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in the Nuclear Industry All Rights Reserved NUCLEAR ACCIDENTS The Chernobyl disaster, in 1986, and the ongoing Fukushima disaster, which began in 2011, have clearly shown that catastrophic nuclear accidents can readily occur. All it takes is one error or one "trigger" and a devastating nuclear disaster is unleased upon the general populace of the world. Once a serious nuclear accident occurs, the world has to deal with the consequences for decades to come. The Chernobyl and Fukushima nuclear disasters have clearly proven to the world that serious problems created by these types of disasters may actually never be fully over for people living in affected areas. Links to information on Chernobyl: (Wikipedia: Chernobyl disaster) (RT News, pictures: Chernobyl, then and now) (video: Chernobyl Nuclear Disaster, Time - 43:26) (video: Chernobyl Accident, Time - 3:39) (video: Chernobyl Victims, Time - 7:17) (video: Chernobyl Uncensored - Documentary, Time - 1:32:58) Links to information on Fukushima: (Wikipedia: Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster) (The Guardian: After Fukushima: families on the edge of meltdown) (Fox News: More US sailors claim cancer from helping at Fukushima) (Reuters: Japan's nuclear crisis deepens, China expresses 'shock') (article and video, CBS News, 60 Minutes: Three Years Later, Time - 14:10) (video: Tokyo hides truth as children die, become ill from radiation, Time - 28:09) A GENERAL OBSERVATION When things are operating properly in nuclear power plants, to the casual observer, they appear to be rather docile and safe. But, once an accident happens and things get out of control, a catastrophic nuclear disaster is a horrific thing to deal with, possibly for a long time to come. PROBLEMS AND "HONESTY" IN NUCLEAR PLANTS Are officials in the nuclear industry truly honest and not misleading about problems and safety issues in their plants? The article linked below, from 2010, presents just one example. It states the following about the leaking Vermont Yankee plant: "Officials of the New Orleans-based Entergy Corp., which owns the plant in Vernon in Vermont's southeast corner, have admitted misleading state regulators and lawmakers by saying the plant did not have the kind of underground pipes that could leak tritium into groundwater." The Vermont Governor at the time, Jim Douglas, declared: "What has happened at Vermont Yankee is a breach of trust that cannot be tolerated." The article states further that Douglas, up until now, "has been a strong supporter of the state's lone nuclear plant." Once a person realizes that they are being horribly lied to and deceived by the nuclear industry, it is hard to trust them ever again. Yes, what else are they covering up? How else are they deceiving the public? The article linked below states that three-quarters of the nuclear power plants in the United States have been leaking radioactive tritium, often into the groundwater. The article states further: "The number and severity of the leaks has been escalating, even as federal regulators extend the licenses of more and more reactors across the nation." The rather disturbing article linked above states: "The tritium leaks also have spurred doubts among independent engineers about the reliability of emergency safety systems at the 104 nuclear reactors situated on the 65 sites. That’s partly because some of the leaky underground pipes carry water meant to cool a reactor in an emergency shutdown and to prevent a meltdown." The article also states: "The leaks sometimes go undiscovered for years." And, "mistakes and defective material have contributed to some leaks." The article above states that "since much of the piping is inaccessible and carries cooling water, the worry is if the pipes leak there could be a meltdown." GROUNDWATER DAMAGE The article, linked here and above, states: "Subsurface water not only rusts underground pipes, it attacks other buried components, including electrical cables that carry signals to control operations." If the electrical control cables are compromised, how is a nuclear plant going to respond properly to an emergency? With compromised control cables, will a plant be able to avoid a meltdown, when things begin to go out of control? IRREPARABLE SAFETY ISSUES The article linked below declares: "All 104 nuclear reactors currently operational in the US have irreparable safety issues and should be taken out of commission and replaced, former chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Gregory B. Jaczko said." The New York Times article, linked below, has the following to say about this former chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission: "Greg has led a Sisyphean fight against some of the nuclear industry's most entrenched opponents of strong, lasting safety regulations, often serving as the lone vote in support of much-needed safety upgrades recommended by the commission's safety staff." JUST LIKE FUKUSHIMA Regarding the nuclear reactors which failed at Fukushima in 2011, the article linked below speaks of "a flawed safety system that houses the nuclear fuel." It states: "The U.S. has 23 reactors with the same kind of safety systems—and the same risky placement of pools for spent nuclear fuel, namely, alongside the main reactor in the top of the reactor building." FUKUSHIMA AND THE NRC The webpage linked below declares: "Emails obtained by journalists at NBC News reveal that officials at the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission --- the government agency that oversees reactor safety and security --- purposely misled the media after the Fukushima, Japan disaster in 2011." According to the page, emails expose "on a major scale the efforts that NRC officials undertook in order to diminish the severity of the event in the hours and days after it began to unfold." It appears that the NRC wilfully and intentionally deceived the general public, via the news media, about the seriousness of the Fukushima disaster. This is totally unacceptable. The page linked above also contains the following quote: "In the tense days after a powerful earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in Japan on March 11, 2011, staff at the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission made a concerted effort to play down the risk of earthquakes and tsunamis to America's aging nuclear plants" The page states that "nuclear regulators went to great lengths to keep the scary facts about the Fukushima meltdown from being brought into the public eye." Furthermore, it appears the NRC was doing everything it could to prevent a disclosure of "the detrimental safety standards in place at American facilities." FALSIFIED DATA It is time to consider some of the history within the nuclear industry. It is time to consider another example of what appears to be blatant dishonesty. The webpage linked below presents an issue with nuclear pellets produced by British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL). It states that "Quality Control Data of the fuel pellets had been falsified by BNFL." The falsified data related to "mixed plutonium-uranium oxide (MOX) fuel:" that same fuel which was in the Fukushima Number 3 reactor which experienced a violent explosion following the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. (link) (link) (link) IN CALIFORNIA The webpage linked below speaks of correspondence between Southern California Edison and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries regarding new steam generators at the San Onofre nuclear plant. In the information presented, Sen. Boxer declares: "This correspondence leads me to believe that Edison intentionally misled the public and regulators in order to avoid a full safety review and public hearing in connection with its redesign of the plant." THREE MILE ISLAND ACCIDENT The document linked below includes information about the Three Mile Island nuclear facility and Unit 2 (TMI-2), which experienced a partial meltdown in 1979. PDF page 4 or 8 notes "allegations of widespread cheating by TMI control room operators on NRC requalification examinations." It also notes "defects in equipment, analyses, procedures and training affecting the operation of TMI-2 of which the NRC was or should have been aware." PDF page 5 of 8 states: "The NRC staff informed the full commission that its investigations concluded that TMI employees falsified safety records in the months leading up to the TMI-2 accident." Regarding the restart of Reactor Unit 1 (TMI-1), PDF page 2 of 8 declares: "The NRC allowed TMI-1 to restart despite the facts that its owner allowed a meltdown of its sister reactor, allowed extensive cheating on operator examinations administered after the meltdown, and made material false statements about TMI-1 equipment status to the NRC after the meltdown." PDF page 2 of 8, of the above document, states: "When culpability for the worst nuclear plant accident in U.S. history combined with subsequent deliberate wrongdoing on the path to restarting that plant does not prompt the NRC to even consider revoking an operating license from a way-ward owner, there’s little reason for hope that the agency will be able to act on warning signs to prevent a similar --- or larger --- accident." LOOKING AGAIN AT CALIFORNIA The webpage linked below speaks about "a lawsuit against PG&E and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission because, as it turns out, federal regulators secretly revised Diablo's license 'to mask the aging plant's vulnerability to earthquakes.'" The webpage linked below speaks directly to the issue, with the following: "Federal regulators secretly and illegally revised the license for California's last nuclear power facility --- PG&E's Diablo Canyon --- to mask the aging plant's vulnerability to earthquakes, according to a lawsuit filed Tuesday by environmentalists." AN EARLIER OREGON EXAMPLE Let us consider an Oregon example of "honesty" and safety within the nuclear industry. If one were to multiply the example, noted in the sections below, by an unknown number of times, you may get a more accurate picture of what is happening in the nuclear industry. The following example regards the former nuclear power plant which existed at the Trojan site, on the banks of the Columbia River, not very far downriver from Portland, Oregon. OVERLOOKED, MAJOR PROBLEMS The Trojan Nuclear Power Plant had its problems. There was a compromised backup safety system. No one knew about this faulty system from the time the plant was put into operation in 1975 until ultimate discovery was made in 1991. In regards to this problem, the article linked below states: "In the event of overheating within the reactor core, the Emergency Core Cooling System could not reliably have been called upon to prevent meltdown." When the non-operational backup safety system was discovered, the article linked above shows that the NRC fined PGE $280,000 for the safety breach. Regarding the operating Trojan plant, Portland lawyer Greg Kafoury declared: "We were one broken pipe away from Chernobyl." NOTICE OF ANOTHER VIOLATION The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission document, linked below, is a 'NOTICE OF VIOLATION AND PROPOSED IMPOSITION OF CIVIL PENALTY - $50,000'. This document involved 'NRC INVESTIGATION CASE NOS. 5-91-012 & 5-91-013' on the former Trojan nuclear plant. WILLFUL FALSIFICATION The legal document, linked here and above, from the NRC, regarding Trojan Nuclear Power Plant indicates that PGE falsified required legal documents regarding the safety and continued operation of the nuclear plant. PGE submitted to the NRC "inaccurate and incomplete information" in a Licensee Event Report. In regards to the violations, it appears there was deliberate misconduct on the part of PGE employees and that the violations were committed willfully. SIGNIFICANT MISMANAGEMENT AND DECEPTION Regarding the Trojan nuclear facility, the NRC declared that "the violations are the result of significant management failures to address the underlying technical issues as well as to establish an appropriate climate for being candid with the NRC with regard to these issues." The violations were also a result of "improper operational safety decisionmaking by senior PGE management and the plant review board." The document shows that PGE had a "pattern of misinforming the NRC." NUCLEAR DANGERS From the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant example, and from other examples noted earlier in this report, it appears that there can be gross mismanagement and deception in the nuclear power industry. This is not a good thing when we are dealing with such a dangerous and potentially deadly product like highly radioactive nuclear fuel. Mismanagement and willful violation of safety regulations could result in a devastating nuclear accident, with dangerous and deadly nuclear radiation spreading across the land. It could result in uninhabitable land for miles around the nuclear facility. It could result in unusable food products and drinking water in the region around these facilities. But, there is even more to consider. An accident at a nuclear facility could result in people dying miserable deaths from radiation poisoning. It could mean cancer and other radiation-induced diseases. It could also mean altered DNA and serious birth defects in future generations. LOOKING AT JAPAN Information presented in the webpage linked below tends to indicate that the nuclear industry in Japan has been lying to government officials, especially about the Fukushima nuclear facility and the ongoing disaster there. HANFORD NUCLEAR FACILITY The information linked below, regarding the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, tends to indicate that the public has been consistently and wilfully lied to and deceived about safety and health issues relating to this facility. More information about what has been happening at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation is presented in 'The Hanford Report' linked here. DECEPTION AND DISHONESTY From the few examples noted in this report, it is clear that deception and dishonesty can and does happen in the nuclear power industry, possibly more often than we will ever know. The webpage linked below declares: "Secrecy, delayed investigations and misinformation have characterized the history of nuclear weapons and power since A-bombs ended World War II." The linked page states further: "Secrecy and deception has since characterized global nuclear history, as documented in the book 'Killing Our Own: The Disaster of America's Experience with Atomic Radiation.'" (link to online book) STRAIGHT TO THE POINT Now for the bottom line. Possibly everything said regarding safety within the nuclear power industry should be checked out to the fullest, whether it be said by an industry or a government official. TRULY LUCKY Looking at the Pacific Northwest region, Portland, Oregon, and southwest Washington (and possibly all of Oregon and Washington, plus surrounding states and Canada), you were very lucky in the case of the problematic Trojan nuclear plant. But there is more to consider. What is now your future as a citizen in the Pacific Northwest if the government begins dumping large amounts of highly radioactive waste from around the United States into nuclear junkyards created in your region: ones which are located on the banks of the vital Columbia River? Let us consider another important issue. What are the safety and "honesty" issues relating the apparently mis-designed and unrepairable vitrification plant at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation? Is it just an accident waiting to happen? This issue is considered further in another report on this site. QUESTIONS TO CONSIDER There are some very serious questions which should be addressed by inhabitants of the Pacific Northwest and beyond. These are questions to be addressed by anyone, virtually anywhere in the world, who could be affected by a nuclear facility. Will you still be as lucky in the future, as you were in the past? In the event of massive earthquakes, or in the event of a terrorist or major cyber attack, what kind of "accidents waiting to happen" do the questionable nuclear facilities present? There is one more important question. Do you like playing "Russian Roulette" with your future and the future of those around you? |
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