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Tokyo Electric to Build US Nuclear Plants<br>
Monday 14 March 2011<br>
by: Greg Palast <br>
<br>
I need to speak to you, not as a reporter, but in my former capacity
as lead investigator in several government nuclear plant fraud and
racketeering investigations.<br>
<br>
I don't know the law in Japan, so I can't tell you if Tokyo Electric
Power Co (TEPCO) can plead insanity to the homicides about to
happen.<br>
<br>
But what will Obama plead? The administration, just months ago,
asked Congress to provide a $4 billion loan guarantee for two new
nuclear reactors to be built and operated on the Gulf Coast of Texas
- by TEPCO and local partners. As if the Gulf hasn't suffered
enough. Here are the facts about TEPCO and the industry you haven't
heard on CNN:<br>
<br>
The failure of emergency systems at Japan's nuclear plants comes as
no surprise to those of us who have worked in the field.<br>
<br>
Nuclear plants the world over must be certified for what is called
"SQ" or "Seismic Qualification." That is, the owners swear that all
components are designed for the maximum conceivable shaking event,
be it from an earthquake or an exploding Christmas card from
al-Qaeda.<br>
<br>
The most inexpensive way to meet your SQ is to lie. The industry
does it all the time. The government team I worked with caught them
once, in 1988, at the Shoreham plant in New York. Correcting the SQ
problem at Shoreham would have cost a cool billion, so engineers
were told to change the tests from "failed" to "passed."<br>
<br>
The company that put in the false safety report? Stone &
Webster, now the nuclear unit of Shaw Construction, which will work
with TEPCO to build the Texas plant. Lord help us.<br>
<br>
There's more.<br>
<br>
Last night, I heard CNN reporters repeat the official line that the
tsunami disabled the pumps needed to cool the reactors, implying
that water unexpectedly got into the diesel generators that run the
pumps.<br>
<br>
These safety backup systems are the "EDGs" in nuke-speak: Emergency
Diesel Generators. That they didn't work in an emergency is like a
fire department telling us they couldn't save a building because "it
was on fire."<br>
<br>
What dim bulbs designed this system? One of the reactors dancing
with death at Fukushima Station 1 was built by Toshiba. Toshiba was
also an architect of the emergency diesel system.<br>
<br>
Now be afraid. Obama's $4 billion bailout in the making is called
the South Texas Project. It's been sold as a red-white-and-blue way
to make power domestically with a reactor from Westinghouse, a great
American brand. However, the reactor will be made substantially in
Japan by the company that bought the US brand name, Westinghouse -
Toshiba.<br>
<br>
I once had a Toshiba computer. I only had to send it in once for
warranty work. However, it's kind of hard to mail back a reactor
with the warranty slip inside the box if the fuel rods are melted
and sinking halfway to the earth's core.<br>
<br>
TEPCO and Toshiba don't know what my son learned in eighth grade
science class: tsunamis follow Pacific Rim earthquakes. So, these
companies are real stupid, eh? Maybe. More likely is that the
diesels and related systems wouldn't have worked on a fine, dry
afternoon.<br>
<br>
Back in the day, when we checked the emergency backup diesels in
America, a mind-blowing number flunked. At the New York nuclear
plant, for example, the builders swore under oath that their three
diesel engines were ready for an emergency. They'd been tested. The
tests were faked; the diesels run for just a short time at low
speed. When the diesels were put through a real test under
emergency-like conditions, the crankshaft on the first one snapped
in about an hour, then the second and third. We nicknamed the
diesels, "Snap, Crackle and Pop."<br>
<br>
(Note: Moments after I wrote that sentence, word came that two of
three diesels failed at the Tokai Station as well.)<br>
<br>
In the US, we supposedly fixed our diesels after much complaining by
the industry. But in Japan, no one tells TEPCO to do anything the
Emperor of Electricity doesn't want to do.<br>
<br>
I get lots of confidential notes from nuclear industry insiders. One
engineer, a big name in the field, is especially concerned that
Obama waved the come-hither check to Toshiba and TEPCO to lure them
to America. The US has a long history of whistleblowers willing to
put themselves on the line to save the public. In our racketeering
case in New York, the government only found out about the seismic
test fraud because two courageous engineers, Gordon Dick and John
Daly, gave our team the documentary evidence.<br>
<br>
In Japan, it's simply not done. The culture does not allow the
salary men, who work all their lives for one company, to drop the
dime.<br>
<br>
Not that US law is a wondrous shield: both engineers in the New York
case were fired and blacklisted by the industry. Nevertheless, the
government (local, state, federal) brought civil racketeering
charges against the builders. The jury didn't buy the corporation's
excuses and, in the end, the plant was, thankfully, dismantled.<br>
<br>
Am I on some kind of xenophobic anti-Nippon crusade? No. In fact,
I'm far more frightened by the American operators in the South Texas
nuclear project, especially Shaw. Stone & Webster, now the Shaw
nuclear division, was also the firm that conspired to fake the EDG
tests in New York . (The company's other exploits have been exposed
by their former consultant, John Perkins, in his book, "Confessions
of an Economic Hit Man.") If the planet wants to shiver, consider
this: Toshiba and Shaw have recently signed a deal to become
worldwide partners in the construction of nuclear stations.<br>
<br>
The other characters involved at the South Texas Plant that Obama is
backing should also give you the willies. But as I'm in the middle
of investigating the American partners, I'll save that for another
day.<br>
<br>
So, if we turned to America's own nuclear contractors, would we be
safe? Well, two of the melting Japanese reactors, including the one
whose building blew sky high, were built by General Electric of the
Good Old US of A.<br>
<br>
After Texas, you're next. The Obama administration is planning a
total of $56 billion in loans for nuclear reactors all over America.<br>
<br>
And now, the homicides:<br>
<br>
CNN is only interested in body counts, how many workers burnt by
radiation, swept away or lost in the explosion. These plants are now
releasing radioactive steam into the atmosphere. Be skeptical about
the statements that the "levels are not dangerous." These are the
same people who said these meltdowns could never happen. Over years,
not days, there may be a thousand people, two thousand, ten thousand
who will suffer from cancers induced by this radiation.<br>
<br>
In my New York investigation, I had the unhappy job of totaling up
post-meltdown "morbidity" rates for the county government. It would
be irresponsible for me to estimate the number of cancer deaths that
will occur from these releases without further information; but it
is just plain criminal for the TEPCO shoguns to say that these
releases are not dangerous.<br>
<br>
Indeed, the fact that residents near the Japanese nuclear plants
were not issued iodine pills to keep at the ready shows TEPCO
doesn't care who lives and who dies, whether in Japan or the USA.
The carcinogenic isotopes that are released at Fukushima are already
floating to Seattle with effects we simply cannot measure.<br>
<br>
Heaven help us. Because Obama won't.<br>
<br>
<br>
On 3/14/11 10:15 PM, C. G. Estabrook wrote:
<blockquote cite="mid:4D7ED9D3.6050100@illinois.edu" type="cite">
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Published on Monday, March 14, 2011 by CommonDreams.org<br>
Nuclear Power Madness<br>
by Norman Solomon<br>
<br>
Like every other president since the 1940s, Barack Obama has
promoted nuclear power. Now, with reactors melting down in Japan,
the official stance is more disconnected from reality than ever.<br>
<br>
Political elites are still clinging to the oxymoron of “safe
nuclear power.” It’s up to us -- people around the world -- to
peacefully and insistently shut those plants down.<br>
<br>
There is no more techno-advanced country in the world than Japan.
Nuclear power is not safe there, and it is not safe anywhere.<br>
<br>
As the New York Times reported on Monday, “most of the nuclear
plants in the United States share some or all of the risk factors
that played a role at Fukushima Daiichi: locations on
tsunami-prone coastlines or near earthquake faults, aging plants
and backup electrical systems that rely on diesel generators and
batteries that could fail in extreme circumstances.”<br>
<br>
Nuclear power -- from uranium mining to fuel fabrication to
reactor operations to nuclear waste that will remain deadly for
hundreds of thousands of years -- is, in fact, a moral crime
against future generations.<br>
<br>
But syrupy rhetoric has always marinated the nuclear age. From the
outset -- even as radioactive ashes were still hot in Hiroshima
and Nagasaki -- top officials in Washington touted atomic energy
as redemptive. The split atom, we were to believe, could be an
elevating marvel.<br>
<br>
President Dwight Eisenhower pledged “to help solve the fearful
atomic dilemma” by showing that “the miraculous inventiveness of
man shall not be dedicated to his death, but consecrated to his
life.”<br>
<br>
Even after the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 and the
Chernobyl disaster in 1986 -- and now this catastrophe in Japan --
the corporate theologians of nuclear faith have continued to bless
their own divine projects.<br>
<br>
Thirty years ago, when I coordinated the National Citizens
Hearings for Radiation Victims on the edge of Capitol Hill, we
heard grim testimony from nuclear scientists, workers, downwinders
and many others whose lives had been forever ravaged by the split
atom. Routine in the process was tag-team deception from
government agencies and nuclear-invested companies.<br>
<br>
By 1980, generations had already suffered a vast array of terrible
consequences -- including cancer, leukemia and genetic injuries --
from a nuclear fuel cycle shared by the “peaceful” and military
atom. Today, we know a lot more about the abrupt and slow-moving
horrors of the nuclear industry.<br>
<br>
And we keep learning, by the minute, as nuclear catastrophe goes
exponential in Japan. But government leaders don’t seem to be
learning much of anything.<br>
<br>
On Sunday, even while nuclear-power reactors were melting down,
the White House issued this statement: “The president believes
that meeting our energy needs means relying on a diverse set of
energy sources that includes renewables like wind and solar,
natural gas, clean coal and nuclear power. Information is still
coming in about the events unfolding in Japan, but <b>the
administration is committed to</b> learning from them and <b>ensuring
that nuclear energy is produced </b>safely and responsibly <b>here
in the U.S.”<br>
</b><br>
Yet another reflexive nuclear salute.<br>
<br>
When this year’s State of the Union address proclaimed a goal of
“clean energy sources” for 80 percent of U.S. electricity by 2035,
Obama added: “Some folks want wind and solar. Others want nuclear,
clean coal and natural gas. To meet this goal, we will need them
all -- and I urge Democrats and Republicans to work together to
make it happen.”<br>
<br>
Bipartisan for nuclear power? You betcha. On Sunday morning TV
shows, Republican Sen. Mitch McConnell voiced support for nuclear
power, while Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer offered this convoluted
ode to atomic flackery: “We are going to have to see what happens
here -- obviously still things are happening -- but the bottom
line is we do have to free ourselves of independence from foreign
oil in the other half of the globe. Libya showed that. Prices are
up, our economy is being hurt by it, or could be hurt by it. So
I'm still willing to look at nuclear. As I’ve always said it has
to be done safely and carefully.”<br>
<br>
Such behavior might just seem absurd or pathetic -- if the
consequences weren’t so grave.<br>
<br>
Nuclear power madness is so entrenched that mainline pundits and
top elected officials rarely murmur dissent. Acquiescence is
equated with prudent sagacity.<br>
<i><br>
In early 2010, President Obama announced federal loan guarantees
-- totaling more than $8 billion -- to revive the construction
of nuclear power plants in this country, where 110 nuclear-power
reactors are already in operation.<br>
<br>
“Investing in nuclear energy remains a necessary step,” he said.
“What I hope is that, with this announcement, we’re underscoring
both our seriousness in meeting the energy challenge and our
willingness to look at this challenge, not as a partisan issue,
but as a matter that’s far more important than politics because
the choices we make will affect not just the next generation but
many generations to come.”<br>
<b><br>
Promising to push for bigger loan guarantees to build more
nuclear power plants, the president said: “This is only the
beginning.”</b><br>
</i><br>
<br>
[Norman Solomon is president of the Institute for Public Accuracy
and a senior fellow at RootsAction. His books include “War Made
Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.”]<br>
<br>
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