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Imagine a Utah that cannot shut the gate on foreign radioactive waste, cannot outlaw hotter low-level waste and cannot even revoke the license of a nuclear waste disposal site within its borders. That anything-goes scenario might well become reality if EnergySolutions Inc. wins its legal quest to strip a regional waste agency of its legal powers, according to a lawyer for the state of Utah. The issue is at the core of a case argued Thursday before U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart. EnergySolutions says a regional oversight agency has no say over the company's mile-square disposal site in Tooele County, since it's a private business with cross-border commerce rights granted by the U.S. Constitution.

A Richmond court's revocation of a water permit key to operating the North Anna nuclear power station may delay construction of a third nuclear reactor, environmental groups claimed yesterday. Judge Margaret Spencer of Richmond Circuit Court ruled on Friday that Dominion Virginia Power's water-quality permit violates the federal Clean Water Act and remanded the permit to the Virginia State Water Control Board for review. The permit allows the power company to dump heated water from its North Anna power station into cooling lagoons at Lake Anna.

A group of retired soldiers, who say they were ordered to help decontaminate a 1958 nuclear accident without the right protective gear, is suing the Defence Department. The class-action suit on behalf of three soldiers and the estates of two others accuses the government of negligence and deceit. The suit says they didn't get proper protective clothing, weren't correctly decontaminated after their shifts and that the government covered things up by purging their records of references to the incident at Chalk River, Ont.

A coalition of environmental groups is asking federal regulators to put the brakes on the proposed expansion of the Fermi nuclear power plant in Monroe County on the grounds that it is unnecessary and poses threats to the environment and human health. Beyond Nuclear, Citizens for Alternatives to Chemical Contamination, Citizens Environment Alliance of Southwestern Ontario, Don't Waste Michigan and the Sierra Club, are all representing locals who live within 50 miles of Fermi and therefore have legal standing to intervene in the reactor permitting process. According to Nuclear Regulatory Commission spokesman Scott Burnell, the Atomic Safety and Licensing Board, a panel of administrative law judges, will determine whether the groups' contentions should be introduced as part of the hearing on the permit. There is one operational nuclear reactor at the electricity-generating complex in Monroe County's Frenchtown Township, known as Fermi 2. Fermi 1 shut down in 1972.

The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday ruled that the state of Washington does have authority over certain radioactive waste mixed with hazardous chemicals at Hanford. It upheld a 2005 summary judgment ruling in Eastern Washington federal District Court that the state had authority to require DOE to dig up and process waste temporarily buried at Hanford after 1970 until the nation has a national repository opened in New Mexico. At issue is mixed transuranic waste, typically trash such as protective clothing and laboratory debris contaminated with plutonium and also hazardous chemicals such as solvents or heavy metals. It's left from the past production of plutonium for the nation's nuclear weapons program. "The federal court has upheld the state's authority to protect its people and its resources from the extremely dangerous wastes that were buried decades ago at Hanford," Jay Manning, director of the Washington state Department of Ecology, said in a statement. The case was filed after Ecology issued an order in 2003 requiring DOE to remove and process enough waste to fill about 75,000 55-gallon drums. The waste is buried in drums and boxes.

Greenpeace is threatening to take legal action against E.ON and other nuclear power companies for rushing ahead with plans to build new reactors before they have got the proper consents. The move has been triggered by reports that preparatory bore holes for new reactors will start to be drilled for E.ON on 3 August at Oldbury in Gloucestershire. EDF is said to be considering similar work. A Greenpeace spokesman said its lawyers were reviewing a situation which made a mockery of a whole raft of hurdles that were meant to be overcome before the government starts official licensing in 2013.

Energy company Essent cannot transfer economic ownership of its half of the Netherlands only nuclear power station to Germany's RWE, a court in Arnhem ruled on Friday. Essent and RWE came up with the plan as part of Essent's €9.3bn takeover by RWE. According to its statutes, the Borssele plant cannot be owned by a foreign listed company. So Essent suggested giving economic ownership to RWE while its current shareholders - local and provincial councils - would retain legal ownership of the Zeeland facility. Power firm Delta, which owns the other half of Borssele, went to court to have the transfer stopped. It wants to take over Essent's 50% share in the plant and refuses to amend the statutes.

A class action is being launched against the Federal Government by a group of Australian veterans of British atomic tests in the 1950s and 1960s. They are seeking compensation for ill health as a result of exposure to the tests at Maralinga in South Australia's far west. Their action follows a court ruling in Britain which has allowed veterans there to sue the British Government. Ric Johnstone from the Australian Nuclear Veterans Association says many veterans have already died, but they are determined to press on with the court case. "We could be long gone by the time it comes to a conclusion, but we're concerned mostly about our offspring and some of those will still be around in 40 or 50 years to come, we hope," he said. "And if they have any problems related to the exposure of their parents, then that should be covered by the Federal Government.

A GROUP of nuclear veterans will launch a class action against the federal government this week seeking compensation for exposure to atomic tests at Maralinga in the 1950s and 1960s. Led by Australian Nuclear Veterans Association national president Ric Johnstone, the group has been buoyed by a ruling last month in Britain's High Court allowing British veterans suffering from ill health to pursue a class action against the Ministry of Defence. Mr Johnstone, a former RAAF mechanic who decontaminated vehicles used at Maralinga during the nuclear testing, told The Australian a team of lawyers was drafting a letter to send to Kevin Rudd and Veterans Affairs Minister Alan Griffin this week. The group will then lodge a statement of claim with the Federal Court seeking undisclosed damages -- likely to be "several million dollars" -- from the federal government.

* Companies to withdraw all pending appeals * USEC says to realize $70 mln no earlier than Q4 * USEC shares up 6 pct May 18 (Reuters) - Uranium fuel supplier USEC Inc (USU.N) and its French competitor Areva (CEPFi.PA) said they agreed to settle pending appeals related to an anti-dumping case involving imports of French low-enriched uranium. Under the settlement, the parties will immediately withdraw or request dismissal of all pending appeals and U.S. Department of Commerce proceedings. USEC said it expected to realize about $70 million no earlier than the fourth quarter from estimated duties deposited by Areva's holding company, Eurodif SA, as a result of the settlement.

The operators of Sellafield are to be prosecuted after two contractors received a "higher than anticipated" dose of radiation. The workers were refurbishing a floor at the site's plutonium finishing and storage plant in July 2007 when they were exposed to airborne contamination. Sellafield Ltd is accused of failing to discharge its duty under Section 3 (1) of the Health and Safety Act 1974. The case will be heard at Whitehaven Magistrates' Court on 24 July.

Ex-servicemen who took part in nuclear tests in the 1950s have won the right to sue the government for compensation. More than 1,000 men say they and their families have suffered ill-health following the nuclear tests conducted in the South Pacific. The ruling by the High Court means the government could face its largest class action yet, for millions of pounds. The servicemen's solicitor, Neil Sampson, urged the government to settle the case out of court.

Radioactive contaminants leaked into Quehanna Wild Area Beginning nearly 50 years ago at a site near Karthaus, where Clearfield, Clinton and Centre counties come together, two companies leaked nuclear radiation into the largest wild area in the eastern United States, the Quehanna Wild Area. It took 40 years for the government to figure out how badly the place was contaminated, and another 10 years to clean up the sources of radiation. Now, more than $20 million in cleanup costs later, the state Department of Environmental Protection is suing the companies to get the money back. In separate suits filed May 14 that share many of the same claims, DEP attorney Michael D. Buchwach asks a federal judge to force Lockheed Martin Corp. and Atlantic Richfield Co. to pay the cleanup costs.

For the first time in United States history, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) will be challenged in Federal appeals court for its approval of a source materials license for an in situ leach uranium mine. The Navajo communities of Crownpoint and Church Rock, New Mexico, with the assistance of the New Mexico Environmental Law Center (NMELC), Eastern Navajo Dine against Uranium Mining (ENDAUM) and Southwest Research and Information Center (SRIC) will fight the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) and Hydro Resources, Inc., demanding that they stay off of Navajo lands in New Mexico. NMELC will present oral arguments on May 12 to a panel of Federal judges in Denver asking that the NRC decision to allow mining be set aside. "The importance of our hearing on May 12 cannot be overstated," states Eric Jantz, New Mexico Environmental Law Center attorney. "We are talking about the land, water, air and health of two whole communities. There are people on this land grazing their cattle and hauling their daily drinking water."

Adams County wrongly spent $750,000 in fees from a hazardous waste dump to sue the state for allowing the dump to accept low-level radioactive material, a judge has ruled. The judge said the county must return the money to a fund set up to offset costs associated with the dump. Adams County District Judge John T. Bryan issued the order late Thursday.

The Colorado pikeminnow, razorback sucker and humpback and bonytail chubs could be unraveling Western Colorado's second uranium boom. Last week, four conservation groups took on the federal government for opening the floodgates to uranium mining without assessing the impacts on the Dolores and San Miguel rivers. Western Colorado's first uranium boom arrived in the 1950s with the beginning of the Cold War. At that time, prospectors with newly patented mining claims and Geiger counters in hand descended en masse on the canyon country west of Durango. Many walked away with fortunes but left a legacy of mine waste and radioactive tailings in their wake. Three years ago, uranium prices once again spiked, and prospectors and mining companies started eyeing the desert of the Dolores River drainage. Local uranium mining got a big nudge in the summer of 2007 when the Department of Energy announced its Uranium Leasing Program. At that time, the agency opened 27,000 additional acres in San Miguel, Montrose and Mesa counties to prospectors seeking the radioactive ore. With this acreage, the DOE estimated that regional mines would produce 2 million tons of unrefined uranium per year.

Neighbors in the Tri-Cities, exposed to radioactive material from the Hanford Nuclear Facility, are one step closer to getting justice. For the past 20 years, the affected neighbors have been in and out of court, trying to get the contractors who ran Hanford to accept responsibility for what happened. On Tuesday, a federal judge asked both sides to lay out a road map to resolve close to 2,000 cases.

"Vieques is a small island with a big problem. And the Obama administration is fighting to keep it that way. A municipality of Puerto Rico just a few miles east of the main island, Vieques has the lamentable distinction of being the venue of six decades of training exercises and weapons testing by the U.S. Navy. Starting around the outbreak of World War II, our military has tested all manner of munitions there, from napalm to depleted uranium to Agent Orange. It has also released immense quantities of jet fuel, flame retardant, and other toxic substances. The place is contaminated. Not surprisingly, Vieques's 9000 residents -- American citizens by birth -- are a sickly bunch. Cancer rates are 30% higher than they are on Puerto Rico's main island. In the case of diabetes, that figure is 41%; for hypertension, nearly 400%. And roughly 80% of residents test positive for heavy metals like lead, mercury, and arsenic in their hair."

"Exxon Mobil Corp., the largest U.S. energy company, must pay $1.2 million to 16 Louisiana workers who claimed they were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation when they were cleaning used oil drilling pipes, a jury said. A state court jury in Gretna, Louisiana, yesterday awarded the men amounts ranging from $10,000 to $175,000 each, finding that they face an increased risk of cancer as a result of their exposure to naturally occurring radioactive material in the used pipes between 1977 and 1992. "It was not what I was hoping for," said one of the men, David Perry, who was awarded $10,000."

"CPS Energy ended a two-month legal battle with its corporate partner in the proposed South Texas Project nuclear expansion with a settlement Wednesday that allows the utility to immediately stop making payments on the project while retaining a small share. The partner, Nuclear Innovation North America, also agreed to pay CPS $80 million and contribute $10 million in assistance for low-income local residents to pay power bills. The deal, which CPS Energy said is worth $1 billion total, means the utility will retain 7.625 percent of the project to build two more reactors near Bay City."