Beyond Nuclear Bulletin August 15, 2024
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"CONSENT-BASED SITING"? DOE targets EJ communities for dumps
Thursday, August 29 at 1:30pm ET, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) will hold its fifth webinar about "consent-based siting" for highly radioactive waste "consolidated interim storage facilities." Pre-registration is required. Beyond Nuclear has opposed DOE's insincere initiative from the get-go: so-called "consent-based siting" is little different from DOE's Nuclear Waste Negotiator efforts decades ago.
As then, so now: low-income, already disproportionately polluted, and/or Black, Indigenous, and People of Color communities are being targeted for nuke waste dumps. These sessions are entirely scripted, with no voices of resistance allowed. But it's still important for us to watch-dog what they are up to, to nip this environmental injustice in the bud!
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ZOMBIE NUKE! Investigative journalist shines light
Investigative journalist Roger Rapoport has published an article in The Progressive Magazine entitled "The Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s Antiques Roadshow: As new U.S. nuclear construction grinds to a halt, one company aims to restart a Michigan reactor that violated fifty codes—in just one year." Rapoport is also host of the podcast "The Nuclear Reactor Next Door," focused on the Palisades zombie atomic reactor on the Lake Michigan shore (pictured). There are currently eight episodes, four featuring Beyond Nuclear's radioactive waste specialist Kevin Kamps, who has watch-dogged Palisades for 32 years. Other guests include Palisades Park Country Club residents Bruce and Karen Davis, epidemiologist Joe Mangano, climate expert Dr. Mark Jacobson, and former Entergy Palisades senior engineer Alan Blind.
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WHAT AROSE AT ZAPORIZHZHIA? Fire at cooling tower extinguished
It could have been an accident. Or deliberate. Ukraine started it. Or Russia did. There was no radiation release. It will be virtually impossible to unravel any of these assertions in the coming weeks. The only comfort is that a fire in one of the two cooling towers at the six-reactor Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant, located in Ukraine but occupied by Russian forces, is out. The precise function of these cooling towers is also unclear as they are not attached to the six reactor buildings. The IAEA says “The cooling towers are separate and removed from the shutdown reactors and spent fuel pools. The towers’ function is to release heat through evaporation to cool down machinery, equipment, or air inside a building.”
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