Protect the Great Lakes: Tell NY Gov. Cuomo to Hang up on Nuclear Subsidies, Ring for Renewables/Efficiency Instead!

Please call New York Governor Andrew Cuomo's office right away at (518) 474-8390, or message him here. Gov. Cuomo has ordered the NY Public Service Commission (PSC) to approve a $10 billion bailout for the state's dirty, dangerous, and financially failing atomic reactors, at ratepayer expense. The PSC could act as soon as Monday, August 1st, so please take action immediately! Click here for some simple instructions and sample call scripts you can use when you call. Propping up New York's four age-degraded atomic reactors on the Lake Ontario shore (FitzPatrick, Ginna, Nine Mile Point 1 & 2) would put the drinking water supply for nine million people in two countries at increasing risk of breakdown phase disaster. Incredibly, Indian Point Units 2 & 3 near New York City now appear to be eligible for the ratepayer bailout too. Indian Point's safety and security risks threaten more than 20 million people within a 50-mile radius. All these reactors need to be shutdown before they melt down. This bad precedent must be nipped in the bud, lest it add momentum to nuclear bailout schemes in numerous other states, including CT, IL, NJ, PA, and others. More.

Speaking truth to nuclear power at both major party national conventions!

Erica Gray of the Virginia Sierra Club Nuclear-Free Committee holds an iconic Smiling Sun "Nuclear Power? No Thanks!" flag at the UN climate march in New York City in Sept. 2014. NIRS spearheaded the Nuclear-Free, Climate-Free contingent there too, which numbered in the thousands or marchers.Beyond Nuclear has striven to push back against the nuclear industry's lobbying juggernaut, by taking part in major organizing efforts in both Cleveland, Ohio and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in recent days. In the shadow of the Republican National Convention, we conducted an anti-nuke/pro-renewables workshop at the People's Justice and Peace Convention (PJPC), and led the successful effort to include a related plank in the PJPC platform, to be delivered to both major political parties. We also raised the "Nuclear Power? No Thanks!" flag (see photo, flag), figuratively and literally, in a diverse progressive coalition march to Cleveland's public square, near the convention center. Then, on the eve of the Democratic National Convention in Philly, we stood in solidarity with the national anti-fracking movement at the "Summit for a Clean Energy Revolution." We also joined with colleagues from NIRS, and grassroots groups from across the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast, Midwest, and beyond, to form the colorful Nuclear-Free, Carbon-Free contingent, as part of the 10,000-person strong "March for a Clean Energy Revolution." In this election year of Republican climate crisis denial and lockstep pro-nuclear advocacy, as well as the Orwellian betrayal of the phrase "clean energy" -- even by way too many Democrats -- as code for nuclear power, we've got our work cut out for us!    More

Update on July 28, 2016 by admin

This just in from Channel 17 Town Hall Meeting Television in Burlington, Vermont (Bernie Sanders' home town!):

FOCUS: Report from the Clean Energy March at the 2016 Philadelphia Democratic Convention with Kevin Kamps

Focus Host, Margaret Harrington, talks with Kevin Kamps of Beyond Nuclear about the massive rally for clean energy in Philadelphia on July 24, the day before the Democratic National Convention.

Kevin Kamps tells us who was there and why millions of people in the United States are against fracking which is a major issue in the presidential race. There is video from the historic rally showing the diversity of activists and ordinary citizens who are alarmed about climate change.

Urgent final reminder: Comment on DOE's radioactive waste dump by July 31! Use Beyond Nuclear talking points

Representatives from a coalition of environmental and public interest groups protest the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's "Nuke Waste Con Game" at the agency's Rockville, MD HQ in late 2013.The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) has held nine public meetings across the country since January, regarding so-called "Consent-Based Siting" of centralized interim storage sites (de facto permanent parking lot dumps) for high-level radioactive waste, and the "Mobile Chernobyl" truck, train, and barge shipments it would take to deliver the irradiated nuclear fuel there. Thank you to everyone who turned out, both in person and via Webinar: you have helped hold DOE's feet to the fire, making clear they are being watch-dogged. There are a few more days left for the submission of written public comments by DOE's July 31 deadline. Beyond Nuclear has prepared a  Top 10 List you can use to prepare your own comments, as well as two-page and 13-page, more detailed versions of the  "We Do Not Consent!" talking points. Comments can be submitted by email, mail, fax, or Web form, by 11:59pm Eastern time on Sunday. The resistance against radioactive waste risks also continues on other fronts. For example, on July 18th  an environmental coalition appealed an adverse court ruling in favor of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Nuclear Waste Confidence policy a month earlier. More 

Greenpeace International: Fukushima five years later report, "Atomic Depths: An Assessment of Freshwater and Marine Sediment Contamination"

Beyond Nuclear board of directors member Kendra Ulrich, a Greenpeace Japan nuclear campaigner, is a co-author of a new Greenpeace International Fukushima five years later report, "Atomic Depths: An Assessment of Freshwater and Marine Sediment Contamination."

The report summarizes numerous scientific studies from the past several years, and also publishes Greenpeace International radioactivity measurements from the Fukushima Daiichi coastline, and nearby river banks and estuaries, as well as control measurements, from the pristine sediments of the ancient Lake Biwa (millions of years old).

ACT BY TOMORROW (Fri., 7/22): $8 billion bailout would worsen radioactive risks to the Great Lakes!

Graphic art from AGREE action alertNY Governor Cuomo and his Public Service Commission have proposed a massive $8 billion bailout, at ratepayer expense, to prop up three financially failing Exelon atomic reactors in upstate NY on the Lake Ontario shore, and a fourth currently owned by Entergy but that Exelon also wants to buy. The nuclear bailout would gobble up two-thirds of a Clean Energy Fund originally meant for renewables, like wind and solar power, as well as energy efficiency. These four age-degraded reactors are also deep into their breakdown phase, so continued operations significantly increase the risk of a catastrophic radioactivity release on the shore of the Great Lakes, drinking water supply for many millions downstream in the U.S., Canada, and a large number of Native American First Nations. Please take one or more of the following actions ASAP to prevent this dangerous boondoggle -- the public comment deadline is tomorrow, Friday, July 22nd, as the PSC races to rubber-stamp this bad deal. You can use the Alliance for a Green Economy's (AGREE) web form, and/or  Public Citizen's web form, and/or sign and submit a letter drafted by Clearwater. If this nuclear bailout precedent gets set in NY, Exelon's and other nuclear industry lobbyists could then attempt to get away with it at dirty, dangerous, and expensive atomic reactors in other states too. More