Group items tagged

"A bipartisan group of senators led by Sen. Tom Udall, D-NM, is requesting a hearing on a proposed expansion of the Radiation Exposure Compensation Act (RECA), aimed at reaching victims throughout the western U.S. whose high rates of cancer and other diseases have been tied to radiation exposure. RECA currently provides funding to qualified "downwinders" in Beaver, Garfield, Iron, Kane, Millard, Piute, San Juan, Sevier, Washington and Wayne counties. The proposed expansion would extend coverage to all of Utah, along with the other six states, and increase the list of illnesses eligible for compensation. Introduced in April, the bill was referred to the Judiciary Committee for consideration, and the group wrote a letter to the committee requesting the hearing."

Review of accelerated depreciation, investment tax credit, and production tax credit provisions of Senator Kerry's and Senator Lieberman's American Power Act In May 2010, Senators John Kerry (D-MA) and Joseph Lieberman (I-CT) released a discussion version of The American Power Act (henceforth referred to as the "K-L Bill" or the "APA"). The K-L Bill as proposed is a wide-ranging piece of energy legislation that includes a number of new subsidies to nuclear power. This memo evaluates three of those nuclear provisions, describing how they work and estimating their subsidy value to recipients in the nuclear power sector: * 5-year accelerated depreciation period for new nuclear power plants (section 1121). * Investment tax credit (ITC) for nuclear power facilities (section 1122) and the related grants for qualified nuclear power facility expenditures in lieu of tax credits (section 1126). * Modification of credit for production from advanced nuclear power facilities (section 1124). The K-L Bill includes a number of subsidies to nuclear power that were not evaluated in this memo, and as a result this memo should be viewed as one part of a larger picture of how federal subsidies distort US energy markets and fuel choice.1 The values presented

"In April 2005, a Presidential Directive established the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office within the Department of Homeland Security to enhance and coordinate federal, state, and local efforts to combat nuclear smuggling abroad and domestically. The DNDO was directed to develop, in coordination with the departments of Defense, Energy, and State, an enhanced global nuclear detection system of radiation detection equipment and interdiction activities. (DNDO refers to this system as an architecture.) DNDO is to implement the domestic portion of the architecture."

"President Obama obliquely referred to the Israeli nuclear weapons program Tuesday, and expressed continued U.S. support for it. Nonproliferation expert Avner Cohen of the Monterey Institute of International Studies talks with Robert Siegel about the well-known "secret" program."

"U.S. Senator Jim Webb abruptly canceled a planned visit to military-ruled Myanmar on Thursday because of concern about the country's alleged nuclear cooperation with North Korea. Politics | North Korea Webb, chairman of the Senate subcommittee on East Asia and Pacific, said his visit would be "unwise" having learned of a report containing new allegations that Myanmar was seeking North Korea's help in developing a nuclear program. It was not immediately known what report Webb was referring to and a U.S. embassy spokesman could not confirm the origin of the report, or where it was published."

"n a clear reference to Pakistan, India today said clandestine proliferation network in the region had adversely affected its security and pitched for a new global paradigm to meet the challenge, factoring in the "real" risks of terrorists gaining access to nuclear material. National Security Adviser Shivshankar Menon also highlighted the dangers India faces by being in the vicinity of "epicentre" of global terrorism and pressed for increased global collaborative efforts to defeat the menace particularly when terror groups are "networked to an unprecedented extent"."

"We cannot look the other way on the Hanford cleanup controversy Referring in print to the Hanford Nuclear Reservation as America's Chernobyl is a pretty good way to get a call from Hanford's press office, which is understandably anxious to avoid comparison with the Soviet reactor disaster. But according to the latest analysis, Chernobyl may start calling to complain about being lumped together with Hanford. This is because the amount of deadly plutonium buried near the Columbia River in southeastern Washington state is three times what the U.S. government has previously estimated. Highly cancer-causing even at microscopic quantities, it is now thought that nearly 26,000 pounds of the bomb-making material was discarded as waste at Hanford."

"An Iranian who claimed he was "abducted" by US spies last year denied upon his arrival in Tehran Thursday that he was a nuclear scientist, but said he was questioned by Israelis during his captivity. Shahram Amiri, who vanished from Saudi Arabia in June 2009 while on a pilgrimage, arrived in Tehran on Thursday after surfacing in Iran's Interest Section in Washington two days ago. Immediately after his arrival he told reporters that he was just a "simple researcher", refuting earlier claims by Iranian officials that he was a nuclear scientist. "I had nothing to do with Natanz and Fordo sites," Amiri said referring to Iran's two uranium enrichment plants."

Federal agencies in charge of radiation protection are struggling to revise their standards to take into account the differences in susceptibility to radiation-induced cancer among men, women and children, and, according to a report released Wednesday, are lagging in that task. The report, from the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research, said the rules were still too heavily based on "Reference Man," a standard created by the International Commission on Radiological Protection in 1975. That standard is a 5-foot-7, 154-pound man who is "Western European or North American in habitat and custom."

Less than three weeks after a congressman demanded more transparency from federal regulators about safety issues at the Oyster Creek Nuclear Generating Station in Lacey, the agency held a secret meeting with plant operators to discuss the implications of new corrosion discovered during the October outage. U.S. Rep. Christopher Smith, R-N.J., in a Dec. 4 letter to the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission, insisted that citizens be apprised of ongoing safety issues, and specifically referred to corrosion discovered during the October refueling as a "significant case of high public interest." He cited the need for "full transparency" in the continuing corrosion and degradation of the reactor's drywell, the steel containment vessel that shields the public from radiation.

The U.S. Department of Energy didn't get a lot of community support Tuesday at a public hearing to discuss its Global Nuclear Energy Partnership Program. The program, referred to as GNEP, would, at its most basic level, allow for research and development of the recycling of spent nuclear fuel rods. At its most active level, the program could include advanced nuclear recycling using advanced recycling reactors. The meeting was conducted in Piketon, where a GNEP program could be implemented in the future. The DOE already owns land and has facilities that would be good for recycling, and is one of many DOE sites being considered.

Lester R. Brown, one of the world's most widely published authors and referred to by the Washington Post as "one of the world's most influential thinkers", has recently published his views via the Earth Policy Institute on the nuclear vs. wind and solar power debate; stating that nuclear power is uneconomical compared to renewable energy. Quoting from a recent analysis entitled "The Nuclear Illusion", Brown points out the cost of electricity from a new nuclear power plant costs around (USD) 14¢ per kilowatt hour compared to a wind farm's very economical 7¢ per kilowatt hour. The costings take into account capital, general operations and maintenance, transmission and distribution in relation to both options.

DOE Manager Gerald Boyd, speaking at this week's conference hosted by the Energy, Technology and Environmental Business Association, reminded folks that the cost of the big K-25 project has increased four-fold since 2002. It went from a $200 million project to one approaching $1 billion, Boyd said, although he suggests the initial estimate may not have been very accurate. A lot of the cost increase, according to DOE's Oak Ridge chief, came after "we almost killed someone," referring to the accident in which a worker fell through a second-story floor. That accident underscored the deteriorated state of the building, and required a whole different approach to cleanup. There have been other cost issues, as well, and taking down such a massive structure, highly deteriorated and heavily contaminated, continues to present surprising new challenges.

The online Encyclopedia of Peace Education provides a comprehensive overview of scholarly developments in the field to date as well as new insights from across the globe from various actors involved in advancing peace education. This online resource serves as a living reference guide that traces the history and emergence of the field, highlights foundational concepts, contextualizes peace education practice across international and disciplinary borders, and suggests new directions for peace educators. From core conceptual perspectives to the moral and spiritual foundations of the field to the role of the United Nations, the Encyclopedia grounds peace education in a solid theoretical and practical framework through the writings of some of the field's most renowned scholars and its emerging voices. This online resource targets undergraduate and graduate students as well as scholars and practitioners working in international and non-governmental organizations in the field of peace education.

He is a messenger between heaven and earth. Manuel Pino comes from the Acoma Pueblo, an adobe village of the Tewa west of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Beyond the earthcolored dwellings one sees only blue sky - Acoma Pueblo occupies the rim of a steep mesa. Standing on the center plaza, one has the feeling that a great invisible magnet is pulling the settlement into the clouds. Tourist guidebooks and highway billboards refer to Acoma as, "Sky City."

The world is on the brink of an avalanche in the spread of devastating weaponry, a new global non-proliferation group warned Tuesday, saying that a nuclear incident would dwarf the September 11 attacks. The Middle East, particularly Iran, is a potential tipping point, according to Gareth Evans, co-chair of the newly formed International Commission on Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament. Evans, a former Australia foreign minister, said the world had been "sleepwalking" on the issue of atomic weapons for a decade. "The devastation that could be wreaked by one major nuclear weapons incident alone puts 9/11 and almost everything else (in) to the category of the insignificant," he said, referring to the attacks inflicted on the United States in 2001.

In the course of summer, Russia removed another 46 strontium-fuelled lighthouses from the coast of the White Sea and the Barents and Kara Seas. With Norwegian project support, Russia has now removed 180 radioactive lighthouses between Murmansk and the Novaya Zemlya and replaced them with solar cell installations. Strontium-fuelled lighthouse (Fylkesmannen.no)The 46 lighthouses were all sent to the VNIITFA institute in Moscow, Rosbaltnord.ru reports with reference to RIA Novosti. Another 11 lighthouses will be brought from the island of Vaigach to Moscow next summer.

South Carolina Electric & Gas Company, Acting for Itself and as Agent for the South Carolina Public Service Authority (Also Referred to as Santee Cooper) Application for the Virgil C. Summer Nuclear Station Units 2 and 3; Notice of Order, Hearing, and Opportunity To Petition for Leave To Intervene

Doug Turner argues that politicians opposing a nuclear waste repository inside Yucca Mountain contribute to our nation's energy woes. Advocating increased use of nuclear power, Turner references the French, who are heavy producers of electricity generated by nuclear power plants. He claims their nuclear power is cheap, profitable and environmentally sound. The French pave their highways with material in which they mix radioactive wastes, spreading the hazard across the land. They store radioactive waste in facilities along miles of coastline. Radioactivity leaks into the ocean. Reprocessing creates more waste than there was before the material was reprocessed. But discarding weapons-grade plutonium and uranium would be economically irresponsible.

The Greens say there is an opportunity for the community to have its say about a possible radioactive waste dump in the Northern Territory. The Federal Government is waiting for a report on the suitability of three sites in the Territory for a dump. The Greens have introduced a bill into Federal Parliament to overturn legislation forcing a dump on the Territory and the bill has now been referred to a committee of inquiry. Western Australian Greens Senator Scott Ludlam says if there is enough interest it may come to the Territory to consult first-hand.