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New technology is providing information on how contaminated ground water from the Hanford nuclear reservation may be entering the Columbia River. A study for the Department of Energy of where ground water seeps into the river and what contaminants it contains won't be completed until the end of the year. But already there is evidence showing ground water enters the Columbia River in upwellings away from its shores, said Larry Hulstrom, Washington Closure Hanford project lead for the Columbia River investigation. It's generally been assumed that ground water enters the river in seeps and springs within the first 6 feet of its banks. But some of the ground water may become trapped below a hard layer in the ground and only seeps into deep areas of the river, rather than at its shores. "We've never had the technology available to determine if it was upwelling further beyond 6 feet," Hulstrom said.

Domestic political squabbles, funding woes and other hurdles threaten a number of nuclear power plant projects in central and southeast Europe but they will not derail the future of atomic energy in the region. Analysts say the global economic crisis has made banks reluctant to provide loans for nuclear plants, which cost around 3 billion euros ($4.30 billion) per 1,000 megawatt reactor, for a pay-off that takes decades.

Thanks to everyone who contacted the U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE) and their Members of Congress two weeks ago, urging an extension of DOE's public comment period on its proposed weakening of taxpayer protections in its nuclear loan guarantee program. Under pressure from concerned citizens and U.S. Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO), DOE extended the comment deadline from Sept. 8th to Sept. 22nd. Now we must take advantage of this extension to get our comments in! DOE's most clearly outrageous proposal is to give up its "first lien" in the event of a new reactor loan repayment default. This would mean that taxpayers would be placed behind other lenders, such as foreign export-import banks, in terms of receiving compensation. Thus, taxpayers likely would not be compensated at all, but rather left holding the bag for billions when a new reactor or uranium enrichment facility goes belly up. The Congressional Budget Office has predicted, based on the nuclear industry's history, that well over half of all new reactors could default on their loans. Taxpayers' liability for dozens of new reactor loan guarantees could reach into the hundreds of billions of dollars. DOE's rule change would increase, not decrease, taxpayer risk.

Eskom's hikes in the electricity price by around a quarter and a third in two years and its need to repeat such price increases for the next three years bring one issue to a head. Why are Eskom and the departments of energy and public enterprises so grimly determined to generate electricity by the most expensive and complicated of all options -- atomic power stations and their high-level radioactive waste depositaries? Eskom and other power companies have set up Westcor (Western Corridor Power Company), incorporated in Botswana. This has spent years conducting road shows for the World Bank and others, estimating the Inga3 hydro-electric power project in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) at around R70-billion.

A new system for monitoring the storage for the highly problematic liquid metal cooled reactors is taken into use. The old cores of the liquid metal cooled Alfa-class submarine reactors have been stored in Gremikha for decades and posed a radiation threat both to the environment and local residents. The new monitoring system is financed by the European Union's Northern Dimension Environ Environmental Program (NDEP) and administrated by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The new computer-based monitoring system will be incorporated in the Murmansk regional system for radiation monitoring.

In a statement June 12, Kazatomprom sought to reassure worried foreign investors that no existing agreements with foreign shareholders would be changed, despite turnover at the company and the reported arrest of its former president, Moukhtar Dzhakishev, last month. Kazatomprom, or KAP, is the world's third-largest uranium producer. In the statement, KAP's new president, Vladimir Shkolnik, said the company "understands its responsibility for resources provision of the world nuclear power industry." Shkolnik said KAP would continue the same pace of development "in order to cover the growing demand [for] our products." KAP said that its top management had met with foreign partners over the past two weeks to discuss implementation of plans ranging from uranium mining to new joint ventures. In particular, it said, negotiations were held with the representatives of Marubeni, Sumitomo, Nuclear Fuel Industries, and Japanese financial and credit and insurance companies and banks, including NEXI, JBIC, ERM, and ING. KAP said management had also met with Atomredmetzoloto, China Guangdong Nuclear Power Holding Co. Ltd., Areva, Uranium One, Nuclear Power Corp. of India Ltd., and others which it did not name. The statement said KAP management would meet soon with Cameco, Toshiba and Westinghouse Electric on further development of cooperation.

Eastern Europe is promoting nuclear energy as the only way to tackle climate change and reduce dependence on Russian gas, in spite of costs of going nuclear that it cannot meet. Amid the last Ukrainian-Russian gas spat early this year, officials from several Central and Eastern European countries were quick to point to the need for nuclear energy to reduce problematic imports of Russian gas. Unlike many countries in the West, public opinion in Central and Eastern Europe overwhelmingly supports nuclear energy, with opinion polls showing 80 percent support in Slovakia and 70 percent in Hungary. "They see it as a way to export electricity, and they believe the simple solution is to have big facilities," Olexi Pasyuk, energy specialist in Kiev with Bankwatch, an independent group monitoring European Bank investments told IPS. "But you have to invest a lot, and maybe you get money back in 30 years, if you're lucky."

Policy analysts typically evaluate proposed new policies against the status quo. From this perspective, the question of whether Congress should encourage the development of nuclear power is moot, because support for nuclear power is a central element of the status quo. Over the last 20 years the federal government has taken numerous steps to encourage nuclear power. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission streamlined the process for developing nuclear power plants; approving standardized reactor designs, allowing utilities to obtain pre-approval for reactor locations that may be banked for future use, and creating combined construction and operating licenses.

Policy analysts typically evaluate proposed new policies against the status quo. From this perspective, the question of whether Congress should encourage the development of nuclear power is moot, because support for nuclear power is a central element of the status quo. Over the last 20 years the federal government has taken numerous steps to encourage nuclear power. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission streamlined the process for developing nuclear power plants - approving standardized reactor designs, allowing utilities to obtain pre-approval for reactor locations that may be banked for future use, and creating combined construction and operating licenses.

The Department of Energy is considering tearing down Hanford's K Reactors that stand on the banks of the Columbia River rather than sealing them up for 75 years. If the plan goes forward, it could lead to tearing down eight of the nine plutonium production reactors along the river instead of leaving them "cocooned." Only B Reactor, which is expected to be preserved as a museum, would remain standing. Demolishing the reactors now instead of waiting 75 years to dispose of them could "save a ton of money" in long-term costs, said Dave Brockman, manager of the DOE Hanford Richland Operations Office.

Perhaps the most distinctive building near N Reactor, the "golf ball," should be rubble by the end of today. The building, which looks like a large, white golf ball half buried in the sand, was used as a waste treatment facility for the piping system at N Reactor. It stands about 20 feet high and has a diameter of 35 feet. Washington Closure Hanford also is making progress at the cooling water building on the banks of the Columbia River. It filtered water from N Reactor's fuel storage basins, which stored highly radioactive fuel rods. Two sand filter tanks, each weighing about 60,000 pounds, have been removed from the building.

An OSCE meeting on support to Central Asia in mitigating radioactive waste problems held here on Thursday urges international organizations and Central Asian countries to step up cooperation in managing radioactive waste. According to OSCE press release, this meeting attracted representatives of the OSCE, the UN Development Program, the International Atomic Energy Agency and the World Bank to discuss ways of enhancing regional cooperation between international organizations, donors and the private sector. Ambassador Tesoriere, head of the OSCE Centre in Bishkek, noted that this joint presentation seeks to inform a wider international audience about the dangers of radioactive and toxic waste in Central Asia to human life, economy and environment, and to demonstrate how these dangers can be addressed.

Twenty-three years have passed since The Day of April 26 divided human fates into "before" and "after" the disaster at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant. Until this day it is the world's worst anthropogenic catastrophe unmatched for its environmental impact. For Ukraine Chornobyl is an everyday reality and a host of global-scale problems. Unfortunately, the problems caused by the catastrophe are as acute today as they were 23 years ago. Can one get used to devastated villages and abandoned fertile land? Today nothing prevents us from learning in detail what was happening on the banks of the Prypiat in late April-November 1986. In May 1986 foreigners were the first to learn the truth: on April 30 a Geiger counter on a Swedish nuclear power plant detected an unacceptably high level of radiation. After the Swedish government ascertained that the discharge did not take place in Sweden, it made an official inquiry. Mikhail Gorbachev addressed the people only 18 days after the disaster, on May 14. And three years passed before the information on the radioactivity conditions was declassified and publicized. After the explosion at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant, the scientists at the Institute for Nuclear Research (National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine) identified two groups of radionuclides emitted from the damaged reactor. One of them included volatile radioactive substances carried up high in aerosols with the streams of warm air (iodine-131, iodine-135, cesium-134, cesium-137, and strontium-90). Nearly 30 percent of cesium accumulated in the reactor core was emitted.

The check stub and a notification letter rest in a file stuffed with Salina resident James Trepoy's military paperwork. The sum -- a whopping $75,000 -- initially made Trepoy afraid to cash the check. Then he kept the money in the bank for a time, fearing someone had made a mistake and he would get a call to send it back. The letter accompanying the check looked official enough, on letterhead from the U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Division, in Washington, D.C. "This is to inform you that your claim for compensation under the Radiation Exposure Compensation Program has been approved," the letter read. Trepoy, 88, is among an estimated group of more than 200,000 former soldiers who witnessed above-ground and undersea atomic tests conducted between 1945 and 1963.

France is banking on 3-1/2 decades of civil nuclear use at home, and three domestic companies with atomic expertise and a global scale to spearhead a worldwide nuclear power rebirth. This is a list of key facts on power group EDF, nuclear reactor maker Areva, and gas and electricity group GDF Suez.

France is banking on 3-1/2 decades of civil nuclear use at home, and three domestic companies with atomic expertise and a global scale to spearhead a worldwide nuclear power rebirth. This is a list of key facts on power group EDF, nuclear reactor maker Areva, and gas and electricity group GDF Suez. AREVA (CEPFi.PA)

Bruce Power has temporarily withdrawn its application to prepare a site for a nuclear power plant near Peace River, and is now considering a second site. In a letter to the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission, the nuclear power company says a new site was chosen partly because concerns were raised about an aquifer near the first location. The second site is on the west bank of the Peace River, about 30 kilometres north of the town. The original site is on the northeast shore of Lac Cardinal, about 30 kilometres west of the town. It was selected by Energy Alberta, which Bruce Power bought last March.

Nuclear Power Corp. of India plans to raise 3 billion euros ($4 billion) in overseas debt to fund a project to be built in partnership with Areva SA, the world's biggest maker of atomic reactors. Mumbai-based Nuclear Power, the state-run monopoly atomic energy producer, received bids from 15 international banks, including 10 French institutions, for the loan, Chairman Shreyans Kumar Jain said in a telephone interview. "Our expression was for 3 billion euros but we have got commitments for 8 billion euros," he said.

"The autobiography of a former director of British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) is likely to reignite fears about the safety of nuclear power, as Britain prepares for a new generation of reactors, by exposing the panic that rocked the industry two decades ago when a link was suggested between radiation and childhood leukaemia. At its height, workers at Sellafield were advised not to have children, while bosses at the Cumbrian nuclear complex even proposed establishing a sperm bank or calling for "radiation volunteers" from among older workers in order to reduce levels of exposure for workers of child-bearing age."

"Statement of Tyson Slocum, Director, Public Citizen's Energy Program Taxpayers are about to take another huge hit. Reports that the Obama administration Tuesday will announce a "conditional" loan guarantee for corporate utility Southern Company to build two new nuclear reactors at its Vogtle site in Georgia will once again put taxpayers on the hook when they can least afford it. In addition, it takes us entirely in the wrong direction. Proven efficiency and renewable energy technologies that can benefit millions of households are more cost-effective public investments than financially risky and uncertified nuclear technology. Initially authorized by the Energy Policy Act of 2005, the loan guarantee program was designed to back "innovative" energy technologies such as renewable wind and solar power, as well as new commercial nuclear reactors. While the program has finalized one $525 million loan guarantee for a solar power facility in California, the size and scope of proposed new nuclear reactors - with a price tag of roughly $10 billion per reactor - will overwhelm the public's bank account. In fact, nuclear power cannot be financially viable without taxpayer support, which includes not only federal loan guarantees but also risk insurance and production tax credits that manipulate the cost of nuclear generated energy. Since 2005, Southern Company has spent nearly $70 million lobbying the federal government, including to ensure these industry-friendly subsidies."