Japanese officials are currently engaging in talks with Russian diplomats about where tens of millions of Japanese refugees might relocate in the very-likely event that the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility’s Reactor 4 completely collapses.
Ms Maya is one of the five survivors of the nuclear tragedy who visited around a dozen countries to share their experience, but India is the only country to revoke the visa.
Ukraine's president vowed Thursday that his country is committed to building a new, safer shelter over the damaged Chernobyl reactor as Ukrainians, Belarusians and Russians marked the 26th anniversary of the world's worst nuclear disaster.
EU energy ministers should be preparing for ever more renewable power in their discussion of long-term energy plans at an informal meeting, which started in Denmark yesterday and is continuing today, Greenpeace said.
Scientists confirm that a wave of highly radioactive waste is headed directly for the US coast, while authorities continue to keep everyone in the dark and push for more nuclear energy.
This year the Cape Argus cycle tour and the first commemoration of the Fukushima crises fell on the same day.
Greenpeace has launched 'Shadowlands', a presentation of haunting photographs depicting the impacts of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, the plight of people displaced by the crisis, and a warning to others that a serious nuclear accident can happen everywhere there are reactors.
On the African continent today, South Africa is the only country to possess a nuclear reactor, and its developments in this field will undoubtedly influence other African countries. If funds and efforts are focused on nuclear power, this inhibits the development of renewable energy, which is the only long term clean solution.
It’s been a long hard road but there could be light at the end of the tunnel for former workers of the Nuclear Energy Corporation of South Africa (Necsa), many of whom are now terminally ill, allegedly after they were employed at Necsa’s Pelindaba nuclear complex, near Pretoria.
The world is still reeling from the shock of the terrible triple disasters of the Töhoku earthquake 13 kilometers off the Oshika coastline near Sendai, the resultant tsunami and then the nuclear near-melt-down that hit Japan in the past week.
What would you do for One Trillion Rand, or ZAR 1,000,000,000,000? Or perhaps I should rather ask these questions: What would Companies do to take a slice of a ZAR 1,000,000,000,000 cake? What would politicians do ensure some gravy from a ZAR 1,000,000,000,000 train?
The events at Fukushima over the past few weeks have raised public awareness about the health risks of nuclear power. Earthlife Africa is calling for a firm stand against nuclear energy:
'Around Fukushima Daiichi Station, on March 23rd, they measured 400 millisieverts ' that's per hour. With this measurement (Chief Cabinet Secretary) Edano admitted for the first time that there was a danger to health, but he didn't explain what this means. All of the information media are at fault here I think. They are saying stupid things like, why, we are exposed to radiation all the time in our daily life, we get radiation from outer space.
We were shocked by the article circulated on the internet where a serious environmental author, George Monbiot, author of 'Heat ' how to stop the planet from burning' turned pro-nuclear since the disaster in Japan. Many people were confused about this sudden turn and concerned that Monbiot had used his good name to potentially damage the anti-nuclear lobby.
Hamburg/Stockholm, 29 March 2011. In a joint statement 50 laureates of the Right Livelihood Award and members of the World Future Council demand a global nuclear phase out. 'Nuclear power is neither the answer to modern energy problems nor a panacea for climate change challenges. There is no solution of problems by creating more problems,' states the declaration issued by experts, activists, politicians, clergy, entrepreneurs and scientists from 26 countries.
The massive explosion following a cooling problem at one Fukushima's nuclear reactors, Daiichi, has been followed by more blasts at three more nuclear reactors, and two others are in danger. Up to date reports confirm that the Japanese government has issued a statement saying that radiation levels are now at dangerous levels, given the additional radiation from a fire in a storage pond of used fuel rods. The level measured is the same as if a person were receiving 4000 chest X-rays every hour. This has created an untenable situation for workers and local residents, especially given that a state of emergency has been declared for five reactors at the two plants.
The European Commission is due to publish a draft nuclear waste directive this Autumn. Deep disposal has dominated the research effort put into the management of highly radioactive nuclear waste for over 30 years and is expected to be centre stage in the directive. However, the Commission has been misinformed of the dangers of deep disposal by its most critical advisors, the Joint Research Centre (JRC) and European Implementing Geological Disposal Technology Platform (IGD-TP). Both claim that a scientific consensus has been reached and construction should proceed.
Civil society groups are up in arms in response to the statement by Minister Dipuo Peters at the Investec Power Summit in Sandton on Tuesday, that South Africa could build 'a fleet of five or six nuclear power stations'.
This is particularly alarming, given the recent release of an authoritative report by an eminent group of Russian scientists that concludes (based on records now available) some 985,000 people died, mainly of cancer, as a result of the Chernobyl accident. That is between when the accident occurred in 1986 and 2004. More deaths, it projects, will follow.
As ancient and unprecedented as nuclear energy is in the history of controversial technology debates, knowledge of nuclear power and its potentially disastrous effects has always remained so atrociously obscure to me that I would often find myself on the nod-and-listen end of any intelligent discussions on the matter. I remembered some things about radioactivity from the physics class teacher and the sci-fi movies and, of course, I knew about Chernobyl and the Three Mile Island accidents, but I still couldn't engage anyone on a prolonged discussion about the real and persistent danger that nuclear energy represents today .
Earthlife Africa Cape Town and friends will hand Minister Pravin Gordhan a sheaf of research that confirms that a 'No Nuclear, No Coal, No Price Increase' future is possible and will deliver improved work and livelihood opportunities for South Africans, improved health and lower energy costs over time. This to commemorate Chernobyl Day (26 April), the anniversary of the single largest nuclear disaster in history where many people died.
Unguarded barrels of radioactive uranium (yellow cake) have been discovered on Swakopmund beach. Near the sewerage works at Tamariskia investigators found 4 barrels.
