Iraqi children with congenital disabilities caused by depleted uranium
Iraqi Kids Test Positive for Depleted Uranium Remnants Near Former US Air Base, https://truthout.org/articles/iraqi-children-test-positive-for-depleted-uranium-near-former-us-air-base/Mike Ludwig, September 19, 2019 For the first time, independent researchers have found that the bodies of Iraqi children born with congenital disabilities, such as heart disease and malformed limbs, near a former United States air base in southern Iraq are contaminated with high levels of radioactive heavy metals associated with toxic depleted uranium pollution leftover from the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.
The findings appear to bolster claims made by Iraqi doctors who observed high rates of congenital disabilities in babies born in areas that experienced heavy fighting during the bloody first year of the most recent Iraq war.
In 2016, researchers tested the hair and teeth of children from villages in proximity to the Talil Air Base, a former U.S. air base, located south of Baghdad and near the city Nasiriyah. They found elevated levels of uranium and of thorium, two slightly radioactive heavy metals linked to cancer and used to make nuclear fuel.
Thorium is a direct decay product of depleted uranium, a chemically toxic byproduct of the nuclear power industry that was added to weapons used during the first year of the war in Iraq. Thanks to its high density, depleted uranium can reinforce tank armor and allow bullets and other munitions to penetrate armored vehicles and other heavy defenses. Depleted uranium was also released into the environment from trash dumps and burn pits outside U.S. military bases.
Mozhgan Savabieasfahani, an independent researcher based in Michigan and a co-author of the study, said that levels of thorium in children born with congenital disabilities near the Talil Air Base were up to 28 times higher than in a control group of children who were born without congenital disabilities and live much further away.
“We are basically seeing a depleted uranium footprint on these children,” Savabieasfahani said in an interview.
Using statistical analysis, the researchers also determined that living near the air base was associated with an increased risk of giving birth to a child with congenital disabilities, including congenital heart disease, spinal deformations, cleft lip and missing or malformed and paralyzed limbs. The results of the study will soon be published in the journal Environmental Pollution, where the authors argue more research is needed to determine the extent that toxins left behind after the U.S.-led war and occupation are continuing to contaminate and sicken the Iraqi population.
For years following the 2003 U.S-led invasion, Iraqi doctors raised alarms about increasing numbers of babies being born with congenital disabilities in areas of heavy fighting. Other peer-reviewed studies found dramatic increases in child cancer, leukemia, miscarriages and infant mortality in cities such as Fallujah, which saw the largest battles of the war. Scientists, Iraqi physicians and international observers have long suspected depleted uranium to be the culprit. In 2014, one Iraqi doctor told Truthout reporter Dahr Jamail that depleted uranium pollution amounted to “genocide.”
The U.S. government provided Iraq’s health ministry with data to track depleted uranium contamination but has said it would be impossible to identify all the material used during wartime. War leaves behind a variety of potentially toxic pollutants, and some researchers have cast doubt on the connection between depleted uranium and congenital disabilities, noting that Iraq has faced a number environmental problems in recent decades. However, political manipulation was suspected to have skewed results of at least one study, a survey of congenital disabilities released by the World Health Organization and the Iraqi government in 2013 that contradicted claims made by Iraqi doctors.
While the authors caution that more research is needed, by identifying the presence of thorium in the teeth and hair of Iraqi children born with congenital disabilities near the Talil Air Base, the latest studies draw direct links to depleted uranium and the U.S. military.
“Baby teeth are highly sensitive to environmental exposures,” said Savabieasfahani. “Such high levels of thorium simply suggest high exposure at an early age and potentially in utero.”
Up to 2,000 metric tons of depleted uranium entered the Iraqi environment in 2003, mostly from thousands of rounds fired by the U.S., according to United Nations estimates. Depleted uranium munitions were also fired by U.S. forces in Iraq, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia during the Persian Gulf War in 1993. Researchers and veterans have long suspected that depleted uranium could be a potential cause of Gulf War syndrome, a wide range of harmful symptoms experienced by thousands of service members for years after the war.
The U.S. has also imported thousands of tons of military equipment into Iraq, including tanks, trucks, bombers, armored vehicles, infantry weapons, antiaircraft systems, artillery and mortars – some of which were coated with depleted uranium. Much of this equipment eventually found its way into military junkyards, dozens of which remain scattered near former U.S. military bases and other installations across country.
Depleted uranium was also stored at U.S. military bases and was known to leak into the environment. The Talil Air Base, which served as a focal point for the new study, is only one of dozens of sites across Iraq where the U.S. military is believed to have left a highly toxic legacy.
“What we see here, and what we imply with this study, is that we could see this very same scenario around every single U.S. military base in Iraq,” Savabieasfahani said. “The exposure of pregnant mothers to the pollutions of war, including uranium and thorium, irreversibly damages their unborn children.”
In 2013, international observers reported that between 300 and 365 sites with depleted uranium contamination were identified by Iraqi authorities in the years following the 2003 U.S. invasion, with an estimated cleanup cost of $30 million to $45 million. In some cases, military junk contaminated with depleted uranium was being sold as scrap metal, spreading the contamination further. At one scrap site, children were seen climbing and playing on contaminated scrap metal.
Savabieasfahani, who has researched military pollution across Iraq, said the violence of war continues through pollution long after the carnage ends and the troops come home. Dropping tons of bombs and releasing millions of bullets leaves toxic residues in the air, water and soil of the “targeted population,” poisoning the landscape – and the people — for generations. Of course, U.S. war making in Iraq has not ended. The U.S. military continues to train Iraqi security forces and lead a coalition that carried out airstrikes against ISIS (also known as Daesh) insurgents in Iraq as recently as last week.
“The U.S. must be held responsible and forced to clean up all the sites which it has polluted. Technology exists for the cleanup of radiation contamination,” Savabieasfahani said. “The removal and disposal of U.S.-created military junkyards would go a long way toward cleaning toxic releases out of the Iraqi environment.”
The U.N. Internal Law Commission is currently circulating 24 draft principles urging governments to protect the environment from the ravages of war. In July, an international group of scientists renewed calls for a Fifth Geneva Convention that would establish an international treaty declaring environmental destruction a war crime under international law. While a Fifth Geneva convention on environmental war crimes would be significant, it would not ensure accountability for the U.S., which routinely shields itself from international prosecution for its war crimes.
Imperial Visits: US Emissaries in the Pacific
Australian Independent Media Binoy Kampmark 19 Mar 23
For some time, Washington has been losing its spunk in the Pacific. When it comes to the Pacific Islands, a number have not fallen – at least entirely – for the rhetoric that Beijing is there to take, consume, and dominate all. Nor have such countries been entirely blind to their own sharpened interests. This largely aqueous region, which promises to submerge them in the rising waters of climate change, has become furiously busy.
A number of officials are keen to push the line that Washington’s policy towards the Pacific is clearly back where it should be. It’s all part of the warming strategy adopted by the Biden administration, typified by the US-Pacific Island Country summit held last September. In remarks made during the summit, President Joe Biden stated that “the security of America, quite frankly, and the world, depends on your security and the security of the Pacific Islands. And I really mean that.”
Not once was China mentioned, but its ghostly presence stalked Biden’s words. A new Pacific Partnership Strategy was announced, “the first national US strategy for [the] Pacific Islands.” Then came the promised cash: some $810 million in expanded US programs including more than $130 million in new investments to support, among other things, climate resilience, buffer the states against the impact of climate change and improve food security.
The Pacific Islands have also seen a flurry of recent visits. In January this year, US Indo-Pacific military commander Admiral John Aquilino popped into Papua New Guinea to remind the good citizens of Port Moresby that the eyes of the US were gazing benignly upon them. It was his first to the country, and the public affairs unit of the US Indo-Pacific Command stated that it underscored “the importance of the US-Papua New Guinea relationship” and showed US resolve “toward building a more peaceful, stable, and prosperous Indo-Pacific region.”
In February, a rather obvious strategic point was made in the reopening of the US embassy in the Solomon Islands. Little interest had been shown towards the island state for some three decades (the embassy had been closed in 1993). But then came Beijing doing, at least from Washington’s perspective, the unpardonable thing of poking around and seeking influence.
Now, Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare finds himself at the centre of much interest, at least till he falls out of favour in the airconditioned corridors of Washington………………………………………………………………………………………….. https://theaimn.com/imperial-visits-us-emissaries-in-the-pacific/
TODAY. Two ways of looking at the world
There is certainly a transformation going on in the media. As far as news media goes, there’s a growing chasm between the “mainstream” corporate media, and the “alternative” media.
To give the most topical example – the coverage of the Ukraine war, by the Western media. The permitted themes are – “atrocities by Russians” “Ukraine is winning”, “Zelensky is a hero”. Any more nuanced views (e.g atrocities by Ukrainians) are covered only by the alternative media.
We see and hear only the big guys (and believe me, they’re very much the guys – though wherever possible they push attractive younger women to the forefront). The result is a glorification of big corporate, military, technical, ways to deal with problems, as against more low-key approaches – stuff like negotiation, compromise, diplomacy.
This gulf is happening also in education. Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics, are now not just very important (which they are), but are now accepted as pretty much the only subjects that matter. The sissy stuff – languages, literature, art, history – are now second-rate studies.
There is a trend now, for people to distrust the corporate media, because it is too close to government, the military, and industry.
Meanwhile, alternative media of all kinds are multiplying. In amongst all this, are the voices of the “smaller” people – women, indigenous , old, young – keeping alive the culture of art, humanity, hope and peace. This alternative culture is surely what we need, rather than the pompous chest-thumping of the world’s political, military, corporate, financial and media leaders.
Nuclear safety agency silent on disposal of AUKUS radioactive waste
By Brian TooheyMar 21, 2023 https://johnmenadue.com/nuclear-safety-agency-silent-on-disposal-of-aukus-radioactive-waste/
At this stage there is little interest in how to dispose of the high level uranium waste from AUKUS SSNs, let alone put First Nations voices to the fore.
This is unlikely to change while the nation’s most prominent journalists see it as their job to promote the dominant military doctrine and boost the demonisation of China, while rubbishing inconvenient interlopers such as the former prime minister Paul Keating.
I recently asked Australia’s principal nuclear safety organisation, the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Agency (ARPANSA), “What’s required to safely dispose of highly enriched uranium (over 90%) and for how long e.g. in stable underground rock formation?” Not a hard question you might suppose. However, the media officer replied, “ARPANSA is unable to provide a response in this instance”.
I then asked without success, “Why not?” This is a timid answer from an organisation supposed to provide the public and others accurate information on big issues in its field.
My question followed the defence minister Richard Marles’ announcement that Australia will take all the nuclear waste generated by the reactors in its newly acquired nuclear submarines which use highly enriched, weapons grade, uranium. Marles’ statement that the uranium waste would be kept “on” defence land shows he lacks a grip of what’s involved.
He’s not dealing with low-grade radioactive hospital waste that can be stored on the surface. At a minimum, the reactor waste will have to be kept deep underground, probably vitrified, and guarded for centuries. Marles says nothing needs to be done for 50 years. This will not be the case if Australia initially gets three to five second-hand US submarines whose high level waste will need to be dealt with much sooner.
Despite the US and the UK’s long experience with nuclear weapons, neither has a high-level underground nuclear waste repository. In these circumstances, Australia could easily be pressured into securing the waste created by the US and UK submarines’ nuclear reactors.
At this stage, it seems likely the burial site will be on land important to Australia’s indigenous population. Whatever happens, it is essential there is no repeat of the neglect of the indigenous people who were wilfully exposed to radiation during and after the British nuclear tests in the 1950s and 60s in Australia’s south and central desert areas. The case for getting nuclear submarines is already bad. They should be ruled out entirely if the indigenous population rejects the proposed waste burial sites, which need to be identified urgently, rather than at Marles’ leisurely timetable.
At this stage there is little interest in how to dispose of the high level uranium waste, let alone put indigenous inhabitants to the fore. This is unlikely to change while the nation’s most prominent journalists see it as their job to promote the dominant military doctrine and boost the demonisation of China, while rubbishing inconvenient interlopers such as the former prime minister Paul Keating. It doesn’t help either that they some are largely ignorant of the issues.
Many journalists put great faith in intelligence briefings from right wing ideologues and others about the alleged threat from China. They claim Keating can’t say anything of value because he hasn’t received an intelligence briefing in decades. On the contrary, this is a distinct advantage.
Keating’s detractors need to pay a lot more attention to the role intelligence played in the illegal invasion of Iraq. The recent 20th anniversary of the invasion, led by George Bush, Tony Blair and John Howard, received little attention in Australia. This act of aggression was justified by concocted intelligence. Howard falsely claimed that at the time of the invasion his government “knew” Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. Thanks largely to the much-disparaged weapons inspectors, Iraq certainly didn’t have any. Yet Howard falsely said they did and were “capable of causing destruction on a mammoth scale”.
Many Australian journalists now rely on purported intelligence and propaganda for their flimsy claims about Chinese acts of aggression, which barely rank alongside the death and destruction wrought by the US aided by Australia. Chinese journalists also rely excessively on government sources, but have almost no influence in Australia.
The White House, for example, engaged in a blatant act of propaganda when unveiling the plan for Australia to get nuclear submarines. It claimed, “For over 60 years, the UK and the US have operated more than 500 naval nuclear reactors . . . without incident or adverse effect on human health or the quality of the environment.” In fact, two US nuclear submarines, the Thresher and the Scorpion, sunk during that period with the loss of all lives on board. Mainstream Australian journalists have not treated this as a staggering falsehood that should be condemned.
Mainstream journalists also have little grasp of other issues involving submarines. One recently claimed that Keating, who opposes Australia buying nuclear submarines, didn’t understand that conventional submarines have to go close to the surface to recharge their diesels by what’s called a “snorting”, a process, where they risk detection. This journalist seemed to have no awareness that modern conventional submarines greatly reduce this risk with Air Independent Propulsion, which uses hydrogen fuel cells to operate extremely quietly for at least three weeks. Using modern batteries can provide another three weeks, or more, of silent operation before charging the batteries in a safe location. They are also much cheaper than nuclear submarines which are detectable from a range of sources, including heat and the wake they leave on the surface at high speed. By the time Australia’s new nuclear submarines arrive around 2050 there is a high chance that advances in sensor technology and computing power will make them relatively easy to detect and destroy.
Although the public currently likes the idea of getting nuclear submarines, it doesn’t like the cost which Marles puts at $268 billion to $368 billion by 2055. The public may like it even less if they realise that the Virginia Class submarines of which we are still get up to five, have an appalling maintenance record. If we got eight, as originally intended, only two would be operationally available on average. Paying $368 billion to have two operationally available would be a scandalous result. Modern conventional submarines, such as German ones, have an exemplary maintenance record and cost about $15 billion for ten.
Australia’s oldest gas power company urges customers to go electric — RenewEconomy
AGL Energy has launched a website to simplify the process of quitting gas and accessing the benefits of a more electric and energy efficient home. The post Australia’s oldest gas power company urges customers to go electric appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Australia’s oldest gas power company urges customers to go electric — RenewEconomy
UN calls on OECD nations to quit coal by 2030, reach net zero by 2040 — RenewEconomy
In case they missed the message from the IPCC, UN chief delivers the cold hard facts on climate and fossil fuels, and calls for a Solidarity Pact. Who’s in? The post UN calls on OECD nations to quit coal by 2030, reach net zero by 2040 appeared first on RenewEconomy.
UN calls on OECD nations to quit coal by 2030, reach net zero by 2040 — RenewEconomy
Ray Tauss Submission – for health, safety, and future generations’ well-being – Australia’s nuclear bans should NOT be repealed
Submission No 67 to: Committee Secretary, Senate Standing Committees on Environment and
Communications Re: Senate inquiry into nuclear power
Nuclear power begins with uranium mining
Nuclear power generation uses uranium. Mining of uranium produces wastes. Wastes can be used for the
extraction of radioactive material. 300,000 years is how long the wastes must be safeguarded before they can be relatively safe for fauna and people. The wastes need to be safeguarded against emitting radiation to the
atmosphere and environment, and safeguarded against theft and safeguarded against being used for terrorism
and safeguarded against war.
Nuclear power plants
Nuclear power plants are vulnerable to sabotage, bombing, implosion, explosion, fire, loss of coolant, earthquake and asteroid impact.
I submit that neither nuclear power nor other nuclear energy should be produced or used in Australia.
Personnel working or volunteering in the nuclear sector
Workers in the nuclear industry (including mining radioactive ores, mining waste storage, nuclear power plant
products and radioactive wastes) are subject to corruption, dishonesty, bribery, persuasion, blackmail and illegal dealings. Any single one of these attributes compromises the safety of a nuclear plant, and compromises the integrity of protection from misuse of nuclear waste products.
I submit that removal of prohibitions on production of nuclear energy is deleterious to safe and healthy futures for people in Australia in this century and beyond and that prohibitions on production of nuclear energy must be maintained.
Management of wastes from nuclear power production
Nuclear wastes are subject to use in terrorist acts, in war, and in the production of energy and other outputs.
Nuclear wastes impose high storage and safe maintenance costs on the country where the wastes are. Wastes
from nuclear power production need to be guarded for some 300,000 years. Wastes carry the potential for
accidental and deliberate acts that can have catastrophic outcomes on human health, environmental health, and
public and private infrastructure.
I submit that hazards and risks associated with nuclear wastes would be exacerbated by production of nuclear
power in Australia and that those hazards and risks should be avoided by maintaining a total prohibition on
production of nuclear energy in Australia. I also submit that nuclear power should be prohibited in any country,
land area, sea area and terrestrial or non-terrestrial air space controlled or owned by Australia.
Risk to future generations
Radioactive products from mining of radioactive and uranium ores, and products of nuclear power generation
retain radioactivity at levels unsafe for human health as well as for human and animal environments for some
300,000 years. Dealing, storing, and safeguarding those ores, ore products, and the wastes from nuclear power
production will confer risks and costs on future generations of people and those hazards, costs, health and
environmental risks would be an wholly unreasonable imposition of all current and future generations.
I submit that the hazards, risks and safety costs imposed on future generations by any removal of prohibitions on nuclear energy creation and production would be unreasonable and inequitable for all future generations of
people.
I submit that the following Sections of the Australian Radiation Protection and Nuclear Safety Act 1998 should not be repealed:
Section 10
I submit that the following parts or Sections of the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 should not be repealed:
Section 37J
Section 140A
Section 146M
Paragraph 305(2)(d) https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Environment_and_Communications/Nuclearprohibitions/Submission
Greg Chapman Submission – Nuclear power is dirty and its fallout lasts forever.
Submission no 66. To Senate Estimates Committee against Environment and Other Legislation Amendment (Removing Nuclear Energy Prohibitions) Bill 2022
How many times do we have to remind ultra-conservative politicians that Australia doesn’t
need or want nuclear power stations or nuclear powered war machines?
Australia has more than enough sustainable renewable energy without having to resort to
dangerous and world-shattering atomic energy.
I live near Darwin River Dam – the water supply for Darwin. On the other side of the Dam is
Rum Jungle Uranium site. It is still radioactive after hundreds of millions of dollars of
remediation since it closed in 1971. Darwin Dam water is tested daily before it reaches city
taps. My bore water is never tested. Over 17,000 people down here have untested water
bores. I’ve had friends who died from unexplained cancers. This is the legacy of being
colonised by the UK and US for their militaries to make nuclear weapons.
Australia has several nuclear bomb testing sites still giving off high levels of radioactivity
because of our unequal ‘alliances’ with the UK and US.
Why does it seem to be that these ultra-conservatives want to make us part of the nuclear
industry and lobby for ‘clean’ nuclear energy when Australian governments make
arrangements with the UK/US to buy nuclear submarines and house B52s with nuclear
weapon capabilities?
Nuclear power is not clean or sustainable. It’s dirty and its fallout lasts forever.
Let’s say we agree to have nuclear energy. We would need to:
Consult fairly, openly and accountably with individuals and communities likely to be
affected;
Arrange constantly assessed assurance and insurance agreements locally, nationally
and internationally – including jurisdictional arrangements between the
Commonwealth and states/territories;
Provide occupational health and safety to a yet to be trained Australian workforce and
educate workers and their families on the dangers of reactor workers taking work
home;
Australia can’t depend on overseas workers to fill highly sophisticated scientific and
technical officer jobs. After 40 years of educational neglect, we can’t rely on other
countries to supply such employment skills and needs;
Have highly secure sites for nuclear facilities;
Allocate huge amounts of water for cooling and preventing meltdown;
Connect power infrastructure to the grid without jeopardising other energy
infrastructure;
Provide extremely safe transport for nuclear materials with warnings and signs
everywhere possible on the transport vehicles and roads used;
Safely decommission reactors – also requiring a huge, well-trained workforce and a
huge and well-trained public service to oversee this;
Be able to do what no other nuclear nation has yet done: safely manage and store
nuclear waste for thousands of years, and
Reassure our non-nuclear neighbours
Australia has colonised and ignored the basic needs and communal responsibilities of our
first nation people – as well as making war on other nations not toeing our white, mainstream
liberal dream of private, individual ownership. Can we really be trusted to use nuclear energy
for the social good of the world? How do we reconcile commissioning volatile reactor
stations in a highly unpredictable atmosphere of climate change? Will another Chenobyl help
us achieve a circular economy and zero waste in the near future – or ever?
Where we even put these monsters? Not in my backyard – that’s for sure! https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Environment_and_Communications/Nuclearprohibitions/Submission
Nuclear power costs prohibitive
Michael Chamley, The Entrance MARCH 21, 2023 https://coastcommunitynews.com.au/central-coast/news/2023/03/nuclear-power-costs-prohibitive/
It seems any mention of cheap, clean renewables gets the dander up some areas, whether they be advocates for more coal and gas burning or, over the past two Forums, nuclear power plants.
Had Blind Freddy (hereafter “Fred”) been able to see, he could have referred his fellow acolytes to the failure of nuclear power plants at Three Mile Island in the USA, Chernobyl in the Ukraine and Fukushima in Japan, all frightful results.
However, almost as frightening is the misinformation these Forum inputs contained about the general use of nuclear power.
Firstly, generating costs: The UK has nine operational nuclear power plants, and 11,000 offshore wind turbines (not a reliable comparison place for solar).
In 2021 the cost per MW hour for wind generation was 37 pounds (A$67); the cost to generate a MW hour of electricity using nuclear was 100 pounds (A$181).
Cost to build: The UK’s latest nuclear power plant; Hinkley Point C; remains incomplete having started construction in 2017, with completion expected (after delays) in 2028.
The cost to date has been 32.7 billion pounds (A$67B), with costs having risen from the initial cost of 22 billion pounds (A$40B).
In the UK experts on energy are saying this station will produce the most expensive UK electricity ever.
Further, there is the added necessity for the power plants to be shut down for maintenance for extended periods. sometimes one-two weeks or more, when their generating capacity is offline, much like coal and gas generators now.
Of course the letters did not include this in their analysis of “intermittency”.
Large wind/solar farms are constructed in two-three years and wind farms cost $2-4M per MW hours.
I also refer Fred to the 2021-2022 Gencost report completed by the CSIRO and AEMO.
In it they stated that wind and solar was the cheapest form of electricity generation (as anyone with rooftop PV will attest), even when taking into account costs associated with storage (batteries or pumped hydro) and related transmission upgrade costs.
The cost of nuclear power would be the most expensive form of power at $16,000 per KwH to produce (Small modular reactors SMR’s Gencost report), with wind and solar under $2000 per KwH.
One of the parties at the coming election is advocating SMR’s for a street near you.
Gencost stated of SMR’s: “Following extensive consultation with the Australian electricity industry, report findings do not see any prospect of domestic projects this decade, given the technology’s commercial immaturity and high cost.
“Future cost reductions are possible but depend on its successful commercial deployment overseas.”
By that time, Australia will be powered by renewables by a mixture of wind, solar, pumped hydro/storage, hydro electric and battery storage – all clean, all sustainable and no radioactive byproducts to dispose of.
Judy Schneider Submission – keep Australia’s nuclear bans, use renewables, including tidal energy
Environment and Other Legislation Amendment (Removing Nuclear Energy Prohibitions) Bill 2022
Submission 70
I wish to make a submission re lifting the ban on creating energy from nuclear sources.
Fortunately, we have not had a long history of nuclear production or disasters.
The ban on nuclear energy production was a great step forward in making Australia safe from impacts of another disaster.
Sure, we need more renewable energy resources and speed up our transition to less climate destroying fossil fuels. Some countries use biomass energy, but that creates pollution too.
Why don’t we use water – “our home is girt by sea”.
Tidal energy is a renewable energy powered by the natural rise and fall of ocean tides and currents. Some of these technologies include turbines and paddles. Tidal energy is produced by the surge of ocean waters during the rise and fall of tides. Tidal energy is a renewable source of energy.
Of course, such tidal plants would need to be constructed away from marine migration areas.
Australia has had problems in the past, e.g. Maralinga and where to dispose of https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Environment_and_Communications/Nuclearprohibitions/Submission
Researchers urge mandatory scheme to ensure solar panels are recycled — RenewEconomy
New study calls for comprehensive “product stewardship scheme” for solar panels, that puts whole-of-life responsibility on shoulders of the producer. The post Researchers urge mandatory scheme to ensure solar panels are recycled appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Researchers urge mandatory scheme to ensure solar panels are recycled — RenewEconomy
This week’s nuclear news
A bit of good news Sir David Attenborough urges people to unite to save ‘nature in crisis’
Premiere of this so timely movie –
The Road to War – new film premiering in Australia is just so very timely – as Australia is currently foremost in nuclear news. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEU02LTJBxI&t=6s
World premiere– Melbourne at 6.30pm on 22 March at the Nova in Carlton. Then in Hobart on 23 March (not 24th as stated in trailer) at the State Cinema . Q & A panel with Bradbury and special guest, Bob Brown. Capri Theatre in Adelaide 29 March. Other cities and regional centres yet to be announced.
Christina notes. Australia’s splendid nuclear submarine goat rodeo – funny, but it’s really serious. Isn’t it wonderful how the men in opposing political parties can unite in hate and belligerence? Nuclear wastes 30 years away. So -no problem for present decision-makers – happily superannuated when the shit hits the fan.
AUSTRALIA.What the nuclear-powered submarine deal really means. Editorial Geppetto logic. AUKUS subs deal binds us to a country that can change its mind on whim. Port Kembla a nuclear submarine hub? Not such a great idea! Australian Strategic Policy Institute among the group of crooked “Think Tanks” funded by weapons companies in order to promote war. Sub-standard: AUKUS plan means more risks for Australia. Australian nuclear submarine program to cost up to $368b as AUKUS details unveiled in the US. Uncle Sam, can you target my Tomahawk, please?.
Australia hasn’t figured out low-level nuclear waste storage yet – let alone high-level waste from submarines. Australia news live: Aukus subs deal includes commitment to dispose of nuclear waste; Greens say plan is ‘mortgaging our future’. Nuclear dump to be built on Defence land. Labor Premiers’ dispute over location for AUKUS nuclear wastes, – but planned Kimba waste dump is”now dead in the water”? ‘Send it to Woomera’: Premier McGowan cold on nuclear waste being stored in Western Australia. Spent Matters: The AUKUS Nuclear Waste Problem. Aukus nuclear submarine deal loophole prompts proliferation fears. Porky pies and half-truths from our USA- captured Prime Minister Albanese . Are these wildly expensive nuclear-powered submarines really in Australia’s best interests? Paul Keating savages AUKUS nuclear submarine deal as Labor’s worst since conscription in World War 1. Why is the Labor government determined to silence the Barngarla people, at the same time as Labor promotes the indigenous Voice to Parliament ?.
CLIMATE. Wiped out: Scientist’s ‘gigantic tsunami’ warning signals ‘grave threat’ to Sizewell C.. UN Secretary-General’s video message to the 58th Session of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
CULTURE. Permission to speak?– Who gets to talk about nuclear power should not be controlled by the nuclear lobby
ECONOMICS. Despite UK government’s enthusiasm, nuclear power is just not a good investment. UK government is urged to “come clean” over the real cost of Sizewell C nuclear power station . EDF confirms nuclear power target for 2023, despite corrosion problems, and plummeting output in 2022.
A $18 million a job? The AUKUS subs plan will cost Australia way more than that. Australia’s Productivity Commission casts doubt on the federal government’s decision to build nuclear-powered submarines.
ETHICS and RELIGION. Grief – Japan marks 12 years since Fukushima nuclear disaster as concerns grow over treated radioactive water release.
ENERGY. Taiwan phasing out nuclear power.
ENVIRONMENT. Campaigners claim permit change at Hinkley Point would kill billions of fish. UK Chancellor Jeremy Hunt wants nuclear power classified as ‘environmentally sustainable’ . But is it?
HEALTH. Life on a nuclear submarine takes its toll.
MEDIA. “Atomic Bamboozle” Probes False Hopes for the Future of Nuclear Power. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUsPt_xUt7I
NUCLEAR TECHNOLOGY. Britain does not have the capacity to support Australia’s plan to build its own nuclear submarine fleet – Rear Admiral. Transparent oceans – Technologies for detection of nuclear submarines will still be all too successful by 2050. Georgia’s big new nuclear reactors could be the ‘last built in the US‘ . World’s largest nuclear fusion reactor promises clean energy, but the challenges are huge.
OPPOSITION to NUCLEAR. Japanese students’ nuclear abolition petition tops 2.5 million signatures. New Mexico says no to storing spent nuclear fuel as Biden touts nuclear energy: ‘The trouble is this is a forever decision’.
POLITICS.
- Fukushima victims feel left out.
- UK political row over ‘expensive and unnecessary ‘ spending on nuclear power stations. UK Chancellor Jeremy Hunt accused of ‘£20bn gamble’ on nuclear energy and carbon capture . UK Chancellor blocks cheap renewable energy , while promoting expensive nuclear power. Scotland’s not-so-Green Freeports: Minister’s equivocal response leaves way open to nuclear manufacturing facility. Sizewell C nuclear plan slammed, despite the UK government’s greenwashing.
- Illinois grapples with the future of nuclear power.
- Ukraine aims to produce full cycle of nuclear nuclear fuel production by 2026, exports to follow.
- The AUKUS nuclear deal “stinks” – Australia’s former environment minister Peter Garret.
POLITICS INTERNATIONAL and DIPLOMACY.
- Nuclear power eliminated from European Commission’s text on funding rules, amid heated disagreements between Europe’s nations.
- Changing dynamics of US nuclear alliances, and a brazen violation of the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty. Watchdog Rafael Grossi pledges ‘demanding’ oversight of nuclear sub deal. Aukus nuclear submarine deal will be ‘too big to fail’, Richard Marles says. AUKUS nuclear submarine plan brings danger as it uses a loophole in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Chinese official asks if Australia’s Aukus nuclear submarines intended for ‘sightseeing’. Australia needs to rethink plan to buy nuclear submarines.
- Sociologist urges Japan to stop perpetuating nuclear colonialism.
- Saudi crown prince is plotting to get US nuclear secrets by playing the White House, Russia, and China off against each other, report says.
PUBLIC OPINION. Something Is Missing From Americans’ Greatest Fears. It’s the Bomb..
SAFETY. Incident. 400,000 gallons of radioactive water leaked from a nuclear plant in Minnesota.
SECRETS and LIES. Libyan general says uranium reported missing by UN nuclear watchdog IAEA has been recovered. Tons of uranium missing from Libyan site, UN nuclear watchdog tells member states. Alarm over 10 drums of uranium missing in Libya.
SPINBUSTER. SIX WAR MONGERING THINK TANKS AND THE MILITARY CONTRACTORS THAT FUND THEM. Lesson from Fukushima: Collusion in the nuclear domain. “Great British Nuclear” launch – an eccentric fraud by the UK government.
WASTES. The (Vancouver) Columbian Editorial Board: Congress must recognize urgency at Hanford. Dumping Fukushima contaminated water is a “cheap and dirty” approach that must be stopped.
From the archives. No country in the world has worked out what to do with its old dead, radioactive, nuclear submarines. UK’s costly struggle to deal with dead nuclear submarines. The daunting, long and untested effort to deal with UK’s dead nuclear submarines. What to do with dead nuclear submarines? A cautionary tale for Australia.
WAR and CONFLICT. Some countries plan to decentralize control of nuclear weapons in a crisis. Here’s why that’s dangerous. Seymour Hersh warns of potential US plan B in Ukraine. U.S. Army launches new headquarters in Poland . North Korea’s Kim led drills ‘simulating nuclear counterattack.’
Spectre of Maralinga hangs over Aukus nuclear waste for Indigenous communities
Sarah Collard and Donna LuSun 19 Mar 2023 https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2023/mar/19/spectre-of-maralinga-hangs-over-aukus-nuclear-waste-for-indigenous-communities
Behind all the pomp of the Aukus submarine deal in San Diego there was a detail that could prove a much bigger obstacle than even the massive USS Missouri moored near the three leaders. Under the agreement, Australia will be responsible for storing high-level nuclear waste from the decommissioned reactors.
And that is no easy feat. The US and UK naval reactors that will power both the Virginia-class subs and the future SSN-Aukus boats are fuelled by highly enriched uranium-235.
Once removed and decommissioned, any spent fuel from naval reactors is usually reprocessed to extract usable nuclear fuel for civilian generation and the remaining radioactive waste concentrated. The Australian government has promised not to reprocess spent fuel, which means it will probably be sent offshore.
Overseas, the process typically involves extracting usable fuel such as uranium and plutonium, and then vitrification, in which radioactive waste is concentrated and melted down into a “big glass block” weighing tonnes, according to Dr Patrick Burr, a senior lecturer in nuclear engineering at the University of New South Wales. “It’s actually a very small volume, but it is extremely radioactive,” he said.
After this complicated and hugely expensive process has been completed, there remains one big question – where will this waste be stored?
Nuclear reactor fuel yields high-level waste, which is not only more radioactive. “When you have high-level waste, it is actually physically hot, so [you] need to think about thermal management as well,” Burr said.
As some experts have pointed out, Australia has not even found a permanent site to store low-level nuclear waste, let alone highly radioactive waste.
So far, the government has not given any details on that other than the defence minister, Richard Marles, saying it will be on land that is either owned by the defence department or to be acquired in future. Marles also said this won’t need to be solved until well into the 2050s.
But that is not enough to satisfy many Indigenous communities, who fear the prospect of high-level nuclear waste dumps on traditional lands, and for whom the spectre of British nuclear testing in the 1950s and 60s still looms large.
In South Australia’s Eyre Peninsula region, a proposed storage facility near Kimba for low-level nuclear waste has faced staunch opposition from traditional owners, as well as environmentalists and farmers, despite a ballot supported by about 60% of residents conducted by the Australian Electoral Commission.
The Barngarla Determination Aboriginal Corporation chair, Jason Bilney, said the Barngarla people had not been consulted, opposed the plan and had been in a legal battle with the federal government against the proposal.
He said he believed any storage of high-level nuclear waste would not be suitable in that area given the lack of granite and rock to hold the toxic waste, which could take hundreds of thousands of years to break down. “The ground is dirt,” he said. “High-level stuff needs to be stored and contained within the solid rock formation and Kimba doesn’t have that.”
Bilney said many traditional owners in the region had a deep distrust and fear of defence testing and nuclear waste after the nuclear weapons testing conducted by the UK in Maralinga.
The tests caused many of the local Anangu Pitjantjatjara people to suffer from radioactive illnesses, with elders and family sickened and the land contaminated.
Bilney said his grandfather, who was from the Maralinga area, always remembered the trauma and the fear, which has continued through the generations.
“That’s why I’m so strong and so passionate about being an advocate for my people and all Indigenous people,” he said.
“There is still a big fear that that could happen again … It’s that generational effect and even now people are still passing away of cancers.”
Bilney said while the bomb testing was not the same as storage of high-powered uranium rods, that fear remains.
“It’s that generational effect. It’s people just dying from the effects of the atomic bomb and still suffering trauma. This is going to be stored into the earth. It’s going to destroy our way of life for us.”
He said there was a real concern that storage of nuclear waste on traditional lands and any restrictions on access could harm the cultural and spiritual knowledge that had been passed down for thousands of generations.
“It’s our biggest worry. We are the oldest culture for over 60,000 years and this is going to outlast it.
“We want to pass down to the next generation and to continue this for decades to come to protect and preserve our sites and our storylines and that connection to country. And if they put it on country, we won’t be able to share that and we will lose those storylines. It will sever those ties.”
One possible location could be a defence site within the Woomera region, an area spanning 122,000 sq km about 450km north-west of Adelaide. The area has long been used for nuclear testing and as a military base.
The Woomera prohibited area takes in the traditional lands the Maralinga Tjarutja and Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yunkunytjatjara, as well as the Antakirinja Matu-Yankunytjatjara, Arabana and Kokatha.
A Kokatha traditional owner and senior lawman, Andrew Starkey, said their traditional lands took in huge swathes from Ceduna to Woomera but that was not recognised by native title.
“Our country is a huge bit of South Australia,” he said. “It starts from the Port Augusta region up to Woomera, around to Coober Pedy and through Tallaringa down around to the west coast, back around through to Whyalla – that’s traditionally Kokatha country.
“Having to fight 20 years to be recognised over a piece of country that’s now going to be targeted to be used as a radioactive waste dump, we’re very concerned about this.”
He said he was strongly against any proposed nuclear waste storage facility in any defence site in his traditional homelands.
“We don’t want it and anyone with any common sense is going to say the same thing. We don’t want that in our back yard.”
He said there were still defence testing sites in the remote desert, with unexploded ordinances, rockets and materials dating back decades – in 2021 an unexploded rocket was found near Lake Hart, a culturally significant site.
“There’s a lot of historic waste that’s still lying around in the Woomera area from the very early days of when they were testing things. It’s bad enough that when we go out to our sites that we’ve got to dodge missiles that are lying around on our heritage sites.”
The federal government has been contacted for response.
$18 million a job? The AUKUS subs plan will cost Australia way more than that
The cost could come in below $300 billion, or easily approach $500 billion.
a large element of old-fashioned pork-barrelling involved.
war with China in the next few years (over Taiwan) isn’t a persuasive argument for submarines that won’t be delivered until the 2030s.
March 17, 2023, John Quiggin, Professor, School of Economics, The University of Queensland https://theconversation.com/18-million-a-job-the-aukus-subs-plan-will-cost-australia-way-more-than-that-202026?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
Australian governments have a long and generally dismal history of using defence procurement, and particularly naval procurement, as a form of industry policy.
Examples including the Collins-class submarines, Hobart-class air warfare destroyers and, most recently, the Hunter-class “Future Frigates”.
The stated goal is to build a defence-based manufacturing industry. But there is also a large element of old-fashioned pork-barrelling involved.
In particular, South Australia has nursed grievances over the shutdown of local car making, centred in the state, following the withdrawal of federal government subsidies. The closure of the Osborne Naval Shipyard in north Adelaide would be politically “courageous” for any government.
So the projects roll on, despite technical problems (the six Collins-class subs were plagued by problems with their noise signature, propulsion and combat systems) and cost overruns (the three Hobart destroyers cost $1.4 billion more than the $8 billion budgeted). The $35 billion plan for nine Hunter-class frigates may yet be abandoned given budget constraints.
All these previous ventures are dwarfed by the AUKUS agreement, which involves projected expenditure of up to $368 billion.
As Richard Denniss of The Australia Institute has noted, the precision implied by this number is spurious. The cost could come in below $300 billion, or easily approach $500 billion.
Military case lacking
The case for such a massive investment in submarines has proved hard to make in a simple and convincing way. The “Red Alert” articles published this month by The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age has helped to raise alarm about China. But the warning Australia could find itself at war with China in the next few years (over Taiwan) isn’t a persuasive argument for submarines that won’t be delivered until the 2030s.
Other questions have emerged.
In different ways, former prime ministers Paul Keating and Malcolm Turnbull have questioned the sense of a renewed alliance with the United Kingdom. The UK in a state of obvious decline, and Labour leader Keir Starmer, likely to be Britain’s next prime minister, has been noticeably lukewarm in his support for AUKUS, saying: “Whatever the merits of an Indo-Pacific tilt, maintaining security in Europe must remain our primary objective.”
Then there’s the view, held by many experts, that what has made submarines such potent weapons in the past – stealth – is unlikely to endure. Underwater drones and improved satellite technology could make our subs obsolete even before they are launched.
What about the jobs?
In these circumstances, the easiest political strategy to sell the AUKUS package is to present it as a job-creation program.
This is an appealing path for the federal government, given Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s yearning for “an Australia that make things”. Albanese’s Twitter account has published tweets extolling the economic benefits of the deal, but none about what the submarines will actually do to make Australians safer.
The obvious response is that the 20,000 jobs the government says the program will directly create over the next 30 years will cost more than $18 million apiece.
But that actually understates how bad the case is.
Where will we find the skilled workers?
Australia already has a shortage of the type of skilled workers required to build the nuclear-powered subs: scientists, technicians and trade workers. Our existing training programs are unlikely to fill the gap. So, the new jobs will mostly be filled either by diverting skilled workers from other industries or by additional immigrants.
The government is grappling with the policies that can meet this existing shortage. Our migration program, for example, allocates extra points for technical skills in short supply, putting skilled workers ahead of people whose motive for migration is to be with their families and friends.
The “Job Ready Graduates” policy introduced by the Morrison government subsidises science, technology, engineering and mathematics degrees, at the expense of humanities and social sciences. This policy is now under review, but may well be maintained in some form.
Such is the scale of the problem that the government’s pre-election commitment to deliver a White Paper on Full Employment (inspired the Chifley government’s 1945 White Paper) has been sidelined by a focus on how to increase the supply of skilled labour, through vocational education, immigration and delayed retirement. Hence the title of the “Jobs and Skills Summit” in September 2022.
There is no indication the shortage of skilled tech workers is going to be resolved any time soon. It is, then, a mistake to boast about the number of technical jobs that will be created by AUKUS.
It would be more accurate to say that, just as the massive financial cost of the submarines will come at the expense of spending on social needs, the workers required to build them will divert skills from addressing needs such as decarbonising the economy.
Perhaps, like previous submarine deals, this plan will be scrapped before consuming the stupendous sums of money now projected. But in the meantime it will divert the Australia’s government from addressing urgent domestic problems.
Jessica Wysser- Submission to Senate – Nuclear power a dangerous distraction from real climate action
To SenateCommittee on Environment and Other Legislation Amendment (Removing Nuclear Energy Prohibitions) Bill 2022 Submission 65
The ban on nuclear power in Australia must remain in place. I support the ban and ask the Senate
Standing Committees to support the continuation of this ban. I am concerned that further nuclear promotion risks delaying the action Australia needs to address the challenges, and maximise the opportunities, of meaningful climate action.
Nuclear power plants are vulnerable to threats which are being exacerbated by climate
change. These include dwindling and warming water sources, sea-level rise, storm damage,
drought, and jelly-fish swarms. Nuclear engineer David Lochbaum states: “You need to solve
global warming for nuclear plants to survive.” Australia does not want or need a nuclear
reactor under these conditions as the country is already affected by climate change and we
can see that it is progressively worsening.
Nuclear power programs have provided cover for numerous weapons programs and an
expansion of nuclear power would worsen the situation. Former US Vice President Al Gore
neatly summarised the problem: “For eight years in the White House, every weaponsproliferation problem we dealt with was connected to a civilian reactor program.
And if we ever got to the point where we wanted to use nuclear reactors to back out a lot of coal … then
we’d have to put them in so many places we’d run that proliferation risk right off the
reasonability scale.”
Nuclear reactors are pre-deployed military or terrorist targets. The
current situation in Ukraine illustrates the risks: electricity supply necessary for reactor
cooling has been repeatedly disrupted by military strikes, posing serious risks of nuclear core
meltdowns. Prior to Russia’s recent attack on Ukraine, there have been numerous military
attacks on nuclear plants. Examples include Israel’s destruction of a research reactor in Iraq in
1981; the United States’ destruction of two smaller research reactors in Iraq in 1991;
attempted military strikes by Iraq and Iran on each other’s nuclear facilities during the 1980 –
88 war; Iraq’s attempted missile strikes on Israel’s nuclear facilities in 1991; and Israel’s
bombing of a suspected nuclear reactor in Syria in 2007.
Having a nuclear reactor opens the country up to the possibility of making Australia a target. Australians would never want or desire this.
Australia needs effective climate action now but nuclear power would slow the transition to a
low-carbon economy. It would increase electricity costs and unnecessarily introduce the
challenges and risks associated with high-level nuclear waste management and the potential
for catastrophic accidents, with profound intergenerational implications for Australians.
Nuclear power is dangerous, expensive, slow and unwanted. Our energy future is renewable
not radioactive.
Thank you for this opportunity to comment.
For the only planet we have https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Environment_and_Communications/Nuclearprohibitions/Submission
1 This month
Chernobyl: The Lost Tapes – A good documentary on Chernobyl on SBS available On Demand for the next 3 weeks– https://www.sbs.com.au/ondemand/tv-program/chernobyl-the-lost-tapes/235274195556
20 May – Webinar – The dangerous world of AUKUS, US, military occupation and suppression of dissent
National Webinar, 20th May, 2026, 6.30pm AEST. Confronting laws restricting/suppressing protest speech and action
Speakers: Former Sen. Rex Patrick, Lawyer Nick Hanna ,Arthur Rorris ,Jorgen Doyle, Sen David Shoebbridge,
Facilitator Kelley Tranter.
of the week – Australians for War Powers Reform (AWPR)
To see nuclear-related stories in greater depth and intensity
Antinuclear 