[ RadSafe ] Chavez Says Venezuela's Interested in Nuclear Energy

[Sandy Perle]

Index:

Chavez Says Venezuela's Interested in Nuclear Energy
Nuclear Power May Be Making a Comeback
Energy Chief Foresees New Nuclear Power Plant
University System Will Vie to Keep Running Los Alamos
Iran Lawmakers Vote to Force Nuclear Development
Nuclear Arms Conference Collapses Without Deal
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Chavez Says Venezuela's Interested in Nuclear Energy

CARACAS, Venezuela (May 22) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said 
on Sunday his government was interested in nuclear energy and could 
start talks with Iranian partners to study possible atomic and solar 
power projects.
   
Chavez, a fierce critic of the United States and a leftist ally of 
Communist Cuba, said Venezuela and other Latin American countries 
could develop nuclear energy as an alternative power source for 
civilian purposes.

"We are interested too, we must start working on that area... the 
nuclear area. We could, along with Brazil, with Argentina and others, 
start investigations into the nuclear sector and ask for help from 
countries like Iran," Chavez said on his regular Sunday TV program.

"It is for development, for life, for peace and energy," the 
president said during the program broadcast at an event in Caracas 
for Iranian companies.

Venezuela, the world's No. 5 oil exporter, is a key energy supplier 
to the United States, but its relations with Washington have soured 
since Chavez came to office six years ago promising to fight poverty 
with a raft of social reforms.

Chavez has backed Iran, branded by Washington part of an "axis of 
evil," in Tehran's dispute with the United States and Europe over its 
nuclear program. U.S. officials accuse Iran of secretly working to 
produce nuclear arms, but Tehran says its atomic program is only for 
civilian energy uses.  

"I am sure the Iranian government is not making any atomic bomb," 
Chavez said, repeating support he gave during a visit by Iranian 
President Mohammad Khatami to Venezuela in March.

Venezuela is rich in heavy crude oil and natural gas. About 75 
percent of its electric power is generated by state-run hydroelectric 
plants.

A self-proclaimed socialist revolutionary, Chavez says he is offering 
an alternative to U.S. "imperialism" and accuses Washington of trying 
to oust or kill him. Supporters applaud his education and health 
programs to help the poor.

He has strengthened political, energy and economic ties with China, 
India and Russia as an alternative to Venezuela's traditional 
alliance with the United States.
----------------

Nuclear Power May Be Making a Comeback
   
LONDON (May 18) - Nuclear power has surged back onto the agenda as a 
solution for global warming as leaders of the world's richest nations 
try to draw up a blueprint for staving off climate disaster.

Nuclear may be emission-free but environmentalists say the new trend 
is poorly conceived, misguided and at worst dangerous.

"Nuclear power is back on the agenda because the industry is lobbying 
powerfully," said Friends of the Earth energy specialist Roger 
Higman.

"But climate change is global so the solution needs to be global. If 
you want to persuade someone to give up coal generation then you are 
going to have to share with them the benefits of your technology," he 
told Reuters.

A solution is needed urgently, scientists say.

They warn that average temperatures could rise by two degrees 
centigrade or more this century, melting ice caps and bringing 
extreme weather events like droughts and floods.

The solution, they say, is in curbing emissions of so-called 
greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide, much of which is produced by 
burning fossil fuels.

The Kyoto Protocol aims to do that. But it only runs to 2012, is 
derided as being too weak by some and too tough by others and has 
been savaged by the United States - the world's biggest polluter 
which has refused to sign.

Less than two months before the heads of the Group of Eight rich 
industrial nations meet in Gleneagles, Scotland to search for a 
solution to climate change, they are still worlds apart.

"So far all the emphasis has been on mitigation of the causes of 
climate change," said Richard Tarasofsky at Britain's Royal Institute 
for International Affairs think-tank..  

"Adaptation to the effects of it has only really just emerged in a 
serious way and has not yet been tackled.

"This is partly because it exposes how little has actually been done 
on mitigation and also because the implications of the adaptation 
agenda are huge and so to try to foster clear international responses 
will actually be quite difficult."  

As a result, and with investment in renewable energy sources like 
wind languishing, nuclear power is resurgent.

President Bush, whose chief climate change negotiator says the jury 
is still out on the causes of climate change, has said in recent 
weeks nuclear power is safe and clean and would reduce American 
dependence on imported oil.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who heads the G8 this year and has 
put global warming at the top of the agenda for the July summit, said 
last week climate change could not be discussed without looking at 
the nuclear option.  

"There can't be debate on climate change without serious 
consideration of it," he told reporters.

The Chinese, who will also be at Gleneagles in Scotland along with 
the leaders of South Africa, India, Brazil and Mexico, have announced 
plans for a major switch from coal to nuclear power.  

But apart from the problems of nuclear waste that remains deadly for 
thousands of years and the true costs of the decommissioning of old 
reactors, there is the issue of security.

"We seem to have great difficulty with the concept of North Korea and 
Iran having nuclear power and yet the same people who are arguing 
that we have to take firm action against them are equally saying we 
need a resurgence of civil nuclear power," said Stephen Tindale, head 
of pressure group Greenpeace.   

"The idea that you can somehow insulate civil nuclear power from 
nuclear weapons is just fanciful. If you look at the debate in 
Brazil, those who are calling for nuclear power are essentially the 
military who want the toys which go with it," he added. "It just 
doesn't stack up as an argument."

So the Gleneagles discussions on global warming look like being a 
failure, environmentalists say.

"As soon as Bush was re-elected, we switched from seeing Gleneagles 
as an opportunity to seeing it as a threat," Tindale said. "There are 
reasons to be cheerful. But Gleneagles is not one of them." 
------------------  

Energy Chief Foresees New Nuclear Power Plant

WASHINGTON (May 17) - Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said Tuesday the 
first new nuclear power plant in more than two decades could be 
completed by 2014 under administration proposals to reduce 
construction risks and speed licensing.

Bodman said the Energy Department will ask Congress to establish a $3 
billion insurance pool to help investors cover interest, operating, 
maintenance and newly acquired construction costs stemming from 
regulatory delays. Premiums would be waived for utilities that place 
firm orders before 2009 for new power plants.

Each new reactor would be insured for up to $500 million.

Bodman said the administration also plans to ask Congress to make it 
harder to stop a new reactor from operating once it is built. He said 
fewer appeals to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission would give "more 
certainty in the licensing process."

"If all goes well, we could see new plants online by 2014," he told 
the Nuclear Energy Institute, a trade group.

The insurance would apply to the first two plants built from a new 
Westinghouse design, and the first two built from a new General 
Electric design. Companies would be asked to pay an insurance premium 
of about 10 percent of their total coverage, possibly over a period 
of years, Bodman said.

The insurance would cover half the costs of interest, operations and 
maintenance, and "newly acquired construction costs accumulated 
during the second, third and fourth years of a serious regulatory 
delay," Bodman said.

"I believe that this is the appropriate level of assistance that the 
government should provide to encourage new plants," said Bodman, 
while dismissing the need for other incentives.

"Looking for upfront incentives now sends the message that nuclear 
power cannot stand on its own without special government assistance. 
I don't think this is the right message to send to the American 
people, and I don't think it's true," he said.

President Bush said last month that more than 35 nuclear power plants 
in the United States have been stopped "because of bureaucratic 
obstacles." The last application for a new reactor was submitted in 
1973. Nuclear power provides about 20 percent of U.S. electricity 
production.

Bodman said he has no specific criteria for raising the bar for an 
appeal to the NRC, other than requiring "clear evidence that there is 
a failure to comply with that which was undertaken when the 
construction began."

"That's really what the standard, in my judgment, should be," he 
said.

For more than a decade, NRC spokesman Eliot Brenner said, the NRC has 
offered a simpler application process for the building and operating 
phases. He said it already had set "a very high threshold to get to a 
second public hearing" after a new plant is built.
----------------

University System Will Vie to Keep Running Los Alamos
   
SAN FRANCISCO (May 26)--The University of California decided Thursday 
to compete for the government contract to continue running Los 
Alamos, the laboratory that built the atomic bomb.

The university has managed the nuclear weapons lab in the New Mexico 
desert since it was created in 1943 as part of the top-secret 
Manhattan Project. But after a recent string of security lapses and 
financial abuses, the government decided for the first time to put 
the contract up for bid.

The university's regents voted 11-1 to team up with the engineering 
powerhouse Bechtel Corp. and submit a bid. Regents chairman Gerald 
Parsky said the board realizes there have been "management 
deficiencies" at Los Alamos, and that is why the university is 
forming a partnership with the industrial giant.

The University of Texas and Lockheed Martin are also planning a joint 
bid. Another defense contractor, Northrop Grumman, recently indicated 
it would compete for the contract, too, but said Thursday it had 
decided not to.

On Wednesday, two key UC committees recommended the university go 
after the contract, saying the school has a duty to stay on as 
stewards of Los Alamos. Some students, though, urged the university 
to cut ties with the lab, saying UC shouldn't be in the weapons 
business.

The contract will be for seven years, with a possible extension for 
13 more. The government is offering to pay as much $79 million 
annually. That would be nearly 10 times what UC had been making.

Los Alamos has about 8,000 University of California employees and 
3,000 contract workers.
------------------

Iran Lawmakers Vote to Force Nuclear Development
   
TEHRAN, Iran (May 28) - Iran's hard-line Guardian Council on Saturday 
approved a law that puts pressure on the government to develop 
nuclear technology that could be used to build atomic weapons, state 
run radio reported.

Parliament had passed the bill on May 15 and sent it to the Guardian 
Council for approval. The council must vet all bills before they 
become law.

The passing of the law does not force the government to resume 
uranium enrichment immediately but encourages it to pursue nuclear 
goals in spite of international pressure on Tehran over its nuclear 
program.

The law calls on the government to develop a nuclear fuel cycle, 
which would include resuming the process of enriching uranium - a 
prospect that has drawn criticism from the United States and Europe 
because the technology could be used in developing atomic weapons.

Iran suspended enrichment last November under international pressure 
led by the United States. Iran maintains its program is peaceful and 
only aimed at generating electricity.

The legislation was viewed as strengthening the government's hand in 
negotiations with European Union representatives, allowing it to 
demonstrate domestic pressure to pursue its nuclear program as talks 
have deadlocked.

Iran agreed Wednesday to meet with European Union negotiators for a 
new round of talks in the summer.

France, Britain and Germany, acting on behalf of the 25-nation 
European Union, want Tehran to abandon its enrichment activities in 
exchange for economic aid, technical support and backing for Iran's 
efforts to join the World Trade Organization.

The European Union has threatened to take Iran to the U.N. Security 
Council for possible sanctions if it again starts uranium 
reprocessing. Tehran says it won't give up its treaty rights to 
enrichment but is prepared to offer guarantees that its nuclear 
program won't be diverted to build weapons.
-------------------

Nuclear Arms Conference Collapses Without Deal
   
UNITED NATIONS (May 28) - The failure of a global nuclear conference 
leaves it to President Bush and other world leaders to ''think 
outside the box'' at a September summit and find new ways to stem the 
spread of nuclear arms, U.N. officials say.

After a month of sharp debate, the conference ended Friday with a 
whimper: no consensus recommendations for strengthening the Nuclear 
Nonproliferation Treaty, the pact that has helped keep the lid on 
doomsday arms since 1970.

The failure comes at a time of mounting nuclear tensions around the 
world.

North Korea has pulled out of the treaty and says it is building atom 
bombs. Iran's nuclear fuel program raises questions about possible 
weapons plans. Arab states view Israel's nuclear arsenal as 
increasingly provocative. The conference had futilely debated 
proposals to address all these issues.

Many delegates also were disturbed over Bush administration talk of 
modernizing the U.S. nuclear force, and sought U.S. reaffirmation of 
commitments made to disarmament steps at the nonproliferation 
conferences of 1995 and 2000.

As the meeting drew toward a close, however, the U.S.-led Western 
group of nations blocked any mention of those past commitments in the 
conference's thin final report.

Delegates said they feared that the outcome - the most complete 
failure at such nonproliferation conferences in 35 years - might 
undermine faith in the treaty, a cornerstone of global arms control.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan agreed, believing the ''inability 
to strengthen their collective efforts is bound to weaken the 
treaty,'' his spokesman said. Annan said world leaders should deal 
with the issues at a global summit scheduled here for September.

Mohamed ElBaradei, the U.N. nuclear agency chief, called the summit 
''a golden opportunity.''

''These are fundamental issues that ought to be addressed at the 
highest policy level because they need an unconventional way of 
thinking, thinking outside the box,'' he said in an interview from 
his International Atomic Energy Agency headquarters in Vienna.

One question needing ''urgent attention'' involves the nuclear fuel 
cycle, he said. Iran's uranium-enrichment technology can produce both 
fuel for peaceful nuclear energy and material for bombs - and 
Washington contends weapons are what Tehran has in mind.

ElBaradei has proposed a five-year moratorium on establishment of any 
new fuel-cycle facilities worldwide while plans are developed for 
better controls, possibly even international control of nuclear fuel 
production. It's a politically explosive matter, however, since it 
involves commercial and government nuclear programs of sovereign 
states.

The failed conference was the latest of the twice-a-decade gatherings 
of the members of the 188-nation nonproliferation treaty, called to 
assess the treaty's workings and find ways to improve them.

Under the nuclear pact, states without atomic arms pledged not to 
develop them, and five with the weapons - the United States, Russia, 
Britain, France and China - undertook to eventually eliminate their 
arsenals. The nonweapons states, meanwhile, were guaranteed access to 
peaceful nuclear technology.

Delegations here had proposed ideas, for example, for limiting access 
to dual-use technology with bombmaking potential, along with 
proposals to strengthen inspection of nuclear facilities and to 
pressure nuclear-armed states to shrink their arsenals more quickly.

On treaty withdrawal, which North Korea managed without consequence 
under the nonproliferation pact, some delegations supported plans to 
make the process more difficult and penalty-laden.

But the dozens of proposals were stalled for more than two weeks 
while delegations squabbled over the agenda. Then, when debate 
finally started, it proved impossible to win consensus in committees.

Iran objected to any mention of it as a proliferation concern. Egypt 
balked at toughening treaty withdrawal, since it wants that option 
open as long as ex-enemy Israel has nuclear bombs. And the United 
States fought every reference to its 1995 and 2000 commitments.

Those commitments included, for example, activating the nuclear test-
ban treaty and negotiating a verifiable treaty to ban production of 
bomb materials - both steps the Bush administration opposes, but 
other weapons states support.

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Sandy Perle 
Senior Vice President, Technical Operations 
Global Dosimetry Solutions, Inc. 
2652 McGaw Avenue
Irvine, CA 92614

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