To February 10 Climate and Nuclear News

I don’t know which is the worst news this week – climate or nuclear.   But I am going away for a week on a boat, WITH NO ACCESS TO ANYTHING DIGITAL.  I can’t wait. I’m taking one of those old things we all used to use – A BOOK.

But I digress:

CLIMATE. I hardly know where to start. I think that the worst thing is  connected with the collapse of journalism – as articles appear denouncing climate scientists as “frauds”. This, despite the 97 percent scientific consensus on climate change.

NUCLEAR. Remarkable apathy prevails, as nuclear weapons tensions hot up.

AUSTRALIA

CLIMATE and ENERGY

• Climate change report: Australia’s heatwaves to be hotter, longer and more frequent.
• Chief Scientist Alan Finkel warns of Trump’s Stalin-like attack on science.
• Cory Bernardi spouts the climate denialism of American right-wing “think tanks”. “Alternative facts” form the basis of Trump and Turnbull’s energy policies.
• Attack on both climate and tax-payers’ money – subsidies to coal power. Taxpayers would put up 21 times more subsidy for Carmichael coal mine, than they would for renewables. Traditional Owners act to defeat Adani’s invalid Indigenous Land Use Agreement.

Fossil fuel generators, not renewables, are to blame for high electricity prices. Australian Energy Council warns on likely electricity problems in New South Wales. Australian Energy Market Operator now  confident of wind power security in South Australia. Queensland govt will back renewable energy, not new coal-fired power stations.

Powershop electricity customers funding community renewable energy.

Western Australian Greens propose solar battery rebate scheme.

NUCLEAR A responsible global citizen would not sell uranium to Ukraine.

South Australia

• On nuclear waste dumping: America’s Dept of Energy more truthful than South Australia’s Nuclear Royal Commission.
• High Level Nuclear Waste IS planned for South Australia’s Federal Dump.
• France’s ANDRA waste company  propagandising rural South Australia, but their French nuclear waste dump leaked radioactivity into wine growing area.
• Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation (ANSTO) propagandising to Aborigines.
• Jeff Baldock could make $$$s from #nuclear waste dump, but poses as community benefactor.
• ENuFF SA (Everyone for a Nuclear Free Future SA) made a real nuisance of themselves, and asked some very hard questions of Australia’s nuclear authorities.
• South Australia’s Liberal leader Steven Marshall wants nuclear power.

Western Australia.Ruling in favour of challenge against Noongar Indigenous land use agreement may lead to amendment of Native Title Act.

INTERNATIONAL

CLIMATE  January sea ice volume is lowest on record, by a considerable margin. Global warming might accelerate, due to the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation, “El Tío” (the uncle).

NUCLEAR. Delays, ballooning costs, stall Next-Generation Nuclear Reactors.    Uranium companies having ‘worst time ever’.

USA.

• Trump has no skills to negotiate foreign relations, but he can unleash nuclear war. Trump’s chief advisor, Steve Bannon and his obsession with war.  Trump didn’t know what the New START nuclear treaty was, but wanted to get rid of it.  Pentagon urges Trump to expand nuclear weapons, ready for “limited” atomic war.
• SOMETIMES there’s A BIT of good news at Hanford nuclear facility.
• Was the Nuclear Control Room Panel Fire at Quad Cities Caused By a Defective GE-Hitachi Switch?
• Risks in nuclear wastes being transported through Texas cities.
• USA Nuclear officials killed study on whether reactors posed cancer risk to nearby residents  ‘The cancer rates have surged enormously due to high levels of radiation’
• US nuclear industry looks to Trump to change nuclear regulation rules.
• Florida Power and Light, and the costly nuclear mess it is in.

FRANCE. Explosion in engine room at Flamanville nuclear station. A legal breakthrough for French Polynesia’s nuclear test victims. France’s Next President Said to Face $3 Billion Nuclear Hangover.

JAPAN.   Toshiba’s nuclear dominoes collapsing . Hitachi to take a 70 billion yen hit after U.S nuclear project fails.  Beyond nuclear power: Japan’s smart energy communities mushroom.  Robot could not cope with the radiation levels inside damaged Fukushima nuclear reactor. Lost in translation: Fukushima readings are not new spikes, just the same “hot mess” that’s always been there.  Fukushima nuclear disaster: Worker sues Tepco over cancer

UK.  Blow to UK nuclear strategy as Toshiba considers pulling out of Cumbria plant  Europe’s biggest nuclear construction project now hangs in the balance. Harmless radiation” – the message from Britain’s fake charity Weinberg Next Nuclear

CANADA. Nuclear waste dump saga continues in Canada

CHINA. China more than doubled solar capacity in 2016

SOUTH AFRICA Civil society organisations call on President Jacob Zuma to scrap South Africa nuclear deal.

SOUTH KOREA. Seoul Administrative Court finds in favour of local residents, orders closure of nuclear facility.

PAKISTAN. Pakistan demands that India bring its nuclear programme under International Atomic Energy Commission (IAEA)’s safeguards.

INDIA. Toshiba to withdraw from Indian nuclear projects

RUSSIA Russia finally admits to a nuclear reactor failure that it covered up for 2 months

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