Uranium mining has done damage enough to Mirrar Aboriginal people
“Uranium mining has also taken our country away from us and destroyed it – billabongs and creeks gone for ever. There are hills of poisonous rock and great holes in the ground with poisonous mud.”
Aborigines to block uranium mining after Japan disaster, The Independent, By Kathy Marks, 14 April 2011 “………..Uranium mining has a troubled history in the area. The Ranger deposit – now operated by Energy Resources of Australia (ERA), a subsidiary of the Anglo-Australian mining giant Rio Tinto – was developed against the Mirarr’s wishes. Continue reading
New radiation problem at Fukushima’s No 4 reactor
Tokyo Electric Power Co. was unsure whether the surge in radiation was being caused by the spent fuel rods or radioactive material leaking from the reactor’s pressure vessel…….
Radiation surges above 4’s fuel pool The Japan TimesOnline By KANAKO TAKAHARA STAFF WRITER, 14 April 11,Radiation has risen to high levels above the spent-fuel pool at reactor No. 4 and its temperature is rising, the nuclear safety agency said Wednesday, indicating the fuel rods have been further damaged and are emitting radioactive substances. Continue reading
Nuclear company AREVA opens solar project in Australia
The Kogan Creek Solar Booster project gave Prime Minister Julia Gillard a wonderful new photo opportunity…the largest project of its type in the world, and the first commercial-scale operation for Areva Solar,….The technology, conceived by Dr David Mills at Sydney University
Areva’s sunshine test Business Spectator CLIMATE SPECTATOR Giles Parkinson, 14 Apr 2011 It’s been just over a year since French nuclear giant Areva bought out the aspiring solar thermal energy developer Ausra, but the purchase of the Californian-based company with the Australian-grown technology may be about to pay dividends. Continue reading
Climate change might cause earthquakes
Earthquakes linked to climate change, The Age, 13 April 11, Long-term climate change could be responsible for moving the Earth’s tectonic plates.A team of scientists based in Australia, France and Germany has established a link between monsoons in India over the past 10 million years and the motion of the Indian plate.The scientists have found that, as monsoons in the area increased, the plate moved by almost one centimetre a year.
The researchers say it’s the first time climate change has been recognised as having the potential to influence the motion of tectonic plates.
“It is known that certain geologic events caused by plate motions have the ability to influence climate patterns over a period of a million years,” Dr Giampiero Iaffaldano from the Australian National University said in a statement. “Now we know that the opposite holds as well……Earthquakes linked to climate change
Productivity Commission condemns desalination plants
The 600-page report is highly critical of decisions by state governments across the country to overinvest in expensive and inefficient desalination plants, with economic modelling indicating desalination plants in Melbourne and Perth alone could cost consumers between $3.1 billion and $4.2bn more than cheaper water-saving measures over 20 years.
Commission slams desal plants * Lauren Wilson * The Australian * April 14, 2011 PROLONGED water restrictions and expensive desalination plants are the least efficient way of providing water security, the government’s key economic advisory body has found. Continue reading
Australians massaged back into nuclear complacency
Nuclear Fall-Out – A Window Into The Rabbit-Hole, Media With Conscience By Allen L. Jasson 13 April “…..the tranquillity I am witnessing here in Australia derives from the way the Nuclear Disaster is subtly presented as a kind of natural extension of the earth quake and tsunami; a terrible, unfortunate but inescapable fact of life. Continue reading
“Very low probability” nuclear accidents mean very high taxpayer cost
The standard formulation of ‘risk’ is that it is a function of the probability of an event occurring and the magnitude of the hazard. From the viewpoint of technological optimism and managerialism, the seductiveness of a very low probability often leads people to discount the magnitude of the hazard. This distortion is amplified even further by the fact that the profits of success remain privatised, wheras the responsibility for large-scale hazards is often socialised, with Governments and taxpayers picking up the tab.
Probability and responsibility at Fukushima, Crikey, April 14, 2011 – , by John Hepburn In the long run, the least likely event will occur. Such is the nature of probability, and the nature of risk. Continue reading
1.This month.
Zoom webinar – “Nuclear Winter: The Environmental Consequences of a Nuclear Exchange.”
April 7th at 11:30 am PST / 2:30 pm EST
Nuclear Winter: The Environmental Consequences of a Nuclear Exchange”
Join us for an informative webinar with renowned atmospheric scientist, Professor Brian Toon, as he discusses the environmental risks and global impacts of a nuclear war. Despite the potential damage caused by the blast from even small nuclear weapons, many countries continue to invest in and expand nuclear arsenals. Professor Toon will provide a scientific assessment of civilian fatalities, agricultural failures, climate concerns, and complications with food supply that would follow any international nuclear conflict. We need to plan how to prevent nuclear conflict and avoid catastrophe. Politicians and military planners must be made aware of global climate and agricultural complications that would ensue. Don’t miss this opportunity to learn from, and engage in, this vital conversation
The Road to War brings a sharp focus to why it is not in Australia’s best interest to be dragged into a war with China which will almost inevitably go nuclear very quickly. The filmmaker has interviewed some of Australia’s senior foreign policy analysts who have vast experience behind them in analysing what really is going on here as the United States rattles its sabres with China. And sets us up to be its proxy, like the poor Ukranians have been fed into the Meatgrinder. So America can remain the Top Dog. The Road to War reveals how the United States through its spy base at Pine Gap and by stationing six nuclear capable B52 bombers in the Top End (without permission from the traditional owners) is making Australia a prime nuclear target if the current war of words suddenly melts down into full scale war.
The Road to War shows the implicit connection between Carbon emissions (the US military uses a whopping 70% of America’s annual petroleum to move its armies and vast War Machine around the globe to its 800+ military bases..but under a loophole wangled at Kyoto, the US military does not have to report its C02 annual emissions). The Road to War starts screening at selected cities and regional centres in March. See the trailer end for details.
Antinuclear 