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"An expert hearing was held at the European Parliament earlier this month regarding the forthcoming EU Directive on Nuclear Waste. Different approaches to nuclear waste management policies by EU member states were discussed in order to shed light on what a strong and comprehensive directive should contain. Veronica Webster, 15/06-2010 The attendees heard that an all-encompassing definition of nuclear waste must be included in the forthcoming directive, as well as some of the necessary characteristics of acceptable geological repositories for nuclear waste. The hearing was co-hosted by Anni Podimata, a Greek socialist and Rebecca Harms, a German green member of the European Parliament. The hearing was also held in cooperation with green NGO Friends of the Earth Europe. "

"Germany's government has proposed a new nuclear fuel tax as part of a wider austerity package, without linking this explicitly to the expected extension of nuclear run-times. According to a statement posted on the government's website, extra profits generated by nuclear plant operators in the wake of higher power prices because of extra CO2 certificates justifies the next tax, which also will contribute to financing nuclear waste storage solutions. From 2011, the government expects Eur2.3 billion ($2.8 billion) a year until 2014 from nuclear plant operators through the planned new measures. E.ON, RWE, EnBW and Vattenfall Europe, which run Germany's 17 operational reactors, are hoping their plants' life spans will be extended beyond the start of the next decade, when nuclear power should be phased out, according to a still valid law. "

Inhabitat has a post on a massive new wind farm planned for the North sea - OMA Plans Massive North Sea Wind Farm to Power Europe. This week Rem Koolhaas' Office for Metropolitan Architecture announced plans for an incredible array of oceanic wind farms that may one day produce as much energy as the Persian Gulf. Dubbed Zeekracht (sea power), the masterplan comprises a massive ring of wind farms centered around the Netherlands that spans seven adjacent countries. By calling for such a large network of communal infrastructure and knowledge, the plan takes a giant step towards ensuring European energy independency by 2025. Thanks to its high and constant wind speeds, shallow waters, and cutting-edge renewable industries, the North Sea is one of the world's most suitable areas for large scale wind farming. OMA states that "The potential magnitude of renewable energy in the North Sea in fact, approaches that of fossil fuel production in the Persian Gulf states today."

The Swedish government plans to overturn a nearly 30-year-old decision to phase out nuclear power and lift a ban on building new reactors. The centre-right government says it wants to allow for new reactors to replace 10 still in operation. The decision still needs to be approved by parliament. The plan will not receive state funding.

France's vast nuclear power network has largely shielded it from the Russian gas crisis, handing the country's atomic energy sector an unexpected public relations coup. With 80 percent of its electricity generated by nuclear power stations, the highest proportion in the world, France was able to reassure nervous households and industry after the Russia-Ukraine dispute cut off gas supplies to Europe. The gas crisis coincided with exceptionally cold weather in France, testing its power system to the limit as households turned up their heaters to maximum.

Fears were raised yesterday over a decision to restart a potentially dangerous decommissioned nuclear power plant in the centre of Europe because of a shortage of gas caused by Russia's dispute with Ukraine. Slovakia, defying undertakings given when it joined the European Union, said that it would reactivate a Soviet-style nuclear generator that has a record of safety problems because it had received no Russian gas since last Thursday. Russia again found a reason to delay turning the taps back on yesterday, despite an agreement brokered by Mirek Topolanek, the Czech Prime Minister, on behalf of the EU, which was signed by Russian and Ukrainian leaders at the weekend.

Electricite de France SA said Thursday it will invest up to euro50 billion with its partners over the next 12 years to build next-generation nuclear plants in Europe, the United States and China. France's state-controlled nuclear power giant said its share of the investment would run to between euro12 billion and euro20 billion ($15.2 billion-$25.3 billion) by 2020.

Electricite de France SA said Thursday it will invest up to euro50 billion with its partners over the next 12 years to build next-generation nuclear plants in Europe, the United States and China. France's state-controlled nuclear power giant said its share of the investment would run to between euro12 billion and euro20 billion ($15.2 billion-$25.3 billion) by 2020. The rest is to be raised through project financing debt, joint venture partners such as the China Guangdong Nuclear Power Company, and cash flow, EdF said. EdF confirmed in a statement that the first of its new so-called European Pressurized Reactors (EPR) would be operational in 2012. That reactor, in Flamanville on the Normandy coast, will be followed by a Chinese EPR in 2013, a U.S. one in 2016, and a British reactor at the end of 2017, EdF said.

Widespread doubts about the ability of nuclear power companies to bring a new generation of reactors on stream at the right time and on budget were raised yesterday within an industry that the UK government is relying on to meet its climate change and energy security goals. EDF, the French power company that has positioned itself as a leading player in the market, admitted that its new European Pressurised Reactor programme at Flamanville in France was already 20% over budget, while delays continue to plague a Finnish facility, the only other new plant under construction in Europe.

Among the first things that President Obama will have to decide when he assumes office is whether to continue President Bush's and the Pentagon's plans to install missile interceptors in Eastern Europe. Let's hope that he rejects those plans. Otherwise, all that will be accomplished will be to increase tensions with Russia, which, not surprisingly, will provide the Pentagon and the military-industrial complex with new excuses to increase their perpetually ever-growing budgets.

A shipment of nuclear waste is expected to arrive at a dump in Germany despite mass protests from environmentalists. Eleven containers of treated waste were on Monday transferred from a train onto lorries in Dannenberg for the final journey to the northern Gorleben site. The train was delayed for hours after setting off from La Hague in France on Friday, as protesters clashed with police trying to block the shipment.

U.S. President-elect Barack Obama has made "no commitment" to plans for a missile defense program in eastern Europe, despite a report on the Polish president's Web site, an Obama adviser said Saturday. An adviser to Barack Obama disputed claims made on the Polish president's Web site. Obama spoke to President Lech Kaczynski over the phone about continuing military and political cooperation between the two countries and possibly meeting in person soon, both sides said. Obama "had a good conversation with the Polish president and the Polish prime minister about the important U.S.-Poland alliance," said Denis McDonough, Obama's senior foreign policy adviser.

Bulgaria's planned nuclear power plant at Belene on the Danube River is amongst the most dangerous contemplated projects of its kind in the whole world, Greenpeace nuclear analyst Heinz Smital has said, as quoted by Deutsche Welle. According to Smital's warning, Belene was massive and irresponsible gamble, which would only tarnish the reparation of RWE, the German company picked as the strategic investor in the nuclear power plant. Far worse, the German company was playing Russian roulette with people's lives in the entire region of South-Eastern Europe, he said.

At least 20 people have died in an accident on a Russian nuclear submarine when a fire extinguishing system was activated by mistake. Russian Pacific Fleet spokesman Igor Dygalo said both sailors and shipyard workers died in the accident, which occurred during sea trials. The dead were suffocated by freon gas, which is used to put out fires as it removes oxygen from the air.

Estonia has completed the decade-long clean-up of one of Europe's most hazardous radioactive waste dumps on the Baltic coast, an official in charge of the operation said Monday. "EU experts considered the radioactive waste storage at Sillamae one of the four most dangerous sites of its kind in Europe," Tonis Kaasik, director of the OkoSil firm responsible for the clean-up of the Soviet-era dump told AFP.

An inquiry is under way into Saturday's gas poisoning on a Russian nuclear submarine in the Pacific that left 20 people dead, including 17 civilians. Another 21 people were left ill in what officials believe was an "unsanctioned" activation of an automatic firefighting system that released freon gas. Experts speculated that the presence of many civilians aboard during sea trials may have elevated the death toll.

Cancer patients across Europe face further delays for diagnoses after the owner of a Dutch nuclear reactor said Tuesday it would not re-open until February, almost three months behind schedule. The Petten reactor in northern Holland, which produces a third of the world's medical isotopes, was shut down for safety reasons at the end of August.

Belgian authorities have warned people in the south of the country not to eat locally grown produce after a leak from a nuclear research institute. A safety alert was issued after a leak of radioactive iodine gas from a laboratory in Fleurus, near the southern city of Charleroi.

Norway may be planning on becoming Europe's battery, but based on what Reuters is saying about a new proposal from Greenpeace it won't just be Norway which supplies Europe with electricity, it will be the North Sea. The head of renewable energy for the European Commission, Hans Van Steen, has called the proposal "ambitious but realistic". 118 Wind Farms + €20 Billion Electric Grid There may be no actual plan in place, but the Greenpeace proposal goes like this: Build 118 offshore wind farms by 2030 in the North Sea off the coasts of Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark and Norway. Connect the 68 gigawatts of power these windfarms would produce to the mainland through a grid of power cables on the sea bed, the construction of which could cost €20 billion ($29 billion).

The news that Joseph Stalin's Russia had successfully tested an atomic bomb in August 1949 sent shockwaves through the chancellories of Europe and the US State Department almost as explosive as the detonation itself.