Free Republic

NEW DELHI: Reiterating their total opposition to the India-U.S. civilian nuclear cooperation, the Left parties on Friday said their discussions with the government were still going on. “At the last meeting of the UPA-Left joint committee on the nuclear deal, we were told that there is a shortage of uranium and reactors were working at 50 per cent of their level of production,” Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Prakash Karat told reporters here. The next meeting of the committee on the nuclear deal is scheduled for May 28. “We have not yet completed our discussions with the government...

The Bush administration will tell Congress tomorrow that a nuclear facility in Syria built with North Korean help was nearly complete when Israel bombed it in September, and that Pyongyang has not provided any further nuclear assistance to the hard-line Arab nation, at least at that site, U.S. officials said. CIA Director Michael V. Hayden and other intelligence officials are expected to brief several congressional committees in closed-door sessions, breaking the administration's silence on the issue. The Syrian facility has become a key issue in six-nation negotiations to end the North's nuclear programs. “The belief is that the reactor was...

By Judi McLeod Tuesday, March 25, 2008 In an effort to provide them a fair trial, the Canadian government is seeking a limited publication ban on the identities of the adults charged with belonging to the so-called “Toronto 18” group. The identity of the youth charged with belonging to a homegrown terror cell is already protected under the Young Criminal Justice Act. The trial for the youth gets underway in a Brampton court today. Almost unheard of since they were nabbed in a foiled undercover operation to kidnap and behead members of Parliament, among other things on June 2, 2006,...

Alright, details are slim, and we really have no idea if Toshiba has any plans whatsoever to sell these nuclear reactors to consumers -- in fact, we hope it doesn't -- but it does seem like the company is well on its way to commercializing the design. Toshiba's Micro Nuclear reactors are designed to power a single apartment building or city block, and measure a mere 20-feet by 6-feet. The 200 kilowatt reactor is fully automatic and fail-safe, and is completely self-sustaining. It uses special liquid lithium-6 reservoirs instead of traditional control rods, and can last up to 40 years,...

New technology takes on energy crisis.The portable nuclear reactor is the size of a hot tub. It’s shaped like a sake cup, filled with a uranium hydride core and surrounded by a hydrogen Invented by scientist Otis Peterson, Hyperion’s patent for a hydride reactor is still pending. atmosphere. Encase it in concrete, truck it to a site, bury it underground, hook it up to a steam turbine and, voila, one would generate enough electricity to power a 25,000-home community for at least five years. The company Hyperion Power Generation was formed last month to develop the nuclear fission reactor at...

MINERAL -- Federal officials are urging public involvement once Dominion Virginia Power applies for a license to build a third reactor at its North Anna Power Station in Louisa County. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission held a meeting in Mineral on Wednesday night to explain how it will review the application, expected next month.

Israel strike 'targeted Syrian nuclear reactor' By Alex Spillius in Washington Last Updated: 5:42pm BST 14/10/2007 Israel's secretive air strike inside Syria last month was directed at a site judged by Israeli and US intelligence analysts to be a partly constructed nuclear reactor, according to a report. Israel has not given any details on the operation in Syria Officials said the reactor was modelled on one in North Korea used for stockpiling nuclear weapons fuel but was in the early stages of development. The attack on the location in north-eastern Syria on Sept 6 has been subject to an official...

NEW YORK - An Israeli airstrike on Syria last month targeted a partially built nuclear reactor that was years away from completion, the New York Times reported Saturday, citing U.S. and foreign officials. The report said President Bush's administration had intense discussions with the Israeli government before the strike and U.S. officials were divided over whether it would be premature. Syrian President Bashar Assad has said Israel bombed an "unused military building" in the Sept. 6 raid. Israel has been extremely secretive about the affair. It only recently relaxed censorship to allow Israel-based journalists to report that Israeli aircraft attacked...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Energy Department said Monday it is looking for industry groups to help design a prototype nuclear reactor that could be available for commercial use by 2030. The government's Idaho National Laboratory is working on a high-temperature fourth-generation nuclear reactor design, a prototype of which could be built by 2021, the Energy Department said. In addition to electricity, they are designed to make heat for industrial applications and hydrogen, which could used to power fuel cells. Companies are expected to file expressions of interest to the Idaho National Laboratory by Aug. 20. The department last year awarded...

N. Korea seeks light-water reactor in exchange for dismantling nuclear facility BEIJING, July 21 (Yonhap) -- North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan said Saturday North Korea could shut down its nuclear facility in Yongbyon if a light-water reactor is provided to the country. Kim made the statement at Beijing International Airport on his way back home a day after the six-party talks ended here.

Satellite images show that Pakistan is building a new nuclear reactor that can produce weapons-grade plutonium, an American watchdog group said Thursday, warning that it could contribute to an atomic arms race with archrival India. A picture taken June 3 shows work progressing rapidly on the reactor at the Khushab nuclear site, 100 miles southwest of the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, the Institute of Science for International Security said. The development of the reactor and other nuclear-related activities "imply" that Pakistan has decided to "increase significantly its production of plutonium for nuclear weapons," the Washington-based institute said in a report analyzing...

N. Korea Holds Off On Reactor Pledge Transfer From Macau Bank in Dispute By Edward Cody Washington Post Foreign Service Saturday, April 21, 2007; Page A12 BEIJING, April 20 -- Despite assurances from U.S. and Macau officials, North Korea said Friday it is still negotiating over possession of $25 million in North Korean accounts frozen by Macau banking authorities for 21 months. U.S. officials have repeatedly declared the complicated financial dispute resolved, but it has persisted in preventing implementation of an agreement Feb. 13 under which North Korea pledged to close its main nuclear reactor and allow verification by inspectors...

North Korea miss deadline in nuclear deal: NBC 14 minutes ago North Korea, told it will soon receive its assets frozen at a Macau bank, said it could start shutting down its main nuclear reactor within 30 days but likely miss a Saturday deadline to do so, NBC news reported on Wednesday. North Korea's chief nuclear negotiator Kim Kye-gwan made the pledge during a dinner meeting with a U.S. delegation visiting Pyongyang led by New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, NBC reported members of his team as saying. Kim also said the reclusive state would also allow nuclear inspectors back into...

MOSCOW, March 26 (Itar-Tass) - The Russian nuclear power plant construction company Atomstroiexport has received the first payment for the Bushehr nuclear power plant construction project since the financing of that facility was suspended, the press-service of the Russian atomic energy agency Rosatom has told Itar-Tass. An aide to the Rosatom?s chief, Sergei Novikov, said ?Russia has characterized positively this step by Iran?s Atomic Energy Organization.? ?That our Iranian partners have coped with the existing problems is a positive sign,? he said. ?However, this installment is not a full compensation yet for the construction site?s requirements that have developed...

Hwang: “Nuclear Facility in Yongbyon Has Been Unnecessary for 10 Years” FEBRUARY 21, 2007 07:10 Hwang Jang-yop, the former secretary of the North Korean Workers Party in charge of international affairs, disclosed in a Freedom North Korea Broadcast on February 19 that the nuclear facility in Yongbyon, which North Korea promised to shut down in exchange for one million tons of oil, was in fact already deemed unnecessary 10 years ago. The former secretary Hwang said, “In fact, I heard the plutonium (extracted) with a graphite reactor is unusable directly from the secretary of munitions manufacture. Before that, they had...

MOSCOW - Uranium fuel deliveries for a Russian-built nuclear reactor in Iran and its launch could be delayed because of the Iranian government dragging its feet on payments, officials said Monday. Iran broke the schedule of payments this year under a $1 billion deal to build the Bushehr nuclear plant, said a government official who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. He said the Iranians cited technical reasons for the delay in payments. Russia's Federal Nuclear Power Agency spokesman Sergei Novikov said the delay could derail the launch schedule. Last year,...

N.Korea seeks oil in return for halting reactor: media Sat Feb 3, 10:34 PM ET North Korea's top envoy to six-party talks on its nuclear programme has told former U.S. officials Pyongyang wants more than half a million tonnes of fuel oil a year in return for suspending its atomic reactor, a Japanese daily said on Sunday. The demand would exceed the energy assistance North Korea received under an 1994 agreement with Washington, which collapsed when the current nuclear crisis began in 2002. The Asahi Shimbun said that North Korean Vice Foreign Minister Kim Kye-gwan had set out Pyongyang's position...

Iran vowed yesterday to press ahead with a controversial nuclear reactor after the United Nations atomic watchdog refused to offer any technical aid in its construction.In the latest round of the battle between the West and Tehran over its nuclear ambitions, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said that it would not help the Iranians to complete the Arak heavy water reactor, where they have asked for help in “security” expertise. “The decision is that the [Arak] project will be definitely put on hold,” Mohamed ElBaradei, the IAEA director, said. “If matters [with Iran] move in a different direction in...

For the first time ever, the Israeli government is releasing top secret documents detailing the secret plans, strategies and implementation of their heralded raid on the Iraqi nuclear facility in 1981, one of the most daring and successful military strikes ever. Faced with a nuclear threat from Saddam Hussein's Iraq, Israel resolved to eliminate a French-built, Baghdad-based reactor producing weapons-grade plutonium. Risking certain international condemnation and the loss of aid from the United States, the IDF utilized their eight newly delivered F-16 fighter jets to bomb the reactor in the heart of Baghdad. The story of the planning of the...

Nuclear reactors could be built more efficiently using supercomputers to artificially "evolve" designs, say engineers from the US Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. They have found they can speed up the extremely complex process of designing a reactor and generate novel designs from scratch by simulating natural selection. Designing a nuclear reactor normally involves input from various specialists and the resulting structure can be uniquely influenced by this collaborative process. "The design that comes out of this lengthy process is typically sub-optimal," says Louis Qualls, a nuclear systems specialist at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. "If you...

There is a deafening, unearthly howl as if a jumbo jet was firing up its engines in the Albert Hall. On the screen in the control room a ghostly pinkish glow whips round the edges of the inside of the nuclear reactor. At its core it is 10 times hotter than the centre of the sun.This, according to some physicists, is the solution to the energy crisis - a future with cheap, reliable, safe and nearly waste-free power. Today, after years of false starts and political wrangling dating from the cold war, they will get their chance to make that...

BRITAIN, France and Germany are expected to offer Iran a light-water nuclear reactor if Tehran agrees to suspend its controversial uranium enrichment programme. In the latest attempt to resolve the deadlock over the nuclear ambitions of Iran, the three European nations will propose a revised deal at a meeting in London on Friday with diplomats from the US, China and Russia. Javier Solana, the EU foreign policy chief, said that Iran would be offered the “most sophisticated” technology to help it to meet its energy needs. But the reactor would mean that Tehran would have to suspend all enrichment work,...

TEHRAN (Reuters) - A European offer asking Iran to give up its uranium enrichment program in return for a package of incentives would be like accepting candy in payment for gold, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said on Wednesday. "They say we want to give Iranians incentives but they think they are dealing with a four-year-old, telling him they will give him candies or walnuts and take gold from him in return," he told a crowd in the central city of Arak. "Don't force governments and nations who are signatories to the atomic Non-Proliferation Treaty to pull out of it," he...

Researchers Describe How Natural Nuclear Reactor Worked In Gabon The Oklo natural nuclear-reactor site in Gabon. St Louis MO (SPX) Nov 01, 2004 To operate a nuclear power plant like Three Mile Island, hundreds of highly trained employees must work in concert to generate power from safe fission, all the while containing dangerous nuclear wastes. On the other hand, it's been known for 30 years that Mother Nature once did nuclear chain reactions by her lonesome. Now, Researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have analyzed the isotopic structure of noble gases produced in fission in a sample from the...

At the dawn of the atomic age, scientists began work on what might have been the nastiest weapon ever conceived.Those who came of age during the era of Three Mile Island and Chernobyl are probably too young to remember the happy days when "our friend the atom" promised electricity too cheap to meter and cars that would run forever without a fill-up. With atom-powered subs like the Nautilus cruising under the polar icecap in the mid-1950s, could anyone doubt that atom-powered rocketships, airplanes, and even automobiles would be far behind? A funny thing happened to that dream on its way...

MOSCOW - An explosion ripped through a smelter at a Russian nuclear power plant in the northern Leningrad region but radiation levels were normal, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported Friday. The news agency, citing the state nuclear agency Rosenergoatom, said the blast occurred on Thursday. It said that the smelter was located on the territory of the plant's second unit.

ABC's Primetime Live report Thursday night alleging dangerous breaches of security at the nation's nuclear research reactors continued to draw strong criticism from government officials and university administrators Monday. Roy Zimmerman, in charge of nuclear security for the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, who appeared on the broadcast and expressed concern over lax security at some of the facilities, said in a statement that the show overstated the threat such incidents posed. At the University of Maryland, where ABC showed open doors leading to the reactor, officials noted that the program failed to take into account the numerous surveillance cameras constantly monitored...

PYONGYANG, North Korea - North Korea will not rejoin nuclear arms control treaties or allow international nuclear inspections until it receives an atomic reactor for power from the United States, a top diplomat told The Associated Press on Thursday. "In order to recover relations of trust between North Korea and the U.S., the U.S. should show its intent to turn words into actions," Kim Yong Guk, section chief of the European department of North's Foreign Ministry, told Associated Press Television News. "The physical foundation of consolidating trust between our nations is a light water reactor." The North's demand for a...

QUESTION: What's your reaction to the protests in Iran around the British Embassy? This is a reaction to the IAEA vote, I presume, were there to be a U.S. embassy, they would be protesting there. MR. MCCORMACK: Right. Well, I'll leave it to those on the ground to describe the protests there and who might be organizing those protests. The position where Iran finds itself right now, I think, is one that is probably a surprise to them after the IAEA Board of Governors vote. And where they find themselves is more isolated from the international community than when they...

VIENNA, Sept 26 (Reuters) - The United States said on Monday it would provide nuclear reactor fuel to countries that refrain from enriching uranium in an effort to prevent the process from being used to make atomic weapons. Enrichment purifies uranium to levels at which it is useable in power plants or, if enriched further, in atomic bombs. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) chief Mohamed ElBaradei has suggested setting up an independent, international system to provide states with a guaranteed fuel supply if they abandoned enrichment. "We are working with major suppliers and the IAEA on a back-up supply mechanism...

SEOUL, South Korea - North Korea demanded Tuesday that the United States give it a light water nuclear reactor before it rejoins the international Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and ends its weapons program. The North's Foreign Ministry made the demand a day after it agreed at six-nation talks in Beijing to give up its arms efforts, rejoin the treaty, and accept inspections by the International Atomic Energy Agency. "We will return to the NPT and sign the safeguards agreement with the IAEA and comply with it immediately upon the U.S. provision of LWRs, a basis of confidence-building to us," the ministry...

STOCKHOLM, Sweden - A Swedish nuclear power plant shut down one of its three reactors Monday because of an abnormal accumulation of jellyfish in the cooling system. The Oskarshamn plant in southeastern Sweden uses water from the Baltic Sea in its cooling tanks. The water has been unusually rich in jellyfish in recent weeks, but the problem grew worse Monday morning, forcing officials to shut down the reactor. "When there are too many jellyfish in the cooling water, the flow is hindered and we have to clean it to keep the reactor going at full effect," plant spokesman Erik Mattsen...

TOKYO: A US spy satellite has found that North Korea reactivated its nuclear reactor last month after it spotted vapour coming out of the reactor's boiler, a Japanese daily said. The reactivation of the Yongbyon nuclear complex came just before six-nation talks aimed at halting the North's nuclear drive began in Beijing in late July, the Asahi Shimbun daily said, quoting unnamed diplomatic sources. The topic of the reactivated reactor had been discussed during the talks - which involved the two Koreas, Russia, Japan, China and the United States - the daily said without giving further details. The Asahi said...

TEHRAN (AFP) - European nations negotiating with Iran over its controversial nuclear programme may be ready to help build nuclear reactors and supply them with fuel, Iranian negotiator Hossein Moussavian said. He told the official IRNA agency that a proposal promised by Britain, France and Germany by August and aimed at resolving the crisis could include such an offer, as well as a several-month delay before Iran's nuclear ambitions are referred to the UN Security Council. The EU proposal could make or break the lengthy diplomatic process aimed at easing widespread fears Iran is seeking nuclear weapons technology. In contrast...

BEIJING, June 30 (Xinhuanet, by Yu Zheng) -- A leading Chinese plasma physicist said Thursday China might build its own thermonuclear experimental reactor, which would be expected to supply sustained electricity for the world's most populous country. While building their own sophisticated devices in thermo nuclear reaction, Chinese scientists have already participated in the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER), a testing step between today's plasma physics studies and tomorrow's electricity-producing fusion power plants. The scientist, who has access to the ITER, said to Xinhua on condition of anominity, "The ultimate goal of the Chinese scientists is to build thermonuclear experimental...

PARIS, June 28 - France won an international competition today to be the site of the world's first nuclear fusion reactor, an estimated $12 billion project that many scientists see as essential to solving the world's future energy needs. "It is a great success for France, for Europe and for all the partners" in the reactor project, President Jacques Chirac of France said in a statement after an international consortium chose the country as the site for the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor. Japan, which had lobbied hard for the project, just dropped out of the bidding.

The 1,000 megawatt reactor is located in the southwestern Iranian city of Bushehr, a port town on the Persian Gulf. Construction of the reactor began in the 1970s and is near completion. Built and designed by Russian engineers, the facility is worth $800 million. Nuclear fuel for the reactor is also produced by Russians and is awaiting delivery. The U.S. is pressuring Russia to halt nuclear cooperation with Iran, but Russia has already built the reactor and signed a fuel deal. For years, Iran kept its nuclear activities under wraps, so its unprecedented openness comes as a surprise to U.S....

The Monju nuclear reactor located in Tsuruga, 350 kilometers (217 miles) west of Tokyo, was a signature of Japan's energy projects until December 1995 when it was closed due to a massive leak of sodium coolant. The Nagoya High Court in January 2003 for the first time ordered the closure of a Japanese reactor, siding with a lawsuit filed before the accident by local people who wanted Monju shut down due to fears of a meltdown. But the Supreme Court backed the government which said it has taken sufficient measures to ensure safety at Monju, administered by the government-run Japan...

Papers Show N. Korea Sought Nukes in 1960s By WILLIAM C. MANN, Associated Press Writer Tue May 17, 3:19 AM ET WASHINGTON - North Korea began nagging its communist allies as early as the 1960s to obtain a nuclear reactor with the intent of launching a hidden weapons program, according to former Soviet bloc documents released Tuesday. Over the next two decades, responses generally were negative, sometimes to the point of hostility. Having largely failed during the Cold War, North Korea in the years since then as put together a nuclear program that the Bush administration considers the equal of...

Russia to close its last plutonium reactor in 3 years According to the bilateral agreement, the USA will assign $350 million for the purpose Russia's last plutonium reactor will be shut down in three years, the Federal Nuclear Power Agency (Rosatom) said. "There are only three military reactors in Russia: two in Seversk, the Tomsk region, and one in Zheleznogorsk, the Krasnoyarsk region. The reactor in Seversk is scheduled to be stopped in 2007, whereas the ADE-2 reactor in Zheleznogorsk is to be shut down in 2008," a spokesperson for the agency said. The Soviet government decided to launch a...

China is poised to develop the world's first commercially operated “pebble bed” nuclear reactor after a Chinese energy consortium chose a site in the eastern province of Shandong to build a 195MW gas-cooled power plant. An official representing the consortium, led by Huaneng, one of China's biggest power producers, said the proposed reactor could start producing electricity within five years. If successfully commercialised, the pebble bed reactor would be the first radically new reactor design for several decades. It would push China to the forefront of development of a technology that researchers claim offers a new “meltdown-proof” alternative to standard...

State, Wayne, and Monroe officials were called to the Fermi II nuclear plant in Monroe early Monday evening to investigate what they would only call a "situation". Authorities told Action News just after 6:00 that they were responding to some kind of situation within the plant.

Fusion Redux BY JIM WILSON Photo by Donna Coveney/MIT After being virtually abandoned, fusion power is poised for a comeback. Nuclear fusion is the process that powers the stars. For more than 50 years, scientists have been trying to bring that power down to Earth. Fusion generators are appealing because they produce none of the pollutants associated with fossil- and nuclear-fuel power plants. Researchers at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory in Plainsboro, N.J., estimate that a 1000-megawatt nuclear fusion plant would produce about 4 pounds of waste a day, compared to 31,000 tons from a coal-fired plant of a similar...

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- November 28, 2004 Hydrogen Production Method Could Bolster Fuel Supplies By MATTHEW L. WALD ASHINGTON, Nov. 27 - Researchers at a government nuclear laboratory and a ceramics company in Salt Lake City say they have found a way to produce pure hydrogen with far less energy than other methods, raising the possibility of using nuclear power to indirectly wean the transportation system from its dependence on oil. The development would move the country closer to the Energy Department's goal of a "hydrogen economy," in which hydrogen would be created through a variety of means, and would be consumed by...

'We're done:' Iran reactor ready despite 2-year delay claim SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM Friday, October 15, 2004 MOSCOW — Iran and Russia said they have completed construction of the nuclear power reactor at Bushehr. The announcement came less than two months after Iran said Bushehr would not begin operations until late 2006, three years behind schedule. At the time, officials said Bushehr — a project estimated at $1 billion — was delayed by the Russian revision of the original nuclear reactor design, drafted by the German firm Simens in the 1970s. But officials from both countries said on Thursday that...

Reactor research to power journey to Jupiter's moonsLOS ALAMOS NATIONAL LABORATORY NEWS RELEASEPosted: February 8, 2004 A planned U.S. mission to investigate three ice-covered moons of Jupiter will demand fast-paced research, fabrication and realistic non-nuclear testing of a prototype nuclear reactor within two years, says a Los Alamos National Laboratory scientist. An artist's concept of Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter. Credit: NASA/JPL  The roots of this build and test effort have been under way at Los Alamos since the mid-1990s, said David Poston, leader of the Space Fission Power Team in Los Alamos' Nuclear Design and Risk Analysis Group. NASA proposes...

China will support France as the site of the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor (ITER)project, said Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zhang Qiyue Thursday. After studying the two proposed sites in France and Japan for the construction of an experimental nuclear fusion reactor, China had decided to support France, Zhang said. France had been competing with Japan as the site of the multi-billion dollar project, but China hoped the issue could be settled according to consultations among all parties, she said. The project is the world's largest-yet nuclear fusion power plant with technology touted as a solution to global energy problems. Once completed...

MIDDLETOWN, Pa. - AmerGen, the owner of Three Mile Island, has announced plans to add 14 sirens to the emergency warning system as part of a $730,000 upgrade to the nuclear plant. The upgrade follows an acoustic test indicating that the plant's warning system was not loud enough in some areas. The sirens must be audible at a minimum rate of 60 decibels throughout the 10-mile radius, AmerGen spokesman Ralph DeSantis said. The added sirens will bring to 93 the total number within a 10-mile radius of Three Mile Island. Six of the sirens will be replaced by louder ones,...

MOSCOW, Nov 19, (AFP) -- Russia and Iran have again put off the signing of an agreement that would clear the way for Moscow to complete construction of the Islamic state's first nuclear power reactor, a top minister said Wednesday. Russian Atomic Energy Minister Alexander Rumyantsev said that the Iranian side had been "too busy" with preparing documents for the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on its nuclear program to work on the agreement for the Bushehr power reactor. Russia has said it would not deliver any fuel for the Bushehr reactor until Tehran signs the agreement, under which it...

John Loftus now on Batchelor Alexander WABC reports: A student of Nuclear Engineering at McMaster University Hamilton, Ontario. has disappeared along with 180 pounds of nuclear waste stolen from the university's nuclear reactor. This happened several months ago but an alert has been ordered tonight in the USA and Canada. His name is ? Adnan al-ShoukriJumai, 27 years old, a Saudi national. A search is underway. The fear is that they may hijack a cargo plane in Canada. I hope to provide further details later on this thread.