This blog is history, come over and see the new Shundahai Network videos and other items!!!
Peace,Shundahai, gregor
Corbin's last words. "We are one people. We cannot separate ourselves now.There are many good things to be done for our people and for the world. It is important to let things be good and it is important to teach the younger generation, so that things are not lost."
]]>
Peace,gregor
PS This Blog will close at the end of May.
]]>When Sue Maes saw a government letter addressed to her husband just a few months after he died in 2000, she read it and threw it away.
The letter explained that people who'd sacrificed their health building the nation's nuclear weapons, or their survivors, were going to be compensated by the federal government.
Maes was devastated by her husband's death. She said she was not emotionally ready to consider that his immune system cancer could be related to his work at Rocky Flats, the massive Cold War-era atomic bomb factory northwest of Denver.
After a second letter arrived, she wound up applying for compensation. That was seven years ago, and the widow is still navigating what has become a highly complex and criticized process.
Most recently, government officials informed Maes they had lost her file.
"There are days I think I just can't do this anymore," Maes said. The officials "are not helpful. I thought they were supposed to be helpful."
But help may be on the way for Maes and others.
Nine people from across the country came to Denver recently to create a clearinghouse of information for sick nuclear workers and their survivors. A Denver-based home health care company hosted the ill workers and their advocates, and donated a Web site for the new group, which also hopes to publish a newsletter.
The nonprofit organization is called Cold War Patriots.
"This is going to help so many people," said Terrie Barrie, of Craig. For the past several years, Barrie has tried to help ill workers like her husband, George, who also worked at Rocky Flats.
"It's a wonderful idea to be able to share all this information in one place."
Sick nuclear weapons workers nationwide have complained bitterly about the yearslong process of trying to prove they qualify for federal compensation.
For some, it's meant finding pay stubs from government contractors that no longer exist, medical records from doctors now deceased and proof of exposure to chemicals and radiation so top secret they couldn't even tell their families about them.
"Put bluntly, the average claimant cannot do it successfully," said Maureen Merritt, a New Mexico physician and member of the Cold War Patriots advisory board.
Barrie said the Cold War Patriots hope to point people like Maes to information about the weapons sites that will help them no matter where they are in the process.
"We're really trying to help them build a community of people," said Greg Austin, president of Professional Case Management, the Denver home health care company helping the new group.
Austin said most sick nuclear workers will probably never need the services of his company, which supplies doctor-ordered end-of-life home health care to those who've been approved for medical coverage. But in serving sick weapons workers across the country, Austin said his company recognized a need.
]]>]]>
 |
A pensioner who says he was a "guinea pig" during atomic bomb tests in the 1950s is suing the Government.
Ex-serviceman Derek Connelly, of Churchill Road, Kidlington, says he was made to stand just wearing his shorts and socks to witness nuclear and hydrogen bombs being set off in the Pacific Ocean 50 years ago.
The 71-year-old's grandchildren have suffered miscarriages, deafness and premature birth, which he fears are linked to his exposure to radiation from the weapons.
Now he has joined forces with hundreds of other servicemen to sue the Government for damages.
The Government says it will argue in court that the legal action has been lodged too late.
Mr Connelly said: "We were taken out of our beds at about 2am just in our shorts and socks - no protective clothing whatsoever. We were made to stand with our backs to the blast, with fists clenched over our eyes.
"When the flash came, you could see every bone and sinew in your hand. The heat on your back felt like someone was running an electric fire across your body - and that was from 30 miles away.
"We didn't know much better. We were just all guinea pigs."
Four bombs were tested during the nine months he served on Christmas Island - now known as Kiribati - while serving in the RAF police, guarding airfields.
For three of the tests, Mr Connelly was 30 miles away from the blast, but for the fourth, he was just 12 miles away.
He left the RAF soon after to became a prison officer. He and his wife Jill moved to Kidlington in the 1970s. They have been married for 45 years and have five grandchildren.
Recently, Mr Connelly has suffered heart problems, while his grandson Ellis Connelly, now 18, was born prematurely, weighing just 1Ib 13oz.
His seven-year-old grand-daughter Freya Connelly-Warne was born deaf.
A third grandchildhe did not want to name has suffered three miscarriages.
Mr Connelly said there were no tests available to prove a link between the health problems and the nuclear bomb tests.
He said: "I never really thought about it until my children and their children started having health problems. I don't wish to achieve anything for me personally, but for my wife and family for after I've gone. But I'm also doing it for all those who have died since the tests.
"The Government needs to accept what happened. We have all been forgotten. It happened in 1958 and now here we are in 2008 and nothing has been done."
If the Government fails to persuade the courts to halt the ex-servicemen's case, it is expected to be heard in 2011.
A Ministry of Defence spokesman said: "When compensation claims are received, they are considered on the basis of whether or not the Ministry has a legal liability to pay compensation. Where there is a proven legal liability, compensation is paid."
]]>WASHINGTON -- Government scientists raised questions in recent weeks about Department of Energy experiments on how long it will take canisters containing highly radioactive nuclear waste to corrode after being placed within Yucca Mountain.
The discovery led DOE to replace the data that were part of its license application to build a repository at the Nevada site, a project official said Wednesday.
At the same time, DOE has launched a review of the challenged research, which involved the nickel-based Alloy 22 that will be the outer cover of waste-containing packages. In the experiments, Alloy 22 samples were subjected to a solution of corrosive chemicals and then weighed to determine how much they had degraded.
Technicians reviewing the results reported "documented, repeated and potentially significant excursions" from the American Society for Testing and Materials standard for handling corrosion test specimens, according to a March 5 document that surfaced this week.
The activity is taking place weeks before the department has said it plans to apply for a construction license. It fueled further criticism from Nevada critics of Yucca Mountain who charge DOE is rushing unduly to file for a license.
Russ Dyer, the chief scientist for the Yucca Mountain Project, said the suspicious corrosion data "was roped off" and is not part of the Yucca application.
Dyer said DOE initiated a corrective action to determine "what exactly happened in this experiment and the results that came out of it and the processes we used."
In the meantime, DOE is using corrosion rates resulting from a separate set of experiments that sought to determine how corrosion might develop in canister welds and other crevices of the waste package.
"What is the potential impact on total system performance, and the answer is none," Dyer said. To gain a license, DOE must show that the canisters together with other features of the repository can prevent radioactive material from leaking for periods close to a million years.
Steve Frishman, technical policy coordinator for the Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects, maintained DOE was "papering over" a problem. He said the state may challenge DOE on the corrosion data during license hearings.
The discovery came as scientists from Sandia National Laboratories were reviewing corrosion data. They said they uncovered a "vulnerability" in the data that were collected over five years.
The Sandia findings were contained in a March 5 Power Point presentation that became available on a Yucca Mountain public document database.
After emerging from the corrosive bath, the Alloy 22 "coupons" were cleaned of corrosion before being weighed. Sandia reported the cleaning process "may have been incomplete."
As a result, salts and other residue may have skewed the weight of the samples, raising questions about how much corrosion had taken place. A heavier piece might suggest the metal could last longer.
Sandia said there is "less than a 50 percent chance" the corrosion data were invalid. "But given the critical nature of this parameter (it) must be confirmed."
"The corrosion rate is the core of the total system performance analysis," Frishman said. "When they are talking about containers that don't fail for hundreds of thousands of year, it is possible they are off by orders of magnitude."
The corrosion experiments were conducted at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. In 2006, DOE issued a stop work order on a separate set of corrosion experiments after Nuclear Regulatory Commission inspectors reported the work was based on humidity gauges that were not calibrated.
The Bush administration said yesterday that it plans to start using the nation’s most advanced spy technology for domestic purposes soon, rebuffing challenges by House Democrats over the idea’s legal authority.
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said his department will activate his department’s new domestic satellite surveillance office in stages, starting as soon as possible with traditional scientific and homeland security activities — such as tracking hurricane damage, monitoring climate change and creating terrain maps.
Sophisticated overhead sensor data will be used for law enforcement once privacy and civil rights concerns are resolved, he said. The department has previously said the program will not intercept communications.
“There is no basis to suggest that this process is in any way insufficient to protect the privacy and civil liberties of Americans,” Chertoff wrote to Reps. Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) and Jane Harman (D-Calif.), chairmen of the House Homeland Security Committee and its intelligence subcommittee, respectively, in letters released yesterday.
“I think we’ve fully addressed anybody’s concerns,” Chertoff added in remarks last week to bloggers. “I think the way is now clear to stand it up and go warm on it.”
His statements marked a fresh determination to operate the department’s new National Applications Office as part of its counterterrorism efforts. The administration in May 2007 gave DHS authority to coordinate requests for satellite imagery, radar, electronic-signal information, chemical detection and other monitoring capabilities that have been used for decades within U.S. borders for mapping and disaster response.
But Congress delayed launch of the new office last October. Critics cited its potential to expand the role of military assets in domestic law enforcement, to turn new or as-yet-undeveloped technologies against Americans without adequate public debate, and to divert the existing civilian and scientific focus of some satellite work to security uses.
Democrats say Chertoff has not spelled out what federal laws govern the NAO, whose funding and size are classified. Congress barred Homeland Security from funding the office until its investigators could review the office’s operating procedures and safeguards. The department submitted answers on Thursday, but some lawmakers promptly said the response was inadequate.
“I have had a firsthand experience with the trust-me theory of law from this administration,” said Harman, citing the 2005 disclosure of the National Security Agency’s domestic spying program, which included warrantless eavesdropping on calls and e-mails between people in the United States and overseas. “I won’t make the same mistake. . . . I want to see the legal underpinnings for the whole program.”
Thompson called DHS’s release Thursday of the office’s procedures and a civil liberties impact assessment “a good start.” But, he said, “We still don’t know whether the NAO will pass constitutional muster since no legal framework has been provided.”
DHS officials said the demands are unwarranted. “The legal framework that governs the National Applications Office . . . is reflected in the Constitution, the U.S. Code and all other U.S. laws,” said DHS spokeswoman Laura Keehner. She said its operations will be subject to “robust,” structured legal scrutiny by multiple agencies.
© 2008 The Washington Post
]]>| By Paul Rincon Science reporter, BBC News |
 Some anticipate a major expansion of nuclear power |
The case for nuclear power as a low carbon energy source to replace fossil fuels has been challenged in a new report by Australian academics.
It suggests greenhouse emissions from the mining of uranium - on which nuclear power relies - are on the rise.
Availability of high-grade uranium ore is set to decline with time, it says, making the fuel less environmentally friendly and more costly to extract.
The findings appear in the journal Environmental Science & Technology.
 |  Yes, we can probably find new uranium deposits, but to me that's not the real issue  Dr Gavin Mudd, Monash University |
Others sources of carbon include construction of the plant - including the manufacturing of steel and concrete materials - and decomissioning.
The authors based their analysis on historical records, contemporary financial and technical reports, and analyses of CO2 emissions.
Experts say it is the first such report to draw together such detailed information on the environmental costs incurred at this point in the nuclear energy chain.
Nuclear impact
The report is likely to come under close scrutiny at a time when governments around the world are considering the nuclear option to meet future energy demands and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
 Mining companies are likely to have to dig deeper for deposits |
Lead author Gavin Mudd, from Monash University in Australia, told BBC News: "Yes, we can probably find new uranium deposits, but to me that's not the real issue. The real issue is: 'what are the environmental and sustainability costs?'
New uranium deposits are likely to be deeper underground and therefore more difficult to extract than at currently exploited sites, said Dr Mudd.
In addition, he said, the average grade of uranium ore - a measure of its uranium oxide content and a key economic factor in mining - is likely to fall. Getting uranium from lower-quality deposits involves digging up and refining more ore.
| Even in the worst case scenario for CO2 emissions, the impact of nuclear on greenhouse emissions is still very small Thierry Dujardin, NEA |
"The rate at which [the average grade of uranium ore] goes down depends on demand, technology, exploration and other factors. But, especially if there is going to be a nuclear resurgence, it will go down and that will entail a higher CO2 cost," Dr Mudd explained.
Overall, the report suggests that uranium mining could require more energy and water in future, releasing greenhouse gases in greater quantities.
New technology
Thierry Dujardin, deputy director for science and development at the Nuclear Energy Agency (NEA), said the analysis made an important contribution to clarifying the impact of nuclear energy on CO2 emissions.
"It is the beginning of the answer to a question I have raised in many fora, including within the agency," he told BBC News.
But Mr Dujardin said he did not fully agree with the authors' conclusions.
"Even in the worst case scenario for CO2 emissions, the impact of nuclear on greenhouse emissions is still very small compared with fossil fuels," he explained.
The NEA official admitted that lower grades of ore might have to be exploited in future, but he added that emissions from mining were only a small part of those produced in the nuclear supply chain as a whole.
He said he was also confident that entirely new deposits would be found as the industry stepped up its exploration effort.
The nuclear industry is carrying out research into recovering uranium from rocks used in the industrial production of phosphates. Various technologies based on solvent extraction can be used to get the element from phosphate rocks.
And in the longer term, some predict that so-called fast breeder reactor technology would increase by up to 50-fold the amount of energy extracted from uranium.
]]>Most of the money will help fund construction of new modular homes for 39 families living on the Utah portion of the Navajo reservation in San Juan County.
Also funded: power-line upgrades, a water survey, a new road grader and other equipment.
Ken Maryboy, Navajo Revitalization Fund Board member and San Juan County commissioner, said 39 homes won't meet demand for housing on the reservation.
"But anything is greatly appreciated," Maryboy said. "Some of these people have been waiting years and years."
He said it's not uncommon for two to three families to live together under one roof, and much of the housing in general is substandard.
"Many of these homes were built in the '40s from rock obtained from area uranium mines, exposing families to dangerous radiation," he said, noting that other homes contain unsafe levels of lead and asbestos.
The Navajo Revitalization Fund Board awards grants and low-interest loans to municipal and tribal agencies in San Juan County impacted by the mining and extraction of oil and gas on Utah land. The money is used to make communities more livable, including building homes and senior centers, and paying for water upgrades and youth programs. Seven Navajo chapters on the Utah strip of the reservation are eligible]]>
