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Robots scour sea for atomic waste
Robin McKie, The Observer
Robot submarines are to be used to sweep particles of plutonium and other radioactive materials from the seabed near one of Britain’s biggest nuclear plants in one of the most delicate clean-up operations ever in this country.
Each submersible will be fitted with a Geiger counter and will crisscross the sea floor to pinpoint every deadly speck close to Dounreay on Scotland’s north coast before lifting each particle and returning it to land for safe storage.
Two kilometres of beach outside the Dounreay nuclear plant have been closed since 1983, and fishing banned, when it was found old fuel rod fragments were being accidentally pumped into the sea.
(25 May 2008)
Italy Embraces Nuclear Power
Elisabeth Rosenthal, New York Times
ROME – Italy announced Thursday that within five years it planned to resume building nuclear energy plants, two decades after a public referendum resoundingly banned nuclear power and deactivated all its reactors.
… The change for Italy is a striking sign of the times, reflecting growing concern in many European countries over the skyrocketing price of oil and energy security, as well as the warming effects of carbon emissions from fossil fuels. All have combined to make this once-scorned form of energy far more palatable.
“Italy has had the most dramatic, the most public turnaround, but the sentiments against nuclear are reversing very quickly all across Europe – Holland, Belgium, Sweden, Germany and more,” said Ian Hore-Lacey, spokesman for the World Nuclear Association, an industry group based in London.
(23 May 2008)
NYT breathtakingly clueless on nuclear energy
Jerome a Paris, Daily Kos
The New York Times has a stupendously bad article about the “rebirth” of nuclear energy in Italy: Italy Embraces Nuclear Power [previous item], it turns the declarations of one right-wing politician into a big policy change, complete with breathless assertions about Europe and energy that are so bad that they are not even wrong…
A lesson for you kossacks is that, while you’re rightly critical of what the NYT and other papers write about US politics, you tend to believe a lot more what they write about European politics or economies – when it’s just as slanted. Please be as skeptical about non-US topics, they are no less ideological or partial there. …
most European countries, which generally have no oil and gas resources of their own,
“no oil and gas resources of their own” – that’s been true of most of continental Europe for the past 50 years, and they have learnt to deal with that. What’s changed today is that the UK has joined the ranks of the importers, since the North Sea fields have started declining. This is always presented as a big change for Europe, but it’s first and foremost a big change for the UK, which did not plan for this transition. Italy, Germany, France, have long been importers of energy and have been worrying about security of supply, diversification of sources, and getting into long term supply contracts for natural gas with producers from Russia, Algeria, Lybia, Nigeria, etc…
have been forced by finances to consider new forms of energy – and fast.
“have been forced by finances to seek sources of their own” – huh? The issue is security of supply, not prices. In a liberalised market, all electricity is sold at the same price, the marginal one (ie the cost of production of the most expensive unit required to satisfy demand at any given time)
(23 May 2008)
EUROPE: Going Nuclear Despite Warnings
Zoltán Dujisin, IPS
The EU seems to be backing nuclear energy as the response to global warming and gas dependency, but civic groups warn that safety and waste processing should be preconditions for the industry’s growth.
These issues were debated in Prague May 22-23 at the second European Nuclear Energy Forum, an EU (European Union) initiative to discuss opportunities and risks of nuclear energy.
Civic groups criticised their extremely low representation at the event, seen by them as a gathering of nuclear energy supporters lobbying the EU.
“There is no energy technology free of risks. We have to live with that and do our best choices among existing possibilities,” Ulla Birgitta Sirkeinen from the EU’s Economic and Social Committee, a consultative body, told participants. “This committee has the view that nuclear energy is needed.”
“We all share the (EU) objective of reducing greenhouse emissions by 20 percent by 2020,” Nicole Fontaine, a European Parliamentarian, told participants. “Although there are many solutions such as renewable energy, reality dictates we use nuclear energy, which covers 32 percent of European energy needs.
“It doesn’t have the greenhouse effect, and it allows ensuring security of supply,” she said, hinting at the high European dependency on Russian gas, to which many believe nuclear power could be an alternative.
The EU is the biggest nuclear energy generator in the world.
(24 May 2008)
