NucNews May 6, 2006 -------- NUCLEAR -------- brazil Brazil joins world's nuclear club Brazil says its technology is some of the most advanced in the world By Steve Kingstone BBC News, Sao Paulo Saturday, 6 May 2006 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4981202.stm Brazil has joined the select group of countries with the capability of enriching uranium as a means of generating energy. A new centrifuge facility was formally opened on Friday at the Resende nuclear plant in the state of Rio de Janeiro. The Brazilian government says its technology is some of the most advanced in the world. The official opening follows lengthy negotiations with the United Nations nuclear watchdog, the IAEA. Brazil has some of the largest reserves of uranium in the world but until now the ore has had to be shipped abroad for enrichment - the process which produces nuclear fuel. In future some of that enrichment will take place in Brazil. The government says that within a decade the country will be able to meet all its nuclear energy needs. Brazilian scientists insist their technology is superior to that of existing nuclear powers. They claim the type of centrifuge in use at Resende will be 25 times more efficient than facilities in France or the United States. Safeguards Sensitivity over that technology led to a standoff two years ago with the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN watchdog. Keen to protect its commercial secrets, Brazil was reluctant to give inspectors full access to its facilities and politically the negotiations were complicated by simultaneous concerns about Iran's nuclear plans. But in the end Brazil and the IAEA agreed a system of safeguards to ensure that the new facilities would not be channelled into weapons production. Friday's opening at Resende is being hailed as a major step forward in Brazil's development and it comes amid renewed concerns about energy supplies in South America. Last week Bolivia announced plans to nationalise its gas reserves, prompting fears of price rises. As a big importer of Bolivian gas, Brazil sees nuclear energy as one of several strategic alternatives. -------- depleted uranium VIEQUES Clean up Navy's mess Sat, May. 06, 2006 By ED MORALES pmproj@progressive.org http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/opinion/14514185.htm The U.S. Navy is not doing right by Puerto Rico. Three years after it left its bombing range in Vieques, the island off the eastern coast of Puerto Rico, the Navy has been slow to clean up its mess. Three years ago this week, the Navy abandoned the island after four years of protests that rocked the main island and frayed relations with Washington. Since then, Vieques has flourished as a tourist spot. But a last bit of business, the EPA-sponsored cleanup of toxic substances -- such as depleted uranium, mercury and napalm -- has not fully materialized. Last summer, the Environmental Protection Agency finally announced its plans for the cleanup. Unfortunately, the first step of the plan involves detonating numerous missiles and unexploded ordnance that have accumulated in the 50-plus years of the site's use. The Navy is using a process called ''open detonation,'' claiming that it is faster and cheaper to blow up the weapons where they are found than to remove them. Thus, Vieques residents, who thought they had heard the end of explosions when the Navy left, are now hearing them again. Find safer alternatives Even worse, according to a recent article in The Chicago Tribune, the EPA says no meaningful cleanup can take place until the remaining ordnance is exploded, and that the process may take up to eight years. Last August, 23 humanitarian and faith-based organizations in the United States sent a letter to Puerto Rico's Gov. Aníbal Acevedo, encouraging him to demand that the Navy find safer alternatives to the current practice of exploding the ordnance. They wrote that the detonations would release toxins into the air, water and soil. More exposure to such a variety of toxic chemicals is not what Vieques needs. It already has the highest cancer rate of any of Puerto Rico's 78 municipalities. The EPA and the U.S. government should reassess the policy of open detonation, and at the very least, offer full disclosure of their programs and policies to island residents. Three years later, the fight to stop the bombing of Vieques is not over. Ed Morales is author of Living in Spanglish. -------- Congressman wants to see plans to clean up uranium storage site Sat, May. 06, 2006 Associated Press http://www.kten.com/Global/story.asp?S=4864723 TULSA, Okla. Oklahoma Congressman Dan Boren wants the Defense Department to tell what its plans are for removing depleted uranium stored in Gore. An amendment calling for the department's remediation plans has been approved by the U-S House of Representatives. Boren says about one-and-a-half million pounds of depleted uranium have been stored at the former Sequoyah Fuels site in Gore since 1993 when the facility completed its work with uranium provided by the government. He says the storage of the uranium is impeding efforts to decontaminate and decommission the facility. -------- u.s. nuc weapons Attorney: 'Divine Strake' bomb test postponed May 6, 2006, KRNV http://www.krnv.com/global/story.asp?s=4867094&ClientType=Printable An attorney for Native American tribes in the West says a bomb test planned for next month at the Nevada Test Site has been postponed. Robert Hager tells News 4 the test was put off after his efforts to halt the "Operation Divine Strake" test over environmental concerns. News 4 contacted the federal Defense Threat Reduction Agency and Nevada Test Site, the offices responsible for performing the large-scale bomb test. Representatives for both agencies said the test has not been postponed, and is still on schedule to be held on June 2. A Nevada Test Site spokesman said the test is contingent upon resolution of Hager's lawsuit, and receipt of environmental permits from the State of Nevada. The spokesman said a revised environmental assessment was to be made public late today, with new information addressing public concerns over the bomb test. The survey can be viewed at www.nv.doe.gov . The test would be the largest non-nuclear bomb blast on record. The Pentagon is using "Divine Strake" to test non-nuclear weapons that could be used to destroy weapons of mass destruction held in deep-underground bunkers. But Hager told News 4 the test is still being postponed. He says he was told of the delay Thursday by the Department of Justice. "I further have been informed today a new decision will be made next week, on Tuesday, and depending upon the decision, the blast would be rescheduled for sometime around June 23," Hager said Friday. Hager represents the Western Shoshone Indian tribe and others in Nevada and Utah who are concerned about radioactive dust that would be stirred up by the blast. He filed another motion to cancel the test on Friday. Hager has seen the new environmental assessment and dismisses it as failing to address problems with the bomb test. "The fact is, nobody has ever looked at this site to determine if there's radioactivity in the ground there, and there obviously is toxic, dangerous radioactive material from previous atmospheric testing at that site," Hager told News 4. -------- utah LDS Church adds objection to nuclear waste in Utah ALAN CHOATE - Daily Herald Saturday, May 06, 2006 http://www.harktheherald.com/content/view/177880/ A proposal to store spent nuclear fuel rods on the Goshute Indian Reservation has met heated opposition, with everyone from Utah's U.S. senators and governor to thousands of residents to the LDS Church denouncing the idea. On Thursday, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints asked the federal government to look for other options for the disposal of nuclear waste. "The transportation and storage of high-level nuclear waste create substantial and legitimate public health, safety and environmental concerns," the First Presidency of the church said in a statement. "It is not reasonable to suggest that any one area bear a disproportionate burden of the transportation and concentration of nuclear waste." But the fallout (so to speak) from an ongoing storage project in New Mexico could be used to bolster the case that a nuclear storage center will have little impact -- though that case is also being used to criticize the current proposal. Private Fuel Storage, a consortium of energy companies, has been licensed by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to store up to 44,000 tons of spent nuclear fuel rods at the Skull Valley Goshute Indian Reservation. The Bureau of Land Management, however, also must approve a request to build either a new rail line or a transfer facility to allow the waste to reach the storage site. Public comments on that request are being accepted until Monday. In the late 1980s, a similar furor erupted involving the Waste Isolation Pilot Project in Carlsbad, N.M. -- and a new highway that was to be built so the nuclear waste would bypass Santa Fe. One couple who owned land crossed by the bypass sued, claiming -- successfully -- that they were owed not only for the land that was taken, but for the lost value of the rest of their property because of the radioactive waste that would be passing nearby. The Utah Association of Realtors is using a similar argument to oppose the Skull Valley project. Nuclear waste headed for that facility would be transported on rail lines. "Our rail line goes through about 100 miles of Wasatch Front real estate," said Christopher Kyler, chief executive officer with the UAR. "In some cases, it's right next to houses." Through opinion surveys and an assessment of property values in areas around rail corridors, the Realtors association arrived at what was called a "conservative" estimate of the effects of nuclear waste transport on property values, which was presented to federal officials. "The number was in the billions of dollars. It was $5 billion, as I recall, due to the PFS proposal," Kyler said. Since the project requires government approval to proceed, "this is clearly government action," he continued. "Is the federal government going to pay us just compensation for our devalued property?" But it's not a given that property would be devalued. A study of real estate sales figures in Santa Fe indicates that property values along the once-controversial bypass have not suffered. The 2003 study was prepared by E.J. Bentz and Associates, a Virginia environmental consulting firm, and an environmental studies professor at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas. The analysis of real estate sales in Santa Fe County found that "the construction and subsequent operation of the Route 599 bypass has not negatively affected real property values along the bypass route." Instead, both the number of sales and the average selling price of land and houses has increased substantially. "The bypass appears to have 'unlocked' areas for residential development which previously had limited accessibility," the report says, resulting in "more homes ... being sold at significantly higher prices than previously in the area." Santa Fe Association of Realtors President Denise DeValle said the fact that nuclear waste is transported on the highway is "a consideration," but that it doesn't stop the development of new homes. One new project has homes priced between $400,000 and $1 million, she said. The Santa Fe area has limited developable land, DeValle noted, and people perhaps are more familiar with nuclear issues because of the proximity of Los Alamos National Laboratory. "We have made the best of a bad situation," she said. "The bypass was needed, as opposed to nuclear waste coming through town. It's enabled the surrounding area to be developed." Kyler said those findings are "completely irrelevant" to the argument about a potential impact on property values. "The fact of the matter is it may be that those properties might have been even more expensive than they are today, or may have developed faster," if the nuclear waste wasn't being transported nearby. "Value is based on perception. People perceive it as less valuable, so it's just a matter of determining, 'How much less?' " The federal Bureau of Land Management will accept comments on the Private Fuel Storage proposal until 5 p.m. Monday. Send comments to: Pam Schuller BLM - Salt Lake Field office 2370 S. 2300 West Salt Lake City, UT 84119 FAX: (801) 977-4397 E-mail: pam_schuller@blm.gov PRO AND CON Among the arguments against allowing nuclear waste to be stored on the Goshute Indian Reservation: Utah doesn't produce nuclear energy and shouldn't store any of its byproducts. It could be a target for terrorist attacks. The site is close to a military testing area for planes and bombs. Radioactive waste should not be allowed to cross public lands. Private Fuel Storage has put forth the following arguments to promote the storage site: It has a willing host in the Skull Valley Band of Goshute Indians, who will benefit economically. It meets safety requirements set by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Transportation will be by dedicated trains with specially designed rail cars. No radioactive material has been lost, nor have members of the public suffered radiation injuries, in 40 years of transporting these materials. ---- Nuke waste may devalue land May 06, 2006 Utah Daily Herald http://www.harktheherald.com/component/option,com_smf/topic,14253 A proposal to store spent nuclear fuel rods on the Goshute Indian Reservation has met heated opposition, with everyone from Utah's U.S. senators and governor to thousands of residents to the LDS Church denouncing the idea. On Thursday, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints asked the federal government to look for other options for the disposal of nuclear waste. ---- Nuclear-waste storage has great safety record Saturday, May 6, 2006 Ogden, UT, Standard http://www.standard.net/standard/79918 We trust experts in many fields such as flying, medicine, automobile repairs, etc. Why, then, should we trust only non-experts regarding nuclear energy and nuclear waste? Do these people have any expertise in nuclear physics? As a Ph.D. physicist, I agree that spent nuclear fuel would be very dangerous if it were not contained in massive, robust containers that could withstand any conventional weapon or a plane crash without releasing any radioactive material to the environment. However, more than 3,000 U.S. shipments of spent nuclear fuel have been made with no radiation deaths or injuries. (I have never been employed by the nuclear power industry, but volunteer some efforts.) Fears are high because they have been cultivated, starting with former Gov. Mike Leavitt. Because of public fears, the Air Force brass would cease flying close by the Goshute Reservation, reducing the usefulness of Hill Air Force Base. Because of that response to fear, our present politicians fight nuclear power, regardless of the country's need for clean abundant economical energy, which doesn't use foreign oil or produce greenhouse gases. To protect jobs at Hill AFB, they oppose nuclear-waste storage, regardless of its outstanding safety record. Without the hyped-up fears, the Goshute project would be acceptable. To encourage the Bureau of Land Management to let the Goshutes make a railroad connection, send an e-mail to pamschuller@blm.gov. Steven C. Barrowes Ogden -------- MILITARY -------- iraq Documentaries show life in Iraq The festival is hosted by the Library of Alexandria Saturday 06 May 2006 Aljazeera http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/FB28FA95-3E1A-4A06-A270-233D0448D4BF.htm Alexandria Library in Egypt is hosting a seven-day festival of documentaries about Iraq. The festival, at the library's arts centre, will show documentary films produced by Iraqi and non-Iraqi producers done before and after the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. Sharif Muhei al-Din, the head of the arts centre, said the screening of documentaries will start on May 19. "The documentaries are produced in different parts of the world … Lebanon, France, Britain and Australia, but they all deal with the humanitarian situation inside Iraq," he said. The festival is an attempt to show the continuing suffering of ordinary Iraqis. Some documentaries deal with the human situation in Iraq before the invasion, and the impact of UN sanctions imposed in 1990 when Iraq invaded neighbouring Kuwait. The sanctions were lifted after the US-led invasion. Defector actress Qutaiba al-Janabi, a British producer, will present three movies "The Terminal", "Peaceful life", "Among Borders", and "Nahida al-Rammah" – which is the name of the first Iraqi actress who lost her sight on the stage in the 1970s. The actress, who first performed in 1956, was sent by the then Iraqi president, Ahmad Hasan al-Bakir abroad to be treated. She defected after receiving treatment and became an opponent of the Baathist government. The documentary "Inside and Outside Baghdad" by Saad Salman, the Iraqi director, deals with life in Baghdad before the invasion. The film is of French production and was made in 2002. "Iraq Is My Home" is an Australian production of 2005, directed by Hadi Mahud, an Iraqi director based in Australia. Basim Fayad, the Lebanese director, will present his documentary "The Road to Low Sunset". -------- spies How Goss failed at CIA May 6, 2006 By Martin Sieff United Press International http://news.monstersandcritics.com/northamerica/article_1161484.php/How_Goss_failed_at_CIA J Porter Goss took over the CIA, confident he had all the answers. He did. The problem was they weren`t the answers to the questions he had to deal with. Porter`s shock resignation Friday took Washington by surprise. He had served for little more than a year head of the nation`s main intelligence gathering organization. President George W. Bush announced Goss`s resignation with the outgoing CIA chief sitting beside him in the Oval Office. 'He has led ably,' the president said. 'He has a five-year plan to increase the analysts and operatives.' Bush also praised Goss for helping to 'make this country a safer place.' And Goss, a former veteran Republican congressman from Florida and long-time Bush loyalist, was also upbeat and on-message. 'I would like to report to you that the agency (CIA) is back on a very even keel and sailing well,' he said. But no amount of spin could disguise the fact that Goss was the latest casualty of new White House Chief of Staff Joshua Bolten`s ambitious plan shake up and revitalize an administration hammered by $70 a barrel plus oil prices, rising casualties and violence in Iraq and tumbling opinion poll ratings. Goss`s resignation was announced the same day that White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan gave his last press briefing. He is being replaced by veteran Fox News commentator Tony Snow. And even Karl Rove, the president`s chief political strategist has given up the hands-on detailed control of administration policy he had enjoyed since the beginning of the president`s second term of office. Goss had the vision of transforming the CIA into a lean, mean intel machine that would focus on the war on terror, put thousands more human agents into the field and provide the U.S. armed forces, especially the Army and Marine forces fighting the Sunni insurgency in Iraq, with real time intelligence that could be of far greater operational use to them. Goss had a background serving in the CIA back in the 1960s, and he had long been regarded on Capitol Hill as one of the most knowledgeable and respected figures in Congress in dealing with intelligence issues. He also enjoyed the president`s full confidence. And expectations were high when he got the job. Unlike so many of his predecessors, he was given a literal blank check in terms of funding and resources by a sympathetic, ask-no-questions GOP majority in Congress. He pushed through an ambitious five year plan that -- on paper -- will transform the agency. However, Goss leaves office with no striking intelligence achievements to his credit, the most remarked upon structural and cultural problems within the CIA still crippling its effectiveness, and a senior staff far more demoralized and stripped of influence than when he arrived. Despite his long experience in Congress, Goss had never had any serious management experience in government or out of it. He proved a very weak administrator at the CIA and rapidly alienated many senior staffers. He was confident from his own service in the agency that he knew street-smart details of operational realities, but his own espionage experience was three and a half decades ago at the height of the Cold War. His arrival and early heavy hand set off so much personal and political feuding at CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia that agency insiders told reporters was turning the venerable, globe-spanning institution into a soap opera. Goss tried to ride above the turmoil. Newsweek magazine reported that in a private question and answer session with agency employees on Sept. 22, 2005, Goss was asked why veteran agency officers were resigning in numbers unprecedented for since the Carter administration. He replied, 'I don`t do personnel.' The answer was reminiscent of the high-handed, confident, publicly abrasive way Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has repeatedly shrugged off criticism of his conduct of the Iraq war. But Goss did not prove as fortunate as Rumsfeld. 'That answer killed him. It destroyed his credibility,' a source with close agency ties told UPI Friday. 'What else is there for a CIA chief to do? The job is all about choosing the right personnel and evaluating them accurately.' Goss also had an adversarial relationship with the media, despite the greatly increased sense of national responsibility that pervaded the nation, including the media following the mega-terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Goss purged senior managers from the agency but he did not appear to have a firm grasp on veteran senior staff and their intelligence assets. Critics charged him with relying too much on his old inner circle of congressional staffers. In his Sept. 22, question and answer session, Newsweek reported, Goss was asked why he had brought to Langley with him a former congressional staffer who, as a junior CIA officer, once got into trouble for shoplifting. He replied that everyone made mistakes. Senior staff compared that answer with Goss`s relentless criticisms of their own more impressive careers and were not impressed, agency insiders told UPI. Goss clashed with senior officials in the agency`s Directorate of Operations. His supporters told the press and sympathetic lawmakers in Congress that the officials had been opposing Goss`s reform efforts. But in the private world of the U.S. intelligence community, this reaction was widely seen as irresponsible, and as a lack of loyalty by Goss towards the troops he led. Goss could not even retain the confidence of senior staff he had promoted himself. He made Robert Richer deputy director of operations. Richer resigned less than a year later and later informed the Senate Select Committee on intelligence that he had told Goss to his face in a private meeting on Sept. 22, 2005 that the CIA director was out of touch with his own agency. More veteran Middle East officers resigned before their retirement or career stints required during Goss`s brief tenure than under any previous CIA director since Adm. Stansfield Turner, who held the job for President Jimmy Carter. -------- ENERGY Energy bill passes amid debate State lawmakers approved an energy plan that offers tax breaks, but opponents say it reduces the public's role. BY ANDREA FANTA Associated Press Sat, May. 06, 2006 http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/14513634.htm TALLAHASSEE - While some hail the energy plan that lawmakers passed Friday as progress toward making the state more efficient in using power, others call it a gift to utilities that will reduce the public's say in electricity policies. Senators unanimously approved a measure Friday that the House had given its final nod to earlier this week. Gov. Jeb Bush will sign the legislation, his spokesman said. It will offer homeowners two tax breaks: a sales tax holiday from Oct. 5-11 on energy-efficient appliances, such as ceiling fans, light bulbs and dishwashers, and a year-round tax rebate of up to $5,000 for homeowners who buy solar-energy products, like water and pool heaters. The bill (SB 888) also will create an independent commission that advises lawmakers on an in-depth energy policy. Some senators complained that representatives had refused to be bold and specific enough in their requirements for the commission. But some environmentalists say the bill also eliminates a requirement for public hearings in communities where companies want to build nuclear plants. ''They've given a gift to the nuclear industry,'' said Susan Glickman, a lobbyist for the Natural Resources Defense Council in Florida. The bill's sponsor, Sen. Lee Constantine, R-Altamonte Springs, denied that. Instead, he said it allows local governments to decide how many hearings they'll hold in their own communities regarding applications to build nuclear plants. Glickman is perhaps most worried about the radioactive waste that new nuclear factories will produce. It lasts for thousands of years and can cause cancer. ''There is no country in the world that has figured out what to do with radioactive nuclear waste,'' she said.