No Nukes News - by-election called!
Bischoff Angela
greenspi at web.ca
Thu Aug 20 21:12:48 EDT 2009
No Nukes News
Aug. 19, 2009
Quote of the Week:
"This is just a new way of farming. We're farming energy," Jon
Kieran said of the field that was thick with corn this time last year.
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Let the Race Begin
The by-election in St. Paul’s (central Toronto riding) was just
announced for Sept. 17th – join in the fun! Elections are an
incredible opportunity to reach out to the electorate. Voters are
alert, and candidates and their parties are paying attention to
voters’ concerns.
Ontario’s electricity system is at a crossroad – whether we go
nuclear or renewable is a key public policy issue, particularly given
the financial challenges facing the province.
OCAA is aiming to make Ontario’s energy future an election issue
through door-to-door canvassing/leafleting, subway station blitzes,
candidates questionnaire, and more. Help us get the word out!
Let me know if you can spare an evening/afternoon or 2 over the next
4 weeks and I’ll set you up. Thank you!
angela at cleanairalliance.org
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Canada loses out as U.S. ups green ante
The Obama administration's titanic $60 billion spending plan for the
U.S. clean energy sector is luring investors away from green
businesses in Canada, threatening the industry's growth here.
http://www.reuters.com/articlePrint?articleId=USTRE57G2HH20090817
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Storing nuclear waste a $24-billion problem
There are two million high-level radioactive fuel bundles sitting at
temporary storage sites in Canada, as the Nuclear Waste Management
Organization wrestles with the mandate of finding a community to host
a central storage facility for the waste for perhaps tens of
thousands of years.
http://license.icopyright.net/user/viewFreeUse.act?fuid=NDU1NjQ1OQ==
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Solar farm takes root in Arnprior
"This is just a new way of farming. We're farming energy," Jon Kieran
said of the field that was thick with corn this time last year.
He said by year's end the steel posts will support 312,000 solar
panels and form the largest solar farm of its kind in Canada. At peak
capacity it will produce 20 MW -- enough energy to power 7,000
households.
http://www.ottawasun.com/news/ottawa/2009/08/16/10480806.html
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Lavish US Lobbying Pushes Nuclear Energy
Climate change and the resulting need for low-carbon energy sources
is driving the current interest in nuclear energy despite the
industry's near universal legacy of staggering cost-overruns,
technical difficulties and dependence on enormous government subsidies.
Government interest in new nuclear energy plants seems far more
political than practical or economic in light of the fact that
Europe's latest nuclear plant under construction in Finland is four
years behind schedule and 50 to 70 percent over budget.
Any claims that nuclear is a viable low-carbon or clean energy source
are negated by its extraordinary costs that have increased at least
five-fold in the past decade.
"Nuclear energy has always been heavily subsidised by governments
around the world," Ellen Vancko, a nuclear energy analyst at the
Union of Concerned Scientists, a U.S.-based non governmental
organisation.
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47906
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Nuclear Steals Billions from Other Technologies
Why is nuclear energy back on the table?
One reason is a powerful U.S. lobby where 14 energy companies spent
48 million dollars in 2007 alone to convince American politicians to
give the industry huge loan guarantees because they cannot get
financing anywhere else, says Ellen Vancko, a nuclear energy analyst
at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a U.S.-based non governmental
organisation (NGO).
This lavish lobbying effort by the energy and nuclear power sector
has been ongoing since the mid-1990s, according to the Center for
Responsive Politics, a U.S. NGO and now totals at least 953 million
dollars.
Even more has been spent to convince the public that nuclear is one
of the keys to energy security so that there is significant public
support for new reactors, a Gallup Environment Poll reported this year
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47907
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Reprocessing isn't the answer
By Richard L. Garwin, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
http://thebulletin.org/node/7654
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Comments on this piece on reprocessing by Dr. Gordon Edwards:
With the cancellation of the Yucca Mountain Project for the permanent
geologic storage of irradiated nuclear fuel, many nuclear proponents
are arguing in favor of "recycling" the used fuel to "extract the
unused energy". What they really mean is "reprocessing" the
irradiated fuel in order to recover the man-made element plutonium,
which constitutes
less than one percent of the irradiated fuel.
This article is written by a pro-nuclear scientist who has worked in
the nuclear weapons program as well as in the peaceful nuclear power
program. He explains why reprocessing is not a sensible approach
because it solves none of the problems that it pretends to address --
for example, it does not solve or even reduce significantly the
problem of storing high-level radioactive waste forever.
What the article does not address is the enormous security risks
attached to the commercialization of plutonium as a nuclear reactor
fuel. Plutonium is immediately weapons-usable; a major study by
Sandia Labs has shown that just a handful of people, working for a
short period of time without elaborate equipment, can extract any
plutonium that has been incorporated into fresh nuclear fuel. Once
extracted, that plutonium can be used to make a nuclear explosive
device of enormous destructive power.
See http://www.ccnr.org/plute_sandia.html
and http://www.ccnr.org/Peaceful_Atom.html
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A nuclear boost
Energy Grit Leader Michael Ignatieff reaffirms support for nuclear power
http://telegraphjournal.canadaeast.com/search/article/760390
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No Nukes
Hawthorne confirmed that Bruce Power dropped plans to build two
nuclear reactors in Nanticoke due to plummeting demand for
electricity in Ontario. The business case that existed for new
reactors last year disappeared over the winter due to a steep
downturn in manufacturing brought on by the global recession.
With demand for electricity in Ontario faltering, Bruce Power will
concentrate on refurbishing two reactors at the Bruce A facility in
Tiverton.
http://simcoereformer.ca/ArticleDisplay.aspx?e=1706194&auth=
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Pedal for the Planet
Pedal for the Planet is a KYOTOplus initiative.
KYOTOplus is a national, non-partisan, petition-centered campaign for
urgent federal government action on climate change.
This summer, people across Canada are joining Pedal for the Planet, a
cross-country relay to call for action on climate change.
Cyclists will converge on Parliament Hill in mid-September, relaying
our expectations for a Copenhagen climate treaty on to Ottawa.
Ontario: On August 24, a team of cyclists will leave Windsor,
Ontario, heading to London, Stratford, Kitchener, Guelph, Burlington,
Mississauga, Toronto, Pickering, Oshawa, Belleville, Kingston, Perth
and Ottawa. To join the rides, contact Emma Cane, Sierra Club Ontario
Chapter, emmac at sierraclub.ca, (416) 960-9606.
For more information, visit www.kyotoplus.ca/pedal. To sign the
online petition, visit www.kyotoplus.ca.
Also, they're looking for a driver to accompany the ON tour. If
you're free for the next few weeks, contact emmac at sierraclub.ca,
(416) 960-9606.
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Angela Bischoff
Campaign Manager
Ontario Clean Air Alliance
Tel: 416 926 1907 x 246
625 Church Street, #402
Toronto, ON M4Y 2G1
angela at cleanairalliance.org
www.ontariosgreenfuture.ca
www.cleanairalliance.org
Our Facebook Group
Sign Our Petition
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