Cannon-Brookes, Forrest pour more money into world’s biggest solar and battery project — RenewEconomy
Cannon-Brookes and Forrest lead another major capital raising for Sun Cable, which is planning world’s biggest solar and battery storage facility, and other projects on a similar scale. The post Cannon-Brookes, Forrest pour more money into world’s biggest solar and battery project appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Cannon-Brookes, Forrest pour more money into world’s biggest solar and battery project — RenewEconomy
Australia’s oldest solar farm was the country’s best performing in February — RenewEconomy
The list of best performing wind and solar farms for the month of February threw up a few surprises. The post Australia’s oldest solar farm was the country’s best performing in February appeared first on RenewEconomy.
Australia’s oldest solar farm was the country’s best performing in February — RenewEconomy
11 years later, fate of Fukushima reactor cleanup uncertain — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
One of the Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (TEPCO) employees holds a radiation counter as they take AP journalists to the area under the Unit 5 reactor pressure vessel, which survived the earthquake-triggered tsunami in 2011, at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, run by TEPCO, in Futaba town, northeastern Japan, Thursday, March 3, 2022. […]
11 years later, fate of Fukushima reactor cleanup uncertain — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
Fukushima spill plan goes ahead despite local opposition — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
March 10, 2022 By Antonio Hermosin Gandul Tokyo, March 10 (EFE).- Japanese authorities continued with their plan to dump contaminated and processed water from the Fukushima nuclear power plant into the Pacific Ocean in 2023, despite the rejection of local communities suffering the consequences of the nuclear disaster 11 years on. The Fukushima Daiichi plant, […]
Fukushima spill plan goes ahead despite local opposition — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
Bullying, suicide attempts…11 years for a girl in Fukushima… Before evacuation, she was cheerful: “It’s OK. You’ll just make more friends.” — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
A woman holds a group photo and high school diploma taken in Fukushima before the evacuation. She sometimes looked at the photos at the beach when she was having a hard time. March 11, 2022 Serialization “At the End of the Tunnel: Trajectory of the Girl and Her Family” (1) On her last day of […]
Bullying, suicide attempts…11 years for a girl in Fukushima… Before evacuation, she was cheerful: “It’s OK. You’ll just make more friends.” — Fukushima 311 Watchdogs
«We forget and we consider ourselves superior… But we are after all a mere part of Creation.» – We all must revise our relationship with Nature and reorient our association with consumerism! — Barbara Crane Navarro
« I do not see a delegation for the Four Footed. I see no seat for the Eagles. We forget & we consider ourselves superior. But we are after all a mere part of Creation. We stand somewhere between the mountain & the Ant. » Chief Oren Lyons, Seneca Nation, in an address to the Non-Governmental […]
«We forget and we consider ourselves superior… But we are after all a mere part of Creation.» – We all must revise our relationship with Nature and reorient our association with consumerism! — Barbara Crane Navarro
No room at the ER — Beyond Nuclear International
Even one nuclear bomb would spell disaster for medical services’ capacity to cope
No room at the ER — Beyond Nuclear International
A fight for homeland — Beyond Nuclear International
Visual narrative of nuclear legacy is lived experience for Dene
A fight for homeland — Beyond Nuclear International
Cumbria Remembers Fukushima — RADIATION FREE LAKELAND
Yesterday was the 11th anniversary of the ongoing Fukushima disaster. Members of Radiation Free Lakeland met up with Kazuhiko Kobayashi in 2018 to show him the Sellafield area and he told us that there is money for climate research but not so much for research into the impacts of radiation on our food and health. […]
Cumbria Remembers Fukushima — RADIATION FREE LAKELAND
What we learned this week — The Earthbound Report
Just building all the renewable energy that already has planning permission would offset any loss from Russia’s oil and gas, according to analysis by Carbon Brief. So no need for fracking then. Greenpeace have a petition to the government on a related note, asking for insulation and energy efficiency measures to reduce our use of […]
What we learned this week — The Earthbound Report
March 13 Energy News — geoharvey
Opinion: ¶ “Will Russia’s Attack On Ukraine Help Thaw US-Venezuela Relations?” • These are desperate times, and desperate measures are needed. Oil helps make the world go round and Venezuela has a lot of it – and when the world is in crisis, such as with the ban on Russian oil exports causing prices to […]
March 13 Energy News — geoharvey
Greenpeace statement on anniversary of the Fukushima nuclear accident
Greenpeace Japan released the following statement on the 11th anniversary
of the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power
Station accident. Sam Annesley, Executive Director of Greenpeace Japan:
“11 years have passed since the Great East Japan Earthquake and Fukushima
Daiichi Nuclear Power Station that caused incredible damage. We offer our
deepest condolences to those who tragically lost their lives and our
sincere respect to those who, despite their deep sorrow, have persevered to
this day.
The example of the disaster-affected areas, which have continued
moving towards recovery over the past 11 years despite the unprecedented
crises of a major earthquake, tsunami and nuclear accident, has given us
great hope.
However, as the memories of the disaster and accident fade, we
are now faced with a serious problem that we must confront. There are still
59 nuclear reactors in Japan including those that are permanently shutdown.
As of the end of February 2022,10 of them have restarted operations.
Recently, the Japanese government and electric power companies are actively
promoting the notion that nuclear power plants are low carbon, and that
they will be one of the key solutions to decarbonization.
However, nuclearpower generation should never be a solution for decarbonization and climate
change. While nuclear power plants can generate tremendous amounts of
electricity, they also carry unfathomable risks. Such risks are not only
limited to natural disasters and humanitarian crises such as Fukushima, but
could also significantly escalate danger during conflicts, such as in the
case of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant situation in Ukraine earlier
this month.
Greenpeace 11th March 2022
Nuclear waste now returning to Sydney can be stored safely at Lucas Heights. Then we need to work on a permanent solution
Australian Conservation Foundation, Dave Sweeney, 12 Mar 22, The Pacific Grebe is a nuclear waste transport vessel that left Cumbria in the UK on 20 January 2022. The ship is now off Australia’s east coast.
On board is a waste transport cannister holding intermediate-level radioactive waste (ILW) being returned to Australia after reprocessing in the UK.
This is serious waste that needs to be isolated for up to 10,000 years. It requires active management and effective regulatory control.
The transport vessel is expected to arrive in Port Kembla this Saturday (12 March) with the ILW to be transported by road to interim storage at the ANSTO nuclear facility at Lucas Heights.
ACF is opposed to nuclear power and weapons in Australia but supports responsible radioactive waste management.
We do not view this waste transfer as an activity to disrupt, but rather as an important time to highlight the Australian government’s deeply flawed handling of the nation’s radioactive waste management.
The federal plan for a national radioactive waste facility near Kimba in regional South Australia lacks a clear rationale and is contested by several interested parties. The Barngarla people, the area’s Native Title holders, were unable to vote against the federal plan in a carefully-curated community ballot.
The Barngarla are challenging the government’s plan right now in the Federal Court. Local grain producers are bitterly opposed, as are a growing number of South Australian political and civil society groups and voices.
Once again battlelines are being drawn and uncertainty increases.
What the Pacific Grebe cargo and interim destination shows is a pathway forward on radioactive waste management.
The vast majority of Australia’s ILW is made and stored at ANSTO. This makes sense as ANSTO has expertise, high security, a permanent on site presence and is home to Australia’s best radiation monitoring and response capacity.
And ANSTO has storage capacity. Right now, following a $60 million dollar federal budget allocation last year, a new extended interim storage facility is being constructed at Lucas Heights.
Together with the existing facilities, Australia’s chief nuclear regulator has confirmed that this waste “can be safely stored at Lucas Heights for decades to come.”
ACF maintains that there is a compelling case that Australia’s ILW be managed in extended interim storage at ANSTO’s nuclear facility at Lucas Heights pending the outcome of a dedicated and transparent review of long term future ILW management.
There is no clear or cogent radiological, public health, environmental or economic rationale for double handling this waste through a planned additional interim storage stage at Kimba.
This waste should come into Port Kembla and be securely transferred by skilled maritime workers and appropriate industry experts. It should then go – without incident – to ANSTO. It should remain at Lucas Heights with the rest of ANSTO’s intermediate level waste as ANSTO is best placed to manage this waste.
After this the much-needed work begins of bringing diverse perspectives from the trenches to the table to answer the missing and very hard question: What is the best thing to do with this stuff in the long term?
Umm….. Are we the baddies?
Umm… Are We The Baddies? https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2022/03/11/umm-are-we-the-baddies/
Reuters reports that Facebook and Instagram are now allowing calls for the death of Russians and Russian leaders in exemption from the platforms’ hate speech terms of service due to the war in Ukraine:
“Meta Platforms will allow Facebook and Instagram users in some countries to call for violence against Russians and Russian soldiers in the context of the Ukraine invasion, according to internal emails seen by Reuters on Thursday, in a temporary change to its hate speech policy.”
Twitter has also altered its rules against incitement and death threats in the case of Russian leaders and military personnel, as Ben Norton explains here for Multipolarista.
Last month we also learned that Facebook is now allowing users to praise the Ukrainian neo-Nazi Azov Battalion because of the war, a move that is arguably the most liberal thing that has ever happened.
Western institutions everywhere are rejecting all things Russia with such a savage degree of xenophobia it really ought to shock anyone who was born after the 1800s. Everything from Russian athletes to Russian musicians to Russian-made films to Russian composers to Russian Netflix shows to lectures about Russian authors to Russian restaurants to Russian vodka to Russian-bred cats to Russian trees to dishes that sound a little too much like “Putin” have been cancelled to varying degrees around the western world.
Normally when the US and its allies are involved in a war they’ll at least pay lip service to the notion that they have nothing but good will for the people of the enemy nation, claiming they only oppose their oppressive rulers. With Russia it’s just a complete rejection of the entire culture, the entire ethnicity. It’s a widespread promotion of hatred for the actual people because of who they are.
These are the people who are being smashed with crushing economic sanctions while western pundits proclaim that “There are no more ‘innocent’ ‘neutral’ Russians anymore” and ask “At what point do you hold a people responsible for putting an evil despot in power?” This even as the Russian people are being arrested by the thousands in anti-war protests, putting to shame our own western society that has generally slept through war after war in the years since 9/11 while our militaries have been killing of millions of people.
And this is all over a war that the western empire knowingly provoked, almost certainly planned in advance, and appears to be doing everything possible to ensure that it continues. Antiwar’s Dave DeCamp reports that Washington is still to this day not engaging in any serious diplomacy with Moscow over this conflict, preferring to strangle Russia economically and pour weapons into Ukraine to make the war as painful and costly as possible. Both of these preferences just so happen to nicely complement the US empire’s goal of unipolar planetary hegemony.
Meanwhile the entire western political/media class seems to be doing everything it can to turn this from a regional proxy war into a very fast and radioactive World War 3. Calls for a no-fly zone over Ukraine, which would require directly attacking the Russian military and risking a nuclear exchange in the resulting escalations, are now ubiquitous. Claims that more directly confrontational military aggressions against Russia won’t start a nuclear war (or that it’s worth the risk anyway) are becoming more and more common in western punditry. Democrats are braying for Russian blood while Republicans like Tom Cotton and Mitt Romney are attacking Democrats for being insufficiently hawkish and escalatory in this conflict, creating a horrifying dynamic where both parties are trying to out-hawk each other to score political points and nobody is calling for de-escalation and detente.
As luck would have it, US officials have also selected this precarious nuclear tightrope walk as the perfect time to begin hurling accusations that Russia is preparing a biological attack, potentially as a false flag blamed on Ukraine or the United States. This coincides with Victoria Nuland’s admission before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that Ukraine has “biological research facilities” that the US is “quite concerned” might end up “falling into the hands of Russian forces”.
All of this on top of the unprecedented wave of authoritarian censorship that has been tearing through the US-centralized empire as our rulers work to quash dissident voices around the world. It certainly is interesting that the fight for freedom and democracy requires so much censorship, warmongering, xenophobia, propaganda and bloodlust.
It’s almost enough to make you wonder: are we the baddies?
I am of course only trying to make a point here. Geopolitical power struggles are not contested by opposing sides of heroes and baddies like a Marvel superhero movie, though you’d never know it from all the hero worship of Volodymyr Zelensky and the self-righteous posturing of mainstream westerners over this war. Vladimir Putin is no Peter Parker, but neither is Zelensky or Biden or any of the other empire managers overseeing this campaign to overwhelm all challengers to US global domination.
The power structure loosely centralized around the United States is without question the single most depraved and destructive on earth. No one else has spent the 21st century waging wars that have killed millions and displaced tens of millions. No one else is circling the planet with military bases and working to destroy any nation on earth which disobeys it. Not Russia. Not China. Nobody.
The hypocrisy, dishonesty and phoniness of this whole song and dance about Ukraine is one of the most distasteful things that I have ever witnessed. Rather than engaging in click-friendly Instagram activism with blue and yellow profile pics making risk-free criticisms of a foreign leader in a far off country who has nothing to do with us, perhaps we would be better served by a bit more introspection, and by a somewhat more difficult stance: intense scrutiny of the corruption and abuses running rampant in our own society.
So many half-truths from Zelensky, and from the nuclear industry! The politics behind Ukraine’s alarming nuclear warnings
While Russia is clearly the aggressor and may be using the nuclear sites to stir anxiety in the West, Ukraine’s authorities have played their part in fanning the public’s fear……………
What cannot be localized is the way public statements spread alarm and confusion. “It’s a technique that any side can use,” Watts said. “But then it starts to create so many false scenarios, where you can’t really wade through the noise to know what is the actual severity of what’s going on at all.”
The politics behind Ukraine’s alarming nuclear warnings
Nuclear regulatory authorities do not share Kyiv’s assessment over the danger posed by Russian actions at nuclear plants. Politico BY LOUISE GUILLOT, KARL MATHIESEN AND ZIA WEISE, March 11, 2022
Kyiv is grasping at every possible lever in its efforts to persuade the West that it too is threatened by Russia’s invasion — including repeated and at times exaggerated warnings of nuclear calamity for the rest of Europe.
Since the very first day of Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine, when Russian troops captured the Chernobyl nuclear disaster site in a firefight, the country’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and his officials have warned of a repeat of the explosion that spread radioactive fallout across Europe…………….
On Wednesday, Ukraine’s nuclear utility Energoatom said a power cut at the still-decommissioning Chernobyl site meant cooling systems would be shut off and “release of radioactive substances into the environment will occur. The wind can transfer the radioactive cloud to other regions of Ukraine, Belarus, Russia and Europe.”
These declarations are part of a highly effective if — in the most recent Chernobyl case — alarmist Ukrainian media offensive to counter Russia’s barrage of missiles and false statements.
It is easy to see why Ukraine, frustrated by Europe’s continued purchases of Russian oil and refusal to implement a no-fly zone despite intense civilian bombing, reckons that it still needs to pile pressure on other Europeans to get their heads round the brutality of the Russian onslaught, and the dangers it poses. The problem is that the nuclear warnings have created a dilemma for Ukraine’s allies and nuclear safety authorities, and have triggered consternation from the image-conscious nuclear industry.
According to international and national nuclear authorities, Russia’s conduct is dangerous but Ukraine’s nuclear facilities do not pose an imminent Europe-wide threat. The situation is being treated with extreme seriousness but the design of modern nuclear facilities means most of the worst-case scenarios would lead to localized fallout — devastating for Ukraine but not a danger for wider Europe.
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Rafael Mariano Grossi has repeatedly expressed his concerns about nuclear safety as the conflict unfolds, but at no point has the organization warned of explicit and immediate danger outside Ukraine.
Germany’s Federal Office for Radiation Protection said Wednesday that based on the information available about the situation at Chernobyl there was “no risk of radiological effects in Germany.” Belgian, Finnish and Polish nuclear safety agencies put out similar statements.
In the most dramatic case of deliberate nuclear sabotage involving a massive explosion there is potential for unpredictable impacts that could affect other countries, said Lars van Dassen, executive director of the World Institute for Nuclear Security. “If there are bombs being thrown on nuclear reactors, then we have a new situation.”
With the Russian war effort increasingly frustrated, there are concerns from Western governments about the lengths to which Putin may go.
The Ukrainian government and nuclear utility Energoatom did not respond to requests for comment for this article……………
“In a lot of newsrooms around the world, if the key word ‘nuclear’ is used it creates a shockwave for media reporting,” Watts said.( Clint Watts, a distinguished research fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute and former U.S. counterterrorism officer)
That has played out in the past two weeks, with headlines often responding to statements from Zelenskyy, his ministers or comments in three-times daily “war bulletins” sent to journalists. More sober assessments from the IAEA have often been less prominently placed. That leaves Ukraine’s allies with a difficult pathway to chart between supporting the besieged government in Kyiv and giving the public a clear assessment of the danger they face.,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
While Russia is clearly the aggressor and may be using the nuclear sites to stir anxiety in the West, Ukraine’s authorities have played their part in fanning the public’s fear……………
Russia’s Permanent Representative to the International Organizations in Vienna Mikhail Ulyanov said last week “nothing extraordinary is happening at Ukrainian nuclear facilities right now.” He added that “Russia, as a country with a developed nuclear industry, is fully aware of the potential risks and intends to do everything to ensure proper safety there.”
Risk assessment
Some allies have begun directly contradicting the Ukrainians.
Shortly after this week’s warning from Energoatom about the power cut to Chernobyl, U.S. Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm tweeted a U.S. government analysis that “the loss of power does not pose a near-term risk of radiological release.”
Officials are also wary of downplaying risks in a fast moving, unpredictable conflict where information and motivations are hard to fully grasp. The instinct is to err on the side of extreme caution and even alarm when it comes to atomic power…….
Nuclear industry and safety experts have warned that accidents could happen as nuclear power plants are not designed to be operated in a war zone………………
Zelenskyy “said things that do not make sense about the Chernobyl site itself because the reactors have been shut down for 20 years,” said Valérie Faudon, general delegate of the French Nuclear Energy Society. While the situation made it understandable, she said, “this is not very responsible,” noting that the risk of a pan-European accident at Chernobyl “is very low and it would be localized.”
What cannot be localized is the way public statements spread alarm and confusion. “It’s a technique that any side can use,” Watts said. “But then it starts to create so many false scenarios, where you can’t really wade through the noise to know what is the actual severity of what’s going on at all.” https://www.politico.eu/article/politics-ukraine-alarm-nuclear-warning/
1 This month.
PETITION – To: Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the Australian Labor Government
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
19 May – Webinar- Webinar: No Nuclear Weapons in Australia
Start: 2026-05-19 18:00:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
End: 2026-05-19 19:30:00 UTC Canberra, Melbourne, Sydney (GMT+10:00)
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 