Sorry history of the inadequate clean-up of radioactive Maralinga nuclear bomb test site
“By ploughing soil at Taranaki without first removing contaminated fragments the British failed to achieve a significant reduction in radiological hazard and made the situation more difficult to remedy,”
Under a 1956 agreement, the UK accepted responsibility for cleaning up the site. In a subsequent agreement in 1968, Australia released the UK from that responsibility.
Clean-up work finally started in 1996 and continued to 2000, with the worst-affected area now deemed safe to visit but not for permanent occupancy, including by traditional owners the Maralinga-Tjarutja people who officially got their land back only in 2009.
Aust demands UK pay up for nuclear mess http://www.9news.com.au/national/2016/01/01/00/09/aust-demands-uk-pay-up-for-nuclear-mess In 1990, [Prime Minister] Bob Hawke faced one of his more challenging missions, demanding British PM Margaret Thatcher pay to clean up the God-awful mess left behind when her predecessors let off A-bombs in the outback. Continue reading
Nuclear lobby’s tactics: deny radiation effects, deny Fukushima harm
Denial in the face of evidence has certainly been an effective tool to frustrate worldwide efforts to address Climate Change. Why not attempt the same public relations makeover on radiation?
This new, bold initiative appears to be coming in a two-pronged attack: the first is reviving an already disproved theory that radiation may be ‘good for you’: hormesis.
The second is changing the world’s perception of the Fukushima Daiichi triple meltdown that released and deposited massive amounts of radioactivity in many areas of Japan.
The potential ramifications for public health are huge.
Demystifying Nuclear Power: Problem: In a post-Fukushima-triple-meltdown world, do the numbers work for atomic power? Fairewinds,November 17, 2015 by Sue Prent
With a giant blot still reading over the page of its public safety record, the multi-national, multi-billion dollar atomic power industry faces the stark economic reality that without even more of the regulatory and financial support that it has long enjoyed, it cannot successfully compete financially with sustainable methods electrical generation.
Moreover, these preferential government regulations and incredible financial subsidies from countries around the world are more concerned with maintaining a nuclear energy fleet that in the US has long been tied-up with Defense Department interests, and throughout the world has also been an assured method of access to nuclear weapons.
During the early days of atomic reactors, decommissioning, clean-up and long-term radioactive waste storage were not even acknowledged or planned for, and now they crowd onto center stage as aged and leaking plants line up to speedily shutdown and abandon their overflowing nuclear waste cesspools. In the US, people living near the plants and state governments without regulatory authority over this federal process are stunned to discover the financial burden of underfunded decommissioning funds and inadequate decommissioning procedures that will leave the public facing corporate waste abandonment.
That’s right, here’s the hook: if it weren’t for the scientific consensus view that radiation is harmful, and more radiation is even more harmful, nuclear plants might be a whole lot cheaper to operate.
Talk about your “inconvenient truth!”
Recent developments suggest that the atomic power industry, with cooperation from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), may have come up with a crafty way to make the financial numbers work once again: rehabilitate radiation. Continue reading
Resistance to South Carolina becoming a nuclear dumping ground
Because this waste would be traveling through our state’s ports and on our roads with no option for a final repository, citizens and elected officials can no longer hope that others are thinking about nuclear waste. All South Carolinians must ask their elected leaders why the DOE and the NRC want to fiercely ignore public policies and laws to send commercial waste to SRS.
Don’t let South Carolina become a nuclear dumping ground, Statehouse Report· 12/31/2015 By Julie Hussey and JoAnne Day | Nuclear waste is one of those things most people hope someone else is thinking about. The good news is that for 40 years, members of the League of Women Voters of South Carolina (LWVSC) have been following waste issues at the Savannah River Site (SRS). Recent national and international proposals require all South Carolinians to become informed and take action. Continue reading
USA Nuclear Medicine Industries have strong vested interest in weakening radiation guidelines
Demystifying Nuclear Power: Problem: In a post-Fukushima-triple-meltdown world, do the numbers work for atomic power? Fairewinds,November 17, 2015 by Sue Prent “…..Nuclear medicine interests share some of the existential angst experienced by their atomic energy sector colleagues. So it is not surprising that Carol Marcus Ph.D., M.D. is a professor of Nuclear Medicine at U.C.L.A is one of the petitioners to the NRC to demand that it relax radiation illness standards. Nuclear medicine is where expansion of the development and application of new radiology treatments and specialized equipment represent a huge corporate industrial growth opportunity.
Ms. Marcus and her colleagues have a special interest in countering many medical evaluations and admonitions that are routinely raised by doctors and hospitals around the world about the over-use of radiation for diagnosis and treatment.
Adoption of the hormesis theory of benign radiation would really help the nuclear medicine industry as much as it will help the atomic reactor power industry. In fact, Dr. Marcus’ petition to the NRC seems to equate the fact that radiation can be useful in diagnosis and treatment of cancer with evidence that low-dose radiation is indeed beneficial, in spite of years of data proving that is not true, including the lengthy German study.
To that, one must counter that the benefits brought to cancer treatment by radiation have a very specific tissue-destroying capacity rather than any positive health function. There is no scientifically corroborated benefit for even an extremely low-dose of radiation. Rather than providing any actual proof for her hypothesis, the balance of Dr. Marcus’ petition seems to be filled with complaints detailing how existing radiation protection guidelines hamstring her profession.
The second petition to end LNT, submitted by Certified Health Physicist Mark L. Miller relies heavily on language identical to that of Dr. Marcus, suggesting a collaborative relationship.
The third petition was submitted by a group lead by one of the principle voices supporting the hormesis theory, Mohan Doss Ph.D. His cosigner’s predictably represent atomic corporate interests that have heavily financially invested in the success and expansion of atomic industries.
According to the Fox Chase Cancer Center website, Mr. Doss, who is an MCCPM (Member of the Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine) radiology practice includes
Mr. Doss, who has found a well-spring of opportunity in the convenient meme of hormesis, is quoted along with the other two petitioners in a New York Times article that uses the number of deaths from suicide and accident that have occurred among evacuees from Fukushima evacuation zone as a rallying call……… http://www.fairewinds.org/nuclear-energy-education/demystifying-nuclear-power-problem-in-a-post-fukushima-triple-meltdown-world-do-the-numbers-work-for-atomic-power
America (and Australia) helping India in its nuclear weapons race
Indian Nuclear Program – A global migraine , The Nation Muhammad Umar December 30, 2015 American experts have been incessantly warning their government of the dire consequences of exempting India from the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) requirements. On December 8, while testifying in front of the United States House Committee on Foreign Affairs, the Executive Director of the Nonproliferation Policy Education Center, Henry D. Sokolski said, “The US persuaded the NSG to allow India to import uranium for its civilian nuclear program but, as predicted, this has only allowed India to dedicate more of its meager domestic uranium production to military purposes. India, in short, with the deal now can make more bombs.”
Spread of radioactive material from USA nuclear waste dump
Pollution from the landfill has already been blamed for a sharp increase in the number of cancer cases in the surrounding areas.
Radioactive materials spreading from St. Louis landfill – report 
https://www.rt.com/usa/327593-nuclear-waste-stlouis-runoff/#.VoWKJnujHaY.twitter 31 Dec, 2015 Dangerous radioactive materials from a nuclear waste dump near St. Louis, Missouri have spread to neighboring areas, a new study shows. Storm water runoff from the site has also raised concerns and is being tested for radioactive pollution. Continue reading
1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 