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County public health officials are offering free doses of the radiation-blocking drug potassium iodide to people who live and work downwind of Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. The pills, also known by their chemical name KI, are available at six locations. They are only to be taken at the direction of public health officials in the event of a radiation leak at Diablo Canyon. The county has enough doses to cover hundreds of thousands of people, said Michelle Shoresman, spokeswoman for the county public health department. They will be available as long as supplies last, which should be a year or so.

County public health officials are offering free doses of the radiation-blocking drug potassium iodide to people who live and work downwind of Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. The pills, also known by their chemical name KI, are available at six locations. They are only to be taken at the direction of public health officials in the event of a radiation leak at Diablo Canyon. The county has enough doses to cover hundreds of thousands of people, said Michelle Shoresman, spokeswoman for the county public health department. They will be available as long as supplies last, which should be a year or so.

Most of the residents of SLO County have received information about obtaining K1 tablets in case radiation is released from the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. We can all get two tablets per household member; keep them safe, know where they are. So far, so good: But please tell me, how are all the kids at school supposed to get the tablets in case of such a horrible emergency? The tablets are supposed to be taken in "an appropriate and timely dosage." What exactly is "timely"? There is no guarantee kids will be at home during such an emergency. School kids might not take pills to school with them. If they need medication while at school, it is given to the school nurse for safe- keeping. However, most schools no longer have school nurses on campus. Who would deal with this? Will parents be able to leave K1 tablets clearly marked for their kids with somebody? Has any thought been given to this? The K1 tablets do not provide protection other than for the thyroid gland, but in children, I must assume that this is protection worthwhile -while we scramble to get out of harm's way!

Most of the residents of SLO County have received information about obtaining K1 tablets in case radiation is released from the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant. We can all get two tablets per household member; keep them safe, know where they are. So far, so good: But please tell me, how are all the kids at school supposed to get the tablets in case of such a horrible emergency? The tablets are supposed to be taken in "an appropriate and timely dosage." What exactly is "timely"? There is no guarantee kids will be at home during such an emergency. School kids might not take pills to school with them. If they need medication while at school, it is given to the school nurse for safe- keeping. However, most schools no longer have school nurses on campus. Who would deal with this? Will parents be able to leave K1 tablets clearly marked for their kids with somebody? Has any thought been given to this? The K1 tablets do not provide protection other than for the thyroid gland, but in children, I must assume that this is protection worthwhile -while we scramble to get out of harm's way!

The investment in nuclear power has been growing around the world over the last few years, being viewed as a means for countries to control their energy security, avoid the price fluctuations of other energy sources, and reduce their carbon dioxide emissions, but concerns are now being raised. A scientist from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology predicts that supplies of uranium are running out and countries relying on imports of uranium may face shortages by 2013, while a New York Times journalist suggests new nuclear power plants are an "abysmal" investment that will never pay for itself without government financial support. Dr Michael Dittmar, a physicist with CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research), said in the fourth and final part of an essay on the world's nuclear industry published this week that civilian stockpiles of uranium could be depleted by as early as 2013.

The investment in nuclear power has been growing around the world over the last few years, being viewed as a means for countries to control their energy security, avoid the price fluctuations of other energy sources, and reduce their carbon dioxide emissions, but concerns are now being raised. A scientist from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology predicts that supplies of uranium are running out and countries relying on imports of uranium may face shortages by 2013, while a New York Times journalist suggests new nuclear power plants are an "abysmal" investment that will never pay for itself without government financial support. Dr Michael Dittmar, a physicist with CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research), said in the fourth and final part of an essay on the world's nuclear industry published this week that civilian stockpiles of uranium could be depleted by as early as 2013.

China promised to slow its carbon emissions, saying it would nearly halve the ratio of pollution to GDP over the next decade - a major move by the world's largest emitter, whose cooperation is crucial to any deal as a global climate summit approaches. Beijing's voluntary pledge Thursday came a day after President Barack Obama promised the U.S. would lay out plans at the summit to substantially cut its own greenhouse gas emissions. Together, the announcements are building momentum for next month's meeting in Copenhagen. "Governments from all over the world are delivering before the climate conference," Denmark's Climate Minister Connie Hedegaard said. "U.S. and China have come forward. All across the globe, things are moving. This is good news."

China promised to slow its carbon emissions, saying it would nearly halve the ratio of pollution to GDP over the next decade - a major move by the world's largest emitter, whose cooperation is crucial to any deal as a global climate summit approaches. Beijing's voluntary pledge Thursday came a day after President Barack Obama promised the U.S. would lay out plans at the summit to substantially cut its own greenhouse gas emissions. Together, the announcements are building momentum for next month's meeting in Copenhagen. "Governments from all over the world are delivering before the climate conference," Denmark's Climate Minister Connie Hedegaard said. "U.S. and China have come forward. All across the globe, things are moving. This is good news."

Most visitors to Japan, this writer included, are usually impressed by the politeness of the Japanese. Taxi drivers are not gruff, department store staff bow, hotel porters try their best to help. In this light, the country's former Foreign Minister Sunao Sonoda was rather un-Japanese when he denounced Dr Edwin Reischauer, America's envoy to Tokyo in the 1960s, a figure who was widely respected in Japan. In 1981, Reischauer had spoken of a secret pact between the United States and Japan, whereby nuclear-armed US ships were allowed into Japan. This defied Japan's cherished "three 'no's" - that it shall not produce, possess or introduce nuclear arms. "I have never met Dr Reischauer," Sonoda told the Japanese Diet. "But he is an uncalled-for meddler who pokes his nose into matters that are absolutely none of his business." Nearly 30 years later, the issue of the secret pact has popped up again.

Most visitors to Japan, this writer included, are usually impressed by the politeness of the Japanese. Taxi drivers are not gruff, department store staff bow, hotel porters try their best to help. In this light, the country's former Foreign Minister Sunao Sonoda was rather un-Japanese when he denounced Dr Edwin Reischauer, America's envoy to Tokyo in the 1960s, a figure who was widely respected in Japan. In 1981, Reischauer had spoken of a secret pact between the United States and Japan, whereby nuclear-armed US ships were allowed into Japan. This defied Japan's cherished "three 'no's" - that it shall not produce, possess or introduce nuclear arms. "I have never met Dr Reischauer," Sonoda told the Japanese Diet. "But he is an uncalled-for meddler who pokes his nose into matters that are absolutely none of his business." Nearly 30 years later, the issue of the secret pact has popped up again.

Self-luminous EXIT signs containing the radioactive gas tritium are widely used in a variety of facilities across the United States, such as public and private office buildings, theaters, stores, schools and churches - anywhere the public needs a rapid exit path. Those who possess tritium EXIT signs are general licensees of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission or an Agreement State,1 and are subject to certain reporting and handling requirements, including proper disposal of unwanted or unused signs. Tritium EXIT signs pose little or no threat to public health and safety and do not constitute a security risk. However, the NRC requires proper accounting and disposal of all radioactive materials. Proper handling and accounting are important, because a damaged or broken sign could cause mild radioactive contamination of the immediate vicinity, requiring a potentially expensive clean up.

Exelon, Entergy and other nuclear-power giants are set to surge, thanks to the Obama administration's plans for heavy investment in clean energy. THE U.S. STANDS AT A PIVOTAL MOMENT for the advancement of nuclear energy. President-elect Barack Obama has put forth a goal to reduce carbon emissions in the U.S. by 80% by 2050, using $150 billion over 10 years to create a "clean-energy" future. Nuclear plants are the biggest producers of energy that doesn't emit any greenhouse gases. [pic] Scott Pollack for Barron's Plans are afoot to build 26 nuclear plants. No new plants have been built in the U.S. for 30 years. "Nuclear power is in a renaissance," says Tom Neff, a physicist and research affiliate at MIT's Center for International Studies. In fact, 17 applicants are seeking government approval to build 26 nuclear plants, meeting a Dec. 31 deadline for federal tax credits and potentially ending a 30-year hiatus in the construction of new U.S. nuke facilities.

Question: Why is radiation dangerous for cells? Answer: Radiation is composed of high-energy waves or particles that can damage cells. The waves are things like X-rays and gamma rays which are like visible light, but have a much smaller wavelength and, thus, higher energy. The particles can be electrons, which are part of atoms in substances. Radiation can be emitted from radioactive substances that can occur naturally in our environment, come from the sun or come from outer space, in which case they are called cosmic rays.

Hydrothermal Vents Are the Solution Hydrothermal vents Are naturally occurring geysers of superheated water, found along Mid-Ocean Ridges. These Are points along the Tectonic Plates, huge tracts of the EArth's crust that move continents Around, found where the plates Are pulling away from each other. As the crust stretches and weakens, new volcanic crust from the eArth's molten core, the magma, rises to create new crust.

Growth in the construction of new nuclear plants worldwide is at risk because of the global financial crisis, U.S. Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said Wednesday, adding that short-term projects like oil drilling are more likely to go ahead. During a visit to Paris, Bodman said the crisis could have an impact on the "nuclear renaissance" that is sweeping the industry as countries around the globe search for alternatives to fossil fuels. Long-term projects like nuclear plant building "are the ones that are going to be the most difficult to finance," he told reporters. While Bodman said he is hopeful the financial crisis will be resolved, "long term projects are at risk, I would think."

Debates about climate change at the G-8 meetings in Japan and this week's mishap at a French nuclear facility have Germans revisiting the benefits and dangers of nuclear energy. Deep national divisions on the issue are reflected on the editorial pages. The Tricastin nuclear plant in southern France, where a liquid containing traces of unenriched uranium leaked Monday. Zoom AP The Tricastin nuclear plant in southern France, where a liquid containing traces of unenriched uranium leaked Monday. Germans are conflicted about nuclear energy, and amazingly so. In fact, according to a survey released Wednesday by the Forsa polling agency, exactly 46 percent of Germans are for -- and 46 percent of Germans are against -- extending the operating life of the country's nuclear reactors past the date 15 years from now when a nuclear phaseout is supposed to be completed.

Former nuclear workers at a western Pennsylvania plant who are sick could receive $150,000 in compensation plus medical help under a government program. The Department of Labor announced Thursday that Atomic Weapons Employer employees who worked at Vitro Manufacturing in Canonsburg, Pa., during a set period in the 1940s and '50s are eligible. Under the program, former workers diagnosed with one of 22 specific cancers are presumed to have received it from working at the plant and will receive compensation. A worker's survivors are also sometimes eligible. Copyright 2008 The Associated

Severe reactor accidents can be mitigated, and are unlikely to release much -- if any --radioactivity even if they are not, NRC staffers said March 11. The NRC's state-of-the-art reactor consequences analysis, or Soarca, attempts to quantify the probability and likely offsite health consequences of severe reactor accidents, beginning with Exelon Nuclear's Peach Bottom and Dominion's Surry plants. Analysis for those stations has been completed and a report will be completed by May, NRC's Charles Tinkler said in his presentation at the agency's annual Regulatory Information Conference in Rockville, Maryland. Jason Schaperow of NRC said the staff's "preliminary conclusions" are that all accident scenarios analyzed for Peach Bottom and Surry "can reasonably be mitigated." Sensitivity analyses concluded that, even if no mitigation measures were taken, there would be no large early releases of radioactivity, due to the relatively slow progression of the accidents and the small probability of containment failure, Schaperow said. Likely radioactive releases from the accidents analyzed so far in Soarca "are dramatically smaller" than those predicted in a 1982 NRC analysis conducted for use in siting new units, Schaperow said. The late Commissioner Edward McGaffigan and some industry officials were highly critical of that report, which they said was unrealistically conservative in its assumptions.

A medical mystery: As overall cancer rates fall, why are thyroid cancer rates rising? Diagnoses of cancer in this gland in the neck are increasing about 6 percent a year, faster than cancers found anywhere else, according to one National Cancer Institute analysis. Researchers know one big reason: The many medical scans Americans have, for everything from neck pain to artery plaque, are turning up thousands of tiny thyroid tumors that otherwise might go undetected and often would do no harm. "We call them 'incidentalomas,' " says Amy Chen, a head and neck surgeon at Emory University in Atlanta and American Cancer Society researcher. But that's not the whole story. Two recent studies, including one co-written by Chen, show larger thyroid tumors are being found at an increasing rate, too. And those can't be explained by more aggressive diagnosis alone, researchers say. "There is something else going on" to contribute to the 37,000 cases of thyroid cancer expected this year, Chen says. That's up from 18,000 in 2000.

People are conserving energy and GRU revenues are declining, except during periods of extreme weather conditions. However, electric battery-charged cars are on the horizon. They will likely take up any slack in energy use, and then some. Progress Energy is looking ahead to increasing energy use. Their plans are to build two new nuclear power plants. However, electric customers beware, excessive cost overruns (and defects and deficiencies) at a Finnish power plant have been reported in the New York Times. If Progress Energy experiences similar problems, utility customers should brace for a double-cost whammy in their electric bills.

Where in London can one purchase plutonium? In Covent Garden, at the Helios Homeopathy shop. Dr Fiona Barclay, a chemist at RGB Research in west London, made this discovery. Her company specialises in selling collections of the periodic table elements (with the exception of those elements that are illegal or are so very short-lived - a few seconds or less - that they invite frustration). Some elements are easy to purchase: carbon, sulphur, iron. For others, one can turn to eBay, where arsenic, uranium (in the form of uranium-tipped missiles), and other elements of ill repute are commonly on offer.

I've always been interested in nuclear weapons. They are a small device that can cause a disproportionally large effect. Not only the sheer power of a nuclear explosion, but their role as a deterrent, the formation of the "nuclear club", and the political psychology that goes along with them are all aspects about nuclear weapons that fascinate me. It's kind of a morbid fascination, I know. But cut me some slack-what red-blooded guy doesn't like big explosions? I have read criticisms before of America's large nuclear arsenal-the largest in the world, and predictably so. I have never been in favor of complete nuclear disarmament, partially because there are many nuclear weapons out there that are unaccounted for that could end up in the hands of the bad guys, and partially because I think they could have their uses in a conventional conflict. I'm sure we've all heard, though, the quips that the US has the power to destroy the entire world X times over if we used every weapon in our nuclear arsenal. If that's true, I think it's a fair question to ask why it is so, when just one nuclear weapon is so effective.

Most DU weapons manufactured in the United States show a distinct difference between conventional weapons and those that contain DU and other toxic elements such as Tungsten etc. The warhead clearly shows the Rod with a Sabot sitting just below the point. It must be clearly understood that despite any re classification that may have taken place by the US Government these truly are nuclear related weapons. You can clearly see that the Israel's IMI is manufacturing weapons that are almost identical to the US weapons that are displayed in the left hand picture above.

External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee has reiterated India's commitment to non-proliferation but said New Delhi would not sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in its present format as it is discriminatory and in favour of the nuclear weapon states. "Our position is very clear. We are totally in agreement that those who are signatories to the NPT, they must fulfil their treaty obligations. Because of this discriminatory nature, we are not signatories, but with the objectives of non-proliferation, we are with the rest of the world," he told journalists here on Sunday.