New Nukes
THE vast majority of business leaders support a new generation of nuclear power stations to safeguard Britain’s energy supply, according to new research. The Institute of Directors has discovered that 85% of the 1,800 business people it surveyed were in favour of a new nuclear build.
The Business Desk 31st Mar 2010 more >>
As the head of Horizon Nuclear Power, Alan Raymant is leading the plan to create a second nuclear power business in Britain, offsetting what would otherwise be domination of the industry by the French, in the shape of EDF.
FT 31st March 2010 more >>
THE Government today welcomed news that German utility giants RWE and E.ON are planning to build two nuclear power plants in the UK, creating thousands of jobs. Horizon Nuclear Power, a joint venture between the two firms, said it proposed having its first reactor at Wylfa on Anglesey in North Wales and a second power station at Oldbury-on-Severn plant in Gloucestershire.
Suffolk Evening Star 30th Mar 2010 more >>
NDA
The next stage of decommissioning Britains ageing fleet of nuclear power stations and cleaning up the legacy of waste will cost 2.8bn, according to a business plan to be published by the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority on Wednesday. About 1.5bn of the money to be spent this financial year will go to Sellafield, where a reprocessing programme that reduces the amount of highly active liquid waste stored on site should be completed soon. The costs to the taxpayer will be defrayed by the income generated by the NDA from its power stations and fuel-reprocessing operations. This income is expected to amount to about 1.15bn next year, though the amount is likely to decrease as plants reach the end of their lives.
FT 31st Mar 2010 more >>
A £140m contract to reduce the height of two nuclear reactors at Magnox North in Wales has been put on hold
Building 31st Mar 2010 more >>
Waste Transport
AN anti-nuclear campaigner is asking questions after claiming a shipment of highly-radioactive waste from Barrow took four days instead of the expected two to get to the Netherlands.
North West Evening Mail 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Oldbury
Up to 5,000 jobs could be created in South Gloucestershire under proposals announced for a new nuclear power plant at Oldbury-on-Severn. Horizon Nuclear Power – a conglomerate formed by E.On and RWE – hopes to start work at the site, next to the existing reactor, by 2019. But formal plans for the plant will not be submitted until work at the firm’s new plant on Anglesey starts. Local campaigners say Oldbury is an unsuitable location.
BBC 30th March 2010 more >>
Hinkley
Chris Ledgard looks at the impact Hinkley Point nuclear power station has had on the surrounding Somerset communities, in particular the Quantock village of Stogursey. Featuring Stop Hinkley campaigners.
Another Green World 30th Mar 2010 more >>
A Community Engagement Programme has been set up by West Somerset Council, Sedgemoor Council and the Community Council for Somerset. The main objective is to ensure that the community has a comprehensive understanding of the scale and nature of the proposals re Hinkley Point C.
Bicknoller Parish Website 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Wylfa
U.K. nuclear joint venture Horizon Nuclear Power Ltd. plans to commission its first reactor by 2020 at Wylfa in Wales followed by a second nuclear power station at Oldbury-on-Severn in Gloucestershire, the company said Tuesday. Horizon is the third nuclear group to outline its plans for the U.K. and comes as the government pushes for a new fleet of reactors to replace aging nuclear and coal-fired power plants that are due to be retired over the next decade.
Fox News 30th Mar 2010 more >>
London South East 30th Mar 2010 more >>
The Druid 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Chemical Engineer 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Professional Engineering 30th Mar 2010 more >>
World Nuclear News 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Business Green 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Utility Week 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Daily Post 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Plaid Cymru leader and Anglesey AM Ieuan Wyn Jones said it was an economic boost, and Labour MP Albert Owen called it a vote of confidence in the area. County council leader Clive McGregor said the move would have a “positive impact” on the community and deliver “high quality jobs”.
BBC 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Campaign group People Against Wylfa B (Pawb) plans a demonstration against nuclear power and the plans for a new Wylfa station at Menai Bridge on Wednesday morning.
BBC 30th Mar 2010 more >>
The North Wales site was chosen ahead of a location at Oldbury-on-Severn, South Gloucestershire, partly because of strong public support, the Times reported.
Wales Online 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Unite, the largest union in Wales, today (Tuesday, 30 March) welcomed the government’s announcement that a new nuclear power station will be built at Wylfa on the Isle of Anglesey.
Unite 30th Mar 2010 more >>
The official timelines for UK new build have slipped repeatedly, and don’t look like stopping. For example: It’s not clear if and when Wylfa would be given the green light, let alone when work could start on site. The complications arise from the deal the government struck with EdF when the company bought British Energy. It has been reported that EdF still holds land vital to the new Wylfa project. It appears EdF doesn’t have to sell the land it owns at Wylfa until it is granted planning permission for two new reactors at both Hinkley Point and Sizewell. There’s no guarantee this will ever happen, so no-one should be holding their breath waiting for an atomic revolution in Anglesey. According to the latest list of Infrastructure Planning Commission (IPC) projects Wylfa was slated to get an application in for November 2011. Yet according to Horizon today, an application for Wylfa is only “scheduled for “2012,” a year behind their original schedule. DECC said in 2008 that Regulatory Justification, a legal requirement, would be completed in mid-2009. They now say this won’t be happen until after the General Election. Similarly, the National Policy Statements should have been designated before 2010. Now DECC can’t say when this will happen. Waste and decommissioning was pencilled in to be signed off in the final quarter of 2009. If or when this particular nuclear nightmare will be straightened out is anyone’s guess.
Left Foot Forward 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Springfields
Lancashire’s nuclear fuel factory will supply the next generation of power stations across the world, according to the head of the energy giant which runs it. Dr Aris Candris, the chief executive and president of Westinghouse, said there would be new jobs and new investment pumped into Springfields Fuels, in Salwick, near Preston, to make it the company’s “centre of excellence” for fuel production. He was speaking at the official signing of a new long-term lease with site owners the Nuclear Decommissioning Agency (NDA) on Monday.
Lancashire Evening Post 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Aldermaston
THE Environment Agency (EA) has issued the Atomic Weapons Establishment with a warning letter after it discovered pollution in the Burghfield Brook. The EA issued the warning after a report revealed that during construction for Project Mensa, a nuclear warhead assembly facility at AWE Burghfield, the brook was polluted. A spokeswoman for the EA, Hayley Willoughby, said the agency would now be working closely with the nuclear weapons establishment to prevent future incidents.
Newbury Today 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Finland
‘More nuclear waste for our children’ – that is the message Greenpeace Finland campaigners took to the construction site of the OL3 nuclear reactor at Olkiluoto in Finland. The activists skied and canoed to the scandal-prone reactor to demand that construction be stopped. They were able to climb a crane on the site and unfurl their banner. In the light of the Greenpeace action, the Finnish nuclear safety authority STUK announced that security measures at the OL3 site are inadequate. If Greenpeace can get there, who else? Just one more reason why nuclear power can’t be trusted.
Greenpeace Nuclear Reaction 29th Mar 2010 more >>
YLE 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Uranium
French nuclear group Areva is not paying enough attention to the health of workers and inhabitants around its two uranium mines in Niger, Greenpeace said yesterday. The environmental lobby group called in a report for an independent radiation study to be conducted around the two mine sites at Arlit and Akokan in the country’s northwest and for the area to be decontaminated.
The Peninsula 29th March 2010 more >>
Belgium
A 250 million euro ($338 million) nuclear tax imposed by Belgium in 2008 and mainly paid by France’s GDF Suez is lawful, the top Belgian court ruled on Tuesday.
Interactive Investor 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Iran
A leading Iranian nuclear scientist has defected to the United States and is working with the CIA, ABC News reported late Tuesday.
Middle East Online 31st Mar 2010 more >>
Barack Obama warned yesterday that a conflict in the Middle East set off by Iran’s nuclear programme could destabilise the world economy as he and Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, stepped up a push for sanctions on Tehran.
FT 31st Mar 2010 more >>
Vietnam
The United States and Vietnam have signed an agreement that may pave the way for US firms to help build nuclear plants in the country as it strives to meet booming energy demand.
Morning Star 30th Mar 2010 more >>
US
Obama has recently taken one step toward a nuclear free world, and two steps away from it. First, the forward step. Last week, Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev agreed to slash their strategic nuclear arsenals from 2,200 warheads each to 1,500. The U.S. and Russia will still have almost 20,000 warheads between them, but this step still deserves a big yay. In February, however, Obama took another step that will make it harder to rid the world of nuclear threats once and for all. He announced that the Department of Energy would provide $8 billion in loan guarantees to help a utility build two new reactors in Georgia. Materials and technologies for nuclear energy can be diverted into making nuclear weapons, either overtly or covertly.
Scientific American 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Miniature, mass-produced nuclear power plants, along with other alternative energy sources, can help the US address global warming, says Energy Secretary Steven Chu. Critics see that plan as raising the risk of proliferation of nuclear materials.
Christian Science Monitor 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Yucca Mountain
President Barack Obama’s Blue Ribbon Commission on America’s Nuclear Future will have its first meeting this week. The commission, formed after Obama cancelled the Yucca Mountain spent nuclear fuel repository in January, is tasked with rebooting the country’s five-decade-plus effort to manage its high-level radioactive waste. The problems the commission will consider are far from new. In 1957 the National Academy of Sciences warned that “[t]he hazard related to radioactive waste is so great that no element of doubt should be allowed to exist regarding safety.”
Bulletin of Atomic Scientists 24th Mar 2010 more >>
Disarmament
Our new video blog shows an interview with NIS Director Peter Burt about the implications of the new US-Russia START arms control treaty and the contradictions in President Obama’s arms control programme.
Nuclear Information Service 30th Mar 2010 more >>
Renewables
Europe could meet all its electricity needs from renewable sources by mid-century, according to a report released Monday by services giant PricewaterhouseCoopers. A “super-smart” grid powered by solar farms in North Africa, wind farms in northern Europe and the North Sea, hydro-electric from Scandinavia and the Alps and a complement of biomass and marine energy could render carbon-based fuels obsolete for electricity by 2050, said the report. The goal is achievable even without the use of nuclear energy, the mainstay of electricity in France, it said.
Bay Ledger 29th Mar 2010 more >>
If the road to a clean energy future seems too long, check your map. The debate about moving to a clean energy economy is over. The question is, how long will it take? Some posit “we shouldn’t expect” clean technologies to significantly dent fossil fuel use anytime soon. But while RMI agrees that new energy innovations in solar, wind and electric vehicles may take years to overtake existing products or technologies, there are several ways to make the road a bit shorter.
Rocky Mountain Institute 9th March 2010 more >>
