It's shutdown or meltdown. Take our pick.

June 10th, 2011

Dear Readers,

Nuclear power is losing ground everywhere in the world. Literally and figuratively.

Nuclear accidents have permanently poisoned large swaths of northern Japan, having similarly poisoned Ukraine and Belarus 25 years ago, and not to mention Hanford, Washington, the Nevada Test Site, the Savannah River Site, and THOUSANDS of other places around the globe.

The latest poll by the uber-pro-nuclear World Nuclear Association indicates less than half the 34,000 people polled in 47 countries favor nuclear power -- a drop of 8 percent since before the accident, by their own admission. And that poll was conducted in late-March to early-April! Undoubtedly, disfavor has continued to increase sharply, as the revelations about the lies are uncovered, and as the reactors continue to smoulder and poison the earth, wind, and water.

The World Nuclear News report about their poll adds, with the happiest spin possible that a pro-nuker could put on the situation: "Unsurprisingly, Japan saw the biggest drop in support for nuclear energy, with the number of people in favour dropping from 62% before the accident to 39% afterwards. Meanwhile, those saying they were opposed to nuclear increased from 28% to 47%."

Clearly, nuclear power's "popularity" is at an all-time low (along with TEPCO's stock price).

It's strange that those of us in America, who have the most freedom to speak out and stop nuclear power, a relatively high education level, and were the birthplace of this global mistake and have more proof that it was a mistake than anyone, actually seem to have the most apathy.

But that lack-of-attitude IS changing! Even in -- and in many ways especially in -- the hometowns of nuclear power plants (where all the workers live and the nuclear power corporations have been pouring funds into the community for decades) the nuclear reactors are suddenly being reviled as the tools of death they really are.

With this new awakening, it may NOT take a meltdown in America to stop nuclear power dead in its tracks after all! I sure hope it doesn't "require" a trillion-dollar accident, with its hundreds of thousands of deaths over the coming years, and the nuclear industry's hollow talk about "lessons learned" while slipping you the bill for the damage and laughing all the way to the bank.

No: Let's not let it come to that. But it's shut down or meltdown. One or the other is inevitable.

Sincerely,

Ace Hoffman Carlsbad, CA

Today's items: --------------------------------------------- (1) Letter to FT (by Ace Hoffman) (2) The lie that closing the nukes is expensive continues (3) Is Yucca Mountain the solution? Not bloody likely! (4) Palo Verde's power lines threatened! But with what? (5) Why are you against music? (6) Contact information for the author of this newsletter ---------------------------------------------

============================================== (1) Letter to FT (by Ace Hoffman): ==============================================

To: ean@ft.com Subject: Nope, they can't fix it...

June 7th, 2011

Dear Financial Times,

Crook's and Pfeifer's commentary yesterday (6/6/11) about nuclear power missed the boat. Nuclear power is a dying industry because it has to die. If it doesn't, the human race will die -- of stupidity.

And please: Don't bother dismissing this letter as the words of a crackpot. Perhaps I am, but they are the words of scientists -- merely parroted, paraphrased, and presented by your humble and obedient servant.

Nowhere in your article were the medical issues addressed -- because they can't be. It's the true Achilless' heal of the industry. Every radiation release can kill -- no exceptions. Trillions of lethal doses of radiation have been released at Fukushima. Incomprehensibly-large numbers for a poison which knows no threshold (BIER VII, and many other references confirm the LNT theory, okay?).

Some groups of scientists have studied the effects of Chernobyl more carefully than the nuclear industry wanted to. The death toll from Fukushima will be either the largest from an industrial accident in history -- worse than Chernobyl -- or it will be nearly as bad. But either way, the two are in a class by themselves, and this scar won't be healing in Japan, or in Germany which as realized how dangerous their reactors are, or in many other countries that are rethinking their past mistakes.

Furthermore, besides causing cancers, leukemia, heart disease, a host of degenerative diseases, and perhaps a thousand other things, radiation -- worst of all -- lowers IQs (hence the final word of my opening retort to yesterday's commentary).

Throughout that commentary we are told that what the nuclear industry needs and intends to do in order to gain the public trust is to become more open about everything. Fat chance! And besides, that's what they ALWAYS say! But look at what's happened at Fukushima: Governments and industry colluded to keep from the public the fact that three meltdowns had occurred virtually simultaneously! And you want to build WHAT from that not-humble rebirth (or death) of an industry? A flowering, growing, loved industry? Ain't gonna happen. TEPCO's shares' new low is the wave of the future for nuclear power companies. When viewed from history, the industry IS just one disaster after another, and WILL be stopped eventually. Will it take another Fukushima? Then there will be another -- and another. Such accidents are inevitable (as a careful, jaundiced reading of the Surry tornado event proves, by the way -- or the TVA event shortly before it (I could go on...)).

From the still-smoldering (and for another 30 years or so, probably...) ashes of Fukushima does ANYONE really think a nuclear renaissance has a chance? Look at how bad the "renaissance" was to begin with: AREVA, or Toshiba, or whoever, would claim they had sold a reactor in one place, having pushed it through a relatively small first step, just so they can go to another place, another country, and say "look, so-and-so bought one, you should too!" And with bribes under tables and fast talking in back rooms, the deal is made. That's the "renaissance" that melted down at Fukushima -- not a real one. One propped up by donating millions of dollars to candidates who would back the nuclear agenda. One propped up by lies. One propped up by claims the waste problem has been solved, or can be (which would defy the laws of physics). One propped up by billions of dollars in loan guarantees and trillions in insurance fraud (Price-Anderson, and every other country's equivalent Acts (they all have one) is nothing but a fraud perpetrated on the people that their homes are safely insured against a nuclear accident at their local (within 50 miles, even though evacuation plans only go out to 10 and aren't used in the event) nuclear reactor.

Nobody reads the fine print. That's the nuclear industry's only hope.

Sincerely,

Ace Hoffman Carlsbad, CA

The author, a computer programmer and award-winning educational software developer, has been studying computers for more than 30 years and nuclear technology for more than 40. His book on the nuclear industry, THE CODE KILLERS, is available as a free download from his web site: www.acehoffman.org

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Nuclear power: Atomised approach By Ed Crooks and Sylvia Pfeifer Financial Times - June 6 2011 http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/27e83c54-9074-11e0-9227-00144feab49a.html#ixzz1OYUJqBfC

On Saturday April 16, a tornado hit the Surry nuclear plant in Virginia, cutting off the supply of power from the grid to the US site's two reactors.

...

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============================================== (2) The lie that closing the nukes is expensive continues: ==============================================

If Reuters really thinks shut-down is expensive, they should balance it against meltdown... ------------------------------------ www.reuters.com Japan may have no nuclear reactors running by next April

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/08/us-japan-nuclear-reactors-idUSTRE7572P920110608

TOKYO (Reuters) - All 54 of Japan's nuclear reactors may be shut by next April, adding more than $30 billion a year to the country's energy costs, if communities object to plant operating plans due to

Comment on FB: All over the world people are protesting against nuclear power, getting arrested, demanding their rights. This isn't NIMBYism, it's survival, and the public can see that now. The hordes of people who have lost their homes, and now may die of cancer because of Fukushima, will be very vocal in the coming years, you can count on it. They all know how to use the Internet, and they are very VERY upset. I do believe they will drive nukes out of Japan, and quickly. Not just "No New Nukes" which is a placebo to the people for the nuke industry, with 440 nuke operating "comfortably" around the world. We need the old ones shut down most of all! And we can't just talk about what to do with the waste, we have to really do something effective. But before shutdown, the waste will always be an afterthought. As Mary Olson (NIRS) puts it: "When you have a plumbing problem, you don't go for the mop first. You go for the wrench." Turn the wrench. Shut off the spigot. Close the spent fuel production facilities -- shut the reactors. By the way only one or two reactors in the whole world are set up to produce medical isotopes because THAT'S ALL YOU NEED and in fact, if no reactors were operating, you could probably get the isotopes other ways or use other LESS DANGEROUS methods like MRIs for CT scans and so forth, which are often medically more useful anyway. Never believe a word a pro-nuker tells you. If Fukushima didn't teach the world that, the world need only look at the timeline, it will always be there for all to see. Governments lie. Nuclear power companies lie. People die.

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============================================== (3) Is Yucca Mountain the solution? Not bloody likely! ==============================================

From: Nikoli McCracken To: stephen.power@wsj.com Sent: Thursday, June 09, 2011 9:59 PM Subject: About Yucca Mountain

Hello:

I read your article about Yucca Mountain. I have a rather unique point of view about it; I was raised in Nevada until age 13. My father worked at both of the Nevada Test sites, and when I grew up, I married a Navy submariner who, within a few short years, was transferred from diesel electric submarines to nuclear boats. I also worked outside the home, and was for 34 years, a technical illustrator, graphic artist, electronics drafter and oil, gas and nuclear power worker. Twice in that 34 years I worked for companies which built nuclear power plants. At first, I was Pro - nuke. Was proud of my Navy husband and his service, and of the work I did both in aerospace and nuclear power. Worked on many space programs, aircraft, you name it, I probably worked on it. Here's the problem with Yucca Mountain: Beneath it, there is a huge earthquake fault, and below that, a water table. It is only 95 miles from Las Vegas. And it simply is not safe, and cannot be MADE safe. There is also strong evidence of vulcanism at the site. Ancient, but then, so was Pompeii! Further, it belongs to the Shoshone People, from whom it was taken without compensation, and for whom it is held as sacred. Is there ANY treaty with Native Americans we have NOT broken? Besides that, the trains and/or trucks could be sabotaged. Or just sheer dumb luck could come into play: In LA, people died because a train engineer was TEXTING! There are 22,000 train vs. car accidents in the US every year. Some of them are train vs. Semi. One drunken driver, one inattentive engineer - and the consequences are too horrible to contemplate. Further, our railroads are in such terrible shape, it would be foolish to use them to transport the waste. One accident - oh, yes, and we are not insured! Look at YOUR personal insurance policy. You are NOT insured against 'radiation.' And the industry is not well-enough insured against catastrophe. We have come closer to a core meltdown more times in the US, than you could believe possible. I can furnish proof if you want it. Finally, after Fukushima-Daiichi, how much proof do we need that nature can screw us over, anytime? I've never been an 'activist.' But the US will open Yucca Mountain over my dead body! I have ten living descendants for whom I want to leave a clean Earth. Six of them are children under age 10.

Very truly yours, Nikoli A."Penny" McCracken Fallon NV

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============================================== (4) Palo Verde's power lines threatened! But with what? ==============================================

BTW, it was a fire...

---------------------------------------------- At 05:34 PM 6/9/2011 -0700, Penny wrote: >Hi: News reports on NBC are stating that the power lines to Palo Verde are threatened. ----------------------------------------------

Threatened with what? High winds? Earthquakes? Fires? Terrorism? Rust? Airplane strikes? Tension poorly adjusted? Laser weapon from space? Overheated? Transformers exploded? Switchyard overrun by rodents? Sandstorm? Fleas? Fuel fleas? Metal-eating microbes? Drunken operators?

============================================== (5) Why are you against music? ==============================================

From Gene Stone, regarding San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (known locally as SONGS):

So I am out putting up signs yesterday "Stop SONGS" and a lady walks up to me in San Clemente and says why are you against music? So we had a great talk about the nuclear power plant that she did not know was here.

============================================== (6) Contact information for the author of this newsletter:

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Ace Hoffman
Author, The Code Killers:
An Expose of the Nuclear Industry
Free download: acehoffman.org
Blog: acehoffman.blogspot.com
YouTube: youtube.com/user/AceHoffman
Carlsbad, CA
Email: ace [at] acehoffman.org

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