nuclear power plants – Infinite Unknown

US Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell Told Japanese Ambassador Ichiro Fujisaki: ‘The Survival Of Your Nation’ Was At Stake

June 7, 2011 by Infinite

– Japan Concedes Severity of Blast (Wall Street Journal, June 7, 2011):

Japan disclosed Monday that its nuclear accident was more severe in its first days than it had previously admitted—casting new light on how Tokyo’s early handling of the disaster briefly sent its relations with the U.S. into one of the tensest periods in years.

Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency on Monday more than doubled its estimate for the amount of radiation released from the plant in the first week of the March disaster and said holes may have formed around pipes attached to reactor containment vessels. It also said it believes that reactor cores at some of the units at the complex melted much faster than the plant operator previously suggested.

Read moreUS Assistant Secretary of State Kurt Campbell Told Japanese Ambassador Ichiro Fujisaki: ‘The Survival Of Your Nation’ Was At Stake

Japanese Official: Meltdown May Be Occurring At Nuclear Plant – IAEA: Japan May Hand Out Iodine Near Nuclear Plants – US Nuclear Experts Worry About Possible Japan Reactor Meltdown

March 12, 2011March 12, 2011 by Infinite

– Japan nuclear blast could be more deadly than Chernobyl, experts fear (Ha’aretz)

– Another Japan nuclear reactor fails (Los Angeles Times):

A third reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 plant loses its emergency cooling capacity, bringing to six the number of reactors that have failed at the two Fukushima nuclear power plants since the earthquake and tsunami.

– Radiation levels rise above limit at quake-hit plant: Kyodo (Reuters)

– IAEA: Japan may hand out iodine near nuclear plants (Reuters):

VIENNA (Reuters) – Japanese authorities have told the U.N.’s atomic watchdog they are making preparations to distribute iodine to people living near nuclear power plants affected by Friday’s earthquake, the Vienna-based agency said.

Iodine can be used to help protect against thyroid cancer in the case of radioactive exposure in a nuclear accident.

After the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, thousands of cases of thyroid cancer were reported in children and adolescents who were exposed at the time of the accident. More cases are expected.

In Japan Saturday, radiation leaked from a damaged nuclear reactor after an explosion blew the roof off in the wake of the massive earthquake, but the government insisted that radiation levels were low.

Japan’s Jiji news agency later said three workers suffered radiation exposure near the Fukushima nuclear plant.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the U.N. nuclear body, said Japanese authorities had informed it of the explosion and that they were “assessing the condition of the reactor core.”

Japan expanded the evacuation zone around the plant, Fukushima Daiichi, and also that of the nearby Fukushima Daini nuclear power plant.

“The authorities also say they are making preparations to distribute iodine to residents in the area of both the plants,” the IAEA said in a statement.

“The IAEA has reiterated its offer of technical assistance to Japan, should the government request this,” it said.

– US Nuclear Experts Worry About Possible Japan Reactor Meltdown (Voice of America)

Meltdown may be occurring at nuclear plant, Japanese official says

‘There is a possibility, we see the possibility of a meltdown,’ an official with Japan’s nuclear agency says in an interview with CNN, adding that he is basing this on radioactivity measurements near the plant Saturday night. But the Japanese ambassasdor to the U.S. tells CNN that there’s no evidence of a meltdown.

A meltdown may be occurring at one of the reactors at an earthquake-damaged nuclear power plant in northeast Japan, a government official told CNN Sunday morning Japan time.

“There is a possibility, we see the possibility of a meltdown,” said Toshihiro Bannai, director of the international affairs office of Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety, in a telephone interview with CNN from the agency’s Tokyo headquarters. “At this point, we have still not confirmed that there is an actual meltdown, but there is a possibility.”

Bannai said engineers have been unable to get close enough to the reactor’s core to know what’s going on, and that he based his conclusion on radioactive cesium and iodine measured in the air near the plant Saturday night.

Iran: Nuclear plant to start operating by August 22

August 16, 2009 by Infinite

What Iran does is perfectly legal under international law.

Iran has signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Iran is regularly inspected by the IAEA.

It is Israel that refuses to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, because this would mean mandatory inspections of their nuclear facilities.

It is Israel that has about 150 nuclear weapons as former U.S. President Jimmy Carter has said.

Any force that would attack Iran is responsible for starting WW III as Russian officials have stated.

bushehr

Iran said on Tuesday that its much-delayed nuclear power plant, where testing began last month, would start operating by August 22.

The 1,000-megawatt Russian-built plant in the southern port city of Bushehr will first generate around 500 megawatts by August 22, Energy Minister Parviz Fattah said, quoted by state television’s website.

The Russian federal nuclear company which is constructing the plant has so far declined to give a date for the start-up.

“By the end of the Iranian month of Mordad (August 22), 500 megawatts of the 1,000 megawatt Bushehr nuclear plant will be transmitted to the national grid,” Fattah said.

“The remaining 500 megawatts will be transmitted in the second half of the (Iranian) year,” which will end in March 2010.

On March 4, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki announced in parliament that the plant would begin operating by September.

Iranian and Russian officials began testing the plant on February 25, as Tehran pressed on with its controversial nuclear programme despite Western fears it may be secretly trying to build an atomic bomb.

Moscow supplied the fuel for the plant in 2008 but it is currently sealed by the UN watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency, which has been investigating Iran’s nuclear drive for six years.

Russia sees no concern over nuclear Iran

February 25, 2009 by Infinite

Still very important to see: Ron Paul on Iran and Energy June 26, 2008
(”Our own CIA says, that the Iranians have not been working on a nuclear weapon since 2003.”)

Russian Atomic Agency Chief Sergei Kiriyenko (centre right) and Iranian Vice President Gholamreza Aqazadeh (center left)

There is no room for Western concern over Russia’s nuclear cooperation with Iran, says the head of the Rosatom State Atomic Corporation.

Sergei Kiriyenko, in a joint Wednesday press conference with head of Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization (AEO) Gholam-Reza Aqazadeh in Bushehr, addressed Western opposition to Moscow’s nuclear cooperation with Tehran.

“Cooperation between Iran and Russia is based on international norms and conventions and it should be said that nothing is being done outside the non-proliferation framework,” explained the Russian nuclear official in response to a question by Press TV’s correspondent Gisoo Misha Ahmadi.

Related article:
Barak Says Israel will ‘Stop at Nothing’ to Deny Iran Nukes (Arutz Sheva)

Kiriyenko added that those who seek to make excuses to hinder the Iranian nuclear program should “lose all hope as they witness the level of progress at the Bushehr power plant.”

“Russia’s cooperation with Iran in building the Bushehr power plant is not subject to any political games,” he stressed.

The remarks came after Iran’s Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, in an interview with RIA Novosti, suggested the West had launched a misinformation campaign against the Iranian nuclear program to force an end to Russia’s nuclear presence in Iran for competitive reasons.

Mini nuclear plants to power 20,000 homes

November 9, 2008 by Infinite

£13m shed-size reactors will be delivered by lorry

Nuclear power plants smaller than a garden shed and able to power 20,000 homes will be on sale within five years, say scientists at Los Alamos, the US government laboratory which developed the first atomic bomb.

The miniature reactors will be factory-sealed, contain no weapons-grade material, have no moving parts and will be nearly impossible to steal because they will be encased in concrete and buried underground.

The US government has licensed the technology to Hyperion, a New Mexico-based company which said last week that it has taken its first firm orders and plans to start mass production within five years. ‘Our goal is to generate electricity for 10 cents a watt anywhere in the world,’ said John Deal, chief executive of Hyperion. ‘They will cost approximately $25m [£13m] each. For a community with 10,000 households, that is a very affordable $250 per home.’

U.S. Is Funding Iranian Nuclear Program

November 9, 2008 by Infinite

The U.S. is literally funding Iranian nuclear capabilities.

As CNN reports, the U.S. state department has given millions of dollars to two Russian institutes which, in turn, are directly helping to ramp up Iran’s nuke capacity at Bushehr and other facilities.

This is especially ironic given that the U.S. has accused Iran of producing fuel for nuclear weapons at Bushehr.

Here’s the CNN report:

Sunday, November 2, 2008

Source: George Washington’s Blog

Massive floating generators, or ‘eco-rigs’, to provide power and food to Japan

September 4, 2008 by Infinite

Battered by soaring energy costs and aghast at dwindling fish stocks, Japanese scientists think they have found the answer: filling the seas with giant “eco-rigs” as powerful as nuclear power stations.

The project, which could result in village-sized platforms peppering the Japanese coastline within a decade, reflects a growing panic in the country over how it will meet its future resource needs.

The floating eco-rig generators which measure 1.2 miles by 0.5 miles (2km by 800m) are intended to harness the energy of the Sun and wind. They are each expected to produce about 300 megawatt hours of power.

Russia may push forward with S-300 sales to Iran

September 3, 2008September 2, 2008 by Infinite

MOSCOW, September 1 (RIA Novosti) – Russia may proceed with plans to sell advanced S-300 air defense systems to Iran under a secret contract believed to have been signed in 2005, a Russian analyst said on Monday. (Russian mobile surface-to-air missile systems – Image gallery)

Commenting on an article in the Sunday Telegraph newspaper saying Russia is using the plans as a bargaining chip in its standoff with America, Ruslan Pukhov, director of Moscow-based Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, said: “In the current situation, when the U.S. and the West in general are stubbornly gearing toward a confrontation with Russia after the events in South Ossetia, the implementation of a lucrative contract on the deliveries of S-300 [air defense systems] to Iran looks like a logical step.”

US fears Russia will sell Iran S-300s

August 31, 2008August 31, 2008 by Infinite

Related article: De Telegraaf: “Attack on Iran expected”:

“AMSTERDAM – The Dutch intelligence agency AIVD has conducted an ultrasecret operation in Iran with the purpose of infiltrating and sabotaging the weapons industry in the islamic republic.”

“The operation, deemed extremely succesfull, has recently been cancelled because of an imminent aerial attack on Iran. Targets include sites that are connected to the Dutch spying.”

So the attack is already on its way and this is just another excuse to justify it:
_______________________________________________________________________________

Russian S-30 missiles

US intelligence says escalating tensions between Washington and Moscow could prompt Russia to sell the sophisticated S-300 system to Iran.

“If Tehran obtained the S-300, it would be a game-changer in military thinking for tackling Iran. That could be a catalyst for Israeli air attacks before it is operational,” said Dan Goure, a long-time Pentagon advisor.

“This is a system that scares every Western air force,” he said.

Warning over French uranium leak

July 9, 2008 by Infinite

Waste containing unenriched uranium has leaked into two rivers from a nuclear plant in southern France.

Officials banned people in three nearby towns from fishing, using water from wells, swimming in the rivers or using river water on their crops.

The accident happened at the Tricastin nuclear site at Bollene, some 40km (25 miles) from the city of Avignon.

The French nuclear safety agency said the substance was toxic but the risk to human health was slight.

Uranium concentrations in the Gaffiere river were initially about 1,000 times higher than normal levels but were falling rapidly, spokeswoman Evangelia Petit said.

Some 30,000l (7,925 gallons) of solution containing 12g of uranium per litre spilled from an overflowing reservoir at the facility – which handles liquids contaminated by uranium – into the ground and into the Gaffiere and Lauzon rivers.

Anti-nuclear campaign group Abandon Nuclear Power said it thought the authorities were underplaying the danger posed by the nuclear waste leak.

“It is impossible that such a spill, containing uranium, does not have important consequences for the environment and for health,” it said.

France is one of the world’s most nuclear-dependent countries, with 80% of its electricity coming from nuclear power.Wednesday, 9 July 2008

Source: BBC News

Drought could close nuclear power plants

March 18, 2008 by Infinite

Southeast water shortage a factor in huge cooling requirements

LAKE NORMAN, N.C. – Nuclear reactors across the Southeast could be forced to throttle back or temporarily shut down later this year because drought is drying up the rivers and lakes that supply power plants with the awesome amounts of cooling water they need to operate.

Utility officials say such shutdowns probably wouldn’t result in blackouts. But they could lead to shockingly higher electric bills for millions of Southerners, because the region’s utilities could be forced to buy expensive replacement power from other energy companies.

Already, there has been one brief, drought-related shutdown, at a reactor in Alabama over the summer.

“Water is the nuclear industry’s Achilles’ heel,” said Jim Warren, executive director of N.C. Waste Awareness and Reduction Network, an environmental group critical of nuclear power. “You need a lot of water to operate nuclear plants.” He added: “This is becoming a crisis.”