25 May 2010

Nuclear Subsidy

21st century nuclear power needs a 21st century subsidy... no blank cheques this time - just an apparently green tweak to the emissions trading system, and voila! A floor price for carbon is the answer. Driving up the cost of producing polluting energy from coal- or gas-fired power plants, doesn’t just favour renewables. It also makes the costs of nuclear production far more competitive, even without subsidy. Plus, of course, those companies looking to build new nukes are the same ones currently providing our electricity, and who can pass on to their customers the extra cost of the floor-price through energy bills, paid for by you and me. Huhne, it seems, may have ruled out using the public purse to fund the new nuclear generation, but his Government is asking us to use our wallets to do the same.

Ecologist 24th May 2010 more >>

Coaltion

THE UK’s new coalition government has confirmed it will push forward with the replacement of the country’s aging nuclear power stations but will axe the Infrastructure Planning Commission and remodel Regional Development Agencies (RDAs).

Chemical Engineer 24th May 2010 more >>

New Nukes

The majority of voters for Britain’s three main political parties support nuclear power and nearly half back moves to change the planning system to make them easier to build, according to a YouGov poll for EDF Energy.

Reuters 24th May 2010 more >>

Business Green 24th May 2010 more >>

The Register 24th May 2010 more >>

THE coalition government will scrap the body set up to push through strategic projects like new nuclear build – but have offered no detail on what will replace it.

Included in the Tory-Lib Dems document Coalition Programme for Government was a promise to abolish the Infrastructure Planning Commission.

North West Evening Mail 24th May 2010 more >>

Nuclear Costs

Entergy Corp Chief Executive J. Wayne Leonard said on Monday that building new nuclear plants remains too costly and will prevent many utilities from participating in the fledgling nuclear renaissance in the United States.While a few U.S. companies are moving ahead to develop new reactors, Leonard said that to make the economics of nuclear work for Entergy, he would need to see “double-digit natural gas prices and carbon blow-out prices” starting at $25 per ton and escalating toward $50.

Reuters 25th May 2010 more >>

Dungeness

The fight to have a new nuclear power station built on the Kent/Sussex border has been renewed with an appeal to the new Energy Secretary Chris Huhne. The new Conservative MP for Folkestone and Hythe, Damian Collins, has written to Mr Huhne asking for a meeting to discuss a new plant at Dungeness.

BBC 24th May 2010 more >>

Sellafield

A NEW nuclear storage centre has been built at Sellafield. The facility is the first major project to be completed since the site was taken over by Nuclear Management Partners (NMP), the US-led consortium.

The scheme, which was finished ahead of schedule and under budget, will be known as the Sellafield Product and Residues Store (SPRS).

Cumberland News 24th May 2010 more >>

Nuclear Waste

An association based in Switzerland is helping its European neighbours in their search for a good place to dump nuclear waste. Ten nations have enlisted the aid of Baden-based Arius, or Association for Regional and International Underground Storage. They hope to consolidate their radioactive waste within a single location. The countries in question include Austria, Ireland, Italy and seven others – but not Switzerland. In 2006, the federal government enacted a ten-year moratorium on the export of nuclear waste – the storage of which is the producers’ responsibility.

Swiss Info 24th May 2010 more >>

Nuclear Testing

The radiological legacy of U.S. nuclear weapons testing in the Marshall Islands remains to this day and will persist for many years to come. The most severe impacts were visited upon the people of the Rongelap Atoll in 1954 following a very large thermonuclear explosion which deposited life-threatening quantities of radioactive fallout on their homeland. They received more than three times the estimated external dose than to the most heavily exposed people living near the Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986. It took more than two days before the people of Rongelap were evacuated after the explosion. Many suffered from tissue destructive effects of radiation and subsequently from latent radiation-induced diseases.

Counterpunch 24th May 2010 more >>

NPT

A UN conference aimed at bolstering and modernising the international non-proliferation regime is reportedly close to an agreement on measures aimed at a ban on nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East.

Guardian 25th May 2010 more >>

Asia

Nuclear energy demand will increase at 5.1% per year through 2030 in Asia, the fastest annual growth rate of any energy type in the Asian Development Bank’s study, Energy Outlook for Asia and the Pacific, which has just been released.

Nuclear Engineering International 24th May 2010 more >>

Japan

The Japan Atomic Energy Agency has just reported that its 246MW Monju nuclear reactor is back on line after a serious accident that operators tried to cover up. More than one tonne of liquid sodium leaked from the reactor’s secondary cooling loop. There were no injuries and no radioactivity escaped from the main building, but the incident was a huge embarrassment for the country and its nuclear programme. Here’s the rub. The emergency happened back in 1995, more than 14 years ago. Gulp. Redesigns, safety assessments and placating the local population and the country’s nuclear safety regulator have all taken rather longer than originally expected. Needless to say, the type of atomic plant involved was a, erm, so-called fast reactor.

Utility Week 24th May 2010 more >>

Iran

Iran has formally submitted a plan to swap nuclear material in Turkey for reactor fuel to the UN atomic watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency.

BBC 24th May 2010 more >>

Telegraph 25th May 2010 more >>

Israel

Israel’s policy of “nuclear ambiguity” came under fresh scrutiny yesterday when officials moved to quash reports that it had offered to sell nuclear weapons to apartheid South Africa in 1975. Israel is believed to have about 200 nuclear weapons but refuses to confirm this. A new book and a report yesterday in the UK’s Guardian newspaper allege senior Israeli officials met their South African counterparts in March 1975 to discuss the sale.

FT 25th May 2010 more >>

Israel has long based its security policy on the preservation of its monopoly of nuclear weapons in the Middle East. It seems to regard this monopoly as an entitlement so self-evident as to need no examination, whether at home or abroad, and has invented a doctrine of ambiguity, under which it neither denies nor confirms its nuclear status, as a means of preventing, or at least staying aloof from, any discussion. Among the many matters which Israel has concealed, documents suggest, was a readiness to consider the transfer of nuclear weapons to apartheid South Africa, something at variance with Israel’s insistence that it has always been a responsible state.

Guardian 25th May 2010 more >>

Israel’s president, Shimon Peres, today robustly denied revelations in the Guardian and a new book that he offered to sell nuclear weapons to apartheid South Africa when he was defence minister in the 1970s.

Guardian 25th May 2010 more >>

Middle East Online 24th May 2010 more >>

The revelation in today’s Guardian that Israel offered to sell nuclear warheads and missiles to apartheid-era South Africa was roundly condemned by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. The news comes a day after Mordechai Vanunu, who first exposed Israel’s nuclear programme, was jailed for a further 3 months for speaking to foreigners.

CND Press Release 24th May 2010 more >>