Sustainable Development Commission
Will Day, who took over as Chair of the Commission at the end of July and lives near to Dungeness power station in Kent, said the waste legacy of nuclear power made it unsustainable. ‘In an unpredictable climate and world, is it right to leave as a legacy waste and management issues that don’t just last five, 10, 20 years but decades and hundreds of years?’ He also said coastal erosion posed a risk to future nuclear power facilities. ‘I live in a village not very far from Dungeness power station. We defend it 24 hours a day with bulldozers against erosion from the sea. ‘Is that a cool thing to have a nuclear power station sitting at sea level with the thought of 10m of sea level rise?’
Ecologist 21st Aug 2009 more >>
Sellafield
Sellafield Limited (Cumbria, England) has announced a contract tender worth a potential £1.5 billion ($2.5 billion) to build a plant to handle onsite radioactive effluent. Figures regarding the value of the contract range from £250 million ($413 million) to £1.5 billion for what the tender calls the Highly Active Liquid Effluent Facility.
Industrial Info 21st Aug 2009 more >>
BNFL is saying a £2 million “goodbye” to West Cumbria after running Sellafield for nearly 40 years. The company which handed over the site to Nuclear Management Partners wants to leave a lasting legacy. One aim is to help young people in the area further their education for which there will be a “Live The Dream” Fund. But the first £261,000 from the BNFL pot will be spent on an oral history of Sellafield involving the capture of 100 or so voices to compile Sellafield Stories, an archive to be housed in the Whitehaven Record Office on Scotch Street.
Whitehaven News 20th Aug 2009 more >>
SELLAFIELD’S Thorp plant, which employs 1,500 people, this week began a shutdown which will last for seven months. Because of the length of the closure, Sellafield Ltd said yesterday some workers would be re-deployed “on decommissioning activities”. Operators Sellafield Ltd says the extensive maintenance and engineering work to be carried out will help secure vital reprocessing. Thorp’s shutdown was first announced only days after anti-nuclear campaigners called for it to be closed for good.
Whitehaven News 19th Aug 2009 more >>
HEAVY penalties are expected to be imposed on Sellafield’s operators tomorrow when the company appears at Carlisle Crown Court. Sellafield Ltd was remanded to Crown Court for sentence after pleading guilty at Whitehaven Court to a breach of health and safety regulations. Magistrates were told that two contractors, John Heron and John Trodden, were exposed to an internal dose of radiation while cleaning contamination on a concrete floor. The incident happened in July 2007.
Whitehaven News 19th Aug 2009 more >>
Nuclear Safety
A Government report this week revealed what, on the face of it, sounded like a catalogue of incidents at nuclear installations across the country – 81 coolant leaks and 80 fires.
Carlisle News and Star 20th Aug 2009 more >>
Cumbria
Letter from Marianne Birkby: THE Government’s new deputy minister for the North West has been well rewarded for his part in orchestrating the pro-nuclear propaganda campaign. Radiation Free Lakeland has discovered that Sellafield (no longer producing electricity) quadrupled its emissions of hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs) from the period 2007 to 2008. HFC’s are hundreds and can be thousands of times more powerful than carbon dioxide.
Carlisle News and Star 21st Aug 2009 more >>
Iran
Diplomats the United Nations and in Western capitals were cautiously hopeful last night that a new agreement between the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and Iran on the oversight of its nuclear facilities may signal the start of a thaw in the long-running confrontation over its enrichment programmes.
Independent 22nd Aug 2009 more >>
US
Entergy Corp’s Louisiana utilities have revived the company’s option to pursue construction of a new nuclear reactor with a regulatory filing in Louisiana made earlier this month, a spokesman said on Friday.
Interactive Investor 21st Aug 2009 more >>
China
China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) has received preliminary approval from National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) for the construction of two reactors at Tianwan nuclear power plant in Jiangsu province, China Daily reported. The company intends to begin the construction of two reactors (number 5 and 6), of 1,000 MW capacity each at Tianwan nuclear plant from October 2010.
Energy Business Review 20th Aug 2009 more >>
Bangladesh
Authorities in Bangladesh continue to plan and prepare to introduce nuclear power, but deny they have reached terms with Russia’s Rosatom atomic energy corporation to build the reactor.
World Nuclear News 20th Aug 2009 more >>