Published: May 12th, 2012 at 6:00 pm ET
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Richard Broinowski* on Uranium and Nuclear
Uploaded by lysisfilms
Published on Apr 27, 2012
At 9:15 in
- Above all what we are having in Japan now, finally, is the mobilization of a good deal of indignation among the Japanese people
- They’re beginning to coalesce into angry groups, which they have not done before
- They’re beginning to slow burn and becoming indignant
- Gov’t is very fearful of opening any reactors because of backlash of local communities
- Nuclear power has 10 more years in Japan and it will be over
- They [the nuclear industry, gov't, regulators] have been vastly discredited
- The people are becoming very indignant
* University of Sydney: Richard Broinowski, LlB (Adel) Master Public Admin (Harvard) is an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Media and Communications [...] he was appointed [Australia's] Ambassador to the Republic of (South) Korea from 1987 to 1989, a posting which covered the 1988 Seoul Olympics. [...] He was appointed as Ambassador to Mexico [...]
Published: May 12th, 2012 at 6:00 pm ET
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sending...
Nuclear was a stupid idea. and there isn't a single person on earth that can debate this. It's over.
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I bet TEPCO would at least try to debate this issue.
They are still in total denial.
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Throwing nuclear out entirely is impossible and a fear-based overreaction.
It might be worth it for Japan to get a little more use out of some of their existing plants. And there are still good uses of nuclear for science, medicine, spacecraft. Cassini is still sending pictures back. Awesome idea, worked great, powered by some plutonium. We have way too many weapons and civilian power plants. We can still use nuclear for subs, it works great for them. There is a nuke sub research/test reactor a few miles away from me right now. Doesn't worry me at all (tho I would be worried if I find out there are spent fuel pools there. I doubt it).
We need to make sane decisions about where to store all these tons of used fuel rods. In casks on, or in casks under the ground. No more everyone saying not in my state. Someplace like they were going to do in Nevada, bury the things. The giant spent fuel pools above the ground was a crazy idea, but might have been because the public is both too fearful and ignorant to support some reasonable storage site. Maybe Tepco (as well as the NRC and the operators here in the US) have tried to move this spent fuel but the public said no.
This spent fuel issue plus placing plants where they should not be placed is most of the problem. Getting out of (90% of)civilian nuclear power is one thing we also should do. That would eliminate the need to build risky plants.
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YEAH PEOPLE CLAIM THEY CAN DRINK ROUND UP AND IT WONT KILL THEM ALSO,
So then whos the ignorant one?
People dont want Nuke anywhere near them, and they dont trust the officials telling them its safe. People are also against aggressive wars based on lies. So, as you can see, this issue is past the point of no return and something WILL give. What you are implying is for people to forget about Fukushima.
Do you have another recommendation?
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I would hope no one ever forgets Fukushima. Its similar to Chernobyl and could be worse in the long run. Wars are a similar issue; some of the same military-industrial complex create unnecessary wars just like they create unnecessary nuke plants and weapons and waste. Perhaps a few small wars are good, maybe if it really is a good cause, like going after sea pirates. Most wars don't even need to happen, but they benefit certain elites at tremendous cost to humanity. No war at all is fantasy, as is no nuclear.
I think there is good to be had from nuclear. But there is simply way too much of it being used.
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Those pirates started pirating after foreign companies ruined their fisheries by dumping industrial waste, including if I remember right, nuclear waste.
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Spent Fuel Pools should be built strategically AWAY from running plants. That way they are a separately contained entity from a plant meltdown and its impacts.
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Of course they should.
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GE will argue convincibly of the financial benefit and operational advantages to the utility of building and using the elevated SFP.
My last 3 GE washer/dryers have suffered premature meltdowns and it's no more GE for me.
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I'm not sure spent fuel pools CAN be built far away from a reactor. How would you transport the spent fuel bundle and keep it cool? How would you load in onto or into a transport vehicle and keep it cool? Used fuel bundles are VERY hot, in every sence of the word, by keeping the spent fuel pool close to the reactor you absolutely minimize time spent out of water. Every time the fuel bundle is exposed to air, radiation screams into the environment. I will bet that most reactors vent radioactive gas after transfering spent fuel in and out of the spent fuel pools.
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Yeah and I really don't agree with your point. You are saying that we cant live or exist without Nuclear Power? Really?
There is something about you I instinctively don't trust. The way you talk down your nose about the ignorant public really bothers me… we ARE the public.
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I don't "talk down my nose" at anyone. That's just an off-point personal attack. You are reading things into what I say that are not there. Of course spent fuel pools should be built away from plants. The part you refuse to see is that they can't do that, because people will protest anything "nuclear" even if they have no idea what it is. It was shortsighted not to put this stuff underneath Nevada years ago.
Obviously we could exist without nuclear power. I did not say we could not. You just made up something I didn't say. But to eliminate ALL nuclear technology would be a very stupid thing to do. Maybe you are a Luddite and want to smash all technology to bits?
I guess I can't say on this forum that anything nuclear (like nuclear medicine) is ok. This forum appears (for some anyway) to be about nuclear fear hysteria. Sort of like the 2012 crap some people get titillated by this stuff and hope the worst does happen. If its NOT the end of the world people like this get depressed.
I just want to see sane responsible use of nuclear power. To me that means moving away from relying on it to give us commercial power, and using it sparingly, carefully. for medicine and science.
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Fair enough. What got me was
'the public is both too fearful and ignorant to support some reasonable storage site'
I'm neither of those things. What I am concerned about is anyone tooting the horn to run the plants as is AND development of new plants. With our health and safety hanging 100 feet in the air, I almost find such thinking shocking. LETS DO FUKUSHIMA AGAIN PEOPLE!!! No thanks, I would rather read by candlelight.
Fukushima is a line in the sand. The nuclear industry has an obligation to strengthen their machinery before the next disaster happens. They no longer enjoy average Joe being ignorant of their horrible impact on our lives.
Now that I know you better and get where you are coming from I hear your point. But I think it is that desperate *We can't do it without Nuclear* stuff that's loaded with dangers for us all.
A year ago I would have thought you were right.
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The public has been mostly complacent about all this on a whole. This situation might wake people up. But even now (at least it seems like) bringing up any of these issues to most people just makes their eyes glaze over and say yup yup and forget what you said a moment later. I have spoken against DU weapons for maybe a decade. Its just terrible to dispose of DU by dropping it as part of bombs on all the people we make all these wars against. People either don't believe it or think your anti-american or whatever. Maybe complacent public is a better word than ignorant public.
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Just so no one misunderstands. Because people on this forum so far seem to misinterpret anything I say to mean something different. Will try again.
Once nuclear fuel rods are removed from a reactor they are (physically) hot for a while and probably should not be transported. Once they cool down enough they can be placed in a concrete cask and at that point they should be moved immediately away from the plant to some faraway safe place. Safe as can be anyway. Instead they keep being stored in the spent fuel pool near the plant, hundred or thousands of these rods being added over time. I believe that the public opposition to creating underground storage sites is the reason they just keep the rods there onsite. Didn;t want to publicize the existence of the fuel pools. Opposition to any more expansion of nuke power makes sense. But misguided fear of transporting the stuff causes it to be kept near the plant where it is for several reasons not in the safest place it should be.
Nuclear (as it is now) was a shortsighted thing but so was not dealing properly with the waste.
This is what we should have done in the US (maybe in Japan too) long ago:
http://articles.cnn.com/2010-11-12/world/finland.nuclear.waste_1_nuclear-waste-disposal-canisters?_s=PM:WORLD
even though in the religion of fukushima feardom that might be considered heresy.
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I demand to differ. No person or company should be allowed to own or operate a nuclear power plant or spent fuel pool. No person or company should be allowed to own or operate any business or facility with the capacity to destroy a large area, as an NPP or SFP can do. We can have a few military reactors to keep up the necessary supply of fissionable materials, if that's really necessary (there are other ways to set off weapons now).
The industry is a compulsive liar with a solid history of coverup, cheating, lies. It only takes one screwup to ruin a large area.
The industry does not even own up to its routine emissions pollution and the higher local cancer rates caused. How many people died from eating salad vegetables grown downwind of Simi Valley? And how many still will?
There is not enough integrity in people for NPPs and SFPs to be safe. It cannot assure plants have been built to specs.
This is an industry which can't even come to terms with serious allegations of faked earthquake tests, or fixing all known hazards and problems; especially things like we now know, boiling water design with thin pipes on the bottom side ensuring meltout in an accident, spf's exploding, cores exploding, and a number of other problems.
It's highly likely that any well-trained commando team could take over an NPP or SPF and do damage before any counter attack could be conducted. These things are a danger to national security just from that standpoint.
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We have the Northern Hemisphere reportedly facing the potential semiequivalent of a nuclear war fallout, from one spent fuel pool in Japan, and you think nuclear electricity generation still deserves a place?
You lump in a small generator in a spacecraft with the 104 NPP threats to humanity in the US?
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The Corn Belt came near destruction last June, and you think what, just another risk involved and necessary for 'cheap' nuclear power?
I think it's time for nuclear power engineers and operators to get jobs in other industries, after shutting everything down and treating the spent fuel.
I think it's time for the NPP industry owners to get a real job, get a real business, and quit sucking off the tit of government taxpayer liability backing.
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Most plants do need to be shut down ASAP.
Yes nuclear power should be de-subsidized by the governments. Exception being a few plants for research and needed to maintain a (smaller) stockpile of nuclear weapons. No more nuclear power industry – no corporations making money to boil water this way.
There will still be military needs (subs) and all the wishful thinking in the world isn't going to change that. So even when and if all the big plants get shut down, I will still have 2 reactors 11 miles from where I sit. These are the test plants for nuke subs. Until the world fundamentally changes, I still want those plants and subs doing their job.
Its easy to say 'no nukes' but its not that simple. How about almost no nukes or a hell of a lot less nukes? (plants or bombs)
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@americancommntr – i found the clarity you brought to all those points was spot on. great summary of the situation.
ToMars, everything would be great, except this stuff poisons for a very long time. (i'd hate to be on the planet Cassini crashes into, would seem like an act of war, dirty bomb and all).
For me it's simple. It's morally vacant to leave toxic waste for other generations to deal with. They can't speak for themselves, never will. any way I look at the matter, it doesn't add up to anything but selfish indulgence at the expense of the future. Futurecide.
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You simply misunderstood what I said about the Cassini spacecraft. What does the amount of fuel it carries have to do with anything? I do think we should do more projects like that one. But because of Fukushima, zealots will demand anything "nuclear" simply go away. I hope the baby doesn't get thrown out with the bath water. Ideally I'd like to see maybe 12 or so plants still exist in the world a decade from now. None at all is very luddite of an idea.
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Like the Apollo Pu238 RTG that is sitting at the bottom of the Tonga Trench?
How about the TWO American reactor failures in Antarctica? That's never in the PRESS? One reactor was cleaned up, and huge quantities of materials shipped back to the USA – but the hold was empty upon return – so where is the reactor core? Somewhere in the Pacific??
What about the RTEG that leaked its contents all over the place down on the ice?
How about workers at McMurdo coming down with cancer? That's hushed up.
You are given the privileged to operate from New Zealand Antarctic Terrorities for your base – I feel that permission is about to be REVOKED.
They sure as hell aren't your Territories.
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That info was never publicized here. That our (US) government put nukes in Antarctica sickens me to think about. Supposed to be sort of a pristine place. NZ would be right to take measures to say they won't tolerate this anymore. The planes from McMurdo go thru NZ and often end up (or start) here in Schenectady NY. I wonder how much dangerous stuff was transported over such great distances.
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Agreed!
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A complete overhaul in the ownership and the oversight of the entire nuclear industry makes sense. Even as we (hopefully) massively drawn down nuclear power.
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Hi tomarsandbeyond, the rotting nuclear subs in the world's seas scare the crap out of me. How can you not be worried? There is no useful meaning for nuclear power on this planet, imho.
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I agree B&B. A year ago I believed exactly what tomarsandbeyond said. I am sure one could dig a post up here to prove my point. But a year is a long time for an industry to flail about and fail. There is 0% progress in any dimension of the Japan accident. In fact there are 14 undisclosed other nuclear accidents that the industry refuses to properly and openly inform us about – and you want to start some more, or keep the ones still active around and poised to turn into a Fukushima or worse.
A year has shown me they, we, do not have what we need to safely provide nuclear energy. If you have to lie about it, I don't want to pay for that, and I am surely not alone. I year ago I didn't believe we COULD wean off and walk away from Nuclear power, but today I think we should run like hell from where this road led to, and never look back. We are going to be lucky to get past this place in time, biologically speaking.
They need to take this puppy back to the drawing-board and the people, WE must never allow industry or government to hurt us again. The people must write and run the ethics involved. We need to regulate the industry. Not them, they have not earned the right to continue with our lives in their hands.
Id rather live like a hobbit than be stressing out over other peoples stupid and irresponsible decisions. Cant get my head in two places with SFP issues today and if reactors will run tomorrow. I hope they all are not, for all our sake!
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I do worry a little about those. And a few nuke bombs have been lost in the ocean too. Not good.
I wish we didn't need nuke subs. But we have them and we cannot get away from using them immediately.
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I do think Nuclear is just not the way to go… for our generation and even more so for the ones yet to be born. In my lifetime I've been affected by both Chernobyl as a kid and now Fukushima as an adult. I grew up in France and now live in Japan… I think that's a bit too much in one short lifespan, and the likelihood it will happen again, in my lifetime, are getting even higher with the aging plants pushing the limits and the hundreds of new ones popping up around what used to be the third world.
Is this the kind of catastrophic future we want to build for future generations? For what? So a few can profit from it now? This is the epitome of selfishness and a sure way to bring self destruction to the whole of humanity and life on this planet, in just one or two generations.
I believe we owe this world better. Hundreds of millions of years of evolution is being short-circuited by a few short sighted individuals. This has to stop.
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Very good talk – worth listening to.
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The Japanese Gov't. <==> TEPCO Gang connection is starting to unravel (as Ex-PM Kan's power base grows exponentially) because of the nuclear denial* that they have.
They continue to push for ever more Nuclear despite the Trillion Dollar Eco-Disaster caused by "THEIR" denial that another Fukushima could happen tomorrow or even the next day while at the same time the issues of the SFP's at Fukushima continue to make World news because of the Global danger they represent!
Expect to see major change in how THE Japanese people begin to deal with their Gov't.'s credibility "PROBLEM", hopefully before it is too late!
If the Gov't allows the Utilities to restart their reactors, without local approval, I think that will become the tipping point of Public confidence!
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I think the people in Cambodia – and four other UN-NAMED countries will also start to slow-burn and get indignant when they find out that Japan has been sending them radioactive fish:
Fishy help? Controversy over Japan food aid from tainted areas
http://rt.com/news/japan-food-aid-cesium-018/
But, Cambodians should not worry, just get creative:They could re-can it and stamp it Made in Thailand or something – for export to the U.S. (or Canada).
Same with rice.
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There was post a while ago about Japanese rice being shipped to other countries that then packaged it with their Country as the Country of Manufacture…
This has and will continue to erode the "Made in Japan" quality BRAND!
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Indignation doesn't play well with the current US Administration's Energy Policy…
… Ergo US black out of current events in Japan.
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"Black Out" says it all!
That was a great comment…
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Folks it not just about Japan and their "Nuclear Village" infested with Yakuza mob types. Didn't Gunderson say the US NRC could demand a dry cask campaign, to get the assemblies out of SFP's while we can get still near them … there is even money set aside (twenty-odd billion would buy tens of thousands of dry casks … it's not a permanent solution, but a vastly improved interim step, which would obviate the risk of catastrophic release through fire and/or prompt moderated criticalities at SFP's …. and THEY DO NOTHING BUT MOLLYCODDLE THIS DEATH INDUSTRY … These are not regulators these are TOADIES waiting to "GO TO HEAVEN" (i.e. get a job with Big Nuclear … )
We should not be fighting amongst ourselves. ENENEWS and all the honest posters here are heros.
General Electric, majority owned by JP Morgan banking interests, foisted nuke business on Japan … THEY have DESTROYED JAPAN. These BWR's were the up-scaled version of early submarine reactors, hence the SPF on top of the reactor (limited space in a sub) and maybe also the dewatering fear AG mentions. These are FOOL POOLS, and they are the Achilles heel of the industry. I'd like to see them get the fuel out NOW, whilst they CAN, but TOADY NRC doesn't demand it; Barack Obama doesn't demand it; previous pro-nuker Arnie Gunderson didn't demand it when he was pulling down big bucks working for Big Nuclear.
Fool (pool) me once and shame on me. Fool (pool) me 435 times …. aw' screw it…
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Ned sez: "previous pro-nuker Arnie Gunderson didn't demand it when he was pulling down big bucks working for Big Nuclear"
SP: Huh? He ended up getting fired for whistleblowing and lost his house to foreclosure after being shunned by the nuclear cabal. I think he did more than make a heroic demand…he paid for his stance with twenty years of financial hardship for his family. How many of us can claim we fought the system and paid that price?
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Sickputer YES! I know and like Arnie, I have chatted with him, and I appreciate his conversion, but he could be a little more forthcoming about his background … he says "I used to support the industry …." I would like something more like Kan, who seems truly sorry, whereas Arnie continues to wear this shit-eating grin, and he's cashing in on his fame, but the mea culpa is weak and actually missiing. It would help if he could stop smiling so much into the camera and actually put a serious face on to match the seriousness of the matter.
He got paid a lot of money by NUKE, and then he found out about NRC being bribed to cover up.
Hell, how about a defamation lawsuit NOW? We would all chip in to fund it. This might give the matter the press coverage it deserves. His book is top seller in JAPAN? He needs to be stronger in his indignation. He's the one who designed the FOOL POOL racks with the boron so a criticality doesn't happen in the FOOL POOL ("that should happen in the reactor ….") No it shouldn't. There should be no and never should have been a civilian nuclear reactor program.
That is what he needs top start saying! It's like Dave Lochbaum of UCS who says"Nuclear Reactors can be made safe, if you're willing to spend enough, but no one is, so they should be shut down." This convoluted logic from reactor heads is too whimsical and light-hearted. They should be serious of mien and admit they helped to midwife this death industry…
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Ned…You ask a lot of the man. Fifteen years ago he might have been a prime candidate for the Karen Silkwood treatment. Today he is a little safer, but he knows that is not guaranteed.
I appreciate what he says in a kind voice in one of the first post-Fukushima videos…that he thinks Three Mile Island was a bookend and Fukushima will be the final bookend for the nuclear industry.
I think the hope in those words is getting closer to a reality with every day. When Joe Six Pack begins to disseminate information about Japanese civilian victims with bleeding eyeballs it will certainly hasten the pace for the public to demand the death of a deadly industry.
Many more informational battles will be fought. The money interests have deep pockets and have bought off virtually every politician, but the tide will turn when the bureaucrats turn on each other.
Their children will die also so it is a moral choice. Take the special interest money and watch our citizens die and along with them possibly your children and grandchildren. Yes you can afford to buy safer water and food, but you can't buy safer air. Nobody can…except maybe Big Gates.
These plastic bribed politicians have to be shown there is clearly no other choice. If Brazil can make the right decison…why can't America?
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Well said, Sickputer. Great minds think alike, as they say.
See my post below.
Cheers! And a very happy Mother's Day to the moms in your life.
G'nite.
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Hi NedlifromVermont. Good to see you chime in here again.
I can't help but wonder just how powerful the forces that be behind the scenes in nuke land which might give one pause, even someone as high profile (now) as Arnie, and stop them from going for a full court (or should I say "full fuel pool"?) press now or ever…
I just read that here in the PNW, the board of Energy Northwest just approved the purchase of nearly $1 BILLION of nuclear fuel ($741 million to be exact) which won't be used until 2018!
http://www.thenewstribune.com/2012/05/11/v-lite/2139595/energy-northwest-to-buy-711m-of.html
$741 million for ONE purchase of fuel, by ONE energy company. That's a HECKUVA lot of moola by just one company…
These guys have some deep pockets (thanks to taxpayer subsidies forced upon us by our gvt.) So to even think about any actions which might force one to go to court to defend oneself might be seen as ill-considered…(especially given the fact that poor Arnie and his wife Maggie have already been down that road before and it ruined them financially).
So while I share somewhat and empathize with your frustration that more people in places of authority aren't speaking up enough or doing more, I have to say I
can understand why they might not wish to.
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P.S. The correct amount is $711 million, which they plan to turn around and sell some of the fuel to the Tennessee Valley Authority for $731 million.
The back story here is pretty interesting, as you'll see if you read the article linked to above.
(snip):
"DOE approached Energy Northwest about the deal, said executive board Chairman Sid Morrison. Energy Secretary Steven Chu plans to defend it vigorously…"
/snip
W-A-T-K: I'm sure Secty. Chu (former nuclear scientist) does…
(snip):
"DOE proposed the deal to help keep a gaseous diffusion plant in Paducah,Ky., operating."
"The plant is in danger of shutting down this year because its technology is outdated, but DOE lacks the budget for decommissioning it…"
…"Instead of using newly mined uranium, DOE's leftover depleted uranium,also known as "tails" would be used for the Energy Northwest fuel…"
"The tails are a byproduct of enriching uranium and would be recycled to get a second round of enriched uranium."
Uranium naturally is composed of mostly uranium 238 isotopes and 0.7 percent uranium 235 isotopes. To be used as fuel,the percentage of uranium 23
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And finally:
(snip):
" DOE has more than 770,000 tons of depleted uranium,which traditionally has been considered waste,stored at Paducah and Portsmouth,Ohio.
"DOE is restricted to offering the depleted uranium from tails for enrichment only to federal entities,which limits the deal to the Bonneville Power Administration,which Energy Northwest is working with,and the Tennessee Valley Authority. However,the Tennessee Valley Authority lacks the borrowing capacity to finance the project now,Atkinson said.
That made only Energy Northwest eligible for the deal."
So this looks to be a case of both "creative financing" and a creative way to "get rid of" nuclear waste ("depleted uranium") by paying for it to be recycled by a plant that is too old and too expensive to decommission…Just a "taste" of the underlying motivation for our beloved NRC to extend the life of our 104 leaking, aging dinosaur NPPs: Not enough $$ in the pot. Thereby increasing our RISK of nuclear catastrophe each minute that ticks by…
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…shouldn't watch the Laker-Denver game while typing…of course I meant to type: Bill Gates. Wonder what he would think if his little horse-riding daughter died from Fukushima fallout? Change his mind maybe?
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Indignant is good. "Indignez-vous!" sparked the Arab Spring, (incorrectly translated into English as outrage.) My mother was a fan of Rachel Carson. She became increasingly saddened to see American culture increasingly money-obsessed. They'd roll over in their graves if they saw this. Instead, for Mothers' Day, I wish they'd rise from their graves and knock some sense into some heads, or make the worst nonsense heads roll.
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great video worth watching for sure. I check this site daily for updates. my local website had something on Japan but no the Fukushima accident
Population clock shows Japan faces extinction in 1000 years: http://www.smh.com.au/world/population-clock-shows-japan-faces-extinction-in-1000-years-20120513-1ykh7.html
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Indeed: Tepco still maintains that
"The No. 4 reactor building is not tilted and it, including the storage pool, will not be destroyed by a quake,"
http://ajw.asahi.com/article/behind_news/social_affairs/AJ201205100051
Now that's what I call chutspah, arrogance, and stupidity, times ten.
Nuclear is a total fraud and a scam, and the quicker and faster we THROW IT OUT ALTOGETHER (despite the pronouncements of know-nothing science geeks), the BETTER.
See; The Doomsday Machine by Martin Cohen and Andrew McKillop
Kudos to the Mr. Broinowski for his excellent presentation, but I do not think "renewables" will indeed ever replace oil, gas and coal, because at this point they only produce a small amount of energy. It is possible the research has been suppressed, and MIT professor Dan Nocera claims to have made a battery whereby 2 gallons of water per day can be heated by the sun to supply enough electricity for a house for one day, but where is this technology now?
I agree with the conclusions of Cohen and Mckillop: renewables is another scam whereby corporate oligarchs can continue to control society through centralized power (physical and metaphysical). What the authors contend and is never raised is the concept of reducing energy consumption, rearranging society in a bioregional, localized, democratic, living lightly sustainable structure. This would mean we would not need the corporate oligarchs or the corrupt and evil Wall Stree/City of London banks to…
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PV on everyones rooftop takes away the centralization
And it costs 3 cents per kWH
http://nukeprofessional.blogspot.com/p/renewable-and-energy-efficiency.html
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tomarsandbeyond,
I am shocked by your statements and could not disagree more with your assessment of current nuclear technology application on this planet. Outer space is one thing but then we do not live in outer space do we. We also do not live on the sun or on any other planet my friend.
The use of nuclear power and related technology has done more damage to this planet's ecosystem and biosphere in less time than any other technology application to date by mankind.
Every step and every application regarding Nuclear Technology has been shrouded in secrecy and buried inside constant lies while benefiting only those that are on the inside of the secrecy loop.
We are fools as human beings for using this technology in any application anywhere on this planet. What benefit has it brought to this world we live in? I see no benefits!
What we now have, are a few nice pictures of Saturn, and that has only cost us about 100 million human diseased lives since 1945?
Brian dead appears to be a very common disease on our planet these days.
Some people actually think that creating a running record and tally of 100 million dead and or sick humans, while promoting 30% extinction rates for other species, is an acceptable behavior for only one species actions inhabiting our planet.
That would be mankind's actions and that clearly makes these types of thoughts and slight of comments by you and or any other Nuclear supporters of this Nuclear Technology Application…
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as I said this forum is filled with people who have a blind emotional fear reaction to the misuse of nuclear power, so you react in an extreme way against all technology good or bad that is even associated with the word nuclear.
Cassini didn't harm a single person anywhere yet you say it sickened 100 million people? That's how it reads.
If you are saying 100 million people were sickened by nuke power (misuse) in general, that may be so. Probably if we count depleted uranium weapons used on our supposed enemies.
"Every step and every application regarding Nuclear Technology has been shrouded in secrecy and buried inside constant lies while benefiting only those that are on the inside of the secrecy loop."
That may be so and that is the problem. Many technologies have great potential for harm and you would probably ban them all: genetics, nuclear, nanotech. Its an all-or-nothing attitude, either nukes all over the world or none at all. That's not rational. But nothing will convince a zealot.
So you say everyone who disagrees a little with your zealotry is 'brain-dead'. No room for any heresy in your extremist religion.
Nuke tech does have a place. A very small place used for pure science. And our subs (for now). Its not a 'nukes good/nukes bad' choice. Its a matter of proper use of something that was badly misused.
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YOu know what really sux…
… A lost nuclear sub at sea.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sunken_nuclear_submarines
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Since this is a defense issue the nations will need to work together to get away from using these subs.
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Bat-Sh&t Crazy!
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The only way a lingering nuke shill can call for more fission after Fukushima is by blotting out the embedded insanity of the nuke industry while calling its wise opponents irrational. Denial, disinfo, and probable professional bias don't work. When the nuke people dig the uranium out of the ground it grossly contaminates, usually some previously pristine native land. How is the nuke industry, even reformed, going to clean up the mining sites of the uranium dust fines blowing everywhere? Then there is the enrichment phase with its DU production soon to be deposited in nanoparticles all over south Asia and quite a few domestic sites, currently classified as permanent nuclear waste dumps by the NRC, because of DU weapons firing, which leaves fine soot particles that can never be removed from site. Then there is the absurd plutonium power generators on spacecraft that have been burning up on reentry for quite a few decades depositing plutonium in the upper atmosphere. If one of them crashes on takeoff, look out. We do not want nuclear subs because they represent a second strike mythology that keeps the nuke powers unafraid of MAD. This is a world designed by losers. It would be better to do away with all nuclear fission industry entirely freeing the world not only from more Fukushimas looming ahead but also the threat of nuclear war designed by the military-space mafia who cooked up a use for fission that was from the outset about mass homicide.
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We have to move away from this stuff. The things that can stop immediately are uranium mining, DU production and use, and the building of any new nuke power plants. I think we are stuck with the subs and some nuke weapons for now as a necessity for survival between US/Russia/China/Israel/India/Pakistan/France. Any of which could destroy or badly maim any of the others. That's like a standoff with guns drawn that needs to be backed away from carefully. The powers that be are still trying to create a war with Iran, and anti-ballistic missiles near Russia,
so we are not headed in the right direction there.
We could probably shut off all nuke power plants now and leave them off. But to try to stop Iran, France, or even Finland, they might simply say no. And is it worth a war to stop them?
For now lets push our governments to get off of using nuclear for power. And if we can use the recent horrors to make people aware of DU and push the US (etc.) to stop using DU weapons, the so much the better.
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That is why we have started holding Tuesday and Thursday Nuclearists Anonymous meetings, because a drug or alcohol dependency mindset seems to be at work here. Addiction to Big Pharma's lab-produced heroin (Oxycontin et al) will make liars and thieves out of relatively mild-mannered people … check out the theft of copper coils from nursing homes and day care centers in Texas …. $60,000 damage to retrieve $300 which buys a handful of pills to smoke, and no compunction … you need that pill ,,, same behavior for the nuclearists just up=sized: $15 Trillion of damage estimated by Germany for one worst case reactor melt out … and General Electric marketed the BWR as "inexpensive" …. the "affordable nuke" "fixed price" and so created the "great bandwagon" movement for nuclear power. The costs for the Fuku disaster will easily exceed two or three times the market value of the entire company.
And who were these august gentlemen who rammed this program through in the face of senior scientists who told them not to; in the face of power utility executives who were truly skeptical; in the face of insurance industry executives who would not budge (simply buy yourselves a convenient federal exemption on liability (Price-Anderson Act) from the whores who happen to sit in Congress at the time …;
MORGAN BANKING INTERESTS, controlling General Electric, who also made the decision to leave a full complement of life boats at home when Titanic sailed
Lord Jim…
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And Paducah!?!: "Clean!!" Nuke uses two old-style (read highly polluting) thermal coal plants, fifteen hundred Megawatts each, to fire the gaseous diffusion centrifuges, to make the nuclear fuel, which gives us CLEAN!?! nuclear … you just couldn't make this stuff up!
Shut down Paducah! Shut down Energy Northwest! Shut down Entergy, Exelon and General Electric while you're at it! This is what crony capitalism looks like. Haven't heard that old capitalist canard regarding Fuku: "Creative destruction" When the pillars behind the whores at Goldman Sachs start to crumble, oh no, can't have destruction that creative …. prop it up, send in Predator clowns.
Oh yeah. In my previous post I left out a group of three guys who also told GE not to proceed any further with the commercial BWR program in 1976 (the problem at that time was still manageable) … it was three executives from INSIDE THE COMPANY, vice-presidents of General Electric in charge of reactor development and quality control, who warned the fuel would overheat, release hydrogen from the zircalloy cladding and explode the containment and pollute the planet and cause death and misery far and wide. They were shown the door, after they testified to AEC their concerns.
People at AEC allowed death machines as designed (with silly back fixes (venting)) to proceed, and why? Because to stop the BWR program then MIGHT CAUSE THE DEATH OF THE INDUSTRY! No shit! Proceeding with it caused said death…
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Rant Off. Happy Mother's Day to everyone out there. It could be our last.
I'll try to lighten up a little, but I am more than a little indignant. And I, too, often wear a shit-eating grin. Please remind me not to …
Peace and out.
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Some good comments on this thread.
Nice to see.
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The force is watching and waiting for a true enlightenment of certain human brain waves,
These logical brain wave patterns are now required to properly function, in order to save each of us and the rest of this planet from our own intellectual arrogant stupidity.
Do not accept "brain dead" presented by or in any form~ anymore from anyone.
Bat-Sh&t Crazy is not an affliction~ its simply a cleverly designed and taught condition!
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I am not a genius here, but it seems to me that if nuclear plants work with material which can have a chain reaction, and it all goes horribly wrong, the smart thing to do would be to start dividing that fuel up, each time removing small piles of it, until it's so divided up any chain reaction can only effect the smaller pile and not the entire load.
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Amazing how some of us "non-geniuses", myself included, come up with some of the most common sense ideas. You are right fellow common sense thinker. I had the "non-genius" idea that radiation monitoring should not be run by volunteer in the USA, as it is now, and fire stations across the nation should be assigned the task. That's enough for now, don't want to blow the minds of real geniuses.
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Great idea. Police already monitor vehicles for radiation. Firefighters could check for radiation in the air. I think we also need more detailed surveys for different isotopes. Universities could do this, probably just need the funding, and we could have regular information on things like how much cesium 134 vs 137 etc that will tell us whats really going on. All over the place it should be tested so we are better informed.
universities might be beholden to the govt for grants but scientists there might give us more truths than just the govt itself would.
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Let us place blame firmly where it should be laid.
The United States has been pushing nuclear power, and nuclear weapons for decades.
If you didn't want Nukes – or Nuclear power – they went bat-shit crazy at you – look at the New Zealand example. Hardly sane?
Now look at Iran? Definitely not a sane response to their nuclear programme? Bombing Iranian nuclear facilities? HELLO!
Now look at Fukushima, and the GE reactors. None of them should have been operating at all! They were death traps when they were built.
Now look at most of the reactors operating around the world today.
What's going to happen when there is ANOTHER MELTDOWN?
Who is next? That shitty medical reactor in Bucharest leaking Iodine every 3-4 weeks? That's killed more people than its cured in a million years.
Maybe Diablo Canyon has a meltdown in a shake next week?
How about Vermont? It's retro at that plant. I can name a dozen more old and substandard US reactors …. and don't get me started on Europe – or Russia.
How about a big pond melt down at SFP4? Anyone up for clouds of +50 microSieverts per hour over Californian?
However, there is one country that is Primarily to blame for pushing nuclear power in the last 50 years – and that's the United States. Time for the US to start cleaning these messes up.
You designed them, built them, pushed the technology down peoples throats like a pimp pushes prostitutes.
Now it is time to clean it all up!
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Sadly, placing the blame (if it's justified the way you put it is another discussion altogether) provides no solution.
Wow, man, you're angry. I see that from all your posts.
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He's quite right to be angry.
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Absolutely – I'm angry, too.
But the damage is done and passing the blame around alone won't help, I'm afraid.
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I'm angry too, I keep waking up on the wrong side of the equator.
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at least we're still waking up.
/sarc
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It's not the United States… it's the global octopus-like economic and political entity that controls the country, and most of the rest of the world.
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US is a good place to start – though the powers that be control a lot of information and mostly set the agenda, its still possible to enact change here when enough people get fired up about something. A million letters to congresspeople would not go unnoticed. I guess I wonder what exactly we should ask them for.
I want full disclosure about the effects from all past and current use of nuclear power (and weapons) and real monitoring of our air water soil and food. And no more new nuke power plants is an important point. We should look at what countries like Germany have done to limit nukes and do that in the US too.
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@RutherfordsGhost: On the money! thank you for your comment…well put…surprising to see a regular attempt to minimize your valid points by calling you angry…seems to me that youʻre just calling it like you see it!
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hi hanaloa, my comment was not meant to "minimize" valid points…
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It was US and Russia (as the USSR) both.
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When will people's "slow burn" become a self-sustaining chain reaction?-Hopefully soon.
Getting back to what tomarsandbeyond said at the start of this. I think we have to find points we can agree on and work from there. One point where we could all agree is that all commercial nuclear should get shutdown. If we could get that accomplished it would be a huge leap forward in protecting life.
What to do with the spent fuel? I have some serious concerns about shipping nuclear waste all over for long term storage in one designated location. I live in Illinois the state with the most nuclear reactors and stored nuclear waste. While I would love to see it out of here I really don't want it put on trains and trucks and shipped all over the state and country. Likewise I don't want waste from other states and other countries shipped through the area I live in. The best solution I have heard is to shut down commercial reactors and move all spent fuel into dry cask storage on-site at each site where it already exists. That way we eliminate the constant moving about of nuclear waste. If we can get to that point we can debate a further solution from that point forward.
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@enuff you might be right about that dry cask storage on-site. Though I wonder if at Fuku these things would survive a tsunmai. Maybe they are heavy enough they wouldn't budge. And at San Onofre would they survive a big quake? That plays into whether to keep them there or bring them to Nevada (underground?).
For shutting down nuke plants we need to do that in the western world and then have more moral backing for asking Iran or others to do the same. China might be the biggest problem; they need a lot of power and might find the risks acceptable. But with enough solidarity and awareness among the public we can force a non-nuke power treaty just like was done for above-ground weapons testing. Anyone who still uses it would be an outcast/pariah.
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Way to go RutherfordsGhost ….. you said it ….. now exhale, and pat yourself on the back, and have a nice unemotional conversation on the matter with any of a number of your friends and aquaintainces who have not WOKEN UP yet … once or twice a day at most (quiet voice tones help, with regular breathing and agreeable facial expressions (so as not to scare them off) …
Tell them about the GE Three (even though they will be incredulous) … it is good mental gymnastics … try channeling the Dalai Lama for a heart/head space … don't tell them about SPF 4 or the Devil's Chain Reaction just yet … (this is too much and will cause emotional overload, and can lead to unnecessary suicides among the general population you know and love) … stick with a melt out or two … it also helps to share about it to get a handle on it all for YOU …
And you will have accomplished a great deal for posterity ….
Check in regularly with ENENEWS where we are "Keeping the Heart" for Planet Earth … with truth.
And when you feel the need to rant, please go ahead using RANT ON … RANT OFF handles …
CHEERS!
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tomars,
Blind fear should not be mistaken for wisdom.
Yet "fear" is paramount inside the genome and DNA of many species residing on this planet and is part of the natural order of life and often a warranted and required reaction to help individual and group survival.
The Cassini mission and 100 million deaths simply states and reinforces that some have projected that the nuclear above and below ground testing period along with the upper atmospheric testing period was responsible for over 100 million diseased deaths worldwide.
I think mankind may have found and identified the world's only current cancer epidemic causative antigen and its called manmade radioactive isotopes in all thier varied flavors and designs.
So yes, we have some great pictures of Saturn based on multi-directional developed technology patterns that are all now slowly destroying our only inhabitable planet.
Follow the radioactive isotope releases on this planet and compile the associated jet stream and world ocean distribution patterns and you will soon find your cancer diagnosis and cancer death certificates in all flavors and designs worldwide.
This is not up for discussion by any informed medical professional. Yet, we blame obesity, poor diet and then the sun that has burned brightly on this planet for a billion years as the culprits.
You my friend are being hoodwinked by those that can be controlled by money and that massive unlimited amounts of money can buy.
Shut them…
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I am not hoodwinked in the least. I understand the power structure that is in place. I am all for phasing out nuclear power. Its just not as simple or easy as shutting them all down.
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down~Shut them all down!
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Greetings again to all and I agree with Obewan … Down down down into the ground ground ground …
Medical isotopes can all be make at one research reactor …
Maybe Iran holds the key to unravelling the western-cum-Russia nuclear cabal. The Mullahs are calling our nation's bluff! Did you hear? Since they can't bully Iran into submission, Obama is going to accept Khamenei's FATWAH against making (or shall we infer final assembly of) a nuclear weapon!?!
Could it be that the Powers That Be realize they have a bigger nuclear problem on their hands than the hypothectical Iranian bomb? Could that bigger problem perhaps be a matched set of super-cheaply-built, inexpensively designed, cut-rate, blue light special, General Electric Mark One and Mark Two Boiling Water Reactors, which blew up just as they were designed to????
Come on Jamie Dimon, you Greek import capitalist thug … spill the beans on GE to deflect the embarasment of having to eat humble pie on Meet the Press!!! What were the trades? Insurance derivatives on Daichi and Daini? Puts or Calls on Japanese real estate that went bust? Maybe you loaded up on Areva bonds thinking Sarkozy was a shoe in? Or Greek debt, since that might seem patriotic to a first generation son of Greek immigrants. Golden boy is looking a little grey.
We need some more heavy weights to join our little band of truly Patriotic truth-tellers. Where is the adult at the slumber party?
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… continiued
Is George Schultz still alive (Reagan's Secretary of State?) He at least managed a serious expression of no-nonsense on camera. There was a seriousness there, a weightiness or gravitas, if you like, which is lacking in today's Ryan Seacrest (shit eating grins all the time) media world.
Even Obama sounds tinny, and seems to have a tin ear for nuclear truth. Come on Barack. I went to Harvard, too. What does that little motto thingy say? Three little syllables (Latin) ve .. ri .. tas. What could that mean? Where is the veracity, the truth, in nuclear power? Too cheap to meter? Nope, that was a con job, a really stupid one at that. For why would you want to produce and sell something you couldn't charge for??? How about safe? Nope: to wit, Fuku-deadly! Necessary? Sorry, doesn't wash (in this case it really doesn't wash … can you spell recontamination? And how many Japanese have died in the OR without nuke power? NONE! How about low carbon? Sorry! See post above about Paducah, and others about mining clean up, and we haven't even got to the waste transfer part, yet. Modern? Nope. It's ancient technology that now is actively anti-modern, stifling funding for renewables which can and do work here and elsewhere, especially solar and wind.
Damn, Barack … none of it's true. Walks like a duck, quacks like a duck …. what do you think el Presidente? IT"S A DUCK! Now ain't it sad we've been had? Maybe it's time to get…
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MAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Peace and Out.
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Tomars,
I understand your concern and confusion as it is one and the same.
San Onofre discovered it had thousands of leaking pipes and what did they do?
They shut the Nuclear Power Plant down!
Japan is fully aware of the current problem they now have and they are yet to realize and or comprehend the future plight of their people.
What have they down after this latest Fukushima Nuclear Radiation disaster.
They shut "all" their Nuclear Power Plants down!
Chernobyl? Simi Valley? Three Mile Island? Above Ground Nuclear Testing?
Should I go on?
Yes~ it is very easy to just shut them "all" down!
We have done so in the past and we can do it again "right now" worldwide.
Either your part of the solution or your part of the problem.
Pick a side and if its the correct side~ then get it done!
We are all living inside a lie and its time for us all to awaken from our carefully crafted boggling mentally designed and created stupor!
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