Apocalypse will be highly likely. Artificial intelligence is not going to save us. These weapons need to be outlawed, not produced and purchased en masse.
As reported by Karl Grossman, and published in Nation of Change.
Karl Grossman is a Beyond Nuclear board member, investigative journalist, and long-time watch-dog on nuclear power and nukes/weapons in space.
The article quotes David Lochbaum, who currently serves Beyond Nuclear as an expert witness, and has served as a technical advisor to Don't Waste Michigan in a recent emergency enforcement petition to the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission regarding Fermi 2:
David Lochbaum, a nuclear safety consultant who previously spent years with the Cambridge, Mass.-based Union of Concerned Scientists as a nuclear safety engineer, said the NRC stated in an August, 2000 report that “risk spikes” during outages at boiling-water reactors like Fermi 2 “are primarily the result of human errors during these processes.”
Mr. Lochbaum, who lives in Tennessee and also worked in the nuclear industry for 14 years, said the NRC “knows that risks during BWR refueling outages can spike to levels higher than during reactor operation.”
“The NRC knows that the risk spikes are due primarily to human error,” he said. “The NRC knows that long hours degrade human performance. The NRC knows that it relaxed the limits established to guard against worker fatigue. The NRC is not clueless about risk during refueling. The NRC is spineless about properly managing that risk.”
The article also quotes Terry Lodge, an attorney in Toledo, Ohio who has served Beyond Nuclear as legal counsel numerous times in reactor and radioactive waste legal interventions:
Terry Lodge, a Toledo-based nuclear activist and lawyer, said he wonders “how much hemorrhaging of their work plan took place before they suspended most operations.”
S. David Freeman, a fierce and tireless advocate for clean air, renewable energy, and public power, passed away of a heart attack on May 12. He was 94.
Freeman, son of an umbrella repairman, obtained degrees in engineering and law, eventually becoming chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) under Carter. Originally established under Roosevelt’s New Deal, under Freeman’s leadership, TVA cancelled numerous atomic reactors. After he left, Dave would criticize his successors at TVA for failing to fully promote conservation and renewables, and for garnering lavish salaries and perks.
While at first maintaining a conventional view of nuclear power, Dave became convinced that we could have all the energy we needed through energy conservation, rather than through new nuclear power construction. Two women from New Hampshire had visited Dave. Their community was being threatened with the construction of a nuclear power facility and their research demonstrated conservation, not construction, was what was needed. Dave listened, ran the numbers, and realized the women were right. This is how things are supposed to work, although they rarely do.
Freeman also headed other electric utilities in Texas, New York and California. His guidance of the 
Shuttered San Onofre nuclear station overlooks low-profile solar array. Photo by Griffin5 at English WikipediaSacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) led it into a solar powered future, with installation of solar panels on the Rancho Seco nuclear site, in the immediate aftermath of the popular referendum that shut it down post-Chernobyl. Dave worked to shut down the dreadfully dangerous San Onofre 2 & 3 reactors in 2013 after a year and a half long emergency campaign. Dave also helped obtain the hard won agreement with PG&E and nuclear worker labor unions to shutter the very high-risk Diablo Canyon 1 & 2 at the end of their 40-year licenses (2024 and 2025 respectively).
Dubbed the “Green Cowboy” in his later years, David Freeman was fearless in the face of what can be paralyzing, overwhelming, yet vital anti-nuclear work. His down to earth advice was simple, clear, inspiring, and motivational. At an Institute for Energy and Environmental Research/Dr. Egghead summer school session Dave said, "Well, being activists, we might as well be active." We couldn’t agree more. We will stand on your shoulders, Dave, as we move onward.
See a sample script for contacting your Members of Congress, to urge they demand public comment meetings in your state/congressional district (once safe to do so, post-pandemic), re: the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission's Draft Environmental Impact Statement on Holtec International's nuke waste consolidated interim storage facility (CISF) targeting southeastern New Mexico. Links to contact info. for contacting both your U.S Senators and your U.S. Rep. is also provided, at this link.
And please submit comments to NRC on the DEIS. The current deadline is July 22nd, but please act ASAP. Sample comments you can use to write your own are posted here, as are instructions for how to submit them to NRC.
See 2017 State of Nevada Agency for Nuclear Projects' route maps, showing the roads and rails through most states, that would be used to haul high-level radioactive waste to the Southwest. And see barge shipment routes on waterways, here.
Learn more about these issues at our Centralized Storage and Waste Transportation website sections.
Thanks for taking action to oppose these environmentally unjust high-level radioactive waste dumps targeting the Southwest (Hispanic areas of s.e. NM, and Western Shoshone land in NV), and the Mobile Chernobyls, Dirty Bombs on Wheels, Mobile X-ray Machines That Can't Be Turned Off, and Floating Fukushimas that would be launched through countless communities! Please spread the word!
May 19, 2020
