In 1985, US President Ronald Reagan and and Russian President Mikhail Gorbachev declared that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.”
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US urged not to use bomb-grade uranium in nuclear power experiment
“It is shocking that the Energy Department, without even notifying the public, would undermine a decades-old, bipartisan U.S. policy to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons,” said Alan Kuperman, a professor at the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, who organized the letter.
By Timothy Gardner, REUTERS | May 30, 2023 reuters.com
WASHINGTON, May 30 (Reuters) – Former U.S. State Department and nuclear regulatory officials on Tuesday urged the U.S. Energy Department to reconsider a plan to use bomb-grade uranium in a nuclear power experiment, saying that its use could encourage such tests in other countries.
The Energy Department and two companies aim to share costs on the Molten Chloride Reactor Experiment (MCRE) at the Idaho National Laboratory and use more than 1,322 pounds (600 kg) of fuel containing 93% enriched uranium.
CNN – Lukashenko offers nuclear weapons to nations willing ‘to join the Union State of Russia and Belarus’
“We must do everything to prevent Putin’s plan to deploy nuclear weapons in Belarus…It directly violates our constitutional non-nuclear status and would secure Russia’s control over Belarus for years ahead. And it would further threaten the security of Ukraine and all of Europe,” — exiled opposition leader Sviatlana Tsikhanouskaya.
By , and , CNN | May 28, 2023 cnn.com
(CNN)—Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko has claimed that nations who are willing “to join the Union State of Russia and Belarus” will be given nuclear weapons, days after confirming the transfer of some tactical nuclear weapons from Moscow to Minsk had begun.
Lukashenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, made the comments in an on-camera interview released Sunday on the state-run Russia 1 channel.
During the interview, Lukashenko said, “no one minds Kazakhstan and other countries having the same close relations that we have with the Russian Federation.”
“It’s very simple,” he added. “Join the Union State of Belarus and Russia. That’s all: there will be nuclear weapons for everyone.”
Stronger Global Governance is the Only Way to a World Free of Nuclear Weapons
“We can begin uncovering this route to a safer, saner world when we recognize that a great many people and governments cling to nuclear weapons because of their desire for national security. After all, it has been and remains a dangerous world, and for thousands of years nations (and before the existence of nations, rival territories) have protected themselves from aggression by wielding military might….
But what if global governance were strengthened to the extent that it could provide national security? ”
By Lawrence S. Wittner, Professor of History Emeritus at SUNY/Albany and the author of Confronting the Bomb (Stanford University Press) HISTORY NEWS NETWORK | May 21, 2023 historynewsnetwork.org
Some of the 800 members of Women Strike for Peace who marched at United Nations headquarters in Manhattan to demand UN mediation of the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis
It should come as no surprise that the world is currently facing an existential nuclear danger. In fact, it has been caught up in that danger since 1945, when atomic bombs were used to annihilate the populations of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Today, however, the danger of a nuclear holocaust is probably greater than in the past. There are now nine nuclear powers―the United States, Russia, Britain, France, China, Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea―and they are currently engaged in a new nuclear arms race, building ever more efficient weapons of mass destruction. The latest entry in their nuclear scramble, the hypersonic missile, travels at more than five times the speed of sound and is adept at evading missile defense systems.
US bombs unlikely to reach underground Iran nuclear site: Report
New Iranian atomic facility near Natanz may be too deep underground to be destroyed by air raids, AP analysis says.
ALJAZEERA | May 22, 2023 aljazeera.com
Near a peak of the Zagros Mountains in central Iran, workers are building a nuclear facility so deep in the earth that it is likely beyond the range of a last-ditch United States weapon designed to destroy such sites, according to experts and satellite imagery analysed by The Associated Press news agency.
The photos and videos from Planet Labs PBC show Iran has been digging tunnels in the mountain near the Natanz nuclear site, which has come under repeated sabotage attacks amid Tehran’s standoff with the West over its atomic programme.
Quiet quarter for US uranium production as momentum builds
All the uranium produced in the USA during the first quarter of this year was from in-situ leach (ISL) operations, according to the latest US government update. But production from conventional mills as well as ISL looks set to ramp up over the coming months.
WORLD NUCLEAR NEWS | May 22, 2023 world-nuclear-news.org
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White Mesa is the only conventional uranium mill currently classed as “operating” by EIA (Image: Energy Fuels)
Total US production of uranium concentrates, at 2511 pounds U3O8 (0.97 tU), was 75% lower year-on-year and 99% down from fourth-quarter 2022 as no material was produced at Energy Fuels’ White Mesa Mill, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) said in its quarterly report. All of the quarter’s production came from just three ISL facilities in Wyoming: Nichols Ranch, Ross, and Smith Ranch-Highland.
White Mesa is the only conventional mill in the USA to be classed as “operating” by the EIA. EnergyFuels said in a US Securities and Exchange Commission filing earlier this month that during the first quarter of this year the mill in Utah has focused on rare-earth carbonate production. “During the three months ended March 31, 2023 the uranium recovered from processing monazite ore was retained in circuit and was not packaged as final U3O8 product,” the company said.
ICAN: G7 Hiroshima summit fails to deliver progress on nuclear disarmament
“This is more than a missed opportunity. With the world facing the acute risk that nuclear weapons could be used for the first time since Hiroshima and Nagasaki were bombed, this is a gross failure of global leadership. Simply pointing fingers at Russia and China is insufficient. We need the G7 countries, which all either possess, host or endorse the use of nuclear weapons, to step up and engage the other nuclear powers in disarmament talks if we are to reach their professed goal of a world without nuclear weapons” — ICAN Executive Director Daniel Hogsta
Update 20 May 2023: the G7 leaders have just issued the final communique from their summit in Hiroshima. It claims they have “taken concrete steps to strengthen disarmament and non-proliferation efforts, towards the ultimate goal of a world without nuclear weapons with undiminished security for all” but it doesn’t say what these steps are. That’s because it can’t.
What we got from the leaders’ discussion on nuclear weapons yesterday was a rehash of ideas and proposals that have failed to deliver progress over the past three decades. They did not announce anything new or concrete. They couldn’t even bring themselves to follow the G20 and TPNW member states by condemning all nuclear threats. Instead they reserved their condemnation for Russia’s and North Korea’s threats, which, while justified, fails to acknowledge how the G7’s own nuclear doctrines are based on the threat to use nuclear weapons and so contribute to the acute danger these weapons pose to everyone.
The G7’s detailed statement “G7 Leaders’ Hiroshima Vision on Nuclear Disarmament”, issued on May 19, falls far short of providing any meaningful outcomes for nuclear disarmament. After months of preparation and amid high expectations, the leaders are missing the moment to make the world safer from nuclear weapons, instead of confronting nuclear threats with a concrete, credible plan for nuclear disarmament – like the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons- they are barely even paying lip service to the horrors of Hiroshima, the first city attacked by nuclear weapons.
LANL Records String of Radioactive Glove Box Breaches
“…A nuclear watchdog group decried this series of breaches, arguing they reflect a systemic problem that’s likely to grow worse as plutonium activity increases with pit production.
“‘It’s just indicative of more problems to come,’ said Jay Coghlan, executive director of Nuclear Watch New Mexico”
BY SCOTT WYLAND, SANTA FE NEW MEXICAN | May 17, 2023 santafenewmexican.com
Los Alamos National Laboratory had five breaches of the glove boxes used to handle radioactive materials in a four-week period, an unusually high number in such a short time.
The lab had three breaches in these sealed compartments at its plutonium facility between late March and mid-April and two more in the following week, according to the most recent reports by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board, the federal agency that provides recommendations and advice regarding public health and safety issues at Department of Energy defense nuclear facilities.
US releases nuclear warhead data in bid to pressure Russia
“Disclosure under New START Treaty follows Russia’s decision to suspend its participation in the nuclear agreement”
ALJAZEERA | May 16, 2023 aljazeera.com
The US Department of State said it was releasing the information publicly as part of its commitments under the New START Treaty, appearing to reverse an earlier decision not to share the data.
Holtec International, the U.S. Federal Government, and the State of New Mexico – What Do We Know?
Nuclear power is a trending topic lately. What’s missing from most of these conversations is the nitty gritty details of the nuclear waste produced from nuclear power plants, and how to handle it. In mainstream and social media, nuclear is often hyped up as a climate solution and the issue of what to do with the waste is promoted as being nearly or already solved. Unfortunately this conception is entirely inaccurate. Most people don’t think about the problem of nuclear waste on a frequent basis, however New Mexicans are often forced to confront it whether we like it or not (spoiler: most of us DON’T).
New Mexico has the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant (WIPP) in the southeastern corner of the state, where radioactive waste is stored in a salt formation repository located deep underground. WIPP has been open since 1999, and now federal regulators are currently considering another facility that would store up to 175,000 metric tons of high-level radioactive nuclear waste. The new repository is called a “HI-STORE Consolidated Interim Storage Facility” by Holtec International, the New Jersey-based company who owns the private waste facility, and the waste would be transported in from nuclear reactors around the nation. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued Holtec a license for this project on May 9, 2023.
New Mexico shouldn’t be the nation’s nuclear dump
“A storage facility cannot be “interim” without a final, designated location. Such a site does not exist. And when it comes to anything nuclear, there’s no such thing as interim or temporary.”
MY VIEW, THE SANTA FE NEW MEXICAN | May 13, 2023 santafenewmexican.com
The federal government’s longstanding failure to build a repository for nuclear waste should not be left for New Mexico to solve.
Yet a decision last week by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to issue a license to “temporarily” store tons of spent nuclear fuel in New Mexico could mean waste from commercial power plants across the nation will end up buried in the state. It’s bad news for us, of course, but it’s catastrophic for a nation that has never fully come to grips with the reality of nuclear power.
To recap: The commission said it will allow Holtec International to build and operate a nuclear waste storage facility near the Lea and Eddy County line in far southeast New Mexico.
This, despite the clear message from New Mexico’s congressional delegation, governor and statewide elected officials that the state is not interested in being the one-size-fits-all nuclear storage solution for the country. New Mexico already hosts the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant. It stores transuranic waste, a byproduct of the country’s nuclear defense program.
Putin ‘Not Insane’ But May Resort to Nuclear Weapons: Estonian President
Russian President Vladimir Putin is not likely to use nuclear weapons in Moscow’s struggling war on Ukraine, according to Estonian President Alar Karis, though may again flirt with using weapons of mass destruction if the Kremlin finds itself in a “very desperate” situation.
BY NEWSWEEK | May 13, 2023 newsweek.com
Speaking with Newsweek at the presidential palace, which once served as the seat for both the occupying Soviet Union and Nazi German authorities, ahead of the Lennart Meri Conference in Tallinn, Karis said that while he is “not that worried” that the Kremlin will deliver on its well-worn nuclear threats, he and other Western leaders must prepare for that possibility.
“There are very few people who are close to Putin who actually know. But he is definitely not insane, at least in medical terms. That means he knows exactly what he is doing,” Karis said about the Russian dictator’s mentality. “But there is not much information, you can speculate when Putin starts to change generals that something is not going the way he wants.”
Bloomberg – The Russian nuclear company the West can’t live without
“Cutting the heart out of a nuclear power plant is a surgical procedure that only a few specialists are equipped to handle…”
Bloomberg News | May 13, 2023 mining.com
Among the oldest and most experienced is Germany’s Nukem Technologies Engineering Services GmbH, which for decades has offered its unique services in Asia and Africa and across Europe. Nukem engineers helped contain radiation from the destroyed reactors in Chernobyl and Fukushima. They helped lead the clean-up of an atomic-fuel factory in Belgium. In France, the company devised ways to treat waste from the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor.
With researchers predicting that cleaning up after aging nuclear power plants will evolve into a $125 billion global business in the near future, Nukem should be ideally positioned to capitalize on the moment.
Except for one thing: the company is wholly owned by Rosatom Corp., the Kremlin-controlled nuclear giant, putting it in the center of an uncomfortable standoff.
Holtec licensed to store nuke waste in New Mexico despite outcry from elected officials
“This is a bad idea, full stop. Placing a nuclear storage facility in the heart of oil and gas operations is a recipe for ecological disaster and unnecessarily puts New Mexicans at risk,
Bottom line, the world’s most active oil and gas producing field is not the right place for a long-term nuclear waste storage site. Holtec needs to understand that New Mexico is not the nation’s dumping ground and should stop misleading the public about the dangers their proposal presents.” — Land Commissioner-elect Stephanie Garcia Richard
Adrian Hedden, Carlsbad Current-Argus | May 9, 2023 currentargus.com
Federal nuclear officials gave the green light to a project which would store high-level nuclear waste at a facility in southeast New Mexico, despite concerns from state and federal leaders it would expose residents to radiation.
Holtec International, headquartered in Jupiter, Florida, applied in 2017 for a 40-year license to store 8,680 metric tons of spent nuclear fuel rods in 500 cannisters from power plants across the country, using a surface-level facility in a remote desert area near the border of Eddy and Lea counties.
That would be the first of 20 phases of the project that could ultimately include more than 100,000 metric tons in a total of 10,000 canisters holding the waste.
