Time NEW YORK, Oct 30 (Reuters) - The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) said late Monday it sent an inspection team to investigate a steam generator tube problem at the 786-megawatt Three Mile Island nuclear unit in Pennsylvania. During an inspection of steam generator tubes last week as part of a refueling outage at Three Mile Island, AmerGen Energy Co., which owns the plant, found a plugged steam generator tube had separated from the tube sheet and caused wear on several adjoining tubes, the NRC said in a statement. The cause of the separation was being evaluated, the NRC said. An inspection report will be issued about 45 days from the end of the inspection. Steam generators transfer heat from the reactor systems to the power-generating portion of a nuclear power plant. Three Mile Island was shut on Oct. 8 for scheduled refueling and maintenance. The unit will likely remain out of service until Nov. 10, a week longer than expected, according to electricity traders. Separately, the NRC said it will review AmerGen's work to identify and repair small cracks associated with control rod drive mechanism nozzle penetrations in Three Mile Island's reactor vessel head. The Three Mile Island station is located in Londonderry Township, Pa. AmerGen is a joint venture between Exelon Corp. (NYSE:EXC - news) of Chicago, the parent of Exelon Nuclear, which operates the reactor, and British Energy Plc (quote from Yahoo! UK & Ireland: BGY.L) of Edinburgh, Scotland. Copyright © 2001 Yahoo! Inc. All rights reserved. Privacy ***************************************************************** 14 ADAMS: Items of Interest - Tuesday, October 30, 2001 State of Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects ADAMS - Items of Interest Recent Released Documents Added - Tuesday, October 30, 2001 These documents and others may be retrieved at the NRC PERR web site Item ID: 013020087 Accession Number: ML012970192 Document Date: 10/23/01 Title: 08/28/2001 Meeting with Industry on Issues Regarding Technical Basis for Reactor Pressure Vessel Closure Flange Rulemaking. Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DE/EMCB Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020009 Accession Number: ML012970248 Document Date: Title: 8/28/2001 Meeting with Industry on Issues Regarding Technical Basis for Reactor Pressure Vessel Closure Flange Rulemaking Author Affiliation: Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020134 Accession Number: ML012960152 Document Date: 9/17/01 Title: 9/19/2001 mtg summary (attmt) with (NEI), Southern Nuclear Operating Company (SNC), Florida Power and Light Company (FPL), Virginia Electric and Power Company (VEPCO), Duke Energy Corporation (Duke), & Exelon Generation Company Author Affiliation: NRC Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020090 Accession Number: ML012960325 Document Date: 10/21/01 Title: 9/19/2001Mtg summary with Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI), Southern Nuclear Operating Company (SNC), Florida Power and Light Company (FPL), Virginia Electric and Power Company (VEPCO), Duke Energy Corporation (Duke), and Exelon Generation Company (Exelon) Author Affiliation: NRC/NRR/DRIP Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020251 Accession Number: ML012570066 Document Date: 9/7/01 Title: Comment (873) submitted by Frank McKeon opposing Proposed Rule PR-1, 2, 50, 51, 52, 54, 60, 70, 73, 76 and 110 regarding Changes to Adjudicatory Process. Author Affiliation: - No Known Affiliation Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020145 Accession Number: ML012970447 Document Date: 10/16/01 Title: Comment (1) submitted by Glenn Michael, Arizona Public Service Company on Proposed Rule PR-72 re amendment 2 of NAC UMS dry cask certificate of compliance & tech specs. Author Affiliation: Arizona Public Service Co Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020199 Accession Number: ML012420436 Document Date: 9/19/01 Title: G20010344/LTR-01-0411 - Ltr to Rep. Sonny Callahan re: Comments on Part 35, Medical Regulations (John T. Renz) Author Affiliation: NRC/EDO Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020144 Accession Number: ML012920594 Document Date: 10/12/01 Title: GE Nuclear Energy - SAFER/GESTR-LOCA Analysis Process Siminar - October 18, 2001, GE Presentation Slides. Author Affiliation: GE Nuclear Energy Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020234 Accession Number: ML013020363 Document Date: 9/30/01 Title: NUREG/CR-6745, "Dry Cask Storage Characterization Project-Phase 1: CASTOR V/21 Cask Opening and Examination." Author Affiliation: Idaho National Engineering & Environmental Lab, NRC/RES/DET Document/Report Number: NUREG/CR-6745 _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020201 Accession Number: ML012970489 Document Date: 10/10/01 Title: STATE OF UTAH'S PETITION FOR IMMEDIATE RELIEF SUSPENDING LICENSING PROCEEDINGS Author Affiliation: State of UT Document/Report Number: _________________________________________________________________ Item ID: 013020194 Accession Number: ML013020285 Document Date: 8/25/00 Title: Transmittal of Report "Review of US DOE Evaluation of Thermal Performance Analysis & Dissolution Rates of Melt & Dilute Aluminum-Based Spent Nuclear Fuel." Author Affiliation: Center for Nuclear Waste Regulatory Analyses, (CNWRA) Document/Report Number: ***************************************************************** 15 DOE To Host "Open House" At Yucca Mountain Site Press Releases For Immediate Release: Saturday, October 27, 2001 News Media Contacts: Joe Davis, 202/586-4940, Allen Benson, 702/794-1322 -- Saturday, November 3 -- Washington, DC — U.S. Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham announced today that the Department of Energy will hold an open house at the Yucca Mountain Project on Saturday, November 3, 2001 for those citizens wishing to visit the facility and to speak with project scientists and engineers about the ongoing work at the site. "I have previously indicated that I would review suggestions about additional public involvement. One important way we can increase the quality and scope of information available to the public is to allow those citizens who wish to see the site for themselves to do so at an 'open house.' The 'open house' will provide citizens with an important opportunity to learn more about the science and engineering work being conducted at the Yucca Mountain site. In addition, citizens will be able to ask our scientist and engineers questions regarding the project," said Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham. The open house will run from 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. The Department will provide transportation. No personal transportation is permitted to and from the open house. Visitors will be permitted to walk inside the Yucca Mountain Project's Exploratory Studies Facility (an underground tunnel used for scientific experiments), travel to the 5,000-foot-high Yucca Mountain crest, and visit the tunnel-boring machine. In addition, a state-of-the-art spent nuclear fuel transportation cask will be on-site for public viewing and experts will be available to address citizens' questions regarding a variety of issues. TRANSPORTATION: Buses for the open house will leave from three locations: Las Vegas, Pahrump, and Beatty, Nevada. + Las Vegas: buses will leave from the Las Vegas Science Center ( 4101-B Meadows Lane) every 15 minutes between 7:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m, and returning from the site between 11:30 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. + Pahrump: buses will leave the Pahrump Science Center (1141 S. Highway 160), every 30 minutes between 7:30 a.m. and 11:30 a.m., returning from the site between 11:30 a.m. and 3:30 p.m. + Beatty: two buses will leave the Beatty Science Center (100 North E Ave.), at 8 a.m. and 10 a.m., returning at 1 p.m. and 2 p.m. Lunch may be purchased at the Yucca Mountain site. MEDIA: A media bus will leave the Las Vegas Science Center promptly at 9:00 a.m. and will depart Yucca Mountain promptly at 2:30 p.m. Media wishing to attend the open house must register 24 hours in advance. Due to security arrangements of the Nevada Test Site, media must present recognized and approved media credentials. Certain requirements regarding photography and recording equipment apply. Please call Yucca Mountain Public Affairs regarding these requirements VISITOR REQUIREMENTS: Visitors must be at least 14 years old and citizens of the United States. Visitors will be required to present photo identification. Reservations are highly recommended, and interested persons may call 1-800-225-6972. Long pants, closed toe shoes, and shirts with sleeves are required. No recording devices, cameras, binoculars or weapons are allowed on the Nevada Test Site. Visitors and belongings are subject to security search and screening. -DOE- YMP-01-09 ***************************************************************** 16 Should anti-radiation pills be offered here? LancasterOnline.com Tuesday, October 30 By Ad Crable New Era Staff Writer Lancaster County has a case of nuclear nerves all over again. And just like 22 years ago, the tiny potassium iodide pill is in the midst of the mounting public anxiety. During the first uncertain days of the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island, the federal government ordered an emergency production of the pills. The plan was to hand them out to the public for protection against radioactive iodine gas poisoning. But due to a series of snafus, the 237,000 bottles of potassium iodide didn't make it to Harrisburg for six days, and by then the accident was almost over. Fortunately, no iodine gas was released from the plant and the Food and Drug Administration ordered the bottles destroyed. Since then, debate has simmered over whether people living near nuclear plants in 33 states should be issued potassium iodide tablets to have on hand in case of an accident at a plant. The nationwide debate has intensified in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. And with the TMI and Peach Bottom nuclear plants so close, fears of a terrorist assault at one of those facilities have sparked particular concerns in Lancaster County. Should emergency workers and farmers living within 10 miles of those potential targets, for example, get the potassium iodide or "KI" pills from the state? In accordance with Pennsylvania's current nuclear accident policy, Lancaster County Emergency Management Agency officials have 1,799 KI tablets in storage in Manheim. They say they could distribute them within an hour. Also, some nursing home resiÄ-Ädents, hospital patients and workers even prisoners in the potentially affected zones currently have KI tablets on hand. But most residents throughout the county would be urged to take shelter in the event of an accident. If something happened at TMI, areas in the county in which farmers and emergency workers would get KI pills include Elizabethtown and West Donegal, East Donegal, Mount Joy and Conoy townships. For an accident at the Peach Bottom plant, Quarryville and Drumore, East Drumore, Little Britain, Fulton and parts of Martic and Providence townships fall under the plan. With a recent rumor that TMI was going to be attacked by a plane, and reports that one of the hijacked jets on Sept. 11 may have been headed for the nuclear plant, the KI controversy has suddenly become particularly relevant to local residents. Some have been contacting their doctors and pharmacies about getting the tablets. It appears no local pharmacies stock the tablets, even though they may be sold over the counter. "One woman said, "I'm scared to death of a nuclear attack,"' said Diane Boomsma, a pharmacist with Williams Apothecary in Lancaster, describing a recent phone request for KI tablets. Indeed, some people living near the country's 103 nuclear plants are already taking matters into their own hands. For example, the Florida-based American Civil Defense Association, which sells KI tablets, reports sales have jumped from 15 bottles a month to more than 500 since Sept. 11. Potassium iodide tablets are readily available for purchase over the Internet. Cost of the tablets ranges from 42 cents to $1.57 per dose. State officials have just decided to help the public get "KI" tablets on their own, if they want them. More sweeping changes may come on the federal level because of the terrorist attacks and heightened concern about nuclear plants. The Federal Emergency Management Agency may decide in several weeks to provide KI tablets to any state that wants them. Mass distribution has long been resisted by the nuclear industry for fears that it will portray nuclear power as unsafe. Pennsylvania continues to oppose handing out the tablets to all residents living within 10 miles of nuclear plants because of a concern that the tablets would be misconstrued by residents as a radiation cure-all and would hinder evacuation efforts. "The number-one protection action should be evacuation," says Dr. Kenneth Miller, a director of health physics at Hershey Medical Center, and head of a potassium iodide working group that completed a two-year study on the issue for the state. The study was done before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Iodine radiation is only one of some 200 radioactive elements that could be released in a nuclear accident, officials point out. "This is not a panacea or silver bullet," cautions Doug Fleck, the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency's radiological emergency preparedness planner. Others argue that thyroid cancers and other illnesses caused by inhaling or ingesting radioactive iodine is the most widespread danger especially to children and the most easily preventable. KI taken before or shortly after a radiation release can block much of the iodine radiation intake in the thyroid gland. Randy Gockley, coordinator of the Lancaster County Emergency Management Agency office, said that except for several calls during the Y2K concerns, local interest in having KI tablets in a home's medicine cabinet has been slight. But the Sept. 11 attacks and recent concerns about TMI being a target could change matters. After all, more than 10,000 Americans are believed to be taking antibiotics as a precaution against anthrax exposure, according to news accounts. Philip A. Colvin, deputy director at the County Emergency Management Agency office, said potassium iodide usually does not have side effects when taken in recommended doses. However, people who are allergic to potassium iodide should not take it. Pregnant and nursing women, babies and even people taking medication for a thyroid problem can take potassium iodide, he said. Usually, side effects of potassium iodide occur when people take high doses for a long time. Colvin said possible side effects include skin rashes, swelling of salivary glands, a metallic taste, burning mouth and throat, sore teeth and gums, symptoms of a head cold, and sometimes stomach upset and diarrhea. Recently, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which has left it up to states to decide whether to stockpile KI pills, is reviewing its policy. States will likely still be the final arbiter on whether to have KI pills on hand for everyone, but FEMA "is leaning towards urging states to do it as a protective measure," says the agency's Bruce Price. "It makes prudent sense, particularly with the current situation," Price said. In January, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission adopted a new policy that recommends states consider giving KI tablets to the general public "to supplement sheltering and evacuation in the event of a severe nuclear power plant accident." Both FEMA and the NRC are considering buying tablets for the states to stockpile for the public. To date, only Tennessee has given out KI tablets to the public. Alabama and Arizona stockpile tablets for the general public in case of an accident. New Hampshire recently took steps to make sure the public can buy it. The plans in the other 29 states with nuclear plants call for issuing KI tablets only to emergency workers. ©2001 Lancaster Newspapers, Inc. ***************************************************************** 17 Shutdown at Three Mile Island extended Daily News | philly.com for Search Help Tuesday, October 30, 2001 Associated Press HARRISBURG - The operators of Three Mile Island's Unit 1 nuclear reactor said yesterday they are extending a routine maintenance outage after finding small cracks in nozzles on the lid of the reactor vessel and wear on tubes in the steam generator. AmerGen Energy Co. said the cracks did not affect safety at the plant and were "not completely unexpected" based on reports from similarly designed plants. Originally scheduled to end in mid-November, the shutdown will be extended about three weeks, said Ralph DeSantis, a spokesman for the partnership that owns the plant. A leak in a tube could cause radioactive water from the reactor to be mixed with non-radioactive water bound for the turbines, an NRC spokesman said. Unit 1 is the only reactor operating at the plant. Unit 2 was mothballed after the nation's worst commercial nuclear accident in 1979. DeSantis said the extension was unrelated to security concerns at the plant. Two nearby airports were closed and military fighter jets were scrambled on Oct. 17 when federal authorities warned of a threat against the plant about 10 miles south of Harrisburg. Officials later determined the threat was not credible. * comments@staff.philly.com ***************************************************************** 18 Protesters Delay Nuclear Train Las Vegas SUN Today: October 30, 2001 at 12:00:34 PST BERLIN (AP) - Protesters briefly delayed a train carrying German nuclear waste to a British reprocessing plant Tuesday by sitting on the tracks, authorities said. Police said they detained 48 anti-nuclear activists. Police carried off about 30 activists who blocked the train for five minutes just after it left the Unterweser nuclear power plant near the northern city of Bremen before dawn. A truck driven onto the tracks by protesters and three activists who chained themselves to the rails were also removed, leading to 18 more detentions, police said. The train carrying the nuclear waste containers faced no further major delays on its journey southward through Germany. It crossed into France early Tuesday evening en route to Britain's Sellafield reprocessing plant. Activists regularly protest nuclear waste transports, which they consider dangerous. Germany sends spent fuel from its 19 nuclear power plants abroad for reprocessing under contracts that oblige it to take back the waste for storage in Germany. Activists are already gearing up for the latest shipment to the main storage site at Gorleben in northern Germany, expected in mid-November. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 19 Norway urges Sellafield curbs NEWS DIGEST Financial Times; Oct 30, 2001 By ANDREW TAYLOR Borge Brende, the Norwegian environment minister, has called on the UK government to halt radioactive emissions into the sea from the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant in Cumbria. Mr Brende, who met Margaret Beckett, environment secretary and Michael Meacher, environment minister, in Luxembourg yesterday, said traces of the nuclear compound technetium-99 had been discovered along the Norwegian coastline as far as Arctic areas. Andrew Taylor Copyright: The Financial Times Limited ***************************************************************** 20 Bulgarian nuclear plant boss denies it is not up to European safety standards BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Oct 30, 2001 Text of report in English by Bulgarian news agency BTA web site Kozloduy (on the Danube), 30 October: The Kozloduy nuclear power plant has attained European standards through numerous technical and technological improvements in line with the requirements for upgrading of its nuclear and operational safety, and its operation now is safe and reliable. This has been proved by several inspection missions of the International Atomic Energy Agency in the last two years, Executive Director Yordan Kostadinov told BTA, shocked by a statement by the French European parliament member Catherine Guy-Quint. On Tuesday [30 September] Kostadinov talked to a representative of Electricite de France (EDF) who was also surprised by Guy-Quint's statement. Guy-Quint, who was taking part in the 13th meeting of the EU-Bulgaria Joint Parliamentary Committee, said earlier on Tuesday that all reactors of the Kozloduy nuclear power plant should be decommissioned within a reasonable time frame. France will by no means make a compromise with safety, be it for Bulgaria or any other country. She quoted EDF experts as saying the Bulgarian nuclear power plant cannot go on functioning as it is. Asked by BTA whether closure could be avoided by investing in the upgrading of safety, Guy-Quint said the experts ruled out the possibility of reaching the European safety standards even with such investment. The trend in Europe is to diversify the energy sources, she said. Kostadinov familiarized Georgi Purvanov, the presidential candidate of the left-wing coalition of Bulgaria, with the upgrading programme of the four 440-megawatt reactors and the two 1,000-MW ones, which is being implemented in partnership with an international consortium and is financed by European and US banks. If France does not want to make compromise with the Kozloduy nuclear power plant, Bulgaria should by no means make a compromise to decommission reactors under pressure, Purvanov said. This is a blow on the most competitive sector and on national security, he said. This pressure is likely to continue, someone may link it with Bulgaria's accession to the EU, but the state and government bodies should not allow this to happen, according to Purvanov. Source: BTA web site, Sofia, in English 30 Oct 01 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. World Reporter All Material Subject to ***************************************************************** 21 German police detain activists for halting nuclear-waste train BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Oct 30, 2001 Text of report by German Deutschlandfunk radio on 30 October The nuclear waste shipment from the Unterweser nuclear power plant, near Bremen, to the British reprocessing plant of Sellafield, has been stopped several times so far. Members of the Greenpeace environmental protection group brought the train to a standstill by squatting on the tracks. Police have temporarily detained almost 50 anti-nuclear activists. The train is scheduled to cross the border to France tonight. Source: Deutschlandfunk radio, Cologne, in German 1200 gmt 30 Oct 01 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. World Reporter All Material Subject to ***************************************************************** 22 Mayak to resume waste processing The Mayak plant (South Urals) reprocesses fuel deriving from civilian and naval PWR type reactors. The Mayak combine in the southern Ural has reportedly commissioned a vitrification facility, which originally was scheduled to start operation in 1998. Bellona is monitoring the radiation at a Techa reservoir in the vicinity of Mayak. photo: Thomas Nilsen Igor Kudrik, 2001-10-30 17:24 The vitrification facility is processing high-level liquid radioactive waste, which is the by-product of spent nuclear fuel reprocessing. At the output, the waste is mixed with glass. In such form it can be stored relatively safe. Each tonne of reprocessed fuel results in around 45 cubic meters of high active liquid waste. The old vitrification facility at Mayak was taken out of operation in early 1997. At that time the plant was 2.5 years past its operational limits. The closure of the plant prompted the Russian State Nuclear Regulatory, GAN, to withdraw the reprocessing licence from the Mayak combine in spring 1997. GAN officials said that the licence was given on the condition that the waste is vitrified. Otherwise Mayak would have to accumulate the waste in the storage tanks for highly radioactive waste, and the capacity of those tanks was limited. The licence was returned later the same year after Mayak proved they had the capacity to store the waste temporarily before installing a new vitrification facility. The newly built vitrification facility has the same capacity as its former prototype - 500 litres of waste per hour, outputting 70kg of glass. The glass is placed into a temporary storage which is now one third full. Mayak officials say the plant will be able to process all the stored high active waste in five to six years to come. Vitrification will not get Mayak better off But the vitrification facility will not solve the disastrous environmental situation around Mayak. 150 cubic meters of medium and 2,000 cubic meters of low active liquid waste generated per tonne of reprocessed fuel are dumped into the Karachay Lake in the vicinity of Mayak. At the bottom of the Karachay Lake there is a lens-form formation with the dense concentration of highly radioactive waste. The 'lens' is gradually moving towards river system posing a threat of vast contamination. The system of Techa River reservoirs located six kilometres from Mayak contain huge amount of highly radioactive waste in sediments resulted from direct discharge in 1950s. The reservoirs are separated from the river system by dams. Each year, depending on the level of precipitation, there is a risk that the water level will increase high enough to flow over the dams. This year the water at one of the dams was 30cm from the critical mark. The management at Mayak say they can solve the problem if the South-Ural nuclear power plant is built in the area, which could use water from Techa reservoirs to cool the reactors. The construction of the South Ural NPP was launched in 1984. It was designed to operate on BN-800 type fast-breeder reactors. In 1987, the project was halted, but during the past couple of years the management of Mayak has been trying to put the construction of the plant back to the agenda. The main argument was the management's 'concern' for the environmental situation around the Techa reservoirs. Mayak fazing out The RT-1 reprocessing plant at Mayak is in operation since 1956. Originally designed to reprocess weapons grade plutonium from military reactors it was later modified to handle spent nuclear fuel from VVER-440 reactors, BN-30 and BN-600 reactors, as well as PWR maritime reactors installed onboard nuclear powered submarines and nuclear powered icebreakers. RT-1 can also reprocess spent fuel from some research reactors. The plant has design capacity of 400 tonnes of spent fuel per year. But the past ten years the plant's production level was rarely higher than 150 tonnes per year. The plans to upgrade RT-2 are not cheerfully accepted by the Ministry for Nuclear Energy, which supervises Mayak. The available reports suggest that the ministry would rather prefer to store spent nuclear fuel both from the domestic reactors and imported for a period of 20 years before a new reprocessing plant is built. The new plant - RT-2 - is located in Krasnoyarsk county. Its construction was launched 30 years ago but put on freeze in 1990s. Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 23 Russian nuclear generator halted for repairs BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Oct 30, 2001 Text of report by Russian news agency ITAR-TASS Desnogorsk (Smolensk Region), 29 October, ITAR-TASS correspondent Aleksandr Kharenko: At Smolenskaya nuclear power station, turbo-generator No 3 of the 2nd reactor has been disconnected from the mains after a defect in the equipment was discovered. The power station's information department told the ITAR-TASS correspondent that this occurred last Sunday [28 October]. At the moment, turbo-generator No 3 is being repaired. No breaches of safety limits and regulations were recorded, and there were no resulting increases in radiation. At present, the first and third reactors are working at their usual capacity while the second is working at 50 per cent capacity. Source: ITAR-TASS news agency, Moscow, in Russian 1237 gmt 29 Oct 01 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. World Reporter All Material Subject to ***************************************************************** 24 Japan to host Asian nuclear ministerial gathering 29 November BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Oct 30, 2001 Text of report in English by Japanese news agency Kyodo Tokyo, 30 October: Japan will host in November a ministerial meeting of a forum for nuclear cooperation consisting of nine Asian countries, the Atomic Energy Commission said Tuesday [30 October]. The second ministerial gathering of the Forum for Nuclear Cooperation in Asia (FNCA), following one held last November in Bangkok, will focus on nuclear power in relation to sustainable development and ways of cooperation on the use of radiation. It is to take place 29 November in Tokyo. The Japan-led forum, originally organized in 1990 as an annual ministerial conference, was transformed into its current form of seven workshops established under an accord reached in March 1999. The upcoming FNCA gathering will aim to enhance cooperation on such common issues as the use of radiation for agricultural and medical purposes and the management of radioactive waste, the commission said. Ministers or proxies in charge of nuclear policy from Australia, China, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam will take part, it added. Source: Kyodo News Service, Tokyo, in English 1417 gmt 30 Oct 01 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. World Reporter All Material Subject to ***************************************************************** 25 Hope for solution to Sellafield problems The Norway Post - Doorway to Norway 29. Oktober 2001 Norway's Environmental Minister, Boerge Brende, says he is hopeful that the British authorities will stop the radioactive emissions from the Sellafield nuclear repossession plant. Brende said this after meeting his British counterpart on Monday. Prior to the meeting Brende had made it known that Norway would take Birtain to court, unless the nuclear pollution from the plant was stopped. Before the meeting, which he described as "tough", Brende had also secured the support from his Nordic colleagues. -I have a certain hope that a solution will be found, so the pollution of our seafood may stop, Brende said. -The Norwegian Government asks that the emission levels of Technetium 99 be reduced to what it was prior to 1994. Until proper cleansing equipment is in place, the nuclear waste should be stored on land, Brende says. The Bellona environmental organization supports the Norwegian stand. -It is a parody when Britain supports land based storage for Russian nuclear waste on the Kola Peninsula, while refusing the same for the Sellafield waste, Bellona leader Frederic Hauge says. Ireland has already sued Britain over what it sees as a breech of the so-called OSPAR Convention of 1998. According to this, Britain committed itself to reducing the radioactive emissions from the Sellafield nuclear repossession plant. Instead the pollution has shown a strong increase over the past three years. (NRK) Rolleiv Solholm ***************************************************************** 26 Norway urges UK to curb Sellafield emissions Planet Ark Environmental NORWAY: October 30, 2001 OSLO - Norway's Environment Minister Boerge Brende said yesterday he had asked his British counterpart to halt emissions from the UK's nuclear reprocessing plant near Sellafield, traced as far as the Arctic Barents Sea. Brende met UK Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Margaret Beckett and Environment Minister Michael Meacher in Luxembourg earlier yesterday to demand emissions from the state-owned British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) facility are processed ashore and not discharged into the Irish Sea. "What came out of the meeting was that the British government would consider the Sellafield emissions again before Christmas," Brende told Reuters. "It was a constructive but tough meeting." Brende said traces of the radioactive compound technetium-99, known to stem from Sellafield, had been discovered along the entire Norwegian coastline and as far as the Arctic areas. "We are not happy about Sellafield and understand fully the strong Irish reactions against Sellafield as the site is only a few miles away from their border," Brende said. Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern promised earlier in the month to pursue "every legal avenue" to halt the commissioning of a mixed oxide (MOX) plant in Cumbria, northwest England. Ireland has long called for the closure of Sellafield. A spokesman for Britain's Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said ministers were considering whether to accept the UK environment agency's proposal to leave limits on technetium emissions unchanged. "Ministers (Beckett and Meacher) are considering whether to intervene," he said. Brende, who took office a week ago as a centre-right coalition came to power after winning a general election on September 10, said Norway was currently exploring possibilities for a lawsuit against British authorities over Sellafield. "I have asked the Foreign Ministry to evaluate the legal aspects of these emissions for Norway," Brende said. Brende said British authorities should have an obligation to choose the most environmentally friendly way of dealing with the discharge from Sellafield. "Environmental considerations should weigh heavier than short-term economic considerations," he said. Brende said he would meet again with British authorities before Christmas. Britain first established nuclear facilities at Sellafield, formerly called Windscale, in the 1940s, and the world's first commercial nuclear power station was opened there in 1956. Research has shown lobsters and other shellfish in the North Sea and in the Irish sea have high levels of technetium-99. Story by Erik Brynhildsbakken REUTERS NEWS SERVICE ***************************************************************** 27 UK Will Meet Green Targets Without Nuclear Power EyeforTransport October 30, 2001---A recently released government backed report reached the conclusion that ministers will meet ambitious targets to reduce greenhouse gas emissions without having to build any more nuclear power stations. (10/30/2001) The Carbon Trust, charged by the prime minister to persuade business to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, has told the government's energy review that the targets can be met if power is generated through other means such as hydrogen, wind and waves. Ian McAllister, who chairs the trust and is also chairman of Ford of Britain, said: "Nuclear is a red herring in this particular debate: you can achieve your low-carbon economy without nuclear. It's not necessary to meet the targets." However, an official at British Nuclear Fuels said: "Without nuclear's contribution this country cannot have a continued, secure and environmentally friendly energy supply." All but one of Britain's nuclear power stations - Sizewell B in Suffolk - are to close by 2023. Nuclear power plants emit negligible amounts of carbon dioxide. But since September 11 there have been concerns that nuclear power stations could be vulnerable to terrorist attack. Ministers have promised that carbon emissions will be 20 per cent below their 1990 level by 2010. Carbon emissions account for up to 90 per cent of greenhouse gases. The review of how to meet energy demands over the next 50 years is being undertaken by Downing Street's performance and innovation unit, and will be completed by the end of this year. It is chaired by Brian Wilson, energy minister - an advocate of nuclear power whose constituency, Cunninghame North, includes the Hunterston plant. In its June manifesto Labour shelved a pledge not to build nuclear stations. However, the evidence from the Carbon Trust, set up by the government, will carry weight. The Carbon Trust submission to the unit says there must be a "clear and unambiguous political commitment beyond the lifetime of individual ministers and governments". Apart from using hydrogen or renewables such as the wind or waves to generate power, carbon emissions can also be reduced by using energy more efficiently and growing more trees to absorb carbon dioxide. The UK's own emissions target goes beyond the Kyoto protocol, which promised that by 2012 greenhouse gas emissions would be 12.5 per cent lower than in 1990. The unit estimates that half the UK's energy needs would by 2020 be met by gas, with 6 per cent coming from coal, 4 per cent from renewables and 3 per cent from nuclear power Author:EyeforEnergy Newsdesk ***************************************************************** 28 American Ecology Posts Quarterly Loss (detailed spreadsheet) Yahoo - Monday October 29, 4:47 pm Eastern Time Press Release SOURCE: American Ecology Oak Ridge Performance Hurts Quarter BOISE, Idaho--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct. 29, 2001--Jim Baumgardner, Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of American Ecology Corporation (Nasdaq:ECOL - news), today announced that for the three months ending September 30, 2001, the company posted a net loss of $1,212,000 compared to net income of $1,100,000 for the same period in 2000, principally as a result of losses at the Company's Oak Ridge waste processing facility. Third quarter basic earnings per share for the quarter dropped from $.07 per share last year to a loss of $.10 per share. While Oak Ridge's performance improved over the second quarter, continued losses combined with higher general and administrative expenses resulted in the Company's third quarter loss. Revenue for the quarter reached $13.9 million or an 18% increase over the third quarter of 2000. For the nine months ending September 30, 2001, consolidated revenue increased 28%, reaching $40.5 million compared to revenue of $31.6 million for the same nine-month period last year. Net income for the nine months dipped to $595,000 from the $3.2 million generated during the same period last year, resulting in basic earning per share of $.03 per share compared to $.22 for the same period last year. ``We are disappointed with the loss for the quarter,'' Baumgardner stated, adding ``However, after revising our outlook downward last month, the Company has reduced costs through a management reorganization and other measures that should return the Company to profitability in the fourth quarter.'' Despite the loss in the quarter, operational and financial performance at the Company's hazardous and radioactive waste disposal facilities remained solid. ``All of our core disposal assets are profitable and performing well,'' Baumgardner stated, adding ``We intend to aggressively execute against our revised business plan to improve the financial performance of the Company.'' The Company will hold its quarterly investor conference call on Monday, October 29, 2001 at 10:00 am MT. Interested parties are invited to submit questions in advance to info@americanecology.com, or by facsimile to 208-331-7900. To join the call, investors and other interested parties may dial 1-877-679-9055. American Ecology Corporation, through its subsidiaries, provides radioactive, PCB, hazardous and non-hazardous waste services to commercial and government customers throughout the United States, such as nuclear power plants, medical and academic institutions, steel mills and petro-chemical facilities. The company provides scientific solutions that protect people and the environment. Headquartered in Boise, Idaho, the Company is the oldest radioactive and hazardous waste services company in the United States. This press release contains forward-looking statements that are based on our current expectations, beliefs, and assumptions about the markets in which American Ecology Corporation and its subsidiaries operate. Actual results may differ materially from what is expressed herein and no assurance can be given that the company can successfully implement its growth strategy, generate future earnings, overcome its operating difficulties at its Oak Ridge facility, or prevail in pending litigation. For information on factors that could cause actual results to differ from expectations, please refer to American Ecology Corporation's Report on Form 10-K and 10-Q filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. AMERICAN ECOLOGY CORPORATION CONSOLIDATED STATEMENTS OF OPERATIONS (Unaudited) ($ in 000's except per share amounts) Three Months Ended Nine Months Ended September 30, September 30, 2001 2000 2001 2000 ------------- ------------- Revenues $13,896 $11,796 $40,493 $31,600 Direct operating costs 8,498 6,555 23,572 17,327 ----- ----- ------ ------ Gross profit 5,398 5,241 16,921 14,273 Selling, general and administrative expenses 6,326 4,228 16,697 11,672 ------ ------ ------ ------ Income (loss) from operations (928) 1,013 224 2,601 Investment income (loss) 24 (95) 231 143 Interest income (expense) (294) (175) (898) (249) Gain on sale of assets 50 45 162 44 Other income (loss) (34) 320 990 775 ------ ------ ------ ------ Net income (loss) before income taxes (1,182) 1,108 709 3,314 Income tax expense (benefit) 30 8 114 69 ------ ------ ------ ------ Net income (1,212) 1,100 595 3,245 Preferred stock dividends 99 100 196 299 ------ ------ ------ ------ Net income (loss) available to common shareholders $(1,311) $ 1,000 $ 399 $ 2,946 ======= ======= ======= ======= Basic earnings per share $ (.10) $ .07 $ .03 $ .22 ======= ======= ======= ======= Diluted earnings per share $ (.10) $ .06 $ .02 $ .18 ======= ======= ======= ======= Dividends paid per common share $ -- $ -- $ -- $ -- ======= ======= ======= ======= Contact: American Ecology Jim Baumgardner, 208/331-8400 info@americanecology.com www.americanecology.com ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARTICLES ***************************************************************** 1 GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION OF NUCLEAR WAR Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2001 04:51:53 -0500 X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook Express 5.00.2919.6700 X-MimeOLE: Produced By Microsoft MimeOLE V5.00.2919.6700 ONGOING THREAT OF NUCLEAR WINTER IS THE BEST ARGUMENT FOR NUCLEAR ABOLITION: http://www.mothersalert.org/nuclearwinter.html MOTHERSALERT HOME PAGE: http://www.mothersalert.org & http://www.mothersalert.org/moreinfo.html USA SPACE COMMAND & "Vision 2020," THE US PLAN TO DOMINATE EARTH FROM SPACE: http://www.spacecom.af.mil/usspace http://www.mothersalert.org/nuclearwar.html The Effects of Nuclear War by Russell D. Hoffman A year ago[1998], India surprised the CIA -- and nearly everyone else except, perhaps, Pakistan, who seems to have been nearly ready -- by setting off several underground nuclear explosions. Then Pakistan, claiming self-defense, followed suit. But what would actually happen if India and Pakistan had a nuclear exchange? Most people in India and in Pakistan (and in the U.S.) probably do not know that as many as 9 out of 10 people -- or more -- who die from a nuclear blast, do not die in the explosion itself. Most people probably think that if they die from a nuclear blast, they will simply see a flash and get quickly cooked. Those within approximately a six square mile area (for a 1 megaton blast) will indeed be close enough to "ground zero" to be killed by the gamma rays emitting from the blast itself. Ghostly shadows of these people will be formed on any concrete or stone that lies behind them, and they will be no more. They literally won't know what hit them, since they will be vaporized before the electrical signals from their sense organs can reach their brains. Of the many victims of a nuclear war, these are the luckiest ones, of course. Outside the circle where people will be instantly vaporized from the initial gamma radiation blast, the light from the explosion (which is many times hotter than the sun) is so bright that it will immediately and permanently blind every living thing, including farm animals (including cows, sacred or otherwise), pets, birds while in flight and not to mention peasants, Maharajah's, and Government officials -- and soldiers, of course. Whether their eyes are opened or closed. This will happen for perhaps 10 miles around in every direction (for a 1 megaton bomb) -- further for those who happen to be looking towards the blast at the moment of detonation. Even from fifty miles away, a 1 megaton blast will be many times brighter than the noonday sun. Those looking directly at the blast will have a large spot permanently burned into their retinas, where the light receptor cells will have been destroyed. The huge bright cloud being nearly instantly formed in front of them (made in part from those closer to the blast, who have already "become death"), will be the last clear image these people will see. Most people who will die from the nuclear explosion will not die in the initial gamma ray burst, nor in the multi-spectral heat blast (mostly X-ray and ultraviolet wavelengths) which will come about a tenth of a second after the gamma burst. Nor will the pressure wave which follows over the next few seconds do most of them in, though it will cause bleeding from every orifice. Nor even will most people be killed by the momentary high winds which accompany the pressure wave. These winds will reach velocities of hundreds of miles an hour near the epicenter of the blast, and will reach velocities of 70 miles per hour as far as 6 miles from the blast (for a 1 megaton bomb). The high winds and flying debris will cause shrapnel-type wounds and blunt-trauma injuries. Together, the pressure wave and the accompanying winds will do in quite a few, and damage most of the rest of the people (and animals, and structures) in a huge circle -- perhaps hundreds of square miles in area. Later, these people will begin to suffer from vomiting, skin rashes, and an intense unquenchable thirst as their hair falls out in clumps. Their skin will begin to peel off. This is because the internal molecular structure of the living cells within their bodies is breaking down, a result of the disruptive effects of the high radiation dose they received. All the animals will be similarly suffering. Since they have already received the dose, these effects will show up even if the people are immediately evacuated from the area -- hardly likely, since everything around will be destroyed and the country would be at war. But this will not concern them at this time: Their immediate threat after the gamma blast, heat blast, pressure wave and sudden fierce wind (first going in the direction of the pressure wave -- outwardly from the blast -- then a moment later, a somewhat weaker wind in the opposite direction), will be the firestorm which will quickly follow, with its intense heat and hurricane-force winds, all driving towards the center where the radioactive mushroom-shaped cloud will be rising, feeding it, enlarging it, and pushing it miles up into the sky. The cloud from a 1 megaton blast will reach nearly 10 miles across and equally high. Soon after forming, it will turn white because of water condensation around it and within it. In an hour or so, it will have largely dissipated, which means that its cargo of death can no longer be tracked visually. People will need to be evacuated from under the fallout, but they will have a hard time knowing where to go. Only for the first day or so will visible pieces of fallout appear on the ground, such as marble-sized chunks of radioactive debris and flea-sized dots of blackened particles. After that the descending debris from the radioactive cloud will become invisible and harder to track; the fallout will only be detectible with geiger counters carried by people in "moon suits". But all the moon suits will already be in use in the known affected area. Probably, no one will be tracking the cloud. One U.S. test in the South Pacific resulted in a cigar-shaped contamination area 340 miles long and up to 60 miles wide. It spread 20 miles *upwind* from the test site, and 320 miles downwind. Where exactly it goes all depends on the winds and the rains at the time. It is difficult to predict where the cloud will travel before it happens, and it is likewise difficult to track the cloud as it moves and dissipates around the globe. While underground testing is bad enough for the environment, a single large above-ground explosion is likely to result in measurable global increases of a whole spectrum of health effects. India or Pakistan will deny culpability for these deaths, of course. The responsible nations, including my own, always do. But the people who were affected by the blast itself will not be worrying about the fallout just yet. A 1 megaton nuclear bomb creates a firestorm that can cover 100 square miles. A 20 megaton blast's firestorm can cover nearly 2500 square miles. Hiroshima and Nagasaki were small cities, and by today's standards the bombs dropped on them were small bombs. The Allied firebombing of nearly 150 cities during World War Two in Germany and Japan seldom destroyed more than 25 square miles at a time, and each of those raids required upwards of 400 planes, and thousands of crewmembers going into harm's way. It was not done lightly. And, they did not leave a lingering legacy of lethal radioactive contamination. In the span of a lunch hour, one multi-warhead nuclear missile can destroy more cities than all the incendiary raids in history, and the only thing the combatant needs to do to carry off such a horror is to sit in air-conditioned comfort hundreds or even thousands of miles away, and push a button. He would barely have to interrupt his lunch. With automation, he wouldn't even have to do that! The perpetrator of this crime against humanity may never have seen his adversary. He only needs to be good at following the simplest of orders. A robot could do it. One would think, that ONLY a robot WOULD do it. Nuclear war is never anything less than genocide. The developing firestorm is what the survivors of the initial blast will be worrying about -- if they can think straight at all. Many will have become instantly "shell-shocked" -- incapacitated and unable to proceed. Many will simply go mad. Perhaps they are among the "lucky" ones, as well. The firestorm produces hurricane-force winds in a matter of minutes. The fire burns so hot that the asphalt in the streets begins to melt and then burn, even as people are trying to run across it, literally melting into the pavement themselves as they run. Victims, on fire, jump into rivers, only to catch fire again when they surface for air. Yet it is hard to see even these pitiable souls as the least lucky ones in a nuclear attack. For the survivors of the initial blast who do not then die in the firestorm that follows, many will die painfully over the next few weeks, often after a brief, hopeful period where they appear to be getting better. It might begin as a tingling sensation on the skin, or an itching, which starts shortly after the blast. These symptoms are signs that the body is starting to break down internally, at the molecular level. The insides of those who get a severe dose of gamma radiation, but manage to survive the other traumas, whose organs had once been well defined as lungs, liver, heart, intestines, etc., begin to resemble an undefined mass of bloody pulp. Within days, or perhaps weeks, the victim, usually bleeding painfully from every hole and pore in their body, at last dies and receives their final mercy. But this too will probably not be how most victims of a nuclear attack will die. A significant percentage, probably most, of the people who die from a nuclear attack will die much later, from the widespread release of radioactive material into the environment. These deaths will occur all over the world, for centuries to come. Scattered deaths, and pockets of higher mortality rates, will continue from cancer, leukemia, and other health effects, especially genetic damage to succeeding generations. Nuclear weapons do not recognize the end of a war, or signed peace treaties, or even the deaths of all the combatants. They simply keep on killing a percentage of whoever happens to inhale or ingest their deadly byproducts. Some deaths will occur hundreds and even thousands of miles away, because low levels of ionizing radiation are capable of causing the full spectrum of health effects, albeit at a lower rate within the population. Not to mention the radioactive runoff from the rivers and streams that flow through the blast area and the area under the radioactive mushroom cloud's drift. It may carry its deadly cargo for thousands of miles, raining a fallout of death only on some cities, and not on others. It will land upon nations which had not been involved in any way in India's dispute with Pakistan. These nations will be mighty hurt and mighty upset. Nuclear weapons do not recognize international borders. Finally, an atmospheric blast of a nuclear "device" creates an EMP (Electro-Magnetic Pulse) which can be as large as Pakistan or even India -- perhaps even larger than India and Pakistan together. The higher the altitude of the blast, the bigger the circle of damage will be from the EMP. This is a very serious concern for those of us in the high-tech industries, such as myself. The Electro-Magnetic Pulse will electrify all sorts of metallic structures that are not normally electrified except by the occasional short circuit or lightening strike. This will be a lot like the whole country getting struck by lightening all at the same time. As computer chips make better and better use of "real estate", using more and more delicate electronic circuits, the more tightly-packed transistors, capacitors, diodes and resistors become more and more vulnerable to the EMP which will be carried into the chips via the connecting wires. The Electro-Magnetic Pulse is one of the reasons above-ground testing was stopped. (The other reason was that it became impossible to deny that the radiation dispersed by the tests was killing people.) Pacemakers, for example, may stop working because of the "hit" from the EMP. It will be quite something to see people in a thousand mile radius of the epicenter of the blast (or further) who are using pacemakers, suddenly drop dead, and all the computers permanently go down and all the lights go out, all at the same time. And commercial and private aircraft will drop out of the sky, since their sensitive electronics and fly-by-wire systems are not very well shielded from the EMP. These planes will then not be available for evacuation purposes, nor will they be available to air-drop food, water, morphine and cyanide, all of which will be in great demand throughout the area. A year ago people were dancing in the streets over this in both India and Pakistan. Why? Home plumbing systems and most other plumbing systems are good examples of large metallic structures that will suddenly become electrified, destroying the motors, gauges, electronics, etc. which are attached to the plumbing systems. More and more pumping equipment is computer controlled nowadays for efficiency. Imbedded controllers are becoming prevalent but as they do, the potential damage from the Electro-Magnetic Pulse increases dramatically. Train tracks will also carry the charge, as well as telephone wiring. All these things will have a nearly simultaneous surge of energy sent through them, igniting gas containers such as fuel storage tanks, propane tanks, and so on. Whatever doesn't blow up will at least stop working. My country has lived under the Russian and Chinese threat of nuclear war for many decades now, and it is not a pleasant thought. This is nothing to dance about. There is no benefit to having, or using, nuclear weapons. I think the world would be a better place if we all stopped and said, "I will not be a part of this. I do not need these weapons, for I would never commit this sin against my own children, nor against my neighbor's children, nor against my enemy's children, nor even against my enemy. I choose not to be a part of this madness." There is a greater battle mankind must fight than against each other. Humanity's fight right now, is for humanity's general survival despite depleted and poorly used resources, environmental degradation (there is none greater than that from a nuclear explosion), dwindling effectiveness of antibiotics and other wonder drugs, an uneven distribution of available food, knowledge and wealth, and against weapons of mass destruction. America had three excuses for her previous use of nuclear weapons in war, which we plead every time it is mentioned. First, we claim that we did not understand back then (over 50 years ago) all the ways nuclear weapons damage the Earth and her living inhabitants. Second, we claim that there was a war going on, and that had we not used these weapons, perhaps a million soldiers would have died invading Japan instead. But this second excuse is weakened by the knowledge that Japan was at that time very near collapse anyway. She was without an air defense, a sea defense, she did not have advanced radar, she had lost all her good pilots, millions of soldiers were either dead, wounded, captured, or uselessly stuck on nameless islands in the middle of the Pacific, and towns in her homeland was being firebombed on almost a nightly basis. Our third excuse was that both Japan (and definitely Germany) were building their own nuclear weapons, and DEFINITELY would have used them against us had they succeeded in developing "the bomb" before the war ended. The war could not go on forever. We were, indeed, running out of time. Perhaps these excuses are insufficient, but India and Pakistan hasn't even got them. India can, and therefore should, along with Pakistan, renounce nuclear weapons and the nuclear option. Perhaps her populace does not understand the full nature of the threat of nuclear weapons, and thus they are dancing in the streets, but I hope that her leaders do. However, I strongly suspect most of them are unaware of the things I have written about in this newsletter. Perhaps you, dear reader, will help me to educate them in this matter. The author is grateful for the assistance of Pamela Blockey-O'Brien and others in the research and preparation of this statement. ************************************************** 2 *** Sources for more information about the effects of nuclear weapons ************************************************** 3 *** For more information on the Electromagnetic Pulse (which can also be created with non-nuclear weapons) you might start with a visit to this URL (which is, actually, specifically about non-nuclear EMP devices): ----- FROM: http://www.infowar.com/mil_c4i/mil_c4i8.html-ssi - ---- Computers used in data processing systems, communications systems, displays, industrial control applications, including road and rail signaling, and those embedded in military equipment, such as signal processors, electronic flight controls and digital engine control systems, are all potentially vulnerable to the EMP effect. Other electronic devices and electrical equipment may also be destroyed by the EMP effect. Telecommunications equipment can be highly vulnerable, due to the presence of lengthy copper cables between devices. Receivers of all varieties are particularly sensitive to EMP, as the highly sensitive miniature high frequency transistors and diodes in such equipment are easily destroyed by exposure to high voltage electrical transients. Therefore radar and electronic warfare equipment, satellite, microwave, UHF, VHF, HF and low band communications equipment and television equipment are all potentially vulnerable to the EMP effect. It is significant that modern military platforms are densely packed with electronic equipment, and unless these platforms are well hardened, an EMP device can substantially reduce their function or render them unusable. Information on INFOWAR web site is available from: Infowar.Com & Interpact, Inc. WebWarrior@Infowar.Com Voice: 727-556-0833 Fax: 727-556-0834 For a photo of the famous wooden-trestle electromagnetic pulse (EMP) simulator at Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico ( with a B-52 bomber sitting on top of it): http://www.brook.edu/FP/projects/nucwcost/trestle. htm Visit the Federation of American Scientists' web site for a more detailed discussion of the effect of nuclear weapons: http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/Nwfaq/Nfaq5.html In 1962 the Department of the Air Force produced Air Force Pamphlet No. 136-1-3, by order of the Secretary of the Air Force Curtis E. LeMay. Titled The Effects of Nuclear Weapons, it was published by the United States Atomic Energy Commission in April of that year and was a revision of the 1957 edition of the same title. In the forward by Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara and the chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission Glenn T. Seaborg, we are told, "There is a need for widespread public understanding of the best information available on the effects of nuclear weapons. The purpose of this book is to present as accurately as possible, within the limits of national security, a comprehensive summary of this information." In other words, fiction where necessary. However, there are several interesting statements to STOP CASSINI readers: ----- FROM "THE EFFECTS OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS" ---- From Paragraph 11.197: "...in the great majority of cases, mutations have deleterious effects of some kind." Paragraph 11.218: "Hemorrhage is a common phenomenon after radiation exposure because the megakaryocytes, from which the blood platelets necessary for clotting are formed, are destroyed and the platelets are not replenished. If hemorrhage occurs in vital centers, death can result. Often the hemorrhages are so widespread that severe anemia and death are the consequences." Paragraph 11.219: "The loss of the epithelial coverings of tissues, together with the loss of white cells and antibodies, lowers the resistance of the body to bacterial and viral invasion. if death does not take place in the first few days after a large dose of radiation, bacterial invasion of the blood stream usually occurs and the patient dies of infection. Often such infections are caused by bacteria which, under normal circumstances, are harmless." -------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------- Mothers' Alert Home | More Information| News | Back to Actions ***************************************************************** 4 Pak Firmly Rejects Even Thought of Using Nuke Weapon: Spokesman Xinhuanet 2001-10-29 21:13:00 ISLAMABAD, October 29 (Xinhuanet) -- Pakistan on Monday rejected firmly "even the thought" of using nuclear weapons tactically or otherwise in Afghanistan. Answering a question at the daily news briefing, Foreign Office spokesman Riaz Mohammad Khan said, "We firmly and categorically reject even the thought of using nuclear weapons tactically or otherwise." About continuation of military operation in Afghanistan during the holy month of Ramazan starts on November 17, Riaz said Pakistan wanted that the operation should be stopped during Ramazan and the United States has also said that it is keeping its options open. To a question about tribal people gathering near Afghan border with the intentions to join Taliban for fight, Khan said we would not want any Pakistani going into Afghanistan and we have also asked Taliban government not to allow any Pakistani there for the purpose of military training or otherwise. Enditem Copyright © 2000 Xinhua News Agency. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 5 Georgia expert discusses attacks Augusta Georgia: Metro: Web posted Tuesday, October 30, 2001 By Albert RossJr. Staff Writers Like many Americans, Bonnie Given has fears of a biological attack on the United States. ''I have a daughter in Washington, and I'm taking 66 people on a trip to New York in December," she said. But Dr. Cham Dallas, an associate professor of pharmaceutical and biomedical sciences and director of the Interdisciplinary Toxicology Program at the University of Georgia, calmed Ms. Given's fears - along with more than 60 others' concerns - during a lecture about nuclear, chemical and biological attacks. Dr. Dallas used slides to show some of the dangers of threats and safeguards against them. He said the U.S. government is aware of such threats and is developing ways to deal with the dangers involved. ''We've been preparing for this for a number of years now," Dr. Dallas assured the audience at the discussion, which took place Monday night at the Walton Way Temple Congregation Children of Israel. ''We've been preparing our police and fire departments, and our medical people. ''The preparation is for mass casualties." Reach Albert Ross at (706) 823-3339 or albert.ross@augustachronicle.com. All contents ©1996 - 2001 The Augusta Chronicle. All rights ***************************************************************** 6 DOE continues on same security track Oak Ridger Online --> Story last updated at 9:52 a.m. on Tuesday, October 30, 2001 by Paul Parson Oak Ridger staff As the FBI warns that terrorists may attack the United States, possibly this week, the Department of Energy locally says it has received no guidance regarding new security measures but it continues to implement those that went into effect after the Sept. 11 events. In the meantime, agency officials breathed a sigh of relief as a white powdery substance found in two Oak Ridge DOE buildings last week tested negative for anthrax spores or bacteria, according to final test results released Monday afternoon. On Monday, Attorney General John Ashcroft said the warning of more attacks -- the second this month -- was based on credible information, described by others as coming from intelligence sources, that terrorists could strike within the United States or against U.S. interests. The information did not specify the type of attack or targets. DOE spokesman Frank Juan said this morning that the Oak Ridge Operations office has received no new guidance regarding security issues. DOE continues to implement random searches and parking restrictions, among other measures, at its facilities. "We're just at the same level we've been at since the Sept. 11 attacks," Juan said. As for the mysterious substance found in Building 2714 last week, final test results indicated it contained no anthrax spores or bacteria. The substance was discovered last Tuesday in an air duct, on the floor and on some furniture in the two wings of the building that house DOE's Office of Safeguards and Security and the Community Reuse Organization of East Tennessee. Also tested was a substance found the same day near an elevator on the second floor of the Federal Building. Test results indicated this material was either crushed candy or medicine. DOE said those parts of Building 2714 closed because of the incident were scheduled to reopen this morning. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 7 Officials Wary About Soviet Arsenal Las Vegas SUN Today: October 30, 2001 at 4:05:28 PST WASHINGTON- The United States has spent as much as $5 billion since 1991 to help secure the former Soviet Union's vast nuclear, chemical and biological arsenal, but U.S. officials say they still can't account for all the weapons. Since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, the United States should be very concerned that some of these Soviet weapons of mass destruction may have slipped into the wrong hands, said Sen. Dick Lugar, R-Ind. "That is the worst-case scenario," he said. "That is the one thing we must make certain did not happen." Lugar co-authored legislation a decade ago that launched the U.S. effort to safeguard the Soviet arsenal during the political, economic and social chaos that surrounded the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Since then, he said, roughly half the Soviet nuclear warheads have been destroyed. The secure disposal of the materials that those weapons use for nuclear explosions - plutonium and highly enriched uranium - is still difficult, he said, and the progress of securing the chemical and biological stockpiles has proceeded far more slowly than the destruction program. The United States has upgraded security systems that cover about one-third of the almost 700 tons of weapons-grade nuclear material identified as at risk of theft or diversion from Russia, according to the General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress. Restrictions imposed by Russia have kept the U.S. Department of Energy from installing security systems at about 100 buildings that contain hundreds of metric tons of nuclear material, according to a February GAO report. The report cites a wide-open gate at one Russian nuclear facility. Ken Alibek, a former top scientist in the Soviet biological weapons program who came to the United States in 1992, said economically struggling Soviet weapons scientists pose the greatest threat. Finding raw materials for biological weapons is easy because each country has its own pathogenic microorganisms, Alibek said, but such materials are worthless without the ability to transform them into weapons. "In the field of biological weapons, the real threat is knowledge," he said. The State and Defense departments have programs to put Soviet weapons scientists to work on beneficial research to reduce the risk they will be recruited by terrorists or smaller nations out to develop mass-destruction armaments. Alibek said the money from those programs doesn't always go to the right people in the biological weapons area. Hundreds of bioweapons scientists have received not a penny. In addition, he said, security remains lax at some Soviet facilities that work with deadly biological agents. Chris Kessler, spokesman for the State Department's nonproliferation bureau, said the agency "has no reason to believe that Russia or any Central Asian country has been the source of anthrax or any other pathogen" used in the mail attacks in the United States. He declined to elaborate, citing the ongoing investigation. Former Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said U.S. programs to support Soviet weapons scientists are a good start but are insufficient given the magnitude of the problem. An international effort is needed, he said. "Now, hopefully, the warming of relationships between the U.S. and Russia will enhance cooperation," he said, "but you still cannot prevent a hungry Russian scientist who cares about feeding his family from defecting for the right price to Iraq, Iran, North Korea or even" Osama bin Laden. Former Sen. Sam Nunn, D-Ga., who authored the Soviet nonproliferation legislation with Lugar, said Americans are safer than they were during the 40 to 50 years that the threat of a Cold War-driven nuclear holocaust hung over their heads. Still, he said, the United States cannot be sure some weapons and expertise have not leaked out of the former Soviet Union. "We'll never be sure, and we'll never be absolutely safe," said Nunn, who now heads the Nuclear Threat Initiative foundation. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 8 Brief: Officials to discuss employee compensation Amarillo Globe-News: Local News: October 30, 2001 4:37 a.m. CT The Labor Department and Energy Department will host informational sessions this week on a compensation program for Pantex employees, former nuclear workers and survivors. Under federal law, some Pantex workers and their survivors may be eligible for $150,000 in compensation through the Energy Occupational Illness Compensation Act. Federal officials will be available to assist in filing claims today through Friday at the Ambassador Hotel, 3100 W. Interstate 40, from 9 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. For more information call (866) 272-3622. 2001 Amarillo Globe-News ***************************************************************** 9 Anti-nuclear activists' lawyers seek trial postponement ABC News - Lawyers representing Australian anti-nuclear activists Stuart Lennox and Nick Clyde are seeking a postponement of their trial in the United States. The men were part of a group of 17 arrested off the Californian coast in July for attempting to stop US missile defence tests. They have pleaded not guilty to charges of trespass and violating a safety zone. Tasmanian Stuart Lennox, who has returned home to await his trial, says his legal representatives are trying to have the trial put back from its present start date of November 20. He says the mood in the United States at the moment would not be conducive to a good trial hearing for the activists. Australian Broadcasting co ***************************************************************** 10 Neptunium levels in 1961 believed not worrisome The Paducah Sun Paducah, Kentucky Tuesday, October 30, 2001 The Paducah plant's former radiation protection head disagrees, in a deposition, with some recent reports on exposure. From AP and staff reports The man formerly in charge of protecting Paducah uranium plant workers from excessive exposure says he had proof from tests in 1961 that some workers had measurable radiation in their bodies from neptunium exposure. But Richard C. Baker, who headed radiation protection at the Paducah Gaseous Diffusion Plant for most of 35 years, said during a deposition for a $10 billion lawsuit that the tests shouldn’t worry anyone. Baker, who retired in late 1986, has lived in Paducah since joining the plant during its construction in 1951. He said he believed the test results on 21 men reflected recent exposure to permissible levels of neptunium dust at the plant, which processed uranium for nuclear weapons. However, he said he wasn’t required by law to calculate how much radiation workers were receiving. Baker's statements came in about seven hours of videotaped deposition Sept. 12-13 and Sept. 13 in Paducah. It was transcribed into a 250-page document, a copy of which the Sun obtained Monday. The suit was filed last year in U.S. District Court here against the plant’s uranium suppliers and its former operators. The urine tests revealed neptunium stored in the men’s bodies from long-term exposure to dust at levels an attorney called ‘‘off the scale.’’ If the tests had been done properly, ‘‘they would have had to recognize that they were nuking people in there, but they turned their heads in an unscientific way,’’ said William McMurry, a Louisville attorney representing current and former plant workers and their families in the case. McMurry was quoted Monday by The Courier-Journal of Louisville. He filed the lawsuit last year against Union Carbide, which ran the plant until 1984; Lockheed Martin, whose predecessor Martin Marietta Corp. took over from Union Carbide; and uranium suppliers General Electric Co., E.I. du Pont de Nemours &Co., NLO Industries Inc. and NLO Inc. Trial is scheduled in July 2003. The suit alleges workers were unknowingly exposed to dangerous levels of radiation and were ‘‘assaulted’’ by radioactive material brought to the plant from other facilities. In September 1999, then-Energy Secretary Bill Richardson came to Paducah to apologize to workers who may have been exposed to dangerous radiation. During deposition, McMurry asked Baker if Richardson’s apology and the conclusions of government investigators about radiation exposure at Paducah were a fair criticism of him, as the person responsible for radiation protection. Baker said no, adding that the conclusions generally "were not based on fact." He said he didn't believe investigators made up the facts, but "were greatly influenced in the way that they presented their case by the directions they had received from their management." Robert Tait, a Columbus, Ohio, attorney representing some of the companies being sued, defended Baker, calling him ‘‘a hero of the Cold War.’’ In a Courier-Journal interview, Tait said the plant under Baker’s supervision complied with the law and applicable regulations ‘‘from the outset of operations through the present day.’’ Baker’s deposition also disputed a February 2000 federal report that found widespread deficiencies in efforts to protect employees from harmful radiation levels. In the report, the Energy Department found that during checks made in 1962, some measurements of airborne contamination from neptunium were as much as 100 times what the plant considered permissible. In 1980, airborne radiation from uranium in one Paducah plant shop was 1,680 times the plant limits; from neptunium 2,121 times; and from plutonium 2,483 times. Baker said he didn’t remember such readings. ‘‘And if they existed like this, they were probably very, very infrequent or of very short duration.’’ ***************************************************************** 11 Little depleted uranium contamination in Kosovo: UN Sunday, 28-Oct-2001 1:30PM Story from AFP Copyright 2001 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet) BELGRADE, Oct 28 (AFP) - Depleted uranium (DU) shells used by NATO forces have not caused widespread contamination in Kosovo, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) said Sunday. "There was no widespread contamination," said Pekka Haavisto, the leader of a UNEP team which tested 11 sites in the Yugoslav province bombed by NATO from March until June of 1999. Haavisto told reporters there were also no signs of contamination in the water system or the food chain. He said NATO had used nine tons of depleted uranium munitions in its air campaign against Yugoslav forces, but that it was only in the summer of 2000 that the alliance indicated which sites had been targeted. After finishing in Kosovo, the UN team is to test four sites in Serbia and Montenegro which were hit by depleted uranium shells during the same campaign. The tests are due to be completed by November 5 and the full report is due to be presented in February next year. "Our mission is to investigate sites targeted by ammunition containing depleted uranium and, if there is a need, to recommend what has to be done," said Haavisto. He said Bosnia, which was hit by three tons of depleted uranium NATO shells in 1994-1995, would also be tested. Tank-piercing cannon rounds tipped with depleted uranium and fired by NATO warplanes against Serbian tanks had been cited as the possible cause of the so-called "Balkans syndrome" -- an allegation that NATO and US officials deny. Haavisto ruled out any link between a string of leukemia cases involving NATO peacekeepers returning from missions in Kosovo and Bosnia, and the depleted uranium munitions. "According to our information, there is no connection with depleted uranium," he said. ***************************************************************** 12 Marshall Islands criticises delay in nuclear compensation Radio Australia News - 30/10/01: Marshall Islands Finance Minister, Michael Konelious, has criticised the Bank of New York for refusing to release the equivalent of 32 million Australian dollars to beneficiaries of the Nuclear Claims Tribunal. The money was to be paid last week to 17-hundred victims of the U.S. nuclear weapons tests carried out between 1946 and 1958. The Pacific news agency PACNEWS says the problem has arisen because it's the largest single payment made directly to the Nuclear Claims Tribunal. Pacnews understands the Bank of New York is seeking US government approval before releasing the funds. But the Marshall Islands Journal says the difficulty is that the US Government has no involvement with the Nuclear Fund. The Fund is administered by the Marshall Islands Government. (30/10/01, 16:28:00 AEST) Agence France-Presse (AFP) and Reuters which is copyright and ***************************************************************** 13 Technology:Governor keeps up SRS fight Augusta Georgia: Letter to Abraham protests readying plutonium transfers Web posted Tuesday, October 30, 2001 By Brandon Haddock Staff Writer Gov. Jim Hodges isn't surrendering his fight against plutonium shipments to Savannah River Site. In a letter Friday to U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham, the South Carolina governor protested ongoing work at Colorado's Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site to prepare plutonium for shipment. The preparations indicate that the federal government is not serious about keeping an agreement to suspend shipments to SRS until it can resolve its differences with South Carolina, Mr. Hodges wrote. ''I understand that the Energy Department intends to immediately begin loading plutonium onto trucks at Rocky Flats for transportation to South Carolina," the governor wrote. ''Preparations to ship plutonium suggests Undersecretary (Robert) Card and other members of your staff are not acting on good faith on their promise to South Carolina." The governor's letter was spurred by a news report that the trucks were being loaded, said Cortney Owings, the governor's spokeswoman. Energy Department spokesman Joe Davis did not return a telephone call seeking comment. But in an interview last week, Mr. Davis said the Energy Department still intended to honor its ''gentlemen's agreement" with South Carolina. South Carolina officials are concerned that the state could become a de facto permanent storage site for plutonium. They have pushed for the Energy Department to commit to a timetable for treating the radioactive metal at SRS and then removing it from the site. Reach Brandon Haddock at (706) 823-3409 or bhaddock@augustachronicle.com. All contents ©1996 - 2001 The Augusta Chronicle. All rights ***************************************************************** 14 Ukraine Destroys Last Missile Silo Las Vegas SUN Today: October 30, 2001 at 9:55:29 PST KIEV, Ukraine- Ukraine destroyed its last nuclear missile silo on Tuesday, fulfilling a pledge to give up the vast nuclear arsenal it inherited after the breakup of the former Soviet Union. The silo was blown up at a military range in the southern Mykolaiv region near Pervomaisk, according to the Interfax news agency. The U.S.-Ukrainian Cooperative Threat Reduction Program oversaw the destruction. A team of U.S. and Ukrainian officials joined three schoolchildren in turning six keys to detonate the explosives that blew up the silo, the last of 46 to be dismantled. "So far, Ukraine confirmed its commitment to secure peace and stability, and made a significant contribution to strengthening the international regime of arms nonproliferation," said Serhiy Borodenkov, spokesman for the Foreign Ministry. The land beneath the silo will be cleaned and converted for agricultural use, officials said. Ukraine inherited the world's third-largest nuclear stockpile with the 1991 Soviet collapse, including 130 SS-19 missiles, 46 SS-24 missiles and dozens of strategic bombers. The country later renounced nuclear weapons and transferred all missiles and its 1,300 nuclear warheads to Russia. After processing, the nuclear materials from the warheads were brought back to Ukraine as nuclear fuel for power plants. In 1997, Ukraine and the United States signed a treaty on American assistance in dismantling 38 Tu-160s and Tu-95s bombers and more than 480 Kh-55 air-launched cruise missiles. The last two bombers were dismantled in February. The United States initiated the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program in 1991 to reduce the nuclear capability of former Soviet Union nations. All work under the disarmament program is scheduled to be completed by Dec. 4. All contents copyright 2001 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 15 US, Israeli team working on how to take out the nukes if Musharraf falls The Indian Express : Top Stories Tuesday, October 30, 2001 AGENCIES WASHINGTON, OCTOBER 29: A special US unit is training with Israeli commandos to take out Pakistan’s nuclear weapons in case of a coup against President Pervez Musharraf, the New Yorker magazine reported today, citing current and previous members of the US Administration. The American force is training in the United States with members of Israel’s Unit 262, a commando team that has engaged in behind-the-lines operations including theft and assasinations, according to the New Yorker report written by Seymour Hersh. (Last week, a report in the Washington Post mentioned the concern in US security circles of a disabling strike by India at Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal in the event of a coup. Such an action could provoke a new war on the subcontinent, the report said. In fact, it quoted an expert on strategic games as saying that the U.S. military has conducted more than 25 war games involving a confrontation between a nuclear-armed India and Pakistan, and each has resulted in nuclear war.) The American unit, operating under Pentagon control with CIA assistance, specializes in slipping undetected into foreign countries to find and, if necessary, disarm nuclear weapons, the magazine reports. The report quoted sources in the administration as saying that Pakistan has at least 24 nuclear warheads that can be delivered by intermediate-range missiles and F-16 airplanes. However, US intelligence agencies cannot be sure of the precise location of all of the Pakistani warheads, officials said. US regional experts quoted by the magazine say they doubt Musharraf’s ability to control the military and Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal if there is a coup — and say dissident fundamentalists within the military might try to seize a nuclear warhead. One US intelligence officer expressed alarm over the recent questioning in Pakistan of two retired Pakistani nuclear scientists with reported Taliban connections, describing it as ‘‘the tip of a very serious iceberg’’. © 2001: Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd. All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 16 Kandahar bombed for 5 hours -DAWN - [DAWN - the Internet Edition] KABUL, Oct 30: US warplanes pounded the Taliban heartland again on Tuesday, with the 24th straight day of assaults on the stronghold of Kandahar. Residents said US jets bombed military targets in the devastated city for up to five hours. Four people were killed in the strikes, the Afghan Islamic Press said. Residents said the city, deprived of water or electricity for over two weeks, had been left a filthy mess with scavengers roaming around. "They're like dogs, creeping into what's left of people's houses at night, trying to find something to eat," one resident said, adding that dangerous health conditions had been made worse by the weather, with winter conditions looming. Overnight US attacks struck Kabul, the key northern city of Mazar-i-Sharif and Taliban frontlines north of the capital and close to the Tajik border, where the opposition Northern Alliance is massed. The Pentagon said warplanes used their firepower to support opposition forces in northern Afghanistan, targeting Taliban positions in an arc from Kabul to Mazar-i-Sharif. Spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said the 95 sorties planned for the day were aimed at Taliban command and control facilities as well as so-called emerging targets, which tend to be mobile military assets like armour, artillery, vehicles and troops. The US air forces "continue to support opposition groups pretty much in the same area - the Shomali plains, Mazar-i-Sharif, Kunduz and Bamian", Clarke said. They "continue to go after the Taliban military focusing on armour and troop concentrations", she said. US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said late on Monday that three weeks of bombings had cleared the way for what he called "phase two" of the campaign - which is widely expected to involve the deployment of ground troops. A senior US defence official said plans for a commando base inside Afghanistan to support opposition forces fighting the Taliban were under consideration but that no decision had been taken. A spokesman for former president Rabbani said no base had yet been proposed, but said it would be feasible if the opposition authorities agreed.-AFP © The DAWN Group of Newspapers, 2001 ***************************************************************** 17 Hastings confident of Hanford cleanup This story was published Sat, Oct 27, 2001 By John Stang Herald staff writer U.S. Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., believes Hanford will get enough money for fiscal 2002 to meet its legal cleanup obligations for that year. "For 2002, I feel very confident about where we are," Hastings said. At a Friday press conference, he pointed to Congress and the Bush administration agreeing to increase the overall federal fiscal 2002 budget from last spring's $661 billion to $683 billion now. That $683 billion is enough to ensure that the roughly $1.8 billion needed for Hanford will materialize for 2002, Hastings said. Right now, the Bush administration's last public Hanford cleanup budget figure, which is more than four months old, is $1.4 billion for fiscal 2002, which began last Oct. 1. Hanford needs $1.832 billion in 2002 to meet its legal obligations for that year, according to the Department of Energy's calculations. In a May testimony before a Senate committee, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham opposed Congress increasing DOE's 2002 nationwide nuclear cleanup money from $5.913 billion to a House figure of $6.613 billion or a Senate figure of $6.754 billion. That nuclear cleanup money includes appropriations to Hanford. The House wants to appropriate $1.814 billion to Hanford, and the Senate wants to spend $1.834 billion. The two chambers expect to reconcile their differences within two weeks. Abraham contended he did not want the extra money until a review of DOE's cleanup programs is completed. The Bush administration wrote a memo in late June that backed Abraham's stance of keeping DOE nuclear cleanup budget to $5.913 billion, including $1.4 billion for Hanford. Since then the administration has not provided any clue about where it now stands on DOE's nuclear cleanup programs. The $683 billion is split among 13 appropriations bills that have more or less passed Congress, but the administration has not said yet how it wants to split that $683 billion among those bills. Copyright 2001 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 18 Small business owners won't want to miss Hanford vendor forum Oct. 28, 2001: This story was published Sun, Oct 28, 2001 By Wendy Culverwell Herald staff writer With approximately one-fourth of the work on the massive River Protection Project at Hanford set aside for small businesses, it's time for local business owners to bone up on cleanup plans. There is a vitrification plant to build, a river corridor to protect, millions of gallons of radioactive waste to process and many engineering challenges to meet. But first there is a schedule to keep. The clock, though already ticking, gets going in earnest Nov. 15. That's when the Department of Energy, its lead contractors and the Tri-City Industrial Development Council will hold a daylong symposium to help small business owners learn how they can be part of the $4 billion effort. The symposium offers would-be business partners a chance to learn more about the project and make face-to-face contact with purchasing officers for the two major contractors, Bechtel National, Inc. and CH2M Hill Hanford Group, Inc. Bechtel is leading the effort to construct the plant where radioactive tank wastes will be treated; CH2M Hill is responsible for the tank farms and rivershore protection. The combined effort is called the River Protection Project and it will play out over the next 10 years at the Hanford site. Even though $1 billion worth of work is set to go to small businesses, size alone won't guarantee work from the government's contractors, said Michael Barrett, Bechtel's contracting director. "Just your small business status isn't going to get you the job," he said. Successful businesses should take time to learn about the project, its timelines, what materials will be needed and when. At a minimum, any small business acting as a supplier or subcontractor must be licensed in Washington state and registered as a federal contractor. "Understand the project. Understand the timeline of the project," advised Greg Jones, executive officer of DOE's Office of River Protection. That's why the vendor symposium was set up. The individual contractors, namely Bechtel, have already held forums for potential vendors. But DOE and Tri-City business leaders wanted an event that covered the full scope of the tank waste project, from tank farm management to construction of the vitrification plant at the Hanford site's central plateau. The project will result in 54 million gallons of highly radioactive and hazardous tank waste being treated at the vitrification plant, where it will be glassified in a process involving extreme heat. Small businesses can have a role in the nuts-and-bolts aspects of the project. Carrie Brittain, supplier advocate for Bechtel National, said the company will need businesses that provide construction services as well as materials. Her office regularly refers potential suppliers to Bechtel's Web site, www.ebechtel.com, to learn what steps they must take to become a supplier as well as what bids are coming up. Visiting the ebechtel.com site is the most important first step a potential business partner can take. "The biggest problem we have is they don't follow through. We send them to the Web site and they don't go," Brittain said. Bechtel already uses small businesses for engineering and architectural services, preparation of the construction site, site security and safety supplies. It's looking for a contractor to install a fence around the project as well as a contractor to install a septic system. Building the vitrification plant will be a massive project that's likely to deplete supplies of certain construction materials and strain the ability of small businesses to supply others. "We've always encouraged teaming arrangements, especially on the large buys," Brittain said. At CH2M Hill Hanford Group, or CHG, prospective vendors can register either by setting up a meeting with the vendor advocate, Debbie Bone-Harris, or by visiting its Web site, www. hanford.gov/chgcp/. Contact names and numbers are listed on the site. CHG relies on small businesses to supply everything from engineering support and contract estimators to office furniture, paper, pens and other office supplies, said Betty Euteneier, director of contracts and procurements. Euteneier tells businesses that they must do more than register and wait for a call offering work. Even among registered businesses, competition for government-sponsored work is fierce. Individual businesses need to study the project, figure out where they fit in, then sell themselves to purchasing officers. "Do the homework, then come and tell us what you can do," she said. The Nov. 15 vendor symposium starts with registration at 9 a.m. and continues until 3 p.m. There will be presentations, a question-and-answer period and a chance to meet buyers. The program will be held at the Trade, Recreation and Agricultural Center in Pasco. To register, call Kris Berg at TRIDEC, 735-1000. Copyright 2001 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 19 Energy secretary to visit Thursday Oct. 30, 2001: This story was published Tue, Oct 30, 2001 By the Herald staff Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham has rescheduled his visit to Hanford for Thursday, when he's scheduled to spend the afternoon in the Tri-Cities. It will be his first trip to the nuclear reservation since being appointed Energy secretary this year. He plans to spend his time here meeting with Hanford employees, touring Hanford and looking over the Fast Flux Test Facility. A community reception and a meeting with news media also are proposed. Abraham is faced with the decision of whether to shut down the FFTF permanently or allow its commercial use, primarily to make isotopes for medicine and other nonmilitary uses. He's also facing a Washington state fine of $10,000 a week for not starting to build a complex to glassify radioactive waste. Copyright 2001 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 20 Container ships could be used as bombs by terrorists online.ie : News The Irish Examiner 30 Oct 2001 By Pete Harrison ANY one of tens of thousands of container ships shuttled into the US each day could conceal a weapon of mass destruction aimed at the heart of America, say maritime security experts. After hijackers used passenger aircraft as missiles to such deadly effect on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, security experts see shipping as a possible vehicle for a similar attack on the US. Boston Mayor Thomas Menino asked a federal court on Friday to ban liquefied natural gas tankers from the city's port, saying there was no adequate plan to cope with any explosion. "Our biggest fear is a fully loaded LNG tanker exploding in New York or Boston Harbor," security adviser William Callahan of New York-based Unitel, a maritime security company, said. "But it doesn't have to be a tanker," he added. "It could be one twenty-foot container loaded with a nuclear device. It (the maritime trade) is the unprotected underside of America," he said. The US administration is aware of the crisis and experts have been rapidly drafted in to review it. "We can see it right now - terrorists will shift their sights to some other modality of transportation in order to inflict pain on the United States," Kim Petersen, executive director of the advisory body the Maritime Security Council told a recent government maritime security hearing. Petersen estimated just 2% of containers entering the US were inspected. "A lot needs to be done," he said. Immediately after last month's attacks, the US tightened port security and started reviewing Coast Guard operations. Transcripts from a hearing held by US Senator John Kerry reveal the gravity of the situation. "A terrorist act involving chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear weapons at one of these (US) seaports could result in extensive loss of lives," Maine Senator Olympia Snowe told one hearing. Maritime security consultant Tim Spicer of London-based Trident Maritime said: "Maritime security is not as good as it should be in the current climate, and people are scrambling to catch up." Spicer said Saudi-born militant Osama bin Ladin and his Al-Qaida network seemed to be aware of shipping's vulnerability to attack, as illustrated by the death of 17 US servicemen in October 2000, when suicide bombers rammed an explosive-laden dinghy into the hull of the American warship USS Cole. Clifford Beal, editor of Jane's Defence Weekly, said that a radiological weapon could also be used in a container to deadly effect. A typical radiological weapon might contain enriched uranium wrapped around a conventional explosive. ***************************************************************** 21 'Torpedo explosion' sank Kursk BBC News | WORLD | 29 October, 2001, The first cruise missiles have been removed The Kursk disaster was caused by one of the submarine's torpedoes exploding, according to the man in charge of the investigation into the accident. All 118 crew members died in the catastrophe in August last year on board one of Russia's most advanced submarines. Russian Deputy Prime Minister Ilya Klebanov told Russian TV: "What is absolutely clear is that the destruction we spoke about during the past year...was caused by the initial explosion of one of the torpedoes." But Mr Klebanov said the investigators had yet to establish what had led to the torpedo explosion. He offered three possible explanations - a fault with the torpedo, collision with a mine, or another kind of collision. Missiles removed Earlier on Monday, the Russian salvage workers removed the first three of 22 Granit cruise missiles from the submarine. "The operation followed normal procedure, just as it would with any other submarine," an official of the Northern Fleet told the AFP news agency. What is now absolutely clear is that the destruction we spoke about... was caused by the initial explosion of one of the torpedoes Ilya Klebanov Russian Deputy Prime Minister Experts expressed fears, as the submarine was being lifted from the sea bed, that any sharp movement could cause a damaged missile to explode. Russian officials have always denied that the missiles are carrying nuclear warheads. Explosions hell So far 45 bodies have been removed from the submarine since it was lifted into dry dock last week. Of these 25 have been identified, and seven have been flown out to relatives. The bow of the Kursk is still on the seabed "People are hellishly tired, but nothing can make them leave the wreck," said Leonid Troshin, spokesman for prosecutor general Vladimir Ustinov. Mr Ustinov described on Saturday the "hell" that followed the explosions as fire swept through the submarine. The flames would have been quenched by the icy water that flooded the Kursk within seven to eight hours, but any attempt to rescue crew members who fled to the rear of the boat would have been futile, he said. Missile questions Mr Troshin said the search for bodies was now focused on the middle of the vessel, as there were none left in the three sections closest to the stern. People are hellishly tired, but nothing can make them leave the wreck Leonid Troshin Spokesman for Prosecutor General Mr Troshin said work was stopped briefly on Monday because some compartments had to be cleared of high concentrations of lethal hydrogen sulfite. Investigators also could not reach a section connecting the two compartments containing the submarine's two nuclear reactors as it was filled with debris from the blasts, he said. Nuclear warheads Russian defence analyst Pavel Felgenhauer has questioned the official line that there were no nuclear warheads on board the Kursk. He points out that immediately after the Barents Sea exercises, the submarine had been due to leave for the Mediterranean on an expedition for which it would certainly have been armed with nuclear missiles. Investigators believe the wreck will provide many clues to the cause of the blasts, but say a definitive answer may only become possible when the bow section is raised. It was sawn off and left on the seabed and is due to be raised next year. ***************************************************************** 22 Pakistan nuclear scientist held by Keith Dovkants in Islamabad American investigators are questioning an eminent Pakistani scientist over intelligence reports that indicate Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda terrorist network has acquired the technology to manufacture a viable nuclear bomb. London dissident on terror charge (30 Oct 2001) In what is being seen as one of the most disturbing developments in the unfolding inquiry into Al Qaeda, Dr Sultan Bashiruddin Mehmood was arrested by Pakistani secret servicemen at his home in Lahore and interrogated by a team of FBI and CIA agents. Dr Mehmood was a leading figure in Pakistan's Atomic Energy Commission until his resignation over disagreements with government policy. He is a staunch supporter of Afghanistan's Taliban regime and has helped establish a number of industrial facilities in the country using mainly Islamic funds. It is understood he has been closely questioned about a complex of buildings outside Kandahar that have been described as a flour mill. He was involved in establishing the factory through an organisation called Ummah Reconstruction. The buildings were targeted in recent allied bombing attacks but a shortage of good intelligence from inside Afghanistan has made it impossible to determine precisely what was inside or whether items had recently been removed. However, according to a number of intelligence reports passed to American investigators, Al Qaeda has already acquired the material and the knowledge to put together a so-called "dirty bomb". Such a device uses conventional explosives, around which radioactive material is packed. When the bomb is detonated radioactive particles are blasted over a wide area. The effects could wipe out large sections of a city and render it uninhabitable. Until recently it was believed that Bin Laden had failed in a number of attempts to buy nuclear material. Earlier this year, a Pakistani who described himself as a chemical engineer tried to acquire nuclear material from a Bulgarian middleman. There was convincing evidence that the Pakistani was acting for Bin Laden's network. The deal fell through. Then, a few months ago, the authorities in Uzbekistan intercepted 10 leadlined containers of radioactive material bound for Quetta, Pakistan - a border town with Afghanistan. This has led investigators to believe that some radioactive material has reached Afghanistan and Bin Laden. Inquiries are continuing but the arrest has focused renewed attention on the allies' greatest fear, that Bin Laden will unleash a weapon of mass destruction on the US or Britain. © Associated Newspapers Ltd., 30 October 2001 ***************************************************************** 23 Pakistan: Report on sealing nuclear warheads rejected BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; Oct 30, 2001 Text of report by Pakistan TV on 30 October Pakistan's nuclear assets are under strict control and nobody can touch them. This was stated by Director-General [of] ISPR [Inter Services Public Relations Maj-Gen Rashid Qureshi at a joint news briefing in Islamabad today. Responding to a question regarding a report published in New Yorker magazine about conspiracy to seal Pakistan's nuclear warheads, he said it is a ridiculous story and shows total ignorance about the procedures and safeguards being observed for our nuclear assets. To another question, Gen Qureshi said Pakistan is not responsible for the increase in tension either at the Line of Control or in occupied Kashmir, rather it is the Indians who are doing it. He said Pakistan takes minimum possible defensive measures to safeguard our land or airspace. Responding to a question, he said a 30-member Shura [consultative committee] is discussing ways and means to end the blockade of Karakoram Highway and expressed the hope that the matter will be resolved in a day or two. The Foreign Office spokesman responding to a question said we have expressed our desire to resolve all outstanding issue with India, including the core issue of Kashmir through peaceful negotiations. And for this purpose, we have invited Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to visit Pakistan as well to meet in New York. We would very much like that all issues between India and Pakistan are resolved through negotiations and for this, meetings at various levels would be necessary. Source: Pakistan TV, Islamabad, in English 1300 gmt 30 Oct 01 /BBC Monitoring/ © BBC. World Reporter All Material Subject to ***************************************************************** 24 Pasko-trial postponed for another month Gregory Pasko, an investigative journalist who worked for the Pacific Fleet's newspaper, was arrested on 20 November 1997 by the FSB and charged with high treason for his writing about the nuclear safety issues in the Russian Pacific Fleet. The experts who have examined whether it is Pasko who talks on FSB's recordings of his telephone conversations or not, needs more time. Pasko says that he does the talking, but the experts are still in doubt... Jon Gauslaa, 2001-10-29 21:00 The Pasko-trial re-started on October 29, but not for long. At the end of the day, the Pacific Fleet Court announced that the proceedings would be postponed, probably for yet another month. The announcement took Pasko and his defence by surprise, and the bizarre reason for the postponement made them even more astonished. Phonetic experts need more time It turns out that the phonetic experts that were called in by the Court in order to determine whether it actually is Pasko who talks on the FSB's recordings of his telephone conversations with Japanese journalists, need more time to carry out their task. The recordings have previously been played in Court. It then became clear that they have no value as evidence for the prosecution, as the content of Pasko's conversations is completely innocent and do not touch upon secret information. Thus, Pasko could easily acknowledge in Court that his voice indeed could be heard on the recordings. The experts were, however, not so sure. They did not rule out that Pasko could be identical with the person talking on the recordings, but needed one more month of examinations before they could conclude. The experts were further delayed by the fact that they also have to determine whether the transcripts in the case files of the recordings are correct or not, a task that they apparently find extremely difficult. No decision in 2001? The Court will in the forthcoming days interrogate some more witnesses. It is expected to announce the length of the postponement on Thursday, but there is reason to believe that the trial will resume first on November 30, 2001. Pasko's St. Petersburg-based defender Ivan Pavlov, explained that the Court had no other option than to postpone the trial. According to the Russian Criminal Procedure Code the expert-evaluation of the recordings has to be carried out before the Court can reach a verdict. Pavlov was however, not impressed by the speed of the experts' work. -- They were appointed in the summer and they could at least have notified us about the delay so that we did not have to come here in vain, he said. Grigory Pasko was arrested on November 20, 1997 on charges of espionage on behalf of the Japanese TV-channel NHK. He was acquitted in July 1999, but convicted of 'abuse of official authority' and freed under an amnesty. Seeking a full acquittal, Pasko appealed, but so did the prosecution, insisting he was a spy. On November 21, 2000 the Russian Military Supreme Court sent the case back for a re-trial at the Pacific Fleet Court. The re-trial started on July 11, 2001, and after the latest postponement, it seems unlikely that the Court will be able to determine the case before the end of the year. Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 25 Kursk was flooded in 8 hours Background information and news about the numerous accidents and incidents that involve the nuclear vessels in the Northern Fleet. (Murmansk:) The Kursk was flooded with water in eight hours after it sank. Water found in the reactor compartment, but the reactors are said to be safely shutdown. Viktor Khabarov, 2001-10-30 13:52 "It is a real hell," Russia's prosecutor general, Vladimir Ustinov, described the situation inside the Kursk. The temperature in the fire epicentre was up to 8,000 degrees centigrade. The fire raged all the compartments except the reactor compartment. Vladimir Kuroedov, the commander of the Russian Navy, said that some cruise missiles will be unloaded using regular procedures. Experts confirmed that the cruise missiles on the port side are in good shape, while the ones on the starboard were likely flooded with water. The investigation activities will be carried parallel to unloading the missiles. So far, 3 out of 22 Shipwreck class cruise missiles, or Granit class, were unloaded. The sixth compartment, the reactor compartment, is empty, no bodies were found there. The tank of reactors' biological shield with water is situated under the sixth compartment. According to Vladimir Kuroedov, the water is pumped from the tank to avoid possible accidents. Besides, the sixth compartment is heated underneath. It is confirmed that the reactors are in safe condition, Igor Serov, the designer of the Kursk reactor, said. "We have to ensure the reactors stays in this safe condition. During the accident they shut down automatically. After opening the hatch, we have to switch off electricity to avoid unexpected complications with the reactors," he added. Experts have already entered the sixth compartment. The seawater, however, was found in the compartment. It leaked in through the ventilation system and other openings. The compartment is being dried now. It is still unclear what caused the explosion on the Kursk. The designers of the torpedoes claim nothing could happen to their torpedoes. The 650mm torpedoes in question were designed back in 1953. According to the recent experts’ opinion the submarine was flooded with water in six to seven, maximum eight, hours after it sank. According to Vladimir Ustinov, the experts examined the rescue capsule and came to the conclusion that due to the severe damages after the explosion the capsule could not be used by the submariners. "We managed to provide high level safety for the reactor compartment and cruise missiles, but we have to work more on crew’s safety," Vladimir Kuroedov said. The Russian deputy premier, Ilya Klebanov, who is the chief of the salvage operation, arrives at Murmansk on Tuesday. Publisher: Bellona Foundation, President: Frederic Hauge Information: info@bellona.no, Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 26 Analysis: Threat from weapon stockpiles BBC News | EUROPE | 30 October, 2001, Work to destroy missiles is behind schedule By BBC News Online's Tom Housden Over the last decade, America is thought to have spent several billion dollars on securing the former Soviet Union's vast arsenal of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. But some of the weapons stocks remain unaccounted for. The 11 September attacks and anthrax outbreaks have rekindled fears that some may have fallen into the wrong hands. A decade after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia's nuclear complex is largely intact, vastly oversized and overstaffed Siegfried Heckler, US scientist Ten years ago the Nunn-Lugar agreement was drawn up as part of a series of US-Russian initiatives aimed at safeguarding weapons of mass destruction amid the political chaos and instability which followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. But Republican Senator Richard Lugar, who co-authored the legislation, admits that work to secure the biological and chemical stockpiles remains far from complete, while the safe disposal of nuclear weapons material is difficult. There is also concern that impoverished or disaffected Russian scientists may decide to export their knowledge - and may not be too scrupulous about who they work for. Complacency Prior to the 11 September attacks on America, US backing for the schemes seemed to be waning amid a backdrop of disorganisation and growing mutual distrust. Former Soviet arsenal 7-800 tons of weapons-grade Uranium 150-200 tons of weapons-grade Plutonium Estimated 16,000 stored nuclear weapons, including nuclear landmines and shells US has spent about $5bn on non-proliferation since 1992 Siegfried Heckler, former director of the US Los Alamos National Laboratory, recently warned that work to safeguard and eliminate weapons of mass destruction was being undermined by inertia and complacency. "Nothing really serious has happened, but a decade after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia's nuclear complex is largely intact, vastly oversized and overstaffed," he told the International Herald and Tribune. Ex-Soviet republics are thought to have 7-800 tons of enriched uranium remaining from its Cold War stockpiles, with an additional 150-200 tons of enriched plutonium. Although making large-scale nuclear weapons requires a high degree of expertise, there are fears that terrorists could scrape together sufficient supplies of radioactive material to produce a small and crude, yet devastating bomb. These so-called dirty bombs could be manufactured by simply wrapping small amounts of radioactive material in conventional explosives. Renewed impetus In March this year the Bush administration delayed an initiative drawn up by the Clinton government aimed at destroying plutonium stocks and helping Russian scientists find new jobs or careers. Russia retains a vast arsenal of nuclear weapons Now there is renewed impetus for another effort. Senator Lugar said he hopes that this year funding will be boosted for the arms reduction and control initiatives. The US recently upgraded security at storage facilities thought to be most vulnerable to theft, but further monitoring has been restricted by the Russian Energy Department. The US recently agreed with Uzbekistan that weapons-grade anthrax spores dumped on the island of Vozrozhdeniye in the Aral Sea will be removed and destroyed. Vozrozhdeniye - the world's largest burial site of weapons-grade anthrax - served as a Russian biological and chemical warfare test site for more than 60 years. Clean-up The island was reputedly used for testing tularaemia, Q-fever, brucellosis, glanders and plague during the 1970s. It is believed that military laboratories also tested typhus, botulinum toxin, Venezuelan equine encephalitis, smallpox, and microbial strains with high virulence and resistance to ultraviolet rays or heat. The facility was abandoned in 1992, but a survey by US scientists in 1997 found that anthrax remained infectious in six out of 11 burial sites. Clearing up Vozrozhdeniye is becoming more urgent given that the Aral Sea is shrinking each year. The island will soon be accessible by land. The Aral Sea is becoming an arid wasteland The US is also to assist with funding improvements to security at germ warfare research and storage facilities elsewhere in Uzbekistan. It has also been predicted that the US Congress will also now pass a long-awaited $35m contribution towards a $200m plant to destroy Soviet chemical weapons. ***************************************************************** 27 Peaceful protest The Scotsman Online - Robin Harper FROM the outset of any protest at Faslane, it is fair to say that most of the protesters expect to be arrested, but that knowledge is unlikely to stop the demonstrators making their point. As protesters, we go into the situation knowing full well that we will most likely be causing an obstruction and breaking the law by committing a clear breach of the peace. From our viewpoint, the fact that we must break minor laws to make a very important point is not really a key issue. What is important is that we draw publicity to a very serious debate. The right to protest is one of the most basic human rights and we are entitled to exercise that right in full. By using non-violent direct action, we are making our point in a civilised and legitimate fashion, and although the public disruption is unfortunate, the over-riding point against nuclear weapons must be made. In many ways, it is almost a positive thing that so many people are arrested , as the more people that are taken into custody, the more publicity our arguments against Trident receive. The conduct of the protesters has been fantastic and the protests, although of a serious nature, are carried out in a cheerful fashion. This is shown in the increasingly positive relationship the protesters have with the police, who have largely carried out their duties with good humour. The majority of protesters, like myself, will remove themselves from the north gate of Faslane as soon as we are tapped on the shoulder by the police. When the time comes for us to move along, most of us do so in good humour. The bottom line is things are unlikely to change but we know that by exercising our public right to protest, we are keeping the issue alive. We will certainly be back and the police know they have to remove us. Scottish Green Party MSP for Lothian. A member of CND for more than 40 years and an active trade unionist with the Educational Institute of Scotland for more than 20 years, he joined the Scottish Green Party (then called the Ecology Party) in 1985. ***************************************************************** 28 Energy and water legislation has $142 million in Nevada projects [Las Vegas Review-Journal] Tuesday, October 30, 2001 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal By STEVE TETREAULT DONREY WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- An energy and water bill expected to be completed in Congress this week contains almost $142 million in projects for Nevada, including $10 million for counterterrorism training at the Nevada Test Site. Test site programs for renewable energy development and nuclear weapons maintenance, research at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and the University of Nevada, Reno, and flood control in Northern and Southern Nevada all are targeted for funding. While many items in the legislation were requested by the Bush administration, others were added by Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., the first-year chairman of the Senate's energy and water subcommittee. For instance, $10 million in counterterrorism funding at the test site was added after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Reid has proposed that the Bush administration designate the test site as a National Center for Combatting Terrorism. A separate bill in Congress would allocate an additional $7 million for training programs at the test site. Reid's office released a list of Nevada projects in the energy and water bill Monday. Today, Senate and House negotiators are scheduled to approve the final $25 billion bill funding the Energy Department, Army Corps of Engineers, Bureau of Reclamation and related agencies in 2002. Congressional leaders hope the House and Senate will add their final approval by week's end, sending the bill to the president for his signature. On nuclear waste, the bill contains $2.5 million for the state of Nevada to continue monitoring government studies of Yucca Mountain, 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas, for a spent-fuel repository. Nevada counties would be granted $6 million. Budget figures for the Yucca Mountain program itself could not be obtained Monday. Some $59 million would be steered to continued research into nuclear waste transmutation, a process to condense waste and reduce its radioactivity. Also, UNLV would be given $4.5 million for other nuclear waste studies. The Clark County Regional Flood Control District would receive an $8 million reimbursement for work it has contributed to flood control along the Tropicana and Flamingo washes. The Army Corps of Engineers would be given another $22 million to continue the program. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado would get $4 million to establish programs in Nevada. Geothermal energy research in the state would be given $3 million, a solar energy program at UNLV would get $1 million, and another $1 million would fund environmental studies of renewable power programs at the test site. Also at the test site, $4 million would be allocated to design a support facility for weapons experiments and $6.2 million would be spent to upgrade power systems and communications networks. The bill would grant UNLV and UNR $5 million for research in support of the nuclear weapons program. Another $4 million would be spent to study groundwater circulation beneath the test site, and $3 million would go to develop "micro sensors" for environmental monitoring at the range. This story is located at: http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/2001/Oct-30-Tue-2001/news/17335914.html ***************************************************************** 29 Pakistan nuclear weapons in safe hands: Fernandes rediff.com: October 30, 2001 Ramesh Menon in New Delhi Defence Minister George Fernandes on Tuesday hoped those who had control of Pakistan's nuclear programme would try their best to not let it fall into the wrong hands. He was speaking at an international seminar, The Global Threat of Terror -- Ideological, Material and Political Linkages, organised by the Institute for Conflict Management in New Delhi. He said the United States had lined up numerous nations to endorse its fight against terrorism and ironically, Pakistan, which harboured, trained, and mounted terrorist attacks on India for years now, had turned out to be the most loyal ally of the US. "Perhaps, there was some poetic justice. It was the United States, which had collaborated with Pakistan in creating the Taleban militia to fight the Russians. Pakistan had now become the cat's paw for the United States to destroy the Frankenstein they jointly fathered," he added. Fernandes pointed out Pakistan, which had used the Taleban to fulfil its nefarious designs in India, is now forced to fight it. But, he claimed Pakistan was playing a double game, citing 'credible evidence' pointing to the continued involvement of the ISI in aiding the Taleban. Fernandes said the US objective of capturing Osama bin Laden dead or alive may be unfulfilled, and the aim of re-establishing a new regime in Afghanistan would be a long-term gamble. Fernandes minced no words saying the mere physical annihilation of Osama bin Laden, and the Taleban militia would not put an end to terrorism. India had enough experience of how one country like Pakistan could keep terrorism alive for decades. Pakistan, he said, emphatically, was the driving force behind every terrorist action on Indian soil in Jammu and Kashmir and the north-east. Quoting from Sanjay Hazarika's book, Strangers of the Mist, he said, "Over the years, the ISI stirred the Punjab insurrection, arming and training Sikh extremists until a ruthless police official, Kanwar Pal Singh Gill, crushed them with an iron hand." He said Pakistan had terrorist linkages in Punjab, Kashmir and the north-east, and used them to destabilise India. Though India had been shouting hoarse about Pakistan's crimes from every global platform, no nation thought it was necessary to bomb terrorist training camps in Pakistan. He said the Indian army had avoided attacking the terrorist training camps fearing civilian casualities. Fernandes said freezing accounts of terrorist organisations was not enough, as these groups got their money from narcotics. He wanted transparency in global banking operations, and getting the Swiss to open up all their numbered and secret accounts. He said similar actions must be taken in all offshore banks and other agencies that hold secret accounts consisting of money secured through questionable means. But, as the United States had high stakes in offshore banking, there was little hope that such flow of money would stop, he warned. ***************************************************************** 30 US edition: Pakistan hands over 3 retired N-scientists to US rediff.com October 30, 2001 Pakistan has handed over three retired nuclear scientists accused of having links with terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden to United States authorities, media reports said on Tuesday. Among those handed over was Sultan Bashiruddin Mehmood, one of Pakistan's top scientists. Mehmood, along with two of his retired colleagues -- former chief engineer of Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission Abdul Majeed, and former PAEC scientist Mirza Yousaf -- were handed over to a joint team of the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Central Intelligence Agency for further investigations, the Pakistan Observer reported. Quoting sources, the paper said that Mehmood was questioned by Pakistani intelligence agencies for alleged links with the Taleban militia and Laden. He was released on October 26 after being "cleared" by security agencies, but was again picked up from his home on the night of October 28. Quoting sources close to Mehmood's family, the paper said the scientist had returned home in a precarious state of mental and physical health. During the time spent with his family after being released by the security agencies, Mehmood appeared nervous, conspicuously quiet and displayed signs of extreme stress, the report said. "He did not talk much. Throughout the two-and-a-half days at home he was constantly watched and nobody was allowed to meet him," it said. Mehmood, who was again picked up on October 28, told his family while leaving that if they did not hear from him in a few days, they must deem him dead, the paper said, adding he had even left behind a will. Mehmood, who resigned from the PAEC in protest when the Nawaz Sharif government considered signing the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, later founded a NGO called 'Ummah Reconstruction' to carry out welfare activities in Afghanistan. The US and British intelligence agencies alleged that the NGO was directly linked to Laden's Al Qaeda network. They claimed that Mehmood's team was trying to develop nuclear technology for Laden. 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