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/02/02 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 10.253
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RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE
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NUCLEAR POLICY
1 UK: A switched-on energy policy?
2 US: Proposals for New Nuclear Power Plants Are "Road Map to a
3 UK BE OP: Spent force
4 IAEA General Conference 46th Regular Session
5 Japan's nuclear safety "dangerously weak"*
6 US: Clinton urges 'UN route' for tackling Iraq
7 US: Second TVA nuclear plant OK'd to make tritium
8 US: Bush Opposes Alternative Iraq Plan
9 Japan Utility Firm Faces Warning
10 US: Democrats Defend Visit to Iraq
11 US: In defense of nuclear energy --
12 Belgium criticises British Energy aid
13 British Government Saves British Energy from Administration — for
14 Parliament set to vote on ratification of U.S.-Russian nuclear
NUCLEAR REACTORS
15 US: NRC expands investigation of radiation exposure at Davis-Besse
16 US: Westinghouse Wins $15 Million in Steam Generator Services Contra
17 US: Davis-Besse Nuclear workers contaminated
18 US: Activist group wants Davis-Besse to go non-nuclear -
NUCLEAR SAFETY
19 US: NRC Issues Order Prohibiting Health Physics Consultant from
20 Analysis: Iraq, Africa and uranium*
21 US: Fort Payne trying to find local hazards
22 Rescue-robot lab opens on Port Island
23 Number of Iraqi Children Suffering from Leukaemia Doubled
24 Strenghtened Safeguards, Mali, Chile and South Africa
25 US: Payments made to IAAP workers
26 Japanese PM Instructs Minister to Stress Nuclear Safety
27 US: Will Wamp sign sick-worker bill?
NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE
28 UK: Nesbitt's Sellafield views rapped*
29 US: AU: Labor urged to honour uranium vow
30 US: Nebraska plans to appeal ruling on nuclear dump
31 AMEC to Begin Operations With Russia's Pacific Fleet
32 US: Nuclear waste road accidents don't faze WIPP*
33 US: Feds Rule Against Anti-Waste Goshutes
34 US: Letter: Bush bragging about Yucca is no surprise
35 US: Lawmakers Oppose Boyd Co. Decision
36 US: State appeals waste-site ruling
37 US: State health department's reputation on line with Cotter
38 US: State begins appeal of ruling in nuke waste compact suit
NUCLEAR WEAPONS
39 Praful Bidwai: Say no to war on Iraq
40 *Commentary: North Korean reforms illusory*
41 Iraq slams British and US rejection of UN deal*
42 US: Bush agrees deal on Iraq with Congressional leaders
43 US: Congressmen Take Heat for Iraq Visit
44 US: Bush: Iraq Force May Be Unavoidable
45 US: Bush, Lawmaker Remarks on Iraq
46 US: Enola Gay navigator, comrades meeting in OR for reunion
47 IAEA and Iraq: The Next Steps
48 US: Race for the Superbomb | Nuclear Blast Mapper
49 US: David Broder: On Iraq, watch what Bush does, not what he says
50 US Resolution Makes Extraordinary Demands on Iraq
51 Iraqi deputy premier insists Iraq has no nuclear weapons
US DEPT. OF ENERGY
52 Hanford Communities still awaiting $2 million
53 PNNL an asset that fits Office of Science goals
54 Lab's laser reviews tainted, judge says Ruling on $4 billion NIF
55 FFTF advocates plan to sue
56 Hanford meets cleanup deadline
57 DOE official delves into PNNL's future
58 TVA gets approval to make more tritium
59 Y-12 criticized for putting stockpile in jeopardy
60 October Marks the 25th Anniversary of the Department of
61 Energy Secretary Abraham and Russian Energy Minister Tour
62 Public Workshops on Improvements to Greenhouse Gas Reporting
OTHER NUCLEAR
63 Obituary: Clive Grove-Palmer
64 Global Cooperation for Advanced Nuclear Electricity Plants
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FULL NEWS STORIES
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1 UK: A switched-on energy policy?
Times Online
October 02, 2002
business editor's commentary by patience wheatcroft
THANKS to a two-month extension of its emergency government loan,
British Energy is still in business and out of the headlines.
Judging from comments made yesterday by Brian Wilson, the Energy
Minister, the Government is far from certain as to how it is to
resolve the company’s fate once the November deadline arrives.
“It would cost more to walk away from British Energy than it
would to address the problem,” he said. This was the firmest hint
yet that the Department of Trade and Industry is not prepared to
leave the nuclear power generator to the mercy of market forces,
no matter how strong the clamour from some rival quarters for
this private sector business not to be bailed out by the
Government.
Wilson was addressing a Blackpool fringe meeting whose title
encapsulated the uncertainties surrounding Britain’s attitude to
power. “An Energy Policy in the interests of all?” it asked. In
fact, the question mark could have come after the first three
words, since an energy policy is something that the country has
lacked for far too long. Another White Paper is due before the
end of the year which may begin to put that right but somehow the
plaque behind Wilson’s head as he spoke did not give cause for
too much optimism. It declared that the hall had been officially
opened by Ken Dodd. The Knotty Ash comedian might have seen the
joke in Britain’s contradictory approaches to energy matters but
Wilson does not. The two themes that emerged from his speech and
the questions and answers that followed, themes that are likely
to be pursued in the White Paper, are that nuclear power must be
encouraged and the planning system has to change. On both fronts
he may find that his own Government is not entirely supportive.
“I don’t want the White Paper to be a fudge, just setting out the
options,” he declared. “We need some conclusions.”
His conclusions are already fairly clear. If Britain is to move
towards an energy supply which is clean, affordable and secure,
then nuclear has to be an important part of the mix. Presently we
risk reaching 2020 being 70 per cent dependent on gas, of which
90 per cent will be imported, much of it from areas where there
is considerable political risk. That is not a balance that any
energy planner would be likely to recommend.
If we are to make any headway in developing renewable energy
sources such as windpower, the planning system will have to
change.
The present target is for 10 per cent of needs to be met by
renewable energy by 2010. “But we won’t get there unless we do a
lot better in overcoming the obstacles in the planning system,”
Wilson said. The Nimby faction is so vigorous in its objections,
particularly to wind turbines, that two thirds of renewable
energy schemes do not get past the planning stages.
The Government has already acknowledged that the planning system
is a drag on British productivity and must be speeded up.
However, to change the law so that environmental arguments were
curtailed over something as controversial as a wind farm would
anger many voters.
But there are some obstacles to the development of turbines which
might be relatively easily removed. For instance, Wilson is
apparently already in negotiation with the Ministry of Defence to
see if it could be persuaded not to argue routinely that wind
farms are likely to interfere with its operations.
Covering the country with wind farms and solar panels would not,
however, come near to meeting our energy needs. Nuclear power
provided a quarter of our supplies last year. If British Energy’s
contribution to that is to be maintained, Wilson will have to
persuade the Government to find a means of effectively
subsidising nuclear power.
Labour gets unreal over private finance
DISCONNECTION between Labour and reality is nowhere greater than
over the Private Finance Initiative, Gordon Brown’s favourite
device to spend now and pay later. In Blackpool, union leaders
fulminated over the X-rated profits supposedly being racked up by
private contractors at the expense of innocent nurses. The likes
of Paris Moayedi. chief executive of Jarvis, and Robin Southwell,
until yesterday boss of WS Atkins, have been subjected to a
virulent personal campaign by the GMB union, guying them as
fat-cat wreckers and profiteers.
Investors should be so lucky. Shares in the firms most closely
associated with PFI have been among the worst losers in the bear
market. There are several reasons for this. The 63 per cent fall
at Capita Group, the IT contractor, in part reflects its premium
rating. Capita shares were valued on future prospects rather than
present profit. Hope value has been heavily punished in the later
stages of the market rout.
The Government coup against Railtrack, whose corporate corpse was
finally handed back by administrators yesterday, has
progressively soured sentiment against the sector. That poisonous
stew of political and operational risk highlighted at Railtrack
has come to appear systematic rather than accidental. A
combination of the financial strain of bidding for contracts,
tighter accounting rules and the delays brought to the supposedly
lucrative London Underground contracts by Mayor Livingstone
persuaded Amey, one of the top PFI enthusiasts, to give up on
future projects. It is not alone. Its shares are down three
quarters.
The rail crash at Potters Bar, where Jarvis was contracted for
track maintenance, has tarnished it corporately, whatever the
financial, legal or moral outcome. Its shares are down two
thirds. The clamour against PFI profits at Blackpool has added to
the risks exposed at Railtrack. It opens the very real prospect,
as soon as the going gets tough, that the Treasury will seek to
rewrite contracts or to impose profit and price regulation
retrospectively.
If PFI firms were ever to make windfall profits, ministers might
tax them, just as they helped to tax Railtrack out of business.
Yesterday, savers were reminded of another danger: contractors
are prone to make spectacularly expensive mistakes. WS Atkins,
whose shares have just joined the 90 per cent club, developed a
computerised billing system that did not do the job and is
costing a fortune. When it comes to IT disasters and overruns,
the public sector has no monopoly of incompetence. As Eurotunnel
investors know, the private sector can get it wrong too.
Fingers crossed for life insurers
SIR Howard Davies’s Financial Services Authority played the role
of Dr Pangloss for Equitable Life. It assumed that the crucial
court case would go the insurer’s way and, when that did not
happen, it assumed that some other company would take Equitable
over.
Understandably, the FSA has ever since been loath to express any
confidence in the insurers it monitors. So yesterday’s vote of
confidence from John Tiner, the FSA director charged with
cleaning up the regulator’s act, should be seen as something very
different from the idle words on offer at Blackpool.
Traditionally, a life assurance policy with a reputable company
was seen as a safe form of saving in bad times for financial
markets. Life policies were seen as a safe haven from storms
precisely because of those reserves of fat, overcautious
declarations of bonus and excessively conservative assumptions
about both liabilities and returns on assets that so enraged
consumerists in the good years.
This time, however, there has been a stark loss of faith in
insurers. Their opacity has worked against them in a less
trusting age. Some of the fat, we know, has been burned off.
Worst of all, the collapse of Equitable Life has destroyed
mystique and exposed vulnerability. Mr Tiner’s estimate that
insurers could stand a further sharp fall in share prices carries
weight only because it rests on an up-to-date survey of the top
20 insurers and “realistic” projections of assets and
liabilities. And Mr Tiner had better be right. The FSA has
everything to lose if he is not. Its faith must rest on several
factors. All but the strongest insurers have had to cover
themselves to some extent by moving from equities to bonds. Some,
led by Legal &General, have raised more capital. Others, such as
bancassurers, have a call on their parent companies and
shareholders. In the end, however, no institution is proof
against meltdown. The FSA survey was taken when the FTSE 100
index traded at about 4,000. When Australia’s AMP put another
£500 million into its UK Pearl subsidiary, it said that would be
enough so long as the index did not fall below 3,700. Fingers
crossed.
WHEN Société Générale faced a hostile bid from French banking
rival BNP in 1999, the insurer now known as Aviva built up its
shareholding in SG and backed the board, causing much muttering
in Paris. Three years later comes the reward. Bank and insurer
have agreed that Aviva will sell its life policies through SG
branches and will replace BNP in a joint venture for the purpose.
Unlike many UK companies, Aviva learnt in good time that if you
want to succeed in France, you do as the Parisians.
Copyright 2002 [http://www.timesonline.co.uk
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2 Proposals for New Nuclear Power Plants Are "Road Map to a
Rip-off"*
*/Oct. 1, 2002/*
*/Nuclear Power Is Too Costly, Public Citizen Analysis Says;
Government?s Own Internal Report Acknowledges Nuclear Power?s
Economic Failures/*
WASHINGTON, D.C. ? Lawmakers should reject pending energy
legislation that heavily promotes nuclear power because the
industry has a history of cost overruns, unexpectedly high
operation and maintenance costs, expensive unscheduled shutdowns,
lower-than-anticipated operating efficiency and an overall
failure to perform competitively, according to a Public Citizen
analysis released today. Congress also should cut off the funding
spigot for the nuclear industry by rejecting giveaways contained
in the proposed 2003 budget, Public Citizen said.
A key problem with the Senate-passed energy bill is that it
enshrines the Bush administration?s "Nuclear Power 2010" program,
an aggressive initiative unveiled earlier this year to promote
and subsidize the construction of new nuclear power plants in the
United States within this decade. The analysis, /Road Map to a
Rip-off,/ concludes that this is particularly foolhardy given
that a panel of high-level nuclear energy executives commissioned
by the Department of Energy (DOE) produced a little-noticed
report last year detailing numerous economic reasons why new
nuclear power plants should not be built.
The internal DOE report presents a gloomy picture of nuclear
power not being viable in the market without massive federal
subsidies and concludes that nuclear companies need a 50-50 cost
share arrangement between taxpayers and the nuclear industry to
fund the first phase of the program. Appropriations bills in both
the House and the Senate fund the administration?s $38.5 million
request for the program, while the Senate energy bill now in
conference would authorize annual spending for the program.
Other forms of energy are less expensive. Building nuclear plants
requires massive up-front expenditures, permitting and
construction take years, and nuclear power isn?t competitive with
other forms of power unless the government subsidizes it, Public
Citizen?s analysis says.
"It is unbelievable that through the energy bill and the budget,
Congress is debating annual bailouts for the expansion of an
inefficient industry whose own representatives admit they need
taxpayer subsidies to stay afloat," said Public Citizen President
Joan Claybrook, who sent a letter today to all the conferees who
are now haggling over the energy legislation. "This is
inconceivable given that nuclear plants can be targeted by
terrorists as weapons of mass destruction, and taxpayers would
have to pay for their expansion."
The energy bill also contains $2.6 billion in tax breaks and
subsidies for the nuclear industry and reauthorizes the
Price-Anderson Act, which limits the nuclear industry?s insurance
payments and liability in case of a serious accident, potentially
leaving taxpayers to pay for clean-up.
Nuclear 2010 is a plan for heavy-handed government command and
control of electricity markets to enrich nuclear power
corporations, leaving taxpayers to foot much of the bill," said
Wenonah Hauter, director of Public Citizen?s Critical Mass Energy
and Environment Program. "This is bad economics and a backwards
public policy, by and for private industry."
Added Alice Slater, president of Global Resource Action Center
for the Environment . "The Nuclear
2010 Program gives an unfair advantage to nuclear corporations
and stacks the deck against clean, safe alternative energy
sources. The government?s internal report candidly acknowledges
the multitude of reasons why nuclear power is not economical. We
can't allow the nuclear industry to waste taxpayers' dollars on
its dangerous dreams for expansion."
Public Citizen
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3 UK BE OP: Spent force
Guardian Unlimited | Archive Search
Paul Brown Guardian
Wednesday October 2, 2002
So far, the government has put £650m into British Energy (BE) in
three weeks to stop it going bankrupt - more than this or any
previous administration has put into renewables in 30 years. Part
of the proposed rescue plan is to reduce the £300m BE pays to
British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) annually to reprocess spent fuel, a
service BE neither wants nor needs. The trouble for BNFL is that
this would hasten the closure of the already troubled Thorp
reprocessing works, supposedly the main reason for the company's
existence. It will also damage the finances and earning power of
BNFL, already technically bankrupt since its liabilities far
exceed its assets. An escapologist of Houdini's brilliance is
required at the DTI .
Japanese retreat
More bad news for BNFL comes from Japan, where one of its major
potential customers has had its permission to install
plutonium-based fuel made from the Thorp reprocessed fuel
withdrawn. A scandal at Tokyo Electric over safety cover-ups has
led to the Fukushima state governor saying the whole nuclear
power policy should be rethought. This is the second state to do
so - and both contained nuclear utilities that are BNFL's best
overseas customers. Shore thinking
Lateral thinking on energy is clearly required. One of the
problems in promoting renewables has been the proximity of new
wind farms to the grid to feed in the national supply. An Eco
Soundings suggestion is to build renewable facilities around
closed and closing nuclear power plants to make use of existing
connections. This scheme would be handy for off-shore wind and
wave installations too, since all but one of the nuclear stations
is on the coast - and it would cost a lot less than £650m. Hairy
need Better news for the animal kingdom. The convention on
protecting endangered species has agreed that the great white
shark is now so endangered any countries with these fabled
creatures in their waters are legally required to protect them
from poaching and being caught in fishing nets. Also to be saved
are three fragmented populations of a curious kind of hairy-kneed
camel. The camel, which numbers less than 1,000 individuals, is
thus rarer than the giant panda. They live in Mongolia and China
in a former nuclear test zone, and are able to survive on salt
water bubbling up from beneath the dunes.
[UP]
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
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4 IAEA General Conference 46th Regular Session
Resolutions of the 46th IAEA General Conference
Resolutions <#Anchor-resolutions> of the 46^th Regular Session of
the IAEA General Conference are accessible here.
* Resolutions adopted by the General Conference*
>> Application by the State of Eritrea for Membership of the Agency
/(13 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/1
ADOPTED, 16 September 2002
>> Application by the Kyrgyz Republic for Membership of the Agency
/(12 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/2
ADOPTED, 16 September 2002
>> Application by the Republic of Seychelles for Membership of the
Agency
/(12 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/3
ADOPTED, 16 September 2002
>> The Agency's Accounts for 2001
/(11 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/4
ADOPTED, 19 September 2002
>> Regular Budget Appropriations for 2003
/(20 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/5
ADOPTED, 19 September 2002
>> Technical Co-operation Fund Allocation for 2003
/(14 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/6
ADOPTED, 19 September 2002
>> The Working Capital Fund in 2003
/(13 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/7
ADOPTED, 19 September 2002
>> Measures to Strengthen International Co-operation in Nuclear,
Radiation, Transport and Waste Safety
/(39 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/9
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
>> Strengthening of the Agency's Technical Co-operation Activities
/(22 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/10
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
>> Strengthening of the Agency's Activities Related to Nuclear
Science, Technology and Applications
/(26 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/11
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
>> Strengthening the Effectiveness and Improving the Efficiency of
the Safeguards System and Application of the Model Additional
Protocol
/(21 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/12
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
>> Nuclear Security - Progress on Measures to Protect Against
Nuclear Terrorism
/(21 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/13
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
>> Implementation of the NPT Safeguards Agreement Between the
Agency and the Democratic People's Republic of Korea
/(17 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/14
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
>> Implementation of United Nations Security Council Resolutions
Relating to Iraq
/(15 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/15
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
>> Application of IAEA Safeguards in the Middle East
/(15 KB)/
GC(46)/RES/16
ADOPTED, 20 September 2002
Copyright 2002 ©, International Atomic Energy Agency
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5 Japan's nuclear safety "dangerously weak"*
The World's No.1 Science & Technology News Service*
10:32 01 October 02
NewScientist.com news service
Safety precautions at nuclear reactors in Japan have been flawed
and dangerously weak, according to newly revealed reports from
the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
The arrangements for accidents, emergency planning and safety
training by Japanese power companies were condemned as inadequate
by IAEA inspectors after they visited four reactors in the 1990s.
Altogether they found 90 deficiencies in safety procedures.
The revelation comes as a major scandal over the cover-up of
scores of cracks in Japanese reactors threatens to undermine the
country's ambitious nuclear programme. Four of Japan's five major
nuclear companies have now confessed to concealing cracks from
the government's regulatory agency.
The IAEA does not know whether the deficiencies its inspectors
found have been corrected because its relations with Japan have
deteriorated since its last visit. "We have not been invited back
for another mission since 1995," an IAEA spokeswoman told *New
Scientist*.
In the midst of the emerging scandal on cracks, the agency
offered on 16 September to send experts to Japan, but so far
there has been no response.
*Major power*
Japan is the world's third largest user of nuclear power after
France and the US, with a third of its electricity generated by
over 50 reactors. There are also a dozen new reactors being
planned.
The IAEA, the United Nations nuclear agency based in Vienna,
frequently sends experts to different countries to share best
practice on nuclear safety. Now, IAEA reports on visits to two
reactors at Fukushima in 1992 and two reactors at Hamaoko in 1995
have been revealed by the nuclear industry newsletter,
/Nucleonics Week/.
They list a long series of alleged safety flaws at the plants,
including "weakness in emergency plan procedures", "insufficient
event analysis on near-misses" and "lack of training for plant
personnel on severe accident management". Evacuation plans were
said to have been inadequately tested, firefighters poorly
trained and there was "no formal policy concerning drug and
alcohol use".
*Cover up*
Tokyo Electric Power Company
Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry
The scandal over cracks in reactors began on 22 August when
Japan's largest power company, Tokyo Electric Power, admitted it
had covered up such flaws in its reactors in the 1990s. This led
to the resignation of senior company officials and the launch of
a major government investigation.
An initial report by Japan's Ministry of Economy, Trade and
Industry disclosed that crude attempts had been made to disguise
repairs to the emergency core cooling system at one of the
company's Fukushima reactors. "After repairing with clamps, the
clamps were painted to be inconspicuous," the report said.
Last week three other major companies said they had also
concealed cracks in reactor cooling systems from regulators:
Chubu Electric Power, Japan Atomic Power and Tohoku Electric
Power. The government's investigation is continuing.
In 1999 Japan suffered its worst ever nuclear accident at the
Tokaimura nuclear fuel manufacturing plant. Enough uranium to
start a chain reaction was inadvertently mixed together, causing
a massive blast of radiation that killed two workers and
irradiated hundreds of local residents.
Rob Edwards
This story is from NewScientist.com's news service - for more
exclusive news and expert analysis every week *subscribe
* to New Scientist print
edition.
*****************************************************************
6 Clinton urges 'UN route' for tackling Iraq
Independent.co.uk
© 2002 Independent Digital (UK) Ltd
By John Deane, Chief Political Correspondent, PA News
02 October 2002
The international community must use the United Nations' route to
settle the Iraqi crisis, former US President Bill Clinton
signalled today.
In a keynote speech to the Labour Party conference in Blackpool,
Mr Clinton argued that the international community could provoke
undesirable consequences if it mishandled the crisis over Saddam
Hussein's weapons of mass destruction.
Mr Clinton warned delegates: "We will not allow ourselves to be
defeated by tyrants with weapons of mass destruction. That will
not happen.
"But we could reduce the future that we can build for our
children if we respond to the challenges in the wrong way.
"Whatever we do we have to have a care for the security of our
nation, the character of our people and the future of our
children.
"We must respond in a way that is consistent with the larger
obligation we all have to build a more integrated global
community.
"Of course we have to stand against weapons of mass destruction
but if we can we have to do it in the context of building the
international institutions that in the end we will have to depend
upon to guarantee the peace and security of the world and the
human rights of all people everywhere."
In his 50 minute speech, which earned him a two and a half minute
standing ovation, Mr Clinton warned that military action against
Iraq had to be a last resort.
"I don't care how precise your bombs and your weapons are, when
you set them off, innocent people will die" he warned.
The formerr President told the conference: "I agree with the many
Republicans and Democrats in America and many here in Britain who
want to go through the United Nations to bring the whole of world
opinion and to bring us all together to offer one more chance to
the inspections.
"Saddam Hussein as usual is bobbing and weaving. We should call
his bluff. The UN should call for a complete and unrestricted set
of inspections with a new resolution.
"If the inspections go forward, and I hope they will, perhaps we
can avoid a conflict.
"In any case the world ought to show up and show we meant it in
1991 when we said this man should not have a biological, chemical
and nuclear weapons programme, and we can do that through the
UN."
Mr Clinton paid tribute to Tony Blair's diplomatic efforts over
the last few weeks.
He said: "I appreciate what the Prime Minister is trying to do in
terms of bringing America and the rest of the world to a common
position. If he weren't there to do this, I doubt if anyone else
could. So I am very, very grateful."
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7 Second TVA nuclear plant OK'd to make tritium
By Rebecca Ferrar, News-Sentinel business writer October 2, 2002
TVA on Tuesday received approval from the Nuclear Regulatory
Commission to make bombgrade tritium at both reactors at its
Sequoyah Nuclear Plant - just one week after the NRC gave its OK
to make tritium at the Watts Bar Nuclear Plant.
The NRC approved amendments to the Sequoyah plant's operating
licenses for Units 1 and 2 to produce the material used in making
nuclear bombs. Tritium, a short-lived gas that boosts the power
of nuclear weapons, will be produced by TVA for the Department of
Energy, which oversees the nuclear weapons stockpile for the
Department of Defense. The Sequoyah plant is at Soddy-Daisy near
Chattanooga, and tritium production is scheduled to begin at that
plant's Unit 2 reactor and the Watts Bar Unit 1 reactor in the
fall of 2003. The Watts Bar plant is at Spring City about 50
miles south of Knoxville. Tritium production is scheduled for the
Sequoyah Unit 1 reactor in the fall of 2004.
"There was a safety evaluation, a review of the environmental
impacts and a test program, a pilot program, which was conducted
safely at Watts Bar,'' said Ken Clark, NRC spokesman. "So the
(NRC) commission staff's regulatory conclusion was that this can
be safely conducted." The NRC will hold a public meeting on Oct.
30 in Dayton at the Rhea County Welcome Center Community Room to
discuss the NRC staff's safety review to give TVA approval to
produce tritium. TVA spokesman Gil Francis said that from TVA's
beginning in 1933 "part of the mandate was to support national
defense, and we've done that in a variety of ways."
"The production of tritium doesn't change the way the plant
operates," Francis said. "We did a test at Watts Bar in February
1999 to demonstrate the process, and it worked very
successfully." To make the tritium, TVA will use lithium in its
fuel rods rather than boron. The rods are placed in the reactor
fuel assemblies, and tritium gas is produced in the rods.
TVA will be able to irradiate 2,300 rods during each reactor fuel
cycle of 18 months.
DOE will remove the irradiated rods from the TVA plants and
transport them to the Savannah River Site in Aiden, S.C., where
the tritium will be extracted. "TVA as a federal agency will do
the work we are asked to do and will be reimbursed for costs, but
we will not make a profit,'' Francis said. "The ratepayers will
not incur any costs." The TVA board approved an agreement with
DOE to produce tritium. Tritium may be made at the plants for up
to 30 years or the life of the plants.
Rebecca Ferrar may be reached at 865-342-6357 or
ferrarr@knews.com.
[Get Copyright Clearance]
Copyright 2002, Knoxville News-Sentinel Co.
*****************************************************************
8 Bush Opposes Alternative Iraq Plan
Las Vegas SUN
October 01, 2002 By JIM ABRAMS ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON- President Bush expressed deep reservations Tuesday
about an alternative congressional measure authorizing force
against Iraq, and demanded that the United Nations "put some
calcium in the backbone" as it works up its own resolution on
disarming Baghdad. The president's spokesman, addressing
questions about the cost of a war in Iraq, said Saddam Hussein's
exile or assassination - "the cost of one bullet if the Iraqi
people take it on themselves" - would be both preferable and
cheaper. "Regime change is welcome in whatever form it takes,"
White House press secretary Ari Fleischer said.
Congress, while generally supporting the president's campaign
against Iraq, has haggled with the White House over the wording
of the resolution. Bush summoned House members of both parties to
the White House late Tuesday afternoon to spur progress, and was
to meet with top Senate and House leaders on Iraq Wednesday
morning.
Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph Biden, D-Del., and
senior committee member Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., on Monday
circulated an alternative proposal that they said "helps the
president attract strong bipartisan support in Congress." Their
draft resolution would focus on authorizing the use of force
against Iraq as opposed to the entire region and make clear that
dismantling Iraq's weapons of mass destruction would be the
primary reason for using force.
"I don't want to get a resolution which ties my hands," Bush told
reporters after meeting with lawmakers on terrorism insurance.
Bush insisted on a resolution that "sends a clear signal to the
world that this country is determined to disarm Iraq, and thereby
bring peace to the world." Asked about the Lugar-Biden
compromise, Bush said he did not want a congressional resolution
weaker than one passed by lawmakers in 1998. "My question is,
what's changed? Why would Congress want to weaken a resolution?"
Bush said. Saddam, he said, is "more of a threat four years
later."
Lugar, who met Tuesday with Secretary of State Colin Powell and
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, said the White House
feels the proposal takes away powers the president had in the
past. "We feel it does not." Biden added: "I'm hopeful they'll
see the wisdom of our position. It's still in play."
"All of us recognize a military option is not the first choice.
Disarming this man is, because he poses a true threat to the
United States, and we've just got to work together to get
something done," Bush said. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer
said the Lugar-Biden measure "cuts back the existing authority
under current United Nations Security Council resolutions and
previous laws passed by the Congress." According to Fleischer,
the Lugar-Biden measure fails to demand that Saddam halt support
for terrorism, stop repressing Iraqis such as Kurds, or cease
threatening his neighbors. The Lugar-Biden alternative leaves
unclear whether allied pilots could continue to patrol no-fly
zones, said another White House spokesman, Sean McCormack.
The five permanent U.N. Security Council members met at the
United Nations Tuesday to discuss key elements of a U.S.-British
draft resolution - chiefly the threat of force against Saddam if
he fails to comply with inspections and whether member states
would be free to carry out the use of that force on their own.
Ambassadors from the United States, Britain, Russia, China and
France said at the end of the closed-door meeting that they would
continue discussions. The United States and Britain want
authorization to use military force if Iraq doesn't comply with
inspectors. They face opposition from three veto-wielding council
members - Russia, France and China - who oppose a resolution
sanctioning military action at this point.
French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin said Monday that
France was interested in a first resolution demanding a return to
inspections, followed by a second resolution threatening military
action if Iraq fails to comply. The United States seeks a single
resolution doing both. Questioned on whether he would consider
the French two-track approach, Bush said: "What I won't accept is
something that allows Saddam Hussein to continue to lie, deceive
the world. I'm just not going to accept something that is weak.
It's not worth it - the United Nations must show its backbone and
we'll work with members of the Security Council to put a little
calcium there, put some calcium in the backbone, so this
organization is more likely to keep the peace as we go down the
road." As the Senate prepared to open debate this week on the
resolution authorizing Bush to wage war, congressional budget
experts said fighting Iraq would cost up to $9 billion a month.
The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office in a report Monday
said uncertainty about the length and intensity of a war with
Iraq made predicting the cost difficult.
But it estimated that deploying U.S. forces to the Persian Gulf
would cost from $9 billion to $13 billion, and that the monthly
cost of combat by either heavy ground or air forces would be $6
billion to $9 billion. Another $5 billion to $7 billion would be
required to bring the troops home after a war. The monthly cost
of a postwar peacekeeping force - excluding humanitarian aid,
reconstruction and the dismantling of weapons of mass destruction
- would be $1 billion to $4 billion.
"This debate should not be driven by how much it will cost U.S.
taxpayers," said Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad,
D-N.D. But he said it was important to keep in mind that three
months of combat with a heavy ground force and a five-year
occupation by a large U.S. force could cost more than $272
billion.
Saying that Iraq's biological and chemical weapons stockpiles and
its attempt to attain a nuclear capability are an immediate
threat to U.S. security interests, the Bush administration is
urging both Congress and the U.N. Security Council to approve
resolutions authorizing the use of military force if Iraq does
not abide by past demands to disarm. --
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
9 Japan Utility Firm Faces Warning
October 01, 2002 By MARI YAMAGUCHI ASSOCIATED PRESS
TOKYO- Japan warned the nation's largest utility Tuesday to
improve safety after the company allegedly manipulated data at
its nuclear reactors, but stopped short of filing criminal
charges because no clear legal violations were found.
In issuing the administrative measure to punish Tokyo Electric
Power Co. in the coverup scandal involving reactor safety
problems, Trade and Industry Minister Takeo Hiranuma told the
utility to improve their safety records and prove it by meeting
tougher requirements in special government inspections. Hiranuma
also demanded the company come up with preventive measures and
submit them in a report to the government by the end of March,
2003.
Tuesday's government action followed investigations by the
Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency after revelations in late
August that TEPCO had been hiding structural problems in its
nuclear reactors.
The warning was based on a report submitted Tuesday by the
Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, which blamed TEPCO and
three regional nuclear power plant operators - Chubu Electric
Power Co., Tohoku Electric Power Co. and Japan Atomic Power Co. -
for failing to report defects more promptly. The agency alleged
that TEPCO manipulated data in 16 of the 29 cases where defects
were found and failed to comply with government regulations.
However, it did not find clear legal violations.
Last month, officials inspected the alleged facility, focusing on
possible cracks in pipes that conduct water into the reactors,
while searching for evidence of any attempts to hide problems.
The public has become increasingly wary of nuclear power since a
1999 radiation leak at a fuel-reprocessing plant killed two
workers. But the government failure to detect coverup attempts
also raised questions of the reliability of government
inspections.
TEPCO admitted in late August that it had misreported safety
problems in the late 1980s and early 1990s after a trade ministry
report revealed 29 cases of cracks or minor structural damage in
eight of the company's 17 nuclear reactors.
The company's top three officials resigned over the scandal, and
authorities raided its Tokyo headquarters earlier this month.
TEPCO contends the cracks never posed any serious danger.
Japan depends on nuclear power for about 30 percent of its
electricity. TEPCO's plants supply nearly half of the country's
nuclear energy. --
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
10 Democrats Defend Visit to Iraq
Las Vegas SUN:
Today: October 02, 2002 at 10:00:08 PDT By JIM ABRAMS ASSOCIATED
PRESS
WASHINGTON- Two Democratic congressmen, brushing off criticisms
they were aiding the enemy, said Wednesday their mission to Iraq
succeeded in impressing on Iraqis that war was likely if they did
not agree to unfettered inspections of weapons stockpiles.
Reps. Jim McDermott of Washington and David Bonior of Michigan,
both Vietnam War-era veterans, also said at a news conference
that they felt obligated to inform Americans of the risks they
faced by going to war with Iraq. McDermott said he was stunned by
"the extent to which the Iraqi people are ready to fight
house-to-house." He asked whether the United States should "be
taking on this country all by itself when the Arab world is now
seething with recruits for Osama bin Laden."
The two lawmakers, and Rep. Mike Thompson, D-Calif., returned
Tuesday night from their visit to Baghdad and other Iraqi cities.
In news conferences while in Iraq they urged the Iraqis not to
interfere with the inspection process and the Bush administration
to give those inspections a chance to work before taking military
action.
Republican leaders strongly criticized the visit, with Sen. Don
Nickles of Oklahoma, the Senate's No. 2 Republican, saying they
"both sound somewhat like spokespersons for the Iraqi
government."
House Majority Leader Dick Armey, R-Texas, said McDermott was
"totally out of touch with the most fundamental tenet of
congressional responsibilities" and that he and other liberals
had "just basically regressed to their childhood days of Vietnam
War protests." McDermott said he was not a pacifist but had "a
responsibility as a patriot, as someone who loves his country, to
speak up for what I believe." War, added Bonior, "destroys lives
in such a profound way." McDermott stressed that "I don't trust
Saddam Hussein under any circumstances," but said President Bush
had confused the issue by shifting the issue from disarmament,
which could be accomplished diplomatically, to regime change,
which would require war. --
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
11 In defense of nuclear energy --
The Washington Times
October 2, 2002
Ralph Beedle
Since the tragic events of September 11 brought terrorism
onto U.S. shores, security concerns have become an overwhelming
priority for America's critical infrastructure, airports and
other civil services. Our government, businesses and even our
entertainment industry have had to alter their entire security
procedures in light of the changed world we live in. The
nuclear energy industry has implemented a number of enhancements
at our facilities, but the reality is that nuclear power plants
were the most secure industrial facilities in the United States
before September 11. Today, we're even more secure.
Since last September, security enhancements at nuclear
power plants include: extending the security perimeters at our
plants, increasing armed security patrols and increasing
well-qualified security staffing to 6,000 at 67 nuclear plant
sites and augmenting almost-daily coordination with local, state
and federal law-enforcement authorities. Seventy percent of
security officers at the nation's nuclear power plants are former
military, law-enforcement or industrial security professionals —
including former U.S. Secret Service, Delta Force and other
paramilitary officers skilled in counterterrorism tactics. They
are heavily armed, well-trained and highly compensated officers
who form the front line of a comprehensive security program.
James Kallstrom, former director of the New York Office of
Public Security, said after a review of the Indian Point nuclear
power plant: "What I care about is the security of this plant,
the ability of a terrorist organization to take it over, and I
can tell you, it's robust enough to let 'em try." Mr. Kallstrom's
view is not unusual. State security directors, governors and
members of Congress who have visited nuclear plants recently are
universally impressed by their robust security programs.
It is unfortunate that in the aftermath of the terrorist
attacks, a few special-interest groups have sought to further
their nuclear phaseout agenda by spinning unwarranted tales of
nuclear disaster. Their conjecture is alarmist and irresponsible,
and has been discredited repeatedly by officials responsible for
security issues. No business can guarantee it won't be
targeted with an act of war similar to the September 11 attacks.
But nuclear power plants already are among the most robust and
closely protected facilities, and the industry has worked with
federal, state and local authorities to ensure that a seamless
response exists to guard against terrorist threats.
Nuclear power plant buildings that protect reactors are
extremely strong and designed to resist catastrophes. The
steel-reinforced concrete containment structures have been
designed to withstand the impact of hurricanes, tornadoes, floods
and airborne objects with tremendous force. Nuclear power plants
were designed with a "defense-in-depth" safety strategy that
includes metal sleeves that hold the low-enriched uranium fuel,
and a combined 12 feet of concrete and steel between the reactor
fuel and the outside of the reactor building.
The industry employs state-of-the-art electronic
surveillance, sensor technology and rigorous personnel screening
procedures to augment plant security programs.
Computer-controlled gates requiring positive identification of
personnel control entry to the plants. In addition, the security
programs at nuclear power plants are constantly updated to take
advantage of new technology and to counter potential new threats
as they evolve.
All 103 nuclear power reactors and other facilities
licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission met stringent
federal security regulations long before September 11. In the
past year, the industry has remained at a heightened security
level and has been continuously monitored by the NRC, which is in
constant contact with the intelligence community, federal law
enforcement agencies and the military. Physical security of
power plants is just one component of our overall energy
security. Energy is the vital foundation of America's national
security and economy, with reliable electricity providing the
foundation and spark for our technology-driven society. Nuclear
energy is essential to the U.S. economy, providing electricity
for one of every five homes and businesses.
In spite of the slowing economy, the demand for electricity is
growing. The U.S. Energy Information Administration estimates
that the United States will require almost 50 percent more
electric generating capacity between now and 2020. In recent
years, U.S. nuclear power plants have produced record amounts of
electricity, and they are operating at a pace to again set
efficiency and production records.
During this time, nuclear plants have operated at well more
than 90 percent efficiency — the best round-the-clock operation
of any energy source. In addition to outstanding reliability and
low production costs (averaging 1.74 cents per kilowatt-hour in
2000), nuclear energy is needed to meet reduction goals for
greenhouse gas emissions, primarily carbon dioxide. Put simply,
if nuclear power were not used nationwide, approximately 135
million passenger cars would have to be removed from our roadways
to keep U.S. carbon dioxide emissions in balance.
We cannot realize our goals of energy security and
environmental stewardship without nuclear energy. An economy that
increasingly relies on computers and electro-technology must have
an ample supply of reliable electricity to power those devices.
There simply is no way to have a coherent, forward-looking energy
policy without significant use of nuclear energy.
Ralph Beedle is senior vice president and chief nuclear
officer at the Nuclear Energy Institute. He served 21 years in
the Navy nuclear submarine program, including as commander of the
USS Los Angeles and as a member of the Secretary of the Navy
Strategic Studies Group.
*****************************************************************
12 Belgium criticises British Energy aid
BBC NEWS | Business |
Wednesday, 2 October, 2002, 10:00 GMT 11:00 UK
[Dungeness B Power Station] British Energy provides one-fifth of
the UK's electricity
Belgium has complained to the European Commission over an
emergency government loan to British Energy.
Belgium has claimed that the £650m granted by the UK government
to the struggling nuclear power company last week broke European
competition rules. Belgian Energy Minister Olivier Deleuze has,
in a letter to the Commission, suggested that the financial help
could distort the electricity market. The UK's Department of
Trade and Industry said it had notified the commission of the
loan, and believed it complied with EU guidelines on state aid.
Breaking the rules?
The UK government last week extended its aid to British Energy
for two months until 29 November and raised the loan from £410m
to £650m. The Belgian complaint said the aid measures taken or
planned by the British government were "difficult to reconcile
with the rules of free competition at the heart of the single
electricity market". Mr Deleuze told BBC Radio 4's Today
Programme that he wanted the EU competition watchdog to
investigate whether the deal broke EU aid regulations. EU rules
allow member governments to give financial help to floundering
companies under certain conditions, such as the drawing up of a
solid restructuring plan.
But last year, the EU rules stopped the Belgian government from
giving financial help to the national airline carrier Sabena,
which later went bust. In the City, British Energy shares stood
1p firmer at 14p at 1000 GMT.
*****************************************************************
13 British Government Saves British Energy from Administration — for
Now
Reprosessing plant Sellafield, located at the western coast of
England, is the largest source to radioactive contamination of
the north-east Atlantic ocean.
British Government Saves British Energy from Administration — for
Now OSLO - The British Government, acting on the advice of the
Department of Trade and Industry, on September 20th granted the
beleaguered privatised arm of Britain’s nuclear industry, British
Energy, a further £240m in financial aid in an attempt to save
the company from bankruptcy. This brings the total aid to £650m,
which aims to keep British Energy operational until a final
decision on the company’s future is taken on November 29th.
Sizewell B, British Energy’s newest plant, started operating one
Pressurised Water Reactor (PWR) in 1995. This plant is located
near Leiston, Suffolk, on the East Anglian coast.
British Energy
Zackary Moss, , 2002-10-02 14:59
British Energy — which operates 15 of Britain’s 33 nuclear
reactors, including 14 advanced gas-cooled reactors and Britain’s
newest reactor, a single pressure water reactor, completed in
1995, employs 5,200 staff and provided 20 per cent of Britain’s
total electricity supply — blames its financial difficulties on a
liberalised energy market that favours non-nuclear producers of
electricity, as well as crippling clean-up costs imposed on it by
British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL).
The decision to allocate £650m of British taxpayers’ money to
save British Energy from bankruptcy comes after mangers had
reassured investors in mid-August that the company was in good
financial health. The managers also paid shareholders a large
dividend — a decision British Ministers were said to be furious
with after the same managers appealed for government aid on
September 5th. Moreover, Britain’s financial watchdog, the
Financial Services Authority, has launched an investigation into
whether British Energy has misled investors.
Tough competition in a liberalised energy market
In comparison to European electricity generation, Britain has a
fairly liberalised energy market. Britain’s energy policy is
concerned with the production of cheap power. Privatisation and
liberalisation in the 1990s encouraged the building of cheap
gas-fired power stations, translating the reduced costs of
electricity generation into cheaper prices for businesses and
households. While the energy market now favours the customer, the
consequence of energy liberalisation is that energy wholesale
prices have fallen by around 40 per cent since 1998. At the
current wholesale price of £16 per megawatt hour, British Energy,
producing at £19, makes a £3 loss — an activity that hardly
justifies British Energy’s operation, never mind it paying
shareholders handsome dividends.
Besides, nuclear operators have additional costs to meet.
According to an article in the Economist on September 14th,
“[energy] liberalisation has exposed the true costs of nuclear
power, and of the political burdens which the British Government
has chosen to impose on British Energy”. British Energy must pay
a total of £200m annually for its spent nuclear fuel (SNF) to be
reprocessed at Sellafield, operated by the state-owned BNFL. But
until Britain’s nuclear industry has a long-term storage facility
for SNF, reprocessing will keep BNFL in business. British Energy
would like to store SNF as this would be cheaper than
reprocessing, as done in most other countries with nuclear power
plants.
Another financial burden for nuclear generators is the payment of
a carbon-based tax aimed at reducing CO2, although nuclear
generators actually produce no CO2 emissions. Currently, British
Energy must pay £80m annually in tax towards this end. The
British Government maintains that this tax is designed to
encourage renewable energy, rather than penalise carbon-emitting
energy producers. Nuclear generators must pay higher rates —
local taxes — than their non-nuclear competitors. But perhaps the
largest financial burden for nuclear power generators is the huge
future decommissioning costs they must pay.
A less than bright future for British Energy
Despite the relatively high operating costs of British Energy, it
is feasible that nuclear generators could operate competitively
in a liberalised energy market. In a telephone interview with
Bellona Web on October 1st, Derek Taylor, Head of the European
Commission’s Directorate-General for Energy and Transport,
commented that nuclear generators could in fact compete quite
successfully. “
This is largely dependent on a company’s control of operating
costs and future liabilities, and whether or not it is well
managed”, he said. He also said that some nuclear generators in
Europe had in the past competed successfully in the energy
market.
“If properly operated there is no reason why nuclear generators
cannot compete in a liberalised energy market”, he said. In his
option, British Energy’s troubles stem mainly from
privatisation’s failure to account properly for future
liabilities, the imposition of the CO2 tax and BNFL’s
reprocessing fees.
Even if nuclear generators could operative competitively, British
Energy’s high fixed costs and poor management mean that this
might not be a good example for the industry to follow.
Nevertheless, the decisions already taken by Patricia Hewitt,
secretary of the Department of Trade and Industry, means that the
British Government seems prepared to stand by British Energy on
the grounds that letting the company go bankrupt would put in
jeopardy Britain’s energy needs. In truth, there is sufficient
capacity in Britain’s energy infrastructure to let British Energy
go bankrupt and shutdown its reactors, though this is unlikely to
happen immediately.
Nuclear generators throughout the European Union will be waiting
for the outcome on November 29th before they decide to bid for
British Energy. But given the past experience of the British
Government, it is likely that the company will be saved from
bankruptcy until a long-term solution is found. The idea that a
government supporting energy liberalisation would be willing to
stand by British Energy is an odd one. Still, the British
taxpayer should be asking whether more money should be used to
support an ailing private company that was until recently in good
financial health and paying its shareholders large dividends.
Publisher: Bellona Foundation [bellona@bellona.no] , President:
Frederic Hauge [frederic@bellona.no] Information: info@bellona.no
[info@bellona.no] , Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no
[webmaster@bellona.no] Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22
38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway
*****************************************************************
14 Parliament set to vote on ratification of U.S.-Russian nuclear
deal in December
, Oct 02, 2002
AP World Politics
By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press Writer
MOSCOW - Russia's lower house of parliament is likely to vote on
the ratification of a new U.S.-Russian arms control treaty in
December, a senior lawmaker said Tuesday.
Retired Gen. Andrei Nikolayev, the head of the parliamentary
defense affairs committee, said that President Vladimir Putin is
expected to submit the treaty to the lower house, the State Duma,
later this month.
Nikolayev, who spoke to reporters after closed hearings on the
treaty which were attended by senior defense and foreign ministry
officials, said several other such hearings would be held by
lawmakers prior to the vote. Putin signed the treaty with U.S.
President George W. Bush in Moscow in May. It calls for both
countries to cut their deployed strategic nuclear arsenals over
the next decade to 1,700-2,200 warheads each, down from about
6,000 each have now.
Bush submitted the treaty to the Senate in June, asking for a
quick vote on ratification.
Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Georgy Mamedov, who attended
Tuesday's hearings in the Duma, hailed the treaty as a symbol of
"friendship and cooperation between Russia and the United
States." Col.-Gen. Yuri Baluyevsky, the first deputy chief of the
military's General Staff, said that even though the treaty calls
for drastic cuts in the number of nuclear weapons it allows
Russia to "ensure its security at a necessary level."
U.S. lawmakers have said they expect the Senate to ratify the
treaty, though some have expressed concern that Russia doesn't
have the money to safely store deactivated warheads. Some
senators have also complained that the treaty lacks verification
measures essential for tracking Russian arsenals. Russian
officials, however, responded that it was U.S. officials who
insisted on a pared-down treaty without strong verification
mechanisms.
Russia and the United States agreed to apply verification
procedures from the 1991 arms control deal, START I, to the new
treaty. Deputy chief of the Duma's defense affairs committee,
retired Gen. Eduard Vorobyov, said Tuesday that some Russian
lawmakers proposed extending the term of START I, which ends in
December 2009, to 2012 to match the new arms deal, the
Interfax-Military News Agency reported.
Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The y
*****************************************************************
15 NRC expands investigation of radiation exposure at Davis-Besse
Wednesday, October 2
By MALIA RULON Associated Press Writer
Regulators are investigating whether the radiation exposure was
higher than originally estimated for workers who accidentally
carried on their clothes tiny radioactive particles out of an
Ohio nuclear power plant.
Estimates of exposure by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission
differed from the assessment of the plant operator, the NRC said
Tuesday.
Five workers left the Davis-Besse nuclear plant in February with
the particles, which were found in hotel rooms and homes in Ohio,
Texas, South Carolina and Virginia, according to FirstEnergy
Corp., which operates the plant near Toledo, Ohio.
While the situation is unusual, particles have been carried out
of other plants before and the workers in question are healthy
and still working, said Viktoria Mitlyng, an NRC spokeswoman.
She said that in this case, urine and fecal samples indicate that
the workers inhaled the particles, and that factor was not
included in the company's original estimates. It was unclear if
that factor would mean higher dose estimates.
"We can't conclude what the internal exposure was until we take a
look at exactly what particles were inhaled and how large those
particles were," Mitlyng said.
The company maintains that the particles, which are too small to
see, don't pose a health risk because they generate radioactivity
at a low level.
Richard Wilkins, a spokesman from FirstEnergy, said a lab error
on the first dose analysis made it appear the workers were
exposed to a higher amount of radiation, but a second analysis
showed safe levels, and a third analysis by a different lab is
pending.
Workers typically wear protective clothing in nuclear plants,
then remove their suits in a safe area where they are screened to
make sure radioactive particles do not escape. The NRC
investigation earlier found that one of the three devices used to
screen workers had been improperly set.
The NRC also is investigating leaks that allowed boric acid to
eat a 7-inch wide hole almost through the 6-inch thick steel cap
that covers the Davis-Besse plant's reactor vessel. The leak was
discovered in March, during a maintenance shutdown.
FirstEnergy Corp.: http://www.firstenergycorp.com
Last modified: October 01. 2002 6:25PM
heraldtribune.com
Sarasota Herald-Tribune. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
16 Westinghouse Wins $15 Million in Steam Generator Services Contracts
at the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant
- Award further strengthens long-standing relationship
with Pacific Gas & Electric
- Project to employ Westinghouse's highly successful
chemical cleaning process
PITTSBURGH, Oct. 1 /PRNewswire/ -- Pacific Gas & Electric Company
and Westinghouse Electric Company signed a $14 million contract
for Westinghouse to chemically clean the secondary sides of
Diablo Canyon's eight steam generators. Separately, PG and
Westinghouse extended their long-standing tubesheet-cleaning
contract in a transaction valued in excess of $1 million.
The cleanings, to be undertaken in 2004, will mitigate tube
corrosion and help maintain or increase the safety performance
margins, thereby allowing the plants to operate at 100 percent of
rated output. This course of action also forestalls the potential
for the costly replacement of the current steam generators.
"The chemical cleaning award builds upon the existing, and
recently extended, steam generator tubesheet cleaning contract
that Westinghouse has with PG," said Aris Candris, senior vice
president of Westinghouse Nuclear Services. "Westinghouse has
been providing these services at Diablo Canyon for over 15 years
and this action will help provide the people of California with a
dependable source of electricity well into the future."
Westinghouse Electric Company, wholly owned by BNFL plc of the
United Kingdom, is the world's leading supplier of nuclear plant
products, services and technology. Sixty-two of the 103 operating
nuclear power plants in the United States are of Westinghouse
design. Worldwide, approximately one-half of the more than 430
plants were either supplied by Westinghouse or by licensees using
Westinghouse designs.
Copyright © 1996-2002 PR Newswire Association LLC. All Rights
*****************************************************************
17 Davis-Besse Nuclear workers contaminated
» The Plain Dealer
Ohio News
10/02/02 John Funk Plain Dealer Reporter
Two workers who repaired a steam generator in the heart of the
Davis-Besse nuclear power plant last February inhaled or ingested
highly radioactive particles from the reactor's damaged fuel
rods, say federal regulators who have expanded their
investigation into the incident.
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission yesterday dispatched a
five-member team of radiation specialists to the Toledo-area
power station to examine Davis-Besse's radiation detection
equipment and review the procedures the plant management is
supposed to enforce when workers enter radioactive areas.
The agency, which expanded the investigation because it disagrees
with Davis-Besse officials about the potential threat to the men,
also ordered additional tests on them.
"We are not looking at an immediately life-threatening
situation," stressed Jan Strasma, the NRC's spokesman for the
Midwest region.
"The [laboratory] results so far are far below the point where it
would be any immediate health concern," he said. "We are looking
at doses that have to be calculated over years. The extra lab
tests are to better quantify what the doses would be."
The calculations are based on the half-life, or decay rate, of
the specific radioactive elements the men ingested and on the
rate at which the human body typically excretes them, Strasma
said.
The elements, called "transuranics," are products of atom
splitting, or fission, that goes on in the reactor, he said.
Reactors produce a number of transuranics, including plutonium
and americium, the element in household smoke detectors. But the
NRC said it did not know which transuranics the workers ingested.
Transuranics decay very slowly.
The two workers were among five people who did maintenance work
on the plant's steam generators. They are employees of Framatome
ANP, a nuclear service company under contract to Davis-Besse.
In April, FirstEnergy Corp., which operates Davis-Besse,
announced that the five had gotten out of the plant wearing
clothing contaminated with microscopic radioactive particles.
FirstEnergy inspection teams located 13 particles at sites in
five states to which the workers had traveled.
The NRC later determined the plant's radiation monitors were not
correctly calibrated to detect the fuel rod particles, which are
present only if the rods are damaged.
Fuel rod damage can occur in the normal operation of a reactor,
said Strasma, and is typically limited to a pinhole, which allows
some of the radioactive fuel to escape into the reactor's
coolant. The coolant can deposit the particles in the steam
generator, where they can become airborne after the reactor is
shut down and the steam generator dries.
The two contaminated workers did not use respirators when they
entered the massive steam generators, said Todd Schneider,
spokesman for Davis-Besse. He said they decided the respirators
would slow them down, exposing them to higher radiation doses.
Strasma said there is no NRC regulation mandating respirators in
all situations. But there are rules about making a judgment in
each case.
"The requirements are that an evaluation be done to determine the
appropriate protective gear to be worn for the job," he said.
"Obviously, one of the things we are going to be looking at is
what precautions were taken."
FirstEnergy and the NRC disagree about the total dosage of
radiation the workers are likely to receive, Schneider said,
based on laboratory analysis of fecal and urine samples. The last
such "bioassay" was done over the weekend, he said, but results
will not be available for about three weeks.
Davis-Besse has recalibrated its equipment since the incident,
said Schneider, revamped its work programs and bought new
whole-body radiation detectors. "The bottom line is that we
continue to believe that there was no over-exposure," he said.
The investigation could further delay the restart of Davis-Besse,
said Strasma, depending on what the radiation specialists turn
up. The reactor has been out of service since Feb. 16. After
inspectors found a large rust hole in the reactor's lid in March,
the NRC ordered the plant shut down until it is repaired and safe
to operate.
To reach this Plain Dealer reporter:
jfunk@plaind.com, 216-999-4138
© 2002 The Plain Dealer. Used with permission.
2002 cleveland.com. All Rights Reserved.
*****************************************************************
18 Activist group wants Davis-Besse to go non-nuclear -
portclintonnewsherald.com
Tuesday, October 1, 2002
A publicity stunt, says FirstEnergy
Associated Press
OAK HARBOR -- Ohio Citizen Action has started a public campaign
to convert the damaged Davis-Besse nuclear plant to coal- or
gas-fired methods of producing electricity.
The activist group said on Monday that Davis-Besse would be safer
and would better serve its neighbors and stockholders by
"repowering" and has asked the plant's owner, FirstEngergy Corp.,
to study the idea. Davis-Besse has not operated since workers
fixing cracks in the reactor's lid in March discovered a large
rust hole. Within hours of learning of the proposal, FirstEnergy
dismissed it as nonsensical and an ill-timed publicity stunt.
"This suggestion does not have merit," either financially or in
terms of engineering, spokeswoman Ellen Raines said. "Davis-Besse
was engineered and built as a nuclear plant and has been operated
as a nuclear plant. We are focused on getting Davis-Besse
repaired and earning the approval to get it restarted. That's the
best path." In a letter Monday, Citizen Action asked FirstEnergy
Chief Executive Peter Burg to form a task force of engineers and
financial analysts to study a repowering of the 25-year-old
plant, The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer reported. The lid cracks and
newly discovered fissures in the lid's stainless -steel liner are
just the first of a range of age-related problems that
Davis-Besse and other nuclear plants around the country can
expect, said Amy Ryder, director of Citizen Action's Cleveland
office. Non-nuclear methods, while not pollution-free, are "far
safer means of generating electricity," she said.
The cost of such a switch, as well as the technological hurdles,
could be formidable, she acknowledged. But FirstEnergy's own
estimate is $281 million or more by year's end for repairs and
replacement power, with no guarantee if or when federal
regulators will allow the reactor to restart. Citizen Action
plans to deluge the company with letters from consumers and to
talk up the switchover idea with FirstEnergy's major investors.
"They act like they are trying to contribute to a solution. But
they are just adding to the controversy," said Ralph DiNicola,
FirstEnergy spokesman. "It gives them an opportunity to
fund-raise." Ryder said the utility shouldn't underestimate the
power of public pressure. "This is absolutely an idea worth
pursuing," she said. "If they are not examining it as an option,
they're doing a disservice to their employees and the citizens of
Ohio."
Originally published Tuesday, October 1, 2002
Copyright ©2002 News Herald. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
19 NRC Issues Order Prohibiting Health Physics Consultant from
Engaging in NRC-Licensed Activities for Three Years
NRC: News Release - Region II - 2002-046 -
U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs,
Region II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 www.nrc.gov
No. II-02-046 October 2, 2002
CONTACT: Ken Clark (404) 562-4416
Roger D. Hannah (404) 562-4417 E-mail: opa2@nrc.gov
[opa2@nrc.gov]
The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff has issued an Order
prohibiting a health physics consultant who provided services to
hospitals in West Virginia and Virginia from engaging
inNRC-licensed activities for a period of three years from
September 23, 2002. The consultant, Perry M. Beale, is prohibited
from engaging in activities conducted under a license issued by
the NRC, including activities of state licensees through
agreements with the NRC conducted under the authority of Title
10, Code of Federal Regulations, Part 150.20. Mr. Beale provided
consulting services to City Hospital in Martinsburg, West
Virginia; Warren Memorial Hospital in Front Royal, Virginia,
Culpeper Memorial Hospital in Culpeper, Virginia; Fauquier
Hospital in Warrenton, Virginia; and Prince William Hospital in
Manassas, Virginia.
NRC officials said Mr. Beale acknowledged at a predecisional
enforcement conference with agency officials that he had provided
the hospitals with inaccurate calculations and evaluations
regarding the use of radioactive materials and that Culpeper
Hospital had been provided with inaccurate information regarding
his educational background and professional qualifications.
The NRC must be able to rely upon its licensees and their
employees, including consultants, to comply with NRC requirements
and to provide complete and accurate information. NRC officials
said Mr. Beales misconduct involving falsification of records
related to his qualifications and to licensees compliance with
regulatory requirements raised serious concerns regarding his
trustworthiness and reliability and his willingness to comply
with NRC requirements.
Privacy Statement | Site Disclaimer
Last revised Wednesday, October 02, 2002
*****************************************************************
20 Analysis: Iraq, Africa and uranium*
United Press International
By R.W. Johnson Published 10/1/2002 5:54 PM
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, Sept. 27 (UPI) -- South Africa has
waxed indignant and shrill about Britain's dossier that avers,
among other claims, that Iraq is scouring 13 African countries in
its search for uranium.
As Iraq lacks a civil atomic program, the insinuation is obvious:
the Brits believe someone on the African continent is at least
thinking to support Iraq's nuclear aspirations.
Deputy Foreign Minister Aziz Pahad, a close confidante of
President Thabo Mbeki, furiously denounced the Blair dossier,
released a week ago Tuesday, as "vague and ill-founded" and said
South Africa would be "demanding an explanation." A spokesman for
the Ministry of Minerals and Energy also denounced rumors that a
South African company had supplied Iraq with uranium: "It is a
very damaging speculation, painting South Africa with such a
brush and not saying who is involved," said Khanyo Gqulu.
In fact such speculation is inevitable. South Africa is the only
country in the continent able to produce processed uranium, and
it is the third largest producer of uranium in Africa in general.
Moreover, it is now known that in the 1980s, under the apartheid
regime, South Africa supplied Saddam Hussein with hundreds of
thousands of 155mm mortar shells large enough to act as delivery
vehicles for chemical agents or poison gas, and that in 1988 it
also supplied enriched uranium to Saddam. Contrary to Iraq, South
Africa has a civil nuclear industry -- comprising three reactors,
to be exact -- and it was only in 1989 under President F.W. De
Klerk that it abandoned its covert nuclear weapons program. By
then it possessed six air-deliverable nuclear bombs.
In short, South Africa has the uranium, the enrichment and
processing capability as well as other forms of nuclear weapons
know-how that Saddam wants. And it has a past record of selling
both arms and uranium to him.
But the speculation goes further than that. South African arms
exports are handled by a committee chaired by Education Minister
Kader Asmal and includes Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Aziz
Pahad, his brother Essop -- President Mbeki's right-hand man and
de facto prime minister -- and the director general of the
Foreign Affairs Ministry, Abdul Minty.
All four men are Muslim Asians with a reported hostility toward
Israel. In 1997 only an explosion of American and European
indignation stopped them from selling tank-sights to Syria, for
example, despite the arms embargo against the Middle East country
for state-sponsored terrorism.
Finally, one cannot help but note that while President Mbeki
initially condemned the terrorist acts of Sept. 11, the South
African government has since swung round to denounce the U.S. and
allied operations in Afghanistan as "killing innocent Muslims."
All of which was doubtless known to Saddam's deputy president,
Tariq Aziz, who was greeted as "a fraternal comrade" on a state
visit to South Africa in early July. At a state banquet in his
honor, Deputy President Jacob Zuma attacked "bully states" who
tried to impose their will on countries such as Iraq and
denounced "the illegality of the no-fly zone" over Iraq. He also
spoke of the many South African delegations to Iraq in recent
time, his government's wish for stronger trade relations and its
donation of humanitarian aid to Iraq.
The next day Aziz had talks with Mbeki, signed an agreement with
Eskom, the power utility which operates South Africa's nuclear
power stations, and declared himself particularly "interested in
South Africa's industrial capacity." Aziz also requested and was
granted bilateral talks with the Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, who
happens to be none other than South Africa's minister for
minerals and energy.
It seems unlikely, all the same, that the South African
government has sold uranium to Iraq. De Klerk, apprehensive about
what might happen with South Africa's nuclear capabilities under
an African National Congress government -- now the ruling party
-- had made provision for tight and regular inspections by the
International Atomic Energy Agency, and the IAEA seems happy that
its controls are adequate.
The possibility of Iraq benefiting at some less official level
from South African nuclear know-how clearly still exists,
however. Meanwhile, it is clear the ANC in general shares the
furious opinion of ex-President Nelson Mandela that it is the
United States, not Iraq, which is now the pre-eminent "danger to
world peace."
The reason for the Mbeki government's furious response is rooted
in the American and Israeli walkout from the United Nations World
Conference Against Racism held here last year and in President
Bush's decision not to attend the U.N. Earth Summit in
Johannesburg last month. The speculation making the rounds in the
press is that the United States now regards South Africa as an
unwise place to visit, particularly in light of Colin Powell's
humiliation at the Earth Summit and his rough treatment by Muslim
and Communist militants on a previous trip to South Africa.
Why should South Africa, and especially Mbeki, care? In a word:
NEPAD. The New Partnership for Africa's Development, an economic
recovery plan, is largely Mbeki's child yet the West and its
foreign investment will largely be its parent -- if indeed it
ever gets off the ground. Despite the support of the likes of
World Bank leaders, NEPAD is receiving little real support from a
world more focused these days on stamping out terrorism rather
than African poverty.
Copyright © 2002 United Press International
*****************************************************************
21 Fort Payne trying to find local hazards
Times-Journal
WRITE A LETTER [sjohnson@times-journal.com]
Leaders come together to figure out a possible plan
By Steven Stiefel
sstiefel@times-journal
A tornado has derailed a train, causing toxic chemicals to spill
as low-lying areas begin to flood in the heavy rain. Someone you
care about has been badly hurt by storm debris, but you are cut
off from the hospital by fallen trees and blocked railway
crossings.
What do you do?
That was one scenario considered at a public meeting Monday. One
of the solutions presented was to make citizens more informed
about what to do during a disaster, including how to evacuate or
remain self-sufficient when help can't reach them for days.
When asked to identify local hazards, there was concern about
deadly substances stored at industries or transported daily by
railroad or truck, loss of utilities, lack of shelter, flash
flooding, ice storms, droughts, slope erosion caused by clear
cutting, incineration of chemical weapons at the Anniston Army
Depot, radioactive substances used in medical offices, wildfires
and other dangers.
Another consideration is the Hispanic population, which is
essentially leaderless, aggravated by the language barrier when
it comes to issuing a warning.
"We are doing a hazard risk assessment to support local decision
makers in the allocation of limited resources," said Gavin Smith,
vice president of Durham Technologies, Inc.
"Some towns are hit by events and never recover. You're setting
goals to save lives, protect the environment, educate the public
and coordinate your response."
Durham has made field trips to understand the physical geography
and collected data on buildings. Based on the information, it is
possible to accurately estimate losses that would occur so
changes can be made to reduce the cost of recovery and handle
situations better.
"You have to look at feasible steps and not pie-in-the-sky things
that aren't going to happen," Smith said. "What you come out with
is a really powerful tool to determine where to focus your
efforts."
The city's geographic information system, or GIS, is being used
to create multi-layered maps full of information that reveals
trends and patterns. This creates predictability from the random
ravages of nature.
Smith introduced the concept of planning for "sustainable
development."
"You come up with a forward-looking plan that balances social
considerations, economic prosperity and ecological integrity so
Fort Payne is a great place to live, work and play - not only
today but also for generations to come," Smith said.
Smith said the Federal Emergency Management Agency now requires
communities to do mitigation planning. Those who do not by Nov.
1, 2003 will not be reimbursed for losses in presidentially
declared disasters, but those cities that do are likely to
receive more money.
"You've been able to bring in different pots of money by working
with FEMA and the state and local EMA offices," he said.
Another meeting will be held in two months. The public is
encouraged to contact local Project Impact coordinator Mohamad
Sleiman to identify hazards or offer solutions. His email is
projectimpact@fortpayne.org.
Copyright ©1999-2002 The Times-Journal. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
22 Rescue-robot lab opens on Port Island
[Daily Yomiuri On-Line]
Yomiuri Shimbun KOBE--Kobe Laboratory, a center that conducts
research into robots that can rescue earthquake and other
disaster victims, opened on Port Island in Kobe last week.
The center is operated by the International Rescue System
Institute, a nonprofit organization headed by Satoshi Tadokoro,
an assistant professor at Kobe University.
It will work alongside experts and researchers at the Kobe
Institute of Robot Technology, established by the Kobe municipal
government and other bodies, and draw on the experiences of the
1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake. The laboratory is part of the
megalopolis earthquake disaster reduction project sponsored by
the Education, Science and Technology Ministry. By the end of the
current fiscal year, it will prepare a 320-square-meter test
facility, modeled on a collapsed house, reproducing rooms filled
with debris and other hazards.
Experiments will be conducted to develop robots that can sense
human body temperature, carbon dioxide from exhaled breath and
subtle movements to detect survivors and confirm their safety.
Researchers at the laboratory will share about 30 computers to
simulate disasters and establish an information-collection
system.
The opening day saw a demonstration of a belt-propelled robot
equipped with a camera that had been jointly developed by Kobe
University and Kobe City College of Technology.
The robot easily negotiated its way over pieces of lumber
scattered on the floor before about 150 observers.
"Rescue robots were deployed after the Hanshin earthquake, but
they were of no use," Tadokoro said.
"The Japanese robot industry possesses excellent technology. I
want to make use of it, as well as our quake experience, to
develop viable rescue robots as soon as possible."
Copyright 2002 The Yomiuri Shimbun
*****************************************************************
23 Number of Iraqi Children Suffering from Leukaemia Doubled
Pravda.RU
¹ Oct, 01 2002
The number of Iraqi children suffering from leukaemia has
doubled, reports the RIA Novosti correspondent. This information
was printed by the Iraqi journal Al-Rafidein on Tuesday with
reference to a report of the UN Program on Iraq.
The cancer incidence among women has also doubled. While in 1990
326 of every 100,000 Iraqi women suffered from breast cancer, in
2000 that figure had already gone up to 633.
The reason for this growth of cancer diseases in Iraq is the use
by US troops during the 1991 Persian Gulf war of banned types of
weapons, including depleted uranium, reports the journal.
© RIAN
Copyright ©1999 by "Pravda.RU [http://www.pravda.ru/] ". When
*****************************************************************
24 Strenghtened Safeguards, Mali, Chile and South Africa
[Image] [www.iaea.org]
Countries Commit to Nuclear Verification by Signing Additional
Protocols WorldAtom Staff Report
Chile's Ambassador Raimundo Gonzales Aninat, Ms. Maria Samiei
Bermudez, and IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei at the
signing ceremony. (Credit: D. Calma)
This month saw another three countries Mali, Chile and South
Africa sign Additional Protocols with the IAEA, as part of their
commitment to the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons.
Additionally, the Agency’s Board of Governors this week approved
an Additional Protocol with El Salvador. The Protocols expand the
Agency’s capability to detect any undeclared nuclear material and
activities. (See the States
[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Programmes/Safeguards/sg_protocol.shtml]
that have signed Additional Protocols to their IAEA safeguards
agreements.)
The latest signatures come with the release of a new IAEA booklet
Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons and Nuclear Security: IAEA
Safeguards Agreements and Additional Protocols. The booklet
explains the important role of the safeguards system as a
credible means to assure the international community that nuclear
material and facilities are being used exclusively for peaceful
purposes. (See the booklet)
[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Press/News/PDF/Engl_Nuke.pdf] .
At the Agency’s General Conference in Vienna last week, IAEA
Director General, Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, said that for the IAEA
to provide assurances about nuclear material, it must have the
required authority. “The number of safeguards agreements and
additional protocols in force remains well below expectations…I
urge all States who have not done so to conclude and bring into
force the required safeguards agreements and additional protocols
at an early date,” he said.
The new booklet explains the strengthened safeguards system, the
rationale for participating in it, reporting requirements, the
assistance provided by the IAEA and, the steps involved in
concluding a safeguards agreement and/or an Additional Protocol.
IAEA, 24 September 2002
*****************************************************************
25 Payments made to IAAP workers
The Hawk Eye Special: IAAP
[The Hawk Eye Special Edition]
Wednesday, October 2, 2002 [Unknown dangers at IAAP]
Handful of former employees or their survivors get funds
authorized
by Congress. By Dennis J. Carroll The Hawk Eye
Injury compensation claims totaling $500,000 have been paid out
to seven former workers or their survivors at the Iowa Army
Ammunition Plant, a Labor Department official said Tuesday.
A total of 1,160 claims representing 790 Middletown workers have
been filed with the Energy Employee Occupational Illness
Compensation Program, said Pete Turcic, the director of the
program. Thirteen claims representing eight workers have been
approved but not yet paid. Some 360 claims, representing 244
workers, have been referred for further evaluation.
The program, created by the Department of Energy and administered
by the Labor Department, was authorized by Congress in 2000 after
then–Energy Secretary Bill Richardson acknowledged that the
nation's former nuclear wea–pons workers were exposed to and may
have been made ill by hazardous materials. Richardson met with
former IAAP workers in Burlington in early 2000 and praised their
work and commitment and called them Cold War heroes.
The program provides a lump sum payment of $150,000 and medical
expenses for workers, or their survivors, who can support their
claims that they suffered illnesses or deaths because of their
exposure to beryllium, radiation or silica.
Turcic said 21 claims representing 17 IAAP workers have been
denied. He said the most common reason for denial has been
because claimants cited a condition or hazardous material
exposure not covered by the program. Workers also have complained
of exposure to other toxic chemicals, such as explosives or heavy
metals, which are not covered under this program. Turcic said
those workers or survivors may be covered under another Energy
Department program operated in conjunction with state worker
compensation programs.
He said that nationwide as of Sept. 19, 34,214 claims have been
filed by former nuclear workers. Some 5,265 have been approved
for payment, and 2,934 have been denied. The total claims
represent 4,698 workers. The compensation paid out totals $3.4
million. At the IAAP, Turcic said, the four workers approved for
payment all had evidence of chronic beryllium disease.
Payments may have gone to the employees themselves or survivors.
The Labor Department did not disclose whether those who received
payments were workers or survivors.
Turcic said there would have been no claims paid for silicosis at
IAAP. The only sites qualifying for such payments under the
Energy Department program are two nuclear test sites, one in
Nevada and the other in Alaska. Turcic said there have been no
payments made for cancers resulting from exposure to radiation at
IAAP.
Those claims, 360 representing 244 workers, have been forwarded
for review to the National Institute of Occupational Safety and
Health.
NIOSH will conduct what is known as "dose reconstruction" on the
claims to determine how much radiation the workers may have been
exposed to. The Labor Department, using a NIOSH computer model,
then will decide the likelihood of whether the amounts could have
caused the cancers. If there is a 50 percent or better chance
that the dosage received caused the cancer, the claim will be
approved, Turcic said. If it is less than 50 percent, the claim
will be denied. Those denied payments may appeal the decisions to
U.S. District Court.
The Hawk Eye 800 S. Main St., Burlington Iowa 52601 319-754-8461
Front Desk · 319-754-6824 FAX · 1-800-397-1708 Toll
*****************************************************************
26 Japanese PM Instructs Minister to Stress Nuclear Safety
Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, October 01, 2002
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Monday told a key
minister to put a priority on restoring the nation's confidence
in nuclear safety, Kyodo news reported.
Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi on Monday told a key
minister to put a priority on restoring the nation's confidence
in nuclear safety, Kyodo news reported.
"The premier gave me a three-point plan in writing. First of all,
he called for utmost efforts to restore the people's confidence
in nuclear safety administration," Takeo Hiranuma said at his
first press conference after being reappointed as minister of
economy, trade and industry in a cabinet shuffle.
The second and third items concerned taking measures centering on
technological innovations to revitalize the Japanese economy and
ensuring energy policies, he said.
The 63-year-old House of Representatives member has served as
trade minister for two years and three months after becoming the
international trade and industry minister, the former title of
thepost, in July 2000.
With Monday's appointment, however, Hiranuma will likely surpass
Hajime Tamura, one of his predecessors who served two years and
five months from 1986 to 1988 as the longest-serving trade
minister.
Copyright by People's Daily Online, all rights reserved
*****************************************************************
27 Will Wamp sign sick-worker bill?
The Oak Ridger Online -- Area News --
p.m. on Wednesday, October 2, 2002
by R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff
A measure that would further remove the Department of Energy from
the sick worker issue is working its way through Congress, and
local folks are wondering where Zach Wamp stands on the issue.
So far Congressman Wamp, R-3rd District, has not signed the bill
that is touted to add reform to the Compensation Act passed in
2000, which the Chattanooga representative supported.
"The latest proposal is a sweeping change that I am carefully
considering," said Wamp in a statement issued from Washington
this morning. "I support these workers and their benefits and
will be there for them."
However, at home sick workers are expressing concern that Wamp is
not on board, and the bill's Ohio sponsor said Tuesday that he
would expect support from legislators who worked for the original
bill.
"I don't want to be critical of Congressman Wamp, but we hope to
get his support and I think it would be incredibly helpful and we
will be pursuing that," Congressman Ted Strickland, D-Ohio, said
in a Tuesday phone interview.
Harry Williams, president of the Coalition for a Healthy
Environment, and one of more than 19,000 workers across the
nation who have filed claims, said: "It's kindly a sore spot with
me, that Congressman Wamp was not a sponsor. Bob Clement signed
on, and we greatly appreciated that."
Clement, D-5th District, was one of nine co-sponsors of the new
bill.
"I think Wamp has to come forward and do the right thing," said
Vikki Hatfield, whose father, Leon Meade, worked at the three
federal plants in Oak Ridge and died in January after battling
illness attributed to his work.
"Congressman Clement signed on to it, and it would have been good
to show a united front from Tennessee."
Clement said in a written statement Tuesday:
"I think it is an outrage that workers are still waiting and
wondering just how much longer before they will see the
compensation they were promised Š . Workers who sacrificed so
much for our nation's security, deserve nothing less than full
benefits."
The new bill would add chronic renal disease to the list of
covered illnesses eligible for lump-sum payment and add lung
cancer to the list of covered beryllium diseases, as well as
place more responsibility in the hands of the Department of Labor
rather than the DOE.
Strickland said it would be difficult for those who were
supportive of the original legislation to justify not being
"equally supportive of this legislation," and noted that he'd
"heard indications that some legislators were not signing because
of tight monetary times and budget concerns."
"Quite frankly I'm unimpressed with that argument," said
Strickland. "If it was right to take care of these people in the
original legislation, and it was, those same arguments are
equally valid for the workers we're trying to gain coverage for."
The Energy Department admitted responsibility in 1999 for
historically putting DOE workers in harm's way without their
knowledge or consent, and that admission was the genesis of the
2000 Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program
Act.
Strickland's bill is aimed at improving the original act.
The bill would negate all memorandums of understanding between
the DOE and the states and establish instead the Labor Department
as the "willing payor" for disability claims for occupational
illnesses arising out of employment at the DOE facilities.
"It absolutely is putting DOE further out of reach, and that is
intentional," said Strickland. "DOE just seems historically
unable to deal with these matters well. Part of that is
attitudinal, and part of it is a bureaucratic problem."
Williams said the further removed the better, when it comes to
DOE.
"If I hit you in the head with a hammer, would you want me to be
in charge of fixing you?" asked Williams. "Except for providing
information, DOE needs to be removed (from the issue)."
Hatfield added that part of her disappointment with Wamp is that
he could be setting an example for DOE.
"If he did the right thing, that way it would put more pressure
on DOE to come forward and do the right thing also."
But, noted Hatfield, "It's been cold with this administration. We
haven't had as good a relationship, and that's huge and very
disappointing."
Strickland said that as far as he could tell, "DOE has processed
only a handful of claims."
When asked whether the administration had been "cold" in dealing
with sick workers, and to provide information as to the Energy
Department being further removed from the sick worker issue, the
DOE headquarters issued a one-sentence statement:
"The department is working very hard to implement the program as
established by Congress to provide workers with the compensation
they deserve," said Dolline Hatchett, spokeswoman for
headquarters.
Clement criticized the Energy Department in his statement: "Some
sick workers are still denied compensation for their illnesses by
the DOE and this is not right. That is why I have co-sponsored
legislation that would designate the Department of Labor as the
willing payor for disability claims for occupational illness
arising out of employment at DOE facilities. ..."
"It has been a long, hard struggle to get the government to
accept responsibility," said Clement.
Strickland said the bill probably would not go far this session,
but with expected Senate support in the form of a companion bill,
he is optimistic for next session.
"I think we have good shot," said Strickland. "It's not going to
happen this year, but I expect to get the good bipartisan
coalition like we had with the original legislation to also get
behind this bill."
R. Cathey Daniels can be contacted at (865) 220-5515 or
danielsrcd@oakridger.com.
All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger
*****************************************************************
28 UK: Nesbitt's Sellafield views rapped*
PUBLICATION DATE: TUESDAY, OCTOBER 1, 2002
Belfast Telegraph | Sunday Life
Publication Date: 01 October 2002
* *By Paul Dykes* *
THE Environment Minister appears to have been "sold the nuclear
idea" by Sellafield spin doctors, the SDLP claimed today.
The party's Patrick Clarke, who has represented the SDLP on
Sellafield issues with the Dublin government, said Dermot
Nesbitt's comments about Sellafield were "a blatant insult" to
people living opposite Sellafield.
"It would appear from Mr Nesbitt's recent visit to Sellafield
that he has been sold the famous BNFL spin ticket that it is
totally safe and is operating under the strictest environmental
and safety guidelines possible by thoroughly professional and
dedicated staff," Mr Clarke said.
"BNFL has mastered the art of convincing and encouraging
Government officials such as Mr Nesbitt over to the plant to be
sold the nuclear idea that Sellafield is operating under the
strictest code of safety. This is nothing more than a cover-up of
deception and scientific wizardry."
Mr Clarke said Mr Nesbitt's comment last week that people were
"scaremongering about Sellafield" was an insult to the
intelligence of the people living opposite the plant.
"We must continue to send out a clear message to BNFL and the
British Government that Ireland, north and south, no longer wants
the Irish Sea to be used as a dumping ground for nuclear waste,
and to shut down Sellafield."
A spokesman for Mr Nesbitt said the minister was standing by his
comment.
Last week Mr Nesbitt said that as a parent living on the east
coast of Co Down he shared concerns about Sellafield, but he
cautioned against "scaremongering".
"We must base our comments on the scientific facts," he said.
"Too often, emotion displaces factual evidence."
*****************************************************************
29 AU: Labor urged to honour uranium vow
The Advertiser:
02 October 2002
By Political Reporter CATHERINE HOCKLEY
THE State Government is being urged to honour an election pledge
and refuse a licence for South Australia's third uranium mine.
It was revealed yesterday the Honeymoon uranium mine, planned for
the state's northeast, failed before the February election to
secure from the then Liberal government one of two licences it
needed for commercial operations.
The Australian Conservation Foundation has called on the Labor
Government to refuse a commercial mining and milling licence for
Honeymoon.
In its 2002 election policy, Labor said it "continues to be
opposed to the establishment of any new uranium mines".
"The SA Government must now deliver on its pre-election promise
to oppose any new uranium mines by not issuing this key
approval," ACF campaigner David Noonan said yesterday. "Without
this approval the project has no legal basis to proceed."
But mine proponent Southern Cross Resources' project executive,
Tom Hunter, said the company had secured a mining lease from
Primary Industries and Resources SA in February.
He said he believed this lease was "the over-riding approval".
Securing a licence under the Radiation Protection and Control Act
was "procedural", Mr Hunter said. The company, based in Canada,
has a licence under this Act for its field trials but must secure
a commercial licence under the same Act, at an annual cost of up
to $200,000, to begin production. Environment Minister John Hill
must approve the granting of the licence by the Radiation
Protection Branch, which was formerly part of the Human Services
Department but has been transferred to the Environment Protection
Authority. Mr Hill said yesterday he would wait until an
application for the licence had been received and then consider
it.
"It's all hypothetical at this stage," he said.
Meanwhile, Southern Cross Resources and the operator of the
Beverley uranium mine, Heathgate Resources, will both appear
before a Senate Committee inquiry into environmental regulation
of uranium mining, which is hearing submissions in Adelaide on
Friday.
The ACF and the SA Chamber of Mines and Energy will also make
submissions.
STORIES IN THIS SECTION KI park mining banned I'll snub AGL's
rises, says Rann Labor urged to honour uranium vow Speculation
grows over future of Mike Elliott Police banned from blanket DNA
testing Pledge on ethics for real estate industry Red, white and
blue flag of the north Adelaide to host film's world premiere Air
quality now online Barossa festival survives funding cut $70 a
kilogram - the price of a cray
*****************************************************************
30 Nebraska plans to appeal ruling on nuclear dump
LJWorld.com:
The Lawrence Journal-World, 6News, World Online]
The Associated Press
Wednesday, October 2, 2002
Lincoln, Neb. — The day after a judge said Nebraska must pay $151
million for blocking construction of a waste dump for low-level
radioactive waste, the state filed notice it would appeal the
ruling.
And Brad Reynolds, Nebraska's lead attorney on the case, could
hardly contain himself Tuesday in talking about what he called a
litany of errors in Monday's ruling.
"There are a number of errors that were made," Reynolds said of
the planned appeal to the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
"There are some pretty serious legal issues that the ruling
presents."
U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf ruled Monday that former Gov.
Ben Nelson, now a U.S. senator, engaged in a politically
motivated and orchestrated plot to keep the dump from being built
in Nebraska.
Kopf said Nelson's office "directly interfered with the
regulatory process."
"Frankly, I cannot conceive of a stronger case of bad faith in
the performance of a contract," Kopf said.
The dump was to contain waste from Nebraska, Kansas, Arkansas,
Louisiana and Oklahoma — which joined in 1983 to form the Central
Interstate Low-Level Radioactive Waste Compact.
Nebraska officials argued they refused to license the dump
because of concerns about possible pollution and a high-water
table at the proposed site in Boyd County near the South Dakota
border.
Reynolds said he was particularly concerned by Kopf's refusal to
let a jury hear the case.
Kopf refused to seat a jury for the case partly because its
members would be made up of taxpayers who ultimately would have
to pay the bill if Nebraska lost the case.
Kopf said the law did not allow jury trials in disputes between
states.
But in his ruling, Kopf characterized the lawsuit as a
contractual dispute.
"And that is precisely the kind of action that the law says is
entitled to be tried to a jury," Reynolds said. "That ... raises
a very serious legal issue."
Reynolds said it could take more than two years to resolve the
issue if the case eventually reaches the U.S. Supreme Court, as
many people expect.
Utilities that generate radioactive waste filed the lawsuit,
accusing Nebraska officials of acting in bad faith by not
licensing the facility in 1998. Other states in the waste compact
later joined the lawsuit.
Copyright © 2002 The Lawrence Journal-World. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
31 AMEC to Begin Operations With Russia's Pacific Fleet
International cooperation on naval clean-up
This section covers international efforts to tackle the
challenges deriving from inactive nuclear subs and nuclear waste.
The US, Norway and EU have been main contributors to on-going
projects.
VLADIVOSTOK, RUSSIAN FAR EAST - This Russian port city at the tip
of the Eurasian continent is as far-flung as some of the polar
ice-sheets Dieter Rudolph has visited as the project director for
Arctic Military Environmental Cooperation (AMEC) organization,
but on this mid-September day, it is a damn sight warmer.
Dieter Rudolph, the project director for Arctic Military
Environmental Cooperation (AMEC) organization.
Charles Digges, 2002-10-02 10:55
But it's not the summery weather — which will turn into Russia's
characteristic coastal ice sludge within weeks — that has brought
Rudolph and 250 other environmental, nuclear and naval experts to
Vladivostok for the Ecoflot 2002 conference: It is one of the
most heated issues concerning the world's nuclear and
environmental security — the disposition of the Russian Pacific
Fleet's rusting and polluting retired nuclear submarines. If
things, however, go as Rudolph hopes they will in Washington this
week, as US congress debates the Homeland Defence and Defence
Appropriations Bills, AMEC will be bringing some of its expertise
and experience in ecological monitoring and nuclear waste
management from Russia's far north to its far east.
Funded and administered by the US Department of Defence (DOD) and
the Norwegian and Russian Defence Ministries, AMEC is an
exception among its American government-funded non-proliferation
cousins like the Cooperative Threat Reduction act (CTR) or the
weapons grade plutonium destruction programmes run through the
DOE and State Department, in that AMEC's charter allows it to
pursue environmental issues. Originally, said Rudolph, AMEC was
conceived on a shoestring budget as an effort to protect
Norwegian fishing territory from encroaching nuclear pollution by
Russia's nearby Arctic-based Northern Fleet. Talks on the
programme began in 1996, and it was implemented in earnest in
1999. Since then — by the accounts of Russian, Norwegian and
American officials — the AMEC programme has been a roaring
success.
Rudolph would like to see that success translated to the problems
of the Pacific Fleet, which presents many of the same
contamination hazards that the Northern Fleet did when AMEC first
began work. For the Pacific programme, the shoestring budget
remains — AMEC is asking for $25-$30 million total for fiscal
years 2003-2008 in the Defence Appropriations Bill, which
duplicates the funding it has received for Northwest Russia.
Infrustructure
"We're trying to get a sense of where the need is [in the
Pacific]. I feel that in Northwest Russia, we have more equipment
available to take care of things," said Rudolph in his easy-going
manner in an interview in Vladivostok. "There are three
dismantlement sites [in Northwest Russia] and there are three
active shipyards ... somehow I get the feeling that's not all
necessarily as available here."
"In terms of numbers, you may have more [submarines awaiting full
decommissioning] in the Northwest, [but] the probability of
rounding up these subs here [in the Pacific] is not as good as
with the ones up there," Rudolph added. "You've got one guy here,
another guy there, and they probably haven't been maintained in
as good a state as some of the others [in the Northwest]."
Familiar problems on the other side of the map
Interviews with Russian naval, nuclear and environmental
officials gathered in Vladivostok confirmed Rudolph's suspicions.
By 2010, the Russian Navy expects to take out of service around
200 submarines. In the Pacific, 77 retired submarines are
currently awaiting decommissioning. Of those, 42 are still afloat
and loaded with spent nuclear fuel — a nuclear waste storage
method, by the way, that you will only find in Russia.
Of these 42 submarines, 39 have hulls so corroded and rusted by
long years in the water that many cannot be safely towed to
decommissioning points at the Zvezda plant at the town of Bolshoi
Kamen for fear that they would sink en route, said Viktor
Akhunov, head of the Ministry for Atomic Energy's (Minatom's)
Ecology and Decommissioning Department. Many of them are at risk
of sinking at their docks as it is.
Two of these 39 submarines have already had reactor accidents,
said Vladimir Shishkin, chief designer of the Minatom's Institute
for Energy Equipment Research and Design, though he would not be
more specific. An additional small number of retired submarines —
though naval officials will not say how many or what kind — lie
literally beached in Kamchatka. There are 22 submarines all
together laid up in Kamchatka.
These ailing Pacific Fleet submarines, unlike their Northern
Fleet counterparts, are spread out over several thousand square
kilometres at bases from the Primorsky Krai, to Kamchatka to the
Khabarovsky Krai. One plan forwarded by Shishkin is to corral the
submarines into a specially-built shelter to store them until the
fission capability in their nuclear reactors ends in about 300
years, essentially leaving them untouched for generations and
hoping for the best.
Full decommissioning poses risks of its own. Besides the towing
logistics, these old boats could explode during defuelling. Such
an accident occurred during refuelling at the Chazhma Bay base in
1985, killing 10 men and causing widespread contamination. Less
dramatic but equally deadly risks are long-term leakage, as well
as low-level radioactive waste (LLW) generated by defuelling a
submarine — an estimated two tonnes of this waste is produced by
chemical washing of the reactor core alone.
The Pacific Fleet's two waste storage facilities — one on
Kamchatka, to the east of the Gornyak naval shipyard, the other
on the southeast tip of the Shkotovo Peninsula, both of which
hold low- and high-level solid and liquid waste as well as spent
nuclear fuel — suffer from chronic leakage problems, space
shortages and transportation woes. Spent nuclear fuel (SNF) taken
out of submarine reactors is being shipped to the Mayak
reprocessing plant. But according to Eduard Avdonin, director of
Minatom's International Centre for Environmental Safety, the navy
can't scratch up a mere $7 million to repair a 27-kilometer
stretch of railroad track to ship SNF from Zvezda to the nearest
railhead that would take shipments to the Mayak reprocessing
facility in the Urals. But even that 10-day journey to Mayak is
fraught with worry: While fresh fuel is shipped on guarded
tracks, SNF travels down unattended civilian railways.
For now, the waste is delivered from Zvezda to the train station
over a rough road in trucks that have been known to leak, and
naval officials confirmed the road is shut "a number of times a
year" while technicians deal with the consequences of small-scale
spills. On top of this is a decades-long legacy of sanctioned
contamination at sea. Until 1993, it was the Russian Navy's
policy to dump low-level liquid nuclear waste in the Sea of Japan
before returning to base. Matters will hopefully improve
following the joint Russian-Japanese construction of a giant
liquid waste treatment barge that went into service in 1998. Even
though the problem of dumping at sea remains edged in memory
thanks to footage shot by military journalist Grigory Pasko in
1994, which was later aired on NHK Japanese Television.
But instead of leading to tighter controls at that time, this
footage prompted treason charges for Russian military journalist
Grigory Pasko, whose own reporting on Russian naval dumping had
attracted attention in Japan. In December 2001, Pasko was
sentenced to 4 years in a labour camp for intending to pass
information on secret naval manoeuvres to Japanese journalists.
Where AMEC would fit in?
The Pacific Fleet is now much like AMEC found the Northern Fleet
in 1996 — a potentially catastrophic collection of latent and
actual sources of nuclear contamination that threaten to destroy
surrounding marine ecosystems. The Northern Fleet also had its
own whistle-blower, Bellona's Aleksander Nikitin, who, too, was
battling treason charges for exposing radioactive dangers when
AMEC got its start.
Where AMEC would fit — in broad terms — is in preventing
pollution in the Pacific Fleet area from getting worse by
intensive monitoring of the areas where solid and liquid wastes
are stored, and by examining vessels awaiting decommissioning,
said Rudolph. AMEC would also push for programmes improving the
safety of workers involved in dealing with radioactive material.
Perhaps the most state-of-the-art bit of gadgetry that would help
fulfil most of those goals is the so-called PICASSO AMEC system
of environmental monitoring, which was developed by Norway for
Northern Fleet bases. Relying on similar technology that has been
used to monitor systems as diverse as nuclear power plants, paper
mills, and telecommunication networks, the PICASSO AMEC employs a
series of sensors that transmit their data back to central and
remote control posts.
This technology may soon see a new application during submarine
dismantlement, gauging the radiation emissions that are a part of
the process. Further, it may be put to use monitoring those 42
foundering submarines loaded with SNF that the Russian Navy says
may sink from corrosion. The system would provide multiple layers
of monitoring — both locally and from offsite — that would
increase the Russian Navy's ability to detect elevated radiation
levels and decrease the response time should a problem arise.
Additional remote stand-alone monitoring would add to safety. An
aspect of the system is getting a test run at the civilian
nuclear icebreaker operator Atomflot, near Murmansk, where
sensors are affixed to a pad for SNF containers to monitor for
contamination. Norwegian environmental officials will be provided
with remote readouts of the data. The pad, which holds 19 casks
of SNF, is scheduled to go into operation later this autumn. And
shipyard Zvezdochka, in Severodvinsk, has built a pad with a
capacity for 60 casks — enough space for fuel for 12 two-reactor
submarines. The Pacific Fleet is scheduled to receive an AMEC
monitoring pad with an 80-cask capacity.
The casks themselves — a 40 tonne transport vessel designated as
TUK-108/1 — are also designed with AMEC economic assistance, and
have been incorporated into a submarine spent nuclear fuel
storage programme at Atomflot, Zvezdochka and Mayak, which is
being negotiated by CTR and other international donors.
Cost-effective
Rudolph sees large possibilities for the PICASSO AMEC technology.
"If you think ahead, and take those sensors and put them on subs
that are awaiting dismantlement, you'll have a terrific warning
system, because the Russian Navy is very concerned about the
condition [of those vessels]," Rudolph said.
"[The submarine monitoring system] is not installed anywhere yet,
but once the Russians see it work, then hopefully they'll say
they want to install it in some places. It's really their call."
Indeed, most of the bill for PICASSO AMEC would be footed by the
United States and Norway. All the Russians have to do is say yes.
"Typically Norway and the US will fund most of the direct
efforts, and Russia will kick in Minatom funds for specific
projects, and then there are in-kind contributions — for
instance, the use of a Russian naval base, the use of guards, the
use of brains."
As one of the cheapest multi-government programmes focused on
nuclear safety in the former Soviet Union, AMEC has spent a total
of $41.5 million since its inception. Of that, Norway has
contributed $10 million, the United States $25 million, and
Russia $6.5 million. By contrast, the DOE is asking for $420
million for its Russia projects from the Defence Appropriations
Bill for fiscal year 2003 alone. Many millions of this will go
toward the continuing battle over plutonium disposition via the
MOX fuel programme, which after eight years on the drawing board
is no closer to realization today than it was when it was first
conceived. Such comparisons, however, are not likely to assure
hands-down passage of AMEC's new plans in US Congress, especially
at a time when America's defence expenditures are dictated almost
wholly by perceived terrorist threats. Having coffee in
Vladivostok while his staffers back in Washington hash out the
final language for AMEC's inclusion in the Defence Appropriations
Bill, Rudolph said he was fielding daily queries from home about
how to respond to congressional questions.
"Some of them are really surprising. They're asking things like
what we plan to do about nuclear terrorism and such," he said. "I
think that by preventing the backlog of radioactive material
here, by supplying monitoring equipment at radioactive waste
sites [and for] submarines, we will have gone a long way toward
preventing this stuff from falling into the wrong hands."
Publisher: [bellona@bellona.no] , President:
[frederic@bellona.no] 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
*****************************************************************
32 Nuclear waste road accidents don't faze WIPP*
*HOTLINE, September 30, 2002*
/by Jamie McEvoy/
WIPP IT UP: Radioactive waste on the road in New Mexico. Photo:
New Mexico Environment Department August, a drunk driver crashed
into a truck in southern New Mexico that was hauling 28 55-gallon
drums of nuclear waste to the Waste Isolation Pilot Project in
Carlsbad, N.M. (HCN 04/12/99: Nuclear Waste Dump Opens). Less
than two weeks later, the driver of another truck carrying waste
to WIPP blacked out, hurtling across an interstate median in
Idaho. His backup driver was asleep in the cab.
In July, the New Mexico Department of Transportation reported 89
minor violations found in WIPP vehicles, which haul waste from
the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory.
"It's only a matter of time until there's a more serious
accident," says Don Hancock of the Southwest Research and
Information Center, a WIPP watchdog group based in Albuquerque.
But WIPP spokesman Dennis Hurtt says the accidents aren't
surprising: "Statistically, we do expect incidents and accidents
to occur over the 35-year life of the project." In response to
the recent accidents, WIPP has given drivers additional training
and now requires them to take an eight-hour rest stop on the
30-hour trip from the Idaho laboratory.
Hancock says it's not enough. He believes that every vehicle
carrying radioactive waste should have an escort and an emergency
response team.
"Escorts are costly and unnecessary," says Hurtt, "except in
special circumstances, like during the Winter Olympics."
This fall, Congress is expected to increase the WIPP budget by
$14 million in order to accelerate waste shipments.
*© copyright 2000 High Country News*
*****************************************************************
33 Feds Rule Against Anti-Waste Goshutes
The Salt Lake Tribune --
Wednesday, October 2, 2002
BY JUDY FAHYS
Federal nuclear regulators said Tuesday it is not their job to
decide whether some members of the Skull Valley Band of Goshutes
are hurt more than other tribal members by a nuclear-waste
storage facility proposed for their reservation.
The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) ruled it has no
jurisdiction over what it termed an internal dispute. And, in
doing so, it dashed the hopes of dissident Goshutes eager for
help dealing with alleged unfairness and corruption brought on by
the $3 billion project.
+ Family Feud: Goshutes Split Over Nuclear Waste Site (8/18/2002)
+ Hot Rod Ride: Nuclear Route A Bit Too Close For Comfort?
(8/25/2002) + For Goshutes, the Issue Has Always Been Simple:
Survival (9/1/2002) + This Is The Place For Waste (9/8/2002)
+ N-Waste: Hot Material Piles Up With No Firm Solution in Sight
(9/15/02) + Officials Covet N-Waste Profits (9/22/02)
+ State Leaders Assail 'Plan B' For Nuclear Waste Storage (9/25/02)
Drafts Show Seamy Side of N-Waste Deal (9/29/2002)--> Feds Rule
Against Anti-Waste Goshutes (10/2/2002)-->
"There is definitely an injustice here, and we are ready to
fight" by appealing the ruling, said Margene Bullcreek, a tribal
member and one of the waste-project critics who sought the NRC's
help.
Tuesday's "environmental justice" decision cheered project
supporters, including the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs, the
Goshutes' tribal leaders, the NRC staff and Private Fuel Storage
(PFS), the nuclear-utility consortium seeking a license for the
waste storage.
The issue has been unsettled for more than seven months, since
the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board ordered PFS and Goshute
leaders to account for payments made to the tribe for the
project. The board also told tribal leaders to show how that
money is being disbursed among tribal members.
The board cited a 1994 mandate by former President Clinton
requiring federal agencies to identify and address
"disproportionately high and adverse human health or
environmental effects of [their] programs, policies, and
activities on minority populations and low-income populations."
The licensing board reviews legal and technical questions about
nuclear projects for the NRC, and it reasoned that regulators
have a duty to make sure that, because tribal leaders denied
dissident Goshutes project money and other benefits that help
soften negative impacts, the dissidents were not being harmed by
the project more than supporters.
But the NRC quickly blocked the board's order on the advice of
its staff, which supports the waste project. In its ruling on
environmental justice Tuesday, the five-member commission said
nuclear regulators had no right to be so nosey.
"Claims of financial and political corruption inside the Skull
Valley tribe do not belong in our hearing process under the
rubric of environmental justice," the commission said. "Our
mission is to protect the public health and safety and the
environment."
The NRC also disputed the argument that Goshute leaders had
agreed to some oversight when they signed the lease for the
project, which would be large enough to store all of the
commercial waste ever produced by U.S. power plants.
Larry Echohawk, an Idaho attorney representing Bullcreek and
other dissident Goshutes, criticized the commission for focusing
on technicalities. He said it overlooked more pressing concerns,
such as corruption and unfair treatment of some tribal members.
"Even in the face of these serious allegations, and even in the
face of licensing a high-level nuclear waste facility," he said,
"they have chosen to ignore those considerations and march on
towards licensing the facility."
fahys@sltrib.com
© Copyright 2002, The Salt Lake Tribune All material found on
*****************************************************************
34 Letter: Bush bragging about Yucca is no surprise
Las Vegas SUN
Today: October 02, 2002 at 9:10:36 PDT
Regarding the Sun's Sept. 25 story, "Yucca a source of pride for
Bush": In the context of an economy in recession, unfettered
corporate scandals and international dissent over the Bush
administration's plans to invade Iraq, it is hardly surprising
that the White House is attempting to paint endorsement of the
flawed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste site as a success.
No doubt desperate for any semblance of a victory, the
administration is reaching for the one area, the environment,
where it has failed most dismally. Having weakened clean air
standards and withdrawn from the Kyoto Protocol, White House spin
doctors have little else to cling to than their misguided seismic
solution to the inconvenient stockpile of nuclear waste sitting
at U.S. reactors and defense sites nationwide. Given its fondness
for other polluting industries such as oil and coal, the Bush
administration likely views jeopardizing the drinking water of
Nevadans and the safety of communities on nuclear waste transport
routes across the country as just one more boon for its big
industry cronies.
LINDA GUNTER
Editor's note: The writer is communications director of the
Washington-based Safe Energy Communication Council, a coalition
of environmental and public interest groups that promotes energy
efficiency and renewable energy sources.
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
35 Lawmakers Oppose Boyd Co. Decision
Press &Dakotan -
Yankton.com [http://www.yankton.com]
--> Web posted Tuesday, October 1, 2002
BY RANDY DOCKENDORF P Regional Editor
A Northeast Nebraska legislator said Monday he believes an appeal
should overturn a federal ruling that Nebraska pay $151 million
for refusing to license a five-state, low-level radioactive waste
site in Boyd County, Neb.
U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf said Monday the administration
of former Gov. Ben Nelson, now a U.S. senator, acted in bad
faith. Kopf ordered the state to pay $151 million, but the
decision is expected to be appealed.
"I knew the ruling was coming, but I was not optimistic because I
was familiar with that court," said State Sen. "Cap" Dierks of
Ewing.
Dierks said he expects a lengthy appeal which could reach the
U.S. Supreme Court.
"For $151 million, the state can't just roll over and play dead.
You have to appeal," he said. "It won't be settled for probably
two or three years."
Another Northeast Nebraska lawmaker, State Sen. Doug Cunningham
of Wausa, said he had been on the road and knew little of
Monday's ruling besides what he had caught in news reports.
"But I sure would support an appeal," he said. "I think you have
to (appeal)."
Dierks represented Boyd County until last year's redistricting.
After taking office in 1987, Dierks introduced legislation
addressing Nebraska's role in the compact.
"We were informed by a law firm that we had the authority to pull
out of the compact and would not suffer liability," he said.
The waste site drew immediate fire upon announcement of the Boyd
County location, Dierks said.
"They selected the site, and then we went to war," he said.
Nebraska officials argued they refused to license the dump
because of concerns over possible pollution and a high-water
table near the proposed site in Boyd County near the South Dakota
border.
They rejected claims that Nelson and others conspired to
submarine plans for the dump meant to store radioactive waste
from Nebraska, Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana.
Utilities that generate radioactive waste filed the lawsuit
against Nebraska, accusing state officials of acting in bad faith
by not licensing the facility in 1998. Other states in the waste
compact later joined the lawsuit.
"It was extremely unfortunate that the lawsuit came down the way
it did. I have been involved (as a legislator) since the very
beginning, and I think it was not politicized," Dierks said
Monday.
"The political parties got involved, and there's not that much
you can do with that. The decision was made originally that they
couldn't license (the site) because it was in the wetlands, and
the laws specifically say you can't put it on a wetland."
The area is not geologically suited for a radioactive-waste site,
Dierks said.
"That area is a swamp. It's the wettest piece of land in Boyd
County. They could have canoe races on that thing," he said. "As
far as I was concerned, there were a lot of studies that said you
couldn't put it there. Unfortunately, we had this (federal-court)
decision."
Dierks said the site selection was questioned from the outset,
particularly the payment of $1,000 an acre for poor-quality land.
Dierks noted the drainage into nearby Ponca Creek.
"But four other states were doing the pushing, and there was a
lot of money from the nuclear-waste people," he said. "They
drilled test wells for water levels, but there wasn't any other
work on the site."
The issue has drawn sharp public opinion in Boyd County which
remains to this day, Dierks said.
"There was a straw vote, and 90 percent of the people in Boyd
County didn't want (the site)," he said. "The percentage of the
opposition far outweighed the number of people who accepted it.
The reason (proponents) accepted it was because it brought money
to their community."
Dierks said the Boyd County site raised another political issue
-- the lack of a voice for South Dakotans who lived just miles
away but had no say because their state was not part of the
compact.
The battle had its genesis in 1970, when Nevada, South Carolina
and Washington grew tired of accepting low-level radioactive
waste from the rest of the country.
Congress told states in 1980 to build their own dumps or join
regional groups to dispose of the waste, which includes
contaminated tools and clothing from nuclear power plants,
hospitals and research centers.
Nebraska joined Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas and Louisiana in 1983
to form the Central Interstate Low-level Radioactive Waste
Compact. The other states voted in 1987 to put the dump in
Nebraska.
The fight began soon after, with both sides wrestling in court on
several issues.
Most of the lawyers involved in the case expect it to eventually
end up in the U.S. Supreme Court.
The following excerpts come from Monday's ruling:
--ŒŒGov. Nelson, either directly or through his subordinates,
influenced the process in order to fulfill a campaign promise,
which required that the license be denied without regard to the
technical merits.''
--The ŒŒgovernor's office directly interfered with the regulatory
process.''
--ŒŒFrankly, I cannot conceive of a stronger case of bad faith in
the performance of a contract.''
--ŒŒIf Nelson uttered these words ... and I find that he did, the
entire licensing process was sullied beyond redemption.''
--ŒŒWithout engaging in strained semantics, there is no plausible
way that these statements can be squared with any notion of good
faith.''
Nebraska Gov. Mike Johanns called a Monday afternoon news
conference to address the decision.
Alan Peterson, a lawyer for the compact, declined comment until
he had studied the decision.
Brad Reynolds, the attorney who led Nebraska's legal team in the
case, was not immediately available for comment.
In a statement issued Monday, U.S. Sen. Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) said
he remains hopeful that Nebraskans will receive a fair hearing on
an appeal of the waste lawsuit.
"Judge Kopf's decision is both disappointing and expected. I held
out hope for an unbiased consideration of the facts of the case
even after the court blocked out a trial by jury," Nelson said.
"This opinion does not change the fact that the license was
denied because the site was unsafe and the developer was nearly
broke.
"Indeed, the state has acted in good faith since the inception of
the compact in the mid 1980s, and I am confident that, on appeal,
Nebraskans will receive a fair hearing and the judgment will be
overturned."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
To contact Randy Dockendorf, e-mail him at rdock@yankton.net.
The Yankton Daily Press & Dakotan
*****************************************************************
36 State appeals waste-site ruling
Omaha.com
October 1, 2002
*BY ROBYNN TYSVER*
WORLD-HERALD BUREAU
LINCOLN - A single federal judge sat in judgment of Nebraska in
the low-level nuclear waste case that resulted in a $151 million
verdict against the state.
U.S. District Judge Richard Kopf admitted that was unusual.
Gov. Mike Johanns believes that is grounds for appeal. A jury
should have decided the case, the governor said.
"Citizens are entitled to be judged by their peers," Johanns
said.
The state started the appeal process Tuesday by filing a request
for a stay of the judgment in U.S. District Court here. The case
probably will end up before the U.S. Supreme Court - perhaps
within two years, Johanns said.
In the meantime, Johanns does not believe that the state should
begin setting aside any money to pay the judgment in the event
the state loses its appeal.
"I don't want to do anything that can be regarded as me waving a
white flag," he said Monday after Kopf's ruling against the
state.
Kopf said that former Gov. Ben Nelson, now a U.S. senator,
presided over a preordained licensing process for a low-level
nuclear waste facility in Boyd County.
The judge said the license was rejected in 1998 to fulfill a
campaign promise that Nelson had made in 1990.
Kopf presided over a two-month trial this summer, without a jury.
He rejected Nebraska's request for a jury, saying the state was
not entitled to a jury in a compact case that pitted states
against states.
Kopf stood behind his decision in Monday's 194-page opinion.
"It requires no citation of authority to recognize that the entry
of a monetary judgment against an otherwise sovereign state by a
single, unelected federal district judge is an extraordinary
act," Kopf said.
"Nonetheless, the law of this case, which I firmly believe to be
correct, is that Nebraska does not have immunity under the
Constitution against damages for its wrongful conduct."
After an eight-year review, the state in 1998 denied a license
for a low-level radioactive-waste facility near Butte, Neb. The
five-state compact that sought to build the regional facility
then sued Nebraska for violating its contract.
In his ruling, Kopf put the blame squarely on Nelson.
He noted that on the campaign trail Nelson said it was unlikely
the facility would be licensed if he was elected. He also noted
that Nelson, in his bid for the Senate, proudly claimed that "I
kept the nuclear waste out of Nebraska."
"Governor Nelson, either directly or through his subordinates,
influenced the process in order to fulfill a campaign promise
which required that the license be denied without regard to
technical merits," Kopf wrote.
Nelson continued to maintain that sound science underscored the
license denial.
"This opinion does not change the fact that the license was
denied because the site was unsafe and the developer was nearly
broke," Nelson said.
The ruling could come back to haunt Nelson politically. Johanns
has been mentioned as a possible candidate for the Senate against
Nelson in 2006. Nelson was narrowly elected in 2000.
Johanns declined Monday to discuss Nelson and his role in the
case.
"I have nothing to say to Ben Nelson," Johanns said. "In fact,
I'm intentionally staying away from that. There is no mileage in
me addressing this."
Nebraska spent $22 million to defend itself against the charge
that it acted in "bad faith" when it denied a license.
The judge made it clear that he would neither force the state to
issue a license nor go forward with an independent review. The
five-state commission had wanted a special master appointed to
consider the license.
"Nebraska could frustrate, or defeat, any court order to license
a facility within its borders," Kopf said.
The question of whether a facility will ever be built in Nebraska
remains unclear. The state is set to leave the commission in
2004.
The commission still could seek a license for a facility in
Nebraska under compact rules, said Alan Peterson, the attorney
for the Central Interstate Low-Level Radioactive Waste
Commission.
He disputed comments made by Johanns that none of the parties
involved wanted to continue to pursue a facility.
"The commission certainly has the option to go forward with its
first host state and seek that license," Peterson said. "No
decision to that effect has been made, but it is by no means a
dead issue."
©2002 Omaha World-Herald. All rights reserved. Copyright
*****************************************************************
37 State health department's reputation on line with Cotter
10-1-02
[Canon City Daily Record - Canon City and the Royal Gorge
Region, Colorado]
By B.J. Plasket
DENVER — Since it began regulating the state's radioactive
materials industry 34 years ago, the Colorado Department of
Public Health and Environment had never suspended the Cotter
Corporation's license to process radioactive materials.
Until now.
When the CDPHE suspended the license in July, it did so in what
it called "the interest of worker safety."
The safety of the mill's workers, however, has been an issue at
Cotter for decades. So has the health department's performance as
the public's Cotter watchdog.
That fact is not lost on Douglas Benevento, the new interim
executive director of the CDPHE. He was appointed to the
temporary post when his boss, health department Executive
Director Jane Norton, was tapped to be Gov. Bill Owens' running
mate during the fall campaigns.
"We need to rebuild the public perception of this department," he
said. "I don't think we've done a good job communicating with the
public."
Other governmental agencies have, over the past 25 years, claimed
the department has also done a poor job regulating Cotter.
When the state allowed Cotter to build its new mill in the late
1970s, it did so in spite of opposition by both the Environmental
Protection Agency and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
In 1979, the NRC said the mill location "would probably not be
authorized for a new uranium mill site due to its proximity to
the town." The NRC added that the mitigating measures proposed by
Cotter "can be sufficient to minimize harmful effects, on both
the environment and the population surrounding the site."
A later report based on an NRC review of the health department's
files, however, said the documents "do not lead to the conclusion
that (state) controls are adequate for this site" and said that
in spite of a 20-page set of suggestions by the EPA, the health
department's own files "do not reflect the vigilance urged by the
EPA."
In a 1981 report commissioned by the EPA after workers inquired
about potential health risks at the mill, the private firm Fred
Hart and Associates ripped both Cotter and the health department.
Noting that the EPA had urged state officials to "carefully
weigh" the decision to allow the new mill to be built at the
Cotter site, the EPA also criticized the department's decision to
allow Cotter to begin construction on the mill before deciding
whether to issue the mill a new license. One EPA scientist wrote
a memo stating that granting approval to build would create
"tremendous pressure to license even if there are strong
reservations about continuing to use the present site."
The Hart report said the health department's water-quality
enforcement "has not always been effective" and said questions
about the mill's environment and health "have remained unresolved
through the years, in spite of requirements as license conditions
that they be resolved."
"Therefore, it is unlikely that the (health department) can
assure their resolution," it said.
The report also criticized the state's licensing procedure,
saying, "Cotter has been responsible for providing virtually all
the data and most of the studies on which licensing decisions are
made." It also suggested that another state agency be employed to
assist the department in overseeing Cotter.
State health officials inherited regulation of nuclear facilities
in 1968, but they also inherited a history of violations.
According to the EPA's Office of Solid Waste, the Atomic Energy
Commission (now the Nuclear Regulatory Commission) cited Cotter
18 times between 1959 and 1966 for "failing to track radioactive
releases." Those violations included "exceedances" of particulate
emission standards, discharge and release from tailings pipes and
poor record keeping regarding off-site surface-water
contamination. State health officials cited Cotter 82 times
between 1968 and 1984. It also cited the company for 26
violations between 1991 and 2000, with 15 of those in 2000 alone.
Violations in other years were not available.
When the health department granted the new Cotter mill's license
in 1979 — against the advice of the EPA and the NRC and during a
criminal probe of allegedly fraudulent air-monitoring results —
the director of the department's radiation division admitted his
agency's shortcomings.
"The enforcement could have been stricter," Director Al Hazle
said at the time. "We have done our best to tighten it up."
More than two decades later, however, Cotter is still solely
responsible for much of the information upon which the health
department makes decisions.
As part of the settlement of a 1983 suit brought by the state,
Cotter is required to monitor uranium and molybdenum in about 40
wells in the Lincoln Park area. Results of those tests are
submitted annually without audit. When asked if the department
checks Cotter's figures, radiation division chief Jake Jacobi
said, "Not routinely, but sometimes we split (share) samples with
them."
At least two Lincoln Park residents argue the department does
virtually no checking on the Cotter reports. Sharyn Cunningham,
who lives on Grand Avenue and whose two wells have been tested
since 1991, was shocked to find test results from 2001.
"They didn't test my well in 2001, but the report is right
there," she said. When she reported the situation to state
officials this year, a CDPHE employee tested the wells and one
them indicated the presence of molybdenum, which had not
previously been detected.
"They tell me the pollution plume is shrinking," she said. "Then
why are my wells getting worse?"
Cunningham said the incident came after a health department
employee said she had no reason for concern because no wells were
being used for drinking water in Lincoln Park.
"I told him we were drinking it and he was shocked," she said.
Deyon Boughton, who lives on Cedar Avenue, said she found a well
report from a time period when the well was "bone dry."
"We dropped a tool on a string down to the bottom and it came
back dry," she said. "I'd like to know where they found water to
test."
Benevento said he was unaware of such allegations, but vowed to
investigate the complaints.
"If the allegations are true that they are faking results, that
would be a criminal offense. We would refer a report to the
attorney general."
While the EPA has over the years expressed frustration with both
Cotter and the health department, it in turn has frustrated at
least two politicians since Lincoln Park and Cotter were placed
on its Superfund list in 1983. Cotter fought that designation in
court and lost, but in 1985 a U.S. senator and a U.S.
congresssman went to bat for the embattled company.
Sen. William Armstrong and U.S. Rep. Michael Strang — both
Colorado Republicans — sent a letter to EPA Administrator Lee
Thomas expressing "concern" over the Superfund listing. A letter
from a member of Strang's staff to Cotter's lawyers indicates
Strang also spoke with the EPA director "on several occasions."
In the letter to the EPA, Strang and Armstrong disagreed with the
EPA's listing of the area as one of the nation's most polluted
sites and said the listing amounted to "duplicative regulations."
It also suggested the health department — Cotter's overseer — was
opposed to the Superfund listing.
"Since the Colorado Department of Health is responsible for the
regulation of this site, why did EPA proceed without consulting
(the health department), especially in light of the state's
subsequent opposition to the listing?" the letter said.
The area, however, remains on the Superfund list today.
The relationship between Cotter and the health department has
been further muddied by movement of employees between the state
and Cotter. Patrick Teegarden, a lawyer with Patton Boggs L.L.P.
— the firm that has represented Cotter for over a decade — left
private practice to become the health department's policy
director. That was February 1995. In June 2001 he left that job
and returned to Patton Boggs. Teegarden this year represented
Cotter during legislative debate on House Bill 1408, the
radioactive-waste measure passed by the state Legislature.
Another Patton Boggs lawyer, Carolyn McIntosh, served as an
assistant attorney general from 1986 to 1988. During that period
the state was suing Cotter for polluting natural resources.
According to a biography on the Patton Boggs website, McIntosh,
while working for the state, litigated cases "establishing the
applicability of state hazardous-waste management laws to the
Rocky Mountain Arsenal, Atomic Energy Act standards for employee
exposure to radioactive releases and remediation at radioactive
mill processing facilities." She also represented Cotter during
legislative hearings this past spring.
According to Benevento, there is little the state can do about
former employees going to work for those they once helped
regulate or sue.
"There are certain ethical procedures that need to be followed
when you leave the state," he said. "A person is not supposed to
go to work for an entity they regulated for a year, but other
than that, we can't tell our former employees what to do."
In spite of the health department's past history, Benevento is
quick to say his department will vigorously enforce its
regulations against Cotter.
"We're taking the concerns of the community and the violations
very seriously," he said in a recent interview. "There have been
times (Cotter) has been difficult to work with. I hope they take
a good look internally."
Benevento said the environmental assessment filed by Cotter in
connection with its plan to bring in radioactive waste for
storage will also face tight scrutiny.
"The environmental assessment is with me," he said. "But I have a
lot of questions."
On Sept. 13 the department partially lifted the general
suspension on Cotter's license — a move that will allow the mill
to process some materials while demonstrating it has implemented
and is following the worker-safety procedures demanded by the
state.
But questions about the state's ability to regulate Cotter are
not likely to go away.
Entire contents Copyright Ó 2000 Royal Gorge Publishing
*****************************************************************
38 State begins appeal of ruling in nuke waste compact suit
BYBUTCHMABIN / Lincoln Journal Star
Attorneys for the state of Nebraska asked a federal judge Tuesday
to grant a stay of the money judgment he ordered against the
state Monday in the radioactive waste warehouse lawsuit.
The request, filed in U.S. District Court in Lincoln, is the
first step in Nebraska's appeal of U.S. District Judge Richard G.
Kopf's $151 million judgment against the state. Kopf said Monday
the state acted in bad faith during the licensing of the
warehouse, proposed for Boyd County.
If Kopf grants a stay, which is widely expected, the state can
file its appeal with the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
John Wittenborn, one of the attorneys representing the state,
said Tuesday Nebraska will argue Kopf made a number of
significant errors in the case's factual record.
In addition, the state is expected to argue, among other things,
that the judge erred in not allowing a jury trial and in
considering evidence outside the statute of limitations.
Kopf, in the 194-page memorandum and order, said the state acted
in bad faith repeatedly during the licensing process.
The nuclear waste generators that spent roughly $90 million on
the project sued Nebraska in federal court in 1998 shortly after
state officials announced they would deny the license.
The appeals court later dismissed the generators from the
lawsuit, but allowed a five-state waste commission to continue
suing the state. Wittenborn said Tuesday the state has 30 days to
file the appeal.
Reach Butch Mabin at 473-7234 or bmabin@journalstar.com.
Copyright © 2002, Lincoln Journal Star. All rights reserved.
*****************************************************************
39 Praful Bidwai: Say no to war on Iraq
rediff.com:
October 1, 2002
After President George W Bush imperiously taunted the United
Nations either to show 'some backbone' -- that is, fall in line
with Washington -- or become 'irrelevant' like the League of
Nations, the US is set to move a new Security Council resolution
on Iraq. This is likely to contain unreasonable conditions which
Baghdad might find impossible to comply with -- despite its
decision to welcome UN weapons inspectors. But Iraq's
non-compliance is exactly what Washington wants! Because then, it
can get the Security Council to authorise an armed attack on Iraq
on which it has already set its mind. Washington is going through
the Security Council not because it respects it, but because its
key allies, including France and Germany, and China and Russia,
are reluctant to act without a UN mandate. A UNSC resolution is a
fig-leaf for what America has already decided on: a 'regime
change' in Iraq. The US/UNSC would be disastrously ill-advised to
make war on Iraq. To start with, there exists no legal mandate
for this. Under international law, there can be only two
arguments for an armed attack: self-defence, and Security Council
resolutions under Chapter VII of the UN Charter in the event of
'threats to' or 'breach of' the peace. Neither applies to the
present case. Iraq is not about to attack the US, its allies or
any other state. Nor was it recently involved in 'terrorism' or
in September 11. Terms such as 'threats to' the peace cannot
apply to a state that has not attacked another since 1990.
Iraq is being wrongly accused of 'defying' UNSC resolutions. In
reality, it has complied with them, in particular the
all-pervasive Resolution 687 (of 1991), which mandates the
destruction of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction -- WMDs --
under international supervision. Yet, the ultra-hawkish US
Vice-President Dick Cheney claims with supreme confidence: 'there
is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has WMDs… he is amassing them
to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us…
The risks of inaction are far greater than the risk of action.'
This flies in the face of reports of the UN Special Commission
and the International Atomic Energy Agency. They carried out
thousands of intrusive inspections based on the toughest-ever
multilateral sanctions imposed in modern history. The IAEA
verified in 1998 that Iraq had compiled a 'full, final and
complete' account of its nuclear projects and there was no
evidence of prohibited activity.
UNSCOM too has endorsed this view through its present chief Hans
Blix. The sanctions regime was used to supply intelligence to the
CIA. Former UNSCOM chief Rolf Ekeus confirms this. As does US
Marine Scott Ritter, formerly with UNSCOM, who says Iraq now has
no WMD programme. To say this is neither to endorse Mr Hussein's
tyrannical regime nor his intentions to acquire WMDs. He had
WMD-acquisition programmes and actually possessed chemical
weapons decades ago. Indeed, he used them in the late 1980s
against Iran. Then, the US, obsessed with defeating Iran, turned
a blind eye. But after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait, it accused
him of having used chemical arms against his Kurdish citizens, at
Halabjah. There is new evidence that the party responsible for
bombarding the Kurds was Iran, not Iraq!
The US's anti-WMD tirade would have sounded less hypocritical if
it were not the world's biggest possessor of nuclear, chemical
and biological weapons, with their unacceptably gruesome human
and environmental consequences. The US in fact is guilty of
tearing up or opposing treaty after arms control treaty,
including the Biological Weapons Protocol, Landmines Ban,
Anti-Ballistic Missiles Treaty, the International Criminal Court,
not to speak of the CTBT. It not only wants to maintain its WMD
arsenals but also build and test new nuclear weapons. The new,
aggressive policies outlined in the recent Nuclear Posture Review
contradict the US' international legal obligation under the NPT
to abolish nuclear weapons. The US condones de facto WMD
possession by many states, including Russia, France, Britain,
China, Israel, India and Pakistan. So long as they continue to
possess WMDs, others will seek to do likewise. The US' singling
out of Iraq has less to do with its now de-fanged WMD programmes
-- which can be neutralised by reasonable multilateral
inspections -- than with other, US-centred, causes.
First and foremost, this is an election year in the US, with the
entire House of Representatives and a sixth of the Senate up for
contest. Post-September 11, war is more popular than Mr Bush's
domestic policies, which have little to show for themselves. The
nationalist Hard Right knows the Democrats are reluctant to be
seen oppose the administration on 'national security' and be
branded 'appeasers.' Electorally, the Republicans are evenly
poised against the Democrats. War could tilt the balance,
completing the Hard Right's takeover of America.
Second, Mr Bush's one-year-long war against 'terrorism' has
produced few results barring a 'regime change' in Afghanistan and
the Taliban's welcome ouster. To this day, 80 per cent of
Al-Qaeda/Taliban top leaders remain unaccounted-for. Afghanistan
is in an extremely volatile state, with the Hamid Karzai regime
lacking military muscle and moral-political authority. Mr Bush
has to show some kind of 'victory' in the so-called 'historic'
war against 'global terror.' Hence Iraq -- not because Mr Hussein
has any connection with September 11, but because 9/11 can be
exploited to target him. Closely tied to America's Iraq plans are
grander designs to restructure the entire West Asian region by
installing slavishly pro-Western regimes in key states. Cheney
has spelt out the purpose of a 'regime change' in Iraq:
'Extremists in the region would have to rethink their strategy of
jehad. Moderates … would take heart. And our ability to advance
the Israeli-Palestinian peace process would be enhanced.' This
would tell the Middle East's people 'they have a friend and ally
in the US …' The third factor at work is Black Gold -- the US
interest in oil.
US energy companies have reacted sharply to a recent RAND
Corporation report terming Saudi Arabia 'the kernel of evil,' a
likely prey to Islamic extremism, which cannot responsibly
perform its role as the world's biggest oil producer. They want
Iraq's huge reserves -- 112 billion barrels, second largest in
the world -- to be opened up. Once 'Evil Saddam' is displaced,
production can also cranked up from the present 2.4 million
barrels/day to 4 mbd. Oil is all-important. No US cabinet has
been closer to the energy industry than Bush Jr's. It is the
energy industry. Driven by these questionable motives, the US is
likely to lead an all-out attack on Iraq. To get UNSC sanction,
it will twist the arms of the 10 non-permanent members of the
Council. Neither Russia nor China, leave alone France, will
probably exercise their veto once they know Washington's mind.
But two things are clear.
The US' NATO allies will support the war only with reservations
-- unlike 1991, after Iraq invaded Kuwait and 'collective
self-defence' could be invoked. Second, the US today has no
significant Arab allies who are willing to contribute troops.
Bush Jr lacks a clear plan for a post-Saddam Iraq. There are at
least a dozen anti-Saddam parties/factions in Iraq. But they are
too weak, divided and mutually hostile to provide a viable
alternative. That is one reason why the US-led coalition decided
to leave Mr Hussein in power in 1991. A post-Saddam Iraq could
well break up into a northern Kurd-dominated state, a southern
largely-Shia country, and a Sunni Arab centre. That would be
worse than the status quo -- even for US oil interests.
The regional and global repercussions of an attack on Iraq will
be grim. War will unleash powerful resentment from Iraq's
neighbours, and strengthen the US' enemies. It will negate
whatever gains have been achieved in the so-called 'war on
terror,' convincing many that the US is invading Iraq without a
casus belli or provocation. The Palestinian crisis will further
worsen (if that's still possible). The Middle East could plunge
into unprecedented turmoil and violence. Zionist and Islamic
fundamentalists will be the principal beneficiaries -- and soon,
their rivals from other religions. The US will have established
that 'Might is Right,' with unspeakable consequences for the
structure of multilateral institutions. This structure has
evolved over two centuries through nation-states voluntarily
abridging absolute sovereignty. The undermining of
multilateralism spells anarchy, chaos and brigandage. This
confronts India with a serious dilemma. New Delhi has good
relations with Iraq, its single biggest oil supplier. There are
3.1 million Indians in the Gulf whose remittances are much
greater than all the FDI flows put together.
War also spells instability in Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan --
an unpleasant prospect for India. New Delhi has been cautioning
against war. But this is now yielding to ambiguity -- because
India wants a 'strategic partnership' with the US! Thus, Mr
Vajpayee kept silent on Iraq during his UN speech. As America
cranks up war preparations, India will find it hard to take an
independent stand. Like with the 1991 refuelling, it will be
asked to fall in line. That bodes ill for our future.
Praful Bidwai
*****************************************************************
40 *Commentary: North Korean reforms illusory*
By Robert Elegant
From the International Desk
Published 10/1/2002 5:42 PM
SEOUL, South Korea, Oct. 1 (UPI) -- The Democratic People's
Republic of (North) Korea, the last Stalinist dictatorship on
Earth, plans "an autonomous capitalist investment zone." The news
appears stupendous to some outside observers, seemingly a total
reversal of the regime's present harsh domination of all
activities, public or private.
Some see it as the start of a new era of total reform. Many
believe the plan even more portentous than the recent directive
allowing consumers to purchase necessities, above all rice, with
money. That eliminated the rationing, which involved no money,
imposed for decades by the Marxist-Leninist "command economy."
Yet look again.
At first glance, the special economic zone appears epoch- making,
opening the Earth's most tightly closed nation to the world. A
second glance, however, reveals that it does no such thing but
actually isolates the people of North Korea even further.
The projected zone will not be integral to the Democratic
People's Republic, but an extension, a kind of protectorate that
earns profits. A Chinese magnate will preside over a regime that
not only employs foreigners, but issues its own currency, even
its own passports.
Beyond all such distancing, the North plans to build a wall
around the zone. However difficult the wall could prove to build,
the intention to keep out Koreans is revealing -- practically,
politically and administratively.
The proposed autonomous zone is a further attempt by a desperate
dictator, "Dear Leader" Kim Jong Il, to retain his dictatorial
power. So is his doomed attempt to suppress the raging black
market, which destabilizes his regime, by monetarizing the
economy.
He is, further, striving by nuclear and missile blackmail, as
well as by cajoling to persuade the United States, and his
neighbors -- Japan, South Korea, Russia, and China -- to provide
food and funds enough to keep his people from open revolt.
Hundreds of thousands of North Korea's some 22 million people
starved to death during the past few years.
The United States has responded cautiously to the overtures from
the nation that President George W. Bush cited as part of the
"axis of evil." Only within the past week has Washington agreed
to resume talks that began in 1994. The goal is Pyongyang's
effective agreement to stop developing nuclear weapons in return
for U.S. financing and technical assistance in building nuclear
reactors for peaceful use.
South Korea's response has, however, been highly positive:
Seoul's Sunshine Policy provides abundant rice and credits to the
North. It did so for humanitarian reasons and to forestall
violence in the North, whether internal turbulence or external
aggression against the South.
The South could provide even more financial assistance, as well
as expert guidance and materiel to build such reactors. Having
recovered more rapidly from the financial meltdown of 1997 than
any other nation of Asia, the South now holds foreign exchange
totaling $117 billion. Besides, after only France, the South
operates the greatest number of reactors producing electricity.
The projected special zone will be tucked into the northwestern
corner of the Korean peninsula, occupying 132 square miles around
Sinuiju on the Yalu River opposite the Chinese city of Andong.
I first saw those two cities from a bomber of the U.S. Air Force
decades ago, when U.N. forces were defending the South against
North Korean and Chinese Communist forces.
North of above the main line of resistance, which ran roughly
along the 38th Parallel, the entire peninsula was jet black. The
only illumination was sporadic: the glare of the searchlights
that from time to time impaled the bomber; the anti-aircraft fire
like streams of flaming tennis balls aimed to bring us down; the
flaming streams of our tracers, and the red glow of the fire of
the locomotive we chased into a tunnel.
A photograph recently taken from a high altitude at night by the
South Korean Air Force reveals a scene at once strikingly similar
and strikingly different.
Seoul, the South's capital, shines widespread and luminous, the
brightest among the flock of lights that cover the entire South.
The North's capital, Pyongyang, is a much smaller blob of lesser
intensity. Otherwise, the North is all black, except for tiny
points of light at Hungham on the east coast and Sinuiju on the
west. China's Manchurian provinces farther north are well lit,
though not as bright as the South.
The North is black today not for defense, but because there is an
acute shortage of power and negligible economic activity.
Industrial production is less than 10 percent of capacity. A
recent Western visitor to Pyongyang learned that street lights
are turned on only for official delegations from abroad.
Otherwise, he said, he could have set up his amateur
astronomer's telescope on any avenue, undisturbed by ambient
light.
The long-severed railroad from Seoul to Pyongyang, just
reconnected by mutual agreement, finally runs across Manchuria
and Siberia to Europe. It traverses not only Sinuiju, but the
town of Kaesong just above the Demilitarized Zone, which runs
roughly along the 38th Parallel.
The South and the North discussed a joint enterprise area at
Kaesong but never got going. Despite initial enthusiasm, the
South's great Hyundai chaebol, or conglomerate, jibed at the very
large investment necessary to provide a workable infrastructure:
water, electricity, telecommunications, sewers and roads. The
North indicated it would provide labor but little else.
Assuring adequate labor for that aborted venture or, more
critically, for the envisioned autonomous zone, was dubious to a
South Korean who worked for several years in the North.
Political dogma and personal fear kept the cadres who policed the
show from effectively cooperating with managers and technicians
from the South and also interfered with the supply of labor.
It was all but impossible to find enough workers who were not
only capable but whom the cadres judged politically reliable.
The Chinese entrepreneur designated to preside over the new zone
has said foreigners will run its administration. Perhaps the
labor force will also come from China.
Finding North Korean workers for its plants would, to say the
least, be problematic. Besides, the projected Great Wall of Korea
will isolate the zone from all unplanned contact with the
country. Clearly, the North's administration and economy would
have to be totally remade before Kim Jong Il could allow his
subjects to be exposed to contamination by the zone's untrammeled
capitalism.
General modifications a few months ago appeared at first to
herald such major reconstruction. Enthusiastic Southern analysts
speak of "opening and reform" like that which started up the
fundamental alteration of Korea's great neighbor. China is moving
towards quasi-free enterprise, accompanied of necessity by some
relaxation of Beijing's control of independent thinking and free
expression.
China's Communist leaders have learned they cannot encourage
spontaneous economic growth, hastened by foreign knowledge and
foreign investment, if they insist on rigidly restricting
exchange of new ideas, social and philosophical, moral and
intellectual, as well as technical. Nothing remotely comparable
to such relaxation of thought control is occurring in Pyongyang.
Those analysts who work closely for the South's President Kim
Dae-jung are most enthusiastic to prove the profound success of
the President's Sunshine Policy in changing the North radically,
at least in the economic sphere.
More sober -- and less committed -- analysts concede that the
changes are, this once, not a snap reaction, not merely an ad
hoc response to an immediate problem, but a considered policy.
A massive shortage of food has dogged the North. In no way could
the full amount of that basic food, rice, promised by the ration
be provided.
Farmers have accordingly concentrated on the small private plots
they are permitted. The food thus produced was in theory sold at
government-fixed rates. In reality, prices in the barely
tolerated "farmers' markets" were much higher.
In July, Pyongyang decreed that prices of services and
commodities would rise 50 times, while recompense would increase
up to 40 times. Private plots were in some areas enlarged 10
times, while the rate of the North's currency, the won, to the
dollar dropped to 2 percent of its previous wholly illusory
official value.
Superficially, at least, those measures were somewhat like the
free markets for farm produce, which in the 1980s initiated the
total alteration of China's economy, which is being followed by
major changes in its government. Prices in those markets were
truly free: what the seller could get, that is, what the buyer
would pay. The authorities did not interfere.
Pyongyang's "reforms" do not approach such freedom, although they
dictate that cash, not rationing, will henceforth secure food.
That provision lets the government off the hook, for it is no
longer bound to provide a fixed amount of, above all, rice to
each individual.
Pyongyang, however, insists that it can impose an upward limit
on the price paid for rice. In reality the farmers' market, which
is actually an uncontrollable black market, still determines
actual prices -- and will continue to do so.
Such failure to even begin to halt raging inflation in an economy
that is in theory wholly subsidiary to government instructions
continues to undermine the regime. Massive corruption among
cadres further destabilizes the authoritarian structure. Senior
officials even run for their private profit brothels masquerading
as "special restaurants."
Kim Jong Il may someday permit the economic freedom introduced
in China by late Paramount Leader Deng Xiaoping. But not yet. Not
for a long time. Not until he can compel the agreement of the
military and the bureaucracy, who maintain his position. Anyway,
he has showed no sign of wishing such epochal change.
More significant than those sweeping, yet ineffectual
modifications, however, is the wooing of foreigners, as well as
foreign aid. Outsiders have, for the first time, been invited as
individuals, rather than as groups of sympathizers -- including
even journalists, though in small numbers for fixed occasions.
The prime minister of Japan called on Kim Jong Il for a few hours
last month. He hinted at substantial compensation, perhaps $7
billion, for Japan's long, harsh occupation of the peninsula from
1910 to 1945.
In return, Kim has struck a less aggressive attitude, typified,
though not limited, to declaring that he will not resume testing
his formidable missiles for an indefinite time.
Nonetheless, crack units of Pyongyang's regular armed forces of
1,100,000 men still threaten the South. Some 300 Katusha
rockets, each a foot in diameter, are aimed at Seoul itself,
while navy and air force units are poised to attack. The regulars
are backed by nearly 5 million reserves, as well as border guards
and internal security troops.
An attack is highly unlikely, particularly when a trip wire of
37,000 American soldiers remains around Seoul. But the South
still feels threatened -- chiefly by irrational factors in the
North it cannot fully understand -- and the Sunshine Policy
cannot yet touch.
(Robert Elegant is a distinguished former foreign correspondent
and novelist.)
Copyright © 2002 United Press International
*****************************************************************
41 Iraq slams British and US rejection of UN deal*
Ananova
The Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister is accusing the US and Britain of
making up excuses to attack his country.
His comment came after the UK and America effectively rejected a
deal brokered between the UN and Iraq for weapons inspections to
resume within weeks.
Tariq Aziz claims Baghdad is ready to co-operate with the UN to
prove there are no hidden arsenals.
He said: "We have no nuclear bombs, we have not engaged in any
banned activities since the inspectors left in 1998. As America
decided to attack Iraq, they are making up excuses one after
another."
Mr Aziz says there is no need for a new UN resolution.
"This proposal of the United States is unacceptable, not only by
Iraq, it is unacceptable by the Security Council.
"Because there is no need for a new resolution, the standing
resolutions of the Security Council concerning the inspections
are valid and they are enough for the perfect performance of the
inspectors of their job."
Mr Aziz believes the real intention of Washington and London is
to launch a war against Iraq and which is why they are seeking a
toughened inspection resolution.
"I have always said that the question of weapons of mass
destruction raised by the United States and Britain is a pretext
to justify the unjustifiable aggression on Iraq."
Story filed: 10:43 Wednesday 2nd October 2002
Orange *Are you interested in this type of story?* If you're an
Orange customer you can follow this subject on your phone. Find
out how Iraq
troubles
*Find out how to get a personal news service* The Orange web and
WAP sites feature all the news and information that's on Ananova
- plus much more. You can choose from thousands of subjects to
get the news that matters to you. Find out more at
orange.co.uk/today
Copyright © 2002 Ananova Ltd
*****************************************************************
42 Bush agrees deal on Iraq with Congressional leaders
Independent.co.uk
AP
02 October 2002
President George Bush and Congressional leaders today agreed a
resolution for dealing with Iraqi President Saddam Hussein
"diplomatically if we can, militarily if we must."
House of Representatives' Minority Leader Dick Gephardt announced
the agreement as he emerged from an hour?long White House
breakfast with President Bush and headed back to Capitol Hill to
brief Democrats on the wording of the resolution, which is
expected to be debated in the House International Relations
Committee this week.
The resolution ethe President to "use the Armed Forces of the
United States as he determines necessary and appropriate in order
to 1) defend the national security interests of the United States
against the continuing threat posed by Iraq and 2) to enforce all
relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding
Iraq," according to a White House official.
The resolution also requireshim to certify to Congress that
diplomatic and other peaceful means alone will not work and
requires him to report to Congress every 60 days on developments.
"Iraq is a problem. It presents a problem after 9/11 that it did
not before and we should deal with it diplomatically if we can,
militarily if we must. And I think this resolution does that,"
said Mr Gephardt.
Agreement in the Democratic?controlled Senate was still up in the
air, although Majority leader Tom Daschle told reporters he
expected that "at the end of the day we're going to have a broad
level of support on both sides of the aisle for a resolution that
indicates our support for the United Nations effort and our
support for the administration's effort in dealing with Iraq."
Secretary of State Colin Powell, reacting to inspection plans
agreed to by UN inspectors and Iraq yesterday, said there should
be no resumption of inspections until the Security Council comes
up with new ground rules for those inspections and spells out the
consequences if Iraq does not abide by them.
"We will not be satisfied with Iraqi half?truths or Iraqi
compromises or Iraqi efforts to get us back into the same swamp,"
Mr Powell said. "Everybody understands that the old inspection
regime did not work. They tied it up in knots."
Agreement on an Iraq resolution could set the stage for a strong
vote for the president's policies before Congress recesses for
the election campaign.
The administration was also pressing the UN Security Council to
accept a proposed U.S.?British resolution to disarm Iraq, a
campaign complicated by an agreement between Baghdad and UN arms
inspectors.
Bush challenged the Security Council to "show its backbone" by
passing a tough resolution. The other permanent members of the
Security Council ? France, Russia and China ? have resisted
US?British demands that the resolution include provisions for a
military response to Iraqi failure to disarm.
*****************************************************************
43 Congressmen Take Heat for Iraq Visit
October 01, 2002 By MELANTHIA MITCHELL ASSOCIATED PRESS
SEATTLE- They have been called dupes of Saddam Hussein, at best.
Their harsher critics have called them traitors.
But in their home districts, four Democratic members of the House
appear to be suffering little political fallout from their visits
to Iraq. Reps. Jim McDermott of Seattle, David Bonior of Michigan
and Mike Thompson of California were due to return Tuesday night
after a visit organized by Physicians for Social Responsibility
and the Interfaith Network of Concern for the People of Iraq.
Rep. Nick Rahall of West Virginia was in Iraq earlier in a trip
was sponsored by the San Francisco-based Institute for Public
Accuracy, a consortium of policy researchers.
Two weeks ago, McDermott won 77 percent of the vote in the
state's open primary from his liberal Seattle constituency. After
the visit to Baghdad, columnist George Will called him a "useful
idiot" for Saddam. George Dignan, 58, of Seattle, said he
applauded McDermott's willingness to take an unpopular stand: "I
appreciate a politician who will act on his convictions rather
than what the opinion polls tell him to do." McDermott, who
opposes U.S. military intervention in Iraq, said he wanted to see
for himself the likely consequences of a U.S. military campaign
to oust Saddam and to urge Iraq to comply with U.N. weapons
inspectors. The congressman also has questioned the war in
Afghanistan.
The Bush administration is trying to persuade Congress and the
United Nations to authorize the use of military force to oust
Saddam, saying the Iraqi leader is stockpiling biological and
chemical weapons and trying to obtain nuclear bombs in violation
of U.N. resolutions. McDermott was sharply criticized by
Republicans after he suggested the president might be misleading
the American people about the need for military action.
Speaking from Baghdad, McDermott and Bonior said Iraqi officials
assured them that they will allow weapons inspectors full access.
The Senate's second-ranking Republican, Don Nickles of Oklahoma,
said the Democrats "sound somewhat like spokespersons for the
Iraqi government." In Macomb County, north of Detroit, some
Bonior constituents said they did not oppose the visit but
questioned its effectiveness. "I don't really agree with him,"
said Debra Skrinner, 40. "I think we should go ahead and bomb
Iraq because we've had nothing but problems with Hussein." Of
Bonior, she said, "I think he's trying to do his job." In
Thompson's district, which stretches from the San Francisco
suburbs to the Oregon state line, some of those interviewed said
they thought the visit would help the Iraqi people.
"There are a lot of people suffering over there. It's good to try
to help them," said Stephene Cardoza of Eureka, Calif. Others
were less sure.
Mike Anderson, owner of a logging company in the Northern
California town of Fort Bragg, said of the Democrats' visit: "I
frankly just thought it was comical. Four know-nothings going
over there to put on a show." --
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
44 Bush: Iraq Force May Be Unavoidable
Las Vegas SUN
Today: October 02, 2002 at 12:00:31 PDT By JIM ABRAMS ASSOCIATED
PRESS
WASHINGTON- President Bush reached agreement Wednesday with House
leaders on a resolution giving him authority to oust Saddam
Hussein. A similar measure gained ground in the
Democratic-controlled Senate as Bush said force "may become
unavoidable" if the Iraqi president refuses to disarm.
"We will not leave the future of peace and the security of
America in the hands of this cruel and dangerous man," said Bush,
flanked by Democratic and Republican lawmakers in the White House
Rose Garden. While the House leadership agreed on a resolution
authorizing force, the Senate was still divided. However, Senate
Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Joseph Biden said Bush's
plan was fast gaining momentum. "I'm a realist," the Delaware
Democrat said. The ranking Republican on the Senate Armed
Services Committee, John Warner of Virginia, said "a solid
phalanx" of support was coming together for Bush.
As part of the deal with the House, Bush bent to Democratic
wishes and pledged to certify to Congress - before any military
strike, if feasible, or within 48 hours of a U.S. attack - that
diplomatic and other peaceful means alone are inadequate to
protect Americans from Saddam's weapons of mass destruction.
Standing shoulder to shoulder with Bush, House Minority Leader
Dick Gephardt, D-Mo., said, "This should not be about politics.
We have to do what is right for the security of the nation."
Gephardt, who had accused Bush last week of playing politics with
the Iraq issue, said Democrats had won concessions from the White
House limiting Bush's authority.
Warner recalled that Congress gave Bush's father authority to
wage war against Saddam in the Persian Gulf War. "Mr. President,
we delivered for your father. We will deliver for you."
Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., a potential rival of Bush in the
2004 presidential election, said the administration had explored
all options, other than military, to disarm Saddam. "They've not
worked. The moment of truth has arrived for Saddam Hussein. This
is his last chance." Lieberman, Warner and Sen. John McCain,
R-Ariz - who had been Bush's rival for the 2000 GOP presidential
nomination - joined forces in introducing in the Senate the
resolution agreed to between Bush and House leaders. Biden said
he doubted the momentum building behind the resolution could be
slowed, although he said he thought Gephardt had made a mistake
in agreeing so readily to the plan. "Democrats are obviously in
disagreement," he said. Still, Biden dropped plans to try to take
up in his committee a proposed alternative that he drafted with
Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., which would have put more emphasis on
a U.N. role and narrowed the reasons for confronting Iraq to
disarmament.
Biden said he and Lugar still hope to offer it as an amendment
during Senate debate, but conceded that it was unlikely to
prevail. Congressional leaders expected the resolution to be
voted on next week, although debate in the Senate could begin as
early as later Wednesday. The House resolution is similar to the
one proposed last week by Bush and gives him broad powers to use
military force against Baghdad if he deems it necessary.
Democrats in the Senate and moderate Republicans hoped to put
some checks on his authority.
The House resolution was to be debated later Wednesday in the
International Relations Committee. It authorizes Bush to "use the
Armed Forces of the United States as he determines to be
necessary and appropriate in order to 1) defend the national
security interests of the United States against the continuing
threat posed by Iraq and 2) to enforce all relevant United
Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq."
The resolution also requires Bush to report to Congress every 60
days on "matters relevant" to the confrontation with Iraq. And,
it reaffirms the policy embedded in U.S. law that Saddam should
be overthrown. "Iraq is a problem," said Gephardt, D-Mo. "It
presents a problem after 9/11 that it did not before and we
should deal with it diplomatically if we can, militarily if we
must. And I think this resolution does that." Rep. Ellen
Tauscher, D-Calif., who had urged that the Iraq war resolution be
delayed until after next month's congressional elections, dropped
those efforts Wednesday. "Unfortunately this has moved way beyond
our ability to put the brakes on it," she told reporters.
While the president and Gephardt conferred over breakfast with
Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-S.D., Senate Republican
leader Trent Lott, R-Miss., and House Speaker Dennis Hastert,
R-Ill., a dozen women crowded around the White House's northwest
gate in protest. "No war in Iraq," read a banner they hung on the
executive mansion's wrought-iron gate while one woman mounted the
fence and shouted from the top of its post before being talked
down by Secret Service officers. Agreement on an Iraq resolution
could set the stage for a strong vote for the president's
policies before Congress recesses for the election campaign. --
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
45 Bush, Lawmaker Remarks on Iraq
Las Vegas SUN
Today: October 02, 2002 at 12:00:31 PDT By The Associated Press
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Remarks by President Bush and members of the Senate and Congress
regarding Iraq on Wednesday:
"America's leadership and willingness to use force confirmed by
the Congress is the best way to ensure compliance and avoid
conflict." - Bush. ---
"Saddam must disarm, period. If, however, he chooses to do
otherwise, if he persists in his defiance, the use of force may
become unavoidable." - Bush. ---
"The resolution does not tie the president's hands. It gives him
flexibility he needs to get the job done." - House Speaker Dennis
Hastert, R-Ill. ---
"This should not be about politics. We have to do what is right
for the security of our nation and the safety of all Americans."
- House Minority Leader Dick Gephardt, D-Mo. ---
"Mr. President, we delivered for your father, we will deliver for
you. And I predict, while the vote was a margin of five in '91,
it'll be a stronger bipartisan margin this time." - Sen. John
Warner, R-Va. ---
"The moment of truth has arrived for Saddam Hussein. This is his
last chance and the best chance for the international community
to come together behind the rule of law and to show that
resolutions of the United Nations are worth more than the paper
that they are written on." - Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn. ---
"I am convinced that an overwhelming, significant majority of
both houses of Congress ... will provide the president of the
United States with the endorsement and the support that he needs,
if necessary, as a last resort to preserve America's security by
a regime change in Iraq." - Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. --
All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc.
*****************************************************************
46 Enola Gay navigator, comrades meeting in OR for reunion
The Oak Ridger Online - Community -
12:47 p.m. on Wednesday, October 2, 2002
The 509th Composite Group will hold its 57th annual military
reunion Thursday through Sunday in Oak Ridge.
The 509th Composite Group is the group that had the two B-29
bomber crews that dropped the first atomic bombs on the cities of
Hiroshima and Nagasaki in Japan in 1945 during World War II.
The B-29 planes were the Enola Gay and the Bockscar. The uranium
used in the first atomic bomb dropped by the Enola Gay was
enriched at the Oak Ridge Y-12 Plant as part of the secret
government project code-named the Manhattan Project to develop an
atomic bomb.
The 509th Composite Group trained in secret at the Windover Air
Base in Utah. Four members of the group will be in Oak Ridge for
reunion activities. They include Theodore "Dutch" Van Kirk, the
navigator of the Enola Gay, and Dora Dougherty Strother, a member
of the Woman Airforce Service Pilot program and the sixth woman
in the United States to earn an airline transport license.
Charles D. Albury, a pilot on the Bockstar and the aircraft
commander of the instrument plane, the Great Artiste, used in
both the Hiroshima and Nagasaki missions, will also be here, as
will Fred Olivi, the co-pilot on both the Great Artiste and the
Bockscar. The members were to arrive today at the Garden Plaza
Hotel. At 6 p.m. Thursday there will be a buffet dinner at which
Mayor David Bradshaw and Joe Valentino, director of the Oak Ridge
Convention and Visitors Bureau, will welcome those attending the
reunion. Friday, starting at 9 a.m., there will be five trips
throughout the day for a tour of the Historic Graphite Reactor at
the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. The trips will be leaving from
the Garden Plaza. At 5 p.m. there will be a tour of the American
Museum of Science and Energy, followed at 6 p.m. by a
Southern-style barbecue dinner at the museum. A panel
presentation will be given by Grady Whitman of the Y-12 plant,
Dick Smyser, founding editor of The Oak Ridger, and Joanne
Gailar, author of "Oak Ridge and Me."
On Saturday there will be two bus trips, one at 10 a.m. and
another at 1 p.m. to the Secret City Excursion Train. A banquet
will be held at 6 p.m. at the Garden Plaza Hotel. Bill Wilcox,
the Y-12 National Security Complex historian, will speak at 7
p.m. On Sunday a buffet breakfast and business meeting will be
held at 8 a.m.
border="0"> [http://www.oakridger.com]
All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger
*****************************************************************
47 IAEA and Iraq: The Next Steps
[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/] [www.iaea.org]
Iraq Talks End in Vienna, Final Report Going to UN Security
Council in New York
[Mohamed ElBaradei] IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei, Hans
Blix (UNMOVIC), and Amir Al Sadi (Iraq) brief the press after the
Vienna talks. (Credit: D.Calma/IAEA)
High-level talks between Iraq, the UN, and IAEA concluded in
Vienna 1 October, with agreement reported on practical
arrangements for facilitating resumed inspections under existing
mandates of the Security Council. The official report on the
talks is set to go to the Security Council this week.
In a
[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Press/P_release/2002/prn0215.shtml]
issued in Vienna Tuesday, the three parties reported progress
through two days of meetings that were held in a "business-like
and focussed manner". Key points include:
+ The Iraqi representatives declared that Iraq accepts all the
rights of inspection provided for in all the relevant Security
Council resolutions.
+ On the question of access, it was clarified that all sites are
subject to immediate, unconditional and unrestricted access.
However, the [http://www.un.org/NewLinks/uniraq.htm] establishes
special procedures for access to eight presidential sites.
+ The Iraqi delegation handed over four compact discs containing
the backlog of semi-annual monitoring declarations for the sites
and items covered by the on-going monitoring and verification
plans for the period June 1998 to July 2002. "Under the existing
mandate we have, we have now the assurances from the Iraqi side
that we would have unrestricted, uninhibited, unconditional
access to all sites in Iraq with the exception of the
Presidential sites that are covered by the Memorandum of
Understanding between the Security Council and the Government of
Iraq." said IAEA Director General ElBaradei. "That assurance is
very important. Of course that has to be tested when we go back
to Iraq." (For an unofficial transcript of the press briefing,
click
[http://www.iaea.org/worldatom/Press/P_release/2002/med-advise_029.shtml]
).
The meetings were held to discuss logistical, communication,
transport, security and other support needs for the possible
resumption of inspections in Iraq. Senior officials taking part
in discussions include Dr. ElBaradei, who heads the IAEA
inspectorate, Dr. Hans Blix, Executive Chairman of the United
Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission
(UNMOVIC), and Dr. Amir Al Sadi, Special Advisor to the President
of Iraq.
[Hans Blix]
Reporters at the press briefing. (Credit: D.Calma/IAEA)
Background - UNMOVIC and IAEA: Under the relevant Security
Council resolutions UNMOVIC and the IAEA have distinct and
different mandates. Although they have separate inspection teams,
the two organizations work closely together particularly in
making use of UNMOVIC’s logistical arrangements.
UNMOVIC is responsible for the chemical, biological and missile
files, while the IAEA is responsible for the nuclear file.
IAEA, 2 October 2002
*****************************************************************
48 Race for the Superbomb | Nuclear Blast Mapper
The American Experience |
[http://www.pbs.org/] [Search]
Would you survive a nuclear blast? Nuclear Blast Mapper will show
you how terribly destructive thermonuclear weapons are.
Step 1: Choose a Weapon...
1 Megaton Surface Blast: Pressure Damage Map
+ The fission bomb detonated over Hiroshima had the explosive blast
equivalent to 12,500 tons of TNT. Blast Mapper's hydrogen bomb,
hypothetically detonated on the earth's surface at any location you
choose, has about 80 times the blast power of that 1945 explosion.
1 Megaton Surface Blast: Fallout Map
+ One of the effects of nuclear weapons detonated on or near the
earth's surface is the resulting radioactive fallout. Immediately
after the detonation, a great deal of earth and debris, made
radioactive by the blast, is carried high into the atmosphere,
forming the now infamous mushroom cloud. The material drifts
downwind and gradually falls back to earth, contaminating
thousands of square miles. Make this selection if you wish to see
the fallout pattern over a seven-day period.
25 Megaton Air Blast: Pressure Damage Map
+ This is a big bomb. At 25 megatons, it has about 2,000 times the
explosive power of the fission bomb used on Hiroshima. Exploding it
high in the atmosphere, at 17,500 feet, will maximize its
destructive range.
Step 2: Enter Location of Target
+ Enter a location in the United States. You may want to select a
large city or some other possible target near your home.
+ Street Address (not required)
City, State or Province, Zip or Postal Code (code not required)
[Example: Boston, MA ]
Country
U.S. Australia Brazil Canada China England France Germany India
Iran Iraq Ireland Israel Italy Japan Mexico Russia Spain United
Kingdom Any Country
map a Blast for a location not in the U.S. -->
Step 3...
WGBH [http://www.wgbh.org] | PBS Online
[http://www.pbs.org]
*****************************************************************
49 David Broder: On Iraq, watch what Bush does, not what he says
The Oak Ridger Online - Opinion -
OPINIONS
p.m. on Wednesday, October 2, 2002
WASHINGTON -- When it comes to the Bush administration's foreign
policy, it's best to heed John Mitchell's classic advice: Watch
what we do, not what we say. Richard Nixon's attorney general,
one of the architects of Watergate, was being realistic, not
cynical, when he gave the press and public that cautionary advice
early in the Nixon years. And it is only realistic to point out
its applicability to the current administration.
This is a president who, in the space of a few weeks last spring,
announced first that the United States would not intervene
actively in the Middle East, then told Ariel Sharon to end
Israeli occupation of the West Bank "without delay,'' and then,
with the occupation still in place, told the Palestinians to
change their government and oust Yasser Arafat, which hasn't
happened either.
But the clearest example is President Bush's famous description
of the adversaries he sees for the United States: "the axis of
evil.'' That axis, he told the world in his last State of the
Union address, was made up of Iran, Iraq and North Korea.
Eight months later, as no one could have predicted from that
speech, the Bush administration is preparing to send a high-level
envoy to North Korea to pursue warming relations with that
government, while lobbying Congress and the United Nations
Security Council to approve going to war with Iraq. Iran has
disappeared from the horizon, at least for now.
As several people have pointed out, North Korea has the raw
materials for nuclear weapons and possesses missiles that could
drop them on Japan, South Korea and U.S. troops protecting those
countries. Iraq is suspected of seeking nuclear weapons it could
use against its neighbors, but apparently lacks the raw materials
now.
But Bush has had Iraq in his sights for months and will not be
diverted. It was back on April 28 that Thom Shanker and David
Sanger reported in The New York Times that Bush administration
officials had shifted the timetable for moving against Saddam
Hussein. "Until recently,'' they wrote, "the administration had
contemplated a possible confrontation with Mr. Hussein this fall,
after building a case at the United Nations that the Iraqi leader
is unwilling to allow the kind of highly intrusive inspections
needed to prove that he has no weapons of mass destruction.''
In the same article, they wrote, "senior officials now
acknowledge that any offensive would probably be delayed until
early next year, allowing time to create the right military,
economic and diplomatic conditions." Ever since the major
fighting ended in Afghanistan, the administration has bent its
efforts to creating those conditions, and Bush seems determined
to do just that -- to begin engaging Iraq early next year. The
rationale for that war is as flexible as the president's
ever-changing justifications for his tax cut -- sharing the
surplus, stimulating the economy or just reducing the price of
success. In the summer, Vice President Cheney and others said it
was the imminent threat of Iraq acquiring nuclear weapons that
required action. But when international agencies and allied
intelligence services said they were skeptical that Iraq had the
materials for such weapons, even if it had the desire, other
explanations were forthcoming. The president gave the United
Nations a laundry list of Iraqi offenses, down to and including
its failure to account for prisoners taken during the Gulf War,
and indicated that Iraq would have to make amends for all of them
to avoid military punishment.
And finally, when Democrats including Al Gore and Edward Kennedy
suggested that a war with Iraq might cost us allies and energy
for the war against terrorism, the administration discovered and
publicized links between Saddam and al Qaeda.
Different versions of that linkage were offered by Defense
Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, National Security Adviser Condoleezza
Rice and White House spokesman Ari Fleischer. But, as Karen
DeYoung has reported in The Washington Post, others in the
administration said it was a mistake to try to hang the war plans
on such a connection. She quoted a senior official as saying,
"You look for a consensus on (intelligence) analysis, but it's
very subjective." What is not is not subjective or shifting is
President Bush's determination to do what he set out to do. He
wants Saddam out of there and it is clear he is preparing to send
American troops to accomplish that goal.
All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger
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50 US Resolution Makes Extraordinary Demands on Iraq
ABCNEWS.com :
October 1, 2002
[Reuters]
— By Evelyn Leopold
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - In an uncompromising U.N. draft
resolution, the United States rewrites inspection rules and makes
extraordinary demands for Iraq to open every inch of its
territory or face military strikes.
The draft resolution, backed by Britain, still faces opposition
from France, Russia and China, who are loathe to let Washington
decide when to attack Baghdad. All five nations have veto-power
in the 15-member Security Council.
The document, obtained by Reuters on Tuesday, is not expected to
be introduced to the full council until later in the week, an
indication of continued disputes among the five.
Before U.N. arms inspectors, out of Iraq since December 1998, can
return, Baghdad has seven days to accept all provisions in the
resolution. It then has 30 days to give an accounting of its
weapons of mass destruction and an extensive list of related
materials and components, after which the U.N. arms experts can
begin their work.
Should it fail to disclose anything, any United Nations member
can use force against Baghdad.
"False statements or omissions in the declaration submitted by
Iraq to the council and failure by Iraq at any time to comply and
cooperate fully in accordance with the provisions laid out in
this resolution, shall constitute a further material breach of
Iraq's obligations," the text says.
Such a breach "authorizes member states to use all necessary
means to restore international peace and security in the area,"
it says.
The declaration Iraq has to submit requires an "acceptable and
currently accurate, full and complete" listing of Baghdad's
nuclear, chemical, ballistic and biological weapons, where they
are located, their components, subcomponents, all research
centers as well as materials used for civilian and military
purposes.
The inspectors can go anywhere, including President Saddam
Hussein's eight presidential sites. They can interview any
scientist or government official in private and even provide
transport out of the country for them and their families, a
provision some diplomats say is an invitation to defect.
The inspection teams can remove or destroy any weapons or
components, records, materials and equipment. They have the right
to "unrestricted voice and data communications, including
encrypted communications," the text says.
The inspectors can have security guards to protect them at their
base, such as new offices they want to open in Mosul and Basra
and declare no-flight or no-drive exclusion zones in areas they
are operating. Still in dispute is whether such zones should be
enforced by U.N. guards or outside troops.
The United States has left room for their entry into Iraq, well
before any declaration of war.
The draft resolution allows any of the five permanent members of
the council, such as the United States, to add representatives to
the inspection teams, recommend to the inspectors who they can
interview, set conditions for the interviews and "receive a
report on the results."
The inspectors are from the New York-based U.N. Monitoring,
Verification and Inspection Commission, known as UNMOVIC,
responsible for accounting for Iraq's chemical and biological
arms and ballistic missiles. The Vienna-based International
Atomic Energy Agency is in charge of nuclear weapons.
France is among the skeptics and is pushing two resolutions that
leaves out an immediate authorization of force.
The French proposal, not officially circulated, says the
inspectors need to report "any serious failure by Iraq to comply
with its obligations."
The council would then "consider any measure" to ensure full
compliance with its relevant resolutions. A second resolution
would be needed to authorize force.
(Irwin Arieff contributed to this report)
Copyright 2002 Reuters News Service. All rights reserved. This
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51 Iraqi deputy premier insists Iraq has no nuclear weapons
Yahoo! News Wed, Oct 02, 2002
ANKARA, Turkey - Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz accused
the United States of making up excuses to attack Iraq, insisting
that his country does not possess nuclear weapons.
In televised remarks broadcast Wednesday, Aziz said Iraq was
ready to cooperate with the United Nations and show that there
were no hidden arsenals as claimed by Washington. "We have no
nuclear bombs, we've not engaged in any banned activities since
the inspectors left in 1998," Aziz told private NTV television in
an interview conducted Tuesday. "As America decided to attack
Iraq, they are making up excuses one after another."
The program was aired on Wednesday, a day after Iraq agreed on a
plan that would let U.N. weapons inspectors return for the first
time in nearly four years.
But the agreement, which provides no new access to Saddam
Hussein's palaces and other contested sites, has failed to
satisfy the United States which is now pressing the United
Nations to hold off inspections until the Security Council adopts
tough new rules.
Under the current agreement with Baghdad, eight so-called
presidential sites that encompass 32 square kilometers (12 square
miles) would remain off-limits to surprise inspections — unless
the Security Council bends to U.S. demands that all sites be
subject to unannounced visits. U.N. weapons inspectors could be
deployed in Iraq within two weeks of an approval from the
Security Council. However, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell
said in Washington on Tuesday that sending inspectors back to
Iraq now after a lapse of nearly four years would risk further
deception by Saddam. Under a 1998 deal worked out between U.N.
Secretary-General Kofi Annan
and Baghdad, the inspectors are not allowed to visit the
presidential sites unannounced and must be accompanied by a team
of international diplomats when they do conduct visits.
U.N. inspectors withdrew from Iraq in late 1998 ahead of punitive
U.S.-British airstrikes amid allegations that Baghdad was not
cooperating with the teams.
Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The
*****************************************************************
52 Hanford Communities still awaiting $2 million
This story was published Mon, Sep 30, 2002
By Nathan Isaacs Herald staff writer
The Hanford Communities -- a coalition of most Tri-City-area city
and county governments -- are still waiting for a promised $2
million in state money to help provide services to more than
7,300 newcomers working on Hanford's waste treatment plant.
The communities had lobbied the Legislature for more money, but
were promised just the $2 million because of the state's economic
troubles.
Now, even the reduced amount has become entangled in paperwork.
Freeing the money is a process akin to a bureaucratic version of
money laundering.
The $2 million was included as a line item in the state's capital
budget for the renovation and expansion of the Benton County
Justice Center.
County officials are expected to free up an equal amount of money
from another pot originally earmarked for the jail project and
send it to Kennewick.
Kennewick would then use that $2 million to pay for city projects
and send another $2 million from its general fund to the Hanford
Communities.
Richland City Manager John Darrington said the city's attorney is
working with the county's legal staff to draft appropriate
agreements to allow the transfers.
In the meantime, County Administer David Sparks said the state
still has the money.
Once the Hanford Communities has the $2 million in the bank, the
money is expected to be doled out to the affected communities
based on where waste treatment project workers live.
Each government in Benton and Franklin counties that has at least
1 percent of the waste treatment project work force will get a
share of the money.
Richland currently would get the lion's share of the money.
Darrington has said that more than 50 percent of the workers are
living in Richland, but that number likely will change as more
people are hired on the project.
Richland City Councilman Larry Haler wrote to the Benton County
Board of Commissioners earlier this month, noting that the
communities are already experiencing increased service demands
because of the waste plant project.
However, those communities can't provide the services because of
a lack of money, Haler said.
Benton Commission Chairman Claude Oliver said the county remains
committed to getting the money to where it's needed.
Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This
*****************************************************************
53 PNNL an asset that fits Office of Science goals
Published Oct. 1, 2002
Department of Energy's new oversight at the Pacific Northwest
National Laboratory is about changing the focus from the lab's
past to its future.
This summer, DOE announced that a major restructuring meant PNNL
would take orders from the agency's Office of Science rather than
the Richland operations office.
The switch was part of efforts to reduce layers of management and
streamline decision-making. The benefit to the Richland lab was
the chance to work more closely with DOE headquarters and to
operate under a branch more in tune with the lab's mission.
The Richland operations office, which reports to the national
Office of Environmental Management, is mostly focused on cleaning
up Hanford. The lab operated by Battelle is not. Although 90
percent of PNNL's work is for DOE, just 15 percent to 20 percent
is related to Hanford.
The move also came without any apparent loss of local oversight.
About 30 DOE employees in Richland transferred from the Office of
Environmental Management to the new local science office.
This week, Office of Science Director Ray Orbach is getting his
first peek at the lab since being appointed this year. He's here
for the lab's annual review.
Orbach's comments Monday were encouraging. His priorities for the
Office of Science dovetail nicely with work the Richland lab is
already doing, and he took note that the lab is well positioned
to serve his office's needs.
Indeed, the lab is a national investment created to serve the
national purpose.
In addition to working on ways to speed cleanup, PNNL is a leader
in developing new energy technology, studying climate change,
equipping the nation for homeland security and exploring the
frontiers of biotechnology. Its Molecular Sciences Computing
Facility is key in allowing the department to use science to find
ways to meet its goals.
The bigger role it can play, the better for the Tri-Cities.
Already a key community asset, the lab exemplifies the kind of
potential this area must exploit to sustain the economy past our
economy after completion of Hanford cleanup.
The transfer to the Office of Science has the promise of making
the lab an even bigger player, one that can help turn this
community's focus from its past to its future. Here's hoping
Orbach can be instrumental in making that happen.
What's your opinon?
Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This
*****************************************************************
54 Lab's laser reviews tainted, judge says Ruling on $4 billion NIF
project provides 'ammunition'
Tri-Valley Herald
Wednesday, October 02, 2002 - 2:54:50 AM MST
By Ian Hoffman STAFF WRITER
Despite demands in Congress for independent reviews of the $4
billion National Ignition Facility, the U.S. Dep- artment of
Energy convened closed-door panels of potentially biased
reviewers in violation of federal open-government laws, a federal
judge ruled Tuesday. U.S. District Judge Emmet G. Sullivan
ordered the Energy Department to print a disclaimer on its latest
NIF reviews, to include an admission that it did not "ensure the
committee is open to the public, balanced in terms of the points
of view represented, and free of conflicts of interest."
The ruling is likely to deepen concern in Congress that the
stadium-sized, 192-beam laser at Lawrence Livermore National
Laboratory will fall short of its promise of igniting hydrogen
fusion in a laboratory. Sullivan suggested his ruling will lend
"ammunition" to NIF critics and plaintiffs in the lawsuit at the
Washington, D.C.-based Natural Resources Defense Council and the
Livermore-based Tri-Valley Citizens Against a Radioactive
Environment, both environmental and arms-control advocacy groups.
"All of these committees have suffered from a lack of
independence, a lack of balance and an intense pressure to come
up with the 'correct' findings, namely that the project should go
forward," said Christopher Paine, a senior nuclear-weapons policy
analyst at the NRDC. "It certainly will add to Congress'
skepticism about NIF." In 1999, Livermore lab and DOE officials
admitted construction of the giant laser-fusion project was at
least $1 billion over its original $1.2 billion budget and well
beyond schedule. In lieu of canceling the NIF's funding, Congress
called for a series of reviews to be certain Livermore lab's
revised NIF budget and schedule were credible. Ever since,
Sullivan found, energy officials repeatedly relied on the
disputed panels and their reports to reassure Congress of "high
confidence that the project can be successfully completed" and
that NIF should proceed. Energy department officials could not be
reached for comment on the ruling, but argued to Sullivan that
its panels were not subject to the Federal Advisory Committee Act
or FACA. The law requires government agencies that form panels of
outside advisers to publish notices of panel meetings, to ensure
a balance of views among panelists, to hold open meetings a to
released documents considered in their reviews.
The Department of Energy filled its latest panels, to varying
degrees, with its own employees, employees for its labs and
employees of private contractors who stood to gain financially by
continuing the project, the judge found. It did not publish a
charter or notice of the meetings or open them to the public, and
it declined to release their internal documents.
Sullivan rejected the agency's claims that the panels were exempt
from the law, including a contention that the federal contractors
were in effect federal employees. In cases elsewhere, the Energy
Department has opposed public-information requests on the grounds
that its contractors are not agents of the federal government and
so not subject to the Freedom of Information Act.
Paine said the ruling will make it more difficult for the Energy
Department to "stack the deck" on reviews of major science
projects.
©1999-2002 by MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers
*****************************************************************
55 FFTF advocates plan to sue
This story was published Tue, Oct 1, 2002
By Nathan Isaacs Herald staff writer
The Citizens for Medical Isotopes, a group hoping to restart
Hanford's test nuclear reactor, expects to sue the federal
government in the next three weeks, hoping a judge will halt the
reactor's decommissioning.
The citizens group briefed county and other officials at Monday's
Benton County Commission meeting on efforts to restart the Fast
Flux Test Facility.
At the same time Fluor Hanford delivered its proposal Monday to
the Department of Energy on how to shut down FFTF.
"We don't have any time to spare," said Claude Oliver, Benton
County Commission chairman and chair of the citizens group.
He's in Washington, D.C., today through Thursday to lobby his
cause with a Department of Energy advisory group, the Department
of Health and Human Services and others to keep the reactor
going. It's Oliver's fourth trip back east this year fighting for
FFTF.
Supporters want the reactor saved to make isotopes used in new
medicines to treat cancer and other diseases. Besides the
proposed medical benefits, some groups want FFTF to continue
because of the economic effects, such as jobs and possible tax
revenue.
Citizens for Medical Isotopes is expected in the coming weeks to
ask Benton County, Richland and the Port of Benton to join in the
suit, Oliver said.
Benton County commissioners are expected to vote Monday on the
issue. The earliest Richland and the port could decide on the
suit is at their regular meetings in two weeks.
The three agencies already have a limited agreement to share
resources and expenses while trying to persuade the federal
government to transfer FFTF to private hands and keep it
operating.
"The community needs to stay united," Oliver said. "The economic
impacts (from restarting FFTF) will change the landscape of the
entire region."
However, the government already is moving forward with plans to
close the plant.
DOE won't make the details of Fluor's proposal public until it's
reviewed, said Andrea Powell, DOE spokeswoman.
Fluor is in charge of decontaminating and dismantling the
reactor.
Information was not available Monday on how much Fluor has
adopted from a independent panel's recommendation in July. That
report stressed speeding up the shutdown and disposal.
But Oliver believes only about a month remains to stop the
government's plans before decommissioning work goes past the
point of no return.
"There's no next year or year after," he said. "We'll either step
into a destiny role or forever wish we did."
That's why, said Pasco attorney John Bolliger, the lawsuit is
needed. Bolliger was recently hired by Citizens for Medical
Isotopes.
He said the government's "boneheaded bureaucratic decision" to
shut down FFTF and its more recent decision to speed up that
process has forced their hand.
"The only way to stop this at this point ... is through the U.S.
District Court. The effort that needs to be produced is huge."
He discussed the possibility of filing the suit by the third week
in October.
The lawsuit also would include a motion to temporarily stop
decommissioning work until the reactor's fate is decided in
court.
In general comments before the commission on Monday, Bolliger
reviewed past legal work on the FFTF issue and suggested his
proposed legal argument would center on whether DOE adequately
performed the environmental studies required before deciding to
close the reactor.
The group would ask the court to require DOE to go back and
complete another set of studies, as well as look at new
developments, Bolliger said.
But even if a court decides in favor of the Citizens for Medical
Isotopes and others, Oliver admitted DOE could still make the
same decision.
Oliver had planned for Bolliger and others to discuss the legal
plans behind closed doors, but the commissioners heeded advice
from Benton County Prosecutor Andy Miller that doing so would
have violated the state's Open Meeting Act.
Gerry Pollet, of Heart of America Northwest, sent an e-mail to
Miller and the commissioners early Monday stating his objections
to the planned closed-door session.
"Whatever political purposes and gain individuals seek in
perpetuating the fight over FFTF reactor cannot be worth
sacrificing the fundamental principles of open government,"
Pollet wrote.
Miller said the planned discussion by Bolliger did not fall under
the attorney-client exemption allowed by state law.
Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This
*****************************************************************
56 Hanford meets cleanup deadline
This story was published Tue, Oct 1, 2002
By John Stang Herald staff writer
Hanford has made its interim deadline for pumping liquid
radioactive wastes out of its leaky single-shell tanks.
When the federal fiscal year ended Monday, Hanford was supposed
to have 550,000 gallons of pumpable wastes left in those tanks.
Hanford reached that milestone Saturday, Roy Schepens, manager of
the Department of Energy Office of River Protection, and Ed
Aromi, president of CH2M Hill Hanford Group, announced Monday.
"I'm proud, and I'm proud of the workers," Schepens said.
The milestone was set in 1998 as part of a federal court decree.
In 1998, Gov. Gary Locke threatened to sue DOE over its lack of
progress in pumping liquid wastes from the 149 old, leak-prone
single-shell tanks into 28 newer and safer double-shell tanks.
The Tri-Party Agreement, the legal pact governing Hanford
cleanup, had originally set a deadline of 2000 to remove all
pumpable liquids from the single-shell tanks.
But DOE and the state renegotiated a new court-enforced deadline
of 2004. In 1998, Hanford still had 3.1 million gallons of
pumpable liquids in its single-shell tanks.
When summer began, DOE and CH2M Hill appeared behind schedule,
but extra work enabled them to catch up.
"It was this summer that we really got it together," Aromi said.
Hanford still has 16 single-shell tanks with pumpable liquids
inside. Fifteen contain small amounts, and one tank -- C-103 --
still needs a pump installed.
The legal timetable calls for the pump to be installed in six
months, but Hanford wants to have it done in about one month.
By Oct. 1, 2003, only about 62,000 gallons -- 2 percent -- of
1998's 3.1 million gallons is supposed to be left in the
single-shell tanks.
The 28 double-shell tanks hold about 22.5 million gallons of
liquid waste awaiting eventual glassification.
Even though the pumpable liquids are almost gone from the
single-shell tanks, approximately 31 million gallons of solid,
flaky and thick sludgy wastes remain in those tanks.
Hanford is figuring out how to remove the solid wastes and seal
the tanks off.
A major unresolved question is what the cleanup standards inside
a tank will be before it can be permanently sealed.
Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This
*****************************************************************
57 DOE official delves into PNNL's future
This story was published Tue, Oct 1, 2002
By Annette Cary Herald staff writer
This spring Pacific Northwest National Laboratory will begin
operating the nation's fastest nondefense computer, allowing
scientists across the nation and beyond to do new research in
areas ranging from nanoscience to fission and combustion.
But although the $24.5 million computer is a major step forward
for the nation, it will be a factor of four behind the speed
possible on a Japanese research computer that began operating in
April.
"It hit us like a ton of bricks," said Raymond Orbach, director
of the Office of Science for the Department of Energy, as he made
his first visit to the lab Monday. "We've got to catch up."
In the six months he has led the Office of Science, Orbach has
thought about where the frontiers of science will be five years
from now.
His conclusions sound much like the research road map already
being followed at PNNL in Richland, one of 10 DOE nonweapons
laboratories managed by his office.
"This lab has done extraordinarily well when you think of where
it started," offering support to the Hanford nuclear reservation,
he said. "The quality of science is superb."
The lab has grown to conduct leading research in computational
science, nanoscience, countering bioterrorism, using biology to
clean up hazardous wastes and other biotechnology research. All
are areas the Office of Science has identified as key to the
nation's future.
But Orbach is concerned about indications that the nation is
losing its leadership in some important areas of scientific
research.
For instance, given the importance of climate change research,
U.S. scientists have no choice other than to travel to Japan and
form partnerships with Japanese scientists to do research on its
new supercomputer, the Earth Simulator.
The United States must regain its leadership as supercomputers
become increasingly key to scientific advancement, he said.
"We think in this century computers will be the third pillar on
which scientific discovery is based," Orbach said. Because of the
incredible power of the machines, they will lead to significant
scientific discoveries.
"It's an opportunity for discovery that mankind has never had
before," he said.
Orbach also is concerned about science education in the United
States, which he characterized as "somewhere between disaster and
catastrophe."
"Frankly, what we are doing is not working," he said, giving the
nation neither the technically trained work force it needs nor a
public that understands science.
The first day of Orbach's visit this week was devoted to
Education Day, a program to show off the lab's capabilities to
science education leaders from 22 universities and colleges and
to interest them in student and faculty collaborations.
The lab already has programs to work with students and teachers
in science programs from elementary school through graduate
education. But Orbach, the former chancellor of the University of
California Riverside, wants to expand such programs in Richland
and nationwide.
Teacher preparation, including sustained relationships between
science teachers and research programs, is key to developing the
knowledge and enthusiasm they need to interest students in
becoming scientists.
Over the last 20 years, the number of U.S. students choosing
majors in engineering and physical sciences has declined
dramatically, he said. From 1986 to 1999, 45 percent of doctoral
degrees from U.S. universities were awarded to foreign students.
The national labs can play a role in rebuilding the nation's
interest in science, which is crucial to the nation's economic
development, Orbach said.
"We want to let the public know how exciting science is, how
beautiful," he said.
Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This
*****************************************************************
58 TVA gets approval to make more tritium
The Oak Ridger Online -- Area News --
p.m. on Wednesday, October 2, 2002
KNOXVILLE (AP) -- The Nuclear Regulatory Commission on Tuesday
authorized the Tennessee Valley Authority to make bomb-grade
tritium at both reactors at its Sequoyah Nuclear Plant near
Chattanooga. The approval came just one week after the NRC gave
its OK to make tritium at the Watts Bar Nuclear Plant near Spring
City. The NRC approved amendments to the Sequoyah plant's
operating licenses for Units 1 and 2 to produce the material used
in making nuclear bombs. Tritium, a short-lived gas that boosts
the power of nuclear weapons, will be produced by TVA for the
Department of Energy, which oversees the nuclear weapons
stockpile for the Department of Defense.
Tritium production is scheduled to begin at the Unit 2 reactor
and the Watts Bar Unit 1 reactor in the fall of 2003. Tritium
production is scheduled for the Sequoyah Unit 1 reactor in the
fall of 2004. "There was a safety evaluation, a review of the
environmental impacts and a test program, a pilot program, which
was conducted safely at Watts Bar," said Ken Clark, NRC
spokesman.
"So the (NRC) commission staff's regulatory conclusion was that
this can be safely conducted." TVA spokesman Gil Francis said
that from TVA's beginning in 1933 "part of the mandate was to
support national defense, and we've done that in a variety of
ways."
"The production of tritium doesn't change the way the plant
operates," he told The Knoxville News-Sentinel. "We did a test at
Watts Bar in February 1999 to demonstrate the process, and it
worked very successfully." To make the tritium, TVA will use
lithium in its fuel rods rather than boron. The rods are placed
in the reactor fuel assemblies, and tritium gas is produced in
the rods. TVA will be able to irradiate 2,300 rods during each
reactor fuel cycle of 18 months. DOE will remove the irradiated
rods from the TVA plants and transport them to the Savannah River
Site in Aiken, S.C., where the tritium will be extracted.
"TVA as a federal agency will do the work we are asked to do and
will be reimbursed for costs, but we will not make a profit,"
Francis said. "The ratepayers will not incur any costs."
The TVA board approved an agreement with DOE to produce tritium.
Tritium may be made at the plants for up to 30 years or the life
of the plants. TVA is the country's largest public utility,
serving some 8.3 million people through 158 distributors in
Tennessee, Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, North
Carolina and Virginia. On the Net:
Tennessee Valley Authority: http://www.tva.gov
[http://www.tva.gov]
All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger
*****************************************************************
59 Y-12 criticized for putting stockpile in jeopardy
The Oak Ridger Online -- Area News --
p.m. on Wednesday, October 2, 2002
by R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff
Over the next couple of days officials at BWXT Y-12 will be
reviewing a report highly critical of the plant for placing in
"jeopardy" the "ability to manufacture needed parts" for the
nation's stockpile of components for modern nuclear weapons.
"Y-12's depleted uranium facility is currently producing needed
components, but it relies on production equipment that, in many
cases, is outdated, damaged, or beyond repair," stated a Sept. 25
Department of Energy's Inspector General's report.
Management at the Energy Department's National Nuclear Security
Administration responded that the report "oversimplifies the
situation regarding the reliability/vulnerability of the depleted
uranium operations." "No one can assure unequivocal reliability
(zero risk of failure) of any process indefinitely into the
future," wrote Anthony Lane, associate administrator for
management and administration. "Consequently we have to make risk
versus cost benefit tradeoffs on all of our capabilities,
including depleted uranium." The report stated as an example of
problems found at the plant, a 42-year-old hydraulic press used
to forge "virtually all parts manufactured at the facility," and
stated that the press is so damaged "that it will ultimately lead
to failure."
"We were surprised to find a replacement press, on site for well
over a year, had not been installed because Y-12 had not budgeted
for its installation," stated the report.
"Similarly, six of seven specialized furnaces used to melt
uranium had failed, yet Y-12 had not installed an available
replacement."
In addition, the report states that "the risk of exposing plant
workers to health and safety hazards remains at an increased
level as long as depleted uranium operations continue in the old
process buildings." Y-12 spokesman Bill Wilburn said this
morning: "We have received the report and are reviewing the
recommendations." He noted that officials at the security complex
had received the Inspector General's report at midday Tuesday.
"It will take a few days to review and to decide how to proceed
on those recommendations," said Wilburn.
Recommendations include ensuring the plant has the "capabilities
and capacities to meet its current and future stockpile
requirements." In addition the plant should immediately begin
preventive maintenance on all depleted uranium equipment;
establish and implement a contingency plan for preserving the
3,500-ton press and develop and implement performance-based
incentives and a comprehensive maintenance implementation plan.
Lane wrote that "short-term priorities can outweigh long-term
needs temporarily but a balanced investment strategy must be
implemented to maintain reliability."
He said that an infrastructure replacement initiative at all NNSA
sites including Y-12 "will allow us to substantially reduce the
reliability risks of our production process, including depleted
uranium operations." R. Cathey Daniels can be contacted at (865)
220-5515 or danielsrcd@oakridger.com.
[http://www.oakridger.com] All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger
*****************************************************************
60 October Marks the 25th Anniversary of the Department of
Energy Events will Commemorate Milestone
energy.gov - Headquarters' Press Release
Special Anniversary Website Launched
WASHINGTON, DC -- Today marks beginning of the 25th anniversary
of the Department of Energy (DOE). The department will be hosting
a number of activities during the month of October to celebrate
this milestone.
On Oct. 8, Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham will host a
commemorative ceremony at the department's headquarters in
Washington, D.C. This event will feature the participation of
several former Secretaries of Energy and will honor the employees
of DOE, particularly the nearly 2000 employees who have been with
the department since its inception in 1977.
On Oct. 4, celebratory banners will be raised at both the
Forrestal and Germantown locations to mark the start of the
anniversary celebration and the theme of the anniversary will be
revealed along with this event.
Beginning Oct. 4, a comprehensive timeline tracing the past 25
years of DOE history will be located in the lobby of the
Forrestal Building. Some field offices and laboratories will be
holding their own anniversary events as well.
Also beginning today, a new website devoted to the anniversary
will be available to the public. WWW.25yearsofenergy.gov
[http://www.25yearsofenergy.gov] will feature many informative
and exciting features pertaining to the anniversary. It will
include a chronology of major DOE events with accompanying
photos, information about former secretaries and a section
honoring the 25-year employees. It will also be accessible from
the DOE website www.energy.gov.
The U.S. Department of Energy was opened on Oct. 1, 1977. The
department's purpose was to house the government's various
energy, science and technology programs and some defense and
nuclear responsibilities in one agency. In the 25 years since its
inception, the department has enjoyed countless scientific
achievements and technological successes.
"In addition to the diversity that characterized our beginnings,
we share a common history," Secretary Abraham, said. "But, more
importantly we share a common future. And we share a common
overarching mission: national security. As we look ahead I am
confident we will fulfill our responsibilities and our successes
will be a great contribution to our energy and national security
for generations to come."
Details about the upcoming events will be released in the coming
days.
Media Contact: Christi Doenges, 202/586-5806
Jeanne Lopatto, 202/586-4940 Release No. PR-02-202
*****************************************************************
61 Energy Secretary Abraham and Russian Energy Minister Tour
Strategic Petroleum Reserve Site
energy.gov - Headquarters' Press Release
HOUSTON, TEXAS - U.S. Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham and
Russian Minister of Energy Igor Yusufov today toured the
Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) site at Freeport, Texas, and
discussed the SPR's role in enhancing America's energy security
as well as its intended function in response to a significant
international oil disruption.
"The Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which could be used to minimize
the economic damage resulting from an oil disruption, is a vital
element of our National Energy Policy," Secretary Abraham said.
"A very short time from now, the SPR will hold more oil than ever
before in its history and, as President Bush directed last
November, the goal is to continue filling the SPR to its maximum
capacity of 700 million barrels."
Abraham hosted Yusufov for a walking tour of the site and
discussions of various SPR components, including the Control
Room, where the site's operations are monitored, and one of the
pipeline terminal sites above the salt domes where the crude oil
is stored. During the tour, Secretary Abraham and Minister
Yusufov observed the movement of oil from a commercial pipeline
terminal into the SPR.
Secretary Abraham invited Minister Yusufov to tour the SPR during
his visit to Moscow last July. Today's visit allowed Minister
Yusufov to observe the SPR's operations firsthand, as well as to
better learn the role of the SPR in alleviating oil disruptions.
President Ford set the SPR into motion when he signed the Energy
Policy and Conservation Act on Dec. 22, 1975, and construction of
the first surface facilities began in June 1977. The first oil -
approximately 412,000 barrels of Saudi Arabian light crude - was
delivered to the SPR the following month. Today, the SPR is the
largest emergency oil stockpile in the world.
In 1993, when much of the SPR's surface equipment began to
approach the end of its projected lifetime, the Energy Department
began a systematic effort to upgrade each of the four oil storage
sites.
As a result of the refurbishment effort, completed in 2000,
operating costs of the SPR will be reduced by $12 million to $15
million per year over the next 25 years, primarily because less
equipment and fewer personnel will be needed to maintain and
operate the reserve. For example, engineers were able to reduce
the number of pumps needed to move crude oil by almost 40
percent, eliminating 60 large high-horsepower pumping units. More
than 900 of the reserve's 1,800 valves were also eliminated. Many
other components have been standardized and automated, making
maintenance and inventory control more efficient and lower cost.
Media Contact: Jill Schroeder Vieth, 202/586-4940
Drew Malcomb, 202/586-5806 Release No. PR-02-204
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62 Public Workshops on Improvements to Greenhouse Gas Reporting
Scheduled
energy.gov - Headquarters' Press Release
RELEASE DATE: October 2, 2002
The Departments of Energy and Agriculture, and the Environmental
Protection Agency are announcing the first series of workshops
and meetings designed to enable interested persons to help
improve the guidelines now governing the Department of Energy's
Voluntary Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program [established by
section 1605(b) of the Energy Policy Act of 1992] and related
programs. These workshops are intended to assist the
participating agencies in enhancing the reporting of greenhouse
gas emissions and emission reductions, as directed by the
President on February 14, 2002.
Specific dates and venues for the workshops being organized by
the Department of Energy have now been set:
Washington DC November 18-19 Hilton Crystal City at National
Airport 2399 Jefferson Davis Highway Arlington, VA 22202
Chicago December 5-6 Renaissance O'Hare Suites Hotel 8500 West
Bryn Mahr Avenue Chicago, IL 60631
San Francisco December 9-10 Best Western Grosvenor Hotel 380
South Airport Boulevard San Francisco, CA 94080
Houston December 12-13 Houston Airport Marriott 18700 John F.
Kennedy Blvd. Houston, TX 77032
Each of these four workshops will address the full range of
issues related to the Department of Energy's Voluntary Greenhouse
Gas Emissions Reporting (1605b) Program. More information about
the four workshops listed above, including instructions for
persons who wish to attend, can be found at the following
website: http://www.pi.energy.gov/enhancingGHGregistry/index.html
[http://www.pi.energy.gov/enhancingGHGregistry/index.html] . Over
the coming weeks, draft agendas and background papers will be
posted on this website. Information on the workshops also will be
distributed by e-mail to registered participants and other
interested persons, and published in the Federal Register.
In January 2003, the Department of Agriculture will host two
meetings to solicit input on the accounting rules and guidelines
for forest and agriculture greenhouse gas offsets that will be
used in DOE's 1605(b) greenhouse gas reporting system. These
meetings will address technical methodological issues associated
with preparing estimates of greenhouse gas offsets from
agriculture and forestry activities and reporting them under
DOE's 1605(b) program.
Agriculture Accounting Rules and Guidelines, January 14-15, 2003
in the Washington metropolitan area.
Forest Accounting Rules and Guidelines, January 23, 2003 in the
Washington metropolitan area.
Additional information about the USDA meetings, including venues,
draft agendas, and instructions for persons who may wish to
attend will become available over the coming weeks. This
information will be distributed by e-mail, published in the
Federal Register, and posted at the following website:
http://www.usda.gov/agency/oce/gcpo/index.htm
[http://www.usda.gov/agency/oce/gcpo/index.htm] .
The Environmental Protection Agency is planning to include
greenhouse gas reporting issues as one of the sessions at the
State and Local Climate Change Partners Conference. The
conference is in Annapolis, MD, November 20-22. Registration
information is on the web site:
http://www.epa.gov/globalwarming/annapolis
[http://www.epa.gov/globalwarming/annapolis] .
Media Contact: Jill Schroeder Vieth, 202/586-4940 Release No.
PR-02-206
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63 Obituary: Clive Grove-Palmer
Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian |
Wave energy programme chief who converted from nuclear power
David Ross Wednesday October 2, 2002 The Guardian
[http://www.guardian.co.uk]
The scientific civil servant Clive Grove-Palmer, who has died
aged 82, entered what should have been an uneventful life as a
government employee, and instead became the centre of a storm of
dissent. He was presiding over the wave energy programme at the
Atomic Energy Research Establishment at Harwell, near Oxford, in
1982 when the programme was destroyed by government intervention,
to clear the way for prime minister Margaret Thatcher's nuclear
programme.
Grove-Palmer was born in Gorlestone, Norfolk. His father was a
chemist and the boy grew up in Muswell Hill, north London, and
was educated locally. He then took a degree in chemical
engineering at Imperial College, London. He joined the Admiralty
and served in wartime as a scientific officer in the Middle East
on what he later described as the "fascinating but terrifying"
work of neutralising mines in the Persian Gulf.
He was then posted to Rosyth, where he married, before he and his
wife relocated, with their two daughters, to Oxford to work for
the United Kingdom Atomic Energy Authority at Harwell. He worked
first in the chemical engineering division, and then with the
energy technology support unit. This was in charge of renewable
energy but remained, oddly, a section of the UKAEA. It should
have been a quiet berth, but he was put in charge of the wave
energy programme. He therefore walked into one of the biggest
uproars that broke out over the new technology of renewable
energy in the mid-1970s.
Grove-Palmer began as a passionate defender both of the Harwell
establishment and of nuclear power. After I first visited him in
1976, I commented in the New Statesman that he was protected by
the armed police of the UKAEA, and that to reach his office you
had to pass by a line of cupboards labelled "Danger Radiation".
He was highly indignant. "You are safer here than anywhere
outside," he said. "Your cigarette smoking is more dangerous than
the radiation in this building." (This was over 25 years ago, and
nearly everyone smoked then). He became a key source of
information about wave power to everyone concerned with renewable
energy. He fiercely defended the programmes of the Labour
government and then, after 1979, when it was replaced by
Thatcher's Conservative government, he defended his new masters.
He refused to believe that there were forces inside the
department of energy -which later became a branch of the
department of trade and industry - who were determined that wave
power would never challenge the established sources of nuclear,
oil, gas and - at that time - coal.
Then came the thunderclap of 1982. With Nigel (later Lord) Lawson
as energy secretary, and David Mellor as his deputy, a conference
on the future of wave power was held at the civil service centre
for secret briefings at Sunningdale, Surrey, and, to his
amazement and dismay, Grove-Palmer was excluded.
Never before had the head of a renewable energy programme been
kept out of a conference to discuss his own discipline.
Grove-Palmer, and his friends, found it almost unbelievable that
the government planned to discuss wave energy without the
presence of the head of the programme. But they did. It was
whispered that he had been excluded because there were doubts
about his competence. His supporters believed that he was
excluded precisely because he would be too competent at
defending, before an audience of engineers and scientists, the
new technology which the government had resolved, in advance, to
abandon.
The meeting decided, as he had anticipated, to end the programme.
Wave energy was regarded as a particular threat because it was
designed for huge power stations out at sea, demanding major
investment, feeding the national grid and replacing both
conventional and nuclear sources, both of which had been
represented around the table at Sunningdale. Grove-Palmer took
early retirement.
He was offered employment with a group of backbench MPs who were
promoting renewable energy, but left the group in high
indignation after discovering that nuclear power was among its
sponsors. He had by then read, as he told me, every word of The
Nuclear Barons by Peter Pringle and James Spigelman, and many
other related works, and he had become as emphatically
anti-nuclear as he had previously been pro-nuclear. He then
devoted himself in retirement to silversmithing, fishing and
studying philosophy and English history and working for his local
Age Concern. After the death of his wife Margaret in 1996, he
went to live in Hong Kong with one of his daughters and her
family. On their return to England, they had a cottage for him
built in the grounds of their house. His two daughters survive
him.
· Clive Grove-Palmer, scientific civil servant, born March 20
1920; died July 20 2002
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
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64 Global Cooperation for Advanced Nuclear Electricity Plants
[Image] [www.iaea.org]
The Republic of Korea's exhibit on nuclear co-operation and
advanced reactors during the IAEA General Conference 2002
A new report produced by the Paris-based International Energy
Agency (IEA), the OECD's Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA), and the
IAEA examines the scope of international cooperation, and
opportunities for collaboration, to develop the next generation
of nuclear power plants.
The result of a joint project known as the "Three Agency Study",
the report reviews specific reactor design proposals. The aims
were to identify how they are addressing the challenges facing
nuclear power and to examine the underlying "enabling"
technologies that might constitute fruitful areas for research
collaboration. Projects reviewed involve organizations in Russia,
Argentina, Japan, China, Republic of Korea, Canada, United
States, South Africa, and Europe. Entitled Innovative Nuclear
Reactor Development - Opportunities for International
Co-operation, the report looks at six specific characteristics of
enhanced performance -- safety; economic competitiveness;
proliferation resistance and safeguards; waste management; fuel
efficiency; and flexibility of application -- of reactor
technologies under development.
While a range of innovative reactor technologies exist for
countries interested in pursuing the nuclear option, "further
collaboration...is warranted," the report states, citing benefits
in terms of both cost and time to develop new technologies. It
offers five recommendations for enhanced cooperation: making
better use of available experience; increasing
cross-fertilization of ideas among the various reactor designers;
taking greater advantage of components and technologies developed
in other industries; increasing cooperation in research and
development; and expanding the analyses of innovative reactors to
a broader set of designs.
[http://www.iea.org/public/studies/nuclear.htm]
In publishing the report, the IAEA, IEA and NEA said that the
joint study can benefit the current international discussion on
innovative nuclear technology. It is is being distributed to
participants of the Generation IV International Forum (GIF) and
the IAEA International Project on Innovative Nuclear Reactors and
Fuel Cycles (INPRO), two global initiatives for the development
of advanced nuclear power plants.
IAEA, 25 September 2002
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NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this
material is distributed without profit or payment to those who
have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for
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information go to:
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