Nuclear Energy

Fukushima Update: TEPCO & Japan Begin To Face Reality

November 16, 2013 Staff, www.PopularResistance.org Resist! Environment, Fukushima, Japan, Nuclear Energy

The Japanese corporation TEPCO is finally beginning to face reality. Removing the fuel rods from Fukushima will be a difficult and dangerous task. They had been saying -- no problem, routine, we've done this a thousand times before. Thankfully, they looked one more time and saw what we have been reporting -- this is a unique challenge, never been done before. The fuel rods are damaged and will be very dangerous to remove. They have to be removed because of the tremendous risk from an earthquake or tsunami. In the last month Fukushima has barely avoided catastrophe from both earthquakes, tsuanmi and a tidal wave. This is a very risky situation no matter what direction TEPCO goes. We are urging people to push to remove TEPCO and replace them with an international group of expert engineers, overseen by civilian experts and a transparent process. Join that effort here.

Bill Moyers Journal: Fighting the Good Fight

November 15, 2013 Staff, www.billmoyers.com Strategize! Democracy, Education, Finance and the Economy, Fukushima, Health Care, Housing, Nuclear Energy, Occupy

“When people ask me ‘what kind of medicine are you practicing?’ I usually say, ‘I’m practicing political medicine because it’s the mother of all illnesses,’” Stein tells Bill. Flowers adds: “Once you start speaking truth to power and standing up for the right things, it’s very empowering.” Stein and Flowers serve as the president and secretary of health, respectively, for the Green Shadow Cabinet, an organization offering alternative policies to the “dysfunctional government in Washington, DC.” This week, Bill talks with them about their personal journeys fighting for policy change — including arrests for acts of civil disobedience — and the pressing challenges they’re focusing on, such as the fallout from the Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan.

What The US Can Learn From Germany’s Stunning Environmental Movement

November 15, 2013 Ben Goossen, www.wagingnonviolence.org Strategize! Coal, Energy, Environment, Nuclear Energy

The secret to Germany’s sustainability success has been the relentless and unapologetic application of populist direct action. From 1975, when 30,000 Germans caught the world’s attention by storming and occupying a proposed nuclear plant for 10 months, to just this past October, when clean energy activists dumped coal outside the workspaces of environmentally friendly politicians who had not gone far enough, confrontation has pumped the heart of progress. The roots of German environmentalism reach back well into the 19th century, when notions of sustainability and conservation fueled dreams of nationalist expansion and military readiness, including under Hitler’s Nazi regime. Postwar environmentalism, however, has proved a tool of liberation. The legions of students, grandmothers, social reformers and full-time activists that formed the emerging movement in the 1950s and 1960s aligned their collective agenda with values like decentralization, anti-fascism, social equality and multiculturalism.

Cynical US’s Hidden Agenda In Offer To Help Japan With Fukushima

November 9, 2013 Rianne Teule, www.greenpeace.org Educate! Corporatism, Fukushima, Nuclear Energy

The US has “kindly offered” to help Japan with the decommissioning of the Fukushima reactors and the problems with the ongoing leakages of radioactively contaminated water. Is the US being the good Samaritan? Unfortunately not. Before the US will provide assistance, Japan has to sign the Convention on Supplementary Compensation for Nuclear Damage(CSC). This is an international treaty that supposedly provides an international regime on nuclear liability -- the who-should-pay-for-a-nuclear-accident issue. But the real aim of the CSC, along with other international conventions on nuclear liability, is to protect the nuclear industry. It caps the total compensation available after a nuclear accident at a level much lower than the actual costs. The companies that supply nuclear reactors and other material are exempt, they don't have to pay anything if there is an accident.

Take Action For International Assistance With The Crises At Fukushima

November 8, 2013 Staff, www.popularresistance.org Petitions and Online Actions Environment, Fukushima, Nuclear Energy

On November 7, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) started removing the spent fuel rods from the damaged Reactor 4 building. This task, which may take a year to complete, requires great care and precision. The rods are damaged and displaced. If a rod breaks, or rods get too close to each other or are exposed to air, a catastrophic reaction could begin and release massive quantities of radioactive material. Not only has TEPCO demonstrated that it is overwhelmed by the crises at Fukushima, but it has also not been forthcoming about the problems they face. Similarly the Japanese government has not been pro-active or forthcoming enough about this situation. The Abe Administration is pushing a state secrets act that would make the repercussions for blowing the whistle severe.

2013 Nagasaki Appeal On Nuclear Power And Weapons

November 7, 2013 5th Nagasaki Global Citizens’ Assembly for the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons, www.popularresistance.org Educate! Fukushima, Nuclear Energy, Wars and Militarism

Although more than 50,000 nuclear weapons have been eliminated since 1986, more than 17,000 remain. It would only take a small number of these weapons of mass destruction to end civilization and most life on earth. Nine countries possess nuclear weapons, another five host U.S. nuclear weapons on their soil, and more still base their security on alliances with nuclear weapon states. Countless atomic bomb survivors worked hard until their last days for the elimination of nuclear weapons. The danger of nuclear annihilation, by accident, miscalculation or design continues to cast a dark shadow over humanity’s future. In addition, the failure of the nuclear weapon states to achieve more progress toward a nuclear weapons free world is undermining the legitimacy of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).

Poem: A Walk With Toshio

November 7, 2013 Martin Steingesser, www.popularresistance.org Educate! Environment, Fukushima, Nuclear Energy

Tsunami becomes a household word, along with foreign names: Saito, a village on the northeastern coast of Japan; Toshio Abe, an old man who heard the siren, ran, climbed a hill and looked back to watch the wave rise. Wreckage carpets the news. Toshio walks along a road, on either side nothing but rubble, only him and the mid-stripe curving away to the sea, a narrow blue band, a few distant islands like a view of islands across the harbor where I live. Where I live, seagulls sail above rooftops, wings brushed rose in morning sun, around me the hum of conversation, white porcelain cups and dishes, and I wonder about who’s tumbled in the wave, who’s left standing on shore. Days later, radiation crackles at the broken power plant.

International Community Demands New Direction, Transparency At Fukushima

November 7, 2013 Green Shadow Cabinet Fukushima Sub-committee, www.popularresistance.org Resist! Environment, Fukushima, Government, Health Care, Nuclear Energy

Members of the Green Shadow Cabinet Fukushima subcommittee and allies deliver a letter signed by more than 150 organizations and individuals from across the globe and petitions signed by more than 150,000 people to the United Nations today calling for a new direction in the management and clean-up of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant. As more information is revealed about the ongoing crises at Fukushima and the difficulties faced by Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), the Japanese public and the global community recognize that the situation requires immediate and independent intervention. TEPCO has failed to demonstrate competence in managing the situation, and they continue to place profits before safety. TEPCO is cutting corners and mistreating workers, which is adding to the deterioration of the situation. They have also shown themselves to be untrustworthy hiding information about serious problems at Fukushima.

Hey Pro-Nuke Climate Scientists—Note Global Terror At Fukushima Four

November 4, 2013 Harvey Wasserrman, www.commondreams.org Educate! Egypt, Energy, Environment, Health Care, Nuclear Energy

Since March 11, 2011, fuel assemblies weighing some 400 tons, containing more than 1500 extremely radioactive fuel rods, have been suspended 100 feet in the air above Fukushima Daiichi’s Unit Four. “If you calculate the amount of cesium 137 in the pool, the amount is equivalent to 14,000 Hiroshima atomic bombs," says Hiroaki Koide, assistant professor at Kyoto University Research Reactor Institute. Former US Department of Energy official Robert Alvarez, an expert on fuel pool fires, calculates potential fallout from Unit Four at ten times greater than what came from Chernobyl. Tokyo Electric Power says it may start moving these fuel rods as early as November 8.

Fukushima: Japanese Organized Crime Involved In Recruitment Of “Specialized Personnel”

November 1, 2013 Prof Michel Chossudovsky, www.globalresearch.ca Educate! Environment, Government, Health Care, Nuclear Energy

The crisis in Japan has been described as “a nuclear war without a war”. In the words of renowned novelist Haruki Murakami: “This time no one dropped a bomb on us … We set the stage, we committed the crime with our own hands, we are destroying our own lands, and we are destroying our own lives.” Several Global Research reports and background articles have outlined the dangers of Worldwide radiation resulting from the Fukushima disaster. This disaster is now being sustained and aggravated by the incompetence of TEPCO as well as political camouflage by the Abe government.

8 Months, 10 Mishaps: A Look At Fukushima Errors

October 30, 2013 Mari Yamaguchi, www.japantoday.com Educate! Fukushima, Nuclear Energy

Workers overfill a tank, spilling radioactive water on the ground. Another mistakenly pushes a button, stalling a pump for a vital cooling system. Six others get soaked with toxic water when they remove the wrong pipe. All over the course of one week in October. A string of mishaps this year at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant, which was swamped by a tsunami in 2011, is raising doubts about the operator’s ability to tackle the crisis and prompting concern that another disaster could be in the making. Worried Japanese regulators are taking a more hands-on approach than usual to seek solutions to what they say appear to be fundamental problems. Human error is mostly to blame, as workers deal with a seemingly unending stream of crises. Tanaka said earlier this month the repeated “silly mistakes” are a sign of declining morale and sense of responsibility.

Over 1300 Fukushima Residents Demand Nuclear Officials Face Jail

October 29, 2013 Common Dreams, www.commondreams.org Educate! Fukushima, Nuclear Energy

Over 1300 residents of Fukushima filed a criminal complaint on Monday against 33 people including Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) executives and workers in government organizations saying that they are responsible for negligence over the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disaster and should go to jail. "The Fukushima nuclear accident is the worst corporate crime in Japan's history and caused significant damage to the life, health and assets of the people of Fukushima and the rest of Japan," the group, the Plaintiffs Against the Fukushima Nuclear Plant, said on its website.

VIDEO: Russell’s Brand New Revolution & Chris Hedges On Class War

October 27, 2013 Dennis Trainor, Jr., www.acronymtv.com Resistance Report Corporatism, Finance and the Economy, Fukushima, Nuclear Energy, Occupy, Video

Resistance Report: While watching Russell Brand’s BBC interview, it is not hard to imagine two families in Middle America, neighbors, watching separately in the comfort of their own homes as Russell Brand does his bit and each nod in lonely agreement. “Yes!”, they are likely to say- “this Russell Brand fellow is right.” But family A has to work hard at a job they are made to feel they are lucky to have buying something, selling something, or processing something when, like their inner Lloyd Dobbler, they don’t want to buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, they don't want to do that. And Family B is doing the same thing. Both are trying to keep up with the Joneses, as they the expression goes. Family B is competing to send their kids to better schools and than Family A; and Family A is competing just as hard to beat out family B. They are each other’s Jones.

Popular Resistance Newsletter – Building A National Culture Of Resistance

October 25, 2013 Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers, www.popularresistance.org Newsletter Corporatism, Energy, Environment, Food and Agriculture, Fracking, Nuclear Energy, Poverty, Tar Sands

We are starting to see how the movement is in fact changing the political system without focusing on elections, but instead by focusing on the big issues of a failed economic system that creates inequity and puts profits before the people and the planet. An example is the extreme austerity measures, including threats to Social Security and Medicare, that need our attention. Building alliances and creating solidarity across the movement are critical ingredients to our success. In the end, we are confident that it is not who is in office, but the environment we create for them to operate in. We need to continue to protest when elected officials go off in the wrong direction – which is too often – but always build a mass national movement of communities across the country networked together and working to end the rule of money in each of its manifestations and to shift power to the people.

Everything You Need to Know About the Fukushima Crisis

October 24, 2013 Kevin Zeese and Margaret Flowers, www.truth-out.org Educate! Fukushima, Nuclear Energy

The story of Fukushima should be on the front pages of every newspaper. Instead, it is rarely mentioned. The problems at Fukushima are unprecedented in human experience and involve a high risk of radiation events larger than any that the global community has ever experienced. It is going to take the best engineering minds in the world to solve these problems and to diminish their global impact. When we researched the realities of Fukushima in preparation for this article, words like apocalyptic, cataclysmic and Earth-threatening came to mind. But, when we say such things, people react as if we were the little red hen screaming "the sky is falling" and the reports are ignored. So, we’re going to present what is known in this article and you can decide whether we are facing a potentially cataclysmic event.

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