Klaim Amano, Perkeruh Isu Nuklir Iran
JUMAT, 18 NOVEMBER 2011 11:52 ADMINISTRATOR
Dirjen Badan Energi Atom Internasional (IAEA), Yukiya Amano kembali mengulangi klaim bahwa Iran tidak kooperatif dalam menyediakan data yang diperlukan untuk membuktikan bahwa Tehran tidak mengejar program nuklir militer, Press TV melaporkan.
"Lembaga ini terus memverifikasi non-pengalihan bahan nuklir yang dinyatakan oleh Iran
"Namun, karena Tehran tidak memberikan kerja sama yang diperlukan, termasuk dengan tidak menerapkan protokol tambahan, IAEA tidak dapat memberikan jaminan yang kredibel tentang adanya bahan nuklir yang tidak diumumkan dan kegiatan di Iran, dan kemudian menyimpulkan bahwa semua bahan nuklir untuk kegiatan damai," tambahnya.
Pada 6 Februari 2006, parlemen Iran menangguhkan pelaksanaan sukarela atas protokol tambahan dan semua kerjasama sukarela dan non-mengikat secara hukum lainnya dengan IAEA untuk memprotes campur tangan Dewan Keamanan PBB dalam program nuklir Iran
Sebelumnya, Duta Besar Iran untuk IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh mengatakan, Tehran tidak akan melaksanakan protokol tambahan selama Dewan Keamanan PBB mengintervensi program nuklir Iran
Iranmembantah keras tuduhan Barat dan berpendapat bahwa sebagai penandatangan Traktat Non-Proliferasi Nuklir (NPT) dan anggota IAEA, memiliki hak untuk mengembangkan dan memperoleh teknologi nuklir untuk tujuan damai. (IRIB Indonesia/RM)
Fukushima to Canada
DATE: 19 DECEMBER 2011
POSTED BY : BY DAVID SUZUKI
Anyone who think that Japan
Nuclear power is experiencing a revival due to growing concerns about climate change. The nuclear industry has reinvented itself as an environmentally friendly option, producing electricity without the air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions of coal, oil or gas.
But a closer look reveals nuclear power is neither an environmentally or financially viable option. Nuclear power creates radioactive waste for which there is no accepted method of safely managing or storing. It is also prohibitively expensive. The last plant constructed in Ontario , Darlington , was budgeted at $3.4 billion but ended up costing $15 billion when it was finally completed in the mid-1980s.
Environmental problems
Whatever benefits nuclear technology may provide through decreased air pollutants are more than made up for by large and unresolved environmental problems. As of 2000, Canada
As well, mining uranium for nuclear power is extremely energy-intensive, meaning that nuclear power is in fact a considerable source of greenhouse gases. Furthermore, routine releases and accidental spills of contaminated water from mining operations have poisoned fisheries and threatened the health of local communities.
Many safety issues surround nuclear power, especially as power plants age. Nuclear plants routinely emit radioactive material, imposing cancer risks on workers, their children and people in surrounding communities. Power plants can also leak other hazardous materials. For example, Pickering reactor #4 had a heavy water leak in April 1996 that released radioactive tritium into Lake Ontario
Economic problems
The energy source once billed as "too cheap to meter" has proven to be one of the most expensive energy sources in history.
Between 1956 and 2000, Canada
The last 20 reactors built in the U.S. had an average cost of $5,000 per kilowatt of capacity; the last one built in Canada
The figures for nuclear do not include lifecycle costs to society from environmental and health damage, or the costs of accidents, clean up, waste disposal or plant decommissioning. And nuclear plants are not only expensive, they're also financially risky because of their long lead times, huge cost overruns and open-ended liabilities.
A Uranium Project in the Political Cross Hairs
By MATTHEW L. WALD
In the last-minute rush in Congress to finalize spending for the current fiscal year and head home for the holidays, one of the losers appears to be USEC, the uranium enrichment company, and the politics are more convoluted than ever.
USEC grew out of the Manhattan Project initiative to develop nuclear weapons and was part of the Energy Department before it was privatized in 1998. It has been trying to develop a new technology to replace the 1940s-era system that it uses to enrich uranium for use in civilian nuclear reactors. It wanted a loan guarantee from the Energy Department, but the department felt that its demonstration plant in Piketon, Ohio, was not ready for prime time.
For one thing, some of its centrifuges were damaged in a power failure,revealing safety problems.
As a presidential candidate, Barack Obama had promised support for USEC; another backer is John Boehner, the House speaker, whose district in southern Ohio is about 100 miles away. Mr. Boehner has been pressing Mr. Obama to make good on his pledge even while complaining that the department should not be making risky loan guarantees, as it did inSolyndra’s case. The administration responded that it wanted to “reprogram” $300 million in the Energy Department’s budget that USEC could spend on further development work, but only if Congress gave its stamp of approval.
On Friday, when the House passed a spending bill that is meant to resolve most spending questions for the current fiscal year, it did not include authority for the Energy Department to transfer $150 million, the amount that USEC and the Energy Department had wanted for this year.
Paul Jacobson, a spokesman for USEC, said the company was “still working with the Department of Energy and the Ohio delegation to see if there’s any method to get that funding.’’
Energy Department officials believe that there is enough support in the Senate, and such a transfer already has the approval of the White House. That leaves the House.
“We’re disappointed that the House refused to back funding,’’ said Damien LaVera, an Energy Department spokesman. He called it “a blow to the future of our domestic nuclear industry as well as the people of southern Ohio.’’
Mr. Boehner issued a disclaimer of sorts. “I made a commitment when I was elected speaker that I would not use my position to direct committee chairmen to airdrop earmarks or earmark-like provisions into spending bills, and I am bound by that pledge,’’ he said in a statement issued on Friday evening. But President Obama should be bound by his pledge in the 2008 campaign, he said.
The Nonproliferation Policy Education Center promptly praised Mr. Boehner for taking a “principled stand.” The nonproliferation group, which seeks to halt the spread of nuclear weapons, generally opposes all things nuclear. But some Democrats grumbled that Mr. Boehner’s stance just seemed to be a way for Republicans to blame them for the fate of USEC, which is highly uncertain if it cannot make its new technology into a commercial project.
Mr. Boehner said there would still be a chance to restore the money when the House comes back in January. As a stand-alone bill, for example, such legislation would not qualify as an “earmark.”
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