Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, October 31, 2024
Posted: 31st October 2024
The Three Mile Island Unit 1 (right) in Pennsylvania is one of the first two shutdown US reactors, with Palisades Nuclear Power Plant in Michigan, to be on path of being restarted to generate electricity again. The dormant cooling towers (left) are from Unit 2, which was permanently damaged in the 1979 accident. (Constellation Energy, CC BY-SA 4.0)
KATHRYN HUFF, NATHAN RYAN
What it will take to restart decommissioned US nuclear plants. A primer
Nuclear plant restarts at Palisades and Three Mile Island Unit 1 are a test case for the future of the US nuclear industry, argues a former assistant secretary for nuclear energy. “The decision is not just unusual for the nation’s nuclear energy sector, it is unprecedented.” Read more.
ALI NOURI
On November 5, AI is also on the ballot
The 2024 election will decide if America leads or retreats from its crucial role in ensuring AI develops in alignment with democratic values. Read more.
ERIK ENGLISH
Egypt is finally free of an “ancient scourge”: malaria
In its certification that Egypt is malaria-free, the WHO said of Egypt: “the disease that plagued pharaohs now belongs to its history and not its future.” Malaria kills over 500,000 people globally every year. Read more.
CHARLIE MATHER, GERALD SINGH
When maximizing food production manufactures disaster risk
The industrialization of food production and animal agriculture has introduced risks that make large-scale disasters more likely, with serious consequences for workers, local communities, and the environment. Read more.
DAWN STOVER
Interview: Lawrence Norden on US election security
A deep dive into the nuts-and-bolts of election security, resiliency, ballots, and ballot-counting, and why it would be so hard to produce a false result. Norden is the senior director of the Elections & Government Program at the Brennan Center for Justice. Read more.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
“With every fraction of a degree of fossil fuel warming, the atmosphere can hold more moisture, leading to heavier bursts of rainfall. These deadly floods are yet another reminder of how dangerous climate change has already become at just 1.3C of warming. But last week the UN warned that we are on track to experience up to 3.1C of warming by the end of the century.”
— Friederike Otto, leader of world weather attribution at the Centre for Environmental Policy, Imperial College London, ”’We were trapped like rats’: Spain’s floods bring devastation and despair,” Guardian
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