***************************************************************** 11/13/02 **** RADIATION BULLETIN(RADBULL) **** VOL 10.294 ***************************************************************** RADBULL IS PRODUCED BY THE ABALONE ALLIANCE CLEARINGHOUSE ***************************************************************** Send News Stories to news@energy-net.org with title on subject line and first line of body NUCLEAR POLICY 1 Outcry in Ontario Over Energy Prices 2 Canada: Ontario Energy crsis continues to expand 3 US: Pollution from power plants expected to get worse 4 UN inspection team 'cannot prevent war' 5 N.Korea Says It Won't Move First in Nuclear Dispute 6 Pakistan blasts IAEA's double standards 7 How Dounreay's nuclear dream turned sour 8 UK: `130 years' before nuclear site safe 9 To Cooperate or to Obfuscate? 10 US: Bush Wins Homeland Bill Deal 11 US: DeLay in New Role As Majority Leader 12 Bush Warns Saddam Against 'Deceit' 13 Iraq Accepts Weapons Inspection Plan 14 US wants N Korea fuel cut 15 Israel is weaker than most think! 16 Ontario's energy strategy hinders OPG: Analysts 17 Russia interested in broadening ties with Iran 18 Ontario Power Generation's future in doubt after changes to 19 Former U.N. Weapons Inspectors Describe Iraq's Concealment 20 North Korea Won't Give Ground in Nuclear Flap NUCLEAR REACTORS 21 US: SC Ports Authority questioning ability to handle nuclear fuel re 22 NUCLEAR PLANT IS CLOSED BY SEAWEED 23 US: Indian Point 2 may lose yellow tag 24 Scotland: Nuclear plant leak sparks inquiry 25 Putin-dinner accompanied by anti-Kola NPP demonstration 26 US: County moves ahead on environmental study on Diablo Canyon 27 US: NRC Approves Power Uprate for H.B. Robinson Nuclear Plant 28 US: NRC OKs output hike for Carolina Power nuke plant NUCLEAR SAFETY 29 UK: Dounreay contamination alert 30 Japan: Corporate whistle-blowers still left out in the cold* 31 Officials say missing Uranium not harmful 32 UK: 20 workers contaminated at Dounreay nuclear plant 33 UK: Mystery deepens over future of controversial munitions site 34 Analysis: Russian cesium threat low* 35 Antiterrorism bill scraps nuclear safety funding 36 Radioactive scare at plant 37 "Collateral Damage" New Report From Medact on Consequences of War 38 US: Anti-Radiation Protection Pills Yet To Be Distributed 39 Opinion: Beryllium: Giving Kazakhstan the business - 40 Probe into radiation leak in Scotland 41 UK: 22 workers comtaminated at Dounreay 42 US: Leukemia study due in February NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE 43 Germans protest against nuclear waste convoy 44 Britain to publish draft bill on nuclear cleanup 45 Protesters Delay Nuclear Waste Load 46 US: Nebraska Earthquake Raises Questions About Proposed Nuclear Wast 47 Russia to remove all spent nuclear fuel from Kola Peninsula 48 US: CCAT: Close, clean up Cotter 11-12-02 49 Train loaded with nuclear waste arrives in Germany - 50 US: Hansen's Effort to Block Nuclear Waste Dies 51 US: Editorial: Legislators must unite over Yucca 52 Britain to publish draft bill on nuclear cleanup NUCLEAR WEAPONS 53 Disclose and dispose 54 Russia: Typhoons being repaired to operate until 2010 55 Author of Chinese nuclear arms book fights U.S. censors 56 US: Disarming disclosures -- The Washington Times 57 US: Brian Greenspun: Truth about our war US DEPT. OF ENERGY 58 DOE: new testing controversy 59 Oregon prepared to fight DOE to protect Columbia 60 Fluor Hanford speeding pace of spent fuel removal 61 SRS head says layoffs won't all come at once* 62 Citizens group makes demands to inspect Livermore... 63 Peace activists seek lab inspection 64 Beta 3 off the chopping block 65 DOE, ORNL expanding use of U-233 66 Good news so far for U-233 supply 67 Public meetings for EPA sampling in Scarboro OTHER NUCLEAR 68 G.O.P. Decides to Delay Spending Bills Till January 69 Native people struggle with mining Co. 70 New York Museum Celebrates Life of Einstein ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** FULL NEWS STORIES ***************************************************************** ***************************************************************** 1 Outcry in Ontario Over Energy Prices The New York Times November 13, 2002* *By BERNARD SIMON* TORONTO, Nov. 12 ? Across much of North America this fall, electricity bills are being held in check by a slack economy and intense competition among producers. But not in Ontario, where politicians are scrambling to quell a public outcry over soaring power prices. Six months after deregulating its power market in hopes of promoting competition and encouraging investment in new capacity, the government of Ontario, Canada's most populous and industrialized province, backtracked late Monday and said it would freeze retail electricity rates for the next four years. Households and small businesses will be given rebates averaging about 75 Canadian dollars ($47.79) to compensate for the surge in electricity bills since the start of deregulation in May, the government said. It also froze the fees local distribution companies charge customers for delivering power from producers to them, reversing an earlier decision to allow them to rise gradually. "We have to smooth out the bumps along the road to a competitive market," John Baird, the province's energy minister, explained. Critics said they saw in the decision the seeds of a crisis like California's in 2001. A price freeze, they said, would significantly increase the risk of blackouts in coming months, and threaten the financial stability of some utilities. "The retreat is so dramatic," said Tom Adams, executive director of Energy Probe, a Toronto research and consulting firm. "It would be positively hazardous for anyone to lay down their cash here in any form of long-term investment." With the ruling Progressive Conservative party trailing in public opinion polls, Mr. Adams said, the government's action looked like a political ploy. An election is expected to be called here within 18 months. Electric bills have become a major issue for many businesses, from hotel operators to mushroom growers. The situation is "a mess," said Gregory Gray, operations manager at Money's Mushrooms near Campbellville, west of Toronto. Mr. Gray's company produces 22 million pounds of mushrooms a year, using large amounts of electricity for climate control in its greenhouses. He said the power bill in August was 40 percent higher than the year before, and the September bill will probably be more than double. High demand in an unusually warm summer was partly to blame for big power bills, analysts said. But the volatile prices and the deepening financial problems experienced by many North American utilities since the collapse of Enron have also exposed flaws in the government's blueprint for the power sector. "It is important to recognize that the world in which we operate is much different than the world in which the Ontario market was created," said Duane Cramer, vice president of Sithe Energies, a New York-based power producer, at a conference here last month. Sithe is a unit of Vivendi Universal . Sithe recently shelved plans to build two power stations on the outskirts of Toronto. "We've spent much of the past year spinning our wheels, and we've run out of rationales to continue spending money," Mr. Cramer said. According to Rocco Sebastiano, a lawyer at Osler Hoskin & Harcourt who specializes in energy matters, "there isn't the appetite in the marketplace to make significant investments in energy these days." Despite deregulation, Ontario's power market is still dominated by two government-owned companies. One, Ontario Power Generation, was created to take over the power plants owned by the old provincial monopoly, Ontario Hydro, when the monopoly was broken up in 1999; the other, Hydro One, was created at the same time to take over Ontario Hydro's transmission network. Hydro One was supposed to be floated in an initial public offering, but unions and advocacy groups heatedly opposed the sale, and Ernie Eves, the provincial premier, called it off shortly after taking office. Instead, the government is trying to find a buyer for a stake of up to 49 percent in Hydro One. To increase competition, the government ordered Ontario Power Generation to give up control over at least 4,000 megawatts of generating capacity over the next three years, about one-sixth of its total capacity. By 2012, Ontario Power is meant to control no more than 35 percent of the province's electricity supply; it now has more than 75 percent. But the government recently forced Ontario Power to cancel a proposed sale of two coal-fired power plants because the buyers would not promise to convert them to run on natural gas or another energy source cleaner than coal. The power picture has not been helped by delays in getting a nuclear plant at Pickering, east of Toronto, running again. The plant, which can produce 2,060 megawatts of power in all, has been closed since 1997 because of safety concerns. The first of the four generating units was to be restarted before deregulation began, but Ontario Power now says it will not come online until the spring. In the meantime, Ontario has had to buy power from neighboring provinces and from the United States at greater cost. Refurbishing the Pickering plant has also eroded Ontario Power's profits, with much of the rising cost, now estimated at about 2.3 billion Canadian dollars ($1.47 billion), charged off as operating expenses. As a result, the company made no contribution last year toward paying down the 20.1 billion Canadian dollars in "stranded debt" that the province assumed from Ontario Hydro to make its two successor companies more attractive to outside investors. According to Mr. Sebastiano, Ontario Power "hasn't moved to market-driven forces ? they're still in a monopoly position." At the time of deregulation, the government said rising prices would curtail demand and be self-correcting. Mr. Baird said today that he now expected demand to be held in check by conservation. To set an example, the government said it would use only half the usual number of Christmas lights to decorate the giant tree at the provincial legislature. Copyright The New York Times Company ***************************************************************** 2 Canada: Ontario Energy crsis continues to expand November 13, 2002 04:28 AM ET HONG KONG (Reuters) - North Korea will not move first to scrap its nuclear weapons program, and insists the U.S. sign a non-aggression pact before it answers Washington's concerns, the North's Consul-General in Hong Kong said on Wednesday. "We want the United States to legally guarantee a non-aggression treaty, then our side is ready to address the U.S. security concerns," Consul-General Ri To Sop told Reuters. His statement was a strong reassertion of Pyongyang's position, just ahead of a Thursday meeting in New York between the U.S., South Korea, Japan, and the European Union on whether to halt fuel oil exports to North Korea for its admission that it still had an active nuclear weapons program. Washington has not yet managed to line up clear regional support from Japan, South Korea, Russia and China to force Pyongyang to comply. <#> South Korea said earlier Wednesday it favored continuing oil shipments through the winter. "Now, we are ready for war or dialogue. We prefer dialogue but we will not move first. We will not beg for recognition from the hostile side," the Consul-General said. In October, the United States presented North Korea with evidence it was enriching uranium, part of the process in making an atomic bomb, and said it had violated a 1994 agreement to freeze such work in exchange for oil shipments and two light water reactors. Such reactors cannot be easily used to produce nuclear weapons material. ***************************************************************** 6 Pakistan blasts IAEA's double standards *UNITED* NATIONS: Pakistan on Monday criticized the International Atomic Energy Agency's (IAEA) double standards by denying access to the latest nuclear technology for peaceful purposes to developing countries. Drawing attention of the world community to the disparities in the application of the IAEA principles, especially with regard to the developing countries, Pakistan's Ambassador to the United Nations, Munir Akram, addressing the UN General Assembly convened to discuss the agency's report said: "Undue restrictions on the transfer of nuclear technology for energy, health and agriculture purposes is bound to affect the economic and social development of the developing countries." Mr Akram said that the crucial relationship between peace, economic growth and technology could not be overemphasized. He observed that the "economic growth is synonymous with the availability of easy and affordable sources of energy." Referring to the report of the Director-General of IAEA on the "Nuclear Security - Progress of Measures to Protect against Nuclear Terrorism" Akram said: "We have taken careful note of the recommendations concerning nuclear materials falling into the hands of terrorists". Stressing that while precautionary measures should be taken by the states which possess nuclear materials, facilities and technology, the IAEA should also address real concerns regarding so-called "Nuclear Terrorism." "It should not be used to serve partisan political objectives. The global focus should not be allowed to be shifted from the priority goal of complete nuclear disarmament by all states," Mr Akram added. He said: "Pakistan's limited hydro fossil fuel resources are insufficient to cater for an ever-increasing demand for energy therefore, nuclear power generation is an indispensable element of our national energy strategy. Mr Akram said that Pakistan wants to build safeguarded nuclear power plants and seeks the cooperation and assistance of the member states of the IAEA, and had embarked upon the second phase of the projects for the Karachi Nuclear Power Plant and the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant. "We believe that the construction and operation of a Nuclear Power Plant not only has direct economic advantages but creates thousands of job opportunities", he added. He said being a founding member of the IAEA, Pakistan has always upheld the goals and objectives of the Agency. The IAEA's role in the process of economic development through the enhanced contribution of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes is universally acknowledged. While observing that "technology, safety and verification remain the three pillars of the IAEA's mandate and that it should discharge those responsibilities fully, Mr Akram however, said that the IAEA must not lose the balance which is required between the various facets of its mandate and functions. He said that it was unfortunate that one found disparities in the application of the IAEA standards and principles, with regard to the developing countries. "Despite their adherence to safety norms, they are denied access to the latest technologies relating to nuclear energy. Undue restrictions on the transfer of nuclear technology for energy, health and agriculture purposes is bound to affect the economic and social development of the developing countries', he added. Copyright 1996-2002 . Hi Pakistan. All rights reserved. ***************************************************************** 7 How Dounreay's nuclear dream turned sour Scotsman.com Wed 13 Nov 2002 Dounreay?s original slogan ? /Atoms for Peace/ ? faltered and safety fears have turned the dream of jobs for the north and cheap power for Britain into a nightmare. /JAMES DOHERTY/ IT IS going to cost more than £4 billion in an operation lasting 60 years to decommission Dounreay. The land around the site at Caithness could remain out of bounds for more than 300 years. But more pressing is the persistent threat to the health of local people and workers, who have been exposed to a catalogue of near disasters since work started on the experimental reactor in March 1955. The plant was seen as a Godsend at a time when the north needed jobs and the dangers of the nuclear age were played down in favour of the potential benefits. However, in 1984, fears were first raised by locals concerned by their atomic neighbour. It was then that the first granular sand-sized specks of plutonium were found to be leaking out of the plant and on to the beaches of Caithness. Several hundred particles have been discovered since, with one government report concluding that ?fatalities might occur?, and that such hot spots ?present a real hazard to health?. As well as finding particles on private land, many have been identified on Sandside beach, a public site. The discovery of a particle off-shore led to a fishing ban within 2kms of Dounreay in 1997. The UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) said it could ?probably narrow it [the leak] down? to a waste shaft or an old underwater effluent treatment chamber and that the chances of exposure to the particles was negligible. But if such exposure did occur, it caused skin blistering. The hot-spots were probably a legacy of the treatment of nuclear fuel in the Sixties and Seventies. It is believed that 100,000 particles may been discharged in a single incident, probably in 1963, from either the waste shaft or effluent chamber. Another serious breach occurred in May 1977, when a shaft containing radioactive waste exploded, blowing off a huge concrete lid and blasting scaffolding poles up to 40 metres away. The explosion was caused by water flooding the shaft and reacting violently with sodium and potassium buried along with the waste. No-one will ever know for sure the extent of the contamination, but as the controversy raged, pressure from the public led to investigations. In 1994, a UKAEA study revealed levels of plutonium in the homes of Dounreay workers ?significantly? higher than in other homes in Thurso. Workers at the plant had been carrying home plutonium particles ? readings were 50 times higher in 21 out of the 34 homes monitored. By then, Dounreay had absorbed its second generation of local workers. Another investigation began in 1997, but two years later, the UKAEA would be accused of ?dragging its feet?. In 1998, the Health and Safety Executive made 143 recommendations on safety, quality, environmental systems and an integrated management system. Safety has been the most contentious issue surrounding the reactor, with the UKAEA fined £101,000 in 2000 on three charges of contaminating three workers in 1995. They were also fined on a separate charge after a contractor?s mechanical digger severed a power cable, cutting off the electricity supply in May 1998. Today?s safety concerns are a far cry from the optimism and faith placed in the all-powerful fast breeder reactors. The slogan at the time was ?atoms for peace?. Hundreds of scientists and engineers moved to the remote northern town of Thurso to be part of a bold and appealing venture aimed at providing limitless amounts of electricity at negligible cost, by using plutonium instead of uranium as a fuel, extracting energy with 60 times more efficiency. The plutonium created by the burning of uranium in ordinary reactors could be used to power the world. However, the scientists of the Fifties and Sixties did not always take the proper precautions, and 1,000 tonnes of radioactive junk thrown down a shaft dug 65 metres into the cliff-top would later provide the fuel for the 1977 explosion. But the fast reactor did not work and fell from favour, with the cost of extracting energy from plutonium higher than alternatives. ?The nuclear industry?s holy grail came to a graceless end,? said anti-nuclear campaigners ? but, as the latest contamination shows, its radioactive threat shows little sign of dissipating. *Related Articles: Nuclear incidents * ***************************************************************** 8 UK: `130 years' before nuclear site safe Nov 13 2002 The Western Mail A PUBLIC inquiry into a proposed radioactive waste store at Trawsfynydd nuclear power station heard yesterday it could take 130 years before the site is restored. Magnox Electric PLC want to build a £80m store at Trawsfynydd, Gwynedd. It would be used to store intermediate level nuclear waste (ILW) on the site. Plans were submitted to Snow-donia National Park Authority in July last year but were called in by Environment Minister Sue Essex after widespread opposition. Yesterday the first day of the month-long inquiry was held at the Memorial Hall, Penrhyndeudraeth, headed by inspector Keith Durrant. He will report to the Assembly, who will decide on the application. Guy Roots QC gave the opening statement on behalf of Magnox. He said there is a significant quantity of "operational" ILW at Trawsfynydd which needs to be stored. At present there is no facility to keep in Britain . The store would only be for waste generated at Trawsfynydd, he said. Mr Roots said nuclear disposal agency Nirex had been given the task of finding both a location and a method of final disposal of inter-mediate level waste, but without success. He said, "The operational ILW must, therefore, be stored safely at Trawsfynydd for as long as it takes the Government to fulfil the task." Possible dismantling of nuclear reactors sooner than the 135 years is being considered in a Nuclear Installations Inspectorate review. Dr Paul Woollam, head of the decommissioning and liabilities unit at BNFL Magnox said it was clear there would not a deep waste site "in the next couple of decades". He warned if planning permission was refused, the deferred option would still be preferred but the re-actor would remain in its present state needing extensive refurbishment to remain safe. A number of objectors to the plans, including the Council for National Parks say planning permission should be refused. © owned by or licensed to Trinity Mirror Plc 2002 icWales^TM is a trade mark of Trinity Mirror Plc. ***************************************************************** 9 To Cooperate or to Obfuscate? Opinion / Comment [http://book.moscowtimes.ru/index.htm] Wednesday, Nov. 13, 2002. Page 10 By Dennis Ross The UN Security Council has spoken, and U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell is receiving well-deserved praise for producing a unanimous vote for a tough resolution. But President George W. Bush had it right: The hard part begins now. As the president has said, there have been 16 Security Council resolutions against Iraq, and Saddam Hussein has not disarmed. This, the president has declared, is his last chance. Will Hussein see it that way? Will there be a moment of truth, and, if so, when will it come? Hussein has demonstrated unmistakably over the past 11 years that he is determined to possess weapons of mass destruction. At any point during this period he could have had sanctions lifted if he had been prepared to do what was required of him by the cease-fire resolutions that ended the Persian Gulf War: reveal all his WMD programs, plans and capabilities and accept disarmament. From the beginning he failed the test of Security Council Resolution 687 of April 1991 when he refused to turn over all the documentation on the location of facilities, components and subcomponents of his WMD programs. From the beginning, he failed in his responsibility to cooperate with the inspection regime. The inspectors were not supposed to find his programs; he was supposed to reveal them. Instead, he hid them and continued to engage in their development even while UN inspectors were in the country. His determination to preserve his WMD capabilities was not about avoiding humiliation, as some suggest. Rather, it was about preserving his ability to pursue his regional ambitions and designs. In particular, Hussein has viewed nuclear weapons as the necessary shield behind which he will be protected as he reverts to the practice of invading his neighbors when he decides his interests require it. Will we be so quick to try to stop him once he has nuclear weapons? He calculates that we will be deterred, given the costs to our troops, and he is determined to acquire this capability. But is he determined to acquire this capability if it means his own demise? Many have said that Hussein is homicidal, not suicidal, and that when faced with the alternatives of survival or acceptance of disarmament, he will accept disarmament. Maybe, but I doubt Hussein feels he is truly being faced with that choice. In his mind, he believes he has been able to maneuver inspection regimes before, and this one, despite the toughened language and anywhere-anytime provisions, ultimately will be no different. And he may be right. For the key to the success of the inspection regime is Iraq's cooperation, and that is the test the administration must emphasize. The moment of truth will thus come for the resolution and for Hussein not at the moment the inspectors go to Iraq. It will come when Iraq, on Dec. 8, must provide a full accounting of all its WMD sites, programs, capabilities, developments and personnel. Hussein will certainly try to create the impression that he is complying with the resolution. No doubt he will turn over voluminous quantities of documents; he may even turn over materials he has heretofore hidden. But he will not turn over the crown jewels of his WMD programs -- especially in the nuclear and biological areas. He will count on the chief inspectors -- Hans Blix and Mohamed El Baradei -- not wanting to declare he is in violation of his obligations before they have even sent full inspection teams into Iraq. The temptation on the part of the inspectors will be to declare that Iraq has taken a step in the right direction and that they remain willing to work with it, but that it is of course up to the Security Council to decide whether Iraq is in compliance and what steps to take. Will France and Russia be willing to declare this is the moment for the use of force? Unlikely. But there should be no mistake about the consequences of letting Hussein get away with a partial disclosure of his WMD programs and efforts after 30 days. He will know that he can continue to hide what he is doing, that it will be tolerated, and that the new resolution will be more about containing what he is doing than about disarming him. Maybe he will understand that it will be more difficult to pursue his aim -- and that he will have to pursue it with even greater stealth -- but he will also believe that the game remains, and that he need not stop pursuing nuclear weapons and more destructive means of delivering biological and chemical agents. Regardless of the inspection regime, the prospect of finding what he does not want us to find is very limited without help from those in Iraq who know where the most sensitive work is being done. And unfortunately, the message that partial disclosure will be tolerated is hardly likely to encourage them to step forward -- even if the inspectors can insist on talking to scientists and others without their Iraqi minders. (Bear in mind that Blix has already indicated that he sees problems with bringing such Iraqi scientists, officials and their families outside the country.) All this does not mean we are now trapped by the resolution. But it does mean that the stakes in ensuring full disclosure on Dec. 8 are very high. If disarmament is the objective, the only possibility of achieving it without war will depend on Hussein's understanding that anything less than full disclosure is, in fact, the trigger for war. Anything less than that will put us on a slippery slope that allows Hussein to play for time, make sure the inspectors find nothing in the early going -- or find only what he wants them to find to "prove" he is cooperating. President Bush has set the stage for disarmament. Now he must condition the French, the Russians and the rest of the world to understand that the moment of truth comes not with the inspectors' arrival but with the character of Iraq's disclosure on Dec. 8. Dennis Ross was director for policy planning in the State Department under President George H.W. Bush and special Middle East coordinator under President Bill Clinton. He is now counselor for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He contributed this comment to The Washington Post. © Copyright 2002, The Moscow Times. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 10 Bush Wins Homeland Bill Deal Las Vegas SUN Today: November 13, 2002 at 5:40:15 PST By JANELLE CARTER ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON- In a sign of President Bush's post-election muscle, congressional negotiators have reached a deal to create a homeland security department, ending a stalemate between Democrats and Republicans. Officials said the Republican-controlled House is likely to pass the measure sometime Wednesday. The Senate, currently controlled by Democrats, is expected to begin debate, although final passage could be delayed into next week. Passage had been held up because of a fight between Bush and Senate Democrats over provisions of the legislation dealing with worker rights. Bush insisted that broad powers were needed to manage the 170,000-employee agency and that he needed relief from some civil service rules covering labor issues. According to a description of the agreement circulating on Capitol Hill, the bill would take a small step to address complaints by Senate Democrats that the agency's workers would lack sufficient job protection. It would require the department to negotiate any workplace changes with the employees' union and require federal mediation if no agreement was reached. But in the end, the department could make whatever changes it wanted - the flexibility the president has sought. The agreement came as lawmakers scrambled to complete work in a lame-duck session that followed last week's stunning congressional victories for Republicans, who retained control of the House while taking back the reins of the Senate. Armed with that power, GOP lawmakers were to elect their leadership teams Wednesday. Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi and House Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois will remain the party's top congressional leaders. Passage of the homeland security legislation would be the first show of Republicans' new congressional power, and it would give a major legislative victory to Bush, who has made its completion a top priority. "I believe we can get this done. I believe Congress can show the country that they can finish their work on a high note of achievement," Bush said Tuesday after a day of meetings spent prodding congressional leaders to complete the bill. The measure would combine nearly two dozen federal agencies into a new department. They would include the Coast Guard, Customs Service, the Secret Service, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and much of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. The Republican-controlled House on July 26 passed a bill creating a department largely along the lines Bush envisioned, but the Senate version stalled as Democrats fought for tougher union rights for the agency's workers. The latest compromise measure includes language that would allow airline pilots to be armed in cockpits, another proposal that became popular after the Sept. 11 attacks. Initial versions of that plan have already passed the House and Senate, but the two chambers have not finished a compromise bill. The bill would also allow a one-year delay in the Jan. 1 deadline for airports to screen all luggage for explosives, and let the new agency do business with American companies that move offshore to avoid U.S. taxes if there are national or economic security reasons to do so, congressional aides said. The bill would drop Senate language that would have established an independent commission to investigate why U.S. authorities failed to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks, congressional aides said. A spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle said he believes the worker protections do not go far enough but plans to bring the bill to the floor because the new department is needed. It appears the bill has enough votes to pass the Senate, Daschle's office said. "There may be differences of opinion on different components of the legislation but there is no disagreement that we need to complete our work on this bill promptly," Daschle, D-S.D., said in a written statement. In other business, congressional leaders were moving to postpone action on spending bills until at least January. Lawmakers plan to push legislation this week that would keep agencies open until Jan. 11 to give House and Senate appropriators more time to complete spending bills. Only two of the 13 spending bills for the federal budget year that started Oct. 1 have been approved, and the current temporary measure expires Nov. 22. House and Senate Democrats are expected to elect their party leaders on Thursday. Rep. Nancy Pelosi of California is expected to be voted minority leader in the House, replacing Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri, who is stepping down. Daschle is expected to be re-elected by Senate Democrats. On the Net: Homeland security office: http://www.whitehouse.gov/homeland/ [http://www.whitehouse.gov/homeland/] All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 11 DeLay in New Role As Majority Leader Las Vegas SUN Today: November 13, 2002 at 5:40:16 PST By SUZANNE GAMBOA ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON- Soon to take over the House majority leader's office, Republican Tom DeLay is moving up to a position where his hard-nosed, take-no-hostages approach to politics may not fit his job title. Even friends say DeLay, already viewed by some as the most powerful Republican in Congress, will need to adopt a softer style. "You are going to see a kinder, gentler Tom Delay," said Grover Norquist, president of Americans For Tax Reform and a conservative movement leader. DeLay, 55, is unopposed in his effort to succeed retiring Majority Leader Dick Armey, another Texas Republican. DeLay will officially become No. 2 in the House GOP leadership behind Speaker Dennis Hastert of Illinois when the party caucuses on Wednesday. "It's a different role," DeLay said in an interview. He also said he's grown as a leader during the past eight in the party's No. 3 job in the House as whip, responsible for maintaining party discipline on votes. As whip, "the report card is every day on that board and it is a lot more intense," he said. "You have to produce every day, all day long and you don't have the time or the luxury of sitting back. I see the majority leader's job as a floor leader. Now I'll be able to take the time to work with the (committee) chairmen to effect policy and set an agenda." In his 18 years in Congress, DeLay has never been shy about pushing the conservative agenda, in the process cementing his position as their leader and proving himself an effective and shrewd tactician. The former pest exterminator earned the moniker "the Hammer" for his own brand of persuasion in soliciting campaign contributions on behalf of GOP candidates and in pressing trade associations not to hire Democrats after Republicans swept control of the House in 1994. He was instrumental in the failed coup attempt by conservatives against former Speaker Newt Gingrich in 1997 and later helped engineer the elevation of Hastert, then a deputy whip, to the speaker's job after Republicans lost five seats in the 1998 election. DeLay also was the leader behind the House Republicans' decision to seek impeachment rather than censure of President Clinton in the Monica Lewinsky affair. Norquist said DeLay had to be confrontational because Clinton was in the White House during most of his tenure as whip. "Now there'll be less confrontation and he will be able to accomplish his Reagan Republican agenda by being cheerful, pleasant and even-handed," Norquist said. "When you are winning you always smile more. He will smile more." Some say that transition already has begun. Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia Center for Politics, said DeLay began trying to change his image to that of loyal supporter upon President Bush's election. "The real test will come in January, when he becomes majority leader. Will he be able to continue defering to the White House and the speaker? If he is smart, he will," Sabato said. Back home in Texas last April, DeLay drew some criticism for advising an audience in a speech at a Baptist Church not to send their children to Baylor or Texas A. A spokesman said the advice pertained to parents who want children to be taught creationism. It was later revealed that DeLay had been kicked out of Baylor for his own college behavior. DeLay, who earned his degree in biology from the University of Houston in 1970, remains popular in his Houston suburban district, winning 63 percent of the vote in last week's election. "In some parts of the country, including my own, it is not a pleaser that the guy who is running the House of Representatives doesn't believe in evolution," said Rep. Zoe Lofgren, D-Calif. "He has run this House for quite some time. He selected the speaker and he calls the shots and having that known in the country is a good thing." Republicans point to DeLay's adeptness at building personal relationships and skill in molding devotion to the party's agenda - going so far as to have food and refreshments on hand for Republicans when Congress is working late. "I think Tom's reputation has never adequately reflected the way he works," said Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., a DeLay loyalist who moves up to House majority whip. "This whole idea of 'the Hammer' - you can't hammer respected members of Congress. You have to have lots of patience. You have to be able to understand their problems and convince them of work that needs to be done." On the Net: http://majoritywhip.house.gov [http://majoritywhip.house.gov] All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 12 Bush Warns Saddam Against 'Deceit' Las Vegas SUN Today: November 13, 2002 at 11:20:12 PST By BARRY SCHWEID ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON- President Bush said Wednesday he will tolerate no "deception or denial or deceit" from Saddam Hussein as Iraq accepted a tough new U.N. resolution that will return weapons inspectors to the country after nearly four years. The acceptance letter was being delivered to Secretary-General Kofi Annan's office by Iraqi Ambassador Mohammed Al-Douri. Just as word of that decision broke, Bush renewed his warning that if Saddam "chooses not to disarm, we will have a coalition of the willing with us" to do the job. It wasn't clear whether Bush was informed of the Iraqi decision as he addressed reporters in the Cabinet Room. White House spokesman Scott McClellan said the test of Iraq's compliance would come in Baghdad's actions. "We've heard this before from Saddam Hussein and the Iraqi regime," he said, adding that he had not seen the specifics of the Iraqi letter. "I would remind you this was never a question of accepting or rejecting the resolution," McClellan said. "The U.N. resolution is binding on Iraq, and the Iraqi regime. Saddam Hussein had no choice but to accept the resolution." Bush was noncommittal about what the U.S. response would be if Iraq does not formally comply with the U.N. resolution by Friday. "I have told the United Nations we'll be glad to consult with them, but the resolution does not prevent us from doing what needs to be done, which is to hold Saddam Hussein into account," Bush said. "We hope that he disarms, we hope that he will listen to the world." Pressed on what would constitute a "material breach" of the resolution, and thereby possibly trigger war, the president said: "Zero-tolerance is about as plain as I can make it. We will not tolerate any deception or denial or deceipt." The administration has kepts its options open as a deadline approaches for Iraq to declare whether it will comply with U.N. disarmament demands. Some of Bush's advisers would consider refusal by Saddam to accept the terms adopted last by the U.N. Security Council as a trigger for military action. But Secretary of State Colin Powell said Tuesday he did not want to prejudge what the United Nations or the United States might do if Saddam turns down the Security Council. "We will see what they will do this Friday," he said. With attention focused on Baghdad, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan was calling on Bush on Wednesday. "We are looking forward to receiving a letter from the Iraqis by the 15th (Friday)," Annan said after a 40-minute meeting Tuesday with Powell at the State Department. "And then we will move on from there." Chief U.N. weapons inspector Hans Blix and an advance team will leave for Iraq on Monday "and begin their work actively," Annan said. While waiting on Baghdad, Bush warned Saddam that "there's no more time" and he must obey a U.N. demand to disarm. If the Iraqi president should ignore the ultimatum, "we will lead a coalition to disarm him," Bush said. "The man must disarm. He said he would disarm; he now must disarm. "This kind of deception and delay - all that is over with," the president said. In renewing his warning about forcibly disarming Iraq, Bush scoffed at the Iraqi parliament's recommendation that the unanimous resolution adopted last week by the Security Council should be rejected. Bush called the assembly in Baghdad "nothing but a rubber stamp for Saddam Hussein," and White House spokesmen said only the Iraqi president could decide whether to cooperate with the United Nations. Powell, asked if Friday was a redline day, responded: "I don't want to prejudge what the council might do or what the United States might do in the presence or absence of a positive statement on the part of the Iraqi government." He said the deadline set by the council for Iraq to accept its terms and pledge to comply was intended as an "early indication from Iraq if they were going to cooperate this time and not try to frustrate the will of the international community." Later, on ABC-TV's "Nightline" program, Powell indicated a judgment of Iraq's intention could be weeks, even months away. "We will have to make a judgment based on, first, if the inspectors get in, and what they find or don't find," he said. "We will have to make a judgment at some point in the future, when the inspectors report, as to whether or not we believe we are getting to the truth or not," Powell said. Meanwhile, administration officials said Iraq had ordered 1.25 million doses of an antidote for nerve agents in what could be an attempt to protect its military personnel if Saddam uses those weapons on the battlefield. At least some of the doses were ordered from Turkey, and U.S. diplomats were discussing the issue with Turkish officials. Powell said it was not clear whether Iraq has received any deliveries of the antidote, known as atropine. "This is not something you would want to be selling to Iraq at this time," he said. "Maybe it was a threat or some effort at disinformation," Powell said. "I don't know. I am not going to speculate on what they had in mind." Gen. Tommy Franks, who would command any U.S. military action in Iraq, said Tuesday it was up to Saddam whether Iraq's disarmament would be voluntary or forced by the U.S. military. Franks said the military is methodically preparing for the possibility of war. "We won't be quick. We will be prudent," Franks said. "The president of the United States has not made a decision to go to war in Iraq," the general said at a luncheon in Florida. "The president of the United States has made a decision that a continuation of cheat, retreat, fail to abide by Security Council resolutions ... will not stand." All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 13 Iraq Accepts Weapons Inspection Plan Las Vegas SUN Today: November 13, 2002 at 12:25:13 PST By EDITH M. LEDERER ASSOCIATED PRESS UNITED NATIONS- Facing a tight deadline and the threat of war, Iraq accepted a tough, new U.N. resolution on Wednesday that will return weapons inspectors to the country after nearly four years. Iraq's U.N. ambassador said his country hadn't placed any conditions on the resolution's terms. In an argumentative and sometimes threatening nine-page acceptance letter to Secretary-General Kofi Annan, Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri lambasted the United States and Britain, the co-sponsors of the resolution, and called the U.N. action unjust and illegal. But he declared nonetheless that Baghdad would abide by the resolution. "We hereby inform you that we will deal with resolution 1441, despite its bad contents. ... The important thing is trying to spare our people from any harm," Sabri wrote. The letter went on to add that Iraq is: "prepared to receive the inspectors within the assigned timetable." In Washington, President Bush said he wouldn't tolerate "deception or denial or deceit" from Iraqi President Saddam Hussein and he renewed his warning that if Iraq "chooses not to disarm, we will have a coalition of the willing with us" to do the job. Bush declined to discuss the letter after a meeting with Annan, though he thanked the U.N. Security Council for passing the U.S.-backed resolution last Friday. "They had no choice" but to accept, said a U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity. "Iraqis need to give their full cooperation to the inspectors to bring about complete and verifiable disarmament. Nothing else will do." Annan said an advance team of inspectors will be returning on Nov. 18 and the resolution "must be implemented." Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov, whose country is Iraq's closest Security Council ally, said on state-controlled ORT television: "We were confident that Iraq would make this decision, which opens the way for a political resolution of the situation. Now it is important that the international inspectors quickly return to Iraq." In Baghdad, state-run television announced Saddam's acceptance of the Security Council resolution two hours after Iraq's U.N. Ambassador Mohammed Al-Douri told the rest of the world. Iraqi TV showed images of Saddam, in a dark suit and tie, presiding over a meeting of his Revolutionary Command Council, made up of senior military officers. The picture was frozen on the screen while an announcer read the message recounting at length a history of Iraq's dispute with the United Nations. In the letter, Sabri accused Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair of fabricating "the biggest and most wicked slander against Iraq" by claiming that it had or was on its way to producing nuclear weapons. He also warned inspectors that Iraq will be watching their actions very closely. In 1998, Baghdad accused inspectors of spying for the United States and Israel. "Dealing with the inspectors, the government of Iraq will ... take into consideration their way of conduct, the intentions of those who are ill-intentioned among them and their improper approach in showing respect to the people's national dignity, their independence and security, and their country's security, independence, and sovereignty," Sabri said. Under Security Council resolutions adopted after Iraq's 1990 invasion of Kuwait, U.N. inspectors must certify that Iraq's nuclear, chemical and biological weapons programs have been eliminated along with the long-range missiles to deliver them. Only then can sanctions against Iraq be lifted. Al-Douri delivered the letter to Annan's office. "There are no conditions, no reservations," contained in the acceptance, he said. Iraq's acceptance would clear the way for the arrival of an advance team of U.N. inspectors on Monday. The team will be led by chief U.N. inspector Hans Blix, who is in charge of biological and chemical inspections, and Mohamed ElBaradei of the International Atomic Energy Agency, which is in charge of nuclear inspections. China's deputy U.N. ambassador Zhang Yishan, the current Security Council president, notified the 14 other council members of Iraq's acceptance. "Members of the Security Council welcomed the correct decision by the Iraqi government and we would like to see resolution 1441 implemented fully and very effectively," he said. Iraq had until Friday to accept the resolution's terms. The resolution allows inspectors to go anywhere at any time to search for weapons of mass destruction. It also warns that Iraq faces "serious consequences" if it doesn't comply - and the United States has made clear that an Iraqi failure to cooperate will almost certainly mean a new war. "Now, we are not talking about war or military action. We are talking about the mission of inspectors and how to make it a successful one," Amr Moussa, the head of the Arab League, told CNN. The Arab League had been instrumental is getting Iraq to accept the unconditional return of inspectors and to secure its support for the resolution. In his letter, Sabri urged inspectors to bear in mind that they were starting work during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan when people fast during the day. If the inspectors do their work "professionally and lawfully," Sabri said "the liars' lies" perpetrated by the United States and Britain about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction will be exposed and the Security Council will then have to lift sanctions. Sabri said he intends to send another letter stating Iraq's observations on elements in resolution 1441 that Baghdad believes are contrary to international law and the U.N. Charter. On Tuesday, Iraq's parliament recommended that Saddam reject the resolution. Saddam's son, Odai Saddam Hussein, proposed making Arabs part of the U.N. team, echoing a recommendation from the Arab League. Blix's office said it has trained inspectors from 49 countries, including six Jordanians, one Moroccan and five Turks. "We don't get too many applications from Arabic countries and we would welcome more applications from people who have the right expertise," one official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. ElBaradei said the IAEA in the past had "many inspectors from many Arab countries" and this was not a problem. In addition to offering Iraq "a final opportunity" to cooperate with inspectors, the resolution extends the possibility of lifting the sanctions. But Iraq must comply with its strict timetable, which now gives Iraq until Dec. 8 to declare all its chemical, biological and nuclear programs. In the meantime, inspectors will have until Dec. 23 to begin their work and must report to the Security Council 60 days later. However, the resolution orders inspectors to immediately notify the council of any Iraqi infraction which could be considered a "material breach," of its obligations to disarm itself of weapons of mass destruction. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 14 US wants N Korea fuel cut BBC NEWS | Asia-Pacific | Thursday, 14 November, 2002, Korean Taepodong 1 missile ] North Korea is under pressure to disarm US President George W Bush says he will cut off oil shipments to North Korea unless the Communist regime dismantles its nuclear weapons programme. "The November shipment is the last one," a senior US official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity. 1994 Agreed Framework West to supply fuel oil and build 2 nuclear reactors N Korea to freeze suspected nuclear weapons programme N Korea still has to allow in UN weapons inspectors US fears N Korea had extracted plutonium for 2 nuclear bombs before 1994 But South Korea, which wants shipments to the impoverished North to continue over the winter, said the subject needed further consultation between the US and its allies. The shipments, which are sent as aid under a 1994 accord designed to limit North Korea's nuclear ambitions, have been thrown into doubt by Pyongyang's admission last month that it was enriching uranium. The Administration's announcement puts it at odds with South Korea, only hours ahead of a crucial meeting on the issue. Mr Bush's decision came at a meeting with his national security advisers on Wednesday. In contrast, South Korea has called for US oil shipments to the impoverished North to continue. The issue is expected to dominate talks between the members of the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation (Kedo) - the US, Japan, South Korea and the European Union - when they meet in New York later on Thursday. 1994 agreement The US sends approximately 500,000 tonnes of oil to North Korea each year. [US President George W Bush] President Bush discussed the issue with advisers on Wednesday The shipment is part of the 1994 deal known as the Agreed Framework, in which the US promised to provide the country with fuel as well as two nuclear reactors, in return for a freeze on its nuclear weapons programme. But Washington considers that Pyongyang nullified the pact, after confessing to a US envoy last month that it was trying to build nuclear weapons with enriched uranium. There is now almost no support in the US Congress for continuing the fuel deliveries, because of the violation of the agreement. South Korea's fears But both South Korea and Japan doubt that stopping oil deliveries would persuade North Korea to terminate its nuclear weapons programme. They fear it would instead lead to a revival of an earlier, plutonium-based nuclear programme. "Oil shipments to North Korea must continue until January," said South Korean Unification Minister Jeong Se-hyun on Wednesday. "I have keenly felt that a hard-line only policy towards North Korea would leave us little to manoeuvre," he said. Meanwhile, North Korea has repeated its call for the US to sign a non-aggression pact before it considers scrapping its weapons programme. "We want the United States to legally guarantee a non-aggression treaty, then our side is ready to address the US security concerns," the North's Consul-General in Hong Kong, Ri To-sop, told Reuters news agency on Wednesday. © MMII | News Sources | Privacy ***************************************************************** 15 Israel is weaker than most think! The Jerusalem Post Newspaper : Online News From Israel [http://www.jpost.com/] Yitzhak Ben Dayan miami fl USA (13 Nov 2002) [Yitzhak Ben Dayan <ybendayan@hotmail.com>] Israel might have nuclear weapons; Israel might have more accurate weaponry; Israel might have better trained soldiers and more decentralized units which give them an edge over the rigid Arab armies; Israel might have better communications through satellites; but Israel has two tremendous flaws: 1) it has no sufficient terrain to retreat to in case of necessity and 2) The enemy lives within Israel's borders. A return to the pre-1967 borders would even reduce the already critical space available. A surprise Arab attack with Nuclear, Chemical or Biological weaponry could almost destroy all Israeli capabilities at once. No recovery would be possible due to the minute size of Israel. for feedback and comments. [http://www.jpost.com/MediaKit/] . ***************************************************************** 16 Ontario's energy strategy hinders OPG: Analysts TheStar.com - Business/News Wed Nov 13, 2002 | Updated at 01:28 PM Bond rating service places OPG, other energy companies under review FROM CANADIAN PRESS Government meddling will handcuff Ontario Power Generation, the Crown-owned utility that generates most of Ontario's power, and delay asset sales that would improve competition, analysts said Tuesday. "It's more constant intervention into OPG's operations that is the negative factor for OPG right now," said Genevieve Lavallee, an analyst with Dominion Bond Rating Service, which placed OPG and a host of other energy companies under review on Tuesday. DBRS and others said the Ontario government's revised energy strategy, announced Monday, will mean OPG has much less control over reducing its dominant market share and reduce its opportunities to make profits. On Monday, Premier Ernie Eves announced rebates for energy consumers and a cap on electricity prices, which rose dramatically this summer after the provincial energy market was deregulated. The province also said it will announce changes to OPG's board of directors and launch an independent investigation into delays in restoring its Pickering A nuclear reactors. Government officials were quick this week to blame the costly rebuild of the nuclear power stations, east of Toronto, for taking too much supply out of the province's electrical system. The short supply contributed to hydro costs for consumers this past summer, when unusually hot weather resulted in heavy air conditioner usage. On Monday, the Eves government said retail rates would be capped at 4.3 cents per kilowatt hour until 2006. Generators like OPG will continue to receive the going wholesale price for power, with the province paying the difference. However, Lavalee said that the government may start "start manipulating and playing with OPG a bit more than they would play with any investor-owned company." In her report, she said government intervention would likely occur if the wholesale price of energy rose above 4.3 cents per kilowatt hour on a sustained basis. Additionally, OPG will be in even less of a hurry to sell revenue-producing assets that will help pay down extra costs associated with consumer rebates, said Andrew Kuske, an analyst with UBS Warburg in Toronto. Critics of the government's deregulation strategy have said true competition would not emerge in the province until OPG's dominance over the market was diminished. "The government doesn't appear to be in any hurry to decontrol the OPG assets at this stage, which would help create a more competitive marketplace," said Kuske. "We don't really anticipate that happening any time soon, especially given where power prices have gone since deregulation." OPG — one of the few energy stakeholders to comment publicly so far on the government's changes this week — was to cut its 70 per cent market share in half over four years, according to the Market Power Mitigation Agreement. The agreement was drafted to guide the province's transition to an open energy market. Four provincial properties for sale are the coal-fired Lakeview station in Mississauga; the Lennox station near Kingston; the Atikokan generating plant in northwestern Ontario; and a Thunder Bay operation. Four hydroelectric stations on the Mississagi River, east of Sault Ste. Marie, were sold this year to an income fund 50 per cent owned by Brascan Power Corp., one of Canada's biggest private power producers. Brascan wouldn't comment specifically on the assets currently on the block but did indicate Tuesday it's still interested in upping its stake in provincial power generation. "It's too early to tell what the long-term impact's going to be. But I will say that we're encouraged," said Brascan spokeswoman Katherine Vyse. "We're still a believer in Ontario and the Ontario market." Paul Kahnert of the Ontario Electricity Coalition, a staunch opponent to energy market deregulation, said OPG will have to "load up" with debt as the government looks for ways to pay for consumer rebates and price caps. "These price caps and rebates mean future taxes and future debt. It doesn't address the problem," said Kahnert, calling the government's handling of the energy market "a complete disaster." Kahnert questioned whether the government's need for cash might result in a "firesale" of both OPG assets and the 49 per cent interest it's looking to sell in Hydro One, which controls Ontario's transmission grid. Montreal-based SNC-Lavalin was said to be interested in the Hydro One portion. Legal Notice:- Copyright 1996-2002. Toronto Star Newspapers ***************************************************************** 17 Russia interested in broadening ties with Iran Islamic Republic News Agency ( I R N A )HeadLines News Baku, Nov 13, IRNA -- Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri Fedotov on Wednesday expressed Russia's interest in broadening ties with the Islamic Republic of Iran. He told IRNA in reply to a question about claims by some sections of the media about the prospect of agreement being reached between Moscow and Washington on suspending Iran-Russia cooperation, he said, "Iran-Russia relations is one of the issues constantly discussed between US and Russian officials." He added that such discussions, however, have not influenced Irano-Russian ties. "Moscow is still interested in broadening cooperation with Iran and is determined to continue developing mutual ties in various fields," he said. Other Russian senior officials, including its nuclear energy minister, have announced on several occasions that despite Moscow's being pressurized by Washington, it will continue its cooperation with Iran in various fields including peaceful application of nuclear energy. A section of the Russian news media had recently claimed that the US has declared its readiness to compensate the damages caused by the disruption of Russian-Iran ties. MP/AH last Update Wednesday, 13-Nov-2002 17:35:04 PST ©2000 Islamic Republic News Agency ( IRNA). All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 18 Ontario Power Generation's future in doubt after changes to energy market | The Record.com November 12, 2002 - 18:33:42 EST STEVE ERWIN TORONTO (CP) - Government meddling will handcuff Ontario Power Generation, the Crown-owned utility that generates most of Ontario's power, and delay asset sales that would improve competition, analysts said Tuesday. "It's more constant intervention into OPG's operations that is the negative factor for OPG right now," said Genevieve Lavallee, an analyst with Dominion Bond Rating Service, which placed OPG and a host of other energy companies under review on Tuesday. DBRS and others said the Ontario government's revised energy strategy, announced Monday, will mean OPG has much less control over reducing its dominant market share and reduce its opportunities to make profits. On Monday, Premier Ernie Eves announced rebates for energy consumers and a cap on electricity prices, which rose dramatically this summer after the provincial energy market was deregulated. The province also said it will announce changes to OPG's board of directors and launch an independent investigation into delays in restoring its Pickering A nuclear reactors. Government officials were quick this week to blame the costly rebuild of the nuclear power stations, east of Toronto, for taking too much supply out of the province's electrical system. The short supply contributed to hydro costs for consumers this past summer, when unusually hot weather resulted in heavy air conditioner usage. On Monday, the Eves government said retail rates would be capped at 4.3 cents per kilowatt hour until 2006. Generators like OPG will continue to receive the going wholesale price for power, with the province paying the difference. However, Lavalee said that the government may start "start manipulating and playing with OPG a bit more than they would play with any investor-owned company." In her report, she said government intervention would likely occur if the wholesale price of energy rose above 4.3 cents per kilowatt hour on a sustained basis. Additionally, OPG will be in even less of a hurry to sell revenue-producing assets that will help pay down extra costs associated with consumer rebates, said Andrew Kuske, an analyst with UBS Warburg in Toronto. Critics of the government's deregulation strategy have said true competition would not emerge in the province until OPG's dominance over the market was diminished. "The government doesn't appear to be in any hurry to decontrol the OPG assets at this stage, which would help create a more competitive marketplace," said Kuske. "We don't really anticipate that happening any time soon, especially given where power prices have gone since deregulation." OPG - one of the few energy stakeholders to comment publicly so far on the government's changes this week - was to cut its 70 per cent market share in half over four years, according to the Market Power Mitigation Agreement. The agreement was drafted to guide the province's transition to an open energy market. Four provincial properties for sale are the coal-fired Lakeview station in Mississauga; the Lennox station near Kingston; the Atikokan generating plant in northwestern Ontario; and a Thunder Bay operation. Four hydroelectric stations on the Mississagi River, east of Sault Ste. Marie, were sold this year to an income fund 50 per cent owned by Brascan Power Corp., one of Canada's biggest private power producers. Brascan wouldn't comment specifically on the assets currently on the block but did indicate Tuesday it's still interested in upping its stake in provincial power generation. "It's too early to tell what the long-term impact's going to be. But I will say that we're encouraged," said Brascan spokeswoman Katherine Vyse. "We're still a believer in Ontario and the Ontario market." Paul Kahnert of the Ontario Electricity Coalition, a staunch opponent to energy market deregulation, said OPG will have to "load up" with debt as the government looks for ways to pay for consumer rebates and price caps. "These price caps and rebates mean future taxes and future debt. It doesn't address the problem," said Kahnert, calling the government's handling of the energy market "a complete disaster." Kahnert questioned whether the government's need for cash might result in a "firesale" of both OPG assets and the 49 per cent interest it's looking to sell in Hydro One, which controls Ontario's transmission grid. Montreal-based SNC-Lavalin was said to be interested in the Hydro One portion. © The Canadian Press, 2002 © The Record 225 Fairway Road South, Kitchener, Ontario, Canada, N2G 4E5 519-894-2231 ***************************************************************** 19 Former U.N. Weapons Inspectors Describe Iraq's Concealment Tactics [International Information Programs] Washington File [Washington File] 12 November 2002 (Say new inspectors will face difficult task of proving weapons development) (870) By Vicki Silverman Washington File Staff Writer Washington -- Two former United Nations weapons inspectors interviewed in September by the Washington File voiced concern at that time that the Iraqi regime would try to undermine the capabilities of any new U.N. weapons inspection team by restricting access to Iraq's most sensitive sites and personnel. U.N. Security Council resolution 1441, unanimously adopted on November 8, addresses some of the inspectors' concerns. The resolution establishes an enhanced inspection regime for Iraq's disarmament, which is to be carried out by the U.N. Monitoring, Verification, and Inspection Commission (UNMOVIC) and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Resolution 1441 says UNMOVIC and IAEA inspectors are to have unrestricted rights of entry and travel into and throughout Iraq, U.N. security for themselves, and the right to conduct interviews inside or outside the country without the presence of Iraqi officials. Most importantly, it says the inspectors are to have immediate, unconditional, and unrestricted access to all sites in Iraq. But proving that the Iraqis still have prohibited weapons "is very, very difficult," former U.N. inspections official Charles Duelfer explained to the Washington File September 20. Duelfer, deputy executive chairman of UNSCOM from 1993-2000, and Richard Spertzel, UNSCOM's specialist in biological warfare 1994-1999, described what they witnessed in Iraq -- the extraordinary efforts of the Iraqi regime to hide its secret weapons programs. Both Duelfer and Spertzel said that Iraq has a well-developed structure for concealing its prohibited weapons programs. Duelfer explained that the concealment efforts appear to be run by the Iraqi security services linked to President Saddam Hussein's inner circle. "Other than protecting the president, these security organizations had no higher priority than protecting these [nuclear, biological and chemical weapons] programs," he said. "They had a very elaborate system and they applied different techniques as they bore fruit. But the primary objective was to understand how we operated ... the inspections activity and to calibrate their responses," Duelfer told the Washington File. These included developing detailed profiles of the inspectors and their expertise, monitoring their travel long before they arrived in Iraq, and gathering intelligence on inspection planning. Iraqi escorts routinely diverted inspectors from reaching sites of interest. "Sometimes convoys would be split or disrupted by other Iraqi vehicles, even to where there is serious risk of having an accident. ... Sometimes teams were simply delayed when our Iraqi minders did not arrive. After calls to the national monitoring authority we'd get off not at 7:30 a.m. It would be 9:30 a.m. by then," Spertzel recalled. In their effort to analyze information related to research or procurement, inspectors would be flooded by falsified documents or they would lose time in investigating dummy purchasing companies. "Good analysis of documents takes time and experience," Spertzel said. Interviews were riddled with inconsistencies. "Then there was the lying," Spertzel said. "At a university there was a person of interest involved in the ricin program [Ricin is a poisonous protein extracted from castor beans. Iraq has produced at least 10 liters of ricin and tested it for use in artillery shells.] We sent someone in to do a document search. We made a point of blocking the stairways and a guy came tearing down the stairway with documents under his arm. Our people intercepted him and he claimed these were his wife's personal medical records. There were not -- they turned out to be some rather critical documents on the ricin program." Spertzel recalled a moment during an interview with Dr. Rihab Rashida Taha, a key facilitator of the biological program. "I said, ‘Dr. Taha, you know that we know that you're lying, so why are you doing it?' She drew herself up and replied ‘Dr. Spertzel, it is not a lie when you are ordered to lie.'" Subtle intimidation, including harassing phone calls, was also used, according to both Duelfer and Spertzel. Spertzel recalled the case of an Iraq official who coyly asked a new member of his team, "How far is it from Salt Lake City to Minneapolis?" Having moved from Salt Lake City to Minneapolis just days prior to her arrival in Iraq, she was unnerved by the comment, according to Spertzel. Duelfer recalls the stress: "The entire environment is oppressive, as journalists will tell you. People are just terrified to speak." "Always being on the alert takes a toll." Spertzel said. Duelfer believes the Iraqi regime is well prepared to re-admit inspectors. "They took the decision (to admit inspectors) back in February, according to Iraqis with whom I have indirect contact. They know they can buy time. They certainly have had many years to prepare for inspectors to come back in." Furthermore, Duelfer suspects the regime also knows how long it will have to wait before creating a confrontation. "There is a mismatch between inspectors and the tools that can be applied against them by a nation state with one of the most extensive security and intelligence apparatuses in the world." Duelfer told the Washington file. Despite the many obstacles faced by the previous inspection teams, Duelfer believes that the presence of inspectors "did have the effect of reducing the scope of what Iraq could do, but it clearly could not eliminate it." (The Washington File is a product of the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov) This site is produced and maintained by the U.S. Department of State's Office of International Information Programs (usinfo.state.gov). Links to other Internet sites should not be construed as an endorsement of the views contained therein. ***************************************************************** 20 North Korea Won't Give Ground in Nuclear Flap ABCNEWS.com : November 13, 2002 — By Eric Hall HONG KONG (Reuters) - North Korea said on Wednesday it would not make the first move to defuse a dispute over its nuclear weapons program, and insisted Washington sign a non-aggression pact first. Consul General Ri To Sop, North Korea's top diplomat in Hong Kong, also told Reuters that any move to halt crucial shipments of oil to Pyongyang would be considered a hostile act. He did not elaborate. "We want the United States to legally guarantee a non-aggression treaty, then our side is ready to address the U.S. security concerns," Ri said in an interview. His statement was a strong reassertion of Pyongyang's position ahead of a key meeting on the oil shipments issue on Thursday between the United States, South Korea, Japan, and the European Union. At the meeting in New York, the United States will try to halt essential oil exports to North Korea for its admission that it still had an active nuclear weapons program, in abrogation of a 1994 agreement. Asked whether Pyongyang would withdraw from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty if oil shipments were stopped, Ri said: "I cannot give you an exact answer but I can say this is another hostile act... the neighboring countries are talking about not stopping." Washington has said Pyongyang clearly violated the 1994 agreement to freeze the nuclear weapons work in exchange for oil shipments and two light water reactors that cannot be easily used to produce weapons-grade material. But the United States has not yet managed to line up clear support from Japan, South Korea, Russia and China to force Pyongyang to comply. South Korea said earlier Wednesday it favored continuing oil shipments through the winter to the beleaguered North Korean economy. Since October, when the United States presented North Korea with evidence it was enriching uranium, which is part of the process in making an atomic bomb, Pyongyang has not only admitted it was doing so, but has stressed that it was part of its sovereign right to defend itself. Ri would not confirm or deny that his country had a working nuclear weapon, or one that could easily be armed or delivered, but added: "So, U.S. pressure to scrap or dismantle our nuclear weapons ... is completely absurd logic." "Now we have our defensive capabilities to defend our sovereignty and our right to existence...against the hostility from the United States." Asked what concrete steps North Korea would take if the United States agreed to its insistence on a non-aggression treaty, Ri said: "This would be discussed." "The U.S. assertion that the DPRK (North Korea) should halt first the nuclear program means a surrender... Since a surrender means a death, it can only lead to a confrontation," Ri said. But he added: "Now, we are ready for war or dialogue. We prefer dialogue but we will not move first. We will not beg for recognition from the hostile side." photo credit and caption: A South Korean man wearing a mock radiation suit holds a sign criticising both North Korea's nuclear weapons program and its leader Kim Jong-il (L, on sign) during a protest in Seoul Nov. 13, 2002. South Korea's unification minister said on Wednesday South Korea favoured keeping heavy fuel oil shipments to North Korea going for three months despite Pyongyang's declared nuclear weapons program. Photo by Lee Jae-Won/Reuters Copyright 2002 Reuters News Service. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 21 SC Ports Authority questioning ability to handle nuclear fuel reactor* (Charleston-AP) Nov. 12, 2002 - The State Ports Authority is questioning the ability of a private company to handle an old nuclear fuel reactor from California to be shipped to the Barnwell low-level nuclear site for disposal. Southern California Edison says it has already awarded a contract to Charleston International Ports and could ship the reactor through Charleston as soon as March. The State Ports Authority says negotiations continue. The agency's chief financial officer, Peter Hughes, says movement of an old nuclear reactor is a uniquely dangerous and complex operation with significant security issues. Hughes says the Ports Authority is unable to consent to Charleston International Ports supervising the movement. Duane Grantham with Charleston International Ports says the shipment will be handled with appropriate caution. /posted 12:42pm by Chris Rees / *WIS News 10 Headlines* All content © Copyright 2000 - 2002 WorldNow and WISTV. All Rights Reserved. ***************************************************************** 22 NUCLEAR PLANT IS CLOSED BY SEAWEED By ROGER WITHERSPOON THE JOURNAL NEWS (Original publication: November 13, 2002) The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission may remove its second-lowest safety designation from Indian Point 2 at the end of this year because all of the plant's control room operators successfully passed this year's licensing exams, officials said yesterday. If the designation is removed, the long-troubled plant would no longer be listed as one of the worst-performing plants in the nation. All seven control room crews, which comprise about 45 people, passed the exams, said Jim Steets, spokesman for Entergy Nuclear Northeast, which owns Indian Point. "These exams were to Entergy's standard, which is more stringent than the standard required by the NRC," he said. The nuclear power plant in Buchanan received the agency's "yellow" designation last fall after four of the seven control room crews failed to pass their annual licensing exam because their response to simulated emergencies could have resulted in the release of radiation into the environment. Six of the crews were later retrained and retested, and 10 operators lost their licenses. But the plant retained its yellow designation pending an evaluation of Entergy's training programs and the results of this year's exams. "We thought earlier this year they were making good progress, but would wait to make a final determination until after they took their exams," NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said. "We had to determine whether their training program was encompassing enough, and whether they had learned lessons from some of the past failures." Sheehan said the agency's evaluation of Indian Point 2 in May found that "long standing problems" in training led to the high failure rate among the operators, but that the training programs developed by Entergy seemed to address those issues. Steets said the latest licensing exams, given in the plant's simulator, were concluded at the end of September and monitored by the NRC. "We are confident that the operators have demonstrated their improved performance," he said. "The recent testing is an indication that the extra training is paying off. Hopefully, the community will see that Entergy has taken its responsibility seriously and (is) getting the improvements we have committed to." The yellow designation will remain until the end of the year because, under NRC procedures, such designations are changed quarterly, regardless of when a violation has been corrected. "If we are fully satisfied that they have addressed all weaknesses in training, the yellow finding would be removed," Sheehan said. "But it would stay on until the end of the year." In addition to developing new training programs, Entergy had to replace many of the control room's computerized systems and equipment. "We had to do a lot of modernization in the control room and the control systems. Technically, they hadn't changed since the 1970s," said plant manager Chris Schwarz. The NRC has four color safety codes, starting with green for minor infractions, and progressing to white, yellow, then red. Indian Point 2 received the "red" designation, the agency's lowest, following the Feb. 15, 2000, rupture of a steam generator tube. It was the nation's only plant to have the agency's lowest safety designation until this summer. There are now five plants with red or yellow designations. The steam tube failure caused a leak of 20,000 gallons of contaminated water into the non-nuclear side of the plant, the release of a small amount of radioactive gas into the atmosphere, and the spill of several hundred gallons of contaminated water into the Hudson River. The accident resulted in the plant's first nuclear alert and a 10-month shutdown. The plant, then owned by Consolidated Edison, was cited by the NRC for failing to properly assess the status of the thousands of tubes within the steam generators. Con Edison had to replace the steam generators before it was allowed to restart the plant. Indian Point 2's "red" designation was removed in August, as a result of Entergy's expenditure of hundreds of millions of dollars to replace much of the antiquated equipment. In addition to the yellow rating, the plant also still has a "white" designation, imposed by the NRC in August because of improper repairs to a firewall in the control room. The wall is supposed to be able to block fire from the room for at least three hours, but officials said it was not up to standards. The wall has since been replaced, officials said. Send e-mail to [rwithers@thejournalnews.com] [http://www.thejournalnews.com] - ***************************************************************** 24 Scotland: Nuclear plant leak sparks inquiry BBC NEWS | UK | Scotland | Wednesday, 13 November, 2002, 08:12 GMT [Dounreay] More than 20 workers were involved in the incident An investigation has been launched after 20 workers at the Dounreay nuclear plant in Caithness were contaminated with radioactive particles. Routine checks detected contamination on the footwear of staff at a waste handling plant. Subsequent investigations found two employees in the D2001 plant had radioactivity on their hands, while one of them also had traces on his face. There was no radioactive release to the environment and there is no evidence that any of the workers ingested any radiation UKAEA spokesman They are due to undergo tests on Wednesday morning to re-assess their condition. A spokesman for the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) said: "They were taken to our occupational health unit where efforts were made to clean the particles from their skin. "Most of the contamination was cleaned from their skin and they were sent home wearing rubber gloves. "It is difficult to quantify at the moment but we believe the risk to them to be low." The UKAEA said early indications suggested that the leak was confined to one floor of the building. "The operation was stopped and the building was sealed off," he said. Protective screens "There was no radioactive release to the environment and there is no evidence that any of the workers ingested any radiation." At the time of the incident 70 workers were carrying out decommissioning work using robotics arms to lift radioactive materials, which were shielded from them by protective screens. The spokesman said an investigation had been launched to establish the cause of the incident. The Health and Safety Nuclear Safety Inspectorate has also been informed and is expected to launch a separate inquiry. Dounreay already has an appalling safety record and this incident comes against a background of leaks and safety problems John Swinney, SNP leader Dounreay was given a clean bill of health earlier this year following an audit by the Health and Safety Executive. The review followed a number of safety lapses at the site in the late 1990s. Scottish National Party leader John Swinney said the leak was "a matter of enormous concern". Mr Swinney said: "Dounreay already has an appalling safety record and this incident comes against a background of leaks and safety problems". He is seeking full disclosure of what he described as "this worrying failure in safety procedures" had happened. © MMII | News Sources | Privacy ***************************************************************** 25 Putin-dinner accompanied by anti-Kola NPP demonstration Russian President in Oslo: Putin-dinner accompanied by anti-Kola NPP demonstration OSLO - While the black limo with Russia's President Vladimir Putin in the back seat drove up to the entrance of the Royal Palace, 250 candles forming a radiation sign lighted the dark Oslo-evening. 250 candles forming a radiation sign lighted the Royal Palace where Putin was eating with the King. Thomas Nilsen, 2002-11-12 23:38 The anti-nuclear demonstration was the only demonstration allowed outside the Royal Palace in central Oslo where President Vladimir Putin, his 40-man delegation, the Norwegian Government and other more or less high-ranking officials had dinner with Norway’s King Harald V and Queen Sonja, Tuesday evening. Some 20 persons from the environmental group Nature and Youth had lighted the radiation sign, formed by 250 candles, in front of the castle. They also held banners with slogans in both English and Russian, sending a clear message to the dinner-eating and toasting President inside the castle: “Stop Kola nuclear power plant.” It's unlikely that Putin was able to see neither the slogans nor the lights when his Mercedes passed by at great speed on its way to the Royal entrance. However, if the President were looking out of the castle windows during dinner, it would in fact be hard for him not to notice the huge shining yellow radiation sign blowing in the wind. King Harald said in his dinner speech that nuclear safety and environmental cooperation within the Barents region is of high importance for the two countries. The King underlined that the relation between Norway and Russia has never been better than it is nowadays. Slogans with the text: Stop Kola nuclear power plant. Photo: Nettavisen The King and his wife, Queen Sonja, do by first-hand experience know what challenges the nuclear safety work in the Russian north are facing. With the King's own boat, the King and Queen visited Murmansk back in the late 1990s. In Murmansk, the Norwegian Royal vessel was anchored just a few hundred feet from a nuclear powered icebreaker in central Kola bay. As part of the official programme, the King was dressed up in a white protection dress before entering the Norwegian-sponsored so-called cleaning facility for liquid radioactive waste, which is situated at the nuclear powered icebreaker base Atomflot, just north of Murmansk. Prior to the King’s visit to Murmansk, the original plan was that King Harald V was supposed to front the official opening of the facility. King Harald failed however to open the facility - in short, because it was nothing there to open. Tonight, some five years later, the Norwegian King could have asked President Putin how things are going with the cleaning facility in Murmansk. And if he did so, Putin would have had to tell his friendly Norwegian neighbour at the castle downtown Oslo, that the Norwegian-paid facility is still not put into operation. “Norway and Russia live under the same Polar star”. Russian President Vladimir Putin Rather than discussing the Norwegian King’s last visit to the nuclear installation in Murmansk, President Putin in his speech friendly pointed to the fact that “Norway and Russia live under the same Polar star”. In these times, before Christmas, the Polar star lights the winter-dark Arctic areas in Norway and Russia. Historically, navigators used the Polar star to find their safe way to the north. Russian President Vladimir Putin and Norwegian Prime Minister Kjell Magne Bondevik discussed nuclear safety cooperation during their meeting in Oslo Tuesday. Photo: Ole Berthelsen/Nettavisen Another fascinating light in the Arctic areas is the polar light, also known as the northern light. This light, however, is not possible to navigate safely after. It blows uncontrolled. Maybe that’s the reason why environmental activists outside the Royal Palace in Oslo lighted up the evening with candles forming the radiation sign and simultaneously demanding the Kola nuclear power plant shut down: The nuclear power plant is not safe, maybe uncontrolled and its located in the city of Polyarny Zori, the Russian name for Polar light. --We demand that the Russian authorities close down the Kola nuclear power plant, the Nature and Youth leader, Elin Lerum Boasson, said commenting on the radiation sign placed in the square in front of Putin’s dinner on the Royal silver plates. The Norwegian environmental group Nature and Youth has local sub-divisions in several cities in the Russian north. They have, together with Bellona, worked actively in the area since the late 1980s. Both organizations want the Kola nuclear power plant to be shut down. --The oldest reactor at the Kola nuclear power plant will, next summer, surpass its original lifetime of 30 years. We fear another Chernobyl, says Elin Lerum Boasson. Kola nuclear power plant near the city of Polyarny Zory are soon 30 years. Photo: Thomas Nilsen Despite fierce criticism from both Russian and Scandinavian nuclear experts, the reactor is not to be closed down. Some officials at the Kola NPP even claim that the reactor very well can go on for at least another ten years, maybe even longer. A Bellona report from last year points out the safety problems in the design of the oldest reactors at Kola NPP. Also, the Bellona report stress the very fact that the oldest reactor can be closed down without leaving the area without electricity. The Kola Peninsula is one of the relatively few places in Russia with a great over-capacity of electricity production. In periods, as much as 40 percent of the electricity produced at the four reactors at the Kola NPP are exported out of the region, either to neighbouring Finland, to the Russian republic of Karelia or to the Leningrad Oblast. Putin left Oslo in his presidential plane late Tuesday evening without commenting on the future of the Kola nuclear power plant. Publisher: [bellona@bellona.no] , President: [frederic@bellona.no] Information: [info@bellona.no] , Technical contact: [webmaster@bellona.no] Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 26 County moves ahead on environmental study on Diablo Canyon storage plan San Luis Obispo Tribune | 11/12/2002 | David Sneed The Tribune SAN LUIS OBISPO - Planners will begin analyzing the environmental consequences of establishing an above-ground storage facility for highly radioactive waste at Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. County supervisors gave the OK Tuesday for a Ventura planning firm, Marine Research Specialists, to prepare an environmental impact report on the proposed dry cask storage facility. The plant's radioactive waste is now stored in pools on the site. The county will not be able to regulate some significant issues addressed within the report -- including matters of safety and radiation, which are left to the federal government. But the supervisors are moving ahead with the study to address concerns of local residents and in hopes that the results might influence federal regulators' decisions on the dry cask facility. A draft version of the report will be ready by June 2003, but county planners will hold a public workshop before Christmas to make sure it addresses all the public's concerns. ***************************************************************** 27 NRC Approves Power Uprate for H.B. Robinson Nuclear Plant NRC: News Release - 2002-131 - U.S. NUCLEAR REGULATORY COMMISSION Office of Public Affairs Telephone: 301/415-8200 Washington, DC 20555-0001 E-mail: opa@nrc.gov [opa@nrc.gov] www.nrc.gov No. 02-131 November 12, 2002 The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved a request by Carolina Power &Light Company to increase the generating capacity of the H.B. Robinson Steam Electric Plant, Unit 2, by 1.7 percent. The power uprate at the plant, located near Hartsville, South Carolina, will increase the generating capacity of Unit 2 from 683 megawatts electric to 695. The licensee intends to implement the power uprate immediately. NRC published a notice about the power uprate application in the Federal Register providing the public an opportunity to comment or request a hearing. The NRC's safety evaluation of the requested power uprate for the plant focused on several areas, including nuclear steam supply systems, instrumentation and control systems, electrical systems, accident evaluations, radiological consequences, operations, and other technical specification changes. The NRC staff determined that the licensee could safely increase the power output of the reactor primarily through increased feedwater flow measurement accuracy. Wednesday, November 13, 2002 ***************************************************************** 28 NRC OKs output hike for Carolina Power nuke plant Forbes.com: Reuters, 11.12.02, 6:40 PM ET WASHINGTON, Nov 12 (Reuters) - The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said on Tuesday it approved a request by Carolina Power & Light Company to increase the generating capacity of its H.B. Robinson Unit 2 nuclear power plant by 1.7 percent, or 12 megawatts. The generating capacity of the plant, located near Hartsville, South Carolina, will increase immediately to 695 megawatts of electricity. Carolina Power is a subsidiary of Progress Energy (nyse: PGN - news - people). The NRC said it approved the ramp up in generating capacity after reviewing the plant's operations, including nuclear steam supply systems, instrumentation and control systems, electrical systems, accident calculations, radiological consequences, operations and technical specification changes. "The NRC staff determined that the licensee could safely increase the power output of the reactor primarily through increased feedwater flow measurement accuracy," the agency said. Copyright 2002, Reuters News Service ***************************************************************** 29 UK: Dounreay contamination alert Guardian Unlimited | The Guardian | Kirsty Scott Wednesday November 13, 2002 The Guardian [http://www.guardian.co.uk] An investigation has been launched after 21 workers were contaminated with radioactive particles at the Dounreay nuclear reprocessing plant in the north of Scotland. The alarm was raised late yesterday when a member of staff leaving the Caithness plant was found to have contamination on the soles of his shoes. Further checks confirmed 18 workers had radioactive dust on their shoes and two were found to have contamination on their skin. A spokeswoman for the UK Atomic Energy Authority said the building concerned had been sealed off and operations stopped. She said it appeared the contamination was confined to the floor area of one part of the facility and there was no radioactive release to the environment. The spokeswoman said the contamination had been discovered during routine monitoring checks on employees heading home. One staff member using a hand-held device to check his clothing discovered he had been exposed to radiation and alerted his colleagues. The two workers found to have contamination on their skin were taken immediately to an occupational health unit where efforts were made to clean the particles from their hands. One also had contamination on his face, but the spokeswoman said it had been cleaned off. Both workers were sent home wearing rubber gloves and will be fully assessed today. "It is difficult to quantify at the moment but we believe the risk to them to be low," the spokeswoman said. "Obviously we want to know what has happened. First and foremost we have got to make sure that these guys are OK." The cause of the leak was not yet known but an investigation was under way and the health and safety nuclear safety inspectorate had been informed. Useful links British Energy [http://www.british-energy.com/] Department of Trade and Industry [http://www.dti.gov.uk/] British Nuclear Fuels Ltd [http://www.bnfl.co.uk/website.nsf/default.htm] Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament [http://www.cnduk.org/] Greenpeace [http://www.greenpeace.org/homepage/] HSE nuclear glossary [http://www.hse.gov.uk/nsd/ilrwglos.htm] UK atomic energy authority [http://www.ukaea.org.uk/] National Radiological Protection Board [http://www.nrpb.org.uk/] Friends of the Earth [http://www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/climate/press_for_change/dump_nuc lear/index.html] World Nuclear Association [http://www.uilondon.org/] World Nuclear Transport Institute [http://www.wnti.co.uk] [UP] Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002 ***************************************************************** 30 Japan: Corporate whistle-blowers still left out in the cold* Wednesday, November 13, 2002 ** LAWMAKERS MOVING SLOWLY By HIROKO NAKATA Staff writer Prompted by a recent spate of corporate misdeeds, moves are afoot, albeit slowly, to provide legal protection for whistle-blowers. News photo *Corporate wrongdoing at (clockwise from top left) Nippon Meat Packers Inc., Tokyo Electric Power Co., Snow Brand Foods Co. and Mitsubishi Motors Corp. has recently been revealed thanks to whistle-blowers.* Current laws do not offer a protective shield for those who have the courage to reveal suspected misdeeds perpetrated by an employer, except for one law covering the nuclear power industry. The country, however, has witnessed endless corporate scandals triggered by revelations from insiders, including the coverup of vehicle defects by Mitsubishi Motors Corp., beef-mislabeling fraud committed by Snow Brand Foods Co. and Nippon Meat Packers Inc., and the concealment of nuclear reactor faults by Tokyo Electric Power Co. and other utilities. The revelations of dubious corporate practices have thrown a spotlight on the role of whistle-blowers -- and their vulnerability to retaliatory mistreatment by their employers. Had Hiroaki Kushioka been born in another country, for example, he might have become a hero of civil justice. But the 56-year-old employee of trucking firm Tonami Transportation Co. was moved to a small isolated room far from the headquarters. He was given neither specific tasks nor a promotion for 28 years only because he spilled the beans on an industry price-fixing cartel involving his company. Kushioka, in a very rare move, disclosed his name when he blew the whistle. Since loyalty to one's employer weighs so much in Japan's corporate culture, inside informers are often treated as betrayers. Most thus remain anonymous, fearing retaliation by their employers. "I never felt sorry for disclosing my name," Kushioka said, "I was confident that I had done nothing wrong. This gave me courage." Despite the severe pressure the company exerted not only on him but on his family and relatives to leave the firm, he dared to stay on. Now various circles are working to create legal protection for whistle-blowers like Kushioka. So far, efforts by Cabinet members and lawmakers to craft protective legal measures have not produced tangible results. The exception is in the nuclear power industry. The law regulating reactors was revised in 1999 to protect whistle-blowers in the wake of the nation's worst nuclear accident, which occurred at a JCO Co. uranium processing plant in Tokai, Ibaraki Prefecture. It was eventually revealed that a deadly nuclear chain reaction was caused by workers following an in-house manual that sidestepped safe operating rules. The revised law, however, falls short, as shown by Tepco's coverups of reactor defects and the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency's admission that it leaked to Tepco the identity of an American engineer who blew the whistle on its coverups when the agency first made inquiries. This happened right after the law was revised. The raft of corporate coverup scandals led the Cabinet Office's advisory panel to Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi to urge earlier this year the quick creation of a system to protect informers. This month, a subgroup of the panel on government consumer policies discussed the legal framework necessary to shield informers from dismissal and other employer retaliation. The panel is expected to hammer out a final report as early as May. Its members, however, are split on specific measures. The panel was initially expected to lean toward revising existing consumer-protection laws to protect whistle-blowers under limited scenarios, including when food is at risk. But many members now favor broader protections. Some even seek a law that would protect not only corporate employees but also public servants. The Democratic Party of Japan has submitted a bill to protect whistle-blowers in the public sector. Under the plan, civil servants who have detected misconduct would be able to report to a body to be created under the Cabinet Office, which would then launch an investigation. Other opposition parties are interested in the bill, but it remains to be seen if they will join forces with the DPJ, opposition sources said. Independent Diet member Etsuko Kawada, whose activist HIV-positive son waged a campaign against a coverup of HIV-tainted blood products by the now-defunct Green Cross Corp., also proposes broad protections for corporate employees and civil servants. Kazuko Miyamoto, author of "The Era of Whistle Blowers" and a director of the Consumer Research Institute, an affiliate of the nonprofit Nippon Association of Consumer Specialists, believes wide-ranging protections are best in the long term. "It will take time to see a comprehensive law enacted like the one in Britain," she said. "In this society, I think it will be difficult to protect everything all at once. As a first step, it would be a good idea to codify protections for whistle-blowers in consumer-related sectors." In Britain, the Public Interest Disclosure Act broadly protects informers in the public and private sectors from dismissal and other unfair treatment. The U.S. has several laws separately covering federal officials, workers in sectors affecting the environment, including the nuclear power industry, and employees at listed firms. "No one would oppose protection for the sake of consumer safety and health," Miyamoto said. "But it would be more difficult to make a statutory judgment on how serious a certain firm's wrongdoing is." Ken Shiraishi, a research fellow at the Economic and Social Research Institute of the Cabinet Office, said the government and lawmakers should recognize the urgency of the issue. "Structural reforms and efforts to revive the economy top the government's agenda right now, so whistle-blower protection legislation would have to wait," he said. But civil rights groups and activists have formed a network in Tokyo to keep the momentum alive. "At present, one takes a great risk blowing the whistle if the consequences may include criminal charges (against a wrongdoer)," said Yukiko Miki, executive director at the Information Clearing House Japan, a nonprofit organization and a member of the network. "I think we need a system that not only protects informers, but also makes good use of the information provided," she said, noting the network will organize symposiums and other opportunities for people to learn more about the issue and eventually put forth a proposal. Last month in Osaka, Kabunushi (Shareholders) Ombudsman, a volunteer group of lawyers and accountants, set up a center to advise and support whistle-blowers while protecting their identity. Amid these efforts, a growing number of people are acknowledging the importance of protecting whistle-blowers, who play a key role in revealing wrongs committed behind closed doors. A recent Cabinet Office survey found more than 90 percent of listed firms in Japan support legislation to protect people who reveal wrongdoing or unjust acts by their employers. Whistle-blower Kushioka also feels the issue is finally being addressed. Just a few years shy of retirement, he decided in January to sue his employer, seeking an official apology and 48 million yen in damages, including the amount of salary he would have received had he not been persecuted. "I never expected so many reporters to gather at the news conference I held to announce my decision to sue the company," Kushioka said. "After witnessing the recent spate of corporate scandals, people probably have begun to realize that whistle-blowers are not traitors to their employers." *The Japan Times: Nov. 13, 2002* (C) All rights reserved ***************************************************************** 31 Officials say missing Uranium not harmful INDIATIMES TIMES NEWS NETWORK �[ WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 2002 02:00:00 AM ] HYDERABAD: A 7.35-kg block of ‘depleted uranium’which is missing from the Central Crime Station (CCS) poses no danger to human health, officials have assured. The block of depleted uranium-molybdenum alloy, seized two years ago by the police,was stored in the CCS store room along with two other pieces,weighing about 35 kg in all. The material had been part of recovered property in a theft case. According to the police, the CCS hired a few persons recently to whitewash the premises and the workers said to have removed the material along with other scrap during the process. Dispelling any fears of radioactivity from the missing block, additional commissioner (crime) M Alagar said experts of the Nuclear Fuel Complex had said that the material did not have any radio-activity left. The police seized the pieces from two scrap dealers, Mohd Ghouse Mohiuddin and Md Khaza Moinuddin, who collected it from the Bibi Cancer Hospital, Malakpet, in Nov. 2000. The hospital had disposed off the metal as scrap. Officials say missing Uranium not harmful')> ***************************************************************** 32 UK: 20 workers contaminated at Dounreay nuclear plant Nov 12 2002 Twenty workers at a nuclear reprocessing plant have been contaminated with radioactive particles. The alarm was raised after radiation was detected on the shoes of one worker at the Dounreay plant in Caithness, northern Scotland, the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) said. Two members of staff in the D2001 plant were found to have contaminated particles on their hands, while one of the pair also had particles on their face. Radioactive dust was found on the shoes of a further 18 workers. A UKAEA spokesman said: "The operation was stopped and the building was sealed off. "There was no radioactive release to the environment and there is no evidence that any of the workers ingested any radiation." Of the two staff found to have contamination on their skin, the spokesman added: "They were taken to our occupational health unit where efforts were made to clean the particles from their skin. "Most of the contamination was cleaned from their skin and they were sent home wearing rubber gloves. It is difficult to quantify at the moment but we believe the risk to them to be low." The cause of the incident is not yet known and an investigation is under way. The Health and Safety Nuclear Safety Inspectorate has been informed and is expected to launch a separate investigation into what went wrong. At the time of the incident, 70 workers at the D2001 plant were carrying out decommissioning work using robotics arms to lift radioactive materials, which were shielded from them by protective screens. icWales^TM is a trade mark of Trinity Mirror Plc. ***************************************************************** 33 UK: Mystery deepens over future of controversial munitions site Nov 13 2002 Ceri Jones, The Western Mail THE future of a former munitions depot at the centre of a nuclear storage controversy was looked uncertain last night in a further blow to the beleaguered Pembrokeshire economy. The two halves of the disbanded Anglo-Irish consortium Omega Pacific, which owns the former Ministry of Defence depot at Trecwn, seemed to contradict each other over the progress of its sale. The site, near Fishguard, was due to be sold by the consortium to the Hampton Trust last month. The proposed sale, believed to be worth around £3m, raised hopes much-needed jobs would be created. However, according to one half of the consortium, Omega Air, the sale has been abandoned and the depot will be put back on the market. But the other half, the WR Trust, disputes this. Now the local MP has stepped into the row. Preseli Pembrokeshire MP Jackie Lawrence said it was time the squabbling stopped and the site was sold so the 600 people who lost their jobs when the MoD depot closed in 1995 could get some benefit, albeit delayed. "We desperately need jobs in North Pembrokeshire, not least now that Dewhirst is closing," she said. "Every possibility must be looked at to get new investment into the area. Here we have a prime site still lying idle after all these years." Omega Pacific bought Trecwn from the MoD for £329,000 in January 1998. The company promised to help revive Pembrokeshire's ailing economy through a multi-million pound investment creating 400 aero-engine jobs. However, its plan was thrown off course by the tightening of European noise controls, and the site later became the centre of huge controversy after the company earmarked its 56 storage caverns for nuclear waste. At a county court hearing in Manchester last June the dispute between the two parties was finally resolved and they were ordered to sell the site with the sale proceeds distributed between them. Although Omega Air would have preferred Trecwn to have been sold by auction, the Hampton Trust had already expressed an interest and with no other buyer in the wings the judge ordered that it be sold to them within 10 weeks. Ulick McEvaddy, director of Omega Air, said, "The sale has fallen through and we will be putting the property on the market in the next few months. "We will now have to agree with Alan Parker of the WR Trust how to market it. I expect it will be put up for sale in the spring." However, the other half of the consortium, the WR Trust, disputed that the sale had collapsed. Alan Parker said, "We have accepted the deal in principle. It's the McEvaddys who are again delaying. It looks like we will be going back to court. When it will go through I don't know." Andrew Clemence of the Pembrokeshire Anti Nuclear Alliance, set up to fight the nuclear storage proposals, said, "We are obviously concerned about any plans any future owners could have for the site. "We would support anyone who would put the site to long term use creating jobs and who would categorically rule out any nuclear use." No-one from Hampton Trust was available for comment. © owned by or licensed to Trinity Mirror Plc 2002 icWales^TM is a trade mark of Trinity Mirror Plc. ***************************************************************** 34 Analysis: Russian cesium threat low* United Press International By Scott R. Burnell UPI Science News Published 11/12/2002 5:40 PM Misplaced canisters of a radioactive isotope of the element cesium in the former Soviet Union should be an item of concern but not excessive worry, scientists told United Press International. The material in question, cesium-137, is "a particularly unfriendly isotope," said P. Andrew Karan, radiation safety officer at the University of Rochester in New York and director of external education for the Health Physics Society. With a half-life of 30 years, however, the 1970s-era sources have expended almost half their radioactivity, he told UPI. Soviet researchers used the pellet-shaped or powdered cesium to study how a nuclear war might affect agriculture. Russian officials have said they are unsure where all the sources are, or even how many exist, raising concerns about terrorists gaining access to them. Large amounts of the material emit life-threatening levels of gamma radiation, Karan said. The powder could be combined with conventional explosives to make a "dirty bomb," capable of contaminating large areas -- but potential terrorists could not obtain both effects simultaneously, he said. "My analogy is like a load of dirt -- you can dump a whole bunch on one person and crush them, or you can spread it around a whole city and irritate everybody," Karan told UPI. Terrorists would have to use a lot of lead or other shielding to transport a source large enough to be immediately dangerous, Karan said, to prevent both detection and premature injury to the delivery person. Such a container hardly would be inconspicuous in the areas where it could do damage, he said, making detection easier. "The physics of the situation dictate that you've got to have something that's very heavy, heavier than it ought to be, or something that's more radioactive than it ought to be," Karan said. Some handheld detectors now in use could spot cesium sources lacking obvious shielding, he said. The attention directed towards the Russian cesium sources is surprising, said Edwin Lyman, president of the Nuclear Control Institute, a non-proliferation research and advocacy organization in Washington. It is highly unlikely the sources could be shielded well enough to cross U.S. borders undetected, he said. Both Lyman and Karan pointed to the recent detection of radioactivity on a cargo ship outside New York City, caused by tiles containing minute amounts of uranium, as evidence that border radiation monitoring is effective. Although the Russian sources have undoubtedly decreased in overall radioactivity, no processing is needed to isolate the remaining active isotope, Lyman said. Even a depleted source still could contribute to a dirty bomb, he said. The Bush administration could be highlighting the overseas situation to mask the issue of potential problems with domestic radioactive sources, such as spent nuclear fuel and university research facilities, Lyman told UPI. "It's easy to point at some sources that have been misplaced in (former Soviet republics), and clearly that's a problem," Lyman said. "But if they're lost, chances are al Qaida's not going to have an easy time locating them." Terrorists could cause far greater problems by attacking containers of spent fuel at locations around the country, some close to major metropolitan areas, Lyman said. A single successful attack of this type would release millions of times more radioactivity than the Russian cesium sources, he said. Such an attack, however, would have to overcome dedicated passive and active security measures, as well as the highly reinforced buildings at nuclear plants. Studies have shown even a Sept. 11-style attack using commercial airliners is unlikely to damage reactors or spent fuel sites enough to disperse radioactive material. Lyman disagreed, however. The cumulative effect of damage throughout a site could lead to some release, he said. The situation in the former Soviet republics merits serious attention, however, especially in the area of monitoring border activity, Karan said. During a just-completed HPS trip to Lithuania, Karan and other society members instructed their counterparts in areas including securing radioactive sources. Lithuanian officials recovered several unused nuclear fuel pellets at the border during his visit, he said. Russian officials have asked the European Union to create a "transit corridor" between Russia and the city of Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea, where shipments would require minimum customs checks and other monitoring, Karan said. In a report to the International Atomic Energy Agency, Karan recommended extensive screening for nuclear materials at both ends of such a corridor. Copyright © 2002 United Press International ***************************************************************** 35 Antiterrorism bill scraps nuclear safety funding Russia operates a fleet of nuclear powered icebreakers and one nuclear powered lighter vessel. This section focuses on radwaste and nuclear safety issues related to the operation of the civilian nuclear fleet. Jump to section [Yellow Report no.3:2001] OSLO - In the wake of the hostage drama in Moscow, the Russian government intends to spend more on the anti-terrorism campaign and scrap funds for federal nuclear safety programmes. Photo: Thomas Nilsen Igor Kudrik, 2002-11-13 09:43 The Federation Council, the upper chamber of the Russian parliament, drafted a 7bn rouble bill — equivalent to $233m — for additional funding of the Russian security forces. The amount was later reduced to just over 3bn roubles by the Russian cabinet. Other budget items, such as security at strategic sites, will be increased, contributing to the overall rise in security funds. But the increase will cut other spending; among these are funds earlier agreed for nuclear safety projects in the Russian Federation. One of the projects to have its funding slashed is Lepse — a storage ship filled with damaged spent nuclear fuel assemblies moored outside Murmansk at the Kola Peninsula. The Lepse project Lepse background Everything about Lepse ship in Bellona's Yellow Report.  download PDF » [http://www.bellona.no/pdfs/Report_3/2_Civilian_nuclear_vessels.p df] The Lepse project has been dragging since 1994, when Bellona in co-operation with Murmansk Shipping Company, or MSCo, — the commercial operator of Russia's nuclear-powered icebreaker fleet — facilitated the EU Commissioner's visit to Murmansk, which brought the first international funding to the project. Lepse has onboard 639 spent nuclear fuel assemblies, which have been stored there for 20 to 37 years. The conditions onboard are considered to be a health hazard for the personnel. This prompted Bellona to finance onshore cabins for the dilapidated ship's crew to reduce risks to their health. Even though Lepse is being constantly monitored, it has an aged hull and is located in the Kola Fjord area, a region of heavy shipping, which presents a risk to the environment in case of accident. The urgency of Lepse's remediation has been recognised by international experts and governments. But only this year the final framework agreement was signed to release funds and to start working on the ship. Two years will be spent on paper work — preparation of the project on how to unload damaged fuel assemblies from the ship's hold with the use of robotics. This work and the eventual unloading operation will be funded by western donors, including the EU and Norway. But there are other expenses to take care of, such as keeping the ship afloat. This year, MSCo received 50m roubles to maintain the ship from the federal budget. A larger sum was in the federal budget for the year 2003, but now the chances of getting the funding are slim, the money will be transferred to the security forces, Bellona's sources at MSCo say. In the long run, the Russian side is also to foot the bill for managing the fuel after it is extracted from Lepse and put onshore, as well as decommissioning the ship. There are other sources to possible funding, but these depend on the signing of the Multilateral Nuclear Environmental Programme for the Russian Federation (MNEPR). MNEPR to be discussed at Putin's visit to Oslo Northern Dimension The Northern Dimension Environmental Partnership (NDEP) is an initiative aimed at co-ordinating efforts to tackle environmental problems in north-west Russia, especially environmental problems from radioactive waste. MNEPR should be signed to release NDEP funds — Bellona's Position Paper. MNEPR was to become a universal agreement between Russia and other states wising to contribute to nuclear safety projects in north-west Russia. The agreement was to regulate tax exemption, nuclear liability and other issues in international nuclear safety projects. Despite the good idea supporting the agreement, negotiations between Russia and potential donor states have been carried out for years without result. The last issues remaining to be discussed relate to value-added taxes. As soon as this problem is resolved, the first part of the 62m euro-fund pledged by the European countries can be spent on projects in north-west Russia. MNEPR, according to Russia's Foreign Ministry, is on the agenda when Russia's President Vladimir Putin arrives in Oslo for the one-day visit on November 12th. But signing MNEPR may not be enough for the eventual release of the funds. Russia has to be also one of the contributors and allocate 10m euros of the 62m fund. So far, Russia has only pledged to do so, without giving a final confirmation. Such a confirmation may be complicated, considering the new spending earmarked for the security forces included in Russia's 2003 budget. Other nuclear programmes are in danger The discussion of the 2003 budget is still pending in the Russian State Duma, but the initial reactions indicate that there will be no major opposition to cuts in nuclear safety. So far, there have been no reports on other specific nuclear safety projects to be buried in 2003, but those are usually the first candidates to be deleted as the past 10-year experience shows. At the same time the Russian Ministry for Nuclear Energy, or Minatom, which has responsibility for managing radioactive waste, is prioritising commercial projects, or so it thinks, such as building new nuclear power plants and developing nuclear fuel cycle infrastructure; including the grand plan to import foreign spent nuclear fuel to the Russian Federation for storage and eventual reprocessing. What it hopes for is unclear. Miantaom's development of projects and obtaining international funding for them has been slow and some times such projects were simply stalled. Publisher: Bellona Foundation [bellona@bellona.no] , President: Frederic Hauge [frederic@bellona.no] Information: info@bellona.no [info@bellona.no] , Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no [webmaster@bellona.no] Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 36 Radioactive scare at plant "There was no radioactive release to the environment and there is no evidence that any of the workers ingested any radiation" - UK Atomic Energy Authority spokesman Britain News --> Radioactive scare at plant 10.50AM GMT, 13 Nov 2002 An investigation has been launched at a nuclear power plant after 20 workers were contaminated with radioactive particles. The alarm was raised after radiation was detected on the shoes of one worker at the Dounreay plant in Caithness, northern Scotland. Two members of staff in the D2001 plant were found to have contaminated particles on their hands, while one of the pair also had particles on the face. Radioactive dust was found on the shoes of a further 18 workers following the incident. Scottish National Party leader John Swinney called for a "full disclosure" of what went wrong at the plant. A spokesman for the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) said: "One of the operators was checking his hands and feet with a Geiger counter when he detected micro-radioactive particles . "The operation was stopped and the building was sealed off. "There was no radioactive release to the environment and there is no evidence that any of the workers ingested any radiation." On the two staff found to have contamination on their skin, the spokesman added: "They were taken to our occupational health unit where efforts were made to clean the particles from their skin. "Most of the contamination was cleaned from their skin and they were sent home wearing rubber gloves. "It is difficult to quantify at the moment but we believe the risk to them to be low." The Health and Safety Nuclear Safety Inspectorate was informed and was expected to launch a separate probe. ***************************************************************** 37 "Collateral Damage" New Report From Medact on Consequences of War on Iraq! International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War IPPNW Opposes US War Against Iraq Washington -- A US-led attack on Iraq could kill between 48,000 and 260,000 civilians and combatants in just the first three months of conflict, according to a study by medical and public health experts. Post-war health effects could take an additional 200,000 lives. The report, Collateral Damage: The Health and Environmental Costs of War on Iraq, was issued by International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), recipient of the 1985 Nobel Peace Prize, and produced by Medact, the organization's United Kingdom affiliate. It is being released today by IPPNW member groups in more than a dozen nations, including Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) in the US. Amy Sisley, MD, a Professor of Surgery at the University of Maryland Medical System, explained the report's findings, "In an era where images of combat are beamed from aircraft, it is too easy to forget about the direct, physical consequences of war. Bombs deafen, blind and blow apart people, riddling them with shrapnel, glass and debris. They collapse buildings on victims and destroy infrastructure vital to finding and treating the wounded. Unexploded ordinance left behind kills and maims, and battlefield toxins can contaminate the environment for decades." Collateral Damage is based on projections from the 1990-91 Gulf War, which led to nearly 200,000 casualties. It analyzes current US combat scenarios and concludes that a new conflict will be much more intense and destructive than the first Gulf War. If nuclear weapons were used, the death toll would rise into the millions. PSR Executive Director Robert K. Musil, PhD, MPH, summarized the public health impacts identified in the report. "Even so-called 'high tech' war wrecks a society's human service systems and physical infrastructure by disrupting delivery of food, water, medicine and energy supplies. The loss of these necessities of life leads to infection, disease, malnutrition, and starvation on a massive scale." The aftermath of a US-led attack could include civil war, famine, epidemics, millions of refugees and economic collapse, according to the report. Dr. Victor W. Sidel, a Professor of Social Medicine at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York City who advised the report authors, added, "As documented in Collateral Damage, a 'pre-emptive' attack would exacerbate the disastrous levels of death, disease, disability and despair already present in Iraq. At the same time, it would weaken the United Nations, weaken international law, weaken efforts to reduce terrorism and weaken the United States itself." Dr. Sidel is Past President of the American Public Health Association and held similar positions at IPPNW and PSR. IPPNW Executive Director Michael Christ offered the group's recommendations to "prevent a human catastrophe": 1. First Do No Harm -- the need to ensure that Iraq is disarmed of its weapons of mass destruction does not warrant an attack which will result in massive civilian and military casualties. 2. Prevent Further Suffering -- a plan must be in place to ensure the supply of food, water and basic services such as health care to the people of Iraq who, more than anyone else, have suffered under Saddam Hussein. 3. Prohibit Pre-emptive Military Action -- the US should not launch a pre-emptive, unilateral war against Iraq, nor should the UN Security Council condone pre-emptive military action. 4. Support Effective Inspections -- provide sufficient resources and backing to UN teams to ensure that the Iraqi regime is disarmed. Christ concluded, "Neither Iraq's suspected weapons programs nor Saddam Hussein's tyranny provide moral or military justification for risking the lives of massive numbers of innocent civilians. We urge all nations to spare the innocent in favor of full and effective inspections." Collateral Damage: The Health and Environmental Costs of War on Iraq may be download here as a PDF file. Please contact Gillian Reeve [gillreeve@medact.org] in the UK or Lynn Martin [ldmartin@ippnw.org] in the US for printed copies. ***************************************************************** 38 Anti-Radiation Protection Pills Yet To Be Distributed NBCSandiego.com - News - Pills Were To Be Distributed Last Summer POSTED: 3:28 p.m. PST November 12, 2002 SAN DIEGO -- The state still hasn't figured out how to distribute about 400,000 anti-radiation pills the federal government gave California last summer. [San Onofre] The potassium iodide pills, locked up in a Southern California storage facility, are designed to protect residents who live near the state's two nuclear power plants -- San Onofre and Diablo Canyon. The dispute centers on whether the pills should be given directly to residents near the nuclear power plants or if they should be placed in hospitals and emergency centers farther away from the plants. "I'm frustrated by the fact that the process has been so slow," Councilwoman Susan Ritschel said. "It doesn't seem like it would be that difficult to determine how to get these pills distributed to folks." The state requested the pills from the federal government, which was offering them after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. The state said it would provide them to people who live within a 10-mile radius of San Onofre and Diablo Canyon. Giving the tablets directly to residents would allow people to take a dose right away if an accident occurs, offering the greatest protection against thyroid cancer. But some officials worry that this could delay evacuations and create a false sense of security. The pills protect against only one type of radioactive isotope -- radioactive iodine. Also, it would be impossible to distribute the pills in advance to every person who would be working, vacationing or passing through the 10-mile evacuation zones. "We are continuing to work as fast as we can to get a plan finalized and in place so we can move forward," said Eric Lamoureux, a spokesman for the governor's Office of Emergency Services. Copyright 2002 by The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 39 Opinion: Beryllium: Giving Kazakhstan the business - By Glenn Bell [http://www.bullatomsci.org/] Beryllium: Giving Kazakhstan the business U.S. plans to partner with the former Soviet republic are already making some people sick By Glenn Bell On July 1, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham announced that the Energy Department would team up with the Republic of Kazakhstan and two private American companiesBrush Wellman and RWE NUKEMto produce beryllium-copper alloys for commercial use. The joint venture, to be based at a former Soviet nuclear-weapons facility near the Chinese border in northeast Kazakhstan, is expected to create some 150 jobs over an 8 to 10 year period and make more than $10 million in profit per year. The Energy Department's decision to participate in a project that will expose Kazakh workers to berylliumworkers who have far fewer safety protections than their counterparts in the United Statesis deplorable. Exposing anyone to the risk of beryllium disease is a blatant disregard of human rights. Neither Russian nor American workers should be expendable, whether the goal is a nation's security or private profit. Beryllium is an extremely strong but lightweight metal that has been widely used since the 1940s, especially in the aerospace and defense industries. Its unique properties make it a perfect reflector material for pits in thermonuclear warheads and as heat shields on reentry vehicles. Today, beryllium alloys are used in several non-military products, including golf clubs, bicycle frames, and computer parts. But it is highly toxic, and has caused the deaths of perhaps thousands of workers across the globe. In recognition of the dangers posed by the metal, Congresswith the backing of then-Energy Secretary Bill Richardsonvoted in 2000 to compensate nuclear weapons workers who were made sick by working with beryllium (see "A Debt Long Overdue," July/August 2001 Bulletin). Studies have shown that as many as 15 percent of those exposed to beryllium experience an immune system response to the presence of beryllium particles in the lungs. Beryllium sensitivity often leads to chronic beryllium disease, or CBD, a debilitating disease that occurs when the body's immune system attempts to break down beryllium particles. The resulting scarring, called granulomas, causes the lungs to stiffen, creating difficulty in breathing and a reduction in the transfer of oxygen to the blood stream. Anyone exposed has about a one-in-six chance of contracting CBD, which takes from a few months to 40 years to develop. The first recorded cases of beryllium disease occurred in Germany in the mid-1930s. U.S. Atomic Energy Commission documents from 1949 cite numerous deaths from beryllium-related illnesses at contractor facilities. At about the same time, the fluorescent lamp industry stopped using beryllium because of mounting illnesses and deaths among workers, as well as the public's growing awareness of the metal's dangers. CBD is widespread in the former Soviet Union. At the Ulbinsky metallurgical plant in Kazakhstan, workers are known to have contaminated family members with beryllium dust, which they unwittingly carried home in clothing. Beryllium dust was found on the tram used by workers, on pillows, even in children's hair and mothers' milk. After visiting affected areas in the region, Lee Newman, a Denver-based pulmonologist, told the Rocky Mountain News (August 2000), "They've got close to 800 workers with this disease at that one plant, and they've carried it out to their community." Workers at the Ulbinsky plant were exposed to 100 times accepted U.S. limits. As a result, there are increased levels of every known ailment associated with the metal, including lung cancer. Around 4 percent of the surrounding population has been sensitized to beryllium. In 1990, an explosion at the Ulbinsky factory created a cloud of beryllium dust that traveled well beyond city limits. It is estimated that more than 120,000 people were exposed to the toxin's dust and fumes. Availability of prednisone and oxygen, the major treatments, is very limited in Russia and the other former Soviet republics. But the need for treatment is urgent, because the younger the afflicted person is, the more aggressive the treatment must be. In Kazakhstan, dozens of children have contracted the disease. Further complicating matters, in October 1995, U.S. News and World Report reported the attempted hijacking of 4.4 tons of radioactive beryllium by the Russian mafia. This deadly stash, which was discovered in a bank vault in Vilnius, Lithuania, was reportedly intercepted only hours before it was to be made available on the open market. In The United States, Beryllium Disease has spread from the nuclear weapons complex to private industry, as suppliers attempt to regain sales lost as a result of the end of the Cold War by encouraging the use of beryllium in commercial products. Beryllium-related illnesses are being found in dental labs, where beryllium alloys are used in dental appliances. Many workers have no idea they are handling a potentially deadly substance. Boy Scout rings were made of a beryllium alloy until last January, when Ohio Citizen Action and other groups explained to the association the potential hazards faced by workers. Increasing public awareness of the metal's dangers may be one reason why suppliers want to site production facilities abroad. In 1949, the U.S. government arbitrarily set the limit for beryllium exposure at 2 micrograms per cubic meter, an infinitesimally small amount. But the Energy Department recently reduced this limit by a factor of 10, to 0.2 micrograms per cubic meter. Many specialists, however, argue that there may be no safe limit for beryllium exposure. At a June 2000 meeting in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, Lisa Maier of the National Jewish Hospital said that so far no study has been able to prove that there is a limit below which sensitization does not occur. There are several hundred recorded cases of beryllium sensitization and CBD throughout the Energy Department complex, and the numbers are growing. Because the link between exposure and disease can be proven beyond any reasonable doubt, CBD was the first illness to be covered under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Act, passed in 2000, which provides compensation and medical benefits to sick nuclear weapons workers. Given the substantial number of beryllium-related illnesses in the United States, it is inappropriate for U.S. authorities to support expanding the metal's production abroad, where health and safety regulations are sorely inadequate. There is also no guarantee that criminal organizations will not try to exploit these private enterprises. Glenn Bell is a machinist at the Y-12 National Nuclear Security Complex in Oak Ridge, Tennessee, and a member of the Beryllium Victims Alliance. Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists November/December 2002 ***************************************************************** 40 Probe into radiation leak in Scotland [newsdesk@rte.ie] (16:58) Britain's Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) has begun an investigation into a radiation leak at a nuclear reprocessing plant in the north of Scotland. "A matter of enormous concern": Swinney It has been revealed that 20 workers at the Dounreay plant in Caithness were contaminated with radioactive particles. A UKAEA spokesperson said there was no serious risk to their health and no radioactive release to the environment. The leader of the Scottish National Party, John Swinney, said the leak was a matter of enormous concern and called for full disclosure of what went wrong. 13 2002 [http://www.onbusiness.ie] ***************************************************************** 41 UK: 22 workers comtaminated at Dounreay Twenty-two workers at Dounreay nuclear reprocessing plant have been contaminated with radioactive particles, it emerged last night. The alarm was raised after radiation was detected on the shoes of one worker at the Caithness plant yesterday morning, the UK Atomic Energy Authority (UKAEA) said. Two staff in the D2001 plant had contaminated particles on their hands, and one of the pair also had particles on the face. Radioactive dust was found on the shoes of a further 20 staff. A UKAEA spokesman said: "The operation was stopped and the building was sealed off. "There was no radioactive release to the environment." Of the staff with skin contamination, the spokesman added: "The facial contamination was removed completely. However, some slight contamination remains on their hands. They have gone home wearing gloves and will be reassessed in the morning. We believe the risk to them to be low." The cause of the scare was not yet known, but an internal investigation is under way. The Health and Safety Nuclear Safety Inspectorate is expected to launch a separate inquiry. At the time of the incident, 70 workers were carrying out decommissioning work using robotic arms to lift radioactive materials, which were shielded from them by protective screens. Lorraine Mann of Scotland Against Nuclear Dumping said: "There have been genuine efforts at Dounreay to improve safety ... but there has been real concern they still have not dented the old culture there." -Nov 13th ***************************************************************** 42 Leukemia study due in February Las Vegas SUN Today: November 13, 2002 at 9:48:26 PST A study searching for environmental links to childhood leukemias in Fallon will be ready in early February, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials told Nevada health authorities on Tuesday. The CDC, based in Atlanta, with state and other federal agencies spent the past year analyzing hundreds of biologic and environmental samples collected for evidence of chemical or infectious agents that could have caused 16 childhood leukemias, three of them fatal. The state has been tracking the 16 leukemia cases since 1997 in the military and farming town of Fallon, about 60 miles east of Reno. The assessment had been scheduled to be released this fall, but a national report on human exposure to environmental chemicals will not be ready until January, CDC experts said. It will report on exposures from 100 chemicals to U.S. residents. "It is our goal and our responsibility to provide the community with the most up-to-date and relevant information so that results can be interpreted accurately," Dr. Carol Rubin of the CDC said on Tuesday. Dr. Randall Todd, Nevada's epidemiologist, agreed. "By waiting for the expanded data from the second national report, CDC will be able to place Churchill County results into a more understandable context," he said. The experts will be able to better interpret Fallon's test results in February, Todd said. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 43 Germans protest against nuclear waste convoy Date: Wed, 13 Nov 2002 00:51:15 +0100 Sunday, November 10, 2002. Posted: 08:32:48 (AEDT)
Thousands have held a protest near a nuclear storage facility in the northern town of Gorleben, as part of protests against the return of nuclear waste to Germany. Organisers said some 5,000 people took part in the rally, while police said the number was 2,000. Twelve containers of nuclear waste, weighing 1,320 tonnes, is expected to arrive in Gorleben next week from the La Hague nuclear waste reprocessing centre in north-western France. The French state-run nuclear reprocessing company, COGEMA, has confirmed 12 containers of waste would leave La Hague for Germany between November 11 and 17. Protesters believe the shipment will arrive in Gorleben on Thursday. Anti-nuclear activists, accompanied by 100 tractors, are planning to block the road on Wednesday with concrete blocks, hay bales and logs. Germany, which has no waste treatment facilities of its own, resumed shipments of spent fuel rods to treatment centres abroad in March last year. They had been suspended in May 1998 due to a scandal over radiation leaks from shipment containers. But Heiner Bartling, Interior Minister for the German state of Lower Saxony, said the situation was calmer than during when previous convoys of nuclear waste had returned from France. "The situation this year is much more relaxed," he said. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ >>CNN Europe 9.11.02: Protesters prepare for nuclear convoy GORLEBEN, Germany -- Several thousand anti-nuclear protesters have begun the start of their planned opposition to a shipment of nuclear waste to a dump in northern Germany. The activists, who were joined by around 100 farmers and their tractors on Saturday, gathered for a rally near to the site at Gorleben where the shipment of 12 containers of reprocessed waste is expected to arrive within days. The shipment is making its way from a reprocessing plant at La Hague in France. Police estimated that 2,200 people took part, while organisers put the figure at more than 4,000. Anti-nuclear activists argue that neither the waste containers nor the dump, at a disused salt mine, are safe. The shipment is the first since last November when demonstrators repeatedly defied over 17,000 police to stage sit-down protests on the rails and the road along the route through Germany of 80 tonnes of nuclear waste. Up to 270 were arrested and almost 100 other were treated for injuries. As on previous occasions, authorities have banned demonstrations along the final stretch of the route to Gorleben during the shipment itself. Nuclear power is a controversial issue in Germany, where government and industry agreed last year to gradually to phase out all reactors by around 2025. Germany sends its nuclear waste to France and Britain for reprocessing, but has been slow to take it back for storage because of political wrangling over where to store it and safety issues over shipping it across Europe. Previous shipments have been hit by violence and disruption from Germany's anti-nuclear lobby. Germany resumed waste shipments last year, following a three-year break imposed by the previous government after radioactive leakage was discovered in some containers. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++ >>ABCNews 9.11.02: German Nuclear Dump Faces Protest *Activists, Farmers Gather Near German Nuclear Waste Dump to Protest Shipment* The Associated Press 9/11/02 GORLEBEN, Germany Nov. 9 — Several thousand anti-nuclear activists joined about 100 farmers on tractors Saturday to protest a forthcoming shipment of nuclear waste to a dump in northern Germany. The demonstrators, whistling and beating drums, gathered for a rally a few hundred yards from the dump at Gorleben, where the shipment of 12 containers of waste from a reprocessing plant at La Hague in France is expected to arrive in midweek after a trip across France and Germany that starts Monday. Police estimated that 2,200 people took part, while organizers put the figure at more than 4,000. Anti-nuclear activists argue that neither the waste containers nor the dump, at a disused salt mine, are safe. The latest shipment is the first since last November, when demonstrators repeatedly defied police to stage sit-down protests on the rails and the road along the shipment's route through Germany. As on previous occasions, authorities have banned demonstrations along the final stretch of the route to Gorleben during the shipment itself. Spent fuel from Germany's 19 nuclear power plants is sent to France and Britain for reprocessing under contracts that oblige Germany to take back the waste. Germany resumed waste shipments last year after a three-year break imposed by the previous government after radioactive leaks were discovered in some containers. Also last year, the government and power companies signed an agreement to phase out nuclear power within about 20 years. Anti-nuclear activists hope that protests against the shipments will push up the security bill and force a quicker shutdown. ***************************************************************** 44 Britain to publish draft bill on nuclear cleanup 13 Nov 2002 11:30 LONDON, Nov 13 (Reuters) - The British government promised on Wednesday to publish a draft bill in the coming year which will set up a new body to manage nuclear "clean up" and take on the 48 billion pound liabilities of British Nuclear Fuels. "Draft legislation will be published on the management of nuclear liabilities," Queen Elizabeth told parliament in a speech setting out Prime Minister Tony Blair's legislative programme for the next 12 months. Analysts and critics of the scheme say the move could make a second wave of nuclear privatisation more attractive to investors by ring-fencing the liabilities in the public sector. It comes as one nuclear firm already in the private sector is being supported by a controversial government loan. British Energy Plc is in a state of financial crisis because of falling UK electricity prices. The draft bill -- which may be held up by lengthy consultation before it is taken forward for legislation -- sets up a Liabilities Management Authority to clean up the "nuclear legacy" safely and cost effectively, according to a Department of Trade and Industry document accompanying the queen's speech. "Current estimates put the undiscounted cost of clean up at some 48 billion pounds," the document said. It said the draft bill would implement proposals set out in a government white paper last July. That white paper said that, once established, the LMA will take responsibility for the public sector civil nuclear liabilities currently held by BNFL and the UK's Atomic Energy Authority. Commercial contracts will remain with BNFL and will be unchanged by the proposals. AlertNet news is provided by www.reuters.com/> ***************************************************************** 45 Protesters Delay Nuclear Waste Load Las Vegas SUN Today: November 13, 2002 at 1:05:20 PST By DAVID McHUGH ASSOCIATED PRESS DANNENBERG, Germany- Anti-nuclear protesters delayed the progress of a shipment of nuclear waste on Wednesday, forcing the trainload of containers to a halt several times with small blockades along its route to a dump in northern Germany. Police said the train was stopped near Verden, south of the city of Bremen, Wednesday morning following a 1 1/2-hour delay nearby when a group of about 30 protesters blocked the tracks. Two protesters had chained themselves to the track - the same tactic that two men used to hold up the train for an hour Tuesday night in the western city of Mannheim. Those men were cut free by police and arrested. The train of waste, weighing a total of 1,320 tons, left a reprocessing plant at La Hague in western France Monday. With 12 containers, it is the biggest shipment yet destined for the facility at Gorleben. The French leg of 870-mile journey was largely incident-free, but hundreds of activists and local farmers have been protesting since the weekend in the region around the dump site at Gorleben, a focus of Germany's anti-nuclear movement since the dump got the go-ahead from the local government in 1977. The waste was due to arrive later Wednesday at a rail terminal in the town of Dannenberg, where the containers will be loaded on trucks for the 12-mile trip to an above-ground shed near Gorleben, about 75 miles southeast of Hamburg. Authorities have sealed the terminal and banned demonstrations within 50 yards of either side of the final stretch of the route. The shipment is the first to the site since last November, when demonstrators defied some 17,500 police and staged sit-down protests along the route through Germany. An estimated 10,000-15,000 officers are in place for the latest transport. Waste shipments to Gorleben resumed in March last year following a three-year break. The previous German government had suspended shipments after radioactive leakage was discovered in some containers. Spent fuel from Germany's 19 nuclear power plants is sent to France and Britain for reprocessing under contracts that oblige Germany to take back the waste. Last year, the government and power companies signed an agreement to phase out nuclear power within about 20 years. Activists hope that protesting waste shipments will push up the security bill and force a quicker shutdown. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 46 Nebraska Earthquake Raises Questions About Proposed Nuclear Waste Site Oklahoma's Newschannel 8 - Tuesday November 12, 2002 10:48am (AP) - An earthquake near a proposed low-level radioactive waste dump in Nebraska has a scientist wanting to know more about the area. Waste from Oklahoma and four other states would be taken to the dump. A magnitude four-point-three earthquake with an epicenter less than ten miles from the site struck earlier this month. Geologist John Shroder says the quake indicates too little is known about the site and he would ring the area with seismographs. The developer says it will build a dump able to withstand a magnitude five-point-oh earthquake. Nebraska officials refused to license the site in 1998, saying they were worried about a low water table and potential pollution. Oklahoma and the other states sued and a federal judge found that Nebraska acted in bad faith and should pay 151 (m) million dollars in damages. Nebraska officials are appealing the ruling. Copyright 2002 by The Associated ©2002 KTUL, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Users of this site are ***************************************************************** 47 Russia to remove all spent nuclear fuel from Kola Peninsula within 6 years - 11/13/2002 - ENN.com Wednesday, November 13, 2002 By Associated Press MOSCOW — Russia will remove all the spent nuclear fuel currently stored on and near the Kola Peninsula, an Arctic region bordering on Norway, within the next six years, the governor of the region said. Murmansk region governor Yuri Yevdokimov said that the government had instructed the Defense Ministry and Atomic Energy Ministry to clean up the fuel that had been used by Russia's nuclear submarine fleet, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported Tuesday. Yevdokimov's comments came while President Vladimir Putin was in Norway on a state visit. In July, the European Union, Russia, and Norway pledged an initial 110 million euro (US$109 million) to support a cleanup fund to rid Russia's northwestern coast of nuclear waste from the submarines. Norway has financed construction of a special train to carry nuclear fuel from submarines; helped build a radioactive waste recycling facility in Murmansk, about 1,450 kilometers (906 miles) north of Moscow; and taken part in renovating a spent nuclear fuel storage site 40 kilometers (25 miles) from the Russian-Norwegian border, ITAR-Tass said. A representative of the Norwegian-based environmental group Bellona said Tuesday that the organization expects progress during Putin's visit on the preparation of a framework agreement meant to avert the danger of nuclear pollution in the Barents Sea and the White Sea off northwestern Russia, the Interfax news agency reported. "Western governments, particularly Scandinavian governments, are concerned about the danger posed by what is called the world's largest nuclear cemetery, the Barents Sea, in which dozens of submarines with nuclear reactors have been dumped," Interfax quoted Igor Kudrik, a Bellona manager in St. Petersburg, as saying. Norway suggested drafting and signing the agreement, called the Multilateral Nuclear Environmental Program for Russia, in 1999, Kudrik said. Bellona says there are about 100 Russian submarines with 300 nuclear reactors aboard in the waters of the Kola Peninsula, Interfax reported. It said Norwegian environmentalists estimate the total cost of cleaning up the peninsula and the nearby Russian region of Arkhangelsk at $2 billion. Copyright 2002, Associated Press ENN is a registered trademark of the Environmental News Network Inc. Copyright © 2001 Environmental News Network Inc. ***************************************************************** 48 CCAT: Close, clean up Cotter 11-12-02 [Canon City Daily Record - Canon City and the Royal Gorge Region, Colorado] [http://www.canoncitydailyrecord.com] By B.J. Plasket Daily Record News Group A group formed earlier this year to fight radioactive waste shipments has now called for the closure and cleanup of the 44-year-old Cotter mill south of Cañon City. A press release from the board of directors for Colorado Citizens Against Toxic Waste, Inc. (CCAT), calls for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment "to deny re-licensing of the mill" and calls on the Health Department — as well as the Environmental Protection Agency and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission — to "immediately begin de-commissioning and cleanup of the Cotter Uranium Mill." CCAT co-chair Sharyn Cunningham said the call for decommissioning was the result of "an accumulation of information we found as we researched and explored all the issues that came up with Cotter." Cunningham said during the group's fight to stop shipments of radioactive soil from another Superfund site in Maywood, N.J., "one thing led to another, revealing more information that was disturbing." George Turner, the director of the Cañon City Chamber of Commerce who has publicly supported Cotter, said he was "disappointed" in CCAT's new stance. "They said their goal was to keep the radioactive waste out of town, not to close Cotter" he said. "It appears they weren't being honest." Cotter Corporation executives did not return phone calls prior to press time. The mill, which began operation in 1958, had its license to handle nuclear materials suspended earlier this year after a series of what health department officials called repeat safety violations — including allowing a pregnant woman in the mill's "product room." The CCAT resolution says Cotter has allowed its impoundment ponds to evaporate in violation of the 1988 consent decree that settled a state pollution lawsuit against the mill. The release said the evaporation poses a "clear and present danger of airborne radioactive particles." The resolution also takes exception to Cotter's contention that it is not becoming a radioactive waste storage site, claiming that the company's license renewal application predicts that 80 percent of the company's future business will come from the handling of radioactive waste, also known as "alternate-feed material." CCAT also claimed that decommissioning the mill would be of greater community benefit than its continued operation. "Decommissioning would establish that the people of our community have a greater value than an industry that has polluted the environment and that Fremont County would benefit from the increase in highly-technical and entry-level jobs that would be required during de-commissioning and cleanup," the resolution said. Cotter, which settled a lawsuit filed by Lincoln Park residents in the early 1990s, is currently appealing another suit in which 16 area residents were awarded damages that now total over $43 million for damages to their property and health. Earlier this year the Colorado Court of Appeals rejected Cotter's appeal of a suit that would have required its insurers to pay any judgment in that case. In that case the court ruled that the company's insurance policies covered accidental discharge of pollutants but did not cover pollution the company knew about and which was ongoing. The Health Department, meanwhile, is planning tests for plutonium and other contaminants in the Lincoln Park area and at the Cotter mill. A public meeting on a proposed testing plan will be held at 6:30 p.m. Thursday at the Fremont County Commissioner Chambers, 615 Macon Ave., Cañon City. News and information is updated Monday - Friday at 5:00pm. Entire contents Copyright Ó 2000 Royal Gorge Publishing Corporation. All ***************************************************************** 49 Train loaded with nuclear waste arrives in Germany - 11/13/2002 - ENN.com Wednesday, November 13, 2002 By Reuters WOERTH, Germany — A train carrying reprocessed German nuclear waste crossed the border from France Tuesday and police said they were expecting thousands of demonstrators to try to slow its passage to a storage site. German police said there had been no disturbances so far to the transport of the 12 containers filled with 1,300 tons of reprocessed nuclear waste on their way to temporary storage in the north German town of Gorleben. But police said they were expecting many thousands of antinuclear activists to try to prevent the train from reaching Gorleben, north of Hanover. The train arrived in Woerth after crossing the border from France Tuesday afternoon. There have been reports of minor injuries in scuffles between police and demonstrators in Gorleben this week. The 660-yard long train left the French reprocessing plant of La Hague Monday and is expected at its final destination Wednesday. Protesters gathering near Gorleben and said they were determined to make the final leg of the journey as difficult — and expensive — as possible. Hundreds of police from several German states were securing the tracks along the way, trying to prevent protesters from blocking the train's path. During the last transport a year ago, protesters chained themselves to the tracks and delayed the train by several hours. "We have a smaller police force in place this time, but are prepared for a more violent confrontation," a police spokesman said. Some 15,000 police were needed to guard the route last year in the largest peacetime security operation in post-war German history. Security costs have reached some 23 million euros (US$23.20 million) in past years. Copyright 2002, Reuters ***************************************************************** 50 Hansen's Effort to Block Nuclear Waste Dies The Salt Lake Tribune -- Wednesday, November 13, 2002 BY ROBERT GEHRKE THE ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON -- Rep. James Hansen's backdoor bid to stop the storage of high-level nuclear waste in Utah's west desert died Tuesday after House and Senate negotiators dropped his provision from the final version of a defense bill. The Utah Republican quietly slipped language into the Defense Authorization Bill that would have created 500,000 acres of wilderness in Utah's west desert, beneath the Air Force's Utah Test and Training Range. The wilderness designation would have blocked shipments of highly radioactive waste to a proposed temporary storage site on the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation. But the provision was opposed by environmentalists, who said the wilderness language was too weak and gave too much power to the Pentagon. Democrats were furious that Hansen usurped the normal committee process and crammed his language into the bill. Electric utilities that operate nuclear reactors that produce the waste also lobbied against the measure. "Utah had its last, best chance to stop the introduction of dangerous, high-level nuclear waste into our community and they let their radical wilderness agenda stop it," Hansen said in a statement. Hansen's language became one of a handful of sticking points that bogged down the defense bill, despite having the support of the Defense Department, the White House and Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt. A number of compromises were offered, including one that would have merely directed the Pentagon to study the impact of storing nuclear waste beneath the bombing range and the potential health and safety effects if there is an incident on the range. "We offered every compromise in the book and we answered every concern, but it appears they would rather have 40,000 metric tons of nuclear waste in our back yard than give an inch on their extreme position on wilderness," Hansen said. On Tuesday, lead negotiators from the House and Senate decided to trash the controversial measures -- including Hansen's proposal -- in order to get a bill passed as Congress meets in a short postelection session this week. Hansen is retiring at the end of the year and without his seniority and position on the key House defense and resources committees, it could be difficult to bring back similar legislation next year. Larry Young, executive director of the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA), said Hansen overreached with his proposal and angered too many important members of Congress with his backdoor tactics. "It was doomed to failure because he took on too many opponents simultaneously," Young said. "It's bittersweet to see the outcome. It was a bad public lands provision that he inserted into the House version. It needed to be stopped and it was. In the process he's willing to sacrifice public safety." Private Fuel Storage, a consortium of electric companies, is seeking a license to store 44,000 tons of highly radioactive fuel from commercial power plants on the Skull Valley Goshute Indian reservation, 45 miles west of Salt Lake City. State officials and Utah's congressional delegation have been searching for ways to block the proposal. Hansen pointed to the recent crash of two F-16s as evidence of the danger of storing nuclear waste on the test and training range. Young said his group supports the concept of using wilderness designations to stop the nuclear waste shipments. But the group objected to Hansen's language, which would have allowed the military to close parts of the wilderness areas, given the Secretary of Defense veto power over land uses, and would have prevented the wilderness designation of lands that SUWA says should be considered. © Copyright 2002, The Salt Lake Tribune All material found on ***************************************************************** 51 Editorial: Legislators must unite over Yucca Las Vegas SUN: November 12, 2002 For 15 years Nevada fought hard against Yucca Mountain in the political arena but lost the final battle in Congress this past July. Its battle is now in the courts and so far state officials have reason for optimism. For example, the state asked that its three lawsuits against federal agencies be heard successively by the same three-judge panel. Last week the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia agreed and the arguments are scheduled for next September. Law firms hired by the state will argue in separate cases that the Department of Energy, without proper notification to Nevada or Congress, changed the rules regarding how a site would be determined suitable for storing high-level nuclear waste; that the Environmental Protection Agency set 100,000 years as the regulatory time frame for protecting against radiation, when the National Academy of Sciences recommended 1 million years, and that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission deviated from the Nuclear Waste Policy Act when it ruled that the site's geology does not have to be the main barrier against deadly radiation. Nevada asked for all three cases to be heard by the same judges so that they would understand fully how the federal government orchestrated its campaign for Yucca Mountain, how it arbitrarily changed the rules and ignored inconvenient facts in fulfilling its preordained policy. Because the reach of politics is supposed to end at the courtroom door, with decisions based solely on facts, the state should have a better chance to stop what surely is a threat not only to Nevada but also to the nation. The job now is for the 2003 Legislature to regard this legal fight as nonpartisan. As the need for funding the fight arises, we're looking for legislators to vote not as Democrats or Republicans, but as Nevadans. All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 52 Britain to publish draft bill on nuclear cleanup Reuters AlertNet - 13 Nov 2002 11:30 LONDON, Nov 13 (Reuters) - The British government promised on Wednesday to publish a draft bill in the coming year which will set up a new body to manage nuclear "clean up" and take on the 48 billion pound liabilities of British Nuclear Fuels. "Draft legislation will be published on the management of nuclear liabilities," Queen Elizabeth told parliament in a speech setting out Prime Minister Tony Blair's legislative programme for the next 12 months. Analysts and critics of the scheme say the move could make a second wave of nuclear privatisation more attractive to investors by ring-fencing the liabilities in the public sector. It comes as one nuclear firm already in the private sector is being supported by a controversial government loan. British Energy Plc is in a state of financial crisis because of falling UK electricity prices. The draft bill -- which may be held up by lengthy consultation before it is taken forward for legislation -- sets up a Liabilities Management Authority to clean up the "nuclear legacy" safely and cost effectively, according to a Department of Trade and Industry document accompanying the queen's speech. "Current estimates put the undiscounted cost of clean up at some 48 billion pounds," the document said. It said the draft bill would implement proposals set out in a government white paper last July. That white paper said that, once established, the LMA will take responsibility for the public sector civil nuclear liabilities currently held by BNFL and the UK's Atomic Energy Authority. Commercial contracts will remain with BNFL and will be unchanged by the proposals. ***************************************************************** 53 Disclose and dispose Times Online November 13, 2002 Saddam must abide by a new inspection regime What Iraq lacks in terms of a professional democracy, it makes up for in amateur dramatics. The nation that produced a 100 per cent approval rate, on a 100 per cent turnout, for President Saddam Hussein in a “referendum” last month witnessed the same degree of unanimity yesterday within its parliament. That body, in a carefully co-ordinated example of spontaneous outrage, recommended that Iraq repudiate UN Resolution 1441 but, with all due deference, chose to leave the final decision on this matter to the “wise leadership” of Saddam. Iraq might not have Christmas in the sense that the British would understand it, but has established its own version of the pantomime season. It would be surprising if Saddam were, by the Friday deadline, to take the advice of his hand-picked fan club. A straight “no” to the UN Security Council in these circumstances would be to roll out the red carpet for American tanks. There is little in Saddam’s record to suggest that he would volunteer for his personal version of Custer’s last stand. The balance of probability is that the “wise leadership” of Iraq will opt instead for one of two answers. The first is “yes, but”; by which Saddam would assent to the UN “in principle”, but seek negotiations on the “details” of which countries would supply the inspectors. The second is “yes, then”; a more sophisticated approach, where the Iraqi dictator would announce his “unconditional” co-operation. The second strategy is what many in the Bush Administration expect. The White House is aware that the most significant deadline is not the one that will pass on Friday, but on December 8, the date when Iraq is supposed to submit an inventory of all its biological, chemical and nuclear weapons. If Saddam haggles over the terms on which the inspectors work, he may force the Security Council to endorse American action. He would surely prefer to champion his “compliance” with the UN and exploit the remaining three weeks to conceal material from inspectors before they arrive, armed as they will be with more sophisticated equipment and a stronger mandate than before. It is for this reason that the next three weeks are especially significant. After all his crocodile tears over 11 years, Saddam can hardly publish a lengthy list which accurately reflects all his efforts to acquire the ingredients for weapons of mass destruction. Far too many apologists, and not merely in Baghdad, have invested too much in the falsehood of his “peaceful intents” for such a confession to materialise now. Nor, on the other hand, can Iraq afford to publish a comically implausible dossier stating that it has little more than a catapult and a penknife at its disposal. That claim would, without a successful camouflage operation, be destroyed by the inspectors within days of their arrival. Iraq would then find itself in “material breach” of Resolution 1441. The UN should therefore be prepared, as the Bush White House is, for the mother of all cover-ups. Some of this will be detectable, and the United States will make strenuous efforts to highlight it. Saddam is not about to abandon all the techniques of “cheat and retreat”, as George W. Bush put it, which have enabled him to survive for as long as he has. He will aspire to find a middle path between obedience to the UN (an outcome that might trigger a coup against him) and defiance of a kind that would be the catalyst for an invasion. The task for the international community over the next few weeks is to remain resolved. The age of “cheat and retreat” has to be replaced by one in which “disclose and dispose” are the watchwords [http://www.thetimes.co.uk ***************************************************************** 54 Russia: Typhoons being repaired to operate until 2010 Comprehensive updates on the nuclear powered submarines and nuclear powered cruisers still in operation in the Northern Fleet. OSLO-SEVERODVINSK - Russian navy may face nuclear-free seas by 2010; repairs Typhoon class submarines to use them as test platforms for weapons, which are still in design. A Typhoon class submarine in Severodvinsk. Bellona archive Igor Kudrik, Andrey Mikhailov, 2002-11-13 15:26 A Typhoon class submarine — Arkhangelsk (TK-17) — left the docks of Sevmash shipyard (Severodvinsk, Arkhangelsk county) and headed to its home base in Zapadnaya Litsa at the Kola Peninsula on November 9th 2002. The submarine has been under repairs and upgrade for one year. The first submarine within Typhoon class — TK-208 — commissioned in 1981 has been under repairs in Severodvinsk since 1990. Its repairs and upgrade seem to near the end as the submarine was taken out of the dry dock and is undergoing pre-sea trial testing. During this long 12-year resting period submarine's ID-number TK-208 was replaced with name Dmitry Donskoy. The sea trials of the submarine are scheduled for spring 2003. The longish repairs of Dmitry Donskoy were apparently not caused only by the lack of funding. As recently as this year Russian admirals started to refer to Dmitry Donskoy as to the submarine of the forth generation. This submarine built in early 1980 belonged at that time to the third generation. No submarines of the forth generation have been constructed in Russia so far. A Typhoon class submarine — Arkhangelsk (TK-17) — left the docks of Sevmash shipyard (Severodvinsk, Arkhangelsk county) and headed to its home base in Zapadnaya Litsa at the Kola Peninsula on November 9th 2002. Severodvinsk There were also reports that Typhoons, or at least upgraded Dmitry Donskoy, will be used as testing platforms for new weaponry. The type of weaponry is a big dilemma for the Russian navy, however. It all started, when the first forth generation submarine — starting from this year it is referred to as the fifth generation submarine — Yury Dolgoruky, Borey class armed with ballistic missiles, was laid down at Sevmash in 1996. The initial plans suggested that Yury Dolgoruky would be carrying Bark missiles. The maker of Bark class missiles was the Makeev Design Bureau, which designed almost all Soviet/Russian sea-based ballistic missiles. The Bureau had been working on this missile since 1982. The Bark-class missiles were a dramatically modified version of the SS-N-20 currently installed on Typhoon class submarines. But after a number of unsuccessful tests, Bark missiles were discarded in 1998. The design of a new ballistic missile system was given Moscow Institute of Thermo-equipment (MIT), which designed land based solid fuel ballistic missiles of Pioneer, Topol and Topol-M classes. The new missile system was nicknamed Bulava-30. Back in 1996, it was said that Yury Dolgoruky would completed in 2002. Today a new date — 2007 — is set, given Bulava-30 is ready by that time. And here enter Typhoons. Out of six originally built Typhoons, three, as Russia's Navy officials maintain, are slashed for decommissioning. In 1996, TK-12 and TK-202 and in 1997 TK-13 were taken out of regular service and placed on reserve. TK-202 arrived to Severodvinsk first week of July 1999 for decommissioning. The work on this submarine is being funded by the US Cooperative Threat Reduction program, or CTR. This autumn spent nuclear fuel was to be unloaded from TK-202 reactors at the Zvezdochka shipyard (Severodvinsk) defuelling site. The construction of the defuelling site was also financed through CTR. TK-12 and TK-13 are lining up for their turn to be scrapped. The remaining three Typhoons, TK-208, TK-17 and TK-20 may be used to ensure that by 2007 Russian navy is not having nuclear-free-seas situation and finally commissions the fifth generation submarine. Programme until 2010 According to Russian daily Vremya MN, the funding of the Russian navy until 2005 will focus on keeping in operation the existing submarines, including SSBNs of Delta-III class in the Pacific and Delta-IV class in the Northern Fleet. Along with that the funding to complete Yury Dolgoruky should be provided in full. But 2010, a serial production of Borey class submarines should start, as suggested by the current programmes. The share of the navy in the defence budget, however, has not exceeded 11 to 12% during the past years. The naval lobby has been trying hard to raise navy's budget allocations up to 25%, but so far those attempts have not been successful. Given the current state of affairs, the strategic forces of the Russian Federation are slowly migrating towards the shore. At least the land-based strategic forces have a modern missile system — Topol-M — which the navy lacks so far for the reasons mentioned above. Putin's favouritism of the naval forces has proven during the years of his presidency to be more of PR-related, rather than having any practical application. The bulk of the funds earmarked for the navy go to ensure the timely payments of allowances, whereas only a small fraction is spent on development. Typhoon class submarines — overview K-no. (fabric no.) Ship yard -Laid down -Launched Active service -Start date -End date Accidents/Incidents Present condition TK-208 (Dmitry Donskoy) Sevmash 30/06 1976 23/09 1979 12/12 1981 1986: Reactor cleaning unit leakage 1987: Reactor cleaning unit leakage The submarine has been under upgrade and repairs at Sevmash shipyard since 1990. Repairs intensified in 2000, but the submarine is still at the shipyard. Scheduled to enter service in spring 2003 TK-202 Sevmash 01/10 1980 26/04 1982 28/12 1983 1996 No data Under decommissioning with CTR funds at Sevmash shipyard in Severodvinsk since 1999. Defueling started in June 2002. TK-12 Sevmash 27/04 1982 17/12 1983 27/12 1984 1996 No data Laid-up in Nerpichya Bay, Zapadnaya Litsa. TK-13 Sevmash 05/01 1984 30/04 1985 30/12 1985 1997 No data Laid-up in Nerpichya Bay, Zapadnaya Litsa. TK-17 (Arkhangelsk) Sevmash 24/02 1985 Aug 1986 06/11 1987 in service No data Repaired at Sevmash 2001-2002. Based in Nerpichya Bay, Zapadnaya Litsa. TK-20 Sevmash 06/01 1986 Jul 1988 Sep 1989 In service No data Based in Nerpichya Bay, Zapadnaya Litsa. 2002-06-12 Nuclear powered vessels Russia scraps Typhoons 2000-01-11 Nuclear powered vessels Typhoons to remain in service 1999-12-14 Nuclear powered vessels Delta-IV put in service, Typhoon to join 1999-08-11 Nuclear powered vessels Typhoon to get scrapped shortly 1998-09-09 Nuclear powered vessels Uriy Dolgoruky Pending Reconstruction Publisher: Bellona Foundation [bellona@bellona.no] , President: Frederic Hauge [frederic@bellona.no] Information: info@bellona.no [info@bellona.no] , Technical contact: webmaster@bellona.no [webmaster@bellona.no] Telephone: +47 23 23 46 00 Telefax: +47 22 38 38 62 * P.O.Box 2141 Grunerlokka, 0505 Oslo, Norway ***************************************************************** 55 Author of Chinese nuclear arms book fights U.S. censors Wednesday, November 13, 2002 Posted: 7:26 PM HKT (1126 GMT) Wen U.S. censors want to classify portions of the book with references to Wen Ho Lee -- another former Los Alamos scientist who was fired in 1999 amid spy allegations *WASHINGTON (Reuters) --* *The U.S. government pressed ahead with efforts to censor a book about China's nuclear weapons program, asking an appeals court to block a former government scientist from showing the disputed manuscript to his own lawyer.* The Justice Department has asked the court to review a June 2002 ruling in which District Judge Emmet Sullivan found that the government had violated Danny Stillman's First Amendment rights by denying his lawyer access to the information in Stillman's manuscript. "The District Court erred in reaching this conclusion," Justice Department lawyer Mark Stern told the three-judge panel reviewing the case. He said there was a "significant risk" of inadvertent disclosure if a private attorney was given access to sections of a manuscript that could contain sensitive material. Stillman, a retired scientist formerly with the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, sued the government in 2001 for blocking publication of his manuscript on China's nuclear weapons program. The government cited national security grounds for holding up publication of the book. The case is still before the District Court, pending a ruling by the Appeals Court, which could come in the next few months, lawyers in the case said. In his June ruling Sullivan ordered Stillman's attorney, Mark Zaid, to have access to the manuscript once he passed a security clearance. Zaid has received a clearance. Sullivan also rejected the government's move to block judicial review of steps the executive branch takes in the interest of national security to censor writings by former employees. "The government has asked this court to take the extraordinary step of insulating its actions from judicial review and from constitutional challenge," he wrote in June. "This court will not allow the government to cloak its violations of plaintiff's First Amendment rights in a blanket of national security." Manuscript classified Stillman, who retired from the Los Alamos laboratory in 1993, had submitted the manuscript of "Inside China's Nuclear Weapons Program" to the Energy and Defense departments in January 2000, as required under secrecy agreements dating back to his employment at the nuclear weapons research lab. Eighteen months later, the government said Stillman's manuscript -- based on nine trips to China between 1990 and 1999 -- was classified and could not be published. Stillman, who headed up the intelligence division at Los Alamos before he retired, then filed suit against the government for blocking publication of his manuscript. The 500-page manuscript includes observations based on trips Stillman made to Chinese nuclear weapons sites during and after his employment with the government. Since the lawsuit was filed, the government has reached agreement with Stillman to clear about 85 percent to 90 percent of the contents. The rest remains censored. Zaid said some of the portions the government wanted to classify included references to Wen Ho Lee -- another former Los Alamos scientist who was fired from his job in 1999 amid spy allegations. Among issues still before the District Court include whether the government can block Stillman from publishing information it deems classified. Zaid argues that since six of the nine trips Stillman made to China were after he left Los Alamos, he did not receive the information through the scope of his employment. Copyright 2002 Reuters . All ***************************************************************** 56 Disarming disclosures -- The Washington Times November 13, 2002 Harlan Ullman      The Bush administration wants to disarm Iraq of its nuclear weapons ambitions, relying on force if necessary to end the regime of Saddam Hussein. But it harbors no such illusions in dealing with North Korea's continuing nuclear weapons program. Yet, it seems reluctant to disclose why it favors diametrically different actions in both instances. And it has not explained why it purposely withheld information from Congress about the latter while requesting a vote to authorize the use of force against the former.      There are few countries in the world whose citizens are better protected from the potential harm of incomplete or non-disclosure than the United States. Failure to disclose is the grounds for lawsuits, reversed judgments and other legal recourse. Indeed, disclosure is essential to the viability of trust and confidence in any transaction.       This standard for disclosure, however, does not always apply to government, even when deliberations extend to the most profound issues of peace and war (although embattled former SEC head Harvey Pitt learned the hard way that failure to disclose vital information about an appointee to a sensitive oversight position brought a steep price — his resignation).       Last month, President Bush called on Congress to authorize force if Iraq did not fully comply with appropriate U.N. resolutions regarding weapons of mass destruction. Many Democrats sided with the president. But, barely a few days before the vote, North Korea made an in- your-face admission to senior American diplomats that it had unabashedly continued its nuclear weapons program, violating a number of treaty agreements. That information was not fully disclosed until well after the Iraq vote had been taken in Congress.       By then, Congress was recessing for the election. So, squeals and shrieks of protest over this failure to disclose were muted. After the election, with Republicans in control of both houses, these complaints are liable to go unheard. And there is still no complete answer to the question of why the administration was prepared to go to war to prevent one member of the "axis of evil" from obtaining nuclear weapons and rely on peaceful means to deal with another that may have already crossed this threshold.       The administration and Republicans in Congress have since argued that Iraq and North Korea are vastly different situations and must be treated as such. North Korea had not invaded its neighbor in 50 years. Its links with Middle Eastern terrorist groups, especially al Qaeda, were unproven and distant. And, most importantly, despite North Korea's million-man army and admittedly quirky leader, Kim Jong Il, it was not a "clear and present danger." Iraq and Saddam Hussein are.       The administration also countered that it had only just been confronted with North Korea's admission. It needed a few days to consult with key allies in the region. Aside from resenting the implication that the White House acted as if it trusted these allies more than members of Congress, some Democrats inferred that this information might have changed the vote. Otherwise, why was Congress not fully informed beforehand?       These critics have a point.       The U.N. vote on an additional resolution compelling Iraq to permit inspectors to verify it has ended its weapons of mass destruction programs may or may not meet the administration's expectations. However, the administration will have to use that resolution as part of whatever strategy it embarks upon toward Iraq. But it cannot ignore what to do about North Korea either. This means a further round of public diplomacy will be necessary to explain America's interests and aims and why it has decided to act, possibly very differently, toward Iraq and North Korea.       The president should seize this as an opportunity to address the nation on these subjects soon and deal with these partially answered questions. He should state the consequences for Iraq if it fails to comply with U.N. resolutions and at least suggest what shape a postwar world might take if a regime change occurs. And he would be wise to discuss North Korea, its nuclear ambitions and the reasons for his decision not to disclose to Congress what he knew about North Korea before the vote authorizing the use of force.       This is not an instance of deceiving a buyer or unfairly winning a court case by failing to disclosing vital information. The administration should be presumed to have had good reasons for its actions. However, as the prospect for war grows, the administration must now present its broad plan of what it proposes to do and explain why it has proceeded as it has.       If the president does that, he will achieve a far more lasting victory than helping Republicans gain a few additional seats in the House and the Senate. Harlan Ullman, a distinguished former naval officer and past teacher at the National War College, is currently with the Center for Strategic and International Studies and the Center for Naval Analyses Corp, and a columnnist with The Washington Times. ***************************************************************** 57 Brian Greenspun: Truth about our war Las Vegas SUN November 12, 2002 Brian Greenspun is editor of the Las Vegas Sun. IN THE POLITICAL world, the art of clarifying one's remarks is just that, an art. And it ain't pretty. In the world of national and international security, clarifying one's remarks is based more on science. The science of real world actions and the science of warfare. It is sometimes not very pretty either. I don't know whether what I heard the other night in Washington qualifies as art or science, but I do know that what I heard was at the very least disconcerting and, at the most, downright scary. And I have a roomful of witnesses who probably feel the same way. One of the great joys of being a member of the Board of Trustees of the prestigious Brookings Institution think tank is the quality of the people who inhabit that world and the brilliance of the scholars who work there. Each meeting is an eye-opener and each meeting provides an opportunity to learn about a world so few of us really understand. I know, as much as I thought I knew about the inner workings of government, politics and international relations, the reality is that I knew very little. It has been through the education I have received at Brookings that my world has been opened and enlightened beyond measure. That, of course, is the role Brookings and other think tanks play in our country and abroad. They think. About the present, the future and the myriad ways we can get from one to the other in the least offensive, least expensive and most advantageous way possible. They inform our congressional leaders, our presidents and those in society whose job it is to chart the course of our lives. And, amongst the handful of top think tanks that speak loudly and often at all levels of government, Brookings is the leader. I mention all of this to create the backdrop for the dinner speaker at our meeting last week in Washington. Unlike most speakers whose presence is desired by the audience usually more than the desire of the speaker to be there, Brookings is one of the few places today's involved people want to be seen and heard. And so it was that the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Richard Myers, came to speak at the beautiful Museum of Women in the Arts last Monday night. I didn't know much about Gen. Myers except that he seems to be providing our president with good advice because, by most accounts, we are winning our war against terrorism. Also, the upcoming war-making plans in Iraq have not raised any red flags between us and a successful effort in Saddam's front yard. Knowing that he would speak to us, I did some homework. Gen. Myers is generally believed to be a man of significant intellect, great integrity and a no nonsense, tell-it-like-it-is personality, each of which traits should make for a very successful and valuable chief. I was told that he tells the truth, which could work to his disadvantage in the current circumstances in which "the less said the better" is the watchword of the administration. Gen. Myers talked at length about the changes in the military's mission in the 21st century and the need to upgrade not only our weapons capability but also our technical operations, manpower deployment tactics and strategies as we move from a world in which we knew our most potent enemy to one in which there could be multiple threats from moving targets, very few of which dealt in the open and according to 20th century war-making rules of engagement. In short, we are undergoing a massive remake of our strategies, our tactics and ourselves. It was during the discussion on how we were improving our capabilities that Gen. Myers mentioned a meeting with a large computer software maker whose efforts were being considered to create software that would allow us to think faster than al-Qaida. You heard it right, the same way we did. I was not alone in my desire to get to the end of his speech so I could ask him what he meant. Surely he couldn't have said what I thought he said. My hand was not the first to go up and the other questioner homed in on that very short sentence spoken among a host of other, seemingly more significant ones. The general explained his comments and reiterated that the United States controlled about three-fourths of Afghanistan but that al-Qaida -- and, presumably -- Osama bin Laden -- were holding us at bay in that last 25 percent of Afghan soil. The reason, he said, was that al-Qaida and the Taliban had been able to adapt their techniques to our war-making abilities and were now outthinking our people. What? How could this be? I can understand how President Bill Clinton could have missed getting Osama a few years ago when we lobbed a few cruise missiles his way and missed him by just a few minutes. But, in the past year, President George W. Bush has thrown the entire weight and considerable capabilities of the armed forces of the United States of America at the man and all we can say is that he's thinking faster than we are! That we need a computer program to enable us to think faster than a man who lives in a cave and the efficiency of whose network has been dramatically diminished? Excuse me if I appear bewildered for just a moment -- a state many of the dinner goers entered following those remarks, I might add. If the best we've got isn't good enough to get Osama, what can we possibly be thinking about when we move full speed ahead toward Saddam Hussein? Given the general's concerns, the only thing I can think of is that Saddam is much easier to defeat and so, if we want a success this year, he's the go-to guy. Well, the inevitable happened. It only took a day or two for Gen. Myers to clarify his position and redefine his words on television consistent with the company position. He said he meant to say that fighting terrorism is not easy and that it will take a long time to win our current war. There, that fits much better into President Bush's plans to keep our country focused on his war-making abilities. Forget the fact that we may be provoking others to action because they believe we can't think fast enough to combat terrorists; it is enough that they might even consider the prospect! I don't blame Gen. Myers for trying to separate himself from his truthful and heartfelt remarks because that's the kind of candor that can get you in trouble with your boss at the Pentagon. And his boss, too. But, just for a moment shouldn't we consider the possibility that he didn't misspeak? That we are stumped over there and that Osama could be winning this war on terrorism? I don't know about the rest of my countrymen, but I would rather hear the truth and act on those facts than to be fed a pabulum of clarifying remarks that obfuscate the reality of fighting this very different war. If the truth shall set us free, what will happen when we are told just the opposite? All contents copyright 2002 Las Vegas SUN, Inc. ***************************************************************** 58 DOE: new testing controversy Oakland Tribune Online Wednesday, November 13, 2002 - 3:09:02 AM MST Weapons chiefs don't see need for new nuke tests Fears of aggressive nuclear policy, sparked by GOP wins, refuted by Livermore lab boss By Ian Hoffman, STAFF WRITER Despite major GOP wins in Congress and talk of a more aggressive nuclear policy, weapons chiefs at the two U.S. nuclear-explosives design labs say they see no reason to revive underground testing unless America's arsenal fails in some unexpected way -- or unless the Pentagon asks for weapons never designed before. Ranking U.S. nuclear-weapons scientists say they have yet to hear those demands, nor have they found what Lawrence Livermore Laboratory's Bruce Goodwin calls "the bolt out of the blue" -- a looming and sudden decrepitude in current U.S. weapons -- despite years of hunting one. "If I knew something was coming, I'd fix it today. I don't see a long-term issue coming," said Goodwin, Livermore associate director for defense and nuclear technologies. "Put it this way: I've never been struck by lightning. Can I guarantee I won't be tomorrow? No. But I don't expect to." "We don't see anything like that right now," agreed John Immele, deputy director for national security at Los Alamos National Laboratory. In 1993, Immele urged the Clinton administration to end a nuclear-test moratorium signed by the first President Bush. Other lab emissaries in- cluding current Livermore director Michael Anastasio pressed the case for low-yield testing through the mid-1990s. But now, says Immele, "I see no reason at this time to do a nuclear test." Goodwin in California and Immele in New Mexico oversee roughly 13,000 staff and $1.8 billion devoted to maintaining and modernizing the "physics package" or nuclear explosive inside the nation's nuclear arms. Their judgments, coming a decade after America's last nuclear test, contrast with claims by the political right that only nuclear blasts will give faith in the might of U.S. hydrogen bombs and claims by the left that Bush administration is driving toward new weapons and tests that, in turn, will ignite a global arms race. For once in a rare while, top scientists say they don't foresee a need for such explosions. Rank-and-file weaponeers remain divided on the need for testing, and hawks at the Pentagon and U.S. Energy Department still agitate for new tests. But the latest assessment by top weapons executives draws confirmation this summer from the prestigious National Academy of Sciences. An expert panel concluded that nuclear testing, while essential for inventing new weapons, rarely played much of a role in maintaining the arsenal. So long as Los Alamos, Livermore and their non-nuclear counterpart, Sandia labs, kept qualified scientists prying for age defects and using good judgment in replacing affected parts, the NAS panel concluded, nuclear blasts weren't necessary. What scientists also learned in recent years is that time has been kinder to their bombs than some feared. Multistage thermonuclear bombs feature more than 5,000 parts, a heart of shape-shifting metal and the rarefied physics of stars. For all this, scientists have found creative ways to test all electronics, explosives, plastics and metals without a full-blown detonation. Even the most sensitive components -- oblong shells of plutonium packed in high explosive -- seem to be faring well despite speculation as recently as the mid-1990s that, in time, they might rapidly deteriorate into duds. "The good news is, from what we can see, they're aging gracefully," Immele said. Scientists also have learned intricate ways to calculate the cumulative impacts of replacing several parts -- and to judge when they ought not risk making one or more of the replacements. "The first principle is much as it is with doctors: 'Do no harm,'" Goodwin said. "You've got to have confidence that it's going to be no worse." The flip side of the testing debate centers on the shape of America's future nuclear arms. The Bush administration's 2001 Nuclear Posture Review calls for retooling the huge, Cold War-style nuclear arsenal into a leaner, "capabilities-based" arsenal. Warheads and bombs would be geared not just for hardened Soviet silos, giant sub bases and airfields but for a larger set of unspecified targets in the Third World. Planners still are debating what these targets will be, but they are widely expected to include the more coveted warfighting structures of what once were called rogue nations -- Iraq, Iran, Libya, Syria, North Korea -- along with those of China and Russia. Contact Ian Hoffman at ihoffman@angnewspapers.com [ihoffman@angnewspapers.com] . Regardless, Pentagon planners and weapons scientists are shifting their sights to lower-yield weapons, dubbed "mini-nukes" and "micro-nukes." "We're just at the leading edge of talking about that," said LANL's Immele. "It hasn't gotten very far because DOD and NNSA have just started talking about what makes sense." If the call comes for those weapons, however, Livermore's Goodwin suggests that weapons scientists already have designed and tested most of the answers. "When we did lots and lots of testing, we could explore terra incognita. We have mapped that out, and now under different circumstances, different numbers of weapons, we will endeavor to use that understanding," Goodwin said. "That means using technologies that we understand well and not to push the limit." In a sense, America's nuclear future is largely its past, with an array of well-tested and sophisticated explosives sitting in today's arsenal or waiting to be repackaged in a variety of bomb or warhead casings. "The truth is that most of the advanced concepts we're talking about have a nuclear-testing pedigree," Immele said. "We have weaponized them (in the'70s and'80s) and done the final engineering. So the risk of fielding those without additional nuclear testing might be considered low to moderate." "They're mature technologies," Goodwin said. "They've been tested. Most of them are already in the stockpile. You take something and adapt it. We're not talking about creating a Star Wars laser that's never been tested. We're talking about things we've already done." RETURN TO TOP ©1999-2002 by MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers ***************************************************************** 59 Oregon prepared to fight DOE to protect Columbia This story was published Tue, Nov 12, 2002 By John Stang Herald staff writer Oregon wants to join a legal fight over whether the Department of Energy can leave some high-level radioactive waste in underground tanks simply by calling it something different. The state has asked to participate in a lawsuit against DOE as a "friend of the court," which would allow it to make arguments in the case even though it is not a plaintiff nor defendant. Washington and Idaho already have such status in the case, and South Carolina is seeking the same role. "We must ensure that cleanup actions taken at Hanford eliminate the serious and long-term threat to the Columbia River," said Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber in a news release Friday. "(DOE's) plans to reclassify wastes are not consistent with that goal." Months ago, Washington, D.C.-based Natural Resources Defense Council, the Idaho-based Snake River Alliance, the Yakama Indian Nation and the Shoshone-Bannock tribe filed a suit against DOE in U.S. District Court in Boise, seeking to halt DOE from reclassifying some high-level radioactive wastes as something less dangerous so that less strict environmental laws can come into play. The suit revolves around DOE considering whether it can or should permanently leave some solid wastes in its tanks at Hanford, Savannah River, S.C., and the Idaho National Engineering and Environmental Laboratory. DOE has been looking at ways -- other than conventional glassification -- for dealing with up to 75 percent of its nationwide tank wastes. Hanford figures show the site's proposed glassification complex can convert only about a third of Hanford's 53 million gallons of tank wastes into glass by a 2028 legal deadline to glassify all of it. Reclassifying tank wastes is one way being explored on how to deal with some of the remaining two-thirds. DOE is on the brink of executing a still-unveiled nationwide master plan to speed nuclear cleanup. To accelerate the plan and cut costs, DOE is considering leaving some solids in these sites' tanks -- possibly encased in a type of cement. To do that, however, DOE would have to reclassify some high-level radioactive solid wastes so they can legally stay in the tanks. Oregon does not have any regulatory authority over Hanford, but state officials fret about Oregon's northern border and Portland being downstream from Hanford on the Columbia River. "No other party in the lawsuit can adequately represent our interest," said Mike Grainey, director of Oregon's Office of Energy. Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 60 Fluor Hanford speeding pace of spent fuel removal This story was published Tue, Nov 12, 2002 By John Stang Herald staff writer The race is going to be tight. Fluor Hanford has recovered some ground in trying to make a Dec. 31 legal deadline to remove all of the K West Basins' spent nuclear fuel. If the contractor can keep its present warp-speed pace in moving the fuel, it hopes to come close to that deadline. "We're going to be very close. If we don't make it, it won't be by much," said Norm Boyter, Fluor's vice president for the spent nuclear fuel project. The K Basins are two water-filled, leak-prone indoor pools that originally held 2,300 tons of spent nuclear fuel 400 yards from the Columbia River. Hanford's master plan is to wash, then remove the fuel from the basins in special cylindrical containers, vacuum all water from the containers and pump in helium to prevent dangerous radiological reactions and store the fuel in an underground vault in central Hanford. The Tri-Party Agreement, the legal pact governing Hanford's cleanup, calls for all of the K West Basin's current fuel to be removed by Dec. 31 and all the fuel to be moved by July 31, 2004. These are the K Basins' current numbers: -- About 190 containers holding 1,053 tons of fuel must be in the underground vault by Dec. 31, and about 400 containers with all 2,300 tons in the vault by July 31, 2004. -- By Wednesday, 164 containers holding 839 tons are supposed to be in the vault, according to the project's timetable. -- But as of Monday, 143 containers holding 814 tons were actually in the vault. However, the project is lagging only 21 containers behind schedule, compared with being 30 containers behind two months ago. The optimum rate of movement is about 312 containers a week -- a pace that the project could not consistently keep up for long periods until early August. Then the pace increased to slightly more than four containers a week until it increased a few weeks ago. In mid-October, the project hit six containers in one week. The pace has been five a week for the past two weeks. Boyter and Odilon Serrano, Fluor's K Basins production manager, noted several reasons for the increased speed. New operators are getting used to their jobs. Operators, engineers, supervisors and maintenance people have meshed together on anticipating, finding and fixing problems quickly. Meanwhile, another segment of the K Basins project is expected to crank up soon. To make work faster and cheaper, Hanford decided to move all the fuel from the K East Basin to the K West Basin. That's so Hanford does not have to build extensive fuel loading and washing equipment in the murkier, more dangerous K East Basin. Instead, the K East fuel will be sent a few hundred feet to the K West Basin where it will be processed and loaded with the equipment already there. The Tri-Party Agreement requires that the transfer from K East to K West start by Nov. 30. This is to keep momentum going when all the existing K West fuel is gone. The Department of Energy currently is reviewing Fluor's fuel transfer system to see if it is ready, expecting to complete that inspection in a few days. After the existing K West fuel is moved, Boyter expects the speed to drop to about 3 1/2 containers a week. That's because Fluor will have to start work on removing radioactive empty containers, racks, debris and sludge from the K West Basin -- at the same time it is moving fuel. Copyright 2002 Tri-City Herald. All rights reserved. This ***************************************************************** 61 SRS head says layoffs won't all come at once* (Aiken-AP) Nov. 13, 2002 - The president of Westinghouse Savannah River Company says future layoffs at the Savannah River Site near Aiken will probably come over an extended period of time rather than all at once. Bob Pedde told employees Monday the company doesn't expect any significant work force reductions in the coming two months. Pedde says future changes in the work force would come through an "ebb and flow" manner. He says the company recently filled new 100 positions to adapt to changing needs at the former nuclear weapons plant. Westinghouse said last month during this year's first layoffs that more cuts would follow. /posted 7:35am by Chris Rees / *WIS News 10 Headlines* ***************************************************************** 62 Citizens group makes demands to inspect Livermore... reviewjournal.com -- News: Wednesday, November 13, 2002 THE ASSOCIATED PRESS LIVERMORE, Calif. -- About 75 activists gathered Monday outside Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory demanding to inspect its facilities. Highlighting the ongoing controversy surrounding inspections of weapons facilities in Iraq, the group called on lab director Michael Anastasio to allow its Citizens Weapons Inspection Team to investigate what it called "clandestine activities" related to weapons development. Jackie Cabasso of the Oakland-based Western States Legal Foundation said the investigations team wanted to examine the lab's plutonium, tritium, uranium and ignition facilities, among others. "While the Bush administration calls on other countries to disarm, we call on the United States to disarm," Peter Ferenbach of the group California Peace Action said. President Bush and members of his administration have been working to build an international coalition against Iraq and its president, Saddam Hussein. Bush has fought to put weapons inspectors back to work in that country. But to the coalition of peace activists outside the lab, the move is hypocritical. "If we want other countries to have weapons inspections, let us start here at home," said Tara Dorabji of Tri-Valley Communities Against a Radioactive Environment. There were no problems or arrests, said lab spokesman David Schwoegler. Monday's demonstration came three months after a Defense Department adviser said the United States will probably need to resume full-scale nuclear tests in five to 10 years to check results of materiel experiments on how the stockpile ages. Dale Klein, assistant to the secretary of defense for nuclear and chemical and biological defense programs, made that prediction at Nellis Air Force Base, before visiting the Nevada Test Site, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas. From 1945 through 1992, the United States conducted 1,054 nuclear tests primarily at the test site and in the South Pacific. Review-Journal writer Keith Rogers contributed to this report. Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal, 1997 - 2002 ***************************************************************** 63 Peace activists seek lab inspection Contra Costa Times | 11/12/2002 | [cctimes.com - The cctimes home page] Livermore lab gets a visit thematically linked to U.N.'s Iraq resolution By Brian Anderson CONTRA COSTA TIMES LIVERMORE - Peace activists gathered outside the gates of Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Monday demanding to inspect some of the most fundamental components of America's weapons program. Highlighting the ongoing controversy surrounding inspections of weapons facilities in Iraq, the group called on lab director Michael Anastasio to allow its Citizens Weapons Inspection Team to investigate what it called "clandestine activities" related to weapons development. Jackie Cabasso of the Western States Legal Foundation in Oakland said in a six-page letter addressed to Anastasio that the investigations team wanted to examine the lab's plutonium, tritium, uranium and National Ignition facilities, among others. Cabasso quoted from United Nations Security Council Resolution 1441, a newly adopted international demand that Iraq open its doors to weapons inspectors or face the possibility of attack. Mock weapons inspectors waved the blue flag of the UN and dressed in white "clean suits" as Cabasso and other speakers rallied the colorful crowd. "While the Bush administration calls on other countries to disarm, we call on the United States to disarm," Peter Ferenbach of the group California Peace Action told about 75 demonstrators. "We are people here with a true commitment to disarmament." President Bush and members of his administration have been working to build an international coalition against Iraq and its president, Saddam Hussein. Bush has fought to put weapons inspectors back to work in that country. But to the coalition of peace activists outside the lab Monday, the move is hypocritical. "If we want other countries to have weapons inspections, let us start here at home," said Tara Dorabji of Tri-Valley CAREs. Not everyone on hand, however, agreed. Craig Hollander stood alone across the street from the group with a sign reading: "Peace, security, freedom: yours courtesy of Lawrence Livermore." The Ripon man said he heard about the demonstration on the radio and just had to be there on his day off. "I just think this whole protest is absurd," Hollander said. "If it wasn't for Lawrence Livermore Lab, they wouldn't have those rights (to protest)." Police worked to keep the crowd on the sidewalks, but otherwise had no problems, said lab spokesman David Schwoegler. There were no arrests, he said, adding that would-be inspectors were not allowed access to the facilities. "They knew they weren't going to get in," Schwoegler said. "Those are restricted facilities. We don't just let people go into special areas with nuclear materials." Reach Brian Anderson at 925-847-2184 or [banderson2@cctimes.com] ***************************************************************** 64 Beta 3 off the chopping block The Oak Ridger Online -- Area News -- 1:08 p.m. on Wednesday, November 13, 2002 R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff A decision has been reversed that would have disabled one of only two facilities in the world capable of providing approximately 110 stable isotopes that can't be produced by any other enrichment technique. The Beta 3 calutrons, located at the Y-12 National Security Complex and operated by Oak Ridge National Laboratory, had been scheduled for drainage earlier this fall. That action would have permanently disabled the facility. A local lobbying campaign evidently was successful in halting the procedure. Susan Gawarecki, executive director of the Oak Ridge Reservation Local Oversight Committee, fired off a June 27 letter to U.S. Sen. Bill Frist, R-Tenn., calling the facility important to national security needs. "This facility is not very costly to maintain and operate, compared to the cost of restoring its function," wrote Gawarecki. "A reasonable solution to this problem would be to allow the National Nuclear Security Administration to take over ownership of the building and facility and continue to allow ORNL to operate it. This would preserve the technical capabilities of the process without damaging the facility's historical integrity." Local workers at Y-12 and ORNL, as well as the Friends of the ORNL organization, put pressure on the office of U.S. Rep. Zach Wamp, R-3rd District, according to chief of staff Helen Hardin, who toured the facility earlier this fall. "Afterward we asked DOE to stop any efforts to disable the calutrons," said Hardin this morning in a phone interview from Washington. "It's such a historic facility, and just having it on standby will keep the Russians from having this monopoly of the production of these important isotopes," said Hardin. The only other facility with such capabilities is in Sverdlovsk, Russia. Wamp wrote in an Oct. 31 e-mail to a constituent: "After learning of the Department of Energy's (DOE) plans to drain the oil from the calutrons and decommission this important and historic facility, I asked my staff to contact DOE and intervene in this unwise decision. "DOE has reversed its stance and now has dropped plans to drain the calutrons. The facility will remain in cold standby in case it is needed." In the midst of the lobbying, Gawarecki nominated the facility for the American Nuclear Society's 2002 Nuclear Historic Landmark Award. That designation was approved, and a ceremony will be held later this year at the facility. Gawarecki is attending an award ceremony next week in Washington, D.C. The award designates sites where "outstanding physical accomplishments took place which were instrumental in the advancement and implementation of nuclear technology and the peaceful uses of nuclear energy," according to a press release from the American Nuclear Society. The activity must have successfully provided an "essential contribution" to subsequent peaceful application of nuclear technology or energy and been "a first of a kind, or provided a significant new departure," according to the release. The facility produces isotopes used in many cancer and medical studies, including prostate, bone and soft-tumor cancers as well as cardiac imaging, coronary restenosis and Hodgkin's disease. Other stable isotopes produced include those used for electronics and explosive detection and atomic clocks for geo-positioning and cellular phone systems. R. Cathey Daniels can be contacted at (865) 220-5515 or danielsrcd@oakridger.com. [http://www.oakridger.com] All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 65 DOE, ORNL expanding use of U-233 The Oak Ridger Online -- Area News -- 1:01 p.m. on Wednesday, November 13, 2002 R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff Follow the elaborate decay chain of uranium 233, and eventually you arrive at an isotope highly valued in cancer research. Scientists at Oak Ridge National Laboratory want to milk that isotope, thorium 229, for all it's worth. That's why they are watching closely a request for proposals currently making its way through the Department of Energy procurement hopper. That deal is to process and repackage the nation's largest inventory of U-233, housed at Building 3019 at ORNL. Tucked into the proposal is one additional step in processing that would extract the thorium 229, which decays to another isotope, actium 225, which can be sent directly to cancer research institutions. "We are now doing that on a small scale," said Jerry Klein, program manager for the Isotope Program at ORNL. "That supply of U-233 would produce enough thorium 229 to probably meet all the needs for at least a half-dozen years or so," he said of the nation's current demand from hospitals and research institutions. About every six weeks the lab sends the actium 225 to those institutions, where workers pull off the real gold -- bismuth 213 -- to use in direct applications to patients with skin cancer and certain types of leukemia. Currently the two primary clinical trials are at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York City and St. George Hospital in Sydney, Australia. But proposals have been submitted with other institutions for prostate and breast cancer research, said Klein. "Unfortunately as far as we know we are the only supplier of this material (U-233) outside Russia and India, and I'm not sure whether either are doing thorium extraction," said Klein. The lab can now supply in the neighborhood of 450 millicuries to 500 millicuries of actium 225 every year. But the current need is for about twice that much, said Klein. And with the Bush administration's performing some extraction of its own -- funds for isotope production were removed in the proposed fiscal year 2003 budget -- the pressure is on for commercial companies to come up with acceptable bids on the DOE work. "The current administration actually took all money out for isotopes, though they left funding for infrastructure," said Klein. "The customer (research institutions) is paying the full cost of recovery of the actium, so it's the initial extraction of the thorium we are paying for. "We have plenty of U-233 for extraction of thorium 229, but it's a very costly process," noted Klein. One reason the isotope is so valuable in cancer research is its ability to zap cancer cells without creating too much damage to surrounding tissue and organs. "It's an alpha-emitting isotope, so it's a high energy and large particle," said Klein. "Therefore it does a lot of damage to the cancer, but because it's so big it only travels a short distance from where the cancer is located." According to Beverly Harness, contracting officer for DOE's Oak Ridge Operations office, the bids for the project are in and now under review. An award for the work is slated for early to mid-April. According to the DOE Web site, part of the procurement is the "leasing" of the thorium 229 back to the successful contractor "for commercial beneficial use." The Web site states that "beneficial use of the leased isotope must support medical research and treatment, and reduce overall project costs or provide other financial benefits to the government." R. Cathey Daniels can be contacted at (865) 220-5515 or danielsrcd@oakridger.com. [http://www.oakridger.com] All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 66 Good news so far for U-233 supply The Oak Ridger Online -- Area News -- p.m. on Wednesday, November 13, 2002 R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff With about 60 percent of inspections complete, the news is good for the condition of the nation's largest single supply of uranium 233. "Given some of the packaging is 30 years old, we are finding the material to be in good condition and no real safety issues arising out of that," said Jim Rushton, group leader for the Radiological Chemical Development Facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. That facility, or Building 3019, houses about 450 kilograms, or about 992 pounds, of U-233 contained in 1,400 kilograms of fissile uranium. That's about half the nation's inventory. According to Rushton, there are about 1000 "packages" of U-233 in about 50 types of containers. Under direction from the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, Rushton's group has taken on the task of inspecting about 10 percent of the supply to determine its condition. That program should wind up toward the end of fiscal year 2003. "At that point we hope to be into transition to the new contract Š for processing the material and extracting the thorium 229 (see related story)," said Rushton. The new contract is slated to process and repackage the inventory of U-233, and render it suitable for safe, long-term, economical storage. That would include eliminating the need for criticality and safeguards and security controls, according to DOE online documents. The plan is to clean and close the building, which is a Manhattan Project-vintage facility. According to DOE, upgrading the facility would involve "major capital" investment, and entail safety issues. Decommissioning decisions for the building would come later, according to Frank Juan, DOE spokesman. R. Cathey Daniels can be contacted at (865) 220-5515 or danielsrcd@oakridger.com. All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 67 Public meetings for EPA sampling in Scarboro The Oak Ridger Online -- Area News -- p.m. on Wednesday, November 13, 2002 Public meetings for EPA sampling in Scarboro R. Cathey Daniels Oak Ridger staff Environmental sampling in the Scarboro neighborhood is back on the city's plate. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will be in town Thursday for two public meetings on the most recent sampling in the neighborhood located just over the ridge from the Y-12 National Security Complex. The first meeting will be held at 11 a.m. at the Oak Ridge Mall; the second meeting is planned for 6:30 p.m. at the Scarboro Community Center on Carver Avenue. Each meeting is scheduled to last two hours. Contamination and its health and environmental effects have been a concern in the neighborhood since a Tennessean newspaper report in the late 1990s raised those concerns. Scarboro sits about 1,500 feet northwest of the Y-12 plant. Two lawsuits linking contamination from federal facilities to poor health in the neighborhood were dismissed in federal court earlier this fall. The most recent EPA draft report states: "It is believed that the residents of the sampled properties in the Scarboro community are not currently being exposed to substances from the DOE Y-12 facility at these sample locations in quantities that pose an unreasonable risk to health or the environment. "This general conclusion, however, cannot be made concerning all of Scarboro since all areas were not sampled. Therefore, EPA does not propose any future action for the Scarboro community." Community activists have been highly critical of the report, saying it is inconclusive, leaves the community still wondering about contamination issues, took too much time to complete, unnecessarily gave the media fodder and didn't attain the goal it set out to attain. The city's Environmental Quality Advisory Board has taken the initiative to rewrite the EPA's summary "to provide in plain language the information that we think EPA should communicate to the community about its studies in Scarboro," according to an EQAB memo. The Oak Ridge Environmental Justice Committee has prepared remarks "giving them hell" if the EPA's final report is not an improved version, according to Al Brooks, local environmental activist. The Local Oversight Committee's Citizens' Advisory Panel is submitting comments stating that the "EPA has never properly defined the rationale for the sampling effort" and that the initial reason for the sampling was to "validate DOE's sampling effort undertaken in 1998." But, stated the panel in its comments, the "EPA refuses to make a determination if DOE's previous study results were valid." A final report is due in January, according to EPA officials. R. Cathey Daniels can be contacted at (865) 220-5515 or danielsrcd@oakridger.com. [http://www.oakridger.com/contact/index.html] [http://www.oakridger.com] All Contents ©Copyright The Oak Ridger ***************************************************************** 68 G.O.P. Decides to Delay Spending Bills Till January The New York *November 13, 2002* *By CARL HULSE* WASHINGTON, Nov. 12 ? Republican leaders in Congress moved today to put off difficult spending decisions until next year, when they will have control of both houses. Lawmakers and top aides said they expected the House to consider as early as Wednesday a resolution to finance federal agencies at current levels through Jan. 11 rather than try to resolve an impasse that has left the appropriations process in tatters. "I think they are going to wait until we get Republican chairmen" in the Senate, a House Republican aide said. It remained uncertain today what legislation Congress might consider before it adjourned, other than a measure to create a Homeland Security Department and a proposal to tighten security at seaports. Agreement is possible on new government-subsidized terrorism insurance, on a revision of bankruptcy law and on clearing away at least some of a backlog of nominations, aides said. Prospects for a scaled-back energy measure seem less likely. Though Republicans have won majorities in both houses for the session that begins in January, they are not yet in control of the Senate. Democrats remain temporarily in charge there because Dean Barkley, an independent sworn in today as an interim senator from Minnesota, has decided to remain unaligned with either party. He will be succeeded in January by a Republican, Norm Coleman. Because of disputes over spending levels, Congress has cleared only 2 of the 13 appropriations bills for the fiscal year that began on Oct. 1, both of them dealing with the military. Since then, federal agencies have been operating under a series of temporary resolutions. The latest is to expire on Nov. 22. Members of the appropriations committees had hoped to use the lame-duck session to pass at least a few of the spending measures. They were overruled by Republican leaders, who would prefer to wrap up the session in a matter of days and wait to confront the spending fight when they are firmly in control. That decision, aides in both parties pointed out, means that billions of dollars for a variety of security initiatives and other programs will not be immediately available. Among the temporary casualties, they said, are more than $3 billion in grants for local emergency teams, $500 million for the Coast Guard and other spending related to stepped-up domestic security. As for what could pass, the White House and Congressional negotiators came to agreement on terror insurance in October, and the president has called the availability of such insurance crucial to the economy. But some Republicans who want strict limits on liability claims have been unhappy with the agreement and would like to reopen negotiations. One House strategist, however, said passage of the accord before adjournment was still a strong possibility. Also awaiting action is legislation that would make it harder for people to erase their debts through bankruptcy. It has been tied up in a battle over a provision that would prevent abortion protesters from using bankruptcy to escape court judgments issued against them in favor of clinics. Now that the election has passed, that language may prove less of an obstacle. With the looming prospect of a war with Iraq, lawmakers are also trying to pass a $392 billion military authorization bill previously stalled over payments to disabled military retirees. The measure, adopted by the House tonight, would allow veterans wounded in combat or with serious combat-related disabilities to collect both disability and retirement pay. Further, lawmakers who have spent weeks negotiating an energy bill are hoping to push to the floor a stripped-down version that includes new pipeline safety rules and the extension of a law limiting liability of nuclear plant operators. More contentious elements, like a plan to begin drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, would be put off until next year. "Too much work was put in by the conferees to walk away empty-handed," said Ken Johnson, a spokesman for the House Energy and Commerce Committee. But the Congressional leadership is pessimistic that any energy plan can pass in the time available. Though the new Congress will not be in place until January, about 50 incoming House freshmen converged on Capitol Hill today to begin the orientation to their new public life. Excited members of both parties were briefed by Congressional leaders on the ins and outs of the House, as well as security precautions added since the Sept. 11 attacks. "There is so much to learn," said Representative-elect Katherine Harris, Republican of Florida, who became a national figure as secretary of state in the 2000 election standoff. Among others attending the orientation were the Republican and Democratic candidates from a House race, still undecided, in Colorado's Seventh District, in suburban Denver. The Republican, Bob Beauprez, leads the Democrat, Mike Feeley, by 386 votes with about 2,000 provisional ballots still being counted. Both candidates said they wanted to be ready to serve, though only one will eventually take the oath of office. "It is a little odd," Mr. Feeley said. Copyright The New York Times Company ***************************************************************** 69 Native people struggle with mining Co. The Lumberjack Newspaper Online [http://www.humboldt.edu] [http://www.tidepool.com] The Sustainable Communities Biodiesel Road Show bus took many to the massive protest in the bay area on Oct. 27. The next mission is Arizona. photo courtesy of Brian Basor by Rich Macgurn The Sustainable Communities Biodiesel Road Show is preparing to pack up the bus again, and this time it's heading to Big Mountain, Ariz. to support a native community embroiled in struggle. In early October the road show was in Nevada, in solidarity with the Shoshone tribe, to protest the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste site and ongoing nuclear testing on the disputed land. The bus leaving Arcata on Nov. 21, will be meeting several other groups from throughout the state and country on their way to the Hopi/Navajo reservation in northeastern Arizona. The caravan will be bringing food and supplies to the last remaining Dineh, Navajo and traditional Hopi people, who have refused to leave its homes despite government eviction efforts. "These last remaining traditional people are routinely subjected to harassment, vigilante property destruction, assault and confiscation of the sheep which they depend on for existence," said Deacon Rivers, an organizer with the road show. "We still have some room on the bus. This will be an incredible educational experience." He said people will be exposed to things that folks in the United States never see." To date, more than 12,000 Dineh American Indians have been removed from their homes. The eviction and ensuing resettlements came as a result of the 1974 Navajo-Hopi Settlement Act. Under the act, former joint use land was partitioned and 100 Hopis and 13,000 Navajos found themselves on the wrong side of the line, and were required to move. Thousands of Dineh were relocated to "new lands," which have now been designated by the Environmental Protection Agency as a Superfund site due to heavy uranium pollution from mining. What led to the creation of the Navajo Hopi Settlement Act in the first place is a contentious issue. A massive, easily accessible coal deposit worth billions of dollars lies under the disputed territories. Peabody Coal Co., the largest coal company in the world, now scrapes mile-long gouges out of the earth, taking more than 13,000 tons of coal a year from the reservation. Peabody pumps 1.3 billion gallons of water a year from the reservations north aquifer for its coal slurry operations. With many of the regions aquifers contaminated by uranium and coal, the north aquifer is the primary source of water for drinking and subsistence farming for both the Hopi and Navajo nations. According to a Natural Resource Defense Council report, "since Peabody began using N-aquifer water for its coal slurry operations . . . water levels have decreased by more than 100 feet in some wells, and discharge has decreased by more than 50 percent in the majority of monitored springs. In the 1950s a Salt Lake City lawyer named John Boyden began courting Hopi tribal members and the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Boyden was instrumental in the creation of the Hopi tribal government and he soon became the tribe's official council. Boyden, a Mormon deacon, happened to represent the Peabody Coal Co. as well as the Mormon Church, which held a controlling stake in the Peabody Coal Co. Contracts were soon signed in secret by the tribal government and the Peabody Coal Co., for mining on areas that were designated specifically for use by the Hopi. Mining companies, however, still had much difficulty attaining contracts on land that was designated for joint use by Hopi and Navajo people. By the early 1970s, a campaign to divide the territories had been launched by various interest groups, spearheaded by attorneys such as John Boyden. Although the campaign has been highly successful, and most indigenous people have been removed from the land, a small number of elders and families have refused to leave today. The residents of the rugged and desolate Arizona plateau are not permitted by law to make improvements to their dilapidated homes and any supplies must be smuggled in. The caravan now comes every year to support the Dineh and traditional Hopi. "We are collecting food, supplies, and money right now. Money is really needed so we can purchase supplies when we get there so the indigenous people can keep up the struggle," Rivers said. ***************************************************************** 70 New York Museum Celebrates Life of Einstein November 13, 2002 08:32 AM ET By Martha Graybow NEW YORK (Reuters) - Albert Einstein is still the hottest scientist around, nearly 100 years after his groundbreaking discoveries helped revolutionize understanding of the universe. All things Einstein -- original scientific manuscripts, photographs, personal letters and even an old report card from his Swiss high school -- are on display in a new exhibition that opens on Friday at the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan. The collection, billed as the most comprehensive exhibition ever presented on Einstein, also explores the legacy and celebrity of the famous physicist, who died in 1955 at age 76. Named the "Person of the Century" by Time magazine, Einstein has become a cultural icon whose name is synonymous with brilliance. His puffy-haired image is recognized worldwide. <#> Einstein was "perhaps the most brilliant mind that science has ever known," Ellen Futter, the museum's president, said at a media briefing unveiling the exhibition on Tuesday. "This iconic figure changed forever how we see the world and the universe," she said. The exhibition, organized by the American Museum of Natural History, the Skirball Cultural Center in Los Angeles and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, will tour the United States after closing in New York in August 2003. It will arrive at the Skirball center in September 2004 before traveling to the Bloomfield Science Museum in Jerusalem for its final stop in 2005, the 100th anniversary of Einstein's so-called "miracle year." In 1905, the 26-year-old German-born scientist devised the Special Theory of Relativity, which included the now-famous equation E=mc2, which links matter and energy. This and other groundbreaking discoveries that year were made in his spare time while he worked as a patent clerk in Switzerland. The exhibition features pages from a 1912 manuscript of the special relativity theory. Also on display are pages from the 1916 manuscript of his General Theory of Relativity, a new vision of how gravity works that predicts objects moving through warped space and time travel along curved paths. The exhibition, organizers say, is not a hagiography, even though it celebrates Einstein's genius. His personal life was often chaotic and he had many love affairs, including one that led to his second marriage to his cousin, Elsa Loewenthal. "Some of his family relationships were extremely rocky to say the least," said Michael Shara, the exhibit's curator. "Two wives, mistresses -- we don't paper that over." Einstein, a German Jew who experienced anti-Semitism, was a dedicated Zionist. He also spoke out against segregation, nuclear armament and "McCarthyism," the term that described Sen. Joseph McCarthy's search for American communists in the 1950s. The exhibition includes the 1952 letter from Israel's ambassador to the United States offering Einstein the presidency of the young state of Israel. Einstein declined the offer, citing ill health and lack of experience for the job. Other documents include Einstein's famous warning to President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1939, saying the Nazis might be using uranium to build a nuclear bomb, as well as Roosevelt's response. ***************************************************************** NOTE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107 this material is distributed without profit or payment to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving this information for non-profit research and educational purposes only. For more information go to: *****************************************************************