***************************************************************** 05/07/02 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 10.117 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** NUCLEAR POLICY 1 Russia is ready to resolve USA's concern about its nuclear 2 Nuclear team arrives in North Korea, but South talks off 3 Ukrainian lawmakers praise U.S. nuclear safety project NUCLEAR REACTORS 4 US: Nuclear Reactor List (in danger of control rod cracking) 5 US: Reactor List and Repairs (extended cracking list) 6 Ukraine restarts one nuclear reactor after repairs, stops another 7 South Africa Considers Nuclear Plants for Rural Power 8 US: Reactor concerns radiate to Ohio 9 US: Nation's most vulnerable nuclear reactors 10 US: NRC Draft Report Finds Surry License Renewal Environmentally 11 European rights court issues first ruling against Russia 12 US: NRC to Meet with Company Regarding Finding at Susquehanna Plant NUCLEAR SAFETY 13 US: House Offers $29.8B Anti-Terror Deal 14 Building a mountain out of a poison pill 15 Ukrainian lawmakers praise U.S. nuclear safety project 16 US: Events Raise Nuclear Safety Questions 17 US: History of atomic spaceship misfires 18 Nuclear risk in Belarus 19 US: Mutations Can Carry Over Generations NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 20 British Energy confirms BNFL talks on issues including Magnox 21 US: Letter urged House Democrats to join Yucca Mountain fight with 22 US: Editorial: Aschcroft entering lion's den on Yucca 23 US: Berkley e-mail seeking Yucca support broke House rules 24 US: Before big vote, board reviewing Yucca questions 25 US: Keep your plutonium; get me Karl Rove! 26 US: Opinions:Hodges is behaving like an idiot 27 US: New spill reported at South Australian uranium mine 28 US: N-waste debate heating up 29 US: Nuclear waste cleanup in Parks hearing topic 30 US: BETTER HANDLING OF NUCLEAR WASTE 31 US: After four decades, BOMARC cleanup to start this month 32 US: The Australian: 'No damage' from uranium spill NUCLEAR WEAPONS 33 US: FCNL INFOLINE (5/7/02): GOVERNMENT ACTIONS MAY THREATEN WORK... 34 US: A Life of Albert Einstein 35 Nuclear team arrives in North Korea, but South talks off 36 Nuclear Team in North Korea, but South Talks Off US DEPT. OF ENERGY 37 SNS millions spent statewide; what, then, is 'spallation'? OTHER NUCLEAR 38 Oil Supply, Nuclear Fusion Occupy G-8 Energy Ministers 39 ExxonMobil denies owing for cleanup ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 Russia is ready to resolve USA's concern about its nuclear cooperation with Iran BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; May 7, 2002 San Francisco, 6 May, correspondents Yuriy Nikolayev and Vladislav Dunayev: Moscow is proposing to set up a special Russian-US working group for Iran in order to resolve the United States' concern about cooperation between Russia and Iran in the sphere of nuclear technologies, Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov said at Stanford University on Monday [6 May]. Ivanov said that Russia was indeed cooperating with Iran in the sphere of nuclear technologies but "exclusively for peaceful purposes". In particular, Russian experts are taking part in the construction of a nuclear power station in Bushehr, Iran, and the station is under the International Atomic Energy Agency's [IAEA] control. The IAEA has not so far lodged any complaints to Russia and the nuclear power station was being constructed under international standards, according to Ivanov. He admitted that the USA was periodically raising the issue of "Moscow's possible illegal deeds linked with nuclear or missile technologies" and said that "if the USA has such information, we are ready to study it jointly and resolve these concerns if this information is confirmed". He believes that this could be done only through cooperation and mutual confidence. Moscow is proposing to set up joint working groups of the special services for the issues of concern, for example, nuclear and missile technologies, Ivanov said. These groups might be modelled on the working group for Afghanistan. The Russian-US working group for Afghanistan would in the near future be transformed into a working group for the problem of new threats and challenges, according to Ivanov. Source: RIA news agency, Moscow, in Russian 2242 gmt 6 May 02 /© BBC Monitoring ***************************************************************** 2 Nuclear team arrives in North Korea, but South talks off - with Richard Meserve U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman - C-SPAN (Jan 17, 2002) Tue May 7, 8:00 AM ET By Martin Nesirky SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said a team from an international consortium at the heart of a crucial nuclear agreement had arrived on Tuesday for talks on how to push forward a deal to build atomic power reactors for Pyongyang. Under a 1994 agreement, North Korea pledged to freeze a suspected nuclear weapons programme in exchange for two safer light-water reactors built by the West. The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation (KEDO), the New York-based consortium set up to build the reactors, cannot deliver critical equipment until U.N. inspections verify the North has no stockpiles of weapons-grade plutonium. This point has proved a stumbling block in talks. "A KEDO delegation arrived today by air to participate in the negotiations of experts for the implementation of the agreement of light-water reactors signed between the DPRK and KEDO," the North's official KCNA news agency said in a one-sentence report. DPRK is the acronym for North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. It was not immediately clear what the agenda for the talks was, notably whether inspections would be discussed. A spokesman at the South Korean Unification Ministry said he was not aware of the visit. KEDO compromises the United States, South Korea, Japan, the European Union and other states. The KEDO delegation's arrival came on the day the North was supposed to have started talks in Seoul on economic cooperation. South Korean President Kim Dae-jung (news [http://rd.yahoo.com/DailyNews/manual/*http://search.news.yahoo.c om/search/news?p=%22Kim%20Dae%20jung%22&c=&n=20&yn=c&c=news&cs=nw ] - web sites [http://rd.yahoo.com/DailyNews/manual/*http://search.yahoo.com/bi n/search?cs=nw&p=Kim%20Dae-jung] ) urged North Korea on Tuesday to live up to the deal it struck with Seoul's special envoy last month and hold the talks as soon as possible. North Korea said on Monday it was pulling out of the talks, after blaming South Korean Foreign Minister Choi Sung-hong for making "reckless remarks" on a recent U.S. trip. The envoy, Lim Dong-won, held five hours of talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il last month. They agreed to restart North-South contacts that had been stalled for months. German politician Hartmut Koschyk told reporters in Seoul on Tuesday he and six other parliamentarians from the Bundestag lower house had not picked up signals North Korea was about to pull the plug on the talks during a visit to Pyongyang last week. ASTONISHMENT "I want to express our astonishment that the North Korean side cancelled the economic talks planned for today," he said. "We consider the cancellation to be a pretext." Political analysts said the North Korean decision to pull out of the North-South talks could carry a silver lining if it meant the North wanted to focus on talks with the United States. That assessment applies equally to KEDO talks, which have tended to go more smoothly than dialogue with Washington. The pace of North Korea diplomacy has picked up in recent weeks. An EU team is expected to follow up later this month or in June on a ministerial visit last year, Koschyk told Reuters. Sepp Blatter, the head of world soccer's governing body FIFA, was also visiting the North this week. KCNA said he met North Korea's number two leader Kim Young-nam. South Korea is co-hosting the World Cup soccer finals with Japan from May 31 to June 30. North Korea did not even enter the qualifying tournament but Seoul has been keen to have at least a delegation from the North watch some of the matches. Blatter's visit is complicated by sharp differences between him and the head of the South Korean Football Association, Chung Mong-joon, over how FIFA is governed. On Wednesday, Chung, a FIFA vice-president, may announce his own trip to the North, soccer officials said. Political analysts say that trip could be undertaken with Park Geun-hye, daughter of former military ruler Park Chung-hee. North Korea's KCNA news agency confirmed on Tuesday she would visit Pyongyang on Saturday. Chung and Park are thought to be considering a joint third-party bid for December's presidential election. President Kim is in his last year of his single-term presidency. The North's announcement pulling out of the talks was a blow to his efforts to revive his "Sunshine Policy" of engaging North Korea. It also came just days after families divided since the 1950-53 Korean War met in a tentative start to renewed links and the United Nations (news [http://rd.yahoo.com/DailyNews/manual/*http://search.news.yahoo.c om/search/news?p=%22United%20Nations%22&c=&n=20&yn=c&c=news&cs=nw ] - web sites [http://rd.yahoo.com/DailyNews/manual/*http://search.yahoo.com/bi n/search?cs=nw&p=United%20Nations] ) raised the spectre of more malnutrition when it said it would have to cut back food supplies unless rich countries donated more cash for aid. North Korea may also wish to avoid discussing a dam on its territory which the South says is in danger of collapsing and inundating southern regions. KCNA reported on Tuesday the North's environment ministry had said the dam was built to be "a monumental edifice of eternal value" and was perfectly safe. Copyright © 2002 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 3 Ukrainian lawmakers praise U.S. nuclear safety project AP World - General News Tue May 7, 8:28 AM ET KIEV, Ukraine - Ukraine's parliament singled out a U.S. company Tuesday for developing what lawmakers called Ukraine's best investment project for improving nuclear security, a news agency said. The fuel and energy committee of the Verkhovna Rada praised GSE Systems of Columbia, Maryland for its work at the Khmelnytskyi atomic plant assisting operators to detect minor malfunctions and prevent them from turning into serious accidents, the Interfax news agency said. The company has teamed up with Russian and Ukrainian subcontractors under projects sponsored by the U.S. Energy Department to improve safety at all of Ukraine's nuclear power stations. The report did not specify the amount of GSE's investment in Ukraine. Ukraine was the site of world's worst nuclear catastrophe in 1986, when a reactor at the Chernobyl power plant exploded and caught fire, spewing radiation over much of Europe. Chernobyl was closed down for good in 2000. Reactors at Ukraine's four nuclear power stations are frequently shut down for both planned and unscheduled repairs. On Tuesday, Ukrainian authorities shut down reactor No. 3 at the Yuzhna nuclear station for two days of scheduled repairs. Ten of the country's 13 reactors are currently operating. (ms/tv) Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. ***************************************************************** 4 Nuclear Reactor List (in danger of control rod cracking) Las Vegas SUN May 06, 2002 Nuclear power reactors with the greatest vulnerability to cracking of their control rod nozzles because of age and temperature conditions or a history of cracking. Plants have been subject to inspection for cracking and have committed to making required repairs when cracks are found: Arkansas Nuclear Unit 1, Russellville, Ark. Crystal River Unit 3, Crystal River, Fla. Davis Besse, Oak Harbor, OhioNuclear Reactor List (in danger of control rod cracking) Las Vegas SUN May 06, 2002 Nuclear power reactors with the greatest vulnerability to cracking of their control rod nozzles because of age and temperature conditions or a history of cracking. Plants have been subject to inspection for cracking and have committed to making required repairs when cracks are found: Arkansas Nuclear Unit 1, Russellville, Ark. Crystal River Unit 3, Crystal River, Fla. Davis Besse, Oak Harbor, Ohio. D.C. Cook Unit 2, Benton Harbor, Mich. H.B. Robinson Unit 2, Florence, S.C. Millstone Unit 2, New London, Conn. North Anna Units 1 and 2, Richmond, Va. Oconee Units 1, 2 and 3, Greenville, S.C. Surry Units 1 and 2, Newport News, Va. Three Mile Island, Harrisburg, Pa. --- Source: Nuclear Regulatory Commission. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 5 Reactor List and Repairs (extended cracking list) Las Vegas SUN May 06, 2002 Nuclear power reactors with the greatest vulnerability to cracking of their control rod nozzles because of age and temperature conditions or a history of cracking. Plants have been subject to inspection for cracking and have committed to making required repairs when cracks are found. (Number of cracks and repairs as of April 9, 2002, according to Nuclear Regulatory Commission.): Arkansas Nuclear Unit 1, Russellville, Ark. (1 crack, repaired) Crystal River Unit 3, Crystal River, Fla. (1 crack, repaired) Davis Besse, Oak Harbor, Ohio. (5 cracks, 3 repaired) D.C. Cook Unit 2, Benton Harbor, Mich. (no cracks, but vulnerable) H.B. Robinson Unit 2, Florence, S.C. (no cracks, but vulnerable) Millstone Unit 2, New London, Conn. (3 cracks, all repaired) North Anna Units 1 and 2, Richmond, Va. (11 cracks, 3 repaired) Oconee Units 1, 2 and 3, Greenville, S.C. (23 cracks, all repaired) Surry Units 1 and 2, Newport News, Va. (10 cracks, 6 repaired) Three Mile Island, Harrisburg, Pa. (8 cracks, 6 repaired.) --- Source: Nuclear Regulatory Commission. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 6 Ukraine restarts one nuclear reactor after repairs, stops another for check BBC Monitoring Service - United Kingdom; May 7, 2002 Kiev, 7 May: The power unit No 6 at the Zaporizhzhya nuclear power station has been restarted after repairs. The reactor was stopped on 13 March for planned repair work and refuelling. This morning, the capacity of the power unit had been restored to 700 MW (70 per cent of the nominal capacity), UNIAN learnt at the State Committee for Nuclear Regulation's information centre. The bloc's capacity is being gradually increased. In the early hours today, the power unit No 3 at the South-Ukrainian nuclear power station was switched off for a check on the speed of the emergency shutdown system and maintenance work at the turbine department. It is planned to restart the power unit by 2300 [2000 gmt] on 9 May. Currently, 10 out of Ukraine's 13 nuclear power units are operational. Repairs are continuing at the Rivne nuclear power station's power unit No 1 and power unit No 1 at the Khmelnytskyy nuclear power station. Source: UNIAN news agency, Kiev, in Ukrainian 0624 gmt 7 May 02 /© BBC Monitoring ***************************************************************** 7 South Africa Considers Nuclear Plants for Rural Power Xinhua News Agency ( May 07, 2002 ) JOHANNESBURG, May 7, 2002 (Xinhua via COMTEX) -- The South African government is considering building a series of small nuclear power stations across the country to supply electricity to rural areas, The Citizen newspaper reported on Tuesday. Minerals and Energy Minister Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka has suggested that a small nuclear power generator could be ideal in a rural area, the report said. A feasibility study and environmental impact assessment is being made about the planned nuclear reactor in Cape Town. However the Cape Town City Council has threatened to challenge the program. The minister said that the government would promote access to cheap electricity for poor households, small farms and community services. To achieve this, the government would "seek special solutions" in areas outside the national electricity grid, he said. He said that one of the possible solutions could be a small nuclear power station. In rural areas, the demand was inadequate to justify any large conventional power stations, which supply from 600 million watts to 1,000 million watts. Copyright 2002 XINHUA NEWS AGENCY. ***************************************************************** 8 Reactor concerns radiate to Ohio The Tribune Chronicle - Your Mahoning Valley News Source The Associated Press WASHINGTON - A nuclear reactor at the Davis-Besse plant in Oak Harbor is found to have a large hole nobody thought possible, burned almost through its six-inch protective steel cover. Cracks of a type never seen before are discovered at a reactor in South Carolina, triggering widespread inspections. Both events caught industry leaders and government regulators by surprise, and they are fueling new questions about aging nuclear power plants and plant inspection programs. The cracks found last year at the Oconee plant in South Carolina and the hole discovered in March in the steel reactor lid at the Davis-Besse plant were in areas thought largely impervious to such problems. ''It was material degradation that wasn't expected,'' acknowledges Alex Marion of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's trade group. The 25-year-old Davis-Besse reactor on the shore of Lake Erie is one of four nuclear plants owned by FirstEnergy Corp. It has been shut down since February, waiting for the hole in the reactor dome to be patched. An inspection of most of the 68 other plants with similar designs and conditions reported no corrosion. But the regulators ordered special inspections at 14 reactors thought to be vulnerable to nozzle cracking because of their age. Some senior officials at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission are viewing the Davis-Besse and Oconee discoveries as the most significant safety issue facing the nuclear industry since the Three Mile Island accident 23 years ago. The steel reactor vessel, which encloses the reactor's core, has always been viewed as ''a sacred component'' that will not be breached, said Brian Sheron, the commission's assistant director for licensing and technology assessment. ''This really challenges that assumption.'' The problems at both reactors were discovered before they posed an immediate safety risk. A break through the reactor cover would have caused thousands of gallons of radioactive water to spew into the containment building, raising the risks of the core overheating and a potential meltdown and possible release of radiation into the environment. Only a thin noncorrosive stainless steel membrane kept the hole at the Ohio reactor from bursting open. The cracks at the Oconee plant, owned by Duke Power, were less urgent. But had the crack expanded, it could have caused the nozzle to separate, also causing a loss of cooling water inside the reactor, nuclear experts said. Industry spokesmen said backup safety systems would have averted more serious problems by pumping more water into the reactor than was being allowed to escape, keeping the nuclear fuel safe until the reactor could be shut down. But that's true if everything worked perfectly, said David Lochbaum, a nuclear engineer and industry watchdog for the Union of Concerned Scientists. And that may not be the case if emergency pumping systems became clogged with debris, if other equipment is damaged or a gauge is misread by plant operators struggling to make sure the reactor core remains covered with water, he said. At the very least, argue nuclear industry critics, the Davis-Besse and Oconee incidents reveal shortcomings in how utilities inspect older power plants and how the NRC monitors them. ''The industry is trying to ensure safety while turning a profit, so they have competing interests that ... at times diverge,'' says Lochbaum. The hole and cracks were found in largely inaccessible areas where there is substantial radiation and inspections can be done only when the plant is shut down. The Davis-Besse corrosion was caused by a buildup of boric acid from leaking reactor cooling water dating back to the mid-90s. The first signs of corrosion appeared in 1998. Concerns about nozzle cracking were first raised in 1991 after an incident in France. Yet their significance was not fully recognized until the recent alarms. ''If this occurred in Russia, we would be saying it could never happen here,'' former NRC Commissioner Victor Gilinsky wrote in a recent commentary in The Washington Post on the Davis-Besse discovery. Gilinksy called it ''a narrow escape'' from a potential catastrophic accident. NRC officials said inspections of other reactors have found no buildup of boron contamination. Nozzle cracks have been found at 34 reactors and are being fixed. FirstEnergy acknowledges signs of corrosion as early as 1998 when filters at Davis-Besse became clogged with rust and some of the boron crystals were observed as turning from white to red. ''We didn't do a good job of recognizing pieces of the puzzle,'' says Todd Schneider, a spokesman for FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Co., the subsidiary that runs the plant 26 miles east of Toledo. NRC officials and industry executives say the 1991 nozzle incident in France was discounted because a test concluded that the cracking could not cause nozzle separation. A decade later at Davis-Besse, similar cracks were leaking as much as 12 gallons of water an hour. The hole at the Ohio plant was found only because of an NRC inspection order arising from the cracking at the Oconee plant. A nozzle supposedly affixed to the reactor dome at Davis-Besse unexpectedly moved several inches when engineers began repairing cracks in it. Leaking borated water in itself is not a corrosion problem. But at Davis Besse, the water, rather than evaporating, settled beneath the hardened layers of boron - just enough moisture needed to turn the crystals back into corrosive boric acid. This produced ''a whole new phenomenon,'' says John Grobe, head of an NRC task force investigating the incident. ''This kind of corrosion has never been seen before on a reactor pressure vessel head.'' www.tribune-chronicle.com [http://www.tribune-chronicle.com] 240 Franklin St. S.E. | Warren, Ohio 44482 330.841.1600 (local) | 888.550.TRIB (toll-free) Copyright © 2002 Tribune Chronicle ***************************************************************** 9 Nation's most vulnerable nuclear reactors Tri-City Herald / 24 Hour News Nation Stories [http://www.tri-cityherald.com] [http://www.nando.net/] Corrosion findings raise questions about nuclear plant regulation By H. JOSEF HEBERT, Associated Press WASHINGTON (May 7, 4:11 a.m. PDT) - Severe cracks found at one nuclear power reactor and the stunning discovery of a hole that nearly breached the six-inch steel dome of another facility are raising new questions about aging nuclear plants and whether they are being inspected closely enough. The hole that went through most of the heavy reactor cover of the Davis Besse power plant in Ohio and the severity of cracks found about a year earlier at a reactor in South Carolina surprised federal safety regulators and the industry. Both incidents have had plant operators scurrying to look for cracking in reactor control rod nozzles and, more recently, for corrosive boric acid on reactor domes. It was a government-ordered inspection prompted by cracks found in South Carolina in early 2001 that led to the discovery of the David Besse hole this past March. A primary reason for the corrosion was the longtime escape through nozzle cracks of borated water from inside the Davis Besse reactor vessel, investigators have concluded. So far, no one else is reporting the kind of corrosion found at the Ohio plant. While 14 reactors on a close-watch list have reported at least 62 nozzle cracks, most of them have been fixed and the rest are on a schedule for repair, industry and government officials said. A spokesman for Duke Power says the 23 cracks found at its three Oconee reactors at Greenville, S.C., have been fixed. Still, the discoveries have prompted new questions about aging nuclear power plants. "It was material degradation that wasn't expected," acknowledges Alex Marion of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's trade group. Still, he added, the problems should not affect relicensing since the problems are identified and being dealt with. Some industry critics disagree. "The concern here is that with this inherently dangerous technology, when it ages it becomes more and more unpredictable in terms of how rapidly things can break, leak and crack," argues Paul Gunter, an anti-nuclear activist and industry watchdog. Most reactors have a 40-year license and a growing number of utilities are planning extensions. FirstEnergy Corp.'s 25-year-old Davis Besse reactor on the shore of Lake Erie has been shut down since February, waiting for the hole in the reactor dome to be patched. Like the reactor nozzle cracks found at the 28-year-old Duke Power-owned Oconee reactor, the hole at Davis Besse was discovered before anything serious could go wrong, nuclear experts said. Still, federal safety regulators view the findings especially at Davis Besse so troubling that some senior officials at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission privately have characterized the cracking and corrosion as the most significant safety issue facing the nuclear industry since the Three Mile Island accident 23 years ago. The steel reactor vessel, which encloses the reactor's core, has always been viewed as "a sacred component" that will not be breached, said Brian Sheron, the commission's assistant director for licensing and technology assessment. "This really challenges that assumption." Only a thin noncorrosive stainless steel membrane kept the hole at the Ohio reactor from bursting open. And nuclear experts say if the cracks at the Oconee plant had been allowed to continue, the nozzle might have separated. In both cases, thousands of gallons of radioactive water would have escaped from the reactor, raising the risk of the core's radioactive fuel overheating and - in a worst-case scenario - possibly a meltdown and a release of radiation from the larger concrete containment building. Industry spokesmen said they are convinced backup safety systems would have averted more serious problems by pumping more water into the reactor than was being allowed to escape to keep the nuclear fuel safe until the reactor could be shut down. But that's true if everything worked as planned, counters David Lochbaum, a nuclear engineer and industry watchdog for the Union of Concerned Scientists. If the emergency pumping systems become clogged with debris, if other equipment is damaged or a gauge misread as workers struggle to keep the fuel covered with water, a more serious accident might be unavoidable, he said. The Davis Besse corrosion was caused by a buildup of boric acid from reactor cooling water that had been leaking from nozzle cracks since the mid-1990s. The first signs of corrosion appeared four years ago when rust began clogging filters, investigators said. Despite a 1988 NRC directive to keep reactor lids free of boron, the layers of the powdery deposits hardened so much atop the dome - where access is difficult because of space and radiation exposure - that workers couldn't pry it loose. "If this occurred in Russia, we would be saying it could never happen here," former NRC Commissioner Victor Gilinsky wrote in a recent commentary on the Davis Besse discovery, calling it "a narrow escape" from a potential catastrophic accident. But the company's engineers did not link the rust to safety-related corrosion and were assured that the boron powder was harmless since they believed heat from the reactor would evaporate any moisture. But it is now believed the water leaking from the nozzle cracks, rather than evaporating, settled beneath the hardened layers of boron, providing enough moisture to turn the powder back into corrosive boric acid. This produced "a whole new phenomenon," says John Grobe, head of an NRC task force investigating the incident. "This kind of corrosion has never been seen before on a reactor pressure vessel head." ***************************************************************** 10 NRC Draft Report Finds Surry License Renewal Environmentally Acceptable; Public Input Sought at Meetings in Late May NRC: Press Release Region II - 2002 - 28 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region II 61 Forsyth Street SW, Atlanta, GA 30303 www.nrc.gov No. II-02-028 May 7, 2002 CONTACT: Ken Clark (404) 562-4416 Roger D. Hannah (404) 562-4417 E-mail: opa2@nrc.gov [opa2@nrc.gov] NRC DRAFT REPORT FINDS SURRY LICENSE RENEWAL ENVIRONMENTALLY ACCEPTABLE; PUBLIC INPUT SOUGHT AT MEETINGS IN LATE MAY The Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff is seeking public comment on its preliminary conclusion that there are no environmental impacts that would preclude renewal of the operating licenses for the two units at the Surry nuclear plant near Surry, Virginia. The information is contained in a draft environmental impact statement on the proposed license renewal issued in late April. That document is open for public comment until July 12, and will also be the subject of public meetings on Wednesday, May 29. Two similar meetings will be held at the Surry Combined District Court Room in the Surry County Government Center, 45 School Street, Surry County, Virginia. There will be one session in the afternoon at 1:30 and one in the evening at 7:00. In addition, the NRC staff will host informal discussions one hour prior to each meeting. NRC staff members will be available to answer questions and provide additional information about the process during those informal sessions, but no comment submittals on environmental issues will be accepted then. The two sessions will begin with identical overviews, including a discussion by NRC staff and its contractors of the contents of the draft supplement to the GEIS. The meeting will then be opened for public comment. For planning purposes, interested parties are encouraged to pre-register to attend or to present oral comments at the May 29 meetings by contacting Andrew Kugler of the NRC by telephone at (800) 368-5642, extension 2828, or by e-mail at SurryEIS@nrc.gov [SurryEIS@nrc.gov] no later than May 22. Interested persons may also register to speak before the start of each session. Time for individual comments at the meetings may be limited to accommodate all speakers. Written comments on the draft supplement to the GEIS will also be considered by NRC staff. Comments should be submitted either by mail to the Chief, Rules and Directives Branch, Division of Administrative Services, Mail Stop T-6 D 59, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, DC 20555-0001, or by Internet to SurryEIS@nrc.gov. The NRC has been reviewing the application for extension of the Surry licenses since Dominion Energy (VEPCo on the licenses), which operates the plants, filed it in May 2001. Under NRC regulations, the original operating license for a nuclear power plant is issued for up to 40 years. The license may be renewed for up to an additional 20 years if NRC requirements are met. The current operating licenses for Surry will expire on May 25, 2012, for Unit 1 and January 29, 2013, for Unit 2. The possible environmental effects of an additional 20 years of nuclear plant operation are described in the NRC's Generic Environmental Impact Statement, or GEIS (NUREG-1437). The NRC issues a site-specific supplement to the GEIS on each plant requesting license renewal to address the potential environmental impacts. Issues specific to Surry are addressed in Supplement 6. The NRC staff's preliminary recommendation is that the Commission determine that the adverse environmental impacts of license renewal for the two units at Surry are not so great that preserving the option of license renewal for energy-planning decision makers would be unreasonable. The draft supplement to the GEIS, along with other related documents, is available electronically for public inspection in the NRC Public Document Room at NRC headquarters, One White Flint North, 11555 Rockville Pike, Rockville, Maryland; or electronically on the Internet at www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/nuregs/staff/sr1437/supple ment6/. In addition, the Earl Gregg Swem Library, College of William and Mary, in Williamsburg, Virginia, has agreed to make the draft supplement to the GEIS available for public inspection. At the conclusion of the public comment period the NRC staff will consider and address the comments provided and issue a final supplement to the GEIS. That supplement will contain a recommendation regarding the environmental acceptability for license renewal. ***************************************************************** 11 European rights court issues first ruling against Russia Tuesday, 07-May-2002 8:20AM Story from AFP Copyright 2002 by Agence France-Presse (via ClariNet) STRASBOURG, May 7 (AFP) - In its first ruling against Russia, the European Court of Human Rights on Tuesday ordered Moscow to compensate a Russian soldier exposed to radiation at the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster. Russia said it considered the ruling "absolutely faire" and would pay the court-ordered compensation of 3,000 euros (2,750 dollars) to the soldier, Anatoly Tikhonovich Burdov. The court said in a statement that Moscow had violated articles in the European Convention on Human Rights concerning the right to a fair trial and protection of property by failing to adequately compensate the soldier. It was the first time that the court has issued a ruling concerning Russia, more than six years after the country joined the Council of Europe, the continent's human rights watchdog. The seven judges at the court's headquarters in the French city of Strasbourg ordered Russia to pay 3,000 euros (2,750 dollars) compensation to Burdov. Russian Labour Minister Alexander Pochinok said, "the court's decision is absolutely fair" and that the compensation would be paid. Burdov was called up by military authorities to take part in the emergency operations at the site of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union, from October 1986 until January 1987. He became ill after being exposed to radioactive emissions, but had to wait until early 2001 to be partially compensated despite a series of court rulings in his favor. The Russian authorities had blamed a lack of funds. But the court ruled it was "not open to a state authority to cite lack of funds as an excuse for not honoring a judgement date." It said Moscow's failure to adequately compensate Burdov constituted a violation of his "right to a fair trial" under Article Six of the European Convention on Human Rights. The "execution of a judgement given by any court must be regarded as an integral part of the trial for the purposes of the fair trial requirement..," the court said. "The applicant should not have been prevented from benefiting from the success of the litigation in question on the grounds of alleged financial difficulties," it said. It also ruled that "the impossibility of the applicant to obtain the execution of these judgements, at least until March 5, 2001, constituted an interference with his right to peaceful enjoyment of his possessions," as set set out in Article One of the Convention on the protection of property. In Moscow, Pochinok told Moscow Echo radio his ministry "will pay up, there's no doubt about it," adding that there had been "a delay in the payment because the budget did not provide funds to settling compensation to Chernobyl workers." Sergei Kovalyov, a member of the Russian lower house of parliament also speaking on Moscow Echo radio, said the Strasbourg ruling "teaches us that the law is the same for everyone, including the Russian state." "Russia has proclaimed its wish to be a law-based state, and must be prepared to lose law suits brought by its own citizens," he said. ***************************************************************** 12 NRC to Meet with Company Regarding Finding at Susquehanna Plant NRC: Press Release Region I - 2002 - 37 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs, Region I 475 Allendale Road, King of Prussia, Pa. 19406 www.nrc.gov No. I-02-037 May 6, 2002 CONTACT: Diane Screnci (610) 337-5330 Neil A. Sheehan (610) 337-5331 E-mail: opa1@nrc.gov [opa1@nrc.gov] The Susquehanna Steam Electric Station's response to an inspection finding of low to moderate importance to safety will be the subject of a meeting between representatives of the plant and Nuclear Regulatory Commission staff on Monday, May 13. Scheduled to begin at 1 p.m. in the Public Meeting Room at the NRC Region I office in King of Prussia, Pa., the meeting will be open to the public for observation. NRC staff determined last September that an NRC inspection finding for Susquehanna -- a twin-reactor nuclear power plant located in Berwick, Pa., and operated by PPL Susquehanna, LLC -- should be characterized as "white," meaning it was an issue of low to moderate importance to safety. The violation concerned several occasions when on-shift staffing was below the minimum on-shift staffing requirements as defined in the plant's emergency plan. At the reduced on-shift staffing levels, certain emergency preparedness functions for an emergency at the site, including monitoring the unaffected unit for safety and operations support center coordination duties, would not be met. At the meeting on May 13, there will be a discussion of the company's review of the "white" finding and its proposed improvement plan for its emergency preparedness program. Under the agency's significance determination process, NRC officials classify certain conditions at nuclear power plants as being one of four colors which delineate increasing levels of safety significance, beginning with green and progressing in severity to white, yellow or red. ***************************************************************** 13 House Offers $29.8B Anti-Terror Deal Las Vegas SUN May 07, 2002 WASHINGTON- A largely bipartisan House bill would enlarge President Bush's anti-terrorism and defense bill to $29.8 billion as Congress continues insisting on a role for itself in the war against terror. The measure, which the House Appropriations Committee plans to vote on Wednesday, is $2.7 billion larger than Bush proposed in March, adding funds to some programs, cutting others and including some that the president ignored. Among the changes is a doubling of the $2.50 per flight segment security fee that airline passengers have been charged since the Sept. 11 attacks. "The bill largely reflects the president's request, with some improvements," the Appropriations Committee chairman, Rep. Bill Young, R-Fla., said. Administration officials have signaled possible acceptance of the added spending. But a clash could loom over a cut in the president's proposal for the new Transportation Security Administration amid legislators' concerns about a top-heavy bureaucracy. The bill is for remainder of this fiscal year, which ends Sept. 30. It is much larger than most midyear spending measures, reflecting a bipartisan consensus to funnel funds to the Pentagon and to the campaign against terrorism. The Senate has not yet written its own package. Though easy committee approval is expected, the bill could run into trouble when it moves to the full House, perhaps next week. Republican leaders want to attach must-pass language boosting the federal borrowing limit, which could delay the package because Democrats blame that need on last year's GOP-backed tax cut. The House measure spotlights Congress' desire to assert itself in shaping the counterterrorism effort. In one instance, the measure would lop $30 million off the $130 million Bush wanted for the Pentagon to disperse money to allies in the fight against terrorism, reflecting an unease with granting that much authority to the Defense Department. Bush's $14 billion proposal for the Pentagon would grow by $1.8 billion, including money for training, parts and the Reserves and National Guard, who represent influential home-district constituencies. There is also more funds than Bush sought for protecting government nuclear facilities and water projects; for the FBI to purchase computers; and to train Secret Service and other federal law enforcement agents. The Transportation Security Administration, responsible for security at airports, would get $4 billion instead of the $4.4 billion Bush sought. But the current $2.50-per-flight segment security fee would be doubled following testimony by Transportation Department officials that the revenue now raised was falling well short of the security administration's budget. The original fee was expected to raise about $1 billion this year. The proposed increase would mean $20 instead of the current $10 would be tacked onto the price of a round-trip flight if a passenger changes planes each way. The bill would provide $200 million for battling AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria overseas, amid worldwide pressure on the United States to increase its contribution to a global effort against AIDS. Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., has said he will seek $500 million to battle the international AIDS epidemic, and Democrats on the House committee are likely to offer an amendment at least matching Helms' figure. Colombia could receive up to $20 million more than the $35 million Bush requested for that country's war against narcotics dealers. Like Bush, the bill would allow Colombia to use its anti-drug money for battling terrorists. The bill contains the same $5.5 billion extra Bush wanted for New York City, fulfilling his pledge for at least $20 billion to help the city rebuild from the Sept. 11 attacks. Lawmakers also added $1 billion for Pell grants for low-income college students; $650 million to help communities improve their voting systems; and $100 million to help Congress relocate in case the Capitol is damaged in an attack. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 14 Building a mountain out of a poison pill The Taipei Times Online: 2002-05-07Tuesday, May 7th, 2002 By Chien Hsi-chieh ²¿ü¬Ò Aborigines from the Tao (¹F®©) tribe on Orchid Island recently took to the streets to demand that nuclear waste be removed from the island when the current storage contract expires. Then, just as the government's headache over the issue was developing, China was reported to be willing to assist with the disposal of the waste and provide locations for storage. What's more, China -- in an apparently completely sincere move -- said that all the waste could be taken away within 45 days and that this was a model that could be followed in the event of future waste problems. This looked not only like rain arriving just in time for the government, but also like a new opportunity to improve cross-strait relations. Beijing appeared to be displaying an immense amount of goodwill. We could roughly predict and understand the attitude of the Mainland Affairs Council (³°©e·|). But why did Environmental Protection Administration chief Hau Lung-bin (°qÀsÙy) also reject the idea? The basic problem lies in the environmental concerns associated with nuclear waste. The waste remains a problem after disposal because of the risk that radioactive substances will leak into groundwater and harm future generations. This, after all, is why the Orchid Island residents took to the streets, expressing their unwillingness to live with nuclear waste no matter how much Taiwan Power Co (¥x¹q) claims that the disposal process is extremely safe. From a basic humanitarian standpoint, how could we allow the Chinese to live with the waste? We fully understand the Orchid Island residents' indignation and support their protests. But that does not mean the problem will disappear after being sent somewhere out of sight -- and in this case the "somewhere else" is Guangdong Province. There is no reason why others should put up with things that we are afraid of and want to get rid of. Disregarding the possible reasons why the Chinese policy-makers are prepared to ship the nuclear waste to Guangdong, it is obvious that they have never taken the feelings of Guangdong residents into account. They have been as inconsiderate as Taiwan's government was when it put the waste on Orchid Island in the first place. From a long-term perspective, this matter could never have a positive effect on cross-strait relations because the people of Guangdong won't forget that the people of Taiwan, simply because of their wealth, sent toxic nuclear waste to their province. This perception, rather than promoting mutual goodwill and understanding, would have a negative effect on relations between the people of either side, deepening the misunderstandings and animosity between them. The issue of nuclear waste should be resolved as an environmental problem, not a political one. Environmental protection should override politics since it is an issue shared by all humanity. We must certainly hope to solve the problem of nuclear waste for all time with safer technology and the assistance of other countries. But the point is not that China is China, but rather whether it possesses the capability to handle nuclear waste. If the waste is simply to be stored at a greater depth, say 8,000m underground, it will still continue to pollute the world by seeping into groundwater. The problem will remain and the damage to humanity will become even more grave. The best solution is to tap new, economical energy resources. We must develop alternative methods of power generation, such as boosting the electricity-generating effects of co-generation and solar energy. For the dangers of nuclear waste to be eliminated, humanity must stop relying on nuclear energy. Otherwise, even in a country as huge as China, the waste will eventually claim every inch of the land. Chien Hsi-chieh is the executive director of the Peacetime Foundation of Taiwan. This story has been viewed 261 times. URL=[http://www.taipeitimes.com/news/2002/05/07/story/0000134983] Copyright © 1999-2002 The Taipei Times. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 15 Ukrainian lawmakers praise U.S. nuclear safety project Tue May 7, 8:28 AM ET KIEV, Ukraine - Ukraine's parliament singled out a U.S. company Tuesday for developing what lawmakers called Ukraine's best investment project for improving nuclear security, a news agency said. The fuel and energy committee of the Verkhovna Rada praised GSE Systems of Columbia, Maryland for its work at the Khmelnytskyi atomic plant assisting operators to detect minor malfunctions and prevent them from turning into serious accidents, the Interfax news agency said. The company has teamed up with Russian and Ukrainian subcontractors under projects sponsored by the U.S. Energy Department to improve safety at all of Ukraine's nuclear power stations. The report did not specify the amount of GSE's investment in Ukraine. Ukraine was the site of world's worst nuclear catastrophe in 1986, when a reactor at the Chernobyl power plant exploded and caught fire, spewing radiation over much of Europe. Chernobyl was closed down for good in 2000. Reactors at Ukraine's four nuclear power stations are frequently shut down for both planned and unscheduled repairs. On Tuesday, Ukrainian authorities shut down reactor No. 3 at the Yuzhna nuclear station for two days of scheduled repairs. Ten of the country's 13 reactors are currently operating. (ms/tv) Copyright © 2002 The Associated Press. ***************************************************************** 16 Events Raise Nuclear Safety Questions Las Vegas SUN May 07, 2002 WASHINGTON- Severe cracks found at one nuclear power reactor and the stunning discovery of a hole that nearly breached the six-inch steel dome of another facility are raising new questions about aging nuclear plants and whether they are being inspected closely enough. The hole that went through most of the heavy reactor cover of the Davis Besse power plant in Ohio and the severity of cracks found about a year earlier at a reactor in South Carolina surprised federal safety regulators and the industry. Both incidents have had plant operators scurrying to look for cracking in reactor control rod nozzles and, more recently, for corrosive boric acid on reactor domes. It was a government-ordered inspection prompted by cracks found in South Carolina in early 2001 that led to the discovery of the David Besse hole this past March. A primary reason for the corrosion was the longtime escape through nozzle cracks of borated water from inside the Davis Besse reactor vessel, investigators have concluded. So far, no one else is reporting the kind of corrosion found at the Ohio plant. While 14 reactors on a close-watch list have reported at least 62 nozzle cracks, most of them have been fixed and the rest are on a schedule for repair, industry and government officials said. A spokesman for Duke Power says the 23 cracks found at its three Oconee reactors at Greenville, S.C., have been fixed. Still, the discoveries have prompted new questions about aging nuclear power plants. "It was material degradation that wasn't expected," acknowledges Alex Marion of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the industry's trade group. Still, he added, the problems should not affect relicensing since the problems are identified and being dealt with. Some industry critics disagree. "The concern here is that with this inherently dangerous technology, when it ages it becomes more and more unpredictable in terms of how rapidly things can break, leak and crack," argues Paul Gunter, an anti-nuclear activist and industry watchdog. Most reactors have a 40-year license and a growing number of utilities are planning extensions. FirstEnergy Corp.'s 25-year-old Davis Besse reactor on the shore of Lake Erie has been shut down since February, waiting for the hole in the reactor dome to be patched. Like the reactor nozzle cracks found at the 28-year-old Duke Power-owned Oconee reactor, the hole at Davis Besse was discovered before anything serious could go wrong, nuclear experts said. Still, federal safety regulators view the findings especially at Davis Besse so troubling that some senior officials at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission privately have characterized the cracking and corrosion as the most significant safety issue facing the nuclear industry since the Three Mile Island accident 23 years ago. The steel reactor vessel, which encloses the reactor's core, has always been viewed as "a sacred component" that will not be breached, said Brian Sheron, the commission's assistant director for licensing and technology assessment. "This really challenges that assumption." Only a thin noncorrosive stainless steel membrane kept the hole at the Ohio reactor from bursting open. And nuclear experts say if the cracks at the Oconee plant had been allowed to continue, the nozzle might have separated. In both cases, thousands of gallons of radioactive water would have escaped from the reactor, raising the risk of the core's radioactive fuel overheating and - in a worst-case scenario - possibly a meltdown and a release of radiation from the larger concrete containment building. Industry spokesmen said they are convinced backup safety systems would have averted more serious problems by pumping more water into the reactor than was being allowed to escape to keep the nuclear fuel safe until the reactor could be shut down. But that's true if everything worked as planned, counters David Lochbaum, a nuclear engineer and industry watchdog for the Union of Concerned Scientists. If the emergency pumping systems becomes clogged with debris, if other equipment is damaged or a gauge misread as workers struggle to keep the fuel covered with water, a more serious accident might be unavoidable, he said. The Davis Besse corrosion was caused by a buildup of boric acid from reactor cooling water that had been leaking from nozzle cracks since the mid-1990s. The first signs of corrosion appeared four years ago when rust began clogging filters, investigators said. Despite a 1988 NRC directive to keep reactor lids free of boron, the layers of the powdery deposits hardened so much atop the dome - where access is difficult because of space and radiation exposure - that workers couldn't pry it loose. "If this occurred in Russia we would be saying it could never happen here," former NRC Commissioner Victor Gilinsky wrote in a recent commentary on the Davis Besse discovery, calling it "a narrow escape" from a potential catastrophic accident. But the company's engineers did not link the rust to safety-related corrosion and were assured that the boron powder was harmless since they believed heat from the reactor would evaporate any moisture. But it is now believed the water leaking from the nozzle cracks, rather than evaporating, settled beneath the hardened layers of boron, providing enough moisture to turn the powder back into corrosive boric acid. This produced "a whole new phenomenon," says John Grobe, head of an NRC task force investigating the incident. "This kind of corrosion has never been seen before on a reactor pressure vessel head." --- On the Net: Nuclear Regulatory Commission: [http://www.nrc.gov] Nuclear Energy Institute: [http://www.nei.org] Union of Concerned Scientists: [http://www.ucsusa.org] All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 17 History of atomic spaceship misfires USATODAY.com - 05/07/2002 - Updated 09:14 AM ET By David Mastio, USA TODAY [Loving Pedro Infante] Project Orion by George Dyson George Dyson's Project Orion: The True Story of the Atomic Spaceship is to books what the Challenger was to American spaceships — a disaster. The tale of how, at the height of the Cold War, the U.S. government spent millions in pursuit of an interplanetary spaceship fueled by nuclear bombs is marred by two flaws: The author spends no time developing the historical characters, and he has no skill in assembling a mishmash of science, politics and bureaucracy into a comprehensible story line. But for readers interested enough in space and the Cold War, Project Orion is worth slogging through. The basic history is packed with vign- ettes that transport the reader directly into the early days of the Cold War, when Sputnik took America by surprise and candidate John F. Kennedy warned of a Russian missile gap in the years before he took the United States to the brink of nuclear war over the Soviet Union's nuclear-tipped missiles based in Cuba. The essence of the Project Orion idea was to power a spaceship by dumping hundreds of precisely timed nuclear bombs out the back in order to ride the force of the explosions to Mars or Jupiter and back. As each detail of the story unfolds — such as one physicist's decision to stand miles from an atomic test so he could use the heat and a parabolic mirror to light a cigarette — the natural reaction is to disbelieve. How on earth could top scientists, the Atomic Energy Commission, the Air Force and the Senate actually believe this could work? But they did more than believe. At one point, the head of the Air Force's Strategic Air Command was planning a multibillion-dollar deep-space fleet to be ready for service by the mid-1970s. All told, between 1958 and 1964 various parts of the federal government spent $10 million on Orion. The initial seed money for the project came from a subsidiary of General Dynamics, the defense contractor that today makes the Seawolf nuclear attack submarine and the Abrams tank. One reason Dyson is so good at making the seemingly loony sound perfectly reasonable is that his father was among the physicists who pioneered Project Orion. Dyson clearly knows the story and believes in what he's writing about. And as an intimate among the program's builders, he provides the kind of details that make parts of the story come alive. The ideas behind Orion were always big: Exploding nuclear bombs a mere 100 feet from the spaceship could be done in a way that doesn't damage the ship by coating the exposed parts of the spacecraft with the right kind of oil, or bombs could be built just the right way so that they explode in one direction. But the practical side was less imposing. The first test model of the ship was built with stainless steel mixing bowls from a supermarket. Although the Orion plan may seem far away, the issues behind it are not. Today's space program is still intimately linked to nuclear power in less dramatic ways. Twenty-three U.S. space missions have used the radioactive decay of plutonium to provide electric power. Plans for future robot visits to Pluto and Mars include a new nuclear power unit and a nuclear-powered rover. [http://www.gannett.com] --> ***************************************************************** 18 Nuclear risk in Belarus - Jane's International Security News [http://www.janes.monster.com/] 06 May 2002 President Alexander Lukashenka of Belarus, whose policies exhibit a nostalgia for all things Soviet, is contemplating acquiring one of the least successful examples of Soviet technology: a nuclear power-station using RBMK reactors — the type that blew up at Chernobyl in April 1986. The Chernobyl disaster, just 6 km across Belarus’s frontier with Ukraine, seriously contaminated 25% of the agricultural land in Belarus and left a legacy of health problems whose full extent has still to be known. The continuing programme to ‘eliminate the consequences of the Chernobyl accident’ still features largely in the Belarusian budget — though veterans of the immediate post-accident clean-up say that the benefits guaranteed under that programme have now dwindled to practically nothing. And, not surprisingly, Chernobyl engendered a profound distrust of nuclear energy in Belarusian public opinion. Yet Lukashenka chose the anniversary of the disaster (26 April) to announce his interest in buying the Ignalina station. The Ignalina station lies just inside Lithuanian territory, on the shores of a lake that straddles the Lithuanian-Belarusian frontier. The Lithuanians plan to close the station in preparation for their hoped-for accession to the EU. In spite of a safety upgrade after the Chernobyl accident, the RBMK reactors at Ignalina do not meet Western safety standards. Lukashenka, however, considers it an “excellent” station and deplores Lithuanian intentions to “ruin it”. Lithuanian Prime Minister Algirdas Braskauskas has dismissed the proposed sale as “utopian”, and “not worth discussing.” Belarus, he observed, at present owes Lithuania some $30 million for electricity supplied over the past five years and to date shows no signs of paying up. The Belarusians should settle this account first, Braskauskas says, before thinking of purchasing the Ignalina station. 279 of 493 words The Ignalina station lies just inside Lithuanian territory. The Lithuanians plan to close it in preparation for their hoped-for accession to the EU. Despite a safety upgrade after the Chernobyl accident, Ignalina’s RBMK reactors do not meet Western safety standards. Lithuanian Prime Minister Algirdas Braskauskas has dismissed the proposed sale as “not worth discussing.” 96 of 493 words --> ***************************************************************** 19 Mutations Can Carry Over Generations Las Vegas SUN May 06, 2002 WASHINGTON- Radiation exposure caused mutations that persisted into the third generation of laboratory mice in an experiment, suggesting genetic changes from high doses of X-rays and other radiation can be inherited by children and grandchildren. The study, appearing Tuesday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is the first to systematically demonstrate the passage of radiation-caused mutations from one generation to another, say experts. But they say the mutations are subtle, with no apparent, proven effect on health. Earlier studies have found no inherited mutations among human families that were exposed to high levels of radiation, such as those at Hiroshima, Japan, target of the first use of the atomic bomb, and at Chernobyl, site of a major nuclear plant accident. Richard B. Setlow, senior biophysicist at Brookhaven National Laboratory in Upton, N.Y., reviewed the study for the National Academy and said the findings are significant because they prove for the first time that radiation-caused mutations can be inherited in mammals. "This study will open the way for further experiments to answer ... questions" about inherited mutations from radiation, said Setlow. "Before this study, no one knew what to look for." In the study, researchers led by Yuri E. Dubrova of the University of Leicester, United Kingdom, exposed a group of male mice from two different strains to whole body neutron and X-ray radiation. They then allowed the animals to reproduce with unexposed partners and checked the descendants for the rate of mutation. Both the children and the grandchildren of the exposed male mice showed evidence of DNA changes at a rate higher than mutations that naturally occur from generation to generation among unexposed mice. The researchers noted that the inherited changes they found were subtle and involved DNA that had "no apparent function." However, the researchers said that the fact that mutations carried over from one generation to another are a matter of concern because of the possible increased risk for cancer and other disorders. Researchers have never identified an inherited mutation among families of Hiroshima survivors, but that "doesn't mean that they weren't there," Setlow said. The genetic variability between people is much greater than it is between the mice used in the experiment, he said. This variability could mask the inherited genetic changes caused by radiation, he said. "We want to know what the risks of radiation are," said Setlow. "So this is something we have to worry about. There could be something transferred to the offspring even though we can't detect it readily." The mapping of the human genome, or genetic structure, may make it possible for researchers to detected inherited mutations that were not obvious before, said Setlow. On the Net: Proceedings: http://www.pnas.org/ [http://www.pnas.org/] All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 20 British Energy confirms BNFL talks on issues including Magnox operation AFX (UK); May 7, 2002 LONDON (AFX) - British Energy PLC, the nuclear power generator, has confirmed it is in talks with British Nuclear Fuels Ltd on a "wide range of issues" including the possibility of taking over the operation of some of BNFL's Magnox reactors. British Energy said "ongoing discussions" are taking place on issues including fuel service arrangements, new nuclear build, the possible operation of Magnox plant and transportation. Press reports had suggested British Energy is close to concluding a deal in which it would take on responsibility for four of BNFL's six Magnox power stations. The deal would allow British Energy to run the plants until they are decommissioned at about the end of this decade and to sell the power without taking on any of the financial risk. British Energy has suffered from the collapse in wholesale energy prices as it is a pure generating company and cannot make up lost margins through consumer supply operations. However, a deal to run the Magnox reactors would give it a greater share of the market and enable it to leverage its trading expertise to boost its financial performance. mps/shw For more information and to contact AFX: www.afxnews.com and www.afxpress.com ***************************************************************** 21 Letter urged House Democrats to join Yucca Mountain fight with her and Dario Herrera Tuesday, May 07, 2002 Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal 'DEAR COLLEAGUE': Berkley admits mistake using House e-mail By TONY BATT STEPHENS WASHINGTON BUREAU WASHINGTON -- A spokesman for Rep. Shelley Berkley acknowledged Monday that Berkley's staff inappropriately used an official House e-mail account last week to seek votes against a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain. The e-mail was sent last week as a "Dear Colleague" letter before a meeting of House Democrats. The House is scheduled to vote Wednesday on a resolution to transport 77,000 tons of high level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain, northwest of Las Vegas. "I am asking you to help me and Dario Herrera, the Democratic candidate for Nevada's open seat, by joining with us to whip members into opposing the Yucca Mountain resolution," Berkley, a Nevada Democrat, said in the e-mail. Berkley spokesman Michael O'Donovan acknowledged the reference to Herrera in the letter strayed from official House business, which is the purpose of the e-mail account. Herrera is chairman of the Clark County Commission. "It was a very serious lapse in judgment by a staffer who got a little overzealous about the job of lobbying against Yucca Mountain," said O'Donovan, who declined to name the staffer. A revised letter, excluding any reference to Herrera, was issued shortly after the first e-mail, O'Donovan said. Berkley's office also sent a $15 check to the House Standards of Official Conduct Committee to reimburse the House for the cost of the first e-mail, O'Donovan said. Berkley, who was traveling Monday, could not be reached. "She was very upset, and it's fair to say the congresswoman had a few choice words for members of the staff," O'Donovan said. Las Vegas City Councilwoman Lynette Boggs McDonald, who is running against Berkley this year, said the e-mail is another example of how Berkley is politicizing the Yucca Mountain issue. "She sent out a fund-raising letter about six weeks ago to Democrats saying the Republican leadership supports Yucca Mountain and, without mentioning me by name, said you can tell a lot about a person by the company they keep," Boggs McDonald said. "I have consistently opposed Yucca Mountain, but she used this as an issue." Lea Anne McBride, a spokeswoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee, said she is not aware of any plans by the GOP to seek an investigation of Berkley's e-mail. "It appears Shelley Berkley is taking cues from Dario Herrera, who has never had a problem blurring the line between using elected office for political gain," McBride said. Herrera, who participated by conference call in last week's meeting of House Democrats, said the reference to him in the e-mail was a mistake. "I'm not surprised that the NRCC would take this opportunity to attack me, especially considering that their candidate has taken thousands of dollars from people who want to put nuclear waste in Nevada," Herrera said. Herrera was referring to state Sen. Jon Porter, a Henderson Republican who is his opponent for the open congressional seat in Nevada. "I guess somebody needs to tell Dario if we lose the House fight (on Yucca Mountain), it is a loss for Nevada; not a win for my opponent," Porter said. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2002 ***************************************************************** 22 Editorial: Aschcroft entering lion's den on Yucca Las Vegas SUN May 07, 2002 By his presence here on Wednesday, Attorney General John Ashcroft will be affirming the importance of Nevada's Anti-Terrorism Task Force. He will meet privately with task force members at the George Federal Building and he will also join with them for a public news conference. Any day-to-day political differences with Ashcroft are trivial in comparison with the overall mission of anti-terrorism. We're glad the attorney general is coming here to discuss this issue. While Ashcroft is here, we would hope that our task force uses the opportunity to state that the transportation of nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain represents a serious threat to homeland security. We respect the attorney general's position as a key member of President Bush's pro-Yucca administration and understand that he will likely disagree. Yet Nevada's strong stand on this issue must be raised at every opportunity. We don't want to lend credence to the statements last week of Yucca lobbyist and former Nev. Gov. Bob List, who said Nevada's resolve on this issue is weakening. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 23 Berkley e-mail seeking Yucca support broke House rules Las Vegas SUN May 07, 2002 By Benjamin Grove LAS VEGAS SUN WASHINGTON -- An unnamed aide in the office of Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., sent an official e-mail to other lawmakers that broke congressional rules by seeking political favors, Berkley aides say. The e-mail was sent last week to a number of Berkley's Democratic House allies, soliciting their support for Berkley's fight against the Yucca Mountain project. A House vote on the nuclear waste dump plan is expected Wednesday. "Dear Colleague" correspondence is common in Congress when lawmakers want to urge support or opposition to a bill. But the e-mail also noted that the Yucca vote "will have a direct effect on my Congressional race and on the new highly competitive third Congressional district." Berkley is running for her third term against Republican Las Vegas City Councilwoman Lynette Boggs McDonald, and she supports Democratic candidate Dario Herrera over Republican Jon Porter in the race for Nevada's new third House seat. "I am asking you to help me and Dario Herrera, the Democratic candidate for Nevada's open seat, by joining with us to whip Members into opposing the Yucca Mountain resolution," Berkley's e-mail said. "Every Democratic vote counts and helps us politically." Using House e-mail for political gain is not permitted under House rules. Berkley did not know about the content of the e-mail and the staff has been reprimanded, Berkley spokesman Michael O'Donovan said. "It didn't go through the normal channels," O'Donovan said of the e-mail. "It was a staffer screw-up."' O'Donovan said the error was corrected the following day when the e-mail was rewritten and re-sent without the references to the political races. Berkley aides also contacted the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct to notify the panel of the error. Committee staffers told Berkley's office to reimburse the House for any expenses, but it was difficult to assign a monetary value to sending an e-mail, O'Donovan said. So Berkley sent the House what it would have cost if Berkley had sent the message to the Democratic colleagues by first class mail: about $15, O'Donovan said. Berkley has often noted that the House Republican leaders -- not Democrats -- are pushing the Yucca Mountain proposal. The full House is expected to overwhelmingly approve the Yucca project in Wednesday's vote, with both Democrats and Republicans voting for the plan. But Berkley has noted that far more Democrats than Republicans intend to vote in opposition. Herrera has tried to gain traction on the Yucca Mountain issue by arguing that he has been more effective than his opponent in battling the dump project. Berkley held an anti-Yucca strategy meeting last week in her office with Democratic Whip Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and staffers from a dozen offices of Democratic allies. Herrera, who is lobbying certain members of Congress against the Yucca project, joined that strategy meeting via conference call. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 24 Before big vote, board reviewing Yucca questions Las Vegas SUN May 07, 2002 By Benjamin Grove < [grove@lasvegassun.com] > WASHINGTON -- On the eve of an expected House vote on the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste dump, an independent board created by Congress continued its ongoing discussion about project safety. The 11-member Nuclear Waste Technical Review Board began a two-day meeting this morning to talk over a variety of issues that Nevada officials hope will bolster their case against Yucca. Congress created the board in 1987 to analyze Energy Department studies at Yucca, give the department guidance and report on the department's progress. Nevada officials have found an ally in the board. It has said scientific evidence supporting the site so far is "weak to moderate," in part because the Energy Department is still trying to resolve 293 unanswered scientific questions about the site. Energy officials have said they will answer all those questions in the next few years -- before the Nuclear Regulatory Commission approves a license for the site. The board's agenda included discussions about the safety of the metal waste containers that would be buried in tunnels under the mountain if the project is ultimately approved. Other topics include the design of the repository and whether to develop the project in stages, which could allow moving waste to Nevada sooner. Several Nevada officials are addressing the board. In a public comment period, Charles Fitzpatrick, a lawyer working for Nevada, asked board Chairman Jared Cohon if the Energy Department had adequately explained all the unresolved questions surrounding the project. "I felt that the DOE did not convey what the uncertainties are ... of Yucca Mountain performance," Cohon said. Having similar comments on record from independent panelists helps the state, Nevada Nuclear Waste Projects Agency Director Bob Loux said. But it won't help the state when the House votes Wednesday to approve Yucca, as expected, he acknowledged. A Senate vote is expected by the end of July. "You listen to the members of Congress and it appears they don't give a whit about the science at Yucca Mountain," Loux said. "They are more interested in moving the project along." Former acting Yucca Director Lake Barrett disagreed with Cohon, saying that Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham explained to Congress that certain technical issues remain unresolved. "We can always (communicate) better," Barrett said. Today's meeting underscores a point of bitter disagreement between Yucca advocates and its opponents. While Energy and nuclear industry officials say scientific study of the site has proven it safe, Nevada officials and environmental groups say technical analysis has proved the mountain cannot isolate radioactive waste from the environment for 10,000 years. High-level Energy officials told the board that they have drafted a plan to apply for a license by December 2004. Energy officials say they can still construct underground tunnels at Yucca, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, and begin shipping waste to the site by 2010, although critics highly doubt it can be completed that quickly. Margaret Chu, the new director, said her goals were to continue studies to answer unanswered questions, to enhance public confidence and to "ramp up" department preparations for transporting nuclear waste across the country. Chu also said she was looking for ways to cut costs. Meanwhile, Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., and Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev., held a press conference with six environmental groups outside the Capitol, urging activists to continue last-minute lobbying efforts. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 25 Keep your plutonium; get me Karl Rove! - May 6, 2002 CNN.com - By Michael Weisskopf Could $100 million, six tons of plutonium and a single phone call from Karl Rove help Republicans win back the Senate this fall? To Rove, the President's top political aide, it might just turn out to be the deal of the year. The story begins in Colorado, where Republican Senator Wayne Allard, who is running for re-election, got the Bush Administration to jump-start a plan to remove plutonium from a federal facility there and ship it to South Carolina, starting this month. That's good politics for Allard--but bad for Representative Lindsey Graham, who is running for the Senate in South Carolina. When Graham asked Washington to pay a fine of $1 million for every day the plutonium remains unprocessed in the state after a specified date, White House budget chief Mitch Daniels refused to go along, sources tell TIME. That's when Graham went nuclear himself, publicly threatening to join a campaign by local Democrats to block the shipments with armed troopers. That, plus Graham's reputation as a maverick, got the White House's attention. Rove stepped in, calling Graham two weeks ago and okaying a deal that would cap any fines at $100 million a year, sources say. Graham is now working with Daniels' aides to codify the deal into law. Then the plutonium will move, two Republican Senate candidates will get what they want and so will Rove. Network LP, LLLP. An AOL Time Warner Company. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 26 Opinions:Hodges is behaving like an idiot Augusta Georgia: Web posted Tuesday, May 7, 2002 Letter to the Editor Gov. Jim Hodges' threat to block plutonium shipments en route to the Savannah River Site reminds me of the days when Hanoi Jane Fonda was in Vietnam protesting against the United States of America. Someone needs to remind Gov. I don't appreciate Gov. Hodges wasting my tax dollars with his stupid tactics. I live five miles from the SRS boundary, and I have complete confidence in its personnel's ability to safely carry out any task handed to them from the Department of Energy. Gov. Hodges' "scare tactics" don't work on the thousands of residents who reside in the counties surrounding SRS. The biggest safety hazard around the SRS facility would be an idiot willing to lay down in the road in front of moving transport trucks. Most residents around SRS see Gov. Hodges as acting like an idiot and fool as he tries to align himself with Hanoi Jane and Bill Clinton. Thank God this is an election year. Anthony Fulmer, Windsor, S.C. [http://augusta.com] ***************************************************************** 27 New spill reported at South Australian uranium mine Radio Australia News - New spill reported at South Australian uranium mine Another spill of uranium solution has been reported from the Beverley uranium mine in South Australia's far north. Chris McLoughlin reports it's the fourth spill this year... "The report of the spill by the Beverly uranium mine's owner, Heathgate Resources coincides with the State Government 's announcment that reporting of such incidents is being reviewed. Nearly 15-thousand litres of water containing uranium spilled from a faulty join in PVC piping late on Sunday night. Monitoring after the spill indicated normal levels of radiation in the spill area. Stephen Middleton from Heathgate says it has not affected the safety of staff at the mine and had no affect on the environment. He says repeated incidents at the mine are unacceptable, but adds minor spills occur from time to time with no effect on the environment." /05/2002 14:03:33 | ABC Radio Australia News ***************************************************************** 28 N-waste debate heating up Tuesday, May 7, 2002 Nevada ads over transportation to Yucca target Utah By Donna Kemp Spangler Deseret News staff writer In the days ahead Utahns will be hearing a lot about nuclear waste at Yucca Mountain, Nev. The state of Nevada is poised to kick off a Utah-targeted campaign designed to sway public opinion here and pressure Utah's two senators in Washington, who have both indicated they may vote to approve Nevada as an ultimate resting spot for 77,000 tons of nuclear spent fuel rods. And a pro-Yucca Mountain group is expected to kick off a commercial of its own, both focusing on the transportation of the nuclear waste. "I haven't personally seen the ads," said Greg Bortolin, spokesman for Nevada Gov. Kenny Guinn. "But I do know the transportation is what it focuses on, and what we are trying to do is let our neighboring state know what is coming through your back yard on our way to ours." Both 30-second spots are timely as the House on Wednesday is expected to vote on a resolution to finalize Yucca Mountain's selection as the world's first permanent underground nuclear waste repository. A Senate vote is expected by the end of July. Utah's Republican Sens. Bob Bennett and Orrin Hatch have said they are likely to support the Yucca project. And Gov. Mike Leavitt has been reluctant to join Nevada's opposition because he is locked in his own battle to stop the Goshute Indians from temporarily storing 40,000 tons of nuclear waste on the tribe's Skull Valley reservation in Tooele County. Nevada officials have hired Brown and Partners, a Las Vegas ad agency, for $1 million to run the television commercials in Utah that focus on the dangers of shipping nuclear waste. More than 90 percent of that waste will travel through Utah by train or truck on its way to Yucca, about 100 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Ad agency officials were reluctant to discuss details of the ads for strategy reasons. But it hasn't stopped a pro-Yucca group from creating ads of their own to counter the opposition. "It's a scare tactic," Melanie Lyons, spokeswoman for the Nuclear Energy Institute, said about the anti-nuclear waste spots. "They are just trying to scare people that this will come through your back yard." Transportation is one of the most contentious issues. Anti-nuclear activists say it's unprecedented and dangerous to haul the waste to Nevada from temporary storage sites nationwide. The Alliance for Sound Nuclear Policy, a coalition of nuclear industry and pro-Yucca groups like the Nuclear Energy Institute, says it's safe, pointing to a 45-year history of shipping nuclear waste in America. "Most of the rail shipments are secure, very robust and safe," Lyons said, pointing out there have been roughly 3,000 shipments since the 1960s, with no releases of radiation. The whole Yucca Mountain debate has been moving away from public policy and into the arena of politics. The Democratic National Committee is using Yucca Mountain to criticize President Bush for backing off on his promise not to send nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain then later signing off on it. "Republicans make promises, Democrats keep them," the ad says. Nevada has raised $10 million as part of the Nevada Protection Fund to fight the Yucca project. And it would like Utah to join the battle. "We would like to call it the Nevada, Utah Protection Fund," Bortolin said. And in Utah, Steve Erickson of Citizens Education Project plans to launch a public campaign of his own to coincide with Nevada's anti-Yucca commercials. He plans to speak to local governments and businesses to highlight the consequences of nuclear waste crossing into Utah. "Just the cost of emergency preparedness is more than enough to scare the daylights out of city governments," Erickson said. "This is on the horizon, and we need to take a hard look at what it means." E-mail: donna@desnews.com © 2002 Deseret News Publishing Company ***************************************************************** 29 Nuclear waste cleanup in Parks hearing topic PittsburghLIVE.com - Thursday, May 9, 2002 || Contact Us By [mathomas@tribweb.com] VALLEY NEWS DISPATCH Monday, May 6, 2002 PARKS: The fate of the 42-year-old Route 66 nuclear waste dump will be discussed during a public meeting at 6 p.m. Wednesday in the township fire hall. Officials from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers will explain a study to clean up potentially 23,5000 cubic yards - about the size of a football field at a depth of 11 feet - of contaminated soil. Between 1960 and the early 1970s, radiological and chemical wastes, from the NUMEC nuclear fuel facility in Apollo, were buried at the Parks site in unlined trenches. The Atlantic Richfield Co. and BWX Technologies (formerly Babcock &Wilcox) became subsequent owners of the site. On Wednesday, the Corps will announce a time line for the cleanup. They typically take 10 to 15 years. "We're doing everything we can to compress that schedule," said Corps spokesman Richard Dowling. Although a "cleanup" was mandated in the fiscal year 2002 defense appropriations budget, "cleanup" doesn't necessarily mean digging up and removing all of the contamination, Dowling said. It's too early in the study for the Corps to decide on what kind of cleanup will be done or how much it will cost, officials said. "It would be improper to jump to conclusions without an intelligent study of what is in the ground - it would be similar to jurors making up their minds before trial evidence," Dowling said. By federal environmental laws, the Corps must weigh a number of cleanup options - from doing nothing to digging up all contamination - before reaching a decision. Although the Corps will examine options, the Corps wants to come up with an option that the community would want, Dowling said. "Technically, they (Army Corps) tell me they need to consider various alternatives for how to 'cleanup' the site," said U.S. Rep. John Murtha, D-Johnstown, who added the government-mandated cleanup to the defense appropriations budget for fiscal year 2003. "But we've made it clear that we very much want to see these materials removed," Murtha said. "I'll ride herd on this process to continue to reinforce that point." Murtha, a long-time supporter of removing the nuclear waste from Parks, snagged $5 million for the Corps to study the site about two years ago. A little more than $2 million is slated for additional study for fiscal year 2003. After that, Congress will have to come up with the rest of the money. Murtha, along with environmental officials and residents, say the Parks site poses a serious potential threat because it sits on top of a tight catacomb of coals mines. Mine subsidence or mine fire could spread contamination, environmental officials have said. "The main concern should be the potential health and safety risks of the people living near this nuclear and chemical waste dump," said Patty Ameno, an environmental activist from Leechburg. Additionally, Corps officials said they will consider off-site testing if the public has documentation or information. "We would need to evaluate such testing on a case-by-case basis," Dowling said. "We just can't go snooping into other people's yards based on rumors." Ameno encourages a large turn out at the meeting. "I strongly urge everyone in the Kiski Valley who has even traveled past this facility to come to this public meeting on Wednesday in the name of health, safety and environment," she said. + Who: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Pittsburgh District. + What: Public meeting on the cleanup of the nuclear waste dump along Route 66 in Parks. + When: Open house from 6 to 7 p.m. Wednesday followed by a brief presentation and question-and-answer session. + Where: Parks Fire Department social hall, Pleasant View Drive. Mary Ann Thomas can be reached at [mathomas@tribweb.com] or (724 )226-4691. Back to headlines copyright © 2002 by The Tribune-Review Publishing Co. ***************************************************************** 30 BETTER HANDLING OF NUCLEAR WASTE Stories of modern science ... from UPI United Press International: Stories of modern science ... from UPI From the Science & Technology Desk Published 5/7/2002 8:02 AM Purdue University researchers say they are closer to understanding how to prepare highly radioactive nuclear waste for permanent storage. Their research is the first to describe the chemistry of waste formed by aluminum and alkaline or caustic sodium compounds mixing with high-level radioactive material, said Cliff Johnston, lead author and environmental scientist. The goal is to decrease the waste volume by evaporating as much water as possible from the crusty sludge. This will make transport easier and storage less costly, Johnston said. In order to do this, however, researchers need to understand the chemistry of the waste when it becomes a solid. In studying how the different aluminum compounds in the tanks transform from a soluble liquid to a solid form, the researchers say they are learning more about how to handle the highly toxic waste, 53 million gallons of which are held in 177 giant underground tanks at the Department of Energy's Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Richland, Wash. Copyright © 2002 United Press International. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 31 After four decades, BOMARC cleanup to start this month New Egypt Press By Bob VossellerMay 06, 2002 Forty-two years ago on June 7, a nuclear warhead on the outskirts of Plumsted on military property caught fire and leaked plutonium. The 10-acre area was covered in concrete and asphalt which was poured over the site with the hope that 11 ounces of plutonium had been contained. In the last four decades the U.S. Department of Defense has wrestled with just how it would permanently cleanup the dangerous material. Sometime this month the long standing cap will be broken open and 12,000 cubic yards of contaminated soil will be removed and transported to its final burial place, a waste site in Utah. It has taken the last 10-years to develop the cleanup plan which will clear 7 1/2 acres of contamination which surrounds the site of the accident of the former BOMARC (Boeing Michigan Aeronautical Research Center) missile site. It is expected that the cleanup will be complete by September or October according to Environmental Engineer King Mak of the 305th Civil Engineering Squadron. At times the cleanup plan has eclipsed the site itself in terms of controversy. Fears of hauling the soil through a rail depot in Lakehurst where it would be transported by train to Utah. The rubberized plastic bags integrity were also questioned, especially after a local official stabbed a gaping hole in one of the bags which was reportedly bulletproof with the use of a penknife. Following a number of heated meetings both private and public the plan was changed to have the 800 truckloads worth of material to instead be transported through a reactivated rail line from the Fort Dix accident site, which is leased from the Army by McGuire, to a rail line on the base of the Lakehurst Naval Air Engineering Station. A section of Route 547 in Lakehurst was closed by the Air Force last week so that repairs and restoration work could be done on the Lakehurst rail line. Much of the material is said not to be highly hazardous according to Mak. The BOMARC cleanup is said to be rather speedy in comparison to other nuclear cleanups of its type. Envirocare of Utah Inc. which is receiving the soil will be paid $1 million to dispose of the soil and another 400 cubic yards of construction debris. The facility which housed 84 nuclear missiles was deactivated in 1972. Environmental impact studies began 1991 and lead the Air Force to recommend the removal of the material. ©New Egypt Press 2002 ***************************************************************** 32 The Australian: 'No damage' from uranium spill [May 07, 2002] A SPILL of uranium-contaminated water has been reported from the Beverley mine in South Australia. Heathgate Resources today confirmed the Sunday night incident, which it said caused no environmental damage. It is one of a number from the uranium mine this year. A faulty join in two sections of PVC pipe is being blamed for the latest incident, which resulted in the release of 14,900 litres of water containing 0.0018 per cent uranium. Similar fittings on other PVC pipes are now being replaced. Heathgate Resources vice president Stephen Middleton said while the spill had no impact on the environment or employee safety the company recognised that the series of incidents this year had affected community confidence in the integrity of the mine. "We find repeated spills at the mine unacceptable, regardless of whether they have had any environmental impact and we recognise community concern in that area," Mr Middleton said. "But we also believe there is a need to consider these incidents in the correct context. "Minor spills occur from time to time without impacting on the environment and the government is advised of Beverley spills in accordance with reporting requirements. "Four incidents have been the subject of written reports to the regulatory authorities this year, while seven smaller spills have been or will be reported. "None had any environmental impact." © The Australian ***************************************************************** 33 FCNL INFOLINE (5/7/02): GOVERNMENT ACTIONS MAY THREATEN WORK... Date: Tue, 7 May 2002 12:34:16 -0500 (CDT) FCNL INFO LINE May 7, 2002 (To learn more about the FCNL INFO LINE, please see the end of this message.) GOVERNMENT ACTIONS MAY THREATEN DECADES OF WORK...FCNL NEEDS YOUR SUPPORT TODAY The image of an embattled nation at war is a driving force behind government actions which may thwart decades of work for arms control, a nuclear test ban, and military spending cuts. Please help FCNL * Stop a $15.5 million appropriation for "useable" nuclear weapons. * Expose the stupefying height of U.S. military spending. The "war on terror" has become the excuse for ever larger increases to an already bloated military budget, drastically affecting the government's ability to meet domestic human needs. * Challenge the Administration's anticipated expansion of the war on terror to Iraq or other countries. * Support sustained and generous U.S. humanitarian and development assistance to Afghanistan and the other poorest countries around the world. * Oppose further U.S. escalation of war in Colombia and reduce U.S. military training and assistance to the region. * Preserve civil liberties for all in the U.S. and abroad; oppose arbitrary detentions, military tribunals, use of the death penalty. * Promote public policies for the peaceful prevention of deadly conflict. We depend on your support of our work. FCNL brings a sorely needed ethical voice of reason, compassion, mutual understanding, and respect for human dignity to current national discourse. We bring experience, history, testimonies, and vision, supported by a strong, committed network of supporters and activists. You can help keep FCNL's voice strong this year by making a contribution today. Thank you for giving as generously as you can. YOU CAN MAKE A SECURE DONATION ONLINE NOW to help support our work by following this link: . FCNL will not sell or trade your name to any other organization. Other methods of giving are also available, including calling 800-630-1330 to make a credit card donation over the phone, or printing out a donation form by following this link: . All contributors receive the monthly FCNL Washington Newsletter, and periodic action kits and alerts. These items are also available by request. We welcome your gifts to FCNL, in support of our lobbying to influence public policy directly, or, if you would prefer a tax deduction, to the FCNL Education Fund. 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These messages (1) focus on legislative work, but do not have a legislative action component, (2) provide updates on FCNL's work, and/or (3) inform you about resources available from FCNL. These messages are intended as a supplement to the Legislative Action Message and other FCNL materials. This message may also be found on PeaceNet in the fcnl.updates conference. This message is distributed via the fcnl-news mailing list. To subscribe to this list, please visit FCNL's web site at . Alternatively, you can send an e-mail message to majordomo@his.com. Leave the subject line blank. The message should read "subscribe fcnl-news." Please Note: Make sure that you are sending this message from the e-mail address to which you would like fcnl-news materials to be sent. If you currently receive this message via the fcnl-news mailing list and are no longer interested in receiving messages from this list, send an e-mail message to majordomo@his.com. The message should read "unsubscribe fcnl-news." -------------------------------------------- We seek a world free of war and the threat of war We seek a society with equity and justice for all We seek a community where every person's potential may be fulfilled We seek an earth restored... -------------------------------------------- ***************************************************************** 34 A Life of Albert Einstein May 7, 2002 TIMELINE By THE NEW YORK TIMES 1879 Born in Ulm, Germany. MID-1890’S Leaves Germany and renounces his citizenship. 1901 Einstein becomes a citizen of Switzerland and promptly flunks army physical. 1905 Publishes special theory of relativity with the famous formula E=mc2. World War I 1914 In April, Einstein moves to Berlin; when World War I breaks out four months later, he signs antiwar petition “Appeal to Europeans.” 1915 Joins antiwar club “Organization for a New Fatherland,” which is later declared illegal. NOV. 1915 Announces general theory of relativity, with gravity as warped space-time. 1918 Provides a refuge in his apartment for Dr. Georg Nicolai, left, a pacifist, biologist and “appeal” author, who deserted the German army and later escapes to Denmark. War’s End 1919 Observations of solar eclipse show bending of light, confirming general relativity. 1920 Laughs from balcony as relativity is denounced at right-wing meeting in Berlin. 1921 Visits U.S. with Chaim Weizmann, the Zionist leader, to raise money for a Hebrew University to be built in Jerusalem. 1922 Joins the League of Nations Committee on Intellectual Cooperation; Russian Communist Party denounces relativity as reactionary; Einstein receives the 1921 Nobel Prize. 1925 Joins Gandhi in manifesto against compulsory military service. 1933 Hitler assumes power; Einstein accepts appointment at Institute for Advanced Study, moves to Princeton. SEPT. 1933 Einstein tells London Times, “I have never favored Communism and do not favor it now.” FEB. 5, 1937 Says he is “ashamed” at lack of support for Loyalist Spain in Spanish Civil War. 1939 Writes to President Franklin D. Roosevelt calling attention to possibility of atomic bomb. World War II JUNE 22, 1940 Praises America in speech, saying, “In this country, it has been generations since men were subject to the humiliating necessity of unquestioning obedience.” JULY 26, 1940 Denied security clearance for Manhattan Project. OCT. 1, 1940 Becomes a U.S. citizen. 1943 Works as consultant for Navy on high explosives. MARCH 1945 Writes another letter to President Roosevelt introducing Leo Szilard, who wants to talk him out of dropping the bomb. Roosevelt dies before reading it. AUGUST 1945 U.S. attacks Japan with atomic bombs. Cold War Years MAY 1946 Einstein agrees to head Emergency Committee of Atomic Scientists, which raises money for antinuclear organizations. SEPT. 1946 Servies as co-chairman of American Crusade to End Lynching. 1947 Writes to Secretary of State George C. Marshall urging world government as the best deterrent against nuclear war. 1948 Praises ideas of Henry Wallace, right, an advocate of disarmament and Progressive Party candidate for president. MARCH 1949 Life magazine lists him among “dupes and fellow travelers.” MAY 1949 Publishes defense of socialism in Monthly Review magazine. “The crippling of individuals I consider the worst evil of capitalism.” JAN. 30, 1950 In response to Russian atomic bomb, President Harry S. Truman announces crash program to build hydrogen bomb. FEB. 2, 1950 Klaus Fuchs, right, is arrested for atomic espionage. FEB. 12, 1950 Appears on Eleanor Roosevelt's new television show warning that hydrogen bombs could result in the annihilation of life on earth. FEB. 23, 1951 Attends birthday party for W. E. B. DuBois, the historian and co-founder of the N.A.A.C.P., who is under indictment for refusing to register as a foreign agent. 1952 Is offered the presidency of Israel but declines. 1953 Urges clemency for the convicted spies Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. JUNE 12, 1953 Advises William Frauenglass, a New York schoolteacher, to refuse to testify before Senator Joseph McCarthy’s panel. APRIL 11, 1955 With Bertrand Russell, issues manifesto urging nations to renounce nuclear weapons: “There lies before us, if we choose, continued progress in happiness, knowledge, wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death, because we cannot forget our quarrels?” APRIL 18, 1955 Dies in Princeton. Sources: “The Einstein File,” by Fred Jerome; “The Expanded Quotable Einstein,” collected and edited by Alice Calaprice; “Einstein: A Life,” by Dennis Brian. Copyright 2002 The New York Times Company | Privacy Information ***************************************************************** 35 Nuclear team arrives in North Korea, but South talks off Tue May 7, 8:00 AM ET By Martin Nesirky SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea (news - web sites) said a team from an international consortium at the heart of a crucial nuclear agreement had arrived on Tuesday for talks on how to push forward a deal to build atomic power reactors for Pyongyang. Under a 1994 agreement, North Korea pledged to freeze a suspected nuclear weapons programme in exchange for two safer light-water reactors built by the West. The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation (KEDO), the New York-based consortium set up to build the reactors, cannot deliver critical equipment until U.N. inspections verify the North has no stockpiles of weapons-grade plutonium. This point has proved a stumbling block in talks. "A KEDO delegation arrived today by air to participate in the negotiations of experts for the implementation of the agreement of light-water reactors signed between the DPRK and KEDO," the North's official KCNA news agency said in a one-sentence report. DPRK is the acronym for North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. It was not immediately clear what the agenda for the talks was, notably whether inspections would be discussed. A spokesman at the South Korean Unification Ministry said he was not aware of the visit. KEDO compromises the United States, South Korea (news - web sites), Japan, the European Union (news - web sites) and other states. The KEDO delegation's arrival came on the day the North was supposed to have started talks in Seoul on economic cooperation. South Korean President Kim Dae-jung (news - web sites) urged North Korea on Tuesday to live up to the deal it struck with Seoul's special envoy last month and hold the talks as soon as possible. North Korea said on Monday it was pulling out of the talks, after blaming South Korean Foreign Minister Choi Sung-hong for making "reckless remarks" on a recent U.S. trip. The envoy, Lim Dong-won, held five hours of talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il last month. They agreed to restart North-South contacts that had been stalled for months. German politician Hartmut Koschyk told reporters in Seoul on Tuesday he and six other parliamentarians from the Bundestag lower house had not picked up signals North Korea was about to pull the plug on the talks during a visit to Pyongyang last week. ASTONISHMENT "I want to express our astonishment that the North Korean side cancelled the economic talks planned for today," he said. "We consider the cancellation to be a pretext." Political analysts said the North Korean decision to pull out of the North-South talks could carry a silver lining if it meant the North wanted to focus on talks with the United States. That assessment applies equally to KEDO talks, which have tended to go more smoothly than dialogue with Washington. The pace of North Korea diplomacy has picked up in recent weeks. An EU team is expected to follow up later this month or in June on a ministerial visit last year, Koschyk told Reuters. Sepp Blatter, the head of world soccer's governing body FIFA, was also visiting the North this week. KCNA said he met North Korea's number two leader Kim Young-nam. South Korea is co-hosting the World Cup soccer finals with Japan from May 31 to June 30. North Korea did not even enter the qualifying tournament but Seoul has been keen to have at least a delegation from the North watch some of the matches. Blatter's visit is complicated by sharp differences between him and the head of the South Korean Football Association, Chung Mong-joon, over how FIFA is governed. On Wednesday, Chung, a FIFA vice-president, may announce his own trip to the North, soccer officials said. Political analysts say that trip could be undertaken with Park Geun-hye, daughter of former military ruler Park Chung-hee. North Korea's KCNA news agency confirmed on Tuesday she would visit Pyongyang on Saturday. Chung and Park are thought to be considering a joint third-party bid for December's presidential election. President Kim is in his last year of his single-term presidency. The North's announcement pulling out of the talks was a blow to his efforts to revive his "Sunshine Policy" of engaging North Korea. It also came just days after families divided since the 1950-53 Korean War met in a tentative start to renewed links and the United Nations (news - web sites) raised the spectre of more malnutrition when it said it would have to cut back food supplies unless rich countries donated more cash for aid. North Korea may also wish to avoid discussing a dam on its territory which the South says is in danger of collapsing and inundating southern regions. KCNA reported on Tuesday the North's environment ministry had said the dam was built to be "a monumental edifice of eternal value" and was perfectly safe. Copyright © 2002 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or ***************************************************************** 36 Nuclear Team in North Korea, but South Talks Off ABCNEWS.com : May 7, 2002 — By Martin Nesirky SEOUL (Reuters) - North Korea said a team from an international consortium at the heart of a crucial nuclear agreement had arrived on Tuesday for talks on how to push forward a deal to build atomic power reactors for Pyongyang. Under a 1994 agreement, North Korea pledged to freeze a suspected nuclear weapons program in exchange for two safer light-water reactors built by the West. The Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO), the New York-based consortium set up to build the reactors, cannot deliver critical equipment until U.N. inspections verify the North has no stockpiles of weapons-grade plutonium. This point has proved a stumbling block in talks. "A KEDO delegation arrived today by air to participate in the negotiations of experts for the implementation of the agreement of light-water reactors signed between the DPRK and KEDO," the North's official KCNA news agency said in a one-sentence report. DPRK is the acronym for North Korea's official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. It was not immediately clear what the agenda for the talks was, notably whether inspections would be discussed. A spokesman at the South Korean Unification Ministry said he was not aware of the visit. KEDO compromises the United States, South Korea, Japan, the European Union and other states. The KEDO delegation's arrival came on the day the North was supposed to have started talks in Seoul on economic cooperation. South Korean President Kim Dae-jung urged North Korea on Tuesday to live up to the deal it struck with Seoul's special envoy last month and hold the talks as soon as possible. North Korea said on Monday it was pulling out of the talks, after blaming South Korean Foreign Minister Choi Sung-hong for making "reckless remarks" on a recent U.S. trip. The envoy, Lim Dong-won, held five hours of talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il last month. They agreed to restart North-South contacts that had been stalled for months. German politician Hartmut Koschyk told reporters in Seoul on Tuesday he and six other parliamentarians from the Bundestag lower house had not picked up signals North Korea was about to pull the plug on the talks during a visit to Pyongyang last week. ASTONISHMENT "I want to express our astonishment that the North Korean side canceled the economic talks planned for today," he said. "We consider the cancellation to be a pretext." Political analysts said the North Korean decision to pull out of the North-South talks could carry a silver lining if it meant the North wanted to focus on talks with the United States. That assessment applies equally to KEDO talks, which have tended to go more smoothly than dialogue with Washington. The pace of North Korea diplomacy has picked up in recent weeks. An EU team is expected to follow up later this month or in June on a ministerial visit last year, Koschyk told Reuters. Sepp Blatter, the head of world soccer's governing body FIFA, was also visiting the North this week. KCNA said he met North Korea's number two leader Kim Young-nam. South Korea is co-hosting the World Cup soccer finals with Japan from May 31 to June 30. North Korea did not even enter the qualifying tournament but Seoul has been keen to have at least a delegation from the North watch some of the matches. Blatter's visit is complicated by sharp differences between him and the head of the South Korean Football Association, Chung Mong-joon, over how FIFA is governed. On Wednesday, Chung, a FIFA vice-president, may announce his own trip to the North, soccer officials said. Political analysts say that trip could be undertaken with Park Geun-hye, daughter of former military ruler Park Chung-hee. North Korea's KCNA news agency confirmed on Tuesday she would visit Pyongyang on Saturday. Chung and Park are thought to be considering a joint third-party bid for December's presidential election. President Kim is in his last year of his single-term presidency. The North's announcement pulling out of the talks was a blow to his efforts to revive his "Sunshine Policy" of engaging North Korea. It also came just days after families divided since the 1950-53 Korean War met in a tentative start to renewed links and the United Nations raised the spectre of more malnutrition when it said it would have to cut back food supplies unless rich countries donated more cash for aid. North Korea may also wish to avoid discussing a dam on its territory which the South says is in danger of collapsing and inundating southern regions. KCNA reported on Tuesday the North's environment ministry had said the dam was built to be "a monumental edifice of eternal value" and was perfectly safe. (Additional reporting by Judy Lee and Kim Myong-hwan) photo credit and caption: South Korea's Foreign Minister Choi Sung-hong is seen in this May 2, 2002 picture. North Korea said on May 6 that it was pulling out of economic cooperation talks planned for this week in Seoul, and it blamed the South Korean foreign minister for making 'reckless remarks' during a recent visit to Washington. Photo by Lee Jae Won/Reuters Copyright 2002 Reuters News Service. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 37 SNS millions spent statewide; what, then, is 'spallation'? The Oak Ridger Online - Opinion - Dick Smyser -- 05/07/02 Editor's License Dick Smyser Things I learned at the Spallation Neutron Source open house at its offices on Scarboro Road a week ago today: + Much of the $1.4 billion cost of the project is being spent elsewhere in Tennessee. Like, up to March of this year, $73,280,887 in Knox County, $2,971,482 in Coffee County, $2,595,398 in Hamilton County, $994,665 in Sevier County, $716,315 in Shelby County, $392,398 in Davidson County, $127,751 in Loudon County and $61,454 in Roane County. The big expenditures in Knox County are labor and contractor costs. A major vendor for the vast amounts of piping needed is in Hamilton County. The Coffee County sum is primarily for computer software from Tullahoma. + Of the six national laboratories collaborating on the project, the most people involved are, expectably, from Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Next largest personnel group is from Los Alamos National Laboratory and then, in order, from Brookhaven, Argonne, Lawrence Berkeley and Jefferson national labs. + This six-laboratory collaboration is expected to establish a precedent for future joint efforts by national labs. When the SNS is completed there will, of course, be a permanent operating staff -- about 400 -- here in Oak Ridge. The scientists involved from the other national labs, however, once their services are no longer needed for the SNS, will return to their research at their respective labs. There will be no need to lay off or relocate senior staff members as there would have been had all been from the ORNL staff. + Communication between the six laboratories has been greatly facilitated, and made more cost-efficient, through a special linkage using an already existing technology for inter-lab contact. On display at the open house was a television screen tuned to a conference room at Argonne north of Chicago. During a teleconference involving all six of the labs, that screen can be divided off into rectangles, one for each of the labs and with a control making it possible to focus on any particular individual participating at any of the six locations. Dan Ciarlette is the ORNL communications guru who devised the system which, because it uses the already existing lab hookup, saves thousands of dollars in what would otherwise be added transmission charges. + As of just recent months, the peak number of construction workers employed on the project -- 400 -- has been reached. This total will hold for the rest of this year and all of next year, construction work beginning to taper off in early 2004. Seventeen different unions allied in the Knoxville Building and Construction Trades Council are overseeing the recruitment of the workers who include boilermakers, bricklayers, carpenters, cement masons, electricians, insulators, ironworkers, laborers, millwrights, operating engineers, painters, plumbers, pipefitters, roofers, sheet metal workers, sprinkler fitters and teamsters. + Spallation, as described on a brochure passed out at the open house, is: "When a fast particle, such as a high-energy proton, bombards a heavy atomic nucleus (such as mercury), some neutrons are 'spalled,' or knocked out, in a nuclear reaction called spallation. Other neutrons are 'boiled off' as the bombarded nucleus heats up. It's something like throwing a baseball at a bucket of balls, resulting in a few being immediately ejected and many more bouncing around and falling out. For every proton striking the nucleus, 20 or 30 neutrons are expelled." And "What does this mean to me?" "Most people don't realize how much neutron-scattering research affects our everyday lives. For example, things like aircraft; credit cards; pocket calculators; compact discs, computer discs, and magnetic recording tapes; shatterproof windshields; adjustable seats; and satellite weather information for forecasts have all been improved by neutron-scattering research. Neutron research also provides insight into the behavior of materials used in biological systems, pharmaceuticals, high-temperature superconductors, powerful lightweight magnets, aluminum bridge decks, and stronger, lighter plastic products." * When might the public be invited to come see the SNS construction site atop Chestnut Ridge? Not for awhile, says Al Ekkebus, manager for user services. Currently the site is quite muddy, concrete trucks are coming and going and there is much other traffic in the area. It's just too dangerous for visitors now. * As an open house extra, the SNS staff offered tours of the RATS building located a few hundred yards up Scarboro Road. No, that's not a rodent research facility. RATS, surely one of Oak Ridge's more imaginatively devised acronyms, stands for Receiving, Acceptance, Testing and Storage. -- R Richard D. Smyser is founding editor of The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 38 Oil Supply, Nuclear Fusion Occupy G-8 Energy Ministers Environment News Service: DETROIT, Michigan, May 6, 2002 (ENS) - Energy ministers from the world's eight largest economies have formally recognized the critical importance of being prepared to respond to oil disruptions. Ministers from the Group of Eight (G-8) meeting here Thursday and Friday agreed that net oil importing countries must maintain emergency oil stocks and commit to coordinating their use during significant disruptions. In their final declaration, the G-8 energy ministers said, "We agreed on the importance of physical protection of energy facilities, as well as the value of flexible oil, gas, and electricity transport networks with multiple links between energy suppliers and consumers, to reduce the vulnerability to disruption of these critical resources." [Dhaliwal] Minister Natural Resources Canada, Herb Dhaliwal (Photo courtesy NRCan [http://www.nrcan.gc.ca/inter/index_e.html] ) The first G-8 gathering to focus on energy since a Moscow meeting four years ago, the meeting in Detroit is only the second G-8 energy ministerial meeting ever held. It is one of several meetings being held in the United States and Canada by G-8 ministers in advance of the G-8 Summit this summer. Canada hosts the 2002 Summit of the G-8. Presidents and Prime Ministers will be meeting in Kananaskis, Alberta on June 26 and 27. The countries participating are Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the Russian Federation, the United Kingdom and the United States. "We recognize the value to all of us when other countries, including those in Asia whose energy demand is projected to increase sharply, build similar stocks to improve their resilience in the face of oil supply disruptions," the ministers said, and pledged to share their experiences with other countries on effective means of doing so. The energy ministers affirmed the importance of both nuclear power and renewable energy technologies into the future. In his speech to the ministers, U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham said the Bush administration is seeking to develop nuclear fusion - the kind of reaction that powers the sun - as a "realistic source of energy." [Abraham] U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham (Photo courtesy DOE [http://www.energy.gov] ) Conventional nuclear power is based on the fission reaction that occurs when atoms are split. Fusion of atoms produces vast energy that, to date, has been uncontrollable for human use. "We are now engaged in serious consultation here in the United States and around the world on how best to pursue a fusion program. President Bush is particularly interested in the potential of the international effort known as ITER and has asked us to seriously consider American participation." The International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER [http://www.iter.org/] ) project is designed to demonstrate the scientific and technological feasibility of fusion energy for peaceful purposes. Scientists and engineers from Canada, Europe, Japan and Russia are working to complete the project by 2013. The United States took part until 1998. Abraham endorsed nuclear power as "one existing source of power that presents no emissions challenge at all." Nuclear power supplies 20 percent of the electric power in the United States; 30 percent in the United Kingdom, Germany and Japan; and 80 percent in France. The United States, France, Japan and others are working together to develop a Generation IV nuclear reactor with enhanced passive safety features and a simpler, more economical design, he said. "The new generation reactor will attempt to address the two principal objections to nuclear power: the danger of the release of radioactive materials, and the high initial capital investment required for construction of new plants." To solve problems of energy security, economic growth, and environmental protection, the G-8 ministers said their final declaration, "Most G-8 members stress the value of nuclear energy in this context, providing optimal safety and waste handling are ensured." Abraham forecast that over the next 20 years energy demand in G-8 countries will rise by 33 percent and in the developing world by 100 percent, bringing them nearly equal to G-8 consumption by 2020. "In the United States we project a 45 percent increase in electricity generating capacity over the next 20 years. That works out to between 1,300 and 1,900 new power plants. We will have to build more than one power plant a week, and the power lines to go with them, to meet our requirements," Abraham said. [nuclear] BNFL Chapelcross Magnox nuclear power station (Photo courtesy Freefoto.com [http://www.freefoto.com] ) Europe will have to build new generating capacity equivalent to its entire current electricity generating system in 20 years to meet projected demand, he said. Ensuring a secure energy supply and a capable infrastructure must be done in "an environmentally responsible manner," Abraham said. "Clearly, in striking the right balance between energy security and environmental performance, we must aim to make the environmental cost negligible and the energy for growth benefit significant." The G-8 is "making enormous progress in developing new technologies to address our environmental concerns," said Abraham. G-8 countries account for 60 percent of the world's total energy use consuming nearly 40 million barrels of oil per day, over half the total world demand, he told the ministers. He said the G-8 nations produce and consume 72 percent of the world's nuclear energy, 56 percent of its electricity; 43 percent of its coal and 68 percent of its natural gas. Over the next two decades, world oil consumption, about one-half of it for transportation, is projected to increase from about 75 million barrels per day in 1999 to about 120 million barrels per day in 2020, Abraham told the ministers. The infrastructure challenge is even more daunting, he added, with investment needs in the range of $2 trillion over the same period of time. [pipeline] The United States depends on the Trans Alaska Pipeline to deliver 17 percent of its domestic oil production. (Photo courtesy Alyeska Pipeline Service Company [http://www.alyeska-pipe.com/] ) "This rapid oil consumption growth raises concerns about global energy security, the risk of oil price shocks to the global economy, and local, regional, and global environmental quality," Abraham said. He said the United States is moving towards hydrogen fuel cell cars, the use of alternative fuels such as those derived from biomass, and energy efficient vehicles, including advanced engines, engine hybrid vehicles, and electric vehicles. Minister of Natural Resources Canada, Herb Dhaliwal, representing the world's largest exporter of uranium, said, "I was also very interested to hear the Secretary's comments about the administration's interest and possible re-entry to the ITER program. Canada has made a formal offer to host ITER [http://www.itercanada.com/] at the Clarington site near Toronto, Ontario. The Spanish government has decided to offer a candidature for the European siting of ITER at Vandellos, near Barcelona. [Hiranuma] Japan's Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Takeo Hiranuma (Photo courtesy Office of the Minister) On the global warming issue, Japan's Economy, Trade and Industry Minister Takeo Hiranuma asked the U.S. to return to the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, the international agreement on mandatory cuts to emissions of heat trapping greenhouse gases by industrialized countries, the Kyodo news agency reported. While acknowledging the importance of coping with global warming, Abraham reiterated that the U.S. will deal with the issue mainly through technological innovations, according to a Japanese official. The energy ministers were offered workshops such as the one on fuel cells and the potential for a hydrogen economy featuring Firoz Rasul, chairman and CEO of Ballard Power Systems of North Vancouver. The eight ministers underscored their reliance on free market practices to ensure enough clean electricity for all. "Ultimately," they declared, "success in enhancing energy efficiency and improving access by the public to clean energy technologies depends critically on private investment facilitated by sound policies. We therefore affirm the importance of working with developing countries to share experiences with respect to legal, policy and regulatory practices that can facilitate investment and access to energy." © Environment News Service (ENS) 2002. ***************************************************************** 39 ExxonMobil denies owing for cleanup 05/07/02 The Advocate News: By MIKE DUNNE [mdunne@theadvocate.com] Advocate staff writer ExxonMobil said a review of records connected to a radioactive spill on a former business site on Bayou Paul Road in St. Gabriel indicates it might not be responsible for paying part of a planned cleanup. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said it is continuing to negotiate with ExxonMobil and Kaiser Aluminum for payment of the cleanup of Coastal Radiation, a company that dismantled gauges and other industrial equipment that used radioactive materials, such as Cesium-137. "After an extensive review of the documentation of the records provided by the owner and the public records" available from government agencies, "ExxonMobil does not believe any of its material was released on that site," spokeswoman Carla Faulkner-Dana said recently. Meanwhile, Kaiser Aluminum spokesman Scott Lamb said, "We are indeed in ongoing discussions with EPA, and we look forward to continuing those discussions." EPA has already determined that nearby residents have not been harmed but that the level of cesium-137 radiation is still high enough to require cleaning up, EPA cleanup project manager Nancy Jones said. EPA did whole-body scans of nearby neighbors "and none of the residents showed any cesium in their bodies." EPA has estimated the cost of the cleanup at $1.5 million. "We are continuing to negotiate with the responsible parties to do cleanup or get a cash settlement" to pay for the cleanup, Jones said. "We don't want to spend Superfund money if we have potential responsible parties." Congress created Superfund by taxing the petrochemical industry to pay for cleanup of abandoned hazardous waste sites. The tax expired in 1995 and the fund is running low on money. Before fund money can be spent, EPA must try to find "potential responsible parties," or old customers of the defunct businesses, that could be asked to pay for cleanup of their old or improperly disposed wastes. Jones said EPA identified Kaiser and ExxonMobil as potential responsible parties. The owner of Coastal Radiation does not have the financial resources, she said. The site was cleaned in 1979 to an old standard of 500 millirems of exposure a year, but that standard is now down to only 25 millirems per year, according to the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality. Radiation exposure is measured in millirems. Models conducted by DEQ and EPA indicate exposure at the Coastal Radiation site could be as high as 100 millirems per year, or the equivalent of getting five to six chest X-rays a year. Officials say the radiation levels are about 25 percent more than what most people would be exposed to by "background" radiation in the Baton Rouge area. Last fall, EPA was ready to move forward on cleaning up about 4,800 cubic yards of radiation-contaminated dirt and concrete from the old site at 6745 Bayou Paul Road. But once it identified potential payers, it began negotiations. The only disposal site to which the contaminated soil can be sent is in Utah. It is limited in what it can take in each day, which could drag out the cleanup schedule, EPA officials have said. 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