Author: admin

— Nuclear power plant near Munich attacked by two viruses

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From La-Kabylie

May 1, 2016
Author: Djeferson Maurice

The company says it’s stepping up security after the incident.

Gundremmingen is around 120km (75m) northwest of Munich and the plant is Gemany’s most elevated yield power station.

W32.Ramnit allows hackers access to files and, potentially, physical control over systems; terrorists could access the information and use it to build a radioactive “dirty” bomb. It included Conflicker, a worm first detected in 2008 created to steal user credentials, personal financial data, and turn infected computers into “bots” to carry out distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks. It is able to spread through networks and by copying itself onto removable data drives, Symantec said.

In a statement, the power plant Kernakraftwerk Gundremmingen GmbH (KGG) noted that the technical components used for system controls are detached from the Internet. “We saw the example of the blast furnace being destroyed by a malware attack (disclosed by Germany’s Federal Office for Information Security); there was Stuxnet – malware allegedly created to physically destroy nuclear enrichment facilities in Iran”.

The BSI was not immediately available for comment.

According to Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer for Finland-based F-Secure, various types of computer viruses can be found in industrial computer networks quite frequently, but are usually harmless.

“Operators and regulators have to understand that in an age when we see more than 310,000 new samples of malware a day, some of those samples might damage systems they were never meant to be aimed at”.

Because the plane runs a different operating system, nothing would befall it. But it would pass the virus on to other devices that plugged into the charger. The viruses were discovered in the B unit of Gundremmingen in a computer system retrofitted in 2008 with data visualisation software used with equipment for moving nuclear fuel rods.

After Japan’s Fukushima nuclear disaster five years ago, concern in Germany over the safety of nuclear power triggered a decision by the government to speed up the shutdown of nuclearplants.

Computer systems of a German nuclear power plant have been found to be infected with viruses, although no harm has been done as the systems were isolated from the internet.

http://la-kabylie.com/2016/05/01/nuclear-power-plant-near-munich-attacked-by-two-viruses/

Posted under Fair Use Rules.

— California Senate Bill 968 supporting PG&E’s Diablo Canyon faces sharp opposition

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Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant faces increasing calls for closure. It is the only power generating nuclear plant currently operating in California. Its problems have been ongoing from the beginning. It is at daily risk from the four earthquake faults in the vicinity. The many frightening safety violations there by Pacific Gas and Electric and the NRC whistleblower exposé that the plant is out of compliance have caused alarm bells. Recent comments by Lieutenant Governor Gavin Newsom on the California Lands Commission mean Diablo Canyon’s future is being questioned in Sacramento.

But in February, Sen. Bill Monning introduced Senate Bill 968, co-written by Sen. Katcho Achadjian (San Luis Obispo) and Assemblywoman Hannah-Beth Jackson (Santa Barbara-Ventura), calling for a study of the adverse economic effects of closing Diablo Canyon. Many profit by its continued operation. The study would be funded by the public. The bill and its unbalanced study has encountered strong opposition from environmental and health organizations. Though Monning has now amended the bill to add ‘beneficial’ economic effects from a closure to the investigation, this seems merely a cosmetic change. The intent of the authors and this bill is clear.

Sen. Monning and co-authors state they want an independent evaluation, but the California Public Utilities Commission – an agency notorious for biasing results and ignoring unwanted conclusions – will oversee the selection. Furthermore in 2011, Monning as Assemblyman helped choose, and then affirmed findings of, the California Council on Science and Technology on Smart Meters. CCST was a supposedly independent group, but flaws in the review panel, the data, and the report were exposed by state health officials, scientists, and medical experts. However, Monning stood firm, despite what was widely known about Smart Meter problems, despite formal comments to the CPUC on overbilling and health issues, and despite public testimony to the Commission and Monning’s own office of the harm being inflicted by Smart Meters. CCST’s pro-industry report gave cover to PG&E and other utility companies for the continued roll-out of the very dangerous and controversial meters.

Bill Monning has proven a reliable supporter for utility company initiatives and Democratic Party positions and backers, despite his former position as Executive Director for the International Physicians for Social Responsibility. The San Francisco Bay and Los Angeles Chapters of Physicians for Social Responsibility called their decision to oppose this bill and its author “painful” because of Monning’s previous affiliation with their group, but they felt they had no choice.

PSR reluctantly has concluded that this bill would be at variance with the fundamental principle “do no harm”. By calling on PG&E to submit an analysis of the supposedly adverse economic impacts of closing the plant at the end of its designed life with no discussion of impacts of a Fukushima-type disaster were the plant to keep running, the study would amount to a piece of advocacy for continued operation of this dangerous facility.

Each Diablo unit contains 1000 times a long-lived radioactivity of the Hiroshima bomb. Each year Diablo produces enough plutonium for hundreds of nuclear weapons as well as waste toxic for half a million years.

The plant was built based on the assumption there were no active earthquake faults within 30 kilometers. Now we know there are 4. It is a catastrophe waiting to happen.

The public should not be forced to pay as taxpayers or ratepayers for a wasteful, unbalanced, and unnecessary report that may have the effect of implicitly pushing for the continuation of these risks. Thank you.

Monning: “One slight correction on the opposition testimony. We do remain open to working with them. This would not be a study conducted by PG&E. It would be supported by an independent study.”

The economic and environmental damage that Diablo Canyon inflicts on San Luis Obispo County now and on the ocean now is not considered by Sen. Monning and Co.. And “a catastrophe waiting to happen” decimating all industry and population centers within many miles is simply not a part of their equation, economic or otherwise – a startling realization. It is especially surprising that Senator Jackson co-authored this bill, since her district does not have the economic gain that SLO County enjoys, and both of the counties she represents — Santa Barbara and Ventura — would suffer terrible impacts if Diablo Canyon underwent an accident. Ventura County was impacted by the Santa Susanna Field Laboratory’s multiple nuclear accidents starting in the 1950s. Why would Sen. Jackson risk more nuclear danger?

Given Sen. Monning and co-authors’ intent for his bill, it is doubtful that an evaluative group would do anything other than rubberstamp the original goal — to show that closing Diablo Canyon would cause adverse economic impacts to San Luis Obispo County (and also, to PG&E investors) – and thereby slow any process to close the plant.

When Monning states that the bill’s authors remain open to working with the groups in opposition, one thing is clear: for the authors, these environmental and health groups are the opposition. The authors are against reason, against the science, and against public safety.

Below is an unofficial transcript of the May 2 Senate Appropriations Committee hearing. The links to the video are here:http://senate.ca.gov/media-archive – Videos, May 2, 2016 Appropriations Comm hearing

http://vod.senate.ca.gov/videos/2016/20160502_Appropriations_high.mp4

Appropriations Committee hearing, May 2, 2016

SB 968 goes from 10:20 – 17:28 on the video.

SB 968 – Diablo Canyon

Sen. Monning: Good morning, Chair, members.

Senate Bill 968 requires an economic assessment of the adverse and beneficial impacts that could occur in the event that the Diablo nuclear power plant shuts down. The economic assessment is an appropriate use of ratepayer funds, because allr atepayers have benefited from the energy generated from Diablo Canyon. There are past examples of ratepayers-funded studies only benefiting a single region.

Even if there is disagreement on this point, the actual impact to ratepayers will be de minimis.

San Luis Obispo’s economy is heavily reliant on Diablo Canyon which is why an independent accurate assessment to help identify ways to mitigate the impacts is indeed prudent.

I along with Asm. Achadjian have a duty to protect the region that we represent from economic harm, and SB 968 is a means for the San Luis Obispo community to plan and discuss in the event of the plant’s closure. I recognize this is a candidate for suspense and would urge an aye vote at the appropriate time. And we have a couple of witnesses in support. Thank you.

In support:

1 — Derek ? on behalf of the San Luis Coastal Unified School District. This is a school district that encompasses the power plant and surrounding region and so it’s really impacted by the local economy that’s brought to the area by PG&E and the power plants.

This nexus we think with state funding here is the fact that when the local economy becomes depressed because of a sudden instance like the closure of a power plant, we’d see an augmentation in state funding required under the local control funding formula and our unique funding system here in California. So we think that some point, there could bee a big augmentation devoted to this very school district and surrounding area, given its $80 million dollar annual operating budget and the fact that it might fall out of basic aid status. And so we urge you to support the bill.

2 — Good morning, Chair, members. Karen Lang (?) of the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors. This county collects almost $26 million dollars in property taxes from the existence of the plant. Obviously that goes to all the tax entities including the school district. With concerns about any sudden or over time closure of the plant, and so a third party analysis would be really helpful we think and we urge your aye vote when the time comes.

Witness in support:

In opposition:

1 — I am Molly Johnson. I am here to present the opposition of more than 30 environmental and other health organizations including Public Citizen, Greenpeace, LA and San Francisco Chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility, San Luis Obispo Mothers for Peace, Northern Band Chumash Council

We remain troubled by the bill’s one-sided nature although it is getting better, and we are working with to continue that, Uit still focuses on adverse economic rather than a balanced, and we would like to it more balanced.

We do see that there has been an amount put to the bill which we did not see until just a little bit ago. So even though these matters are now touched upon by the staff report, we feel that this still is a wasteful expense unless it is a balanced bill. Thank you.

2 — Good morning. I am Tabez Zadi (sp?) and am appearing on behalf of the San Francisco Bay and Los Angeles Chapters of Physicians for Social Responsibility which has long worked to address nuclear risks. And Sen. Monning once served as Executive Director of PSR’s parent international physician’s organization.

And PSR’s opposition to his bill on Diablo Canyon is thus painful and hasn’t been entered into lightly. PSR reluctantly has concluded that this bill would be at variance with the fundamental principle “do no harm”. By calling on PG&E to submit an analysis of the supposedly adverse economic impacts of closing the plant at the end of its designed life with no discussion of impacts of a Fukushima-type disaster were the plant to keep running, the study would amount to a piece of advocacy for continued operation of this dangerous facility.

Each Diablo unit contains 1000 times a long-lived radioactivity of the Hiroshima bomb. Each year Diablo produces enough plutonium for hundreds of nuclear weapons as well as waste toxic for half a million years.

The plant was built based on the assumption there were no active earthquake faults within 30 kilometers. Now we know there are four. It is a catastrophe waiting to happen.

The public should not be forced to pay as taxpayers or ratepayers for a wasteful, unbalanced, and unnecessary report that may have the effect of implicitly pushing for the continuation of these risks. Thank you.

Monning: One slight correction on the opposition testimony. We do remain open to working with them. This would not be a study conducted by PGE&. It would be supported by an independent study. With that again, I would request at the appropriate time an aye vote.

——————-

More information:

http://mothersforpeace.org/blog/29-gaps-in-excellence-in-2014

http://nonukesca.net/?p=539

http://www.foe.org/news/news-releases/2015-03-diablo-pge-secretly-used-wrong-data-for-safety-equipment#sthash.8DQl1ReI.dpuf

https://healfukushima.org/2016/02/29/take-action-on-diablo-canyon-npp-tell-california-state-lands-commission-to-do-full-ceqa-review/

http://mothersforpeace.org/blog/topics-to-address-at-august-5-2015-nrc-meeting-in-slo

http://www.ktvu.com/news/news/ap-exclusive-expert-calls-diablo-canyon-shutdown/ng8Tj/

http://lompocrecord.com/news/opinion/mailbag/hartmann-nuke-risks-oil-trains/article_9f1703e4-4a34-5f16-997c-6be468a26bc9.html

— Fukushima: they knew — will “completely and utterly fail in an earthquake”

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To financially assist this type of courageous journalism, go to http://www.gregpalast.com

From Greg Palast
Thursday, November 10, 2011

“Completely and Utterly Fail in an Earthquake”
The Fukushima story you didn’t hear on CNN

by Greg Palast
for FreePress.org

I’ve seen a lot of sick stuff in my career, but this was sick on a new level.

Here was the handwritten log kept by a senior engineer at the nuclear power plant:

Wiesel was very upset. He seemed very nervous. Very agitated. . . . In fact, the plant was riddled with problems that, no way on earth, could stand an earth- quake. The team of engineers sent in to inspect found that most of these components could “completely and utterly fail” during an earthquake.

“Utterly fail during an earthquake.” And here in Japan was the quake and here is the utter failure.

The warning was in what the investigations team called The Notebook, which I’m not supposed to have.  Good thing I’ve kept a copy anyway, because the file cabinets went down with my office building ….

WORLD TRADE CENTER TOWER 1, FIFTY-SECOND FLOOR
NEW YORK, 1986

[This is an excerpt in FreePress.org from Vultures’ Picnic: In Pursuit of Petroleum Pigs, Power Pirates and High-Finance Fraudsters, to be released this Monday.  Click here to get the videos and the book.]

Two senior nuclear plant engineers were spilling out their souls and files on our huge conference table, blowing away my government investigations team with the inside stuff about the construction of the Shoreham, New York, power station.

The meeting was secret. Very secret. Their courage could destroy their careers: No engineering firm wants to hire a snitch, even one who has saved thousands of lives. They could lose their jobs; they could lose everything. They did. That’s what happens. Have a nice day.

On March 12 this year, as I watched Fukushima melt, I knew:  the “SQ” had been faked.  Anderson Cooper said it would all be OK.  He’d flown to Japan, to suck up the radiation and official company bullshit.  The horror show was not the fault of Tokyo Electric, he said, because the plant was built to withstand only an 8.0 earthquake on the Richter scale, and this was 9.0.  Anderson must have been in the gym when they handed out the facts.  The 9.0 shake was in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, 90 miles away.  It was barely a tenth of that power at Fukushima.

I was ready to vomit.  Because I knew who had designed the plant, who had built it and whom Tokyo Electric Power was having rebuild it:  Shaw Construction.  The latest alias of Stone & Webster, the designated builder for every one of the four new nuclear plants that the Obama Administration has approved for billions in federal studies.

But I had The Notebook, the diaries of the earthquake inspector for the company.  I’d squirreled it out sometime before the Trade Center went down.  I shouldn’t have done that.  Too bad.

All field engineers keep a diary. Gordon Dick, a supervisor, wasn’t sup- posed to show his to us. I asked him to show it to us and, reluctantly, he directed me to these notes about the “SQ” tests.

SQ is nuclear-speak for “Seismic Qualification.” A seismically qualified nuclear plant won’t melt down if you shake it. A “seismic event” can be an earthquake or a Christmas present from Al Qaeda. You can’t run a nuclear reactor in the USA or Europe or Japan without certified SQ.

This much is clear from his notebook: This nuclear plant will melt down in an earthquake. The plant dismally failed to meet the Seismic I (shaking) standards required by U.S. and international rules.

Here’s what we learned: Dick’s subordinate at the nuclear plant, Robert Wiesel, conducted the standard seismic review. Wiesel flunked his company. No good. Dick then ordered Wiesel to change his report to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, change it from failed to passed. Dick didn’t want to make Wiesel do it, but Dick was under the gun himself, acting on direct command from corporate chiefs. From The Notebook:

Wiesel was very upset. He seemed very nervous. Very agitated. [He said,] “I believe these are bad results and I believe it’s reportable,” and then he took the volume of federal regulations from the shelf and went to section 50.55(e), which describes reportable deficiencies at a nuclear plant and [they] read the section together, with Wiesel pointing to the appropriate paragraphs that federal law clearly required [them and the company] to report the Category II, Seismic I deficiencies.

Wiesel then expressed his concern that he was afraid that if he [Wiesel] reported the deficiencies, he would be fired, but that if he didn’t report the deficiencies, he would be breaking a federal law. . . .

The law is clear. It is a crime not to report a safety failure. I could imagine Wiesel standing there with that big, thick rule book in his hands, The Law. It must have been heavy. So was his paycheck. He weighed the choices: Break the law, possibly a jail-time crime, or keep his job.

What did Wiesel do? What would you do?

Why the hell would his company make this man walk the line? Why did they put the gun to his head, to make him conceal mortal danger? It was the money. It’s always the money. Fixing the seismic problem would have cost the plant’s owner half a billion dollars easy. A guy from corporate told Dick, “Bob is a good man. He’ll do what’s right. Don’t worry about Bob.”

That is, they thought Bob would save his job and career rather than rat out the company to the feds.

But I think we should all worry about Bob. The company he worked for, Stone & Webster Engineering, built or designed about a third of the nuclear plants in the United States.

From the fifty-second floor we could look at the Statue of Liberty. She didn’t look back.

***

Greg Palast is the author of Vultures’ Picnic: In Pursuit of Petroleum Pigs, Power Pirates and High-Finance Carnivores.

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Fukushima: They Knew

— US Senate Bill 2795 on deregulation of the nuclear industry – the conflicts of interests of author and sponsors — Senators Inhofe, Booker, Crapo, Whitehouse, Fischer

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Sen. James Inhofe, S. 2795: “The existing fleet of nuclear reactors in the United States is operating safely and securely.“

From Mining Awareness

April 29, 2016

It is perfectly possible that Inhofe, Booker, Crapo et. al. are simply lazy, stupid and ignorant in pushing a bill (S. 2795) claiming that US nuclear reactors are “operating safely and securely”. Maybe they’ve just observed that the US NRC does exactly what the nuclear industry wants anyway so should indeed have funding cut. It is actually pretty funny that all the workers at US NRC that have sold their soul to the nuclear devil have their jobs on the cutting block anyway. So, the proposal to cut funding to the US NRC is actually pretty funny. Watch and learn before you sell your soul to the devil. However, many NRC workers will just go home to their countries of origin, leaving the children of the American Revolution and others who have no other home stuck with their nuclear crimes. But, why not just totally shut down the US NRC?

The attempt by Inhofe et. al. to stop mandatory hearings for new nuclear reactor types suggests other nefarious motives:https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2016/04/27/us-senate-efforts-to-do-away-with-mandatory-licensing-hearings-for-so-called-advanced-nuclear-reactors-small-modular-reactors/

According to the idiotic statement in the Senator Inhofe sponsored bill S2795, “the existing fleet of nuclear reactors in the United States is operating safely and securely;…” (S.2795 — 114th Congress https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/2795/all-actions?resultIndex=3&overview=closed Sponsor: Sen. Inhofe, James M. [R-OK]). Inhofe and his co-sponsors can’t read? The list of safety related problems-“incidents” reported to the US NRC appears endless: http://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/event-status/event/

http://www.c-span.org/video/?408515-1/hearing-nuclear-energy&start=5937 Why is the entire panel pro-nuclear? Read about them at the bottom of this post. Second from the left is Ashley Finan who works for the so-called “
Clean Air Task Force”, but has promoted the use of nuclear power in the Canadian tar sands industry.

The electrical defects for all but one US nuclear power station are so serious that 7 brave NRC electrical engineers put themselves at risk by demanding something be done immediately. They were ignored. These brave seven were led by an American from India who loves America. And, maybe he’s just smart enough to understand that the world environment is interconnected too.

This claim about the safety and security of US Nuclear Power Stations and push for nuclear deregulation is oddly coming from a Senator (Inhofe) from Oklahoma where there are no operating nuclear power stations, though Oklahoma is the location of the infamous Kerr-McGee site where Karen Silkwood worked.

Does Inhofe’s bill have to do with campaign contributions related to Andarko? https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/contrib.php?cycle=2012&cid=N00005582 Andarko inherited the Kerr-McGee liability:
http://www.nrc.gov/info-finder/decommissioning/complex/kerr-mcgee-cimarron-corporation-former-fuel-fabrication-facility.html

Maybe Inhofe’s bill has to do with his funding related to Honeywell International: https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2015/08/04/us-nrc-launches-special-inspection-at-honeywell-uranium-hex-facility-in-metropolis-illinois/

And, funding to Inhofe related to Southern Co. with their Vogtle Nuclear Reactors, both old and under construction?https://www.opensecrets.org/politicians/contrib.php?type=C&cid=N00005582&newMem=N&cycle=2016 More overt, of course, is Inhofe’s military industrial complex funding.

Continue reading →

— ALERT: US Senate bill S. 2795 would eliminate mandatory licensing hearings for ‘Advanced Nuclear Reactors’ – Small Modular Reactors

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Translation, no public input on licensing.

If it isn’t mandatory, it doesn’t happen.

The industry is pushing nuclear energy as a zero emissions climate solution. Is the next step mandatory nuclear reactors wherever the government and industry deem necessary? 

From Mining Awareness
April 27. 2016

Excerpts below from the April 21st, 2016 US Senate Hearing on Nuclear Energy Regulation (i.e. deregulation).”Committee on Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Clean Air and Nuclear Safety. Hearings held. Type of Action: Committee Consideration, Action By: Senate Environment and Public Works Subcommittee on Clean Air and Nuclear Safety S.2795 — 114th Congress”https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/2795/all-actions?resultIndex=3&overview=closed This bill needs to be watched.

This part discusses the effort by nuclear industry, and their lackeys in the Senate, to do away with mandatory hearings for new reactor types, on the basis of circular logic. Senator Markey stands up for public safety.
Ed Markey US Senate Nuclear Hearing 21 April 2016

Senator Ed Markey:
“Dr. Lyman, This Bill would scrap the requirement that the NRC hold a mandatory hearing on each application for a construction permit or operating license. Instead, such hearings would only occur if they are requested by a person who’s interest might be effected. Is there any evidence that mandatory hearings have uncovered weaknesses in NRC staff evaluations of construction permits or operating license applications that otherwise would never have come to public view?”

Dr. Lyman: “Thank you for the question. In our view, the mandatory hearing does establish a unique and important role in filling a gap in the event that a contested hearing does not occur. And, even if a contested hearing does occur the mandatory hearing, the scope, examines other issues including the adequacy of the NRC staff’s review. And, a colleague of mine, a lawyer, Diane Curran, has compiled a number of instances where the mandatory hearings have uncovered significantinadequacies in the NRC staff’s review and I would offer that list for your inspection. So, we believe that the mandatory hearing process is important. It is also important for transparency. We heard a lot about the need to maintain transparency in the NRC review process. And, the fact is that the public doesn’t always have the resources to be able to contest a hearing, even if there are very important safety issues that need adjudication. For those reasons we think that mandatory hearings should be preserved.”

Senator Markey: “And, I agree with you. There are mandatory hearings if you want to build a new house next door to someone else’s house. There’s a public hearing down at town hall. And, here we are building a nuclear power plant and mandatory hearings for a construction permit, for an operating permit would no longer be mandatory? That just makes no sense whatsoever.

That’s an inherently dangerous technology that needs all kinds of tough questions to be asked about it.

So, I understand the wish list of the [nuclear] industry that would say – “No more hearings”, “No more public input”, “No more questions asked by the Union of concern scientists in public hearings questioning the underlying premise of building a nuclear power plant in someone’s neighborhood”.

But, I don’t think the public will be happy that they’re told no hearings on this dangerous technology.

Again it still needs insurance protection from the Federal Government, that’s how inherently dangerous it is. The private sector still isn’t willing to provide the insurance. You need the government to intervene to provide that coverage.”

Senator Markey: “Do you agree that granting safety exemptions to Advance Reactor Licensees could lead to a net reduction in overall safety?”

Ed Lyman: “Yes. Just to elaborate on that concern. The industry is pressing for generic decisions to be made on certain policy issues including the size of emergency planning zones for Advanced Reactors or Small Modular Reactors, the level of security that is needed, whether or not the containment needs to be robust against large pressure increases and whether the number of operators needed to staff a nuclear reactor complex should be reduced.

They want these decisions to be made based on expectation or the assertion that Advanced Reactors are so much safer than current reactors that we don’t need that we don’t need these extra levels of protection. Our concern is that assertion is not always based on a full enough body of evidence and experimental data to justify making those decisions. So there could be a net reduction of safety if exemptions and other relaxations in safety procedures are granted based on a presumption that a new reactor is safer without a full examination of that claim.”

Senator Markey: “So, laced throughout the bill as it is drafted is an assumption that there are inherent safety features built into Advanced design for reactors that make it safer automatically. And, that’s a nice assumption to make, it’s a nice assertion to make but that’s got to be tested. We have to make sure that any one additional potentially successful safety feature interacts with the totality of the rest of the nuclear power plant in terms of them assuming that the plant’s safer. And, we don’t know that. It’s an assumption built into the language of the bill and so this just goes to the question, and it is an 80-20 question.

What are the big issues that we have to deal with here? And 80% of it’s just going to still remain is there enough money for the NRC to do their job? Have enough personnel asking all the right questions? Having the right supervision? The fees are going to be reduced.

Are these new technologies actually inherently safer? We have to have the capacity to be able to determine that.

Will the public be able to ask questions?

The industry’s has always tried to get the public out. But after Three Mile Island, after Chernobyl and after any other number of other incidents, the people don’t trust the experts anymore. They want to be able to ask questions too. Because these power plants are going into their neighborhoods. You can’t wall out whole areas of the country from these questions…

Public input is vital and should actually be strengthened. The new reactors should not be exempted from important safety requirements that historically have been required. And, that the NRC budget should not be capped. So, these are the central areas, the big questions that we are going to have to answer in this legislation. It’s going to keep coming back to the same questions we have been asking for the last seven years on technology. The questions don’t change…”
http://www.c-span.org/video/?408515-1/hearing-nuclear-energy&start=5937

Note that when they say that a “person who’s interest might be effected” might request a hearing, the US NRC appears to have a really narrow definition of that. From our understanding, to get “standing” you apparently need to be within the 50 mile official impact zone. So, if they make the official impact zone smaller based on the “inherent safety” of new reactors then there will be even less opportunity to request a hearing. If the US Senate is not stopped on this, in the end for the SMRs it will probably fall to local zoning ordinances, where they exist.

A recent Gallup poll shows that the majority of Americans oppose nuclear power now. The number would certainly be higher if it were a nuclear power station nearby. The number would be higher still if they have to take the waste.

NB-Disclaimer: This transcript is our own based on the video. The C-Span transcript is really incomplete and inaccurate. They even state that it is “uncorrected”. We do not guarantee that our transcript is perfect, but it is close to perfect. Always listen and compare to the original video if you need a word for word transcript. We are also unable to transcribe Senator Markey’s intonation which is very important here.

https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2016/04/27/us-senate-efforts-to-do-away-with-mandatory-licensing-hearings-for-so-called-advanced-nuclear-reactors-small-modular-reactors/

— Hanford nuclear waste contractors under US investigation; given $13.7 Million bonus for “Very Good” ops; “Excellent” tank management despite continued tank leakage

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From Mining Awareness
April 19, 2016

The current Hanford contractor, WRPS, LLC, for the leaky Hanford radioactive waste tanks is a consortium comprised of AECOM (due to recent purchase of URS), EnergySolutions (owned by Energy Capital Partners – mostly former Goldman Sachs investment bankers led by Doug Kimmelman), and French Government owned AREVA, which would be bankrupt if it weren’t French State owned. If AREVA knows so much then why did the US take French HEU (highly enriched uranium) or HEU waste off the hands of the French? Why didn’t the French take Swiss HEU waste or Swiss plutonium? Why, instead, was it dumped on America?

The State of Washington, Dept of Ecology, Explains: “The alarm indicates an increase in waste seeping from the primary tank into the space between the primary and secondary tank, known as the annulus.” Read the rest here:https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2016/04/19/leaking-hanford-nuclear-waste-tanks/

Hanford Contractors Under US Government investigation

In an SEC Quarterly filing, last August, AECOM, which recently bought URS stated:
“DOE Hanford Nuclear Reservation

URS Energy and Construction, Washington River Protection Solutions LLC and Washington Closure Hanford LLC, affiliates of URS, perform services under multiple contracts (including under the Waste Treatment Plant contract, the Tank Farm contract and the River Corridor contract) at the DOE’s Hanford nuclear reservation that have been subject to various government investigations or litigation:

· Waste Treatment Plant government investigation: The federal government is conducting an investigation into our affiliate, URS Energy & Construction, a subcontractor on the Waste Treatment Plant, regarding contractual compliance and various technical issues in the design, development and construction of the Waste Treatment Plant.

· Tank Farms government investigation: The federal government is conducting an investigation regarding the time keeping of employees at our joint venture, Washington River Protection Solutions LLC, when the joint venture took over as the prime contractor from another federal contractor.

· Tank Farms government investigation: The federal government is conducting an investigation into the circumstances surrounding the response of our joint venture, Washington River Protection Solutions LLC, to a leak within the tank farms of the Hanford nuclear reservation.

· River Corridor litigation: The federal government has partially intervened in a false claims act complaint filed in the Eastern District of Washington on December 2013 challenging our joint venture, Washington Closure Hanford LLC, and its contracting procedures under the Small Business Act.

· Waste Treatment Plant whistleblower and employment claims: Two former employees have each filed employment related claims against our affiliate, URS Energy & Construction, seeking restitution for alleged retaliation and wrongful termination.

URS Energy and Construction, Washington River Protection Solutions LLC and Washington Closure Hanford LLC dispute these investigations and claims and intend to continue to defend these matters vigorously; however, URS Energy and Construction, Washington River Protection Solutions LLC and Washington Closure Hanford LLC cannot provide assurances that they will be successful in these efforts. The resolution of these matters cannot be determined at this time and could have a material adverse effect on the Company’s results of operations and cash flows.”https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/868857/000110465915058803/a15-12010_110q.htm (Emphasis our own).

Contractors Given “Very Good” Ranking for (Now) Leaking Radioactive Tank Ops and $13.7 million Bonus

“Home » Hanford Site Contractor Receives Overall ‘Very Good’ Rating for Tank Operations Hanford Site Contractor Receives Overall ‘Very Good’ Rating for Tank Operations

January 27, 2016 – 12:45pm

WRPS workers do preparatory work at the A/AX tank farms at Hanford in April 2015. They are the next tank farms from which waste will be retrieved at Hanford. WRPS recently received an 88 percent award fee for its performance in fiscal year 2015.

RICHLAND, Wash. – EM recently gave its Office of River Protection (ORP) tank operations contractor Washington River Protection Solutions (WRPS) an overall “very good” rating for fiscal year 2015, allowing the company at the Hanford Site to earn a $13,728,000 award fee.

Each year EM releases information relating to contractor fee payments — earned by completing the work called for in the contracts — to further transparency in its cleanup program.

WRPS also received an overall “very good” in 2014, but the 2015 award fee was five percent higher than the previous year.

The company was recognized for strong, consistent leadership in several key activities, including:

Taking over responsibilities for the Effluent Treatment Facility, which removes radioactive and hazardous contaminants from waste water;
Implementing recommendations from the independent Tank Vapors Assessment Team, which has worked to minimize risks to workers, including chemical vapors in the tank farms; and
Improving integration between ORP contractors and the DOE national laboratories.
WRPS exceeded many significant award fee criteria and met overall cost, schedule, and technical performance requirements, according to the fee determination scorecard.

The scorecard lists eight special emphasis areas of which WRPS received “very good” ratings in six and “excellent” in two: management of the single-shell and double-shell tank system, and nuclear safety.

WRPS is responsible for safely managing the Hanford Site’s 56 million gallons of nuclear and chemical waste in 177 underground tanks, and preparing the systems to feed waste to the Waste Treatment and Immobilization Plant for vitrification.” http://energy.gov/em/articles/hanford-site-contractor-receives-overall-very-good-rating-tank-operations (Emphasis added; Embedded links at original, which didn’t work for us making us wonder if the US DOE doesn’t want people to see the report card? Or perhaps we were just unlucky.That waste treatment facility isn’t built yet is it? The Hanford gov link won’t open but the LA Times says that it is partially built with significant design vulnerabilities: http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-hanford-waste-20150826-story.html )

https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2016/04/19/nuclear-waste-contractors-under-us-gov-investigation-given-13-7-million-bonus-for-very-good-ops-excellent-tank-management-but-alarm-just-went-off-indicating-increased-tank-seepage-of-rad-wa/

— French government/AREVA is partner in Hanford waste consortium

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A highlight from this article on Hanford.

From Mining Awareness, April 19, 2016

The current Hanford contractor, WRPS, LLC, for the leaky Hanford radioactive waste tanks is a consortium comprised of AECOM (due to recent purchase of URS), EnergySolutions (owned by Energy Capital Partners – mostly former Goldman Sachs investment bankers led by Doug Kimmelman), and French Government owned AREVA, which would be bankrupt if it weren’t French State owned. If AREVA knows so much then why did the US take French HEU (highly enriched uranium) or HEU waste off the hands of the French? Why didn’t the French take Swiss HEU waste or Swiss plutonium? Why, instead, was it dumped on America? [1]

Why is France co-managing nuclear waste facilities in the U.S.?

Is AREVA dumping nuclear waste in the U.S.?

AREVA dumps nuclear waste at sea in France. It used to dump drums of waste at sea. These are AREVA’s environmental credentials. It cares nothing for the environment.

The beautiful Columbia River. Salmon. The ocean.

Not important to AREVA or the French government or WRPS.

 

[1]

https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2016/04/19/nuclear-waste-contractors-under-us-gov-investigation-given-13-7-million-bonus-for-very-good-ops-excellent-tank-management-but-alarm-just-went-off-indicating-increased-tank-seepage-of-rad-wa/

http://enenews.com/tv-plutonium-being-pumped-ocean-miles-underwater-pipes-nuclear-waste-left-lying-beach-kids-playing-sand-machines-scoop-plutonium-day-video-photos

— Drigg: quaint coastal village and the UK’s “low level” nuclear dump

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Up until the late 1980s radioactive wastes including plutonium wastes were tumble tipped into trenches. Now the site has gone all hi tech and compacts radioactive waste into rusting shipping containers…

From Radiation Free Lakeland
April 30. 2016

Drigg the quaint coastal village is also home to the UKs ‘Low Level Waste Repository’ (the word ‘Nuclear’ has been dropped from the official title) Although locals know this as the  Nuclear Dump.  Drigg is located near the Sellafield nuclear site on the shifting sands of the Cumbrian coast. Up until the late 1980s radioactive wastes including plutonium wastes were tumble tipped into trenches. Now the site has gone all hi tech and compacts radioactive waste into rusting shipping containers, any void in the container is filled with concrete.

The site sits above West Cumbria Aquifer from which is drawn the borehole water supply for much of West Cumbria while Sellafield gets most of its water from Wastwater.

The plan is to keep on dumping the high end of “low level” radioactive waste here despite the threat of inundation not just from the Irish Sea but also from the rivers and becks running through and alongside the site.

The planning application to extend the wastes, stacking ever more shipping containers higher, has already been approved by our toothless regulators, the Environment Agency.

Please write to the Development Control and Regulation Committee of Cumbria County Council who will be looking at this application on the 11th May ( if it isn’t postponed again) and ask them to refuse permission for the continued use of Drigg as a nuclear waste dump. Ask them to lobby government to hold a moratorium on “decommissioning” and dumping (breaking up and ‘disposing’ of old nuclear plants) which we now know means dispersal of radioactive wastes to Drigg rather than containment on original sites. Many more Driggs and radioactive landfills will be needed if new nuclear build goes ahead.

The site owners the Nuclear Decommissioning Authority pass day to day running of the site to multinational corporations involved in “decommissioning’ and those corporations largely monitor themselves. SO the same people responsible for producing the waste are also responsible for dumping it. The Environment Agency has told us it sees no conflict of interest in this…but we do!   Studsvik, a Swedish company who operate the only radioactive scrap metal plant in Europe here in Cumbria is one of the partners of the Drigg site.  On 20th April Studsvik’s waste operations were taken over by EDF.  Presumably this means that EDF  now have a large hand in running the Drigg site? Will EDF be tempted to ship tonnes of radioactive metals from their 9 nuclear plants being decommissioned now in France, to the Studsvik plant in Workington now that they own it?  And will the ever increasing tonnage of radioactive shot metal from that radioactive metal “recycling” end up in Drigg which they will also be operating?

more info here:http://www.theecologist.org/campaigning/2986745/cumbria_flooding_environment_agency_issues_alert_on_drigg_nuclear_waste_site.html

https://mariannewildart.wordpress.com/2016/04/30/drigg-quaint-coastal-village-and-the-uks-low-level-nuclear-dump/

— Radioactive blues: NRC relicensing hearing of Grand Gulf Nuclear Power Station (Mississippi) held 1000 miles away in D.C. May 4

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From Mining Awareness
May 2, 2016

To Obama’s statement after B.B. King’s death, almost a year ago, that “there’s going to be one killer blues session in heaven tonight.” one can but reply that there’s going to be a killer of a nuclear accident in Mississippi or somewhere else soon, and that will be a reason for a killer blues session in heaven alright.https://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2015/05/15/bb-king-blues-has-lost-its-king-and-america-has-lost-legend
BB King performs "Merry Christmas Baby" at the National Christmas Tree Lighting ceremony on the Ellipse in Washington, D.C. December 9, 2010. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)
“BB King on December 9, 2010 in DC. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)”

Obama apparently intends to evac to his father’s birthplace, Kenya, or he wouldn’t have beem running around the world begging to dump foreign nuclear waste upon America, to be buried there, under the guise of “non-proliferation”. Unless, of course, he’s just blinkered, drugged up and/or insane.
Grand Gulf Steam
Grand Gulf Nuclear Reactor near Port Gibson, Mississippi

When a man was found hung last year near Port Gibson Mississippi, the news was heard around the world. When B. B. King passed away last year, it made international news, as had the death of Elvis, also a Mississippian. When accusations were made that B.B. King was poisoned, once again it made news. His visitation and funeral in Mississippi made international news, as well. They are both lucky to have died and miss what’s to come.

But, when the US NRC-Entergy are already legally, and illegally, poisoning land, air and water with deadly radionuclides, and courting a major nuclear disaster in B.B. King’s and Elvis’ home state of Mississippi, not a peep is heard.

The fact that the neighboring Jefferson county, just downriver from Grand Gulf, is the fattest county in a fat country has made world headlines.[1] But, there is no discussion of if this may be due to thyroid damage from radioiodine coming out of Grand Gulf – the largest single nuclear reactor in the US.

When the US NRC-Entergy are playing statistical games which may, at any moment, lead to reactor pressure vessel failure and major nuclear disaster in Mississippi, it doesn’t make news at all, even though it will probably impact much of North America, depending on the luck of the wind direction and rain (or lack thereof). There is no room for the 20 to 40% error allowed by the NRC, when it comes to a potential major nuclear disaster.
https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2015/04/30/us-nrc-sneak-through-alert-comment-deadline-today-at-11-59-et-request-hearing-by-1-june/
https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2015/05/01/us-nrc-safety-abuses-alert-comment-deadline-april-30-at-11-59-eastern-time-request-hearing-by-1-june/
https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2015/01/01/dangerous-maximum-extended-load-line-limit-plus-for-largest-us-nuclear-reactor-urgent-comment-demand-hearing-now/

The US NRC is having a hearing where people could speak in Washington DC, almost 1,000 miles away from the Mississippi nuclear reactor on May 4th.http://meetings.nrc.gov/pmns/mtg To speak, one is supposed to give five days notice. And, yet the official announcement only came out on April 19th, and we didn’t find that people could do presentations until May 1st. We found out about the meeting ca April 26th, but not that people could speak. The “Safety Evaluation Report, Related to the License Renewal of Grand Gulf Nuclear Station, Unit 1, Docket No. 50-416, Entergy Operations, Inc.“, United States Nuclear Regulatory CommissionOffice of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, April 2016 is a daunting 777 pages which makes even less sense than most NRC documents. http://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1609/ML16090A252.pdf As it’s a technical document, one may estimate 4 or more hours per day which might be spent reviewing it over the course of April 4th to May 4th, if it were well-written and comprehensible. But, it’s not. The parts that we read basically say that Entergy failed to do this and that and the US NRC asked them to do this or that and that the US NRC is ok with their follow-up.

But, should we be ok with the follow-up? An educated guess is most likely not. And yet, each topic has related documents, meaning that one would probably need to examine 1000s of pages, meaning more like a dozen hours per day for one month. And, that allows no preparation of a presentation, nor the travel time. If a Ph.D. who is pretty good at reading bureaucratic crap, and who has been reading US NRC crap for two or three years finds it too daunting to deal with, what about other people? Even if one were motivated to work night and day and beg for an audience, the US NRC is lap-dog to the nuclear industry.

The Japanese are neat, orderly, and think of everything. If you think that Fukushima is bad, a nuclear disaster in the US is going to be a never-ending radioactive Katrina, where people are just left to die, as they were in New Orleans. A nuclear disaster in the UK will be worse than their massive flu epidemic, around 16 or 17 years ago, where they had no room for the bodies. History tells us that after a nuclear accident in Europe, the French will probably try to pretend it never happened. Of course, the US will probably try this as well, but the truth will come out – too late for people to take shelter, as with the plutonium flying out from WIPP. Mississippi may actually fare better than most due to low population density, many people still having a farm work ethic and the heavy military-retired military presence in the state. But, you can be certain that the Feds will treat it like New Orleans.

[…]

[1] Claiborne County, home to the Grand Gulf nuclear reactor is 84% African American. Just down river is Jefferson County, the county with “the highest percentage of African Americans of any county in the United States, as well as being the most obese in the nation statistically.” Both are among the poorest counties in the United States.” Jefferson is 85.7% African American. The county seat of Fayette is 97.37% African American. At 37% the State of Mississippi still has the highest percentage of African Americans in the USA.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claiborne_County,_Mississippihttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_County,_Mississippi

“Siting Nukes in a Poor Black Town — If A Black President Does It, Is It Still Environmental Racism?” 07/04/2010 05:12 am ET, Updated May 25, 2011
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-dixon/siting-nukes-in-a-poor-bl_b_559103.html

Related from 2004 pointing out that the county failed to get promised and needed infrastructure due to the cost overruns during construction of Grand Gulf Nuclear Power Station. The NIRS found that one evacuation road near the nuclear power station had ben washed out.https://www.wiseinternational.org/nuclear-monitor/616/us-nrc-adopts-jim-crow-policy-nuclear-licensing

Report about tritium at incomplete Grand Gulf Nuclear Reactor next to the operating reactor. It was flushed to the Mississippi River, where people still fish and many communities, including New Orleans, get their drinking water. No one has clarified where this tritium came from and why they believe there won’t be more! The 106,400 picocuries flushed is 3,936.8 becquerels per liter. This is over 5 times the amount of tritium allowed in drinking water in the US and over 50 times the California Public Health goal. How the tritium was in the incomplete building apparently remains a mystery.http://pbadupws.nrc.gov/docs/ML1215/ML12157A182.pdf (Note that in another context we finally found that there is apparently a long-standing pipe problem, which probably led to the tritium discharge and which we need to post about.)

More information on Grand Gulf, which hasn’t made it into the mainstream news either
http://www.stuarthsmith.com/nuclear-plant-workers-dump-large-amount-of-radioactive-tritium-directly-into-mississippi-river/
https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2015/04/28/us-nrc-impact-of-environmental-conditions-on-nuclear-waste-dry-storage-comment-deadline-may-4-2015/
https://robertsingleton.wordpress.com/2012/04/13/event-reports-fire-at-mississippi-nuke-a-supervisor-on-drugs-at-florida-facility-and-a-mistaken-alert-and-an-arkansas-tv-station-issues-an-inaccurate-emergency-alert/
https://robertsingleton.wordpress.com/2012/04/04/event-reports-fires-in-south-carolina-and-florida-a-lightning-strike-in-mississippi-and-a-reactor-shutdown-in-illinois/
https://robertsingleton.wordpress.com/2013/12/12/event-report-grand-gulf-worker-fired-for-drug-use/
https://robertsingleton.wordpress.com/2011/06/03/drunk-supervisor-at-mississippi-nuke/
A tritium report from Grand Gulf:http://pbadupws.nrc.gov/docs/ML1407/ML14071A249.pdf

Obama was happy to have B.B. King at the White House, but does nothing to protect Mississippians or other Americans from imminent danger – probably because of the funding which he’s gotten from nuclear utility Exelon. Obama’s “push for more nuclear energy came after the nation’s biggest nuclear power company strongly backed his candidacy. Illinois-based Exelon was one of the biggest corporate backers of then-Sen. Obama’s 2008 presidential run. The company’s director, John W. Rogers, served on Obama’s finance committee and bundled $193,598 to the Illinois senator’s campaign, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Rogers also sat on the president’s Inaugural Committee and donated $50,000 to the 2009 Inauguration. ComEd CEO Frank Clark bundled $75,100 in contributions to the Obama presidential campaign. (ComEd is a subsidiary of Exelon.) Former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel made millions when he joined an investment bank in Chicago and shepherded through the merger deal between PECO Energy and Unicom that created Exelon.”https://sunlightfoundation.com/blog/2011/03/23/nuclear-industry-lobbyists-battle-fallout-from-japan-reactor-crisis

He does nothing to stop the poisoning of Tennessee either, probably so Exelon can decommission its nuclear reactors on the cheap by sending the waste to landfills. https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2014/09/28/what-makes-tennessee-so-popular-as-a-nuclear-waste-dump-not-its-great-singers/

Obama had a white mother and an African father from Kenya. He was raised by white grandparents. Thus, he is not African American. African Americans arrived during a 200 year period starting ca 1614 and mostly from west Africa. He does not share the history or culture, except through marriage. But, his wife apparently doesn’t care either.

 

https://miningawareness.wordpress.com/2016/05/02/radioactive-blues-grand-gulf-nuclear-power-station-relicensing-hearing-a-1000-miles-away-in-dc-on-may-4th/

US govt won’t compensate Santa Susanna Field Laboratory workers exposed to radiation

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Some experts say SSFL was the worst nuclear disaster in U.S. history.

BY FRANK MATT
fmatt@mcclatchydc.com
April 18,2016

Highlights:

Department of Energy says only Santa Susana workers in Area IV could be exposed to radiation

But former nuclear workers say the system wasn’t so tidy and that they deserve medical compensation

Tales of sodium reactor waste dump, radioactive mist

WASHINGTON

Lorraine Kurowski never knew many details about her husband Dan’s job at a secretive, sprawling facility on a hilltop far north of Los Angeles. “We need the money and we’ll have a good retirement,” she remembers him saying, “but when I die, turn the lights off and watch me glow.”

That line – “watch me glow” – became a running joke about his job, but today Lorraine wishes she had taken it as a warning.

Dan, known by his coworkers as “Big Dan,” worked from 1964 until 1997 as a radioactive waste packer at the Santa Susana Field Laboratory, a sprawling facility where some of the nation’s top

scientists contracted by NASA and the Atomic Energy Commission once worked together to advance the fields of space exploration, weaponry and nuclear power at the height of the cold war.

And when he found himself dying years later of pancreatic cancer, Dan sought compensation from a government program meant to help former workers who had been exposed to radiation and toxic substances at nuclear technology sites.

Dan Kurowski was denied, becoming one of hundreds of Santa Susana workers refused compensation for a variety of illnesses potentially associated with radiation and toxic chemical exposure. That’s because those workers – many of them NASA contractors – were unable to prove that they were ever in the small sliver of the site known as Area IV.

The Department of Energy, the Department of Labor and the Boeing company – the site’s current corporate owner – all say Area IV is the only portion of the site where the Department of Energy operated.

Yet for all its denied claims, Santa Susana is one of the reasons the compensation program for former nuclear workers exists in the first place. In 1999, an independent study of illnesses in the communities surrounding the site were one of several presented to the White House and Congress as evidence of the need for a compensation program.

And therefore, the Labor Department insists, it can compensate only a subset of sick former Santa Susana workers.Members of the Santa Susana workforce were among those in a McClatchy report in December who tracked how the federal government has treated its nuclear workers. More than 107,000 nuclear workers nationally have applied for benefits through a Department of Labor compensation program since 2001. The payments go to workers, or their surviving family members, who might have been exposed to radiation or other toxic hazards from their jobs at Department of Energy nuclear facilities.

Nationwide, almost half of claimants who apply to the program receive benefits. At Santa Susana, less than a third of the over 1,400 claims filed have resulted in compensation, according to data reviewed by McClatchy.

Yet for all its denied claims, Santa Susana is one of the reasons the compensation program for former nuclear workers exists in the first place. In 1999, an independent study of illnesses in the communities surrounding the site were one of several presented to the White House and Congress as evidence of the need for a compensation program.

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