World's largest climate rally: September 21st. NYC

World leaders are coming to New York City next week for a UN summit on the climate crisis. UN Secretary­ General Ban Ki-­moon is urging governments to support an ambitious global agreement to dramatically reduce global warming pollution.

With our future on the line and the whole world watching, we’ll take a stand to bend the course of history. We’ll take to the streets to demand the world we know is within our reach: a world with an economy that works for people and the planet; a world safe from the ravages of climate change; a world with good jobs, clean air and water, and healthy communities.

A world beyond nuclear!

Sunday, September 21 in New York City. Join us.

More.

Nader cites "supine" government and regulators for taxpayers' nuclear burden

Writing this week in The Ecologist, Ralph Nader points out that "nuclear power exists for one reason only -- government support.

Read the full article.

Here is an excerpt:

"So if you go to work at the NEI and you read about the absence of any permanent radioactive waste storage site, no problem, the government / taxpayers are responsible for transporting and safeguarding that lethal garbage for centuries.

Passing the bill onto consumers

If your reactors experience ever larger cost over-runs and delays, as is now happening with two new reactors in South Carolina, no problem, the supine state regulatory commissions will just pass the bill on to consumers, despite the fact that consumers receive no electricity from these unfinished plants.

If these plants, and two others in Georgia under construction, experience financial squeezes from Wall Street, no problem, a supine Congress has already passed ample taxpayer loan guarantees that make Uncle Sam (you the taxpayer) bear the cost of the risk.

If there were to be an accident such as the one that happened in Fukushima, Japan, no problem, under the Price-Anderson Act, the government / taxpayers bear the cost of the vast amount of damage from any nuclear power plant meltdown."

Tom Hayden calls on UN to delete nuclear from climate change policy

The UN is looking to include nuclear energy as part of its Sustainable Development Goals. Jeffrey Sachs, who leads the science panel for UN Secretary General, Ban Ki Moon, has presented a report this month to the General Assembly of the UN, which calls for action on climate change, including increasing the scale of nuclear fission. This is unacceptable.

Tom Hayden has launched a petition to ask the UN to drop the nuclear component.

SIGN THE PETITION!

The petition states:

"We urge you to revise the recommendations of the UN's Sustainable Development Solutions Network to remove its advocacy of nuclear fission as a "solution" to the climate crisis. The accelerated development of nuclear power plants would only increase the course we are on to planetary catastrophe. 

We urge you to develop an analytic model that includes the decommissioning of current nuclear plants as part of a transition to a future based on conservation, efficiency and renewable energy."

FENOC conceals Davis-Besse containment's damaging water-saturation for two years

On September 8, 2014, environmental coalition attorney Terry Lodge of Toledo filed a supplement/amendment to a contention regarding FirstEnergy Nuclear Operating Company's (FENOC) severely cracked Shield Building at its problem-plagued Davis-Besse atomic reactor on the Lake Erie shore of n. OH.

To the ice-wedging crack propagation contention filed a week earlier, the coalition has added evidence that FENOC knew about damaging water saturation of the Shield Building walls in 2012, but did not divulge the information until July 8, 2014.

Ironically enough, FENOC now admits that its whitewash of 2012 has dammed up damaging water in the walls to a depth of 8 to 10 inches. FENOC acknowledges every time it freezes (dozens of times per winter), sub-surface laminar cracks at the outer rebar mat grow circumferentially by a remarkable 0.4 to 0.7 inches in length. More.

Families sue government for Fukushima radiation exposure

"A group of parents and children who were residing in Fukushima Prefecture when the nuclear disaster unfolded in March 2011 is suing the central and prefectural governments for failing to take sufficient steps to protect children from radiation exposure during the crisis." The Japan Times

Children are particularly vulnerable to radiation exposure, so these families are not waiting until someone has taken ill to sue for compensation. This lawsuit implies that exposure to radiation against their will, and due to government incompetence, is enough to allow them compensation since their risk of contracting certain diseases has been increased. More