Re-release of Karl Grossman's interview with environmental giant David Brower to mark his 100th birthday

Beyond Nuclear board member and investigative journalist Karl Grossman has written:

"In honor of the 100th anniversary of the birth of David Brower [July 1, 1912 – November 5, 2000], founder and chair of Earth Island Institute, founder and chair of  Friends of the Earth and long-time executive director of the Sierra  Club, EnviroVideo has re-issued a 1996 Enviro Close-Up interview I  did with Mr. Brower. It is being aired nationally this month on Free Speech TV. And it can be viewed online at -- http://blip.tv/envirovideo/david-brower-ecu-617-6181648

Among other things, he tells of how his opposition to nuclear power led to losing his position at the Sierra Club."

The Sierra Club has since taken an anti-nuclear position. The Sierra Club grassroots held a No Nukes summit in Takoma Park, Maryland in early May, at which Beyond Nuclear board member Dr. Judith Johnsrud was honored for her 50 years of anti-nuclear leadership.

Kenneth Brower, David Brower's eldest son, has recently written The Wildness Within: Remembering David Brower (see cover photo).

San Onofre down for the summer! Let's keep it shutdown for good!

NRC file photo of San Onofre nuclear power plantIn some very welcome news, the Los Angeles Times reports that Southern California Edison today announced it will not re-start the troubled San Onofre nuclear power plant this summer. As the article reports, "When running at full capacity, San Onofre supplies about 2,200 megawatts of power and makes up 19% of the power provided to Edison customers. With contingency plans in place, officials said Southern California should be able to get through the summer without power shortages under all but the most extreme circumstances." Which begs the question, why run these reactors in this earthquake and tsunami zone, when they are not even needed during the highest peak electricity demand season of the year?!

Brand new steam generators, costings many hundreds of millions of dollars, have suffered unexplained tube failure just a year or two into operations. A cascading steam generator tube failure can lead to a Loss of Coolant Accident in the reactor cores, and meltdowns. Groups such as Nuclear Free California (a coalition of grassroots and national organizations, including Beyond Nuclear) and Friends of the Earth, however, are calling for San Onofre's permanent shut down. 

Davis-Besse kept from re-starting due to reactor coolant system leak

Bathtub Curve for Nuclear Accidents provided by David Lochbaum, Union of Concerned ScientistsThe long-troubled Davis-Besse atomic reactor in Oak Harbor, Ohio on the Lake Erie shoreline near Toledo was prevented from re-starting after a re-fueling outage because of a "pinhole leak" in the reactor cooling system at a rate of 1 gallon of water per ten minutes. FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company (FENOC) issued an "event notification," now posted at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) website. The Cleveland Plain Dealer has reported on this incident, as has Bloomberg, Business Week, and the Toledo Blade.

This latest corrosion incident must now be added to a very long list of Davis-Besse woes dating back more than 35 years, from perhaps more near-misses with disaster than any other single U.S. reactor, to a recently revealed cracked concrete containment building. FENOC blames the cracking on the Blizzard of 1978, a claim critics mock as a "Snow Job."

Beyond Nuclear, in coalition with Citizens Environment Alliance of Southwestern Ontario, Don't Waste Michigan, and the Green Party of Ohio, has officially intervened before the NRC Atomic Safety (sic) and Licensing Board to block FENOC's application for a 20 year license extension. The environmental coalition is represented by Toledo attorney Terry Lodge.

Davis-Besse is deep into its "break down phase" for increased risk of disaster. In fact, it has already suffered the most infamous "break down phase" accident yet in U.S. history -- the 2002 Hole-in-the-Head Fiasco, where its reactor lid was almost entirely eaten through by boric acid corrosion due to leakage from the core. (See the "Bathtub Curve," so named for its shape, above left.) This risked a Loss of Coolant Accident and meltdown. At the 2006 environmental conference commemorating 20 years since the Chernobyl nuclear catastrophe began in Kiev, a Ukrainian nuclear whistleblower cautioned that it's not just Russian reactor designs we have to worry about -- he pointed to Davis-Besse as a case in point. 

Update on June 9, 2012 by admin

U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH)U.S. Representative Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) has issued a press release entitled "Following Leak of Radioactive Coolant at Davis-Besse, NRC Officials Parrot False Claims from Corporate Flaks." He has demanded an investigation, and stated:

“The Plain Dealer reported yesterday that engineers at the Davis-Besse nuclear reactor had discovered ‘a pinhole coolant leak in a pipe weld Wednesday evening while doing a walk-down inspection of the plant…while the reactor was in ‘hot standby’ mode.’  I intend to monitor this situation carefully as the facts are revealed in the days or weeks to come, but I am concerned about … statements, made by NRC spokespeople and reported in news articles on the subject.

I am concerned because this is not the first time that the NRC Region III spokespeople have made misleading and inaccurate statements about problems at Davis-Besse…

FirstEnergy has consistently misled the public about the nature and extent of problems at Davis-Besse.  We need a Nuclear Regulatory Commission that tells the public the truth, not one that merely repeats the soothing, but misleading, statements of the reactor’s operator.  I have full confidence in Chairman Jaczko’s leadership and I support his efforts to make NRC more independent, efficient, open, clear and reliable.  I am therefore asking for an independent investigation of the reasons behind the disparity between the public statements made by the NRC and the full truth will prevent further degradation of NRC’s credibility as a regulator capable of objectivity.”

Kucinich has fired off a letter to NRC's Office of Inspector General, demanding an investigation of NRC wrong doing.

Two new Beyond Nuclear pamphlets!

Feel free to download our newly revised Freeze our Fukushimas pamphlet and join the campaign today to shut down US nuclear reactors, beginning with the GE Mark I and II boiling water reactors that are twins to the four destroyed reactors at Fukishima Daiichi. The pamphlet includes a list of all US Mark I and II reactors, details on their flaws and action items.

And please also download our revised and upated introductory pamphlet, that introduces you to on overview of our work. This pamphlet now incorporates our old Ten Reasons palm card, listing ten of the most serious nuclear risks and ten brighter energy alternatives.

If you would prefer to order hard copies of these or any other of our publications, please contact Beyond Nuclear by email - info@beyondnuclear.org - or by phone - 301.270.2209 - to place your order.

Help resist the nuclear madness in the District of Corruption

Nuclear industry lobbyists' mega-bucks have blinded Members of Congress and government regulators to the the dangers of nuclear power and radioactive waste, as depicted in this UN IAEA warning symbol.Considering the nuclear establishment's stranglehold on Washington, the "D.C." could stand for District of Corruption. Some days the nuclear madness reaches a fever pitch. Thursday, June 7, 2012 is a good example.

First, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) is "Inviting Atomic Catastrophe," as Beyond Nuclear board member and investigative journalist Karl Grossman warns, by considering extending reactor operating licenses for up to 80 years. NRC has already rubberstamped approvals for 73 reactors' operations out to 60 years, as well as scores of risky "power uprates" to run "break down phase" nuclear plants harder and hotter than originally designed, so utilities can "maximize profits."

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, powerful U.S. Senators are promoting the risky agenda of President Obama's and Energy Secretary Chu's Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future (BRC). U.S. Sen. Carper (D-DE), Chairman of the Subcommittee on Clean Air and Nuclear Safety, is holding a hearing on advancing the BRC's proposal to expedite the search for a new national dumpsite, as well as parking lot dumps, for high-level radioactive waste. Either scheme would launch a radioactive waste shell game on our roads, rails, and waterways (including Delaware's), involving unprecedented thousands of shipments through major metropolitan areas, vulerable to accidents or attacks. Ironically, as revealed by the 1982 CRAC-2 (Calculation of Reactor Accident Consequences) report, which NRC unsuccessfully tried to cover up, Sen. Carper's home state would suffer some of the worst casualties in the country (up to 100,000 "peak early fatalities," 75,000 "peak early injuries," and 40,000 "peak cancer deaths," not to mention $300 billion or more [2010 dollar figures] in property damage), if a catastrophic radioactivity release were to occur at a single of the three reactors at the Salem 1 & 2/Hope Creek nuclear power plant in New Jersey, just 18 miles from Delaware's state capital, Wilmington. 

Simultaneously, U.S. Sen. Bingaman (D-NM), Chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, is leading a bipartisan effort to authorize and fund BRC's bad ideas, wholesale. In mid-March, 2011, just days into the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe, Bingaman sponsored a hastily arranged, high profile Nuclear Energy Institute lobbyists' briefing on Capitol Hill, which erroneously claimed the disaster was not that big a deal, and besides, nothing like it could never happen here.

Please help resist the nuclear-fueled corruption in the nation's Capitol by contacting the White House, your U.S. Senators and Representative. Urge that the generation of radioactive waste be stopped by blocking subsidies for new reactors, and shutting down dangerous old reactors, before they melt down. Urge that, for radioactive waste that already exists, hardened on-site storage be required.