RECENT NEWS OF RADIOACTIVE CONTAMINATION IN JAPAN, GOVERNMENT COVER UPS, AND THE DANGER TO THE U.S. OF IT'S OWN SPENT NUCLEAR FUEL RODS

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June 10, 2011

Japan Admits 3 Nuclear Meltdowns, More Radiation Leaked into Sea; U.S. Nuclear Waste Poses Deadly Risks

Almost three months after the earthquake and tsunami that triggered a nuclear disaster in Japan, new radiation "hot spots" may require the evacuation of more areas further from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power facility. Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency recently admitted for the first time that full nuclear meltdowns occurred at three of the plant’s reactors, and more than doubled its estimate for the amount of radiation that leaked from the plant in the first week of the disaster in March. “What they failed to mention is that they discharged an equally large amount into the ocean,” says our guest Robert Alvarez, former senior policy adviser to the U.S. Secretary of Energy. “As [the radiation] goes up the food chain, it accumulates. By the time it reaches people who consume this food, the levels are higher than they originally were when they entered the environment.” Alvarez also discusses his new report on the vulnerabilities and hazards of stored spent fuel at U.S. reactors in the United States. Then we go to Tokyo to speak with Aileen Mioko Smith, executive director of the group Green Action. She says citizens leading their own monitoring efforts are calling for additional evacuations, especially for young children and pregnant women. [Original includes transcript]

AN UNUSUAL DEBATE ON THE SECURITY OF U.S. NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS

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Blogger's Note: To properly judge the all-is-well-with-U.S.-reactor-safety defense, the reader is advised to first read this column and this one.

Interestingly, the interviewer mentions that the World Trade Center Towers are regarded to have been destroyed by jetliner strikes (never mind the evidence they were packed with explosives) and should not therefore U.S. nuclear reactors be strengthened against airliner strikes? The industry-favorable debater said that the industry is doing all that is required of them by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which is to do "analyses."  According to the academic debater, no material changes have been done by the U.S. nuclear power industry because the NRC hasn't required them to do anything that costs them money. Still, the industry rep finishes by assessing probability of a Japan-like disaster in the U.S. as "beyond credible" (despite the fact that 23 reactors in the U.S. are identical to those in Fukashima).

March 19, 2011

Debate: Is US Nuclear Power Safe?

Is The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the nuclear industry prepared to deal with disaster?



Bio

Daphne Wysham is a Fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies and founder and host of Earthbeat, now airing on 61 public radio stations in the US and Canada. Eileen Supko began her career as a nuclear engineer at Carolina Power and Light Company. She is is a Vice President of Energy Resources International, Inc., a nuclear fuel consulting company in Washington, DC. For over 25 years, she has worked in the electric power industry, providing technical, economic, and policy expertise in all phases of nuclear fuel management to US and international companies. As well, between 1995 and 1997, she was the U.S. representative of a consultancy to the International Atomic Energy Agency regarding international experience with the storage of spent nuclear fuel. Arjun Makhijani is president of the Institute for Energy and Environmental Research. He is the author of "Carbon-Free and Nuclear-Free: A Roadmap for U.S. Energy Policy" (2007) and he has served as a consultant on energy issues for agencies of the United Nations.