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A quarterly newsletter for Sierrans interested in problems posed by the escalating accumulation of nuclear waste. Compiled, condensed, and edited by Ellen Winchester for the Sierra Club National Nuclear Waste Task Force, tel. 850-576-0954.
SENATE COMMITTEE HEARING ON INTERIM WASTE BILL (S. 104) DELAYED TO FEB. 26. Identical to last year's S. 1936 (called Mobil Chernobyl by environmentalists) and passed by the Senate last year by 63-37 votes, this bill did not make it to a House floor vote then. Presumably, if voted out of the committee hearing, the bill will reach the Senate floor sometime in March and if passed will probably also be passed by the House. S. 104 would send the nation's high level waste to what is essentially an asphalt parking lot in the Nevada test site near the foot of Yucca Mt., until the repository in the mountain is open for business. It severely weakens environmental standards for nuclear waste disposal by carving loopholes in the National Environmental Policy Act, preempting other environmental laws, eliminating licensing standards for a permanent repository, and overburdening the Environmental Protection Agency. If passed by both houses and not vetoed by President Clinton, over 95 percent of the radioactivity in the nation's nuclear waste would hit the roads and rails of 43 states. (Alert from Citizen Alert) U.S. SAYS IT CANNOT FULFILL 14 YEAR OLD PROMISE OF NUCLEAR WASTE DISPOSAL. In return for taking one-tenth of a cent on each kilowatt hour generated by utilities' reactors, the Government promised to dispose of the waste by Jan. 31, 1998. Thomas P. Grumbly, Deputy Energy Secretary, says the Yucca Mt. repository will not be ready until at least 2010, although it might be able to accept some waste by 2006. The Clinton Administration says that spending money on an interim site would drain resources from research at Yucca Mountain and remove all sense of urgency about completing the plans for the permanent site. (New York Times, 2/6/97) Over 40 states and utilities plan to sue DOE in an attempt to force it to take charge of high level wastes from commercial power plants. (Greenwire,1/30/97) DOE PROPOSES YUCCA MT. EXEMPTION FROM ALL FACTORS WHICH MIGHT DISQUALIFY the site from development as a high-level nuclear waste dump, leaving only the requirement that the site meet yet to be announced EPA standards being written especially for it. The current regs, written for the characterization of multiple sites, are being preserved for any future repository siting, in other words, for any site except Yucca Mt. This proposed rule abandons the previous commitment to assess the site on the basis of its natural barriers for waste isolation, such as groundwater travel time and heat load impacts, without reference to engineered components. It also scratches the requirement for an assessment of socioeconomic, environmental and transportation considerations in evaluating a site, ignoring the fact that some 50 million Americans in 43 states will be affected by a centralized repository or interim storage site. As Mary Olson of NIRS says, "If this rule is accepted, there will be no difficult decision on Yucca Mountain's `suitability' because there will be next to nothing left to decide." DOE published the proposed rule in the Federal Register on Monday, Dec. 16, 1996 Vol. 61, Number 242, pages 66157-66169. It can also be accessed at the NIRS Web site. The deadline for comments on the proposal is March 17. For more information contact: Mary Olson, Nuclear Information and Resource Service, 202-328-0002. CHLORINE-36 FROM ATMOSPHERIC NUKE TESTS 4 DECADES AGO SHOWS UP IN YUCCA MT. research tunnel at 5 locations and at depths of 600 feet from the surface. However, not to worry, site models dating back to 1983-1985 anticipated fast pathways through fractures and faults in the mountain. Whether existing faults can sustain rapid water flow into and through the unsaturated zone is a critical issue still to be resolved. The evidence "seems to suggest one strong possibility: that some faults, in some places, and at some times over the last 40 years, provided a quick route down to at least part of the unsaturated zone." But it's too early to tell whether that has "any direct bearing on the mountain's suitability as a repository site." (The DOE Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management's OCRWM Enterprise, 12/96) THREE MILE ISLAND'S 150 TONS OF NUCLEAR DEBRIS STILL NEEDS PERMANENT SITE. Crews have completed the cleanup from the 1979 partial meltdown at the Pennsylvania reactor and transported the radioactive material to temporary underwater storage in the Idaho desert. It will stay there until safer quarters can be built, at least until 2010. "At this point, it's waste without a return address," said Eric Epstein, chairman of Three Mile Island Alert. (AP, 2/2/97) DOE IGNORES PUBLIC OPPOSITION IN NEW MEXICO AND PLANS TO OPEN WIPP IN NOVEMBER `97. It has not asked people in Nevada, Texas, and more than 15 other states on the transportation routes what they think about WIPP. This year Congress amended the WIPP Land Withdrawal Act of 1992 to remove some of the important environmental protection and citizen participation provisions in hopes of speeding up the opening of the facility, which is years late and billions over budget. Technically DOE's compliance certification application to EPA is seriously flawed. It states that there is only an 8 percent probability that drilling will hit the large volumes of pressurized brine underlying the waste rooms, that there will be no drilling for the next 700 years even though the site is surrounded by oil and gas wells and potash mines, that water dissolving rock will not affect the repository for 10,000 years, that the seals for large shafts will be impermeable for 10,000 years but that borehole plugs will all fail within 200 years. And there are other problems. (Don Hancock, Director, Southwest Research & Information Center, in Citizen Alert, winter 1996) NRC ATOMIC SAFETY AND LICENSING BOARD (ASLB) RULES AGAINST HOMER ENRICHMENT PLANT on grounds Louisiana Energy Services (LES) is not financially qualified to build it. In addition, the ASLB agreed with Citizens Against Nuclear Trash (CANT) that the Final Environmental Impact Statement did not adequately address the benefits of not building the plant. The ASLB strongly suggested that there is no need for the plant. Major corporate partners of LES are the European firm Urenco, Fluor Daniel, Duke Power and Northern States Power. Attorneys for CANT included Nathalie Walker of Sierra Club Legal Defense Fund, Louisiana. (nirsnet, 12/5/96) NRC WATCH LIST FOR SAFETY PROBLEMS RISES TO 14 REACTORS, MOST IN A DECADE. Nearly half belong to Commonwealth Edison. The six newly listed were Salem 1 and 2, near Salem, N.J.; Crystal River 3 in Florida; LaSalle 1 and 2, operated by Commonwealth Edison, near Ottawa, Ill; and Maine Yankee near Bath, Maine. (New York Times, 1/30/97) O'LEARY SAYS POOR STORAGE OF DOE'S 250 TONS OF HIGHLY ENRICHED URANIUM POSE DOE's most serious current health and safety hazard. Many buildings built in 1950's have faulty fire-protection systems. The most vulnerable sites include Oak Ridge National Laboratory, where the largest stock is kept; the Idaho Falls National Laboratory; Rocky Flats Environmental Technology Site; and Los Alamos National Laboratory. (The Wall Street Journal, 1/16/97) FIRST STAINLESS STEEL CANISTERS FILLED WITH VITRIFIED HIGH LEVEL NUCLEAR WASTE at the West Valley Demonstration Project. According to the DOE Office of Environmental Management, 300 canisters will be filled by the project`s completion in 1998. (DOE'S EM Progress, Fall `96) DOE'S SECOND OAK RIDGE IN SITU VITRIFICATION EFFORT EXPLODES OR "BURPS" depending on who's looking, DOE or its critics. Anyway, both efforts failed. What they're trying to do is turn buried nuclear waste into glass without first digging it up. Massive electrodes are drilled into the ground and huge surges of electricity melt the soil and hopefully turn it into molten glass which will cool and can be left in place forever. The Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance views turning two hundred tons of dirt into a permanent tomb for radioactive and hazardous waste as an activity likely to have an impact on the environment, for which an environmental impact statement should be prepared. DOE claims the law exempts such small-scale pilot projects. (Oak Ridge Environmental Peace Alliance, 10/96) SCIENTISTS BACK OFF WARD VALLEY STUDIES, CITE WASTE COMPANY SUIT THREAT. Martin Mifflin and Scott W. Tyler, hydrogeologists on a National Academy of Sciences panel studying the chances of radioactive leaks from the proposed low level waste site, have stopped research until the federal government agrees to pay their legal costs if sued. Deputy Interior Secretary John Garamendi cited a letter of warning from U.S. Ecology to the researchers and denounced the tactic as "raw intimidation." U.S. Ecology accuses the federal government of delaying the project with reviews and inspections. (AP, 11/22/96) EPA'S BROWNER CONCERNED NRC MAY BE MORE LENIENT ON GROUND WATER REMEDIATION and cleanup levels than the agency previously proposed. In a letter to NRC Chair Shirley Jackson, Browner says EPA is disturbed by NRC changes from a 1994 proposed rule, such as increasing the dose limit from 15 mrem/yr to as much as 30 mrem/yr and eliminating a separate requirement for protecting ground water that could be used as drinking water. If her understanding is right, Browner says, EPA will not consider NRC's rule to be protective under CERCLA and will reconsider its own policy of exempting NRC sites from the National Priorities List. Link to the Superfund Homepage and search for CERCLA. DOE SECRETARY O'LEARY STIRS HOT DEBATE OVER MOX AS SHE LEAVES OFFICE. By deciding on a "dual track" plan for long term handling of U.S. stocks of surplus military plutonium, one track encasing the plutonium in glass, the other "burning" it in civilian reactors as mixed oxide fuel (MOX), the Secretary gave new life to dormant fears that the United States would eventually erase the separation between military and civilian nuclear hegemonies. Advocates of the plan assert that the handful of commercial power reactors needed to "burn up" the nation's fifty odd tons of military plutonium would be carefully controlled to stand apart from the nuclear industry; opponents are skeptical. They point to vitrification as an existing technology that would cost the government less and be more environmentally benign. MOX proponents protest that Russian hawks believe vitrified plutonium could be too easily recovered and used to enhance the U.S. military position vis-a-vis Russia. Therefore only the "burn up" option would induce Russia to undertake a parallel effort to shrink their plutonium stockpile. MOX proponents also insist powerful individuals in the Russian scientific establishment would ensure the safety of Russian efforts to transmute their Pu into non fissile isotopes in spent fuel. Critics point to daily news articles about the disintegration of law and order in Russia, as well as to the difficulty everywhere of storing or safeguarding already existing spent fuel. They remind the "burn-up" faction that some plutonium is always left in spent fuel. Recent information from scientists at Los Alamos indicates that gallium in military plutonium would corrode its zirconium cladding, adding to long term spent fuel disposal problems. The MOX opponents' biggest worry is that by going the MOX route the U.S. would give its blessing to the use of plutonium for fuel all over the world, to enemies as well as friends, with the corollary encouragement of reprocessing. And they warn that Russia is continuing to reprocess its spent fuel, thus increasing the world's burden of plutonium even as public figures are engaging in talks about reducing it. (The Albuquerque Journal, 1/29/97, New York Times, 12/10/96 and The Atlanta Journal/Atlanta Constitution, 12/8/96) Before the end of December most environmental groups signed on to a peace making letter to O'Leary from Paul Leventhal of the Nuclear Control Institute, opposing MOX unless immobilization (vitrification) doesn't work. GEORGIA POWER OFFERS PLANT VOGTLE FOR MIXED OXIDE USE, ARGUES LOCATION across from the Savannah River DOE site might make it especially appealing to DOE. Some Georgia groups already have written DOE to protest burning plutonium in civilian reactors. "We believe the use of plutonium would be abused by a nuclear industry that has been searching for ways to revive itself," says Rita Kilpatric of the Campaign for a Prosperous Georgia, a consumer watchdog group. (The Atlanta Journal/The Atlanta Constitution, 12/10/96) TRITIUM TO BE MADE IN TENNESSEE'S WATTS BAR PLANT FOR 18 MONTHS. The major electricity supplier for the Southeast will produce about an ounce of tritium that will not be used in nuclear weapons. "This test will provide confidence to the nuclear industry and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that making tritium in a light-water reactor is technically straightforward and safe," said the Acting Energy Secretary, Charles Curtis. Tritium, which has a short half life, 12 years, is a radioactive gas necessary in hydrogen bombs. (New York Times, 2/08/97) Environmental groups have opposed tritium production in civilian reactors as (1) abandoning the national policy separating military and civilian uses of nuclear energy, (2) as unnecessary at this time, when the START II arms reduction treaty will make recovery of enough tritium from decommissioned bombs to last for many years, and (3) if tritium is ever needed, producing it in a linear accelerator would result in fewer environmental impacts. Meanwhile, the accelerator plan has an inside track that could be slowed by a shrinking federal budget or technical problems. In that case the Fast Flux Test Facility (FFTF) at Richland, WA, might get the nod to produce both tritium and medical isotopes. This would mean that decommissioning FFTF, slated for last winter, would be delayed, an outcome hoped for by a local business consortium and opposed by local citizens who say over 200 square miles of Hanford has groundwater contaminated with radioactive tritium already with levels up to 168 times the Drinking Water Standard. (Oregonian, 1/30/97, Citizen Alert, Winter`96) BIPARTISAN GROUP ADVISES SAVING 100 MILLION BY CUTTING PYROPROCESSING FROM U.S. budget over five years. The group of House members and interest groups targeted the technology, otherwise known as reprocessing, as a corporate welfare program that can be eliminated. Westinghouse and General Electric would be beneficiaries of the program. (Virginian-Pilot, 2/3/97) DOE CHANGES ROUTING OF BROOKHAVEN NUCLEAR WASTE SHIPMENTS, AVOIDS BUSY HIGHWAY. Agreeing to requests of the Sierra Club's Virginia Chapter, the U.S. Department of Energy has changed the routing plan for shipments of reactor wastes from DOE's Brookhaven National Laboratory on Long Island to its Savannah River site in South Carolina. Instead of going by barge to the Virginia port of Hampton Roads for highway truck shipment to South Carolina, the huge casks of radwaste will now bypass Virginia and continue by barge to the Naval Weapons Station at Charleston, South Carolina, a short distance from their Savannah River destination. (Robert Deegan, Virginia Chapter Nuclear Waste Issues Chair) ROCKY FLATS IS A DISASTER WAITING TO HAPPEN SAYS DENVER CHAMBER OF COMMERCE president, John I. Lay. "This is the largest repository of dangerous material next to a major metropolitan city and it happens to be upwind from us." Both plant managers, community boosters and anti-nuclear forces fear that without public pressure, a 10 year, $5 billion cleanup plan will fall victim to Congressional crossfire over competing demands on the Federal budget. If Congress appropriates the money, under the disposal plan announced by retiring DOE Secretary O'Leary, starting next year plutonium pits will be shipped from Rocky Flats to the Pantex Plant near Amarillo and non-pit plutonium will be shipped to the Savannah River Site for use as fuel in nuclear reactors. (New York Times, 12/11/96. DEREGULATION RAISES QUESTIONS OVER NUKE POWER CONSTRUCTION DEBT. Who pays, stockholders or rate payers? While the cost of running nuclear plants is about the same as for other types of power plants, the fixed costs that stem from building the plants make the electricity they generate much more costly. Utilities that have invested heavily in nuclear power could face problems if their debt burden does not continue to be assumed by rate payers. Investors bid down the stocks of many of these utilities in 1996 while the overall Dow Jones utilities index rose 3.2 percent. (New York Times, 1/3/97) LOCKHEED PLAN TO CLEAN UP INEL RADIOACTIVE BURIAL PIT DELAYED 14 MONTHS. Lockheed says it needs the time to figure out an alternative to its current plan which involves separating the buried materials using a leaching process. The Pit 9 cleanup is a first-of-its-kind program where a corporation assumes all responsibility for the development of the cleanup project. DOE has hopes that if this project proves to be successful, it could then be applied to the remaining burial pits at the Idaho DOE facility. (Autumn `96 Snake River Alliance Newsletter) FEDERAL OFFICIALS ACCUSED OF COVERING UP LEAKS FROM NEVADA LLW DUMP TO PREVENT political opposition to the development of a similar dump in California's Mojave Desert. The accusing group, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, (PEER) revealed internal communications to support charges that U.S. Geological Survey staff concealed evidence of radioactive leaks at the Beatty, Nev., waste dump for 16 months in 1994 and 1995. Proponents of the California Ward Valley dump felt that similarities of the desert terrain made the 30 year old Beatty dump a good benchmark for Ward Valley's safety. PEER filed a complaint Dec. 19 asking the Department of Interiors' Inspector General to investigate the alleged misconduct. (San Jose Mercury News, 1/4/97) TEXAS NATURAL RESOURCE CONSERVATION COMMISSION (TNRCC) RULES LEGAL STATUS for nine opponents of the proposed low level waste facility in Sierra Blanca. They will face lawyers hired by the Texas Low Level Radioactive Waste Disposal Authority and the state's two biggest electric utilities. The January 22 hearing was the latest legal maneuver in the ongoing fight over the siting and licensing of what could become one of the biggest disposal sites for non-military nuclear waste in the country. (Austin Chronicle) ELECTRIC UTILITIES WEIGH STORAGE OF NUCLEAR WASTE ON UTAH RESERVATION. Led by Northern States Power Co., of Minneapolis, the group has signed an agreement to lease part of the western Utah Indian reservation while it explores the possibility of using the site as a repository for radioactive waste. The land in question is part of 17,700 acre reservation that belongs to the Skull Valley Band of Goshute, Utah. (Journal of Commerce, 1/10/97) NEW MEXICO REPORT SAYS LOS ALAMOS RAD CONTAMINANTS HAVE SEEPED INTO WELL WATER. New Mexico's Department of Energy Oversight geologists report that from 1994 to 1995 they found traces of plutonium, americium, strontium and uranium in test wells 1500 feet deep into the main aquifer beneath Los Alamos. The aquifer is the main source of well water for ranches and towns on the Pajarito Plateau of northern New Mexico. John Parker, acting director of the oversight bureau, said the levels of contaminants, apparently from Los Alamos National Laboratory, are very small and well below federal drinking water standards, so they do not appear to threaten human health. Lab environmental scientists for years have disputed evidence of contamination in the deepest ground water level. They contended an impervious shield of volcanic ash would prevent contaminants from reaching the main aquifer. Director Parker said the state hopes the laboratory will implement a long awaited ground water monitoring plan. (Denver Post, l/1/97) NEBRASKA ICE STORM TRUCK ACCIDENT RAISES CONCERN OVER NUCLEAR WARHEAD HAULING. The overturn of the truck has "focused a spotlight"on the safety of secret shipments of nuclear weapons along the nation's roads and raised questions about Dept. of Energy plans to move radioactive materials around the U.S. It was the first in 13 years involving "sensitive nuclear materials" hauled by DOE's Transportation Safeguards Division. DOE spokesperson AL Stotts said the incident resulted in nothing more than scratches to the trailer. Nebraska Gov. Ben Nelson says he has no idea how many nuclear weapons are shipped through his state and has asked the DOE to notify him of the timing of shipments. (New York Times, 12/19/97) COULD A FALSE ALARM STILL START A NUCLEAR WAR? (A nuclear waste issue, broadly considered) Five years after the end of the Cold War U.S. and Russian nuclear doctrine continues to rely on extraordinarily rapid decision making and a growing number of military experts argue that this hair trigger response combined with the possibility of human error creates a possibility for miscalculation that surpasses the threat of a surprise attack as the most clear and present danger. The world has had cautionary escapes from both Russian and U.S. malfunctioning early warning systems. Both countries still have around 3,000 strategic warheads on land and submarine missiles that can be launched within minutes. Retired General George Lee Butler, former commander responsible for the plans and operations of the entire U.S. strategic nuclear arsenal, has stated, referring to the START II process, "As opposed to this sort of mechanical, lockstep, phased-down, numbers-driven arms control process we've been in most of my life, we need to pursue practical, verifiable, and I think immediately achievable stepssuch as standing weapons down off alert, separating the warheads, and putting them in centralized, monitored storage." In December 60 retired generals and admirals from nuclear states around the world called for the negotiated abolition of all nuclear weapons. (U.S. News & World Report, 2/10/97) CLINTON WEIGHS NEW PACT WITH RUSSIA TO SHARPLY REDUCE NUCLEAR ARMS. The administration is studying the possibility of seeking an agreement with Russia on the outlines of a treaty requiring new cuts in strategic arms, going beyond the roughly 50 percent reduction set as a 10 year goal by U.S. and Russian leaders in 1993. Apparently the goal is to persuade Russian legislators to ratify the START treaty, which they have complained would cost them too much to implement and would impel their government to build new strategic weapons to maintain rough parity with the U.S. (The Washington Post, 1/23/97) U.S. STRATEGIC COMMAND'S NEW NUCLEAR WAR STRATEGY SEEKS TO MAXIMIZE FALLOUT and radiation in the former Soviet Union during a nuclear war. The new strategy would cut down on the number of weapons used, justifying the plan. Increasing the radioactive fallout would keep people from cranking out war material. Ted Postel, an MIT professor and former Pentagon nuclear analyst, says a strategy of this kind "is indistinguishable from an attack focused on killing as many people as possible." (William M. Arkin, The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, January/February 1997.) LOS ALAMOS TO BUILD FROM 20 TO 80 NEW NUCLEAR WARHEADS, CALLED "CORES." What used to be referred to as new nuclear weapons are today called "modifications." (The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, Nov/Dec, p.10) WASHINGTON PROTESTS CASH STARVED RUSSIA'S SALE OF ATOMIC PLANTS TO INDIA. The U.S. asserts the deal violates the non-proliferation treaty and will hurt international efforts to stem the spread of nuclear weapons. Roots of the dispute go back to 1974 when New Delhi startled the world by conducting a nuclear test. The Indians used plutonium from a research reactor sold to them by Canada for peaceful purposes. They recently refused to sign the CTB, citing the failures of nuclear weapons states to end dependence on nuclear defense. Under the NPT only the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China are authorized as nuclear weapons states permitted to sell nuclear technologybut only to signers of the NPT and not to aspiring nuclear powers. Indians say they're desperate for electric power, and Russians say they're desperate to pay their debts. RUSSIANS VOTE "NO" TO NUCLEAR POWER PLANT IN FIRST OF ITS KIND REFERENDUM. The partially constructed power plant in Kostroma, 250 miles northeast of Moscow, was begun before the 1986 Chernobyl catastrophe. Residents fear finishing it would drive away tourists who enjoy the region's clean lakes and woodlands, said Karen Richardson of Greenpeace International, which helped residents put the issue to a referendum. (AP, 12/10/96) LACK OF FUNDS PARALYZES RUSSIA'S NUCLEAR SAFETY COMMITTEE ENDANGERING POWER plants, research reactors, nuclear powered ships, and civilian nuclear installations as authorities threaten to cut telephone lines and water and electricity supplies. The cash-strapped government has failed to provide the Committee with funds earmarked for it in the 1996 budget. (The Virginian-Pilot, 11/28/96) OCCUPATION OF NUCLEAR PLANT SIGNALS RUSSIAN LABOR'S ANGER. More than a dozen employees at St. Petersburg's nuclear power plant took over the control room in December and threatened to shut down the plant that provides most of the city's power unless they received months' worth of back pay. 400 colleagues joined in the protest and announced a hunger strike. By noon, the Russian Government had flown more than a billion rubles --$200 for each workerto the plant and promised to deliver the rest within a week. (New York Times, 12/07/97) UKRAINE BEGINS SHUT DOWN OF ONE CHERNOBYL REACTOR BUT PLANS TO RESTART another. The Russian Nuclear Energy Committee, citing Ukraine's energy crisis, said reactor No. 2, idle since a fire in 1992, would be temporarily restarted at the end of 1997. (The Virginian-Pilot, 12/1/96) GEORGIA OFFERS HIGHLY ENRICHED URANIUM FOR SALE TO NON-MILITARY BUYERS. The Uranium-235 was used in a research reactor just outside Tbilisi, the capital, and was left there when the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. Buyers must have nuclear facilities under the oversight of the International Atomic Energy Agency, required by the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. India, Pakistan and North Korea would not qualify. (AP, 1/8/97) EMERGENCY SENSORS CONTAINING PLUTONIUM STOLEN FROM FACTORY IN UKRAINE. The sensors were used at a radio equipment factory in Zaporizhzhya, an industrial city 260 miles southwest of Kiev. If broken open they could cause serious harm to people and the surrounding environment. (AP, 12/13/96) TAIWANESE PROTESTERS RIOT OVER MONEY TO RESTORE NUCLEAR POWER PROJECT. In October hundreds of protestors battled riot police outside Parliament after legislators voted to restore money for a stalled nuclear project. 4,000 helmeted riot police officers used water cannons to knock back the angry crowd. The rioting was the worst in Taiwan since it began its transition to a democracy in 1987. (New York Times, 10/19/96) JAPAN TO CONTINUE PLUTONIUM REACTOR PROJECT DESPITE `95 MONJU SODIUM LEAK. The government's annual Nuclear Power White Paper says the "foundation" of Japan's nuclear policy is reprocessing spent nuclear fuel into plutonium and burning it in fast-breeder reactors. The paper does little to address the government's growing difficulty in persuading local regions to accept conventional nuclear power plants. In August, the town of Maki voted by a 6-4 margin in a nonbinding referendum to reject a proposed nuclear plant. Japan has 51 nuclear power plants in operation, producing 33.8% of the country's total energy needs. (AP, 12/25/96) NORTH KOREA AGREES TO ACCEPT 200,000 BARRELS OF TAIWAN'S LOW LEVEL N. WASTE. South Korea worries about the waste's safe storage and suggests it may not help arrange aid for the economically struggling North if the plan goes through. Taiwan will pay about $227 million to North Korea for taking the waste off its hands. Since the waste contains no uranium or plutonium, United States spokespeople see no proliferation risk in its movement to North Korea. Seoul argues that Taiwan's move threatens to break an international practice of disposing of one's own nuclear waste at home. (New York Times, 2/7/97) CANADA VIOLATES NON-PROLIFERATION PROMISES, SELLS CANDU REACTORS TO CHINA, sweetening deal by providing $l.l billion financing and brushing aside Canada's law requiring environmental assessments on federally funded overseas projects. Before U.S. reactors can be sold to China, the White House must certify to Congress that China is not selling nuclear-weapons technology to rogue nations, and Washington watchers say the U.S. nuclear industry is pressing to get China certified. The Sierra Club of Canada filed suit last month to force Ottawa to conduct an environmental assessment of the CANDU sale. (The Christian Science Monitor, 2/12/97) BOUND FOR SELLAFIELD, TRAIN OF GERMAN NUCLEAR FUEL DERAILS IN EASTERN FRANCE. According to a spokeswoman for France's Moselle department, "There was radioactive material aboard but there are no leaks." Germany's Green Party said the accident was one of a series of recent nuclear mishaps, including an incident at Sellafield in which six workers were contaminated by radioactive dust.The Irish Times, 2/5/97 IRISH PROTEST 2 ACCIDENTS AT BRITISH NUCLEAR PLANT. One day after six workers were slightly contaminated at a fuel reprocessing plant at Sellafield, located on the other side of the Irish Sea, radioactive liquid spilled from a storage tank at the same British Nuclear Fuels facility. Emmet Stagg, the Irish minister responsible for nuclear safety, in discussing these incidents with the British Ambassador also stressed the Irish Government's opposition to a proposed nuclear dump near Sellafield. A scientists' report has indicated that radioactive material from the proposed underground waste storage site could seep into the Irish Sea. (New York Times, 2/08/97) FRENCH EPIDEMIOLOGISTS CLAIM LINK BETWEEN CASES OF LEUKEMIA AND THE NUCLEAR waste reprocessing plant at La Hague on the Normandy Coast. In a British Medical Journal article they say children of mothers who had frequented local beaches more than once a month during their pregnancies had a risk of leukemia 4.5 times that of children of mothers who went less than once a month. A critic from France's main biomedical research agency questions the validity of the control group, which was recruited by general practitioners in the study area. The editor of BMJ has suggested that the French press might be overly influenced in the debate by France's dependence on nuclear energy. (Science, 1/31/97) INDIA SAYS U.S. APPLIES DOUBLE STANDARD TO ENFORCEMENT OF NPT BY APPROVING PLAN to supply reactors to North Korea, not a signer of the Nonproliferation Treaty, while urging Russia to drop its planned sale of two light-water reactors to India, also not a signer. The U.S. believes the plan, sponsored by the European Union, Japan, South Korea and the United States, to supply North Korea with reactors that are more modern and produce less waste convertible into arms will reduce proliferation risks. The reactors India is negotiating to purchase from Russia would be installed in southern India and can produce one million kilowatts of power each, which India says it needs to address a huge electricity shortage. India detonated a nuclear device in 1974 but says it has not built a nuclear bomb. (New York Times, 2/9/97) MORE THAN A TON OF BERYLLIUM TO BE AIR TRANSPORTED TO THE U.S. VANISHED FROM Stockholm airport. Beryllium is a nonradioactive metal used in making nuclear weapons. (The Virginian-Pilot, 11/24/97) Up to Top |
