CND Press Roundup Tuesday 6th September

War in Ukraine / NATO

• The Guardian speaks to chair in nuclear material degradation at the University of Sheffield, Professor Claire Corkhill, on the threats posed to the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant and how a nuclear meltdown can be avoided. You can listen to the podcast here.

• The Bulletin speaks to Valeriia Hesse, a Ukrainian non-proliferation and international security expert based in Vienna, Austria, on the UN nuclear watchdog’s recent visit to Zaporizhzhia. On the chances of an accident she notes: “In my view, the two most likely scenarios threatening the safety of ZNPP are projectiles hitting a spent fuel storage or the plant’s cooling systems being damaged. Another scenario is to blow up the machine room at the working power units, which is outside the containment building. However, the plant’s staff has claimed to be prepared for such a scenario.”

• That’s as shelling at Zaporizhzhia continued on Tuesday, despite two inspectors from the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency remaining on site. The body is expected to deliver a report on the situation at the plant to the UN Security Council later today.

Trident / UK Nuclear Testing

• Boris Johnson used his last day as prime minister to announce that Britain’s nuclear test veterans will be remembered – following decades of government cover-up. In an open letter published on Monday, Johnson promised funds for a commemoration to coincide with the 70th anniversary of Britain’s first nuclear weapons test in October. He also reiterated his support that nuclear test veterans be issued with a medal – although this decision is made by a body independent from the government.

• Former Polaris sub commander Robert Forsyth has a letter in The Times, responding to warnings from Tory MP Tobias Ellwood that a nuclear weapon will be used within the next decade. Robert writes: “I fear he may well be right because of the increasing danger of the use of these weapons by Russia. Your report added that “a tactical nuclear weapon can typically destroy a football stadium”. In fact a typical low-yield tactical nuclear weapon (4-5 kilo tonnes) is half that of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945, so its immediate “blast and fire” effect could destroy at least half a city. Hundreds of thousands of people would be killed or otherwise affected by radiation drifting to wide areas round the drop zone. Furthermore, the firing of one tactical nuclear weapon would undoubtedly lead to an exchange by several of these weapons, the cumulative and consequential effects of which would dwarf Hiroshima and lead to an unimaginable human and environmental catastrophe. These weapons present an all-too-real danger to our world.”

• Part one of a two-part profile of Liz Truss features in The Times, focusing on the new PM’s journey from Liberal Democrat to darling of the Tory right. The piece features a reference to the Truss family’s involvement in anti-nuclear campaigning: “Our would-be prime minister was born in Oxford in 1975. Three brothers, Chris, Patrick and Francis, were to follow. John and Priscilla, newly arrived in Scotland in the early 1980s, were politically active and Priscilla became a member of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND). A photograph from the time shows both parents, with Liz and a younger brother, posing proudly beside a homemade banner proclaiming their support for Paisley CND. Truss, a pupil at Paisley’s West Primary School, remembers Ban the Bomb protest marches at the Faslane nuclear submarine base in which the repeated chant was ‘Maggie, Maggie, Maggie, out, out, out’.

UK Nuclear Energy

• Some nice coverage of CND Cyrmu’s youth cohort-led march against small modular reactors.

• Nuclear Free Local Authorities has joined with the Close Capenhurst Campaign and Highlands against Nuclear Transport (HANT) to highlight the issue of safety in nuclear rail transport in the UK. Chair of the NFLA Steering Committee, Councillor David Blackburn, said: “All of our organisations are opposed to civil nuclear power generation, and so nuclear waste, but we are pragmatic; we cannot simply magic ‘nuclear away’. Although the case for renewables rather than nuclear – on the grounds of cost, time, practicality and safety – becomes stronger every day, the present government remains intent on building new nuclear power plants and keeping existing plants online for several years yet, and the decommissioning of closed stations will take many decades to complete. Consequently, there shall continue to be nuclear fuel rods and nuclear waste in transit for many years to come.”

• Tom Burke writes on Johnson’s reannouncement of funding for Sizewell C and how much distance remains before the project gets off the ground. A good point on how bad the nuclear solution would be for taxpayers/customers: “You can currently buy electricity from offshore wind at about thirty-seven pounds per megawatt hour. If we went ahead with Sizewell, in about fifteen years, you would be buying electricity from Sizewell at somewhere around one hundred and twenty pounds per megawatt hour. So, it is completely impossible to see how that is a good deal for consumers. Not only that, but you would be asking consumers first of all to start paying now for building Sizewell C, way before it is generating any electricity. Then when it does start generating electricity, you will be asking people to pay more for that electricity than they would be paying if they were getting it from renewables. So, it is a really bad deal for consumers.”

• That’s as the UK government is likely to fund the early costs of Sizewell C – until more investors can be tempted to take part in the project. Under the Regulated Asset Base (RAB) model introduced to fund Sizewell, the government and EDF will each take a 20 percent stake while a levy placed on consumer bills will give EDF cash up front to build the plant. However, financiers for the remaining 60 percent have yet to be found. The Times is now reporting that the government and EDF will now take a fifty-fifty split to fund the early construction with the stake gradually going to 20 percent as investors are found.

• Politics Home runs an opinion from the head of the Nuclear Industry Association calling on Liz Truss to commit to nuclear power in order to ensure energy security.

Nuclear Energy

• Germany is to temporarily halt the mothballing of its two remaining nuclear plants as part of an emergency measure to ensure energy security measures. Neckarwestheim in Baden Württemberg and Isar 2 in Bavaria were scheduled to be switched off at the end of the year – but will now be kept online until the middle of 2023. Economy minister Robert Habeck said the decision was made after stress test exercises carried out came to the conclusion that “hourly crisis-like situations in the electricity supply system during winter 22/23, while very unlikely, cannot be fully ruled out”.

• Nature writes on the problems facing France’s nuclear plants: “Climate change, for example, is already hampering French nuclear output. An especially hot and dry summer has warmed the country’s rivers and lowered water levels, reducing the ability of its energy companies to use the water to cool nuclear reactors. Some power plants are beginning to show their age and require extensive maintenance for corrosion damage, which could end up taking years. All of this has conspired to force half of France’s nuclear reactors offline for now. This couldn’t have come at a worse time: Europe’s energy prices and supplies are already under immense pressure following the invasion of Ukraine.”

Iran Nuclear Deal

• Iran has offered to flood Europe with cheap natural gas this winter in exchange for support in getting a renewed nuclear deal over the line. “Considering the crisis in Ukraine and problems that Europe has in energy supplies, if the nuclear talks conclude and unilateral and illegal sanctions are lifted, the Islamic Republic of Iran can meet a larger part of Europe’s needs,” Iran’s foreign ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani said on Monday. He added, “Iran wants a deal, but the Europeans need a deal.” However, some energy experts are sceptical over how quickly Iranian gas could get to Europe, and certainyl not this year, citing the fact that Russia’s reserves dwarf that of Iran and that it would take years to construct a pipeline connecting Iran to Europe.

• Abu Dhabi-based paper The National asks if Iran already has nuclear weapons and assesses if a new nuclear deal will get over the line.