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Soon after Japan's triple disaster, I suggested that an official cover-up of a nuclear-weapons program hidden inside the Fukushima No.1 plant was delaying the effort to contain the reactor meltdowns. Soon after the tsunami struck, the Tokyo Electric Power Company reported that only three reactors had been generating electricity on the afternoon of March 11.. (According to the initial report, these were the older GE-built reactors 1,2 and 6.). Yet overheating at five of the plant's six reactors indicated that two additional reactors had also been operating (the newer and more advanced Nos. 3 and 4, built by Toshiba and Hitachi). The only plausible purpose of such unscheduled operation is uranium enrichment toward the production of nuclear warhead

On my subsequent sojourns in Japan, other suspicious activities also pointed to a high-level cover-up, including systematic undercounts of radiation levels, inexplicable damage to thousands of imported dosimeters, armed anti-terrorism police aboard trains and inside the dead zone, the jamming of international phone calls, homing devices installed in the GPS of rented cars, and warning visits to contacts by government agents discouraging cooperation with independent investigations. These aggressive infringements on civil liberties cannot be shrugged off as an overreaction to a civil disaster but must have been invoked on grounds of national security.

One telltale sign of high-level interference was the refusal by science equipment manufacturers to sell isotope chromatography devices to non-governmental customers, even to organizations ready to pay $170,000 in cash for a single unit. These sensitive instruments can detect the presence of specific isotopes, for example cesium-137 and strontium-90. Whether uranium was being enriched at Fukushima could be determined by the ratio of isotopes from enriched weapons-grade fissile material versus residues from less concentrated fuel rods.

It has been 208 days since the Fukushima nuclear meltdown. The casualty count from atomic radiation is today exactly what it was the day before the Great East Japan Earthquake launched a tsunami that killed thousands and wrecked three reactors at the nuclear plant. That is, the number of radiation casualties is still zero. On May 13, sixty-three days after the quake and tsunami hit, John Boice, a professor of Radiation Epidemiology at Vanderbilt University, told a U.S. congressional committee why.

This is something that a lot of people (including me; see article) predicted on the first day of the nuclear situation. Nuclear meltdowns have never lived up to their pop-culture billing. The three major meltdowns in the history of the nuclear age—Chalk River in 1952, Three Mile Island in 1979, and of course Fukushima—resulted in zero casualties and negligible environmental damage. This is because they simply did not release enough radiation to kill anyone or harm the environment. Nevertheless, the term “nuclear meltdown” holds irresistible drawing power for media headline writers. Why is this? Because very few people understand nuclear radiation, much less its units of measure. So when faced with a barrage of reporting about radiation measurements—expressed in terms of picocuries, becquerels, rads, and microsieverts—most people have no way of evaluating that information. Therefore it all sounds kind of scary.

This may be why Dr. Boice also told the representatives this: There is a pressing need to learn more about the health consequences of radiation in humans when exposures are spread over time at low levels and not received briefly at high doses such as in atomic bomb survivors. When he gives radiation measurements, Dr. Boice oscillates between common and international (SI) units. When describing radioactivity, e.g. in bananas, he uses becquerels (SI units). When describing absorbed dose measurements, Dr. Boice uses millirems, which are common units. Most people use sieverts to describe absorbed dose. To convert millirems to microsieverts, multiply by ten. Click here for an excellent web-based radiation unit coverter.

SUKAGAWA, Fukushima — When small amounts of radioactive cesium were detected in the hay needed for this city’s annual fire festival, event organizers decided to break tradition and use materials from other prefectures for the first time in history. However, when their decision was heavily criticized for intensifying radiation rumors, they began wondering whether their choice was correct or not. With its approximately 420 years of history, the annual Taimatsu-akashi Festival is one of the three greatest fire festivals in Japan and one of the most important events in Sukagawa. The festival reportedly was started to console the souls of local samurai who were killed by warlord Masamune Date in a battle in 1589.

I have been rereading a 1982 book by Bertrand Goldschmidt titled “The Atomic Complex: A Worldwide Political History of Nuclear Energy.”

The two self-assigned homework projects are as part of a reflective effort to understand more about how human society moved from a period of optimism based on a vision of “Atoms for Peace” to a period where someone reading the advertiser supported press would believe that sensible people would logically consider giving up the whole technology out of fear of radiation and its health consequences.One of the hopeful lessons I have learned so far is that the initial conditions of our current fight to defend and expand the safe use of atomic energy are far different from those that faced the people engaged in the earliest battles against a well organized opposition to nuclear technology development. We have a much better chance of success now than we did then – and there are several reasons why that is true.

One condition that is vastly different is the ability of nuclear professionals to have their voices heard. No longer are most people who understand nuclear energy isolated in small communities with few media outlets. In the 1970s, a large fraction of nuclear professionals were located near remotely sited national laboratories or power stations. Today, though many still work at national labs or in small market communities like Lynchburg, VA, we are all globally connected to a vast network on the Internet. We have Skype, YouTube and blogs. Some of us know that major decision makers and journalists read or listen to our words on a regular basis. We are no longer shy about responding to misinformation and unwarranted criticism.

95% disagree with “Beyond Nuclear”. Let’s make it 99% by Rod Adams on October 14, 2011 in Antinuclear activist , Politics of Nuclear Energy , Unreliables , Wind energy Share0 One of the more powerful concepts that I studied in college was called “groupthink.” The curriculum developers in the history department at the US Naval Academy thought it was important for people in training to become leaders in the US Navy learn to seek counsel and advice from as broad a range of sources as possible. We were taught how to avoid the kind of bad decision making that can result by surrounding oneself with yes-men or fellow travelers. The case study I remember most was the ill fated Bay of Pigs invasion where virtually the entire Kennedy Administration cabinet thought that it would be a cakewalk . If Patricia Miller had bothered to do the fact-checking required by journalistic integrity she would have come across this video showing 30 feet of water above the fuel at Fukushima with all of the fuel bundles exactly where they’re supposed to be. Aside: Don’t we live in an amazing world? I just typed “Bay of Pigs groupthink” into my browser search box and instantly hit on exactly the link I needed to support the statement above. It even cites the book we used when I was a plebe in 1977, more than 33 years ago. End Aside. Not everyone, however, has the benefit of early leadership lessons about the danger of believing that a small group of likeminded people can provide actionable advice. Some of the people who are most likely to be victims of groupthink are those who adamantly oppose the continued safe operation of emission-free nuclear power plants. The writers who exclusively quote members of that tiny community have also fallen into the groupthink trap.   On October 8, 2011, the Berkeley Patch, a New Jersey based journal that regularly posts negative stories about Oyster Creek, featured an article titled Petitioners to NRC: Shut Down All Fukushima-Like Nuclear Plants . Here is a snapshot of the masthead, the headline and the lede. The article is a diatribe that quotes people on the short list of frequently quoted antinuclear activists including Paul Gunter, Michael Mariotte, Kevin Kamps, Deb Katz and Dale Bridenbaugh. The author faithfully reproduces some of their best attempts to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt using untruths about the actual events at Fukushima. For example, the article uses the following example of how antinuclear activists are still trying to spread the myth that the used fuel pools at Fukushima caught fire. Oyster Creek – the oldest nuclear plant in the United States – has generated over 700 tons of high-level radioactive waste, Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuc

95% disagree with “Beyond Nuclear”. Let’s make it 99% by Rod Adams on October 14, 2011 in Antinuclear activist, Politics of Nuclear Energy, Unreliables, Wind energy Share0 One of the more powerful concepts that I studied in college was called “groupthink.” The curriculum developers in the history department at the US Naval Academy thought it was important for people in training to become leaders in the US Navy learn to seek counsel and advice from as broad a range of sources as possible. We were taught how to avoid the kind of bad decision making that can result by surrounding oneself with yes-men or fellow travelers. The case study I remember most was the ill fated Bay of Pigs invasion where virtually the entire Kennedy Administration cabinet thought that it would be a cakewalk. If Patricia Miller had bothered to do the fact-checking required by journalistic integrity she would have come across this video showing 30 feet of water above the fuel at Fukushima with all of the fuel bundles exactly where they’re supposed to be.Aside: Don’t we live in an amazing world? I just typed “Bay of Pigs groupthink” into my browser search box and instantly hit on exactly the link I needed to support the statement above. It even cites the book we used when I was a plebe in 1977, more than 33 years ago. End Aside. Not everyone, however, has the benefit of early leadership lessons about the danger of believing that a small group of likeminded people can provide actionable advice. Some of the people who are most likely to be victims of groupthink are those who adamantly oppose the continued safe operation of emission-free nuclear power plants. The writers who exclusively quote members of that tiny community have also fallen into the groupthink trap.  On October 8, 2011, the Berkeley Patch, a New Jersey based journal that regularly posts negative stories about Oyster Creek, featured an article titled Petitioners to NRC: Shut Down All Fukushima-Like Nuclear Plants . Here is a snapshot of the masthead, the headline and the lede. The article is a diatribe that quotes people on the short list of frequently quoted antinuclear activists including Paul Gunter, Michael Mariotte, Kevin Kamps, Deb Katz and Dale Bridenbaugh. The author faithfully reproduces some of their best attempts to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt using untruths about the actual events at Fukushima. For example, the article uses the following example of how antinuclear activists are still trying to spread the myth that the used fuel pools at Fukushima caught fire. Oyster Creek – the oldest nuclear plant in the United States – has generated over 700 tons of high-level radioactive waste, Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear said. “Granted that some of that has been moved into dry cast storage, but the pool remains full to its capacity,” Kamps said. “And this was a re-rack capacity. Much later in terms of quantity of high level radioactive waste than it was originally designed for.” This represents 125 million curies of radioactive cesium-137 and the NRC has reported that up to 100 percent of the hazardous material could be released from a pool fire, Kamps said. “I would like to point out that Fukushima Daiichi units one, two, three and four combined in terms of the inventory of high level radioactive waste in their storage pools does not match some of these reactors I mentioned in terms of how much waste is in these pools,” Kamps said. “So the risks are greater here for boil downs and the consequences of a radioactive fire in these pools.” Fortunately, the people who are not a part of the antinuclear community are finally beginning to recognize their own strength and to realize that they do not have to remain silent while the lies are being spread. Here is how a knowledgable commenter responded to the above segment of the article: If Patricia Miller had bothered to do the fact-checking required by journalistic integrity she would have come across this video showing 30 feet of water above the fuel at Fukushima with all of the fuel bundles exactly where they’re supposed to be.

On October 8, 2011, the Berkeley Patch, a New Jersey based journal that regularly posts negative stories about Oyster Creek, featured an article titled Petitioners to NRC: Shut Down All Fukushima-Like Nuclear Plants. Here is a snapshot of the masthead, the headline and the lede. The article is a diatribe that quotes people on the short list of frequently quoted antinuclear activists including Paul Gunter, Michael Mariotte, Kevin Kamps, Deb Katz and Dale Bridenbaugh. The author faithfully reproduces some of their best attempts to spread fear, uncertainty and doubt using untruths about the actual events at Fukushima. For example, the article uses the following example of how antinuclear activists are still trying to spread the myth that the used fuel pools at Fukushima caught fire. Oyster Creek – the oldest nuclear plant in the United States – has generated over 700 tons of high-level radioactive waste, Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear said. “Granted that some of that has been moved into dry cast storage, but the pool remains full to its capacity,” Kamps said. “And this was a re-rack capacity. Much later in terms of quantity of high level radioactive waste than it was originally designed for.” This represents 125 million curies of radioactive cesium-137 and the NRC has reported that up to 100 percent of the hazardous material could be released from a pool fire, Kamps said. “I would like to point out that Fukushima Daiichi units one, two, three and four combined in terms of the inventory of high level radioactive waste in their storage pools does not match some of these reactors I mentioned in terms of how much waste is in these pools,” Kamps said. “So the risks are greater here for boil downs and the consequences of a radioactive fire in these pools.”

Shaun O'Dwyer's Sept. 26 article, "Nuclear crisis lowers curtain on Japan's Confucian politics," is a highly recommended history lesson on how Confucianism helped to create a nation of overly trusting and obedient citizens in Japan. It offers an important understanding of how a nation that is naturally and culturally conservative could be led down the wrong road of nuclear power and take wild chances on tsunamis and earthquakes. Had it not been for the dependence on state benevolence, perhaps the population would have put up greater resistance at the start of the ill-fated "Atoms for Peace" project begun in the 1960s.

April 26 will mark the 26th anniversary of the worst case of nuclear contamination in history: the 1986 Chernobyl disaster. Since the meltdowns at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant in March last year, the Japanese government has shown interest in decontamination and other projects around Chernobyl as a reference point for efforts to deal with its own nuclear disaster. However in northern Ukraine, where the radioactive husk of the former Soviet power station lies, large-scale decontamination work has been abandoned as largely ineffective, and disaster refugees are no closer to going home.

As part of the biggest, costliest environmental cleanup project in the nation's history - disposing of 53 million gallons of radioactive waste at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in Washington state - one thing was supposed to be sure: Waste stored in the sturdy, double-wall steel tanks that hold part of the toxic ooze wasn't going anywhere. But that reassurance has been thrown into question with the discovery of a 3-foot-long piece of radioactive material between the inner and outer steel walls of one of the storage tanks, prompting new worries at the troubled cleanup site. "We're taking it seriously, and we're doing an investigation so we can better understand what it is," Department of Energy spokeswoman Lori Gamache said

The discovery marks the first time material has been found outside the inner wall of one of the site's 28 double-shell tanks, thought to be relatively secure interim storage for the radioactive material generated when Hanford was one of the nation's major atomic production facilities. It opened in 1943 and began a gradual shutdown in 1964. Cleanup started in 1989. The $12.2-billion cleanup project eventually aims to turn most of the waste stored at Hanford into glass rods at a high-tech vitrification plant scheduled to be operational in 2019, assuming the formidable design and engineering hurdles can be overcome. In the meantime, plant engineers have been gathering waste stored in the facility's 149 aging, leaky single-wall storage tanks and redepositing them in the double0-shell tanks for safekeeping. Over the years, more than 1 million gallons of waste has leaked out of 67 single-wall tanks into the surrounding soil.

"There's been this presumption that the double-shell tanks at least are sound and won't fail, and they'll be there for us," said Tom Carpenter of the advocacy group Hanford Challenge. Several days ago the group obtained a memo from the cleanup site detailing discovery of the mysterious substance. "This changes everything. It is alarming that there is now solid evidence that Hanford double-shell has leaked," Carpenter said in a separate statement on the discovery. The 42-year-old tank, known as AY-102, holds about 857,000 gallons of radioactive and other toxic chemical waste, much of it removed several years ago from a single-shell storage tank where it was considered unsaf

For the first time in Canadian history, First Nations, whose territory encompasses the entire coastline of British Columbia, have publicly united to oppose the transport of tar sands crude oil through their land. Over 60 nations have signed the Save the Fraser Declaration, which bans tar sands oil pipelines throughout the Fraser River watershed, an area that was never ceded to the Canadian government, and therefore not legally under the government’s control. “North or south, it makes no difference. First Nations from every corner of BC are saying absolutely no tar sands pipelines or tankers in our territories,” said Chief Jackie Thomas of Saik’uz First Nation, a member of the Yinka Dene Alliance. “We have banned oil pipelines and tankers using our laws, and we will defend our decision using all the means at our disposal.” The First Nations’ refusal to allow tar sands oil extraction or transport through their would make it legally impossible for the Canadian government to move forward with many high price oil production projects. Monday’s announcement – on the first anniversary of the Save the Fraser Declaration – comes in response to recent calls from the Harper government and oil executives to push through pipeline and tanker projects against the wishes of British Columbians and First Nations.

Amid the worst accidental release of crude oil in human history, the Obama administration sought to undermine its own scientists' estimates of just how much oil was gushing into the Gulf of Mexico, a newly disclosed email reveals.

Obtained by a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by the advocacy group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), the message shows how the White House, the National Incident Command (NIC) and Department of the Interior (DOI) recommended scientists with the U.S. Geologic Survey (USGS) lowball their estimates in public statements.

The agency was able to determine that at least 25,000 barrels of oil were gushing out of the damaged BP well in the gulf - an estimate they said was on the low end of the spectrum. But when those figures were reported by members of the press, they were stated dramatically lower, sparking complaints from scientists who felt their findings were being misrepresented. The email's author, Dr. Marcia McNutt, replied to the team by explaining that the White House had suggested she "simplify" the USGS estimate by claiming there was around 12,000 to 19,000 barrels per day gushing from the well, or "as high as 25,000 barrels per day."

will an oil embargo work? Not as far as oil analyst Paul Stevens of London-based Chatham House is concerned. "If you look at history, oil embargoes have never, ever worked and never, ever been effective…so it's not going to work," he said. "It's just going to cause a great deal of disruption."

Stevens says EU countries that depend on Iranian oil can find new suppliers - like the Gulf states. But Iran may also find new buyers for its oil in Asia.

Iranian officials have downplayed the impact of Western measures - including new U.S. sanctions that could reduce Iran's ability to sell oil and other exports.  But Tehran also has threatened to close the critically important Strait of Hormuz, the entrance to the Persian Gulf.

The aftermath of the tsunami that ransacked the Japanese coast led to one of the worst nuclear meltdowns in the history of the world. Now, two researchers believe it may also have played some role in killing tens of thousands of Americans. “[It’s] 155,000 deaths,” Joseph Mangano said, ”so we’re not talking about an increase from three to five deaths. We’re talking about quite a few.”

Mangano works at the Radiation and Public Health Project. The report he co-authored for a medical journal suggesting a link between Fukushima fallout and an increase in deaths in the United States has stirred up some controversy. “The authors appeared to start at a conclusion,” Scientific American’s Michael Moyer wrote, “ – babies are dying because of Fukushima radiation – and work backwards, torturing their data to fit their claims.” But Mangano said his critics miss the point.

“We have not stated conclusively that Fukushima fallout killed 22,000 Americans,” he said. Instead, he and co-author Dr. Jannette Sherman cite numbers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's weekly morbidity report. That data showed a large spike in deaths – particularly infant deaths – in the 14 weeks following the Fukushima meltdown.

As efforts to end the nuclear disaster at Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant drag on, it is important for the central and local governments to step up their efforts to closely examine the health conditions of people concerned and to decontaminate areas contaminated by radiation.

The people who have been most affected by radiation from the Fukushima plant are workers, both from Tepco and from subcontractors, who have been trying to bring the radiation-leaking plant under control. In the nation's history, these workers rank second only to the victims of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in terms of their exposure to radiation, therefore the possibility cannot be ruled out that they will develop cancer. Tepco and the central government must do their best to prevent workers' overexposure to radiation and take necessary measures should workers become overexposed to radiation. It is of great concern that little has been disclosed regarding the conditions of the workers at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant. Tepco and the central government should disseminate information on the actual working conditions of these people, even if such information seems repetitious and includes what they regard as minor incidents. People are forgetful. They need to be informed. Such information will help raise people's awareness about the issue of radiation and its impact on health.

It must not be forgotten that exposure to radiation has long-term effects on human health. In the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombings, the number of leukemia cases started to increase among bombing survivors two years after the bombs were dropped. In the case of the 1986 Chernobyl accident, thyroid cancer began to appear among children several years after the disaster happened. Particular attention should be paid to the health of children. In view of these facts, it is logical that the Fukushima prefectural government has developed a program to monitor the health of all residents in the prefecture, who number about 2 million, throughout their lifetime. It has also started examining the thyroids of some 360,000 children who are age 18 or younger. Detailed and long-term area-by-area studies should be carried out to record cancer incidences. In August, the Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan estimated that the Fukushima accidents released a total of 570,000 terabecquerels of radioactive substances, including some 11,000 terabecquerels of radioactive cesium 137.

did you know that huge demonstrations have been taking place in Tokyo as well? We certainly didn't until a SOTT forum member posted a report on our forum. The general lack of awareness of the protests in Japan is probably due to the fact that there has been zero coverage of 'Occupy Tokyo' - which has grown out of the country's large (and growing) grassroots anti-nuclear movement - in Japan's mainstream media.

Several large demonstrations have taken place all over Japan in recent months, especially in Tokyo. The general mood is the same as elsewhere: ordinary people in Japan are fed up with their leaders' lies, particularly the lies told by TEPCO, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, and how the government has handled the Fukushima disaster. Or rather, how it has avoided handling it. This should all be eerily familiar to Americans of course; BP's lies and the US government's enabling role from the moment the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded in April 2010 has continued to this day, with the tragedy continuing to unfold in deathly silence. What is happening in Japan is almost a carbon copy; denial, smear campaigns, heavy-handed tactics and, of course, total media blackout. Up to one million people may have died as a result of Chernobyl, although we'll never really know the true death toll. Fukushima is many orders of magnitude worse...

People in Japan are very angry. Even though the Fukushima disaster is nowhere near ending (in fact, it is getting worse), Japanese media are simply not covering the fallout of the worst nuclear accident in history. Aftershocks from the Magnitude 9 earthquake which struck off the coast of Japan on March 11th are hardly mentioned in the Japanese media, but the fact is they are still ongoing and people are constantly stressed out by them. The economic aftershock is also beginning to take hold in a big way. The good news, says the SOTT forum member in Japan, is that people are now starting to wake up the fact that the Japanese government, TEPCO, and the media have been lying all this time and that more people are starting to take action to actually deal with the situation rather than wishfully think it will just blow away out into the Pacific Ocean.

Of all the lies that came out of the Gulf disaster, the most preposterous has been the 3 leaks on the riser story. Figure 165-0a to 165-0c were the first few schematic illustrations of BP’s blowout incident. They were so embarrassingly stupid and logic defying, most experts believed the schematics were deliberately drawn by cartoonists to confuse the average Joe Public. The patchwork of realities resembled a makeshift car hastily assembled from parts of different size vehicles. Obviously a mini car body does not match the oversize truck tires. It is obvious the 5½ inch drill pipe at leak(3) cannot be the same 21inch diameter riser (actually a well casing) at leak(2). Yet the world's technical experts willfully overlooked this fundamental discrepancy and allowed the criminals to get away with murders. And America, the world's greatest nation shouting human rights abuses all over the world, allowed this hideous crime of mass destruction in its own backyard to go unpunished? In China, the corporate criminals responsible for this environmental carnage would have been executed instead of having their lives back. Can the 11 dead crewmen, their young families and thousands of Gulf victims who suffered numerous medical problems from the toxic contaminated Gulf waters and corexit sprayed on them, ever have their lives back?

Surely the world's most technologically advanced country could not have been so easily fooled by this “3 wells & 3 leaks on a single riser” fairy tale (concocted Beyond Phantasm). Besides the many controversial circumstances surrounding the sinking of the burning rig (DWH) and the sudden breaking of the super-strong riser in calm water, how could a third open-ended leak (3) be even possible beyond the completely severed riser at the second leak (2)? See fig165-0c. Leak(2) has to be the blown crater of well no.#3 as illustrated in many of our previous articles and irrefutably shown in Figure 165-5 with the right coordinates in the few undoctored videos.

“When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.” S Homes.

The chairman of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Monday that it should decide within 90 days on how to address recommendations to be issued this week by a task force that examined the lessons of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident in Japan. Almost simultaneously, House Republicans and the industry’s trade association warned him not to rush.

The chairman, Gregory B. Jaczko, speaking at the National Press Club, cast the March 11 earthquake and tsunami at Fukushima Daiichi, which produced three meltdowns, as a serious challenge for the American nuclear industry. “The history of nuclear power has also been punctuated by several significant events that challenged old truths and upended our understanding of nuclear safety,’’ he said.

The task force’s recommendations are to be issued on Tuesday. Mr. Jaczko did not say that the five-member commission should complete its work in 90 days, only that it should give strong direction on each recommendation by then. The work should be finished within five years, he said.

The National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) today announced that it has signed a new agreement with the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) to promote greater cooperation in nuclear security and nonproliferation. NNSA Assistant Deputy Administrator for Nonproliferation and International Security, Mark Whitney, and Dr. Roland Schenkel, Director General of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC), signed the agreement at a nuclear safeguards symposium at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna, Austria

The agreement provides a framework for greater technical cooperation between the United States and Europe in areas such as nuclear safeguards, border monitoring, nuclear forensics, export controls, and physical protection of nuclear materials facilities. It also calls for closer collaboration on research and development of nuclear security and nonproliferation technologies, and for enhanced coordination of outreach to third countries

“This agreement is an important step in achieving President Obama’s goal of securing vulnerable nuclear material, preventing nuclear smuggling, and strengthening the international nuclear nonproliferation regime.”

French energy group Areva has entered tentative talks with the Tennessee Valley Authority that could pave the way for TVA’s nuclear plants to use fuel made from retired weapons. On Friday, the company announced it signed a letter of intent with TVA to initiate discussions on the use of fuel from the Department of Energy’s Mixed-Oxide Fuel Fabrication Facility. While it would not obligate TVA to use the fuel, the letter highlights the agency’s ongoing relationship with DOE in evaluating the fuel-from-weapons program

Scheduled to begin operating in 2016, the mixed-oxide facility at DOE’s Savannah River site in South Carolina will blend plutonium from disassembled weapons with depleted uranium oxide, according to the National Nuclear Security Administration. Using the fuel in commercial reactors would make the plutonium unfit for explosives and help meet a commitment made by the United States and Russia in 2000 to dispose of 68 metric tons of surplus plutonium. Shaw Areva MOX Services Llc. holds the contract to build and operate the South Carolina facility

According to NNSA, more than 30 commercial reactors currently use mixed-oxide fuel, including at plants in the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Belgium and Switzerland.