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Reuters) - Several people who could serve as energy secretary in U.S. President-elect Barack Obama's administration already have been mentioned by Washington insiders, lobbyists and blog writers, including: * U.S. Sen. Jeff Bingaman, Democrat of New Mexico, chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee. He advocates renewable energy and energy efficiency measures. * Wesley Clark, retired Army general and former NATO commander who ran unsuccessfully for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004. * General Electric Co Chief Executive Jeff Immelt, who says government investment in environmental technologies can create green jobs. * Ray Mabus, former Democratic Governor of Mississippi and U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, the world's biggest oil producer. He served as a senior adviser to the Obama campaign. * U.S. Rep. Ed Markey, Democrat of Massachusetts, chairman of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. A long-time critic of OPEC and nuclear power, he supported higher fuel economy standards for cars and trucks. * Dan Reicher, director of climate change and energy initiatives at Google.org. A former assistant energy secretary under President Bill Clinton, he wants more U.S. electricity generated by renewable sources and promotes plug-in vehicles. * Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a Democrat who has called for a $850 million state Energy Independence Fund to invest in clean energy projects and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. * Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer, a Democrat who is a big promoter of developing liquid fuel from coal. * Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, a Democrat who fought efforts to allow a coal-fired power plant to expand in her state, saying it would spew more greenhouse gas emissions.

The federal secretary of Health and Human Services has agreed to expand automatic compensation of $150,000 to more Hanford workers who may have developed cancer because of exposure to radiation. If Congress does not object, the decision by Secretary Kathleen Sebelius takes effect Jan. 10. The action was recommended in October by a federal advisory board. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, or NIOSH, will review 340 pending claims of former Hanford workers, some filed by their survivors. The claims are for workers who had cancers covered under the automatic compensation program and who worked at Hanford during the years the new expanded rules would cover. Those pending claims are in addition to hundreds of past claims that have been denied but would be reviewed by the Department of Labor to see if they now qualify for compensation under the eased rules. The new rules also could help some middle-aged Hanford workers and recent retirees who yet may develop cancer.

The federal secretary of Health and Human Services has agreed to expand automatic compensation of $150,000 to more Hanford workers who may have developed cancer because of exposure to radiation. If Congress does not object, the decision by Secretary Kathleen Sebelius takes effect Jan. 10. The action was recommended in October by a federal advisory board. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, or NIOSH, will review 340 pending claims of former Hanford workers, some filed by their survivors. The claims are for workers who had cancers covered under the automatic compensation program and who worked at Hanford during the years the new expanded rules would cover. Those pending claims are in addition to hundreds of past claims that have been denied but would be reviewed by the Department of Labor to see if they now qualify for compensation under the eased rules. The new rules also could help some middle-aged Hanford workers and recent retirees who yet may develop cancer.

Leonard W. Duke survived being dragged by a truck when he was 7. Doctors said he wouldn't make it. As he grew older, three doctors subsequently told him he wouldn't live to be 30, another 10 years and to be 50. At 81, he's healthier than many of his fellow former Line 1 workers. Since doctors long have predicted his demise, Duke is not keen on visits to the doctor's office, even after he's suffered some recent dizziness. He does, however, trust Laurence Fuortes and his staff at the University of Iowa's College of Public Health's Burlington Atomic Energy Commission Plant-Former Worker Program. During a luncheon Thursday that honored former Iowa Army Ammunition workers who worked on Line 1 where secret atomic weapons were assembled between 1947 and 1975, people like Duke visited with fellow plant workers and the University of Iowa staff.

Leonard W. Duke survived being dragged by a truck when he was 7. Doctors said he wouldn't make it. As he grew older, three doctors subsequently told him he wouldn't live to be 30, another 10 years and to be 50. At 81, he's healthier than many of his fellow former Line 1 workers. Since doctors long have predicted his demise, Duke is not keen on visits to the doctor's office, even after he's suffered some recent dizziness. He does, however, trust Laurence Fuortes and his staff at the University of Iowa's College of Public Health's Burlington Atomic Energy Commission Plant-Former Worker Program. During a luncheon Thursday that honored former Iowa Army Ammunition workers who worked on Line 1 where secret atomic weapons were assembled between 1947 and 1975, people like Duke visited with fellow plant workers and the University of Iowa staff.

Leonard W. Duke survived being dragged by a truck when he was 7. Doctors said he wouldn't make it. As he grew older, three doctors subsequently told him he wouldn't live to be 30, another 10 years and to be 50. At 81, he's healthier than many of his fellow former Line 1 workers. Since doctors long have predicted his demise, Duke is not keen on visits to the doctor's office, even after he's suffered some recent dizziness. He does, however, trust Laurence Fuortes and his staff at the University of Iowa's College of Public Health's Burlington Atomic Energy Commission Plant-Former Worker Program. During a luncheon Thursday that honored former Iowa Army Ammunition workers who worked on Line 1 where secret atomic weapons were assembled between 1947 and 1975, people like Duke visited with fellow plant workers and the University of Iowa staff.

"The U.S. Department of Labor is notifying all former Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory employees who worked at the Berkeley, Calif., site between Aug. 13, 1942, and Dec. 31, 1961, about a new class of employees added to the Special Exposure Cohort of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act. The act provides compensation and medical benefits to workers who became ill as a result of working in the nuclear weapons industry. Survivors of qualified workers may also be entitled to benefits. A worker who is included in a designated SEC class of employees, and who is diagnosed with one of 22 specified cancers, may receive a presumption of causation under the EEOICPA. On April 5, 2010, the secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services designated the following class of employees as an addition to the SEC: all employees of the Department of Energy, its predecessor agencies, and their contractors and subcontractors who worked at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif., from Aug. 13, 1942, through Dec. 31, 1961, for at least 250 workdays occurring either solely under this employment or in combination with workdays within other classes of employees in the SEC. This designation became effective on May 5, 2010. The Labor Department's role is to adjudicate these claims based on the new SEC class definitions as determined and introduced by HHS. "

If a picture's worth a thousand words, the Vermont Public Interest Research Group's photo mosaic of about 5,000 mini-portraits is something like 5 million words. And those words all say Vermont Yankee should be decommissioned. Advertisement VPIRG unveiled the mosaic Thursday on Elizabeth Hunt's freshly cut lawn in South Burlington. The mosaic's miniature portraits, taken of people at their homes throughout Vermont, put together and tinted slightly, become a pixilated picture roughly the size of a Publishers Clearing House check, of Hunt; her husband, Jesse Moore; and their 1-year-old son, Sam Moore. Members of the research group said they assembled the photo petition to personalize the state's general opinion of the 650-megawatt nuclear power plant. "You can tell a lot more by a person's face than their signature," said Anika James, 21, of Shelburne, who knocked on doors for VPIRG.

If a picture's worth a thousand words, the Vermont Public Interest Research Group's photo mosaic of about 5,000 mini-portraits is something like 5 million words. And those words all say Vermont Yankee should be decommissioned. Advertisement VPIRG unveiled the mosaic Thursday on Elizabeth Hunt's freshly cut lawn in South Burlington. The mosaic's miniature portraits, taken of people at their homes throughout Vermont, put together and tinted slightly, become a pixilated picture roughly the size of a Publishers Clearing House check, of Hunt; her husband, Jesse Moore; and their 1-year-old son, Sam Moore. Members of the research group said they assembled the photo petition to personalize the state's general opinion of the 650-megawatt nuclear power plant. "You can tell a lot more by a person's face than their signature," said Anika James, 21, of Shelburne, who knocked on doors for VPIRG.

If a picture's worth a thousand words, the Vermont Public Interest Research Group's photo mosaic of about 5,000 mini-portraits is something like 5 million words. And those words all say Vermont Yankee should be decommissioned. Advertisement VPIRG unveiled the mosaic Thursday on Elizabeth Hunt's freshly cut lawn in South Burlington. The mosaic's miniature portraits, taken of people at their homes throughout Vermont, put together and tinted slightly, become a pixilated picture roughly the size of a Publishers Clearing House check, of Hunt; her husband, Jesse Moore; and their 1-year-old son, Sam Moore. Members of the research group said they assembled the photo petition to personalize the state's general opinion of the 650-megawatt nuclear power plant. "You can tell a lot more by a person's face than their signature," said Anika James, 21, of Shelburne, who knocked on doors for VPIRG.

Vice President Dick Cheney told the FBI he had no idea who leaked to the news media that Valerie Plame, wife of a Bush administration critic, worked for the CIA. An FBI summary of Cheney's interview from 2004 reflects that the vice president had deep concern about Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, a former U.S. ambassador in Africa who said the administration had twisted prewar intelligence on Iraq. Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, was convicted of perjury, obstruction and lying to the FBI in the probe of who leaked Plame's identity to the news media. At the end of Libby's trial, prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said that "there is a cloud over the vice president" in the leaking of Plame's identity.

Vice President Dick Cheney told the FBI he had no idea who leaked to the news media that Valerie Plame, wife of a Bush administration critic, worked for the CIA. An FBI summary of Cheney's interview from 2004 reflects that the vice president had deep concern about Plame's husband, Joseph Wilson, a former U.S. ambassador in Africa who said the administration had twisted prewar intelligence on Iraq. Cheney's chief of staff, I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, was convicted of perjury, obstruction and lying to the FBI in the probe of who leaked Plame's identity to the news media. At the end of Libby's trial, prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said that "there is a cloud over the vice president" in the leaking of Plame's identity.

John Fleck at the Albuqeurque Journal's blog noted an article in the Chronicle of Higher Education that says that switching over control of national labs to the Department of Defense could have an adverse effect on the caliber of scientists who could be brought in to the labs for their research. Some experts who have studied or worked with the labs fear that change could reduce the quality of research. "They've already made it much harder for themselves to attract good people," said Hugh Gusterson, a professor of anthropology and sociology at George Mason University who has spent years studying the culture of scientists at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, talking about the management changes. A further shift, he said, "will just compound the difficulty."

Are nuclear power plant workers at higher risk to die of cancer? A study conducted by a Canadian researcher concluded the risk is substantially higher to them than to the general public. The document, "Exposure to Radiation and Health Outcomes" was made public last week. It was written by Mark Lemstra, who was formerly a senior research epidemiologist for the Saskatoon, Canada, Health Region. Lemstra left -- or was relieved of, depending on which source you read -- his job last year after a dispute over a report he authored that documented the health disparities between different socioeconomic categories in Saskatoon. In the radiation report, in which Lemstra reviewed 1,725 articles related to radiation studies, he concluded that nuclear power plant workers have a "relative excess risk" of getting cancer. In epidemiology, excess risk is defined as the difference between the proportion of subjects in a population with a particular disease who were exposed to a specific risk factor and the proportion of subjects with that same disease who were not exposed.

Are nuclear power plant workers at higher risk to die of cancer? A study conducted by a Canadian researcher concluded the risk is substantially higher to them than to the general public. The document, "Exposure to Radiation and Health Outcomes" was made public last week. It was written by Mark Lemstra, who was formerly a senior research epidemiologist for the Saskatoon, Canada, Health Region. Lemstra left -- or was relieved of, depending on which source you read -- his job last year after a dispute over a report he authored that documented the health disparities between different socioeconomic categories in Saskatoon. In the radiation report, in which Lemstra reviewed 1,725 articles related to radiation studies, he concluded that nuclear power plant workers have a "relative excess risk" of getting cancer. In epidemiology, excess risk is defined as the difference between the proportion of subjects in a population with a particular disease who were exposed to a specific risk factor and the proportion of subjects with that same disease who were not exposed.

This is the final of two stories detailing a new report on the economics of closing Vermont Yankee in 2012. BRATTLEBORO -- A revenue-sharing agreement between Vermont Yankee and the state's utilities that goes into effect if the nuclear power plant continues to operate past 2012 is not all it's cracked up to be, said a pair of men who reviewed reams of documents filed with the Vermont Public Service Board. BRATTLEBORO -- A revenue-sharing agreement between Vermont Yankee and the state's utilities that goes into effect if the nuclear power plant continues to operate past 2012 is not all it's cracked up to be, said a pair of men who reviewed reams of documents filed with the Vermont Public Service Board. "While there is a small chance that it will have small value, conceivably as high as around $150 million, this could come only against the backdrop of Vermonters' buying over $3 billion of electricity from VY at market rates," said John Greenberg, who with Michael Daley, authored the study, which was released in August.

This is the final of two stories detailing a new report on the economics of closing Vermont Yankee in 2012. BRATTLEBORO -- A revenue-sharing agreement between Vermont Yankee and the state's utilities that goes into effect if the nuclear power plant continues to operate past 2012 is not all it's cracked up to be, said a pair of men who reviewed reams of documents filed with the Vermont Public Service Board. BRATTLEBORO -- A revenue-sharing agreement between Vermont Yankee and the state's utilities that goes into effect if the nuclear power plant continues to operate past 2012 is not all it's cracked up to be, said a pair of men who reviewed reams of documents filed with the Vermont Public Service Board. "While there is a small chance that it will have small value, conceivably as high as around $150 million, this could come only against the backdrop of Vermonters' buying over $3 billion of electricity from VY at market rates," said John Greenberg, who with Michael Daley, authored the study, which was released in August.

"The U.S. Department of Labor will visit Livermore, Calif., on June 29 and Emeryville, Calif., on June 30 to present information about the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act, which provides compensation and medical benefits to employees who became ill as a result of working in the nuclear weapons industry. Through town hall meetings, officials will present details about two new classes of former employees at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory recently added to the EEOICPA's Special Exposure Cohort, as well as provide an overview of the program. The Labor Department's California Resource Center staff will also be available at the town hall meetings for extended periods of time to assist individuals with the filing of claims under the EEOICPA. A worker who is included in a designated SEC class of employees, and who is diagnosed with one of 22 specified cancers, may receive a presumption of causation under the EEOICPA. On April 5, 2010, the secretary of health and human services designated the following two classes of employees as additions to the SEC: all employees of the Department of Energy, its predecessor agencies, and their contractors and subcontractors, who worked at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., from Jan. 1, 1950, through Dec. 31, 1973, and at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, Calif., from Aug. 13, 1942, through Dec. 31, 1961, for at least 250 workdays occurring either solely under this employment or in combination with workdays within other classes of employees in the SEC. Both designations became effective on May 5, 2010. As the Department of Health and Human Services determines and introduces new SEC classes into the EEOICPA claims process, the Labor Department's role is to adjudicate these claims based on the new SEC class definition. To date, more than $118 million in compensation and medical bills have been paid to 1,0

"While the world is busy watching the FIFA World Cup that is being held at South Africa, the CBS on Sunday went to throw some light on a still unsolved issue of 2007 when a raid was carried out at the Pelindaba's nuclear research facility that contained weapons-grade uranium. Scott Pelley of CBS' "60 Minutes" is seen exploring the incidents and how such a raid could have had one of the most horrific effects on the whole world. CBS replayed its 2008 famous report on the issue that has brought the matter to the national attention. The "60 Minutes" episode that once again enlivened in front of the viewers the horror of the attack with interviews with people who have been present at the place and also experts who provided insight into the matter and what consequences the raid could have yielded. Scott Pelley interviews Anton Gerber the man who was present at the plant on that fatal night and who had worked at Pelindaba for 30 years."

"The U.S. Department of Labor has announced that a new class of nuclear weapons workers from plants located in California and New Jersey have been added to the Special Exposure Cohort of the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act (EEOICPA), which provides compensation and medical benefits to workers who became ill as a result of working in the nuclear weapons industry. Survivors of qualified workers may also be entitled to benefits. All former Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory employees who worked at the Berkeley, Calif., site between Aug. 13, 1942, and Dec. 31, 1961, as well as former Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory employees who worked at the Livermore, Calif., site between Jan. 1, 1950, and Dec. 31, 1973, have been added to the Special Exposure Cohort. In addition, former Westinghouse Electric Corp. employees who worked at the Bloomfield, N.J., site between Aug. 13, 1942, and Dec. 31, 1949, are included. "

"Tularosa downwinders prepare for vigil, meetings this week There will be a candle for Ruthina Utter Tyler, who died after battling a series of cancers. There will be a candle for Tony Cordova, who endures two types of cancer, and a candle for Demetrio Montoya, a former mayor of Tularosa who died of pancreatic cancer. There will be candles for mothers, sons, a daughter or a father, a grandparent who told their children of their memories of that morning 65 years ago when the brilliant light and roar of the very first detonation of a radioactive bomb at the historic Trinity Test site brought a secret military project to the Tularosa Basin and an unexamined legacy. These and hundreds of others will be honored at a candlelight vigil Friday evening at the Tularosa Little League Park to begin a weekend of educational programs and documentation of as many oral histories as possible of the fateful day. Organizers hope it will bring more light onto the dark secret of suffering and a widespread "cancer culture" among residents of the area. Ruthina Tyler believed her cancers were a result of exposures throughout her life to the contaminated food, water and land after the Trinity Test. Her son Fred Tyler agreed with her and while she was still alive, he publicly questioned the impacts of the historic test on local residents in Tularosa and the surrounding areas."

he U.S. Department of Labor on February 4 announced that it has paid more than $100 million in compensation and medical benefits to Florida residents under the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act (EEOICPA). The act was created to assist those individuals who became ill as a result of working in the atomic weapons industry. Survivors of such individuals may also be eligible for benefits. Since the implementation of the act, the Labor Department has paid 48,510 claimants more than $4.5 billion in compensation and medical benefits nationwide. "We are extremely proud of having compensated so many deserving Florida residents," said Rachel P. Leiton, director of the department's Division of Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program (DEEOIC). "This milestone further demonstrates DEEOIC's commitment to assisting those Cold War workers who served this nation in building its nuclear defense programs. But we also believe there may be other Floridians who have not yet filed for these benefits, including many who worked at nuclear weapons facilities elsewhere and later retired in Florida. These individuals are urged to contact the U.S. Department of Labor at 866-666-4606 to inquire about their potential eligibility."

Radiation from the atomic bomb blasts in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945, likely rearranged chromosomes in some survivors who later developed papillary thyroid cancer as adults, according to Japanese researchers. Newswise - Radiation from the atomic bomb blasts in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, in 1945, likely rearranged chromosomes in some survivors who later developed papillary thyroid cancer as adults, according to Japanese researchers. In the September 1, 2008, issue of Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research, the scientists report that subjects who lived close to the blast sites, were comparably young at the time, and developed the cancer quickly once they reached adulthood, were likely to have a chromosomal rearrangement known as RET/PTC that is not very frequent in adults who develop the disease.

The U.S. Department of Labor has announced that all former Vitro Manufacturing workers have now been added to the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act's (EEOICPA) Special Exposure Cohort (SEC). The EEOICPA provides compensation and medical benefits to employees who became ill as a result of working in the nuclear weapons industry. Survivors of qualified employees may also be entitled to benefits. An employee who is included in a designated SEC class of employees, and who is diagnosed with one of 22 specified cancers, may receive a presumption of causation under the EEOICPA. The new SEC class of former employees includes all Atomic Weapons Employer employees who worked at Vitro Manufacturing in Canonsburg, Pa., from August13, 1942, through December 31, 1957, for at least 250 workdays, occurring either solely under this employment or in combination with workdays within one or more other classes of employees in the SEC.

The U.S. Department of Labor has announced that all former Connecticut Aircraft Nuclear Engine Laboratory (CANEL) workers have now been added to the Energy Employees Occupational Illness Compensation Program Act's (EEOICPA) Special Exposure Cohort (SEC). The EEOICPA provides compensation and medical benefits to employees who became ill as a result of working in the nuclear weapons industry. Survivors of qualified employees may also be entitled to benefits. An employee who is included in a designated SEC class of employees and who is diagnosed with a specified cancer may receive a presumption of causation under the EEOICPA. The new SEC class of former employees at CANEL includes all Department of Energy, its predecessor agencies, and Energy Department contractors and subcontractors who worked at CANEL in Middletown, Conn., from Jan. 1, 1958, through Dec. 31, 1965. Additionally, to be eligible for inclusion in an SEC, the employee had to work for a number of workdays aggregating at least 250 occurring either solely under this employment or in combination with workdays within the parameters established for other classes of employees in the SEC.

The World Health Organization has slashed the safety limits of radon to a tenth of its current level, noting that the naturally occurring radioactive gas causes up to 14 percent of lung cancer cases. "In view of the latest scientific data, WHO proposes a reference level of 100 becquerels per metric cube to minimize health hazards due to indoor radon exposure," said the UN health agency in a report published this week. "However, if this level cannot be reached under the prevailing country-specific conditions, the chosen reference level should not exceed 300 becquerels per metric cube," it added. Becquerel is a measuring unit for radioactivity and reference levels represents the maximum accepted radon concentration in a residential dwelling. A previous WHO report published in 1996 had fixed the reference level at 1,000 becquerels per cubic metre. After smoking, radon is the second biggest cause of lung cancer, killing tens of thousands of people a year, said the WHO.

A 50-year-old agreement with the IAEA has effectively gagged the WHO from telling the truth about the health risks of radiation Fifty years ago, on 28 May 1959, the World Health Organisation's assembly voted into force an obscure but important agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency - the United Nations "Atoms for Peace" organisation, founded just two years before in 1957. The effect of this agreement has been to give the IAEA an effective veto on any actions by the WHO that relate in any way to nuclear power - and so prevent the WHO from playing its proper role in investigating and warning of the dangers of nuclear radiation on human health.

Advisory commission, county planning director recommend approval The approximately 250 people who filled the Nucla High School gym last week were there to witness a different kind of rivalry than the basketball games that usually inhabit the venue. Instead, they came to debate the proposed uranium mill in Paradox Valley, a project that has electrified the fence between area residents who want jobs and those who are wary of the environmental impacts of such a facility. The Montrose County Planning Commission held the public hearing to gather input about the proposed mill before making a recommendation to the county commissioners about a permit. The 880-acre project site is on private land zoned for agricultural use, not for industrial operations like processing ore, so it will require a special use permit for the proposed mill. The planning commission deferred its decision on the permit to a June 10 meeting, but both County Planning Director Steve White and the West End Planning Advisory Committee (made up of residents who live closer to the proposed project) recommended approval of the permit.