A publication of Nuclear Information and Resource Service

MAYJUNE 2006 Volume II: issue 4 ISSN 1556-8822 Iran Irony Linda’s Log non-proliferation groups are rightly working hard to persuade the The U.S. government not to use military might to end Iran’s uranium Meaning Nenrichment program. Meanwhile, those of us concerned with the of proposed proliferation of new nuclear reactors - as well as plans to build Green? a new uranium enrichment facility of our own in New Mexico - can’t help but smile at the irony. No better example of the inextricable bond between and nuclear weapons could have emerged than the situation Th e fi ve-minute , in Iran. For decades the International Atomic Energy Agency has upheld Patrick Moore, also dubbed the disingenous philosophy that splitting the atom to turn the lights on is “plastic surgeon to the polluters,” allright as long as countries promise not to make an atomic bomb as well. Th e has had to come clean about his panic over Iran has emerged not only because it is impossible to be sure Iran status. He is a paid fl ak for the has only commercial intentions but precisely because it could use the same nuclear industry (oh and yes the technology for nuclear weapons. It’s time the U.S. led by example and, as a logging industry and possibly the fi rst step, at least abandoned new uranium enrichment projects on home soil. chemical industry and proponents of genetically modifi ed foods and....) Does this sound like an environmentalist to you? Of RetroActivist course not. But this didn’t stop the Washington Post headlining Licensed To Kill: How the nuclear Moore as “a Green” when running power industry destroys marine his Outlook section apology for wildlife and ocean habitat to all things nuclear in April. Th en save money, a joint publication , perhaps of NIRS and the now defunct also beguiled by Moore’s myths, Safe Energy Communication pronounced nuclear power a good Council, was published 5 years idea in a recent editorial. Moore ago. This landmark report, takes his sound bites as well as containing new research, found his paycheck from the Nuclear that endangered sea turtles - Energy Institute, the industry among many species of marine lobbying behemoth. He rests his life - were harmed and killed by the routine operation of nuclear reactors. At reputation on being a the time, the report revealed that the agency responsible for monitoring and die-hard who underwent a regulating sea turtle captures at reactor intakes - National Marine Fisheries wondrous epiphany when he Service - chose to accommodate the industry’s fi nancial concerns over the suddenly discovered, among other welfare of animals by simply raising the permitted “take” numbers at plants things, that the Th ree Mile Island already capturing sea turtles. This practice continues. Recently, we have accident was “a success story.” witnessed allowed increased “takes” of endangered Kemps Ridley turtles at the Now with Moore’s loyalties out Oyster Creek reactor, for example. This disregard for impacts to non-human in the open, the media’s habitual species cannot go unfettered. Be sure to check the wildlife impacts when description of him as some sort of contesting license extensions at your local plant or proposals for new reactors. environmentalist needs to stop. tritium leaks into drinking water, has declined. Read the NIRS press THUMBS DOWN as it has near a reactor in Ilinois, release on this at www.nirs.org. and tritiated water is ingested, it Yucca Mountain Doozy can cross the placenta and aff ect Going Bananas, or was that Nuts? unborn children, a fact supported As if the Yucca Mountain project NRC Commissioners are supposed by the medical profession. But weren’t a big enough joke already, to retain an impartial view toward an unrelenting McGaffi gan then along comes the Department of nuclear power and protect the demanded to know “is NIRS Energy’s latest creation, “Yucca public’s health and safety. But as position that we give up bananas?” Mountain Johnny.” In an obvious we all know, the NRC agenda is in when he alleged that pregnant attempt to make their fl awed site reality rather diff erent. Th is was women who ate Brazil nuts and sound like a fun place to store never more apparent at a recent bananas would get a “factors of high-level , public meeting on emergency 100 higher” dose of radiation from the DOE has created the Yucca planning when Commissioner potassium 40 than “they’d ever get Mountain Youth Zone, complete Edward McGaffi gan launched from drinking tritiated water.” After with hard-hatted Johnny. Th e into a tirade, at fi rst directed at Gunter cited one of his sources most ironic item on the site is NIRS with whom he said the NRC - leading phycist and nuclear fuel entitled “Using Science to Solve the has to “compete on a daily basis.” cycle expert, Dr. Problem” the one thing the DOE (Th is seemed odd since NIRS is - McGaffi gan railed: “He’s another apparently neglected to do. After also about protecting public health person who doesn’t know anything identifying two key challenges to and safety.) McGaffi gan accused about radiation.” NIRS has since the choice of site - the longlasting NIRS invited speaker fi led a motion for Commissioner half-lives of isotopes in the waste of going to Illinois to “use factoids McGaffi gan to recuse himself from and the potential for water contact or made-up facts or irrelevant licensing proceeding decisions - the DOE asks: How would you facts in order to . . . spur fear in involving NIRS and Dr. Makhijani solve these problems? Perhaps the public. You yourself have - NIRS’ expert - in the LES uranium waiting for children to provide done that. I mean, you yourself enrichment case because of the the solution is their best hope for go and do this placenta thing.” Commissioner’s obvious bias a better plan than Yucca? Yucca Th e “placenta thing” was Gunter’s and prejudice against NIRS and Mountain Johnny is at: www. earlier observation that when Makhijani. McGaffi gan, predictably, ocrwm.doe.gov/youth/index.shtml.

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NIRS in the Mary Olson News By Kitty Boniske

* Mary Olson was heard on NPR’s “All NIRS staff er Mary Olson Th ings Considered” addressing the is on a roll. In recent nuclear power relapse. months she’s given presentations on nuclear * A nuclear power piece ran on issues at the United Nations and has been AlterNet quoting Paul Gunter about heard on NPR’s “All Th ings the bonanza AmerGen stands to reap - Considered” and “Living over $400 million in decommissioning on Earth. She will shortly trust funds - after paying just $10 appear in MS Magazine. million for the Oyster Creek plant. In all these venues, she has displayed her unique talent for dealing with * Pulse of the Twin Cities ran Public complex issues in a way Citizen nuclear expert Michele Boyd’s that is understandable opinion-editorial about climate to the average listener. change that references NIRS. Mary joined the NIRS staff in 1991 and began making a major contribution to our work when she led our eff ort to prevent high-level nuclear waste from * Mary was quoted in an being dumped on Indian reservations. We were able to stop 26 of the proposed 28 sites. In 1994 she initiated the Mobile Chernobyl Campaign to oppose a Environmental News Service story change in the law which would have permitted a temporary “parking lot dump” about the relicensing of the Browns at Yucca Mountain. 1996 found her working on what came to be known as Ferry Nuclear Plant. the Nix MOX Campaign, an eff ort to head off the DOE’s plans to use weapons grade plutonium in the fuel mix in civilian nuclear power reactors. Mary and * Las Vegas City Life ran an article her husband Pete live near Asheville, NC - where the NIRS southeast offi ce is about Peggy Maze Johnson’s trip based - a beautiful little mountain town she has dubbed a “Nuclear Crossroads.” She is helping grassroots groups to organize around the dangers of escalating to the C-20 conference in which she shipments of radioactive materials through the region between Savannah River mentions NIRS. and the bomb plant in Oak Ridge, TN, as well as high-level waste from civilian reactors. Her work has recently brought her into the limelight internationally. * Mary appeared on NPR’s “Living As I write this, Mary is on her way to Vienna at the invitation of the Nobel on Earth” in a segment about the so- Women’s Initiative to participate in a dialogue between women representing called nuclear revival. NGOs in the U.S. and Iran and led by women Nobel Laureates from the two countries, an opportuniy that could not be more timely or appropos! * A letter to the editor by Paxus Calta, Kitty Boniske is a North Carolina-based activist whose longimte off -grid solar home NIRS Board Member, appeared in the recently began “feeding” electricity back to the grid. Toledo Blade Donate to NIRS… Clip this donation coupon and return to NIRS. Or donate on * Kevin Kamps was quoted on WOOD line at: www.nirs.org TV Channel 8 (Michigan) about Yes! I would like to make a donation this month to NIRS Palisades license renewal concerns. $10 $20 $50 $100 $1,000 other * Kevin was widely quoted in a story Send your donation to: in Th e Mercury (Pottstown, PA) NIRS, 6930 Carroll Avenue, Suite 340, Takoma Park, MD 20912 about spent fuel storage issues at the Call or email us for more ways you can help: Tel: 301.270.6477. Limerick nuclear power plant. Th e Email: [email protected]. story coincided with a visit to the Or visit our Web site: www.nirs.org reactor that day by President Bush. THUMBS UP “Nuclear power is neither the answer to modern energy This month Dragonslayer Reprocessing Revival Reviled salutes the top 45 donors to problems nor a panacea for NIRS so far this year Th e Financial Times ran a sensible Kay and Leo Drey editorial rebuking the Bush climate change challenges.” The Trust for Mutual Understanding administration for pushing a Mikhail Gorbachev resumption of reprocessing and Friedrike Merck concluded: “Mr. Bush is heedlessly Jay Harris dismantling his country’s once- Anonymous #1 coeherent counter proliferation policy Anonymous #2 and replacing it with ill-considered Anonymous #3 nuclear initiatives that have one William DeCamp, Jr. unfortunate common denominator. Florsheim Family Foundation Th at is that they, like President Jacques Anne Hess and Craig Kaplan Chirac’s recent ill-advised vaunting Dan Zorn of the usefulness of nuclear weapons Claire and Robert Heron against rogue states, hand Iran further Cathie Sullivan arguments to complain of western Lou and Judi Friedman double standards.” Chernobyl aftermath - a “nuclear family Susan Clark A Genuine Green says No to Nuclear embarassment” that must not be repeated. (Photo: Gabriela Bulisova) Anthony Barrett Australian Senator, Christine Milne of Kirk Booth the Australian Greens, wrote a spot- panacea for climate change challenges,” Janet Tauro on opinion-editorial condemning any former Soviet president Mikhail Faith A. Young move toward nuclear power in the Gorbachev said while marking the 20th Johanette Wallerstein Institute April 26th edition of the Melbourne anniversary of the Chernobyl accident Garo Bakerjian Age. Th is was a more appropriate in April. In urging the leaders of the Kathleen Sullivan marking of the Chernobyl anniversary Group of Eight (G-8) industrialized Martha E. Martin than the rantings of faux green, nations to move away from nuclear Keith and Tada Gunter Patrick Moore, published widely by power, he continued: “You don’t Duane Deacon our home-grown newspapers around actually solve problems by fi nding Theresa C. Freeman that date. “Chernobyl has become the solutions that create more problems nuclear family embarassment to be Maria Stanis down the track . . . it doesn’t add up Kenneth S. Welch swept under the carpet,” she wrote. economically, environmentally or Larry V. Roberts “It is foolish to think that accidents socially. Of all the energy options, Jean R. Larson such as Chernobyl cannot happen nuclear is the most capital intensive again, regardless of the technologies to establish, decommissioning is John Clarke employed,” she concluded. “It is prohibitively expensive and the Kelli Potts a disaster that should never be fi nancial burden continues long after James Michael Whedbee repeated.” And she observes what the plant is closed. In the U.S., for Susan Corbett all real greens know; that “carbon example, direct subsidies to nuclear David Levner dioxide reduction targets can be energy amounted to $115 billion Christiana Walford met without nuclear power through between 1947 and 1999 with a further David Lochbaum demand reduction, energy effi ciency, $145 billion in indirect subsidies. In Kay Leppold co-generation and investment in and contrast, subsidies to wind and solar Hope C. Taylor rapid deployment of . combined during the same period Stephen Koermer Th ese are cheaper, faster, safer and totaled only $5.5 billion.” more sustainable.” Bernard S. Coleman Support NIRS! Contribute $250 or more before July Hildegarde Hannum Gorbachev Dismisses the Nuclear 31st and we’ll send you a complimentary copy of Sara Shannon Choice NIRS Board member, ’’s new Sandra Gavutis “Nuclear power is neither the answer to book, Solartopia! Make a gift today! Victor Skorapa modern energy problems nor a Judith Johnsrud