Nuclear and climate news in the week that was

Things appear to be  quiet on the global nuclear news scene. Lulled by the present stalemate in USA-North Korea nuclear tensions, the world's media complacently reports on the nuclear weapons build-up going on in USA, Russia,  India, Pakistan , and  to a much lesser degree China .

The main focus of media about things nuclear is the hype about "new nuclear" - Small Modular Nuclear Reactors, (SMRs). So many news items in praise of SMRs - all sounding suspiciously as if copied from industry handout sheets, and all claiming that nuclear is the cure for climate change. Do these journalists ever bother to check on the facts about this claim?

The world's many pollution problems are at last being recognised as a global malaise, with the horror stories of epidemic plastic rubbish in oceans and on beaches. Climate change is manifested in various ways: it's affecting migration patterns, changes in Arctic seas, wildfires, bees, water, hotspots in South Asia.

AUSTRALIA

July will be a critical month, as the Australian govt gears up for making a decision on 20 August to set up a nuclear waste dump in the iconic Flinders Ranges. Never mind that both South Australian and Federal Law prohibit this!

It is almost certainly intended as a step towards making Australia the world's garbage bin for nuclear waste, - the 2016 plan that South Australia rejected. But The Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation and the wider Australian and global nuclear lobby never give up!

The process is secretive as far as Australia at large is concerned, even secretive from South Australians. It's being pitched as just a local matter, for decision by small rural communities, encouraged by bribes that are fairly stingy, considering the huge and long effect it will have on the region

A Senate committee is considering this, but they don't report until 14 August - probably  too late to influence the decision.

The waste dump is being pitched to the locals as a "medical necessity", though it is really intended for long-lasting and highly toxic nuclear reactor wastes from across the continent, at Lucas Heights, Sydney.  The Australian media silence about this is either due to cowardly and criminal cowering before the government  - or are they just stupidly ignorant?

Nuclear enthusiast Matt Canavan keen to quickly wrap up waste dump site in Flinders Ranges.

Submission to Senate Inquiry: Brett Stokes-Submission on "community consultation" and the illegality of the campaign for a nuclear waste dump in South Australia. Brett Stokes shows how plans for nuclear waste dumping in South Australia have breached S.A. law.

Regina McKenzie's detailed letters to Minister Matt Canavan ask the hard questions about the proposed Barndioota nuclear waste dump.

Geologists warn that the Barndioota region is a dangerous site for nuclear waste dumping.

South Australian top university big-wigs are nuclear industry promoters.

Restoring Kakadu to its former glory (now that uranium mining is finished).

CLIMATE. Hypocrisy in Australia - our truly awful climate policy.

RENEWABLE ENERGY. Major 200MW + battery solar farm approved in outback South Australia. Tesla batteries arrive for world’s first wind-solar-battery project.  Renewables replaced more than half Hazelwood capacity. Australia solar costs hit “extraordinary” new lows – $50s/MWh.  How Australia will get to 33% renewable energy by 2020 . Big business lobby declares war on wind and solar.

INTERNATIONAL

Russia's Putin has all the advantages in the coming summit with Trump.

World Nuclear Market is Shrinking - preview of 2018 World Nuclear Industry Status Report (WNISR),

Small Modular Nuclear Reactors are NOT going to save the nuclear industry.

High cancer rates in flight attendants - effect of ionising radiation.

International nuclear decommissioning market will be worth £250bn by 2030.

NORTH KOREA. North Korea has little incentive to "denuclearize". Trump's incoherent strategy leaves the world in danger.North Korea carrying out improvements at Yongbyon Nuclear Research Facility. A nuclear North Korea seen not as a threat, but as an ideal stabilizer.

ARCTIC. Arctic climate change: The northern Barents Sea has warmed 1.5 degrees Celsius in just 18 years.

ISRAEL. The dangers in Israel's and USA's policy of deception about Israels' nuclear weapons. Israel is sure that nuclear power for Saudi Arabia will not lead to Saudi nuclear weapons.

RUSSIA.Russia's environmental groups demand an end to secrecy about Russia's nuclear wastes.

JAPAN. Delay in removing spent nuclear fuel from Fukushima's crippled nuclear reactor. Japanese firms shift to clean energy despite state's cling to nuclear power.  Despite everything, Japan's power companies are still loyal to nuclear power.

USA.

• U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo urges China to enforce sanctions on North Korea. U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo confident that North Korea understands what is expected in complete denuclearization.  Previously angry and aggressive, John Bolton, Trump’s national security adviser, now chummy with Putin and Kim Jong Un.
• Despite the Outer Space Treaty to prevent this, USA has a long history of planning for nuclear weapons in space.
• A glut of plutonium pits. Oh great! USA can make more nuclear weapons.
• Redress for nuclear industry whistleblowers in USA.
• Radiation from USA's nuclear bomb tests went far and wide - now compensation is needed.
• New report connects cancer increase in North St Louis County with radioactive pollution from Coldwater Creek.
• Protest campaign to stop nuclear waste transport in Idaho.
•  Trumpocracy - analysed by Noam Chomsky.
• USA local group works to remove investments from nuclear weapons making companies.

CANADA. Toronto schools want anti-radiation pills in case of nuclear incident at Pickering plant. Protesters rally in Pickering to decommission nuclear power plant.

FRANCE. France's anti nuclear activists not imprisoned. EDF aims to be the key corporation in nuclear station decommissioning. French nuclear corporation EDF hedges its bets: now starting 2 renewable energy programmes.

UK. 

• Scrap Trident or risk a "nuclear annihilation abyss"- former nuclear sub commander warns UK govt.
• How the British government struck such a terrible deal as Hinkley Point C nuclear power project.
• Britain’s Planning Inspectorate has accepted Hitachi unit Horizon’s application for the Wylfa nuclear power station in Wales.
• UK govt launches pro nuclear campaign, pushes for women in the nuclear industry.
•  UK's nuclear power bigwigs want "community engagement", but exclude critics of Sizewell nuclear project.
• Theresa May's UK govt rejects renewables, promotes nuclear - and cancels promising tidal energy project.UK's nuclear lobby appears to be winning, but the Tidal Lagoon Energy movement has not given up.
• Norwegian anti nuclear protest ship "Nora" sails to Sellafield to campaign for the closure of the nuclear plant.

NORWAY. Halden nuclear reactor shut down not just for safety reasons, more because it lost so much money.

INDIA. India - the global nuclear weapons threat that is being ignored. India's space dream - to develop nuclear fuel from helium on the moon.  USA's General Electric and France's EDF getting together to market to India huge and costly nuclear station.

SOUTH AFRICA. In South Africa, there's confusion about the new government's policy on matters nuclear.

JORDAN. Jordan gives up on big nuclear power station, but might be sucked in by "Small Nukes" propaganda.

GERMANY. Germany's successful development towards nuclear fusion.

FINLAND. Finland's nuclear waste dump will still be in the trial stage for years.

 
Christina Macpherson
Antinuclear Australia
www.antinuclear.net
www.nuclear-news.nethttps://nuclearinformation.wordpress.com/ @ChristinaMac1