NDA
The Times produced an article on 25th November 2009 entitled “Cuts loom over UK’s nuclear clean-up budget” which explains that the Government will be reassessing next years budget for the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA). The report claims that big spending cuts are looking likely for UK contaminated sites including Sellafield and Dounreay. The Times explained that the biggest area of concern for the treasury is that almost £800m per year is spent on administration and other ‘support costs’. The NDA were quick to respond to the article in The Times and in their statement published on 25th November 2009, they explained that “it is a priority for the whole NDA estate, including our Site Licence Companies which carry out the work on our sites and the NDA itself, to reduce the proportion of our budget spent on support costs so that we can deliver more decommissioning and clean-up work.”
Earth Times 16th Dec 2009 more >>
Nuclear Waste
The government has been slammed for proposing that the Infrastructure Planning Commission (IPC) should not consider nuclear waste when deciding on stations. Four former members of the Committee on Radioactive Waste Management (CoRWM), the government’s independent adviser on nuclear waste, have written to energy secretary Ed Miliband complaining that their recommendations have been “seriously misrepresented”.
Planning Resource 18th Dec 2009 more >>
Low Level Waste
Radioactive waste from the Sellafield nuclear plant is set to be disposed of in Hampshire, the Southern Daily Echo has revealed. Under a proposal out to consultation today, ten trucks a year would make the 350- mile journey from Cumbria to an incinerator in Fawley (pictured), on the edge of the New Forest. Each truck would carry about 40 barrels of low-level radioactive waste oil to the Spanish-owned facility. Up to 100 cubic metres of radioactive waste would be sent to Hampshire each year, a spokesman for Sellafield said. The radioactive waste consists of contaminated lubricate, hydraulic and engine oils from the Cumbrian site.
Get Noticed Online 17th Dec 2009 more >>
Dounreay
How to react to this motion, laid before the Scottish parliament and calling on the Scottish Environment Protection Agency “to fully investigate the circumstances surrounding the reappearance of part of the 170kg of enriched uranium that was first reported as being lost and then reported as an accountancy error in that the material was not missing but never existed in the first place”. And further calling “for those in authority who are responsible for public announcements on decommissioning at Dounreay to stop spinning stories after the fact that infer that highly enriched uranium, which is not accounted for nor can be found, is in any event safe”. How to react? OMG! Race you to the shelter.
Guardian 17th Dec 2009 more >>
Sellafield
THE Spanish-led power consortium that wants to build a new nuclear power station near Sellafield has denied reports in Madrid that work will be put back at least three years. Comments made in Spanish by Ignacio Galan, the boss of Iberdrola, are said to have been “lost in translation”. After attending an energy committee in the Spanish parliament, Senor Galan is reported to have said no new reactors developed by the consortium would be operational until 2018 to 2020. Greenpeace later said this contradicted a Whitehaven News article in October that “work will start on a new nuclear power station near Sellafield in 2015”. A spokesman for the consortium, which also includes French utility company GDF Suez and Scottish/Southern Energy, said the words of Iberdrola’s chairman had been misinterpreted and that 2015 was still the predicted starting date.
Whitehaven News 17th Dec 2009 more >>
GLOBAL nuclear giants Westinghouse Electric Company has joined a Cumbrian team bidding to land £130 million worth of lucrative work at Sellafield. It has become the sixth partner in Cumbria Nuclear Solutions Ltd which has submitted a partnership bid for decommissioning work estimated to be worth £30 million a year over four years.
Whitehaven News 17th Dec 2009 more >>
Wylfa
FOR the first time, people will be given the opportunity to train locally for a career in the nuclear industry. And with talk of a new Wylfa B nuclear plant for Anglesey to replace the existing station – which will stop generating electricity at the end of next year – local firms and workers from across the two counties will be well placed to benefit from having this resource on their doorsteps.
Caernarfon Herald 17th Dec 2009 more >>
Canada
The Canadian province of Saskatchewan, a top uranium producing region, said on Thursday it will not go ahead with construction of Western Canada’s first nuclear power plant due to uncertainty about costs.
Reuters 17th Dec 2009 more >>
China
China is planning its first “localised” third-generation nuclear power reactor based on AP1000 nuclear technologies, even though the world’s first AP1000 reactors have just begun construction. State Nuclear Power Technology Corp (SNPTC) and China Huaneng Group, China’s leading power generating group, established a joint venture on Thursday to build a demonstration third-generation reactor in Shidaowan, Rongcheng city, in the eastern province of Shandong, SNPTC said.
Reuters 18th Dec 2009 more >>
Iran
IT IS our final nightmare –nuclear Armageddon in the Middle East. The Holy City of Jerusalem destroyed, the Saudi Arabian oilfields ablaze, Tehran in ruins, oil at $500 a barrel, and the whole world on the brink of the apocalypse. But like some sick Christmas present to the world, Iran by test firing its long-range missile the Sejil-2 this week has threatened to turn that ominous nightmare into hellish reality.
Express 18th Dec 2009 more >>
IS IRAN trying to build a bomb, or is its nuclear work aimed merely at keeping the lights on? Gathering evidence, and Iran’s refusal to heed a string of UN Security Council resolutions and stop its suspect activities, make the question seem quaint.
Economist 17th Dec 2009 more >>
UAE
The United States formally signed a civilian nuclear cooperation deal with the United Arab Emirates on Thursday, hailing it as a “new bargain” that could help prevent the spread of dangerous atomic technology.
Reuters 17th Dec 2009 more >>
Disarmament
The US and Russia are on the brink of a new arms control treaty that would reduce their strategic nuclear arsenals by at least one quarter. A senior US official in Washington said US President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev would meet on the sidelines of the Copenhagen climate summit today to discuss the delayed accord.
Times 18th Dec 2009 more >>
Russia accused the United States of throwing up last-minute obstacles to a new landmark nuclear arms reduction treaty as Nato promised Moscow the military alliance would “never” attack it.
Telegraph 18th Dec 2009 more >>
BBC 17th Dec 2009 more >>
It is sheer dumb luck that since Nagasaki no nuclear weapon has exploded in a major population centre by accident, miscalculation or design. Some 23,000 warheads still exist, nearly half actively deployed, and more than 2,000 on dangerously high alert. Command and control systems are much more susceptible to error than commonly believed, and it is not beyond the capacity of terrorists to buy or build nuclear weapons. Climate change is not the only man-made threat capable of destroying life on this planet as we know it. The prospect of a nuclear catastrophe defies complacency, and maintaining the status quo indefinitely is not an option. The necessary interdependence of non-proliferation and disarmament is a central theme of this week’s report of the Australia-Japan sponsored International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament.
FT 17th Dec 2009 more >>
Climate
An internal briefing paper drawn up by the UN Framework Committee on Climate Change that is in charge of the talks, says that even the most ambitious emission reduction targets currently offered by developed and developing countries, including the EU and US, would set the world on course for warming of around 3C.
Telegraph 18th dec 2009 more >>
A global deal to address climate change is likely to be agreed today but the commitments it contains on cutting greenhouse gases will fall short of the minimum target set by the UN’s science body.
Times 18th Dec 2009 more >>
Guardian 18th Dec 2009 more >>
An increase of 3C would mean up to 170 million more people suffering severe coastal floods than with a 2C rise, and 550 million more at risk of hunger, according to the 2006 Stern economic review of climate change for the UK government.
Scotsman 18th Dec 2009 more >>
