Monitors a host of energy and nuclear issues from a public interest perspective
BOOM!!! Tritium in Nuclear Warheads = Boosted Nuclear Explosive Force; SRS Watch Requests Report
This National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) notice in the June 11, 2020 Federal Register underscores that the postponed meeting by the Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) on SRS tritium operations needs to be held ASAP.
Stephen Bryne, former official with South Carolina Electric & Gas (SCE&G – taken over by Dominion Energy – admits fraud in the failed construction of two new nuclear reactors at the VC Summer site in South Carolina.
Numerous Comments Submitted on NNSA’s Draft EIS on the SRS Plutonium Bomb Plant; Question Need for Expanding Plutonium “Pit” Production to SRS, Call for Programmatic EIS to Review Pit Need
In Bizarre and Dangerous Twist,
“Japan should end its nonsensical effort to recycle nuclear fuel”
One day Japan’s costly, dangerous and failed program to reprocess highly radioactive spent fuel and stockpile plutonium will end.
SRS Watch news release, May 12, 2020: Inadequate Los Alamos Lab Environmental Analysis of Plutonium “Pit” Production for 4000 New and Refurbished Nuclear Warheads Must be Amended by DOE to Cover Key Issues Overlooked
Options to “Reuse” Pits and Method to Purify Plutonium are Key Matters Totally Lacking from Draft Supplement Analysis,
Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement (PEIS) on surplus plutonium disposition? That’s the call in the new report (April 30) of the National Academies of Sciences on disposal of 48 metric tons of plutonium,
DOE’s National Nuclear Security Administration Extends by 15 Days Comment Period on Draft EIS on Proposed Savannah River Site Plutonium Bomb Plant, Period Extended from May 18 to About June 2
Columbia,
“Plutonium: How Nuclear Power’s Dream Fuel Became a Nightmare”
by friends and colleagues of SRS Watch – by Frank von Hippel (Author), Masafumi Takubo (Author), Jungmin Kang (Author)
This book provides a readable and thought-provoking analysis of the issues surrounding nuclear fuel reprocessing and fast-neutron reactors,
“Nuclear waste could remain in Jülich for even longer”
“Der Atommüll könnte noch länger in Jülich bleiben”
WDR German radio,
FOIA Documents Confirm Profiteers Still Pursuing Scheme to Dump Highly Radioactive German Spent Fuel (Graphite “Pebbles”) at SRS – Should be Terminated
SRS and the German entity Jülicher Entsorgungsgesellschaft für Nuklearanlagen (JEN) are still working on the scheme to import German highly radioactive graphite spent fuel from the Jülich,
SRS Watch in “Nuclear Cleanup Sites Can Endure Prolonged Use of Skeleton Crews, Sources Say”
Federal and industry sources said this week they don’t foresee major environmental or public safety concerns emerging if the current level of reduced staffing at Energy Department nuclear cleanup sites due to COVID-19 lingers for months.
“New earthquake report shows risks “ten times as high”
This is troubling – on a new analysis on the nuclear bomb plant under construction by NNSA at Y-12 in Oak Ridge,
“DOE Ignores COVID-19 Threat, Diverts Resources to Planning for Nuclear War by Releasing Draft Environmental Study on SRS Plutonium Bomb Plant (PBP)”
Today,
Letter to DOE, April 1, 2020: Request for two-month extension of the April 24, 2020 comment deadline for the draft Supplement Analysis to the 2008 Site-Wide Environmental Impact Statement for continued operations of Los Alamos National Laboratory (DOEIEIS-0380- SA-06) in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.
SRS has slapped a lid of secrecy on “minimum mission-critical activities” that are occurring at the site – no explanation given for that terminology or what it covers. Shameful and potentially dangerous!
Why is Savannah River site management not telling the public what’s going on at SRS is response to the threat of the coronavirus?
As SRS management has failed to release a list of “mission-critical activities”
“Arms Control and Nonproliferation: A Catalog of Treaties and Agreements”
Congressional Research Service (CRS), updated March 26, 2020
report linked here: https://fas.org/sgp/crs/nuke/RL33865.pdf
When will Congress allow the CRS to post reports so the public can see them in a timely manner?
DOE admits Los Alamos National Lab to look at production of 80 plutonium pits/year – to fuel the new nuclear arms race – which underscores the requirement for preparation of a Programmatic Environmental Impact Statement ( PEIS) on the matter,
SRS Watch news, March 27, 202o: “While the Nation Rallies to Confront Virus, Savannah River Site Takes Eye Off the Threat and Focuses on Planning for New Nuclear Arms Race –
This is Very Worrying: SRS Action Against the Virus Comes Late, After Public Already Acting
The DOE’s Savannah River Site (SRS) on the afternoon of Monday,
“Request to Publish Notice of Draft Supplement Analysis in the Federal Register, DOE/EIS-0380-SA-06: Draft Supplement Analysis”
Public interest groups working for US DOE to fully comply with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) in its unjustified plans to produce more plutonium “pits”
Well, some things in life are predictable. The US nuclear industry is seeking relief that goes far beyond immediate COVID-19 impacts.
In addition to seeking help for the floundering Votgle reactor construction project in Georgia,
It’s still looking like SRS thinks the COVID-19 virus situation is mostly a hoax. WHEN will SRS start acting responsibly and declare certain jobs “essential,” like high-level waste management and security of plutonium,
We are hearing NOTHING about what DOE and the NRC are doing to protect public safety by working to make sure staffing at key operations – like SRS high-level waste management &
The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety board (DNFSB), mandated to oversight of certain DOE activities, confirms SRS “denied or delayed access to information, facilities, or personnel meetings that were necessary for the Board to perform its mission.”
Is SRS and the German entity Jülicher Entsorgungsgesellschaft für Nuklearanlagen (JEN) still working on the scheme to import German highly radioactive graphite spent fuel from the Jülich storage site to SRS for reprocessing and dumping?
What’s the status of start up of a key SRS facility to process liquid high-level waste? DOE has said that the Salt Waste Processing Facility (SWPF) would start in March 2020 but then said April and then that it would be in Fiscal Year 2020.
“SRS experienced the three radiological events recently.”
DEFENSE NUCLEAR FACILITIES SAFETY BOARD
February 21, 2020 report
SUBJECT: Savannah River Site Activity Report for Week
Radiological Protection: SRS experienced the three radiological events recently.
As the coronavirus spreads in the US and South Carolina – location of the Savannah River Site – what is the US Department of Energy doing concerning the 11,000 employees at SRS?
The Defense Nuclear Facilities Safety Board (DNFSB) March 19 meeting on SRS was cancelled and has now been rescheduled for June 1, 2020, but we wonder if that will happen.
